After a string of mostly mediocre and/or forgettable episodes, it was about time for a good one. And "Touch of Petulance" is one of the best I've seen so far. The story is one of Ray Bradbury's most original and inventive, even poetic in a way: one night, on a train, a man meets the future version of himself, from about 35 years later! And he is informed that his current dream life will eventually be shattered: he will experience professional failure, personal tragedy, and finally he will resort to murder. Can he change his destiny, or is he doomed? A lot of these episodes have weak endings, but in this one the ending is perfect: not too short, not too long, just subtle enough. The production values are (again) low, but it's the ideas that carry this episode. *** out of 4.
5 Reviews
One of the best in the series
bellino-angelo20147 January 2018
I always had been a fan of Ray Bradbury's novels and short stories, and it's one of the best sci-fi writers ever (in my opinion). And despite I haven't seen the entire RAY BRADBURY THEATER show I wanted to try an episode.
It begins with the sound of shots fired by an old man (Eddie Albert), and then the man goes out at night escaping. The next day, we see a young couple (played by Dulcie Smart and Jess Collins as Jonathan Hughes), and when the young man returns home by train he encounters the old man, and it says to Jonathan that is the older version of himself and it's trying to avoid that he will kill his wife, so he follows Jonathan home unevitably meeting Jonathan's wife, and Albert starts to help the young man, even annoying him with a lot of talking, and in the end it goes out at night returning home. And Jonathan, with a gun kills his wife only for a simple discussion.
Personally I found it a bit weird, especially in the ending, but this episode it's full of suspense and with a nice soundtrack. It's avalaible on Youtube if you want to give a try.
It begins with the sound of shots fired by an old man (Eddie Albert), and then the man goes out at night escaping. The next day, we see a young couple (played by Dulcie Smart and Jess Collins as Jonathan Hughes), and when the young man returns home by train he encounters the old man, and it says to Jonathan that is the older version of himself and it's trying to avoid that he will kill his wife, so he follows Jonathan home unevitably meeting Jonathan's wife, and Albert starts to help the young man, even annoying him with a lot of talking, and in the end it goes out at night returning home. And Jonathan, with a gun kills his wife only for a simple discussion.
Personally I found it a bit weird, especially in the ending, but this episode it's full of suspense and with a nice soundtrack. It's avalaible on Youtube if you want to give a try.
Who's Doing It to Who?
Hitchcoc29 March 2015
The episode begins with shots being fired and woman's body lying on the floor. A young man in a seeming idyllic marriage (granted it is early in the relationship) rides the commuter train each day. His loving wife drops him off and picks him up each day. One evening he sits across from an older man (Eddie Albert) who has a newspaper. The newspaper describes the murder of the young man's wife. It has a date of 2025 which is some forty or so years in the future. He proceeds to tell the young man that he is actually the incarnation of him in the future and that he is headed down a road that will lead to murder. Of course, the young fellow thinks he is crazy, but knowledge presented makes him realize that there is something more to this. When his wife meets them at the train station, she invites the older guy to their house. What transpires is an effort to get the young man to change his ways and prevent the future event. I'm afraid that even if I accept the possibilities of the general premise, the plot holes bog this down. It's also rather dull in that Albert's character is not a very sympathetic, It is also very harsh and insensitive.
"Do you think there's any hope for us?"
classicsoncall21 February 2022
Warning: Spoilers
A young man off to work and riding a train notices that an elderly gentleman is reading a newspaper dated 2025, with a headline stating that he, Jonathan Hughes (Jesse Collins), is being sought in connection with the murder of his wife! The elderly man is Jonathan Hughes of the future (Eddie Albert), with a warning that his life has derailed, but if young Jonathan can change things, he might prevent the terrible outcome he just read in the paper, along with a host of other unfavorable circumstances that he'll experience throughout his life. Arriving at their destination, both men get off the train, and meet young Jonathan's wife Alice (Dulcie Smart), who invites old Jonathan back to their home for dinner. The dinner conversation is somewhat erratic, and old Jonathan gives off a peculiar vibe that makes Alice queasy. Suddenly old Jonathan determines that perhaps his younger self would be better off if he takes action now with his wife, and departs leaving the future newspaper wrapped around a handgun for his younger self. I have to say, I wasn't terribly impressed with this episode, as the attempt by the older man to save his two selves only led to more consternation for the one he left behind. Are we supposed to surmise that young Jonathan would kill his wife, apparently for no good reason other than the say-so of his future self? The story fell apart for me right at the very end.
Destiny's Killer
hellraiser721 October 2019
Warning: Spoilers
Warning do not read unless seen episode.
This story is an honorable mention, this is a time travel story once again from Bradberry, it was a partial inspiration for the sci-fi film "Looper" as both had a similar concept. You could also say this is sort of the old guardian angel motive, only this time this angel is bad.
Both leads were good, Jesse Collins whom I remember from "Katts and Dog" he's solid as Young Johnathan, a man that is idealistic, optimistic, and just seems like he has everything in order. Eddie Albert is great as the Old Johnathan whom you see a broken-down man whose life not just slipped thought the cracks of time but also his own sanity as you can tell from bits of his behavior, not all his chambers are loaded.
The episode is suspenseful in a suttle sense where you just have a knawing sense of dread the more time he spends with Old Johnathan the more danger Young Johnathan is. Despite how much of an info dump he is giving young Johnathan you just know he's steering Young Johnathan on the wrong track. The dialog is good, mainly from Eddie Albert's character whom in a place or two where it's almost poetic.
The story really gets at the concept on how throughout time we're never the same person, we become totally different. Both Young and Old Johnathan truly are different people in more ways than one.
There is this thing about both remembering the past, Old Johnathan says he remembers but he doesn't, yes, he has memories of the past but he doesn't really remembers who he was or what he felt during that time. And due to certain other things, he's done throughout his life that we hear about from him, it doesn't feel like Young Johnathan as he's never resorted to any of that behavior, at least not yet depending on what else he does throughout his life.
Also, this might not really be Johnathan from the same timeline, this could be an alternate version of him that game from just one possible future. In a way this just makes the danger for Young Johnathan even higher because Old Johnathan presence in Young Johnathan's timeline could make things even worse and unfortunately probably already has.
This also pertains to the character Alice, Young Johnathan's wife whom turns out to be pretty and sweet and not the awful person Old Johnathan paints her out to be. In fact, when you see Old Johnathan observing and even interacting with Alice in the timeline, he realizes how different she is and how much he's forgotten about this version of her.
This is also about how too much knowledge about the future isn't such a wonderful thing. The biggest problem with knowing the future is it makes it hard to live in the present because it's made use resign a certain amount of control of what we're doing in the present to help shape our destiny. But worst of all it can be like a disease, as it can make feelings like uncertainty and paranoia fester and grow, till it destroys our own sense of destiny.
It then comes down to the final minutes when we see the bad angel spreads his wings when Old Johnathan has an awful unthinkable idea to save his past self from grief. At that point I just know Old Johnathan's sanity and morality is truly gone, but it's also just goes to show how far Old Johnathan has fallen.
However, it's really the ending that just gave me a chill as we see in the final minutes, Old Johnathan has given Young Johnathan the gun he used to kill his wife, basically handing him in his sick mind an opportunity to save himself. We then see Alice but she's covered in darkness and she says one little sentence which wasn't a big deal, but it's was a very nasty tone that just rubbed me the wrong way. And you see in Young Johnathan's eyes he is now plagued with uncertainty, and so are we and uncertainty are destiny's killer.
Rating: 3 and a half stars
This story is an honorable mention, this is a time travel story once again from Bradberry, it was a partial inspiration for the sci-fi film "Looper" as both had a similar concept. You could also say this is sort of the old guardian angel motive, only this time this angel is bad.
Both leads were good, Jesse Collins whom I remember from "Katts and Dog" he's solid as Young Johnathan, a man that is idealistic, optimistic, and just seems like he has everything in order. Eddie Albert is great as the Old Johnathan whom you see a broken-down man whose life not just slipped thought the cracks of time but also his own sanity as you can tell from bits of his behavior, not all his chambers are loaded.
The episode is suspenseful in a suttle sense where you just have a knawing sense of dread the more time he spends with Old Johnathan the more danger Young Johnathan is. Despite how much of an info dump he is giving young Johnathan you just know he's steering Young Johnathan on the wrong track. The dialog is good, mainly from Eddie Albert's character whom in a place or two where it's almost poetic.
The story really gets at the concept on how throughout time we're never the same person, we become totally different. Both Young and Old Johnathan truly are different people in more ways than one.
There is this thing about both remembering the past, Old Johnathan says he remembers but he doesn't, yes, he has memories of the past but he doesn't really remembers who he was or what he felt during that time. And due to certain other things, he's done throughout his life that we hear about from him, it doesn't feel like Young Johnathan as he's never resorted to any of that behavior, at least not yet depending on what else he does throughout his life.
Also, this might not really be Johnathan from the same timeline, this could be an alternate version of him that game from just one possible future. In a way this just makes the danger for Young Johnathan even higher because Old Johnathan presence in Young Johnathan's timeline could make things even worse and unfortunately probably already has.
This also pertains to the character Alice, Young Johnathan's wife whom turns out to be pretty and sweet and not the awful person Old Johnathan paints her out to be. In fact, when you see Old Johnathan observing and even interacting with Alice in the timeline, he realizes how different she is and how much he's forgotten about this version of her.
This is also about how too much knowledge about the future isn't such a wonderful thing. The biggest problem with knowing the future is it makes it hard to live in the present because it's made use resign a certain amount of control of what we're doing in the present to help shape our destiny. But worst of all it can be like a disease, as it can make feelings like uncertainty and paranoia fester and grow, till it destroys our own sense of destiny.
It then comes down to the final minutes when we see the bad angel spreads his wings when Old Johnathan has an awful unthinkable idea to save his past self from grief. At that point I just know Old Johnathan's sanity and morality is truly gone, but it's also just goes to show how far Old Johnathan has fallen.
However, it's really the ending that just gave me a chill as we see in the final minutes, Old Johnathan has given Young Johnathan the gun he used to kill his wife, basically handing him in his sick mind an opportunity to save himself. We then see Alice but she's covered in darkness and she says one little sentence which wasn't a big deal, but it's was a very nasty tone that just rubbed me the wrong way. And you see in Young Johnathan's eyes he is now plagued with uncertainty, and so are we and uncertainty are destiny's killer.
Rating: 3 and a half stars
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