This comment may contain a "spoiler.
"Dick Powell's Zane Gray Theater" was one of the highlights of my Friday night viewing back in the mid to late 1950's. I remember one episode in particular in which Powell starred as Dan Case , a kind of old west version of the flying Dutchman, who was killed in a gunfight, then doomed to wander the west, repeatedly getting into shootouts and being gunned down. The theme song sums it up: "They draw guns and then/Dan dies again/as he wanders in search of his soul". It was haunting T.V. in several senses of the term. Other episodes, with performances by journeyman actors, like Wendell Corey, Dennis Hopper and others, remain mere fragments in the memory, yet the impression remains of substantial story-telling and satisfying entertainment. I started watching at the age of seven; withing two years I was reading Zane Gray novels like "the Thundering Herd" (having cut my teeth on the comic book associated with the show).
"Dick Powell's Zane Gray Theater" was one of the highlights of my Friday night viewing back in the mid to late 1950's. I remember one episode in particular in which Powell starred as Dan Case , a kind of old west version of the flying Dutchman, who was killed in a gunfight, then doomed to wander the west, repeatedly getting into shootouts and being gunned down. The theme song sums it up: "They draw guns and then/Dan dies again/as he wanders in search of his soul". It was haunting T.V. in several senses of the term. Other episodes, with performances by journeyman actors, like Wendell Corey, Dennis Hopper and others, remain mere fragments in the memory, yet the impression remains of substantial story-telling and satisfying entertainment. I started watching at the age of seven; withing two years I was reading Zane Gray novels like "the Thundering Herd" (having cut my teeth on the comic book associated with the show).