episode #62 - Shadow Play

Air Date: 5/5/61    Director: John Brahm    written by Charles Beaumont
PLOT: a man (Dennis Weaver) who has just been sentenced to death by electric chair insists that the whole scenario is just a dream he is having. Weaver was known for very tense performances back then and he provides such tension in this one.
This episode also obviously raises questions about what is reality, in a more blatant fashion than usual (it's also probably more well known as a TZ episode). The main difference to this one is that we know WHY this is happening - at least, we get a reason from Weaver's character - the main character is dreaming, that's all. Or, is he crazy? Well, based on the ending, he's not nuts. There is only doubt among the other characters and, if one is watching this for the first time - the audience - in the middle of the story. Some interesting questions are raised concerning disproving - or trying to - Weaver's assertions.

We, the audience, are not in the dark with the main character (s) in this one, wondering what it's all about. We are told what it is about so this lacks the mysterious quality of the other episodes (though there are still questions as to why he is having such a recurring dream - not something we are accustomed to). But, this story does have the same solipsistic viewpoint - again, more blatant - that all that really matters is the individual; this time, he is literally the only real thing in this episode - it's spelled out this time. Or, he is the only representative of what is truly real - some godlike entity perhaps - an entity which may be ill with fever.

And, we have the same questions on the nature of reality: are we what we seem to be - flesh & blood - or are we just wisps of someone's or something's imagination? Can we cease to exist without a moment's notice, as if we had never been? (see And When the Sky Was Opened). We think we know what reality is - stone & brick & mortar & flesh... and atoms - or do we just perceive the universe this way because something wills us to? Is this Base and its members real - or is it and they just phantoms I conjured up in what I guessed a Board or website would be like? Life is but a dream... ta-da, ta-dum...  BoG's Score: 8 out of 10