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X-Entertainment loves Amazing Stories.

Was going to wait till late Sunday to put this up, but it's already done, so yeah. I've had this review sitting on the bench waiting to be written for months, and it was starting to get mad at me. Here's a review of Go To The Head Of The Class, my most favorite-ever episode from the late, great Amazing Stories television series. Starring Christopher Lloyd as a psychotic school teacher who loses his head over two of his students, I was permanently affected after just one viewing on a 1986 Sunday night.

Posted by Matt on 05/13/2006. E-mail me!



Discussion Thread: 124 comments

I never watched "Amazing Stories" the television show but I sure as hell remember the crazy ass movies…remember the one story about the black babysitter who watched the kids who were harassed by demons/monsters?…strange ass shit!!! Anyways, Matt do you remember the "Friday the 13th” series that ran for a brief time in the late 80′s…scared the shit out of me! You should do a review of an episode of that ill-fated show.

Chestnuts roasted by Kevin @ 05/14/2006 3:04 AM

OK, so I actually do like this show. I’m not sure why I slammed it earlier. I guess I’m just grmpy. Or maybe I got my hopes up too high.

Chestnuts roasted by Nate @ 05/14/2006 3:38 AM

I too have a memory that has stuck with me since childhood from this show.
I don’t know the name of the episode but it went like this.
A Rich Bitch is sent to jail for some reason. She hatches a plan to break out with the help of the caretaker. He needs an operation but can’t afford it so the RB offers to pay in exchange for a favor. Whenever the bell rings, a prisoner has died and will be buried in the prison cemetary. RB will hide in the coffin, be buried, and the caretaker will dig her up that night. When the bell does chime, the RB climbs into the coffin but is too squeamish to look at the corpse. Hours later she is buried and bored. She lights a match and looks at the body… its the caretaker. She screams and screams and we cut to a shot of the empty cemetary and a muffled scream. fade to black.
Freaked me out something fierce. I couldn’t sleep for days.

Chestnuts roasted by Crazycraig @ 05/14/2006 8:52 AM

Heh heh…I like how you explained your word choice with a link to a page explaining the fallacy of the word.

I never saw the show (but I do have several soundtracks). I collect film scores, and Amazing Stories is a treasure trove–most of the time, the famous directors brought along their famous composers, i.e. John Williams did some of the more heavy-handedly Spielbergian episodes, Danny Elfman did the Tim Burton episode and one other, Jerry Goldsmith had his hands all over it. Ahhh, to love a show I’ve never seen.

Chestnuts roasted by Spoodles @ 05/14/2006 9:24 AM

Anyone else remember a simliar low-budget B show called "Dark Room" or "In The Dark Room"? It had several forgettable storied except one…a kid is abused by his dad. Then, one night, the kids toy army men come to life and beat the holy hell out of the dad.

Unfortunately it was probably too obscure a series to ever make it to DVD

Chestnuts roasted by medevac @ 05/14/2006 10:55 AM

wow..the wonders of a google search…

http://www.tv.com/darkroom/siege-of-31-august/episode/131426/summary.html

Chestnuts roasted by medevac @ 05/14/2006 10:58 AM

Wow, you summed up my memories of, and fascination with, this television episode exactly. I don’t know if I’ve seen is since it first aired in 1986, but I also remembered every last detail about it. The thing that reminds me most about it is one of the Treehouse of Horror segments from The Simpons, where Bart and Lisa, trying to resurrect their cat, accidently raise all the dead in the cemetary. Certain elements of it recall Go to the Head of the Class, and every time I’ve seen it (many times over the year, unlike Amazing Stories)I have vivid flashbacks to Christopher Llyod’s disembodied head screaming at naughty teenagers.

Chestnuts roasted by The Kraken @ 05/14/2006 11:32 AM

I don’t remember this show either, but I recall the movies. Well, no, ok I remember ONE part of ONE of the movies. Family Dog. I loved that freakin dog, and when he got his own show, I was beyond stoked. Alas, hey cancelled him and the show wasn’t even as funny as the short was. :( But, I did find a stuffed animal of him and I still have him, somewhere. :)

Chestnuts roasted by Ryane @ 05/14/2006 12:12 PM

Holy fuck! I remember this episode! Awesome man! I wasn’t alive when it originally ran but sci-fi used to play it.

Chestnuts roasted by Darth Poop @ 05/14/2006 12:40 PM

The six Amazing Stories movies was where I first saw this one. I LOVE the opening montage of this show. My favorite episode is pilot episode with the war plane, but they had some other gems too.

I love anthologies in general, but the big problem is that depending on what’s going on, some episodes rock while some suck.

My favorite anthologies are Twilight Zone, Friday the 13th, and Tales From the Crypt. But I also remember Darkside, Monsters, Freddy’s Nightmares, and Outer Limits.

Chestnuts roasted by JLAJRC @ 05/14/2006 12:43 PM

I just watched an episode a few months ago on Sci Fi. Awesome stuff. I remember this one when I was a kid about a ghost train or something like that that ran through someone’s house.

Happy Mother’s Day Matt, you’re the mother of X-E

Chestnuts roasted by Fox @ 05/14/2006 1:06 PM

And Family Dog, man I loved that show. It was on for like two weeks, right?

Chestnuts roasted by Fox @ 05/14/2006 1:10 PM

Fox – Yeah, I actually wasn’t sure it even made it past one episode, but I’m sure they gave it at least a 2nd showing. I hope they did. I was probably so stricken with grief that it got cancelled before they even gave it a good shot and that’s why I can’t remember. :’(

Chestnuts roasted by Ryane @ 05/14/2006 1:34 PM

I want to see the episode where the whole town has to go into this Radiation type room and the people 1 by 1 are altered. It made an impression on me but I can’t remember the jist of the story. I must see it again. I can’t wait for the DVD’s.

Chestnuts roasted by Bobby Sox @ 05/14/2006 1:50 PM

The only Amazing Story episodes I remember are the ones mentioned above; the one with the landing gear drawn in and the one with the various freaky supermodels(thought that was weird science), but if I remember correctly the models resulted being half formed from torn pages or had staples in them(?) and I used to draw as a kid so of course I love the episode with the landing gear, but somehow I ended up only fulfilling half the episode, I didn’t end up doing art but joining the Army. How does that happen?
Once again I will probably shun this on DVD as nostalgia has not been kind to me(somehow I thought Sonic the Hedgehog was a much better game and as far as Capcom goes, at least Final Fight retains some of its kick-assedness, I fear playing Strider or Golden Axe again for fear of discovering my childhood was all one long delusion.)
In closing who would’ve imagined these days Christopher Lloyd would be doing a Pam Anderson sitcom, Mary Stuart Masterson would still be doing movies(though she is easily confused with every other 3 named actress from the 80s) and Brad would disappear…well, maybe we foresaw that last one.

Chestnuts roasted by whitemale_98 @ 05/14/2006 3:37 PM

I missed Amazing Stories, which was probably good because I have a vivid imagination and stuff like that would’ve freaked me the hell out. Even now, although I love the Twilight Zone (original flavor), I have to watch it during the day. Even the goofy episodes with Burgess Meredith (hint- all his episodes were goofy).

The anthology series is such a great idea though- were there any that weren’t horror/scifi besides "Love, American Style"?

Chestnuts roasted by Welsh Rabbit @ 05/14/2006 4:00 PM

I used to have the Family Dog episode on VHS. It was taped a year before I was born, but it was really weird finding it when I was 10 and having no idea where it was from. I loved it though, and now I know what series it’s from. Thanks Matt!

Chestnuts roasted by Gooble @ 05/14/2006 4:25 PM

Off the top of my head, Welsh, the only thing I can think of would be something like Papa Beaver’s Story Time, if that’s not too much of a stretch.
Happy Mother’s Day to IHAQ, Mrs. Manimal, Trajeal and any other blogging mommas!

Chestnuts roasted by squee4242 @ 05/14/2006 4:33 PM

The most famous Amazing Story episode (beside the war plane one) is another high school related one. It’s about a jock/bully who somehow becomes magnet when a meteor crashes in his yard. Everything metal sticks to him. In the end, he becomes stuck to the ugly chick with braces who has a crush on him. Funny.

Chestnuts roasted by JLAJRC @ 05/14/2006 5:26 PM

It may very well be my favorite role of his, and we’re talking about the guy who played Doc, Uncle Fester and Professor Plum.

Clearly you haven’t seen his Oscar-worthy performance in Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle.

Chestnuts roasted by Mystie @ 05/14/2006 6:02 PM

The only two I’ve seen are the muchly aforemention ‘The mission’ (aka ‘the plane one’) and ‘Ghost Train’, which coincidentally happen to be the only two directed by Spielberg.

Chestnuts roasted by Cap'n B @ 05/14/2006 7:37 PM

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle!!! I absolutely loved those books. Never did see the movie, though.

As for Amazing Stories, I’m not sure if I caught any of those episodes, but I do remember watching things like the Outer Limits and the Twilight Zone. I’m not sure which show it was on, but I remember an episode in which this old guy dies, but is too stubborn to know it. He begins to decompose, and it grosses out his family. They try to tell him he’s dead, but he just won’t believe it. At the suggestion of the family doctor, the guy’s wife sprinkles pepper in his napkin at breakfast time. The guy sneazes into the napkin, looks at it, and realizes he IS dead and he gets up from the table to lie down in his bed. The last shot is of the napkin which now contains pieces of the guy’s rotting face.

Chestnuts roasted by DeeJay @ 05/14/2006 7:48 PM

Wow, I haven’t though about Amazing Stories in years.

So, remember Monsters? I’m trying to remember a certain episode. There was a woman dating a man, and her son somehow ends up thinking the man is a demon or something, but then it turns out that the woman and the son are really demons. Anyone got a title or anything for that one?

Chestnuts roasted by marioshoku @ 05/14/2006 8:52 PM

I only vaguely remember "Amazing Stories." I probably wouldn’t have watched it, either. I also have a vivid imagination and get freaked out easily.

Chestnuts roasted by starwenn @ 05/14/2006 9:16 PM

You know that whole episode looked awfully familiar, I think i may have seen part of it late one night (3am ish)

Chestnuts roasted by chris @ 05/14/2006 11:26 PM

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This entry was posted on Saturday, May 13th, 2006 at 11:12 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.