History Recap / TheTwilightZoneS1E22TheMonstersAreDueOnMapleStreet

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/twilight_zone_monsters_are_due_on_maple_street.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:[[{{Theatre/Othello}} Zarminian dogs/More fell than antimatter or black holes/Look on the tragic carnage on this world/This is your work!]]]]

->'''Creator/RodSerling''': Maple Street, U.S.A. Late summer. A tree-lined little world of front porch gliders, barbecues, the laughter of children, and the bell of an ice-cream vendor. At the sound of the roar and the flash of light, it will be precisely 6:43pm on Maple Street (...) This is Maple Street on a late Saturday afternoon. Maple Street, in the last calm and reflective moment, before the monsters came.

Air date: March 4, 1960

The happy-go-lucky residents of Maple Street are enjoying an ordinary summer evening when a supposed meteor flies closely overhead... but doesn't crash. Soon after, all electrical devices stop working, and when everyone starts asking questions, local boy Tommy comes forth with an idea he got from a comic book, about aliens landing and disguising themselves as normal people. While everyone initially ignores him, they start thinking...

A few hours pass, and no restoration of normal circumstances has happened. Paranoia soon gets the better of the people of Maple Street, and they start a borderline WitchHunt against people in the neighborhood who have been perceived as acting suspicious. Even if it is just minor stuff like having a slightly different daily routine than everybody else, these people are accused of being aliens in cahoots with whoever is behind the power outage. It doesn't get any better when the power in some houses starts randomly turning on and off, and their inhabitants now have the blame cast on them.

It is in the midst of this thick atmosphere of fear that Pete van Horn, a man who went to check on the next street over, is shot and killed. The rest of the residents promptly go insane from the resultant accusations, running around and committing acts of wanton assault and vandalism as they blame everyone around them for being the enemy.

On a nearby hill, it is revealed the mysterious meteor that had flown overhead was indeed an alien spaceship. Its inhabitants, two alien observers, are watching the riot on Maple Street while using a device to manipulate the neighborhood's power. One of the aliens explains to his colleague that they have repeated this strategy all over the planet, and the result has been the same each and every time. With their plan to utilize humankind's own paranoia against them, they don't have to fire a single shot to conquer the planet. They board their [=UFO=] with the intent to spread their invasion to other places, conquering Earth one neighborhood at a time.

This episode was remade as "The Monsters Are On Maple Street" for ''Series/TheTwilightZone2002'', with the fear of aliens being changed to one of terrorists.
----
!!The Tropes Are Due on Maple Street:
* AlienAmongUs: [[SubvertedTrope Sort of]]. There ''were'' aliens, just not among them.
* AlienInvasion: The aliens plan to manipulate humanity into destroying themselves before they take over.
* AnAesop: Whether it's an atom bomb or an alien invasion, human beings don't need any external force to destroy them. All it takes is unfounded suspicion, fear, and panic, and they'll be able to destroy themselves just as easy. In other words, [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters they are, indeed, the real monsters]] [[TitleDrop due on Maple Street]]...
* TheBadGuyWins: The aliens succeed in destroying Maple Street by manipulating the residents into attacking each other, then announce they'll keep doing that to other communities until Earth is vacant.
* BatmanGambit: The aliens' plan.
* BlameGame: Everybody puts the blame for the power outage on incompetence, accidents, and eventually aliens.
* CantArgueWithElves: The aliens are right; HumansAreTheRealMonsters.
* CloseKnitCommunity: Maple Street is a picturesque example of suburban friendliness and unity. Unfortunately, this picture is steadily undone as the episode goes on.
* ComicBookAdaptation: This episode was adapted as a graphic novel by Walker Paperback in 2009.
* TheCorrupter: The aliens' modus operandi comes straight out of ''Theatre/{{Othello}}''.
* TheCuckoolanderWasRight: Tommy is the one who proposed the idea (from his comic book) that alien invaders shut off the electricity to deliberately stir up mistrust and dissent, as well as to keep everyone from leaving. Unknowingly, he was completely correct. There actually ''were'' aliens subjecting the residents to a ParanoiaGambit. Unfortunately, Tommy was not savvy enough to realize that actually letting Steve and Charlie leave Maple Street likely would've prevented the whole thing. Thus, he [[UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom walked the crowd right into the aliens' trap]], and ultimately got the ire of the whole community.
* DivideAndConquer: The aliens use HumansAreTheRealMonsters to their advantage, stirring mistrust among the populace to let them destroy themselves.
* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The episode is an identifiable TakeThat to the RedScare.
* DoubleMeaningTitle: Whether the monsters are the Maple Street citizens themselves, or the aliens who caused the power outage.
* DutchAngle: There are multiple such shots in the final scene when the residents of Maple Street go berserk and start rioting.
* FantasticAesop: Played with. We probably won't be subject to alien conquest any time soon, but the story's [[AnAesop moral]] rings true all the same: paranoia and suspicion ''can'' tear people apart without aliens premeditating it, as the last line of narration proposes. Note that [[JustifiedTrope this was a time when the Red Scare would still have been fresh in the audience's memory]].
* TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou: As part of the TakeThat to the RedScare, Serling disappointingly notes in his closing narration that (unlike so many other occurrences on this show) the horror that viewers have just seen is not confined to the Twilight Zone.
* HangingJudge: Charlie. He's very quick to jump on and immediately convict neighbors who are accused of being alien scouts. Steve even refers to him as "a self-appointed hanging judge."
* HumansAreTheRealMonsters: The aliens don't need to attack Earth. They just let the dark side of human nature allow humans to destroy themselves.
* {{Hypocrite}}: For all his finger-pointing and stirring the pot, Charlie has a much different attitude when ''he'' is the one facing allegations and violence. He begs for the mercy and understanding that he was so quick to deny others.
* {{Jerkass}}: Charlie continually stirs the pot and is quick to jump on fellow neighbors who are accused.
* JerkassHasAPoint: Charlie blames ''Tommy'' of being the alien. He's wrong there, but Tommy's comic book plot about alien invasions ''did'' get the people of Maple Street to become suspicious and paranoid of each other.
* JerkassRealization: Charlie's wife expresses disappointment with herself and the mob for so quickly distrusting their neighbors, people she says they've known for years and had considered their friends. Charlie and many others don't heed this sentiment.
* LetsYouAndHimFight: What the aliens expect to happen with their plan. And they start to gloat that it worked perfectly after seeing the riot.
* NeverMyFault: Charlie shoots and kills the "monster", but when said "monster" is revealed to be Pete Van Horn returning from Floral Street, Charlie refuses responsibility for killing him, blaming the darkness and asking how he was supposed to know who Pete was, when all he could've done was call out his name. [[NoSympathy Even Steve refuses to defend him when the neighbors turn on him]].
* NoodleIncident: The more experienced alien tells his partner that he has seen their gambit play out in various areas, all with a handful of variations, but always the same result.
* NotHelpingYourCase: Steve refuses to let the others see the ham radio set in the basement, and prove to them that it's just that, without a search warrant for Lord knows ''what'' reason.
** Charlie's aggressiveness also gets used against him when suspicion is cast on him.
* NotSoAboveItAll: Despite his skepticism, Steve slips into believing the alien story a few times.
* OnlySaneMan: Steve is the voice of reason among the residents of Maple Street.
* ParanoiaGambit: A large-scale version is the aliens' endgame.
* PoorCommunicationKills: For both sides. The crowd sees a mysterious figure walking out of the darkness. Knowing how tense everything is at the moment, instead of calling out to the figure, or the figure calling out to them, Charlie grabs a shotgun and shoots the figure. Turns out it was one of their neighbors, Pete, who was going over to the next block to see if that street had power, so he was killed for nothing. It gets worse when you realize what Pete could've told them.
* SarcasmMode: In the face of questions about who he talks to on his ham radio, Steve mockingly says he talks to monsters and aliens, of course. His wife urges him to stop out of concern of what the others will do in response to this sarcasm.
* TheScapegoat: Steve points out that what the mob really wants is someone, ''anyone'', to condemn and take to task just so that they can go back to feeling safe. Serling's closing narration also notes the "thoughtless, frightened search for a scapegoat" can affect generations to come.
* ShamingTheMob: Steve does this to the neighbors for quickly accusing others, but it didn't last.
* SouthernGothicSatan: The aliens are a sci-fi version, drawing out the townsfolk's worst sins in order to get them to destroy themselves.
* StockFootage: A shot of the C-57D in space is taken from ''Film/ForbiddenPlanet'' (shown here turned upside down).
* TooDumbToLive: Maple Street itself. Without power, running cars, and electricity, they devolve back to their primitive caveman-like ways and start killing each other out of envy that one house has power and theirs does not.
* UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom: If Tommy hadn't told everyone about his AlienAmongUs comic book, it's possible the entire plot wouldn't have happened. Him screaming "It's the monster!" when the crowd spots Pete in the darkness doesn't help one bit.
* YouFool: Steve shouts this as the neighborhood descends into chaos.

!!2003 remake
* TheGhost: The family in the only house that still has power are never seen onscreen. It makes their deaths when their house is burned [[GoryDiscretionShot all the more scary]].
* TheGovernment: A GovernmentConspiracy is the one responsible for the blackout this time, as a counter-terror experiment.
* KarmaHoudini: The government agents who conducted the experiment receive no retribution for causing the panic and for inadvertently being responsible for an innocent family being burned alive. [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone Though they are deeply disturbed by the results of the experiment]].
* NiceJobBreakingItHero: Will Marshall tells the family who have the only house in the neighborhood that still has power to stay inside to avoid the wrath of the angry mob growing suspicious they might be responsible for the blackout; the family did offer to come out and explain. The mob comes barging into the family's house, burns it down and the family are left to be incinerated.
* OhCrap: The soldiers worry how quickly the neighbors reacted during the blackout they caused. One soldier mentions in every experiment, the neighbors respond with violence a lot faster each time.
* Post911TerrorismMovie: Thus the story was changed from 'AliensAmongUs' to 'terrorist cells amongst us' paranoia, which increased the mundanity of the story and yet still maintained the original story's allegory perfectly.
* SettingUpdate: Taking advantage of post-9/11 sensitivities to deliver an equally meaningful message -- the family that is being targeted for paranoia this time are Middle Eastern and the first thing people suspect when everything goes wrong is "terrorist plot" for no good reason other than race and the family wanting to keep its privacy in the midst of all the confusion.
* WithUsOrAgainstUs: In this case, you're an American or you're a terrorist.
* WrongGenreSavvy: Will tries to calm down the crowd at every point and stop the neighbours from coming out to stop any physical altercation from occuring. Sadly, he doesn't realise that FailureIsTheOnlyOption.
----
->'''Creator/RodSerling''': The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices, to be found only in the minds of men. For the record, prejudices can kill and suspicion can destroy, and a thoughtless, frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own - for the children, and the children yet unborn. And the pity of it is that these things cannot be confined to the Twilight Zone.

->'''Creator/RodSerling''': Maple Street, U.S.A. Late summer. A tree-lined little world of front porch gliders, barbecues, the laughter of children, and the bell of an ice-cream vendor. At the sound of the roar and the flash of light, it will be precisely 6:43pm on Maple Street... This is Maple Street on a late Saturday afternoon. Maple Street, in the last calm and reflective moment before the monsters came.

A group of families on Maple Street are enjoying an evening when a supposed meteor flies closely overhead...and doesn't crash. Soon the power goes out, and when everyone starts asking questions, a boy comes forth with a comic book about aliens landing and disguising themselves as normal people. While everyone initially ignores him, they start thinking...

As a few hours passes, and no restoration of normal circumstances happens, paranoia soon gets the better of the people on Maple Street, and they start a borderline WitchHunt, as people in the neighborhood who have been perceived as acting suspicious, even if it is just minor stuff like having a slightly different daily routine than everybody else, are accused of being aliens in cahoots with whoever is behind the power outage. It doesn't get any better when the power in some houses along Maple Street starts randomly turning on and off, and their inhabitants now have the blame cast on them.

It is in the midst of this thick atmosphere of fear that a man from the street who returns from checking on neighbors is shot, and this finally pushes everyone over the edge; the whole neighborhood goes insane, running around and committing acts of wanton assault and vandalism, as they blame everyone around them for being one of the enemy.

On a nearby hill, it is revealed the mysterious meteor that had flown overhead was, indeed, an alien spaceship. Its inhabitants, two alien observers, are watching the riot on Maple Street while using a device to manipulate the neighborhood's power. One of the aliens explains to his colleague that they have done this all over the planet, and the result has been the same each and every time. They don't have to fire a single shot to conquer the planet; they board their [=UFO=] with the intent to spread their invasion to other places.

* AlienAmongUs: [[SubvertedTrope Sort of]]. There actually ''were'' aliens, just not among them.
* AlienInvasion: The aliens plan to manipulate humanity into destroying themselves before taking over.

* TheBadGuyWins: The aliens succeed in destroying the neighborhood by manipulating the humans into attacking each other, then announce they'll keep doing that to other communities until Earth is vacant.

* BlameGame: Everybody puts the blame on incompetence or accidents and eventually aliens.

* CloseKnitCommunity: Steadily become undone as the episode goes on.

* TheCuckoolanderWasRight: Tommy is the one who proposed the idea (from his comic book story) that alien invaders shut off the electricity to deliberately hold the people back from leaving Maple Street to stir up mistrust and dissent. Unknowingly, he was correct. There actually ''were'' alien beings subjecting them to a ParanoiaGambit. Unfortunately, Tommy was not savvy enough to realize that actually letting Steve and Charlie leave Maple Street likely would've prevented the whole thing. Thus he [[UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom walked the crowd right into the aliens' trap]], and ultimately got the ire of the community later on.
* DivideAndConquer: The Alien Race uses HumansAreTheRealMonsters to their advantage. Stir mistrust and dissent among the populace and let them destroy themselves.
* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The show was a TakeThat at the RedScare.
* DoubleMeaningTitle: On whether the monsters are the Maple Street citizens themselves or the aliens who caused the power outage.

* FantasticAesop: Played with. We probably won't be subject to alien conquest any time soon, but the [[AnAesop moral]] of the story rings true all the same: suspicion ''can'' tear people apart without aliens premeditating it, as the last line of narration proposes. Note that [[JustifiedTrope this was a time when the Red Scare would still have been fresh in the audience's memory]].

* HangingJudge: Charlie. He's very quick to jump on and immediately convict neighbors who are accused of being alien invaders. Steve Brand even refers to him as "a self-appointed hanging judge."
* HumansAreTheRealMonsters: The aliens don't need to attack Earth. They just let the dark side of human nature allow the humans to destroy themselves.
* {{Hypocrite}}: For all his finger-pointing and stirring the pot, Charlie has a much different attitude when he is the one facing allegations and violence. He begs for the mercy and understanding that he was so quick to deny others.

* JerkassHasAPoint: Charlie ''blames Tommy'' for being the alien. He's wrong there, but Tommy's storytelling of comic book plots about alien invasions did get the people of Maple Street to get suspicious and paranoid of each other.
* JerkassRealization: Charlie's wife expresses disappointment with herself and the mob for so quickly distrusting their neighbors, people she says they had known for years and had considered their friends. Charlie and many others don't heed this sentiment.
* LetsYouAndHimFight: What the aliens expect to happen with their plan. And they start to gloat that this has worked wonderfully after seeing the riot.
* NeverMyFault: Charlie shoots and kills the "monster", but when said "monster" is revealed to be their neighbor Pete Van Horne, Charlie refuses responsibility for killing him, blaming the darkness and asking how he was supposed to know who Pete was when all he could've done was call out his name. [[NoSympathy Even Steve refuses to defend him when the neighbors turn on him]].
* NoodleIncident: The more experienced alien tells his partner that he has seen this gambit play out in various areas, all with a handful of variations but always the same end result.
* NotHelpingYourCase: Steve refuses to let the others see his ham radio set in the basement, and prove to them that it's just that, without a search warrant for lord knows ''what'' reason.
** Charlie's aggressiveness also gets used against him when suspicion falls on him.
* NotSoAboveItAll: Despite his skepticism, Steve Brand slips into believing the Space Monster story a few times.
* OnlySaneMan: Steve Brand is the voice of reason among the residents of Maple Street.
* ParanoiaGambit: A large-scale version.
* PoorCommunicationKills: For both sides. The crowd sees a mysterious figure walking out of the darkness. Knowing how tense everything is at the moment, Instead of calling out to the figure, or the figure calling out to them, Charlie instead grabs a shotgun and shoots the figure. Turns out it was one of their neighbors, Pete Van Horne, who was going over to the next block to see if the next street had power. They killed him for nothing. It gets worse when you realize what Pete could've told them.
* SarcasmMode: In the face of questions about who he talks to on his radio, Steve mockingly says he talks to monsters and aliens, of course. His wife urges him to stop out of concern of what the others will do in response to this sarcasm.

* ShamingTheMob: Steve does this to the neighbors for quickly accusing and blaming others. But it didn't last.

* TooDumbToLive: The neighborhood itself. Simply without power, running cars and electricity, they devolve back to their primitive caveman-like ways and start killing each other out of envy that one house has power and theirs does not.
* UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom: If Tommy hadn't told everyone about his AlienAmongUs comic books, it's possible the entire plot wouldn't have happened. Screaming "It's the monster!" when the crowd spots the mysterious figure in the darkness doesn't help one bit.
* YouFool: Steve shouts this, as the neighborhood descends into chaos.

* PostNineElevenTerrorismMovie: Thus the story was changed from 'AliensAmongUs' to 'terrorist cells amongst us' paranoia, which increased the mundanity of the story and yet still maintained the original story's allegory perfectly.

* AnAesop: Whether it's an atom bomb or an alien invasion, human beings don't need any external force to destroy them. All it takes is unfounded suspicion, fear, and panic, and they'll be able to destroy themselves just as easy. In other words, [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters they are, indeed, the real monsters.]]