The 

American Film Institute defines Western films as those "set in the American West that
[embody] the spirit, the struggle, and the demise of the new frontier".[9] The term "Western", used
to describe a narrative film genre, appears to have originated with a July 1912 article in Motion
Picture World magazine.[10] Most of the characteristics of Western films were part of 19th-century
popular Western fiction, and were firmly in place before film became a popular art form.
[11]
 Western films commonly feature protagonists such as cowboys, gunslingers, and bounty
hunters, who are often depicted as seminomadic wanderers who wear Stetson hats, bandannas,
spurs, and buckskins, use revolvers or rifles as everyday tools of survival and as a means to
settle disputes using "frontier justice". Protagonists ride between dusty towns and cattle ranches
on their trusty steeds.[citation needed]

Gary Cooper in Vera Cruz

The first films that belong to the Western genre are a series of short single reel silents made in
1894 by Edison Studios at their Black Maria studio in West Orange, New Jersey. These featured
veterans of Buffalo Bill's Wild West show exhibiting skills acquired by living in the Old West – they
included Annie Oakley (shooting) and members of the Sioux (dancing).[12]
The earliest known Western narrative film is the British short Kidnapping by Indians, made
by Mitchell and Kenyon in Blackburn, England, in 1899.[13][14] The Great Train Robbery (1903,
based on the earlier British film A Daring Daylight Burglary), Edwin S. Porter's film
starring Broncho Billy Anderson, is often erroneously cited as the first Western, though George N.
Fenin and William K. Everson point out (as mentioned above) that the "Edison company had
played with Western material for several years prior to The Great Train Robbery". Nonetheless,
they concur that Porter's film "set the pattern—of crime, pursuit, and retribution—for the Western
film as a genre".[15] The film's popularity opened the door for Anderson to become the screen's first
Western star; he made several hundred Western film shorts. So popular was the genre that he
soon faced competition from Tom Mix and William S. Hart.[16]
Western films were enormously popular in the silent-film era (1894–1927). With the advent of
sound in 1927–28, the major Hollywood studios rapidly abandoned Westerns,[17] leaving the genre
to smaller studios and producers. These smaller organizations churned out countless low-budget
features and serials in the 1930s. By the late 1930s, the Western film was widely regarded as a
"pulp" genre in Hollywood, but its popularity was dramatically revived in 1939 by major studio
productions such as Dodge City starring Errol Flynn, Jesse James with Tyrone Power, Union
Pacific with Joel McCrea, Destry Rides Again featuring James Stewart and Marlene Dietrich, and
especially John Ford's landmark Western adventure Stagecoach starring John Wayne, which
became one of the biggest hits of the year. Released through United Artists, Stagecoach made
John Wayne a mainstream screen star in the wake of a decade of headlining B Westerns. Wayne
had been introduced to the screen 10 years earlier as the leading man in director Raoul Walsh's
spectacular widescreen The Big Trail, which failed at the box office in spite of being shot on
location across the American West, including the Grand Canyon, Yosemite, and the
giant redwoods, due in part to exhibitors' inability to switch over to widescreen during the Great
Depression. After the Westerns' renewed commercial successes in the late 1930s, their
popularity continued to rise until its peak in the 1950s, when the number of Western films
produced outnumbered all other genres combined.[18]
The period from 1940 to 1960 has been called the "Golden Age of the Western".[19] It is epitomized
by the work of several prominent directors including Robert Aldrich, Budd Boetticher, Delmer
Daves, John Ford, and others. Some of the popular films during this era
include Apache (1954), Broken Arrow (1950), and My Darling Clementine (1946).[citation needed]
The changing popularity of the Western genre has influenced worldwide pop culture over time.[20]
[21]
 During the 1960s and 1970s, Spaghetti Westerns from Italy became popular worldwide; this
was due to the success of Sergio Leone's storytelling method.[22][23] At the turn of the 21st century,
Westerns again increased in popularity.[24][25]

Television[edit]
Main article: Westerns on television

James Garner and Jack Kelly in Maverick (1957)

When television became popular in the late 1940s and 1950s, Television Westerns quickly
became an audience favorite.[26] Beginning with rebroadcasts of existing films, a number of movie
cowboys had their own TV shows. As demand for the Western increased, new stories and stars
were introduced. A number of long-running TV Westerns became classics in their own right, such
as: The Lone Ranger (1949–1957), Death Valley Days (1952–1970), The Life and Legend of
Wyatt Earp (1955–1961), Cheyenne (1955–1962), Gunsmoke (1955–1975), Maverick (1957–
1962), Have Gun – Will Travel (1957–1963), Wagon Train (1957–1965), The Rifleman (1958–
1963), Rawhide (1959–1966), Bonanza (1959–1973), The Virginian (1962–1971), and The Big
Valley (1965–1969). The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp was the first Western television series
written for adults,[27] premiering four days before Gunsmoke on September 6, 1955.[28]: 570, 786 [29]: 351, 927 
The peak year for television Westerns was 1959, with 26 such shows airing during primetime. At
least six of them were connected in some extent to Wyatt Earp: The Life and Legend of Wyatt
Earp, Bat Masterson, Tombstone Territory, Broken Arrow, Johnny Ringo, and Gunsmoke.
[30]
 Increasing costs of American television production weeded out most action half-hour series in
the early 1960s, and their replacement by hour-long television shows, increasingly in color.
[31]
 Traditional Westerns died out in the late 1960s as a result of network changes in demographic
targeting along with pressure from parental television groups. Future entries in the genre would
incorporate elements from other genera, such as crime drama and mystery whodunit elements.
Western shows from the 1970s included Hec Ramsey, Kung Fu, Little House on the
Prairie, McCloud, The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams, and the short-lived but highly
acclaimed How the West Was Won that originated from a miniseries with the same name. In the
1990s and 2000s, hour-long Westerns and slickly packaged made-for-TV movie Westerns were
introduced, such as Lonesome Dove (1989) and Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. Also, new
elements were once again added to the Western formula, such as science-fiction Western Firefly,
created by Joss Whedon in 2002. Deadwood was a critically acclaimed Western series that aired
on HBO from 2004 through 2006. Hell on Wheels, a fictionalized story of the construction of
the first transcontinental railroad, aired on AMC for five seasons between 2011 and
2016. Longmire is a Western series that centered on Walt Longmire, a sheriff in fictional
Absaroka County, Wyoming. Originally aired on the A&E network from 2012 to 2014, it was
picked up by Netflix in 2015 until the show's conclusion in 2017.
AMC and Vince Gilligan’s critically-acclaimed Breaking Bad is a much more modern take on the
western genre. Set in New Mexico from 2008 through 2013, it follows Walter White (Bryan
Cranston), a chemistry teacher diagnosed with Stage III Lung Cancer who cooks and sells
crystal meth to provide money for his family after he dies, while slowly growing further and further
into the illicit drug market, eventually turning into a ruthless drug dealer and killer. While the show
has scenes in a populated suburban neighborhood and nearby Albuquerque, much of the show
takes place in the desert, where Walter often takes his RV car out into the open desert to cook his
meth, and most action sequences occur in the desert, similar to old-fashioned western movies.
The clash between the Wild West and modern technology like cars and cellphones, while also
focusing primarily on being a Crime drama makes the show a unique spin on both genres.
Walter’s reliance on the desert environment makes the western-feel a pivotal role in the show,
and would continue to be used in the spinoff series Better Call Saul.[32]

Literature[edit]
Main article: Western fiction
Western fiction is a genre of literature set in the American Old West, most commonly between
1860 and 1900. The first critically recognized Western was The Virginian (1902) by Owen
Wister."Classic Wild West Literature". Other well-known writers of Western fiction include Zane
Grey, from the early 1900s, Ernest Haycox, Luke Short, and Louis L'Amour, from the mid 20th
century. Many writers better known in other genres, such as Leigh Brackett, Elmore Leonard,
and Larry McMurtry, have also written Western novels. The genre's popularity peaked in the
1960s, due in part to the shuttering of many pulp magazines, the popularity of televised
Westerns, and the rise of the spy novel. Readership began to drop off in the mid- to late 1970s
and reached a new low in the 2000s. Most bookstores, outside of a few Western states, now only
carry a small number of Western novels and short-story collections.[33]
Literary forms that share similar themes include stories of the American frontier,
the gaucho literature of Argentina, and tales of the settlement of the Australian Outback.

"As Wild felled one of the redskins by a blow from the butt of his revolver, and sprang for the one with
the tomahawk, the chief's daughter suddenly appeared. Raising her hands, she exclaimed, 'Go back,
Young Wild West. I will save her!'" (1908)

Visual arts[edit]
Main article: Western American Art
A number of visual artists focused their work on representations of the American Old West.
American West-oriented art is sometimes referred to as "Western Art" by Americans. This
relatively new category of art includes paintings, sculptures, and sometimes Native American
crafts. Initially, subjects included exploration of the Western states and cowboy themes. Frederic
Remington and Charles M. Russell are two artists who captured the "Wild West" in paintings and
sculpture.[34] After the death of Remington Richard Lorenz became the preeminent artist painting
in the western genre.[35]
Some art museums, such as the Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Wyoming and the Autry
National Center in Los Angeles, feature American Western Art.[36]

Anime and manga[edit]

With anime and manga, the genre tends towards the science-fiction Western – e.g., Cowboy
Bebop (1998 anime), Trigun (1995–2007 manga), and Outlaw Star (1996–1999 manga).
Although contemporary Westerns also appear, such as Koya no Shonen Isamu, a
1971 shonen manga about a boy with a Japanese father and a Native American mother, or El
Cazador de la Bruja, a 2007 anime television series set in modern-day Mexico. Part 7 of the
manga series JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is based in the American Western setting. The story
follows racers in a transcontinental horse race, the "Steel Ball Run". Golden Kamuy (2014–2022)
shifts its setting to the fallout of the Russo-Japanese War, specifically focusing
on Hokkaido and Sakhalin, and featuring the Ainu people and other local tribes instead of Native
Americans, as well other recognizable western tropes.

Comics[edit]
Western comics have included serious entries, (such as the classic comics of the late 1940s and
early 1950s (namely Kid Colt, Outlaw, Rawhide Kid, and Red Ryder) or more modern ones
as Blueberry), cartoons, and parodies (such as Cocco Bill and Lucky Luke). In the 1990s and
2000s, Western comics leaned towards the fantasy, horror and science fiction genres, usually
involving supernatural monsters, or Christian iconography as in Preacher. More traditional
Western comics are found throughout this period, though (e.g., Jonah Hex and Loveless).

Games[edit]
Western arcade games, computer games, role-playing games, and video games are often either
straightforward Westerns or Western-horror hybrids. Some Western-themed computer games
include The Oregon Trail (1971), Mad Dog McCree (1990), Sunset
Riders (1991), Outlaws (1997), Desperados series (2001–), Red Dead series
(2004–), Gun (2005), and Call of Juarez series (2007–). Other video games adapt the "weird
West" concept – e.g., Fallout (1997), Gunman Chronicles (2000), Darkwatch (2005),
the Borderlands series (2009–), Fallout: New Vegas (2010), and Hard West (2015).

Radio dramas[edit]
Western radio dramas were very popular from the 1930s to the 1960s. Some popular shows
include The Lone Ranger (first broadcast in 1933), The Cisco Kid (first broadcast in 1942), Dr.
Sixgun (first broadcast in 1954), Have Gun–Will Travel (first broadcast in 1958),
and Gunsmoke (first broadcast in 1952).[37]

Web series[edit]
Westerns have been showcased in short-episodic web series. Examples include League of
STEAM, Red Bird, and Arkansas Traveler.

Subgenres[edit]
Main article: List of Western subgenres
Within the larger scope of the Western genre, there are several recognized subgenres. Some
subgenres, such as spaghetti Westerns, maintain standard Western settings and plots, while
others take the Western theme and archetypes into different supergenres, such as Neo-Westerns
or Space Westerns. For a time, Westerns made in countries other than the United States were
often labeled by foods associated with the culture, such as spaghetti Westerns (Italy), meat pie
Westerns (Australia), ramen Westerns (Asia), and masala Westerns (India).[38]

Influence on other genres[edit]

Being period drama pieces, both the Western and samurai genre influenced each other in style
and themes throughout the years.[39] The Magnificent Seven was a remake of Akira Kurosawa's
film Seven Samurai, and A Fistful of Dollars was a remake of Kurosawa's Yojimbo, which itself
was inspired by Red Harvest, an American detective novel by Dashiell Hammett.[40] Kurosawa was
influenced by American Westerns and was a fan of the genre, most especially John Ford.[41][42]
Despite the Cold War, the Western was a strong influence on Eastern Bloc cinema, which had its
own take on the genre, the so-called "Red Western" or "Ostern". Generally these took two forms:
either straight Westerns shot in the Eastern Bloc, or action films involving the Russian
Revolution and civil war and the Basmachi rebellion.[citation needed]
Many elements of space-travel series and films borrow extensively from the conventions of the
Western genre. This is particularly the case in the space Western subgenre of science
fiction. Peter Hyams' Outland transferred the plot of High Noon to Io, moon of Jupiter. More
recently, the space opera series Firefly used an explicitly Western theme for its portrayal of
frontier worlds. Anime shows such as Cowboy Bebop, Trigun and Outlaw Star have been similar
mixes of science-fiction and Western elements. The science fiction Western can be seen as a
subgenre of either Westerns or science fiction. Elements of Western films can be found also in
some films belonging essentially to other genres. For example, Kelly's Heroes is a war film, but its
action and characters are Western-like.

John Wayne (1948)

The character played by Humphrey Bogart in noir films such as Casablanca and To Have and

Have Not—an individual bound only by his own private code of honor—has a lot in common with
the classic Western hero. In turn, the Western has also explored noir elements, as with the
films Pursued and Sugar Creek.[citation needed]
In many of Robert A. Heinlein's books, the settlement of other planets is depicted in ways
explicitly modeled on American settlement of the West. For example, in his Tunnel in the Sky,
settlers set out to the planet "New Canaan", via an interstellar teleporter portal across the galaxy,
in Conestoga wagons, their captain sporting mustaches and a little goatee and riding
a Palomino horse—with Heinlein explaining that the colonists would need to survive on their own
for some years, so horses are more practical than machines.[citation needed]
Stephen King's The Dark Tower is a series of seven books that meshes themes of
Westerns, high fantasy, science fiction, and horror. The protagonist Roland Deschain is a
gunslinger whose image and personality are largely inspired by the Man with No Name from
Sergio Leone's films. In addition, the superhero fantasy genre has been described as having
been derived from the cowboy hero, only powered up to omnipotence in a primarily urban setting.
The Western genre has been parodied on a number of occasions, famous examples
being Support Your Local Sheriff!, Cat Ballou, Mel Brooks's Blazing Saddles, and Rustler's
Rhapsody.[citation needed]
George Lucas's Star Wars films use many elements of a Western, and Lucas has said he
intended for Star Wars to revitalize cinematic mythology, a part the Western once held. The Jedi,
who take their name from Jidaigeki, are modeled after samurai, showing the influence of
Kurosawa. The character Han Solo dressed like an archetypal gunslinger, and the Mos
Eisley cantina is much like an Old West saloon.[43]
Meanwhile, films such as The Big Lebowski, which plucked actor Sam Elliott out of the Old West
and into a Los Angeles bowling alley, and Midnight Cowboy, about a Southern-boy-turned-gigolo
in New York (who disappoints a client when he does not measure up to Gary Cooper),
transplanted Western themes into modern settings for both purposes of parody and homage.[44]

See also