Panic!

I think this was one of the many shows forbidden me when I was ten, but obviously mainstream 50s TV (a "Panic!" marathon would be a great Thanksgiving Day). The only one I remember has of course the heavy voice-over at the beginning. A man is on a subway with three men sitting opposite him. All are wearing generic 50s suits. "Your friend seems to have had one too many," he says. The heavy voice-over then comes in ending ominously "... the man in the middle was dead." At the next stop, the 'hero' reaches down for his newspaper and bolts out the door. The pre-commercial shot is a close-up of the face of one of the three men (with gun) pressed against the closed subway door ... (The memory trail now grows cold.) Think of all the great things I could have done in life if my brain were not cluttered with things like this.

I just now remembered another episode of the short-lived TV series Panic. This one involved a Catholic priest. He hears the confession of a stranger, who confesses to planting a bomb somewhere in the city. - But before he can reveal where he planted the bomb, he dies of a heart attack. Now the priest is forbidden to reveal what he heard in the confessional - thus his panic. - What the priest is able to do, however, is find the bomb himself -- which is the story line of this episode.

One of the best things about the show was the voice-over at the beginning of each episode done by Westbrook Van Voorhis (you just don't see names like that anymore.) He had a great deep voice that added much intensity to the show intros. I only remember fragments of episodes, one had a scene with two boys hiding under a porch and overhearing some sinister conversation, and the other episode had something to do with a lighthouse. I believe that when I was watching this show in Washington DC, it was on at the same time as "Twilight Zone" and it was always a tough decision which one to watch. I hope these shows are not totally lost or destroyed, so we can see them again.

i was only 9 years old when this show was on the air, which may be one reason it was so memorable. the most unique thing about the show was the opening. a narrator introduced a character and gave a time in minutes and seconds when he (or she) would become involved in a harrowing situation. for example: "this is mr. smith. in 2 minutes and 36 seconds he will be in PANIC"! then in that announced time the character would get into some unforseen trouble and would indeed become panicky! the title then came on the screen and shattered into hundreds of pieces. the rest of the show would be how the victims of the situation were saved from their predicament. i think it was always a happy ending. i don't recall anybody actually dying as a result of the initially dangerous (and potentially more dangerous) plot set-up. another reviewer mentioned the plot involving the little boy finding a man trapped in a tank with a tiger. the boy was known in town as a liar so nobody believes him when he tries to get help. in this case, the title could refer to either the boy or the man in the tank. the only other plot i remember vaguely was a woman trapped in a closed and darkened theater with a maniacal killer. i would love to have somebody contact me who remembers more shows of this series.

This was a good show. Each episode started out with the TV screen (glass) seemingly shattering. No regular cast, each episode had guest stars who were inevitably thrown into dire circumstances and who then had to save themselves or be doomed! Thus the title.