Years ago I was watching a modern Twilight Zone, which was titled something like "The Invisible Man." I have seen it mentioned on Twilight Zone fan sites, but I have never been able to find a copy of it on VHS or DVD. If anyone knows an online source, I would like to find it. This is a summary of the episode.
It is the future and the government has developed a way of dealing with people they see as not being valuable-members of society. They have standards of how people should feel, and interact with others and they judge and convict people along these standards. The main character does not fit into the standards, so he is judged to be made Invisible. In doing so, the government burns a round circle onto his forehead that means the world should ignore him. If he tries to cover it up, it burns through any thing and exposes itself. Flying police robots fly around the city and make sure that people do not treat this person as a human, or even see or acknowledge his presence. If they do, they risk being made invisible as well.
The man at first takes advantage of this and walks into stores and takes things and destroys things. Nothing happens to him and he thinks he is going to handle this one year conviction with no problem. He does this for weeks and gets drunk, and is basically having his way with what he calls freedom. Soon one day he is walking home to his apartment and some teenagers drive by and nearly hit him. They then see he is invisible and for fun, chase him down with their car and hit him and leave him for dead. Because he is invisible, the people who see it happen have to leave him alone and no one takes him to the hospital. He is messed up and in massive pain, but he manages to make it to the hospital. When he arrives at the hospital bleeding and in need of medical assistance, the people see his mark and ignore him and leave him to die. He ends up having to steal some supplies and spends weeks in massive pain and healing from his wounds. He is screwed up in the mind by this point and a complete mess mentally and physically. He is not even allowed to speak to other invisible people, as this will extend his time as invisible.
The time fast forwards to a year and the government has come to remove his mark. The police then offer to take him for a drink, and he says "no" and they mention that "they always have a drink with the newly returned" and he realizes he has no choice or risk an extended conviction. He then sees his family later and they mention how the Invisible conviction has made him a better man and they are glad it happened and changed him to the standards of society. He seems happy at his return and walks around with smiles and joy. Then one day he is walking along this street and comes across a woman with an Invisible mark and she is crying and looking suicidal. She begs him to listen to her and acknowledge her presence and he walks along as if she is not there. She starts crying louder and shows her pain in tears. He stops and turns around, grabs her and hugs her and says things are going to be okay. The robot police start coming and sirens are sounding and the episode comes to an end.
I was a Witness when I saw this, but now it means a lot to me and I think about it in what it taught. I think the message of making people Invisible is obviously cruel, yet something so feared that people would be afraid to speak out on it and risk being made Invisible themselves. There are many points I could take from it.
Edited by - whyhideit on 23 December 2002 16:55:15