These are some of my faves. I guess I like the apocalyptic and time travel scenarios...
1. Nightmare at 20,000 Feet: Imagine being trapped in a tube at 20,000 feet with some creature determined to sabotage your flight. On top of this, no one believes your story. That is what makes this episode so effective. The claustrophobic environment, the helplessness, the knowledge that no one could help, and the monster itself. Having a young William Shatner, aka James T. Kirk, in the title role furthers the ambient fear.
2. Time Enough At Last: Burgess Meredith stars as a man that wants to be left alone with his books. He falls asleep in a bank vault as nuclear explosions signify the end of the world. Meredith awakens to find his dream has come true and then breaks his glasses.
3. Back There: Russell Johnson (the Professor from Gilligan’s Island) finds himself teleported back to the night Lincoln was shot. After some initial confusion, he desperately tries to alert the authorities and comes to the attention of John Wilkes Booth. In the end, Johnson can not change history on the macro level. However, he does manage to change the fortunes of a porter in his high society club after an encounter with the man’s ancestor. When he returns to 1961, the porter is now a rich club member.
4. The Dummy: Before Chucky, there was Willie. A ventriloquist (Cliff Robertson) believes his dummy (Willie) is alive and evil and locks it in a trunk. Why do wooden dummies scare people? Well, in the Twilight Zone, the evil Willie ends up switching places with the ventriloquist. The episode is made especially creepy by the mood lighting, shadows, and Willie’s cackling laughter.
5. The Howling Man: World War I devastated Europe. David Ellington (H.M. Bryant) is wandering through the postwar countryside and gets lost. He stops at a castle for help and collapses. The monks help Ellington who discovers they are holding a man captive. The man begs Ellington to help him escape, but Brother Jerome (John Carradine) warns that the captive is the Devil and if he is set loose, the world would suffer. Ellington does not believe Jerome and sets the Devil loose to launch World War II. Years later, Ellington tracks the Devil down and locks him up. It is his turn to warn his housekeeper to leave the man locked up, but she curiously removes the bar from the door.
6. The Midnight Sun: The world is ending. Earth is flinging itself toward the sun. Or is it? Just as it appears the world is going to be burned to a cinder, it appears that it is actually hurdling away from the sun. The Twilight Zone loved the apocalypse and this episode was prescient in that it predated the global cooling craze which was followed by the global warming craze.
7. The Masks: A dying millionaire makes his family wear masks to supposedly celebrate Mardi Gras. His real aim is to make them wear masks representing their horrid personalities. He forces them to keep the masks on until midnight or be disinherited. They acquiesce and when they remove them, they find that their faces have morphed into their masks.
8. The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms: Three national guardsmen from the present day end up in 1876 at the Little Big Horn. When their comrades search for the missing men, they find their names on a monument to the fallen.
9. A Stop at Willoughby: A poor, overworked, henpecked businessman wants to get away from the modern world. He sleeps on the train ride home from work and is transported to a pleasant turn of the century small town called Willoughby. The people are friendly and life is quiet. He longs for peace and rest. Eventually, he decides to stay in Willoughby rather than wake up. The townspeople embrace him and he goes off happily. His smiling body is found by the train conductor. The man jumped off the train in his sleep and was killed. Willoughby was the funeral home that took his body.
10. A Hundred Years Over the Rim: Another time travel episode…only this one has a happy ending! Cliff Robertson is a pioneer from 1847 and his son is sick with a high fever. So, he sets out searching for water and lands in the 1960s. While there, he procures the medicine that saves his son’s life. As a result of his time travel, the boy becomes a famous doctor.
1. Nightmare at 20,000 Feet: Imagine being trapped in a tube at 20,000 feet with some creature determined to sabotage your flight. On top of this, no one believes your story. That is what makes this episode so effective. The claustrophobic environment, the helplessness, the knowledge that no one could help, and the monster itself. Having a young William Shatner, aka James T. Kirk, in the title role furthers the ambient fear.
2. Time Enough At Last: Burgess Meredith stars as a man that wants to be left alone with his books. He falls asleep in a bank vault as nuclear explosions signify the end of the world. Meredith awakens to find his dream has come true and then breaks his glasses.
3. Back There: Russell Johnson (the Professor from Gilligan’s Island) finds himself teleported back to the night Lincoln was shot. After some initial confusion, he desperately tries to alert the authorities and comes to the attention of John Wilkes Booth. In the end, Johnson can not change history on the macro level. However, he does manage to change the fortunes of a porter in his high society club after an encounter with the man’s ancestor. When he returns to 1961, the porter is now a rich club member.
4. The Dummy: Before Chucky, there was Willie. A ventriloquist (Cliff Robertson) believes his dummy (Willie) is alive and evil and locks it in a trunk. Why do wooden dummies scare people? Well, in the Twilight Zone, the evil Willie ends up switching places with the ventriloquist. The episode is made especially creepy by the mood lighting, shadows, and Willie’s cackling laughter.
5. The Howling Man: World War I devastated Europe. David Ellington (H.M. Bryant) is wandering through the postwar countryside and gets lost. He stops at a castle for help and collapses. The monks help Ellington who discovers they are holding a man captive. The man begs Ellington to help him escape, but Brother Jerome (John Carradine) warns that the captive is the Devil and if he is set loose, the world would suffer. Ellington does not believe Jerome and sets the Devil loose to launch World War II. Years later, Ellington tracks the Devil down and locks him up. It is his turn to warn his housekeeper to leave the man locked up, but she curiously removes the bar from the door.
6. The Midnight Sun: The world is ending. Earth is flinging itself toward the sun. Or is it? Just as it appears the world is going to be burned to a cinder, it appears that it is actually hurdling away from the sun. The Twilight Zone loved the apocalypse and this episode was prescient in that it predated the global cooling craze which was followed by the global warming craze.
7. The Masks: A dying millionaire makes his family wear masks to supposedly celebrate Mardi Gras. His real aim is to make them wear masks representing their horrid personalities. He forces them to keep the masks on until midnight or be disinherited. They acquiesce and when they remove them, they find that their faces have morphed into their masks.
8. The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms: Three national guardsmen from the present day end up in 1876 at the Little Big Horn. When their comrades search for the missing men, they find their names on a monument to the fallen.
9. A Stop at Willoughby: A poor, overworked, henpecked businessman wants to get away from the modern world. He sleeps on the train ride home from work and is transported to a pleasant turn of the century small town called Willoughby. The people are friendly and life is quiet. He longs for peace and rest. Eventually, he decides to stay in Willoughby rather than wake up. The townspeople embrace him and he goes off happily. His smiling body is found by the train conductor. The man jumped off the train in his sleep and was killed. Willoughby was the funeral home that took his body.
10. A Hundred Years Over the Rim: Another time travel episode…only this one has a happy ending! Cliff Robertson is a pioneer from 1847 and his son is sick with a high fever. So, he sets out searching for water and lands in the 1960s. While there, he procures the medicine that saves his son’s life. As a result of his time travel, the boy becomes a famous doctor.
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