Search - TV Westerns on DVD

Haven't I Seen This Before?

Robert Huggins | Suburban Philadelphia, PA United States | 07/05/2005

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This 5-disc collection from Madacy contains one or more episodes from nine different Western television shows that appeared in the 1950s to early 1960s. This set contains episodes that have fallen into the public domain and, therefore, can be released by anyone who can get copies of the episodes. Consequently, the vast majority of episodes contained on this set have also appeared on other Western TV episode compilations from budget DVD releasing companies like Platinum Disc Corporation, Diamond Entertainment, Goodtimes, Brentwood and St. Clair Vision. In this regard, there's not much that's "new" here and, because these companies don't have access to the original film elements, the audio/visual quality of the episodes, while watchable, is less than pristine for most of the episodes included.

The shows included on the disc include the following:

The Adventures of Jim Bowie
The Adventures of Kit Carson
Annie Oakley
Bat Masterson
The Cisco Kid
The Deputy
The Rifleman
Sugarfoot
Wagon Train

"Wagon Train" (3 episodes) and "Sugarfoot" (1 episode) are shows that were produced for an hour time slot while the remaining shows are all of the half hour variety. MPI has released authorized collections of both "The Rifleman" and "The Cisco Kid," but one wishes that there were a greater variety of episodes available for these "public domain" compilations. The sad reality is that with a few exceptions, television Westerns have largely been ignored on DVD so these collections, imperfect as they are, do fill a gap. Fans of Western theme music will be pleased to know that all of the original theme music for these shows has been retained.

My rating for this collection is closer to *** & ½.
"