Customer Reviews

Richard Matheson's The Twilight Zone Scripts (Volume 1)

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"The Twilight Zone" has long been acknowledged as a television classic. Not only can episodes still be seen on the SciFi Channel, but the show has also proven to be a durable video and DVD best seller.

The stories presented on the show are intelligent and have a timeless quality and charm about them that makes even repeated viewings seem new. One of the main reasons for this is the contributions of Richard Matheson. A noted sci-fi and horror novelist with several books turned into classic movies ("Incredible Shrinking Man", "I Am Legend", which became "The Last Man on Earth", and later "The Omega Man" with Charlton Heston, and "Whatever Dreams May Come"), Matheson was a master of the short story, a style perfect for the 30 minute "Twilight Zone" format. While the scripts cannot fully take the place of the televised story, reading them is like reading a short story, with the advantage that the reader is able to see how the story is constructed from scene to scene.

The scripts included in this volume are as follows: "The Last Flight", A World of Difference", "A World of His Own", "Nick of Time" (Who can forget the sight of William Shatner feeding penny after penny into the fortune telling machine with the Devil's head?), "The Invaders" (Agnes Moorehead versus tiny invaders from another world. It was the first episode I saw as a child and continues to scare me.), "Once Upon a Time", "Little Girl Lost", and "Young Man's Fancy".

For those who loved the series or just for those who love a good script.

The Twilight Zone Scripts by Richard Matheson are a great thing to have if your a nut about the original TV show "The Twilight Zone" These are scripts that include stage direction etc etc... My Favorite one out of both of these books (Vol 1 & 2) is entitled "Mute" (Vol 2). This one is about a group of scientists that come together and are conducting an experiment on teaching children to be telepathic from birth, in order to make a more perfect society. One that is "speechless".

Another one that I found intriguing is entitled "Last Flight" (Vol. 1). This one is about a pilot for the Royal Flying Corps in the 1917's that travels through some type of portal and arrives in the future 1959.

These two books are a great compendium to have if you are a fan of Matheson or a fan of the Twilight Zone. In my opinion a great collectors item!

Fans of the original series know of Richard Matheson's
stellar thirteen episodes, which include some of the finest in the series: "The Invaders", "Death Ship", "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet". And at long last, here they are in readable form.
Unfortunately, the two volumes offer little more than
the scripts themselves. Those familiar with the "TZ Companion"
by Zicree and the newly-released "TZ Scripts of Earl Hamner"
(with commentary by Tony Albarella), or "Forgotten Gems from The Twilight Zone" (with commentary by Andrew Ramage) know of the in-depth commentary offered for nearly all the episodes.
Stanley Wiater does little more than repeat what has
been said elsewhere about Matheson's episodes. No
real analyses or significant insight precedes the
scripts themselves, thus making the book rather uninteresting
on the whole.

I've always been a fan of science-fiction and fantasy,including The Twilight Zone in its diferent versions. As a filmmaker this book is a great chance to explore the scripts of the episodes. Richard Matheson is trully a master writer.

This book is exactly what it says. It is a collectin f stories by Richard Matheson that are used in the original Twilight zone. These are NOT a set of short stories. They are scripts that you can follow along with while watching the story on TV. If that is what you enjoy, then this book is exactly what you want. It delivers what you expect.

The Twilight Zone Scripts by Richard Matheson are a great thing to have if your a nut about the original TV show "The Twilight Zone" These are scripts that include stage direction etc etc... My Favorite one out of both of these books (Vol 1 & 2) is entitled "Mute" (Vol 2). This one is about a group of scientists that come together and are conducting an experiment on teaching children to be telepathic from birth, in order to make a more perfect society. One that is "speechless".

Another one that I found intriguing is entitled "Last Flight" (Vol. 1). This one is about a pilot for the Royal Flying Corps in the 1917's that travels through some type of portal and arrives in the future 1959.

These two books are a great compendium to have if you are a fan of Matheson or a fan of the Twilight Zone. In my opinion a great collectors item!