The Best Episodes of Gunsmoke Season 8

A young man named Cale may have earned Marshal Dillon's respect, but Tate Gifford says Cale has just ridden off on a stolen horse - Tate's horse.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: Kathleen Hite

An adolescent escapee from a cruel orphanage knows she has a lot to learn, and she starts learning it from the rough-and-tumble characters and loafers she encounters in Dodge.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: Kathleen Hite

A half-Comanche has joined his mother's tribe in killing whites to avenge the murder of his father, but Matt sees the good in the man and the chance to re-integrate him, perhaps, into white society.

Director: Andrew V. McLaglen

Writer: John Meston

Chester may find himself entrapped into marriage with a drifter's daughter who isn't particular about how she lands a husband.

Director: N/A

Writer: Kathleen Hite

A bank robber hides out in Dodge, bringing along his girl. While he's gambling away his loot, his girl casts her eye on Matt.

Director: Andrew V. McLaglen

Writer: John Meston

Released after eight bitter years in prison, Collie Patten has difficulty adjusting to the fact that things have inevitably changed with respect to his relationships with his wife, his son, and the citizens of Dodge.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: Kathleen Hite

A young woman who's heir to her father's land decides to carry out his plan to build a ditch that will impair her neighbors' access to water and perhaps trigger a range war.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: N/A

A trapper leaves his friend dying alone in order to save his own life, only later to stumble across that friend in Dodge, very much alive and wanting him dead.

Director: Andrew V. McLaglen

Writer: N/A

A band of ne'er-do-wells, led by their mother, see in town a young woman that pleases them and decide to take her by force.

Director: Andrew V. McLaglen

Writer: John Meston

Matt and Doc come to the rescue of a farm wife and daughter who essentially are kept as prisoners by the farmer and his son.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: N/A

Civilization is moving in on the isolation of a rugged pioneer friend of Matt's, and he starts using lethal force against the settlers encroaching on the land he regards as his.

Director: Andrew V. McLaglen

Writer: John Meston

While Matt is out of town, putting lawman's business ahead of Kitty yet again, a new man in her life has plenty of time and attention to give--perhaps too much attention.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: Kathleen Hite

When a boy witnesses his grandfather's murder, it sends Matt looking for a new found companion's uncle. Festus Haggen is tracking his uncle for killing his twin brother Fergus. Matt is wary but learns to trust Festus when he's shot and in bad shape.

Director: Andrew V. McLaglen

Writer: N/A

Chester gets a letter from his uncle Sunday, a 'crook', on his upcoming trip to Dodge city. When he arrives with a niece, he finds he has to watch them both or what they have planned just might work, at his expense.

Director: Joseph Sargent

Writer: John Meston

A slick city reporter sets out to prove that even a milquetoast can pass for a feared gunfighter, if a few well-placed tidbits of rumor precede him.

Director: Andrew V. McLaglen

Writer: John Meston

The "town fool" has a chance to change his life when he learns that a famous general, now on his deathbed, believes him to be his long-lost son.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: N/A

The town drunk who saw a man drowned, believes it was dream, until he meets up with the guy who did the drowning.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: John Meston

Quint says that white renegades, not Indians, are the cause of recent raids around Dodge. Working shotgun on the stage, he proves his point when he is attacked, then pursued by those renegades. His "Indian" skills save him and a colonel's daughter who has contempt for half-Comanche Quint.

Director: Andrew V. McLaglen

Writer: John Meston

A father's dying request is that Matt go to retrieve his daughter. Expecting to find a little girl, Matt finds a near-grown woman, but one who's wild and desperately in need of civilizing.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: Kathleen Hite

When a young pretty farm woman becomes attracted to and sees some good in a would-be robber, she refuses to identify him.

Director: N/A

Writer: N/A

Chance Hopper is Matt's young foster brother, torn between loyalty to Matt and to his partners in crime, who are counting on Chance to divert Matt from their course and make good their getaway.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: Kathleen Hite

Gib Dawson brings his beautiful Indian wife, Shona, in to Dodge for treatment of a badly infected hand wound, at a time when racial tensions are running high against the Comanches.

Director: Ted Post

Writer: John Meston

The friendship between business partners is jeopardized when one of them sustains a head injury, changing his personality. The injured man threatens to kill West's character, the fiancé of a young saloon woman.

Director: Harry Harris

Writer: John Meston

Billy Poe is falsely accused of murder by a dying man, and flees to another town while Matt follows him, and encounters dangerous resistance from other men who hate lawmen.

Director: Ted Post

Writer: John Meston

Two ne'er-do-wells come to town and soon cook up a plot under which half-Comanche blacksmith Quint Asper is framed for the theft of a horse. The atmosphere in Dodge quickly becomes dangerously ugly for Quint.

Director: N/A

Writer: John Meston