New Year's Tradition: Twilight Zone Marathon

[kryptosmaster]

I caught one last night that I had never seen from beginning to end before. Although I still didn't catch the title, it was a star-studded episode. Had Lee Marvin, Lee Van Cleef, the guy that played Chief O'Hara on Batman, the guy that played Roscoe on Dukes of Hazzard and I know I've seen the other guy before too but couldn't place him.
Had to do with a town killing an outlaw and Lee Marvin was the bounty hunter that was after him. They bet Lee that he wouldn't visit the grave of the outlaw at midnight.
Rich

[The Toyroom]

^ "The Grave"....what I like about TZ is it's not just pure sci-fi...you get all types of genres...some they do better than others. The couple that were played more for laughs didn't fare very well. I dig the ones with the western slant though.

[mego73]

I caught an episode here and there. It basically served as an inducement to break out my Twilight Zone DVD's (have the entire series on DVD) and see a few episodes in a better way.

How many were jarred the first time they showed episodes like "Night Of The Meek" off the original video tape, instead of film?

For those that are unaware, as an experiment, Rod Serling did a few episodes on videotape and mostly in the same manor as if they had done them live (not completely).

For a long time, they were only seen on film made from the video. But now they show them from the video tape.

It was quite a shock to see these episodes I only thought were on film suddenly be on videotape.

One of the greats, "Night Of The Meek" is a videotape one.

It was something else on TV New Years day. Twilight Zone marathon on Sci-Fi, Honeymooners marathon on WGN (the classic 39 were shown uncut, although they were time compressed), TV Land marathoning Leave it To Beaver in the morning, Brady Bunch in the afternoon and Andy Griffith in the evening, Tom and Jerry marathon on boomerang and (although I didn't know about this) Looney Tunes marathon on Cartoon Network..

[The Toyroom]

For those that are unaware, as an experiment, Rod Serling did a few episodes on videotape and mostly in the same manor as if they had done them live (not completely).

It really wasn't an "experiment" but moreso a cost-cutting method enforced on Serling by the network, as the price tag per episode in the 2nd season was getting pretty high. In all, only 6 episodes were done this way:

"Night of the Meek"
"Static"
"Long Distance Call"
"Twenty-Two"
"Lateness of the Hour"
"The Whole Truth"

If things had worked out, they probably would have done more videotaped episodes as opposed to film, but as the technology was new it had limitations at the time that prohibited them carrying on the process further.

I actually enjoy the video-tape episodes as it gives the feel of a live stage production...also reminds me of old episodes of "Dark Shadows" (which were also video-taped).

I was trying to explain this to my kids when they were watching "Long Distance Call" and wondering why it looked different. But they didn't get it.
My comparision of "Happy Days" (film) vs. "Three's Company" (video) seemed to go over their heads but I used those two as an example because I still recall my brother and I noticing the difference between the two formats back in the day. Yeah, TV geeks even back then.

[kingdom warrior]

I always loved this series but my two favs are the episode with Charles Bronson and Elizabeth Montgomery as two soldiers on opposite sides of a War....and of course The Episode with William Shatner who sees the gremlin outside the airplane. My Son watched it with me and it scared him he loved it!

[HardyGirl]

I was trying to explain this to my kids when they were watching "Long Distance Call" and wondering why it looked different. But they didn't get it.
My comparision of "Happy Days" (film) vs. "Three's Company" (video) seemed to go over their heads but I used those two as an example because I still recall my brother and I noticing the difference between the two formats back in the day. Yeah, TV geeks even back then.

When I was a kid, I noticed stuff like that too. I used to think it was b/c the film was bigger (for video taped stuff). I dunno if someone told me that, or I worked it out in my own mind. That the frames and the space between them was a different size than standard film. One show changed format from film to video (Doc w/ Bernard Shaw on CBS), and I remember not liking it as much.