The Twilight Zone - The Arrival

I think a review I wrote for IMDb hits some of the same notes that remain about right with me after the viewing tonight and the 20 odd some times I've watched it through the last twenty some odd years. It has chinks in the armour like how we see an entire scene play out with those involved in the airplane company experiencing the extraordinary event of the empty plane landing without any passengers, all privy to what happened before Stone enters the picture to do his investigation. Then when it plays out its big twist at the end involving how Stone is in fact reliving a case he couldn't solve as people in that "illusion" were real people who he had never met before but knew their names (it is possible, I guess, that Stone knew of their existence and through his loop of never ending hysteria just imagined them as the folks replacing those who were part of the case of the missing plane fifteen/twenty years prior but I'm guessing that is me covering up a creative mistake) becomes the obvious crack in the armour, a major flaw that just can't escape detection. Are these continuity problems reason to flunk it as a failure? I don't think so. It just has so much going for it in terms of the eerie effects of how the direction and music reflect the spooky machinations of an enigma that continues to bewilder the more it challenges those trying to figure it out.

A plane, Flight 107, lands on an airstrip but those attending to it
realize no crew or passengers are on it! So FAA sends in investigator
Grant Sheckly (Harold J Stone), the federal government's Sherlock
Holmes of aviation mysteries, preferably those that have gone missing
or have missing people. Flight 107 is unique as those who operate the
airline for which this plane lands see different colored seats in the
plane and numbers on the tail! Why? Sheckly has a theory, regarding
mass hypnosis, which is quite a doozy. "The Arrival" is really the kind
of spooky tale synonymous with Twilight Zone. A plane lands 90 minutes
after taking off on the very same airstrip, no one on board, and
finding an answer as to why tests all involved in trying to solve this
very unusual case. The result as to whether or not Sheckly's theory
regarding a plane that is just an illusion only segues into quite a
tragic story of one man's inability to escape "the one that got away",
as sometimes when a master "puzzle solver", noted for always getting
the job done, isn't successful, it weighs an anvil-like burden that
works as a yoke around the neck. I think this episode really is at its
best in the early part when that plane, empty and ominous, resembles a
"Flying Dutchmen", a ghost ship that remains a symbol of mystery that
leaves a lump in the throat. I could take or leave the twist, involving
a mentally-cracking Sheckly, trying to make sense of a 17 year mystery
that he "couldn't lick", but it does kind of leave us with a haunting
feeling questioning just how could a plane, with about 17 people, just
vanish without a trace, not one piece of evidence determining its fate.
This particular episode I have a fondness for because it introduced me
to the show at a young age and hooked me immediately. That said, I
think this episode would have trouble holding up to close scrutiny.


In this basic review where I think I summed up the general consensus of its plot and feelings of that particular viewing.in June of 2012 when I watched it, tonight it does still leave some really good chills that remain key to the success it does have. While many a review does find it difficult to get past the story problems that exist, joining Stone in that plane, looking at those empty seats, with the score certainly adding the creeps along with just some simple lighting techniques to emphasize this ghostly presence this DC-3 exhibits works wonders. Stone rushing across the darkened airway, pitiably questioning why the missing plane evaded him, finding himself all alone in his hunt for an answer that will never come--even if built in a less than satisfactory way--leaves us with another reminder that the past can envelope someone unable to recover because confidence was shattered and a mystery just didn't offer the pieces of the puzzle needed to "lick" it. You see Stone as he arrives quite full of himself. He explains to those at the airplane company--such as Noah Keen as the executive and Fredd Wayne as the PR man--his impressive credentials and assures them he's the man for this job. He takes to the case with full belief this case will have its answer and he'll be the one that provides it. By the end he's sweaty, broken, and traumatized. Perhaps Serling wanted that ending and sacrificed the potential of a great mystery (if Serling had ended it with that dynamic spinning propeller scene it could have maybe been enough) solved in a unique way. Like what if it was a type of mass hypnosis and Stone was left with the question of how and why? There had been some time left to investigate that if Serling had chosen to. But he wanted the "Flying Dutchmen of the Psyche" conclusion with Stone looking into the stars, a night cry with the darkness nearly eclipsing him. It is a scene I think pops off the screen well thanks to good direction, but maybe the story before the twist had more potential than was realized. Just the same, the beginning mystery and the peculiarities of it worked over me quite well. It was just the disappearing airplane personnel and seeing them again that sort of kicks up some dust in the eyes. Still I have watched this one many, many times so it always gets me at the beginning. And I don't feel all the way disappointed because it just kind of gives me goosebumps.Better that than apathy, right?