Watching "The Outer Limits" (1963-1964)

[Harvey]

The Architects of Fear
written by: Meyer Dolinsky
directed by: Byron Haskin

Oh, I so wanted to like this one. The opening with the near miss was a nice use of carefully edited stock footage. The 'boardroom' scene predates The X-Files by more than thirty years, and was wonderfully paced and filmed. With Robert Culp on one end and the doctor calling out his name on the other--great use of space. Speaking of Robert Culp, his performance is really strong here. At first, he plays a man with a cavalier attitude towards his own death. Then, in the labratory scene at the half-way mark he has a psychotic break that is wonderfully played. And although the science is vague, the syndicate's (might as well crib a little from The X-Files) plan is pretty clever (with overtones of Watchmen, although I think this earlier version works better). Of course it doesn't work, but it comes close.

But the last act! The space capsule model work is unwatchable, and the design a hilarious cliché (it looks like something out of the Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon serials). And the alien goes from a subtle transformation with realistic make-up in earlier scenes to an absurd and silly monster that belongs in the cheesy space monster movies from the preceding decade. And the voice over at the end is some silly moralizing to try and justify this cheesiness. Doesn't work.

Oh well. 80% of it is well written and photographed...

 

[Christopher]

I think of the 90's Outer Limits as Tales from the Darkside with a bigger budget...cliched junk with silly twist endings. Just watch the last 10 minutes and save some time. (Oh, no, human race/Earth doomed...again...insert creepy narrator's so-called-moral)

I didn't care for the Showtime revival. For the most part, it just wasn't that good. And it was so dang Luddite. The majority of its stories' morals basically came down to "Progress is evil and advancing science and technology will inevitably lead to death and despair." It wasn't so much science fiction as anti-science fiction.

But the last act! The space capsule model work is unwatchable, and the design a hilarious cliché (it looks like something out of the Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon serials). And the alien goes from a subtle transformation with realistic make-up in earlier scenes to an absurd and silly monster that belongs in the cheesy space monster movies from the preceding decade. And the voice over at the end is some silly moralizing to try and justify this cheesiness. Doesn't work.

By 1960s standards, it did. If you insist on judging the show by modern expectations, you're never going to be able to appreciate it on its own terms. What looks cheesy and silly by one generation's standards may have been striking, state-of-the-art stuff for a previous generation. After all, the whole reason a thing eventually becomes a cliche is because it was successful enough to get a lot of use.

As for the garish monsters, get used to them. The network insisted on them. And by the standards of the day, within the limits of the makeup technology of the day and the budget of the show, they were good work.

 

[byron lomax]

"The Architects of Fear" is a brilliant episode. You'd never think it nowadays, but the episode was cut on some channels when shown in the 60s, because the monster was considered too terrifying! I thought the monster was great, it was really ambitious for the time. But the scariest moments were the glimpse of Leighton mid-transformation and the scene in which he starts to breath with alien lungs for the first time.

It was referenced directly in Watchmen (in the final chapter), though Alan Moore says he didn't get his idea from it, but only discovered the similarities towards the end of the story's completion.

 

[Harvey]

By 1960s standards, it did. If you insist on judging the show by modern expectations, you're never going to be able to appreciate it on its own terms. What looks cheesy and silly by one generation's standards may have been striking, state-of-the-art stuff for a previous generation. After all, the whole reason a thing eventually becomes a cliche is because it was successful enough to get a lot of use.

The rocket ship looked like something out of the Buster Crabbe serials of Buck Rogers (1939) and Flash Gordon (1936). Seems twenty-five years out of date to me, since the episode was produced in 1963. Manned space programs by the United States and the Soviet Union were already showing these designs to be out of date. I don't think it's out of line to criticize them.

As for the garish monsters, get used to them. The network insisted on them. And by the standards of the day, within the limits of the makeup technology of the day and the budget of the show, they were good work.

The make-up when Culp's character is part way through his transformation is excellent work, timeless even. The monster may be of the time, but the contrast between it and the earlier work in the episode makes it stick right out like a sore thumb. I'll try and be more mindful of the period as I go forward, but if you have a creature effect that doesn't hold up to the rest of your episode or film, you should be smart enough to hide the creature as much as possible, not have it so front and center. But that's just my view.

 

[Christopher]

^Like I said, the network wanted the monsters, it wanted them up front and clearly shown, it wanted them featured heavily. It even insisted on teasers that showed the monsters right up front, even though it usually meant showing a clip from the middle of the episode at the start of the show. If the producers had been free of all executive meddling, there would've been fewer monsters and they probably would've been subtler. But that wasn't the case.

Remember, at the time there had been very, very few SF shows that weren't aimed at children. Pretty much the only prior adult-oriented genre shows had been Science Fiction Theater and The Twilight Zone. So the network suits were probably thinking of it more in terms of a kids' show, and that meant they weren't thinking in terms of subtlety and sophistication. They wanted flashy monsters and big thrills. The producers had to do their best to make a sophisticated, thoughtful, adult science fiction anthology while still accommodating the network's marching orders.

 

[Greg Cox]

The monsters were definitely a big selling point, especially for the kids in the audience. I remember picking up a pack of OUTER LIMITS bubble gum cards, with monsters on every card!

 

[Christopher]

^There you go. It was about marketing. Monsters made money. That's probably the same reason NBC decided to lead off Star Trek with "The Man Trap," an episode revolving around a monster.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I didn't care for the Showtime revival. For the most part, it just wasn't that good. And it was so dang Luddite. The majority of its stories' morals basically came down to "Progress is evil and advancing science and technology will inevitably lead to death and despair." It wasn't so much science fiction as anti-science fiction.

I freaking loved the revival. Some of its stories were the best I'd ever seen on TV in awhile (like "Tribunal" - that episode literally almost made me cry).

Fun fact: "The Human Operators" (from the revival) is a semi-sequel to "Demon with a Glass Hand".

 

[Haggis and tatties]

Just watched the one were Donald Pleasence became a early Magneto/storm type hybrid with that chip in his head, good stuff although anything Pleasence is in is always very watchable.

 

[Harvey]

It's been a while between episodes. I was caught by vacation, work, and marathons of Dexter (season three) and Californication (season two). But now I'm back at it--at least until the discs are once again due back at the library.

The Man With The Power
written by: Jerome Ross
directed by: Laslo Benedek

This appears to be the episode Haggis and Tatties described. It was rather wathchable, although nothing stood out that was excellent. It didn't descend into the cheese of 'The Architects of Fear,' but it didn't reach that episode's heights, either.

The premise of all of Earth's atomic elements being used up doesn't ring particularly true, and I wonder why it is included. The story would be driven forward just as well without it, and it would make the fact that so many people act as if there is no crisis easier to swallow.

Speaking of things that don't ring true, you can see the wires holding up the object Pleasance levitates in the office near the beginning. This stands out since the effects in the rest of the episode (the scene where Pleasance tears his house apart around him and his wife, for example) are so well done. I don't think I've seen wire work so obvious since the original Battlestar Galactica.

Speaking of Pleasance, he's perfect in the role of a nobody professor elevated to a position of power not through aptitude, but artificial intervention (in his case, a brain operation). The episode feels padded to fit an hour, but I almost don't mind, since it means I get to watch more of Pleasance slowly realize what he's become.

And, as an aside, when the dean of the college and his wife were sleeping in separate beds, I'm not sure if it was a plot contrivance (so he could be killed, but she could survive), a remnant of the period's puritanical rules for television, or both. But it stood out watching in 2009.

 

[Christopher]

^In 1963? That wasn't a remnant of TV puritanism, it was the standard of the day. Married couples on TV wouldn't consistently be sleeping in the same bed until the late '60s or early '70s. The Munsters and the Flintstones got away with it because they weren't quite human, but more ordinary couples had to wait a while longer.

As for the wire work, remember again that you're probably seeing these episodes with far more clarity than the original viewers would have.

 

[Harvey]

Perhaps I chose my words poorly. By remnant of the day, I meant a bit that was standard then but stands out now. And it is, although I wonder if it is not also a plot contrivance. But I blather on...

Your second point is well made, though. I'm definitely seeing these clearer than anyone would have seen them back when they first aired.

 

[Maurice]

^In 1963? That wasn't a remnant of TV puritanism, it was the standard of the day. Married couples on TV wouldn't consistently be sleeping in the same bed until the late '60s or early '70s. The Munsters and the Flintstones got away with it because they weren't quite human, but more ordinary couples had to wait a while longer.

As for the wire work, remember again that you're probably seeing these episodes with far more clarity than the original viewers would have.

The Flintstones were sometimes in twin beds, and sometimes in a single bed. Apparently, the first American TV show to portray a married couple sharing a bed was its first sitcom, Mary Kay and Johnny, on the Dumont Network in late 1947. Also, Ozzie and Harriet shared a bed in some scenes in the early 1950s.

 

[Hober Mallow]

Before Twilight Zone was cancelled, the network wanted to continue it as a monster-of-the-week show. Thank God the show's legacy was never tainted with that nonsense.

Given the enormous amount of network meddling, I'd say the Outer Limits folks did a pretty good job.

 

[Haggis and tatties]

It's been a while between episodes. I was caught by vacation, work, and marathons of Dexter (season three) and

Californication​

(season two). But now I'm back at it--at least until the discs are once again due back at the library.

The Man With The Power
written by: Jerome Ross
directed by: Laslo Benedek

This appears to be the episode Haggis and Tatties described. It was rather wathchable, although nothing stood out that was excellent. It didn't descend into the cheese of 'The Architects of Fear,' but it didn't reach that episode's heights, either.

The premise of all of Earth's atomic elements being used up doesn't ring particularly true, and I wonder why it is included. The story would be driven forward just as well without it, and it would make the fact that so many people act as if there is no crisis easier to swallow.

Speaking of things that don't ring true, you can see the wires holding up the object Pleasance levitates in the office near the beginning. This stands out since the effects in the rest of the episode (the scene where Pleasance tears his house apart around him and his wife, for example) are so well done. I don't think I've seen wire work so obvious since the original

Battlestar​

Galactica​

.

Speaking of Pleasance, he's perfect in the role of a nobody professor elevated to a position of power not through aptitude, but artificial intervention (in his case, a brain operation). The episode feels padded to fit an hour, but I almost don't mind, since it means I get to watch more of Pleasance slowly realize what he's become.

And, as an aside, when the dean of the college and his wife were sleeping in separate beds, I'm not sure if it was a plot contrivance (so he could be killed, but she could survive), a remnant of the period's puritanical rules for television, or both. But it stood out watching in 2009.

That's the episodes, good review there, and yes on the wire work, although it did not detract in any way from my enjoyment of the story, i have no doubt way back in the 60s when TVs were much smaller and not as good a resolution, it would have been invisible to the eye.

Still these shows hold up quite well today, i am really enjoying them.

 

[Sir Rhosis]

To pick nits, I wouldn't say that Ellison and Van Vogt's 1971 (or thereabouts) short story "The Human Operators," filmed for the OL revival, is even a semi-sequel to "Demon with a Glass Hand," but rather just set against the same very very loose "Earth-Kyba War" backdrop. Ellison has written seven or eight stories set against the war, and, honestly, none of them really sync up. Sometimes, like in "The Human Operators," it's just simply a line or two here mentioning the conflict. Trent and his exploits are never mentioned in the prose stories (most of which were written prior to 1964).

Sir Rhosis

 

[Haggis and tatties]

So I'm watching two episodes last night and it turns out to be a Star Trek cast convention......In the episode Expanding human we have Jimmy Doohan playing a detective, with Kieth Andes who was in the apple, and Skip Homeier who was in This way to Eden and Patterns of force....

Then randomly i pick another episodes called Cold Hands warm heart, and blow me its the Shat, with non other than Commodore José I. Mendez played by Malachi Throne who was playing the doctor and James sikking from ST3....and what the Shats character involved in during this episode, Project Vulcan no less.

I had never seen these before so it was a treat to say the least.

 

[Christopher]

^Heck, I'm getting that experience all the time as I Netflix Mission: Impossible. It was Star Trek's sister show at Desilu and had the same casting director, so tons of Trek actors show up.

 

[Harvey]

The Sixth Finger
writer: Ellis St. Joseph
director: James Goldstone

Again, the pre-credits teaser seems gratuitous. All it does is spoil a scene late in the episode. Since the credits sequence has been shortened here (the line about making the picture "flutter" has been excised), they surely could have done without the teaser and just had the regular credits?

Overall, I liked this one. I thought David McCallum was quite good (I recognized him from The Great Escape, but IMDB tells me he's still quite active on television) and unlike previous installments, his make-up was of a consistant quality throughout the entire episode. The make-up of Darwin the Ape was quite good, too. Good enough, at least, to make me wonder for a second if it was an actual ape or a performer.

Griffiths' motives are actually quite interesting. I never questioned his desire to submit himself to the experiment. To him, his choices are to either be treated like an animal in the mine, or be treated like an animal in Mathers' lab. And the lab carries the possibility of escape from the backwards town.

I question why Professor Mathers would be so secluded from the scientific community (this is a common conceit among The Outer Limits and The Twilight Zone). One would think his invention would be worth advertising to others. Then again, it is mentioned that he has embarked upon this research because of guilt over helping build the atomic bomb, so his isolation isn't completely without sense.

The camerawork is mostly wormanlike here, although there is a beautiful low-angle shot of Mathers looking into his microscope and Griffiths towering above him that foreshadows their power relationship to come.

Of personal annoyance, Wilt Morgan (Robert Doyle) is painfully unconvincing when he's supposed to be playing the concertina. The movements don't even begin to match the musical instrument. McCallum, on the other hand, looks like he's really playing the piano. Although I suspect the writer and director were not mindful of how hard it is to play the piano and carry on a conversation at the same time (a common convention of film and television is that it is no bother), it makes sense that in his advanced state Griffiths could play the piano and converse with no difficulties.

The fact that such a complex machine has been mostly reduced to a lever that says "forward" and "backward" delivers a chuckle, although the idea of a functional evolution machine is so unlikely that it's probably best the episode doesn't dwell on its specifics. What is interesting here, rather, is the scenario the machine produces.

I haven't mentioned Jill Haworth as Cathy Evans at all. She's the weak point of the episode, and I'd just as soon put her out of my mind (Griffiths can stop a heart, stop Mathers from activating the machine, knock guns out of people's hands [twice], but can't get Cathy to push the lever forward instead of pull it back?).

But small quibbles aside, quite a good episode, overall.

 

[Christopher]

Again, the pre-credits teaser seems gratuitous. All it does is spoil a scene late in the episode. Since the credits sequence has been shortened here (the line about making the picture "flutter" has been excised), they surely could have done without the teaser and just had the regular credits?

As I said before, most of the teasers are like that, and they were insisted on by the network, which wanted to "grab" viewers with the monsters as soon as possible. If the titles were shortened, it may be that the rest of the episode ran a bit long. Or maybe the title trim is permanent; I don't recall.

I thought David McCallum was quite good (I recognized him from The Great Escape, but IMDB tells me he's still quite active on television)

I think he's known these days for a gig on NCIS or some such show, but his greatest fame used to be from playing Ilya Kuryakin on The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

The make-up of Darwin the Ape was quite good, too. Good enough, at least, to make me wonder for a second if it was an actual ape or a performer.

It's a safe bet it was Janos Prohaska. Just about any "gorilla" you see in '60s TV is gonna be Janos Prohaska in a suit. (Checks IMDb) Yep, it was.

The fact that such a complex machine has been mostly reduced to a lever that says "forward" and "backward" delivers a chuckle, although the idea of a functional evolution machine is so unlikely that it's probably best the episode doesn't dwell on its specifics.

One of my main problems with the episode is its embrace of the myth that evolution has an "upward" direction toward a higher form of life, rather than simply being a process of adaptation to the demands of the environment. But that's such a ubiquitous misunderstanding that it's forgivable here.

I'm also not crazy about the ending -- Griffiths is on the verge of achieving something wondrous, he gets pulled back to the old status quo, and it's played as a happy ending. I think the lever should've been pushed in the other direction, or else Cathy's decision to undo his final breakthrough should've been played as more of a betrayal.