The classic one, I mean, not any of the three (yes, three by now) reboots.
Mine would have to be
But there are a ton I could sub in. I could easily make a top ten or even top 20 of this…
I won’t ask that of you, though, only the top three will do.
(To be fair there are more and it’s been ages since I watched the show so I’m not going to fight hard for these choices.)
Honorable mention: Time Enough at Last (my GFs favorite)
Nick of Time
The Howling Man
A Most Unusual Camera
Stranger
To Serve Man
The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street
The After Hours
“Nightmare at Twenty Thousand Feet”
“Little Girl Lost”
“To Serve Man”
Honorable Mentions:
“Nick of Time”
“The Jeopardy Room”
“The Odyssey of Flight 33”
I’m surprised I forgot this one. A true classic.
One For The Angels
It’s A Good Life
Steel
We all enjoyed “Eye of the Beholder” but it scared my 8 year old sister so much that she still talks about it.
I could be persuaded to change my mind about 2 and 3, but #1 is non-negotiable. I’m surprised no one else mentioned it yet. I agree with novelist R L Stine that it’s the best Twilight Zone episode ever. Rod Serling himself felt that it was at least the best of the first season. 3a and 3b are ties.
Room for One More
To Serve Man
It’s a Good Life
It’s a Good Life
The Invaders
The After Hours
ETA: Damn! I swear I wasn’t cribbing off of @Stranger_On_A_Train
As long as we’re talking about favorite, not always best, most iconic, or some other criterea.
Though my opinions change depending on the day and the mood, #1 is probably almost always # 1, and TOMitC is almost always in my top 5 due to the insightful, yet rueful condemnation of our species. Flight 33 just always stays with me, the situation, the quite desperation in the end, and of course, the completely unresolved question and the fact that it is so very random, compared to a lot of more moralistic/ironic justice episodes.
Nick of Time
It’s a Good Life
To Serve Man
To Serve Man. This one has the classic Twilight Zone twist at the end—and what a twist!
The Hunt. I saw this one in reruns about fifty years ago, and it has always stayed with me. I don’t know why; I’m nothing like the main character, nor do I hunt, or even own a hound dog. But it does have a valuable moral: “Not even the Devil can fool a hound dog.”
The Shelter. Serling pulled out all the stops with this one. Perfectly normal people, enjoying an evening together, who become a ravenous mob, just because one of them has something the others want. The Cold War threat is central to this one, and it fits perfectly, though the lesson can extend to anything, really.
Honorable Mentions go to the following:
A Stop at Willoughby. As mentioned above, and thank you for reminding me of it, @wolfpup. This one is quiet and understated, and will likely make no “Best Of” lists because of that. But it should. In today’s world, and even in the world of the early 1960s, who wouldn’t want a Willoughby to stop at? Away from phones ringing nonstop, people wanting something, and an ever-growing inbox of e-mails? Sounds good to me.
Miniature. This was one from the fourth season, when episodes were an hour long. For some reason, it was never included in syndicated reruns. But I had the great good luck to see it, thanks to a local TV station who said, “Screw it, we’re buying it,” and ran all of Season Four in late-night.
It is a bittersweet story. A man who visits the local museum daily—apparently, its cafeteria always has a great lunch special—and on his daily visit, is convinced that he sees the dolls moving in a dollhouse exhibit. He watches the goings-on in the dollhouse daily, and falls in love with one of the dolls, who is apparently being abused.
One day, the man (who, I should note, is played extremely well by Robert Duvall) disappears. Nobody can find him; his family has no idea where he is. Until a museum guard notices an addition to the cast of characters in the dollhouse, and he looks suspiciously like the man who used to visit daily.
That was one of the best hour-long episodes, IMHO. It remains one of my favourites.
In no particular order, these came to mind immediately:
“A Stop at Willoughby”
“It’s a Good Life”
“The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street”
The Invaders - with Agnes Moorehead. There is no dialog, but her acting is superb!
The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street - In the 6th grade, we read this out loud in class. It had always stuck with me, and one day I saw it on The Twilight Zone! I was blown away.
Nothing in the Dark - Robert Redford shines as a policeman who gets shot. An old woman afraid of “the dark” (death personified) decides to help him, even though she is very afraid.
And When the Sky Was Opened (very creepy)
The Thirty Fathom Grave (who, or what, is banging on hull of the submarine)
The Fear (a great twist after 20 minutes of suspense)