It consists of six vignettes set on the American frontier. Buster Scruggs, a cheerful singing cowboy clad in white, arrives at an isolated cantina full of outlaws. He exchanges insults with another patron before shooting everyone as they reach for their guns.
Buster then wanders into Frenchman's Gulch and enters a saloon, leaving his guns at the door to comply with its no firearms policy. He joins a game of poker that another player has suddenly left, but discovers the player vacated the seat after being dealt the infamous dead man's hand , which the other players insist Buster play now that he has seen the cards.
When Buster refuses, a large menacing player named Joe stands up and draws a concealed revolver. After failing to persuade Joe to end the confrontation, Buster repeatedly kicks a loose plank in the poker table, which tips Joe's hand so that his gun discharges into his face.
Having shot himself three times, Joe falls dead. Buster breaks the barroom tension with a boisterous song about "Surly Joe", [ b ] [ c ] to the patrons' delight. Joe's brother challenges Buster to a gunfight.
Buster complies and proceeds to shoot off each of the fingers of his opponent's right hand before stylishly finishing him off with the sixth shot delivered over-the-shoulder using a mirror. A young singing cowboy clad in black then rides into town and politely challenges Buster. Buster obliges but, to his surprise, the young man is an even faster draw and shoots him in the forehead. Buster examines the bullet hole in his hat before collapsing, admitting in voice-over that he should have foreseen that "you can't be top dog forever".
