Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic FDK: Lois and Clark: The New Adventures in the Twilight Zone: Summer Ficathon (1/1)

Here's my entry into the Summer Ficathon challenge. My prompt was "rerun."

As always, all feedback welcomed.

Joy,
Lynn

Oh boy! Talk about a great way to get things started!!

I need to get my story off my iPhone and into my computer.

Thanks for the prompting.

It makes me with I wasn't so long winded.

All my stories seem to run on and on and on. i don't think I could come up with something short like that. That really takes talent.

Uh-oh!



Oh dear. This is going to be fun.

Definitely a dream.



Oooooh!

This. Is. Brilliant!



What a brilliant, fun way to get the ficathon kiked off!

Poor Clark. What a horrible nightmare?! Or was it one of his foreshadowing dreams? <<bites fingernails>> I'm guessing if there's actually a tape of the show, he'd say, "You're right, Lois, I don't think we need to watch any more of this." Too bad he didn't x-ray the package beforehand.

Great, Lynn. That's what I love about your stories. They may be short (please let me echo Ken's desire to be able to write short vignettes like you do), but they stick with you and keep you thinking long after I've read them. Excellent!

Poor Clark. All his worst nightmares rolled into one.

I thought putting the real world TV show into the world of the TV show via a video tape was really interesting. That's a thought that could definitely stand some further exploration.

(I started betaing a fic that ran along those lines, but alas, the writer is no longer working on it.)

Nice story, Lynn.

Corrina.

I like the twist ending. That's very "Twilight Zonish".

Morgana, thank you. I'm relieved that you liked the story; I had been nervous about this one. (Well, I should say, "more nervous than usual," because I am always a bit nervous when I post a story.)

Ken, thank you! I guess the grass really is always greener on the other side. I am always impressed and somewhat envious of people who can write long, complex stories and hold the reader's attention throughout.

DC, I *love* receiving such detailed feedback. Thank you! If I had to put money on who is behind the dream tape, I'd go with Mxyzptlk. It just seems to me like the sort of thing he would do. <shrug> I purposely left a lot to the reader's imagination in this story.

Virginia, dream-Clark's sense of judgment did leave rather a lot to be desired, didn't it?

And thank you for letting me know that my stories stick with you and keep you thinking after reading them. That, to me, is high praise, since I consider it the mark of a good short story.

Corrina, I hadn't read any stories with the tape-given-to-the-show's-characters premise before, but I'm not surprised that someone else had the idea. I'd love to read other stories based on it; I agree that it has the potential for a great deal of fun. Hmmm... Maybe I'll post a fanfic challenge to see what others can come up with.

Iolanthe, thank you. That is exactly what I was aiming for. I can hear Rod Serling delivering the final line very clearly in my mind; I'm glad that his voice came through for you, as well.

Thanks to all who "fed the author."

Joy,
Lynn

I'm a huge Twilight Zone fan so I had to read this. Nice transition into the 'dream'. Love the mysterious package and the revelation. I like that Cat in Season 2 got a job in Paris - nice continuity there. Love the classic 'Zone' wrap up.

Joan

Too clever!! And great kick off to the summer ficathon!

Awesome! LOL. Loved it!

Here we go again!

Michael

Joan, I'm glad the story held up for someone who is both an L&C and a TZ fan. I had fun with this crossover.

Mouserocks, I'm relieved that the story does seem acceptable for the challenge, despite there being very little to do with summer in it. (Well, except for what was seen on the tape.) Now I'm looking forward to seeing someone stealing second under blue skies.

Laura, it's nice to see it made you smile. Bringing smiles is a goal of mine for almost all my stories.

Michael, if you ever get a chance to watch the Twilight Zone, I highly recommend it. It first aired about half a century ago. The special effects are dated, but the plots still hold up incredibly well. The basic premise of the show is that the Twilight Zone is a place where bizarre, usually unexplained, things happen, and the main character has to deal with them. Except for the narrator Rod Serling, there was a different cast each week. If I had to sum the show up in one word, it would probably be "eerie." The endings often had a surprising twist of some sort. A couple of example plots:

1) A white supremacist suddenly winds up becoming an African American and finding out first-hand what racism is like from the other side. (Although there was an obvious moral to this particular episode, the show was far from preachy.)

***What follows is a serious spoiler for what was, IMHO, one of the best stand-alone episodes of any series, ever. If you want to be spoiler-free for the Twilight Zone episode "To Serve Man," stop reading here***

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2) Aliens come to earth and cure all diseases, solve all food shortages, and generally make the world a Utopia. At set intervals, people are chosen to be able to visit the alien home world. The aliens carry around a huge book written in their native language. One of the protagonists is a linguist who was trying to figure out what the book said. He cracked the title, "To Serve Man," fairly early on. Just as the other protagonist is about to enter a ship to fly to the aliens' world, the linguist comes rushing up to him screaming the final line of the show: "IT'S A COOKBOOK!" (Incidentally, this episode is adapted from a short story by Fredric Brown. He was a master of short-short stories (often less than one side of one page of a paperback) that had surprise endings and that made one think long after one put them down. A lot of his stories are cliched now, but in the same way that Shakespeare's works are -- so many people borrowed his ideas that that he was the originator of what became cliches. His works were a huge influence on my own writing.)

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I hope my story was able to stand up at least reasonably well even for someone who didn't know the Twilight Zone.

If you remember what made you think at first the story was set in S4 or later, would you let me know? Thanks.

BTW, I love the picture. I was thinking of the story as more of a hall of mirrors than Groundhog Day, but I can see the similarity to that, too.

Joy,
Lynn

Reminds me a lot of Outer Limits, format-wise. And Michael

You're right, Michael. It is similar to The Outer Limits. But, IMHO, good though The Outer Limits was, The Twilight Zone was much better. The Twilight Zone also started airing a few years before the Outer Limits did. I would guess that the latter probably was created to piggyback on the success of the former. (Pure speculation on my part.)

Joy,
Lynn

I thought The Twilight Zone was a much better show too.

Joan