Jordan Peele Reveals THE TWILIGHT ZONE Episode That Inspired US
Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone has inspired countless stories and films over the years. So many people have borrowed from that classic series for their own purposes. Even Jordan Peele’s upcoming horror movie Us, was inspired by it!
With Peele also producing the upcoming Twilight Zone revival series, it makes sense that he would want to talk about the series and connect it to Us. While talking with Rolling Stone, Peele said that Us was inspired by one of his favorite The Twilight Zone episodes titled “Mirror Image.”
The episode starred actress Vera Miles, and it tells the story of a young career woman named Miss Barnes. While waiting for the bus, she encounters a woman that looks exactly like her and she becomes convinced that her doppelgänger is an evil entity from a parallel universe who’s out to eliminate and replace her.
When talking about the episode, Peele said, “It’s terrifying, beautiful, really elegant storytelling, and it opens up a world. It opens up your imagination.” Do you remember that Twilight Zone episode? It’s certainly a great one!
Does this mean the doppelgänger family in Us could be from another parallel universe? We’ll just have to wait and see! Here’s the synopsis for Us:
Set in present day along the iconic Northern California coastline, Us stars Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o as Adelaide Wilson, a woman returning to her beachside childhood home with her husband, Gabe (Black Panther’s Winston Duke), and their two children (Shahadi Wright Joseph, Evan Alex) for an idyllic summer getaway. Haunted by an unexplainable and unresolved trauma from her past and compounded by a string of eerie coincidences, Adelaide feels her paranoia elevate to high-alert as she grows increasingly certain that something bad is about to befall her family.
After spending a tense beach day with their friends, the Tylers (Emmy winner Elisabeth Moss, Tim Heidecker, Cali Sheldon, Noelle Sheldon), Adelaide and her family return to their vacation home to discover the silhouettes of four figures standing in their driveway. Us pits an ordinary American family against a terrifying and uncanny opponent: doppelgängers of themselves.
The film is scheduled to hit theaters on March 22nd.