Revisiting The Twilight Zone: S05E32: Mr. Garrity and the Graves

Revisiting The Twilight Zone: S05E32: Mr. Garrity and the Graves

Here’s another one of those episodes that you work your way through, looking for the hook or twist, waiting for it to occur, and then when it comes thinking… “well, maybe they should have done something else”.

The set up and setting is all terrific. Back in the old west, in the small town, where Mr. Garrity shows up and pronounces that he can raise the dead. Disbelief abounds, as it should, until he brings a dog back from the dead that has been hit by a stage coach, and the man who was shot dead by his brother is seen to be walking down the street until the brother bribes Garrity to make him go away. All of the set-up is well done, and then the meeting up with his partner who has done the groundwork on the townsfolk, and the dog who has been trained to play dead.

So the end has come, and we discover the clueless Mr. Garrity can actually raise the dead, as the cemetery they pass I rapidly emptying as the inhabitants all head into town to confront those that had offed them in the first place. Now that’s okay, but I just felt a little gypped. Maybe the undead taking out Garrity before heading for town? I don’t know. It just felt like it was trying too hard and hadn’t quite delivered on a real Twilight Zone ending.

Rating: Night of the living dead. 3.5/5