Movie Review // Wanted: Dead or Alive, Season 1 with Steve McQueen

Sooo…. after some inexcusable and longwinded delays (which you don’t want to hear about and we won’t get into here), I FINALLY delved properly into this and… oh my great cactus blossoms, it ended up totally sucking me down its splendid rabbit hole. (Thank you for that Natalie and Hamlette, true friends ye are XD), and I’m so happy about it!! 

First to get some generalities out of the way. This review is for the first season. When I last checked Prime has seasons 2 & 3 too, which is where I’m hoping to watch them (our tv is just giving me a bit of a hassle with compatibility for some reason, so figuring that out).

It has a number of familiar, and some quite famous, faces, so that’s fun. The acting’s good, and the plot lines are varied and original -- it’s quite impressive in that regard actually. Some of the dialogue and also the fight scenes are sliiiiiightly staged (i.e. even I know there’re some better self defense tactics than some of the folks used), but of course, even for the most skilled in that area there’s the difference between practicing something and actually doing it in the heat of the moment, and in this case there’s the whole cinematic effect thing as well. Also, like it or not, I’ve realized even heroes have to mess up occasionally for things to get out of hand and create story and all that. 

Content wise, there's lots of shooting and some of the bad guys are real baddies with explicitly wicked intent; also due to Randall’s job description there are some more complex themes to grasp, (and he does enjoy chatting with saloon girls here and there, though it never states or shows that that actually develops into anything), so with younger fry I’d say it’s a step up from Andy Griffith and the Richard Greene Robin Hood, if that’s helpful. (And the great thing is, it's a tv series, so as with all tv series, some episodes are more intense and/or just a slight cut above the others, but if you're concerned about anything, you can easily skip any eps and adjust for viewership, etc.)

Now we’ll get down to more of the good stuff and why I enjoyed it so much. 

There are lots of surprising twists and turns, and while not mystery, it is about fulfilling the mission and thwarting the bad guys, and as such y’all know how I’ll love it. ;) It’s about building and maintaining justice in a lawless land, and our protagonist Josh Randall actually using his role as a bounty hunter in building that, fighting to make sure everyone gets fair play.

And, I know both still exist today, but for all the lawlessness in a time and place where there was a real marketable need for bounty hunters, it shows the historical fact that (though it was the wild west) they were sticklers for proper procedure, and there were also way more records and official justice than you might think. 

As for the characters peopling this wild west: real life is messy. Because of common grace and because they bear God’s image, bad people can still do good things -- and, as is the case since the beginning of time, some of the 'bad guys' aren't so much out and out evil as just downright Pigheaded Idiots. By the same token, good people sin, and good people, trying to do good to others as best they can, also sometimes just plain put their foot in it. 

One thing I found most interesting and somewhat unusual, is in it showing the bad, black-hearted women of the frontier (and I don’t mean saloon girls), just as much as the men. Much as I love a sweet, rosy-haloed Dickens heroine once in a great while, it’s bracing to see something realistic, without being morbid or depressing either, so I grew to appreciate that. There isn't any ongoing love interest, but there are a couple good sweet women he meets (and I'm totally going to need to write at least a short story spinning off the Double Fee episode).

As for our main character, Josh Randall: he’s resourceful and smart -- generally smart as a whip, careful not to rush to judgment but clearheaded as to the depravity of man; a loner yet able to make friends easily; and with little flashes of dry humor, usually with a wry twist. (To applicably quote Blackadder, “You’ve really worked out your banter, haven’t you?” “No, not really. This is a different thing; it’s spontaneous and it’s called wit.” Ha, love that quote and it keeps coming to mind when thinking of WDoA. ;D) 

I’ve realized (despite Shadow on the Mesa being such a top favorite), I’d not thought a terrible lot on how other people would perceive the character of a bounty hunter. I guess because in SoTM, you can figure out pretty quickly his level of honorableness, etc., so you don’t see (quite) as much what preconceptions other people have coming face to face with it, i.e. viewing him as being a heartless, violent mercenary. But that’s part of what makes this so good too -- it’s a job someone has to do, but Randall makes sure he does all in his power to bring the wanted in alive for a proper trial, even to the extent of putting his own life on the line. And practical, sometimes brusque, and always laconic, he often quietly helps those in need -- sometimes with his services, at other times even giving away his reward money, and then after all that, downplaying his good deeds and sidestepping effusive appreciation -- it’s like he feels it’s no more than he ought to do.

As you've gathered, usually I do like a good romance, but I don’t feel like this needs it. You do feel achy sorry sometimes for just what a lonely job it must really be, not being able to trust anyone hardly ever, except (most of) the grizzled old sheriffs, but I think here it helps contribute to that relentless twinge of longing that most all good epic westerns have. Very satisfying. 

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In conclusion I’m very VERY happy to say I ended up loving it (well, season 1 and looking forward with cautious yet very enthusiastic optimism to seeing the others ;D). Seriously y’all, you’ve GOT to come and join me down this particularly splendiferous rabbit hole!!