Episode #25 : The Gunfighters

"He gave me a gun, he extracted my tooth. What more do you want?"

Episode 25:   The Gunfighters.
Companions: The 1st Doctor, Steven Taylor and Dodo.
Air Date:        Four episodes. 30th April to 21st May 1966.

Arriving in the town of Tombstone, the First Doctor finds himself involved with gunmen out to kill Doc Holliday.
If ever there was a time zone that would, or should, work perfectly for a time travel adventure series, the Wild West is it. The Gunfighters almost pulls it off. It is a good fun story that doesn't take itself too seriously but I find myself wondering if had it been made several years later would it have worked even better. But I can't argue as William Hartnell swaggers around Tombstone as though he belongs there and it is great.

The only downer to this story is the "Ballad of the Last Chance Saloon" which gets played over and over again, with some occasional variaton, throughout all four parts of this story. It gets a bit much to be honest.

Which brings me to the last point, and that is that the story is historically inaccurate. According to the Dr Who wiki:

The storyline of the serial makes several notable departures from the historical fact. In reality, Bat Masterson, Johnny Ringo, Warren Earp and Phineas Clanton were not present in Tombstone in October 1881. Consequently, neither Ringo nor Phineas Clanton participated in the Gunfight at the O. K. Corral and were therefore not casualties of it as portrayed here. Warren Earp did not die until July 1900, almost nineteen years after the events of this story take place. Phineas' brother Ike Clanton survived the gunfight whereas their father Pa Clanton had died the previous August. Conversely, no reference is made to four of the gunfight's actual participants: Warren, Wyatt and Virgil Earp's brother Morgan Earp and the Clanton brothers' fellow outlaw cowboys Billy Claiborne and Tom and Frank McLaury. Furthermore, Doc Holliday was only 30 years old in 1881 in real life whereas Anthony Jacobs was 48 in 1966.