IMHO, the Lonesome Dove novel is alot more entertaining than The Last Picture Show novel. The miniseries is really one of the best examples of the “just successfully film the book and people will be happy” that I can think of. I can only think of one spot where they changed something and messed it up, but it’s easy to just shrug off. The book is still better, but the perfect casting prevents the miniseries from being skippable for people who read the book.

I did not watch the apocryphal “Return to Lonesome Dove” miniseries, which is not based on a book, or the TV show. The other miniseries are mediocre-to-bad, even if I enjoyed the other books. I’ll concede that George Carlin was a great casting choice for Streets of Laredo, but I still disliked much of the series.