The Hidden Thing

Disappointing episode with a lame payoff. Nice guy Dana (McGuire) is cuddling with sweetie Laura (Ames) in front seat of car, when they decide to cross highway on foot to get some food. Trouble is Laura leaves Dana in front of diner to re-cross highway to get her purse. On way back she's struck and killed by hit-and-run driver. Dana's distraught and unable to give police a description of the car or its license plate. He blames himself for not fetching her purse, and is thus guilt-ridden. Then a strange little man (Harris) shows up claiming he can get the hapless Dana to recall what the police need. Just who is this Hurley.

So far, so good. There's some suspense concerning the stranger and where the episode is going. However, the payoff lacks usual Hitch imagination or even irony. And I was left wondering if that was all there is. Plus, catch Harris's coy gesture at the end that almost amounts to a wink at the audience. Clearly, the series customarily did a lot better.

What a curious cute episode this story, very simple to tell and with a terrific and terrifying ending, again simple but hair rising. Unusual twist ending. A hit and run scheme, very often used in anthology crime shows, as the hitch hiker scheme, or blackmail one. Revenge too. This plot also is very close to common folks who look like so many audiences. I highly recommend you this episode. You won't regret it. I don't want to spoil you this story. Just watch, watch and enjoy. I don't know any of the actors and actresses, but that's not important, the directing and acting are above average. Good watch.

"The Hidden Thing" did have potential to be good. Robert Stevens was the most prolific director of 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents' and was responsible for some truly fine episodes, including in Season 1. This is not the first appearances on the series for Biff McGuire and Robert H. Harris, they were in previous episodes and both were watchable. The idea for the story was intriguing even if not original. While the series had its weak points, when it hit particularly high it was brilliant.

Brilliant "The Hidden Thing" turned out not to be by any stretch of the imagination. Really did want to go against the grain, considering its potential, and say that it is not as bad as others are saying, but to me it is that bad. It is a strong contender for the worst episode of Season 1, and none of the things the episode was seen for come off well. Considering the potential, "The Hidden Thing" really should have been so much better and everybody involved deserved much better than this. And no, this actually is not a case of one aspect completely ruining things.

It is not a complete disaster. Harris has enough pretty good moments and gives the only halfway decent performance of the episode, the reaction to being called a nut is indeed priceless. Hitchcock's bookending always entertain, and it is amusingly written and nicely staged here.

Also thought that the episode doesn't look too bad, though there are better looking episodes of the series, and the main theme for the series is deservedly iconic.

Unfortunately, that is it when it comes to the praise for "The Hidden Thing". Am another person that thought that the acting was not good, especially at the beginning. McGuire does not look at ease here and there are no fireworks in the chemistry throughout. Stevens' direction is uninvolving and lifeless, had a hard time believing that it was Stevens directing. The dialogue tends to be clunky.

Story-wise, "The Hidden Thing" is pretty much a mess. It is thin, while also trying to rush through the second half, and lacks any kind of suspense. Also found it pretty silly too when it increasingly lost credibility later. The characters are mere ciphers with motivations that are vague at best and not delved to anywhere near enough, so actions made no sense and made the characters look stupid. The worst thing about the episode is the ending, while not single-handedly ruining it it brings it down considerably. Calling it a head-scratcher is being far too kind.

Overall, weak. 3/10.

This is an interesting episode at first, but it starts to fizzle. I actually had a better ending where the man is actually the killer of the older man's son. They chose to use their own ending, so I guess there's not much of a chance of their changing the ending. This is about a fellow who is in love with a woman. One night, as they stop for a hamburger, she goes back to the car and is struck and killed by a hit and run driver. This causes great pain to the fellow. One day, an older man shows up and asks to help him raise memories from his subconscious through a kind of hypnotism. He is incredibly persistent. They are trying to dredge up the license plate number of the offending vehicle. Something is wrong because a law officer sits in wait. I know that this show is frustrating for some people because we often have to provide our own conclusions. Nevertheless, I believe this episode is quite weak because motivations and actions are not explained. Without motivations, action becomes random. With randomness, the viewer is left in the dark. This could have been quite good.

It's amazing how people can watch the same thing and have such differing opinions.

I realize that something like this is subjective but I would think that some aspects of this episode would be seen in the same way by a vast majority of viewers. For example: Is terrible acting really that subjective? This series features some great stories by outstanding writers, and also some terrific actors. Yet, it still manages to produce a large number of very weak episodes and terrible acting. The acting in the opening minutes of this episode is so bad that it's hard to not just stop watching right then and there. I actually thought the bad acting was intentional and came up with a reason why they might be doing it that related to the story. But no, it's just bad acting. Yet one of the reviews here suggests the acting is great! In addition to the bad acting, the directing seems very poor. I kept thinking that if I was directing this I would have constantly been yelling: "Cut! Are you kidding me?", but this director obviously saw no problems with some of the absurdity taking place.

As others have suggested, the ending is NOT good. (Except for that one strange review that thought the ending and the acting were great!) I would suggest to anyone thinking of watching this episode that they watch the beginning and see what they think. If you think, as I did, that it in unbelievably bad, then you might not want to waste your time, because it doesn't get much better.