"Longmire": A Unique Updated Take on the TV Western

I've always been someone who's kept very close tabs on the comings and goings of television series, but in the past 15 years amidst the overwhelming influx of cable and web series being made available, I've clearly missed a step.  That became especially clear when a friend suggested I check out a neo-Western crimefighter series called "Longmire" that I had never heard of before, despite running six seasons between A & E and Netflix between 2012 and 2017.  A few months later, a retired coworker made an even more impassioned plea for me to check the series out.  After two out-of-nowhere appeals for me to give the series a try by people whose opinion I respected on such matters, I figured it was a sign that I shouldn't ignore....and that this would likely be a series that was a good fit for me.

And it was a good call.  "Longmire", based on a series of novels, was a series rich in both atmosphere and storytelling, stitching together a rich tapestry of characters on the frontier of contemporary Wyoming.  Conflict came from many sources, but was centered around the sheriff's department of a rural Wyoming county and the Native American reservation within the county.  The series made an extra effort to get the Native American treatment right, and it resulted in some of the series' strongest characters, visuals, and plotlines. 

All of this made for an interesting launch for the series, but at least for me, the series' first couple of seasons were primarily defined by being a very well done police procedural.  It was highly entertaining and well put-together, but didn't necessarily have an X factor that separated mere quality series with classic series.  But by season 3, the series took its storytelling up a notch, shifting to more elaborate story arcs and reducing the number of conventional procedural storylines.  The subtle stylistic shift helped raise the stakes for the audience's investment in the characters and helped the tell even more compelling stories over the course of several episodes.

The A & E cable network dropped "Longmire" in 2014 after three seasons based largely on inside baseball property rights disputes, but the series was picked up by Netflix and produced three more seasons where it was given even more creative liberties.  The second half of the series' run continued with the format of season 3, less reliant on tropes and largely as stylistically wide-open as the Wyoming countryside. 

Almost all acting performances were impressive, with the standout scene in my opinion coming from Robert Taylor, portraying the reserved Western lawman Walt Longmire, finally breaking down as he poured his late wife's ashes to the soil after finally coming to terms.  Other series regulars Katee Sackhoff, Lou Diamond Phillips, and Adam Bartley also played their respective roles to great effect, but at times the actors playing semiregular villains stole the show, including Graham Greene as corrupt tribal elder and crime boss Malachi Strand, A Martinez as casino mogul and top Walt rival Jacob Nighthorse, and Gerald McRaney as amoral old-money patriarch Barlow Connally.

It's important to remember that the seasons were short (five of the six were only 10 episodes) so even though the series ran six seasons, its 63 total episodes is less than what a network series would make in three seasons.  With that in mind,  it's no surprise that the series still had some creative stamina in its sixth and final season, to the point that I wanted more when the series ended and believe there could have one or more additional seasons without missing a step.  Nonetheless I was very pleased with the six seasons I got from "Longmire", which tickled my fancy more than any of the network shows I just reviewed this past spring.  I'm grateful for the recommendations of my peers that led me to check it out.