The Night of the Hangman

That wonderful (and quite young at the time) character actor Harry Dean Stanton guest stars as a character named Mr. Lucious Brand in this 3rd-season episode of the series as a man falsely accused of murder in a small town. Although he testifies in the accused man's trial, Jim West (and a bit later his partner, Artemus Gordon, as well) are a little unsure of the "open and shut" nature of the case against Stanton. This episode introduces the recurring character of Henrietta, the carrier pigeon (or white dove, if you prefer) which will act as an 1870's version of a cellular phone for our intrepid 2 Secret Service agents. (Don't stop to talk to any hawks, dear!) I round up this one's rating to an 8 out of 10 stars.

"The Wild Wild West" is one of those shows that's so "out there", it's really rather amazing that CBS, (at the time the show was produced, still known as "The Tiffany Network"), actually bought the show! But I, for one, was thankful they did. The "WWW" was a rather strange amalgam of a standard TV Western and a VERY imaginative Science-Fiction show - not exactly the sort of thing one would think of coming from the network that brought you Gunsmoke. In this outing, "The Night Of The Hangman", a man is shot in front of dozens of witnesses. The man accused of the murder swears he didn't do it. At first glance, it looks like he's a liar. But the combined brain power of West and Gordon of the Secret Service end up proving what he ("Dean" Stanton) says is true. Sure, there are a few things in this show that are a bit out of their actual time (check the other review for the years the Daguerreotype was actually in use, for example). Be that as it may, the script was clever, and just take a look at this cast! A young Harry Dean Stanton (before he used the "Harry"), The Rifleman's Paul Fix as The Judge, just to name two, work together with West and Gordon to make this show a great one!

Or you can replace Harry Dean Stanton character as a kind of Lee Harvey Oswald...That's my own interpretation of this basic story; the only link that first came to my mind. A rather unusual W W WEST show indeed, but with some recurrent elements though. And I also found weird the more than supporting character, just at the beginning, whom the camera focuses on, with no reasons at all, this old rude man at the buffet.