The Tower of Terror is rooted in the history of one of the most important television shows to ever grace American airwaves. The Twilight Zone was a program with brand new characters, settings, and stories every week, and Disney was able to translate many of those disparate episodes into one ultimate tribute to the legendary TV show that was created, hosted, and narrated by Rod Serling. The Imagineers worked hard to share their respect for the source material, watching every episode of The Twilight Zone at least twice and littering the Tower of Terror with references to it.
Here is a guide to some of the known ways Disney Imagineers paid tribute to The Twilight Zone with the Tower of Terror, as stories behind the trinkets found inside.
1. The introduction
Image © CBS Television Studios.
The opening lines in the introduction video for the Tower of Terror: “Tonight’s story on the Twilight Zone is somewhat unique and calls for a different kind of introduction. This as you may recognize is a…” This is a direct quote from the beginning of the It’s a Good Life episode of the Twilight Zone.
2. The doll
Image © CBS Television Studios.
There’s a dusty old doll on the couch in of the Disney parks in Anaheim and Paris which some claim is an ancient Shirley Temple doll. The more interesting suggestions, though, are that it’s Talky Tina from the episode “Living Doll” or Sally Shine from the 1997 Tower of Terror movie.
Personally, I’m pulling for Talky Tina, a particularly creepy “lifelike creation of plastic and springs” that utters threats to her owner’s cruel stepfather. Admittedly, though, it’s hard to root for a bad parent who throws away and tries to scorch his young daughter’s toy, no matter how scary it is.
3. The ventriloquist’s dummy
Image © CBS Television Studios.
Both elevator exit areas in the Florida attraction contain a display featuring a lot of cool stuff, but particularly great is the creepy ventriloquist dummy Caesar from the Twilight Zone episode “Caesar and Me”. Caesar isn’t quite as terrifying as Talky Tina, but the wisecracking jerk of a puppet is certainly spooky. He’s a little more three-dimensional than Tina, too, offering advice to his Irish owner about to live a life of crime instead of just delivering dark threats.
Things get pretty dim, though, when good ol’ Caesar encourages that episode’s poor protagonist to pull a major heist and then abandons him when the cops come knocking on his door.
4. The oft-used phrase
Image © CBS Television Studios.
Even the on-ride photos from the Tower of Terror connect to The Twilight Zone. “Picture If You Will…”, a phrase that Rod Serling used more than once in The Twilight Zone, appears in the gift shop where you can purchase the photos.
5. The Mystic Seer machine
Image © CBS Television Studios.
The Mystic Seer machine from “Nick of Time” is sitting on the high shelf in the Tower of Terror library. That machine is a napkin dispenser with a devil head that also serves mechanical fortune-teller, charging a mere penny per fortune. Even after factoring in inflation, that would still only cost us a little over eight cents in 2014! That sounds like a great deal.
However, if you happen to come across one be wary if/when your fortunes turn ominous like they did in Nick of Time. The protagonists found themselves increasingly scared of the Mystic Seer Machine as its ominous fortunes proved themselves to be uncannily accurate. Their obsession with the Mystic Seer Machine ultimately traps them in their hometown forever.
6. The Trumpet
Image © CBS Television Studios.
The trumpet featured in A Passage for Trumpet is on display when you exit from the Tower of Terror libraries. That trumpet is the property of an alcoholic, out-of-work musician named Joey Crown who finds himself a ghost in limbo after he steps in front of a speeding truck.
7. The premiere date
Image © CBS Television Studios.
A plaque on the elevator reads that it was last checked “10259”. Those numbers also mark the day the first episode of The Twilight Zone aired: October 2nd, 1959. The plaque also explains that the elevator was checked by a Mr. Cadwallader, the devilish character who exchanged immortality for a hypochondriac’s soul in “Escape Clause”.
8. The chalk marks
Image © CBS Television Studios.
The queues at California Adventures and Paris include chalk marks on the wall reminiscent to the ones that were sketched out when two worried parents were trying to find their young daughter after she accidentally passed through into another dimension in the episode Little Girl Lost.
I hope this post will give you a little more appreciation for the mementos spread throughout the Tower of Terror. Keep an eye out for them next time you visit one of the Disney parks. If it also incentivized you into watching the Twilight Zone you can watch the whole series except for, strangely, Season 4 via Netflix. Despite being over 50 years old, it holds up well and is a truly captivating show.
