Pick of the week
The Abandons
As his biker epic Sons of Anarchy proved, Kurt Sutter is helpless to resist the iconography of the American outlaw. This western is set in the 1850s, a gritty era of cattle rustlers, blood vendettas and murders with pitchforks. In rural Oregon, the brutal Van Ness family are threatening smallholders as they expand their territory. Will the locals join forces to protect their homesteads? Lena Headey stars as sad-eyed Irish emigre Fiona Nolan, a woman who cannot bear children but has gathered a band of orphans around her. Looming menacingly over her is Constance Van Ness (Gillian Anderson), an amusingly one-note villain. Pure hokum but it rattles along entertainingly.
Netflix, from Thursday 4 December
