Category Archives: TV

Outer Limits – Origin of Species (11/27/98)

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Note:  This is Part 2 of Double Helix, an Outer Limits episode that aired 20 months earlier.  So this writer has about the same work ethic as me.

We start with a recap of Part 1.  Professor Martin Nodel recruited a group of college girls for an experiment that required them to get naked.  His effort worked better than mine, maybe because he also recruited some dudes as cover.  The group met at a cave in which a spacecraft had been hidden for millions of years.  The aliens left a message that they wanted humans to pay them a visit to see how we turned out.  Faced with the choice of abandoning Earth or trying to get a job with their “studies” degrees, the students boarded the ship with Nodel.

And now on with the story . . .

The “action” moves to the interior of the ship and it is as narratively underwhelming as it was in Close Encounters.  At least the CE3K ship looked great (if thoroughly inefficient) and had the John Williams score going for it.  Here, it is just transportation with some padded scenes to get us to a couple of twists at the end.

Dr. Nodel jacks in to the ship again and channels its builders, “Four score and seven eons ago, the ancestors of our race foresaw a great danger . . .”  However, before he gets to the good part, and I’m being optimistic there, he begins to glow and disappears.  His son Paul tries to help him and disappears also.  This leaves behind several students and Paul’s girlfriend Hope.  To head off any weirdness, I must point out that Paul and his girlfriend joined the group after the naked examinations.  Although, that does make me question their scientific value.

The walls begin to twist, but ship does not lose structural integrity, like that Star Trek episode that bugged me so much that I can’t remember whether it was TNG or Voyager.  Another passageway opens up, but it leads — literally, figuratively, and narratively — nowhere.  The shifting walls do split the group up, but not much is done with this.

Eventually, they all get back together somehow.  They can feel the ship decelerating.  One of the guys says, “Get back to launch positions, now!” which is probably the same as “landing positions” but why not just say that?  They land, and a hatch opens.

SPOILERS

They exit the ship to a very earth-like environment.  One of them wonders why the aliens were not there to greet them.  This ship is supposed to be 65 million years old.  Would anyone rally remember this ship was out there?

They climb a nearby hill to determine the lay of the land, although it is clearly the girl who looks like Nancy Allen.  It is a pretty nice series of shots that shows their reaction to the unseen sight before them.  Then we see the ruins of the Golden Gate Bridge.  Hope says, “Oh my God, we’re home.” [1]  

They fortuitously find a food wrapper that has an expiration date of May 2267.  So, unless it was a Twinkie, they merely went about 269 years into the future. [2]  There are no people here, though.  They find a massive graveyard with a marker blaming their vanity in “trying to control nature.”  So, trying to stop Global Warming was the cause, I guess.

They conclude they were sent here to repopulate the planet.  Someone says, “There’s only seven of us.  We don’t have enough genetic diversity to repopulate” even though one of them is a brunette.  They go back to the ship and a nursery full of babies is revealed.  The ship somehow tweaked their DNA to provide the diversity needed to safely repopulate.

Dr. Nodel and son reappear as a hologram.  They explain that the aliens were humans million of years in the future that left the ship on Earth to give the planet another chance.  That raises more questions, but that might just be because it is 2:15 am.

The big grave-site and the low disk space message that pops up every 5 goddamn minutes.

There are a few cheats and padding — clearly, there was never supposed to be a Part 2.  The characters are pretty generic.  I can only name Hope and a guy whose name I don’t know; so just Hope, I guess.

Still, I’m a sucker for such derivative, high-concept stories.  Plus, it has the benefit of following Science Fiction Theater and Tales of Tomorrow.  I would never watch it again, but it gets an OK.

Other Stuff:

  • [1] Suspiciously close to “Oh my God, I’m back, I’m home” from Planet of the Apes.  However, Hope does not start name-calling and blaspheming.
  • [2] Joe Miller Jokebook, circa 1739.

Science Fiction Theatre – The Hastings Secret (11/12/55)

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“It’s hard to believe that termites cost millions of dollars every year by their devastation of telephone and telegraph poles in the United States.  This is the central research laboratory of the Continental Telephone Company.  Scientists are employed by this firm to develop chemical preservatives for telephone poles in defense against woodpeckers, carpenter ants, and termites.”

Unless one of these termites is the size of a bus, this is shaping up to be dullest episode ev– hey, what is Truman Bradley doing in the story?  No, I guess they hired an actor who looks exactly like the series narrator, Truman Bradley.  Guess that’s going to happen occasionally when every part’s casting call is for “40 year old white guy.”

Bill Twining has come to the telephone company about a job.  Pat Hastings asks him what he was doing during the gaps on his resume.  He says, “Fishing.”  Dude, always say “Consulting”!  However, this seems to satisfy Pat’s rigorous screening process, so she hires him to join her working for Dr. Clausen, heir to the pickle fortune. [1]

Clausen tells him Pat’s father, Dr. Hastings, mans the termite research outpost in Peru.  He had asked for an electronics expert to be sent down.  The last “chemical shipment” that came from him was accompanied by moldy, unreadable notes.  Pat ran an analysis on the solution, assuming it was a new insecticide.

She produces a beaker of river clay and adds water.  When she adds the solution her father shipped to them, it causes “complete molecular dissociation!”  What this means to a layman is that clay was broken down into its elements; what means to a scientist is probably a hearty guffaw.  Not only has the clay broken down into 15% iron, 7% aluminum [2], and 20% silicon [3], the materials have sorted themselves out by atomic weight like a geologic pousse-café.

Clausen explains that this could revolutionize mining.  We could extract all the minerals we need from common dirt by mixing it with this solution.  Unfortunately, they don’t know what is in the solution.  Er, so exactly what kind of analysis did brainiac Pat do on it earlier?  Dr. Hastings has been incommunicado for 3 weeks, so Pat and Bill get a couple of pith helmets from the supply cabinet and head for Peru.

They arrive at the outpost, which is a tent in the jungle.  They immediately find the generator has been stripped for parts.  Pat, quite the detective, notices that Dr. Hastings had not changed the calendar in 22 days; but maybe he just had the hots for Miss October. [4]  Not only that, she knows her father had 3 pairs of glasses and all 3 are there in the tent.

Bill repairs the radio.  Radio Lima confirms that Dr. Hastings did not go there for supplies or to renew his Playboy subscription.  Pat wonders if an animal could have carried him off.  Bill assures her there was no sign of a struggle.  “What about a giant anaconda?” she asks.  He says there’s no time for such shenanigans.  Bill says he will beat the bushes, and then search the area for Dr. Hastings.  He suggests Pat search the tent for clues about her father’s research, and maybe do a little vacuuming.

Bill returns, having not found Dr. Hastings.  Pat’s search turned up a coil that produces a high-frequency field but, to be fair, she had a much smaller area to search.  They take Dr. Harding’s equipment outside.  Bill uses the coil to detect electronic activity in the area.  He is such a brainiac that he is able to triangulate the location with just two bearings.  The signal is coming from 50 feet inside a nearby hill.

On top of the hill, they find a crevice which leads to a crevasse.  There is a ladder which leads down to a cave where Dr. Harding has more equipment and Playboy calendars.  They spot two viewing devices.  The viewers provide a magnified look into an ant colony, but housing termites.  So I guess you’d call it an ant-colony-except-with-termites.  Pat says they are just about the most ancient species of life.  Dr. Hastings’ discovery was a species of termite that secretes the solution he shipped back to the lab.

They notice a tunnel that was not in Dr. Hastings’ notes and conclude that the termites swarmed the area to create it.  Pat grimaces as she realizes her father was “eaten alive by termites.”  Bill says, “It must have happened while he was asleep”  (i.e. he was sleeping like a log).  He further concludes the termites were attracted by the Doctor’s morning wood from dreaming about Bettie Page, but is too much of a gentleman to say so.

Pat continues her father’s research, but the termites begin to swarm again.  She and Bill flee the cave.  It collapses, but Pat is happy that her father will be remembered in scientific journals for the discovery of this new solution, and in Ripley’s for being eaten alive by termites.

The synthesized solution will revolutionize mining and mineral extraction — increasing production, lowering cost, and making melodramatic movies about trapped miners a thing of the past.  At least until the inevitable spill destroys the planet like Ice-Nine, leading to the inevitable New York Times headline: TRUMP DESTROYS EARTH.

Meh.  The shots of the termites were probably cool for kids in the ’50s.  Not so much for their parents who didn’t sleep a wink and called the exterminator the next day.

Other Stuff:

  • [1] Ach du lieber!  Pickles have their own web-page!  I feel a little better about the digital real estate I’m squandering.
  • [2] What, no bauxite?  Finally, my geology class pays off!
  • [3] Where did they get this “clay” from, a freakin’ meteorite?  And we’re light on the composition, too.  Maybe the other 58% was Pyrex, because that beaker didn’t go anywhere.
  • [4] This theory is implausible because any guy alone in the jungle in 1955 would still have his calendar showing January:  Bettie Page!

 

Alfred Hitchcock Presents – The Little Man Who Was There (04/03/60)

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Leave it to the consistently great AHP to provide a better TZ episode than Twilight Zone served up this week.  Yes, it is another AHP period piece, but has two huge mitigating factors:  1) it is set in America, and 2) it stars Norman Lloyd.

Two guys back in an old west saloon circa 1899 are arguing about who will pay for this round of drinks.  The twist is, these guys are like the Goofy Gophers,[1] arguing over who will get the privilege of paying.

The two town strong-men break up the argument just as it was about to come to blows — and this town is so friendly I don’t even want to think about what that might have entailed.  The strong-men even settle the argument by paying for their drinks.  This is the nicest bar in history.  Anthony Fremont’s family wasn’t this agreeable.

Somehow, this positive attitude and generosity even extends to the slot machine.  Strongman Jamie optimistically gives it spin, and the wheels come back with a royal straight flush.  This is the happiest, smiliest, good-natured, backslapping bunch of guys . . . wait a minute, where are the women?

Into this saloon walks a slim, elegant drink-of-water with evening wear, white gloves, a stylish hat and a mellifluous voice.  Oh wait, that’s Norman Lloyd.  He orders a rum, and the bartender blows dust off the bottle.  I’m not sure what the gag is there, except maybe all these giggling he-men are whiskey drinkers; at least until Zima is invented.

Their next diversion is the always-fun anvil-lift.  Several of the locals try, but the thing is like Thor’s Hammer.  Strongman Ben is able to lift it.  For a strongman, he should know better than to lift with his back, though.

The bartender tells Norman, “This place is like a church social compared to what it was 2 months ago.”  It was at that time that Jamie and Ben McMahon came to town.  The local copper miners were a tough crew with the fighting, gambling, drinking, shooting each other, and reusing postage stamps.  He says, “They brought the magic of brotherly love.”  They got every professional gambler thrown out of town.  They explained there was more to life than those shenanigans.  They were such happy, peace-loving, God-fearing leaders that the town wanted to be like them.

Norman has heard enough.  With a flash and a plume of smoke, he gets their attention.  Jamie says Norman should just apologize for smoking indoors and be on his way.  Norman says he must be “one of the righteous ones, an ecclesiastical bore, a pompous ass.” [2]  Jamie is steamed, but turns the other cheek.  Norman does everything he can to provoke Jamie, but Jamie stays calm.  Then Norman throws a drink in his face.  That’s it!  Jamie throws several punches, but there seems to be a protective field around Norman.

With a flick of his gloved hand, Norman knocks Jamie to the floor.  Ben, clearly not the smarter brother, takes a swing.  He goes down also.  Now that all the rubes think he is a demon, he instructs them to hand over their cash.  He takes the brothers’ wallets, then hits the register, then a statue with a hidden stash.  No mention of that slot machine loot, though.  Norman goes to the door and tells them not to follow him or “there will be the devil to pay.

Of course there is a twist that you will probably see coming, but that doesn’t matter.  There is the what-does-God-need-with-a-starship issue with the devil stealing cash, but that doesn’t matter either.  It is just a pleasure to watch Norman Lloyd chew up the scenery in every frame. [3]  But the episode does not fully rest on his great performance.  After 4 years, I should no longer be surprised, but the sheer consistency and professionalism of this series is astounding.

PS:  For the commentor who chastised me for mixing actors’ names with character’s names . . . dedicated to you, buddy.

Other Stuff:

  • [1] Wow, for my entire life, I had thought they were Chip and Dale.
  • [2] This has to be one of the first uses of ass on American TV; at least that does not involve a jawbone.
  • AHP Deathwatch: Read Morgan — whose name is an imperative sentence — is also still with us.  Among the deceased, an imperative sentence from yoga class:  Arch, Johnson!  Roscoe Ates came sooo close to being a declarative sentence.
  • Norman Lloyd is still with us at 103.  He is such a classy, amazing talent, I hate to lump him in the Deathwatch category.  When his day comes, I suspect we will not read obituaries about him saying “F*** NIXON” at the Oscars or suggesting Nixon’s daughters should be molested.  Adios, Hollywood!
  • AHP Proximity Alert:  Mike Ragan (Pete) was the enigmatic Alfredo on last week’s episode.  Give someone else a chance!
  • Title Analysis: It is from the poem Antigonish, but I don’t understand the relevance to this episode.  With AHP, I happily concede that is probably my ignorance.

Twilight Zone – 20/20 Vision (12/10/88)

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Well congratulations to Warren Cribbens who was just promoted to Loan Officer at the bank.  No time for a bear claw and looking up his neighbor’s account balances, though.  Vern Slater was waiting for the bank to open so he could talk to the previous Loan Officer, Mr. Simmons.

The meek Cribbens accidentally bumps into his cute new secretary Sandy that he inherited from Simmons.  Amidst the carnage of dropped papers and files are Cribbens’ glasses with a cracked lens.  Luckily, he says they are just for “up-close work.”

There is a scene in his cubicle which doesn’t really fit his character.  He bruskly says to a caller, “I didn’t take out the loan, you did!”  It is unprofessional and makes no sense for someone who was established as being mild-mannered and fastidious about his work.

After getting all worked up, he emerges from his cubicle.  He puts on his cracked glasses.  Across the bank, he clearly sees one of the tellers accidentally knock a $100 bill into the trashcan.  Although, with reading glasses, at that distance she should have just been a blur.  When he confronts her, he sees that there is no bill in the trash.  He apologizes, but as he backs away and takes his glasses off, he sees her knock the bill into the trash again.  This time it is real, and the teller is baffled; also really overweight.

Bank President Cutler calls Cribbens into his office to talk business.  He has a map on the wall with color-coded pins denoting 1) property the bank owns, 2) untouchable land belonging to corporate farmers, 3) property the bank holds the mortgage on, and oddly, 4) the nearest Popeye’s Chicken [1].  He reminds Cribbens that many of the farmers are operating at a loss and “we have to call in all loans as they come due.”  By no coincidence, a new highway is going to be built and Cutler wants the bank to own the property.

Vern Slater is shown into Cribbens’ office.  Wait, this all seems to be the same day.  Slater was there when the doors were unlocked.  Has he been waiting all this time?  Is this Bank of America?  Slater asks for an extension on his mortgage.  Cribbens quotes both Presidents Cutler and Coolidge that, “The business of America is business.”  He puts on the broken glasses and sees Slater as an old man.  Slater counters that the business of America ought to be people, and that his farm is his life.

The next day, Cribbens goes out to the Slater farm to see if they can work something out.  Unfortunately, he is not authorized to extend the loan and their equipment is pretty old, so he recommends selling off some land.  He tells Vern that Cutler wants to foreclose.  When he puts on his broken glasses, he sees the farmhouse as vacant and dilapidated with a flapping front door and broken windows.  Warren, dude, they’re just cheaters; you couldn’t have dropped by CVS for a new pair for $7?

Slater says he isn’t going to sell.  Cribbens gets back in his car.  In a strange continuity error, Cribbens backs up looking like he is going to accidentally run Slater down.  They cut to another angle, and Slater is safely to the side.  It’s just strange.  Seems like the actor would have been genuinely concerned about being accidentally being killed for a dopey 1980s TZ episode.  At least Vic Morrow was in a TZ movie.

The next day at the bank — and this must be the busiest bank in America — he vaguely describes the Slater problem to Sandy and asks her opinion.  He slips on his glasses and has a vision of her falling off a ladder.  He asks her to cut a cashier’s check out of his own account and tells her to be careful.

Cribbens’ solution is to loan Slater the money himself.  Slater accepts and swears he will pay Cribbens back.  When Cutler hears about this, he chews Cribbens out in front of the whole bank, and fires him.  As he is packing up, he sees Sandy on a ladder.  She falls just as in his vision, and he catches her.

Dammit, I was so happy to bust them on another error! But I guess it is the same sweater, but just decolorized in the vision.

This accident further shatters the lens.  Cribbens says he won’t need them anymore and drops them in the trash.  What?  He wasn’t interested if they still saw the future?  Didn’t he want to see if future Sandy had his ring on her finger? Or maybe now they gave the wearer x-ray vision!  At least try the x-ray vision out on her!  [UPDATE:  Read in the light of day, that was a little too #METOO.  Maybe it would work on scratch-off lottery tickets].

Or does he not need the glasses because he will make so much off the new highway on Slater’s land that he won’t have to work again?  Was there profit participation in the Loan Agreement he gave Slater?  And why does Cutler say Cribbens’ bail-out of Slater “cost me a fortune”?  The bank would have repossessed the farm, not Cutler.  Cutler said earlier he did not own the bank, he just worked there.

This episode is the 1980’s Twilight Zone in a nutshell:

  • 1960’s TZ:  Broken glasses result in a cruel, ironic denial of the one thing Henry Bemis loved; and that on top of the crushing loneliness of being the last man on earth, and eking out a miserable survival in the post-apocalyptic ruins.
  • 1980’s TZ:  Broken glasses result in saving the family farm and getting the girl.

Take it to Hallmark [2].  I know it was filmed in Canada, but does it have to be so nice?

Some of the premonitions after the first one are just a mess.  When Cribbens sees Slater as an old man in his office, what is the point?  OK, he is still alive, that’s good.  He got older — welcome to the club.  Still has a nice head of hair — screw him.  He apparently didn’t lose an arm in the thresher — isn’t that a point in favor of him losing the farm?

Cribbens’ vision at the farmhouse is equally nonsensical.  If the bank were to foreclose on the farm, the house would not become run-down and abandoned; it would be torn down and paved over for the new highway. Or maybe a Cracker Barrel.

So, another simple yet promising high-concept is fumbled.

Other Stuff:

  • [1] OK, not really.  They are finally building one near me and my excitement at that news is a sad commentary on how my life is going.
  • [2] Hallmark replaces Lifetime as the sappy go-to channel.  I had actually typed Lifetime, but its website was plugging a movie called Deadly Matrimony.
  • Title Analysis:  Another mess.  Kudos for it being sight-related and having the word vision, but the 20/20 part is like one of those Tales From the Crypt titles with only half a pun.  Why 20/20?  The future in his visions is changeable, so they are not perfect (i.e 20/20).  Even the cinematography of the visions themselves is inconsistent, so that’s not perfect either.  The term 20/20 isn’t even relevant for reading glasses, so the whole thing makes no sense.

Tales of Tomorrow – The Evil Within (05/01/53)

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After enduring two episodes this week of men beating up their wives, finally something to celebrate:  The last episode of Tales of Tomorrow. [1]  

Peter has brought his work home with him.  Sadly, he does not work in a bakery or modeling agency, but in a lab that produces toxic chemicals.  He tells Anne he has created “the perfect serum”.  Wow, does it cure cancer?   Maybe reverse the effects of Alzheimer’s?  Spit it out, man!  He tells her, “I gave a shot of this stuff to the monkeys at the lab to see how they reacted.  Instantly, they lost all their behavior control and their inhibitions.”  Yeah, that behavior-control that inhibited monkeys are so famous for.

Unfortunately, the refrigerator at the lab broke down and the serum must be kept cold, so he brought it home.  Pffft, some “perfect” serum.  After putting it next to last night’s meatloaf, he tells Anne that it works on humans too.  “It goes straight to the glands, then they overpower the mind.  That unleashes the evil within the human being!”  Well thank God science cracked this problem; finally we can get some evil peeps ’round here.  I wouldn’t wait for Jonas Salk to share his Nobel Prize. [2]

Anne wants to go out to a movie, but in addition to bringing his work home with him, Peter has brought his work home with him.  He pulls papers from his briefcase.  He plans to begin work immediately on an antidote which will bring out the good intentions in people.  Well that’s not really an antidote unless the people are only a**holes because they took the first drug.  What about those who are just naturally a**holes like Robert DeNiro and Peter Fonda? [3]

After a solid 15 seconds of working, he packs his bag and announces he is going for a walk, then returning to the lab to check on the monkeys.  Anne consoles herself by having a piece of the pie that was on the rack below the leaky test-tubes.  Just like the monkeys, Anne loses her inhibitions immediately and begins writhing seductively in her chair.  She dances around the apartment.  Then she gleefully pours the test tubes in the sink.  My God, if that gets in the water supply, New Yorkers could turn into angry, loud, obnoxious jerks!  Then she sets fire to Peter’s notes.

The next morning, Peter sees that the test-tubes are empty.  Anne tells him it was an accident and he isn’t too upset.  Unlike every scientist in sci-fi history, he is able to reproduce his discovery.  Well . . . he isn’t so sure when he gets to the lab and realizes he has lost his notes and has no backup.  Now that’s a Hollywood sci-fi scientist!

He returns home and confronts Anne about a call she received from his lab assistant the previous night.  She lies about it.  Then she giddily tells him she poured the serum down the drain and “burned your precious formula!”  She is happily in his face as she proudly confesses, even trilling the R’s in precious — a great choice by the actress.  “She taunts him that she “destroyed everything you care about.”

Peter figures out that Anne ate the infected pie.  Again, he tells her it will be OK because he can analyze the pie and reverse-engineer the formula.  She still says she wants to destroy him.  She pulls out a kitchen knife, and says she wants to “destroy you the way you destroyed me.”  She plans to kill herself so she will be on his conscience.  He promises to give up his career if she will put down the knife.

Peter’s lab assistant calls to tell him the serum has worn off, the monkeys are acting like little angels, although them feces-hurling angels like in the Old Testament.  He asks Anne to not do anything crazy for 15 minutes.  The serum wears off and she starts crying.

Meh, not the worst episode of the series.  In a three-person cast which included Rod Steiger and James Dean, only Margaret Phillips’ name was announced at the top of the show — and she deserved it.  Rod Steiger is the same mumbling, erratic, inexplicably praised lump he would evolve into.  As the lab assistant, James Dean — also inexplicably revered — wasn’t given much to do, but at least he didn’t cry this time.  Mags came off great though!  She was attractive as Before, but as After she was an untamed, grinning seductress / killer pie-eater.

Thus endeth Tales of Tomorrow.

Other Stuff:

  • [1] Last of the three DVD sets released, anyway.
  • [2] I am shocked to learn Salk did not get a Nobel Prize.  Barack Obama got one for reasons that still no one can figure out.  But saving millions of kids world-wide from a devastating disease only gets you into the Polio Hall of Fame (no, really).
  • [3] This doesn’t need to break down by party.  Forget politics — really, not one person in that auditorium thought DeNiro was just coarse and trashy?  And Jesus Christ, WTF did Henry Fonda do to his kids?