Itazura ichiban wrote:
I think that the common theme is a bygone era, in which we fantasize that honor, courage and inner strength were factors that enobled the heros of that day. It's a gross generalization, historically of course. But that doesn't matter, since when we watch these dramas, we are inspired to be a little more than we are today.
Well if you think the timeline of western movies, even it is the late 19. century-early 20. century, the stories take in uncivilised lands with people who still have the medieval mentality from 300-400 hunders years ago. Outlaws are everywhere, people rule by the gun. And this clash of distant eras makes it close to samurai dominant Japan, because like that period common man is extremely unprotected. A samurai can kill a common man very easily like an outlaw in wild west. Apart from the legal rights of samurai to be able to do that, he has etreme fighting skills that a common man never had. Like that, western era outlaws have similer extreme fighting skill level, but with their gun. In a normal late 19. century country nobody carries a gun and shoot eachother, so common man does not need to have to those skills. But "wild west" is not 19. century, more like a time travel to the medieval with modern guns so common man finds himself in environment that he is bottom of the society if he does not fight back. This similar "crazy" circumstance creates same kind of idea for a samurai or wild west guy: questioning honor, nobility and what is it that being a real man.
just my two cents (with a bad english), as i am madly in love with both genres i couldn't resist.