Episode no. Season 3
Episode 24 Production code 4807 | Directed by Richard L. Bare Original air date March 2, 1962 | |
Written by Rod Serling (Based on the story To Serve Man by Damon Knight) Featured music Stock (from Jerry Goldsmith's scores for "Back There" and "The Invaders") | ||
"To Serve Man" is episode 89 of the anthology series The Twilight Zone. It originally aired on March 2, 1962 on CBS.
Contents
The story is based on the 1950 short story "To Serve Man", written by Damon Knight. The title is a play on the verb serve, which has a dual meaning of "to assist" and "to provide as a meal". The episode is one of the few instances in the series wherein an actor breaks the fourth wall and addresses the viewing audience at the episode's end. The episode, along with the line "It's a cookbook!" have become elements in pop culture.
Plot
The Kanamits, a race of 9-foot-tall (2.7 m) aliens, land on Earth. One of them addresses the United Nations via telepathy, announcing that his race's motive in coming to Earth is to aid humanity by sharing their advanced technology. After answering questions, the Kanamit departs and leaves a book in the Kanamit language without comment, which leads Michael Chambers, a US government cryptographer, to be pressed into service.
Initially wary of an alien race who came "quite uninvited", international leaders begin to be persuaded of the Kanamits' benevolence when their advanced technology puts an end to hunger, energy shortages, and nuclear proliferation. Trust in the Kanamits seems to be justified when Patty, a member of the cryptography staff led by Chambers, decodes the title of the Kanamit book: To Serve Man. The Kanamits submit to interrogation and polygraph, at the request of the UN delegates. When declaring their benevolent intentions, the polygraph indicates that the Kanamit is speaking the truth.
Soon, humans are volunteering for trips to the Kanamits' home planet, which they describe as a paradise. Kanamits now have embassies in every major city on Earth. With the Cold War ended, the code-breaking staff has no real work to do, but Patty is still trying to work out the meaning of the text of To Serve Man.
The day arrives for Chambers's excursion to the Kanamits' planet. Just as he mounts the spaceship's boarding stairs, Patty runs toward him in great agitation. While being held back by a Kanamit guard, Patty cries: "Mr. Chambers, don't get on that ship! The rest of the book To Serve Man, it's... it's a cookbook!" Chambers tries to run back down the stairs, but a Kanamit blocks him, the stairs retract, and the ship lifts off.
Michael Chambers's ship quarters are a cot in a spartan interior. A voice offers him a choice of dish at all the regular meal times. Each time he refuses food with increasing irritation. At last he says to the audience: "How about you? You still on Earth, or on the ship with me? Really doesn't make very much difference, because sooner or later, all of us will be on the menu... all of us." The episode closes as he gives in and breaks his hunger strike.
Cast
Production
The arriving Kanamit ship is shown as scenes extracted from The Day the Earth Stood Still, but with different sound; the departing Kanamit ship is shown as a scene extracted from Earth vs. the Flying Saucers, also with different sound.
Critical response
Marc Scott Zicree, writing in The Twilight Zone Companion, has criticized a cardinal plot point in "To Serve Man": "In the show ... a staff of cryptographers led by [Michael Chambers] Lloyd Bochner attempts to decipher the alien language as though it were some secret code, which is utterly ludicrous. Without some sort of interplanetary Rosetta stone, deciphering an unknown language would be impossible." Zicree also points out that the chances of the word "serve" having the same dual meaning in both English and another language, especially an alien one, are almost nil.
In 1997 TV Guide ranked the episode at No. 11 on its "100 Greatest Episodes of All Time" list and in 2013 ranked the ending as the "Greatest Twist of All Time." In 2009, Time listed the episode among the "Top 10 Twilight Zone Episodes."
Cultural influence
An unofficial badge of the 509th Bomb Wing based in Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri shows a space alien with huge eyes holding a stealth bomber near its mouth. The text reads, "To Serve Man," and the caption below reads, "Gustatus Similis Pullus"—dog Latin for "Tastes Like Chicken".
The plot device of the alien cookbook is parodied in the segment "Hungry Are the Damned" on The Simpsons episode "Treehouse of Horror" (1990). In the segment, the seemingly benevolent aliens Kang and Kodos are discovered to have a book titled "How to Cook Humans". When it's revealed that the cookbook says "How to Cook for Forty Humans", Lisa's suspicion humiliates her family when the aliens reveal that they intended for the Simpsons to come live with them peacefully on their home planet. Homer and Bart agrees with Kang and Kodos and blames her. Marge tries to explain to Kang and Kodos while she thinks Lisa should've known better and ask them about the cookbook, she also defends Lisa's actions as it was out of concern for her family.