Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site jhunix.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!think!harvard!seismo!umcp-cs!aplcen!jhunix!ins_aset
From: ins_aset@jhunix.UUCP (Sue Trowbridge)
Newsgroups: net.tv,net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: Harlan Ellison quits TWILIGHT ZONE
Message-ID: <1459@jhunix.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 16-Dec-85 18:47:06 EST
Article-I.D.: jhunix.1459
Posted: Mon Dec 16 18:47:06 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 18-Dec-85 05:31:39 EST
References: <783@rtech.UUCP> <674@hou2b.UUCP> <1797@utcsri.UUCP>
Organization: Johns Hopkins Univ. Computing Ctr.
Lines: 51
Xref: watmath net.tv:3736 net.sf-lovers:11571

> 
> Ellsion has walked off virtually every long-term commitment he
> has ever had and bitched about virtually every short-term media
> project that has ever come to fruition.  It was predictable
> that he would leave TZ in a huff.  It was only a matter of time.
> I, too, think he has a wonderful way with the English language,
> but he is hardly irreplacable.  C'est la vie.
> 
> RJS in Toronto
> Posted c/o


I have been an Ellison fan for quite some time now and have read nearly
every book he's published (short stories, essays, etc.) -- no mean feat.
However, I have been disappointed by the new TZ series.

(WARNING -- spoilers ahead)

For one thing, it's not really true to the spirit of the old show.  In
Serling's zone, the good were always rewarded and the bad were always
punished.  This has hardly been the case on the new TZ -- i.e., the boy
who was killed for being too intelligent, the harried housewife who
stopped time with a nuclear bomb in the air, trapped forever or doomed.
Granted, not every old TZ was a morality play -- perhaps the most famous
episode of all, "Time Enough at Last," was a sad story where a kind old
man's "best-laid plans" were ruined.  But so many TZs featured baddies
getting poetic justice.  The new TZ seems to have forgotten this.

Some of the new TZs have been so stupid and sentimental that it's a wonder
that crusty old Harlan was involved, such as last Friday's about a woman
brought back from the past to save a scientist's marriage.  I really did
expect more from Ellison.  But the "Shatterday" episode proved that his
works function much better as stories than as visuals.  I think print is
the best medium for him; besides, it's a solitary art rather than a coll-
aborative one, and Ellison doesn't seem to be Mr. Congeniality.  

Hard to believe the man who wrote two books entitled _The_Glass_Teat_ could
get a job in tv in the first place.  Ellisonmaniacs, and anyone interested
in a good argument, should check out his latest volume of essays, _An_
Edge_In_My_Voice_.  Reading it was lots more fun than watching any episode
of the TZ.

-- 

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-
Sue Trowbridge

"Enquiring minds want to know!"

allegra!umcp-cs!aplvax.....
decvax!decuac!aplvax.....