User Reviews

"Three Queens Full" parodies Bonanza. The Wheelwrights replace the Cartwrights. The Ponderosa becomes the Subrosa. Hoss becomes Moose. Daddy Wheelwright hires Bart to chaperone three brides for his three fine sons. When the girls start robbing the house, Bart teaches them manners: "Tone down the wiggle!" After some intrigue and second-guessing, the girls marry the Wheelwright boys. This is a funny episode, and Ed Robertson who wrote a book about the series decries the reliance on slapstick after James Garner left the show. Robertson was partial to the humor that arose naturally from Garner's character. As for me, I enjoyed all five seasons.

Okay, Maverick's spoof of Gunsmoke ("Gun Shy") worked really well, so why not a spoof of another big western of the day, Bonanza. It's a good plot— rounding up 3 girls of dubious reputation and selling them off as refined ladies for the 3 Wheelwright (Cartwright) boys. Lots of laughs there, getting the girls to mind their manners at the same time their schooling is courtesy the San Francisco saloon circuit. The trouble is that the Wheelwrights just aren't that funny. Well, Jake Sheffield certainly looks funny as the overfed brother Moose (Hoss, of Bonanza). He peers out from somewhere beneath a hat pulled down around his socks, looking like the son Pa (Jim Backus) would be advised to keep in the barn. But the other two brothers, Small Paul and Henry, (Little Joe and Adam) don't even look funny and come across as just another couple of guys hanging around town. And oddly, comedy actor Backus in the Lorne Greene role seems unsure how to play the part when a caricaturing of the lordly Ponderosa patriarch is clearly in order. I'm not sure whether the problem is with the casting, the directing, or the writing, but the satirical side is a long way from the satisfactions of Gun Shy. Anyway, a few humorous compensations remain, so the hour is still likely worth a look-see.