User Reviews

When a young man, George Whitman, is hired on the Ponderosa work force the rest of the hired hands believe that Whitman is bad luck. For some reason it was common knowledge that Whitman was the thirteenth son of a thirteenth son but all the Cartwrights were unaware of the man's reputation as a jonah.

Thanks to Hoss, he takes Whitman to a saloon soothsayer that gives instruction on how to wash the bad luck away. And when they follow the instruction to the letter and place the charm next to Whitman's heart, all of the sudden someone turned on the light and Whitman becomes a brave sort that can take on the world. But when Hoss tells the soothsayer about using dirt from an Indian burial ground, all of the sudden the voodoo returns. And the saloon fortune teller, Madam Teresa, tells Hoss and Whitman they are foreseen to die. And when events begin to happen that Madam Teresa had foretold, people began to believe in the soothsayer's readings.

The beginning of the show seemed slow as it was more of a woe-is-me tale than an interesting story. But thanks to Dan Blocker ability to capture the interest in a story, the ending picks up nicely. By the end of the episode we have been treated to a interesting superstitious tale that was enjoyable.

Dan Blocker gets his life saved by Andrew Prine and the Cartwrights hire him on as a hand. This despite old hand Ken Mayer's dire predictions that all kinds of bad luck will befall the Cartwrights.

Bad luck is befalling them now with the Ponderosa dealing with some rustling. Still both Hoss and Andrew Prine go to the gypsy fortune teller Angela Clarke who works in a Virginia City saloon. She devises a concoction to take the jinx off Prine. Then when Hoss gets it wrong and an evil curse comes on both of them, she's back offering yet another concoction to take the curse off.

Why do these things only happen with Hoss? Sometimes with Little Joe, never with Adam or Ben. And those rustlers.

Watch this one to see if curses and rustling are taken care of.

This had to be some personal agenda, from some writer, or one of the staff, who must have blackballed the producers, into allowing it.

Terrible script. It drones on and on, endlessly, about one thing: the validity of the gypsy.

I can't believe that Mr. Dotort would ever allow such a script.

Adam is not in it at all. Pernell probably vetoed it.

Pa and Hoss, constantly expressed how these supposed jinxes, were no such thing, yet Hoss immediately, approved of it, and continuously came running to the gypsy.

Pa said it was foolish to believe in it, at least four times. The final scene, shows Pa suddenly changing his mind, and almost running to the gypsy for advice in love-absolutely ridiculous for both the entire series, and for the nature of a true Cattleman of that era.

There are a few great episodes in season 6, but many dubious ones.

It is no wonder that Pernell bailed.