"Walking Distance" must be one of the more popular episodes of the entire "The Twilight Zone" series. It appears in many favorite episode rankings and just recently I was watching a romantic comedy with my wife – "The Rewrite", starring Hugh Grant and Marisa Tomei – where this particular episode got mentioned as well. I can see why it's so beloved to many people, considering it's such an endearing and moralistic story, but personally I found it a bit too soft for my liking. It's a tale about almost every normal human being's occasional desire to return back to his/her carefree and nostalgic childhood years. Back to the park they used to play, to the merry- go-round where they shared their first kiss or to the gazebo where they toughly carved their names in
Martin Sloan has that desire as well. He's the 36-year-old VP of a company in the big city of New York and balancing on the verge of an immense burn-out when his car breaks down on a lonesome road in the countryside. When he notices a signpost for "Homewood", Martin realizes he's very close to the little town where he grew up and decides to walk over there. Martin literally walks 25 years back in time and ends up in the year 1934, where he runs into his own former neighborhood pals, parents and eventually the eleven-year-old version of himself. Martin so obsessively wants to tell his younger self to enjoy his youth to the fullest that he nearly causes an accident. "Walking Distance" contains a couple of very powerful scenes and dialogs, most notably the conversation between adult Martin and his same-aged father, but it's lacking the typical Twilight Zone aura of mystery. This episode must have been very dear and personal to creator Rod Serling, and allegedly the fictional town of Homewood is even based on his own hometown (with merry-go-round!) Gig Young convincingly portrays Martin Sloan. The actor's own life ended quite tragically with severe alcoholism, murder and suicide.