Intent on setting it apart from other programs, the creators behind Gunsmoke focused on upending the traditional storybook ending in Westerns. Sure, The Lone Ranger, Hopalong Cassidy, and others made mistakes. Yet these mistakes were just minor nuisances for the heroes. Marshall Matt Dillon was not a picture perfect radio Western cowboy hero – he was far from it and the people he tried to help were all too often placed in more dire circumstances than the ones he was trying to save them from. More than once, Marshall Matt Dillon failed and miserably so. He arrived too late to prevent a lynching. He amputated a man’s leg in an attempt to save his life, but the patient died anyway.
All too often Marshall Dillon played his hand after laying all his cards on the table and bitterly lost – and those missteps caused even Miss Kitty’s faith in him to falter and waver. Several times, even his triumphs ended badly. There were also aspects of his job that Marshall Dillon hated, especially when he had to enforce laws he disagreed with, and he wasn’t above voicing his disgust – something no Western hero before him had ever done. Dillon walked areas of gray often, while other Western heroes of the time were constantly pure. Sometimes Dillon even looked the other way. This made the Marshall more real to the listeners. Listen to the Sparkling Audio Quality in Radio Archives restoration of Gunsmoke, Volume 14.
