Execution (The Twilight Zone)

"Execution"
The Twilight Zone episode
Episode no. Season 1
Episode 26
Directed by David Orrick McDearmon
Written by

Rod Serling

Story by George Clayton Johnson
Production code 173-3628
Original air date April 1, 1960
Guest appearance(s)

"Execution" is episode 26 of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone. It features Albert Salmi, who also plays the lead character in the Season 4 episode "Of Late I Think of Cliffordville".

Opening narration

Commonplace—if somewhat grim—unsocial event known as a necktie party, the guest of dishonor a cowboy named Joe Caswell, just a moment away from a rope, a short dance several feet off the ground, and then the dark eternity of all evil men. Mr. Joe Caswell, who, when the good Lord passed out a conscience, a heart, a feeling for fellow men, must have been out for a beer and missed out. Mr. Joe Caswell, in the last, quiet moment of a violent life.

Plot

In 1880, an outlaw cowboy named Joe Caswell is about to be hanged for murder. But as the noose tightens around his neck, he suddenly disappears...and finds himself in 1960, in the laboratory of Professor Manion. Manion explains that he used a time machine to pluck Caswell from the past. But when Manion sees Caswell's rope burns around his neck, and hears his admission that in his life he had murdered over twenty men, he knows he must try to send Caswell back.

The discussion leads to an argument. Caswell attacks Manion, killing him with a desk lamp. He then flees from the laboratory into a busy street, but becomes so overwhelmed by the lights and the noise that he returns to the lab. Caswell, distraught and desperate, breaks down, pleading for the dead scientist to help him.

Suddenly, a thief named Paul Johnson enters the lab. Caswell fights with Johnson, but Johnson gets the upper hand in the fight and strangles Caswell with the cord from the window curtains. As he tries to find Manion's safe, he accidentally activates the time machine and is sent back to 1880, appearing in the noose intended for Caswell, just in time to be hanged. The Old Man and the Reverend are shocked to see a stranger's body, in strange clothes, in place of Caswell's; the Old Man orders it to be cut down and asks the Reverend for an explanation, but the latter cannot even answer whether this was the Devil's work or some other power's.

Closing narration

This is November 1880, the aftermath of a necktie party. The victim's name—Paul Johnson, a minor-league criminal and the taker of another human life. No comment on his death save this: justice can span years. Retribution is not subject to a calendar. Tonight's case in point in The Twilight Zone.

Further reading

External links

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