Shows Like Netflix's American Primeval

The price of the American Dream's westward expansion in the 1800s was paid in blood, sweat, and tears. That much is clear in Netflix's limited series American Primeval, a six-episode excursion through the Utah War of 1857, when Mormons violently brawled with the United States military, leaving indigenous communities and innocent bystanders caught in the middle.

The series, from Friday Night Lights director Peter Berg, is a gritty, visceral restaging of the lawless land that was the Wild West, a place where America's hopes for the future clashed with its hunger for unyielding power. Lives were lost, communities were wiped off the plains their ancestors had settled, and the darkest side of America was laid bare. The unflinching nature of the West is why Westerns remain a venerable genre of TV, and not the ones your father and grandfather cued up in the age of Gunsmoke, Have Gun Will Travel, and Wanted Dead or Alive.

In recent years, modern-day takes on the genre like Yellowstone and Outer Range have given way to a resurgence of tales in the West. So as you process the American-as-apple-pie tragedy and triumphs of American Primeval, here are a few other series that ponder if the West was ever really won.

In a machismo genre defined by men working out their issues with guns and whiskey, Netflix's limited series Godless wonders what would happen if all the men in a dusty midwestern town died and left the women to survive and thrive. Led by gun-toting heroines played by Michelle Dockery and Merritt Wever, this series follows the townswomen as they harbor a fugitive (Jack O'Connell) and trade bullets with the cruel man hunting him down (Jeff Daniels). Much like American Primeval, this is an unforgiving and unflattering look at a time when life existed on a razor's edge. In this no man's land, women rule and, for obvious reasons, that's a threat to the fragile masculinity on which this country was built.

Streaming now on Netflix

For Taylor Sheridan's first spinoff of his hit Yellowstone, he went all the way back to when the Dutton family first christened their Montana land with their own traumas in 1883. The miniseries was led by real-life husband-and-wife duo Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, who depart their Tennessee home as part of a wagon train for Texas and eventually find themselves at the mercy of the many hurdles — human and otherwise — that await them on their journey to find a new home. The series showed the country music superstars in a harsh new light. But it was achingly heartfelt in its story of a family holding itself together through thick and thin, and proved to be a striking spotlight for newcomer Isabel May, as headstrong daughter Elsa, and Hollywood stalwart Sam Elliott, as their grizzled and sullen guide to the promised land.

Streaming now on Paramount+

While it takes place a good six decades after American Primeval, Taylor Sheridan's second Yellowstone prequel 1923 is all about holding onto the way of life their ancestors in 1883 were trying to forge. In the series, Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren play the elder Duttons, fighting with stern looks and plenty of guns to retain their Montana ranch on their terms in the face of technological advancements (running water, automobiles!) and lecherous businessmen looking to steal their land for profit. Set partially in Africa and on the ocean as the Duttons' eldest nephew Spencer (Brandon Sklenar) tries against all odds to get back to his family's ranch, the series is a great companion to American Primeval simply because it shows what people in the 1800s West were able to build and why their descendants didn't give it up without a fight.

Streaming now on Paramount+

If you watched American Primeval, which opens with glimpses of railroad workers, and wondered what was happening with that industry in the mid-1800s, then we have the perfect next watch for you. AMC's surprisingly enduring Hell on Wheels literally follows the migrating construction of the Union Pacific Railroad, the first transcontinental railroad in America, as it moves west across the Great Plains. The encampment that followed the steam-engined progress, known ever-so affectionately as "Hell on Wheels," sets the scene for the series with its assortment of laborers, henchmen, sex workers, and thugs all looking to get a piece of the profit and history. Like most of these Westerns, it's not a cheery watch, but it is a compelling one that ran five seasons.

Streaming now on AMC+, Hulu, and Paramount+

A classic to this day, HBO's snapshot of the West's most infamous town and the brave souls who lived in it set the tone for what could be done with Westerns in the 21st century. Gone were the days of sanded-down violence, respectfully clad sex workers, and the battle between good and evil that could be easily wrapped up in under an hour. In Deadwood, anything goes and nothing is held back. From Ian McShane's saloon-owning Al Swearengen to Timothy Olyphant's beaten-down sheriff, there was no sense of good and evil in a place without a soul. There are only survivors and those who became the latest victims of the West. Don't forget to finish up your binge with 2021's feature-film continuation, Deadwood: The Movie.

Streaming now on Max

Most of the stories told about the West regale audiences with the defiant sagas of lawbreakers pushing back against a corrupt system of capitalism, prejudice, and self-interest. But some of the people who made a name for themselves in the West were the ones attempting to establish some sense of law and order from nothing. Enter Bass Reeves, who became the first African American Deputy U.S. Marshal west of the Mississippi River. Played by David Oyelowo, Reeves was a legendary figure in the latter half of the 1800s who had a sterling record of arresting thousands of criminals without ever taking a bullet himself. Also starring Dennis Quaid and Donald Sutherland, Lawman: Bass Reeves offers a different perspective — in more ways than one — on taming the West.

Streaming now on Paramount+

If you didn't know that Emily Blunt led one of the most underrated Westerns in recent years, don't worry. You aren't alone. In this 2022 Prime Video series, the Oscar nominee stars as Lady Cornelia Locke, an Englishwoman who arrives in the West in 1890 seeking revenge on the man who killed her son. In her travels, she meets Eli Whipp (Chaske Spencer), a member of the Pawnee Nation and an ex-military cavalry scout seeking to claim the land promised for his service in the U.S. Army. Unsurprisingly, both quickly realize that all the talk about the prosperous future afforded to all those who sacrificed for America was a lie. The series is very much a mood piece, sitting in the grim reality that the American Dream was only reserved for those with deep pockets, white skin, and an extra chromosome.

Streaming now on Prime Video

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