Perchance To Dream

I've been having these super weird dreams for the past month now, ever since I started taking those pills. So, I have this dream last night where I'm some sort of super cop, with this huge robotic suit and this massive chaingun, and this amazing helmet with all of this infra-red optical gizmo stuff. But I'm one of those troubled gunslinger types, you know, the Dirty Harry kind of anti-conformist, bend the rules, killer-with-a-conscience kind of guy.

Anyway, in this dream, I'm on the trail of this violent psychopath guy, and we have this kind of showdown on the roof of this 50 storey skyscraper. Now, I know that this dude is pretty smart, a John Doe/Seven kind of clever, so I'm wary of doing anything without thinking.

We're both checking each other out, you know, he's looking at my advanced firepower, but I'm worried about that wily mind of his, and I'm just sure he's got some trap or ploy lined up. So I take a couple of mechanical steps forward, you know, with the big crashings and crunching roof tiles, when sure enough, he lets fly.

My infra-red opticals pick up the object as it leaves his hand, and analyzes it mid-flight, and my heart almost stops when it is identified as one of those new Maxi-Slorta Thermonuclear devices. I have to think quick, you know, outwit the fox, when I realise that if I'm lucky, I can sniper the detonator pin out of the bomb with my Eezi-Site Opto-Mag sniper rifle, built into the shoulder casing of my suit.

Now, you gotta realise that this is all happening in a couple of split seconds after he threw the bomb, so time is really slowing down for dramatic effect. The rifle extends itself from its shoulder holster, the visor on the sight drops, and I have almost no time to take aim before I have to shoot. BANG. One loud shot, I feel the recoil as it digs into the padding in my shoulder pad, and with my advanced telescoping sight I see the detonator pin fly out of the bomb as the device lands harmlessly at my feet. I take a deep breath, and look up at John Doe, kind of menacing but also confident. "Give it up!" I shout. Of course, I know that he's not gonna give up, and he knows that I know, and I know that he knows that I know. So it comes as no surprise to either of us when he fakes forward, turns, and jumps off the side of the building.

Now being a cop on the edge, I'm not gonna let the perp get away that easily, with an easy suicide and everything. So I think quick, set my suit to Insane Destruction and let rip.

Now that .30mm Vulcan Minigun really got down and dirty. At 4 200 shots per minute, John Doe's body was liquified before he passed the 40th floor. I let go with two small surface-to-air missiles, just for good measure, and they both hit spot on, incinerating his remains. By the time he would have hit the ground, 50 storeys down, he was nothing more than a fine mist. And I'm just kind of standing there, Bruce Willis-like, enjoying the view and smelling the gunpowder in the air, when I hear the sirens, and I just know the shit's gonna hit the fan.

Anyway, after the whole crime scene is cleared and they have checked the roof for evidence and such-like, I'm taken off to the cop shop (in this huge Knight Industries kind of truck) for questioning, because they want to know what went down, you know, with the whole pulverizing his body and nonsense like that. So I'm all belligerent, shouting down the captain, who's played by the captain from Blade Runner, and I'm saying that I did the right thing, and he has no idea what it's like on the streets, and he hasn't been out there since he turned into a desk jockey. Now he gets all pissed at me, and starts laying about with all that "Procedure" and "Human Rights" bullshit, but I just ain't listening.

So anyway, they're gonna hold this enquiry, so they take away my suit and put me in a holding cell, and the guards are all sympathetic, 'cos they know the scum on the streets today. But I'm havin' a rough time sleeping, 'cos even though I'm a tough guy I'm also kind of soft and feel a little bad about perforating that sucker's body, so the guards slip me a couple of sleeping pills and I'm out for the night.

So I wake up this morning, after this weirdo dream, and I'm lying in bed and thinking how real that dream was, because my muscles are aching, and it seems as if I can still smell the gunpowder. Thinking about this, I go to the kitchen, make myself a sandwich, and sit down in front of the TV. And while I'm tucking into my bacon sandwich, there’s this news report on T.V. about this guy who was shot and pushed off a building in town last night, and how these killings have been going on for a month now, and how the cops have no idea as to who the killer is.

And I'm just sitting there, thinking that if I was the robot cop guy, I would definitely find the killer. Definitely.

No, this isn't a dreamlog...

"Perchance to Dream" is the ninth episode of The Twilight Zone. It was written by Charles Beaumont and starred Richard Conte. It was first broadcast in November of 1959.

The first praise I can give to this episode is that it took me a long time to figure out what was going on. Much like when I first watched "Where Is Everybody?", my first few guesses about what direction the plot was heading were all wrong. Some of the misdirection and suspense were built up through cinematography that is almost nauseous: although it is unrelated to the main plot, some sped up shots of a revolving door at the beginning of the episode set the viewer's mind into a frenetic, confused mindset.

Mood being established, we proceed to our plot: a man who is afraid of falling asleep goes to visit a psychiatrist. He has a heart condition that might be triggered by a strong shock, and he has intrusive thoughts that if he lays down to sleep, something in a dream could trigger this shock. He begins to describe his past dreams to his psychiatrists, dreams that become increasingly tense.

Since this is a Twilight Zone episode, we know there is a twist ending. But more important than that is the way the episode sets its mood: it has a fast, frenetic pace, and has some scenes where the implications of sex, drugs and violence are quite strong for 1959. This episode is another episode that shows the growth in the scope of The Twilight Zone.