I saw an article recently about why we hate everyone as we get older.  I didn’t read it.  I hate those journalists.  No, I’m just kidding.  I had actually intended to read it but got distracted and closed the window.  No I can’t find it again.  Oh well.  Still, my experience is not that people start to hate people so much as people get sort of intolerant of certain things.  I find myself disliking some new ideas from time to time and I have to remember to course-correct.  Most of the time, once I think it through, I can overcome that dislike and find merit.  And then there are times where I try to think it through and still hate it.  I noticed that happened at the start of this episode of The Waltons Zone.  I’m just so tired of this sort of setting in The Twilight Zone.  Some quiet little country home in the Midwest where people are just a little bit less educated and a little more gullible than those city folk.  It’s not that I have anything against country folk.  Nor do I have anything against people in the mid 20’s in the Midwest in general.  Hell, the truth is, I basically like everyone!  But man, am I bored with Serling’s repeated attempts at giving us some out-of-the-way place where insular people are acting against their friends and neighbors because of some little oddity.  Been there, done that, over and over again.

When Jeff Myrtlebank rises from his coffin, not as a zombie or a vampire, but as a regular person… everyone runs.  No one thinks to talk to him, even though they’ve known him all their lives.  This is a town of about 20 people, after all.  Ma and Pa even run away.  Only Jeff’s little sister sticks around and that’s the small move that changes the tide, because you know, if your kid died, you wouldn’t be delighted to see him walking and talking again.  The local doctor tries to put a spin on it: Jeff was suffering Epso Suspendo Animation.  It’s rare; you probably haven’t heard of it. It’s silly, mildly funny, but ultimately just showcases the ignorance of the people of this town.

The cast of characters are no different than you’d expect.  Maybe it’s a bygone day that I just don’t understand and  I acknowledge that it’s possible, but it’s still tedious.  I talk to a friend of mine who is substantially younger than me and I realize the world she’s growing up in just doesn’t know the world I came from and nothing is going to change that.  I can now clearly see what my parents and grandparents would explain to me; no generation can really completely relate to the generation before but this is just a little too removed for me.  I mean, did boys really keep frogs under their hats to torment little girls?  Did people really name their daughters “Comfort” and their sons “Orgram”?  And what did the expression “little pitchers have big ears” really mean?  (I’ll be honest, I searched high and low for a transcript of the episode because I did a triple take when I thought the woman said “little bitches have big ears”.)

The episode does just enough right to keep it interesting.  Jeff does seem to have come back from the dead with a curse.  He kills flowers that were picked earlier the same day.  They wilt and turn black in the short time it took for him to bring them to his fiancé.  This causes Comfort to doubt him; maybe he really is cursed like everyone says.  But in the end, she stands by her man and the townsfolk stop bothering the two of them realizing they don’t want to do “no harm” to Comfort.  As they leave, Jeff lights his pipe without striking the match on anything and we’re left to wonder: is there actually something amiss with Jeff Myrtlebank?  Even Comfort doesn’t take comfort in the fact, but she’s made up her mind.

I would have preferred a bit more mystery.  This was no Wilbur Whatley, after all.  This didn’t have the feel of a proper, creepy Lovecraftian horror.  This was just another Serling episode giving us characters who we don’t really like,  putting them in situations that are really not that interesting. It seems to be what he does best.  Or perhaps it’s me.  Perhaps I’m just getting older and I hate everything.  I’m pretty sure that’s not the case, but I have to keep an open mind.  Like: maybe the next episode will be better.  I may be getting older, but I still live in hope!   ML

The view from across the pond:

“We all know that the Lord moves in mysterious ways, and today…” Today, He’s moving in a very mysterious way, or at least somebody is, because Jeff Myrtlebank has been dead for three days, and then he climbs out of his coffin at his funeral service. The townsfolk are quick to jump to conclusions. Is this really Jeff, or has something else inhabited his body while it’s still fresh?

The clever thing about this is the way the reactions of Jeff’s friends and family seem so unreasonable to start with. This is thanks largely to the performance of James Best, who makes Jeff so likeable and down to earth that it seems absurd to suggest he’s anything other than himself. His family and his girlfriend should be overwhelmed with joy, and seeing them shrinking away from him makes them look like silly, superstitious people. It takes the wisdom of a child to embrace him, and then the others finally follow suit.

It’s an uneasy acceptance, though, and the next stage of this clever process from writer Montgomery Pittman is to invite the viewers to have some doubts as well. Jeff’s parents notice a few minor changes in his personality: eating two eggs instead of three each day, working harder, “fiddling with things” more (well, he’s getting no comfort from Comfort, so that one is understandable). It’s all insignificant stuff, but for the first time a rational viewer is drawn into thinking that there’s actually a possibility something might be wrong here, although if there’s something really wrong in the town it must surely be with the parents who decided to name their children “Comfort” and “Orgram”.

While all this is going on, and Jeff and Orgram are coming to blows, the comedy music does nothing to help the credibility of the episode. We could have done with some creepy music to sell the idea and unsettle the viewers rather than the quirky silliness we get instead. But the mob showing up to drive Jeff out of town still packs a dramatic punch.

It’s interesting that Comfort’s decision to stand by Jeff is what turns the tide here. It’s a lot harder to attack a man and a woman than just a man, especially when the woman’s brother is one of the mob. The writing stumbles a bit on Comfort’s motivations. It appears that she changes her mind about Jeff simply because he proposes to her, which doesn’t reflect well on her character, as if she’s prepared to live with a monster as long as she gets the life she wanted. Considering we last saw her recoiling from him in fear and disgust, that’s quite a condemnation of an otherwise likeable character, but I’m not sure that was the writer’s intention. She was presumably having a change of heart before she arrived to speak with Jeff, but it feels like there’s something missing.

What really turns the tide against the mob is Jeff’s threat, and it’s a very clever argument: if he’s Jeff, they don’t need to drive him out; if he’s not, then they had better not make him angry. There’s no arguing with logic like that, but it also shows what a bunch of cowards all those big men really are when they sense danger.

I’m not sure what to make of the final revelation. What are we supposed to take from this? We should trust to our gut feelings, or first instincts? We are right to be superstitious? Not for the first time, the writer didn’t seem to have a clear view on the point he was making, beyond a lazy political joke. As a punchline to an episode that made us think, it’s pretty banal.   RP

Read next in the Junkyard… The Twilight Zone: To Serve Man