Twilight Tales from the Outer Limits of the Darkside

[Trollheart]

If there's one thing I really enjoy it's a good anthology show. Series like The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, Tales from the Crypt, Black Mirror, Monsters... can't get enough of them. But some are without question better than others, and almost every one of these series has its bad episodes. So which is better? Which is the best? Well, there's really only one way to find out, isn't there?

So I've undertaken to watch selected episodes from, so far, twenty different anthology series and compare them against each other. Series range from science fiction, speculative fiction and fantasy to horror, and everything in between. Some of them I had never even heard about, never mind seen, before I began doing this. Over the course of the project so far I've come across some absolute gems whose existence I was entirely unaware of, as well as some with so many turkeys they could probably supply the whole eastern seaboard for Thanksgiving.

Episodes are taken at random, using a random number generator, so even the series seen as being the best - the likes of your Twilight Zones, Outer Limits, Black Mirrors etc - may stumble at times if I happen to select a bad episode. This will make it fairer and more equitable, as otherwise I could just go straight to the best episodes of each that I know will score high, and tip the balance unfairly in their favour.

The format? Glad you asked. Oh, you didn't ask? Well I'm going to tell  you anyway.

There will be three separate section, with the third one broken into two parts. Why you ask? Wait till I tell you, I answer. Don't be so impatient. Section one is called "The Classics", for obvious reasons, and will feature the shows I, and probably you, know best; the ones already established in this era and the ones that I can, hopefully, reasonably expect to reward me the most with more good than bad episodes.

Section 2 is called "Ye Lesser Mortals " (shut up) and features shows I know of, or have seen the odd episode of, which have been running for some time and can be seen in one way to be nearly the descendants of the classics. Sort of.

Section 3 is "New Kids on the Block" and covers all the other shows, mostly the newer ones, ones which only began in the twenty-first century. Because I have more shows of this type than in the other sections, I've split this into two separate parts, as I mentioned above (see? I told you I'd explain it if you just waited).

Each section will feature fairly detailed synopses of an episode from each show, with my own comments and a rating. At the end of the round the shows will be ranked and then fit into a chart, which will show which of the series impresses me the most, which is at the top, and over the course of a few rounds it will be interesting to see if the positions are maintained or not.

Comment as usual is invited, but not that much expected. At worst, it should hopefully provide an entertaining read, and might bring back memories of certain shows to some of you. For others, it may encourage you to try out some of the shows here, and for still others, give you a reason to roll your eyes and stick on your headphones and shake your head in a "he's at it again, for the love of all that's holy, when will he stop?" kind of way. Spoiler: answer is - never.

Okay then, I can't resist using an obvious pun so
Let's get this show on the road.

[Trollheart]

"Doo-doo-doo-doo Doo-doo-doo-doo" etc...

ROUND ONE, SECTION I: THE CLASSICS


Title: "Shades of Guilt"
Series: The Twilight Zone
Season: 1 (Second reboot)
Year: 2002
Writer(s): Ira Steven Behr

Storyline: A man who refuses to help a black man who is being pursued by attackers at night, and drives off and leaves him to his fate awakes the next morning with unexplained pain, manifesting itself in cuts and bruises on his body. He then sees in the newspaper (it's like a printed, solid form of the internet kids: work it out) that the man he left to be beaten up was in fact beaten to death. He's now wracked with guilt, literally. The pains continue and get worse, but now he starts to exhibit a more frightening outward sign: his skin is darkening, and he's becoming a black man. Not only that: THE black man, the same one he left to die. Oh, you can see it already can't you? I bet some of his last words are "I'm not black! Don't kill me!" or something along those lines. But let's not get ahead of ourselves here. His wife doesn't recognise him (duh) and his dog attacks him and as he runs out of his house his neighbour, who of course does not recognise him either, shoots at him, as you Americans do.

The cops are soon after him, and old Matt McGreevy begins to find out what life as a black person is like. Taxis won't stop, his credit card is no good, people look suspiciously at him. He has the perhaps not entirely brilliant idea of going to the house of the dead man, John Woodrell,  and looking as he does his, or rather, Woodrell's brother can't believe it's not him. He asks to speak to his, that is, Woodrell's wife, hoping that if she can understand, if she can forgive him, he may change back. The brother is dubious, also disgusted when McGreevy says that if he had known John Woodrell was a college professor he would have helped. As if that somehow makes a difference. But she can see through him. He's not sorry, only desperate to be changed back. She asks him the most pertinent and damning question she can, and the only one that matters: if her husband had been a white guy, would he have helped him? McGreevy's silence is her answer and she turns away.

The end scene then plays out as you might expect. Wandering, friendless and persistently and knowingly black, he's jumped by some white guys who kick the shit out of him, and when a white motorist happens upon them and he asks for help yadda yadda yadda. The ending writes itself. Oh no wait it doesn't. My mistake. What happens is that the scene resets. He's in Woodrell's body, but kind of not, as it's him in the car and this time he drives off but then changes his mind and comes back, saving Woodrell. And thereby himself. Okay, not that bad really if a little confusing.


Comments: All right, not quite what I had expected but I do have questions. One, what was John Woodrell doing out in the rain, walking so close to his own house if he knows, as he must, that the area is so bad? And how are the Woodrells able to live in such an obviously whites-only area? He doesn't run far, so it's not like he's miles away when he's attacked.

Second, at what point does the bodyswap reverse, as it were? When Woodrell is attacked by the skinheads, his demeanour is more McGreevy's to me - okay he doesn't say "I'm white", so I was wrong there but he doesn't act like he expects to be attacked. So when does time reset? Hard to suss it. I thought this was another white guy stopping for him, then realised it was McGreevy himself, but how can he be in two...

All right, my head hurts. I would have preferred to have seen him stuck as a black man and having to learn to live with that, see the world through other eyes. But the writer took the easy way out and gave us a happy ending. Meh. By now, walk in my shoes, see the world through my eyes, get a new perspective stories have been done to death, and while this has a certain charm it's nothing new at all. I guess it got its message of "we're all brothers under the skin" over tolerably well, though the writer does kind of bash you over the head with it. I thought it might have been more effective had the white guy not realised he was black, till he saw himself in the car mirror as he pleaded with another white guy to save him. Meh. Meh I say!

Rating: A -


Note: where I can get them I'll post videos of the episodes.

No, no need to thank me, honestly. Cash will do.

[Guybrush]

There are so many anthology shows now that I'm vaguely interested in, but have not seen, so I'll keep a watch on this. Because every episode is its own story, I see no need to be a completionist when it comes to these kinda shows. Might as well see the best and forget the rest, if such a thing is possible to figure out.

I'll admit as I read the above post, I kind of averted my eyes when it came to plot details because if I'm gonna watch something, I don't want spoilers beforehand. Maybe you can consider using the [spoiler][/spoiler] tags to accommodate the spoiler-sensitive.

By the way, you've seen Monsters? I have seen some of that show too, but I think we're probably in a very small minority

[Trollheart]

I can't really do spoilers. It won't work with this. I'll be commenting on each episode, linking back occasionally, and then talking about them again when I get to do the ratings and the chart. If I spoilered everything that gave things away I'd have far too many spoilers, and people who either had seen or hadn't intentions of watching the episodes would get pissed off clicking "show" tags. Best I can say is if you can see from the show/title that you haven't watched it, and intend to, just don't read any further.

I'm sorry I can't be more accommodating, but this is how it is with all my TV writeups: I always give the whole deal, and warn beforehand not to read if it's going to spoil it for you. Most of these shows are decades old anyway, so spoilering them is not really what I would call necessary. Anyway it would be too much work and look shitty so sorry I just can't do it.

As for Monsters, yeah, great show, one of the better horror(ish) anthology shows I've seen in a long time. Kind of went under the radar; as you say, not many people know about it, and even looking for it on Google or Wiki throws you to Monsters Inc., which is annoying but not surprising.

[Trollheart]

There is nothing wrong with your television. Do not attempt to adjust it. We are in control - what? We're not in control? Form 1775A? What form 1775A? Listen mate, I'm a fucking Controller, right? I don't have time for your bureaucratic red tape and bloody forms - what? Until I fill in the appropriate form I am not authorised to take control of anyone's television? Since when? Now just you look here a - hello? HEL-LO?


Anyway...


Title: "Beyond the Veil"
Series: The Outer Limits
Season: 2 (Reboot)
Year: 1996
Writer(s): Chris Brancato

Storyline: Eddie Wexler has had enough of being abducted by aliens, so he decides to end it all, but is rescued by paramedics when he makes a 911 call. Taken to a psychiatric facility, the only one set up to deal specifically and solely with alien abductees, he meets another man there, who is called Quasgo and tells him that he too has been regularly abducted. He says there is a "traitor" in the place, an alien in human guise. Eddie becomes friendly with another abductee, a girl called Courtney. Eddie begins therapy; he's told by the doctor in charge, Sherrick, that he will experience "hallucinations", and he starts seeing aliens conducting experiments on him. But are these just hallucinations, or is something more sinister going on?

Well, it's The Outer Limits: of course something more sinister is going on!

Dr. Sherrick is very brusque and unfeeling, seems to be pushing everyone and when he pushes Courtney Eddie stands up for her. Suddenly he sees the doctor as an alien. Nobody else seems to, though, and he's quickly sedated. (Let me just throw my hat into the ring here: they're ALL aliens, and he's on a spaceship, maybe the last human left alive? Meh, probably wrong but there's my guess. Or maybe he's an alien and they're trying to deprogam him?)

Anyway Courtney visits him and gives him a piece of paper she has taken from Sherrick's office, which seems to have alien writing on it. Quasgo tells him he's not mad, despite what Sherrick says; there are aliens here, and they must expose them. Eddie decides to escape and take Courtney with him, but when they go to find Quasgo he seems to have killed himself. When Courtney is prevented from leaving due to the hold Sherrick has on her through her family, she ends up being killed in one of the sessions, and Eddie, furious, desperate and bereft, kills Sherrick, throwing him down a flight of stairs.

Then it turns out it wasn't Sherrick who was the alien, but some other doctor guy who hasn't featured in the programme in any way so far, and Eddie ends up in a loony bin. Jesus Christ.



Comments: Fucking awful. I thought I had it worked out (as I said above) but man was I wrong. The ending was terrible; a guy who hasn't featured in the episode up to now is suddenly unmasked at the end, like a character shoe-horned in at the last minute in a bad mystery novel, and he's the alien. What the actual blue jumping fuck was that about? How Chris Brancato, who wrote and created Narcos, Godfather of Harlem and First Wave could pen this drivel is beyond me. The cinematography was great, the atmosphere evoked, the tension built up but in the end it all fizzled into less than a damp squib and left me feeling completely betrayed and pissed off that I wasted my time watching this. I could have written four better endings, and in fact now I have an idea for a story based around a similar theme.

Rating: C (if I could do a C- I would, but I don't do those. This was a turd).

[Trollheart]

WARNING! If you watch this one there is a lot of sexual content and literally full frontal nudity in it. Be warned. Or, you know, not.



Title: "On a Deadman's Chest"
Series: Tales from the Crypt
Season: 4
Year: 1992
Writer(s): Larry Wilson

Storyline: Danny, the cocksure frontman of rock band Exorcist hates the fact that his bandmate, Nick, has got married, and wants the new wife out. His groupie girlfriend shows him her snake tattoo, which appears to be alive, as it sticks out a tongue at him (don't ask me from where; use your imagination or watch it) and tells him the guy who did it is a "magician". She's going to introduce him to Danny, and takes him to a strange backstreet tattoo parlour on the wrong side of the tracks. The girl leaves him and Danny enters the place alone, but can't find anyone until a big guy appears. He sneers at Danny when he says he wants a tiger; the tattoo artist says everyone's skin has a story to tell, and his talent is to bring it out onto the surface.

Danny isn't best pleased though when the tattoo is finished, as it depicts Scarlet, the new wife of his bandmate, and some sort of dragon thing. He storms out, furious and aghast. The tattoo guy watches him as he departs, refusing to hand over his money. He smiles "You'll pay later." On his return, Danny argues with Scarlet and then with his groupie girlfriend (I think she may be called Vendetta? Not sure), accusing her of setting him up with the tattoo artist, though she swears she had nothing to do with it. She then helps him get it removed, but it comes back, and seems to come to life.

Vendetta (let's just call her that for handiness' sake, okay?) tells him ominously that if he gets rid of Scarlet for real the tattoo may vanish, and as she has already intimated to him that Nick, the guitarist and the real force behind Exorcist, is thinking of going solo, he gets even more angry at her, while at the same time trying to patch things up with Nick. Then he goes and brutally murders Scarlet. Later, he seems to see the tattoo bleeding, reflecting Scarlet's bleeding face as he killed her, then on stage it seems to be swelling, rising within his chest as if something is trying to get out...

... and then a dragon bursts, Alien-like, out of his chest. Well of course it does. Except maybe it's in Danny's mind, because when Nick, having heard that his wife has been murdered by the singer, bursts into his room, Danny has carved out the piece of skin that had Scarlet's face on it and is holding it in his hand, with a big gaping hole in his chest. Right. Always said tattoos were a bad idea.

Comments: Pretty stupid really. I mean, yes, at the end it's left up to you as to whether all the pulsing, changing and eventually the emergence of the dragon was in Danny's mind or whether it actually happens, though given that there's no corpse of a dragon in the room one would assume the former. It's a pretty poor stereotypical look at a rock  band, with Danny on the edge really from minute one and just plunging further down the rabbit hole into madness, and there's no reason given for why Vendetta hates Scarlet and encourages Danny to kill her, other than that she just hates her. Poor writing, and a very stupid ending.

And here was me, thinking it was going to be about pirates...

Rating: B-