Sheriff Jeff rides out to the Tom & Ben’s shack in the desert. The town council is concerned about the two old coots living with no visible means of support. They claim to be homesteaders but can provide no evidence of being farmers or prospectors.
Sigh . . . this is a pretty thin story that relies on a ludicrous plot-point and has a familiar ending. There just isn’t much to grab onto here.
The Sheriff assures them that the town council just has their welfare in mind. The fact that this beautiful location would be the perfect spot for a red rock spa resort surely plays no role in their decision, and is not mentioned here. And where is this utopia where the government is so concerned about old people who pay no taxes and give no campaign contributions?
The Sheriff is on their side and just needs some evidence, any evidence that they are really homesteaders — say, growing a single crop or mining enough gold to sustain them. The absurd plot-point is that they finally agree that if the geezers can grow a single rose bush that flowers, they can can technically be considered farmers. Are we sure these guys aren’t making campaign contributions? That kind of sleazy technicality is the essence of politics.
As luck would have it, they get a visitor. A stranger’s car breaks down just in front of their shack. The old guys tell the man — credited spoilerifically as Killer on IMDb — that the nearest town is 47 miles away. They claim they can walk it in a day and a half which seems unlikely. Killer pulls a gun and insists that they lead him to town. Tom — or Ben, it really doesn’t matter — gets his hand on a pistol and shoots Killer with one of those AHP patented one-shot kills. This series wounds less people than Jack Bauer.
One month later, the Sheriff comes by again looking for Killer. He doesn’t find Killer, but the boys do show him a thriving rose bush on top of a burial plot-shaped mound of dirt.
In Alfred Hitchcock’s closing remarks, as usual, he assures the audience — and by audience, I mean FCC — that the old fellows were caught and punished. In an unusual departure, however, he actually says that after using Killer for fertilizer, they continued the practice with other criminals and innocent passersby.
That comment and the camaraderie of the guys are the only reasons to sit through this episode. I rate it 17.5 out of Isaiah 35.
Post-Post:
- AHP Deathwatch: No survivors.
- Title Analysis: Very good. Streamlined from the source, but still identifiable. Even more on-point if you look at the original.
- Killer played Chief Bell in The Thirty-Fathom Grave.
William Benteen is in charge of 187 people on a distant rock. They left the earth 30 years ago, according to Serling, “In search of a new millennium.” The year is 1991, so the joke’s on them — they could have stuck around and it would have soon come to them. After three decades, the earth has become a distant memory for many and a legend for the young. Now they have finally received a signal that a rescue ship will arrive in one month.
Like the meteor shower, the close-up of the ship is like nothing seen before in TZ. In fact, many of the sets for this episode are the best in the show’s run. The cavernous . . er, cavern, the shanty town, the bleak landscape, the number of extras — all are on a scale never seen before.
Later on the ship Benteen tells Sloan that he expects his group to stay together after the return to earth — under his watchful eye. He has not asked their opinion on this. He regards them as children — he must decide what is best for them. Fearing he is losing his grip on his flock, he gets the group together in the cave. As they ask about different parts of the US, he tells them they will all stay together and he magnanimously agrees to continue as their leader.
Serling: “William Benteen — once a god, now a population of one.”
The long-threatened western.
The three gringos — despite one being shot and another being Ernest Borgnine — escape the pursing cops. They stop at an adobe ranch house where a man introduces himself as Jim Caulder — I don’t like his odds. Not surprisingly, he is dispatched within seconds and the gang goes inside to find the titular Hannie Caulder. Over a static shot of the house we hear her screams as she is raped. Nothing funny about that, although there is an odd bit of business with one of the men being thrown out the front door . . . twice. Or maybe they were different men; they were indistinguishable from the distance. No idea what they were going for there.
Up rides bounty hunter Thomas Price (
It is obvious this was filmed in the early days of Hollywood’s new freedom. A few son-of-a-bitches and asses are thrown around, but they come off as being spoken by a 10 year-old who just discovered them. There is no weight to them — to be fair, a lesson 
It takes two cops to bring Duane “Eater” Mellor into the station. They install him in the kind of cage that we need more of — unpainted, crumbling walls, exposed bricks, a metal toilet.
As Dani reads the file, she imagines the scene where Eater cuts off a captive woman’s tongue and fries it up. Despite not being very bloody, this is admirably horrific for network television. When he goes back for seconds and raises the tin-snips to her nose, I was genuinely disgusted. Kudos to everyone involved.
That is both the appeal and the curse of the episode. Mattingley and Steinwitz as themselves were obnoxious jerks of Trumpian proportions. When possessed by Eater, they become even worse — fidgety, sweaty and grotesque. As the last half of the episode consists of each them alternately alone with Dani as she figures out what they really are, they wear out there welcome very quickly.
Post-Post:
A young, lithe and beautiful blonde is on stage at a rally screaming at the crowd.