Plot: While exploring the American West, a small group travels across the plains, experiencing violent collisions with cults, religion, and men and women fighting for control of the new world.

Review: When most people think of the Western genre, they envision actors like Clint Eastwood, John Wayne, James Stewart, and Gary Cooper playing six-shooter superheroes with leathery skin, shiny spurs, and a devil-may-care attitude. As icons of an idealized American West, these men often shine as paragons of virtue, justice, and heroism. Still, history bends to the will of the storyteller, someone who can glorify the cowboy and make their actions appear pure and righteous. American Primeval offers no such quarter to its gun-slingers. Though the series presents a fictionalized and dramatized recount of 1857, its depiction of harsh living conditions, cutthroat politics, and relentless violence is all too honest. Saddle up, folks! We’re riding along one of Netflix’s...