MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological* The best thing about this routine B-western is the villain's use of a "diabolical device" to commit murder. While cowboy Bob Neal (played by sound-alike performer Bob Steele) is away from home, Bob's father is robbed and killed. But the killer, instead of simply shooting the father, uses a smoldering corrosive chemical in a jar to suffocate the victim. Neal and the sheriff examine the curious weapon-- to whose fumes they're also exposed-- and decide to ask local assayer Otto Zenz (William Quinn), the only guy in town who knows chemistry, to analyze the substance. They stumble across the fact that Zenz is the killer, but he escapes using the smoking chemical concoction again. Zenz doesn't go far; he hides out in some podunk town nearby, using a comical disguise to establish a new identity. (Maybe he didn't manage to get away with the dough he stole?) Neal goes looking for the killer but only stumbles across him by accident, in the process of getting accused of a separate murder of the father of your standard pretty young thing. Finally, at the climax Zenz tries to kill Neal with that smoking acid but of course he fails while the hero survives. I suppose this setup is mildly preferable to sitting through a tedious mystery about some mystery killer's true identity, but since the viewer already knows the villain's ID, the whole middle portion is a waste of time even for a B-western.
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