Dead Man's Gun (1997)
Dead Man's Gun was a western anthology series that ran on Showtime from 1997 to 1999. The series followed the travels of a gun as it passed to a new character in each episode. The gun would change the life of whomever possessed it. Each episode was narrated by Kris Kristofferson. The executive producer was Henry Winkler.
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Episode 1 - The Judgement of Joe Dean Bonner
Release Date: 1998-08-07Joe Dean Bonner (Brian Austin Green) is a professional killer who cares for nothing but himself. After his latest killing, he rides into a strange town populated by only one man, who he obtains the Dead Man's gun from. Soon, Bonner is on trial for his past deeds, with a jury of those he has butchered, and not even the Dead Man's gun can help him against the supernatural. After visits from his dead, disappointed father, a pastor, and the love of his life, who committed suicide after he impregnated then abandoned her, Bonner seems to repent, but is he sincere? The Dead Man's Gun knows! And so do I, he's not sincere at all, so he gets hung.
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Episode 2 - Ties That Bind
Release Date: 1998-08-14Blood is thicker than water as two brothers wrestle with each other over what they should do when one of them falls under the spell of The Dead Man's Gun, after finding it on a body. Will his brother be able to save him, and himself, from the fate that awaits them?
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Episode 3 - Sheep's Clothing
Release Date: 1998-08-21The town push-over, a school teacher, turns his life around when he discovers the Dead Man's Gun on a killed outlaw. He no longer puts up with the bullying of his peers, but ends up becoming a bully himself. Can he turn his life back around, though, when the outlaw's partners turn up, looking for the powerful Dead Man's Gun? And can he win the love of the school marm, whom he secretly adores?
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Episode 4 - Winner Takes All
Release Date: 1998-09-04An aging manager and his talented pugilist travel town to town, winning money by boxing. They arrive one day in a boxing tycoon's town and quickly make waste of his best boxer; demanding a chance to win back his money, and the Dead Man's Gun, the tycoon brings in a ringer and has his ruffians ambush the boxer one night, forcing him to break his hand on one of their skulls. Meanwhile, the manager has taken in a young boy who years to learn the art of boxing. Faced with the choice of forfeiting, or making his boxer fight with one hand, the manager elects to return to the ring for one lst fight, 14 years after retiring, against one of the best boxers. He is badly beaten for several rounds before taking his own advice from the boy: win with your heart! He uppercuts the boxer, punches out the tycoon, and leaves town with his money, but not the Dead Man's Gun! That's for sure!
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Episode 5 - Sisters of Mercy
Release Date: 1998-09-11Kendall Cross (as Sister Elizabeth) and Susan Hogan (as Sister Katherine) are two criminals making their way west dressed as nuns, robbing bad men on their way to a gold town. When they reach their destination they realize that the town is under the thumb of an evil tyrant. Soon they devise a plan to break into his bank through the wall of his saloon, enlisting the help of the impoverished townfolk to force him to close the saloon on Sundays so they can perform this deed. But should they really steal the money and skip town, or help the poor people there? And can Sister Katherine come to terms with her questionable past? They can indeed, but only with the help of the Dead Man's Gun.
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Episode 6 - Hangman
Release Date: 1998-09-18Phineas Newman (Winkler) is a hangman by trade. Ostracized by the rest of society for his work, he takes pride in it, and strives to be the best executioner money can by. He explains to his assistant that he does his job because, as a child, he saw his uncle hung by unprofessionals, and believes that even a condemned man shouldn't suffer. He also becomes fascinated with a gun he picks up from his latest hanging client, the Dead Man's Gun, of course. When he arrives for his next job at another town, he learns that the town, including the mother of the raped and murdered girl, refuses to believe that their Reverend has committed the crime. He goes about his duties of preparation, not caring to hear anything about the crime, and refusing to give mercy to the pleading, condemned Reverend. That night, depressed after being refused service by the town's low-life whore, he tries to kill himself, and realizes that the Dead Man's Gun and he both have the power to choose when to take life
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Episode 7 - The Collector
Release Date: 1998-09-25A German collector of antiquities (Michael York) travels to the American west in search of goods to trade for, with the hopes of taking his riches back to Germany. He finds the Dead Man's Gun on a dead body while scavenging for goods, and hires a Mexican to help him on his way. He soon visits an American professor with similar interests, and seeks to trade for part of his valuable collection, i.e. a map rumoured to lead to a dead tribe's treasure cave, but just as a deal is reached, the American backs out, having realized the kind of man von Hubert is after butchering a rare buffalo for its pelt. Furious, von Hubert arranges for a goodbye ride with the professor, ostensibly to leave on good terms, but he instead murders the professor and shoots himself, blaming the deed on the renegade in the area, thus winning the professor's collection and his beautiful wife as well. Soon, however, the wife realizes where von Hubert's love lies, and sabotages him by taking the bullets out of hi
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Episode 8 - The Trapper
Release Date: 1998-10-02A man with no appreciation for nature begins trapping near the home of old native, Charlie Three Claws (Gordon Tootoosis), and becomes enraged when Charlie begins springing his traps before animals can fall prey to them. The trapper kills another trapper, who he feels is responsible for his lost pelts, and takes his weapon, the Dead Man's Gun. He then comes after Charlie Three Claws, and, after being forced at gunpoint to leave by Charlie's beautiful granddaughter, he returns and rapes her. Charlie can not get justice from the local sheriff, who hates Indians even more than he hates the evil trapper, so he decides to get it on his own by summoning up an old friend, Jimmy the Dead Grizzly Bear.
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Episode 9 - The Mimsers
Release Date: 1998-10-09An English couple flee to America after being caught stealing from their employers, and soon find a new victim in a scatterbrained old Colonel, who enjoys shooting at squirrels with the Dead Man's Gun. They worry that their employer may not have enough money to make the difficult task of caring for him worth-while until they spot him one night, planting money in his garden. They soon become convinced that the locations of all of his hidden treasure chests are hidden in his hidden book, but to get it from his bedside table they have to get the key from around his neck. The butler urges his wife, who the Colonel has become quite fond of, to give him what he wants so that they can get the key, but it isn't as easy as it would seem. In the end, the tables are turned around again and again, and they all get the fate they deserve at the hands of the Dead Man's Gun.
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Episode 10 - The Pinkerton
Release Date: 1998-10-30When a wife and mother is murdered, and the local law can not find the killer, her widower calls in expert help in the form of John Eastman (Michael Dorn), a talented Pinkerton investigator. Eastman has troubles during his investigation, primarily because of racism in a small white town, but he will not be turned away. Using the Dead Man's Gun, he solves the evil crime, and justice is doled out to the surprising culprit.
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Episode 11 - Seven Deadly Sins
Release Date: 1998-11-06The prodigal son returns to his small-town roots just in time to miss his father's funeral. He inherits half the bank, but he wants responsibility to run it, which has been left to his responsible brother. However, destitute, having blown the substantial amount of money his father gave him when he went to Philadelphia, he is forced to take a position as bank teller and work his way up. Not patient enough for this, however, and needing money to pay off his gambling debts to the local gangster, he gets the vault's combination and starts stealing money, framing the kindly assistant manager, who has been training him, for the crime. He then becomes assistant manager, but when his brother discovers the crime, he murders him with the Dead Man's Gun. Along the way, despising his father's religious instruction, Baldwin strives to get pleasure by breaking all of the seven deadly sins, but will they come back to haunt him via the Dead Man's Gun?
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Episode 12 - The Ripper
Release Date: 1998-11-27When a bizarre slashing murder takes place in a small western town, an English inspector soon turns up asking questions about the crime. It is soon divulged that he is hot on the trail of Jack the Ripper, and thinks the killer is in the town. Could the murderer be the town's doctor? Or the scarred, malevolent blacksmith? Or even the town's shady Sheriff or the brothel's madam, who the inspector finds himself getting close with? The murders continue until the Ripper is finally flushed out, and brought down by the Dead Man's Gun.
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Episode 13 - The Regulator
Release Date: 1999-01-22When a Regulator comes across the Dead Man's Gun, he believes he is set for life ... until other Regulators come after HIM!
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Episode 14 - The Womanizer
Release Date: 1999-01-29Patrick Duffy is a Womanizer. When the husband of one of his flings tracks him down, and dies after being thrown off his horse during the chase, the Womanizer loots his wallet, and picks up The Dead Man's Gun. Can he mend his ways, or will he fall prey to the gun's evil powers?
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Episode 15 - Sleepwalker
Release Date: 1999-02-05Gruesome, unmotivated killings soon begin to take place in a small town after a man finds the Dead Man's Gun, and soon he become convinced that he is performing the deeds himself while sleepwalking. His wife stays awake to watch him, but falls asleep early and another murder takes place. The man is incredibly guilty for what he's done, turns himself in, and is sentenced to die ... but is he the real culprit? No, he's not. His wife is!
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Episode 16 - Four of a Kind
Release Date: 1999-02-12Years after the town hooligan and three of his men murder a young woman's husband simply for beating them at poker, she returns with the Dead Man's Gun, seeking revenge. She leaves an Ace at each dead man's side, and soon a showdown is set up with the hooligan and his son. After being injured she enlists the help of the town's shopkeeper, a victim of the town's gang's treachery for years, and his young daughter. The hooligan waits for her to show up to ambush her, but she cleverly kidnaps his son instead and forces him to come to her, at her old ranch, where her husband had been murdered so long ago. Here he finds his son in an unexpected predicament, and she forces him to face his deepest, darkest fears. Then she goes back to town to marry the shopkeeper and to be the littler girl's mother.
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Episode 17 - The Oath
Release Date: 1999-02-19A woman helps carry out an oath she made to her murdered husband ... thanks to the Dead Man's Gun!
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Episode 18 - The Good Chef
Release Date: 1999-02-26Chef Emil (Jay Thomas) gets the cash for his dream of setting up his own high class French restaurant by poisoning his employers, and also inherits the Dead Man's Gun. An ill-tempered man, he treats the people of the town terribly, but is forgiven because of his great food, and the hungry Sheriff is content to simply look the other way. Anyone who disagrees with Emil's cooking is killed by him. The town's other home-cooking restaurant, an Irish mother/son operation, suffers for lack of business at the hands of Chez Emil, with Emil humiliating the man every chance he gets. Soon, the restaurant goes under, and he young man is forced to work for Emil himself. Emil soon covets the man's girlfriend, and drugs her. Luckily, the man discovers Emil's plan and saves the girl, just in time to be shot by Emil who claims he was attacked without provocation. Emil gets his just desserts, though, thanks to the Dead Man's Gun! (He is poisoned and used for meat.)
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Episode 19 - The Vine
Release Date: 1999-03-05An Italian immigrant, on his way to California with a grapevine from his family's winery in Italy, comes across a group of murdered people and takes the lone survivor, a Polish woman with nowhere to go, under his wing, and the Dead Man's Gun she has found. They soon run into the culprits, who let him go only after she offers to do whatever they want. He can't just leave her, though, and rescues her when the thieves go off hunting. The two soon fall in love after they reach the next town, and head for California together, but the gang catches up prompting a short gunfight. She saves the vine from the campfire for him, and, after getting a reward for killing the gang leader, they head to California to start a new life together, and a fantastic winery!
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Episode 20 - Bad Boys
Release Date: 1999-03-12Three young boys find the Dead Man's Gun and use it to become tough, and to get money by rolling the town drunk. But one of the boy's, whose mother needs money, considers using it to kill his drunken, abusive father, but he can't bring himself to do it. When the bankrobber returns for his gun, he agrees not to kill the boys in exchange for their help in robbing the town's bank. The abused boy learns that he shares some history with the robber, who ended up killing his own father as a boy, which set him on his evil path. The robbery goes awry when the bank manager recognizes one of the boys, and they have a choice to make: they decide to save the manager and foil the robber's getaway by setting him on fire, but it's too late for the boy's father, who is shot by the robber when he discovers the goings-on and screams for help. In the end, they realize that they don't want the gun any more, and that their small town isn't so bad after all. The grateful manager decides not to press c
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Episode 21 - The Phrenologist
Release Date: 1999-03-19C. Thomas Howell is a habberdasher and phrenologist; a city boy who leaps at whatever the latest big-city fad is. He hires a new assistant, who has just witnessed an outlaw being bucked off his horse into quicksand and could not save him, only the Dead Man's Gun, which he carried. The Phrenologist uses the boy to try to win the heart of a beautiful young lady, whose affections he is competing for with a local rancher. She is having great difficulty choosing between them. Meanwhile, the outlaws bank-robbing partners are hot on his (and the stolen money's) trail, and, after being placed under arrest, notice the Phrenologist carrying their old partner's gun. The boy overhears their discussion, and leads the Phrenologist to the swamp where the money must be, while the outlaws escape. They take the phrenologist and the rancher hostage, but are saved by the clever boy, who turns out to be Thomas Edison; the woman uses trickery to discover which man she should give her hand to.
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Episode 22 - A Just Reward
Release Date: 1999-03-26An outlaw (William Forsythe) retrieves the Dead Man's Gun by murdering its latest owners for a mysterious, eccentric, incredibly rich man, known only as Mr. Smith. Upon delivery of the gun, the outlaw is treated to several stories about its eerie past (in the form of flashbacks to previous episodes including The Hangman, The Bounty Hunter, The Photographer, Bad Boys, and The Great Mcdonacle), and cannot leave because of the posse outside. He grows more and more uncomfortable, and feels that, because of the danger of the weapon, he deserves more money for it. His greed is his undoing, as Mr. Smith reveals himself to be the original owner of the cursed weapon, and the outlaw receives his just reward.