Tension

Jack Elam has to be high on anyone's list of favorite character actors. Though he made a career of (mostly) playing bad guys, he did it with style, delivering consistently high-quality performances. He was not merely a good actor, but a /fine/ actor who could hold his own.

I'd normally give this episode only 6 stars, but it's got Jack Elam in what appears to be an early TV appearance. (I don't remember him receiving special billing in the credits.) He's so slender and (yes!) danged handsome, I had trouble recognizing him -- until the camera came in for a closeup of his wayward left eye. It's the only time I've seen Elam's injury exploited for dramatic effect.

The story itself is another "bad guys show up and cause trouble", with another sado-masochistic "Lucas-gets-beaten-up-and-hog-tied" sequence (Elam delivering the sadism). But the plot is a bit different; the bad guys are interesting; and Lucas has to decide whether to keep the background of a reformed bad'un secret. Elam is the main attraction, though.

The episode begins with Lucas and Mark helping a neighbor, Sid Halpern, move some cattle. Soon a young man, Clemmie, comes riding up with a wanted poster for a Roy Coleman that is 6 foot 5 inches and a square jaw. It just so happens meets the description of both Sid and Lucas. Clemmie sets up a situation where we all find out that Sid is actually the wanted man. But before Clemmie sets off with his prisoner they get into a gunfight where both men die. Now it is up to Lucas and Mark to take Sid back to his family for burial.

In the meantime Clemmie's brother, Gavin, finds Lucas's ranch and believes that Lucas is the Roy Coleman that is wanted. Even though Lucas tries to explain that he is not Roy Coleman, Gavin is ready to take the law into his own hands and collect the reward money. He even makes a 'point' of it.

There is nothing wrong with the story but it just did not have the flare that other episodes contain. It has a similar plot as other shows when a person is falsely identified all with a wanted poster. Just a routine script that was made better by the actors.

NOTE- There is a hole in this script. Early, before the gunfight, Clemmie tells Lucas and Sid that his brother(had to be Gavin) had seen Sid in a nearby town and then saw the wanted poster. That was the reason that he was on their trail. However, if Gavin had actually saw Sid in the nearby town then he would have known that Lucas was a different person upon arriving at the McCain ranch.