They might seem cheesy to some people these days, because they launched a bunch of great actors. Hey, there's Robert Redford! Kojak! Ellery Queen! Ellie May Clampett! Captain Kirk! My favorite Martian! But no, they weren't and aren't cheesy to me.
I know. We definitely dropped the ball on that one, but as we progress, so do our editing skills so you can believe it won't happen again. Trust me, we're always learning. And thanks for much for watching the video and enjoying it despite the shortcomings with the audio. 😀
Sterling was the reason I got into writing...as a younger person I always had a dark and twisted sense of humour and after watching my first episode I was hooked! He was definitely one of my heroes...Ray Bradbury was my second.
The episode "Where is everybody" still gives me chills to this day, just the very idea of being the only person left alive in the world is terrifying to me.
For me, the scariest episode was the one where William Shatner saw a gremlin on the wing of the plane he was flying, and no one would believe him. Scared the crap out of me as a kid.
I also liked the one where the old rich man is about to die and he calls his relatives over and puts a condition on the inheritance they should get. They have to wear an ugly looking mask until midnight if they want the money. While they are wearing it, he points out how horrible each and everyone of them is and has been to him and then at midnight he dies. When they remove their masks, happy to have the inheritance, they realize that their faces have taken the ugly shape of the masks....forever!! I don't remember the name of the episode but that really freaked me out when I first saw it!
'Night Call' is by far the scariest Twilight Zone episode for me ( where the old woman receives mysterious phone calls at night ). I remember watching it as a kid, and the moment where we see the fallen telephone wire is lying on the gravestone scared the life out of me! Still watch that episode to this day, and it still scares me.
"Shadow Play". Where the guy in jail is waiting for his execution by electric chair, and after he is executed, wakes up in the same cell reliving the whole scenario again, but all of the other characters have switched roles. ie: the janitor is now the judge...... Unbelievable writing (& excuse the pun) and execution 😁.
The one where a tiny UFO landed on the roof of a lonely old lady house. After she destroyed the ship, we later found out that the tiny visitors were from Earth and the old lady was just a frightend giant alien.
@@halkingsbury8795 Yep, a great episode, and Moorehead won an Emmy for her performance or some TV award. Not one word spoken by her; she was an exceptional actress. Orson Welles' favourite actress in his infamous 1940s movie, Citizen Kane, considered by many, the greatest movie of all time.
I love how in Midnight Sun" ends with the girl waking up thinking "thank god it was just a dream" But then you hear Mrs Bronson and a doctor talking, and it's revealed Earth has in fact left it's orbital position. The only difference is that Earth is not heading toward the Sun. Instead Earth is headed away from the Sun and is slowly freezing to death!
They do it on my "Twilight Zone" broadcast network on July 4th weekend - they call it "Rod, White and Blue." A lot of these very episodes are usually on. The one that freaked me out that is NOT here is the one with Agnes Moorhead where she played with NO dialogue but a one woman performance where she fought off invaders from another planet. Come to find out she is one of a giant race where "aliens" from Earth have landed on another planet, and she kills them all.
@@jimhuffman9434 I thought this was such a good plot twist! Although I did look it up and it's most likely that the earth out of orbit would move towards the sun then away because of the sun's gravitational pull...I still think the idea of the earth slowly becoming colder and colder is more terrifying. I adored the ending.
I consider 'To Serve Man' to be the best tomato surprise story* ever broadcast. But the comic brilliance (admittedly morbid) of the punchline negates the horror, so it's not my best candidate for Scariest Ep. * long tale building up to a revelation that changes everything
"Five Characters In Search Of An Exit" - the fact there is virtually no set, other than that cylinder, is unnerving, especially when watched for the first time.
MrBargill Do remember his fellow writers Richard Matheson and Charles Beaumont. Serling certainly did at an awards ceremony where the show won, inviting them to come on up so they could slice into like a turkey.
@@billmurray7473, Chucky may have been inspired by Talky Tina, but I'm pretty sure he was more evil. Tina only killed someone who more-or-less had it coming.
@@johnathonhaney8291 Right - many TZ episodes from Richard Matheson. Serling was brilliant in putting it all together but I don't think tht he actually wrote too many.
When I was younger I vowed never to get on any train that had a train station stop in Willoughby, and I'd never go near any girls who had talking dolls!
What about the shelter, I think that was the name, it was a similar situation, neighbors friendly in the beginning. Then there was alarm of a nuclear attack and everyone turned on each other.
The two episodes that scared the dog-living shite out of me as a kid were Last Train to Willoughby and Eye of the Beholder. The one that ripped out my soul was Time Enough At Last; I'm still heartbroken for poor Henry.
Yeah, Beemis, especially if you're a reader yourself, does hurt. But try watching it again with the idea that he had it coming, which I now think was Serling's real intent
One of the great things about the classic Twilight Series was just how much variety it offered. One episode could be scary, the next episode could be sci-fi with a social message and the next episode could be an odd light-hearted story. Basically there's something for everyone.
Beautifully put-- the new medium, with America's best writers-- from radio -- with our best talent --- and thank Goodness for us that execs were willing to take risks back then without the fear of losing their job by 6pm that same say over a gigantic expensive flop they greenlit, but were too exhausted to remember. When you had "the Ford Hour" or the " Westinghouse hour", the stakes between the producers and the sponsors would be for that performance of that show only -- a quick turnaround, low budgets, and accountability -- no wonder the quality was so consistent -- the Twilight Zone team were all veterans of Live TV's Best-- Kraft Playhouse 90, You Are There, etc... these tight-knit teams knew everyone else's job, bc the show had to go on the air no matter what-- if the gaffer wasn't there -- someone else had to do it -- bc that airtime had to be filled. You got a lot of real Pros coming up that way. And most important, they didn;t worry if different lobbies complained. The Twilight Zones were not afraid of being called hokey or maudlin. The Robot Grandmother Episode was one of the most heartwrenching episodes I remember-- including modern television .... I cried for her when I was little. The show seems to have touched everyone in every master emotion. Wow.
I wrote an essay about the golden age of television, and I did a compare and contrast between the twilight zone, and Alfred Hitchcock‘s horror hour I believe it was called. The thing about Rod Serling is he was a short story. Writer in the magazines didn’t like the spin he was putting on these stories. He was offering too much social commentary, and spinning it into a sci-fi thing, so they kind of scooted him off to television which was the new thing and figured he wouldn’t go far with his weird stories. Come to find out he had an audience. He developed a cult following and then from there the show just blew up. It is currently 2023 and I can still sit down in front of the TV and watch episodes of the twilight zone that I have seen many times and still get the heebie-jeebies scared out of me.
It's a fine thing you've done Anthony.Could ya wish it out into the Corn field for me? That kid scares the living daylights out of me.On the new Twilight Zone they had a follow up with Cloris Leachman again playing the now grown up boys mother and he has a daughter.The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.Even though nothing compares to the original,this was a good follow up.The first Twilight Zone episode was scary as well with no one in a town with a man who didn't know who he was.A couple of night gallery episodes were good as well.Rod Serling was always a step ahead of his time.
Partially because she was so beautiful,Arlene Martel,A Bronx Beauty was so mesmerizing in 22.Room for 1 more honey.Wow!So exotically beautiful and so scary.She was also Spock's Wife on Star Trek and was the Female lead in the outer limits episode, Demon with a glass hand, opposite Robert Culp as male lead.Its a classic.Rod Serling cast a lot of young and fine actors in the Twilight Zone.
"Stopover in a Quiet Town" Everything was fake it was empty trees were fake no people nothing and then to find that a little girl laughing with a giant hand scoops them up and her father says " be careful with your pets, I brought them all the way from earth"
To bad Rod Serling died to early sure he could of done more great work. I think a lot of the movies we have taken the Twilight zone episodes like the toys in the drum. The Talking doll.. Chucky.
Byron Herrera Plenty of people have tried imitating it since--Black Mirror being the latest attempt--but their stories are too grounded in the time periods they are made. The 1980s TZ revival had genuinely good and/or scary episodes but there's not a single moment when I'm not thinking "That's so '80s." Even with some dated touches here and there, I NEVER feel like that with the OG TZ series at its best.
No there's better shit than that. I mean it's a great example of irony, to say it's one of the scariest lines ever is ridiculous I mean it was a good episode and it was scarier in my opinion then now I can't remember all the fucking names cuz you know really starting to irritate after hours it was scarier than that one but hitchhiker was scarier than both and yada yada yada I've already made enough comments if you care you can go look. But you know to serve man and the Obsolete Man two great examples of they're two of the best but they're not the scariest
Don't forget all the episodes that were absolutely charming. The one with Art Carney about becoming Santa Clause, the one about the school teacher forced into early retirement who then has a visit with ghosts of his former students and realizes how much impact he had, the one about the man and his dog going to Heaven and almost being tricked into entering Hell, etc. Sorry, I don't remember the titles.
All great episodes. But, the one with the "old man" and "old woman" and the dog and trying to trick the old man into going to Hell, is my favorite episode.
The Hitchhiker episode by far is the scariest of all. And a close second was the one with the little girl called Markie who saw her mother murdered. Both were so suspenseful. But the one where Robert Redford plays death and he tricks the old lady into letting him inside her house was both creepy and sad.
My favorite twilight zone episode is death’s head revisited. In that episode a former SS commandant returns to the concentration camp he once ruled with an iron fist and took glee in torturing prisoners in for some sick nostalgia. However, the ghosts of the men he killed put him on trial for his crimes.
Same here! I was five years old and wasn’t expecting those pig faces, which me and my sister call them! My sister and I still talk about it to this day! Same with “Masks’, another one that scared me!
and when they had the "reveal" of what she looked like...voila!...it was Donna Douglass that played Elly May Clampett of the Beverly Hillbillys. Initially when it first aired, I didn't notice little things about the various scenes. Just like other stuff as you grow and learn, you pick up on stuff and ask..hmmm. with this episode it was all the gauze used to cover her face...OMG..what all THAT necessary (ha ha ha). I, too, am a huge fan of the show. Watch the marathon whenever one's on. So many good actors appeared on it through out the decades and made several appearances in different episodes. Hats off to Mr. Serling and other writers, directors, producers.
still good to watch today, even though you know what's coming. The TERRIFIED woman calling out in alarm and anguish, as she delivers that line: ……."IT'S.....A COOK BOOK"!!!!!!!
"The Mystic Seer" episode starring William Shatner. His debilitating reliance on a "Fortune telling" machine in a old style Cafe that he can't leave alone because of it's vague answers, shows how a person's superstitions can become enslaving. It's even more pitiful in that it shows another couple come in after they narrowly escape and they have possibly been held hostage by the table-top nick-nack for an even longer time.
the scariest twilight zone is a one hour long episode called 'the new exhibit' when the owner closes down his museum of infamous killers made of wax and his employee gets to take them home and put them in his basement and one by one they come to life and commit murder...
@@bd3966 Netflix does not have the season 4 hour-long episodes. However, when I got the one-month trial to Paramount Plus, I was able to finally see the episodes I hadn't seen before.
The Monsters are Due on Maple Street is the one episode that still sticks with me today. How something could go wrong and how everyone around you who are normally cordial and pleasant, if not outright friends, can turn on you in an instant. The thought that people you deal with and trust on an everyday basis could be the first to point their finger at you is the root of scary.
That episode was my introduction to the serieis when my 7th Grade Teacher (Mr. Kuppersmith/Henry Clay Middle School in LA) made us watch it for an assignment. It became my favorite black and white tv series afterwards. That episode will forever stick with me.
The episode with Gladys Cooper where she's an elderly shut-in and her phone begins to ring every night. Then we learn that the caller is her long-dead boyfriend Brian, whom she accidentally killed because she insisted on driving all those years before. When she finally realizes it was her old BF (after she had screamed at him to leave her alone) she is taken to the cemetery by her nurse (as she was paralyzed in the accident.) Then she realizes that the phone line was hanging down broken, right at his grave. She then receives one last call from "Brian" and he promises to never bother her again, which saddens and upsets her until she begs him not to leave her. It is SCARY and CREEPY and a little bit sad. Cooper was in several episodes and was always absolutely incredible in every single one of them.
@@sarcasticallyrearranged Yep. Either that or Night Caller. Gladys Cooper was in several episodes as well as some Alfred Hitchcock Presents episodes. Even in her 70s+ she was still so beautiful and SO amazing.
I think "To Serve Man" suffers from being one of the most parodied episodes ever. I saw the twist coming because Is aw the Simpsons episode about it before. Still a classic though.
Would you consider reuploading the video without the theme? Or if time permitting, remixing it so that with each episode featured, you play a sample of the score featured in each episode.
The constant repeating of the same 4 notes of the Twilight Zone theme played over and over again became quite annoying after only a few minutes of watching this.
Great video but I have to admit. Playing the theme music all the way threw was a bit distracting. It made it kind of difficult to concentrate on your dialogue. Still a great analysis. Thumbs up!
Thanks so much, Draven! Yeah, we've definitely recognized our mistake with the theme being mixed in the background. Believe me, it won't happen again. I'm glad you enjoyed the video and hope you'll check back for more of our content.
I have noticed the same thing. Especially when listening to a foreign language (like English) it gets distracting when there is music playing in the background.
This was my favorite TV show as a kid in the '60s. I used to sit in a chair behind my father to watch it so that when it got scary I could hide behind him!
The creepy Mandela effect stuff is like the freakin Twilight Zone... lol And yes, I've been confused about that cause I don't know if it's supposed to be Talking Tina or Talky Tina.
My vote for the scariest Twilight Zone episode ever? The one entitled "Little Girl Lost." Creeps me out to this day whenever I watch it. Imagine being the parents of this little girl and having her disappear into another dimension - a dimension beyond your reach. Hearing her voice but unable to physically reach out and touch her. Having no idea how to save her. Imagine the horrors. This is my vote for the creepiest "Zone" of all time.
I thought this would be on the list as it was the creepiest one for me and my sister as kids. After watching this one, we were afraid to sleep especially by the walls thinking we would fall in.
I think that episode really opened my mind to different dimensions at a very early age. I thought it would be neat to suddenly have these black holes or dimensions appear spontaneously anywhere, anytime, and anyplace. The theory of how cryptids appear and people sometimes disappearing without a trace could be related to this Twilight Zone episode
@@QuarrellaDeVil L😳L. I wonder what these people looked liked ? well when it came to Rod Serling there's no telling ☺ perhaps some had 👀eyes in the back of their heads , faces like 🐟 fish & arms like wings of a 🐦 bird so they could fly away to visit his friend Alfred Hitchcock ☺September 18 , 2019
@@mr.nickname9172 L😄L - wow !!! now that comment is a what ? & a what ? I have a question for you & that is : how long did it take for you to type your award winning 🏆 comment which lead you into The Twilight Zone 😵of emojis 😄 September 18 , 2019
I KNOW RIGHT I WAS SUPER UNNERVED WHEN HE HAD FOUR HANDS AND THEN WHEN THE DINER DUDE SHOWED THAT HE HAD A THIRD EYE I JUST TURNED OFF THE TV CUZ IT WAS REAAAALLY CREEPY FOR ME
I was 12 years old when I saw that episode. Everything was fine (even the guy with 3 arms) until...Haley, the counterman took off his cap to reveal his third eye! Scared the living wits outta me! Love that episode!
That was the very first episode of the twilight zone that I saw. It was late, my mom and sisters were asleep, and it scared me to death. I think I stayed up all night because I was too scared to go to sleep. Recently, I had my boys watched it with me...they didn't find it as frightening as I did, but they loved it.
That one is very creepy! I think his name is Brian. You told me to leave you alone! Something like that. It’s been so long I can’t exactly remember. Haha 😆
@@decmagnet2072 I remember exactly what Brian said to Elva at the end. "You said 'Leave you alone.' I always do what you say." How sad it was that she lost Brian twice all because she wanted to be the boss in their relationship!
My comment exactly to someone else who responded. Those of us who are huge fans of classic t.v. and movies can appreciate this genre. Robert Redford, Martin Balsam, Agnes Moorehead, Robert Duval, Telly Savalas, Inger Stevens, and so many more who went on to great, working careers. While on the subject of the show, I just want to comment about another episode which starred one of my crushes, William Shatner, in which he was flying on a plane ("Nightmare at 10,000 Feet") and kept seeing a "creature" on the wing. Well, I gotta say, that furry costume (a wet gorilla?) the actor was wearing was a hoot! AND the face of the "creature" had the same mask/features from a couple other episodes (I pick up on stuff like that as others pick up on production errors on movie sets...I'm anal that way....oh well). But, hey, it's all good and still classic and still fun.
I liked the one about the brother and sister that found a kind old lady and some other 'children' Everytime they dived in their pool to get away from their bickering parents.🙈🙉🙊
The very last episode of the series to air in prime time. The experts consider it one of the Zone's Worst Episodes. I didn't think it was all that bad, though. I always thought it was creepy thinking about what happened to the kids. Did they grow up? If so, did they have to swim back to the real world when they did? What if that swimming pool was no longer there when they grew up? I totally gave that episode more thought than necessary.
I like that one too it has a sorta happy ending I originally thought the old lady was gonna be evil and trap them there and do something awful to them but no nothing bad happened and they got away from their parents who they didn’t seem to wanna be with anymore sad they couldn’t work things out with their parents though and their parents seemed worried at the end
Surprised Night Call wasn't included.An old lady recieving calls in a storm from her dead husband buried in a nearby cemetery was a classic scary episode.Enjoyed countdown.Great episodes mentioned.
I like the less-known one where a young Robert Duvall gets fascinated by a dollhouse and the lives of the dolls. The ending was great. Also the one where Joseph Wiseman (Dr. No) plays a super rich guy who will let people into his bomb shelter, but they have to beg, and it's like a test of will and character.
The scariest episode for me was “Long Live Walter Jameson”. idk why but the last five minutes of the episode terrified me. the fact that all that was left of his body was his suit and dust was scary.
My absolute favorite episode, though it isn’t scary, is The Hunt, where the old man goes hunting with his dog! Beautiful episode! Thank you for this compilation! I happen to think the howling man is for me the scariest!
I love the Twilight Zone but I will never forget one night in Nigeria ( I was eleven years) when minutes after watching an episode, there was the usual but random power cut....and I had to go to bed in a room by myself...in complete darkness save for a kerosene lantern that gave me nothing but ominous shadows for company ffs!
I loved the episode where the father leaves his covered wagon to go up over the hill looking for medicine for his sick child and ends up in a little town 100 yrs in the future!!
'A hundred yards over the rim' with Cliff Robertson. "Dear God, how can it be nineteen hundred and sixty two when it's really eighteen hundred and forty seven?!"
This episode (in 2020) was created 58 years ago. I just watched it for the first time since 1962. It is amazing how well I remember these episodes. As I recall it was on around 10pm Friday nights.
This was a great time-slip episode. Another was “The last flight” where a WWOne pilot lands at a airbase 40 years later. And another where a jetliner keeps jumping back and forth in time.
"An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge." A multiple award winning (Oscar, Cannes, BAFTA) French film of an Ambrose Bierce short story. Rod Serling gave it a wonderful introduction at the head of the telecast. Easily one of the finest short films in history. I felt a kaleidoscope of emotions until that ending.
Saw this short film in an elementary school class. Don't even remember what class it was, but remembered the film vividly 60+ years later. Never knew it was Rod Serling.
I knew that the Billy Mumy episode "It's A Good Life" would be way up there. Creepy as hell, especially the adult reactions while deferring to the little kid.
Yeah, as if none of the adults ever got up in the middle of the night to take a leak and thought to themselves: "Say, maybe now would be a good time to crush that little monster's skull!"
You're a BAD MAN, you're a very BAD MAN, and then he is a jackinthebox, and the other adults say, oh that was good because they want to placate him! Send them to the field,
TDK There was an episode, when they brought the Twilight Zone back, in which Bill Mumy had grown to adulthood, and had a daughter with the same powers he had. It was an hour episode. Not as frightening, bet well worth watching.
Thanks for sharing, I remember all of these! There’s another one that is about a man who wants to read but life gets in the way. He’s in a bank vault when the area is hit by a bomb. Of course he’s feeling desolate walking over the crumbling buildings but then sees a sweet site-a library fill of books. He sits down to start reading and his glasses fall off and break. Good one!
"Mirror Image" with Vera Miles and Martin Milner. Extremely creepy and moody. The unnerving atmospherics created by that underlit bus terminal waiting room was almost unbearable.
Someone wrote a short essay about Mirror Image stating that ot was actually about fascism. I found the guy who worked behind the counter irritating even though i sort of understood where he was coming from according to his perspective. Also, I found the guy pretending to be a friend annoying but not enough to be glad when the same thing happened to him
I read a good book once written by Robert Serling, Rod's older brother, about plane crashes he had investigated for the federal government. There were a few Twilight Zones centering around aviation which Robert's experiences helped contribute to.
_The Hitchhiker_ would've been on my list, that is definitely one of the creepiest tales ever. Along with, _The Obsolete Man_ , _Eye of The Beholder_ , _Nightmare At 20,000 Feet_ , _To Serve Man_ , _The Masks_ , _The New Exhibit_ etc. etc., all very creepy episodes.
The alien certainly did look like Lurch. However, he was played by Richard Kiel, best know for playing "Jaws" in two James Bond films, not Ted Cassidy from "The Addams Family" TV show.
"Its a Good Life" is the one episode I try not to watch.It is a well written show but the concept is hard to watch. I see shows and movies where kids have extra powers but not like the dark side of this one, where a child has control over a community to the point of life and death, which the child has no concept of good or bad.
There are two episodes I think were the best, Billy Mummy as the enpowered kid that everyone was scared of, and the second with Burgess who survives the destruction on earth by being in a gigantic safe and when he comes see's all the damage and now he has time to read at last! But when he bends over to pick up a book and his glasses fall of his face and now he cannot read anymore! Those two episodes are the best for me!
@@devilsadvocate838 Why didn't he just go to a drug store and pick from some of the reading glasses that were for sale? I know, this would mess up the story.
the one where the dead husband talks to the old lady and you see the phone line in the ground at the end. creeped me out the most. but my favourite episode is "Dead Mans Shoes"
He was actually her fiance. He died a week before their wedding. The episode that really creeped me out was Long Distance Call. Where a five year old boy would talk to his dead grandmother on his toy telephone. The frightening part was that she was telling her grandson to kill himself so that they would be together forever!
Melissa Cooper :: was there an episode where the owner of a certain vintage automobile HAD to tell the truth ? ........where the last scene was Nikita Khrushchev happily being gifted the auto ?.......am I confusing myself with an OuterLimits episode ? Help me, Melissa.
What amazes me the most is how they were able to pack so much creepiness into a 30-minute episode. Actually, probably more like 22 minutes when you figure in the commercials.
That one horrified me. One by one they disappear and no one remembers that there were three Astronauts that went up to space and came back. Just by them disappearing like that shook me. And the other two were both Shatner episodes and Classics. One with the diner and creepy fortune Teller telling them not to leave. And the other was my favorite where the Gremlin creature was attacking the engine of the plane. When he opens the little window and that Ghoulish creatures face is looking back at him that made me jump! Then he asks for witnesses and that damn thing jumps away every time making him look crazy! He finally gets his revenge on the creature by shooting it dead. I swear I would do the same damn thing although I’d probably get swept out the plane and get sucked up into an engine with my luck. Rod Serling had a great imagination and was a great writer at times! RIP Serling
This episode was brilliant and I can imagine it was even more scary during the time it aired back in '59 because this was BEFORE space travel, so no one really knew if this would really happen or not. Rod was a genius.
For me "The Shelter" was the scariest. Because it was, and remains, quite possible. The panic and turning on each other as doomsday approaches was far more pronounced than either "Midnight Sun" or other similar themed episodes such as "The Monsters are Due on Maple Street". The other one that freaked me out when I was a kid was "The Arrival". When the FAA guy commits to testing his theory by sticking his arm out and slowly walking towards the spinning propeller of a DC-3 to prove it's all in their minds had me wigging out when I was young.
Normal human beings can be the worst monsters given the chance. And we want alien beings to contact us why? They may show up one day and look at us and say why should we come here? You beings are scary and you need to learn how to control yourselves first and then maybe we'll come back...
A Nice Place to Visit was pretty shocking: Heaven? What ever gave you the idea you were in heaven? This IS the other place!! Eye of the beholder was also creepy!
I was totally freaked out as a child. For me it was the episode with Billy Mumy It’s a Good Life, and also the episode with the little girl trapped in the wall. And of course To Serve Man was a freak out too. As I got older I realized how brilliant the series truly was but I was still scared. 😆
