User Reviews

Not that the plot is necessarily bad; sometimes you just have to fall back on the standard, tried-and-true Western format, especially when grinding out a new hour show every week.

I enjoyed the guessing-game relationship between Matt and Forrest Tucker, which was well plotted; just when we thought Matt had him figured out, things took a new, unexpected turn.

Festus was again front-and-center; by mid-season #10, Ken Curtis had become an audience favorite, so his prominence in many scripts was increased. His opening "coffee" scene with Doc went on about 30% longer than it should have, but his charming scene with Guitarist (NOT "Fiddler", as the end credits list him) Rudy Sooter..in real-life an old pal of Ken's from their Western music days... was great. INCIDENTALLY...anyone who doesn't know Ken Curtis' real singing should check out his work (c.1950) with the Sons of the Pioneers. Check You-Tube for the religious song "Little White Cross"....you'll be ASTOUNDED, and so will yer' friends and neighbors who only know Ken as Festus.

Speaking of astounding, check out Doc (Milburn Stone) calling out the Square Dance during the big party scene. Now THAT's worth an extra rating star!

Ultimately, the "B-Western" approach to this script lets us down during the final 10 minutes; I though that scene in the old mine would NEVER end, plus the stunt double for Arness was really obvious in the muddy water action. The ending just didn't cut it; nice try..but the rest of the script's relationship between Matt and Forrest T....very nicely laid out....needed something much less predictable and, well...... "B-Western". LR.

Well I dont like Forest Tucker for starters but the real issue was I didnt care about any of the characters or their issues. This episode was just ok and I feel all of them just phoned it in and picked up the paycheck.

This episode is great because of the story Festus tells about a dog. I love it! Festus was SO MUCH BETTER than Chester in my opinion. I would compare Chester to a Chevy Corvair and Festus to a Rolls Royce.

Matt's old friend, Brad McClain, rides into Dodge and the first few minutes he is in town gets held up by a local named Yuma Joe. Instead of Joe taking his money, Brad whirls around and takes the gun from Joe's hand. He then makes Joe pick up his bags and tells him that he lost his gun as he makes his way down the street.

The next day Brad goes to see Matt and they talk about old times. Brad tells Matt that he is thinking about settling down and is looking for a business to buy. It just so happens that Jake Bookly's stagecoach line is for sell and Matt introduces him to Jake.

Jake shows Brad all the stage routes and the fact that they have some large money and gold shipments coming and going from Dodge and the danger that can happen. But then some strange things occur that makes Matt suspicious of Brad's intentions. When Yuma Joe is killed even the viewers know that something is amiss. With a large gold shipment coming in on the stage line and Brad riding shotgun, Matt and the viewer believe all is not well.

The episode provided nothing new and seemed like a rehashed plot. Not to say that there was bad acting but there was some odd occurrences during the show. Matt gets knocked out with a small judo chop to the shoulder which was literally absurd. Plus when the scene goes to an abandon mine, I was shocked to see how well lit the underground mine is during filming of a TV show. There was a bright spot when Doc Adams is calling square dance moves but little else that is remarkable. Not one of the most interesting shows of the lot.

This episode was on INSP today, so took a look here to check out the guest stars and reviews....as I usually do. And according to the current reviews, discovered that on this showing, two key scenes were cut out entirely. In an effort to squeeze in as many commercials as possible. Bad move INSP programming.

We we see Doc and Festus outside the jail in the opening segment, and then Doc says that they had been discussing coffee until Matt showed up on horseback. That discussion never appeared; apparently because INSP had cut it in order to perserve time. Not acceptable.

After another commercial break we see the big dinner scene at the Longbranch with Matt, Doc, Kitty, Festus, Brad, Botkin and the stage owner. During this scene the characters discuss how much fun the squaredance was and that ol' Doc did a great job calling and included Fesus dancing. However, the squaredance scene was ALSO cut, as it obviously occured before the dinner scene, and right after a commercial.

Cutting out a squaredance with Doc, Rudy, Chester and Sam is basically an unforgiveable sin where I come from! Two cuts is even worse.

There were slow paced portions of this episode that would have been acceptable to cut, however these used were both comming out of commercials, so the easy path was taken.

Reckon I'll have to pony down for the DVD set.