Out of This World (UK TV series)

Out of This World
Boris Karloff hosting Out of this World
Created by	Irene Shubik
Presented by	Boris Karloff
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Original language(s)	English
No. of series	1
No. of episodes	13
Production
Producer(s)	Leonard White
Running time	c. 60 min. per episode
Release
Original network	ABC Television (UK)
Original release	30 June – 22 September 1962
Chronology
Related shows	Armchair Theatre

Out of This World is a British science fiction anthology television series made by ABC Television and broadcast in 1962. A spin-off from the Armchair Theatre anthology series, each episode was introduced by the actor Boris Karloff. Many of the episodes were adaptations of stories by science fiction writers including Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick and Clifford D. Simak. The series is generally seen as a precursor to the BBC science fiction anthology series Out of the Unknown.

Series creator Irene Shubik began her career working on educational films for Encyclopædia Britannica Inc in Chicago before returning home to London where she joined ABC Television as a story editor on the anthology series Armchair Theatre under producer Sydney Newman in 1960. A science fiction fan since college, Shubik approached Newman during the summer of 1961 with the notion of making a science fiction version of Armchair Theatre, similar to the Armchair Mystery Theatre spin-off that specialised in crime and mystery stories. Shubik had already commissioned several science fiction tinged scripts for Armchair Theatre such as "The Omega Mystery" and "The Ship That Couldn't Stop". However, the production that acted as a template for what would become Out of This World was "Murder Club", an adaptation of Robert Sheckley’s short story The Seventh Victim, starring Richard Briers, that aired under the Armchair Theatre banner on 3 December 1961. Also around this time the BBC had scored a notable hit with the science fiction thriller A for Andromeda.