Having recently left Universal Pictures in a huff, mercurial cowboy star Ken Maynard stopped briefly at Mascot Studios for a brace of films. The first was In Old Santa Fe, a modern story set at a dude ranch where Maynard (playing himself) is employed. The villain is dude sharpshooter Chandler (Kenneth Thomson), who makes a play for Maynard's sweetheart Lila Miller (Evelyn Knapp). Before our hero is permitted to triumph, the film makes a side trip to a western nightclub, wherein a couple of radio crooners named Gene Autry and Smiley Burnette make their joint film debuts. Less than a year later, Autry would replace a recalcitrant Ken Maynard in the Mascot serial Phantom Empire -- and the rest, as they say, is history. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi