Monthly Archives: February 2015

Alfred Hitchcock Presents – The Young One (S3E9)

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Janice is an 17-year-old girl who wants to be older, able to drink, and move out of her aunt’s house.  Her boyfriend Stan is a pretty conserv-ative guy her own age.  They are at a local roadhouse, The Wooly Bear, but only able to drink lemonade because they are too young.

Stan wants to leave, but she wants to dance, and spins her way alone across the dance-floor.  At the end, she gets a call for a round of applause from tough guy Tex sitting at the bar.  Janice goes to him, and Stan fights for his woman by walking out — the ultimate passive resistance.  Tex gives her a cigarette because they are both cool.

ahpyoungone30

This is the wild roadhouse Aunt Mae wants to keep her out of?

It takes about 2 minutes for Janice to ask Tex to take her out of this town and her humdrum life.  Tex knows trouble when he sees it and declines her offer.  Or maybe he is turned off by the huge fly that lands on her while they are talking (left shoulder, about 6:20 in).

The very forgiving sap Stan is waiting for her outside and walks her back to Aunt Mae’s house.  After an argument with her Aunt Mae, she goes back to the bar to see Tex.  A coppish friend of the family shoos her away and says he’ll check on her later at home, but when Tex leaves, he finds Janice waiting for him.

ahpyoungone15He walks her back to Aunt Mae’s house.  Really, the amount of walking in this episode would make my Fitbit explode.  They enter quietly with the lights off so as to not attract Aunt Mae’s attention.  Janice goes to get them some drinks and comes back with two milks.  WTH?

When they hear a police car pull up, Janice throws a glass of milk at Tex, rips her dress and runs outside screaming.  The cop naturally thinks Tex assaulted her.  Not only that, with the lights on, we can see Tex standing right beside Aunt Mae who has been pushed down the stairs and killed.  Doesn’t look good for Tex.

Janice makes up a story of Tex following her home, attacking her and killing Aunt Mae. Too bad for her, Stan strolls in and says he had stopped by the house while she was at the bar with Tex and saw Aunt Mae already dead.  A lot of guys might have called the police upon first finding the dead body.

ahpyoungone28A good story, but a so-so episode.

Post-Post:

  • AHP Deathwatch:  Carol Lynley (Janice) and Stephen Joyce (Stan) are still with us.
  • Carol Lynley aged very well, looking much sexier in The Poseiden Adventure than here.
  • A big point is made that Tex is much older than Janice, and the actor is 14 years older.  But even Stan is 11 years older than Janice, playing 18.  A little more effort in casting, please.
  • Directed by Robert Altman.

Night Gallery – The Miracle at Camafeo (S2E17)

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ngmiraclecamafeo10Hey, didn’t that murderer Harry Guardino just get the electric chair in Last Request?  When he died, like all bad people, he went south — but only as far as Camafeo, Mexico.  He is in a bar watching a line of Mexicans make their way to a local shrine in such a steady stream that it looks like they’re heading for the border.

When an American woman walks into the bar alone, he strikes up a conversation.  Even though she says she is married, he buys her a margarita and says he wants to tell her a story.  The story turns out to be about her husband Joe Melcor, and Guardino is really an insurance investigator named Rogan.

He tells her what she already knows — how Joe Melcor (later called Joe Morgoth) was sideswiped by a bus.  He was taken to a hospital, but no signs of injury were found. Never-the-less, Melcor claims to be paralyzed and sues the bus company.  After seeing him being wheeled into the courtroom everyday, the jury awards him $500,000.  Rogan is sure Melcor is faking it.

ngmiraclecamafeo19Mrs. Melcor goes back up to her room.  Naturally, Melcor is able to walk.  His wife is feeling guilty that the other people are going to the shrine to pray for a miracle, and they are going there to cheat, using the people’s faith as an alibi.

The next morning, Rogan walks to the shrine.  Along the way he helps a small blind boy, carrying him up the hill.  No one ever seems to go back down the hill; it is just a steady stream up to the shrine.  It should be packed like a soccer stadium, but there is only about a Home Depot parking lot’s worth of worshippers.  At the shrine, he sees Melcor carried inside on a stretcher.

ngmiraclecamafeo15Outside, the blind boy miraculously can see again.  Inside, Melcor decides he can safely end the charade and jumps up, pats the priest on the back and slips him a few dollars.

He struts out the door of the shrine and the sun seems very bright to him.  He puts on a pair of sunglasses but realizes that he has been stricken blind.  He takes the sunglasses off and the crowd gasps — despite them all being behind him.  He has the same cataracts over his eyes that the little boy had.  Pathetically, he stumbles about begging for help.

Good episode.  I liked that we thought Rogan was a jerk, but he turned out to be decent and respectful of the people.  Mrs. Melcor began as an accomplice, but saw the light (irony noted).  Joe Melcor was just a prick throughout — scamming the bus company, threatening to smack his wife around, exploiting the shrine to explain his recovery., and a lousy tipper  Also, not a great performance from him.  And that suit!

Maybe the irony or symmetry would have been more perfect if Melcor had truly become paralyzed after faking it.  The blindness was more theatrical, though and the kid was a nice counterpart in trading off the infirmity.

Post-Post:

  • Twilight Zone Legacy:  Rudolfo Hoyos was in The Mirror.
  • Mrs. Melcor was played by Julie Adams of Creature from the Black Lagoon.
  • Skipped Segment: The Ghost of Sorworth.  Meh.

Tales From the Crypt – Split Second (SE11)

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tftcsplitsecond02OK, you’ve got my attention.

The beautiful Liz Kelly (the beautiful Michelle Johnson) is waitressing at a honky-tonk bar that is far beneath her.  With her looks she should be working in a classy place . . . with a tuxedoed maître d.  Or stripper pole.

One of the local losers starts hitting on her and she just wants to get away.  He grabs her and says, “I bet if I got you drunk enough, I could have you out in my truck in no time.”

I love this line because he could have said “bashed your skull with a rock” instead of “got you drunk” and his conquest would have been just as noble.  And given her complete inability to resist, in his fantasy he doesn’t even opt for a hotel with clean sheets — the truck will do fine. Efficiently says it all about the character.  That, and his name is Banjo.

tftcsplitsecond12Luckily there is one gentleman in the bar.  Steve Dixon, owner of the local timber company, puts a pistol to Banjo’s neck and tells him to apologize to the lady.  Liz likes a man defending her and gives him a drink and a slow dance.  By the end of the night, he asks her to marry him and she accepts.  Being no looker, Dixon made sure to mention he was rich.  But I’m sure that had no impact on her decision.  At least no more than a few drinks or getting bashed in the skull would have.

The next day Dixon is in the bunkhouse talking to his men.  Liz shows up in a pair of Daisy Dukes and a halter, making him furious.  He is even more furious at the men ogling his wife.  He smacks down one of them for a misheard comment.

tftcsplitsecond29Liz quickly grows bored with life in the lumber camp, then a cute new worker named Ted starts.  He is not a fan of chainsaws, preferring to do it the old fashioned way with an axe.  As great as he is at it, it is still hugely inefficient, but they need someone for the upcoming lumberjack contest.  Liz sneaks down to the worksite and watches him chop the wood all sweaty and muscles a-rippling.

Liz wastes no time summoning the new guy up to the main house to move some boxes; one box in particular.  She just happens to be in the shower at the time.  When she tries to seduce him, he runs out in fear of Dixon.

Ted decides it is time to leave the camp, but Liz catches him in the bunkhouse and they start making out.  Dixon catches them and gives him a beating.  Then he whacks him several times in the head with an axe.  But to be fair, he used the side of the axe, so Ted kept his head.  Ted ended up alive but blind.

Apparently a beneficiary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, Ted is welcomed back to the crew of the lumber camp.  But you can’t have a blind guy swinging an axe — that’s just crazy.  So they give him a chainsaw.

tftcsplitsecond31Later that day, they have Ted chainsaw through a vertical log.  It has been hollowed out and Dixon is inside.  Once the blood starts spraying on his face, even Ted gets it.  He asks if there is another one, and it is revealed that Liz has also been put into a hollow tree like a Keebler MILF.

Another good episode.  Brion James was great, hamming it up in just the way this series requires.  Michelle Johnson was also great, although the cigarettes were a major turn-off.

Post-Post:

  • Michelle Johnson was last seen in First Anniversary, in another marriage to a below-average Joe.
  • The Mathesons must really love Michelle.  This episode was written by Richard Christian Matheson; First Anniversary was written by his sister, based on a short story by their father.
  • Title Analysis:  Another misfire — OK, splitting wood, and referring to Liz as sloppy seconds, I guess.  Better choices:  Something like Mourning Wood or Don’t Axe me Again.
  • I was sorry to see Brion James died in 1999.  He will always be the “nice” Cajun in Southern Comfort to me.

Outer Limits – The Heist (S2E14)

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olheist03A group of mercenaries hijack a truck expecting to find a cache of Stinger missiles inside.  Fortunately for them, The US Army ships these deadly weapons in UPS trucks with just a padlock on the back door, and takes routes that lead them down narrow deserted alleys.

When they open the door, they are surprised by a soldier firing at them, but are able to take him down pretty easily.  Then they are surprised that the truck was transporting a cryo unit and not missiles.  My first assumption was it was stone crabs for some general on the taxpayer dime, but a sharp eye will catch the letters EBE on the unit.

olheist04And you better have a sharp eye. When they first see the unit, it clearly says EBE. After they fire back at the soldier, it still says EBE in two separate shots.  But for some reason, the most important shot of the container just before the credits has the unit scarred by gunfire so the EBE is unreadable.  So they screwed up on the order of the shots, and then why would you obliterate the most important word which sets up the episode?

There is another soldier, Washington, hiding in the truck.  After she is subdued, one of the mercs fires at the container, breaking the seal.  When the gang threatens the soldier to get information, an alien shoots out of the crate and turns one of the men to ice.  For no apparent reason, the Major shoots the ice-man and he crumbles like Robert Patrick in T2.  The alien zips around the warehouse, and for reasons I can’t figure, the soldiers open fire on the crate again — the one place they know the alien ain’t.

olheist05They decide to abandon the warehouse, but find the door iced over.  The Major asks, “What the hell? Where’d this ice come from?” after he just saw an alien turn one of his crew into an ice-man.  Yeah, what a conundrum.

They search the warehouse for the alien and a way to escape.  That really is the next 20 minutes of the episode.  Think of how suspenseful it was when the crew of the Nostromo was searching for their alien.  This is nothing like that.

They aren’t given much to do, but a lot of the problem is the cast.  Colm Feore is terrible as the beret-wearing major (he would later go on to be terrible as the President’s husband (referred to gratingly as “the First Gentleman”) in a season of 24).  Where’s Michael Ironside when you need him?  Jasmine Guy is simply not believable as the soldier who is willing to be tortured with a welding torch to protect the alien.  There really is not one person to care about in this group.

olheist07There is just so much that makes no sense.  Washington sets the major’s sleeve on fire so the heat will draw the alien.  The major just waves his arm above his head rather than, say, taking off his flaming coat, or rolling on the ground.

Somehow the neon in a sign is able to kill the alien because it is “mostly made of helium.”  Not really sure what’s keeping it from floating away, then.

Washington and one of the mercs are able to force an icy door open to escape.  In the last shot, we hear a police dispatcher and see a frozen police officer.  Did Washington just leave the door open and not secure the building?  That can’t be right because the alien was already dead.  Did the officer earlier just stroll in the front door when the whole group could no find a way out of the building?  Why would the police have been called anyway?

A  disappointing episode.

Post-Post:

  • On the plus side, Colm Feore was excellent in Stephen King’s Storm of the Century.
  • Written, surprisingly, by Steven Barnes who also wrote the excellent Stitch in Time.
  • Also surprising, it was directed by Brad Turner who directed almost 2 days worth of 24.

Ray Bradbury Theater – The Long Years (S4E11)

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bradbury02The Hathaways are the last people on Mars because they missed the last ship back to Earth.  They were in the mountains on an archaeological dig.  When they returned a week later, Mars had been evacuated.

John Hathaway stares at the stars each night hoping to see a rocket ship streaking among the unmoving stars.

One night, he takes his regular walk up to a hill where there are three graves.  In a quick pan, we see only the name Tom Hathaway (1988 – 2007).  At this point, we don’t know Tom is his son.  He asks their forgiveness for what he did.  He reflects on 20 years spent waiting for another ship from Earth.

rbtlongyears04Returning to his house, he sees a light moving across the sky.  He calls the family out and tells them, “We’re going home!”  To be sure they are spotted, Hathaway is able to remotely switch on every light in nearby New New York City.  In the short story, he just burns the city down.

Hathaway and his son take a golf cart to meet the ship.  The crew is descending the ladder, and hey — it’s Captain Wilder from And the Moon Be Still as Bright!  Hathaway takes them home to meet the wife and kids who they had last seen 20 years ago. Wilder comments that Cora has not aged a bit in 20 years.  Maybe it is just the way she is styled, but unfortunately the actress playing Cora doesn’t really look that much younger than Hathaway.

rbtlongyears05One of the other crewman knew the kids and comments they they also appear exactly as they had 20 years earlier on Earth.  Son Tom evens says he is “twenty-one” in his only dialogue in the episode.  He is in several scenes, but just stands there looking a lot like Jim Carrey in Dumb and Dumber, never uttering another word.

But he is positively loquacious next to the female crew member who gets not a single line of dialogue.  She is even seen speaking in a couple of scenes, but in the background where we can’t hear her.

As Hathaway visits the graves again, Wilder joins him.  Hathaway explains that a virus killed his whole family in a week.  So he built robots to recreate his family.

When Wilder tells Hathaway that they can only take him back to Earth, not his family, he tries to explain it to them.  “What is goodbye?” asks his robot wife in the sci-fi trope where a non-human speaks perfectly throughout an episode, but then doesn’t know a key common word.  What if they had been humans, would there still only have been room for Hathaway?

rbtlongyears10While he is trying to explain “going away”, he ironically does the big “going away” as he has a heart attack and dies.  They bury Hathaway next to his real family, and the crew leave them on Mars.  The episode has a much better ending, a great ending — the robot family uses the same tools which created them to create another John Hathaway.

In the last scene, they are all sitting at the dinner table and Cora has made John’s favorite chicken dish.  Although, I don’t know what he’s going to do with it as it was strongly suggested that robots do not eat.

In the short story, the robots are deemed too human to kill, so they are left to do the same repetitive mundane tasks forever.

Post-Post:

  • First published in Macleans, September 1948.
  • Just to confuse things, in the episode, the father is John and the son is Tom.  In the short story, the names are reversed.  Also, the wife in the episode is named Cora instead of Alice, and they have an extra daughter in the short story.
  • Directed by Paul Lynch who also made Prom Night.