The Curious Case of Edgar Witherspoon
"One old man in a private world of irrational urgencies. For Dr. Jeremy Sinclair, an all too common sight. But Edgar Witherspoon is a most uncommon old man, with a secret that reaches out to the four corners of the Earth, as the good doctor is about to discover."
Edgar Witherspoon (Harry Morgan), a former engineer, is an odd and eccentric old man who spends all of his time scavenging for random items. His niece Cynthia (Eve Crawford) and his landlady Mrs. Milligan (Barbara Chilcot) bring Edgar's case to Dr. Jeremy Sinclair (Cedric Smith), a psychiatrist who works in a mental hospital, in the hopes that his behavior can be examined and corrected. When he is invited to meet Edgar, Dr. Sinclair discovers that his apartment houses a massive contraption made from random junk, which Edgar adds onto with every new item he finds and has been maintaining for the past 11 years. Edgar tells the doctor that a voice in his head tells him what parts of the contraption need adjusting and new items that are needed for it to prevent disasters from striking the world. Sinclair likely thinks that Edgar is trying to find a new purpose in his life, until he accidentally damages the contraption and causes a tsunami that wipes out a small island.
Tropes
- Bittersweet Ending: Edgar is finally relieved of keeping his contraption in shape, but Sinclair is made his replacement, and he fails to find a tambourine to add to the thing so it can stop the next disaster.
- Bookends: The beginning and end of the episode have Sinclair's watch alarm going off.
- Cassandra Truth: Dr. Sinclair doesn't believe Edgar's claims that the contraption he looks after is vital to keeping the world in balance. Sinclair instead comes to the conclusion that Edgar is suffering from delusions of grandeur, wanting to find a sense of purpose after his retirement. However, Dr. Sinclair realizes that Edgar was telling the truth when he learns that the tiny South Pacific island of Tatoa was destroyed by a tidal wave at 3:17 P.M. local time, exactly as Edgar said would happen after the contraption was disturbed. Sinclair rushes to Edgar's apartment to stop Mrs. Milligan from destroying it.
- Comically Missing the Point: Edgar tells Sinclair that he hears voices. When the psychiatrist replies "Oh, you also hear voices?", Edgar assumes that Sinclair can hear them too.
- Contrived Coincidence: Sinclair's radio broadcasts the disasters that Edgar stops or fails to stop throughout the episode, such as the Santa Barbara earthquake and Tatoa being wiped out by a tidal wave.
- Cosmic Keystone: Edgar's contraption, which the voice in his head says is necessary for keeping the world from being wracked with disasters. Under the voice's direction, Edgar regularly roots through the garbage to find things to add to it. When Sinclair's men accidentally knock a paperclip chain off of it, a South Pacific island is destroyed by a tsunami, proving that Edgar was right about its importance.
- The End of the World as We Know It: Or in Edgar's words, "going poof". He claims that the contraption he maintains is vital to the world's survival, hence why he spends all his time trying to maintain it.
- Establishing Character Moment: Edgar is introduced ignoring Dr. Sinclair's attempts to make conversation with him, too busy looking for a small, blonde doll's head so he can keep an earthquake from striking Santa Barbara and plunging the town into the sea.
- Hearing Voices: Edgar tells Dr. Sinclair that 11 years ago, he was feeding pigeons in the park one day, when he suddenly heard a strange voice that told him he was chosen keep the world in balance, building a contraption made of numerous odds and ends and keep it safe no matter what, or else the world would "go poof." He used to think the voice was God, but he thought otherwise because he figured God would have a deeper voice. Though the audience never hears the voice for themselves, Sinclair later begins hearing it when Edgar retires and makes Sinclair his replacement.
- Here We Go Again!: The end of the episode has Sinclair being forced to inherit Edgar's responsibility of maintaining the contraption and keeping the world safe from catastrophes. The voice that spoke to Edgar transfers to his mind, and it tells him that the contraption needs a tambourine added to it immediately. He frantically searches the neighborhood for a tambourine to add to the device, only for the alarm on his watch to go off, lamenting that he was too late.
- Lighter and Softer: Despite its apocalyptic subject matter, the episode is largely light-hearted, with vaudevillian-styled musical cues and Edgar going about maintaining his ridiculous contraption with a smile.
- Literary Allusion Title: The episode's title is a reference to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
- Nothing Is Scarier: At the end of the episode, Sinclair is made the new keeper of the contraption, and the voice that spoke in Edgar's head tells him to find a tambourine and add it to the device immediately. He unfortunately fails, as his watch alarm goes off as he's searching. Earlier in the episode, an entire island was wiped out by a tidal wave just because a chain of paperclips got knocked off the contraption. If something that intense arose from only a few paperclips, what would a missing tambourine do?
- Passing the Torch: Edgar tells Dr. Sinclair that the voice in his head told him he can retire to Miami. When Edgar leaves his apartment, the voice transfers to Sinclair, who is forced to assume Edgar's duty of preventing disasters by maintaining the contraption Edgar built.
- Race Against the Clock: Under the voice's guidance, Edgar needs to find new parts to add to the contraption before a certain time to prevent disaster from plaguing the world.
- Reality Warper: In an interesting take on this trope, Edgar explains that his machine represents reality itself, and if he isn't around to maintain it via instructions from a voice only he can hear, things will go "poof". Sinclair scoffs, but Witherspoon is ultimately proven to be right: moving a few paper clips is enough to wipe out an entire Pacific island nation. Witherspoon is eventually relieved of his reality-maintaining duties — because Sinclair's been tapped for the job. The episode ends with the former psychiatrist being told to attach a tambourine to the device immediately.
- Riddle for the Ages: How exactly is the contraption Edgar built responsible for keeping the world in order? All Edgar says is that the voice deems it necessary because the world would otherwise "go poof".
- Rube Goldberg Device: The contraption Edgar has been building and maintaining for 11 years. It's an absolutely ridiculous-looking thing big enough to fill his entire apartment, and it's built from all sorts of odds and ends like dolls' heads, bicycle spokes, old shoes, baseball cards, paperclips, and broken instruments. As a result, Edgar regularly rummages through his neighbors' trash cans and the local garbage dumps to find things that he desperately needs to add to it. When he meets with Sinclair, Edgar explains that a strange voice started talking to him in his head one day, and it told him that the contraption was necessary in order to keep the world from ending. Sinclair originally doesn't believe Edgar, thinking he's suffering from a psychosis, but he eventually realizes that he was telling the truth when Tatoa, a tiny island in the South Pacific, is destroyed by a tidal wave at 3:17 PM after he accidentally knocks a paperclip chain off the contraption, exactly as Edgar said it would be.
- Stock Sound Effects: The contraption gives off all sorts of boings, whooshes, and chimes when the camera focuses on it.
- Sudden Downer Ending: After he's made Edgar's replacement, Sinclair hears the voice Edgar was hearing, which tells him to find a tambourine and add it to the contraption right away. As he frantically searches for said tambourine, the alarm on his watch goes off, meaning that he was too late. One can only wonder what will come about from that missing tambourine, as paperclips being knocked off the contraption wiped out an entire island.
- The Unreveal: We never hear the voice Edgar and later Sinclair hear in their heads, so we can only speculate about what it sounds like, why it chooses them, and why it insists the contraption is essential for the world to survive.
"If, in the next few months, you notice that there has been a spate of catastrophes, or things are just not going right, remember that Edgar Witherspoon's replacement is learning how to make some precise adjustments. Don't worry, his education won't last long, and then you might give thanks to a physician whose practice extends to the well-being of the entire planet. Dr. Jeremy Sinclair offers a unique form of preventive medicine found only — in the Twilight Zone."
