No, not the PC 1990s-2000 version, either...The Original 1963-65 Scare-the-P!ss-Outta-You Leslie Stevens-Joe Stefano series...Odd, murky cinematography...Odd, murky scripts...Hysterical music...$1.98 EFX (but they were good for 1963)... Actually, it WAS an excellent series, some of the most talented people in Hollywood at the time worked in it. ABC, perennially in 3rd place in those days, didn't know quite what to do w/the show, kept cutting the budgets & moving it around. Even after Stevens & Stefano left/got kicked out at the beginning of the 2nd season, they STILL managed to pull off several excellent shows. I think I know why all the revivals of shows like this fail-They attempt to impose a modern-day sensibility on them-try to show "Compassion", "Tolerance", "Relevance", all that other happy horseshit. The people that watch these kinds of shows could care less about seeing a woman as the boss-they watch 'em for one reason & one reason only-To get the living daylights scared out of themselves. Anyhow, anybody else have a soft spot for "Outer Limits" like me ?

great series sandy!

When it first ran in the 60's I was about 10 years old and I remember it well. But I never got past the intro "...we are taking over your TV...."

Too fricken scary.

I watched the Twilight Zone and a lot of the sci-fi shows at that time, but Outer Limits was too intense.

"There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. We can roll the image, make it flutter. We can change the focus to a soft blur, or sharpen it to crystal clarity. For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control all that you see and hear. You are about to participate in a great adventure. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to... The Outer Limits."

http://audiokarma.org/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=63432&stc=1&d=1191112703

Chills down the spine, EVERY time!

I used to sneak and watch it as a kid. It would creep me out afterward for days.

I still to this day, enjoy it better than Twilight Zone.

RC

I used to sneak and watch it as a kid. It would creep me out afterward for days.

I still to this day, enjoy it better than Twilight Zone.

RC

Me too!

One of my faves was "A Feasability Study"...A well-to-do man in a '63 Lincoln pulls into this strange cloudbank...This horrible hand drops down on his windshield..He's surrounded by these ghastly creatures...We see him screaming as the frenetic music starts...Oh, Mommy ! (grin)

I loved them both. Zone had excellent writing, but rarely gave me the creeps. Outer Limits on the other hand... :para:

As soon as I saw the opening O-scope screen, I was locked!

Yep, love it. the Zone was pretty cool but the Outer Limits was always, well, out there. Some cable station reran the originals all at once and I taped most of them. "The Galaxy Being" was weird as hell, an auspicious way to start the series.

This series reminds me a lot of the old radio show "Dimension X" which was also fairly weird and scary. Those old shows are a blast- they can be found all over the net, though if you don't mind RealAudio, this (http://www.otr.net/?p=dimx) is a good place to start.

Growing up in the 60's-70's I lived in Fresno, CA which had 4 TV stations IIRC. I was programming starved as much of what was on was local station generated. Ugh! We'd drive down to visit my relatives in Socal and there were 25-30 stations along with what seemed to be hundreds programs I'd never seen before. The Outer Limits absolutely hooked me the first time I stumbled across it. The 2D creature, the ant criminals, the human made alien to infiltrate aliens, man it just went on & on. The Outer Limits was like the Sears Screamer drag bicycles to Schwinn's StingRays. Wilder and more out there. Maybe not as good over the long haul but they sure got your attention.

More here -

Outer Limits Episodes (http://www.theouterlimits.com/episodes/1960s.html)

I loved that series growing up,now when I see it(You can still get it from Netflix)It's great seeing the old movie stars that were just starting out.

I loved it as a kid, and my family had no problem with me watching it. The Architects of Fear, Robert Culp being redesigned to be a fake alien to get the public to worry about invaders from space to end the cold war, The Sixth Finger, David McCallum is pushed through a few millieum of evolution in a few weeks and begins viewing the rest of us as little, weak beings.
The Man Who Was Never Born, Martin Landau is a mutant from the future out to kill the father of the scientist who brought humanity down and create a future that never included him
O.B.I.T., the rare TV or movie to scare the crap out of me as a kid. A machine that can spy on people without them knowing only to see the feet of some creature sneaking up behind them
Fun and Games, Nick Adams gets to play a game, if he wins, he doesn't die.
The Invisible Enemy, funny thing about landing on Mars, evryone dies.
Demon with a Glass Hand, Robert Culp has no memory, someone has amputated his hand and replaced it with a glass version that talks to him, and Aliens are trying to kill him

Really, I need to buy the DVD's.

I loved that show as a kid. Used to scare/freak me out every time!

"The Zanti Misfits" somehow managed to be hokey & scary at the same time...

Agreed; I picked up the Outer Limits soundtrack (The Outer Limits: Original Television Soundtrack (1963-65 Television Series) label: Gnp Crescendo
Catalog: #8032) and it brought back memories of rainy Saturdays spent huddled around the Portable B&W in the "rumpus" room, watching television, and getting wrapped up in Outer Limits warped reality... would dig to see the classics again in pristine form.


Demon with a Glass Hand, Robert Culp has no memory, someone has amputated his hand and replaced it with a glass version that talks to him, and Aliens are trying to kill him

and this is the one I've NEVER seen...

Really, I need to buy the DVD's.

A-Men, brother...

The Architects of Fear, Robert Culp being redesigned to be a fake alien to get the public to worry about invaders from space to end the cold war,

Holy crap! For many years I've been trying to remember on just what program I first saw this episode (Thought it was Twilight zone, or maybe I just dreamed it). Been haunted by it ever since. Anyway, thanks for the re-direction. :thmbsp:

Ron.

Good stuff Sandy G!!:yes:

The autumn/fall of 1963, when The Outer Limits first aired on TV, I was in first grade elementary school. The opening series episode called The Galaxy Being aired on TV and I was freaked out big time. It has been 44 years since I watched that mind-warping first episode. My almost 7 year old brain (back then in 1963) was warped and dazed. Still, to this day, I vividly recall the Galaxy Being walking down a city street peering into shop windows while gawking at the odd trinkets displayed in the windows. The weird blank-and-white negative image video (film) photography showing the Being's glowing eyes scared the HELL out of me.

Another episode called The Man with the Power frightened me so badly that I had to peek around a door frame from across the room to be able to watch the TV and beat a hasty retreat whenever needed. My parent's early 1950's Philco TV seemed to come alive with those damn creatures.

I remember many other episodes and have since relived most of them throughout the years on TV reruns, but those two broadcasts put a kink in my Psyche.

Go here for info about classic TOL episodes: http://www.scifi.com/outerlimits/episodes/classic/

The Galaxy Being -- Whoa! What an episode that was -- burned right into your cortex and stayed there. Great thread Sandy.

...An' the one that had Michael Ansara & Lloyd Nolan in it..."Soldier" Ansara plays this soldier drone from the distant future...What was the one that had the monster that was deemed so scary, a number of local stations blankscreened it out ?

That would be the episode THE ARCHITECTS of FEAR which first aired September 30, 1963.

Go here to read about this episode: http://www.scifi.com/outerlimits/episodes/classic/season1/03architectsfear.html

...An' the one that had Michael Ansara & Lloyd Nolan in it..."Soldier" Ansara plays this soldier drone from the distant future...What was the one that had the monster that was deemed so scary, a number of local stations blankscreened it out ?

I read this week that Harlan Ellison sued the folks who made the movier Terminator and won due to this episode.

And Deep Discount has them on a two for one close out though they only have two of the three sets left. I orded the first two today, hopefully they are still in stock.

Thanks Sandy for starting this thread.

I love what one of the producers said about Ellison...He had to periodically toss "Ellison on his ass" to get him to work..How do you live w/a genius ?...You have to wait for him to "gene", & if he wasn't particularly in the mood, fuggeddaboutit...

I got via Netflix the two-parter 'The Inheritors' wi Robert Duvall. not a traditional scary-monster ep but great to sit and watch and wonder.
interesting how they'd play tricks wi light and sound to make up for the relatively primitive sfx.
my fave moment was the end of 'Galaxy Being' (the pilot wi Cliff Robertson) as it says, "end of transmission...".
whoa...!
:tresbon:

I loved (and still love) shows like The Outer Limits, The Twilight Zone, Night Gallery, plus one that no one mentioned -- One Step Beyond.

As an older grade school kid just starting to get his arms around the way the world worked, watching those shows and their variety of story topics certainly had an impact on the way I began to look at (and question) the world back then. One of my favorite stories was about a book given to humanity by seemingly benevolent aliens after first contact entitled "How to Serve Man." :scratch2:


Those shows were also springboards that fueled my passion to read a wide variety of science fiction and SciFi/Fantasy novels (back when reading was quite the fashion of the day.) Folks mentioned Harlan Ellison, who is truly a talented author (and quite a "unique" character) and I still enjoy many of his efforts even to this day. I recall once reading a print article that pictured him writing while sitting at his reserved table positioned in front of the large plate glass window of a cafe he frequented, where people on the sidewalk could, as he put it, "actually stop and watch an author during the creative process while writing actual material and drinking his coffee."

Here's (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lI2XuMoQOCU) part 3 of an interesting interview with Harlan (Warning: contains bad language and hand gestures) where he mentions deriving inspiration from cranking his stereo.
Not recommended for those easily offended... :D

I love the old Outer Limits and Twilight Zone. They are a must watch on my Predicta's. The Alfred Hitchcock tv series was cool too.
-Tony

Watching it again on a 35 inch TV just doesn't make it. These shows were shot to be watched on nothing bigger than 17 sets. The kid is getting a mini DVD player for Christmas, it's the perfect thing for this.

huge outer limits fan. would scare the hell out of me back then.along with twilight zone and the fugitive were my must see tv in the 60s. also liked the invaders.then came the 70s and it was all gone.bring back the 60s!

The Outer Limits was great too, I hardly ever look in this forum, and there's two threads going about some of my favorite shows. The first episode of the show I ever saw and the one that really hooked me on the series was that one where that guy somehow "receives" an alien from another universe while experimenting at his radio station, I remember it was Oct. of 1985 and I had just started the 2nd grade when I first saw that one, much of my fascination with electronics began by watching weird stuff like that on the old b/w Zenith I had, the Outer Limits was on at midnight on Saturday night just after the Twilight Zone on ch 20 back then, I used to always stay up for it.

I love "The Outer Limits", always have. I used to watch it as a kid. The episode, "It Crawled Out Of The Woodwork", where this creature made of energy controls everyone in a research facility, and they have to wear a pacemaker to keep themselves alive, always scared the crap out of me for some reason.

No, not the PC 1990s-2000 version, either...The Original 1963-65 Scare-the-P!ss-Outta-You Leslie Stevens-Joe Stefano series...Odd, murky cinematography...Odd, murky scripts...Hysterical music...$1.98 EFX (but they were good for 1963)... Actually, it WAS an excellent series, some of the most talented people in Hollywood at the time worked in it. ABC, perennially in 3rd place in those days, didn't know quite what to do w/the show, kept cutting the budgets & moving it around. Even after Stevens & Stefano left/got kicked out at the beginning of the 2nd season, they STILL managed to pull off several excellent shows. I think I know why all the revivals of shows like this fail-They attempt to impose a modern-day sensibility on them-try to show "Compassion", "Tolerance", "Relevance", all that other happy horseshit. The people that watch these kinds of shows could care less about seeing a woman as the boss-they watch 'em for one reason & one reason only-To get the living daylights scared out of themselves. Anyhow, anybody else have a soft spot for "Outer Limits" like me ?

:thmbsp:

I have DirecTV and I think they've played a few original episodes just once or twice.
But, I was wondering if anyone knows if the following stories are from the OL?
Been so long since I saw them, but here's the gist...

A man (Jack Warden?) finds himself in the world where everything and everyone seems to be frozen in time, except they aren't; they are all moving imperceptibly slowly. He realizes that a truck will hit a little girl on a trike and fashions the emergency brake to activate with the seat belts from the truck that he cut out. Sound familiar?

The other is something about 2 small cubes in a lab setting. They are moving very slowly towards each other. If someone doesn't do what's required, then they will touch and the world will blow to bits or some such thing?

Thanks.

I have DirecTV and I think they've played a few original episodes just once or twice.
But, I was wondering if anyone knows if the following stories are from the OL?
Been so long since I saw them, but here's the gist...

A man (Jack Warden?) finds himself in the world where everything and everyone seems to be frozen in time, except they aren't; they are all moving imperceptibly slowly. He realizes that a truck will hit a little girl on a trike and fashions the emergency brake to activate with the seat belts from the truck that he cut out. Sound familiar?

The other is something about 2 small cubes in a lab setting. They are moving very slowly towards each other. If someone doesn't do what's required, then they will touch and the world will blow to bits or some such thing?

Thanks.
I happen to remember that first one! The title was "Premonition" and the actor was David Garcia, where the solution involved a seat beat cleverly tied between the truck wheel and emergency brake lever. That was Season 1 Episode 8 on One Step Beyond (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052442/episodes)

"Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond" ran from 1959-1961 and I was 8 years old when I saw it. For some reason that episode has remained stuck in my head all these years... :)

Sorry, but the two cubes don't ring a bell at the moment.

Thanks, sleddogman. It crossed my mind that it could have been an episode from One Step Beyond, which is another favorite that I haven't seen in many years, but I thought it was more of an Outer Limits type story.

These favorite episodes, whether from Outer Limits, 'Zone and One Step Beyond tend to get fuzzy after so many years of not watching them.

As far as I know, only The Twilight Zone is on on a regular basis.

Maybe it's time to buy the DVD box sets.

I happen to remember that first one! The title was "Premonition" and the actor was David Garcia, where the solution involved a seat beat cleverly tied between the truck wheel and emergency brake lever. That was Season 1 Episode 8 on One Step Beyond (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052442/episodes)

"Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond" ran from 1959-1961 and I was 8 years old when I saw it. For some reason that episode has remained stuck in my head all these years... :)

Sorry, but the two cubes don't ring a bell at the moment.

The Preminition outshined would be thinking of is OL, the second to the last one aired, Dewey Martin was an X-15 pilot who broke the time barrier and saves his kid with the seat belt trick. OSB's premintion involved a falling chandelier (spelling?)

The Preminition outshined would be thinking of is OL, the second to the last one aired, Dewey Martin was an X-15 pilot who broke the time barrier and saves his kid with the seat belt trick. OSB's premintion involved a falling chandelier (spelling?)

Thanks for the clarification. I have been looking at the OSB dvd's, but there isn't much in the way of plot outlines. I thought it was an episode from The Outer Limits.

With two series of the same genre, and two episodes with the same name, I can see how this can become a little confusing, but sleddogmans response is appreciated nontheless.

The Preminition outshined would be thinking of is OL, the second to the last one aired, Dewey Martin was an X-15 pilot who broke the time barrier and saves his kid with the seat belt trick. OSB's premintion involved a falling chandelier (spelling?)
Oops. My bad...

Both Series. Granted the new one is a little PCish but I've seen a few of those that were while not scary like the ones I saw when I was a little kid or the reruns or the reruns. But at least as good as anything Stargate Atlantis and such have come up with.

The show first aired when I was 6. There was one episode that scared the CRAP out of me back then. Couldn't remember its name, other than it something to do with radioactive particles. Found a VHS tape on ebay with the title Production and Decay of Strange Particles and decided to gamble that it was the one and buy it, to see if I had the same reaction. It was the episode I remembered and although it was creepy, it didn't quite have the same effect. Still, there was a nice frisson between the 50 year old me and and 44 year old memory.

I also found a stack of VHS tapes for $.49 each at a thrift late last year, so picked up about 15 episodes that way.

There is a nice discussion of the show in Stephen King's Danse Macabre