Monday, August 11, 2008

The Twilight Zone


The Twilight Zone is the greatest television show that has ever been or will ever be.  If one surpasses it I will be the first to tell everyone.  It's children "The X-Files" and "Lost" come somewhere near it's greatness but Twilight Zone is number 1 .   Creator Rod Serling was a one of a kind visionary, an undisputed genius and a true pioneer in the industry.   The show is so clever, so thought provoking..I'll give just one example in "The monsters are due on Maple Street"  A suburban town slowly devolves due to a power outage...everyone starts blaming everybody else as the person being at fault.  Eventually someone is murdered, and at the end two aliens who orchestrated the experiment say to each other, "You see the pattern is the same everywhere, you turn off their machines, what they rely on, this is the result"   This subject was explored in the show, along with time travel, perception of reality, human vices, aliens, the nature of man, post tramatic stress disorder in war, and fear of death was a huge theme as well.  

There were also classic lighthearted episodes where ordinary people are given extraordinary powers like reading peoples thoughts, or superhuman strength..anyways at the end of each episode, a twist was revealed, or a moral lesson was taught....like in the one where 4 thiefs steal bars of gold, and then fearing they couldn't fence the gold because it was too hot, they put themselves in suspended animation for 100 years, and when they wake up (in 2061)  they find themselves in a world where gold is worthless!!  Or who could forget the classic where burgess merideth wants to spend his entire life reading but his wife dominates him and never lets him....there is a nuclear holocaust, only he survives...he has all the time in the world to read...but then his glasses fall off and break!!!

What are your favorite episodes?


2 comments:

Sailing Vessel Serenity NOW said...

The episode where the 3 atronauts come back from flight and can't remember anything. I think they start disappearing one by one. Longgggggggggggggg time ago and I don't remember the name but that one stands out. Also I can still hear that eerie music at the end of each program. GREAT program and brilliant mind. love ya, Susan

Brett said...

Classic episodes:

On par with Henry Beamer's broken glasses is the astronaut who leaves suspended animation for forty years in a space capsule so that he will be the same age as his beloved when he returns only to find out she entered into suspended animation and is forty years his junior and can't be with him and that with newer technology they had already been to his destination and back while he was sitting awake, isolated for 40 years. Classic.

Episodes that still give me chills: The Hitchhiker ('I believe your going my way...') and the lesser known Spur of the Moment - where a young gal on a white horse is chased by a demented mad woman on a black horse screaming her name. Only to find out ten years later it was her warning herself not to marry the jerk she was with.

Great shows! Good post Gar.