User Reviews

Is he John Abbot or isn't he? Dennis Carter says Cheyenne Bodie is the heir to about half the territory of Wyoming. White Cloud, chief of the tribe that killed Cheyenne's parents, named the baby boy he saved and raised as his own ("Years have been good to you, my son."), produces a locket to prove it. When Cheyenne meets Lionel Abbot, the test seems to be whether or not he'll fight the resident bully. Then there's John's half-brother James Abbot, an alcoholic whiner who has hated him all his life so doesn't welcome him with open arms. James' wife, Lorna, is the only one in the family with any sense, but her appeals go unheeded. Lionel turns out to be not only the richest man in the territory but also the most bitter, bigoted, and overbearing.

After Cheyenne spends some time with the Abbots, he concludes that they might not be the family he's always wanted. "I always thought of a family as something kinda special, closer than the closest friends, held together by blood and trust." But he's willing to give the Abbots a try, offering to share equally with James and hoping to give back the land that had been taken from White Cloud's tribe. Then when Cheyenne saves him from drowning and from being killed by White Cloud's braves, James begins grudgingly to change his mind about the man he set up to be the brother he'd always hated.

Cheyenne isn't there long before he finds out the truth. Carter tries to kill him and is shot by James, who admits that it's all a fraud concocted to make sure he inherits the estate he feels belongs to him alone. Even though he does his best to talk some sense into the battling Abbots and even manages to get Lionel and White Cloud to meet face-to-face, when Cheyenne leaves, the family remains splintered and the family heads stubbornly intolerant. No happy ending on this one, but Cheyenne could ride away confident that he had done all he could to reconcile the combatants.

Peter Whitney (Lionel Abbot) makes a great narrow-minded man who abuses his power; I think those eyebrows have a lot to do with it. William Windom (Dennis Carter) seems to easily pull off playing against type; he's a greedy, murderous detective here but in "My World and Welcome to It" (1969-70) he played a Thurber-like character and was kindly country doc Seth Hazlitt in many episodes of "Murder She Wrote," to name a few examples in his long career. Peter Breck's James Abbot is an annoying spoiled rich kid but, considering who his father is, there's room for sympathy. Craggy-faced Richard Hale's White Cloud is willing to compromise his storied Indian sense of integrity to go along in the scheme to establish Cheyenne as heir to the Abbot ranch; he just wanted his land back for his tribe. If Clint Walker's appealing, honest, and principled Cheyenne Bodie hadn't been the center of this story, I wouldn't have wanted to spend 50 minutes with any of these characters.

The most-interesting thing about "Cheyenne" is, as TV reviewers of the show's era pointed out, Mr Walker's chest. (The Trivia section of the IMDb reviews indicates whether his shirt comes off in a given episode.) Clint is his well-chosen stage name, and he definitely //looks like// someone named Clint Walker. He also, at times, resembles a bull on two legs.

"Cheyenne" falls somewhere between adult and kiddie Westerns. Befitting the latter, Cheyenne is impeccably decent, law-abiding, and honorable, a role model for children. * As with too many TV series, each episode ends with all the problems resolved, as Cheyenne rides off in search of another problem to be set right -- Mary Worth on a horse. *

This episode finds Cheyenne as the supposed son of a man (Abbot) who owns half of Montana -- and the land Cheyenne was raised on. There is warfare between Abbot and White Cloud (Cheyenne's father), as tit-for-tat revenge for continual killings. Cheyenne is willing to believe he's Abbot's son, because he can use his position to set things right.

He finally forces Abbot and White Cloud to talk with each other, but nothing is decided. White Cloud seems to be coming to an understanding that it's time to make peace, but Abbot rides off in a huff -- an ambiguous and not necessarily happy ending. One wonders how much of an influence Roy Huggins was.

Not great drama, but a change of pace for a largely formulaic series.

The cast is interesting.

Peter Whitney (Abbot) was a big, heavyset man, but Walker "cuts him down to size" (at least visually).

William Windom, playing a villain, is recognizable mostly by his voice.

X Brands, a German (!!!) actor noted for his accurate portrayals of First Americans, appears in a small role. He's probably best remembered as Yancy Derringer's faithful Indian companion.

* Cheyenne Bodie is so-named because he was raised by the Cheyenne. Here we meet his First American father, and learn he was called Gray Fox. He is supposedly a "lonely man" who cannot settle down. The stories take this as a "given", and does little to develop it.