Nickie Ferrante, a well-known playboy, meets Terry McKay aboard the transatlantic ocean liner en route from Europe to New York. Each is romantically involved with someone else. After a series of meetings aboard the ship, they establish a friendship. When Terry joins Nickie on a brief visit to his grandmother Janou while the ship is anchored near her home at Villefranche-sur-Mer on the Mediterranean coast, she sees Nickie with new eyes and their feelings become deeper. During their visit, Janou tells Terry that Nickie is a talented painter but destroys most of his paintings because they don't meet his standards. As the ship returns to New York City, they agree to reunite at the top of the Empire State Building in six months' time if they have succeeded in ending their relationships and starting new careers.

On the day of their rendezvous, Terry, hurrying to reach the Empire State Building, is struck down by a car while crossing a street. Gravely injured, she is rushed to the hospital. Meanwhile, Nickie, waiting for her at the observation deck at the top of the building, is unaware of the accident and, after many hours, leaves at midnight, believing that she has rejected him.

After the accident, Terry, now unable to walk, refuses to contact Nickie because of her disability. Instead, she finds work as a music teacher. Nickie has pursued his painting and has his work displayed by Courbet, an art gallery owner. Six months after the accident, Terry sees Nickie with his former fiancée at the ballet. Nickie does not notice her condition because she is seated, and they both say hello.

Nickie learns Terry's address and on Christmas Eve pays her a surprise visit. Although he tries to coax her to explain her actions, Terry dodges the subject, never leaving the couch on which she lies. He gives Terry a shawl that Janou, who has died, left for her. As he is leaving, Nickie mentions a painting on which he had been working when they first met, and that it was just given away to a woman who liked it but had no money. He is about to say that the woman was in a wheelchair when he pauses, suddenly suspecting why Terry has been lying still on the couch. He walks into her bedroom and sees the painting hanging on the wall, realizing that she was the woman in the wheelchair. The film ends with the two in a tight embrace as Terry says, "If you can paint, I can walk. Anything can happen, don't you think?"

In one vignette, a Burmese journalist says, "For some reason, the [American] people I meet in my country are not the same as the ones I knew in the United States. A mysterious change seems to come over Americans when they go to a foreign land. They isolate themselves socially. They live pretentiously. They are loud and ostentatious." p. 145

The American Ambassador "Lucky" Lou Sears confines himself to his comfortable diplomatic compound in the capital. The Soviet ambassador speaks the local language and understands the local culture. He informs his Moscow superiors that Sears "keeps his people tied up with meetings, social events, and greeting and briefing the scores of senators, congressmen, generals, admirals, under secretaries of state and defense, and so on, who come pouring through here to 'look for themselves.'" Sears undermines the creative efforts to head off the communist insurgency.

Quincy Watson (Jamie Foxx) is unceremoniously dumped by his fiancée Helen (Bianca Lawson) during their engagement party. Devastated, he attempts to express his feelings to her with a heartfelt letter. His boss, Phillip (Peter MacNicol), has also given him the job of researching how to diplomatically lay off people at their company. As Quincy writes, the letter becomes a "how to" book on the correct way to end a relationship. He has a book published and becomes a best-selling author on the subject. Not wanting his male friends to suffer the same fate, he gives them advice on dumping their mates including Phillip, who is trying to break up with his gold-digger girlfriend Rita (Jennifer Esposito). After his cousin Evan (Morris Chestnut) reads Quincy's book he starts to question his relationship with his girlfriend Nicky (Gabrielle Union).

Mistakenly believing that Nicky wants to break up with him, Evan goes to his cousin Quincy and asks him to talk to her, hopefully convincing her that Evan's a good guy. Since Quincy has never met her, he does not know what she looks like so Evan tells him that she has long, black hair. (As it turns out, that day, Nicky had cut her hair to a short length she described as being like Halle Berry). Quincy and Nicky end up sitting next to each other at the bar where Nicky was supposed to meet Evan. Quincy tells her that he is looking for his cousin's ex-girlfriend Nicky who has long black hair.

Knowing that Quincy is Evan's cousin, Nicky lies and tells Quincy her name is Mary. During the time Quincy and Nicky are at the bar, Rita finds out that Philip is planning to break up with her. She goes to Quincy's house but when she gets there Evan lies and says that he's Quincy. The two begin an affair. Later, Evan goes to Nicky's house to break up with her, only to find that she was going to do the same, and has been seeing another man.

Changing his mind, Evan goes to Quincy's job and tells him that he thinks he is in love with Nicky, and that she has been seeing another man. During that conversation, Quincy realizes that 'Mary' is actually Nicky. At the party for Quincy's hot seller book, Helen is just back from Paris and has decided she wants to get back with Quincy. Evan had planned on proposing to Nicky at the party but finds out that Quincy is dating his ex-girlfriend. He becomes upset with him and leaves the party to look for Nicky. The next day, Evan talks to Quincy and tells him he will marry Rita. Phillip had a heart attack, and at the hospital, Rita finds out that Evan lied to her. Instead of getting mad, she says she fell in love with him. Quincy breaks up with Helen and goes to look for Nicky. When he goes to her door, her neighbor tells him that she's leaving for Portland by train. He goes to look for her. As the train is speeding away he confesses his love for her and they both ride the train to Portland.

High-powered divorce attorneys Audrey Woods and Daniel Rafferty have seen love go wrong in many scenarios—so, how good could their own chances be? As two of the top divorce lawyers in New York, Audrey and Daniel are a study in opposites. She practices law strictly by the book. He seems to win by the seat of his pants, or by "cheap theatrics," as Audrey says in one scene.

Soon the two lawyers are pitted against one another in several high-profile divorce cases, including a nasty public split between rock star Thorne Jamison and his dress-designer wife, Serena. The settlement hinges on an Irish castle, Caisleán Cloiche, or "Rock Castle," that each spouse wants. Audrey and Daniel travel to Ireland to chase down depositions, and both stay in the castle. Although Audrey, at least, is reluctant to acknowledge their mutual attraction, they find themselves attending a romantic Irish festival together. After a night of wild celebration, they wake up the next morning to discover they have wed. Audrey is shocked, though Daniel takes their apparent marriage in his stride.

The pair return to New York and find news of their wedding printed on Page 6 of the New York Post the following day. Audrey suggests the two maintain the semblance of a marriage for the sake of their careers, and Daniel moves into the guest room of Audrey's apartment. Although, in the courtroom they continue to fight the Jamisons' high-profile divorce case with the gusto they have always shown, at home, they settle into domestic life together. While disposing of garbage one day, Daniel accidentally discovers some sensitive information about Audrey's client, Thorne Jamison, which he reveals in the next day's court proceedings. Audrey feels betrayed and asks for a divorce, which Daniel agrees to give, citing his love for her.

Next, their famous clients each return to the castle in Ireland, even though they are not permitted to be there because of the pending division of assets. Judge Abramovitz sends their respective counselors to Ireland to inform them of this, but on arrival they discover the celebrity couple has reconciled on the seventh anniversary of their wedding, which took place at the castle. Audrey and Daniel then learn that the "priest" who performed their own marriage ceremony is in fact the Jamisons' butler, and the "weddings" he presided over at the festival were simply romantic celebrations.

Daniel returns immediately to New York, alone, but with Audrey fast on his heels, as she realizes she has fallen in love with him. Confronting him in the grocery store below Daniel's Chinatown office, Audrey asks Daniel if he is willing to fight to save their relationship. In the romantic final scenes, the couple are married in a private ceremony in Judge Abramovitz's chambers, with Audrey's mother as the sole witness.

Billy West, otherwise known as Bayou Billy, is a Crocodile Dundee-like survivalist, vigilante, and former U.S. soldier from New Orleans, who has fought against a local crime boss, known as Godfather Gordon. In retaliation for interfering with his smuggling operations, Gordon kidnaps Billy's girlfriend Annabelle Lane in order to lure Billy into one final battle. Billy's quest to save Annabelle consists of nine stages that takes him from the swamplands to Bourbon Street, as he battles Gordon's henchmen and eventually arrives at Gordon's estate to come face-to-face with the big boss himself.

Architect Steven Kovacs moves into an apartment after a failed marriage proposal to his girlfriend Robin Harris. Taking advice from his friend Rick, Steven bribes cable installer Ernie "Chip" Douglas into giving him free movie channels. Chip gets Steven to hang out with him the next day and makes him one of his "preferred customers". Chip takes Steven to the city's central satellite dish, where he confides to Steven about being raised by television due to the frequent absences of his single mother. Chip soon proves to be intrusive as he crashes a basketball game between Steven and his friends and leaves multiple messages on Steven's answering machine. Following a knight's duel between Chip and Steven at Medieval Times, Steven finds that Chip has secretly installed an expensive home theater system in his living room as a gift in return for Steven's friendship. Although Steven declines the gift, he agrees to host a party attended by Chip's other preferred customers before having the system returned. In the fervor of the party, Steven sleeps with a young guest, whom Chip reveals the next morning to have been a prostitute that he had hired specifically for Steven. Upon this revelation, Steven angrily ejects Chip from his apartment.

To make amends, Chip tracks down Robin, who is dating another man. A disguised Chip severely beats the man in a restaurant bathroom and tells him to stay away from Robin. He later upgrades Robin's cable, ostensibly as a gift from Steven. Robin decides to get back together with Steven as a result. However, when Chip informs Steven of his role in reuniting him with Robin, Steven politely ends his relationship with Chip. Devastated, Chip sets out on a series of vengeful acts. He gets Steven arrested for possession of stolen property and mocks him through a prison visitation window. After being released on bail, Steven is further embarrassed when Chip attends dinner with his family and Robin. Following a sexualized version of the game ''Password'', Steven openly berates Chip and punches him. The next day, Steven is fired from his job when Chip transmits a privately recorded conversation, in which Steven insults his boss, onto the company's computers.

Rick investigates Chip at Steven's request and finds that Chip was fired from the cable company for stalking customers, and uses the names of various television characters as aliases such as Chip and Ernie Douglas from ''My Three Sons'' and Larry Tate from ''Bewitched''. Chip calls Steven that night, telling him he is paying Robin a visit. After visiting Robin's empty apartment, Steven tracks them down to the satellite dish, where Chip holds Robin hostage in a rainstorm. After a physical altercation and a chase, Steven is able to save Robin. As the police arrive, Chip apologizes to Steven for being a bad friend. Chip, proclaiming that he must "kill the babysitter" to prevent others from becoming like him, dives backward from the top of a ladder onto the satellite dish, knocking out the television signal to the entire city. Chip survives the fall with an injured back, and bids Steven farewell before being hauled away in a rescue helicopter. When one of the paramedics addresses him as "buddy", Chip asks the paramedic if he is truly his buddy, to which the paramedic replies "Yeah, sure you are", causing Chip to smile deviously, implying a repeat of Chip's stalking cycle.

IBC Television president Frank Cross is pushing his company to broadcast an extravagant live production of ''A Christmas Carol'' on Christmas Eve, making the staff work throughout the holiday. Frank fires executive Eliot Loudermilk for disagreeing with him, and sends cheap IBC-monogrammed towels to most of the people on his Christmas list, including his personal assistant Grace and his brother James, while the powerful and influential people on his list get an expensive four-head hi-fi stereo VCR. Frank's boss Preston Rhinelander, seeing the stress Frank is under with the production, brings in Brice Cummings to provide assistance, though Brice secretly wants Frank's job.

The night before the show, Frank is visited by the ghost of his mentor Lew Hayward, an unloved miser who died from a heart attack seven years prior. Lew warns him three more ghosts will appear to him over the next day to help Frank avoid the same fate. Before it vanishes, the ghost dials up Claire Phillips, Frank's lost love from years ago. Claire comes to the network to talk to Frank, but Frank does not make time for her and she returns to the homeless shelter where she works.

As rehearsals start, Frank is visited by the Ghost of Christmas Past, appearing as a manic taxi driver. He takes Frank to see his past: how he found solace in television after his mother left his father, and how he had fallen in love with Claire but lost her when he prioritized his television career over her. In the present, Frank goes to the shelter to see Claire, hoping to make amends. However, his attitude quickly sours and he shows his contempt for a homeless man named Herman and the shelter workers. He returns to the studio, but not before telling Claire: "If you wanna save someone, save yourself."

The Ghost of Christmas Present arrives as an ethereal, sweet-voiced fairy who punches, kicks and slaps Frank to focus his attention. She takes him to Grace's apartment, showing his assistant's struggles to support her large family, including her youngest son Calvin who has remained mute since witnessing his father's death. The Ghost then shows him James, spending a humble yet festive Christmas with a group of friends and his wife Wendie.

James still defends Frank, despite Frank's cheap gifts and his refusal to share in Christmas celebrations with him. The Ghost leaves him in a utility space under a sidewalk with Herman, who, Frank finds to his shock, has frozen to death. Frank desperately tries to escape, breaking through a boarded-up door to end back up on the set of the production. Preston directs Brice to take over rehearsals to give Frank some time off.

Retiring to his office, Frank finds a drunken Eliot waiting for him with a shotgun, ready to kill Frank for causing the loss of his job and family. Frank escapes into the elevator where the Grim Reaper-like Ghost of Christmas Future awaits. The Ghost takes him to the future where a now-catatonic Calvin has been institutionalized. Claire has heeded Frank's words and married rich, now viewing the homeless with disgust.

Finally, the Ghost shows Frank's cremation ceremony, with only James and Wendie in attendance. Frightened and remorseful, Frank is further shocked to find himself inside the casket as it is about to be incinerated; he breaks his way out, ending up out of the elevator and facing Eliot. Frank's completely changed demeanor surprises Eliot, particularly when Frank offers him a high-level executive position.

With Eliot's help, Frank returns to the production set, secures Brice in the control room, and breaks into the show's live broadcast to speak of his new appreciation for life. He apologizes on-air to Grace, James, and the cast and crew, and makes a passionate plea to Claire to come back to him. Claire sees this at the shelter and heads for the network with the help of the Ghost of Christmas Past. As Frank and Claire reunite, Calvin comes up to Frank and speaks for the first time, reminding him to say the words "God bless us, everyone", much to Grace's elation. Frank leads the crew in singing "Put a Little Love in Your Heart", and sees Lew, the three Ghosts, and the ghost of Herman smiling and waving back to him while singing along.

In Richmond, a city district in a time period that resembles the 1950s (referred to within the film as '''another time, another place'''), Ellen Aim, lead singer of Ellen Aim and the Attackers, has returned home for a concert. The Bombers, a biker gang from another part of town named the Battery, led by Raven Shaddock, crash the concert and kidnap Ellen.

Witnessing this is Reva Cody, who asks her brother Tom, an ex-soldier and Ellen's ex-boyfriend, to come home and rescue her. Upon his return, Tom defeats a small gang of greasers and takes their car. When Reva fails to convince Tom to rescue Ellen, he checks out the local tavern, the Blackhawk. He is annoyed by a tomboyish ex-soldier named McCoy, a mechanic who "could drive anything" and who is good with her fists. They leave the bar and Tom lets McCoy stay with him and Reva. That night, Tom agrees to rescue Ellen, but for $10,000 to be paid by Ellen's manager and current boyfriend, Billy Fish.

While Reva and McCoy go to a diner to wait for Billy, Tom acquires a cache of weapons, including a pump action shotgun, a revolver, and a lever action rifle. Tom and Billy meet at the diner, and Billy agrees to pay Tom, but Tom requires that Billy accompany him into the Battery to get Ellen, since he used to live there; after some negotiation, Billy agrees to go, and McCoy talks Tom into cutting her in for 10% in exchange for her help.

In the Battery, they visit Torchie's, where Billy used to book bands. They wait until nightfall under an overpass, watching bikers come and go. Raven has Ellen tied up in an upstairs bedroom. As Tom, Billy, and McCoy approach, Tom directs Billy to get the car and be out front in fifteen minutes.

McCoy enters and is stopped by one of the "Bombers". Pretending to like him, McCoy follows him to his special "party room", close to where Raven is playing poker. McCoy then knocks him out. Tom finds a window and, as a distraction, starts shooting the gas tanks on the gang's motorcycles; he then reaches Ellen's room, cuts her free and, with McCoy's help, escapes just as Billy arrives at the front door.

Riding in the convertible, Tom sends his crew off to meet at the Grant Street Overpass, and leaves to blow up the gas pumps outside a bar. Raven appears out of the flames to confront Tom. After learning who he is, Raven warns he will be coming for Ellen and for him, too. Tom escapes on the one intact motorcycle. Billy persuades Ellen the only reason Tom rescued her was for money. Tom returns, as McCoy explains to Billy that Tom used to be Ellen's boyfriend.

Ellen follows Tom, while Billy and McCoy go back and forth once again about Tom and Ellen's love affair. Ellen and Tom also have an argument. When they all meet up on the street, they are in the Battery. The group is joined by "Baby Doll", a fan of Ellen's, who warns them that the police are looking for whoever caused the fight at Torchie's. In an attempt to escape undetected, the group boards the tour bus of a band called The Sorels. The Sorels try to convince Ellen to let them open for her, and when the bus is stopped by the police, McCoy and Billy masquerade as the band's driver and manager, respectively. The charade almost fools the police, but ultimately the crew (now including the members of the Sorels) has to escape on foot and take a train back to The Richmond. They return Ellen safely home, where she initially rejects her home town as well as Tom. Later, he goes to the hotel where Ellen and Billy are staying, to collect his reward. He takes only McCoy's cut and throws the rest back at Billy. He then tells Ellen that there was a time he would have done anything for her, but no more. As Tom storms out, Ellen follows and the two embrace in the rain.

Meanwhile, Raven informs Officer Ed Price, the head of the police department, that he wants Tom to meet him alone. If he agrees, he will leave the Richmond alone. Price warns Tom to get out of town. Tom, Ellen, and McCoy leave on a train, but Tom knocks out Ellen and returns to town for a climactic sledgehammer duel with Raven. Tom defeats Raven and the defeated gang carries their leader away. Later that night, Tom bids a final goodbye to Ellen as she performs on stage, and he rides off with McCoy.

The player has a choice between four street fighters: Briggs, a dishonorably discharged soldier; Proof, an ex-superbike racer; Tank, a massive Japanese fighter, and the DJ Spider, although the story is the same for each of them.

When the player chooses their street fighter, they are then called up to help out their friend Manny by taking his place in a street fight. Once the player wins a certain number of fights, they'll go against the rapper Scarface. Once the player beats his character, they'll get their first girlfriend, Deja. Other girls will come up to the player every couple of street fights, and then eventually, the player will have to choose which one should be the street fighter's new girlfriend, from which they'll all fight each other.

Eventually, N.O.R.E. will challenge The Protagonist to a fight at ''Grimeyville'' in LeFrak City, Queens, New York City. Before the fight, The Protagonist arrives and almost gets into a fight with D-Mob (Chris Judge). Not long after the fight, Manny signs The Protagonist and him up for a tag team tournament. After a while, The Protagonist will be challenged by Ludacris to a fight in Club Luda. After the fight, D-Mob claims that The Protagonist and Manny are nothing. He says that if anyone in the club wants the power and respect, they have to beat him at the Def Jam tournament. Manny tells The Protagonist to stop fighting, but he ignores him.

DMX challenges The Protagonist but first the character has to overcome The Dragon House's offer. Once they have done that, they take on Method Man and Redman in the finale of the tag team tournament. After that, The Protagonist fights DMX. Once The Protagonist wins, they receive an email from Angel (The Protagonist's girlfriend taken by D-Mob) saying that they need to talk. When they arrive at The Face Club, it is revealed that D-Mob has sent House, Pockets and Snowman to stop them from coming to the Def Jam tournament. The Protagonist defeats them, but Manny knocks him out and joins D-Mob against his will. Soon The Protagonist wakes up and enters the tournament and defeat their best fighters. D-Mob then attempts to shoot The Protagonist but Manny takes the bullet and survives. Your character triumphs over D-Mob and gets back Angel. While The Protagonist is walking out, D-Mob is arrested, leading up to the events of ''Def Jam: Fight for NY''.

In the opening scene of the movie, set in a house in Washington, near the Pentagon, Lt. Cdr. Tom Farrell of the Office of Naval Intelligence is shown being debriefed by 2 other men. He is tired and bloodied. His interrogators press him on how Farrell came to meet the Secretary of Defense David Brice.

The story flashes back 6 months, showing Farrell attending an inaugural ball, invited by Scott Pritchard, a his college buddy who intends to introduce him to Secretary of Defense David Brice. There, Farrell also meets Susan Atwell, and the two begin an affair. Brice and Pritchard, his second-in-command, later hire Farrell to get secret information from other government agencies, such as the CIA, and pass it on to Brice. Farrell finds that he may be at times working with Sam Hesselman, an old friend now working as a programmer/analyst in the Pentagon's new computer center. Atwell eventually tells Farrell that she is Brice's mistress.

After Atwell and Farrell return from a romantic weekend, Brice visits her unexpectedly and becomes suspicious that she has another lover. When Atwell tells Brice to leave, he becomes enraged and accidentally pushes her to her death over an upstairs railing. Brice confesses what has happened to Pritchard, who suggests that if Atwell's other lover were alleged to be a suspected KGB sleeper agent code-named "Yuri", then investigating her death could be made a matter of national security and "Yuri" could be killed "in the line of duty" by operatives under Pritchard's control. At Atwell's house, Pritchard discovers the negative of a photograph she had earlier taken of Farrell. The negative is blurry and does not show a recognizable face, but Hesselman attempts to have the image enhanced by computer, a process that may take days.

Army CID officers, commanded by Major Donovan, scour Atwell's apartment for evidence. Meanwhile, as his initial shock begins to wear away, Farrell realizes that Brice is the real murderer and that Pritchard is helping him cover up the crime. At the same time, Farrell also becomes aware that the evidence gathered so far makes him the prime suspect. Farrell determines to play along with the bogus investigation until he can develop evidence linking Brice to Atwell, so that he can defend himself against being charged with both murder and espionage (as "Yuri").

Farrell learns that one piece of evidence is a Moroccan jewel box, a gift to Atwell from Brice. As any foreign gift must be registered with the State Department, Farrell gets Hesselman to "raid" State's computerized registry of such items, which should link the gift to Brice. However, the plan begins unraveling when Pritchard finds Atwell's address book, which Pritchard uses to track down and question her friend Nina. She pretends not to recognize Farrell, but reveals that she knows that Atwell was dating Brice. Pritchard sends two former CIA assassins to eliminate her. Overhearing this, Farrell delays the assassins while warning Nina, who goes into hiding. This activity raises Pritchard's suspicions of Farrell's loyalty to Brice and himself, as well as his motives for attempting to disrupt the coverup.

Farrell convinces Hesselman to delay the photo enhancement by confiding to him that Farrell is the person in the photo, that he was in love with Atwell, and that Brice killed Atwell. The CID begins a search of the Pentagon on grounds that "Yuri" is somewhere in the building, but Farrell eludes the search by climbing into a ceiling vent. Believing that Farrell is delusional, Hesselman informs Pritchard about what he has told him. Hesselman is then killed by Pritchard. Knowing that Farrell has a printout of the gift registry data connecting him to Atwell, Brice improvises a different story: Pritchard, who is gay, killed Atwell out of jealousy of Brice's relationship with her. The devastated Pritchard commits suicide and, when guards break in, Brice identifies Pritchard as "Yuri," concluding the search for the spy.

Farrell quietly sends the printout by courier to the Director of the CIA, an enemy of Brice, then leaves the Pentagon as the finished image enhancement of the photograph positively reveals Farrell as Atwell's lover. Later, Farrell is picked up by two men while sitting despondently at Atwell's grave, the men shown at the beginning of the story. They begin to interrogate Farrell about why things were so "poorly handled."

Farrell angrily confronts the chief interrogator who is revealed to be, not American, but Russian, and that Farrell ''has'' actually been "Yuri" the entire time, a deep cover Soviet agent passing as an American and working as a high level mole inside the Pentagon. The KGB ordered Farrell to seduce Brice's mistress to gather intelligence from her. Farrell's handler, his landlord, tells "Yuri" that America is no longer safe for him and that it is time for him to return to the Soviet Union. Revealing that he genuinely loved Susan Atwell, Farrell refuses and tells his handlers that he is finished being a spy. Though the other KGB are ready to kill Farrell, his handler orders to them to allow Farrell to escape, believing that Farrell will return on his own. In the final scenes, Farrell is seen driving away from the house, to meet an uncertain fate.

In August 1942 the American forces are fighting the Japanese in the South Pacific during World War II. Fresh out of PT boat training school in Melville, Rhode Island, U.S. Navy Lieutenant, junior grade John F. Kennedy used his wealthy and powerful family's influence to get himself assigned to the fighting in the Solomon Islands, a hotbed in the Pacific Theater.

Once there he lobbies for command and is given the well worn ''PT 109''. Initially, Tulagi's irascible boat maintenance officer Commander C. R. Ritchie is unimpressed with the young, untested Kennedy, but the lieutenant is undaunted. With a hodge-podge crew anchored by Ensign Leonard J. Thom as executive officer and initially skeptical sailors "Bucky" Harris and Edmund Drewitch he gets the 109 seaworthy again.

Without enough fuel for the return trip, the ''PT 109'' is dispatched on an emergency mission to evacuate paramarines pinned down on a distant beach after disrupting the Japanese in the Raid on Choiseul. Under heavy fire Kennedy rescues the survivors, but barely gets out of range before his engines die. Drawn shoreward by an incoming tide, the boat and its passengers are saved from disaster when a tow arrives just in time.

The ''109'' is then relocated to a base on Rendova. While on patrol one dark, moonless night in August 1943, the radar-less boat is throttled down and searching for a Japanese convoy returning from a supply mission via "The Slot". Out of nowhere an Imperial Navy destroyer appears, and before Kennedy can react the ''PT 109'' is rammed and sliced in half, killing two of her 13 crewmen.

Towing a badly burned crew member by a life jacket strap clenched in his teeth, Kennedy leads the survivors to Plum Pudding Island. The next day the abandoned wreckage is spotted by a reconnaissance plane, and the ''109'''s crew is presumed lost with all hands. After dark, Kennedy swims out into the channel with a signal lantern, staying out all night in the hope of flagging down a passing U.S. vessel. The next night, he sends out a friend who tagged along on the mission, Ensign George Ross.

After several fruitless days morale drops and Kennedy is forced to quell an uprising determined to surrender. Hoping for better prospects of food and water on a nearby island, he leads the crew on another three-mile swim. There two rifle-armed natives show up in a canoe and hold the men at gunpoint, confused as to their identity and affiliation. As the pair do not understand English but appear receptive, Kennedy carves a message on a coconut requesting rescue and gives it to them. They take it to Australian coastwatcher Lieutenant Reginald Evans. Evans notifies the U.S. Navy, and the men are rescued by PT boat without any further loss of life.

As a result of their ordeal Kennedy and his men are eligible for leave back in the U.S., but he and several loyal crewmembers elect to stay and continue the fight on a new combat-weathered boat.

Small-town teacher Johnny Smith is involved in a car accident that leaves him comatose for approximately six years. After regaining consciousness, Johnny begins having visions of the past and future triggered by touching items or people; doctors attribute the visions to activity in a previously unused "dead zone" of his brain that is attempting to compensate for the impaired function of the portions injured in the accident. Johnny also learns that his fiancée, Sarah, gave birth to his son in the interim following the accident, but has since married another man.

With the help of Sarah, her husband (and town sheriff) Walt Bannerman, and physical therapist Bruce, Johnny begins using his abilities to help solve crimes. However, his attempts to do good are complicated by intermittent visions of apocalyptic events brought about following the future election of congressional candidate Greg Stillson.

The film reenacts Robert Chambers' murder of Jennifer Levin. Robert Chambers, a man who attended prep schools on a scholarship, kills Jennifer Levin, who herself was of a privileged background after they leave a trendy Manhattan bar together. When Detective Mike Sheehan arrests him, Chambers claims that he killed her in self-defense after rough sex got out of hand. In the ensuing trial, Chambers' attorney, Jack Litman, attacks Levin's personal history. Chambers eventually pleads guilty to a lesser charge of manslaughter.

A high school student named Brett Bumpers (Weston) receives a mysterious package one day. It contains a bull penis totem with a note explaining that it will grant him three wishes. His first wish is for Samantha (Alexandra Holden) to go with him to a spring dance. The next day, Samantha invites him to the dance, and he suspects that his wish has come true. Samantha's boyfriend Cody is the star jock at the school, and he is humiliated by Samantha's decision.

After the dance, one of Cody's buddies is murdered by a cloaked figure with a grotesquely disfigured face. When Brett drops Samantha off at home, she suggests that they should return to just being friends. Heartbroken, Brett makes his second wish that Samantha would become his girlfriend and actually fall in love with him. The next day, Samantha breaks up with Cody and initiates a relationship with Brett. Meanwhile, the cloaked figure continues to kill students at the high school.

Feeling guilty about wishing Samantha into a relationship, Brett confesses the truth to her. As Samantha is coming to grips with the truth, the cloaked figure attacks the pair. He lures Brett away from Samantha and then reveals himself to be Brett's history teacher, Mr. Turner (Austin Pendleton). Mr. Turner explains that he bought the totem and discovered that it actually granted wishes. He wished his wife dead, to avoid divorcing her. Then he wished for "Fuck-you-money", and he promptly got $100 million which he hid in a Swiss bank account. Mr. Turner confessed that he also wished for supernatural strength, because he decided to kill problem students at the school. As he was killing the students on his list, he sent the totem to Brett because he was an exemplary student. If the totem is given to another person, that person can also make three wishes.

Mr. Turner then reveals that Samantha is the last name on his list. Just as he is about to kill Samantha, Brett makes his third wish, asking for more strength and agility than Mr. Turner. The two struggle, and eventually, Brett kills Mr. Turner with a samurai sword. Brett gives the totem to Samantha so that she is not forced to love him against her will. She uses the totem to begin their relationship again, but this time, on her own terms.

Isabel Archer is a very beautiful woman, who has already rejected many suitors: among them the wealthy Lord Warburton and Caspar Goodwood, to whom she had initially given hope. Caspar's arrival is arranged by Henrietta, a close friend of Isabel, who cares for her deeply. Isabel's strong character and free-spirited nature is adored by her cousin, Ralph Touchett, who persuades his father, her uncle, to give Isabel money so that she can be rich and independent. Upon her uncle's death, Isabel receives a fortune.

Isabel encounters Madame Serena and instantly likes her, however, learning about Isabel's wealth, Serena decides to arrange a marriage between Isabel and Serena's former lover Gilbert Osmond, who lives in Florence, Italy. Gilbert is a widower and has a daughter Pansy, who grew up in a convent and is not allowed to leave the house, even to walk in the garden, when her father is away. Isabel is enchanted by Gilbert and accepts the proposal; however, she's warned by Ralph that Gilbert is a "small man" and Isabel is giving up her dreams to be in a cage with a worthless husband. Isabel is enraged and slaps Ralph, to which he calmly answers that he said what he must, that he loves Isabel, and that he knows he has no hope. It's also evident that he's slowly dying from consumption.

Gilbert is nice to Isabel until after they are married. Isabel finds herself trapped in Rome in an unhappy marriage with a fear of her abusive husband, who gradually disconnects her from all of her friends. Henrietta, Ralph, and Caspar all leave for England. Pansy is also a victim of her father's overly protective behavior; she's in love with Rosier, but Gilbert has decided to arrange a marriage between her and Lord Warburton, who is attentive to Pansy just to get closer to Isabel. Isabel sees the mutual love between Pansy and Rosier and is deeply moved. Gilbert sees through Isabel's schemes to prevent Pansy becoming engaged to Warburton, but he is too late; Lord Warburton leaves Italy. Gilbert angrily slaps Isabel and steps on her dress so that she falls on the ground. Serena deeply regrets organizing the fateful union between Gilbert and Isabel.

Isabel learns that Ralph is overtaken by consumption and is on his deathbed. She asks Gilbert to let her to go to England to be with her dying cousin, but receives a cold and negative answer. Pansy is sent to a convent away from her lover. Isabel is pitied by Gilbert's sister, who finally opens Isabel's eyes, telling her that Gilbert's first wife was childless and Pansy is, in fact, Gilbert and Serena's daughter. Isabel finally decides to go against her husband's wishes and leave for England. She visits Pansy and proposes the girl to flee, but Pansy refuses, saying that she wants to please her father. In the convent, Isabel also encounters Serena, but proudly ignores her attempts to start a conversation. However, in the last minute before Isabel leaves, Serena runs to her - she has guessed Isabel is going to England to Ralph and reveals to Isabel that Ralph is the one that persuaded the uncle to give Isabel her fortune. On Ralph's deathbed, Isabel tearfully confesses that he's been her best friend and she loves him. Henrietta and Caspar attend Ralph's funeral. In the garden, Caspar tries to persuade Isabel to let go of her fear of her husband. They kiss passionately, but Isabel runs away to the house. She suddenly stops before the house door, and leans against it, looking back into the garden.

In London, in 1908, aspiring journalist and women's rights campaigner Sonia Winter (Diana Rigg) uncovers an organisation that specialises in killing for money, the Assassination Bureau Limited. To bring about its destruction, she commissions the assassination of the bureau's own chairman, Ivan Dragomiloff (Oliver Reed) for £20,000 after being bankrolled by her employer, Lord Bostwick.

Far from being outraged or angry, Dragomiloff is amused and delighted and decides to turn the situation to his own advantage. The guiding principle of his bureau, founded by his father, has always been that there was a moral reason why their victims should be killed; these have included despots and tyrants. More recently, though, his elder colleagues have tended to kill more for financial gain than for moral reasons. Dragomiloff, therefore, decides to accept the commission of his own death and challenge the other board members: Kill him or he will kill them!

He meets Miss Winter at the Albert Memorial and with her in tow, Dragomiloff sets off on a tour of Edwardian Europe, challenging and systematically purging the bureau's senior members. Their first stop is Paris where Dragomiloff disguises himself as Le Comte and goes to a brothel. Miss Winters materialises and they hide in a laundry room. The staff outside put a gas pipe into the room, but there is a police raid. They escape down the laundry chute, but leave a booby trap that blows the room up when the door is eventually smashed in, killing Lucoville. Miss Winters is arrested while Dragomiloff sneaks off.

She catches him on a train to Zurich, but Popescu also appears, disguised as a train waiter serving cognac and cigars. He pulls a gun, but Dragomiloff sprays him with fiery brandy, lit by the cigar, burning his face and he jumps off the train and dies. In Zurich the bank manager Weiss pulls a gun on a suspicious-looking customer and throws his bag into the street, thinking it is a bomb. The angry customer leaves, and while Weiss is distracted, Dragomiloff hides a real bomb that kills Weiss.

Next, in Vienna the couple watch a military parade. A man behind them pulls a pistol, but he is trying to assassinate the Archduke watching the parade from a balcony opposite. Dragomiloff disdainfully remarks to Miss Winters that had "The Assassination Bureau" undertaken this "assignment", the Archduke would not remain alive. In Venice Bureau member Cesare Spado dies after being poisoned by his wife; with the help of her lover Angelo she tries to poison Dragomiloff and have Baron Muntzof kill Miss Winters. Dragomiloff not only survives the attempt on his life, but kills both Angelo and Muntzof and rescues Miss Winters. Eleanora Spado tries to blackmail the Assassination Bureau for money by using her knowledge of its existence; the Bureau's response is to have General Pinck kill her with his Luger pistol.

Little do they realise that this is a plot by Miss Winter's sponsor, newspaper publisher Lord Bostwick (Telly Savalas), to take over the bureau, as Bostwick is the bureau's vice-chairman and is bitter for having been passed over in favour of the founder's son. Bostwick and the other surviving members of the Bureau plan to get rich quick by the "biggest killing" of them all, namely buying stocks in arms companies and then propelling Europe into a world war. Their plan is to assassinate all the European heads of state. They attend a secret peace conference where the kings, emperors, and prime ministers of Europe are trying to avoid a possible war over the assassination of a Balkan prince who had accidentally been killed by a bomb intended for Dragomiloff.

Dragomiloff and Miss Winter uncover the plot, which is to drop a large aerial bomb from a hijacked Zeppelin airship directly onto the castle in Ruthenia where the peace conference is being held. Dragomiloff steals aboard the airship and successfully destroys the bomb, while also disposing of Lord Bostwick and all the remaining members of his board of directors. For example, he exploits General Pinck's one weakness, a sword duel challenge to the death. He is heralded as a hero and later decorated by the heads of state that he has saved. It is implied that Dragomiloff may now wed Miss Winter, since he has been redeemed by his actions.

The novel commences on February 23, 1861 as Lincoln, the incumbent president, is traveling to Washington for his inauguration. It is in Washington where a majority of the novel is set. Washington is depicted as turbulent and deteriorating with infestations of pests, poor infrastructure, a Capitol building without a dome, and an incomplete Washington Monument. The novel extends across Lincoln’s two terms of office throughout the American civil war. It offers a detailed and extensive narrative, with the book totaling over 650 pages. It primarily focuses on Lincoln's efforts to unite and mobilize political adversaries and military strategists to ultimately win the war. It is through the various perspectives of other characters that Vidal portrays an ambitious visionary who struggles with an unstable marriage, physical ailments and the failing trust of his fellow cabinet members. The novel also explores Lincoln’s growth as he overcomes these personal and political burdens to ultimately triumph and preserve the union. Vidal completes the novel with President Lincoln’s assassination.

Urland, a sixth-century post-Roman kingdom situated near the River Ur,Fingeroth, Danny, 1981, The Making of Dragonslayer in Dragonslayer - The Official Marvel Comics Adaptation of the Spectacular Paramount/Disney Motion Picture!, Marvel Super Special, 1, 20, Marvel Comics Group, 1981 is being terrorized by Vermithrax Pejorative, a 400-year-old dragon. To appease the creature, King Casiodorus offers it virgin girls selected by lottery twice a year. An expedition led by a young man called Valerian seeks help from the last sorcerer, Ulrich of Cragganmore.

The expedition is followed by Tyrian, the brutal and cynical Captain of Casiodorus's Royal Guard. He and his lieutenant Jerbul openly intimidate the wizard, doubtful of his abilities. Ulrich invites Tyrian to stab him to prove his magical powers. Tyrian does so and Ulrich dies instantly, to the horror of his young apprentice Galen Bradwarden and his elderly servant Hodge, who cremates Ulrich's body and places the ashes in a leather pouch. Hodge informs Galen that Ulrich wanted his ashes spread over a lake of burning water.

Galen is selected by the wizard's magical amulet as its next owner; encouraged, he journeys to Urland. On the way, he discovers Valerian is actually a young woman, who is disguised to avoid being selected in the lottery. In an effort to discourage the expedition, Tyrian kills Hodge. Just before dying, he hands Galen the pouch of ashes.

Arriving in Urland, Galen inspects the dragon's lair and magically seals – he thinks – its entrance with a rock slide. Tyrian apprehends Galen and takes him to Castle Morgenthorme, from which King Casiodorus governs Urland. Casiodorus guesses that Galen is not a real wizard and complains that his attack may have angered the dragon instead of killing it, as his own brother and predecessor once did. The king confiscates the amulet and imprisons Galen. His daughter, Princess Elspeth, visits Galen and is shocked when he informs her of rumors that the lottery is rigged; it excludes her name, and those who are rich enough to bribe the king into disqualifying their children. Her father is unable to lie convincingly when she confronts him over this.

Meanwhile, the dragon frees itself from its prison and causes an earthquake. Galen narrowly escapes from his prison, but without the amulet. The village priest, Brother Jacopus, leads his congregation to confront the dragon, denouncing it as the Devil, but the dragon incinerates him and then heads for the village of Swanscombe, burning all in its path.

When the lottery begins anew, Elspeth rigs the draw so that only her name can be chosen. Consequently, King Casiodorus returns the amulet to Galen so that he might save Elspeth. Galen uses the amulet to enchant a heavy spear that had been forged by Valerian's father (which he had dubbed ''Sicarius Dracorum'', or "Dragonslayer") with the ability to pierce the dragon's armored hide. Valerian gathers some molted dragon scales to create a shield for Galen. Valerian laments now that her cross-dressing disguise is blown, she'll be eligible for the lottery since she herself is still a virgin, and that Galen has fallen in love with Princess Elspeth. Galen admits he has fallen in love, but it's Valerian, not Elspeth, he's in love with. The couple kiss, thus realizing their romantic feelings for each other.

Attempting to rescue Elspeth, Galen fights Tyrian and kills him emerging victorious. The Princess, however, is determined to make amends for all the girls whose names have been chosen in the past; she descends into the dragon's cave and to her death. Galen follows her and finds a brood of young dragons feasting on her corpse. He kills them and finds Vermithrax resting by an underground lake of fire. He manages to wound the dragon, but the spear is broken. Only Valerian's shield saves him from incineration.

After his failure to kill Vermithrax, Valerian convinces Galen to leave Swanscombe with her. As both prepare to depart, the amulet gives Galen a vision explaining his teacher's final wish to use Galen to deliver him to Urland. Ulrich had asked that his ashes be spread over "burning water", which is in the dragon's cave. Galen realizes that the wizard had planned his own death and cremation, realizing he was too old and frail to make the journey.

Galen returns to the cave. When he spreads the ashes over the fiery lake, the wizard is resurrected within the flames. Ulrich reveals that his time is short and that Galen must destroy the amulet "when the time is right". The wizard then transports himself to a mountaintop, where he summons a storm and confronts Vermithrax. After a brief battle, the monster snatches the old man and flies away with him. Cued by Ulrich, Galen crushes the amulet with a rock. The wizard's body explodes and kills the dragon, whose corpse falls out of the sky.

In the aftermath, villagers inspecting the wreckage credit God with the victory. The king arrives and drives a sword into the dragon's broken carcass to claim the glory for himself. As Galen and Valerian leave Urland together, he confesses that he misses both Ulrich and the amulet. He says, "I just wish we had a horse." Suddenly, a white horse appears, insinuating that the power of the amulet is now within Galen himself. The couple mounts the horse and rides away.

PaRappa, having won a lifetime's worth supply of instant noodle products, has become nothing short of weary from eating nothing but noodles for every meal every single day. When PaRappa complains about being served noodles by his crush, Sunny Funny, he becomes shocked when she calls him a baby, causing him to question his own maturity. When PaRappa and his friend P.J. Berri go to eat at Beard Burger instead, they learn that a mysterious phenomenon is turning all the food in town into noodles. From a poster, the Beard Burger Master, the person who opened Beard Burgers, comes back as a ghost and helps PaRappa make a "Traditional Parappa Town Burger". Papa PaRappa and General Potter, PaRappa and Sunny's respective fathers, try to develop an invention that can stop the "noodlelization." However, they inadvertently shrink themselves in the process. Afterwards, PaRappa and P.J. participate in a workout on an adult show run by Chop Chop Master Onion, not knowing that Papa PaRappa and Potter are stuck small by Papa PaRappa's invention. PaRappa presses a remote for a different T.V. show but accidentally shrinks both P.J. and himself, along with their friends and some other people. They are soon helped out by the Guru Ant and return to normal size. After undergoing army training under Instructor Moosesha, PaRappa helps rescue a Hairdresser Octopus from being hypnotized into giving people afros, later discovering "Food Court", a video game cartridge, to be the cause. PaRappa's father warns that if the player loses the game, the cartridge will curse them to only be able to eat noodles. Despite this, PaRappa insists that he should be the one to complete the game.

Upon winning the game, PaRappa's father reverse engineers the cartridge to create a device that can reverse the noodlelization. PaRappa and the others use sweets and the de-noodlelization devices to combat against the Noodle Syndicate, who are behind the town's noodlelization. They soon confront the mastermind, Colonel Noodle, who is revealed to be the son of Beard Burger Master who, similar to PaRappa's situation, had grown nothing short of weary from eating burgers all his life and decided that noodles should rule the world instead. Thankfully, PaRappa manages to convince him to be more open-minded about various types of food. As everyone celebrates with a party, Sunny assures PaRappa that he's more mature than what he thinks himself to be. Everything returns to normal excluding the situation repeating itself when he wins a lifetime supply of cheese.

Ben Cronin is a star swimmer of his high school's swim team. His coach informs him that Stanford University scouts will appear at next week's swim meet. Ben and his girlfriend Amy discuss their future plans. Amy wants to attend school in Rhode Island but explains she will go to school in California to stay close to Ben. The next day, Ben nearly runs his car into Madison Bell and gives her a ride home as an apology. Later, he realizes that Madison left her notebook in his car. The notebook is filled with music notes, and Ben spots his initials written inside a staff. When he returns the notebook, he meets Madison's cousin, Christopher. Madison appears stressed and explains she has not eaten, so Ben offers to take her to a diner. At the diner, Ben tells Madison about his girlfriend, but Madison does not appear too bothered and explains that she has a boy waiting for her in New York City.

Ben shares some of his past with Madison: he began doing drugs five years ago, which led to crime and six months in juvenile hall, which "saved him" because he ultimately realized his passion and talent for swimming. Although Ben tries to end the date, Madison convinces him to go to the pool. Her aggressive flirtation lures Ben in, and despite his initial hesitancy, the two have sex. Both agree to remain friends and not to discuss their encounter.

The next night, Ben goes to a party at Amy's house. Amy introduces Ben to her new friend, who turns out to be Madison. The two pretend to have not met one another. Shortly after, Madison obsesses over Ben—she stops by his house to meet his mom and bombards Ben with e-mails and instant messages. Ben realizes her unhealthy behavior and demands her to leave him alone. Ben's lying eats at him, but before he confesses, Madison tells Amy first. Madison dates Ben's rival teammate, Josh. Right before their biggest swim competition, Ben is disqualified for having steroids in his urine. Outraged and suspecting Madison had Josh set him up, he confronts Josh about the drug test, revealing his suspicion. Days later, Madison accidentally calls Josh by Ben's name while they are kissing in a car. Josh realizes that Madison's obsession with Ben is real and tells her off.

Ben tries to tell Amy everything, but she doesn’t believe him. The next day, he goes to the pool, where he finds Josh dead. The police suspect that Ben murdered Josh, so to prove his innocence, Ben breaks into Madison's room to find evidence, where he discovers a bottle of steroids and a creepy shrine of his personal belongings she has been secretly stashing. Christopher warns Ben of a similar case regarding a man named Jake Donnelly. When Ben visits Jake in the hospital, a nurse tells him that Jake's girlfriend Madison survived the crash.

Disguising herself as Ben, Madison steals his car, follows Amy home from school and runs her off the road, with Ben being framed for the crime. That night at the hospital, Ben and a few friends record Madison confessing her crime and intentions, resulting in her arrest. She escapes custody by stealing an officer's gun and shooting the two policemen escorting her, then enters Ben's house and drags Amy to the school's swimming pool. After watching Madison throw a handcuffed and chairbound Amy into the pool, Ben dives in. Madison attacks them with the handle of a pool cleaner, and Ben grabs one end, pulling her into the pool. Unable to swim, Madison drowns while Ben frees the drowned Amy from her handcuffs, carries her out of the pool, and then resuscitates her via mouth-to-mouth artificial respiration. Later, after watching a swim meet, Ben goes outside to his car, where he and Amy kiss and drive away.

Matt Sullivan lives in San Francisco with his roommate Ryan, working at a dot-com company. His obsession with his ex-girlfriend Nicole causes him sexual dysfunction with other women, which he confides to his brother John, a Catholic priest-in-training. After disastrously trying to fake an orgasm with a date, Matt learns that Nicole is now engaged. Hoping to resolve his issues, he vows to abstain from sexual stimulation, including masturbation, for the 40 days of Lent.

On the first day of his celibacy, Matt purges his apartment of items of temptation and reminders of Nicole. He befriends a stranger named Erica at a laundromat, despite being unable to speak to her. Unbeknownst to Matt, his coworkers and Ryan start a pool to bet on how long he can last, which soon spreads online. He revisits the laundromat to see Erica, who reveals she works as a “cyber nanny” filtering internet pornography. They share an emotional connection, and Matt takes Erica on a date riding the city bus, but awkwardly avoids kissing her.

They both discover his coworkers’ betting pool, complete with its own website. Matt tries to explain his intentions but Erica remains upset, and Matt’s boss decides to join him in celibacy. Having fallen for Matt, she agrees to another date, where they run into Nicole and her fiancé. Frustrated by Matt’s vow and his feelings for Nicole, Erica leaves him. Struggling with his urges, Matt is forced to endure his coworkers’ attempts to sabotage him. He turns to his brother for help, but even a family dinner results in their parents discussing their own sex life.

By Day 35 of Matt’s vow, the pool has reached $18,000, and a colleague convinces him to give in. As Matt marches into the bathroom to masturbate, he discovers his boss – who accidentally had a Viagra-spiked drink intended for Matt – masturbating in the next stall. With the entire office waiting, Matt escapes through the bathroom window and goes to Erica. They reconcile, and spend a night of intimacy together without actual intercourse.

On Day 38, Matt has an inadvertent erection at work and is sent home. Nicole arrives at his apartment, having broken up with her cheating fiancé, but Matt rejects her advances and sends her away, which only excites her more. Overhearing the bet the next day, she goes to Matt’s coworkers, adding her own $3,500 to the pot and discovering that Matt has plans to celebrate with Erica at midnight when his vow ends.

On Day 40, the long-suffering Matt is unable to stop picturing women naked. He walks in on his brother kissing a nun; tormented by Matt’s exploits, John is taking a sabbatical from the priesthood. Fighting to contain himself, Matt has Ryan handcuff him to his bed, and awakens from an erotic dream to find Nicole has raped him while he was asleep, just before midnight. Arriving as Nicole is leaving, Erica assumes Matt was unfaithful and dishonored his vow, and storms out.

Determined to win Erica back, Matt gives her a box of moments they had shared; he finds her at the laundromat, and they finally kiss. As they consummate their relationship in Matt’s bedroom for hours, Ryan and the coworkers wait outside and place new bets on how long he can last, until Matt kicks them all out.

Cassie Harrison, a 13-year-old girl, is searching the universe for her father after he was kidnapped by space pirates. To help her, she enlists the aid of the only bounty hunter she can afford, a talking blue hamster named Marion. They have an odd-couple style relationship and search the universe together for Cassie's father.

The blue space ship the pair use is divided into two parts, a driving cockpit which can be detached in order to fly down to a planet in a similar manner to a jolly boat from a vessel, and a larger booster component which is attached on top of the small driving compartment. Scenes involving driving often show large objects and rooms that appear within the ship. The name of the ship is Keith.

Running gags include Marion pulling many, or odd, objects from his cheeks as if they are large pockets. In one instance he pulls out a large assortment of objects to help him and Cassie when they are falling off a cliff and this includes a cruise ship. Also, one of the science fiction references is the gag in which C-3PO from ''Star Wars'' appears in the ship and Cassie asks who he is.

Every episode starts with a brief explanation of the basic running plot and features a sequence showing Cassie's father being taken away. This is followed by a short sequence showing Marion being uncovered from a 'tough' armoured outfit and standing on stilts. The next sequence features the screen divided into four quarters, each showing several different scenes from episodes. The credits culminate in Marion uttering a fierce growl. The closing credits show an image of stars in space. The tune to the theme sounds like the words 'bounty hamster' but with notes to a 3-4 beat.

Despite airing in a children's timeslot, the show has quite a broad appeal, containing frequent science fiction references, in-jokes and puns, as well as nods to other movies and TV series. Marion's name and eyepatch is a parody of John Wayne and the character he played in ''True Grit''. The show's premise is also based on ''True Grit'' – a young girl loses her father and then hires a bounty hunter.

On his 30th birthday, unemployed rogue Tommy Deacon (Bobby Howes) inherits his aunt's fortune, but is informed it has been hidden in a bust of Napoleon in a country house he has also inherited. On discovering the house is now an Academy for Young Ladies, Tommy pretends to be the brother of Anne (René Ray), one of the girls, in order to gain admittance.

''Chrono Crusade'' is set in the height of the Roaring Twenties, where jazz is king, bootleg liquor flows freely, and the mob rules the streets. It is a time of prosperity, luxury and decadence, and the division between rich and poor grows even wider in the wake of the First World War. It is at such times of great change and upheaval that the dark things that lurk below the world of man can come to the surface. In the world of ''Chrono Crusade'', a fictional organization known as the Order of Magdalene (home to the characters Sister Rosette Christopher and her soul-bound demon partner, Chrono) exists to fight the demonic threats that appear with increasing regularity across America. Both Rosette and Chrono are revealed during the course of the story to be driven by a shadowy past, centered on a search for Rosette's lost brother Joshua who is shown to have been taken from her by the Sinner, Aion, a demon who shares a dark and bloody history with Chrono. He seeks nothing less than to overthrow the delicate balance between Heaven, Earth, and Hell (in the manga it is the demons' hierarchy he wished to destroy).

The anime follows the manga through the events of Volume IV, but it diverges during a crucial plot event, creating different courses of events and endings. The characterization of some of the characters, including Rosette and Aion, and their roles in the story were changed drastically in the adaptation of the manga. Much of the story is driven by the individual pasts of the main characters and the complex relationships between them.

Setting

The Order of Magdalene is an organization that banishes devils and demons. The Order has many branches around the country (some that are mentioned/visited include the Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, and Seattle branches); each one is presided over by the Council of the Catholic Church. The New York branch of the Order is headed by Kate Valentine, assisted by Ewan Remington, who lead the fight against the forces of darkness. The Order has many members; however, in times of great crisis, other less generally accepted individuals may be introduced into the Order to help fight the forces of darkness.

They use various weapons, mainly guns, swords, and melee weapons, many of which are developed by the New York branch's own Edward "Elder" Hamilton. The Order's preferred handgun is the Colt 1911, often loaded with Sacreds, standard bullets containing holy water, and Gospels, bullets with alchemy-transformed silver. The Spirit bullet was also developed, but upon test-fire it was found to be too dangerous, using a repressed lower-class demon for its explosive power. Tetragrammaton, a gun with high power against demons with low backlash, is given to Rosette and later used by Chrono. Besides using guns, there are members of the Order with special powers as well, using devices like tomes, violins, or dolls. They also use Angel Capture Fields, specialized barriers that can repel demons, their powers, and other astral based substances, and are set up by creating a rectangular array of cross-shaped stakes in the ground and activating them. The Order also developed the Soul Dive, an experimental system used to dive into souls for direct exorcism. The Order also unveils its flagship, the Metatron, in the final showdown with Pandemonium and Aion.

Jim Davenport is transferred to his company's branch in Tampa, Florida. He and his wife Martha are initially excited by the move and the beauty of their new neighborhood on Triggerfish Lane, but the reality proves to be disturbing: the Davenports' neighbors are a strange bunch of eccentrics, and crime is much worse than they had thought. These neighbors eventually include brutal-but-charismatic criminal Serge Storms, spiteful cocaine-addicted stripper Sharon Rhodes, and drug addict Seymour "Coleman" Bunsen, who move into the rental home across from the Davenports after Sharon and Coleman's brainless antics accidentally burn down Serge's home.

Jim's troubles begin while he is waiting in a bank drive-through, when an armed robber mistakes Jim's Suburban for his getaway vehicle and jumps in, threatening Jim and his infant daughter with a gun. Jim manages to overpower the robber, breaking his neck when a faulty airbag inflates in his face. Jim does not know that the robber was the youngest of five brothers, and the remaining four are released from prison on a technicality and begin looking for revenge. FDLE Agent Mahoney, obsessed with capturing Serge, convinces his boss to let him travel to Tampa, ostensibly to warn Jim.

When Jim returns to work, his consulting employer is acquired by a different company, which alters its corporate policy to make Jim the primary scapegoat for corporate layoffs. Jim is unable to adjust to his new role and is eventually fired.

Serge, despite his criminal lifestyle, develops a great liking and admiration for Jim, even considering proposing marriage to Sharon to emulate Jim's success as a family man. Jim likes Serge as well, but Martha senses something strange about Serge and orders him to stay away.

At least three subplots intertwine with and lead up to the novel's climax: While browsing the library at the University of Tampa, Serge is mistaken for a professor, and his impromptu lectures on Florida history and culture become so popular among the student body that the Dean asks Serge to deliver the commencement address. John Milton, a substitute teacher turned bank teller turned car salesman, is fired from his last job and decides to take revenge on Jim, the person assigned official blame for his firing from the bank.
*Ambrose Tarrington III, a bankrupt former millionaire, lives in a small house on Triggerfish Lane, but mimics the attitude of wealth so well that he is constantly treated to test drives of luxury cars, free lunches from eager bank executives, and the use of mansions being offered for sale. Mistaking Ambrose's act for reality, Serge kidnaps him for ransom.

Events come to a head at the Davenports' Fourth of July costume party, which includes the four criminal McGraw brothers taking the party hostage and Serge and Mahoney reluctantly teaming up to save the guests. Jim, normally passive to a fault, is driven to defend his family by snatching a gun and shooting two of the brothers.

The novel ends with the principal characters being featured on an episode of the Bill Maher show, which Serge (on the run from the police and still pursuing the $5 million briefcase featured in ''Florida Roadkill'') calls into to express his sincere admiration for men with wives and children, declaring it a tougher job than anything Serge has had to cope with.

Stitch is still not fitting in and causes another disaster. Lilo tries to encourage him by saying he's one-of-a-kind, comparing him to Frankenstein's monster, which just makes him feel worse. Meanwhile, ex-captain Gantu, who's in his new spaceship after his original one got destroyed when he kidnapped Lilo and tried to recapture Stitch, is hired by Jumba's former partner; a diminutive creature resembling a cross between a hamster, poodle and rabbit named Dr. Jacques von Hämsterviel to retrieve the other 625 experiments. Gantu goes to Earth, breaking into Lilo and Stitch's home, blasting Stitch into a net, finding and taking a blue pod with the number 625 on it, and abducting Jumba for interrogation. Stitch and Lilo take Jumba's spaceship and chase Gantu into outer space, engaging him in battle, only to be defeated and fall back towards Earth.

Back at their house, Lilo, Stitch and Pleakley find the container Jumba was hiding. Pleakley realizes that these are the other 625 experiments, in dehydrated form, and warns them not to tell anyone or put the experiments in water, aware of how dangerous they are. Deliberately disobeying Pleakley's orders, Stitch and Lilo retrieve the container and hydrate one of the experiments, Experiment 221, who promptly escapes into the night. Jumba is being held captive on the ship of Dr. Hämsterviel. Unable to intimidate Jumba, Hämsterviel activates another experiment, Experiment 625, to attack him. Although 625 has some of Stitch's powers, he is incredibly lazy and a terrible coward, prioritizing and making sandwiches above all else. Meanwhile, Pleakley is able to call Hämsterviel's ship via telephone. Hämsterviel tells Pleakley that he wants a ransom of the other 624 experiments in return for Jumba. When Pleakley informs the other family members what the ransom is, Nani proceeds to call Cobra Bubbles about the problem while Lilo and Stitch go out to find 221. When Cobra arrives the next morning, he seems to already know about what happened. Meanwhile, Stitch and Lilo finally manage to catch a troublesome Experiment 221 at a nearby hotel with a glass vase and soon befriend him.

The rendezvous time arrives and Pleakley and Cobra show up with the container, not knowing that it contains only 623 experiments. Pleakley hands the container over to Hämsterviel, who is shocked to find that one is missing. Lilo then shows up with Experiment 221 trapped in the vase. Announcing that she has named it "Sparky", she says that Sparky is part of Stitch's, and thus her, '' ohana''. Furious, Hämsterviel tells her to give him the experiment or Jumba will die. After several moments of thinking and hearing Cobra, Pleakley, Jumba and Hämsterviel persuading them, Lilo and Stitch set Sparky free and break Jumba from his bonds. On Cobra's signal, the Grand Councilwoman's ship rises out of the nearby ocean and aims several guns at Hämsterviel to obliterate him. Lilo protests, saying that Hämsterviel has the other experiments while Sparky overhears this. Sparky then proceeds to use his electrical abilities to blow the power on the Councilwoman's ship, while Hämsterviel and Gantu climb back aboard their own ship with the captured experiments. In a last attempt to stop Hämsterviel, Lilo, Stitch and Sparky stow away on it as it leaves Earth.

Inside the ship, Lilo and Stitch manage to swipe the container with the other experiments in it. The struggle for the container between Lilo, Stitch and Gantu results in releasing the dehydrated pods to rain down and scatter throughout Hawaii. Having captured the two, Hämsterviel reveals his plans to clone Stitch a thousand times over and orders Gantu to do what he wants with Lilo. While Gantu puts Lilo in a teleportation pod to send her to an intergalactic zoo, Stitch is strapped to a weight just heavier than he can lift. Watching as Stitch tries to avoid being vivisected by a laser for the cloning process, Sparky shows that he has reformed by short-circuiting the cloning machine. He then breaks Stitch free from his bonds and the two strap Hämsterviel to the device before they rescue Lilo.

Having locked Hämsterviel in handcuffs, Lilo, Stitch, and Sparky short-circuit Gantu's ship, causing it to crash near a waterfall on Kauai. Landing Hämsterviel's ship back at the rendezvous point, they give Sparky a new home powering Kīlauea Lighthouse, which hasn't been running in years because powering it was very expensive. They then persuade the Grand Councilwoman to let them rehabilitate the other 623 experiments. The Councilwoman places Hämsterviel under arrest, and Jumba whispers to Pleakley that he has plans for making Experiment 627. At that moment, Experiments 202, 529, 455, 489, and 390 are activated, beginning the events of the series.

Later, Jumba and Pleakley hope to go home with the Grand Councilwoman this time, but they are left stranded on Earth once again.

''Roadkill'' is set in 1997, against the backdrop of that year's World Series in which the Florida Marlins won a stunning upset in Miami, Florida.

The book begins ''in media res'', with the discovery of three corpses in South Florida, whose murders are eventually described as the book reveals the events preceding them, starting 11 months before the World Series.

At the start of the novel, Evelyn, a male English professor, is taking up a new post in a university in New York. His tribute to Tristessa de St Ange, a (fictional) American silent movie star, on his last night in England is to be given fellatio by a girl he takes to see one of her films.

He arrives in a dystopian New York, a city in its last stages of rotting death, overrun by huge rats and human emotions distilled to their most primeval. The job that he has been offered at a university falls through after the school is taken over by a militant black rebel group. He is then left destitute in the middle of New York with very little money and no job. Evelyn then befriends a Czech neighbour, Baroslav, who is an alchemist. Baroslav is killed by a group of men in the city and Evelyn is then left alone. On a late night run to the local drug store he meets Leilah. He becomes fascinated with Leilah, an exotic young African-American night club dancer, and he follows her home through the city. He lives with her and they have a short sexual relationship where he frequently abuses her. He makes no emotional link, seeing her only in terms of sex. He writes to his parents and finds out that he is left a lot of money from a recently deceased relative. He becomes repelled by Leilah after he impregnated her, and he then abandons her to a voodoo abortionist. The abortion goes wrong and Leilah is put in hospital. Evelyn is expected to pay a large fee for Leilah's hospital bills, but only plans on using some of the money. The rest Leilah gets from selling her fur coats. After Evelyn withdraws the money to pay for the bill, he is mugged and beaten by a group of young men. At the last moment, they are scared away before they can find the wad of cash Evelyn has taped under his genitals. He sends Leilah red roses, then rents a bulletproof car and heads straight to the desert, leaving everything behind including Leilah.

Evelyn seeks out the clean, clear desert and is captured by a woman from the subterranean female city of Beulah and dragged across the sandscape to encounter Mother, a mother goddess figure who fashioned herself with the surgeon's knife. She operates on Evelyn, removing his genitals and implants a fully functioning vagina and ovaries, as well as giving him breast augmentation surgery. She plans on impregnating him with a new Messiah, using his own sperm that she harvested from him before the operation. The transformation from male to female seems to be absolute, despite the fact that Eve struggles to learn to become the woman that her body is, and from this point on she is referred to only in female pronouns.

Eve escapes but is captured, raped, and enslaved by Zero, a cruel male cult leader and "poet" with only one eye and one leg. His harem are all passive, slavish "wives" who he whips unless they talk in grunts and honour their bedfellows, the pigs. Zero leads Eve on a search for the silent film star Tristessa, an embodiment of beauty, sorrow, and loneliness, whom he hates obsessively, because he believes Tristessa has made him infertile. Tristessa was Evelyn's first object of desire in his boyhood, and Eve still has her own obsession with this figure.

Zero leads his dungaree-clad harem to the glass palace of Tristessa and invades the beautiful gothic pile, discovering Tristessa herself laid out in a room surrounded by waxwork effigies in coffins. However she is alive and only when Zero tracks her down to the top of one of the towers and cuts her thong do the gang discover that Tristessa is male.

Upon discovering this, Zero and his wives create a mock-up wedding ceremony and marry the two, forcing Tristessa to rape Eve. Eve and Tristessa escape, spin Zero and his harem to death in Tristessa's spinning glass palace. They escape back into the desert where they imbibe each other's newly discovered sexuality and fall in love through their realisation that they are Tiresias. Tristessa is shot by a passing band of teenage desert mafia boys. Their Colonel is 14 years old and scared of the dark. They "rescue" Eve, but she escapes and encounters Leilah in a new guise of Lilith, vagabond rebel leader.

Lilith takes Eve to the coast to meet with Mother again, here they see a crazy old lady on a beach—a manifestation of ageing superficiality: dirty, caked in make-up, with piled high golden locks, singing old musical songs and living on vodka and cold tinned food and defecating in the bushes behind her deck chair.

Eve realises that Leilah never objectively existed but was only a manifestation of his own lusts and corruption.

Lilith tells Eve she must go and meet The Mother and pushes her into a cleft in the rocks that metamorphoses into the uterus of time. Eve progresses through the increasingly deep and warm subterranean rock pools to her rebirth. The amber Eve discovers in one of the caves and holds in her hands liquifies into ancient pine forests and primeval species.

Eve is then symbolically reborn, guided by Leilah, and rejects her chauvinistic male past.

Eve emerges onto a beach by Lilith, (name taken from the apocryphal story of Adam's first wife) who leaves her to go back and fight with her rebels, saying Eve cannot join her because she is pregnant. Eve swaps the gold alchemical on a neck chain that Lilith has given her for the purple skiff belonging to the crazed old woman and takes the boat and sails away.

Two generals, Macbett and Banco, put down a rebellion. In payment for their heroic service, Archduke Duncan promises to bestow on them land, titles and cash, but he reneges on the deal. Encouraged by the seductive Lady Duncan, Macbett plots to assassinate the Archduke and crown himself King. He tries to maintain his tenuous grip on the throne through a vicious cycle of murder and bloodshed. Meanwhile, he is haunted by the ghosts of his victims and discovers that his new wife is not all that she seems.

Machizo Sakaida's father is a successful manga artist. Machizo feels he is living under his father's shadow, and resents his father's success. Machizo recently transferred to Tetsuo's school. Tetsuo's friends start Tetsuo on reading ''Oretachi no Banka'', a manga by Machizo's father, Daizō Sakai. A manga competition advertised in the magazine sets Tetsuo on redrawing manga, hoping to win some money to help pay his mother's hospitalization fees. Tetsuo's initial efforts are ruined by Machizo. Kumiko, a ruthless girl who adored Tetsuo, threatened Machizo to repay Tetsuo. Machizo's novel writing efforts were recognized by Tetsuo, and they end up working together to create a manga. In the meantime, it is revealed that Tetsuo's father had returned and was trying to end the publication of ''Oretachi no Banka''. It is also revealed that a manga written by Tetsuo had caused his mother to fall ill, and that Daizō took possession of the aforementioned manga. Daizō describes his motivation as trying his best so that one day Tetsuo would return to creating manga.

Machizo and Tetsuo's manga is completed in the nick of time, with Machizo writing the story and Tetsuo drawing the graphics. Kumiko also advises Machizo on the plot details. They manage to receive the Special Merit Award. Daizō, as a judge of the competition, went up to present the prize to Tetsuo and Machizo, and remembering Tetsuo as his inspiration, hugged him before even realizing that Machizo was on stage as well. Tetsuo's father puts another handicap on both of them: they could not enter any collaborative works for the next competition, but had to create their own work. The death of Tetsuo's mother allows him freedom to create manga, and he begins to work on manga obsessively. Machizo, on the other hand, apprentices himself to another manga artist in order to learn the basics of making manga.

The Toronto-filmed show starred Roberta Maxwell as Jean Lipton, a radio talk show host and widowed mother, who lived with her daughter Zoe, played by Ingrid Veninger, and her father Bob, played by Roland Hewgill."Airwaves gets back to basics after reaching too far". ''Ottawa Citizen'', February 27, 1987. Maxwell has indicated that Canadian journalist-activist June Callwood was a basis for her portrayal of Jean.

The show's cast also included Taborah Johnson, Alec Willows, and Kimble Hall. Writers for the series included Judith Thompson, John Frizzell, Susan Martin, Rob Forsythe, Linda Svendsen and Paul Gross.

Cal Stephanides (his masculine identity), also known as Calliope (feminine), recounts how 5-alpha-reductase deficiency, a recessive condition, caused him to be born with female characteristics. The book continues with accounts of his family's history and the conception of Cal, his childhood and teenage years being raised as a girl, and the discovery of his intersex condition. Cal weaves his opinion of the events in hindsight from his life after his father's funeral. ''Middlesex'' is set in the 20th century and interjects historical elements, such as the Balkan Wars, the Nation of Islam, the 1967 Detroit riot, and the Watergate scandal in the story.

In 1922, Cal's paternal grandfather, Eleutherios "Lefty" Stephanides, lives in Bithynios, a village in Asia Minor. In the small village, high on the slope of Mount Olympos above the city of Bursa, incestuous marriages between cousins are a quietly accepted practice. Lefty makes a living selling silkworm cocoons harvested by his sister, Desdemona. The siblings are orphans; their parents are victims of the ongoing Greco-Turkish War. Lefty and Desdemona develop a romantic relationship as the war progresses. They flee the chaos brought by the war on a ship the United States amid the Great Fire of Smyrna. Their histories unknown to the other passengers, they marry each other on board the vessel.

After arriving in New York, they locate and stay with their cousin Sourmelina "Lina" Zizmo, in Detroit, Michigan. Lina is a closeted lesbian and the only person who knows of the siblings' incestuous relationship. Lefty takes on a job at Ford Motor Company, but is later retrenched. He unknowingly joins Lina's husband, Jimmy, in bootlegging. Desdemona gives birth to a son, Milton, and a daughter, Zoe. Lina gives birth to a daughter, Theodora or "Tessie". The relationship between Lefty and Desdemona declines after she learns that there is an increased chance of genetic disease for children born from incest. In 1924, after Milton's birth, Lefty opens a bar and gambling room called the Zebra Room.

Milton and Tessie marry in 1946. They have two children, Chapter Eleven and Calliope ("Callie"). Prior to Callie's birth, Desdemona predicts the child to be a boy, although the parents prepare for a girl. Chapter Eleven is a biologically "normal" boy; however, Callie is intersex. Unaware of this, her family raise Callie as a girl. Elements of family life are portrayed against struggles in the rise and fall of industrial Detroit. The family gets caught up in the 1967 Detroit riot resulting from racial tensions, after President Johnson authorizes the use of federal troops, and the family restaurant is raided during this period. Because of the threat of school integration, the family moves to a house on Middlesex Boulevard, Grosse Pointe.

When she is 14 years old, Callie falls in love with her female best friend, whom Callie refers to as the "Obscure Object". In separate encounters, Callie has her first sexual experiences with a woman, the Obscure Object, and with a man, the Obscure Object's brother. After Callie is injured by a tractor, a doctor discovers that she is intersex. She undergoes tests and examinations at a clinic in New York, and it is determined that her body will naturally develop more masculine traits. After learning about the syndrome and facing the prospect of sex reassignment surgery to make her anatomy appear "normally" female, Callie runs away and assumes a male identity as Cal. He hitchhikes cross-country and reaches San Francisco, where he joins a burlesque show as Hermaphroditus.

Cal is arrested by police during a raid on his workplace. He is released into Chapter Eleven's custody and learns of their father's recent death. The siblings return to their family home on Middlesex. Desdemona privately confesses to Cal that her husband is also her brother, recognizing Cal's condition and associating it with stories from her old village about children born of incest. As Milton's funeral takes place at the church, Cal stands in the doorway of his family home, assuming the male-only role in Greek traditions to keep his father's spirit from re-entering the home.

Years later, Cal becomes a diplomat stationed in Berlin. He meets Julie Kikuchi, a Japanese-American woman, and tentatively starts a relationship with her after telling her about his past.

The novel is narrated by Jock McLeish, a supervisor of the installation of alarm systems. Divorced, alcoholic and approaching fifty, his problems coalesce in a long night of the soul in a hotel room in Peebles or Selkirk.

McLeish attempts to spend the night assembling an intricate pornographic fantasy. His cast of characters includes: Janine, based on a childhood memory of Jane Russell in ''The Outlaw''; Superb (short for Superbitch); and Big Momma, an obese lesbian. All of these are submitted to sadomasochistic practices, parts of which are described at some length. However, McLeish constantly returns to reminiscences of his previous life and lovers. These prompt his attempted suicide. Chapter 11 of the novel is a typographical explosion, with the text splitting into several parallel voices on each page (including that of God). The crisis concludes with McLeish vomiting up the pills which he had hoped would kill him, and facing the truth of his actions as morning dawns.

Sirius is raised by scientist Thomas Trelone in North Wales, near Trawsfynydd. Thomas embarks on a program of using steroids and other chemicals to rapidly develop cognitive power of dogs, resulting in super sheep dogs. Sirius, however, proves to possess a dog intelligence comparable to a normal human being, as he is able to communicate with English words, although it takes some time for the humans to understand his canine pronunciation. He is born at the same time as his creator's human daughter, Plaxy, and the two of them are raised together as brother and sister. During childhood, Sirius and Plaxy develop an intense bond for each other. Their physical and intellectual growth become a sort of competition, with Sirius striving to equal his handed sister. But as they grew, their relationship comes under strain, as Sirius develops a dog-like sensitivity to sound leading to a unique musicality, while Plaxy had a strong visual aesthetic. Their different sensory experiences afforded less interest in each other's experience of the world. Soon it was time for Plaxy to attend primary school, but Sirius could not attend. Despite his pleas to learn, Plaxy became reluctant to share her school and social life experiences with him. Their lives drifted further apart. When Plaxy departed to attend boarding school, Thomas wanted to bring Sirius to Mr. Pugh's farm, where he would work as a "sheep-dog apprentice" before taking him to the city, believing the experience would be beneficial to his character. However, Thomas wanted Sirius to keep most of his human intelligence a secret, with Pugh only suspecting him to be a "Super-super-sheep-dog." After a period of time, Sirius became desperately lonely and longed for his family, Plaxy especially. He yearned to write to her, and after weeks of difficulty and strings of failure, but gradually building upon his successes, he managed to write and send out a letter to her, without the aid of human hands.

After a year being a silent sheep-dog, save for the holidays with Thomas and Plaxy, Sirius surprises Thomas by describing the psychological trauma he has experienced. Sorely realizing the insensitivity of his program, Thomas decides to show Sirius the university, where he marvels in awe. Sirius is acquainted with his creator's most trusted colleagues and scientists. They soon begin to study his mind and body. Months pass, and his new life as a pampered laboratory animal takes a toll on his physical and mental well-being, becoming overweight and agitated. After realizing his declining state, he arranges a meeting with Plaxy, now a university student. Plaxy, however, does little to console his feelings. After sensing her coldness and discomfort with him, Sirius is left feeling nauseated.

As they part for the night, an embittered and dispirited Sirius strolls through town. His mind floods with brooding thoughts of his own loneliness, analyzing the cruelty and hypocrisy of humankind, and the harshness of the universe towards all living things. Miserably depressed, lonely, and frustrated, he sought for an outlet to express the "spirit" within him. He develops a mystical idea of the perfect hunting, which is associated with his sophisticated sense of smell. The scent he pursues, the prey he's looking for is God. Sirius experiences a spiritual epiphany, seeing and sensing the world in a new light. He becomes instantly fascinated by human religion, realizing it had the answers he sought for, beyond the strict boundaries of science. His foster-mother, Elizabeth, agrees to take Sirius to a priest, Rev. Geoffrey Adams, who serves in the impoverished East End. Over a period of time, Sirius converses with Geoffrey, hoping to find the heart of spiritual truth and love, but is disappointed to learn that human religion has become lost in its doctrine and mythology. Fortunately, he discovers one outlet for his spirit, his feelings and life experience. After great persuasion to express himself, Geoffrey, with caution, allows Sirius to sing in his church — in front of an astounded audience.

When Sirius returns home, he mostly works as a sophisticated sheep-dog. But after seeing the destruction, death and misery of war, and mankind's stupidity, combined with his unique nature, which makes him isolated, he has a spiritual breakdown, and begins to indulge more and more his "wolf mood" which is irrational and murderously destructive. The final part of the story deals with his hatred towards humans and towards himself, and his violent acts. It also deals with the rumors of the rural community about Sirius' advanced nature being the work of the devil, and the scandal of Plaxy possibly having a sexual relationship with Sirius — which the novel's narrator, Plaxy's human lover, indirectly suggests that their love has a physical nature, but not directly sexual. Plaxy and Sirius have, during the whole tale, their political and personal issues, but also a very special bond, which leads to the idea of a mystical or metaphysical relationship, transcending ordinary love and understanding, which Plaxy refers to as a unique double-being, a 'Plaxy-Sirius.'

Eventually, Plaxy is conscripted during the Second World War. People continued to attack Sirius, and he subsequently sinks into deep despair. The hysterically religious population, who seek to vent their own fear and frustration with the war on an easy target, persecute Sirius with increasing violence, provoking violent responses by Sirius. Depression with what he calls the "tyrant species" cause him to abandon many of his more humane pursuits and live wild, killing many animals on their farms. One farmer and his sheepdogs venture out to hunt him, but Sirius kills the farmer in self-defense. Fear and rage rises in the town, solidifying their resolve to destroy him. Plaxy, after a desperate search, finds a terrified and feral Sirius, hiding from the townspeople. Plaxy manages to re-awaken Sirius' human mind, and tries to console him. But Sirius laments, realizing there's no place for him in the world, insisting that his human-needing spirit, and his wild wolf-side, made his nature fundamentally incompatible and torn. As they planned for their escape to Scotland, Sirius is hunted and eventually shot by the community. He dies professing his love for Plaxy, stating their life and time together, despite all the hardship, was worthwhile.

The film is about two couples: Jack (Sydney Pollack) and Sally (Judy Davis), and Gabe (Woody Allen) and Judy (Mia Farrow). The film starts when Jack and Sally arrive at Gabe and Judy's apartment and announce their separation. Gabe is shocked, but Judy takes the news personally and is very hurt. Still confused, they go out for dinner at a Chinese restaurant.

A few weeks later Sally visits the apartment of a colleague. They plan to go out together to the opera and then to dinner. Sally asks if she can use his phone, and calls Jack. Learning from him that he has met someone, she accuses him of having had an affair during their marriage.

Judy and Gabe are introduced to Jack's new girlfriend, Sam (Lysette Anthony), an aerobics trainer. While Judy and Sam shop, Gabe calls Jack's new girlfriend a "cocktail waitress" and tells him that he is crazy for leaving Sally for her. About a week later, Judy introduces Sally to Michael (Liam Neeson), Judy's magazine colleague, in whom Judy herself is clearly interested. Michael asks Sally out, and they begin dating; Michael is smitten, but Sally is dissatisfied with the relationship.

Meanwhile, Gabe has developed a friendship with a young student of his, Rain (Juliette Lewis), and has her read the manuscript of his novel. She comments on its brilliance but has several criticisms, to which Gabe reacts defensively.

At a party, Jack learns from a friend that Sally is seeing someone and flees with Sam in a jealous rage. They have an intense argument, and Jack drives back to his house to find Sally in bed with Michael. He asks Sally to give their marriage another chance, but she tells him to leave.

Less than two weeks later, however, Jack and Sally are back together and the couple meets Judy and Gabe for dinner like old times. After dinner, Judy and Gabe get into an argument at their apartment about her not sharing her poetry. After Gabe makes a failed pass at her, Judy tells him she thinks the relationship is over; a week later Gabe moves out. Judy begins seeing Michael.

Gabe goes to Rain's 21st birthday party and gives her a music box as a present. She asks him to kiss her, and though the two share a romantic moment, Gabe tells her they should not pursue it any further. As he walks home in the rain, he realizes that he has ruined his relationship with Judy.

Michael tells Judy he needs time alone and he can't help still having feelings for Sally. Angry and hurt, Judy walks out into the rain. Highlighting her "passive-aggressiveness," Michael follows and begs her to stay with him. A year and a half later, they marry.

In the end, the audience sees a pensive Jack and Sally back together. Jack and Sally admit their marital problems still exist (her frigidity is not solved), but they find they accept their problems as simply the price they have to pay to remain together.

Gabe is living alone because he says he is not dating for the time being, as he does not want to hurt anyone, including himself. The film ends with an immediate cut to black after Gabe asks the unseen documentary crew, "Can I go? Is this over?"

Christopher John Francis Boone is a 15-year old boy with behavioral problems living in Swindon, England with his widowed father, Ed. Christopher’s mother Judy passed away from a heart attack two years prior to the events of the story. One day, Christopher discovers that his neighbor Mrs. Shears’ dog Wellington has been fatally speared with a garden fork. As Christopher mourns over Wellington’s body, Mrs. Shears calls the police. When a policeman grabs Christopher’s arm, Christopher panics and hits him, resulting in him being arrested for assaulting a police officer, though he is quickly released with a police caution. He decides to investigate the dog's death, chronicling any information he receives in a book. During his investigation, he meets the elderly Mrs. Alexander, who informs Christopher that his mother had an affair with Mr. Shears.

Ed discovers the book and confiscates it. While searching Ed’s room for the book, Christopher finds letters from his mother dated after her supposed death, leading him to become distressed and enter a catatonic state. Realizing that Christopher has discovered the letters, Ed admits to lying about Judy's death; she is still alive and living in London with Mr. Shears. Ed also confesses that he had killed Wellington in anger after an argument with Mrs. Shears. Christopher decides to run away and live with his mother.

After a long, event-filled journey, evading policemen and feeling ill from the trains and crowds around him, he finally finds his way to the home of his mother and Mr. Shears, much to the delight of the former and chagrin of the latter. Soon after arriving, Christopher wants to return to Swindon in order to take his mathematics A-level. Judy leaves Mr. Shears as he continues to reject and mistreat her son.

After an argument, Judy agrees to let Ed see Christopher for brief daily visits. Christopher remains apprehensive of Ed, hoping he will be imprisoned for killing Wellington. Ed gifts Christopher a puppy, promising that he will gradually rebuild trust with his son. Christopher declares that he will take further exams and attend university. He completes his mathematics A-level with top grades. The book ends with Christopher optimistic about his future.

Act One

Middle-aged actress Margo Channing presents the Tony Award to rising star Eve Harrington, who graciously thanks "my producer, my director, my writer and above all, Margo Channing". In flashback, Margo recalls the opening night for one of her plays a year-and a-half before, when Eve entered her life. Margo's admirers crowd her dressing room and fill the air with "Backstage Babble". Among the admirers is Eve, a young woman who says that she, alone and friendless in New York, has found solace in watching her hero, Margo, perform. As soon as Margo can be alone with Bill Sampson, her director and fiancé, she tries to convince him to stay with her and not go to Rome to direct a movie. Bill firmly but lovingly tells her goodbye ("Think How It's Gonna Be"). Margo dreads facing the opening night party alone, and, wanting to have a good time, she persuades, Duane, her gay hairdresser, to take her and Eve to a gay nightclub in Greenwich Village ("But Alive"). The lively evening ends back at Margo's apartment. Eve declares that it has been the best time she's ever had ("The Best Night of My Life"). Margo, seeing her 19-year-old self in one of her old movies on TV, senses the impact her increasing age will have on her career and sarcastically asks "Who's That Girl?".

Four months later, Eve has become Margo's indispensable assistant, impressing Margo's close friends, including her producer, Howard Benedict. Howard takes Eve to a "gypsy" hangout. "Gypsy," Howard explains,"is the name dancers affectionately give themselves as they go camping from show to show." The "gypsies", led by one of their own, Bonnie, celebrate "the sound that says love" – "Applause". That night, at three a.m. after a phone call from Bill in Rome, Margo longingly wishes he would "Hurry Back". Bill arranges to hurry back two weeks later, but at Margo's welcome home party for him a misunderstanding leads to a disastrous evening ("Fasten Your Seat Belts"). Eve, as Margo's ever-present assistant, knows Margo's part in the play completely, and Eve contrives to get herself hired as Margo's understudy. Margo, feeling betrayed and threatened, faces Eve with an ironic "Welcome to the Theatre". Bill accuses her of being paranoid about Eve, and after a bitter fight, he says goodbye to Margo, ending his relationship with her. Margo is left alone on an empty stage.

Act Two

Margo is visiting her friends, playwright Buzz Richards and his wife Karen, in their Connecticut home. Karen, thinking Margo behaved unfairly to Eve, arranges for Margo to miss a performance by draining the car's gas tank so they cannot return to New York in time for the evening's performance. Stuck in the country for the night, they express their warm feelings as "Good Friends". Back in New York, Eve gives a triumphant performance in Margo's role. Howard again takes Eve to the "gypsy" hangout where she snubs Bonnie and her friends, who do a scathing parody of a girl who becomes an overnight star ("She's No Longer a Gypsy").

Margo is devastated when she reads a nasty interview that Eve has given in which she refers to "aging stars." Bill now realizes what Eve's true intentions are and rushes back full of love for Margo, telling her she's "One of a Kind". Margo, though, is too focused on her career to want to return to Bill. Eve, who has made an unsuccessful pass at Bill, ensnares the playwright, Buzz, and she rejoices that she now has a man who can help her career ("One Hallowe'en"). Her plans with Buzz are crushed by Howard who claims her for himself, telling her "We both know what you want and you know I'm the one who can get it for you" – Eve needs Howard's influence as a producer as well as his silence concerning her devious rise to stardom.

Margo seems to have lost everything because of Eve, but suddenly she realizes she could be the winner because she now has a chance at "Something Greater" – a life with Bill. In the finale, she and Bill join with everybody answering the question "why do we live this crazy life?" – "Applause".

This Cold War espionage thriller follows the story of British anti-hero spy Charlie Muffin (Hemmings), who has fallen on hard times since the forced retirement of Sir Archibald Willoughby, his previous boss at the U.K. secret service (Sir Ralph Richardson). His new boss, Sir Henry Cuthbertson (Ian Richardson), a former military man who epitomises the haughty upper-class British imperialist, barely attempts to conceal his disdain for the under-educated agent who, although more and highly experienced, quite obviously does not stem from the "right class". At the start of the film, it is established that Charlie has been deemed expendable and accordingly is set up to be captured or killed during a mission to East Germany — despite having been responsible for the mission's success. However, Charlie religiously follows his former chief's first rule: "Always secure an escape route", and another man is killed in his place. Cuthbertson's lap-dog agents Snare and Harrison — both totally lacking in experience and as arrogant as their boss — are shocked and embarrassed to see Muffin returning alive and well.

Back in the UK, Muffin's humiliation does not end, as Cuthbertson attempts to demote him over Charlie's supposed failure in interrogating a captured Russian agent. Because of Cutherbertson's not following established British Intelligence guidelines and Charlie's proving that his interrogation was actually a success, Charlie escapes demotion and goes on leave, which he spends with his wife Edith (Linden), while at the same time maintaining an affair with Cuthbertson's secretary-receptionist.

Next, the story unfolds around British and American attempts to facilitate a safe defection of high-ranking Soviet General Valery Kalenin (Braun). Director of Central Intelligence Garson Ruttgers (Wanamaker) proves equally ambitious but not much smarter and ultimately equally officious and presumptuous as his British counterpart. After Harrison and Snare's spectacular downfalls (one is killed in Leipzig trying to escape capture by KGB agents and the other is actually captured in Moscow) as the result of CIA interference and because the Americans are using diplomatic pressure on the British to make Kalenin's defection a joint Anglo-American operation, Cuthbertson has no choice but to call in Charlie to handle the affair. Charlie meets with Kalenin in Moscow without the CIA finding out, and Ruttgers' aide Braley (Rimmer), a good-hearted but docile sideshow official, is assigned to accompany Muffin first to casinos in various cities in order to "launder" the $500,000 Kalenin is demanding as the price of his defection and later to Prague to liaise with Kalenin on the final details. Meanwhile, Cuthbertson, who is still wary of Charlie (who keeps insisting that Kalenin's defection is false and a trap), arranges with his secretary-receptionist that she spy on Charlie during their liaisons together.

After the arrangements have been made, Charlie, Braley, Cuthbertson and Ruttgers meet in a safehouse in Vienna. Charlie and Braley meet Kalenin at an obscure border-crossing post and escort him to the safehouse. Charlie leaves to hide the car, while Cuthbertson and Ruttgers jubilantly welcome Kalenin. However, their joy is short-lived when Kalenin reveals that his "defection" was merely the bait in an elaborate trap to capture the heads of both MI5 and the CIA in order to exchange them for an important Russian agent imprisoned in England, and that his men are now in complete control of the safehouse. Cuthbertson and Ruttgers realize too late that Kalenin's plan couldn't have succeeded without inside help...from Charlie, who has escaped with the money intended for Kalenin.

The Russian agent is released and flies home to Moscow, while Cuthbertson and Ruttgers are presumably disgraced and dismissed from their positions, and Charlie and Edith, now in hiding in Brighton, celebrate their freedom with the money.

Trevor Chaplin teaches woodwork and likes to listen to jazz. Jill Swinburne teaches English and wants to help save the planet. They live together and just want a quiet life. Then they meet John the barman who died but is much better now. John gives them a tape, which leads to meeting Dave the wimp. They find out about The People's Front for the Liberation of West Yorkshire. The man with no name called Mr Peterson came to see them. He was followed by the six men in grey suits. Jill goes to see The Oldest Suffragette in Town. Trevor and Jill go on a trip to Amsterdam with their class from "San Quentin High". Trevor and Jill meet The Honourable Order of Elks who are "looking for a bit of action".

The tone throughout is deliberately discursive and undramatic. Trevor and Jill are mistakenly given a secret tape recording, which results in their harassment by security forces, their home being invaded, their private lives used to discredit them at school and their being pursued all the way to Amsterdam and Edinburgh. Eventually the tapes are revealed as just a charade invented by shady government forces as a part of a disinformation campaign.

Trevor Chaplin teaches woodwork and likes to listen to jazz. Jill Swinburne teaches English and wants to help save the planet. They live together and just want a quiet life. Since their last adventure in ''The Beiderbecke Tapes'', Jill and Trevor have a child - Firstborn. Big Al asks them to put up a friend of his and they agree. But when Ivan arrives, they find he speaks no English but thinks that "Bix is cool". Meetings with criminals, smuggling people over the border, fighting for the right to education even when it's against the rules. These and other adventures are played out to a soundtrack of jazz music in the style of Bix Beiderbecke performed by Frank Ricotti with Kenny Baker as featured cornet soloist.

Atlantis is ruled by the beautiful and intelligent Empress Salustra. The fate of the Empire will be decided by an arranged marriage with the ruler of a less advanced, semi-barbarian northern kingdom, as the advanced technology of Atlantis is powerless against strange environmental and ecological disasters.

One

• "Go Carolina" - David is forced to go to his elementary school speech therapist for his lisp.
• "Giant Dreams, Midget Abilities" -. David's father, Lou, enrolls David in guitar lessons taught by a person with dwarfism.
• "Genetic Engineering" - David discusses the disparate interests between Lou and the rest of the family.
• "Twelve Moments in the Life of the Artist" - David presents his own efforts to establish himself as a performance artist while fueled by methamphetamine.
• "You Can't Kill the Rooster" - Despite his horrible language, David's brother, Paul, has a kind heart.
• "The Youth in Asia" - David recounts his childhood pets and their demises.
• "The Learning Curve" - David gets a job as a writing teacher and satirizes his efforts at conducting workshops.
• "Big Boy" - While attending a party, David finds himself trying to get rid of a huge turd left in the toilet by the previous visitor.
• "The Great Leap Forward" - A woman who lives in a big house hires David as her personal assistant; subsequently he works for a moving company.
• "Today's Special" - David pokes fun at over-elaborately prepared foods and their fanciful descriptions on menus.
• "City of Angels" - A lesbian childhood friend from North Carolina comes to visit David in New York and brings along her rather country bumpkin girlfriend she recently met who seems to express culture shock much to the annoyance of David and even her girlfriend.
• "A Shiner Like a Diamond" - David's sister, Amy, is to be profiled in a New York magazine, an event that occasions David to recall that Lou is obsessed with the Sedaris sisters looking thin and beautiful; they play a practical joke on him.
• "Nutcracker.com" - David recalls his reluctance to join the internet.

Deux

• "See You Again Yesterday" - David recalls his first visits to Normandy with his partner, Hugh.
• "Me Talk Pretty One Day" - David recalls a French class he took in Paris.
• "Jesus Shaves" - David recounts a day in the Parisian French class where the class explained Easter to a Moroccan woman.
• "The Tapeworm Is In" - David buys a Walkman to aid learning French.
• "Make That a Double" - David explains that he finds gender assignment the most challenging aspect of learning French.
• "Remembering My Childhood on the Continent of Africa" - David compares the childhood of his partner, Hugh, to his own; where his boyhood had been pedestrian, Hugh's was exotic.
• "21 Down" - David talks about his crossword addiction.
• "The City of Light in the Dark" - David enjoys going to the movies in Paris more than seeing the usual cultural sights.
• "I Pledge Allegiance to the Bag" - David satirizes French ideas of what Americans are like.
• "Picka Pocketoni" - American tourists mistake David for a pickpocket while riding the train in Paris.
• "I Almost Saw This Girl Get Killed" - David recalls an evening at the county fair near his home in France.
• "Smart Guy" - David and Hugh take IQ tests. Hugh outscores David.
• "The Late Show" - David lists the different fantasies he mulls over while trying to sleep at night.
• "I'll Eat What He's Wearing" - A visit from David's father Lou prompts David to remember Lou's penchant for economizing, buying and storing food past reasonable limits.

A pair of explorers, Lewis Moon and Wolf, become stranded in ''Mãe de Deus'' (Portuguese: ''Mother of God''), an outpost in the deep Brazilian Amazon River basin, after their plane runs out of fuel.

The local police commander wants the Niaruna tribe, living upriver, to move their village so they will not be killed by gold miners moving into the area and cause trouble for him with the provincial government. The commander cuts a deal with Moon: if he and his fellow mercenary would bomb the Niaruna village from the air and drive them away, they will be given enough fuel for their airplane and be allowed to leave.

Born-again Christian evangelist (and missionary) Martin Quarrier and his wife Hazel arrive with their son Billy, to spread the Christian gospel to the primitive Niaruna indigenous natives. They arrive in Mãe de Deus to meet fellow missionaries Leslie and Andy Huben, who live with a Niaruna helper. In town, they meet a Catholic priest who wants to re-establish a mission to the Niarunas, as the former missionary was killed by them.

Moon and Wolf leave in their plane to attack the Niaruna. But upon seeing the community with his own eyes as well as an Indian firing an arrow at the plane, Moon has second thoughts. The plane returns to Mãe de Deus.

That night, after a discussion with Wolf, Quarrier and the priest, Moon takes an Indian drug and begins hallucinating. He takes off alone in his plane and parachutes into the Niaruna village. Moon, a half-Native American Cheyenne, aligns himself with the Niarunas. He is accepted as "Kisu-Mu", one of the Niaruna gods, and begins to adapt to Niaruna life and culture.

The four evangelists travel upriver to establish their mission. Indians originally converted by the Catholics turn up, awaiting the arrival of the Niaruna. Eventually they do come and accept the gifts that the Quarriers offer, not staying long.

Young Billy dies of blackwater fever (a serious complication of malaria), causing Hazel to lose her sanity. She is returned to Mãe de Deus. Martin becomes despondent, arguing with Leslie and gradually losing his faith.

Meanwhile, Moon encounters Andy swimming nude. After they kiss, Moon catches her cold. He returns to the Niaruna camp and inadvertently infects everyone. Much of the tribe becomes sick. Moon and the tribe's leaders go to the missionary Leslie to beg for drugs.

Leslie refuses, but Martin agrees to provide the drugs. He travels to the Niaruna village with the missionaries' young helper. In the village, after Martin speaks with Moon, helicopters arrive to begin bombing. Martin survives the bombing, but is killed by his helper soon after. Moon is exposed as a man and not a god. He runs, ending up alone.

Lee Simon (Kenneth Branagh) is an unsuccessful novelist turned travel writer who immerses himself in celebrity journalism following a midlife crisis and subsequent divorce from his insecure wife, Robin (Judy Davis), a former English teacher, after sixteen years of marriage.

As he stumbles his way through both professional encounters and sexual escapades with performers, models, and other players in the world of entertainment, Lee increasingly questions his purpose in life. He ruins numerous opportunities due to his fame-seeking, insecurities and neuroses.

Meanwhile, Robin trades her many neuroses for a makeover and a job with television producer Tony Gardella (Joe Mantegna) that leads to her own celebrity interview program. She takes advantage of numerous opportunities and ends up happy and successful.

The film starts with a 12-year-old girl whose babysitter is on a date with serial killer Patrick Bateman. After Bateman kills and starts to dissect her babysitter, said 12-year-old girl stabs him with an ice pick. Fast forward to the present day and the girl, who is named Rachael Newman, is now a college student studying criminology under Professor Starkman, a former FBI agent. Rachael aspires to join the FBI and is determined to get the teaching assistant position under Starkman, which would make her a shoo-in for the FBI training program.

Tough competition for the position stands in her way, and Rachael proceeds to kill off classmates one by one. During her killing spree, she decides to see the school psychiatrist, Dr. Eric Daniels. Realizing that Rachael is a textbook sociopath that is obsessed with Starkman, Daniels tries to warn Starkman but without revealing Rachel's name due to patient confidentiality. Starkman mistakenly assumes that the student obsessed with him is Cassandra Blaire, with whom he had an extramarital affair. When Cassandra reveals that her affair with Professor Starkman has guaranteed her the TA position, Rachael decides to murder her as well. After she does so, Professor Starkman discovers Cassandra's body and calls Daniels to tell him that "she's dead". However, he does not identify the victim and Daniels assumes it must be Rachael. Distraught, Professor Starkman leaves his teaching position, which angers the obsessed Rachael. It is revealed that she is not Rachael Newman; she killed the real Rachael at the beginning of the semester and assumed her identity.

During spring break, "Rachael" stays on campus and locates an intoxicated Starkman, impaired by the effects of Valium and alcohol, and tries to seduce him to get the job. However, Starkman sees she is wearing a dress and necklace he had given to Cassandra. She then confesses her crimes to him, her "crush" on him, and that she knew about his affairs with various women (which included her former babysitter that Bateman murdered), as he backs up towards the window in a state of confusion and fear. Rachael blows him a kiss, and he falls out the window to his death. As she leaves, Rachael also murders a janitor and a security guard because they witnessed Starkman's death.

As the film reaches its conclusion, Daniels and two cops pursue Rachael in a car chase, which ends with Rachael driving off a cliff, resulting in the car exploding. At this point, she is presumed to be dead by the cops who witnessed the event and the media.

Two years later, Dr. Daniels is giving a lecture on Rachael's mind and how he wrote a book about her. When he looks up from speaking with a student, he sees Rachael, who has not died after all; she indirectly reveals that she killed Starkman's last assistant, Elizabeth McGuire, and stole her identity to get into Quantico FBI Academy. She allows Dr. Daniels to know because she believes there is no point in committing the perfect crime if no one knows about it and she is confident he will not divulge this information because it would make a farce of his best-selling book in which he claimed to completely understand her and witness her death in the fiery car. The body that was in the car was the real Rachael, whose decaying body had been kept in the killer's dorm closet. It was revealed by another student that Rachael is the youngest agent to be drafted to the Bureau in her sophomore year. As Rachael walks out of his class, Dr. Daniels is visibly shaken by what he had just learned.

Cloe, Yasmin, Sasha and Jade get ready for prom night. Their art teacher, Mr. Del Rio, assigned them a project to express themselves. Asked by the girls to give them extra time for the project, the professor denied the girls' petition, thus presenting them with a dilemma: Get prepared for prom night, or make a project that will count for 25 percent of their yearly grade.

Yasmin likes literature, Cloe likes art and drawing, Sasha likes music, and Jade likes fashion. They borrow a school video camera, so they can shoot a video and explain their points of view about the types of things they enjoy and like.

A day at the beach stresses out Sasha, who has volunteered to be the school's prom committee and chairperson. Problems arise when Sasha is insulted in the school's newspaper column. The girls automatically blame Cameron and Dylan for telling the writer about their conversation at the beach. Cloe crashes her car, and Cameron, an expert mechanic, comes to fix it.

When the girls go shopping for prom outfits, Jade doubts her sense of fashion when she picks out an outrageous outfit the others disapprove of. Gossip appears in the paper about Jade. They figure it was not the boys because there they could not have heard about Jade's meltdown. At Cloe's sleepover, they apologize to Cameron and give him a makeover to make up for their accusations. Later on that night, Jade accidentally leaves the video camera on and someone can be seen walking around the room writing in a notepad.

At school, everyone is going crazy over the picture of Cameron after the makeover the girls gave him. He blames Cloe and tells her to pick up her car because he is not going to the prom after.

The girls try to figure out which one of them has been betraying their secrets. Yasmin was writing the columns, as a ghost writer. When she confesses to the rest of the girls, they get mad at her and ignore her. The girls try to forget about Yasmin by going to the spa, but have a terrible time without her. They admit they were the ones who had given her the idea to write more interesting stories.

Yasmin returns and apologizes, explaining that people used to comment that her column was boring, and that, after she spread gossip about people around school, those who knew she was the ghost writer made her feel important. Her friends apologize to her in return for their own comments and forgive each other. Cameron forgives Yasmin after she explains the whole thing to him.

On prom night, the hired cooks not arriving on time due to a traffic jam, the photographer quitting to become a painter, and the DJ being home sick with a fever. The girls come up with a plan for a do-it-yourself prom, they are making a disco ball work, setting up balloons, using their video camera to take digital pictures, preparing their own food, playing their own music, and turning an empty room into a dance hall. Jade is elected prom queen while Dylan is elected prom king.

After their video, which included the prom night dance, was shown to their art professor, he gave the four girls an A-plus on their project.

In 2013, Los Angeles Police Department officer Jonathan Ingram (Hideyuki Tanaka) was one of five "Policenauts", police officers who received astronaut training to protect Beyond Coast, humanity's first functional self-supporting space colony. During the test of a new space suit, an accident causes Jonathan to drift into space, presumed dead by his colleagues. In reality, the cryogenic survival system in the suit preserved him, and he is found and revived 25 years later. During that time, Beyond Coast has become the principal development location for potential interstellar travel, and is protected by a dedicated police force dubbed the Beyond Coast Police Department (BCPD).

In 2040, Jonathan has become a private investigator on Earth in Old Los Angeles. He is visited by his former wife Lorraine (Chiyoko Kawashima), who remarried while he was presumed dead. Lorraine asks for Jonathan's help in solving the disappearance of her husband, Kenzo Hojo; the only clues are a torn leaf, a set of capsules, and the word "Plato". Jonathan is reluctant to take her case at first, but after Lorraine leaves his office, she is murdered by a man in a black motorcycle suit. After failing to catch the culprit, Jonathan decides to fulfill Lorraine's final request and travels to Beyond, where he is reunited with his former LAPD partner, BCPD Vice Department chief Ed Brown (Shōzō Iizuka), who agrees to help Jonathan investigate the circumstances surrounding Hojo's disappearance and Lorraine's murder along with Vice Unit members Meryl Silverburgh (Kyoko Terase) and Dave Forrest (Bin Shimada).

During their investigation, Jonathan receives information from Karen (Kikuko Inoue), Lorraine's daughter with Hojo, that Hojo was growing increasingly stressed working at Tokugawa Pharmaceuticals, which is helping research medical solutions to health problems caused by living in space. Jonathan and Ed also run into former Policenauts Gates Becker (Osamu Saka) and Joseph Tokugawa (Iemasa Kayumi), the latter of whom Jonathan suspects of being involved. They receive further leads from a former co-worker of Hojo's; the informant is later killed and used to lure Jonathan and Ed into an unsuccessful booby trap. Hojo's body is eventually found, and Jonathan is framed for the killings. Tokugawa and Becker are revealed to have both been responsible for Jonathan's accident, and the prime movers behind an illegal drug and organ trafficking ring designed to counteract the negative side-effects of being in space for long periods of time.

Hojo became involved in the conspiracy to save Karen from her terminal bone cancer, but eventually tried to break away and was murdered. With help from Ed and Meryl, Jonathan storms the Tokugawa headquarters, killing Lorraine's assassin and then confronts Becker. When apparently cornered, Jonathan tricks Becker into revealing the whole scheme through a live video feed, exposing the scandal to Beyond Coast. Ed saves Jonathan by killing Becker, while Meryl and the remaining police arrest Tokugawa. Jonathan donates his bone marrow to Karen upon learning that he is her biological father, and returns to Earth.

Roger Shumway, a reporter, is invited to visit Craig Bennett Stiles, a 130-year-old man also known as the Time Traveler. This is the first interview Stiles has granted since shortly after his return from the future, 100 years earlier. Stiles had claimed then that he invented a time machine (which he privately refers to as his ''Toynbee Convector'', although he does not reveal the name of the device to anyone until much later). Stiles used the machine to travel forward in time about a hundred years from what was an economically and creatively stagnant society (c. 1984). On returning to that present, he showed evidence — films and other records collected on his journey — showing that humanity developed an advanced civilization with many marvelous and helpful inventions, and a restored natural environment. He also claimed to have then destroyed the machine deliberately to prevent anyone else doing the same.

Initially, people were skeptical of the Traveler's claims, but they are unable to explain or disprove the authenticity of the records brought from the future. Inspired by the prospect of a utopian future, many people began projects to fulfill the vision and create the world the Traveler claims to have seen.

A hundred years later, the perfect world of Stiles' visions has come to pass, just as he saw in his time travel. Now 130 years old, Stiles recounts the story to Shumway. Stiles calmly reveals what really happened, simply stating, "I lied." Since he knew the people of the world had it in them to create a utopia, he created the illusion of one, to give humanity a goal, and hope. Because of people's belief in the illusion, the imagined utopian future became reality. After explaining his actions, Stiles presents Shumway with the evidence of his fraud on several recorded tapes and cassettes. Stiles then steps into a machine of his own creation, which he calls "a real time machine". Turning the machine on, electricity pulses through it and Stiles' body, taking his life. Shumway is then left with the decision to either reveal Stiles' deception to the world or destroy the evidence, thus perpetuating Stiles' utopian tale. Turning the machine on once again, in order to destroy it, Shumway quietly drops the evidence into an incinerator set into the wall nearby and exits Stiles' home via a glass elevator.

''FF:U'' follows the story of Ai and Yu Hayakawa, 12-year-old twins who travel into Wonderland, a mysterious parallel dimension, in search of their missing parents. Other main characters include Lisa Pacifist, a 22-year-old woman whom Ai and Yu encounter in the Subway as she becomes their protector while helping them search for their parents in Wonderland. The series is divided into two major sections, defined by the main method of transport the protagonists are utilizing. The first half of the series sees the group using the Ghost Train to reach a part of Wonderland, crossing paths with Kaze as he has no memory of his past save Makenshi, who aids the Lords of Gaudium who attack them. The group also encounters fragments of a destructive being named Omega, which is after the Ghost Train's power source to become whole. Meanwhile, the story from the antagonist's view is periodically revealed with Earl Tyrant's discussion with his lords. Earl is the embodiment of Chaos and is seeking the fragments of Omega to possess a power equal to the Unlimited, beings of immense power like Kaze and Makenshi who could destroy him.

The second half of the series sees the protagonists join up with the rebel faction, the Comodeen, and board the submarine, Jane, which is bound for Telos, the only place in Wonderland that has a natural deposit of the gravity-defying Flying Water. Both parties sought this substance: the Comodeen to power their airship Silvia to reach Earl's flying fortress Gaudium and the Earl's forces using the substance to contain Omega's power. The series climaxes when the Earl himself makes a move on the Comodeen, destroying Jane and capturing the protagonists in his true form: Chaos Tyrant. It was then that the Earl's right-hand man, Oscha, reveals that Ai and Yu were spawned from Chaos in the aftermath of Kaze and Makenshi's sending their adoptive parents to Wonderland. With only Omega's heart, Clear, remaining and fused with his Flying Water suit into a crystal, the Earl intended to absorb the Hayakawa twins as well to increase Chaos's power from their experiences. Luckily, Lou Lupus and Moogle come to their friends' aid as the Earl killed the former. Confronted with Chaos Tyrant, Kaze and Makenshi sacrifice themselves to destroy the Earl, thus ending his reign of terror over Wonderland while Lisa and the Hayakawa family were found by the Comodeen. There are also two mysterious figures that the group encounter, and , beings of incredible power who each lost their world before coming to Wonderland.

U. S. Air Force Interceptor Command Experimental Station No. 6 is a long-range radar installation located in rural Winthrop, Manitoba, Canada. Unexplained deaths begin to occur in the general area of a farming village near the American base. Postmortems reveal the victims were murdered and the brains and spinal cords are missing from the corpses; the only clue left behind are two puncture marks at the base of each skull. The locals, however, become convinced that radiation leaks from the radar installation's nuclear-power experiments are the cause of the mysterious deaths.

Air Force Major Jeff Cummings (Thompson) begins an investigation as the local deaths continue, interviewing various townsfolk, while looking for anything unusual. Cummings becomes suspicious of Professor R. E. Walgate (Reeves), a retired British scientist living near the airbase; Walgate is in the process of writing another book about his ongoing experiments with telekinesis, this time as it applies to thought projection. Major Cummings' suspicion of Walgate is later proved to be correct. The scientist finally admits he has not only succeeded in developing his mental ability, but in the process created a living thought projection. Unknown to Professor Walgate, the nuclear power radar experiments underway at the nearby U. S. airbase have greatly enhanced his mental abilities to the point that, through him, his living thought projection has become a malevolent and invisible new life form. It escaped from Walgate's laboratory and is now attacking humans as a means of replicating physical, though still invisible, new versions of itself, all of which are now feeding on the base's nuclear-generated power.

The invisible creatures eventually attack and kill the military personnel at the airbase in order to take over control of the radar station's nuclear reactor; two of them dial-up the power to very dangerous levels. As they do so all the creatures suddenly become visible. Their now visible bodies are revealed to be the missing brains with spinal cords stolen from their victims; their spinal cords have become very flexible and have now sprouted tendrils. These mutations also allow the brain-spine creatures to move quickly and even leap distances; each brain-spine has also developed a pair of small eyes at the ends of extended eye stalks.

The slithering creations then attack Walgate's home, where most of the film's principal characters have gathered to discuss the crisis. Some of the brains get inside by breaking through a boarded-up window using their tendrils, while others leap to the roof and slither down through the fireplace's open flue. Some of the defenders are attacked and killed, but well-aimed .45 semi-automatic pistol shots to the brains soon make short work of most of the attacking creatures; they gorily bleed out as they expire.

Walgate exits his home as a diversion, but is quickly attacked and killed by his creation. Meanwhile, Major Cummings escapes out the back way and quickly heads to the airbase, where he saves the day by blowing up the radar installation's power machinery. This immediately robs the surviving brains of their high-energy food source, and the creatures quickly die, dissolving into puddles of goo.

With Lestat de Lioncourt still in slumber since ''Memnoch the Devil'', the vampire coven is reunited around the "brat prince" and the vampire David Talbot asks Armand tell his life story.

Born somewhere in the Kievan Rus in the late 15th century, Armand (at this time called Andrei) becomes an icon painter in a monastery. He is forcefully taken out of this life of prayer and devotion by slave traders, who transport him to Constantinople and then to a brothel in Venice. Soon after his arrival, he is purchased by the vampire Marius de Romanus, who names him Amadeo.

Marius lives the extravagant life of a respected Renaissance painter, and mentors many boys who serve as his apprentices. Marius provides them with education, shelter, and food, and he assists them in finding respectable positions once they are grown. Over time, Amadeo's relationship with Marius develops and they become much closer than Marius is with any of the other boys. In addition to developing a sexual relationship, Amadeo sleeps in Marius' bed, is privy to special privileges, and becomes something of a "head boy" in the household. Still, Marius maintains strict control over Amadeo, and expects industriousness from him in all things.

When Amadeo comes of age, Marius begins Amadeo's education in sexuality and coupling. He takes Amadeo to a brothel, where he remains for several days. Amadeo later visits a male brothel, and makes several observations about the difference in sexual activities with the different genders. There is a distinct bisexuality to Amadeo's nature, as he enjoys activity with either sex. He later has a brief affair with an Englishman called Lord Harlech, who develops an unrequited obsession with Amadeo. During this period, Amadeo befriends and ultimately seduces Bianca Solderini, a wealthy debutante and courtesan whose primary role in life seems to be to throw nightly parties.

Marius eventually divulges his vampire nature to Amadeo, who almost immediately begins asking to be turned. Marius shows Amadeo some of what it means to be immortal, and allows him to join him in the hunt on several occasions. He tells Amadeo that they must always focus on killing evildoers; they assist Bianca by murdering her kinsmen who have been forcing her to poison those from whom they have borrowed money.

Eventually, on a night when Marius is out of the country, Harlech breaks into Marius's palazzo and attacks Amadeo, murdering two apprentices in the process. Amadeo kills Harlech, but not before the Englishman wounds him with a poisoned sword. Amadeo falls critically ill, and over several days falls into fever and delusions. Upon returning and finding Amadeo on his deathbed, Marius heals Amadeo's external wounds, cleans and grooms him, then gives him the Dark Gift, turning him into a vampire.

Marius sets out to train Amadeo, retaining high expectations of him, and forces him to continue his education in the arts. Amadeo's transition to vampire is relatively easy for him, although the Dark Gift brings about nightmares of his childhood. Marius and Amadeo return to Ukraine, where Amadeo visits his old school and home. He finds his elderly parents, reveals that he is alive, and leaves them with all the money and jewels he has with him.

Shortly after returning to Venice, the vampire Santino and his coven attack Marius' home, kidnap Amadeo and the apprentices, and burn the villa. Marius is burned and thought to be destroyed; his boys are taken to a bonfire and thrown in one by one by the coven as Amadeo watches. Santino spares Amadeo and educates him in the laws of the coven. Amadeo later goes to Paris, changes his name to Armand, and creates his own coven under the Cimetière des Innocents, which Lestat would years later drastically impact, thus resulting in the creation of the Théâtre des Vampires.

In the final segment of the book, Armand explains what occurred to him after the final chapters of ''Memnoch the Devil''. At the end of ''Memnoch the Devil'', Armand rushes into the open daylight and appears to be destroyed in a conflagration. Armand explains to David that by some means beyond his understanding he survived, and ended up on a rooftop in a stairwell protected from further exposure to the sun. However, he is badly burned and unable to move or fully function. While in this delirious state, he makes a mental connection to two children in a nearby apartment—Sybelle and Benji. The connection is forged through Sybelle's constant piano playing.

Eventually, Armand is able to reach out to the children and lead them to him. They believe he is an angel, but are moderately unsurprised when Armand divulges his true nature to them. Armand cannot hunt, so the two agree to trick a drug dealer up to the apartment so that Armand may feed on him. The plan works, and ultimately Armand is fully healed. He becomes friends with Sybelle and Benji and ultimately falls in love with them, showing to a certain degree a lolita complex. He shares his wealth with them without limit, mirroring the relationship Marius had with him to a certain degree.

Armand brings them to see Lestat, which he has some concerns about since vampires are traditionally not safe for mortals to be around. After trying to wake Lestat from his catatonic state, Armand returns to Marius's house to discover that Marius has given Benji and Sybelle the Dark Gift. Armand is at first furious at Marius because he wanted Sybelle and Benji to have full, mortal lives. The fact that Benji is ecstatic about the prospect of eternal life, only serves to fuel his anger. Marius explains to Armand that he did it since Armand never could without the two coming to hate him for it. Marius is willing to take the burden of Sybelle and Benji's eventual anger.

Two men bail on a wedding, go to a strip joint, and end up at a hotel.

The character Japhy drives Ray Smith's story, whose penchant for simplicity and Zen Buddhism influenced Kerouac on the eve of the sudden and unpredicted success of ''On the Road''. The action shifts between the events of Smith and Ryder's "city life," such as three-day parties and enactments of the Buddhist "Yab-Yum" rituals, to the sublime and peaceful imagery where Kerouac seeks a type of transcendence. The novel concludes with a change in narrative style, with Kerouac working alone as a fire lookout on Desolation Peak (adjacent to Hozomeen Mountain), in what would soon be declared North Cascades National Park (see also Kerouac's novel ''Desolation Angels''). His summer on Desolation Peak was desperately lonely. “Many's the time I thought I'd die of boredom or jump off the mountain,” he wrote in ''Desolation Angels''. Yet in ''The'' ''Dharma Bums'', Kerouac described the experience in elegiac prose.

One episode in the book features Smith, Ryder, and Henry Morley (based on real-life friend John Montgomery) climbing Matterhorn Peak in California. It relates Kerouac's introduction to this type of mountaineering and inspired him to spend the following summer as a fire lookout for the United States Forest Service on Desolation Peak in Washington.

Chapter 2 of the novel gives an account of the legendary 1955 Six Gallery reading, where Allen Ginsberg ('Alvah Goldbrook' in the book) gave a debut presentation of his poem "Howl" (changed to "Wail" in the book). At the event, other authors including Snyder, Kenneth Rexroth, Michael McClure, and Philip Whalen also performed.

Anyway I followed the whole gang of howling poets to the reading at Gallery Six that night, which was, among other important things, the night of the birth of the San Francisco Poetry Renaissance. Everyone was there. It was a mad night. And I was the one who got things jumping by going around collecting dimes and quarters from the rather stiff audience standing around in the gallery and coming back with three huge gallon jugs of California Burgundy and getting them all piffed so that by eleven o'clock when Alvah Goldbook was reading his poem 'Wail' drunk with arms outspread everybody was yelling 'Go! Go! Go!' (like a jam session) and old Rheinhold Cacoethes the father of the Frisco poetry scene was wiping his tears in gladness.

First season

Opening narration (spoken in voice-over by Martin in character as Blackwood):

Along with other sci-fi/horror series that ran in syndication in the late 1980s (such as ''Friday the 13th: The Series'' and ''Freddy's Nightmares''), ''War of the Worlds'' constantly pushed the “acceptable content” envelope, regularly featuring violence on par with the R-rated horror movies of the time. Gore is commonplace in the first season: dead aliens and their tossed-away hosts’ bodies melt in a grotesque puddle and the ruthless Mor-Taxans have no compunctions about torturing or mutilating any human who gets in their way. One of their trademark methods of murder would be gouged-out eyes courtesy of the third arm that would often burst out from their chest.

During the first season, the aliens are led by a triumvirate known as the Advocacy. They are a part of their society's ruling class, overseeing the invasion force on Earth while their leaders, the invisible and never heard Council, remain back on Mor-Tax. Outfitted throughout most of the season in contamination suits that pump coolant to counteract the killing heat of the radiation they need, they stay in their base of operation: a cavern in the Nevada desert, which is perfect due to the ambient radiation from atomic bomb tests. Due to the risks to their lives, they rarely venture into the outside world because without the Advocacy the lower classes would have no guidance and be useless.

Their goal is to pick up where they left off in 1953 by making way on Earth for the three million colonists heading in exodus from their dying world. Their major objective in order to accomplish this terraforming is to remove humanity from the planet. The aliens’ hatred of human beings goes beyond simple prejudice. Having come from a planet that can be compared to the Garden of Eden based on its description, the aliens see that humans do nothing but desecrate what they would call a paradise, and most importantly, a new home. Without humans in the way, they can restore the vegetation, and better replicate the conditions of their deceased world. To carry out a successful war, they seek out weapons (some of which are their own left behind from previous visitations), help amass their army, and engage in infiltration and all sorts of acts of warfare. But to make things more problematic, they must also find immunity against the germs that befell them in 1953.

The simplicity of the alien invasion storyline is countered in the first season by the addition of anomalous entities whose motives are only partially explained:

• Quinn: An alien trapped in a human host since the invasion of ’53, mysteriously immune to bacteria, and ready to play both of the major warring factions against each other for his own favor.
• The Qar’To: An unknown alien race represented by a synthetic lifeform sent to Earth, they want the Mor-Taxans dead and humanity preserved, but for sinister reasons.
• Project 9: A shadow government organization much like the Blackwood Project, but more interested in alien research than in resisting or countering the Mor-Taxan invasion plans.

A number of recurring allies are presented for the Blackwood team. Sylvia Van Buren (a character from the George Pal film reprised by the original actress, Ann Robinson), who was a colleague of Dr. Forrester, has since the end of the war developed the ability to sense the aliens and is prone to fairly accurate precognitive visions. The aliens’ scientific arsenal has little power over the supernatural powers of shaman Joseph Lonetree (whose presence is seemingly foreshadowed in the first episode). The team even makes friends with the remaining Grover's Mill militia of 1938 who had their own run-in with the aliens.

A recurring element in the series is the number three. This is an extension of the film, wherein the aliens’ physiology, technology and society are rooted in multiples of three: from their caste system (ruling class, soldiers, and scientists) to their bodies (three arms with three fingers), weaponry (in “The Resurrection”, they make bolas with three weighted ends), and even their mating cycle is every nine years (three times three years). The appearance of the number in some form is sprinkled throughout the season in reference to the aliens.

The episodes all had (often ironic) Biblical titles, such as "The Walls of Jericho", "To Heal the Leper", and "Among the Philistines".

“To Life Immortal” (''too doe nakotae'' as it would be said in the aliens’ native tongue), a phrase by which the aliens seem to sum up their belief system, is a common exchange between aliens, as a pledge to their shared goal or as a battle cry before honorable self-sacrifice. It later became a popular catchphrase among the show's fans.

Second season

Opening voice-over:

The creative team of Season 1 was replaced, bringing in Frank Mancuso, Jr., who was also busy producing ''Friday the 13th: The Series''. Many aspects of the show were retooled, such as the title sequence and music, and much of the black humor and Biblical references were removed. Norton and Ironhorse, two major characters from the first season, are killed off in the season premiere and replaced by mercenary John Kincaid (Adrian Paul).

The modern-day setting of the first season shifted to a not-too-distant future of "Almost Tomorrow" where the world has since spiraled into a dismal state with its economy, environment, and government all beaten down. The antagonists of the first season are replaced by the Morthren, from Mothrai; while the first season aliens were said to be from the planet Mor-Tax, there is a half-hearted explanation for this change in the final episode. The Morthren exterminate all the aliens from the first season for their failure to eradicate humanity.

Whereas bacteria and radiation are constant problems for the aliens in the first season, the Morthren have quickly found a cure-all means for this by transmutating into human bodies. With this, they forwent the ability to possess human bodies, retaining only one human body. These bodies are, however, easily damaged; as seen in the series a single bullet wound is enough to cause the aliens' human form to break down, killing them. Their equivalent of body-swapping is a cloning machine that makes exact copies of someone, only differing in that the duplicates would be loyal to the Morthren cause and their existence tied to the original. Ironically, as sores are the telltale signs of alien possession in the first season, a lack of scars or any physical flaw was a telltale sign of a clone, as the Morthren are fixated with perfection. While the Eternal is their god, the Morthren are led by Malzor (played by Denis Forest, who had a large part in the Season 1 episode “Vengeance Is Mine”). Just under him was the scientist Mana (Catherine Disher, whose husband also played a major role in a Season 1 episode) with Ardix (Julian Richings who appeared briefly in “He Feedeth Among the Lillies”) as her assistant.

Meanwhile, with General Wilson missing, the Cottage destroyed, and two team members lost in battle, the remnants of the team, with mercenary Kincaid, seek shelter. They take up base in an underground hideout in the sewers. Some of the characters experience shifts, such as Harrison carrying a gun, becoming more sullen and losing his more quirky personality traits. The friction between the militaristic Ironhorse and the other team members was not transferred with Kincaid, who got along well with everyone, who themselves became more militaristic in season 2. The show's theme of warfare between two races, and all the issues that come with it, was replaced by a theme of a bleak life on a desolate world, but with possible hope for the future.

Although the series was canceled after 14 episodes had been broadcast, six more episodes were completed. This also gave the production team the opportunity to create a finale, "The Obelisk", which offers a conclusive ending to the series as a whole.

American student Tara and her college friends visit Ireland to meet with local resident and friend Jake, and go camping in woodlands surrounding a long-disused children's home. While collecting psilocybin mushrooms for later consumption, Tara eats a death bell mushroom (Galerina) and suffers a seizure after which she experiences dream-like trances in which she begins having premonitions of future events.

Around the evening camp fire, with Tara resting in her tent, Jake tells a ghost story of the empty children's home nearby, and of a violent sadistic monk who survived an assault by one of his charges, as revenge for killing his twin brother. Overhearing this causes Tara to have premonitions of the murders of her friends.

After a deathly row with his girlfriend and the others, aggressive jock Bluto drinks some of the hallucinogenic tea (supposedly for all to share in the morning) and experiences a trip which culminates in his murder, seemingly at the hands of the rogue monk from the children's home.

The following morning, unconcerned by Bluto's disappearance – the others consume the mushroom tea, only to become separated from one another in the woods while under its effects. The three women, arguing and squabbling, get lost until they themselves are split, and Holly and Lisa are violently murdered – in accordance with Tara's continuing visions – after an encounter with local woodsmen Ernie and Bernie.

Jake and Troy find Tara on the bank of a river, and tell her to meet them in the abandoned home to summon help. Upon investigating the property, Troy is apparently killed by the monk, and Jake escapes by jumping from a high window, breaking his leg as he lands. Tara finds him and the two flee the haunted scene. Then, while resting his leg, he is murdered.

Tara awakes as a Garda helicopter hovers over the camp, and is dispatched into an ambulance as the sole survivor. As her mobile phone rings, she experiences a rapid flashback and realizes that the death bell mushroom caused her to murder all of her friends. She asks the paramedic for help. Everything becomes quiet until we see her bloody hands holding a pair of bloody scissors which suggests that she has killed the paramedic. The film ends with Tara running in the woods.

Aware that the world is round, Christopher Columbus lobbies for a trip westwards to Asia, but lacks a crew and ship. The Catholic theologians at the University of Salamanca heavily disapprove of Columbus's plan, not being keen on ideas that go against the writings of Ptolemaeus. Columbus is approached by Martín Pinzón, a shipowner from Palos, who introduces him to the banker Santángel, to whom Queen Isabella I owes money. Columbus meets with the queen, who grants him his journey in exchange for his promise to bring back sufficient amounts of riches in gold.

Columbus deceives many crewmen by telling them that the voyage will only last seven weeks. Three ships depart. Nine weeks go by with no sign of land. The crew becomes restless and edges toward mutiny. He tries to reinvigorate them with an inspiring speech, coinciding with a fast wind, which goads the men to return to their duties. At night, Columbus notices mosquitoes on the deck, indicating that land is not far off. Suddenly, out of the mist they see the lush vegetation and sandy beaches of Guanahani.

The Europeans befriend the local natives, who show them gold they have collected. Columbus teaches one of them Spanish so that they are able to communicate. He then informs them that he will return to Spain, which will be followed by the arrival of many more Europeans. Columbus leaves behind a group to begin the colonisation of the Americas. Back in Spain, he receives a high honour from the queen and has dinner with the council. They express disappointment with the small amount of gold he brought back, but the queen approves of his gifts. On the second expedition, Columbus takes 17 ships and over 1,000 men with him to the island; however, all the crewmen left behind are found to have been killed. When the tribe is confronted by Columbus and his troops, they tell him that another tribe came and killed them. Columbus chooses to believe them, but his commanding officer Moxica is not convinced. They begin to build the city of La Isabela and eventually manage to hoist the town bell into its tower.

Four years later, the natives are being forced to mine for gold. Moxica punishes one who fails to find any gold by cutting off his hand. The word of this act of violence spreads throughout the native tribes and they all disappear into the forest. Columbus begins to worry about a potential war, with the natives heavily outnumbering them. Upon return to his home, he finds his house set ablaze by Moxica and his followers, confirming his unpopularity among a certain faction of the settlers. Soon, the tribes arrive to fight the Spaniards and the island becomes war-torn, with Columbus' governorship being reassigned with orders for him to return to Spain.

Columbus is accused of nepotism and offering administrative positions to his personal friends, thereby injuring the pride of the nobles such as Moxica; he is replaced by de Bobadilla. Columbus returns to Castile to be imprisoned, but is bailed out by his sons. When he is summoned by the queen, she is reluctantly convinced to allow him to make another voyage, with the proviso that he neither take his brothers nor return to the colonies. As an old man, Columbus is virtually forgotten in Spain, with the discovery of the New World being credited to Amerigo Vespucci. Columbus's son Ferdinand asks his father to tell him his story so he can transcribe it.

A few years after helping to end the skaven plot in ''Shadow of the Horned Rat'', Morgan Bernhardt, commander of the "Grudgebringer" mercenaries, continues to take on work for those who have the gold to spare with the Empire. After helping to defend a trading post from a goblin attack, Bernhardt finds himself called to the city of Altdorf for a meeting with Emperor Karl Franz, who reveals to him that orcs have recently begun invading the Border Princes from the south. Agreeing to help Sven Carlsson, a border prince and Bernhardt's old friend and employer, the mercenaries head to contend with the threat, but soon discover that the orcs are fleeing into the empire to escape attack from an increasing number of undead forces.

Returning to Altdorf with news of this matter, Franz sends reinforcements to assist Carlsson. He then assigns Bernhardt to reinforce an Imperial fort under attack, whilst escorting his cousin, Countess Isabella Von Liberhurtz, to a town along his route. During the escort, bandit ambush the group, whereupon Bernhardt learns that a vampire lord seeks to abduct Isabella and make her his bride. After assisting the fort, the mercenaries return to Altdorf, whereupon they learn that Isabella was kidnapped after her escort was over, and that the recently increasing number of undead forces across the Old World is the result of an evil undead entity, known as the Dread King, having returned to the world. Learning that the Dread King now seeks three objects to increase his power, Bernhardt finds himself tasked with investigating what each is and preventing the undead from retrieving them, reluctantly being joined by Witchhunter General Matthias in his quest.

Heading to Sylvania first, Bernhardt destroys the first object - a powerful warpstone - while rescuing Isabella and killing the vampire lord that abducted her. Upon reporting his success, he then proceeds to the Northern Wastes via Kislev, engaging undead and destroying the second object - a necromancer assistant trapped in a glacier, who had become powerful over time. Following his success, Bernhardt travels to Bretonnia and the dark city of Moussilon, whereupon the mercenaries manage to destroy the third and final object - a group of deceased grail knights that had been resurrected to serve the Dread King's armies. Following the final campaign, Bernhardt returns to Altdorf, whereupon the Dread King's location is discovered to be at the Black Pyramid within the south. Tasked by Franz to destroy, Bernhardt leads his men south and engages the Dread King, successfully destroying him and saving the Old World from the undead threat.

Following a raid on the tower of a sorcerer, a skaven grey seer named Thanquol discovers that a crystal in their possession is actually a piece of a runic crystal that can power an ancient elven artifact known as the Menhir, allowing it to channel magic wherever one directs it. Seeking to use it to conquer the Old World, Thanquol launches a search for the other pieces, while creating a specially enchanted axe that allows him to manipulate an orc warboss named Urgat Rip-Eye into launching raids against the humans and dwarves in order to weaken them and divert their attention. At the same time, Thanquol orders a hunt for an elf named Ceridan, who could impede Thanquol's plans by warning others of the encroaching danger.

Whilst working within the Border Princes, Morgan Bernhardt, commander of the "Grudgebringer" mercenaries, is approached by Sven Carlsson, one of the aforementioned princes, who contracts him into capturing a rogue border prince working with the Skaven. However, the Skaven kill the prince and then attack Carlsson's hometown while the mercenaries conduct a patrol for him, capturing his adviser Ilmarin. Bernhardt manages to rescue him along with a dwarven regiment seeking to warn their king of increased Skaven activity, only to learn that Ilmarin is, in reality, Ceridan, a ranger from the Black Mountains, who has become increasingly concerned with the Skaven activity and requests the need to go to Loren Forest. Upon learning that Carlsson was captured by orcs, Ceridan requests Bernhardt's aid to rescue him.

Following his success, Bernhardt does what he can to combat the raids by the orcs in the Border Princes, while learning that the dwarven fortress of Zhufbar has come under attack from Skaven and orc forces. Eventually, he and Ceridan find themselves forced to travel to Zhufbar, whereupon the mercenaries become involved in helping with the dwarves' defence of the fortress. When the sceptre belonging to King Ungrunn, ruler of Zhufbar, is stolen by the Skaven, Ceridan reveals himself as a descendant of the ancient elves who created the Menhir, during the war between the elves and dwarves, explaining that the Skaven are seeking to find its location at the ruins of Ulthuan and use it. Concerned with the Menhir's power, despite knowing the Skaven must not find it, Ungrunn contracts Bernhardt to escort an envoy of his to the city of Nuln in order to meet with Emperor Karl Franz and request his aid in combating the Skaven's plot; in addition, he also provides a regiment of dwarves to help him, with the secret intention that they destroy the Menhir upon it being located.

Upon arriving in Nuln, Bernhardt and Ceridan meet with Franz and relay what they know about the Skaven's plot. After initially deciding to deliberate the matter with his council, Franz decides to provide aid upon learning that the pair intend to continue towards Loren without waiting for his response. After escorting Ungrunn's envoy to a dwarven fort in the Grey Mountains, the mercenaries finally make it to Loren and assist the elves within the wood against Skaven attacks. However, Thanquol finally finds the remaining piece of the crystal and with it, locates Ulthuan. Realising that the Menhir has been located, Ceridan advises Bernhardt to journey to the elven ruins, guiding the army with the runic crystal's sister stone embedded in his family's sword. While en route back to Nuln, Bernhardt's mercenaries defeat a large orc army, killing Urgat during the battle. Upon reaching Ulthan, the army encounters more Skaven, and launch an assault to stop them using the Menhir.

If the player fails to retake the Menhir in the final battle, Thanquol channels the artifact to make him into a powerful Skaven entity called the Horned Rat, which begins attacking the Empire and bringing destruction and chaos across the Old World. If the player lets the dwarves destroy the Menhir while defeating the Skaven, Ceridan considers the action as unjustified, citing that the dwarves were ignorant of what the artifact could do, and thus vowing that the elves will seek revenge for what they did. If the player lets the elves secure the Menhir while defeating the Skaven, Ceridan forces the dwarves to leave the artifact alone and let it be protected by the elves, before Bernhardt returns with him to Nuln to receive a hero's welcome for foiling the Skaven plot.

In a world populated by sentient robots, Rodney Copperbottom, son of Herb and Lydia Copperbottom from Rivet Town, is an aspiring young inventor. He idolizes Bigweld, a famous inventor, entrepreneur, and philanthropist whose company, Bigweld Industries, hires other inventors and provides robots with spare parts. Following Bigweld's example to "see a need, fill a need", Rodney develops a small, flying robot, named Wonderbot, to assist his father, Herb, who works as a dishwasher at a restaurant. When Herb's supervisor Mr. Gunk confronts them, Wonderbot malfunctions and wreaks havoc in the kitchen.

To help Herb pay for the damages, Rodney decides to move to Robot City, hoping to present Wonderbot to Bigweld Industries. Upon his arrival, Rodney is ejected from Bigweld Industries by the company's current head Phineas T. Ratchet, who, in Bigweld's absence, has stopped producing spare parts and inventions in favor of expensive "upgrades", thereby "outmoding" robots who are unable or unwilling to pay for them. Ratchet's mother, Madame Gasket, runs the Chop Shop, a facility that collects scrap and spare parts (and sometimes outmoded robots) and melts them to create ingots for Upgrades.

Rodney befriends Fender Pinwheeler, a ne'er-do-well he met at the train station. Fender takes him in to a boarding home populated by other outmodes, known collectively as the "Rusties". Word of Rodney's mechanical prowess spreads, and he is hailed as a local hero after he and the Rusties fix outmodes throughout the neighborhood, although they are eventually unable to cope with the demand due to the spare part shortage. Hoping to enlist Bigweld's help, Rodney and Fender infiltrate the Bigweld Ball – where Bigweld usually makes an appearance – only for Ratchet to announce that Bigweld will not attend. Enraged, Rodney publicly berates Ratchet, who orders his security team to eliminate him. Cappy, a Bigweld Industries executive opposed to Ratchet's plans, rescues Rodney and Fender. Fender is captured by a Sweeper, a vehicle that collects scrap metal and outmodes, and taken to the Chop Shop where he discovers Gasket and Ratchet's plan to use a heavily-armed fleet of Super-Sweepers to destroy all outmodes throughout the city to make and sell more ingots.

Meanwhile, Rodney and Cappy fly to Bigweld's mansion, where they eventually find Bigweld and tell him what has been going on. Bigweld reveals Ratchet's greed and business sense dwarfed his idealism in the management of Bigweld Industries, and tells Rodney and Cappy to leave. Crushed, Rodney calls his parents and plans to return to Rivet Town. Herb encourages Rodney to fight for his dreams, or he will spend the rest of his life regretting it like Herb did. Fender returns upon escaping from the Chop Shop and reveals Ratchet and Gasket's plot. Rodney rallies Cappy and the Rusties to stop them. They are joined by Bigweld, who has regained his resolve after realizing how much he and his ideals meant to Rodney.

The group returns to Bigweld Industries where Bigweld fires Ratchet, who ultimately knocks him unconscious, planning on melting him down as well. Rodney, Cappy, and Wonderbot rescue Bigweld from Ratchet and escape with the Rusties in a security vehicle with Ratchet close behind. Rodney unclips Ratchet's vehicle to break free, but their vehicle loses control in front of the Chop Shop and Bigweld is rolled inside. Refusing to give up, Rodney upgrades the Rusties to rescue Bigweld. Rodney, Cappy, and the Rusties, alongside an army of outmodes that Rodney had repaired earlier, battle Ratchet, Gasket, and their army of workers. Rodney and Bigweld immobilize the Super-Sweepers and defeat Ratchet, who accidentally kills Gasket by knocking her into the incinerator while trying to escape. Ratchet is accidentally stripped of his upgrades, being left chained to the ceiling with his father.

Taking control of Bigweld Industries once again, Bigweld promises to make spare parts available to everyone. Later, he holds a public ceremony in Rivet Town, where he nominates Rodney as his new second-in-command and eventual successor. Rodney provides Herb with new replacement parts and a flugelhorn-like instrument to fulfill his dream of being a musician. After a shaky start, Herb leads Rodney, Cappy, the Rusties, Bigweld and the townspeople in a rousing rendition of "Get Up Offa That Thing".

Johnny is a data trafficker who has undergone cybernetic surgery to have a data storage system implanted in his head. The system allows him to store digital data too sensitive to risk transmission on computer networks. To keep the cargo secure, the data is locked by a password known only to the intended recipient. Johnny enters a trance-like state while the data is being transferred or the password is being set, making him unaware of the contents and unable to retrieve them. He makes a modest living in the Sprawl by physically transporting sensitive information for corporations, underworld crime rings or wealthy individuals.

As the story opens, Johnny has arranged to meet with his most recent customer, Ralfi Face, at the Drome bar. Ralfi is overdue to retrieve the hundreds of megabytes of data he has stored in Johnny's head. To add to his troubles, Johnny has learned that Ralfi has placed a contract on him, although the reasons are unclear. Johnny finds Ralfi at his usual table, accompanied by his bodyguard Lewis. Johnny threatens them with a sawed-off shotgun in his bag, but Lewis incapacitates him with a neural disruption device hidden under the table. Ralfi reveals that the data was, unknown to him at the time, stolen from the Yakuza, who are very interested in ensuring it is not revealed.

Johnny is rescued by Molly, a "razorgirl" who has undergone extensive body modifications, most notably razor-sharp blades under her fingers. She joins the action at the table, looking for a job. When Lewis tries to attack her, she cuts his wrist tendons and takes the incapacitating control device from him. Ralfi offers to pay her off, but she turns off the device and frees Johnny. Johnny immediately offers a higher bid to hire her as a bodyguard. Johnny and Molly take Ralfi as they exit the bar, but a Yakuza assassin waiting outside cuts Ralfi to pieces with a monomolecular wire hidden in a prosthetic thumb. Johnny fires his shotgun at the assassin but misses due to the man's enhanced reflexes. Molly is delighted to be facing another professional.

Johnny decides that the only way to save himself from the same fate as Ralfi is to get the data out of his head, which can be done only by using a SQUID to retrieve the password. Molly takes him to an amusement park to meet Jones, a cybernetically enhanced dolphin retired from Navy service. Jones' previous assignment was to locate and hack into enemy mines using the SQUID and other sensors implanted in his skull. Since he is now addicted to heroin, the result of the Navy's efforts to keep its dolphins loyal, Molly trades him a batch in exchange for finding the password. Johnny then has Molly read it out so he can enter his retrieval trance, with recorders capturing all the data. They upload a snippet to a Yakuza communications satellite and threaten to release the rest unless Johnny is left alone.

To deal with the Yakuza assassin, who is still following them, Molly leads Johnny to the Lo Teks, a group of anti-technology outcasts who live in a suspended hideout near the top of the geodesic domes covering the Sprawl. At Molly's request, the Lo Teks allow the assassin to climb up so she can face him on the "Killing Floor," a sprung-floor arena wired to synthesizers and amplifiers. Molly dances around the assassin, causing discordant noise to blare from the sound system. She eventually tricks him into slicing off his own hand with his thumb wire. Overwhelmed by the noise and the strange environment, he jumps through a hole in the floor and falls to his death.

The story closes nearly a year later, with Johnny now living among the Lo Teks. He and Molly have gone into business for themselves, using Jones' SQUID to retrieve traces of all the data he has ever carried and blackmailing former clients with it.

Harry Folger is a food critic for a major newspaper. Restaurants live or die by his reviews, which often use gratuitously nasty prose in order to draw more readers. Spiting journalistic integrity, Harry usually only visits the restaurants he pans so that he can collect their matchbooks and display them as tombstones in a graveyard scene at his office.

Harry visits a new Chinese restaurant called "Mr. Lee's Chinese Cuisine", orders a massive amount of food and then immediately asks for the check without eating. Assuming Harry was displeased with the food, the owner Mr. Lee apologizes, tells Harry the meal is free, and presents him with a fortune cookie. The fortune reads "A grand reward awaits you just around the corner."

As Harry walks past an alley, a thief knocks him down and drops $100,000 in diamonds before running away. The grateful jewelry store owner gives Harry $1,000 as a reward. Realizing the fortune cookies are magical, Harry returns for more. When Mr. Lee complains that customers canceled their reservations because of his review, Harry promises to write a more favorable re-review if he is allowed to have a table. After again not touching his food, he receives a fortune that says "April arrives today, bringing romance." As it is September, Harry storms out, intending to go back on his promise. On the way to his office, he meets a woman asking for directions. He shows her the way and asks her out to dinner. She introduces herself as April Hamilton.

Harry takes her out to Mr. Lee's. Harry, again, does not eat any food despite April telling him how good it is. As the two get fortune cookies, April's fortune says that she will soon recognize a grievous error in judgment, while Harry's fortune says "You're going to die." Outraged, Harry threatens Mr. Lee and causes a scene. Disconcerted, April leaves. As he exits the restaurant, Harry is overcome with massive hunger pangs. He finds that he is on a street of Chinese restaurants that were not there before. He wanders into one restaurant after another, but is unable to satisfy his hunger. As he continues to endlessly eat, he receives a fortune cookie that says "You're dead." A tombstone with Harry's name on it has been added to his matchbook graveyard.

Sissy Hankshaw, the novel's protagonist, is a woman born with enormously large thumbs who considers her mutation a gift. The novel covers various topics, including free love, feminism, drug use, birds, political rebellion, animal rights, body odor, religion, and yams.

Sissy capitalizes on the size of her thumbs by becoming a hitchhiker and subsequently travels to New York. The character becomes a model for The Countess, a male homosexual tycoon of menstrual hygiene products. The Tycoon introduces Sissy to a staid Mohawk named Julian Gitche, whom she later marries. In her later travels, she encounters, among many others, a sexually open cowgirl named Bonanza Jellybean and an itinerant escapee from a Japanese internment camp happily mislabeled The Chink. The Chink is presented as a hermetic mystic and, at one point writes on a cave wall, "I believe in everything; nothing is sacred. I believe in nothing; everything is sacred." and frequently says "Ha Ha Ho Ho and Hee Hee." A flock of whooping cranes also makes frequent appearances throughout the novel, which includes details of their physical characteristics and migratory patterns. Robbins also inserts himself into the novel (as a character).

The series focused on middle-aged couple Stanley (Norman Fell) and Helen Roper (Audra Lindley), who were landlords to Jack, Janet and Chrissy on ''Three's Company''.

In this spin-off, the Ropers have sold their apartment building in the ''Three's Company'' episode "An Anniversary Surprise" (season 3, episode 20) to live in the upmarket community of Cheviot Hills, where the social-climbing Helen struggled to fit in with her neighbors. Stanley made little attempt to fit in with the standards of the community, thereby causing Helen much embarrassment.

As was the case during their time on ''Three's Company'', opening credits for ''The Ropers'' alternate between Audra Lindley and Norman Fell being credited first.

Cat burglar Jackie Thompson breaks into a museum and steals a stone from a display case. After tripping the alarm, he is shot by a security guard, but the stolen stone heals him. Jack escapes and heads back to his apartment. Hearing a commotion in the hallway, he discovers that his friendly neighbor Harry is having a heart attack. While grasping the stone, Jackie touches Harry's chest and begs for healing. Harry makes a full recovery.

Harry tells Jackie he had an out of body experience, which he feels confirms that the stone not only healed him, but brought him back from the dead. Harry tells Jackie that they could make a fortune with that kind of power. Jackie becomes "Brother John," a healer on a TV ministry. Jackie is so heartened by the good he accomplishes that he comes to care about it more than the money, while Harry remains only interested in profits. Duende, a Native American man, visits them backstage and states that his people loaned the stone to the museum. He demands they give it back. Jackie is inclined to return the stone, since they have already earned more money than they can spend in a lifetime and he fears Duende will report his theft to the police otherwise, but Harry refuses.

Joseph Rubello, a drug lord, visits Jackie at his home and begs him to heal his terminal cancer. Because Rubello once had his thugs put Jackie in the hospital for botching a delivery, Jackie demands $2 million to heal him. However, the stone fails to work. Hoping this was a one-time failure, at the TV ministry Jackie tests the power by trying to heal a deaf boy backstage, so as not to risk embarrassing himself on live television. The power fails again. Duende arrives and explains that the stone only works when used unselfishly. His old bullet wound opens and begins bleeding profusely. Harry refuses to help Jackie, preferring to inherit his half of the profits. The deaf boy follows Jackie outside. He hands the stone to the boy, who heals him. Jackie takes the stone and cures the boy's deafness. He then gives the stone to Duende. Jackie's TV career is over, but he has a brighter outlook on life now that he has learned to care about other people.

Peter Jay Novins is at a bar and accidentally dials his own home phone number. The phone is answered by someone who claims to be Peter Jay Novins and sounds just like him. Flustered, Peter leaves the bar and uses a phone booth to call his house. He gets himself again and begins to believe that the man on the other end of the line is his doppelganger. Peter thinks about heading over to his apartment, but the man on the phone warns him against it and tells him that because Peter's life is terrible, he is going to change it.

Peter cashes out his bank account, calls the grocery store and insults them to ensure that Peter B (the doppelganger still in the apartment) cannot get food delivered. He hopes this will force Peter B to eventually leave the apartment and allow him to move back in, reclaiming his life. However, Peter B already used the $200 that was stashed away to stock up on groceries. He tells Peter A that he figures that Peter A is a piece of him that wandered off while he was sleeping. Peter A, however, thinks that it's possible that when he went to a friend's lab and a picture of his "aura" was taken, it somehow "stole" something from him.

As days go by, Peter A becomes increasingly sick, while Peter B makes major changes to his life: He patches things up with his estranged mother and invites her to live with him, turns down an unethical advertising job that he had previously accepted, tries to make amends with an ex-girlfriend who left her husband to pursue their affair only for Peter to dump her when he tired of their relationship, and plans to marry his current girlfriend and have children. Peter B visits Peter A's hotel room to finally meet him face to face, telling him that he is being replaced and is becoming a memory. Peter B reveals that things are going well with him and that he has put his life in order—something Peter A failed to do. He asks Peter A if there is anything he would have done differently. He says no. As Peter B leaves, Peter A wishes him well, shakes his hand, and then disappears.

David Wong, a young Asian American, has spent three years looking for a mysterious place called "The Lost and Found Emporium." He tracks it down to a backroom of a San Francisco pawn shop, but cannot find any staff. Browsing, David meets an elderly woman who is looking for lost time. He is not interested in her story, but he sees an orb of light floating behind her. Following the orb, which the woman does not see, he finds a cage with mice that have instructions to rub them until they calm down. Believing this is her chance to win back her lost time, the woman tries to do so but the mice scatter. She breaks down in tears and David leaves her.

David meets an elderly man who came to the emporium by accident. He says he lost the respect of his children. With the help of another orb, David points him to a mirror, which he must look at for no less than five and a half minutes. The man is disgusted by what he sees-—a distorted, monstrous image of him. He smashes the mirror and then realizes he has destroyed his chance. David shakes his head and leaves.

David is confronted by a young woman named Melinda who scolds him for his lack of compassion. David says it is his compassion he is after and explains how he lost it due to racial intolerance, in particular the murder of Vincent Chin. Deducing that visitors to the emporium can see other people's guiding orbs but not their own, Melinda offers to find his compassion if he finds her lost item. David agrees and follows her orb to an old thermos, which releases a stream of vapor. After inhaling the vapor, Melinda receives back her sense of humor. She points David to three flasks, but won't tell him which one contains his compassion.

David smashes the two biggest flasks, regaining his integrity and a childhood memory. The third flask rolls away and is lost. David is unhappy, but decides it is destiny to help other unfortunate souls. Melinda hypothesizes that he gained back some of his compassion with the restoration of his integrity, and volunteers to stay as his assistant. They start by helping the elderly man and woman. Afterwards Melinda puts up a new sign on the entrance: "Wong's Lost and Found Emporium: Under new management".

Adam Grant is tried for first-degree murder, found guilty, and sentenced to death by hanging. He laughs and tells the judge that his execution won't matter because he is only dreaming.

Prosecutor Mark Ritchie and Grant's attorney Erin Jacobs ponder Grant's strange claim. Jacobs argues that Grant must be telling the truth. For evidence, Jacobs asks why there was no press in or around the courtroom despite this being a murder trial.

Ritchie visits Grant's cell and tries to argue that Grant is simply trying for an insanity defense, even though Grant can lip-sync everything Ritchie says. Grant asks Ritchie how, if he is to be executed Monday at 12:01 am, could he have been sentenced less than a day ago, as courts do not operate on Sundays. Grant says that though different people take on each role in each iteration of the dream, Ritchie's wife Carol never changes roles because she is Grant's sister in reality. Grant suspects that he is having this dream because he feels guilty about something which he did to Carol. He is momentarily troubled when he realizes that he can't remember what it is he feels guilty about or what happens after he is hung, but he brushes these concerns aside. Grant tells what Carol told Ritchie earlier that evening, which makes Ritchie panic and leave.

A priest visits Grant in his cell. Grant claims that the priest is actually his own father who died years ago. Meanwhile, Ritchie frantically tries to get a stay of execution. Just as the governor calls the execution chamber, the buttons are pushed. Before Grant can be hanged, he disappears, shortly followed by everyone in this world.

The opening courtroom scene replays with the people in different roles—Jacobs is now the judge, Grant's father is the jury foreman, inmate Flash is the prosecutor, and Jimmy (another inmate) is the defense attorney.

Miley Judson is an alcoholic who has tried quitting alcohol countless times and with countless methods, with only short-term success. He and his wife have succeeded in concealing his alcoholism from their son, but their marriage is deteriorating.

In a late night drunken stupor, Miley visits Dr. Eugene Murrick, whose Hellgramite Method for curing alcoholism he saw advertised on a box of matches. Dr. Merrick offers him a red pill. He takes the pill, and though Dr. Murrick makes contradictory statements about the treatment, Miley is too drunk to notice anything suspicious. The next day, he discovers alcohol does not intoxicate him anymore. He consults Murrick, who tells him that the pill contained a Hellgramite, a tapeworm that absorbs all alcohol in the digestive system, making it grow with each drink. The only solution is to starve the Hellgramite, but to do so prompts it to attack the host from within, causing excruciating pain. If he can endure the pain, the Hellgramite will eventually be forced into a hibernation state. But if he ever drinks another drop of alcohol the Hellgramite will re-awaken, growing stronger with each reincarnation, until it can kill the host.

Miley sends his wife and son away for a couple of weeks and dumps all the alcohol in the house down the drain. As days pass, he undergoes ever-increasing pain. Miley confronts Murrick, who reveals that the Hellgramite Method was created not to cure alcoholics, but to take revenge on them after Murrick's wife and two children were killed by a drunk driver.

Later at the bar Miley used to frequent, he approaches a man and offers him matches with the Hellgramite Method advertised on the box. He is now well-dressed and self-confident. He pays his bar tab. The bartender offers him a drink on the house but Miley declines and walks out of the bar into the sunlight.

Callous businessman Tom Bennett returns to his office after recovering from a heart transplant. He begins acting uncharacteristically, loosening his necktie, spontaneously leaving the office to buy a pair of boots, ordering plants for the office, and buying his colleague Julie a hot dog for lunch. They take a walk on a beach and run into a sad-looking young woman to whom he is instantly drawn.

On a drive with his colleague Spence, they end up leaving the city and find a diner. Tom spots the woman he ran into at the beach, Mary Jo, working as a waitress. Mary Jo is disturbed by his staring at her and angered when he asks her out to dinner and refuses to take no for an answer. Despite her rebuff, he begins patronizing the diner twice a week. Julie, who has had an on-again, off-again relationship with Tom, gets jealous and confronts Tom about this. He confides in her that Mary Jo refuses to wait at his table, but he has become obsessed with her. Another waitress at the diner finally pulls him aside and explains that Mary Jo is still grieving for her boyfriend, who died in a car accident.

When Tom asks Mary Jo about her boyfriend, she says that they were childhood sweethearts. They were making plans to get married when the accident occurred. On a hunch, Tom asks what his name was. She tells him Jamie Adler, who was the donor for Tom's heart. At work, Tom's lackadaisical attitude toward business increases. Tom drives to the diner dressed in jeans and T-shirt and in a pick-up truck. He sits and waits for Mary Jo all night. She finally decides to talk to him and he tells her his life was in bad shape before, but now he has been given a second chance. Tom also promises to wait as long as it takes for her to open up to him. She reveals that Jamie similarly promised he would always be there for her.

Shortly after entering a hospital emergency room, Mrs. Reed goes blind from cataracts. While Nurse Claire Hendricks is visiting her hospital room, Mrs. Reed tells her that they are two of a kind. Uninterested in her cryptic remarks, Claire leaves. Mr. Reed is brought to the hospital, having been abandoned by Mrs. Reed after he started going blind.

The spontaneous cataract development proves to be an epidemic. Claire, despite her incredible workload, visits with Mrs. Reed again. Mrs. Reed again says they are alike and claims the blindness is divine retribution on a human race that has become indifferent to suffering, like monkeys—see no evil, speak no evil, etc.

A report surfaces that an explosion at a biological research laboratory released several unstable forms of bacteria into the atmosphere just hours before the outbreak. Claire tells Dr. Peterson that she is nonetheless now convinced that Mrs. Reed is right, and she feels that she herself has become unfeeling towards her patients and to her own husband. Dr. Peterson argues that she has only maintained the professional distance necessary to do her job, but she is unconvinced. After talking to him, Claire succumbs to blindness.

A surgery is developed to remove the cataracts. Dr. Peterson asks Mrs. Reed to visit Claire and cheer her. Though she has not yet had the surgery, Mrs. Reed is hopeful and convinced that the discovery of the bacteria proves she was wrong. However, Claire argues that the presence of a scientific explanation for the epidemic does not mean it is not divine retribution, and that if they treat themselves with surgery, the same affliction will strike them down in another form. Concerned, Mrs. Reed asks Dr. Peterson if Claire will have the surgery. He says "An operation isn't the answer in her case.", as Claire's eyes are clear and her blindness is psychosomatic.

A down-and-out, injured baseball player named Ed Hamner tries to maintain his love for baseball by chatting and trading baseball cards with his teenage neighbor Paula, who shows potential as a player herself, but his wife Cindy insists that baseball is a children's game and wants him to spend all his time getting a job in an unrelated field. Paula finds an old baseball card of a player from 1909-10 named Monte Hanks, who not only happens to resemble Ed, but has identical rookie year stats. Ed is impressed that Hanks got 7 home runs in his second year, his final year before a baseball to the head ended his life. After a fight with Cindy about Ed missing a job interview so that he could cheer Paula on at an important game, Ed goes to sleep and awakens to discover the card magically growing to the size of a door. Ed steps into it to find himself in the uniform of Monte Hanks. He no longer has an injury and is ready to play baseball.

Ed tells Paula he went back in time 78 years and played ball without the use of his cane, showing as proof that Hanks's card now shows 8 home runs. He takes her with him into the card, and she watches him play baseball in the past. After returning to the present, Paula and Ed are excited that Ed is going to play in the World Series. Cindy arranges for her and Ed to go to a dinner party where he will meet prospective employers the evening after the World Series.

Paula tells Ed she cannot go to the game with him because of an orthodontist appointment, but wonders whether or not Ed belongs in 1910. He seems happier there. The game runs late, and Ed opts to skip out on the dinner party so he can finish it. Cindy finds Ed gone and burns his card collection in anger. Paula comes in and saves the Monte Hanks card. Hearing Cindy's bitter words about Ed, Paula realizes Cindy does not truly understand or care about Ed, so she tears the card in half in order to keep Ed in 1910. At home, she looks at the torn card, and is delighted as it magically fills with impressive statistics for the years succeeding 1910.

Gary Pitkin, an Elvis impersonator, is booked by his manager Sandra into a small hotel on the Las Vegas Strip. Gary is unsatisfied with this, and vents his frustration over his music career having degraded into lounge performances. Sandra mentions that she met the real Elvis when she was a teenager, after he picked her out of an audience. He took her back to his hotel room and said some strange things, such as that he wasn't really Elvis and that someone was after him.

As Gary is driving home, he gets in an accident with a crazed driver. He thumbs for a ride, and is picked up by a trucker who resembles Elvis. When he sees a newspaper on the floor dated July 3, 1954, Gary realizes that the trucker actually ''is'' Presley and that it is two days before he will record his first single.

When they arrive at Crown Electric, Elvis questions Gary about who he is. Gary uses his strong physical resemblance to Elvis and Elvis's belief in the supernatural to convince him that he is Elvis's twin brother Jesse, who died at birth. Gary tells him that he came back to help him start his legendary music career and avoid the drugs and dishonest industry figures which brought him down.

They meet the next day to rehearse the song he is going to record for Sam Phillips. Elvis starts playing the ballad "I Love You Because". Gary attempts to convince him to play a rock and roll version of "That's All Right" instead, knowing it ended up being Elvis's first single. Elvis is horrified, saying the music is "not decent". The two break into an argument that leads to a brawl. Elvis leaps towards Gary and is fatally impaled on his own broken guitar when Gary moves out of the way.

Gary buries Elvis and assumes his identity in order to make up for causing his death. The following day, Gary goes into Sun Studio and records "That's All Right".

Gary successfully recreates Elvis's career, including his 1970s encounter with Sandra. He tells her that he did all the songs and all the movies as closely as he remembered. He questions whether, had he allowed Elvis to start his career the way he wanted, the real Elvis would have been better at it than him or if he would have never introduced rock and roll at all. He says that he talks to Elvis, who tells him that he still owes him, and that he now realizes it is not enough to recreate Elvis's glory; he must experience Elvis's downfall as well. He sends her off with a kiss, and sits in front of a window facing the Vegas Strip.

When criminal mastermind Erwin "Doc" Riedenschneider is released from prison after seven years, he visits a bookie named Cobby in an unnamed Midwestern river city. Cobby arranges a meeting between Doc and Alonzo Emmerich, a wealthy lawyer. Doc tells Emmerich of his plan to steal jewelry worth half a million dollars or more. Doc needs $50,000 to hire three men—a safecracker, a driver, and a hooligan—to pull off the caper. Emmerich agrees to provide the money and find a fence.

Doc hires Louie Ciavelli, a professional safecracker. Ciavelli only trusts Gus Minissi, a hunchbacked diner owner, to be the getaway driver. The last member of the gang is “hooligan” Dix Handley, also a friend of Gus. Dix tells Doll Conovan—who is in love with him—of his dream to buy back the horse farm that his family lost after a terrible year that included his father's death and a prized colt breaking its leg.

To access the jewelry store, Ciavelli hammers through a brick wall, deactivates a door alarm to admit Doc and Dix, and opens the main safe using home-brewed nitroglycerine. Things begin to go drastically wrong. The concussion of the explosion triggers several alarms in the area. Dix slugs a security guard on rounds. The guard drops his revolver, which discharges and wounds Ciavelli in the belly. The men get away unseen, but a police manhunt begins.

Ciavelli insists that Gus take him home. Gus's wife wants to take him to the hospital, but Gus sends for a trusted doctor. Dix and Doc take the loot to Emmerich, who is broke. He sent private detective Bob Brannom to collect sums owed to him, but Brannom failed. Desperate, Emmerich tries to double-cross the others with Brannom's help, suggesting that they leave the gems with him. Realizing that Doc and Dix have seen through Emmerich's stalling, Brannom draws a gun. Dix kills him but is wounded by a through-and-through shot. Doc scolds a suicidal Emmerich for his foolish plan and tells him to offer the jeweler's insurance company the return of the valuables for 25% of their value.

Emmerich dumps Brannom's body in the river. The police find the list of debtors on Emmerich's letterhead on the corpse. When they question him, Emmerich lies about his whereabouts and claims he spent the night with his mistress, Angela Phinlay.

Under pressure from police commissioner Hardy, police lieutenant Ditrich—who is on Cobby's payroll—beats the bookie into confessing everything in a vain attempt to save himself. Ditrich is later arrested for corruption.

With Cobby's confession, Hardy arrests Emmerich at Angela's home and pressures Angela to tell the truth about his whereabouts the night of the crime. When the police allow Emmerich to leave the room to phone his invalid wife, he commits suicide.

After Gus is arrested, he attacks Cobby in the jail, warning him that he will end up in the morgue. When the police knock on Ciavelli's door, they find his funeral in progress.

In Doll's apartment, Doc offers Dix some of the stones but he refuses; he just wants to leave town. After Doc says goodbye to Dix, Doll gets a car and insists on going with Dix.

Doc persuades a taxi driver to drive him a long distance to Cleveland. They stop at a roadside diner, where Doc lusts after a pretty young woman dancing to jukebox tunes and is entranced. Because of the delay, Doc is recognized by two policemen, who arrest him after finding the stolen jewels hidden in his overcoat.

In the car, at a railroad crossing, Dix passes out. A railroad employee takes them to a doctor, who phones the local police to report the gunshot wound. Dix regains consciousness, pulls out the plasma IV and escapes. The doctor observes that he "doesn't have enough blood in him to keep a chicken alive."

At a press conference, Hardy notes that 3 of the 7 suspects have died, 3 others have been arrested, and the one on the loose is a hardened killer "without human feeling."

Dix drives Doll through the fields of Kentucky, deliriously rambling about the black colt he loved as a boy. He arrives at his family's former farm, stumbles into the pasture, and collapses. Doll runs for help, while horses gather to nuzzle the dead man.

The story opens with a paragraph about Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest mountain in Africa, whose western summit is called in Masai the "House of God." There, we are told, lies the frozen carcass of a leopard near the summit. No one knows why it is there at such altitude.

The reader is introduced to Harry, a writer dying of gangrene, and Helen, who is with him on safari in Africa. They are stranded in the camp, because a bearing in their truck's engine burnt out. Harry's situation makes him irritable, and he speaks about his impending death in a matter-of-fact, sarcastic way that upsets Helen. He quarrels with her over minute things, from whether he should drink a whiskey and soda, to whether she should read to him. Helen is obviously concerned for his welfare, but Harry's frustration makes him talk unpleasantly towards her.

Harry then begins to ruminate on his life experiences, which have been many and varied, and on the fact that he feels he has never reached his potential as a writer because he has chosen to make his living by marrying wealthy women. In italicized portions of the text that are scattered throughout the story, Hemingway narrates some of Harry's experiences in a stream-of-consciousness style. Harry's first memories consist of traveling around Europe following a battle: hiding a deserter in a cottage, hunting and skiing in the mountains, playing cards during a blizzard, and hearing about a bombing run on a train full of Austrian officers.

Harry then falls asleep and wakes in the evening to find Helen returning from a shooting expedition. He meditates on how she really is thoughtful and good to him, and how she is not to blame that his talent as a writer has been destroyed. Helen, he remembers, is a rich widow who lost her husband and a child, was bored by a series of lovers, and eventually "acquired" Harry because "she wanted some one that she respected with her"; she loves Harry "dearly as a writer, as a man, as a companion and as a proud possession", while Harry makes it clear that he does not love her. Harry then recalls how he developed gangrene two weeks earlier: they had been trying to get a picture of some waterbuck, and Harry scratched his right knee on a thorn. He had not applied iodine right away, and the wound got infected; because all other antiseptics ran out, he used a weak carbolic solution that "paralyzed the minute blood vessels", thus the leg developed gangrene.

As Helen returns to drink cocktails with Harry, they make up over their quarrel. Harry's second memory sequence then begins. He recalls how he once patronized prostitutes in Constantinople "to kill his loneliness", pining for the very first woman he fell in love with, with whom he quarreled in Paris and broke up. Harry had a fight with a British soldier over an Armenian prostitute, and then left Constantinople for Anatolia, where, after running from a group of Turkish soldiers, "he had seen the things that he could never think of and later still he had seen much worse". Then Harry recalls that upon his return to Paris, his then-wife inquired about a letter that was actually from Harry's first love—a reply to the letter he wrote to that woman (mailed to New York, asking to write to his office in Paris) while being in Constantinople.

Helen and Harry eat dinner, and then Harry has another memory—this time of how his grandfather's log house burned down. He then relates how he fished in the Black Forest, and how he lived in a poor quarter of Paris and felt a kinship with his poor neighbors. Next, he remembers a ranch and a boy he turned in to the sheriff after the boy protected Harry's horse feed by shooting and killing a thief. Harry ponders: "That was one story he had saved to write. He knew at least twenty good stories from out there and he had never written one. Why?". Then he felt once again that he'd prefer to be in a different company rather than with Helen, as "rich were dull". Next, his thoughts wander to beating the fear of death, and the limits of being able to bear pain. He remembers an officer named Williamson who was hit by a bomb, and to whom Harry subsequently fed all his morphine tablets. Harry considers how he does not have to worry about pain in his current condition.

As Harry lies on his cot remembering, he feels the overwhelming presence of death and associates it with the hyena that has been spotted running around the edge of the campsite. He is unable to speak. Helen, thinking that Harry has fallen asleep, has him moved into the tent for the night. Harry dreams that it is morning, and that a man called Compton has come with a plane to rescue him. He is lifted onto the plane (which has space only for him and the pilot) and watches the landscape go by beneath him. Suddenly, he sees the snow-covered top of Mt. Kilimanjaro, and knows that is where he is bound. Helen wakes up in the middle of the night to a strange hyena cry, and finds Harry unresponsive on his cot.

Maury is a playwright who is behind in his rent. Though he boasts that when his latest play is completed he will have more than enough money to pay his bills, inwardly he realizes that much as he and his longtime writing partner Harry enjoy writing together, their ongoing lack of success is primarily due to their mediocre talent. During an intense joint writing session, Harry dies of a heart attack. Harry, in his last moments, hands Maury an ancient relic and explains that each bearer of this relic gets one wish only, and he has already used his, so he needs Maury to use his wish to bring him back to life. Still fretting over his financial troubles, however, Maury instead wishes to have the greatest playwright ever as his new partner.

Maury is transported back in time to the Elizabethan era into the identity of a servant to William Shakespeare. Intuiting that history cannot be changed and therefore any work he does with Shakespeare will be uncredited, Maury regrets not using the wish to save Harry. Intrigued by Maury's relic and his offhand summary of ''Hamlet'', a play Shakespeare has yet to write, Shakespeare takes the relic and says to Maury, "I wish for you to write with me." The relic fills Maury's mind with every line of every play that Shakespeare wrote. Resigned to his fate, he sits at a desk and begins to write ''Hamlet'' from memory.

Karen Billings is an overworked, underappreciated secretary. Her colleague Marcy is studying to be a lawyer and encourages Karen to change career paths as well, but while Karen loathes her current boss, she loves being a secretary. While making copies on the office Xerox machine, it malfunctions and Karen is transported to another reality. Unaware that she is no longer in her own universe, Karen attends a party where she is supposed to meet her boyfriend. She discovers to her surprise that secretaries are a cherished commodity in this dimension. Men become nervous in her presence and women talk of how jealous they are of her position. Even the hostess feels her party is now a real event upon finding out a secretary has deemed her party worthy enough to attend. A man named Rehnquist offers her a job at his company. She stays at the party until midnight, regaling the guests with stories of her adventures as a secretary. She returns to the copy room to retrieve her dropped keys, accidentally runs the Xerox machine again, and is returned to her reality.

Still unaware of the change, Karen returns home to find a message from her boyfriend about missing her at the party. She remembers the card given to her by Rehnquist and calls, but the number is not in service. Karen returns to work. Irate over her work being one copy short (due to that copy having been produced while in the alternate dimension), her boss makes derogatory remarks about her and secretaries in general. While talking with Marcy, Karen realizes what has happened. She runs down to the copy room and finds workmen about to remove the defective machine. She fights them off and operates the copier. A flash of light erupts and Karen disappears. Now in the alternate dimension, Karen calls the number on the card, which now works. Rehnquist ushers her to a waiting limousine, which takes her to the company's Paris office.

Kevin and Dan are scientists designing a holographic projector. One day, the device generates images of a human fetus which are not in the stored data. When they return the next day, the fetus has already matured into a young girl, who introduces herself as Nola Granville. Nola lived in Westchester County, New York during the early twentieth century. Dan calculates she is aging at a rate of ten years each day. They debate over whether or not Nola is a human soul somehow integrated into their hologram generator.

Kevin's marriage has already been strained by his spending all his time at the lab and his repeatedly postponing their plans to have children, and after he falls in love with Nola, he separates from his wife Carol so that he can remain by Nola's side 24 hours a day. He exhaustively questions Nola about her life, which she recalls as she matures to the relevant ages. They also discuss the poetry of Yeats. Nola relates meeting and falling in love with Robert, who her father objected to because he was Jewish. She becomes convinced that she has manifested in the projector to take care of some unfinished business, and asks Kevin to help her recall what it is. He searches for surviving acquaintances of Nola in hopes they may have the answer.

During the fifth day of studying Nola, she relives a miscarriage. Days later, Dan finds a surviving friend of Nola's, who tells him Nola died from the miscarriage, at the age of 35, and that Robert became despondent afterwards. Kevin is left wondering why Nola is still around when her real life ended when she was decades younger.

Nola uses a voice modifier to impersonate Kevin and tell Carol to come pick him up from the laboratory. She then wakes Kevin and tells him she must leave. She reveals that Kevin is Robert reincarnated; his grief at her death carried into his next life, causing his unwillingness to fully devote himself to Carol and his fear of having children. Nola's unfinished business was to give him closure by experiencing a life with her. He brings out the Yeats book and reads their favorite passage. Nola fades away. Carol enters the lab, and they have an emotional reunion. A toy ball bounces out of the holographic chamber and into Carol's hands.

Aboard an airplane, teenager Keith Barnes annoys those around him with his drum sticks and argues with a flight attendant when she tells him to turn off his portable radio. When he accidentally drops his radio into the bathroom sink, a lightning storm transforms it into a telepathic tuning device. He begins to hear the thoughts of the people around him in the plane, and then even sees the world through their eyes. From his seat, he sees a man strapping a bomb to himself in the bathroom mirror. He tells the flight attendant about the bomb, but due to his earlier shenanigans she does not believe him.

Keith recognizes Mr. Williams, the man seated next to him, as the bomber by the ring and wristwatch on his right hand. He puts his radio headphones back on and learns that Williams is distraught over the death of his wife and child in an airplane crash due to airline negligence. He intends to destroy the plane as revenge. Keith tries to talk him out of it. This backfires, as the revelation that Keith knows of his plan galvanizes Williams into taking immediate action, getting up from his seat and grasping the bomb trigger. Keith sneaks up behind him and puts the headphones over his ears. Hearing the pleading thoughts of the frightened passengers, Williams is filled with remorse and relents. As Williams is taken away, Keith decides he has had enough of the radio and drops it on the floor, allowing it to be crushed by the departing passengers.

Johnny Davis is a truck driver unemployed due to his many accidents. Johnny asks Pete, a friend of his father, for help in getting a job. Pete warns Johnny that the jobs he takes require unusual fortitude. Johnny insists he has no alternative and Pete agrees to take him on his next run. Pete shows him that the job is to deliver souls to Hell via semi-trailer truck. At a truck stop, they observe other truckers are nervous about disturbances in Hell.

Dropping their cargo, Johnny is surprised that there is no punishment in Hell. Pete explains that Hell was not made for punishment, but to keep evildoers away from those who have chosen good. Souls run around loose and some plead with Johnny to rescue them. Other souls attack the drivers, but one of them, Gary Frick, comes to Johnny's aid. Gary tells Johnny he is an afterlife manager who was sent to Hell when he died, and has been starting an insurrection. Gary explains that a new bureaucracy has taken over the job of deciding who goes to Heaven or Hell, and confides to Johnny the location of the road to Heaven.

A guard sees Johnny with Gary and takes him to meet with upper management. Johnny relates what he heard and saw. The manager explains that God does not have time to personally judge the deceased. He points out that Johnny has no reason to believe the stupid claims that they are innocent, but Johnny still thinks his standards are too strict. He pretends to be convinced and is allowed to return to his job.

Johnny interviews the dead that ride with him and decides which of them should go to Hell and which he should release and show the road to Heaven. Johnny likens himself to Jesus, who descended into Hell to give the souls there another chance. He tells the freed souls that Heaven may not match their preconceptions of what Paradise would be like, but it is their best chance.

Alex Mattingly and his young son Jeff move to a remote cabin in the woods following Alex's divorce. Jeff is lonely and unhappy because he has no one for companionship during the summer. Alex suggests he get an imaginary friend.

Jeff meets a boy named Mike, and the two become friends. Mike always plays whatever game Jeff wants, and produces various playthings for them, such as horses to play cowboys with. When Jeff asks Mike where these playthings come from, Mike becomes snippy and convinces Jeff to follow him into a makeshift fort in the woods, which collapses on them. Mike turns into a being of light and floats away, leaving Jeff to die, but Alex finds Jeff and digs him out.

Once school starts, Alex introduces Jeff to the three children of his department head, but Jeff keeps getting into fights with them when they do not play his way and wants to play with Mike instead. Mike lures Alex out into the woods and identifies himself as Alex's imaginary childhood friend, proving it by producing a yo-yo that Alex etched his name into. Mike says he has been waiting for a long time for Alex to come back and play with him. Realizing that playing with Mike is discouraging Jeff from making real friends, Alex tells Mike to not play with Jeff any more. Mike refuses, saying that if he doesn't have anyone to play with anymore he will have to sleep again.

During a barbecue, the department head's daughter Cindy calls Jeff a goober. Jeff shoves her and runs into the woods to find Mike. Mike tells Jeff that he was only pretending to be his friend and calls him names. Alex finds Jeff and tells him about the value of real friends. Alex lingers behind to thank Mike, who transforms into light form again. Alex asks Mike who he really is and Mike tells him that he is a being who has lived on Earth since it was first created. Alex and Mike reminisce about their friendship and say goodbye. Alex returns to the barbecue and sees Jeff playing with the other children, having apologized to Cindy.

Jenny Templeton is a college student who discovers that her trash is empty after she filled it with her old notes. Her political science book is missing and then reappears. She accuses her roommate Kathy of playing a prank on her, and then realizes that her study books and high school yearbook are missing as well.

She hears a noise in her closet and thinks someone is inside. Kathy thinks Jenny is imagining things and opens the closet to reveal two weirdly-dressed people, out-of-sync and draped in light, who return her pencil mug. They tell her that they were not supposed to take anything that Jenny would have missed. The two are time travelers from 2139. They apologize to Jenny for disturbing her. They reveal that Jenny will become the first president of Earth and will be called "The Great Peacemaker." After they depart, Kathy stands in shock while Jenny thinks aloud that she will not cut her political science class anymore.

Far north of the Arctic Circle, a nuclear bomb test, dubbed "Operation Experiment", is conducted. Prophetically, right after the blast, physicist Thomas Nesbitt muses "What the cumulative effects of all these atomic explosions and tests will be, only time will tell". The explosion awakens a long carnivorous dinosaur known as a ''Rhedosaurus'',[https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Dinosaur_Films_of_Ray_Harryhausen.html?id=le9QoR0JyEYC&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false ''The Dinosaur Films of Ray Harryhausen: Features, Early 16mm Experiments and Unrealized Projects'' by Roy P. Webber] thawing it out of the ice where it had been held in suspended animation for millions of years. Nesbitt is the only surviving witness to the beast's awakening and later is dismissed out-of-hand as being delirious at the time of his sighting. Despite the skepticism, he persists, knowing what he saw.

The dinosaur begins making its way down the east coast of North America, sinking a fishing ketch off the Grand Banks, destroying another near Marquette, Canada, wrecking a lighthouse in Maine and destroying buildings in Massachusetts. Nesbitt eventually gains allies in paleontologist Thurgood Elson and his young assistant Lee Hunter after one of the surviving fishermen identifies from a collection of drawings the very same dinosaur that Nesbitt saw. Plotting the sightings of the beast's appearances on a map for skeptical military officers, Elson proposes the dinosaur is returning to the Hudson River area, where fossils of ''Rhedosaurus'' were first found. In a diving bell search of the undersea Hudson River Canyon, Professor Elson is killed after his bell is swallowed by the beast, which eventually comes ashore in Manhattan. It eats a police officer shooting at it, squashes cars, knocks over buildings and generally causes panic and havoc. A later newspaper report of its rampage lists "180 known dead, 1500 injured, damage estimates $300 million".

Meanwhile, military troops led by Colonel Jack Evans attempt to stop the ''Rhedosaurus'' with an electrified barricade, then blast a hole with a bazooka in the beast's throat, which drives it back into the sea. Unfortunately, it bleeds all over the streets of New York, unleashing a horrible, virulent prehistoric contagion, which begins to infect the populace, causing even more fatalities. The infection precludes blowing up the ''Rhedosaurus'' or even setting it ablaze, lest the contagion spread further. It is decided to shoot a radioactive isotope into the beast's neck wound with hopes of burning it from the inside, while at the same time neutralizing the contagion.

When the ''Rhedosaurus'' comes ashore and reaches the Coney Island amusement park, military sharpshooter Corporal Stone takes a rifle grenade loaded with a potent radioactive isotope and along with Dr. Nesbitt climbs on board a roller coaster. Riding the coaster to the top of the tracks, so he can get to eye-level with the beast, he fires the isotope into its open neck wound. It thrashes about in reaction, causing the roller coaster to spark when falling to the ground, setting the amusement park ablaze. With the fire spreading rapidly, Nesbitt and Stone climb down as the park becomes engulfed in flames. The ''Rhedosaurus'' collapses and eventually dies from isotope poisoning.

Christine, a 40-year-old news anchor, worries that she will lose her job to someone younger. Her husband Marc, a fashion photographer still in his 30s, remains passionate about Christine, but she fears losing him to one of the many attractive models he works with. Her colleague Shauna, who is 47 years old but looks 30, says the secret to her youthful appearance is a bottled water called "Aqua Vita". Christine orders some. The delivery man says the first batch is free and that after the initial dose only one glass a day is needed.

Ratings on Christine's show go up in response to her de-aging, saving her job. Marc is pleased by Christine's more youthful appearance, but he becomes irate when she aborts their romantic three-day getaway so that she can get her daily dose of Aqua Vita, since she cannot bring it outside of the house. Moreover, at the end of each day Aqua Vita makes the user appear elderly, an effect which only stops when another dose is taken. Contrary to the delivery man's promise, Christine begins to require multiple glasses to get the same effect. Shauna asks Christine for a massive loan. She learns the reason when the Aqua Vita delivery man tells her the second batch costs $5,000 ( ). She realizes she could have Aqua Vita investigated for deceptive business practices, but refrains from doing so so that she can keep getting the water.

Marc is increasingly worried by Christine's secretive behavior, especially when he finds her up in the middle of the night guzzling water from the Aqua Vita dispenser and she refuses to give him an explanation. He goes to Shauna for answers, and his suspicions are further aroused when Shauna refuses to let him in her room but immediately opens the door for the Aqua Vita delivery man. He glances inside and sees Shauna appears elderly.

Marc tells Christine she needs to stop taking Aqua Vita. He points out that the withdrawal effects only make her look old, and she is qualified for jobs which do not require her to look youthful. He also says her appearance will not affect their relationship, but she says he is being unrealistic, and that the disparity in their apparent ages will be an increasing embarrassment. Recognizing the truth in this, Marc drinks the water himself in order to join her in looking old. They sit together on a park bench, condemned to look old for the rest of their lives, but happy to spend these years together.

Donald Knowles is an archaeologist accompanying an expedition surveying Earth 1,000 years after all life has been destroyed by human exploitation of the environment. In those years humanity has only increased its consumption of natural resources, to the point where expeditions such as these are needed to constantly scout out uninhabited planets for mining. Knowles has four days to explore before mining ships come to strip Earth of resources. As Knowles explores an abandoned café he plays Chopin's Nocturne Op. 9 No. 2 on an old CD player, and is confronted by ghosts.

The ghosts are the forefathers left on Earth when life became unsustainable. They believe that humans are coming back to repopulate Earth. Knowles explains why they are really there. He tries to get them to leave Earth, but they cannot leave on conventional ships because they warp space in a way that makes it impossible for them to survive the trip. They plead with him not to let the others destroy what remains of Earth in their search for valuable minerals. Knowles takes Commander Jacinda Carlyle to the café to meet the ghosts. However, they refuse to appear. Later, the specters possess Knowles and force him to attack a console on the ship. Carlyle and the other crew members stop him. Carlyle, now convinced Knowles is having a breakdown as a result of the trauma of seeing the ruined Earth, gives him medical leave.

Knowles returns to the café to confront the ghosts. They admit they plan to leave Earth by channeling through him. He refuses. He suggests instead that if they were able to change the methane to oxygen to allow him to breathe without a spacesuit, they can change Earth into a living world again. They claim they may not be able to perform such a large-scale feat without losing consciousness. He calls them cowards for not trying and returns to the ship. Suddenly, the ship's readings show it is raining, restoring the biosphere. The first stages of life are discovered in the oceans. Evolution is accelerated, returning Earth to a living planet. As such, the mining expedition must be cancelled, since the law does not allow mining of inhabited planets. Knowles steps outside and—not knowing if they can hear him or not—calls out that one day they will be back.

Nelson Moss meets Sara Deever, a woman very different from anyone he has met before. His ignorance leads to her failing her driving test. She beguiles him and continually asks him to spend a month with her on the promise that she will change his life for the better. On the first night of November, after Nelson is fired and dumped on the same day, she sleeps with him, and the next day Chaz, a close friend of Sara's, arrives and refers to Nelson as Sara's "November".

Throughout November, the two experience happy times together and fall in love. Nelson examines his life and past, and befriends a 10-year-old fatherless child named Abner. Eventually, he realizes he is in love with Sara and asks her to marry him. It is revealed that Sara has terminal cancer, non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Because she cannot bear to have Nelson experience her death, she asks him to leave. Sara tells Chaz that Nelson proposed to her. Chaz says that it wasn't the first time that a man had proposed, implying Sara has had numerous "months" before. Sara confirms this but claims it was the first time she had wanted to say yes. She decides she will not continue the relationship to protect Nelson from being hurt. Nelson complies, but then stages a surprise return during the Thanksgiving holiday, giving her gifts that remind her of their happy times.

They stay together for one more day; he posts November calendars all over her apartment walls, saying it can always be November for them. They make love, but the next morning, Nelson finds Sara is dressed. She asks him to leave, and he sees she has taken down the calendars. Sara runs out of her apartment with Nelson chasing her in the street until finally she stops along a foot bridge to the park entrance. There, Sara asks Nelson to let her go so that he will always have happy memories of her, and explains that this is how she needs to be remembered. She will return home to her family (whom she had been avoiding) and face her last days.

Sara then blindfolds Nelson, leads him into the park, and gives him a last kiss. Nelson takes off the blindfold and sees that he is alone in the park he and Sara went on one of their first dates. His eyes fill with tears.

James Henry Trotter is a boy who lives happily with his parents in a house by the sea. Unfortunately, when he is four years old, a rhinoceros with a strange carnivorous appetite escapes from the zoo and eats James' parents, so he ends up with his two cruel aunts, Spiker and Sponge. Instead of caring for him, they treat him badly, feed him improperly, and force him to sleep on bare floorboards.

After James had been living with his aunts for three years, he meets a mysterious man who gives him a bag of magical crystals, instructing James to use them in a potion that would change his life for the better. While returning home, James stumbles and spills the bag on the ground, losing the crystals as they dig themselves underground. A nearby peach tree, in turn, produces a single peach which soon grows to the size of a house. Spiker and Sponge build a fence around it and earn money by selling viewing tickets to tourists; James is locked in the house only able to see the peach through the bars of his bedroom window.

After the tourists have gone, James is assigned to clean the rubbish around the peach and finds a tunnel inside it. He enters it and meets Centipede, Miss Spider, Old Green Grasshopper, Earthworm, Ladybug, Glowworm, and Silkworm who become his friends.

The next day, Centipede cuts the stem of the peach, causing it to roll away and crush James' aunts. It reaches the sea and is surrounded by ravenous sharks. James uses Miss Spider and Silkworm to make threads, while Earthworm is used as bait and draws 502 seagulls to the peach, whereupon the threads are tied on their necks. The peach is lifted off the water. High above the clouds, the peach encounters the Cloud-Men who are portrayed as responsible for weather phenomena like hailstorms and rainbows. Centipede mocks the Cloud-Men, but James is able to avoid an altercation by bringing the peach to a lower altitude. James realizes that the group has reached New York City.

The massive peach lands on the spire of the Empire State Building. It is mistaken as a bomb at first, resulting in the arrival of police and firemen. Calming the crowd, James tells his story and becomes friends with many children in New York, they eat the peach and James and his friends get their own jobs.

The first book in the Uplift series, ''Sundiver'' (1980), is essentially a detective story and occurs only decades after humanity's first contact with the Five Galaxies. In this story mankind discovers the sun's inhabitants and a plot to overthrow a patron race. This is the only novel to directly involve Earth. The protagonist, Jacob Demwa, is referenced in later novels as a mentor in Gillian Baskin and Tom Orley, and the captain of the ''Sundiver'' appears briefly in ''The Uplift War'', having been promoted to admiral. This suggests human lifespans have been significantly extended by galactic technology.

The second book, ''Startide Rising'' (1983), occurs centuries later. It follows the Earthclan amphibious spaceship ''Streaker'' (crewed by uplifted dolphins and their human patrons) which has discovered a colossal derelict fleet. ''Streaker'' is pursued as rumors spread throughout the Five Galaxies that the ship has found the remains of the Progenitors.

The third book, ''The Uplift War'' (1987), occurs around the same time as ''Startide Rising'' but in another part of the galaxy. An intergalactic war, sparked by the events of ''Startide Rising'', results in a successful invasion of the EarthClan colony on the planet Garth, heavily populated by uplifted chimps.

In 1995 ''Brightness Reef'' was published, the first book in a new Uplift trilogy. The "Uplift Storm" trilogy (excluding the first book, which solely focuses on Jijo) follows the survivors of the spaceship ''Streaker'' as they continue to evade the various galactic powers. Along the way they encounter a hidden planet which has been inhabited by six races which have illegally settled and dropped out of the civilization of the Five Galaxies. They eventually make contact with the other orders of life. The second and third books in the new Uplift trilogy are ''Infinity's Shore'' and ''Heaven's Reach''.

In ''Heaven's Reach'', the series sums up with conclusions on the nature of life in the universe and revelations on the motivations of the oldest species in the Five Galaxies. Further explanations are provided on the ''Streaker'' s continuing mission, Earth's fate after invasion, and the nature of galactic life in the overlapping conspiracies of galactic civilization.

The short story "Aficionado" or "Life in the Extreme" is set earliest of all the currently written work and gives an account of the early days of the human uplift program before Contact. The contents of this story have since been reused as part of the unrelated novel ''Existence'', making its position in the uplift universe uncertain.

The novella ''Temptation'' is set back on Jijo just after the ending of ''Infinity's Shore'', and tells what happened to some of the characters from the trilogy after ''Streaker'' escaped from Jijo, as well as offering some hints as to the fate of the mysterious Buyur, the last race to legally settle there.

A group of scientists (namely psychologist Norman Johnson, mathematician Harry Adams, zoologist Beth Halpern, astrophysicist Ted Fielding, and marine biologist Arthur Levine), along with U.S. Navy personnel, travel to a deep sea habitat at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, where an enormous spacecraft has been discovered.

During the descent, Levine becomes claustrophobic and is returned to the surface. The other scientists arrive safely at Habitat DH-8. After their arrival and subsequent pressurization to the habitat's exotic-gas environment, the Navy sends a robot to enter the spacecraft first, which locates and opens a panel near the spacecraft door.

As the robot's cameras focus on the opened panel, labels in English indicate the spacecraft is actually a U.S. spacecraft constructed in the future and sent through time, appearing on the seabed at least 350 years before its creation. The robot is unable to open a hatch leading further inside, forcing the team to don pressure suits and explore the spacecraft. In a large cargo hold, the team discovers a mysterious spherical object that is clearly of extra-terrestrial origin.

Reasoning the ship's future builders were apparently unaware that it had already been found in their past, Adams becomes convinced that the team will not survive to report their discovery. Remaining behind after the rest of the team returns to the habitat, Adams succeeds in opening and entering the sphere. Meanwhile, on the surface, a Pacific cyclone forces the supporting Naval ships to evacuate, trapping and isolating the scientists on the ocean floor for five days. Adams is found and returned to the DH-8 Habitat where he awakens with a terrible headache and little-to-no memory of how he opened the sphere or what occurred while he was inside. Immediately afterwards, the team is contacted by an intelligent, seemingly friendly alien entity that calls itself "Jerry".

At first, Jerry communicates with the scientists using a numeric code transmitted to the habitat's computer. While the team struggles to communicate with Jerry, increasingly bizarre and deadly events occur, including the appearance of impossible sea creatures that Halpern claims cannot exist (such as shrimp with no digestive organs), confirmed when Jerry informs them he is "manifesting" the creatures.

At this point, members of the team start to die in various attacks by giant squid, and the dwindling band of survivors struggle in their dealings with the unthinkably powerful, childlike, and temperamental alien entity. Johnson realizes he must use psychology to keep the remaining survivors alive namely Johnson, Adams, Halpern.

After re-translating the original code, Johnson realizes by transposition the entity's name is "Harry". Johnson hypothesizes that the sphere is an object which allows a person's subconscious thoughts to manifest in reality, and Harry Adams has acquired the power through entering it. This is confirmed by his childhood fear of squid, especially the giant squid in the novel ''Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea'', manifested in the form of a vast number of small squid and later a giant squid that attacks the DH-8 Habitat.

Johnson and Halpern sedate Adams and wait for contact to be re-established with the surface, but the manifestations continue. Halpern accuses Johnson of having entered the sphere and gaining access to the power. While unable to recall this incident, Johnson comes close to yielding, until he watches a security video of Halpern entering the sphere herself. Rejecting the notion, Halpern decides that Johnson is an imminent threat and defends herself by planting potent explosives around the spacecraft and habitat, and then attempts to suffocate Johnson by manipulating the habitat's life-support system.

Escaping from the habitat, Johnson goes to the spacecraft and enters the presence of the sphere, then the sphere itself. Inside the sphere, he finds a large sea of translucent "foam," and has a conversation in his thoughts with some sort of entity that speaks in cryptic riddles, who eventually tells Johnson that the greatest power humans possess is the ability to imagine things. After leaving the sphere, Johnson decides to escape using the submarine docked at Habitat DH-7, a nearby habitat for Navy personnel, but cannot abandon the other survivors. Now empowered in the same way as Adams and Halpern, Johnson returns to DH-8, and using the submarine, the trio escape before the explosives set by Halpern count down and destroy the spaceship, research habitat, and surrounding site.

On the surface, confined to a decompression chamber, the trio ponder on what version of their story to tell the Navy. Realizing they could not control the power granted them by the sphere, they decide its knowledge to be too dangerous to be communicated, and resolve to use its power to remove it from themselves and alter their memories, replacing the fantastical experiences with more mundane memories of a technical failure, though it is hinted that Halpern did not do the same.

MI6 director M (head of MI6) gives her evaluation of one of her 00 agents who lost his right eye in an encounter with Dr. Julius No. The agent has since become obsessed with revenge and often resorts to brutality to complete his missions. M concludes that the agent in question is no longer fit for service and recommends that he be dismissed from MI6.

Three years later, the agent in question is evaluated through a holographic simulation in which he is paired with 007 to stop Auric Goldfinger, a member of a criminal organization, from detonating a suitcase nuke inside Fort Knox. The agent ultimately fails the test after failing to “save” 007 and being too late to stop the bomb. Charged with "reckless brutality," he is dismissed from MI6. As he leaves the headquarters, he reads an offer by Goldfinger to enlist in his organization.

The agent accepts Goldfinger's offer and is recruited as his enforcer, meeting with him at Auric Enterprises, where Goldfinger's scientists have developed a weapon known as the OMEN (Organic Mass Energy Neutralizer), which releases energy capable of breaking down organic matter on a nearly atomic level, resulting in disintegration. For his job of eliminating Dr. No, a fellow official of the criminal organization who has declared war on Goldfinger's branch of the organization, he is given a gold-hued cybernetic eye created by Francisco Scaramanga, another official of Goldfinger's organization. It is from this implant that he receives his codename: "GoldenEye". Scaramanga provides upgrades for the eye, starting with MRI vision.

During his first mission in Hong Kong, GoldenEye has to get a sniper rifle to take down Dr. No with the EM hack feature. At the Midas Casino, GoldenEye has to get to the vault to protect the OMEN with the magnetic polarity shield. The next mission takes place at the Hoover Dam, GoldenEye has to destroy the dam and kill Xenia Onatopp. GoldenEye also tosses Oddjob over a rail into a pit inside the Hoover Dam after he betrays and attacks GoldenEye for unknown reasons. At The Octopus, GoldenEye has to download the navigation coordinates to Crab Key (Dr. No's base) with the help of the generated force field from his golden eye.

He is eventually sent to Crab Key, where he confronts Dr. No. During their duel, GoldenEye uses his mechanical eye to sabotage the island's nuclear reactor, causing it to electrocute Dr. No. Upon No's death, Goldfinger contacts GoldenEye and informs him that he believes he is too dangerous to be left alive, and that he had contacted GoldenEye earlier and told him to activate a program which would shut down the Lair's defense grid. Goldfinger reveals that he is intent on taking over the Lair, and leaves GoldenEye to die in the impending nuclear meltdown. GoldenEye, however, manages to escape in Dr. No's osprey before the reactor overloads and the island is destroyed in a large explosion. GoldenEye returns to the Lair intent on confronting Goldfinger. Pussy Galore rendezvous with GoldenEye and informs him that Goldfinger has used the OMEN to wipe out most of the Lair's guards, and taken control of it. Scaramanga provides the mechanical eye with a computer virus that he can use to overload the OMEN.

GoldenEye fights his way through the Lair, implanting the computer virus in the process, eventually reaching Goldfinger and the OMEN. Goldfinger traps GoldenEye inside a chamber that he claims will soon be devoid of oxygen. The computer virus then activates the OMEN, causing it to explode in a burst of energy, killing Goldfinger and his troops. GoldenEye and Galore leave the Lair aboard Galore's chopper, and Scaramanga and Number One (Ernst Stavro Blofeld) later discuss what to do with GoldenEye and decide to simply see what he does next before proceeding.

Characters

Both the Campaign missions and the multiplayer game feature characters based on characters in the film adaptations of Fleming's Bond novels. * '''GoldenEye''': A fearsome man who used to be in service with the MI6, fired for his reckless brutality and recruited into the World's most powerful criminal organization under the employment of Auric Goldfinger. Shot in the right eye by Dr. No but merely survived during an assignment that went awry in the past, he was given a new gold-hued cybernetic eye, from which he gained his nickname, "GoldenEye". Even though he is the protagonist of the game, his face is rarely seen on screen and he never speaks. In the game's instruction manual, his surname is revealed to be Hunter. * '''Auric Goldfinger''': A very mysterious man who has his own firm called "Auric Enterprises", expresses an obsession with gold and wealth, and is determined to take down Dr. No, and be the sole dominant operative in the organization he works for. He is modeled after Gert Fröbe but voiced by Enn Reitel. * '''Dr. Julius No''': A high-ranking officer in the world's most powerful criminal organization, who went freelance, seeking world domination for his own, therefore setting up his evil schemes on his own personal island, Crab Key. He is modeled after Joseph Wiseman and was voiced by Carlos Alazraqui in the game. * '''Ernst Stavro Blofeld''': The head of the criminal organization, whose face is never seen on the screen, and simply called "Number One" in the game's closing credits; the name he was known by in From Russia With Love and Thunderball. Official footage of character renders released by Electronic Arts feature him holding his Persian Cat, with the likeness of Donald Pleasence. He was voiced by Gideon Emery. * '''M''': The head of the MI6 is a woman who has been a veteran in the business of espionage after the cold war. She dismissed GoldenEye from duty for his "unwarranted brutality," revealing that "there is no place in the service for an agent like him". She was modelled after and was voiced by Judi Dench. * '''Francisco Scaramanga''': He is in charge of the operations and technological division within the criminal organization, and is often seen mentoring GoldenEye through an earpiece. He is modeled after and was voiced by Christopher Lee. * '''Pussy Galore''': Pussy is Goldfinger's personal pilot, who helps GoldenEye in his mission to take down his employer's chaotic plot. She is modeled after Honor Blackman but voiced by Jeannie Elias. * '''Xenia Onatopp''': A deadly assassin and a femme fatale, who works for Dr. No, sent to specifically eliminate GoldenEye. Her likeness is based on that of Famke Janssen's and was voiced by Jenya Lano. * '''Oddjob''': Goldfinger's right-hand man, a martial arts master who is also very deadly with his razor-sharp bowler hat, as well. He is the second character next to GoldenEye to never speak at all. He is modeled after Harold Sakata. * '''007''': An agent of the MI6 within the Double-O Division, who was tasked with re-evaluating GoldenEye, but lost hope when the latter has proven to be a loose cannon and caused the "death" of 007 in a training simulation, therefore failing the test. Agent 007 is only seen in the first level of the game. A generic model was used for his likeness and he was voiced by Jason Carter.

The novel examines how Triton's freedoms and customs are perceived by the main characters, particularly Bron Helstrom, a young man who has previously worked on Mars as a male prostitute. The society of Mars is far harsher than that of Triton, and it has evidently influenced Bron's personality. He is self-absorbed, often lacks insight about himself and others, and has great difficulty with personal relationships. Though the civilization of Triton offers everything that he could reasonably want, he is unhappy with his life, out of harmony with those around him, and continually looking for others to blame whenever things go wrong.

As the novel continues, political tensions between Triton and Earth lead to a destructive interplanetary war. This is mainly used as the backdrop for Bron's (ultimately disastrous) relationship with a brilliant young woman known as the Spike, but Delany speculates about how an interplanetary war might actually unfold.

Timber the Tiger's parents go on holiday and leave their son in charge of the island they live on, prompting him and his friends to organise a race. Their enjoyment is interrupted when a sinister intergalactic pig-wizard named Wizpig arrives at Timber's Island and attempts to take it over after having conquered his own planet. He turns the island's four guardians (Tricky the Triceratops, Bluey the Walrus, Bubbler the Octopus and Smokey the Dragon) into his henchmen. The only solution available to the island's inhabitants is to defeat Wizpig in an elaborate series of races that involve cars, hovercraft, and aeroplanes. Drumstick the Rooster, the best racer on the island, fails this challenge and is transformed into a frog by Wizpig's magic.

Timber hires a team of eight racers: Diddy Kong, the first recruit; Conker the Squirrel and Banjo the Bear, recruited by Diddy; Krunch the Kremling, Diddy's enemy who follows after him; Tiptup the Turtle, T.T. the Stopwatch, Pipsy the Mouse, and Bumper the Badger, all inhabitants of Timber's island. Aided by Taj, an Indian elephant-like genie residing on the island, they eventually complete all of Wizpig's challenges and confront Wizpig himself to a race and defeat him. Shortly afterwards, Drumstick is turned back into a rooster, and Wizpig leaves for his home planet, Future Fun Land. Fearing that Wizpig would again attempt to invade Timber's Island, the islanders travel to Future Fun Land for a second challenge. When Wizpig loses the second race, the rocket he rides on malfunctions and launches him to the moon. However, an additional cutscene reveals Wizpig's spaceship flying through the sky, unscathed.

After Charles "Corky" Withers (Hopkins) fails in his first attempt at professional magic, his mentor Merlin (E.J. André) says that he needs to have a better gimmick. A year later, Corky comes back as a combination magician and ventriloquist with a foul-mouthed dummy named Fats, becoming a huge success. Corky's powerful agent, Ben Greene (Meredith), is on the verge of signing him for his own television show, but Corky bails out for the Catskills, where he grew up. His talent agent thinks that Corky is "afraid of success." In truth, Corky does not want to take the TV network's required medical examination because the doctors might find out that he suffers from severe mental issues, and that even off-stage he cannot control Fats (a manifestation of Corky's id).

In the Catskills, Corky reunites with his high school crush, Peggy Ann Snow (Ann-Margret), who is stuck in a passionless marriage with Duke (Ed Lauter), Corky's friend from high school. A magic trick with a deck of cards charms Peggy into thinking they are soulmates, leading to them having sex. This sparks the jealousy not only of Duke, but also the dummy Fats. In the midst of an argument "between" Corky and Fats, Greene arrives unexpectedly and confronts Corky, discovering the truth about Corky's state of mind. Corky pleads that nothing is wrong with him and that he is just rehearsing, so Greene puts him to the test, saying "Make Fats shut up for 5 minutes." Corky puts aside Fats, but is unable to last 5 minutes without delivering a rapid stream of speech through Fats. Greene demands that Corky get help and leaves to make some calls to the doctors, but Fats convinces Corky to kill his agent. Corky chases after Greene in the woods and bludgeons him with Fats' hard, wooden head and then attempts to drag the body into a lake. However, a still-living Greene suddenly lunges at him, causing Corky to drown him.

The next morning, Fats becomes even more possessive and jealous when Corky says that he plans to elope with Peggy and leave the dummy behind. Duke returns from his trip earlier than expected. Suspecting his wife has cheated on him, he wants to have a talk with Corky by the lake. Rather than confront him, Duke awkwardly confides to Corky that he loves Peggy and is worried about losing her. Duke suddenly spots Greene's body on the edge of the lake. Duke, believing Greene could still be alive, sends Corky to get help. Curious, he decides to search Corky's cabin, where Fats stabs him with a knife with "help" from Corky.

An increasingly deranged Corky manages to pull himself together and persuade Peggy to run away with him, but she insists on waiting to tell Duke face to face. She thinks everything is fine until Fats "comes alive" and reveals that Corky's card trick is only a ruse he uses to seduce women and that Peggy is only the latest of his conquests. Repulsed, she rejects Corky and locks herself in her bedroom. Fats says that, from this point on, ''he'' will make the decisions in Corky's life, immediately asserting this new authority by ordering Corky to kill Peggy.

Corky, turning on the charm and using Fats' voice, apologizes to Peggy through her locked door and leaves her a wooden heart that he carved. A short while later, Corky returns with a bloodstained knife. Fats seems pleased — until it is revealed that the blood on the knife is Corky's, who has fatally stabbed himself so that he will not kill anyone else. As a result, Fats also feels faint. They wonder which one of them will die first. Moments later, Peggy returns to the cabin, happily calling out that she has changed her mind and has decided to run away with Corky after all. As she speaks, she playfully changes her voice to impersonate Fats.

On Gromit’s birthday, Wallace gives Gromit a new invention called the “Techno-Trousers” for walks, then discovers he doesn’t have enough money to pay off his bills and debts. Wallace lets the spare bedroom to a penguin, who befriends Wallace and drives Gromit from the house. The penguin takes an interest in the techno-trousers, which can walk on walls and ceilings, and secretly rewires them for radio control. Gromit realizes that the penguin is Feathers McGraw, a wanted robber who frequently disguises himself as a chicken.

Feathers secretly switches Wallace's normal trousers with the techno-trousers; Wallace becomes trapped in them, and Feathers uses the new remote control to send Wallace on a lengthy, high-speed test run through town. Later, Gromit spies on Feathers as he takes measurements of the city museum. He also discovers Feathers' plans to steal a diamond from the museum, but it is too late to stop him.

Wallace, exhausted by the day of forced exercise, falls into a deep sleep. Feathers marches the unconscious Wallace to the museum and uses the trousers to infiltrate the building. He uses a remotely operated crane claw, contained in a helmet he has made Wallace wear, to capture the diamond, but accidentally sets off the burglar alarm. As Wallace wakes up, Feathers returns to the house and traps him and Gromit in a wardrobe at gunpoint.

Gromit rewires the trousers to break open the wardrobe. He and Wallace chase Feathers aboard their model train set. Wallace disarms Feathers and frees himself from the trousers. After Feathers' train crashes into the trousers, Gromit captures him in a milk bottle. The police incarcerate Feathers in the prison-cell wall of the city zoo. Wallace and Gromit paid all their debts using the bounty reward they gave them. Then, celebrate by have a cup of tea with cheese and crackers, while the techno-trousers walk off into the sunset.

Cheese-loving inventor Wallace and his dog Gromit, while trying to decide where they will spend their bank holiday, find that their house is bereft of cheese. As "everybody knows the Moon is made of cheese", they decide to build a rocket and fly to the Moon. Upon arrival, they begin sampling and gathering cheese, and encounter a coin-operated robot. Wallace inserts a coin, but nothing happens. After he and Gromit leave, the robot comes to life and gathers the dirty plates left at their picnic spot.

The robot discovers Wallace's skiing magazine, and yearns to travel to Earth to ski for itself. It repairs a broken piece of the Moon that Wallace had cut off, issues a parking ticket for the rocket, and becomes annoyed by an oil leakage from the craft. The robot sneaks up on Wallace and prepares to strike him, but the money Wallace inserted runs out, and it freezes. Wallace takes the robot's baton as a souvenir, inserts another coin, and prepares to leave with Gromit and the cheese they have gathered.

Returning to life, the robot realizes Wallace and Gromit can bring it to Earth, and follows them. Wallace panics, thinking that the robot is angry over the cheese he is taking with him, and he and Gromit retreat into the rocket. Unable to climb up the ladder, the robot cuts into the fuselage using a can opener. Upon entering the dark engine section of the rocket, it lights a match and accidentally ignites some fuel. The resultant explosion throws it off the rocket, and Wallace and Gromit lift off. Initially distraught at losing its chance to go to Earth, the robot fashions discarded rocket fuselage into skis, and skis across the lunar landscape. It waves goodbye to Wallace and Gromit as they return home.

As a "coma diary", the reader learns of Misty Marie Wilmot as her husband lies senseless in a hospital after a suicide attempt. The story is not exactly told by Misty but through a second-person perspective. Once she was an art student, dreaming of creativity and freedom, but after marrying Peter while they were both still at school and then giving birth to their daughter shortly after, she is eventually brought back to Waytansea Island. It was once quaint, but it has become overrun with tourists. Misty has been reduced to the lowly condition of a mere waitress within a common resort hotel. Peter, before falling into his coma, was building hidden rooms within the houses he was remodeling and scrawling vile messages all over the walls; this is an old habit of builders but it was dramatically overdone in Peter's case. Angry homeowners are suing Misty, and her dreams of artistic greatness have been ruined. But then, as if she was possessed by the spirit of the fabled Waytansea artist Maura Kincaid, Misty begins painting again, excessively and compulsively.

Misty discovers that the islanders, including her father-in-law (previously thought to be dead) are involved in a conspiracy which repeats every four generations. A young artist (in this case Misty) is lured to the island by an old piece of jewelry, she becomes pregnant and has her child within the community. It is implied that this old jewelry works to lure and entrap Misty because it was hers in a past life, during which these same events occur again. During middle age, her husband dies, followed by all her children, resulting in a wave of great artistic creativity, the product of which is mesmerizing to the observing audience.

The islanders create an exhibition of Misty's art work at the local hotel where a fire is started by Misty's daughter, who is revealed to be alive after a previous point in the book when she was thought to have drowned, and all the hotel's occupants are burned to death due to their being mesmerized by her painting. The result is a huge insurance claim which leaves the remaining island citizens wealthy enough to support their luxurious lifestyles for the next four generations, at which point a new young artist will be found to repeat the cycle. Peter attempted to warn her of this plot using his hidden writing, and it is revealed that his suicide attempt was in fact a murder attempt. It is never revealed whether Peter recovered from his coma, but from Misty's descriptions of his state of health, he more than likely died.

In the New England town of Peyton Place, Paul Cross, fed up with his alcoholic stepfather, Lucas Cross, leaves town. Lucas is the school custodian and his downtrodden wife, Nellie, works as housekeeper for Constance "Connie" MacKenzie, a widow who owns a clothing shop. The daughters of both families, Allison MacKenzie and Selena Cross, are best friends and about to graduate from high school. While the MacKenzies live a comfortable life, the Cross family is indigent. At Peyton Place High School, town newcomer Michael Rossi has been hired as the new principal by school board president Leslie Harrington; the students had favored veteran teacher Elsie Thornton. Rossi wins Ms. Thornton over by offering to work with her.

Connie allows Allison to have an unchaperoned birthday party. She invites her classmates, including the overtly sexual Betty Anderson and her boyfriend, Rodney Harrington. Connie is horrified to arrive home and find the teens, including Allison, making out. The next morning, Allison goes to meet Selena for church. She witnesses and then intervenes during an altercation between Lucas and Selena.

Allison is named class valedictorian, and Rossi asks Connie to help chaperone the graduation dance; the two gradually develop a romantic relationship. Meanwhile, Harrington disapproves of his son, Rodney, dating Betty. Rodney then invites Allison to the dance, though she likes Norman Page, a shy, bookish boy raised by an emotionally abusive mother. Rodney tries to make out with Betty, but she remains angry that he broke up with her. Rossi asks Ms. Thornton to give a short speech and lead the song "Auld Lang Syne". This annoys Marion Partridge, a member of the school board and a malicious gossip.

Shortly after, Lucas rapes and impregnates Selena. She goes to Dr. Matthew Swain. He assumes Selena's boyfriend, Ted, is the father, but she breaks down and admits Lucas raped her. Furious, Dr. Swain forces Lucas to sign a confession that he will keep secret if Lucas permanently leaves town. Unknown to either, Nellie overhears their conversation. A vengeful Lucas chases Selena when she returns home. Selena escapes but falls, starting a miscarriage. Dr. Swain records it as an appendectomy to protect Selena from scandal.

At the Labor Day parade, Rodney and Betty make up and go skinny dipping; nearby, Allison and Norman are also swimming, wearing bathing suits. When Marion and Charles Partridge see a naked couple, they believe it is Allison and Norman and tell Connie. During an ensuing argument with Allison, Connie angrily blurts out that Allison is illegitimate, the result of an affair she had with Allison's still living and already-married father. Upset, Allison runs upstairs, only to find that Nellie, distraught over Lucas, has committed suicide. Some time later, Rodney and Betty elope, infuriating Rodney's father, while Allison leaves home for New York City.

When World War II breaks out, many of Peyton Place's young men enlist. When Rodney is killed in action, his bereaved father finally accepts Betty as family after she explains she only acted racy to attract Rodney. During Christmas 1942, Connie visits Rossi and admits her affair. Rossi still wants to marry her.

A drunken Lucas returns to town and attempts to rape Selena again. She bludgeons him to death in self-defense, then she and her younger brother, Joey, hide the body. After Easter 1943, Selena breaks down and tells Connie that she killed Lucas, who reports her to the police. Selena is arrested and tried. Allison returns for the trial, as does Norman. The truth about Selena killing Lucas in self-defense, his physical and sexual abuse, and Dr. Swain's false medical report all come to light. Dr. Swain openly berates the townspeople for their constant vicious gossip and rumors. Selena is acquitted and the town sympathetically reaches out to her; she and Ted are free to marry. Allison approaches Connie, wanting to reconcile; Norman is welcomed into the house.

Twelve-year-old Johnny receives a pirate edition of the new video game ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' from his friend Wobbler. However, he has not been playing for long when the ScreeWee Empire surrenders to him. After accepting the surrender he finds himself inside the game in his dreams, where he must deal with the suspicious Gunnery Officer as well as the understanding Captain, and work out exactly what they're all supposed to do now.

This might all be the result of an over-active imagination except that the ScreeWee have disappeared altogether from everyone else's copy of the game. With the help of another player, Kirsty, who calls herself "Sigourney" (as in Weaver), Johnny must try to get the ScreeWee home.

In 1973, a nuclear-powered spaceship blasts off from Mars for Earth, bringing with it the sole survivor of the first mission, Col. Edward Carruthers (Marshall Thompson). He is suspected of having murdered the other nine members of his crew for their food and water rations, on the premise that he had no way of knowing if or when an Earth rescue mission would ever arrive. Carruthers denies this allegation, attributing his crew's deaths to a hostile humanoid life form on the Red Planet.

Commander Col. Van Heusen is unconvinced and makes sure that Carruthers is constantly accompanied by another member of his crew. While the ship was on the Martian surface, an emergency hatch had been left open, allowing the creature easy access. The crew are at first skeptical that something crawled aboard while they were on Mars. However, when Kienholz investigates odd sounds coming from a lower level, he is killed and his body hidden in an air duct. Next is Gino Finelli. He is found, barely alive, but the creature attacks his would-be rescuer. Bullets have no effect, forcing the crewman to leave Gino behind, much to the distress of his brother Bob. An autopsy of Kienholz's body reveals that it has been sucked dry of all fluids.

The crew use hand grenades and gas grenades, but the creature proves to be immune to both. They next try electrocution, also with no effect. When "It" is tricked into going into the spaceship's atomic reactor room, they shut the heavily shielded door and expose the creature directly to the ship's nuclear pile. It easily crashes through the door and escapes. The creature is so strong that it can tear through the metal hatches separating each of the ship's levels. The survivors (except for an injured crewman, who is trapped below in a spot inaccessible to the creature) retreat to the control room on the topmost deck. When Carruthers notices the ship's higher-than-normal oxygen consumption rate, he surmises that this is due to the creature's larger lung capacity, needed for the thin Martian atmosphere. In a last desperate move, everyone puts on their spacesuits, and Carruthers opens the command deck's hull airlock directly to the vacuum of space. A violent decompression follows, and the plan works: "It" suffocates and finally expires, stuck part way through the final hatch.

A press conference is later held on Earth, revealing the details of what happened aboard the rescue ship. The project director emphasizes that Earth may now be forced to bypass the Red Planet "because another word for Mars is death".

In Mexico at the turn of the 20th century, a cowgirl named T.J. Breckenridge hosts a struggling rodeo. Her former lover, Tuck Kirby, a heroic former stuntman working for Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, wants to buy her out. Along the way, he is followed by a Mexican boy named Lope, who intends to join the rodeo on a quest for fame and fortune. T.J. is not interested in Tuck because of this, but Tuck is still attracted to T.J., especially when T.J. jumps off a diving board on her horse. T.J. finally accepts Tuck when he saves Lope from a bull and the two kiss.

T.J. has an ace she hopes will boost attendance at her show – a tiny horse called El Diablo. Tuck meets a British paleontologist named Horace Bromley, who is working in a nearby Mexican desert. Bromley shows Tuck fossilized horse tracks, and Tuck notes their similarity to El Diablo's feet. Tuck sneaks Bromley into the circus for a look at El Diablo, and Bromley declares the horse to be a prehistoric ''Eohippus''.

The tiny horse came from a place known as the Forbidden Valley. A gypsy known as Tia Zorina claims that the horse is cursed, and demands that it be immediately returned. Later, she and the other gypsies collaborate with Bromley to steal El Diablo and release it back in the valley. Bromley hopes to follow the horse to its home in search of other prehistoric specimens. Carlos, an ex-member of the Gypsy tribe now working for T.J.'s circus, walks in on the theft and tries to stop it, but is knocked out.

Tuck arrives just as the Gypsy posse leaves. Carlos sees him as he is regaining consciousness. Tuck notices that the horse is missing, and sets off after Bromley. When T.J. and her crew discover Carlos, Carlos claims that Tuck has stolen El Diablo for himself. Carlos, T.J., and the others decide to follow Tuck and Bromley into the valley.

Making their way into the Forbidden Valley, Tuck, T.J., and the rest of the group meet up and soon discover why the valley is said to be cursed when a ''Pteranodon'' swoops down and snatches Lope but due to the weight it falls back to the ground. After Carlos kills the ''Pteranodon'' by twisting its neck, they spot an ''Ornithomimus'', which they chase after in the hopes of capturing it. Just as it is about to escape, it is killed by Gwangi, a vicious ''Allosaurus'' which chases Bromley and the rest of the group. However, a ''Styracosaurus'' appears and drives Gwangi away. As Gwangi leaves, he takes the dead ''Pteranodon'' with him.

Later, Gwangi pursues the group to their base camp and they try to rope him down, but he breaks free when the ''Styracosaurus'' reappears. Gwangi battles and kills the ''Styracosaurus'' and later manages to catch and kill Carlos, but is knocked out by a rockslide while trying to exit the valley in pursuit of the rest of the group.

Securing the creature with ropes, Tuck and the other men in the group take Gwangi back to town to be put on display in T.J.'s show. On the opening day of the show, the dwarfed Gypsy sneaks in and begins to unlock Gwangi's cage in an effort to free him, only to be killed when Gwangi breaks free. The crowd begins to flee as Gwangi attacks, and Tia Zorina is trampled to death in the chaos. Bromley is crushed by a broken piece of the cage, and Gwangi attacks and kills a circus elephant before rampaging through the town. Tuck, accompanied by T.J. and Lope, tries to hide the crowd in a cathedral, but Gwangi finds them and breaks in. Tuck urges the crowd out through a back exit, leaving Tuck inside with Gwangi, T.J. and Lope.

Though Gwangi tries to eat them, he is distracted when the cathedral's organ is accidentally sounded off as Tuck falls backwards into the keyboard. Tuck then manages to wound the dinosaur with a flag and throws a torch onto the floor near Gwangi, setting the building on fire. Tuck and the others manage to escape, leaving Gwangi trapped in the burning, collapsing building. Shrieking in agony, Gwangi is finally crushed to death by the falling debris, as Tuck, T.J., Lope (with tears in his eyes), and the townspeople look on.

The first U.S. spaceship to Venus, the XY-21, crashes into the Mediterranean sea off the coast of Sicily, Italy. Fishermen board boats and head to the spacecraft, enter through a hole in the spacecraft, and pull two spacemen from the nose-down craft before it completely sinks.

In Washington, D.C., Major General A.D. McIntosh discovers that the missing spaceship, piloted by Colonel Bob Calder, has been located. As McIntosh flies to the site, Pepe, a little boy, finds and opens a translucent cylinder marked “USAF” on the beach. It contains a gelatinous mass, which he presents to Dr. Leonardo, a zoologist studying sea creatures. Meanwhile, Leonardo's granddaughter Marisa, a third-year medical student, is summoned to take care of the injured spacemen. When Calder regains consciousness, he finds his crewmate, Dr. Sharman, in the last throes of the fatal disease that killed his other eight crewmen.

After Marisa returns to the trailer shared with her grandfather, a small creature hatches from the egg, and Leonardo locks it in a cage. By morning, the creature has tripled in size. McIntosh arrives, accompanied by scientist Dr. Justin Uhl, and meets with two representatives of the Italian government, informing them the spaceship has returned from Venus. Leonardo and Marisa hitch the trailer to their truck and head for Rome. Calder's spacecraft carried a sealed metal container bearing an unborn Venusian species. As police divers begin to search for it, McIntosh offers a half-million lira reward for the capsule's recovery, prompting Pepe to lead them to the empty container. When Pepe tells them that he sold the mass to Dr. Leonardo, McIntosh and Calder pursue him.

That night, Leonardo discovers that the creature has grown to human size. Soon after, it breaks out of the cage and heads to a nearby farm, terrorizing the animals. The creature eats sulfur and rips open several bags it discovers in a barn. While feeding, the creature is attacked by the farmer's dog, and the creature maims the dog, alerting the farmer. Calder and the others reach the barn, trapping the creature inside. Calder explains that the creature is not dangerous unless provoked. However, he provokes it by trying to prod the creature with a pole into a cage-like cart, and the creature injures the farmer after he stabs the creature with a pitchfork. After the creature breaks out of the barn and disappears into the countryside, the police commissioner insists that it must be destroyed.

After the Italian government grants Calder permission to capture the creature alive, he devises a plan to ensnare it in an electric net dropped from a helicopter. The Italian police conduct their own pursuit, shooting at it with flamethrowers. Gunfire has little effect on the creature, as it has no heart or lungs. Aware that sulfur is the creature's food of choice, Calder uses bags of sulfur as bait, luring the creature to a secluded site and subduing it with an electric jolt from the net. Later, at the American Embassy in Rome, McIntosh briefs the press corps and allows three reporters to view the creature, which has been placed in the Rome zoo. There, Calder explains that the creature is being sedated with a continuous electric shock so it can be studied. Marisa, who is aiding her uncle, begins flirting with Calder. Suddenly, electrical equipment shorts out and the creature awakens.

The creature, now in gargantuan size, battles a zoo elephant and sends the panicked patrons scurrying. Taking their fight to the streets of Rome, the two beasts destroy cars and damage buildings. The creature maims the elephant and continues its rampage. Calder rams the creature with his car and tracks the creature to the River Tiber, where it submerges. Soldiers lob grenades into the river, and the creature surfaces, destroying the Ponte Sant'Angelo. It heads for the Colosseum and destroys an ancient temple, killing a few soldiers. As the creature disappears into the ruins, Calder charges after it with a group of bazooka-carrying soldiers, driving it to the top of the structure. Calder scores a direct bazooka hit. Direct fire from a tank then destroys the ledge the creature is clinging to, and it plunges to its death. A relieved Marisa runs into Calder's arms.

On the Swiss mountain Trollenberg, one of three student climbers is suddenly killed, his head ripped from his body. Two sisters, Anne and Sarah Pilgrim, a London mind-reading act, are travelling by train to Geneva when Anne faints as the train passes the mountain. Upon waking Anne insists that they must get off at the next stop.

UN troubleshooter Alan Brooks, in the same train compartment as the sisters, goes to Trollenberg's observatory. Professor Crevett explains that, despite many climbing accidents, no bodies are ever found, and an always-stationary radioactive cloud is regularly observed on the mountain's south face. Brooks mentions similar incidents that took place in the Andes three years earlier, just before a similar radioactive cloud vanished without a trace. Local rumors circulated that something was living in the heavy mist.

Anne is giving a mind-reading demonstration at the hotel when she "sees" two men in a base camp hut on the mountain. Dewhurst is asleep when the other man, Brett, under some kind of mental compulsion, walks outside as the cloud envelopes the hut. Anne suddenly faints again. Brooks phones the hut, Dewhurst answers, but the connection goes dead.

A rescue party, including Brooks, climbs up to the hut looking for both men. Anne, in a trance-like state, urges the rescuers to stay away. Inside the hut the rescuers discover that everything is frozen solid, despite the door being locked from the inside. Dewhurst's body is found under a bed, its head missing. A spotter plane arrives and circles overhead, and a man is spotted a half mile away. The first rescuer finds a rucksack at that location with a severed head inside. He is set upon and killed by Brett, who also kills the second rescuer when he arrives.

Later at the hotel, Brett suddenly staggers in, claiming that he had been lost on the mountain. Soon after he attacks Anne with a knife, but Brooks manages to subdue him. Brett sustains a severe head gash during the struggle, but no blood flows from the wound. He is heavily sedated and locked away. Brooks recalls to journalist Philip Truscott a similar incident in the Andes that followed a similar pattern: a man murdered an elderly woman who allegedly had psychic abilities like those displayed by Anne. The killer's body was discovered to have been dead for at least 24 hours prior to his murder of the old woman. Brett escapes his improvised cell and resumes his hunt for Anne, this time armed with a handaxe. Before he can reach her, Brett dispatches him with a pistol. Brett's flesh appears crystalized upon inspection and rapidly decomposes in the heat.

The cloud has begun to move down the mountainside towards the hotel, so the guests retreat to the fortified observatory. A mother realises that her young daughter is missing as they enter the cable car. In a thickening mist a giant tentacled creature with a single huge eye appears at the hotel, smashing down the front door. Brooks manages to rescue the child from the lobby, both of them narrowly escaping. They return to the cable car, but the delay gives the mist a chance to reach the car platform. The transport motor begins to freeze, starting and stopping, the cable slipping, but the cable car arrives safely. The single cloud has now split into five while converging on the observatory.

Hans, who left the hotel by car, suddenly turns up at the observatory. Once inside, he begins exhibiting the same obsession with Anne. Hans tries to strangle her, but Brooks and Truscott stop him as Brooks stabs him. As the monsters near the observatory, everyone makes Molotov cocktails to combat them. By radio, Alan orders an aerial firebombing raid against the observatory, which has a reinforced concrete roof and walls that can withstand the assault.

Truscott strikes one of the creatures with a Molotov cocktail, setting it ablaze. He is caught by a tentacle from another monster now atop the observatory's roof. Brooks sets that one ablaze with another Molotov cocktail, forcing it to drop Truscott. Later, Truscott firebombs another creature that manages to breach a portion of thick wall to get at Anne. The aerial firebombing assault begins and successfully torches the remaining monsters.

Dr. James Xavier develops eye drops intended to increase the range of human vision, allowing one to see beyond the "visible" spectrum into the ultraviolet and x-ray wavelengths and beyond. Believing that testing on animals and volunteers will produce uselessly subjective data, he tests the drops on himself.

Initially, Xavier discovers that he can see through people's clothing, and he uses his vision to save a young girl whose medical problem was misdiagnosed. Over time and with continued use of the drops, Xavier's visual capacity increases but his ability to control it decreases. Eventually, he can see the world only in forms of light and texture that his brain is unable to fully comprehend. Even closing his eyes brings no relief from the darkness in his increasingly frightening world, as he can see through his closed eyelids.

After accidentally killing a friend, Xavier goes on the run, using his x-ray vision first to work in a carnival, and then to win at gambling in a Las Vegas casino. His eyes are altered along with his vision; first they become black and gold and later entirely black. To hide his startling appearance, he wears dark wraparound sunglasses at all times.

Leaving Las Vegas, Xavier drives out to the desert and finds a religious tent revival. He tells the evangelist that he is beginning to see things at the edges of the universe, including an "eye that sees us all" in the center of the universe. The pastor replies that what he sees is "sin and the devil" and quotes the Biblical verse, "If thine eye offends thee... pluck it out!" Xavier chooses to blind himself rather than continuing to see anything more.

The story starts with Johnny Maxwell, a 12-year-old boy, taking a shortcut through the local Blackbury cemetery to reach his home. In the cemetery, Johnny meets the spirit of Alderman Thomas Bowler and realizes that he can interact with the spirits of the dead. Later, Johnny meets all the deceased occupants of the cemetery and discusses with them the council's sale of Blackbury's neglected cemetery to a faceless conglomerate, who plan to build offices on it. Various dead citizens, led by a former town councillor, ask Johnny to help stop it.

While Johnny (helped by his semi-believing friends) tries to find evidence of famous internees and speaks out at community meetings, the dead begin to take an interest in modern-day life and realise they are not, as they once believed, trapped in the cemetery.

Finally the council is forced to back down, but the dead are no longer interested; they have decided that instead of waiting for the Day of Judgement, they will make the decision themselves. Most of them depart the cemetery to continue their journey into the afterlife but, thanks to the campaigning of the Blackbury Volunteers, the town's living residents have rediscovered the cemetery as a link to their past. As one of the dead puts it before leaving: "The living must remember, and the dead must forget."

The game takes place in the distant future. The player takes the role of a survivor of a faction of humans known as the Tograns, whose society was decimated after their homeworld became engulfed in the civil war between the Freedom Guard and the Imperium (who were once both the Sprawlers and the Jovian Detention Authority (JDA) from ''Dark Reign 2'' respectively). As one of the last remaining Tograns that set off in hopes they might find a new refuge to rebuild and carry on the words of Alpheus Togra (a famous research scientist and philosopher), the player is presented with an opportunity to go back through time and prevent Togra's death, using an advanced probe launched by him just prior to the destruction of the planet Strata-7. To use the device, the player must first demonstrate their worth by achieving victory in simulations of famous battles between the Imperium and the Freedom Guard.

The thirteen missions play out the events from the first skirmish between the Imperium and Freedom Guard up to the battle for and destruction of Strata-7. The missions may freely be played from the perspective of the Imperium or the Freedom Guard. In the thirteenth and final mission, the last Togran, the player, is sent back in time using the Chronomachine to Strata-7, and must use the weapons and technology of both the Imperium and the Freedom Guard to combine a force that will defeat both sides and prevent the complete destruction of Strata-7 and the death of Togra.

In the expansion, ''Rise of the Shadowhand'', the story depicts the increasing desperation and despotism of the Imperium after the emergence of the Tograns as a third credible faction. After a massive Imperium assault on Freedom Guard space, a fleeing transport stumbles upon a planet, at the other side of the galaxy, where the Imperium secret police, the Shadowhand, have conducted major research. By coincidence, the Shadowhand simultaneously is faced with losing control of its advanced units due to the malfunction of their guiding AI, Osiris.

Terri Griffith is an aspiring teenage journalist in Phoenix, Arizona, who feels that her teachers do not take her articles seriously because of her good looks. After failing to get her dream job as a newspaper intern, she comes to the conclusion that it is because she is a girl.

With her parents out of town on a two-week Caribbean vacation, Terri decides to remedy the situation. Enrolling at a rival high school, she enlists the help of her sex-obsessed younger brother, Buddy, and her best friend Denise to disguise herself as a boy. Along the way, she meets Rick Morehouse, a nerd who becomes her pet project. After helping him through an image makeover and encouraging him to start talking to girls, Terri starts to fall for him.

After many episodes in and out of school, including fending off a group of bullies led by bodybuilder Greg Tolan, dealing with her real college boyfriend Kevin, and being set up on a blind date with a potential new girlfriend named Sandy, Terri manages to be accepted as "one of the guys".

At the senior prom, a jealous Greg picks a fight with Rick, who ultimately trounces the bully in front of the entire class. When Terri's boyfriend shows up unexpectedly and discovers the ruse, Rick assumes that Terri's big secret was that she was gay. To prove otherwise, Terri opens her shirt and reveals her breasts to Rick. Although she admits to loving him, Rick rejects her, prompting a desperate Terri to kiss him in front of everyone. To placate the awestruck students, Rick derisively announces that Terri "has tits" before leaving the prom and Terri behind.

Heartbroken and humiliated, Terri retreats to her room and writes a long article on what it is like to be a girl in boys' clothing, detailing all of her experiences, both good and bad.

Terri returns to her own school. When her article is printed in the newspaper, she receives high praise and finally earns her dream job at the newspaper. Nevertheless, she still finds herself yearning for Rick, who has not spoken to her since the prom. One day during the summer, Rick suddenly turns up after reading her article. Realizing their true feelings for each other, they reconcile and make plans for another date. They decide to go for a drive in Terri's car, but before Buddy can join them, an attractive blonde on a motorcycle rides up and beckons to him with a smile. Buddy then climbs onto the back of her motorcycle, and both couples happily drive away.

When Nicola Anders (Winona Ryder), the star of the new film by out-of-favor director Viktor Taransky (Al Pacino), refuses to finish it, Taransky is forced to find a replacement. Contractual requirements totally prevent using her image in the film, so he must re-shoot. Instead, Taransky experiments with a new computer program he inherits from late acquaintance Hank Aleno (Elias Koteas) which allows the creation of a computer-generated woman which he can easily animate to play the film's central character. Taransky names his virtual actor "Simone," a name derived from the computer program's title, '''''Sim'''ulation '''One'''''. Seamlessly incorporated into the film, Simone (Rachel Roberts) gives a fantastic performance, exactly controlled by Taransky. The film is immediately a huge success. The studio, and soon the world, ask "who is Simone?"

Taransky initially claims that Simone is a recluse and requests her privacy be respected, but that only intensifies media demands for her to appear. Taransky intends to reveal the secret of her non-existence after the second picture. To satisfy demand, he executes a number of progressively ambitious stunts relying on misdirection and cinematic special effects technology. Eventually, it escalates to simulated remote location video live interviews.

In one instance, two determined tabloid reporters discover Taransky used out-of-date stock photography as a background during an interview instead of being on that site as claimed, and they blackmail him into getting Simone to make a live appearance. He arranges her to perform a song at a stadium event appearing in a cloud of smoke and then using flawless holographic technology. The perception of being in person is reinforced with real-time visualization on the stadium's monitors. Simone becomes even more famous, simultaneously becoming a double winner for the Academy Award for Best Actress, tying with herself in the process.

Once Taransky grows tired of Simone constantly overshadowing him in the press, he decides to ruin her career. Simone's next film, ''I Am Pig'', is her "directorial debut" and a tasteless treatment about zoophilia intended to disgust audiences. Not only does it fail to achieve the desired effect of audience alienation, but it also serves to foster her credibility as a risk-taking, fearless and avant-garde artist. Taransky's subsequent attempts to discredit Simone—by having her drink, smoke, and curse at public appearances and use politically incorrect statements—similarly backfire when the press instead begins to see her as refreshingly honest. As a last resort, Taransky decides to dispose of Simone completely by using a computer virus to erase her, dumping the hard drive and floppy disks into a steamer trunk, burying the trunk at sea, and then announcing to the press that she has died of a rare virus contracted on her Goodwill Tour of the Third World. During the funeral, the police interrupt, open the coffin and find only a cardboard cutout of Simone. He is arrested and shown a security camera video where he loads a large trunk onto his yacht.

After being charged with her murder, he admits that Simone is not a person, but a computer program. The chest containing the computer data is brought up empty. Taransky's daughter Lainey and ex-wife Elaine enter his studio to try to help. They find Taransky's forgotten virus source disk (''Plague'') and apply an anti-virus program to eradicate the computer virus. They restore Simone and have her appear on national television laughing while holding up a newspaper headline with her obituary. They pick up a confused Taransky, with whom Elaine asks to get back together. In the end, Simone and Taransky are remotely interviewed at home about their new (virtual) baby, used as a cover story for her absence. Simone is concerned about her child's future and decides to enter politics.

A post-credits scene reveals Viktor creating footage of Simone buying a calorie-laden meat pie TV dinner at a supermarket, while tabloid investigator character Max Sayer, who has an obsessive crush on Simone throughout the film, is thrilled to discover that she appears to love meat pies as much as he does.

In ''Three's Company'''s final episodes, Vicky Bradford (Mary Cadorette) is introduced as a love interest of Jack Tripper (John Ritter), beginning with the episode titled "Cupid Works Overtime." In the following two-part episode, "Friends and Lovers", Jack proposes marriage, but Vicky, afraid of marriage after witnessing her parents' tumultuous relationship and bitter divorce, declines the offer. Vicky instead convinces Jack to move in with her in the vacant apartment above his restaurant. Vicky's wealthy father James Bradford (Robert Mandan) buys the building from Jack's former boss, Frank Angelino. James does not approve of Jack and he constantly tries to disrupt his and Vicky's relationship.

Other characters include E.Z. Taylor (Alan Campbell), Jack's eccentric assistant at the bistro, and Claudia Bradford (Jessica Walter), Vicky's mother and James' ex-wife.

The film begins with the contorted body of a young woman lying in a ditch, covered in frost. From this image, an unseen interviewer (Varda) puts the camera on the last men to see her and the one who found her. The action then flashes back to the woman, Mona, walking along the roadside, hiding from the police and trying to get a ride. Along her journey she takes up with other vagabonds as well as a Tunisian vineyard worker, a family of goat farmers, an agronomy professor, and a maid who envies what she perceives to be Mona's beautiful and passionate lifestyle. Mona explains to one of her temporary companions that at one time she was a secretary in Paris but became unsettled with the way she was living, choosing instead to wander the country, free from any responsibility. Her condition worsens until she finally falls where we first encounter her in a ditch, frozen to death.

Rose Tyler, a teenage shop assistant, is chased by mannequins in the basement of Henrik's, the department store where she works. She is rescued by the Ninth Doctor, who destroys the building with an explosion. The next day, the Doctor visits Rose at her home, where he is attacked by a plastic mannequin arm which he and Rose subdue. Rose investigates the Doctor and meets Clive, who has been tracking the Doctor's appearances throughout history. Clive tells Rose that the Doctor is dangerous and that if he's there, something bad is about to happen. While Rose is talking to Clive, her boyfriend Mickey Smith is kidnapped by a wheelie bin and replaced with a plastic doppelgänger.

The fake Mickey takes Rose to lunch and attempts to question her about the Doctor, but the Doctor shows up and beheads the doppelgänger. The Doctor takes Rose and the plastic head to the TARDIS and attempts to use the head to locate the controlling signal. With the head connected, the TARDIS takes them to the London Eye. The Doctor explains to Rose that the fake Mickey was an Auton, controlled by a signal from the Nestene Consciousness. He has a vial of anti-plastic that can be used to destroy the Nestene Consciousness if necessary. Realising that the transmitter is the London Eye itself, Rose and the Doctor descend underneath it to stop the Nestene Consciousness. They find Mickey, tied up but alive, and the Doctor speaks to the Nestene Consciousness. He tries to negotiate with it, but the Consciousness blames the Doctor for the destruction of its planet. The Nestene Consciousness activates all the Autons at a shopping arcade, where several shoppers are shot and killed, including Clive. The Doctor is also held down by a pair of Autons, but Rose rescues him and the anti-plastic drops into the vat where the Nestene Consciousness resides, killing it. With the Nestene Consciousness dead, the Autons all collapse. The Doctor uses the TARDIS to take Mickey and Rose home, then persuades Rose to join him as his new companion in the TARDIS.

Continuity

Both the Autons and the Nestene Consciousness first appeared in the serial ''Spearhead from Space'' (1970), then reappeared on-screen in ''Terror of the Autons'' (1971).

Dr. Coppélius is a doctor who has made a life-size dancing doll. It is so lifelike that Franz, a village youth, becomes infatuated with it and sets aside his heart's true desire, Swanhilda. She shows him his folly by dressing as the doll, pretending to make it come to life and ultimately saving him from an untimely end at the hands of the inventor.

;Act I

The story begins during a town festival to celebrate the arrival of a new bell. The town crier announces that, when it arrives, anyone who becomes married will be awarded a special gift of money. Swanhilda and Franz plan to marry during the festival. However, Swanhilda becomes unhappy with Franz because he seems to be paying more attention to a girl named Coppélia, who sits motionless on the balcony of a nearby house. The house belongs to a mysterious and faintly diabolical inventor, Doctor Coppélius. Although Coppélia spends all of her time sitting motionless and reading, Franz is mesmerized by her beauty and is determined to attract her attention. Still upset with Franz, Swanhilda shakes an ear of wheat to her head: if it rattles, then she will know that Franz loves her. Upon doing this, however, she hears nothing. When she shakes it by Franz's head, he also hears nothing; but then he tells her that it rattles. However, she does not believe him and runs away heartbroken.

Later on, Dr. Coppelius leaves his house and is heckled by a group of boys. After shooing them away, he continues on without realizing that he has dropped his keys in the melée. Swanhilda finds the keys, which gives her the idea of learning more about Coppélia. She and her friends decide to enter Dr. Coppelius' house. Meanwhile, Franz develops his own plan to meet Coppélia, climbing a ladder to her balcony.

;Act II

Swanhilda and her friends find themselves in a large room filled with people. However, the occupants aren't moving. The girls discover that, rather than people, these are life-size mechanical dolls. They quickly wind them up and watch them move. Swanhilda also finds Coppélia behind a curtain and discovers that she, too, is a doll.

Dr. Coppelius returns home to find the girls. He becomes angry with them, not only for trespassing but for also disturbing his workroom. He kicks them out and begins cleaning up the mess. However, upon noticing Franz at the window, Coppélius invites him in. The inventor wants to bring Coppélia to life but, to do that, he needs a human sacrifice. With a magic spell, he will take Franz's spirit and transfer it to Coppélia. After Dr. Coppelius proffers him some wine laced with sleeping powder, Franz begins to fall asleep. The inventor then readies his magic spell.

However, Dr. Coppelius did not expel all the girls: Swanhilda is still there, hidden behind a curtain. She dresses up in Coppélia's clothes and pretends that the doll has come to life. She wakes Franz and then winds up all the mechanical dolls to aid their escape. Dr. Coppelius becomes confused and then saddened when he finds a lifeless Coppélia behind the curtain.

(Note: In some Russian versions of the ballet, after getting caught, Swanhilda confesses to Dr. Coppelius about what she and her friends did and her situation with Franz. Coppelius decides to forgive Swanhilda and teach her how to act like a doll coming to life to fool Franz, thus ending Act 2 on a happier note.)

;Act III

Swanhilda and Franz are about to make their wedding vows when the angry Dr. Coppelius appears, claiming damages. Dismayed at having caused such an upset, Swanhilda offers Dr. Coppelius her dowry in return for his forgiveness. However, Franz tells Swanhilda to keep her dowry and offers to pay Dr. Coppelius instead. At that point, the mayor intervenes and gives Dr. Coppelius a bag of money, which placates him. Swanhilda and Franz are married and the entire town celebrates by dancing.

The film focuses on Antwone "Fish" Fisher, a temperamental young man from Cleveland, Ohio with a violent history who is serving in the U.S. Navy. His father was killed before he was born and his teenage mother, Eva Mae Fisher, ended up arrested soon after and put in jail, where she gave birth to him. He was then placed in an orphanage until such time as she was released and could claim him. Since she had not yet claimed him, at the age of two Antwone was placed in a foster home run by a couple, Mr. and Mrs. Tate. Antwone suffers years of physical and emotional abuse at Mrs. Tate's hands, and is molested by her adult niece Nadine. He finally leaves the home at age 14. After living out on the streets for the next few years, he decides to join the U.S. Navy to make something out of his life.

The rough life he had as a child has caused him to have a violent temper; after getting into a fight with a fellow sailor, Antwone is sentenced at a captain's mast to be demoted, fined, and restricted to the ship for 45 days. His commanding officer also orders him to go to psychiatric treatment. Antwone goes in to meet Dr. Jerome Davenport, who attempts to get him to open up. Antwone is at first extremely resistant, but gradually comes to trust Davenport and opens up about his traumatic childhood. Meanwhile, Antwone develops feelings for fellow Navy sailor Cheryl. With Antwone still getting into altercations, Davenport tries to explore his feelings for Cheryl in order to channel Antwone's feelings into something positive. Antwone finally goes on a date with Cheryl and establishes a relationship with her.

While on leave in Mexico, Antwone gets into a fight with a sailor who insinuates that he is gay, and is thrown into jail. Davenport meets him in jail, where Antwone confides the sexual abuse he suffered as a child. Antwone eventually reveals to Cheryl that he sees a psychiatrist.

At a Thanksgiving dinner, Davenport advises Antwone to find his real family. Antwone refuses, but thanks Davenport before inviting him to a graduation ceremony. Following the graduation ceremony, Davenport tells Antwone that he's ending the sessions and feels Antwone needs to progress on his own. Antwone breaks down, feeling everyone has abandoned him. He reveals his best friend Jesse was killed while attempting a robbery, and that he resents Jesse for leaving him behind. Realizing he needs to find his parents to find closure, Antwone asks Cheryl to go with him to Cleveland. After a dead end at social services, Antwone decides to return to the Tate household. There he confronts Nadine and Mrs. Tate about their abuse. Mrs. Tate ultimately reveals Antwone's father's name: Edward Elkins.

After looking through multiple telephone books, Antwone comes into contact with his aunt Annette and visits her. Antwone learns his mother lives nearby, and goes to visit her. Antwone finds closure, forgives her, and leaves. When he returns to the Elkins household, he finds a feast prepared for him and finds the family he lost.

Antwone visits Davenport and thanks him for everything. Davenport then replies that it is he who should be thanking Antwone. Davenport confesses that he had been failing to deal with his own problems, and that treating Antwone prompted him to finally confront his demons. The film draws to a close as Davenport and Antwone go to eat.

A large meteor crashes in the barren Arizona desert late at night, which aspiring firefighter Wayne Grey witnesses. The next day, science professors Ira Kane and Harry Block from nearby Glen Canyon Community College investigate the crash site, discovering the meteor has landed in a cavern and 'bleeds' a strange blue liquid when scraped. They quickly learn that the meteor harbors extraterrestrial nitrogen-based microorganisms that condense millions of years of evolution within a matter of hours: the next day, the microscopic organisms have evolved into asexual fungi and flatworms that cannot yet breathe oxygen, and aquatic life the day after that.

After the U.S. Army soon seals off the site, Ira and Harry ask Brigadier General Russell Woodman, Ira's former boss, and the clumsy Dr. Allison Reed, senior researcher in epidemiology at the CDC, to aid in their research, but their efforts fail when two weeks later, Ira goes to court to be allowed to be part of the federal investigation, and when Allison questions him as a witness, he reveals that he was discharged from the army in the summer of 1997 after an experiment in May of that year, in which he developed an anthrax vaccine and administered it to nearly 140,000 soldiers, resulted in terrible consequences, which led to his dismissal from his position as a top-level researcher at USAMRIID. Upon returning to the lab, Ira and Harry discover that Woodman has stolen their research, forcing them to infiltrate the base in disguise to get another meteor sample. They shockingly and amazingly discover that the caverns now harbor an alien rainforest teeming with tropical plant and animal life, including flying insects and carnivorous plantlife. That night, a large reptilian creature fatally mauls the owner of a local country club where Wayne works, and the next day a dog-sized frog-like animal attacks two elderly ladies in their home. Ira, Harry and Wayne find a valley behind the home filled with suffocating dragon-like creatures, which they theorize cannot yet breathe oxygen and are escaping from the meteor site through the local caverns. However, a newly-born dragon quickly adapts to the earth's oxygen and terrorizes a shopping mall before the trio gun it down.

With the media becoming increasingly aware of the alien attacks, Governor Lewis visits the site demanding answers, furious at not being informed earlier about the situation. Allison believes that the aliens will engulf the United States in two months, and Woodman suggests a napalm strike to destroy the meteor's contents and the surrounding town. Though Lewis opposes bombing the community, primate-like creatures suddenly attack the base and wound several members, persuading him to approve Woodman's napalm strike. Disgusted, Allison quits the CDC and joins Ira's crew. Ira later realizes that intense heat triggers the aliens' DNA and that the initial impact to earth activated its evolution. Woodman ignores Allison's pleas and the town begins evacuating for the impending bombing strike. Looking at the positions of nitrogen and carbon on the periodic table on the back of Allison's T-shirt, Ira theorizes that selenium might be as toxic to the aliens as arsenic is to Earth's carbon life. Rather surprisingly, two of his dumbest students, Deke and Danny Donald, recall that selenium sulfide is the active ingredient in Head & Shoulders hair shampoo, which they decide to use against the alien organisms.

Wayne procures a firetruck and fills it with the shampoo with help from his college students. However, Woodman's napalm strike goes off ahead of schedule before the team can try their plan, triggering the entire alien ecosystem to fuse together into a single immense amoeba-like blob that stands hundreds of feet tall. The giant mass begins multiplying through mitosis, which it would do infinitely until the country was overtaken by thousands of these gigantic creatures. The team maneuvers their firetruck underneath the mass and discovers a rectal-like orifice to spray the shampoo up-into; moments before the creature splits into two, the team succeeds and the monster explodes. The governor declares Ira, Harry, Wayne and Allison heroes; Wayne is made a fully-credentialed firefighter, and Ira and Allison begin dating.

Later, Harry, Ira and Wayne are shown promoting Head & Shoulders for both hair-care and fighting the aliens.

The Simpson family goes to Rainier Wolfcastle's bankruptcy garage sale. Homer asks Rainier if he has anything that will increase in value when he dies, and is shown an old weight-lifting set, complete with dumbbells and bench press, which he ends up buying. After loading the car with the family's purchases, Homer does not leave any room for himself. On the way home, Marge and the kids discover that Maggie has soiled her diaper. Marge pulls into the Kwik-E-Mart, and changes Maggie in the restroom. As she is leaving the store, a shady character accosts her and threatens her with a gun. Finding only diapers in Marge's purse, he grabs Marge's pearl necklace and runs off. Marge, stunned, walks to her car in a daze and breaks down crying at the wheel in front of her kids.

The next day, they inform the police and Chief Wiggum declares he will investigate immediately. Later, as Marge is about to leave the house, Homer gives her pepper spray and some tips on how to handle an attacker. She pulls up to the Kwik-E-Mart, but she snaps when Ralph greets her. She pepper-sprays him on impulse and, feeling guilty, drives back home where she feels safe. When she reaches home, Bart tells her she is parked over the mailman. Marge cannot bring herself to cross the threshold of her house to help the mailman. Dr. Hibbert diagnoses Marge with agoraphobia. Homer and the kids try their best over the next few days to encourage her to go outside, but to no avail. Eventually, she moves into the basement. There, feeling a bit safer, she prepares breakfast for the family and sets up a bed for herself. One day, when she is alone at home, she eyes Rainier Wolfcastle's weight-lifting set and decides to use it to pass the time. In two weeks, she builds herself up and gets well-defined abdominal muscles, much to Homer's delight. She dashes out to the garden to get some lemons and, realizing that she is not afraid anymore, starts running around town. She runs into her mugger; even though the mugger isn't aggressive against Marge, she assaults him and beats him up as a revenge. The cops arrive and arrest the crook, and Marge starts exercising even more. One day, as she jogs by an open-air gym at the beach, she runs into Ruth Powers, her old neighbor. Ruth is also very muscular, and tells Marge that she owes it all to anabolic steroids. She talks Marge into using them, and also advises Marge to enter a women's bodybuilding contest. Using the steroids, Marge exercises harder than ever, becoming very muscular and estrogen-depleted, which results in a short temper and a violent streak.

That night, the family attends the Iron Maiden Fitness Pageant to see the women's bodybuilding final. Marge wins second place, which irritates her when she overhears her family's unhappy conversation in the audience. Later that night, at Moe's, Marge boasts to all the male attendees about her performance at the competition. Homer then tells her he is proud of her ability to bulk up but not lose her femininity. Marge is angered by that, saying that was the reason she came in second place. She then tells everyone at the bar that she intends to up her usage of drugs. Moe says to Marge, "I don't got enough booze to make you look good". She flies into an uncontrollable rage and trashes the bar. Homer confronts his wife as she prepares to hurl Lenny at him. Terrified, Homer tells Marge that he misses the sweet, feminine woman he married. Marge, horrified with what she has done, apologizes, drops Lenny, and leaves with Homer. In order to cover the costs of repairing his bar, Moe sets fire to it to receive insurance money; however, Carl points out that the place has not been insured yet.

Later, at the Simpson house, Marge burns the weight set in the furnace as the show ends. Homer asks if Marge is ready for a "real workout" which turns out to be a request to wax the car, after which he gets beaten by Marge until he says that he was just kidding.

While on holiday in the French Alps, Regina "Reggie" Lampert, an expatriate American working as a simultaneous interpreter, tells friend Sylvie that she is divorcing her husband, Charles. She also meets Peter Joshua, a charming American.

On her return to Paris, she finds her apartment stripped bare. A police inspector says Charles sold off their belongings, then was murdered while leaving Paris. Their money is also missing. Reggie is given her husband's small travel bag, containing a letter addressed to her, a ship ticket to Venezuela, four passports in multiple names and nationalities, and other miscellaneous personal items. At Charles' sparsely attended funeral, three men show up to view the body. One sticks a pin into the corpse to confirm Charles is really dead.

Reggie is summoned to meet CIA administrator Hamilton Bartholomew at the American Embassy. She learns that the three men are Herman Scobie, Leopold W. Gideon, and Tex Panthollow. During World War II, they, Charles, and Carson Dyle were assigned by the OSS to deliver $250,000 ($ million in current dollar terms) in gold to the French Resistance, but instead stole it. Carson was fatally wounded in a German ambush, and Charles double-crossed the others, taking all the gold. The three survivors are after the missing money, as is the U.S. government. Hamilton insists Reggie has it, even if she does not know what or where it is—and that she is in great danger.

Peter locates Reggie and helps her move into a hotel. The three criminals separately threaten her, each convinced she knows where the money is. Herman then shocks her, claiming that Peter is in league with them, after which Peter confesses he is Carson Dyle's brother, Alexander, and is trying to bring the others to justice, believing they killed Carson.

As the hunt for the money continues, Herman and Leopold are murdered. Hamilton tells Reggie that Carson Dyle had no brother. When she confronts Peter, he claims he is Adam Canfield, a professional thief. Although frustrated by his dishonesty, Reggie still trusts him.

Reggie and Adam go to an outdoor market where Charles' last known appointment was. Spotting Tex, Adam follows him. At the stamp-selling booths, Adam and Tex each realize that Charles bought some extremely valuable stamps and affixed them to the envelope found in his travel bag. Both men race back to Reggie's hotel room, only to discover the stamps missing from the envelope. Reggie, who gave the stamps to Sylvie's young son, Jean-Louis, suddenly realizes their significance. She and Sylvie locate Jean-Louis, but he has already traded the stamps to a dealer. They find the dealer, who says the rare stamps are worth $250,000 in total. He returns them to Reggie.

Reggie returns to the hotel and finds Tex's body with the name "Dyle" scrawled next to it. Convinced Adam is the murderer, a frightened Reggie telephones Hamilton, who says to meet him at the Colonnade at the Palais-Royal. Adam sees her and gives chase. At the Colonnade, Reggie is caught out in the open between the two men. Adam claims Hamilton is really Carson Dyle: surviving the German ambush, he became obsessed with revenge and reclaiming the treasure. Reggie runs into an empty theater and hides in the prompt box. Carson is about to shoot her, but Adam activates a trapdoor under him, and Carson falls to his death.

The next day, Reggie and Adam go to the embassy to turn over the stamps, though Adam declines going in. Inside, Reggie discovers that Adam is really Brian Cruikshank, a U.S. Treasury agent responsible for recovering stolen government property. With his true identity now revealed, he proposes marriage to Reggie.

The film ends with a split-screen grid showing flashback shots of Cruikshank's four identities; Reggie says she hopes they have lots of boys, so they can name them all after him.

Set in Ottawa, Ontario and the fictional community of Moose Falls, the series starred Pinsent as Quentin Durgens, an idealistic young lawyer who wins election as a Member of Parliament, succeeding his father in a by-election after his father's death in office. Durgens was a backbench member of the governing party in the House of Commons, but had a maverick streak and aspired to do the right thing even if it wasn't politically expedient. Some of the storylines within the series were fictionalized depictions of real-life events in Canadian politics, and the series incorporated some documentary filmmaking techniques inspired by the National Film Board.

Steve Wojeck is a crusading big city coroner who regularly fights moral injustices raised by the deaths he investigated. He often tackles tough and controversial issues. The first episode of the series examines the role of racism in the suicide of a young Ojibwe man.

The story revolves around a Beijing man, "Dong-dong", who was born in a public toilet. To look for his past, he searches lavatories around the world.

The Seventh Doctor brings Ace back home to Perivale in west London. Ace becomes worried when most of her old friends seem to have disappeared, but the Doctor is more preoccupied with the black cat he sees skulking about. The cat appears to be selecting people and transporting them to another dimension. Ace finds herself being hunted down by a creature on horseback, which seems to be half-human, half-cheetah, and which hunts in tandem with the black cat. Later the Doctor and a keep-fit instructor called Paterson are chosen and teleported to another world, where the Doctor is greeted by his nemesis the Master.

The Master explains the complex situation: they are on a sentient planet, which has the power to transform its inhabitants into animals. The formerly human inhabitants, which have since evolved into Cheetah People, originally bred the black cats as pets. The Master himself shows signs of transformation and needs the Doctor's help to escape from the planet.

Ace finds her friends, Shreela and Midge, who are hiding in some woods with a young man called Derek. A Cheetah pack attacks and during the fight Midge kills one Cheetah while Ace injures another, called Karra. She begins to form an attachment to Karra and nurses her, tending her injuries, which worries the Doctor greatly. Ace's eyes change and she begins to transform into a Cheetah herself.

Midge submits to the power of the planet and begins to transform. The Master seizes on this and uses Midge to teleport them both back to Earth and away from the dying world. Ace helps The Doctor get back to Perivale, also enabling Paterson, Derek and Shreela to flee the strange planet. The Doctor and Ace return to Perivale, where they find Midge and the Master have killed Paterson for sport. Midge too is killed in the Master's machinations. Karra's arrival brings comfort to Ace, whose transformation is continuing, but the Master kills Karra too.

The Master transports the Doctor with him back to the Cheetah Planet for a final conflict but the Doctor resists the pull of the planet, turning away from violence, and is transported away from the dying world. However, the Master looks doomed on the planet as it begins to break up. The Doctor has gone back to the TARDIS and Earth, where he finds Ace, whose metamorphosis has reversed.

Team America, a paramilitary counter-terrorist police force, eliminates a gang of terrorists in Paris, accidentally destroying the Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe, and the Louvre in the process. The team includes Lisa, an idealistic psychologist; her love interest Carson; Sarah, a psychic; Joe, a jock who is in love with Sarah; and Chris, a martial arts expert who harbors a phobia towards actors. Carson proposes to Lisa, but a terrorist shoots him dead as he is doing it.

Team America leader Spottswoode brings Broadway actor Gary Johnston to Team America's base in Mount Rushmore and asks him to use his acting skills to infiltrate a terrorist cell. Unbeknownst to the team, North Korean dictator and terrorist mastermind Kim Jong-il is supplying international terrorists with weapons of mass destruction. Gary infiltrates a terrorist group in Cairo. The team is discovered and a chase ensues, with the team killing the terrorists. However, the city is left in ruins, drawing criticism from the Film Actors Guild (often shown as "F.A.G." in the film), a union of liberal Hollywood actors led by Alec Baldwin.

At the base, Gary tells Lisa that, as a child, his acting talent caused his brother to be savagely killed by gorillas. While the two grow close and have sex, terrorists blow up the Panama Canal in retaliation for the Cairo operation, which the Film Actors Guild blame on Team America, as well as Kim chastising the terrorists for detonating one bomb too early. Gary, feeling his acting talents have again resulted in innocent people dying, resigns from Team America. The remaining members depart for the Middle East, but are defeated and captured by North Korean forces while Michael Moore blows up Team America's base in a suicide attack. In North Korea, Kim invites the Film Actors Guild and world leaders to a peace ceremony, planning to detonate a series of bombs around the globe while they are distracted.

Succumbing to depression, Gary is reminded of his responsibility by a speech from a drunken tramp. Returning to the team's base, he finds Spottswoode has survived the bomb attack. After regaining Spottswoode's trust by giving him a blowjob and undergoing one-day training, Gary goes to North Korea, where he uses his acting skills to infiltrate the base and free the team, although Lisa is held hostage by Kim. The team are confronted by members of the Film Actors Guild and engage them in a fight in which most of the actors are killed. After Gary uses his acting skills to save Chris from Susan Sarandon, Chris confesses to Gary that the reason he dislikes actors is because he was gang-raped by the cast of the musical ''Cats'' when he was 19 years old.

The team crash the peace ceremony and Gary goes on stage where he convinces the world's leaders to unite, using the tramp's speech. Alec Baldwin cannot counter Gary's arguments, so Kim betrays and kills Baldwin, but is kicked over a balcony by Lisa and impaled on a Pickelhaube. Kim reveals his true form as an enormous extraterrestrial cockroach and flees in a spaceship, promising to return. Gary and Lisa happily begin a relationship and the team reunites, preparing to fight the world's terrorists once again.

Around the world, unusual phenomena are occurring that bear resemblance to signs of the Biblical apocalypse; these include a mass death of sea life in Haiti and a devastating freeze in the Middle East, and at each of these locations, a mysterious traveler opens a sealed envelope just prior to the event taking place. The Vatican tasks Father Lucci with investigating these events, though Lucci advises that they are all either hoaxes or have scientific explanations.

Concurrently to this, Abby Quinn, a pregnant woman living in California, prepares for the birth of her child. Her husband, Russell, is a defense lawyer representing Jimmy Szaragosa, a man with Down syndrome, who is on trial for murdering his incestuous parents and claiming that he did so after having been ordered to by God. Jimmy is convicted of the crime.

For additional income, Abby and Russell rent a room to the mysterious traveler, who identifies himself as David Bannon. Soon after, Abby begins to have terrible nightmares of a man resembling David being struck down by a Roman soldier, who then asks "will you die for him?" of her. In addition Abby physically reacts inexplicably. Abby also learns of the apocalyptic signs that have occurred, and combined with her nightmares and David's suspicious behavior, she begins to worry that something terrible is taking place. She snoops through David's papers and discovers an ancient note that leads her to believe that he intends to harm her child. When Abby confronts David about this, he tells her that God's grace is empty and soon, no souls will remain to be given to newborn people. Abby panics and stabs David, only for him to shrug off the injury and claim that he "cannot die again." To add to Abby's shock and horror the stab wound David sustains bursts with light rather than blood.

It becomes apparent that he is actually the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. Abby's nightmares are visions of his original crucifixion, and she is the reincarnation of Seraphia, the woman who offered Jesus water only to be turned away by Cartaphilus, who was Pilate's porter who struck Jesus.

The signs of the apocalypse continue to unfold and eventually cause a giant storm. Abby connects with Avi, a rabbinical student who helps her understand the events. Father Lucci, who has come to California as part of his investigation, finds her and hears her concerns. However, while meeting with Lucci, Abby spots a ring on his finger identical to the one that Cartaphilus wore and learns that Lucci is Cartaphilus himself who was cursed to wander the Earth until Christ's return to judge humanity. He intends to allow the apocalypse to take place so that his curse will finally be broken.

Abby flees from Lucci with Avi's aid, and together the two of them find a Bible to learn what will happen next. They discover that the sixth sign will be a solar eclipse that will take place the next day, meaning that the fifth sign — the tortured death of a martyr for God's cause — must take place very soon. Abby realizes that clemency has been denied to Jimmy and his execution will be the fifth sign. In a panic, she drives to the prison to stop the execution; however, Lucci has already infiltrated the prison. As Abby approaches, Lucci kills Jimmy and wounds Abby and is taken away by the guards.

The eclipse begins along with a catastrophic earthquake. Despondent over her failure to save Jimmy and the rest of humanity, Abby goes into labor and is rushed through the disaster to a nearby hospital. Despite the best efforts of Russell and the doctors to help her, the child's heart stops beating as Abby gives birth, thus fulfilling the seventh and final sign, the birth of the soulless child. However, Abby has another vision of her past as Seraphia and remembers Cartaphilus' question. Finally finding true hope, Abby answers the question in the affirmative—"I will die for him"—and reaches out to her child, who revives and holds her finger. Her soul is thus transferred to the child, saving him at the cost of her own life. This act of faith ends the apocalypse. Jesus appears in the hospital and tells Russell that Abby's sacrifice has refilled the Hall of Souls, ensuring that humanity will continue to survive. He tells Avi to record this for future humanity.

Set in contemporary Victorian times, the novel concerns businessman Paul Bultitude and his son Dick. Dick is about to leave home to return to a boarding school run by the cane-wielding headmaster, Dr. Grimstone. Bultitude, seeing his son's fear of returning to school, asserts that schooldays are the best years of a boy's life, and how he wishes he were the one going.

At this point, thanks to a magic stone brought by an uncle from India which grants the possessor one wish, the father becomes a boy identical to the son. They are now on even terms. Dick, holding the stone, is ordered by his father to return him to his own body, but Dick refuses, and decides instead to become a man identical to how his father looked before the change. Mr Bultitude has to begin the new term at his son's boarding school, while Dick gets a chance to run his father's business in the City. In the end, both are restored to their own bodies, with a better understanding of each other.

The film attempts to portray the craziness of life on the road as a rock musician, and as such consists of a series of unconnected nonsense vignettes interspersed with concert footage of the Mothers of Invention. Ostensibly, while on tour The Mothers of Invention go crazy in the small fictional town of Centerville ("a real nice place to raise your kids up"), wander around, and get beaten up in "Redneck Eats", a cowboy bar. In an animated interlude passed off as a "dental hygiene movie", bassist "Jeff", tired of playing what he refers to as "Zappa's comedy music", is persuaded by his bad conscience to quit the group, as did his real-life counterpart Jeff Simmons. Simmons was replaced by Martin Lickert (who was Starr's chauffeur) for the film. Almost every scene is drenched with video special effects (double and triple exposures, solarisation, false color, speed changes, etc.) which were innovative in 1971. The film has been dubbed a "surrealistic documentary".Canby, Vincent (November 11, 1971). "Film: Frank Zappa's Surrealist '200 Motels'". ''The New York Times''. 60.

The story begins after Adol's ship is attacked by a fleet of Romun ships. Forced to sail into an unknown area, they encounter a large storm. Adol is swept off the vessel while trying to rescue a fellow sailor and washed ashore by the vortex that surrounds the Canaan Islands. He is found, unconscious, by the nieces of the chieftain of the nearby Rehda village, Olha and Isha, who are the daughters of his brother that died when battling with fellow Redha against the Wandering Calamity. The girls take him to their village and lay him to rest in their Uncle Ord's house. Adol hears them talking about him and wakes up briefly, afterwards going back to sleep because of his exhaustion. His adventure then begins.

In 1929, nine year-old Sakamoto Chiyo and her sister are sold by their father to work within the entertainment districts of Kyoto. They are taken from their home in a coastal fishing village known as Yoroido and travel to Kyoto by train. Chiyo is taken to the Nitta (geisha boarding house) in Gion, but her sister is taken to a brothel within Kyoto's pleasure district.

Chiyo is introduced to Auntie, Mother, and Granny. Both Auntie and Mother are strict, though Auntie is kinder to Chiyo, whereas Mother is driven by money and business. Chiyo is also introduced to Hatsumomo, the premier geisha of the , its primary earner, and one of the most famous geisha of Gion. Hatsumomo dislikes Chiyo and goes out of her way to torment her.

A few years later, Chiyo is given money and a handkerchief in the street by a kind stranger known to Chiyo as the Chairman. Soon afterwards, Pumpkin prepares to make her debut as a and the "younger sister" of Hatsumomo, whilst Chiyo remains a maid. Mameha, another famous geisha in Gion, persuades a reluctant Mother to reinvest in Chiyo's training, with Mameha acting as Chiyo's mentor and "older sister".

Chiyo becomes an apprentice geisha with the given name of Sayuri, and is reacquainted with Chairman Iwamura, his closest friend and business partner Nobu, and a number of other prominent men. As Sayuri gains popularity, Hatsumomo tries to hurt Sayuri's reputation and career in the hopes of Mother adopting Pumpkin instead.

Mameha orchestrates a bidding war for Sayuri's and uses the record-breaking payment for Sayuri's to cover all of her debts. Mother adopts Sayuri, and Hatsumomo begins a downward spiral into alcoholism before being thrown out of the .

In 1944, geisha districts are ordered to close, and Sayuri desperately asks Nobu for help to avoid being conscripted into factory work. He sends Sayuri far north to live with his old friend, Arashino, where she stays for much of the war.

At the end of the war, Nobu visits Sayuri, asking that she return to Gion. Sayuri finds Pumpkin working in a new ; despite hoping to rekindle their friendship, Pumpkin later sabotages Sayuri's plan to scare Nobu off from proposing to be her , as revenge for taking her place in the adoption so many years ago.

A few days after her plan fails, Sayuri is summoned to meet the Chairman at a teahouse. She confesses that she has worked for years to become close to the Chairman. The Chairman admits that he has always known she was the girl he met on the street, and confesses his feelings for her as well, but felt he owed Nobu – his oldest and closest friend – the chance to be with Sayuri out of kindness. He also admits to having asked Mameha to train Sayuri.

Sayuri peacefully retires from geisha work when the Chairman becomes her . Sayuri relocates to New York City and opens her own small tea house for entertaining Japanese men on business in the United States. The Chairman remains her until his death.

In 2004, a Predator ship arrives on Earth and uses a heating device to melt a hole in Antarctic ice. Meanwhile, a satellite detects the heat bloom beneath Bouvetøya, an island about off the coast of Antarctica. Wealthy industrialist Charles Weyland discovers through thermal imaging that there is a pyramid buried beneath the ice. He assembles a team of experts to investigate, including archaeologists, linguists, mercenaries, and a mountaineering guide named Lex Woods. Terminally ill, Weyland desires to claim the discovery in his name.

When the team arrives at the abandoned whaling station, they find a newly made tunnel running directly beneath the ice toward the pyramid. The team descends the tunnel and begins to explore the pyramid, soon finding evidence of an ancient civilization and what appears to be a sacrificial chamber filled with human skeletons that all have ruptured rib cages.

Meanwhile, three Predators ⁠— Scar, Celtic, and Chopper ⁠— arrive and kill the remaining team members on the surface. They make their way down to the pyramid and arrive just as the team unwittingly activates the structure and are trapped within it. The Xenomorph Queen awakes from cryogenic stasis and begins to produce eggs. When the eggs hatch, several facehuggers attach themselves to humans trapped in the sacrificial chamber. Chestbursters emerge from the humans and quickly grow into adult Xenomorphs. The humans take possession of the Predator's blasters, and conflict erupts between the Predators, Xenomorphs, and humans. Celtic and Chopper are killed by a Xenomorph, and Weyland buys Lex and Sebastian De Rosa enough time to escape from Scar, giving his life in the process. The two witness Scar kill a facehugger and a Xenomorph before unmasking and marking himself with the acidic blood of the facehugger. After Lex and Sebastian leave, another facehugger attacks Scar.

Through translation of the pyramid's hieroglyphs, Lex and Sebastian learn that the Predators have been visiting Earth for thousands of years. They taught the early human civilization how to build pyramids and were worshipped as gods. Every 100 years, they visit Earth to take part in a rite of passage by which several humans sacrifice themselves as hosts for the Xenomorphs, creating the "ultimate prey" for the Predators to hunt. As a fail-safe, if overwhelmed, the Predators would activate a self-destruct device to eliminate the Xenomorphs. They deduce that the Predators lured them into the pyramid to use as a sacrifice.

Lex and Sebastian decide that the Predators must be allowed to succeed so that the Xenomorphs do not escape to the surface. Sebastian is captured by a Xenomorph, and Lex returns the blaster to Scar. They are attacked by a Xenomorph, and Lex manages to kill it. Impressed, Scar uses parts of a dead Xenomorph to fashion weapons for Lex, and the two form an alliance. Lex finds Sebastian, who has become the host for a Xenomorph. She mercy kills him, but the Xenomorph Queen is freed from her restraints and, along with the other Xenomorphs, begins pursuing Lex and Scar. Scar detaches and uses a bomb in his wrist module to destroy the pyramid and the remaining Xenomorphs and eggs. Lex and Scar reach the surface, and Scar uses acidic Xenomorph blood to mark Lex with the Xenomorph hunter symbol. However, the Xenomorph Queen reappears and attacks. They defeat the Queen by pushing it over a cliff, dragging her to the ocean floor. Scar is fatally wounded.

A Predator spaceship appears, and its crew retrieves its fallen comrade. An elder Predator presents Lex with a spear as a gift as the spaceship departs. Lex walks over to a snowcat and leaves the area. On the Predator spaceship, Scar's body lies in rest when a Predalien chestburster erupts from his chest.

James Dalton is a professional "cooler", with a mysterious past who is enticed from his job in New York City by Frank Tilghman to take over security at his own club, the Double Deuce, in Jasper, Missouri. Tilghman plans to invest substantial money into the club to enhance its image, and he needs a first-rate cooler to maintain stability. Handed control of all bar operations and hiring by Frank, Dalton fires multiple employees for theft and drug dealing.

Dalton is introduced to local business magnate Brad Wesley, who effectively controls the town. His henchmen threaten Tilghman, during the ensuing struggle, Dalton receives a knife wound. At the hospital, he begins a friendship with Dr. Elizabeth "Doc" Clay, which develops into a romance. Dalton also reunites with his mentor, aging cooler Wade Garrett, who comes in to town after receiving a disconcerting phone call from Dalton.

Wesley summons Dalton to his home and reveals knowledge of Dalton's past regarding an incident in which he killed a man in self defense. Wesley tries to convince Dalton to work for him once he extorts the Double Deuce. Dalton refuses, and Wesley increases his attack on the club as well as beginning to sabotage other businesses that start disobeying him. After Wesley‘s henchman Jimmy Reno sets Dalton‘s house on fire, he kills him in self-defense, shocking Elizabeth.

After Wesley has Garrett killed, Dalton snaps and storms Wesley‘s estate, killing most of his henchmen and ultimately incapacitating Wesley. As he tries to walk away, Wesley pulls a gun on him. Before he can shoot, however; he is shot to death by the townspeople, who deny any knowledge of what had happened to the arriving police. In the end, the town celebrates its newfound freedom at the Double Deuce.

Richard Clark is an unsatisfied prep school teacher at the fictional Wellington Academy, who accepts a job at inner city Marion Barry High School, much to the chagrin of his boss and father, Wellington headmaster Thaddeus Clark. Richard arrives to find the school in a state of disarray and disorder, while meeting several students and faculty members including: the blunted, soured, and uninspiring principal, Evelyn Doyle, her cheerful assistant Victoria Chappell and student Griff McReynolds.

Despite initial opposition to his teaching style and harassment from the school gang leader Paco, Richard begins connecting with his students and teaches them effectively, while developing a romantic relationship with Victoria. Barry High eventually is transformed into a fine educational establishment. Frustrated, Paco and his gang tamper with the school's final exam scores, causing everyone to fail. Griff, who grew to see Richard as a mentor, loses faith in him, as does the rest of the school and Richard is fired. Griff subsequently joins Paco's gang to make extra money.

Victoria learns through word of mouth that Paco was behind the failing test scores and rushes to inform Richard, who decides to confront Paco and rescue Griff with the help of several of his students, including Anferny Jefferson, Natalie Thompson and Julie Rubels. By deceiving Mr. DeMarco, a local gangster, Richard and Victoria reach Paco and the local crime boss, "Mr. A", whom they find has been Principal Doyle the entire time. Griff is told the truth about the test scores and after a brief fight, Paco, Doyle and DeMarco are arrested.

Richard (now principal of Barry High) presides over the graduation ceremony and proudly names Griff as the class valedictorian. The six main students of the film graduate (but only those six). Richard makes good on his promise to send Griff to college and is in a relationship with Victoria.

Captain Kathryn Janeway and Tuvok leave the ship as official guests of a nearby colony; Neelix is assigned the task of escorting the colony's guest, Tomin, aboard the ship. Neelix is surprised that Tomin is quick to break the strict regime set by his people to sample everything from food to entertainment that ''Voyager'' has to offer.

Meanwhile, Tom Paris and B'Elanna Torres become upset after discovering Seven of Nine observing and documenting their romantic interactions. The Doctor offers to help teach Seven on human courting rituals through an elaborate educational course, including such elements as singing. Seven works her way up from interactions with holodeck men and eventually ends up on a date with another human crewman. When they attempt to dance, Seven's strength strains the crewman's arms, prematurely ending the date. Seven comes to believe that she is unsuitable for dating. The Doctor has become somewhat smitten with her, and on a bet with Paris, offers to take her to Tomin's reception. Seven's behavior is perfectly appropriate for the event but upon learning of The Doctor's bet, she storms off.

The crew finds that Tomin's physiology is unable to handle the synthahol used in drinks and becomes highly intoxicated on the night prior to the return of his elder, on the night a shipwide reception is due to take place for him. Neelix works with The Doctor and Seven to use Seven's Borg nano-probes to process the synthahol. Tomin, though still unsteady on his feet, is collected enough to greet his elder, Janeway, and Tuvok with Neelix's help in the same regiment he initially arrived with. To their surprise, the elder thought that Tomin would have taken time to sample what ''Voyager'' had, in moderation. Neelix is commended for his duties.

The Doctor, alone, practices wooing Seven in the holodeck. He is interrupted by the real Seven. She presents the Doctor with an enhanced tricorder as a gift for his help, but admits that she believes there is no suitable mate on board and says she may seek his "guidance" in the future. The Doctor is unable to express his feelings and only tells Seven that the last few days have been "unforgettable". After she leaves, the Doctor begins to play George Gershwin's "Someone to Watch Over Me" on piano in one of the hologram simulation of Sandrine's Bar.

The game begins seventeen years after Balor crossed the Cloudspine, with the forces of Light losing the war badly. They are led by "The Nine", a group of avatara, chief amongst whom is Alric. The story is told through the journal entries of a soldier in "The Legion", an elite unit in the army. As the game begins, a berserk runs into the camp of The Nine, and gives them an urn. They extract a severed head, which opens its eyes.

The game then cuts to The Legion as they head to the city of Madrigal, headquarters of The Nine, which is under siege by Shiver (one of the Fallen), with the army planning to attack her from behind. The plan works, and after four days, the siege is lifted. Of particular significance is that Rabican (one of The Nine) kills Shiver in a "dream duel". Rabican had been advised by the Head, who claims to be an ancient enemy of Balor, that Shiver's one real weakness was her vanity, and his victory represents the first time one of the Fallen has been defeated. After this a detachment of the Legion is sent to the ruins of Covenant, a major city destroyed in the earlier years of the war, to find the Total Codex. The Total Codex is ancient book that reputedly has the past, present, and future written within its pages. The Legion successfully retrieves the codex while skirmishing with the Fallen Lord known as the Watcher. During this time Alric, an Avatara of the Nine, is sent east with an army on the advice of the head to recover another magical artifact. The Legion then meet with Maeldun (one of The Nine) in the city of Scales, where they learn Rabican's army is heading to block Seven Gates and Bagrada, two of the passes through the Cloudspine Mountains, so as to prevent The Deceiver (one of the Fallen) crossing west prior to winter. Rabican holds Seven Gates, and The Legion hold Bagrada, but their victory is tempered by the fact that The Watcher (another of the Fallen) remains behind their lines, and Alric and his army are trapped beyond the Cloudspine.

News soon reaches The Nine that Alric's army has been destroyed, and he has been captured by The Deceiver. He was sent to The Barrier to search for a suit of enchanted armor by the Head, who now claims to have been an ally of Connacht, although some are beginning to doubt the veracity of its claims. A small group from The Legion fly over the mountains in a hot air balloon, and rescue Alric. The Legion is then ordered to Silvermines to look for The Watcher's arm, lost when Balor freed him from captivity beneath the Cloudspine, as The Nine believe the arm can be used to fashion a weapon to use against The Watcher. However, The Deceiver is also in Silvermines searching for the arm, as he and The Watcher were enemies before the rise of Balor. The Legion find the arm, but soon thereafter, a volcano erupts, melting the snow on the Cloudspine, and allowing The Deceiver to move west. At the same time, The Watcher attacks Rabican's army, crushing it. The army of The Deceiver, heading west, and the army of The Watcher, pursuing the remnants of Rabican's army east, begin to fight one another, with Maeldun using the distraction to retake the passes.

The following spring, Cu Roi and Murgen (two of The Nine) take four thousand men into occupied eastern territory to try to gain the support of the Forest Giants. They agree to join the Light, but Soulblighter (Balor's chief lieutenant) springs a surprise attack, trapping The Legion within the Tain; an artifact small enough to hold in one's hand, but which contains a pocket universe of limitless capacity. A group of fifty men led by Murgen find the battle standard of the long-dead Myrkridia, and shortly thereafter, Murgen finds a secret exit. He is able to open it, but the rest of the four thousand men are lost, as is Cu Roi, whilst Murgen is killed as he destroys the Tain. Shocked at their escape, Soulblighter flees, but news soon arrives that Maeldun has lost Bagrada, and The Deceiver has crossed west. Also, when the remainder of The Nine tried to destroy the Head, which they have come to believe has been betraying them, they were prevented from doing so by the army, with two of The Nine killed in the ensuing conflict. Meanwhile, Alric joins The Legion.

Rather than returning west, Alric leads The Legion north, moving towards Balor's fortress in Rhi'anon, capital city of the Trow, an ancient race of giants thought extinct until they joined the war against the Light. Believing they can do nothing to save any of the remaining free cities from The Deceiver, Alric hopes to achieve a more important victory; during his captivity in The Barrier, he learned that to ensure the obedience of the Fallen Lords, Balor bound them to his will, and is channeling his power to them. Thus, if he were destroyed, they would lose their power, ending the war. Leaving a garrison of men behind to delay the pursuing Soulblighter, Alric plans to attack The Watcher using arrows tipped with bone from his arm. The plan works; The Watcher is killed, scattering his army and clearing the way ahead, whilst Soulblighter breaks off his pursuit.

At the same time as a comet appears in the western skies, Alric orders the majority of the surviving members of the Legion, twenty-two hundred men, to launch a frontal attack on Balor's fortress in a suicide mission designed to cause a distraction, as he takes the remaining one-hundred men through a World Knot (a teleportation device) to a spot behind the fortress. As they near the fortress, Alric tells the stunned soldiers that Balor is in fact Connacht, and with this in mind, he intends to raise the Myrkridian battle standard found in the Tain, hoping to enrage Balor into making a tactical error. The plan works; furious at the sight of the flag, Balor leaves the fortress, and Alric immobilizes him with an Eblis Stone. The Legion kills him, and take his head to a bottomless pit known as "The Great Devoid", as only by throwing his head into the Devoid can he be destroyed. The thirty remaining members of The Legion are ambushed by Soulblighter as they approach the Devoid, but they fight their way through, and fling the head into the pit. Soulblighter turns into a murder of crows and flees, moments before a massive explosion erupts from within the Devoid. With Balor's destruction, the remaining Fallen are rendered powerless, and their armies collapse, bringing to an end the war between the Light and the Dark.

''Blindness'' is the story of an unexplained mass epidemic of blindness afflicting nearly everyone in an unnamed city, and the social breakdown that swiftly follows. The novel follows the misfortune of a handful of unnamed characters who are among the first to be stricken with blindness, including an ophthalmologist, several of his patients, and assorted others, who are thrown together by chance. The ophthalmologist's spouse, "the doctor's wife," is inexplicably immune to the blindness. After a lengthy and traumatic quarantine in an asylum, the group bands together in a family-like unit to survive by their wits and by the good fortune that the doctor's wife has escaped the blindness. The sudden onset and unexplained origin and nature of the blindness cause widespread panic, and the social order rapidly unravels as the government attempts to contain the apparent contagion and keep order via increasingly repressive and inept measures.

The first part of the novel follows the experiences of the central characters in the filthy, overcrowded asylum where they and other blind people have been quarantined. Hygiene, living conditions, and morale degrade horrifically in a very short period, mirroring the society outside.

Anxiety over the availability of food, caused by delivery irregularities, acts to undermine solidarity; and lack of organization prevents the internees from fairly distributing food or chores. Soldiers assigned to guard the asylum and look after the well-being of the internees become increasingly antipathetic as one soldier after another becomes infected. The military refuses to allow basic medicine to be delivered, which ensures that a simple infection becomes deadly. Fearing an imminent escape, soldiers shoot down a crowd of internees waiting for a food delivery.

Conditions degenerate further as an armed clique gains control over food deliveries, subjugating their fellow internees and exposing them to violent assault, rape, and deprivation. Faced with starvation, internees battle each other and burn down the asylum, only to discover that the army has abandoned the asylum, after which the protagonists join the throngs of nearly helpless blind people outside who wander the devastated city and fight one another to survive.

The story then follows the doctor's wife, her husband, and their impromptu “family” as they attempt to survive outside, cared for largely by the doctor’s wife, who can still see (though she must hide this fact at first). At this point, the breakdown of society is near total. Law and order, social services, government, schools, etc., no longer function. Families have been separated and cannot find one another. People squat in abandoned buildings and scrounge for food. Violence, disease, and despair threaten to overwhelm human coping. The doctor and his wife and their new “family” eventually make a permanent home in the doctor's house and are establishing a new order to their lives when the blindness lifts from the city en masse just as suddenly and inexplicably as it struck.

Norwegian police officer Harry Hole is sent to Sydney, Australia to serve as an attaché for the Australian police's investigation into the murder of a young female Norwegian girl residing in Australia, Inger Holter. Her boyfriend, Evans White, is initially approached as a suspect. Hole is assisted by Aboriginal colleague Andrew Kensington; together they find out that they are dealing with a serial killer who strangles blonde women. Hole befriends a red haired Swede named Birgitta. As the story becomes more complex, Hole struggles to find the killer and falls deeper into alcoholism. There are more back stories about Harry's past and culture in Australia.

Jason Bourne has recovered from most of his mental and physical injuries and is teaching Asian studies at a university in Maine under his real name of David Webb, living happily on campus with his wife Marie under supervision of psychiatrist Morris Panov.

Meanwhile, high-ranking U.S. officials Ambassador Raymond Havilland and Undersecretary Edward McAllister discuss an increasingly alarming situation in the People's Republic of China, where the popular Communist official Sheng Chou Yang is boosting his rise to power with assassinations perpetrated by someone impersonating Jason Bourne. They fear that Sheng, a fanatical nationalist, might trigger a war, and therefore want him to be found and killed. Webb would be ideal for this, but they plan to involve him indirectly owing to his mistrust of the U.S. government and Webb's deep-seated emotional instability due to the loss of his first wife and children in Vietnam.

McAllister arrives and informs Webb of the assassin in Asia who is killing under the name of Jason Bourne. Webb is told he requires a more visible security force because someone wants him dead.

Soon thereafter, Marie is abducted by unknown people. Webb returns to the house, finds clues to her abduction, and immediately phones government officials, threatening to leak information about Treadstone and Medusa in an attempt to get assistance. He finds out information has been manipulated in order to make him seem crazy and delusional, and that his only course of action is to follow the instructions left by the kidnappers. He turns to the only person he thinks will be able to help him, Alexander Conklin, even though Conklin once tried to kill him. Conklin, now limping, is convinced there is government involvement but that they have lost control of the situation and the hired guns holding Marie are no longer in their control. Webb, who has transformed back into the persona of Jason Bourne, now has no choice but to go to Hong Kong and play out the scenario to get Marie back. In Hong Kong Bourne is led to a wealthy Tai-Pan who wants Webb to locate the impostor Jason Bourne because the impostor killed his wife; the Taipan is actually a British intelligence officer named Lin Wenzu collaborating with the CIA to make Bourne find the impostor. Bourne agrees, saying that if his wife is not heard from the very moment he returns, he will kill his nabbed impostor without a second thought. Lin Wenzu is later fatally injured when he uncovers and kills traitors on his team passing information to Sheng.

Marie, held captive in a British hospital, fakes illness and escapes, taking refuge with Catherine Staples, a former colleague now employed at the Canadian consulate in Hong Kong. The duo make runs and go incognito to avoid the CIA and to find Webb. Unfortunately Marie runs away from Staples thinking she has joined forces with her captors who want to take her back, and Staples gets killed by Sheng's men. Marie later contacts Conklin and Panov, who arrive in Hong Kong and confront McAllister and Havilland.

Webb, tracking the impostor Bourne on land, water and air, through Kowloon and Macau, encounters D'Anjou, alias Echo, another former Medusa operative, who is also tracking down the impostor Bourne, whom he had personally trained to be like Bourne. They join forces and track the impostor to mainland China, where they realise that a trap was laid by Sheng who was anticipating them following the impostor, and Echo is captured. Webb tracks him to a bird sanctuary at night, where Sheng Chou Yang is seen holding an open air conference with his rebel supporters and captured "traitors" to his cause, whom he is going to "judge", including Echo and the impostor Bourne. Echo is executed but not before he manages to delay Sheng and buy enough time for Bourne to mount a surprise attack on everyone. Amidst explosions and gunfire and killings, Webb captures the impostor Bourne, hijacks an empty charter plane and brings him to Kowloon, but in attempting to swap the impostor for Marie, is misled by McAllister, as Marie is not with them as was agreed, and still hidden by Conklin. Thinking Marie has been killed, an angry Webb now attacks and bombs Havilland's estate, Victoria Peak, where the impostor Bourne is killed and Webb nearly is as well, saved only by the timely arrival of Marie, Panov, and Conklin.

Webb and Marie learn he was selected because no one was more skilled and lethal, and Marie was abducted because Webb would have never agreed to the mission had the CIA told him the truth. Since Webb has now seen what Sheng is capable of and since Echo died for his sake, he decides to go back into the fray and kill Sheng. McAllister accompanies Webb, and during their search for Sheng, McAllister explains that he should be the one to kill Sheng, and Sheng will only trust McAllister for agreeing to rendezvous, and this has been McAllister's plan from the start. They fool Sheng into meeting with them, proposing to destroy the only copy of confidential documents that can expose him in return for money. The meeting between Sheng, Webb and McAllister takes place on the Chinese border with the assistance of Wong, a previous acquaintance of Bourne. During the meeting, McAllister sees that Sheng has already grabbed the confidential documents from Victoria Peak, and is shot by Sheng before he can shoot the latter. But Bourne arrives and stabs Sheng dead. Webb, McAllister, and Wong escape in Sheng's helicopter amidst gunfire.

In the end, it is shown that Lin Wenzu and McAllister have survived, Havilland commends McAllister for his acts of bravado, saying he will be promoted, Panov and Conklin have left for the U.S., and Webb and Marie have flown to Hawaii to rest.

In the Latin Quarter of Paris, sculptor Margaret Dauncey is injured when the top of the huge statue of a faun she is working on breaks off and falls on her. After a successful surgery by Dr. Arthur Burdon saves her from paralysis, she and Burdon fall in love.

The surgery is watched by various doctors and others including Oliver Haddo, a hypnotist, magician and student of medicine (a character in Maugham's original novel based on real-life occultist Aleister Crowley). Later, in the Library of the Arsenal, Haddo finds what he has been searching for - a magic formula for the creation of human life. One of the ingredients is the "heart blood of a Maiden". He rips out the page and presents the old book to Dr. Porhoët, Margaret's uncle and guardian, who has also been looking for it.

When Margaret, Burdon and Dr. Porhoët go to the Fair at Leon de Belfort, they encounter Haddo, whom Margaret dislikes immediately. When Dr. Porhoët claims that the snake charmers use harmless snakes, Haddo refutes him and demonstrates his powers by letting a deadly horned viper bite him. He then magically makes the wound disappear. Porhoët remains unconvinced until the discarded viper strikes a young woman performer. Burdon has to rush her to a hospital.

Later, Haddo visits Margaret uninvited. He hypnotizes her and tells her to concentrate on her statue. It seems to come to life to preside over a large orgy.

Two days before her wedding to Burdon, Margaret receives a note from Haddo, asking her to see him the next morning. She tries to resist the summons, but fails. On the day of the wedding, Burdon learns that Margaret has married Haddo instead but Porhoët is convinced it was against his niece's will and Burdon tries to track them down.

Burdon eventually encounters the couple at a casino in Monte Carlo. He and Porhoët free Margaret while Haddo is away. Porhoët places her in a sanatorium to recover.

However, Haddo finds her and takes her to his laboratory in a tower. Just as Haddo is about to stab a bound Margaret, Burdon bursts in. After a violent struggle, Haddo falls into a huge fire and is killed. Margaret emerges from her trance and is reunited with her true love. Porhoët finds the page with the formula and burns it and sets the laboratory on fire.

On the way to show Brighton to Leela, the TARDIS lands on the island of Fang Rock off the south coast of England in the early 20th century. Noticing that the lighthouse isn't functioning properly, the Fourth Doctor decides to investigate, as well as to ask for directions, as the TARDIS seems to have got 'lost in the fog'. Upon arrival at the lighthouse, and after introducing themselves, the Doctor discovers the dead body of one of the keepers, Ben. The other two keepers, old superstitious Reuben and the keen young Vince Hawkins, report that a light fell from the sky near the island. They also explain the electricity flow to the lamp on the lighthouse has become erratic and the Doctor deduces something is feeding on the flow. Reuben does not help matters with his constant references to the mythical Beast of Fang Rock, which reputedly once terrorised the lighthouse. As the Doctor and Leela explore, something moves Ben's body out of the lighthouse and onto the island, and they witness a curious electric crackling which seems to have killed fish nearby.

The loss of the electric light due to the unexplained draining of power from the generators causes a luxury yacht to crash on to Fang Rock. The four survivors are brought to the lighthouse: the bosun Harker; Colonel James Skinsale MP; the owner, Lord Palmerdale; and his highly strung secretary Adelaide Lessage. Over time it emerges Palmerdale has bought government secrets from Skinsale and was desperate to reach the stock exchange to make a killing – hence the reason the ship was travelling at such a pace.

Harker and the Doctor retrieve Ben's body and the Time Lord deduces it has been used as an anatomy lesson for an alien life form. He determines that their best protection is to secure the lighthouse to keep the creature out. Reuben then disappears for a time and then reappears a changed man, which the others put down to shock. Palmerdale is killed in the lamp room by a glowing alien presence on the outside of the lighthouse, and then Harker is killed in the boiler room. From the alien light emanating from Reuben it is clear he has become possessed or transformed by the alien creature. The Doctor finds Harker's body and then Reuben's own – the latter cold for some time – which means the creature in Reuben's form has chameleonic properties.

The creature then stalks and kills the others in the lighthouse. With its presence now revealed, the alien sheds its disguise, revealing it to be a Rutan, a green blob-like amphibious life form, whose scout ship crash landed in the sea and is trying to summon its mother ship. With the Rutans losing a long war against their hereditary enemies, the Sontarans, they plan to turn the strategically-located Earth into a base, from which they can launch a counterattack. However, once the Sontarans find the planet, they will certainly bombard Earth with photonic missiles, taking countless human lives in the process. The Doctor uses a flashbomb to disorient the Rutan, forcing it to retreat to the boiler room. The Doctor and Skinsale the retrieve diamonds from Palmerdale's body belt to use in modifying the lighthouse beacon, but Skinsale is killed by the Rutan in the process. The Doctor then modifies a flare mortar to destroy the alien, and then uses the diamonds as a focus for the electric lighthouse beam to convert it into a high-energy laser, with which he destroys the Rutan mothership. Disobeying the Doctor, Leela watches the laser destroy the ship and is momentarily blinded, and as a side effect the blinding flash turns Leela's eyes from brown to blue. The Doctor quotes Wilfrid Wilson Gibson's poem ''Flannan Isle'' as they leave.

Henry Bigg learns that his parents have been lost during an archaeological trip to Africa, although the remains of their aircraft have been found. His housekeeper Mrs. Evans says his Uncle Augustus is his next of kin and therefore his legal guardian. Thus, Henry moves to Augustus' residence where Mrs. Evans states that she can't join him because Augustus doesn't need to have a housekeeper. While appearing friendly in the eyes of Mrs. Evans, he drops the routine when Mrs. Evans leaves and tells Henry that he will not have him shedding tears here as Augustus escorts him to his room.

Meanwhile, Tom and Lucy Little (two of the tiny people inside the walls of Henry's house) snag an apple that Mrs. Evans had left for Henry. They repay the boy by finding his lucky rabbit's foot and sneaking it in his suitcase. They are carried away to Augustus' house, trapped inside the luggage. Another two of the tiny creatures, Grandpa and Dinky, soon find them.

There, the Littles soon learn of Augustus' ill-tempered and mean-spirited ways: He treats Henry more like a slave and is planning on replacing his nephew's house with a shopping mall. While the creatures try to escape, Henry discovers Grandpa and Dinky, not knowing who—or what—they are. Augustus also sees them, but mistaking them for toys, grabs them from Henry and locks them in the desk drawer in his study. Here, Dinky and Grandpa discover that Augustus forged the documents in order to become Henry's legal guardian, as well as to steal and redevelop the Biggs' property.

To rescue those two, Lucy persuades Tom to talk to Henry—a bold move, considering that humans never knew about the creatures until recently. Grandpa and Dinky, whom Henry finds inside the study, both prove the evidence of Augustus' fraud. Before Augustus locks him inside his room, Henry soon creates a diversion allowing Tom and Lucy to save them.

Eventually, Lucy and Tom are hungry, and begin to search for food. Tom gets trapped in a jar of honey, and a change of plans ensues: the Littles must rescue Henry before they can save Tom. At first Grandpa resists, but consents since Henry has already met them.

After several attempts to escape, the Littles finally flee away aboard their gas-powered toy aircraft, but cause a garage fire that wakes up Augustus. Henry attempts to go to the police station, but gets lost and is eventually caught by his uncle. The Littles distract Augustus long enough for Henry to run down there. Meanwhile, Augustus orders the demolition crew by phone to start tearing down the Biggs' place.

When the Littles get to Henry's house, they split up. Grandpa looks for Mr. and Mrs. Little while the others try to sabotage the bulldozer. Both plans succeed just in the nick of time. The moment Augustus arrives and learns what happened, the police arrive and arrest him for propose illegal destruction to private property, forgery and the child abuse he committed on Henry.

Henry is reunited with Mrs. Evans and prepares to meet his rediscovered parents at the airport. He casts a knowing wink at the gate as the Littles watch on.

The novel revolves around Montgomery Brewster, a young man who inherits one million dollars from his rich grandfather. Shortly after, a rich uncle also dies. This uncle hated Brewster's grandfather, a long-held grudge stemming from the grandfather's disapproval of the marriage of Brewster's parents. The uncle will leave Brewster seven million dollars, but only under the condition that he keeps none of the grandfather's money. Brewster is required to spend every penny of his grandfather's million within one year, resulting in no assets or property held from the wealth at the end of that time. If Brewster meets these terms, he will gain the full seven million; if he fails, he remains penniless.

Brewster finds that spending so much money within the course of a year is incredibly difficult under the strict conditions imposed by his uncle's will. Brewster is required to demonstrate business sense by obtaining good value for the money he spends, limiting his donations to charity, his losses to gambling, and the value of his tips to waiters and cab drivers. Moreover, Brewster is sworn to secrecy, and cannot tell anyone why he is living to excess. Working against him are his well-meaning friends, who try repeatedly to limit his losses and extravagance even as they share in his luxurious lifestyle.

Brewster's challenge is compounded by the fact that his attempts to lose money through stock speculation and roulette prove to increase his funds rather than decrease them. He throws large parties and balls, and charters a cruise lasting several months to Europe and Egypt for his large circle of friends and employees; the press lampoons him as a spendthrift. Despite his loose purse strings, Brewster repeatedly demonstrates a strong moral character. At one point, he uses his funds to bail out a bank to save his landlady's account, despite risking his eligibility for the will. At another, he jumps overboard to save a drowning sailor from his cruise even as his rich friends choose not to.

Brewster's would-be wife Barbara Drew turns down his marriage proposal early in the year, believing him to be financially irresponsible and bound to a life of poverty, and his attempts to win her back repeatedly fail as his attention is entirely absorbed by the requirement to spend so much money. At the conclusion of the year, he succeeds in spending the last of his funds, which he has meticulously documented, and confesses his love to another woman, Peggy Gray, who has been sympathetic to his lifestyle despite knowing nothing about his challenge. Disaster strikes the night before the deadline, as his lawyers informed him that the executor of his uncle's will has vanished after liquidating all of the assets. Brewster convinces himself that he is doomed to poverty, but marries Peggy Gray, who accepts him despite the lack of wealth. Shortly after the wedding, the executor of his uncle's will arrives to inform him that he has successfully met the challenge and that he has come to deliver the money to Brewster in person.

The Tales

As the tales unfold, they recount a world where humans, having developed superior transportation, have abandoned the cities and moved into the countryside. Hydroponic farming and decentralized power allow small communities to become self-sufficient. In the beginning, the driving force for dispersion is the fear of nuclear holocaust, but eventually humans discover they simply prefer the pastoral lifestyle.

The tales primarily focus around the Webster family and their robot servant, Jenkins. The name Webster gradually becomes "webster", a noun meaning a human. Themes familiar to Simak readers recur in these stories, notably the pastoral settings and the faithful dogs.

Each successive tale tells of further breakdown of urban society. As mankind abandons the cities, each family becomes increasingly isolated. Bruce Webster surgically provides dogs with a means of speech and he gives them contact lenses for better vision. The breakdown of civilization allows wandering mutant geniuses to grow up unrestrained by conventional mores. A mutant called Joe invents a way for ants to stay active year-round in Wisconsin, so that they need not start over every spring. Eventually, the ants form an industrial society in their hill. The amoral Joe, tiring of the game, kicks over the anthill. The ants ignore this setback and build bigger and more industrialized colonies.

A later tale tells of a research station on the surface of Jupiter. (This story, first published as ''Desertion'' in 1944, was one of the first stories about pantropy.) Simak's version of Jupiter is a cold, windswept, and corrosive hell where only advanced technology allows the station to exist at all. A scientist is accompanied by Towser, his tired and flea-bitten old dog. But there is a problem: Men permanently transformed to survive unaided on Jupiter's surface leave the station to gather data and inexplicably fail to return. Finally, the scientist transforms himself and his canine companion into the seal-like beings that can survive the surface. They leave the station in their new form and experience Jupiter as a paradise. Towser's fleas and irritations are gone and he is able to talk telepathically to his former master. Like the previously transformed station personnel, the scientist decides never to return.

He eventually does return, to share with all humankind what he has discovered. It seems impossible – how can he show them the wondrous Jupiter that he and Towser perceive? Joe steps in again, once more out of sheer mischief. He knows a mind trick to allow people to broadcast meaning to others' minds as they speak. By means of a kaleidoscope-like instrument, he can twist the minds of other people so they can perform the mind trick. Thus all humanity learns the truth about Jupiter, and most elect to leave Earth, give up their physical humanity and live transformed on Jupiter's surface.

Simak's vision of human apocalypse is unusual, not one of destruction, but simply of isolation. Much of humankind becomes so lonely that it eventually dies off. Some favor starting over as a completely different species capable of experiencing on Jupiter the simple bliss that humans have otherwise lost.

Ten thousand years in the future, Jenkins is provided with a new body so he can better serve the few remaining "websters". By then, the dog civilization has spread all around the Earth, including the rest of the animals whom, little by little, the dogs introduce to their civilization. All of them are significantly intelligent, and Simak appears to mean that they were so all the while even though humans were not able to notice it. This civilization is a pacifist and vegetarian one. The dogs intervene in nature and distribute food to wild animals, managing to end virtually all predation. Besides, they also look for doors between dimensions through which some beings from different worlds are able to pass. At this point, a wraithlike creature called a "cobbly" appears, having traveled from another world on the time thread. Before it is driven away, Jenkins's new telepathic sense enables him to read the creature's mind to discover how it moves from world to world. Realizing that humanity cannot peacefully coexist with the Dogs and the other animals, Jenkins uses the knowledge to take his human charges to one of the other worlds. Eventually, the human race dies out on the new world.

However, returning to the initial Earth in the final tale of the book, Jenkins finds the dogs dealing with the ever-growing Ant City, which is taking over the Earth. Jenkins travels to Geneva, where a last small group of humans sleep in suspended animation. He asks his former master, a Webster, how to deal with the ants. The answer is typically human – poisoned bait, enough to kill but not before the bait is taken back to the ant colony to kill widely there. Jenkins is saddened because he realizes the Dogs will never accept this solution. He tells the dogs that the "websters" had no answer. The Dogs leave Earth for one of the other worlds.

The original eight stories were written and published during World War II and reflect the attitude that humans are unable to live at peace with their fellow beings. There is an underlying theme throughout the book that humans possess a fundamental aggressive flaw they will never be able to overcome.

The Coda

Simak wrote the ninth and last tale in the City saga in 1973, twenty-two years after he wrote the previous episode. Jenkins is on the original Earth, living at the old Webster home, surrounded on all sides by the Ant City. He comes to realize that the Ant City is dead, just as a spaceship returns to take him to the robot worlds. Breaking through the wall of the city, he sees nothing but infinitely repeated versions of a single sculpture; a human boot kicking over an anthill.

Two romantic couples, consisting of four teenagers, decide to spend a weekend together located in a remote cabin found in the woods. An unseen force stalks and watches the group without their knowledge. Ellen and her boyfriend Bruce enter the woods to have a picnic lunch. The other couple, Scotty and Shelly, remain at the cabin playing Monopoly to pass time. During their lunch, Bruce announces to Ellen that they're camping on an Indian burial ground. Ellen is concerned, but Bruce assures her that they will be fine as long as they don't disturb the graves of the dead. Bruce then explores the area and discovers an ancient dagger belonging to the Indians. Ignoring his own advice, he takes the dagger with him.

After lunch, Ellen takes a nap. When she awakes, she finds Bruce missing and wanders into the woods looking for him. To her horror, she finds Bruce's dead body, horribly mutilated with apparent knife wounds. She is then startled by the presence of a demonic entity hiding within the woods, and quickly runs back to the cabin. While fleeing, she is attacked by unseen forces. She runs back to the cabin and screams to be let in immediately, being let in just as the entity is approaching her. Ellen tells her friends that Bruce has been murdered, but Scotty dismisses the whole thing as a joke and goes to find Bruce. Shelly and Ellen are concerned when Scotty doesn't return right away. Shelly walks outside to begin a search for the missing men, but a possessed Bruce assaults and strangles her, eventually stabbing her in the neck and killing her with the dagger that he found, moaning "join us."

Ellen encounters her possessed friend and flees into another room, grabbing knives to protect her. Something attempts to enter the room where Ellen is hiding, and she blindly lashes out with a knife - mistakenly stabbing Scotty who had just returned to the cabin. While horrified, Ellen is then attacked by the possessed Bruce. Ellen manages to trap Bruce outside, stabbing Bruce's hand several times in the process. The bleeding Scotty tells Ellen to look into the cellar for the gun they brought along. While walking down the stairs to the cellar, she trips on a broken step and injures herself. After finding the gun, she goes back up stairs and discovers that Scotty had been stabbed to death while she was downstairs. The demonic Bruce then attacks her, but she manages to cut off his hand.

Ellen attempts to flee but is severely beaten by the possessed Bruce, who throws her around the cabin. While being strangled, Ellen picks up Bruce's mutilated hand which is still holding the dagger found from before, and she uses it to stab Bruce. A large amount of blood is expended by Bruce, who lies motionless for a moment, only to then continue his assault on Ellen. Ellen mutilates Bruce's body even further with an axe, chopping off nearly every limb from the writhing body. Severely disturbed by the things she has witnessed, Ellen rocks back and forth muttering to herself. The corpse of Scotty suddenly springs up, before turning towards the oblivious Ellen, ready to attack. The screen then cuts to black, leaving the fate of Ellen ambiguous.

The telenovela tells the story of Jade and Lucas. Jade is a young woman of Arab descent, who has to live with her father's family in Morocco after the death of her mother. Lucas is a young romantic, and son of a powerful businessman. When Lucas is on vacation in Morocco, he meets Jade, and the two of them fall in love. However, cultural differences do not allow them to be together.

After the sudden death of her mother, Jade returns to live in Morocco with her family. She feels forced into Muslim culture. One night while dancing, she falls in love at first sight with a stranger.

Lucas is a man who lives among the luxuries from the success of Leonardo Ferrer, his father, owner of an exporting firm. Lucas longs to be a musician, but his family tries to persuade him to become interested in their business. Lucas's twin brother Diego, is the candidate to inherit Leonardo's empire. Diego is a cheerful and enterprising conquistador that ends in a fight without truce with his father, because of his father's girlfriend.

Uncle Ali arranges for his two nieces, Jade and Latiffa to marry Said and Mohammed. After Latiffa's wedding to Mohammed, she, her husband, and Jade go to Miami.

Unfortunately for Leonardo, Diego dies in an accident when he goes to his girlfriend's party. Lucas's family does not accept his relationship with Jade and she is unable to leave her family to be with Lucas. Eventually, she goes back to Morocco. Lucas follows her in an attempt to get her back to the United States. However, he arrives in time to see her wedding to Said.

Lucas takes the place of his brother in both the company and the hand of his girlfriend Marisa, whom he married shortly after. Meanwhile, in Miami, the scientist Augusto Albieri, upset by the death of Diego (which occurred on January 24, 1988), secretly cloned Lucas and implanting the embryo into Dora, resulting in an exact genetic clone of Diego: Daniel.

However, the mistakes of the past does not end the love story between Lucas and Jade, and end up reliving a love match. Marisa and Lucas separate, until news of a daughter brings them back together.

The story has a twist 20 years later: Lucas, replacing his brother, had a daughter with his girlfriend Marisa called Natalia, who is a proud product of both her parents and her grandfather for her academic excellence, but she feels she lacks enjoy life more because while others take to the streets to have fun, she stays in her room alone, studying and amid all her troubles, was hired by her grandfather's chauffeur, ex-fighter, Alejandro, but Marisa does not allow her daughter to marry someone of lower class. Subsequently, Natalia becomes an alcoholic starts to abuse drugs.

Daniel, the clone has also grown, with great resentment to his mother for having Albieri away from that known as "Dad," Dora and her mother wanted a simple life rather than luxuries for him, then had to move away from child's doctor, so Daniel escapes to find Albieri.

Jade has become a mother and had to keep Said to educate her daughter to the customs of their culture provides, but Said has a contract with the Ferrer business. Jade and Lucas again have that thirst to be together, but to achieve the task will be to overcome several difficult tests and all downhill when Daniel appears in the life of Jade, making people swirling around Lucas and Daniel have serious problems in their lives...

Escobar cannot regain Clara, and after several attempts, gives up, then Anita's friend Louise, seduces him, plays with him and tells him to get one that's worth.

Natalia, after having her baby had trouble breathing, improved and remained healthy. Marisa asks that hospitalize her against addictions to avoid any harm to the baby. Natalian enter rehab and as months pass, she succeeds, she continues to struggle daily with the help of Alejandro, his family and his godfather, Enrique. Now recovered, along with Fernando, opened a clinic for drug addicts and put "Paula" which was the name of their drug-addicted friend who never saw again.

Marisa comprises all agree that Lucas go with Jade leaves the house on the road. At the beach, she meets a man who made her laugh while she was sad and so began a love sincere and very strong with she was happy.

Dora makes a demand for Leonardo and all celebrate in her house, but now Daniel is gone, then Miguel, Dora's new partner, says that trust because he always comes back. Daniel while in fear of being killed Albieri (as it sought to send him to prison), it follows Albieri in the desert where he says he let Daniel do not agree and both continue to walk through the desert, this being the last scene appearing in both.

Luisa and the reporter who wanted information about the clone, look for Albieri. Luisa wants to return with him and the reporter who no one believes that the clone exists, wants to prove herself, giving evidence to the world.

Alicia, now away from everyone, becomes a maid and tries to seduce her boss.

Mohamed and Latifa live happily with his family, Samira's boyfriend decides to become a Muslim to be with her, so he is taught by Mohamed, who accepts the relationship.

Nazira escapes with Pablo and live very happy with him.

Said wants to see Jadiya happy and lets her see Jade every week, but Said has another wife who daily fight with Ranya, but is equally happy in their own way.

Karla and her mother go to the beach, where they are choosing the next one to be cheated by them. Cristina and Leonardo have twins and everything starts again in the Ferrer house. Uncle Ali married Zoraida and both live happily together, she makes doesn't allow fighting at home but peace, in the end Ali accepts Jade back.

In the early 1980s, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Jade (Giovanna Antonelli), a young Muslim girl, is orphaned when her mother dies and has to go to Morocco where her uncle Alí lives. The problem is that Jade was living in a country with a culture very different from that of an Islamic country. Thus, once she arrives in Morocco, she must learn all concomitant new traditions and customs, adjust to her new way of living, and face all the punishments she will be exposed to because of her conflicting personality and actions that go against her religion.

Back in Rio, a well-off family, the Ferraz, go to vacation in Morocco. Twin brothers Lucas and Diogo Ferraz (Murilo Benício), along with Leônidas (Reginaldo Faria), their father, and doctor Augusto Albieri (Juca de Oliveira), friend of the family and the twins Godfather who is a genetic scientist, visit Alí, a friend of Albieri's. There, Lucas and Jade meet for the first time, and they fall in love at first sight. Jade, knowing it's haraam (a sin) to love Lucas, decides to forgo her religious mandates for the sake of love, which prohibit her from marrying a non-Muslim person. Meanwhile, in Rio, Diogo tragically dies in a helicopter crash. Both Lucas and Leônidas are devastated by the news and Lucas' plans of running away with Jade are subsequently ruined. Albieri, his godparent, is shattered and becomes deeply despondent. He never recovered fully from the death of his fiancée, and Diogo's death reinvigorates his distress.

In an effort to change the natural course of events, Albieri in his despair resolves to utilize Lucas' cell in order to make the first human clone. Deusa (Adriana Lessa), a low-middle class woman who has not been able to get pregnant, is subsequently inseminated with Lucas' cell, and as a result gives birth to a baby, not knowing that it is a clone. Léo is born without complications, but Albieri wants to stay close to Léo and watch him grow up. Léo gradually becomes attached to Albieri, thus making Deusa uneasy.

Several years have passed since Léo was born. Now, Jade is married to Saíd (Dalton Vigh) and she's a mother of a little child, Khadija (Carla Diaz). She lives happily with her new family and is even starting to love Saíd. However, due to Said's insecurities a new encounter with Lucas is forced upon her to test Jade's love for him, with this encounter the old passion revives, but they're not the young lovers they once were and now they have new lives and new responsibilities. Lucas, who also is married, to Maysa (Daniela Escobar) and with a daughter, Mel (Débora Falabella) doesn't know he had been cloned 20 years before. Albieri had kept this a secret from everybody's knowledge and is trying to make it so that Léo and Lucas never meet and thus find out the truth. The last thing Albieri knew from Léo is that he and Deusa went to the north of Brazil, but with the return of both, Léo has become a young, handsome man, and the living image of the young Lucas whom Jade met in Morocco. The appearance of Leo in Brazil and his later travels to Morocco will change the life of all the characters forever.

Rudolf Ising is thinking of ideas for a new character, until he draws a blackfaced person with an ink pen, who comes to life. Ising then talks to the character, and then asks his name. The new character introduces himself as Bosko. Ising tells Bosko to show what he can do. Bosko starts to tap dance, whistle, and sing. After dancing, Bosko looks directly to the screen. Bosko asks, "Who's all them folks out there in the dark?" Ising tells Bosko that they are the audience, and asks him if he can make them laugh; Bosko agrees to try. Bosko asks Ising if he can draw a piano; Ising does so. Bosko starts to press some piano keys. When one of the keys near the upper end of the keyboard produces a low note, Bosko removes the key and puts it in its proper place near the left end of the keyboard. Bosko hits more random notes, then plays a glissando. Bosko laughs, and then sings "Sonny Boy", accidentally sliding his tongue out. Bosko opens his hat and pulls his hair, letting his tongue out of his mouth again. He plays another song, singing, which causes his head to pop out like a slinky. After that, Bosko sings again. Ising says this is enough. He sucks Bosko, who also pulls the piano, back into his fountain pen, and then him back into the ink bottle. Bosko then pops out of the ink bottle and promises to return.

Maddie Wirtz is a high school senior living in the suburbs of Portland, Oregon. Her plans to coast through her last school year before college are waylaid when she meets another teenage girl, "Legs," a drifter who takes shelter from the rain inside Maddie's school. The same day she meets them, Legs convinces Maddie and fellow students Rita Faldes and Violet Kahn to confront Mr. Buttinger, a teacher who has been sexually harassing Rita and Violet. Maddie, Rita, and Violet flee after the confrontation turns violent, witnessed by student Goldie Goldman, who flees with them. Later, Legs finds Maddie at her house from the address in a notebook Maddie dropped in Mr. Buttinger's classroom. Legs spends the night at Maddie's house and bonds with her further in the morning before school.

At school, Maddie, Rita, Violet, and Goldie are suspended for the confrontation of Mr. Buttinger, despite their explanation of what happened. After getting kicked out of school, the girls go to an abandoned house where Maddie suggested Legs stay, finding Legs there. All five girls quickly form a close bond, with the abandoned house as their "headquarters" and engaging in further acts of rebellion, such as breaking into the school to retrieve part of Maddie's art school application (which the principal refused to let her get before she got kicked out) and Legs tattooing a flame on all of them. Legs and Maddie also learn Goldie's father physically abuses her. Everything culminates when the girls crash a car stolen from a group of boys who were about to rape Maddie in "revenge" for what happened to Mr. Buttinger.

Though not seriously injured, the girls go on trial for stealing the car, with the boys and one of their girlfriends, Cindy, lying about the events leading up to it. Legs is sent to a juvenile prison and the group flounders without her, with Goldie starting to use heroin. Eventually, Cindy, feeling guilty, tells the judge the truth, leading to Legs' release.

The girls' reunion is tempered by Legs learning of Goldie's addiction; Maddie has taken her to the abandoned house to detox. In an effort to help her, Legs leads Maddie, Rita, and Violet to Goldie's house to demand $10,000 from her parents to send Goldie to rehab. The situation escalates when Goldie's father refuses and Legs, holding him at gunpoint, forces the others to take him to the abandoned house. He is tied to a chair while the girls try to think of what to do next, and the tension rises as Legs begins taking her own paternal frustrations out on him. In the midst of the chaos, Rita accidentally shoots Goldie's father in the shoulder.

Panic ensues and the girls resolve to get Goldie's father to the hospital. When Goldie, Rita, and Violet leave with Goldie's father, Maddie realizes Legs is missing. She finds Legs walking along the bridge, looking for a ride to another town. Both girls make proposals, Maddie for Legs to stay with her and the others and Legs for Maddie to join her on the road. Sad but resolute, the two eventually go their separate ways. Legs gets a truck to stop and boards as Maddie watches it disappear.

In a voice-over, it is revealed that Maddie reunited with her boyfriend, finished high school, and went on to attend art school in New York City. She travels the world, always stopping at airports and bus stops along the way. Although none of the group ever see Legs again, they still get together once in a while and strengthen their bond over the past.

Shrek and Princess Fiona are to succeed the dying King Harold, but Shrek's attempts to serve as the Regent during the King's medical leave end in disaster. He insists that an ogre as king is not ideal and that there must be someone else. Before he dies, Harold tells Shrek of another heir: his nephew and Fiona's cousin, Arthur "Artie" Pendragon. Meanwhile, Prince Charming vows to become King of Far Far Away and avenge the death of his mother, the Fairy Godmother. Charming goes to the Poison Apple tavern and persuades fairy tale villains to fight for their "happily ever after".

Shrek, Donkey, and Puss in Boots set out to retrieve Artie. As they sail away, Fiona reveals to Shrek that she is pregnant, much to Shrek's horror as he does not believe himself capable of raising children. The trio journey to Worcestershire Academy, an elite magical boarding school, where they discover Artie is a scrawny, 16-year-old underachiever. At the school pep rally, Shrek tells Artie he has been chosen to be king of Far Far Away. Artie is excited until Donkey and Puss inadvertently frighten him by discussing the king's responsibilities. Losing confidence, Artie tries to take control of the ship and steer it back to Worcestershire; following a scuffle with Shrek, the ship crashes on a remote island where they encounter Artie's retired wizard teacher, Merlin.

Charming and other villains attack the castle, but Wolfie, Pinocchio, Gingy, and others stall them long enough for the castle's occupants, including Fiona, her mother Queen Lillian, and several princesses to escape. The Third Little Pig accidentally reveals that Shrek has gone to retrieve Arthur. Prince Charming sends Captain Hook and his pirates to track them down. The ladies are locked in a tower after Rapunzel betrays them, having fallen in love with Charming.

Captain Hook and his pirates catch up to Shrek on Merlin's island. Shrek avoids capture, and Hook reveals Charming's takeover of Far Far Away. Shrek urges Artie to return to Worcestershire. Instead, Artie cons Merlin into using his magic to send them to Far Far Away. The spell causes Puss and Donkey to accidentally switch bodies. They find Pinocchio and learn that Charming plans to kill Shrek as part of a play. After breaking into the castle, they are caught and taken captive.

Charming prepares to kill Artie to retain the crown. To save Artie's life, Shrek lies, claiming that he was just using Artie to replace him as the next king. Charming believes Shrek and allows a disheartened Artie to leave. Donkey and Puss are imprisoned with Fiona and the ladies, where Fiona grows frustrated with their lack of initiative. Queen Lillian smashes an opening in the stone wall of the prison with a headbutt. While the princesses launch a rescue mission for Shrek, Donkey and Puss free Gingy, Pinocchio, and others along with Dragon and Donkey's children. Puss and Donkey mollify Artie by explaining that Shrek lied to save Artie's life.

Charming stages a musical in front of the kingdom. Just as Charming is about to kill Shrek, Fiona, Puss, and Donkey, the princesses and other fairy tale characters confront the villains, but quickly lose in a showdown. Artie shows up and gives a speech to the villains, convincing them that they can be accepted into society instead of being outcasts. The villains agree to give up their evil ways, while Charming refuses to listen and lunges at Artie with his sword. Shrek blocks the blow and it appears that he has been stabbed. Charming decrees himself the new king, but Shrek reveals that the sword missed and pushes Charming aside, while Dragon knocks the tower down onto Charming.

Artie is crowned the new king. While the kingdom celebrates, Merlin reverts Puss and Donkey's body swap. Shrek and Fiona return home to their swamp, where they become the parents of ogre triplets, coping with parenthood with the help of Puss, Lillian, Donkey and Dragon.

During a patrol through the cemetery, Xander shows Buffy a silver necklace he intends to give to Cordelia the following night for Valentine's Day. The next day at school, Xander witnesses Amy Madison use magic to avoid a homework assignment. Soon after, Giles runs into Jenny Calendar; however, their relationship remains frosty, with Giles deciding talking to Buffy is more important than making amends with Jenny. Giles warns Buffy that Angelus becomes particularly vicious around Valentine's Day, and suggests she stays indoors for the following nights. Meanwhile, Cordelia is insulted by Harmony and the Cordettes, revealing to Cordelia that her relationship with Xander is not as secret as she once thought.

Xander gives the necklace to Cordelia, but she breaks up with him under pressure from her friends. Xander is heartbroken, and blackmails Amy into casting a love spell upon Cordelia so he can take revenge by breaking up with her. However, as he intended to use the spell for revenge rather than its true purpose, the magic goes wrong, with Cordelia becoming the only female not to be affected by the spell (protected by her necklace).

The following day, Xander is shocked to find Cordelia repels his advances, and retreats to the library. Buffy makes it clear that she is attracted to Xander, but Amy interrupts them and tells Xander she believes the spell went wrong. She begins to act similarly to Buffy, so Xander rushes home and finds Willow in his bed, where she attempts to seduce him.

The following day, all of the girls of Sunnydale High obsessively start following Xander around the corridors and Harmony criticises a shocked Cordelia for breaking up with Xander. Xander seeks help from Giles, who is appalled by Xander's foolishness. Giles goes looking for Amy, so that she can reverse the spell, while Xander barricades himself in the library. However, Buffy gets in and attempts to seduce a reluctant Xander. Amy also arrives, and becomes jealous of Buffy, ultimately casting a spell that changes Buffy into a rat. An angry Giles orders Xander to go home, while he attempts to make Amy reverse the spells. Oz looks for the Buffy-rat to ensure that she is not hurt.

As Xander is leaving the school, he finds the spell is becoming stronger and more uncontrollable. He saves Cordelia from an attack by Harmony and a group of girls. Xander and Cordelia seek shelter in Buffy's home, locking Joyce out when she too falls under the spell. While in Buffy's room, Xander is pulled out of the window by Angelus, who intends to kill him to upset Buffy. Xander is saved by an infatuated Drusilla. Just as Drusilla is about to turn Xander into a vampire, a group of girls from the school arrive to save him, then Cordelia saves him from the girls. Xander barricades himself in the basement with Cordelia, who is touched to learn that Xander performed the spell for her. The love-crazed mob breaks through the door and attacks Xander and Cordelia just as Giles and Amy manage to lift the spell. Buffy regains human form and the mob disperse, uncertain of why they were there in the first place. The next day Buffy and Xander talk about events and decide it could be worse. Cordelia comes by with her friends and they make fun of Xander when Cordelia suddenly snaps, tells her friends she is way cooler than any of them because she makes up her own mind about what she wants, and she will date who she wants to. She then catches up with Xander and they walk away together holding hands.

Buffy has a vivid dream where a very undead Drusilla dusts Angel, which she fears is prophetic and realizes that Spike and Drusilla may still be alive. Oz finally asks Willow out on a date. She accepts, but remembers the Scoobies are planning a surprise party for Buffy's 17th birthday and instead invites him to the party. Elsewhere, Drusilla, strong as Buffy dreamed, arranges her own gala event, while Spike, using a wheelchair but quite undead as well, directs his gang to collect scattered pieces of the demon Judge to reassemble for her present.

Jenny Calendar gets a visit from her mysterious uncle Enyos who reveals her Gypsy past, and they discuss her responsibilities in ensuring Angel's continued suffering. Enyos orders Jenny to separate Angel from the Slayer. On their way to Buffy's surprise party, she and Jenny intercept a piece of the Judge and bring it to the party, deducing Drusilla's plot. Following her Gypsy orders, Jenny encourages Angel on his mission to prevent the dire consequences of reassembly – he must take the Judge's arm by cargo ship to "the remotest region possible". While Angel gives Buffy a Claddagh ring for her birthday during their tearful parting at the dock, Spike's vamps manage to steal the arm back, scrubbing the mission.

Later at the library, Buffy has another informative dream, and takes Angel to investigate Spike and Drusilla's lair at the factory. They discover the Judge is fully assembled and activated, and Spike and Drusilla capture and taunt the two, debating who will die first. They narrowly escape into the sewer system, then return to Angel's apartment exhausted and drenched from the rain. Still suffering from successive threats of losing one another, Angel and Buffy confess feelings each has been trying to suppress. They make love for the first time and fall asleep in each other's arms. Suddenly, in a flash of lightning and a crash of thunder, Angel bolts awake and runs out into the storm, calling Buffy's name in anguish.

After making love with Buffy, Angel is racked with pain as his soul is ripped from him. In the street, he kills a passer-by when she offers to help him. He goes to the factory to join Spike and Drusilla, but the Judge attacks him. It is unable to burn him because Angel has fully reverted to the evil Angelus. Spike, Drusilla, and Angelus are clearly pleased to be reunited. Angelus vows to destroy Buffy for how she made him feel when he was Angel.

While researching a way to defeat the Judge, a demon with the power to destroy the world whom "no weapon forged" can harm, Xander and Cordelia are caught kissing in the library by a jealous Willow. Buffy finds Angel in his apartment, not knowing that he is now Angelus, and he blows her off, laughing at her as she weeps. Jenny is castigated by her uncle Enyos, who tells her that if Angel has one moment of true happiness, the curse placed on him will be broken and his new soul taken from him. Angelus terrorizes Willow and the Gang at school, emotionally tormenting Buffy. Later, as they discuss Angel's transformation in the library, Buffy realises that having sex with Angel is what caused him to turn evil.

Buffy has a dream in which Angel indicates that Jenny knows more than she is letting on. The next morning Buffy confronts Jenny who tells her that Angelus was cursed with a soul in vengeance for what he did to her people, and that Enyos had tasked her with keeping Buffy and Angel apart. When Buffy, Jenny, and Giles arrive at Enyos' home, they find that Angelus has brutally killed him, leaving Buffy a message written in blood on the wall. Buffy begins to accept that she has to kill Angelus.

Xander, using memories from being a soldier on Halloween, hatches a plan to kill the Judge. He and Cordelia break into an army base and steal a shoulder-launched rocket. Oz declines Willow's offer to make out, as he suspects that she only wants to make Xander jealous.

Tracking down the Judge, who is slaughtering people at a crowded mall, Buffy blows him to bits with the anti-tank weapon. Buffy stalks Angelus through the fleeing crowd and, when he ambushes her, they battle ferociously. Reaching a stand-off, Buffy is still unwilling to kill Angelus and settles for kicking him in the crotch.

Buffy blames herself for everything that has happened, but Giles reassures her that although she acted rashly, she and Angel loved each other and that Giles still supports and respects her. Later, Joyce lights the candle on Buffy's birthday cake and tells her to make a wish, but Buffy decides to let it burn, while they watch the classic movie ''Stowaway''.

One year has passed since Zero defeated Copy X. He has since separated from Ciel and the Resistance, now wandering the desert and defeating countless Pantheons. The three surviving members of the Four Guardians have assumed command of Neo Arcadia, with Harpuia as the leader. Copy X's death was covered up, as the humans revered him as their savior. The Resistance is now being led by a Reploid named Elpizo, while Ciel continues her work on a new form of energy that will hopefully eliminate the need for war.

Zero wearily makes his way through a sandstorm wrapped in a tattered cloak. As the sands die down he is once more being chased by enemies. Despite being in disrepair, with cracked armor and broken weapons, he charges into the fray. After the battle, Zero collapses from exhaustion and is found by Harpuia. Wishing to see Zero die in battle rather than perish from exhaustion, Harpuia rescues Zero and covertly delivers him to a location near the Resistance base, where he is found and repaired. He learns that Elpizo is planning a frontal assault on Neo Arcadia, as he doesn't believe in Ciel's plan of creating energy as means to resolve the war. Unable to convince him to call it off, Zero is left to do busy-work in the meantime.

Elpizo's assault fails miserably, himself being the only survivor. Driven mad, he declares his desire to harness the power of the legendary Dark Elf to destroy Neo Arcadia (and wipe out the humans), which had brought about the Elf Wars a century ago that left the Earth in a disastrous state(first the planet, then the population, since the first were the reploids of the dead 90%, and the second were the people of the dead 60%). Using the powers granted by partially unsealing the Dark Elf, he invades Neo Arcadia and breaks into the temple where the body of the real X is kept. It is revealed that X ended the Elf Wars by sealing the Dark Elf away with his body, thus leading to his disappearance. Despite the Guardians' and Zero's best efforts, Elpizo destroys X's body, which unseals the Dark Elf, and Elpizo absorbs its powers.

After a fierce battle, Zero puts an end to Elpizo's plans, who reverts to his normal self and apologizes as he dies. Surprisingly, the Dark Elf turns him into a Cyber-elf, convincing Elpizo that she is not truly evil. As the Dark Elf departs, X appears and tells Zero about the Dark Elf: she was originally known as the Mother Elf and was the savior who ended the Maverick Wars, but was later cursed by a man named Dr. Weil. Zero admits to feeling like he knows her.

In a post credits scene, an unknown man notes the Dark Elf has been released, and tells an entity known as "Omega" that it is time to take action.

While the Allied Nations were still recovering from the war in Cosmo Land, the Black Hole Army had already recovered and has decided to launch a large-scale invasion on Macro Land. Along with the original Black Hole army's commanding officers (COs), four new COs were recruited, under the command of Sturm. Sturm orders each Black Hole CO to invade and capture each of the four continents controlled by the four other armies from the original game: Orange Star was to be taken by Flak, Blue Moon by Lash, Yellow Comet by Adder, and Green Earth by Hawke. Lash also invented several new war weapons like the Black Cannon and the Mini Cannons that were to be put to use in this invasion. The four allied armies must now work together to drive Black Hole out of their world once and for all.

Once the Black Hole troops are driven from the Allied Nations' continents, their COs convene in Black Hole territory, near Black Hole's base of operations. Here they fight Sturm, the mastermind behind the invasion. The final battle takes place in front of the Death Ray, a powerful new weapon guarding the entrance to a missile, which, if not subdued in time, would destroy half of Wars World.

The Death Ray is eventually destroyed by the COs of the Allied Nations, who manage to disarm the missile and corner Sturm. In an act of desperation, Sturm attempts to blow up the base and inflict damage on Wars World by self-destructing the missile. Andy attempts to stop Sturm to no avail. However, in a surprising turn of events, Hawke, second in command to Sturm, betrays his leader by killing him with Black Storm before the self-destruct is triggered. Hawke takes over as leader of Black Hole, and along with Flak, Lash, and Adder, leaves Macro Land with the few troops he has left.

Broadcast in the year 2008, the film is presented in a TV documentary style format, combining talking head interviews, news coverage clips and video surveillance footage surrounding the assassination of U.S. President George W. Bush in Chicago around a year earlier on 19 October 2007. The president is fatally shot by a sniper after he addresses an economic forum at the Chicago Sheraton Hotel, before which an anti-war rally had taken place. News outlets immediately begin reporting on the incident along with its political ramifications. After authorities earlier arrest and interrogate war-protesting detainees, Jamal Abu Zikri (Malik Bader), an IT professional of Syrian origin, becomes the prime suspect.

Vice President Dick Cheney, now president, uses the possible al-Qaeda relationship in connection with the suspected assassin, Zikri, to push his own domestic political security agenda. He calls for the legislation of PATRIOT Act III, trying to increase the investigative powers of the FBI, the police, and other government agencies over American citizens and foreign residents as he contemplates attacking Syria.

As his wife Zahra (Hend Ayoub) listens to the verdict with family attorney Dawn Norton (Patricia Buckley) in a packed courtroom, Zikri is convicted of killing the U.S. President and sentenced to death based upon dubious forensic evidence. Meanwhile, a new report which surfaces, substantiated by interviews with Marianne Claybon (Chavez Ravine), indicates that the perpetrator is most likely her husband Al Claybon (Tony Dale), a veteran of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, who lived in Rock Island, Illinois, and who also was the father of David Claybon, a U.S. soldier recently killed in the Iraq War. The assassin, who blames President Bush for the death of his son, killed himself after Bush's assassination. Claybon's suicide note, addressed to a second son, Casey Claybon (Neko Parham), an Iraq War veteran living in Chicago who was previously considered as a suspect, reads:

Ten months after President Bush's assassination, Zikri remains on death row at the Stateville Correctional Center, because government officials are deliberately delaying his legal appeal. Moreover, in his dead father's Rock Island house, Casey Claybon finds evidence of his father's planning of the shooting. The most incriminating piece of evidence is a copy of a top secret presidential itinerary outlining, to the minute, President Bush's Chicago whereabouts on 19 October 2007. The news report ends while the U.S. Government continues investigating how presidential assassin Al Claybon obtained that top secret document.

The final closing titles of the film inform the viewer that President Cheney's USA PATRIOT Act III was signed into permanent law in the U.S., stating the following: ''"It has granted investigators unprecedented powers of detention and surveillance, and further expanded the powers of the executive branch"''.

Atouk (Ringo Starr) is a bullied and scrawny caveman living in "One Zillion BC – October 9th". He lusts after the beautiful but shallow Lana (Barbara Bach), who is the mate of Tonda (John Matuszak), their tribe's physically imposing bullying leader and brutish instigator. After being banished along with his friend Lar (Dennis Quaid), Atouk falls in with a band of assorted misfits, among them the comely Tala (Shelley Long) and the elderly blind man Gog (Jack Gilford). The group has ongoing encounters with hungry dinosaurs, and rescues Lar from a "nearby ice age", where they encounter an abominable snowman. In the course of these adventures they discover sedative drugs, fire, invent cooking, music, weapons, and learn how to walk fully upright. Atouk uses these advancements to lead an attack on Tonda, overthrowing him and becoming the tribe's new leader. He rejects Lana and takes Tala as his mate, and they live happily ever after.

The first act opens with a dinner party hosted by Håkon Werle, a wealthy merchant and industrialist. The gathering is attended by his son, Gregers Werle, who has just returned to his father's home following a self-imposed exile. There, he learns the fate of a former classmate, Hjalmar Ekdal. Hjalmar married Gina, a young servant in the Werle household. The older Werle had arranged the match by providing Hjalmar with a home and profession as a photographer. Gregers, whose mother died believing that Gina and Håkon had carried on an affair, becomes enraged at the thought that his old friend is living a life built on a lie.

The remaining four acts take place in Hjalmar Ekdal's apartments. The Ekdals initially appear to be living a life of cozy domesticity. Hjalmar's father makes a living doing odd copying jobs for Werle. Hjalmar runs a portrait studio out of the apartment. Gina helps him run the business in addition to keeping house. They both dote on their daughter Hedvig. Gregers travels directly to their home from the party. While getting acquainted with the family, Hjalmar confesses that Hedvig is both his greatest joy and greatest sorrow, because she is slowly losing her eyesight. The family eagerly reveals a loft in the apartment where they keep various animals like rabbits and pigeons. Most prized is the wild duck they rescued. The duck was wounded by none other than Werle, whose eyesight is also failing. His shot winged the duck, which dived to the bottom of the lake to drown itself by clinging to the seaweed. Werle's dog retrieved it though, and despite its wounds from the shot and the dog's teeth, the Ekdals had nursed the duck back to good health.

Gregers decides to rent the spare room in the apartment. The next day, he begins to realize that there are more lies hanging over the Ekdals than Gina's affair with his father. While talking to Hedvig, she explains that Hjalmar keeps her from school because of her eyesight, but he has no time to tutor her, leaving the girl to escape into imaginary worlds through pictures she sees in books. During their conversation, Gregers hears shots in the attic, and the family explains that Old Ekdal entertains himself by hunting rabbits and birds in the loft, and Hjalmar often joins in the hunts. The activity helps Old Ekdal cling to his former life as a great hunter. Hjalmar also speaks of his 'great invention', which he never specifies. It is related to photography, and he is certain that it will enable him to pay off his debts to Werle and finally make himself and his family completely independent. In order to work on his invention, he often needs to lie down on the couch and think about it.

During a lunch with Gregers and Hjalmar's friends Relling and Molvik, Håkon arrives to try to convince Gregers to return home. Gregers insists that he cannot return and that he will tell Hjalmar the truth. Håkon is certain that Hjalmar will not be grateful for Gregers' intervention. After he leaves, Gregers asks Hjalmar to accompany him on a walk, where he reveals the truth about Gina's affair with his father.

Upon returning home, Hjalmar is aloof from his wife and daughter. He demands to handle all future photography business by himself with no help from Gina. He also demands to manage the family's finances, which Gina has traditionally done. Gina begs him to reconsider, suggesting that with all his time consumed he will not be able to work on his invention. Hedvig adds that he also will not have time to spend in the loft with the wild duck. Embittered by Gregers' news, Hjalmar bristles at the suggestion and confesses that he would like to wring the duck's neck. Indulging his mood, Hjalmar confronts Gina about her affair with Håkon. She confesses to it, but insists that she loves Hjalmar intensely.

In the midst of the argument, Gregers returns, stunned to find that the couple are not overjoyed to be living without such a lie hanging over their heads. Mrs. Sørby arrives with a letter for Hedvig and news that she is marrying Håkon. The letter announces that Håkon is paying Old Ekdal a pension of 100 crowns per month until his death. Upon his death, the allowance will be transferred to Hedvig for the remainder of her life. The news sickens Hjalmar even further, and it dawns on him that Hedvig may very well be Håkon's child. He cannot stand the sight of Hedvig any longer and leaves the house to drink with Molvik and Relling. Gregers tries to calm the distraught Hedvig by suggesting that she sacrifice the wild duck for her father's happiness. Hedvig is desperate to win her father's love back and agrees to have her grandfather shoot the duck in the morning.

The next day, Relling arrives to tell the family that Hjalmar has stayed with him. He is appalled at what Gregers has done, and he reveals that he long ago implanted the idea of the invention with Hjalmar as a "life-lie" to keep him from giving in to despair. The pair argue as Hjalmar returns to gather his materials to work on the invention. He is overwhelmed by the number of details involved in moving out of the apartment. Hedvig is overjoyed to see him, but Hjalmar demands to be 'free from intruders' while he thinks about his next move. Crushed, Hedvig remembers the wild duck and goes to the loft with a pistol. After hearing a shot, the family assumes Old Ekdal is hunting in the loft, but Gregers knows he has shot the wild duck for Hedvig. He explains the sacrifice to Hjalmar who is deeply touched. When Old Ekdal emerges from his room, the family realizes he could not have fired the gun in the loft. They rush in to see Hedvig lying on the ground. No one can find a wound, and Relling has to examine the girl. He finds that the shot has penetrated her breastbone and she died immediately. Given the powder burns on her shirt, he determines that she shot herself. Hjalmar begs for her to live again so that she can see how much he loves her. The play ends with Relling and Gregers arguing again. Gregers insists that Hedvig did not die in vain, because her suicide unleashed a greatness within Hjalmar. Relling sneers at the notion, and insists that Hjalmar will be a drunk within a year.

Brian Stimpson, headmaster of Thomas Tompion Comprehensive School, has been elected to chair the annual Headmasters' Conference meeting in Norwich. Openly careless as a young man, Stimpson is now compulsively organised and punctual and his school runs "like clockwork". Stimpson is the first headmaster of a comprehensive school to chair the Headmasters' Conference, that honour usually being reserved for heads of the more prestigious public schools.

Despite constant rehearsal of his speech and preparations for the journey to the conference, Stimpson's ordered world unwinds as a series of unfortunate circumstances delay him en route. He mistakenly boards the wrong train, missing his connection for Norwich, owing to a lingering habit of saying "right" as emphasis in situations where it would be mistaken for a direction; then, in his desperation to board the departing correct train, he leaves the text of his speech behind on the wrong one, and is finally left at the railway station by his wife, who thinks he departed on the train.

Determined to get to Norwich on time, Stimpson searches for his wife at home and then at the hospital where she volunteers looking after dementia patients, but narrowly misses her. Attempting to hail a taxi, Stimpson stumbles across Laura Wisely, one of his sixth form students who is driving and playing truant during a study break; he commandeers her and her car in a bid to drive to Norwich.

Stimpson's wife sees the two at a petrol station, assuming that her husband is carrying on with the student and taking her down to attend the conference. Mrs. Stimpson, who is still looking after three senile old women, drives after Stimpson and both parties forget to pay for their petrol. The police are called and, responding to a call from Laura's parents reporting the car as stolen and their daughter as missing, attempt to find Stimpson and arrest him for kidnapping. Stimpson's wife, Laura's parents, the police and Mr. Jolly, a music teacher at Thomas Tompion who has secretly been dating Laura, all pursue Stimpson and Laura to the conference.

Taking a break, Stimpson and Laura try to call the conference from a telephone box. A local mistakes them for vandals after Stimpson vents his frustrations at the malfunctioning phones, and calls the police. The local sends her daughter Pat to Stimpson, but she turns out to be a childhood friend and former girlfriend of Stimpson. Stimpson coerces her into driving them to the conference.

After a series of wrong turns, the group desperately turn into a farmer's field in order to escape cows and a lorry, and shortly after get stuck in deep mud. Brian leaves the stuck car to seek help, and ends up at a monastery where he is persuaded to take a bath and collect himself. While he's gone, a local farmer tugs the car out of the mud; Pat finally drives away in the car but is soon arrested for assaulting a police officer. All the while, Stimpson's wife and the others arrive at the conference uninvited, much to the horror of the headmasters; they attempt to sequester the growing group of concerned parents, wives, senile ladies and police officers as the conference continues.

Stranded without transport, Laura and Stimpson (who is dressed in monks' robes, leaving his muddy suit with the monks) attempt to hitchhike. They are picked up by a wealthy car salesman, whom they persuade to come for a walk in the woods. They trick the traveller into swapping clothes with Stimpson under the guise of foreplay, but Stimpson and Laura run away and steal his car.

Stimpson finally arrives at the conference in the torn suit of the car salesman and delivers an improvised recount of his lost speech, which becomes increasingly mocking and oppressive in tone to the disappointed headmasters. During his speech various characters including the old women, Mr. Jolly and Laura's parents walk into the hall, and Stimpson addresses them like he would late pupils, ordering and humiliating the entire collected group with the same authoritarian demeanour with which he runs his own school. Finally, he directs all of the headmasters to stand and sing the hymn "To Be a Pilgrim", as he walks out of the building to face the police. The headmasters watch on as Stimpson and the rest of the party are all led away by policemen, with Stimpson still giving headmasterly orders to all the officers in the car.

The film is a lightly fictionalized account of Basquiat's life. Initially a struggling artist living in a cardboard box in Tompkins Square Park, he works his way up the rungs of the New York art world in the eighties, thanks in part to his association with Andy Warhol, the art dealer Bruno Bischofberger, poet and critic René Ricard, and fellow artist Albert Milo.

Alongside the development of his artistic career, the film also follows Basquiat's tumultuous relationship with Gina, a fellow aspiring artist he meets while she is working as a waitress at a diner he frequents with his friend Benny. Their romance is affected by Basquiat's affair with the so-called "Big Pink", a woman he picks up on the street, and his habitual abuse of heroin. Eventually, Basquiat finds himself isolated by his fame, the death of Warhol, and his drug use. The film ends with a title card informing the audience that Basquiat died of a heroin overdose on August 12, 1988, at the age of 27.

Homer and Marge take the kids to get their shots. Just before Dr. Hibbert is about to inject Bart, he escapes. After a chase through town, Hibbert finally outsmarts Bart, by having Barney wear a latex mask, and finally injects him. The shot, however, causes Bart's earholes to swell shut as a side effect, making him temporarily deaf. Hibbert also tricks Homer into signing a malpractice waiver. Marge wanted Bart to stay home; however, Bart wants to play in the donkey basketball game.

While at the Springfield Elementary School donkey basketball game, Bart taunts a donkey with a carrot, unaware that the school is reciting the national anthem. After he places the carrot in his shorts, the donkey takes it and rips off Bart's shorts. While Bart is bent over to keep his privates covered with his shirt, the US flag is put up behind him and a photo is taken, which results in the crowd assuming that Bart is mooning the US flag. Shortly afterwards, the ''Springfield Shopper'' takes the story and completely turns it around, making it seem as if Bart had deliberately mooned the flag. Marge tries to tell Skinner that Bart was deaf at the time; however, because of Bart's history of similar pranks, Skinner doesn't believe it. Bart and his family soon are hated by all of Springfield.

The Simpsons are later asked to appear on a talk show and tell their side of the story. Homer advises Marge to not take it too far. However, the host asks, instead, "What part of America do you hate most?" (an example of the fallacy of many questions). Marge says that, if by Americans you mean loud mouth talkshow hosts which everyone seems to be, then yes she DOES hate the Americans. She also said that she is well liked in Springfield, prompting the host to say that Springfield hates the US. The US then turns their back on Springfield (though there is widespread celebration in praise of Springfield in the Middle East), so Mayor Quimby frantically decides to change the name of Springfield to "Liberty-ville." Everything in town is quickly patriotized; the traffic light colors are changed to red, white, and blue, and everything costs $17.76. While at church, Lisa speaks her opinion about patriotism, and the Simpsons are arrested by SWAT, in violation of the "Government Knows Best Act."

The Simpsons are taken to the "Ronald Reagan Re-education Center", a prison which houses Michael Moore, the Dixie Chicks, Elmo, Al Franken, and Bill Clinton, as well as a man who moans "My only crime was driving a van full of explosives in from Canada!". Marge feels bad that she took it too far after Homer warned her not to. With some help from the last-registered Democrat, the Simpsons escape the prison (in a parody of the escape scene from The Blues Brothers), but realize that the re-education center is actually Alcatraz Prison. While they are swimming to land (choosing to swim to Oakland instead of San Francisco because they "aren't made of money"), they are picked up by a French freighter and are brought to France. They are well adjusted, but still miss the United States, mainly because it is where all their stuff is. They then move back to the US dressed as 19th century immigrants from Europe where Homer speaks of plans of integration into the United States.

Setting and characters

While the original game focused on three areas in the Sword Coast and Western Heartlands regions of the Faerûnian continent, the second game is predominately based in and around the city of Baldur's Gate itself.

The game features five main playable characters; Dorn Redbear, Ysuran Aundril, Borador Goldhand, Vhaidra Uoswiir and Allessia Faithhammer, each of whom has come to Baldur's Gate for different reasons. Dorn seeks fame and glory. Vhaidra has come looking for vengeance against those who have attempted to destroy her family. Ysuran is suffering from amnesia and has come in the hope of finding clues to his past. Borador comes for wealth, in order to release his clan from its debt to the drow. Allessia comes to spread the word of Helm and advance to become a high-ranking priest.

Story

The game begins by revealing that after jumping through the portal at the top of the Onyx Tower, Vahn, Kromlech and Adrianna are taken prisoner by the vampire Mordoc SeLanmere.

Meanwhile, outside Baldur's Gate, Dorn, Vhaidra, Ysuran, Borador and Allessia meet on the Trade Way, and learn that since the collapse of Xantam's Guild, the route has become increasingly dangerous due to the rise of the Red Fang Marauders, a goblin army who prey on travelers. After infiltrating a nearby Marauders cave, and freeing the caravan guard Randalla, the heroes head to Wayfork Village, a nearby fiefdom. There, they rescue the village from the Marauders and kill their hobgoblin leader, Harnak.

Upon entering Baldur's Gate, Randalla hires them to investigate a series of murders in the city. At Bloodmire Manor, they learn that Luvia Bloodmire has been combining the body parts of various creatures in an attempt to make a new species, and has been giving her creations to Lady Aragozia Firewind. Her first creation, Argesh, has set up the Hands of Glory, a thieves' guild faction of the Marauders. The heroes kill Argesh, crippling the Hands of Glory, and infiltrate the main base of the Marauders. There, they defeat but do not kill the Red Queen, leader of the Marauders. They follow her to Lady Arogazia's manor, and learn that Arogazia is a member of the Zhentarim, a criminal network intent on ruling Faerûn. She has been using the Marauders in an effort to bring back the Onyx Tower. Along with her associate Kharne (a former member of Xantham's Guild, presumed killed in the first game), Arogazia escapes from the heroes, revealing herself as the polymorphed form of the red Dragon, Aizagora.

Impressed with their efforts, Jherek, a member of the Harpers, requests that the heroes find four elemental objects. Meanwhile, the Zhentarim are also trying to attain the objects to reactivate the Onyx Tower. During their journey, the heroes encounter Sleyvas, the humanoid lizard who betrayed the protagonists at the end of ''Dark Alliance''. He too is working for the Zhentarim, and the heroes kill him. After finding the four objects, each of the heroes pursues their own personal quest.

After killing the dragon Baragoth, the druid inside Dorn is awakened. Ysuran realizes his horrific past and his hate crimes against humans, determining not to worry about the past, but instead build a good name for himself in the future. Borador frees Gandam's Hold and reclaims the Goblinbreaker name for his clan, who begin working on new forges to free themselves from their debt to fey folk. Vhaidra travels to Cloud Peaks and gets her revenge on a murderous black elf who assisted in the fall of her family's house. Allessia frees the Church of Helm in Baldur's Gate from Goreth Vileback, a cleric of Cyric.

After the five return to town, Jherek enlists them for a journey to each of the Elemental Planes to activate the Elemental Foundations using the four objects they recovered. In each plane, they are attacked by the Zhentarim, who are in control of the Foundations. Luvia Bloodmire and Aizagora attack them, but are defeated. Upon returning from the final plane and speaking to Jherek, they are approached by Kharne. He tells them the Zhentarim no longer wish to reactivate the Onyx Tower, and that the Harpers and the Zhentarim have a common enemy; Mordoc SeLanmere. Mordoc believes he can use the Tower to bring about the downfall of Baldur's Gate, which will please his "allies in the east." His steward, Xanhast, interrogates Vahn, Adrianna and Kromlech, finding they know little of the larger scheme playing out. Kharne, Jherek and the five adventurers storm Mordoc's Keep of Pale Night. They rescue the trio of adventurers, forcing Mordoc to speed up his plans, and relocate the Onyx Tower into Baldur's Gate ahead of schedule.

Now called Mordoc's Gate, the entire population of the city are turned into zombies. The five adventurers attack the Tower, kill Xanhast, and attack Mordoc in the Elemental Plane of Shadows. After killing him, they destroy the Onyx Heart, supposedly destroying the Tower forever. This releases the citizens from their zombification, and led by Randalla, they thank the heroes for saving the city. Meanwhile, in a room with an Ancient Egyptian ''milieu'', a servant tells a stone sarcophagus that Mordoc has failed and Baldur's Gate still stands. The sarcophagus says that Mordoc's failure will not interrupt "my sacred mission", and orders his servant to prepare the army and ready his sun barge.

Setting

''Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast'' takes place around the same time of the original game, and within the same region of Faerûn. The expansion adds a number of new locations, including the small town Ulgoth's Beard, a mysterious island in the Trackless Sea, the Isle of Ice, and the ruins of Durlag's Tower. While it provides additional side quests, these do not impact the original game's main story, especially if it is ongoing.

Story

Travelling to Ulgoth's Beard, a small town with great adventuring possibilities, a party of adventurers consisting of Gorion's Ward and their companions, meet with a mysterious mage called Shandalar who asks them to recover a cloak of his from the Isle of Ice, before forcefully teleporting them to the island. The Ward's party soon find themselves fighting against those who were trapped on the island's dungeon, eventually recovering the cloak and managing to return with it.

Heading to the town's docks, the party encounters Mendas, a strange man who seeks help for an expedition to track down the ship used by Balduran. After returning with a sea chart that had been found by a local guild in Baldur's Gate, the party travel across the Trackless Sea, only for a storm to shipwreck them on an island. Discovering a village of people living there, the Ward's party learn from the village's chief that they suffer from werewolf attacks, to which the party agree to help deal with them, learning that the creatures reside in the wreck of Balduran's ship. Venturing towards it, the group encounter an elven mage residing in a cave, who reveals the truth behind the incident aboard Baldruan's ship, and that the villagers are not what they seem to be. Defeating what turns out to be wolfweres, the party returns to the village to find that all the villagers were actually werewolves, forcing them to fight through them, including a Loup Garou, in order to escape the island. Returning to Ulgoth's Beard, the group soon learns that Mendas is a werewolf and had sent them out to help him bring back the village chief, his mate, along with the villagers, in order for them to roam free across the Sword Coast. Upon learning of what the Ward did, Mendas transforms into a Loup Garou and attacks the party, but is ultimately defeated.

In the town's inn, the party encounter a dwarf by the name of Hurgan Stoneblade, who asks them to help him recover an item from the dungeons beneath Durlag's Tower called the Soultaker Dagger. Agreeing to help, the party travel to the ruined tower for a guided tour, just as a powerful Demon Knight claims control over the ruins and its dungeon, forcing the party to fight past several creatures while overcoming the traps and puzzles set up by Durlag, eventually defeating the Demon Knight and recovering the Soultaker. Upon returning to Ulgath's Beard, the group are accosted by a member of a cult, who steals the Soultaker from them. Forced to take it back, the party venture into the cult's hideout, but arrive too late to stop them from summoning demon from the Abyss called Aec' Letec. Bravely fighting it, the party defeat the cult and kill the demon, preventing it from escaping into the rest of the Sword Coast, while ending their final adventure in the town.

After seeing his wife (Janet Warren) off on her trip, Kerry West (Hans Conried), a philosophy teacher at a small-town college goes inside his home to contemplate his new purchase: a television set. Sitting down in his office, he places a cigarette in his mouth and is about to light it when a solid beam of light shoots from the television screen, lighting it for him. Absentmindedly unaware of what has taken place, it is only when the television subsequently lights his pipe that West realizes that his television is behaving abnormally.

West soon discovers that the television can walk and perform a variety of functions, including dishwashing, vacuuming, and card-playing. When the television deliveryman (Edwin Max) returns to settle the bill, the television materializes copies of a five-dollar bill in order to provide payment. Yet the television soon exhibits other, more controlling traits, permitting West only a single cup of coffee and breaking West’s classical music records in favor of military marches to which it dances. After West demonstrates the television to his friend Coach Trout (Billy Lynn), the coach declares the television set to be a “twonky”, the word he used as a child to label the inexplicable.

Trout concludes that the Twonky is actually a robot committed to serving West. When he tests this hypothesis by attempting to kick West, the Twonky paralyzes his leg. After tending to the coach, West attempts to write a lecture on the role of individualism in art, but the Twonky hits him with beams that alter his thoughts and censors his reading. When West attempts to give his lecture the next day, he finds himself unable to do more than ramble on about trivialities. Frustrated, West goes to the store from which his wife had ordered the television and demands that they take it back or exchange it.

Meanwhile, at West’s house, the coach summons members of the college's football team and orders them to destroy the Twonky. West arrives with the television deliveryman and his replacement set, only to find the players passed out in front of the machine. Upon being awakened by West, they appear to be in a hypnotic state mumbling that they have “no complaints,” a condition the Twonky soon inflicts on the deliveryman as well. Upstairs, Trout theorizes that the Twonky is from a future “super state” that uses such machines to control the population, which the Twonky soon demonstrates by walking into the room and altering his mind so that he no longer believes there to be a problem. As the now-fixed Trout attempts to leave, police storm into the house in response to a call made by the device seeking female companionship for West, followed by Treasury men tracking down the bogus $5 bills manufactured by the set. When the law enforcement officers attempt to arrest West, though, the Twonky places all of them in a trance, and they leave without complaint.

Frustrated, West escapes the house and returns drunk, only to have the Twonky return him to sobriety with a light beam. After his wife returns to see a visiting bill collector driven from their home by the machine, West decides to take action. Luring the device into his car, he attempts to crash it by a variety of means but is frustrated by the Twonky’s ability to control the vehicle. Spotting a vehicle parked alongside the road, West pulls over and abandons his car, hitching a ride from the other driver, an elderly Englishwoman. His relief at having escaped is soon negated by the woman’s erratic driving, and by the discovery that the Twonky was able to hide in the trunk. When the Twonky attempts to stop the woman’s reckless driving, it precipitates a crash that destroys itself.

Setting

The Forgotten Realms, the high fantasy campaign setting in which ''Baldur's Gate II'' is set, is a fictional world similar to a medieval Earth, but with its own peoples, geography, and history. In the Realms, as its inhabitants call it, fantastic creatures and magic are common.

''Baldur's Gate II'' takes place mainly in Amn, a country on the subcontinent of Faerûn. This country, known commonly as the Merchant Kingdom, lies south of Baldur's Gate; wealth and trade are the chief concerns of the region. The capital city of Athkatla, around which a fair portion of the game revolves, is the most important in Amn and is ruled by the anonymous Council of Six. The local thieves' guild, the Shadow Thieves, also has considerable power. The group, which operates all along the Sword Coast, is based in Athkatla. Another powerful organization in Amn are the Cowled Wizards, who regulate the use of magic in the region. The Shadow Thieves, the Cowled Wizards, and the Harpers, a semi-secret conglomeration of good organizations, all factor prominently into the story and provide side quests.

Besides Athkatla, other places the player will pass through include: an island, on which stands both the port town of Brynnlaw and the asylum Spellhold; the Underdark; the city of Suldanessellar; and the Astral Plane. There are also other places, which may be explored: the Umar Hills, where people have been disappearing; a temple ruins, fallen under the shadow of the Shade Lord; the de'Arnise Keep, home of the de'Arnises but recently overrun by trolls; the town of Trademeet, under attack by animals; a druid grove connected to Trademeet's woes; the Windspear Hills, where the player becomes entangled in the intrigues of Firkraag, a dragon; the underwater Sahuagin city; and the Planar Prison.

''Baldur's Gate II'' is set in the year 1369 DR (Dale Reckoning), and thus takes place not long after the Time of Troubles (1358 DR), when the Tablets of Fate, powerful magic items which maintain a balance between good and evil, were stolen. Lord Ao, the Overdeity, forced the gods to become mortal until the Tablets were found; some gods died while in this mortal state.

Characters

Bhaal, the God of Murder, was one such god, slain by an adventurer named Cyric, who himself became a god. But Bhaal foresaw his destruction and walked the land before the other gods. He left behind him "a score of mortal progeny," whose later deaths, when they were slain by heroes, would fuel his rebirth. The game's protagonist is one of these offspring; but, through the choices of the player, may be either good or evil. The character grew up in the library fortress of Candlekeep, watched over by the mage Gorion. Imoen, who grew up there as well, became a close friend. The story of the first ''Baldur's Gate'' followed their adventure along the Sword Coast, where the hero learned of their heritage and defeated their half-brother Sarevok, a fellow child of Bhaal.

Some notable characters in ''Shadows of Amn'' include: Gaelan Bayle, who offers the party the help of the Shadow Thieves; Aran Linvail, the leader of the Shadow Thieves; Saemon Havarian, who sails the party to an island; Adalon, a silver dragon whose eggs have been stolen and given to drow; Elhan; and Queen Ellesime, the ruler of Suldanessellar. Jon Irenicus and his sister Bodhi are the chief antagonists, Irenicus being the main villain of the game. Celebrated Forgotten Realms character Drizzt Do'Urden also makes an appearance; and if the player solicits his aid, he and his companions will later help the player.

In ''Baldur's Gate II'', several characters from the first game reappear, of which the following can join the player's party: Imoen, who grew up with the protagonist in Candlekeep; Jaheira, who, with her husband Khalid, was a friend of Gorion's; Minsc, a warrior who carries with him a hamster named Boo; Edwin, a Red Wizard of Thay; and Viconia, a dark elf cleric. There are also many new NPCs who may join the party: Aerie, a winged elf who has lost her wings and was sold to the circus by slavers at a young age; Keldorn, an older paladin and a powerful and respected member of the Most Noble Order of the Radiant Heart; Mazzy, an honorable halfling fighter and "the nearest thing to a paladin that a halfling can aspire to"; Nalia, who is of the upper class, but, though conscious of class distinction, tries to help those less fortunate than herself; Valygar, who is of a family noted for its talented magic-users, but hates the art; Anomen, a member of the Most Noble Order of the Radiant Heart, and whose wish is to become a full knight; Cernd, a druid; Haer'Dalis, a tiefling bard and one of the actors of an acting troupe; Jan, a gnome, of the Jansen family; Yoshimo, a thief from the land of Kara-Tur; and Korgan, an evil dwarven fighter.

Story

Shortly after the events of ''Baldur's Gate'', the hero and companions are overcome and taken captive. When the game opens, the player character awakens in a cage and is then experimented on by a wizard, who is aware of the player character's heritage and speaks of "untapped power". The wizard is distracted as his complex is attacked by Shadow Thieves, and disappears to fight them. Imoen, appearing from a side room, frees the player character. Jaheira and Minsc are also held in cells close by. Minsc reveals that his witch Dynaheir was killed sometime after their capture, while Jaheira's husband Khalid is later found tortured to death, leaving Jaheira emotionally devastated. The characters fight their way through the underground complex, learning more and more of their captor's despicable character and that his name is ''Irenicus''. At length, escaping the complex, they emerge into the city of Athkatla and witness Irenicus fighting off some of his attackers, whom he destroys. An argument then ensues, during which Imoen angrily attacks Irenicus using magic. The Cowled Wizards appear and, after a fight, arrest both Irenicus and Imoen for the unsanctioned use of magic, and teleport both of them away.

In the slums of Athkatla, a man named Gaelan Bayle offers the party the help of a powerful organization, who can find Imoen or Irenicus for the large sum of 20,000 gold pieces. The party is approached by and offered the help of another rival guild headed by Bodhi; it is the player's choice whom to side with. Meanwhile, Imoen and Irenicus have been removed to an asylum called Spellhold, which is situated on an island. Irenicus soon breaks his bonds and prepares to experiment on Imoen.

Back in Athkatla, the party raises the money necessary and receives assistance from whichever organization it has decided to work with, and gains passage to the island on a ship sailed by the dubious and treacherous Saemon Havarian. The heroes then manage to get inside Spellhold, but they are captured by Irenicus, who has taken control of the prison and had planned all along to bring the protagonist there. Irenicus then subjects the protagonist to a ritual, taking the latter's soul. Imoen, who turns out to be a Child of Bhaal as well, had earlier undergone Irenicus's ritual, and her soul has gone to Bodhi, Irenicus's sister. Bodhi then abandons the party to the maze beneath Spellhold, so that she can hunt them after a span of time, saying also, as bait, that Irenicus may yet be foiled. When they face her, the now soulless protagonist loses control and transforms into a creature called the Slayer, one of the avatar forms of Bhaal. Bodhi, quite taken aback, retreats to tell Irenicus of it. The player character returns to their normal self after a short while. Soon, with the aid of Spellhold's inmates, the party battles Irenicus, forcing him to retreat. The party follows, and reaches the surface via the Underdark.

Upon reaching the surface, the party encounters the army of the elven city of Suldanessellar. The elves cannot return to the city, for Irenicus has magically hidden it. To gain access to it, the party secures the Rhynn Lanthorn from Bodhi, who has stolen the artifact; upon Bodhi's death, Imoen's soul is restored. The Rhynn Lanthorn lights the way to Suldanessellar, which has been invaded by Irenicus and his minions. The party proceeds through the city and, at the Tree of Life, learns that Irenicus is draining the power of the Tree, which will doom Suldanessellar. The heroes defeat him, but because Irenicus still has the protagonist's soul, the protagonist is dragged with the wizard into Hell, and the rest of the party are dragged along also. When they defeat Irenicus, they return to life and are honored by the elves of Suldanessellar.

The play tells the story of a young couple, Cathy (played by Carol White) and Reg (Ray Brooks), and their descent into poverty and homelessness. At the start of the film, Cathy leaves her parents' overcrowded rural home and hitchhikes to the city, where she finds work and meets Reg, a well-paid lorry driver. They fall in love, marry and rent a modern flat in a building that does not allow children. Cathy soon becomes pregnant and must stop working, and Reg is injured on the job and becomes unemployed. The loss of income and birth of baby Sean force them to leave their flat, and they are unable to find another affordable place to live that permits children.

They move in with Reg's mother, until tensions develop between her and Cathy in the crowded flat. A kind elderly landlady, Mrs. Alley, rents to them for a while, during which time Cathy has another son, Stevie. Mrs. Alley even allows them to stay when they fall behind on the rent. However, she dies suddenly and an agent of her nephew and heir appears at the door demanding all the back rent, which they are unable to pay. Again Cathy and Reg go house hunting but are continually turned down as they can find nothing available that permits children. During this time Cathy gives birth to her third child, a girl they call Marlene. Their new landlord takes them to court and the judge rules against them. The family are evicted by bailiffs. The family then moves to a caravan parked in a camp where several other families are already living in caravans, but the local residents object to the camp and set it on fire, killing several children. Cathy, Reg and their children are forced into illegal squatting in a wrecked, abandoned building. They repeatedly try to get decent housing through the local council, but are not helped because of their many moves and the long list of other people also seeking housing assistance.

Cathy and Reg decide to separate temporarily so that Cathy and the children can move into an emergency homeless shelter where husbands are not allowed to stay. Reg leaves the area to seek employment. Cathy's loneliness and frustration finally boil over and she becomes belligerent with the shelter authorities, who are often cold and judgmental towards the women living in the shelter. Cathy's allotted time at the shelter expires while Reg is away, and she and her two remaining children (one having been sent to live with Reg's mother) have nowhere to go. They go to a railway station, where Cathy's children are taken away from her by social services.

Jim Halsey, a young man delivering a car from Chicago to San Diego, spots a man hitchhiking in the West Texas desert and gives him a ride. The brooding and evasive hitcher, who calls himself John Ryder, forces Jim's leg down on the accelerator when they pass a stranded car. Ryder states he murdered the driver and intends to do the same to Jim, threatening him with a switchblade. Terrified, Jim asks what Ryder wants. He replies, "I want you to stop me." When Jim realizes that Ryder's seat belt is unbuckled and the passenger door is ajar, he shoves Ryder out of the moving car.

Relieved, Jim continues his journey. When he sees Ryder in the back of a family car, Jim tries to warn the occupants, but has a minor accident. He later comes across the family's blood-soaked car and vomits after peeking inside. Ryder then corners Jim but simply tosses him the keys from Jim's car. Ryder leaves with a trucker, and later nearly runs Jim down with the truck as it crashes into the pumps of a gas station. As Jim flees, Ryder causes the station to explode.

At a roadside diner, Jim meets Nash, a waitress who cooks him lunch while he calls the police. He starts eating until he finds a severed finger among his French fries, indicating Ryder's proximity. The police arrive immediately but they arrest Jim, whom Ryder is now framing for his murders. During interrogation, Sergeant Starr infers Jim's innocence. However, he instructs his two deputies to lock Jim up overnight as protocol, until other law enforcement arrives from Austin for further questioning. Jim wakes to find the cell door unlocked and the three officers murdered. He panics and flees with a revolver. At a gas station, he sees two officers, takes them hostage, and speaks on the radio to Captain Esteridge, the officer in charge of the manhunt. As Esteridge convinces Jim to surrender, Ryder pulls up and kills the two officers.

The patrol car crashes, and Ryder disappears again. After briefly considering suicide, Jim reaches a cafe, where Ryder confronts him. He points out Jim's revolver is unloaded, and proves it by challenging Jim to shoot him. Ryder also remains oblique about his reasons for tormenting him, and after cryptically placing two coins on Jim's eyes, leaves him several bullets and departs. Jim boards a bus, where he meets Nash and explains his situation. After a police car pulls the bus over, Jim surrenders. The furious officers accuse him of killing their colleagues and attempt to kill him. Nash appears with Jim's revolver, disarms the officers, and flees with Jim in their patrol car. As the police chase after them, Ryder joins the chase and murders the officers by causing a massive car accident and shooting down a police helicopter.

Jim and Nash abandon the patrol car and hike to a motel. While Jim is in the shower, Ryder abducts Nash and Jim immediately searches for her. Captain Esteridge discovers Jim and enlists him to try to negotiate with Ryder, who is at the wheel of a large Mack truck. Ryder has gagged and tied Nash between the truck and its trailer hitch, and is threatening to tear her apart. Esteridge tells Jim that his men cannot shoot Ryder because his foot would slip off the clutch, causing the truck to roll. Jim enters the cab with Ryder, who gives him a revolver and tells him to shoot, but Jim is unable to do so. Ryder, disappointed, releases the clutch, killing Nash.

Ryder is taken into custody. Esteridge gives Jim a ride, but Jim, believing the police cannot hold Ryder, takes Esteridge's revolver and vehicle to chase down Ryder's prison bus. Ryder kills the deputies and leaps through Jim's windshield as the bus crashes. Jim slams on his brakes, sending Ryder through the windshield and onto the road. Ryder challenges Jim to run him over, which he does. When Jim leaves his car to look at Ryder's body, Ryder jumps up, but Jim shoots him repeatedly with a shotgun, finally killing him. Jim leans against Esteridge's car in a daze, and smokes a cigarette as the sun sets.

In 1978 Victoria, Australia, Mark “Chopper” Read is an inmate at Pentridge Prison. Keithy George, another inmate, points to a line in the yard and tells Mark not to cross the line as it marks the Painters and Dockers territory. The next day, Mark rushes across the line and stabs Keithy multiple times.

The Painters and Dockers put out a $10,000 contract on Mark. Mark conscripts Bluey Barnes and Jimmy Loughnan to help him lead a siege on the Painters and Dockers. Wanting out of the suicide mission, Jimmy shanks Mark. Jimmy slashes his own arm so that he can claim self-defense. Mark recovers and is returned to a separate cell from Bluey and Jimmy. It's revealed that Mark is serving a 16 ½ year sentence for the attempted abduction of a judge in order to give Jimmy Loughnan freedom.

Mark meets with the Prison Board to negotiate a change of prisons for security. The board declines, so Mark has his ears cut off so that he can relocate to a mental health wing where he serves the remainder of his sentence.

When Mark is released from prison, he reunites with his old girlfriend Tanya. While out at a club, Mark flies into a jealous rage and fires several shots with a handgun. Back at Tanya’s house, Mark finds her on the phone with Neville Bartos (Vince Colosimo). He physically abuses both Tanya and her mother. Mark goes to Neville’s house and learns that Neville supplies most of the cocaine to the western suburbs of Melbourne and is very wealthy. When Neville refuses to give Mark money, Mark shoots him in the abdomen.

Mark goes to Jimmy Loughnan’s apartment that he shares with his pregnant fiancée, Mandy, and their young daughter. Mark reveals that he’s working for the police, stating that he has a green light to shoot criminals and that he shot Neville. Mark tells Jimmy that he heard about the contracts out on his life and that Jimmy was meant to do them, and then holds a gun to Jimmy’s head. Eventually Mark apologizes and gives money to Jimmy.

In a parking lot at the Bojangles, Sammy the Turk, another affiliate, states that he wants to show Mark something. Mark produces a Sawed-off 410 Shotgun and after a brief argument, Mark shoots him in the eye. Mandy witnesses the murder from behind a parked car and tells Jimmy.

Mandy turns crown witness against Mark for the murder of Sammy the Turk. It’s revealed that Sammy took Mark out to the car park for Jimmy to cash in on the contract against Mark, but unknowingly took him to the wrong car park. Mark beats the murder charge but is convicted of malicious wounding of Neville Bartos, and is sentenced to 5 years.

On a crowded New York City subway train, pickpocket Skip McCoy steals Candy's wallet. Unbeknownst to Skip or Candy, in the wallet is microfilm of top-secret government information. Candy was delivering an envelope as a final favor to her ex-boyfriend, Joey. Joey has told her that it contains stolen business secrets and she believed him, unaware that Joey is actually a communist spy.

Government agent Zara had Candy under surveillance, hoping she would lead him to the top man in the spy ring. He seeks police help to identify the thief. Police Captain Dan Tiger has professional informant Moe Williams brought in. She asks Zara several questions about the pickpocket's technique, and after she and Tiger agree on a price, she gives him a list of eight names; Zara quickly identifies Skip from his mug shot. Zara tries to get Skip to give up the film, revealing its importance and appealing to his (non-existent) patriotism, but Skip denies everything.

Meanwhile, Joey persuades a reluctant Candy to track down the thief using her underworld connections. The trail leads to Moe, who is delighted to be able to sell the same information a second time, knowing that her good friend Skip will not mind.

Candy searches Skip's waterfront shack that night while he is out. When he returns, he spots her flashlight, sneaks in and knocks her out. When she comes to, she tries to get the film from him without success. The second time she visits, she is puzzled when he calls her a "commie" and "a Red" and demands $25,000 for the film. He reveals that he knows what is on the film. Skip thinks she is only acting. Despite his rough treatment, however, she finds herself falling for him.

When she returns to Joey, his superior gives him a day to get the film back, and leaves him a gun. Candy finally realizes the truth. She turns to Moe for help, since Skip will not believe it if she tells him he is in danger. Moe tries, but fails, to convince Skip to give the film to the government. Moe goes home, and finds Joey waiting for her. Moe refuses to reveal Skip's address and taunts Joey for being a turncoat and a rat until he shoots her dead.

The next morning, Skip returns home to find Candy there. She blames herself for Moe's death, but to her dismay, Skip is still willing to deal with Joey. When he starts to leave with the film, she knocks him out with a bottle and takes it to Zara and Tiger. Zara asks her to give Joey the film, so he can lead them to his boss. Candy does, but Joey notices that there is a frame missing. He beats Candy in an attempt to get Skip's address, then shoots her as she tries to leave. In her purse, Joey finds Skip's address. Skip visits Candy in the hospital and comforts her.

Joey and an associate go to the shack, but Skip hears them coming and hides underneath. When Joey is ordered to deliver the portion of film he does have, Skip follows him to a subway station. He watches as the film is exchanged in a restroom, then knocks out the ringleader and chases after and beats up Joey.

Later, at the police station, Tiger predicts Skip will return to his criminal ways, but he and a recovered Candy leave together.

The United States Navy destroyer USS ''Bedford'', under the command of Captain Eric Finlander, is sailing in the Greenland, Iceland, and United Kingdom gap. Aboard are Ben Munceford, a civilian photojournalist; Commodore Wolfgang Schrepke, a German Navy NATO naval advisor; Ensign Ralston, an inexperienced young officer who is constantly criticized by Finlander for small errors; and Lieutenant Commander Chester Potter, the ship's new doctor.

The ''Bedford'' detects a Soviet Navy submarine nearby, off the coast of Greenland. Although the United States and the Soviet Union are not at war, Finlander mercilessly harries his prey, while Munceford and Schrepke look on with mounting alarm. Finlander exploits the fact that the diesel-powered Soviet sub has to surface periodically to replenish its air and recharge its batteries, knowing full well it will make the Soviets more desperate.

Munceford is aboard to photograph life on a Navy destroyer, but his real interest is Finlander, who was recently passed over for promotion to rear admiral. Munceford is curious whether a comment made by Finlander regarding the American intervention in Cuba is the reason for his lack of promotion. This prompts Finlander to become openly hostile to Munceford, whom he sees as an interfering civilian questioning Finlander's harrying of the submarine.

The crew becomes increasingly fatigued by the unrelenting pursuit. At the same time, Finlander becomes intolerant of anyone who questions his actions, including Potter, who warns him that crew are feeling the pressure.

The submarine ignores Finlander's order to surface and identify itself. The angered captain runs over its snorkel, having it logged as an "unidentified floating object". He orders Ralston to arm one weapon, then withdraws to a distance to wait for the submerged sub to run out of air and surface. He reassures Munceford and Schrepke that he is in command of the situation and that he will not fire first, but "If he fires one, I'll fire one." A fatigued Ralston mistakes Finlander's remark as a command to "fire one". He launches an anti-submarine rocket which destroys the submarine. Sonar then detects four nuclear torpedoes targeting the destroyer. Finlander immediately orders evasive maneuvers and countermeasures, but then stops. He looks at Schrepke, who appears to have reached the same conclusion. Finlander silently leaves the bridge. Munceford follows, frantically pleading with him to do something, but the captain merely looks at him.

The film ends with still shots of various crewmen "melting" as if the celluloid film were burning, as the ''Bedford'' and her crew are vaporized in an atomic blast, the final shot being a mushroom cloud.

At independent record store Empire Records in Delaware, employee Lucas has been tasked by store manager Joe with closing the store for the first time. While counting the day's receipts in Joe's office, he discovers the store is about to be sold and converted into a branch of ''Music Town'', a large national chain.

Determined to keep the store independent, Lucas hatches a plan, taking the day's cash receipts of approximately $9,000 to a casino in Atlantic City to quadruple it playing craps. Though successfully doubling the money on his first roll, he loses everything on the second.

The following morning, fellow Empire employees A.J. and Mark find Lucas, who confides in them about the previous night's events, just before riding off on his motorcycle. Joe arrives and quickly receives frantic phone calls about the missing deposit from both the bank and the store's owner, Mitchell Beck.

Other employees arrive, including overachieving high school student Corey and her uninhibited best friend Gina. Hostile employee Deb, who has survived an apparent suicide attempt, also arrives. Deb then goes into the bathroom and shaves her head. Upon Lucas' arrival, Joe confronts him about the missing deposit, and Lucas confirms the money was lost. Joe explains his anti-''Music Town'' plan to the employees – he had saved enough money to become part-owner of the store to save it, but will now be $9,000 short as he must cover the missing money with Mitchell.

Joe is distracted from the crisis due to a major store event: Rex Manning Day. The washed-up 1980s pop idol is holding an autograph session at the store for fans of his latest album ''Back with More''. The unenthused staff mock both Manning and the event, and ultimately many of the fans showing up to meet him are either older women or gay men.

Though detained by Joe in his office, Lucas nonetheless apprehends a belligerent young shoplifter who identifies himself only as "Warren Beatty". He is taken away by police but vows to return seeking revenge. Encouraged by Gina, Corey indulges her schoolgirl crush on Manning by attempting to seduce him, but winds up humiliated and dejected; A.J. then chooses this inopportune time to confess his love to Corey, which she rejects. After Gina and Corey argue, Gina has sex with Manning. When the staff discover this, A.J. attacks Manning, Gina reveals Corey's addiction to amphetamines, Corey hysterically trashes the store, and Joe tells Manning to leave.

Deb surprisingly attempts to cheer Corey up, and in return she holds a mock funeral for Deb with the whole staff. The shoplifter "Warren" returns with a gun (ultimately loaded with blanks), and Lucas defuses the situation by revealing that he himself was a troubled youth until he was taken in and saved by Joe. He in turn offers "Warren" a job at the store.

After the police leave, Lucas admits defeat, and suggests confessing the truth about the missing money to Mitchell. However, the staff try to replace the missing money but can raise only $3,000. Suddenly inspired, Mark runs in front of the news crew covering the holdup, announcing on live TV a late-night benefit party at the store to "Save the Empire". An impromptu concert on the roof by Gina and Berko, another employee, raises funds so Joe can hand the money raised to Mitchell to buy the store.

Corey finally finds a dejected A.J. on the roof fixing the Empire Records sign, and confesses that she loves him too. He decides to attend art school in Boston to be near her while she attends Harvard. They kiss, and the staff ends the long day with a dance party on the roof.

The Scarecrow is upset when Professor Woggle-bug tells him that he has no family, so he goes back to the corn-field where Dorothy Gale found him to trace his "roots." When he fails to return, Dorothy and the Cowardly Lion set out to search for him. They meet an elderly knight, Sir Hokus of Pokes. They also meet the Doubtful Dromedary and the Comfortable Camel. Together, they have several curious adventures while searching for the Scarecrow.

In this novel the Scarecrow discovers that, in a previous incarnation, he was human. More specifically, he was the Emperor of the Silver Islands, a kingdom located deep underground beneath the Munchkin region of Oz, inhabited by people who resemble Chinese people. When Dorothy first discovered the Scarecrow (in ''The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'') he was hanging from a beanpole in a cornfield; it now develops that this pole descends deep underground to the Silver Islands. The Emperor of the Silver Islands had been transformed into a crocus by an enemy magician; this magical crocus had sprouted and grown into the beanpole all the way up to the surface of the earth. When the farmer placed his scarecrow on the beanpole, the spirit of the transformed Emperor entered the Scarecrow's body, causing him to come to life.

The Scarecrow digs at the base of the beanpole and slides down the beanpole to the Silver Islands. The islanders hail him as the Emperor, returned to save his people. After spending some time in his former kingdom ruling the quarrelsome Silver Islanders, the Scarecrow decides to return to Oz and continue his carefree existence there. The islanders, however, are reluctant to let him go, and plot to change him back into his human form, an 85-year-old man. Dorothy and her party reach the Silver Islands, rescue the Scarecrow from the islanders, and accompany him back to the Emerald City. Sir Hokus, the Comfortable Camel, and the Doubtful Dromedary become residents of the Emerald City.

Sir Hokus and the Comfortable Camel return as principal characters in ''The Yellow Knight of Oz''.

Daniel Kintner and Susan Watkins are frustrated that their hard-working lives do not allow them to spend much time together. They decide to go on a scuba-diving vacation to help improve their relationship. On their second day, they join a group scuba dive. A head count is taken and the passenger total is recorded as 20. Daniel and Susan decide to separate briefly from the group while underwater. Half an hour later, the group returns to the boat; two members of the group are inadvertently counted twice, so the dive master thinks that everyone is back on board and the boat leaves the site. However, Daniel and Susan are still underwater, unaware that the others have returned to shore. When they resurface, the boat has gone. They believe that the group will soon return to recover them.

Stranded at sea, it slowly dawns on Daniel and Susan that their boat is not coming back for them. They bicker, battle bouts of hunger and mental exhaustion and realize that they have probably drifted far from the dive site. They also realize that sharks have been circling them below the surface. Soon, jellyfish appear, stinging them both, while sharks come in close. Susan receives a small shark bite on the leg, but does not immediately realize it. Daniel goes under and discovers a small fish feeding on the exposed flesh of her bite wound. Later, a shark bites Daniel and the wound begins to bleed profusely. Susan removes her weight belt and uses it to apply pressure to Daniel's wound, but he appears to go into shock. After night falls, sharks return and attack Daniel during a storm, killing him. The next morning, Daniel and Susan's belongings are finally noticed on the boat by a crew member and he realizes that they must have been left at the dive site. A massive search for the couple begins immediately.

Susan realizes that Daniel is dead and releases him into the water, where sharks pull him down in a feeding frenzy. After putting on her mask, she looks beneath the surface and sees several large sharks now circling her. Susan looks around one last time for any sign of coming rescue. Seeing none, she removes her scuba gear and goes underwater to drown before the sharks can attack. Elsewhere, a fishing crew cut open a newly caught shark's stomach, finding a diving camera (apparently that of Daniel and Susan). One of the fishermen asks offhandedly to another, "Wonder if it works?"

In 1916, the bandit El Guapo and his gang collect protection money from the Mexican village of Santo Poco. Carmen, daughter of the village leader, searches for someone who can rescue her townspeople. Visiting a village church, she sees a silent film featuring The Three Amigos, a trio of gunfighters who protect the vulnerable from villains. Believing them to be real heroes, Carmen sends a telegram asking them to come and stop El Guapo.

Lucky Day, Dusty Bottoms, and Ned Nederlander, the actors who portray the Amigos, demand a salary increase for their next project and are fired by their boss Harry Flugelman. He has them evicted from the studio mansion, banned from his lot, and the clothes they borrowed from wardrobe repossessed. They soon receive Carmen's telegram, misinterpreting it as a job offer to perform a show in Santo Poco. The Amigos break into the studio to retrieve their costumes and head for Mexico.

Stopping at a cantina near Santo Poco, they are mistaken for associates of a fast-shooting German pilot who arrived just before they did, also in search of El Guapo. They perform "My Little Buttercup" at the cantina, confusing the locals. The German's real associates arrive at the cantina, proving themselves lethal with their pistols when everybody laughs at them. Relieved, Carmen picks up the Amigos and takes them to the village, where they are pampered in the best house in town.

The next morning, when three of El Guapo's men raid the village, the Amigos do a Hollywood-style stunt show that leaves the men bemused. The bandits ride off, making the villagers think they have defeated the enemy. In reality, the men inform El Guapo of what has happened and he decides to return the next day to kill the Amigos.

The village throws a victory party for the Amigos. The next morning, El Guapo and his gang come to Santo Poco and call them out, but they think it's another show. After Lucky gets shot, they realize they are facing real bandits and beg for mercy. El Guapo allows the Amigos to live, then lets his men loot the village and kidnaps Carmen. They leave Santo Poco in humiliation.

Ned persuades Lucky and Dusty to go after El Guapo as they have nothing worth going back to in America and this is their chance to be real heroes. They spot a plane and follow it; it is flown by the German, who has brought a shipment of rifles for the gang. El Guapo's 40th birthday party is being prepared and he plans to bed Carmen that night. The Amigos fling themselves over the wall to infiltrate the hideout with mixed results: Lucky is immediately captured and chained in a dungeon, Dusty crashes into Carmen's room, and Ned ends up suspended from a piñata.

Lucky frees himself, but Dusty and Ned are discovered and held hostage. The German, having idolized Ned's quick-draw and gun-spinning pistol skills in childhood, challenges him to a shootout. Ned kills the German and Lucky holds El Guapo at gunpoint long enough for Carmen and the Amigos to escape in the German's plane.

Returning to Santo Poco with El Guapo's army in pursuit, the Amigos rally the villagers to stand up for themselves. Drawing inspiration from one of their films, they have the villagers create improvised Amigos costumes. The bandits arrive, are shot at by Amigos from all sides, and fall into hidden trenches. El Guapo's men either ride off or are shot, and he takes a fatal wound. Before he dies, the villagers, dressed as Amigos, step out to confront him. El Guapo congratulates them, then shoots Lucky in the foot before dying.

The villagers offer the Amigos all the money they have, but the Amigos refuse it with: "Our reward is that justice has been done." They then ride off into the sunset.

Colonel Proudfoot of Proudfoot Industries aims to entice a couple of dentists to advertise "Dreem", a revolutionary type of toothpaste, but he knows that if the dentists learn that they are part of an advertising campaign, they will be struck off. His cousin, the director of a Dental School (also Barker), sees his chance to rid the field of dentistry of two newly qualified incompetents David Cookson and Brian Dexter. However, once employed by Proudfoot, they set about improving on Dreem's terrible formula, and accidentally succeed in creating a much better toothpaste. Their attempts to convince Proudfoot of its merits are foiled by Proudfoot's assistant, Macreedy.

They then read a newspaper article about the forthcoming launch of a rocket from a British base carrying a satellite which will continuously broadcast a taped message of peace from the President of the United States, and conceive a plan. They record an impromptu commercial for the new formula Dreem and, with the help of an ex-convict friend Sam Field and actress Jill Venner, manage to smuggle it aboard the rocket in place of the President's speech, guaranteeing Proudfoot years of free advertising. The resulting publicity ensures the product's success and the pair are promoted.

Con artists Leo (John Hannah) and Lily (Famke Janssen) are partners both in work and in life. Lily wants to get out of the racket and settle down in a nice place somewhere far away. Leo agrees, saying that within a week they should have enough to leave for good.

Leo's cousin Bruno (Brian Conley) is having a problem with his casino losing money. He wants Leo to run it. But he hates Leo and wants to get rid of him.

Further complicating Leo's life is Julius (Peter Stormare) who has asked Leo to kill his wife, Gloria. Only when it comes time to be paid, Julius, who has Leo committing the murder on tape, confesses he does not have a wife; he paid a woman to pretend to be his wife. Julius wants 500,000 in pounds, otherwise, he will release the tape to the authorities.

Then Moose shows up and he is looking for a woman who is the love of his life. Her name is Gloria. He asks if Leo could help him find her and Leo reluctantly agrees.

Finally, there's Troy, a loan shark. Leo owes him a lot of money, but he has lost it all at the track. Troy is getting increasingly impatient and violent as he does not like to be kept waiting on his money.

Evidence is piling up that Lily is working a con on Leo. With all these problems, it does not look as if Leo will survive the week.

Bruno's in trouble with the Inland Revenue, so his accountant, Julius, comes up with an idea to con Lily by turning all of Bruno's shipping company over to her, while Bruno pockets a $20 million. Only the problem is that Leo has got to Julius first and worked out a con of his own. Together Julius and Leo staged Gloria's murder.

Leo goes to meet Julius with the blackmail money. Bruno has men with guns waiting, but Moose shows up to even out the fight. A bloodbath ensues and Julius, the only survivor, tells the tale to Bruno.

Only Leo is not dead, and he leaves a recording that Lily finds and then shows to Bruno. Leo figured out that Lily was conning him, and he confesses that he stole Bruno's money. An enraged Lily and Bruno go to find Julius and catch him as he is splitting town. But then Leo shows up wanting to kill Bruno.

Bruno says that Leo cannot possibly kill him because he would have to kill his wife also. Reluctantly Leo agrees, and shoots Lily. Then he convinces Julius that the only way they can be partners is if he kills Bruno, so that they have a murder each on their hands. Julius does not mean to, but the gun goes off and Bruno is dead.

During their getaway, Julius begins to feel odd. Leo confesses that he slipped a sedative into Julius' drink. He leaves a drugged Julius by the side of the road and with the con finished he makes his way to the train station where he meets up with Lily.

The plot revolves around the character of Augusto, a wealthy, intellectual and introverted young man. He falls in love with a young woman named Eugenia as she walks past him on the street, and he sets about trying to court her. He is aided in his efforts by the other members of Eugenia's household. Her Aunt Ermelinda is particularly keen for a relationship to evolve, so that Augusto might help with her niece's financial troubles. Nevertheless, Eugenia rejects his advances, since she is already in a relationship with the down-and-out Mauricio. Augusto pays off Eugenia's mortgage as a goodwill gesture without her knowing, but this only serves to insult Eugenia, rather than endear him to her.

In the meantime, Augusto becomes involved with another girl, Rosario, and he begins to question if he is really in love with Eugenia at all. After talking with various friends and acquaintances, Augusto decides he will propose to Eugenia in any case. To his surprise, Eugenia accepts the engagement. A few days before the marriage is to occur, Augusto receives a letter from Eugenia. The letter explained that she was leaving him for Mauricio. Augusto, heartbroken, decides to kill himself.

Because everything Augusto does involves a lengthy thought process, he decides that he needs to consult Unamuno himself (the author of the novel), who had written an article on suicide which Augusto had read. When Augusto speaks with Unamuno, the truth is revealed that Augusto is actually a fictional character whom Unamuno has created. Augusto is not real, Unamuno explains, and for that reason cannot kill himself. Augusto asserts that he exists, even though he acknowledges internally that he doesn't, and threatens Unamuno by telling him that he is not the ultimate author. Augusto reminds Unamuno that he might be just a character in one of God's dreams. Augusto returns to his home and dies.

Whether or not he is killed by Unamuno or commits suicide is a subject of debate and is mostly down to the reader's opinion. The book ends with the author himself debating himself about bringing back the character of Augusto. He establishes, however, that this would not be feasible. The eulogy is given by Orfeo, Augusto's dog.

The title, Spanish for 'fog', is a reference to how Augusto sees his life. Augusto describes his world as full of small and almost imperceptible occurrences, some of them good, some of them bad, that all serve to obscure his vision.

Jay Bulworth, a Democratic U.S. Senator from California, faces a primary challenge from a fiery young populist. Once politically liberal, Bulworth has over time conceded to more conservative politics and to accepting donations from large corporations. While he and his wife have been having affairs with each other's knowledge for years, they maintain a happy facade for the sake of their public image. Tired of politics and unhappy with life, Bulworth makes plans to kill himself, and negotiates a $10 million life insurance policy with his daughter as the beneficiary. Knowing that a suicide would void the policy, he contracts to have himself assassinated within two days.

He arrives extremely drunk at a Los Angeles campaign event, where he freely speaks his mind in the presence of the C-SPAN film crew following his campaign. After dancing all night in an underground club and smoking marijuana, he begins rapping in public. His frank, offensive remarks make him an instant media darling and re-energize his campaign. He becomes romantically involved with Nina, a young black activist, who begins to join him on campaign stops. He is pursued by the paparazzi, his insurance company, his campaign managers, and an increasingly adoring public, all the while awaiting his impending assassination.

After a televised debate during which Bulworth derides insurance companies and the American healthcare system while drinking from a flask, he retreats to the home of Nina's family in impoverished South Central Los Angeles. He witnesses a group of children selling crack and intervenes to rescue them from an encounter with a racist police officer, and later discovers they work for L.D., a local drug kingpin to whom Nina's brother owes money. Bulworth eventually makes it to a television appearance arranged earlier by his campaign manager, during which he raps and repeats verbatim statements that Nina and L.D. have told him about the lives of poor black people and their opinions of various American institutions, such as education and employment. Eventually he offers the solution that "everybody should fuck everybody" until everyone is "all the same color," stunning the audience and his interviewer.

Bulworth spends the film fearful of a man who had been following him under the assumption that he was the assassin trying to murder him. After the man finally pushes Bulworth to complete terror, he corners Bulworth on a set at the television studio and begins photographing Bulworth with Nina, revealing himself to be simply paparazzi. Bulworth, frustrated, flees with Nina, who reveals that she is the assassin he indirectly hired (ostensibly to make the money needed to pay off her brother's debt) and will now not carry out the job. Relieved, Bulworth falls asleep for the first time in days in Nina's arms. He sleeps for 36 hours, during which the media speculates over his sudden absence leading up to election day. Bulworth wins the primary in a landslide, and L.D. allows Nina's brother to work off the debt. Bulworth accepts a new campaign for the presidency during his victory speech, but is suddenly shot by Graham Crockett, an agent of the insurance company that was fearful of Bulworth's recent push for single-payer health care, who makes a quick escape.

Bulworth's fate is left ambiguous. The final scene shows an elderly vagrant, whom Bulworth met previously, standing alone outside a hospital. He exhorts Bulworth, who is presumably inside, to not be "a ghost" but "a spirit" which, as he had mentioned earlier, can only happen if you have "a song". In the final shot of the film, he asks the same of the audience.

The USS ''Enterprise'' arrives at the pergium mining colony on planet Janus VI to help the colony deal with an unknown creature that has killed 50 miners and engineers, and destroyed equipment with a strong corrosive substance. Captain Kirk, Spock, and McCoy meet with the mine supervisor, Chief Engineer Vanderberg. During the briefing, Spock's attention is drawn to a silicon nodule on Vanderberg's desk, which Vanderberg dismisses as a geological oddity. They are alerted to a problem in the colony's nuclear reactor, and find its guard killed and the main circulating pump stolen. The part has long since gone out of production, so no replacements are available. Chief Engineer Scott jury rigs a substitute, but it fails shortly thereafter, necessitating the missing part be found and reinstalled before the reactor goes super-critical in 10 hours.

Kirk and his security team search for the creature. Spock, suspecting it may be a silicon based lifeform, modifies their phasers to be more effective against silicon. They encounter the creature—which has the appearance of molten rock—and fire upon it, breaking a piece of it off. The creature flees by burrowing through a rock wall. Spock analyzes the fragment, whose composition resembles fibrous asbestos. He deduces that it burrows through solid rock by secreting the same corrosive substance that has killed the miners. Spock adjusts his tricorder to scan for silicon-based life, and confirms that the creature is the only such lifeform for miles.

Kirk and Spock happen upon a chamber containing thousands of the silicon nodules. The creature causes a cave-in that separates Kirk from Spock. Though Spock urges Kirk to kill it, Kirk observes the creature backs off whenever he aims his phaser at it. Spock finds a way around the cave-in and joins Kirk. He attempts a mind meld with the creature, but perceives little but intense pain. The creature etches the ambiguous message "NO KILL I" into a rock, having gained some knowledge of human language from the meld. By making physical contact with the creature, Spock establishes a deeper mind meld. He learns that the creature is called a Horta, and that its species dies out completely every 50,000 years, save for one individual that remains alive to protect the eggs, which are the silicon nodules. As the nodule eggs hatch, the single adult Horta acts as a protective mother to this next generation. Though nearing death because of her wound, the Horta communicates through Spock, telling them the location of the stolen pump. There Kirk also discovers thousands of broken eggs which were destroyed by the miners as worthless.

The miners arrive and attempt to attack the creature. Kirk and Spock stop them, explaining that it was only protecting its eggs when it killed humans. Dr. McCoy successfully treats the Horta's wound using a silicon-based cement normally used for building emergency shelters. The miners fear the prospect of thousands of Horta, but Kirk convinces them that the Horta are peaceful and could collaborate with the miners by tunneling for them.

Kirk, Spock, and McCoy return to the Enterprise, prepare to leave orbit, and learn from Vanderberg that the eggs have hatched and already the new Horta have uncovered rich veins of pergium and other valuable metals.

Baran (Cagdas Bozkurt) is a young Kurd who was sent to Hamburg after his parents, who had helped Kurdish rebels, were betrayed and subsequently killed by the Turkish militia. Now that Baran is 16, he is no longer allowed to stay in Germany and faces the bleak prospect of getting deported back.

Baran meets Chernor (Leroy Delmar), an African boy who has the same problem and trafficks drugs to make some money.

Things get even more complicated when Baran spots the traitor of his family and wants to kill him. However, the man pleads for his life and Baran spares him. Finally, both Cherno and Baran, who had made a desperate attempt to free Cherno, are arrested by the police.

''Viewtiful Joe'' is divided into seven stages, or "episodes", interspersed with storyline cutscenes, and bookended by an opening and ending cinematic. The setting is divided between Earth, and "Movieland", the game's fictional world of films. The plot begins in a movie theatre on Earth, in which the game's central character Joe and his girlfriend Silvia are watching a tokusatsu drama, starring the aged superhero Captain Blue. The movie's antagonist, having seemingly defeated Captain Blue, suddenly reaches out of the screen and abducts Silvia, taking her into Movieland. Joe is likewise picked up and taken into Movieland by Captain Blue's giant mecha, "Six Majin". Inside the movie, Joe must rescue Silvia from the evil Jadow, the game's organization of villains. To help him, Captain Blue entrusts him with a V-Watch, a device Joe can use to transform into a superhero upon saying the word "henshin (transform)." Joe promptly does so, inventing his own catchphrase: "Henshin-a-go-go, baby!"

With the guidance of Captain Blue, Joe fights his way through a number of Movieland's locations such as cities, caves, an underwater base, and a submarine, often travelling via his trusty, robot aircraft "Six Machine". One by one, Joe defeats the members of the Jadow, the game's bosses. These include Dark Fiend Charles the 3rd, Iron Ogre Hulk Davidson, Aquatic Terror Gran Bruce, a doppelgänger of Viewtiful Joe, and Blade Master Alastor. Before fighting Alastor, he reveals that in order for the Jadow to break out of Movieland and into the land of humans, they need the "DNA of the Creator", namely Silvia. Joe makes his way to her, trumping the Jadow's leader Inferno Lord Fire Leo in combat, only to witness Silvia being kidnapped once again afterwards. Joe and Six Machine race off into outer space after her in the game's final episode.

Finding Silvia atop the control room of a space station, Joe discovers that Captain Blue has been behind the plot the entire time. The former hero reveals that he is the creator of the film in which they currently exist, and that he is Silvia's seemingly-deceased father. Transforming into the colossal robot King Blue, the villain proclaims that he will take Sylvia's energy by force in order to break into the real world. Joe tells him off, telling him that he's no hero. Joe summons Six Majin, and the two engage in combat. When the fight ends, Captain Blue and Viewtiful Joe abandon their respective vehicles, and face off in a final battle within the space station.

Joe is victorious, and Captain Blue, finally coming to his senses, thanks the young hero for stopping him. He explains that two decades earlier, Blue was a revolutionary film maker who was soon thought of as a fad. Wanting nothing more than to create heroes, Blue was sucked into one of his own films, allowing him to live out his dream as a hero. However, he had lost touch with reality, and wanted revenge on the people who had betrayed him. As Captain Blue and Silvia embrace in a heartfelt reunion, the director tells Joe that the story is not complete. He snaps his fingers, and the space station's onboard computer warns of a large number of UFOs heading towards Earth. Blue tells Joe that a hero will be needed twice more to save the world. Joe attempts to leave, but not before Silvia requests a V-Watch from her father and to accompany her boyfriend. Viewtiful Joe and a newly transformed Silvia head out to stop the impending threat together.

This outline is different from the plot of the ballet version revived by Alexei Ratmansky for the Bolshoi Ballet.

The ballet opens in a forest near Marseilles, where the peasant Gaspard and his children, Jeanne and Pierre, are gathering firewood. When a Count and his hunting party arrive, the peasants disperse, but Jeanne attracts the attention of the Count, who attempts to embrace her. When her father intervenes, he is beaten up by the Count's servant and taken away. Next, in the city square in Marseilles Jeanne tells the people what has happened to her father and the people's indignation over the injustices of the aristocracy grows. They storm the prison and free the prisoners of the Marquis de Beauregard.

At the court of Versailles a performance of the court theatre is followed by a lush banquet. The officials of the court present a formal petition to the king, requesting permission to deal with the unruly revolutionaries. Antoine Mistral, an actor in the theatre, on discovering this secret document is killed by the Marquis de Beauregard, but before he dies he manages to pass the petition on to Mireille de Poitiers, who escapes the palace as the sound of the Marseillaise is heard through the windows.

The scene shifts to a square in Paris, where an uprising and the storming of the palace is prepared. Mireille rushes in with the document revealing the conspiracy against the revolution, and her bravery is applauded. At the height of this scene, the officers of the Marquis arrive in the square; Jeanne, recognizing the man who insulted her in the woods, runs up and slaps his face. Following this, the crowd attacks the aristocrats. To the sound of revolutionary songs, the people storm the palace and burst into the staircase of the front hall. Jeanne attacks the Marquis, who is then killed by her brother, and the Basque girl Thérèse is shot to death.

Finally, back in the Paris square, the people celebrate their victory over the defenders of the Old Regime.

The film opens on 25 April 1945, the day Italy is liberated from the fascists. The peasants on an estate in Emilia-Romagna are shown attempting to join the partisans and place the owner of the estate, Alfredo Berlinghieri, under arrest. A middle-aged man named Attila and woman named Regina are seen attempting to flee the farm but are attacked by women labourers wielding pitchforks.

The narrative moves back to the start of the century. Both born on the day of the death of composer Giuseppe Verdi – 27 January 1901 – Alfredo Berlinghieri and Olmo Dalcò come from opposite ends of the social spectrum. Alfredo is from a family of wealthy landowners led by his popular grandfather (also called Alfredo or Alfredo the Elder) and grows up with his cousin Regina. Olmo is an illegitimate peasant born to an unmarried young woman who already has had several children. His grandfather, Leo, is the foreman and peasants' spokesman who carries out a duel of wits with the elder Alfredo which masks a deep-seated mutual respect. As Alfredo is somewhat rebellious and despises the falseness of his family, in particular his weak but abusive and cynical father Giovanni, he befriends Olmo, who has been raised as a socialist. During this time, Leo leads strikes against the unfair conditions on the farm.

The two are friends throughout their childhood, despite the social differences of their families, and spend much time in one another's company. Olmo enlists with the Italian army in 1917 during World War I and goes off to fight while Alfredo learns how to run his family's large plantation under the guidance of his father. Olmo returns from the war over a year later and his friendship with Alfredo continues. However, Giovanni, the ''padrone'' since the elder Alfredo's suicide, has hired Attila Mellanchini as his foreman. Taken with fascism in a similar way that Giovanni has been, Attila eventually incorporates his new belief system in his dealings with the Berlinghieri workers; he treats them cruelly, and wins Regina and Giovanni over to his side. In the 1920s, Olmo enters into a relationship with Anita, a down-to-earth woman who shares his enthusiasm for the cause of workers' rights. Together, Olmo and Anita lead several fervent protests against the landowners.

Following the death of Giovanni, Alfredo becomes the new ''padrone'' and marries Ada, a gorgeous, demure Frenchwoman. During the 1930s, he proves to be a weak ''padrone'', repeatedly bending to the whim of the fascists. Ada sinks into alcoholism when confronted with the reality of the emptiness of her marriage to Alfredo; she sympathises to some extent with the workers and despises Alfredo for his failure to stand up to Attila.

Meanwhile, Olmo's wife Anita dies in childbirth, but manages to bring another member into the community; a daughter whom Olmo names after his late wife. Olmo's daughter, Anita the Younger, grows into a young and resourceful teenager who is supportive of her father's socialist beliefs. As Olmo takes on his fateful role of leader among the poor farmers and their families, he clashes several times with Attila. The latter, whose psychopathic tendencies have been revealed via the murders of a cat and a small boy (the latter at Alfredo and Ada's wedding and for which Olmo was initially blamed), commits further atrocities such as killing the elderly Mrs. Pioppi in order to steal her land and home. However, he becomes a fresh target of ridicule at the hands of the peasants; led by Olmo, they take turns throwing manure at him after Attila tries to sell Olmo like a slave. Olmo flees to keep from being killed by the fascists, and Attila reacts to the humiliation by tearing up Olmo's house with his blackshirts before caging the peasants on the Berlinghieri compound and indiscriminately shooting them. Alfredo fires Attila, but discovers that Ada has already left him.

The story comes full circle when the power shifts after World War II in 1945, and the ruling class is at the mercy of the jovial yet bitter farm labourers. Attila and Regina, having been apprehended, are imprisoned in the Berlinghieri pigsty, and the women peasants cut off Regina's hair. Attila gleefully confesses to the murders he has committed over the years and is executed on the spot. Olmo returns to the farm in time to see Alfredo being brought before a workers' tribunal to stand trial. Many workers come forth and accuse Alfredo of letting them suffer in squalor while he profited from their labours, although he did not support fascism. Alfredo is sentenced to death, but his execution is prevented after Olmo explains that the ''padrone'' is dead, so Alfredo Berlinghieri is alive, suggesting that the social system has been overthrown with the end of the war. As soon as the verdict is reached, however, representatives and soldiers of the new government, which represents the Communist Party, Christian Democrats, the Action Party, Liberals, and Socialists arrive and call on the peasants to turn in their arms. Olmo convinces the peasants to do so, overcoming their scepticism. Alone with Olmo, Alfredo declares "The ''padrone'' is alive", indicating the struggle between the working and ruling classes is destined to continue.

The film ends with Alfredo and Olmo playfully tackling each other as they did in their childhood, then the scene suddenly jumps forward several years to the present day with the elderly Alfredo and Olmo walking along a railway track. Alfredo lies down in the center of the tracks as his younger self would do as a game while a train would run over the tracks, but Alfredo would emerge unharmed as he would lie perfectly still. Alfredo appears to lay himself across the tracks as a train approaches in a clear attempt at suicide as if he has chosen to end his life at that time. The final shot shows the train traveling over the younger Alfredo lying perfectly still in the center of the tracks.

Set in between the two World Wars, Noelle Page is born to a poor family in Marseille, France, though she is led to believe she is better than everyone else. She is initially devoted to her father, who capitalizes on her beauty when she comes of age and forces her to be the mistress of Auguste Lanchon, a well-off boutique owner. She comes to an epiphany that if she can control men, she can be powerful. She escapes to Paris, where she is enchanted by American pilot Lawrence "Larry" Douglas, who promises to marry her when he returns from London. When he does not return, she develops pneumonia, and is saved by Jewish medical intern Israel Katz, who selflessly helps her get back on her feet. Furious over Larry's betrayal, she aborts their unborn child in the most painful way and devotes the rest of her life planning revenge against him. Meanwhile, Larry returns to the United States and marries Catherine, though their relationship is strained after World War II, since Catherine feels like Larry returned as a different man.

Noelle uses the war to her advantage. She hires a private investigator and learns of Larry and Catherine's marriage. She seduces two men, actor-singer Philippe Sorel and director Armand Gautier, and becomes a popular name in theater and film. At one point, she risks her plan to help Israel — the only man who has treated her with kindness — escape to Africa from the Nazis. She attracts the attention of Constantin "Costa" Demiris, a powerful Greek whose business extends to every industry in the world. She becomes his mistress and moves to his private villa. She learns that Larry is having a difficult time adjusting to a regular life and his aggressive pilot skills make him unsuited to a commercial airline setting, and convinces Demiris to hire him. Larry and Catherine move to Greece for his new job, and Noelle discovers that Larry does not even remember her. She treats him poorly as an employee, pushing him to angrily rape her when she emasculates him. She gets excited and falls in love with him again. Larry cannot recall her claims of their past, but stays with her for her power. However, he becomes unsettled when his co-pilot and his other mistress, Helena — two people compromising his and Noelle's relationship — suddenly disappear. Noelle insists that Larry and Catherine, whose marriage is at its lowest point, divorce so they can be together. When Catherine constantly refuses and fails an attempted suicide, Noelle plots to kill her. Larry abandons her in a sea cave on their trip, but is forced to return for her when the coast guard notices him exiting alone. Catherine tries to tell the doctor about Larry's plot to kill her, but the doctor thinks she is hallucinating. Catherine wakes up in the middle of the night and overhears Larry and Noelle plotting her death and she escapes during a heavy thunderstorm. She goes into a boat, but falls overboard, apparently drowning.

Catherine's claims against them lead Larry and Noelle to be put on trial for her murder. Demiris is noticeably absent, but visits Noelle in jail. He claims to still love her and offers to pay the judge off if she will stay with him forever. Towards the end of the trial, Demiris' lawyer, Napoleon Chotas, informs Larry, Noelle, and Larry's lawyer Starvos that Demiris made a deal with the judge: if they plead guilty, Larry will be banned from Greece and will serve a short sentence in America while Noelle's passport will be taken and she will stay with him forever. They both agree to the deal. However, after pleading guilty, they realize that there was never a deal made when the judge thanks them for having a conscience and admitting to the murder despite the lack of evidence against them. Chotas offers Starvos a position in his firm in exchange for his silence. They are sentenced to death, and Demiris, sitting in the courtroom, looks pleased. They are executed months later.

In the end, Demiris donates money to a convent near the sea, where a woman implied to be Catherine is kept, having been found on the shore.

The film begins with Tunin (Giancarlo Giannini) learning that his friend, an anarchist who was plotting to kill Benito Mussolini, has been killed by Mussolini's fascist police in the countryside. Tunin decides to take up the cause his friend died for. The movie then shows Tunin entering a brothel in Rome and meeting Salomè (Mariangela Melato), and the two have a casual sexual encounter. Salomè explains her reasons for helping in the assassination plot as her former lover was wrongfully beaten to death by Mussolini's police in Milan. The story continues as Salomè arranges for her, Tunin and Tripolina (Lina Polito), another prostitute at the brothel, to spend the day with Spatoletti (Eros Pagni), the head of Mussolini's police. The four of them go to the countryside near Rome where the assassination will take place in a few days' time. Salomè keeps Spatoletti busy while Tunin scouts out the area and makes a plan. Tunin takes an interest, however, in Tripolina, and they fall in love. Tunin convinces Tripolina to spend the next two days with him before the assassination as he fears they may be his last. On the morning of the assassination, Tripolina is supposed to wake Tunin early. She loves him and is scared he will die so she decides she will not wake him. Tripolina and Salomè argue about this and what to do but in the end they decide to let him sleep. Tunin wakes up and is furious at both of them, and he goes into a tirade that draws the attention of the police. He starts a shootout with them and screams that he wants to kill Mussolini. He is captured and beaten to death by the police. The film ends the way it began showing the full title of the film "Stamattina alle 10, in via dei Fiori, nella nota casa di tolleranza..." ''This morning at 10, on Via dei Fiori (Flowers Street), in a noted brothel'' which is the headline of an unnamed newspaper. The article, displaying fascist censorship, states that Tunin (who is unnamed) was arrested and then took his own life.

The film follows the personal relationship between Arkady Shapira, his terminally ill wife Irina, and their two sons, Joshua and Reuben. Joshua, the elder brother, is a hit-man for the Russian-Jewish mafia in Brooklyn and estranged from his family. After finishing a contract killing, Joshua is ordered to kill an Iranian jeweler in Brighton Beach, which he reluctantly accepts. Joshua stands outside his family's apartment, where he is spotted by one of his old friends Sasha, who tells Joshua's brother Reuben the next day. Reuben goes to the hotel where Joshua is staying to see him. Joshua asks Reuben how he knew he was in Brighton, and they plan to meet again the next day.

Joshua waits near the boardwalk where Sasha is and intimidates him to tell who else knows about Joshua being in Brighton. Sasha brings Joshua to the car repair stand where Viktor and Yuri are. Joshua says they will help him find the Iranian jeweler and when they refuse, Joshua threatens them.

When a man notices Joshua walking on the street, Joshua follows him to a phone booth and shoots him dead to avoid being exposed, angering neighborhood boss Boris Volkoff. Joshua starts dating his ex-girlfriend Alla Shustervich, who asks Reuben if he has seen Joshua anywhere, and the trio see a movie together. Eventually, Reuben takes Joshua home to see his parents again, but Arkady denounces him as a murderer and kicks him out.

Joshua uses information about his father's affair to see his dying mother, who, after reminiscing about the past, asks him to go to his grandmother's birthday party, which Joshua agrees to. On the day of the party, Joshua meets with his friends to kidnap the jeweler. They take him to the dump where Joshua kills the man, before burning the body in the furnace. They wipe the gun clean of prints and drop it near the furnace. Reuben witnesses the killing, and takes the gun from the murder scene. Arkady discovers that Reuben has been skipping school for two months and beats him. Upon seeing Reuben's bruised face, Joshua brings Arkady to a snowy field and prepares to kill him, but loses his nerve after Arkady tells him that there's nowhere left for him to go in Brighton Beach. Afterwards, Arkady relinquishes his son to Volkoff and Irina dies.

The next day when Reuben is riding his bike, two of Volkoff's men push him to the ground and tell him that Joshua is a dead man. With the mafia pursuing him, Joshua stays at Alla's.

Volkoff's men look for Joshua and search Alla's neighborhood. Reuben finds out from Sasha where Joshua is and rides there on his bike to warn his brother. One of Volkoff's men finds Alla outside hanging out laundry and shoots her before escaping. Reuben finds Alla's body and shoots the second would-be assassin. Sasha arrives on the spot and, seeing somebody behind the sheets that Alla had hung out to dry, immediately shoots the person through the sheet, believing it is one of the men looking for Joshua. When he looks behind the sheet, he realizes that he has killed Reuben; he runs off before Joshua can show up. Afterwards, Joshua finds Reuben and takes his body, wrapped in the sheet, to the furnace for cremation.

In the game, Tux begins in Icy Island. Tux holds a picnic with Penny, his girlfriend. He starts dancing and gets distracted, he doesn't notice that the villain of the game, named Nolok, kidnaps Penny. Once he finds that Penny is missing, and determined to save her, Tux begins his journey. He then navigates the Icy Island and later Forest to find her.

The opening of this play is "This is a simple-minded play about men who enjoy killing, and those who don't."

Big-game hunter and war hero Harold Ryan returns home to America, after having been presumed dead for several years. During the war, he killed over 200 men and women, and countless more animals — for sport. He was in the Amazon Rainforest hunting for diamonds with Colonel Looseleaf Harper, a slow-witted aviation hero, who had the unhappy task of dropping the atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Harold finds that his wife Penelope has developed relationships with men very much unlike himself, including a vacuum cleaner salesman called Shuttle and a hippie doctor called Dr. Woodly, who later becomes Harold's foe. Harold also finds that his son, Paul, has been pampered and grown unmanly. Harold Ryan, the prolific killing machine, is very unsatisfied. It is set during 1960s America, and Harold feels the country has become weak, all the heroes have been replaced by intolerable pacifists, and that in postwar America, no proper enemy is available for him to vanquish. This is the story of his tragic attempt to find one.

The "Wanda June" of the title is a young girl who died before she could celebrate her birthday. She was run over by an ice cream truck, but she is very pleased with her situation in Heaven, and feels that dying is a good thing and everyone in Heaven loves the person who sent them there. Her birthday cake was subsequently purchased by one of Penelope's lovers, for a celebration of Harold's birthday in his absence. Wanda June and several other deceased connections to Harold Ryan (including his ex-wife Mildred who drank herself to death because she could not stand Harold's premature ejaculation, and Major Siegfried von Konigswald, the Beast of Yugoslavia, Harold Ryan's most infamous victim) speak to the audience from Heaven, where Jesus, Judas Iscariot, Adolf Hitler, and Albert Einstein are happily playing shuffleboard.

Set on Long Island, the film opens with Joey Buttafuoco playing drums, driving under influence of cocaine, fleeing from the cops and visiting his mother's grave. At home, his wife Mary Jo awaits his return, disappointed in his drug relapse. After she threatens to leave him if he does not quit using drugs, Joey decides to enter rehab. Six weeks later, he is a renewed man, promising his wife he is now the person again she fell in love with. Three years later, in the summer of 1991, he works in an auto repair shop, and meets 17-year-old Amy Fisher, who begs Joey to repair her car without telling her parents. Joey agrees, even though he is a close acquaintance of her father Elliot. Amy frequently crashes her car, prompting her to make multiple visits to Joey. It does not take long before she starts coming on to him, making hints of her promiscuous past despite her young age. Even though he does not respond to her affection, Joey does not especially push her away and constantly pays her special attention.

One day at the carnival with her friend Lizzy, Amy notices Joey and surprises him with a kiss. Joey is startled and immediately leaves. After he is gone, Amy claims to Lizzy that she has been dating him for a while now. The next day, Joey finds out that Elliot has filed a complaint with the police after Amy has claimed that Joey gave her herpes. Joey sets out to the Fisher residence to set things straight, and Amy eventually admits that she lied about the situation. Joey is outraged, though does not inform his wife, fearing that it will affect their marriage. Later, at a cafe, Joey assures Amy that he has no interest in leaving his wife and children, and ignores her when she shows to him that she is wearing his car repair shop t-shirt. By now, Amy is madly in love with Joey and thinks that the only thing holding them apart is Mary Jo. She hires a contract killer to kill Mary Jo - paying him $600 and allowing him to sleep with her - though the young man eventually chickens out.

Six months later, she shows up at the Buttafuoco residence once again and claims to Mary Jo that Joey is having an affair with her "16-year-old sister", showing him Joey's car repair shop t-shirt to "prove" her claim. When Mary Jo refuses to believe her, Amy takes out her gun and shoots Mary Jo in the head. Later at the hospital, Joey is informed that his wife's situation is critical and that she might be paralyzed for the rest of her life, if she does not die. Amy, meanwhile, sets out to her boyfriend Paul, who is in a relationship with another woman, for comfort. Back in the hospital, a severely injured Mary Jo informs Joey and the detectives that her attacker owned his repair shop t-shirt. Joey then realizes Amy shot Mary Jo. Following her arrest, Amy claims that she and Joey both conspired to kill Mary Jo, enabling them to spend their life together. Joey denies any of Amy's claims and swears to the cops that he was never involved with her. In the media, Joey is frequently mentioned as an adulterer and conspirator, causing even Mary Jo to question her husband.

Even though he is advised to not set out to the media, Joey decides to make an official report after the media releases a sex tape of Amy and an older man. It is claimed that Joey forced her into a life of prostitution, and that the older man of the tape was one of her clients. In prison, Amy continues to make love claims to Joey, now through letters. During the court case, Amy's bail is set at $2 million, the highest in New York state history, and Joey is tarnished by reporters. He tries to stand by his wife, but Mary Jo is confused by all the "evidence" that's coming up in court, "proving" Joey is guilty. She blames him for not being able to protect her, though she does not leave him.

By August 1992, bail for Amy is made by a TV network working to adapt her story. Joey's life falls more apart when he is informed that the entire Buttafuoco family will lose the auto repair shop if it is proven that he had an affair with Amy (the pressure causes his father to have a heart attack). The Buttafuocos want to allow Amy to have a plea bargain, or else her attorney will destroy the family company. Even though Mary Jo objects to the situation, reminding her family that she is the victim here, Amy is allowed a deal in court: she will receive 5 to 15 years for "reckless assault". Pleas of "attempted murder" among others are dropped, so the D.A. can come after Joey Buttafuoco for statutory rape. Soon after, a videotape is released in which Amy brags about her plea, and asks Paul to marry her. The tape allows the Buttafuocos to clear their name, while Amy receives the maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.

After the Globe Theatre burns down in 1613 during a performance of Shakespeare's play ''Henry VIII'', William Shakespeare, aged 49, returns home from London to Stratford-upon-Avon to rejoin his wife, Anne Hathaway. Shakespeare and Anne have a distant relationship, as he has spent most of their marriage working in London, and she is a down-to-earth country woman who cannot read or write. Their marriage has never recovered from the death of their son Hamnet, aged 11, in an outbreak of plague in Stratford while his father was in London. While they also have two daughters, Hamnet was Shakespeare’s favourite child, especially because of the poems which he believes the child wrote. Shakespeare now devotes his time to tending to the family garden. In spite of his hard work he is not very successful.

The Shakespeares' elder daughter Susanna is married to a doctor named John Hall, who is a prominent Puritan in town. Susanna has to stifle her independence and her own personality to live by her husband's moral codes. She is accused of committing adultery, and faces a public trial. Shakespeare terrifies her accuser by claiming that he knows an African actor who was once in love with Susanna, and who would kill anyone who ruined her good name. The accuser fails to attend the hearing, as a consequence of which Susanna is acquitted. Anne is impressed by her husband's actions, especially as she knows that he was lying: the African actor was a gentle person who would never harm anyone.

Shakespeare's younger daughter, Judith (Hamnet's twin), is outspoken in her doubts about the role of women in Jacobean England. She has not been allowed to have an education or opportunities in life, because it is expected she will marry and provide children. She has refused to marry, and is bitter at her father for not loving her as much as her dead brother. One night during an argument, Judith confesses to Shakespeare that it was she who wrote the poems, rather than her brother. They were in Hamnet's handwriting because Judith cannot read or write, and dictated them to him. Anne agrees that Hamnet was not especially intelligent; they have hidden this from Shakespeare so he would be able to keep his fond memories.

The Shakespeares receive a visit from the Earl of Southampton, Shakespeare's former literary patron, to whom he wrote his 154 sonnets. This upsets Anne; she is aware of rumours that her husband and Southampton were lovers. While drinking with Southampton, Shakespeare recites his Sonnet 29, expressing his feelings for Southampton and hoping that Southampton felt the same way about him. Southampton cuts off the conversation, and seems uncomfortable, but as he leaves he also recites Sonnet 29, indicating to Shakespeare that he did have feelings for him.

After some time at home, Shakespeare and Anne grow closer and develop a mature relationship. Anne ultimately allows her husband to sleep with her in the family's second-best bed (the best bed is reserved for guests). Having fallen back in love with Anne, Shakespeare amends his will to make sure that she will receive this bed. Now that the truth has been told about the poems, Judith also develops a warmer relationship with her father. She agrees to marry a local man, Thomas Quiney, who has been her suitor for some time. However Quiney's reputation is damaged when his former sweetheart gives birth to his illegitimate child, and the baby and mother die during labour. Judith becomes pregnant by Quiney, much to Shakespeare's delight.

While researching, Shakespeare discovers that there was no notable plague outbreak in 1596, the year that Hamnet died. He becomes suspicious and questions his family. Anne tries to convince him that Hamnet died of plague, but Judith confesses the truth. One day as a child, Judith told her brother that she was going to reveal the truth to their father, that Hamnet did not write the poems. That night, Hamnet went missing. He was found in a nearby pond, having drowned, with the copies of the poems in the water with him. Hamnet would never normally enter the pond, and so Anne and Judith suspect he committed suicide. The women covered it up, and told everyone that the boy had died of plague. Although it is an emotional revelation, the truth allows Shakespeare to finally come to terms with his son's death, and to accept a more honest memory of the boy.

In April 1616 Shakespeare's fellow playwright Ben Jonson visits him and they reminisce about their lives. On the 23rd of April, Shakespeare's fifty-second birthday, he is feeling unwell. His wife and daughters gather to present him with a surprise. Susanna has been teaching Anne and Judith how to read and write. Susanna has found the Shakespeares' marriage certificate, and Anne finally signs her name, where previously she had only been able to sign with an "X".

Shakespeare dies that day. At his funeral, the three women recite the song "Fear No More" from Shakespeare's play ''Cymbeline''. They are now all able to read.

''Bob Roberts'' takes place in Pennsylvania in 1990. It depicts a fictitious senatorial race between a conservative Republican folk singer, Bob Roberts, and the incumbent Democrat, Brickley Paiste. The film is shot through the perspective of Terry Manchester, a British documentary filmmaker who is following the Roberts campaign. Through his lens we see Roberts travel across the state, performing songs about drug users, lazy people and the triumph of traditional family values over the rebelliousness of the 1960s. As the campaign continues, Paiste remains in the lead until a scandal arises involving him and a young woman who was seen emerging from a car with him. Paiste claims that she was a friend of his granddaughter whom he was driving home, but he cannot shake the accusations.

Throughout the campaign, reporter Bugs Raplin attempts to use the documentary being made about Roberts as a way to expose him to the public as a fraud. Raplin believes that Roberts' anti-drug charity, Broken Dove, is connected to an old CIA drug trafficking scheme. As the election approaches, Roberts is asked to appear on a network's sketch comedy show. When Roberts announces that he will not be playing the song he had originally proposed, a dispute breaks out between the cast and producers of the show. This new song turns out to be nothing more than a thinly veiled campaign endorsement, and an angry staff member of the network pulls the plug mid-performance. As Roberts is leaving the studio, he is seemingly shot by a would-be assassin. Raplin, who has been causing problems for the campaign, is initially linked to the shooting, but he is later cleared when it is found that due to constrictive palsy in his right hand he physically could not have fired the gun. Following the incident, Raplin contends that Roberts was never actually shot and that the gun was fired into the ground.

The campaign is boosted by public support following the assassination attempt, and Roberts wins the election with 52 percent of the vote. Although Roberts claims that his wounds have left him paralyzed from the waist down, he is seen tapping his feet at a celebration party. While Terry Manchester is interviewing Roberts' supporters outside the new senator's hotel, a boy runs up shouting, "He's dead, he's dead, they got him!" When Manchester asks him what he is talking about, the boy shouts, "Bugs Raplin! He's dead! They got him!" A joyful celebration breaks out among Roberts' supporters, the shot changes to an image of his hotel room, and an upright walking shadow suggesting Roberts' profile passes the window before the lights go out. The film ends with a radio news report about Raplin's death at the hands of a right-wing fanatic and a shot of Manchester standing in the Jefferson Memorial, looking at the words, "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man", inscribed there.

Comedian Albert Brooks (played by himself) leads a documentary film project meant to encapsulate the joys, sorrows and intimacy of real life by filming a regular american family at all times for a full year using expensive cameras: some installed on walls and four large helmet-like ones worn by a small camera crew that follows Brooks and the family in and out of their neighboring homes (a regular film crew is hired by the studio but aren’t needed.)

After countless testing, two families are declared ‘’perfect’’: the Feltons and the Yeagers. Brooks tells the audience that the Feltons are the clear pick because they live in Wisconsin and the Yeagers live in Arizona. The studio picks the Yeagers.

The Yeagers are sent on vacation and filming starts as soon as they arrive back at the airport, causing immediate nervousness in the family. Brooks takes an hour off to do antiquing while the Yeagers have pizza and argue about rules at the dinner table. The father, Warren, makes a few unsympathetic remarks and ends up eating alone.

Doctors Howard Hill and Ted Cleary are there to observe the project’s integrity and progress. Cleary does not appreciate Brooks’ intrusive method of constantly filming the family, worrying that their hold of reality is being threatened.

The mother, Jeanette, leaves the house without cameras to unwind and meets Brooks later to thank him by inviting him to an appointment at the gynecologist. Brooks is thrilled until Jeanette kisses him, which he dislikes. He warns her that he’s no better than her husband and that his charisma ‘’doesn’t run deep.’’

The gynecologist refuses to be on camera because of a damning news story that ran about him years ago. Brooks offers him $500 to accept but then recognizes the man as ‘’the baby broker’’ from the news story and the deal is off.

Warren brings the crew to witness a day at his work as a veterinarian. Being nervous from the cameras, he starts surgery on a horse by accidentally ordering an anesthetic drug twice and killing the animal instantly. He asks Brooks to not show the footage in the film but Brooks won’t sign off on that.

Jeannette’s grandmother also dies and the family enters a deep depression. In trying to cheer the family up, Brooks invites Jeanette to a dinner date which she declines, having changed her mind on her attraction to him. Brooks then shows up to the house in a clown costume to cheer the kids but they are at school. While still in costume, Brooks is asked to sit down with Warren and Jeannette, where Warren confesses to feeling a nervous breakdown. Brooks is dismissive of the claim, saying that it’s okay to be sad and confused as long as you don’t ‘’clam up’’.

After a meeting with the doctors, some scientists from the institute and an old-timey film producer obsessed with getting movie stars involved, Dr. Cleary leaves the project, disapproving of how the family is being treated. The family return to a happier, more harmonious lifestyle until Cleary’s book on the project is published, calling it ‘’mind-control’’ and ‘’psychological rape’’. The book attracts attention on the family from newscasters, much to the anger of Brooks and the discomfort of the Yeagers.

Another meeting with Dr. Hill, the institute and the film producer calls for the termination of the project. Brooks brings the Yeagers to the meeting and, to his surprise, they also want to end the project. Despite his pleas and threats for them to stay, they do not change their minds and the producer calls for the Yeagers to be paid anyway to apologize for the stress they endured. Brooks suggests to start the project over with the Feltons back in Wisconsin but is turned down by the producer.

While dressing back into the clown costume for a benefit at a children’s hospital, Brooks starts losing his mind over the project. In a desperate attempt to find a solid ending to the film, Brooks recalls the endings of famous films and picks ''Gone with the Wind'' as the one he should copy. He burns down the Yeagers’ house with elation in front of them, the camera crew and the scientists. No one is harmed.

An epilogue is presented in text form saying that the house was rebuilt with a tennis court added for ‘appreciation’, that Dr. Cleary’s book sold poorly and he is now ill. Real-life historians are invited to call 1-800-555-3824, should they want documentation on the project.

Mick (Darren Healy) and Kev (Niall O'Shea) spend a late afternoon near railroad tracks by the seaside where Mick teaches Kev how to "shotgun" beer for reasons then unknown to the viewer. He observes that Kev is "a bit of a wuss" after he fails to replicate the proper shotgunning technique and calls for Kev to come sit close to him for a test of courage, the knife game, which involves stabbing a knife between outstretched fingers at an ever-faster rate. The game is usually played with one person's hand at a time and as a gesture of what may be seen as self-sacrifice, Mick puts his hand over Kev's in order to shield Kev's hand from the brunt of an injury should it occur.

When a train speeds by them, Mick accidentally cuts Kev and himself very slightly with the knife. They clasp each other's hands tightly and Mick, who suddenly seems very insecure and in need of affection is lovingly embraced by Kev, who perhaps has known all along why Mick brought him here.

A single screen of credits appears, then the film ends with a brief shot of the two in silhouette, standing apart, watching the sun set over the ocean.

Slans are evolved humans, named after their alleged creator, Samuel Lann. They have the psychic abilities to read minds and are super-intelligent. They possess near limitless stamina, "nerves of steel," and superior strength and speed. When Slans are ill or seriously injured, they retreat into a healing trance.

There are two kinds of Slans. One type has tendrils on their heads and can read the minds of ordinary humans and telepathically communicate with other Slans. The tendrils are golden-colored, making it easy to spot a Slan. These Slans are hunted to near extinction. The other type is tendrilless, still super intelligent but without psychic abilities, except the ability to hide their thoughts from the first type of Slan. The human dictator Kier Gray leads a campaign to exterminate the Slans.

As the novel begins, nine-year-old Jommy Cross (a telepathic Slan of the first type) travels with his mother to the capital, Centropolis. They are discovered and Jommy's mother is killed, while Jommy flees. Jommy Cross is not only the heir to the brilliant inventions of his father, but he represents the last hope of the Slan race to save it from genocide. In fulfilling his mission, he seeks to destroy Kier Gray, and, in their final confrontation, discovers an astonishing secret.

The book picks up the story nine months after the end of ''Rama II''. The book follows the story of three astronauts from the expedition in ''Rama II'' who were trapped aboard the cylindrical alien spacecraft, Rama II, heading out towards deep space. Along the journey, five children were born. Simone Tiasso Wakefield, Catharine Colin Wakefield, Eleanor Joan Wakefield, Benjamin Ryan O'Toole and Patrick Erin O'Toole, were born by Nicole des Jardins from her relationships with Richard Wakefield and Michael O'Toole. These children later become major characters in ''Rama Revealed''. After a twelve-year journey, they arrive in the vicinity of the star Sirius, where all eight rendezvous with a Raman Node.

At the Node they are subjected to physiological tests for a year while Rama is refurbished, and they are eventually sent back to the solar system, this time to collect two thousand more representatives of humanity. An Earth agency, known as the ISA, receives the message from Rama requesting two thousand humans. Upon its reception, the message is kept secret and, under the guise of a new Martian colony, the ISA starts acquiring its payload. The ISA selects a handful of their own representatives; meanwhile, they selectively gather convicts and promise them freedom if they are chosen to be a colonist. The payload is subdivided into three ships: the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria (names based on Christopher Columbus's ships Niña, Pinta, and Santa María) that arrive sequentially at Rama. At this point the colonists believe everything is a hoax (despite the colossal size of Rama) created by the ISA. With that discontent as the tone upon their arrival, Rama III heads back to deep space with its new payload.

Soon an aggressive group of humans, led by a mob boss, seizes control of the human colony and begins a war of annihilation and propaganda against one of the other races occupying the massive spacecraft. The original astronauts and their children find themselves powerless to prevent the genocide. However, the aggressive behavior of the human species does not go unnoticed: Another species, unknown to the humans, observes their behavior and starts considering a possible counterattack.

Meanwhile, Rama III determines that total escalation of the conflict is imminent and transmits an emergency signal to its ancient constructors. The book ends with a cliffhanger, on the eve of the execution of one of the original astronauts.

The game world of ''Giants'' is set on a fictional "Island" traveling through space. Its surface comprises grasslands, deserts, and forests, surrounded by azure seas. Players have an unobstructed view of the game world to its horizon; whereas distant objects are slightly blurred to convey a sense of distance. Missions for Meccaryns provide cover to hide behind, large spaces of water for Reapers, and creatures for Kabuto to eat.

Characters

Planet Moon intended for the player characters to provide a varied gameplay experience, laying down requirements to make the characters distinct with unique advantages and disadvantages.

• Meccaryns use high technology and attack as a pack led by the player. Meccaryn players sport guns, explosives, and backpacks that provide special abilities: jet packs allow players to fly over obstacles and outmaneuver opponents, and the "Bush"-pack camouflages the character as a shrub. In single-player mode, players assume the role of Baz, leader of a group of Meccaryns comprising Gordon, Bennett, Tel, and Reg. Several scenarios in the game shows the responsible Baz frustrated with the laxity of Gordon and Bennett, and the inquisitive Tel and Reg.

• Sea Reapers are amphibious, humanoid swimmers. Therefore, they regain health in contact with water, and the game's Piranhas do not attack them. To travel fast over land, players can "turbo boost" their Reapers to targeted areas. The Reapers can use swords, bows, and spells, such as summoning firestorms or tornadoes, in combat. Planet Moon Studios initially conceived the Sea Reaper single-player character, Delphi, as evil, but later gave her a conscience.

• Kabuto is the title creature of the game, and the only one of his race. In his back-story, the Reapers created him as their guardian, but found him beyond control. Creative Director Tim Williams gave the "Citizen" title to Kabuto for its allusion to the character's wish for a sense of belonging to the Island. The game developer modeled Kabuto's attacks after those of giant monsters in classic monster movies, allowing him to use professional wrestling attacks and aerial techniques such as elbow drops, foot stomps, and the "butt flop" described as "like the body slam, but with less dignity". To balance his strength, a weak point at his waist inflicts heavy damage when struck. Players playing the giant monster can assume a perspective through his mouth to target prey.

For non-playable races, the team designed Smarties to have oversized heads, bulging eyes, and idiotic personalities for comedic effect. Players labor for the Smarties while witnessing their hedonistic indulgences. The payoff, however, is a "giant gun". Standard enemies include Reaper Guards (male Reapers with no magical ability, who serve as common soldiers), as well as fauna such as the insectoid Rippers, beast-of-burden Sonaks, and bat-like Verms.

Story

Originally featuring each race in its own distinct story, the single-player mode now depicts a single sequential story wherein the player begins as Baz and must complete a sequence of missions before assuming the role of Delphi. On completion of Delphi's story, the player takes control of a Kabuto character. Williams used cut scenes to introduce and conclude each mission.

As Baz, the player searches for Reg and Tel. Timmy, a Smartie rescued in the first mission, functions as a guide for the player, introducing other Smartie characters and providing exposition of the scenario. The plot portrays the Smarties as suffering under the reign of the Sea Reapers and their Queen Sappho. Alluding to the film ''The Magnificent Seven'', Baz gathers the separated Meccaryns and takes on a quest to solve the Smarties' predicaments. In a climactic cut scene, Sappho sacrifices Timmy to Kabuto, and the young Smartie's grandfather, Borjoyzee, becomes the player's guide. Baz leads an escape from the area and sets up a base to lead a counterattack. Thereafter Delphi becomes the player's character. Yan, the Samurai Smartie, serves as the guide for this story segment, giving instructions on Delphi's abilities. After completing the training missions under Yan, Delphi attacks Sappho's base and the Reapers, eventually confronting the queen in a boss fight. When defeated, Sappho summons Kabuto to destroy the Smarties, but Kabuto eats her instead.

In the final story, Delphi has transformed herself into a Kabuto-like creature to challenge the original. The player wanders around the islands as the Delphi-Kabuto character, searching for prey to increase her size. After Delphi-Kabuto achieves her maximum size, she proceeds to a boss fight with the original Kabuto. Despite her victory, Kabuto revives in a triggered cut scene and restores her Reaper form, whereupon the player takes the role of Baz against the revived monster. After defeating Kabuto, Baz is shown in the final cut scene, flying off to Planet Majorca with Delphi, Borjoyzee, and his fellow Meccaryns.

Three years after the events of the original ''Metal Gear'', FOXHOUND discovers that a hostile nation in the Middle East may have gotten a hold of the plans for Metal Gear and are secretly constructing a new model. Lt. Solid Snake, the FOXHOUND operative responsible for the destruction of Metal Gear, is given orders to lead a three-man team to the enemy's base consisting of himself and two fellow operatives: John Turner, a former Navy Intelligence agent and infiltration pro; and Nick Myer, a weapons and explosive expert formerly with the Marines. The codename of the mission is Operation 747.

Snake infiltrates the enemy's jungle base with the help of John, who acts as a decoy by allowing himself to be captured. Snake eventually learns that the enemy is transporting their weapons, a set of mass-produced Metal Gear tanks, on a cargo ship. Snake blows up the ship's ammunition cache and escapes with the help of the team's helicopter pilot while the ship sinks.

The pilot informs Snake that the enemy has a prototype of the new Metal Gear 2 model in their main base and is told to contact their double agent, Jennifer, on the inside. As Snake goes deep into the base, he defeats an impostor posing as John, regains contact with Nick and eventually comes in touch with Jennifer, who reveals that the enemy commander is planning to launch nukes around the face of the globe. However, as Snake approaches the commander's lair, Nick is mortally wounded and dies, while Jennifer is exposed as a spy and gets captured. Snake confronts the enemy's commander, who reveals himself to be a cybernetically enhanced Big Boss, having survived his previous encounter with Snake. Snake defeats Big Boss and rescues Jennifer, who shows him to the storage facility where Metal Gear 2 is located. Snake destroys the weapon before its launch countdown is completed.

In the aftermath of Operation 747, the United Nations declares "World Peace Day". John Turner is declared missing in action and removed from Navy records, while Nick Myer is awarded three posthumous promotions.

Monroe as Pola, Grable as Loco, and Bacall as Schatze Resourceful Schatze Page, spunky Loco Dempsey, and ditzy Pola Debevoise are money-hungry gold diggers. The trio rent a luxurious Sutton Place penthouse in New York City from Freddie Denmark, who is avoiding the IRS by living in Europe. The women plan to use the apartment to attract rich men. And on the day they move in, Loco carries in groceries, assisted by Tom Brookman (Cameron Mitchell), who is attracted to Schatze. She dismisses him as being poor and sets her sights on the charming, classy, rich widower J.D. Hanley. While she is stalking the older J.D., Tom pursues her. After every date, she says she never wants to see Tom again, refusing to marry another "gas pump jockey".

Meanwhile, Loco meets grumpy businessman, Walter Brewster. He is married, but she agrees to go with him to his lodge in Maine, thinking it is a convention of the Elks Club. Loco discovers her mistake and attempts to leave. However, she comes down with the measles and is quarantined. Upon recovering, she begins seeing forest ranger, Eben Salem. She mistakenly believes Salem is a wealthy landowner instead of a civil servant overseeing acres of forestlands. She is disappointed when she realizes the truth, but loves him anyway and is willing to overlook his financial shortcomings.

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Pola is myopia but hates wearing glasses in the presence of men. She falls for a phony oil tycoon, J. Stewart Merrill, unaware he is a crooked speculator. When she takes a plane from LaGuardia Airport to meet him, she ends up on the wrong plane. A man sits next to her, also wearing glasses. He thinks she is "quite a strudel" and encourages her to wear hers. He is the mysterious Freddie Denmark on his way to Kansas City to find the crooked accountant who got him into trouble with the IRS. He has little luck when he tracks the man down, but he and Pola fall in love and get married.

Loco and Pola are reunited with Schatze just before her wedding to J.D.. Schatze is unable to go through with the marriage and confesses to J.D. that she loves Tom. He agrees to call off the ceremony. Tom is among the wedding guests and the two reconcile and marry. Afterwards, the three happy couples end up at a greasy spoon diner. Schatze jokingly asks Eben and Freddie about their financial prospects, which are slim. When she finally gets around to Tom, he casually admits a net worth of around $200 million, which no one takes seriously. He then calls for the check, pulls out an enormous wad of money, and pays with a $1,000 bill, telling the chef to keep the change. The three astonished women faint, and the men drink a toast to their unconscious wives.

The novel revolves around the mishaps of its narrator, Fred Trumper, a floundering late-twenty-something graduate student with serious commitment and honesty issues that earn him the nickname "Bogus." The novel shows Irving beginning to develop a blend of comedy and pathos, as well as a penchant for fashioning quirky characters. It follows a non-linear narrative in the form of a sort of 'confession' authored by Trumper, who humorously recounts his various failures in life and love, from his New England childhood through his experiences on foreign study in Vienna, Austria, and as a graduate student in Iowa, leading up to the present-action setting, early-1970s New York, where Trumper is attempting to sever himself from his adolescent past. "I want to change", Trumper says at the end of Chapter One. The phrase seems to be the novel's central theme.

The title refers to a method prescribed to Trumper for the treatment of non-specific urological disorders relating to his abnormally narrow urinary tract. Trumper's urologist, Dr. Jean Claude Vigneron, offers him three options for the treatment of his disorder: abstinence from sex and alcohol, a painful operation to widen the urinary canal, or the Water Method, which consists simply of consuming abnormal quantities of water before and after sex to flush bacteria out of the urinary tract. Trumper opts for the Water Method, suggesting both his generally comical cowardice and lack of self-discipline.

Trumper's narration meanders through flashbacks revolving around his relationships with the novel's two primary female characters: Sue "Biggie" Kunft, a former championship downhill skier whom Trumper courts, impregnates, and marries in Vienna while still a student, and Tulpen, Trumper's present day live-in girlfriend, a documentary film editor in New York, where he lands after losing Biggie. Though the two relationships function chiefly as a means of demonstrating Bogus Trumper's tendency to repeat his mistakes, Irving is often noted for his strong, independent female characters, and Tulpen and Biggie can be seen as markers in the development of the strong women in his more popularly successful novels, particularly ''The World According to Garp'' (1979).

Other characters include Trumper's best childhood friend Couth, a still-photographer; Merrill Overturf, an alcoholic and diabetic loon Trumper befriends in Vienna; Ralph Packer, a pretentious documentary filmmaker who employs Trumper as a sound editor; and Colm, Trumper's young son from his first marriage to Biggie.

Trumper is a graduate student at the University of Iowa in comparative literature whose thesis is to be a translation of an ancient, "Old Low Norse" epic called "Akthelt and Gunnel". Irving employs the "Akthelt and Gunnel" poem as a means for allowing Trumper to poke merciless fun at himself through analogously inventing the story of the poem according to his own life's mishaps.

Category:1972 American novels Category:Novels by John Irving Category:Random House books Category:Nonlinear narrative novels

The story begins on the Isle of Wight, 25 years after the events from ''The Day of the Triffids''. The community there has thrived, primarily by refining triffid oil into fuel.

One morning, a solar blackout occurs and triffids once again besiege the island. Pilot David Masen (son of Bill and Josella Masen from ''The Day of the Triffids'') takes to the skies to investigate the cause of the blackout; however, even after taking his plane into the atmosphere as high as it can go, he finds that there is no end to the absolute darkness.

On David's descent, he loses communication with the control tower and is forced to make a crash landing on a floating island populated by triffids. There, he meets an orphaned young girl, Christina, who has been surviving on her own in the wild since she was a young child, primarily because she is immune to triffid stings. The pair are rescued by an American ship that takes them to Manhattan Island in New York City.

Manhattan, a secure and self-contained community like the one on the Isle of Wight, appears at first glance to be a utopia seemingly untouched by the triffid catastrophe. David quickly falls in love with his tour guide, Kerris Baedekker, who is one of the hundreds of daughters of General Fielding, the primary ruler of the city. David divulges to General Fielding that the Isle of Wight has a considerable fleet of aircraft, which, using triffid oil for fuel, can fly much farther than the Manhattan fleet, which runs on wood alcohol.

Just before David is set to return home to the Isle of Wight, he is kidnapped by a rebel group known as the Forresters. However, David ends up siding with them when they reveal that Fielding is actually a terrible dictator named Torrence, an old enemy of David's father, and that he keeps Manhattan prosperous by using the black and blind citizens as slaves, unbeknownst to the rest of the population. The Forresters further reveal that Torrence is planning to attack the Isle of Wight in order to steal their triffid oil refining machinery and that he intends to create a race of soldiers immune to triffid poison by harvesting Christina's ovaries and implanting them into all the viable women in Manhattan.

In order to rescue Christina and Kerris from Torrence's headquarters in the Empire State Building, the Forresters unleash thousands of triffids into the city, some as gigantic as sixty feet tall. Unfortunately, Torrence and his guards manage to fend off the attacks and capture David and his group. However, Torrence is defeated when thousands of slaves arrive, released from their slave camps during the triffid attack, and persuade the soldiers to turn on the dictator.

At the end of the story, it is revealed that the great blackout was caused by interstellar dust, and that even though it continues to wreak havoc on the global climate, people everywhere are still surviving. It is also revealed that up to 25 percent of the population is immune to triffid stings, due to repeated exposure to small amounts of the plant's poison when consuming triffids for food.

The story begins with Batman rescuing a boy kidnapped by Killer Croc when Catwoman steals the ransom money for the boy. As Batman swings through Gotham City in pursuit of her, his grapple is cut and he falls to the ground, fracturing his skull. He is nearly killed by a group of criminals before he is saved by Huntress. His butler, Alfred Pennyworth, follows his instructions to summon his childhood friend, Thomas Elliot, who is now a renowned brain surgeon. Dr. Elliot removes the skull fragments from Bruce's brain. Batman recovers and discovers that Poison Ivy used Catwoman to steal the ransom before taking the money from her. Catwoman is furious when she learns that Ivy had used mind-control powers on her. Batman rescues Catwoman and a tenuous romance blooms between them. Batman eventually decides to trust Catwoman and reveals his identity to her. At this time, Killer Croc's increasing savageness (and decreasing humanity) allows him to escape from Arkham Asylum, with Batman immediately tracking him. Killer Croc leads Batman to one of Poison Ivy's abandoned greenhouses. Before he can interrogate him further, Killer Croc is captured.

Batman and Catwoman track Poison Ivy to Metropolis. There they find Ivy has taken control of Superman, and she commands the Man of Steel to kill Batman. Batman observes that Superman is subconsciously resisting Ivy's influence, holding back in his attempts to kill the Caped Crusader. Using a variety of weapons, including flashbang grenades, hypersonics, electroshock, and a kryptonite ring to defend against Superman, Batman stalls Superman while Catwoman lets Lois Lane fall from the ''Daily Planet'' building. Superman breaks free of Ivy's control to save Lois, he and Batman then capture Ivy.

Later, in Gotham City, Bruce Wayne, Selina Kyle, Leslie Thompkins, and Dr. Elliot are attending the opera ''Pagliacci'', when Harley Quinn tries to rob everyone in the theater. In the ensuing struggle, Dr. Elliot is apparently shot dead by the Joker. An enraged Batman begins to brutally beat the Joker, knocking out Harley Quinn and even Catwoman in the process when they both tried to intervene. Batman attempts to finally kill the Joker but is then dissuaded by former police commissioner James Gordon who intervened by superficially wounding Batman with a gunshot.

Dick Grayson returns to Gotham City for Elliot's funeral. Batman tells him of his suspicions that some mastermind is behind all his enemies behaving so out of character. Behind the scenes, a man with a bandaged face appears at all of the crime scenes, and seems to be orchestrating the plot. He comes to be referred to as Hush.

After foiling an armored car robbery by the Riddler, Nightwing and Batman discover evidence that Ra's al Ghul is also involved in what Batman has come to think of as a grand plot. Batman kidnaps Ra's' daughter Talia and leaves Catwoman to guard her while he seeks out Ra's, who tells Batman that someone from his past has used one of the Lazarus Pits. Catwoman is overpowered by Lady Shiva who has been sent to rescue Talia, but Talia knocks Shiva out and helps Catwoman recover from the attack, later relating these events to Batman. Returning to Gotham, Batman finds Catwoman being attacked by a delusional Huntress. Batman is able to have her knocked out, but then encounters the cause of the Huntress' attack, the Scarecrow, but he overpowers him in a graveyard. He discovers that the current Robin, Tim Drake, has been captured by the former second Robin, Jason Todd, who had previously perished during the events of the 1988 storyline "Batman: A Death in the Family". While fighting Jason, it becomes apparent that Clayface is mimicking the identity of Jason.

Batman then finds a device planted in his computer, which lead him to seek his old friend (and trusted mechanic) Harold. He has a late-night meeting with Harold, who has been missing since the times of the 1999 "No Man's Land" storyline. Harold admits that someone had treated his disfigured condition in exchange for planting that device, but he is shot and killed by Hush before he can name the mastermind. Thomas Elliot is discovered to be the trigger-man, and the face behind the bandages of the mastermind (it is later implied that Clayface had been mimicking Elliot when he appeared to be killed). Elliot held a grudge against the Wayne family since Batman's father, Dr. Thomas Wayne, had saved the life of Elliot's mother after a motor vehicle accident; Elliot had sabotaged his parents' vehicle in order to gain their inheritance, and considered Bruce's father as the one who did not allow his plan to be completed. In the ensuing confrontation, Elliot is shot by the reborn Harvey Dent and plummets into the water, with Batman never having a chance to unmask him (it is only assumed it is Thomas Elliot). His body is unable to be recovered.

In an epilogue to his face-off with Elliot, Batman discovers that the true mastermind behind the conspiracy is the Riddler. Batman realized it was Riddler when he used, not his real name in Elliot's medical records, but the name of the inventor of the crossword puzzle, Arthur Wynne. Riddler had used a Lazarus Pit to cure himself of terminal brain cancer, and during his time in the pit, deduced Batman's identity as Bruce Wayne. Having first approached Thomas Elliot with a cure for his mother's disease (the Lazarus Pit), the Riddler had instead allied with Elliot against Wayne. Riddler was also the only villain who Batman did not believe acted in an unusual way during the entire saga; the robbery Batman foiled was fairly typical of Riddler at the time. The Riddler also tells him that he and Elliot referred to the plot as the "Hush" plot. He further reveals that he knows Batman's identity as Wayne, but Batman is unfazed because a riddle which everyone knows the answer to would be worthless to Riddler. In addition, Batman warns that if Riddler reveals his secrets, it exposes Riddler as the culprit who used Ra's al Ghul's Lazarus Pit, who would then send the League of Assassins after him.

Another mystery begins troubling the Dark Knight. Even though the man he fought at the graveyard was revealed to be Clayface, Jason Todd's remains are still missing from his grave. The Riddler even taunts Batman of his greatest failure to save Jason's life, and refuses to tell him where Jason's body is, prompting Batman to knock out the Riddler.

In the final scene Batman and Catwoman meet. He continues to mistrust her and cannot be sure that she is not more aware of the plot than she admits. While trying to console him, Catwoman inadvertently tells him to "hush" seconds before trying to kiss him, provoking a fierce reaction from Batman that compels her to end the relationship. Before leaving, she says that she does not care if their relationship started out as a "spell". It works because of who they are, and someday he will learn to trust that. Batman also thinks that it may be possible "someday".

Aftermath

After the story's success, Lee and Loeb were slated to follow the story up with another six issues, but the project failed to materialize. Hush's story was continued by AJ Lieberman in the now discontinued ''Batman: Gotham Knights'' title.

The plot element involving Jason Todd was later retconned in other ''Batman'' storylines. In the ''Under the Hood'' arc, it was revealed that Batman was actually fighting the real Jason Todd in the graveyard, who later switched places with Clayface. Todd is now a vigilante known as the Red Hood and aims to dominate Gotham's underworld through vicious tactics. It is also revealed that Batman had suspected that it was really Jason Todd he fought with; he secretly realizes that despite that the supposed impostor mimicked Dick Grayson and Tim Drake in skills, some of his maneuvers uncannily belonged to Jason. His former protégé had been stalking him since then. This is evident during the arc storyline "As the Crow Flies", where it is shown that Jason's mask was found in the Batmobile. After Jason revealed himself to Batman and kidnapped the Joker, he not only antagonizes Batman and his allies in Gotham but also clashes with the Teen Titans, Outsiders and Green Arrow as well. At the same time the Dark Knight has desperately tried to reach Jason in an effort to atone for his past failures. Following the 2005–2006 "Infinite Crisis" storyline, the Riddler spent a year in a coma and lost all memory of ever knowing that Batman was Bruce Wayne.

The "Hush" storyline was followed up in Paul Dini and Dustin Nguyen's storyline, "Heart of Hush", where Hush returns to get revenge on Batman through Catwoman and surgically changed his appearance to match Bruce Wayne's in an attempt to steal his identity. The series was praised for adding backstory and depth to the character of Hush while returning him to a credible threat. An origin story for Hush is given in ''Detective Comics'' #846–847.

In 1784, shortly after the United States wins its independence, American Peter Standish sails from New York to England to marry his cousin. Upon hearing of a Frenchman crossing the English Channel in a balloon, Peter regrets that he will not be able to see the marvels the future has in store.

In 1933, his descendant, also named Peter Standish, unexpectedly inherits a house in Berkeley Square, London. He becomes increasingly obsessed with his ancestor's diary, causing his fiancée Marjorie Frant great concern. When they have tea with the American ambassador, Peter confides to the diplomat with eager anticipation his conviction that he will be transported back 149 years at 5:30 that day. Peter is convinced that all he needs to do is follow his ancestor's diary, since he already knows what happens, from reading it.

He rushes home, and just as he opens the door, he is indeed back in 1784, taking the place of the earlier Peter Standish just as he arrives at the house, then owned by his relations, the Pettigrews. Lady Ann and her grown offspring Tom, Kate, and Helen are there to greet him. The Pettigrews, being in desperate financial straits, are anxious for Kate to marry the wealthy American. Peter is determined not to alter the future he has read about, until he sees Helen for the first time. He tries to fight his attraction to her, but ultimately fails. Helen, meanwhile, is being pressed by her mother to marry Mr. Throstle, but Helen has determined, even before Peter's arrival, not to marry. She later confesses to Peter that she had been dreaming of him before she saw him.

As time goes on, Peter keeps inadvertently giving offense with his unfamiliarity with 18th century customs. People also begin to fear him, as he blunders and speaks of things which have not yet taken place. For example, when he commissions Sir Joshua Reynolds to paint his portrait, he praises another Reynolds work by name, one the painter has only just begun. Kate becomes convinced that Peter is demonically possessed and breaks their engagement. Helen, however, is sympathetic to his difficulties, and falls in love with him.

Helen eventually presses Peter for an explanation of his "second sight", which he has only hinted at. Though he refuses to speak openly, she somehow sees in his eyes visions of his modern world, with all its horrors as well as its marvels, and guesses the truth. Knowing he has become disillusioned, living among ghosts born 149 years before his time, and desperately unhappy with the day-to-day realities of her era (including a lack of hygiene and plumbing, and not bathing regularly in what he calls a "filthy little pigsty of a world"), she urges him to return to his own time. He wants to stay with her regardless of the consequences, but in the end, he does go back to 1933.

When he visits Helen's grave, he learns that she died on June 15, 1787 at the age of 23. Marjorie comes to see him, worried about his sanity because he has been saying that he is from the 18th century. Peter believes his ancestor had switched places with him. He tells her he cannot marry her. Peter is consoled by the epitaph on Helen's grave, and her conviction that they will be together, "not in my time, nor in yours, but in God's".

In the year 2120, humanity has left the Solar System and started the colonization of other planets. One of the farthest colonies is located on the terraformed planet Glorie. The powerful army of the Southern Cross protects the colonists there from any unknown dangers. However, unbeknownst to the humans, Glorie is also the ancestral home of the Zor, a highly advanced race of nomadic humanoid aliens who have returned to reclaim their world.

Characters

Main characters

(Michie Tomizawa): At 17 years of age, Jeanne finds herself the leader of the 15th Squad in the Southern Cross' Alpha Tactics Armored Corps (ATAC). A native from the planet Liberté, Jeanne has a tendency to follow her heart and act rashly. Her superiors consider her to be an embarrassment to the army because they feel that she does not take her duty seriously. Her frequent disregard for protocol, orders, and regulations continually lands her in solitary confinement, often placed there by Lt. Lana Isavia. Fortunately she always manages to be let out when needed. Jeanne develops a romantic interest in Seifriet Weiße, but his reaction is one of puzzlement and disdain. Most of the series revolves around Jeanne's escapades with the 15th Squad, and her increasingly personal war with the invading Zor.

In Robotech, her name was changed to Dana Sterling.

(Kumiko Mizukura): Nicknamed the "Cosmo Amazon," Marie represents the model soldier. She was once the leader of a biker gang and has also an aptitude for machines. Despite her tough exterior, she still feels intensely, and begins a rocky relationship with the womanizer Charles De L'Étoile. As a capable leader, Marie is often the one to snap Jeanne out of her periodic episodes of shock or indecision, usually with a slap to the face. Marie leads her own unit within the Tactics Armored Space Corps (TASC), in which she is also an ace pilot.

(Mika Doi): The third central woman of the Southern Cross. At 19, Lana is the youngest military police officer on Glorie, and one of the highest-ranking. Like Marie, she is quite different from Jeanne, taking her duties very seriously and allowing no compromises regarding protocol and regulations. Her rivalry with Jeanne can be viewed as a subtle game of "cat and mouse." In the beginning of the series, Lana appears to be colder and less personable than Marie. But as the story progresses, it is revealed that she is an even bigger romantic than Jeanne. Her military training eventually conflicts with her passionate emotions, and she is forced to choose between her duty to the Southern Cross and her friendship with the 15th Squad.

Other characters

(Arihiro Hase): Bowie is a private first class assigned to the 15th Squad at the age of 16. Due to his father's influence, he was pressured to join the military even though he is a pacifist more interested in composing music rather than fighting.

In Robotech, his name was changed to Bowie Grant.

(Yūichi Meguro): He is the dutiful sergeant of the 15th Squad, occasionally acting as leader in the absence of a superior officer. He has served longer than anyone else in the 15th Squad, but his conventional mindset is sometimes at odds with his new commanding officer, Jeanne Fránçaix. In Robotech, his name was changed to Angelo Dante.

(Issei Futamata): He is the resident mechanics expert and in-house genius. A quiet individual until a mecha-related issue comes up. His expertise comes in use when assessing and analyzing the Bioroid threat. In Robotech, his name was changed to Louis "Louie" Nichols.

(from the most famous French Parisians subway station on the top of Champs Elysées (Charles de Gaulle l'étoile))(Bin Shimada): At the age of 23, Charles was the former commander of the 15th Squad until a romantic indiscretion had him demoted to private. Charles is a constant womanizer who eventually falls in love with Marie. In Robotech, his named was changed to Sean Phillips.

(Yoshikazu Hirano): He is a human pilot who was captured and brainwashed by the Zor, and later becomes an informant for them. Initially, Seifreit pilots a red Zor Bioroid, and he is nearly unstoppable in battle against Jeanne and her ATAC squadron. He is recaptured by Lana, and his memories are examined for clues into the Zor. His human mind begins to conflict with his Zor brainwashing, and he is nearly driven insane. Instead of breaking down mentally, he decides to take revenge on the Zor for their violation of his mind. In Robotech, his name is changed to Zor Prime (a clone of the original Zor, Protoculture Scientist from the Macross saga).

(Kouji Totani): He is a lieutenant in the Tactics Armored Space Corps (TASC). Lana is impressed with Brown's sense of integrity, optimism, and duty. In Robotech, his name is Lt. Dennis Brown.

(Daisuke Gōri): The supreme general of the Southern Cross. A megalomaniac determined on wiping out the Zor at any cost, he begins to take extreme measures to ensure victory. His policies are heavily criticized by General Emerson. In Robotech, he is called "Supreme Commander Leonard."

(Makoto Terada): Father of Bowie Emerson, and part-time guardian of Jeanne. He is the primary critic of General Leon, but stops short of disobeying orders. His tactical maneuvers during battles in the war with the Zor are seen as innovative and ingenious. His name is unchanged for Robotech.

''' , and ''' (Hirotaka Suzuoki): the leaders of the Zor. In Robotech, they are not individually named but referred to as "The Robotech Masters" or "The Triumvirate."

''' , , '''(Noriko Hidaka): The triplet sirens whose music inspires the Zor people. Musica begins doubting her people's ways and, after meeting Bowie, escapes the mother ship and defects to Glorie. She and Bowie quickly fall in love, and then flee into the woods to escape capture by Lana. In Robotech, they are called Musica (no change), Allegra, and Octavia.

Background

The world of Glorie was founded by the human race in an effort to find new worlds for humanity because the Earth had become uninhabitable as a result of a catastrophic nuclear holocaust. Relay stations have been established at Mars and Jupiter, and as a result the planet "Liberté" located in the Proxima solar system was colonized. The next planet, Glorie, was discovered in the Epsilon Eridani system. Similar in planetary scale and atmospheric conditions to Earth, Glorie still had an unexpectedly harsh natural environment. The planet has an elliptical orbit around the sun, with a cycle of 73 years. Sixty percent of the planet's surface area is land, and in the winter, fifty percent of that land is covered with glaciers. Originally the planetary temperatures in winter averaged between . Thanks to extensive military terraforming, Glorie was successfully turned into a suitable planet for terrestrial life.

The government of Glorie is independent from that of Liberté but is an ally to that planet. In the year 2120 (when this story takes place), Glorie is now a self-sufficient planet in terms of food and resources.

Southern Cross Army

The military organization (referred to as the Southern Cross Army) is under the jurisdiction of its prime minister. The units are divided among the Surface (land/sea) Forces and the Aerospace Forces.

The '''Surface Forces''' consist of: * A.T.A.C. - the Alpha Tactics Armored Corps, * C.D.U. - the Cities Defense Unit, and * T.C. - the Tactics Corps and its specialized subdivisions: ** RE.P. - the Reconnoitering Party, ** CO.S. - the Cold Squad, ** DE.S. - the Desert Squad, ** MO.S. - the Mountains Squad, ** FO.S. - the Forest Squad, ** MA.S. - the Marsh Squad, and ** NA.D. - the Navy Division.

The '''Aerospace Forces''' consist of: * T.A.F. - the Tactics Air Force, * T.S.C. - the Tactics Space Corps, * C.D.F.C. - the Cities Defense Flying Corps, and * T.A.S.C. - the Tactics Armored Space Corps.

There are also security forces and the Glorie Military Police (G.M.P.), which are independent but still directly affiliated with Supreme General Headquarters. Headquarters are located in every major city.

Each unit has a specialized robotic vehicle for combat campaigns. Among them are: * ATAC-01-SCA '''Spartas''': A one-man transformable hit-and-run vehicle used exclusively by the Alpha Tactics Armored Corps (A.T.A.C.). Each Spartas has the ability to transform into 3 modes: Sniping Clapper (a high-speed hovercraft), Walker Cannon (a GERWALK-like artillery emplacement which actually cannot walk but can make rocket-assisted jumps), and Battle Sniper (a humanoid robot form). Models differ depending on the rank of the individual and are upgraded throughout the conflict. By the time that the Auroran is introduced, the Spartas has been remodeled for effective space combat. * TASC-01-SCF '''Logan''': The Logan is a transformable aerial assault mecha used exclusively by the Tactics Armored Space Corps (T.A.S.C.). The mecha has two modes: Flying Cat (fighter) mode for high-speed aerial combat and Flying Walker (humanoid) mode which is suited for near ground assaults. The fighter has the ability to cover great distances but performs poorly in space and is consistently outfought by Bioroids in all early engagements of the war. * TASC-02-SCF '''Auroran''': The Auroran was a late development during the war, that was constructed to replace the Logan. It has the capability to transform into three different modes: Crusader (fighter), Cross Fighter (heavy combat helicopter), and Cosmo Sniper (humanoid). Though the new Cosmo Sniper mode was specifically designed to deal with the Zor Bioroid threat, the Auroran proves only moderately successful, since its debut coincides closely with an improved model of bioroid. * TAF '''Sylphide''': The Sylphide is a fighter used by the Tactics Air Force. This fighter can also be distinguished by a center tail as well as vertical surfaces mounted in the middle of each wing. The weaponry of the Sylphide includes two guns in the fuselage, two guns mounted on a ventral pod and four missile hardpoints (two on the outside of either lower engine nacelle). * GMP '''Garm''': The Southern Cross Glorie Military Police uses this mecha fielded exclusively for it. The unit is capable of identifying personnel and recording evidence in investigations. Its systems have access to the military legal code to assist in determining if the law has been broken. * TC '''Salamander''': The Tactics Corps uses the Salamander robot as their main combat robot for high-mobility heavy-weapons support. The arms have reinforced armor to assist in parrying attacks. There is a thruster in the rear to assist the mecha in leaping.

Personal armor

Every soldier of the Southern Cross Army is issued a personal combat suit known as an "arming doublet." The suit not only acts as protective armor but also improves combat performance. Each suit is equipped to serve different functions and can be altered depending on the mission requirements and needs of each division and rank. All suits are personally tailored for the physique of the individual, resulting in high mobility. Some variants of the arming doublet also have the ability to serve as self-sealed spacesuits.

Zor

The are a race who serve as the antagonists for the Southern Cross Army. The Zor were the former inhabitants of the planet Glorie, but they had to evacuate due to an apocalyptic war. Their advances in biotechnology surpass that of humanity, and the weapons they employ called "Bioroids" serve as a formidable enemy to the units of the Southern Cross. They operate in groups of three. Each member is responsible for one of three functions: information, decision and action. As a whole, they present a powerful threat, but if one member is lost to the group, then they lose their stability and become unable to function. Characteristically, the Zor are human in appearance, tall and slender with violet eyes, silvery hair and pale skin.

The Zor have a symbiotic relationship with a flower native to Glorie referred to as the Protozor, which, like them, exist in trinities.

Bioroids

Like the troops of the Southern Cross, the Zor rely on large humanoid mecha to spearhead military operations. The Zor mecha, called "bioroids," are considerably more advanced than their Southern Cross counterparts, based on a symbiotic interface that conveys the thoughts of the operator directly to the mecha. Because of this interface, Bioroids are effectively "alive," with the pilots acting as their "brains;" this increases the response promptness and makes their movements much more agile that those of the Southern Cross mecha. At the same time, there appears to be no pain-receptor feedback to the pilot, as bioroids are unaffected by direct hits unless the cockpit itself is damaged.

In addition to mentally centered control, bioroids have access to an array of weapons, including both advanced projectile and sustained-beam weapons held in one hand. Typical engagements also find the bioroids riding anti-gravity hovercraft equipped with their own strafing weapons, and it appears that the hovercraft can be summoned to their riders remotely.

Since the Zor are not a race suited for combat, they abduct personnel from the armies of the Southern Cross and Liberté forces, brainwash them, and use them as "biohuman" pilots for the bioroids. Southern Cross troops adapt slowly to the tactical imbalance they have versus bioroid forces but become ensnared as they start to gain ground in combat by the psychological deterrent of knowing that they are fighting their own kind. Even late in the war, Southern Cross troops demonstrate conflicting emotions over advances in weaponry, knowing that increases in their own kill rates paradoxically still mean greater death for humanity as a whole.

During the time of the conflict, many variations of the Bioroid are implemented by the Zor in order to adapt to the ever-changing battle conditions experienced on the field. The final version of the Bioroid embodies the Zor's own triplet model of operation, with each triple set representing thought, action, and reaction.

The story takes place in 2092, 80 years after the events depicted in ''Macross: Do You Remember Love?'' The SDF-1 ''Macross'' still exists, as does the U.N. Spacy ''Minmay Attack'' stratagem, which has been successfully employed to thwart the Zentradi threat ever since. However, a new humanoid alien race called the Marduk (Mardook in the original Japanese version), arrives in the Solar System with enslaved Zentradi and Meltlandi warriors who are seemingly unaffected by the ''Minmay Attack''. The Marduk employ their own female singers, called Emulators, who incite their giant warriors with songs.

The story focuses on reporter Hibiki Kanzaki, who is caught in the middle of the action when he rescues an Emulator, Ishtar, while covering a battle between the U.N. Spacy and the Marduk. Hibiki proceeds to teach her about Earth's culture, which she then shares with the rest of the Marduk. However, the Marduk leader, Emperor Ingues, considers Earth's culture anathema. With the help of ace fighter pilot Silvie Gena, Hibiki and Ishtar attempt to end the war.

The novel centres on Charlotte Heywood, the eldest of the daughters still at home in the large family of a country gentleman from Willingden, Sussex. The narrative opens when the carriage of Mr and Mrs Parker of Sanditon topples over on a hill near the Heywood home. Because Mr Parker is injured in the crash, and the carriage needs repairs, the Parkers stay with the Heywood family for a fortnight. During this time, Mr Parker talks fondly of Sanditon, a town which until a few years before had been a small, unpretentious fishing village. With his business partner, Lady Denham, Mr Parker hopes to make Sanditon into a fashionable seaside resort. Mr Parker's enormous enthusiasm for his plans to improve and modernise Sanditon has resulted in the installation of bathing machines and the construction of a new home for himself and his family near the seashore. Upon repair of the carriage and improvement to Mr Parker's foot, the Parkers return to Sanditon, bringing Charlotte with them as their summer guest.

Upon arrival in Sanditon, Charlotte meets the inhabitants of the town. Prominent among them is Lady Denham, a twice-widowed woman who received a fortune from her first husband and a title from her second. Living with Lady Denham is her niece Clara Brereton, a sweet and beautiful, yet impoverished, young lady. Also living in Sanditon are Sir Edward Denham and his sister Esther, nephew and niece to Lady Denham by her second husband. The siblings are poor and are thought to be seeking Lady Denham's fortune; Sir Edward is described as a silly and very florid man, though handsome.

After settling in with the Parkers and encountering various neighbours, Charlotte and Mr and Mrs Parker are surprised by a visit from his two sisters and younger brother, all of whom are self-declared invalids. However, given their level of activity and seeming strength, Charlotte quickly surmises that their complaints are invented. Diana Parker has come on a mission to secure a house for a wealthy family from the West Indies, although she has not specifically been asked to help. She also brings word of a second large party, a girls' school, which is intending to summer at Sanditon. This news causes a stir in the small town, especially for Mr Parker, whose fondest wish is the promotion of tourism in the town.

With the arrival of Mrs Griffiths at Sanditon, it soon becomes apparent that the family from the West Indies and the girls' school group are one and the same. The visitors consist of Miss Lambe, a teenaged Antigua-English heiress, and the two Miss Beauforts, English girls just arrived from the West Indies. In short order, Lady Denham calls on Mrs. Griffiths to be introduced to Miss Lambe, the sickly and very rich young woman that she intends her nephew, Sir Edward, to marry.

A carriage unexpectedly arrives bearing Sidney Parker, the second eldest Parker brother. He will be staying in town for a few days with two friends who will join him shortly. Sidney Parker is about 27 or 28 years old, and Charlotte finds him very good-looking with a decided air of fashion.

The book fragment ends when Mrs Parker and Charlotte visit Sanditon House, Lady Denham's residence. There Charlotte spots Clara Brereton seated with Sir Edward Denham at her side having an intimate conversation in the garden and surmises that they must have a secret understanding. When they arrive inside, Charlotte observes that a large portrait of Sir Henry Denham hangs over the fireplace, whereas Lady Denham's first husband, who owned Sanditon House, only gets a miniature in the corner — obliged, as it were, to sit back in his own house and see the best place by the fire constantly occupied by Sir Henry Denham.

On July 17, 2002, all living mammals with a Y chromosome—including embryos and sperm—simultaneously die, with the exception of a young amateur escape artist named Yorick Brown and his Capuchin monkey, Ampersand. Many women die as a secondary effect of male deaths, such as plane crashes. Society is plunged into chaos as infrastructures collapse, and the surviving women everywhere try to cope with the loss of men, and the belief that, barring a rapid, major scientific breakthrough or other extraordinary event, humanity is doomed to extinction.

Yorick's mother, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, commissions Agent 355 of the secret Culper Ring organization to protect Yorick. The two travel to meet geneticist and cloning expert Dr. Allison Mann, who works to discover why Yorick survived and find a way to save humankind. Due to damage at Mann's laboratory in Boston, the trio first travel across the country to Mann's other lab in San Francisco, then to Australia and Japan.

During the trip, the group is chased by multiple parties who know of Yorick's existence and want to capture or kill him for their own purposes, including an Israeli army commando named Alter, the militant Daughters of the Amazon, and a ninja. They are aided by Yorick's sister, Hero; a Russian soldier named Natalya; an astronaut named Ciba; a former flight attendant named Beth who becomes pregnant after a one-night stand with Yorick; and Rose, an Australian sailor.

In China, the group learns Mann's father, Dr. Matsumori, is also still alive and has created many clones of Allison Mann. He reveals to Yorick that Ampersand had been one of his lab animals he was experimenting on. He believes Ampersand had been inadvertently shielded by what killed off other Y-chromosome lifeforms as a result of one of his experiments and that this protection was transferred to Yorick via pathogens. He also reveals that Ampersand ended up in Yorick's care by accident. When Mann learns that Matsumori plans to murder Yorick before committing suicide, she kills him. Armed with the samples and information she needs, Mann stays in China to work on cloning.

Yorick and Agent 355 journey to Paris, France, where Yorick is reunited with his ex-girlfriend, whom he wanted to marry before the die-off. After initially celebrating their reconnection, Yorick realizes he actually loves 355. After meeting up with 355, Yorick tells her how he feels and she reveals she feels the same for him. Agent 355 is killed by Alter using a sniper rifle shortly thereafter. When Alter attempts to capture Yorick, he defeats her and says he believes her dedicated pursuit of him was actually a roundabout way of suicide. He lets her live, and she is remanded into the custody of the Israelis. Yorick and Beth become a couple shortly thereafter and raise their daughter together.

Decades later, Dr. Mann has succeeded in cloning Yorick seventeen times, along with thousands of copies of a small number of deceased males. Most of the world enjoys peace and prosperity as economic and technological development has resumed. Yorick and Beth's daughter is President of France. Yorick is institutionalized after making a joke interpreted as a suicide attempt. He is visited by one of his clones, who is the same age he was during the die-off event. After imparting advice to his clone, Yorick escapes.

The series takes place in a retro-futuristic setting, where the Shizuma Drive ends the depletion of petroleum resources and the need for nuclear power. The system is a non-polluting recyclable energy source that powers everything on land, sea and air. Ten years prior to the events of the series a team of scientists, led by Professor Shizuma, created the revolutionary system. In the process they nearly destroyed the world and one of their own, Franken von Vogler, was lost in the event that went down in history as the "Tragedy of Bashtarle." At the start of ''Giant Robo'', the BF Group is in the middle of recreating the event with aid from the resurfaced von Vogler.

The story explores a society completely brought down, within the span of one week, because of dependency on a single energy source and a state of prosperity tainted by compromise and deceit.

The is the main antagonist of the series. Their origin is unknown, but not so their reason to be: to lead mankind down a road of ruin. The Group's forces consist of mechanical monsters, foot soldiers and , individuals with superhuman powers.

The most powerful Experts form the ruling cadre of the organization, the cabal of the . Its members swear allegiance to , the Group's founder and leader, with faltering loyalty punishable by death. At the time of ''The Day the Earth Stood Still'', the Ten are gearing up for the final showdown with the IPO.

The is the BF Group's counterpart in the ''Giant Robo'' universe."The world of ''Giant Robo'': The BF Group vs. the IPO". Liner Notes. (1993). ''Giant Robo Volume 3''. Bandai Visual. The leaders of the world acknowledged Big Fire as a threat to world security and signed the charter creating the IPO. The IPO's methods are information and espionage, looking to bring down the BF Group rather than defeating them in an all-out war.

However, to counter Big Fire's superhuman elements, "Experts" are recruited and granted special international jurisdiction. The agents assembled are known as the . Working with the Experts from the Peking Branch is Daisaku Kusama. While he does not possess any special powers, Daisaku is the one and only master of Giant Robo. Constructed by Daisaku's father,"Character biographies". Liner Notes. (1992). ''Giant Robo Volume 1''. Bandai Visual. Giant Robo is the IPO's trump card against Big Fire.