The Best Western of the 2010s Wasn't a Movie or TV Show—It Was 'Red Dead Redemption 2'
Who said a Western had to be a movie, or even a television show? The best Western of the 2010s, or really the neo-modern era, isn’t either. It’s the best video game of all time.
'Red Dead Redemption 2'
We’ll be honest, we’ve been on a bit of a Western kick here at No Film School over the past few months. You could argue that once you go on a Western kick, though, you never really get off of it. And for a genre so deep with films, shows, and other content, you could spend your whole life in it without ever having truly watched and consumed all of it.
Yet, when looking back at different eras of Westerns, something strange happens in the 2010s. Well into the modern neo-Western style, films and shows are much more aware of the genre, and often trying to turn things on their heads—often too much so.
But one Western from the era stands tall as a true Western through-and-through, and it’s not a movie or a show; it’s a video game. Let’s look at how Red Dead Redemption 2 stands tall as not only the best Western video game of all time, but also as the best Western of the 2010s and the modern era overall.
And why the debate isn’t even close…
The Legacy of 'Read Dead Redemption 2'
While not usually part of our coverage, it’s hard to ignore the cultural impact and significance of the Red Dead Redemption franchise from Rockstar Games. The third entry in the Red Dead series, which includes Red Dead Revolver, which came out in 2004, and the original Red Dead Redemption game (to which RDR2 is technically a prequel), Rockstar Games’ series likely didn’t set out to challenge the greatest Western films and shows of all time for genre superiority.
It was really just meant to be a fun action-adventure game that expands on the success of the company’s GTA franchise into a different sub-genre.
Yet, by the time the first Red Dead Redemption game was released in 2010, the game quickly became something more than just a GTA-spinoff. The developers, to their endless credit, didn’t treat it as just a game either, as it was filled with well-researched homages to Western classics throughout.
And while Red Dead Redemption is a masterpiece in its own right, when Red Dead Redemption 2 was finally released in 2018, the developers not only found new ways to homage the genre, they found ways to reinvent it by giving gamers an experience unlike anything any film, show, or other game was able to provide before—or still has been able to provide after.
The Best Westerns of the 2010s
As we’ve covered in the past, while the 2010s might not have been the heyday for traditional Western films, the decade is squarely in the era of the modern Western, which has become a new genre unto itself and has some of the best titles of all time.
Yet, while many of these films explore Western themes and include many of the same icons and locales, it’s hard to call them Westerns in the classical sense. And, as far as exploring the West and feeling what it must have been like for those pioneers on the edges of society at the time, you wouldn’t really call many of these films immersive or true to the era.
Similar to True Grit, Django Unchained, and Bone Tomahawk, some of the best modern Westerns from the 2010, Red Dead Redemption 2 tells a story that is contained to a time and place of the era, but its open world-ness expands beyond just one tale and brings multiple narratives and nearly endless adventures to audiences in a way that one film, or even television series, can truly equal.
Can a Video Game Beat a Movie?
We know it’s a bit shallow to debate titles across different mediums, and video games and movies are always going to be quite different in so many ways. But from a storytelling perspective alone, Red Dead Redemption 2 finds a way to balance homages and tributes to the Western tales that came before it, while also carving out a new narrative that feels fresh and true even to this day.
We’ll also grant that it’s a bit not fair to equate a triple-A game to even a blockbuster movie, much less an indie, as a game like RDR2 reportedly cost over $500 million to make. Still, despite not being an avid gamer myself, I’ve played a fair number of action and adventure titles, and even several different Western-themed games, and RDR2 stands infinitely taller in just about every way.
It’s also a game that’s meant to be enjoyed by both casual and serious gamers alike, as its open world design allows even the most uninitiated of players to simply enjoy riding horses through the wild, getting drunk in a town bar with the locals, or taking on bounty quests or small adventures.
At the end of the day though, whether you’re a gamer or not is besides the point. Regardless of your cross-section between the mediums, for those interested in filmmaking, Red Dead Redemption 2 isn’t just a great example of what the Western genre can be; it’s the best example of what it is at its best.
