"Kung Fu": TV Series, The Gunman

#27 (Prod #166212) "The Gunman"
Teleplay By:: Robert Lewin (also #9 & 14)
Directed By:: Richard Lang (also # 5, 17, 19, 22, 24, 29, 31, 33, 35, 37-38, 39, 42, 45-6)
First Broadcast: ABC, January 3, 1974
Guest Stars: Andrew Prine, Katherine Woodville
Regular Cast: David Carradine, Philip Ahn, Keye Luke, Radames Pera

Caine befriends a wounded gunman who is being tracked by a bounty hunter. The gunman insists on being taken to the ranch of a widow whom he first met during the war and to whom he feels he owes $50.

"I live. I rest. I am at peace. It is good." - Caine, when asked what he is doing

"I wish to help." - Caine, identifying himself

"'Why would you do this for me?'
'Why would I not?'" - Caine

"I will help you." - Caine

"'He needs help.' - Caine
'Not much of a reason [to do all this].'
'It is enough.'" - Caine

"As the leaf flows with the river. It does not hold it back. It makes not even a ripple." - Master Po

". . . we are taught that a good man's heart is not shut within itself but is open to the hearts of others." - Caine

"Do what must be done. . . . The way to do is to be." - Master Po

"It would repay me if you did not [kill the bounty hunter]." - Caine

"Are you not now hiding from the debt you owe me?" - Caine, when his friend refuses to hide from the bounty hunter

"Have we not become friends without asking that it be so?" - Caine

"The Sage says, 'Find good people good and bad people good because I am good enough. Trust men of their word and liars if I am true enough." - Master Po (refers to Tao #49)

"To be yourself. . . feel the heartbeats of others above your own." - Po

"'But if I shall love others, how can I be sure that they in return will love me?' - Caine
'Do you seek love or barter?'" - Master Po

"'. . . if I love others and they do not love me, I shall feel great pain.' - Caine
'That is what you risk. . . . Great pain or great joy.'" - Master Po

"Does not tomorrow begin now? Each act can be an act of improvement." - Caine

"I must stay here. . . . Why must I leave? I have told the truth." - Caine

"'You mean you got the best of five armed men then turned around and walked back to your cell?'
'Yes.'" - Caine

"He had lost his edge. He thought of you not as an enemy but as a man." - Caine, answering the sheriff on why the gunman had hesitated

"There is also gain. You feel." - Caine, on their friend's death

Caine does not deny that the wanted man is a friend of his and that he knows where he is and he refuses to back up a lie the woman wants to tell: he merely refuses to tell where his friend is.

On screen during this episode Caine/Carradine makes himself a new flute to replace the one he gave away in #25, "The Hoots."

And Caine still seems to be carrying around seedlings at times as he plants one here (first time we have seen him do so since episode #4).

". . . one must flow with life, rather than swim upstream." - Caine^*2*p2

"If one intervenes, one is swimming upstream, against the flow of life. Sometimes that seems called for. Right action can come only from inner conviction. But there is nothing written which guarantees that which comes from a good motive will bring good results. Intervention is therefore its own paradox." - Master Kan^*2*p24