What a revelation has been SAPPHIRE AND STEEL! I'd never even heard of this series (let alone seen it) before it turned up (all but the first "assignment") at my local library. For decades, I've been cranking out no-budget, surreal "fantasies" for Public Access channels that have left viewers scratching their heads in wonder- fantasies not totally unlike what's been wrought here, on SAPPHIRE AND STEEL. David McCallum starred in two of my all-time favorite episodes of THE OUTER LIMITS (the original, black and white series- first season): THE SIXTH FINGER (as a mild-mannered miner turned mutant mastermind) and a pilot for what could very well have been SAPPHIRE AND STEEL itself, THE FORMS OF THINGS UNKNOWN. In fact, THE FORMS OF THINGS UNKNOWN plays out not totally unlike an episode of SAPPHIRE AND STEEL. One can't help but lament the passing of shows like THE OUTER LIMITS (the original, black and white series) and SAPPHIRE AND STEEL. They are far too few and far between. (Just this past weekend, I recorded the latest episode of the latest reincarnation of DR. WHO for a friend, which I didn't mind- but that was followed by a recording of the pilot for the new FLASH GORDON TV series for said friend that proved so odious a task that I called him up midway through the taping and expressed my dissatisfaction with the whole sordid affair.) SAPPHIRE AND STEEL, despite its budgetary limitations, reminds me more than a little of another low-key but effective series from days gone by: THE PRISONER.
Review of Sapphire & Steel
