The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas, Volume 4 brings together six more Twilight Zone radio episodes:

“Steel” stars Lou Gossett, Jr. as a fight manager and former fighter in a world that’s outlawed humans boxing and now leaves it to robots. Gossett’s character has an assistant who doubts the efficacy of everything Gossett’s character does which begs the question of why the question of why the guy is training an outdated robot boxer. Despite that, this one still works for its overall thrust about the triumph of the human spirit in a world that seems to try to move human beings towards obsolescence.

“Four o’Clock” stars Stan Freberg as a crank who persecutes everyone as guilty of some kind of evildoing and sets out a plan to shrink every evil person to two feet tall. This episode is mostly Freberg ranting as an over the top character. It seems like a commentary on the McCarthy era using the most cartoonish caricature possible.

“Uncle Simon” features a woman named Barbara (Beverly Garland) who has spent her life caring for her disabled, brilliant, and cruel uncle (Mark Richman) in hopes of inheriting his estate. He has a secret experiment he carries on but won’t tell her about. This is an all-time classic Twilight Zone story with a great twist. Garland was a true professional and turns in the best performance of the entire set.

“The Parallel” is about an astronaut (Lou Diamond Phillips) who returns to Earth from space but everything in his life seems to be slightly different. This one may be a story that doesn’t hold up well in modern times. Genre savvy fans will easily guess what’s going on and the title may give the game away for modern fans. The solution to the problem is well-executed but  simple with relatively little consequence. The story’s strength is supposed to be its concept but the concept’s been done so often and so much better that this is the most forgettable story in the collection.

“A Hundred Yards Over the Rim” begins with a wagon train traveling from Ohio to Arizona. A man (Jim Caviezel) goes to see if he can find help for his sick son and stumbles into the then-present day. While in some ways, this feels like the Time Travel version of “Parallel,” there’s a bit more to the story emotionally with our hero trying to save the son, plus there’s a powerful idea of pioneers seeing the West that was founded on their efforts and the society that emerged. It’s a solid tale.

“One for the Angels” is about a kindly salesman (Ed Begley, Jr.) who has just gotten by in life. He’s kind to the kids in the neighborhood but is otherwise unremarkable. That’s when Death arrives to tell him to give him time to prepare to die. However, the Salesman objects he never had a  successful big pitch and asks time to achieve this pitch “for the angels.” Death agrees, but the salesman resolves to one-up Death by never making the pitch. However, Death is hard to cheat. Over television, the part of the salesman was played by comedy Ed Wynn. While Begley’s not the same sort of actor, he does do a good job and this is an enjoyable take on the story.

Overall, this is a pretty good collection. While there were a couple of stories that didn’t work as well as I’d like, these six trips into the Twilight Zone make for nice listening.

Rating: 3.75 out of 5

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