Product Details

• Actors: Richard Boone, James Olson, Lurene Tuttle, Walter Barnes, Alan Carney
• Directors: Andrew V. McLaglen, Lamont Johnson, Lewis Milestone
• Writers: Albert Aley, Berni Gould, Buckley Angell, Don Brinkley, Doris Hursley
• Format: Box set, Black & White, NTSC
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono)
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 6
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Paramount
• DVD Release Date: May 11, 2004
• Run Time: 1009 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (151 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0001JXQ2Y
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #8,915 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #1 in	Movies & TV > Television > Westerns > Have Gun - Will Travel
  #76 in	Movies & TV > Boxed Sets > Westerns

• For more information about "Have Gun Will Travel - The Complete First Season" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

• This is item 1 in The Have Gun, Will Travel Series.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

The first season of Have Gun--Will Travel makes it easy to see why this Western series was an overnight success. Making its debut on September 14, 1957, the half-hour show ranked no. 4 in the ratings for its entire first season, which ran almost completely uninterrupted (minus a one-week preemption) until June of 1958--a punishing schedule unheard of in present-day television. (It ranked even higher in subsequent seasons, holding the no. 3 spot, behind Gunsmoke and Wagon Train.) Richard Boone was perfectly cast in the lead role of Paladin, a cultured gunslinger whose West Point education, impeccable style, literate sophistication, and distinguished Civil War service made him unique among Western heroes, and the prototype for many dashing figures to follow. Based in San Francisco's ritzy Carlton Hotel, he scans newspapers to locate trouble throughout the wild West, then cagily markets his services (via his legendary calling card, "Have Gun--Will Travel") as a hired gun, moral arbiter, voice of reason, and reluctant killer of badmen. Understanding the complexities of frontier justice, Paladin (whose full name is never revealed) could turn on those who hired him if he suspected dubious motivations. He wore black, but he traveled in an ethical gray zone.

Running about 25 minutes each, these 39 episodes are consistently good and economically plotted, since Have Gun boasted stellar talent on both sides of the camera. Each episode began with the memorable theme by legendary film composer Bernard Herrmann, and most of the first season was directed by Andrew V. McLaglen, who worked regularly on Gunsmoke, Rawhide, and Perry Mason before graduating to a prolific big-screen career. Regular writers included Gene Roddenberry (who created Star Trek six years later), and budding maverick Sam Peckinpah co-wrote episode #22, "The Singer." In addition to series regular Kam Tong as Paladin's Chinese-American manservant Hey Boy (a "Coolie" stereotype, but Tong handles it with dignity, especially in "Hey Boy's Revenge"), Have Gun offered a who's-who of 1950s and '60s guest stars, from genre stalwarts like Victor McLaglen (Andrew's father), John Carradine, Strother Martin, and R.G. Armstrong, to promising newcomers like Angie Dickinson, Warren Oates, and Charles Bronson (the last starring in "The Outlaw," one of the season's finest episodes). Each episode is accompanied by background information and guest-star profiles, and while picture quality is quite good overall, the audio quality suffers from a low-level mix with noticeable hiss from aged source materials. Fortunately, this won't prevent anyone from enjoying a first-rate TV series that thrived for another five seasons, until cancellation in 1963. --Jeff Shannon

Product Description

Have Gun - Will Travel Wire Paladin San Francisco. It's the statement on a business card adorned with a chess-piece knight that heralds the professional services of Paladin (Richard Boone) in this wildly popular Western series from the Golden Age of television. Based at the Hotel Carlton in San Francisco and assisted by his manservant Hey Boy (Kam Tong) Paladin is an intelligent yet mysterious loner as well as a man of many talents including detective bodyguard courier sleuth and bounty hunter. When the situation is desparate Paladin is the man to wire. This premiere season of Have Gun - Will Travel showcases both Boone and such guest stars as Jack Lord Charles Bronson Angie Dickenson Claude Akins Strother Martin Mike Connors and June Lockhart in a keleidoscope of thrilling action-packed adventures featuring the heroic man in black!System Requirements: Running Time 1009 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS Rating: NR UPC: 097368752344 Manufacturer No: 875234

See all Editorial Reviews

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

109 of 111 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A knight without armor in a savage land, March 13, 2005

By	Steven Hellerstedt "SH" - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Richard Boone stars as Paladin in this six-disk dvd set of the first season of HAVE GUN, WILL TRAVEL (1957-1958).
CBS broadcast an incredible thirty-nine episodes that first season, each episode lasting 23 to 25 minutes. Most episodes begin with the spiffily dressed Paladin (we're never given a last name) scouring the thick stacks newspapers brought to him by the ever helpful Hey Boy (Kam Tong), bellboy at Paladin's residence, the Carlton Hotel in San Francisco. Eventually Paladin reads of a missing child in Colorado, or a rash of robberies occurring in Montana. Paladin slips his business card - a chess knight with the legend Have Gun, Will Travel, Wire Paladin, San Francisco - into an envelope and mails it to the injured party.
Slowly enough as we wend our way through the first year we learn something of Paladin. He has a passion for justice and a taste for the good things. His going rate is $1000, although he will take on a pro bono job if the cause is just. In town he dresses to the nines and in sundry other ways consumes conspicuously. When traveling with a gun he dresses in black. Somewhere along the line he picked up a military education, quotes Shakespeare and Pliny, savors a first-edition of Dryden. His taste in and knowledge of fine wines is commented upon in a couple of episodes....
I don't know if any of this matters, but going through fifteen hours of HGWT over a week or so it's kind of fun to have an aha moment or two. Paladin is an enigma, and Boone, a little more credible as the gunslinger than the city dandy, was an inspired choice to play him. Boone has a commanding presence and, believe me when I tell you buckaroos, was pretty darn quick on the draw.
Twenty-three minutes is a pretty tight box to fit a action story in, which might explain why we don't waste a whole lot of time on Paladin's backstory. Of course, the storytelling is made a lot easier when you consider the talent involved. The talent rundown has to start with Boone, who was nominated Best Leading Actor as Paladin in 1959 and 1960. The great majority of the first season episodes were directed by action veteran Andrew McLaglen (son of actor Victor McLaglen), although a couple were helmed by Oscar winning director Lewis Milestone. Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry wrote a few scripts for the first season as well. Sam Peckingpah even co-wrote one episode (The Singer).
The talent in front of the camera was as formidable as that behind. Major established stars like Victor McLaglen and John Carradine appeared in episodes - weak ones, in my opinion, especially the McLaglen episode (directed by son Andrew) in which the old actor played a construction foreman threatening to cut a town off from its source of water. McLaglen simply wasn't getting around very briskly and it's a little painful to watch. Another major movie star fares much better. Charles Bronson wasn't established yet, but he plays a robber who more or less forces Paladin into a gunfighting showdown in an episode that paints fatal violence as both regrettable and, sometimes, unavoidable. Strother Martin (Cool Hand Luke) appears in two episodes, once as an unscrupulous frontier lawyer and earlier in a more affecting role as a high wire walker who'd lost his nerve somewhere along the way. Warren Oates plays one of the bad offspring in a truncated take on King Lear.
That's just the beginning. Future television stars appear in almost every episode. Pernell Roberts and Dan Blocker (Bonanza) appear as scruffy tough guys in relatively small roles in separate episodes. Jack Lord (Hawaii 5-0) is a cowardly kidnapper. June Lockhart (Lassie, Lost In Space) appears twice as a frontier doctor. Angie Dickinson (Police Woman) plays a young woman whose brother was murdered and threatens to incite a lynch mob. Mike Connors (Mannix) plays a cattle rustling bad guy in one of the early episodes.
Okay, I'm enthusing here. Still haven't got to the best stuff. What gave me the biggest kick was watching the people I'd never heard of. Peter Whitney, who the intro blurb that precedes each episode tells us made a film career out of playing slow-witted big guys and menacing big guys, plays a mentally challenged ranch hand who's goaded into placing a burr under boss's Stuart Whitman's saddle, with dire consequences, in "The Last Laugh." The diminutive B-western star Bob Steele plays a crooked mine boss in "The High Graders" - the Wire Paladin blurb tells us Steele had developed a quick draw during his B-career, which McLaglen pays homage to in a draw down between his character and Paladin. My favorite discovery, though, has to be Marian Seldes, a tremendous actress who is featured in two episodes. First as a mail order bride who Paladin escorts to her new home in "The Bride" and later as a small town teacher who the local bullies try to intimidate in "The Teacher."
Very strongly recommended, especially for fans of traditional westerns.

54 of 56 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Classic western with Boone firmly in control, July 17, 2004

By	Deborah MacGillivray "Author," (US & UK) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Richard Boone was one of the most natural actors ever to grace the screen. Good guys, bad guys, he did them all with such a grace and ease that he made it seem so effortless. Paladin was a product of the post-Civil War. A West Point Graduate, he was an educated man, a man who appreciated literature, opera, culture. So it was not surprising he settled in San Franscisco after the war. Though a man of refinement, he made his living by hiring his gun out to those in need. He passed his little cards around - "Have Gun, Will Travel. Wire Paladin, San Fransisco" and waited for clients to find him.

While a cultured man, he was just as comfortable in the deadly knight errant persona, the man in black. Boone excelled at making you believe both sides could exist within one man. While he was a hired gun, he often spent more time talking to people making them listen to reason.

A loved all these Westerns. Have enjoyed the reruns on TVLand, Starz Westerns, and the Hallmark Channel. But so many of the old Westerns don't hold up well. I was surprised how well Rawhide and Have Gun, Will Travel hold their quality. So these are a super addition to any video maven's collection. Sadly, I don't think Boone ever got the true recognition his talent deserved, but those of us who appreciated him can now watch his talent shine.

49 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "the man clad in black a silver chess-set knight ~ Paladin", June 13, 2005

By	J. Lovins "Mr. Jim" (Missouri-USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Have Gun Will Travel - The Complete Second Season (DVD)

CBS and Paramount Home Video present "HAVE GUN WILL TRAVEL - THE COMPLETE SECOND SEASON (1958-1959), featuring Richard Boone as Paladin in his clad black wearing a pistol and holster custom made stamped with a silver chess-set knight which was his trademark...as was his theme song "reads the card of a man, a knight without armor in a Savage Land"...a graduate of West Point and a veteran of The Civil War, who makes his headquarters at the Hotel Carlton in San Francisco...fighting for the underdog at a price of $1000, sometimes giving his fee away whenever the situation comanded it so for the needy...this role for Mr. Boone catapulted him to stardom and made the series a cult favorite.

First time on DVD with all 39 Original Episodes of Season Two...with guest stars noted:
Disc One (Episodes 40 - 45)
THE MANHUNTER (guest stars: Joseph Calleia, Martin Balsam, David Whorf & Stephen Colt )
IN AN EVIL TIME (guest star: Hank Patterson)
THE MAN WHO WOULDN'T TALK (guest stars: Charles Bronson & Harry Carey Jr.)
THE HANGING OF ROY CARTER (guest stars: Robert Armstrong, Francis McDonald, John Larch & Scott Marlowe)
(Screenplay: Gene Roddenberry)
DUEL AT FLORENCE (guest star: Dean Harens, Bonnie Bolding, Charles Gray, John Alderson & Hank Patterson)
THE PORTEGE (guest star: Peter Breck)

Disc Two (Episodes 46 - 51)
THE ROAD TO WICKENBURG (guest stars: Harry Carey Jr. & Don "Red" Barry) (Screenplay: Gene Roddenberry)
A SENSE OF JUSTICE (guest stars: Karl Swenson, Bing Russell & Barrie Chase)
YOUNG GUN (guest stars: Dick Foran & Abby Dalton)
THE LADY (guest star: Patricia Medina)
A SNARE FOR MURDER (guest stars: Harry Morgan, Harry Bartell & Ron Hagerthy)
THE BALLAD OF OSCAR WILDE (guest stars: John O'Malley, Richard Shannon, Jack Hogan & Roy Engel)

Disc Three (Episodes 52 - 58)
THE SOLID GOLD PATROL (guest stars: Eddie Little Sky, Sean McClory & Mike Kellin)
SOMETHING TO LIVE FOR (guest stars: Rayford Barnes, Tom Brown, John Anderson & Nancy Hadley
(Filmed on location in the San Bernardino National Forest)
THE MOOR'S REVENGE (guest stars: Vincent Price, Patricia Morison & Morey Amsterdam)
THE WAGER (guest stars: Denver Pyle, Jacqueline Scott, Ken Lynch & Bob Hopkins)
THE TAFFETA MAYOR (guest stars: Edward Platt, Robert Karnes, Norma Crane & Tom Steele)
LADY ON THE STAGECOACH (guest stars: John Douchette, Dolores Vitina & Raymond Bailey)
TREASURE TRAIL (guest stars: Bruce Gordon, Peters Adams, Dean Stanton & Willard Stage)

Disc Four (Episodes 59 - 65)
JULIET (guest stars: Earle Hodgins, Miranda Jones, Allen Case & John Beradino)
(Screenplay: Gene Roddenberry)
HUNT THE MAN DOWN (guest stars: James Drury, Robert Wilke & Madlyn Rhue)
THE SCORCHED FEATHER (guest stars: Lon Chaney Jr, Mario Alcalde, Cy Malis & Mike Steele.)
( Screenplay: Bruce Geller...Robert Ceilbleu mentions people from three episodes. The Sheriff of Promise from "The Man Hunter," the barber in Florence, California from "Duel at Florence," and the two sulfur miners in Lucifer's Pit from "Gold and Brimstone.")
THE RETURN OF THE LADY (guest stars: Patricia Medina, Gene Nelson, Theodore Marcuse & Kam Tong)
THE MONSTER OF MOON RIDGE (Kam Tong, W. T. Change, Barney Phillips, Natalie Norwick)
(Screenplay: Gene Roddenberry)
THE LONG HUNT (guest stars: Anthony Caruso, Kam Tong, Anne Barton & Steve Roberts)
DEATH OF A GUNFIGHTER (guest stars: Suzanne Pieshette, I. Stanford Jolley, Kam Tong & Christopher Dark)

Disc Five (Episodes 66 - 72)
INCIDENT AT BORRASCA BEND (guest stars: Jacques Aubuchon, Perry Cook, Ben Wright & Ed Faulker)
MAGGIE O'BANNION (guest star: Marion Marshall, Peggy Rea, Don Haggerty & Mickey Simpson)
(Screenplay: Gene Roddenberry)
THE CHASE (guest stars: Kam Tong, Paul Richards, Paul Birch & Wright King)
ALASKA (guest stars: Karl Swenson, Richard Shannon, Kam Tong, Allen Case, Elizabeth York & Fay Roope)
THE MAN WHO LOST (guest stars: Jack Elam, Mort Mills, Barbara Hayden & Ed Nelson)
(Directed by Ida Lupino)
THE RETURN OF ROY CARTER (guest stars: Clu Galager, Larry J. Blake, Brad von Beltz & Craig Duncan)
(Screenplay: Gene Roddenberry)
THE SONS OF AARON MURDOCK (guest stars: Kam Tong, Frank Gorshin, Philip Coolidge, Lee Kinsolving & Elizabeth York)

Disc Six (Episodes 73 - 78)
COMANCHE (guest stars: Susan Cabot, Roy Barcroft, Larry Pennell & Robert Anderson)
( This episode takes place in June, 1876.)
HOMECOMING (guest stars: Ed Nelson, Kam Tong, Don Mcgowan, Lewis Martin & Dick Rich)
THE FIFTH MAN (guest stars: John Emery, Leo Gordon, Kam Tong, Walter Burke & Ward Wood)
HERITAGE OF ANGER (guest stars: Carol Thurston, Kam Tong. Ricky Vera, Peter Coe & Carol Hill)
THE HAUNTED TREES (guest stars: Roy Barcroft, Kam Tong, Jane Chang, Doris Dowling & Duane Grey)
GOLD AND BRIMSTONE (guest stars: Eduardo Ciannelli, Phillipe Pine, Alan Reed & William Vaughan)
(Screenplay: Bruce Geller...The two sulfur miners in this episode are mentioned in an earlier episode, "The Scorched Feather". possible this is the episode that was pre-empted on 11/29/58 and shown at this later time)

Season Two contains...Special Features of Production Notes, Cast Biographies and Behind-The-Scenes Episodic Information which will quench the thirst of any fan who needed and wanted to know more about Paladin and his travels.

Want to thank Paramount Home Video and CBS for taking us back to those thrilling '50s TV Westerns...watching this legendary actor and his professional team of directors (Andrew V. McLaglen & Ida Lupino) and writers (Gene Roddenberry, Bruce Geller & Gene L. Coon) and music (Bernard Herrmann, Jerry Goldsmith & Leonard Rosenman), creators (Herb Meadow & Sam Rolfe) served up the best of the best during that decade of television...great character actors of B-Westerns in each storyline with Paladin (Richard Boone)...every episode brings back so many wonderful memories of the times when television cared about you the viewer...gotta love it!

Total Time: 6-DVD-Set ~ Paramount Home Video 887774 ~ (5/10/2005)