tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post6542527472109068878..comments2023-09-15T04:27:57.129-04:00Comments on Commentarama: TV Review: The Twilight Zone (1959-1964)AndrewPricehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comBlogger45125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-21534925330076064512011-01-09T15:17:21.839-05:002011-01-09T15:17:21.839-05:00Scott, Thanks for the link. I had not heard about...Scott, Thanks for the link. I had not heard about the commencement speech, so thanks for that info too!<br /><br />I think you're right about the sympathetic portrayal of soldiers. It's very rare in the Twilight Zone where you get a soldier who fits the modern bloodthirsty view of Hollywood. Most of the soldiers he shows seem instead to be struck by a profound sense of duty.<br /><br />There is a lot Hollywood could learn from the Twilight Zone. I wish they would pay more attention to work like Serling's.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-14351452761309438382011-01-09T12:30:50.373-05:002011-01-09T12:30:50.373-05:00@Andrew: You're right. Serling, who served as ...@Andrew: You're right. Serling, who served as a paratrooper during W.W.II, never struck me as being anti-military although he was definitely anti-war. His stories have many sympathetic portrayals of soldiers. Look at "A Quality of Mercy," and "The Purple Testament" where war is shown to be a nightmare, but the soldiers fighting it are good people doing what needs to be done. Serling hated war, but felt people needed to fight when necessary. Look at his 1968 commencement speech for Binghamton Central High School. Serling criticizes the glorification of war, but he goes on to say, "But if survival calls for the bearing of arms - bear them, you must."<br />http://www.rodserling.com/01281968.htmScott Sheafferhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01582347320417529969noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-90012713117084423092011-01-08T17:39:04.475-05:002011-01-08T17:39:04.475-05:00Ed, Thanks! Believe it or not, I actually thought...Ed, Thanks! Believe it or not, I actually thought about Stargate when I mentioned STNG. I think the difference is very clear. In Stargate, they couldn't rely on some of the crutches STNG had, so they had to put more effort into the characters, and they did create people that feel very real to us. I think you're right that it's hard to see the STNG characters as real people.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-66586366323984158322011-01-08T14:31:56.708-05:002011-01-08T14:31:56.708-05:00Great review! I agree completely about how to writ...Great review! I agree completely about how to write characters. I look at the difference between a show like Star Trek TNG and Stargate SG-1. Star Trek has the effects and the bigger budget, but they never had the writing. If one of the characters disappeared during Star Trek, it just wasn't a big deal. Ho hum, nothing will change. But when people left Stargate, it felt like the world had shattered, and the reason for that was that you cared so much about these characters personally. The reason you felt so much for the characters was because you'd gotten to know them in episode after episode as you saw what they believed and what they were made of. The Star Trek case, who I liked, never felt much more than props.Ednoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-63872515246659132732011-01-08T12:57:23.426-05:002011-01-08T12:57:23.426-05:00Thanks Anon!Thanks Anon!AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-12599189238703171782011-01-08T01:04:05.605-05:002011-01-08T01:04:05.605-05:00Great review. I love "The Twilight Zone"...Great review. I love "The Twilight Zone" and I think you really nailed it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-90249859294710684012011-01-07T22:29:31.547-05:002011-01-07T22:29:31.547-05:00Writer X, Those seem to be very popular judging by...Writer X, Those seem to be very popular judging by people's responses above.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-25435864960520257122011-01-07T22:15:46.203-05:002011-01-07T22:15:46.203-05:00Anddrew, it's really hard to choose but I thin...Anddrew, it's really hard to choose but I think my fave is when Burgess Meredith plays the brow-beaten, book-loving husband who survives the A-bomb in the bank vault, only to emerge and break his reading glasses when he finds the public library. I also love any of the episodes dealing with outerspace.Writer Xnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-78844926012370617112011-01-07T19:03:07.270-05:002011-01-07T19:03:07.270-05:00Writer X, Yep, I caught the marathon.
It's on...Writer X, Yep, I caught the marathon.<br /><br />It's one of my favorites too! And you're right, nothing comes even close.<br /><br />I agree entirely about the black and white photography. It really pulls you in and somehow makes the whole thing come alive -- which seems counter-intuitive, but is true. If you were going to do these in color and you wanted to get the same level of dramatic effect, you would need to do some sort of strange, stylized lighting, and that would become very gimmicky after you did it a couple times. So the black and white really does help.<br /><br />Got a favorite?AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-28835143475535185662011-01-07T18:47:31.442-05:002011-01-07T18:47:31.442-05:00Oh, I adore THE TWILIGHT ZONE! Andrew, I take it y...Oh, I adore THE TWILIGHT ZONE! Andrew, I take it you caught the Marathon over New Year's? :-)<br /><br />You are so right about the storytelling. It's pitch-perfect. I also think filming in black and white added tremendously to the story, tension, cadence, twists. I'm not sure they would have been as effective in color, regardless of the writing. There's something about the shadows, the layer of sweat on the actor's brow, even the starkness about the black and white. It all adds to great storytelling. It's like you can feel what's happening in each episode. You're not just a viewer.<br /><br />I've seen every episode dozens of times. There's nothing else that comes close.Writer Xnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-90351510181931590372011-01-07T16:19:25.837-05:002011-01-07T16:19:25.837-05:00T_Rav, I often wonder how many of the 1950s libera...T_Rav, I often wonder how many of the 1950s liberals would react to modern liberals? Would they see the contradiction with what they claimed to believe or would they just roll over and join the groupthink? I tend to think they would move to the libertarian end of the spectrum, but you never know. One thing is for sure, Jefferson and Jackson would not approve of what their party has become.<br /><br />My issue with the BM episode is that it seems rather unfair. I don't take him to be a bad man by any stretch. I guess the message is "ask for isolation and you might get it," but it has always struck me as harsh -- especially compared to some of the truly nasty people that so often take center stage in the Twilight Zone.<br /><br />Yeah, the one with the astronauts who think they're all alone is a great one ("I Shot An Arrow"). And let me point out again, that's not a cynical episode. It has an ironic ending, but the punishment was brought on by their own misbehavior. If they (specifically the one guy, but you can argue that others waited too long to control him) had acted like decent human beings then they would have survived. Hence, the lesson is that you can never let society fall apart without nasty consequences.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-85645024789283214022011-01-07T16:07:14.809-05:002011-01-07T16:07:14.809-05:00Andrew, that's certainly a good point. If Serl...Andrew, that's certainly a good point. If Serling was on the Left, it was very much the Old Left. Had he lived long enough to see the full consequences of the new liberalism, I suspect he would have recoiled from it in horror. <br /><br />On the Burgess Meredith episode, that one always bothered me a bit, not because I disliked the message or tone, but because I'm a rather introverted bookworm myself, so it struck rather close to home. (On the other hand, while nearsighted, I'm not blind as a bat without my specs either, so I could have just held the books real close to my face and kept on reading.) Nonetheless, I did appreciate the story, since like you said, it exposes a character flaw we have in common: isolate yourself from the rest of humanity and you may get what you wish for, and then some. <br /><br />There was another episode like that which was probably better, in which astronauts crash-land on what they think is an asteroid, and one decides to follow the law of the jungle and kills the rest to preserve resources for himself, proclaiming that morality no longer exists; then he finds out at the end that the ship actually fell back to Earth and landed in the Nevada desert, only a few miles from civilization. Very haunting, even more so than the BM episode, in my opinion.T_Ravnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-29417932200107371442011-01-07T15:58:34.822-05:002011-01-07T15:58:34.822-05:00Crispy, You have to watch out for those marathons,...Crispy, You have to watch out for those marathons, they can pull you in all weekend if you aren't careful, especially because each episode is only 30 minutes long, so it's easy to say "just until the end of this episode."<br /><br />We never watch the Twilight Zone in school, but it might have been a good idea! LOL!AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-18498841537853880192011-01-07T15:31:40.102-05:002011-01-07T15:31:40.102-05:00One more thing about the Monsters on Maple Street ...One more thing about the Monsters on Maple Street -- I remember watching it in English class in 7th grade specifically because it used the word "idiosyncrasy" and that was one of our vocabulary words that week. It obviously worked enough that I know the word well to this day, LOL!<br /><br />rlaWTX, those marathons suck me in and I get nothing done those days, sheesh! I think Netflix was streaming them a couple months ago, as well.CrispyRicehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07302075204880024936noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-16313629052079608462011-01-07T15:21:50.693-05:002011-01-07T15:21:50.693-05:00rlaWTX, Many of these episodes have entered our fa...rlaWTX, Many of these episodes have entered our family lexicon as well. "It's a cook book!" comes up quite often! LOL!<br /><br />I think it's good evidence of how iconic some of these episodes really are that their quotes have made it into people's daily lives.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-13531028759189166562011-01-07T15:15:07.394-05:002011-01-07T15:15:07.394-05:00DUQ, That's a great episode! And I too love t...DUQ, That's a great episode! And I too love the space episodes. Almost any one of those could have been made into a full length movie today.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-20172380783098316062011-01-07T15:13:30.873-05:002011-01-07T15:13:30.873-05:00Crispy, It's possible, but I don't think T...Crispy, It's possible, but I don't think The Twilight Zone was that limited. The reason I say that is that it had several bases from which to work. For example, some episode were based on exploiting human faults or sins. Others were based on challenging human fears. Others were based on social issues of the time. Others were simply fun. Others were theoretical/philosophical science fiction questions like "what makes us human" and "what is reality." Some were based on "what would happen if..."<br /><br />And within each of these ideas, you had a further 5-6 different bases from which you could operate.<br /><br />Thus, while I'm sure there are formulas and that these episodes could be categorized, I suspect that the number of categories is much, much larger than the X-Files, which had a very narrow premise if you think about it.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-66050892531796662192011-01-07T15:08:01.339-05:002011-01-07T15:08:01.339-05:00Scott, I did check it out, it was very interesting...Scott, I did check it out, it was very interesting. I also checked out the RedLetterMedia review and nearly laughed myself to death at his take on it.<br /><br />Regarding DS9. I didn't like it at first because it seems like a poor-man's rip off of Babylon 5. But it grew on me -- especially Sisko. And I totally agree that the show had a very different feel and they got much deeper into the characters than the other spin offs. In fact, in many ways, it was the best of the spin offs.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-62009531463690053002011-01-07T15:02:57.795-05:002011-01-07T15:02:57.795-05:00I watched the TZ marathon off and on over the week...I watched the TZ marathon off and on over the weekend. It seemed that I kept seeing the ones I had already seen a dozen times. Bad timing on my part; but I did catch several new ones too. Serving Man ("it's a cookbook") has been a part of our family lexicon (along with "it's peeeeople!") all my life - because my dad was a TZ fan - but hadn't ever seen the whole episode til now. "Talking Tina" has also been in the family lexicon too - but that was because my mom liked it! If it was on, I missed it this time - one creepy doll!<br /><br />I saw the aliens on Maple Street for the first time. And the wishing into a field one - I was rooting for that last guy! I didn't get to see the end of the B Meridith book one - too bad he didn't get to read happily ever after.<br /><br />The one with the people stuck in a tubular room who turn out to be dolls struck me as --- memorable. And of course pig-faces.rlaWTXhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09319344164726195144noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-49634314083430500732011-01-07T15:01:40.921-05:002011-01-07T15:01:40.921-05:00Loved the show. I always liked the space-themed s...Loved the show. I always liked the space-themed shows best. Like when they landed on what they thought was Mars, but it would turn out to be Earth after they all killed each other. Those shows were great!DUQhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08746724287720239837noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-42494272494733198172011-01-07T14:44:47.816-05:002011-01-07T14:44:47.816-05:00Well, it may just be more of a "be careful wh...Well, it may just be more of a "be careful what you wish for" episode. Kind of the like the genie in a bottle eps, too.<br /><br />You know, we were watching old X-Files eps and we realized that they basically only have about 4 or 5 archetypes of episodes. Everything fits into those themes. (Ie monster of the week that lives in the forest, sewer, trees...; some creature that lives off human livers, fat, fear...; government experiments gone awry; the "big soap opera story" eps; etc., there weren't many types.) I'd bet you could find a similar categorization with Twilight Zone as well.CrispyRicehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07302075204880024936noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-44348324199134544852011-01-07T14:38:33.070-05:002011-01-07T14:38:33.070-05:00I don't recall any real moment of disagreement...<i>I don't recall any real moment of disagreement or divergence in their characters -- you could have swapped out any other character in any scene without changing the dialog.</i><br /><br />This was Roddenberry's doing. I know I've mentioned this before but, to the best of my knowledge, his initial idea was that there would be no conflict between the crew and that humanity had progressed to the point where things like jealousy and greed would be no more. Rick Berman and Co. might've tried a little too hard to keep to this mantra.<br /><br />I give the producers of DS9 credit for at least trying to branch out (incidentally, Berman didn't have tons of day-to-day involvement with it).<br /><br />You should check out that .pdf file I sent you on the writing of Star Trek: Insurrection. The late writer Michael Piller goes into some detail on this stuff.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-56110692504964457782011-01-07T14:36:28.045-05:002011-01-07T14:36:28.045-05:00Cripsy, That's possible. I'm not sure he&...Cripsy, That's possible. I'm not sure he's exactly nasty to people so much as he's a loner -- his boss and wife are nasty to him, that's for sure. I'm thinking the point is definitely as you say, "being a loner is bad," but it's always struck me that the episode is a bit too harsh toward him? BUT, you could be right, and maybe it's not as cynical as I first assumed? So maybe the show is even less cynical than I believed... which would make it almost entirely cynicism free. Hmmm.<br /><br />I'm going to have to consider the other cynical episodes and see what I can make of those.<br /><br />Good comment!AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-41560411752618708362011-01-07T14:32:36.673-05:002011-01-07T14:32:36.673-05:00Scott, Next time, just lie to me. I don't thi...Scott, Next time, just lie to me. I don't think my blood pressure could take it if you said, "Star Wars? I've never seen it." Ahhhhhh ..... pop! ;-)<br /><br />In terms of STNG, I think there is a definite sense that they didn't have a grasp of who the characters were except in kind of a vague way.<br /><br />But even beyond that, I think they went about it wrong. For example, they had such problems with consistency that it was impossible to create characters in the normal way -- through their actions. Indeed, seemingly every week, they would be spouting off contradictory "principles" and then they would act in ways that didn't conform to either position they had staked out. And as if they had amnesia, the next week they would flip it around and espouse the other view.<br /><br />Moreover, they all acted alike. Seriously, it was like "high school cliche in space." I don't recall any real moment of disagreement or divergence in their characters -- you could have swapped out any other character in any scene without changing the dialog.<br /><br />So instead, I think they substituted trivia to distinguish them. Thus, rather than understanding Riker by witnessing him act in cowardly, arrogant, altrusitic, hateful, pious, swashbucklerian, or any other way, we get a bland shell of a character about whom we're told "he's an excellent officer" and then we get a list of trivia: daddy problems, from Alaska, plays the trombone.<br /><br />And I think I am correct in believing that they thought this was an adequate substitute for character because they even tried to shoehorn the trivia into episodes. Thus, the resolution of Riker's father issues becomes an episode, and the fact he can't hit a high note on a trombone becomes a plot point. With Troi, we know she likes ice cream sundays, so we get an episode where an alien tries to turn her into a glutton. Jordi is bad with women, so we have two episodes where he "falls in love" (read: stalks women) and that becomes plot points.<br /><br />The problem is that none of these things really tell us anything about the characters personally. We need something to sympathize with. And knowing Riker plays an instrument is not enough for people to invest in the character. That's why they really needed to dig deeper into who these people are.<br /><br />I've always felt that was the biggest weakness of STNG. If they had mastered that, STNG would have been so much more.AndrewPricehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11312364467936820986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425587034622601550.post-49571642995873716592011-01-07T14:25:02.586-05:002011-01-07T14:25:02.586-05:00Andrew, if I remember the Burgess Meredith ep corr...Andrew, if I remember the Burgess Meredith ep correctly, he really is a misanthrope. He doesn't treat people well, nor does he show any kindness, nor does he make any attempts to enjoy his hobbies within the confines of living in society. I take the ep as more of a "life isn't perfect and 100% the way you want, but you should appreciate what you do have." In the end, he has all the time and books, but without another human (someone to fix his glasses) it's all useless.CrispyRicehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07302075204880024936noreply@blogger.com