Graphic Novels Reimagine Twilight Zone Episodes
Comic Book Creators Adapt Rod Serling’s Original Teleplays
Jun 17, 2009
From the morbidly ironic To Serve Man to the chillingly relevant The Monsters are Due on Maple Street, Twilight Zone episodes have entertained science fiction fans for decades with their stories of prejudice, paranoia, and injustice. Introduced by creator Rod Serling (who also wrote over half the episodes) the episodes have since been classified by many as modern morality plays that offer a critical look at the human condition.
Now, publishing company Walker & Company offers fans a new way to experience their favorite Twilight Zone episodes – as graphic novel adaptations of Rod Serling’s teleplays. Featuring excellent art and scripts faithful to the original Twilight Zone episodes, the graphic novels do a good job of re-creating the eerie mood of The Twilight Zone, while also adding new elements through the possibilities of comic book storytelling.
Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone: The Monsters are Due on Maple Street
One of the more disturbing Twilight Zone episodes, The Monsters are Due on Maple Street offers a terrifying look at what can happen when prejudice and paranoia run rampant.
When a power failure hits idealistic Maple Street, everyone laughs when one boy claims monsters disguised as some of the neighbors are responsible. But as the night goes on, flickering house lights and a self-starting car feed suspicions, making neighbors try to ferret out the “monsters.” As their paranoia becomes an ugly mob mentality, former friends turn on each other – leading to a riot and the awful truth behind the blackout.
An examination of the ugly, irrational side of humanity, The Monsters are Due on Maple Street works well as a graphic novel, especially since artist Rich Ellis manages to maintain the episode’s menacing atmosphere through dark shadows and ominous lighting. Some of the scenes prove more graphic than the original Twilight Zone episode, yet they do serve as an effective portrait of man’s inhumanity to man.
Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone: The Midnight Sun
Norma Smith is experiencing the end of the world. Due to a radical climate change, Earth is growing hotter and hotter, resulting in the slow death of all life on the planet. As survivors brace for the hottest day yet, Norma and her neighbor try to survive water shortages, a home invasion, and a final apocalypse that could lead to Norma’s survival – or death.
More relevant today than it was when it first aired in 1961, The Midnight Sun gives a hideous look at humanity’s final days. Perhaps because climate change and global warming are bigger issues today, the comic book creators chose to set this Twilight Zone episode in modern times (in one scene Norma’s TV tunes into a reality show). While these “modern” touches don’t always work, here they seem disturbingly appropriate.
Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone: Deaths-Head Revisited
In 1945, German SS Captain Lutze escaped capture when American soldiers took the Dachau concentration camp. Decades later, Lutze, now using the alias “Schmidt,” returns to the camp to remember “the good old days.” But the ghosts of his victims still haunt the camp – and soon Lutze finds himself put on a gruesome trial for his war crimes.
Lutze’s trial is easily one of the more horrific re-interpretations of Serling’s Twilight Zone episodes, full of scenes of torture and fire, as well as equally disturbing moments where he’s confronted the ghosts of his victims. It’s an unsettling tale of hatred bred by hatred, made all the more disquieting when it’s revealed at the end that the tale was inspired by the true story of Nazi criminal Adolf Eichhmann who escaped capture in World War II but was later found and executed in Israel for his crimes.
Read more reviews of Twilight Zone graphic novels at Rod Serling Stories Reborn as Comic Books.
Like classic science fiction/horror TV shows? Then check out How Universal Studios Created the Munster Family.
Kneece, Mark and Rich Ellis. Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone: The Monsters are Due on Maple Street. NY: Walker & Company, 2009. ISBN: 978-0-8027-9713-1
Kneece, Mark and Anthony Spay. Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone: The Midnight Sun. NY: Walker & Company, 2009. ISBN: 978-0-8027-9721-6
Kneece, Mark and Chris Lie. Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone: Deaths-Head Revisited. NY: Walker & Company, 2009. ISBN: 978-0-8027-9723-0
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