Dead Run (The Twilight Zone)

"**Dead Run**"
"Dead Run"
The Twilight Zone episode
	Scene from "Dead Run"
Episode no.	Season 1; Episode 19b
Directed by	Paul Tucker
Written by	Alan Brennert
Based on	"Dead Run" by Greg Bear
Original air date	February 21, 1986
Guest appearances
	Steve Railsback: Johnny Davis ; Barry Corbin: Pete ; Ebbe Roe Smith: Gary Frick ; John de Lancie: The Dispatcher ; Brent Spiner: Draft Dodger ; John D. LeMay: Gay Man ; Paul Jenkins: Trucker
Episode chronology
← Previous; "The Leprechaun-Artist"	Next →; "Profile in Silver"
	List of episodes

"Dead Run" is the second segment of the nineteenth episode from the first season (1985–86) of the television series The Twilight Zone. This segment is based on the short story "Dead Run" by Greg Bear, first published in Omni (April 1985). It follows a truck driver who gets a job transporting souls into Hell.

Plot[]

Johnny Davis is a truck driver unemployed due to his many accidents. Johnny asks Pete, a friend of his father, for help in getting a job. Pete warns Johnny that the jobs he takes require unusual fortitude. Johnny insists he has no alternative and Pete agrees to take him on his next run. Pete shows him that the job is to deliver souls to Hell via semi-trailer truck. At a truck stop, they observe other truckers are nervous about disturbances in Hell.

Dropping their cargo, Johnny is surprised that there is no punishment in Hell. Pete explains that Hell was not made for punishment, but to keep evildoers away from those who have chosen good. Souls run around loose and some plead with Johnny to rescue them. Other souls attack the drivers, but one of them, Gary Frick, comes to Johnny's aid. Gary tells Johnny he is an afterlife manager who was sent to Hell when he died, and has been starting an insurrection. Gary explains that a new bureaucracy has taken over the job of deciding who goes to Heaven or Hell, and confides to Johnny the location of the road to Heaven.

A guard sees Johnny with Gary and takes him to meet with upper management. Johnny relates what he heard and saw. The manager explains that God does not have time to personally judge the deceased. He points out that Johnny has no reason to believe the stupid claims that they are innocent, but Johnny still thinks his standards are too strict. He pretends to be convinced and is allowed to return to his job.

Johnny interviews the dead that ride with him and decides which of them should go to Hell and which he should release and show the road to Heaven. Johnny likens himself to Jesus, who descended into Hell to give the souls there another chance. He tells the freed souls that it is possible that from their perspective Heaven is actually worse than Hell, but it is their best chance.

References[]

Zicree, Marc Scott: The Twilight Zone Companion. Sillman-James Press, 1982 (second edition)

External links[]

"Dead Run" at IMDb

v t The Twilight Zone (1985) episodes
Season 1	"Shatterday" "A Little Peace and Quiet" "Wordplay" "Dreams for Sale" "Chameleon" "Healer" "Children's Zoo" "Kentucky Rye" "Little Boy Lost" "Wish Bank" "Nightcrawlers" "If She Dies" "Ye Gods" "Examination Day" "A Message from Charity" "Teacher's Aide" "Paladin of the Lost Hour" "Act Break" "The Burning Man" "Dealer's Choice" "Dead Woman's Shoes" "Wong's Lost and Found Emporium" "The Shadow Man" "The Uncle Devil Show" "Opening Day" "The Beacon" "One Life, Furnished in Early Poverty" "Her Pilgrim Soul" "I of Newton" "Night of the Meek" "But Can She Type?" "The Star" "Still Life" "The Little People of Killany Woods" "The Misfortune Cookie" "Monsters!" "A Small Talent for War" "A Matter of Minutes" "The Elevator" "To See the Invisible Man" "Tooth and Consequences" "Welcome to Winfield" "Quarantine" "Gramma" "Personal Demons" "Cold Reading" "The Leprechaun-Artist" "Dead Run" "Profile in Silver" "Button, Button" "Need to Know" "Red Snow" "Take My Life...Please!" "Devil's Alphabet" "The Library" "Shadow Play" "Grace Note" "A Day in Beaumont" "The Last Defender of Camelot"
Season 2	"The Once and Future King" "A Saucer of Loneliness" "What Are Friends For?" "Aqua Vita" "The Storyteller" "Nightsong" "The After Hours" "Lost and Found" "The World Next Door" "The Toys of Caliban" "The Convict's Piano" "The Road Less Traveled" "The Card" "The Junction" "Joy Ride" "Shelter Skelter" "Private Channel" "Time and Teresa Golowitz" "Voices in the Earth" "Song of the Younger World" "The Girl I Married"
Season 3	"The Curious Case of Edgar Witherspoon" "Extra Innings" "The Crossing" "The Hunters" "Dream Me a Life" "Memories" "The Hellgramite Method" "Our Selena Is Dying" "The Call" "The Trance" "Acts of Terror" "20/20 Vision" "There Was an Old Woman" "The Trunk" "Appointment on Route 17" "The Cold Equations" "Stranger in Possum Meadows" "Street of Shadows" "Something in the Walls" "A Game of Pool" "Room 2426" "The Mind of Simon Foster" "The Wall" "Cat and Mouse" "Rendezvous in a Dark Place" "Many, Many Monkeys" "Love Is Blind" "Crazy as a Soup Sandwich" "Special Service" "Father and Son Game"