Scoring Patty Duke in the lead as a young woman who holidays at a resort, only to be visited by a less than desirable guest, "The Last Visitor" is another unremarkable entry in Hammer's Journey to the Unknown series. Speaking of Hammer, this was the second episode in a row to be directed by Don Chaffey who had done a number of adventure and fantasy films for the studio, the material here being light years removed from One Million Years B.C. and The Viking Queen. Duke gets little to do in such a context besides act annoyed that nothing is done about the creepy old person who keeps interrupting her sleep and apparently has free reign of Kay Walsh's establishment. We eventually get an explanation and it is hardly the most startling or frightening, so besides Walsh getting to chew the scenery here or there, this is just a pedestrian psycho-biddy time-waster.
The William Abney short story "Poor Butterfly" gets the Journey to the Unknown treatment, continuing the program's trend of featuring uncanny scenarios with predictable twists and outcomes. Chad Everett gets an invitation through his mail slot to a costume party out in the country that is hosted by a man that he has never met, which is curious enough, but once he meets a local that shoots him a perplexed and disturbed look when Everett asks for directions, the audience can easily deduce what is happening. Things continue in such a direction from there and some of the specifics as to the mysterious shindig and why Everett was invited are the only things that keep it captivating, at least to a degree. Alan Gibson was behind the screen on three segments for the series, (the most for any director), but he, the cast, and the crew can only do so much with a tale that fails to pack a punch and simply lands where everyone thought it would land after only ten minutes in.
One of the more interesting Journey to the Unknown installments, (authored by prolific playwright David Campton), "Stranger in the Family" dips its does into science fiction as much as it does horror. Set in modern day, it concerns a "mutant" who has reached early adulthood and has the ability to control people's actions, as well as having weird fingers without nails because evolution is an odd duck apparently. Anthony Higgins turns in an increasingly wrought performance as said individual, who is sought after by scientists, a smarmy talent agent, and protected by his parents who can no longer keep him under lock and key. The opening scene is fetching where we are introduced to the disturbing outcome of Higgins' powers, and we get several more examples along the way, most memorably in a live hypnotism act that hilariously goes awry immediately after it starts.
Infidelity meets super computers in Journey to the Unknown's "The Madison Equation". Any time that scientists insist that a complex machine of their own creation is infallible, eyes are bound to role. In this particular instance, Barbara Bel Geddes and Allan Cuthbertson play a less-than-happy couple who have collectively designed said super computer to run an entire establishment and have various fail-safes in place. Cuthbertson is a hot-tempered asshole who hires a private investigator, (portrayed by the always unsettling and effeminate Aubrey Morris), to spy on his wife Geddes and her love interest who are trying to bide their time for the correct moment to make their partnership official. The computer gets in the way with deadly results, but the story has a predictable reveal, none of the characters are likeable, and none of the set pieces are memorable.
Even with heavyweight Roddy McDowall on board as a lowlife conman who is out for his brother's inheritance, the final Journey to the Unknown installment "The Killing Bottle" fails to deliver. An adaptation of L. P. Hartley's short story of the same name, is has a convoluted scheme involving driving McDowall's eccentric sibling William Marlowe insane via the death of a butterfly in a mason jar because the gentleman is apparently touchy about any living creature being killed or something. Not that this stops him from going full-on maniac eventually, so it is probably best not to think about such things so much. There is also a young songwriter looking for a break who gets involved, though one could take him out of the equation and the outcome would hardly differ. McDowall is great in anything and this is no exception, turning on the sleaze as he makes his wife increasingly uncomfortable and exhibits hardly any moral compass. Otherwise though, this is a meandering bore.