Rod Serling is back in this episode and not just hosting as he contributes an experimental story that might not completely work, but offers something beyond the expected and the everyday.

“Midnight Never Ends” has Ruth Asquith (Susan Strasberg, Scream of Fear) and hitchhiking marine Vincent Riley (Robert F. Lyons, 10 to Midnight) returning again and again to a diner where owner Jim Emsden (Robert Hogan) and Sheriff Lewis (Robert Karnes) confront them, all as they hear the faint sounds of clicking. They’ve all been there before and yet, they have no idea why. You’ll be able to decipher what this is all about relatively quickly, yet the blackened setting and strange air make this work. This is the second Jeannot Szwarc Night Gallery story that tries this approach.

This is the only story that has a painting of Serling, which is appropriate, as it is very much about how. a writer tries to bring his story to life.

“Brenda” (Laurie Prange) is a weird and often mean little girl, knocking over sand castles and treating her friends horribly. The one friend she bonds with and understands comes from the sea and is a monster feared by everyone in the summer vacation town she’s spending a few months enjoying with her parents.

Directed by Allen Reisner, whose TV career had work on every show from The Twilight Zone and Playhouse 90 to Hardcastle and McCormick, and written by Douglas Heyes, who created the mini-series North and South from a short story by Margaret St. Clair, this has an odd monster, a strange little girl and an interesting friendship between them.

Not the greatest of episodes but definitely it’s nice to have Serling back writing one story and Laird’s influence isn’t as strong.