Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Western film" in English language version.
[T]he principal archetype of the genre, the Western hero, is analyzed within the context of his various personas: the chivalrous cowboy, the honorable marshal, the lone crusader, and the rebel outlaw... He is more comfortable living in the open fronteir than in the cities, and most importantly, he does not conform to the laws and customs of civilized society. He answers only to his own code of honor and enforces his own personal brand of justice... [W]riters established the cowboy hero as the legendary icon of the West. They dressed him in chaps and a ten-gallon hat, straddled him atop a horse, armed him with a revolver, and set him loose on the Western plains.
The Western hero himself epitomizes the animus archetype. He is a character that is completely and utterly masculine... In turn, the Native American is often portrayed as the shadow archetype, the representative of savage, wild emotions, and the dark adversary for the hero in their oedipal rivalry over the maternal landscape.
[T]he role of the landscape is typically accentuated, making the scenery in the Western as equally import a character as the hero or villain... a good Western must import a strong sense of the frontier landscape... to depict the glory and majesty of the frontier landscape.