What I’m Watching: The Twilight Zone

The Twilight Zone: Season 1, Episode 5 “The Wunderkind” (B)

This episode was definitely very watchable, though I don’t think I loved its framing. The way that the first three episodes of this show played out found the protagonists realizing that there was something strange going on and trying to figure out both what to do with it and how to get anyone else to believe it. This hour spotlighted an unusual event, but we knew how it was going to end (mostly) because we were treated to the sight of Raff waking up to realize the horror that his candidate is the president and that spells doom for him. John Cho was a smart choice to play Raff, joining his “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle” costar Kal Penn in the political sphere as this skilled campaign manager who didn’t always manage to back the right horse, starting with John Larroquette’s unpopular incumbent. Enter an eleven-year-old streaming sensation, played, of course, by Jacob Tremblay, of films like “Room,” “Wonder,” and “Good Boys,” a natural for this role. This episode had far more to say about the state of politics in this country that could get a child elected for president and the way that he just wanted to deliver on his promises which is never so easily possible than about supernatural occurrences. The young doctor bit at the end was the only moderately horrifying part, following the way that his treason was instantly reported and identified by the child president. Even though their roles were minimal, I was happy to see Aaron Douglas from “Battlestar Galactica” and Allison Tolman from “Fargo” in the cast.