7 Western Shows That Are Better Than 'Yellowstone'

Image via Paramount Network Published Nov 8, 2026, 7:21 PM EST Kareem is a veteran editor and writer with over 15 years of experience covering all forms of entertainment, from music to movies. He serves as a High Trending List Writer for Collider, covering all things TV. His work has been seen in numerous online publications such as FanSided, AXS, Examiner, Narcity, HuffPost, and ScreenRant. He first began his professional writing career in 2011 writing political columns for HubPages, gradualaly building his portfolio until he was rewarded with his first paid writing position with News Headquarters in 2013. Since then, Kareem has covered everything imaginable, from writing political news columns for Examiner, reviewing the latest albums for AXS.com, and giving a unique take on sports, food, and the entertainment industry for Fansided.com. He had another online stop at Narcity, covering travel and things to do in his native Florida, before finally bringing his uniquely immense writing talent and voice to Valnet in 2020, first as a List Writer for ScreenRant before taking his talents to Collider in 2021. During his time at Collider, Kareem has showcased his talented writing style on a number of beats, trailer previews (DOTA: Dragon's Blood) to season premiers (Abbott Elementary), to Lists ranking everything from 80s Sitcoms (which holds a special place in his heart), to classic Disney Channel shows. When he's not working, you can catch him bing-watching classic horror movies (he's a huge fan of Friday the 13th), hitting bike trails, and playing UNO (and losing) during game nights with friends. He calls Orlando, FL home. Sign in to your Collider account In June 2018, a neo-Western premiered on the Paramount Network that would revitalize the genre. That show was called Yellowstone, created by Taylor Sheridan and John Linson, snagging the iconic Kevin Costner to lead a talented, stellar cast. The series takes place in Montana and follows John Dutton (Costner) as he and his family, the overly ambitious Jamie (Wes Bentley) and the smart, loose cannon Beth (Kelly Reilly) try to defend their ranch from those trying to poach it away from them — from the Indian reservation that wants to transform the Yellowstone-Dutton Ranch back to its pristine, original form, to a global conglomerate that wants to transform the land into a modern paradise for tourists. While trying to fight off those who want their land, the Duttons have to contend with their own family issues. We didn't know it at the time, but what we turned into on June 20, 2018, was a show that would bend the rules of the traditional Western. Yellowstone wasn't your typical, family-friendly Western show. This series was gritty, violent, and filled to the brim with drama and treachery at every turn. Yellowstone is, by far, one of the best neo-Westerns of all-time, one that you can binge-watch over-and-over without ever getting bored with it. While the show has etched its name in pop culture history, there are Western shows out there that, for all intents and purposes, are just as good, or better, than Yellowstone. So, if you're on your 50th viewing, and are now trying to search out for something better, here are the Westerns that are definitely better than Yellowstone. 'Bonanza' (1959–1973) Image via NBC In the 1950s, Western shows were just gaining popularity, and one show that many viewers tuned into week-after-week was Bonanza. The NBC show, which premiered in 1959, is one of the longest-running Western shows of all time, and watching just one episode of this legendary series, you'll quickly see why it had so much staying power. Set in the 1860s, Bonanza follows the Cartwright family, a wealthy clan who lives in Virginia City, Nevada during the Gold Rush era. That little gold nugget of information is important, because the show is basically centered on mining, especially silver ore, which was under the town of Virginia City and was discovered in 1859. Bonanza has all the Western tropes that one would love, and its opening theme is iconic in TV history. Notable for being one of TV Guide's 50 Greatest Shows of All Time, Bonanza is certainly one of the best Westerns ever. 'The Lone Ranger' (1949–1957) Image via ABC When you think about how the Western genre on television came to be, you have to trace its roots back to The Lone Ranger, which brought popularity to Western TV shows and was ABC's first bonafide ratings hit. Starting out as a popular radio series, The Lone Ranger made the jump to television in 1949, and saying it was an instant hit is a drastic understatement. The Lone Ranger follows a group of Texas Rangers who get ambushed, and all are nearly killed, except one, who is known as "The Lone Ranger" (John Hart for 52 episodes, Clayton Moore for 169 episodes), and teams up with Tonto (Jay Silverheels), a Native American who saved and nursed The Lone Ranger back to health. Much like Bonanza, The Lone Ranger helped popularize Westerns on TV, which was just coming into the mainstream. The episodes are exciting, and the characters are iconic. Unlike Yellowstone, The Lone Ranger is more friendly for families, which makes it a better watch for TV viewers who want to introduce Westerns to the little ones. 'Justified' (2010–2015) Image via FX Before Yellowstone became the vanguard of the neo-Western, you could make an argument that FX's Justified was the show that popularized the sub-genre. Based on the novel Fire in the Hole by Elmore Leonard, Justified is a unique throwback to the Westerns of old, but with a more modern twist that contemporary Western fans would come to expect, especially after watching Yellowstone. The series follows Raylan Givens (Timothy Olyphant), a Deputy U.S. Marshal who does his work the way Marshals did in the 1800s. This way of investigating makes him a frequent target for criminals, especially Boyd Crowder (Walton Goggins), a career criminal known for robbing banks. Just by reading that, you get the sense of what Justified is. Having an old-school Western show set in the modern age was a bold move for the show creators and runners to make, but it was one that paid off thanks to the awesome acting and intriguing storylines. If it wasn't for Yellowstone, we would be talking about Justified being the vanguard of neo-Westerns, without question. 'Little House on the Prairie' (1974–1983) Image via NBC When you think of Westerns, most people think of gunfights in the middle of town, and law enforcement officers trying to hunt down criminal bank robbers. While most of the best Westerns have these tropes, not all in the genre has to be action-packed, gun-fighting bonanzas. Take Little House on the Prairie, for example, the famed NBC Western that went the historical drama route to its claim to fame. Based on Laura Ingalls Wider's Little House on the Prairie novel, the series follows the Ingalls family, who move to Walnut Grove, Minnesota in the 1840s, and most of the show revolves around their lives, which is told through the lens of Charles (Michael Landon) and Caroline's (Karen Grassle) middle daughter, Laura (Melissa Gilbert), and her maturation from child to adulthood. Little House on the Prairie is well-known for its story of "strength through family," with the Ingalls and other Walnut Grove townsfolks finding a way to make it through the strength of family and community. This is completely separate from what Yellowstone represents, which saw family as more of a hindrance than anything else. If you're looking for a Western drama that is more family-focused, Little House on the Prairie is definitely your show. Collider Exclusive · Taylor Sheridan Universe Quiz Which Taylor SheridanShow Do You Belong In? Yellowstone · Landman · Tulsa King · Mayor of Kingstown Four worlds. All of them brutal, complicated, and built on power, loyalty, and the price of survival. Taylor Sheridan doesn't write heroes — he writes people who do what they have to do and live with the cost. Ten questions will reveal which one of his worlds you were made for. 🤠Yellowstone 🛢️Landman 👑Tulsa King ⚖️Mayor of Kingstown FIND YOUR WORLD → 01 Where does your power come from? In Sheridan's world, everyone has leverage. The question is what kind. ALand, legacy, and a name that's been feared and respected for generations. BKnowing the deal better than anyone else in the room — and being willing to walk away first. CReputation. I've earned it the hard way, and everyone in the room knows it. DBeing the only person both sides will talk to. That makes me indispensable — and dangerous. NEXT QUESTION → 02 Who do you put first, no matter what? Loyalty in Sheridan's universe is always absolute — and always costly. AFamily — blood or chosen. The ranch, the name, the people who carry it with me. BThe company — or whoever's signing the cheques. Loyalty follows the contract. CMy crew. The men who stood with me when it counted — I don't abandon them for anything. DMy community — even when my community is a powder keg and I'm the only thing stopping it from blowing. NEXT QUESTION → 03 Someone crosses a line. How do you respond? Every Sheridan protagonist has a line. What matters is what happens after it's crossed. AQuietly, decisively, and in a way that sends a message to everyone watching. BI outmanoeuvre them legally, financially, and politically before they even know I've moved. CDirectly. Old school. You cross me, you hear about it to your face — and then you deal with the consequences. DI absorb it, calculate the fallout, and find the move that keeps the whole system from collapsing. NEXT QUESTION → 04 Where do you feel most in your element? Sheridan's worlds are as much about place as they are about people. AWide open land — mountains, sky, silence. Somewhere you can see trouble coming from a mile away. BThe oil fields of West Texas — brutal, lucrative, and indifferent to whoever happens to be standing on top of them. CA mid-size city where the rules haven't quite caught up yet — fertile ground for someone with vision and nerve. DA rust-belt town built around a prison — where everyone's life is shaped by what's inside those walls. NEXT QUESTION → 05 How do you feel about operating in the grey? Nobody in a Sheridan show has clean hands. The question is how they carry the dirt. AI do what has to be done to protect what's mine. I'll answer for it eventually — but not today. BGrey is just business. The line moves depending on what's at stake, and I move with it. CI have a code — it's not the law's code, but it's mine, and I don't break it. DI've made peace with it. Keeping the peace requires compromises most people don't have the stomach for. NEXT QUESTION → 06 What are you actually fighting to hold onto? Every Sheridan character is fighting a war. The real question is what they're defending. AA way of life that the modern world is doing everything it can to erase. BMy position — and the leverage that comes with being the person everyone needs to close a deal. CRelevance. I've been away, I've been written off — and I'm proving that was a mistake. DWhatever fragile order I've managed to build — because without it, everything burns. NEXT QUESTION → 07 How do you lead? Authority in Sheridan's world is never given — it's established, maintained, and constantly tested. ABy example and force of will. People follow me because they believe in what I'm protecting — and because they know what happens if they don't. BThrough negotiation and leverage. I don't need people to like me — I need them to need me. CBy being the smartest, most experienced person in the room and making sure everyone quietly knows it. DBy being the calm centre of a situation that would spiral without me — and accepting that nobody thanks you for it. NEXT QUESTION → 08 Someone new arrives and tries to change how things work. Your reaction? Every Sheridan show has an outsider disrupting an established order. Sometimes that outsider is you. AThey'll learn. Or they won't. Either way, the land was here before them and it'll be here after. BI figure out what they want, what they're worth, and whether they're an asset or a problem — fast. CI was the outsider once. I give them a chance — one — to show they understand respect. DNew players destabilise everything I've built. I assess the threat and manage it before it manages me. NEXT QUESTION → 09 What has your position cost you? Nobody gets to where these characters are without paying for it. The bill is always personal. AMy family's peace — maybe their innocence. The ranch demands everything, and I've let it take too much. BRelationships, time, any version of a normal life. The job eats everything that isn't nailed down. CYears. Decades in some cases. Time I can't get back — but I'm not done yet. DMy conscience, mostly. And the ability to ever fully trust anyone on either side of the wall. NEXT QUESTION → 10 When it's over, what do you want people to say? Sheridan's characters all know the ending is coming. The question is what they leave behind. AThat I held the line. That the land is still ours and everything I did was worth it. BThat I was the best at what I did and that no deal ever got closed without me at the table. CThat I built something real, somewhere nobody expected it, and I did it on my own terms. DThat I kept the peace when nobody else could — and that the town is still standing because of it. REVEAL MY SHOW → Sheridan Has Spoken You Belong In…The show that claimed the most of your answers is the world you were built for. If two tied, both are shown — you're complicated enough to straddle two Sheridan universes. 🤠 Yellowstone 🛢️ Landman 👑 Tulsa King ⚖️ Mayor of Kingstown You are a Dutton — or you might as well be. You understand that some things are worth protecting at any cost, and that the modern world's indifference to history, to land, to legacy, is not something you're willing to accept quietly. You lead from the front, you carry your family's weight without complaint, and when someone threatens what's yours, you don't escalate — you finish it. You're not cruel. But you are absolute. In Yellowstone's world, that combination of ferocity and loyalty doesn't make you a villain. It makes you the only thing standing between everything that matters and everyone who wants to take it. You thrive in the chaos of high-stakes negotiation, where the money is enormous, the margins are thin, and the wrong word in the wrong room can cost everyone everything. You're a fixer — the person called when a situation is already on fire and needs someone with the nerve to walk into it. West Texas oil country rewards exactly what you are: sharp, adaptable, unsentimental, and absolutely clear-eyed about what people want and what they'll do to get it. You're not naive enough to think this world is fair. You're smart enough to be the one deciding who it's fair to. You are a Dwight Manfredi — someone who has served their time, paid their dues, and arrived somewhere unexpected with nothing but their reputation and their wits. You adapt without losing yourself. You build loyalty through respect rather than fear, though you're not above reminding people that the two aren't mutually exclusive. Tulsa King is for people who are still standing when everyone assumed they'd be finished — who find, in an unfamiliar place, that they're more capable than the world gave them credit for. You don't need a throne. You build one, wherever you happen to land. You carry the weight of a system that is broken by design, and you do it anyway — because someone has to, and because you're the only one positioned to do it without the whole thing collapsing. Mike McLusky's world is for people who are comfortable operating where there are no good options, only less catastrophic ones. You speak every language: law enforcement, criminal, political, human. That fluency makes you invaluable and it makes you a target. You've made your peace with both. Mayor of Kingstown belongs to people who understand that keeping the peace is not the same as being at peace — and who do the job regardless. ↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ 'Maverick' (1957–1962) Image via ABC By the late 1950s, Westerns were the staple on television, especially for ABC, which already had a massive Western hit on their hands with The Lone Ranger. However, with that series coming to an end in 1957, they needed another Western to fill its timeslot and continue its ratings' dominance. Enter Maverick, a Western comedy created by Roy Huggins which is just as iconic as the series it replaced. More comedy-focused than The Lone Ranger, Maverick follows Bert Maverick (James Garner), a poker-playing rounder who is always on the lookout for games with high stakes. Most of the storylines within Maverick center on Maverick's high-stakes poker-playing, and this is where the comedy is born. Maverick wasn't always about poker, however. Make no mistake, this was a Western in the 1950s, so you know there were villains that were able gunslingers as well. Maverick is a truly exciting Western series, one that we hope today's Hollywood will not touch and remake. It's that timeless. '1883' (2021–2022) With Yellowstone being a massive hit, there was little doubt that the show was going to spawn a franchise. The first show to spin-off from its parent series was 1883, created by Taylor Sheridan, and, if one gives it a chance, would see that it actually exceeds its parent show in both story and tone. 1883 is a prequel that follows the Dutton family at the end of the Civil War. As they pack up and leave Tennessee, they begin to head west, eventually settling in Montana and putting up stakes in the land that would later become the massive Yellowstone-Dutton Ranch. Filmed as a miniseries, 1883 is a great look at how the Dutton family came to be and the struggles they endured to make a home and living for themselves in those tough times. By ditching the heightened drama and toxic vitriol of Yellowstone, 1883 is a more traditional Western drama that follows the rules, not aims to break them. So, for fans of old-school Westerns who were turned off by Yellowstone's breakneck drama, 1883 is a show that's more your speed. 'Gunsmoke' (1955–1975) Image via CBS We've listed some truly iconic Western shows that are certainly better than Yellowstone. However, we have yet to discuss the show that outclasses them all, especially Yellowstone, and that show is Gunsmoke. Starting out as a radio series, like other Westerns at the time, Gunsmoke made the jump to TV in 1955, thanks to CBS. No one at CBS, however, would have guessed that Gunsmoke would be a staple of the network for 20 years. Set in Dodge City, Kansas after the Civil War, Gunsmoke follows U.S. Marshal Matt Dillion (James Arness), who protects the citizens of Dodge City from criminals. When one talks about traditional Westerns, Gunsmoke is the show that is often brought up as an example of how to do it right, and exciting. You'll get it all here, from drama to exhilarating gun-fights, all packed in a single episode. With its strong Western tone, and great plotlines, there is no question Gunsmoke is certainly better than Yellowstone. Gunsmoke Release Date 1955 - 1975-00-00 Directors Andrew V. McLaglen, Harry Harris, Ted Post, Bernard McEveety, Vincent McEveety Cast James Arness Marshal Matt Dillon Writers John Meston, Charles Marquis Warren, Paul Savage Main Genre Western Seasons 20 Creator(s) Charles Marquis Warren, Clyde Ware Streaming Service(s) Paramount Plus