8.6/10 1,152 votes#1 - Demon with a Glass Hand
Season 2 Episode 5 - Aired 10/17/1964
A man with a glass hand attempts to unravel the mystery of who he is.
Director: Byron Haskin
Writer: Harlan Ellison
8.4/10 658 votes#2 - The Inheritors Part II
Season 2 Episode 11 - Aired 11/28/1964
An investigation reveals a desperate plan involving the construction of a spaceship and a group of special children.
Director: James Goldstone
Writer: Seeleg Lester, Sam Neuman, Ed Adamson
8.3/10 705 votes#3 - The Inheritors Part I
Season 2 Episode 10 - Aired 11/21/1964
After being shot in the head, a soldier gains a genius IQ and begins working fervently toward a mysterious goal.
Director: James Goldstone
Writer: Seeleg Lester, Sam Neuman
8.1/10 1,001 votes#4 - The Man Who Was Never Born
Season 1 Episode 6 - Aired 10/28/1963
An astronaut travels to the 23rd Century, where he finds the Earth a blasted wasteland inhabited by monsters.
Director: Leonard Horn
Writer: Anthony Lawrence
8.0/10 1,030 votes#5 - The Sixth Finger
Season 1 Episode 5 - Aired 10/14/1963
A scientist discovers a way to speed up evolution and tries out the process on a simple miner.
Director: James Goldstone
Writer: Ellis St. Joseph
8.0/10 717 votes#6 - The Bellero Shield
Season 1 Episode 20 - Aired 2/10/1964
A scientist captures an alien that can protect itself with an unbreakable shield.
Director: John Brahm
Writer: Joseph Stefano, Lou Morheim
7.9/10 648 votes#7 - A Feasibility Study
Season 1 Episode 29 - Aired 4/13/1964
The people of Earth surprise their alien captors when an entire neighborhood is transported to another planet as part of a plan to enslave the human race.
Director: Byron Haskin
Writer: Joseph Stefano
7.9/10 618 votes#8 - I, Robot
Season 2 Episode 9 - Aired 11/14/1964
A robot is put on trial for the murder of his creator.
Director: Leon Benson
Writer: Robert C. Dennis, Otto Binder
7.8/10 905 votes#9 - The Zanti Misfits
Season 1 Episode 14 - Aired 12/30/1963
Exiles from the planet Zanti arrive on Earth, and a startling truth is uncovered when two human renegades invade their privacy.
Director: Leonard Horn
Writer: Joseph Stefano
7.8/10 776 votes#10 - Soldier
Season 2 Episode 1 - Aired 9/19/1964
Two soldiers from the future are thrust back through time to the present day.
Director: Gerd Oswald
Writer: Harlan Ellison
7.7/10 786 votes#11 - Nightmare
Season 1 Episode 10 - Aired 12/2/1963
In a war action with the planet Ebon, some soldiers are captured, interrogated and tortured.
Director: John Erman
Writer: Joseph Stefano
7.6/10 1,049 votes#12 - The Architects of Fear
Season 1 Episode 3 - Aired 9/30/1963
A noble scheme goes horribly awry when a group of scientists plan an elaborate hoax designed to frighten and ultimately unite humankind.
Director: Byron Haskin
Writer: Meyer Dolinsky
7.6/10 532 votes#13 - The Chameleon
Season 1 Episode 31 - Aired 4/27/1964
A government agent faces a crisis of conscience when he infiltrates a band of aliens marooned aboard the wreckage of a flying saucer.
Director: Gerd Oswald
Writer: Joseph Stefano, Lou Morheim, Robert Towne
7.5/10 1,346 votes#14 - The Galaxy Being
Season 1 Episode 1 - Aired 9/16/1963
A radio station engineer named Allan Maxwell establishes contact with an alien being. But when the station's power is turned up, the alien is teleported to Earth where its radioactive nature causes havoc.
Director: Leslie Stevens
Writer: Leslie Stevens
7.5/10 659 votes#15 - The Forms of Things Unknown
Season 1 Episode 32 - Aired 5/4/1964
A crazy man invents a machine that can tilt time and bring the dead back to life.
Director: Gerd Oswald
Writer: Joseph Stefano
7.4/10 608 votes#16 - The Invisibles
Season 1 Episode 19 - Aired 2/3/1964
A government agent infiltrates a secret criminal organization that uses alien parasites to control its members.
Director: Gerd Oswald
Writer: Joseph Stefano
7.4/10 531 votes#17 - The Premonition
Season 2 Episode 16 - Aired 1/9/1965
An out-of-control test flight traps a pilot and his wife in a slow-moving time warp, and they're not alone.
Director: Gerd Oswald
Writer: Ib Melchior, Samuel Roeca
7.3/10 776 votes#18 - O.B.I.T.
Season 1 Episode 7 - Aired 11/4/1963
A new invention allows spying on anyone, anywhere.
Director: Gerd Oswald
Writer: Meyer Dolinsky
7.3/10 592 votes#19 - The Guests
Season 1 Episode 26 - Aired 3/23/1964
After discovering an elderly man dying by the side of the road, a young man finds a strange house where some people are kept prisoner and ageless by an alien intelligence.
Director: Paul Stanley
Writer: Donald S. Sanford
7.2/10 1,007 votes#20 - The Hundred Days of the Dragon
Season 1 Episode 2 - Aired 9/23/1963
A sinister foreign power replaces the President of the United States with its own agent via the use of a powerful drug allowing the skin to be temporarily molded into any likeness.
Director: Byron Haskin
Writer: Robert Mintz, Allan Balter
7.2/10 835 votes#21 - The Man with the Power
Season 1 Episode 4 - Aired 10/7/1963
A radical experiment gives a college professor incredible power, which his subconcious mind uses to destroy his enemies.
Director: László Benedek
Writer: Jerome Ross
7.2/10 721 votes#22 - It Crawled Out of the Woodwork
Season 1 Episode 11 - Aired 12/9/1963
An incredible being made of pure energy imperils the staff of a research lab and hides a deadly secret.
Director: Gerd Oswald
Writer: Joseph Stefano
7.2/10 584 votes#23 - Second Chance
Season 1 Episode 23 - Aired 3/2/1964
A group of people board an amusement park ride. Then they (and their surprised "captain") find that they're really going on a space jaunt.
Director: Paul Stanley
Writer: Lou Morheim, Lin Dane, Sonya Roberts
7.2/10 559 votes#24 - Fun and Games
Season 1 Episode 27 - Aired 3/30/1964
Two Earth people are transported to an alien planet, along with two aliens. The are told by their abductors that they will fight each other to the death. The stakes are high: the homeworld of the losers will be destroyed slowly, for the further amusement of their captors.
Director: Gerd Oswald
Writer: Joseph Stefano, Robert Specht
7.1/10 683 votes#25 - Controlled Experiment
Season 1 Episode 16 - Aired 1/13/1964
Two Martian investigators probe our custom of homicide.
Director: Leslie Stevens
Writer: Leslie Stevens
The Best Episodes of The Outer Limits
Every episode of The Outer Limits ranked from best to worst. Let's dive into the Best Episodes of The Outer Limits!
The Outer Limits is an anthology tv series of self-contained sci-fi-horror stories, sometimes with a plot twist at the end.
Genres:DramaSci-Fi & Fantasy
Network:ABC
Top Episode Ratings Summary
"Demon with a Glass Hand" is the best rated episode of "The Outer Limits". It scored 8.6/10 based on 1152 votes. Directed by Byron Haskin and written by Harlan Ellison, it aired on 10/17/1964. This episode scored 0.2 points higher than the second highest rated, "The Inheritors Part II".