The Seven Twilight Zone Segments Directed By Horror Master Wes Craven

"The Twilight Zone" is one of those shows so ingrained in popular culture that it's become synonymous with anything mysterious or spooky, even for people who have never seen an episode before. Conceived by Rod Serling as a method of exploring social commentary and often controversial ideas that are still relevant today, the original series first aired in 1959 and ran for five seasons. Serling wrote the bulk of the teleplays and narrated in his own inimitable way, sometimes inserting himself into an episode while dangling an ever-present cigarette. "The Twilight Zone" was also a showcase for some great actors: William Shatner, Burgess Meredith, Buster Keaton, Lee Marvin, Peter Falk, and many others made memorable impressions in classic episodes.

10 years after Serling passed away in 1975, CBS decided to resurrect the show. Although 1983's "Twilight Zone: The Movie" was a disappointment, the '80s "Twilight Zone" TV revamp was still able to attract a superb array of acting talent ranging from old hands like Martin Balsam and Janet Leigh to then up-and-coming stars like Bruce Willis and Frances McDormand. The show also employed a range of talented writers, including Harlan Ellison, Rockne S. O'Bannon, and a young(ish) George R. R. Martin, and there were some interesting names behind the camera, too: William Friedkin, Joe Dante, John Milius, and Bill Duke all directed episodes. Perhaps the biggest directorial coup for the series was hiring Wes Craven, who'd only just been crowned the king of horror after the huge success of "A Nightmare on Elm Street." Let's take a look at his seven segments and how they fit into his legacy.

Unlike the original "Twilight Zone" TV series, the '80s revival used a multi-segment format, and Wes Craven had the honor of kicking things off with a double-bill. "Shatterday" features Bruce Willis while he was still starring in "Moonlighting," and he gets a dual role very different from the light comic persona that made him famous. He plays Peter Jay Novins, a cynical P.R. man whose life is turned upside down when a doppelganger moves into his apartment. This alternative version represents his better self, seeking to fix the emotional damage that his callous deeds have caused in the past. As the week progresses and Novins unravels, it becomes clear that only one of them can exist in this world.

Craven handles the material concisely, presenting the cautionary tale in a chilly and matter-of-fact way that grounds the bizarre scenario in reality. For his part, Willis goes to town with two very different versions of the same man. Bad Novins is sweaty and loathsome in his power suit, whereas Good Novins is calm and compassionate in his soft-knit sweaters. In between we catch a few John McLane-isms a few years before Willis shot to superstardom as the character in "Die Hard."

Wes Craven's second segment from the show's first episode is the stronger of the pair, a typical "be careful what you wish for" story reminiscent of "A Kind of Stopwatch" and "Time Enough at Last" (one of the most notable episodes of the original "Twilight Zone"). Melinda Dillon stars as Penny, a harried housewife who just yearns for a little peace and quiet, only to get her wish when she discovers a mysterious pendant that can freeze time at her command.

This episode starts out cheerfully in a bustling Spielbergian household while also cranking up the sound to put us in Penny's frazzled headspace. Once she finds the pendant and lightly starts abusing it, Craven also has a lot of fun with time-halting effects. (Amusingly, he simply gets his actors to play wobbly human statues rather than employing freeze frames.) With mid-'80s Cold War tensions playing out in the background, the episode takes a far darker turn in the final moments. Here, we get the one truly great kicker in all of Craven's "Twilight Zone" segments: While Penny is able to save the world from nuclear annihilation, she is doomed to wander it completely alone.

Following the haunting conclusion of "A Little Peace and Quiet," Wes Craven keeps it light with "Wordplay," the first of his two offerings in the show's three-parter second episode. Robert Klein plays Bill, a salesman who notices that people around him are suddenly switching out some words for others. ("Anniversary" becomes "Throw Rug," for example.) The situation deteriorates until the entire dictionary is jumbled up and Bill can't understand anything anyone says, and they can't understand him either.

It's a really fun segment that delves into the arbitrary nature of language while showing what "The Twilight Zone" can do at its best: taking a simple premise and spinning it out to a surreal conclusion. Craven again displays a surprisingly light touch, allowing the verbal absurdities to play out with minimum fuss. The supporting cast (including Annie Potts as Bill's wife) does a great job delivering the garbled dialogue so fluently that it sounds like they are speaking another language. While "The Twilight Zone" episodes often end on a dark note, "Wordplay" goes in a different direction by suggesting language is no barrier to love and even an old dog like Bill can learn new tricks.

Wes Craven concludes the series' second episode with "Chameleon," a throwback to the sci-fi elements of the original "Twilight Zone" TV show — but not in a good way. Rod Serling often speculated about encounters with extra-terrestrials and their motives, most famously with the great twist ending in "To Serve Man." Here, though, we get a very unsatisfying segment about NASA astronauts unwittingly bringing a shape-shifting alien back to Earth. The creature doesn't take too kindly to being held for observation, however, and offers the befuddled scientists a deadly ultimatum.

Craven was reportedly unhappy with the set and working conditions on this segment, and his frustrations show in the finished product. The episode's solid cast also really struggle to enliven a clunky exposition-laden script. (At one point, when the alien turns into a bomb, a character helpfully reads out the timer for us.) Blending the chameleonic powers of John Carpenter's "The Thing" with the friendly alien visitations of "Starman" and "Cocoon," the story barely creaks into motion before delivering an underwhelming coda. "Chameleon" might have just about flown back in the 1950s, but it feels very dated in an '80s context, and the segment is easily Craven's worst contribution to "The Twilight Zone."

Wes Craven was on much better form with "Dealer's Choice." This jovial tale showed just how assured the director could be with a cracking light-hearted script, and it stands out as one of the most purely entertaining entries in the show's 1980s run. It no doubt helped that the segment starred perhaps the best ensemble cast of any episode of "The Twilight Zone."

Morgan Freeman, M. Emmet Walsh, Garret Morris, and Barney Smith play four New Jersey buddies settling down for their regular Friday night game of poker. However, their usual fifth player is absent, having been replaced by a mysterious newcomer known as Nick (Dan Hedaya). The boys soon deduce he is none other than Old Nick himself seeking to claim one of their souls.

"Dealer's Choice" doesn't give us much to ponder, but who cares when an episode is this much fun? It's a joy watching five great actors who are clearly having a blast playing off each other, with Freeman and Morris showing great natural chemistry. Hedaya, often guilty of over-acting in some of his film roles, also does a great job playing the Devil with charmingly sinister understatement.

The old trope of a protagonist falling in love with a ghost is well-worn almost to the point of cliché, and even the sci-fi elements of this 40-minute segment can't offset the inherent corniness of "Her Pilgrim Soul." Kristoffer Tabori plays Kevin, a scientist who discovers that his cutting-edge holographic projector has summoned the spirit of a young girl. As she matures from a toddler into a beautiful young woman, they start falling for each other. The supernatural romance is short-lived, however, as the ghost ages by 10 years every day.

Mind you, there've been some great variations on this kind of fantasy in the past, with "Her Pilgrim Soul" bearing a striking resemblance to William Dieterle's far superior "Portrait of Jennie." Alan Brennert's script is heartfelt enough (he reportedly took inspiration from the death of a loved one) but a few disastrous choices scupper the potency of the story. Craven allows his actors to veer into melodramatics, a problem compounded by a weepy score that would have sounded cheesy in a soap opera of the day. Ultimately, "Her Pilgrim Soul" is an overlong spin on a familiar tale that is totally hamstrung by its mawkish presentation.

Wes Craven's final directorial effort in "The Twilight Zone" came midway through Season 2 and it's another solid effort. Notably, "The Road Less Traveled" was one of five episodes written by George R. R. Martin long before he found worldwide fame for "Game of Thrones." Cliff DeYoung plays Jeff, a family man who is forced to confront his guilt about draft-dodging during the Vietnam War when he encounters nightmarish visions and the mysterious apparition of a wheelchair-using man in his house. As the episode touches upon themes that are similar to those in "Shatterday," it turns out the ghostly stranger is an alternate-reality version of Jeff if he had gone to war.

Out of his seven segments on the series, "The Road Less Traveled" is the most Craven-esque. The darker material allows him to show his talent for shadow play, disturbing imagery, and abrupt lurches from ordinary reality. It also covers a worthy subject at a time when America was still coming to terms with the physical and psychological fallout of Vietnam, although the brief running time doesn't give the episode's writer or director full scope to explore the story's ideas to their maximum potential. It's a decent enough episode, but it still feels like a missed opportunity.

Wes Craven's work on "The Twilight Zone" provides an interesting perspective on him as a director. By the time he took the gig, he was already labeled a horror master not only for directing his grisly '70s calling cards "The Last House on the Left" and "The Hills Have Eyes" but also for giving us one of the most iconic slasher villains of all time in "A Nightmare on Elm Street." His career would continue in a similar vein until his death in 2015, offering him very few opportunities to break out of the genre that made his name.

Viewing Craven's segments in the show illustrate two contrasting dimensions to his filmmaking. On one hand, they reveal he was far more adaptable than his pigeonholing in the horror genre would suggest, slipping easily into the role of no-nonsense gun for hire and displaying a surprising lighter side with some really enjoyable tales. On the other, his work here highlights how Craven's approach to telling stories was efficient and workmanlike rather than bravura, lacking the distinctive flair of other directors who made their mark in horror around the same time (including John Carpenter, Sam Raimi, Joe Dante, and David Cronenberg).

Nevertheless, you can see why these stories might have appealed to Craven. His movies regularly depicted something sinister lurking just beyond the boundaries of day-to-day life, and five of his seven segments notably take place in very ordinary settings before lurching into the realms of the uncanny. In that sense, his unobtrusive style is a great fit for these particular types of "Twilight Zone" tales, which often feature regular people thrust into very irregular situations. It is just a shame that he didn't add anything truly outstanding to the show. As it stands, his episodes are really only requisite viewing for Craven completists.