Guest Appearance on the Tumbleweeds and TV Cowboys Podcast

As you may or may not recall, The Big Valley (1965-69) is my favorite TV western.  Today, I get to be the guest star on the podcast Tumbleweeds and TV Cowboys, in which we discuss my two favorite Big Valley episodes: "A Time to Kill" (1966) and "Showdown in Limbo" (1967).

You can listen to this episode on Spotify or on Apple Podcasts.  

I never really got into podcasts, but Tumbleweeds and TV Cowboys has changed that for me -- at least, for this particular podcast!  Might be the only one I ever listen to more than a couple episodes of, but that's okay.  I'm very much enjoying it!  It's like sitting down and chatting with western film-obsessed friends :-)

My Answers to This Year's LOWCW Tag

Every year, Olivia and Heidi and I have a lot of fun coming up with the questions for our tag.  Every year, I look forward to answering them myself.  And, every year, there's at least one question that stumps me or makes me have to think really hard about my answer.  Which is all part of the fun!  (This year it was question #9 that I struggled with.  Now you know.)

You can find the original tag here, on my kick-off post.  Also, don't forget that today is the LAST DAY to enter my giveaway!

If I've reviewed a movie I talk about here, I've linked its title to my full review, in case you're curious to read more about a particular film.

1) Favorite western focused on a lone hero? 

That would be 3:10 to Yuma (1957), in which struggling rancher Dan Evers (Van Heflin) singlehandedly stands up against an entire outlaw gang to take its leader, notorious Ben Wade (Glenn Ford) to the train that will transport him to prison.  It is a moody, atmospheric, aesthetically pleasing masterpiece of tension.

2) Favorite western focused on a group of compadres? 

The Magnificent Seven (1960), no contest.  It truly is magnificent.  The acting is superb, the writing is taut and masterful, and the score by Elmer Bernstein is one of the finest movie scores ever written.  I never, ever get tired of this movie.

3) Favorite western with a female main character? 

The Rare Breed (1966).  It's about a British widow (Maureen O'Hara) and her daughter (Juliet Mills) who bring a prize Hereford bull to the St. Louis stockyards to auction off.  They get worried that something terrible will befall the bull while it's being shipped to its new owner (Brian Keith) in Texas, so they insist on accompanying the man (James Stewart) tasked with delivering him.  It's a pretty unusual western in a lot of ways, and really enjoyable.

4) Favorite western with a POC main character? 

That would be Silverado (1985).  It has three main characters: Emmett (Scott Glenn), Paden (Kevin Kline), and Mal (Danny Glover), who join forces to take down a common enemy.  Mal's trying to save his family's homestead and convince his sister to abandon some questionable life choices she's been more or less forced to make.

Now, since Silverado is an ensemble piece, I'm going to answer this question twice so I can also mention Buck and the Preacher (1972) , which Sidney Poitier starred in and directed.  It's about African American pioneers seeking new homes in Kansas after the Civil War.  I highly recommend it to older teens and adults.  It probably hits a little too heavy for kids.

5) Favorite western with kids in it? 

Shane (1953) is told through the eyes of a boy (Brandon de Wilde) who idolizes the gunfighter (Alan Ladd) that his father (Van Heflin) and mother (Jean Arthur) have befriended and hired to work on their farm.  It's a beautiful meditation on what happens when a child idolizes an adult, and the kind of influence that idolization can have on the adult in question.  Shane works as hard as he can not to let that little boy down, but he works even harder to convince the boy that his own father is the real hero of the story.

6) Favorite western set somewhere other than the United States? 

The Man from Snowy River (1982).  It's also my favorite movie of all time, and it's all about a young man coming of age in Australia, finding work and falling in love and generally proving himself.  I saw this in the theater when I was two years old and fell in love with horses, Australia, and westerns all in one fell swoop.  It's been my favorite ever since.

7) Favorite "western" that doesn't fit the genre's dictionary definition? 

Well, The Proud Rebel (1958) takes place in Illinois, and so it's not technically a western.  But it feels like a western, so I call it one anyway.  It's about a man (Alan Ladd) searching for a doctor who can cure his mute son (David Ladd).  They end up working for a farmer (Olivia de Havilland) who's being harassed by some neighbors that want to buy her land, or force her off it if she won't sell.  And they have to overcome a bunch of problems, but they also form a nice little family in the process.

8) Favorite funny western? 

Support Your Local Sheriff (1969), always and forever.  A quirky, clever drifter (James Garner) takes the job as sheriff in a lawless goldrush town, makes a deputy out of the town drunk (Jack Elam), falls in love with the mayor's daughter (Joan Hackett), and dispatches a family of ne'erdowells, all in the most unconventional ways possible.  It's a spoof of western tropes, but such a loving spoof that its humor completely works.

9) Favorite tragic/sad western? 

The Alamo (1960).  Almost every single character dies.  Gloriously, yes, but still!  Tragic.  And yet, I watch it over and over.

10) Favorite western TV show?

The Big Valley (1965-69).  I love every member of the Barkley family, most especially Heath (Lee Majors) and Victoria (Barbara Stanwyck).  I want to be friends with them and hang out with them and go on adventures with them and just... can I either get adopted into or marry into that family already?  Please?

There you have it!  I can't believe that today is the last official day of Legends of Western Cinema Week already!  Like I said, if you haven't entered my giveaway yet, do that here.  And if you haven't made your guesses about my movie poster game yet, do that here.

My Ten Favorite Western TV Shows -- 2021 Update

Back in 2016, I posted my list of My Ten Favorite Western TV Shows for that year's Legends of Western Cinema Week.  Well, five years have passed, and I've found some new favorites, so it's time to revise that list!  And what better occasion than this year's edition of LOWCW, right?  Especially since I'm giving away several of these shows in this year's giveaway!  (Enter it here!)

1. The Big Valley (1965-69)

The adventures of the rich, influential Barkley family:  wise matriarch Victoria (Miss Barbara Stanwyck); sensible lawyer Jarrod (Richard Long); hot-tempered charmer Nick (Peter Breck); sensitive tough guy Heath (Lee Majors); and bold little sister Audra (Linda Evans).  Together or apart, they're always encountering excitement of one sort or another in and around the big California valley they own.  I've reviewed my two favorite episodes: "A Time to Kill" and "Showdown in Limbo."

2. The Magnificent Seven (1998-2000) 

A "found family" formed from seven archetypical loners:  a volatile gunslinger, Chris (Michael Biehn); wistful bounty hunter, Vin (Eric Close); a cheerful ladies' man, Buck (Dale Midkiff); a snarky card sharp, Ezra (Anthony Starke); a former slave learning to be a doctor, Nathan (Rick Worthy); a doubtful religious man, Josiah (Ron Perlman); and an annoying tenderfoot, J.D. (Andrew Kavovit).  They're hired by a circuit judge (Robert Vaughn) to clean up and protect a lawless town.  You can read the list of my 10 favorite episodes here.

3. Cheyenne (1955-63) 

Nomadic loner Cheyenne Bodie (Clint Walker) travels the west helping people, taking odd jobs, and doing the right thing wherever he can.  Kind of like the Lone Ranger, but generally without a sidekick, and always without a mask.

4. The Rifleman (1958-63) 

Widowed rancher Lucas McCain (Chuck Connors) and his son Mark (Johnny Crawford) contend with all the bad guys who seem irresistably drawn to the tiny Texas town of North Fork, where Marshal Micah Torrence (Paul Fix) is forever needing Lucas and his famous, specially modified Winchester to help stave them off.

5. Five Mile Creek (1983-85) 

The daily lives of a band of strangers working together to run a small stage coach line and its way station in the Australia frontier.  Through a variety of adversities and problems, they forge a "found family" that I have wanted to belong to for as long as I can remember.  You can read my overview of the series here.

6. The Mandalorian (2019-) 

A bounty hunter seeks to reunite an orphan with its family.  Although this is part of the Star Wars universe, I consider it to be a western with sci-fi trappings, not the other way around.  I reviewed the first eight episodes individually, and you can find links to those reviews here.

7. Wanted: Dead or Alive (1958-61) 

Bounty hunter Josh Randall (Steve McQueen) is on a quest to earn money by capturing bad guys and delivering them to the authorities, with many moral dilemmas mixed in.  This may actually be the strongest western show of all -- it has very few "so-so" episodes and manymanymany magnificent ones.

8. The Lone Ranger (1949-57) 

John Reid (Clayton Moore) is the only survivor of an ambushed party of Texas Rangers.  After the lonesome Indian Tonto (Jay Silverheels) nurses him back to health, the two embark on a crusade to bring justice, law, and order to the West.

9. Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman (1993-98) 

Intrepid woman doctor Michaela Quinn (Jane Seymour) moves to Colorado Springs, adopts three kids, romances handsome and sometimes mysterious Sully (Joe Lando), and generally works to eradicate disease, prejudice, and ignorance.

10. Zorro (1957-59) 

The merry adventures of wealthy Spanish scion Diego de la Vega (Guy Williams) as he battles injustice, oppression, and greed in old California.  It's superduper fun, appropriate for just about any age... and currently unavailable on DVD because of a distribution rights dispute :-(  BUT you can watch the first few episodes in the form of the movie The Sign of Zorro on Disney+ now!  Disney edited eight episodes together and released them to the big screen as a movie in 1958, and it is absolutely delightful.

Have you watched any of these?  Do you have other favorites that I didn't list here?  Let's discuss over a cup of coffee by the campfire, shall we?

My Ten Favorite Female On-Screen Characters

A few years ago, I did a list of my ten favorite movie/TV characters.  It didn't occur to me at the time I was making that list, but... they were all men.  So... time to do another list :-)  Here are my ten favorite female characters on screens big and small.

I love some of these characters in print too, but here I'm focusing on their onscreen iterations, okay?

1.  Victoria Barkley (Miss Barbara Stanwyck) from The Big Valley (1965-69).  I wrote a whole post a few years ago about how much I want to be like Victoria when I grow up.  She is smart, compassionate, feisty, stubborn, generous, loyal, and forgiving.  Wonderful woman.

2.  Anne Shirley (Megan Followes) from Anne of Green Gables (1985) and Anne of Avonlea (1987).  She's very unlike me in a lot of ways -- she's as unshy as I am shy, she's got a quick temper and mine is a slower simmer, and she keeps grudges, while I am usually quick to forgive.  But she's also so similar.  Like me, she's an imaginative daydreamer.  A book-lover.  An outsider.  I relate to Anne a lot, both in the books and in these filmed versions.

3.  Jane Eyre (Zelah Clarke) from the 1983 BBC version of Jane Eyre.  Jane is actually my favorite fictional heroine overall, but this list is supposed to be about on-screen characters, so she drops a few slots here.  Anyway, I love Jane because she is so principled, stalwart, and loving.  She spends her whole life insisting she will obey God (and her conscience) rather than men, and standing up to man after man who tries to bend her to their own will instead of God's.  She's an inspiration to me.

4.  Nora Charles (Myrna Loy) from the Thin Man movies.  Nora is the epitome of a spunky, helpful, supportive wife.  She and her husband Nick Charles (William Powell) are #marriagegoals for me because they genuinely enjoy being together.  They make each other laugh, encourage each other, help each other, and keep each other sane.  I adore them, but especially Nora.

5.  Lucy Eleanor Moderatz (Sandra Bullock) from While You Were Sleeping (1995).  Lucy is basically exactly me.  Put me in that situation, parents dead and me unmarried, and I'd be Lucy.  Have a cat, break things with my Christmas tree, create an imaginary life for myself with a handsome stranger, and totally be unable to tell people truths because I'm so lonely I can't bring myself to give them up.

6.  Gaby Teller (Alicia Vikander) from The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015).  Gaby is extremely competent.  She can fix cars, drive cars, banter, dance, spy, and survive with the best of them.  She is 1/3 of why I love that movie so much.

7.  Beatrice (Emma Thompson) from Much Ado About Nothing (1993).  Oh look, another intelligent, feisty, witty, sarcastic, fierce female character.  Are you sensing a theme here?  Clearly, I have a Type when it comes to female characters I will gravitate toward.  Beatrice also happens to have been written by Shakespeare, so she gets a extra good dialog and some above-par character development.  Thompson manages to blend plenty of wistful in with the prickly so you don't just want her to go away all the time.

8.  Juliet Burke (Elizabeth Mitchell) from Lost (2004-10).  I'm not into "shipping" and don't go in for "One True Pairings" as a general rule... but Sawyer and Juliet are my Lost OTP.  Also, you'll notice they're a canonical couple.  I get very annoyed with people who want Sawyer to get back with Kate because Juliet is so Right For Him.  She matches him in intelligence and stubbornness, gently guides him to becoming a better person, inspires him, uplifts him, and... it's probably weird for me to be talking so much about a guy on a list that's supposed to be about female characters, but Juliet's patience and perseverance with Sawyer is a big part of why I love her, so... there it is.

9.  Emma Woodhouse (Gwyneth Paltrow) from Emma (1996).  I don't like Emma in Jane Austen's book until the very end, but Paltrow's Emma has a kindness and elegance and sweetness that make the character one I'd love to hang out with, not one I want to kick.  Remarkable achievement, I think.

10.  Dr. Michaela Quinn (Jane Seymour) from Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman (1993-98).  Smart, stubborn, courageous, kind, helpful, determined, protective, loving, a little bossy... Dr. Mike is everything I like in a woman.  As you may have come to realize while reading this list.

Okay, that's it!  Who are your favorite female screen characters?  Do we share any favorites?

"Showdown in Limbo" (The Big Valley) 1967

I have such vivid memories of watching this ep when I was in my teens.  We were lucky enough to tape it off cable when we were visiting my grandparents one summer -- lucky because it guest-stars Tom Lowell, who played Billy Nelson on my absolute favorite show, Combat! (1962-67).

My teen years were spent obsessing over both Combat! and classic Star Trek (1966-69), so I was always overjoyed when we could find actors who played regulars in those shows guest-starring in another show I liked, such as The Big Valley, like William Shatner's turn in the episode "A Time to Kill" I reviewed here a couple months ago.

Anyway, "Showdown in Limbo" starts off with Heath Barkley (Lee Majors) arriving in the town of Jubilee, stopping by to visit his old friend Frank Sawyer (Arch Johnson).

Heath was Frank's deputy once, and Frank thinks of him like a son.  Welcomes him like one too, all happy and cheerful and full of high praise for Heath.

Heath clearly has fond memories of their time together hunting outlaws, pursuing bandits, and otherwise upholding law and order.  I mean, he even smiles several times within the first couple minutes of the episode!

Know who's not so happy to see Heath?  Frank's actual son, Chad (Tom Lowell).  Chad grew up back east, where his mother retreated after one too many blow-ups with Frank.  Now she's dead and Chad has come to live with his father.  And Frank clearly misses no opportunity to praise Heath, compare Chad to Heath, or talk about how Heath would have done things.

(Let's all ignore the fact that Frank refers to Heath as Heath Barkley, yet clearly he knew Heath when he was a lot younger, which obviously was before Heath found out he was a Barkley or claimed the family name.  It's best not to scrutinize timelines too closely when you're looking at Heath's life and just remember this was before people kept very strict track of such things with regard to TV shows.)

Well, Chad's being polite and Heath's noticing that Frank's paying Chad very little mind, and things are progressing reasonably well when in comes the episodes villain, since obviously, we have to have a villain since Frank is a lawman and all.

The villain's name is Earl Vaughn, he's played by L.Q. Jones, and he provides this ep with a lot of liveliness.  And I don't mean just because he's carrying a live chicken.

Just as Earl and his girl enter the Big Mule Saloon, Chad exits.  He bumps Earl.  Earl loses his chicken.  It flies up to this handy ledge above the bar.

Chad knows he's in trouble now.

Earl can't wait to cause trouble.  L.Q. Jones is never, ever a boring actor, and he really shines here as a swaggering, mouthy, trouble-making bad guy.  Weirdly enough, you never feel like he's hamming it up or chewing the scenery.  He really is as interesting as he thinks he is.

Anyway, Chad is not looking forward to what comes next.  And rightly so.

Right there in front of his dad and the oft-praised Heath Barkley, Chad gets knocked flat and kicked.

Heath steps in.  Because Heath just can't stop himself from helping.  It's an occupational hazard if you're a Barkley: You Must Help.

Of course, Heath takes care of Earl in about three seconds.  Chad resents this.  Of course.  The Great and Mighty Heath Barkley showed him up within ten minutes of hitting town.

Heath understands exactly what's bothering Chad.  He tries to make friends with him over a cup of coffee.

I'd just like to point out how well Heath's hat matches the paint scheme in this back room of the jail.  Or this family kitchen.  Or whatever this place is.  Anyway, it matches really well.  That's totally the reason this picture is here.  Has nothing whatsoever to do with Heath leeeeeeaning on one knee.

Ahem.  So, they lock up Earl.  And they discover he's Wanted for Something Important, so Frank decides that he and Chad are going to take Earl to the federal marshal in Stockton.  Heath had planned to continue on to Sonora on Important Business, but he decides to tag along on this adventure instead.

Meanwhile back at the Barkley Ranch, Nick (Peter Breck) and Jarrod (Richard Long) are having a very loud argument about selling cattle.  Their mother Victoria (Miss Barbara Stanwyck) is so done with their nonsense, she actually rolls her eyes at them.

They take no notice of her silent sass and keep bickering.

Finally, Sheriff Madden (James Gavin) turns up to let them know he got a telegram that Heath's coming along with a prisoner transfer with Jubilee, and he was going to run out to meet him, and do Jarrod and Nick want to come along, by any chance?

Of COURSE they do!  They've clearly only been arguing over selling a cattle herd for a whole hour because they are bored.  They run upstairs for their gunbelts and hats, and off they go.

Isn't this shot pretty?

I haven't mentioned yet that this ep was directed by Bernard McEveety, who also directed "A Time to Kill," plus nine other Big Valley eps.  And he directed 31 episodes of Combat!.  I really like his style.  He loves to put lots and lots of people in his frames, which you'll see more of later on.

So, we have to make camp while on this trip because I guess Jubilee is a long ways from Stockton.  Chad is on guard duty and keeps himself awake by drawing.

Turns out Chad is quite the talented artist.  But his father hates the idea of him being an artist.  He'll only be contented if Chad turns into a second Heath Barkley, all fists and guns and so on.

Here's one of those shots with lots of people in it, some close up and some far away.  Nick and Jarrod are wearing big, heavy coats to remind us this is supposed to take place in winter or something.

Well, Frank, Chad, Heath, and their prisoner Earl all end up in this little ghost town called Limbo.  Obviously, or else the ep title wouldn't make any sense.  I forgot to mention that Earl has a brother named Floyd who is trailing them and wants to free Earl.  Floyd is Very Evil and does Mean Things, but he's actually fairly boring, so I haven't bothered mentioning him yet.

Earl is much more interesting.  He tries to pull a Glenn-Ford-in-3:10-to-Yuma routine, get inside Chad's head and talk him into letting him go.

Chad gets mad.  Chad makes mistakes.  Heath rescues him for like the fourth time this episode.  Chad gets mad at Heath too.

Then Heath does something really sweet.  That picture Chad was drawing back in camp, well, Frank got all mad about it and ripped it out of Chad's sketch book.  Heath rescued it, kept it, and now returns it to Chad.  Says he thinks it's really good and Chad ought to pursue art, use this talent he has.

Isn't that refreshing?  In so many westerns, any man who does something creative like play music or draw or write fiction is portrayed as weak and unmanly.  Heath stands right here and says, first to Chad and then to Frank, that you don't have to throw a punch or shoot a gun to be a man, that everyone has different talents and it's wrong not to use them, whatever those talents are.

I mean, is it any wonder I love the man?

Well, anyway, Earl's brother Floyd catches up with them there in Limbo.  Here's another nice shot with lots of people crammed in it.

Earl is just as happy as a little clam that his brother's shown up to free him.

So we have our showdown.  Cuz otherwise the ep title wouldn't make sense.

Here are all four bad guys, crammed in one shot.

One of them sneaks up on top of a building so he can shoot Frank.  I love this shot too!

But then Jarrod and Nick arrive!  To help!  Because they are Barkleys, so They Must Help.

And all's well that ends well.  I like how Heath and Jarrod's hats match their coats, and Nick's like, "Match?  Who needs to match?  I make my own rules."  That's Nick for you.

By the end of the episode, Chad no longer hates Heath because he no longer feels like he has to live up to Heath's reputation.  Hooray!

Tom Lowell puts in such a lovely performance in this ep.  He's so excellent at playing someone unsure of themselves in a way that makes you relate to him and want to hug him, not want to tell him to just grow up.  That's a tricky line to walk, but he does so with ease.

He did get shot in the leg too, which makes his dad respect him, so that helps.  I mean, nothing like getting shot in the leg and then patted on the back by Heath Barkley to sort out all your problems.

This has been my entry into the sixth annual Favourite TV Show Episode Blogathon hosted by A Shroud of Thoughts this weekend.  This is one of my favorite blogathons, and I look forward to it every year!