The Outer Limits (TV Series) The Shroud (1999) User Reviews

Totally Lame

[I_hatenazis · 1/10 · 14 March 2010]

I love the Outer Limits and this had virtually no characteristics of a typical good Outer Limits episode and I was very surprised that it was so well rated. Basically, a religious zealot dupes a young couple to * * SPOILER ALERT * * clone Jesus.

This was a bad combination of The Omen, Rosemary's Baby, and various other bad 70's movies. 1. Everyone was wooden and I did not care about the characters. David Stiers (Winchester from M.A.S.H.) gave a valiant but futile attempt to look convincing. In a good Outer Limits episode you ALWAYS care about the actors and it kills you when there is a bad ending.

2. Pacing, in a good Outer Limits episode they use the non-story time for character development but in this episode there simply was no character development.

I kept watching this episode to see when it was going to pick up and it never does. Please watch virtually any other Outer Limit's episode before judging this series.

One of the Worst Episodes in the Series

[Hitchcoc · 2/10 · 28 July 2014]

I have to begin by telling you that I don't buy the Shroud of Turin stuff. The evidence of a Christ figure on a piece of cloth is ludicrous. For starters no one knows anything about what Christ looked like. The figure on the shroud shows us a face that looks like the portrayals in Italian paintings. As usual, they are white and duplicate the Italian males of the time. Perhaps it would be better if they used a figure created by ketchup and mustard on a cheeseburger. So David Ogden Stiers is an overzealous minister who has overseen the cloning of a new Jesus, using DNA stuck to the aforementioned shroud. The embryo has been implanted in a young "new virgin Mary" who is eventually going to give birth to the super- tyke. She doesn't know that this is being done, and believes it is a normal in- vitro birth. Her husband is in on the plot and this leads to some tension. He is the new Joseph, of course. They even head to a barn to have the baby. While the baby is still in the womb, it begins to make things float in the air and is also able to destroy the lab where he was "formed." Sorry, I can't go on.

Rosemarys Resurrection

[sta56 · 2/10 · 20 June 2023]

Setting aside that the relic is fake , did anyone really think this premise through? It could have been an amazing episode , but as it stands they should have went with plan B.

I would have loved to see 90s religious zealots been given the outer limits wake up call, but instead we get a b grade story about consent. Which feels like a moot point considering that if someone was that fanatical you would have gotten consent really easily , then we could have spent the hour exploring the dangers of over zealous Christians and science.

If this episode gets a reboot maybe focus on fanatics and less on the boys from Galilee.

This episode wrong in so many ways...

[NecrolyteSol · 1/10 · 14 April 2020]

Not only is religion used to violate and deceive a young woman looking to have a baby in-vitro with her husband who lied to her, she is deceived by her own religious leader who used her loyalty to basically rape her for his own gain, having inseminated her with DNA the found on a religious artifact called the Shroud of Turin* against her knowledge.

Just as people see the virgin Mary on grilled cheese sandwich and not just a lady with her hair covered, or Jesus on the side of a building and not just bearded man, the belief is unwavering that this was the burial shroud of Jesus because it has his "likeness", but cannot be questioned or dismissed easily because, hey, it's religion and apparently if you don't believe it's heresy or whatever.

This is a scientific take on religious propaganda as the mother has a conflict of faith to keep a baby forced on her through deceit not because she was a victim, because she sees herself "religiously unworthy" to care for "the son of god". Throughout the episode the mother's wants and needs are neglected for religion and faith, being deemed more important than her being used. This is a terrible episode for people of faith and seems more like an episode to brainwash that treating women like breeding sows is okay as long as it's for the good of religion.

*This was proven to be a hoax as the Shroud of Turin was carbon-dated to have existed around 1390 A.C.

Lame from the very genesis.

[californiarecordshop · 1/10 · 16 October 2020]

Maybe the writer was unaware that the Shroud of Lies, was definitively Carbon-Dated to around the 15th or 16th Century, which sounds about right, so even if they did get DNA off the thing, it could be from absolutely anyone at all... So this premise is just stupid from the beginning as its all based on a hoax, so for me, it was stupid from the very start. Skip.