Trail Riders (1942) starring John 'Dusty' King, David Sharpe, Max Terhune, Elmer, Evelyn Finley directed by Robert Emmett Tansey Movie Review

Trail Riders (1942)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Trail Riders (1942) starring John 'Dusty' King, David Sharpe, Max Terhune, Elmer

Busters Spring into Action

Gila Springs is in trouble as a group of outlaws lead by Ace Alton have robbed the bank and in doing so they kill Marshal Frank Hammond. With the trouble the Range Busters; Dusty, Davy and Alibi are called in to bring law and order back to the town but find themselves being kicked out by Ed Cole who is the head of the local vigilantes but is secretly in cahoots with Alton. The Range Buster head to the ranch of Mike Rand where Mike's son Jeff has become involved with Cole and his gang who order him to shoot Davy. When they guys learn what is going on they set a trap to catch the duplicitous Cole.

I had better say that "Trail Riders" is my first Range Buster movie and it is one of the last in the series which ran to 19 features between 1940 and 1943. Yes that is 19 movies in three years and yes "Trail Riders" is one of those old western b-movies which clocks in at just under the hour which makes them now an enjoyable little time filler. Although having said that if I wasn't a fan of old westerns I am not entirely sure I would watch another Range Buster movie on the back of this one.

The trouble with "Trail Riders" is that it is full of quirks which for me don't fit in to a western such as Alibi having a puppet which he uses. Okay so you may say it is just a quirk like a singing cowboy was or the comedy sidekick but seriously a puppet, what cowboy carried around with them a blinking puppet. There are other issues and from a plot where thing happens so easily to text book characters "Trail Riders" offers up very little too encourage anyone to seek out other Range Buster movies.

What this all boils down to is that "Trail Riders" just didn't do it for me and found the easy in the way things happen too much as is the puppet which is used by one of the men. Maybe the earlier movies in the series were better but other than some stunt work this comes up short.


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