A reviewer called this episode 'somewhat interesting', but I respectfully disagree. The idea of a parallel universe has been explored via television drama before. 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents' 'The Case of Mr. Pelham' with Tom Ewell was fairly eerie.
Serling himself wrote 'Mirror Image', which to me is one of the overlooked and underrated 'Twilight Zone' episodes. Featuring the lovely Vera Miles, and future 'Adam-12' cop Martin Milner, it delivers its chills subtly. A piece of baggage is not where it should be.
'The Parallel' simply takes the idea into the space age, and, although I regard many of the hour-long 'Twilight Zone' stories to be padded out to fill extra time, I did not find this to be the case with 'The Parallel'.
It is interesting to hear the name 'John Kennedy' in a television drama, but this would not raise anyone's attention had Kennedy not been assassinated months later. His name was simply used to let the viewers know that Steve Forrest's character was perfectly right about his suspicions of something being not quite right. (Which all begins when he does not recognize a picket fence in front of his home sweet home.)
His daughter no longer believes the man that came back from space is her father. Shades of 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers'. The parallel universe is further substantiated when the designer of the space craft insists that it is not the model he built.
I found this a compelling 'Twilight Zone' hour (although I still admire the conciseness of the half-hour episodes). And it does leave one to ponder....
What if we had never heard of 'John Kennedy'? Might have been a good thing for the country, in retrospect.
Serling himself wrote 'Mirror Image', which to me is one of the overlooked and underrated 'Twilight Zone' episodes. Featuring the lovely Vera Miles, and future 'Adam-12' cop Martin Milner, it delivers its chills subtly. A piece of baggage is not where it should be.
'The Parallel' simply takes the idea into the space age, and, although I regard many of the hour-long 'Twilight Zone' stories to be padded out to fill extra time, I did not find this to be the case with 'The Parallel'.
It is interesting to hear the name 'John Kennedy' in a television drama, but this would not raise anyone's attention had Kennedy not been assassinated months later. His name was simply used to let the viewers know that Steve Forrest's character was perfectly right about his suspicions of something being not quite right. (Which all begins when he does not recognize a picket fence in front of his home sweet home.)
His daughter no longer believes the man that came back from space is her father. Shades of 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers'. The parallel universe is further substantiated when the designer of the space craft insists that it is not the model he built.
I found this a compelling 'Twilight Zone' hour (although I still admire the conciseness of the half-hour episodes). And it does leave one to ponder....
What if we had never heard of 'John Kennedy'? Might have been a good thing for the country, in retrospect.