Frontier Gentleman was one of several "adult westerns," along with Gunsmoke (1952–1961), Luke Slaughter of Tombstone and others, that appeared on radio and television in the early 1950s. The genre was described as "grittier, more realistic, and clearly intended for an older audience.

Adult westerns were less the descendants of their juvenile predecessors than they were cousins of western feature films such as Shane (1953), with Alan Ladd and High Noon (1952), starring Gary Cooper"