THE OUTER LIMITS |
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The Control Voice - Kevin Conway Emma - Natasha Henstridge Karl Durand - Howie Mandell Rebecca Highfield - Kim Cattrall Jake Miller - Casper Van Dien John Virgil - Eric McCormack Dr Vasquez - Kenneth Walsh Paul Nodel - Ryan Reynolds Emory Taylor - Howard Hesseman Joyce Taylor - Kirsten Dunst Becka Paulson - Catherine O'Hara William Clark - Mario Van Peebles Robin Dysart - Jennifer Beals Joshua Hayward - David McCallum 
Season 1 Season 2 Season 4 Season 5 Season 6 Season 7 Other Anthology Shows Philip K Dick's Electric Dreams Masters of Science Fiction Metal Hurlant Chronicles Stephen King's Nightmares & Dreamscapes Ray Bradbury Theater Twilight Zone(1985-1989) Twlight Zone (2019)
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BITS OF LOVEBeneath the shattered surface of a destroyed world one man lives a life of luxury in a high-tech shelter surrounded by holograms of his dead family. He even has a sensory pod so that he can have simulated sexual encounters. Looking after all of this is an artificial intelligence who appears as a gorgeous woman and who declares that she has actual feelings. When the inevitable romance occurs, however, things turn sour. This is a perfectly good set up, however it serves a particularly weak story. For one thing Jon Tenney is so thoroughly dislikeable as the last man alive that it is impossible to empathise with him or care about what happens to him. Natasha Henstridge looks the part as the gorgeous AI, but her part is so underwritten that she can do nothing more. It is unfortunate that the new season starts on such a weak note and we can only hope that it improves. TopSECOND THOUGHTSA mentally subnormal janitor has the mind of a top scientist downloaded into his head when the man dies. The police are interested in the death and when a business partner dies whilst trying to steal the scientist's work, the janitor downloads him too. But one mind isn't built to hold three personalities and when a fourth and fifth are added, things start to go horribly wrong. There's a little bit of Flowers for Algernon in this story, but it soon spins off in some interesting directions and comes up with a twist worthy of the name, though it is almost drowned out in the welter of noise from the voices that assail the janitor's crowded mind. Howie Mandel does well in conveying a simple man, but when the script requires him to start bouncing between brilliant, stupid and shifty it's all a bit too staccato to convince. TopRE-GENERATIONGraham, a politically ambitious man and his wife Rebecca are suffered a horrible blow by the death of their son, Justin. When Graham offers Rebecca the chance for a clone of their child to be implanted in her womb immediately, she has reservations, but is persuaded. The pregnancy takes an unusual turn when Justin's clone starts to send his mother images from her womb, images that hint at a dark secret. Kim SEX AND THE CITY Catrall plays the uncertain wife and even less certain mother well enough, especially in the latter stages when the thriller element sets in, but Daniel Benzali is so obviously untrustworthy from the outset that the shocks planned for later on in the story are expected rather than surprising. That said, the sequences where Rebecca is forced to run away from her husband by her own fears (and, cleverly, there is no clarity as to his intentions so it could all be in her mind) are quite tense. The foetus effects vary from fine to poor, but the ultrasound of a baby in utero waving to the camera is unintentionally hilarious. TopLAST SUPPERWhen his son brings home the new girlfriend, a Vietnam veteran is shocked to find that she is exactly like a woman involved in an inexplicable event he suffered during that war over 20 years previously. When she informs him that she is not the daughter of the woman he saved from illegal scientific experiments, but the woman herself, despite not being a day older, he can't believe her, but the military scientist is hot on her tail. It's hard to see what the point of this story is, except that perhaps the right thing to do is always the right thing to do no matter what the consequences. Unfortunately, it is so plodding and long-winded that by the time it gets to where it wants to go the audience mostly wants to go to bed. The flashback scenes are shot in a nice black and white fashion, but how stupid can a man be to check out his son's girlfriend for a birthmark in their bedroom with the kid about to come back in at any moment? TopSTREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESSThe world relies on the Stream, an internet connection to all mankind's knowledge that is built directly into the brain. When people start suffering breakdowns and the Stream starts to act strangely one man with a braiin defect that made connection impossible may hold the key to humanity's survival. Taking a story that is rooted in our current obsession with technology and communications (computers in phones, bluetooth in our ears) this episode posits a frighteningly plausible possible future. The story starts as a story of personal exclusion and frustration and then morphs into an action adventure with a satisfying conclusion that relies on an act of cleverness rather than strength for its outcome. This plot hangs together extremely well at each stage to provide one of the show's better episodes. TopDARK RAINIn the near-future an exchange of chemical and biological weapons renders the human race sterile. Birth control is outlawed despite the few viable children being born as mutated monsters. One couple gets pregnant and a giant government machine swings into operation to ensure that the child survives, but at what cost? The set up to this story is far more effective than the story itself. A world without children is a desolate place and, whilst not as desperate as that depicted in CHILDREN OF MEN, this one is no less scary as the unborn child becomes property of the state, terrible decisions are made without personal consent and parents become prisoners. The situation is obvious straight away so it seems ridiculous that it takes the couple so long to figure it out, but there are chilling images of child coffins in piles and a nightmare trip through a hall of mutated babies. The conclusion, however betrays what has gone before with its sunny optimism. TopTHE CAMPAliens engaged in a war came Earth and enslaved her people in camps where they forged weapons for their new masters for generations. Now, however, a female technician learns secrets about their guards and their alien masters that will change their destinies. This is effectively a female pow story dressed up with a few sci-fi trappings. The technician is dragged into a relationship with the commandant in order to better conditions for everyone, including her daughter, but is rejected by the very people she is trying to help. It's not a new story, but it's told well with a stark vision of the future camp right up until the final uprising where it all gets a bit silly. TopHEART'S DESIREA group of outlaws converge on their hometown of Heart's Desire to divide up their ill-gotten gains, but they are not the only strangers in town and the other is not of this Earth, though he is willing to share his deadly power. An episode set in the Wild West makes for a nice change of pace. The sense of place and time is nicely evoked as well. The story, however is less succesful. After the initial contact it becomes a series of power displays that move the story along not at all. Only at the end is the alien's purpose finally made clear and must be explained, but at least it has the courage to forego the happy ending it keeps threatening. TopTEMPESTSA ship carrying a vital serum against a plague ravaging an Earth colony crashes onto a strange planetoid in habited by giant spider monsters. One of the crew is bitten and finds himself transferring between the world of the spiders and a colony that he has saved and where he is a hero. One is a hallucination brought about by the spider venom, but which one? Suffering from the fact that the spider monsters are pretty rubbish, this episode is otherwise pretty good thanks to performances from Eric McCormack (WILL & GRACE), Burt Young (ROCKY) and Kenneth Welsh (TWIN PEAKS). These three make it unimportant that we've seen most of this plot done before, and usually better. The whole plotline is cobbled together from elements that are genre staples (alternate realities of equal reality, trapped inside a living being, soldiers unable to reconcile the end of war). The backstory is pleasingly detailed and subtly used, bringing the characters into a sharper relief than is often the case for this series. The gritty atmosphere iniside the crashed and failing ship is realistic and convincing, ramping up the tension as the plot hurtles to the inevitable decision between two realities. And the twist in the tail is less obvious and more pleasing than is often the case. TopTHE AWAKENINGA woman with a congenital condition that makes her unable to feel emotions is given a new lease of life by a brain implant that allows her to experience feelings for the first time. Fear, though, is also an emotion. This episode is a muddled story that rambles about all over the place before getting to its conclusion. It's another story about what's real and what's not, but the hints of 'ROSEMARY'S BABY' shoehorned into the story tip its hat as to what is going on all along. The revelation of what is behind the night terrors is a little bit desperate and unconvincing, but at least manages to come up with a twist. It's not that great a one, but it at least makes more sense than what has gone before. Considering it's a story about emotions, it's surprising how little the characters engage and there are few surprises along the way. TopNEW LEASETwo scientists develop a process that can reanimate the dead for 24 hours. When one of them gets shot, he finds himself with only a day to reconect with his family, but then his thoughts turn to revenge. The word that most sums up this episode is predictable. It rambles around in the early stages with no sense of what it wants to be, but following the shooting, every step of the way to the unsurprising twist can be instantly mapped out. At least the effects are up to scratch. TopDOUBLE HELIXA geneticist experiments upon himself to bring about the next stage of evolution, but what evolves is a knowledge of things that he must do, so he creates a team of volunteers including his estranged son to go out into the wilderness to find something. The story here starts off traditionally enough with a disaffected, disappointed scientist experimenting on himself. It then wanders off into the strange avenues of how he chooses his eight volunteers before suddenly taking a left turn into the map that appears on his back and the discovery that he makes in the woods. The centre section drags interminably and it is only at the end where the story takes off on a whole other tack that things get interesting. TopDEAD MAN'S SWITCHAliens are heading for Earth with uncertain intent. Five disparate people are secreted in underground bunkers and required to switch off an alarm at random periods. Should they fail, the Earth will be utterly destroyed and useless to the aliens. A year is a long time to be alone with only the faces of strangers on video screens for company. An intriguing premise that riffs on the mutually assured destruction principles of the Cold War, but tells a human story as the time, isolation and lack of news plays havoc on the people left to protect Humanity from its own doomsday device. The characters are only sketches it's true, but they are detailed enough for the audience to care as each one meets their fate. Some of these are contrived enough to be less than convincing and the inevitable twist in the tail is exactly the one that you expect it to be, but it's nicely played and sticks to its convictions right to the end. TopMUSIC OF THE SPHERESA young scientist discovers a radio signal buried in the static of space noise. His even younger sister recognises it as beautiful music and tries to play it to the youth of the area, but instead unleashes a plague that the doctors find unable to cure. This starts off well enough with the discovery of the signal and the impression that it is music, but when it sidesteps into the plague business it all gets a bit humdrum, been there seen that. Is it a weapon? Is it something else? Should the disease be allowed to run its course? By the end it's hard to really summon up the energy to care. That the interest is maintained to the length that it is falls to a spirited young cast including Joshua Jackson (FRINGE), Kirsten Dunst (SPIDER-MAN) and Howard Hessemen who manage to make the whole thing a lot better than the script deserves. TopTHE REVELATIONS OF BECKA PAULSONBecka Paulson manages to shoot herself in the head, but instead of being dead she finds that she is much smarter and that a man in a picture frame is talking to her, mainly about the affair that her husband is having at the post office. Based on a short story by Stephen King, this doesn't have enough plot to fill out the episode running time. Becka shoots herself, but that doesn't seem to have too much effect on her life in general. She still wanders around in the same fairly aimless manner until finally she does something that seems both unlikely and far too abrupt. Catherine O'Hara plays Becka Paulson and it is through her performance that the episode manages to avoid being a total waste of time. She creates a very real and believable character who the audience can empathise with and it is only that performance that keeps us watching to the end. TopBODIES OF EVIDENCEFollowing a series of deaths on a space station in Earth orbit, the captain faces a hearing to determine if he, as one of only two survivors, was responsible. He is defended by his ex-wife. This is a court case episode, but any real sense of jeopardy is diluted straight away as the killings are shown in the early stages to be the work of some sort of SOLARIS situation, with people from crew members' pasts appearing to them. Since we know this at the outset, the guilt of the captain is in no doubt. The twist at the end fails to make up for this absence. Mario Van Peebles and Jennifer Beals are perfectly acceptable as accused and defence counsel, but acceptable is as far as the episode goes. TopFEASIBILITY STUDYA father and estranged daughter are brought back together when their local community finds itself cut off from the rest of the world. That's because it is no longer on the world, but has been transported to an alien planet where they community is to be tested as to whether they would make good slaves for the inhabitants there. The initial mystery phase of the story in which the community slowly become aware of their situation is nicely done, aided immensely by the presence of David McCallum at the centre, but that gives way to the much less interesting alien goings on. What happens inside the community as it tears itself apart is always more interesting than wahat is going on outside. The daughter's friendship with an alien turning to stone is irrelevent to the plot as a whole until the final moments when a choice is made. The kidnapping aliens are not very convincing either. TopSPECIAL EDITIONAn investigative journalist and television anchorman becomes aware that someone within the government is building an army of clones for dark purposes. He attempts to get the information out on the air, but the forces ranged against him are formidable indeed. Several of the episodes in the season are stitched together into a clips show with the framing device of a televsion news show revealing the truth behind a huge government conspiracy. As in the first season, the framing device is quite well done, but doesn't make up for the fact that if you have seen the episodes it is hardly worth the time to look. Top |
