Old School TV: One Step Beyond- Anniversary of a Murder

As we continue to process a Year that refuses to stop killing our beloved Celebrities, let us take...

Beloved Host/Narrator introduces us to 'Anniversary of a Murder.'  It should be as light-hearted as the last Episode!

This guy is haunted by a mysterious voice he keeps hearing on his Phone and Voice Recorder (which is the size of VCR!).  Why?

Well, a year earlier, he was driving home after a date with his Mistress and they ran over a teenager, who's sad final words haunted them for the next 365 days.

Fun!

They ran away and never reported it.  Such nice people.

On a fun note, Cloris Leachman is in this Episode.  Fun!

After another Narrator interlude (weird considering that he did none of these in the last 2 Episodes I saw), the voice continues to haunt him.

Yeah, there's not much to this one really.  Weird voice, upset calls, weird voice again...

He continues to be bothered by the voices until he crashes his car into a tree and dies.  In the aftermath, the woman confesses to the crime and we learn that there was no Audio Recording- just guilt.  The End.

Joy.  To be fair, these don't HAVE to be fun to be good.  Plus, if I'm being honest, the last one was all kinds of silly.  In this case, we get a bi-polar swing in the opposite direction.  Dead kids, crushing guilt and dark secrets- fun stuff!  The Segment is well-acted and well-produced.  The big issue is just that there isn't much too it.  We find out the basic Premise pretty quickly, find out the hook and then...it just kind of finishes...eventually.  The thing is about 20 minutes long, but could easily be 10 the way that it plays out.  There's certainly more you could have done with this premise, so it isn't like they were working with bad material.  It is just kind of one-note and dreary.  Oh well- it is early TV.  You don't make great TV in a day, to completely butcher a famous quote.  Hey look- the Narrator is tampering with Police Evidence- get him!

Next time, something hopefully more upbeat.  Given the random nature of the Set though, there's no telling!  See you then...