7.8/10228 votes#1 - The Search
Season 8 Episode 1 - Aired 9/15/1962
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
8.1/10239 votes#2 - Call Me Dodie
Season 8 Episode 2 - Aired 9/22/1962
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
8.5/10251 votes#3 - Quint Asper Comes Home
Season 8 Episode 3 - Aired 9/29/1962
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
6.8/10214 votes#4 - Root Down
Season 8 Episode 4 - Aired 10/6/1962
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
7.7/10205 votes#5 - Jenny
Season 8 Episode 5 - Aired 10/13/1962
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
7.8/10204 votes#6 - Collie's Free
Season 8 Episode 6 - Aired 10/20/1962
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
7.7/10195 votes#7 - The Ditch
Season 8 Episode 7 - Aired 10/27/1962
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
8.2/10205 votes#8 - The Trappers
Season 8 Episode 8 - Aired 11/3/1962
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
7.6/10238 votes#9 - Phoebe Strunk
Season 8 Episode 9 - Aired 11/10/1962
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
8.6/10255 votes#10 - The Hunger
Season 8 Episode 10 - Aired 11/17/1962
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
7.9/10243 votes#11 - Abe Blocker
Season 8 Episode 11 - Aired 11/24/1962
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
8.1/10235 votes#12 - The Way It Is
Season 8 Episode 12 - Aired 12/1/1962
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
8.6/10287 votes#13 - Us Haggens
Season 8 Episode 13 - Aired 12/8/1962
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
7.7/10197 votes#14 - Uncle Sunday
Season 8 Episode 14 - Aired 12/15/1962
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
7.9/10188 votes#15 - False Front
Season 8 Episode 15 - Aired 12/22/1962
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
7.1/10190 votes#16 - Old Comrade
Season 8 Episode 16 - Aired 12/29/1962
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
8.0/10197 votes#17 - Louie Pheeters
Season 8 Episode 17 - Aired 1/5/1963
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
8.7/10220 votes#18 - The Renegades
Season 8 Episode 18 - Aired 1/12/1963
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
8.6/10307 votes#19 - Cotter's Girl
Season 8 Episode 19 - Aired 1/19/1963
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
7.3/10188 votes#20 - The Bad One
Season 8 Episode 20 - Aired 1/26/1963
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
7.7/10203 votes#21 - The Cousin
Season 8 Episode 21 - Aired 2/2/1963
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
8.0/10200 votes#22 - Shona
Season 8 Episode 22 - Aired 2/9/1963
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
8.2/10247 votes#23 - Ash
Season 8 Episode 23 - Aired 2/16/1963
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
8.4/10230 votes#24 - Blind Man's Bluff
Season 8 Episode 24 - Aired 2/23/1963
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
7.6/10191 votes#25 - Quint's Indian
Season 8 Episode 25 - Aired 3/1/1963
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
The Best Episodes of Gunsmoke Season 8
Every episode of Gunsmoke Season 8 ranked from best to worst. Discover the Best Episodes of Gunsmoke Season 8!
Gunsmoke is an American radio and television Western drama series created by director Norman MacDonnell and writer John Meston. The stories take place in and...
Genres:WesternAction & AdventureDrama
Network:CBS
Season 8 Ratings Summary
"The Search" is the best rated episode of "Gunsmoke" season 8. It scored 7.8/10 based on 228 votes. Directed by Harry Harris and written by Kathleen Hite, it aired on 9/15/1962. This episode is rated 0.3 points higher than the second-best, "Call Me Dodie".