Demon with a Glass Hand
| "Demon with a Glass Hand" | |
|---|---|
| The Outer Limits episode | |
| Episode no. | Season 2 Episode 5 |
| Directed by | Byron Haskin |
| Written by | Harlan Ellison |
| Cinematography by | Kenneth Peach |
| Production code | 41 |
| Original air date | October 17, 1964 |
| Guest appearance(s) | |
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| Episode chronology | |
"Demon with a Glass Hand" is an episode of The Outer Limits television series, the second to be based on a script by Harlan Ellison, which Ellison wrote specifically with actor Robert Culp in mind for the lead role. It originally aired on 17 October 1964, and was the fifth episode of the second season.
In 2009, TV Guide ranked "Demon with a Glass Hand" #73 on its list of the 100 Greatest Episodes.
"Through all the legends of ancient peoples — Assyrian, Babylonian, Sumerian, Semitic — runs the saga of the Eternal Man, the one who never dies, called by various names in various times, but historically known as Gilgamesh, the man who has never tasted death ... the hero who strides through the centuries ..."
(Narrator Vic Perrin mistakenly says "Sumerican" instead of "Sumerian".)
Trent (Robert Culp) is a man with no memory of his life before the past ten days. His left hand has been replaced by an advanced computer shaped like his missing hand and protected by some transparent material. Three fingers are missing; the computer tells him they must be reattached before it can tell Trent what is going on. Trent is being hunted by a handful of humanoid aliens called the Kyben; they have the missing appendages. The action takes place in a large rundown office building which the Kyben have sealed off from the world. In this deadly game of hide-and-seek, Trent enlists the help of Consuelo Biros (Arlene Martel), a woman who works in the building.
For reasons unknown to him, Trent was sent into the past via a "time mirror", located in the building. A captured Kyben tells Trent that both of them are from a thousand years in the future. In that future, Earth has been conquered by the Kyben, but all the surviving humans except Trent have mysteriously vanished. The aliens are being obliterated by a "radioactive plague" that is killing all intelligent life on the planet, apparently unleashed by the humans in a last-ditch effort to repel the invasion. In a desperate attempt to find a cure for the plague and to extract whatever knowledge is stored in the hand/computer, the Kyben have followed him back in time with the missing fingers.
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