The Showdown

Baron Rendor (Morris Ankrum) arrives in town under the pretence of being a horse trader from across the sea in Europe. What no one in town realises is that Rendor is in fact a crooked gambler who is more adept at a bit of horse theft. What the Baron doesn't count on is the suspicious tendencies of Hopalong Cassidy (William Boyd) who arrives in town to and immediately thinks there is something dodgy. His feelings are backed when he enters a game of cards with the Baron and after being dealt 4 aces pulls one over on the Baron and then marking his winnings because he knows a sore loser will try and steal them back.

I like how Hoppy expresses his suspicions of someone dodgy with that face expression of his - and when Morris Ankrum, who plays the Baron, appears Hoppy's suspicious mind starts ticking - especially when he sees regular B-western bad guy Roy Barcroft talking to the horse trader - this briskly-paced western has an intriguing storyline, a tense poker game, a subplot of whether the girl who Lucky takes a shine to his Colonel's niece and Hoppy gets trapped in a burning barn. Lucky gets the wrong idea about Hoppy and the Colonel's niece and the villain uses this to his advantage.