Love Is Blind (The Twilight Zone)
| "Love is Blind" | |
|---|---|
| The New Twilight Zone episode | |
| Episode no. | Season 3 Episode 62 |
| Directed by | Gilbert M. Shilton |
| Written by | Cal Willingham |
| Original air date | March 25, 1989 |
| Guest appearances | |
| Ben Murphy: Jack Haines Sneezy Waters: The Blind Singer | |
"Love is Blind" is the sixty-second episode and the twenty-seventh episode of the third season (1988–89) of the television series The Twilight Zone.
Opening narration
The man behind the wheel is Jack Haines, a long-haul trucker. On any other night, he'd be on the lookout for a good time, but that's changed. A lot has changed for Jack because of one overheard telephone conversation. He learned that tonight his wife is meeting another man here at the Mustang Bar, his name unknown. The only thing Jack Haines knows for certain is that tonight, there's going to be murder at the Mustang, a little place ten miles from town and deep in the heart...of the Twilight Zone.
Plot
A man is sitting in his pick-up truck outside a bar, drinking whiskey out of a bottle, watching the door to the bar. When he finishes enough of the whiskey, he pulls out a gun from his glove compartment and goes inside. The man, Jack Haines, strolls up to the singer on stage and then walks back to the bar and orders a beer. The singer finishes his song and begins talking about another song when he pauses and does a different song, one that hits Jack Haines right square in the face. When Jack questions the bartender, he tells him that the singer just came in out of the rain, looking for a dry place and some work and turned out to be a great singer and blind as a bat.
The singer sits down next to Jack and asks what he thought of his song and they begin talking. He tells Jack he meant the song to hit him where he lives. The singer claims he has a talent, or curse, to be able to zero in on people where the bad things hit them. He even tells Jack that he knows what he wants to do: shoot someone that he feels has wronged him. Jack says if he's so talented, the singer should tell him which guy is cheating with his wife. The singer claims he doesn't know anything but the pain Jack's feeling. Jack notices his wife has come into the bar and is seated at a nearby table. When he notices a guy flirting with her, Jack nearly pulls the gun out, but the singer stops him. It turns out the guy was just flirting and never saw her before.
A plaintive Jack decides to just sit at the bar and listen to the singer's story while watching to see if any guy comes up to her. The singer, meanwhile, is telling Jack about how he became blind. He was messing with a guy's wife and the guy shot him in the head. The bullet wound to the brain caused the singer's blindness, then passed through his head and hit his wife—killing her. The shooter ended up hanging himself from the guilt. And somehow, the singer acquired this talent to know about the pain of some guys just like Jack. He never knows when it will hit but when it does, he somehow knows the right song to sing and try to stop the guy from giving in to his pain. He tells Jack that some guys listened and some didn't and he needs to decide for himself. After the singer walks away, the wife is joined by her date. Jack gets upset but he goes over to listen to the singer sing while the majority of the bar dances. Jack is almost out the door but a flash of anger hits him. He turns around and heads over to his wife. He pulls out the gun and his wife walks in front of him and he shoots her instead of the date. He runs out with half the bar chasing after him. Jack runs out into the woods only to meet up with the blind singer who tells him he's going the wrong way.
Jack continues to run and makes his way close to the police. He overhears the "date", who was Jack's friend, telling the police that Jack's wife wanted to surprise him for their anniversary so she had saved for months to get him mag wheels for his truck. She wasn't cheating on him, only meeting the friend to look through the auto parts catalog to pick out the wheels. The police flash the light in Jack's eyes and he suddenly awakens in the bar. The singer comes over and says that that's what his songs do, give the taste of what might happen. But this time, it's the real thing and it's up to Jack. He turns to see his wife and their friend walk out and he notices a catalog for mag wheels in the trash. Jack goes out to his truck and finds the singer sitting in it. He asks how he knew which truck was his, but shakes his head. He then asks the singer if there's anything he could do for him. The singer says just a ride down the road for he has more songs to sing. A curious Jack asks the singer how he could have possibly survived the bullet wound to the head, but the man ominously refuses to answer.
Closing narration
No comment necessary, except to note the necessity of caution when the hands show midnight in the dark hour of the human soul. A song of warning and hope written in somber red and copyrighted...by the Twilight Zone.