While Chester is out searching for Doc, his horse is injured. Chester goes to a house for help and is instead taken prisoner.While Chester is out searching for Doc, his horse is injured. Chester goes to a house for help and is instead taken prisoner.While Chester is out searching for Doc, his horse is injured. Chester goes to a house for help and is instead taken prisoner.
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- Director
- Writers
- John Meston(uncredited)
- Frank Paris
- Norman MacDonnell(uncredited)
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
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Featured review
Just Another Abusive Hillbilly Husband
The incredibly morbid and depressing John Meston wrote a large number of the Gunsmoke episodes until he was let go in 1965. There is rarely a happy ending, and most of the people Marshal Dillon and Chester meet on the prairie are vile, evil, vicious, and vindictive.
The prairie folks are usually stealing horses, potatoes, other food, cattle-rustling, murdering travelers, or engaged in petty feuds. In the "adult Western" genre, The Old West is a tough place to survive.
This tale is no exception. Dillon and Chester are riding out to look for Doc Adams, who has not been in town for about four or five days. They split up to cover more ground. Naturally, it is the incompetent Chester whose horse goes lame. As the dim-witted sidekick, all the bad things always happened mostly to Chester.
So now Chester is on foot, and he comes across vicious and nasty Dack, played by Charles Aidman. Aidman was on Gunsmoke five times. He had a very ugly face, and was usually playing villains, henchmen, dishonest partners, back-stabbing friends, and other lowlifes.
He is perfect in this episode, playing a totally paranoid, borderline insane, wife-abusing horse-thief. Aidman was over the top, ranting evil at his common-law wife, shaking her, pushing her, threatening to kill her, and all over a few horses that he had stolen. Since dumb Chester immediately tells Aidman that he is working for Marshal Dillon, Aidman presumes that Dillon is looking for Aidman. So after he disables Chester and ties him up, the rest of the episode is all about Aidman ranting and raving about killing Chester, threatening and beating his wife, and just going nuts. Aidman does a great job of being a nasty jerk. As an actor, Aidman put in a great performance as another Gunsmoke prairie psychopath.
Chester spends most of this episode tied-up and laying on his back, looking pathetic, as he often did. Mary Munday played Lillamae, Aidman's common-law wife. She was on Gunsmoke only this once. She is very convincing as a woman who wants to be loved, and is getting abused instead.
The only bright spot is when Matt Dillon finds Doc Adams at the home of a local rancher named Bowers (played by Harry Shannon in his only Gunsmoke appearance). Shannon had a long career in Westerns, and did a good job as the friendly neighbor who had Doc Adams over for a few days because Doc was feeling sick. The few minutes of dinner conversation between Doc Adams, Dillon, and Bowers was the highlight of this episode.
The prairie folks are usually stealing horses, potatoes, other food, cattle-rustling, murdering travelers, or engaged in petty feuds. In the "adult Western" genre, The Old West is a tough place to survive.
This tale is no exception. Dillon and Chester are riding out to look for Doc Adams, who has not been in town for about four or five days. They split up to cover more ground. Naturally, it is the incompetent Chester whose horse goes lame. As the dim-witted sidekick, all the bad things always happened mostly to Chester.
So now Chester is on foot, and he comes across vicious and nasty Dack, played by Charles Aidman. Aidman was on Gunsmoke five times. He had a very ugly face, and was usually playing villains, henchmen, dishonest partners, back-stabbing friends, and other lowlifes.
He is perfect in this episode, playing a totally paranoid, borderline insane, wife-abusing horse-thief. Aidman was over the top, ranting evil at his common-law wife, shaking her, pushing her, threatening to kill her, and all over a few horses that he had stolen. Since dumb Chester immediately tells Aidman that he is working for Marshal Dillon, Aidman presumes that Dillon is looking for Aidman. So after he disables Chester and ties him up, the rest of the episode is all about Aidman ranting and raving about killing Chester, threatening and beating his wife, and just going nuts. Aidman does a great job of being a nasty jerk. As an actor, Aidman put in a great performance as another Gunsmoke prairie psychopath.
Chester spends most of this episode tied-up and laying on his back, looking pathetic, as he often did. Mary Munday played Lillamae, Aidman's common-law wife. She was on Gunsmoke only this once. She is very convincing as a woman who wants to be loved, and is getting abused instead.
The only bright spot is when Matt Dillon finds Doc Adams at the home of a local rancher named Bowers (played by Harry Shannon in his only Gunsmoke appearance). Shannon had a long career in Westerns, and did a good job as the friendly neighbor who had Doc Adams over for a few days because Doc was feeling sick. The few minutes of dinner conversation between Doc Adams, Dillon, and Bowers was the highlight of this episode.
helpful•1910
- Johnny_West
- Apr 25, 2020
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Filming locations
- Stage 5 & Stage 6, Paramount Sunset Lot, 5800 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, California, USA(Dodge City Western Street)
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
- Runtime30 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 1.33 : 1
- 4:3
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