Chris Pratt Plays a Western–Villain?–In the First Trailer for Vincent D’Onofrio’s The Kid

You don’t often see a trailer that is simultaneously so familiar and odd as this one, our first look at the Vincent D’Onofrio-directed western The Kid. Familiar in the sense that the cast and color palette seems comfortably on brand for the genre—it’s a reunion of three actors from 2016’s The Magnificent Seven, actually—it’s also quite odd, if only for the fact that the trailer’s big reveal is Chris Pratt, in a magnificently bushy beard, playing an honest-to-god villain.

No, really! The film’s official synopsis literally uses the word “evil” as the first descriptor of Pratt’s character, which certainly marks a departure for him. Here’s that synopsis in full:

Rio (Jake Schur) is forced to go on the run across the Southwestern United States to save his sister Sara (Leila George) from his evil uncle Grant Cutler (Chris Pratt). Along the way, he encounters Sheriff Pat Garrett (Ethan Hawke) on the hunt for the infamous outlaw Billy the Kid (Dane DeHaan). Ultimately Rio must choose which type of man he is going to become, the outlaw or the man of valor, and will use the self-realization in a final act to save his sister.

Presumably, “the kid” is more of a reference to newcomer Jake Schur here than it is to the guy whose nickname was historically “the kid.” In that role as Billy, Dane DeHaan looks pretty natural—perhaps a bit similar to Leonardo DiCaprio’s fresh-faced character from The Quick and the Dead, who also happened to be referred to as “The Kid.” It would seem that “the kid” is something of a Western stock trope, is it not?

The Kid hits theaters very soon, on March 8, 2019, via Lionsgate. Check out the trailer below, and let us know whether you’re able to buy Chris Pratt as the bushy antagonist in a period piece.