NBC Persons Unknown Theory - Episode Eight

Persons Unknown, Episode 8

When I watched the pilot episode of Persons Unknown, I came to the conclusion that it was a rip off of the Twilight Zone and a cheap version of ABC’s Lost. I would like to modify that theory just a tad.

After watching last night’s episode, I am for certain what the show is about. (This is the part where my giant Ego can’t fit on this page) For six years on my Lost page I updated my theory after each episode. From the pilot episode to the finale episode. I stayed true to my theory. I thought it was a fairly believable one. Alas, Lost had a different scenario and we all know how the show ended.

Now, watching last night’s show, I am amending my theory. Here it is. And the Lost fans that have followed this blog for six years will know it straight away.

The 7 eclectic unknown persons are in a virtual reality laboratory. All the participants are interconnected to one another sharing each others thoughts, memories, and feelings. While in this virtual reality laboratory, a battery of physical and mental experiments are performed on them. And who is running these experiments? A New World Order government consortium in partner with a superior race of aliens.

Perhaps the boys of NBC were readers of my Lost blog. Perhaps they took my premise and ran with it. Keep in mind, my theory had elements of the Twilight Zone embedded and you can clearly see the similarities in Persons unknown as well.

To prove my theory, let’s look at last nights episode. Joe is hooked up with multiple electrodes inside a sterile hospital room. A mechanical voice is piped in reprogramming Joe to become part of the program again. Joe refuses to cooperate.

We also learn that once in the program, you can never leave the program.

There are always seven candidates, err, persons for the experiment, err, program.

Joe has been through the program before, he is someone different every time. This time he has a love interest. (Janet)

Seriously, doesn’t the town remind you of a rat maze, where the rats are let loose to follow their every movement. Various stimuli in inserted to determine how the rats will react to each stimuli. For this episode, Bill was a perfect example. Bill breaks down, realizing he has no one back home and has completely alienated himself from the other persons in the town. He pleads to the watching eye for help, he wants to leave, to go home. He also makes the statement when he found the cigarettes at the bar, that you guys must be reading his mind.

Anyway, Bill is outside and chases a book of matches outside the deadly fence line. He does not get electrocuted. He runs up the hill, looks back at the town, and after a minute states, where am I going, I have nowhere to go. Bill returns to the town, kneels down to the watching eye and states he’s back. This is a classic experiment in human conditioning.

Now about Joe and his repeat performance and Tori’s reappearance on the show which I called by the way. This episode is a remake of the Twilight Zone episode titled, Shadow Play. Here is the synopsis of the Twilight Zone episode.

Shadow Play – Original Airdate – 05/05/1961

Monologue:
Adam Grant, a nondescript kind of man found guilty of murder and sentenced to the electric chair. Like every other criminal caught in the wheels of justice he’s scared, right down to the marrow of his bones. But it isn’t prison that scares him, the long, silent nights of waiting, the slow walk to the little room, or even death itself. It’s something else that holds Adam Grant in the hot, sweaty grip of fear, something worse than any punishment this world has to offer, something found only in the Twilight Zone.

Synopsis:
Adam Grant was a man convicted of murder who tries to convince the judge and jury that he is living a nightmare, that everything around him is just an illusion that keeps repeating over and over. He states that the judge, attorneys, and jury are merely players in his dream. The judge asks why he is so concerned of dying if its only a dream and Grant says because since having this nightmare, he hasn’t been able to get any sleep because he always wakes up screaming. He tells his attorney to go home and what he originally thought was for dinner will be something else. What Grant said is true, and the attorneys friends discuss the matter and perhaps get a stay of execution on the lines of insanity. Alas, the call to the governor arrives to late and Adam Grant is electrocuted. The next day, the same events occur once again, Grant in court going through the same motions, except the characters have assumed different roles.

Epilogue:
We know that a dream can be real, but whoever thought that reality could be a dream? We exist, of course, but how, in what way? As we believe, as flesh-and-blood human beings, or are we simply parts of someone’s feverish, complicated nightmare? Think about it, and then ask yourself, do you live here, in this country, in this world, or do you live instead in the Twilight Zone?

Persons Unknown Tie-In:
Men and women in captivity. Going through the motions, each not realizing that they are in an illusion. Except one man, (Joe) who has the knowledge that an experiment is being conducted. He informs everyone that he is part of the program yet he cannot change the outcome as the scenario continues to play out.

When he wakes up, and trust me, Joe will be back on the show next week, but he will be somewhat different, the program will continue. To bolster my theory even more, Tori is now a nurse instead of the wild child she portrayed earlier.

There you have it.

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