Alright, Season 2 of the 3rd reboot Twilight Zone. Just a reminder that these are not traditional reviews, but stream-of-consciousness reviews where I just ramble off immediate thoughts on a show, and don't really have any recommendations on whether to do it or not. Anyway, let's gooooo.
Alright in 1963, for the 4th season of the original Twilight Zone, Rod Serling tried an experiment where he would expand the stories out from a half-hour to one hour (with commercials). This turned out to be a failure, with the 4th season being regarded as the worst, even by Serling himself and the half-hour restored. I bring this up because a huge problem with the first season was that the episodes were all too long. The structure of a Twilight Zone episode necessitates a half-hour structure, and an hour just feels too long and the story overstays its welcome. Unfortunately, for this season, the problem persists. There are several episodes that are too long and have very superfluous elements to them. The first episode, "Meet in the Middle", is a prime example, with its premise being stretched out far beyond its breaking point. Ditto "Who of You", which has an interesting body switching element, but drags on with this really odd chase element to it. If you can get over the lengths, overall, this season is actually a lot better than the first. My biggest problem with the first season was that it was trying way too hard to be too contemporary, so we had episodes like "Kid Trump" and "Not All Men", which fell flat in execution despite promising premises. Here, all episodes do work, and while not as political, manage to have their own commentary on society or individuals, which makes the season as a whole a lot stronger. The individual episodes, while starting off slow, do have good pay-offs and at least interesting endings. My favorites of this bunch are probably the aforementioned season premiere; "8", about an Antarctic research station terrorized by an intelligent octopus; and "A Small Town", which was the closest this series gets to feeling like a classic Twilight Zone episode. The other ones vary in quality, but none of them were bad in the way "Kid Trump" was last season. My least favorites are probably "Among the Downtrodden" (which took an interesting premise, but stretched to a 40 minute length, making it kind of boring. However, Sophia Macy, daughter of William Macy and Felicity Huffman, is quite good in, and I hope she does other things and shakes off the whole college admissions scandal thing.), and "You Will Also Like," which had the potentially interesting concept of creating a sequel to the classic episode "To Serve Man", but got caught up in its own satire and was also just boring. Really, if there is one big problem with the bad episodes this season, it's that they are boring, which is exacerbated by the long lengths. This is true of "Try, Try", which takes a horror riff on the "Groundhog Day" formula, milks it, and ends up with Topher Grace just spouting Gamergate propaganda out of basically nowhere. Again, though, as an overall season, it works better than the first season. Hopefully, they can continue this trend into the next season.
Alright, there's the review for you. If you like my work, you can see my Ko-Fi page. Not anything there right now, but I will start posting exclusive content for those interested: https://ko-fi.com/rohithc. And in a few days, I will start my Summer of Terror annual horror reviews, and with the new decade coming up, I will be looking at a diverse range of films about Gods.... and Monsters.
Alright in 1963, for the 4th season of the original Twilight Zone, Rod Serling tried an experiment where he would expand the stories out from a half-hour to one hour (with commercials). This turned out to be a failure, with the 4th season being regarded as the worst, even by Serling himself and the half-hour restored. I bring this up because a huge problem with the first season was that the episodes were all too long. The structure of a Twilight Zone episode necessitates a half-hour structure, and an hour just feels too long and the story overstays its welcome. Unfortunately, for this season, the problem persists. There are several episodes that are too long and have very superfluous elements to them. The first episode, "Meet in the Middle", is a prime example, with its premise being stretched out far beyond its breaking point. Ditto "Who of You", which has an interesting body switching element, but drags on with this really odd chase element to it. If you can get over the lengths, overall, this season is actually a lot better than the first. My biggest problem with the first season was that it was trying way too hard to be too contemporary, so we had episodes like "Kid Trump" and "Not All Men", which fell flat in execution despite promising premises. Here, all episodes do work, and while not as political, manage to have their own commentary on society or individuals, which makes the season as a whole a lot stronger. The individual episodes, while starting off slow, do have good pay-offs and at least interesting endings. My favorites of this bunch are probably the aforementioned season premiere; "8", about an Antarctic research station terrorized by an intelligent octopus; and "A Small Town", which was the closest this series gets to feeling like a classic Twilight Zone episode. The other ones vary in quality, but none of them were bad in the way "Kid Trump" was last season. My least favorites are probably "Among the Downtrodden" (which took an interesting premise, but stretched to a 40 minute length, making it kind of boring. However, Sophia Macy, daughter of William Macy and Felicity Huffman, is quite good in, and I hope she does other things and shakes off the whole college admissions scandal thing.), and "You Will Also Like," which had the potentially interesting concept of creating a sequel to the classic episode "To Serve Man", but got caught up in its own satire and was also just boring. Really, if there is one big problem with the bad episodes this season, it's that they are boring, which is exacerbated by the long lengths. This is true of "Try, Try", which takes a horror riff on the "Groundhog Day" formula, milks it, and ends up with Topher Grace just spouting Gamergate propaganda out of basically nowhere. Again, though, as an overall season, it works better than the first season. Hopefully, they can continue this trend into the next season.
Alright, there's the review for you. If you like my work, you can see my Ko-Fi page. Not anything there right now, but I will start posting exclusive content for those interested: https://ko-fi.com/rohithc. And in a few days, I will start my Summer of Terror annual horror reviews, and with the new decade coming up, I will be looking at a diverse range of films about Gods.... and Monsters.
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