This is a whole 'nother kind of western.

It starts with a singing, guitar-playing cowboy all dressed in white, but the eponymous Buster Scruggs (Tim Blake Nelson) is no milk-drinking Fancy Dan, but a ruthless gambler and killer who's assured of his own invincibility. But, in this montage of six stories from the Coen brothers, don't get too attached to any of the stars.

That said, they're a lot of fun.

Besides the titular hero, the film offers segments on a would-be bank robber and accidental rustler who's destined for a rope, a traveling road show with fewer limbs than you might expect, a wilderness prospector, a woman with a dog but little hope who's bound for Oregon on a wagon train, and a group of stagecoach passengers with several stories to tell.

Some of the yarns are played for laughs, others are deadly serious and thought-provoking. There's music and a few great speeches, a lot of gunplay and some lonely frontier towns.

And there are some great performances, too. Besides Nelson, the movie benefits from the likes of James Franco (the cowboy), Tom Waits (the prospector), Clancy Brown (the mean gambler), Liam Neeson and Harry Melling (the impresario and the artist), Bill Heck and Grainger Hines (the wagonmasters), Zoe Kazan (the woman alone), and Jonjo O'Neill, Brendan Gleeson, Saul Rubinek, Chelcie Ross and Tyne Daly (the stagecoach passengers).

Nothing links the stories except maybe a theme of death, but each is a complete tale with unexpected developments and some gorgeous sets and scenery.

I stumbled on this made-for-Netflix movie purely by accident, but I'm sure glad I did.