Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I do concede that this book is a must-have for any serious Twilight Zone fan and is probably the best available resource of its kind. However after reading all the glowing reviews here I suppose I was expecting more. Much more. If you own all the episodes on DVD and watch them on a regular basis, don't expect to get a whole lot out of this book. It's definitely worth every penny of the modest price and the time to read it, but it's not the treasure trove of knowledge I had hoped to find. First let me say that I'm not one for biographies and the whole history of how it was pitched to the network, so I skipped the first chapter. What I wanted was a book that I could open up immediately after watching an episode and read all sorts of interesting tidbits. How it was filmed, accounts of the arguments/discussions over direction and editing, bloopers, how the special effects were accomplished, really anything. Certainly Zicree has his favorite episodes and put much effort into those. But for most episodes here is what you get: - Rod Serling's opening and closing dialogs. Just watched it, thanks. - A one paragraph plot outline. Again, great for reference I suppose, but just watched it. I know what the episode is about. And some of them contain factual errors. Not huge things, just annoyances. - For some episodes, selected lines of dialog. I know what the actors said, thanks. - Then what you are left with is one small paragraph in most cases. That one remaining paragraph is usually filled with Zicree's opinionated rants or raves about the acting and direction. If you are lucky you get one tidbit of information about the behind the scenes. Worse yet, most of the time those one or two facts were already in the DVD extras so you've already read them if you have the DVDs. Now don't get me wrong, there is some good information in this book. Just very little of it on a per-episode basis. And for a select few episodes he really does go all out. The section for the first season is decent, and it seems to go downhill from there. Almost as if he was tiring from the research. I'll select a few of my favorite episodes at random so you know what you can expect. For each episode here is what's left after disregarding Serling's narration and the plot outline: "The After Hours" As this was a first season episode, Zicree does a fair job here. Almost one full page of information. How the manequins were constructed (this was on the DVD), how they got access to the set, and one paragraph of Zicree's opinions. Two factual pieces of information explained in good detail, and that's about as good as you can hope for in this book for most episodes. "A Most Unusual Camera" The ONLY thing he can say here is why did the waiter fall out of the window at the end. Seriously that's all there is. "Living Doll" He explains that the voice of Talky Tiny was done by June Foray (Rocky the flying squirrel). This was on the DVD. And then he takes a paragraph _explaining_ the plot to us. Yes, we know the doll only talks when nobody else is around. Thanks. "A Stop at Willoughby" One paragraph explaining the similarities to another episode. One paragraph of Zicree telling us that humans have a desire to escape from the pressures and demands of life. Absolutely zero real information. "The Thirty Fathom Grave" For being an hour long episode you'd think he'd have plenty to write about. Well he does: He complains that it was an hour long. And takes an entire paragraph to do so. A few lines of dialog. (Useless.) Then one paragraph explaining that Variety magazine didn't like the episode either. Again, zero information. "The Old Man in the Cave" One paragraph explaining to us mere mortals the deeper meaning of the plot. Other than that, all he can ask is how the computer got electricity for 10 years?? Come on. The rest of the book is much like the above; I could go on and on. Grab the book, but don't expect much.