I must say I’m quite disappointed. The title “Twilight Zone” is a great deal to live up to, so I thought “My, they must have balls indeed!” upon seeing the title and epic digital logo:

I thought, “I’m going to buckle up for an incredible radio drama experience!” I was gravely dissappointed. They didn’t have balls and it wasn’t a radio drama.

And I must say that my disappointment is their fault, because their mode of representing themselves is easily categorized under false advertisement.

“Fifth Dimension” is a string of barely-related audio assignments from the DS106 database strung together without much mind to a dramatic arc. The foreshadowing excerpts from Silent Spring are thrust in the middle, and haltingly read, at that. Altogether, it was a Frankenstien’s monster mess of terror: barely-related “fear”-some bits of audio stitched together by annoyingly loud and grating “wee-oooh/wee-ooh/wee-ooh”-themed bumpers and commercials. Evidently the entire group thought it amusing to have the actual Twilight Zone theme in poor audio resolution repeated ad nauseam even though the radio show had little other inspiration from the show.

The opening was a nightmare, as I had no idea who Adam Sandler was or why he would converse with the esteemed Jedi master Yoda. If I wasn’t obliged to listen to the entirety of the Fifth Dimension show, I would have stopped there. The background music on a great deal of Yoda’s dialogue indicated from which Episode of Star Wars it had been clipped – incredibly distracting.

The Twilight Zone episode redramatization is crudely summarized before it starts so as to ruin the suspense of the entire segment. I thought this was a class on storytelling, in which one should learn from the masters, not butcher them. The segment itself was well-played, though I have not seen the original episode, and thus cannot compare it to whence it came. It was the thoughtless introduction that killed it, by not allowing the story to tell itself.

During one segment there was a clear indication that it was ineptly recorded: the sound of a computer fan whirring throughout.

The nail in the coffin, however was the conclusion, “We leave you with this medley of chilling sounds…” It was a poorly-bridged compilation of music which was reminiscent of four or five of my favorite pessimistic bands, not particularly chilling. I think they mangaged to avoid using any easily recognized Evanescence songs, but one of the clips was very likely from Edward Scissorhands.

If a rating is iTunes style and must have one star to count as a rating at all: *