The Choice

A pleasant story with pretty good acting. The pace is slow, and there is not much suspense, but there is enough time to do some development of all the characters.

It made me think of Zenna Henderson stories I read 35 years ago, and I was wondering if there would be something about her in the credits. But after researching those old stories some, I realize that this was not a direct adaptation.

Henderson's stories about "The People" were about an extraterrestrial group that had been stranded on Earth, and had both male and female members. This Outer Limits story is more in line with traditional stories of witches.

This episode REALLY would have benefited from a longer runtime, closer to that of the pilot episode - Sandkings - because there's definitely potential here.

Thora Birch is decent as a Carrie-esque young girl with apparent telekinetic abilities who, rather than being mistreated by an over-bearing religious nutter in the shape of Piper Laurie is instead well loved by concerned but caring parents in the shape of Page Fletcher and Sandra Nelson. Enter a 'nanny' who seems to have similar, if weaker, abilities and a shadowy 'government agency' that are hunting women with these abilities and you've got a somewhat promising combination of Carrie and Firestarter. Again though, they don't fully commit, seemingly choosing to go in a more teen-friendly direction.

They also commit the heinous crime of utterly wasting the wonderful Frances Sternhagen...

Perhaps having Ann Hamilton, known for primarily chick flick TV, write this episode wasn't such a good idea, as this episode starring a young pre-American Beauty Thora Birch about a secret coven of witches who take interest in a young girl who's one of them and the government who dislikes them is basically the equivalent of any generic Lifetime movie. Marginally good acting, but it just didn't have the feel of an Outer Limits episode and is definite nowhere near the caliber of storytelling I expect from the aforementioned show. (even if those expectations were already reduced as opposed to the original better series.

My Grade: D