A pair of pretty dimwitted villains are investigated by Hopalong Cassidy (William Boyd) for a series of express company hold-ups, and you have to wonder why they didn't lay low long enough for Hoppy to get tired and give up pursuit. The picture did do an adequate job of keeping me in the dark on whether Ed Colby (Minor Watson) and Sheriff Cameron (Lee Phelps) were conspiring with the outlaws or not. Colby was a reformed bad guy trying to go straight, but it's not until the end of the story that that was confirmed. The sheriff, well he seemed inept enough to be in league with Ward Ackerman's (George Anderson) bunch, but wound up helping Hoppy round up the baddies to close out the story.
The story is not so much about 'hidden gold' as it is about gold being robbed off express company wagons by a bandit posse headed by Ackerman's henchman Hendricks (Roy Barcroft). Hoppy decides to ride shotgun on one of the transports with sidekick Speedy's (Britt Wood) personal gold nugget stash, assuring his friend that it was safe enough under his supervision. You know, Hoppy could have tricked out those small pouches of gold with coal for all the outlaws knew, they never even checked the contents when they robbed the stagecoach!
When it came time for the final showdown between Hoppy's good guys and Ackerman's bunch, I couldn't believe the outlaws would actually retreat into their abandoned mine hideout, virtually assuring their capture! Like I say, they were pretty inept. I'll say this though, the stunt man for Ackerman took a real nasty bump backing out of the mine with Hoppy in pursuit. I had to rewind that scene a couple of times because the guy looked like he could have gotten hurt real bad. That's one thing you never do find out about in these old time flicks.
The comedy relief in the picture is handled by Britt Wood's Speedy character. Not as accomplished as a Gabby Hayes or an Andy Clyde, his running gimmick here is a henpecked foil for a woman he calls Miss Candy, who I assume must be the Matilda Purdy character listed in the credits and portrayed by Ethel Wales. Miss Candy insists on Speedy working his own gold mining aspirations, with an eye on eventual marriage. When it looks like Speedy's about to pop the question, all he's really interested in is keeping her dog Buttercup!
The story is not so much about 'hidden gold' as it is about gold being robbed off express company wagons by a bandit posse headed by Ackerman's henchman Hendricks (Roy Barcroft). Hoppy decides to ride shotgun on one of the transports with sidekick Speedy's (Britt Wood) personal gold nugget stash, assuring his friend that it was safe enough under his supervision. You know, Hoppy could have tricked out those small pouches of gold with coal for all the outlaws knew, they never even checked the contents when they robbed the stagecoach!
When it came time for the final showdown between Hoppy's good guys and Ackerman's bunch, I couldn't believe the outlaws would actually retreat into their abandoned mine hideout, virtually assuring their capture! Like I say, they were pretty inept. I'll say this though, the stunt man for Ackerman took a real nasty bump backing out of the mine with Hoppy in pursuit. I had to rewind that scene a couple of times because the guy looked like he could have gotten hurt real bad. That's one thing you never do find out about in these old time flicks.
The comedy relief in the picture is handled by Britt Wood's Speedy character. Not as accomplished as a Gabby Hayes or an Andy Clyde, his running gimmick here is a henpecked foil for a woman he calls Miss Candy, who I assume must be the Matilda Purdy character listed in the credits and portrayed by Ethel Wales. Miss Candy insists on Speedy working his own gold mining aspirations, with an eye on eventual marriage. When it looks like Speedy's about to pop the question, all he's really interested in is keeping her dog Buttercup!