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You are about to enter a dimension of sight and sound…of a column requested by a reader. That’s a signpost up ahead – next stop, TV-Holic’s look at The Twilight Zone.
1. The Truth about the Theme Song
Much like the “dum-de-DUM-dum” Dragnet theme, the opening notes of The Twilight Zone theme song have become a pop culture icon. Any time something frightening or inexplicable is mentioned in conversation, odds are someone will intone the iconic four repetitive notes composed by Marius Constant. The French avant-garde composer was never commissioned to write the theme song; it was instead cobbled together from two different short “cues” he had previously written for CBS. “Etrange 3 (Strange No. 3)” and “Milieu 2 (Middle No. 2)” were two different short pieces Constant had written and recorded for the CBS music library in 1959 with a small ensemble featuring two guitars, bongo drums, a saxophone and French horns. When The Twilight Zone was picked up for a second season, the show’s producers were looking to replace the original Bernard Hermann theme, which CBS execs had described as “too down.” By splicing together the two rarely-heard short pieces composed by Constant which were already owned by CBS, the network managed to create a theme song legend without having to pay a truckload of royalty fees.
2. Rod Serling Was a Boxer, a Paratrooper and a Peabody Winner (all before the show!)
Rod Serling, the host and brainchild behind The Twilight Zone, holds the record as the recipient of the most Emmy Awards for dramatic writing. Serling grew up in Binghamton, New York, and served as a U.S. Army paratrooper in the Pacific Theater during World War II. The combination of a small-town childhood plus the horrors that he saw during the war influenced his writing. After graduating from Antioch College, he started penning scripts for shows such as Kraft Television Theatre, Studio One and Lux Video Theater in the then-fledgling TV market. Serling had been a fairly successful boxer during his time in the military, and he drew from that experience to write a teleplay called “Requiem for a Heavyweight” for Playhouse 90. “Requiem” won a Peabody Award, the first given to an individual script, and suddenly Serling had a “name” in the industry.
3. The Actors Only Got One Take
Every Twilight Zone fan has his or her favorite episodes, and there are a few which are universally popular and always featured in marathons. Interestingly enough, many of the actors in these pieces, when interviewed decades after the fact, confessed that they weren’t particularly proud of their performances. The Twilight Zone had a budget, just like any other series, and often the bulk of the money per episode had to be spent on sets and special effects. There was no luxury of multiple retakes until the actor felt just right about a particular scene. A sub-par performance wasn’t a matter of concern in most episodic television of that era, but, as William Shatner later mentioned in an interview, at that time a Twilight Zone appearance was just another job – no one ever suspected that these episodes would be aired over and over (and over!) again for years to come.
4. William Shatner Still Gets Asked About It
William Shatner was the star in one of the fan favorite episodes, “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet.” He portrayed salesman Robert Wilson who was traveling on an airplane for the first time since his release from a sanitarium after a nervous breakdown. All was well en route, unless Wilson looked out the window; there he’d see a gremlin on the wing. Of course, every time he alerted someone to the situation the gremlin would jump out of sight. In the end, Wilson is removed from the flight in a straitjacket, but after he’s carted away it is noted that the outer covering of one engine has unusual damage, as if something had been clawing at it. Shatner says that even today when he flies a fan will occasionally recognize him and ask “Do you see anything on the wing?”
5. The Burgess Meredith Episode
Depending on your age, the name Burgess Meredith usually conjures up either The Penguin on Batman or trainer Mickey Goldmill in Rocky. The versatile actor with the unruly hair also appeared on The Twilight Zone several times, most memorably in “Time Enough at Last.” Meredith’s Henry Bemish was a meek and mild-mannered bank teller who was brow-beaten by his boss and his wife, and who loved nothing more than to lose himself in a good book. One day during his lunch break, Bemish retreats to the bank vault in order to have some uninterrupted reading time. Suddenly the vault shakes so violently that Henry is knocked unconscious. When he awakens and ventures outside he discovers that the world as he knew it has been destroyed by an H-Bomb, and he is the last survivor on Earth. After wandering around, trying to comprehend the situation, he stumbles upon the ruins of a public library. As he slowly realizes that he now has the time and the resources to read to his heart’s content, he stumbles and his glasses fall off his face and shatter on the ground. In the original story, Henry Bemish’s specs were strictly reading glasses, but Rod Serling had Burgess Meredith wear them throughout the episode in order to make him look more “bookish.”
6. The Isolation Episode
In “Where Is Everybody?” Earl Holliman, dressed in an Air Force jumpsuit, finds himself stranded in a seemingly deserted town. He doesn’t know where he is or how he got there, and every place he goes gives hints that someone was recently there (food cooking on a stove in a restaurant and burning cigarettes in ashtrays, for example). Feeling more and more isolated and panicked, he wanders the streets, calling out to someone, anyone and finally collapses at a street crossing, hopelessly pressing the WALK button. In reality, Holliman was astronaut-in-training Mike Ferris who’d been confined to a sensory deprivation chamber for three weeks to test his reactions to complete isolation. Holliman stated that the hardest part of this role was having to constantly talk to himself and make it sound convincing. He never really felt a sense of isolation, since the film crew was always within his sight.
7. The Episode Referenced on The Simpsons
Billy Mumy was just six years old when he starred in “It’s a Good Life,” but he already had over a dozen acting credits on his resume. His freckle-faced fresh-scrubbed look made him the perfect Anthony Fremont – all-American kid on the surface, evil spoiled brat in actuality. For some reason, Anthony has amazing mental capabilities and is in complete control of his small Ohio town. He controls the weather and which foodstuffs are available at the local grocery store. He has eliminated electricity and automobiles, and for all the few remaining inhabitants know, he has also destroyed the rest of the outside world. Everyone walks on eggshells around Anthony lest they displease him; earning the wrath of Anthony means being banished to the “cornfield.” His punishment for one man who dared defy him was to turn him into a jack-in-the-box, a scene which was recreated in a Hallowe’en episode of The Simpsons.
What are your favorite Twilight Zone episodes? Remember to be very, very good when commenting….I don’t want to have to send you to the cornfield.
Comments (98)
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Balls, this is tough. I have too many favorite episodes. Balls.
Ok, I’ve always been partial to Midnight Sun. Due to an unexpected shift in the earth’s orbit, we’re much closer to the sun and it’s always daytime, with temps well over 100 degrees. And it’s just getting worse! There’s little water and electricity is rationed. An artist and her landlady are the only tenants left in their building, as everyone else is leaving the city to find some alleged cooler areas. Anyway, I don’t wanna give away the ending but there’s a fantastic twist that’s always made it such a memorable damned episode.
posted by Bestie on 10-9-2009 at 2:45 pm
This is my absolute favorite show, but I think my favorite episode is the one that takes place in the bus depot. The woman keeps catching a glimpse of her doppleganger, who ends up taking her spot on the bus while she is taken away for being crazy. It always creeped me out.
posted by Bean on 10-9-2009 at 2:45 pm
I also have a hard time narrowing down my favorites but “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street,” involving a group of neighbors who devolve into violent paranoid behavior after the electricity goes out is certainly one of them.
“A Stop at Willoughby” is a classic and I’ve always felt “The Changing of the Guard,” starring Donald Pleasance, is sadly underrated. It’s the only episode that actually made me cry.
Oh, there are so many good ones. I could go on and on.
posted by Mother Chat on 10-9-2009 at 2:58 pm
The Talking Tina episode still gives me goosebumps.
posted by Wigger on 10-9-2009 at 3:00 pm
Oo, forgot to mention “Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?”, involving patrons at a diner, one of whom is an alien. The identity of the alien is not known until the end of the episode. I watched that one a few times before realizing there was a clue to the Martian’s identity.
posted by Mother Chat on 10-9-2009 at 3:00 pm
Ok, as much as I shudder to talk about it, the episode with the Talking Tina doll creeps me out to this day. The doll said “I’m talking Tina, and I love you very much” to the little girl who owned her, but got more evil as the show progressed. Of course, it probably didn’t help that I was young when I saw this, and had an older brother who liked to torment by laying in his bedroom, downstairs from mine, and using the Talking Tina voice to freak me out. Ah, childhood.
posted by Jamie on 10-9-2009 at 3:02 pm
“The Howling Man”
Monks at an isolated monastery have a howling man in a cell and a strranger who has come to them after being lost asks who the man is only to find out he is the devil…The devil tricks the man into freeing him.
Truly spooky.
posted by Jeff on 10-9-2009 at 3:07 pm
Oh yeah and Talking Tina…Starring Telly Savalas!
posted by Jeff on 10-9-2009 at 3:08 pm
They’re all so awesome, it’s hard to pick, I love this show! One of my faves is “The Obsolete Man.” And I too, always tear up at the end of “The Changing of The Guard.”
posted by KS on 10-9-2009 at 3:15 pm
I am totally declaring my nerdiness today! I would like to point out that more than one episode has been referenced on the Simpsons.
In a Treehouse of Horror Episode:
The episode opens as a reference to the lesser known Night Gallery, also by Rod Serling. One of the three segments is “Terror at 5 1/2 Feet” which more or less plays out the Will Shatner episode, with Bart seeing the gremlin.
Otto the bus driver also sees a gremlin. Unfortunately the Gremlin of note is a green AMC driven by Hans Moleman. Otto’s reaction is to drag race.
posted by emily on 10-9-2009 at 3:20 pm
I love To Serve Man. Whenever, I have the opportunity, I’ll yell at my 15 year old daughter; Breanna, you know that library book that is due: “Its, its a cookbook!”
posted by Peter on 10-9-2009 at 3:27 pm
Emily is right – there have been multiple references in Simpsons episodes. I believe “Time Enough at Last” has also been parodied, though I forget which episode (I believe it also involved Moleman).
Many of the Treehouse of Horror episodes reference TZ – for example, the Homer 3D segment as a reference to “Little Girl Lost”, the Evil Krusty Doll referncing “Living Doll”, and the episode where Kang and Kodos abduct the Simpsons and Lisa finds the cookbook referencing “To Serve Man”.
Even my recaptcha kind of sounds like a TZ episode – “Program Ranchers”
posted by Bert on 10-9-2009 at 3:33 pm
I can’t remember the name of the episode, but the one where some guy has one of those creepy puppet dolls – ventriloquist dummy. Just thinking about it gives me the creeps.
posted by Christina on 10-9-2009 at 3:44 pm
I really like “The Hunt” about what happens to an old man and his dog after they go on a coon hunt. It’s a little sweeter than most Twilight Zones.
My favorite is “A World of His Own” where Keenan Wynn plays a writer who can make people come alive. It’s got a great ending (and I have a weakness for anything that has Keenan or his father Ed in it).
posted by CamilleR on 10-9-2009 at 3:58 pm
Room for one more honey…….
posted by Doflitchit on 10-9-2009 at 3:59 pm
“A Passage For Trumpet” – Jack Klugman as a down on his luck trumpet player who realizes what he has after he’s hit by a truck.
“The Old Man in the Cave” – Survivors of a nuclear holocaust rely on a person in their town who consults with “the old man in the cave.” The arrival of some soldiers who question the “old man’s” judgment puts their existence into turmoil.
“The Silence” – An annoying member of a gentleman’s club takes a bet to undergo a year without talking.
“The Invaders” – Agnes Moorehead is tormented by tiny aliens whose identity is revealed at the end of the episode.
“The Eye of the Beholder” – a woman goes through plastic surgery to make herself attractive… of course, the results are not what you expect.
These, among many, have stuck in my head all these years – here in the Twilight Zone.
posted by Steve from San Diego on 10-9-2009 at 4:06 pm
I love the episode ‘Nothing in the Dark’ with the old woman who’s terrified of death…really great episode.
‘Five Characters in Search of an Exit’ and ‘The Invaders’ were ones I always found absurdly entertaining as well.
posted by Shawn on 10-9-2009 at 4:17 pm
Oh the one with the masks on Mardi Gras. Freaky faces.
posted by Bean on 10-9-2009 at 4:18 pm
Love, love, LOVE “The Zone.” Too many faves to pick from, though “Night of the Meek,” wherein a poor, drunk department store Santa (Art Carney) gets to really become Santa is surely one of the greats. Also “A Pitch for the Angels” with Edd Wynn…just hilarious.
That’s a real good article you wrote there, Kara. A real good article.
posted by loripop on 10-9-2009 at 4:32 pm
I wrote a chapter around “The Shelter” for my MA thesis on Civil Defense. A well-liked neighborhood doctor builds a fallout shelter big enough to hold his family… when a false alarm triggers a CONELRAD alert, the neighbors all show up demanding the doctor let them in the shelter, too. Fascinating psychological study of Cold War mentalities… I seem to recall referencing “Time Enough at Last,” too.
posted by Roger on 10-9-2009 at 4:57 pm
Hey, no has mentioned the one with Robert Redford, where he plays a wounded soldier I think, who talks his way into the home of a woman who never leaves her house for fear that death would get her….so she lets Robert Redford in and nurses him….so in the end….guess who is death!…loved that episode..my all time favourite.
posted by Debs on 10-9-2009 at 4:57 pm
As a “Family Guy” fanatic, I can say they also referenced an episode. Specifically the final scene from #5, using Peter’s last remaining brain cell as the one who breaks his glasses. Hilarious
reCaptcha: auditor Mr. (backwards, eh?)
posted by Erin on 10-9-2009 at 5:02 pm
Several good ones mentioned. I’ll add a few:
“Two” with Elizabeth Montgomery and Charles Bronson as possibly the only survivors of a war – sort of human-only version of “Enemy Mine”
“The 7th is Made Up of Phantoms” where a National Guard tank crew somehow winds up at the Battle of Little Big Horn.
One I don’t know the name of where three astronauts return from a space mission – but then it was a two man mission – then a one man mission. . .
and “Come wander, come wander, come wander with me.”
posted by PartiallyDeflected on 10-9-2009 at 5:09 pm
I always liked the other episode that Shatner was in – “Nick Of Time”.
Shatner and his wife stop in a little town to get their car fixed and go to a little diner to eat. They end up being “trapped” by a little fortune telling machine which tells them what will happen to them.
posted by RT on 10-9-2009 at 5:35 pm
My favorite will always be “The Changing of the Guard.” My sister was more of a fan of “One for the Angels,” though.
I saw the Talky Tina episode when I was about four and never owned a doll in my entire childhood. The American Girl years were hellish, let me tell you. The Samantha doll looked entirely too much like Tina, and I spent many a sleepless night at a sleepover where there were as many as four Samantha dolls in the room.
posted by treewithlights on 10-9-2009 at 5:35 pm
Another episode I really liked (and I can’t remember the name of the episode), was about a small-time crook who ends up dying and thinking he has gone to heaven because he ends up in this wonderously lavish place where everything he asks for comes true and everything is tailored especially for him. But, he gets bored with how everything always turns out in his favor, that everything is so great for him, and he actually finds out he’s not in heaven, but “the other place”.
posted by RT on 10-9-2009 at 5:39 pm
“The Invaders” – and thanks, Steve, for the name
and the one where a deaf man (I believe it may have been Burgess Meredith) walks down a street and “hears” a woman calling for help and saves her.
posted by Susan Mix on 10-9-2009 at 5:51 pm
In Eighth grade our teacher had us do ‘The Visitors on Maple Street” as a play.
posted by lorelei on 10-9-2009 at 5:52 pm
RT you’re thinking about “a nice place to visit”
I have two favorite episodes – “Perchance to Dream” which creeps me out to this day (i also dream in serial sometimes)
and “The Masks” – ever since I was a kid I was fascinated with everything Mardi Gras and this is one of the reasons
posted by Jennifer on 10-9-2009 at 5:58 pm
My favorite has to be the one where the three astronauts think they’re on a deserted planet but they’re really in Nevada. Also, another episode was referenced in a Simpsons’ Treehouse of Horror- the one where the little girl gets sucked into an alternate dimension, except that it’s Homer and he turns 3-D.
posted by Leggy on 10-9-2009 at 6:02 pm
Not sure if this is allowed but…
http://www.veoh.com/search/videos/q/Twilight+Zone
Here is a whole mess of entire episodes (15 pages about 20 episodes per page) all for your streaming pleasure. I have spent a few Sunday evenings just watching these.
Not my uploads…Just an online find.
posted by Jeff on 10-9-2009 at 6:10 pm
One of my favorite episodes is “Nothing in the Dark” which features Gladys Cooper and Robert Redford.
“This low-key Twilight Zone episode stars Gladys Cooper as Wanda Dann, an old woman terrified at the prospect of death. Sequestering herself in a shabby basement apartment, Wanda refuses to let anyone past her door, fearful that one of her visitors might be Death himself. And then late one evening, she lets down her guard long enough to offer shelter to wounded policeman Harold Belden”
posted by Dianne on 10-9-2009 at 6:11 pm
There are so many great episodes. A lot of my favorites already mentioned.
Another one is “Nothing in the Dark” where an old woman refuses to let anyone into her home for fear they might be Death. She eventually allows a charming and wounded man (Robert Redford) to come in. Can’t say I blame her!
“Ah, here’s your problem! This doll is set to Evil.”
posted by Nerak on 10-9-2009 at 6:20 pm
Ok – that’s a little creepy… when I posted and the page refreshed – some one had just cited the same episode just above my comment.
posted by Nerak on 10-9-2009 at 6:23 pm
RT – The episode in question is called “A Nice Place to Visit.”
posted by Steve from San Diego on 10-9-2009 at 6:48 pm
So many favorites it is hard to come up with a few but I would say “The Hunt”, “Changing of the Guard” and “Night of the Meek” are at the top of the list.
posted by Dave on 10-9-2009 at 6:57 pm
There’s so many, but one of the first I ever saw was “Number 12 Looks Just Like You”. You gotta love TZ’s social commentary.
posted by Ale on 10-9-2009 at 7:01 pm
I always liked the one with Buster Keaton as a time traveler from the turn of the century to “modern times”. All he wants to do is get back to the peace and quiet of his own time. Reminiscent of the “Next Stop Willowby” type episode. The “go to the past and fix it” episodes were always fun, too. There was one about a merry-go-round and a man who went into the past to stop the accident that left him lame, and another where a weasel starts his empire over. Julie Newmar plays the devil he makes a deal with…very delicious.
posted by Beach Goat on 10-9-2009 at 7:04 pm
“A penny for your Thoughts” Where a coin flip that lands on end gives the power to hear people’s thoughts.
“Kick the Can” The adventures of residents of a nursing home.
posted by Carl G on 10-9-2009 at 7:08 pm
I’ve never seen the Isolation Episode, but there was a hilarious Arby’s commercial I think must’ve been based on it. At the end, the guy running around yelling for anybody to answer finally finds someone, grabs him by the jacket and shouts, “Where is everybody?”
“Arby’s. Roast Beef sale.”
“Really?”
Awesome. My favorite Twilight has to be “Button, button,” which unfortunately will be made into a lousy movie soon.
posted by Seth on 10-9-2009 at 7:14 pm
A Game of Pool, with Jack Klugman and Jonathan Winters, is tremendous.
posted by Gabe on 10-9-2009 at 7:27 pm
I was six when the series started and scared to death to watch, so naturely I just stayed in my bedroom where I could hear the tv and let my imagination fill in the blanks on what whas showing. Much, much, much more terrifying as I found out in later years watching the reruns. That said, my favorite was a soft show about a guy who finds a magic lamp and is given only 1 wish instead of 3. After spending the show fantasizing what he wish would be (and the consequences there of) he makes a wish that is absolutely perfect. I won’t spoil it for you.
reCAPTCHA other enemies (like watching with your imagination?)
posted by Hawaiian on 10-9-2009 at 7:48 pm
My favorite is “Time Enough at Last” as it is with so many others. The one that freaked me out the most, though, was the one with Dennis Hopper as the neo-Nazi being counseled by Adolph Hitler in the shadows. That one originally aired two days after I was born.
… Oh, I’m surprised no one has yet mentioned “The Hitchhiker.” Classic! But they all were, weren’t they?
posted by Liz on 10-9-2009 at 8:15 pm
Oh! How about the one where the old lady is getting phone calls from her dead fiance from the cemetery?!
Keeps me from being a nagging wife to this very day…
posted by Liz on 10-9-2009 at 8:16 pm
Favorite sentimental and most poignant episode: The Changing of the Guard
Serling was excellent on his commentary on human nature: The Shelter and
Rip Van Winkle Caper–
“As the man gets back into his car to report Farwell’s death to the police, he quizzically remarks to his wife, “Can you imagine that? He offered this to me as if it was really worth something.” The wife vaguely recalls that it had, indeed been valuable sometime in the distant past. The husband replies, “Sure, about a…. hundred years or so ago, before they found a way of manufacturing it,” and tosses the gold bar away.
posted by Nick Vitto on 10-9-2009 at 8:41 pm
My favorite, among so many great episodes, is \Eye of the Beholder\ where a young woman has undergone surgery so she won’t be so ugly. Throughout the entire episode, you never get to see the faces of the doctors and nurses. Then when the surgery is a failure and she is still ugly, we then get to see everyone’s faces. It is revealed that, in reality, the girl is beautiful (by OUR standards) and all the doctors and nurses are really the ugly ones. I LOVED this episode and it hooked me on twist endings!
posted by Joy Vyoral on 10-9-2009 at 8:48 pm
Wow, no one has mentioned my favorite episode, and I’m surprised.
“To Serve Man”.
And, just to prove my nerdiness, every one of my toons on WoW owns this book. It is a cookbook, after all.
posted by bryan on 10-9-2009 at 8:49 pm
i watch the SCI-FI marathon every year while recovering from new years eve & saw an episode this year i haven seen before
its about a rich woman who hires a bum to give her his eyes since she is blind… well after the surgery she is able to see until a blackout occurs & she is convinced she is blind again
posted by Scott T. on 10-9-2009 at 9:20 pm
I am so glad to see someone else loves A Stop at Willoughby. Not sure what the afterlife is like, but I kinda hope it’s like Willoughby but, uh, with air conditioning and the internet! I also liked Once Upon a Time with Buster Keaton in it. He plays a man who lives (I think) in the late 1800s who is also complaining about life and he ends up in the 1960s and finds out it is much worse (for him).
I remember watching all of these reruns with my dad, in the late 70s/early 80s. I innocently asked if we could write a letter to Rod Serling and see if he wanted to come to our house. My dad had to explain that Rod was in Heaven now….
posted by TeacherPatti on 10-9-2009 at 10:07 pm
I loved \The Howling Man.\ I actually managed to track down the book where the short story came from.
My other favorite was \The Fugitive\ with Ben, the runaway shapeshifting alien, and Jenny, the human child he befriends.
posted by Sam on 10-9-2009 at 11:13 pm
i always liked \An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge\ the ending is pretty good
posted by kidrad on 10-9-2009 at 11:19 pm
Here’s one I haven’t seen mentioned,but I cannot think of the name of the eppy to save my life!
It’s about the old lady getting the late night phone calls with this supper creepy voice on the end moaning. After a couple of days she is screaming at him to stop calling. When her and her nurse go to graveyard to figure out what is up with the telephone line they find it in the grave of her fiance’. And in the end she is distraught because of how everything had happened.
Oh my gosh,that one scared the beejeezes outta of me at 1:30 in the morning.
posted by lisaj on 10-9-2009 at 11:37 pm
I think one of my most favorite episodes is the one where the old lady is by herself in the farmhouse. When she was attacked by aliens. In the end the alien space craft says NASA or USA… that one is good, surprised me a good one.
posted by Tiffany on 10-10-2009 at 12:17 am
Nobody has mentioned “The Odyssey of Flight 33″ yet? That was one of the best. My heart sank when the Trylon and Perisphere showed up.
More favorites that haven’ been mentioned:
-”On Thursday We Leave for Home”. James Whitmore plays Benteen, the leader of a failed outer space colony who is keeping the colonists alive with hope that they will be rescued and stories about Earth. But when help arrives, Benteen can’t relinquish control. A great study of the positive and negative uses of power.
-”Miniature”. Robert Duvall plays a misfit who falls in love with a doll that comes to life in his presence. Much better than it sounds.
My all-time favorite episode is “The Masks”. How different would life be if we could see one’s true self on their face?
posted by Michael Doty on 10-10-2009 at 1:57 am
There were so many brilliant episodes. While there were some I liked more than others, I never came across one that was actually bad. My favourites are:
One for the Angels
Escape Clause
Judgement Night
The Hitchhiker
The Fever (I have only been to a casino maybe three or four times, but this would always be on the night before I left. Creepy, eh?)
The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street
Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room
The Private World of Darkness
A Most Unusual Camera
Night of the Meek
A Penny for Your Thoughts
Will The Real Martian Please Stand Up
Time Enough At Last
The Obsolete Man
Two
A Game of Pool
The Midnight Sun
Nothing in the Dark
Kick the Can
To Serve Man
The Fugitive
Four O’Clock
The Trade-Ins
I Sing the Body Electric
Changing of the Guard
In His Image
Death Ship
On Thursday We Leave For Home
In Praise of Pip
Nightmare at 20,000 Feet
Number 12 Looks Just Like You
An Occurance at Owl Creek Bridge
The Masks
The Jeapordy Room
I have a lot of favorites; what can I say? It is my favorite show of all time.
posted by Mindymoo on 10-10-2009 at 2:18 am
God now I’m dying of curiosity. What was the hint in Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?
posted by Angela on 10-10-2009 at 2:46 am
Scroll past if you don’t want to know the hint.
When they are talking amongst themselves and trying to remember who was on the bus, everyone has someone who will vouch for him or her EXCEPT for the one who turns out to be the Martian. No one ever actually says they remember that person.
posted by Mother Chat on 10-10-2009 at 3:01 am
The Twilight Zone is an awesome show! But the best parts about it are the facts that its black and white (which I prefer to color, just because its different), and because there is no swearing or anything bad in it.
I love:
Number 12 Looks Just Like You
Twenty-Two
To Serve Man (a classic)
The Obsolete Man
Death’s Head Revisited
Nothing in The Dark
It’s a Good Life
Living Doll, of course
The After Hours
A world of his Own
Eye of the Beholder
He’s Alive
But one of my absolute favorites is A Nice Place to Visit. It’s about a gangster who gets shot by the police. He dies, and goes to a place where he gets anything he wants. He assumes its heaven, but is it?
@ lisaj, The episode you’re talking about is Night Call, I love that one!
posted by Carli on 10-10-2009 at 9:45 am
@ Motherchat Thank you! I never noticed that!
I think one of my favorites was always Jesse-Belle. Of course when I was a little girl I thought turning into a leopard all night would be cool.
BTW someone’s done an amazing job of putting plot summaries or every single episode on Wikipedia. It does include the twist endings though for everyone’s warned.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_The_Twilight_Zone_episodes
posted by Angela on 10-10-2009 at 12:38 pm
my faves are:
‘kick the can’, which perpetuates the whole ‘you are what age you feel’ idea, which i totally agree with. its adorable.
the ‘eye of the beholder’ is a good one. isnt it much shorter than most of them though? i don’t remember it being very long
but \time enough at last\ makes me so sad! i can’t watch the end, it makes me want to cry, poor old guy
posted by mary on 10-10-2009 at 1:19 pm
My Great-grandfather was bffs with Rod Sterling. His name was Edgar Stehli and he use to do small parts for Sterling when he needed an extra actor. He got a real part in the episode “Listen, Listen.” Whenever my grandfather went out to California he would stay with Sterling. They bonded over being Unitarian Universalists. Of course this means I know things about Sterling, like that he was very pretentious and only likable in small doses.
posted by K. Schaubz on 10-10-2009 at 1:24 pm
There are a lot of great TW episodes, but I think my favorite is “Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?”
From TV.com:
“Troopers follow the tracks from a frozen pond, into a diner. Inside they find a soda jerk, a bus driver and his seven passengers. The bus driver is certain only six people boarded his bus…”
The scariest episode, for me anyway, was “Stopover in a Quiet Town”, where a couple who’ve had too much to drink leave a party, but wake up in the wrong house. I watched it late one night, and it took me hours to fall asleep afterward.
posted by Tammy on 10-10-2009 at 1:41 pm
My all time favorite has got to be “A world of his own.” Who wouldn’t want to be able to make people or other things appear just by writing or talking about them? It was the 1st episode where Mr. Serling appeared onscreen and the only one where he interacts with the characters. One interesting fact is that one of the characters is named Mary and the actress who played her really was named Mary. It isn’t often that a character has the same 1st name as the actor playing him/her.
posted by Charles B on 10-10-2009 at 2:49 pm
All these great, great episodes and no one mentions one of my favorites … To Serve Man. \Don’t go, it’s a cook book!!!\
posted by Bob on 10-10-2009 at 4:21 pm
I like “The Passer-by.” I was taking a class on the Civil War at the time I saw it, and the bitter Southern woman really struck a chord with me.
“The After Hours,” because mannequins are scary.
On a slightly related note, “The Purple Testament” episode, where a WWII lieutenant sees a light on someone’s face when they were about to die, well, I saw it spoofed on SNL with and it ruined it for me.
posted by Liz on 10-10-2009 at 5:22 pm
Wait, i can’t believe nobody mentioned Shadow Play. That episode one of my all time favorites along with To Serve Man and Will The Real Martian Please Stand Up? Gosh. Twilight Zone is too awesome.
posted by rkalila on 10-10-2009 at 6:12 pm
how to serve humans, hands down.
posted by toribug11 on 10-10-2009 at 6:29 pm
/@ lisaj, The episode you’re talking about is Night Call, I love that one!/
That’s it! Thanks Carli.
And to note my thanks in recaptcha: \correct Jr.\ LOL!
posted by lisaj on 10-10-2009 at 9:32 pm
Odyssey of Flight 33:
I got a nice letter from Mr. Serling when, as a kid, I wrote to ask what the “blast” effect was when the plane went through the time barrier. He said it was just an effect, no particular thing in mind, to indicate that something really big had happened to the plane.
NOW: About an elevator and flower scent show. Was this a TZ program? Someone above mentioned “Room For One More,” and that reminded me of an elevator attendant who said that. It was part of the plot where a woman would hear those words, smell apple blossoms, and the elevator cables would snap. Which they did. I couldn’t go into an elevator for the longest time and my Mom never understood why.
posted by Tom Carten on 10-10-2009 at 10:55 pm
“What You Need” An old peddler manages to come up with just exactly what his customers need before they know they will need it. He is noticed by a thug who tries to shake him down. The ending will stay with me forever!
posted by Pam on 10-10-2009 at 11:54 pm
There is one that always haunted me, but I don’t remember the title or even most of the story. It ends with time being frozen for all but one person. A nuclear bomb is just a few feet from earth. If the person were to unfreeze time, the bomb would go off. Can anyone tell me the title of this?
posted by lynn on 10-11-2009 at 12:40 am
The creepiest one for me by far was the one where a grandmother gives her grandson a toy telephone for his birthday. She then dies, but keeps talking to him through the phone. Thinking back on it, it wasn’t so creepy, but still.
posted by Ki on 10-11-2009 at 10:04 am
In a great scene from the show “Third Rock from the Sun”, William Shatner (playing “The Big Giant Head”) arrives by plane to visit Dick (John Lithgow) and family. Lithgow is waiting at the gate and asks “How was your flight?” Shatner replies “Terrible! All the way here there was this THING on the wing of the plane!” Lithgow replies “The same thing happened to ME!” Lithgow, of course, played the Shatner role in the movie version. I have no idea what happened in the rest of the episode…I laughed til I cried, and by that time it was over!
posted by Richard DIxon on 10-11-2009 at 11:47 am
im not sure about this, but i watched an episode where an old lady had a husband who was bored of his life and wanted a hobby or something. he resorted to taxidermy. he became a fanatic and eventually killed and stuffed his wife’s dog. his wife got angry and got back to his husband, doing to him what he does to animals… is there an episode like that? not sure… i kinda remember it.
posted by Rolan on 10-11-2009 at 12:25 pm
^ whoops, sorry wrong show. haha bad memory
posted by Rolan on 10-11-2009 at 2:38 pm
I loved ‘The Shelter’ it’s one of my favorites and does a good job of depicting humans under stress of impending death.
Its the one about a couple who throw a dinner party and the hosts have a bomb shelter built in their basement. Everyone jokes about the hosts paranoia and having one built, until a radio announcement broadcasts a possible attack on America. This ensues their party trying to break into his bomb shelter for protection and them fighting amoungst one another should he made a decision to let someone in.
When hurricane Ike came through Houston, watched it on tv before we lost power. Talk about spooky.
posted by Emily on 10-11-2009 at 2:44 pm
Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up, Hands down.
posted by Isabella on 10-11-2009 at 5:25 pm
The “Hitchhiker” with Ingar Stevens is still my all time favorite, but the airpane flight that could never land is one too.
posted by Kathy on 10-11-2009 at 6:25 pm
@ Bean: the Mardi Gras masks episode scared the crap out of me! Most Twilight Zones just make me shiver, but that one…I think I slept with the covers over my head!
posted by Jenny on 10-11-2009 at 10:03 pm
To Serve Man is fantastic. Also, the one where there are eight or nine stranded bus passengers in a diner during a snow storm, and it becomes known one of them is an alien.
posted by Wade Thomas on 10-11-2009 at 10:14 pm
I can’t pick one favorite, I would end up listing all the episodes! I do always get a kick out of other shows who reference “The Zone” though. I giggle at every instance of “The Scary Door” on Futurama.
posted by Jen on 10-11-2009 at 11:07 pm
I wouldn’t criticise CBS conceptually in their use of music for the theme song. Production music libraries provide much of the music heard on television including memorable themes, and editing them up to provide the right effect at the right time is common too.
In the case of “traditional” music libraries, the composer is paid a royalty every time the music is used – typically in a 50/50 split with the library – and composers can make quite a good living if something they wrote for a library becomes the theme of a TV series.
Whether, of course, the CBS music library paid royalties to Marius Constant is another matter – but in principle, using production library music for TV themes is not only common: it’s a good idea too, as you can choose from an enormous collection of pieces at affordable prices.
posted by Richard E on 10-12-2009 at 4:32 am
I loved Rod’s take on McCarthyism and the Red Scare (for example: The Monsters are Due on Maple Street).
There was an episode about an old woman being attacked by these small alien-looking things with the big reveal at end.
posted by ThunderMonkey on 10-12-2009 at 12:57 pm
“THE Burgess Meredith episode”???
He was in four of them!
#8 – Time Enough At Last (mentioned)
#55 – Mr. Dingle, The Strong
#65 – The obsolete Man
#111 – Printer’s Devil
Admittedly, most people can recall the “Time Enough At Last” episode over the others.
posted by Sorcerer Mickey on 10-12-2009 at 5:53 pm
There are some amazing episodes of Twilight Zone out there, for every great one, there are too many boring ones. How many different episodes deal with someone who is dead and either doesn’t realize it yet or does realize it and spends the whole time regretting things? Too many, I say.
posted by Josh Yeary on 10-12-2009 at 8:18 pm
No one mentioned the episode where a brother and sister who had mean step parents dove into their swimming pool and came out of a pond where a kindly old lady lived who took care of lots of runaway kids. I was that age at the time I saw it so it realy hit home then.
posted by Bo Jangles on 10-13-2009 at 2:33 pm
i love the episode where a gangster is killed off-scene and then a bum prys his shoes off and wears them and basically “becomes” the dead man..his mannerisms, etc..he even goes to the dead guys’ apartmen, kisses his girl, and goes and tries to “avenge” his death..the bum gets shot and then the shoes go on to someone else..everytime the shoes are on a nifty theme song plays..great episode!
posted by liz on 10-13-2009 at 7:11 pm
“It’s a Good Life” is a short story by Jerome Bixby, written in 1953. In 1970 it was voted by the Science Fiction Writers of America as one of the 20 finest science fiction stories ever written.
posted by Totoche on 10-14-2009 at 2:18 pm
ouch – previous comment doesn’t show attribution, sorry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It%27s_a_Good_Life
posted by Totoche on 10-14-2009 at 2:19 pm
A little late to the party, but I didn’t see it mentioned yet, so I wanted to point out the ep, “Nervous Man in a $4 Room” – just brilliantly done.
I almost always loved the episodes written by Rod Serling more than the others – though Charles Beaumont had a few great ones as well!
posted by ViciousJ on 10-19-2009 at 12:05 pm
\Next Stop Willoughby\
\Walking Distance\ (LOVE Gig Young)
\The Obselete Man\
posted by Laneschica on 10-20-2009 at 8:29 pm
What’s the one with the gentleman’s club, where one of the older members makes a bet with a loud mouth that with net him a million if he can go a year of monitoring with out saying a word?
Great twist ending.
posted by Greg VA on 10-20-2009 at 11:27 pm
I always loved the Night of the Meek. Every year at Christmas I watch and get all misty eyed.
The two others that I love are the one with the Four characters in the round cylinder, the Clown, the Piper, The Pilot and the Ballerina (absolutely creepy and claustrophobic). And also, the one which not many people have mentioned, the episode with the old woman in the log cabin who is being tormented/attacked by the small robotic looking space aliens. There’s only about two sentences worth of dialog in the episode and they are uttered at the very end. Probably one of the most compelling and well filmed Twilight Zone episodes.
posted by Jonathon on 10-23-2009 at 2:02 pm
Some of my favorites: The Invaders, The Night of the Meek, & The Midnight Sun
Some that scare the tofu out of me:
The Hitchhiker, Mirror Image, Nightmare as a Child, The After Hours (mannequins – ack!), Twenty Two and The New Exhibit with Martin Balsma, which keep me awake for a few nights afterward.
posted by vegebrarian on 10-24-2009 at 5:17 pm
I’m not sure if anyone mentioned this and I missed it, but can anyone tell me where I can find, or if I’m off my rocker, a TZ episode in black and white that is the “original” version of the 80’s Button Button? I can still remember it, but was it a TZ or something else? And, if you know of it, do you know where I can find it? This has been driving me crazy for years! Thanks!
posted by kebells on 10-25-2009 at 9:09 pm
I have so many favorites, many of which have been listed already. But to add one which I haven’t seen posted already (in my albeit quick scan) would be Night Call.
…
An elderly, wheelchair-bound lady named Elva Keene receives strange anonymous phone calls. At first the caller says nothing, and all that can be heard is static. In subsequent calls, he can be heard moaning. After several calls, Elva says repeatedly, \Hello? Hello?\ The caller finally says slowly, garbled, and weakly, \Hello?\. Elva demands to know who is calling, but the only response is \Hello?\ Finally the caller manages to get out the words, \Where are you? I want to talk to you.\
Elva has had enough and screams at the man to leave her alone. There are no more calls and the phone company traces the source to a fallen telephone line.
Elva and her housekeeper visit the location of the line given by the telephone operator. To the astonishment of both, they find themselves at a cemetery, and they find that the line is resting on the grave of Elva’s long-deceased fiancé, Brian Douglas. Elva says that she always insisted upon having her own way, and Brian always did what she said. A week before they were to be married, she insisted upon driving, and lost control of the car. The accident left Brian dead, and she, a lonely cripple. Now she can talk to him again, she won’t have to be alone.
At home, she picks up the phone and calls out to Brian. She pleads with him to answer so that she can talk to him. He replies that she has told him to leave her alone, and that he always does what she says. Then the line goes dead, leaving Elva alone and crying in her bed
posted by Mark on 10-30-2009 at 3:38 pm
which episode is the saying….
room for one more honey?
posted by Isabella on 10-31-2009 at 12:35 pm
Isabella,
That episode was called “Twenty-Two” and involved a woman with a recurring nightmare.
posted by Mother Chat on 11-2-2009 at 10:12 am