Miles Federman (Billy Zane) may be the protege of Zorbin the Magnificent (Martin Sheen), but he can never equal his master. He blames everyone he can, including his assistant Greta Kreutzel (Maryam d’Abo). When he fires her, she notices that he has Zorbin’s medallion. She asks if he murdered him and he laughs as he shakes his head yes.

Bon soir, kiddies! I was just in the middle of my French lesson. Your pal, ze Crypt Keeper, has decided to see Le Mans! Imagine me in gay Scaree, sitting in a nice little café on the rot bank, sipping a glass of Cha-bleed while I write ghost-cards home to all my fiends. Or I could stay home and tell you tonight’s tale. It concerns an ambitious young magician who wants to expand his gore-izons, too, in a tasteless trick called: “Well Cooked Hams.””

Greta is hired by another magician, Franz Kraygen (Martin Sheen), who invites Miles to his show and shares a trick known as the Box of Death, where he is stabbed numerous times and yet lives. Miles wants the trick for himself, so he killed the older illusionist.

Using the box, Miles becomes a major star and Thomas Miller (Martin Sheen), a Hollywood director, wants to make a movie of his act. Of course, all of these people are all Zorbin and they’ve all faked their deaths, all to get revenge while the audience applauds the death of Miles.

Directed by Elliot Silverstein (The Car) and written by Andrew Kevin Walker (Se7en), this is a fun episode with a great ending for the villain.

This episode comes from the story “Well-Cooked Hams!” in Tales From the Crypt #27. In that tale, written by Al Feldstein and William Gaines and drawn by Jack Davis, two American producers want to bring Paris’s Grand Guignol to Broadway. When the owner won’t give them the rights, they kill him but he comes back from the dead to get his revenge on stage.