John Wayne still has more adventures to go through and so now we’re back here with another one. This time Wayne has to go undercover to put a stop to one of the most dangerous gangs around. The only way to trick his adversaries is to also trick his friends which ends up getting him in quite a bit of trouble. It’s a pretty fun film all the way through and fits right in with the rest.

The film starts off with John on the run as he has to clear his name once more. He ends up bumping into a guy named Joseph who introduces him to a gang that could always use a little extra firepower. John agrees as a way to sabotage the gang and along the way he also wants to help Joseph stay on the straight and narrow. It’ll be difficult though because the rest of the gang starts to suspect him early on. It makes a lot of sense because all of their plans begin to go haywire immediately after John joins up. Doesn’t take a genius to put two and two together. Will John survive this one?

So John means well but you can see how the plan isn’t particularly good. He also has to count on the gang not making the first move and just bumping him off. For example there is a scene early on where he tries to break up a fight and is knocked out for his troubles. That easily could have gone even worse for him. He’s also just not very subtle about ratting them out as he goes to the nearby store to flirt with the cashier and then drop the notes.

There is slightly more romance here than in the last few but only to the extent that we have John and Joseph flirting with the same girl. Ultimately you have a feeling on who is going to win out there. At least she is given a role beyond just being the love interest as she helps relay the messages and also talks to Joseph when he gets the wrong idea about what John is doing. So by giving these contributions to the story, that helped the heroine be important. Still not a strong romance though.

If you’re familiar with the Wayne films by now, you know what to expect when it comes to the fights. There is a lot of fun hand to hand combat all the way around. The script and writing are both solid and the film’s extremely short runtime helps make for quick pacing at all times. Adding Joseph in as a supporting character was a good way to not just have the film be focused around John for once. Joseph is a criminal through and through but the film does try to humanize him to an extent.

It’s part of why John feels bad for the guy since he is clearly not as heartless as the others. Unfortunately for him, this still comes a bit too late. This gang is a serious one after all and doesn’t take kindly to traitors. You also feel a bit mixed on the idea of the sympathetic villain like this. On one hand, he doesn’t seem to be the smartest guy around and is someone who can be easily influenced. So if he had a good role model then perhaps he would have been a good guy all along.

At the same time, as an adult he is still responsible for his actions. So even though we see that he is less evil than the others, just hanging around them for so long makes him guilty by association to all of the crazy crimes that they have been committing. It’s probably why his character arc had to end the way thast it did so the film wouldn’t send out a mixed message here.

The villains as a whole are not very memorable otherwise though. They’re still a fun group to have around though. They land pretty good blows here and there and did have the town running scared. If not for John, they would have really ended up dominating here. The leader in particular had a lot of confidence on his own and was the first to see through John’s ruse so you have to give him some credit there. He’s not the leader by chance or anything like that, it’s because he is absolutely the most skilled member of the group.

Finally, John was a solid hero as always. He could also really fight hand to hand when needed and was doing his best to see that justice was done. It’s more than the others could. The town gets a bunch of demerit points for not really doing anything though. The town has a lot of able bodied men so why aren’t they doing anything? It’s always my criticism for these kinds of films but it’s not something that would hurt the score of the film. It just means that you’ll be judging them rather hard. Sure there is a sheriff and he’s always ready in the climax once the heroes have the edge but without John around he ends up being rather toothless.

Overall, This was a pretty good film. It’s always fun to see John have to play the role of a villain for a bit. He definitely has that smug confidence that works well in the role. I always have a blast seeing him act, well essentially sarcastic with how he talks to the other characters. He is always rather polite to everyone on the surface but you can feel the contempt when he’s talking to one of the villains. I’d definitely recommend this movie.

Overall 7/10