Seth MacFarlane’s Guilty-Pleasure Western Rides Its Horses to Netflix

The genre of Western movies can be considered the most serious one as its characters are almost always cold and tough as steel. However, what if we take a typical Wild West plot and make a comedy that will mock all the genre’s obvious tropes of it?

Such an attempt was made by Seth MacFarlane, who is famous for creating the Family Guy sitcom (since 1999) and two of Mark Wahlberg-starring Ted movies (2012 and 2015). Indeed, the filmmaker has the required comedy potential, so let’s learn about this movie.

The plot of MacFarlane’s Western flick centers on Albert Stark, a farmer who lives his calm life near the notorious Western frontier. After breaking up with his girlfriend, he loses all his temper but, luckily, is then helped by Anna, a brave female gunfighter.

Stark starts finding his inner courage under the woman’s surveillance, and it’s high time to show himself off, as he is about to confront Anna's outlaw husband, arriving in the town to perform his bloody revenge by punishing the farmer who fell for his wife.

While this synopsis seems to combine a bunch of good old Western plots, the movie offers you a notable satire on the genre. It can be easily compared to the staples of such comedies, starting from Blazing Saddles (1974) to the animated hit Rango (2011).

Nevertheless, it fell victim to critics’ strict judgment that resulted in the film’s shameful score of 33% on Rotten Tomatoes. The comedy was panned for its unreasonable length (and it lasts almost 2 hours), problematic screenplay and, more than that, for MacFarlane’s poor performance as both the leading actor and the movie’s director.

Despite all this criticism, this flick, titled A Million Ways to Die in the West, turns out to be really hilarious when it comes to parodying Western classics. It’ll clearly make you laugh even if you’re not into the genre as much as its veterans, and it assembles our favorite Charlize Theron, Amanda Seyfried, Neil Patrick Harris and Liam Neeson.

“It's stupid as f**k, but it has some funny gags and decent cast,” as fairly admitted on Reddit, and it proves it can serve as a light-hearted movie for an evening chill.

A Million Ways to Die in the West will be added to Netflix ’s catalog already on June 1.