Entertainment
The Best Western Thrillers on Tubi Are a 3-Part Epic Perfect From Start to Finish
Westerns can be exciting. Not all of them, and some are kind of old-fashioned in ways that may alienate certain viewers. Not that Westerns are like musicals, but they’re two genres that people sometimes swear off on principle. In either event, such people are missing out. Focusing on Westerns specifically, if you want to convert someone to the genre overall, and say this person might be able to get around Tombstone or No Country for Old Men, but not other Westerns that are significantly older… well, you should make them start with the Dollars trilogy, since they’re some of the most thrilling and entertaining Westerns ever made.
A Fistful of Dollars was the first, though The Good, the Bad and the Ugly seems to take place first chronologically, so you’ve got a bit of a Star Wars situation on your hands in terms of being like, “Hey, where do I start?” Continuity doesn’t really matter, and it’s, like, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly shows where Clint Eastwood’s character got his poncho that he wears in the other two, so that’s about as deep as it gets. Eastwood is in all three as the Man with No Name, but this man has a different nickname each time, and all the films are self-contained while each proves approachable, engaging, and thrilling in its own particular way.
What Happens Throughout the ‘Dollars’ Trilogy
As mentioned before, A Fistful of Dollars (1964) was the first, and it comes the closest to being a proper thriller out of the three films in the Dollars trilogy. This is due to it being an unofficial remake of Yojimbo, which was an Akira Kurosawa samurai film that had more of an emphasis on suspense than action. The plot there had a lone warrior coming into a town torn apart by warring gangs, and then he puts himself in the middle of the conflict, claiming to ally himself with both sides so that he can play them against each other.
A Fistful of Dollars was improved upon immensely by Sergio Leone when he directed For a Few Dollars More one year later.
It being an unofficial remake meant there was a lawsuit (it’s just Yojimbo, but with an Old West setting and, obviously, no samurai), but it was still a net good that the film came about, because it was improved upon immensely by Sergio Leone when he directed For a Few Dollars More one year later. This one wasn’t an unofficial remake, and it also had a more emotionally engaging story that involved the Man with No Name going after a notorious bandit, simultaneously clashing with another man (played by Lee Van Cleef) after the same target, but for very different reasons. Then, in order of release, at least, came The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, which was a full-on epic, not to mention perhaps the most broadly entertaining of the bunch.
What Makes the ‘Dollars’ Trilogy Movies So Thrilling
There’s a tension to A Fistful of Dollars that makes it feel sort of in line with the thriller genre, but The Good, the Bad and the Ugly feels like it’s the most thrilling, if that makes sense. Lee Van Cleef’s also in this one, but in a villainous role, being the titular “Bad.” Eastwood’s the “Good,” though he’s not all that good, he’s just not as bad as the “Bad” is bad. And then in between is the “Ugly,” played by Eli Wallach, who’s probably the most endearing, even if he’s also not a great guy.
He’s more just the underdog, or a wild card, and watching these three men try to play each other as they all pursue the same goal (a buried fortune somewhere in the desert) is exceptionally entertaining. You get a mix of emotions and genres here, compared to the other Dollars movies, because The Good, the Bad and the Ugly successfully balances suspense, comedy, adventuring, and action, all the while being a Western, an epic, and even something of a Civil War movie. It’s got it all, and it’s got the time to do it, since it’s nearly three hours long, all up. The three movies do share in common great finales, which is naturally where things get the most suspenseful and thrilling in each one.
How the ‘Dollars’ Movies Prove Unique as a “Trilogy”
If it weren’t for Clint Eastwood being (probably) the same character across all three movies, the Dollars trilogy would be a thematic one at most. Even if you’re willing to classify it as such, then it still feels like the sort of trilogy where each movie is quite different, though not in a bad way, by any means. There’s something satisfying about seeing the scale grow from film to film, and the progression from the scrappy, brisk, and self-contained A Fistful of Dollars to the more sprawling and sometimes bombastic The Good, the Bad and the Ugly makes a weird amount of sense (For a Few Dollars More is the perfect middle-ground, too, it should be stressed).
Sergio Leone didn’t make any movies with Clint Eastwood after The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, which is something of a shame, but he did make another trilogy of sorts that’s also very much worth checking out. Once Upon a Time in the West begins that thematic trilogy, and it signifies Leone moving away from more thrilling and pulpy territory, since it’s a good deal more restrained and quietly tense. Duck, You Sucker is the most underrated of the bunch, and remarkably bleak, while Once Upon a Time in America jumps forward in time, out of the Western genre entirely, being a gangster movie set across decades (with a good chunk of the story taking place during the Prohibition era). But the Dollars films are where it’s at, if you want exciting Sergio Leone movies, and if you want thrilling Westerns more generally, since they all hold up well and prove truly enthralling in their own unique ways. Few trilogies are as satisfying to binge, truth be told.
The Dollars trilogy movies are available to stream on Tubi.
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