Gunsmoke (TV Series) Journey for Three (1964) User Reviews

A nice story to end season 9.

[kfo9494 · 7/10 · 16 January 2013]

For the last show of season 9, we get a tale of three guys leaving their home in Missouri to make a life in California. You have two brothers named Adam and Cyrus and a friend named Boyd. They are totally out of money and making their way to Dodge to get jobs so they can continue their journey west.

While traveling in their wagon a young woman comes riding up on a horse with the usual greetings. Boyd spooks her horse making her fall and twisting her leg. Adam goes after the horse leaving Boyd and Cyrus with the girl. When Adam returns without the horse the two others tell him that they have already taken her home. Only later Adam, the wise one of the bunch, will be told that the woman died when she hit her head on a rock. Adam wants to return but Boyd beats him up forcing him to ride onward.

Quint comes up to their camp just for a visit and Boyd ties him up. Adam is able to prevent Boyd from killing him and they leave him on the prairie. Marshal Dillon had gotten word of the woman's murder and was in the area. He finds Quint and they make tracks for the wagon with the three men.

When they find the wagon, Boyd wants to shoot it out. Adam is able to wrestle him over the rifle where it accidentally discharges killing Boyd. Matt takes Adam in for assault on Quint with Cyrus being able to run away before capture.

At the jail, Adam tells Matt the entire story about Boyd killing the woman. Matt asks about Cyrus and Adam tells him that Cyrus is slow and could not have committed murder. Later Cyrus tries to break Adam out of jail but Adam puts a stop to it. The last scenes are Adam leaving the Marshal's office with his brother still in jail awaiting a hearing.

The story is nice, perhaps not as exciting as others but a decent story that holds up for the entire hour. The script was good, the acting good and was an interesting topic. A nice watch.

Michael J. Pollard in the Season Finale

[wdavidreynolds · 7/10 · 11 December 2020]

Three men are traveling by wagon from St. Joseph, Missouri to California. Two of the three, Adam and Cyrus, are brothers. The third goes by the name Boyd. Adam is the older brother, and he is the moral voice of the group. Boyd is evil. Cyrus, the younger brother, is the central focus of this story of good versus evil. I have always wondered if there is any significance in the three men's names starting with A, B, and C.

When a friendly woman meets the trio, she is killed due to the actions of the evil Boyd. When Quint Asper encounters the men, he is nearly killed by Boyd, but the good Adam prevents the murder. Eventually "good" and "evil" literally fight one another with evil being destroyed.

This story is oddly paced. There are a few brief moments of excitement and tension, but it plods along much of the time.

Michael J. Pollard is the Cyrus character, and he tends to steal the scenes where he appears. Pollard appeared in several television shows around the time this episode was filmed, and he went on to a fairly successful career in films, most notably his supporting role in the film Bonnie and Clyde, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award. Pollard's characters were always offbeat and awkward.

Mark Goddard, who was best known as the Major Don West character on Lost In Space, plays Boyd. His portrayal of the evil character here is well done with the necessary amount of intensity.

The role of Adam is played by an actor named William Arvin, who had a very short acting career. I thought his performance here was poorly executed and added significantly to the strange pacing of the episode.

There are three fairly distinct acts in this episode. The first involves the three travelers and the young woman. The second act features Matt pursuing the men and finding Quint. The third act takes place once the story is back in Dodge City.

Other than Marshal Dillon, there is a fair amount of Quint Asper in this episode. We also get short sequences with Doc Adams, Miss Kitty, and Festus Haggen.

This final Season 9 episode does not rank among some of the better episodes during the season. For me, the finest of the season include Episode 12, "The Magician," Episode 19, "No Hands," and Episode 26, "Caleb." There are several other fine episodes during the season, but those three stand out.

Psychopath and apprentice

[gary-64659 · 8/10 · 5 June 2019]

An interesting study in psychopathy, and well-portrayed by Mark Goddard, soon to be the young heart-throb in the "Lost In Space" series (1965-68). Mercifully, his molestation-murder of a young woman who happens along on the path of a scavenging threesome is not depicted. The atmosphere of this episode is dominated by the presence of Michael J. Pollard, who through the mid-sixties became famous for his stock in trade of rebellious hedonism that was taken as representative of the "free spirit" of the times (see also "Star Trek" and the "Bonnie & Clyde" film, both c.1967) and was supposed to be a symbol of cool. Here, in his usual slow way, in mocking and helping to subdue the doomed girl after she is injured, he dumbly follows the example of his chosen sociopathic role model rather than that of his upright older brother. The story pulled its punches in the end, only the "real" baddie getting his deserts but the hobgoblin little brother turning over a new leaf as reformed and lovable all too suddenly to be believable.

Loser Brothers

[Johnny_West · 24 May 2022]

This episode featured Mark Goddard (Lost in Space TV series) and Michael J. Pollard (1960s LSD hippie) as a couple of psychopaths just riding along on the prairie.

Goddard is the alpha male, and Pollard is his subordinate student or lackey. Pollard as usual, plays an empty headed loser who wants to follow someone. He is tired of his boring brother, and along comes Mark Goddard, a psychopath waiting to happen. A young girl comes across the trio, and she is soon assaulted and killed by Goddard, with Pollard watching with his moronic smirk.

The other brother has no guts, and he just tries to stay out of the way so he can claim innocence when the ship hits the fan. After repeated episodes of homicidal acts by Goddard and Pollard, you have to wonder how Matt Dillon could decide that the other brother was an innocent bystander. I never liked how often Matt Dillon let accomplices off the hook. Dillon had a very liberal interpretation of what guilt was.

There were many times that it seemed to me that Dillon should have been blowing people away instead of trying to find their bright side. In this episode, the end would have been much better if Michael J. Pollard and his smug smirk were sent to hell with a bullet to the guts, instead of waiting for an off-screen trial where the results were never to be known.

Never a Safe Time for Women

[sarastrickland · 8/10 · 8 April 2024]

I am a huge fan of the show. I agree with the review that insinuated the producers were veering away from focusing on the main characters. That always proved to be a big mistake. We are left longing for their presence or input. I vehemently disagree with the reviewer that comments that actor Michael Pollard "stole every scene he was in." Are we watching the same guy? I thought he had a speech problem at first. His acting coach must have told him to always pause 3-5 seconds before he speaks, and to always stare like he has some sort of brain injury. He must know someone in production to have been given so many roles outside of Gunsmoke.

I had an epiphany watching this episode...

[AlsExGal · 6/10 · 21 January 2023]

... that being just why Gunsmoke, as I go through these episodes chronologically , gets less consistently appealing as the seasons wear on.

The primary reason is that the recurring characters - Matt, Kitty, Doc, and now Festus (replacing Chester's type of character, whether you are willing to admit that or not) are less and less the center of the episodes and more and more taking on a "Now you see here you darn kids!" role.

This episode is a tale of two brothers - Adam and Cyrus - out to make a new life for themselves in California, and a traveling companion named Boyd. It turns out that Boyd is bad news as he is a complete sociopath. He is so violent and unpredictable that Adam is afraid to try to get away from him, and his brother Cyrus, a complete simpleton, is impressed by him. When Boyd kills a local girl and Matt Dillon goes on the trail of the killer, complications ensue.

Gunsmoke did motiveless violence well. It fit with the wilderness atmosphere of the show, and it fit with what was becoming all too common in 1960s America - random violent criminal acts. But as I watched this episode with little interaction by the rest of the cast I had to wonder - What is it about these three guys that would keep me watching? I had to answer - not much other than the hope that the principal players would show up.

Perhaps the producers thought that as the main players transitioned into middle age they would not be as appealing as a series of younger guest stars? I think that belief was incorrect as no other guest stars and no script, no matter how compelling, could replace the chemistry and the talent of the actors playing the central and original roles.