User Reviews

This Maverick episode has Bret Maverick being hammerlocked into serving as sheriff of the wild and lawless town of Duck n'Shoot. Not only do the folks run wild in this town, but the bank is continually robbed with a regularity like the way the wise guys rob the airport in Goodfellas. Of course sheriffs also come and go.

When a horse knocks out a cowboy on a toot and they think James Garner did it the town elders force Garner to be sheriff by impounding his $5000.00 in poker winnings on a specious claim. After that Bret Maverick is the symbol of law and order.

This Maverick story is almost a preview of what James Garner did in Support Your Local Sheriff. In the end it's brother Bart who bails Bret out in the end.

Not that Jack Kelly doesn't get conned, watch the story to see how.

....the similarities between this episode and Garner's "Support Your Local Sherriff" from a few years later. I noticed this of course, having recently watched SYLS. However, far more interesting to me, is at about 25-26 minutes in, during the bar fight between Bimbo and Little George Roy. The music cue includes a passage that is a dead ringer for John Williams' "Superman" (1978) theme. No mention of Williams (who was working in TV at the time), either in the episode credits or the overall series credits. Hmmmmm.....

Sixty minutes of classic Maverick. Bret's shifty character is all over the inventive Driskill script from opening horse kick to closing escape out of town. The show's iconoclasm reaches a high or low when Bret fesses up to cowboydom's ultimate sin-- he can't be sheriff because he's a "coward" and a "lousy shot" on top of it. An ice sheet must have descended on Hades at the sound of that sacrilege. But, not to worry, towns can be tamed by quick wits and a stacked deck as well as by the proverbial six-gun, and Bret shows how. The irreverent twists fly fast and furious, even when shady lady Peggy McKay arrives in town with an eye on Bret and the town bank. Actually, the series pioneered gender equality by showing how the ladies could be just as charming and low-down as the Maverick boys. Watch her get even sneakier than Bret, and only by calling in brother Bart can Bret even the odds.

Good to see ex-cowboy star Don (Red) Barry picking up a paycheck if only for a bit role. Trouble with seeing these episodes daily instead of weekly is facing up to the cost-cutters used in production. Note how the Maverick boys keep checking into the same hotel lobby, front desk, and staircase episode after episode. Then again, maybe these hotels are just a frontier version of the standard Marriott floor plan. But however you cut it, this is vintage humor on the Hollywood range.

An odd coincidence leads to Bret becoming sheriff in the town with a strange name. When a trouble maker is knocked unconscious by a horse, the mayor thinks Bret did it. The Mavericks are forever being coerced into situations they do not like, and Bret has a problem with authority. As sheriff, he resorts to cheating at cards (something he never does) to keep Bimbo from destroying the town. Both Mavericks would rather use their brains than their guns. Pappyism: "The worst crime a man can commit is to interrupt a poker game." The best episodes are the ones in which both James Garner and Jack Kelly appeared. They worked well together.