Twilight Zone Season 2 Review

I can’t believe we are ready to start Season 3 already! Today I’ll just have this review and we will start on season 3 on Wednesday. Thank you all again for following me on this long journey. The second season was very strong with many great episodes. In the third season Serling started to burn out. He had writing credits on almost every show and was the Twilight Zones showrunner.

Of 156 episodes of The Twilight Zone, Serling wrote roughly 70 percent of them. He would write a script in less than 40 hours and then on to the next one. Serling also spent a great deal of time defending scripts against narrowminded network executives alarmed that some of the content would upset sponsors. And, with the hundreds of functions as a television producer, the workload caught up to him. By the time the series was canceled in 1964, Serling was physically and mentally exhausted.

While running the show he also fought battles with the CBS executives who complained about the darkness of the scripts among many other things. Serling wanted integrity and would even fight against some of the commercials. “However moving and however probing and incisive the drama, it cannot retain any thread of legitimacy when after 12 or 13 minutes, out comes 12 dancing rabbits singing about toilet paper.“

James Aubrey, who became CBS president after the show launched,  hated the show, believing programs with regular stars were more likely to grab audiences.

Aubrey canceled Twilight Zone twice, once after its third season, but it was revived when a replacement program tanked in the ratings. Later, he reduced the show’s budget to compromise its quality and axed the series in 1964. Ironically, Aubrey was fired a year later…not soon enough…and that was a good thing.

Do any of you have any different thoughts on the rankings below? What was your favorite and least favorite episode of season two?

I would like to link to two other bloggers doing tv shows. They are going through a TV series show by show like I’m doing here. I’ll continue to have the Twilight Zone every Saturday, Sunday, and Wednesday.

Hanspostcard is going through the episodes of The Andy Griffith Show

Best 'The Andy Griffith Show' episodes, ranked - GoldDerby

John Holton is going through each episode of Hogan’s Heroes 

Hogan's Heroes Intro - YouTube

Season 2      
Episode Date Episode Stars
1 Sept 30, 1960 King Nine Will Not Return  3.5
2 Oct 7, 1960 The Man in the Bottle    4
3 Oct 14, 1960 Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room  4
4 Oct 28, 1960 A Thing About Machines  3
5 Nov 4, 1960 The Howling Man 5
6 Nov 11, 1960 The Eye of the Beholder 5
7 Nov 18, 1960 Nick of Time 5
8 Dec 2, 1960 The Lateness of the Hour 4
9 Dec 9, 1960 The Trouble with Templeton 5
10 Dec 16, 1960  A Most Unusual Camera 3.5
11 Dec 23, 1960 The Night of the Meek 5
12 Jan 6, 1961  Dust 4
13 Jan 13, 1961 Back There  4
14 Jan 20, 1961 The Whole Truth 3
15 Jan 27, 1961 The Invaders 5
16 Feb 3, 1961 A Penny for Your Thoughts 4.5
17 Feb 10, 1961 Twenty-Two 4
18 Feb 24, 1961 The Odyssey of Flight 33 5
19 Mar 3, 1961 Mr. Dingle, the Strong 3.5
20 Mar 10, 1961 Static 3.5
21 Mar 24, 1961 The Prime Mover 4
22 Mar 31, 1961 Long Distance Call 5
23 April 7, 1961 A Hundred Yards Over the Rim 5
24 April 21, 1961 The Rip Van Winkle Caper 4
25 April 28, 1961 The Silence 5
26 May 5, 1961 Shadow Play 5
27 May 12, 1961 The Mind and the Matter 2.5
28 May 26, 1961 Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up 5
29 June 2, 1961 The Obsolete Man 5

10 Key Twilight Zone Episodes To Watch If You're New To The Series - CINEMABLEND

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player.

31 thoughts on “Twilight Zone Season 2 Review”

  1. Agree Max this was a strong season. Lots of great episodes. I think I would give it a slight edge over Season 1. Agree with the episode ratings with exception of Mind over Matter might give a 3. As we’ve discussed I didn’t dislike main character quite as much as you did

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    1. I think I favor the season over the first also. I’m going to watch Mind over Matter again… and see…Hans and you liked it better than I did but I’m always open to watch them again.

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  3. Given I’ve only watched a handful of episodes of The Twilight Zone, I’m far from being an expert, so I let others who know much better what they are talking about weigh in here. That said, I’ve been enjoying your blog series and look forward to season 3!

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    1. Same here Hans. I wish more would do it.

      You know one that has crossed my mind? I just don’t think enough people would be interested…Barney Miller. I would love to go through that one day.

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      2. LOL that is right! I’ve been watching it again recently. Jen never really watched it before….she is loving it. I showed her the Hash episode first and she was hooked.
        It is really consistent…I think it was because Danny Arnold had complete control instead of a bunch of people.

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      3. I will have to get it out and start watching it-.. only two left from that crew- Barney and Wojo. I think my favorite character was Dietrich but all that cast was great.

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      4. Yes…Dietrich is mine also…in my top 5 of tv characters ever…
        Hard to believe Fish outlived many of them…he was older of course but not as much as people thought.

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      5. way back in 1982 there were rumors of Abe’s death- People referred to his death– the man lived to be 95! He was one of those guys like Walter Mattheau and Karl Malden who were born looking old!

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      6. I remember that! He had fun with it by posing with the magazine that had the rumor.
        They did look old…even when they weren’t….

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  6. I did not see every episode this season but I’m on board with your ratings of the ones I did see. I also admire Serling for the comment he made about the break and the dancing rabbits. That’s all commercial tv stations are anymore. I remember my aunt who came from Germany told me that on their tv they had a block of time set aside for commercials so there weren’t interruptions in the programming. Not sure if it is still like that there or not. I honestly can’t watch commercial TV anymore. It’s too frantic and A.D.D. for me.

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    1. Of all people…George Harrison is where I found out about the BBC back in the day. They had exactly what you said…blocked time for commercials. It’s my favorite interview of him by Dick Cavett.
      I do not watch commercial TV…I wait til a show is done with and then get the seasons.

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    1. No problem at all John…I wish more people would do it. After this is done…I thought about doing Barney Miller…I doubt if I would get a giant response.

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  9. Another excellent season and thanks for giving us an idea of the highlights and ones to check out if we’re not going to have the time to look at them all right away. Have you sort of come up with an average and figured out which season was the best overall?
    By the way, I for one would like to see 12 rabbits dancing and singing about toilet paper!

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    1. LOL I loved that quote about the rabbits!
      No wonder the man was wore out…the 3rd season is good…and has some classics BUT…not as consistent as the first two.

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