Classic TV 📺 Series: The Twilight Zone (1959) Season 1 – Episode #8: “Time Enough At Last”

Original logo of The Twilight Zone in 1959. (Photo Source: National Library Service)

Except for life itself, nothing else is more precious than the time we spend living it. How that time is spent – or should be spent, though, can always the subject of lively and often acrimonious debate. Such is the case in “Time Enough At Last” where a nerdy bank teller, Henry Bemis (Burgess Meredith) is harassed by his pompous branch manager at work and his shrewish wife at home because of his love for reading just about any publication he can get his hands on. It also appears that nobody else around him appreciates his admiration for classical literature by such greats as Charles Dickens in particular.

To avoid being constantly nagged about engaging in his favorite (or only!) pastime as the case appears to be, he goes to the extreme length of retreating to the bank’s vault to read during his lunch hour. What is most appealing about this episode (at least for me) is not merely about being a bookworm, but also about the need for solitude. Much as the Twilight Zone episode implies then —there still is severe lack of appreciation by society at large today for the need some of us fully recognize to engage in quiet, contemplative activities. This activity does not necessarily include present day social media (unknown in 1959) which is geared towards inciting negative emotions to encourage further political and social discord.

However, this episode implies something more sinister and anti-intellectual at work here. Bemis is being chastised a time waster, and being engaged in anything that isn’t an economic activity such as reading is useless and suspect — subversive even, and a danger to society. Bemis is even viewed as antisocial, although that is a term often misused as he is hardly dangerous, criminal, or unprincipled. Unfortunately for Bemis (and likely for some of us too) there is a bigger enemy than hostile surroundings which thwart our efforts to engage in reading to our hearts content. This, of course, is time…the eventual downfall and terminator of us all. It’s almost perversely amusing that a nuclear holocaust was necessary for Bemis to have “Time Enough At Last” to engage his obsession for consuming an astonishing array of print media.

After all, being locked away in the bank vault buried in a book is what saved him from annihilation. It was as though for a brief, wonderful while…time was stopped and all other interferences were removed from his self-indulgent, self-satisfied realm. As it turns out, though, anything that seems to good to be true always is — hoary old clichés notwithstanding. After Bemis is finally all alone and left to his own devices, with all the books he could ever need, the unthinkable happens. While pondering his incredible good fortune in an otherwise shattered world, another deterrent puts the kibosh on pursuing his solitary dream…and for this anyone who hasn’t watched this episode yet, won’t have the ending spoiled by me!

Seriously, though, “Time Enough At Last” like all Twilight Zone episodes always has a surprising or thought provoking twist. The end of this episode was especially regrettable in my estimation because of identifying with Henry Bemis to a large degree and as a person who does not have an issue distinguishing the difference between solitude and loneliness. The over dependence on technology is another important theme here that causes me (along with many other people) considerable anxiety. In the end, it’s a relatively simple loss of technology suffered by Bemis which ends his last grab at happiness and contentment that can almost bring tears to our eyes.