Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire show is streaming on Tubi.
This week, it’s the worst episode of Monsters yet!
Episode 1.16 “Their Divided Self”
(Dir by Frank De Palma, originally aired on February 25th, 1989)
Bleh.
James (David L. Lander) and Robert Self (Keith MacKechnie) are conjoined twins who found fame as a stand-up comedy team but who now spend all of their time isolated in their mansion and arguing with each other. They hate one another but they’re literally stuck with each other. And, since they share the same lungs and heart, they can’t really fight with each other.
James’s girlfriend (Karen Harber) hires Dr. Blackman (Rich Hall) to help the twins but even Dr. Blackman’s years of psychiatric experience can’t seem to convince the twins to stop bickering. However, when Dr. Blackman says that he wants to write a book about the twins, the twins announce that they resent being exploited and they kill the doctor. It’s a murder that brings them together as siblings.
The end.
This was a dumb and pointless episode and I’m not going to waste too much time on it. Making conjoined twins into the episode’s “monster,” just feels wrong on so many levels. What feels even more wrong is not really doing anything interesting with them. If you’re villain is going to be borderline offensive, at least find a way to make the character interesting. There’s probably an interesting story to be found in the idea of two conjoined twins hating but needing each other but this episode is not served well by either its script or its performances. (Some really shoddy FX doesn’t help either. From the minute they appear, their big, boxy suit makes it obvious that the two actors are just standing next to each other.)
Hopefully, next week’s episode will be better.
Through the Shattered Lens 