Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

For a television, network show this series was special, in that it was truly scary and sent my siblings and I to bed each Friday night in the fall of 1972 scared to death. We ranged in ages from 6 to 14 and this was the must see show for all of us. Seeing it again 45 years later, I appreciate the writing and the cavalcade of stars (both big and small screen) that starred in these episodes. They excelled in crafty horror tales, set in mostly present day '70's, that would wind up the suspense to the very end and just spook the daylights out of any impressionable young person. Eerie soundtrack and all!Very well timed, great editing and a fabulous narration by Sebastian Cabot who was later abandoned as the show continued in 1973 with a new title and with less ghostly charm.

I have been looking for this show for years. I could only remember bits and pieces of this show as my brother and I watched it with our dad when I was 8.The two episodes that kept sticking in my mind were the one about the toy horse that grows when it's outside the mirrored box and the other was the story of the brother and sister who find the man living in the empty apartment upstairs who turns out to be an Ax Murderer! For the longest time I have searched for these shows and I kept remembering it as being a painting that the kids went into so I was associating it with "Night Gallery".Well, I'm glad I stumbled across this post and I just ordered a copy of the show on DVD from Amazon! Can't wait to see these shows again with my brother. I only regret that my dad is no longer with us to watch as well.

I was a child of ten when this came out, and if our family was home on Friday nights, we'd tune into it. We lost interest when it became "Circle of Fear," but I still remember this one fondly, and wish I could get it on video/DVD or whatever.The basic setup of the show was that Winston Essex (Sebastian Cabot) would invite you into his hotel, and point out a guest that was about to have a very odd experience. The episode then featured that person dealing with whatever supernatural issues they faced for the week. About halfway through the season, Essex disappeared, and the episodes started without any preamble. Unfortunately, neither version of the series caught on, and it only lasted a season, but I still remember some of the more frightening episodes: The New House: A young couple (David Birney, Barbara Parkins), expecting their first child move into their first home, which happens to be built on the site of a gallows where an innocent girl was hanged two centuries before. Her spirit, however, lives on, and takes a most unfortunate interest in the newborn baby...At the Cradle Foot: Paul, a recently divorced man (James Franciscus) has a vision of his young daughter, Emily (Lorie Busk) being murdered as an adult (Lisa James). He decides to go to the town he sees in his vision to see if he can stop the murder from happening. During his stay there, he becomes involved with Julie (Meg Foster), the young woman who runs the boardinghouse where he's staying, who just happens to be engaged to Ed, the man (Karl Swenson) who killed Emily in Paul's vision. Tensions heat up between the two, and Paul ends up killing Ed. While on trial, his ex-wife Karen (Elizabeth Ashley) comes to help out. Paul gets off by claiming the killing was accidental. However, just as he is about to leave, Julie informs him that she is carrying Ed's child. Realizing that Julie's child will grow up to be the man who kills his daughter, Paul goes to his car, where Karen is waiting, and grabs a gun. Karen stops him from killing Julie, saying that she and Paul should be able to stay alive long enough to keep Emily from being murdered.The Summer House: A woman (Carolyn Jones) goes to spend the summer at a vacation house that she and her husband (Steve Forrest) own. She hates the house, and it turns out to be with good cause, as there is a malevolent spirit that lives in the well in the basement. Unfortunately, the spirit causes a time loop, and she and her husband are trapped forever in that house during that summer. What was particularly cool about this episode was that you only got part of the information each time through the loop, and it wasn't until the very end that it became apparent what was happening.Alter-Ego: Bobby (Michael-James Wixted) is a somewhat sickly boy who loves to play chess. He has just started the fifth grade, and loves his popular teacher (Helen Hayes), so he is especially disappointed when he becomes too sick to attend school early on in the year. A young boy who looks just like him tells him not to worry, that he will go to school in Bobby's stead and teach him everything when he comes back home. Bobby is too sick to do anything other than agree to this arrangement, but the alter-ego quickly takes over, terrorizing the teacher, causing her to retire in disgrace, and ultimately causing her death when she falls on a pair of pruning sheers. He brags about all of this to Bobby who seems to become weaker as the alter-ego becomes stronger. The alter-ego decides that the two should play a game of chess, and whoever wins gets to live out his life as Bobby. The game seems to be going in favor of the alter-ego when the teacher appears telling Bobby what moves to make. The alter-ego complains that this is unfair, but the teacher informs him that he can't finish the game anyway, as he is due to spend eternity in a little classroom with the teacher discussing what he did to her. The teacher and the alter-ego vanish, and Bobby is well again.Half a Death: A young woman named Christina (Pamela Franklin) comes home to visit her parents. Christina has a twin named Lisa (Pamela Franklin, oddly enough) whom she has never met. She is expecting to meet Lisa once she gets home, but finds, to her disappointment that Lisa has recently died. However, Christina starts hearing Lisa calling for her at night. Pressing her mother (Eleanor Parker) for information about Lisa, she finds that Lisa had severe mental problems, and that when Lisa was sick with a high fever one night, her mother delayed calling the doctor until morning, and by morning Lisa had died. When Lisa calls for Christina again, their mother offers herself to Lisa, dying so that Christina may live.The episodes were exceptionally well done. The writing was subtle so that often it wasn't until the end that the viewer figured out what was going on. The acting was good. The atmosphere created lent to the sense of unease in the story. All in all, it made for very enjoyable viewing.It's a shame they no longer broadcast these. Hopefully, a channel will pick them up, or they will be released on video someday. They truly were well crafted, scary stories.

I liked this series. The one episode I remember best is "Concrete Captain," where the body of an old sailor is entombed in a block of concrete. He was killed by the grandfather of one of the characters in the story (I think it was a mercy killing) by having a harpoon chucked through his heart. The top of the harpoon still sticks out of the concrete. Then the ghost of the sailor comes back to haunt everyone.I also liked the theme music. I actually recorded it off the TV one night with my first cassette recorder. I still have that tape.When they changed it to "Circle of Fear," I thought it was a mistake. The theme music was dumb, too.