In a small, dusty border town, two long-time best friends of the mysterious gunman Josey Wales are brutally murdered by marauding rurales. The rurales, led by the beastial Commandante Escobar, head back to Mexico with gambler Ten Spot as hostage. Told of his friend's peril, Josey sets out on a trail of bloody vengeance.

Shortly after moving to Dallas, a young woman is raped at gunpoint. Her intense anger drives her to seek revenge, and she becomes a hunter on a vengeance mission.

The historic federal-state controversy over the integration of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, as seen through the eyes of Elizabeth Huckaby, one of the teachers and girls' vice principal.