Allow us to discover just a little story about Charlie Hill, who buys an odd jar and takes it residence. Though the jar emanates an ominous aura, Charlie doesn’t half with it, as he thinks it has granted him respect amongst his friends. His spouse, Thedy, is petrified of the jar, and her paranoia escalates when individuals from afar throng to their home to view the curio. Everybody perceives one thing completely different within the jar, unable to make out its contents, which reinforces its thriller because the episode progresses. After an enraged Thedy breaks the jar, Charlie murders her, and reinstalls the jar for everybody to see: this time, everybody perceives Thedy’s decapitated head contained in the seemingly-cursed curio.
Such a twisty, spine-chilling story can simply be thought of part of “The Twilight Zone,” as a number of entries in that sequence have been equally, if no more macabre of their therapy of normal themes in horror. Nonetheless, the above entry, titled “The Jar”, is definitely an episode of the second season of “The Alfred Hitchcock Hour,” which aired in 1964. The explanation why “The Jar” is usually mistaken for a Serling particular is that Hitchcock’s anthology targeted extra on subtlety than ugly twists, hinging its horror on absurd eventualities equivalent to those in “The Case of Mr. Pelham” and “Lamb to the Slaughter.” Norman Lloyd’s “The Jar” broke the mould of a Hitchcock particular in some ways, because it step by step constructed up an aura of suspenseful mysticism solely to subvert expectations and unleash a monstrous act. Ultimately, the contents of the jar are immaterial, as Charlie’s actions add an irredeemable layer of evil to what the jar might need represented.
Combine-up apart, each Serling’s and Hitchcock’s reveals brim with distinctive gems value revisiting to good measure.