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Whiplash: The Complete Series (TV)
R2 - United Kingdom - Network Review written by and copyright: Paul Lewis (9th December 2009). |
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The Show
 Whiplash (ATV, 1960) 
A co-production between ATV and Australia’s Seven Network, Whiplash attempted to capitalise on the popularity during the 1950s and early-1960s of Western-themed television shows such as Have Gun – Will Travel (CBS, 1957-63), Rawhide (CBS, 1959-66), Wanted: Dead or Alive (CBS, 1958-61) and Gunsmoke (CBS, 1966-75). Although set in Australia, Whiplash utilised both the iconography and the narrative tropes of American television Westerns. Frank Gruber, the author of many pulp Western novels, once claimed that the Western genre contained seven basic plots; one of the most well-established of these was what Gruber called the Union Pacific Story, which focuses on ‘the construction of a railroad, telegraph or stagecoach line or around the adventures of a Wagon Train’ (Gruber, cited in Cawelti, 1999: 19). Whiplash transposes the Union Pacific plot to Australia, with the series focusing on the Cobb and Co. stage line, the Australian equivalent of Wells Fargo. During the Australian gold rush of the 1950s, the real Cobb and Co. had initially provided transport between Melbourne and the goldfields in Victoria; the company gradually grew to the point where it serviced much of Eastern Australia. 
In Whiplash, Peter Graves plays Chris Cobb, the fictional American owner of the Cobb and Company Stagecoach Line; the episodes follow Cobb’s attempts to establish Cobb and Co. Helped by his friend and assistant Dan Ledward (Anthony Wickert), Cobb finds himself facing all manner of obstacles, including interference from a group of convict settlers (in ‘Convict Town’), cruel landowners (in ‘Barbed Wire’), cattle thieves (‘Divide and Conquer’) and, occasionally, the traditions and beliefs of the Aborigines (‘The Bone that Whispered’). In overcoming these obstacles, Cobb’s weapons-of-choice are a whip and a weapon closely associated with the American Western, a Winchester rifle. The show’s title sequence depicts an initially odd juxtaposition of the iconography of the Western and the imagery associated with the Australian landscape. In the vein of Frankie Laine’s title theme for Rawhide, a male voice (belonging to Frank Ifield) sings the show’s title song, which includes lyrics that allude to the conventions of the Western (‘In 1851, the Great Australian gold rush/The only law a gun, the only shelter wildbush’). A stagecoach is shown travelling across an open landscape (from right to left of the screen), and accompanied by the non-diegetic sound of the crack of a whip the show’s title appears onscreen, superimposed over a shot of kangaroos travelling in the opposite direction to the stagecoach (from left to right).  
The series made use of a number of American writers, including Gerry Day (who had written scripts for Universal’s Wagon Train, 1957-65), the veteran writer Wells Root (who had written for a number of the most popular Western series, including Wanted: Dead or Alive and Warner’s Cheyenne, 1955-63, and Maverick, 1957-62) and Gene Roddenberry, the future creator of Star Trek (NBC, 1966-9) who had cut his teeth writing scripts for Western shows such as Have Gun – Will Travel. The use of American writers is apparent throughout this series, which often features simple paradigmatic substitutions in order to transpose the familiar narrative conventions of the Western onto the Australian landscape: perhaps most obviously (and most questionably), the role that Native Americans (and their traditions) played in television Westerns has, in Whiplash, been taken by Aborigines. (Other elements of cultural incongruity may be more apparent to those familiar with the culture and environment of Australia.) However, the use of writers who were experienced in scripting condensed half-hour Western dramas is apparent throughout Whiplash: there is a confidence to the series’ use of Western conventions and its deployment of the half-hour format, with each episode feeling satisfactorily structured despite the condensed format – these episodes are as dramatically satisfying as episodes of Have Gun – Will Travel (which used the half-hour format throughout its six seasons) and the early half hour episodes of Gunsmoke (before the show acquired an hour long slot in its eighth season).  
Graves, the brother of Gunsmoke star James Arness, had by this point in his career acquired experience in American television Westerns, having played Jim Newton in NBC’s children’s series Fury (1955-1960). Best known for his role as Jim Phelps, the successor to Dan Briggs (Steven Hill) as the leader of the Impossible Mission Force in Mission: Impossible (Desilu/Paramount, 1966-73), Graves brings his characteristic sense of earnestness and integrity to the role of Chris Cobb, providing a strong anchor for the show. 
The episodes do not appear to suffer from any edits. Episodes: Disc One: 1. ‘Convict Town’ (24:55) 2. ‘Episode in Bathurst’ (24:31) 3. ‘Sarong’ (24:51) 4. ‘Rider on the Hill’ (24:53) 5. ‘Love Story in Gold’ (24:55) 6. ‘Dutchman’s Reef’ (24:54) 7. ‘The Other Side of Swan’ (24:54) Image Gallery (3:24) Disc Two: 8. ‘Barbed Wire’ (24:54) 9. ‘The Bone That Whispered’ (24:55) 10. ‘The Secret of the Screaming Hills’ (24:56) 11. ‘The Actress’ (24:50) 12. ‘Stage for Two’ (24:57) 13. ‘The Hunters’ (24:40) 14. ‘The Wreckers’ (24:48) Image Gallery (7:36) Disc Three: 15. ‘Act of Courage’ (24:40) 16. ‘The Haunted Valley’ (24:53) 17. ‘Day of the Hunter’ (24:50) 18. ‘The Twisted Road’ (24:54) 19. ‘The Solid Gold Brigade’ (24:58) 20. ‘Divide and Conquer’ (24:55) 21. ‘The Remittance Man’ (24:38) Disc Four: 22. ‘Canoomba Incident’ (24:56) 23. ‘The Rushing Sands’ (24:50) 24. ‘The Legacy’ (24:57) 25. ‘Stage Freight’ (24:52) 26. ‘Fire Rock’ (24:51) 27. ‘The Adelaide Arabs’ (24:55) 28. ‘Dark Runs the Sea’ (24:52) Disc Five: 29. ‘Flood Tide’ (24:55) 30. ‘Storm River’ (24:35) 31. ‘Ribbons and Wheels’ (24:51) 32. ‘Magic Wire’ (24:58) 33. ‘Dilemma in Wool’ (24:59) 34. ‘Portrait in Gunpowder’ (24:55) French Titles (1:24)
Video
Shot in monochrome and on 35mm film, the episodes in this set get a handsome presentation. Detail is good, and the image displays relatively strong contrast: in terms of their visual presentation, these episodes are comparable with the releases of American monochrome shows of a similar vintage, such as the US releases of the first three seasons of Have Gun – Will Travel. (However, don’t expect anything approaching Paramount’s stunning remastered DVD releases of Rawhide.) 
The series is presented in its original broadcast screen ratio of 4:3.
Audio
Audio is presented via a two-channel mono track. This is clear; dialogue is audible. However, there are no subtitles.
Extras
Discs one and two contain an image gallery apiece (3:24 and 7:36, respectively), whilst disc six includes the series’ French titles sequence (1:24), including a French-language rendition of the title song.
Overall
Whilst Whiplash’s depiction of Australia in the mid-19th Century doesn’t always ring true – the series travels to the goldfields of Victoria via Texas – the series makes excellent use of its condensed half hour format. Graves provides a likeable protagonist, and the moral conflicts in the series are as engaging as those in, say, an episode of Have Gun – Will Travel – probably in large part due to Whiplash’s use of personnel associated with some of the more established American Western television series. This complete series release of Whiplash – never before available on DVD - is exceptionally welcome and should provide hours of enjoyment for fans of American Western television shows of the 1950s. Whiplash: The Complete Series is a web exclusive, only available from Network Releasing’s website. Sources: Cawelti, John, 1999: The Six-Gun Mystique Sequel. Popular Press For more information, please visit the homepage of Network DVD.
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