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5.0 out of 5 stars
Five of the earliest episodes of TV's creepiest show, July 12, 2004
This review is from: One Step Beyond, Vol. 1 (DVD)
Everyone is familiar with The Twilight Zone, but how many know about One Step Beyond? Even I, a huge fan of classic television and the outré in all its forms, was completely unfamiliar with this show until some time last year. One Step Beyond is sort of like The Twilight Zone - except it's actually much better. I love Rod Serling, but there was always a sense of otherness about him and his famous show. With One Step Beyond and John Newland - the show's guide into the unknown - you had a much different experience. The strange story chronicled each week was reportedly based on actual events, and this lent the show a force and visceral connection with the viewer that could not be found in fictional shows of the same type. One Step Beyond is oftentimes genuinely creepy - as much now as it was when it originally aired. Newland's persona was perfect for the show's desired effect, there was no dependence on strange twists or unexpected endings to save an otherwise bland episode, and the music greatly added to the whole effect. I've read a number of comments by those who remember watching the show as a young person and being spooked if not quite frightened by what they saw; when you have viewers already gripping the arms of their chairs before your host even appears to say a word, you are definitely doing something right. I can't imagine why the show only aired for three seasons, beginning in early 1959 and ending in the summer of 1960. It not only pre-dates The Twilight Zone, it goes it one better.
This DVD features five of the earliest episodes of the show. Night of April 14 (originally aired on January 27, 1959) was the show's second episode and, as you might guess, concerns the events of April 14, 1912 - the night the Titanic slipped down into its watery grave. A bride-to-be has an awful nightmare of drowning in cold water, unable to find the man she is to marry in the chaos around her; the next day, her fiancé (played by Patrick MacNee who would go on to great fame playing John Steed in The Avengers) suddenly announces that the honeymoon in Switzerland has now become a honeymoon to New York on board the Titanic. The bride gives in to her future hubby's wishes, despite more dreams wherein she sees the name of Titanic on the boats around her, and - well, you know what happened. The episode also features the stories of a couple of individuals thousands of miles away who have prescient premonitions of the disaster, as well. The episode closes with a description of the book Futility, written by Morgan Robertson and published in 1898 - it is the story of a huge, luxurious ship called the Titan which hits an iceberg on its maiden voyage and sinks - the similarities to the Titanic and its fate are indeed quite eerie.
Cloris Leachman stars in The Dark Room (which originally aired on February 10, 1959); she is an American photographer who has come to France to capture the essence of the French people in pictures. Her first subject has a wonderful face, but the stranger eventually goes off the deep end and attacks her - his identity, when it is finally revealed, definitely takes the story "one step beyond." Epilogue (which originally aired February 24, 1959) is an especially memorable episode. Let this be a lesson to all: abandoned mines are not a good place for mother-son outings; the manner in which the estranged husband is alerted to his son's entrapment in the mine did, I am sure, inspire shivers down the spines of countless viewers across the country.
The Dream (original airdate: March 3, 1959) takes us to Britain during the early days of World War II. Here we witness a double dream that would seem to indicate that love knows no earthly bounds. This collection closes with The Dead Part of the House (original airdate: March 17, 1959), an episode which is creepy in a good way. Jennifer, Rose, and Mary help bring a father and daughter together following the death of the girl's mother - but are the trio of little girls merely dolls, or are they the ghosts of three little girls who haunt the nursery where they died?
I love One Step Beyond. It may not have the technical quality of The Twilight Zone, but it connects with viewers in a personal way that, rather than asking them to ponder the mysteries of some undefined outer limits, takes the viewer one step beyond the normal and explainable right there from the confines of their own comfortable seats.
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3.0 out of 5 stars
Not as good as I remember :(, April 8, 2007
This review is from: One Step Beyond, Vol. 1 (DVD)
I watched most of this serious as a kid and I thought that I would really enjoy this DVD. I also have several DVDs of TZ and I find them far superior to One Step Beyond. You may not agree, but I'm spending my money on the complete set of TZ and the X Files. Both are far better that OSB!
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