Have Gun - Will Travel (TV Series) The Prophet (1960) User Reviews

Apocalpse Then

[zsenorsock · 6/10 · 6 May 2007]

In a story that predates "Apocalpse Now", Army Intelligence asks Paladin to investigate, bring back and kill if necessary a renegade Colonel Nunez(Sheppherd Strudwick) who has gone native--married an Indian woman and is training an Army of Indians to fight the military.

Paladin once served with the Colonel and when he finds the man, he finds a bitter and paranoid ex-officer who unlike Kurtz is not actually leading the Indians, he's being used by the Indians to learn Army tactics and better kill the round eye. The episode ends with Paladin coming about as close to certain death as he ever has in the series.

Sheppherd Strudwick is no Marlon Brando, but did make a career out of doing a lot of soap operas and small parts over the years. Here he never brings it to the level where his characterization of Colonel Nunez is all that memorable, but that may be because of the slow direction in this episode. Everyone seems to move like they are underwater. The Indian men are convincingly tough, but the Colonel's wife doesn't show us anything that would make us understand why he fell for her in the first place.

Paladin does his best to investigate the situation and try and get the Colonel to see reality, but in the end fails, though he completes the Army's assignment.

In teresting story and excellent performance

[michaelacollins · 9/10 · 20 May 2020]

Shepperd Strudwick Colonel Benjamin Nunez mastered George C. Scott's 'Patton' voice and timbre many years before the film was made. I think it is an intriguing story about a military office who betrays his country and trains the enemy. For that reason alone it is worth watching. Overall, Boone takes a back seat and lets Strudwick take over the show. There is more action than the usual "Have Gun Will Travel" so there are at least a couple good reasons to hang in there until the end.

Heart of Weirdness (Spoiler Alert)

[cougarannie · 10/10 · 24 December 2015]

Long before Joseph Conrad's novel "Heart of Darkness" was brilliantly re-made as "Apocalypse Now" we were presented with this Wild West version.

Colonel Nunez, a once-esteemed Cavalry Officer, has an enormous axe to grind with the U.S. Army --- possibly stemming from a suspicion that his Hispanic roots have hindered his own advancement. His marriage to an Apache woman seems clearly to have been meant to shock the Establishment as he obviously does not love his bride, but her subsequent rape (which he may have even facilitated) gives him the perfect excuse to turn rogue and start training his own Apache Army in the wilderness.

Like Conrad's Kurtz, Nunez feels only contempt for the "savages" he now leads. But unlike Kurtz, Nunez is not viewed as a god by his recruits. They see him for exactly what he is -- a delusional, pathetic old man whose military genius they fully intend to exploit.

Paladin. in the role of Conrad's hired man-hunter Marlow, tries to reason with the man he once admired, convincing Nunez to return and face desertion charges, but finds himself unable to penetrate Nunez's deepening madness. A truly intriguing "adaptation" of a Classic!