In the only picture Brennan ever did for the legendary director John Ford, the character actor worked well beside Ford stalwarts such as Ward Bond, playing one of Earp's brothers. Indeed, what is most remarkable about this film is the contrast between Clanton and his boys and Earp and his congenial brothers, the youngest of whom is killed when the Clanton gang rustles cattle the Earps have been driving to California. Brennan personifies the authority of evil, as he does in Brimstone (August 15, 1949), where he again bullies his boys into driving out homesteaders. It is almost as if in each subsequent film--especially in Westerns--Brennan is building a persona that is like a suit subjected to constant alteration without ever losing its basic contours. He would essay yet another version of the dominating father with sons in tow in Shoot Out at Big Sag (June 1, 1962), an independent production organized by his son Andy, in which Walter plays a pusillanimous preacher who has let down his wife and family by not defending them. But he ultimately redeems himself when he realizes he has lost the respect of everyone, including his daughter, who in the end proves to be his salvation owing to her unwillingness to accept her family's defeatist mentality.