Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In the days of TV antiheroes like Tony Soprano and Don Draper, Sheriff Walt Longmire serves as a throwback to old-fashioned heroes like Marshall Matt\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In the days of TV antiheroes like Tony Soprano and Don Draper, Sheriff Walt Longmire serves as a throwback to old-fashioned heroes like Marshall Matt\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Christopher Closeup\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-07-15T14:37:38+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-01-06T15:28:25+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/121\/2013\/07\/Longmire-1-e1373898175426.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"400\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"265\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Tony Rossi\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Tony Rossi\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/\",\"name\":\"Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-07-15T14:37:38+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-01-06T15:28:25+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#\/schema\/person\/9215d33862959dfe2334a97a802ebf1d\"},\"description\":\"In the days of TV antiheroes like Tony Soprano and Don Draper, Sheriff Walt Longmire serves as a throwback to old-fashioned heroes like Marshall Matt\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/\",\"name\":\"Christopher Closeup\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#\/schema\/person\/9215d33862959dfe2334a97a802ebf1d\",\"name\":\"Tony Rossi\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ef58b23d79989facf5779819377620d3?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ef58b23d79989facf5779819377620d3?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Tony Rossi\"},\"description\":\"After graduating from St. John's University in New York with degrees in Communications and English, Tony Rossi found a job at the Catholic media organization, The Christophers, that allowed him to indulge his interest in religion, media, and pop culture. He served as The Christophers' TV producer for 11 years, and is currently the host and producer of the organization's radio show\/podcast Christopher Closeup, writer and editor of their syndicated Light One Candle column, and producer\/scriptwriter of the annual Christopher Awards ceremony.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/author\/tonyrossi\/\"}]}<\/script>\n","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes","description":"In the days of TV antiheroes like Tony Soprano and Don Draper, Sheriff Walt Longmire serves as a throwback to old-fashioned heroes like Marshall Matt","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes","og_description":"In the days of TV antiheroes like Tony Soprano and Don Draper, Sheriff Walt Longmire serves as a throwback to old-fashioned heroes like Marshall Matt","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/","og_site_name":"Christopher Closeup","article_published_time":"2013-07-15T14:37:38+00:00","article_modified_time":"2015-01-06T15:28:25+00:00","og_image":[{"width":"400","height":"265","url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/121\/2013\/07\/Longmire-1-e1373898175426.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Tony Rossi","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Tony Rossi","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/","name":"Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-07-15T14:37:38+00:00","dateModified":"2015-01-06T15:28:25+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#\/schema\/person\/9215d33862959dfe2334a97a802ebf1d"},"description":"In the days of TV antiheroes like Tony Soprano and Don Draper, Sheriff Walt Longmire serves as a throwback to old-fashioned heroes like Marshall Matt","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/","name":"Christopher Closeup","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#\/schema\/person\/9215d33862959dfe2334a97a802ebf1d","name":"Tony Rossi","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ef58b23d79989facf5779819377620d3?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ef58b23d79989facf5779819377620d3?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Tony Rossi"},"description":"After graduating from St. John's University in New York with degrees in Communications and English, Tony Rossi found a job at the Catholic media organization, The Christophers, that allowed him to indulge his interest in religion, media, and pop culture. He served as The Christophers' TV producer for 11 years, and is currently the host and producer of the organization's radio show\/podcast Christopher Closeup, writer and editor of their syndicated Light One Candle column, and producer\/scriptwriter of the annual Christopher Awards ceremony.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/author\/tonyrossi\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/488"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3278\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}

{"id":3278,"date":"2013-07-15T09:37:38","date_gmt":"2013-07-15T14:37:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/?p=3278"},"modified":"2015-01-06T10:28:25","modified_gmt":"2015-01-06T15:28:25","slug":"sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christophers\/2013\/07\/sheriff-walt-longmire-an-old-fashioned-hero-in-a-world-of-tv-antiheroes\/","title":{"rendered":"Sheriff Walt Longmire: An Old-Fashioned Hero in a World of TV Antiheroes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/a>In the days of TV antiheroes like Tony Soprano and Don Draper, Sheriff Walt Longmire serves as a throwback to old-fashioned heroes like Marshall Matt Dillon of \u201cGunsmoke.\u201d In fact, the series \u201cLongmire\u201d reminds me of that classic TV western in a couple of ways.<\/p>\n

\u201cLongmire\u201d \u2013 which premiered on A&E in June 2012, and is based on Craig Johnson\u2019s book series \u2013 introduced viewers to Walt Longmire, sheriff of Absaroka County, a fictional community in Wyoming. Though he\u2019s the chief law enforcement officer, his head has been a little out of the policing game for the past year due to his wife\u2019s death. His deputies \u2013 Victoria \u201cVic\u201d Moretti, Branch Connally and \u201cFerg\u201d Ferguson \u2013 have picked up Longmire\u2019s slack during that time, but as the show begins he is renewing his focus on doing his job to the best of his abilities.<\/p>\n

Longmire, as played by Australian actor Robert Taylor, reminds me of James Arness\u2019s Matt Dillon not so much in looks, but attitude. He\u2019s an imposing figure with a strong sense of justice along with a compassionate heart for the victims he\u2019s trying to help. He\u2019s also a man grounded in the past. Longmire\u2019s stubborn refusal to carry a cell phone as a statement against modernity is repeatedly played for a chuckle \u2013 and yet you can\u2019t help but admire him for it. And when faced with some of the crimes he has to solve, he laments the fact that this is no longer the Wyoming he knew, suggesting that criminals \u2013 and maybe the world \u2013 have gotten more mean and corrupt since he was a young cop.<\/p>\n

Longmire has his flaws, but overall he is a character grounded in traditional American heroism: he treats his friends and fellow officers like family, always looks out for the little guy, and puts his life on the line in the pursuit of his duty.<\/p>\n

Longmire is running for re-election as sheriff, faced by none other than his deputy, Branch. Yet Walt lacks the self-aggrandizing ego we\u2019re used to seeing in people who run for office and can barely be bothered to show up at one of his own campaign rallies. The bread-and-circuses part of electioneering clearly don\u2019t appeal to him. He simply wants to be re-elected if the people believe he\u2019s done a good job.<\/p>\n

\u201cLongmire\u201d also reminds me of \u201cGunsmoke\u201d in the sense that its stories can be dark. If you haven\u2019t seen \u201cGunsmoke\u201d in a while \u2013 or ever \u2013 and think it depicts some idyllic vision of the Old West, think again. By the end of most episodes (at least the old black-and-whites I\u2019ve seen), there was usually a dead good guy and a dead bad guy, if not more. These were not endings in which everybody lived happily ever after. The price of evil and injustice were paid by the innocent and the guilty. In that sense, \u201cLongmire\u201d is no different. The wages of sin are always present.<\/p>\n

Another element that makes the show work is the supporting cast and characters. As Deputy \u201cVic\u201d Moretti \u2013 a fish-out-of-water transplant from Philadelphia because her husband\u2019s job got transferred \u2013 Katee Sackhoff brings the attitude, edge, humor and heart that defined her portrayal of Starbuck on \u201cBattlestar Galactica.\u201d Bailey Chase, as Longmire\u2019s deputy and opponent Branch Connally, comes across as cocky, yet never to the point where he\u2019s unlikably so; he realizes that there are things he can still learn from his older and sometimes wiser boss. Lou Diamond Phillips as Henry Standing Bear, a Cheyenne who is Walt\u2019s best friend and liaison with the local Indian reservation, conveys dignity, intelligence and a stoic humor. Adam Bartley as Deputy \u201cFerg\u201d Ferguson often brings the semi-Barney-Fifeish comic relief.<\/p>\n

\u201cLongmire\u201d became A&E\u2019s highest rated scripted drama when it debuted in 2012, suggesting that America may want some regular heroes along with its antiheroes. I began watching the show on Netflix a few weeks ago and am currently up to episode eight of season one, which is what this review is based on. But \u201cLongmire\u201d is currently in the midst of its second season with new episodes airing Monday nights at 10\/9C.<\/p>\n

$\"\"$ <\/a>\u201cLongmire\u201d is a basic cable series so the crime scenes can be a little graphic, the occasional expletive is thrown around, and adult themes and sexual situations sometimes arise. But if you\u2019re looking for a modern Western\/crime-drama with an old-fashioned heart, you may want to give \u201cLongmire\u201d a try.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"