By 1988, westerns were probably more your dad’s thing.
The genre had essentially vanished from screens after Heaven’s Gate cratered United Artists in 1980 and made studios terrified of anything with spurs and chaps.
When westerns did appear, they were cautiously aimed at people who already loved westerns like Silverado and Eastwood going back to the well with Pale Rider. Nobody was out trying to make new western fans. The genre was long gone and belly up.
But, and hear me out – what if you round up some Emilio Estevez, Kiefer Sutherland, Lou Diamond Phillips and Charlie Sheen. Fill those saddles with familiar young butts and let the ol’ western tropes do their work in the background? You get a hit, that’s what.
And somewhere along the way, you’re letting a new generation absorb the genre’s grammar without realizing they’re being taught the cowboy way.
And tarnation, that $56 million box office surprised people.
Then the 90s happened and audiences were ready to saddle up once again. Dances with Wolves won Best Picture in 1990, Unforgiven won in ’92, Tombstone became a massive hit in ’93… Then came Maverick, Posse, Bad Girls, Dead Man, The Quick and the Dead – suddenly westerns weren’t just prestige, but a viable genre again.
When Unforgiven (and even Back to the Future Part III) started deconstructing the western’s mythology, audiences had spent a few years being re-familiarized with the genre through Young Guns, its sequel, The Young Riders, and whatever else slipped through the lasso.
Young Guns didn’t revive the western singlehandedly, but it’s the straight shooter that taught a generation why westerns were cool. -Pop
Young Guns arrived on home video this week in 1989, after an August 13, 1988 theatrical showdown.