The Last Flight

Description: Season 1, Episode 18

Air Date: February 5, 1960

Plot Summary: A British fighter pilot from WWI suddenly finds himself landing at an American airbase in 1959.

Review: I think I have to classify this episode under the forgettable category as the tale is mostly pointless. It's not that it isn't interesting, to a certain degree, it's just that nothing really happens and there was no deeper introspection or harsh irony to supplement this lack of story; as I've said before, every episode is not gold that's for sure. On top of the shallow story, we have a few cornball moments that further exasperate the lame factor so that wasn't helping things.

Essentially, all that happens is some British pilot from WWI, named Decker, flies into a weird cloud and ends up in 1959. He lands at an air force base he thought was French, but is American, I suppose, for contrivance's sake. Decker is semi-arrested and questioned as they realize he's a time traveler...or at least they believe he thinks he's from the past; one officer in particular believes the story quite easily. Not understanding the meaning behind the situation, they mention that a British officer will be visiting the base but Decker believes this officer died. Inquiring why Decker believes this assertion, he reveals he was a cowardly pilot and abandoned that officer when he was surrounded by German planes. Once Decker comes to terms with his cowardice, he has the epiphany that perhaps his destiny is to travel back into the past and save this officer from being shot down in order to ensure the future. Lamely escaping his confines, Decker gets to his fighter plane and magically travels back into the past. When that particular British officer shows up they question him about Decker and most of what Decker claimed is vindicated along with the explanation that Decker appeared out of nowhere saving that officer. And that's pretty much all she wrote.

On paper this could be a mildly entertaining tale, but I have a certain expectation for TZ that this episode simply does not live up to. The main feeling you get walking away from this episode is "meh." It's not terrible, but it's not good. Maybe they blew the episode's budget on the plane scenes and were forced to focus the rest of the story to a single room. Who knows. What I can say positive is that they amusingly made female officers check out Decker so there's that.