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Post by wmcclain on Sept 13, 2020 15:54:14 GMT
The Outer Limits (1963) I was eight years old when these programs were first broadcast and I remember seeing many of them then. Was I too young? Yes: nightmares. No: I had discovered horror-tinged science fiction and wanted more. I've seen the series again in the decades since, first as rebroadcasts and then on a DVD collection. When Kino announced both seasons on Blu-ray I wasn't going to bother with the upgrade but was intrigued by the rich set of commentary tracks. Hearing more about these shows from film scholars and fellow fans: I couldn't resist. And the upgrade in video quality is substantial. As always when looking at classic TV in modern high definition, I marvel that today we see them as they have never been seen before. My original viewing was on a small boxy TV with a blurry image. I never imagined that I would be able to revisit these programs presented in such quality. We must be grateful that so much classic TV was filmed in 35mm, the same as theatrical releases. That always seemed odd: film records vastly more detail than could be broadcast at the time. The studio workflows must have been setup for 35mm and it was just easier to stick with it.
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 13, 2020 15:54:25 GMT
The Galaxy Being, written and directed by Leslie Stevens. A devoted radio engineer develops 3D television and tunes into microwave broadcasts from another galaxy. Inadvertently: it is also a matter transmitter. He has already cobbled together an automatic language translator. When an irresponsible DJ turns the power up too high, First Contact follows. This is a fine pilot episode for the series. The alien effects are pretty simple superimposed negatives, but that nicely suggests a truly alien incompatible form of matter. As always, the sound and visual design of the program is superb. The music cues bring back so many memories, tying the whole series together. The plot is a familiar one of obsessed scientist in tension with his wife and social obligations. See Altered States (1980) for another treatment. The clever bit this time is that the only like-minded friend our hero can find is a deathless "nitrogen-cycle" (?) being from Andromeda. Who is also a renegade, breaking the rules to contact other life. The story pauses for a couple instances of TV drama-speak between husband and wife. We see the show is still rooted in the TV anthology genre of the 1950s, which itself had roots in radio serials of the decade before: often the same actors, same types of stories. We have parallels to The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951): our fear of the alien, his healing powers, and his final lecture on the need for understanding. Notes: - We're ignoring the speed of light in this clever scenario.
- In a real-world parallel, early radio astronomy was indeed pioneered by amateur enthusiasts. Grote Reber built the first parabolic radio telescope in his backyard and did a complete sky survey. For ten years he was the only radio astronomer in the world.
- The alien says that electromagnetic waves are the ultimate reality. There is no death because the brain waves travel outward forever.
- The truly unbelievable part: army, police and mob disperse when dismissed by the alien.
- The radio station silhouetted against the sky became a scene in my dreams.
- I always loved the astronomical photos in the closing credits.
The commentary track is by Outer Limits expert and author David J Schow. He gives much background on Leslie Stevens and the origins of the series. - He notes the similarities to The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)...
- ...and also that our engineer has found a like-minded companion from across space.
- The brother's girlfriend is played by Allyson Ames, married to Leslie Stevens at the time.
- William O. Douglas Jr is the man in the alien suit. He was the son of the Supreme Court justice of that name.
- The suit was a neoprene wet-suit worn backwards and oiled to make it shine. The eyes were "crow's eyes", glass ones from a taxidermist, I presume.
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 13, 2020 15:54:44 GMT
The Hundred Days of the Dragon, directed by Byron Haskin. In a cunning plot to take over the United States, the Chinese develop a serum that plasticizes the skin, allowing them to murder a presidential candidate and substitute a look-alike. Those closest to him begin to suspect something is not right. Can they figure it out, prove it and defeat the insidious plan? This second episode is a big decline from the sense of wonder of the rest of the series. Apart from the magic serum it could have been an entry in any other drama anthology. A Cold War thriller somewhat like The Manchurian Candidate (1962), it was broadcast two months before the assassination of JFK. In those days having two Communist superpowers was somewhat balanced by the fact that they didn't get along. We're still in the inscrutable, insidious Orient era. The fake-President gets extra squinty-eyed under pressure. Familiar faces: Richard Loo as a military honcho and James Hong as the would-be substitute for the vice president, played by Phillip Pine who I best remember from The Savage Curtain (1969), an episode of the original Star Trek. Directed by the experienced Byron Haskin -- The War of the Worlds (1953), The Naked Jungle (1954), Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964). This is the first of his six episodes. Photographed by Conrad Hall, the first of his fifteen episodes. The commentary track is by Reba Wissner, who gives a meticulous analysis of the musical themes and cues, pointing out that even subtle changes in the chords communicates something to the audience. "Nothing in film or TV music is accidental". 
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 13, 2020 15:55:08 GMT
The Architects of Fear, directed by Byron Haskin. A science fiction tragedy in three acts: - Fearing imminent nuclear war, a secret cabal of scientists plot to unite humanity by giving them a common enemy: an alien menace. Which will be faked but convincing, complete with spaceship and raygun.
Ok, that's a plan. It might work. - But who thought it was a good idea to turn one of their members into an actual alien through torturous transformations of mind and body, replacing all his organs and giving him new body chemistry and senses?
Didn't anyone suspect that this new being might be actually alien with incomprehensible thoughts and emotions, no longer part of their cunning plan? - Finally: a monster loose on Earth, his mission never to be accomplished, might our alien retain some core of his human past, love and yearning for his wife and unborn child?
This is one of the most memorable episodes. Maybe the effects worked better in the old days on small low-definition TVs where the horror of the monster-making procedures were less explicit, more suggested. Robert Culp is our hero in the first of his three episodes. A prolific TV actor -- I Spy -- he also had a movie career -- Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969), Hannie Caulder (1971). His wife is played by Geraldine Brooks who I best remember at age 22 in Cry Wolf (1947) with Errol Flynn and Barbara Stanwyck. When young she much resembled later actress Natalie Portman.  Notes: - According to the wikipedia some stations censored the alien "Thetan" as too horrific.
- His encounter with the duck hunters inevitably suggests a parallel but comic scene in the later The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984).
- Returning: director Byron Haskin and cinematographer Conrad Hall.
- This is the first of three episodes by prolific TV writer Meyer Dolinsky.
On the Blu-ray the light commentary track is by Gary Gerani, who laughs at everything. 
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 13, 2020 15:56:15 GMT
(I'll try to do capsule reviews of all the episodes, but they will appear bit by bit as I get to them...)
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 15, 2020 19:23:09 GMT
The Man with the Power, directed by László Benedek. We jump right into the story: a meek little professor, wanting to help the space program, has implanted a new device in his brain that allows him to control vast energies. He eventually realizes that his subconscious is using it to attack and kill others who irritate or frustrate him. By the time he discovers the truth he can no longer control the power. I didn't remember much about this one but with a rewatch it has several interesting features: - A reminder of how far back eco-catastrophe scenarios go, with worries about exhaustion of resources and peak-everything. Set a little time in the future, the episode's narration begins:
- Brief hints that mind and brain are not the same thing, still debated today.
- The recognition that everyone yearns to be of consequence, to achieve something that matters.
- A revival of the old notion of the Evil Eye, of projecting evil thoughts out into the world. For a while this has been a metaphor for envy, of poisoning the social environment with greedy regard, but with science fiction we can make the old superstition literal again.
- The familiar dilemma of every modern Prometheus: that we have access to powers without the skill or wisdom to control them.
Our conflicted hero is Donald Pleasence who often got these interesting combinations of the meek and weird. Before this I remember him as the wicked Prince John in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1955) TV series. This same year he would do The Great Escape (1963) for John Sturges, then Cul-De-Sac (1966) for Roman Polanski, Fantastic Voyage (1966) for Richard Fleischer and on and on. He became a regular for John Carpenter. Notes: - Many familiar faces, including Edward Platt (North by Northwest (1959), Get Smart) and John Marley (Cat Ballou (1965), The Godfather (1972)).
- The plot of external manifestation of subconscious desires had been used in Forbidden Planet (1956).
- The "boiling cloud with lightning" effect is really pretty good, like something from another dimension.
- The "transformation of the human" becomes a continuing theme in the series.
- Another episode photographed by Conrad Hall.
No Blu-ray commentary track for this one. 
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 17, 2020 14:06:16 GMT
The Sixth Finger, directed by James Goldstone. Experiments in accelerated evolution transform a test subject into a man of first 20,000 years in the future, then a million years. He displays powers of mind and mind over mater, becomes arrogant and aggressive, but finally moves past that, wanting to leave the body behind and become pure mind, like an angel. In this scenario evolution means increased intelligence, prefigured by clear class distinctions: the Londoner lording over the Welsh, the clean over the dirty, intellectuals over laborers and servants. This is early in David McCallum's US career, and he brings great sensitivity to a role that might have been ridiculous if played differently. He and the makeup artist conspired to retain the character's expressiveness of eyes and mouth:  Notes: - Another "transformed man" plot.
- Jill Haworth is Gwyllm's girl, "Kathy". She was offered the lead in Lolita (1962) but Otto Preminger owned her contract and wouldn't let her out of it.
- We have a man in a chimp costume. He is a transformed chimp, so maybe that works.
- The plot owes something to Pygmalion (1938) and My Fair Lady (1964) with the Professor taking in the dirty urchin and telling the landlady "Clean him up." It is easy to imagine Edward Mulhare as Higgins and in fact he took over the part from Rex Harrison in the stage version of "My Fair Lady".
- When still a dissatisfied coal miner, Gwyllm says he wants "to get out from under, away from this dirt and stupidity". When he is a hyper-intelligent man of the future, Kathy says his hatred of the town is all he has left. Which is not quite true: he retains his fondness for her.
- The notion that the gross body tethers the pure mind is an ancient idea, still under discussion.
- Note that it is Kathy on the machine who brings him back and determines his "just right" level. Men propose, but women dispose.
- The evolution machine has a simple "Forward / Back" lever. Didn't the Time Traveler have a similar control?
- Gwyllm seems dazed at the end. Are we sure he came back?
- The idea of perilous increase in IQ was used in an early Star Trek episode, Where No Man Has Gone Before, coincidentally by the same director.
- Photographed by John M. Nickolaus Jr, the first of his nine episodes. He and Conrad Hall are jointly credited with the visual look of the series.
- Glenn Gould provides some keyboard Bach, his second IMDB credit.
The commentary track is another encyclopedic effort by David J Schow, series expert. He had a couple of Outer Limits books, now out of print and fabulously expensive on the used market. In this track he reveals something I had not realized: the show was very much an ensemble effort. Director Byron ("Bunny") Haskins and cinematographer Conrad Hall are not credited for this episode, but they were there and contributing. He also points out that McCallum grows taller during his transformations, and that this happens on camera. Everyone on set was scrambling around with planks and orange crates just out of frame. 
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Post by amyghost on Sept 17, 2020 16:18:25 GMT
I've always been a fan of this series, but sadly it's been eclipsed for younger audiences by the mostly mediocre cable reboot made in the 1990's. That version seems to be getting a lot more tv syndication these days than the original.
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Post by Prime etc. on Sept 17, 2020 21:41:53 GMT
The only show I recall from the remake was the one with "John Boy" injecting himself with nanobots that keep changing his body to improve it--which he doesn't agree with. Interesting idea but the show was of the cheap-shot in Canada variety.
I think the X-Files was much better off in California since the UFO stuff is more suited for that rather than trying to fake a desert in Canada like they did.
The special effects for the Outer Limits was done by Project Unlimited, which was run by Gene Warren Sr. and Wah Chang (who designed the Star Trek tricorder and communicator). I think some Outer Limits props ended up in Star Trek as well.
Was Robert Culp embarrassed by the Architects of Fear? I seem to recall reading somewhere he did not like to talk about it --or maybe it was an obituary that said he felt he should have done something else beside acting!
Watchmen used a similar plot device (Architects of Fear) for the comic book.
The Zanti Misfits is my favorite episode.
The Outer Limits was at the center of a copyright dispute between James Cameron and Harlan Ellison--on the set of the Terminator, Cameron told a reporter for Starlog that he lifted ideas from a couple of Outer Limits episodes.
Ellison sued and a credit note was added to the film's video saying it was inspired by the OL episodes.
Apparently, according to Ellison, when the Terminator premiered on television, Cameron went to the tv network and personally supervised to make sure the Ellison credit was not shown.
Ellison said Cameron had an even bigger ego than himself.
But I wonder how true it was that Cameron had been inspired by the Outer Limits since an obscure movie Cyborg 2087 has many direct parallels to the Terminator and the sequel.
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 20, 2020 19:19:24 GMT
The Man Who Was Never Born, directed by Leonard Horn. An astronaut of 1963 slips through the time barrier and finds that Earth of 2148 is desolate with the mutated, horribly disfigured human race nearing extinction. Atomic war? No: an alien microbe altered with unwise genetic manipulation. He decides to take the gentle if hideous future man Andro back in time to persuade humanity not to do that. Problem: it seems you can cross the time barrier only once and our astronaut doesn't make it. Andro must complete the mission alone: prevent the military scientist from causing the catastrophe. Kill him if necessary. Andro has special hypnotic powers: he can appear as the exotically handsome Martin Landau, allowing him to mix with humans of the past. Terminator (1984)-like, he has arrived too early and falls in love with the mother of the man he has to stop. Andro is both Kyle Reese and the Terminator Model 101 in one! The setup for an SF action plot turns into a love triangle. Love triumphs because Andro is not a killer. But love also changes the future, which ought to be a happy ending, except: you can cross the time barrier only once. Andro can't return to the future, leaving Noelle alone in the space capsule... Which is a shocking finale: we shift to an obvious sound stage, and then pull back as she drifts alone in a star field, fading out, lost in space. That's bleak. Another reason they can't be together: having changed the future, Andro no longer exists. As explained by the title. This is another of my favorite, most memorable episodes, although I did not recall so much love triangle. The dialogue sometimes has a lecturing tone, like Rod Serling would use in his Twilight Zone scripts. Conrad Hall uses soft lenses for a dream-like, fairy tale effect on Earth of 1963. Notes: - It is a Beauty and the Beast story, with something of the Princess and the Frog. Shirley Knight as Noelle is a golden girl.
- Another Star Trek analogue: The City on the Edge of Forever.
- The groom sees his runaway bride blast off with a space alien on their wedding day. Did he and the groomsmen go down to the bar and talk it out afterwards?
- The lens filtering produces amazing eye reflections in our lovers; I've never seen anything like it. Screen grabs don't show the effect, but it is spectacular (literaly) on the Blu-ray.
- I want to mention William A. Fraker, who often operated the camera for Conrad Hall, and did this and 14 other episodes. Fraker was a cinematographer in his own right -- Rosemary's Baby (1968), Bullitt (1968), Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), 1941 (1979), WarGames (1983) -- and a director -- Monte Walsh (1970).
The commentary track is by Gary Gerani, who gives good production detail but tends to narrate the plot. 
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Post by theravenking on Sept 20, 2020 21:20:18 GMT
I've never seen the original Outer Limits, but I love the 1990's reboot. Sure there were some weak episodes, but the series was never boring and the best episodes were vintage science-fiction. In my opinion it's so much better than the horrifically over-rated Black Mirror.
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 26, 2020 19:26:48 GMT
O.B.I.T., directed by Gerd Oswald. A secret base uses an eerie surveillance monitor -- something like the interocitor in This Island Earth (1955) -- to spy on anyone, anywhere, at any time. Sometimes you get glimpses of aliens, and sometimes you see yourself just before clawed hands reach in to throttle you. It's a great premise. Unfortunately a lot of time is taken up in a sort of courtroom drama when a Senator -- why him? -- arrives to grill everyone on a murder. He wants to know more about the Outer Band Individuated Teletracer and is astounded to find everyone vague on where they come from, how they work or how many there are. It's not much of a spoiler to reveal the truth: aliens. Early on we see they are disguised as humans with heavy glasses, hairy hands, and walk with a curious limp. Their plan is just to provide the O.B.I.T. machines and let the human race ruin itself by using them as intended. The machines are addictive. The base commander says: "I can't not watch it! It's like a drug!" As the commentary track points out, it's as if writer Meyer Dolinsky had visited the 21st century and come back with a cautionary, prophetic tale of constant mass surveillance and the destruction of privacy. The "watching as addiction" metaphor applies to TV itself, as well as to the internet and pornography. Much of the story takes place in one room; maybe that helps present the claustrophobic paranoia of the staff at the base, knowing they are always watched. Like a "ghost town" they say. No one talks, no one trusts. The O.B.I.T. screen is nice and eerie, a wavering inter-dimensional look. Keyed to a living organism it shows only the human being (and their clothes!) but not any other object. Photographed by Conrad Hall. First of 14 episodes directed by Gerd Oswald. Commentary by Craig Beam. He wants more Outer Limits collectibles and resents Twilight Zone fans for getting all the good swag. He also says Gerd Oswald deserves credit along with the cinematographers for the look of the series. 
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Post by mszanadu on Sept 26, 2020 19:42:12 GMT
This is definitely one of my top favorite classic TV Shows from the 1960's
( next to the original Twilight Zone of course )
Thanks so much wmcclain and to all the good folks here
for your most intriguing and awesome input on
this most memorable TV Show ( to us ) here as well   .
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 27, 2020 13:23:18 GMT
The Human Factor, directed by Abner Biberman. Isolated military bases in the arctic are natural locations for SF thrillers, and this one begins like a scene from The Thing from Another World (1951). But no, that's not a alien in ice they are hauling in from the storm, but an atom bomb. The major who is cracking up and seeing guilt-induced visions of a dead man really wants to know how it works. Not a lot of Outer Limits material here, more like an episode of Science Fiction Theater. As a bonus wrinkle a base scientist is -- for some damn reason at a radar base in the arctic -- working on a mind-sharing rig. When this goes all the way to mind transfer the erratic major has a good chance of getting to his a-bomb. Many familiar faces. Big star Gary Merrill and Sally Kellerman at age 26. With Harry Guardino and Ivan Dixon and a glimpse of James Sikking. I did not know that Abner Biberman directed but he has a long list of credits. I remember him best as the comical tough guy Louie in His Girl Friday (1940) ("She ain't no albino. She was born right here is this country"):  Photographed by Conrad Hall. No commentary track. 
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Post by wmcclain on Sept 30, 2020 13:57:31 GMT
Corpus Earthling, directed by Gerd Oswald. After a lab accident a doctor begins hearing voices discussing the invasion of Earth. A metal plate in his head allows him to eavesdrop on a conversation no one else can hear. When the aliens become aware of him his death becomes their priority. The two invaders look like simple lumps of coal. They "breathe" when no one is watching and when attacking they turn into crab-like creatures, which are rudimentary rubber models but still horrific in effect. It's a familiar dilemma from other paranoia stories like Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956): when faced with the impossible, do you doubt your own sanity or decide the universe is not what you supposed? Keep it to yourself or risk being sent to the psycho ward? I remember this one! You can bet I scrutinized my rock collection carefully afterwards. "Fear of rocks" is a new one, but you can see how it can work: rocks are inconceivably ancient compared to human life. Who knows what mysteries the Earth has known during those millions of years? I also started having the paranoia dream: finding that everyone had changed and I was the last one... I did not remember the intimate TV drama moments between husband and wife, tending to ignore those segments when I was young. Now I study the dark, striking visual composition of the scenes. Another intriguing plot point I had forgotten: our couple flees to a modest rental pueblo in Mexico. When danger appears the caretaker builds a circle of fires, claiming this is a defense against possession by evil forces, and that his people have known this evil many times. It is a remarkably bleak episode. In a truly horrific segment the wife is captured and her face forced down onto the crab-alien while she screams and screams. Robert Culp returns. His wife is played by Salome Jens who I remember having a good part in Seconds (1966); didn't she jump into the vat of grapes during the orgiastic wine festival? Photographed by Conrad Hall. The commentary track is by Craig Beam. He says that William A. Fraker was the camera operator on every one of the first season episodes. 
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Post by wmcclain on Oct 3, 2020 12:26:14 GMT
If I can critique your series a bit, like Rod Serling’s bookended narrations for the Twilight Zone, the narration open and close are important to the episodes. I would post some these as well along with plot descriptions. Especially when you get to Production and Decay of Strange Particles. That's a good idea. Maybe I should, but I've been reluctant to do too much cut and paste from other sources. The title of each episode is a link to the wikipedia article which has the narration text plus cast & crew & production details that I don't include. My little reviews are personal reflections, not meant to be encyclopedic. If you look at the next episode, "Nightmare", the opening text is long plot setup and I would omit it, but the closing thoughts might be valuable.
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Post by wmcclain on Oct 4, 2020 18:11:23 GMT
Nightmare, directed by John Erman. When planet Ebon A-bombs Earth, the multi-national and multi-racial space force takes the war to them. Which goes poorly: all the troop ships are captured and the soldiers subjected to physical and mental torture on their strange planet. We have hints that all is not as it appears and the big plot twist is delivered at the half-way point. The bare surreal staging gives the show a theatrical look and it does run like an experimental play. This is probably due to the director's casting experience: when you make an actors showcase the result will be stage-like. That actually sort of fits with the "experimental" nature of the plot. In the end it is a moral little tale like those used in the Twilight Zone, less often for this series. The Ebonite Interrogator is played by busy character actor John Anderson. He had been the suspicious car salesman in Psycho (1960) a little earlier:  He really, really hated the costume. Many other familiar faces: Ed Nelson, James Shigeta, Whit Bissell. Martin Sheen, age 23, would become a star. Written by Joseph Stefano, photographed by John M. Nickolaus. The commentary track is by David J Schow, who points out strong parallels with the patriotic war film The Purple Heart (1944). He gives a lot of production detail and offers his opinion on what works and what doesn't. This was Erman's only episode and the producers did quite a bit of re-editing. They told him: you can either cast or direct, but not both. Apparently there were no hard feelings and he found it to be good advice. 
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Post by wmcclain on Oct 8, 2020 19:07:51 GMT
It Crawled Out of the Woodwork, directed by Gerd Oswald. The whimsical title has a cute opening: it's the cleaning lady's fault. She shouldn't poke at that unknown mass in the corner. Could be a deadly, unstoppable energy being. Not so funny after that. Staff at the research lab are paranoid and in despair. A lot of deaths. They all wear little electronic boxes under their clothes: you won't believe what those are for. A reasonably straightforward SF thriller with a little psycho-drama between the brothers. The smoke/shadows/electricity energy menace is at once a rudimentary effect and really quite effective. It lives in "the Pit". The closing narration tells us it is a metaphor for various human powers, but particularly that of controlling the atom: We have a rich set of familiar faces: - Kent Smith as the head honcho, always handsome and dull, remembered from earlier thrillers like Cat People (1942), The Curse of the Cat People (1944), and The Spiral Staircase (1946). Here he has a giant photo of a mushroom cloud on the wall behind his desk. The man knows what he wants.
- Ed Asner as the police detective.
- Michael Forest who I remember as the god Apollo in Star Trek Who Mourns for Adonais?
- Barbara Luna was all over TV back then, again in Star Trek as Kirk's consort in the alternative universe Mirror, Mirror.
- The great Ted de Corsia has a small part as a gate guard. He was doing a lot of TV around then.
Photographed by Conrad Hall. No Blu-ray commentary track for this episode. 
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Post by Prime etc. on Oct 9, 2020 8:19:06 GMT
I wonder if anyone ever contacted the tv station to complain about their tv signal despite the Control Voice telling them there's nothing wrong.
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Post by wmcclain on Oct 10, 2020 19:56:17 GMT
The Borderland, written and directed by Leslie Stevens. When experimenting with strong magnetic fields, scientists discover how to open a passage to another dimension. A side-effect of entering that dimension is reversal of objects into their mirror images. In the first scene the chief scientist puts his hand in the field, with inconvenient results. Could have been worse. This is a good setup and uses several intriguing elements: - The meeting of science and spiritualism. The rich man funding the research will use either path to contact his dead son.
- When dealing with new aspects of time and space we have to start taking premonitions seriously. Are they real, or just the familiar projections of our hopes and fears?
- The business manager looks for ways of exploiting the 4th dimension. He never explains what he has in mind.
- The Control Voice becomes sentimental in the closing narration: "There are worlds beyond and worlds within which the explorer must explore, but there is one power which seems to transcend space and time, life and death. It is a deeply human power which holds us safe and together when all other forces combine to tear us apart — we call it the power of love".
- The climax reminds me of Blair Brown pulling William Hurt out of the Elsewhere into the Here at the end of Altered States (1980).
On the down side, even with this rich set of ideas, the episode is padded. We have a long dinner table exposition and then an experimental procedure at the power plant which is repeated many times. The gear is impressive and everyone takes it seriously, dramatically flipping those switches and calling out the steps. But it goes on and on. Even so, this builds to an impressive, exciting climax, with our scientist caught between dimensions, witnessing strange and confusing realities, while his wife and friends frantically struggle to bring him back. The cast includes: As always with the series the effects are economical but strangely appropriate. Photographed by John M. Nickolaus. No Blu-ray commentary track for this episode. 
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