Twilight Zone episode review — 4.1 — In His Image

Episode 4.1 “In His Image”
Original air date: January 3, 1963
Writer: Charles Beaumont (adapted from his short story)
Director: Perry Lafferty

Rating: 9/10

The first hour-long Twilight Zone episode may be the best. It’s strange, for sure, but it’s very compelling, and it makes the most of its lengthened time slot, telling a story with a slowly unravelling mystery that wouldn’t have been possible in a half-hour time slot. This season would definitely have its lows, but this episode is one of the three or four that really stand out.

Waiting at a subway station, Alan Talbot (George Grizzard) goes crazy after hearing some strange noises, and pushes an evangelist into the train, killing her.

He then visits his fiance, Jessica (Gail Kobe) and decides to take her on a nice trip to the town where he grew up. When they arrive at his town, another man is living at the house where he remember his Aunt Mildred living, and he slowly notices other things that seem off about his memory.

He visits the grave where his parents are buried, and he instead finds a tombstone with the name Walter Ryder. This seems somewhat familiar to him, but he can’t place it.

As he and Jessica drive, he has to get out of the car, as he hears the mechanical noises again. He fights his urges to kill her, telling her to get away. She drives away, and Alan gets hit by a car, but isn’t bleeding. He peels his skin away to reveal wires in a really neat looking moment.

Alan looks up the name Walter Ryder in the phonebook and goes to his house to find that Walter Ryder is also played by George Grizzard. Walter explains that he’s an android, and that his memories were constructed from Ryder’s own, with some liberties thrown in. Alan was designed to be a more perfect version of Walter, making up for his faults. Apparently Walter wasn’t able to control the android and just a week ago, Alan had attempted to kill him with scissors before running away and I guess getting engaged.

Walter doesn’t know how to fix Alan’s random desire to kill. Alan then requests that Walter construct a better android — one that will be able to love Jessica without feeling sudden urges to kill her. But then he gets an urge and tries to kill Walter. There’s a struggle and we don’t see who wins.

The winner, whoever it is, shows up at Jessica’s home and apologizes for his strange behavior, promising to one day explain it. It’s then revealed that the winner is Walter, and not the android that had fallen in love with Jessica.

This is truly one of the few episodes that actually benefits from the increased length. Indeed, I couldn’t imagine it as a 30-minute episode. It couldn’t open in the same intriguing way, because it would almost immediately have to cut to the explanation. And the scenes of his memory being proven to be wrong over and over again couldn’t take place either.

The ending isn’t the most satisfying thing in the world, and it’s a bit predictable. But the episode does a nice job of building intrigue and mystery.