Hello!

We saw this link in a post circulated by Joe Dante yet it’s been up for seven years. An anonymous Rod Serling fan cobbled together an ersatz episode of The Twilight Zone, using film clips purloined from the 1968 classic Sci-fi feature  Planet of the Apes.

What sounds like a nice exercise gets nicer when we learn that the revisionist editor added other elements to make his fan cut more authentic. The clips from the Franklin J. Schaffner movie are pan-scanned flat and in B&W, to better match the Twilight Zone format. And the editor scoured episodes of TZ to find just the right opening and closing narration to borrow. Rod Serling’s voice sounds like it belongs there.

Serling’s voice does belong there: the TV legend was a co-writer on Planet of the Apes, along with the previously blacklisted Michael Wilson.

A new article by Josh Weiss at the web page  Sy Fy has more information on the clever edit. We agree with the observation, ‘what could look more appropriate than the Statue of Liberty finale with the Twilight Zone music playing?’

Thanks for reading! — Glenn Erickson