 If you've been watching The Mandalorian on Disney Plus, I'm sure you've noticed all the classic Western themes and tropes. From Ludwig Gorenzen's Morricone-like score and the setting to The Bounty Hunter with no name, The Mandalorian is clearly a Western that just happens to take place in a galaxy far, far away. But are all those tropes about gunslingers in the Wild West actually true? And if so, why? Find out on this special short edition of Out of Frame. The Western frontier depicted in movies like Shane, The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, or A Fistful of Dollars is chaotic, violent, and incredibly hostile. It's definitely entertaining, but it's not particularly realistic, at least not at the beginning. In the early 1800s, Westward expansion in America was far from idyllic, but it wasn't exactly the quick and the dead, either. Back then, there were no formal governments to speak of on most of the continent. Instead, groups of individuals voluntarily formed cattlemen's associations, mining camps, trading posts, and wagon trains in order to prosper in inhospitable new territories. People kept the peace through the use of private contracts, localized constitutions, and social pressure. Now you behave yourself, or you're gonna ride into Dodge City backwards on a mule, you'll look very silly. Not with gunfights, or all-out war. I can bring you in warm, or I can bring you in cold. Even the relations between European settlers and indigenous tribes weren't nearly as contentious as they would eventually become. Just like today, it was a lot easier, less expensive, and less dangerous for everyone to deal with most other people peacefully than it was to start a fight that could get you and your family killed. But all that changed around the Civil War. In the late 1800s, the newly expanded national government started sending troops to secure the western territories and protect politically favorable business interests. For the first time in America, peacekeeping in the west was paid by federal taxes providing an essentially unlimited budget to soldiers that had little regard for native people, local customs, and trade deals, or the environment. The shift in incentives and financing meant that large-scale military solutions to frontier problems were easier to adopt and significantly less expensive or risky for individual settlers. Hardworking people finding ways to deal with their neighbors through peaceful cooperation and trade gave way to a centralized power that used severe violence against anyone who got in their way. We see the same pattern play out in the Mandalorian. If you're not caught up, I won't spoil any major plot points, but there will be some mild spoilers ahead. The Mandalorian depicts a world where the Empire sent troops all over the galaxy, raiding local star systems, controlling trade routes, and crushing resistance from indigenous populations in a world that, by all appearances, used to solve problems mostly through cooperation and commerce. Why did Mandalore resist our expansion? And that's actually one of the most realistic parts of the show, where the violence in the Mandalorian escalates the most, is where the tendrils of power in the galaxy continue to grow. If the Mandalorian wants to find peace for himself and the child, he'll have to find a new home that limits the authority of government and values individual freedom. Hey, everybody. Thanks for watching this short episode of Out of Frame. We're thinking about doing more of these each month. What do you think of the format? If you like it, let me know in the comments. And don't forget to like, share, and subscribe to all our social channels on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Thanks for watching.