"Cold Hands, Warm Heart" is an episode of the original The Outer Limits television show. It first aired on 26 September 1964, during the second season. The episode is notable for its early television appearance of actor William Shatner prior to his Star Trek fame as Captain Kirk, and his character's pursuit of "where no man has gone before."

1 Opening narration
2 Plot
3 Closing narration
4 Cast
5 External links

[edit] Opening narration

"The most brilliant planet in our solar system is Venus, named for the goddess of love. It is closer to Earth than any other planet — twenty-eight million miles away. Until sometime in the last half of the twentieth century it is still a planet shrouded in mystery, enveloped in a heavy blanket of clouds and steam. Because its surface temperature was believed to be several times that of Earth's, it was not thought possible for Man to reach Venus and come back... until one day, somebody did it."

[edit] Plot

After completing the first manned mission to orbit Venus, astronaut Jefferson Barton (Shatner) returns to Earth with recurring nightmares and an increasing inability to stay warm. Barton's conditions continue to worsen and result in a peculiar webbing of his fingers, and only after his nightmares become more vivid is he reminded of an unrevealed alien encounter in the Venusian atmosphere. Barton's doctors suspect the astronaut had been genetically affected by his mission, and they then struggle to treat and cure him before his mutations completely take over.

[edit] Closing narration

"The eternal, never-ceasing search for knowledge often leads to dark and dangerous places. Sometimes it demands risks not only of those who are searching, but of others who love them. These, in their own special way, know that knowledge is never wasted, nor is love."