'Nightmares & Dreamscapes' Retro Recap: 'Umney's Last Case'

​Written by John Edward Betancourt

Sometimes, life gets rough. So rough in fact that it brings us to our proverbial knees and we want nothing more than a chance to escape our every day lives and the problems that plague us. This is the moment where our imagination takes over to save us, giving us ideas of how we could indeed alleviate our stress, and for some, the idea of switching places with another person, be them fictional or real seems to help soothe their soul.

After all, who wouldn't want the opportunity to assume the life of say, a superhero, or a wizard and enjoy the incredible adventures they go through and possibly save the world along the way. But what would it look like, if we actually could switch places with fictional characters...specifically, what would it be like for them? We know we would relish in those special moments that allowed for us to fall in love with them in the first place, but would they be okay living our lives? Would Superman enjoy working the night shift at the factory, or closing down a retail store? Would Harry Potter take pleasure in being stiffed on a tip or yelled at because someone's package didn't arrive on time? More than likely not, but the idea of switching places with fictional characters and seeing how both halves truly live was explored in depth in Nightmares & Dreamscapes in the episode, 'Umney's Last Case'.

Clyde Umney is a private investigator, who is having one incredibly strange day. All the people that have ever mattered to him or that he encounters in his daily life are suddenly becoming incredibly ill, or disappearing outright and Clyde would like some answers as to what the heck is happening to him. Unfortunately for Clyde, his request is going to be granted when a strange man that looks just like him shows up in his office and explains that Clyde...is nothing more than a fictional character and the doppelgänger standing before him is a writer named Sam Landry that just so happened to create Clyde and well...Sam has had a rough couple of years in the real world and has decided it's time for a change and he wants his literary alter ego to trade places with him so Sam can finally live a life free of responsibility, and while the swap works like a charm, both men will quickly discover that the grass is not always greener on the other side...

Well, this episode was simply a delight to say the least and let's get it out of the way now, that's all thanks to William H. Macy's incredible performance in this episode. Obviously he plays the two halves of this proverbial coin in Sam Landry and Clyde Umney but outside of the physical similarities, one would never know the difference. Clyde is full of little quirks and ticks that make him the private dick perfect for that Pre-World War II era and Sam is well...just your every day dude who happens to think he has all the answers and really at its core, this episode is nothing more than a grand and sweeping tragedy for Sam, with Clyde caught in the middle of the mess, and while it's damn entertaining to watch Clyde struggle with life in our world we are always brought back to the point that Sam truly cannot cope with any part of his life or reality for that matter and he firmly believes the swap is the only way to escape it all.

Which makes the ending of this episode the most powerful part of this entire story; since Sam's decision to run and hide in the comfort of another world, ends up causing more harm than good and those final images of what happens to his wife because of the swap and Clyde's predisposition to not really give a crap about anything but dames and danger...stay with you for quite some time after the episode has come to its end, which makes this story a brilliant morality tale. One that reminds us that while life gets tough, to the point where you want to do nothing more than run and hide...that solution simply won't change anything. Our problems are still there, waiting to be resolved and while it's fun to imagine what if...we should simply leave it at that. Either way, this episode is a strong one to say the least, and it certainly eclipses its predecessor by delivering a top notch story. Until next time.

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