The premise here is that astronauts have crash-landed on an asteroid, one that happens to not only be in the same orbit as Earth (which they note explicitly), but which also happens to have an atmosphere identical to Earth's (which they mention in passing, without noting that this is physically impossible, as no asteroid has enough gravity to retain an atmosphere). Oh, and which also seems to have the same length day as Earth, meaning the asteroid is rotating at the same speed -- after first wondering whether the sun will in fact go down, they never mention this again.
No effort is made to portray the astronauts as being addle-brained as a result of crash trauma. So we have the classic flaw of the characters being in possession of the same facts as the audience, but not getting the "twist," which couldn't be more obvious. (This is true, alas, even if the episode takes place in an alternate reality where there *are* immense asteroids in the same orbit as Earth. The crew would know of those, and probably know their rotational speeds / day lengths, as well). If you work it backwards, there's absolutely no reason why the crew would have ever thought they *were* on an asteroid; there's no reason they would have ever given that answer after asking the obvious question "where are we?" It would have made as much sense to have them believe they'd crash-landed in Oz.
The human drama involves one astronaut who is immediately revealed to be a sociopath, concerned only for his own well-being at the expense of his crewmates. Again, it's hardly credible that someone like that would be among the crew of the first manned spacecraft. That drama would have been much more effective if he'd been initially portrayed as caring, and had devolved into selfishness from the stress of apparent imminent death. Had they been able to make that belief credible, that is.
A rare misfire from Serling, on every front that matters.
No effort is made to portray the astronauts as being addle-brained as a result of crash trauma. So we have the classic flaw of the characters being in possession of the same facts as the audience, but not getting the "twist," which couldn't be more obvious. (This is true, alas, even if the episode takes place in an alternate reality where there *are* immense asteroids in the same orbit as Earth. The crew would know of those, and probably know their rotational speeds / day lengths, as well). If you work it backwards, there's absolutely no reason why the crew would have ever thought they *were* on an asteroid; there's no reason they would have ever given that answer after asking the obvious question "where are we?" It would have made as much sense to have them believe they'd crash-landed in Oz.
The human drama involves one astronaut who is immediately revealed to be a sociopath, concerned only for his own well-being at the expense of his crewmates. Again, it's hardly credible that someone like that would be among the crew of the first manned spacecraft. That drama would have been much more effective if he'd been initially portrayed as caring, and had devolved into selfishness from the stress of apparent imminent death. Had they been able to make that belief credible, that is.
A rare misfire from Serling, on every front that matters.