In Retrospect: Season 5 (1963-1964)

Well, what can I say about the worst season of my all-time favorite television series? That’s right, kids, I said worst. Maybe I should take a moment to duck and cover, to avoid the inevitable brickbats and flames headed my way.

I’m speaking from a mostly statistical standpoint. While I’ve eschewed rating the episodes, I still have a general reference system, comprised of three categories: good-to-excellent, mediocre, and lousy (not exactly scientific, I’ll grant you). The stats for Season 5 are as follows:

Mediocre:

Ninety Years without Slumbering

Probe 7 – Over and Out

Ring-a-Ding Girl

Black Leather Jackets

Spur of the Moment

“What’s in the Box,”

The Brain Center at Whipple’s

The Fear

The Bewitchin’ Pool

Lousy:

A Kind of Stopwatch

Caesar and Me

From Agnes – with Love

Sounds and Silences

Season 5 is made up of 36 episodes, which means that only 63.89% of the season falls under the good-to-excellent category. That’s a D, folks. And honestly, it could’ve been worse: “The 7th Is Made up of Phantoms” and “You Drive” both had me on the fence, but they ended up being just decent enough to escape the mediocre label (conversely, "Ninety Years without Slumbering" is just disappointing enough to earn it).

But here’s the surprising thing: before now, I hadn’t watched most of the fifth season in probably 20 years. Overall, I’d say most of the episodes were actually better than I’d remembered, so... I dunno, maybe I’m softening up in my old age. It’s still the weakest season, and it still pales quite painfully when held up against the brilliance of season one, but it’s not terrible. A D grade, after all, is still passing.

In Retrospect: Season 4 (1963)

There's a certain mystique about The Twilight Zone's fourth season, mostly because the expanded length has historically kept it from airing as often in syndication, where the series was/is usually allotted a 30-minute time slot. However, said mystique has dissipated somewhat over the last decade or so, with the numerous ways in which these episodes can now be seen/obtained (DVD, blu-ray, Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, etc) alongside the more familiar half-hour efforts.

Season 4 is actually a half-season of 18 episodes but, because of the hour format, the total running time is about the same as the other seasons (with the exception of the slightly-shorter 2nd season). But does the double length equate to double quality? In most cases.... not quite. However, most of the season's offerings are at least decent, and several are pretty great. I don’t typically rate and/or rank the episodes as I spotlight them. However, for categorization purposes, I am willing to place them in three general ballparks:  Good-to-excellent, mediocre, and lousy.  In this fan's humble opinion, season 4 breaks down as follows:

Good-to-Excellent:  15

Mediocre:  3

Lousy:  0

Statistically, that means 83.33% of season four is at least good, if not great or even excellent. What's really interesting to note is the fact that NONE of these 18 episodes are truly lousy, which is the first and only time that'll happen in the series' five-year run (no Bevises, Dingles or Unusual Cameras to be found here, thankfully!). The mediocre episodes, in case you're wondering, are "The Thirty-Fathom Grave," "The Parallel" and "I Dream of Genie," but even these three have some positive aspects that keep them from truly sucking. Season 4 is often dismissed as being inferior to the rest of the series but, from my perspective, it's better than season 5 (which is positively riddled with crappy episodes; you'll see when we resume in the fall).

In Retrospect: Season 3 (1961-1962)

The Twilight Zone aired more episodes in season 3 than any other season (37; seasons 1 and 5 each had 36); however, two of those episodes were actually produced during season 2 (“The Grave” and “Nothing in the Dark”).  Unfortunately, quantity didn’t always equal quality…

Readers of this blog are aware that I don’t typically rate and rank the episodes as I review them.  However, for retrospective purposes, I am willing to categorize them in three general ballparks:  Decent-to-excellent, mediocre, and lousy.  Season 3 breaks down as follows:

Good-to-excellent: 32

Mediocre: 2

Lousy: 5

This means that 81.08% of season 3 was good-to-excellent.  That’s not bad, but it’s a step down from season 2’s 82.76%, and it’s a dramatic drop from season 1’s 91.67%.

The mediocre entries were “Showdown with Rance McGrew” and “Hocus-Pocus and Frisby.”  Neither were terrible and they had their moments, but I’d be fine if I never crossed paths with them again.

The lousy entries were “The Mirror,” “Once Upon a Time,” “Four O’clock,” “The Gift,” and “Cavender is Coming.”  All five are offensively bad in some way (actually several ways, in most cases), and all five should’ve been aborted before production ever started.  They could’ve (and should’ve) produced five less episodes and ran some of the season 1 gems that never got encores instead.

Here are some screenshots that I held back during the weekly episode spotlights (usually to avoid spoilers.)  Enjoy!

In Retrospect: Season 2 (1960-1961)

Another season of The Twilight Zone has come and gone. What can one say about season two? Um… well, it was shorter than the other seasons (with the exception of season four, but since that’s only a half-season, it’s not really a fair comparison) due to budgetary demands by CBS (which resulted in six videotaped episodes, most of which were subpar). Season two was also a slight step down in quality from season one, but it still contained some absolute gems (including two of my top ten favorites, “Shadow Play” and “The Obsolete Man,” as well as other classics like “Eye of the Beholder,” “Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room,” and “The Invaders”). There were also some clunkers sprinkled throughout (“Mr. Dingle, the Strong,” “The Whole Truth,” and “A Most Unusual Camera” should’ve been aborted before they ever saw the light of day), and a few mediocre offerings (“The Man in the Bottle,” “A Thing About Machines,” and “The Mind and the Matter” weren't exactly awful, but they weren't especially good either). Nothing in season two trumped the absolute crime against television that season one’s “Mr. Bevis” committed, but “Dingle” sure as hell tried.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the series would never match the overall brilliance of its first season. “Bevis” aside, it was nine months of damn good television. Season two, despite its abbreviated length, was a pretty impressive follow-up (however, I should note that a whopping nine of my top 20 favorite episodes of all time come from season one, while a mere three come from season two). Season three will feature some brilliant episodes, but things will start to get a bit stale… well, we’ll get there in the fall.

As I did last year, I’ll post screen captures from select episodes that I didn’t use during the season (usually to prevent spoilers). Enjoy!

King Nine Will Not Return.... well, I guess it kinda did return after all.

The Eye of the Beholder. Makes me wonder what the pigs on that planet look like....

Gotta love an elaborate makeup job that still allows you to smoke. I'm sure Oasis Cigarettes appreciated this.

The Invaders are from... earth. Wait, so we're actually the invaders? OMG!!!

Henry Corwin is the REAL Santa Claus. I derive from this that it's perfectly okay for me to get drunk on Xmas Eve.

Static: it seems nostalgia really CAN make you younger.

A crack in the glass meant this Rip Van Winkle never woke up. Oh well, he would've died anyway.

The Silence: The guy with the voicebox-removal scar is a total cheater.

The Obsolete Man: Romney Wordsworth meets an explosive end.

The Obsolete Man: The chancellor meets an explosive end of his own.

Season Two was brought to you by Oasis Cigarettes. Thank you, and goodnight.

In Retrospect: Season One (1959-1960)

I must admit, I feel a bit sad that the 50th anniversary of The Twilight Zone’s first season has now passed. It is, you see, my favorite of the five seasons. Don’t get me wrong, the other seasons have much to recommend them (even the lesser fourth and fifth seasons manage to produce amazing episodes here and there), but there’s nothing that compares to season one. Even season two (which we’ll dig into in a few months), while including top-tier efforts like “Eye of the Beholder,” “The Obsolete man” and “Shadow Play,” isn’t as consistently marvelous as the first season.

My Top 40 Favorite Episodes of All Time features 11 season one episodes (a number which will likely increase when I revise it to include “The After Hours,” which somehow got excluded; a criminal oversight, to be sure). My Top 10, meanwhile, features 4 season one episodes (that’s nearly half!).

So yeah, season one is my favorite. And it’s glorious. Well, with the exception of “Mr. Bevis,” which may very well be the worst single episode in the series’ five-year, 156-episode run. Fortunately, the bulk of the season is so luminously brilliant that a hairy wart, even one as hideous as “Mr. Bevis,” is fairly easy to ignore. The only other questionable efforts are “Elegy” and “The Mighty Casey,” but each has its charms (“Elegy” evokes Ray Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles, and “The Mighty Casey” has an undeniably fascinating production history). Those three aside, that leaves 33 out of 36 are either really good or, in most cases, excellent. That’s a 91.67% success rate, people.

The remaining four seasons won’t have stats like that. There is still a wealth of great episodes to come, but nothing like the reliable excellence that season one gave us.

As a final look back, I thought it might be nice to post some screen captures that I didn’t post before, usually because they gave away either crucial plot points or, in many cases, surprise endings. Enjoy!

The Lonely

Perchance to Dream

The Hitch-hiker

The Fever

Elegy

The Monsters are Due on Maple Street

A Stop at Willoughby

A Passage for Trumpet

The After Hours