One of the PRC Billy the Kid series B western, with Buster Crabbe starring as Billy, and Al St. John as his faithful comical sidekick. In this one, we have a trio of very familiar actors playing the brains of the criminal gang. J. Stanford Jolly plays the dominant one of the 3: Mort Slade, while Glenn Strange plays his brother Tom, and the always present Charles King plays their partner Vic.....The story begins with Billy breaking out of jail in Texas, and traveling to Sundown: not in Texas, where Fuzzy is living, making saddles. But, aside from Fuzzy, nobody in this town is glad to see Billy, with his gun slinging reputation......As in many of the films of this series, the outlaw gang specializes in rustling the cattle of ranches they hold a mortgage on, thus hoping that the rusting will bankrupt the rancher. The sheriff is afraid of these 3 and gets out of town when told to. Billy has been butting heads with the evil 3, thus they arrange a street showdown with him. Fuzzy makes sure the contest is fought fair, and Billy clearly wins......Mort derives a plan to bankrupt the bank, and hopefully get it's mortgages held cheap. He deposits $10,000. in his account. That night the gang breaks into the bank and steals that money. About the same time, Fuzzy breaks Billy out of jail. This is unfortunate timing, because Billy is blamed for the bank theft. But Billy has an idea who is responsible. He and Fuzzy ride to the Slade ranch house. Fuzzy keeps the gang busy, by riding around shooting his gun in the air, while Billy enters the house and looks for the money. He thinks he found it, when Tom Slade shows up. They have a fight, and Billy ties him up and puts him on a horse. The 3 ride to town, pursued by the gang as well as by the Sheriff and posse! They hand the money to the banker just in time to end a run on the bank. Billy then seeks out Mort Slade, in the saloon. They have a few words, then a shoot out. Tom is hustled into the jail, despite the confused state of the sheriff who though he was going to put Billy back in........There is a problem: How can Billy be sure the money he found was the stolen money? In " Fuzzy Settles Down", the stolen money was distinguished by some ink spilled on it. In "Overland Riders", the stolen money was known to be marked by Billy's bloody hand. But, there is no such way in which the bills were marked in this case. Thus, Billy could be convicted of breaking and entering and of burglary, if the identity of the money is questioned. This film is available at YouTube.

Buster Crabbe playing the notorious Billy The Kid again in The Kid Rides Again is on a mission to Texas to track down another notorious outlaw who robbed a train and left Billy with the blame. Yet another PRC release where the notorious outlaw is once again blamed with a crime he didn't commit. After a while I wonder if the viewers of this series were asking just what did he do to become the most notorious outlaw in the west.One thing that was unusual for this film is that the town banker who more often than not is responsible for the local dirty deeds is an honest man and played by Edward Peil. Outlaw Glenn Strange who has gone and diversified from train robbery to cattle rustling wants to take over the mortgage on a property and Peil won't sell out to him. Strange starts a campaign to undermine the confidence in the bank and to a wartime audience who remembered the bank runs of the Depression this would have been a theme that found favor.Crabbe and sidekick Al St. John deliver the usual goods required for a cowboy hero. Not as much action as in some of the Billy The Kid films for PRC, but a satisfactory conclusion for the front row Saturday matinée kids.

There's a good showdown scene about halfway through but other than that there's nothing much else to recommend about The Kid Rides Again. There isn't as much action in this as there was in previous entries, the female lead is uninteresting and the heavies just aren't heavy enough in this one, with the exception of the always great Glenn Strange. Even Fuzzy St. John's usually amusing comic relief is weak this time around, featuring one too many "sitting on nails" jokes.In this Billy the kid tangles with some bank-robbing baddies in a town fed up with outlaws, even framed ones such as himself.The series was beginning to wear a bit thin by 1943. Producers Releasing Corperation, probably tired of celebrating a real-life killer, changed the main character to Billy Carson and re-started the series without the Billy The Kid moniker later that year.