Save the best for last, Rod Serling must have thought! The second season of his magnificent TV-creation "The Twilight Zone" has seen a handful of truly terrific episodes (notably "The Howling Man", "Eye of the Beholder", "Twenty-Two" and "Shadow Play") but in the humble opinion of yours truly this "The Obsolete Man" is the most astounding of them all. And, although I've yet to review three entire seasons after this, I'm already fairly certain this episode will turn up again quite high in my ultimate series' top 10.
I'm a tremendous fanatic of dystopian Sci-Fi tales, especially if they are intelligent and realistic enough to downright petrify you. In the good old tradition of "1984", "Fahrenheit 451" and "Brave New World", "The Obsolete Man" creates a downright nightmarish vision of society in an undefined future. In the totalitarian regime, referred to only as The State, people who don't serve a supposedly useful purpose or contribute anything are quickly declared "obsolete" and sentenced to death. With books being forbidden and burned some years ago already, former librarian Romney Wordsworth also gets condemned by a merciless and avidly fanatic chancellor. But, from the moment you lay eyes upon him, you'll see that Mr. Wordsworth is a literate and very sophisticated person, and so the place and circumstances of the execution that he chooses for himself will hold some surprises in store.
"The Obsolete Man" has a brilliant plot, courtesy of Rod Serling himself, but many others contribute a great deal as well. Director Elliot Silverstein, in his first of four episodes for "The Twilight Zone", terrifically captures the stoic and nihilistic atmosphere of a dystopian sci-fi tale (especially during the courtroom sequences). The show's regular cinematographer George T. Clemens delivers some of his best work with the menacing positioning of the camera. Last but not least, the performances of both Burgess Meredith and Fritz Weaver are nothing short of staggering. Their characters are complete opposites, obviously, but their chemistry is practically burning holes in the screen.
