Straight and Narrow (The Outer Limits)

Infobox Television episode
Title = Straight and Narrow
Series = The Outer Limits


Caption =
Season = 2
Episode = 8
Airdate = 23 February, 1996
Production = 30
Writer = Joel Metzger
Director = Joseph Scanlan
Photographer =
Guests = Peter Yunker as Instructor, Ryan Phillippe as Rusty Dobson, Tom Butler as the Doctor, Tygh Runyan as James Scardale, Steve Makaj as Officer Brown, Peter Donat as Principal Kern, Campbell Lane as Roland Baker, Kavan Smith as Aloyson Tenner, Jonathan Scarfe as Charlie Walter
Episode list = List of "The Outer Limits" episodes
Prev = First Anniversary
Next = Trial by Fire

"Straight and Narrow" is an episode of "The Outer Limits" television series. It first aired on 23 February, 1996, during the second season.

Introduction

A mother sends her recalcitrant son, Rusty Dobson, to a military academy.

Opening Narration

"In our relentless pursuit of career and worldly possessions is it we who pay the highest price or is it...our children?"

Plot

The administrators are actually controlling the students through a chip inserted into their heads. They want to create a group of business executives who are willing to commit murder in order to make more money for their companies.

Rusty and one other student are immune to the chip because of a medicine they are taking for ulcers.

The other student wants to wait to graduate, and then expose the place to the outside world. Rusty is convinced that this is a bad idea, and wants to escape. However, as soon as he approaches the boundary of the academy, the chip in his head gives him severe migraine.

At the end of the episode, Rusty manages to escape by stealing the security clearance cards out of the administrator's office and disabling the boundary control system. His fellow students chase after him, but he re-activates the system and they are unable to follow him past the walls of the academy.

He tries to call his mother from a payphone, but she is busy in an office. He heads to site of an assassination plan he knows of, but police (who show the distinctive scars from the computer chip implantation) detain him. His friend from school performs the assassination.

Closing Narration

"It's said the road to hell is paved with good intentions. It is with the same good intentions that we blindly place our trust in those with power, the architects of our future and all to often, the manipulators of our ultimate fate."

External links

* [http://www.theouterlimits.com/episodes/season2/218.htm Episode guide at The Outer Limits website]
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* [http://www.scifi.com/outerlimits/episodes/season2/208narrow.html Scifi.com episode guide]