John Dutton Meets Raylan Givens In Streaming’s Most Overlooked Neo-Western Series
After joining Screen Rant in January 2025, Guy became a Senior Features Writer in March of the same year, and now specializes in features about classic TV shows. With several years' experience writing for and editing TV, film and music publications, his areas of expertise include a wide range of genres, from comedies, animated series, and crime dramas, to Westerns and political thrillers.
Kevin Costner’s Montana rancher John Dutton and Timothy Olyphant’s Kentucky lawman Raylan Givens are arguably the two most iconic Western characters of the past two decades. Yet, another hugely overlooked TV series combines the best of both of them into a single formidable protagonist.
Almost a decade after this show concluded its original run on A&E, its central figure has built up a cult following as the toughest sheriff in the West. Longmire’s title character is everything you could want in a neo-Western series that honors its genre’s traditions.
He’s as rugged and combative as he needs to be to get by in rural Wyoming, and more than knows his way around a handgun. He’s also the rock on which his local community rests, with his knowledge of ranching and understanding of indigenous values. Walt Longmire is the main reason his series is among the best TV Westerns of the 21st century.
Only a fraction of the audience that Taylor Sheridan’s latest releases regularly command will have heard of Longmire, but it’s the show to watch next if you love all things Yellowstone. If you squint hard enough, you might even mistake its lead actor Robert Taylor for Costner, although there’s more honor in his character than the entire Dutton clan combined.
Longmire’s Title Character Blends John Dutton With Raylan Givens
Still, Longmire serves as the ultimate Yellowstone replacement for those looking for a wizened patriarch to mete out punishment to anyone who’s crossed him in one of North America’s most unforgiving landscapes. The series is set in the fictional Absaroka County, Wyoming, not far from where the Duttons settled in Montana.
There’s plenty about Walt Longmire that will remind you of John Dutton, too, from his gruff demeanor to his love of horses, and how protective he is of his daughter. While the pair live their lives by very different values overall, there is something about the harsh wilderness of the Rocky Mountains that binds them and their respective social codes.
Besides the mutual respect Dutton and Longmire both share with local First Nations tribespeople, the latter’s approach to life is much more similar to Raylan Givens, the gunslinging U.S. Marshal at the forefront of Justified. Like Givens, Longmire doesn’t suffer fools gladly, and is prepared to apply the full force of the law when required.
In a sense, Raylan and Walt are both exceptions to the rules of the modern world, in the context of their neo-Western settings. It feels as though they’d both be more comfortable in a 19th century frontier town where the definition of the law is altogether looser, and justice is served in a showdown at dawn.
Walt Longmire Is The Western Genre’s Most Overlooked Hero
A fierce defender of the greater good over and above the precise application of the law, Walt Longmire is arguably the best sheriff in a TV Western. He’s as entertaining as he is intimidating, with an acerbic sense of humor, a quick temper, and a no-nonsense attitude to getting things done.
While fellow lawmen like Givens and Gunsmoke’s Matt Dillon are more iconic Western heroes, they work for the Marshal Service rather than their local sheriff’s office. Longmire, on the other hand, is a sheriff in name as well as vocation. He deserves to be far better known among fans of the Western genre.
Because Longmire originally aired on the niche cable network A&E, it’s never managed to attract much more than a cult following. The show did move to Netflix after the relative success of its initial seasons, but it subsequently disappeared from the streaming platform when its license agreement expired. It’s now available on Paramount+ instead, alongside Taylor Sheridan’s Westerns.