The Ray Bradbury Theater (TV Series) Silent Towns (1992) User Reviews

Can Beggars Be Choosers

[Hitchcoc · 7/10 · 7 April 2015]

A man who is away from the center of a Martian colony, misses a mass evacuation. He does his best to utilize the town to his advantage, but loneliness soon sets in. Suddenly, phones begin to ring in the houses. Whenever he reaches a phone, he gets a dial tone. Finally, he is able to talk to a person. It is a woman named Genevieve who is all alone as well. She lives 900 miles away and he heads off for her town, believing a beautiful woman is attached to the voice. When he gets there she is not what he expected. This is a sad presentation because he is faced with possibly rejecting the only other person left on Mars. An interesting and somewhat sexist presentation.

"We've got a lot to find out about each other..."

[classicsoncall · 7/10 · 18 March 2022]

This story could just as well have taken place on Earth, though the location makes the situation that much more desperate and remote. Walter Grip (John Glover) finds himself stranded on Mars following an evacuation that recalled all the rocket ships on the planet back to Earth. Frantically answering automated phone calls ringing from building to building, he eventually connects with a real live person, and in his loneliness, decides to make the nine hundred mile journey by car to the place where Genevieve (Monica Parker) is located. His enthusiasm when he arrives is shattered, and his expression betrays his emotions, as the woman isn't anything like he expected. Granted, Genevieve did seem quite pushy, but at the same time, Walter didn't give it a chance to find out if she might have been a suitable companion, being the only other known person on Mars. The story stands in direct juxtaposition to a first season Twilight Zone episode titled 'The Lonely'. In that one, the only man confined to a prison planet becomes ecstatic when a supply ship arrives with an android woman to keep him company. The differing ways in which the two individuals dealt with their isolation and loneliness speaks to the manner in which we are all different as human beings, and how a solution for one might be totally inappropriate for another.