| "A Quality of Mercy" | |||
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| The Twilight Zone episode | |||
One of the first scenes from "A Quality of Mercy": Leonard Nimoy on the left. |
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| Episode no. | Season 3 Episode 80 |
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| Directed by | Buzz Kulik | ||
| Written by | Rod Serling from a story by Sam Rolfe | ||
| Production code | 4809 | ||
| Original air date | December 29, 1961 | ||
| Guest stars | |||
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Dean Stockwell: Lt. Katell/Lt. Yamuri |
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| Episode chronology | |||
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| List of Twilight Zone episodes | |||
"A Quality of Mercy" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone. The title is taken from William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. It was later adapted into the first segment of Twilight Zone: The Movie.
Contents |
A young gung-ho American, Second Lieutenant Katell, in World War II orders his war-weary soldiers to make a near-suicidal attack on a group of sick and wounded Japanese soldiers holed up in a cave. Sgt. Causarano, who knows the men have had enough of war, tries to talk him out of it -- the attack will accomplish nothing but pointless deaths on both sides -- but Katell pulls rank and stands firm on his orders, intent on proving himself.
Suddenly, Lt. Katell finds himself in Corregidor, three years earlier in the war, and gets a new perspective. As Lt. Yamuri in the Japanese army, he is ordered to attack a group of American soldiers in the cave. In vain, he tries to dissuade the captain from the attack, but the Japanese captain believes the young man is sick with jungle fever, or worse, has lost his nerve. He tells him to straighten up or stay with the wounded.
His mind reeling from what he has just experienced, Katell finds himself back in 1945, an American soldier, with his men telling him that they've gotten word the A-bomb has been dropped. They have been ordered not to attack the cave and to fall back. The young man seems relieved, in light of his revelation.
The episode would later be remade into the first segment of Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983), with a modern day approach in which the main character, Bill Konnors (played by Vic Morrow) is a racist businessman who is upset after a promotion is passed on him for a Jewish man. After giving a prejudicial rant in a bar, he is then taken on a trip through time and is given similar justice of intolerance; a Jew during the Holocaust, an African-American being lynched by the KKK and a Vietnamese being attacked by American soldiers during the Vietnam War. It was directed by film director John Landis. While filming the Vietnam scene of the segment, actor Vic Morrow and two young child actors were killed during a helicopter stunt. Later, Landis along with the film's producers were put on trial for manslaughter and child endangerment, but were found not guilty on all counts.
Many cast members from this episode went on to achieve fame in later science fiction television series. The episode's main protagonist Dean Stockwell became well-known to science fiction fans as Al Calavicci in the television series Quantum Leap (interestingly, the show revolves about one man "jumping" into another man's body like Stockwell's character in this episode when he "jumped" into the body of a Japanese officer). Leonard Nimoy, who makes a brief appearance in this episode, also later became well-known as Mr. Spock in Star Trek. Michael Pataki also made appearances on Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
This episode was filmed on a soundstage at Hal Roach Studios, instead of the usual MGM facilities.