A Wyatt Earp Series Narrated By A Legendary Actor Is Climbing Netflix's Top Charts

Don't let anyone tell you Westerns are dead. They're apparently still alive and well on Netflix, where this week the docudrama "Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War" has been steadily climbing the streaming charts. According to viewership data site Flixpatrol, the series about the early American lawman is currently being bested in the top 10 most-watched English-language Netflix shows chart by just two other series: true crime docuseries "American Murder: Laci Peterson" and inexplicably popular girlboss rom-com "Emily in Paris."

If your Boomer dad hasn't yet told you about "Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War," let us do the honors. It's a six-episode Netflix-exclusive series that's a hybrid of narrative nonfiction, talking-head documentary, and intense reenactments. Here's the official synopsis that accompanied the show's trailer on YouTube: "The legendary feud between Wyatt Earp and Ike Clanton unfolds through vivid reenactments in this gritty docudrama about the gunfight that defined an era." It also unfolds with some help from modern Western mainstay Ed Harris, who hangs up the cowboy hat he wore in projects like "Westworld," "Appaloosa," and "Walker" here in favor of a behind-the-camera contribution as the series' narrator.

This is far from the first Wyatt Earp story to grace our TV screens. The O.K. Corral gunfighter has been portrayed before in films like "Tombstone," "Wyatt Earp," and "Wyatt Earp's Revenge," played by famous cool guys like Kurt Russell, Kevin Costner, and Val Kilmer. They near-mythical figure has also been in shows dating back to the earliest days of television, outlasting the end of the Western boom to appear in more recent shows like "Deadwood" and "Wynonna Earp," too. So, what makes this new series different? For one thing, it purports to share the real history behind Earp's most infamous moments; the trailer begins with Wood requesting that audiences "forget everything you know about Wild West history."

Whether or not "Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War" is actually any more true to history than the interpretations that came before it, it does feature an entertaining angle; as Harris explains, "The cowboys were a notorious criminal gang like the mafia." The show also seems to have the stylish, seemingly high production value reenactments to back it up, with shots of explosions, gunfights, and racing horses interspersed with the testimony from historians and other interviewees. Tim Fellingham ("Vikings") stars as Earp, with Ariel Eliaz ("Snowfall") and Shane Penhale ("Homicide: Hours To Kill") playing his brothers Virgil and Morgan. The cast is rounded out by newcomer Hayden Josef Silberer as The Lone Rider, Jack Gordon ("Call the Midwife") as Ike Clanton, and Edward Franklin ("Vikings: Valhalla") as Doc Holliday.

"Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War" leaped onto the Netflix charts so quickly that the streamer's own official top 10 site doesn't seem to have registered its popularity yet (though my Netflix homepage does currently list it as number three in TV shows), and it has no critical or fan reviews on Rotten Tomatoes as of publication time. But it's no surprise that the show that seemed to come out of nowhere is popular. It likely scratches the same itch as the Western melodramas of the "Yellowstone" universe, and fans of that franchise certainly need something to tide them over until its final, Costner-less episodes finally arrive.

"Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War" is currently streaming on Netflix.