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if Rod Serling wrote Star Wars...

Cute... but technically that should probably be "if Jerome Bixby wrote Star Wars." Serling adapted the episode from Bixby's story.
 
And writing from someone else's story is still writing, innit? Is why the credits are different.

I remember seeing one of these which recast Planet of the Apes as a Twilight Zone episode, which predictably worked rather well.
 
Rod Serling is the guy who came up with the "it was Earth all along!" twist anyway. :D He used that at least once in a TZ episode...
 
I've often thought of PLANET OF THE APES as the biggest, most expensive Twilight Zone episode ever . . ..
 
I've often thought of PLANET OF THE APES as the biggest, most expensive Twilight Zone episode ever . . ..

Oh, yeah. Say what you want about the original novel-the movie was obviously influenced by The Man....

If by "influenced by" you mean "actually co-written by," then yes. Serling's draft was rewritten by Michael Wilson, but Serling's own voice and style are still very present in the final draft.
 
Everybody worshipping the bomb in the underground cave was very reminiscent of yet another TZ episode, where nuclear war survivors are worshipping (well, taking orders from) a computer in a cave, which also looked exactly like the same computer in that TOS episode about Landru. :rommie:

And I just saw another "it was Earth all along!" TZ episode - Probe 7, Over and Out. Cute.
 
...if RS wrote SW? The Emperor/Palpatine connection would have been an actual, well-crafted twist rather than something everyone except the Jedi knew. :rolleyes:

And it would have had cameos by Burgess Meredith and Jack Klugman. :D
 
The problem with Palps is that the audience knows the actor who plays the Emperor so there's no way to make his identity a surprise if that actor is playing him.

The way to make it work would have either found a reasonable excuse to have a different actor play him, so that the reveal actually would be a surprise, or just not have the Emperor's secret identity be important in the story.

What if there was no Palpatine? Anakin has some mystical experience on a planet like the one in the Mortis Arc and comes back with a stowaway, a seemingly innocuous, wizened old man...
 
The way to make it work would have either found a reasonable excuse to have a different actor play him, so that the reveal actually would be a surprise

The name "Palpatine" was already out there in the books, so it would only have been a surprise to those who didn't know the ROTJ Emperor was called Palpatine.
 
I've often thought of PLANET OF THE APES as the biggest, most expensive Twilight Zone episode ever . . ..


The script was originally written by Rod Serling but had many rewrites before eventually being made

The reveal at the end

The other pilot being lobotomized

Certain way scenes are shot.

You could just hear Serling narrating the ending
 
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