Overview: Of all the heroes of the Old West, few are as well-loved or as easily recognized as the Cisco Kid, based on O’Henry’s famous character. Together with his bumbling, but lovable amigo, Pancho, Cisco has entertained millions of children and adults for many years.

This rough-in-tumble 5-disc collection, containing 13 movies, combines the talents of both Gilbert Roland and Duncan Renaldo starring in the role of Cisco Kid.

Bonus features include: Archival video interview with Duncan Renaldo and Colonel Tim McCoy, Multiple Photo & Poster Galleries, Archival video interview with Duncan Renaldo, 2-Bonus Cisco Kid Episodes in Color from the popular 1950’s TV Series.

DVD Verdict: I won’t go over everything in this phenomenal collection, as you have either seen them before, know heartily of them, or are such a fan you could tell me what I stated was, perhaps, wrong, but a few films I will.

Firstly, The Gay Amigo (1949), in which The Cisco Kid and Pancho are mistakenly identified as leaders of an outlaw band and wile the cavalry runs them down, they must hunt down the real bad guys. One thing the Cisco Kid will not stand for is a defamation of his people. So when some Americano’s dress up as Mexicans and start bandit activity in southern Arizona he springs into action.

At the same time that Duncan Renaldo and Leo Carrillo were starting their weekly television series which I remember so well as a little kid, they also did some feature films of which The Gay Amigo is the first. The title does not refer to Cisco’s sexual orientation, which was straight.

The Cisco Kid in Old New Mexico (1945) is the story of when The Cisco Kid and Pancho hold up a stagecoach and kidnap Ellen Roth. They take the girl, who is wanted on a murder charge, to the mission where Padre Angelo will look after her. She tells Cisco of a mysterious Doctor Willis who called on an aged woman she had been nursing and gave her an overdose of sleeping pills.

This Cisco Kid story has Duncan Renaldo and Martin Galarraga helping Gwen Kenyon who is the accused murderess. She was the principal heir to the woman’s fortune, but when about to be arrested she flees to New Mexico territory where Cisco takes a hand. A rather elaborate trap is set by Renaldo to make the real murderer confess. And in church as well.

King of the Bandits (1947) tells the tale of when traveling north into Arizona, Cisco finds that someone committing robberies has been impersonating him and he is a wanted man. After retrieving some of the stolen loot, he is caught with it in his possession and put in the guard house. A friend whose life he recently saved beaks him out and Cisco heads out to find the impersonator and clear himself.

Giblert Roland and Chris-Pin Martin pay the Cisco Kid and Pancho here and the plot finds them in Arizona for the first time and no sooner do they get there when they find someone is using Cisco’s name to perpetrate all kinds crimes. The latest being a stagecoach holdup where Roland has to rescue mother and daughter Laura Treadwell and Angela Greene. In a most charming manner does Roland get his name cleared.

FYI: When Monogram Pictures Corporation sold their Cisco Kid series of films to television in 1949, United Artists had acquired and now held the rights to the O’Henry characters, and the company was forced to dub-over and pronounce another name in every reference to Cisco, Cisco Kid and Pancho.

Beauty and the Bandit (1946), a young Frenchman transporting a chest full of silver travels by stagecoach to San Marino, to complete a complex business deal. The stagecoach is ambushed by a band of men whose leader, a mysterious bandido known as Cisco (Gilbert Roland), claims the silver is money that was extorted over a period of years from the poor people of California. The bandits take the money and escape, but Cisco stays behind with the Frenchman -- who, it turns out, is actually a lovely mademoiselle, Jeanne DuBois (Ramsay Ames).

Gilbert Roland spends this episode of the Monogram Cisco Kid series frustrating evil-doing William Gould by chain-smoking and making love to a succession of lovelies, including Frenchwoman Ramsey Ames -- she spends the first quarter hour of the movie pretending to be a man. Being Gilbert Roland, he is remarkably successful in all these endeavors.

We’re now in Old California, which may explain why Zorro’s TV father, George J. Lewis is in this movie. He’s a police captain who keeps trying to find and arrest Cisco.

Although the movie doesn’t settle down to brass tacks until the last ten minutes, it’s a fun, lighthearted romp for most of its length, and those last ten minutes are pretty scary. Gould is quite obviously a bad ’un, but he doesn’t work too hard, spending much of his time sitting in a chair in a hotel, and a lot of the rest being a chuckling voice in the dark. Overall, it’s a remarkably entertaining movie, nonetheless.

Lastly, and leaving my own personal favorite to last, The Daring Caballero (1949), where Cisco learns from the Padre that Pappy Del Rio, the town’s leading citizen, is to be hung the next day for murder and robbery. The Padre thinks he is innocent so Cisco breaks him out and hides him. Cisco then runs into the Mayor, an outlaw he knows who is now using a different name. Cisco figures he is the murderer and sets out to prove it.

The boys are up against an unholy trio of villains in this one, including Mayor Brady (Steven Chase), bank president Hodges (Charles Halton) and Sheriff Scott (Edmund Cobb). There is also a lovely senorita (Kippee Valdez) to help the boys out.

Cisco breaks Del Rio out of jail and hides him out at the mission. It seems that Del Rio was framed for robbery and murder by the unholy three. Well, Cisco and Pancho uncover their plot and bring them all to justice, as we knew they would. As was usual in the series, Leo Carillo fractures the English language is his humorous way.

The movies in the collection include: The Gay Amigo (1949), The Cisco Kid in Old New Mexico (1945), The Cisco Kid Returns (1945), Satan’s Cradle (1949), South of the Rio Grande (1945), King of the Bandits (1947), Robin Hood of Monterey (1947), Riding the California Trail (1947), South of Monterey (1946), Beauty and the Bandit (1946), The Girl from San Lorenzo (1950), The Daring Caballero (1949), and The Gay Cavalier (1946).