1879, à Rose Creek. L’industriel Bartholomew « Bart » Bogue arrive avec l'intention d'acheter aux habitants leurs terres à bas prix et d'exploiter la mine d'or proche de la ville. Aidé de ses hommes de main, Bogue terrorise les habitants en abattant quelques uns d'entre eux, dont Matthew Cullen, et en faisant incendier l'église. L’homme d’affaires sans scrupule se retire ensuite à Sacramento, durant trois semaines, le temps que les habitants se décident. Alors que la veuve Emma Cullen rencontre le chasseur de primes Sam Chisolm dans une ville voisine, elle lui réclame son aide. Ce dernier accepte. Afin de fonder une équipe, il recrute aussitôt six hommes de divers horizons : Josh Faraday, Goodnight Robicheaux, Jack Horne, Billy Rocks, Manuel Vasquez et Red Harvest. Après avoir éliminé la garde de Bogue laissée à Rose Creek, les sept mercenaires décident d'entraîner les habitants pour les préparer à résister au retour de Bogue et ses hommes.
Sick of the betrayals the United States government has perpetrated on the Native Americans, Colonel William Ludlow retires with his family to a remote part of Montana with One Stab, a Cree friend, where they build a ranch. Accompanying them are hired hand Decker, who's an outlaw; Decker's Cree wife, Pet; and their daughter, Isabel Two. Ludlow's wife Isabel, who does not adapt to the harsh winters, at first leaves for the winter to come back during the summer. One spring she doesn't return and moves to the East Coast. As much as her sons love her, it's Tristan that is most affected by her abandonment and he vows never to speak of her again.
The film is set in 1880 in Big Whiskey, Wyoming, where Little Bill Daggett, the local sheriff and former gunfighter, does not allow guns or criminals in his town. Two cowboys, Quick Mike and "Davey-Boy" Bunting, disfigure prostitute Delilah Fitzgerald after she laughs at the small size of Quick Mike's penis. Instead of punishing the cowboys, Little Bill allows them to pay compensation to the brothel owner, Skinny Dubois. The rest of the prostitutes, led by Strawberry Alice, are infuriated by this leniency and offer a $1,000 reward to whoever can kill the cowboys.
Thirty years after a nuclear apocalypse, Eli (Denzel Washington) travels on foot toward the west coast of the former United States. Along the way he demonstrates uncanny survival and fighting skills, hunting wildlife and swiftly defeating a group of desert bandits who try to ambush him. Searching for water, he arrives in a ramshackle town rebuilt and overseen by Carnegie (Gary Oldman). Carnegie dreams of building more towns and of controlling the people by using the power of a certain book. His henchmen scour the desolate landscape daily in search of it, but to no avail.
In post-Civil War Wyoming, John "The Hangman" Ruth (Russell) is escorting fugitive Daisy "The Prisoner" Domergue (Leigh) to Red Rock where the latter will face justice for murder. They encounter another bounty hunter named Major Marquis "The Bounty Hunter" Warren (Jackson) and Chris "The Sheriff" Mannix (Goggins). A blizzard forces the four to take shelter at a stagecoach passover called Minnie's Haberdashery where they encounter four more strangers; Bob "The Mexican" (Bichir), Oswaldo "The Little Man" Mobray (Roth), Joe "The Cow Puncher" Gage (Madsen), and ex-General Sanford "The Confederate" Smithers (Dern). Through betrayal and deception, the eight strangers soon learn that they may not make it to Red Rock after all.
Maggie is the only cow left on the Dixon Ranch after Alameda Slim (a cattle rustler capable of stealing 500 in a single night) stole all the rest of Mr. Dixon's cattle. Dixon sells Maggie to Pearl, a kind and elderly woman who runs a small farm called Patch of Heaven. The local Sheriff arrives to tell Pearl that her bank is cracking down on debtors. Pearl has three days to pay the bank $750, or her farm will be sold to the highest bidder. Hearing this, Maggie convinces the other cows on the farm (Grace, a happy-go-lucky character, and Mrs. Caloway, who has had leadership gone to her head) to go to town to attempt winning prize money at a fair. While the cows are in town, a bounty hunter named Rico (who Buck, the Sheriff's horse, idolizes) drops a criminal off and collects the reward. Stating he needs a replacement horse to go after Alameda Slim while his own horse rests, he takes Buck. When Maggie find out that the reward for capturing Slim is of exactly $750, she convinces the other cows to try to capture him to save Patch of Heaven.
In 1850 (nine years after the events of the first film), California is voting on whether to join the United States of America as a state. A wild gunman with wooden teeth, Jacob McGivens, attempts to steal some ballots, but Zorro chases after him and recaptures the votes. In their scuffle, McGivens pulls off Zorro's mask. A pair of Pinkerton agents recognize him as Don Alejandro de la Vega. Zorro fashions a makeshift mask from his costume and rides off on his stallion, Tornado, to deliver the votes to the governor. Upon returning to his mansion, Alejandro is greeted by his loving wife, Elena (Catherine Zeta-Jones). Elena believes that Alejandro can now up give his alter ego, but Alejandro is sure that the people will still need him. The next day, after sending their son Joaquin to school, Elena is confronted by the Pinkertons, who disclose their knowledge of Zorro's identity. Soon after, Elena is forced to have Alejandro served with divorce papers.
In 1893 Ireland, Joseph Donnelly's family home is burned down by his landlord's men because of unpaid rent. Vowing revenge, Joseph attempts to kill the landlord Christie whose daughter Shannon has rebelled against family tradition and made plans to claim free land in America. She offers to take Joseph with her as her "servant" so she, a single woman, can travel without scandal. Joseph agrees, convinced he can also stake a land claim.
The film starts with a brief introduction in the 19th-century American West featuring a bald eagle gliding over the homeland of the mustangs, showing several western US National Parks. There is then a scene showing the birth of a dun Kiger Mustang, Spirit. Spirit soon grows into a stallion, and assumes the role of leader of the herd, whose duty it is to keep the herd safe, demonstrated when he saves two foals from a mountain lion. Spirit is a courageous leader, but has great curiosity. Spotting a strange light one night not far from his herd, the stallion is unable to control his curiosity and moves towards it. To Spirit's surprise, he finds restrained, docile horses, and two-legs (possibly wranglers) sleeping around a campfire. They wake up, and seeing him as a magnificent specimen, chase and capture him, then drag him to a US cavalry post.
In the American Old West of 1874, construction on a new railroad led by Lyle (Burton Gilliam) runs into quicksand. The route has to be changed, which will require it to go through Rock Ridge, a frontier town where everyone has the last name of "Johnson" (including a "Howard Johnson," a "Dr. Samuel Johnson," a "Van Johnson" and an "Olson N. Johnson"). The conniving State Attorney General Hedley Lamarr (Harvey Korman) – who constantly has to correct people who call him "Hedy", the name of a movie star, instead of "Hedley" – wants to buy the land along the new railroad route cheaply by driving out the townspeople. He sends a gang of thugs, led by his flunky assistant Taggart (Slim Pickens), to scare them away, prompting the townsfolk to demand that Governor William J. Le Petomane (Mel Brooks) appoint a new sheriff. Lamarr persuades the dim-witted Le Petomane to select Bart (Cleavon Little), a black railroad worker who was about to be hanged, as he believes a black lawman will so offend the townspeople that they will either abandon Rock Ridge or lynch the new sheriff, with either result paving the way for him to take over the town.
Le pistolero Roland de Gilead est lancé sur les traces de Walter Padick, l'homme en noir. Assoiffé de vengeance, Roland doit par ailleurs protéger la mythique Tour sombre, lieu servant de point de connexion entre tous les univers, pour sauver son monde sur le point de s'écrouler. Il peut compter sur l'aide de Jake Chambers, un adolescent originaire de la « Terre-clef » et ayant reçu de nombreuses visions de Roland, de son ennemi juré et de la Tour sombre.
In 1891, American Frank Hopkins (Viggo Mortensen) and his mustang, Hidalgo, are part of Buffalo Bill's Wild West show, where they are advertised as "the world's greatest distance horse and rider". Hopkins had been a famous distance rider, a cowboy, and a dispatch rider for the United States government; in the latter capacity he carried a message to the U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment authorizing the Wounded Knee Massacre of Lakota Sioux.
William Blake, an accountant from Cleveland, Ohio, rides by train to the frontier company town of Machine to assume a promised job as an accountant in the town's metal works. During the trip, a Fireman warns Blake against the enterprise while passengers shoot buffalo from the train windows. Arriving in town, Blake discovers that his position has already been filled, and he is driven from the workplace at gunpoint by John Dickinson, the ferocious owner of the company. Jobless and without money or prospects, Blake meets Thel Russell, a former prostitute who sells paper flowers. He lets her take him home. Thel's ex-boyfriend Charlie surprises them in bed and shoots at Blake, accidentally killing Thel when she tries to shield Blake with her body. A wounded Blake shoots and kills Charlie with Thel's gun before climbing dazedly out the window and fleeing Machine on a stolen horse. Company-owner Dickinson just happens to be Charlie's father, and he hires three legendary frontier killers, Cole Wilson, Conway Twill, and Johnny "The Kid" Pickett to bring Blake back 'dead or alive'.
In late 1890s Wyoming, Butch Cassidy (Paul Newman) is the affable, clever, talkative leader of the outlaw Hole in the Wall Gang. His closest companion is the laconic dead-shot "Sundance Kid" (Robert Redford). The two return to their hideout at Hole-in-the-Wall (Wyoming) to discover that the rest of the gang, irked at Butch's long absences, have selected Harvey Logan (Ted Cassidy) as their new leader. Harvey challenges Butch to a knife fight over the gang's leadership. Butch defeats him using trickery, but embraces Harvey's idea to rob the Union Pacific Overland Flyer train on both its eastward and westward runs, agreeing that the second robbery would be unexpected and likely reap even more money than the first.