Under Texas Skies (1940)

Under Texas Skies
Directed by George Sherman
Written by Anthony Coldeway and Betty Burbridge based on characters created by William Colt McDonald
1940/USA
Republic Pictures
First viewing/Streaming on Amazon Prime Instant Video

[box] Tagline: A RAIDER-BUSTIN’ Buckeroo in a ROARIN’ ROUND-UP OF BLAZIN’ Action![/box]

I have not been religious in watching all the “B” Westerns available to me but this one was highly rated (7.8/10 on IMDb) and I had the time so I gave it a try.  It was quite OK but nothing special.

The Civil War causes the government to pull troops out of the frontier, leaving the ranchers without protection. Sheriff Brooke is looking for men to take their place and varmint Tom Blackton manages to get himself and part of his gang deputized.  The other members of the gang proceed to terrorize the county.  When Tuscon Smith finds them out, Blackton frames him for the murder of the sheriff.  Stony Brooke (Robert Livingston) arrives in town and starts to hunt down his old friend Tuscon who has escaped from jail.  Soon enough, he discovers the true culprit and, with the aid of feckless Lullaby Jones and Tuscon, hunts him down.

This is sort of a prequel to the Three Musketeers series in that the boys are not yet a team at the start.  It also marked the return of Robert Livingston, who had been replaced by John Wayne for several films, as Stony.  The story has all the elements that would appeal to its target audience.  Unfortunately, this includes some fairly lame comic relief by Lullaby who continues to specialize in ventriloquism.

Although no attention is called to it, these guys appear to be time travelers.  In the last episode I watched they were driving pickup trucks.