As it struggled into the '90s, the Western finally discovered salvation in the form of Kevin Costner's Dances With Wolves. It packed in audiences and carted away the Academy Award for Best Picture. And soon afterwards, the TV mini-series Lonesome Dove (based on Larry McMurtry's Pulitzer-prize-winning novel) attracted a huge following. Eastwood's Unforgiven followed in 1992. It's a magnificent meditation on the Old West, filled with bitter ironies and brutal violence meted out by lawmen and outlaws alike. Unforgiven took home the Best Picture Academy Award in 1992.
 

Even with the minor resurgence of the Western in the '90s, the Western exists in limbo. It still has the power to fan the sparks of imagination, but our distance from the West has weakened its authority. While the West once represented a simpler time in America's history, we now see that the power of the gun (as shown in Unforgiven and Tombstone) could make lawmen just as dangerous as the outlaws. And although justice may have been swift; it was not necessarily fair and at times it was absolutely deadly. As the myths and heroes of the American West fade away, the Western becomes just another genre, a genre that becomes more remote with each passing year.