Let The Lone Ranger ride again

 It’s time for The Lone Ranger to ride again.

It’s also time the character got the treatment it deserves. Twelve years ago, Disney made a thrilling, big budget Lone Ranger movie. Although it is generally thought of as a flop, it did top $250 million at the box office. It made money even though it fell far short of projections.

The movie was made by the “Pirates of the Caribbean” team of Jerry Bruckheimer, Gore Verbinski and Johnny Depp, who starred as Tonto. It starred Armie Hammer at the masked man.

The movie itself was an action thriller and very entertaining. Unfortunately, it alienated millions of Lone Ranger fans by making The Lone Ranger an affable idiot and injecting mystical elements and cannibalism. It also didn’t help that Depp’s Tonto wore makeup and had a dead crow on his head.

When you look at the history of The Lone Ranger, you can see a progression of degradation of the character in recent outings. The Lone Ranger began in 1933 in the theater of the mind as a radio program for WXYZ radio in Detroit. (Before I go further, let me nip the Bass Reeves theory in the bud right here. I has been proven beyond all shadow of a doubt that The Lone Ranger was not inspired by or connected in any way to the real-life lawman Bass Reeves.)

While The Lone Ranger was dominating the radio airwaves, two movie serials were made. That was followed in 1949 with the wildly popular TV show that starred Clayton Moore and Jay Silverheels. Moore is best known for his portrayal of the masked man, a role he embraced the rest of his life. He starred in four of the five seasons of the show (back when a season was a full year). Moore was replaced in 1952 by John Hart during a contract dispute.

After Moore returned to the role, ownership of the character traded hands from creator George W. Trendle to Jack Wrather. Wrather had the last season of the show filmed in color and, when the show ended, had two major motion pictures made: “The Lone Ranger” in 1956 and “The Lone Ranger and the Lost City of Gold” in 1958.

That was the peak of Lone Ranger mania. The television show and movies went into syndication and Moore toured the country in costume as The Lone Ranger. That is, until 1979 when Wrather Corp. issued a cease-and-desist order that was held up after a lengthy court battle. Wrather was getting ready to make a new Lone Ranger movie with a new actor and didn’t want any confusion with the aging Moore and stripped him of his mask. That was a monumental mistake.

The action set off a firestorm of sympathy for Moore and negative publicity for the film. That was exacerbated by the uncooperative antics of Klinton Spilsbury, who was set to star as the hero in “The Legend of The Lone Ranger.” The movie was dead on arrival when it was released in 1981. In addition to all the negative publicity, it marked the first time we saw the masked man unmasked. That ruined a lot of the mystique that made The Lone Ranger appealing.

After the movie flopped and Spilsbury went into hiding, the courts returned the mask to Moore and he continued to make appearances until his death in 1999.

The Lone Ranger made a resurgence in the early 2000s. The WB network made a pilot for what was supposed to be a new Lone Ranger show. It was so horribly done that it aired once as a movie of the week and has never been broadcast again. There was also a highly acclaimed comic book by Dynamite and several new toys and keepsakes produced.

It was at this time that I started the Lone Ranger Fan Club after taking over a quarterly newsletter called The Silver Bullet. I passed on ownership of the club and the newsletter just before the Disney movie came out in 2013. I’m happy to say that both are still going and growing under new ownership.

I think enough time has passed since the Lone Ranger’s last ride and it’s time to saddle up again. When you look at the popularity of superhero movies in the theaters and westerns on TV, the time is ripe for the superhero cowboy. I think Disney could do it justice in the same way it has handled its Marvel and Star Wars franchises with short seasons of hour-long episodes.

The one thing that needs to happen is for The Lone Ranger to be filmed in Texas. After all, he is a former Texas Ranger. And not one single frame of film or decibel of radio broadcast has ever originated in Texas. That needs to change. And if Disney or any other movie studio takes my advice, they need to do to “The Lone Ranger” what Paramount did with “Star Trek: The Motion Picture.” It needs to ditch it and reboot like Trek did with “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.”

Hi-yo Silver, away!