Descent (The Outer Limits)

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“Descent”

The Outer Limits episode

Episode no.

Season 5
Episode 102

Written by

Erik Saltzgaber

Directed by

Steve Anker

Guest stars

Leland Orser (Arthur Zeller), Jenny Levine (Laura White), Greg Thirloway (Dr. Jim Feind), John Novak (Professor Martin Standfield), Frank C. Turner (Mikulak), Benita Ha (Cute Lab Technician), John "Bear" Curtis (Bum), Robyn Driscoll (Detective), David Neale (Security Guard)

Original airdate

25 June 1999

Episode chronology
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"Summit"	"The Haven"

List of The Outer Limits episodes

"Descent" is an episode of "The Outer Limits" television show. It first aired on 25 June 1999, during the fifth season.

1 Opening narration
2 Plot
3 Closing narration
4 External links
5 See also

[edit] Opening narration

"What makes us human? Is it our basic instincts or our noble aspirations? Are we slaves to our genetics or masters of our fate?"

[edit] Plot

Leland Orser as Arthur Zeller, post transformation

Shy, unassertive researcher Dr. Arthur Zeller (Leland Orser) routinely admires a Homo erectus display in the Life Sciences department of his university and daydreams about what it would be like if he could only unlock the animal within him. It turns out his real life is that of a pushover, a "doormat" for his co-workers. Even a bum shakes him up regularly for "lunch money". All his brilliance and scientific accomplishments take a backseat to his meek personality and no one seems to take him seriously. He begins to try and make his dreams a reality by developing a kind of gene therapy which involves injecting himself with the genes for dominance extracted from primitive primates. This starts changing his entire personality. Zeller suffers from occasional lapses in which he reverts to the mind of a caveman and attacks his boss (John Novak), and kills and eats a dog.

Unfortunately, the changes may improve his life on many levels but they are doing nothing for his love life. His affection towards his co-worker Dr. Laura White (Jenny Levine) remains unrequited and so he decides to tip the scales. During a routine flu shot session, he surreptitiously injects Laura with the genes for submissiveness. The injection has severe side effects for Laura because her basic personality is not submissive at all, so she starts to pass out. Arthur takes her to his place and attempts to attack her, but regains control of his senses and begs her for help. He tells her what he has been up to and the shocked Laura decides to help him develop a way of reversing the process. Together they come up with an experimental antidote, but things go really bad when he reveals to Laura that he had injected her with the submissiveness genes. Seeing that he has blown his chance with her forever, Arthur escapes into the night with a batch of his syringes. Laura has a change of heart and follows him to offer her help, but it's too late for Arthur who had already injected himself with a megadose of the ape genes.