The Many Faces of Gideon Flinch

This episode of Bonanza leaned very heavily toward comedy with Ian Wolfe and daughter Sue Ane Langdon coming to town. Ian breaks it to Sue Ane gently that he's kind of on the run because a very short tempered Harry Swoger wants to know where the $5000.00 that he invested with Wolfe has disappeared to. Not to worry because Sue Ane has interested two Cartwright brothers with raging hormones in her. She's sure that she can get them to help if Dan Blocker and Michael Landon will stop conning each other trying to impress Langdon.

At the same time Arnold Stang comes to town and back east he's a well known pickpocket and he cleans out a lot of valuables and identities of a few of principal players here. Pretty soon Swoger has many Gideon Flinches to choose from between Cartwright hormones, Langdon's charms, and Stang's work, Gideon Flinch being the character name of Wolfe.

You might notice that former Dead End kid Bobby Jordan plays one of the henchmen that Swoger has. Even young Ricky Kelman pulls a con or two aiding and abetting Little Joe against Hoss.

Functioning as a kind of befuddled Greek chorus is Burtin Mustin and Clem Bevans.

A really top flight cast makes this Bonanza episode most enjoyable.

This is another great comic relief episodes! I especially like Joe Cartwright's facial expressions! My favorite scene is when Joe accuses Jennifer of taking his wallet.

Its in episodes like this when we see brother against brother. Adam and Ben's uncaring episode of the boys' escapades just makes the episode that much more funny. Add to that the sheriff, deputy, and other townspeople who are usually caught in intense tear-jerking that makes the viewer breathe a deep sigh of relief.

This was another great one for the writer's! This light-hearted episodes mixed in with the heavy episode are what keep Bonanza great after all these years.