Among the tv box sets on sale at Amazon.com are CHECKMATE, with "best ofs" Season 1 and Season 2 available. Anyone sample these sets?

Also, there are several new western sets from Timeless Media such as LAREDO and THE RESTLESS GUN and TATE (a summer series about a one-armed gunslinger played by an actor who went on to be a Marlboro man). I have fond memories of re-runs of LAREDO (Neville Brand and William Smith - how can you go wrong??), but the other series are unknown to me. Can anyone comment on the quality of these sets?

I LOVE it when I have never heard of something I instantly have to see. TATE's roster of guest stars is pretty choice - James Coburn, Warren Oates, Martin Landau, Marianna Hill... I'm going to have to seek this one out.

John Williams did the music for this show, which starred Anthony George, Sebastian Cabot and Doug McClure. Film Score Monthly has a CD available.

I wound up sampling both series during the amazon.com sale, and I recently received the first set for both shows.

LAREDO has the feel of one of the better Burt Kennedy comedy westerns of the 60s. Not quite as good as either MAVERICK or ALIAS SMITH AND JONES; the interplay between the cast makes this a fun show. Neville Brand, Peter Brown, and William Smith are lovable rogues, with Philip Carey pretty relaxed as their Captain. The series is about a group of Texas Rangers, and it is definitely modeled after GUNGA DIN. The one episode I watched in its entirety had James Farentino as the leader of a group of Mexican bandits who are returning home with Brand as their captive. Marley is a padron who is indirectly involved. The relationship between Brand and Marley was the best part of the show. In the sa,e episode, James Doohan appears for about 30 seconds and Seymour Cassell may have played the drunk that comes roaring into town right after it has been ransacked. (It's a little weird to realize that two of the leads of FACES, filmed a year or so later, are in this show.)

Brand frequently missed work due to drinking problems (he was the fourth most decorated soldier in World War II) and Claude Akins sometimes subbed for him. Akins is not bad, but it's comparable to finding out that Jack Kelly is starring in the episode of MAVERICK that you just turned on. There was supposed to be a drop in quality in the second season of the show. There is a good Laredo fan site, and some of the reviews on Amazon are detailed and knowledgeable.

The set from Timeless Media has the title sequence for the series shown at the beginning of the individual DVD, but not during the individual episdoes. Quality is fine; it's the same as watching an uncut episdoe on cable (without commercials). No chapter stops within an episode and no extras. I watched the opening scene from the other shows on the DVD and noted one episode has Julie Harris as a guest star with Bruce Dern as the cook for an outlaw gang.

I just sampled CHECKMATE, and it looked about the same in quality. The black and white photography isn't nearly as sharp as say the Perry Mason sets, just okay. However, unlike LAREDO, the title sequence is on each individual episode. (Charming in an early 60's / Ernie Kovacs way, it's paint swirling under John Williams brassy score.) One episode had Jane Wyman and another had Joseph Cotten, Julie Adams, and Philip Ahn. The series was created by Eric Ambler and produced by Jack Benny. Based on the informative Amazon reviews, the strength of the show was its writing, and the concept that the team tried to prevent a murder from taking place rather than solve it. With Doug McClure and a very suave Sebastian Cabot, how can you go wrong?