The BEST episodes of The West
Every episode of The West ever, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of The West!
This documentary covers the history of the American West from the Native American tribes to their encounter with Europeans and how the Europeans conquered them and settled the land. In telling this story, the film takes into the account to both the viewpoints of Indians and other minorities to balance the white populations history.
#1 - The Grandest Enterprise Under God (1868–1874)
Season 1 - Episode 5 - Aired 9/19/1996
A triumph of the human spirit, the transcontinental railroad opens a new era in the West, carrying homesteaders onto the prairies, bringing cowboys up the cattle trail from Texas, helping give women the vote in Utah and sending buffalo hunters onto the plains, where they drive a symbol of the West—and a way of life—to the brink of extinction.
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#2 - Fight No More Forever (1874–1877)
Season 1 - Episode 6 - Aired 9/20/1996
The federal government tightens its grip on the West, but three bold spirits remain defiant—Sitting Bull, who prophesies his people's greatest victory but cannot prevent their ultimate defeat; Brigham Young, who must sacrifice a spiritual son to save his church; and Chief Joseph, who triumphs in defeat as an indomitable voice of conscience for the West.
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#3 - Death Runs Riot (1856–1868)
Season 1 - Episode 4 - Aired 9/18/1996
The Civil War comes early to the West. In “Bleeding Kansas,” abolitionists battle for free soil. In Utah, federal troops march against Mormon polygamy. And along the Rio Grande, oppressed Mexican Americans rebel. The war between North and South unleashes brute savagery in the West, and leaves behind an army prepared for total war against the native peoples of the plains.
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#4 - Empire Upon the Trails (1806–1848)
Season 1 - Episode 2 - Aired 9/16/1996
Americans head west along many pathways—following the fur trade into the mountains, fighting for self-determination in Texas, seeking religious freedom in Utah or a better life along the Oregon Trail. But whatever direction they travel, they move closer with every step to a “Manifest Destiny” that will make the West their own.
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#5 - One Sky Above Us (1887–1914)
Season 1 - Episode 9 - Aired 9/22/1996
As settlers race to claim tribal lands, Native Americans take up the Ghost Dance, trusting in its power to restore a lost way of life until their hopes are crushed at Wounded Knee. The new century marks a new era in the West, an age of aqueducts and smelters. But the West remains what it has always been, a world waiting for a dream.
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#6 - The Speck of the Future (1848–1856)
Season 1 - Episode 3 - Aired 9/17/1996
The Gold Rush brings the whole world to the West, as 49ers from Asia, South America and the eastern states scramble for “a share of the rocks,” littering the hills with mining towns and creating the West’s first metropolis. But in the push to strike it rich, many are violently pushed aside.
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#7 - The People (1500–1806)
Season 1 - Episode 1 - Aired 9/15/1996
The West begins as the whole world to the people who live there. It becomes a New World when Europeans arrive, a world shaken by incompatible visions. And almost three centuries later, when Lewis and Clark venture west to find a Northwest Passage, this world becomes the testing-ground for a young nation's continent-spanning dream.
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#8 - The Geography of Hope (1877–1887)
Season 1 - Episode 7 - Aired 9/21/1996
Newcomers arrive by the millions, bringing a new spirit of conformity to the West. Indian children are taught to forsake their heritage, Mormons are told to abandon a tenet of their faith, and new laws deny Chinese and Mexican Americans a place in society. Yet the legend of the “Wild West” lives on, thanks to the greatest showman of the age.
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