Monday, January 25, 2021

TALES OF TOMORROW / "The Invader" - 1951

Now, here's a shocking little production about five people on an ocean expedition looking for rare sea plants. A 'meteorite' hits down near their boat, and what happens next is unexpected...

This thing stars Eva (THE MAD MAGICIAN) Gabor, William (in two episodes of LIGHTS OUT) Eythe, Edgar (4D MAN) Stehll, Salem (I LOVE YOU, ALICE B. TOKLAS!) Ludwig and Ferrell (DARBY O'GILL AND THE LITTLE PEOPLE) Pelly. Very sad about William Lythe, died at age 38, and considered a victim of Hollywood.

The story starts with Burroughs pulling up a basket full of a rare sea weed that his diver had found. His son Roy is there with his fiancée, Laura.

It is very strange that pops is mean to his son and won't let him help with anything and is just simply mean with him constantly. Laura logs in the catch.

Chandler, the diver, eventually makes it back to the surface and gets help removing his gear.

Even Chandler is a jerk with Roy, calling him junior, and tells him to give his dad the message, he's not doing any more diving, he wants to go to port and have some fun.

The crew then witness something falling out of the sky. They watch as the thing splashes down into the sea with a bang near their ship!

They establish that the object came down in a zig-zag trajectory and it couldn't possibly be a meteorite, and, must be a spaceship from another world! Chandler refuses to dive down to see what's on the sea floor, and of all things, Roy says that he'll do it...

He wants to prove to his dad that he can contribute to the expedition, but Laura's frightened about Roy agreeing to the dive, and that unknown object down there.

Roy makes it to the bottom where he sees something and heads off towards it...

Roy returns to the surface and reports that it was just a meteorite, not a spaceship. He has a hard edge to his demeanor now, and is very short with his dad who's proud of his accomplishment.

McQueen is the first one to go, he sees Roy for who he really is and dies from the alien's touch!

Ho boy, no kidding! Laura then receives the death touch from the deadly invader! He's already taken care of Chandler.

When the lights go out, we can see Roy as the alien. Very underwhelming! So, when the lights go out, William had to run over to a makeup artist who, as quickly as possible, makes him into an alien and get him back to the camera! That's just horrible! 

Burroughs gets to see some of the victims!

The alien tells the old man that everyone is dead, including Roy, and that he plans on getting to the mainland to continue his mayhem and destroy the people of Earth. 

But the tricky old codger comes up with a plan to get rid of the threat. He cuts a gas line and then splashes the invader with an acid or something, causing him to fade into the darkness, just like this post!

2 comments:

KD said...

Actor William Eythe had a difficult life, and ultimately a tragic death.

His Wikipedia entry profiles the heights of his acting career, and the eventual too-early end of his life. It was much more difficult for a talented man like him in those days (see the "Personal Life" part of his profile).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Eythe

See also the "Personal Life" part of the profile for Eythe's longtime partner, Lon McCallister:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lon_McCallister

Things were different in those so-called "happy days" of the '40s and '50s.

KD said...

PS: Lon_McCallister was in 3 episodes of TALES OF TOMORROW also, including the very first episode, VERDICT FROM SPACE: https://youtu.be/lawlPujLLkk

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