63 Years Later, the Creepiest Episode of 'The Twilight Zone' is Still Nightmare Fuel

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https://www.polygon.com/creepiest-episode-twilight-zone-living-doll/

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“Living Doll” is about a little girl named Christie (Tracy Stratford), who lives in a troubled household with her mother Annabelle (Mary La Roche) and new stepfather Erich (Telly Savalas). Erich is a mean, insecure man, frustrated by his infertility and inability to have a child with his new wife. He also rejects his stepdaughter’s affections, telling her he is not her father. The problems in the family get worse when Annabelle buys Christie a new doll called Talky Tina, which Erich disapproves of because of the cost. This also sparks a fight in front of Christie and her new doll.

When the key in Tina’s back is wound up, she says, “My name is Talky Tina, and I love you very much.” But when Erich is alone with the doll and he turns the key out of simple curiosity, the doll says to him, “My name is Talky Tina and I don’t think I like you.” After that, every time he’s left alone with the doll, it says increasingly threatening things, like, “My name is Talky Tina, and I’m beginning to hate you.” He initially thinks it’s a trick from his wife designed to humiliate him. Once he’s convinced the doll is some evil entity out to get him, he tries to destroy it, but it continuously reappears in Christie’s bed as Erich grows more erratic.

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“Yep, heres your problem. Someone set this thing to evil.”

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They released the toy as The Simpsons merch, I would like to get it one day. From what I’ve heard it’s pretty good, except they accidentally swapped good and evil labels.

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I think all my Scary Door Twilight Zone knowledge comes from Matt Groening.

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kinda just sounds like a riff on The Raven.

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I don’t know, I feel like there are creepier episodes than that. I still like it, but I don’t think it was that creepy.

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Absolutely, “Five Characters in Search of an Exit” is much creepier.

Also “The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street” is pretty damn terrfying, because you know it’s entirely true.

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The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street

Yup, that’s the one that stayed with me for years as a genuine life lesson. It is true, too - people quickly and easily fly into paranoid fits, they isolate and blame “the other” among even themselves. Anyone who’s lived in a small town has seen the same dynamics play out.

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“The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street”

The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices … to be found only in the minds of men. For the record, prejudices can kill, and suspicion can destroy, and a thoughtless, frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own … for the children and the children yet unborn. And the pity of it is, that these things cannot be confined only to The Twilight Zone.

And that is where we are. We are going after each other down here in the street while the aliens ( billionaires ) are up on the hill watching us conquering us one neighborhood at a time.

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I almost forgot about that one, yes. That one was definitely creepier.

The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street episode is a great societal commentary (similarly to The Shelter) and it’s stayed with me since I watched it. Honestly, it feels even scarier in today’s world.

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Most importantly, baby dolls are just plain creepy. They were creepy in the 1960s and they’re creepy now. And Talky Tina, with her blank, expressionless face and childish voice, is still effectively scary. Her scariness is only aided by the fact that The Twilight Zone is black-and-white.

OMFG so true!

I don’t remember this episode, so I am going to track it down.

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I’m not kidding that I literally scrolled until I saw “Living Doll” and I was like “oh FUCK that!”

I have always thought baby dolls are creepy, they seem inherently haunted.

For example, the original Titanic baby doll, just lying down there all terrifying.

Children can also be extremely creepy so it fits.

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