Creature Features: The Twilight Zone

Twilight Zone Sci-Fi marathon season officially opens at the Blender.

The Twilight Zone Episode Guide is dedicated to the series that formally introduced sci-fi and horror to American house holds over 40 years ago. Rod Serling's brainchild took the fears of his generation: atomic warfare, self-annihilating hatred, bitter jealousy, disfiguring greed and fear of the unknown and made them all into flesh and bone - a half hour at a time.

The Zone lives on here at The Blender where yer ol' buddy, The Sleaze-A-Saurus, has kindly rounded up the episodes that have become as familiar in pop culture as the back of the Sleaze-A-Saurus' tentacle is to unwary, scaleless manlings.

The Twilight Zone: Time Enough At Last (1959)
	A bookish Burgress Meredith relishes the idea of reading Shakespeare in the ruined ashes of the modern world in the classic 1959 Twilight Zone episode Time Enough. But, can he survive long enough to realize his ambition without the conveniences of the modern day world?
The Twilight Zone: To Serve Man (1962)
	Newly arrived alien overlord Mr. Richard "Jaws" Kiel of Eegah! and James Bond fame stoically converts the world population of an unsuspecting Earth into intergalactic Space Spam in the 1962 Twilight Zone episode To Serve Man. Can one ace reporter stop it before it's too late?
The Twilight Zone: Two (1961)
	Charles Bronson and Elizabeth "Bewitched" Montgomery, after trying to murder each other with carbines, play like Adam and Eve in the post-Apocalyptic world of 1961 in the classic and very rarely screened, Twilight Zone episode Two.
The Twilight Zone: He's Alive (1963)
	The late Mr. Dennis Hopper, in a break out TV role that took him from bit roles as a cowboy or extra, delivers one hell of a performance in 1963 in Twilight Zone episode He's Alive. Co-starring none other than the nefarious Fuehrer hisself.

The Twilight Zone: Dead Run (1985)

John de Lancie appears in a supporting role as Satan's V.P. of Human Resources.

Dead Run, the "B" episode 19 from the first season of the new hour long Twilight Zone, was a kind of perfect storm of good writing and good acting. Based on a short story of the same name by Greg Bear, the explosive writer of Moving Mars (Nebula Award winner 1990) and the stunning Queen of Angels, the episode is delivered by Steve Railsback (Life Force) and an ensemble cast of supporting actors including: Brent Spiner (Star Trek The Next Generation) in a cameo role as a Viet Nam era draft dodger, John de Lancie (Q from Star Trek The Next Generation) as Satan's V.P. and Barry Corbin (War Games, No Country For Old Men) as Hell's Trucker, Pete.

And the road to Hell needs drivers! Down-on-his-luck trucker Johnny Davis is just desperate enough to take this job. After some careful instruction from his pal Pete and a run-in with a gravel-throated minor demon with a mean case of pyromania - Johnny signs on with Hell's H.R. Dept. courtesy of John de Lancie.


The road to Hell itself is conducted by American truckers? It figures.

On his road trips from the world of the living to the "low road" to Hell (which looks a lot like Green Bay), Johnny interviews the ghostly souls of the damned. The doomed seem more than happy to recount their own personal tales of anguish and damnation to him.

On the final ride of the episode, Johnny frees four seemingly innocent souls while recollecting the Harrowing of Hell to them, the time between the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ Jesus when He descended into Hell (Acts 2:27 and Acts 2:31). Johnny points out the way to Heaven to his freed captives before getting back in his big rig to deliver the rest of his load of souls into the pit.

References:
Wikipedia, Dead Run
Wikipedia, John de Lancie
Wikipedia, Harrowing Of Hell