Speaker 1: You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond
Speaker 1: it is another dimension, a dimension of sun, a dimension
Speaker 1: of sight, a dimension of mind. You're moving into a
Speaker 1: land of both shadow and substance of things and ideas.
Speaker 1: You've just crossed over into the Twilight Zone.
Speaker 2: In an interview that was conducted during the third season
Speaker 2: of The Twilight Zone, Road Sailing expressed his fatigue with
Speaker 2: the show. He said, I'm tired of it, as most
Speaker 2: people are when they do a series for three years.
Speaker 2: I was tired after the fourth show. It's been a
Speaker 2: good series. It's not been consistently good, but I don't
Speaker 2: know any one series that is consistently good when you
Speaker 2: shoot each episode in three days. We've been trying gradually
Speaker 2: to get away from the necessity of a gimmick, but
Speaker 2: the show has the stamp of the gimmick and it's
Speaker 2: hooked for now. It's tough to come up with them
Speaker 2: week after week. And this wasn't the only time that
Speaker 2: Rod Sailing spoke about his growing exhaustion. As the series
Speaker 2: progressed by the fifth season, his fatigue must have been
Speaker 2: even more pronounced, and if he felt that the show
Speaker 2: was relying too heavily on the twist ending gimmick, as
Speaker 2: he called it. Perhaps in its fifth year, it needed
Speaker 2: to evolve, with other writers taking on the line's share
Speaker 2: of writing duties. In season five, wrote only six episodes.
Speaker 2: It was clear that times where changing and new themes emerging,
Speaker 2: and this evolution of the show occurred against the backdrop
Speaker 2: of nineteen sixty four, a pivotal year in American history
Speaker 2: marked by social and cultural changes. The civil rights movement
Speaker 2: reached a milestone with the signing of the Civil Rights
Speaker 2: Act of nineteen sixty four by President Lyndon B. Johnson,
Speaker 2: outlawing discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
Speaker 2: The arrival of the Beatles in America sparked a British invasion,
Speaker 2: influencing music and fashion. The Vietnam War was escalating, leading
Speaker 2: to growing anti war sentiment and protests. Culturally, new forms
Speaker 2: of expression in art, music, and literature were emerging in
Speaker 2: fluenced by the beat generation and the burgeoning counterculture movement.
Speaker 2: This period of transformation set the stage for the social
Speaker 2: and political upevils that would define the rest of the decade.
Speaker 2: So if counterculture was leaving its mark on the arts,
Speaker 2: perhaps it was time for the Twilight Zone to address
Speaker 2: that counterculture.
Speaker 3: You know who they are, no, I don't know.
Speaker 4: Strange type of this neighborhood and you stay away from
Speaker 4: a young lady.
Speaker 2: Traditionally the Twilight Zone was the domain of men in
Speaker 2: suits and ties. But as three men ride their motorcycles
Speaker 2: into a white pickard fence neighborhood, the type that we've
Speaker 2: seen over and over in episodes like Walking Distance, maybe
Speaker 2: the show was ready to address the counterculture and leave
Speaker 2: the suits and ties in the closet of instead for
Speaker 2: some black leather jackets.
Speaker 1: Three strangers arrive in a small town, three men in
Speaker 1: black leather jackets and an empty rented house. We'll call
Speaker 1: them Steve and Scott and Fred, but their names are
Speaker 1: not important. Their mission is as three men on motorcycles
Speaker 1: lead us into the twilight'sign.
Speaker 2: First broadcast on January thirty first, nineteen sixty four, written
Speaker 2: by el Hamner Junior and directed by Joseph F.
Speaker 3: Newman.
Speaker 2: So pretty basic opening narration from Rod Sailing where he
Speaker 2: introduces the characters even by name, and says they have
Speaker 2: a mission. So not much to comment on here. And
Speaker 2: our writer tonight is Earl Hamner Junior, who is on
Speaker 2: episode six of his eight episode run, and he shares
Speaker 2: something in common with our director tonight, who is Joseph f.
Speaker 2: New who we have spoken about before, because he is
Speaker 2: one of that new crop of directors who came to
Speaker 2: the show in season five, and he actually has the
Speaker 2: distinction of bookending this season by starting it with in
Speaker 2: praise of Pip. And the thing he has in common
Speaker 2: with al Hamner is they both ended with the Bewitching Pool.
Speaker 2: So I won't go into his bio now, as we
Speaker 2: will have done it before in this season, apart from
Speaker 2: to say that after this episode he only has one
Speaker 2: more credit, one episode of a Western show called The
Speaker 2: Big Valley. So our scene is set. Three bikers come
Speaker 2: to this quiet suburb, attracting suspicious looks from one of
Speaker 2: the residents, Stuugh Tillman, but admiring looks from his daughter
Speaker 2: Ellen Tillman, and the Tilmans settled down for the evening
Speaker 2: in their living room, which is a set that gets
Speaker 2: a lot of use here in season five because as
Speaker 2: we've seen it in ninety years without slumbering and ringed
Speaker 2: in girls so far. But when they do sit down,
Speaker 2: the television loses its picture. The lights flicker, on and off.
Speaker 2: Ellen's radio is picking up strange voices, and Stu Tillman
Speaker 2: notices a new aerial on the roof of the house
Speaker 2: where the three bikers moved in, so Stu goes to investigate.
Speaker 1: Billy, I'm Stu Tillman live over next door. I've been
Speaker 1: having a little trouble over there with my electricity.
Speaker 3: It fades on and off. Are you boys? Don't happen
Speaker 3: to be Ham radio operators? Do you? What's so funny?
Speaker 5: Big Daddy wants to know what's so funny?
Speaker 3: Who are you boys? Anyway? We are Master's Daddyo.
Speaker 2: We came from out of space.
Speaker 3: Take us to your.
Speaker 4: Leader just a minute, or I'll just syntegrated with my
Speaker 4: rag gun.
Speaker 1: Now you wait.
Speaker 2: So, after being pushed around by the bikers, ste does
Speaker 2: forget it after one of the bikers uses powers of
Speaker 2: suggestion to remove it from his mind.
Speaker 3: Still, what is it? What's happened to you? Do? Those men?
Speaker 5: What they've done to you?
Speaker 3: M nothing, They didn't do anything.
Speaker 1: Well, you were you were going to ask them about
Speaker 1: the television interference.
Speaker 3: Oh it wasn't them. There the nice boys. There three
Speaker 3: very nice boys.
Speaker 2: So who are these three very nice boys. Now, I
Speaker 2: won't go too deep into bios on our three Bikers,
Speaker 2: because otherwise this episode will be nothing but bios. But
Speaker 2: let's just briefly go over their careers. Steve has played
Speaker 2: by Michael Frost, who I believe is still with us
Speaker 2: today and has been working as recently as twenty twenty,
Speaker 2: and in contrast to his rugged screen persona, he was
Speaker 2: also an accomplished Shakespearean actor and in Unlocking the Door
Speaker 2: to a Television classic, Martin Graham's junior prints part of
Speaker 2: an interview that he did with Tom Weaver, and Michael says,
Speaker 2: we played aliens on motorcycles in there, and I used
Speaker 2: to ride motorcycles. They gave me a bike that had
Speaker 2: a regular foot clutch, which was the old fashioned kind
Speaker 2: that I was used to riding. So they gave me
Speaker 2: this nineteen thirty nine Harley frame with a brand new
Speaker 2: engine and a foot clutch. They call it a suicide clutch.
Speaker 2: The other bikes had the hand clutch, which of course
Speaker 2: all bikes have now. It was fun because they were
Speaker 2: very hot bikes, and we did wheelies a couple of times,
Speaker 2: which weren't supposed to do, but we got fooling around
Speaker 2: and it was a fun episode to do.
Speaker 3: So.
Speaker 2: The next of our trio is Fred, played by Tom
Speaker 2: gilleran an actor with so few credits to his name
Speaker 2: that I can reel them off for you right now.
Speaker 2: He was in Riverboat in nineteen sixty Alfred Hitchcock Presents
Speaker 2: in nineteen sixty one to nineteen sixty two, four episodes
Speaker 2: in total, an episode of The Donna Reed Show in
Speaker 2: nineteen sixty two, this episode of the Twilight Zone in
Speaker 2: nineteen sixty four, one episode of the TV show Gidget
Speaker 2: in nineteen sixty six, an episode of the FBI in
Speaker 2: nineteen seventy two, one episode of Dallas in nineteen eighty one,
Speaker 2: and two episodes of night Rider in nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 2: So not particularly prolific in acting, and it does suggest
Speaker 2: that maybe he decided that the business wasn't for him,
Speaker 2: and I believe that he left acting and worked in
Speaker 2: real estate for many years. Then finally, Scott is played
Speaker 2: by Leakinsolving and he was born in nineteen thirty eight
Speaker 2: in Boston, Massachusetts. Initially he was a Broadway actor and
Speaker 2: was signed by the same agents who had brought success
Speaker 2: to James Dean and Tad Hunter. He hit television screens
Speaker 2: in nineteen fifty eight and started to do the rounds
Speaker 2: on anthologies like Playhouse ninety and The Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse.
Speaker 2: So things were looking bright. But as he approached the
Speaker 2: mid sixties, although he was working steadily, he hadn't found
Speaker 2: that breakout part that would take him to the next level, so,
Speaker 2: after becoming frustrated, he too quit the business. After that,
Speaker 2: he ran a bar for a couple of years, managed
Speaker 2: Dark Galleries, and then in nineteen seventy two decided to
Speaker 2: spend most of his time on his boat exploring exotic locations.
Speaker 2: But sadly, in nineteen seventy four, at the age of
Speaker 2: thirty six, he died of a mysterious respiratory illness. So
Speaker 2: back to our episode. While Stu Tillman didn't have a
Speaker 2: particularly good running with the bikers, his daughter has quite
Speaker 2: a different experience when the bus that she wants it
Speaker 2: to catch drives away and biker Scott approaches her on
Speaker 2: his motorcycle.
Speaker 6: Did you see that bus?
Speaker 3: It pulled right away?
Speaker 6: It's like a game with them. They just like to
Speaker 6: make people suffer.
Speaker 3: Why do they do that?
Speaker 6: Oh?
Speaker 3: It beats me? Just thank you're lucky stars.
Speaker 6: You don't have to depend on buses to get around.
Speaker 5: Stars are lucky?
Speaker 6: Well, you know that old expression.
Speaker 7: Well, I understand a great deal about the constellations, that
Speaker 7: is the nature of the galactic structure.
Speaker 2: But I mean I dig stars.
Speaker 3: But so they're lucky.
Speaker 7: That's a gas.
Speaker 3: Yes, So are you? One minute you sound like a professor.
Speaker 3: In the next minute you're.
Speaker 6: Talking like a beatnik.
Speaker 2: You need a ride?
Speaker 6: Well, you're not going by the library by any chance,
Speaker 6: are you? I could with me on the back seat?
Speaker 3: Why not?
Speaker 2: So we hear that, Scott and Nish. He doesn't grasp
Speaker 2: that figure of speech that Ellen says. But then it's
Speaker 2: like he remembers that he's supposed to talk a particular
Speaker 2: way and starts to use slang again, and Ellen says
Speaker 2: that he talks like a beatnik.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: One of the things that sticks out about this episode
Speaker 2: is the language, the use of words like daddio and cool,
Speaker 2: and in Rod Selling's closing narration on the previous episode,
Speaker 2: he says this, and.
Speaker 1: Now mister Surling Earl Hamnrid Junior brings his typebreter in
Speaker 1: his ferutile mind back into the twilight. So next time
Speaker 1: with a program about visitors on the service. They're beatniks.
Speaker 1: A few ranchy looking characters and motorcycles draw in a
Speaker 1: tone one day, but once you meet them, you won't
Speaker 1: forget them. They're quite different from what they appear.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: I'm no expert on American history, and I'm not sure
Speaker 2: whether the term beatnick could be used in different ways,
Speaker 2: kind of like how someone might call another person a punk.
Speaker 2: They're not saying that a punk in the context of
Speaker 2: punk music, but they're saying that they're a troublemaker or
Speaker 2: immature or disruptive. So I don't know whether they're called
Speaker 2: beatnicks in that sense, because to me, the three bikers
Speaker 2: who we see here aren't beatnicks. Beatnicks were a kind
Speaker 2: of social and literary movement that took place in the
Speaker 2: nineteen fifties and sixties, and their whole thing was to
Speaker 2: reject societal norms and they embraced the more liberated and
Speaker 2: bohemian lifestyle. Poetry, readings, jazz music, and comfortable clothes were
Speaker 2: the order of the day. But while the gang in
Speaker 2: black leather jackets talk, the beatnick talk, the more in
Speaker 2: line with Marlon Brando's character Johnny Strabler, In the nineteen
Speaker 2: fifty three movie The Wild One, he's the leader of
Speaker 2: a motorcycle gang called the Black Rebels Motorcycle Club. And
Speaker 2: while Johnny does embody a rebellious and anti establishment attitude,
Speaker 2: which is somewhat in line with the Beatnick ethos, he
Speaker 2: isn't really a beatnick either, like I said beat next
Speaker 2: to or more associated with the literary and artistic counterculture
Speaker 2: of the nineteen fifties, focusing on poetry, jazz, and the
Speaker 2: bohemia lifestyle. Johnny, on the other hand, is more of
Speaker 2: an outlaw biker, representing a different kind of rebellion against
Speaker 2: societal norms.
Speaker 1: Hey, where you been?
Speaker 2: Hey?
Speaker 3: Listen, what's happening later?
Speaker 2: What are you gonna do later?
Speaker 3: I work? You gotta go forth, don't you Well? You're
Speaker 3: not gonna work forever? Are you? It looks like it sometimes.
Speaker 8: What I'm talking about tonight after finish up my ten
Speaker 8: years long we're busy, sounds like we're going to be
Speaker 8: busy until you leave here?
Speaker 2: Where are you going when you leave here?
Speaker 3: Don't you know? Hm? Man, We're just gonna go.
Speaker 9: Just trying to make conversation that means nothing to me.
Speaker 3: Well, on the weekends, we go out and have a ball.
Speaker 1: And what do you do?
Speaker 9: I mean, do you just ride around or do you
Speaker 9: go on some sort of a picnic or something?
Speaker 3: A picnic?
Speaker 1: Man, you are too square.
Speaker 7: I'm ya.
Speaker 3: I have to straighten you out.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 8: Listen.
Speaker 1: You don't go any one special place.
Speaker 3: That's cornball style.
Speaker 5: You just go a bunch gets together after all week,
Speaker 5: it builds up you.
Speaker 7: Just the idea is to have a ball.
Speaker 3: Now, if you're gonna stay cool, you.
Speaker 1: Got to whale.
Speaker 3: You got to put something down. You got to make
Speaker 3: some jive.
Speaker 2: Don't you know what I'm talking about?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I know.
Speaker 9: What you mean.
Speaker 1: Well, that's all I'm saying.
Speaker 9: My father was going to take me on a fishing
Speaker 9: trip to Canada once.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we didn't go crazy.
Speaker 2: And his character in that movie became a cultural corner
Speaker 2: of the nineteen fifties, symbolizing youthful defile and the spirit
Speaker 2: of rebellion. So, while there are some overlapping themes of
Speaker 2: nonconformity and rebellion, and also I guess similar youth speak,
Speaker 2: Johnny Strabler is more accurately described as an outlaw biker
Speaker 2: rather than a beatnick. And I'd argue that our characters
Speaker 2: here in black leather jackets would be too. So while
Speaker 2: I think it's inaccurate to call them beat nicks, is
Speaker 2: that the point is that what el Hamner was getting
Speaker 2: at was he showing us that these aliens are getting
Speaker 2: their countercultures mixed up. They dress like bikers, but they
Speaker 2: talk like beatnicks. Or is it the case that Hamner
Speaker 2: just wasn't up on his countercultures? Well, I think in
Speaker 2: Hamner's favor on that one, would Allen have said, you
Speaker 2: talk like a beatnick if he'd have actually looked like
Speaker 2: a beatnick, she'd have just taken that as red. So
Speaker 2: she does have a bit of a sense of why
Speaker 2: you talking like beating it? You don't look like one.
Speaker 2: So I guess we'll give el Hamner the benefit of
Speaker 2: the doubt on that one. But it's not really drawn
Speaker 2: attention to apart from nah the fact that these aliens
Speaker 2: are getting their kind of cultural milestones mixed up and
Speaker 2: melding together these styles. It kind of comes to nothing
Speaker 2: in the episode, but as Scott and Allen rides away
Speaker 2: on Scott's bike, there's a nice shot where the other
Speaker 2: two members of Scott's gang look out of the window disapprovingly,
Speaker 2: and then we cut to Ellen's parents looking out of
Speaker 2: their window disapprovingly too. So while Scott and Allen head
Speaker 2: to the library, we can't help but notice that Ellen's dad, Stu,
Speaker 2: looks very familiar. And that's because Stu Tillman is played
Speaker 2: by Denver Pyle and he was born in nineteen twenty
Speaker 2: in Colorado. Now, depending on your viewing habits, you might
Speaker 2: recall him mouse for the role where he sported a
Speaker 2: big white beard and dungarees and was the uncle of
Speaker 2: those Duke boys in The Dukes of Hazard. But that
Speaker 2: fame in the eighties really was just a tip of
Speaker 2: the iceberg of a career that spanned two hundred and
Speaker 2: sixty seven credits, making him truly one of the hardest
Speaker 2: working actors of his day. As a young man, having
Speaker 2: grown up on a farm, he worked on everything from
Speaker 2: oil fields to shrimp boats before serving in the Navy
Speaker 2: in World War Two. But following the war he went
Speaker 2: back to manual labor, but also took part in some
Speaker 2: amateur dramatics, and it was here that he was spotted
Speaker 2: by a talent scout, and he made his film debut
Speaker 2: in nineteen forty seven in a film called The Guilt
Speaker 2: of Janet Ames, and then the hard work ethic that
Speaker 2: he had as a younger man translated to the screen.
Speaker 2: Often in his early career he would take uncredited sidekick roles,
Speaker 2: but later on his association with John Wayne Will lead
Speaker 2: them to work on several of the Duke's movies like
Speaker 2: The Horse Soldiers, The Man Who Shot Liberty, Balance, and
Speaker 2: The Alamo, and he was often cast as older than
Speaker 2: he was because of his prematurely white hair, but it
Speaker 2: was not old age that beat him in the end.
Speaker 2: Denver passed away in nineteen ninety seven of lung cancer,
Speaker 2: but not before The Dukes of Hazard Reunion movie was
Speaker 2: released that year, and he also received the honor of
Speaker 2: a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, attending the
Speaker 2: ceremony despite his weakness from his illness. So when Ellen
Speaker 2: and Scott drive off into the night on Scott's motorbike,
Speaker 2: we are coming up to halfway through the episode, and
Speaker 2: while the language the bikers use is a bit goofy
Speaker 2: and dated, it's not the only reason why this feels
Speaker 2: a bit different from your usual Twilight Zone. Maybe in
Speaker 2: the fifth season that's a good thing. So let's just
Speaker 2: keep an eye on that for the moment. But when
Speaker 2: Ellen and Scott decide to take a walk to the
Speaker 2: library through the park, this happens pretty.
Speaker 3: Isn't it.
Speaker 9: Mm hm?
Speaker 6: You know this is kind of a special place with me.
Speaker 6: I come you sometimes and I just try to figure
Speaker 6: things out, like what, Well, for one thing, did you
Speaker 6: know that you have lived next door to me for
Speaker 6: a week and you've never said hello, Hello?
Speaker 3: My name is Ellen, my name is Scott.
Speaker 1: Where are you from?
Speaker 9: I mean, where did you live before you move next door?
Speaker 7: Long way from here?
Speaker 5: Where I doubt you ever even heard of?
Speaker 2: It?
Speaker 8: Could be geography is one of my worst subjects.
Speaker 3: Have you finished school? Yes? Ten years ago?
Speaker 6: Ten years ago?
Speaker 3: You're not that at old.
Speaker 7: I'm older than you'd think.
Speaker 5: My people just don't show their age well by time.
Speaker 9: It's the same way.
Speaker 6: You know, my grandmother lived to be ninety and you
Speaker 6: would have taken when he was sixty until we eh,
Speaker 6: she died.
Speaker 5: I've never seen anything so beautiful now.
Speaker 2: When this episode was given a production number, Martin Graham's
Speaker 2: junior writes that it was originally titled Love Story, And
Speaker 2: you could say that this is where the episode kind
Speaker 2: of screeches to a halt and we get thrown over
Speaker 2: the handlebars. Scott and Allen start to fall for each other,
Speaker 2: and Steve and Fred look on disapprovingly as they man
Speaker 2: a huge computer bank.
Speaker 3: Be at ease. Where is your brother? You no longer
Speaker 3: trust our brother? What has he done?
Speaker 2: Formed an attachment here with one of the people.
Speaker 3: What kind of attachment? I'm not sure yet.
Speaker 2: He's with a young girl in spite of our orders.
Speaker 3: Proceed without him. Good. We've been in touch with all units.
Speaker 4: The second wave has landed successfully and has concealed as planned.
Speaker 4: The landing of a third wave, we will be in
Speaker 4: key position us throughout the country.
Speaker 3: Excellent. The people, are they suspicious? Not a bit?
Speaker 4: They are stupid race, as our research stutus an inferior breed.
Speaker 4: Given the killing, hatred, making war, greed and cruelly to
Speaker 4: one another.
Speaker 3: The universe can well do with that.
Speaker 4: Then you will receive your instructions for the final move
Speaker 4: in a few days.
Speaker 2: So these two aliens Shor did lose trust in their
Speaker 2: brother quickly, and they informed their leader of that. And
Speaker 2: we discovered that this is a plot to take over
Speaker 2: the world, and this is just one of several teams
Speaker 2: who are doing it, so why did they choose the
Speaker 2: names Scott, Steve and Fred Well. In his book Dimensions
Speaker 2: Behind the Twilight Zone, Stuart Staniard speaks to el Hamner
Speaker 2: Junior and asks him black Leather Jacket seems to be
Speaker 2: a precursor to biker films of the mid to late sixties,
Speaker 2: and el Hamner says, oh, yes, they stole that idea
Speaker 2: from me.
Speaker 6: No.
Speaker 2: The only similarity I can find to real life of
Speaker 2: the guys in the Leather Jacket story with the fact
Speaker 2: that there were kids in my neighborhood, my son Scott
Speaker 2: and the Kooch's boy Steve and the next door neighbor
Speaker 2: the hobblets on Fred all had mini bikes and they
Speaker 2: used to terrorize the neighborhood with their mini bikes. There
Speaker 2: was an English lady, Pamela Goldstein who lived next door,
Speaker 2: who would get hoses out and throw water at them
Speaker 2: and shout be gone. As a matter of fact, I
Speaker 2: even call those characters Freddie, Scott and Steve. And I
Speaker 2: understand a lot of people who felt that episode was
Speaker 2: rather faultily constructed with a lot of holes in it,
Speaker 2: but I still had the fun of naming the characters
Speaker 2: after my son and his friends. I don't think they
Speaker 2: were especially pleased about it. Now, in the middle of
Speaker 2: this episode, there is a space for a commercial break,
Speaker 2: and prior to the break, we see the two brothers
Speaker 2: speaking to their leader on the bank of s Greens
Speaker 2: at their house. And then after the break we see
Speaker 2: them there again, but this time five days have passed
Speaker 2: and we'll learn that Scott has been seeing Ellen for
Speaker 2: those five days and this has caused the alien commander
Speaker 2: to lose trust in them too, and the other two
Speaker 2: are to continue with the plan themselves. Now, the alien
Speaker 2: leader is depicted as just a huge eye on the screen,
Speaker 2: and it's a bit of a strange choice considering the
Speaker 2: aliens themselves seem to take on human form, So if
Speaker 2: he's just taken on human form, why doesn't he just
Speaker 2: sit in front of the screen. But this wasn't how
Speaker 2: he was described in the original script. In the original
Speaker 2: script it said, over the heads of the three men,
Speaker 2: we see a screen where a being of some kind
Speaker 2: is visible. It is ahead a metallic mask with slits
Speaker 2: for eyes, nose, and lips. Now, central to this story
Speaker 2: is the love affair between Scott and Ellen, which sabotages
Speaker 2: Scott's ability to take part in the alien invasion plot,
Speaker 2: and possibly sabotage is the episode itself. So with about
Speaker 2: ten minutes left, we are treated to a scene between
Speaker 2: Ellen and Scott with the dialogue is so clunky that
Speaker 2: it feels like George Lucas might have used it as
Speaker 2: inspiration for the Infamous I don't like sand scene between
Speaker 2: Padme and Anakin in Attack of the Clones.
Speaker 3: You like me, don't you?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 3: You know that, Scott very much?
Speaker 2: Yes, very much.
Speaker 3: Do you know the word love?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 3: Of course, silly? What an odd question?
Speaker 5: What's odd about it?
Speaker 7: Don't you read your newspapers, your magazines, listen to your
Speaker 7: television programs, your radio?
Speaker 2: We have we, Scott?
Speaker 6: Who is we?
Speaker 7: Well, that doesn't matter. It is filled with hate, Ellen, hate, violence, mistrust.
Speaker 7: I don't see how anyone as nice as you have
Speaker 7: survived this long.
Speaker 3: Well, I'm certainly no different from anybody else.
Speaker 5: I haven't seen a single report on anyone.
Speaker 1: Like you report, Scott.
Speaker 4: You're talking riddles.
Speaker 6: Sometimes you make me feel like an insect under a microscope.
Speaker 2: Please, I'd like to go home.
Speaker 1: Got it?
Speaker 6: I'm very sorry, but I feel as though you have
Speaker 6: been lying to me. I don't know why or what
Speaker 6: it is you're trying to hide, but I know you're
Speaker 6: not what you're seeing.
Speaker 5: What if I'm not?
Speaker 7: Do you think you're in any position to judge me?
Speaker 5: Any of you?
Speaker 3: Please?
Speaker 2: I would like to go home.
Speaker 5: I'm sorry, Ellen, It's my fault.
Speaker 3: I expected too much. Now.
Speaker 2: I know Scott is an alien and his use of
Speaker 2: the language can be off sometimes, but I still find
Speaker 2: the dialogue here and in several other scenes to be
Speaker 2: pretty bad. But while Scott and Allen talk about whatever
Speaker 2: that was, let's meet the woman who played Ellen. Shelley
Speaker 2: Fabrerez plays Ellen, and she was born in nineteen forty
Speaker 2: four in Santa Monica, California, and her aunt was a
Speaker 2: singer and comedian called Nanette Fabri who was successful in
Speaker 2: the business in several shows of the fifties and sixties,
Speaker 2: and she appeared in things like Playhouse ninety. But her
Speaker 2: renditions of songs can also be heard on several soundtracks,
Speaker 2: most recently a version of that entertainment in the movie
Speaker 2: Joker Folio dur So. Shelley started early in the business,
Speaker 2: tap dancing at the age of three, modeling in school
Speaker 2: and at the age of eleven, appearing on television in
Speaker 2: shows like Mattine Theater and Captain Midnight, but it was
Speaker 2: their teenage years that really cemented her star status, becoming
Speaker 2: a teen idol in film like Rock Pretty Baby, where
Speaker 2: she played Twinkie daily and again in its sequel Summer
Speaker 2: Love in nineteen fifty eight. So by the time she
Speaker 2: hits the Twilight Zone in nineteen sixty four, she'd have
Speaker 2: been about nineteen or twenty years old, and thankfully she
Speaker 2: was able to make that transition from teen star to
Speaker 2: adult star when a lot of other teen idols of
Speaker 2: hair generation fizzled out. And after the Twilight Zone, she
Speaker 2: had parts in the Elvis movies Girl Happy, spin Out,
Speaker 2: and clam Bake, and then transitioned mainly into television going Forward,
Speaker 2: where she worked all the way up to two thousand
Speaker 2: and six, and one of her lastree caring roles was
Speaker 2: as Mark Kent in Superman the animated series. So what
Speaker 2: we find out is that the aliens have a plot
Speaker 2: to put bacteria in a reservoir that will wipe out
Speaker 2: all the people in the area, and we learn this
Speaker 2: when the alien leader is speaking with Steve and Fred,
Speaker 2: but Scott overhears, and when they notice him, he runs
Speaker 2: away to Ellen's house. And the way it kind of
Speaker 2: plays is that Scott is shocked by this, But what
Speaker 2: exactly did he think they were there to do? He
Speaker 2: wouldn't have come to Earth for nothing, And as we
Speaker 2: hear in a moment, he knows every other aspect of
Speaker 2: the plan. If he's not into it, he's had a
Speaker 2: whole week of dating Allen to do something about it.
Speaker 5: We came from out there, Ellen, from beyond those stars,
Speaker 5: the thousands.
Speaker 2: Of us on this planet right now.
Speaker 5: Our people need space. We've come here to set up colonies.
Speaker 6: Scott, you can't be serious.
Speaker 5: We have had bacteria units in every country on this
Speaker 5: planet for months. Each unit has enough germs to poison
Speaker 5: the drinking supply of the entire world population.
Speaker 6: I will walk with you over to your friend's house.
Speaker 1: You had better wake them and let them call you
Speaker 1: a doctor.
Speaker 2: Now you've got to listeners.
Speaker 6: Good please, I love you, but you're not wildn.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 2: I often say that I don't need Twilight Own episodes
Speaker 2: to join every dot for me. I see them as
Speaker 2: fables and will accept a lot as long as everything
Speaker 2: generally hangs together and the message is delivered intact, but
Speaker 2: what exactly is the message here?
Speaker 3: Now?
Speaker 2: Granted, not everything needs to have a message. Sometimes something
Speaker 2: can just be a story for the sake of it,
Speaker 2: and that's fine, but the episode does seem to be
Speaker 2: reaching for something. You know, a love story about an
Speaker 2: alien who is part of an invasion force changing his
Speaker 2: mind because he falls in love and learns what love is.
Speaker 2: You know, there's a story in that. But this is
Speaker 2: just so undercooked. It would have made a lot more
Speaker 2: sense if Scott was falling for Ellen, and the more
Speaker 2: he fell for her, the more he began to reflect
Speaker 2: on why they were there and why he didn't want
Speaker 2: to be part of her anymore. But this just plays
Speaker 2: like he forgot about it and it doesn't really make
Speaker 2: any sense. So things come to a head, and while
Speaker 2: Scott continues to try and do the right thing, unfortunately
Speaker 2: things are more advanced than we thought, and when Ellen's
Speaker 2: family try to report it to the deputy Sheriff, it
Speaker 2: turns out that the deputy sheriff is one of them
Speaker 2: two and the ever ready men in white coats come
Speaker 2: to take Scott away. In the Twilight Zone, companion Mark
Speaker 2: Zickri says the episode is filled with wild implosibilities, such
Speaker 2: as the fact that these creatures attempting to blend into
Speaker 2: the background as much as possible so that they can
Speaker 2: surreptitiously poison the water supply. Assume disguise is guaranteed to
Speaker 2: attract the eye of every nervous suburbanite. Then there's the
Speaker 2: matter of one of them falling in love with a
Speaker 2: pretty little Native girl. Although he has telekinetic powers, the
Speaker 2: smith and alien makes no effect to prove his claim
Speaker 2: that he's from outer space by demonstrating his otherworldly abilities,
Speaker 2: So not un much to disagree with Dare. And then
Speaker 2: there are the reviews from critics of the day that
Speaker 2: Martin Graham's junior quotes in Unlocking the Door to a
Speaker 2: television Classic, and he writes that Edwin Matteski, a television columnist,
Speaker 2: gave a rundown of the shows that had been presented
Speaker 2: on the program for the past few weeks, including Probe seven,
Speaker 2: Over and Out, Number twelve, Looks Just Like You, and
Speaker 2: The Long Morrow, and he said that they were underdone,
Speaker 2: sometimes mediocre type of science fiction from the level of
Speaker 2: great science fiction ala Ray Brabery or Isaac Asimov or
Speaker 2: Our Long sailing the Twilight Soon has tumbled, for the
Speaker 2: most part, into the bleak pedestrian world of pulp science fiction. Now,
Speaker 2: I wouldn't necessarily agree with him with some of the
Speaker 2: other episodes that he quoted, but I probably would with
Speaker 2: this one. And another newspaper columnist said that this was
Speaker 2: more an outer limit episode than anything else, and I
Speaker 2: would probably agree with that too. Throughout the history of
Speaker 2: the Twilight Zone podcast, I've made it a point to
Speaker 2: set aside preconceived notions and give each episode a fair chance,
Speaker 2: regardless of its reputation. But it's hard to ignore the
Speaker 2: shadow that black Leather Jackets casts. So where do we begin?
Speaker 2: Does it disave its infamy as one of the worst
Speaker 2: Twilight Zone episodes. I've often said that the Twilight Zone
Speaker 2: is a product of its time, but most of the
Speaker 2: time it's also timeless. The fashion of the nineteen fifties
Speaker 2: and sixties, for example, rarely feels outdated. Fashions evolve, but
Speaker 2: there's something enduring about a well tailored suit on a man,
Speaker 2: or the kind of attire that the women of the
Speaker 2: Twilight Zone wear. These styles not only remain appealing today,
Speaker 2: but they also harken back to the earlier decades, as
Speaker 2: men's suits had been staples in American fashion since the
Speaker 2: early nineteen hundreds. So because of this, the Twilight Zone
Speaker 2: feels classic but seldom dated until now. By the time
Speaker 2: Black Leather Jackets aired, it had been ten years since
Speaker 2: Marlon Brando's rebellious ten in the Wild one where he
Speaker 2: rode a motorcycle in jeans and a leather jacket, So
Speaker 2: by now this look wasn't new by any means, but
Speaker 2: it was still fresh in the world of the Twilight Zone,
Speaker 2: where protagonists were typically clad in those timeless formal styles.
Speaker 2: So in that context, the ganging leather jacket does feel
Speaker 2: like a disruption. So there is something potentially intriguing here,
Speaker 2: the idea of our classic Twilight Zone world being invaded
Speaker 2: by this anarchic new generation the bikers, and for these
Speaker 2: rebellious figures to turn out to be actual invaders from
Speaker 2: another world. So that parallel does seem very much in
Speaker 2: line with the show's sensibilities. So what went wrong? I
Speaker 2: do think part of it is the language. The beatnick
Speaker 2: slang feels painfully dated now, so while tailored suit and
Speaker 2: leather jackets might have a timeless appeal, this mode of
Speaker 2: talking with its daddios and far out sounds ridiculous to
Speaker 2: modern ears. And whether they are beat Nicks or whether
Speaker 2: they are bikers, this ethos of rejecting traditional American values,
Speaker 2: a theme that is rich with potential, is barely explored
Speaker 2: in any meaningful way. At the time this episode aired,
Speaker 2: Earl Hamner Junior was forty years old, But more significant
Speaker 2: than his age was the fact that he wasn't really
Speaker 2: part of the counterculture. Now, I know you don't need
Speaker 2: to be part of a thing to write about a thing,
Speaker 2: but when you read the works of true beat Nicks,
Speaker 2: you realize just how difficult it is to capture that spirit.
Speaker 2: It's not something you can fake. The language and philosophy
Speaker 2: of the Beat generation comes from a deeply rooted rebellion
Speaker 2: against convention, and if you're not part of that movement,
Speaker 2: it's hard to authentically replicate their voice. Dropping a few
Speaker 2: catchphrases like daddio without fully understanding the subculture just feels hollow.
Speaker 2: But as we said earlier, maybe that's the point that
Speaker 2: the aliens are faking it, and that they are just
Speaker 2: a mishmash of different cultures, not understanding any of them.
Speaker 2: But If that's the case, it seems that so little
Speaker 2: is done with that there's no payoff to the whole thing. Now,
Speaker 2: to be fair, this poor use of the language. El
Speaker 2: Hamner wasn't alone in struggling with that. Even Rod Sailing
Speaker 2: stumbled when trying to write for youth culture in his
Speaker 2: nineteen sixty nine show The New People.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: It didn't feature beating it specifically, but it did involve
Speaker 2: a group of young people stranded on an island, and
Speaker 2: the attempt to catch a youth speak was just as
Speaker 2: cringe inducing as this.
Speaker 10: I'm not going to take too much of your time,
Speaker 10: Sunny Share Center mission time. Well, now you've got the
Speaker 10: authority to stop this tour handah chet, I've got the
Speaker 10: authority to confiscate that guitar and then feed it to
Speaker 10: your strings.
Speaker 3: First. Wow, there's a serious cat.
Speaker 10: Man, all right, by young Grahams. I'm going to give
Speaker 10: you the bottom line.
Speaker 2: But perhaps the biggest flow in Black Leather Jacket is
Speaker 2: that it just doesn't feel like a Twilight Zone. The
Speaker 2: show is proven, it can take many forms, and even
Speaker 2: in the lesser episodes, it is often a distinctive quality
Speaker 2: that still makes it unmistakably twilight Zone. Here, however, the
Speaker 2: core of the story is a shallow love plot that
Speaker 2: ultimately says nothing significant. Yet this episode held the potential
Speaker 2: to comment on much deeper themes, counterculture, rebellion, the friction
Speaker 2: between generations. The nineteen sixties were a period when the polished,
Speaker 2: idealized image of nineteen fifties domesticity began to crack. A
Speaker 2: shift was underway from the rigid expectations of the past
Speaker 2: to a more complex, turbulent future defined by civil rights,
Speaker 2: youth culture, and a rejection of conformity in black leather jackets.
Speaker 2: There was an opportunity to explore the changing tides of
Speaker 2: an era, the angst and uphevial simmering beneath the surface,
Speaker 2: with the advancement of youth represented by an alien invasion.
Speaker 2: But instead the episode just feels devoid of any substance.
Speaker 2: And maybe that's okay if on the surface it's still entertaining,
Speaker 2: But I think it'll also fall short of even providing
Speaker 2: that surface level entertainment.
Speaker 1: Portrait of an American family and the eve of invasion
Speaker 1: from outer space. Of course, we know it's merely fiction,
Speaker 1: and yet think twice when you drink your next class
Speaker 1: of water. Find out that it's from your local reservoir,
Speaker 1: or possibly it came direct to you from the Twilight.
Speaker 2: On Okay, black leather jackets, that was one that a
Speaker 2: lot of people mentioned to me as being one that
Speaker 2: they were kind of looking forward to be being covered.
Speaker 2: But maybe not for necessarily the right reasons.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: So let's go over to our friends in the after
Speaker 2: hours club to see what they thought of it. Now,
Speaker 2: over there, I put a vote up to see whether
Speaker 2: people think it's top tier, middle tier or bottom tier
Speaker 2: twilight Zone, and the vote well, like this top tier
Speaker 2: two percent. Now, that would have been one person, and
Speaker 2: I think he fessed up to it that it was
Speaker 2: Chad Boykin, our friend, the writer of the Twilight Zone
Speaker 2: hi Q, and he'd been at the Golden Daylight that night,
Speaker 2: so he he did a bit of a drunken vote
Speaker 2: on that one. Now we have twelve percent say it's
Speaker 2: middle tier, okay, and then bottom tier are whopping eighty
Speaker 2: six percent. Have we had a bottom tier that high?
Speaker 2: I'm not too sure, but it's a high one for sure.
Speaker 2: So let's hear what people have to say about it. Okay,
Speaker 2: We've had a lot of comments, so I'll just try
Speaker 2: and zip through them. So thank you everyone for your comments. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: with this many won't be able to really personalize any responses,
Speaker 2: but we'll just zip through.
Speaker 3: So.
Speaker 2: Our friend Liam Young says, I rewatched. I rewatched this
Speaker 2: having memories of being terrible. I have to say that
Speaker 2: it wasn't as bad as I remembered, and I actually
Speaker 2: quite enjoyed. It shows what managing expectations can do for
Speaker 2: your perception of something. Had a touch or valley of
Speaker 2: the shadow about it, but done for a teen audience.
Speaker 2: Our friend Joshua Haired says, really more of an outer
Speaker 2: limit episode that Ale couldn't sell right, and this is
Speaker 2: an Earl Hamner junior script good Night Ale. Our friend
Speaker 2: Jason Schwartz says it's bad, like really bad, daddy O.
Speaker 2: But I kind of enjoy it because it's so bad,
Speaker 2: like watching Mystery Science Theater three thousand. It's still low tea,
Speaker 2: but I like it. It's like when you eat something
Speaker 2: terrible and immediately turn to the person next to you
Speaker 2: and say, hey, try this well, not sit next to
Speaker 2: you again. Jason, okay. So, Our old friend Al Shadsman says, oh,
Speaker 2: it's awful. Dreadful, horrible, and it seemed to be on
Speaker 2: every other time that I turned on a TZ rerun
Speaker 2: when I was a kid. But I've seen it enough
Speaker 2: time times now that it's sort of grown on me. Well, Al,
Speaker 2: you are a fan of the Bard, so you know
Speaker 2: everything's fair game. Airing early two months after the Kennedy assassination,
Speaker 2: you could think of it as a classic Cold War commentary,
Speaker 2: but the elements in employees were already dated. Brando's The
Speaker 2: Wild One was ten years before, and fifties SF films
Speaker 2: were already gutted with the they came from out of
Speaker 2: space to conquerors motifs. The whole thing plays like a
Speaker 2: ridiculous parody, a mad magazine pastiche. On that level, it
Speaker 2: works brilliantly. It is a parody, isn't it.
Speaker 9: Thank you?
Speaker 3: Al.
Speaker 2: Our friend Whitney Beeler says, I really dig the way
Speaker 2: the bikers sequentially park and dismount their bikes. Man, listen, Dad, Yo.
Speaker 2: As a TZ fan, I think I'm supposed to dislike
Speaker 2: this story. Honestly, I can't totally dismiss it. It's enjoyable
Speaker 2: and at the very least is never dull. The impending
Speaker 2: doom that's coming to the planet is not a pleasant thought,
Speaker 2: especially knowing that the bikers aliens will soon poison the
Speaker 2: water supply, never mind that the alien seems to have
Speaker 2: forgotten about a substantial number of humans with well water.
Speaker 2: The episode reminds me of an earlier version of The Invaders,
Speaker 2: Quinn Martin's TV series, especially the deputy that intervenes in
Speaker 2: the relationship between Scott and Allen. Ultimately, this is somehow
Speaker 2: silly and grim at the same time, and that's part
Speaker 2: of its appeal. Still at my bottom tier, but seems
Speaker 2: to be creeping up my list. Thank you, Whitney. Our
Speaker 2: friend Steve Badger says, Shelley Fabres looked great in this.
Speaker 2: She was in three Alvis movies in the mid sixties. Anyway,
Speaker 2: what was the question? Oh, yeah, bottom tier. I'm afraid
Speaker 2: despite Shelley Fabres being in it, did I mention she
Speaker 2: looks great? Thank you, Steve. Am If anyone was going
Speaker 2: to mention the Alvis connection, I knew it would be you.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: I actually have met Steve a couple of times and
Speaker 2: he has like the best Elvas shrine going in his house.
Speaker 2: Our friend Michael Clark says, a bit of an unintended comedy.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Michael cerebral P says, I like this one, but probably
Speaker 2: better suited for an hour long episode. It would have
Speaker 2: been great to see a spaceship landing or some bedlam enchewing.
Speaker 2: It's difficult to imagine the scale of the invasion force,
Speaker 2: though I'm sure a select group of paranoid individuals in
Speaker 2: the sixties were wary of Beatnicks on bikes. It's the
Speaker 2: cheese baked on top of the bottom tier, a healthy
Speaker 2: saving of hammer O Greton, Thank you, cerebral P. Brian
Speaker 2: Griffin says black leather pajamas, pantalons, el fuego. But since
Speaker 2: this was jackets, no mass, Thank you, Brian. Okay, Chad
Speaker 2: boych and here he is the drunken polster, he says,
Speaker 2: top tier all the way, but I've had too many
Speaker 2: golden delights. I may regret this in the morning. Well,
Speaker 2: I hope you took a long look at yourself in
Speaker 2: the morning, Chad. Michael Fahnbach says bottom tier. But it's
Speaker 2: almost like a condensed version of those cheesy science fiction
Speaker 2: alien movies from the fifties. That mystery signs theater three
Speaker 2: thousand like to tackle. So while it's bottom tier, it's
Speaker 2: not without some entertainment value. Thank you, Michael. Our friend
Speaker 2: Professor John says, despite the fact that Black Leather Jackets
Speaker 2: features Michael Forrest, who masterfully played the Gord Apollo in
Speaker 2: the original Star Trek, this episode is a bit silly
Speaker 2: and poorly executed.
Speaker 3: I agree.
Speaker 2: Our friend Andrew Snyder says, I consider this by far
Speaker 2: the waste episode of the entire series. It's as if
Speaker 2: Hamner were trying to do The Wild One as a
Speaker 2: Twilight Zone episode. A failure on every level. It actually
Speaker 2: hits to watch this because I can easily imagine the
Speaker 2: network executives doing so and deciding it was time to
Speaker 2: cancel the series. Our friend Ben Carkem says terrible. Sorry, Well,
Speaker 2: I'm sorry too, Ben. Our friend Michael Lynn says, just
Speaker 2: a bad story episode, not much to add to earlier comments.
Speaker 2: Considered a low point. Tough to imagine that Hamner also
Speaker 2: wrote The Hunt, which was an excellent episode. Issue may
Speaker 2: have been that Hamner's strength was folksy, perhaps even old
Speaker 2: fashioned tales versus contemporary sci fi fantasy. Our friend John
Speaker 2: Hayes says, very bad, very very bad, bad writing. Bad acting,
Speaker 2: nothing redeeming about it. Thank you, John. Our old friend
Speaker 2: Uncommon Nasa says, I wanted to like this episode a
Speaker 2: law for a while. I pushed it to mid tier
Speaker 2: just on its concept alone, but after watching several times,
Speaker 2: its slow pace and dry acting from the main biker
Speaker 2: make it lower tier. It's a shame that Hammner is
Speaker 2: known for this episode, sometimes more than the classic The Hunt.
Speaker 2: There is a good episode buried in here, but not
Speaker 2: many of uncovered it yet, and I haven't either. Our
Speaker 2: friend Joe Brown says, this episode is just not good.
Speaker 2: Aliens using the trope to blend in with Earthlings in
Speaker 2: order to facilitate a takeover, and they won't even no
Speaker 2: it's coming is poorly done. I look at this as
Speaker 2: a Trojan Horse story that turns into west Side story
Speaker 2: or the wild Ones. Tough kids aliens bent on destruction
Speaker 2: while one of them gets sidetracked by a love interest,
Speaker 2: causing the infiltrators aliens to leave them behind branded as
Speaker 2: a traitor. It's just so bad it reminds me of
Speaker 2: a B movie. In twenty five minutes. Bottom of the
Speaker 2: bottom tier. Thank you, Joe. Our friend Adam Scriven says,
Speaker 2: it's close to the very bottom of the series. For me,
Speaker 2: it's certainly in the bottom ten and possibly the bottom five.
Speaker 2: It was written like someone in the twenty twenties was
Speaker 2: trying the stereotype in nineteen sixties, not like a contemporary
Speaker 2: commentary on current culture. Thank you, Adam. We're almost there, man,
Speaker 2: This one feels like a marathon. Okay, Jordan Dlock, our
Speaker 2: friend says, come on, it's not that bad. It can't
Speaker 2: be the human and it doesn't make me cringe like
Speaker 2: Cavender is coming. Thank you, Jordan. Our friend Joseph Lesino says,
Speaker 2: this episode has to go in the bototier in my ranking. However,
Speaker 2: this doesn't prevent the episode from being an interesting, campy episode.
Speaker 2: To me, this episode is a window into how counterculture
Speaker 2: could and would be shown to a nineteen sixty four audience.
Speaker 2: It could also be seen as a spoof sci fi
Speaker 2: at the time. All in all, can be fun to
Speaker 2: examine and sometimes watch. And our friend Josh Chambers finally says,
Speaker 2: oh boy, oh okay, we got through it.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 2: That was a lot of comments.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: I don't think I've thanked the new members of the
Speaker 2: After Hours Club for a while now. So I'm going
Speaker 2: to go back a little bit and I might double
Speaker 2: up on these board. I just want to make sure
Speaker 2: that I thank people because I really do appreciate when
Speaker 2: people come aboard. So I want to thank Chris Pulman
Speaker 2: for joinings. Thank you, Chris, Jay, thank you for coming
Speaker 2: on board. James la Grotta, Thank you, James. Appreciate it.
Speaker 2: Aaron and Maxwell, thank you both for coming on. I
Speaker 2: really appreciate you coming on board. Christopher Sadler, Thank you, Christopher.
Speaker 2: Thank you for coming to the After Hours Club. My
Speaker 2: old friend Cassie, sailing Fest attendee and longtime friends of
Speaker 2: the show. Thank you. Jeffrey kat came on board. Thank you, Jeffrey.
Speaker 2: Appreciate it. And finally John Caderet my old friend John Caderett.
Speaker 2: I remember you, John. Don't you worry about that? Okay?
Speaker 2: Next on the Twilight and Podcast, I was hoping to
Speaker 2: get another episode out before Christmas, because I know we
Speaker 2: had that big summer break because of Sailing Fest. But
Speaker 2: time has just caught up with me as it always
Speaker 2: tends to do. And after this one, we will be
Speaker 2: going into our December Twilight and Podcast Advent calendar, and
Speaker 2: then that will lead up to Christmas Day, when I
Speaker 2: will be presenting a version of my Sailing Fest presentation,
Speaker 2: which is called No Christmas this year. So that's the
Speaker 2: plan for decem But it went down really well last
Speaker 2: time and everyone seemed to make good comments about the
Speaker 2: advent calendar, so I hope you enjoy it this time.
Speaker 2: But don't worry. I will still be working behind the
Speaker 2: scenes so that we can hopefully hit the ground running
Speaker 2: in January with our next episode. But before that, let's
Speaker 2: hear some comments on black leather Jackets.
Speaker 9: Hi, Tom, I'm here to give a rare defense of
Speaker 9: black leather jackets. Ever since I started reading The Twilight
Speaker 9: Own Companion as a kid, I remembered reading how terrible
Speaker 9: this episode was. It was also sort of hard to
Speaker 9: find the episode because when they started releasing them on DVD,
Speaker 9: they were done nonsequentially, so I never saw it on
Speaker 9: DVD until the box sets were released. But when I
Speaker 9: saw it, I could tell it was bad, but it
Speaker 9: wasn't terrible. It was a little bit funny, but the
Speaker 9: brand of humor doesn't seem quite as obvious anymore. It's
Speaker 9: tongue in cheek, it's really self aware, and it's similar
Speaker 9: to any number of alien invasion comic book stories from
Speaker 9: the fifties. The sensibility of the episode actually reminds me
Speaker 9: a whole lot of an episode of Alfared Hitchcock Presents
Speaker 9: It's in the fifth season, called Special Delivery. It's an
Speaker 9: alien invasion story that involves aliens persuading kids to grow
Speaker 9: mushrooms in their basements, and while black leather jackets used
Speaker 9: as a more realistic extermination method, both of them are
Speaker 9: handled with the same kind of ridiculousness, and that's really
Speaker 9: the fun of it. The radio adaptation of the episode
Speaker 9: does a whole lot better at playing up some of
Speaker 9: the campy fifty style lingo and making the aliens behave
Speaker 9: in more dated ways, but the overarching joke of the
Speaker 9: aliens behaving in a dated way hasn't age very well.
Speaker 9: For good reason. It's that most people can't tell the
Speaker 9: difference between popular slang of the fifties and of the
Speaker 9: early sixties. I think at the time this would have
Speaker 9: been a whole lot more obvious and funny. There are
Speaker 9: a few other things that I'd like. The aliens justify
Speaker 9: their invasion by saying that mankind is cruel and violent,
Speaker 9: but then they bully the father needlessly and then brainwash
Speaker 9: him into thinking that they're good people. The aliens also
Speaker 9: seem to restrict their telekinesis to the most trivial things possible,
Speaker 9: like doors and window blinds. The romance element of the
Speaker 9: episode is not meant to be taken seriously. It's a
Speaker 9: step removed from what is this thing you humans call love?
Speaker 9: I don't think there's any message beyond the surface level
Speaker 9: with this episode. It really doesn't have anything special to say,
Speaker 9: insights to offer, or even clever plotting or storytelling, but
Speaker 9: it doesn't offend, and that's something that bumps this episode up.
Speaker 9: In my estimation of the Twiletson episodes make you feel
Speaker 9: a little embarrassed for the project. Cavender is coming and
Speaker 9: mister Beats make me cringe. But you can also imagine
Speaker 9: if this episode were made as an eighties Twilightson episode.
Speaker 9: To my eye, I think it would fit right in,
Speaker 9: and the joke of them behaving in such a dated
Speaker 9: way would be much more outlandish and entertaining. I can't
Speaker 9: defend it as a good Twiletson episode, but I can
Speaker 9: say that it's watchable and for an episode without a message,
Speaker 9: that's pretty good.
Speaker 8: Hey there, Tom Harold Clark reporting in from you to
Speaker 8: Texas talking about black leather jackets. If you look at
Speaker 8: the world today, if you open up your social media
Speaker 8: or turn on your local news feed, perhaps even look
Speaker 8: at your own window, you were going to see that
Speaker 8: this is a planet filled with hate, violence, and mistrust,
Speaker 8: and that we are a world of angry, frightened people.
Speaker 8: But also it is true that they murder and hurt
Speaker 8: one another, and that they're subject to unreasonable hate and prejudice.
Speaker 8: But these are only the brutes you find them in
Speaker 8: any race. Most of these people have the capacity for love.
Speaker 8: They learn love from their God and they teach it
Speaker 8: to their children. There's more of love here than hate.
Speaker 8: All of that came from this episode, so we obviously
Speaker 8: haven't changed very much in sixty two years. It's been
Speaker 8: a long while since I've seen this episode. Fifteen years,
Speaker 8: I guess, and I knew of its reputation as one
Speaker 8: of the worst Twilight Zone episodes. Sure, it plays like
Speaker 8: a cliff notes version of a more fleshed out episode,
Speaker 8: and perhaps this would have been a fine example to
Speaker 8: turn into a season four episode in order to flesh
Speaker 8: out some of these some of the story beats, but
Speaker 8: one of the worst. Nah if for no rather reason,
Speaker 8: it shows us that we are a stubborn human race.
Speaker 8: But it also should remind us that there is more
Speaker 8: love than.
Speaker 9: Hate in the world.
Speaker 8: But there are brutes or bad apples in every group
Speaker 8: of people Americans, Europeans, white, Black, Hispanic Asians, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, police, doctors, lawyers, teachers, politicians, celebrities, neighbors,
Speaker 8: family members, and the list goes on and.
Speaker 9: On and on.
Speaker 8: We can't let them drowned out the rest of us.
Speaker 8: Let us not forget we all are all a part
Speaker 8: of one race, the human race, and this episode reminded
Speaker 8: me of that. So Bravo twilight Zone and Earl Hamner Junior.
Speaker 4: Rod Serling, creator of The Twilight Zone. We'll tell you
Speaker 4: about next week's story after this message.
Speaker 2: If you want to get your thoughts onto the show,
Speaker 2: then send a clip of about five minutes or less
Speaker 2: to Tom at the twilight Zone podcast dot com about
Speaker 2: the show that we've covered or our next one. And
Speaker 2: let's go over to Rod Sailing to find out what's
Speaker 2: coming up next.
Speaker 1: And now, mister Surling next time out on the Twilight Zone,
Speaker 1: Richard Matheson provides us with a tour de force and
Speaker 1: suspense and the unexpected with a show called Nightcall. It
Speaker 1: stars one of the most eminent actresses of our time,
Speaker 1: Miss Gladys Cooper, and it poses the kind of question
Speaker 1: that arises when a telephone keeps ringing and you realize
Speaker 1: that the caller has.
Speaker 3: Not been on earth for a number of years.
Speaker 1: I hope this intrigues, because I think the show will.
Speaker 1: Next time out. Nightcall fand the Band took the Band
Speaker 1: and