The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance was the best western ever. Except for maybe Unforgiven.
Good catch, I love the movie but had not thought to start mentioning it in terms like that but you are right and that is what is happening with Wayne, his work is being recognized in a critical sense by less biased Hollywood critics.
I think most Americans have always been baffled by the claim that he wasn’t a good actor, we would watch Wayne’s great classic movies that we knew would endure for generations and then pick up our TIME magazine and read that he was not a quality actor.
A lot of doubts about media honesty came from that dichotomy.