Amazing Stories (1985) 1.05

The Mission

starring Kevin Costner, Casey Siemaszko, Kiefer Sutherland

written by Menno Meyjes, Steven Spielberg

directed by Steven Spielberg

The crew of an American bomber flying a mission (from England during World War II) survives encounters with German airplanes but encounters some difficulty on was home. Jonathan (Casey Siemaszko), the belly gunner, gets trapped in the belly turret due to damage incurred during aerial combat. The landing gear was also damaged and the airplane is running out of fuel. They have enough to make it back to England but they don't have enough to try anything fancy.

The only chance is for the pilot (Kevin Costner) to land the airplane on its belly but while the rest of them should probably survive such a landing, Jonathan would be crushed. They try valiantly to get Jonathan out of the turret without success. In the end Jonathan comes with an unconventional and magical solution.

Thoughts

This episode (with commercials) was an hour long, unlike most episodes of this show that were a half hour in length. There is one more hour long episode but it is part of the second season.

This was a very good episode. I figured that there would be a twist in the tale. The ending wasn't going to be quite as bleak as it looked like it was going to be for most of the episode.

The performances are good. Most of the characters are characterized by their roles in the bomber. I wouldn't single out any of the performances as being great, which is in part because there are so many characters that most of them don't get more than a line here or line there.

Notes

This is the only episode of this show in which Kevin Costner appeared. I have seen him in at least 10 movies but none recently.

This is the only episode of this show in which Casey Siemaszko appeared. I've seen him in recent years in Back to the Future (1985) and in the past couple weeks in Stand by Me (1986).

Kiefer Sutherland played the part of Static, the radio operator. This is the only episode of this show in which he appeared. I saw him very recently in Stand By Me (1986).

The only other name from the cast that I recognized is Anthony LaPaglia and he had a very small part in this episode. Blink and you miss it. I missed his moment and only discovered he was in it when looking at the end credits.

Menno Meyjes wrote the teleplay for this episode. The story was by Steven Spielberg. Meyjes worked on a few other projects helmed by Spielberg including The Color Purple (1985).

This is the second of two episodes of this show that Steven Spielberg directed. The first was 1.01 Ghost Train.