Twilight Zone Marathon on SciFi Channel

[imoldfashioned]

"But Can She Type?" - totally charming turnabout fantasy of an underappreciated secretary (Pam Dawber) who has a run-in with a magical Xerox machine and ends up in a parallel reality where secretaries are at the top of the food chain and executives are treated like dirt!

I'd forgotten about this one--very nice satire!

Her Pilgrim Soul was directed by Wes Craven, which I never realized until I looked it up just now. Gary Cole was the male lead--I really like him as an actor.

 

[Doctor Strange]

Yes, they managed to line up some wonderful directors, writers, and actors on that show - even though it wasn't really a class-A production and producer Phil DeGuerre had nothing on his resume to indicate that he could pull it off. And I was a Deadhead in those days, so I was tickled that the Dead did the show's new "theme" (not that it was really much of anything.)

Another one that I personally found even more affecting than Her Pilgrim Soul was... well, I don't remember the title, or who was in it. A woman photographer meets a charming child and starts photographing him, and they spend a perfect day together. A the end, it turns out that he's the child she WOULD have had if she hadn't just broken off her engagement for her career (or something like that). She pleads with him that she can still have children, but he tells her - preternaturally calm, yet still obviously moved, "Yes, but that child won't be me." (Geez, I'm ferklempt just typing it!)

Don't get me wrong, though: I'm still more partial to the original series. As somebody said earlier, it was always there in NYC at 11pm, and I watched it until I knew virtually all the episodes. (I had actually watched the show a few times during the last two seasons of its CBS run when I was VERY little - my parents, though never fans of SF/fantasy, were fans of Serling's work. I'm almost prouder of this than that I watched Star Trek from its very first broadcast in September 1966!)

 

[imoldfashioned]

Another one that I personally found even more affecting than Her Pilgrim Soul was... well, I don't remember the title, or who was in it. A woman photographer meets a charming child and starts photographing him, and they spend a perfect day together. A the end, it turns out that he's the child she WOULD have had if she hadn't just broken off her engagement for her career (or something like that). She pleads with him that she can still have children, but he tells her - preternaturally calm, yet still obviously moved, "Yes, but that child won't be me." (Geez, I'm ferklempt just typing it!)

Oh, Little Boy Lost! What is it about lost love that turns on the waterworks? I've got that one on my mouldering VHS too. I should really just buy the DVDs.

Do you remember Amazing Stories? I think it was Spielberg who did that one. There was a story with Mark Hamill (!) as a guy who saved all this stuff and everyone made fun of him until he sold it 40 years later for tons of money. Not as good as the "New" Twilight Zone but there were a couple good stories there.

I completely agree that the original TZ was the best. And you're an original Star Trek viewer?! I bow before you Sir!

 

[Roger]

I didn't really get into the movie version that much. I really didn't care for it.[huh]

 

[Doctor Strange]

The movie was pretty lame, but I did like Joe Dante's remake of "It's A Good Life" with the cartoon theme. It showed some style. But as a whole, the film was unnecessary and weak - plus the spectre of the liability case when Vic Morrow and those kids died during the shoot hovered over it, making enjoyment difficult.

imoldfashioned - "Little Boy Lost", of course!

Yes, I am one of the aboriginal Trekkers who watched the show from day one. I was 11-1/2 and *primed*. I loved it instantly, wrote a letter to NBC to save the show at the end of the second season, bought "The Making of Star Trek" (the first book on the series) as soon as it came out and committed it to memory, interviewed Gene Roddenberry at the second-ever convention for a fanzine I was doing with my buddies, saw The Motion(less) Picture twice the day it opened (and was thrilled, even though I realized it wasn't exactly *good*), etc. The ongoing franchise - TNG, the movies, the other series - would never have existed without folks like me!

I am also one of the rare few who watched "The Prisoner" during it's original US run in the summer of 1968, when it was a replacement for The Jackie Gleason Show! (In fact, for most of my life, my standard answer to "What are your favorite TV shows?" has been - Twilight Zone, Star Trek, and The Prisoner.)

I watched Amazing Stories, but it was a bitter disappointment. Despite all the big-name actors and directors and a healthy budget, only a few of its stories were barely worthwhile. The show never lived up to its way-cool opening titles with the shaman by the fire ending up as grandpa watching TV (ah, back when CGI was new and exciting!)

 

[Doh!]

Doc, thanks for your breakdown of some of those key episodes -- I was telling somebody about "Minute by Minute" just the other day! This talk makes me want to get them on DVD, but even on Amazon they're a little pricey.

Maybe I can find them used somewhere.

http://www.amazon.com/Twilight-Zone...9-0325537?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1184539117&sr=1-5