Terror TV Blogathon: “The Bellero Shield” – The Outer Limits

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No less a horror authority than author Stephen King described The Outer Limits as “the best program of its type ever to run on network TV.” (Though to be honest, he also made a similar statement about Boris Karloff’s Thriller.) Which you’ll have to admit: that’s heady praise for a program that couldn’t quite make it across the finish line in its second season. (I’m talking about its original 1963-65 run; the revival that began in 1995 had a bit more success, sticking around on small screens on Showtime and the Sci-Fi Channel until 2002.) Outer Limits most assuredly deserves its cult reputation, however; though there are a few clinkers in its catalog (“The Hundred Days of the Dragon,” “Tourist Attraction”) its best episodes can stand up to anything cranked out by Thriller or The Twilight Zone any day of the week.

In fact, I’ve often discussed OL episodes with my geek friends in the past…and if I had a nickel for every time one of them remarked “Was that on Outer Limits? I could have sworn that was a Twilight Zone!” I would be so wealthy as to be completely inaccessible to you “proles.” (I’m just kidding you. I wouldn’t change. Much.) It’s easy to confuse the two shows (although TZ was only an hour-long presentation in its fourth season): both used its horror/sci-fi elements as commentary on the human condition, and both frequently employed the “twist ending” as a plot device. But there was something a bit more sinister about OL episodes as a rule, defined by its dark, textured cinematography (with echoes of German expressionism and the film style later defined as noir). And then…there was “the bear.”

“The bear” was the nickname bestowed upon the monsters/creatures featured in Outer Limits installments, an element insisted upon by both ABC and producer Joseph Stefano to heighten fear and suspense. (When Stefano vacated the producer’s chair in the show’s second season, “the bear” went with him—though there were episode exceptions.) OL was created by Leslie Stevens, whose previous series Stoney Burke (an underrated Western program starring Jack Lord) has been cancelled by ABC after a solitary season. Stevens sold the network on a show he called Please Stand By, but when ABC insisted that the title of the series be changed, The Outer Limits became the substitute. September 16, 1963 marked the debut of OL with “The Galaxy Being,” a slightly-tweaked version of the Please Stand By pilot.

Like The Twilight Zone devotees, fans of The Outer Limits cherish their favorite episodes. Some of the best-remembered include “The Architects of Fear,” “The Sixth Finger,” “The Zanti Misfits” (TV Guide gave this one the #98 spot on its “100 Greatest Episodes of All Time” in 1997), “Nightmare,” and “Demon with a Glass Hand” (#78 on TV Guide’s revised “Greatest Episode List” in 2009). Our fearless leader and founder of the Classic TV Blog Association, Rick of the Classic Film and TV Café, even got into the act with a post listing his five favorites in 2012 (he includes “Zzzzz” and “The Inheritors”). My own personal preferences include “It Crawled Out of the Woodwork,” “Don’t Open Till Doomsday” …and the episode that I shall take as my text for this blogathon: “The Bellero Shield.”