i am not a horror fan . so out of those 67 episodes can anyone tell me the non horror episodes . like crime / twists / mystery ones only
shareI know the very first episode "The Twisted Image" is non-horror. I think out of all 67 episodes, there are 4 or 5 that are non-horror.
sharePartly from memory but mostly from a quick scan of descriptions in Alan Warren's book "This Is a Thriller," other non-supernatural episodes include:
"Child's Play"
"Worse Than Murder"
"The Mark of the Hand"
"Rose's Last Summer"
"The Guilty Men"
"The Watcher"
"Girl With a Secret"
"The Fatal Impulse"
"The Big Blackout"
"Knock Three-One-Two"
"Man in the Middle"
"The Poisoner"
"Man in the Cage"
"Choose a Victim"
"The Merriweather File" (my favorite crime episode)
"The Fingers of Fear"
"The Ordeal of Dr. Cordell" (another favorite of mine, but it's a variation on Jekyll/Hyde -- a combination of science fiction and horror. On the other hand, Warren describes it as "a chilling account of one man's descent into madness" and calls it "one of the most compelling of the first season Thrillers.")
"Late Date"
"A Good Imagination"
"Guillotine" (my favorite non-supernatural suspense episode)
"Letter to a Lover"
"A Third for Pinochle"
"The Storm"
"Kill My Love"
"Man of Mystery"
"The Innocent Bystanders" (based on the story of real-life murderers Burke & Hare, this might cross the line into horror)
"The Specialists"
There may be others; it's also possible that some of these episodes in addition to "The Ordeal of Dr. Cordell" and possibly "The Innocent Bystanders" are intense enough to qualify as "horror" stories by other folks' standards.
"You gotta start off each day with a song ... even when things go wrong ...."
Wow! Nearly half of the episodes are non-horror. Interesting. Of the ones I have seen over the years, they qualified as horror, sheer horror, in fact.
I guess it could be argued that "Thriller" was, in a sense, a cross between "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" and "The Twilight Zone," with an additional dose of the macabre for good measure. I'm really looking forward to watching these episodes. Classic television is the best, in my opinion.
The non-supernatural count is much higher than I expected. I watched THRILLER regularly during its first run, probably from beginning to end, and I expected to find that only 10 episodes or so would be considered crime entries. Apparently the supernatural horror stories made a deeper impression on me -- understandable, since I was already a fan of Robert Bloch (whose "The Devil's Ticket" rounds out my top four favorites in the series) & August Derleth, as well as others who wrote in the genre but whose stories weren't adapted for THRILLER.
"You gotta start off each day with a song ... even when things go wrong ...."
Watched one of the non-horror episodes last night, "Late Date." It was very good. I'm looking forward to viewing more.
shareWarren says "Late Date" is one of three episodes adapted from works of Cornell Woolrich, whom many consider a master of suspense stories. The other two are "Papa Benjamin," which Warren finds disappointing; and "Guillotine," which he says is "rightly regarded [along with Hitchcock's TV version of "Three O'Clock"] as the finest adaptation of Woolrich ever filmed." He thinks "Late Date" is excellent most of the way through, but he feels let down by what he calls "a cop-out ending," implying it was altered to conform with TV standards of the time.
"You gotta start off each day with a song ... even when things go wrong ...."
I had the feeling watching "Late Date" that it would have ended with the police leaving the two brothers inside the house at the end if it had been an episode of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents." Hitchcock, of course, would have appeared afterward to announce the brothers went to the police to turn themselves in.
I will be watching "Guillotine" tonight. Can't wait.
Warren feels the way you do about how AHP might have handled it:
Kindred wife murderers got away free on Alfred Hitchcock Presents via Hitch's jokey, tongue-in-cheek assurances, in the epilogues, that justice was done. No such latitude was permitted here, and the fine acting and suspenseful direction can do little to alleviate the situation.
Recently watched Late Date again and the ending is open-ended, similar to what Hitchock did in his TV shows except that in Thriller, there was no Hitchcock to appear and appease the morality police was a quickie (fake) explanation of how the criminal was brought to justice later on, another example of the man's genius.
shareI'll have to make LATE DATE the next episode I see. So far, I've watched only PORTRAIT WITHOUT A FACE. I started with that one partly because Jane Greer stars, playing a character named Moffat for the second time in her career; and partly because I drew a blank on the plot, though I probably watched it in the '60s. It's pretty good, though somewhat undermined by Cackling Crone Syndrome; the DVD picture looks very good to me, too.
"You gotta start off each day with a song ... even when things go wrong ...."
I really liked "Portrait Without a Face," and was a little surprised at the violence in it. My only problem with it was with last 5 minutes. The answer to the mystery occured to me about five minutes before it was revealed.
shareI'm watching out of order...good old netflix! I started with probably my favorite episode (I grew up on the few vhs tapes that were released), The Terror in Teakwood, then The Grim Reaper (another great one)...I also watched:
Mr. George - I thought this episode was pretty cute
A Good Imagination - non-horror ep, reminded me of John Collier's Back for Christmas, which IMO was far superior than this but this wasn't too bad. It had a bit of a different ending at least
The Prisoner of the Mirror - wasn't bad, I liked the aspect of the mirror but wish they would have done more with it
Dark Legacies - didn't really enjoy this one
Pigeons from Hell - yeah, I know Stephen King raved about this ep and it's a favorite of many fans of Thriller but I just couldn't get into it for some reason. I'm not sure why.
"The Merriweather File" is definitely one of the best episodes out there, and "The Last of the Sommervilles" was pretty enjoyable, as well.
share"can anyone tell me the non horror episodes ."
Is this a question or a statement?...