“the Twilight Zone”, How It Affected the Culture of Its Time and Can Still Be Felt Today
“The Twilight Zone”, how it affected the culture of its time and can still be felt today.
“There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle-ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area we call the Twilight Zone.” (Rod Serling) Twilight Zone’s Opening narration.
Though this show aired some thirty years before I was born it has been one of my all time favorites. The show was a first of its kind. Twilight Zone aired from 1959 to 1964 lasting five seasons, remembering the time was early fifties, many of the fears and anxieties of that time period could be felt in the show from the events during that decade. The Twilight Zone captured America at the end of one of the most time changing decades of the century. During this time, Americans experienced dramatic changes not only in the country's position in the world, but also in the culture, and one of the major influential changes was television. In a time when skit comedies and game shows ruled the air waves, Rod Serling's created a science fiction program that would stand out as an example of the artistic potential and cutting edge special effects of the era. The powerful television program had a social commentary and a thought-provoking theme. Seeing television's potentially as not just a entertaining tool for the masses, but as an opportunity to indulge the conscious, stimulate the subconscious, and make people think without realizing it, Serling used this new medium to showcase the troubling issues of the time, as well as to reflect on people’s fears of the consequences of our actions. The Cold War, the H-Bomb, space travel, aliens, technology -- even morality in general -- are all themes that would appear frequently in The Twilight Zone. What sets the show apart is the
“There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle-ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area we call the Twilight Zone.” (Rod Serling) Twilight Zone’s Opening narration.
Though this show aired some thirty years before I was born it has been one of my all time favorites. The show was a first of its kind. Twilight Zone aired from 1959 to 1964 lasting five seasons, remembering the time was early fifties, many of the fears and anxieties of that time period could be felt in the show from the events during that decade. The Twilight Zone captured America at the end of one of the most time changing decades of the century. During this time, Americans experienced dramatic changes not only in the country's position in the world, but also in the culture, and one of the major influential changes was television. In a time when skit comedies and game shows ruled the air waves, Rod Serling's created a science fiction program that would stand out as an example of the artistic potential and cutting edge special effects of the era. The powerful television program had a social commentary and a thought-provoking theme. Seeing television's potentially as not just a entertaining tool for the masses, but as an opportunity to indulge the conscious, stimulate the subconscious, and make people think without realizing it, Serling used this new medium to showcase the troubling issues of the time, as well as to reflect on people’s fears of the consequences of our actions. The Cold War, the H-Bomb, space travel, aliens, technology -- even morality in general -- are all themes that would appear frequently in The Twilight Zone. What sets the show apart is the