A potent, unusually vivid (and profane) Western about a late-1870s South Dakota settlement in the aftermath of Little Big Horn. Creator David Milch defends the seemingly nonstop expletives and brutality as a factual depiction of the era's lawlessness and its rough-and-tumble types, such as legendary gunslinger Wild Bill Hickok and saloonkeeper Al Swearengen (Golden Globe winner Ian McShane).