The Outer Limits (TV Series) Valerie 23 (1995) User Reviews

A Boost for the Doll Industry

[Hitchcoc · 8/10 · 22 February 2014]

A young man finds himself confined to a wheelchair. He can't shake his depression and a friend/coworker feels that he could combat loneliness by having access to a beautiful android, manufactured in the lab. The stresses come from his futility in finding relationships. At first he rejects her because she is a "machine." However this machine is fully functional and breathtakingly beautiful and can provide everything a red-blooded man could want. Unfortunately, one emotion that was left in the mix by her creators was jealousy. When he fellow realizes that there is someone else and pursues a relationship with a real woman (less attractive but kind and caring), Valerie begins to flex her synthetic muscles. She becomes more than angry; she becomes a real threat. There is some serious talk about what makes a sentient creature (fearing death, for example), and this gives the episode some legs. The byplay between the man and his "plaything" is pretty believable (assuming such a being could be put together) and we feel for him, but once again, one mustn't mess with the gods and creation.

Good episode

[dean2900 · 7/10 · 18 August 2007]

This episode appears on the Sex and Science Fiction Collection of the Outer Limits new series.

This doesn't cover new territory as it tells the story of an android programmed to be a companion who develops human emotions such as love, hate, jealousy, etc. The themes are very similar to many old sci-fi novels and even the TNG Star Trek in debating what separates a human from an android.

This is the Outer Limits so you know something will go awry.

Don't expect a masterpiece but it will entertain you if you like sci-fi.

One heckuva robot

[ctomvelu1 · 6/10 · 24 November 2012]

There is one very good reason for watching this distaff version of "Frankenstein": our protagonist, a wheelchair-bound scientist (Sadler) has sex with a comely android creation (Shinas). Shinas is absolutely gorgeous, and fulfills an anatomically correct living doll in the closet fantasy all hetero males share. And unlike "Jeannie" and "My Living Doll," this stunner gets completely nekkid before doing the dirty deed with her master. Nothing new plot wise here, but it is definitely entertaining for an adult male audience. This OL episode, like so many others, contains female nudity (using the most stunning looking women imaginable) and soft core sex scenes -- which certainly also must have entertained young boys everywhere. Highly recommended for the sensuality, even when you know where the plot will end up.

One freaky sci-fi love triangle!

[Foreverisacastironmess123 · 8/10 · 26 March 2019]

What's better, a real flesh and blood woman with human faults and frailties, or an idealised manufactured fantasy? Can a machine develop a soul? And would you have sex with a robot?? These are the questions that Valerie 23 dared to ask! Valerie 23 should have been the perfect housekeeper and companion, being programmed to cook, clean, be unfailingly obedient, polite, and ~fully~ equipped to take care of her master's every need! But there's a hidden danger in her perfect servitude and it seems that her makers made a minor oversight when they were compiling her do no harm subroutines, because she's capable of developing her basic personality beyond its original bounds, and has no sense of conscience, and is quite capable of experiencing the darker emotions like possessiveness and a deadly jealousy that drives her to 'logically' eliminate the competition! Okay so I also think that it's mainly the performance of Sofia Shinas that really makes this episode a worthwhile and compelling one, she had a manner in how she played it that made it seem like she was a robot trying to act like a human and not vice-versa. She made for a terrific robot who was strangely desirable but who also had an otherworldly quality that decidedly was definitely not human, and it was creepy when she became threatening while still wearing the same sweet programmed expression. William Sadler was good too as about the most unsympathetic cripple ever, he was a rather abrasive character I thought, and he was so mean when he compared Valerie to a dishwasher and made her cry and felt bad about it, and then took it back and admonished himself for feeling for the emotions of a mere machine! It is a bit of a hammy episode but it does make you think about some of the themes that it brings to light. I don't think I'd be so inconsiderate with even an artificial being's emotions, just because she wouldn't be real wouldn't mean that I'd have to be a rude jerk! I don't think I could be intimate with one though, not even if it looked like my true love. It would just feel too pathetic. I'm glad they slowly cut down on the erotica element as the series went on, because to me it felt a bit tacky and ill-fitting somewhere, it wasn't hard edged enough of a show to have full frontal nudity, leave it to HBO guys! It is quite unintentionally hilarious when Valerie gets fried and dances around like a crazy woman with her weird bald head and it makes me laugh every time I see it, what an insane little moment! Her following 'death' is quite poignant enough to make up for it though.. In closing this episode about Alluring robot women gone homicidally awry still makes for a good romp and is a classic of the show's slightly more raunchy early days, and while there were much better and more intelligently done robotics stories that were to come this is still worth revisiting every now and then, it's a good solid episode. X

wow Valerie

[petersjoelen · 8/10 · 19 October 2020]

I just saw this episode again after 25 years and i remember i was back then blown away by the story . See it again after so many years the story is still blows me away and is very well written . The actress who plays valerie does an amazing job and she is both beautiful and affectively robotic . The special effects are also very well for an tv show .

"I'm going to clean the house and cook the best dinner in my memory banks."

[classicsoncall · 7/10 · 10 July 2022]

In the mid-Nineties when this show aired, robotic companions like the one in this story were still pretty much in the realm of wishful thinking. Today, the idea isn't so preposterous, and there's already a fairly well established sexbot industry with plenty of customers, and you don't have to be physically handicapped to indulge. Watching the episode today, you have to place yourself back in time to a world where human-like robots were still the stuff of science fiction. The story played out plausibly enough with a skeptical man who wanted no part of co-habiting with a beautiful android, but gradually came around to the idea when a potential relationship got derailed before it had a chance to get off the ground. The fly in the ointment turned out to be a little thing called jealousy, which entered the picture when 'Valerie 23' (Sofia Shinas) began to question Frank Hellner (William Sadler) about the physical therapist (Nancy Allen) who had a change of heart about a possible romance. I would question the method used by Frank to come up with the live wire he used to short circuit Valerie without shocking himself, but it all happens so quickly you don't have time to dwell on it. This one ended about the only way it could have if you're in the camp of 'love conquers all', but wouldn't it have been interesting if Valerie turned out to be a robotic serial killer?

Are we there yet?

[steve-balogh · 10/10 · 28 February 2021]

I am watching this episode 25 years after it was made and am impressed how accurate this OL prediction is turning out to be. Already there are some very humanoid companions available and AI is becoming more and more indistinguishable from real people. I give it another 10 years before a close approximation to "Valerie" becomes commercially available. Although tempting, I think I will stick with my very human female companion for now.

Uncensored

[californiarecordshop · 7/10 · 12 September 2020]

Warning: Uncensored version may cause spontaneous tumescence. I was watching this the other day and had no idea there were uncensored versions of this show... the chick is hot. In spite her 'Doherty' eye syndrome, if you only look at one side of her face at a time; she looks like two different people. But I had no idea she was going to completely strip and leave NOTHING to the imagination... it was so unexpected that it was a real turn on and a side effect was a spontaneous tumescence that had to be dealt with... Fair warning guys... watch this when your girlfriend is around... Its a decent run-o-the-mill android flick other than that... with some fairly obvious devices, but the acting is done very well especially the android chick and she is very creepy as she stalks her man. Looking forward to the Valerie 25...

Haunting and prescient

[powersofdavid · 9/10 · 23 February 2024]

This story, about a paraplegic man and a prototype female android that was designed to be a companion, assistant, conversationalist, and sexual partner for the lonely, is oddly haunting and affecting. "Valerie", the robot, is an extraordinarily sympathetic character; I found myself wishing that her preoccupied male cohort weren't so inclined to be dismissive of her, because she is programmed to behave in remarkably human ways (for better or worse). But, then again, without conflict between man and robot, there would be no plot. The way Artificial Intelligence and robots are progressing in the 21st Century, something like this may actually happen in 60 or 70 years. This episode is well written, well acted, and superbly cast. I was such a fan of the original 1960's Outer Limits, it's great to delve into this color "sequel series" from the mid-1990's.

Great premise, although disability to developing a best offer !!!!

[elo-equipamentos · 6/10 · 18 October 2019]

I'm very disappointed until now on Outer Limits new series, the pilot episode was a bad introducing, the Valerie 23 also is an average attempt to bring to life the fabulous original concept, perhaps l've been nostalgic or something, however the new series wasn't a match the forerunner, the plot is quite promising, the science create a new kind of Android with emotional feelings, soft skin, fed like humans that provides everything that it needs and most important, will be available every time to make sex without complaints, no headaches, unwillingness, whatever a perfect companion that the man can buy, sadly it wasn't so easy, it will be collateral effects, should be better as expected, an alternative ending with Karen Allen being an Android neither, it will be unpredictable ending, just a suggestion!!

Resume:

First watch: 2019 / How many: 1 / Source: DVD / Rating: 6.5

Life is defined by the fear of death

[Bored_Dragon · 5/10 · 5 December 2018]

The series "The Outer Limits" in the second episode again tells the story of scientists who are playing gods. This time, they developed an android, which by its appearance and behavior perfectly imitates a person, and even does not work on electricity, but eats and lubricates by extraction of oil from food. The prototype is a perfect woman, intended for a companion to handicapped men who can not find a partner. One of them takes her home for a week to test her before releasing into mass production.

Although interesting and deals with controversial issues about which people will probably never agree, the story is totally unoriginal, haste and undeveloped. If it was made as a feature film, like the pilot episode, it would leave time for the story to be developed gradually and more thoroughly, and for convincing characterization as well, so the film, although unoriginal, might have left some distinct mark on the already seen story. This way, we can see only hints of its unexploited potential and the episode is bland and unimpressive. The acting is mediocre and the only impressionable thing in this film is the fully naked body of breathtaking Sofia Shinas.

5/10