Flora looks on as Franklin succumbs to the fever.
Rod Serling: Mr. and Mrs. Franklin Gibbs, three days and two nights all expenses paid at a Las Vegas hotel, won by virtue of Mrs. Gibbs' knack with a phrase. But unbeknownst to either Mr. or Mrs. Gibbs is the fact that there's a prize in their package, neither expected nor bargained for. In just a moment, one of them will succumb to an illness worse than any virus can produce. A most inoperative, deadly life-shattering affliction known as the Fever.
Air date: Jan. 29, 1960
Franklin Gibbs is not at all happy about being dragged to Las Vegas on a trip won by his wife, Flora. He detests all forms of gambling, resents the effort on the casinos' staff to get money out of his pocket, and constantly denounces the gamblers around him for blowing through their finances. However, a drunk gives him a coin and forces him to put it into a slot machine. Franklin suprisingly wins, and this unexpected success leads him to rationalize playing the machine again (under the excuse of getting rid of his previous "dirty" winnings) gradually growing addicted himself. But the Twilight Zone has a terrifying symbol of Franklin's problem — a living slot machine that won't stop haunting him.
The Trope Fever:
- An Aesop: Anyone can be instantly hooked on gambling, don't let your guard down just because you say you don't like it.
- Big "NO!": Flora screams one after Franklin falls to his death. It's particularly painful since she has to watch it happen.
- Disney Villain Death: What ultimately gets Franklin in the end.
- Dutch Angle: Used for a shot of Franklin at the slot machine after he's become obsessed, screaming at his wife to leave him alone.
- The Gambling Addict: Franklin, who abhors all types of gambling, travels to Las Vegas with his wife (who won a contest) and is forced by a drunk to put a dollar token into a slot machine, winning some money in the process. Despite his efforts to run away from the machine, he hears it literally calling his name, and winds up addicted to the point where he thinks it's alive, and it turns out he’s right.
- Greed: Franklin is very greedy. At first, he’s a stingy miser who refuses to spend a single dollar gambling, only agrees to go on the trip to Vegas because it’s free, and boasts that he understands the value of money. Once he wins ten grand from the slot machine, he becomes tempted to try again by the hope of winning even more money.
- Hallucinations: After Franklin wins ten grand in tokens from the slot machine, he hallucinates about his stack of tokens getting taller and taller as he’s tempted to try and win at the slot machine again.
- Haunted Technology: Zigzagged. A seemingly possessed slot machine follows Franklin around, calling his name. It's said to be a hallucination created by Franklin's insomnia and addiction that ultimately drove him to suicide, but is ultimately subverted later, as it turns out that the slot machine is haunted.
- Holier Than Thou: In the beginning, Franklin scolds and lectures his wife about how immoral gambling is and denounces gamblers as immature and stupid.
- Honest John's Dealership: The casino manager comes across as something of an Honest John. He greets the couple in a smarmy-like manner, the photographer indicating that the casino seems to do this every (other) day. As he leaves, he tells "remember, you have unlimited credit (not unlimited "funds") meaning their "prize" is guaranteed to cost them.
- Hypocrite: After all his talk about how gambling is stupid and immoral, and claiming that he has maturity and self-control, Franklin ends up becoming completely addicted to gambling, with the casino owner commenting in the end that he was the biggest addict he’d ever seen.
- Insane Troll Logic: Franklin's excuse to go back to the slot machine. He says that the money he won before is tainted and immoral, and he can't keep it in good conscience, so he's going to... go back to "feed it to the machine".
- Irony: In the beginning, Franklin utterly detests gambling. He soon becomes the biggest gambling addict the casino owner has ever seen.
- Jerkass: Franklin. He begins the episode as a condescending, self-righteous, and judgmental man. Then he gets even worse and turns into a selfish, rude, desperate gambling addict.
- Karmic Transformation: Of the non-physical kind. Franklin looks down on all the other casino patrons and thinks of himself as morally superior, but once he wins some cash at a slot machine, he ends up becoming a gambler far worse than any of them. Even the casino owner said he’d never seen a case of gambling addiction as bad as his.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: The events of most of the episode could easily be explained by Franklin becoming increasingly unhinged through obsession and lack of sleep, or the slot machine really could be alive, like Franklin thinks. When the haunted slot machine starts stalking Franklin, he seems to be hallucinating since his wife can’t see or hear it. It's subverted at the end when the slot machine moves on its own after Franklin’s death.
- Not-So-Imaginary Friend: Or enemy, in this case. Everyone thinks that Franklin is hallucinating about the slot machine being alive. At the end, it appears in front of his dead body and spits out his last dollar, with a smile its “face”.
- Offscreen Teleportation: During the final scene, the slot machine starts warping around the Gibbs' hotel room, appearing before Franklin whenever he tries to run away.
- Psychological Projection: Franklin has a total disdain for all forms of gambling, and seems to think that inserting one coin will instantly turn anyone into a hopeless addict. This is exactly what happens to him.
- Real After All: The ending reveals that the slot machine was sentient, as it appears outside the casino, smiling, and spits Franklin's last silver dollar—the one it "stole" from him—into his hand after he falls from his window.
- Red Herring: The opening narration and the first part of the story initially gives the audience the impression that Flora will be the one to fall prey to a gambling addiction, seemingly ruling out her strict and stingy husband. As it turns out, Franklin ends up being the victim of the titular fever.
- Robo Speak: Played for horror with the machine's repeated cry of "FRANK-LIN", in a metallic voice accompanied by the jingling sound of silver dollars, suggesting that it's coming from the depths of the device.
- Sanity Slippage: Franklin slowly loses his sanity as his gambling addiction grows.
- Say My Name: The machine endlessly chants Franklin's name in a droning staticky voice.
- The Scrooge: Franklin. He wouldn't even have taken the trip if it hadn't been a paid-for prize his wife won, and he scolds Flora for wanting to spend a dollar gambling, only relenting to let her try the slot machine once because she’d already put a dollar in the machine.
- Sleeping Single: Franklin and Flora sleep in two separate single beds. Perhaps justified, as their relationship is somewhat fraught.
- Truth in Television: Franklin telling himself that the slot machine has got to pay off eventually after he's been playing for such a long time might sound familiar to psychologists or veteran gamblers. (In fact, this line of thinking is actually called the Gambler's Fallacy.)
- Real Life Writes the Plot / Write What You Know: This episode only exists because Rod Serling himself experienced the fallacy for himself while visiting Las Vegas.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: The drunk who forces Franklin to put the coin in the slot machine sets up the plot, making Franklin become a gambling addict and eventually killing himself.
Rod Serling: Mr. Franklin Gibbs, visitor to Las Vegas, who lost his money, his reason, and finally his life to an inanimate metal machine, variously described as a "one-armed bandit", a "slot machine", or, in Mr. Franklin Gibbs' words, a "monster with a will all of its own." For our purposes, we'll stick with the latter definition, because we're in the Twilight Zone.
