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Writer's pictureAndy McIlvain

Cinema & The Arts as Sermons: The Inheritors - Classic Outer Limits

Updated: Apr 13

There Is Nothing Wrong With Your Television Set. Do Not Attempt To Adjust The Picture. We Will Control All You See and Hear in this, the original, groundbreaking series...a compendium of stories that reaches from the inner mind to The Outer Limits!


Opening Narration:

The Earth, tumbling grain of sand in the darkness of unending space, plays host to a strange and awful guest, unsought, uninvited, possessor of fearsome power, purveyor of dark deed, a relentless traveler on the road to its mysterious goal...



"Season 2, Episode 10 Robert Duvall and Ivan Dixon lead an impressive cast in this haunting episode in which four wounded American soldiers find themselves endowed with amazing mental powers and compelled to complete a secret project they do not understand. Part 1 of 2." from video introduction


How many of you remember seeing this when it aired in November of 1964? Well, I do and it made a huge impression on me.

Why?

This episode was ironic and mysterious, with sinister motives and the government doing what it does. But there is much more to it than that. Is everything we don't understand always evil? Are other people always evil?

Is what we don't see or understand become a problem to solve, suppress, and eliminate?

For all purposes the evidence was sinister. Bullets made from meteorites that contained the consciousness of an alien species(?) that once in the body of a human superimposed another consciousness, a new brain wave that compelled them to do what they did not want to do.

Could only be bad right?

Yet once we see the result we find "goodwill" or so it seems is the goal.

Perhaps the inheritors should compel us to be less judgmental and more understanding. - Andy



"In part 2 of this haunting episode, Intelligence Officer Ballard (Robert Duvall) follows Lt. Minns (Steve Ihnat) and discovers not only a spaceship but that the soldiers intend to abduct the children of Earth and transport them to a faraway world." from video introduction


"The Inheritors" is the only two-part episode of the original The Outer Limits television show. Part I was first aired on November 21, 1964; Part II on November 28, 1964.[1]

Introduction

Four U.S. Army soldiers, with nothing in common other than having served in the same combat zone and been shot in the head with bullets cast from fragments of a meteorite, cheat death and begin working on a mysterious project. Intelligence officer Adam Ballard attempts to unravel the mystery behind the strange behavior of the men, who have each attained I.Q.s of over 200.

Opening narration, Part I

In the troubled places of the world, the Devil's Hunter finds rare game. For man-made savagery is only the instrument for a secret terror stirring from its dark place of ambush...

Plot, Part I

Lt. Minns (Steve Ihnat) is shot in the head. Rescued, he is flown to the U.S. and is operated on by American doctors. Adam Ballard (Robert Duvall) watches the operation. Minns begins to show the same brainwave patterns that three other men have shown—each one shot in the head by a bullet made from a meteorite fragment. Ballard explains to his superior (Ted De Corsia) that he believes Earth has been invaded, and that these four men are in league with extraterrestrials. As Ballard investigates, he discovers that the men are building a starship. He also discovers that Minns is recruiting children to take with him on a long trip. All the children are handicapped in some way—blind, deaf/mute, paralyzed in the legs, and so on. Ballard is afraid these helpless children are to be victims of alien abduction. He finds the location where the ship is being built, but the men within are sealed off by a force field that nothing can penetrate.." from the article: The Inheritors

Closing narration, Part II

The Inheritors are on their way. In a universe of billions of stars, there are places of love and happiness. On this Earth, in this spot, magic settled for a moment. Wonder touched a few lives, and a few odd pieces fell smoothly into the jigsaw of Creation.


The Writers

Seelig Lester ( October 31, 1914 - November 14, 2004)

Born October 31, 1913 in New York City, Lester wrote for radio and then

for early half-hour television anthologies like "Four Star Playhouse,"

"Climax," and "The Millionaire." He wrote or co-wrote twenty episodes

of "Perry Mason" before succeeding whodunit guru Gene Wang as the

show's story editor and eventually moving up to producer. Lester later

followed Ben Brady, "Perry Mason" executive producer, to United

Artists when Brady took over "The Outer Limits"' doomed second season.

Lester served as the show's story editor and wrote the episode "Wolf

359," "The Probe," and (sharing credit) the excellent two-parter "The

Inheritors.".. from the article Seelig Lester


Sam Neuman Sam Neuman was a writer for film and television. Very little else is available about his life.


"Ed Adamson (January 28, 1915 - October 1, 1972), a television writer-producer for Warner Bros and creator of the current “Banyon” series, died Sunday of a heart attack at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital. He was 57 years old and had lived here since 1955.

Edward Joseph Adamson attended Columbia University and later wrote radio scripts for “Bulldog Drummond,” “The Thin Man,” “Inner Sanctum,” “International Airport” and “Cafe Istanbul.”

Moving to Hollywood in 1955, he became writer-producer for the television series, “Wanted Dead or Alive.”

Surviving are his widow, Helene; a daughter, Nancy; two sons, Richard and Stephen, and a twin, Hans."



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