The WORST episodes of The Virginian
Every episode of The Virginian ever, ranked from worst to best by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The worst episodes of The Virginian!
The Virginian was the very first 90 minute western on prime-time television, and is about a man, only known as "the Virginian" who served as foreman on the Shiloh Ranch (owned in sequence by Judge Garth, the Grainger brothers, and Col. MacKenzie) in 19th century Medicine Bow, Wyoming. James Drury starred as the title character with the likes of Doug McClure, Lee J. Cobb, John McIntire, and Clu Gulager co-starring. It is in these settings that a variety of stories, much more based on character and relationships than the usual westerns, take place.
#1 - The Strange Quest of Claire Bingham
Season 5 - Episode 29 - Aired 4/12/1967
A nurse comes to Medicine Bow so see if an outlaw Ryker captured might be her brother as they were both orphaned at an early age. When he escapes and is shot, he uses her feelings to get help as Ryker who is attracted to her purses him.
#2 - The Girl on the Pinto
Season 5 - Episode 27 - Aired 3/29/1967
On the range Trampas spots a girl (Valora Noland) riding a pinto whom he has seen before but whom no one believes exists including the Virginian. Trampas rides after her but she rides off refusing to talk to him. In town he sees her again with her mother, Miriam Harley (Vivi Janiss), learns her name is Amanda, and that her parents have bought a local farm. He tries to get her to go a dance but she refuses. As the Harley's leave town they are watched by a man, Richard Pierce (Warren Stevens), who has just arrived at the hotel. Pierce learns where the Harleys live and later visits and talks with Amanda but rides off when her father, Frederick (R. G. Amstrong) arrives. In town, Pierce tries to get the stationmaster to arrange to stop a train so it can drop off some horses and is overheard by Sheriff Mark Abbott. He also briefly talks with another man who arrives on the train, Bert Robinson (Sandy Kenyon). The Sheriff returns to the jail where Marshall John Howard (Ken Mayer) is waiting a
#3 - A Welcoming Town
Season 5 - Episode 26 - Aired 3/22/1967
Trampas goes to visit Ida Martin and son Joe who he lived with as a child. Having not seen them in a few years he finds their place deserted. When he learns Joe was killed by a posse, he can't believe the reason given for his death.
#4 - The Mysterious Mr. Tate
Season 9 - Episode 5 - Aired 10/14/1970
Colonel MacKenzie is traveling on a train with Lark Walters, the young and sheltered daughter of a wealthy friend of his. At a stop in a town, he sees a young man shoot another man in self-defense. Later, MacKenzie saves the same young man from being lynched, and brings him onto the train, where the overly romantic Lark falls for the young stranger. MacKenzie tries to keep them apart, but Lark won't give up. Meanwhile, other men on the train hatch up a scheme to kidnap Lark and hold her for ransom, and try to get the young man, Tate, to join with them. This episode introduces Tate as a series regular.
#5 - The Modoc Kid
Season 5 - Episode 19 - Aired 2/1/1967
Five men arrive in Medicine Bow intent on robbing the bank: Bob Archer (Harry Carey Jr.), Frank Cave (Gene Ellis), brothers Roy (John Goddard) and Cullen Tindall (Harrison Ford), and leader and well-known gunslinger, Del Stetler alias the Modoc Kid (John Saxon). However, they have been observed by Deputy Emmett Ryker and are ambushed by him, Sheriff Abbott (Ross Elliott) and other deputies. Cave is killed and Archer is wounded and captured but the others escape even though Roy Tindall is seriously wounded. They manage to elude the posse and go to Shiloh ranch where the hands are away on a trail drive and only the Graingers are home. They take the Graingers prisoner, forcing Elizabeth to tend to the wounded Roy, and it soon becomes clear the Modoc Kid is obsessed with his own notoriety as a gunslinger. Roy needs medical attention and so the Modoc Kid forces John Grainger to lure Dr. Hinton (Paul Fix) to Shiloh with the pretense that Elizabeth Grainger has broken her collar bone in an ac
#6 - Doctor Pat
Season 5 - Episode 23 - Aired 3/1/1967
Dr. Spaulding decides to hire another doctor to help share the load but he is unsure whether the attractive female doctor he is sent will work out. The Virginian takes a strong interest in her and her problems as she tries to adapt.
#7 - Melanie
Season 5 - Episode 22 - Aired 2/22/1967
An old and successful friend and his daughter from Chicago visit the Graingers. John is surprised when he learns they want to stay in the area. The high society daughter falls in love with Trampas who doesn't know about her secret illness.
#8 - Without Mercy
Season 5 - Episode 21 - Aired 2/15/1967
Stacey has developed an interest in a girl but her father doesn't approve of him. After dragging Stacey, the father is found shot in the back. When the $300 he was carrying is found in Stacey's saddle bags, Stacey is charged with murder.
#9 - Bitter Harvest
Season 5 - Episode 25 - Aired 3/15/1967
The Virginian travels to Winton to buys oats for Shiloh. He finds himself in the middle of a fight between the farmers and ranchers with the owner of the oats at the core of the fight with a rancher who is a close friend of John Grainger.
#10 - Nightmare at Fort Killman
Season 5 - Episode 24 - Aired 3/8/1967
Watched by two men, Stacey Grainger buys a train ticket to San Francisco where he is to meet the Virginian. He leaves his bag with the Station Master (Harry Harvey Sr.) but when he returns to the station to catch the train he is waylaid by the men who had been watching him. One of the men, whom it turns out is army Sergeant Tom Beale (Johnny Seven), dresses Stacey in an army uniform, fills him with rotgut and takes him to Fort Killman where he gives the clerk (Wally Strauss) papers saying Stacey is Willard J. Thorne, a new recruit. Beale is surprised to learn, however, that his own army discharge papers have not yet arrived and won't come through for two days. The unconscious Stacey is thrown in the guardhouse where he meets black soldier Billy Martin (Don Mitchell). The top Sergeant, Joe Trapp (James Daly) and commanding officer, Captain MacDowell (Les Crane), return to the fort from a reconnaissance. It is clear the two distrust one another and are not on good terms, with Trapp imply
#11 - The Saddle Warmer
Season 7 - Episode 1 - Aired 9/18/1968
David Sutton takes a job at Shiloh to make up for the work Trampas can't do after being involved in Trampas breaking his leg. He has a hard time fitting in with the other hands while a girl he met earlier tracks him down to help her.
#12 - Sue Ann
Season 5 - Episode 16 - Aired 1/11/1967
Sue Ann McCrae (Patty Duke) lives on a small farmstead with her widower father (Edward Binns), her two younger brothers, and hand Joe Stevens (Paul Carr). Joe wants to marry her but she feels trapped and one night runs off. She hails a stage driven by Mr. Tait (Roy Barcroft) and on it meets Trampas and tells him she is going to San Francisco. Arriving in Medicine Bow, Trampas gets her a room at Mrs. Crandall's (Rita Lynn) boarding house. Meanwhile, Joe and Pa McCrae search for Sue Ann and learn from Tait that she went to Medicine Bow and that she was with a Shiloh hand, Trampas. They arrive at Shiloh and Trampas takes them to the boarding house. Sue Ann confesses to them that she wants to see life and live it and do things outside the farm routine and that she is going to get a job to raise money to go to San Francisco. She volunteers to come back to the farm but her father says he will give her a chance to spread her wings but she is always welcome to return. Joe wants to stick around
#13 - That Saunders Woman
Season 4 - Episode 27 - Aired 3/30/1966
The Virginian, attempting to recover money Shiloh spent on diseased cattle, becomes embroiled in a blackmail attempt and finally murder. A pretty woman is involved who was just released from prison for murder and is the talk of Medicine Bow.
#14 - No Drums, No Trumpets
Season 4 - Episode 28 - Aired 4/6/1966
Starr with Trampas agrees to go to Mexico to check the security of a town where A US Senator and a Mexican Governor plan to sign a treat. All looks okay so Trampas leaves but Starr soon finds he is in the middle of an assassination plot.
#15 - Deadeye Dick
Season 5 - Episode 9 - Aired 11/9/1966
Lucy Hammond (June Vincent) and her teenage daughter Marjorie (Alice Rawlings) arrive by train in Medicine Bow. Marjorie is enthralled by her first trip west which she imagines to be like the dime novels featuring her hero Deadeye Dick. At Medicine Bow they are met by Lucy's widowed sister Livvy Underhill (Patricia Donahue). While Marjorie is waiting in the buggy for her mother and aunt, a tumbleweed spooks the horse but is calmed down by the Virginian who happens to be nearby and she tells the Virginian that was how the heroine of her novels met Deadeye Dick. Marjorie and Lucy arrive at the Underhill ranch and while out riding Marjorie spies the Virginian rounding up cattle and meets him by pretending her horse is a runaway so he will rescue her. She even pretends to see a snake to see how fast the Virginian is on the draw. The two meet neighbouring farmer Tom Foley (William Schallert) and his teenage son Bob (David Macklin) and the Virginian gets Bob to escort Marjorie home. Bob disc
#16 - The Girl on the Glass Mountain
Season 5 - Episode 14 - Aired 12/28/1966
Cowhand Howie Sheppard (Tom Tryon) participates in his last cattle drive for Shiloh as he is to marry Donna Maguire (Pamela Austin) once the roundup is over and settle down – that is, if Donna's father Jasper (Hugh Beaumont), a well-off store owner, consents to the marriage. He also encounters Rail (Michael Greene), a former co-worker with a larcenous streak and warns him against rustling cattle from the Shiloh herd like he used to do when they worked together at the Connally ranch. At a dance, Donna tells Howie the story of the girl on the glass mountain who would not come down until she met her Prince. After a dance, Howie asks Jasper Maguire for his daughter's hand and although he tells Howie he does not see him as the ideal son-in-law, he consents to the marriage. Howie agrees to buy a store with a living area at the rear where he can set up a saddlery shop. Donna and Howie are married with Stacey and Elizabeth Grainger serving as best man and bridesmaid. The saddlery shop is a suc
#17 - The Gauntlet
Season 5 - Episode 20 - Aired 2/8/1967
The Virginian is shot crossing a large Texas ranch. The owner taking him in tries to hire him to be his own foreman. The owner likes to make his own rules putting him at odds with his wife over their son and the running of a gauntlet.
#18 - The Best Man
Season 9 - Episode 2 - Aired 9/23/1970
Trampas and his friend Pick Lexington visit some old friends in Mexico. But Trampas is caught between Pick and one of his Mexican friends as both men fall for the same girl, and he hopes to stop them from dueling each other while the girl chooses between them.
#19 - The Challenge
Season 5 - Episode 6 - Aired 10/19/1966
After a stagecoach holdup and accident, Trampas stumbles into a farm with a concussion and amnesia. The farmer and his two kids tend to Trampas but the white handled gun he is carrying puts him into danger from the law and the outlaws.
#20 - The Mark of a Man
Season 4 - Episode 30 - Aired 4/20/1966
The Virginian and Trampas arrive at the Medicine Bow saloon just as young Johnny Younce (Barry Primus) stumbles out. Johnny looks in the window of a tailor shop owned by Jake (Harold J. Stone) which contains a sign ‘the clothes make a man."" Johnny proceeds to break the window and goes on a rampage even trying to burn down the town with a thrown lantern. He is subdued by the Virginian but hits his head on a wagon and gets a concussion. At the jail Doctor Stanton (Bill Quinn) says Johnny can not be left alone so the Virginian volunteers to take Johnny to Shiloh to recuperate until his trial. The Virginian learns that Johnny had been working at the saloon but had been fired for unclear reasons. He also learns Johnny had come to town the year before looking for his Aunt Emily but found she was Lily Duvall (Jean Willes) who ran the local bordello and never visited her again. He also will not tell the Virginian or Emmett Ryker why he went on his rampage. At Shiloh it is clear Jennifer Sommer
#21 - A Bald-Faced Boy
Season 4 - Episode 29 - Aired 4/13/1966
Trampas, Emmett Ryker and Randy Benton spend some time at the Grand Teton Hotel in Medicine Bow spinning tall tales when four hillbillies arrive. They include Randy's brother Brett (Andrew Prine), his Uncle Del (Royal Dano), and his two cousins, Peck (Michael Stanwood) and Razz (Kay E. Kutzer). They tell him they are there to protect him. Jim Claiborne (Andrew Duggan), with whose family the Bentons have had a long history of feuding, is on his way to Medicine Bow to seek revenge on Randy whose testimony sent Jim to prison for six years. Claiborne and his daughter Glory (Karen Jensen) arrive in town. Jim has learned about Medicine while in prison and hopes to set up in Medicine Bow helping a doctor but he has kept from Glory his reasons for choosing that town. They meet Randy accidentally in the hotel and Randy offers to show Glory around town but Jim is reluctant to have anything to do with Randy. When the Benton clan sees Jim Claiborne in the street they attack him but are stopped by
#22 - Trail to Ashley Mountain
Season 5 - Episode 8 - Aired 11/2/1966
Sheriff Mark Abbott (Ross Elliott) arrives at Ed Wells (Hugh Marlowe) ranch and finds him playing checkers with Trampas and being served lemonade by Ed's wife, Connie (Monica Lewis). The Sheriff finds a horse in the corral missing a shoe and reveals a shoe, along with a piece of fringe from a distinctive shirt Ed owned, were found at the scene of the murder of Cy Bates who had been robbed of $8,000 in gold. The shirt is missing and Ed claims he was home at the time of the robbery, meeting with travelling salesman/tinker Gabe Styles. Marks wants Ed to come to town with him. In private Ed asks his wife where the shirt is and she says she gave it to her brother Willy (Steve Carlson) who lives with them, a fact Ed hides from the Sheriff. After the Sheriff and Ed leave, Willy arrives and admits to his sister that he was at the robbery but claims an accomplice killed Cy Bates and that Ed will get off anyway once Gabe Styles confirms his alibi. However, unknown to all, Gabe has died a natural
#23 - Jenny
Season 9 - Episode 3 - Aired 9/30/1970
The Virginian comes to the aid of a woman being attacked in a hotel, and finds that it's an old flame, Jenny Davis, who says three men have been following her though she doesn't know why. The next day, she and The Virginian are on a stage with another man and a young woman when the three men chase after them and cause the stage to break down in the desert. Jenny is slow with telling the whole truth, but finally admits that the men are the partners of her late outlaw husband who are looking for money he hid before he was imprisoned. A mysterious man riding alone is also following both the stage and the three outlaws.
#24 - Nightmare
Season 8 - Episode 16 - Aired 1/21/1970
When the wife of a prominent Medicine Bow business man arrives, smoldering jealousies quickly rise to the top.
#25 - Outcast
Season 5 - Episode 7 - Aired 10/26/1966
A man wanted for murder and robbery escapes jail and ends up in Medicine Bow where he befriends Stacey in a fight. He goes to work at Shiloh as a ranch hand and Elizabeth takes an interest in him. However, Stacey is less certain about him.