Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This companion book is very necessary for any fan of The Twilight Zone. It offers, interviews, insight, cast lists, dates, EVERYTHING; even an extensive look into the lives and/or backgrounds of Rod Serling and the other writers - which I enjoyed. Where it annoyed me is the fact that Zicree ends up criticizing and suggesting for us what to think of many episodes. Throughout the whole book, he bashes scripts (eg. "If such and such were changed or taken out, it would have been better." "This script is cliche-ed"), actors and actresses (eg. "...with and uninspired performance by..."), directors (eg. "...in the hands of any other director, this could have been great..."). Zicree even "nit picks" on facts: there's an episode in which he points out that Rod Serling had gotten the distance from Earth to the planet Venus wrong. LOL WHO CARES?!! Serling was an overworked writer (which Zicree makes very clear, but still decides to nit pick), not a NASA engineer! There's also another passage in which he proclaims an episode a disappointment just because the plot is slightly possible. "Any episode that is this grounded in reality, should be considered a disappoinment." Ok, thanks for letting us know Marc. *sigh* Pleeease... Further in the book, he starts off an episode's commentary with, "Despite the basically absurd premise..." WHAT?! It's science fiction! It's the TWILIGHT ZONE! Aren't all the stories based on absurd premises?! Not to mention, that aforementioned quote about being "too grounded in reality" - now the TZ is too absurd for him?!? What an annoying little man this Zicree dude is... I was hoping for more behind the scenes info such as commentary from people who actually worked on the episodes, or how certain effects were accomplished in such an era. While there is a lot of those two things too; I was hoping for a lot more it. And A LOT less of the writer's feelings and bashings of the episodes he felt like picking on. Still this book is a required read for any fan.