Twilight Zone episode review — 1.20 — Elegy

Episode 1.20 “Elegy”
Original air date: February 19, 1960
Writer: Charles Beaumont
Director: Douglas Heyes

Rating: 9/10

“Elegy” resembles an episode of Star Trek, featuring a small crew of a ship that lands on a planet and encounters a weird phenomenon.

As Rod Serling’s narration states, “The time is the day after tomorrow. The place: a far corner of the universe. A cast of characters: three men lost amongst the stars. Three men sharing the common urgency of all men lost. They’re looking for home. And in a moment, they’ll find home; not a home that is a place to be seen, but a strange unexplainable experience to be felt.”

The three astronauts are played by Jeff Morrow (This Island Earth), Kevin Hagen, and Don Dubbins. They’re out of fuel, and see that the air is breathable, so they decide to exit their ship, to see that the world they are in is pretty much like Earth. Seeing images of mid-century America, they think that maybe they had traveled back in time to Earth, until they realize there are two suns.

As they travel around, they realize that nothing moves. They see people, but they are motionless. They see people in several different scenes — a farmer, a fisherman, a mayoral inaugural, etc. If you look close enough, you’ll see people move a bit, and maybe even blink, but that’s okay. It’s handled pretty well, and you see how the characters’ frustration escalates.

The three astronauts split up and when one is at a beauty pageant, we see that there is one kindly looking old man that moves. He later introduces himself to the three men, and is confused as to where they come from. The old man, Wickwire (Cecil Kellaway), explains that they’re at a cemetery, where people can exist in their most pleasant dreams after they’ve stopped dreaming. He gives them a drink, and eventually learns more about them.

Coming from Earth, the astronauts mention that Earth had a total war in the 1980s, and they come from 200 years later. They realize that they have been poisoned, and, as they are dying, Wickwire explains it is because “You are here, and you are men. And where there are men, there can be no peace.” It’s a badass line.

In the conclusion of the episode, Wickwire goes and dusts the inside of their ship, featuring the astronauts, in the place that they’d most want to be.

“Elegy” is good fun. It’s got a very interesting premise, and the scenes of the astronauts wandering around seeing this phenomenon are well done. There are moments of this episode that feel very nostalgic for mid-century America, and I always appreciate that in this series.