There are so many streaming options available these days, and so many conflicting recommendations, that it’s hard to see through all the crap you could be watching. Each Friday, The Verge’s Cut the Crap column simplifies the choice by sorting through the overwhelming multitude of movies and TV shows on subscription services and recommending a single perfect thing to watch this weekend.

What to watch

“Sandkings,” the two-part premiere episode of Showtime’s mid-1990s The Outer Limits revival. The second iteration of the 1960s science fiction / fantasy / horror anthology was generally more adult than the original (sort of a hard PG-13), but it told the same kinds of creepy cautionary tales, often adapted from the work of some of the era’s best genre writers.

“Sandkings” is based on a multi-award-winning 1979 George R.R. Martin novella, described by the author in his 2003 omnibus Dreamsongs as “the story I was best known for,” prior to A Game of Thrones. The TV version (written by Martin’s friend and occasional collaborator Melinda M. Snodgrass, and directed by Stuart Gillard) changes the setting and plot considerably, but it keeps the core idea. Beau Bridges plays Simon Kress, a government researcher who becomes so obsessed with some sentient alien insects that he discovers that he steals some samples, brings them back to his farm, and begins raising the creatures — becoming their chronicler, deity, and tormentor.

Why watch now?

Because Nightflyers — based on the 1980 Martin novella of the same name — debuts on Syfy this Sunday night.

In Dreamsongs, Martin writes about how the success of the Sandkings novella (which, by 2003, had “earned me more money than two of my novels and most of my TV scripts and screenplays”) inspired him to keep blending SF and horror… with the result being his “haunted starship story,” Nightflyers. The novella was made into a poorly received 1987 movie, and its basic premise has now been expanded into a television series by writer-producer Jeff Buhler. Set in deep space, the TV Nightflyers follows a disparate band of colonists who are fleeing a dying Earth and are driven to paranoia and madness by some mysterious entity. With its elaborate sets and special effects, the show aims to evoke the atmospheric intergalactic terror of Alien.

Because of his commitment to HBO and Game of Thrones, Martin has no creative involvement with this new Nightflyers (unlike the 1987 movie where he worked on the script). The earlier Nightflyers remains the only theatrical feature adaptation of one of Martin’s works. But his writing has periodically turned up on television. In the mid-1980s, Martin was on the staff of CBS’s first revival of The Twilight Zone, and he’s the credited writer on five episodes. Also in the 1980s, he was a writer and producer on CBS’s cult fantasy / romance Beauty and the Beast.

Then there’s “Sandkings,” The Outer Limits’ splashy 1995 movie-length debut. Martin had sold the rights to the novella before, with nothing to show for it but a few big paychecks. When he sold it again to Showtime (in conjunction with Canadian / Hollywood crossover financing and production company Trilogy Entertainment), Martin accepted the trade-off of a much lower budget for the guarantee that at least his story would finally make it to the screen.

The biggest changes between Martin’s Sandkings and the one Snodgrass wrote for The Outer Limits is that the TV version is set on Earth instead on a futuristic planet, and the hero is now a family man and a scientist driven to the brink of insanity by his new pets, not a wealthy bachelor with a mean streak. The television episode waits until about halfway through the story to get to the point where the novella more or less begins, with Simon becoming dangerously absorbed in the machinations of the space insects and realizing that by controlling their food supply, he can goad them into waging war on each other. In the second half of the episode, carnage ensues.

Who it’s for

Horror fans and Martin completists.

Showtime’s Outer Limits takes advantage of premium cable’s freedom to be more violent than the 1960s version of the show. Though the special effects in “Sandkings” aren’t as impressive as what today’s television creators can do with very little money, Gillard and company compensate with some good, gooey splatter — as well as with scenes that emphasize how the characters react to the bugs, as opposed to what they actually see. The episode aims for maximum creepiness, especially in its second half, when Simon notices that the aliens are constructing giant sculptures of his face out of sand.

What Snodgrass’s teleplay mainly grasps about Martin’s original Sandkings is that it’s a character study, examining the destructively casual cruelty of one man. The TV version gives Simon a wife (played by Helen Shaver), whom he eventually neglects. The episode also adds a father and a son (played by Bridges’ actual father, Lloyd, and son, Dylan), who form their own special relationship in his absence — reinforcing the story’s theme of how role models shape those who look up to them. Throughout Martin’s work, whatever the genre or form, he’s been fascinated by the extent to which good people can behave abominably and bad people can have some redeeming value. In this Outer Limits, between the first and second parts, Simon occupies both ends of that spectrum.

Where to see it

Hulu. For more of the non-Game of Thrones George R.R. Martin, the original Beauty and the Beast series is also on Hulu, as well as on CBS All Access. The 1980s version of The Twilight Zone, alas, is currently unavailable to stream, though that may change when the latest Twilight Zone revival arrives on CBS All Access next year.