User Reviews

Crusty old Will Wright invites a whole passle of relatives to his Ponderosa like ranch for a family reunion. Most of them he can't stand but they are his heirs and he wants to look over and decide who gets what in the will.

One of them is Hans Conreid who has a premonition and asks his friend Bret Maverick to come with him and exchange identities.

Sure enough just like in Ten Little Indians heirs start getting dead. And it's a good group of familiar character players who are the heirs.

It never gets down to all of them being dispatched and James Garner does come up with the solution before they all die. Will Wright and Hans Conreid do make an interesting pair of cynics. They have more in common than they first realize besides being blood relations.

Nicely done story.

...plays in this "Maverick". If you've read the other reviews, you already have an inkling (or more, if you've read the reviews with "spoilers") of what happens in this outing. So I'll just say this: Any TV show that features Will Wright, James Garner and Hans Conreid (who happens to be none other than the voice of the evil Snidely Whiplash, arch-nemesis of the early-1960's "Dudley Do-Right of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police", on either "The Bullwinkle Show" or "Rocky And His Friends" fame), is okay with me!

Excellent entry that combines mystery, suspense, and a healthy dose of sly and not-so-sly humor. The likable Bret is enlisted by the dislikeable Homer (Hans Conreid) to pose as him at a family get-together where ornery old skinflint Will Wright (who else) will decide who gets his sizable fortune. The family stacks up as an odd assortment of characters who nonetheless disappear one by one, narrowing down the number of possible heirs as they gather around the dinner table. So which one is the culprit. (You may be able to spot the show's very last line coming from a mile away since it's a movie cliché.)

The story is sort of like the old Agatha Christie who-dun-it Ten Little Indians transposed to the American frontier. Fine script with lots of sharply humorous dialogue, especially from professional cynic Conreid who could curl his lip with the best of them. Seeing him in a Western takes some getting used to, but then he does stay in type as an acidly eccentric artist. Getting such an unWestern-type actor was both risky and a brilliant touch that all in all makes the episode.

Note also the several fleeting innuendos that apparently were too quick for the censors. Actually Bret (Garner) has a rather secondary role as the colorful family characters share in the limelight. This may not be the best Maverick "Western" since time and place are inessential to the plot. Nonetheless, it's one of the most entertaining.

Good story

Garner does a serviceable job pretending to be Homer Eakins But James Garner is best at being James Garner and not anyone else.

But Hans Conreid is so absolutely wonderful that he becomes the reason to watch this more than once. Indeed lots more than once.