Tales of Tomorrow (1951)
Tales of Tomorrow is an American anthology science fiction series that was performed and broadcast live on ABC from 1951 to 1953. The series covered such stories as Frankenstein, starring Lon Chaney, Jr., 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea starring Thomas Mitchell as Captain Nemo, and many others featuring such performers as Boris Karloff, Brian Keith, Lee J. Cobb, Rod Steiger, Bruce Cabot, Franchot Tone, Gene Lockhart, Walter Abel, Leslie Nielsen, and Paul Newman. The series had many similarities to the later Twilight Zone which also covered one of the same stories, "What You Need". In total it ran for eighty-five 30-minute episodes.
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Episode 1 - A Bird in Hand
Release Date: 1952-08-22Two youngsters discover a talking bird in a zoo and come to the realization that the bird is part of a plot by the animal kingdom to reclaim the world from humans.
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Episode 2 - Thanks
Release Date: 1952-08-29A scientific invention brings glory to a struggling violinist but it also causes him to commit murder.
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Episode 3 - The Seeing Eye Surgeon
Release Date: 1952-09-05When a prominent physician dons a pair of eyeglasses he discovers that he can see into the future.
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Episode 4 - The Cocoon
Release Date: 1952-09-12A group of scientists are trapped inside a house in a remote jungle by hideous invisible creatures.
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Episode 5 - The Chase
Release Date: 1952-09-19A man arrives at a sea lodge and confesses to a murder but it's later revealed that he's from the future.
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Episode 6 - Youth on Tap (aka: Young Blood)
Release Date: 1952-09-26A 26 year old man gives a doctor a blood transfusion in return for $1,000 but the process causes the young man to age.
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Episode 7 - Substance X
Release Date: 1952-10-03A young woman goes to her hometown at the behest of a food conglomerate. Her assignment is to discover what the people of the community are using for food after their only food outlet closes. She discovers a scientist who has developed a food substitute called 'Substance X'. Anyone who diets on Substance X is unable to eat normal food from that time on.
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Episode 8 - The Horn
Release Date: 1952-10-10A scientist invents a machine that has the power to control human emotions.
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Episode 9 - Double Trouble
Release Date: 1952-10-17A writer pens a story about a death ray machine only to discover later that the government actually has such a device.
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Episode 10 - Many Happy Returns (aka: Invaders at Ground Zero)
Release Date: 1952-10-24A father discovers that his son and other neighborhood children are being controlled telepathically by an alien.
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Episode 11 - The Tomb of King Tarus
Release Date: 1952-10-31An archeologist discovers that an ancient king has been able to stay alive for centuries in a tomb deep beneath the Egyptian desert.
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Episode 12 - The Window
Release Date: 1952-11-07A live television program is interrupted by a mysterious signal that shows a murder about to take place.
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Episode 13 - The Camera
Release Date: 1952-11-14A blackmailer discovers a camera that will take pictures 25 years into the future.
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Episode 14 - The Quiet Lady
Release Date: 1952-11-21A deadly disease covers the earth and its only hope is a little girl.
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Episode 15 - The Invigorating Air
Release Date: 1952-11-28A young scientist produces a new kind of air which proves to be "invigorating."
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Episode 16 - The Glacier Giant
Release Date: 1952-12-05A reporter and his damsel sidekick search for a giant reportedly encased in the ice of the Himalayas.
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Episode 17 - The Fatal Flower
Release Date: 1952-12-12Doing research in the Brazilian jungle, two biochemists develop a mysterious plant.
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Episode 18 - The Machine
Release Date: 1952-12-19A machine that can foretell the future says that one of a doctor's infant patients will grow up to be a murderer.
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Episode 19 - The Bitter Storm
Release Date: 1952-12-26A man brings back voices and sounds from the Garden of Eden.
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Episode 20 - The Mask of Medusa
Release Date: 1953-01-02Perry Mason won't be able to help a killer who takes refuge in a museum where the statues come to life.
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Episode 21 - Conqueror's Isle
Release Date: 1953-01-09 -
Episode 22 - Discovered Heart
Release Date: 1953-01-16An alien who's an advance scout for an invasion force arrives at a lighthouse hoping to use its beacon as a signal. A precocious little girl win's the alien's heart and moves the extraterrestrial to surrender his life to prevent invasion.
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Episode 23 - The Picture of Dorian Gray
Release Date: 1953-01-23Handsome Dorian Gray never seems to age but the same cannot be said about his portrait.
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Episode 24 - Two Faced
Release Date: 1953-01-30To win the love of a woman, a man arranges to have the head of her former lover transplanted onto his body.
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Episode 25 - The Build Box
Release Date: 1953-02-06A little boy is the recipient of a strange box from the owner of a gift shop.
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Episode 26 - Another Chance
Release Date: 1953-02-13A man is given the chance to live the past seven years of his life over but he makes the same mistakes.
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Episode 27 - The Great Silence
Release Date: 1953-02-20The nation is hit with an epidemic in which vocal chords are paralyzed but it's actually an alien plot to control the people of the United States.
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Episode 28 - Lonesome Village
Release Date: 1953-02-27 -
Episode 29 - The Fury of the Cocoon
Release Date: 1953-03-06Members of an expedition into the jungle are attacked by invisible blood sucking leaches from outer space.
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Episode 30 - The Squeeze Play
Release Date: 1953-03-13A magician hates a reporter so he hypnotizes all the people with whom the newsie comes into contact into forgetting him.
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Episode 31 - Read to Me Herr Doktor
Release Date: 1953-03-20An old professor with failing eyesight builds a robot named Herr Doktor to read him books that he had never had a chance to read when he was younger. The relationship between the professor and the robot is very close. The books that the robot reads give it the desire to be a complete person. Their roles become reversed. The robot begins to demand that the professor read aloud to him. Later, the robot falls in love with the professor's daughter. When she spurns the robot, it learns that the books it has been reading were wrong and it dies of a broken heart.
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Episode 32 - Ghost Writer
Release Date: 1953-03-27A writer discovers to his horror that the events in his short stories are coming true.
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Episode 33 - Past Tense
Release Date: 1953-04-03A doctor travels back in time in order to extol the virtues of penicillin and save lives but ends up being committed to an insane asylum where he falls ill and dies from a disease which could have been prevented by penicillin.
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Episode 34 - Homecoming
Release Date: 1953-04-10A pilot returns home after being stranded in the Arctic for five years and discovers that he can only live in cold temperatures.
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Episode 35 - The Rivals
Release Date: 1953-04-17A new wife finds herself a rival for her husband's affections--his cat.
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Episode 36 - Please Omit Flowers
Release Date: 1953-04-24A mortician discovers a serum that induces a death-like sleep.
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Episode 37 - The Evil Within
Release Date: 1953-05-01A scientist creates a formula that unlocks evil. Then his wife unknowingly ingests some of the formula.
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Episode 38 - The Vault
Release Date: 1953-05-08While making scientific tests, four people get trapped inside a vault.
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Episode 39 - Ink
Release Date: 1953-05-15A chemist comes into possession of an ink which has the power to hypnotize all who look at anything written with the substance.
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Episode 40 - The Spider's Web
Release Date: 1953-05-22Inhabitants of an island find themselves affected by atomic radiation.
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Episode 41 - Lazarus Walks
Release Date: 1953-05-29A man gets revived after being declared clinically dead for a short period of time. Then he discovers that he has the ability to detect lies.
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Episode 42 - What Dreams May Come
Release Date: 1953-06-12A woman receives telepathic waves that she is about to be murdered.