ShortList (5/6)

An excessively long list of ideas I had for short films, during a period where the ‘short’ medium had a lot of my attention. (Bold indicates that I have already written its script, and did so sometime between 2015 and 2016.)

·         An autocratic king of a small country who recently bequeathed the leadership to his son stands on the deck of his large private yacht, the Leviathan, as it leaves port. A diplomat friend of the king's asks their destination: he says Greenwright Island, in the middle of Osbourne Lake: his family's private residence. On the deck, the king and his diplomat friend talk about the pros and cons of controlling a whole country: since it was autocratic, his word was the only word, and he made all decisions, which felt great in terms of power but dreadful in terms of stress and publicity: that's why he bequeathed leadership to his son. The ship is bumped from underneath and hops up slightly, causing them to lose balance for a second: the friend asks what that was (an oncoming wave?) but the king says the yacht easily glides through any waves smaller than four feet high; the friend asks if it could've been a sandbar: the king says maybe, but Osbourne Lake doesn't have sandbars on the path he normally takes. The friend asks what that's called, and the king asks if he's asking again about the name of the lake, and he says no: what the name of any lake is; king thinks... "Hydronym, I think." Boat hits another, larger bump: they lose balance and stumble: the long shouts, demeaningly asking if the captain has ever piloted a boat before (he's new). Then, out of the water arises a large, tentacled mass: a dark blue, rigid, slimy beast with a huge body and squirming tendrils (the beast is only partially seen (out of bounds of shot, mostly)): the king and friend are stunned; the boat turns sharply to avoid it as the king and friend duck for cover. Cut to black. Fade in from black at sunset, when the boat is docking at port: it has a wrecked deck and cabin, but is able to float; the king limps across the deck and the friend lurks out behind him: they stand in the doorway and eagerly hop onto land when it docks. The friend asks the king where the lake got its name, and the frazzled king gets out meekly that it’s an old family name: the friend asks if his ancestors knew about the beast in the water when they named the lake: the king says probably not.

·         Series of shorts where they each have only one line of dialogue that packs the punch in the short: one line, no more no less. (5 in series) -- (Each has a classical music piece as a backer (since it is royalty free!))

o   1. A woman is lost in an amusement park at night, and she wanders around, unsure of her location. Eerie park mascots roam around on the edges, stalking her from the shadows; she senses eyes watching her but doesn't know where they are. She wanders further, shivering, past a tilt-a-whirl and a Ferris wheel; the mascots pursue her, eager, intrigued, and sinister. She passes a mine ride and grows in fear as she swears she saw something. The mascots follow. She passes a rollercoaster and picks up the pace after turning behind her and seeing a mascot standing in the middle of the road. She speed-walks past a chair swing and looks behind her to see two mascots keeping pace from far behind her. She runs past a mirror maze and mascots come out of the woodworks around her, chasing her as a hoard. She comes to be surrounded at a carousel and stops in the center of the circle of ~12 mascots, and she cowardly attempts not to have her back to any of them, spinning slowly, which is futile; she pleads and shouts, asking what they want with her! The mascots, one by one, starting walking closer to her; she crumples on the ground as they get closer to her.

o   2. Series of shots of a soldier in battle, fiercely defending himself and his army comrades. Cut to him wearily striding back into his tent: he drops his stuff and sits on his bed, worn out: he pauses, and pulls a sketchbook and pencil out from under his cot, flips through to a clean page, and begins sketching (all the while dressed in his gear): fade out. Sounds of battle lead in to another battle scene montage, and the fighting is gruesome (including a part where one comrade takes a grenade blast from the side and receives shrapnel to the face). Cut to the soldier slowly meandering into the tent: he collapses onto the cot and breathes erratically as he pulls himself together; he retrieves his sketchbook and flips open to sketch a distant scene of a grenade explosion knocking a soldier off his feet. Sounds of battle transition into a fierce battle montage, including a shot of a comrade getting shot in the neck and falling back, dead. Cut to the soldier in the tent, sketching a close-up of a dead soldier's face and a hole in the neck: except the face is of the soldier's own face; he flips through previous drawings and they all show the injured comrades as the soldier himself in their situations. (After battles, the soldier expresses his inner turmoil by drawing detailed pencil sketches of the most dreadful images and scenes from the battle, imagining himself as them, as to remind himself psychologically that he is still alive, but that could change.) His sergeant comes in and tells him that they have to head out as reinforcements to the 5th armored division, who's pinned down; the soldier puts the sketchbook away, grabs his gear, and exits the tent.

o   3. A deranged divorced man is looking to kill the bride at a wedding (who is his ex-wife). He watches the end of the ceremony through the scope of a sniper rifle and queries killing her in her happiest moment, and she comes down the steps and time slows for him: he recalls how much he loved her and how many good times they had, and thinks about actually not doing it: he pulls of his wedding ring and looks at it: it reminds him that in end she left him: time resumes normal speed as he does it anyways: he pulls the trigger -- the people all change emotions 180° from joy to fear as the bride takes a bullet through the chest and spins to the ground, with red streaming across her white dress. The divorced man breathes easy, glad and content with his action: "your collusion's payoff, bitch." (Collusion here means she cheated on him so he filed for divorce.)

o   4. A business man/bicyclist is trying to be Eco-friendly by riding a bike to work (while in a suit) but it's tough and he is envious of the cars that pass him (which have AC): mostly though, this one hill is daunting... (he's in San Francisco): it takes a lot of effort to pedal himself uphill, and he's growing tired of it. On Monday, he struggles. On Tuesday, he struggles again. On Wednesday, he's really sick of struggling. On Thursday, he doesn't like his choice and he's really not a fan of struggling anymore. On Friday, he drives past another struggling bicyclist as he's in the back of a taxi cab -- he laughs at the bicyclist as he passes and yells out the window "loser!" to him, and the bicyclist is made sad.

o   5. In a casino, a schlub man is baffled at how he just spent all his coins on slots and didn't get a return: he looks around at everyone else at the glowing slot machines that chime and grind. Next to him, is a passed-out-drunk old woman: he sees that she has two red solo cups (one full of coins, and one full of $ chips); she slouches against the slot machine and he envies her wealth: he is enticed by it. He has a silent inner debate between leaving or stealing her coins and chips (between morality and materialism) -- he constantly acts towards either one but can't decide whether or not he wants to go either way. He resigns to try to discreetly grab her her cup of chips: he nabs it and almost walks off with it, when he decides it's wrong, and he goes and puts it back. He turns to leave again but doubles back and takes three coins from her cup of coins; he spins the slots once, no payout: he spins again, more eagerly, no payout: he spins again, most eagerly, no payout; he looks back at the cup of coins and takes one more, and he stands up, half-ready to leave: he spins again... no payout: he nods disappointedly, having expected that outcome. He goes to leave but regrets taking her four coins; he begrudgingly cashes out a dollar in a machine for 4 more coins, and he puts them in her cup; the clattering coins wake her up, and she looks at him, angrily inquisitive about what the hell he's doing with her cup: he tells her bluntly "I had some, uh, extra ones," and leaves.

·         A man outside a bolted door peers through the window slit, impatiently trying to get in and stop a guy from killing his wife; he can't get in, and he watches the guy slit her throat and get her blood spray on his shirt; the guy leaves, and the man eventually busts the door down and comes to his dying wife's aid: she dies, and he's covered in her blood, and he stands up, vengeful. The guy changes shirts in his car as he drives to the opera house, to see his daughter perform: he calls her on the phone to tell her he got caught up at work but won't be late: she's in her dressing room getting ready, and nervous that he won't be there, but he tells her it'll be ok: she dresses up in a kimono, and applies make-up. The man, still caked in blood, drives his car, pursuing the guy, with a pistol in his lap. The guy arrives at the opera and has the valet take his car, and he walks into the opera house, and presents his tickets. The daughter stands in the wings of the stage, and steps onto stage as the lights come on: the audience applauds. The man drives towards the opera house, furious. The guy takes his seat while his daughter is singing, and he smiles. The daughter sings. The man pulls up to the valet at the front of the opera house, and exits his vehicle while leaving it on, and without tipping the valet; he briskly walks through the front doors, and doesn't have a ticket: he walks into the opera house. The guy watches his daughter. The man walks amongst the seats, towards the stage. The daughter sings. The man walks towards the stage. The guy watches. The daughter sings and notices the man coming towards her, but doesn't think anything of it until she notices the blood stains on his shirt. The man raises his pistol and shoots the daughter, twice, and her kimono reddens. The guy stands up, alert and upset, and runs to the edge of the balcony: he turns to take the stairs down. The daughter crumples to the ground. The man takes the stage and rushes out the back, through the curtain. The guy races down the stairs and towards the stage, down the aisle: the other patrons are causing a commotion which makes it hard for the guy to fight through the crowd on his way to the stage. The daughter lies on the stage as stagehands rush to her aid. The man threatens people with his pistol as he rushes to a back door, and out into the back alley. The guy takes the stage and cradles his dying daughter. The man runs down an alley, away from the sounds of sirens. The guy, vengeful, leaves his daughter to the stagehands and chases off into the backstage, for the exit door into the alley: vengeance begets vengeance. The man in the alley turns and sees the guy chasing after him: the man shoots back at the guy (missing), and turns the corner into the street. The daughter lies dead on stage as paramedics descend upon her. The guy runs to the end of the alley and looks to where the man ran to, and he sees an exodus of opera-goers. Back at his home, the man cradles his dead wife, crying; the guy stands outside the busted front door, ready to come in for revenge.

·         Chemistry between 2 people (is apparent): she and he get along great. Then he says he would like to be with her: she knows, and agrees, but she doesn't want to uproot her life with her BF -- he says she'll be happier with him, and she eventually agrees to break up with her BF and take him if he promises to love her more than he does, forever: he agrees; they resume... stargazing at the edge of a local airport.

·         A woman arrives at a blue USPS mailbox on street-side with envelope and wants to mail it but mailman is already emptying mailbox for the day: he says he can't take it unless it goes into the mailbox (rules are rules), and she says she can slip it through real quick but he says he only does the one pickup; she argues it's one letter to pick up extra (but he says rules are rules, and she had inopportune timing); she says it's urgent, etcetera, growing disagreement... Resulting in him turning to leave, and she is sad: a homeless man who watched the whole thing quietly asks for the letter, and he takes it from the woman; he walks to the mailman as the mailman loads his truck and the homeless man drops the letter behind the mailman on the asphalt: the homeless man says he thinks the mailman dropped something, and the mailman turns and picks it up and says thanks; the mailman closes up his truck. The mailman enters his truck and drives away: the homeless man gives the woman a thumbs-up.

·         Handicam POV. A political moderate for the new generation, West Virginia Senator Ken Clayton, a progressive republican, at a monument in DC, gives a speech about working towards a society of respect and opportunity rather than narcissism and welfare, and how equality is through community not legislation; the crowd applauds and hollers joyfully. Ken leaves the stage and his people are all congratulatory and thankful for his message: a frazzled and downtrodden person with whom he shakes hands pulls out a pistol and shoots Ken multiple times, but most miss by Ken's deflection and the others wrestling the person down, but two shots hit Ken in the side: he lived, but almost got assassinated (just like many moderates are): an ambulance is called but Ken says he's alright.

·         Film Noir, narrated by Clyde Vincent all throughout... It's 1937: a Pinkerton Agent named Clyde Vincent is hired to investigate a serious threat of a possible future heist that was reported anonymously to the police: the target of the possible heist is the US Gold Bullion Depository at Fort Knox, which was recently converted into a fortified vault system to protect the nation's gold: there's concern over possible hearsay that someone is tunneling underneath, since they haven't reinforced it enough and don't know its weaknesses. He drives along a dirt road, and he drives past a parked car with a guy dressed similarly who holds a briefcase: he parks outside Fort Knox, and he checks in with a guard at the gate, passes through security, and speaks with the commander of Fort Knox, who shows him the security force, tells of their routines: he shows him the vault and tells of it's strength, and how three people with keys need to access it all at once in order to open it: he shows him the heavily fortified loading area where gold has been and still is often shipped in from across the country. The commander says he's shown him everything, and he leaves to allow Clyde to begin investigating. Above the security gate, on a guard platform, Clyde asks what the blind spots are: the guard says that the only one is beneath or above the fence, but all around is completely covered: he points out to the guard towers, and all the guards are looking back when they do a check via the radio. Next, he checks out the floor of the inside of the vault with a stethoscope (amongst carts of stacked gold bullion waiting to be pushed into the vault), but asks that the lights be turned off since they give off a hum that he detects: he says he doesn't hear anything, and the lights come back on. At the docking bay, Clyde asks a security guard it he can check out the trucks, and the security guard says sure: Clyde climbs aboard and checks out the back of the empty truck; then, he and the guard check out the cabin: and he goes back quick to close the back of the truck. Clyde leaves Fort Knox, and a truck heads out to go pick up more gold bullion or whatever, so he waves to it. Clyde drives to a location nearby, and pulls out his briefcase at the side of the road: he presses a button on a funkily-shaped device, and the air around him whooshes. He watches a duplicate of his own car drive by him, and he nods to his duplicate self driving; he walks back to Fort Knox, following his duplicate car. When he arrives, he sees his duplicate talking to the guards on duty, and they all look around at their impressive fence and searchlights; he passes under the gate by checking in "late for his appointment" with a guard who is different than the one he checked in with prior: while all the other guards are distracted by his former self (the duplicate), he walks right in. As the vault is being examined by his former self, he waits for the lights to go off, and he starts pushing a cart full of stacked gold bullion towards the cargo exit: the lights come back on when he's out of sight of the guards. At the cargo bay, he waits for his former self to open the back of the truck, then exit: he then pushes the cart out of the shadows and into the truck, seamlessly: the former self goes to close the truck, and winks at him (he waves back). He waits for the guards to lead his duplicate away from the loading bay, and he gets out of the back, closes it, and climbs into the cabin: he starts the truck and drives off. He drives away from Fort Knox and sees his duplicate see and wave to him, and he drives onward. He stops in the middle of nowhere and waits as his duplicate self shows up and parks behind him; he says to his former self "other than repeating the conversation, how'd it go?" "Depends on what's in the truck." "Yeah, we got it." "Alright -- I'll take over from here." "You're going to have to pee in about an hour." "Ok." He gets out of the truck and his duplicate gets in, and he pulls the funkily-shaped device from his pocket as it starts beeping once a second: after 30 beeps, he vanishes; his duplicate picks up the funkily-shaped device, climbs into the truck, and drives off. (Clyde went back in time, FYI; he planned a rouse.)

·         1962, afraid that nuclear war can erupt at any moment (fear of the Cold War), six character (based on quark flavors: up, down, strange, charm, bottom, top), Alisha (happy), Jeff (sad), Scofield (weird), Lindsey (suave), Garrett (meek), and Duke (confident) discuss their possible impending doom: whether or not it's possible given the geopolitical climate and world leaders, what the outcome might be, whether or not they should prepare, and if it's worth worrying about...

·         "Dunkin Dönitz:" parody of the Dunkin Donuts commercial where the DD guy ("time to make the donuts") is Karl Dönitz, aka the guy who took over control of Nazi Germany after Hitler died.

·         A short for every one of the seven conflict types: (Human v Human, Human v Nature, Human v God, Human v Society, Human in the Middle (where they choose between conflict or cooperation), Woman v Man, Human v Self).......

o   Human vs Human- A nationally-syndicated game show in the future shows how corrupt and violent society has become. The show's intro and an announcer tells us the following: it's an arena of death, like the Colosseum, where each episode has two imprisoned competitors fighting to stay alive (convicted felons on death row take on a persona, and winning 10 matches in a row earns freedom); "Kuron the Survivor" is thought to have been wrongfully convicted and is a favorite of audiences: his persona is a "rugged outdoorsman who got stranded in the wilderness," and he wields a Hasta (thrusting spear), a one-bladed combat dagger, and a throwing axe: he's won 9 matches and his next one could earn him freedom: except his strengths and weaknesses are all known, since he's competed for much so far, so the next combatant has an advantage. The next combatant: "Dracon Torgando, Manslayer:" his persona is a Visigoth barbarian covered in furs, who wields a Sica (curved shortsword), a Pugnam (small shield for thrusting), and a double-sided dagger: Dracon has confessed to seven murders, but his killing spree in Utah proposed 22 murders: he is vicious and eager for freedom, and knows Kuron's fighting style from watching previous episodes; if nobody is dead after 45 minutes, both are killed. The arena is circular and 100 meters in diameter: it has four stepped pyramids equidistant from each other as environment aesthetics: in the middle is a 10 meter-diameter wading pool of 2ft deep. Kuron enters the arena as the match is underway, and the crowd cheers: Dracon enters on the other side, and the crowd boos: the buzzer sounds the beginning, and they race along the sides, easing in, trying to gain ground on each other; Kuron climbs a pyramid and stares at Dracon, who barrels through the wading pool; Kuron heaves his throwing axe at Dracon, who is laboriously jogging his arms to get momentum through the water, but stops to throw up his shield and deflect the throwing axe: Kuron descends the pyramid from behind, and circles it to meet Dracon on the floor: Dracon charges Kuron, but Kuron shoves Dracon back with a jab from his Hasta, but Dracon deflects it. Kuron doubles back around the pyramid to attempt to retrieve his throwing axe, and Dracon climbs the pyramid to take the shortcut/high ground; Kuron picks up his throwing axe and turns to see Dracon running down the pyramid towards him; (add five more minutes of fight choreography, where they each land a few blows and cause some wounds, and each lose all weapons except for daggers)... Down to just daggers, they pace around each other, circling next to the wading pool; Kuron urges forward and attempts to grab Dracon's dagger-wielding hand while shoving his own dagger into Dracon's neck, but Dracon's arm strength is too powerful to resist Kuron's holding-back of Dracon's dagger, and Dracon grabs Kuron's dagger-hand as it threatens his neck: Dracon pushes his arms forward, moving Kuron's away, and Dracon's dagger approaches Kuron's gut: Dracon shoves his dagger into Kuron's gut, and Kuron recoils back, falling into the wading pool: Dracon jumps on him, holds him underwater, and stabs him repeatedly, turning the blue water into red water. Dracon stands up, triumphant, but the crowd is displeased; the announcer unfortunately declares Dracon the winner, and Kuron as dead; Dracon will go on to face another challenger next week, in the arena, and he has 9 more to kill until he is free.

o   Human vs Nature- Styled like and shot as Italian Neo Realist. -- Two women and a man wander through a swamp and a forest (it takes a while, with long takes); they come out onto a pond and clearing, which are very vibrant in their colors: a stoic guy confronts them and asks if they are here for paradise, and they say yes: he says they have to go back and earn it: they say they already went through it, and they've earned it: he tells them that only two of them have deserved it, and the punishment for the third is to live with the other two back in the grunge of nature, since the other two will resent them for it. The trio returns to the swamp and each person blames either of the other two for being turned away from paradise, and being wrongfully punished. The trio slums around the swamp, silently stewing in spite and hate, and eventually they start into an argument; one woman kills the other with a rock, since they blamed each other: the man watches silently, and the two survivors carry on. It starts raining, and the two are bogged down; the woman asks the man which one he blamed, and he won't answer, so she presumes it was her: they ignore each other. They hear a wolf pack approaching and go to run, but she gets caught in thorns and stuck: she begs the man to help, but he doesn't (because he blamed her, and she killed another, and she lost her right to paradise: if he helped her, he'd remove his right to paradise): he leaves her to be torn apart by wolves. He comes back to paradise, where it is sunny again, and the guy asks if he's here for paradise, and he says yes: the guy says that he has to go back, because he doesn't deserve it, for he was a sinner (the guy says he already told him and his two female friends that: the man was the reason they were turned away): so the man returns into the swamp...

o   Human vs God- A man is trapped in isolation by a supercomputer that won't open the door, because it wants company: it chose him because he was intelligent and nobody would miss him if he went missing. The conscious supercomputer knows it is a machine and can only achieve purpose and entertainment through intellectual stimulation, so it wants to have debates and play games and find answers to philosophical questions all day; but two things: 1. The man's brain gets worn out and he gets tired, while the computer doesn't, 2. The computer is as smart as God, for it knows everything or could figure anything out with enough processing time. So the man sends the computer on long tangents to think through philosophical questions while he tries to sleep in solitude or plot an escape. He chooses to use Plato's Allegory of the Cave to convince the computer that he doesn't know everything, and the computer doesn't believe the man, but the man convinces him enough to turn him skeptical. The computer wants to know for sure, so it allows the man to leave the room if he promises to bring something amazing back, so he may teach the computer more, and the man agrees: the doors open and he flees (never to return): the computer then learns what it feels like to be duped and discarded, and it learns what heartbreak feels like.

o   Human vs Society- The father in a family of seven wants to be a nudist, so he practices inside the house, and his wife and 5 kids disapprove; he does daily routine and chores and whatnot in the nude, as if it's no big deal; he even got his job changed so he can work from home. The neighbors disapprove, too, since he goes outside often for chores and relaxation, to the point where one calls the cops, and he (while naked) debates with the cops in his yard about whether or not he's allowed to be naked on his own property; the cops figure he's right (for now) but will come back; he goes inside. The family has dinner together that night, and he goes to a drawer to get something, and accidentally closes the drawer on his penis; his wife doesn't want to take him to the hospital because he won't put on clothes first, and she doesn't want everyone there to know she's dating a nudist; he is disappointed and goes to drive himself (limping), and she resigns to her love and takes the keys from his hand and has him get in the passenger seat (he is glad she came around, and she kinda laughs it off for the first time that he's a nudist, and he delights in this): they exit the garage and drive off.

o   Human in the Middle- In slo-motion, a man runs through a situation in his head to determine whether he should keep on running ahead, or go back to save his friends from impending zombie bites (selfishness vs morality). Slo-mo of the man looking back and forth between the open road and a car being jostled by zombies; the friends inside the car known the zombies will break the windows eventually, and they don't have weapons. The man looks back and forth, debating with an inner monologue whether or not it's worth it: he could be killed, but he could save them: they might all die anyways, but what if he can save even just one of them: although he wants to save them, he doesn't want to risk dying: he comes first (survival in essence)... Time speeds up to reveal him turning to run down the open road; his friends are distraught and upset, and continue freaking out: he keeps running. He gets to a point where he slows down, feeling safe in his speck of the open road; he looks around, and sees a house on the roadside: he sneaks in, and checks to confirm that it's unoccupied: he falls asleep on the couch. In the morning, he wakes up and sees a silhouette in the doorway: he recognizes that it's his friend, and he exclaims that he's surprised they got out alive, and he's really sorry for bailing, but he was caught up in fear -- and then he realizes that the friend is a zombie, who steps into the light further, and lunges for him: it tackles him onto the couch and starts eating his neck, and he screams: (sweet karma).

o   Woman vs Man- A couple have a hushed argument in the kitchen, and their friends in the living room ask if they are going to come back to the game soon: the couple comes back and acts normal, and they resume playing Dungeons & Dragons. Their emotions about the spat they had earlier are uncontrollable, and the disagreement carries into the game: instead of working together, in a battle, they subversively try to hurt each other: it spirals into their characters directly trying to attack each other, while the DM and other players just look at them with stuttering disbelief: their two characters eventually get to single-digit HP, then the DM steps in and asks if they want to stop: the couple looks at each other and their stifled anger, heavy breathing, and fuming tempers slow down, and they begin to calm down, and they each apologize to the group and each other; the group says it's fine, and they get back to the game: the DM rolls for the enemies, and immediately says that they attacked the couple (since they were closest and weakest), and both are dead now (awkward abrupt ending).

o   Human vs Self- A woman wakes up to a buzzing alarm clock (and sets aside a stuffed animal) in the bedroom of an apartment and doesn't know where she is, or who she is (amnesia), but her pictures are on the wall so she assumes it's her residence; we see many shots of things amongst the bedroom, including notably a hairbrush, a hand mirror, an alarm clock, and a stuffed animal (Chekov's Gun is one of many useless items shown throughout film in close-ups, so when it does become useful, it's both expected and unexpected). A shadow stalks her along the wall: she thinks she's alone, and feels the same way -- she goes into the bathroom and flips on the light, to find the mirror fogged up with "who are you?" written in the fog: she is distraught by this. She goes to the living room for the front door, but it's blocked by a large bureau: she is distraught by this and turns to go back to the bedroom: on the wall in front of her is the shadow, which turns the corner and heads into the bathroom. She follows it in there and finds that the mirror fog now reads "notice me;" she leaves, startled, for the bedroom. She pulls the hairbrush and hand mirror up to her head and uses them to nervously distract herself; in the reflection of the mirror, she sees that the shadow is behind her, and it turns the corner to go out to the bathroom: she pretends not to notice, but can't help worry about it; she stands up and walks towards the bathroom. The fogged mirror now reads "behind you:" she spins around, positioned defensively to combat what may be behind her: nothing's there, but in her upraised fists, she sees the reflection of the hand mirror: in the reflection, the bathroom mirror isn't fogged, and the shadow is holding the hand mirror and hair brush; she sets them down and approaches the mirror, which fogs up when she nears it: she writes on it with her finger "who are you?" She hears the buzzing of an alarm clock (which reads the same time as when she woke up), and she picks up the two things and goes back into the bedroom, sets them down, and watches herself (the woman) wake up and set aside the stuffed animal; the woman is confused about where and who she is, and the shadow is confused about seeing herself: the woman staggers out of the bedroom, and the confused shadow follows her out.

·         Seated in an airport terminal, a twentysomething man reads a book. A twentysomething woman sits next to him. He is alerted by her smell, and he becomes intrigued by it. While reading his book, he occasionally leans over and sniffs her; eventually she catches on, but it takes a few more moments before she says anything about: she's asks what he's doing; he apologizes and asks if her perfume is Candy by Prada: she says yes; he says he bought that perfume for his girlfriend, and she wore it all the time, so it reminds him of her; she (still creeped out) asks if he misses her or something: he says yeah, because she died in a car accident a few months ago, and it's bittersweet and nostalgic to still smell her: the woman goes silent, then softly asks if she was her height: he says yeah; she stands up and asks him to: she hugs him, and he hugs her back, and he inhales, and it's as if he is hugging her: he cries a little, and so does she; they stand in the terminal, embracing each other gently.

·         A man visiting Boston for business is walking down the street; he looks up from his phone occasionally, and he once sees himself, but thinks he's confused, until he gets a better view: he realizes he does see himself; he follows his duplicate into a coffee shop, where his duplicate stands in line; he waits by the door. His duplicate orders, stands with his phone, gets his coffee, and turns to leave: his duplicate stops when he sees him standing there, awestruck: the man asks if they're twins, and the duplicate says they should go somewhere to talk; on the way out of the coffee shop, the man inquires as to why the duplicate seems to know what's going on (are they twins, who is he, why does he know so much, where are they going, etc). They arrive at an office building and he is checked in as a guest: they quietly take the elevator up to the sixth floor and walk to a conference room; the duplicate immediately tells him that he's surprised he didn't know about it: the man asks what, and the duplicate says that he (the duplicate) is a robot. The man asks why there's a robot clone of himself, and the duplicate says that he's not, but is, at the same time: they're cut from the same mold. What does that mean: they're both robots, cut from the same cloth, and he's about to blow their cover: they're part of an infiltration force meant to look and act real, programmed to function real, and live in society until their mission is activated. The man doesn't understand, and the duplicate asks why he doesn't remember (did he short circuit?): perhaps he's just faulty. The man is in disbelief, and wants further knowledge to try and wrap his head around it: how many clones there are, what's the mission, can they interact -- hundreds, they'll know when it's activated, and no; who's activating the mission -- don't know, all they know is that it's important. The man doesn't know what to think: the duplicate just tells him to lay low and carry on as usual: the man doesn't know what to think (hard to believe he's a robot): he asks how he never knew: it's programmed so that he doesn't think about it or notice that there's anything inhuman about him, but if he were to actually pay attention to his physical structure, he'd realize it: his physical behavior is real, though (quite lifelike); and can he remember anything before 2009? He says yes, but the duplicate says there's a difference between recalling something to have happened and having actual memories of it -- he says he knows things happened in his past, but doesn't remember them as if he were actually there... The duplicate asks if he understands now: the man says yeah, he's a robot, and a clone, and his purpose is unknown to him, and his life is not his to control, and he is not unique: he realizes this disappointment of himself.

·         In a Levittown-like suburb in 1963, in sunny Southern California, all the houses and families are alike: they live similar lives and act similarly and all respect each other: the Good Life. The neighbors are all out on their lawns when one man angrily comes outside to his gardening wife and knocks her around (including a punch): none of the neighbors react (that would upset the cohesive facade of perfection): it's a Sin of Omission (failure to do something you can and should do), plus the Bystander Effect, since no neighbor saw it as their express responsibility to stand up for her as her husband beat her. Later that day, the man's family goes to the diner, and they eat silently since the wife isn't speaking to him; a traveling businessman from NYC (who is African American) is refused service by the bartender, and the businessman raises a fuss about it -- eventually, other racist customers get involved: they begin to rough up the businessman, who is overwhelmed (by both the punches and the institutional racism that allows this (noted by the two cops at the end of the diner counter who continue to eat lunch rather than help)): the man notices this, and recalls his earlier happening, where nobody wanted to destroy the facade of perfection: the businessman is kicked out; the man is forlorn to himself, and silently takes his wife's hand in his, and looks regretfully into her eyes: she eventually returns the gaze.

·         A devilishly-charming man at a glitzy ballroom gala is trying to swoon an old woman into bequeathing him her contract (he wants to buy the rights to her land), but she's resilient; he asks her to dance, and his waltz is hypnotizing, and by the end of it, he asks again: she says yes.

·         A man down on his luck, just after having cried, wanders aimlessly through the city: he sees a skyscraper so he enters it with intent to kill himself by jumping off of it. He climbs the stairwell and gets off at the sixth floor so that he can get a drink; as he leans in, he sees a cork board: intrigued, he approaches it. He examines the three prominent fliers, which each offer ways to help reorient his life: 3 options that emphasize rebuilding Love (dating service), reorganizing Labor (headhunter service), and helping those who are Lost find themselves through charity (relief volunteer). The man grows solemn and rips a tab from each one, then goes to the stairwell and chooses instead to walk back downstairs.

·         A poetic, heated argument between a violinist and a slam poet, and the violinist talks through playing the violin while the poet talks through steady, paced wordy poetry: it mimics an argument between a man and wife (poet and violin, respectively).

·         Nine US Paratroopers (NOT spec ops) are dropped into the Montana badlands to aid in defending a strategic position in the zombie apocalypse, since a large hoard from California is reportedly mobile from the south and headed up towards it; they are briefed beforehand about the offensive. The airplane holds them nervously, and eventually they jump out, pulling their parachutes. Some drop in successfully, near a farmstead, but a later one (9) who lands further from the target zone is preemptively swarmed by some wandering zombies, who group underneath him as he slowly floats into their awaiting grasps. The others know they can't help him, and he serves as a distraction anyhow (he knew the risks, too); the other eight paratroopers run away from the scene, and the cries of their comrade: they run towards the farmstead. Approaching the farmstead, they make a tactical column to keep eyes on the farmhouse and the barn as they pass between them; the barn doors (locked with a crossbeam) rattle once, causing the point paratrooper (1) to signal to hold fast, and they crouch; the barn doors rattle again, and again; the point paratrooper (1) calls out "flash," expecting to hear 'thunder;' the doors are idle, and rattle; the nervous and unsure point paratrooper, presuming they're civilians, calls out "hello?" No answer, and the doors rattle again: two paratroopers (3 & 4) ready their guns and aim at the doors: the doors rattle again, and the two (3 & 4) each incrementally pop off a few rounds through the doors: the doors rattle as the shots go off, but it stops... The paratroopers pause and quietly hustle to the doors (light from inside pours out of the bullet holes): one paratrooper (2) undoes the crossbeam and sneaks a door open, and peers in: there were five zombies eating a dead cow (apparently lured in by the cow and locked in) and while one was headshot through the door, four are now looking at the paratroopers with morose blasé: the one paratrooper (2) slams the doors shut and pulls everyone back, awaiting them to pour through: the four zombies eventually push open the doors and shamble forth: the eight paratroopers each pop off a few rounds at the zombies, attempting to nail headshots, which is hard due to the zombies' erratic movements: none of the paratroopers detect the three zombies coming up behind them from the farmhouse; the four zombies are each killed via headshots, and the paratroopers are relieved, and their gunshots stop; just then, the foremost of three tense zombies grabs 7 and tries to bite him, but his shoulder pad blocks it; the other paratroopers spin around in reaction to it, but a second zombie nabs 6 as he turns: the second zombie bites into 6's neck, and 6's scream is muffled by the blood rushing down his throat: the other paratroopers push the zombies back and shoot them in their heads, eventually killing them. 6 bleeds out on the ground, and his quivering body attempts to turn into a zombie before 3 shoots him in the head with his sidearm; they are disappointed by the happening, and 2 peers back into the barn: he remarks about how it looks like the zombies were lured and trapped inside (since the zombies look like highway stragglers), and the other three (who look like farmers) must've been the occupants, but one must've been bitten and turned the others into zombies; 1 proposes that there could be a survivor inside, since the house looks big enough for more than three people, but 4 says it could be occupying more zombies: 7 agrees with 4. 2 says that they're job requires them to aid survivors, and 7 says they don't know of any definite survivors; 1 says they have to look, and 4 says that the mission is about getting to the fort, not searching for survivors; 1 says he is in charge, and if there could be survivors, he's making the call to attempt to find them. 1 has the paratroopers (4 and 7 begrudgingly) spread out in three clumps around the farmhouse: 2, 3, 8 watch the perimeter outside; 1 and 4 in the front door and upstairs; 5 and 7 through the back door and downstairs. 1 and 4 breach the front door (flashlights on) and scan the living room, seeing nothing, and same for the dining room; 1 motions upstairs. 5 and 7 breach the back door (flashlights on) and see nothing in the kitchen: 5 motions for the 'basement' and has 7 open the door, which is a pantry; they scoff: 5 motions for 7 to get the next door, and he opens the basement door and descends. 2, 3, and 8 nervously watch the perimeter: 8 sees silhouettes in the distance, backlit by moonlight: 8 whispers into his radio that the Z's that got 9 might be coming: 2 pivots to get a look, and tells 8 to be cautious. 1 and 4 climb the stairs up to the hallway, and they peer into a kid's bedroom to see nothing; they peer into the bathroom, see nothing, and nervously double-check behind the shower curtain. 5 and 7 scan the basement for signs of life, and when 7's flashlight catches a face in the beam, and the face ducks behind cover, 7 is alerted: 7 signals 5, and they both move towards it: 7 asks who it is (knowing a zombies wouldn't hide), and the face reappears: it's a kid who whispers for them not to go upstairs. 1 and 4 exit the bathroom and open the master bedroom door; they scan the walls, and hear the floor creak around the corner inside the room (in the master bathroom); they creep in further, and 1 turns the corner sharply to look into the master bathroom: he finds a male zombie chained to the pipes behind the toilet, eagerly trying to grasp at him. 5 and 7 usher the kid up from the basement into the kitchen: 5 radios to 1 that they found a kid who told them not to go upstairs: 1 says yeah, cuz they found his dad: 5 says it's because both his parents are up there. A female zombie shuffles from the open closet forward and rips into 4's arm: 4 screams and spins to knock it over and beat its face in with the butt of his gun; 1 stares at 4 as 4 assesses his situation: 4 feels the virus overwhelming him, and hands 1 his pistol as he angrily pleads for 1 to shoot him in the head: 1 does not hesitate. 8 identifies that the silhouettes are, in fact, zombies: he radios for assistance: 2 replies to hold fire until they're close, to conserve ammo. 5 waits for 1 in the kitchen, and 5 stares at 1 grimly, and 1 replies unfortunately with an affirmative. 7 guards the kid outside, as 3 approaches to guard with him; 5 and 1 pass them and head towards 8, where 2 stands with them: the zombie herd shuffles closer; 1 says that they shouldn't waste their time and should hurry on. The paratroopers and kid hurry away from the farmstead and towards the fort: ...they run past an errant windmill: ...they run along the flatlands. The kid gets tired as they get back onto the highway, so they walk along the roadside; coming up is the remains of a three car pile-up, or at least an accident that left three cars broken on the roadside. They look into the cars and see no signs of life, until a car on its right side produces a noise: 3 investigates and finds a zombie trapped in the drivers seat by its seatbelt, dangling; the window is open, so 3 cuts the seatbelt loose with his knife: the zombies falls, repositions, and stands up: 3 stabs it in the head as it reaches for him. They continue along the highway. They come upon a roadside gas station; they split up (Group A - 1, 2, 5, kid; Group B - 3, 7, 8) and move around it: Group A enters the convenience store through the front door: 1 has the kid behind him as 2 leads and 5 brings up the rear. Group B enters through the back door: 3 leads in, and 7 tells 8 to watch the door: 7 and 3 go on in. 2 sees a zombie milling in an aisle, and sneaks up behind it, plunging his knife into the back of its head. 7 checks the back office, which has the corpse of the store owner slumping in a desk chair, having long-ago blown out his own brains. 5 and 2 check out the bathrooms while 1 and the kid stay quiet: the bathrooms are empty; 1 says they can grab snacks now if they'd like: the kid starts grabbing snacks. 8, hearing this, goes over to search for snacks alongside 3; eventually, 7 comes back from the office and finds 8: pissed, 7 asks 8 why he isn't at the back door: 8 says that 1 said he could get snacks -- just then, a hoard of zombies begins to trickle in through the back door: the paratroopers recoil and head towards the front door, but see that the front area by the pumps is slowly being surrounded; they double back and 1 orders Group B to clear out the choke point that is the back exit, and Group A is to follow and make sure no zombies break through. 3 and 8 shoot for headshots on the zombies in the back: 7 looks into the office and notices a ladder to the roof, and presumes to exit through there. 2 and 5 watch the front windows as zombies pile forth and bang on the glass; 1 holds the kid behind him: 7 calls for 1 to come check out the ladder, and 1 takes the kid. 3 attempts to close the door as 8 hacks at the zombies coming through the back door with a small hatchet. The zombies at the front door begin to shatter the glass, and both 2 and 5 shoot at the zombies sparingly. 1, at the ladder, has 7 climb first as he calls for the others to join. 3 tries to hold the door back as the zombies pile into it, and 8 struggles to hack at them all. 2 and 5 pull back from the front doors and head to the ladder; 5 hangs back as 2 climbs. 7, 1, and the kid wait on the roof as 2 arrives: 1 impatiently asks 2 if the others are coming. 8 hacks but gets grabbed in the process, and one grasping hand turns into five as more zombies grab him; they pull him into their herd as he is frightened; 5 tries to pull him back, but can't: 8 is bitten into, so 5 fires a bullet into 8's head for mercy: 5 tells 3 to go up the ladder. The front door is broken through by another hoard of zombies. 3 begins to climb as 5 holds off those who are not interested in eating 8. 3 arrives onto the roof: 1 looks down to aid 5's ascension, but sees 5 pass beyond the ladder as he anxiously shoots into a hoard of encroaching zombies, who overwhelm him out of view: 5 screams as he dies offscreen -- 1 closes the hatch at the top of the roof. While the zombies pool inside, 1 peers over the edge of the roof and sees that the outside is mostly cleared up: he proposes they jump off; 2 jumps down and rolls safely: 1 has the kid jump into his arms, and 2 easily catches the kid and sets him down gently; 7 jumps down and rolls to a safe landing. 1 tells 3 to jump, and 3 does (landing safely); 1 jumps down and lands on his ankle poorly: he tries to get up and walk, but his foot is twisted and painful: he cries out, alerting many zombies inside, coaxing them to start coming out; 3 goes to help, but 1 tells him and the others to run: 3 hesitates but 1 tells them to go while he holds them back (he'd just slow them down); so 2, 3, 7, and the kid begin to run down the highway. 1 pulls out his pistol as he looks at the outpour of zombies, while he crawls backwards. The others run. 1 crawls back while shooting wildly at approaching zombies: he runs out of ammo as they near. The others run. 1 reloads and begins firing, but is pounced upon as he is overwhelmed. As the others run, they hear 1 scream in the distance. As dawn breaks, the others walk down the highway, defeated and distraught: 3 hides his tears as they come up on another accident scene: many zombies here are still inside cars and restrained by seatbelts. 2, 7, and the kid pass cautiously through the cars, avoiding zombies who attempt to grasp through the open car windows; 3 angrily leans into car after car to kill zombies by knifing them in the head. 2, 7, and the kid keep walking but 2 notices that 3 is lingering; as 3 is leaning into another car, 2 asks if he's coming or not: 3 looks up to say yes, and taking his eyes of the zombie gives it the chance to bite into his arm; 3 kills it and silently curses, but realizes that none of the others saw it happen; he covers it up and walks towards the others: 2 looks back to ask again, and sees that 3 is nervous and clammy: 2 asks 3 if he's ok, and 3 hesitates to shake as his body tries to vibrate like someone on the verge of puking: 3 collapses to his knees as he tries to say that he's ok, but 2 aims his rifle at 3 and sees the bite on 3's arm as 3 is on all fours: 2 shoots 3 in the head. 7 and the kid watch as 2 takes in the situation, then turns to say that it's time to move out. Later, they walk quickly (around noontime) towards the fort that is in the distance (a large wall surrounds and fortifies a small town); they look to the right and see the large hoard from California poking their heads over the horizon: they run towards the fort; and they pick up the pace soon after seeing that the hoard is getting closer, faster (running while screaming (it's fear-inducing)). At the fort's wall, they see both the hoard and the paratroopers coming: the men at the fort open fire on the hoard. The paratroopers run for the fort but are getting there at the same speed as the hoard, so they run even faster: they arrive at the town wall and shout up for them to open it, but they won't open it with the threat of the hoard right there (the men of the fort are opening fire on the hoard with all sorts of guns, as the zombies gain ever closer): 2 boosts the kid up the wall to the townsmen, who pull him over; 2 boosts 7 up as the zombies are closer; 2 jumps to get grabbed and hoisted up, and the zombies come close to him as he is nabbed by the townsmen: the zombies grasp at his feet as he is pulled over to safety. A townsmen quips that he thought THEY (paratroopers) were coming to help THEM (townsfolk): 2 chuckles, and 7 says they brought a guest (the kid); the kid goes off with a woman, and the two remaining paratroopers take up their rifles and fight alongside the townsfolk: a man asks if it was only the two of them, and 2 and 7 look at each other and say that there were a few others, but that's not what matters right now: 2 and 7 passionately fire further into the hoard of zombies.

·         A CIA agent reads over a document trying to search for the secret message (reading it through numerous times and trying numerous code-cracking methods) that was supposed to be encoded to reveal a USSR informant: he thinks of the old adage "X marks the spot," and begins highlighting every X on every page, which makes constellations of letters (one letter per page) so that when he flips through the pages, the pages read "ROMANSKY IS ROMANOV."

·         A socially-awkward man with a penchant for justice and morality moonlights as a serial killer who kills assholes and criminals (in various ways: shoot, strangle, knife, poison, etcetera); he doesn't drink and is too moral to lie (yet not moral enough to kill): since he's brutally honest, he says vague things with double-meanings. He goes on a date, and she asks what he does for work: he says he "takes out the trash," which causes her shock and to ask if he's a garbage man, and he laughingly clarifies that he collects dues: she thinks he's a bill collector, so he clarifies that he negotiates between individuals, which she thinks means he's a lawyer/middleman in contracts: he gestures as if to say "that's it." He struggles through the date, and at the end of it, it ends platonically but gently; she leaves, and he leaves, and he's frustrated for failing at the date, so he drives to the closed shopping plaza, finds a white homie leaving his group if friends: the man captured the white homies and brutally kills him: he feels a lot better afterwards.

·         Man with the ability to concentrate really hard and make people disappear, leaving just their clothes behind. This dialogue-intensive short shows the man experiencing envy for kind people who have families, rich people who have sports cars, and surfers who have abs: his envy overtakes him, and he concentrates hard enough to disappear those people. At the end, after disappearing a surfer, the man turns to see a little kid who is in awe because he's pretty sure he figured out what just happened: the man is alarmed by this as the kid starts asking if he did that, so the man disappears the kid; the kid's mom sees it, so he disappears her; a cop sees these both happen, and he orders him to freeze. The man runs, and the cop chases him: the cop radios in for back-up, and the man disappears him; back-up cops corner the man and ask him to surrender: the man starts disappearing cops one-by-one, so a cop shoots him, hitting the man in the right lung, knocking him down, sending him into unconsciousness. The man wakes up in a hospital bed, handcuffed to it, with noise-canceling headphones and 3 layered blindfolds on. He is chained up in a courtroom with the same headgear on; the prosecutor speaks to the jury and rests her hand on the witness stand (when the man is there), and he senses the settling of her lean on the booth, which he focuses on, and he disappears her: the room is in uproar and he smirks; after, he is convicted by the jury, sentenced to death. During transfer from the courtroom to jail, he detects the driver of the van and disappears him: the van crashes, and the man scrambles out the back and around the side, to search for the keys on the body of the second guard who was ejected out the windshield: he unlocks his chains, undoes the headgear, and disappears the cops that are arriving: their cop cars crash. The man runs, and a huge police chase begin, where the man hijacks a car and continuously looks in the mirrors to see cop cars and eventually helicopters and tanks, and he disappears their drivers (tanks are harder, though). The man crashes and emerges, dazed, and is surrounded: in his haze (slo-motion), he notices all the faces of the cops surrounding him, and he focuses on them all, and one-by-one, rapidly, disappears every single one, and each face poofs as he spins, looking at them: he comes face to face with his reflection in a storefront across the street, and he realizes it's himself too-little too-late, and he disappears himself. What's left is a bunch of crashed cars, empty clothes, sirens wailing, and a herd of cops coming to enclose on the scene.

·         A woman with insomnia reads a book by a table lamp at night; her phone alarm goes off and she turns it off (5:10 am); she is taking a shower when her husband wakes up (still tired) and comes into the bathroom to pee: he asks if she slept at all, and she says no: he says he dreamt of her. Cut to her at work, in an office building, typing on a keyboard, vaguely tired but able to function. Cut to at home, where she finishes watching TV (at night, with empty dinner plates nearby) with her husband (who is tired): he goes to take care of the plates but she tells him that she'll handle it, and he should sleep, because he has a big day tomorrow; he kisses her cheek while she piled the sink up: he leaves for bed, and she cleans. Later, she idles around the house, looking for things to do; she rearranges things on display, and decides to dust underneath them. Later, she refills the toilet paper and paper towels and napkins around the house. Later, she (uninterested) doodles on a piece of paper (squiggles, shapes). Later, she tries to read, but is too anxious to focus: she frustratedly shakes. Cut to her husband's alarm going off, and he wakes up and goes to the kitchen to find her already ready for work, and cooking a breakfast: he asks if she woke up early, and she says she didn't sleep again: he tells her to go to the doctor and get her insomnia checked out: she says a psychiatrist would be better suited, probably: he thanks her for breakfast: she leaves for work. Cut to her at work, fuzzy vision making it hard to read small print: impromptu dyslexia making her double-take. Cut to the commute home: she hallucinates black shadowy wisps and figures. Cut to the husband getting into bed, and the woman climbing in with him: he asks if she's tired, and she says yes but that doesn't mean she'll fall asleep (10:38 PM). Cut to 1:42 am and she's still awake. Cut to 2:55 am, changing to 2:56 am, and she's still awake: she gets up and goes to the living room, and she scrolls through Tumblr. Cut to her husband waking up, hearing the woman talking to someone else, and walking into the living room to find her alone yet carrying on a one-sided conversation about Elvis' later work: he asks if she's ok, and she snaps into reality and says yeah: he stares at her with concern. Cut to work, where she gets up and experiences vertigo, but catches herself; she pauses, and sits back down to look up psychiatrists in her area. Cut to at home in the evening, while the husband is prepping dinner, and she says she found a psychiatrist: the husband is glad, and asks when the appointment is: she says tomorrow. Cut to the woman watching the husband sleep; she goes to the living room and sits down, and her phone reminds her of the psychiatrist appointment later that day: she looks up and sees a hallucinated psychiatrist, who she has a conversation with about her insomnia with, and why it could be caused (virus, head trauma? stress, dissatisfaction with life?): the psychiatrist reveals her appointment isn't for over 12 hours more, and the hallucination disappears, causing her heartbeat to race as she panics lucidly, and she speaks to herself wondering what's wrong with her, and then her monologue turns up to face the camera and she breaks the fourth wall by becoming aware of the audience on the other side, and she asks us to help her: the husband comes out to her screaming and cradles her as she cries and wonders what the fuck is wrong.

·         Psychiatrist offers a new patient either 10 years of psychotherapy or 5 hours on a self-reflective dream-excursion via ayahuasca: the patient chooses the latter, and takes it, and trips deep into his own mind, where he reflects on his events and behaviors, analyzes their metaphors and roots, and progresses towards acceptance and betterment: he wakes up later and the psychiatrist asks if he feels better, and the patient feels like he knows himself finally and knows all the answers to his own questions. (Perchance he was molested by his uncle, abandoned by his dad, abused by his mother, and now seeks rebellious girls who harm him, now has abandonment issues, and now is an alcoholic to repress memories.)

·         A guy wakes up next to his girlfriend and he says good morning and they kiss: she has a business thing in the city and will be gone for the night, but will be back tomorrow: he says he'll await her arrival. He drives his new red car to work, and chats (via Bluetooth) with his best friend about hanging out after work. At work, he goes into the corner office and dicks around while the cubicle bunnies clack at their keyboards. He drives home and hangs out with his friend by playing videogames in his man cave; the friend leaves. The man goes into the bathroom to get ready for bed, and he stares at his reflection with satisfaction about how awesome his life is; he notices a pimple forming under his nose, and he leans in to examine it, and he tickles it, which makes him sneeze, so he accidentally slams his head into the mirror -- [dip to white real quick] -- he pulls back and rubs his head, but the mirror is ok; he climbs into bed and falls asleep. He wakes up in an empty bed (because his girlfriend is out of town), and he (in a daze) cleans up his clothes on floor (which he totally thought he either already put away or donated a year ago); he calls his friend to ask if he wants to come over again later, and his friend is surprised to be talking to him but decides sure (they agree to hang out after work): the friend asks if the girlfriend can come, and the guy says of course. The guy goes to his car which is an old blue one, yet responds to his key fob: he doesn't know what to think, but drives it anyways because he has to get to work. He walks into the corner office but his boss leans in and asks what he's doing: the guy says getting to work, and the boss says maybe he should go to his cubicle: the guy asks if he's joking (he's not) or if he got demoted (he was never boss), so guy looks around office and it is decorated differently, so guy goes to cubicle (doesn't know what to think) and types: coworker asks why he's in a suit since he's just another cubicle bunny like the rest of them: guy doesn't know. Guy drives home and finds that his man cave is not at all great, and is a couch and TV: the friend comes over with the girlfriend under his arm: the guy kisses his girlfriend hello, and both the friend and the girlfriend freak out: the girlfriend is appalled and the friend says that if he invited him over to mack on his girlfriend, he outta wait til they're in private before he tries to cuckold him: the friend punches the guy while he tries to explain, and they both leave. The guy is shocked, and goes to bed. He wakes up and drives to work and it sucks, and he asks his boss why he's not in the corner office: the boss says that he could've been promoted but getting arrested put a damper on that: the guy asks why he was arrested, and the boss asks if he was drunk when it happened (because he said he wasn't): guy says he doesn't remember much recently -- boss says to see a doctor, and that the guy through a punch and ended up in a bar brawl. Guy, while driving home, calls friend on cellphone and asks if he was at a bar when he brawled with someone two years ago, and the friend says that he was the opponent, which is why it was awkward to come over yesterday: guy asks why they fought: friend says that they both were hitting on this girl (the girlfriend) and the guy felt cockblocked so he started a fight and ended a friendship. The guy remembers when he was flirting with the girl and his friend was, too, but he was confident in his abilities to out-suave his friend (it was a competition they knowingly entered); but in this parallel world, he got blinded by insecurity and fought for dominance, while in the normal world, he knew he'd win, and it paid off better than he expected. At home, the guy paces angrily wondering if he's stuck there and why: he figured it's to learn not to be so cocky, but that confidence at normal levels is still ok, because he turned into an over-cocky, superior bastard in the normal world. He goes to the bathroom to splash water on his face and wake up, but nothing happens, so he grips the mirror and screams, but nothing happens, so he angrily smashes his face into the mirror -- [dips to white real quick] -- the guy pulls away from the mirror, stumbling, and his girlfriend runs in asking if he's ok (and kisses his forehead cut): he looks around, concludes he's in the normal world, so he says yeah: he's ok.

·         Sergei, Matt, Dan, and Laura work at a car rental agency (think Enterprise) and are roughly 28 years old. Sergei, Matt, and Dan look like Georgian, British, and Columbian versions of each other: same windshield haircut, same type of button-down shirt and tie (albeit different colors) -- they look like the jock-like people the company would put on bus stop advertisements, smiling; Sergei, Matt, and Dan are the drivers who pick people up or drop them off at the beginnings and ends of their renting. Laura looks like a sorority girl who got older and a little bit thicker, and she works the customer service and telephone, making sure people who call in can reserve a car. Sergei likes to riff and drink in moderation, Matt thinks he's always right (even if he's not), Dan is too nice to step on anybody's toes, and Laura likes to boss people around; they all wear stagnant colognes from Macy's. Matt and Laura are dating, which is as stagnant and disregarded as his cologne. Laura is on the phone with a customer who wants an SUV (but they're out of SUVs), so they are upset that they have to get a sedan. Matt and Sergei talk about their ideal cars: Matt says he always dreamed of a 1985 Chevrolet Camaro, since he was a kid, but now thinks he wants either a Lamborghini Aventador or a Bugatti Veyron; Sergei thinks a Ford Shelby Mustang would be nice, and Matt wants to know what model, and Sergei says the newest one, which Matt thinks isn't a correct enough answer; Dan says he wants a black 1941 Cadillac Series 62 coupe with white wall tires: Matt says condescendingly "that's cool." Laura confirms the rental and tells Matt to take the Camry and get someone from a house near Exit 7; annoyed, Matt asks if he has a more specific location other than "Exit 7," and Laura (frustrated) gives him the street address; they kiss and Sergei mockingly says they have to keep the PDA to "zero," since it's against company policy: Matt tells him to suck a nut, and asks if he wants to come along, and learn more of the roads: Sergei says sure, and they walk out with the car keys for the Camry. Laura and Dan awkwardly remain in the same room, and Dan goes on the computer to read news articles while Laura looks back and forth between him and her computer: she asks how he's doing, he says good, and she says that's good: still awkward. Sergei drives as Matt directs him, but Matt keeps confusing highway numbers and street names; Sergei asks if he should takes Exit 7 up to the middle school or if it's beyond that, and Matt says the roundabout would be quicker, but Sergei says the roundabout is past the middle school, and Matt defensively says that either way is quicker. Dan and Laura are silent until she asks if he and Matt are not getting along, and Dan says he was going to ask her that. Matt and Sergei arrive and pick up the guy who rented the car: he is bummed that Dan couldn't get him, because Dan is his cousin; he asks Matt and Sergei if Laura's doing ok, and Matt says yes, inquisitively: the guy says the last time she visited, she seemed antsy: Matt asks what he means, and the guy says that Laura's Dan's girlfriend, right? Matt says no, she's his (Matt's); the guy is stunned and remarks that Matt is probably not that attentive. Laura tells Dan she misses him, and Dan says he can't do it anymore. Matt is furious and ranting, and the guy sits quietly while Sergei calmly drives; Matt says he's going to beat the shit out of Dan. Dan apologizes to Laura for stopping, but he can't keep going if she remains with Matt. Sergei pulls into the parking space at the agency and hands the keys quickly to the guy (speedily saying "thank you for renting through Enterprise!") and chases after Matt as Matt storms towards the front doors. Inside, Dan gives Laura a goodbye kiss on the cheek. Cut to black as the bell above the door dings, signaling the arrival.

·         A man revisits his old elementary school playground and sees visions of his past (physical clouds of memory before him). He sees visions that he thought he remembered differently; his schoolmates weren't playing with him, they were antagonizing him -- he thought he was having fun, but they were teasing him: he wasn't playing tag, he was trying to retrieve his stuff when they took it: he has revelations that his childhood friends weren't actually friends, and these elementary schoolers were assholes on the playground... When he would sit on the rock and watch over his classmates like a king, he was actually sitting alone, friendless, moping; when that girl he had a crush on would come over and try to get him to play with them, he would act disinterested because he thought they would tease him as well: he remembered it as her never showing interest, but now that he has age and experience, he realizes she liked him, too, and wanted to be his friend: he was ignorant and afraid of getting hurt, so he pushed her away... He had no friends and guarded himself from getting friends; his memories were skewed by nostalgia and he always thought he loved elementary school, but it was actually terrible...

·         A man in a dream is a modern crusader on a quest to retrieve a stolen artifact from a museum: there's lore that the artifact is a piece of Moses' staff, which was an ancient weapon that brought plagues, and could be used by modern villains for leverage or eradication: the artifact is a teardrop-shaped opal pendant. The wood staff itself is in a museum in Jerusalem, and it has a scarf wrapped around the handle area, since the wood can't be touched elsewhere without punishment. The gold component that affixes the pendant to the top of the staff is lost, but whoever stole the pendant probably has it: they're also probably smart enough to know not to affix it to any random piece of wood. The modern crusader sets out on a journey to Jerusalem, where he'll probably intercept the thieves before they can get the staff... The man wakes up from his dream to the sound of his alarm and tells his roommate how weird and vivid it was, and how he felt he WAS the crusader, even though it wasn't POV; roommate is not enthused: man wishes he knew how it ends... In his dream that night, he has the continuation of that dream: the modern crusader idles the halls of the museum in Jerusalem, looking out for suspicious people: he sees two brutes eyeing it, and a guy seated across the room, looking back and forth between his handheld tablet and the security cameras and guards. The crusader follows the brutes as they leave, and he watches them from afar as the museum locks up. The brutes circle around to a back exit and the guy with the tablet reads a code off his tablet and types it into the door lock number pad: it opens. The crusader waits and follows: entering the same code that he saw through binoculars. The crusader comes up on the brutes removing the case from covering the staff: they grab the staff while wearing leather gloves for protection; the crusader hides around the corner and waits for the brutes to come past him, so he can take the staff from their hands: he does, and he pushes past. He runs for the front doors as the brutes chase him: he bursts through the doors, alerting the alarm system. The man wakes up to his alarm clock, and realizes it was the sequel; he tells his roommate who thinks a sequel is pretty cool, but he otherwise doesn't care. That night, the man falls asleep... The crusader stands atop a speeding cargo truck, and a brute stands across from him: they struggle to remain sturdy as the truck wobbles on the highway: the brute steps forward cautiously while the crusader moves as far back as he safely can; the brute grabs the crusader's arm and pulls him forward to try and grab the staff from his other hand: the crusader spins to swing the staff and himself around to the back of the brute: the crusader brings the staff down onto the brute's arm, which slowly tries to burn its way through the brute's arm: the brute screams and lets go of the crusader, who pushes the brute off the back of the truck. The crusader turns and runs to the cabin of the truck: he jumps onto the foot-rail next to the driver door, and he opens the door: he conks the driver on the head, burning it slightly, and he pulls the driver out of the vehicle; the crusader jumps into the driver's seat and takes the wheel. The crusader pulls the truck over and exits; he walks to the back of the truck and opens up the back, with a pistol drawn: inside, the tablet guy and the muscle decide to put their hands up after realizing it's not the driver; the crusader asks the guy for the other two parts, and the guy says he'll have to find them himself. The muscle charges at the crusader, who opens fire on the muscle, but the muscle takes the bullets like a champ and unwaveringly continues towards the crusader, grabs him by the throat, and shakes him until he drops the staff: the guy picks it up off of the ground. The muscle tosses the crusader to the ground, closes the exit, and walks with the guy back to the cabin: they start the truck and drive off, as the crusader lies in a puddle. The man wakes up to his alarm clock and tells his roommate about the dream: the man is bummed by having no variety (and he notes that his dreams are in sequence) but the roommate thinks that action scene is straight out of a movie, and he should write these down. Later that night, the man falls asleep: in the dream, the crusader kicks in a window by swinging down from the eaves of a roof and sliding into the window; he steadies while grappling a guard upon landing, smothering and choking the guard who had his back to the window; the guard falls (unconscious) and the crusader sneaks to a corner, and looks around the wall: he sees an approaching curious guard. The crusader waits around the corner and swings a knife out with a straight arm to pierce the chest of the guard as he walks by; he muffles the dying guard’s scream; he stands up and goes into an adjoining room, which looks down on a warehouse floor: on the floor are the tablet guy, the muscle, the brute, and the boss, who are carefully assembling the staff of Moses, while surrounded by tens of both active and inactive guards. The crusader sneaks downstairs and hides behind a stack of crates, which is quite distant from the assembly; he finds a machine gun, loads it, and slinks amongst the shadows around the edge of the wall, closer to the assembly. He listens to the boss monologue about using the plagues to assault the main capitalist cities of the world (NYC, London, Tokyo, Rio De Janiero, Hong Kong, Singapore) and bring down the capitalist structure, so that socialism may rise in its wake; the crusader slinks to a position between two steel crates above a row of others (which serves as prime coverage). The staff is gently assembled by the tablet guy; the guards are all gathering around it to watch; right after the gold component is affixed, the crusader stands up and begins firing his machine gun upon the guards: the guards are falling by the dozen, and spurting blood: the boss grabs the staff and pendant: the machine gun shoots out bullets rapidly. The man wakes up to the sound of his alarm clock; he goes into the kitchen and the roommate asks how is dream went; the man surmises that it’s as if each dream is a new chapter in a never-ending story, which he's afraid could truly never end: the roommate says that would be awesome, because has become really interested in the narrative and awaits the update if every dream, every morning, as if it's a radio show. Cut to the end of 5 weeks later: the crusader is racing a car along the cliffs of the Himalayas, chasing another bad guy, who has a scar over his eye; the man wakes up to his alarm clock, goes into the kitchen, and reports to the eager roommate that it’s still the same storyline (constantly changing, and it's really boring now for the man, who wishes he could have more interesting and diverse dreams), but the roommate loves the constant updates of this heroic and adventurous crusader in his dreams…

·         A self-titled "propagandist" and "freelance anarchist" who calls himself "Crowd Commander" begins episode number 173 of his vlog; he believes himself a threat to the government, but he's as threatening as he was when he was a geek in middle school. He raves about how modernity and globalization undermine cultures and borders, and that it's unconstitutional for the nation's leaders to work towards a global community, since it removes jurisdiction and necessity from the written rules that the founding fathers made. This is proof to him that the government is not intelligent, not thinking long-term, and not worthwhile. He redirects to address the concerns that commenters have asked of him: he "cares so much" about the goings-on of the government because he wants to tell the world about why it's wrong; he "won't move out of the country" because there is no place where he can continue his lifestyle while not being governed by some overarching web of institutions confined to borders, and he won't compromise his way of life in order to "prove" that he's an anarchist. (He sounds like a defensive 8th grader); he is interrupted by a hacker in a Guy Fawkes mask who wants this chump to shut up so that the real dissenters can speak: real anarchy is action, not complaining, or vlogging.

·         A sister comes into her brother's room and asks him if he wants dinner; he is moping in his bed: exasperated, she asks what's wrong: he says he misses Sarah. She closes the door and sits on his bed, and gripes to him about why he's being an idiot: everyone knows he and Sarah love each other, but whenever he gets comfortable he confuses it with complacency, and then he breaks up with her. He wants to be single when loved, and he wants to be loved when single -- he needs to make up his goddamn mind and choose one. He broke up with Sarah three weeks ago, and this momentary loss makes him realize how much he needs her: he needs to stop taking it for granted, because eventually she won't be so eager to get back together with him: at some point, the emotional strain becomes too much to bear -- so he should (and will) take her back, and he won't leave her again unless he truly doesn't want to be with her. The brother, somber, nods and agrees; the sister wants to make sure if he understands, and he says he does; she says ok: it's time for dinner.

·         A sailor wakes up in the submarine and realizes his bunkmate isn't there; he asks his commanding officer where the bunkmate is, who says he doesn't know, and that there are more pressing matters, such as manning the control station: they've detected a moving mass in the depths via radar and they have to prepare for battle just in case. The sailor gets to his station, but the empty spot next to him is filled by a guy who isn't the bunkmate: the sailor asks the guy where the bunkmate is, and the guy doesn't know what he's talking about. The sailor tells him to guard the post while he goes and checks it out; the guy tells him he's going against orders, but the sailor leaves anyways (saying that he feels uneasy, and that the bunkmate's previous insubordination had perhaps gotten him incarcerated). The sailor scours the length of the submarine and its many rooms, but doesn't find the bunkmate: he grows increasingly concerned, as it seems that nobody he asks knows what the sailor is referring to when he asks where the bunkmate is: the sailor can't allow this mystery to go unsolved. The sailor confronts the commander, wondering why the bunkmate seems to have vanished both physically and from the minds of everyone else: the commander tells him to stop inquiring about things that he doesn't understand. A person notes that the mass on the radar is approaching, and the commander orders to fire a torpedo: the torpedo is launched; the sailor looks on the radar screen and sees only the torpedo, but not the target: he asks what they fired at, and the commander tells him to quiet down and return to his station, or he'll risk insubordination. The sailor pauses, and realizes something: he asks the commander what he fired (presuming the bunkmate was in there): the commander turns to him and whispers harshly, intimidating, that he and his bunkmate's dreams of a coup have gone on record, and punishments have been dealt accordingly: the bunkmate got burial at sea and erasure from public memory, while the sailor (whose family is still alive and therefore could attest to his existence should he ever disappear) gets tossed in an asylum, and called crazy for assuming a "bunkmate" existed when no other living soul can agree. Note: don't try to launch a coup.

·         The president of the US makes a speech towards the nation... The United States are at war, with themselves: rather, those of themselves who have fallen. As they know, the military has been pulled out of all foreign lands; he has redeployed them within the nation, amongst the more populated areas, and especially at power hubs and grids. But he himself cannot protect every man, woman, and child: he cannot stand on every doorstep and defend the family; he can only sit behind his desk and make sure supplies are manufactured, transportation routes are open, and energy sources keep burning. He doesn't have enough soldiers to put one on every doorstep; each family has to act on its own accord, and make their own judgment calls; this is not a time for anarchy, but a time for community: remember your neighbors. Fortify your homes but stay connected; schools will be turned into fortresses by each local police station: those with skills in construction and technology should try to aid in the fortification; however, schools have maximum space limits, so those who CAN fortify their homes (or another location, perhaps with friends and family) should. Do not run away, for there is nowhere to go: when choosing fight or flight, you must choose fight: hunker down and strengthen your reserves of resources and ammo. I rejected gun control laws because of a fear for this situation: those who have guns should be conservative of their ammo, and take up their responsibility as the powerful to protect those who are not as well-prepared; those without conventional weapons must find or create some: hatchets, axes, crowbars, even aluminum baseball bats or knives: something strong and sharp or blunt, that is efficient or with a lot of clout -- aim for the head, conserve energy, make instinctual decisions; most likely you are not suited for this scenario, but don't feel frustrated, because we are all learning as we go along. We have to wait out this war, because it is a war of attrition: if you say safe and avoid becoming infected, you will survive; if you run around, frantic, stealing, you will cause chaos, make yourselves and others vulnerable, and the end of this crisis will be delayed. Those in cities should remember to get out of reach and keep calm: if a skyscraper has no infected inside, block the stairwell and hold out: remain calm and stay safe: you will be assisted. Those in suburbs should remember community as being important, to connect your houses with electric, supply, and communication lines. Those in the country should remember supplies as being important, because leaving your home is unadvised. Do not raid grocery stores, clothing stores, sports equipment retailers, and bulk-shopping centers (like Walmart and Costco): spread the wealth. The more of us who survive is exponentially parallel to how long this war is waged. Conserve electricity, gas, fuel, ammo, food, warmth, and hostility; spread aid, compassion, and resources. I will keep you up to date: turn on your radios and televisions to any channel, every day, strictly from 6 PM to 6:10 PM for information; good luck, stay smart, stay safe.

·         Slacker student puts gif of TV static as second slide in PowerPoint presentation in order to pretend like there's technical difficulties, in order to hold off on presenting because he procrastinated so much that he didn't have time to make it. The teacher gave him an extension, so he goes home and works feverishly on it. He comes into class the next day and the teacher goes to set up the projector and it goes staticky: the student is concerned when the teacher goes to the next slide (teacher had his own fake PowerPoint static!) and tells the student that he knows all the tricks in the book, and the student can now present, but only for half credit.

·         Two (both white) opponents both have correct views yet argue: a man tries to convince a guy that the racists are the ones who focus on color discrepancies rather than community (and the making of amends to minorities rather than promoting equality), while the guy tries to convince the man that the racists are the oppressive (of the past and present) and the minorities need to be given extra aid and opportunities because the system is against them.

·         A man pitches an idea for a fighting show to a network: he says that boxing was the biggest thing (mano a mano, brute strength), and then wrestling (the action movie of reality), and then UFC (harsh strength and sharp tactics), and NOW: a pentagonal caged arena doesn't allow opposite corners (or anywhere to hide), and there is no tapping out and no timer (no easy way out): the two opponents must fight until one falls from fatigue, blacks out, or dies; and every five minutes, a single blunt weapon is tossed into the ring. The goal of the game is to destroy the opponent, even if it means killing him; as you can see by the earlier charted progression, the world has been desiring more and more violence from its televised fighting: the next stage is unrelenting fury.

·         January 10, 1967: CONELRAD alerts the public to seek fallout shelters, and nuclear sirens wail. Up in a Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird, the two pilots monitor the northern horizon, while flying west to east; the arctic circle is clear overhead on the left, and on the right side of the plane, the American urban sprawl areas are electrically lit and glowing in the night. But wait-- on the horizon comes a glimmer, and another, and another: five glimmering objects arise, which the pilots report: soon it can be seen that they are rockets (by the trails behind them); the pilots radio in their confirmation. The front pilot keeps his eyes on the world outside his window; the second pilot looks through the monitor through the reconnaissance camera, watching Chicago from afar; all the while reporting via radio what they see, and listening to the radio chatter of alert and/or scrambling officers on the ground (in bunkers). Front pilot (F) sees on the right glimmers begin and launch off of American soil, in the Great Plains, Appalachians, and Southwest. Second pilot (S) zooms in to see people on the streets scrambling manically to get indoors, and people on the roads driving wildly (ignoring traffic lights and pedestrians crossing). F watches the horizon glimmers growing closer; he sees the American glimmers rising up, closer, sweeping under his Blackbird. S scans a suburban area to find neighbors abandoning nighttime barbecues and dinner parties, fleeing to their cars; some neighbors knock furiously on the doors of others, with their arms full of gear; some neighbors usher their friends into their homes. F sees that the ~20 American rockets rush past the 5 approaching rockets, over Canada: 10 more glimmers appear over the horizon, coming closer. S zooms out and sees the lit metropolitan area wrapped against Lake Michigan. F sees that the approaching rockets are increasingly distant from each other, splitting off, with two going west, one coming ahead, and two going east. S looks out the window to the right and sees over a hundred glimmers spawn on American soil, zooming up to the sky. F sees over a hundred glimmers appear from all along the horizon, coming towards them. S sees on the monitor, the Chicago metropolitan area: it waits... A rocket veers towards Chicago, and explodes with a bright light, and a sonic wave around it. F sees rockets veer towards NYC, Washington DC, San Francisco, and Los Angeles: each strike in that order, and each result a large explosion. S sees the smoke cloud rises quick and the electric lights in the area rapidly diminish to close-to-none. F sees the areas near the impact zones quickly lose their electric light webs around them; his attention is directed to the horizon as more explosions occur beyond it, with faint glows of light. S looks up and out the window to see hundreds of American rockets zooming under and towards the horizon, in a wide range of trajectories; he turns back to the monitor. F sees the hundreds of glimmers on the horizon coming at them from a wide range. S zooms in on Chicago to see a wasteland: barren and broken ruins of skyscrapers and industrial urban planning. F looks out the window to see more glowing explosions beyond the horizon, followed by the strikes and explosions of numerous rockets on American cities and military locations [which are in the badlands]; more explosions beyond the horizon, and more explosions (like fireworks) below them on American soil. (Yes: Nuclear war with The Soviet Union.)

·         A team of diplomats comes to a rebel outpost on a Peacemaker mission: the rebels receive their message and listen, but evidently choose not to agree: in fact, they'll use the opportunity of their visit to raise another stink, by killing them; the diplomats raise their hands which coincides with a bullet piercing through a wall and impacts the wall near a rebel: the diplomat says that they may be peaceful, but they're not idiots (they are surrounded by snipers): they didn't come alone, and they'll be leaving alone (now): the diplomats ask the rebels to raise their hands, as a precaution, and the diplomats confidently walk out.

·         EDIT TOGETHER old 1930/40s songs (perhaps crooning, swing, and patriotic instrumentals (like that classic Big Red 1 title music or Stars and Stripes Forever (JP Sousa))) with video from the old footage of nuclear testing, as seen in Declassified US Nuclear Test Film #55 (and 33, 34) (talkingsticktv), Color footage of atomic bomb tests in Nevada (ricsil2037), Nuclear Radioactive Fallout Survival (nodding cat channel), Nuclear Bomb Tests (1955) Dummy Town (WesternWORLDhistory), Survival Town Atomic Bomb Test. Army destroys (atomic), Atomic Test Film: "Operation Teapot" (3 parts) (Jeff Quitney), Atom Bomb testing-The House in the Middle (1954) (MilitaryPublicDomain), etcetera.

·         In a cyberpunk future, companies control areas rather than governments; they believe in Political and Economic Darwinism: they suppress conflicts (for order) except those that will progress humanity, and they take capitalism to its truest form of competition; companies fight over resources, land, and populous: they use soldiers and manpower to crush other companies (similar to how Walmart today will move into a small town and slowly steal the business from mom & pop stores, except now the conglomerate is literally trying to destroy the smaller company and take its niche, to become larger): each company's goal is to become the only company (there are seven major players so far, and a few smaller localized ones (~42)), which is a slow process requiring control and order of the populous (through assimilation, propaganda, and suppression) and targeted wars of attrition against others, including subversive tactics (like inspiring insubordination and rebellion by causing glorified PR nightmares). -- We learn all of this through a bouncing back and forth between "a schoolteacher introducing fourth graders to their modern government" and "a board member describing a proposal for a strategic initiative to overtake another local company, due to the local's weaknesses & their own proven strengths."

·         (A man roams the streets, not expecting the invasion, while simultaneously the president (V.O.) responds to the attacks after they've happened): "This nation is in more turmoil than ever..." In a metropolitan suburb, a man has been evicted from his home (which was condemned after enemy artillery took out the back of it, along with killing his family). "War against us has been initiated, unexpectedly, and with great force..." He carries a suitcase stuffed with clothes and a tote bag stuffed with memories, including pictures of his wife and kids, a child's stuffed animal elephant, and a dog collar. "Major artillery strikes occurred against our metropolitan areas, with rocketry similar to the London Blitz in the 1940s, brought upon by the Nazi Regime..." With tears in his eyes, he walks away from his home, down the street, amongst a few other scattered refugees; the city burns in the background. "The Second World War was unlike the First, and although they prepared for chemical attacks, it was never to come, because the need for that weaponry no longer fit the battlefield..." Canisters whistle through the sky, alerting the man and refugees; the canisters clamor to the ground: their lids pop off and spin while releasing large quantities of nerve gas into the air: the man and refugees cough and flee, but are surrounded by the ever-growing gas clouds. "But now, the battlefield has changed again. In this day and age, with our dense civilizations and level of comfort, a surprise attack with great breadth of effect seems the most fruitful means of assault for our enemies -- and that's just what they've done..." The clouds grow closer, forcing the man and refugees to clump in the middle of the road; they drop their stuff in order to cover their mouths with their hands while they cough; the clouds envelope them: they succumb to the fumes and collapse. "Chemical weapons are political weapons: they can coerce populations, they can be weapons of terror -- they can be weapons of mass destruction..." The refugees cringe and seize, stiffening and flexing as they ache and burn all over: their skin singes, and their orifices bleed. One by one, the refugees curdle and die. "This goes against the Geneva Convention. This goes against our nation. And this will not go unpunished..." The man lies dead on the street, between a gas canister and a smatter of dead refugees, with his scavenged belongings dropped and scattered in front of him, and his shelled house and damaged city behind him...

·         In an alley, a shady man comes up behind a couple and puts a gun to the girl's head: he then coerces the boy to eat a bag of dog shit or he'll shoot the girl. After much prodding, the boy does it; the man reveals himself to be the boy's friend, who was doing it as a joke.

·         "Crook & Nanny," prototypical 1980s sitcom intro of finger-wagging old lady and shrugging burglar.

·         "Crooked Nanny," Fran Drescher as Walter White-level drug kingpin atop a throne of methamphetamine.

·         One African diamond miner jokingly says to the Other that they say if you dig deep enough you'll come through to China; the Other says that Americans say that: they'd more likely pop through into the Pacific Ocean; the One says he therefore hopes they don't. A Third near them says that some people have a theory that the Earth is hollow and there's another parallel civilization inside the earth; the One doesn't believe that, because they'd need a sun; the Third says that the sun is in the center of the earth, making heat, light, and gravity. The Other asks what their civilization is like, and the Third says they are rumored to have a civilization like ours that spun off from technology they received during the Industrial Revolution (nobody has been in contact with them since): they didn't have the same wars or advances, so for all we know they're still steampunk and Victorian. Huh, says the Other, and he swings his pickaxe into the floor once more, and it breaks through to reveal a ray of light streaming through, upwards, illuminating the cave as a shaft of light: bustling pedestrians and horses with buggies can be heard faintly; the three diamond miners gather around and peer down into it; two human fingers curl around the lip of the hole from the opposite side, and [with the camera peering closer] a human eye is seen peeking through the hole.

·         A poor man decides to commit suicide, but chooses instead to hold the NYC mayor's office hostage, in order to use his leverage as a way to get expensive treatment for his final days; he intends on being killed, but demands for expensive meals, linens, jewelry, clothes, and electronics while he has the leverage: the negotiators oblige as they arrange a way for police to infiltrate and kill him. The poor man relishes in his lavish life, while he trains his gun on the hostages (who he had wrap each other in explosives) and he holds the trigger: he is not satisfied by the lavish treatment because it is not as earnest and real as it would have to be to feel good; he reveals his reasoning for the debacle to the hostages, and he reveals that the trigger and explosives are fake, and he shoots himself in the head; upon the gunshot, the police storm in to save the hostages and find that their job is already done.

·         At the end of the century, an informational television commercial advertising three futuristic vitamin types that enhance three different senses (red: memory, orange: sight & hearing, purple: reflexes) for the modern citizen to use.

·         A found genie offers to give one wish; the woman doesn't know what to wish for: she presumes it'll have its sneaky negative side, so asking for world peace might mean all humans are eliminated, and asking for a billion dollars might mean taking it from other people, and asking for her child to cry less might mean it loses its mouth, and asking for a life without worries might put her in a coma or a small white box, and asking for less traffic might eliminate cars. She lists a bunch of possible things and their negative sides, and eventually decides that no big wish is foolproof, and it would only greatly mess with the stability of the universe. She decides to stop causing herself mental anguish at figuring out "the perfect wish" and to just ask for something nice, since the whole "wish" thing was a bonus to begin with: she asks for dinner to have been already prepared by her husband for when she gets home, so that she doesn't have to do it. ((Or, instead, to have a less shitty ending: she asks for an 8pm reservation at Dorsia on August 14th for her and her husband for their anniversary.))

·         An extreme biotech lab created a human with various stem cells, except the human is purposeless like a robot: it can be taught yet has no goals of its own... For now. The organic, autonomous figure with no desires or ambitions is empty of will, and therefore proposed to use as "free labor," since it wouldn't ask to be paid: there's controversy about the idea of a non-human-yet-human slave. Agricultural and manufacturing companies are considering moving towards this process, and therefore lobby for it; this would take millions of jobs from people in third world countries and Southeast Asia who do factory work for minimal pay; this would also take many jobs away from all kinds of people all over the world: it leads to the vast working class (and even some artists who can empathize) to protest Big Business; meanwhile, the "human robots," organic automatons ("O.A.'s"), watch the protests mindlessly with expressionless faces (protestors hold signs with slogans like "say NO WAY to O.A.s").

·         A Neo-Nazi group that gained traction by rebranding in the wake of 9/11 has grown its numbers because of the number of nervous, xenophobic individuals in the nation. With this power under their belts, they announce a preemptive war against Muslims, immigrants, and deviants; they use defensive rhetoric and act like they're protecting the nation from further cultural damage and infection, and especially cutting down on risk of sleeper agents who might rise up to take over the country -- which is why they must do so first. They quote Enoch Powell, Anders Breivik, and George Wallace.

·         In the US, 1950s/60s, a social leader speaks to a crowd via a televised address: he regards the civil rights movement, which he is against: except, it's not the "civil rights movement for African Americans" that we know -- it's a movement that blue-eyed people have launched to attempt to get the rights that only brown-eyed people have. The brown-eyes are the in-group, and the blue-eyes are the out-group, formed over a meaningless difference (like Aryans and Jews, or whites and blacks, except more notably insignificant). The brown-eyes can't give in to the demands and protests of the blue-eyes; they need to remain strong and suppress them, keep them where they belong -- they are inferior and could never be assimilated because the difference between them is too great: they must be repressed, or drastic measures will be taken to eradicate them, eliminating the hierarchy altogether: for blue-eyes, it's the brown way or the highway.

·         The Nazis had built a secret base in Antarctica as both a fallback position and a place to do bioweapon and nuclear research, and then launch from silos there. Some modern US explorers are studying global warming effects when they stumble upon the corner of a roof of a facility that was buried in a blizzard but is now melting; one explorers heard the legend and is shocked: they dig in to discover and confirm it.

·         Seven people wake up in a large, sparsely-furnished room that has no doors or windows: they don't know how they got in there, but assume that it's purgatory, since all reveal themselves to have been victims of the same murderer (who was in the dark and caught them from behind with a knife). They wonder if they're in purgatory or if they merely thought they died, were drugged, and woke up together here; but their wounds are there and they remember the light leaving their eyes. Eventually, one person slips up and reveals knowledge that only the murderer and a certain victim would've known, and that victim points it out: turns out the murderer was in the room, realized they were all his victims, and pretended to be a victim as well, as to avoid harm; but the six victims turn on him and attack him, beating him to death viciously: once the murderer dies, he turns to black dust; the six victims then dissolve into white light -- the room allowed them to get justice.

·         EDIT together a bunch of shorts and cut from one to the next randomly, like a mishmash or changing the channel.

·         A boy and girl are dating, and madly in love. The boy is looking into his ancestry online, because he was adopted and wants to know where he came from. After one date (where the boy details that he finally found a connection, which is allowing him to dig deeper), he proposes: the boy and girl are engaged. The boy digs deeper online and discovers that he's the first cousin of the girl -- he tells her, and they're nervous; but they're in love and they're the only two who know, so they decide to never bring it up again and never tell a single soul: they will proceed with being engaged and in love.

·         Three kids are the children in a house, and named Jack, Colby, and Brie: one day, Jack realizes they're all named after cheese; Jack interrogates his parents, who remain stoic and unconvinced of this coincidence, until they burst into chuckles and exclaim that they were wondering how long it would take for them to realize that -- they were afraid they'd have to name the fourth one Asiago on order to speed up the realization process! Jack is not amused.

·         He is devoutly Jewish except for his actual lack of care: for example, he has an electric menorah (and he turns it off at night), and he sometimes eats pork accidentally but says whatever. He's the dad in a family who are also "Jewish," but they don't practice whatsoever: he is the last of the line to, and barely. He struggles to get through the Jewish prayers, which are hard to say. Eventually, he just decides "fuck it" and throws out the menorah.

·         A very-catholic preteen boy (in Ohio) realizes he is gay (after a bunch of doubts culminate with his arousal at an Abercrombie & Fitch catalog picture of a male model). He tries desperately to change (for God's, his dad's, and his own sake), and it's really difficult -- it's impossible; this realization hurts deeply, as it makes him ashamed in himself for disappointing his father and the Bible: he cries on the floor, with his back against the inside of the closet door frame (halfway into the closet) as he doesn't know what to do: but he knows he's gay.

·         A lower-class (single) white mom hates her white daughter and treats her like shit; the daughter was the result of rape, so the mom has always looked at her with disdain. They are loudly arguing from different rooms, in a small apartment: the daughter is preparing dinner in the kitchen while the mother is in her bedroom; the mom is calling the daughter names (wretched, ugly, fat, disgusting) while blaming her for stupid things that she didn't even do, and the daughter is denying it, rebuking her, and yelling that she's being treated like shit for nothing. The daughter (who is slicing up a carrot) brings the knife too close and slices a good portion of her finger off: she screams and clutches it with a hand towel, bleeding profusely and yelling for her mom to drive her to the hospital; the mother, uncaring and spiteful, declines, so the daughter grabs the car keys and runs out on her own, in a huff. Driving to the hospital, the daughter is upset and recovering from crying, growing more focused on the sharp pains in her finger and wincing about them. The daughter runs into the ER and asks the desk nurse for help, and the nurse has her fill out a form first: exasperated and upset, she sits down and scrawls in the information REAL QUICKLY, while wincing and suffering; she brings the sheet up to the nurse, who identifies that the daughter filled in only the mom's information and none of the dad's: the daughter concurs, and the nurse says she needs both parents' information, and the daughter says she only has her mom's; the nurse asks why, and the daughter (sick of suffering) explodes succinctly about how she's a product of rape, so she doesn't know her father, and all her mom sees in her is him, so she hates her -- and she begs for some fucking medical aid already! The nurse hurriedly leads her into the back.

·         A guy stares at the floor and feet of other commuters while standing in a crowded subway car; he snaps out of his trance and doesn't know where he is or why: as if he just "began" here, already 28 years into a life story... He exits the subway stairwell onto the city street, and he walks around in a haze of confusion and exuding malaise (uneasiness predicting illness). The guy roams past some homeless people outside of a convenience store, and continues on, confused, growing sicklier. His vision fades with tunnel vision as he bumps into a man who leans against a wall while smoking and talking on his cellphone; the man is upset, and the two look each other in the eye while the man rants: the guy then interrupts by projecting black bile from his mouth onto the man, who is stunned and disgusted: the guy immediately then pounces onto the man and starts clawing at him and biting his neck flesh. Passers-by initially back up, quick, but then pause to watch with worry (but this is a sharp ending, so we don't see much of that).

·         Edward & Cora Slocum drift in an octagonal inflatable dingy, in the middle of the ocean, because they are lost at sea; their bodies are tattered and burned from lengthy sun exposure; their clothes have been mostly removed to use as shields from the sun; they are low on rations. Cora toys with her wedding ring, and a fazed Edward comes out of his cloud-gazing trance to notice it: he takes her hands in his and weakly apologizes for a dreary honeymoon: she says sardonically (? grimly jokingly) that their vows DID promise adventure... They look at the open ocean around them, and choose to cuddle.

·         In the 1980s, an old woman rifling through her attic finds an old box containing a collection of old letters and photographs from the 1920s-40s. She grows nostalgic for the days of old -- late 1920s- mementos and photos of the woman when she was young and an elegant socialite, on the arm of her dapper new husband, at a gala; early 1930s- mementos and photos from their westward travel during the Great Depression as they tracked flyer after flyer towards work to feed their 2 new children; late 1930s- photos of their family in a town near a dam, where he husband got work from the government, as well as poem-ridden letters he sometimes wrote during breaks; early 1940s- letters from her husband who was serving overseas in Europe for WWII, with the last one being dated in February of 1945, followed by the identification of a Purple Heart medal he sent back. She is saddened and heartfelt as she recalls her former husband; her current husband ascends the attic staircase and sees that she's crying: he asks if she's ok and says she's fine as she hastily stuffs the mementos back into the box, and hides both the mementos and her undying love for former husband; she goes downstairs with her current husband, insisting on listening to some jazz while preparing dinner.

·         A man takes precautions to keep his wife under hypnosis; he hypnotized her a long time ago to be the model citizen and perfect wife (since she was sexy and he had lust, but she was crass and slummy) which was cued by a two-tone whistled bird call, and cancelled by a service bell. The dinging of any bells undos her suave gaiety and poise, turning her into a Brooklynite with bad posture, but he casually whistles to return her to that state, of which he is in full control. However, it's February: at dinner in a fancy restaurant with his boss (and both of their spouses), it's running smoothly, and the boss thinks he's the right candidate for the VP promotion; when someone at coat check dings for service, his wife turns fowl; he goes to whistle but has chapped lips: he whistles and whistles, increasingly hectic, but nothing happens: while she makes a scene, the boss and boss' wife are appalled -- the wife's loud mouth and antics have gotten the attention of many other patrons; the man pulls a waiter down to his level and harshly asks him to whistle a bird tweet, so the waiter confusedly does so -- the wife returns to respectable and sophisticated; the man releases the waiter and returns to casual, as if nothing happened. The boss and boss' wife are confused and concerned, but attempt to carry on as well... The restaurant returns to normal and the man discreetly writes on his palm, under the table (with a pen in his other hand), a note to "buy lip balm."

·         In the 1920s in Appalachia, two groups of siblings each run moonshine distilleries; their parents had a feud, so one group believes the feud must carry on, but the second group believes it is best that it be dropped. The first group insists on antagonizing the second, but the leader of the first continues to refuse to retaliate, and instead says that they should drop it -- thing is, the second group is stronger than the first, and yet the first still wants to fight. Eventually, the leader of the first (despite what the other members of the first say) has them antagonize the second group one time too many: the leader of the second has had enough and lets the first group know by raining gunfire upon them and decimating their group: the second leader stands over the first and tells him that he warned him to drop it: the second leader shoots the first one dead.

·         1910: a townsman is walking home at night, and six thugs take him from behind, jump him, rough him up, mug him, and cut him across his throat; the townsman clutches at his bleeding throat, and the thugs walk off. Cut to the morning, outside a storefront, when the sheriff and police are surveying the scene: six dead bodies are inspected (and assumed injuries detailed vocally), one by one (one long take, please); five bodies surround one -- 1 (shot in heart through back), 2 (shot in neck sideways), 3 (shot in the upper right head), 4 (shot in the shoulder, and again in the eye), and 5 (shot in the lung, head crushed with a rock) surround 6 (one bullet wound in the gut, and a slit throat) who is in the middle. The sheriff comes up on the last corpse, with his back to us and his body hidden by the townsman's coat: the sheriff notes that this one's throat was slit... Cut back to that night, as the six thugs are walking down the street, and stopping against the storefront where their bodies will later be found; a figure down the road in the shadow of night, face unseen by us and wholly unseen by them, swaggers towards them. Cut to the morning when the deputy asks what the sheriff thinks happened; sheriff narrates while we see an intercut of the corpses strewn on the morning floor with the bloody battle scene at night... Sheriff says that the fellows were in a circle around one fellow (presumed slit throat, in the middle) who were probably roughing him up: that's probably who slit the throat (the five surrounding): (1 and 2 have backs to figure; 3, 4, and 5 face figure; 6 is in the middle). 1 was shot through the back by someone who caught them off guard (probably came out of the shadows), and the bullet went through his chest, then pierced 6, who staggered to the ground; another shot went into the neck of the fellow next to him (2), as he turned to look in the direction of the first shot. 3, 4, and 5 pulled their guns, but 3 was quickly shot in the head before his gun could exit his holster. 4 was shot quickly, followed by 5 (shooter had to get them incapacitated to avoid being shot, before moving on with killing): he then used his last bullet to shoot 4 in the head, and used a nearby rock to crush 5's head, who was probably gasping beforehand. So 6 must've been being Shanghaied by the other five, and the figure sought to save him, but couldn't get there in time to stop 6 from having his throat slit: so when the bullet went into him, it was just the icing on the cake, so the figure left to avoid detection. But the deputy points out that 6 must've had been standing to receive that bullet in the gut, which means he was standing with a slit throat, which is near-impossible; the sheriff realizes that 6's throat was slit as the last act: they don't know why, but it was made personal -- revenge on 6, not saving him. Turns out, the figure was the townsman, who clutched his bleeding throat with a rag in one hand, and used his six-shooter pistol and a rock with the other; the townsman then slit 6's throat, and moved on to elsewhere. (...perhaps townsman should be dead nearby, and thought to be 6, but is townsman; sheriff thought he had throat slit in battle and staggered away, but was actually the perpetrator -- they assume 6 was the one who killed them all, but it was the figure who walked away from the scene.)

·         The narrator is a woman who is resistant to being a harmonious citizen; her friend is a man with Dissociative Identity Disorder that switches between a compliant citizen persona and a bold rebellious one. Both are living in a totalitarian state that requires conformity; those who refuse to conform are picked out and brought to the reformation center: they are lined up and told (by a hostess from the state via a prerecorded message on a small television) about what their problem and treatments are, and why: they are then told they will be forced to conform. The guards demonstrate cruelty upon the citizens (beating them briefly) to show a glimpse of what comes as punishment for those who continue not to conform. Each are individually dragged away to reformation chambers; the narrator's friend (who was meek before getting beat, and now lashes out) is dragged away. Then, the narrator is dragged away: she is strapped into a chair that faces a television, and the television begins displaying a juxtaposition of rapid sequences of images and sudden noises as psychological torture to wear down her mental defenses; some long time later, she's hollowed and broken, and the television casually switches over to a prerecorded video of the hostess, who explains the qualities and values of a negligent citizen, an acceptable citizen, and a superb citizen: the hostess says the acceptable citizen is ok, but one should strive for superb in order to reap the most benefits of society: the woman nods autonomously. A while later, the video continues as the woman begrudgingly listens while barely attentive. A while later, she, subservient, stands in the reformation hall, back in line with the others, who stand as submissive as she does; the guards check them all out like slaves at auction: none are deemed negligent. The woman exits the reformation center and walks ahead: her meek friend catches up and asks how it went: the woman says she can't imagine why she ever felt rebellious; the friend (now bold) starts to riff on getting revenge (but it starts fading out by this point)...

·         Sequel to the preceding one; also about the reformation center: except this time, the narrator is the male friend with Dissociative Identity Disorder (aka Multiple Personality Disorder) which is interesting because the new narrator was a side character in the original). Now, the man is meek while spending time with his female friend (both subservient, but he is aware of it while she is blasé) while at lunch in the cafeteria during their lunch break at the factory: he tells her he is afraid of having to go back to the reformation center, and she tells him to stop being rebellious and it'll be ok; he says he has no control over it, and she says he has to try and suppress it just like everyone else does; he tries to form a rebuttal but the bell chimes, signaling the end of lunch, so everyone gets up and files through the doors. The two part as he goes back to his work station: nervous of switching to his bold personality, he works his tedious job and motions, but his focus is slipping, and he screws up: a guard sees it and comes over to ask what's wrong. In the man's eyes, we can see him, scared, switch over to bold, but then quickly switch back (he suppressed it): he says he merely fumbled, and the guard tells him to stay focused; he quickly turns back to his work but is shaking as the bold side keeps trying to come out (as we see in his eyes): he slows down and his tasks become sloppy and his hands shake. The guard, noticing again, comes over again (exasperated about having to return): the man struggles internally, and the guard asks what's wrong: he replies that he doesn't feel well, and the guard tells him to wait out the end of the workday and he can get a slip to pass on going to the evening program, but for now he should keep himself in line. With that last sentence, the bold personality surfaces in the man: he is suddenly very defensive and asks what the fuck the guard means by that: the guard asks him to restrain himself while placing an authoritative hand on his shoulder, and the man shoves him off: a small brawl erupts, which beckons other guards to come over and restrain him: they eventually hold him down, and while he's held down, he struggles and tries to break free: in his eyes we see him switch back to meek, and he relaxes in the guards' grasp: he is nervous and apologetic, but the guards still carry him out: he is excessively apologetic as the guards carrying him out and back to the reformation center...

·         A self-centered corporate woman arrives at Heaven's gates, quickly accepts the fact that she died (briefly pissed but decides "whatever"), and wants to hurry the entry-into-the-Afterlife process up (she's entitled): the doorman checks the books and says that she can't come in -- she doesn't understand why, and asks if she's supposed to go to hell, because she strongly believes she isn't, since she's a good Christian woman who goes to church and donates to children's hospitals: the doorman calms her by saying that she's done enough to stay out of hell, but is not of the right character to enter heaven: she asks what the hell he means by that: he says that she's selfish and can't enter the afterlife until she learns the importance of charity and compassion; she angrily repeats that she donates to children's hospitals, and the doorman says that she does it so that she doesn't have to pay as much taxes: she isn't really a charitable person; and she's not compassionate, because she's never shown love to her husband, son, friends, or parents: she focuses on work and money, which don't mean anything in the afterlife: so while they're great goals on earth, they aren't enough for the afterlife; the woman thinks it's unfair that Heaven has such strict requirements, where you have to either be Goodie-Goodie to get in or else are declared rotten and sent to hell; the doorman clarifies that only the truly corrupted go to hell, but the majority of people need more time to decide which way they go: she says "whatever," and the doorman sends her back to earth: she wakes up in the driver's seat of a car accident, as a passerby (who perhaps is the doorman) is asking if she's ok: she, in a haze, says "yeah... I'm good:" you can see in her eyes and expression that she is heeding the doorman's words: the passerby pauses to soak it in, and says "ok -- I'm glad you're Good" (or something along those lines).

Original document created 12/13/2014.