The Abandons: Kurt Sutter developing new Western series for Netflix

Sons of Anarchy creator Kurt Sutter is set to bring his own particular brand of gritty drama to Netflix as Deadline has reported that he’s made a deal with the streaming service for a new Western series. Set in the Old West, The Abandons would bring Kurt Sutter’s long-standing desire to make a Western series to life.

“I’ve always wanted to do a western, even before Sons, and then Deadwood came out,” Kurt Sutter told Deadline. “There’s that great lore of Ian Anderson wanting to be a great rock guitarist, and he saw Clapton play, and he said, ‘F*ck, I’m going to become the best rock flautist that ever lived.’ And he did just that for Jethro Tull. This is how I felt when I saw Deadwood. I said, ‘Let me stick to the crime genre” and then used just about every actor that was on that show. But I do love the genre, and over the pandemic, I tried to get a western IP.” The origin of The Abandons has its roots in La Cosa Nostra and Bonanza.

I’ve always been fascinated with the origins of La Cosa Nostra, how these Sicilian peasant families were being more than marginalized by the land barons and the aristocrats. These families banded together to defend themselves from these abusive land barons, and from that taking those matters into their own hands, La Cosa Nostra was born and became the authority and the law and the order of the land. There are other influences. Over the pandemic, I was watching reruns of Bonanza, and first of all, it completely holds up. I remember watching it as a kid, but I just remember there’s an episode where somebody gets killed, and Hoss just wants revenge, and I mean, like, dark f*cking revenge. Ultimately, it’s a Sunday network TV ending, but I just realized that the Cartwrights were a bullet away from being outlaws, right? And I loved that it all came from that deep sense of loyalty to the family, the land, the town. Those were the origins of this, with the working title The Abandons.

Kurt Sutter says that the new series will be set in a small cattle town post-Gold Rush, pre-Civil War and revolve around a group of families who refuse to give up their land to a rich land baron. “They band together. They stand up to the oppressor. Choices are made. Some of them violent, and then, like the peasants in Sicily, they take matters into their own hands and create their own destiny,” Sutter explained. “You have these humble, God-fearing, hardworking people who are forced to become the line in the sand. And of course, ultimately that line is drawn in blood. Thematically, it’s all the shit I love; family, that fine line between survival and law, the consequences of violence, and my favorite and the thing that was so prevalent in Sons: the corrosive power of secrets.” The Abandons isn’t a done deal just yet, but it certainly has plenty of potential, and I’m a sucker for anything Western. Count me in.

This won’t be Kurt Sutter’s first project with Netflix as he’s set to make his directorial debut with The Beast, a new take on the legend of the Beast of Gévaudan, which inspired The Brotherhood of the Wolf.