Little Labor Day Marathon - The Twilight Zone

The Four of Us is Dying
The Fever
Elegy
The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street
Long Live Walter Jameson

The Four of Us is Dying has always been a rather interesting episode of the TZ to me, mainly because it seems to tell only a brief bit of story regarding this con artist who loves to use a technique in bending and contorting his face to resemble anyone he might see in a newspaper clipping or on a boxing poster in a back alley. And the episode’s title telegraphs the ending so we essentially spend a small amount of time with this creep who assembles a gallery of faces, mimicking them for thrills, kicks, and giggles. The trumpet player, beloved and lost to a train-to-car accident, who returns to his singer lover, preparing their departure later in the night; the crook who was betrayed by the mob, left with bullets in his belly at the bottom of the harbor water after pulling a job; the boxer who left behind grieving parents and a young bride for parts unknown, only taking his face because it was needed to persuade thugs he wasn’t the crook with taken loot; the nobody Arch Hammer who seems to be the legit face of the face-changing slime talking himself into believing that he should be able to wear visages and their lives if he wants. Never quite revealing much. It is all neon lights and noir trappings. It does make a point to tell us that living in the lives of others—especially those who leave behind a history not quite pleasant—could have consequences. 2.5/5

Early in The Fever, Flora says to grumpy husband, Franklin, “I’m not very lucky, am I?” I always say to myself when I watch this, “You will be by episode’s end because you will be rid of this miserly sod.” Franklin, the high and mighty sourpuss, assures Flora that gambling away even nickels is throwing it all away. This episode is considered comic gold by many TZ fans, while others look at it as one of the worst episodes of the series. The lead is so bossy, hypocritical, and salty that whatever fate he does suffer is too good for him. Poor Flora, trying to convince the sweaty, cruel, and eventually obsessive Franklin that he should leave the “inhuman” machine—eventually calling his name over and over, not to as much unnerving horror as sidesplitting hilarity—behind and get some rest before they lose their entire savings, can’t get a break until the “gambler’s mania” takes him out (even writing “takes him out” cracks me up). The message regarding gambling is overt and even laughable, having Franklin gain a five-o’clock shadow, wearing himself and the machine (!) out by the time he loses his very last dollar to it. The fever of the title that overtakes Franklin has given this episode a kind of cult fandom. Another in a long line of episodes where a character goes out a window. 2/5

Cecil Kellaway is mostly shown in Elegy as a congenial, affable, chatty, hospitable fellow without any hint or sign of sinister intent. Kellaway never seems to be anything but trustworthy and easily likable. But one close shot of his face before tending to the astronauts in their ship with a duster, now more or less wax figures occupying a particular position for all eternity, removes all of that pleasantness and briefly contains the look of fear and this sociopathic conclusion that man cannot exist where eternal happiness is required. Poisoning the astronauts, who didn’t come with any hostile intentions (and with no women, no ability to procreate), Kellaway’s “eternal caretaker”, a “scientific device” that goes on and off when needed, to make sure the exhibits recreating entire events at the specifications of the clients who occupy their “fantasy graveyards”, weren’t “disturbed”. Because that is what mankind does. This is one of the many TZ episodes featuring extras having to stand very still, not blinking but clearly uncomfortable. The astronauts search the asteroid for any sign of life, left to live there because no fuel is left to patrol space on a geological study, damaged structure of the ship due to meteorites. Stumbling on all of the “people” who don’t talk or move leaves the astronauts puzzled until Kellaway emerges to tell them just why. 3/5

The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street

The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices to be found only in the minds of men. For the record, prejudices can kill, and suspicion can destroy, and a thoughtless frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own for the children, and the children yet unborn. And the pity of it is that these things cannot be confined to the Twilight Zone.

Written by Serling nearly 60 years ago…and nevermore relevant. My eyes welled up after this. If Serling were alive today, I wonder what he would say. Most of those involved in this episode are dead, but the closing narration by Serling isn’t archaic or outdated. You can replace the characters that turn on each other and maybe the dialogue in some places but rocks are thrown, windows break, accusations fly, anger is doled out, seemingly rational and reasonable people become a mob trying to kill each other. Maybe aliens aren’t turning on and off machines but choose the news you watch and social media you frequent…watch the world burn. 5/5

I thoroughly enjoy the idea of the episode, Long Live Walter Jameson, even as the end result kind of left me a bit underwhelmed. I can’t necessarily put my finger on it exactly, the disappointment, because it really is the only conclusion that makes sense…he can’t keep hurting women and children as they age and he doesn’t, the guy just leaves them behind to start a new relationship and family. And yet with such a magnificent “alchemic gift”, immortality, it just seems so much more than a brief Civil War back story could be told. Watching the fourth season, certain episodes like Long Live Walter Jameson, seem better suited for a longer format. Of course, in saying that, I imagine if this story had been told at such length I’d bellyache about the “extra padding”. It is all subjective…none of us truly can be satisfied. Anyway, as a college professor, Jameson captivates the students with his elaborate, very detailed lectures about the likes of Sherman during the burning of Atlanta. Professor Kittridge (Edgar Stehli) is sure Jameson is just too knowledgeable (as if “he were there when it happened”), wondering if he knows so much for a reason. And Jameson plans to wed his daughter so his interest in finding out for sure is piqued. A woman from Jameson’s past just might be a monkey wrench in any further marital bliss. My favorite scene has Jameson having to explain his immortality to Kittridge, clearly interested in how he has kept from dying for 2000 years. The aging to dust ending is a bit over the top but nothing I myself considered too egregious. If it was good enough an end one of many) for Lee’s Dracula… 3/5