The Twilight Zone, Season Three: 3 Classics and 3 Wasted Trips

It was apparent early on that season three of the The Twilight Zone would present the toughest challenge when it came to selecting just three classic episodes. In quality, cleverness, memorable performances and intriguing stories, the series served up so many memorable outings among 37 episodes that choosing the best of the best was a daunting prospect.

Why do it? As I explained back in March I’ve been watching The Twilight Zone for as long as I’ve been watching television. But I’ve never owned the series or experienced all the episodes in order in their entirety. That’s what I’m doing now. And it’s been an interesting experience – especially in how I’ve been discovering quite a few episodes that I’ve never seen before.

I’m sure my selections won’t be the same as yours, but we’re likely to agree on at least two of the three worst.


The Three Best

To Serve Man

An obvious choice, but also an inevitable one. It’s most easily recalled now for one three-word line at the climax, but everything leading up to that epiphany is just as compelling. A story about being wary of strangers bearing gifts goes back to the Trojan War, but the payoff here is so delightfully droll that it still makes me laugh. In 1997, TV Guide ranked “To Serve Man” at #11 on its list of the 100 Greatest Episodes.

The Grave

This is by far the best of the western Twilight Zone stories, with a cast as impressive as any feature film western – Lee Marvin, Strother Martin, James Best, and Lee Van Cleef. The script was by Montgomery Pittman, who was in familiar territory having written for episodes of several 1950s westerns, including Cheyenne and Sugarfoot.

Marvin plays Conny Miller, a hired gun who arrives in a town after a man named Pinto Sykes was shot and killed. Sykes vowed that if Miller visits his grave, Sykes will rise and grab him. The rest of the episode has town folk, including Sykes’ sister, daring him to go to the cemetery. Of course he does it, or it wouldn’t be much of an episode. How does it end? See for yourself.

The Dummy

As with the first two seasons I reviewed, the scariest episode of the bunch makes the list. Cliff Robertson plays a ventriloquist driven to drink because of his belief that his dummy is alive and determined to take control of the act. The inherently creepy quality of that scenario is heightened by fevered direction and cinematography – lots of tilted camera angles and subjective cuts that force viewers to share in Robertson’s paranoia. It’s one of the series’ most compelling examples of psychological horror.

I stand by these selections even as I regret how many more shows could have make the list, beginning with “Two,” the season opener, with Charles Bronson and Elizabeth Montgomery trying to survive the aftermath of a devastating war. “The Arrival” opens with a plane landing at an airport with no one aboard. “Five Characters in Search of an Exit” is TZ at its most existential.

There were also several episodes that slightly missed the mark but were saved by outstanding performances in lead roles. “The Mirror” wasn’t that compelling but buried within a barely-there story are some wonderful dialogue flourishes in Rod Serling’s script, and an unlikely but effective performance by Peter Falk, essentially playing Fidel Castro.

The twist ending in “Four O’Clock” may not be much of a surprise, but Theodore Bikel is fantastic as a vicious man determined to punish all those he deems evil. 

And Jack Klugman (always great in this series), shines as a pool player who dreams about challenging the best in the game, even if that champion has passed away (“A Game of Pool”).

Finally, “A Changing of the Guard” is a wonderful and touching series finale about an aging English professor (Donald Pleasance) who questions whether decades of teaching poetry had any impact on his students. It’s Goodbye Mr. Chips meets It’s a Wonderful Life.

The Three Worst

The Hunt

I support the message of this episode – that Heaven wouldn’t be Heaven if dogs were not allowed to enter – but this story of a mountain man and his hound wandering through a rural afterlife is slow and boring.

The Gift

Arguably Rod Serling’s worst Twilight Zone script.

Cavender is Coming

Yet another example of how comedy rarely (if ever) worked on this series. Carol Burnett plays a clumsy chorus girl assigned to an equally inept guardian angel (Jesse White).