5 TV Shows To Watch If You Like Marshals

This has been a big year for the Yellowstone universe — aka the Duttonverse — with the debut of two new spin-offs. Season 1 of both "Dutton Ranch" and "Marshals" are running concurrently, the former a Paramount+ original and the latter airing on CBS. That makes "Marshals" the first Duttonverse show to air on regular network television, a big move for the franchise. 

"Marshals" also treads new ground for the property in that it combines the usual Western flavor of a Duttonverse show with a police procedural. It follows John Dutton's (Kevin Costner) son, Kayce Dutton (Luke Grimes), as he uses his experience as a former Navy SEAL in his new career as a U.S. Marshal in Montana. That combination of genres, sometimes called a frontier procedural, has been home to some great shows in recent years. In fact, one such effort definitely played a key role in the current Western renaissance on television, a renaissance that the Duttonverse sometimes gets a disproportionate amount of credit for. 

The series we are alluding to, along with a few other recent neo-Western crime shows, are sure to keep "Marshals" fans occupied once Season 1 of that program wraps up and the wait for Season 2 — which has already been greenlit by CBS — begins.

Based on Tony Hillerman's long-running series of Navajo Tribal Police novels starring detectives Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee, the FX series "Dark Winds" brings those characters to life via actors Zahn McClarnon and Kiowa Gordon respectively. Notably, the show was produced by Robert Redford, who had previously produced two film adaptations of Hillerman novels: "The Dark Wind" in 1991, and "Skinwalkers" in 2002. He even made an uncredited cameo in a 2025 episode of "Dark Winds" in what would be his final on-screen appearance — so clearly, Redford had a strong affection for this universe.

Watching the "Dark Winds" series, it's easy to see why Redford was so in love with this world and its characters. In addition to the ways it brings Western flavors into a gritty police procedural, having it set in and around the Four Corners region of the American Southwest makes "Dark Winds" all the more unique in its focus on the struggles of Native Americans in the United States in the 1970s. If the cast of "Dark Winds" might look familiar, that's because several of them are mainstays of this genre in particular — with McClarnon also starring in the next show on this list.

While getting decent numbers on original network A&E — enough to justify three seasons — "Longmire" didn't fully get its due until Netflix picked it up starting with Season 4 in 2014. The show then got a further two seasons on the streamer, doubling its lifespan beyond what A&E had offered it. While Netflix no longer carries it, "Longmire" has found a fitting new streaming home on Paramount+, where it has seen a second — or should we say, a third — life, thanks to it being a common recommendation after someone watches an episode of a Duttonverse show. 

"Longmire" follows the titular sheriff, Walt Longmire (Robert Taylor), as he oversees the fictional Wyoming county of Absaroka. He frequently collaborates with childhood friend Henry Standing Bear (Lou Diamond Philips), a tracker for the Cheyenne tribe, in dealing with the Cheyenne Tribal Police. Much of the show revolves around Longmire clashing with the Tribal Police over various jurisdictional issues, with both sides wanting justice but not always in agreement as to how to go about it — or who should carry it out.

Like the best dramas, there are things you only notice in "Longmire" after watching it more than once, so even if you've already seen it, you might consider a second lap. 

After having the misfortune of being stuck on the niche Spectrum cable network when it was first released, "Joe Pickett" was picked up by Paramount+ for its second season. It nevertheless became another Western TV show that was canceled too soon, likely due to how much competition there was in the genre by 2023. If you were a brand new Western series in the 2020s that wasn't created by Taylor Sheridan, you were bound to have a rough time.

Luckily, viewers can still go back and watch both seasons of this highly underrated Western crime drama — and definitely should. Lead character Joe Pickett (Michael Dorman) thinks he is taking a fairly low-key game warden job in a remote Wyoming community. But the discovery of a poacher's corpse leads Joe down a rabbit hole of cover-ups and conspiracies involving the most influential family in the area.

Naturally, this puts both Joe and his family on the radars of some very dangerous people. And with that, Joe's responsibilities become much greater and much more dangerous than he ever could have bargained for, in the unfairly overlooked firecracker of a Western series that is "Joe Pickett."

If you're a fan of neo-Western crime dramas, there's a good chance you've already guessed that "Justified" was that pre-"Yellowstone" trailblazer we were referring to in the introduction. Debuting on FX in 2010, "Justified" didn't always get as much mainstream attention as prestige television peers like "Breaking Bad" or "Mad Men." But it still very much found an audience that earned it six seasons. It also had the critical acclaim to match, winning two Primetime Emmy awards off eight nominations despite some incredibly difficult competition. 

"Justified" centers on a U.S. Marshal named Raylan Givens (Timothy Olyphant), who is often at odds with his superiors for conducting himself like a rule-bending Old West sheriff rather than adhering to the modern rules and guidelines of law enforcement. He eventually pushes so many buttons that he is shipped off to a backwater Kentucky town as a form of soft demotion — the same town in which he lived a very troubled past and where some old enemies are all too excited to see him return. 

We recently proclaimed "Justified" the best modern TV Western, and given how prolific the genre is these days, that honor definitely carries a lot more weight than it would have back during the show's original run. There's a good chance "Yellowstone" wouldn't exist at all, let alone yield a spin-off to write a list of recommendations about, if it weren't for "Justified."

We wanted to go with something a bit different for our final recommendation. While the main character is the great-great-granddaughter of Wyatt Earp, one of the original Western lawmen and the basis for numerous classic movies and TV shows, "Wynonna Earp" is far from a traditional Western series. Instead, the show combines elements of a Western crime series with magic and whimsy.

Based on the Image Comics character of the same name, "Wynonna Earp" follows the titular heroine (Melanie Scrofano) as she uses her family's magical handgun to dispatch the reanimated corpses of the outlaws that were killed by her famous ancestor. Helping her on her mission is none other than the actual Doc Holliday (Tim Rozon), her great-great-grandpop's associate, who was cursed with immortality by a witch. It's all as goofy as it sounds, but not in a bad way. The show knows what it is and cannily leans into its campy premise, bringing some much-needed fun and levity into a genre that often takes itself far too seriously.

Ultimately, the real reason Syfy canceled "Wynonna Earp" in 2021 had more to do with complex — and costly — licensing rights issues than low ratings. But it still produced an impressive four seasons, during which several outlets named it one of the best shows on television. A well-received follow-up movie, "Wynonna Earp: Vengeance," was released to Tubi in 2024.