EPISODE: Twilight Town
Reviewed by Lindy
Season 5 Episode 138 First aired October 13, 1963
Guest Stars: Davey Davison, Stacy Harris
Written By: Cy Chermak
Directed By: John Florea
SUMMARY:
Joe is riding through the desert, and stops to help a man he finds lying in the sand. The man hits Joe in the head and steals Joe’s horse. When Joe wakes up, he sees the tracks of his horse in the sand and starts to follow them. We see sweaty Joe, with his pants clinging tightly to his body, staggering across the desert.
(I love this part at the beginning of the show). Ben throws Little Joe a birthday party. Of coarse Joe doesn't show up. When the last guest leaves, Hoss tells Ben he is worried about Little Joe; he thinks Joe is in trouble. Pa tells Hoss to get to bed. He says that Joe is a big boy & can take care of himself. You can see that Pa is worried & doesn't want to admit it. That exact moment, Adam rides up with the horses. Ben looks to Hoss & says I'll get changed. You can see the worried look in Ben’s eyes, once again. This time, he isn't hiding it.
In the meantime, Joe staggers through the desert toward a town he sees in the distance. But it’s a ghost town. Joe cries out in despair and collapses.
Joe wakes up in a bed. He is totally confused and doesn’t understand. He said, yesterday, this was a ghost town. A girl, Louise, tells him that he had a head injury and was out in the sun a long time. She then quickly changes the subject. Joe then asks Louise why the town was deserted, when he arrived and now it isn't. She tells him, that the town was at the funeral of their sheriff.
A lady named Katy warns Joe to leave town while he can. They will kill him, like they did her husband, she tells Joe. But Joe reluctantly becomes sheriff, taking the job only with the promise the men will help him fight the outlaws that have taken over Martinville. The men in town stand up to the outlaws, after getting courage from Joe. But the outlaws tell Joe that if the town doesn’t take down the barricade, they will be back and wipe out the whole town. The men in the town want to take down the barricade but Joe convinces them to go out and fight the outlaws.
The fighting starts and Joe kills the leader of the outlaws just as he falls to the ground. Ben, Hoss & Adam show up and praise Joe for taking on the man who stole his horse. Joe tells Ben that the townspeople helped him fight off the outlaws. When Ben asks what townspeople, Joe tells him the people from Martinville. Ben explains to Joe that Martinville has been deserted for years. Joe is confused and rushes back to the town to find it is a ghost town once again. Joe doesn’t know what to think. Ben tells him the legend that Martinville turned its back on their sheriff and their ghosts were doomed to stay in the town until someone helped them fight. Joe is even more confused now, but since there’s no clear explanation, Ben, Adam, Hoss and Joe start to ride away. Suddenly, Joe turns around and looks back at the town. He sees Louise, but she quickly disappears. Was Joe kissing a ghost or not???? :-)
REVIEWS:
"I love Twilight Town for a number of reasons, none of which has anything to do with the plot. First, we have a "shirtless Joe" scene (although that darn blanket is pulled up way too high). This alone gives the episode a reason to be watched. Then we have a hot, sweaty Joe walking through the desert, with his damp clothes clinging to his body....I also like the ending, when Pa is tending to Joe with such care, and trying to gently explain to him that there are no people around and that the town was abandoned years ago. Joe gives Pa such a incredulous look, instantly believing his father but at the same time, unable to figure out what is going on. A nice Pa-Joe moment." Susan Grote
"Do dah doo dah doo dah doo dah...Camera pulls back and there is Rod Serling.... "Submitted for your scrutiny...Joseph Francis Cartwright...known to his friends and family as "Little Joe"...a brave young cowboy who took a brief ride on his coffee-drinking pinto into the dododoododollslijououooosos(Twilight Zone Music) TWILIGHT ZONE......Camera goes into the hot blue cloudless desert sky and up up up into the starry night sky and into the TWIGHLIGHT ZOOOOOONeeeee....." Robin
"As an adult I like this episode but as a kid it gave me the 'willies'. I was always afraid of supernatural stuff. Plus the dark lady-Katy, always reminded me of a witch-a mean one like in the Wizard of OZ." Judy
Great chapter....a mystery this chapter" Nico
"Even though it is none too subtle, I still love how it keeps building more and more evidence that the townspeople are ghosts. Deliciously eerie little touches - for instance, how the townspeople sound like they're in an echo chamber whenever Joe is out of earshot. I like the way it switches suddenly to non-ghost zone towards the end: there has been a ton of shooting in Joe's twilight zone world, but when we cut to Ben, Adam, and Hoss, they haven't heard any of it until the last couple of gunshots - the ones Joe trades with real-world bad guy." Sue W
"Here's what happened to me first time I saw this show. I was sitting alone at home after school (12 or 13 years old) and watching my daily dose of my favorite show. Of course I was totally engrossed and wide-eyed, but, girls, at that last moment when they turn their horses to leave town, and Joe turns around to see the girl standing there, well, when I saw her I SCREAMED and just about jumped out of my skin. I compared notes the next day with my junior-high band teacher who was also a fan of the show, and she said she freaked out as well." Gina