User Reviews

I really was not expecting much out of this episode. I mean a man is saying he is Abraham Lincoln and everyone goes along with the joke- this does not seem like good viewing. But I was pleasantly surprised by the interesting plot and the nice acting by Royal Dano. The combination of the way the script was written and the acting made an otherwise sappy story into an entertaining episode for the entire family.

It all begins at the home of Able "Abe' Lincoln where he asks Lucas if he can go into town with him. It seems that the man, due to psychological scars from the war, believes he really is the President. And instead of embarrassing the nice Mr Lincoln, the entire town of North Fork goes along with the character.

Everything goes well until a stranger taunts Mr Lincoln into a wrestling match where the stranger receives a broken arm. Now the stranger is out to kill (assassinate) Mr Lincoln in the same way the real President was killed.

From a rather silly plot the episode turned out to be an interesting and entertaining show. With excellent acting by Mr Dano this turned into a nice watch.

The great and under-rated character actor Royal Dano, who played Abe Lincoln earlier in the decade in an acclaimed five part series for the TV program Omnibus, gets a chance to reprise his most famous role in this episode of the Rifleman. The hitch is that he is delusional and only believes he is Lincoln. Because he is a kind and harmless man the people of Northfork accept him as the real Lincoln even though they know he is not. However, a bullying stranger from Virginia meets Abe in the town bar and taunts into into a fight. As a result, Abe breaks the man's arm. Seeking revenge, the Southerner vows to kill Abe and goes to the McCain ranch where he confronts him. This episodes is a chance for viewers to see one of Royal's representation of Lincoln, a role he would continue to play throughout his long career. Most of the viewers of that day would have been familiar with Dano's earlier representation of Abe and would have appreciated his performance in this episode. If you are unaware of Mr. Dano's Lincoln portrayals, this episode may seem out of place today.

Royal Dano spent 50 years in Hollywood, playing bumbling oafs, inbred hillbillies, ignorant yokels, cowardly soldiers, mean-spirited alcoholics, and other broad stereotypes. In this episode of The Rifleman, Dano plays a creepy parody of Abraham Lincoln.

Every time Dano showed up in a TV Western, it was usually in some kind of role that called for a two-dimensional character. Dano never delivered a thoughtful or meaningful performance as a 1870s Western cowboy. He always played the broadest and most degrading stereotype of a rough mountain man, dim-witted hillbilly, gullible country folk, drunken miner, etc.

Here Dano plays some demented half-wit who thinks he is Abraham Lincoln. Fake Lincoln is married to an understanding woman who caters to him as if he were President Lincoln. Living on a tiny dirt farm, you have to wonder how the fake Mr. Lincoln reconciled his poverty?

The people in town despised him, and constantly baited his ridiculous persona and physically attacked him. In the real world of the 1870s, how long could that last before fake Lincoln was killed? This could have been a ground-breaking episode about mental health treatment. Instead it was about labeling a crazy person as eccentric. Luke taught his son Mark that dealing with the mentally disturbed was just about playing along with whatever a crazy person believes is true.

Every time I see this episode, and watch Royal Dano shuffling around, making faces like he was Abraham Lincoln, I feel sorry for Honest Abe. I bet the real President Lincoln turned in his grave, back in 1961, when this episode first aired.

What in the world is The Rifleman coming to. 2 over the top silly episodes about a man believing he is someone else. If a person had never seen an episode and found these 2 episodes as I did back to back, they may have never watched the usually great show again. One reviewer on the previous episode referred to it as an episode in the vein of Gilligan's Island. This episode could have been given the name "Dano Flies Over the Cuckoo's Nest" as Royal Dano believes he is Abe Lincoln and Luke, Mark, and the whole town let's him believe that they believe him but then the real John Wilkes Booth comes along and really believes him . Confused ??