William O. Douglas Jr.: An Outer Limits Visual Résumé

Well, I'm an idiot. I stupidly neglected to mention William O. Douglas Jr. in my spotlight of "The Galaxy Being" last month. He was the man inside the Andromedan costume, the inaugural Outer Limits "bear," so he was certainly more than  deserving. However, his importance to the TOL universe is much broader than that: he appeared in a total of four episodes, and inhabited three different alien/monster get-ups (his fourth appearance was actually a human character; however, he did wind up getting hunchbacked, so there's that). To atone for my egregious omission, I've prepared a special spotlight of his work on the show.

Andy the Andromedan ("The Galaxy Being")

The Ghost of Private Gordon/The Ice Ghost ("The Human Factor")

Henry Castle ("The Invisibles")

Aabel of Eros ("The Children of Spider County")

Outer Limits 50th Anniversary Book Announced!

David J. Schow, the preeminent authority on All Things Outer Limits (and author of The Outer Limits Companion) has announced that a new TOL book is on the horizon, set for release sometime in the first quarter of 2014, celebrating the show's golden anniversary. Have a look:

I am all over this. In fact, I'll probably buy two copies just to be safe (readers will recall the tragic fate that befell my original copy of The Outer Limits Companion). Mr. Schow is a friend of this blog, and he's a super nice guy, so hopefully he'll sign a copy for me. I'll beg. I'll plead. I'll do whatever the hell it takes. I can't wait to dive into it.... here's hoping the following shot makes the cut (it's one of my favorite behind-the-scenes photos from the series):

Is this a meme-worthy pic or what?  Expect some fun when we get to "Nightmare" in December.

I'm also highly intrigued by this "gallery event to be announced," and I'm seriously considering making the trek to LA to check it out. Bill Huelbig, any interest in another visit to the west coast?

Artist Spotlight: Woody Welch

Portrait of the artist at his horniest.

If you frequent various Facebook groups devoted to classic sci-fi, you may have seen the work of Woody Welch, who sketches and paints iconic genre characters with amazing (sometimes startling) near-photorealistic precision (I should also mention that he does some really, um, enticing nudes). He’s also a really nice guy, nice enough to both grant me permission to showcase his work here and to answer a few boring, run-of-the-mill questions that he’s probably answered a million time before.

CB: Take us back to the beginning...Have you been an artist since you were first able to hold a pencil, or did your considerable talents develop later?

WW: I was born in New York City and my mother was a pin-up for about 19 years for artist Rolf Armstrong. Sometimes I would hang around the studio he had when I was four and five years old. They'd give me paper and pencils to play with and even at that young age I was able to see what he would do with charcoal, pastels and so forth...that's how I began to learn to draw. Armstrong had done this great portrait of the Frankenstein Monster in 1935...he still had it and I was fascinated by the art and the photos that were taken at the time...when I asked who the "square-headed" guy was they told me and that was the birth of THIS monster kid. I got the first issue of Famous Monsters the following year and there was no looking back after that.

CB:  I seem to recall some amount of Hollywood fame within your immediate family...?

WW: No...but Rolf Armstrong's cousin was the actor Robert Armstrong, (KING KONG, MIGHTY JOE YOUNG) and that's how I learned about those particular types of special effects....stop motion, matte paintings, etc. I think i was eight when i first met "Uncle Bob". [I actually meant your mother, WW. In my universe, pin-up models ABSOLUTELY count as celebrities! - CB]

CB: What were some of your early subjects?  If you say you have been doing nudes since you were a little kid, I'm going to have a new level of respect for you.

WW: (laughs) I drew mostly dinosaurs because I was obsessed with them....and movie monsters, because I loved them and i could get great reference pictures from the pages of FAMOUS MONSTERS and CASTLE of FRANKENSTEIN and all the rest. The nudes started in middle school....I got caught and had to get a note from my mother..she wanted to see what I had done. When she saw the work she said that if I wanted to do this, that i should not do it in school where i should be learning, but at home. The next day she brought home several "men's" magazines...Playboy, Swank, etc. "If you want to draw nude girls, here are some that you can use for modeling." she said. I became "charlie potatoes" by the time I got to high school. Kids would ask me to draw nudes of Nancy Sinatra and so forth, and I would charge them five bucks a piece. I would hide the money I made in the hollow legs of my Aurora Monster kits because my mom would never think to disassemble something that I had made. I built up quite a bank account in those monster kits!!!

CB: Describe a typical day in the life of Woody Welch. How many commissions would you be juggling at one time?

WW: Well, thanks to the internet, I have reached lots and lots of people, and they have commissioned several things, for example...I am doing covers and science fiction pin ups for magazines in England and I just finished doing a DVD cover for someone, but that's a secret for now...and every once in a while i do storyboards or work on advertising campaigns for films. Mostly though, I do art for me and sling it around to various groups on Facebook, now that I am semi-retired. I have a big one bedroom apartment in a 1930 art deco building in the Hancock Park area of Los Angeles and it has an enclosed balcony which is my workshop. Mostly, I go for walks to my favorite Hollywood restaurants, and engorge myself. 

CB: I'm sure you're proud of your impressive body of work in general, but what specific works are you most proud of? What do you hope will live on after you?

WW: I don't think I've done that piece of art yet...I had a blast working on HALLOWEEN: RESURRECTION, so that goofy thing will live long after I drop dead, and I built, along with my buddy, Jeff Copeland, the giant spider that is attached to the upper face of HOLLYWOOD TOYS, and that damn thing has withstood earthquakes, windstorms and pigeon poop so I know that the fiberglass arachnid will be there long after I have left to join the choir invisible.

Woody's spider, perched comfortably at 6600 Hollywood Blvd, Los Angeles.

CB: When did you discover the OUTER LIMITS? Did it immediately occur to you to capture its various aliens and monsters on paper? Have you drawn or painted all of them?

WW: I "discovered" the OUTER LIMITS like most kids my age, (I was eleven) during the waning days of the summer of '63 I believe. All those tv commercials made it look like a show right up my street...and it was. I sculpted several creatures from the show out of modeling clay...the only one I drew was the Thetan from THE ARCHITECTS OF FEAR...drew that in the back of math class...old habits die hard. My favorite are the Zantis because i am a big stop motion nut. Recently i did a drawing in Prismacolors with acrylic washes from a little black and white reference photo I found on the internet. It turned out okay.

Just "okay"??? This is amazing! *

I also did a great deal of character studies of actors and other "things' from the TWILIGHT ZONE over the summer. My favorite of those, would have to be the "reverse angle" of the plane flying over the brontosaurus from ODYSSEY OF FLIGHT 33, simply because it is something that you didn't see in the show. I don't want to paint or draw from photos ALL the time, because you tend to get dependent on them and the creative parts of your brain become softer and squishy.

CB: Do you have a favorite OUTER LIMITS character or TWILIGHT ZONE character? If so, what about them speaks to you?

WW: For the OUTER LIMITS it would have to be ALL of the soldiers in NIGHTMARE because each one of them is a part of us...the mama's boy, the poet, the leader(a father figure),  the minority, the strict by-the-book fellow...etc. For the TWILIGHT ZONE, all of the characters in THE MASKS for pretty much the same reason....not just the horrible family, but the good too.... doctor, the butler, and the old millionaire as well.

CB: What's on the horizon for you?

WW: (laughs) I don't know....and that is what makes life worth living. I have friends in Europe and I fly back and forth to see them. I have plans to eat my way through all the finest restaurants in Budapest.....AGAIN!!!!

What a great guy! I can't thank Mr. Welch enough for sharing with work (and his words) with me. Next time I find myself in Los Angeles... well, the drinks are on me.

   

* Just okay? I happen to LOVE Woody's Zanti. In fact, I've been using it as wallpaper on my phone for the past month or so....

Episode Spotlight: "The Sixth Finger" (10/14/1963)

“The Sixth Finger”

Season 1, Episode 5

Originally aired 10/14/1963

The films of Universal Studios' classic horror cycle feature numerous intense and driven scientists, probing the outer rim of known science and often unleashing new and destructive horrors upon the world. The Outer Limits introduced us to many such men, groping and stumbling their way through the hidden tapestry that seethes beneath everyday reality, discovering (or creating) atomic-age horrors of their own. Fifty years ago tonight, one of them peered into mankind's distant future only to find that there are monsters waiting for us there too: ourselves.

Professor Mathers has set up shop in a secluded Welsh mining town (sure sounds like a Universal horror flick) to experiment with artificially speeding up natural evolution. He finds a subject in Gwyllm Griffiths, a sullen and restless miner who believes himself destined for something beyond his meager surroundings (shades of Harold J. Finney!). Mathers exposes him to "selected wavelengths" designed to stimulate his superior genes and "thereby accelerating the inborn mechanism of evolution to a fantastically high speed," and immediately advances him 10,000 years further along man's evolutionary line.

What appears to be a resounding success quickly turns into something dark and unpredictable. Having set the biological rush in motion, Mathers is shocked to witness Gwyllm's evolution continue without further stimulation. His mental powers increase exponentially: he can read minds and, upon being discovered by Mathers' maid Ms. Ives, he telekinetically murders her by stopping her heart.

He then sets out to "utterly destroy" the town to settle his long-seated hatred for it but quickly evolves beyond the need for petty revenge. He enlists the aid of Cathy, the local girl who loves him, to use Mathers' equipment to advance him even further, past the physical realm into a state of pure thought. Unable to bear losing him for good, she pushes the lever the opposite way (yes, it all comes down to a lever; shades of Bride of Frankenstein!) and brings him back to his old primitive self.

RANDOMONIUM

“The Sixth Finger” is the only season one episode directed by James Goldstone; he’ll be back in a big way in season two, however, with the wonderful two-part “The Inheritors.” This is the only episode written by Ellis St. Joseph; of more interest to us is the fact that series producer Joseph Stefano contributed additional script material, so this is the first episode aired that he had a hand in writing.

John Nickolaus, DOP on the series premiere “The Galaxy Being,” is back this week; he’ll work on a total of nine episodes this season (Conrad Hall, meanwhile, will do fifteen; Kenneth Peach will do eight). There’s certainly nothing wrong with his work here, but it’s a bit flat when compared to the lush, shadow-drenched visuals Conrad Hall churns out. Maybe ‘flat’ is too harsh… not as rich, maybe?

 I have other, more specific issues with the cinematography: what the hell is up with the extreme close-ups? I’m totally cool with them if they’re there to provide a claustrophobic feel, or to impart some other dramatic sentiment, but the close-ups in “The Sixth Finger” feel arbitrary and pointless. And, in the case of Prof. Mathers, kinda creepy.


Second, the staccato-cutting back-and-forth of Gwyllm shifting between evolutionary stages in the chamber during the climax looks ridiculous. I mean, like, hilariously goofy. Like drama-killing. It looks like those animated GIFs you see all over the internet. Hey, that gives me an idea....

And again, Nickolaus just doesn't slather his visuals in shadows the way Conrad Hall does. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying his work is necessarily bad.... it's just not as moody, not as atmospheric, and not as beautiful. An exception is Mrs. Ives' funeral scene, which looks like it came straight out of Ingmar Bergman's 1962 film Winter Light (which is being aired on TCM tonight, so maybe I'm not the first person to make the connection).

"The Sixth Finger" is one of the series' best-remembered and most-beloved episodes, thanks in no small part to the elaborate makeup used for Gwyllm's last evolutionary stage. It may be the single most iconic "bear" the series has to offer (to my knowledge, it's the only TOL character ever to have spawned a Halloween mask; more on this below), and I have the utmost respect for it. Well, except for the droopy nose (the evolutionary point of which mystifies me).

What I have a hard time accepting or respecting is the design for Gwyllm's first evolutionary leap forward. High forehead, patchy unkempt hair and Jesus, look at those caterpillars (Martin Scorsese called, he wants his eyebrows back).  Does the man of the future sweat more, necessitating more eye protection?  This hardly looks like a step forward. He looks like a macrocephalic clown in search of his makeup.

Happily his next evolutionary stage (one million years ahead) is much more aesthetically pleasing: less hair, smoother head... it just looks cleaner, sleeker. I think I prefer this stage to the final, much more elaborate makeup. Watch him smugly observe that he's now the opposite of the relatively-primitive Professor Mathers. It's a chilling moment and, if we didn't already foresee problems, we sure as hell do now.

Check out time stamp 44:41, in which a fly buzzes around (and lands on) Gwyllm's head. I'd never noticed it before now, and upon spotting it I immediately squealed "Help meeeeeee!" before collapsing in a fit of hysterics. Man, I crack myself up.


Okay, so Gwyllm has already demonstrated some pretty impressive telekinetic ability (opening doors, stopping hearts, throwing people around, etc), so why does he need Cathy to operate the lever to propel him even higher up the evolutionary chain? Couldn't he, you know, DO IT HIMSELF? Having her of all people help him is a reckless and moronic risk, since she's already begged him not to evolve further (he even shows her exactly how to revert him back to earlier stages!). And Christ, he's supposed to be telepathic; that big brain of his should've known what she'd do. But hey, the episode's almost over and we need a happy ending, so screw everything.

And finally, what's wrong with Gwyllm when he exits the chamber at the end? He seems okay at first: he walks over to Cathy, touches her face, examines her teardrop on his finger... and then drops to the floor, mute and glassy-eyed. Is his brain fried? Or is he just really tired from all that evolving (and devolving)?  The original script called for him to revert all the way back to protoplasmic goo, which would've made for an infinitely better ending.

Wait, this isn't hand sanitizer...!

I'd like to think he's so stunned by Jill Haworth's breathtaking beauty that he needs a moment to collect himself. I'd probably react the same way.

Sigh.

In this type of story, the lab is typically destroyed in some spectacular fashion. That surprisingly doesn't happen here, which means that Mathers can just start over again with a different subject (hopefully one without those pesky delusions of grandeur). So if the lesson here is that man isn't yet ready to evolve... well, I see no indication that Mathers has learned it.


HOUSEKEEPING

Last week I reported that the "electronic buzzing, augmented with a reverby “magic wand” sound" would be standard accompaniment for the episode-specific titles for the rest of the season (instead of actual musical underscore). Well, surprise of surprises, this week's episode has ACTUAL MUSICAL UNDERSCORE playing under the episode titles, so I was clearly wrong there. I've checked every single episode, and this is absolutely, positively the LAST one. Starting next week, the series' structure and window dressing is set in stone.*

The length of the opening title sequence is shorter starting this week: gone are the Control Voice’s lines about controlling the volume and making the image roll or flutter. Here’s a decidedly low-resolution video capture for your reference:

The opening sequence will be downsized even further down the road. You'll see when we get there.

AURAL PLEASURE

Like last week, no original music was composed for this episode; however, attentive ears will pick up the "Coffee and Cigarettes" cue from "Controlled Experiment," used here as an ersatz theme for Cathy (we hear it almost every time she's onscreen). Later, we get "Monster Appears" from "The Human Factor" and "The Big Finish" from "The Borderland" (again). Because the episodes were shot and scored out of order, cues were often heard on the series for the first time out of context, a kind of a musical sneak preview. There are also some action-oriented cues in "The Sixth Finger" that I don't recognize, so I'm guessing they came from Stoney Burke. I'd really love to get my hands on some cue sheets so I could be sure (I have cue sheets for every episode of The Twilight Zone, which has been invaluable in tracing the use and reuse of music for that show in my other blog. 

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

David McCallum is quite good as Gwyllm Griffiths in the first of two TOL starring roles (he'll be back at the end of the season in “The Forms of Things Unknown”). Interestingly, he appeared in a remake of "A Feasibility Study" in 1997 on Showtime's Outer Limits revival series (which mostly sucked, unfortunately, though there are a few gems hidden in there). Genre fans undoubtedly remember him from his stint on The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1964-68), but he's known to millions in the present day as Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard on the CBS stalwart NCIS (2003-present; if only The Outer Limits had had that kind of run).

Edward Mulhare is sufficiently stuffy (and a bit dickish, truth be told) as Professor Mathers. He appeared in a 1966 episode of The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. ("The Mata Hari Affair"), which I'm gonna count as a connection to David McCallum (despite the fact that McCallum never actually appeared on his show's S.P.I.N.O.F.F.).

Robert Doyle plays Wilt Morgan, Gwyllm's soot-covered coal-minin' coworker (say that fast three times). He worked for Daystar Productions previously in the "Cat's Eyes" episode of Stoney Burke, and he'll show up on TOL again in season two's "Expanding Human." And hey, he appeared on both The Man from U.N.C.L.E. ("The Minus-X Affair") and The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. ("The Phi Beta Killer Affair"), so there's a double C.O.N.N.E.C.T.I.O.N. for ya.

Janos Prohaska (the full-sized Thetan in "The Architects of Fear") returns to The Outer Limits as Darwin the Monkey (you didn't think that was a real monkey, did you?). He'll return in the series finale "The Probe" as Mikie the Microbe a year from January.

Jill Haworth is delicate and radiant as Cathy Evans in her only TOL appearance, which is a damn shame because she is undeniably a TOL Babe. I'd buy bread from her anytime.

Sigh (again).

HOME VIDEO RELEASES

Yes, I know there's some geometric distortion going on here. Google Images beggars can't be choosers.

“The Sixth Finger” has been released on VHS twice here in the US; first in the late 80’s as part of the 48-volume series collection, then again in the late 90’s with revised artwork.

If you didn't get out much, you probably got your TOL video fix from Columbia House, who offered the entire series on 24 two-episode tapes via mail order. “The Sixth Finger” was paired with “The Man Who Was Never Born.” In a nice bit off intercontinental synchrony, the UK retail release (volume 3 of 8) featured the same two episodes.

The episode was included in the third LaserDisc collection in 1994. The OCD collector in me wants to seek out the four TOL LD volumes, even though I don’t have player and probably never will.  I still want ‘em... you know, just to look at and stuff.

The episode has found its way onto three different DVD releases: the season one boxed set in 2002, the volume 1 set in 2007 (which comprised the first half of season 1), and the complete series boxed set in 2008. In all three incarnations, the discs are exactly the same, those unreliable DVD-18s (double-sided and dual-layered) that are the bane of so many collectors’ existences (I had to buy the volume 3 set to replace a disc that had gone bad, and I know I'm not the only one). The UK season sets (which match the original season sets here in terms of content) are single-sided discs... and I do have two region-free players.... hmmmm....

And finally, MGM has made the series available for standard-def streaming on Hulu but NOT Hulu Plus, which means even if you’re a paying member (which I am), you can’t watch it on your TV or mobile device.

What about blu-ray, you ask? Ha. I’m not holding my breath at this point. Maybe someday we’ll get an HD remastering, but it’ll probably only be available for streaming and not in a physical-object-to-own-and-cherish format.

TRADING CARD CORNER

Gwyllm was depicted twice in Topps' classic Monsters from Outer Limits card series in 1964, which is double what they gave Andy the Andromedan, but a mere fraction of the overexposure they indulged in for Andro ("The Man Who Was Never Born") and the Ebonite Interrogator ("Nightmare"), both of whom saw a whopping six cards each.

Rittenhouse produced a single series of TOL cards in 2002 which spotlighted eight episodes (nine cards for each) the backs of which summarized the story, Control Voice narration and all, and provided main cast and crew credits. Unfortunately, they frequently chose rather unexciting images for the fronts of the cards and, to my dismay, only featured the exquisite Jill Haworth on ONE lousy card.

MERCHANDISE SPOTLIGHT

As one of the series' most recognizable characters, Gwyllm has been immortalized a number of times. First and foremost, he got the deluxe action figure treatment in 2002 from Sideshow Collectibles, and it's a pretty amazing thing to behold. Look at that detail! Sideshow did a total of eight TOL characters, and I own exactly NONE of them (they're damn spendy these days, especially the two Zanti Misfits, which are up into car payment territory). Let's just say I plan to collect them all in a few years, when my wife finishes nursing school and is making the big bucks.

In 1988 Golden Era Miniatures released a 9" model kit and, as far as I can tell, they never released any other TOL kits... which might be a bit of a blessing, since the likeness here is kinda off.

Of course there's a Dimensional Designs model too... or is there? There's one listed on their website but, like Harold J. Finley last week, the listing has no picture, no price, and no sculptor listed. It was clearly planned (it was assigned a serial number, DD/OL/GG-40), but since it appears DD's TOL series has basically dried up, it'll probably never happen. Odd that they sculpted so many of the show's aliens and monsters, but never got around to doing Gwyllm, probably the most famous of them all.

There was also a "Tiny Terrors Super Deformed" model from Mad Labs released at some point (above). Um... yeah, okay.


The following video is obviously not connected to our "Sixth Finger" in any way, but I'm including it anyway because... well, it's funny. No other agenda. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, folks.

This next item doesn't really count as "merchandise," per say, but I stumbled across this while deep fishing on the internet and decided to throw it in. In 1967, Famous Monsters of Filmland published a story on John Chambers' super-evolved Gwyllm design. It's definitely worth a read:

Full disclosure time: the above article scans were rudely pilfered from The Blood Curdling Blog of Monster Masks, which is a great blog devoted to.... well, you get the idea. Do check it out. While I'm at it, here's another scan I thoughtlessly snagged from them which advertises the Gwyllm mask:

Chambers' design was turned into a full-head latex mask from Distortions Unlimited back in the early 80's. It was $74.95 then, so it would be a little over $180.00 in 2013 dollars... but you'll likely pay a lot more than that, since it's rare and highly collectible now: I found one on Amazon for $400.00 (if you order now you'll probably get it in time for Halloween!). The listing says "Death Studios," so it might be a bootleg, I dunno. Not exactly my field of expertise.






THE WRAP-UP

I'm sure I'm gonna get a few bricks thrown my way for this, but "The Sixth Finger" just doesn't quite gel for me. I do appreciate its strengths, and I certainly respect its stature within the Outer Limits creatureverse, but.... well, it's not top ten for me. Maybe not even top twenty. Go ahead, flame away. I can take it.

* Set in stone? Well, "It Crawled Out of the Woodwork" and "The Special One" will feature actual prologues instead of the now-standard pre-episode teasers, but that's not really a structural change... or is it?