20/20 Vision (The Twilight Zone)

"20/20 Vision" is the forty-seventh episode and the twelfth episode of the third season (1988–89) of the television series The Twilight Zone.

Opening narration[]

Focus on Warren Cribbens, a myopic little man. Precise with figures, awkward with people. His horizons? A bottom line dotted with decimal points. But his safety in numbers is about to be erased.

Plot[]

It is opening time at the local farmer's bank and teller Sandy is at the door letting customers inside the building. When business starts to pick up, officer of the bank Mr. Warren Cribbens is called into the bank manager Mr. Cutler's office. He tells Cribbens how efficient and hard-working he is and offers him a promotion to bank loan officer. Cribbens is apprehensive about this change and feels he isn't cut out for that particular position, but Cutler doesn't pay attention to him.

When Cribbens leaves Cutler's office, Sandy bumps into him and accidentally steps on his glasses and cracks them. After a blowup on the phone with a defaulted loan, Cribbens looks through his cracked glasses and sees a teller accidentally drop a large denomination bill into a trash can. When he tells her about it, they look and see nothing, but later she does drop the bill and thanks him for noticing. He then is told to foreclose on any mortgages that are outstanding and can't pay. But when he looks at the unfortunate people through his cracked glasses, he sees their desperate future—which will happen if he goes through with the foreclosures. He tries to help but nothing seems to work out.

When Cribbens talks to Sandy about how to deal with the problem, he sees her future - she falls off a ladder and breaks her neck. He begs her to be careful around the bank and then withdraws money out of his own account to give one of the farmers a personal loan. In Cutler's office, he wants Cribbens to offer the farmer bottom dollar for his land since he is so far in debt he'll take anything. Cribbens puts on his glasses to find out Cutler is being shady about the foreclosures because he will get some kickback from a big highway going through the farmland while these people will lose their homes. When Cutler finds out about Cribbens' loan to the farmer he fires him. Just then, Sandy falls from the ladder but Cribbens saves her in time. She apologizes for breaking his glasses again but he assures her not to worry as he doesn't need them anymore.

Closing narration[]

Accidents will happen, and Warren Cribbens had a lucky break. Instead of blindly following orders, his eyes were opened and he saw humanity and discovered it was his greatest asset. Add him to the list of those who have peered into...the Twilight Zone.

Notes[]

This episode is based loosely on the original series episode "A Penny for Your Thoughts", starring Dick York as a bank officer who, because of an odd twist of luck, becomes able to read people's thoughts and uses it to help the bank, an old man, and himself.

External links[]

• "20/20 Vision" at IMDb