“Tribunal” may be one of the most dark and unsettling stories that the 1995 revival of “The Outer Limits” had to offer. The episode opens amid the holocaust during World War II, where in a Nazi death camp German SS officers are lining up Jewish prisoners for inspection and execution. There we meet a young man named Leon Zgierski, who is forced to watch as his wife is killed in cold blood.
In the present day we’re introduced to Aaron Zgierski (Saul Rubinek), a lawyer and the son of Leon, who has dedicated his life to hunting down members of the Nazi party who’ve escaped justice. His latest target is Robert Greene, a Philadelphia man who he believes is actually Karl Rademacher, a Nazi commandant and the same man who murdered his father’s first wife in a concentration camp. But just when it seems his evidence isn’t strong enough, a mysterious traveler arrives with everything he needs to prove that Greene is the commandant. When Aaron discovers the pocket watch that the mystery man uses to traverse time, he realizes he can use it to do more than just prove his case against Radermacher.
One of the most touching, tear-jerking stories in the series’ seven-season run, “Tribunal” is a triumph of sci-fi storytelling. An episode about the power of grief, guilt, and healing, it has a truly disturbing two-fold ending that’s both bone-chilling and tearfully uplifting at the same time.