The Five Best "Outer Limits" Episodes

Leslie Stevens and Joseph Stefano (who wrote the screenplay for Psycho) were the creative talents behind the best sci fi anthology of the 1960s (maybe of all time). The concept was that each show would stay within the confines of the science fiction genre and feature a “bear”—Stefano’s nickname for a scary monster. The scripts weren't as consistently strong as The Twilight Zone and the show’s budget often worked against some of the high-end concepts. But when The Outer Limits was good, it was very good. Without further adieu, we list our picks for the five best episodes.

Trent getting handy advice.

1. Demon with A Glass Hand - Trent (Robert Culp) is a man “born ten days ago” who has no previous memory and is being pursued throughout a huge deserted office building by alien beings that want to kill him. His actions are guided solely by his hand, which is made of glass with a tiny computer inside. The hand has two digits—the thumb and pinky—and talks to Trent. This fascinating episode penned by Harlan Ellison showcased The Outer Limits at its best: a brilliant concept, an offbeat setting, and a strong central performance.

2. The Architects of Fear - With the world facing annihilation from a nuclear war, a group of idealistic scientists decide to fake an alien invasion so warring factions will join against a greater enemy. In this way, they hope to achieve world peace. They draw lots and Dr. Allen Leighton (Robert Culp again) is selected to undergo surgeries that will transform him into an "alien being." Like any great science fiction story, The Architects of Fear balances social comment on the macro level with human drama on the micro level (in this case, the relationship between Leighton and his wife). The ending of the popular graphic novel Watchmen owes much to this classic Outer Limits episode.

A very memorable alien creature.

3. The Zanti Misfits - The imaginative premise has an army unit occupying a modern-day ghost town to ensure the safe arrival of an alien spacecraft carrying prisoners. No one is enthused about this mission--the Zantis threatened to declare war if their request to establish a penal colony on Earth was not granted. Although the army has secured the area, a low-life criminal (Bruce Dern) and his runaway wife (Olive Deering) break through the barricade. Their meddling ultimately leads to a memorable, all-out battle between the bug-like Zantis and the soldiers. A memorable exercise in visual horror, writer Joseph Stefano also makes a chilling statement about the nature of the human race.

Bee-ware of the new lab assistant!

4. Zzzzz - An entomologist studying bees needs a new lab assistant. A queen bee who can transform herself into human form needs a new mate. The entomologist is married. We now have a conflict. This entertaining episode benefits mightily from Joanna Frank, who scores as the exotic bee queen determined to get her way. This episode may lack the social significance of other better episodes--but it is sure is fun.

5. The Inheritors - An Army officer, Lieutenant Minns (Steven Ihnat), miraculously survives after being shot in the head by a bullet forged from a meteorite. He tracks down three other men who endured a similar experience. They began to build a spaceship while Minns recruits handicapped children for a special mission. What in the heck is going on? The Outer Limits' only two-part episode is a stellar one, unfolding as a mystery and ending in inspirational fashion. Ihnat, a good actor often relegated to supporting roles, is first-rate as Minns.

Honorable Mentions:  Soldier (also written by Harlan Ellison); The Sixth Finger (David McCallum becomes the man of the future); and It Crawled Out of the Woodwork.

What are your favorites?

Best B-Movies…oops, I mean, Bee Movies

I originally wrote this post in 2009 to generate some buzz. After considering several possibilities, I seized on a honey of an idea and decided to do one on bees in the cinema (no, not bees in movie theatres, but rather bees depicted on film). Since the number of quality bee films is limited, I dipped into television, too. Here are my top five:

1. Mysterious Island (1961). Bees hit the big time, or rather they were big in this lively adaptation of the Jules Verne novel. Castaways on the title island battle giant bees, courtesy of special effects wizard Ray Harryhausen. Bottom line: Harryhausen + giant bees = cool scene.

2. The Outer Limits episode “Zzzzz” (1964). An entomologist studying bees needs a new lab assistant. A queen bee who can transform herself into human form needs a new mate. The entomologist is married. We now have a conflict. This entertaining episode benefits mightily from Joanna Frank, who scores as the exotic bee queen determined to get her way.

3. The Deadly Bees (1966). OK, it’s not a great movie, but it didn't deserve to be spoofed on Mystery Science Theater 3000. It was directed by famed cinematographer Freddie Francis, so it looks good. Plus, it earns its spot on this list just for including a plotline about liquidizing the “smell of fear” and for featuring great a tag line: “Hives of Horror!”

4. Ulee’s Gold (1997). Too recent to qualify as a classic film, but we’ll toss it in here as an example of a serious bee movie. Actually, the bees are strictly supporting players in this low-key tale of a beekeeper and his family in northern Florida. Still, it earned Peter Fonda his best reviews in years.

5. The Swarm (1978). Irwin Allen made other big-budget films after this one, but Swarm marked the beginning of the end for the Disaster Movie King. Still, if you’re going to have an all-star cast fight hordes of bees, you could do worse than Michael Caine, Henry Fonda, Richard Widmark, Olivia de Havilland, and Fred MacMurray. Plus, it was nominated for an Oscar! For Best Costume Design (?).

Honorable Mentions: The Savage Bees, The Bees (1978), Terror Out of the Sky, and Invasion of the Bee Girls (a Roger Ebert favorite). I don’t remember bees in The Hellstrom Chronicle, but surely they were some. I omitted recent films like Bee Movie and The Secret Life of Bees.

What other bee films are there? I’m hoping someone can up with a humdinger! Or at least one that buzzworthy!

The Outer Limits: Alien Bugs Wreak Havoc on Earthlings in "The Zanti Misfits"

Start a discussion of the top five episodes of The Outer Limits and it's likely that "The Zanti Misfits" will enter the conversation. Many casual fans of the 1960s cult science fiction TV series won't remember the title of this episode. But just mention it's the one with the bugs and folks will recognize it.

What's interesting is that "The Zanti Misfits" isn't particularly well-acted, most of the characters are poorly developed, and the mundane dialogue leaves much to be desired. And yet, all those weaknesses remain an afterthought in light of the episode's ambitious premise, visual power, and a twist with some surprising heft.

The imaginative premise has an army unit occupying a modern-day ghost town to ensure the safe arrival of an alien spacecraft carrying prisoners. No one is enthused about this mission--the Zantis threatened to declare war if their request to establish a penal colony on Earth was not granted.

Although the army has secured the area, a speeding car breaks through one of the barricades, killing a guard. The driver is a low-life named Ben (Bruce Dern), who is fleeing from a crime scene with a runaway wife (Olive Deering). When the unhappy couple spots a small spaceship landing, Ben unwisely goes to investigate. His meddling ultimatey results in a memorable, all-out battle between the bug-like Zantis and the soldiers.

The special effects budget for The Outer Limits sometimes hampered the full exploitation of the show's "bears" (producer Joseph Stefano's unique term for a terrifying creature). That's not the case with "The Zanti Misfits." The aliens are genuinely disturbing little things with insect bodies and human-like heads (perhaps inspired by the creature glimpsed at the end of 1958's The Fly). In some scenes, the Zantis are fully animated via stop-motion photography. In other scenes, they look far less real, as soldiers roll around with fake bugs covering their bodies. Yet, despite a few cheesy shots, the climatic fight scene is creatively staged (Zantis crawling down the windows!) and the overall effect is impressive.

Yet, for all its visual power, it's a twist at the end that lingers after the credits roll. The Outer Limits was known for producing stories with a social conscience, such as "The Inheritors" and "The Architects of Fear." It also tacked on some impressive plot twists on occasion, as evidenced by the haunting "Demon With a Glass Hand." With "The Zanti Misfits," writer Stefano combines both and makes a chilling statement about the nature of the human race.

It's reason enough to watch "The Zanti Misfits"--even if you don't like creepy, crawling things with human-like faces!

Five Best Science Fiction TV Series of the 1960s

1. Star Trek (1966-69) – Gene Roddenberry’s brainchild is certainly the most successful series in the history of sci fi television, spawning five spin-off TV shows (don’t forget the animated one) and three film series…thus far. That’s pretty good for a TV show that wasn’t a big hit when it first aired. But Trek earns its spot at No. 1 because of the rich futuristic world created by Roddenberry. He may not have originated some of the innovative concepts (e.g., teleportation, a federation of planets), but he wove them together to create a believable future of hope and humanity. And, despite William Shatner’s occasional forays into the hammy side of acting, the cast helped create immensely likable characters that carried some of the weaker episodes.

2. The Outer Limits (1963-65) – Leslie Stevens and Joseph Stefano (who wrote the screenplay for Psycho) were the creative talents behind the best sci fi anthology of the 1960s (maybe of all time). The concept was that each show would stay within the confines of the science fiction genre and feature a “bear”—Stefano’s nickname for a scary monster. The scripts weren’t as consistently strong as The Twilight Zone and the show’s budget often worked against some of the high-end concepts. But when The Outer Limits was good, it was very good—with several classic episodes like “Demon With a Glass Hand”, “Soldier” (both penned by Harlan Ellison), “The Inheritors”, “The Zanti Misfits”, “The Architects of Fear”, and “Z-z-z-z-z”.

3. The Invaders (1966-67) – Larry Cohen (It’s Alive) is credited for creating this series, but it bears a strong resemblance to executive producer Quinn Martin’s earlier hit The Fugitive. The premise of The Invaders is simple: architect David Vincent (Roy Thinnes) learns that aliens are planning to take over the Earth, but no one will believe him. He travels from place to place trying to thwart the aliens and convince people to believe him. It doesn’t help that the aliens glow orange and disappear when they die, thus destroying all evidence (in some episodes, aliens commit suicide to avoid capture). The first season of 17 episodes contains most of the series’ high points. In season 2, Vincent linked up with a group of other alien fighters called “The Believers” and the show faltered a little. But at the top of its game in episodes like “The Mutant” and “The Organization”, The Invaders was quite good.

4. Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1964-68) – Television critics harped on Irwin Allen’s series for its “monster of the week” approach, but that criticism actually applies only to the last two years of the show. During its first two years, Admiral Nelson (Richard Basehart) and the crew of the submarine Seaview battled enemy spies and natural disasters as well as outer space aliens and monstrous denizens of the deep. Even when things got a little silly (e.g., an evil puppeteer), the always reliable Basehart was on hand to lend credibility to the proceedings.

5. Doctor Who (1963-1989, 2005- ) – The longest-running sci fi series in the history of television has evolved from a low-budget serial directed at kids to a sophisticated series aimed at a broad audience. The Doctor is a Time Lord, who travels through time in a machine called the TARDIS (an acronym for Time and Relative Dimensions in Space). When William Hartnell, the actor who originated the role of Doctor Who, decided in leave in 1966, the writers came up with an ingenious revelation: as a time lord, Doctor Who could “regenerate” himself when near death…thus paving the way for the character to be played by another actor. As of 2009, there have been ten Doctor Who’s, with another regeneration scheduled for 2010. (Note: Peter Cushing played Who in two theatrical films.)

Honorable mentions: The Jetsons, Jonny Quest, My Favorite Martian, Lost in Space, and Stingray.

31 Days of Halloween: "Demon With a Glass Hand" on The Outer Limits

Trent is a man “born ten days ago” who has no previous memory and is being pursued throughout a huge deserted office building by alien beings that want to kill him. His actions are guided solely by his hand, which is made of glass with a tiny computer inside. The hand has two digits—the thumb and pinky—and talks to Trent. It tells Trent how to destroy the aliens, but says it can’t answer additional questions until Trent restores the three middle fingers…which are in the possession of the aliens.

This fascinating episode, penned by science fiction writer Harlan Ellison, was the highlight of season 2 of The Outer Limits (with “The Inheritors” coming in a close second). The story unfolds like a riddle, with Trent’s hand providing clues along the way. Robert Culp is perfect as the puzzled Trent, who plays a puppet to his own hand, acting and reacting without ever knowing the complete goal.

The episode benefits considerably from its setting and photography. The Bradbury Building in Los Angeles (where parts of Blade Runner were also filmed) provides a vast interior, where shadows lurk down every corridor and one never knows what lies behind an office door. The expressionistic photography (always an Outer Limits trademark) enhances the setting with unusual angles and deeply textured lighting.

The only flaw is an unexpected relationship that sets the stage for an effective ending, but otherwise comes across as forced and unlikely. Still, that’s a minor complaint against an otherwise original, well-crafted tale.

You may note some similarities between this story and a famous film series. I won’t divulge the famous film here (because it gives away a plot twist), but Ellison did sue the film’s producers and settled out of court.

Trivia Time Part Deux Bonus

I love "bending" Rick29's mind with trivia questions. So Rick, just for you, a bonus question ! Get it and I'll give you a pass on all of next months questions. OK?

This actor did an Outer Limits episode before he became a huge star in the mid 60's. No, Rick, you don't have to name it. What you have to do is name him, and the mid 70's short lived show he did for Leslie Stevens. Bonus points for the number of shows. I'll give you a huge hint. He was one of a handful that did both The original Outer Limits and the revival. and is on a current hit TV show (dead giveaway). The answer will be with the others Sunday night.

Steve Ihnat -- Man without a Star

I'm going to delay my next post on Route 66 because I got the sudden urge to write about an actor I greatly admired. His name was Steve Ihnat and though he never became a major star, he was one of the most sought after guest stars on television in the late 60s and early 70s. He made more than 70 appearances in various television series, including Star Trek, Mission: Impossible, The Outer Limits, Gunsmoke, The Virginian, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Bonanza, etc. Although he favored westerns two of his most memorable roles were in Star Trek and the Outer Limits. His performance as Garth, a maniacal, shape shifting warlord, devoured all the scenery and left very little for Shatner and Nimoy to chew on. But it was his performance as Lt. Mims, a sensitive and compassionate alien in "The Inheritors", a two-part episode on the Outer Limits, that led to his career as an A-list guest star. You probably saw him many times if you watched the classic television series of the 60s and 70s, but didn't know his name. He appeared in several motion pictures most notably as the man who killed Robert Redford in The Chase and murdered Richard Widmark in Madigan. But I knew who he was and I was a fan.

Reader, I met him. While I was trying out for a Hollywood trivia game show I met Jo Heims, who wrote the screenplay for Play Misty for Me. She knew Steve Ihnat and I had the chutzpa to ask her to set up a meeting for me with Steve. I received a phone call from Steve and we set up a meeting at his home in the Hollywood Hills. I had written a synopsis for a TV series in which he would be the lead and I wanted to give it to him. I had actually spoken with his agent who told me,"He's not a star". To say the least I was appalled by this statement. Anyway on the appointed day I jumped into my rented Mustang convertible and drove up into the Hollywood Hills. He was editing the film that he had directed Do Not Throw Pillows into the Ring and allowed me to watch him run the film through the editing machine. I gave him a copy of my synopsis and he said he would read it. What I found interesting was that he had a large port wine stain around one of his eyes; the makeup artists really did a good job of concealing that.

He went on to direct the rodeo film Honkers starring James Coburn. He was at the Cannes Film Festival in 1972 trying to get a distributor for his film Do Not Throw Pillows into the Ring, when he died of a heart attack at the age of 37. I attended his funeral where they christened his six-week-old son.

I always checked the TV Guide to see if he was guest starring in any TV shows and usually he appeared at least once a week. To me he was a star giving many excellent performances in a wide variety of genres. He was a damned good actor!