Plunder of Paradise

A god-awful episode. The only reason to comment is to indicate that as good as the series could be, some of the entries could also be complete misfires like this one. Let's hope no one in Mexican government sees this travesty. The bandidos are cartoonish buffoons, not even up to the level of the Frito Bandido. Jay Novello and his compadres amount to the worst stereotypes imaginable, obvious caricatures of the bandits in Treasure of the Sierra Madre. They talk like comedy school drop-outs, laugh like hyenas, and dress like garbage pails. And pity poor Joan Weldon who has to keep up a pretense all the time the story crashes around her, while even Jack Kelly fumbles at times. I guess the boisterous Ruta Lee was brought in half-way through to help fill out the time slot since her role has absolutely nothing to do with the plot, which, incidentally, is darn near incomprehensible. Lee does however liven up the dreary proceedings. At the same time, the outdoor sets are so full of phony rocks so as to hide the backlot locations that it looks like an episode of the Flintstones. In fact, the whole 60 minutes appears pasted together on the fly. On the other hand, I take no pleasure in ridiculing this 60 minutes, except to point out what most of us know anyway-- that even the best of long-running series inevitably comes up with a turkey now and then. This one unfortunately belongs to Maverick.

Warner Bros. Studios hit a home run with the Maverick franchise; it was so good, it survived the departure of James Garner after the third season and soldiered on with Bart Maverick (Jack Kelly, no slouch of an actor, himself) and his cousin Beauregarde Maverick (Roger Moore... no saint here, and yes - that's how the writers spelled Beau's name, with two "Es." ) The delectable Ruta Lee appears as a saloon singer, not that it has anything to do with the plot. Even the producers seemed to realize this offering was a stinker and cast her for eye candy only. Leo Gordon and Kelly worked well together, but couldn't save this from going down for the third time. Jay Novello does NOT present himself as a Mexican bandit, but more as a Hollywood Mexican bandit stereotype. He was somewhat believable as Mayor Lugatto with an Italian accent in McHale's Navy; here, his Mexican accent isn't laughable - it's pitiful and hurts the ears. All things considered, this episode was forgettable.

This Maverick story has Jack Kelly and Leo Gordon as Big Mike McComb on the Mexican coast looking for a treasure that was put in a sea cave. Kelly has good reason to think that an earthquake rearranged the geography so that what they seek is now on land. They are following Joan Weldon's husband who had disappeared looking for the loot.

Kelly and Gordon also have to contend with an amiable group of bandits led by Jay Novello who are nowhere as deadly as the group Alfonso Bedoya led in Treasure Of The Sierra Madre. In fact the climax involving a shootout with Kelly, Weldon, and Gordon ends the episode on a minor key.

Ruta Lee is around as a stranded entertainer to sing a song or two, she's superfluous but still nice to see her.

Not one of the better first season stories.