Monthly Archives: May 2019

One Step Beyond – The Bride Possessed (01/20/59)

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So we begin a new series.  Because every genre show must be compared to The Twilight Zone, I’ll compare it to The Twilight Zone.  It is no Twilight Zone.

But it debuted a year before TZ, and I have only watched one episode, so it might turn out fine.  They use a host like most TV anthologies.  I appreciate that the host here, John Newland, is not just a carpetbagger like Truman Bradley on Science Fiction Theatre.  Bradley — Tru’, I call him — seems like a swell guy, but why is he there?

Serling is the king of the hosts because, in addition to being a scary dude, he created the TZ world and wrote a huge number of the episodes.  Sorry, 2 faceless guys on the 1980’s TZ run, you were awful.  Forrest Whitaker, I like you as an actor, but you were just collecting a check on the 2000’s TZ.  Hey, Jordan Peele, I appreciate your movies, but I don’t see any writing or directing credits on the series. [4] Plus, I’ll be damned if I’ll pay a nickel to watch TZ or Star Trek when God intended them to be free!  Fight the power!

Anyhoo, I respect John Newland for directing 94 of the 96 episodes of One Step Beyond.  I also see a single writer was responsible for 72 episodes. [3] I hope these guys know what they’re doing . . .

John Newland announces that he is in The Elite Bar and Grill — stop the tape!  Well, that didn’t take long.  The ornate writing on the door clearly says Ray’s Bar.  This appears to be a set — how could they not get that right?

Matt and Sally McCoy are celebrating their wedding at this elite cafe named Ray’s Bar.  I guess the reception was held there because Newland was diddling the cake earlier.  Adding to the class and sanctity of this blessed event, a couple of dudes have attended in their work-shirts with the name of a moving company on the back.  Sally is dancing with a bunch of the guys who are Matt’s friends, but everyone seems happy.

The happy couple bails out so they can reach their honeymoon hotel by 9:00.  We hear that Sally has a heavy, adorable Southern accent.  On the drive to the hotel, Matt says, “Those crazy guys down at Tommy’s.  You sure knocked them for a loop.”  Wait, so the joint is named Tommy’s now? [1]  Suddenly Sally sits up as erect as Matt and says, “Matt, if we turn left about a mile ahead, it is a prettier drive.”  As they approach the road, Sally says, “Turn right.”  Then when the reach the road, Matt turns left.  What the hell?

Matt pulls the car over, and Sally gets out.  She runs to a beautiful cliff overlooking the ocean. [2]  She is darting about as if confused and in a trance.  Matt asks her what is wrong.  She says,”Who are you?”  Even stranger, she has lost her accent quicker than Elizabeth Olsen in Avengers: Infinity War.  She runs back to the car and — LOL — takes it, stranding Matt.

He is able to flag down a cop.  As they are driving back to the station, the officer sees a light on at the ol’ Wharton place.  And hey, Matt recognizes his car out front.  As they go inside, the cop says the former owner jumped to her death from the cliff Sally just led them to.  Sally suddenly appears and tells the cop in a nice midwestern non-accent, “No, I didn’t kill myself!  I was murdered!  I was murdered!”

So they take her to the nut-house.  Matt chews out the doctor for keeping her drugged up.  Then the doctor plays tapes of Sally insisting that she is named Karen Wharton.  She again insists she was murdered.  She even knows Karen Wharton’s birthdate, mother’s name, how her father died, and all about that special night during finals at Bryn Mawr.  That’s all fine, but then she tells the doctor that she knows his wife drowned at a picnic in 1941 during freak dunk tank accident.  Not only that, she says that four years ago, the doctor asked her to marry him.  Hunh?

She says she was murdered by Dan Stapler who she used to be married to.  The doctor knows that Dan was never married.  Sally — oh sorry, she’s identifying as Karen today — says they kept the marriage secret because her mother hated Dan.   Her mother’s instincts were correct as Dan soon bashed Karen’s head in and threw her off the cliff.

Of course, all this is so Dan Stapler can panic and prematurely blow his wad, confessing before the local Perry Mason can even get him on the stand.  I’m sure the testimony of the crazy lady who did not know any of them, had never been to the city, and no longer remembered her her paranormal flashback would have held up in court.  Mission accomplished, Karen Wharton vanishes from inside Sally and she and Matt head for the hotel to fill that void.

This was actually a pretty good start.  The episode looked great, but the bar might have been lowered by low-res DVDs and You Tube public domain uploads of other series I endure.  It was refreshing just to see a crisp, clear B&W picture.  The music was a little overwrought at the end, and the story was a little thin, but consider this a Pilot.

My only real beef is the bit where Karen said the doctor asked her to marry him four years ago.  It is bizarre how that is shoehorned in, given no reaction, then dropped.  I can only figure that 1) a scene was deleted for time, and/or 2) that was supposed to explain why the doctor just happened to have an 8 x 10 glamor shot of Karen Wharton in his office that was not an X-Ray of her skull.

My only fear, largely based on nothing, is that the series will be the same story every week.  Until proven correct, I will be uncharacteristically optimistic.

Other Stuff:

  • [1] You’re thinking Tommy’s is the name of the moving company where they all work.  Nope, that’s Nor-Cal Van & Storage.
  • [2] Maybe not worth a footnote, but dayum Sally looks hot in that white dress on the cliff with that blinding smile.
  • [3] Hmmmm, upon further examination, most of the episodes had other writers.  Lawrence Marcus was credited as Executive Writer on 50 of them.  His other credits include Dramatized By, Dramatised By, Dramatisation, and a very special Material Assembled By.
  • [4] Correction, he does have one TZ Story By credit for Nightmare at 30,000 Feet.  However: 1) the episode is based on the original TZ’s Nightmare at 20,000 Feet, 2) that was based on the Richard Matheson short story, 3) he shares the Story By credit with 2 other guys, and 4) one of the other guys wrote the teleplay.  So I’m not sure how much his fingerprints are on the episode.

Tales from the Crypt – Fatal Caper (04/19/96)

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I had read on another site that production for Season 7 was moved to England.  Holy crap did they ever move it to England!

The locations, the actors, the director, the tone . . . I know the original Tales from the Crypt movie and sequel were British joints, but there is something uniquely American about this series when done right.  It works best with good ol’ American shameless greed and capitalism, shysters, con-men, modern art, televangelists, zoot-suiters, gold-diggers, carnies, door-to-door salesmen, speed traps, kangaroo courts, the death penalty, pulp comics, lumberjacks, ventriloquists [1] . . . and all kinds of American pop references.  Sadly, even the fact that they shipped it overseas to save a buck is evidence of its essential Americanism.

But I already shelled out an outrageous $25 for the Season 7 set, so here we go. [2]

Of course rich old Mycroft Amberson wears a silk robe and ascot, of course he lives in a Downton Abbey style castle, of course it is surrounded by statues, of course he has a butler, and of course he has a limey name like Mycroft.  If there is a Fiona or Hermione here, I’m done.

Mycroft’s banker says it is time that he get his affairs in order; i.e. have a will drawn up.  To assist, he has brought in the lovely Fiona Havisham — damnit!

Mycroft says that he has three sons, but that 15 years ago Frank left home.  Actually, it is more like Mycroft threw him out, saying, “I don’t want your sort in my house.”  The reason is only clear at the end.

We next meet his son Justin who is practicing Tantric sex with a topless girl.  I’m warming up to this new European vibe.

His other son Evelyn is quite the butterball.  Maybe he developed an eating disorder because his father gave him a girl’s name.  Hopefully he plays an ironically small role because I can’t understand WTF he is saying.

Mycroft describes them as monsters.  He amends his will to require that Justin and Evelyn find Frank within 6 months of Mycroft’s death or they get nothing.  How does that make sense?  If he wants them to be a family again, why wait until after he’s dead?  If they make the effort and fail, why penalize them?

There are a few bright spots, but the relocation across the pond kind of ruined it for me.  The ending will be no shocker to anyone who has seen the British film The Crying Game.  But America did it first 9 years earlier in Sleepaway Camp — Team America, F*** yeah!  American ingenuity and creativity wins again!  Oh, wait, TFTC used the exact same twist in The Assassin just last month.  Damnit!

Other Stuff:

  • [1] Maybe they had ventriloquists in the old country, but it took Americans to make one a star on radio.
  • [2] This blog started because I needed something to force me to watch the $9 set of Ray Bradbury Theater that I just could not finish.
  • [2] The packaging for Season 7, TFTC’s final season, is awful.  I guess they figured no one would last that long.  Season 6 of AHP is also much cheaper than the previous seasons, and has yet another season to go.  I expect those discs to say AOL on the back.

Outer Limits – The Haven (07/02/99)

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I remember this one from the original 1999 airing, so it must be good.  But I also remember seeing Bicentennial Man in 1999, so . . .

The titular Haven is one of the new high rise condos that promise the residents “the utmost in privacy and security”.  Aside from an occasional awkward encounter in the elevator, the occupants are virtually guaranteed to never see or hear their neighbors.  If unauthorized persons appear on their floor, say selling overpriced, loosely packed cookies, hovering drones will zap them.  There is never any noise, and eye contact is discouraged.  Wait, are you sure this place isn’t called The Heaven?

Caleb is not happy to have to share his elevator with another resident.  No, wait, two residents — what is this, f***ing Woodstock?  George, the holographic concierge, explains that it would be cost-prohibitive for every resident to have a private elevator.

As Caleb walks through his unit the next morning, everything seems to be Alexa’d.  He asks for the blinds to open and they do, he asks for the refrigerator door to open and it does.  He similarly bosses around the cabinets, TV, laptop, and orders muffins.  Suddenly, everything starts glitching.  His appliances turn off, and he is trapped in his condo.  We see from the identical holographic Georges on every floor responding to complaints that the failure is building-wide, not just because Caleb was mean to his toaster, and forget what he told his toilet to do.

After a pretty short time of experiencing the isolation that he pays such high HOA Fees for and still just gets basic cable, Caleb gets cabin fever.  He bundles up some knives and begins hacking away at the wall — literal, not figurative — between him and his neighbor.  Really, what is that going to do?  Isn’t that unit in the same condition as his?  Wouldn’t he have been better off trying to reach the hallway?  How about tossing a paperweight or a sofa out the window with a note attached?  This seems like the worst possible plan — oh wait, his neighbor is a hot chick.  Well-played then.

She also happens to be an electronics whiz.  In no time, she shorts out her door so it swings open.  Alyssa and Caleb go into the hallway which is dim with emergency lighting.  George is back online and actually visible in the dark because, in a masterful bit planning, they used an albino as the model for holographic George.

The rest of the episode is them trying to reach the ground floor while George puts obstacles in their way, sometimes fatally.  It’s not exactly Die Hard in a . . . uh, highrise . . . er, OK just like Die Hard.  So it’s a little like Die Hard, just without the machine guns, homicidal ballet dancer, Huey Lewis look-alike, coke-snorting yuppie, Urkel’s neighbor, Clarence Beeks, and George is no Hans Gruber.  Still, they are trapped in a building, you feel the claustrophobia, and they are constantly in danger and on the move.

Their constant motion gives the episode an inertia the Outer Limits sometimes lacks.  They even have an interesting message at the end.  I’m not sure if it is a great episode, but it is one of my favorites.

Other Stuff:

  • Caleb was fine, but I find the actor kind of annoying.  Maybe it’s jealousy because he dated Lorelei on The Gilmore Girls.  Her daughter Rory was hot too.  I could have gone either way in that family, being right in the middle of the two of them.  Two years younger than Lorelei, and 13 years older than her daughter.  Yep, right in the middle.  Too close to call, really. [1]
  • [1] Based on the reboot ages; I’m not an monster.

Science Fiction Theatre – The Human Experiment (06/22/56)

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Narrator:  “In this building in Atlantic City, an important scientific convention is being held.  The eagerly awaited highlight of this meeting is a paper prepared by Dr. Eleanor Ballard, a devoted pioneer in bio-chemistry.” 

Dr. Eleanor Ballard has been researching beads, no, bees, and how changes can be made to them while still in the larval form.  She is injecting an enzyme into the bees to alter their behavior.  But she is using an extract to inject into other animals.  So is the enzyme from the bees?  No, they seem to be the subject of the experiment.  Then the enzyme is used on puppies.  So WTF do the bees have to do with anything?

Eleanor hopes to use her discovery to help the mentally ill.  Injecting the enzyme into some puppies has turned then from docile, playful little dogs into “a militant soldier” (a film shows 2 dogs fighting), “a worker” (film shows a dog diligently digging), “and a very proud, productive mother” (film shows 6 puppies nursing).  I guess the point is that the enzyme made the dogs like Worker, Drone and Queen bees.  So what was injected into the bees?  They already have that society.  Besides, I think the “proud, productive mother” was created by a different kind of injection (film not available).

Eleanor announces she believes this enzyme can be used on people with “human disturbed personalities” to give them ambition, courage, and a love of groups so they “can perform as part of the human family.”

After the conference, Dr. Tom MacDougal goes to visit Eleanor at her ranch.  He takes time to flirt with “the most attractive taxi driver I’ve ever run across.”  She inexplicably waits while he walks to the door, checking out his butt I guess.  He notices a man energetically mowing the grass with a push mower; literally trotting as he pushes it.  Tom calls out that the man should slow down because it is so hot.  The man just keeps mowing as if he doesn’t understand English; which would have unusual been in 1956, unlike today.

Tom rings the bell and it is answered by a brutish, belligerent man.  He says Eleanor is not accepting visitors and Tom should just f*** off.  When Tom says he is expected, the man shoves him across the porch and shuts the door.

Jean the taxi driver suggests he go back to his hotel and call from there.  Wait, she picked him up at the train station, how does she know he is not staying the ranch?  Anyhoo, the door opens again and a tall, thin, stearn woman invites him in.  He is nearly run down by a woman furiously vacuuming the carpet.  Like the landscaper, she seems to be in a trance.

The tall woman apologizes for the man’s action, but still refuses to let Tom see Eleanor.  She says that she is Eleanor’s daughter, and that everyone there is very protective of her mother.  She is doing important work and can’t be interrupted.  Tom walks back to the hotel where Jean works.

That night, he remembers that Eleanor told him she had no children.  But since Eleanor is only 9 years older than the other woman, maybe it is a painful subject to her.  Even though it is the middle of the night, Tom asks Jean to drive him back to Eleanor’s house.

Jean waits while Tom approaches the house.  BTW, he has dressed in a nice suit including a necktie for this covert operation.  It’s nice to see the young people dressing for felonies again.  Rather than risk encountering the brute at the door again, he checks the bathroom windows.  After confirming Eleanor is not showering, or disrobing for a shower, or drying off after a shower, he checks the window of the lab.  Seeing her working, he slides the window open and climbs into the room.

He announces his presence, but Eleanor does not respond.  He says her name again and she does stoically say, “Dr. MacDougal” but continues performing her experiments.  She says, “Please go away, I have a great deal of work to do.  It is of utmost importance.”  When the brute unlocks the lab door, Tom goes back out the window.

He watches through the window as the mower, the vacuumer, the brute, and the thin woman all come into the lab.  One by one, Eleanor gives them an injection.  Finally, the thin woman administers an injection to Eleanor.

Tom asks Jean if there is an all-night drugstore in the nearby town.[1]  Luckily, the local CVS seems to carry beakers, test tubes, test tube racks, bunsen burners, and all the chemicals he needs.  He mixes up a solution at the hotel and they go back to Eleanor’s house.

Eleanor realizes her experiment failed. Also that Tom has his arm around the taxi driver who is 9 years younger than her.  But mostly that.

Tom slips back in through the window.  He begins knocking over equipment so that the other inhabitants of the house will come to the lab.  Once all are present, he puts on a gas-mask — wow, CVS rules! — and throws down the smoke bomb he made.  As the others are gagging, he carries Eleanor to safety.

Back at the hotel, Eleanor is sobered up and sees that her experiments to make the “maladjusted” part of society have failed.  She was able to transform them, like bees, into productive soldiers and workers and a queen, but lost control.  They return to the house and find all the inhabitants are now all jittery, frightened layabouts, the world’s oldest millennials.

  1. The tall woman was the Queen in this hive.  WTF wasn’t Eleanor the queen?  She says the tall woman injected her.  Was that a coup, or part of the experiment?
  2. Since Eleanor was not the queen, why were the others so protective of her?  She was just a drone; as her original lecture proved.
  3. Why have they all reverted to their natural state already?  We just saw them get injected that morning.

Tom says this was still an amazing breakthrough.  He suggests that he stay and help her.  Not only will he have fresh ideas, assist in the research, and be able to protect her from another such coup, but having a man’s name on her findings, they might actually get published in a scientific journal.  Bloody sexism!

Other Stuff:

  • [1] Actually, he says, “I want to pick up some supplies.  You may have to open up a drugstore.”  Hunh?
  • Eleanor was in the classic Invasion of the Body Snatchers.  Jean was in the classic-in-a-bad-way Robot Monster.  Wonder if that came up on-set.  Both were paid $125 for this episode, though.  That’s BS — even the mower and vacuumer got $80 and they had no lines!  Tom picked up a cool $750 for his work.  Bloody sexism!

Alfred Hitchcock Presents – The Five-Forty-Eight (10/25/60)

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Mr. Blake zips out of his office and says goodnight to his secretary, although why he is leaving this doll there to work after he skates is left unanswered.  He rides the elevator down which, given his haste, is probably the express.

In the lobby, a frumpy woman asks to talk to him.  Surprisingly, he does acknowledge her by tipping his hat, but silently hustles right out the door.  The woman follows him down the sidewalk.  She is swimming against all the tides — the wind is blowing against her, everyone in New York seems to be heading the other direction on the sidewalk, and Blake is figuratively pushing against her desire to speak to him.

He spots the woman tailing him in a coffee-shop window, at a frankly impossible angle BTW.  He picks up the pace even more to avoid this dame.  He sees sanctuary around the corner where there is a bar with a neon sign NO WOMEN ADMITTED.  And also, although the sign does not mention it, apparently hats are required and she is hatless.  I mean, the number of hats in this place is unbelievable.  I know men used to wear hats, but didn’t they take them off indoors?  He stays for only one drink, does not see the woman peering in the window, and leaves.

Unfortunately, she corners him on the train and sits beside him.  He recognizes her as his former employee Miss Dent, but she is sick, depressed, and unemployed.  When Blake tries to move to the next car, she pulls a gun on him.  Sensing a flashback, I’m not feeling so well myself.  It seems like only a trimester ago . . .

Miss Dent is happy at her job as Blake’s secretary.  After they work late one night arranging the Pensky File, Blake suggests that they have dinner.  Afterward, he walks her home to her brownstone located conveniently near the train station.  She invites him up for a drink.  She makes frequent references to her loneliness, but a gal that open to a last-second, late night dinner, and going straight back to her food-less place with no room-mate for straight liquor ought to be pretty popular.  Soon enough, while playing some stock, white-people jazz LPs, they are kissing.  Cut to the next day.

Blake breezes through the door in his usual brisk gait and barely acknowledges Miss Dent.  Miss Dent says Mr. Johnson is waiting in his office and is crushed by his ignoring her after their night of passion.  Wow, she really doesn’t get around much.

Isn’t this kinda how both of them got into trouble?

The two men talk, and Johnson comes out to speak to her.  He says she is being let go due to her poor performance; presumably on the job, not last night.  She will get 2 weeks severance and any unmarked lunches in the break-room refrigerator.  She bolts into Blake’s office but he is no longer there.  The only signs of his departure are a swinging coat hanger and an executive-shaped hole in the door.

Back in the present, 3 months later, Miss Dent tells Blake that she would not have told his wife.  Actually, if he was afraid she would tell his wife, he would be more likely to give her a raise than fire her.  She says, “I know what you’re thinking.  You’re thinking I’m crazy.  And it’s true.  I have been very sick.  But I’m going to be better.  It’s going to make me much better to talk to you.  I was in the hospital for eight months before I came to work for you.  I thought I was alright, but since you fired me, I’ve gotten all confused.  But I’m not afraid to kill you because I don’t care what happens to myself.”

Well, this is a downer.  Miss Dent really is in pain.  This isn’t the usual merry murder mix-ups and homicidal hijinks that we usually get on AHP.  She really is melting down due to her loneliness, depression, and that scotch probably isn’t helping.  This is more of a pure character study than I remember on AHP before.  Because Phyllis Thaxter pulls it off so magnificently, I felt more like I was watching a play or one of the drama anthologies from the 1950s.  The last 10 minutes are almost an interrupted monologue by Thaxter.

Miss Dent leads Blake at gunpoint off the train and down the dark tracks.  There is no big twist or conclusion.  She says what she needs to say and walks off into the dark.

Not your usual AHP offering, especially in the 2nd half, but another great episode of the type no one knows how to make anymore.

Other Stuff:

  • Based on a short story by John Cheever who I kinda made fun of last week.
  • 24 references:  1) Miss Dent standing behind Blake with a gun to his head in a train yard like Jack Bauer did to Ryan Chappell.  2) Blake often had an uncanny resemblance to President  Logan.  Man, having that series in constant rotation for 10 years is getting to me.
  • Thanks to Jack at Bare*Bones for helping me appreciate the episode.  His background on the source material and insights on the episode filled in some important gaps for me.
  • This is the 2nd consecutive AHP with no murder.  Let’s not forget why we’re here, fellas.