Notes

* AlbinismIsValuable: The horse owned by Kicking Bird, as befitting for a medicine man, is an albino.
* AnnoyingArrows: PlayedWith. It takes ''six'' arrows to kill [[spoiler: Timmons]] and he still lives long enough to be scalped alive. In other situations, one arrow is usually enough, but it still doesn't guarantee instant death.
* BlownAcrossTheRoom: When the Pawnees decide to sneak-attack the camp, [[spoiler: they didn't expect Sioux being armed with rifles. One of them ends up being literally blown out of a tipi he just entered]].
* HiddenDepths: John would make an amazing ethnographer with his insight on many subjects, keen observations and trying to document as much as possible. Yet the Army he is mostly valuable as someone who willingly wants [[ReassignedToAntarctica to be posted at the frontier]].
* JerkassVictim: Parents of Standing With A Fist, all things considered. [[spoiler: From what little is shown, they've decided it's a wise choice to antagonise a group of Pawnees and treat them like dirt, despite tense situation and essentially squatting on tribe's land. It turns into TooDumbToLive when they face the natives unarmed, trying to shoo them away like dogs and then turn their backs on the Pawnees]].
* MightyWhitey: Debatable if not nearly as overt as most other examples. Rather than being superior to the Sioux, John spends the whole story to get acknowledged by them as part of the tribe, struggling with their culture and language while adapting. He never takes any special position and in few particular instances, is given inferior role and duties due to being an outsider. [[spoiler: By the end of the story, he needs to be saved by the rest of the tribe, in the process also endangering its existence]].
* SoldierVsWarrior: Despite being a career officer with a hefty experience behind his belt, Dunbar is not considered "ready" to be a warrior when Sioux organise their war party. Both sides acknowledge reasoning behind this decision without any hard feelings.
* StockScream: The Pawnee blown out of the tipi uses the classic Wilhelm.
* TranslationConvention: Averted and averted hard. While shooting half of the movie in Lakota was ridiculed during the production, it turned out to be a fantastic choice from stylistic standpoint. Both critics and audiences praised how much more real it felt thanks to Sioux talking in their language and John struggling with it.[[note]]However, it turned into unintentional comedy for actual Lakota users, as most of actors had to be coached into it and by a woman - while Lakota lacks grammatical gender, there is still enough differences betweem "men" and "women" Lakota[[/note]]
* WarIsHell: Unfortunately, John learns too late there isn't much difference if it's Union vs. Confederates or Sioux vs. Pawnee. It's always messy, brutal and with sensless waste of human life.