Geoffrey Horne stars as a young drifter named Wade Norton who stumbles across a dying old man while driving his car on a desolate back road. In order to get help, he goes up a winding path that seems to lead to an old house, but in reality is a large-looking brain controlled by an amoeba-like being that has been conducting an experiment on its "guests", an old couple evading the law(played by Vaughn Taylor and Nellie Burt), a former movie star(played by Gloria Grahame) and a young woman named Tess(played by Luana Anders) whose father was the dying old man. All have sad secrets that keep them there, and only Wade will have the suitable emotion to complete the necessary equation - and an end to the experiment... Fascinating philosophical episode is quite atmospheric and worthwhile,(if deliberately paced and strange) with a complex multi-layered story and haunting end.
17 Reviews
Similar in many respects to "Don't Open Till Doomsday"
garrard13 June 2007
Warning: Spoilers
The aforementioned episode, which happened to be the seventeenth of the original series' first season, and "The Guests," episode twenty-six, share many similar plot elements: both have five major characters that are trapped in a "cage," of sorts, both have a malevolent misshapen alien controlling the characters' destinies, and both are steeped in the Gothic form of storytelling.
In addition to those three commonalities, each episode has a female character that seems to be trapped in a time era of her choosing (Miriam Hopkins' abandoned flapper in "Doomsday" and Gloria Grahame's silent movie queen in "Guests." Also, Nellie Bly appears in both, playing a controlling shrew of a wife.
Because of the connection in the two, it's not hard to see "The Guests" as a sort of sequel to "Doomsday," with the "creature" in the former as being a kindred spirit to the one in the latter.
Both compliment each other and, if one can only have a few episodes of the landmark series, then these two would play well off each other.
In addition to those three commonalities, each episode has a female character that seems to be trapped in a time era of her choosing (Miriam Hopkins' abandoned flapper in "Doomsday" and Gloria Grahame's silent movie queen in "Guests." Also, Nellie Bly appears in both, playing a controlling shrew of a wife.
Because of the connection in the two, it's not hard to see "The Guests" as a sort of sequel to "Doomsday," with the "creature" in the former as being a kindred spirit to the one in the latter.
Both compliment each other and, if one can only have a few episodes of the landmark series, then these two would play well off each other.
A LITTLE SLOW BUT SCARY
asalerno1030 May 2022
A young boy runs into an old man on the road who escapes terrified of something, before dying he gives him an old photo of a beautiful young woman, the only place nearby to ask for help is an old house, once inside he notices that its occupants a strange behavior to finally discover that they are all prisoners of different times of an alien entity that is conducting a study on human behavior. The development of the episode may be
a little slow, but it is extremely creepy, intriguing and claustrophobic. The effects of the corridor with several doors are well done and the creature is quite repulsive.
That's just awful.....awful, awful, awful!
jpierce-6677510 March 2022
I saw this back in the 1960's when it first came out and the following lines from the old lady really creeped me out as a 10yo kid! "That's just awful.....awful, awful, awful!" It still creeps me out and I'm closing in on 70!
Similarities to the Eagles "Hotel California"
cathedra-3146920 January 2016
This is my absolute favorite Outer Limits episode. Does anyone else see the similarities between what happens in "The Guests" and the Eagles huge hit song, "Hotel California?" Lots of similarities, in my opinion. think about it... "you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave..." As soon as I heard the Eagles' song "Hotel California" way back in the day, it brought back memories of this episode from The Outer Limits -- even the Eagles'album cover had the same spooky kind of feel as the storyline in this episode. Has anyone else noticed? Feedback or comments, anyone? Maybe it's time for me to send an e-mail to Don Felder and ask him directly, huh?
Similar plot to "Lost Horizon" movie of 1937
whittrt6 January 2020
In Lost Horizon a plan crash delivers a group of people to the secluded Land of Shangri-La. There they enjoyed eternal youth unless they tried to leave, at which time they would rapidly age and die. One of this movie's tag lines was "I believe it because I want to believe it." This is similar to The Drifter saying "I want to believe..."
A Nice Place to Visit, but .......
Hitchcoc15 January 2015
A young man finds an old man, dying on the side of a road. When he goes to a large impressive house to get help, he is "ingested" into a surreal world of open and closed doors and open and closed minds. The place is being ruled over by a giant artichoke who is trying to "balance the equation," hoping to find a reason why humans should continue to evolve. The four people who inhabit the place seem resigned to stay there. We find in time that some of them have been in this place for forty years, yet their physical being contradicts that. In the approach to the house, the young man finds a watch with a picture of a beautiful young woman. This young woman lives in the house and is seemingly terrified. The alien talks to the inhabitants, intimidating and diminishing them. The young man tries to form an alliance with the young woman, with whom he is falling in love, but she knows something he doesn't. The conclusion is pretty much given away early on, but it is an interesting pathway. The whole thing is pretty Freudian, full of doorways, opening to nothing or simply being closed. It's worth the time, though pretty clichéd.
A brilliant episode.
Sleepin_Dragon31 July 2023
Wade Norton finds an elderly man laying on the roadside, he runs to a nearby House to find some help, when he enters he finds a group of unusual people, none of whom seek to want to help him.
Without a shadow of a doubt, this is one of my top three episodes, it's brilliant. It's a captivating mix of adventure, sci fi, heartache and mystery. It's pretty straightforward sci fi mystery, but the developing romance makes it a quite enchanting watch.
It's somewhat ambiguous, my take on it, is that it almost feels like a snippet from a long sci fi saga, we're probably left with more questions than answers.
It looks great, even the strange alien being that looks like it should be in a hay-fever commercial seems to work, I may be wrong but I think that's appeared on the show before.
As for the music, it's wonderful, that slow purposeful thud is so simple, but it's incredibly effective.
10/10.
Without a shadow of a doubt, this is one of my top three episodes, it's brilliant. It's a captivating mix of adventure, sci fi, heartache and mystery. It's pretty straightforward sci fi mystery, but the developing romance makes it a quite enchanting watch.
It's somewhat ambiguous, my take on it, is that it almost feels like a snippet from a long sci fi saga, we're probably left with more questions than answers.
It looks great, even the strange alien being that looks like it should be in a hay-fever commercial seems to work, I may be wrong but I think that's appeared on the show before.
As for the music, it's wonderful, that slow purposeful thud is so simple, but it's incredibly effective.
10/10.
Nobody leaves this house
bkoganbing22 September 2020
A very old man played by Burt Mustin comes bursting out of the woods an dies
in drifter Geoffrey Horne's arms. Seeking any family Mustin might have had Horne
goes into the woods and finds a strange old house with some very strange inhabitants. Old married couple NellieBur and Vaughn Taylor, a former movie
actress played by Gloria Grahame who dropped out of site decades ago and
young Luana Anders who says Mustin was her father. He looked more like her
great grandfather.
In fact all the people are well preserved in this place and all their needs are provided for. They just can't leave because this house is a living being and craves their company.
The plot is a bit sketchy but some great atmosphere is created in this tale from the Outer Limits. Another eviewer noted the similarity in plot between this and Lost Horizon. A most malevolent version of Lost Horizon.
In fact all the people are well preserved in this place and all their needs are provided for. They just can't leave because this house is a living being and craves their company.
The plot is a bit sketchy but some great atmosphere is created in this tale from the Outer Limits. Another eviewer noted the similarity in plot between this and Lost Horizon. A most malevolent version of Lost Horizon.
Welcome to
jbloch-7295329 December 2021
When I first heard the Eagles song my mind sprang back to this episode of the original OL's.
The story in my opinion matches the song so closely I would have great difficulty believing it was not the impetus for the song.
The story in my opinion matches the song so closely I would have great difficulty believing it was not the impetus for the song.
"If I can get myself into this house, I can get myself out!"
classicsoncall28 May 2022
Warning: Spoilers
The maze-like house in this episode could have been the inspiration for the Eagles hit song 'Hotel California' - "You can check out any time you want, but you can never leave". Up to a point anyway, because there was a way to escape, one simply had to find the answer to the missing equation. It was pretty predictable that the missing ingredient would be love, a concept the goofy host alien of the story hadn't encountered yet after roughly forty years of keeping its inhabitants captive. I found the story to be something of a parable for the lives of people trapped by their own fears, insecurities and illusions, afraid to face an unknown that might possibly lead to freedom and redemption. That was represented in the story by the gate in the cemetery that Theresa Ames (Luana Anders) was wary of walking through, though she did it as a sacrifice to allow drifter Wade Norton (Geoffrey Horne) to make his way back into the world. Gloria Grahame's character, silent screen actress Florinda Patten, reminded me of the Gloria Swanson role in "Sunset Boulevard", believing herself to be a star long past her prime as well as her day in the sun. Grahame portrayed a similar character opposite Humphrey Bogart in 1950's "In a Lonely Place", a woman possessed of a veneer of caution and distrust. Overall, I liked this episode, but with the caveat that I have of almost all the Outer Limits episodes - they came up with the sorriest looking aliens and monsters ever. The one in this story looked like a huge glowing orb of snot, in contention for the dumbest looking creature of the entire series.
This is the outstanding Outer Limits episode
pwpj1113 November 2023
Warning: Spoilers
This is the one that has invaded my dreams ever since it was first on, fifty-nine years ago! The characters are perfect: the older, bickering couple, the has-been actress straight out of Sunset Boulevard, the sincere ingenue in 19th-centuery dress, the drifter who is, at heart, a good person. He and the ingenue immediately fall for each other. I knew the ingenue could not leave because her years would catch up to her once she stepped outside the garden gate. Nevertheless, she went out of love so that the drifter, who could not have left without her, has a chance at a real life.
The creature had never before encountered love, yet he created the conditions for the ingenue and the drifter to fall in love.
The creature had never before encountered love, yet he created the conditions for the ingenue and the drifter to fall in love.
Slow....very, slow.
planktonrules8 July 2012
Warning: Spoilers
While I love "The Outer Limits" and think it's one of the great TV series of the 1960s, I've got to admit that occasionally there were misfires--episodes that just did not work for me. This is certainly the case with "The Guests"--an episode that is slow and not particularly enjoyable to watch.
It all begins with a drifter finding an old man in the road (perennial TV supporting actor, Burt Mustin). He appears to be dying and he takes him to the nearest home. However, the folks in side really don't seem to care and are total weirdos. The drifter is angry--how can they be so uncaring? Soon he finds out that they are ALL prisoners--and the house is a giant alien entity.
Wow....now that I give an overview of the show, it sounds a bit stupid too. It's not terrible but it really tried my patience as a devoted viewer. Oh, and by the way, Gloria Grahame makes an appearance as one of the unsympathetic residents of the home.
It all begins with a drifter finding an old man in the road (perennial TV supporting actor, Burt Mustin). He appears to be dying and he takes him to the nearest home. However, the folks in side really don't seem to care and are total weirdos. The drifter is angry--how can they be so uncaring? Soon he finds out that they are ALL prisoners--and the house is a giant alien entity.
Wow....now that I give an overview of the show, it sounds a bit stupid too. It's not terrible but it really tried my patience as a devoted viewer. Oh, and by the way, Gloria Grahame makes an appearance as one of the unsympathetic residents of the home.
The Gloria Grahame Episode
aimless-461 May 2010
A young drifter (Wade Norton played by Geoffrey Horne) stops his car on a rural road when he spots an ancient looking man (character actor Burt Mustin) in distress. Wade runs to a nearby Gothic mansion to telephone and finds four people seemingly trapped inside the house, one of whom is the man's young daughter.
It turns out that the house is actually an alien creature whose century long project has been the study of humans in order to construct a mathematical equation to reflect the relationship between our good and bad qualities. The alien hopes that Wade can provide the final factor he needs to balance the equation.
As almost always happened with this series, there is a profound philosophical message at work behind the monsters and the overwrought melodrama. In this case they seemed to be working toward a "Groundhog Day" allegory about living a meaningless existence. Unfortunately at the end they pull their punches and the story ends up with an extremely predictable and tame resolution.
All of which is too bad because the performances, the shot selection, and the production design make for a very creepy and off-kilter episode. This tale deserved a more challenging follow through, certainly one with a more cognitive theme.
Still it is very possible that "Groundhog Day" was partially inspired by this episode. And that Grahame's subtle characterization of an actress who no longer belongs was the model for the "Daisy" character in the "Dead Like Me" series.
Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.
It turns out that the house is actually an alien creature whose century long project has been the study of humans in order to construct a mathematical equation to reflect the relationship between our good and bad qualities. The alien hopes that Wade can provide the final factor he needs to balance the equation.
As almost always happened with this series, there is a profound philosophical message at work behind the monsters and the overwrought melodrama. In this case they seemed to be working toward a "Groundhog Day" allegory about living a meaningless existence. Unfortunately at the end they pull their punches and the story ends up with an extremely predictable and tame resolution.
All of which is too bad because the performances, the shot selection, and the production design make for a very creepy and off-kilter episode. This tale deserved a more challenging follow through, certainly one with a more cognitive theme.
Still it is very possible that "Groundhog Day" was partially inspired by this episode. And that Grahame's subtle characterization of an actress who no longer belongs was the model for the "Daisy" character in the "Dead Like Me" series.
Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.
"Dream a life and live a dream"
nickenchuggets3 December 2023
Warning: Spoilers
Out of all the episodes of The Outer Limits, The Guests is probably the one that has the most archaic feel to it. It is also one of my favorites due to its relative simplicity, but the story behind its production (which I'll get to soon) is just as interesting as most of this show's plots. The story begins with a vagabond named Norton (Geoffrey Horne) driving down a desolate country road. A very old man holding a pocket watch walks out of some tall grass and then collapses. Norton stops his car and tries to help the man, but he won't move. Taking his pocket watch, Norton finds a picture of a pretty young woman inside, and then attempts to find help. Unbeknownst to him, the old man behind Norton has turned to dust. Eventually, Norton sees a large mansion situated on a hill in the distance. Going inside, he tries to get the inhabitants, a man named Randall, his wife, and a formerly famous silent film actress named Florida Patton (Gloria Grahame) to help the old man, but none of them seem to care. They're more concerned with how old the man in the street looked. Norton says to the residents if they're unwilling to help him, they should at least point him to a telephone, but Tess (Luana Anders), says there's no way the man is still alive by now. She seems to be the only member of the house that has any compassion. Determined to still be of help, Norton tries to exit the house, but finds the door is gone. He is then pulled up towards the attic against his will by an invisible force which reveals itself in the attic as a strange, gelatinous alien creature with no visible face. This thing has been basically keeping the members of the house hostage until it is able to figure out what the fate of the human race is. It tells Norton it is on the verge of figuring out its "equation" but can't yet because humans are capable of many negative things such as hate and destruction. The thing tries to probe Norton's mind for information, but he resists it. Returning to the group downstairs, Norton finds out each person in the house has a personal exit door located in a large, dark corridor that they can use to escape the alien's presence, but don't. When Norton discovers Tess following him in this dark place, he gets mad at her for wanting to find enjoyment in "seeing the rat run through the maze", but Tess tearfully says she just didn't want him to be alone. As the brain tries to solve its seemingly unsolvable equation, it again calls Norton up to the attic as Tess pleads with it not to trap him there like it did to everyone else. Shortly after, Norton finds Tess running through the dark corridors as she tries to get away from him. She opens one door that leads into a cemetery attached to the mansion. When Norton tells Tess he wants to always be with her (even if the creature keeps him stuck in the house forever), she says she can't allow that to happen. The old man Norton found in the street was her father, and he was over a century old. Kept frozen in time as long as he stood within the house, his age revealed itself when he left it. Not wanting to see Norton be tormented by the alien forever, Tess opens the gate to the cemetery and steps outside, where she ages many decades in a matter of seconds and then dies. The devastated Norton then hears the voice of the creature talking to him: it has finally solved its equation. As it so happens, the missing part or human emotion it needed to complete it was detected during Tess and Norton's final conversation: love. The alien tells Norton to leave the house, which he does. As he walks out, the mansion on the hill turns into a giant brain and then disappears, the inhabitants being consumed by the alien. What a weird episode. No one really ever accused Outer Limits of being a normal show, but this one is really hard to figure out. The characters have all been in my mind for years, and seeing Gloria Grahame in a show like this was quite unexpected, but the best character has to be Randall's wife Ethel (Nellie Burt). She is delightfully punishing to her husband and sardonic. As for how this got made, it actually involves another very famous 60s series. Donald Sanford, who did the teleplay for this, also worked on the (by then) cancelled Boris Karloff series Thriller. Charles Beaumont, who wrote many of Twilight Zone's most classic episodes, gave Joseph Stefano a script titled "An Ordinary Town" which bears a resemblance to an hour long TZ installment in which a man is inexplicably trapped in a town brimming with advanced technology. The shot of the brain sitting on the hill was actually Beaumont's idea, but the rest of the script was made by Sanford. This seems to suggest that while many fans of old shows think Outer Limits and TZ were rivals, they borrowed some things from each other, but it mostly went only one way. Twilight Zone didn't really borrow from the Outer Limits. Whatever the case, because this episode takes place in an old Gothic house and has such a weird story, it is another example of this show at its best.
The House From Hell
StuOz5 July 2014
A drifter enters an oddball house in the middle of nowhere.
Not a classic but Limits just seemed to do the oddball-house-in-the-middle-of-nowhere thing well. It would do a better job of it in the coming episode: The Forms Of Things Unknown (this is actually one of my very favourites of the whole series).
A very hard episode to review, I can't really single out clever things about this hour, all I can say is it will never escape my memory for whatever reason???????????
The closing two minutes is without question the best part of the episode so don't give up on this one...even if that old lady gets on your nerves at bit!
Not a classic but Limits just seemed to do the oddball-house-in-the-middle-of-nowhere thing well. It would do a better job of it in the coming episode: The Forms Of Things Unknown (this is actually one of my very favourites of the whole series).
A very hard episode to review, I can't really single out clever things about this hour, all I can say is it will never escape my memory for whatever reason???????????
The closing two minutes is without question the best part of the episode so don't give up on this one...even if that old lady gets on your nerves at bit!
When in great danger, just fall in love...
fedor811 September 2021
Warning: Spoilers
One of the strangest episodes, somewhat Kafkaesque. The first 15 minutes are the most effective. The rest is interesting too, but the disappointing thing is the fairly predictable theme of love i.e. We know almost instantly that the creature's "missing ingredient" is love, which is so bloody cheesy.
This leads me to the other flaw: the very forced, unrealistic romance between Drifter and the (average-looking yet supposedly beautiful) girl. Finding himself trapped in a bizarre house created and run by an evil alien creature should have had him in full panic mode (which he was in, to a limited extent) and yet our hero finds the time to instantly fall in love, which is far too corny and undeserving for such a unique premise, not to mention absurd.
I would have preferred for the story to unfold in a more unpredictable, unusual way, just as it had started. Alas, these were the mid-60s, and it was television - and housewives needed their schmaltz. The only problem being that they didn't want their schmaltz dipped in science-fiction (just as I don't want my science-fiction dipped into schmaltz) which is one of the main reasons TOL was canceled after only two seasons: catering to female demographics within a male genre is way too optimistic and usually not doable.
The direction is very good. One of the most unique episodes.
This leads me to the other flaw: the very forced, unrealistic romance between Drifter and the (average-looking yet supposedly beautiful) girl. Finding himself trapped in a bizarre house created and run by an evil alien creature should have had him in full panic mode (which he was in, to a limited extent) and yet our hero finds the time to instantly fall in love, which is far too corny and undeserving for such a unique premise, not to mention absurd.
I would have preferred for the story to unfold in a more unpredictable, unusual way, just as it had started. Alas, these were the mid-60s, and it was television - and housewives needed their schmaltz. The only problem being that they didn't want their schmaltz dipped in science-fiction (just as I don't want my science-fiction dipped into schmaltz) which is one of the main reasons TOL was canceled after only two seasons: catering to female demographics within a male genre is way too optimistic and usually not doable.
The direction is very good. One of the most unique episodes.
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