The Outer Limits

7.7
199544m

Anthology series of composed of distinct story episodes, sometimes with a plot twist at the end, with occasional recurring story elements that were often tied together during season-finale clip shows.

Production

Logo for Alliance Atlantis
Logo for Showtime Networks
Logo for Trilogy Entertainment Group

Seasons

21 Episodes • Premiered 1995

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 1: The Sandkings

1. The Sandkings

6.4

Scientist Simon Kress finds himself the master of a colony of Sandkings -- creatures from Mars that look like insects, but have the intelligence of much higher beings.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 2: Valerie 23

2. Valerie 23

6.0

Frank Hellner, a lonely paraplegic, takes part in a top-secret project -- allowing an "inorganic human," or robot named Valerie, to be his companion for a week. The experiment goes awry when Valerie, unable to control her programmed emotions, becomes jealous and threatens the life of Frank's physical therapist and close friend Rachel.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 3: Blood Brothers

3. Blood Brothers

5.9

Two diametrically opposed brothers, wrestle for control of a million-dollar pharmaceutical company. A vaccine that could hold the secret to eternal life, becomes the object of the brothers' bitter struggle.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 4: The Second Soul

4. The Second Soul

5.0

Man's first encounter with beings from another planet -- the N'Tal -- appears to be a mutually rewarding arrangement. But a leery doctor/scientist must decide whether the N'Tal are friend or foe.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 5: White Light Fever

5. White Light Fever

4.8

An experiment at St. Peter's Hospital threatens nature's order of existence, when billionaire Harlan Hawkes pays a brilliant cardiologist, Dr. "Mac" McEnerney to help him cheat death.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 6: The Choice

6. The Choice

5.4

A young girl with strange, supernatural powers is shunned by her friends, but welcomed by a nanny with similar gifts, while her parents must decide what's ultimately best for their child.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 7: Virtual Future

7. Virtual Future

5.1

A brilliant young scientist discovers a way to see the future, but gets caught up in a billionaire's ambitious political schemes, and must alter the future to save his own life.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 8: Living Hell

8. Living Hell

5.7

Ben Kohler's life is saved after having an experimental chip implanted in his brain, but when he starts seeing and experiencing violent images, it becomes clear something is desperately wrong.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 9: Corner of the Eye

9. Corner of the Eye

5.3

A disillusioned priest is given healing power by aliens who use him as they attempt to save their own planet by destroying all human life.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 10: Under the Bed

10. Under the Bed

5.2

When a little boy is abducted the only witness, his sister, claims that someone or something under the bed took him.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 11: Dark Matters

11. Dark Matters

6.3

Dropped out of hyperspace by a mysterious chunk of dark matter, Pilot Paul Stein must save the transport vessel by facing his past and ultimately trusting his own decisions.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 12: The Conversion

12. The Conversion

7.3

Henry Marshall is a greedy man who has paid for his greed with a prison sentence but has yet to learn his lesson. His life abruptly changes when he encounters visitors from another planet who instill new sense of compassion for others.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 13: Quality of Mercy

13. Quality of Mercy

6.4

Major John Skokes is taken prisoner by the enemy during a savage galactic war and a seemingly undefeatable alien race. The tension increases when his cellmate, a cadet named Pri, is being transformed into one of them. Skokes must find an escape to save his cellmate and to avoid a disturbing revelation of the course of this war.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 14: The New Breed

14. The New Breed

6.6

The discovery of a gifted scientist falls into the wrong hands, bringing what at first appears to be a lifesaving miracle, but ultimately the untimely death of his closest friend.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 15: The Voyage Home

15. The Voyage Home

6.8

When an astronaut returning from Mars discovers an alien aboard ship, he must face the loss of his shipmates, and make the ultimate sacrifice in order to prevent the alien from reaching Earth.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 16: Caught in the Act

16. Caught in the Act

4.9

A chaste co-ed is enveloped by a strange power that gives her an insatiable sexual appetite, which is perpetuated by encounters with consenting men who, after making physical contact, morph into her body and disappear.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 17: The Message

17. The Message

6.4

A deaf woman with a transplanted device, which is supposed to enable her to hear, turns into a transmitter for aliens, who are crying for help.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 18: I, Robot

18. I, Robot

6.0

Adam, a powerful robot, kills his creator when the scientist attempts to convert him into a military killing machine by destroying his more human qualities.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 19: If These Walls Could Talk

19. If These Walls Could Talk

4.9

Levi Mitchell, a physicist and skeptic, meets Lynda Tillman, a woman whose strength and faith help him unravel the mystery of a haunted house.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 20: Birthright

20. Birthright

7.2

An environmentally-friendly U.S. Senator's life changes drastically after a freak accident, when he realizes he's actually an alien in disguise, with a "mission" to surreptitiously reconfigure the earth's atmosphere.

Still image for The Outer Limits season 1 episode 21: The Voice of Reason

21. The Voice of Reason

4.4

A civilian with strong ties to the military tries desperately to use concrete evidence to convince a high level committee that alien forces are trying to overcome the human race.

Cast

Photo of Kevin Conway

Kevin Conway

The Control Voice (voice) (uncredited)

More Like This

Reviews

G

GenerationofSwine

10/10

It was kind of all over the place wasn't it?

It wasn't the best show out there, but it had it's moments and when those moments came it was far better than the X-Files.

Unlike the Twilight Zone revivals that lost the moralistic bent, the 90s revival sort of brought it back in full swing and made it feel more like a Twilight Zone revival than an Outer Limits Revival, but let's be honest, the Outer Limits was kind of just a continuation under a different name with more of a lean towards science fiction.

It also does a good job of staying within the genre of science fiction which is something that you scarcely see in shows post Alien when it started to meld into horror as well. So what you get is less X-Files and more pure Sci-Fi, which, by the 90s was refreshing.

However the quality of the story telling was hit or miss. You can compare it to Tales From the Crypt, another Anthology from about the same time, or the Hitch Hiker, which were both solid for nearly every episode.

The 90s revival of the Outer Limits wasn't as solid. You had some episodes that would blow your hair back, some that would entertain and nothing else, and those were about equal to the ones that just kind of fell flat.

But, they didn't want to mix genres, they wanted to keep it more pure sci-fi, so it's hard to fault them for having so many misses in an Anthology series that tried so hard to stay true to the genre.

You've reached the end.