Archetypes In Cowboys

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Many characters in the movie demonstrate specific archetypes common to the time period in history. Shane, a former gunfighter/cowboy turned town hero. Joe, who is a homesteader/farmer, refuses to back down from opposition, and leads the revolt against the Ryker crew. Marian is your typical farm wife, who does not want to see her husband hurt. Stonewall Torey, hot headed confederate war veteran with a bad temper, has little concern for the Ryker game, and says he can go to town when he pleases. He is inexperienced with his gun compared to the skilled gunfighter Wilson, which lead to his demise. Wilson is the typical bad guy cowboy, and starts trouble with the farmers. Chris Calloway is the bad guy who goes good, starts a fight with Shane at …show more content…

He works together with Joe as a team and this demonstrates that two walks of life can come together to get a job done. This reflects on the future where they work together to take down Ryker’s crew. This event is meaningful because it sets the scene for the rest of the film. Shane’s focus is on his actions opposed to word. After this, Shane goes into town to buy farmer clothing to replace his cowboy threads he has been wearing. This shows that life in that time period was hard: hard work, no law enforcement, and shootings. Basically whoever had the most money in the settlement could do as they pleased. Money meant power and whoever had the money had the power. That led to problems when poor farmers were threatened by wealthy cattle drivers which were shown in the movie. Ryker, the wealthy cattle driver, abused his status and money to intimidate and wreak havoc upon the homesteaders until they would eventually pack up and leave. Had it not been for Joe standing up to Ryker, and pleading with the other homesteaders in the settlement, they probably would have left to avoid conflict with Ryker, but Joe was not taken down that easily. He wanted to defend his farm under all circumstances, whether that meant killing Wilson and Ryker, and helping his fellow homesteader rebuild when his house was burnt down by Ryker’s