THE OUTER LIMITS: "Controlled Experiment" / Season 1 Episode 16 - 1964
Today's weird little story goes like this... Deimos is a Martian agent on Earth disguised as a pawnshop owner, he's on Earth to observe Earthlings. Phobos has just arrived to Earth, he's a Martian supervisor with a time controlling device to investigate what a murder is! Phobos receives a message from Mars for him and Deimos to go to a low budget hotel to witness a murder in the lobby there. When they arrive, they identify the blonde waiting for her boyfriend, Phobos then uses the time controlling device to repeat the murder many times to understand the details. However, the experiment goes awry and they receive a report that the future of Earth will be severely affected by the event!
I kept thinking I was watching a TWILIGHT ZONE episode!
It stars Barry (ASYLUM) Morse as Phobos, Carroll ((Archie Bunker) O'Connor as Deimos, Grace (STAR TREK) Lee Whitney as the blonde and Robert (INCUBUS) Fortier as her boyfriend.
Here's Phobos in Earth's orbit, on his way to meet his Earth contact... Check it out, that's the saucer built by Paul Blaisdell for INVASION OF THE SAUCER-MEN seven years earlier!
Phobos locates Deimon at his shop, he goes in to announce that's he's here on a mission from Mars and will need his help to assist.
Phobos shows Deimos his ID card to prove that he's who he says he is!
Deimos gets to check out the mesmerizing monitoring machine from Mars!
My favorite part... Deimos offers Phobos a cigarette and a cup of coffee, and, Phobos is in love. he's addicted immediately!! Viva la Earth!
Then, an assignment from Mars comes in, they are to surveil a murder at a hotel...
Here's Carla, she's seriously pissed off!!.. She found out that her boyfriend, Bert, has been seeing another woman!! Bert comes out of the elevator and Carla pulls the trigger! Damn, that sixties style pose of Carla in the top photo is freakin' ... HOT!!
They run the incident over and over, trying to make sense of the melodrama!
They even freeze time so that they can make small changes to have the situation come to a different conclusion than the one before...
After looking further into the past, they find that Bert did kiss another woman, but, he tells her he's in love with Carla! They decide that Bert should live and they make it happen, Bert then asks Carla to marry him, and she says yes! Alright! Things turn out swell...
Until, Mars calls to inform the boys that Bert must die because their male child would ultimately bring the end of the world through a series of events he causes!! The list of events is a real crack up.
Anyway, they come up with a way around Mars' request to have Bert shot and everything turns out great for the couple, The boys don't believe the Martian report about the child...
And, Phobos requests to stay and work on Earth, they agree and the boys celebrate the cool ending!.. So, like, we be back Wednesday with... uhh.. Crap, who knows?! See you then.
Joseph Gilbert Thompson said...
Everyone thinks this is a Twilight Zone episode because it is so not an general Outer Lims show
I think there was a Starlog article that said this episode was done because the producers were running short of money. It had a minimum of special effects, and rerunning the incident over and over allowed them to film fewer scenes.
I have seen this wonderful episode repeatedly mistaken for a Twilight Zone episode -- mainly on account of its humor!
Barry Morse and Carroll O'Connor together! What a great pair!!