The 25 Best Twilight Zone Episodes...#1 - "To Serve Man"

"Respectfully submitted for your perusal: a Kanamit. Height: a little over nine feet. Weight: in the neighborhood of three hundred and fifty pounds. Origin: unknown. Motives? Therein hangs the tale, for in just a moment we're going to ask you to shake hands, figuratively, with a Christopher Columbus from another galaxy and another time. This is the Twilight Zone."

These introductory words from Rod Serling raise the curtain on arguably the most celebrated Twilight Zone episode, To Serve Man, #1 on this "best of" list, the result of an unscientific poll of 250 people in the New York metropolitan area who were asked to rank their favorite Twilight Zone episodes based on writing, performance, and compelling subject matter. The historic television series turned 50 this year, and to commemorate Rod Serling's masterpiece, the 25 best episodes are being chronicled here.

Clearly, To Serve Man has been the episode most referred to in popular culture through the years, as television programs and feature films playfully turned "...it's a cookbook" into a punch line in honor of the phrase most commonly associated with the show. Most "best-of" Twilight Zone polls will find To Serve Man resting comfortably on top, and it might very well appear on a number of composite lists documenting television's best episodes overall. (One such list was generated by TV Guide not long ago, and To Serve Man did not make the cut, though another brilliant Twilight Zone offering did...Time Enough at Last, an "honorable mention" episode in this survey).

To Serve Man is a somewhat unusual Twilight Zone teleplay. There was rarely an alien sighting on the show, a characteristic generally found in the science fiction fare of the time. The contemporary series, The Outer Limits, was your site for macabre, deformed, and ghastly-looking life forms. While the Twilight Zone was technically considered science fiction, it is no secret Rod Serling used the format as the foundation to tell a wide-range of stories exploring the human condition. Science fiction was simply Mr. Serling's road map to a television series.

Here, Serling, who adapted a 1950 short story by Damon Knight to arrive at To Serve Man, creates environments of fear, anticipation, relief, and shock all in the short 30-minute time allowed him. He quite skillfully paints a picture of late'50's, early '60's America, in which fear of nuclear holocaust reigned, and space travel piqued our adventuresome instincts. There were anxieties, a sense of pall hovering over all of us at the time. Would the Russians or the United States blink first in the nuclear stare-down? With less fear, but as much wonder, we speculated apprehensively about the mysteries beyond the stars we were so driven to reach in these futuristic space vehicles blasting off from Cape Canaveral.

To Serve Man ventured into the depths of our disquiet to ask the following question. What would you risk to embrace solutions to all that imperils us? The Kanamits arrived at a time when we were at our most vulnerable, and when it seemed conceivable that life elsewhere in the universe was just as likely to travel to us as we were to search intergalactically for them. They inspired great fear and trepidation at first as word traveled quickly that their enormous representative was on his way to the United Nations presumably to inform us of their dastardly intentions. To everyone's surprise, he offered the sun, the moon, and the stars, and with very little cross examination, we jumped at the opportunity to eliminate world hunger, the threat of nuclear war, illness, and all else that plagued us as a global society.

Then, of course, there is the matter of the cookbook, essentially the central focus of the program. We'll return to that in a moment.

There is so much to admire in this, the quintessential Twilight Zone effort. The strength of To Serve Man lies as much in the story-telling as in the story. As was Twilight Zone custom, Rod Serling offered parenthetical summary at the beginning and end of each episode. But here, Lloyd Bochner, who played Mr. Chambers, also served as the flashback narrator from his position as prisoner on board the Kanamit's ship. The result is a narrative within the narrative. Serling is a master, as has been detailed before in this series of articles, at diminishing the incredulity of the subject matter, at compelling us to consider the story at hand as feasible...not necessarily likely, but feasible. The voice-over narrative technique is To Serve Man's method of accomplishing that weighty task. Chambers represents an immediately credible source, because he shares the concept of improbability with the audience at the outset.

We are also treated to some of the best Twilight Zone writing in To Serve Man. Consider this line from Chambers as he exhibits his considerable frustration in captivity:

"Can you just tell me the time on earth without an exercise in Euclidian geometry?"

This is not a line you're likely to hear on a commercial television broadcast very often. The episode is written crisply and provides no hint of the startling ending now part of television lore.

Then, of course, there are the performances. It is well documented that the Twilight Zone provided the acting platform for many celebrities in waiting, such as Robert Redford, Robert Duvall, Vera Miles, Lee Marvin and many, many others. Bochner is hardly a household name, but like so many other somewhat anonymous Twilight Zone players, he went on to a phenomenally successful career. His acting life spanned more than 50 years and featured a long run on Dynasty among its highlights. The sound of Richard Kiel's voice as the Kanamit is impactful and memorable. If you are a Twilight Zone follower, you can still hear the intonation rattling around in your head today. And for one very famous scene, Susan Cummings (as Patty) is commanding as she reveals to Chambers, as he heads up the spaceship's walkway to his eventual demise, that the book she's been deciphering for him all this time is...a cookbook!

Ahh, the cookbook. Ultimately, the book is the lead character in To Serve Man. It is left behind by the Kanamits, and hovering in the background of the episode is the ongoing attempt to decipher it. Midway through, Serling teases us with the title but little else that suggests its role as villain. "To serve man," utters Chambers. "I hope so...I fervently hope so."

There is one particularly effective scene that really sets To Serve Man apart from its fellow Twilight Zone episodes. Just before Chambers turns the show back to Rod Serling for his concluding remarks, he breaks the fourth wall and speaks directly and ominously to the audience. "How about you? You still on Earth, or on the ship with me? Really doesn't make very much difference, because sooner or later, we'll all of us be on the menu...all of us."

"The recollections of one Michael Chambers, with appropriate flashbacks and soliloquy," says Serling somberly. "Or more simply stated, the evolution of man, the cycle of going from dust to dessert, the metamorphosis from being the ruler of a planet to an ingredient in someone's soup. It's tonight's "bill of fare," from the Twilight Zone."