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Although Netflix’s best Western series only received a single season, its brevity means that revisiting the self-contained show feels like watching a seven-hour masterpiece in the genre. Some TV shows are intentionally designed, especially in the era of streaming services, to feel like extra-long movies. While the original run of Twin Peakswas formatted as a conventional network TV drama (even if the show itself was anything but conventional), its 2017 revival, Twin Peaks: The Return, was a single 17-hour movie broken up into more manageable chunks.
The success of Taylor Sheridan’s Yellowstone franchise has proven that Neo-Westerns can succeed on the small screen, while its prequels 1883 and 1923 show that even traditional period pieces in the genre can be major mainstream hits if they follow the right familiar, crowd-pleasing narrative beats. HBO’s earlier, grittier Deadwood wasn’t as big a mainstream hit but the show earned better reviews from critics who considered the unapologetically grim and brutal series more complex and morally ambiguous than anything from the Yellowstone franchise.
However, one of the best small-screen Westerns of the last 30 years is actually a standalone miniseries from Netflix that feels like a 7-hour movie upon a re-watch. Set in the small New Mexico town of La Belle, 2017’s Godless follows Sinners star Jack O’Connell’s injured outlaw Roy Goode. Goode arrives in La Belle hoping to hide from his former boss, the chilling crime magnate Frank Griffin. Played by Jeff Daniels, Griffin is a disquieting presence who successfully subverts the actor’s usual cuddly screen persona.
Why Godless Feels Like One Big Western Movie
While Griffin’s pursuit of Goode would be a compelling story in its own right, it is upon the outlaw’s arrival in the town of La Belle that the story of Godless reveals the proverbial ace up its sleeve. Thanks to a tragic mining disaster that wiped out almost every man in the town, La Belle has an almost entirely female population. Scoot McNairy’s sheriff, Bill McNue, is one of La Bell’s only surviving men, alongside newcomer Goode.
This makes for a unique, original spin on the Western template, as traditional entries into the genre hadn’t historically focused on female perspectives. Interestingly enough, the idea of a town left without male citizens was a historic reality in the American West, owing to wars, disasters like the mining accident in Godless, and other factors. However, since traditional stories in the genre are typically centered on a male protagonist, the outlook of this Netflix series feels revolutionary and fresh.
With a stacked supporting cast including Merritt Wever, Sam Waterston, and a standout turn from Michelle Dockery as the frosty widow Alice Fletcher, Godless is a must-watch whose tense, thrilling story never lets up for a moment. While the Yellowstone franchise owes as much to gangster movies as traditional Westerns, the historical setting of Godless means it will satisfy fans of Sergio Leone and John Ford, while its female cast means the show never feels like an entirely straightforward entry into the genre.
Godless Is Netflix's Most Underrated Western Series
Although 2025’s American Primeval and The Abandons saw Netflix once again try to revisit the Western genre, this seven-episode epic remains the streaming service’s most essential small-screen Western. With a stellar cast and a subversive take on the familiar tropes of Western movies, Godless is smart, daring television with all the ambition and verve of the genre’s best big-screen efforts.
At a time when Yellowstone and its many sequels represent the most visible and popular incarnation of the genre on the small screen, Godless makes for a compelling alternative to Taylor Sheridan’s biggest series. As re-watchable as it is unpredictable, Netflix’s Godless deserves to be remembered as an all-time great small-screen Western.
