The Westerns

Just checking,
or couldn't you take it anymore?
1. Darren McGavin. I've always liked Darren, especially later in his career when he got to mix it up with every half-baked monster the script writers could toss in the Night Stalker's path.
2. Tyrone Power. 
3. Guy Williams.
4. Bernardo. The actor wasn't allowed to speak because the scripts were so thin anyway there probably weren't enough words to go around. God knows, there was never enough good dialogue.
5. William Conrad, of Cannon and Fat Man fame. Not Robert Conrad, of little fame. "See these batteries on my shoulder, knock 'em off. I dare ya." Shoot the bum.
6. Mica.
7. Paul Fix.
8. Diablo.
9. Leo Carillo.
10. Not counting the wimpy kid, Brandon de Wilde, or Jean Arthur, who was a better cowboy as Calamity Jane in The Plainsman than both of these guys are in this one, the leading men were Van Heflen (not Halen) and the tiny perfect Alan Ladd.
11. Jack (Walter in this one) Palance. Remember the camera trick used to get him off his horse?
12. Wilson.
13. A "bit player" who made such classics as The Maltese Falcon (he was the diminutive gunsel, Wilmer) and The House on Haunted Hill, he was, and possibly still is, Elisha Cook Jr.
14. John Wayne. Much to the chagrin of audiences who felt ourselves duped and used, we find out near the end that it wasn't really Jimmy Stewart who got the bad guy, but ol' Duke, who was hiding like a coward in a dark alley and plugged Liberty with a Winchester at the precise second that Jimmy fired his mail order pistol. Talk about plot twists.
15. Lee Marvin.
16. The misguided fool who said, "I'll git it Libbidy," was referring to a plate of steak and potatoes dropped by Rance Stoddard (Jimmy Stewart) after Liberty tripped him in the diner. Well Rance was more than willing to retrieve the plate to avoid bloodshed between Valence and Tom (the Duke), but since it was Tom's supper on the floor and Liberty put it there, what better excuse for a gunfight?Tom wanted Valence to pick it up or die. That's when poor, simpleminded Strother Martin uttered his immortal line and ended up shining the Duke's boot with his teeth. Lee Van Cleef was Liberty's other lackey but he knew better than to open his mouth.
17. The Range Rider. Early 1950s show featuring Billy the Kid, as a nice, upstanding young citizen, only too happy to help the Range Rider out of tough jams by dazzling the bad guys with his lightnin'-quick draw. You may recall that Mahoney's gunbelt didn't have a buckle - it was treated rawhide that sort of wrapped around his waist like it was reinforced with flexible plastic. But that's silly, isn't it. We know cowboys didn't have plastic back then . . .
18. Steve McQueen. Right after The Blob, he landed this TV Western. It really was a terrific show, and not just because Steve was a young guy who easily got the better of the older generation, while always looking so James Dean-ish. Remember his gimmicky gun? A sawed off Winchester he kept in a pistol holster! He called it a Mare's Leg.
19. Robert Culp. This was possibly the fastest actor with a gun at the time! Actor with the fastest gun? Culp had great style and maintained a wonderfully low key. Good show. "I Spy" was a groundbreaker, as well. Remember?
20. The only western series where the hero had only one name, Paladin. Richard Boone was probably closest to what a real gunfighter looked like - no prettyboy this one.
21. Just ask Sergio Leone who Rowdy Yates was and he'd tell you The Man With No Name. But we recognize him as Dirty Harry, Josie Wales, Joe Kidd and the erstwhile Mayor of Carmel. Clint Eastwood.
22. The only time we ever really liked Gene Barry was in War of the Worlds. Bat Masterson was a wimp, because while all the other cowboys on TV were shooting the hell out of the bad guys, Masterson was hitting them over the head with his fancy cane and taking them to jail. What a git! The show had a great theme song, though.