Episode Guide - Bushwhacked
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Title Bushwhacked!
Episode No: 392 Season: 13
Summary: Joe is found shot in the back and leg, miles from home. Ben and Hoss hurry to his side to find his assailants before they can silence Joe for good.
You’ll like this if: you liked maimed Joe, older Joe, sweaty Joe, Joe wearing black gloves and suffering Joe. Ben is very moral and Hoss is a stalwart support. In other words, something for everyone…
Synopsis: Tom Griswold and his androgynous ranch hand Ern find Joe badly injured in the desert. He’s been shot twice: once in the back and once in his leg. Getting him back to the Griswold ranch, they discover Joe’s identity and a substantial amount of money…so robbery was obviously not the motive. Who shot Joe and why?
Ben is summoned by to go the ranch by telegraph, and he and Hoss ride there post haste. Naturally, the Cartwrights are determined to find out who shot Joe, who is now gravely ill and suffering quite beautifully, his golden skin glistening with sweat, his lovely hair slightly dampened, but still looking wonderful.
The sheriff is so incompetent that he makes Roy Coffee look dynamic! Little by little, Ben pieces together the missing pieces of the jigsaw, as Joe mumbles a few helpful hints, while lost in a morass of nightmares. To add to Ben’s worries, the doctor is reluctant to operate to remove the bullet that is causing the infection, as he the operation may kill Joe. Ben has to watch in anguish as his son suffers and then makes the decision to let the doctor operate.
Of course, Ben discovers ‘whodunit’, with a little help from Joe – a neighbouring rancher was illegally altering the Griswold’s “TP” brand and turning it into his own wagonwheel mark. The operation is a success, a night-time raid on the Griswold ranch is foiled and Hoss saves Joe from being smothered to death by his own pillow. Eventually the family set off on the long journey home.
Clothes: Nothing out of the ordinary, except the female guest star wears a blue dress and survives. But then, she isn’t one of Joe’s paramours! However, despite the dress being of the “shirtwaister” design, there is clearly a zip up the back!
Hoss: is wearing his usual white shirt, tan waistcoat and brown trousers. He has stopped tucking his trousers into his boots by this point, which is a very wise move. Hoss is very big here.
Joe: is wearing his usual uniform of tan shirt, trousers and green jacket, cunningly accessorised by blood stains. At the end, he gets to wear a dark blue shirt. He also sports a yellow cloth on his head at one point that looks suspiciously like the one from Twilight Town with the tassels cut off! And for whole chunks of this episode we can only presume that he is modelling his birthday suit underneath those bedclothes…
Ben: Ben is wearing his usual aubergine shirt, tan waistcoat and green neckerchief.
JPM: a remarkably poor JPM for such an emotive ep. Ben barely touches Joe in this one and although his relief at finding Joe alive at the end is quite evident, there is otherwise no touching to reassure himself, other than a slight ruffling of the curls. Lots of angst-ridden looks, at which Lorne excels, pouring his whole heart into the anguish of a father watching his son suffer and being essentially unable to help him. There is a lovely moment, after the operation, when Ben leans over and reassures Joe, going “shhh” and telling him to go to sleep. This whisks the more sentimental among us back thorough the mist of time and we can see a father rocking his little son to sleep…
Token Female Interest: Mrs Griswold and her soppy daughter Julia. Julia is another female who is going around wearing her hair down when it should have been up. She’s obsessed by Joe dying, but Joe doesn’t fall for her, even though she clearly fancies him. Sensible girl. Mrs Griswold is one of the few competent women we see on the entire show and one of the few realistic portraits of a frontierswoman we ever get to see. She’s practical, doesn’t go into a tizzy over a bit of blood and you can clearly imagine her helping Mr Griswold to build up their ranch. She clearly doesn’t think all that much of the doctor as she assists him during the operation, which was presumably one of the reasons she wasn’t keen to send for him in the first place.
It’s a bloodless Bullet Wound
Except it isn’t – for once!! Joe’s trouser leg is stained with blood, as is his shirt, and the indestructible green jacket, which the lucky Mrs G gets to cut off him. Of such stuff are dreams made…
Marvellous Medicine: A couple of operations and lots of cold water do the trick here!
Sadly, we don’t see Doctor Scully removing the bullet from Joe’s leg. Pity, as there might have been an exciting glimpse of foot during the process!
A cunning little chloroform mask ensures darling Joe is out for the count during the operation and Dr Scully makes a huge fuss over sterilising the bowl, while not even popping a clean apron over his clothes! He spends an inordinate amount of time panting over Joe, which makes you wonder if he was getting over excited by the sight of the golden one in his birthday suit. Mind you, he’s extraordinarily fat, so it might just be a sign of his general unfitness…Joe spends a lot of time breathing deeply, which is jolly exciting.
And there’s another of those famous childbirth emergencies to get the doctor out of the way so poor defenceless darling Joe is left alone. Odd how they keep popping up, when the writers can’t be bothered to think of a more convincing reason…Ben is slightly concerned, but Doc Scully reassures him that he will return. Of course he will!! He hasn’t been paid yet, has he? Obviously, the Cartwright’s habit for never paying for medical treatment has preceded them. I’m just surprised he didn’t ask for cash up-front.
And the Drugs Don’t Work…
Only they do in this episode!! Lots of hallucinogenic scenes, illustrating the agonies Joe is going through. His unconscious mind replays the shooting as he tries to make sense of events. Different filters, unusual camera angles and optical effects add to the very disquieting impact. The most disquieting moment has to be when Joe sees Hoss shooting him. Very nasty, and never explained.
Where am I? This is an excellent question. Clearly not at the Ponderosa, but none of them seem quite sure where they actually are! Griswold says Lodge Pine, but Ben reads Lone Pine off the telegram. So where are they? Somewhere in California, probably!! Or should that be Nevada?
Continuity; what continuity?: This must have been filmed on Continuity’s annual holiday. Ben’s neckerchief comes and goes. The area where the Griswold ranch is located wavers about. The pillow that is used to try and smother Joe magically reappears back under his head when Hoss turns around – now that is clever!
Have you been following the plot? The implication is that Lone/Lodge Pine is a couple of days ride away, since Ben asks for two days supplies put on their horses. Yet it appears that they arrive on the same day that Joe was found. Either that, or the doctor was AWOL and poor Joe had to lie there and suffer for a very long time.
(The real-life Lone Pine is on the way from Tahoe to Death Valley and seemed much further than a two-day ride when the blonde made a similar journey…)
And given that the fat doctor had been a surgeon in the Civil War, why was he hesitating about operating? Most doctors of the time didn’t think twice about opening someone up – even if they died, they’d have learned something. Perhaps he was concerned about the retribution the Cartwrights might exact upon him?
Hair Today
Lovely to see Joe’s hair blowing in the wind, or tousled from lying in bed. And for those who like that sort of thing (hello, Jenny!) it’s got a hint of grey too!!
Hoss wears a wig throughout this episode – sadly, it is entirely the wrong colour.
The Crucial questions no-one asks: How did that sheriff manage to get the job in the first place?
In one of his dreams, Joe takes a cup of coffee, asks for salt and is handed a little tepee. Now, even given that he was out of his head at the time, why ask for salt???? (The redhead knows the answer to that – adding salt takes the bitterness out of coffee. This is courtesy of the redhead’s mythical husband; the redhead is far too sensible to test this out.)
You Can Quote Me On That:
“Suppose he dies – in my bed?” the soppy Julia, who provides moments of lighter relief.
“Looks ta me like enough time’s bin wasted around here as it is.” Hoss, very bitingly, to the inept sheriff Truslaw.
“Whoever did it isn’t going to ride in here wearing a sign across his chest saying ‘I shot Joe Cartwright’” Ben, to the inept sheriff.