My understanding is that the cussing is accurate to the times. When the show first came out I read lots of articles about it--I love westerns--and the folks who make it apparently did lots of research about the old west of the time, including the use of language. And they did swear a lot back then.

Any time you get a group of men together with little female interaction for an extended period of time, the level of profanity goes through the roof.

I didn't notice it as much after the first 2-3 episodes. It just kinda blended into the atmosphere - like Jack capping asses in 24.

Good to hear it,it really is an amazing show.I think another thing that really helped me appreciate it was reading about the lives of the real people a lot of the characters are based on.Here is a Link to a site with a little write up about most of them.

Season 2 starts this weekend ( Sunday night) ...Woot !

I just read the dime novel Deadwood Dick for my english fiction class. Is the town Deadwood in the show based on the same town Deadwood from the story I read? In the story Deadwood was a town mostly populated by gold miners and gamblers and was a pretty rough place.

The Deadwood of the dime novels was fictional, although the real Deadwood embraced the novels and several people took the name "Deadwood Dick" over the years.

Here's a page on Deadwood Dick:

http://www.kessells.cwc.net/personal/dozen.html

I don't think I've loved a "bad guy" like Al since JR Ewing...and I mean that as one of the highest compliments. He's one of the best TV villians EVER.

Absolutely, he had me from the very first episode, with that amazing closing scene. IMO he is as good if not better, than any TV villain I've ever seen.

you'll get to where you don't even notice the cussing....the stories and character development is some of the best I've ever seen on any show.

I'm not a fan of excessive cussing OR westerns, but Deadwood is the best series I've ever seen

I just started watching this series, finished ep 4 last night. My jaw just dropped when I was not expecting that at all.

Kind of like the thread starter, I was a bit distracted by the cursing at first. I think it's because I've never seen a Western with language like this, but the typical lack of language is probably a construct of Hollywood rather than reality. The show has really hooked me, though. But I still can't believe that

I'd put Stringer Bell of the wire and Vernon Schillinger of Oz in the top 5 as well