5 Reasons To Get ‘The Twilight Man: Rod Serling & The Birth Of Television!’

Incredibly heartfelt and poignant, The Twilight Man: Rod Serling and the Birth of Television (Humanoids) deconstructs the legend of a renowned sci-fi icon.The biographical drama explores how creative control, the horrors of war, and advertising had an effect on The Twilight Zone creator.

Rod Serling was a just a writer who had to fight to make his voice heard. Both on and off the screen, Serling was active in politics. He vehemently challenged the networks and viewership alike to expand their minds and standards―rejecting notions of censorship, racism and war. But it wasn’t until he began to write about real world enemies in the guise of aliens and monsters that people started paying attention. Serling pushed the television industry to the edge of glory, and himself to the edge of sanity. He operated in a dimension beyond that of contemporary society, making him both a revolutionary and an outsider.

Here are 5 reasons why you should read The Twilight Man: Rod Serling and the Birth of Television:

There are certain facts and behind-the-scenes stories I already knew about Rod Serling’s life. My argument about Planet of the Apes is that it would have been any mediocre film if it wasn’t for that twist ending. To this very day, there are few writers who have a face as recognizable as Serling’s. 

While pulling off multiple duties, Koren Shadmi examines how the battlefield had an immense and traumatizing effect on Rod Serling himself. On one hand, you could argue Serling was an adrenaline junkie because he was a crazy paratrooper. On the other, the best Twilight Zone episodes deal with the acceptance of death because Serling had to watch his band of brothers die during war.  

If you love spotting easter eggs, Shadmi illustrates iconic moments from The Twilight Zone throughout the narrative. The opening sequence starts off very similarly to how William Shatner spots a gremlin on the wing on the plane. At its best, Shadmi captures the heartbreak of a frustrated writer as he struggles to hold his family life together.

Like the show itself, the illustrations is painted in black and white, with a splash of purple. Notice how the black tones are heavier during Serling’s flashbacks in the war. 

Overall, The Twilight Man: Rod Serling and the Birth of Television celebrates a brilliant writer who kept fighting against hardships in his personal and professional life. It’s a powerfully moving tale for the legend who changed the landscape of television.

The Twilight Man: Rod Serling and the Birth of Television arrives in bookstores on October 8 and in comic stores on October 9, 2019.