Penned by prolific pulp writer William Colt MacDonald, this
Tim McCoy Columbia Western may have been the forerunner of McDonald's later so popular The Three Mesqueteers.
John Wayne, whose character is named, appropriately, Duke, and
Wallace MacDonald (no relation to William Colt) play McCoy's loyal ranch hands, and although they remain in the background for part of the action, the germ of the triad hero is there. Tim plays a rancher losing his property to a crooked money-lender turned cattle rustler (
Wheeler Oakman). The dastardly villain is in league with a sheriff's deputy (
Walter Brennan) and together they rob the Wells Fargo. There is a final shootout and the dying deputy confesses to both the Wells Fargo heist and to the fact that Tim's ranch was illegally obtained. Wayne, who didn't get along with McCoy and had several rows with studio czar
Harry Cohn, swore that he would never again work for Columbia, a promise he kept. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide