A retired lawman and showman wants only to settle down with the Dodge seamstress he left behind twenty years ago, but a young whippersnapper hopes to make a name for himself by challenging the aging gun to a duel.
It's a test of wills when Quint witnesses a murder and the father of one of the prime suspects lowers Quint into a well to try to force him to promise his silence.
A man carrying a tempting sum of money is attacked from behind by someone who beats him and leaves him for dead. Lucky for the injured man, an old friend of Matt is there to take him in to Doc Adams for mending.
Bucko, a close friend of Festus, is accused of murdering a man to whom he lost at poker. When his alibi witness lies out of fear, Bucko is sentenced to hang, and Festus, who'd begun to see the marshal as a friend, vows Bucko won't swing.
The Ginnis family live on the prairie and are used to getting their own way. When one son breaks his leg, they ride into Dodge to get help. Their first brush with the townsfolk proves not to be their last.
Festus's beautiful young cousin, whom he has not seen since she was a little one, arrives in Dodge to keep the pact her father made for her when she was a baby: to marry Festus.
A family in search of a doctor find Matt and his prisoner unconscious and handcuffed to each other on the prairie. The prisoner wakens first and announces that Matt is the condemned man he is transporting for hanging.
Festus finds a little girl out on the prairie. He learns she saw her mother get killed by a stranger. When he takes her to Dodge, Matt hears she was hiding when this happened but can identify this man who may already be in town.
After some horsing around, Festus breaks some of Quint's equipment. To repair or get anew, they travel to Wichita and meet a saloon girl who tells them she needs to get away from town but her jealous boyfriend is now hot on their trail.
A saloon girl spurns a man's advances in Wichita and moves to Dodge, where she becomes a respectable married woman, only to be confronted with her past when she discovers that her rancher husband is the nephew of the man she refused.
Festus, returning to Dodge after doing some trapping, sees his girl, April, and they argue over a gift she received. Running off, she hides but her perch gives her a bird's eye view of a murder, one no one believes she witnessed but the killers.
Childless and poor, farmer Caleb feels like a failure, and his wife assures him he is one. Caleb moves into town to seek some meaning in his life, and soon finds himself--a man who doesn't wear a gun--challenged to a duel.
Henry Huckaby, a local farmer and fed up with a sore back and an empty belly leaves to seek his fortune in Dodge. After several failed ideas he hits on one that may make him rich but could also cost him his life.
Given three months to live by a quack peddler of patent medicines, a mousy bank clerk quits his job, withdraws all his money, makes ready to go to California, and falls for a girl who may endanger what time he has remaining.
Rob Scot is married and has six children, but nonetheless keeps various women on the hook and spends his money on whiskey. When his wife asks Marshall Dillon to find him, the trail leads to even bigger trouble.
A traveling salesman meets up with Bull Foot, an Indian who mainly sells vegetables. When goods are traded for a squaw, he is upset when she runs away and into the arms of Festus, whose mule she steals, only to return home awaiting sale to the next customer.
Orval returns from seven years in prison for killing his wife's lover, vowing to reclaim his house and business. Edna tries to goad her new husband and Orval's son into a plot to kill Orval; then her head is turned by a traveling salesman.
Jess, Jay's twin, is shot and killed by an unknown assailant while working late at the family business. When a stranger to Dodge is suspected, Matt does his best to track him down and bring him to justice.
Two brothers traveling to California are joined by a third man who soon proves to be a wrong 'un, manhandling and killing a young woman they encounter on the prairie and turning on Quint when he shows up to share his rabbits with them.
A runaway kid and a wanted man from East Texas team up to first find the kid's mother and second to shake those who have been chasing the man about a murder in Carver County and robbery he just didn't commit.
Mr. Degler is determined to break up the romance between his adult daughter and half Indian Quint, so he sends for his cousin Praylie to help out, but Praylie has murder in mind instead.
A violent killing appears to be the work of Indians, but Matt doubts it. Someone accuses Quint of it and the solution involves secret motives and revenge in Indian country.
There's trouble for Doc Adams, and perhaps for Dodge, when a new doctor and his wife arrive in town and the wife resorts to spreading a nasty rumor about Doc to get the new practice started.
When a young pregnant woman seeks Kitty's aid in escaping from the child's father, the two women take the stagecoach from Dodge and meet with greater danger.
As Matt takes a convicted man to Hays City for hanging, Matt and the prisoner are waylaid, the prisoner lynched, and Matt is framed for the killing, then arrested by a sergeant with a grudge against him.
An old rancher returns home after many years in prison, ready to reclaim what is his by any means necessary, including burning out the squatters on his land.
Ellie Merchant, the wife of farmer Joe Merchant, is having a passionate affair with outlaw Pike Beechum. Beechum intends to remove Joe and any other obstacle between him and Ellie.
Mistakenly hailed as a hero who downed four robbers, a man rethinks his decision to let folks regard him as a gunfighter when protecting the woman he wants calls for a gunman's skill.
Art and Bob both have an eye on a new girl in town. She works at the Long Branch but only has eyes for the most well-liked man in town. On the eve of their marriage, it all comes to a head and the town is out for blood.