Number 12 Looks Just Like You - Twilight-Tober Zone
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- Опубліковано 13 жов 2024
- "Number 12 Looks Just Like You" is one of the most memorable installments of The Twilight Zone's fifth season, but it goes beyond that; it's likely among the more recognizable premises of the entire series. Does this iconic episode still hold up? Join Walter in the Twilight-Tober Zone and find out now!
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"Number 12 Looks Just Like You" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone. It is set in a dystopian future in which everyone, upon reaching adulthood, has their body surgically altered into one of a set of physically attractive models.
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I actually liked the fact that the same guy played all the male figures. She is essentially staring into the face of her father’s killer every time she sees that face.
Me too. I think it also helped the episode feel more claustrophobic.
Also the all-white, limited cast erodes racial differences, ethnic differences and disability, suggesting that these demographics were all transformed white and able-bodied or perhaps simply don't exist... Dr. Sig's subtle hints at supporting eugenics, coupled with Rod Serling's own personal interest in addressing the Holocaust and racism in many Twilight Zone episodes, makes these implications even darker. The scene with a housemaid who is berated cruelly by Lana sadly also suggests that despite everybody looking exactly the same, classism still exists and some people in this world have much more power than others.
One of the things I love about this episode is how none of them explicitly say that the transformation is mandatory, basically pushing the societal narrative that everyone WANTS the transformation.
@@ShawnRavenfire Precisely, none of the characters who are pushing the transformation on Marilyn are malicious, and are disappointed that she doesn't want to be like them.
@@ShawnRavenfire they can't even imagine or understand the possibility that someone would NOT want, and in the beginning when she says it have to ask "what you're talking about" as if the words don't make intelligible sense in this order, which shows how deep the view is in their brains
@@jensrettberg7968Do not want everyone to have good health?
Good looks?
That was always what bothered me as well!
On other words, gaslighting people into conformity.
The worst way to kill someone without killing them, very horrifying.
In other words, Marylin lost her true identity after she went through the transformation!
It's called Ego Death.
This is one of my favorite of all time episodes of Twilight Zone, probably because I relate to it a lot. When Marilyn says "I'm not pretty, but I'm not ugly", I _feel_ that, but not everyone else understands...
In other words, she was a plain Jane!
So, average basically, which most people are and that's okay.
When I was really young and I stumbled upon my grandpa watching a rerun of this episode, he looked over at me, and basically had to explain the entire story so I could understand it. When I rewatched this episode some time in the near, the twist still hits just as hard knowing what’s going to come.
I always found the ending of this episode to be much darker than Eye of the Beholder because despite getting exiled from society, Janet at least got to keep Her mind while Marilyn has to live the rest of Her life as a lobotomized automaton.
It makes you wonder how can thei society function. If a system is incapable of addaptation it will naturaly lose to decay.
@@Raximus3000 And it most likely does.
The forced conformity makes everyone think alike. Since everyone that comes after them is forced to think the same way as them, there is never any meaningful innovation, creativity, or adaptability.
A species that refuses to adapt to the inevitable march of time and change brought via entropy is doomed to extinction by its own inaction.
@@derekstein6193
Here is the most likely scenario for this. The number of models will keep decreasing in order to force further conformity until one is left and then deviations that as we have seen are possible(her father could not handle his new identity ergo he was not like everyone else) until one being is left.
That is the painless scenario the painful one is simply destruction via outside factors.
Like going full Stepford wife.
It's interesting that many of the characters are named after 50's and 60's Hollywood stars, to reflect the episode's themes about beauty and appearances. You have Marilyn, Lana, Grace, Eva, Valerie and Rex. Conversely, Jane and Doe, who have the surgery, now lack individuality.
Since everyone looks alike, they have all lost their true identities in the process!
@@melissacooper8724 Precisely, it's a really great subtle detail.
The word "Sig" means label, signature, or significant figure, whereas the name "Doe" is typically a made-up moniker used in legalese to provide anonymity, or to refer to a female animal species. This is eerie considering that Dr. Sig is in a position of authority and retains certain aspects of his unique identity (his European accent, his hand gestures and quirky mannerisms, knowledge of forbidden materials and what they're about), while the nurse named Doe is his subordinate and remains largely silent and lacking personality for the entirety of the episode.
So this is where the Uglies book series got its idea.
I wouldn't be surprised if that's where the basic idea spawned from, since many works are inspired by "Twilight Zone."
I love that series! I hadn't seen this twilight zone before but I can definitely see some similarities
I was just about to say that lol
@@riftshredder5438Same here.
The author of Uglies has said that this is where he got the idea from.
This episode is S tier twilight zone. The look of horror homegirl has in her face when she realizes she’s truly alone is EPIC
This is another episode that I never saw in those old 24 hour Twilight Zone marathons back in the 1990s. But when I first saw it online years later, it was an instant classic.
They only have 20 minutes to tell the story and drive the point home that everybody's the same. So the small cast was crucial. If it was a feature length film they could expand the cast to feature more models
As much as we admire attractive people would we truly want to look exactly like them in adulthood? This episode definitely has a topic that holds up to this day.
Well, a part of me wishes to look like Taylor Swift while the other part of me likes my true self better!
Precisely, six decades on, and the message about plastic surgery and true beauty still rings through.
I mean is it really that hard to be attractive and be an individual?
I mean really my only problems with this whole process is the pressure to look exactly identical to the point of needing name tags just to tell each other apart, and it clearly being just a cover for a government mandated deep physiological brainwashing procedure to strip individual will.
If it was actually voluntary, allowed for significant individual personalization, and didn’t turn people into the government’s meat puppet drones it’d be amazing cosmetic procedure.
Being an average guy, and ignored by women, being attractive seems like a great change.
Yes?
We could put breed bad genes.
Disabilities, bad health, and more.
If we all had good looks there’s less bullying, less mental health issues, stress and so on.
But no not having a select group of people to look like.
I think Sweden done this and had good results.
But I don’t agree with forcing such an agenda on people.
One of my favorites. And even though it doesn’t a happy ending, the ending narration is a bit humorous. “Portrait of a girl, in love with herself.”
The use of the small cast in this episode is genius
The cast is also all white, all western, all young, all English-speaking and all able-bodied... and the connotations of this are extremely disturbing, probably intentionally so.
@@RebeccaMayeHoliday perhaps not. This was the early 1960's after all and token characters were not yet a practice. You might be using a 2024 lens looking at a product from that erq.
@@shaider1982 You may be right, although Rod Serling never shied away from having a diverse cast if it suited the world of the story well. He was never much for "tokenism"; any story he featured that had a non-white or diverse cast member usually incorporated them in as just another regular part of the world they were in, unless race or ethnicity were directly brought up in the subject matter (some episodes did often address racism, antisemitism, christphobia and xenophobia). In this episode, it seems that racially-diverse people simply don't exist in this world, nor do disabled people, not necessarily even due to racism or ableism but for the mere fact that those demographics don't conform to the hegemony of the transformation.
That turn and smile is freakyyyy
As opposed to the original short story, where the protagonist is forced into the transformation by a Court, nobody in the episode is malicious. They genuinely believe that it's the right thing to do, and are hurt that Marilyn doesn't want to be like them.
I think that change made it better
I think that makes it feel more real. Because often a "I don't want to be like you" even if they're an amazing human, always comes off as hurtful.
Some of the greatest evils in human history were performed by those that honestly believed that they were right in doing so.
For extra creepy points, everyone after the procedure is made to THINK it's a good thing and forget any objections they had.
@@louisduarte8763 Every one of these characters is a victim of the "wiser man than I" who Dr. Sig mentions to Marilyn, the scientific magicians who found a way to craft a genocide of anybody non-conforming, both physically and ideologically, a genocide without death, the only murder being the murder of the soul, but a genocide, all the same.
Hopefully you keep this up Walter. Maybe do tales from the crypt or the 80s twilight zone next year
I've always loved this episode. I've always said that it's one of the few originals that I wouldn't mind seeing colorized...or at least remade.
This reminds me of a line from Silent Hill 3. The context is different but, it works well here.
Douglass Cartland: "No this. No that. No nothing. A paradise for castrated sheep maybe. Sounds pretty boring."
"Life is pretty, life is fun-!" Life is beautiful and hard. Anyone who says otherwise is trying to sell you something.
Such a good episode. And still so relevant.
I remember watching this for a class assignment in middle school
This is actually one of my absolute favorite Twilight Zone episodes, and sadly among the most relevant nowadays.
Some things become even MORE relevant as time goes by. This is one of those things. ❤
My thoughts exactly😢
Yeah the pushing and forcing of the C vac, to make us all the same.
Most definitely
i agree.
Did anyone else think of "There is no war in Ba Sing Say" from Avatar?
I've been pumped for this episode for years! It reminds me of the Uglies series which I am a huge fan of! I've noticed my fav Twilight Zone episodes have dark endings or are dystopic.
This episode is like the polar opposite of Eye of the Beholder
Ironically, he reviewed this one on the 12th.
I think you mean coincidentally
@@bbarrett726 Yep
Replying to your comment 12 hours later. 😮
when i read uglies, i thought of this episode. and this is so heartbreaking. it's so iconic, and Marylin's life, agency and choice was all taken away. and she was perfect how she was. in the decade, when this came out, i really hope others who felt like this, make them rethink and realise they were perfect as they and we all are. and I'm an advocate for surgery, as long as it's someone choice
@@CrypticCharm yeah, that's what I thought of too. It's like a book length rumination on this idea.
@@CrypticCharm The author of Uglies has said that he took a lot of inspiration from this episode.
I was thinking about how my grandma had proudly considered herself a plain Jane. I remember she once told me that God made us and God don't make no junk!
This is one of the best examples of "Ego Death" in media that I've seen.
or death of the personality
It's so crazy how when you look at these older shows and movies that warn of such a dystopian future, we find ourselves living more and more in that version of reality. Man, the writers and producers must have been psychic! Makes you wonder just how close we'll come to this or other versions of a dysfunctional society.
The twilight zone creepy endings are a serious vibe! Reminds me of THAT PART from George Orwell’s 1984.
evocative of harrison bergeron. "you haven't made everyone equal, you made everyone the same! and there's a big difference!
explain please
@@ianr.navahuber2195 harrison bergeron is a story by kurt vonnegut. it tells of a future where everyone is made "equal" by hobbling athletes and using brain surgery to maintain a standard (low) level IQ. the govt decided it was easier to keep people dumb than spend effort on education.
There’s another dystopian short story that comes to mind, Examination Day, where a mandatory IQ test when you reach 12 has death for those who score too highly on it. That was adapted for the 80’s Twilight Zone. It’s another variation on the theme of eliminating individuality as a means of continuing the status quo.
We did this almost 15 years ago in English and I can still remember some of the analyzing we did. Stuff like the kid being called something a bit more childish and having comic books rather than proper chapter books being part of his parents limiting the kind of material he had access to that he’d properly learn from. Memory is weird.
@@ianr.navahuber2195Kurt Vonnegut wrote a short story where mediocrity is mandated by society. Talented dancers, singers, athletes, and so on are forcibly handicapped so that the average person doesn't feel jealous.
I like to think of this as a prequel to Eye of the Beholder.
'The future, which, afterall, is the Twilight Zone.' Love Mr. Serling's foreshadowing. Mr. Tober, thank you so much for these recap videos. I hope you do the next TZ series starting next October.
Shades of Brave New World add more or less than rods ending little speech at the end more or less gives us that this is very frightening and can be very real
I thought of Brave New World also when Val was rattling on in the hospital room.
I watched this episode when I was a child and I remember the ending didn't scare me but rather it broke my heart but I couldn't really say as to why because I was really young. Maybe a part of me felt the loss and injustice that happened to Marilyn but couldn't possibly articulate.
Maybe I related to being a person who felt that she had to conform and change who she was just to exist. Who knows, yet I never forgot this one and the message got clearer as I got older.
After all the decades, for me this remains the most quintessential TZ episode, and unfortunately yes, out of all of them, the one that has over time became only more and more relevant. Probably the first one that comes to mind when the show is mentioned.
The scary thing is, its not like everyone ISN'T happy in this utopia. They are, but life should be more about just self-obsession and only living for yourself.
That was what Marylin was trying to say all along! But everyone else has become so vapid and lack love and empathy that they just couldn't understand!
I always interpreted the ending as being comparable to the old saying, “Oh, you’ll stop talking like that once you get laid!” and that Marilyn has been swayed just like everyone else which she also looks/resembles upon transformation. Therefore the twist would be that “evil” wins.
I love that almost all of the episodes were shot on film. These restorations/conversions look amazing! 📺🚬😃
Awesome Twilight Zone episode!
Whenever this episode is on TV, I stop everything to watch it.
Now that you've done Disneycember, Dreamworksuary, Bat May, and this, you should do Nickuly/Aprilodeon.
That Number 12 was FINE….
Last time I was this early this joke wasnt stale!
1:42, I watched the movie BURN WITCH BURN from 1962 and he co wrote the screenplay with Richard Matheson and i thought to myself, "What if this was an attempt at a Twilight Zone movie in 1962?"
Love your content! Thanks For this ❤❤
The lack of variety in the way men look could be a commentary on fashion. Men's fashion tends to look more uniform while women's fashion has more variety. (Though not too much if you want to stay en vogue.)
The most disturbing monsters to me aren't the ones that kill you, but the ones that strip away your identity. The Borg, Zombies, the Cybermen, the Reapers, all take a living person with hopes, dreams and ambitions, and just turn them into empty husks.
This episode is absolutely terrifying.
I watched this episode in my English class during my senior year in high school
I’d also like to mention this is after reading brave new world
This reminds me of how the Kens turned the Barbies stupid in the "Barbie" (2023)
Collin Wilcox gave an amazing performance in "To Kill a Mockingbird"
This episode can be relatable today.
oh god, i remembered this episode so well! it's so memorable. SEASON FIVE? I can't believe it was so late in the show...
This is also my favorite episode, especially for its relevance mentioned in the video!
However, I have one issue with the scene where Marilyn tries to escape from the hospital because I don’t understand two things.
1. Why does Marilyn suddenly pull back when she sees the door at the end of the hallway? Is that the hospital’s entrance?
2. Where did the note in Marilyn’s hand come from that the nurse takes and says, “She has chosen number 8”?
Unfortunately, neither the _Twilight Zone Companion_ nor this video addresses this; only a Twilight Zone Wiki writes _“due to a post-hypnotic suggestion planted during her stay, she instead goes to the operating room”,_ which I find questionable since I see no signs of hypnosis in the episode.
It's so nice to see Season 5 episodes here. Several I haven't seen in decades, if ever. They're hard to find.
This was the first Twilight Zone episode I've ever saw. It was great.
Watching these old shows/movies and seeing what they considered beautiful and youthful is absolutely a trip. It's a much more... bulky form of thinness. Like, I love how even young men in their twenties are all barrel chested with thick mats of chest hair and very rectangular bodies to the point it almost looks like they're overweight. Youthful and beautiful a lot of the times is a very much more early-thirties version of beautiful in these films/shows of this time period.
I love this series to bits man! I look forward to it every October!
Previous used idea but different concept pulled off perfectly with the twist making it absolutely terrifying and twisted
This is one of the episodes of The Twilight zone that seriously scared me as a kid. It introduced me to the idea of killing someone's soul but leaving the body alive.
Another great Twilight Zone episode.
The ending to this episode is one of the most uncomfortable I’ve ever felt watching anything
Finally we reach one of my top five favorite episodes
I adore this episode. It might even be one of my favourites. You really feel for Marilyn because in reality the only one who seemed to understand her was her father, but the people around her are so numb to everything that they don’t see why she not only feels sad, but WANTS to feel sad. Marilyn would rather feel the grief and loss of her father for the rest of her life than be a smiling robot like everyone else.
It’s heartbreaking seeing that after the procedure, there isn’t a trait of who she used to be. In a lot of ways, she dies, and her afterlife is spending the rest of her life in a soulless shell.
Go to a department store, look at the women's section, then at the men's. The point being if we had a society like this, there would definitely be way more female models than male ones. =D
I felt heartbroken for Marylin at the end of the episode because she lost her true identity forever after her transformation! 💔 There were times I wished that I would look like Taylor Swift. But the more I think about it the more I realize that I wouldn't be my true self!
Honestly, we should appreciate we still HAVE stories like this to refer to to remind us so even if a lot of us go to the deep end of conformity, enough people can resist on their own terms and fight for more causes. Don't get too cynical. Just keep our spirit going. Because there are places where these stories are deliberately inaccessible.
I have the Mongrel CD in my car currently. (The highlight of the bands legacy). This is one episode I have seen and it was really great
Could you please do these as part of FanScription
• What if Disney’s Peter Pan was killed by Captain Hook’s bomb (Disney’s Peter Pan 1953movie)
• What if The Stabbington Brothers raised Rapunzel in Disney’s Tangled (2010movie)
• What if Disney’s The Rescuers 3 happened?
• RoboCop vs The Terminator
• What if Disney’s The Great Mouse Detective 2 happened?
• What if the 101 Dalmatian family got older (Disney’s 101 Dalmatians 2)
• What if Luke Skywalker had joined The Dark Side
• Batman vs Venom
• Spider-man vs The Riddler
• What if Shere Khan (from Disney’s The Jungle Book 1967movie) had won?
• What if we fixed Hulk (2003movie)
The episode that poses the question: is Happiness and Health better than having free will? The scary thing is, there might be a lot of people out there willing to have the surgery in order to escape their own depression and health issues.
I feel like the reason she went with number 8 and not 12 is BECAUSE 12 looked too much like her, and no one is allowed to resemble or think like themselves in such a society. Thinking of it that way makes the title fit pretty good!
I don't believe things have gotten worse regarding this episode's message. While mainstream media did hit an impossible beauty standard in the 90's and 2000's, ever since the 2010's society has become much more accepting of a diversity of appearances and most everyone is encouraged to find their own look. We've definitely taken a turn towards appreciating natural, distinct beauty.
When everyone looks perfect and beautiful, nobody is.
I really love this episode and I always get so sad when she chose to become a clone of vow even though that's my name but it's like Marilyn disappeared and when you said that in the video I got all weepy that was a beautiful way of putting it, but yeah, that's great
pretty awesome how an attractive woman smiling at the camera is the "creep out moment"
I believe this is the saddest, or at least most tragic, TZ episode, especially after what I learned about eugenics. It did kinda tickle me when Rod Serling said at the beginning, “Let’s say this is the year 2000.” Huh, I must’ve missed that part . . .
oooh, i remember this one! it was so good!
This is funny because my girlfriend put that new movie Uglies on and within the first five minutes I was like "This sounds an awfully lot like an episode of The Twilight Zone."
This reminds me of an animated short called "Being Pretty." Anyone here seen it? It's part of the "Autodale" anthology and it's all here on youtube. Highly recommended if you're into dark dystopian futures like this and are a fan of independent animation.
There's a really good mathcore band named after this episode The Number Twelve Looks Like You.
even if you don't like that music you should listen to their cover of My Sharona. it's a riot.
I really like the music use in this video. Another thing i like is the shadows on this ep
The real kick in the head?
Rod Serling: “Improbable? Perhaps. But in an age of plastic surgery, bodybuilding and an infinity of cosmetics, let us hesitate to say impossible. These and other strange blessings may be waiting in the future, which, after all, is the Twilight Zone.”
And right after:
Announcer: “This show has been brought to you in part by Prell shampoo.”
12 is better than the unlucky number 😆
They probably don't have a number 13 model because of the same reason there is no 13th floor in buildings!
So this is the inspiration for Uglies.
That's what I think and societies like in this episode it's what causes rebellion if one can stand up thousands can follow I would rather choose death then be transformed to look like someone or act like someone who is the same this is how society collapses because nobody can agree that what is okay and what is not okay!
@@noahdean9685 I'd go join the Smoke (Uglies reference), though in terms of the real world, I think I joined it years ago.
@@legojedi626 me too the world is already ugly, get used to it.
This episode gives me the 1984 vibe. Both take place in a terrifying dystopia where there are no happy endings for the protagonists.
The popularity of Plastic Surgery makes this more terrifying to me.
This might be the best adaptation we ever got of Brave New World.
An excellent episode w/ excellent writing.
I think the play on Sigmund Freud was the idea that they were tasked to get rid of all ugliness and instead of seeing it from the angle of hate and discrimination, they went a sexually charged route. Instead of the countless other paths you could take to "get rid of ugliness in the world", they went with "Let's make everyone, including myself, HOT!" lol
I might be overthinking it, but that's my take.
Regarding Collin Wilcox's "childlike" line readings as Marilyn, it's worth noting that in the same year she played a character, the cheating wife Thedy Sue Hill in the _The Alfred Hitchcock Hour_ episode "The Jar". The role has her depicted as a not too bright tramp, who also undegoes a radical transformation, but one that is much darker than in _The Twilight Zone._ (Btw, although the Hitchcock series is generally inferior to _TZ,_ with "The Jar" we find a horror episode that easily stands with the best of Serling's entries in the genre.)
Saw a recap last week for a Netflix movie called "Uglies" and it was very similar to this story. Feel it's a direct inspiration.
Too bad the movie ended up being garbage. The 15% rating score on Rotten Tomatoes really says it all.
Very interesting that a modern viewing could also take an approach of self identity thats becoming more common amongst us, people expect you to conform to what is considered normal but you go against it, compelling thoughts there
I love this episode! And eye off the beholder.
The documentary ‘Century of the Self’ comes to mind
I liked this episode! And it freaked me out with the soulless gazes. But the scientist guy seemed to be on top of things, with just enough will above everybody else to keep them under his thumb. Yeah, you're right, it's got worse. o_O
So basically Instagram. The twilight zone was always ahead of its time.
Well, this is now my personal most horrifying TZ episode. Jeebus...