Watching this episode makes me wish there was a real good movie or documentary about Crazy Horse of the Oglala Lakota Sioux. He was one of the chiefs that led a war party to victory at the Battle of Little Big Horn in June of 1876. Referencing my summary line above, there's a scene in this story where Matt Clark (Jim Davis) shoots at Crazy Horse making a getaway from a posse and Matt claims he couldn't have missed. It was a neat tie-in to the legend of Crazy Horse's mysticism and belief that he couldn't be killed in battle.
I also got a kick out of the opening scene in which a band of Sioux warriors set an explosive to blow up a train crossing a wooden bridge. When the dynamite goes off, we see a timbers flying and a cloud of smoke that fills the screen which served as a good cover for not having to wreck an actual train. I thought that was pretty clever.
There's a comical event as well. There's a sheriff in this story portrayed by actor Chubby Johnson who's fifty one years old at the time and he lives up to his nickname. Why he was cast as a sheriff here probably had more to do with his availability at the time than to his looking like a lawman. When he and Matt take off after Crazy Horse, another Indian shoots him, and instead of falling off his horse, he puts one leg over the side of his saddle and plops off. It's just the funniest thing, quite like nothing I've seen before in any Western.
The story ends with the surrender of Crazy Horse to the military with Matt Clark present and promising that he wouldn't have to go to prison. Of course Matt's authority here is secondary to the Major in charge, and the railroad detective averts Crazy Horse's gaze as he's marched to a jail cell. The death of Crazy Horse is depicted relatively accurate, stabbed by a military guard as he resists imprisonment.
I also got a kick out of the opening scene in which a band of Sioux warriors set an explosive to blow up a train crossing a wooden bridge. When the dynamite goes off, we see a timbers flying and a cloud of smoke that fills the screen which served as a good cover for not having to wreck an actual train. I thought that was pretty clever.
There's a comical event as well. There's a sheriff in this story portrayed by actor Chubby Johnson who's fifty one years old at the time and he lives up to his nickname. Why he was cast as a sheriff here probably had more to do with his availability at the time than to his looking like a lawman. When he and Matt take off after Crazy Horse, another Indian shoots him, and instead of falling off his horse, he puts one leg over the side of his saddle and plops off. It's just the funniest thing, quite like nothing I've seen before in any Western.
The story ends with the surrender of Crazy Horse to the military with Matt Clark present and promising that he wouldn't have to go to prison. Of course Matt's authority here is secondary to the Major in charge, and the railroad detective averts Crazy Horse's gaze as he's marched to a jail cell. The death of Crazy Horse is depicted relatively accurate, stabbed by a military guard as he resists imprisonment.
