Daniel and Mingo are selling their furs in Mecklenburg, Virginia. But Dan falls afoul of a frame-up from an arson and robbery scheme hatched by trader Samuel Thurston (Jerome Thor) and his moll Lacey Lowe (Joanna Moore) - who purportedly double crosses Samuel by offing him and grabbing the loot for herself.
Time for a whodunit hour on DB, albeit one that is deconstructed early in the hour. Supporting specialist Thor is out of the story early, but the story is carried by Vaughn Taylor in a continuation of his other 1960's hanging-judge personas, and Southern siren Moore - an Alfred Hitchcock discovery - is a sufficiently malevolent beauty.
Possibilities were here of doing a takeoff on "The Fugitive" or a noir piece, but the pieces are never sufficiently assembled for either. Starting with the premise that Dan might be sufficiently angered over a soured business deal to blast his partner would have been much more intriguing, but would have required some setup and temporarily ditching Fess Parker's Disney mode. Dan and Mingo mostly spend the hour muddling around Mecklenberg and environs in daylight, evading a rather improbable posse of musketeers. Viewers familiar with 1970's crime drama plots should be able to make sufficient deductions ten minutes in.
No explanation as to why Mecklenberg County, Va., founded after the French & Indian War in 1765, is supposedly in demand as a fur trading depot. Also in one scene, Moore apparently uses a single-shot flintlock pistol as a revolver.
As stated before, always nice to get away from the Boonesborough shenanigans, but DB's road adventures can fall into the valley of the mundane as well. End of production season fatigue shines through here.
Time for a whodunit hour on DB, albeit one that is deconstructed early in the hour. Supporting specialist Thor is out of the story early, but the story is carried by Vaughn Taylor in a continuation of his other 1960's hanging-judge personas, and Southern siren Moore - an Alfred Hitchcock discovery - is a sufficiently malevolent beauty.
Possibilities were here of doing a takeoff on "The Fugitive" or a noir piece, but the pieces are never sufficiently assembled for either. Starting with the premise that Dan might be sufficiently angered over a soured business deal to blast his partner would have been much more intriguing, but would have required some setup and temporarily ditching Fess Parker's Disney mode. Dan and Mingo mostly spend the hour muddling around Mecklenberg and environs in daylight, evading a rather improbable posse of musketeers. Viewers familiar with 1970's crime drama plots should be able to make sufficient deductions ten minutes in.
No explanation as to why Mecklenberg County, Va., founded after the French & Indian War in 1765, is supposedly in demand as a fur trading depot. Also in one scene, Moore apparently uses a single-shot flintlock pistol as a revolver.
As stated before, always nice to get away from the Boonesborough shenanigans, but DB's road adventures can fall into the valley of the mundane as well. End of production season fatigue shines through here.