And did you?
Regards,
Posted on 10/31/2023 8:18:42 PM PDT by dynachrome
If you have only passing familiarity with The Twilight Zone — maybe only really knowing its iconic opening sequence — you might be forgiven for thinking that the classic television show centered on scary themes. In reality, however, while the show certainly had a dark atmosphere and included plenty of suspense, creepiness, and dread, it fell more into the genres of science fiction and fantasy than horror. It was layered more with incisive insights into the dynamics of the individual mind and the group collective than outright frights. The monsters of the show lived in people’s heads; its chills were of the existential variety.
Nevertheless, there are some episodes of The Twilight Zone that land on the more traditionally frightening side of things. Not on the level of modern horror flicks, mind you, but as compared to the rest of the series. Of these episodes, here are the five scariest:
(Excerpt) Read more at artofmanliness.com ...
That was one of the greatest jobs of acting I’ve ever seen. She didn’t utter a word.
I adore that one; one of the all time best episodes!
A quick TZ story. My wife is younger than me, and grew up not watching B&W TV shows, or movies. She claimed the storylines of the ones she had tried to watch were ENTIRELY predictable. So, I pulled up an episode of TZ. We watched it to just before “the turn”, and I asked her “OK, what’s going on here, and what’s going to happen”. She gave me some predictable plot, and outcome. Then I unpaused it. She was more than a little shocked. Lesson learned. :D
I also want to get off at Willoughby.
The one about the guy who’s in search of a song and wanders into the woods, meeting a woman in black who sings predictions. The things she sings about keep happening and she finally sings a verse predicting his death. Which, of course, happens.
That one haunted me for awhile when I saw it at about 15 years old.
The episode listed in the article: THE DUMMY, was one of TWO versions that were on this show. The idea predates this show AND television! The movie THE GREAT GABO is the earliest movie or T.V. version of this kind of tale, was one of the very first "talkies", and starred Erich Von Stroheim as the ventriloquist. A much later/modern movie, MAGIC, starring Anthony Hopkins as the ventriloquist, is also well worth seeing.
That’s a really good one and IIRC, stars one of Bing Crosby’s sons.
“I also want to get off at Willoughby.”
Count my wife and I too for Willoughby.
Rod Sterling was a Jewish-American combat veteran who saw saw action and horrid things in the Philippines. Those experiences greatly affected him and his writing. Wonder what he would be writing if he were alive today.
I thought the only terrifying episode was the mannequins coming to life. Everything else was just hokey. Entertaining, yes. Watchable, yes. I really liked the Custer episode.
The mannequins one was good, but all of the others were too; nothing "hokey" about them!
The one with the magical player piano was marvelous, the Adam & Eve one was too, I can wax lyrical about almost every single one of them.
The one with Art Carney playing Santa and then actually turning into him? FANTASTIC!
And NOT ENOUGH TIME, starring Burgess Meredith always makes me cry a bit at the end.
Where a man can slow down to a walk and live his life full measure.
And did you?
Regards,
Serling, not Sterling.
Eye of the Beholder is one of my favorites.
So far, so good. Really enjoy living life full measure.
Not scary, but ‘Two’ is my favorite. Elizabeth Montgomery, delicious.
Do you recall the one where they bricked themselves into an unescapable small space? I was so young when I watched it. So I don’t remember much except I found it scary.
Astronauts landing on Earth...
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