A Thing About Machines

This is the story of a bitter man who hates technology. Of course, the technology of his day is a razor, a toaster, a television. Well it's the story of the Good Little Toaster that has had enough. The typewriter writes threatening notes. We've all imagined if our appliances or our toys came to life and began to try to do us in. In this, the plot is OK, but the effects and the resolution are so bad, it's laughable. There is a great deal of ranting and threat. And why is this man so angry? Has he been chosen for his fate, or has he brought it upon himself? Anyway, given the fact that he doesn't listen to the threats and stays put, he eventually must confront the situation in which he finds himself. The acting is hammy and over the top. Watch this only for its quirky amusement value.

I raised this point after various "Twilight Zone" episodes already, but it always remains relevant: many, many of cinema's greatest and most famous film concepts featured here first in this magnificent TV- Show, albeit in short and more modest versions. The story of "A Thing about Machines" can easily be considered as a blueprint for James Cameron's awesome "The Terminator"; as it's centered on a man – Bartlett Finchley – who painfully experiences how all types of machinery in his house, including his car television set and even his electrical shaving device, violently turn against him. Of course, it might just be his imagination, as Mr. Finchley is an obnoxious and self-indulgent individual who's against all forms of technological progress and also leads a very secluded life without friends or family. It starts with the television switching on and off and alarm clocks continuing to ring even though they lie broken on the floor, but pretty soon the typewriter sends him messages to get out of the house and his car is chasing him up and down the driveway. This is only the fourth episode of the second season, but I can already safely claim that it's one of the most suspenseful and unsettling ones of the whole franchise. There's something genuinely disturbing and petrifying about machines operating themselves and attacking their proprietors. James Cameron knows it, and various other movies also used this idea already like "Killdozer" and "Maximum Overdrive". But remember, it featured first … in "The Twilight Zone". "A Thing about Machines" features a few very powerful sequences, like when the typewriter delivers an unfriendly message. Also, as silly as it may sound, there's something very scary about a shaving machine slithering down the stairs like a snake.

The lonely and snobbish forty-eight year-old food critic Bartlett Finchley has paranoia with his appliances and machines. He has problems with his television, radio, clock, electric razors, typewriter and car. When he receives the message "Get out of the house" from his appliances, he decides to stay home with tragic consequences. "A Thing About Machines" is a pointless and silly episode of "The Twilight Zone". It is not clear whether Finchley was delusional in his paranoia or whether he was attacked indeed by his car and appliances. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Sobre Máquinas" ("About Machines")

I should explain that when I say "overused," I don't quite mean that it has been done to death, because even though there have been countless examples of sci fi TV show and movies about machines coming to life, they are not necessarily all the same or rip-offs of each other. Besides, if any TV show ever had the right to do a show on the topic of machines coming to life, the Twilight Zone is it.

The main characters in the show are Richard Haydn as Bartlett Finchley and Barney Phillips as a TV repairman who, I have to say, must certainly act in a certain way that no TV repairman has ever acted toward a customer. Of course, I wasn't exactly spending much time hiring repairmen back in the 1960s, nearly 20 years before I was born, but I would think that, even if he was called repeatedly to Finchley's house to fix the most mysterious and suspicious damages, it's probably generally not such a good idea to openly criticize and insult one of your best repeat customers!

At any rate, it sets up the situation that we need to know about. Finchley has to call repeatedly to have his various machines and appliances fixed because, for example, he is provided with reason to put his foot through his TV set. I've heard about that being done in several movies and TV shows, and it always strikes me as something that would be exceedingly difficult to do. Have you ever imagined how much force would be needed to drive a foot through a TV set? This man's foot certainly had some momentum behind it!

And the question, of course, is what could possibly have led him to such a state as to cause him to make such a vicious kick? Babara Stuart shows up briefly to angrily quit her job as his secretary, once again hinting toward the reality of his state of mind. Once she threatens to quit because of his ill treatment, he panics at the thought of being left alone in his house, and we begin to understand what is really going on. Well, we already knew what was going on because we know the title of the episode, but you get the idea.

Sadly, the second half of the episode is where the show starts to falter. The main reason, I think, that the threat of the machines becomes a problem is because the threat is just never made realistic enough. At the time of this writing, there is only one other IMDb reviewer who has reviewed this episode, jcravens42, and he (or she) notes the hilarity that may ensue at things like the attack of the killer electric shaver.

And on this point Craven is exactly right. I didn't quite laugh out loud, but I did smirk a bit, and not just because it's so ludicrous that you have to laugh, but because such a thing could never be a real threat. What could it do? Give Finchley razor burn? Why not just grab it out of the air and toss it into the tub? Or out the window? But then again, imagining yourself in the situation of the characters in many Twilight Zone episodes is a great way to ruin the experience.

But it's the same thing with the climax of the show, the car chasing him around outside. It's not just placing yourself in his situation that could ruin the suspense, but I have never been able to feel any sympathy for people in movies being chased by cars (manned or otherwise) when all they do is run right up the middle of the road or, in this case, back and forth. Avoiding a car at close range would be FAR too easy for it to ever be able to generate any suspense.

But in the show's defense, it is also an illustration of Finchley's state of mind, which is not exactly allowing for rational thought. You could call this one of the Twilight Zone's weaker episodes and probably be right, but it's also an almost required theme for the show and is well made enough, I should think...

OK, maybe this isn't the best TZ episode ever. But reviews (including one here) often completely miss the intended tone of this episode.

Take Barbara Stuart's line for example: "In this conspiracy, this mortal combat between you and the appliances... I hope you lose!" The first time I heard that line, I laughed so hard I spit water out my nose.

It wasn't supposed to be anything other than funny.

Of course the shaver is absurd. It's supposed to be. As is the dancing woman on TV, the typewriter etc. Serling doesn't give it away at the end, but clearly Finchley had a much deserved nervous breakdown and was delusional.