Copyright Screen Rant
For decades, the Golden Age of Western TV shows followed a relatively formulaic group of tropes, with shows set in similar settings. Even the best Westerns of all time have generally been set in small frontier towns and ranches, despite having very different tones and plots. However, the Western revival has shaken up the genre with a major change. One of the biggest changes modern Westerns have introduced is a much wider range of settings. While there are still typical characters, themes, and locations, these are often treated differently, with a blend of genres or a new feature that makes the setting stand out. The neo-Westerns that define the genre often take place in an unconventional place, but some do it better than others. Iron River Ranch The Ranch Being set on a ranch is hardly unusual for a Western TV show, but The Ranch treats the subject very differently. Most TV Westerns feature sweeping rugged scenery, presenting the ranch as a place of both danger and romance, while The Ranch is a cozy sitcom with a laugh track. This drastically changes the show, which is one of Netflix's best Western shows. The show stars iconic Western actor Sam Elliott as Beau, who owns a struggling Colorado ranch and enlists his son Colt's (Ashton Kutcher) help to run it. The Ranch takes a typical Western TV show trope and treats it in a new way, making Iron River Ranch a great setting for the series, despite seeming like nothing out of the ordinary at first. Yellowstone Dutton Ranch Yellowstone While many Western TV shows feature a ranch that is often treated as an extra character, Yellowstone stands out for being a perfect example of a show using its setting well. Yellowstone is one of the best modern TV Westerns of all time, and it started Taylor Sheridan's Western career, earning an 83% positive Rotten Tomatoes score from critics. Yellowstone is set in Montana, and filming shifted entirely to Montana in season 5 to make even better use of the landscape. The scenery and mountainous terrain are not just an excellent backdrop for the story, but an integral part of the show, as the Dutton family dumps the bodies of their enemies into a canyon they call "the train station." The Solar System Cowboy Bebop The sci-fi and Western genres don't immediately appear to be an easy pairing, with Westerns so firmly rooted in the American frontier. However, Cowboy Bebop takes the drama and typical character tropes of classic Westerns and applies them to space. Cowboy Bebop might not have been a hit with critics, but audiences gave it a 60% positive Rotten Tomatoes score, praising the space Western spectacle. Cowboy Bebop makes the solar system its answer to the frontier, and just like in Westerns, the crew are often guns for hire, with conflicting moral codes. Virtually every typical classic Western trope has an equivalent in Cowboy Bebop, and this merges the two genres more seamlessly and ambitiously than other Westerns that incorporate sci-fi elements and visuals. The Frontier American Primeval Neo-Westerns have revolutionized the Western genre by setting modern Western stories in new locations. However, many recent Westerns are still historical dramas, offering a new perspective on a setting that has been well-covered previously. American Primeval follows Sara Rowell as she crosses the frontier, but rather than romanticizing the setting, the show highlights its violence. The series does not shy away from gore, and many of American Primeval's most brutal moments are hard to watch. Western TV shows from the Golden Age of Westerns often idealized the frontier, and had a simple good-versus-evil storyline, with lawmen and outlaws having gunfights in the street. However, American Primeval's moral complexity fits the setting well. Sara and her son's epic journey across the frontier lasts about two weeks, and they encounter several unforgiving climates and adversaries, including the Mountain Meadows Massacre and driving snow. As most of the characters in American Primeval are morally grey, the setting reflects this, being harsh rather than welcoming, and threatening rather than reassuringly predictable. The Transcontinental Railroad Construction Hell on Wheels As so many Western TV shows emphasize the idea of one person for themselves through characters like The Lone Ranger, Hell on Wheels stands out, featuring the character trope while presenting the opposite ideal. The show is about the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad, with most of the characters having a common goal, which is to complete the immense project. Hell on Wheels is one of the best Western TV shows of the last decade, and this is partly due to its innovative location. In Hell on Wheels, much of the show focuses on the constantly moving settlement built to keep pace with the railroad's construction. As the characters' stories progress, this aspect of the Wild West is explored in every episode. Wild West Amusement Park Westworld Westworld might have lost its way in later seasons, but its pilot episode and first season are masterpieces both for science fiction and for the Western genre. Westworld mostly takes place in a Wild West-themed amusement park populated by robots known as "hosts." The setting is seemingly as lawless as the West is presented in classic Westerns, but there's a twist. While the hosts are not supposed to know that they are anything other than human, as some start to discover the truth, an uprising begins. The ensuing gunfights and battles between outlaws and lawmaker characters play on a well-used Western TV show trope, but the sci-fi element creates an entirely new world that still makes use of the Western aesthetic. La Belle Godless The Western genre has traditionally been very male-dominated, and Godless introduced a new dynamic. The underrated Western miniseries has an 85% positive audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and while it is set in a typical Western location, its population brings a new perspective to the genre. Godless is set in the fictional town of La Belle after an accident. After a mining tragedy killed most of the male inhabitants of New Mexico's La Belle, the women of the town have rebuilt it and are now running things themselves. This is already an exciting and unusual setting for a Western TV show, but Godless takes the idea a step further. What could have been a ghost town is a thriving matriarchy. Godless contains all the expected elements of a classic Western, including brutal gunfights, a gritty tone, and a battle over what is morally right, yet it reimagines them. These popular tropes are given a new perspective through the setting and the eyes of the women who have already known tragedy and abuse, but now must fight for their land. Gando Song Of The Bandits The South Korean Song of the Bandits is one of the most visually striking recent Westerns, set in the lawless Gando region, where people are uniting to protect their homeland. While countries like Australia have also created Westerns, Song of the Bandits has a cinematic style that evokes the best martial arts movies, while embracing classic Western plotlines like land disputes.
