"Hey! Sci Fi Channel! Thanks for Making The Twilight Zone's 50th Anniversary So Special!" He Said Sarcastically.

This year, the Sci Fi Channel ran marathons of the 1980s Twilight Zone and the original Twilight Zone back to back. If they ever include the Forrest Whitaker version, I'll run from the TV screaming.

Sci Fi considered it all one marathon, but I consider it two different ones. I liked it, but I'm glad that all the 80s stuff ran in one block and the original stuff all in another.

I hadn't seen most of the 80s episodes in over 20 years. I know Chiller has been showing them, but I usually don't watch, or only catch part of an episode over there. I loved the 80s version when CBS broadcast it though, and I remember many episodes very well despite not seeing them for decades. I haven't noticed any of my favorites when I channel surf through Chiller.


The 1985 and 86 stuff held up well. I missed "A Message From Charity," the episode which made me a fan of the 80s show. I did see some long remembered favorites like "The Shadow Man," and enjoyed them just as much as the first time I saw them. Most of the 1987 episodes I saw were weak. The best I one I noticed from 87 was "Shelter Skelter." I've heard people rave about the ending, but I wasn't all that impressed. Besides, the guy wouldn't have survived the blast at all if he didn't have that bomb shelter. Man! Was he dumb or what? (Hint: The question was sarcastic.)


As far as the old shows, the strongest sustained stretch came between 6:00 PM and around 11:00 PM on the 4th itself. When any of the episodes which ran between those times comes on and I'm able to watch them, I watch them. I also love "Death's Head Revisited" which ran at 11:00 PM, but I don't rank it quite as high as the episodes which ran before it. The 11:30 episode, "The Hunt," is one which I like, but I can skip it if there are other things to do like putting out the trash and cleaning up around the house. I'd do stuff like that during an episode like "The Hunt" if they need to be done. With episodes like "The Howling Man," "Where is Everybody?" and "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street," I'm glued to the screen.

A few things disappointed me. This year marks The Twilight Zone's 50th anniversary. Obviously, this excludes "The Time Element," regarded by many fans as an unofficial pilot. "The Time Element" (which I'd love to see in a marathon) aired in 1958. The official pilot, "Where is Everybody?" aired in 1959. And, of course, "The Time Element" was really an episode of another anthology show after all. Anyway, other than running a little banner on the bottom of the screen announcing that it was The Twilight Zone's 50th Anniversary, Sci Fi didn't do anything special to commemorate the milestone.


If anything, Sci Fi made this marathon less special than others. In recent years, Sci Fi has been running uncut versions of many episodes. At the moment, I don't remember why the episodes were cut, and a quick search didn't bring up the information. Was it because commercial breaks increased between the time the show originally aired and when it aired in syndication? I can't recall. Suffice it to say, the shows got cut. When Sci Fi started running uncut episodes, they hyped it a lot. They still ran plenty of cut episodes, but between certain times, they showed the uncut stuff. Between that and my DVDs, I got used to seeing the original versions of many episodes. Judging by the odd running times of some episodes during the most recent New Year's Marathon, they were still running some uncut episodes, but they didn't hype it in their promotional spots. I don't know what Sci Fi's schedule claimed, but, judging by the run times of this marathon's episodes, none of them appeared to be uncut.

With my DVDs now, and after a few years of even seeing uncut versions on TV, I've noticed how hacked up some of the best episodes were. I've been spoiled watching the uncut stuff. One that made my jaw drop was "Third From the Sun." There's some great stuff missing from that episode. Not spectacular action stuff. Just great character and storytelling bits. The kind of stuff that still makes The Twilight Zone shine even in this age of special effects spectacles.

It would have been nice if Sci Fi had aired some interviews and some sort of documentary material. In recent years when Sci Fi ran some episodes uncut, they also aired commercials for the "Complete Definitive Edition" Twilight Zone DVDs. These often had snippets of interviews and other extras on the DVDs so that the commercials actually enhanced the marathon. Unfortunately, none of those commercials ran either. So besides losing the uncut episodes, we fans also lost out on little bits of behind the scenes commentary.

But wait! Sci Fi didn't stop there. They excluded all the hour long episodes too. Originally, Serling wanted hour long episodes. CBS insisted on half hour episodes though. Serling soon realized that the half hour length was perfect for what he wanted to do. A few seasons later, CBS changed its mind and wanted hour long episodes. Serling fought the change. Despite that, some of the hour long episodes were terrific. I love "He's Alive!" Plus, no Twilight Zone marathon feels complete without "Miniature" and "Printer's Devil." Well, too bad. Those are all hour long episodes. (Note that the run times aren't an hour, but with commercials, they're meant to fill an hour on a TV schedule.)

Oh well, at least we can be thankful that The Sci Fi Channel still runs the marathons. With the way the channel operates sometimes, I wonder how much longer the marathons will last.

Speaking of the Sci Fi Channel, changes are afoot. Starting this Tuesday, July 7th, they're changing the spelling of their name. From now on it will be "Syfy." Now my first thought was that they're widening their appeal to include semiliterates who can't read anything more complex than a text message.

Well, it turns out that Sci Fi has lots of marketing gibberish to explain the change. For instance, they thought Sci Fi was too technical and that it prevented more women from watching the channel. Wow! That's why they pay those marketing whizzes the big bucks. Their strategy for getting female viewers flocking to the channel is insulting women. See, I would have never thought of that.

However, I think all that marketing gibberish is a bunch of BS. No, there's something else spokespeople have mentioned, and I think that's the real reason for the change. What is it? Well, they couldn't trademark the term Sci Fi. They wanted to trademark their name. Well, heck, we know the results are always awesome when lawyers and accounts jump into the creative process, right?

Oh, well. A lot of science fiction fans view the term Sci Fi as a slap in the face anyway. Harlan Ellison said it should be pronounced as "skiffy." Now we can pronounce Syfy like "siphy."

Well, whatever they call it, I'll keep watching as long as they do those marathons. Disappointed as I was in the lack of something special for the 50th anniversary, the lack of uncut episodes, and the lack of hour long episodes, it's still a whole bunch of episodes from one of my favorite shows running one after the other. I still enjoyed watching them, and I still enjoyed that communal sense that others out there were watching them along with me.

Okay, now that the marathon is over, I'll go back to the once a week blogging schedule I started in June. Plus, I'll finish (hopefully) my discussion of The Year's Best Science Fiction 17 with stories from 1999.