Hey, 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.

Mrs. 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.

Outside, 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.

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.

The only episode I ever remember seeing — it must be great!

Lydia Bowen (Else Lanchester) has not only a green thumb, but 10 green fingers — everything she plants seems to grow.  Unfortunately developer Michael Saunders (Cameron Mitchell) has his eye on her property to build a factory.

A couple of comments on his glasses:  First, they make him look very much like Burgess Meredith in Time Enough at Last. Second, for some reason, he wears the arms of the glasses on the outside of his ears rather than over the top.

Saunders has sent emissaries to buy the land, but Ms. Bowen simply refuses to sell. Saunders pays a visit himself, but she still refuses to sell.  She has lived here all her life, the last 10 years alone since her husband died.  When Saunders can’t budge her, he hires a fixer to get her her off the land.

The police show up the next day after someone hears screams coming from her house. They find her in the garden burying something — her fingers.  They get her to the hospital, but she dies from the loss of blood.  The elderly doctor says he remembers “the widow Bowen” from when he was a kid.  Hmmm, she said her husband died 10 years ago, so this guy would have been about a 55 year old kid.

That night, Saunders stops by the property.  He sees Ms. Bowen’s hands coming up through the soil and panics.  When he looks again, there is a hole in the ground which he inexplicably lowers himself into.  He hears her singing in the house.  Her green fingers have grown into a new Ms. Bowen.

He runs outside and breaks the fourth wall, addressing the camera.  I assume at that point he goes mad.

One of the best.

Post-Post:

• Twilight Zone Legacy:  George Keymas was in Eye of the Beholder.  Bill Quinn was in the TZ Movie, but that doesn’t count.
• Else Lanchester played the Bride of Frankenstein.
• Greensleeves plays throughout the episode.
• Skipped Segment #1: The Funeral.  The second and final of Richard Matheson’s contributions to Night Gallery.  Neither were of the quality of his TZ work.
• Skipped Segment #2: The Tune in Dan’s Cafe.  Meh.

A 17 year old boy, Vic, is sitting alone in his bedroom as kids outside yell at his window calling him ugly and a freak.  We’re in kind of a tough position to judge since he has a sack over his head.  In any event, I think we can agree the kids are assholes.

His father says that after a lot of thought, he has decided to send Vic to live among others like him.  Somewhere he can be himself and walk in the sun.  Vic asks where this utopia is, but his father really has no ideas.

The father calls the government on a swell video-phone, asking for the department that deals with deformed kids.  He is referred to The Department of Special Urban Problems.  When they ask the nature of the deformity, Vic tears off the sack and photobombs his dad’s call.

Shockingly, the government is of no help.  Their only solutions are 1) Vic lives with his father for the rest of his life, or 2) Vic is put to sleep (OK’d by the Conformity Act of 1993).  At the last second, a position opens up in an exchange program with another planet.

Vic’s father watches with tears in his eyes as a rocket takes off carrying away his son.  Then we are treated to a lot of NASA stock footage, which is OK with me — I could watch that stuff all day..  He meets a very human looking man in the jet-way and learns that he is the exchange for Vic.

Bottom line, the freak on the other planet is handsome by human standards, and Vic is handsome by their standards.  Everybody’s a winner.

A pretty light-weight segment, but I’m a sucker for a happy ending.

Post-Post:

• Twilight Zone Legacy:  Mary Gregory was in three episodes, and Dana Andrews was in one.
• Also, I was getting Eye of the Beholder deja vu.