The Inheritors Part I

Are the most amazing episodes of any television show in the entire history of television.

Written by Perry Mason writers Sam Newman and Seeleg Lester with Ed Adamson, they seem to have surpassed just about all of the science fiction and speculative fiction of that decade.

This story is like a well woven tapestry, each piece causes instant intrigue, genuine curiosity, and wonder.

The underlying mechanisms of the plot, a meteor in an enemy territory (I'm pretty sure with the Korean War in remembrance) that has unusual properties, brings an alien agenda to earth 🌎 in the minds of four soldiers, each recovering from an identical wound.

It was interesting how in the 60's we had stories where the characters openly discuss aliens and spaceships, not just within the confines of The Outer Limits, but other shows as well.

And these two episodes are the very Zenith of this type of storytelling.

We don't know why these men are affected, we don't even know what with until halfway through the 1st episode.

Robert Duvall is a government agent who is trying to make sense of all of it- and at the beginning, he is even remarkable with his characters ability to pull answers out from under rocks. But then his character shifts, back into Intelligence Operative Mode, where he stops investigating why and focuses upon using force. Whereas the target of his pursuit, Steve Inhat ("Lord Garth" from "Whom Gods Destroy" on Star Trek), is operating totally above board, with kindness.

The other affected men start questioning themselves, but that is all they can do: even when one of them in a spot of soul-searching asks himself or God: "is what we are doing, in fact evil?" - and there is no answer for that in this first part, not definitively. We also reflect on this same question, but the answer is not given, not until the 2nd part.

I remember seeing this when I was a child, the story is more relevant to the modern world.

Four men, four bullets to the head, four normal soldiers now have IQ's of over 200. It is discovered that their brainwaves are doubled which means they actually have a second brain, but even more interesting is that the patterns of this second brain are identical in all of the men. Robert Duvall becomes aware that there is something afoot and begins to investigate things. The clue is a honeycomb pattern to the metal in the bullets. There appears to have been a substance within the cells that has infiltrated the brains of the soldiers, giving them super powers. What they do with it is a mystery because there is nothing dangerous about what they do. One of them even uses the stock market to get a substantial, though in some ways, modest profit. They begin to travel the world doing all kinds of seemingly unrelated things, including coming up with alloys and producing large quantities of inert gases. Duvall calls out the dogs, even though there is nothing illegal which begs the question of government interference in the lives of what should be considered war heroes. This is a worthy setup to the second half.

When I watched this two-part episode of "The Outer Limits", I had no idea that it was a two-parter. Instead, I accidentally watched the second episode--because the DVD had part one and part two on different sides of the disc. Oddly, however, part two alone made for one of the greatest episodes in the series!

Everything in part one was explained or alluded to in part two. What you see in part one is mostly about the Lieutenant--his injury, the surgery, the beginnings of his odd psychic powers, etc.--but there is also much more emphasis on the work of the government investigator (Robert Duvall) and his tracking down the cause of the strange changes in four soldiers all shot in a place which seems to probably be Vietnam (though the country is left unnamed). Regardless, four soldiers have brain injuries from weird bullets and the four find themselves being compelled to work on some strange other-worldy project--and the government is very worried about what this project may be. I'd say more, but it would spoil the suspense.

It's all very interesting but also seemed a bit stretched thin--like the episode could have been done in 30 minutes. Still, it's all very interesting and along with its conclusion make for great viewing. Well worth seeing--and very intelligently written.

Intelligent, driving, compelling drama. I won't belabor the plot which is already described here. Don't read too much about it before viewing! (Frankly, the less you know about the plot in advance, the better.) I will say how glad I am that the producers permitted this story to stretch over two episodes. It permits detail, texture, and the buildup of suspense normally characteristic of finer motion pictures. Surprisingly, two hours are barely enough.

Of course, it doesn't hurt to have a legend on the order of Robert Duvall in the lead--and the supporting performances are just as strong. But the real credit in my view goes to Seeleg Lester, Sam Neuman, and Ed Adamson, who devised one heck of a cracking yarn, so deliberate and insistent that you aren't really distracted by some minor plot holes, or anything else frankly. On top of its entertainment value, it's genuinely disturbing.

I have no idea if Lester intended this--consciously or otherwise--as an addiction allegory but it most certainly works as one. Men forced to do things against their will, over and over--lying, cheating, stealing, "but for what purpose?...We aren't even aware of what we're doing." Because they are driven by an unseen demon. Of a sort. (A bit more far-fetched, it also works as a Cold War allegory.)

Ever since seeing "Demon with a Glass Hand" (q.v.) I sorted the series to see which other episodes got such high ratings (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0056777/eprate). That naturally led me to this. So I was very much interested to see what OL ep would garner an 8.8 rating. Well, it turns out that the Outer Limits fanboys (and girls) on IMDb know what they're doing. Given that TOL includes some really cheesy, kitschy eps it's gratifying to see one as smart as this.

Two hours? There's barely enough time to catch your breath.

Robert Duvall stars as a government agent named Adam Ballard who has been assigned to a most peculiar case: Four men(played by Steve Inhat, Dee Pollack, James Frawley, and Ivan Dixon), all soldiers, have been shot in the head during an ongoing Asian war, but have survived. The bullets used in all four cases were manufactured from meteorite fragments that have somehow healed their bodies, and given them a secondary brain wave pattern that has given them increased intelligence and an inexplicable drive to complete a project that Adam believes is for sinister alien purposes, but the fact remains that no one has been hurt, or any laws broken, so why the pursuit? Excellent episode with fine acting, intelligent script and smooth direction. First of two parts.