The afthermath.

[/b]jesse james and his brother come to town to hide.The towns people find out theire true idenities.And the outlaws take the town hostage.[b]




This esp is a little scarey. I was scared for mary.She was a very trusted person.I love how the town sticks together.

This was a great episode... Mary should have listened to Laura and not gone back to the outlaws house. Of course, that had to work like that in order for the story to work though! I love the part where Charles is trying to slip past the bounty hunters and Jonathan goes out to distract the one that was patrolling the bridge... that way Charles could swim under and get to Mary without getting stopped. But Charles gets taken as a hostage too.

The best part is the ending when Jonathan leads the bounty hunters to the wrong building so that he could get horses over to the outlaws in order to let them get away, thus freeing Charles and Mary. Jonathan sure was smart to be able to think of all of his little plans in such short order... this wasn't the only time his quick planning saved the day. The way the bounty hunters went after that old abandoned house shows that they only wanted the money, and didn't care about Mary's life. I am glad the whole town kept quiet about the real hideout.

*spoiler alert

Maybe the most intriguing aspect of this whole episode is at its very end when they reveal that the eventual killer of Jesse James was among the students. That is perhaps an appropriate touch to attempt closure to the situation in which Jesse and his brother succeeded in evading the hunters.

That was an interesting point that was mentioned in the end of the episode... was that something that happened in real life, or just in the episode?

According to the history Bob Ford was the name of the man who killed Jesse James. It is most probably fiction that he was a student in the schoolhouse which Laura Ingalls attended. Bob Ford was shot to death too, by the way, and so was the man who shot him. A lot of shooting going on back in those days.

Very interesting... Yes, I am sure he was probably not a student at the school Laura went to... Michael Landon just wrote it like that because he could include that detail into the end of the story.

The guy who played the role of Jesse James had a minor part in an episode of my all-time favorite series, "Columbo", playing the role of a parking attendant in "Suitable for Framing", which was during the first season of the series.

david wrote:

The guy who played the role of Jesse James had a minor part in an episode of my all-time favorite series, "Columbo", playing the role of a parking attendant in "Suitable for Framing", which was during the first season of the series.

Dennis Rucker was also in Officer and a Gentleman.........did quite a bit of stuff back then

At first I didn't understand why the people of Walnut Grove wanted to help Jesse and his brother, especially Charles when he knew that Mary was in trouble. But I loved seeing the townspeople work together to rescue Mary and eventually Charles. Jonathan was the real hero of the episode, when he outsmarted the men trying to capture the James brothers multiple times.

It has taken repeated viewings to realize what a terrific episode "The Aftermath" is. Interesting question: Who were the villains? The show pretty much implies that the bounty hunters were, although the James brothers resort to kidnapping and Jesse is willing to kill. Bobby Ford gets his plug at the end, although the real life Bob Ford ends up getting shot to death too, as does the guy who shoots him. Lots of shooting going on back in those days.

I think, in Laura's book. Jesse James was mention. I like this episode.