Lucifer's Pen: September 2009

Episode 1: The Duck Stops Here

(The episode opens with a shot of a dark, creepy castle on a cliff. Eventually the camera zooms in to show the interior of a tower in the castle, a laboratory. A dark wizard is hunched over, concocting some sort of potion in a test tube. He finishes, sighs, and takes a sip of the mixture. In disgust, he spits it out and throws the potion-filled test tube against the wall, which simultaneously breaks and explodes into snakes which fall to the ground.)

Wizard: "Confound it! Years upon years of exhaustive research-- all for nothing! If only I could successfully craft a serum or spell that would grant me immortality. I would desire nothing more than eternal life. I could spend an eternity studying the spells of wizards past, and I would be unstoppable. (The wizard sighs.) Perhaps it was not meant to be."

(The wizard sits at his desk and begins to weep softly. After a few moments of weeping, he hears loud laughter coming from another room in the castle. Puzzled, he stops crying, wipes the tears from his eyes, and heads into the other room to see what the laughter is about. He enters a typical living room area, where his two children are watching cartoons on a television set. The camera zooms in to the cartoon. Within the cartoon in very rapid succession: a cartoony fox hits a cartoony pelican with a hammer, the pelican bites the fox's legs off, the fox throws a cartoony bomb into the pelican's mouth, causing the pelican's mouth to expand in size from the explosion, and the pelican removes a shotgun from his mouth and fires it into the fox's chest. Both characters emerge almost unscathed and are still alive. The wizard's children giggle, then leave the room during the commercial break to follow.)

[from the TV:] "We'll be right back!"

(The wizard stares blankly at the screen for a few moments, then has an epiphany.)

Wizard: "That's it! That's what I've been searching for! These... these... 'cartoons', as they're called... They have immortality! I must figure out how to infiltrate their cursed realm and wrest this power from these... colorful abominations."

(The wizard retires for a short while, and the camera zooms into the television screen again, during a commercial break. It is a live-action commercial for a new show on the network.)

TV Announcer: "COMING SOON TO TBC THURSDAY NIGHTS..."

(A cheesy sitcom theme song plays, and the only lyrics are 'My Two Husbands', which is the name of the show. A brief preview of the show is given.)

TV Announcer: "What would you do if you married the man of your dreams... twice?"

TV Wife: "I can't believe I married two different men without telling them about each other!"

(A cheesy laugh track plays.)

TV Announcer: "Things go from zany to wacky in no time, when Carol moves in with both of them! As she'll soon discover, it's a crazy ride trying to live with two husbands in the same house without them finding out about each other!"

TV Husband 1: "Honey, have you seen my red shirt? It's red shirt day at the office, and I won't look like upper management material without it."

TV Wife: "I'm sorry dear, I don't know where it could be!"

TV Husband 1: "That's strange. Red shirts don't usually just disappear like that. Hmm. I guess I'll see you when I get back from the office."

(TV Husband 1 leaves the house. Shortly after, TV Husband 2 enters from another room, wearing a red shirt.)

TV Husband 2: "Were you talking to someone just now?" (Laugh track.)

TV Wife: "No, honey."

(Wife turns head and looks at camera, with no expression.)

TV Husband 2: "I could swear I heard voices." (Shakes head.) "Well, anyway, thanks for the new shirt, hon." (He leaves as well. TV Wife turns to the camera, and looks directly at the audience.)

TV Wife: "That's my husbands!" (Laughter, applause.)

TV Announcer: "My Two Husbands, Thursdays on TBC. TBC! Keeping that cold, hollow feeling at bay."

(The camera zooms out from the TV to show the wizard walking into his living room with a potion in hand.)

Wizard: "This ought to do the trick. Bottoms up!"

(The wizard drinks the potion and pulls a magic wand from his sleeve. He points the wand at the TV, casts a little spell at the screen, and steps into the television. He enters a very minimalist and empty yet colorful cartoon world, but the wizard is hidden from the view of the audience.)

Wizard: "I feel so strange... Is this what attaining immortality feels like?"

(The camera views bits and pieces of his body while he says this, revealing that his arms are yellow and goofy, and that his legs and feet are orange and webbed. The wizard walks over to a pond and looks at his reflection. He discovers that in becoming a cartoon and entering the cartoon world, he has been transformed into a bright yellow cartoon duck without retaining any of his physical traits. At the same time, the wizard's kids return to the TV set in the castle living room to watch the cartoon.)

Wizard: "BY THE GODS! What has happened to my corporeal form!? Yellow plumage has replaced my ivory flesh and pewter-grey locks! What foul trickery be this?"

(He pauses and looks at the horizons, the sky, and the land. There is eerie silence, and the sky and fields are vacant and creepy. The duck wizard becomes very visibly disturbed by his surroundings. He cautiously takes a few steps to the right of the screen, and a minimal bongo drum beat starts playing as he walks. He stops, looks up to the sky as if searching for the source of the sound, and keeps walking. A suave looking fox enters the screen.)

Frank: "Say! I haven't seen you around here before! My name's Frank. Frank the fox. What's yours?"

Wizard: "I am Thornhilt, sorcerer of the seven obsidian moons. I am the greatest dark wizard these wastes have ever known. I come seeking immortality."

Frank: "Well, it's always nice to see a new face around here. Say! I was just about to have dinner. Would you like to join me?"

Wizard: "I'm sorry but I must refuse. I've much more pressing matters to attend to."

Frank: "I'm afraid you don't have much choice in the matter, my friend!"

(The fox bites the wizard/duck's neck, grabbing it with his mouth. The duck lets out a scream. The fox jerks and breaks the duck's neck, so as to render him unconscious. The fox drags the unconscious duck wizard back towards his house, which is a large tree stump. Once at the house, the fox ties up the duck and begins cooking a stew, throwing in various vegetables, while singing the theme song to 'My Two Husbands'. The wizard regains consciousness.)

Wizard: "Ugh... what... what happened?" (He sees the fox stirring the pot. He says the following in his head:) "My neck... I thought it was broken. It must have healed while I was... Oh my... I've done it! I've become impervious to harm! Invincible! Dare I say... immortal?"

(The wizard, arms tied up, bites through the rope with his bill, tearing it off.)

Frank: "Dinner's..."

(Frank finishes stirring the pot, and turns around to unexpectedly find the duck wizard pointing his wand at him.)

Frank: "ready..."

Wizard: "Foolish rodent! To think that I would let you so easily devour me like a Christmas goose... preposterous! I am a great and powerful wizard. I am IMMORTAL!"

Frank: "I... I'm sorry... You just looked so... delicious!"

Wizard: "Apologizing will not help you, I'm afraid. Prepare to be incinerated. WIZARD FIRE SPELL!"

(Nothing happens. The wizard is apparently unable to use his magic in the cartoon world. He pauses for a split second, and pushes the fox into his own oversized pot of stew, boiling him alive with very graphic detail. The fox's fur and skin boil off, and his scream dies as he sinks into the stew. The camera cuts to the wizard's kids watching the show, both of whom are extremely shocked and terrified by the death, mouths agape in silence. Pleased with his victory, the wizard leaves the tree stump house, and returns to where he entered the cartoon realm.)

Wizard: "I appear to be immortal. But what is immortality without being able to use magic, my one true passion? This place is desolate, yet full of an evil much scarier than anything I have ever faced. I think it's time I took my leave."

(The wizard locates the screen that he passed through before, and enters it. He comes out of the television in a very bizarre way, his arms flailing and his head pushing through the layer of screen to get through. This act horrifies the watching children who do not expect this, and they run screaming as a cartoon duck yells after them as he passes through the TV.)

Wizard: "WAIT! I'M YOUR FATHER! IT'S ME! I'M YOUR FATHER!"