At the time of this writing there is only one other IMDb reviewer who has commented on this episode, and he makes a lot of good points about how strangely effective this episode is in approaching very deep and emotionally powerful elements of human life. The show is mostly about the relationship between a young boy and his grandmother, who is aging and knows that any day now she will pass away.
She is staying with her son and his wife, and the parents attempt to shield the boy from directly acknowledging the fact that grandma is going to die soon, but the grandmother knows it will happen and, because the boy fills her with happiness and a sense of lifelong fulfillment, she wants to acknowledge her own passing before it happens so that no one in the family afterwards suffers from that awful feeling of never having been able to say goodbye.
After watching this show, you may find it arguable whether it is better to never have been able to say goodbye, or to actually come right out and acknowledge impending death and say your goodbyes to a loved one who is just about to pass. This has never happened to me, but I can't imagine a more emotionally torturous situation than having to say goodbye to someone like that.
I have to say that the performance of Bill Mumy as the young Billy stole the show, the kid was brilliant. The show approaches the very complex issues that married couples deal with in modern America, such as conflicting views of how to raise a child, the relationships with in-laws, and of course, death.
But most of all, there is an amazingly palpable presence of the grandmother, even after she has died, and not just because Billy spends so much of the second half of the show on the phone with her. His near death experience gives a surprisingly convincing feeling of her waiting just on the other side, desperate to take her biggest source of happiness with her to the twilight zone and beyond, but ultimately deciding to leave him behind to have a full life. Serious but entertaining, this one has the pleasant effect of leaving you with an urge to really appreciate the ones you love...
She is staying with her son and his wife, and the parents attempt to shield the boy from directly acknowledging the fact that grandma is going to die soon, but the grandmother knows it will happen and, because the boy fills her with happiness and a sense of lifelong fulfillment, she wants to acknowledge her own passing before it happens so that no one in the family afterwards suffers from that awful feeling of never having been able to say goodbye.
After watching this show, you may find it arguable whether it is better to never have been able to say goodbye, or to actually come right out and acknowledge impending death and say your goodbyes to a loved one who is just about to pass. This has never happened to me, but I can't imagine a more emotionally torturous situation than having to say goodbye to someone like that.
I have to say that the performance of Bill Mumy as the young Billy stole the show, the kid was brilliant. The show approaches the very complex issues that married couples deal with in modern America, such as conflicting views of how to raise a child, the relationships with in-laws, and of course, death.
But most of all, there is an amazingly palpable presence of the grandmother, even after she has died, and not just because Billy spends so much of the second half of the show on the phone with her. His near death experience gives a surprisingly convincing feeling of her waiting just on the other side, desperate to take her biggest source of happiness with her to the twilight zone and beyond, but ultimately deciding to leave him behind to have a full life. Serious but entertaining, this one has the pleasant effect of leaving you with an urge to really appreciate the ones you love...