Broken Trail, on AMC
AMC; IMDb; Sony Pictures; TV Tango; TV Tropes; Wikipedia
streaming sites: Amazon; Google Play; iTunes; Movies Anywhere; Vudu; YouTube

Caution: spoilers.

This miniseries first aired in 2006. I vaguely recall wanting to see it at the time, but I'm afraid I can't remember if I saw a bit of it, all of it, or none of it. I got it on DVD in 2013 and watched it then, and I feel like some of it was vaguely familiar, but I'm still not sure.

Anyway, it's set in 1898. It starts with a lowlife named Captain Billy Fender buying five Chinese girls in San Francisco, to transport to a mining town, where they were to be enslaved as prostitutes. Meanwhile, in Oregon, a cowboy named Print Ritter shows up at a ranch to deliver news to his nephew, Tom Harte, that Tom's mother had died. She'd left her property to Print, but he planned to use it as collateral to borrow money and buy horses to transport to Wyoming, where he'd sell them to the British Army. He wanted Tom to come with him and help herd the horses, and also wanted to reconnect with him, since Tom had been estranged from his family, I guess. At the first town they stop at along the way, Tom meets a fiddle-player named Henry "Heck" Gilpin, and hires him to help with the drive.

Not long after that, the three of them meet Fender, and while they don't seem comfortable with the business he's engaged in, they let him join them. That night, he shares some alcohol with them, which he had drugged. In the morning, they woke up to find he'd stolen their money and horses, and left four of the Chinese girls behind. Tom rode after Fender, soon caught up with him, killed him, and brought the horses back, along with the fifth girl. So now Tom, Print, and Heck would have to take the girls along with them, hoping to find a safe place to leave them. Of course, things are somewhat complicated by the fact that none of the girls speak English (and of course none of the three cowboys speak Chinese).

Toward the end of the first episode, they reach the mining town- Cariboo, a name I find a bit amusing since I happen to live near a city called Caribou. They're hoping to leave the girls there, but there are no authorities in town, no place that would be safe for them. They meet a Chinese man named Lung Hay, who can translate for them. They also meet Kate "Big Rump" Becker, a madam who runs pretty much all the vices in town, and who had actually paid for the girls; she'd just sent Fender to collect them and deliver them to her. She naturally wanted her property, but Tom and the others were not willing to give the girls to her. After meeting Kate, Tom and Heck return to the room they'd rented, and find a couple of guys trying to rape the girls. One of Kate's prostitutes, Nola Johns, had tried to help them, and now she asked Tom and Heck to take her with them. So Tom, Heck, the girls, Nola, and Lung Hay all ride out of town in a hurry, though Kate obviously isn't planning to give up.

So, in part two, she sends a group of men after them, led by Ed "Big Ears" Bywater. In part one, we saw that he had recently gotten out of prison, and that he had a history with Nola. He didn't have an interest in pursuing the cowboys and the girls, until Kate told him that Nola had been the one who snitched on him, which had gotten him sent to prison. So, anyway... Ed and his gang would cause some trouble for the good guys. Meanwhile, of course, the cowboys still have to get all those horses to Wyoming. And Pritt kind of gets close to Nola. And Tom... well, he frequently exchanged meaningful glances with one of the girls, throughout the miniseries.

Don't want to say how it all ends, but there were various random people the main group met at different times throughout both parts of the miniseries. And there were lots of times they were just alone on the trail, or whatever. The story had a fair bit of humor, as well as tragedy, and action, some understated romance, maybe even a bit of rough philosophy. This time I doubt I'll ever forget that I've seen it (and I guess if I did, I could just look at this review). I'm leaving plenty of details out, but basically... it was a good story, and Print was a decent character. And I dunno what else to say.