The Twilight Zone - Valley of the Shadow

I must admit, while I like the concept and even the twist on the end—and agree that man would more than likely use what could be a gift to all mankind for profit—of Valley of the Shadow, it was just too long. Just plenty of silent space. And while I have even admitted that content could use a running time to breathe, I just could see a really strong Beaumont script for the usual thirty minutes. I know this probably wouldn’t be popular for many Twilight Zone fans but the cast bored me. No signs of life. I thought the entire cast was put in a trance by Werner Herzog. 

Ed Nelson gets lost, turning into Peaceful Valley, his dog pursuing a little girl’s cat into her yard. The little girl uses a device (a box, with a mic-like hand tub from a wire attached to it) to “disappear” Nelson’s dog! Star Trek’s own Scotty, James Doohan, is the child’s father, using a similar device to return the dog to Nelson. Nelson can’t seem to just leave Peaceful Valley, driving further into town, talking to a hotel proprietor, played by Natalie Trudy (just recently seen her in an episode Thriller, with Boris Karloff), who has plenty of vacancies according to the keys on their hooks even as she tells him no rooms are occupied. Nelson eventually returns to his car, attempting to leave but some sort of invisible barrier/wall causes him to crash hideously into it. A cool scene, I thought.

 Nelson’s dog is killed again as hunters emerge to see if he is okay, before essentially carrying Nelson, seemingly with no interest of going back into Peaceful Valley. Soon they introduce him to Opatoshu (I know him from Star Trek & the Chuck Norris action flick, “Forced Vengeance”), Jacques Aubuchon, and Dabbs Greer (this guy had an incredible career, one of the most eclectic resumes you’ll ever see; he was in a prior TZ episode, “Hocus-Pocus & Frisby”), a trio with quite a story to tell. Opatoshu is the mayor of Peaceful Valley, informing Nelson that they were visited by an alien or some kind of scientist way before his time a century before, providing them mathematical equations that can create incredible devices that provide the ability to repair wounds, dissemble atoms and reassemble them, and even alter memories (or just flat brain wipe). 

Nelson believes what this town has available to them could feed the world, heal diseases, and provide any number of items (imagine having a house created for you to your specifications without human physicality being involved or need for purchased tools, lumber, pipes, furniture, fixtures, etc) that would remove a lot of burdens from mankind. Opatoshu, though, and his colleagues believe that the world isn’t ready for them. Nelson proves them right towards the end when he plans to steal the computations of the long-gone scientist, using a machine with the gun math equations sheet to give him a weapon. Sure enough he would rather shoot the township’s board rather than allow them to keep the secrets from the outside world. 

Sandy Kenyon was a frequent TZ actor, appearing in the likes of “The Shelter” (the neighbor whose racism rears its ugly head when he insists his family survive ahead of a Mexican-American and his interracial family) and “The Odyssey of Flight 33”; in this episode, Kenyon is a gas station attendant desperate to get rid of Nelson, until he learns too much and is eventually kept inside town against his will. Nelson and Trudy also fall in love as she hopes he will grow to like Peaceful Valley, although he not only feels obligated to tell the world about what is in the possession of the town but is against the loss of freedom that being kept there costs him. 

A test to see if Nelson would leave with Trudy leaves them no choice but to take drastic measures to assure their secrets remain safe. I have never seen this episode. In fact, it wasn’t until the Decades Network provided their TZ marathon lineup for Independence Day that it was brought to my attention. When I started my foray into the fourth season of The Twilight Zone, I noticed this episode was coming up. 

The twist regarding the town (well, we don’t really see a lot of folks) deciding to abolish the use of violent death to eliminate a threat to their secrets getting out through a clearing of events returning Nelson to his first day, according to his mind after the erasure I thought was clever and well done. Trudy getting one last look at him, knowing he decided to choose the secrets over her, still in love with him but Nelson no longer accessing the previous time spent in the town, leaves behind the obvious disappointment that true romance just couldn’t be fulfilled. Opatoshu tells Nelson that he could have had paradise, but he just couldn’t accept the limitations. Whatever noble his intentions might have been, seeing Nelson shooting the board removed any question from my own mind they were right in keeping him from leaving with the secrets. He made the gun (why even have a card with those mathematical equations on file?), used it on them because they refused to let him just walk out with the book of the genius’ notes.

 I think, though, this could have plenty of room for debate and features thought-provoking subject matter that is as relevant today as ever before. Who could be trusted with such world-changing equations? Sadly, Opatoshu and the board would still not allow their secrets out in 2019…mankind just still isn’t ready. 2.5/5