Anne's past is coming at her on a dark horse.
Rod Serling: This is the face of terror. Anne Marie Henderson, 18 years of age, her young existence suddenly marred by a savage and wholly unanticipated pursuit by a strange, nightmarish figure of a woman in black, who has appeared as if from nowhere and now, at driving gallop, chases the terrified girl across the countryside, as if she means to ride her down and kill her, and then suddenly and inexplicably stops to watch in malignant silence as her prey takes flight. Miss Henderson has no idea whatever as to the motive for this pursuit. Worse, not the vaguest notion regarding the identity of her pursuer. Soon enough, she will be given the solution to this twofold mystery, but in a manner far beyond her present capacity to understand, a manner enigmatically bizarre in terms of time and space – which is to say, an answer from... the Twilight Zone.
Air date: February 21, 1964
In 1939, Anne Henderson (Diana Hyland) is a wealthy young woman in the prime of her life. She has a comfortable life on a nice ranch, she's getting married to a nice investment broker, and is the very picture of health. One day while riding a horse, a bedraggled woman on a horse starts chasing her and screaming her name.
Spur of the Tropes:
- An Aesop:
- You can't change the past, no matter how hard you may try.
- A secondary one is, marriage shouldn't be done on a spur of the moment. It takes more than perceived "true love" or "childhood romance" to make it work; but rather time and good judge of character on one's part.
- Despite the popular romantic myth about the impulsive, impetuous "bad boy" being the ideal romantic hero, the "bad boy" isn't necessarily a misunderstood Woobie or diamond in the rough. Sometimes, the "bad boy" is just what it sounds like, a bad person.
- The Alcoholic: In 1964, Anne and David are both alcoholics. Anne's mother scolds her for drinking and ignoring the fact that their house is going to be repossessed but Anne retorts that it helps her. She clearly drinks as an attempt to escape her miserable life with David. What's more, it's strongly implied that as a result, Anne's alcoholism has made her unable to have children.
- Awful Wedded Life: Anne eloped with David on the night of her engagement party to Robert on June 13, 1939 but their marriage proved to be a disaster. David turned into an abusive wastrel who ran the Henderson family estate into the ground and drove Anne to alcoholism. In 1964, the two of them despise each other.
- Bad People Abuse Animals: In keeping with being everything her past-self wasn't, Future Anne uses a riding crop on her riding horse, and especially more-so when she chases down Past Anne.
- Bait-and-Switch: In 1964, Anne laments about her horrible married life...and in walks David instead of Robert.
- Bitch Slap: In the future, Anne and her mother exchange one of these when their conversation steers towards the subject of Anne's late father. Anne's opinion of her father earns a rather tame slap from her mother. In response, Anne casually gives a very sound and uncalled-for slap to her mother, driving home that 1964-Anne is no longer her parents' respectful daughter like before.
- Book Ends: The episode starts and finishes with Future Anne's trying to catch up to Past Anne to warn her about running off with David.
- Bottle Episode: Although this episode covers 25 years, it takes place almost entirely in the living room of Anne's parents' house.
- Cannot Spit It Out: Anne is furnished, at great personal risk to her preferred boyfriend, with a golden opportunity to speak out with her wishes, avoiding the unwanted marriage; she squanders it by clamming up, making bizarre squeaking noises, and bolting from the room. Future Anne has not improved in this; given the supernatural opportunity to warn her past self to make a better choice, she sticks with frightening Past Anne by screaming indistinctly like a crazed madwoman rather than use her words to communicate anything to the effect of "You should marry Robert rather than David", despite having experienced this herself and therefore knowing that Past Anne will perceive it as a threat.
- Childhood Friend Romance: Played with—according to David, he and Anne had planned to marry since they were kids, and while she does, their union turns out to be anything but happy.
- Dating What Daddy Hates: Played with. While Anne claims she broke things off with David, it's implied she didn't break off their relationship proper. Speaking of which, David and Mr. Henderson are often butting heads, to the point he has the young man at gun point to get off his property. David even wonders if Anne will want her father to get between them like this. Heavily deconstructed, as it turns out Mr. Henderson has very good reason to dislike him. When Anne ultimately chooses David over Robert, not only does David turn out to be a poor choice, but he gloats over how his father-in-law's death makes him the ranch's patriarch now.
- The Dog Bites Back: When David snidely mocks Anne for her decision to marry him for love years ago, she snaps and hits him on the side of the head with her bourbon glass, before she leaves to (once more) attempt changing the past.
- Domestic Abuse: In 1964, David is verbally abusive towards Anne and takes delight in mocking her for marrying him for love 25 years earlier.
- Double-Meaning Title: The episode's title can refer to horse chase between Anne's past and future selves, and how Anne impulsively ran off with David.
- Downer Ending: Future Anne is on the verge of financial collapse in a failing marriage with a man she now despises, and Past Anne is doomed to repeat her mistake.
- Dramatic Irony: In Anne's flashback of the night she eloped with David, the young woman gushes about how he's her one true love and she trusts he'll make her happy. This is rather painful in hindsight, as the audience has just seen the future that results from this heedless union. It's surreal to see young Anne sing praises to the man she not only will come to hate, but the very one who will destroy her innocence and generally ruin her future. As a final twist of the knife, Anne's words about how David is "her true love and adored one" are soured by the knowledge that future David will use those same words against her to mock and torment her.
- Foil: Anne's father is this to Anne. Anne is a soft-spoken, naive, and weak-willed individual whose poor judgment ruined her own life. Her father on the other hand is a brutally honest, sharp-witted, and stubborn man who has worked his whole life to provide a luxurious life for his family who saw David for what he was beyond just his love for Anne.
- Foreshadowing: David punching Robert hints towards his abusive nature.
- Future Me Scares Me: A literal example.
- Good All Along: In a flashback, a younger Anne stands wistfully outside her own engagement party, before she's approached by Robert. Seeing her stand outside the night by her lonesome, Robert wonders if she's okay. Given he didn't take her story about the "scary lady" seriously earlier, this is rather sweet on his part. It's meant to not only establish that Robert was actually the "good suitor", but also drive home Anne's regret that she didn't deem him her "true love" instead of David.
- Good Colors, Evil Colors: Anne wears a white shirt and rides a white horse fitting her politeness, innocence, and naivety. Future Anne is dressed entirely in black and rides a black horse symbolizing her unhappy and jaded nature.
- I Hate Past Me: And how! Future Anne despises how her past self's naiveté and innocence made her vulnerable to making the one bad choice that got her where she is today.
- Innocently Insensitive: Robert may be a good man who likes his fiancé, and he was only trying to cheer Anne up by joking about the mysterious woman who chased her. Anne doesn't appreciate the gesture, as she's still shaken up by the event.
- Ironic Echo: In 1964, David mockingly tells Anne that he is her true love and her adored one, the same words that Anne used to describe him before they eloped in 1939.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Anne's father, he's blunt and somewhat aggressive and controlling, but he genuinely cares about his family and can see right through David and knows how horrible a husband he would be.
- Jerkass: David—he's an abusive alcoholic who calls Anne stupid for marrying him.
- Kick the Dog: When her mother tries to mildly slap some sense into her for calling her late father "Daddy-Dear-Daddy", Anne responds with a callous Bitch Slap, for no other reason than to express how little she respects her only living parent.
- Manipulative Bastard: It's subtle, but on a rewatch, it can be seen how manipulative Dave is by trying to alienate Anne from those who care about her by painting those who care about her as in the wrong for understandable things such as her dad pulling a gun on him when he barged into their house uninvited and was given several warnings to leave.
- Marry for Love: A brutal deconstruction; Anne risks her safe future with Robert to marry her childhood love David without taking into account various red flags he showed early on resulting in her life going in a downward spiral.
- My Greatest Failure: In 1964, Anne may blame practically everyone else for how her life is going horribly. But deep down, she can't deny that all her present-day misfortunes (her awful marriage and the loss of her family's wealth) came to be because she made the innocent mistake of eloping with David. She's so fixated on her mistake that she knows the exact date of the fateful engagement party (and subsequent elopement) to the day. This is what motivates Anne to try in vain to tell her 1939-self not to marry David.
- Never My Fault: Future Anne blames her father for her life being ruined because he never taught her how to fend for herself—however, she wouldn't be in her current situation had she actually listened about marrying Robert instead of David.
- Never Speak Ill of the Dead: Averted with Anne, though her mother plays it straight by calling her out on what she said.
- Once More, with Clarity: In the beginning, a strange woman in black begins chasing Anne, screaming her name. This moment means something completely different at the end, when the woman's identity has been revealed.
- Poor Judge of Character: Future Anne lampshades the deconstruction of this trope. She bitterly looks back on how she unwisely believed David to be her "true love". She resents that her younger self failed to recognize that not only was David's violent personality a red flag, but he otherwise didn't have practical skills to make money and keep a roof over their heads.
- The Resenter: Future Anne resents her late father and blames him for her awful life, feeling that her pampered rich upbringing failed to provide her the discipline and judgment to see how awful David is and never marry him.
- The Reveal: To go off of Bait-and-Switch above, it turns out that instead of marrying Robert, Anne ended up leaving him to elope with David, but this ended up having some serious consequences.
- Rich Suitor, Poor Suitor: Brutally deconstructed when it's shown that Anne married "poor" David instead of "rich" Robert with disasterous results.
- Riches to Rags: Thanks to David's horrendous management of the ranch and abuse, Anne lost everything and is set to soon lose the ranch as well.
- Rule of Symbolism: Future Anne's inability to catch up to Past Anne and warn her not to marry David represents the fact that you can't change the past no matter how hard you try.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
- Anne ditches the "boring" investment banker Robert to marry her "true love," the carefree David...and he ends up driving the family business and home straight into the ground.
- Robert is Innocently Insensitive towards Anne's blight in his well-intended effort to help. It ultimately leads up to Fauxshadowing as it's shown Anne married David and Robert was really Good All Along. Even good people have flaws.
- Tempting Fate: In the past, when David tries to convince Anne to break off her engagement to Robert, he warns "Don't make this mistake with your life". Little does he know that he had it the other way around: staying with Robert would've been the smarter idea, and running off with David is the mistake of her life.
- Time Skip: The first half of the episode takes place on June 13, 1939 while the second half takes place in 1964.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: While somewhat understandable due to her situation, Future Anne's callousness towards people who had nothing to do with ruining her life, especially her mother and late father, is inexcusable.
- Ungrateful Bastard: Future Anne is mad at her father for the comfortable living he gave her because she thinks it kept her from learning how to provide for herself.
- Used to Be a Sweet Kid: Once upon a time, Ann was a sweet, innocent young woman who was easily frightened and loved her parents dearly. In the present, she's become quite the opposite, right down to disrespecting her late father's memory.
- Warning Mistaken for Threat: For the most part, 1964-Anne chases down 1939-Anne because the former intended to tell the latter not to make her mistake and marry the wrong man. Unfortunately, between her intimidating appearance and her shrieking Anne's name, it easily comes off as future-Anne trying to violently trample her past-self down.
- Wham Shot: When 1964-Anne bitterly muses how her future self was trying to warn her 1939-self "not to marry the wrong man", rather than Robert walking into the room, David is revealed to be the ill-chosen husband. The Wham part is, the episode has seemingly been building up the direction of the episode was, Anne chose poorly for choosing riches over love, and she blames her mother and late father for choosing who to marry for her. The sight of David is meant to greatly subvert those expectations.
- What the Hell, Hero?: In the future, Anne's mother gives her daughter such a speech when Anne speaks ill of her late father.
- You Can't Fight Fate: The point of the end scene as Anne desperately tries to warn her younger self not to make her mistake, not grasping she can't change what's already happened for her.
Rod Serling: This is the face of terror. Anne Marie Mitchell, 43 years of age, her desolate existence once more afflicted by the hope of altering her past mistake – a hope which is unfortunately doomed to disappointment. For warnings from the future to the past must be taken in the past. Today may change tomorrow but once today is gone, tomorrow can only look back in sorrow that the warning was ignored. Said warning as of now stamped 'Not Accepted' – and stored away in the dead file, in the recording office... of the Twilight Zone.
