For years, Yellowstone and its spin-offs have owned the frontier with barbed monologues about land, legacy, and death-by-metaphorical-train-station. But every empire eventually meets a rival, and Netflix just rolled up with The Abandons, a bloody, female-driven series that looks ready to trade shots with Taylor Sheridan’s dominance.
Already sitting comfortably in Netflix’s Top 10, The Abandons doesn’t just flirt with the Western — it wrestles it into submission. Lena Headey stars as a frontier survivor-turned-matriarch leading a ragtag “found family” through scorched earth. Opposite her is Gillian Anderson, delivering ice-vein brilliance as a mining magnate who wants the same piece of land — and the silver buried beneath it. The result isn’t just another cowboy saga; it’s a collision course between two powerhouses, and the sparks fly.
Set in Washington Territory in 1854, the story begins with a simple conflict — but nothing stays simple for long. The land is rich, the authorities are corrupt, and everyone seems to carry enough trauma to fill a saddlebag. What unfolds is less a classic Western and more a territorial war where survival is bought in blood.
Is ‘The Abandons’ Worth Watching?
The disappointing news is that it doesn’t appear so. Despite the undoubted quality pedigree behind it, and two outstanding actors at the lead, the series is less than the sum of its parts. Collider’s Carly Lane described the series as “plodding”, adding that she felt the two leads deserved much better than what they were given, adding that original helmer Kurt Sutter‘s disagreement with Netflix executives had a material effect on the final product:
“The Netflix Western series can’t sustain any significant narrative momentum, despite the two acting powerhouses that are billed highest. The show’s episodes are wildly divergent in runtime — some stretch for closer to an hour, while others only clock in at around 35 minutes — and both the story and characters ultimately suffer for it. There may have been a glimmer of promise in the premise when The Abandons was first announced, especially for a genre that has rarely been led onscreen by women, but the plodding end product that was cobbled together after Sutter’s departure can’t successfully be carried on Anderson and Headey’s strengths alone.”
The Abandons is streaming on Netflix now. Stay tuned to Collider for all the latest updates on your favorite streaming shows.
Release Date
December 4, 2025
Network
Netflix
