The Riding Avenger: A Dusty, Forgettable B-Western

Should you watch The Riding Avenger today? Only if you have a very specific craving for black-and-white desert brawls and plot points that resolve themselves in about five minutes. If you’re a fan of old B-Westerns, you’ll probably find some comfort in the rhythm of it. If you need a movie that respects your time or offers anything resembling modern pacing, you are going to hate this.

The whole thing starts with Buck Bonner playing dress-up as the Morning Glory Kid. It is one of those classic tropes where the disguise works perfectly until, obviously, it doesn't. When the guys who actually put the real Kid in the ground wander into town, the tension is supposed to be high. It mostly just felt like a quick way to move the scene along to the next horse ride.

There is a lot of riding in this movie. Like, a lot. The camera just follows these guys trotting across the same patch of brush for what feels like an eternity. It reminded me of Alice at the Rodeo, though with significantly less charm and way more squinting into the sun.

The bad guys are exactly who you think they are. They have the sneers, the big hats, and the inevitable habit of standing in the open during a shootout. One of the henchmen has this weird tic where he keeps adjusting his gun belt every time he speaks. I couldn't stop looking at it.

The script is paper-thin. It’s not trying to be Avatar or some grand epic, so I guess I can't really fault it for being simple. But sometimes the dialogue just stops dead. Characters will state the obvious with the intensity of a Shakespeare play, which is honestly kind of hilarious.

• The dust on these sets looks real enough to make you cough.
• There is one shot of a campfire that lasts way too long.
• I am pretty sure the same two horses were used for every single character.
• The sound mixing is… well, let's just say it's very 1930s.

It’s not a masterpiece, and it’s not trying to be. It feels like something you'd watch on a rainy Saturday when you've already seen everything else on the shelf. It’s just a movie about a guy trying to survive a lie. Sometimes that's enough, even if the acting is as stiff as a board in the wind. 🤠