Welcome to Winfield
"Visiting hours have just ended at City General Hospital, but this man never needs permission to enter. He comes to places like these quite frequently, wearing a visitor's pass printed — in the Twilight Zone.
Griffin St. George (Gerrit Graham), an agent of death, enters a hospital to collect the soul of Matt Winnaker (Johnathan Caliri), a young man in critical condition. Sensing his impending visitor, Matt furiously tells his visiting girlfriend Mamie (Sally Klein) to save him. Once he and Mamie escape, Matt soon discovers Winfield, a small town not seen on any maps, whose residents seem to be permanently stuck in the days of the Old West. Once the locals learn of Matt's plight, they allow him and Mamie to stay in town for as long as they need. Once St. George learns where Matt has fled to, he makes a personal visit to Winfield not just to claim Matt, but the town's citizens, as they too cheated death long ago.
Tropes
- The Ageless: The people of Winfield stopped aging in the late 19th century, after St. George's predecessor, Chin Du Long, grew to like them and arranged to spare them from death.
- The Alcoholic: Weldon, the town drunk, whose intoxication and big mouth nearly leads to Matt and Mamie being found out.
- Balancing Death's Books: Matt wakes up in the hospital after reaching near-death from a coma. He talks to his girlfriend Mamie, who follows his command to rescue him before St. George can take him away, and the two of them travel to the titular town, where the occupants struck a deal with Chin Du Long, the previous agent of death, to avoid dying 100 years earlier. When St. George finds Matt, he offers a method to balance things out: either Matt is allowed to live in exchange for Winfield's people, or the people are spared in exchange for Matt. After calling Chin, St. George decides to spare both of them.
- Cannot Keep a Secret: Town drunk Weldon keeps spilling the beans that Matt and his girlfriend are hiding out in his town. To protect the young lovers, the sheriff hangs Weldon by his suspenders from a coat rack to keep him from spilling anymore info.
- Celestial Bureaucracy: Heaven is shown to be operated this way, as St. George, an agent of death, wears a sharp white suit and drives an expensive sports car with a built in phone, which he uses to call Chin.
- Cowboy Episode: The titular town has never progressed beyond the Old West way of living, so there are definite shades of the trope here.
- Deadly Euphemism: When they first meet, St. George tells the people of Winfield that he's in "the reclamation business." After a while, they realize that he means the reclamation of souls. He later says that he has come for Matt, because his number is up and it is his time.
- Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?: The people of Winfield were spared from dying a century ago, solely because their kindness, charity, and hospitality convinced St. George's predecessor Chin against taking them.
- Don't Fear the Reaper: Chin Du Long decided to spare the people of Winfield from death, as he took a liking to them for how kind and welcoming they were. His successor, Griffin St. George, is an impatient, officious, and rude bureaucrat, but he's far from evil. He eventually decides to let Matt and the townspeople go free, but tells them that no one lives forever and that he'll be back in a century or so.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: Matt, Mamie, and the people of Winfield all get to keep their lives, with St. George pretending he never found them.
- The End... Or Is It?: Though he lets them all live, St. George tells everyone that no one lives forever, and says that he'll be back next century.
- Fate Worse than Death: St. George tells the people of Winfield that his boss is not the easiest guy in the world to work for, and things can still cause pain after you're dead.
- Fish out of Temporal Water: The people of Winfield are perplexed by St. George's attire, his road map, and his fancy car, clearly from being 100 years behind the times. Despite their befuddlement, the mayor has some of the men try to fix the car when it gets a flat. They end up replacing the tire with a wagon wheel, even though St. George tells them they could've used the spare.
- Flying Car: St. George's car is shown to be one of these, as he drives it above the ground and flies back to Heaven.
- Fourth-Date Marriage: Mamie was Matt's girlfriend back when he was in the hospital. Three weeks after they find Winfield, they're shown to have gotten married.
- The Ghost: Chin Du Long, the previous agent of death who let Winfield's people live when they were unfailingly kind to him. St. George mentions that he had a habit of letting similar people live when their time was up, and as such was reassigned to another position. He also calls him a couple of times throughout the episode, but we don't hear his voice.
- Good Samaritan: All the citizens of Winfield have genuine hearts of gold, welcoming anyone who wanders into their humble town, helping them with whatever troubles they may have, and allowing them to stay in their local hotel for as long as they prefer. Their kindness even got them spared from death itself, since the agent who was sent to collect them was charmed and amused by their genuinely good natures. In the climax, Matt tries to offer himself to St. George if he spares the townspeople, stating that they've never hurt anyone... only for the townsfolk to offer themselves if Matt is spared. Thankfully, St. George lets everyone stay alive... at least for the century.
- The Grim Reaper: It's a position that multiple men dubbed "agents of Death" have taken up over the centuries. The two featured in the episode are Griffin St. George and Chin Du Long.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Matt offers to go with St. George if he leaves the people of Winfield alone. The townsfolk instead offer to go in his place if Matt gets to live. Fed up with all the positive emotion, St. George decides to cut his losses and let everyone live.
- Long-Lived: The people of Winfield have lived for nearly a century, thanks to their kindness convincing Chin Du Long to spare them.
- Loon with a Heart of Gold: Weldon the drunk. He may keep raving about Winfield's secret and Matt's whereabouts, but he's as kind as the rest of his neighbors.
- New Powers as the Plot Demands: Matt apparently develops heightened perception as he's close to death, warning Mamie to rescue him when he senses that St. George is on his way to reclaim him.
- Really 700 Years Old: Weldon appears to be about 80, but he declares that his 150th birthday is coming up. Most of the other residents of Winfield are also over 100 years old, but look much younger as part of their deal with Chin. According to the closing narration, the median age of the town is 112.
- Riddle for the Ages: How does Matt know St. George is coming for him while he's in the hospital? As far as we can tell, it's just an improbable event that happens because it happens.
- We also never learn why Matt was close to dying in the first place. The only indication we get of his original statistics is that "it was his time" and "his number was up".
- Rule of Three: The mayor of Winfield and his citizens slowly approach St. George as he clears his throat to get his attention, three times in succession.
- Sharp-Dressed Man: St. George wears a white suit and matching shoes, establishing his heavenly atmosphere.
- Take a Third Option: Instead of sparing Matt and taking the townsfolk, or sparing the townsfolk for Matt, St. George, disgusted by all the honesty and self-sacrifice, lets both of them stay alive.
- Take Me Instead: The people of Winfield plead for St. George to take them instead of Matt, as most of them are over 100 and Matt has his whole life ahead of him. However, Matt has none of it and asks St. George to take him, reasoning that the townsfolk have done nothing to deserve death. Fed up with the wholesomeness of the scene, St. George decides to let both parties live.
- Time Skip: When Mamie first brings Matt to Winfield and screams for someone to help them, the townspeople ask if there's anything they can do to help. The episode then skips ahead three weeks later, where St. George finds Winfield himself and attempts to reclaim Matt, who has married Mamie in the interim.
- Token Evil Teammate: Town drunk Weldon is the closest thing Winfield has to such a teammate. He's just as good-hearted as everyone else, but he just never knows when to keep his big mouth shut, since his rambling clues St. George in on the fact that Matt is hiding out in their town and they're long overdue for "reclamation".
- Town with a Dark Secret: Winfield is a strong subversion of the trope. The town's population have cheated death for a century and have been hiding the fact so they can continue living out their lives, but they're not evil or mean-spirited by any means.
- Weather Manipulation: St. George uses the apparently divine ability to conjure thunder and lightning, doing so to try and coerce the people of Winfield into telling him where Matt and Mamie are. He does it again to get their attention when they plead him to take them instead of Matt.
"You're now leaving scenic Winfield. Population: 62; Median age: 112. There's not much to do here, but you do it for a very long time. Look for it off the beaten path, just south of the middle of nowhere, on the backroads — of the Twilight Zone."
Quarantine
Weapons designer Matthew Foreman (Scott Wilson) is awakened from cryogenic stasis in 2347, 300 years after he was frozen. He finds himself in a village where the locals have shunned all forms of technology after a nuclear war in 2043 wiped out 80% of the population. They have also developed strong psychic abilities, which they demonstrate by removing his tumors, having hoped that a cure would be found after his freezing. They tell Matthew that they have awakened him because a meteor is supposedly approaching Earth, and he is the only person to activate an old satellite defense system he designed that can be used to destroy it. When he is able to get the system online, Matthew learns a dark truth about the supposed meteor.
Tropes
- 20 Minutes into the Future: Matthew entered suspended animation on June 18, 2023 in the hopes that his cancer could be cured in the distant future. After being awakened in 2347, he learns that 80% of Earth's population was wiped out in a nuclear war in 2043.
- After the End: Matthew is awakened from suspended animation in 2347, a little over 300 years after a devastating nuclear war wiped out 80% of the world's population.
- The Ark: When nuclear war broke out, the United States launched a spacecraft containing 1,000 politicians and military figures into space, and it returns to Earth in 2347. Sarah and the other members of the village use their psychic powers to fool Matthew into thinking that the ship is a meteor that is going to destroy Earth's ecosystem. They try to get him to destroy it using particle beam satellites that he created prior to being frozen, as they don't want the cycle of war to start all over again. When Matthew discovers the truth, he attempts to stop the satellite from firing, but Sarah stops him by sabotaging the computer, leaving him to watch as the ship is destroyed.
- Armies Are Evil: The villagers firmly believe that the spacecraft full of military officials is carrying nuclear weapons, and intend to conquer their peaceful society when they land. The massive explosion seen when the ship blows up confirms they were right, as nukes were aboard the ship.
- Astral Projection: Sarah and the other members of the village have the ability to astrally project themselves to anywhere they want in the universe, including inhospitable planets spaceships could have never visited. Irene uses her psychic powers on Matthew and takes his mind on a trip around the Solar System.
- Bio-Augmentation: The survivors of the nuclear war began using genetic engineering to give themselves psychic powers, since they no longer trusted technology. By 2347, all life on Earth exists in harmony in a biological gestalt. Their computers are a form of Organic Technology created by genetically engineered apes, increasing their intelligence by a factor of 20. Each augmented ape performs a specific function, and all available knowledge is stored in their brains, accessible to anyone who requires it. The telepathic humans make contact with the apes at an early age and give them the choice of either living a normal life, or becoming part of the collective computer brain.
- Bittersweet Ending: The US spacecraft is destroyed, killing 1,000 people, but the villagers note that doing so has saved their utopian peace. Matthew himself is left devastated at his role in the ship's destruction, but the villagers use astral projection to let him travel the stars, offering to help him in his psychic journey.
- But What About the Astronauts?: Matthew is revived by a post-World War III community of psychics because a United States spacecraft that enabled the nation's leaders to escape the war by traveling through space at relativistic speeds is returning to Earth centuries later. The ship is carrying nuclear weapons, and the village fears that they will try to take over their now-peaceful society. They trick Matthew into using an old particle satellite to destroy the spacecraft before it can land on Earth.
- Commune: After being revived from cryo-stasis, Matthew finds himself in what appears to be a small, primitive farming community in 2347. He later learns that although they have abandoned all forms of machinery, the residents are far from primitive, as they use Bio-Augmentation to improve both themselves and the world around them.
- Depopulation Bomb: A nuclear war broke out in 2043, where each side fired six missiles at the other. 80% of the world's population was wiped out, and all major cities were destroyed. By 2347, the population is only 200,000.
- The Elites Jump Ship: Matthew was cryogenically frozen during the early 21st Century due to cancer, and is revived 300 years later by Perfect Pacifist People with Psychic Powers, living in an Arcadia based on an agrarian lifestyle and supplemented by Organic Technology. They need his help to reactivate orbital particle beam cannons from his time to supposedly deflect an incoming asteroid. Questioning their motives, he discovers that they are a post-apocalyptic society, a mere 200,000 people descended from survivors of World War III. The "asteroid" is actually a U.S. spacecraft loaded with politicians and military personnel, who fled Earth just as the war began by using a relativistic orbit that would take advantage of Time Dilation, allowing them to return them to Earth and take over once the aftereffects of the war passed. The future people actually want Matthew to destroy the spacecraft so human warfare will not return to Earth.
- Empathic Healer: John has the ability to absorb another person's emotions, and he uses the ability on Matthew during the surgery to remove his cancerous tissues, absorbing his pain while he's still conscious.
- Healing Hands: The residents of the future society perform psychic surgery on Matthew, reaching into his body and removing his cancer with their bare hands.
- Human Popsicle: Matthew was cryogenically frozen in 2023, and he is awakened from his slumber in the year 2347.
- Humans Are Psychic in the Future: The survivors of World War III have reverted to living in Arcadia, eschewing all mechanical technology. But in spite of this life, they have developed a wide range of psychic powers and various levels of Organic Technology.
- Intangibility: Sarah has the ability to phase her hand through solid matter. She uses this power to remove Matthew's cancerous tissues after he is revived from cryo-stasis.
- Kill Sat: Matthew designed a series of particle beam satellites for the United States government before he entered suspended animation. Sarah and the rest of the villagers ask him to use one of the surviving satellites to destroy a meteor that is rapidly approaching Earth. However, it turns out that they are using their psychic powers to make him think the object is an asteroid. It's actually an American spacecraft containing 1,000 politicians and military figures who fled Earth when nuclear war broke out, and they want the ship destroyed so the brutality of war won't return to Earth.
- Ludd Was Right: 80% of Earth's population was killed in the nuclear war, and the survivors made the decision to rid themselves of all forms of advanced machinery out of fear that the catastrophe would happen again. They still use genetic engineering in order to achieve Bio-Augmentation.
- Organic Technology: The future society uses genetically modified primates as telepathic computers. The members of this society call their organic technology a "biological gestalt".
- Psychic Surgery: Matthew has a tumor removed in this manner, as technology has reverted to pre-Industrial Revolution levels following a nuclear holocaust. In order to prevent history from repeating itself, mankind swore not to rebuild as they had before, devoting their energies to mental and psychic research instead.
- Sole Surviving Scientist: Matthew, a designer of particle beam satellites, is the only person with the necessary skills to save the day because of society's progression while he was in stasis. He's awoken from cryo-sleep to help the utopian society that ordinarily shuns technology in order to destroy an approaching American spaceship with one of the old satellites.
- Technophobia: The survivors of World War III came to despise technology because nuclear weapons had wiped out 80% of the world's population. They abandoned machines in favor of improving humanity through genetic engineering, and soon achieved harmony with the natural world.
- Time Dilation: Although 304 years have passed on Earth, Joshua estimates that it's only been five to ten years for the people aboard the American spacecraft launched during the nuclear war in 2043.
- Utopia Justifies the Means: The villagers intend to blow up a spaceship filled with American politicians and military officers to prevent war from returning to their now-peaceful society. Matthew is horrified with the revelation that he's largely responsible for the deaths of 1,000 people, but the villagers console him by telling him it was the only thing that could be done.
- World War III: 80% of the world's population was wiped out in a nuclear war in 2043. The authorities of the time considered it a limited engagement, as only six missiles were fired by each side. Nonetheless, this led the survivors to shun technology and work on strengthening their mental and psychic capabilities.
"In his mind, he starts to hear a song. A song of alien thoughts speaking without voice, welcoming him. Matthew Foreman, once a sleeper standing outside time, has found his place at last. A voyager touching the farthest shores — of the Twilight Zone.
