EDITOR’S NOTE: This episode of Kolchak: The Night Stalker was on the CBS Late Movie on September 21, 1979; July 10, 1981 and October 23, 1987.

“F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote, ‘The rich are different than you and me.’ They sure are. They got more money. But there wasn’t enough money in the world to save some of Chicago’s upper crust members from a fiendish force so dark, it can only be called diabolic.” This quote sets the tone for the episode, hinting at the episode’s focus on the wealthy and their encounter with a sinister force.

With those words, Carl Kolchak embarks on a new episode, delving into the mysterious deaths of two Chicago socialites who killed themselves the same night and lost their precious gems. This leads him to the intriguing Native American legend of the Diablero, a sorcerer amassing a fortune in gems to break its eternal curse.

The highlight of this episode is when Karl goes to battle the legend at the Champion Towers, a luxurious high-rise in Chicago, bringing along a small mirror as seeing its reflection is the only way to stop this monster. Of course, Karl gets spooked and drops the mirror, shattering it and is alone, afraid and up against pure terror.

Despite facing a force that can hypnotize people into doing its bidding, Kolchak finds a mirror in the bathroom, transforms it into a skeleton, and then dusts. In a surprising turn of events, Canadian actor Victor Jory plays Charles Rolling Thunder, a role that might raise some eyebrows. And to top it off, the tribe in this episode, the Yoshone, is a fictional creation.

This episode was directed by Alexander Grasshoff (The Last Dinosaur) and was written by L. Ford Neale and John Huff, both of whom wrote the Burt Reynolds movie The Hunter’s Moon.

The makers of Kolchak must have really liked Kiel, as he would return the next episode to play the Paramafait in the next episode, “The Spanish Moss Murders.”