This week’s assemblage of episodes includes:
"Eye of the Beholder"
"Time Enough at Last"
"Nightmare at 20,000 Feet"
"Number Twelve Looks Just Like You"
"Escape Clause"
"Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?"
"The Midnight Sun"
"To Serve Man"
"The Four of us are Dying"
The focal features will be To Serve Man, Eye of the Beholder, and Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up? The honorable mention is Number Twelve Looks Just like You.
Picture of a man dressed sharply in a suit. There is a cadence to his voice, a lilt, all but lost to the movement of space-time. Disappeared from modern speech, and with it, the strangeness of the stories he had to tell. His name: Rod Serling. His calm, prophetic narration signals the beginning of the close. In a moment he will step out of the frame, and the nightmare will begin. To put it plainly, you’ve just crossed over into the Twilight Zone.
Now to those who have made this perilous trip before, I offer you a warm welcome back. To those braving the fifth dimension for the first time, I invite you to investigate week one and two’s destinations. The common link these television episodes share is that they come from The Twilight Zone. As I most likely don’t need to introduce, this television series is an anthology series that originally ran for five seasons of varying episode length and style, although there are themed attractions, rebooted versions of the series, and feature film, a TV movie, and more based upon or inspired by the original work. Most notably of these derivative works is this year’s reboot hosted by Jordan Peele.
First airing in 1959, The Twilight Zone used the science fiction and fantasy nature of the show to sneak social commentary past the censors that otherwise blocked social commentary in more “serious” pieces. While Serling himself wrote most of the series, that which was not written by him was written by the likes of science fiction greats including Ray Bradbury and Richard Matheson. The original series spanned five seasons and spawned so many iconic moments in popular culture that to not include the series would be an insult.
In selecting which episodes to recommend, I tried to blend episodes that are popular or critically acclaimed with episodes that I personally enjoyed. The unfortunate truth is that, living in a world 60 years after the series debuted, many of the more famous episodes have been spoiled to the point where they lose their impact. As critical as they are, it is important to recognize that the messages operate to a certain extent on the reaction they provoke in their audience. Whether or not you find them as relevant is something I cannot predict.
To commence, “To Serve Man” is the twenty-fourth episode of the third season, which happens to be the first season with the iconic background music and introductory graphics that most people envision when they think of The Twilight Zone. This also happens to be one of the few episodes (if not the only) in which the protagonist directly addresses the audience. Based on the story “To Serve Man” by Damon Knight, this episode was listed by Time as one of the top 10 'Twilight Zone' episodes in 2009.
The storyline itself follows the arrival of a Kanamit: nine-foot tall aliens who speak solely through telepathy and have come to Earth to solve all of our problems for free. It is stated that “as a race we are unaccustomed to charity. Brutality is a far more universal language to us than an expression of friendship,” and that becomes apparent through society’s initial reactions to the Kanamits. The Kanamit submits to various tests, including a lie detector, to prove his innocence. In the midst of the consequences of war and colonization in Berlin, Indochina, and Algeria, the world is ready for a savior. People are excited when they are given a chance to visit the Kanamits’ home planet as well, but one lone team of cryptographers (Michael Chambers, portrayed by Lloyd Bochner, and Patty, played by Susan Cummings) continues to attempt to decipher the strange book the Kanamit leaves with them. They find out what it means, for better or for worse.
This episode comments on colonization on many levels, especially through its extended focus on communication among UN delegates and the way in which it highlights relevant global context. Rod Serling even addresses the Kanamit as “a Christopher Columbus from another galaxy and another time,” calling to mind another infamous era of colonization and framing the eventual fate of the protagonist. This social commentary is cleverly concealed – well, as much as a social commentary can be concealed and still viable – by the fourth-wall breaking and a certain famed exclamation made by Patty which quite ruins the effect of it all if I include it here. “To Serve Man” has rightfully earned its spot in science fiction history. Now, it is time to cross the threshold into the next nightmare.
The sixth episode of season two, “Eye of the Beholder” has an electric opening with a strange, obscure premise – or at least, it would be, were it not one of the most popular and most referenced episodes I can think of. The clever way in which all the faces are obscured heightens the mystery. In fact, Rod Serling’s face is the first we see. He delivers a relatively standard opening monologue. Janet Tyler (Maxine Stuart) fears never living a normal life due to her facial disfigurement, and the State is unsure of what to do to fix her face – plastic surgery isn’t an option, and she hasn’t responded to any of her ten other treatments. This eleventh treatment is her last chance to fit into society before the State is forced to turn to other options. Her doctor tries to reassure her by telling her that she will merely have to move to an area where “people of her kind have been congregated,” which she calls “a ghetto designed for freaks.” Everyone is afforded a chance to become normal by the State because to be different (ugly) is a crime. The hospital staff speaks of hope and miracles, and everyone worries about others destroying themselves over it. Interestingly, even though the doctor questions why this is the situation, he refrains from being too vocal about his disease.
The commentary in this episode is very much on the surface. It drives the tension, through the suspense and length of time required to remove Tyler’s bandages and the way in which Tyler requests extermination rather than to be ugly because she, too, has been indoctrinated. This operates similarly yet oppositely of another excellent episode: “Number 12 Looks Just like You.” Whereas “Eye of the Beholder” operates under the idea of a singular norm and a singular people through physical ideals, ‘Number 12’ operates under the idea of being made to conform to a group identity both physically and mentally. Juxtaposing the two episodes lends itself to the contrast of operating on Tyler for her sake vs. operating on the protagonist of ‘Number 12’ for society’s sake. Either episode is positively electric.
Finally, “Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?”, episode twenty-eight of season two, has a simple premise not unlike that of “To Serve Man”: a UFO arrives. This UFO, however, crash lands in a lake, and its occupant disguises itself among a group of bus passengers trapped in a diner due to dangerous weather conditions. Out of six passengers comes seven. The officers investigating the UFO crash, the stranded passengers, the driver, and the diner’s owner are forced to unravel the mystery of who could be the alien with no evidence to go on. From the UFO, light tricks, an uncontrollable jukebox, and a strangely ringing telephone comes a mystery that seems unsolvable because it is unsolvable.
As one of the guests says, “We’re all going to get so panicky we pick up invisible clues.” This, of course, hearkens to McCarthyism and the Red Scare. The nature of the 7 passengers’ comments became frantic and nitpicky, not unlike what this episode is trying to criticize. As the episode continues, colonization is addressed vaguely, but as a function of fear and not necessarily a social commentary. Talk of “parlor tricks” and a twist to be expected of The Twilight Zone round out the episode nicely. While ‘Martian’ operates under a simple premise, the devolution of the situation is simultaneously predictable and enjoyably complex, making it the perfect way to spend a wayward half-hour.
And now you're here, at the bottom of the page, nearing the time where you must make a choice. There is no limit to what you can do from here on out. Take my advice, or don't take it. It won't always be so easy in the real world. But sometimes, it seems to be so here... in the Twilight Zone.
To those of you who made it, thank you for taking this journey with me. I would tell you about how to survive next week’s disaster, but that would break the first rule…
Indira Ramgolam is a freshman in Columbia College.