BS: The Twilight Zone

Subject: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Wesley S
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 03:55 PM

I don't know about you – but when I was a child one of the best things about Friday nights was a chance to stay up late in a darkened room and watch Rod Serlings Twilight Zone. From the first notes of the creepy opening music I was hooked. You never knew what you were going to get. Sometimes thought provoking, sometimes funny, and sometimes it would just plain scare the pants off of you.

I just got some of the old episodes on DVD and I'm impressed how well this series has help up over the years. The special effects were never great – sometimes they were downright silly – but the stories were the real attraction. And it's interesting to see just how many unknown actors from that time went on to become household names.

It seems like over the years TV tried to duplicate the magic from this show. But as far as I was concerned most other attempts fell flat. The Outer Limits had a few good episodes, but Night Gallery was a big waste of time. You may disagree.

It's great that these old shows are still available.

For your consideration – you have stepped over into … The Twilight Zone.

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Sorcha
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 04:00 PM

It's on reruns....can't remember which channel

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Sorcha
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 04:02 PM

Sci Fi channel http://www.scifi.com/twilightzone/

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 04:11 PM

And of course that actor who shall remain nameless for fear of reprisals (but his initials are WS) was in the one with the gremlin. Not sure which one overacted the most...

:D (tG)

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 04:13 PM

I WISH there was still a channel here that ran TZ late at night.... There was nothing I loved more than coming home from a gig to a late night snack and good short sci-fi stories

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: bobad
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 04:15 PM

One of the neat things about it was seeing future "stars" in bit parts.

"The series featured such soon-to-be-famous actors as Robert Redford, William Shatner, Burt Reynolds, Robert Duvall, Dennis Hopper, Carol Burnett, James Coburn, Charles Bronson, Lee Marvin, Peter Falk and Bill Mumy, as well as such established stars as silent-film giant Buster Keaton, Art Carney, Mickey Rooney, Ida Lupino and John Carradine."

From: http://www.scifi.com/twilightzone/

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: GUEST,maryrrf
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 04:44 PM

I was also a fan of The Twilight Zone. I watched it when I was a kid and still remember many of the stories. Yes, the special effects weren't very good and were probably done on the cheap, but sometimes I think nowadays the special effects are so overwhelming that they detract from the story. I haven't seen any reruns in a long time but will be on the lookout.

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: skipy
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 04:46 PM

ox12 0bp
Skipy

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Sorcha
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 04:47 PM

CH, you can't get SciFi channel up there? Odd....

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Bill Hahn//\\
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 05:11 PM

True---stories were great, some acting just so-so and some just wonderful. But, to me, the best thing was that most of the stories made a point about society, life, and other such things.

    I recall one of the best ones for myself was w/. Burgess Meredith as the last man on earth and he loved books---as he walked up the steps at the end to the library he crushed his very strong eyeglasses.   

      Also, Fritz Weaver in a wonderful episode about leaving home w/ friends on a space ship to a planet just like his--that can sustain life---because an H Bomb was going to drop shortly. It has a most wonderful twist ending and I won't reveal it here since, perhaps, some of you have not seen it.   

       The roster of new actors and old-timers is impressive. My only complaint w/ the reruns on Sci Fi is that they compress the credits at the end so they are unreadable---one episode I am sure started the wonder Viennese actor Joseph Schildkraut.

         Would that we had TV like this now.

Bill Hahn

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 05:12 PM

Not your American Sci-fi Channel... well, not without satellite TV...

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Wesley S
Date: 02 Aug 06 - 05:21 PM

Bill - That's one of the things I like about the DVD's I just got - extensive credits and no commercials.

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Big Jim from Jackson
Date: 03 Aug 06 - 10:13 AM

A favorite episode for me was the one staring Agnes Moorhead. There wasn't a single word of spoken dialog in the whole show, but there was a great twist at the end!

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Skivee
Date: 03 Aug 06 - 12:54 PM

***PEDANT ALERT***
JIm, it was among the best episodes, but there was dialog at the end.
It wasn't from Ms. Morehead, but from the dying invaders.

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 03 Aug 06 - 03:06 PM

Also the episode "To Serve Man" with the aliens transporting humans to their planet in absolute luxury...


CHEERS
Nigel

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: pdq
Date: 04 Aug 06 - 11:03 AM

Actor and occasional folksinger Theodore Bickel did an episode of Twilight Zone. It is called "Four O'clock" and was presented first in 1962. It is about bigotry, but seems to prefer the 'blunt instrument approach' rather than intelligent persuasion. Bickel is allowed to show-off his acting skills, which he does. Overly, in the opinion of some.

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: RangerSteve
Date: 04 Aug 06 - 11:48 AM

Andy Devine played a guy who told tall tales about his war exploits, in which I practically won WWII single-handed. All the towns people like to listen to him, but they all know he's full of it. He gets kidnapped by aliens who need someone to lead their army in an interplanetary war they're involved in (and losing). He tries to convince them that he was lying all along but they don't believe him.He tries to relax by playing his harmonica, and the sound drives the aliens crazy. They realize they have no defense against his "Death device" and let him go. He goes back to town and, for once, has a true story, but, of course, no one believes him.

As a harmonica play, myself, I consider this to be one of the best episodes, ever.

Steve

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Wesley S
Date: 04 Aug 06 - 12:12 PM

Do you remember the title of that one Steve?

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Les from Hull
Date: 04 Aug 06 - 12:37 PM

Interesting site

It shows what an impact this show had that people can do the 'do-do-do-do do-do-do-do' bit of the theme tune to show that something weird is happening and people understand. People who have never seen the show. People who are far to young to have ever heard about the show.

The UK snackfood 'Twiglets' used this to advertise their product with the slogan 'The Twiglet Zone'. And I'll tell you what's really strange - Twiglets are flavoured with...



MARMITE!

(goes off making do-do-do-do do-do-do-do noises)

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: 282RA
Date: 04 Aug 06 - 07:58 PM

I always loved the one with Anne Francis as the woman who goes to this department store to get a gold thimble for her mother and ends up getting trapped inside for the whole night. I guess I shouldn't spoil it for you ETs and Matto Grasso Indians who've never seen it but that one always spooked me since I was a kid.

I also love the one about the guy that lived in NYC but had the curse of an African tribal chief put on him and his wife believes in it and he thinks she's going crazy. Excellent ending on that one!

I also like the one with Cliff Robertson and Charles Aidman where the three astronauts return to earth from this mission and vanish literally without a trace. There was no explanation for what happened but that's what makes it creepy.

Then there's the immortal ones like The Hitchhiker and The Monsters Are Coming to Maple Street and the first episode where Earl Holliman finds himself in a totally deserted town (although they changed the ending from the actual story and so eliminated the Twilight Zone aspect).

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Bill Hahn//\\
Date: 05 Aug 06 - 05:47 PM

The Thimble and Deptmt Store episode was a beauty---great ending and made a good point---as most episodes did--about selfishness and purposeful forgetfullness.

      The one w/ Joseph Shildkraut as part of an aging couple looking to purchase youth again---and how it ends is really a beauty. The acting--other than Shildkraut was so-so, but that was the case in many episodes, and yet they all, pretty much, worked.

       I have to say that one of the more annoying ones was Shatner and the gremlin on the wing aand the truly unrealistic one about the empty plane that is supposed to have landed without crew or passengers.

       But, hey, one or two clunkers in years of great and meaningful shows (circumventing political and network problems through metaphors) is pretty good.

Bill Hahn

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: robomatic
Date: 06 Aug 06 - 12:34 AM

One that caught my fancy (and I've told this one elsewhere in the forums) is a story of a WWI English fighter pilot who is running away from a dogfight in 1916, flies into a cloud to hide and comes out of it (we learn) in 1960 over an American base in the same place in England. He comes to a landing, his little biplane amidst modern jet traffic of the time, taxis to a stop among bewildered US airmen and delivers himself of classic English understatement:

"I had no idea you Yanks were so advanced!"

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: RangerSteve
Date: 06 Aug 06 - 08:20 AM

Wesley S - Sorry, I can't remember the title. I have a TWZ book upstairs somewhere, and if I get the time, I'll look it up.

Another clever one - the old guy who sells things out of a suitcase, always whatever a person needs at a certain time.

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 06 Aug 06 - 09:57 AM

This thread brings back almost as many memories as playing "Twilight Zone" pinball, Which I last saw at the Qawra Palace Hotel in Malta.

CHEERS

Nigel

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: GUEST,Wesley S
Date: 06 Aug 06 - 06:50 PM

Steve - thanks.

Another thing I liked about the show is just how little they showed you. They allowed your imagination to do a lot of the work that the special effects department wasn't capable of doing.

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Bill Hahn//\\
Date: 06 Aug 06 - 07:45 PM

Robomatic: and he got out of there just in time because his commander was arriving--and was now quite elderly and of high rank.

Great episode--as were most all!!!

Bill Hahn

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Peter Kasin
Date: 07 Aug 06 - 06:30 PM

It was my favorite TV show in the 60s. It's available on DVD..Check Amazon.com. The prices are very high, though, so also check used DVD sections in stores. The episodes with Serling's mark of good storytelling hold up well, but, as all TV shows go, it had a few duds, too, at least for my taste.

An episode with Dennis Weaver, "Shadow Play," originally aired in 1961, is a particularly good one. He is trapped in a recurring nightmare where he is going to be executed, and he is desperately trying to convince everyone that it's a dream, and that if he IS executed, they will all disappear, too.

Shatner was in at least three episodes. Anyone seen the one about the fortune telling machine?

Some of the episodes don't hold up as well as others, but that's to be expected. They didn't all have the mark of Serling's great storytelling.

One of the great episodes was a French film that Serling aired on The Twilight Zone, though it wasn't produced for the show. Incident At Owl Creek Bridge, from the Ambrose Bierce story., about a U.S. Civil War soldier about to be hanged (for desertion?). Anyone remember that?

Chanteyranger

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: bobad
Date: 07 Aug 06 - 06:52 PM

"Shatner was in at least three episodes. Anyone seen the one about the fortune telling machine?"

You just triggered a memory about this episode, one which was deeply buried. I don't recall many details nor do I remember Shatner being in it but I do recall it being creepy and unsettling as were most episodes.

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Slag
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 01:56 AM

The Ventures had a hit with their rendition of the TW theme. I think it was on their first album. Does anyone remeber that WS played a US Army Air Corps major, a pilot of a B-17 in WWII in the series "12 o' Clock High"? I believe his stage name was Kirk but I might be wrong on that point, but if not it would explain his Star Dreck monicker!

Subject: RE: BS: The Twilight Zone
From: Wesley S
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 02:23 PM

I remember the 12 O'clock High TV series but if Shatner was in it I've blissfully forgotten.

I'm pretty sure I have that fortune telling machine episode in the collection I received. I'll check on it tonight.