This has been bugging me for many, many years, but is just one of those things I keep forgetting to ask about, and only now have gotten around to mining the Dope’s collective wisdom.
As a kid, I remember a particular episode really creeping me out. So much so, apparently, that I still remember bits and pieces of it 30 years later. The central plot of the episode, at least as my memories as a 7-year-old remember it, concerned the Robinsons coming across an alien race (?) that aged backwards. That is, they started out old, and got younger and younger. I can’t exactly remember what the conflict was: I seem to recall that they had to get away from these aliens for some reason. Maybe the young aliens needed older host bodies or something like that? Or maybe if the Robinsons stayed where they were at, they, too, would age backwards? I don’t know.
ETA: There is also the possibility that there might have been an additional twist, but this could just be my own twisting of the concept: That they mentally aged normally, but physically aged in reverse. So the aliens that looked like old men were kids mentally, but the kids were old and wise, mentally. But, remember, this is remembered through the haze of 30 years.
Now, I think this was a Lost in Space episode, but I’m not sure. All I remember as a kid is the idea of aging backwards really sticking to me and kind of freaking me out as I thought closely as to how it would feel.
I remember going through the LiS episode guide a few years ago and not seeing anything that matched my description, so it’s absolutely possible I may be thinking of some other sci-fi type TV show.
That was the premise behind Merth, Mork and Mindy’s son played by Jonathan Winters. Like all Orkans, he was born (hatched, really) old and got younger as he aged, physically, but he still had the mind of a child.
Hmm…that does sound similar, but not quite exactly what I remember. I remember a feeling of danger, fear, and pity at the beings. I don’t recall this being a comedy on Earth, but more of something with a spaceship sci-fi setting and sinister overtones.
Now, memory being what it is, it might be a mish-mash of memories, and I’m conflating various sources together.
Ah, good idea. My memories of it very much align with a Twilight Zone type of atmosphere and subject matter. And I did used to catch episodes of that as a kid, too. Hmmm…
it could easily have been a recycled plot. cowboy stories became space stories. scifi books became a Twilight Zone/Outer Limits episode which became a Lost in Space/Star Trek/Battlestar Galactica episode. so you might have seen it a number of places.
The Robinsons finally arrive at their destination, the Alpha Centauri system, but they are surprised to find an Earth colony already established there. Another oddity is that it only seems to be populated by teenagers who try to brainwash Penny and Will into rebelling against the “olders.” When Dr. Smith snoops around, he discovers the teens are really aliens in human guise, but they give Smith his youth back and make him forget what he saw. The aliens, who never grow older-minded than adolescents, try to discover what makes the human children mature.
"Buck Rogers In The Twenty Fifth Century also had a one-off appearance by a golden-skinned race who aged backwards. They had the intrinsic power to transmute elements, but this weakened as they aged (i.e., became more childlike). "
Yep, this is definitely it. I just found it on Xfinity/Hulu and watched it. I may have been conflating it with something else, too, but the bulk of my memory is this episode. I also remembered a hazy recollection of there being dancing at the very end, and there was dancing in the last scene. I forgot how campy and trippy Lost in Space was.
Then check out “The Great Vegetable Rebellion,” in which Dr. Smith becomes an eggplant, captured by a carrot, played by Stanley Adams (Tribble trader Cyrano Jones from “Star Trek”).