Paul Taylor (Granville Van Dusen) is a sportswriter. A motorcycle accident sends him to the emergency room. He dies on the operating table but is then revived after 2 minutes and 37 seconds. His near-death experience opens a door to another world. From then on, he is able to connect with the dead. They send messages to his mind asking him to help a loved one who is in trouble.
He hears the voice of Frank Faber (Richard Fitzpatrick) telling him to go to Logan’s Island in Maine and protect the life of Marian Faber (JoBeth Williams). When he gets to Maine Paul hires a local boatman, Andy Borchard (Barnard Hughes), to take him over to Logan’s Island. Borchard tells Paul that they are waiting for one other passenger. Marian arrives and they head over to the island. She tells Paul that she is Paul’s sister, and she received a letter from him to visit the island. Before they get there, Borchard’s dog, Lover, begins barking. At the island she refuses to leave the boat and attacks Borchard when he tries to grab her collar. Then they see that Frank’s boat has been scuttled.
When they get to the house, they find it empty. Frank is nowhere around but all the windows are boarded up. Frank has a large collection of books that deal with the occult. When they hear Lover howling, they run back to the boat. They find the dog dead and the boat smashed. Then the sound of something unworldly begins screaming in the woods.
There is one other person on the island, Sam Barker (Jan Van Elvera). They decide to see if he has a boat that will get them to the mainland. On the way they find a hollow in the mud that is human shaped. Then they find the body of Frank. At Sam’s cabin they find Sam dying and his boat is destroyed. He says he was attacked by a mud monster that Frank made. Paul believes that Frank conjured up an ancient demon called a Golem, and it is now loose on the island.
“The World Beyond” was released in 1978 and was directed by Noel Black. It is a horror, paranormal thriller pilot for an unsold series. The episode was filmed in Canada and was called “The Monster” or, as some would indicate, “The Mud Monster”.
The pilot was copied from a television airing, so the quality is fuzzy, and the sound is sometimes difficult to understand. Unfortunately, that is all there is of the pilot. The mud monster is also difficult to see due to the quality of the film. As a story, however, it is interesting and, for the most part, good. I can understand why it scared so many kids in the seventies. It’s too bad it never made it to a series. There are a lot of occult situations that would have been great episodes. I consider it a missed opportunity.
There were actually two pilots that used the near-death premise and starred Granville Van Dusen. The first was called “The World of Darkness” and it aired in 1977. In that pilot Paul Taylor is sent to a town in New England where Joanna Sanford (Beatrice Straight) and her daughter, Clara (Tovah Feldshuh), are menaced by an evil spirit. I have not been able to find a copy of that episode and I’m not sure one ever survived. It is possible that “The World of Darkness” and “The World Beyond” were made at the same time and were supposed to be episode one and two of the series.