The Twilight Zone

The Twilight Zone was an Earth science fiction and fantasy television program.

Trip Tucker said T'Pol's story about her second foremother, T'Mir, sounded like something from The Twilight Zone. (ENT: "Carbon Creek")

Background

Relevance

The Twilight Zone was created by Rod Serling and ran on CBS from 1959 though 1964. Using the framework of science fiction and fantasy, Serling hosted every episode himself, telling speculative stories that explored the Human condition and topics too sensitive for open public discourse. It won three Emmy Awards as well as three Hugo Awards.

The series was important for Star Trek in several ways. Many Star Trek actors got their start with the series, demonstrating their ability to work in the science fiction genre. Also, four of the writers and directors were contributors to the series. The series also exposed the general public to science fiction as a prime-time genre, whereas previously it had been aimed at juveniles (the Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials, and the Steve Holland Flash Gordon TV series, and the later Lost In Space series, for instance).

Thematically, The Twilight Zone also set the tone for Star Trek by discussing sensitive issues in an "other-worldly" setting. Essentially, both Serling and Gene Roddenberry were sneaking the touchy issues past the studio censors under the pretext that the episodes were not about the issues, but were just science fiction stories of the far future.

Additionally, several TOS episodes bear a strong resemblance to earlier Twilight Zone episodes:

• "People Are Alike All Over" and "The Cage": Both involve Humans being put in an extraterrestrial zoo.
• "The Parallel" and "Mirror, Mirror": Both have space travelers who spend some time in a parallel, but altered, universe.
• "It's a Good Life" and "Charlie X": Both involve a young boy terrorizing people with his super powers.
• "Mute" and "The Empath": Both episodes involve a mute female with ESP.
• "The Lateness of the Hour" and "Requiem for Methuselah". Both involve a woman who is really a robot. This premise is also similar to the The Twilight Zone episode "In His Image" and the TOS episodes "I, Mudd" and "What Are Little Girls Made Of?", where robots pass themselves off as humans.

Crossover performers, writers, and directors

• Four main TOS actors appeared in The Twilight Zone: William Shatner starred in two episodes: "Nick of Time" in 1960 and "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" in 1963. Leonard Nimoy was part of the cast in "A Quality of Mercy" in 1961. James Doohan appeared in the episode "Valley of the Shadow" (1963) and George Takei in "The Encounter" (1964).
• William Windom (Commodore Matt Decker) was in two episodes: "Miniature" (1963) and "Five Characters in Search of an Exit" (1961). John Hoyt (Dr. Philip Boyce) was in "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?" (1961), and "The Lateness of the Hour" (1960). Robert Lansing (Gary Seven) was in "The Long Morrow. Stanley Adams (Cyrano Jones) was in two episodes: "Mr. Garrity And The Graves" and "Once Upon A Time." John Fiedler (Mr. Hengist) was in "Cavender Is Coming" and "Night Of The Meek." Bill Mumy (Kellin (Crewman)) was in "In Praise of Pip," "It's a Good Life," "Long Distance Call," Twilight Zone: The Movie, and "It's Still a Good Life," from the 2003 revival series.
• "The Doomsday Machine" has five Twilight Zone alumni: Shatner, Nimoy, Doohan, Takei, and Windom.
• TOS writers Richard Matheson and George Clayton Johnson were regular contributors, so as directors Robert Butler and Robert Gist.
• In the 1980s' series, Terry Farrell starred in a remake of "After Hours" (1986), an episode that was also in the 1960s' series (although, it had no Star Trek actors in it).

External link

• The Twilight Zone at Wikipedia