Trollheart

Title: “The After Hours”
Original transmission date: June 10 1960
Written by: Rod Serling
Directed by: Douglas Heyes
Starring: Anne Francis as Marsha White
Elizabeth Allen as Saleswoman
James Millhollin as Mr. Armbruster
John Conwell as Elevator Man
Patrick Whyte as Mr. Sloan
Nancy Rennick as Ms. Keevers


Setting: Earth
Timeframe: Present (at the time)
Theme(s): Fear, alienation, confusion, consumerism, selfishness, amnesia, paranoia
Parodied? Not to my knowledge, no
Rating: A++

Serling's opening monologue

Express elevator to the ninth floor of a department store, carrying Miss Marsha White on a most prosaic, ordinary, run-of-the-mill errand. Miss Marsha White on the ninth floor, specialties department, looking for a gold thimble. The odds are that she'll find it—but there are even better odds that she'll find something else, because this isn't just a department store. This happens to be The Twilight Zone.

A woman takes a lift to the ninth floor in a department store, looking for a gold thimble, but ends up in a pretty deserted shopfloor. An assistant appears and seems to have the very thing she’s looking for - and only that. There is no other merchandise at all. She also calls the woman by name - Marcia - but the buyer does not know the seller, and believes the reverse to be true. A strange sense of disquiet has taken hold of her since she first set foot on this floor, and now it intensifies. As she leaves, the saleswoman asks her if she is happy, but she snaps back that it’s none of her business. The lift arrives and she goes back down, but as she does she realises the thimble is defective. So the lift attendant takes her to the floor for complaints.

Next we see the manager’s officer, where one of the floor managers is explaining to his manager, a Mr. Sloan, that the woman returning the thimble claims she got it on the ninth floor. Sloan looks at him as if he’s an idiot: didn’t he explain that the building only has eight floors? Yes he did, the floor manager insists, but she won’t be put off. She is sticking to her story. Sloan agrees to see her himself. While she is re-explaining herself to him, and getting quite agitated that nobody believes her, she sees the shop assistant who served her and calls to her, but just then someone picks her up, and she sees to her horror that the “assistant” is a mannequin!

She faints, and is taken into a room to recover, but things being busy as they are she is forgotten about when the shop closes, and she wakes to find herself locked in alone. As she runs through the store looking for help, she knocks over a dummy, and sees that the face is that of the lift attendant who ferried her up and down earlier. Suddenly voices begin to call her name, many voices, telling her to remember who she is, to climb up, doesn’t she remember? She thinks one of them moves. She runs, terrified, into the lift, which automatically takes her to the ninth floor, where she again meets the “woman” who served her here.

As she brings her onto the ninth floor from the lift, all the other dummies come to life and follow her as she helps the crying Marcia walk, as she begins to remember. She remembers she is a mannequin herself, that each of them gets a chance to live, for a month, as a human, but that she was due back yesterday and has overstayed her time. The saleswoman, whose turn it is, heads off and this next morning Marcia is again a mannequin.

Serling's closing monologue

Marsha White, in her normal and natural state, a wooden lady with a painted face who, one month out of the year, takes on the characteristics of someone as normal and as flesh and blood as you and I. But it makes you wonder, doesn't it, just how normal are we? Just who are the people we nod our hellos to as we pass on the street? A rather good question to ask . . . particularly in the Twilight Zone.

The Resolution

Absolutely superb. When I saw this first I think it was the eighties remake, and even then it floored me (no pun intended). What a clever story, one of the best yet.

The Moral

I don’t know: to thine own self be true? All good things come to an end?

Themes

Fear is the main one here, and a nagging sense that something just is not right. A sort of creeping dread that there is some fundamental truth which is just out of your grasp, but that if you can uncover it, will make sense of everything. Consumerism too, I guess, being based in a department store, and the inevitability of things being as they are. Selfishness too, supposedly, if we imagine Marsha deliberately overstayed her time, or maybe a touch of amnesia?

And isn't that...?

Anne Francis (1930 - 2011)
Famed for her role in the classic science fiction movie Forbidden Planet, she also starred in the first ever TV series about a female detective, Honey West, for which she won a Golden Globe. She was also in Funny Girl, starring opposite such greats as Omar Sharif and Barbara Streisand, and later with Burt Reynolds in Impasse. She also appeared in, among others, Murder She Wrote, Matlock, The Love Boat, Dallas and the Golden Girls.

Questions, and sometimes, Answers

How is it that the saleswoman had the thing Marsha was looking for, the gold thimble? How did she know she would be coming up to the ninth floor (although that was where the mannequins were stored) looking for exactly this item? Did she fail to give her a receipt as she knew the purchase was not being made by a living person? Ans why was the thimble defective? To force her back to the ninth floor? But she only ended up back there after hours.

If the saleslady had already “metamorphosed” into a living being that day, and could serve Marsha on the ninth floor, how was it she was a mannequin down on the main floor?

Really now, how did Marsha get forgotten about? Surely women faint all the time in shops, and have to be moved to rooms to rest. Does nobody check these things? Are they not afraid of being sued for, I don’t know, mental stress, unlawful imprisonment, whatever?

If Marsha is not real, how did she have a mother, for whom she was buying the thimble? Or had she just made that up? Are we looking at a Norman Bates sort of thing here?

Why is the lift attendant so brusque and unhelpful, almost hostile to Marsha? Is it because he knows she has forgotten who she is, or is it that he is romantically involved with her, as seems to be the case when she “remembers”?

Iconic?

Not really, but I was reminded of this story when the new Dr. Who began, and all the mannequins came to life. Different thing altogether, but brought this to mind.

The Times they are a Changin’

Marsha buys a 14-carat gold thimble for the princely sum of 25 dollars (including tax). Also, the lift is attended, someone employed to do nothing more than stand there and press buttons to take people where they want to go. That ended a long time ago.

Personal Notes

A great story, very innovative, but on the face of it very cruel too. The idea of someone experiencing real life for a month, and then having to go back to being a dummy seems harsh. I would imagine there have been, or will be, other rebel dummies who will refuse to go back when their time is up.

Useless factoid: The music here is the same music that was used in the opening episode, “Where is Everybody?” Given that this is almost the last episode, that there were mannequins in that one too, and that, in the end, the world the character inhabited turned out to be more than met the eye, I find that interesting.

__________________
Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

Title: “The Mighty Casey”
Original transmission date: June 17 1960
Written by: Rod Serling
Directed by: Robert Parrish and Alvin Ganzer
Starring: Jack Warden as McGarry[2]
Robert Sorrells as Casey[2]
Abraham Sofaer as Dr. Stillman[2


Setting: Earth
Timeframe: Present (at the time)
Theme(s): Robotics, sports, gambling, cheating, doing Trollheart's head in!
Parodied? Not to my knowledge, no
Rating: C

Serling's opening monologue

What you're looking at is a ghost, once alive but now deceased. Once upon a time, it was a baseball stadium that housed a major league ball club known as the Hoboken Zephyrs. Now it houses nothing but memories and a wind that stirs in the high grass of what was once an outfield, a wind that sometimes bears a faint, ghostly resemblance to the roar of a crowd that once sat here. We're back in time now, when the Hoboken Zephyrs were still a part of the National League, and this mausoleum of memories was an honest-to-Pete stadium. But since this is strictly a story of make believe, it has to start this way: once upon a time, in Hoboken, New Jersey, it was tryout day. And though he's not yet on the field, you're about to meet a most unusual fella, a left-handed pitcher named Casey.

Oh crap no! Not baseball! Even worse than boxing, worse than jazz, worse than most things I can think of. Sigh. All right then, personal prejudices to one side. Let’s get this thing started.

A crappy baseball team (no I don’t mean that; they really are useless, worst in the wor - ah, country) are looking for a new catcher, and find one in a strange tall man who seems to have a grip of iron. He’s brought to the field by a Doctor Stillman, and seems to almost have to be directed what to do by the doctor. Of course he’s a robot, which the doctor confides to the coach, and which the kid, the robot, Casey, amply demonstrates by his prowess at baseball. Of course the team suddenly start winning all their games, but then Casey gets “beaned” (takes a ball to the head? Don’t ask me, ask Wiki - it doesn’t hate baseball like I do. No, it doesn’t know either, or perhaps care. Let’s assume that’s right) and has to be taken to hospital.

While there, obviously, his true nature comes out and the doctor examining him says he’ll have to report this to the baseball commission, who, not surprisingly, take a dim view of any team employing a robot. Well,. It’s hardly fair, is it, and surely against the rules. Then Doctor Stillman says, if a lack of a heart is the problem, as the baseball commissioner says it is, then he can give Casey a heart. With his new heart, Casey returns but now he can’t endanger the other team; he feels compassion and so is no longer any use as a pitcher.

Trollheart’s note: Jesus Christ on gluten free toast with marmalade! Get me OUT of here!


Serling's closing monologue

Once upon a time, there was a major league baseball team called the Hoboken Zephyrs, who, during the last year of their existence, wound up in last place and shortly thererafter wound up in oblivion. There's a rumor, unsubstantiated, of course, that a manager named McGarry took them to the West Coast and wound up with several pennants and a couple of world championships. This team had a pitching staff that made history. Of course, none of them smiled very much, but it happens to be a fact that they pitched like nothing human. And if you're interested as to where these gentlemen came from, you might check under 'B' for Baseball - in The Twilight Zone


The Resolution

I’m too depressed to even comment here. Jesus - well, you know the rest.

The Moral

Don’t give a robot a heart.

Themes

Robotics - only I think the second time we’ve heard of robots, since the female robot in “The Lonely”, and again some sort of moralising about how emotions kill them. Very interestingly, the coach here - Jack Warden - is the same actor that played the man marooned on the asteroid in that episode, Corry. So he’s been involved with both the robots in the series so far. Sport of course is the other theme, bloody baseball - making this again the second sport-themed one, following on from “The Big Tall Wish”, and I guess cheating (for make no mistake, that’s what it is) can also be considered a theme here.


And isn't that...?

Jack Warden (1920 - 2006)
An impressive list of film credits, including iconic movies such as From Here to Eternity, 12 Angry Men, Heaven Can Wait, All the President’s Men and Shampoo, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award, as he was for Heaven Can Wait. On television he starred in the series NYPD (but not Blue), Crazy Like a Fox, Jigsaw John and The Bad News Bears.

Robert Sorrels (1930 - 2019)
This is a new one. Guy was convicted of a double murder and jailed in 2005, died in prison. Interestingly, some of the movies he appeared in included All Fall Down, Ride to Hangman’s Tree, Death of a Gunfighter and his final movie, Nowhere to Run.

Abraham Sofaer (1986 - 1988)
Played Joseph of Arimathea in The Greatest Story Ever Told, was in Quo Vadis? and also guested on episodes of Star Trek, Lost in Space, The Time Tunnel and The Outer Limits.


Questions, and sometimes, Answers

Oh so many. How did a man in the 1960s manage to build a perfectly humanoid robot, and then give it - not an approximation of a heart, we’re told, but a real human one - when we can’t even begin to come close to that sort of technology in the twenty-first century? Maybe the guy was an alien. Who knows? Or cares?

Useless factoid:

This is the only time (so far) I’ve seen two different directors work on an episode.

Personal Notes

My own hatred for and antipathy towards baseball aside, this has to be one of my least favourite episodes. It’s just so stupid. Look, I’m all for suspending my disbelief, but this is asking too much.

On a more sombre note, it seems the role of the manager was originally to have been played by another actor, Paul Douglas, but on the day shooting ended he passed away, had been sick all the time he had been filming. Serling decided apparently this cast a cloud over what was meant to be a frivolous little happy episode, and recast the role. Now, I’m not saying that was the wrong thing to do, but I feel it was a little unfair to take the man’s final performance and consign it to the cutting-room floor. I wonder what he would have wanted? This is why there are two directors, as mentioned above - the original one, Ganzer, was not available for the reshoot. I don’t know if this is unique to The Twilight Zone, but I haven’t heard of two directors before.

__________________
Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

Title: “A World of His Own”
Original transmission date: July 1 1960
Written by: Richard Matheson
Directed by: Ralph Nelson
Starring: Keenan Wynn as Gregory West
Phyllis Kirk as Victoria West
Mary LaRoche as Mary

Setting: Earth
Timeframe: Present (at the time)
Theme(s): Magic, omnipotence, hubris, love
Parodied? Not to my knowledge, no
Rating: A-

Serling's opening monologue

The home of Mr. Gregory West, one of America's most noted playwrights. The office of Mr. Gregory West. Mr. Gregory West—shy, quiet, and at the moment, very happy. Mary—warm, affectionate...And the final ingredient: Mrs. Gregory West.

A man seems idyllically, even nauseatingly in love with his wife, until we suddenly discover the woman making a martini for him and sitting on his lap is not his wife; she is outside, about to barge in and tear apart the little love nest. However, when Mrs. West enters the house and looks triumphantly around of there rival, there is nobody to be seen. Where is the young woman who only a moment ago she saw sitting beside her husband? She couldn’t have got out; there’s only one door and Mrs. West just came in by it! She’s at a loss, and Gregory of course offers no explanation, as she has not accused him of anything. Yet.

Now she tells him about the woman she saw, but he just laughs, and she can’t prove anything as she can’t find any trace of the girl. When she catches him out though, he has to explain and tells her that, unbelievable as it may seem, the characters from his plays have begun to come to life, and that is what she saw. She of course does not believe him (who would?) and goes to call to have him committed, but he stops her and shows her how he does it, while she tries to get away. Describing the character into his tape recorder, he brings her literally to life, and she walks into the room.

Of course, the wife thinks it’s some set-up (at least she doesn’t call it a gag!) so Greg has to show her it’s real by cutting off the piece of tape on which the character, Mary, is described, balling it up and throwing it in the fire, whereupon Mary vanishes. Before she does, though, she begs Greg not to: she seems distressed, as if being erased from existence is painful and traumatic for her, but he has to prove he’s telling the truth. Besides, she’s not real is she? She’s only a character in one of his plays, right?

Oddly enough, even after seeing this with her own eyes his wife does not believe it, and goes to leave. Gregory has to convince her further, by creating an elephant in the hall. Now she surely can’t fail to understand. But she stubbornly sticks to her idea that he is crazy, even after the elephant disappears. I mean, where did she think it came from? Finally he has no choice, and reveals to her that she too is a character, and if she’s determined to leave him, why then he has no alternative but to throw her tape into the fire and erase her. True to her scepticism, she refuses to take heed, to believe that she could be a character created by the playwright, and when Gregory goes to put the tape back in the safe from which he took it, she contemptuously grabs it and flings it on the fire.

And that’s the end of her.

Lamenting that he made her too strong, too cold, too perfect, Gregory is about to recreate her when he has second thoughts, and brings Mary back again to be his wife.

A nice aside at the end, when Serling appears and begins narrating the end, then Gregory waves a finger at him warningly, takes out his tape and throws it on the fire, whereupon Serling vanishes.



Serling's closing monologue

Leaving Mr. Gregory West—Still shy, quiet, very happy... and apparently in complete control of The Twilight Zone.

The Resolution

Perhaps predictable, but still quite enjoyable. Everyone in Gregory West’s circle, it seems, it a character created by him. Which has to make you wonder about his own character as a person. Does he have to be surrounded by perfect people all the time?

The Moral

There really isn’t one here that I can see, unless it’s “And God created Woman”. Sigh.

Themes

Omnipotence would appear to be the main one: whatever Gregory West wants he can have, just by describing it with the powers of a talented playwright. But there’s a small amount of hubris too, though it does not backfire on him but on his “wife”, who realises too late that she is also created by him. Love, too, as in the end that’s all West is looking for, though if this is the case why he put up for so long with a sharp, snippy wife like he has is anybody’s guess. I suppose he does or did love her, as he didn’t put her tape on the fire, she did that and he even tried to get it back. Nevertheless, he learns his lesson and does not recreate her, instead going with the more compliant (and younger and prettier) Mary.

Magic of a sort here too. An unexplainable process creates these characters, and there’s no other way to describe it than magic, taking the power of the imagination and making it real. I suppose you could also throw in the legend of Doubting Thomas, or in this case Victoria. She’s seen with her own eyes how this works and still persists in refusing to believe it, and pays the ultimate price in the end.


And isn't that...?

Keenan Wynn (1916 - 1986)
A huge career in movies, including some pretty big ones - Dr. Strangelove, Stagecoach, Finian’s Rainbow, Once Upon a Time in the West - as well as work on Kolchak the Night-stalker and Dallas, Fantasy Island, Taxi, The Bionic Woman, Alias Smith and Jones, Hawaii Five-0, Quincy and so on. He was also the son of Ed Wynn, who played the role of Lew Bookman in “One for the Angels”, the second episode we looked at here.

Questions, and sometimes, Answers

The wife asks the husband if he has a secret door installed. If he had, would he be likely to tell her? It would be secret, after all. That’s the whole point of a secret, so that nobody knows. Especially the wife!

I read how he came about it, but surely Stephen King, an avid horror and science fiction fan, must have seen this episode, and therefore it had to have been, even subconsciously, an influence on his short story “Word Processor of the Gods”?

Iconic?

Is it possible that a young John Cleese watched this and saw the wife patting the walls, and included it in the episode of Fawlty Towers where Basil pretends to do the same while trying to find out if a guest has a girl in his bedroom? It’s so similar, the intention even the same, the excuse literally being “I’m checking the walls”...

Ten things or less I hate about you

1. Gregory West’s smiling face is annoying; that sort of self-satisfied, knowing look that says I could destroy you now if I wished.

2. As I note below, this is very demeaning to women, though of course it is 1960. But I wonder if they ever rewrote this, putting the woman in Gregory’s place?

3. Victoria’s stubborn refusal to believe is, well, hard to believe. Even after she’s seen Mary vanish before her eyes, seen an elephant appear in the hall, she still thinks it’s some sort of trick. Is she stupid?


Personal Notes

It’s a light-hearted story, not meant to be taken seriously, and perhaps, in my opinion, not the best way to end the season, but I find its chauvinistic, not to say misogynistic tone disturbing. The man can have any woman he wants, and if they don’t suit he can, essentially, kill them, and then if he wants bring them back to life, killing and resurrecting them as many times as he wishes. There’s no evidence this hurts the characters, but Mary alludes to it, saying it frightens her. And he is burning the tape, after all.

__________________
Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

rubber soul

Boy somebody was busy yesterday.

This will be a two parter, five today and the rest of season one tomorrow.

Execution: Interesting theme when a condemned man is inexplicably sent into the future. I do like the twist where a modern day crook, who kills the previously condemned man, ends up transported into the noose meant for that same condemned man.

Pity you never watched Gilligan's Island. You can have it though, we had to endure that show in reruns for decades. Incidentally, Russel Johnson seemed to always play brainiacs, didn't he? You'll see him in another TZ later (Rating: A-)

The Big Tall Wish: This is an especially interesting, and brave Twilight Zone, because it featured a predominately African-American cast when it wasn't cool to do so. You missed an "Isn't that" though. Ivan Dixon would be best remembered for playing Kinchloe on Hogan's Heroes a few years later. Anyway, great episode and kind of sweet in its own way (Rating: A)

A Nice Place To Visit: This episode has a special place on my heart because this is the first Twilight Zone I truly remember. This is where Beaumont is starting to get into his groove as well. Sebastian Cabot is menacing as the "angel" Pip and it makes up for Larry Blyden's overacting (and if you think he's bad here, check out his other Twilight Zone, Showdown with Rance McGrew). Blyden doesn't take away from the premise though and Cabot, who went as far as to dye his hair and beard white, more than makes up for Dryden's overacting chops. One of my favorite TZs (Rating: A+)

Nightmare as a Child: This one is eerie and psychological at the same time. My thought is Helen is seeing her repressed memory. Either that or it is a doppleganger of herself as a child warning her that she's in trouble. Either way, it has you thinking throughout. I like this episode (Rating A-)


A Stop At Willoughby: Another favorite of mine. In some ways, it's a lot like Walking Distance but with, perhaps, more tragic undertones. Misrell is a beleagured middle-aged executive who desperately wants to get out of the rat race and finds his oasis in the magical town of Willoughby circa 1888 if I got the year right. As it turns out, Willoughby is just a vehicle for Misrell's suicide by way of jumping off the train... or is it?

(Rating: A+ )

Will wrap up first season tomorrow. You're hard to keep up with, Trolls

__________________

rubber soul

Okay, to catch up again.

The Chaser: Did I mention the Twilight Zone didn't do comedy as well as the other genres? Well, sorry to disagree with you on this one, Trolls, but this is one of them. Shackleford seems about as desirable as the Trix rabbit and Leila is so self-centered, it's amazing she didn't marry herself. And couldn't they have come up with a better name than Professor A. Daemon? (rating: C)

A Passage For Trumpet: Now we're getting to who I think is the best Twilight Zone actor. I'm talking about Jack Klugman (later of the Odd Couple TV Series and Quincy M.E) and he's excellent in all four episodes he was in. This, arguably, may be his best as a washed up musician who gets a second chance at life. A shout out also to John Anderson, who plays the angel, Gabriel. I think this is my favorite episode of the first season (Rating A ++)

Mr. Bevis: Again, Serling isn't necessarily the best comedy writer. At least they had the good sense to use Orson Bean as the lead and he's such a likeable character it's hard to rate this one as badly as The Chaser. Still, it's not particularly funny or even all that well written despite the efforts of Bean and Henry Jones, who plays the guardian angel. So, it doesn't do that much for me. (Rating B-)

The After Hours: Another rare Twilight Zone where the female lead shines. This time it's Anne Francis, a familiar face of the period and already a veteran of sorts. And she's excellent here as the befuddled shopper who is being tormented by mannequins only to realize that she herself is one just coming back from a vacation. Very likeable episode and strangely sweet at the end (Rating: A)

The Mighty Casey: Well, we agree on this one, Trolls. This episode truly does suck. Did I mention Rod Serling sucks at comedy? And there is no one to save him here. Jack Warden doesn't have the affability Orson Bean had in Bevis, and Casey, well, he is a robot isn't he? Even a die hard baseball fan has to go for the barf bag after this one (Rating: D-)

A World Of His Own: Like I said, Rod Serling sucks at comedy. Fortunately, Richard Matheson doesn't, at least not here. As such, the first season ends on a good note. Keenan Wynn carries this premise quite well. Yeah, I can see the misogyny in this (It is 1960 after all) but you can't help but like the guy and maybe even feel a little sorry for him (he seems a bit lonely to me), I also like Phyllis Kirk as the high maintenance wife. This is the first on camera appearance of Serling and he's actually perfect as West has to make him disappear as well. Of all the "comedies", this is probably the best (Rating: A)

See you in the next season, Trolls.

__________________

Trollheart

Trollheart’s note: this (gasp) took a whole lot (wheeze) more out of... me... than I… expected…! Call (gasp) 999. No, not (urgh) 911! I… live… in… Irelaaaaagghhhhh!!


Between Light and Shadow: An Overview of Season One

So we’ve reviewed all of the first season of a show that would go on to become not only one of the most successful and popular science fiction/speculative fiction shows on television, but which would be copied, cited, parodied and used by so many other shows, both science fiction and not, and whose title and theme would enter the human experience in such a way that anything odd or unexplainable would have people humming the title tune. We’ve dissected all the thirty-five episodes, and what have we learned? Let’s see.

Things are rarely what they seem

This appears to be a constant factor running through most of the series. We first encounter the weird, untrustworthy nature of reality in the opening episode, where everything the spaceman sees has been manufactured in his own mind, then Barbara’s closed world of fading glory on the screen turns out to be a portal to another life in “The Sixteen Millimeter Shrine”, while in “Perchance to Dream” a man is driven to suicide, though only in his dreams. Apparently, he suffers a heart attack and dies in the doctor’s office. A more horrifying and true nightmare grips the space pilots in “And When the Sky Was Opened”, as each begins to forget the other as they cease to exist, till none of them are left, even the memory of them wiped out, and in “Third From the Sun” we discover that, though Earth-like, the planet the people are escaping a nuclear holocaust from is an alien one.

Decidedly un-alien, in fact, Earth, is the landscape the stranded astronauts wander in “I Shot An Arrow Into the Air”, until the survivor, having killed the others to, as he sees it, survive, realises he was home all along, and the girl who thinks a sinister hitch-hiker is stalking her finds out too late that he is Death, and she has passed on. It is an alien planet - or rather, an asteroid - that the travellers encounter in “Elegy”, but they’re unaware that it also is a massive cemetery, and they have disturbed its peace and must pay the ultimate price, a woman realises her evil double is trying to claim her existence in “Mirror Image” and then there is perhaps the ultimate example this first season of things not being what they seem, when the residents of Maple Street realise they have become the very monsters they fear.

In “A World of Difference”, Arthur Curtis’s world vanishes to be replaced by one he hates, and can’t bear to live in, while Conrad is forced to live in the one he finds himself on, a prisoner in a zoo on Mars in “People Are Alike All Over”. Reality itself shifts in “The Big Tall Wish” and even the afterlife can provide nasty surprises in “A Nice Place to Visit”, though “Nightmare as a Child” shows too that dreams can be very real, and frightening. A secret world lives in “The After Hours” as mannequins take turns coming to life, and finally even the wife is a construct in “A World of His Own”.

You can’t cheat death/fate/the devil

This is amply proven many times. Walter Bedecker, intending to live forever in “Escape Clause”, backs himself into a corner from which there is only one way out, nothing can be changed in “Walking Distance”, and fate has the last laugh in “Time Enough at Last”, as well as in “Elegy”. No matter how many faces he puts on, Arch Hammer can’t avoid death, no more than can Nan Adams in “The Hitch-Hiker”, as death calmly and patiently pursues her. Fate gives Lt. Terry Decker a second chance to redeem himself and save an old friend in “The Last Flight”, but to do so he has to sacrifice his own life, and “The Purple Testament” marks Fitz, taking him as one of its victims after he has seen the presentiment of many men dying.

Walter Jameson, having cheated death for thousands of years, finally ends up being undone by his own callousness and cruelty, succumbing to the most cliched death possible, at the hands of his angry wife, while the noose waits for Caswell, in 1880 or 1960, in “Execution.” Henry finds you can’t cheat fate if the person you want to cheat it for doesn’t believe in “The Big Tall Wish” (or, to Disneyfy it slightly, “if your heart is not in your dreams, some requests are too extreme”) and when Valentine thinks he has cheated fate and ended up in Heaven despite a life of crime, he finds out this is very much not the case, and fate has, as always, balanced the books. Trying to make the object of his affection fall in love with him proves hazardous in “The Chaser”, committing suicide doesn’t solve Joey’s problems in “A Passage for Trumpet” and Mr. Bevis finds that, on the whole, he prefers his life as it is, warts and all.

Or can you?

Like most things in The Twilight Zone, nothing is really set in stone, and while there are many tales of people trying to change their luck, and failing, occasionally it does work. Look at, for instance, Barbara in “The Sixteen Millimeter Shrine”. She manages to escape to a better world, as does Arthur in “A World of Difference”, and Gart Williams (technically) in “A Stop at Willoughby”. Technically, too, I guess you could say Bookman cheats, literally, death (or, if you prefer (sigh) Mister Death) in “One For the Angels”, when he manages to divert him from his secondary purpose, or, perhaps it might be more accurate to say, re-aligns him back on the road he was travelling originally, the taking of Bookman’s life.

Denton is a harder prospect, in “Mr. Denton on Doomsday”. Does he cheat fate, or does (Henry J.) Fate cheat him, or does Fate in fact save him? He could, theoretically, go in either column, while in “Time Enough at Last”, Bemis seems to have cheated fate, outlived all those who disparaged his reading, yet fate in the end has the final laugh at his expense. The Sturka and Riden families certainly cheat their own fate, and escape death, in “Third From the Sun”, and even Decker in “The Last Flight” does indeed get a chance to cheat fate by giving himself to death and changing the outcome of the future.

Love doesn’t conquer all

While it’s true that love is a strong force in almost any story, The Twilight Zone often shows us that love by itself is not always enough. Take Corry in “The Lonely”, who falls in love with the robot Alicia but in the end accepts its loss in order to escape his prison, or Shackleforth in “The Chaser”, who learns all too late that total love and devotion can drive you crazy, and not in a good way. Not quite love as such, but the bonds of friendship and trust snap as easily as three-hundred-year-old chains in “The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street” once paranoia takes hold, and Marsha’s - possible - love for the lift attendant in “The After Hours” is not enough to stop her wanting to remain human, until she’s more or less forced back.

A World of Pure Imagination

I expect this show was one of the first in which audiences were asked to just accept a lot of stuff on face value, willing the old suspension of belief to the nth degree. If someone got murdered in a cop show, the characters - and by extension, the audience - wanted to know why and how. If a family broke up in a romantic drama, the reasons had to be stated. Apart from cartoons though, science fiction - certainly early science fiction anyway - as well as “creature-feature” style horror movies were allowed to just be; nobody asked how The Blob got here or questioned how it survived in space or where it came from, it just was. And so with The Twilight Zone. Despite my desperate nit-picking, worrying at the fabric of the stories and demanding explanations, sometimes there just weren’t any, or at least, none were advanced. You just had to believe.

How and why does Death (oh this is the last time I’ll say it, I swear! Mister Death then!) find his way to a nondescript New York street to pick up a similarly nondescript street seller and take him to the afterlife? Doesn’t he have better things to do? Where does the gun come from that gives Denton back his courage, and in the end, his life, too? How does Barbara escape into a world of old movies? How does Martin Sloan end up going back in time to his childhood? How can the devil live in Walter Bedeker’s bedroom? Why was Edward Hall being pursued by a maniacal woman in his dreams, and how does Kapitan Lanser end up on the ship he sunk, returning there again and again?

None of these questions will be answered, nor should they. We can ask them, but we know in reality there will be no explanation afforded. There can’t be. If everything was explained two things would happen: the world would be very much a duller place and it would quickly become evident that the things we have seen happen could not in reality have happened, and the illusion would be destroyed. So we allow ourselves this conceit, to accept that some things happen because they happen, because the reason behind them, if any, is well beyond our ken. Or, as an obscure writer from the sixteenth century put it, because there are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy. Which is just as it should be.

So questions like what made the space pilots disappear one by one after their supposedly successful voyage into space, what power motivates Pedott in “What You Need”, how Arch Hammer can change his face and a dead woman be pursued by the personification of that death in the guise of a hitch-hiker, or how a one-armed bandit can push a man to fall to his death, are never to be answered. Nor will enquiries on the subject of a World War I fighter pilot arriving in 1960, a soldier in World War II gaining the power to foresee death, or why and how doppelgangers sudden break through into our world. Dealt with similarly will be the questions how can a man be a character in a movie but then actually live that life, how can a man live as long as Walter Jameson has, and how can a kid have the power to change the outcome of the future? Ask in vain, too, why overworked Gart Williams see a nineteenth-century village on a train line and ends up dying for the vision of a better, more simpler world, or where Professor A. Daemon came from. Question not the existence of guardian angels, animated mannequins or even a man who can make people come to life simply by describing them. There are no answers to these questions, or perhaps there is one, one which covers all eventualities and makes a certain kind of sense.

All these things happen, all these things are possible, because it is The Twilight Zone.

__________________
Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

Go no further, if ye be not of great nerdly quality! Turn back, young errant knight, if statistics, charts and graphs be not thy thing, if numbers bore ye or waffling to the nth degree doth send thee into a coma.

Thou hast been warned. If thou art of stout heart and firm brain, proceed at thine own risk. If thou dost take no heed of these warnings, and doth possess not the stomach for such arcane knowledge, then

Statistics

I thought it might be interesting to look at some numbers, so here they are.

Quality of episodes

Based on my own rating system, here’s how they break down in season one:
A++ 6
A+ 6
A 13
A- 5
B+ or below 5

Admittedly, those are only based on my personal ratings, but overall this is still impressive reading. What we can see is that of the thirty-five episodes of season one, thirty of them all rated at the very least an A, and 12 rated A+ or higher. On the other end of the scale, a mere five fell below the high watermark I’ve come to expect of this series, and even though it doesn’t differentiate, I can tell you that only two of them were miserable C ratings. That’s pretty much unheard of for a show starting off, especially one tackling a premise that had been, pretty much untouched up to then. Try this with even the original Star Trek and I guarantee you’ll get a lower figure of top quality or even very good episodes. It’s often hard for a show to find its feet, and its audience, in its first season, but from the outset The Twilight Zone seems to have captured the imagination of its viewers, and would only go - mostly - from strength to strength as it was renewed for future seasons.

Themes

This is just a general thing. As each episode can be said to have, as shown in the reviews, several themes, I’m just choosing the main, overarching one (time travel, justice, crime etc) on which to base these.

Alienation: 26
Of course I’m going to explain and detail this figure.
Note: since i have a pain in my, um, face writing episode titles, I’m just going to use the abbreviations here. I’m sure it’ll be clear enough.
So…

WIE? The astronaut feels alienated here because he appears to be alone, cannot contact anyone and everyone around him seems frozen in time. From the beginning, a dark, scary, unsettling atmosphere is laid down which, while it will not be prevalent in every episode, will permeate the larger majority of them. Sometimes, as here, the alienation will be shown for what it is, something not necessarily to be frightened of, and sometimes, it will not.
MDOD: Surely the main character here feels alienated? Laughed at, abused, drunk most of the time and trying to get drunk the rest of the time, he has a memory of the man he used to be, but nobody cares and it seems unlikely to him that he will ever be that man again.
TSMS: Barbara feels cut off from the world (truth is, she has cut herself off from it) and unable to face a cruel and changed outside, where nothing is how it used to be. She longs for the old days, and feels a stranger in this time.
WD: Our man here feels a stranger, too, in his own past, unable to make anyone understand or accept who he is, unable to change that past, longing for it yet knowing it to be long gone. He’s like a ghost, flitting through the memories of his own childhood.
EC: Bedeker I guess feels a kind of alienation too, possibly twice: the first time when he thinks he is dying of everything under the sun, then when he makes his deal and finds nothing can kill him, but more to the point, nothing can excite him any more. Hard to feel any sympathy for the selfish old bastard though.
TL: A man who certainly feels alienated, in every sense of the word, is Corry, imprisoned on his own personal asteroid without another human being to keep him company.
TEAL: Hard to say whether Henry Bevis feels alienated, but given that nobody wants to hear about his books, I guess you’d have to say yes. He certainly feels that way after the world is destroyed and he’s the only person (apparently) left alive.
PTD: Edward Hall feels very alienated, as nobody will believe he is being hunted in his dreams by a psychopathic murderer.
JN: Although he doesn’t initially know why, Lanser feels he should not be where he is, and knows something terrible is about to happen. He can’t explain this to anyone or get them to understand, so in his fear he is alone.
AWTSWO: Forbes feels a growing sense of alienation and fear, as his memories don’t tally with anyone else’s, and events seem to be changing at a rapid rate.
ISAAITA: The crew all feel alienated, having crashed and believing themselves lost on some asteroid millions of miles from home.
THH: Unable to convince anyone of the sinister intentions of the hitch-hiker, Nan Adams feels increasingly alienated and alone.
TLF: Thrown forward in time, Lt. Decker feels very alienated and out of place in 1960.
TPT: Able, through no fault of his, to see which of the men are to die, Fitz becomes alienated from his comrades, a pariah among them.
MI: Millicnet Barnes feels scared and isolated as weird things continue to happen around her, and even her new companion will not believe her.
TMADOMS: One by one, each suspect becomes alienated - literally - from his fellows as suspicion falls upon them.
AWOD: Trapped in a world which seems to be a movie set, Arthur Curtis feels a growing sense of alienation.
PAAAO: By the end of the episode, Conrad certainly feels alienated - again, literally - when he realises he is an exhibit in a Martian zoo!
EX: Like Decker in TLF, Caswell feels out of place and out of time when he is snatched from 1880 and brought into 1960.
TBTW: Bolie must feel alienated in a world in which he can no longer compete, in which he is washed up and forgotten about.
ANPTV: On his arrival in “Heaven”, Valentine feels very alienated, wondering what’s going on and how he is somehow in this great place? By the end, his alienation has taken on an entirely different complexion!
NAAC: As she begins to be disturbed by the presence of Marky, Helen feels alienated too.
ASAW: Gart Williams feels very alienated, both by his high-pressure job and by his cold, unsympathetic wife.
APFT: Like Bolie in TBTW, Joey Crown feels cut off from his erstwhile passion, alienated in a world that no longer seems to want him.
MB: After his guardian angel resets the day, Bevis begins to feel progressively more isolated from the people who had been his friends.
TAH: Unaware she is a dummy, Marsha feels alienated as things seem to get weirder for her in the shop.

Locations other than Earth: 6 (with caveats, see below)

Surprisingly, not that many. Or maybe not that surprisingly. The Twilight Zone was not, after all, billed or sold as a space or science fiction show, and while, as time went on and its popularity - and presumably its working budget - increased, there would be more forays out into space and onto distant planets, here we wait a long time, relatively speaking, before we even see a story set off our homeworld, and there aren’t too many following it. I suppose as well it might have been that Serling, or the network, wished to avoid driving away those who were not “into” sci-fi, and who assumed they’d be watching a show where spacemen in unconvincing silver suits battled equally unconvincing monsters and flew unconvincing rocket ships into unconvincing starfields. The Twilight Zone was always - and continues to be - first and foremost, about the story and the characters, and most times these can be handled on Earth, even in the present, as well as out on some godforsaken rock in space.

TL: This is of course the first, set on a desolate asteroid being used as a prison for one man. It also features, unsurprisingly, the first appearance of space ships, and again unsurprisingly, they’re pretty standard as to what film sci-fi was visualising them as. This is also one of the only stories concerning robotics, but more of that later.

TFTS: Although we’re made believe this is Earth, we find out at the very end, indeed in the last words of the episode, that it is some unidentified alien planet from which the people are fleeing, heading towards our homeworld.

EL: Strictly speaking, an asteroid, but still not the Earth, though it’s made look just like it, for the benefit of the rich, um, inhabitants.

PAAAO: Following the trend of the times, this is set on Mars, the first Twilight Zone episode to be based there.

ANPTV: Technically speaking, I suppose, you could include this one, though whether Hell is Earth depends I guess on your own personal beliefs and experiences!

APFT: And similarly, given that most of it takes place in Limbo, maybe this could be considered too.

Revenge and/or Justice: 11

Sort of interchangeable in a way, revenge and justice tend to be fairly recurrent motifs in the show, since, as Serling likes to moralise, most if not all of the characters either end up getting revenge or being revenged upon, or finding justice or being brought to justice, one way or another. The clear message here is: crime does not pay and your sins will eventually find you out, sometimes in surprising, even terrifying ways.

EC: Probably the first in terms of the latter, where a selfish narcissist gets what’s coming to him.

TEAL: You could say I guess that Bemis gets his revenge in this one, though it’s a two-edged sword for him.

PTD: Certainly seems to involve revenge, though for what I don’t know.

JN: Justice and revenge in this one, if you consider God - assuming you believe Him to exist - to be a vengeful one. Or maybe it’s just karma. Or the Great Pixie. Whatever.

WYN: Certainly a sense of justice here - not quite revenge, as who can imagine such an inoffensive, friendly little man wishing ill on anyone? - but the bad guy gets his comeuppance in the end.

TFOUAD: Definitely justice here, for a man who has used and abused both people and personalities for his own ends.

ISAAITA: Justice for the remaining astronaut, when he sees he has killed his friends for nothing, and perhaps revenge for them from the grave.

LLWJ: Revenge here takes the shape of a gun held by a spurned wife, ending a life that has spanned more than two thousand years.

EX: Revenge and justice both loom large here, for both victims.

ANPTV: As they do here, with the ultimate revenge and the ultimate justice meted out after death.

NAAC: Revenge is had by Helen on her mother’s murderer and justice is finally seen to be done, the most final justice of all.

__________________
Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

Fear: 22

It’s not at all surprising that in a show like The Twilight Zone, though not marketed as scary really, fear plays a large part; whether it’s fear due to not knowing what’s going on (or indeed, knowing exactly what’s gong on!), fear of discovery, fear of consequences, fear of being stalked, fear of realising something you suspect and do not want to be true, the shadow of fear stalks through at least this season, and surely subsequent ones, like a giant stalking thing. Sometimes those fears are realised, sometimes shown to be nothing to worry about, and sometimes left slightly ambiguous.

WIE? Again, fear plays a large part here, escalating to paranoia and eventual mental breakdown, the result of enforced and prolonged isolation.

MDOD: Again, fear is a factor here. Initially not so much, as Denton is too drunk to care what’s done to him or what’s said about him, but when he finds the gun and begins to regain his self-respect, the fear that his old reputation will come looking for him, forcing him to kill again (or be killed) surfaces.

TSMS: Barbara fears that her best days are gone, and they’re not coming back, and wonders how she is supposed to survive in this strange new world, while her agent fears for her sanity as she closets herself away with her memories. There’s fear, too, when he finds her gone and can’t understand where she has disappeared to, until he sees her on the screen.

EC: Fear only plays a short part in this one, when Bedeker has himself convinced that he, a perfectly healthy man, is dying. Later there is no fear as he is invulnerable and immortal, though right at the end he does fear being incarcerated for “life”, nobody realising how long his life is going to be.

TL: Corry fears he will never get off the asteroid, and then at the end he fears that he will not be able to take Alicia with him.

TEAL: For a relatively short moment, Bemis fears being alone on the Earth, and contemplates suicide. He probably also quite rightly fears his martinet wife.

PTD: Hall fears he will be killed if he falls back asleep, but also fears remaining awake, knowing he cannot do so forever.

JN: Fear runs through this like water rushing into a sinking vessel, as Lanser’s fear grows, the hour of retribution once again at hand, though he cannot remember what it is he fears.

AWTSWO: Forbes fears as things he knows to be true change and warp, and people seem to be getting written out of time. He fears when he can no longer see his reflection in the mirror, and when Harrington vanishes from the phone box.

WYN: Peddot fears the influence of Renard, whom he knows is going to end up killing him.

TFOUAD: There’s fear - finally - when Hammer faces “his father” and realises he is going to die if he can’t again change his face.

TFTS: The two families fear both the approaching holocaust and also the chance that they will be caught and stopped in their escape.

ISAAITA: All the crew fear dying on this “lonely deserted asteroid”, little realising they are home in the desert and only miles from salvation.

THH: The fear is almost palpable as Nan Adams tries desperately to avoid the odd hitch-hiker who won’t leave her alone.

TLF: Decker fears what will happen if he does not go back in time and make things right.

TPT: Fitz fears looking into the eyes of his men, knowing he will see which of them is going to die.

MI: Millicent is terrified by the strange happenings, and the fact that a doppelganger is pursuing her.

TMADOMS: Fear rules the roost here, propelling the residents of Maple Street into a witch-hunt and turning them against their own. There are two types of fear in this episode: fear of the alien invasion and fear that one of the townspeople may be in league with them, or indeed alien themselves.

AWOD: Arthur fears he is in the wrong world, and will never get back to his own.

PAAAO: Conrad fears what they will encounter on Mars, fears when the hatch won’t open, has his fears assuaged only to have them come right back at the end when he realises he is trapped.

NAAC: Helen fears the strange girl, and then her mother’s murderer as she struggles against him.

TAH: Marsha fears that the shop seems very strange and the assistant is acting oddly. Deep down, she probably also fears that she has to go back to being a mannequin.

Loneliness: 12

Even if few of the episodes are set off-world, The Twilight Zone is mostly a lonely place, with one character struggling against the odds, or trying to make sense of a senseless situation, and you can be just as lonely on a deserted rock in space as you can be in a crowd of people at home.

WIE? Again we’re back to the pilot, where loneliness features heavily, though it’s mostly overshadowed by fear and panic.

TSMS: You would have to assume Barbara feels lonely, living in her own private world of past glories and old achievements.

TL: Not as lonely as Corry, of course, on his personal asteroid prison.

TEAL: Or indeed Henry Bemis, after the holocaust as he wanders the ruins of Earth. He must feel very lonely indeed; for a moment, he was about to have all the company fiction and other books can provide, and then in an instant it’s all snatched away, and he’s left alone, in every sense of the word.

THH: I’m torn as to whether or not to assume Nan suffers from loneliness. It’s a lonely business, certainly, driving across the states unaccompanied, but given the company that’s trying to join her, maybe she’s better off being on her own? Then again, given that the sailor won’t believe her story, maybe there’s a sense of being lonely there.

TPT: When you can tell who’s going to die and who’s going to live, it stands to reason people are going to want to steer clear of you, just in case.

MI: And when nobody believes you that something very weird and inexplicable is going on, that’s going to make you lonely too.

TMADOMS: Nothing like feeling lonely in a crowd, though, especially a crowd of people who just recently were your friends and neighbours.

AWOD: Arthur finds himself a lonely figure whom nobody will believe, somewhat like Millicent in MI.

LLWJ: It’s a lonely life when everyone around you keeps dying and you live on.

PAAAO: Space is a lonely place, but it’s lonelier yet when you’re stuck in a cage on your own on a strange planet.

APFT: And it’s lonely too when you’re thrown on the scrap heap and nobody wants your talents any more.

Robotics: 2

I hardly need to detail them, but given that the idea of robotics is approached from extremely opposite ends of the scale in each, maybe I will.

TL: A robot female is delivered to the prisoner to keep him company. He falls in love with it and in the end sees it as a real person when he is released, however in the end he accepts it is just a machine and must be left behind.

TMC: A robot baseball player is used by a crooked baseball coach to win games, but has to be fitted with a human heart and in so doing gains, for some reason, human emotions, making it useless as it no longer wishes to play baseball and hurt opposition players.

Spaceflight: 8

Not necessarily referring to off-world adventures, but any episode in which spaceflight is used, alluded to or even envisioned goes here. So we have

WIE? In which the astronaut is training for an imminent mission to the moon.

TL: Where supply ships land to deliver the goods needed to keep the prisoner alive (and presumably one brought him there originally too, and one takes him away at the end).

AWTSWO: Not technically spaceflight I guess, but close enough. The ship exits Earth’s atmosphere, and is said in the episode to be the first craft ever to do so.

TFTS: The two families steal an experimental craft capable of going into space, in order to escape the coming holocaust on their homeworld.

ISAAITA: Although we never see the spacecraft, we’re told the astronauts stuck in what they don’t know is the Nevada Desert have crashlanded after their spacecraft crashed.

EL: The spacemen arrive on the cemetery asteroid on their way back from a mission and land their ship there; they also end up being positioned, diorama-like, there in death.

TMADOMS: At the very end we see the aliens get into their spacecraft, having incited the residents of the street into a panicked, paranoid frenzy.

PAAAO: A rocket ship takes off for, and crashlands on, Mars.

Aliens: 4

Not terribly surprisingly, given a) the pretty low budget for the show, b) the embryonic nature of prosthetics and c) the fact that the show is not really about aliens, we don’t see too many, at least in the first season. The term aliens here does not include the likes of guardian angels, djinn or devils. Nor does it include Death, Fate, or men who can shapeshift or doppelgangers from a parallel universe.

TFTS: For the purposes of this category I’m including the Riden and Sturka family, who are, technically, at least to us, aliens.

EL: I’m unsure whether I should include Wickwire, as it was never explained just what he was, but I think on balance we can assume he was some sort of alien. I think he may have been a computer program. Um.

TMADOMS: Although we only see them at the end, the aliens invading are the impetus for all the hoo-hah that takes over Maple Street.

PAAAO: Our first Martians, even if they look like refugees from The Greatest Story Ever Told!

Insanity: 14

For our purposes here, insanity refers to either someone coming to the brink of, or actually going insane or thinking they are, or being driven to that point by another party.

WIE? At the end, the astronaut’s mind snaps due to the overwhelming pressure of loneliness and he goes mad. It is however only temporary.

TSMS: It’s never actually said out loud, but Barbara is slowly going insane as she sits in the dark and watches her old movies, wishing for the past.

TL: No surprise that Corry is pushed to the edge of insanity, living on his own for most of the year.

TEAL: It can reasonably be assumed that Bemis goes mad at the end, when his precious books are snatched away from him by a cruel twist of fate.

PTD: Did Hall go mad or did his heart just give out? I guess we’ll never know, but he was certainly approaching the precipice of madness.

AWTSWO: Forbes certainly feels he’s going mad, as nobody will believe him that there were three of them and now only he is left. Although not for long.

ISAAITA: Corey must go mad at the end when he realises they’ve been on Earth all along, and he didn’t need to murder anyone to survive.

THH: Nan wonders if she is going insane as the hitch-hiker closes in on her.

TF: You’d have to imagine that Franklin goes mad, as he believes he sees the one-armed bandit coming for him and ends up falling out of the window to his death.

MI: Millicent believes she is going mad, though by the time she has (somehow) figured out what’s going on she is, ironically, taken in as a madwoman by the cops.

TMADOMS: Paranoia is a kind of madness, and it infects almost everyone on Maple Street.

AWOD: Arthur thinks he is going mad, as everyone tries to convince him he is a drunken actor and not the man he thinks he is.

NAAC: Until her memories come back, Helen must think she’s going mad as the strange child seems to know so much about her.

ASAW: The jury’s out as to whether Williams went mad, just jumping out of the train, thinking he was entering Willoughby, or whether he really did somehow transfer his consciousness/soul there.

TAH: Marsha thinks she’s going mad, little realising she is not even human.

__________________
Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

Redemption: 9

Although many of the episodes, even here in the first season, are dark and somewhat unremitting and unforgiving, there is room for redemption and salvation.

MDOD: The clearest and indeed earliest example being Mr. Denton, who gains his self-respect back and also need no longer fear challengers to his prowess.

TSMS: Can it be considered redemption for Barbara, who disappears into the world in which she wants to live? Maybe.

TL: Redemption comes, finally, for Corry as he is pardoned and allowed leave the asteroid prison.

TFTS: Salvation is available to the Sturka and Riden families as they escape their doomed planet and head to a new life on Earth.

TLF: Decker finds the courage to gain redemption by sacrificing his life in the past to save his friend in the future.

AWOD: Arthur manages to find redemption when he makes it back to the world he believes is real, though everyone else seems to think it is that of a film script and a character in that film.

NAAC: Salvation for Helen as the murderer of her mother is both identified and brought to swift and brutal justice.

ASAW: And whether he actually got there or died en route to a place that did not exist, Williams seems to have found redemption in Willoughby.

APFT: Joey Crown is saved from Limbo and from a dismal existence on Earth, and allowed a second chance.

Pressures of modern life: 4

As I noted in the review of one of the episodes, the 1950s and 1960s saw the rise of the business executive, with things like Madison Avenue springing up and people no longer working just for a wage but to make a career. This led to intense and often brutal competition, both between and within companies, and gave birth to the kind of stress that could end a career, or even a life.

WD: It’s the pressure of his high-powered job that sends Martin Sloan back to the carefree days of his boyhood, though in the end he makes it even worse, ending up with a limp for his troubles.

TEAL: The pressures of his bank job, to say nothing of those at home from his social-climbing wife, make Henry Bemis take refuge in the sanctuary of books.

ASAW: Gart Williams is increasingly unable to deal with the stress of his job, and pines for a simpler time, when the pace of life was slower.

MB: Mr. Bevis does not do well with the hurly-burly of modern life, and as a consequence (before the day is reset) is fired from his job.

Immortality: 5

The great goal of man, to live forever. But this always comes at a price, and to some extent could dovetail with the next theme, though we’ll keep them separate.

TSMS: Barbara attains a kind of immortality, living forever now on the silver screen, where she will always be young and never age.

EC: Walter Bedeker seeks immortality, but is in the end bored by it and ends up painting himself into a corner by being far too clever for his own good.

JN: I guess you could say Lanser has also attained a kind of immortality, though he would probably prefer not to have done.

LLWJ: Walter Jameson is the longest-lived man in history. Until he pisses off the wrong woman.

ANPTV: Valentine, like Barbara and Kapitan Lanser, also becomes immortal in the very worst way.

Greed and hubris: 8

Where there’s ambition and desire there’s greed, and usually hubris too, which is why I’m grouping them together here. A story with a moral can only be such if the hubris of the main character - or someone else - is shown to its fullest extent. Here we have the people who thought they could have what they wanted at no price, never realising that of all places, The Twilight Zone extracts the highest tolls for the bounties it confers.

EC: As I said, there might, and probably will be, some crossover between these and the last theme, and here we have a classic example both of greed and hubris, as Bedeker tries to stack the deck in his favour, but realises too late that the devil always finds a way to win the game. Do not bet against the House!

TEAL: Perhaps not greed but definitely hubris, as Bemis realises that his own frailties have led to his disappointment and loss.

JN: The hubris of the Kapitan is rewarded by having him relive it every single night for eternity.

WYN: Renard’s greed and hubris is his undoing, as he fails to be happy with what the pedlar gives him and wants to make money out of his talent.

TFOUAD: And in a similar way, hubris ends up being the downfall of Arch Hammer, who thinks he can circumvent any situation by choosing the face that best suits it, but makes the wrong choice in the wrong place.

TF: I reckon you could say Franklin’s snottiness about gambling is a kind of hubris, and it certainly is newly-awakened greed which leads to his death.

LLWJ: Jameson believes he will live forever (and why not, given how long he has already lived?) but treats those around him as lesser beings, toys to be played with, and it is this hubris that fails to credit the possibility of one of these used people coming back and ending his long life.

AWOHO: The only place I can see where man’s hubris does not turn against him, where Gregory West believes he can control everything in his life, and does. There’s no real comeuppance in this story, unless you consider Victoria’s hubris in refusing to believe she is a made-up character - and even when his wife is proven to be not real, he just shrugs and creates a new one.

Deal with the devil/Demons and Angels: 8

While the theme of meeting and dealing with the devil would run, not throughout just this series but fantasy and speculative fiction in general for centuries - and had done, well before Serling put pen to paper to create The Twilight Zone - the first season only has a handful of episodes involving the Fallen One, so I’ve paired this with episodes which feature or refer to angels and also demons if any. Also Death and Fate, and any other supernatural agencies.

OFTA: Bookman has a date with Death (no I’m not saying it any more, deal with it) which he does not relish keeping.

MDOD: Denton is helped turn his life around by Fate.

EC: Bedeker literally makes a deal with the devil, and ends up regretting doing so.

THH: Nan is pursued by the personification of Death, in the form of a hitch-hiker.

ANPTV: Valentine thinks he’s dealing with an angel but finds out to his cost he could not be more wrong.

TC: Roger goes to see a man whose name is Professor A. Daemon. Yeah.

APFT: Crown is helped in the afterlife by an angel. Again, yeah.

MB: And a guardian angel helps Bevis re-run the worst day of his life.

__________________
Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

bob_32_116

I dimly recall seeing a few of the episodes of TZ (I preferred The Outer Limits).

Sometimes Serling's monologues annoyed me, especially the closing ones, where he felt the need to explain what the point of the story was. If it's well written and well acted, summing up is redundant and a little bit condescending to the viewer.

I believe several (perhaps most) of the Twilight Zone stories were adapted from print short stories. "What You Need" is a particularly good tale, although I have only read the story, not seen the TZ episode. There is a certain amount of pathos in the fact that the inventor had to kill the main character, not because he had yet done anything wrong, but because of what he would otherwise do some time in the future.