User Reviews

A fictionalized account of a lab experiment gone wrong, and the very first mention of LSD as a psychodelic (the word hadn't been coined yet) in the media. This was October 1955 and Timothy Leary was still experimenting with mushrooms. This was very avant-gard in 1955 and was still relatively unknown in 1963 when Leary started shooting off his mouth. Remember, Imipramine was just invented, also Thorazine. Retalin wasn't yet but Dexadrine and Benzedrine was. The main psychotropics were Phenobarbitol and Dexadrine. We were primitive. The whole idea of medication to affect neurotransmitters was still two decades off. This show, like so many others, is a decade before its time.

I was reminded of an episode of the original Star Trek. In it we find that those mining a certain substance turn violent when in the mines. Kirk tries to convince the ruling class that this is happening and to end their conflicted relationship. In this offering, an elderly researcher who has been doing work of great importance) strangles a cleaning woman outside his lab. He is duly convicted and sentenced to death (the old electric chair). This violence was totally out of character for him and leaves his friends and relatives searching for answers. A new guy comes along (Macdonald Carey) comes in to take over the man's work. His associates waver back and forth between joyous acceptance and violent disdain. At one point, two relatively quiet people get into a fight. I probably don't need to get into any of the details; you can guess the results.