Local crackpot Abner Suggs is reading fortunes from cards when Captain Lindemann comes in for a couple of shots of whiskey. The Cap’n seems like a no-nonsense guy and doesn’t respond to Suggs offer to see his fortune in the cards. Then Suggs suggests palm-reading, then reading tea-leaves. If this guy would read actual books instead of cards, palms and tea scum, maybe he’d know better.
What is strange is that Lindemann was doing shots — where did Suggs get this cup of tea leaves? Shouldn’t the tea-leaves have been left behind by the one having his fortune told? Does just any old filthy teacup work for any random yahoo? It’s almost like there’s no scientific basis to this practice.
After Lindemann decks Suggs, he leaves the pub. Outside, he is called over to the pier to see what they’ve caught. He drops his lantern when he sees it is a mermaid. His first reaction is “kill it!” He calls it a monster, although the top half is not monstrous at all. Beneath some strategically placed hair, seaweed and rope, there is a beautiful topless woman.
He has a change of heart, and takes the mermaid down to his cabin. Maybe he is tired of his trawler and wants to try a little motorboating. He keeps her there for 3 days and can’t seem to figure out why she is wasting away like a fish out of water. He calls the doctor who prescribes saline — like enough to swim in. The doctor can offer no help other than to suggest giving her back to the sea.
In desperation and loneliness, he lowers himself to seeking help from Suggs. He gives Lindemann a potion to turn the fishy parts into a nice set of gams. The next morning, the Captain pulls the blankets back to reveal human legs and goes topside to excitedly tell the other sailors that she is a woman! He calls her topside to show her off and is shocked that while she now has a nice set of legs, her top half is a fish-head.
She jumps in the water and the Captain follows. Neither surface.
Post-Post:
- Twilight Zone Legacy: Harry Townes was in 2 episodes.
- Skipped Segment #1: The Late Mr. Peddington. Not bad, GREAT ending!
- Skipped Segment #2: A Feast of Blood. Meh.
Although you could see this coming from at least six fathoms away, it was still a solid tail with a shock ending. Thumbs up on this episode.
This is a fine episode, one of the best in the series, and one of Rod Serling’s best horror teleplays. Abner Suggs offering to read tea leaves for Lindemann from a cup not used by the Captain doesn’t necessarily show he was lacking in knowledge of the occult arts, as he might have simply been seeking to make a quick buck from someone ignorant of such details.
Clearly, Suggs had the power,,as his potion was efficacious in causing the malicious transformation. The resulting fish-headed monstrosity looked like something out an HP Lovecraft nightmare.
Early on in the episode, after catching the mermaid in his fish net, Lindemann suggests that he should throw her/it back into the water, but some of the locals are opposed – essentially suggesting it would be murder if he lowered her back into the sea, as the top half of her would surely drown.
Seriously – none of these men understand the legend of the mermaid? Granted, they have heard the stories, but never saw one up close; even so, if she was caught in the ocean, she obviously had the capacity to survive there. That anomaly really annoyed me, as did the ending…..not necessarily because the outcome was predictable. She jumps in the water after being ‘transformed’, and Lindemann goes in after her, never to be heard from again? Either way, she was not long for living outside of her environment. Seems like a pretty cheesy ending coming from Serling.
Wouldn’t surprise me if this was one of those episodes where Serling’s lack of creative control left me more than a little disenchanted.