Judgment Night (The Twilight Zone)

"Judgment Night"
	The Twilight Zone episode
Episode no.	Season 1; Episode 10
Directed by	John Brahm
Written by	Rod Serling
Featured music	Stock
Production code	173-3604
Original air date	December 4, 1959
Guest actors
	Nehemiah Persoff as Carl Lanser; Ben Wright as Captain Wilbur; Patrick Macnee as First Officer; James Franciscus as Lt. Mueller; Hugh Sanders as Potter; Leslie Bradley as Major Devereaux; Deirdre Owens as Miss Stanley; Kendrick Huxham as Bartender; Barry Bernard as Engineer; Richard Peel as 1st Steward; Donald Journeaux as 2nd Steward;
Episode chronology
← Previous; "Perchance to Dream"	Next →; "And When the Sky Was Opened"
	List of season 1 episodes; List of Twilight Zone episodes

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"Judgment Night" is episode 10 of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.

Plot summary

A nervous passenger, Carl Lanser, appears aboard a British passenger liner in 1942. It becomes clear that Lanser has no idea of how he got aboard or who he really is. He is standing on deck when a man calls him to dinner. He enters the dining cabin and joins the crew and passengers. The captain discusses German U-boats seen in the area. Lanser seems annoyed and explains in great detail how one would not be aware of the presence of a U-boat. The diners ask Lanser what his profession is and how long he has been in England. Lanser explains that he has not been there long and that he was born in Frankfurt, Germany. Lanser appears confused, explains that he is ill and retires to his cabin.

While still on deck, he speaks to a female passenger but his irritation grows and he rants about impending doom. He explains that he knows who he is but can't recall specific details. The captain asks to see Lanser again. He is suspicious because Lanser claims he was born in Germany but cannot provide details of his life and does not have his passport on hand to verify his identity. The captain sends a steward to Lanser's cabin where he finds the cap of a German naval officer. While inspecting it in private, Lanser discovers the cap bears his own name on the inside. Lanser leaves and goes to the ship's bar.

Lanser becomes increasingly panicked while listening to fellow passengers discuss the War. He experiences déjà vu and believes it obvious that he is, unbeknownst to the others, a German submarine officer. Lanser is now certain that the ship will be attacked. The engines halt at 12:05. Despite the crew's reassurances Lanser panics, announcing that they will be killed at 1:15. Unable to convince the crew that they will soon be under attack, Lanser must suffer the agony of watching the passengers killed at precisely the time that Lanser predicted. The freighter is sunk by a German U-boat commanded by a Captain Lieutenant Lanser.

Later, Lanser is in his cabin on the U-boat, recording that night's kill. When his second-in-command asks Lanser if they might be judged according to the way they attacked the defenseless ship, Lanser replies that surely only the British will judge them. The first mate questions whether God might also be judging them, condemning them to relive the final moments of the doomed ship. The First Mate's fears are realized: The attacking U-Boat and crew are condemned to sink the freighter over and over, with Lanser as an unwitting passenger among those killed without mercy. The episode thus recounts Carl Lanser's private hell. Lanser instantaneously reappears on the deck of the ship, and the nightmare begins again.

Episode notes

In the first 18 episodes, Serling only had one minor conflict with CBS regarding episode content. In an interview with Mike Wallace on September 22, 1959, Serling said, "We changed, in eighteen scripts, Mike, we have had one line changed, which, again, was a little ludicrous but of insufficient basic concern within the context of the story, not to put up a fight. On a bridge of a British ship, a sailor calls down to the galley and asks in my script for a pot of tea, because I believe that it's constitutionally acceptable in the British Navy to drink tea. One of my sponsors happens to sell instant coffee (Sanka), and he took great umbrage, or at least minor umbrage anyway, with the idea of saying tea. Well, we had a couple of swings back and forth, nothing serious, and we decided we'd ask for a tray to be sent up to the bridge. But in eighteen scripts, that's the only conflict we've had."

References

Zicree, Marc Scott: The Twilight Zone Companion. Sillman-James Press, 1982 (second edition)
DeVoe, Bill. (2008). Trivia from The Twilight Zone. Albany, GA: Bear Manor Media. ISBN 978-1-59393-136-0
Grams, Martin. (2008). The Twilight Zone: Unlocking the Door to a Television Classic. Churchville, MD: OTR Publishing. ISBN 978-0-9703310-9-0

External links

"Judgment Night" at IMDbLua error in Module:WikidataCheck at line 28: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value).
TV.com episode page

v t e The Twilight Zone (1959) episodes
Season 1	"Where Is Everybody?" "One for the Angels" "Mr. Denton on Doomsday" "The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine" "Walking Distance" "Escape Clause" "The Lonely" "Time Enough at Last" "Perchance to Dream" "Judgment Night" "And When the Sky Was Opened" "What You Need" "The Four of Us Are Dying" "Third from the Sun" "I Shot an Arrow into the Air" "The Hitch-Hiker" "The Fever" "The Last Flight" "The Purple Testament" "Elegy" "Mirror Image" "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" "A World of Difference" "Long Live Walter Jameson" "People Are Alike All Over" "Execution" "The Big Tall Wish" "A Nice Place to Visit" "Nightmare as a Child" "A Stop at Willoughby" "The Chaser" "A Passage for Trumpet" "Mr. Bevis" "The After Hours" "The Mighty Casey" "A World of His Own"
Season 2	"King Nine Will Not Return" "The Man in the Bottle" "Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room" "A Thing About Machines" "The Howling Man" "Eye of the Beholder" "Nick of Time" "The Lateness of the Hour" "The Trouble with Templeton" "A Most Unusual Camera" "The Night of the Meek" "Dust" "Back There" "The Whole Truth" "The Invaders" "A Penny for Your Thoughts" "Twenty Two" "The Odyssey of Flight 33" "Mr. Dingle, the Strong" "Static" "The Prime Mover" "Long Distance Call" "A Hundred Yards Over the Rim" "The Rip Van Winkle Caper" "The Silence" "Shadow Play" "The Mind and the Matter" "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?" "The Obsolete Man"
Season 3	"Two" "The Arrival" "The Shelter" "The Passersby" "A Game of Pool" "The Mirror" "The Grave" "It's a Good Life" "Deaths-Head Revisited" "The Midnight Sun" "Still Valley" "The Jungle" "Once Upon a Time" "Five Characters in Search of an Exit" "A Quality of Mercy" "Nothing in the Dark" "One More Pallbearer" "Dead Man's Shoes" "The Hunt" "Showdown with Rance McGrew" "Kick the Can" "A Piano in the House" "The Last Rites of Jeff Myrtlebank" "To Serve Man" "The Fugitive" "Little Girl Lost" "Person or Persons Unknown" "The Little People" "Four O'Clock" "Hocus-Pocus and Frisby" "The Trade-Ins" "The Gift" "The Dummy" "Young Man's Fancy" "I Sing the Body Electric" "Cavender Is Coming" "The Changing of the Guard"
Season 4	"In His Image" "The Thirty-Fathom Grave" "Valley of the Shadow" "He's Alive" "Mute" "Death Ship" "Jess-Belle" "Miniature" "Printer's Devil" "No Time Like the Past" "The Parallel" "I Dream of Genie" "The New Exhibit" "Of Late I Think of Cliffordville" "The Incredible World of Horace Ford" "On Thursday We Leave for Home" "Passage on the Lady Anne" "The Bard"
Season 5	"In Praise of Pip" "Steel" "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" "A Kind of a Stopwatch" "The Last Night of a Jockey" "Living Doll" "The Old Man in the Cave" "Uncle Simon" "Probe 7, Over and Out" "The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms" "A Short Drink from a Certain Fountain" "Ninety Years Without Slumbering" "Ring-a-Ding Girl" "You Drive" "The Long Morrow" "The Self-Improvement of Salvadore Ross" "Number 12 Looks Just Like You" "Black Leather Jackets" "Night Call" "From Agnes—With Love" "Spur of the Moment" "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" "Queen of the Nile" "What's in the Box" "The Masks" "I Am the Night—Color Me Black" "Sounds and Silences" "Caesar and Me" "The Jeopardy Room" "Stopover in a Quiet Town" "The Encounter" "Mr. Garrity and the Graves" "The Brain Center at Whipple's" "Come Wander with Me" "The Fear" "The Bewitchin' Pool"

Judgment Night (The Twilight Zone)

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