One of my favorite parts of the morning is when SyFy shows old episodes of The Twilight Zone, curled up under a blanket on the sofa with a hot cup of coffee, losing myself in the ironic twists. I’ve been watching this show since I was old enough to remember watching television. My mother was a big fan of science fiction shows and we always watched The Twilight Zone, Star Trek, The Outer Limits… The first movie I was taken to see in a theater was Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, the first time it was in theaters. I was only 4 at the time… Boy, am I dating myself by telling you that… But it gives you a good idea of how long I’ve been a fan of science fiction…

One of my favorite episodes is “Eye of the Beholder”. In this episode, we see a woman who’s face is covered in thick bandages, having undergone treatment to make her appear “normal” like everyone else. We also see the hospital staff who are shrouded in shadow until the right moment; the moment the bandages are removed and we see a pretty blonde, the oddball in a world full of people who look like a cross between The Creature from the Black Lagoon and a pig… The moral of the story? Beauty really is in the eye of the beholder…

The Twilight Zone was just chock full of morals to the story as well as irony…

Like poor Henry Bemis who wanted nothing more than to have time to read as much as he wanted. After the world was destroyed by an atomic bomb, he has all the time he needs and all the time he wants… Until he accidentally breaks those Coke bottles he calls lenses in his glasses and now can’t read a thing…

But there were sometimes major goofs…

Another of my favorite episodes, “Midnight Sun” has quite a few flaws right from the beginning. We’re told the Earth is moving closer and closer to the sun and everyone is doomed. We’re also told the time is midnight, even though it’s bright as day, because there is no more night… This is the biggest goof in this episode. I don’t care how close the Earth gets to the sun, you’re going to have darkness somewhere, whether the Earth is still rotating or not. Some part of the planet will still be facing away from the sun and you’ll have darkness!

I’m not saying that the Earth can’t suddenly change its orbit. According to the nerdy science shows I watch, it’s possible. But to have no more night at all? That’s physically impossible…

In the end, it turns out it was all just a dream of our main character. She was very ill with a high fever for a long time, which would have explained the hallucination of being hot and the Earth moving closer to the sun. But we find out that the reality is the Earth is moving further and further away. It’s a nice twist. And watching oil paints melt down the canvas looks cool as shit!

Another massive goof is in the episode “Elegy”… Three astronauts land on a planet/asteroid that turns out to be a special kind of cemetery in a binary star system. Near the beginning of the episode, one of the astronauts informs us that they’re 65 million miles from Earth. Now, I’m not good with determining distance, but I knew that didn’t sound right, so I looked it up. Apparently, 65 million miles from Earth would put you close to the neighborhood of Saturn. Which means they didn’t even get close to leaving our solar system, let alone reach a binary star system. That was a pretty big goof. You’d think the writers would have done a bit more research on that one…

The reason for this randomness today was this morning’s episode, “The Long Morrow”…

It’s really a great episode, don’t get me wrong. It’s a romance story with a really dark twist…

An astronaut gets chosen to make a journey to another solar system that will take 40 years round trip. He’s informed that he won’t age because he will be in a state of suspended animation and will be leaving in six months (interesting side note, this takes place in the late 80s, haha). But things don’t turn out as planned…

Before the astronaut leaves, he meets a young lady who also works for the space agency. They’re obviously both very smitten with each other and he states he’s going to pick her up for a date that evening (he’s got balls, I’ll give him that). And, in the course of a few hours, they fall in love… Not a good thing considering he’s leaving for 40 years and when he comes back, she’ll be an old woman. It seems quite the tragic love story at this point, when they part…

Eventually, the astronaut returns (and the staff has to do some digging to find the information on the mission). There’s a note in the file that there’s a young woman in suspended animation that is to be “woken” (for lack of a better term) upon the astronaut’s return. She’s informed that the astronaut found no life on the other planet, however, they discovered that 20 years before and could have saved him the trip. She was also informed that soon after leaving the Earth, the astronaut released himself from suspended animation, unbeknownst to them. He had aged those 40 years while she was still a young woman… But she was still in love with him and wanted to make it work. The astronaut tells her there’s too much difference, 40 years difference, and tells her to go away. Major dick move on his part, if you ask me…

But what makes no sense is how in the hell the astronaut was supposed to have survived for 40 years, totally isolated, in a tiny ship… I mean, aside from the fact that 40 years of conscience thought, completely isolated, would more than likely make you clinically insane. Especially since there would have been nothing to do or keep your mind occupied all those years except your own crazy thoughts and the thoughts of the girl you left behind. But the bigger question is, how could he have lived for 40 years with no food or water?! Obviously they wouldn’t have added any of that if he was supposed to be in suspended animation. Even if they added a little food and water, it certainly wouldn’t be enough to last 40 years! I guess the writers didn’t consider that…

Still, even for all its faults and its goofs, The Twilight Zone was a show way ahead of its time.

Over the years, people have tried to copy the magic that was the original show. And so far, they’ve all failed. There was a certain something about the original that will never be recaptured.

And besides… Without Rod Serling, it’s just not right… The short time he was on camera or his voice was heard made the show.

Over 50 years and it’s still one of the best science fiction shows on television. But that’s just my opinion… Watch a few episodes and see for yourself…