Tourist Attraction

The Outer Limits (1963)

Tourist Attraction, directed by Laslo Benedek.

In a mashup of Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) and The Thing from Another World (1951) a tough and unpleasant businessman is testing new diving gear in South America when he captures a gill-man creature. He fights with the local General/President (and everyone else) over what to do with it.

Definitely one of the lesser episodes without much in the way of an Outer Limits sense of wonder. They hint at elements which are not developed: the creature was once worshiped as a god and has hypnotic powers (making it one of the Spawn of Cthulhu).

Way too much TV drama diddling around, soap opera with the secretary and confrontation with the strongman.

The gill-man outfits are not very good but give them credit for trying: underwater filming in that gear is not easy. The episode also has an unusual degree of outdoor effects, with flooding after a broken dam.

Unusually, the Control Voice provides (unneeded) narration during the program.

Notable cast: Ralph Meeker (Kiss Me Deadly (1955)), Henry Silva (The Manchurian Candidate (1962)), Jay Novello, and a brief glimpse of Henry Darrow.

Photographed by John M. Nickolaus.

No Blu-ray commentary track for this episode.