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The character of Jude Bonner is a William Smith classic, strong, evil, vindictive, muscular and well costumed. His pride requires him to rescue, and that failing, avenge his brother Virgil despite Jude's recognition that Virgil is useless, troublesome and brought his fate upon himself by continuing to party at a bar when the rest of the gang left. The writers offer some justification for Jude's character. He tells Kitty that his Cheyenne mother was butchered by cavalry soldiers. As with most evil characters, he is not without cowardice. In his one on one "unarmed" fight with Matt Dillon, he gets a knife from the 2nd in command who has been told to shoot Dillon should Jude go down in the fight.
Bonner's wicked glee |
The Fight |
NITEOWL REVIEW: Jude Bonner dominates the episode. The character could have been written for Bill and no one could have played him better. Due to James Arness' considerable size, it may have been difficult through-out the course of the series to find villains who could offer him a realistic opponent in hand to hand combat. However, in the final fight scene here, the contrast between the vital muscular William Smith and the [by then] older James Arness made Matt seem like an unlikely winner despite his four inch advantage in height. [Okay, we're prejudiced. I'm sure Arness fans would give us a fight on that comment.] We would have liked to have seen this match up in Arness's younger years when he was one of the most physically powerful of the TV heroes.Chick Note: Bill looked utterly grand in this part. He had similar facial hair and costumes, also to great effect, in Ultimate Warrior and C.C. & Company. But this look was reserved for his villain roles. It's really a shame that he was never cast as a hero with this kind of magnificent warrior look.
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