The Lone Ranger Throws Down
by Lonnie Harris

David Milch's HBO "Deadwood," which finished its second season this spring, reshapes the Western genre in some very telling ways. Though it clearly shares a dusty, weather-beaten color palate and eye for stylized violence with its genre predecessors, there haven't been many Westerns so focused on community, on fastidious historical detail, and on the gritty argot of the frontier. Lifting heavily from many American and international films, the writers and creators behind "Deadwood" have provided the show with a level of complexity and depth missing from most prime time television, fleshing out not simply "slice-of-life Americana" but a nuanced portrait of a community existing outside traditional legality and standards.

Milch's story, in its rough outline, resembles every horse opera ever shot. It's the story of a real historical figure, Deadwood Sheriff Seth Bullock (played ably in the show by Timothy Olyphant), and his ongoing efforts to "clean up" the town of crime and villainy. Deadwood, Wyoming exists in a kind of civilized limbo. Because of its location in Indian territory, the United States Government officially has no authority there, yet the expansion of the mining economy and the increase in population has caused some bureaucracy to move in and attempt to extend influence. Bullock finds himself in that precarious situation that often confronts strong, silent men of the range in Westerns — between the pull of proper, civilized society and the day-to-day reality of hold-ups, bar brawls and gunfights.

This formula can be seen in any number of Western films. One must think only of the legend of Wyatt Earp, the brave lawman who fought to rid Tombstone, Colorado of a bloodthirsty gang of outlaws. He, too, looked to establish a kind-of in-between justice, a law based on respecting the right of good folks not to get shot and killing anyone who got too far out of line.

That's essentially the philosophy espoused by Deadwood's saloon owner Al Swearengen (Ian McShane) and Milch and company take great pains to give their villain some shading. Swearengen works towards his own interests, not towards the cause of evil, and they only occasionally overlap. He leaves the real skullduggery to his competition, brothel owner and all-around psychopath, Cy Tolliver (Powers Boothe, in a role he was born to play).

This multi-layered villainy sets "Deadwood" far apart from the Western archetypes that have governed the genre for years. "Deadwood" is an ensemble show, an investigation into the inner workings of an entire historical community. Though there are certainly films in the Western genre that have attempted to shed light on the interrelations of individuals in the trading camp setting — Robert Altman's landmark 1971 feature "McCabe and Mrs. Miller" comes immediately to mind — never has one observed so keenly and reflected so realistically the various bonds and unspoken agreements that keep an entire frontier camp operational.

One need only think of the heroes of Western TV to understand the atypical nature of "Deadwood's" storytelling. They are always lone, brave men — cowboys — with an innate and personal set of moral principles used to guide them through the unpredictable and dangerous terrain of The American West.

In Richard Boone's Paladin, from "Have Gun, Will Travel," Westerns were given a man who existed independent of any community. Living in a San Francisco hotel and waiting for urgent telegrams from ranchers or cowboys, asking for his help, all Paladin ever did was ride in and save the day. It was the Western myth retranslated as a superhero story. Like Batman responding to a signal in the sky, Paladin swooped in with a six-shooter, fired a few rounds, talked briefly about nobility and self-respect, and then road off into the sunset.

The typical Western heroe is a lone man like Paladin — just take look at the titles of America's popular Western TV series: The Rifleman, The Virginian, Judge Roy Bean, The Lone Ranger. These shows were not about communities.

In transcending its Western roots, however, the genre that really functions in "Deadwood" is the gangster film. Besides defining criminality for many generations of film- and tv-wathcing Americans, filmmakers shooting gang stories have always taken a keen interest in how communities have formed and functioned around illicit activities. And this concept, of looking at how illegality forces people into mutually advantageous but potentially unpleasant relationships, is lurking at the core of every episode of "Deadwood."

In the opening scenes of Martin Scorsese's "Casino," we're given a whirlwind tour of a casino, seeing all the many ways that casino security tries to prevent theft and then watching as the Mob carefully robs the place blind. In "Deadwood," we're given a similar birds-eye view of treachery. Plots, like the attempt to stake the claim held by a wealthy Eastern landowner during the shows first season, are shown from the foundational stage right through to the end result. And the show pays particular attention to strange relationships inspired by these illegal activities.

In the second season, a good deal of time was spent on Francis Walcott (Garrett Dillahunt), a sociopath and wealthy miner who uses his influence in the camp to carry out all manner of malicious and horrific deeds. After Walcott kills several whores, essentially shutting down an entire brothel, Tolliver must begrudgingly clean up the mess. He hates Walcott, and the murdered whores worked at his own establishment, but he must respect the money and influence Walcott represents.

Other conflicts simmer just beneath the surface, as one would expect from any weekly dramatic TV series. An uneasy truce between white shop owners and Chinese businessmen (called "Celestials" here) is all that keeps any semblance of order in the town. Tolliver himself has demonstrated a penchant for violent irrationality. And even Bullock, who stands as the town's symbol of temperance and fairness, can fly off the handle and cause problems if his manhood is threatened (as when Swearengen openly mocks his marital infidelity in the street).

It brings to mind, in many ways, the Japanese take on the gangster genre, the yakuza film. Those movies always focus on criminality as not just organized around a central community, but as aligned in family-like clusters of loyalty and responsibility. In other words: as gangs.

"Deadwood" shows this "gang" dynamic at play as vividly as the film's of Japanese outlaw masters Kinji Fukasaku or Takashi Miike. Swearengen's accomplices, including the fierce Dan Dority, the simpleton Johnny Burns and the scheming Silas Adams, flank him in his office, carry out his orders and assiduously curry his favor.

In an episode near the end of the second season, in which Swearengen has been sidelined by life-threatening bladder stones, a large number of men form a queue outside his office, waiting for a chance to speak with the man for only a few moments. It's a representation of the power he holds over their lives. Swearengen is the center of their small world, and without a word or two from him, they are useless appendages of a criminal apparatus they cannot begin to understand.

"Deadwood" cherry-picks the most interesting aspects of each of these dramas, to present a vision of lawlessness that feels both realistic and hugely cinematic. It starts off with the familiar tropes of the TV Western and then converts them into a fevered dream of chaos, sprung not so much from the annals of American history as the imagination of criminal literature and cinema.