An excited young man rides into Dodge City and tells Matt Dillon his father has killed someone. Matt and Chester Goode follow the young man, whose name is Budge Grilk (another bizarre John Meston character name), back to the dugout house where the Grilk family lives. (Dugout houses were popular choices for frontier, plains homes because they could be built cheaply and did not require a lot of resources. In a later season, Chester builds his own dugout house with decidedly mixed results. The Grilk house in this story is the same structure that was used for the Season 1 episode, "Smoking Out the Nolans.") Pa Grilk has devised a plan to lure Marshal Dillon to their ramshackle homestead and kill him. Pa thinks with Matt out of the way, the Grilks will then easily ride into Dodge and rob the bank.
Robert F. Simon returns to play another overwrought character in Pa Grilk. He had portrayed another ornery character in the late Season 2 episode "Cheap Labor," but the Pa Grilk character is even more incorrigible and clearly deranged.
Promising young actor Tom Pittman takes on the Budge Grilk character in this story. Pittman had appeared as a sly, young cowboy who outwits Marshal Dillon in Season 1's "Dutch George" episode. Pittman, who reportedly idolized James Dean, was killed in a terrible automobile accident within a few months after this episode was filmed. (Pittman was driving the same model Porsche Dean was driving when he was killed.)
The incredible Jeanette Nolan makes her first Gunsmoke appearance in this episode where she plays Mrs. Grilk. Nolan appeared in eight different Gunsmoke episodes over the run of the series, including portraying the character "Dirty" Sally Fergus in three episodes (one was a two-part episode) in Seasons 16 and 17. The Dirty Sally series featured the same Sally Fergus character and was the only Gunsmoke spin-off series. Nolan is almost unrecognizable in this episode, as her character has clearly suffered extreme abuse from her husband and moves about through the story in a sort of hopeless, cowering despair.
Morgan Woodward -- who would later appear in so many Gunsmoke episodes it almost seemed he was part of the regular cast -- makes his first appearance in the series in a brief scene as a man named Calhoun who is the Grilk's neighbor. This appearance takes place early in Woodward's acting career. His next appearance in the series did not occur until Season 11.
This story is about as close as Gunsmoke gets to a horror entry in the series. The Grilks are deranged and sadistic. For example, there is a scene where Pa is going to shoot Matt and Chester, and Budge calls to his mother, who is inside the house, to come out if she wants to see the killing.
Viewers looking for an uplifting story or a happy conclusion would be advised to skip this entry. The Grilk family is another of those amazingly dark, despairing, hopeless John Meston creations. Meston often created these characters to represent the brutal life of homesteaders who settled on the plains. The ending of this episode is especially sad and dark.
On the other hand, viewers that enjoy this kind of story might also want to check out Season 8's "Phoebe Strunk," Season 9's "No Hands," and especially "The Cabin" - arguably the darkest story in Gunsmoke history - which appears later during the third season.
Robert F. Simon returns to play another overwrought character in Pa Grilk. He had portrayed another ornery character in the late Season 2 episode "Cheap Labor," but the Pa Grilk character is even more incorrigible and clearly deranged.
Promising young actor Tom Pittman takes on the Budge Grilk character in this story. Pittman had appeared as a sly, young cowboy who outwits Marshal Dillon in Season 1's "Dutch George" episode. Pittman, who reportedly idolized James Dean, was killed in a terrible automobile accident within a few months after this episode was filmed. (Pittman was driving the same model Porsche Dean was driving when he was killed.)
The incredible Jeanette Nolan makes her first Gunsmoke appearance in this episode where she plays Mrs. Grilk. Nolan appeared in eight different Gunsmoke episodes over the run of the series, including portraying the character "Dirty" Sally Fergus in three episodes (one was a two-part episode) in Seasons 16 and 17. The Dirty Sally series featured the same Sally Fergus character and was the only Gunsmoke spin-off series. Nolan is almost unrecognizable in this episode, as her character has clearly suffered extreme abuse from her husband and moves about through the story in a sort of hopeless, cowering despair.
Morgan Woodward -- who would later appear in so many Gunsmoke episodes it almost seemed he was part of the regular cast -- makes his first appearance in the series in a brief scene as a man named Calhoun who is the Grilk's neighbor. This appearance takes place early in Woodward's acting career. His next appearance in the series did not occur until Season 11.
This story is about as close as Gunsmoke gets to a horror entry in the series. The Grilks are deranged and sadistic. For example, there is a scene where Pa is going to shoot Matt and Chester, and Budge calls to his mother, who is inside the house, to come out if she wants to see the killing.
Viewers looking for an uplifting story or a happy conclusion would be advised to skip this entry. The Grilk family is another of those amazingly dark, despairing, hopeless John Meston creations. Meston often created these characters to represent the brutal life of homesteaders who settled on the plains. The ending of this episode is especially sad and dark.
On the other hand, viewers that enjoy this kind of story might also want to check out Season 8's "Phoebe Strunk," Season 9's "No Hands," and especially "The Cabin" - arguably the darkest story in Gunsmoke history - which appears later during the third season.
