# The FIRST Twilight Zone episode you saw **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 12, 2015, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503 "2015-02-12T20:07:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/21 "2015-02-13T05:07:55Z")
I did see the very first TZ episode, “Where Is Everybody?” in its original broadcast when I was 8. I distinctly remember my shock when Ferris crashes into the mirror. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/22 "2015-02-13T06:37:15Z")
I started watching _TZ_ when it first aired, on October 2, 1959, and was immediately hooked. The first episode was \*Where is Everybody? \* ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/23 "2015-02-13T06:45:46Z")
I can’t say for certain, but the first one I remember seeing is the Talky Tina one, which was kind of unnerving when I was 9 or so. ---
**Author:** ![Soylent\_Juicy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/82dd89/32.png) [@Soylent\_Juicy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Soylent_Juicy)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/24 "2015-02-13T14:59:33Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > _ **Time Enough at Last.** _ > It still breaks my heart when poor Burgess Meredith breaks his glasses. (I was an 11 year old, 4-eyed bookworm at the time, myself.) Me too. I saw it when I was little and a few years ago when I embarked on a mission to watch every single episode I couldn’t bring myself to watch that one again. > [@dracoi](#): > > Anyway, the one truly memorable episode from that time period is the little boy with virtually omnipotent powers who terrorizes the farming town around him. At the end, he turns someone into a jack-in-the-box. I think this was the first one I saw. Also the one with William Shatner and the “gremlin” on the airplane wing. ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/25 "2015-02-13T15:32:32Z")
If it counts - the movie. If not…well, the first I remember seeing is The Eye of the Beholder, but I’m pretty sure I saw some before that. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/26 "2015-02-13T15:56:02Z")
The first one I remember seeing all of was the salesman trying to cheat death in “One for the Angels”. I was an adult at the time. However, in junior high my class read out loud the script from the episode “The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street”. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/27 "2015-02-13T16:46:19Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > The episode where David McCallum’s evolution was accelerated was one from _ **The Outer Limits** _, right? Or was that _ **TZ** _ too? Definitely _Outer Limits_. It (“The Sixth Finger”) stuck with me, and I watched it again years later (with my daughter, who was the same age as I was when I first saw it). It turned out to be have far more going on than I realized at first. ---
**Author:** ![BubbaDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bubbadog/32/333_2.png) [@BubbaDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BubbaDog)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/28 "2015-02-13T17:28:07Z")
The first one I remember was **The Invaders** with Agnes Moorehead fighting off what appears to be an attack of little spacemen. I was too young to immediately pick up on the big reveal at the end (the Spacemen were USA astronauts in a world where the people were giants) Even after my older sister somewhat explained it to me I was fearful for weeks that little men in spacesuits where hiding under my bed. ---
**Author:** ![kath94](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/67e7ee/32.png) [@kath94](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kath94)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/29 "2015-02-13T17:42:30Z")
I didn’t know what The Twilight Zone was at the time, or that what I’d seen was an episode of it, but the one with the morgue & the nurse who always has “room for one more, honey” FREAKED me out. I am now a HUGE fan of TZ & have a well-worn dog-eared copy of the first printing of The Twilight Zone Companion. ---
**Author:** ![Octarine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/22d042/32.png) [@Octarine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octarine)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/30 "2015-02-13T20:37:46Z")
I believe it was “To Serve Man”. Yeah, my parents knew what they were doing. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/31 "2015-02-13T20:44:58Z")
“A Game of Pool”, starring Jack Klugman and Jonathan Winters. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/32 "2015-02-13T21:02:34Z")
> [@Octarine](#): > > I believe it was “To Serve Man”. Yeah, my parents knew what they were doing. That was ONE of my first… I think the second was another one with Burgess Meredith- “The Obsolete Man.” WPIX, channel 11 in New York, used to run them almost every night when I was a kid. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/33 "2015-02-13T21:11:19Z")
Around the same time as the episode with the tank, I recall watching the one where the astronauts land in a desert they think is on another planet, but they’re actually on Earth. I remember the telephone poles scratched in the sand by the guy who died. That must also have been in the winter of 1962 (or maybe '61). ---
**Author:** ![G0sp3l](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c68b51/32.png) [@G0sp3l](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/G0sp3l)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/34 "2015-02-13T21:17:28Z")
> [@Octarine](#): > > I believe it was “To Serve Man”. Yeah, my parents knew what they were doing. Were they doing B_raised Octarine on a bed of lemongrass_? I’ve heard that’s a tough recipe. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Cartoonacy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/848f3c/32.png) [@Cartoonacy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartoonacy)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/35 "2015-02-13T21:28:32Z")
The only one I remember watching when it was first aired was _Mute_. I would have been four at the time. I caught up on all the rest when I was in my teens and the show was in syndication. I think there are still about a half dozen episodes that I’ve never seen. ---
**Author:** ![Ponch8](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ponch8/32/9883_2.png) [@Ponch8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ponch8)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/36 "2015-02-13T21:46:58Z")
I remember seeing one where somebody makes a bet that he won’t speak for an entire year. When the year ends and he wins his bet, he reveals that he had had his tongue removed to ensure that he’d win. We watched it in my high school English class after reading a short story that the episode was based on. ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [February 13, 2015, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/37 "2015-02-13T21:52:24Z")
I also watched them on WPIX. They aired them nightly and would also do marathons on the holidays. Somewhere I have a VHS tape with 8 hours of one of their New Years Eve Marathons. ---
**Author:** ![AppallingGael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9bd4f/32.png) [@AppallingGael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AppallingGael)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2015, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/38 "2015-02-14T00:39:33Z")
“We now join ‘The Twilight Zone’…already in progress” was a catch-phrase among my crowd in the early 80’s (ok, we weren’t quite a “crowd”). WPIX-11, NYC. Whenever the Yankees game ran over its allotted 2:30 (in other words, nearly every night), PIX would shows the news and then a couple of old sitcoms (Odd Couple? Honeymooners?) in full, and finally catch up at Twilight Zone time. So my first (partial) TZ episode, I believe: Six Characters in Search of an Exit. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2015, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/39 "2015-02-14T03:16:17Z")
I was born in 1961, and have seen them so often that I honestly could not tell you the first one I ever saw. There were so many good ones, and so many replayed so frequently - I suppose it could have been the one with Burgess Meredith - Time Enough At Last maybe? I know they would replay that one lots. ---
**Author:** ![purplehearingaid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@purplehearingaid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehearingaid)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2015, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503/40 "2015-02-14T04:10:01Z")
> **["The Twilight Zone" Where Is Everybody? (TV Episode 1959) - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0734692/)** > > Where Is Everybody?: Directed by Robert Stevens. With Earl Holliman, James Gregory, Paul Langton, James McCallion. Mike Ferris finds himself alone in the small Oakwood town and without recollection about his name, where he is or who he is. Mike... This is the very episode , some stations did not want to air the show b/c they thought it too weird and would not do good. Boy they were wrong ! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-first-twilight-zone-episode-you-saw/712503.md?page=3)