Good Westerns. John Wayne and James Arness Were Never Replaced. Are Westerns Dead in America?

Westerns. Many Americans were raised with James Arness (Matt Dillon), Richard Boone (Paladin), and Cheyenne (Clint Walker) in their living rooms. Shows like Maverick, Bonanza, the Rifleman and Bat Masterson were also on Americans' TVs.

When it came to western movies, John Wayne made his mark and it has yet to be topped. Where are the new western movies and TV shows? Westerns were alive and well in America until the 70s. Did Americans appetite westerns die OR were there no more "believable" actors left to carry on for John Wayne, James Arness, Glen Ford, Henry Fonda, Chuck Connors, Richard Boone and the list could go on and on.

After these greats stopped making westerns, it seems like westerns quit being made. The "new" westerns started out with Clint Eastwood and the famous spaghetti westerns. Lee Van Cleef made some B spaghetti movies and from there we went to the "Gambler" series of western movies. And the lone movie like Unforgiven would occasionally pop up.

Classic westerns were always filled with horses, guns, drinking, shooting and fist fighting. Classic westerns do not have nudity, rapes, brutality for brutality's sake or blood and guts. Much was left to the imagination of the viewer. The new westerns have all of the above and in the case of Clint Eastwood's westerns, its hard to say which character is the vilest, Eastwood's or the bad guys. Is that when westerns started to go wrong in latter years?

Looking at todays actors, who can play a believable cowboy? Rick Schroder, Stacy Keach can handle a western role, but who else? Not only are there no stand outs as far as actors go, but writers don't seem to be able to come up with an interesting western story line without nudity, extreme violence and horrible language. Why is that? How did Gunsmoke last those many years without nudity? A shy grin, wink and a nod between Matt Dillon and Kitty was sufficient and somehow much more palatable than seeing them rip clothes off and get down to business. Michael Landon seemed to be able to write a caring and interesting semi western in his Little House on the Prairie series without blood and guts.

Are good westerns a thing of the past? Has America become too politically correct or too immoral to actually turn out good western movies anymore? We need another John Wayne or James Arness. We need another Gunsmoke or Bonanza TV series. We need someone to step up to the plate and continue the classic western movies and western tv series going.

Or, maybe the classic westerns are the way of the dinosaur and myself. If so, thank God for John Wayne DVDs with his old westerns like Dakota and Angel and the Badman. And thanks to TVLand and the western channel for James Arness and Gunsmoke and the whole gang of western TV series. Are westerns dead in America? Hopefully they are not.