The Purple Testament

Description: Season 1, Episode 19

Air Date: February 12, 1960

Plot Summary: During the Pacific front of WWII, a man can foresee who will die ahead of time.

Review: This definitely falls into the forgettable category of episodes--mostly due to the lack of depth in the story; this is a problem common of the weaker entries as they lacked a certain oomph associated with TZ. This isn't to say the episode offers nothing of value though. We have the first appearance of Barney Phillips, who is one of the few actors to appear in multiple episodes, as well as Dick York who is better known as the original Darrin from "Bewitched." On top of that, this is one of the rarer instances where we see the Pacific side of WWII as opposed to the European front that almost always makes up WWII themed fiction; specifically, the episode's setting is supposed to be in the Philippines and somewhat close to Manila.

The episode begins with a group of soldiers coming back from a mission and one of them is troubled. This troubled officer discusses with his commanding officer, a captain (Mr. York), that he wrote a note with four names on it. In turns out those four men died during the mission, but the officer wrote the names the day before. The officer claims he sees a bright light around the faces of soldiers before they die as a kind of omen. The captain, of course, doesn't want to believe this but the conviction of the officer forces the captain to have him physically evaluated. Turning up nothing of significance in the evaluation, we see the officer's ability first hand as an injured soldier's face glows right before he dies moments later. When going on another mission, the officer sees that the captain's face now glows, and he tries to warn the captain to not go on the mission. Not entirely discounting this advice, the captain leaves a few personal belongings behind, but when regular soldiers question this psychic ability the captain reassures everyone it's not real. After the mission, the captain obviously dies, and the officer is requested to come back to base camp. Predictable as hell, the officer is preparing his gear when he looks in a mirror to see that his own face now glows. Accepting his fate, the officer gets into a jeep with a driver whose face also glows. Sure enough, a loud explosion is heard as the remaining soldiers aren't sure if it was thunder or an explosion...but come the fuck on guys. And that's it!

I mean, the episode simply feels hollow. There's no questioning what's happening. No philosophical considerations. No implications as to why this particular soldier or for what purpose. Just nothing. This is highly atypical for TZ especially considering the writers' wariness from WWII we see explored in other, better, episodes. Eh, the story is put together competently enough, with room to do something creative, but we never have an interesting idea manifest and the predictability to the ending didn't help either. Oh well, like I've said before, they can't all be gold.