The Invaders (TV Series) Nightmare (1967) User Reviews

Small Community Nightmare

[hrkepler · 7/10 · 28 May 2018]

'Nightmare' is one peculiar episode - it has some of the best and eeriest moments of the first season, and some of the most ridiculous ones of the whole series. There is tension and action and also plot holes big enough to drive harvester through.

The Invaders have worked out the plot to use flesh eating insects to wipe out human population. For that they seem to use some sort of powder or chemical mixture. The plot starts in small town in Kansas that is nearly in the heart of United States. When school teacher Ellen (Kathleen Widdoes) witnesses aliens using a machine that controls the insects the story finally reaches the newspapers. David Vincent arrives into town to investigate. He finds out that Ellen is little bit mentally unstable thanks to tragic event from the past. Still he believes the woman while the rest of the town, including Ellen's fiancee, are convinced that she imagined it all. The town's folk are not very friendly towards nosy Vincent and again he has hard time to find himself allies.

Not the best episode of the series, but the creepy small town atmoshpere, the constant threat and fast paced action makes it one of the most enjoyable ones. Truly nightmarish chapter. And Roy Thinnes is awesome as always.

Robert Emhardt

[tavasiloff · 8/10 · 27 March 2021]

Character actor Robert Emhardt always reminded me of Hubert H. Humphrey. Episode was good and held my interest.

They can even control insects!

[planktonrules · 8/10 · 10 August 2021]

This episode of "The Invaders" takes David to a small town in the geographic center of the United States*. He arrives there because a local school teacher was quoted in the newspaper saying that she saw some metallic box that controlled the locusts...and that sure sounds like alien technology! However, when he arrives, the locals are amazing unfriendly. At first, it looks as if they are just being protective over the teacher, as she's very fragile emotionally. But, of course. Over time it's obvious the aliens are behind this wall of silence.

While this is an odd plot, it is an interesting one. The aliens apparently want to use the insects to kill people...to possibly depopulate the Earth. A fascinating story and one well worth seeing.

*In this geographic center of the US (which is actually Lebanon, KS), you can see mountains in the distance. Well, in the approximate middle of Kansas there are no nearby mountains...none. Like most TV shows, this was actually filmed in California. And, like another Quinn Martin series, "The F. B. I.", I saw similar geographic mistakes...such as an episode set in the Chicago area...with mountains! There certainly are no mountains near Chicago but California is full of them!

Them nasty bugs.

[mm-39 · 6/10 · 19 August 2019]

Them nasty bugs. Well Dave has another mystery too solve. This time the Invaders have another device which make bugs eat flesh and attack humans. Kansas has a locus problem. There is a women who the aliens try to drive crazy. A sheriff who is an Invader. The special effects are cool and the story is very 1960's. One of the better episodes. 6 stars.

GREAT COMPELLING EPISODE

[floridacalisurferboy · 9/10 · 5 December 2021]

🐛 Another deliciously Paranoid inducing Plot has residents of a small town being the menace (Like an evil Mayberry from the Andy Griffith Show) The best part is how even the most friendly small town folks could be the evil aliens.. This episode has that rampant paranoia that movies like Roman Polanski's ROSEMARY'S BABY had... Every sweet old lady could be a murderous alien..

Best Episode!

[daveiulee · 10/10 · 12 April 2020]

The Ed character is worthless and damages the show. Similar to Hitchcock's the birds. Good hook and story.

Full of holes but sufficiently creepy

[Miles-10 · 5/10 · 7 December 2009]

The idea of flesh eating bugs is creepy enough, I suppose. The spoiler is that nobody actually gets eaten. It's the threat of it hanging out there that gets you. But not even a nibble occurs. That's unnecessarily squeamish. Makes me think the script probably called for some bite marks or maybe some guy named Bob being consumed, but the producers didn't have the stomach for going through with it.

Anyway, David Vincent is as serious as ever and remarkably forgiving after the boyfriend, Ed, of the woman he's trying to enlist in the resistance beats him unconscious. Later on, Vincent goes to Ed's house to try to enlist him. Does he want another beating? The hero is pretty desperate by this point. He is fairly desperate throughout.

My nomination for moment of inevitable futility is when he realizes that the chief of police is an alien so he calls the state police, but he doesn't give the statie any reason not to call the local police and alert them to the fact that Vincent is calling in the outside world; so the statie does just that and puts the phony police chief onto Vincent. That was predictable. Before that, Vincent sends poor Ellen, the victimized woman he is trying to help, back to the home of Mr. Ames who clearly does not have her best interest at heart. It's another predictably disastrous decision that precipitates the climactic crisis that could have been avoided by more thinking. I mean, I know there would not have been a story without a climactic crisis, but do stupid mistakes have to be the cause of the climactic crisis?

Once again, the aliens seem like Wiley Coyote with a perfectly good scheme of the week for destroying humanity, and when David "Road Runner" Vincent foils it this time, they never retry the same scheme on a different day in another country. No, they altogether abandon the approach that almost worked, check out the Acme Catalog, and order a new gizmo guaranteed to further their evil plan. When that one almost but doesn't succeed they'll abandon that one, too.

Also, very strange conceit about a whole town of unfriendly, suspicious people. If they are so suspicous, how did they let numerous aliens from outer space into their community? Weren't they the least bit suspicious when these newcomers started buying up the land of neighbors who had been scared off?

And bag those bad special effects: when the insect lab blows up, it just looks like red marks appear on the film that obviously are not in the real world. No budget for a real explosion, I guess.