Over the last couple of months I’ve been able to write a little bit about MPI Home Video’s DVD releases of “The Cisco Kid.” I got a little preachy in the first review, not so much about the series itself, but more so the debt of gratitude that I owed my parents for making me such a well-rounded person when it comes to entertainment. They helped me to have an appreciation for a wide variety of styles. If it hadn’t been for them I would have never heard about great westerns like “The Cisco Kid.” As it turned out, this was one of my Mom’s favorite shows, so inviting her over to watch the each of the two available sets with us was very gratifying as I could see some of the excitement she felt in her youth returning to her eyes. I was equally excited a few days ago when I saw that MPI Home Video was already releasing a third volume. That’s right, 20 more episodes of “The Cisco Kid.” I got my Mom on the phone again and set up some time for us to get together so she could watch them with us. She couldn’t get over to the house fast enough.

Now just in case, you’ve never heard of the series let me fill you in just a little bit. “The Cisco Kid” starred Duncan Renaldo as the title character and Leo Carillo as his faithful sidekick Pancho. Often going afoul of the law, it was their mission in life to right wrongs and seek justice when justice couldn’t be found by conventional means. Cisco was basically the ‘Robin Hood’ of the old west. Bandits and cattle rustlers had to be on the lookout when these two hit town.

“The Cisco Kid” ran from 1950 to 1956, turning out a total of 156 episodes. And as you might imagine that the acting reflected the styles of the time. There was the occasional over-acting that some younger audiences today might find silly, but again we can chalk that up to single-mindedness. Though the show utilized a lot of humorous interplay between Cisco and Pancho, it was also a little bit more violent than was usual for the time. Where most shows used to old ‘shooting the guns out of the bad guy’s hands’ routine, here the bad guys often actually got shot. The series also had the distinction of being one of the first TV series to be shot in color (even though most people didn’t even have color TVs then).

Now that we’ve gone through the third set of the DVD series, I’m finding that I’m enjoying the episodes more and more, and there’s no doubt my Mom is having a great time seeing them again after all these years. The series had a certain simplicity, so I could care less about the overacting. I honestly don’t think I’ve seen a bad episode yet, though there are certainly some that are stronger than others.

“The Cisco Kid: Collection 3” has several great episodes, including “Hypnotist Murder”, in which a greedy woman hypnotizes her husband and orders him to kill his father. Fortunately, the attempt is stopped by Cisco, who finds he is quite suspicious about the motives. I also really enjoyed “The Caution of Curley Thompson”, where Cisco and Pancho try to help a former convict track down the leader of his old gang. Problems arise when they discover he has since turned his back on his old life and is starting over as the owner of a general store. The episode was directed by Eddie Davis (who also helmed episodes of “Rat Patrol”, “Sea Hunt” and “The Rough Riders”), and in an unusual little side note, he ended up changing the name of the Thompson character from Curley to Whitey. Why? Well, becasue he neded up casting actor Sandy Sanders in the role, who just happened to have straight, light colored hair.

There is also a particularly poignant episode entitled “Cisco and the Giant”, in which a large, slow-witted man is led to believe that he has killed his brother-in-law. He winds up hiding out with an outlaw gang. Cisco and Pancho end up going undercover, joining up with the gang in order to solve a series of stagecoach robberies.

What I really found interesting however, were the strong Hispanic stereotypes represented here. It reminded me of how much times have changed. When I read that in 1980 Duncan Renaldo received a special Lifetime Achievement Award in which he was honored for providing a positive Hispanic role model for Americans, it led me to wonder how his and Carillo’s performances would be viewed today. We live in such a PC world nowadays, and thanks to the ‘Intellectually Challenged’ (re: stupid people) any stereotype is generally immediately met with picket lines and protesters. Of course, these are usually made up of the ‘Employment Challenged’ (re: lazy people) whom we shouldn’t be listening to anyway.

“The Cisco Kid: Volume 3” from MPI offers up 20 more half hour episodes of the series, with no extra features. I will warn those who might be interested in picking up the set not to expect a crystal clear transfer. Due to the age of the materials, there’s only so much that can be done to clean up the image. The picture is a bit hazy and there are a lot of imperfections that can be seen, but this in no way hampered my delight in watching the series. I know that there are some DVD ‘purists’ (see Intellectually Challenged above) out there who might be outraged that the image isn’t crystal clear and that the sound is not re-mixed in Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and tweaked by THX. For shows like these I think they are just being a little too nit picky. I only mention it so that those of you who pick up the set already know what to expect.

Episodes:
Vigilante Story
Hidden Valley
Carrier Pigeon
Hypnotist Murder
Romany Caravan
Robber Crow
Sleeping Gas
The Ventriloquist
A Six-Gun For No Pain
Gold Strike
The Lowest Bidder
Mining Madness
Pot of Gold
Caution of Curley Thompson
Three Suspects
Pancho’s Suspects
Extradition Papers
New Evidence
Doorway to Nowhere
Cisco and the Giant

Starring: Duncan Renaldo, Leo Carrillo
Extras: None
Specifications: Full Frame, English Stereo
Studio: MPI Home Video
Release Date: 7/27/2004
Region: 1
MPAA Rating: NR
Website

We'll give Cisco Kid: Collection 3 a C+.