A group of people gather at a remote snowbound lodge in the wilds of northern New England. A seance is held in order to reach the dead husband of the medium. Remarried, the medium's husband wants permission from the dead man to open a tract of land to logging. During the seance, it appears that the spirit of the dead man returns to possess one of the group, using him as an instrument to murder another of the group.

The hero, Rogan Kincaid, is an adventurer who takes it upon himself (with help from a Czech refugee, the daughter of the dead man, and others), to solve the mystery before the police are brought in. As impossibilities pile up (including a locked room murder, footprints that begin and end in the middle of an expanse of snow, and a murderer who seems to be able to fly after being taken over by a Windigo), it looks like the only explanation is a supernatural one.

The play begins with married couple Kate and Deeley smoking cigarettes and discussing Kate's old friend Anna, who is coming to visit them. Kate says that Anna was her only friend, but Anna had many friends. Deeley says he's never met Anna, and is surprised to hear that Kate and Anna roomed together 20 years ago. Kate says that Anna occasionally stole her underwear.

In the next scene, Anna arrives, talking incessantly about the fun times she and Kate shared in their youth. Kate says very little. Deeley tells Anna that he first met Kate at a movie, and asked her out for coffee afterwards. Anna's rebuttal is a story about her time living with Kate, when she came home to find Kate sitting in silence while a young man sat in their arm chair crying. Anna couldn't see his face because his hand was covering it while he cried. Neither of them said anything to her, so she awkwardly went to bed. Kate went to bed as well, and the man continued to sob in the darkness for a while before getting up and walking over to Anna's bed. He stared at her for a while, but she ignored him. He then went to Kate's bed and lay across her lap, and then he left. Anna emphasizes to Deeley that she ignored the man because she would have nothing to do with him. Kate neither confirms nor denies either of their stories, and eventually decides to take a bath.

While Kate is taking her bath, Deeley confronts Anna, telling her that he's met her before. He says she used to dress in black and get men to buy her drinks, and he fell for it, buying her a drink 20 years ago and going with her to party. They sat across the room from each other, and he looked up her skirt. A girl sat beside her and they talked, while Deeley was surrounded by men and lost track of the girls. When he got through the crowd to the couch where the girls had sat, they were gone. Anna pretends to have no idea what he's talking about, and he insists that she was trying to be Kate back then, mimicking her mannerisms and shy smile, but she wasn't as good at it. Deeley recounts first meeting Kate in a movie theater showing the film ''Odd Man Out''.

Kate returns in her bathrobe, and the two compete for her attention, while she consistently says practically nothing. Eventually Anna admits that she once wore Kate's underwear to a party where a man unabashedly stared up her skirt. She goes on to tell Deeley that Kate always lent her underwear, asking her to wear it all the time. Kate says nothing, but when prompted to confirm or deny their stories, she says to Anna "I remember you dead." Kate then goes on to describe how Anna had been dead in bed, covered in dirt, and how her body was gone when a man arrived. She told the man that no one slept in the extra bed, and he lay in it, thinking Kate would sleep with him. Instead, she nearly suffocated him with mud from the flower pot by the window, and his response was a proposal of marriage.

At home in his New York City apartment, John Shaft is drugged with a tranquilizer dart, then kidnapped and persuaded by threats of physical force, the promise of money, and the lure of a pretty tutor to travel to Africa, assuming the identity of an indigenous language-speaking itinerant worker. His job is to help break a criminal ring that is smuggling immigrants into Europe, then exploiting them. But the villains are tipped off that he is on his way.

Shaft initially passes a test before being hired for the job; the test involves him surviving in a small, overheated room without water, and a floor covered in deep sand, mimicking the supposed conditions of Africa. Shaft covers himself with the sand, thereby avoiding heatstroke and winning the contract from his new employer. Shaft then embarks on a mission to infiltrate and destroy a human trafficking and slavery ring in Africa and France.

The players are cast as slaves who are forced to fight in a fantasy gladiator arena, which is the reason for the game title. The slaves are from a village where people are bred solely to be gladiators and fight for the pleasure of demon types to win their freedom. The players have the help of Balfus, a Spirit Mentor, and need to overcome the challenges and defeat the guardians of each arena. Spirit Mentors guide gladiators through the arena and Balfus is revealed to have done so for previous dead gladiators before the player. Balfus remains the source of drama since the protagonists are silent throughout the game and the antagonists do not go beyond taunting them.

In their first arena fight, they defeat the guardian called "Wrathhoof", who refuses to accept defeat to let them pass to the next arena. Despite Balfus' warning that this would be against the rules, Wrathhoof continues to attack the players who then kill him. The players and Balfus try to keep this murder of a guardian a secret and embark to the next arena, where the next guardian Slarth, discovers what they did. Slarth and the next guardian Graw are revealed to be former gladiators themselves and Balfus, their mentor. The players then defeat and kill Slarth. On killing Graw, Balfus decides to end this gladiator event by killing the remaining guardian Mordar and the final guardian called "The Master".

While Elongated Man is on a stakeout, during which a minor villain called Bolt is shot and wounded by criminals, his wife Sue Dibny is murdered in their apartment, apparently dying of burns. The DC superhero community rallies to find the murderer, with recurring villain Doctor Light being the prime suspect. Green Arrow reveals to the Flash (Wally West) and Green Lantern (Kyle Rayner) that Light once raped Sue Dibny in the JLA satellite headquarters. To ensure this could not happen again to Sue, another Justice League member or their loved ones, the members at that time — Atom (Ray Palmer), Black Canary, Hawkman, Green Lantern (Hal Jordan), and a very reluctant Flash (Barry Allen) — voted to allow the sorceress Zatanna to mind-wipe the villain and alter his personality to an ineffectual buffoon before again sending him to prison.

Further discussion reveals that a mind wipe was also done on at least one other occasion: when the Secret Society of Super Villains (the Wizard, Floronic Man, Star Sapphire, Reverse-Flash, and Blockbuster) captures JLA members Superman, Batman, Flash, Green Lantern (Hal Jordan), Zatanna and Black Canary (Wonder Woman in the pre-Crisis continuity) and switched bodies with the heroes, allowing the villains to learn their secret identities by casually removing the heroes' masks. Although the heroes defeated the villains, Zatanna once again erased the villains' memories of the incident and their knowledge of the secret identities. Green Arrow's words also imply that they have done this on other occasions when their secret identities were threatened by magic or other means.

The heroes locate Light, who has hired the mercenary Deathstroke to protect him. During the ensuing battle, Light regains his memory and, enraged by the violation, uses his formerly lost powers to escape. Although questioned by Superman, Wally West continues to protect the heroes and their secrets, but Superman has learned them after eavesdropping on the conversations between him and Green Arrow with his enhanced hearing. Atom finds his estranged ex-wife, Jean Loring, hanging from a door, blindfolded and gagged, and revives her just in time, but she is unable to describe her attacker. A death threat is then sent to Superman's wife, Lois Lane.The Flash's Rogues member Captain Boomerang (Digger Harkness) is hired by third-rate villain the Calculator (on behalf of the real killer) to assassinate Jack Drake, father of Robin, Tim Drake. Jack finds a gun and a note warning him of the impending attempt on his life, and fatally shoots Boomerang who also kills him. Tim Drake comes upon the aftermath of this and is comforted by partner Batman, who confiscates the note before the authorities or the media can learn of its existence.

During questioning of several villains by the heroes, former League member Firestorm (Ronnie Raymond) is stabbed through the chest with the sword of the Shining Knight by the villain the Shadow Thief. Firestorm's nuclear powers reach critical mass and he detonates in the atmosphere.

Wally West questions Green Arrow again after accidentally seeing a snapshot of the battle on the Satellite in Light's mind, which reveals that Batman was also present. Green Arrow confesses that Batman had left immediately after the battle, but unexpectedly returned just as the mind wipe was taking place. He disapproved of this and nearly attacked the other heroes; he was magically restrained and his memory of the incident was removed. Batman locates the Calculator's hideout, but discovers the villain anticipated this and abandoned it. The autopsy of Sue Dibny's body by Doctor Mid-Nite and Mister Terrific, members of the Justice Society, reveals Dibny was killed by an infarction in her brain. A microscopic scan of Dibny's brain reveals tiny footprints as a clue to the infarction's cause.

Doctor Mid-Nite and Mister Terrific realize, as does Batman in the course of his own investigation, that Dibny was murdered by someone who has access to Ray Palmer's technology, which as the Atom, he uses to shrink himself to subatomic size. Almost simultaneously, Palmer learns that Jean is aware of the note sent to Jack Drake (which had been kept secret) and realizes she is the killer. Loring claims she did not mean to kill Sue, and it was not her intention for Jack Drake to be killed, arguing that she sent the note and gun so he could protect himself. Loring states that she undertook the plan (including faking the attempt on her own life) in order to bring Ray back into her life. Realizing that Loring is insane, he has her committed to Arkham Asylum before being wracked by guilt over his former wife's actions then disappeared. In the final scene with the Justice League, Wally West is awkward in the presence of Batman, who is suspicious of his behavior.

Aftermath

The ramifications of ''Identity Crisis'' are depicted in the title ''Flash'', as his Rogues Gallery villains band together at the funeral of Boomerang; the one-shot ''Countdown to Infinite Crisis'', as well as one of its tie-ins, ''The OMAC Project''; and the title ''JLA'', which reveals that Batman remembered the events in question at some point afterwards. Batman's suspicions of his fellow heroes' conduct lead him to create the Brother MK I satellite to monitor superhumans, which is an important factor in the 2005–2006 crossover storyline ''Infinite Crisis''. It is revealed in that storyline that the Justice League's mind manipulation, Jean Loring's turn to villainy, and Sue Dibny's rape by Dr. Light were three of the many indirect changes effected by Alexander Luthor Jr. and Superboy-Prime when they caused overlaps of parallel timelines (Hypertime) from their pocket universe since after the events of ''Crisis on Infinite Earths''.

Setting and characters

The game stars the members of Star Fox, a team of spacefaring mercenaries: Fox McCloud, Falco Lombardi, Slippy Toad and their newest member Krystal participate in combat missions, while Peppy Hare and ROB 64 provide tactical support from their mothership, the ''Great Fox''. Star Fox frequently clash with rival mercenary group Star Wolf, made up of Wolf O'Donnell, Leon Powalski and new recruit Panther Caroso; former members Pigma Dengar and Andrew Oikonny have since been kicked out of the team. Other supporting characters include Cornerian commanding officer General Pepper and Slippy's scientist father, Beltino Toad.

The Star Fox team's primary opponents are the Aparoids, a race of cybernetic insectoid creatures. They are capable of controlling machines and life forms through an infection process known as "Aparoidedation". The Aparoids operate as a hive mind under the control of the Aparoid Queen, who believes that all things exist for the infestation and seeks to assimilate everything in the universe under her control.

''Assault'' takes place one year after the events of ''Star Fox Adventures''. The game is once again set in the Lylat System and sees the Star Fox team traveling to many different locations, such as their native planet Corneria, Star Wolf's base the Sargasso Hideout, the prehistoric planet Sauria, and the Aparoid Homeworld. Other planets are featured exclusively in the game's multiplayer mode.

Story

After the defeat of his uncle Andross, Andrew Oikonny assumes leadership of the planet Venom's remaining troops and begins a rebellion. General Pepper orders an attack on Oikonny's forces, hiring the Star Fox team to assist the Cornerian Army. During the battle, Oikonny's flagship is destroyed by an insectoid creature, which attacks the Star Fox team. After Fox destroys the creature, he recovers its damaged Core Memory unit and turns it over to Beltino for research. Beltino explains the creature is a member of a race of robotic insectoids called Aparoids, one of which ravaged the Cornerian fleet 17 years prior. Fearing an invasion, Beltino asks Star Fox to recover an undamaged Core Memory so that they might find a way to stop the Aparoids.

Lured by a false distress signal, the Star Fox team are deceived by Pigma, who tricks them into destroying a giant Aparoid so he can steal its Core Memory and sell it on the black market. Wishing to find Pigma, the team attack the base of his former cohorts, Star Wolf, and get them to reveal his hideout’s location. However, by the time Team Star Fox arrive to Pigma’s hideaway, he has already been infected by the Aparoids and they are forced to kill him. The Memory Unit Pigma had stolen is then sent to Beltino for analysis. While Star Fox prevents an Aparoid assault on Sauria, Corneria is left nearly defenseless, with the Aparoids breaching the planet and infecting General Pepper. The team returns to contain the threat, aided by the unexpected arrival of Star Wolf, who seek to eliminate their common enemy.

Beltino uses the Core Memory to locate the Aparoid Homeworld, and discovers their vulnerability to apoptosis. He creates a program which, if fired into the Aparoid Queen, will force all Aparoids to self-destruct. Star Fox and Star Wolf travel to the Aparoid Homeworld, only to discover the planet's core is blocked by a regenerative shield. With the ''Great Fox'' becoming infected, Peppy and ROB crash it into the shield to create an opening for the two teams to enter. While Star Wolf takes care of the remaining Aparoid forces, Fox and his allies reach the planet's core. The Aparoid Queen attempts to use the voices of Peppy, Pepper, Pigma and James McCloud to deceive them into joining her, but the team is undeterred. After a long battle, Fox launches the self-destruct program into the Queen, but she resists it and attempts to escape to create an antibody. The team deals the final blow to the Queen, killing her and causing the destruction of the planet and all the Aparoids. Successfully evacuating, the Star Fox team reunite with Peppy and ROB, who survived the crash via an escape pod and reveal the other infectees have been cured, including General Pepper. Satisfied, Fox thanks his friends as they head for home.

Dirk Pitt, Special Projects Director for the National Underwater and Marine Agency, and his Deputy Special Projects Director, Al Giordino, are traveling to their assignment in the Aegean Sea in Dirk's PBY Catalina when they receive a mayday distress call from the control tower at the nearby Brady Air Force Base on the Greek island of Thásos. The tower reports that they are under aerial attack by a World War I era German Albatros D-3 biplane painted a startling bright yellow and bearing the familiar black Maltese Cross of World War I Germany. The biplane, with its top speed of just 103 mph, is strafing the runways and destroying multimillion-dollar F-105 Starfire fighters and C-133 Cargomasters without a shred of resistance. Dirk and Al, armed with nothing more than a couple of rifles in their World War Two flying boat face-off against the World War I fighter and its machine guns. After a spectacular dogfight they exit the field of battle victorious.

Dirk has been sent to the Aegean to meet Commander Rudi Gunn, captain of the NUMA research vessel ''First Attempt'', to try to get to the bottom of the recent spate of mishaps on its current assignment. The ''First Attempt'' is on a research expedition attempting to find a living fossil lovingly named The Teaser, which scientists believe may be living evidence of the development of the first mammal.

Following his fight with the biplane Dirk goes for a midnight swim and meets a beautiful young woman named Teri von Till whom he quickly seduces. She invites him to dinner at her uncle's villa that evening where Pitt is introduced to the book's primary villain, Bruno von Till. Pitt learns that von Till is an old comrade in arms of Lt. Kurt Hiebert, a World War I flying ace known as the Hawk of Macedonia, whose trademark was a bright yellow Albatross biplane.

After dinner, he confronts von Till about his involvement with the attack on the airfield and while von Till admits nothing he forces Pitt to leave the villa at gunpoint through a door that leads him into what is known as the Pit of Hades. It is later explained that the Pit of Hades is a labyrinth once used in ancient Greek times when the villagers sentenced a convicted felon to death. The person sentenced to die was given the choice of an instant death or choosing the Pit of Hades. The labyrinth had only one entrance, a concealed exit, and roaming amongst the many passages was a hungry lion. In recorded history no one had successfully found the exit before the lion found them. While von Till does not have a lion he does have a very large white German Shepherd with which Dirk Pitt engages in a mortal struggle.

Following his successful escape Pitt is taken into custody when he returns to seek his revenge on Bruno von Till and is captured escaping the villa with Teri von Till as his prisoner. It is later revealed that Bruno von Till has been under surveillance by agents of Interpol and Inspector Hercules Zacynthus of the United States Federal Bureau of Narcotics. The inspector explains that von Till is suspected of being a world-class smuggler responsible for the transportation of all types of goods related to many heinous criminal acts. These acts include the great Spanish gold theft in 1954 which nearly toppled the Spanish economy; the mysterious disappearance of 85 high-ranking Nazi officers from Germany at the end of World War II and their sudden reemergence in Buenos Aires; and the abduction of a bus full of teenage girls in Naples, Italy who were sold into white slavery in Casablanca. The inspector now believes that von Till is attempting to smuggle nearly half a billion dollars worth of heroin into the United States using his fleet of cargo ships called Minerva Lines.

Despite the best efforts of Interpol, the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, Customs, and many other law enforcement agencies they have been unable to catch Bruno von Till transporting anything illegal on any of his ships. Pitt eventually discovers that von Till, using the resources of his shipping line, has raised the sunken wrecks of the German U-boat ''U-19'' and a Japanese I-Boat class submarine which he has been using as part of a smuggling operation. Von Till has converted a German submarine into a completely automated smuggling craft that can be easily attached or detached from the holds of his cargo ships.

Using Pitt's surmises as a basis for action, the inspector launches a campaign to capture as many distributors of heroin in the United States as possible. However, Pitt suspects that Bruno von Till is aware of the approach of Interpol and the Federal Bureau of Narcotics and he launches his own desperate mission with Al and members of the crew of the ''First Attempt'' in a last-ditch effort to stop von Till before he can escape and set up his nefarious drug smuggling operation somewhere else. Pitt succeeds in defeating von Till and finds a Teaser in the process for Admiral Sandecker.

The Brandenburg horse dealer Michael Kohlhaas is leading a team of horses in the direction of Saxony when an official of the nobleman Junker Wenzel von Tronka detains him, claiming that he does not have proper transit papers. The official demands that Kohlhaas leave two horses as collateral.

In Dresden (the Saxon capital) Kohlhaas discovers that this collateral was totally arbitrary, and proceeds to demand return of his horses. When he arrives at the castle of Junker Tronka he discovers that the horses have been suffering from working in the fields and his hired man, who protested against the mistreatment of the horses, has been beaten.

Kohlhaas sues the Junker for the cost of medical treatment of his hired man and for rehabilitation of his horses. After one year he finds that the suit was turned down through political influence of the Junker's relatives. Kohlhaas persists in demanding his rights. In spite of support of a friendly politician and personal engagement of his wife (who is struck down by a guard in her attempt to deliver a petition to the Elector of Saxony and later dies of her injuries), he remains unsuccessful.

Since the administrative "old boys' club" prevents any progress through legal channels, Kohlhaas resorts to criminal means. He begins a private war. Together with seven men he destroys the castle of the Junker, who in the meantime has fled to Wittenberg, and slaughters the remaining servants (including an infant). Kohlhaas frees his horses, but then ditches them in the castle to lead his growing "army" (really a mob) to Wittenberg, demanding the Junker. In spite of numerous attacks of his 400-man army on Wittenberg he fails to secure the Junker.

Through personal intervention of Martin Luther an amnesty is arranged, whereby the Elector of Saxony approves the suit against the Squire. But the Junker again activates his influential family and Kohlhaas is thrown into a dungeon in Brandenburg.

The Elector of Brandenburg manages to have Kohlhaas released, but since in the meantime Saxony has informed the Kaiser in Vienna, the ruling families in Berlin feel this threat to the authority of the aristocracy must be handled with severity. In spite of surprising efforts of the Elector of Brandenburg to save Kohlhaas, he is sentenced to death. Later it turns out that Kohlhaas has on his person papers that contain important information about the House of Saxony.

As Kohlhaas is led to execution, he sees in the crowd the disguised Elector of Saxony. Through his lawyer, he is informed that his suit against the Junker has been successful, and is presented with compensation for the injuries of his hired man and shown the horses, now well-fed and healthy. Pleased that justice has been served, he submits willingly to the execution. However, shortly before being beheaded, he opens the amulet on his neck containing the papers regarding the House of Saxony and swallows them. The Elector of Saxony is so distressed by this act that he faints, and Kohlhaas is beheaded shortly thereafter.

Nick "The Zone" Falzone and his fellow air traffic controllers at the New York TRACON pride themselves on their ability to handle the intense stress of being a controller for one of the busiest airspaces in the country, even boasting of the 50% drop-out rate for new additions to staff unable to cope with the pressure. The group is joined by the quiet and confident Russell Bell, a veteran of TRACONs in the Western US.

Russell quickly proves to be exceptionally capable of handling the increased workload using unorthodox and risky methods. Nick feels challenged by the new controller's ability to out-perform him at seemingly every task. He warns his supervisor Bell is a loose cannon, especially after discovering that Russell once stood on a runway to allow himself to be violently propelled by a landing commercial airliner's jetwash.

At a supermarket, Nick encounters Russell's despondent young wife Mary, who is sobbing over a grocery cart full of alcohol. In consoling her, he ends up at the Bells' house, where they cheat on their respective spouses. Several days later, Mary informs Nick that she immediately told Russell about the affair, and that the confession has actually improved their marriage.

Fearing retaliation, Nick confronts Russell at work, and is confused and surprised by his even-tempered response to the situation. Meanwhile, Nick's wife, Connie seems to become more and more intrigued by Russell, and Nick becomes increasingly paranoid that he will eventually seek revenge by having sex with her.

While out of town for his father-in-law's funeral, Nick can't bring himself to lie when a grieving Connie challenges him to say that he has never cheated on her. As their flight home approaches New York, she tells him that she has indeed slept with Russell. The plane then makes an odd turn, and he believes Russell is harassing him, or possibly going insane, purposely directing the plane into a dangerous storm.

Soon after going to TRACON to confront Russell, a bomb threat is called in to the facility. The building is evacuated and both Nick and Russell volunteer to stay behind to handle the daunting task of landing all the planes on approach before the alleged bomb is set to go off in 26 minutes. Successfully routing all but one plane that has lost radio contact, Nick leaves the building as the deadline approaches, while Russell remains inside to make contact with the plane by calling one of its passengers via Airfone. Russell is lauded as a hero for making the effort despite the threat, which turned out to be a hoax.

Russell abruptly quits and he and Mary move to Colorado. Connie leaves Nick, and his performance at work suffers; the once cocky, boastful controller is sent home after being responsible for two "deals" (near mid-air collisions) in one shift. After learning that Russell had ordered the diversion of his flight not to provoke him, but to clear a path to make a plane with a medical emergency on board next in line for a landing, Nick impulsively drives out to Colorado to make amends.

Nick seeks his advice on how to get his personal life back in order, but Russell is unable to make him understand with words. He instead brings Nick to a runway so that he too can experience being caught in a landing aircraft's turbulence. They engage in the stunt together, and it has a profound effect on Nick, who thanks Russell. He returns to New York, where he regains his form at work, and reconciles with Connie.

The few thousand humans survive in a nebula of relatively breathable air, existing in divided communities. The society is highly stratified, with the elite living on the "Raft" (the remains of the starship that contains almost all the high technology), workers/miners living on various "Belt" worlds (where they mine burned-out star kernels), and the "Boneys", a nomadic band of "unmentionables" who live on worlds created out of corpses.

It is not directly detailed how humans came to the universe, but hints within the story indicate that the Raft ship came through a rift in our universe into this alternate reality. The original short story, also by Stephen Baxter, provides more insight as to how humans arrived, "five hundred years ago a great warship – chasing some forgotten opponent – blundered through a portal. A gateway. It left its own universe and arrived here." A glimpse of the high-gravity universe is seen in the book ''Ring'', implying that the humans in Raft came from the main universe of the Xeelee Sequence, although during which time period they escaped is not clear.

The alternate universe the humans live in follows same laws as our universe, except that it has a gravitational constant which is orders of magnitude larger than our own universe.

The physics of the alternate universe have slowly turned the nebula into an increasingly hostile environment and the humans, along with the bizarre native species, are suffering the effects of environmental collapse.

Harmond Wilks, an Ivy League-educated man who has inherited a real estate agency from his father, his ambitious wife Mame, and his friend Roosevelt Hicks want to redevelop the Hill District in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The project, called the Bedford Hills Redevelopment Project, includes two high-rise apartment buildings and high-end chain stores like Starbucks, Whole Foods, and Barnes & Noble. Harmond is also about to declare his candidacy to be Pittsburgh's first black mayor. Roosevelt has just been named a vice-president of Mellon Bank and has been tapped by a Bernie Smith to help him acquire a local radio station at less than market value, which is possible through a minority tax incentive.

A complication arises when Harmond discovers that the house at 1839 Wylie, slated for demolition, was acquired illegally. Harmond offers the owner of the property market value for the house, but the owner refuses to sell. Harmond decides the only way to proceed is to build around the house, which will require minor modifications to the planned development, and calls the demolition company to cancel the demolition. Roosevelt sees no reason to delay since no one but Harmond, Roosevelt, Mame, and the house's owner know the truth, a view Mame supports. When, on the day of the demolition, which Roosevelt has put back into motion, Harmond refuses to be swayed from his stand, Roosevelt announces he will be buying Harmond out and Bernie Smith will be helping him. Harmond accuses Roosevelt of being Smith's "black face" and the two argue over the consequences of Harmond demanding changes in the development plans and if Roosevelt is allowing himself to be used by Bernie Smith. Harmond tells Roosevelt to leave the Bedford Hills Redevelopment office, which is owned by Wilks Realty. The scene ends with Harmond leaving the office to join the group of Hill residents at 1839 Wylie protesting the demolition.

Set thousands of years in the future (AD 5407), the human race has been conquered by the Qax, a truly alien turbulent-liquid form of life, who now rule over the few star systems of human space – adopting processes from human history to effectively oppress the resentful race. Humans have encountered a few other races, including the astoundingly advanced Xeelee, and been conquered once before – by the Squeem – but successfully recovered.

A human-built device, the Interface project, returns to the Solar System after 1,500 years. The project, towed by the spaceship ''Cauchy'', returns a wormhole gate, appearing to offer time travel due to the time 'difference' between the exits of the wormhole (relativistic time dilation), with one end having remained in the Solar System and the other travelling at near lightspeed for a century. The Qax had destroyed the Solar System gate, but a lashed-up human ship (a great chunk of soil including Stonehenge, crewed by a group called the Friends of Wigner) passes through the returning gate, travelling back to the unconquered humanity of 1,500 years ago.

One of the crew of the ''Cauchy'' returns with the Friends, Miriam Berg. The Friends have a complex scheme, which does not include a simple military return-and-rescue – the 1,500-year technology gap makes this "risible". From the Wigner thought experiment they have postulated an unusual theory on the ultimate destiny of life in the universe. They believe that quantum wave-functions do not collapse like the Copenhagen interpretation holds, nor that each collapse actually buds off separate universes (like the quantum multiverse hypothesis holds) but rather that the universe is a participatory universe: the entire universe exists as a single massive quantum superposition, and that at the end of time (in the open universe of the Xeelee Sequence, time and space are unbounded, or more precisely, bounded only at the Cauchy boundaries of "Time-like infinity" and "Space-like infinity"), when intelligent life collects all information (compare the Final anthropic principle and the Omega Point), it will transform into an "Ultimate Observer" and make the "final Observation", the observation which collapses all the possible entangled wave-functions generated since the beginning of the universe. They believe further that the Ultimate Observer will not merely observe, but ''choose'' which world line will be the true world-line, and that it will choose the one in which humanity suffers no Squeem or Qax occupations. However, the Ultimate Observer cannot choose between worldlines if no information survives to its era to distinguish worldlines- if the UO never knows of humanity, it cannot choose a worldline favourable to it. In other words, some way is needed to securely send information forward in time.

As a consequence of this necessity, they intend to turn Jupiter into a carefully formed singularity and use the precisely specified parameters as a method of encoding information. Miriam Berg is more concerned over the immediate fate of humanity, with the threat of the future Qax, and transmits a 'help' message to the gate designer Michael Poole.

The Qax, naturally, panic a little at the escape to the past. A complex, unavoidably fragile species in their huge living Spline spacecraft, the few Qax present are somewhat at a loss. They decide to build their own Interface, with major human-collaborator assistance (headed by Ambassador Jasoft Parz), to create a link to their future to gain aid in resolving the problem – with more modern GUT-engine spacecraft they can make a 500-year link in just eighteen months. A startling high-technology future vessel (in truth, one of the legendary Xeelee nightfighters, an advanced and long-range fast scout ship), with a future Qax comes through the gate. Its first act is to execute the Qax Governor of Earth and gather up Parz, before passing through the original portal after the Friends and all humanity. The future Qax takes two Spline ships (presumably leaving behind the nightfighter; this might be the nightfighter that is discovered by the crew of ''The Great Northern'' millennia later in ''Ring'') through the gate and on the journey reveals to Parz the reason behind its desire to completely destroy the human race.

The Ring

The future Qax tells Parz that over the centuries, the Qax had worn down humanity through constant oppression, and had eventually decided to eliminate its space-faring capabilities. But before they did, as economical traders, they wished to get as much value out of their human pilots as possible. So certain pilots were dispatched on a number of dangerous or quixotic missions.

One such pilot was a man named Jim Bolder. The Qax had come into possession of a Xeelee nightfighter, and had modified it to support human control. Bolder's mission was simple: go to the Great Attractor, the cause of most galactic drift, and find out why and how it exists. Bolder travelled to the bottom of the gravitational well, and found the Ring. A torus a thousand light-years in diameter, constructed of an unknown substance, rotating at a large fraction of lightspeed. The Qax goes on to speculate that the torus created a Kerr metric, and that it allowed egress from the current universe, that it was in effect an escape route for the Xeelee. Before Parz, the Spline warship, and the Qax exit the wormhole, the Qax asks, "What do Xeelee fear, do you suppose?". Regardless, Bolder escaped the Great Attractor and returned to the Qax home system, where he was supposed to be taken into custody by dozens of Spline warships wielding gravitational-wave based "starbreakers" and his priceless data on the god-like Xeelee's ultimate project secured. Bolder either did not, or somehow escaped; in the ensuing fight, the starbreakers were accidentally fired at the Qax system primary star, and true to their name, destabilised it, causing it to go nova. The Qax were forced to hurriedly evacuate. Many died, and the power of the Qax trading empire (and by extension, their Occupation of Earth) ended.

Defeat

In the past, Poole joins Berg on the Friend vessel shortly before the Qax emerges, having travelled aboard his ship, ''Hermit Crab'', from the Oort cloud. He is accompanied by a Virtual of his father, Harry. Together they elude the control of the Friends, whose project fails under the bombardment of the Spline's starbreaker beam. Miriam Berg commandeers the singularity cannon used to sculpt Jupiter and fires a pair of black holes into the Spline, which merge and disable it. Meanwhile, aided by Jasoft Parz's internal sabotage, Poole succeeds in ramming the ''Hermit Crab'' into the second Spline, killing the sapience of the vessel and the entangled Qax, second Governor of Earth, with it. Harry takes over in lieu of the higher intelligence and, at the direction of Poole, steers it back into the wormhole: when inside, Poole intends to activate the hyperdrive, shattering the fragile dimensional warping of the wormhole, and of all wormholes connecting to it, thus saving humanity from further interference by the future.

Poole's audacious plan succeeds, but with an unexpected side effect. As the hyperdrive activates, it somewhat shatters space-time, forming a long series of interconnected wormholes that hurl Poole 5 million years forward into the far future. Poole discovers a sad cosmos, in which the stars are guttering out; the Friends were wrong- intelligent life would not triumph and remake the cosmos, eventually leading to their Prime Observer.

His ship shattered and broken, Poole begins dying, but at the last moment, an "anti-Xeelee" (whom it is implied is a being created by the Xeelee to be like them, except travelling like a tachyon backwards in time, the better to mould the Xeelee's early evolutionary history) takes a liking to Poole, and converts him into an intangible immortal being of "quantum functions". In this form, Poole travels the universe, but out of boredom, eventually begins to lapse into a quasi-coma- until an unexpected event occurs: a savage in a glass box, having travelled through a wormhole like Poole himself. "History resumed." (This final event is one of the early plot points of the ''Ring'').

Fonda and Davis in a trailer for the film. At Halcyon, Julie puts on the white dress she had originally planned to wear to the Olympus Ball as she waits to humble herself before Pres on his return from the North. (George Brent is second from the left.) In 1852 New Orleans, spoiled, strong-willed belle Julie Marsden is engaged to banker Preston "Pres" Dillard. In an important meeting, Pres is trying to convince the board to invest in railroads, as Northerners are doing, and supporting Dr. Livingstone's plea for measures to prevent another outbreak of yellow fever.

In retaliation for Pres refusing to leave the meeting and accompany her to the last fitting for a ball gown, Julie buys a brazen red satin dress ordered by a notorious woman. At the Olympus Ball, the most important social event of the year, unmarried women are expected to wear virginal white. All of Julie's friends are horrified, but no one can convince her to give up her whim.

At the Olympus Ball, Julie's attire is met with shock and disgust by all present. She begs Pres to take her away, but instead he forces her to dance with him while all the other couples leave the floor. When the orchestra stops playing at the instruction of one of the ball's sponsors, Pres tells the conductor to continue. Pres and Julie finish the dance.

Afterwards, Pres takes his leave of Julie, implicitly breaking their engagement. In a final act of spite, Julie slaps him in the face. Aunt Belle Massey urges her to go after him, but she refuses, stating that he will return to her. Instead, he goes North on business. Julie shuts herself up in her house and refuses to see visitors.

A year later, Pres finally returns, bringing his Northern wife, Amy to a homecoming party in his honor at Halcyon Plantation, Julie's estate. Aunt Belle cannot find Julie in time to warn her. Wearing a luminous white gown, before Pres can stop her, Julie humbles herself and begs for his forgiveness and a return of his love. Then Pres introduces her to Amy.

Julie eggs on her longtime admirer, skilled duellist Buck Cantrell, to quarrel with Pres, but the scheme goes awry. It is Pres's inexperienced brother Ted who is goaded into challenging Buck. In an unexpected twist, Ted kills Buck.

Then, as Dr. Livingstone foretold, a deadly epidemic sweeps through the city. They fight it with cannon and smoke and, believing that yellow fever is highly contagious, a quarantine so rigid that people who try to escape the city are shot. In New Orleans, Pres is stricken and, like all other victims, is to be quarantined in the leper colony on Lazaret Island. Julie goes to Dr. Livingstone's place and nurses Pres for a night and a day. The family arrives, thanks to a pass from the governor. When the wagon comes for Pres, Amy begs to go with him, but Julie tells her that she is not equipped to fight for Pres. She does not know the creole words for food and water, or how to deal with the conditions or the people there. Julie begs to go in her place to try to redeem herself. Before agreeing, Amy asks if Pres still loves Julie. Julie declares that he loves only his wife. Amy blesses them, and Julie accompanies Pres on a wagon loaded with other victims and caregivers.

When concert pianist Sandra Kovak (Mary Astor) and her aviator husband Peter Van Allen (George Brent) discover their impulsive marriage is invalid because her divorce had not been finalized before they wed, he leaves her and marries his old flame Maggie Patterson (Bette Davis). Peter travels to Brazil on business and, when his aircraft goes missing, it is presumed it crashed in the jungle and he was killed.

Sandra discovers she is pregnant by Peter, and Maggie proposes she be allowed to raise the child as her own in exchange for taking care of Sandra financially. The two women go to Arizona to await the birth, and Sandra delivers a boy, who is named after his father.

Sandra embarks upon a world tour, during which Peter, who survived the crash, returns home, and Maggie leads him to believe the boy is theirs. Sandra, wanting both father and son for herself, taunts Maggie that Peter has remained with her only because of the boy and demands she confess she misled him. When Maggie explains the true situation, Peter is shocked by Sandra's behavior and announces she may take the baby but he will remain with Maggie. Sandra, accepting that Peter truly loves Maggie and knowing Maggie will be a far better mother to the child, sits down at the piano and announces she is leaving the child with his mother as she plays Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1.

Army veteran Frank McCloud arrives at the Hotel Largo in Key Largo, Florida, visiting the family of George Temple, a friend who served under him and was killed in the Italian campaign several years before. He meets with the friend's widow Nora Temple, and his father James, who owns the hotel. Because the winter vacation season has ended and a hurricane is approaching, the hotel has only six guests: dapper Toots, boorish Curly, stone-faced Ralph, servant Angel, attractive but aging alcoholic Gaye Dawn, and a sixth man who remains secluded in his room. The visitors claim to be in the Florida Keys for fishing.

Frank tells Nora and James about George's heroism under fire and shares some small and cherished details that George had spoken of. Nora and her father-in-law seem taken with Frank, stating that George frequently mentioned Frank in his letters.

While preparing the hotel for the hurricane, the three are interrupted by Sheriff Ben Wade and his deputy Sawyer. They are searching for the Osceola brothers, a pair of fugitive American Indians. Soon after the police leave, the local Seminoles seek shelter at the hotel, among them the Osceola brothers.

As the storm approaches, Curly, Ralph, Angel, and Toots pull guns and take the Temples and Frank hostage. They explain that the sixth, reclusive member of their party is notorious gangster Johnny Rocco, who was exiled to Cuba some years before. Rocco is waiting for his Miami contacts to arrive to conclude a deal. The gang discover Deputy Sawyer looking about and capture him. A tense standoff ensues. Frank declines to fight a duel with Rocco, stating his belief in self-preservation over heroics and that "one Rocco more or less isn't worth dying for”. Rocco shoots Sawyer, and Rocco's men take Sawyer's body out on a rowboat in the approaching storm and drop it in the ocean.

As the storm rages outside, Rocco forces his former moll, Gaye, to sing for them but then demeans her. In contrast, Frank politely gives her the promised drink and ignores Rocco's slaps. Nora understands that Frank's heroism matches her husband's, who was killed around Monte Cassino in Italy. Mr. Temple invites Frank to live with them at the hotel, a prospect that intrigues Nora.

The storm finally subsides. Sheriff Wade returns looking for Deputy Sawyer, and discovers his body washed up by the storm on the hotel driveway. Rocco blames Sawyer's death on the Osceola brothers. Wade confronts and kills them both before leaving with Sawyer's body. Rocco's contact Ziggy arrives to buy a large amount of counterfeit money. Rocco then forces Frank, who is a skilled seaman, to take him and his henchmen back to Cuba on the small hotel boat. As the gang prepares to board the boat, Gaye steals Rocco's gun and covertly passes it to Frank.

Out on the Straits of Florida, Frank uses seamanship, trickery, and the stolen gun to kill the gang members one by one. He then heads back to Key Largo, while radioing for Coast Guard help and to get a message to the hotel. Meanwhile, Gaye tells Wade that Rocco bears the blame for Deputy Sawyer's murder. Wade mentions that Ziggy's gang has been captured and leaves with Gaye to identify them.

The phone rings: James and Nora are delighted to hear that Frank is returning safely. Nora opens the shutters to the sun, while out at sea, Frank steers the boat towards shore.

The film is set within Terminal 3 of London Heathrow Airport during a fog. As flights are delayed, the VIPs (very important people) of the title play out the drama of their lives in a number of slightly interconnected stories. The delays have caused serious hardship for most of the characters and have plunged some of them into a deep personal or financial crisis.

The central story concerns famed actress Frances Andros (Elizabeth Taylor) trying to leave her husband, millionaire Paul Andros (Richard Burton), and fly away with her suitor Marc Champselle (Louis Jourdan). Because of the fog, Andros has the opportunity to come to the airport to persuade his wife not to leave him.

The Duchess of Brighton (Margaret Rutherford) is on her way to Florida to take a job, which will pay her enough money to save her historic home. Meanwhile, film producer Max Buda (Orson Welles) needs to leave London, taking his newest protégée Gloria Gritti (Elsa Martinelli) with him, by midnight if he is to avoid paying a hefty tax bill.

Les Mangrum (Rod Taylor), an Australian businessman, must get to New York City to prevent his business from being sold. His dutiful secretary, Miss Mead (Maggie Smith), is secretly in love with him. It being a matter of great urgency, she decides to approach Paul Andros and ask him to advance a sum of money that will save Mangrum's company.

Buda spots a poster picturing the Duchess's home. She is offered a sum of money if she will permit Buda to use it as a location in a film, enough to keep the house she loves. Andros, meanwhile, about to lose the woman he loves, is spared a possible suicide at the last minute when he and his wife reconcile.

In San Francisco of the early 1970s, Don Baker, who was born blind, has lived all his life with his mother. When Don was young, Mrs. Baker wrote a series of popular children's books about Little Donny Dark, a blind boy who performs heroic deeds. Don moves into an apartment on his own, but finds himself all alone. He has made a contract that his mother will not come to see him for at least two months.

One month has passed. This is when Jill Tanner moves into an adjoining apartment. She listens to Don talking to his mother over the phone and turns on the radio. When Don asks her to turn the volume down, she invites herself over for a cup of coffee. They start talking and find each other friendly. Jill does not realize that Don is blind until she sees him dropping his cigarette ash on the table. Jill never had met a blind man before, so she asks all sorts of questions about how Don manages everyday chores.

Jill tells Don that her favorite quote is: "I only ask to be free. The butterflies are free. Mankind will surely not deny to Harold Skimpole what it concedes to the butterflies." (From Dickens' ''Bleak House''.) She takes him to Asparagus, a bohemian clothing store, where owner Roy helps them pick out some free-spirited fashion. Back home, Don makes up a song and starts to sing "Butterflies Are Free" on his guitar. They discover they can unlock the door separating their two apartments.

Surprising Don with a visit, Mrs. Baker sees that Don has attached himself to Jill. She also encounters them in the apartment partially undressed. She fears that Jill will break Don's heart. She takes Jill out for a lunch and tries to talk her out of Don's life. Jill has strong feelings for Don and tells Mrs. Baker that if there is someone who should get out of Don's life, it is she.

Following Mrs. Baker's input, Jill later breaks a dinner date at Don's apartment, showing up much later with Ralph, the director of the play she has auditioned for. Jill hesitantly announces that she is moving in with Ralph, trying too hard to convince Don, and herself, that it is a great idea.

When Jill goes to pack her things, a heartbroken Don asks his mother if he can move back home. She talks him out of it, pointing out that her Little Donny Dark books had been her way of helping young Don face his fears, and she (sadly) must do the same now. They finally make peace over their new roles in life. Jill and Don fight over her moving out, and Don tells her she is the one who is disabled. She leaves but returns to Don, and the two reconcile.

Neal Page is an advertising executive on a business trip in New York City, eager to return to his family in Chicago before Thanksgiving, which is in two days' time. After a late-running business meeting with an indecisive client, Neal has horrible luck trying to get a cab during rush hour. As he bribes a man to let him have a cab he's hailed, it is unwittingly taken by a third man. Neal gets to JFK Airport just as his flight is delayed. While waiting, he meets Del Griffith, a loquacious man who sells shower curtain rings, whom he recognizes as the man who "stole" the cab. To his chagrin (and Del's delight) Neal is then assigned a seat next to Del on the crowded flight to O'Hare.

Due to a blizzard in Chicago, their plane is diverted to Wichita, where they must stay overnight. Neal is unable to book a room, but Del has successfully reserved one. Neal reluctantly accepts Del's promise of a room if Neal pays for their cab ride to the motel. During check-in, Del mistakenly takes Neal's credit card. Forced to share the last available room, Neal loses his temper over Del's irritating behavior and lambastes him. Del is hurt by Neal's invective, but they calm down and awkwardly share the only bed. As they sleep, their cash is stolen by a burglar.

The following day, with air travel still prohibitively delayed, Neal buys them both train tickets to Chicago, but with seats in separate cars. However, the locomotive breaks down near Jefferson City, stranding its passengers in a field. Neal takes pity on Del struggling with his trunk, and they are reunited. They travel on a crowded bus to St. Louis, where Del raises cash by selling curtain ring samples to passers-by as earrings. Neal offends Del over lunch and the two part ways again.

At the St. Louis airport, Neal attempts to rent a car, but it is not there when he gets to the lot. After a long and perilous walk back to the terminal, Neal vents his anger in a profane tirade at the rental agent, but to no avail. He attempts to book a taxi to Chicago, but furiously insults the dispatcher, who punches him. By chance, Del arrives at the scene in his own rental car, and takes the dazed Neal with him. As they drive, they argue again. After nightfall, Del nearly gets them killed by driving in the wrong direction on a freeway. As they compose themselves by the side of the road, Del's carelessly discarded cigarette sets fire to the car. Neal initially gloats, thinking that Del is liable for the damage, until Del reveals he had found Neal's credit card in his wallet and used it to rent the car.

With his credit cards destroyed in the fire, Neal barters his expensive watch for his own motel room. Del has nothing of value, so he attempts to sleep in the charred, roofless car. Neal eventually feels sympathy for Del and invites him in from the cold and snowy night. They share Del's collection of miniature liquors and laugh about the events of the past two days. The pair resume driving to Chicago the next morning, but their car is impounded by the police as unroadworthy. Del persuades a trucker to take them into Chicago and they ride in the semi's refrigerated trailer.

At a Chicago "L" station, Neal sincerely thanks Del for getting him home, and they part ways with affection. As Neal rides a commuter train to his neighborhood, he thinks about the trip, recalling some of Del's odd comments and silences during the journey. It occurs to him that Del hasn't actually been trying to get home himself. Neal returns to the station, where he finds Del still sitting. Del explains that he doesn't have a home, and that the beloved wife he's talked about died eight years earlier. Neal brings Del home with him for Thanksgiving dinner and introduces his family to his new friend.

In a post-credits scene, the client from Neal's Tuesday meeting is still in the conference room trying to decide which ad to choose, with a partially eaten Thanksgiving dinner on the table.

The ''Bleach'' anime series adapts Kubo's manga but also introduces several original, self-contained story arcs. In Karakura Town, a 15-year-old high school student Ichigo Kurosaki becomes a substitute when Rukia Kuchiki, a Soul Reaper, cannot fulfill her duties after engaging in battle with a particularly powerful Hollow. Although initially reluctant to accept the heavy responsibility, he begins eliminating Hollows in Rukia's place and during this time discovers that several of his friends and classmates are spiritually aware and have powers of their own: Uryū Ishida is a Quincy who can use spirit particles, Orihime Inoue possesses a group of protective spirits known as the ''Shun Shun Rikka'' and Yasutora Sado ("Chad") has strength equal to the Hollows encased in his tough right (and occasionally left) arm.

When Rukia is sentenced to death for her transgressions in the human world and taken back to the spirit world of Soul Society, Ichigo seeks out the assistance of Kisuke Urahara and Yoruichi Shihōin, who unbeknownst to him are two exiled Soul Reapers, to allow himself and his friends to save Rukia. After Ichigo and his friends battle many Soul Reapers, it is revealed that high-ranking Soul Reaper Sōsuke Aizen framed Rukia for the crime and has been illegally experimenting on Soul Reapers and Hollows. Aizen plans on taking over Soul Society via the use of the Hōgyoku, a legendary substance that can turn Hollows into half Soul Reapers and vice versa, increasing their powers greatly. After the event of faking his death and his reappearance which caused a fight with some of the people from Soul Society, he escapes into Hueco Mundo, the realm of the Hollows, and later abducts Orihime as she is instrumental in creating the Oken, a power that will allow him to kill the Soul King, the ruler of Soul Society.

After being trained by the Vizards, other exiled Soul Reapers who were unwilling subjects of Aizen's experiments and developed Hollow powers, Ichigo and his friends travel into Hueco Mundo to save Orihime, and the world. Facing Aizen's army of Arrancars, who are Hollows given Soul Reaper abilities, led by an elite group known as the Espadas, which are composed of ten Arrancars with exemplary strength. Espadas serve as commanders in Aizen's army and each has its factions of weaker Arrancars. Along with Aizen, Gin Ichimaru and Kaname Tōsen, the Espada as a group possess comparable strength to Soul Society's Gotei 13 Soul Reaper captains. After finally reaching Orihime, Aizen reveals her kidnapping was a distraction to allow him to take Karakura Town, as its spiritual energy is what is needed for the Oken. After receiving final training from his father Isshin, another exiled Soul Reaper, Ichigo and the Soul Reapers face off against Aizen, the Soul Reapers who aligned with his cause and his most powerful Espadas, resulting in Aizen's surrender and the loss of Ichigo's Soul Reaper powers as he uses a secret technique to seal Aizen away for good.

Nearly two years later, Chad reveals to Ichigo that he has found people like him, known as Fullbringers, in a group known as Xcution. The Fullbringers can give up their powers to restore a Soul Reaper's powers and they plan on doing so for Ichigo, who begins to use Fullbring as well. However, it is all a ruse by their leader Kugo Ginjo, a Fullbringer and former Substitute Soul Reaper, to steal Ichigo's powers to empower the rest of them. Ichigo ultimately has his Soul Reaper powers restored when he finally earns proper trust from the Soul Society. The captains and lieutenants then share their powers with Ichigo, who defeats Ginjo and the other members of Xcution and returns to his duty of protecting Karakura Town proudly as a Substitute Soul Reaper.

Several anime exclusive story arcs are presented. The Bount arc in season 4 focuses on spiritually aware humans who are immortal so long as they absorb souls. Their leader Jin Kariya seeks to destroy Soul Society for the constant hunting of the Bount, and he and Ichigo battle for the fate of Soul Society. Another storyline is the introduction of captain Shūsuke Amagai, the replacement for Gin Ichimaru after he joined Aizen in his betrayal. Amagai seeks revenge against Commander Yamamoto for the death of his father and uses the Kasumiōji family's Bakkōtō weapons in his plans. Ichigo battles Amagai, who acknowledges the shame of his actions and commits suicide. The third original arc features the evil Zanpakutō Muramasa, which can turn itself and other Zanpakutō into spiritual beings to take revenge on Soul Society for imprisoning its master Kōga Kuchiki. After he is successful, he is double-crossed and transforms into a monstrous creature that Ichigo defeats, but not before Muramasa reveals the intention was to have Soul Reapers and Zanpakutō communicate on equal terms. The fourth and final original arc features an event in which Kagerōza Inaba creates modified soul copies of many members of the Gotei 13, placing them in Reigai bodies. Inaba sought to capture Nozomi Kujō to fuse with her and once again become their original being Ōko Yushima. Upon fusion, Yushima sought to destroy the Soul Society.

US Marine Force Recon Lt. Colonel and CIA operative Al Simmons is assigned by his superior, Jason Wynn, to infiltrate a biochemical weapons plant in North Korea, despite Simmons' growing moral qualms with the nature of his work. Unknown to Simmons, Wynn has ordered his top assassin Jessica Priest to murder him while he is on the mission. Before Simmons dies, he is set on fire by Wynn and the flames cause the plant to explode. Simmons arrives in Hell, where one of the rulers of Hell - Malebolgia - offers him a Faustian deal: if Simmons becomes his eternal servant and leader of his army in Armageddon, he will be able to return to Earth to see his fiancée, Wanda Blake. Simmons accepts the offer and returns to Earth.

Upon his return as Spawn, he learns that five years have passed since his death. Wanda is now married to his best friend Terry Fitzgerald, who is living as the stepfather to his daughter Cyan. Spawn encounters a clown-like demon named Violator, sent by Malebolgia, who acts as his guide down the path to evil. Spawn also meets and befriends a young homeless boy named Zack and a mysterious old man named Cogliostro, a fellow Hellspawn, who has successfully freed his soul and now fights for Heaven. Spawn learns that Wynn, is now a weapons dealer, and has developed a biological weapon called Heat 16. During a reception, Spawn attacks Wynn, kills Jessica, and escapes with the help of his necroplasm armor.

Following the attack by Spawn, Violator convinces Wynn to have a device attached to his heart that will release Heat 16 worldwide if his vital signs flatline as a deterrent against assassination attempts. Malebolgia wants Simmons to kill Wynn and initiate the apocalypse. Spawn confronts Violator, who turns into his demonic form and beats him down. Cogliostro rescues him and teaches him how to use his necroplasm armor with Zack. Spawn learns that Violator and Wynn are going to kill Terry, Cyan, and Wanda.

Terry sends an email incriminating Wynn to a fellow newsman. Just as the email is sent, Cyan and Wynn enter the room. Wynn destroys Terry's computer and takes the family hostage. Spawn, Cogliostro and Zack arrive and nearly kill Wynn, but Spawn extracts the device from Wynn's body instead and destroys it. With his plan foiled, Violator sends Spawn and Cogliostro to Hell, where they both battle the demon before subduing him. Spawn is then confronted by Malebolgia, and tells the demon that he will never lead Hell's army. Spawn escapes with Cogliostro just before they are overwhelmed by Malebolgia's forces. Violator, having recovered, follows them. A final battle ensues, ending with Spawn decapitating the demon with his chains. Violator's head taunts the group and threatens his return before melting and returning to Hell. Wynn is arrested, and Spawn, realizing there is no place for him in Wanda's world anymore, dedicates himself to justice rather than succumbing to his lust for vengeance and returns to the streets with Cogliostro and Zack.

''The Wallflower'' is about a girl named Sunako who was called ugly by the first and only person to whom she confessed her love. This incident sparks a life change, and as a result Sunako shuns all forms of beauty, both in herself as well as in life. Concerned by her change for the worse, Sunako's aunt, the owner of a huge mansion where four very handsome high school students live (for free), demands the boys to transform her niece into the "perfect lady", and in return they will be able to continue living there for free. They are given a deadline and if they are unable to uphold their deal then they would have to either pay a lump sum of cash or vacate the premises.

While the four of them manage to make Sunako physically beautiful enough to become a lady, the problem lies with her attitude and interests (which Sunako has no intention of changing). Up until the most recent release in the story, they manage to convince Sunako's aunt that her niece is indeed a lady befitting the mansion in which they live (and prevent the rent from skyrocketing to triple the required amount). However, in reality Sunako has not changed at all. Sunako has the tendency to spurt out in a nose bleed when seen by bright creatures, especially around Kyohei.

It is a humorous tale following Sunako and the four boys through unusual and ridiculous situations where Sunako is confronted with many unwanted experiences of being a lady, while also channeling the idea of self and beauty.

The story is set in the distant future, when the Earth's oceans have risen and flooded most of the sea-lying land on Earth.

The rogue scientist Zorndyke caused the flooding, which killed countless individuals, and most of humanity's remaining cities have been attacked or destroyed by Zorndyke's army of half-animal "hybrids". The remaining humans begin to wage war against Zorndyke's seagoing creations for survival. Humanity's best hope for a resolution to the conflict lies with its submarine forces, among which is the focus of the story, Blue Submarine #6. It is revealed that Zorndyke is attempting to decisively end the conflict in the favor of his hybrid children by artificially inducing a polar switch using geothermal energy at the South Pole.

In the land of the Cubivores, the beast known as the Killer Cubivore reigns at the top of the animal food chain. This powerful tyrant and his gang of cronies have gorged themselves on the essence of the land, known in the game as "Wilderness", so much that they have absorbed some of it into themselves. Meanwhile, nature has begun to fade away, becoming drab and infertile, and the number of beasts has declined. The user-named protagonist has taken it upon himself to become King of All Cubivores, in order to challenge the Killer Cubivore and restore the Wilderness to the world.

Inspector Eddie Chan of the Organised Crime and Triad Bureau, who suffers from emotional stress after shooting several men in self-defense, is assigned to track down the kidnapped businessman Wong Yat-fei. The search takes him from Hong Kong to Taiwan, causing him to cross paths with some powerful mobsters. What complicates matters is that one of the kidnappers is operating within the police force, determined to stop Chan from succeeding. The relentlessly driven Chan finds himself fighting his personal demons at the same time he battles the seemingly unending wave of crime in the city.

The protagonist is Guy Crouchback, heir of a declining aristocratic English Roman Catholic family. Guy has spent his thirties at the family villa in Italy shunning the world after the failure of his marriage and has decided to return to England at the very beginning of the Second World War, in the belief that the creeping evils of modernity, gradually apparent in the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, have become all too clearly displayed as a real and embodied enemy.

He attempts to join the Army, finally succeeding with the (fictitious) Royal Corps of Halberdiers, an old but not too fashionable regiment. He trains as an officer and is posted to various centres around Britain. One of the themes is recurring "flaps" or chaos – embarking and disembarking from ships and railway carriages that go nowhere. Crouchback meets the fire-eating Brigadier Ben Ritchie-Hook (probably based on Lieutenant General Sir Adrian Carton de Wiart, a college friend of Waugh's father-in-law whom Waugh knew somewhat from his club), and Apthorpe, a very eccentric fellow officer; in an episode of high farce, the latter two have a battle of wits and military discipline over an Edwardian thunder-box (portable toilet) which Crouchback observes, amused and detached. Before being sent on active service, he attempts to seduce his ex-wife Virginia, secure in the knowledge that the Catholic Church still regards her as his wife; she refuses him.

He and Ben Ritchie-Hook share an adventure during the Battle of Dakar in 1940. Apthorpe dies in Freetown, supposedly of a tropical disease; when it is discovered that Guy gave him a bottle of whisky when visiting him in hospital (there is an implication that Apthorpe's disease, unknown to Guy, was really alcoholic liver failure), Guy is sent home, having blotted his copybook. Thus ends the first book.

Crouchback eventually manages to find a place in a fledgling commando brigade training on a Scottish island under an old friend, Tommy Blackhouse, for whom Virginia left him. Another trainee is Ivor Claire, whom Crouchback regards as the flower of English chivalry. He learns to exploit the niceties of military ways of doing things with the assistance of Colonel "Jumbo" Trotter, an elderly Halberdier who knows all the strings to pull. Crouchback is posted to Egypt, headquarters for the Middle East theatre of operations. This involves him in the Battle of Crete, where he meets the disquieting Corporal-Major Ludovic. Crouchback acquits himself well on Crete, though chaos and muddle prevail. He, Ludovic and a few others achieve a perilous escape from the advancing Germans in a small boat. Ludovic wades ashore in Egypt, carrying Guy; the others in the boat have disappeared. Apparently a hero, Ludovic is made an officer. In Egypt the beautiful and well connected Mrs Stitch, a character who also figures in other Waugh novels, takes Guy under her wing. She also endeavours to protect Claire, who was evacuated from Crete even though his unit's orders were to fight to the last and then surrender as prisoners of war. She arranges for Crouchback to be sent the long way home to England, possibly to prevent him from compromising the cover story worked up to protect Claire from desertion charges. Guy finds himself once more in his club, asking around for a suitable job. Thus ends the second book.

Crouchback spends 1941–1943 in Britain, mostly at desk jobs. He turns 40 and, with Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union and Britain's subsequent alliance with the Soviets, feels a sense of the war's futility. American soldiers swarm around London. Virginia has fallen on hard times and is reduced to selling her furs. She had been persuaded to accompany Trimmer, her former hairdresser, who has been set up as a war hero for media consumption. She becomes pregnant by him and searches futilely for an abortion care provider. Eventually she decides to look for a husband instead. Crouchback is selected for parachute training, preparatory to being sent into action one last time. The commanding officer at the training centre is Ludovic. In Crete, Ludovic had deserted from his unit, and in the process murdered two men, one on the boat. Although Crouchback was delirious at the time, Ludovic is afraid that he will be exposed if Guy meets him. Already a misfit as an officer, he becomes increasingly paranoid and isolated.

Guy is injured during the parachute training, and finds himself stuck in an RAF medical unit, cut off from anyone he knows. He eventually contacts Jumbo Trotter to extract him and returns to live with his elderly bachelor uncle Peregrine Crouchback. His father having died and left an appreciable estate, Guy is now able to support himself comfortably. This attracts the attention of Virginia, who begins to visit him.

Before Guy goes abroad, he and Virginia are reconciled and remarry (i.e., simply resuming their marriage, in the eyes of the Catholic Church). Virginia stays in London with Guy's Uncle Peregrine and has her baby there. Despite being incorrectly suspected of pro-Axis sympathies because of his time in pre-war Italy and of his Catholicism, Guy is posted to Yugoslavia where he is appalled by the partisans, befriends a small group of Jews and finds out that his former friend de Souza's loyalties are with the Communists rather than with Britain. While Guy is overseas, a German doodlebug hits Uncle Peregrine's flat and kills him and Virginia, but not the infant son of Virginia and Trimmer, Gervase, who is in the country with Guy's sister.

On his late father's advice, Guy attempts individual acts of salvation, but these ultimately make matters worse for the recipients. The Yugoslavian Jews receive gifts from Jewish organisations in the US, infuriating non-Jewish locals, although the gifts consist largely of warm clothing and food. Upon returning to England, Guy is told that some of his friends in Yugoslavia were shot as spies, largely because they had become so friendly with him.

After the end of the war Guy meets the daughter of another old Roman Catholic family, Domenica Plessington, and marries her. In Waugh's first version of the novel's conclusion, Guy and his second wife produce further children who are to be disinherited by Trimmer's son. Waugh altered this ending to an uncompromisingly childless marriage in the revised text, after realising that some readers interpreted such a conclusion as hopeful. "No nippers for Guy," he clarified in a letter to Nancy Mitford. Even so, although Waugh died in 1966, in the Penguin 1974 reprint Guy still has two sons with Domenica Plessington.

Part I

Amir, a well-to-do Pashtun boy, and Hassan, a Hazara boy who is the son of Ali, Amir's father's servant, spend their days kite fighting in the hitherto peaceful city of Kabul. Flying kites was a way to escape the horrific reality the two boys were living in. Hassan is a successful "kite runner" for Amir; he knows where the kite will land without watching it. Both boys are motherless: Amir's mother died in childbirth, while Hassan's mother, Sanaubar, simply abandoned him and Ali. Amir's father, a wealthy merchant Amir affectionately refers to as ''Baba,'' loves both boys. He makes a point of buying Hassan exactly the same things as Amir, to Amir's annoyance. He even pays to have Hassan's cleft lip surgically corrected. On the other hand, Baba is often critical of Amir, considering him weak and lacking in courage, even threatening to physically punish him when he complains about Hassan. Amir finds a kinder fatherly figure in Rahim Khan, Baba's closest friend, who understands him and supports his interest in writing, whereas Baba considers that interest to be worthy only of females. In a rare moment, when Amir is sitting on Baba's lap rather than being shooed away as a bother, he asks why his father drinks alcohol which is forbidden by Islam. Baba tells him that the Mullahs are hypocrites and the only real sin is theft which takes many forms.

Assef, an older boy with a sadistic taste for violence, mocks Amir for socializing with a Hazara which, according to him, whose members belong only in Hazarajat. Assef is himself only half Pashtun, having a German mother. One day, he prepares to attack Amir with brass knuckles, but Hassan defends Amir, threatening to shoot out Assef's eye with his slingshot. Assef backs off but swears to take revenge one day.

One triumphant day, Amir wins the local kite-fighting tournament and finally earns Baba's praise. Hassan runs for the last cut kite, a great trophy, saying to Amir, "For you, a thousand times over." However, after finding the kite, Hassan encounters Assef in an alleyway. Hassan refuses to give up the kite, and Assef severely beats him and rapes him. Amir witnesses the act but is too scared to intervene. He knows that if he fails to bring home the kite, Baba would be less proud of him. He feels incredibly guilty but knows his cowardice would destroy any hopes for Baba's affections, so he keeps quiet about the incident. Afterwards, Amir keeps distant from Hassan; his feelings of guilt prevent him from interacting with the boy. Hassan's mental and physical well-being begin to deteriorate.

Amir begins to believe that life would be easier if Hassan were not around, so he plants a watch and some money under Hassan's mattress in the hope that Baba will make him leave; Hassan falsely confesses when confronted by Baba. Although Baba believes "there is no act more wretched than stealing", he forgives him. To Baba's sorrow, Hassan and Ali leave anyway, because Hassan has told Ali what happened to him. Amir is freed of the daily reminder of his cowardice and betrayal, but he still lives in their shadow.

Part II

In 1979, five years later, the Soviet Union militarily intervened in Afghanistan. Baba and Amir escape to Peshawar, Pakistan, and then to Fremont, California, where they settle in a run-down apartment. Baba begins work at a gas station. After graduating from high school, Amir takes classes at San Jose State University to develop his writing skills. Every Sunday, Baba and Amir make extra money selling used goods at a flea market in San Jose. There, Amir meets fellow refugee Soraya Taheri and her family. Baba is diagnosed with terminal cancer but is still capable of granting Amir one last favor: he asks Soraya's father's permission for Amir to marry her. He agrees and the two marry. Baba dies. Amir and Soraya settle down in a happy marriage, but to their sorrow, they learn that they cannot have children.

Amir embarks on a successful career as a novelist. Fifteen years after his wedding, Amir receives a call from his father's best friend (and his childhood father figure) Rahim Khan. Khan, who is dying, asks Amir to visit him in Peshawar. He enigmatically tells Amir, "There is a way to be good again."

Part III

From Rahim Khan, Amir learns that Hassan and Ali are both dead. Ali was killed by a land mine. Hassan and his wife were killed after Hassan refused to allow the Taliban to confiscate Baba and Amir's house in Kabul. Rahim Khan further reveals that Ali was sterile and was not Hassan's biological father. Hassan was actually the son of Sanaubar and Baba, making him Amir's half brother. Finally, Khan tells Amir that the reason he has called Amir to Pakistan is to ask him to rescue Hassan's son, Sohrab, from an orphanage in Kabul.

Amir searches for Sohrab, accompanied by Farid, an Afghan taxi driver and veteran of the war with the Soviets. They learn that a Taliban official comes to the orphanage often, brings cash, and usually takes a girl away with him. Occasionally he chooses a boy, recently Sohrab. The orphanage director tells Amir how to find the official, and Farid secures an appointment at his home by claiming to have "personal business" with him.

Amir meets the Taliban leader, who reveals himself as Assef. Sohrab is being kept at Assef's house as a dancing boy. Assef agrees to relinquish him if Amir can beat him in a fight. Assef then badly beats Amir, breaking several bones, until Sohrab uses a slingshot to fire a brass ball into Assef's left eye. Sohrab helps Amir out of the house, where he passes out and wakes up in a hospital.

Amir tells Sohrab of his plans to take him back to America and possibly adopt him. However, American authorities demand evidence of Sohrab's orphan status. Amir tells Sohrab that he may have to go back to an orphanage for a little while as they have encountered a problem in the adoption process, and Sohrab, terrified about returning to an orphanage, attempts suicide. Amir eventually manages to take him back to the United States. After his adoption, Sohrab refuses to interact with Amir or Soraya until Amir reminisces about Hassan and kites and shows off some of Hassan's tricks. In the end, Sohrab only gives a lopsided smile, but Amir takes it with all his heart as he runs the kite for Sohrab, saying, "For you, a thousand times over."

Following a failed sting operation in which two fellow undercover officers are killed months prior, Detroit Police Department Sergeant Jake Roenick begins to regularly abuse alcohol and painkillers while clinging to his unambitious assignment as a desk sergeant at Precinct 13, which is due to be decommissioned. On New Year's Eve, Roenick, officer Jasper O'Shea, and secretary Iris Ferry maintain a skeleton shift. Psychiatrist Alexandra Sabian arrives to evaluate Roenick's fitness for duty.

Crime boss Marion Bishop is arrested after killing an undercover policeman, and is set to be transferred to prison with three other criminals: Beck, Anna, and Smiley. When a snowstorm shuts down the roads, the prison transport is diverted to Precinct 13, where an unprepared Roenick places the prisoners in cells.

Masked gunmen cut off the precinct's communications and electricity, and attack the station, killing the deputies before demanding that Bishop be handed over. Roenick kills one of the attackers and finds he is an undercover cop working under Captain Marcus Duvall of Precinct 21. Bishop explains that Duvall and his team are corrupt and were formerly his business partners. They now plan to eliminate him to preserve their secret.

The precinct staff and criminals form an uneasy truce. Heavily outnumbered and outgunned, Roenick releases the prisoners and arms them to help defend the precinct. Their combined efforts repel several more attacks, eventually leading to a stalemate. Another officer, Capra, arrives and is shot at by the corrupt officers, but makes it inside, but Bishop suspects him of being sent by Duvall when he discovers an unlocked back entrance.

Beck and Smiley meanwhile secretly conspire to escape; simultaneously, the rest of the defenders plan for Anna and Sabian to escape in Capra's SUV. When Beck and Smiley sneak out, they are killed by Duvall's men, providing the distraction which allows Anna and Sabian to drive off but they are ambushed by Duvall’s right-hand man Kahane; who kills Anna, having been hiding in the back seat, whilst Duvall kills Sabian after she refuses to cooperate.

When the snowfall subsides, Duvall calls in a corrupt SWAT team who land on the roof of the precinct. The defenders flee through a utilities tunnel underneath the building. Emerging from the tunnel, they find themselves surrounded by Duvall's men. The traitor is revealed to be O'Shea and not Capra. As Duvall prepares to execute the others, Bishop secretly plants a flash bang grenade on O'Shea, mortally wounding him. In the confusion, Iris and Capra flee in Duvall's SUV. Kahane shoots out the tires, causing the vehicle to crash and knock Capra unconscious, but Iris manages to kill Kahane after a struggle.

Duvall chases Roenick and Bishop into a nearby forest where they ambush and kill the remaining forces, however Duvall shoots and wounds Bishop before being killed by Roenick, who is himself injured in the process. Following this, an injured Bishop takes Roenick's gun and flees, and Roenick promises to personally arrest him in the future. When Iris arrives with police and firemen, Roenick claims that only he and Duvall's gang are present, effectively granting Bishop a getaway. As the authorities secure the area, Roenick and Iris leave the forest as the sun rises.

Upon returning home from work on his birthday, Steve (Gary Sweet), a middle class husband and father of two, finds the house dark and his family not home. He notices a chair, his television set, and a video tape obviously set out for his viewing. He turns the TV and VCR on, and begins to watch a tape made for him by his wife, Alexandra (Helen Buday). The first clip shows his wife and children wishing him a happy birthday, but after the kids leave the room, Alexandra begins a striptease, and it appears to be nothing more than a birthday gift. As it progresses, however, it becomes clear that the tape is designed to humiliate and torture Steve for marital problems that Alexandra has been stewing about for years. As part of her 'show', Alexandra feigns breast cancer, has sex with their neighbor, and tells Steve that neither she nor their two children are ever coming home.

In South-Central Los Angeles, a local gang, Street Thunder, steals a cache of assault rifles and pistols. At 3:00 am on a Saturday in Anderson, a crime-infested ghetto, a team of heavily-armed LAPD officers ambush and kill six members of the gang. Later, the gang's four warlords swear a blood oath of revenge against the police and the citizens of Los Angeles.

During the day, three sequences of events occur parallel to one another: First, Lieutenant Ethan Bishop, a newly promoted highway patrol officer, is assigned to take charge of the decommissioned Anderson police precinct during the last few hours before it is permanently closed. Only a skeleton staff remains, composed of Sergeant Chaney and the station's two secretaries, Leigh and Julie. Across town, two of the Street Thunder warlords, along with two other gang members, drive around the neighborhood looking for people to kill. One of the warlords shoots and kills a little girl, Kathy, and the driver of an ice-cream truck. Kathy's father, Lawson, pursues and kills the warlord and the other gang members chase him into the Anderson precinct. In shock, Lawson is unable to communicate to Bishop or Chaney what has happened to him.

Just before this, a prison bus commanded by Starker stops at the station to find medical help for one of three prisoners being transported to the state prison. The prisoners are Napoleon Wilson, Wells, and Caudell, who is sick. As the prisoners are put into cells, the telephone lines go dead, and when Starker prepares to put the prisoners back on the bus, the gang opens fire on the precinct, using weapons fitted with silencers. In seconds, they kill Chaney, the bus driver, Caudell, Starker, and the two officers accompanying Starker. Bishop unchains Wilson from Starker's body and puts Wilson and Wells back into the cells. When the gang members cut the station's electricity and begin a second wave of shooting, Bishop sends Leigh to release Wells and Wilson, and they help Bishop and Leigh repel an attempted invasion, though Julie is killed in the firefight and Leigh is shot in one arm.

Meanwhile, the gang members remove all evidence of the skirmish to avoid attracting outside attention. Bishop hopes that someone has heard the police weapons firing, but the neighborhood is too sparsely populated for nearby residents to pinpoint the location of the noise. Wells is chosen to sneak out of the precinct through the sewer line and hot-wire a car, but is killed by a gang member hiding in the back seat. However, two police officers responding to reports of gunfire find the dead body of a telephone repairman hanging from a pole near the police station and call for backup.

As the gang rallies for an all-out final assault, Wilson, Leigh, and Bishop retreat to the basement, taking the still-catatonic Lawson with them. The gang then storms the building and rushes the survivors, who protect themselves with a large, durable sign. Bishop shoots a tank full of acetylene gas, which explodes and kills all the gang members in the basement. The remainder of the gang flees as more police support arrives to secure the station. Venturing down into the basement, the police officers find dozens of dead and badly-burned gang members strewn about the hallway; the only survivors are Bishop, Leigh, Wilson, and Lawson. Lawson is wheeled out on a stretcher, while Leigh refuses medical help for the gunshot wound in her arm and walks off. An officer tries to cuff Wilson, but Bishop angrily stops him and asks Wilson to walk out of the station with him.

Two rebellious children, Lindsey and Kevin Kingston (Aleisha Allen and Philip Daniel Bolden), sabotage the relationships of their divorced mother, determined to keep her single until their parents reconcile. Meanwhile, Nick Persons (Ice Cube), a bachelor who dislikes children, purchases a brand new 2004 Lincoln Navigator and boasts with his beloved bobblehead doll of Satchel Paige, who comes to life at its own will – though only Nick can hear him. When he reaches his sports shop, he witnesses the woman of his dreams, Suzanne Kingston (Nia Long). On his way to talk to her, he is disgusted to find she has two kids, who turn out to be Lindsey and Kevin. Later that night, Nick runs into Suzanne on his way home, asking for a ride because her car has broken down. He agrees to take her home, and once there, he agrees to transport her wherever she needs to go. On New Year's Eve, he brings her to the local airport to go to Vancouver for a business meeting, but her former husband Frank calls to say he is sick and cannot bring the children to the airport, leaving her to put her trust in Nick.

Once at her house, he meets Kevin and Lindsey for the second time. Kevin asks Nick if he wants to learn any Chinese and kicks him between the legs and slaps him. Their babysitter warns Nick he'll fail as the kids fight over the front seat. They go to the airport, and Kevin accidentally damages Nick's car door, inside the terminal, Kevin learns that corkscrews, a gift he got from Nick, are illegal to bring on planes. Unable to get to a trashcan, he slips the item in Nick's jacket pocket, which leads to Nick being tackled by security. They decide to take a train, but the two kids jump off to collect a cape from a toy just as Nick boards, forcing him to jump off and land unsafely, losing their luggage, and they reluctantly decide to drive.

Believing Nick is only their mother's friend, the kids are tamed but still continue to misbehave and show Nick no respect. At a truck stop, the two learn from one of Nick's friends, Marty (Jay Mohr), on his cellphone that he not only hates them, but also lied about not having feelings for their mother. Kevin fakes an asthma attack to lock Nick out of the car. Lindsey then tries to drive the car away, but fails because of not knowing how to drive, forcing Nick to chase after them and then trying to get in from the SUV’s rooftop. Lindsey drives the car in a butcher statue, causing the axe to injure Nick in his testicles. Later, Lindsey signals to truck driver Al Buck (M. C. Gainey) who believes that they have been kidnapped, causing Nick to accidentally drive his car into the woods and down a mountain, resulting in heavy damage to the car, much to his horror and dismay. Ultimately, the kids run away to visit their father in a train, with Nick chasing after them on a horse, but ultimately falling off when Kevin points out a pile of stuff in Nick's trail.

Once they arrive at their father's house, the kids discover he lied about being sick to spend time with his mistress/new wife and their baby instead. Feeling betrayed and forgotten, they begin warming up to Nick, as he does with them, when Nick tells them his father also abandoned him. As the three begin to become friends, they continue their journey on the road, but still find themselves facing various mishaps on the way. Eventually, Kevin vomits on the car's windshield after he ate too many sugars (like pies, cakes, and brownies) which he wasn't supposed to eat and they pull into a rest area to clean out the car. While Kevin and Nick feed a deer some cookies, Lindsey accidentally scares it with a camera flash, causing the deer to attack Nick, resulting in him losing his car keys. Because of this, Nick tries to hotwire the car using his lighter, but he accidentally causes the lighter to tip over and set the inside of the car on fire, which explodes. Nick takes his frustration out on the kids, but quickly calms down and apologizes afterward. When they find the keys and use them, the doors fall over.

With the car now a heap of scrap metal, the trio tries to hitch a ride from Al Buck, but he leaves Nick behind and drives off, still thinking Nick is a kidnapper. Nick hitches a ride from Ernst (C. Ernst Harth) in a billboard truck. In Al's truck, the kids physically attack him in the van, leading to a chase that ends in Vancouver, where Nick fights Al. During the fight, Kevin has an asthma attack and collapses. Nick rushes to his side and revives him. Witnessing the event, Suzanne believes trusting Nick was a mistake. After encouragement from Satchel, Nick goes to Suzanne's hotel to say goodbye to her and the kids. After Suzanne realizes how much Nick and the kids have grown to care for each other, Suzanne tells Nick that he is the one for her, and they kiss on New Year's Eve.

In 1918, Max Rothman (John Cusack), a Munich art dealer, is a World War I veteran who lost his right arm in the Third Battle of Ypres, effectively ending his career as a painter. He returns to Germany and opens a modern art gallery. He is married to Nina (Molly Parker), but also has a mistress, Liselore von Peltz (Leelee Sobieski). Through a chance encounter, Rothman is approached by a young Adolf Hitler (Noah Taylor), a war veteran as well, disgruntled over Germany's loss during the conflict and the country's humiliation by the signing of the Versailles Treaty. Hitler is also an aspiring painter, and wishes to have his artwork displayed.

Rothman comes to believe that Hitler has talent, but has failed to tap his inner potential to create great art. While Rothman is aware of his new protégé's anti-Semitism, he feels sorry for Hitler, who had nothing to come home to after the war, and encourages him to delve deeper in his art. Despite his overall doubts about Hitler, Rothman agrees to take some of his paintings under a contractual basis.

Meanwhile, Reichswehr officer Captain Karl Mayr (Ulrich Thomsen), sees Hitler give an anti-Semitic speech to uninterested passerby, and encourages him to go into politics and make a career out of propaganda. During a brief conversation in an army barracks, Mayr also offers to financially support Hitler by having the army pay his expenses, further enticing Hitler to join his national socialist movement, the German Workers' Party.

Later, Rothman begins to question Hitler's motives regarding his racial views. During a conversation with Rothman, Hitler denies being anti-Semitic and says that, on the contrary, he grudgingly admires Jews for their "blood purity". He goes on to state that the German people would be better off if they did not integrate themselves with different races. Seeing Hitler's architectural sketches, with their appeal to a romanticized national greatness, Rothman realizes this is where Hitler's talent lies, and that it would be far less dangerous if confined to art galleries. Hitler is thrilled by Rothman's enthusiasm, not understanding it is partly motivated by fear of what he might become.

Rothman and Hitler arrange to meet that evening to discuss Hitler's future projects, and after making a violently anti-Semitic speech to a group of supporters at a rally—with Mayr's backing—Hitler goes to a cafe to discuss a series of new militaristic drawings with Rothman. As Rothman approaches the cafe for his meeting with Hitler, he is savagely beaten by a group of anti-Semites who had attended Hitler's rally and been incited to violence by his words. As Rothman lies dying, an angry Hitler leaves the cafe, believing that Rothman has stood him up.

In Pushkin's poem, an old man and woman have been living poorly for many years. They have a small hut, and every day the man goes out to fish. One day, he throws in his net and pulls out seaweed two times in succession, but on the third time he pulls out a golden fish. The fish pleads for its life, promising any wish in return. However, the old man is scared by the fact that a fish can speak; he says he does not want anything, and lets the fish go.

When he returns and tells his wife about the golden fish, she gets angry and tells her husband to go ask the fish for a new trough, as theirs is broken, and the fish happily grants this small request. The next day, the wife asks for a new house, and the fish grants this also. Then, in succession, the wife asks for a palace, to become a noble lady, to become the ruler of her province, to become the tsarina, and finally to become the Ruler of the Sea and to subjugate the golden fish completely to her boundless will. As the man goes to ask for each item, the sea becomes more and more stormy, until the last request, where the man can hardly hear himself think. When he asks that his wife be made the Ruler of the Sea, the fish cures her greed by putting everything back to the way it was before, including the broken trough.

''Groove'' tells the story of an all-night rave. The film is broken up into segments by which DJ is spinning and features real-life DJs Forest Green, WishFM, Polywog, and Digweed. It follows David Turner (Hamish Linklater), who becomes a reluctant raver when his brother Colin (Denny Kirkwood) drags him to the rave.

Setting

''Thief'' takes place in a metropolis called "the City", which has been noted to contain elements of the Middle Ages-like dark fantasy and the Industrial Revolution. Project director Greg LoPiccolo said in an early preview: "In essence [... it's] this undefined medieval age, sort of medieval [Europe] meets ''Brazil'' meets ''City of Lost Children''. There's some electricity, some magic, and some 19th century machinery kind of stuff." The setting has been described as steampunk, a fantastical setting where steam engine technology is prominently used. It has also been argued that ''Thief'' is one of the earliest examples of the New Weird genre. During levels, the player may learn about the setting by finding notes and overhearing conversations; it has been noted that the player participates in the revelation of ''Thief'''s setting.

The City contains three factions: the Keepers, and two opposing religious orders known as the Pagans and the Order of the Hammer, or "Hammerites". The latter two have been cited as representations of chaos and order, respectively; the neutral, secretive Keepers strive to maintain balance within the City. The Hammerites worship a deity called "The Builder", and believe in progress, craftsmanship and righteousness; the Pagans, who have been described as "primitive, almost animalistic", worship the dangerous "Trickster" god and value the natural world. It has been assessed that the design of each group's architecture reflects their beliefs.

Story

The game's prologue sees Garrett, the protagonist, describing his youth as a homeless orphan on the City's streets. He is caught while attempting to pickpocket a suspicious man who reveals himself to be a Keeper named Artemus. Impressed by Garrett's ability to see him, he offers Garrett the chance to join his order. Garrett accepts, but later leaves the order to pursue a life of thievery. Years later, Garrett works as a thief, and is under pressure to join a crime ring. As punishment for his failure to pay a protection fee, he is targeted for assassination by the crime lord Ramirez. Garrett evades the assassins, and robs Ramirez's mansion in retaliation. Following this, he is approached by a woman named Viktoria—the representative of an anonymous client who was impressed by Garrett's theft from Ramirez. He is contracted to steal a sword from Constantine, an eccentric nobleman who recently arrived in the City. After Garrett completes the mission, Viktoria takes him to Constantine, who explains that he hired Garrett to steal his own sword as a test. Constantine offers him a fortune to steal The Eye—a gem kept within a sealed and deserted Hammerite cathedral.

To reach the cathedral, Garrett ventures through Old Quarter, a haunted, abandoned district of the City. Through an opening in the cathedral, The Eye informs Garrett of a nearby Keeper sanctuary, where he may learn how to unseal the cathedral. There, Garrett discovers that the cathedral was sealed to prevent the City's destruction by the Trickster. He learns that there are four talismans needed to remove the seal: two hidden in ancient ruins beneath the City, and two inside a Hammerite temple (in ''Thief Gold'', one talisman is in possession of the mages and another was found at an opera house after it was taken from the caves below, while the other two are in the Lost City and the Hammerite Temple as in the original game). Garrett recovers the talismans and returns to the cathedral. After unsealing the cathedral, he learns that its inhabitants had been killed and made undead by The Eye. He returns The Eye to Constantine, who reveals himself to be the Trickster. Viktoria says that The Eye requires a flesh eye to function; she binds Garrett with vines and removes his right eye. The Trickster places it on the gemstone, and the two disappear through a portal. Garrett, left for dead, is found and freed by two Keepers. During his escape from the Trickster's mansion, he learns that the Trickster plans to use The Eye to revert the world to a wild state.

After Garrett escapes the mansion, he seeks help from the Order of the Hammer. However, he finds that the Trickster has attacked the Hammerite temple. In a refuge beneath the temple, he finds Hammerite survivors who provide him with a booby-trapped replica of The Eye. Garrett descends into the Trickster's domain, where he finds the Trickster performing a ritual with The Eye to complete his plan. Garrett stealthily substitutes The Eye with its copy, which kills the Trickster. Later, Garrett has acquired a mechanical replacement for his lost eye. On the streets of the City, Artemus approaches Garrett and claims that he will soon require the Keepers' help. Garrett dismisses him, and as he walks away, Artemus warns of the encroaching "metal age".

In Pamplona, Spain in 1976, the Basque people are fighting against the Spanish government for their rights to autonomy. ETA leader Jaime Miró, along with friends Ricardo Mellado and Felix Carpio, escape from prison, but at the expense of many civilian lives during a sabotaged bull-running exhibit that was used as a distraction from the police. Following the event, the Prime Minister assigns Colonel Ramón Acoca (head of the anti-ETA group GOE) to hunt down Jaime Miró; Acoca's wife and unborn child were killed in a Basque demonstration assisted by ETA and the Church, so when he suspects Jaime hiding in a convent, he decides to raid it by force despite the implications of it.

The Cistercian Convent of the Strict Observance just outside Ávila, where women of all backgrounds choose to live a life of solitude, worship, and fasting, is run by Reverend Mother Betina. When the GOE raid the convent and proceed to assault and rape the sisters, four sisters manage to escape; the eldest nun, Teresa, is given the task to take the convent's only valuable asset, a cross made of gold, to the nearest convent where it will be safe. The four nuns have different back stories. The latest member of the convent, Sister Lucia, is actually Lucia Carmine, the wealthy daughter of a Mafia Don who went to the convent as a means of escape after she murdered three men involved in her father's arrest, and plans to lay low for a few months before escaping to Switzerland to retrieve her father's offshore money. Sister Graciela is the daughter of a bitter woman who loathes her daughter because she is a reminder of the man who left her, as well as the fact that Graciela "stole" her beauty, and beat her daughter unconscious when she caught her having sex with her current lover; Graciela found peace with God, and voluntarily went to the convent. Sister Megan was abandoned and was never claimed for adoption and opted to join the convent instead of becoming a maid, but longs to know who her real family is. And Sister Teresa was a religious person growing up until her younger, more beautiful sister Monique stole her fiancé, and she went against God until she decided to stay in a convent when her fiancé begged for her forgiveness and said he was coming back for her.

Lucia is determined to make it to the Swiss border without drawing suspicion, and plots to steal the golden cross, pawn it, and use the money to go to Switzerland. They are tricked by a man named Carrillo who poses as a priest, but they manage to subdue him before he rapes Graciela. They change out of their convent clothes to seem inconspicuous while travelling. However, they run into Jaime and his men, along with Jaime's girlfriend Amparo. Afraid that the sisters will give away their location, they decide to take them to their hideout.

Colonel Acoca has figured out that four of the nuns are missing and is convinced that Jaime Miró escaped before the soldiers got there. The Prime Minister doubts that he was there in the first place and believes that Acoca is starting to get out of control, but continues to have the Colonel search for both Miró and the missing nuns, in order to avoid public's suspicion and critics about the brutality and raid to the convent done by his men for no obvious reason. They get a tip from Carrillo, whom they suspect due to the robes left in the store that he was subdued in.

Meanwhile, Sister Teresa, nervous about leaving the convent after years of solitude, has become paranoid of everyone, including the men escorting her to the ETA hideout. She sees a father pushing a baby stroller, and is anxious that is her fiancé and his child with his sister, but she tries to remind herself that the infant is supposed to be an adult by now.

Meanwhile, Ellen Scott, a CEO of Scott Industries, has incurable cancer. She once was a middle-class worker who saved the life of Milo Scott, the younger brother of Byron Scott, the then-CEO of the company. They married and Ellen went to live in New York, where she saw how Byron mistreated Milo and how greedy and manipulative upper-class people were, turning her into a bitter woman whose only consolation was that Byron would eventually give the company to Milo. However, Byron and his wife produced a daughter named Patricia, and Milo and Ellen feared that Byron would name her the heiress of the company. During a business trip to Spain, the private jet they are travelling in crashes, killing everyone except Milo, Ellen, and Patricia. Ellen convinces Milo that if they take Patricia, they will simply raise her before she comes of age and inherits everything and leave them with nothing, and they abandon her at a farm and claim that they are the only survivors. However, during the reading of Byron's will, it is revealed that Byron's personal assets go to Patricia, but Milo will inherit the company, leaving them both guilty over abandoning Patricia, since they cannot claim her now and face suspicions that they attempted to abandon her. Milo dies of guilt a year later, leaving Ellen to inherit it. She hires her chief of security, former detective Alan Tucker, to search for a baby abandoned in Avila, Spain, not telling him why. It is implied that the baby is Sister Megan.

Back in Spain, Colonel Acoca informs his colleagues that the nuns are with Jaime Miró, saying one of Jaime's friends are actually his informants. Sister Teresa is slowly going insane, believing that the terrorists were hired by Raoul to kidnap her and take her back. While everyone is sleeping, she leave the golden cross with Lucia and makes her way to Colonel Acoca's camp, informing them of their location, begging them not to let her go to her former fiancé. They raid the camp, and Jaime agrees to split the group to avoid capture - Ricardo Mellado with Sister Graciela, Rubio Arzano with Sister Lucia, and Jaime Miró, Felix Carpio, and Amparo with Sister Megan. Acoca interrogates Sister Teresa for their location, but her madness has taken over and proves to be of no use, and he has his men rape her until she speaks. She decides that she has been abandoned by God, but evil still exists and steals a pistol to shoot a few of them before she is shot dead.

Meanwhile, Alan Tucker is in Ávila tracking the baby. He visits the priest involved with the orphanage, the hospital, and the orphanage itself and manages to connect that the baby is in fact Patricia Scott, and that Ellen needs to find her as an heiress to the company. He decides to blackmail Ellen, hoping to become her business partner.

Lucia is entertained with Rubio, who believes that she has been in the convent for ten years and does not know what the current state of the world is. She thinks she is falling for him, but is determined to get her money. At the same time, Jaime is reflecting upon his life as a terrorist. His family sought refuge in a Church from the Spaniards, but everyone but him died, and he sought revenge and at the same time did not like the Church, which was why he was reluctant to take the sisters. He and Megan start to become friends, which Amparo is not pleased about. As the group stops at a hotel for the night, the room clerk calls the police, but they manage to escape.

Rubio asks Lucia to say a prayer and shares the only prayer she knows. For the first time in her life, Lucia understands the prayer and what it means to her. While taking a bath in a stream, Lucia almost drowns, and Rubio saves her, and they eventually have sex. Rubio wishes to marry her, and Lucia finds herself wishing she could, but she is still determined to go to Switzerland. They arrive at a town, and Lucia successfully haggles for a passport and money from a pawn shop. While having dinner, Rubio is stabbed when he defends a snide comment someone makes about Lucia. They run to a church, where Lucia tries her best to take care of him, but is forced to go to a hospital to take care of him. They are both arrested because the authorities recognize Rubio as a terrorist and Lucia as a criminal from Italy.

Sister Graciela and Ricardo's trip is quiet as Graciela will not talk to Ricardo despite his best efforts. Although he is exasperated with her cold shoulder, he is reluctantly starting to fall for her. It is not until she is almost attacked by a wild wolf in a cave that she begins to speak to him. She does not want to love him because of her past of falling for another man, but falls for him anyway, and they plan to marry.

Alan Tucker goes to the orphanage to find more information about Megan/Patricia, but comes to a dead end when the owner of the orphanage tells him that the date Megan arrived does not coincide with the date Patricia should have died, and continues the assignment trying to locate Megan. It is revealed that Ellen paid the owner to lie and change the dates.

Amparo is growing angry with Jaime and Megan's relationship. They hide out at a bullfight, where Megan impresses Jaime with her knowledge of the subject. They discover that Rubio and Lucia were arrested, leaving Megan shocked to find out about Lucia's past, as well as Sister Teresa's death. She is also saddened to hear about Sister Teresa's death. Megan grows sympathetic to his ideals even though she believes that violence is wrong. Jaime holds up a bank to get money to continue traveling, and Acoca nearly catches him if it were not for Megan, and he suspects Felix of betraying him. Amparo tells him that one of their friends wants them to meet in the town square, and when he leaves, Megan overhears her calling Acoca, and saves him from getting caught by pretending to be an angry wife looking for her husband. When he confronts Ampara, she tells him that she is sick of the bloodshed and how they are hurting the Basque people as well, and they keep her with the group so as not to escape.

Acoca discovers that Jaime escaped, and tricks him to meeting up in a convent. However, after reuniting with Graciela and Ricardo, he realized that it is a trap and they head to the countryside. Jaime tricks Amparo by forcing her to drink with powder in it, but it is only sleeping pills and they leave while she is asleep. He persuades Megan to wait in France with his aunt until he is done fighting so they can marry, and she talks to Graciela about leaving the convent.

The next morning, they go into a Basque town to find Acoca waiting for them, as he was tipped off by Amparo when she woke up. Surrounded by Basque people, Acoca cannot kill Jaime and leaves, knowing that he will surely be killed by the people who hired him for failing his job. Alan finds Megan, telling her that Ellen has been looking for her. She promises to return to Jaime soon, and Alan realizes that she is Patricia, and Ellen had a hand at hiding the evidence.

During their wedding, Graciela stops and decides to return to the convent. Jaime's men get Rubio and Lucia out of prison by pretending be Acoca's men. Rubio and Lucia are reunited, and Lucia goes to Switzerland to collect thirteen million dollars. Megan knows the truth about her past because of Ellen, but forgives her and is eventually adopted by her. Megan learns how to run the company and inherits it after Ellen dies. Three years later, Jaime has been caught and sentenced to death. She tries to save him with good lawyers and talking to the Prime Minister, but nothing happens. The execution seems to have gone as planned, but when she opens the body bag sent to her, Jaime is in it, still alive, and it is implied that she paid the men responsible for the execution to leave the country and become wealthy men. Lucia and Rubio have settled for a simple life in the French countryside, having twin children. Sister Graciela returns to the convent, where she returns the golden cross and continues life as it was before.

Jennifer Parker, a beautiful, inexperienced, newly sworn in Assistant District Attorney for the State of New York, inadvertently participates in a plot by Michael Moretti, the rising star of one of the most powerful organized crime families in America, to escape a trial. Manhattan District Attorney Robert Di Silva, believing that Jennifer is truly responsible, fires her and vows to destroy her for her part in the fiasco with Moretti. Di Silva initiates disbarment procedures against Jennifer, and young lawyer Adam Warner is assigned to investigate Jennifer. Adam immediately realizes that she is not guilty at all, and falls for her. With Adam's help Jennifer begins to rise again; meanwhile Moretti, inspired by her determination to succeed, follows her career from a distance.

Adam, despite being married and groomed for the United States Senate, cannot help falling in love with Jennifer. When he tells her that his wife Mary Beth has asked for a divorce, Jennifer meets with her. Being so close to the Senate election, the two women decide it is best for Adam to wait until after the election. But Mary Beth sleeps with Adam one last time, in the process tricking him into impregnating her. Adam learns that his wife is pregnant, wins the election and Jennifer ends their affair. Jennifer, having previously discovered that she too is pregnant and not wanting to be hurt by Adam, accepts but does not reveal to him that she is carrying his child.

Jennifer gives birth and names her son Joshua Adam Parker. Only her assistant Ken Bailey knows of Joshua's existence. Jennifer returns to her practice and soon makes headlines as a successful lawyer. Meanwhile, Moretti constantly tries to spark friendship with Jennifer, which she rebuffs at every attempt, reminding him of his earlier trick that was devastating to her early career. Nevertheless, when her son is kidnapped by a criminal Jennifer is defending, she, in desperation, turns to Moretti for help. After helping her, he seduces her and Jennifer eventually becomes the Family consigliere. Joshua dies following a water skiing accident. Jennifer and Moretti are soon being hunted down by the government; he shoots her, wrongly thinking she has betrayed him, and is killed himself in an FBI raid of his house. Adam is able to use his position to save Jennifer. Soon Jennifer watches on television as Adam is sworn in as President of the United States. Jennifer returns to her home town and a small law practice, with everyone she loved taken from her and all joy and happiness gone from her life.

The quiet life of Oxford professor James Westgate (Bob Peck) is shattered when he is introduced to Penny (Miranda Richardson), the wife of his crass new colleague (Barry Foster). Westgate recognises her as his childhood sweetheart "Patch", and the two resume their friendship. Westgate is bored with his mundane college life, including his German friend Boris who experiments on animals in the lab, and his lady friend Amanda, as well as the attentions of a shy male student who claims to be in love with him. He is only too happy to be diverted into joining Penny in her search for missing archaeologist Pilkington (a fellow Oxford colleague). As Westgate's obsession with his childhood friend grows, he is drawn into a tangle of misunderstanding, intrigue, and murder. Bob Peck imbues his character with comic ineptitude.

The film frequently has the 4th movement from Schubert's Trout Quintet on the soundtrack.

, July 2006. In Taliban-ruled Afghanistan, women must wear burqas to cover themselves and are banned from working outside the home. This causes difficulty for a family consisting of only an unnamed young girl, her mother, and her grandmother, whose male relatives were killed in battle during the Soviet invasion and subsequent civil wars. The mother loses her hospital job when the Taliban cuts off funding, and cannot find other work.

Desperate, the mother and grandmother decide to have the young girl disguise herself as a boy so that she can get a job. To persuade the girl to accept the plan, the grandmother tells her an Afghan fable about a boy who became a girl when he went under a rainbow. The girl reluctantly agrees, despite being afraid that the Taliban will kill her if they discover her masquerade. They cut her hair, and the girl plants a lock of it in a flowerpot. The only other people who know of the ruse are the milk vendor, who gives her a job because he was a friend of her deceased father, and a local boy named Espandi who sees through her disguise. It is Espandi who renames the girl Osama.

The masquerade becomes more difficult when the Taliban draft all the local boys into their madrasa, a religious and military training school for boys. They are taught how to fight and conduct ''ghusl'', ritual ablutions, including one for when they experience a nocturnal emission or, when they are older, have sex with their wives. Osama attempts to avoid joining the ablution session, and the schoolmaster grows suspicious of her. She realises that she will inevitably be found out. Several of the boys begin to pick on her. Espandi is able to protect her at first, but her secret is discovered when she begins to menstruate.

Osama is arrested and put on trial along with two other people. The others are condemned and put to death, but as Osama is destitute and helpless, her life is spared; she is instead given in marriage to a much older man. He already has three wives, all of whom hate him and say he has destroyed their lives. The wives take pity on Osama, but are powerless to help her. The husband shows her the padlocks he uses on his wives' rooms, reserving the largest for her. The film ends with the new husband conducting an ablution in an outdoor bath, which the boys were earlier taught to conduct after ejaculation.

The episode is a parody of the VH1 biography series ''Behind the Music'' and shares its narrator, Jim Forbes. It begins with the Simpson family history and how they got into show business: believing that families depicted in the numerous TV shows they watch together bear no resemblance to their comparative dysfunctionalism, Homer writes and directs an inadequate video "pilot" that fails to attract the attention of the major networks except for Fox, as its president happens to be Marge's hairdresser. After much fine-tuning and on-set mishaps produce many of the show's running gags, ''The Simpsons''' resounding ratings and merchandising success makes the family extraordinarily wealthy; having moved out of their house on Evergreen Terrace to live in MC Hammer's former mansion, "Hammertime" (renamed "Homertime"), they expand their scope to include a series of Grammy-winning, "mega-platinum" novelty albums.

Problems begin to arise as the Simpsons' fame continues: they become reckless spendthrifts, alternating between buying their colleagues extravagant gifts and paying them to perform embarrassing acts for their amusement. After a funny stunt (the plummet into Springfield Gorge from "Bart the Daredevil") causes him injury, Homer becomes addicted to prescription painkillers; Marge blows much of the family's fortune on licensing her likeness for use on diaphragms, and Bart goes into rehab after attacking flight attendants, being temporarily replaced on the show by Richie Rich. Following a tip from Apu, the IRS discovers that the Simpsons are evading tax payments and repossess Homertime. As tensions mount in the family, the show's writing and production team resort to gimmicky, nonsensical plots and shameless guest star appearances to maintain ratings. Finally, while performing with Jimmy Carter at the Iowa State Fair, the family gets into a big dispute and splits up.

Fox puts the show on hiatus since none of the Simpsons will talk to each other. The members pursue independent endeavors: Homer follows a career as a hammy character actor in stage productions such as ''Rent II: Condo Fever''; Bart replaces Lorenzo Lamas as the star of the syndicated action show ''Renegade''; Marge creates a nightclub act performing Bob Marley's song "I Shot the Sheriff"; and Lisa writes ''Where Are My Residuals?'', a tell-all book about her negative experiences from working on the show, such as Homer's spiking of her cereal with anti-growth hormones. Bringing the family back together seems impossible, until Dr. Hibbert tasks his old fraternity brother, country singer Willie Nelson, with reuniting them. Nelson puts on a phony awards show in order to reconcile the family, who hug and forgive each other for their past wrongs. They look with hope to the many years of episodes of ''The Simpsons'' to come... or not.

The episode ends with an epilogue, in which Forbes states, "...the future looks brighter than ever for this northern Kentucky family". Following the epilogue, the Simpson family is shown in a video editing room, viewing a scene from an upcoming episode from the next season, which shows the family talking about winning a trip to Delaware. Seemingly in response to the stilted and unfunny quality of the proceedings, Homer quietly assures the editor that the next season will be the last. The final scene shows a mock teaser for an "upcoming episode" of ''Behind the Laughter'' about Huckleberry Hound, in which he reveals that he is gay.

An evil vampire duke seeks to kill and collect the blood of a royal family of European vampires in order to become all powerful. The last surviving member of the family, Prince Kazaf, flees to Hong Kong with his servant Prada. There, they are introduced by estate agent Momoko to live in an abandoned church.

Vampire hunter Reeve is depressed after his partner Lila is killed by vampires. He decides to train Lila's younger sister, Gypsy, to inherit her sister's duty and fight the vampire duke. However, Reeve's own sister, Helen, sees Gypsy as a rival.

At the same time, Kazaf meets Helen and falls in love with her, after which he intends to lead the life of a human being, but he is tracked down by the duke. Helen helps Kazaf and lets him hide in her home, where they are later discovered by Gypsy. Meanwhile, Reeve falls into the duke's trap while hunting vampires. Helen and Gypsy team up to save him.

In the Autumn of 1955, working-class Jewish teenager David Greene, from Scranton, Pennsylvania, receives a football scholarship to St. Matthew's, an exclusive Massachusetts prep school, for his senior year due to his grades and ability to play football. Upon arrival, he meets his teammates Rip Van Kelt, Charlie Dillon, Jack Connors, and his roommate Chris Reece, the most well-known and popular students who are from well-to-do families, and learns of the school's cherished honor code system. Soon learning that his new friends are antisemites, he suppresses his background.

David becomes the team hero and attracts beautiful débutante Sally Wheeler, whom Dillon claims is his girlfriend. After a victory over the school's chief rival St. Luke's, Dillon inadvertently discovers David's Judaism. Out of jealousy, Dillon sensationalizes this, causing Sally and his teammates to turn against David. David's classmates, led by Richard "McGoo" Collins and his bodyguard-like roommate Chesty Smith, constantly harass him, with only Reece and another unnamed student remaining loyal. The final straw comes when he finds a sign above his bed bearing a swastika and the words "Go home Jew." Finally having enough, he furiously posts a public confrontation with whoever made the sign outside the building the following night. No one shows up, however, and David calls out the students' cowardice when he sees them looking out their dorm windows.

Overwhelmed by pressure from his prestigious family, Dillon uses a crib sheet to cheat in an important history exam. David and Van Kelt spot him doing so, but keep quiet. After the exam, Dillon gets pushed while leaving class and drops the sheet on the floor. When the teacher, Mr. Geirasch, discovers it, he informs the class that he will fail all of them if the cheater keeps silent. He instructs the students, led by Van Kelt, the head prefect, to find the cheat.

When David confronts Dillon and threatens to turn him in if he does not confess, Dillon tells him about his pressure, apologizes for his actions against him and unsuccessfully attempts to buy David's silence with money. Just when David is about to reveal Dillon to the other students as the cheat, Dillon accuses David. They fight until Van Kelt breaks it up and tells them to leave and let the rest of the class decide who is being honest. Both agree to do so. The majority of the class blame David out of antisemitic prejudice, while Reece, the unnamed student, and Connors, going against his own self-professed antisemitism, argue that it is unlike David to cheat or lie. Despite this, the class votes to convict David, prompting Van Kelt to tell him to report to the elitist headmaster, Dr. Bartram, to confess to cheating.

David goes to Bartram's office and says that he was the cheater. Unbeknownst to him, Van Kelt has already told the headmaster that the real offender was Dillon. Bartram tells David and Van Kelt that they should have reported the offense, but he absolves the both of them. As David leaves the headmaster's office, he sees an expelled Dillon leaving the school. Dillon says that he will be accepted to Harvard anyway and that years later everybody will have forgotten about his incident. The two coldly exchange final insults to each other before Dillon leaves.

Following the commencement of Operation Barbarossa in 1941, a motorized Gebirgsjäger unit of the Wehrmacht transported on a Steyr 1500A V8 (4x4) field-car and two Demag Sd.Kfz. 10 light halftracks, one towing a 7.5 cm Pak 40 anti-tank gun and the other a field kitchen (''Gulaschkanone''), under the command of Captain Klaus Woermann and his adjutant, Sergeant Dietrich Oster, arrives to a uninhabited citadel – simply known as 'the Keep' – near a village in Romania to control the Dinu Mountain Pass in the Carpathian Mountains. Two German soldiers, privates Lutz and Anton, attempt to loot a metallic icon within the keep but accidentally unleash a spectral entity, which kills them. The being, known as Radu Molasar, proceeds to kill five more soldiers in the following days and begins to take corporeal form. A detachment of SS Einsatzkommandos transported on a Mercedes-Benz Lo 2000 (4x2) truck and supported by a Sd.Kfz. 222 Horch 801v armoured car under the command of the sadistic SD Sturmbannführer Erich Kaempffer arrives to deal with what is thought to be partisan activity, executing three villagers as collective punishment and taking other five as hostages, despite Woermann's protests.

At the instigation of the local village priest, Father Mihail Fonescu, the Germans retrieve an ailing Jewish historian, Prof. Theodore Cuza, from a concentration camp. He deciphers a mysterious message written in Old Slavonic using the Glagolitic alphabet emblazoned on a wall of the citadel before Molasar saves the professor's daughter, Eva, from sexual assault by two Einsatzkommandos and cures Cuza of his debilitating scleroderma by touch. The professor becomes indebted to the entity who demands that Cuza remove a talisman from the keep so that Molasar can escape its confines.

Having remotely sensed Molasar's presence, a mysterious stranger named Glaeken Trismegestus arrives from Greece, seducing Eva and incurring the professor's ire. The malign power of Molasar begins to affect the villagers, seemingly driving them mad. After an unsuccessful attempt by the professor to have the stranger stopped, Kaempffer and Woermann clash over the former's sadistic crimes; Woermann furiously denounces the Nazis, claiming that the monster hunting them is a reflection of their evil. When their conversation is suddenly interrupted by the sound of horrible screams and machine gun fire coming from the keep's inner courtyard, Woermman is shot and killed by Kaempffer. Afterwards, Kaempffer flees the scene and rushes to the now-silent courtyard, only to find that the entire German garrison of the citadel has been slaughtered in a gruesome manner by Molasar, and that all the military vehicles parked inside had been disabled. Stumbling across the mutilated corpses and the wreckage of vehicles that litter the courtyard, a terrified Kaempffer is killed when he is confronted by Molasar as Cuza goes to remove the talisman from the keep. When Eva attempts to prevent him from doing so, Cuza refuses Molasar's command to kill her. In response, Molasar returns Cuza to his diseased state. Glaeken arrives, retrieves the talisman and confronts Molasar. After their battle, the latter is weakened and banished back into the innermost recesses of the keep. Glaeken is transformed in a storm of light and seals the aperture that freed Molasar, containing the entity within once more. The villagers, freed from Molasar's influence, escort Eva and Cuza away.

Nighttime radio disc jockey Andie is in a funk after a short relationship with a fellow D.J. He leaves a record in her library: ''Nightsong'' by Simon Locke, a former lover, whom she has been pining for since he mysteriously disappeared five years earlier.

When she plays the album during her shift, Simon shows up. She confronts him angrily about his disappearance. She then turns and he's gone. When leaving the station after work, a motorcycle almost hits her but Simon saves her. He follows her and they begin rehashing their relationship.

At a coffee shop, Simon and Andie discuss their past and she questions why he hasn't produced music since they broke up. They discuss the good and bad times of their relationship, and she realizes that she doesn't want to get played by Simon so she leaves the cafe. At home, she finds "Nightsong" playing on her stereo. She then discovers Simon and asks him about his songs, which detailed their relationship. He attempts to seduce her but then stops and says that they can't have their relationship back.

Simon takes Andie toward the ocean on a back road, getting out near the edge of a cliff. He takes her down the hillside and tells her how after she played his album he decided to come back to explain to her what happened and help her move on with her life. He tells her he died in a motorcycle accident and was never discovered, pulling back some brush to reveal a wrecked motorcycle and his own rotted skeleton. Simon then fades away. Later, while she is at work she gets a call requesting "Nightsong". She tags the song with "from Andrea to Simon with love."

Fifteen years in the future, Chakotay and Harry Kim discover ''Voyager'' frozen on the surface of an ice world. They recover the body of Seven of Nine, collect the Doctor via his mobile emitter, and return to the ''Delta Flyer'', joining Chakotay's girlfriend Tessa Omond (Christine Harnos). Kim explains to the Doctor that fifteen years prior, the crew had attempted to use slipstream engine technology to bring ''Voyager'' home, with Chakotay and Kim in the ''Delta Flyer'' leading the larger ship. However, the slipstream became unstable, causing ''Voyager'' to crash into the ice world. Chakotay and Kim have spent the last fifteen years searching for the ship. Kim explains that he can send a message back in time to Seven using a stolen Borg temporal transmitter, which would then prevent the accident.

As the Doctor and Kim work, they are pursued by USS ''Challenger'', commanded by Captain Geordi La Forge. La Forge warns them that he knows they are trying to alter the past, a violation of the Temporal Prime Directive and although he's sympathetic to them, La Forge must stop their efforts. Chakotay offers Tessa the opportunity to be safely transported to the ''Challenger'' but she refuses.

The Doctor successfully discovers the correct Borg time index, and Kim sends the information, but this ultimately has no effect on the slipstream, and ''Voyager'' is still lost. Kim realizes the changes have not worked and blames himself for destroying ''Voyager'' twice. The Doctor convinces him to try again, but with a less optimal solution: to have the changes collapse the slipstream, keeping ''Voyager'' stranded in the Delta Quadrant but with all hands alive. As the ''Challenger'' opens fire on the ''Delta Flyer'', an overload starts to build in the warp matrix. Kim successfully sends out the signal before the ''Delta Flyer'' warp core breaches.

In the present, ''Voyager'' once again enters the slipstream, losing communications with the ''Delta Flyer''. Seven receives the new calculations, and Janeway orders her to implement them. As planned, this causes the slipstream to fail, leaving ''Voyager'' and its crew safely in normal space, unharmed, and nearly ten years closer to home. Janeway orders the crew to dismantle the slipstream technology, believing it not yet ready for safe usage. She later provides Kim with an encoded message found in the signal telemetry: a recording that the future Kim had sent to his past self, giving him much-needed confidence in his abilities.

One morning in the near future, a group of assorted stereotypes awake in a strange town with no memory of who they are or where they came from. Their only clues come from the assorted labels that hold their names (Wade's name badge and Sam's underwear) and a mysteriously creepy voice issuing from their televisions. Over the course of the season, they endure many trials including an unusual reality show kitchen task, a murder mystery among their group, a secret affair and of course their own strange personalities before they learn the horrifying truth behind the unusual events of the Strangerhood.

Strangerhood Studios

''Strangerhood Studios'' is a series of shorts, each about one or two minutes long, featuring the characters of ''The Strangerhood''. The story, however, departs from the main plot of ''The Strangerhood''. For example, the characters are back in the outside world, not trapped on Strangerhood Lane. ''Strangerhood Studios'' was created when the Independent Film Channel asked Rooster Teeth Productions and machinima artist Paul Marino to create six shorts for television broadcast.

''Pharaoh'' begins with one of the more memorable openings in a novel — an opening written in the style of an ancient chronicle:

In the thirty-third year of the happy reign of Ramses XII, Egypt celebrated two events that filled her loyal inhabitants with pride and joy.

In the month of Mechir, in December, there returned to Thebes laden with sumptuous gifts the god Khonsu, who had traveled three years and nine months in the land of Bukhten, restoring to health the local king's daughter named Bent-res and exorcising the evil spirit not only from the king's family but even from the fortress of Bukhten.

And in the month of Pharmouthi, in February, the Lord of Upper and Lower Egypt, the ruler of Phoenicia and of the nine nations, Mer-amen-Ramses XII, after consulting the gods, to whom he is equal, named as his Successor to the Throne his twenty-two-year-old son Ham-sem-merer-amen-Ramses.

This choice delighted the pious priests, eminent nomarchs, valiant army, faithful people and all creatures living on Egyptian soil. For the Pharaoh's elder sons, born of the Hittite princess, had, due to spells that could not be investigated, been visited by an evil spirit. One, twenty-seven years old, had been unable to walk from his majority; another had cut his veins and died; and the third, after drinking tainted wine that he had been unwilling to give up, had gone mad and, fancying himself an ape, spent days on end in the trees.

The fourth son Ramses, however, born of Queen Nikotris, daughter of High Priest Amenhotep, was strong as the Apis bull, brave as a lion and wise as the priests....

''Pharaoh'' combines features of several literary genres: the historical novel, the political novel, the ''Bildungsroman'', the utopian novel, the sensation novel. It also comprises a number of interbraided strands — including the plot line, Egypt's cycle of seasons, the country's geography and monuments, and ancient Egyptian practices (e.g. mummification rituals and techniques) — each of which rises to prominence at appropriate moments.

Much as in an ancient Greek tragedy, the fate of the novel's protagonist, the future "Ramses XIII," is known from the beginning. Prus closes his introduction with the statement that the narrative "relates to the eleventh century before Christ, when the Twentieth Dynasty fell and when, after the demise of the Son of the Sun the eternally living Ramses XIII, the throne was seized by, and the uraeus came to adorn the brow of, the eternally living Son of the Sun Sem-amen-Herhor, High Priest of Amon." What the novel will subsequently reveal is the elements that lead to this denouement—the character traits of the principals, the social forces in play.

Ancient Egypt at the end of its New Kingdom period is experiencing adversities. The deserts are eroding Egypt's arable land. The country's population has declined from eight to six million. Foreign peoples are entering Egypt in ever-growing numbers, undermining its unity. The chasm between the peasants and craftsmen on one hand, and the ruling classes on the other, is growing, exacerbated by the ruling elites' fondness for luxury and idleness. The country is becoming ever more deeply indebted to Phoenician merchants, as imported goods destroy native industries.

The Egyptian priesthood, backbone of the bureaucracy and virtual monopolists of knowledge, have grown immensely wealthy at the expense of the pharaoh and the country. At the same time, Egypt is facing prospective peril at the hands of rising powers to the north — Assyria and Persia. .) The 22-year-old Egyptian crown prince and viceroy Ramses, having made a careful study of his country and of the challenges that it faces, evolves a strategy that he hopes will arrest the decline of his own political power and of Egypt's internal viability and international standing. Ramses plans to win over or subordinate the priesthood, especially the High Priest of Amon, Herhor; obtain for the country's use the treasures that lie stored in the Labyrinth; and, emulating Ramses the Great's military exploits, wage war on Assyria.

Ramses proves himself a brilliant military commander in a victorious lightning war against the invading Libyans. On succeeding to the throne, he encounters the adamant opposition of the priestly hierarchy to his planned reforms. The Egyptian populace is instinctively drawn to Ramses, but he must still win over or crush the priesthood and their adherents.

In the course of the political intrigue, Ramses' private life becomes hostage to the conflicting interests of the Phoenicians and the Egyptian high priests.

Ramses' ultimate downfall is caused by his underestimation of his opponents and by his impatience with priestly obscurantism. Along with the chaff of the priests' myths and rituals, he has inadvertently discarded a crucial piece of scientific knowledge.

Ramses is succeeded to the throne by his arch-enemy Herhor, who paradoxically ends up raising treasure from the Labyrinth to finance the very social reforms that had been planned by Ramses, and whose implementation Herhor and his allies had blocked. But it is too late to arrest the decline of the Egyptian polity and to avert the eventual fall of the Egyptian civilization.

The novel closes with a poetic epilogue that reflects Prus' own path through life.Christopher Kasparek, "Prus' ''Pharaoh'' and Curtin's Translation", p. 128. The priest Pentuer, who had declined to betray the priesthood and aid Ramses' campaign to reform the Egyptian polity, mourns Ramses, who like the teenage Prus had risked all to save his country. As Pentuer and his mentor, the sage priest Menes, listen to the song of a mendicant priest, Pentuer says:

"Do you hear? [...] He whose heart no longer beats not only is not saddened by the mourning of others, he does not even take pleasure in his own life, no matter how beautifully sculpted... What for, then, this sculpting for which one pays in pain and bloody tears?..."

Night was falling. Menes wrapped himself in his gaberdine and replied:

"Whenever such thoughts assail you, go to one of our temples and look at its walls crammed with pictures of men, animals, trees, rivers, stars—just like the world we live in.

"For the simple man such figures have no value, and more than one may have asked, what are they for?... why carve them at such great expense of labor?... But the wise man approaches these figures with reverence and, sweeping them with his eye, reads in them the history of distant times or secrets of wisdom."

A voice-over by Lieutenant-Commander George Ericson (Jack Hawkins), a British Merchant Navy officer in the Royal Naval Reserve, declares:

This is a story of the Battle of the Atlantic, the story of an ocean, two ships, and a handful of men. The men are the heroes; the heroines are the ships. The only villain is the sea, the cruel sea, that man has made more cruel...

In late 1939, just as war breaks out, Ericson is recalled to the Royal Navy and given command of HMS ''Compass Rose'', a newly built intended for convoy escort duties. His sub-lieutenants, Lockhart and Ferraby, are both newly commissioned and without experience at sea. The new first lieutenant, James Bennett (Stanley Baker), is an abusive martinet.

Despite these initial disadvantages, the ship's company gains hard experience and becomes an effective fighting unit. At first their worst enemy is the weather, since German submarines lack the range to attack shipping far into the Atlantic. With the Fall of France, French ports become available to the Germans and U-boats can attack convoys anywhere in the Atlantic – making bad weather the convoys' greatest advantage. Germany is joined in the war by Italy, while the Spanish dictator Franco allows Axis U-boats to use Spanish harbours. The first lieutenant is put ashore due to illness, the junior officers mature and the ship crosses the Atlantic many times escorting convoys, often in brutal weather. They witness the sinking of many merchant vessels they are charged with protecting and the tragic deaths of merchant navy crewmen. A key scene involves Ericson's decision to carry out a depth charge attack even though the blast will kill merchant seamen floating in the water. After close to three years of service, including one U-boat sunk, ''Compass Rose'' is herself torpedoed and her crew forced to abandon ship. Most of the crew are lost. Taking to a couple of liferafts, Ericson survives this ordeal along with his first lieutenant, Lockhart (Donald Sinden), and with the few crew left (including Ferraby) they are picked up the next day.

Ericson is promoted commander, and together with Lockhart, his now-promoted "Number One", takes command of a new frigate, HMS ''Saltash Castle''. With Ericson leading an anti-submarine escort group they continue the monotonous but vital duty of convoy escort. Late in the war, while serving with the Arctic convoys, they doggedly pursue and sink another U-boat, marked as , ''Saltash Castle'' s only "kill". As the war ends the ship is shown returning to port, as guard to a number of German submarines that have surrendered.

Written during the middle of World War II, ''Arrival and Departure'' reflects Koestler's own plight as a Hungarian refugee. Like Koestler, the main character is a former member of the Communist party. He escapes to "Neutralia," a neutral country based on Portugal, where Koestler himself had gone, and flees from there. (Harold Rosenberg wrote in a book review in ''Partisan Review'' that "there ought to be a law against such place-names.") Reflecting Koestler's later life relationship with science, and particularly his disagreement with various movements within psychiatry, the main character emerges from treatment psychically neutered, and the critical question of the novel is how much of his later trauma and political activity is due to a small incident in his childhood.

A decade after the events of the first film, Doctor Arthur Neuman is giving a tour of the hall of Norse mythology in Edge City's local museum. Neuman mentions that Loki, the God of Mischief, created the mask and unleashed it on Earth in order to spread his chaos among mankind, and that those who wear the mask are granted his powers. When Neuman brings up Loki's punishment and imprisonment at Odin's hands, a stranger suddenly becomes furious and transforms, revealing himself to be Loki. The tourists panic and flee, but Neuman stays to argue with Loki, who takes the mask in the display case, only to realize it is a replica. In anger, he removes Neuman's face from his body and puts it in the case, before disposing of the arriving authorities and storming out of the museum in a whirlwind of rage.

Meanwhile, the real mask, which was disposed of by Stanley Ipkiss and Tina Carlyle, makes its way to Fringe City and is found in a river by a dog named Otis - who belongs to Tim Avery, an aspiring animator at an animation studio, who is reluctant to accept parenthood with his wife, Tonya. On a tropical island, Loki is relaxing until Odin confronts and orders him to resume the search for the mask he had sent him on, as he believes it has caused too much chaos for mankind. Loki asks his father to help him, only for the latter to sternly say that he has to take responsibility for his actions. Later that night, Tim puts on the mask for a Halloween party held at the studio, becoming a reincarnation of Stanley Ipkiss' "The Mask" alter-ego. When the party turns out to be a bore, Tim uses his newfound powers to perform a remix of "Can't Take My Eyes Off You", making the party a success and giving Tim's boss, Daniel Moss, the inspiration for a new cartoon, resulting in Tim's promotion the next day.

Tim returns to his house that night and has sex with his wife, Tonya, while still wearing the mask. A baby is conceived. The baby, Alvey, is born with the same powers as the mask, which alerts Odin. Possessing a store clerk, Odin informs Loki about this and tells him that if he finds the child, he will find the mask. Months later, Tonya goes on a business trip, leaving Tim with their son. Tim, now promoted, desperately tries to work on his cartoon at home, but is continuously disrupted by Alvey. In order to get some peace and quiet, Tim lets Alvey watch various cartoons on television, giving Alvey the idea to torment his father using his powers. Meanwhile, Otis, who has been feeling neglected by Tim because of Alvey, dons the mask by accident and becomes a reincarnation of the masked persona of Stanley Ipkiss' dog, Milo, who tries to get rid of Alvey, but all of his attempts are foiled by the much craftier infant.

Eventually, Loki, after searching from home to home for the baby and leaving a trail of mayhem in his wake, finds Alvey and confronts Tim for the mask back, but Alvey uses his powers to protect his father. Odin, possessing Tim's body, becomes fed up with Loki's destructive approach and strips his son of his powers. Tim is later fired after failing to impress Moss during a pitch but is able to reconcile and bond with Alvey. Loki, still determined to please his father, sneaks into the Avery household that night and manages to complete a summoning ritual and appeal to Odin to restore his powers. Odin agrees, but only for a limited time, stating this is his last chance. He immediately turns the head of the neighbor Betty into a big nose for being a nosey neighbor.

Loki then kidnaps Alvey in exchange for the mask. When Tonya returns home, she goes with Tim and Otis, to whom Tim had apologized for his negligence towards him and convinced him that Alvey could be his new best friend, to make the exchange with Loki, but Loki decides to keep Alvey despite the exchange, forcing the group to chase after them as Tim becomes the Mask once more. The subsequent confrontation is relatively evenly matched due to both of them possessing equal powers, prompting Loki to halt the fight, and suggest that they should let Alvey decide who he wants to be with. Although Loki tries to lure Alvey to him with promises of fun, Tim takes the mask off and convinces his son to choose him using the connection he had forged with him. Saddened and enraged, Loki tries to kill Tim, but his time runs out and Odin appears in person, once again scolding Loki for his failure. Tim, however, feels sympathy for Loki and reminds Odin that regardless of their problems, they will still be family and nothing is more important than that. Touched by Tim's speech as the mask is returned, Odin reconciles with Loki, and the duo returns home.

Some time later, Tim is rehired when his subsequent cartoon, based on his own experiences of Alvey and Otis competing for his attention, becomes a success. After the Avery family watches the cartoon's premiere, Tonya reveals that she is pregnant again.

''Seeds of Evil'' begins with the new Turok, Joshua Fireseed, appearing through a portal to face a female alien named Adon. She explains he has been called by the Elders of the Lost Land, the Lazarus Concordance, to defeat the Primagen, a powerful alien entity that was imprisoned in the wreckage of his own Lightship after attempting to witness the creation of the universe. This incident led to the creation of the Lost Land, a bizarre and barbarian world where time has no meaning. Awakened by the events of ''Dinosaur Hunter'', the Primagen mobilizes several races of primitive creatures from the Lost Land to destroy five Energy Totems, powerful devices that bound the Primagen to his Lightship. The destruction of these Energy Totems would allow the Primagen to escape the confines of his Lightship, and the resulting shockwave would destroy the known universe.

As Joshua defeats the Primagen's armies through the Lost Land and acquires ancient magical powers from sacred talisman chambers, a mysterious entity calling itself Oblivion attempts to thwart his quest by creating false copies of the talisman chamber portals that lead to areas populated by its servants, the Flesh Eaters. Ultimately, Joshua manages to reach the Primagen's Lightship and defeat the Primagen himself. If the Energy Totems are not protected, traces of his telepathic powers will remain. At the end of the game, Adon states that the mysterious force which conspired against Joshua during his quest still exists, setting the stage for the sequel ''Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion''.

The school has been run since its inception ten years earlier by two elderly educators, Mabel Edge and Hermione Baker, who are regarded by many as old spinsters hopelessly out of touch with reality, especially with what their teenage charges really think and feel. The 300 or so students are virtually indistinguishable from one another, a fact which is stressed by their names all starting with the letter M: Margot, Marion, Mary, Melissa, Merode, Midget, Mirabel, Moira. Their budding but suppressed sexuality—they are all between 16 and 18 years of age and "going to be attractive"—is constantly alluded to in the novel. ("They're only children, the girls I mean, and sex is unconscious at their age. It's such a temptation for a man.")

Of the teaching staff, only few characters are mentioned. There is Miss Winstanley, young, colourless, and secretly in love with one of the few male teachers at the academy, economics tutor Sebastian Birt. Birt, however, a short and stout man in his late twenties, is having an affair with Elizabeth Rock, a 35-year-old woman recovering from a nervous breakdown who temporarily also lives on the school grounds, in her grandfather's cottage. That man, 76-year-old Mr Rock, is a retired scientist who has been granted the privilege to live there for the remainder of his life for past services rendered to the State. The ageing Rock, who is referred to as "the sage" by some (including the narrator) and as "Gapa" by his granddaughter, spends his time mainly with, and for, his pets—his albino sow, Daisy, his cat, Alice, and his goose, Ted. He describes himself as "a bit stiff about the joints these days", he has some difficulty climbing steps, has poor eyesight, is deaf in one ear and almost deaf in the other, and has recently had problems with his memory. In addition, one of his idiosyncrasies consists in putting all the post he gets in a big trunk without opening any of it, ever.

Edge, one of the principals, has for some time wanted to thoroughly "spring-clean" the whole place and get rid of Rock, his granddaughter, and Birt, partly to secure the sage's cottage for the use of additional school staff. In other matters, she is more hesitant. When in the morning some girls report Mary and Merode missing, pointing out that neither of their beds has been slept in, Edge turns out to be very reluctant to use the official channels to inform relatives, the school supervisor, or the local police. Naturally it occurs to her and her colleague Baker that Mary and Merode might have eloped with two young men ("At the station much of their time was taken up with young women adrift, who, after fourteen days, returned brown and happy from a fortnight with a boy by the ocean."), but, rather than fearing the worst, they assume the girls will be back for that night's entertainment, a ball in honour of the academy's founder—without men of course. At the same time Edge turns down some of the staff's requests to be allowed to go swimming in the nearby lake, which is interpreted as a sure sign that one of the girls' bodies could turn up any time floating in the water.

In the course of the day, especially where Rock is involved, many people talk at cross-purposes, deliberately as well as accidentally misunderstanding what others are saying, in many instances only hinting at facts or, worse, spreading rumours. Around noon Merode is found, right on the compound but somewhat dazed, under a fallen beech in the vicinity of Rock's cottage—the very beech tree used by Sebastian Birt and Elizabeth Rock when they want to have some fun. According to school regulations, Merode must not be interrogated before she has submitted a written statement about what has happened, and she is immediately locked away for her own good. The rest of the afternoon is mainly taken up with preparations for the dance.

As usual, the Founder's Day Ball is held without any guests from outside the school. However, Rock and his granddaughter turn up unexpectedly but appropriately dressed, without having been invited by anyone. While Mary is still missing (the reader never learns where she is or what has happened to her), Elizabeth Rock and Sebastian Birt start dancing together cheek to cheek and, generally, appear glued to each other, a "display of animalism" Edge is not willing to put up with any longer. Almost at the end of her tether, she secretly indulges in a cigarette or two in her office. Meanwhile, Mr Rock is accosted by several of the girls who first want to dance with him and later drag him downstairs into the cellar of the building where they take turns kissing him and where they introduce him to the "Institute Inn", their secret club. Although Rock initially enjoys the girls' attentions, he quickly becomes appalled by their lack of morals and leaves the "club." He comes upon his nemesis, Miss Edge, but after his experiences with the girls he is more sympathetic to her difficulties maintaining order at the school. For her part, Edge is impressed with the courtly bearing Rock has affected in the Ball's formal setting and also consumed by a tobacco-fuelled lassitude. The two older adults have a pleasant conversation which comes to a head when Edge, almost without realising, finds herself proposing marriage to Rock. The sage is astounded, and politely but firmly rejects her suggestion. He then leaves the ball and returns home to his animals.

At the end of the day no one has reached any conclusions, and everything remains undecided.

Home console versions

In Bikini Bottom, Plankton, the evil genius owner of the Chum Bucket, has built a new machine called the Duplicatotron 3000 to produce an army of robots, which he plans to control them to steal the Krabby Patty Secret Formula. After creating them, he realizes that the switch on the Duplicatotron has accidentally been set to "Don't Obey". This leads the robots to seize control of the Chum Bucket out of Plankton and wreak havoc all over Bikini Bottom.

Meanwhile, SpongeBob and Patrick are playing with toy robots and horses. SpongeBob and Patrick are bored with the toys and wish they could play with real robots. Patrick uses his "magic wishing shell", believing it will make their wish come true the following morning. SpongeBob wakes to find that his house has been trashed by real robots. He receives a fax from Mr. Krabs, stating that he would give SpongeBob a Golden Spatula for every certain amount of Shiny Objects he collects for him. Shiny Objects must be collected to open or activate various tolls throughout the game. Outside, SpongeBob finds a disappointed Plankton, who lies and claims that the robots appeared suddenly and kicked him out. Plankton convinces SpongeBob to help him back into the Chum Bucket by embarking on a perilous quest to find golden spatulas and get rid of the robots, secretly intending to regain control of them once back inside.

Every area in the game has a unique set of missions to collect Golden Spatulas including a main overarching mission. SpongeBob travels to Jellyfish Fields, where he finds that Squidward has been stung by jellyfish. He manages to defeat King Jellyfish in a battle and obtains some of his jelly for Squidward's stings. SpongeBob also helps Mrs. Puff by locating stolen steering wheels in Downtown Bikini Bottom, stolen paintings in Rock Bottom, and missing students in the Kelp Forest. King Neptune calls SpongeBob and Patrick to the Poseidome to defeat Robot Sandy. He then goes to the Mermalair, where he fights Prawn, one of Mermaid Man's archenemies. He also helps Mermaidman and Barnacle Boy several other times throughout the game. Other quests include completing tasks for Larry the Lobster, his pet snail Gary, and the Flying Dutchman, in other areas like Goo Lagoon, Sand Mountain, and the Dutchman's Graveyard (where Sandy beats the Dutchman in a fight). Later, SpongeBob and Sandy save Squidward from Robot Patrick.

SpongeBob then falls asleep, allowing him to enter his friends' dream worlds to search for more golden spatulas. After Plankton, SpongeBob and his friends finally gain access to the Chum Bucket, they discover the gigantic Robot SpongeBob and learn that Plankton was responsible for making the robots. Plankton sets the switch on the Duplicatotron to "Obey" (by placing an Obey sign over the ''don't obey'' setting), only to find out Robot Plankton has been controlling the robots instead. Robot Plankton remarks to SpongeBob that he has interfered in his plans for the last time, simply stating “SpongeBob, meet SpongeBot”. SpongeBob attempts to disable Robot SpongeBob's brain from the inside while fending off frequent attacks from Robot Plankton. Upon succeeding, SpongeBob hopes that Plankton learned his "lesson". The Duplicatotron produces several more Robot Planktons, which begin arguing among themselves. The game ends after SpongeBob says that their work is not done, as there are still many robots running amok in the city.

The game then cuts to The Spongeball Arena, where the player rolls around in ball form in a large arena, while the credits roll on the screen. If the player collects all 100 golden spatulas, the game ends with a special surprise cutscene of all the game's characters singing the theme song.

Game Boy Advance and Windows versions

In the Windows game, SpongeBob and Patrick have a robot tea party with toy robots and SpongeBob wishes upon "the first falling clam" that robots "were people too". The next day, Bikini Bottom gets attacked by an army of robots. Patrick, Sandy, Gary, Squidward, and Mr. Krabs are captured by robots and locked inside cages. SpongeBob works his way through Bikini Bottom, the Flying Dutchman's Graveyard, the Kelp Forest, the Chum Bucket, and the Mermalair to locate his friends and various objects stolen by the robots. After all locations' games are played, a video is unlocked for the end of the game where SpongeBob and Patrick discover that Plankton was the one behind the robot invasion. Plankton admits that it was his fault and that the robots are not listening to him and the only way to control the robots is to set the switch to "obey" mode. Instead, Patrick fools around with the machine, accidentally pulling its obey switch off, which turns off the machine and deprograms the robots. After SpongeBob and Patrick leave, Plankton tries to tell them that he will be back with another plan.

The Game Boy Advance version is a 2D platform game with four chapters, each containing seven levels, all of which have their own unique puzzles. In the game, Mr. Krabs thinks the robot invasion is putting him out of business, so his assignment for SpongeBob is to fight the robots to get into the Chum Bucket to shut down Plankton's Duplicatron.

The story focuses on Nicole Gunther-Perrin, a young lawyer in late 20th-century Los Angeles who is dissatisfied with her hectic life, which includes balancing her career with being a mother and dealing with her deadbeat ex-husband and sexist coworkers. Believing the past to be a better time, one evening after a particularly distressing day, she makes a wistful plea to a plaque of two Roman gods, Liber and Libera, who take it as a prayer. Unknown to her, the plaque, which she thinks is a tourist copy picked up in Europe on holidays on a trip a few years earlier, is actually an ancient relic from the Roman Era. The next morning, she finds herself waking up in the body of one of her ancient ancestors running a tavern in the 2nd century Carnuntum, in what is now Austria.

In general, she finds out the hard way that life in the past was not quite what she thought it would be: slavery is taken for granted, and there are no women's rights, no effective medicine or clean medical practices, little entertainment, and no tampons. Over the course of a year and a half, she is forced to revise many of her long-held modern prejudices, including those against alcohol and corporal punishment.

She survives epidemic disease (the Antonine Plague) and a Germanic invasion that is part of the Marcomannic Wars. She finds that early Christianity was uncomfortably zealous and apocalyptic, and, after a brutal rape by a Roman soldier, she discusses the role of government and its duties to abused citizens with Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius.

Eventually, Liber and Libera fulfill her desire to return home. She wakes from a six-day 'coma' to discover that she can improve both her working and family life. Not only have her hard-won skills given her more empathy and self-confidence, but also she now has greater appreciation for the life that modern conveniences allow. With her new perspective, she can more easily and successfully deal with the stress and difficulties of her existence.

In 2020, the ''Mars I'' mission launches for planet Mars, commanded by Luke Graham (Don Cheadle). Upon arrival, the team discovers a bright white formation in the Cydonia region, which they suspect is an extrusion from a subsurface geothermal column of water, useful to future human colonization. After reporting this to the Earth-orbiting World Space Station, they go to investigate the formation and start hearing a low sound on their communications system. Radar initially reports that the formation is metal, but when they increase power to the radar, a large vortex appears and kills everyone except Luke. After the vortex subsides, the formation is revealed to be part of a large humanoid face.

The event creates an electromagnetic pulse the space station observes, after which it receives a distress message from Luke. Realizing Luke couldn't have left because the pulse would have damaged the computer system of the ERV ("Earth Return Vehicle"), they repurpose the ''Mars II'' mission into a rescue.

Months later, as ''Mars Rescue'', consisting of Commander Woody Blake (Tim Robbins), his wife Terri Fisher (Connie Nielsen), recent widower Jim McConnell (Gary Sinise), and technician Phil Ohlmyer (Jerry O'Connell), nears Mars orbit, they discover that all satellite imagery of the formation area is covered with static. Micrometeoroids breach the ship, causing damage to the external fuel lines and resulting in the engines exploding. With the destroyed Mars II out of control, crew are forced to abandon ship and travel in their spacesuits to the REMO ("Resupply Module") in a nearby orbit over Mars. Woody launches himself at the module and manages to attach a tether to it, but loses his grip and begins descending into the Martian atmosphere. Terri attempts to rescue Woody, but knowing she would run out of fuel before reaching him, Woody removes his helmet, killing himself to save her.

The survivors arrive on the Martian surface, and begin repairing the ERV. They find Luke living in a greenhouse, who shows them pictures of the face, and reveals that the pulses in the low sound they heard represented a 3D model of human-like DNA, but missing a pair of chromosomes. Jim determines they must complete the sequence to pass a test, and they send a rover to broadcast the completed signal via radar. Following the transmission, an opening appears in the side of the structure. With a massive dust storm approaching Jim, Terri, and Luke head to the formation, while Phil stays to finish repairing the ERV. Phil is ordered to launch, with or without them, before the storm hits.

The three astronauts enter the opening, which seals behind them. A three-dimensional projection of the solar system depicts the planet Mars, covered with water, being struck by a large asteroid and rendered uninhabitable. A projection of a humanoid Martian lifeform reveals that the native Martians evacuated the planet in spaceships, one of which was sent to seed Earth with DNA, intending to create life that could one day land on Mars and be recognized as descendants. An invitation is offered for one of their group to follow the Martians to their new home. Jim accepts the invitation, bidding farewell to Terri and Luke, and is sealed inside a small capsule. Terri and Luke race back to the ERV and arrive just as Phil is about to take off. They barely escape the dust storm into space as Jim's capsule is launched from the crumbling formation and past them toward the Martians' home.

Kenji is a lonely librarian in the Japan Foundation in Bangkok. Living in an apartment full of precise stacks of books, his half-hearted attempts to kill himself are continually interrupted by the people around him. Kenji's most notable obstacle is his self-absorbed brother, Yukio, a ''yakuza'', or Japanese gangster. Yukio fled from Japan to escape the wrath of his employer, with whose daughter he had had sex. Yukio's friend Takashi suggests that if it were his daughter, he would have the despoiler killed, but Kenji's brother laughs this warning off. Yukio frequents a club where he can enjoy the attention of a bunny-eared hostess, a local girl named Nid. Nid's sister, Noi, is furious at her sibling for having slept with her boyfriend, Jon.

One day in the library, Kenji spies on Nid, clad in a school girl's uniform. Soon after, he discovers that his brother has hidden a pistol inside a teddy bear. He is about to shoot himself when Yukio is slain by Takashi, who was apparently hired by Yukio's employer. (During the library scene where Kenji first encounters Nid, a hanging poster for the Takashi Miike film ''Ichi the Killer'' is clearly featured. Tadanobu Asano was also the star of that film.)

Takashi sees Kenji, who appears hopeful at his impending death, but suddenly Kenji shoots and kills the assassin. Not long after that, Kenji is about to jump off a bridge when Noi and Nid, driving past, have an argument. Noi throws Nid out of the car, then reconsiders. Nid, distracted by Kenji sitting on the railing of the bridge, is struck by another car and dies.

Kenji and Noi, both having lost a sibling, form a tentative friendship. The introspective Kenji asks the extroverted Noi if he can stay with her, unwilling to spend time with the two corpses in his apartment. Noi agrees, and invites the fussy Japanese man into her disastrously unkempt beachside home. As Kenji begins cleaning, Noi prepares to leave for Japan to further her career. Surreal elements creep into the film; Noi sees the house magically cleaning itself, while Kenji watches Noi transform into her temptress sister. The couple, in some ways polar opposites and in some ways mirror images, form a semi-romantic relationship. Meanwhile, the abusive and promiscuous ex-boyfriend Jon begins calling, angry that Noi thinks she can leave him. Three ''yakuza'' are also dispatched to find out what has happened to Takashi.

In the final segments, Kenji drives Noi to the airport, then decides he will join her. He returns to his apartment to gather his things and purposely knocks over a stack of books. While he is in the bathroom, first Jon, then the ''yakuza'' arrive. Jon is slain, and Kenji apparently escapes out the window. The movie then cuts back and forth between two scenes: one, in which Kenji has been arrested for some unspecified crime, and another in which he is re-united with Noi in Japan. The relationship between or canonicity of these two scenes is not made clear by the movie - particularly whether the reuniting scene is imagined or not.

Throughout the movie, images of the furtive gecko who lives in Noi's house, as well as ''The Last Lizard'' are shown, Kenji's children's book about a reptile who wakes up to discover he is the final member of his species. The fictional lizard realizes that even being with his enemies, the other lizards who picked on him, was preferable to being alone.

A million years prior to the dawn of ''Homo sapiens'', two immortal, shapeshifting aliens roam the Earth with little memory of their origin or their purpose. In the year 2019, an artifact is discovered off the coast of Samoa, buried deep beneath the ocean floor. The mysterious find attracts the alien beings—the "changeling" and the "chameleon"—to Samoa, where one ponders the meaning of the object and the other speculates on its relationship to each of them. Both immortals seek each other for different reasons: one harbours good intentions toward humanity, while the other is extremely hostile.

A million years before the rise of humans, the changeling arrives on Earth from Messier 22; its spaceship hides deep in the Pacific Ocean. The changeling lives in the ocean for millennia, taking the form of a great white shark, killer whale, or porpoise while it explores, and it gradually forgets where it came from. Eventually it discovers humanity "and wades ashore naked and ignorant. But eager to learn."

San Guillermo, California, 1931. The changeling takes the form of (and unwittingly kills) the first person it comes across, a handsome, wealthy young man named Jimmy Berry. Because it cannot speak English (yet), Jimmy's friends assume that he has brain damage, and the changeling is sent home to his parents.

Baja California, 2019. Dr. Russell Sutton is a marine engineer who runs the small firm Poseidon Projects. He is approached by elderly Admiral Jack Halliburton, who has a for-profit job for Poseidon: recover a submarine sunk in the Tonga Trench, and then "find" a mysterious cigar-shaped object located nearby. Jack wants to use Russell's team as camouflage, because all he really cares about is getting the object – for himself.

Chapters alternate between the stories of the changeling and its various lives over decades; of Russ's attempts to decipher the artifact; and of the chameleon, whose story begins in Eurasia in the Pre-Christian Era. The chameleon "was always a man, and usually a brute." He can change his looks in a moment (unlike the changeling, who needs several minutes and suffers while doing so). The chameleon has often been a soldier, fighting for example with Alexander the Great and as a Masai warrior, though he also lived as farmers and butchers, among others; he suffers as a slave brought from West Africa to the new America, but in later decades makes a vast fortune.

The changeling begins to learn about humanity with Jimmy Berry's parents. They have specialists brought to their mansion to test it, and it learns to read, draw, play piano, and speak. The changeling has eidetic memory, so these tasks are easy; human psychology baffles it. When a nurse seduces it, it learns about sex; when next seduced, the changeling is unaware that it has hurt the woman badly, and in 1932 it is sent to a "private insane asylum", where it learns a great deal more about the range of human behaviors than a coddled rich boy normally would.

Jack and Russ move their team to Apia, Samoa. The artifact proves difficult to move, as it is possibly three times as dense as plutonium, but they bring it to the beach and build a wall around it. Dr. Franklin Nesbitt, Chief of NASA Advanced Planning, comes to them with a proposal: To share much of the enormous cost of the project, he wants to add a team of researchers to the Poseidon Project, for what ''he'' seeks: "Half our team are exobiologists. It's not so much a 'what'... as a 'who'." The new team includes Jan Dagmar, an exobiologist, who quickly befriends Russ.

In 1935, the changeling attends the University of Massachusetts to study oceanography, then the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution; it senses that something important to it will be found in marine science. Its studies are interrupted by World War II. In 1941, it takes part in the Bataan Death March, during which "Jimmy" sees horrific incidents which humanize the changeling; it learns friendship and pity. The changeling escapes Bataan and spends years swimming back to America as a shark; meanwhile, the chameleon enjoys war atrocities and becomes assistant to Josef Mengele at Birkenau.

In 2020, the team attempts many ways to make an impression on the artifact; when they try to communicate with it, they get a surprising momentary result.

In 1948, the changeling comes to shore in California. It attends college at Berkeley to study literature and anthropology. When it learns of Project Sign, it begins to wonder whether there are other extraterrestrials on Earth. The chameleon also hunts for other aliens, so that he may enjoy fighting and killing them.

In 2021, Jan Dagmar begins to send a complex message to the artifact, by beaming at it in every frequency from microwave to X ray, and by tapping it mechanically. The team plunges the artifact into different atmospheres – specifically, those of the planets and moons of our Solar System – in case the object might recognize one of them as "home-like" and respond.

For many years, the changeling earns further doctorates in astronomy, astrophysics, marine biology and biotechnology. It attends Massachusetts Institute of Technology to study computers. It works on the SETI project, then leaves academia for several years to work in the circus, get married, and otherwise learn more about humanity. After re-creating itself as a woman many times, it finds that it prefers to be one, though for a long time it establishes an identity as Professor Jimmy Coleridge at the University of Hawaii. It occasionally shows a human playfulness: turning into a shark, for example, and then swimming up to the local campus's marine cameras and dissemblingly doing something "unsharklike."

In 2019, the changeling learns about the artifact at Apia and, feeling "a shock of recognition," determines to join the team there. The chameleon has also come to Apia and pleasures itself by killing people. In 2021, the artifact answers Jan's tests by tapping back. The changeling borrows biological and job information from a Californian woman, Rae Archer, to apply for a job at Poseidon. "She" is interviewed by Russ and Jan, and gets a job as a technician. Part of this job requires trying to crack the message that the artifact has sent. While working on it, for some weeks, "Rae" and Russ fall in love. "Rae" can do enormous computations in her head while working with others or pretending to sleep, and soon becomes convinced that the message that the artifact emitted is meant for herself.

The impersonation of Rae Archer is exposed by the CIA. Agents plan an ambush for Russ and Rae by allowing them to think that they have won a weekend at a luxury hotel, the Aggie Grey's. The changeling enters the room first, and the agents assault her; one blows off her left arm with a double-barreled shotgun. The changeling smashes through the balcony, runs across the traffic, and dives into the water, where it changes into a shark again. "Rae" decides to approach Russ again, to reunite with him as well as to approach the artifact, and creates a new personality, Sharon Valida, a pretty blonde.

Meeting Russ one night as Sharon, she makes love to him, reveals herself as both Rae and an extraterrestrial, and insists that he take her to the artifact site. Russ agrees, and the changeling changes itself to look like Jan, so that they can get through the security checkpoints. As Rae approaches the artifact, which she now recognizes as her spaceship, Jack Halliburton appears in the room, traps them there, and reveals himself as the chameleon. Rae fights the chameleon, but almost loses the battle while trying to protect Russ. At last, her spaceship traps "Jack," and, revealing her true self (large, shimmering, colorful, "inhumanly beautiful"), she tells Russ that she must leave. "It's like a law. I've been here for too long. Done things I shouldn't have done. Like fall in love with a local, an alien." Russ begs to go with her, and with great joy, they enter the spaceship and leave for her home.

Mr. Burns reserves the Springfield Air and Space Museum for a plant company party. While there, Burns acts strangely kind to all of his employees. At the end of the party, Burns announces that he will terminate the prescription drug plan. The workers chase after him, but Burns is able to escape in a wacky flying machine, based on the Pitts Sky Car. At home, the Simpsons try to figure out how they can afford new prescription drugs. Homer decides to get another job, but he can not have his choice of starring on ''Friends'' as Rachel's Irish cousin, and is unable to get a new job. Other companies follow Burns's lead and all prescription drug plans are canceled. Marge and Lisa go to the pharmaceutical company to voice their concerns but are ignored.

At the retirement home, all prescription drugs are unaffordable and the staff decide to let the old folks go cold turkey. Grampa Simpson comes up with a plan to get more drugs for Springfield. He and Homer go to Winnipeg, Manitoba, and with help from one of Grampa's Canadian friends, they are able to get unlimited access to the drugs they need. They take them back into the United States and are praised in Springfield as heroes. Later, as Grampa and Homer plan to do more smuggling trips in order to give more support for the town, Apu and Ned ask if they can tag along with them, stating that their children are desperate to get their medicine. Homer accepts and allows them on the trip, even though Ned tries to convert Apu on the way (despite the fact he claims to be sarcastically congratulating him on his bravery of worshiping an idol). Ned even meets his Canadian counterpart, but takes an instant dislike to him when he offers Ned a "reeferino". A coffee accident fools a border guard into thinking Apu is 'expressing his faith' as a Muslim (despite being Hindu), causing the whole border patrol to hold the men at gunpoint. Homer tries to pacify the situation, but unfortunately, he accidentally slips out a large amount of pills on the pavement while opening the door, exposing their smuggling. As a result, Homer and his gang are arrested, but soon let go and banned from returning to Canada.

Meanwhile, Smithers' thyroid becomes a goiter as he can no longer afford the medicine he needs that was provided under the drug plan. Burns vows to help him so he takes Homer and Grampa along in his plane, the "''Plywood Pelican''", which he built for Nazi Germany. After getting the drugs, while flying back to Springfield, the plane loses altitude and Burns jumps off with Homer and Grampa's parachutes as they are "gifts" for his nephews. They crash-land in Springfield Town Square, almost crushing Chief Wiggum's squad car. Wiggum arrests Grampa but the people of Springfield protest, as his smuggling has gotten them the medicine they need. Seeing how much Grampa had been helping for the whole town, Wiggum lets Grampa go free. In the meantime, Smithers is saved with a kiss from Mr. Burns after receiving his medicine, and Burns, feeling very remorseful, decides to bring back the drug plan to all his full-time employees, much to their delight. Homer gets a new job with Burns as a "freelance consultant" and then wonders what the lump on his neck is.

Jared Phelps returns home from his mission in Wyoming to find a world very different from the one he left two years previously.

This movie opens with a send-off at the airport full of family and friends of Elder Phelps. He serves a two-year mission in the Wyoming Evanston South Mission. The opening credits are shown by using instant photographs. They also show Elder Phelps going from a "greenie" (new missionary), to district leader, to zone leader and finally to an assistant to the mission president.

Returning home, things do not go so well. His parents thought that he was coming home the following month, so no one is there to meet him at the airport. He did not receive the letter that his family had moved, so he is surprised by the greeting of the new homeowner in the form of a karate kick while he is in the shower. (He later refers to this as being "Kung-fued by a naked ninja".) His bed is now occupied by a foreign exchange student from Tonga. When he is reunited with his parents, he discovers his mother is pregnant. Jared's girlfriend, who promised to wait for him to return, is getting married in two weeks. The jewelry store where he bought the ring will not take it back. And his former employer who promised to give him a job on his return has sold the business and started an Internet enterprise and the only job opening is to mine diamonds in South Africa.

Things become worse from there. He is rejected from Brigham Young University (BYU). He quickly goes through a series of jobs and even considers selling knives. He develops a romantic relationship with Kelly, the daughter of H. Ronald Powers, a general authority who, to his embarrassment, he is unfamiliar with (despite the fact that he gave a "great talk" last October in general conference, to which everyone seems to refer). While Jared is on a date with Kelly, his mother goes into labor and has a boy. He also has boils and eventually is arrested due to the actions of a friend. Because of the arrest, he is fired from his job and released from his church calling as elders quorum president. He has to seriously consider whether to lie and keep him and his friend out of jail, or to tell the truth and send himself and/or his friend to jail. In the end, he decides to tell the truth, and is ultimately cleared of all charges, but his friend must face some time in jail.

Later, Jared gives a talk at church about how his mission blessed his life in ways he did not expect. He decides to take night classes and reapply for BYU in the fall. After some time dating Kelly, the two are seen in a jewelry shop to exchange Jared's old ring for a new one, as they are now engaged.

''The Best Two Years'' portrays the experience of four missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints living in the same apartment in Haarlem in the Netherlands. The movie begins with Elder Rogers finding out that his new companion will be a "greenie", a newly trained missionary fresh from the Missionary Training Center. He and the other two missionaries that reside in the same apartment, Elder Johnson and Elder Van Pelt, go to the train station to meet the new elder. Elder Rogers finds out that the new missionary, Elder Calhoun, is exactly what he had jokingly predicted his new companion would be like.

Elder Rogers used to be an excellent missionary, until his girlfriend married one of his former mission companions. That is why he and the other two missionaries residing in the same apartment are surprised that the mission president has assigned him to be the trainer (first companion and mentor) to a missionary new to the mission.

The new missionary, Elder Calhoun, tackles mission work with unbounded enthusiasm. He attempts to talk to anyone although he has little knowledge of the Dutch language. Despite his poor Dutch, he maintains an eager attitude.

Fortunately for him, he soon encounters a man from the United States that speaks English. They speak briefly in the park before the man goes off with his girlfriend. Later, when he encounters the same man in a market, Calhoun gives him a Dutch Book of Mormon with his telephone number. Despite what the other three missionaries expect, the man does call and asks for Calhoun.

The man doesn't want to meet the missionaries in his own apartment because his roommates wouldn't understand. The missionaries arrange for him to meet them in their apartment. When he tries to give back the Book of Mormon because he doesn't read Dutch, they promptly give him one in English. The missionaries find out his name (Kyle Harrison) and teach him a discussion (short lesson) about Joseph Smith and Joseph's First Vision. Afterwards, Kyle shows sincere desire to learn more, so the missionaries schedule another discussion.

Tension has been building throughout the entire movie between Elder Johnson and Elder Van Pelt. Earlier, Johnson had received an audio tape from his girlfriend. He hasn't been able to play the tape for several days because Van Pelt had lent their tape player to a ward member. Also, Van Pelt is annoyed by Johnson's repeated use of the word "flip", as a mild substitute for any of a number of profane words. Johnson had told Van Pelt to hit him every time he used that word, but while waiting outside the apartment Johnson says it, and frustrated with Van Pelt for always hitting him, physically forces him to stop, showing his anger. This tension culminates outside of the missionary apartment just as Kyle is leaving from his first discussion. As he is leaving, Johnson and Van Pelt are looking in, hoping for him to leave soon. However, Johnson states: "Oh, flip! They're just standing around in there!" Forgetting Johnson's threats if he does so again, Van Pelt hits Johnson on the back. Johnson chases Van Pelt around, and eventually, as Kyle is on his way out of the door, Van Pelt enters and hides. Johnson quickly bursts in as well, smashing Kyle behind the door. He demands to know where Van Pelt is, and misunderstands most of what Rogers says and hears only, "Behind the door". He angrily starts to smash Kyle even more, until he realized what he just did. Rogers and Calhoun leave with Kyle out the door, but rush back in when they hear Van Pelt scream. They run in to see that Johnson has just hogtied Van Pelt with a rope when the mission president arrives in the apartment.

President Sandburg gives Johnson and Van Pelt a mild, but appropriate and effective, reprimand for their misbehavior. (Prescriptions were respectively and .) He recommends Elder Calhoun work on his Dutch, (Calhoun had, in Dutch, stated: "With all the walking and bike riding, my rear end has become quite beautiful."), and gently reprimands Rogers for not having written letters to his mother for a while, and persuades him to send at least one letter a week home for the remainder of his mission.

Things start to get worse for Elder Johnson when the president has to talk to him and Van Pelt decides to listen to his tape from his girlfriend. At the end of the tape, Johnson's girlfriend reveals she will marry a returned missionary after dating him for three weeks.

The second discussion with Kyle is followed by several more, again in the missionaries' apartment. He does decide to become a member of the Church. The baptism is scheduled for the Saturday just over a week from then. Kyle chooses Rogers to baptize him, to the great surprise of Rogers.

Johnson starts to resemble Elder Rogers when he starts to not do his work and jokingly says that the zone leaders are coming to promote Van Pelt because of Van Pelts' high hopes, like those Rogers had when his girlfriend broke up with him. Afterwards, Rogers convinces him to not do the same thing he did after Calhoun and Van Pelt leave for a store.

The baptism takes place in a river as scheduled, on the same day that Rogers is leaving for home. There are long good-byes at the train station. And in the station, with Rogers looking on from the train, Calhoun finally understands and speaks Dutch well.

Set in the fictional Camden College in New Hampshire, the film opens at the "End of the World" party, where students Lauren Hynde, Paul Denton, and Sean Bateman give apathetic interior monologues on their lives and briefly exchange glances with one another. Lauren, previously a virgin, takes a film student upstairs to have sex and passes out; she wakes to find herself being ostensibly raped by a townie while the film student records it, and reflects on how she had planned to lose her virginity to Victor, her now ex-boyfriend. Meanwhile, Paul, who is bisexual, tries to have sex with a jock, only to be bashed when the jock, deeply in the closet, rejects his advances. A bruised and beaten Sean is shown drinking a whole bottle of Jack Daniel's, tearing up a series of purple letters, before approaching and having sex with a blonde girl at the party.

The plot then moves backwards several months to the beginning of the school year, and explores the love triangle between Lauren, Paul, and Sean. Misinterpreting Sean's willingness to spend time with him, Paul makes several advances, to which Sean is oblivious. Paul fantasizes about having sex with Sean while masturbating. Concurrently, Lauren also finds herself attracted to Sean despite saving her virginity for her traveling boyfriend, Victor. Sean reciprocates her feelings, and assumes the anonymous, purple love letters he has started receiving are from Lauren. Sean masturbates to reading these letters and fantasizes about Lauren.

While Paul is visiting his friend "Dick", Sean has sex with Lauren's roommate Lara at the "Dressed to Get Screwed" party. Sean regrets it immediately, and realizes that he is in love with Lauren. It is then revealed that another, unnamed cafeteria girl is the author of Sean's love letters; after seeing him leave the party with Lara, she sends him a suicide note before cutting her wrists in the dorm bathtub. Lauren, finding Sean with Lara, runs to the girls' bathroom in tears, only to find the unnamed girl's body, leaving Lauren extremely distressed. Sean, still believing Lauren wrote the purple letters, misinterprets the unnamed girl's suicide note and assumes Lauren never wants to be with him. Lauren decides to lose her virginity to her Art History professor Lance Lawson. But being married and worried about losing his tenure, he simply allows her to perform fellatio on him instead.

After numerous failed attempts at suicide, Sean fakes his death and, unaware that Lauren recently found a corpse, unintentionally upsets her further when she finds him pretending to be dead. After stealing drugs from dealer Rupert, Sean tries to speak to Lauren again, asking only to know her. Lauren tells Sean he will never know her, and abandons him. She approaches Victor, who has finally returned to Camden College, only to find that Victor is having sex with Lara and does not remember who Lauren is, leaving her completely distraught.

Paul, upon finding a drunk Sean, tries to talk to him, parroting Sean's own words by saying he merely wants to know him. Sean coldly rejects him, using Lauren's words to say that Paul will never know him. Paul throws a snowball at Sean, then angrily runs off in tears. Sean checks his campus mailbox in vain, only to find that the love notes have stopped. He is then cornered by Rupert and his Jamaican partner, Guest, and brutally beaten.

The three protagonists then attend the "End of the World" party and the plot returns to the introduction. After seeing Lauren heading upstairs with the film student, Sean finally accepts he cannot be with her, and tears up the purple letters he believes to be from her. It is then revealed that, rather than having sex with the blonde girl as he does in the intro, Sean has an epiphany, reconsiders and he instead leaves his drink and exits. Paul and Lauren meet on the house porch and reflect on the recent events, as well as on Sean, whom they watch depart on his motorcycle. Sean begins narrating his final thoughts only for them to end prematurely as the film cuts to the end credits, which are run backwards.

After faithfully serving a full-time mission for the LDS Church and marrying, Jordan finds himself divorced and once again a member of the LDS single adult world. He attends a "singles ward", a congregation specifically for unmarried adults, where the ultimate goal is eternal marriage. Disenchanted, Jordan stops going to church. He even creates a standup routine lampooning the Mormon lifestyle. His resistance to the church continues until he falls for Cammie Giles, a member of the local singles ward. Suddenly, Jordan finds going to church more appealing, but is he attending church again just to impress her? During the course of the movie, Jonathan frequently breaks the fourth wall to narrate events to the audience.

The film follows Martin and his relationship with Christine. Martin, a young professor at Brigham Young University gets engaged to Christine, who is a student. When her divorced parents come to town for their nuptials, Dalen and Christine must maintain the peace between them while Jonathan (Will Swenson) is working on a film about his experiences in the first film.

The game takes place after the fictional Rock War, an intergalactic conflict between mankind and aliens which ended with the aliens destroying Earth with missile-firing space stations, known as "Orbitals", and enslaving all humans. In an attempt to fight back against the aliens and regain their independence, humans built a spacecraft known as the Starfighter with the best technology they could find. However, only one such vehicle could be built. The game involves the unnamed pilot of the Starfighter defeating the aliens to save Earth.

Sometime after the drowning of their young daughter Christine (Sharon Williams) in an accident at their English country home, John Baxter (Donald Sutherland) and his grief-stricken wife Laura (Julie Christie) travel to Venice where John has accepted a commission from a bishop (Massimo Serato) to restore an ancient church. Laura encounters two elderly sisters, Heather (Hilary Mason) and Wendy (Clelia Matania), at a restaurant where she and John are dining; Heather claims to be psychic and—despite being blind—informs Laura she is able to "see" the Baxters' deceased daughter. Shaken, Laura returns to her table, then faints.

Laura is taken to the hospital, where she later tells John what Heather told her. John is sceptical but pleasantly surprised by the positive change in Laura's demeanour. After returning from the hospital, John and Laura have passionate sex later that evening. Afterwards, they go out to dinner where they get lost and briefly become separated. John catches a glimpse of what appears to be a small child (Adelina Poerio) wearing a red coat similar to the one Christine was wearing when she died.

The next day, Laura meets with Heather and Wendy, who hold a séance to try to contact Christine. When she returns to the hotel, Laura informs John that Christine said he is in danger and must leave Venice. John loses his temper with Laura, but that night they receive a telephone call informing them that their son (Nicholas Salter) has been injured in an accident at his boarding school. Laura departs for England, while John stays on to complete the restoration. Shortly afterward, John is nearly killed in an accident at the church when the scaffolding collapses, and he interprets this as the "danger" foretold by the sisters.

Later that day and under the assumption that Laura is in England, John is shocked when he spots her on a passing boat that is part of a funeral cortege, accompanied by the two sisters. Concerned about his wife's mental state and with reports of a serial killer at large in Venice, John reports Laura's seeming disappearance to the police. The inspector (Renato Scarpa) investigating the killings is suspicious of John and has him followed. After conducting a futile search for Laura and the sisters—during which he again sees the childlike figure in the red coat—John contacts his son's school to enquire about his condition, only to discover that Laura is actually there. After speaking to her to confirm she really is in England, a bewildered John returns to the police station to inform the police he has found his wife. In the meantime, the police have brought Heather in for questioning and an apologetic John offers to escort her back to the hotel.

Shortly after returning to the hotel, Heather slips into a trance. John makes his excuses and quickly leaves. Upon coming out of the trance, Heather pleads with her sister to go after John, sensing that something terrible is about to happen, but Wendy is unable to catch up with him. Meanwhile, John catches another glimpse of the mysterious figure in red and this time pursues it. He corners the figure in a deserted palazzo and approaches, believing it to be a child. Instead, it is revealed to be a hideous female dwarf. When John freezes in shock, the dwarf pulls out a meat cleaver and cuts his throat. Dying, John realises too late that the strange sightings he experienced were premonitions of his own murder and funeral.

Sports writer Steve Taggart (O'Neal) volunteers to do a series of articles for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner about a compulsive sports and casino gambler he calls "Mr. Green" who is, in fact, himself. His sports editor, John Saxon, enthusiastically assigns Taggart the sports betting and casino gambling series, which soon attracts a large readership interest.

Over time, Taggart becomes more obsessed with gambling in Las Vegas, which lands him even more deeply in debt. He compounds his money and gambling problems by dealing with associated loan sharks, including the mean and dangerous L.A. bookmaker known as "The Dutchman" (Chad Everett). Taggart soon learns that even a L.A. pro football quarterback, whose football team he covers, is also on the Dutchman's payroll - as a means of cutting his own sports gambling debts. After clearing the story further with his sports editor (John Saxon), Taggart journeys to Las Vegas for a field report on his gambling series; he meets a newspaper publisher, who helps him make more gambling industry contacts. Through the MGM casino executive, Mr. Sweeney Keith Hefner, Taggart meets a sexy casino cocktail hostess named Flo (Catherine Hicks). Flo is sent to Taggart's hotel room for a night, but Taggart, loving the gaming tables, with Flo as his 'lucky charm', goes gambling at the Dunes Hotel casino. Taggart gambles with Flo at roulette, and wins. Taggart, as part of his on going news story, also checks out assorted Las Vegas bookmakers, including Leroy's. Taggart meets various Vegas gambling and business figures, including famed Las Vegas Sun publisher Hank Greenspun, for more insights into the Las Vegas gambling world. He is unaware that the Dutchman's tough guy enforcer, "Panama Hat" (William Smith), is following him, until "The Hat" confronts him at the hotel pool, as Taggart attempts to relax on a chaise longue. Panama Hat forcefully orders Taggart to return to Los Angeles immediately, and settle up with the Dutchman, or there will be dire consequences.

Taggart's risk-addiction and perennial gambling money-losses ultimately spill over into his personal life. After a day trip to Knott's Berry Farm, Taggart brings his young daughter (Bridgette Andersen) to Hollywood Park; at the track pressbox, they chat with his colleagues, including famed Los Angeles newspaper sportswriters, the L.A. Times Jim Murray and the L.A. Herald Examiner's Alan Malamud. Taggart, while trying to stem his gambling while at the racetrack, is physically assaulted by a track-goer to whom he owes money. Reporting to work the next day at the Herald Examiner, his editor says he loves the "Mr. Green" series, and foolishly advances Taggart $10,000 dollars for "Mr. Green" to use as seed money for more gambling.

Upon more reflection on how truly dangerous sports gambling can be, Taggart visits Gamblers Anonymous in order to end his gambling compulsion. Taggart still returns to Las Vegas, where he becomes increasingly acquainted with high-roller Charley Peru (Giancarlo Giannini), in hopes of making a large score and breaking even. He also hopes Peru can help him get Panama Hat off Taggart's back. After attending the Gambler's Anonymous meeting, Taggart soon decides to stop gambling "forever".

Before returning to Los Angeles, to celebrate "kicking" his gambling habit, Taggart places a few dollars into a slot machine at the Las Vegas Airport, where he magically scores a huge jackpot. Taggart immediately gets an attorney to hold the huge cash score in trust fund for his daughter. When he asks the attorney to reassure him, that "even I cannot touch the money?", his attorney firmly replies, "especially, not you."

Exactly one year prior to the beginning of ''DearS'', humanity made unprecedented contact with extraterrestrial life. Forced to crash land into Tokyo Bay when, en route to their home planet of Thanatos, their spacecraft breaks down, 150 humanoid aliens are naturalized into Japanese society and affectionately nicknamed "DearS"; a portmanteau of the words "Dear" and "Friends".

Takeya Ikuhara is a temperamental seventeen-year-old Japanese student attending the fictitious Koharu High School with a strong prejudice against the DearS. Due to a childhood scare, he believes that the aliens are fake, worthless beings that have generated nationwide overhype and are secretly plotting to take control of Earth.

On his way home from school he discovers a homeless DearS who, after fainting and much to his annoyance, he feeds and shelters in his apartment. The girl, who he nicknames Ren, is infantile and friendly, and grows obsequious and dependent upon Takeya, a responsibility he tries to disassociate himself from. Her oblivious tenacity keeps her around, however, and over time, realizing Ren's genuine care and empathy for him, Takeya has a change of heart. Unfortunately, because Ren is deemed defective, DearS headquarters orders her arrest.

The small fishing village Ste-Marie-la-Mauderne on the north coast of Quebec is in decline. Every resident collects welfare. To lure a company into building a plastic container factory nearby, they need to double their population of 120, have a resident doctor, and give a $50,000 bribe for the company owner.

Montreal plastic surgeon Dr. Christopher Lewis (David Boutin) gets pulled over for speeding by an officer, Réal Fournier (Jean-Pierre Gonthier), the former mayor of Ste-Marie-la-Mauderne who moved to the city because he, like most of the residents of Ste-Marie, couldn't get a job there. After finding cocaine on Dr. Lewis, Fournier agrees not arrest him for drug possession if Dr. Lewis will visit Ste-Marie-la-Mauderne for one month. In a deleted scene, Dr. Lewis sells cocaine to his patients.

Germain Lesage (Raymond Bouchard), a welfare recipient himself and the new mayor, hatches a plan. The entire village will convince Dr. Lewis to stay. They tap his phone, and pretend to share his likes: cricket, fusion jazz, and all the same foods. Henri Giroux (Benoît Brière), the local banker whose sole job is to cash the townfolks' welfare cheques, leaves small amounts of money for Dr. Lewis to find as small measures to increase Dr. Lewis' happiness about being in town, and attempts to secure a loan through his bank for the bribe. Dr. Lewis likes the beautiful post office worker Ève Beauchemin (Lucie Laurier), but Ève knows he has a girlfriend, Brigitte, in Montreal.

The ruse works, but they cannot secure a loan. Henri fronts the money from his personal savings, after a bank executive tells him that he has a job only as a favour to his father, and that his position could easily be replaced by an ATM. When the plastics company owner arrives, everyone continues their elaborate trick, and convinces him to build the factory there. The owner is ready to sign, but insists that they must have a doctor.

When Dr. Lewis learns that Brigitte has been having an affair with his best friend Paul for three years, he proclaims that he will stay because everyone in the village is genuine. Germain feels bad for lying, and "lets him off the hook" by telling him another lie in that they have secured another person as a permanent doctor. Hurt, Dr. Lewis turns to Ève, who has disliked all the lying, and confesses all to him, including the phone tap. Dr. Lewis confronts Germain about the lies, with Germain confirming the accusations. When Dr. Lewis asks him if he will learn the game of cricket for real if he decides to stay, Germain replies "no". It is then that Dr. Lewis decides to stay. The factory is built, Ste-Marie-la-Mauderne is saved, everyone gains renewed pride, and Dr. Lewis has five years in which to woo Ève.

Harvek Milos Krumpetzki is born "upside down and back to front" in Poland in 1922. As a child, his mother helps him collect pieces of information called "fakts" that are written in a notebook hung around his neck, which are presented throughout the film. At the outbreak of World War II, shortly after his home is burned down and his parents freeze to death, Harvek migrates to Australia as a refugee, settles in Spotswood, Victoria, and changes his name to Harvie Krumpet.

Despite a life filled with bad luck, including being diagnosed with Tourette syndrome; having part of his skull replaced with a steel plate that becomes magnetised after being struck by lightning; developing asthma due to heavy smoking; and losing one of his testicles to cancer, Harvie remains optimistic, living out his own eccentric way of life. In one of the pivotal episodes of his life, Harvie sits in the park next to a statue of Horace while he hears the instructional ''Carpe diem'', which inspires him to make many changes in his life, such as embracing nudism and vegetarianism, and embarking on daring rescue missions for animal rights. He marries Val, a nurse he meets in hospital, and they adopt a daughter, Ruby, who has deformed limbs due to the effects of thalidomide.

After Ruby moves to America to pursue a career as a lawyer and Val dies of a stroke, Harvie develops Alzheimer's disease and is placed in a nursing home. Although he briefly considers suicide, he decides to continue living the remainder of his life to the fullest. The final "fakt" presented reads: "Life is like a cigarette. Smoke it to the butt."

Schultze (played by Horst Krause)[http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050310/REVIEWS/50301008/1001 Schultze Gets the Blues] Roger Ebert is a large, recently retired salt-miner living in Teutschenthal (near Halle, Saxony-Anhalt in Germany). Along with his also laid-off friends Jürgen and Manfred, he finds himself restless with so much spare time.

For years, he has played traditional polka music on his accordion, but a series of upheavals in his life inspires an interest in American Zydeco and Cajun music. Despite his initial fear of travelling to the United States, he accepts his music club's wish to represent it at a German folk music festival in New Braunfels, Texas.

However, instead of appearing there, he chooses to travel in a motor boat around the countryside despite speaking little English, immersing himself in the music and culture of the Bayou. Finally, among his newly-found friends, he becomes very sick and presumably dies. Back in Teutschenthal, a funeral is held for Schultze, which turns into a decent and mildly happy celebration of his life: "Herr, lehre uns bedenken, dass wir alle einmal sterben müssen, auf das wir im Leben klug werden" – "Lord, teach us to understand we all have to die sometime, that we become wiser in our lives" (Psalm 90,12).

Initially, Ravenholm was a small mining town, mainly containing decrepit wooden houses. Following the invasion of the Combine, a hostile alliance of alien races, it became one of the last bastions of the Resistance, a group of humans who opposed the alien occupation. When the Combine discovered the town's location, they bombarded it with Headcrab Shells, biological weapons containing numerous alien headcrabs that can take over their victims and turn them into zombies. These headcrab launchers were rarely used by the Combine, and their deployment may have been an act of retribution towards the Resistance. The total zombification of its population caused the rebels outside the town to begin only speaking of it in whispers, and warning others not to go near it.

"The Cop and the Anthem" has only one character who is given a name, the protagonist "Soapy." It is made clear that Soapy is homeless, one of the underclass men and women who flocked to New York City during the earliest years of the twentieth century.

The short story's narrative is set in an unstated day in late fall. Soapy faces the urgent necessity of finding some sort of shelter for the winter. He is psychologically experienced in thinking of Blackwell's Island, the local jail, as a ''de facto'' winter homeless shelter, and the narrative shows him developing a series of tactics intended to encourage the police to classify him as a criminal and arrest him.

Soapy's ploys include swindling a restaurant into serving him an expensive meal, vandalizing the plate-glass window of a luxury shop, repeating his eatery exploit at a humble diner, sexually harassing a young woman, pretending to be publicly intoxicated, and stealing another man's umbrella.

However, all of these attempts are quickly exposed as failures. The upper-class restaurant looks at Soapy's threadbare clothes and refuses to serve him. A police officer responds to the broken window but decides to pursue an innocent bystander. The diner refuses to have Soapy arrested, and instead has two servers throw Soapy out onto a concrete pavement.

Soapy's failures to earn his desired arrest continue. The young woman, far from feeling harassed, proves to be more than ready for action. Another police officer observes Soapy impersonating a drunk and disorderly man, but assumes that the exhibitionistic conduct is that of a Yale student celebrating a victory over "Hartford College" in football. Finally, the victim of the umbrella theft relinquishes the item without a struggle.

Based on these events, Soapy despairs of his goal of getting arrested and imprisoned. With the autumn sun gone and night having fallen, Soapy lingers by a small Christian church, considering his plight.

As O. Henry describes events, the small church has a working organ and a practicing organist. As Soapy listens to the church organ play an anthem, he experiences a spiritual epiphany in which he resolves to cease to be homeless, end his life as a tramp afflicted with unemployment, and regain his self-respect. Soapy recalls that a successful businessman had once offered him a job. Lost in a reverie, Soapy decides that on the very next day he will seek out this potential mentor and apply for employment.

As Soapy stands on the street and considers this plan for his future, however, a "cop" (policeman) taps him on the shoulder and asks him what he is doing. When Soapy answers "Nothing," his fate is sealed: he has been arrested for loitering. In the magistrate's court on the following day, he is convicted of a misdemeanor and is sentenced to three months in Blackwell's Island, the New York City jail.

Ruth Anne, nicknamed "Bone" Boatwright, is a young girl growing up in Greenville, South Carolina in the 1950s. Born out of wedlock to Anney, Bone lives with her mother and their extended family in a poor part of town. Anney loves Bone, but is still very much a child herself, tired out from working and needy for attention and adoration. Bone and Anney nearly always have to face the shame of the "ILLEGITIMATE" stamp on Bone's birth certificate. When the county courthouse burns down, Anney is happy that a copy of Bone's birth certificate no longer exists.

After her kind, hardworking first husband, Lyle Parsons, the father of Bone's half-sister, is killed in an automobile accident, Anney remarries a man named Glen Waddell, who seems attentive until Anney and Glen's baby dies at birth. Glen first molests Bone while waiting in the car for the birth of his child. Frustrated by the loss of his eagerly-anticipated son, Anney's inability to have more children, and his own inability to manage his temper and maintain steady employment, Glen begins to physically and sexually abuse Bone regularly, beating her in the bathroom. Bone wakes her mother up in the middle of the night, barely able to walk because of the immense pain she is in. Anney takes her to the hospital, where the doctor berates Anney for beating the child so badly that her coccyx is broken. The only thing Bone says is 'Mama.' Anney takes Bone to the car, leaving the hospital against the doctor's wishes, and slaps Glen's hand away as he tries to comfort the girl. Anney is saddened and angered by her new husband's behavior towards her child and takes Bone to her sister Alma's house to recuperate. However, once Bone is better, Anney returns to Glen after he swears to never touch Bone again. However, the abuse resumes not long after.

While reading with her mama at the cafe, Anney asks Bone to go and stay with her Aunt Ruth since she is very sick. Ruth asks Bone about Glen and if he has ever hurt her. Bone says no and the two grow close listening to gospel music on the radio. After a visit from Dee Dee, Ruth dies of sickness. At Aunt Ruth's funeral, Bone's Aunt Raylene finds her in the bathroom falling over drunk after drinking too much alcohol and when she tries to take her to a bed, she discovers lashes on her legs and alerts the girl's uncles, Earle, Wade, and Travis, and a man, who beat Glen unconscious for what he did to her. Bone is sent to live with her aunts, and eventually tells her mother that she is allowed to love Glen, but Bone will never come home to him again. Eventually, Glen comes around while the aunts are out, trying to force her to come back. But she refuses, asks him to leave, then threatens to tell Anney everything he did to her. When she fights back, he punches, and then rapes her. Anney discovers the rape and retaliates by hitting Glen over the head with a glass bottle, breaking it and resulting in him bleeding from his head. She pulls, kicks, and hurls him off of Bone, screams at him, then carries her out of the house away from him and to her car. Glen stumbles out of the house after Anney, screaming his apologies and saying he can't live without her. She yells at him to stay away from her and Bone. She then puts Bone into her car. When Glen tries to comfort her, she pushes him away, gets into her car, starts it and tries to drive away, attempting to leave him for good. Glen then leans against the car door and repeatedly smashes his head against it, screaming for Anney to kill him if he can't be with her anymore. Instead, she strokes his head in forgiveness, believing he will never hurt Bone again. This causes Bone to feel disgusted and amazed, making her for the first time hate her own mother. Ultimately, Anney returns to Glen.

Moments after, Bone is visited at the hospital by Aunt Raylene. When the cops attempt to question her about who brutalized her, she still refuses to reveal that it was Glen and calls out for her mother who is nowhere to be found. In the end, Bone is allowed to stay with her Aunt Raylene and Uncle Earle, far away from the reach of those who would harm her. Her mother visits one final time to deliver to her the copy of her birth certificate without the mark of "ILLEGITIMATE" and apologizes for what happened, saying that she loved Glen too much to see the real him and she tells her that she loves her, before driving away to rejoin Glen. Bone remains with her Aunt Raylene and Uncle Earle, and with this final, tearful goodbye, she cries for her mother's sacrifice and for the freedom she has at last achieved. Her final words are narrated by Laura Dern as the film ends.

"Who had mama been? What did she wanted to be or do before I was born? Once I was born, her hopes turned, and I climbed up her life like a flower reaching for the sun. Her life had folded into mine. Who would I be when I was 15, 20, 30? Would I be as strong as she had been? As hungry for love? As desperate, determined and ashamed? I wouldn't know but I was already who I was gonna be. Someone like her, like my mama, a Boatwright, a bastard, a bastard out of Carolina."

The novel presents the story from the perspective of Desiderio, a bureau member in the main city currently under the attack of Doctor Hoffman's desire machines. With these machines, Doctor Hoffman expands the dimensions of time and space, allowing ever-changing mirages to inhabit the same dimension as the living. Desiderio, though indifferent to the haunting apparitions, finds himself visited nightly by a glass woman, the manifestation of Albertina, Hoffman's daughter and Desiderio's lover-to-be. Unlike Desiderio, many people go crazy in response to the apparitions, and the city, severed from communication with the outside world, becomes a place of rampant insanity and crime, thereby prompting a state of emergency. Under the command of the Minister of Determination, Desiderio embarks on an undercover journey to find and assassinate Doctor Hoffman.

On his way to the first stop on his journey, Desiderio encounters Doctor Hoffman's former physics professor who now works as blind peep-show proprietor. During the story, Desiderio visits the sexualised exhibits of the peep show a number of times to find that they bear uncanny resemblance to the events that occur within his own life. Upon reaching his first destination, the Mayor's Office of town S., Desiderio finds that the Mayor has disappeared. Thereupon he visits the Mayor's home where he rapes the Mayor's somnambulist daughter, Mary Anne, while she remains unconscious. When Mary Anne turns up dead, dirty members of the Determination Police charge Desiderio, but he escapes. From there on, Desiderio finds himself involved in a number of wild adventures in which the novel features many graphic scenes of eroticism that include sexual taboos. On these adventures, Albertina secretly accompanies Desiderio.

Desiderio spends time living with the river people, Amerindian families that live on barges. He later joins a traveling carnival in which he becomes enthralled with the mind-boggling performance of the Acrobats of Desire. Following a tragic event, a Lithuanian count, in flight from the wrath of a black pimp, takes Desiderio into his company. With the count, Desiderio narrowly escapes becoming the victim of cannibalism on the African coast before Albertina reveals herself and leads Desiderio through the landscape of Nebulous Time where a community of centaurs adopts the two. However, the couple's lives become endangered yet again and they must flee to Hoffman's castle, where Doctor Hoffman explains his plans to reduce the world into its most basic constituents with the help of Desiderio and Albertina. While Desiderio loves Albertina, he ultimately chooses reality over the fulfilment of desire when he kills both Doctor Hoffman and his daughter. As a result, Desiderio becomes the proclaimed hero of the Great War. Nevertheless, he continues to long for his dead lover.

Orphaned Jim Burden rides the trains from Virginia to Black Hawk, Nebraska, where he will live with his paternal grandparents. Jake, a farmhand from Virginia, rides with the 10-year-old boy. On the same train, headed to the same destination, is the Shimerda family from Bohemia. Jim lives with his grandparents in the home they have built, helping as he can with chores to ease the labor on the others. The home has the dining room and kitchen downstairs, like a basement, with small windows at the top of the walls, an arrangement quite different from Jim’s home in Virginia. The sleeping quarters and parlor are at ground level. The Shimerda family paid for a homestead which proves to have no home on it, just a cave in the earth, and not much of the land broken for cultivation. The two families are nearest neighbors to each other in a sparsely settled land. Ántonia, the elder daughter in the Shimerda family, is a few years older than young Jim. The two are friends from the start, helped by Mrs. Shimerda asking that Jim teach both her daughters to read English. Ántonia helps Mrs. Burden in her kitchen when she visits, learning more about cooking and housekeeping. The first year is extremely difficult for the Shimerda family, without a proper house in the winter. Mr. Shimerda comes to thank the Burdens for the Christmas gifts given to them, and has a peaceful day with them, sharing a meal and the parts of a Christian tradition that Protestant Mr. Burden and Catholic Mr. Shimerda respect. He did not want to move from Bohemia, where he had a skilled trade, a home and friends with whom he could play his violin. His wife is sure life will be better for her children in America.

The pressures of the new life are too much for Mr. Shimerda, who kills himself before the winter is finished. The nearest Catholic priest is too far away for last rites. He is buried without formal rites at the corner marker of their homestead, a place that is left alone when the territory is later marked out with section lines and roads. Ántonia stops her lessons and begins to work the land with her older brother. The wood piled up to build their log cabin is made into a house. Jim continues to have adventures with Ántonia when they can, discovering nature around them, alive with color in summer and almost monotone in winter. She is a girl full of life. Deep memories are set in both of them from the adventures they share, including the time Jim killed a long rattlesnake with a shovel they were fetching for Ambrosch, her older brother.

A few years after Jim arrives, his grandparents move to the edge of town, buying a house while renting their farm. Their neighbors, the Harlings, have a housekeeper to help with meals and care of the children. When they need a new housekeeper, Mrs. Burden connects Ántonia with Mrs. Harling, who hires her for good wages. Becoming a town girl is a success, as Ántonia is popular with the children, and learns more about running a household, letting her brother handle the heavy farm chores. She stays in town for a few years, having her worst experience with Mr. and Mrs. Cutter. The couple goes out of town while she is their housekeeper, after Mr. Cutter said something that made Ántonia uncomfortable to stay alone in the house as requested. Jim stays there in her place, only to be surprised by Mr. Cutter returning to rape Ántonia, whom he expects will be alone and defenseless. Instead, Jim attacks the intruder, belatedly realizing that it is Mr. Cutter.

Jim does well in school, the valedictorian of his high school class. He attends the new state university in Lincoln, where his mind is opened to a new intellectual life. In his second year, he finds one of the immigrant farm girls, Lena, is in Lincoln, too, with a successful dressmaking business. He takes her to plays, which they both enjoy. His teacher realizes that Jim is so distracted from his studies, that he suggests Jim come with him to finish his studies at Harvard in Boston. He does, where he then studies the law. He becomes an attorney for one of the western railroads. He keeps in touch with Ántonia, whose life takes a hard turn when the man she loves proposes marriage, but deceives her and leaves her with child. She moves back in with her mother. Years later, Jim visits Ántonia, meeting Anton Cuzak, her husband and father of ten more children, on their farm in Nebraska. He visits with them, getting to know her sons especially. They know all about him, as he features in the stories of their mother’s childhood. She is happy with her brood and all the work of a farm wife. Jim makes plans to take her sons on a hunting trip next year.

''Act of War'' is set in what is only referred to as "a near future" (presumably 2017 or 2023, since the game starts on Wednesday, May 10) where the gasoline prices in the United States have reached over $7 a gallon due to an economic crisis. One week before the "World Energy Forum" meeting in London, a terrorist bombing destroys an oil facility in Houston. As such, an elite top-secret military unit known as Task Force Talon is assigned to guard the World Energy Forum. The squad thwarts an attack but two VIPs are kidnapped: Arthur Kingman, CEO of TransGlobal Energy corporation (TGE), and Yegor Zakharov, the representative of the world energy consortium. Task Force Talon manages to recover these VIPs apparently before they are murdered. Later, an unknown terrorist faction launches a massive military assault in San Francisco. With the aid of Task Force Talon, the attackers are eventually neutralized. To protect against further attacks on American soil, the U.S. government orders a full troop recall: U.S. forces from all around the globe are ordered to return to the United States.

The commander of Task Force Talon, Major Jason Richter, however, is not satisfied with the troop recall order. He has noticed that the primary target of the terrorist attacks in Houston, London, California and other places around the globe has been TGE, the oil company that is on the verge of resolving the oil crisis. Richter thinks that without U.S. troops in Egypt, terrorists will destroy TGE. Therefore, Major Richter goes against executive orders from the U.S. President and deploys Task Force Talon forces to Egypt. They manage to gather enough intelligence to convince the President to support their military defense of the TGE complex in Egypt. In a battle within the Egyptian TGE refinery, Task Force Talon deploy cutting-edge military technology against an enemy that now possesses self-propelled artillery and invisible tanks. Eventually, Task Force Talon prevails.

During the battle in Egypt, Task Force Talon finally discovered the identity of their enemy: the Consortium, led by Zakharov, who owns two of the labs that produced stealth tanks. The United States government, Task Force Talon and the Russian government launch a joint assault against Zakharov who has a stronghold in Russia and is now in possession of a full army, a small air force and even 9K720 Iskander ballistic missiles. Through the joint effort, Zakharov is eventually captured.

Major Richter personally takes Zakharov to the United States. Upon arrival however, he finds Washington, D.C. under the military occupation of the Consortium. Even as the U.S. forces struggle to liberate the United States Capitol, the 81st U.S. Armored Division, taken over by the Consortium, rescues Zakharov and occupies the White House area. The President attempts to escape but his helicopter is shot down. Only with the aid of Task Force Talon, the president manages to evade capture. Eventually, the U.S. Army and Task Force Talon mount a counter-attack on the Consortium-occupied White House, facing cutting-edge enemy technology that is supposed to be top-secret U.S. and Russian prototypes. Even as they take back the White House, Zakharov unleashes the Falling Star, a space-based superweapon. Having deployed Patriot batteries to counter the Falling Star, Task Force Talon and the United States Army deploy cruise missiles to destroy Zakharov's base. Zakharov is discovered dead after Major Richter, standing atop of a massive smoldering crater, orders a DNA analysis of the remnants of the bodies.

After finding out Deebo escaped prison to get revenge on his son Craig, Willie decides it would be safer for Craig to move to Rancho Cucamonga to live with his uncle Elroy and cousin Day-Day, who had just won the lottery. Day-Day shows Craig around the house and neighborhood. Day-Day explains to Craig that after winning the lottery, all of the taxes and fees that were taken out only left them enough to buy their house and Day-Day's car. A notice arrives informing them that their house could face repossession.

Later, Craig visits Day-Day at work, a record shop. Day-Day hides from his pregnant ex D'Wana and her little sister Baby D who constantly stalk and harass him saying that he is the baby's father. Day-Day's boss Pinky arrives at the store finding it locked. While Day-Day and his co-worker Roach are in the back, a scuffle between Craig and Pinky ensues in which Pinky mistakes him for a robber, while Craig tries to explain that he is Day-Day’s cousin. Pinky then fires Day-Day and Roach.

Craig, Day-Day, and Roach try to figure out how to keep the house. Craig remembers seeing their neighbors, a trio of gang member brothers known as "the Jokers", who live with their sister Karla carrying a hydraulic pump. Suspecting that it may be hiding cash, Craig convinces Day-Day and Roach to help him get inside the Jokers' house and steal the pump.

Later that night, Roach drugs the Jokers' dog Chico with Cannabis to keep him distracted while Craig sneaks into the Jokers' house. Craig locates the pump finding cash is hidden inside and taking some for himself. He escapes out of a window. Panicking after the eldest Joker closes the window (the way Craig got into the house), Day-Day and Roach knock on the Jokers' door as a diversion for Craig to escape. After discovering money missing, The Jokers take Day-Day and Roach hostage and tie them up.

Willie returns to the neighborhood while unknowingly hauling Deebo and his brother Tyrone in his truck, who snuck in earlier. Craig returns to Elroy's house only to find Day-Day and Roach missing. Craig, Willie, and Elroy decide to investigate the Jokers' house with Elroy's girlfriend Suga saying she will call the police if they aren’t back in ten minutes.

The trio sneaks into the Jokers' backyard. Joker sends Baby Joker and Lil' Joker to get a chainsaw from the toolshed. Willie knocks Baby Joker with a 2x4 and Elroy tackles Lil' Joker. Willie ties the younger Jokers up and puts them in the shed.

Joker goes to look for his brothers and finds Elroy on the ground due to his back giving out after tackling Lil' Joker. Craig then engages him in a fight. As Craig and Joker fight, Elroy unties Day-Day and Roach. Joker gains the upper hand when he picks up an AK-47, Deebo appears and knocks Joker out. Armed with Joker’s rifle, Deebo prepares to shoot but not before he is bitten by Chico. The police arrive and arrest the Joker brothers, Deebo, and Tyrone. Craig leaves with the Jokers' pump.

After witnessing D’Wana and Baby D toss a brick at Day-Day’s BMW, Craig returns home with his dad.

B movie film producer Bobby Bowfinger has been saving up to direct a movie since he was ten years old—he now has $2,184 to pay for production costs. He has a script ("''Chubby Rain''") penned by an accountant, Afrim, and a camera operator, Dave, with access to studio-owned equipment. Bowfinger then lines up several actors who are hungry for work, along with a crowd of illegal Mexican immigrants for a camera crew; the only other thing he needs is access to a studio in order to distribute his masterwork.

He extracts a promise from a high-ranking Universal Pictures executive, Jerry Renfro, that Universal will distribute the film if it includes currently-hot action star Kit Ramsey. Ramsey—a pompous, neurotic, and paranoid actor—refuses, so Bowfinger constructs a plan to covertly film all of Ramsey's scenes without his knowledge. The actors, told that Ramsey is method acting and will not be interacting with them outside of their scenes, walk up to Ramsey in public and recite their lines while hidden cameras catch Ramsey's confused reactions.

The plan goes well at first: Ramsey (who is a member of an organization called MindHead) swallows the movie's alien invasion premise and believes he is genuinely being stalked by aliens, resulting in an exceptionally genuine and intense performance. However, the strain on his already-precarious mental state leads him to go into hiding in order to maintain his sanity, stalling the film's production.

Bowfinger resorts to hiring a Ramsey lookalike named Jiff. Jiff is unassuming, amiable and very naive. For a shot, Bowfinger persuades him to run across a busy freeway by assuring him the many cars racing by are all "stunt drivers". During a chat with the other cast members, Jiff reveals that he is Kit's twin brother, explaining the likeness. Using this new knowledge, Bowfinger tasks Jiff with finding out Kit's location and plans so they can ambush him and film the final scene.

Only one scene remains to be shot: the finale set at the Griffith Observatory. Though otherwise pleased with Kit's unscripted dialogue, Bowfinger considers his character's final line "Gotcha, suckas!" to be the key moment of the film. Bowfinger directs Daisy to guide Kit through the scene under the guise of showing him how to get rid of the "aliens". During the filming, Kit becomes terrified and struggles to deliver the final line. At this point, Kit's MindHead mentor, Terry Stricter, who has discovered evidence that Kit's "aliens" may not be just in his head, shows up at the observatory and shuts down production.

Bowfinger's camera crew show him B-roll footage of Kit Ramsey they were filming off-set, just in case they caught anything they could use. The footage shows Kit donning a paper bag over his head and exposing himself to the Laker Girl Cheerleading Squad, something Terry Stricter previously dissuaded him from doing. Bowfinger blackmails Stricter and the MindHead leadership with the footage, threatening to release it and ruin Ramsey's career (which would impact MindHead's finances as Ramsey is a major donor). MindHead advises the star to finish the project. Bowfinger and the cast and crew finally get to attend the film's premiere, and are awed. Following the apparent success of the film, Bowfinger receives a FedEx envelope containing an offer to direct a martial arts film in Taiwan starring Jiff Ramsey. The film ends with an elaborate fight scene from the new movie, ''Fake Purse Ninjas'', featuring everyone who worked on ''Chubby Rain''.

Malcolm Ross, a young barrister, is awakened in the middle of the night and summoned to the house of famous Egyptologist Abel Trelawny at the request of Abel's daughter, Margaret, of whom Malcolm is enamoured. Once Malcolm arrives at the house, he meets Margaret, Superintendent Dolan, and Doctor Winchester, and learns why he has been called: Margaret, hearing strange noises from her father's bedroom, woke to find him unconscious and bloodied on the floor of his room, under some sort of trance. Margaret reveals that her father had left a letter of strange instructions in the event of his incapacitation, stating that his body should not be removed from his room and must be watched at all times until he wakes up. The room is filled with Egyptian relics, and Malcolm notices that the "mummy smell" has an effect on those in the room. A large mummy cat in the room disturbs Margaret's cat, Silvio, and the doctor suspects Silvio is guilty of the scratch marks on Trelawny's arm.

On the first night of watch, Malcolm awakens to find Trelawny again on the floor, bloody and senseless. Margaret asks Dr. Winchester to summon another expert, and he calls for Dr. James Frere, a brain specialist. However, when Frere demands that Trelawny be moved from his room, Margaret refuses and sends him away. After a normal night with no attacks, a stranger arrives, begging to see Trelawny. He reveals himself to be Eugene Corbeck, an Egyptologist who was working with Trelawny. He has returned from Egypt with lamps that Trelawny requested, but finds upon his arrival at the house that the lamps have disappeared. The next day, Malcolm and Margaret admire Trelawny's Egyptian treasures, noting in particular a large sarcophagus, a coffer covered with hieroglyphics, and an oddly well-preserved mummy hand with seven fingers. Malcolm then finds the missing lamps in Margaret's bedroom. Concerned for Margaret, Malcolm tells Corbeck everything that has happened up until his arrival, and Corbeck gives Malcolm a mysterious book to read. The book tells the story of Nicholas van Huyn, a Dutch explorer who travelled to the Valley of the Sorcerer to explore the tomb of a mysterious Egyptian queen, Tera. In the tomb, he finds a sarcophagus and a mummy hand with seven fingers, adorned with a ruby ring with seven points that look like stars.

Corbeck tells Malcolm that, years ago, he and Trelawny travelled to Egypt to search for the tomb where the sarcophagus lies. They find the tomb and discover that the mummy's wrist was coated with fresh dried blood. The hieroglyphics on the wall led Corbeck and Trelawny to believe that the mummy was possessed with some sort of black magic and that Queen Tera had immense power over the Upper and Lower Worlds. The hieroglyphics seemed to indicate that Tera planned to return from the dead. They took the sarcophagus from the tomb and left, only to be robbed of the mummy during a storm by their Arab guides. Trelawny suggested that they return to the tomb, where they found the mummy and the three Arabs, murdered. During their time in the tomb, they were put under some trance and recovered three days later to find that Trelawny's wife had died in childbirth, but Margaret survived. Sixteen years passed before Trelawny contacted Corbeck, frantic because he believed that the lamps they saw in the tomb, when arranged in a specific shape, would make the coffer open and would possibly be the key to Tera's resurrection.

Corbeck's story is interrupted by Trelawny's revival. He embraces his daughter and joyfully approves Malcolm's courtship. Dolan and the police depart, glad to escape from the mystery, and Trelawny gathers the remaining inhabitants of the house to explain his Great Experiment. He describes how powerful Queen Tera was and explains that her spirit has been residing in the mummy cat in Trelawny's room, waiting to be reunited with its human form. Trelawny believes that the coffer, when opened by the proper formation of the lamps, will release some sort of magic that will revive the mummy and bring Tera's spirit to life. Trelawny's attack was the attempt of Tera's astral body—the mummy cat—to remove the Jewel of Seven Stars from a locked safe in his bedroom. He reveals that he has prepared an isolated house at Kyllion, in Cornwall, where the experiment is to take place.

After this overwhelming wealth of information is revealed, Malcolm questions the implications of ancient forces interacting with new civilization. He worries about the impact on religion and monotheism if the power of the ancient Egyptian gods is proven. Trelawny also posits that the ancient Egyptians possessed contemporary scientific knowledge, such as the discovery of radium and invention of electricity. Once everyone arrives at the new house, Margaret's behavior becomes increasingly erratic, and she seems to have an uncanny knowledge of Tera's thoughts and feelings. Malcolm begins to suspect that Margaret is the astral body of Tera and fears that she will be too weak to fight off a possession, but when he relays these concerns to Trelawny and Margaret, they seem unafraid of this possibility.

On the night of the experiment, a wild storm rages outside as they set up in a cave underneath the house. Margaret tells her father that Tera will not possess the mummy cat and will remain powerless until the experiment is complete, seeming to confirm that Margaret has been possessed. Somehow comforted by the confirmation of Tera's existence, they proceed with the experiment and unwrap the mummy. They discover that Tera is wearing a marriage robe, which greatly distresses Margaret. Malcolm is put in charge of turning on the electric lights after the experiment ends, and Margaret blows out the candles. As the lamps are lit, the coffer begins to glow, emitting a green vapour that passes into the sarcophagus. Suddenly, the wind from the storm shatters a window, blowing the vapour around the room, and black smoke pours out of the coffer. The room is engulfed in smoke, and Malcolm waits for the command to turn on the lights, but it never comes. The lamps slowly burn out and Malcolm fumbles in the dark, coming across the limp body of a woman whom he believes is Margaret. He carries her upstairs and leaves her in the hall while he runs for matches, but when he returns, he finds only Tera's bridal robe lying on the floor, the Jewel of Seven Stars lying where the heart would be. He returns to the cave and turns on the lights to find all of his companions on the floor, dead.

In a revised version released in 1912, this ending was removed. In the second version, the experiment fails entirely, no one is harmed, and Margaret and Malcolm marry a few years later.

Characters

• '''Malcolm Ross''': The protagonist and narrator, Malcolm is drawn into the mystery of Queen Tera by his love for Margaret Trelawny, and his desire to protect her guides most of his actions.
• '''Margaret Trelawney''': The daughter of Abel, born while Abel was entranced in Tera's tomb, Margaret begins as a demure and sweet woman but grows more independent throughout the text. She strongly resembles Queen Tera and eventually takes on similar characteristics, possibly being possessed by Tera's spirit.
• '''Abel Trelawny''': A famous Egyptologist who becomes obsessed with the idea of resurrecting Tera. A hopeful, ambitious, and fearless man, he is extremely interested in scientific progress and believes that the ancient Egyptians were more progressive than the contemporary British.
• '''Eugene Corbeck''': An Egyptologist who aids Trelawny in his endeavors to recover Egyptian artifacts. A little bit feisty, he seems more interested in the artifacts than the idea of resurrecting Tera. His enthusiasm wanes and his anxiety grows as the Great Experiment goes from theory to reality.
• '''Doctor Winchester''': A young doctor who initially comes to treat Trelawny for his wounds but becomes entangled in the mystery. Though he is hesitant at first to give up on factual evidence, he shows a willingness to believe in the supernatural and eagerly assists in the revival.

In 1942, during the Second World War, American pilot Major Steve Trevor (Waggoner) bails out during an air battle over the Bermuda Triangle, location of Paradise Island. The island is home to the Amazons: beautiful, ageless women with great strength, agility, and intelligence. Amazon princess Diana (Carter) rescues the handsome unconscious Trevor and helps nurse him back to health. Her mother, the Amazon queen (Cloris Leachman; succeeded by Carolyn Jones and Beatrice Straight in later episodes), decrees that Olympic-style games shall be held to select one Amazon to return Trevor back to America. But she forbids her own daughter Diana, the princess, to participate. Diana states that since she is not allowed to participate, she does not want to be present for the games and will take a retreat to the other side of the island. The games are held with participants wearing masks and numbers, shown as Roman numerals in triangles on white sleeveless short tunic-dresses.

Among the contestants is a masked blonde Amazon. During the events, the blonde Amazon shows exceptional skills and she ties for first with another Amazon. To break the deadlock, the "bullets and bracelets" event is decided as the tiebreaker, wherein each of the women takes turns shooting at the other; the one being shot at must deflect the bullets with her bulletproof bracelets. The blonde woman wins the event, superficially injuring her opponent's arm. When she is pronounced the winner, she removes her mask and wig and reveals that she is Diana. Her mother, though initially shocked, relents and allows her to go to America.

Diana's uniform as Wonder Woman, designed by Queen Hippolyta, features emblems of America, the land to which she will be returning Steve Trevor. A golden belt will be the source of her strength and power while away from Paradise Island. She has her bullet-deflecting bracelets and also receives a golden lasso which is unbreakable and forces people to obey and tell the truth when bound with it. As shown later in flashback, Hippolyta also teaches Diana how to magically transform her clothes into the uniform.

Diana, as Wonder Woman, flies to Washington, D.C. in an invisible plane. After dropping Trevor off at a hospital, the heroine stumbles upon a bank robbery, which she stops. A theatrical agent who sees her in action offers to help make her bullets and bracelets act a stage attraction. Diana is hesitant, but needing money in this new society, she agrees.

Meanwhile, Trevor's civilian secretary Marcia (Stella Stevens) is a double agent for the Nazi Fifth Columnists. She seeks to aid top spies in killing Trevor and opposing this new threat, Wonder Woman. Her first attempt is arranging for an accomplice to fire a machine gun at Wonder Woman during her stage act. Later, as spy activities increase, Trevor leaves the hospital but gets in a fight and is captured, prompting his "nurse" Diana to come to his rescue. Wonder Woman defeats Marcia in an extended fight sequence in the War Department. Having defeated Marcia, Wonder Woman thwarts a Nazi pilot who had plans to bomb the Brooklyn Navy Yard by using her invisible plane, and she rescues Trevor. With Marcia and the spy ring defeated, the film closes as Trevor and Brigadier General Blankenship talk about Trevor's new secretary whom Blankenship selected not only for her outstanding clerical test scores, but her decidedly plain appearance in contrast to Marcia: the bespectacled Yeoman First Class Diana Prince USNR(WR), Wonder Woman in disguise.

The plot centers on Inukai Heishirō (Mitsuru Fukikoshi), the son of a clan officer. One of his clan's most precious heirlooms, a sword given them by the Shogun, has been stolen by the samurai Kazamatsuri (Tomoyasu Hotei). Against his father's advice, Heishirō insists on retrieving the sword himself. His father sends two ninja after him to make sure he doesn't do anything stupid.

Kazamatsuri wounds Heishirō, and kills one of his companions. The young noble ends up staying with an older samurai (Morio Kazama) and his daughter Koharu (Tamaki Ogawa) while he heals from his wound and plans his next move. The older samurai tries to dissuade him from fighting, but Heishirō's honor won't allow him to leave Kazamatsuri alive. The older samurai, who turns out to be the master Hanbei Mizoguchi, convinces him to fight Kazamatsuri by throwing rocks rather than with swords.

Meanwhile, Kazamatsuri settles for a few days at a gambling house owned by Lady Okatsu (Mari Natsuki), who falls in love with him. Then one night one of the ninja sent to protect Heishirō bribes her to poison his sake for one thousand gold. She does, but Kazamatsuri tastes the poison and kills Okatsu. He then kidnaps Koharu in an attempt to get the master Mizoguchi to fight him.

Mizoguchi reveals to Heishirō that he killed Koharu's father, and has since never drawn his sword on another man, despite his immense skill. They then go to find Kazamatsuri and rescue Koharu. While Mizoguchi stalls Kazamatsuri, Heishirō takes Koharu aside and says he will marry her if Mizoguchi wins. Kazamatsuri fights Mizoguchi, who only draws his sword after his opponent destroys his wooden sword. He then disarms Kazamatsuri near a cliff. Kazamatsuri, admitting defeat, commits suicide by jumping off the cliff. Heishirō and the others go to the bottom, where there is no sign of Kazamatsuri's body, but Koharu spots the stolen sword at the bottom of the river, where Heishirō retrieves it.

Flash forward one year. Heishirō has married Koharu, the sword is restored, and Mizoguchi is now an official in Heishiro's clan.

A forest fire interrupts a camping trip enjoyed by Gohan, Krillin, Bulma and Oolong. Gohan and Krillin manage to put out the fire and use the Dragon Balls to restore the forest and the animals that were killed by the inferno, and Gohan befriends a small dragon he names Icarus. Unbeknownst to the group, the fire was started by a probe sent by a Saiyan space pirate named Turles, who bears a striking resemblance to Goku and who has chosen the Earth to plant the tree of might, which absorbs the life of a planet and converts it into fruit that when eaten, gives the consumer a massive power increase. Turles' henchmen plant the seed and King Kai telepathically warns Goku of the danger. He, Krillin, Yamcha, Tien Shinhan, and Chiaotzu attempt to destroy the tree using energy blasts but fail. Turles' henchmen attack and overwhelm them. The Earth begins to succumb to the devastation of the tree's life absorption as water vanishes and plants and animals begin to perish.

After Gohan fights back against the henchmen, Turles enters the fray after realizing Gohan is part-Saiyan and deduces that he is Goku's son, who he states is from the same class of Saiyan warrior and thus explains their similar appearances. Gohan impresses Turles with his power level and is invited to join his conquest, but he refuses and attempts to fight Turles before Piccolo intervenes to rescue him. Turles forces Piccolo to protect Gohan and the Namekian is dispatched. Turles creates an artificial moon and forces Gohan to observe it, causing him to transform into a great ape (oozaru), who attacks Goku but is calmed by the appearance of Icarus. Turles injures Icarus with an energy blast, causing Gohan to go into a frenzy before Goku severs his son's tail with an energy disc, transforming him back to normal and saving him from Turles' incoming energy blasts. Goku kills Turles' henchmen and engages his evil doppelganger in battle.

Goku gains the upper hand against Turles, until he obtains a fully grown piece of fruit from the Tree of Might and consumes it. With the sudden surge of power, Turles overwhelms Goku until his allies come to his aid. As they fight Turles with limited success, Goku begins to form a Spirit Bomb, but the Earth, having been drained by the Tree of Might, does not have the energy left to properly fuel Goku's bomb which Turles destroys. However, the energy from the Tree of Might begins to flow into Goku and this allows him to create another, more powerful Spirit Bomb. Goku confronts Turles underneath the tree's roots and blasts him directly with the attack, launching him up the tree and destroying them both.

The Earth begins to heal as the heroes celebrate their victory. Piccolo meditates alone by a waterfall.

At the end of the previous novel, ''Stowaway to Mars'', the British spaceship, the ''Gloria Mundi'' departed Mars, expecting the USSR ship to leave at the same time. It did not. In the Stowaway to Mars it is mentioned that while the British reached Earth safely, it was now several years later, and still there had been no sign of the Soviet vessel. This story tells their fate.

While on the planet in the previous story, the Soviet and British crews had explored part of Mars around their landing sites, discovering vegetation plant life, in the form of scrubby bushes growing along the banks of ancient canal works, with sluggish water still in them. The planet also hosted AI robots, hostile to the visitors from Earth. They seemed almost wild, feral machines living without control of organic life. Due to fatal encounters with these robots, and ill planned gunfight with the British crew, the Soviets now number four crewmen. Preparing to depart for Earth they discuss the fate of their mission - originally a race between the nations of Earth to be the first to reach Mars. The British and the ''Gloria Mundi'' had won the race, reach Mars before the Soviets and United States (whose rocket had crashed with no survivors upon reaching Mars). The Russians speculate what would be the global reaction if the ''Gloria Mundi'' reaches Earth, and then the Soviets return, and claim that they were the first to land on Mars, not the British. They conclude that they would not be believed. However, they reason that if they succeed in racing the British home, then they can claim that the USSR was the first to conquer the Red Planet, and the British will be disbelieved.

Both spaceships prepare to take off, with the Russians planning to boost their engines to achieve greater velocity than the smaller British craft. Upon take off, however, the Soviet ship suffers a malfunction, crash-landing back upon Mars. Although the ship is relatively undamaged and the four crew survive the impact, the ship has landed on its side and they lack the means to right it for take off. Even worse, they have no more fuel for a second attempt.

Stranded on Mars, their wrecked ship surrounded by the hostile robots, the Russians are saved by the arrival of more advanced and powerful robots, commanded by a Martian. Humanoid in appearance, he is one of the same Martians encountered by the British party (but not by the Soviets) in the previous story. His machines drive off the feral AIs, and allows the Russians to leave their ship. Using advanced technology, the Martian is able to modify the mind of one of their crew so that they can communicate.

The Martian offers to provide the Soviet crew safety in one of their enclosed cities while they decide what to do with them. Faced with few options the Russians agree. They are taken by the advanced robots to a nearby Martian city. They find it to be in good working order, fully automated, with dwellings suitable for their needs. There are no people living there however. Given an apartment within the city the Martian communicates with them via video screen from another settlement. Talking via the crew member they modified, the Martian explains to the Soviets how the Martians are a dying race, as is their world. Once fertile and full of life, Mars long ago ran short of water. As its rivers dried up, so its life died with it. There was even an attempt to melt the icecaps in an attempt to provide more water. While this worked for a time, eventually even this water was used up, only holding off the inevitable for a few generations and the planet continued to decline. The Martian tells that his people are now few in number, and expect that they will eventually become extinct. Asked to explain the robots, the Soviets are told how the Martians experimented with forms of artificial intelligence, and consider the robots to be their successors and evolutionary children. The rogue AIs encountered earlier in the novel were early attempts, and they now live beyond control of the Martians. The more advanced robots obey their commands, and perform such tasks as are required in the city.

The Martian is eager for the earthmen to leave his world, and expresses a willingness to aid them. He tells the Russians that they can remain as guests in the city while he will instruct the robots to repair their ship and refuel it for the voyage back to Earth. Due to their earlier encounter with the British, the Martian is confident that the city can produce both atmosphere and food suitable for the humans. While they wait for the repairs to be completed, the Soviets explore the abandoned city. They discover several interesting machines and devices, and their engineer believes that he can take several examples of advanced technology back to Earth that will give their country an advantage over the capitalist nations in the Cold War. The chance to learn of the Martian civilisation far eclipses losing the race back to Earth (the ''Gloria Mundi'' will by now have had such a head-start that catching them up will be impossible).

After several days of exploring, two of the crew discover a huge vault deep beneath the city. Inside are countless fluid-filled capsules containing apparently dead Martians. Opening one, they are shocked to discover that the occupant is alive, but the Martian female dies swiftly upon the opening of the container, likely due to trauma caused by incorrect revival. Realising that all the capsules contain living Martians in some form of suspended animation, the ship's doctor attempts to revive a second one. This time the Russians take the precaution of bringing the capsule to their quarters and preparing medical equipment before they try to awaken the second Martian.

Their efforts are successful, and the sleeper awakes, surviving the process. Once recovered he is able to talk with the modified Russian, and discuss his past. It seems that he was once part of a larger Martian population living many hundreds of years ago, at the time when the world was drying up. At the time the best hope for their civilisation was seen as the Project to Melt the Ice Caps. This great work would take many years to achieve, and with the aid of the robot workforce, only need a few Martians to supervise the project. To conserve water and resources, the vast majority of the population agreed to go into suspended animation for the decades it would take. They would be woken years later by the descendants of those who remained to direct the project, once the world was fertile once more. He is shocked to see the world at it is now - far worse and more barren than in his day. It appears that he and the other sleepers have been left to hibernate for far longer than originally envisaged.

The Soviet crew discuss the implications of this, speculating what happened. They conclude that while the early generations of Martians entered into the plan with good intentions, the later generations who had melted the poles, reneged on their ancestors' agreement. They had seen no reason to awaken these sleeping people, when they had done all the work, and could keep all the benefits for themselves. Now the world had dried up once more, and the sleepers would be left forever in the silent cities. The Russians are worried by this revelation, and also by the reaction of the Martian they woke. Angry at the betrayal of him, his wife and all his people he blames the current rulers of Mars. He claims that he can also order the robots, and will have revenge upon those who kept him dormant for so long.

The Earthmen argue about what course of action they should take. They debate warning the current Martians, given that their return to Earth depends on their goodwill, compared to the injustice suffered by the sleepers. Also if it will do any good at all, and if it is not best to pretend nothing happened. Eventually they prevail upon the modified crewman to use the video link to contact the main Martian settlement and warn them. He does so, causing their host to become displeased. The Russian assures his fellows that the ruling Martian was not too concerned, and that the robots have since been modified and that the sleepers can be stopped. Also their ship is now ready for launch, and they can depart the planet.

As they prepare to leave the city, the doctor confronts the modified crewman, revealing that he knows that he lied to them, and did not actually warn the ruling Martians. As they argue they spot more Martian sleepers now awake in the city, some armed, using machines to awaken others. It appears that their Martian friend has awoken other sleepers and is preparing to attack the ruling Martians. Before the four men can react, the sleeper they woke bursts into their quarters, and in an angry rage uses a raygun to kill the doctor. He is shot dead by the remaining Russians. They conclude that he had gone into hibernation beside his wife, and that she must have been the first sleeper they tried to awake and inadvertently killed. While arguing what to do, the Soviets notice from the window that sleepers are attempting to board their spaceship, now fuelled and ready for launch.

As two of the remaining crew race to the landing site to try and stop them, the last Soviet remains behind in the city. He watches as his comrades are unable to prevent several of the sleepers entering their ship and sealing the hatch. They are still on the boarding ladder when the ignition sequence is triggered and the ship blasts off, killing two Russians. The last Russian considers his options, locates the Martian's ray-gun and uses it to kill himself.

The ultimate fate of the Martian civilisation is unknown, nor the final landing site of the Russian ship, which could have carried a crew of Martians to a remote corner of Earth.

Category:1973 short story collections Category:Short story collections by John Wyndham Category:Books published posthumously Category:Coronet Books books

Set in the 1930s, the film depicts Gertrude Stein and her lover and assistant Alice B. Toklas meeting Pablo Picasso and his lover Fernande Olivier, as well as the authors Ernest Hemingway and Guillaume Apollinaire.

''Andrei Rublev'' is divided into eight episodes, with a prologue and an epilogue only loosely related to the main film. The main film charts the life of the great icon painter through seven episodes which either parallel his life or represent episodic transitions in his life. The background is 15th century Russia, a turbulent period characterized by fighting between rival princes and the Tatar invasions.

Prologue

The film's ''prologue'' shows the preparations for a hot air balloon ride. The balloon is tethered to the spire of a church next to a river, with a man named Yefim (Nikolay Glazkov) attempting to make the flight by use of a harness roped beneath the balloon.

At the very moment of his attempt, an ignorant mob arrive from the river and attempt to thwart the flight, putting a firebrand into the face of one of the men on the ground assisting Yefim. In spite of this the balloon is successfully released and Yefim is overwhelmed and delighted by the view from above and the sensation of flying, but he cannot prevent a crash-landing shortly after.

He is the first of several creative characters, representing the daring escapist, whose hopes are easily crushed. After the crash, a horse is seen rolling on its back by a pond, one of many horses in the film.

I. ''The Jester'' (Summer 1400)

Andrei (Anatoly Solonitsyn), Daniil (Nikolai Grinko) and Kirill (Ivan Lapikov) are wandering monks and religious icon painters, looking for work. The three represent different creative characters.

Andrei is the observer, a humanist who searches for the good in people and wants to inspire and not frighten. Daniil is withdrawn and resigned, and not as bent on creativity as on self-realization. Kirill lacks talent as a painter, yet still strives to achieve prominence. He is jealous, self-righteous, very intelligent and perceptive.

The three have just left the Andronikov Monastery, where they have lived for many years, heading to Moscow. During a heavy rain shower they seek shelter in a barn, where a group of villagers is being entertained by a jester (Rolan Bykov). The jester, or skomorokh, is a bitterly sarcastic enemy of the state and the Church, who earns a living with his scathing and obscene social commentary and by making fun of the Boyars. He ridicules the monks as they come in, and after some time Kirill leaves unnoticed.

Shortly after, a group of soldiers arrive to arrest the skomorokh, whom they take outside, knock unconscious and take away, also smashing his musical instrument. As the rain has stopped, Kirill returns. Kirill wants to leave, so Andrei wakes up resting Daniil. Unaware of what has happened to the jester, Daniil thanks the villagers for the shelter. As they walk on, the heavy rain starts again.

II. ''Theophanes the Greek'' (Summer–Winter–Spring–Summer 1405–1406)

Kirill arrives at the workshop of Theophanes the Greek (Nikolai Sergeyev), a prominent and well-recognized master painter, who is working on a new icon of Jesus Christ. Theophanes is portrayed as a complex character: an established artist, humanistic and God-fearing in his views yet somewhat cynical, regarding his art more as a craft and a chore in his disillusion with other people.

His young apprentices have all run away to the town square, where a wrongly convicted criminal is about to be tortured and executed. Kirill talks to Theophanes, and the artist, impressed by the monk's understanding and erudition, invites him to work as his apprentice on the decoration of the Cathedral of the Annunciation in Moscow. Kirill refuses at first, but then accepts the offer on the condition that Theophanes will personally come to the Andronikov Monastery and invite Kirill to work with him in front of all the fraternity and Andrei Rublev, who is renowned for his icon painting in the outside world, an admiration shared by Kirill and Theophanes.

A short while later at the Andronikov Monastery, a messenger arrives from Moscow to ask for assistance in decorating the cathedral, as arranged, but instead of Kirill, he propositions Andrei. Both Daniil and Kirill are agitated by the recognition that Andrei receives. Daniil refuses to accompany Andrei and reproaches him for accepting Theophanes’ offer without considering his fellows, but soon repents of his temper and tearfully wishes Andrei well when the younger monk comes to say goodbye to his friend. Kirill is jealous of Andrei and, in a fit of anger, decides to leave the monastery for the secular world, throwing accusations of greed in the face of his fellow monks, who also dismiss him. Kirill stumbles out of the monastery into the snowy countryside and is followed by his dog, but, in anger, he savagely beats it with his walking stick and leaves it for dead.

III. ''The Passion'' (1406)

Andrei leaves for Moscow with his young apprentice Foma (Mikhail Kononov). While walking in the woods, Andrei and Foma have a conversation about Foma's flaws, and in particular lying. Foma confesses to having taken honey from an apiary, after Andrei notices his cassock is sticky, and he smears mud on his face to soothe a bee sting.

While Foma has talent as an artist, he is less interested in the deeper meaning of his work and more concerned with the practical aspects of the job, like perfecting his azure, a color which at the time was often considered unstable to mix. They encounter Theophanes in the forest, and the old master sends Foma away, unimpressed by his attitude to art. As he leaves, the apprentice finds a dead swan; after poking it with a stick, he admires its wing and fantasizes about having a bird's-eye view.

In the forest, Andrei and Theophanes argue about religion, while Foma cleans his master's paint brushes. Theophanes argues that the ignorance of the Russian people is due to stupidity, while Andrei says that he doesn't understand how he can be a painter and maintain such views. This section contains a Passion Play, or a reenactment of Christ's Crucifixion, on a snow-covered hillside which plays out as Andrei recounts the events of Christ's death and expresses his belief that the men who crucified him were obeying God's will and loved him.

IV. ''The Holiday ''(1408)

Camping for the night on a riverbank, Andrei and Foma are collecting firewood for their traveling party when Andrei hears the distant sounds of celebration further upstream in the woods. Going to investigate, he comes upon a large group of naked pagans who are conducting a lit-torch ritual for Kupala Night. Andrei is intrigued and excited by the behaviour of the pagans but is caught spying on a couple making love, tied to the crossbeam of a hut, his arms raised in a mockery of Jesus' crucifixion, and is threatened with drowning in the morning.

A woman named Marfa (Nelly Snegina), dressed only in a fur coat, approaches Andrei. After explaining to Andrei, who lashes her with prejudice, that her people are persecuted for their beliefs, she drops her coat, kisses Andrei and then unties him. Andrei runs away and is lost in the dense woods, scratching his face. The next morning Andrei returns to his group, with Daniil now present, and as they leave on their boats a group of soldiers appear on the riverbank chasing after several of the pagans, including Marfa. In the struggle, her lover is captured, but she manages to escape by swimming naked into the river, passing right by Andrei's boat. He and his fellow monks look away in shame.

V. ''The Last Judgment ''(Summer 1408)

Andrei and Daniil are working on the decoration of a church in Vladimir. Although they have been there for two months the walls are still white and bare. A messenger, Patrikei (Yuri Nikulin), arrives with word from the Bishop, who is furious, to say they have until autumn to finish the job. On a nearby road in the middle of a field of flowers Andrei confides to Daniil that the task disgusts him and that he is unable to paint a subject such as the ''Last Judgement'' as he doesn't want to terrify people into submission. He comes to the conclusion that he has lost the ease of mind that an artist needs for his work. Foma, impatient and wanting to work, resigns and leaves Andrei's group to take up the offer of painting a smaller, less prestigious church.

Stone carvers and decorators of Andrei's party have also been working on the Grand Duke's mansion. The Prince is dissatisfied with the work done, and wants it to be redone, more in line with his tastes, but the workers already have another job, which is to help set up the mansion of the Grand Duke's brother, and they promptly refuse and leave, after indignantly proclaiming that the Grand Duke's brother will have a much more splendid home than he himself. While walking on a path through a nearby forest towards the mansion of their client, the artisans are assaulted by soldiers sent by the Grand Duke, and their eyes are gouged out, leaving them incapable of practicing their craft.

Back at the church, Andrei is dismayed by the news of the attack on the artisans and angrily throws paint and smears it on one of the walls. Sergei (Vladimir Titov), a young apprentice who escaped the assault unharmed, reads a random section of the bible aloud, at Daniil's request, concerning women. A young woman, Durochka (Irma Raush), whose name identifies her as a holy fool, or Yurodivy, wanders in to take shelter from the rain and is upset by the sight of the paint on the wall. Her feeble-mindedness and innocence inspires in Andrei the idea to paint a feast.

VI. ''The Raid'' (Autumn 1408)

While the Grand Duke is away in Lithuania, his power-hungry younger brother forms an allegiance with a group of Tatars and raids Vladimir. In a flashback, the Grand Duke and his brother attend a religious service in a church, and the rivalry and animosity between them is clear. The invasion of the combined armed forces, their men on horseback, results in great carnage: the city is burned, the citizens murdered and women raped and killed. One scene shows a horse falling from a flight of stairs.

Foma, who is in the midst of the chaos, narrowly escapes being killed in the city by a Russian soldier and escapes into the nearby countryside, but as he is crossing a river he is shot in the back with an arrow and killed. The Tatars force their way into the barricaded church, now fully decorated with Andrei's paintings, where the majority of the citizens have taken refuge. The Tatars show no mercy and massacre the people inside and burn all the painted wooden altarpieces. Andrei, who is also in the church, saves Durochka from being raped by a Russian soldier by killing him with an axe. The bishop's messenger Patrikei is also present; he is tortured with fire to make him reveal the location of the city's gold, which he refuses to do. After being repeatedly burned with a flaming torch, he has hot liquid metal from a melted crucifix poured into his mouth silencing his screams. Then he is dragged away feet first, tied to a horse.

In the aftermath only Andrei and Durochka are left alive in the church. Andrei imagines a conversation with the dead Theophanes the Greek, lamenting the loss of his work and the cruelty of mankind, while Durochka distractedly plaits the hair of a dead woman. Andrei decides to give up painting and takes a vow of silence to atone for his killing of another man.

, Moscow)

VII. ''Silence'' (Winter 1412)

:''Note: In the 205-minute version known as The Passion According to Andrei, this episode is titled The Charity'' Andrei is once again at the Andronikov Monastery as famine and war grip the country. He no longer paints and never speaks, and keeps Durochka with him as a fellow companion in silence.

In the same monastery, refugees discuss the problems plaguing their respective home towns, and one man who appears starts telling, in a broken voice, of his escape from Vladimir. He is recognized by a younger monk as the long absent Kirill. He has suffered during his time away from the monastery and begs the father superior to allow him to return. His wish is granted after much pleading and initial rejection, but he is instructed to copy out the holy scriptures 15 times in penance.

Soon, a group of Tatars stops at the monastery while traveling through the region, much to the concern of Andrei and Kirill who have experienced their brutality first hand. Durochka, however, is too simple-minded to understand or remember what the Tatars did and is fascinated by the shining breastplate carried by one of them. The group taunt and play with her, but the Tatar takes a liking to her, putting his horned helmet on her head and dressing her in a blanket, promising to take her away with him as his eighth, and only Russian, wife.

Andrei attempts to stop her from leaving, but she is delighted with the Tatar's gifts, and she rides away with the Tatars. Kirill approaches Andrei and talks to him for the first time since their departure from the monastery, and he assures him that Durochka won't be in any danger, as harming a holy fool is considered bad luck and a great sin, and that she will be let go. Andrei still does not speak, despite Kirill's despaired pleading, and continues his menial work of carrying large hot stones from a fire with tongs to heat water for the monastery, but drops the stone in the snow.

VIII. ''The Bell ''(Spring–Summer–Winter–Spring 1423–1424)

This episode concerns Boriska, (Nikolai Burlyayev) the young son of an expert bellmaker. Men have been sent by the prince to search out Boriska's father in order to ask him to cast a bronze bell for a church. Instead, they come upon Boriska, who tells them that the area has been ravaged by a plague, and that his father, as well as all his family, is dead. He furthermore tells them that he is the only one who possesses the secret, delivered by his father at his death bed, of casting a quality bronze bell, and asks them to take him with them, as he is, by his own contention, the only person left alive who can complete the task successfully. The men are initially dismissive, but soon agree, and Boriska is put in charge of the project.

At the site, Boriska contradicts and challenges the instincts of the workers in choosing the location of the pit, the selection of the proper clay, the building of the mold, the firing of the furnaces and finally the hoisting of the bell. The workers soon complain to him that his father treated them differently and one worker, who refuses his orders, is flogged in punishment. The process of making the bell grows into a huge, expensive endeavour with many hundreds of workers and Boriska makes several risky decisions, guided only by his instincts; soon, even he doubts the project's prospective success. Andrei, who has arrived on the scene, silently watches Boriska during the casting, and the younger man notices him too.

During the bell-making, the ''skomorokh'' (jester) from the first sequence makes a reappearance amongst the crowds who have come to watch the bell being raised up and, seeing Andrei, he threatens to kill him, mistaking him for Kirill, his denouncer of years past. Kirill's implication of the man led to him being imprisoned and tortured. Kirill soon arrives and intervenes on behalf of the silent Andrei and later privately confesses to Andrei that his sinful envy of his talent dissipated once he heard Andrei had abandoned painting and that it was he who had denounced the ''skomorokh''. Kirill then criticizes Andrei for allowing his God-given talent for painting to go to waste and pleads with him to resume his artistry, but receives no response.

As the bell-making nears completion, Boriska's confidence slowly transforms into a stunned, detached disbelief that he's seemingly succeeded at the task. As the furnaces are opened and the molten metal pours into the mould, he privately asks God for help. The work crew takes over as Boriska makes several attempts to fade into the background of the activities. After completion, the bell is hoisted into its tower and the Grand Duke and his entourage arrive for the inaugural ceremony as the bell is blessed by a priest. As the bell is prepared to be rung, some Italian ambassadors in the royal entourage express their doubt over the prospective success of its ringing. It is revealed that Boriska and the work crew know that if the bell fails to ring, the Grand Duke will have them all beheaded. (It is also overheard that the Grand Duke has already had his brother, the one who raided Vladimir, beheaded.)

There is a quiet, agonizing tension among the crowd as the foreman slowly coaxes the bell's clapper back and forth, nudging it closer to the lip of the bell with each swing. A pan across the assembly reveals the white-robed Durochka, leading a horse and preceded by a child which is, presumably, hers, as she walks through the crowd. At the critical moment the bell rings perfectly, and she smiles. After the ceremony, Andrei finds Boriska collapsed on the ground, sobbing. He admits his father never actually told him his bell-casting secret. Andrei, impressed by the effect the successful ringing has had on the rejoicing crowd, realizes the joy that his own art might bring. He comforts Boriska, breaking his vow of silence and telling the boy that they should carry on their work together: “You’ll cast bells. I’ll paint icons.” Andrei then sees Durochka, the boy and the horse walk off across a muddy field in the distance. The eighth part of the film ends with this scene and it is followed by an epilogue.

Epilogue

The ''epilogue'' is the only part of the film in color and shows time-aged, but still vibrant, details of several of Andrei Rublev's actual icons. The icons are shown in the following order: ''Enthroned Christ'', ''Twelve Apostles'', ''The Annunciation'', ''Twelve Apostles'', ''Jesus entering Jerusalem'', ''Birth of Christ'', ''Enthroned Christ'', ''Transfiguration of Jesus'', ''Resurrection of Lazarus'', ''The Annunciation'', ''Resurrection of Lazarus'', ''Birth of Christ'', ''Trinity'', ''Archangel Michael'', ''Paul the Apostle'', ''The Redeemer''. The final scene crossfades from the icons and shows four horses standing by a river in thunder and rain.

During the Black Death of mid-14th century England, people in a remote Cumbrian mountain village listen with fear to tales of the gruesome plague that has engulfed the world. In an attempt to stave off the infection, they rely upon the visions of a boy, named Griffin, who has a reputation for having a kind of "second sight". With the backing of the village's most famous adventurer, a man named Connor, whom Griffin idolizes, a group of the townsfolk travel to a nearby cavern. Bringing good copper ore to be melted and cast into shape, they dig down into the earth, all the while racing against time and the coming of the next full moon, in an effort to place a holy cross on the steeple of "the biggest Church in all of Christendom" as an offering for God's protection.

As the full moon is rising, the villagers break through into a smooth-lined tunnel, and then, finding a ladder, climb up and into late 20th century New Zealand. Up until this point, the film has been shown in black and white. Now the adventure continues in colour film. The villagers marvel at the various technologies, never questioning what year it might be, believing that such things are only natural in great cities. But Griffin is haunted by a dark vision as the villagers come closer to fulfilling their quest.

In medieval Sweden, prosperous Christian Per Töre sends his daughter, Karin, to take candles to the church. Karin is accompanied by her pregnant servant Ingeri, who secretly worships the Norse deity Odin. Along their way through the forest on horseback, Ingeri becomes frightened when they come to a stream-side mill and admonishes Karin; but Karin chooses to proceed on her own leaving Ingeri at the mill.

Ingeri encounters a one-eyed man at the stream-side mill. When Ingeri asks about his name he enigmatically responds he has none "in these days". The man tells Ingeri that he can see and hear things others can not. When the man makes sexual advances towards her and promises her power, Ingeri flees in terror. Meanwhile, Karin meets three herdsmen, two men and a boy, and invites them to eat her lunch with her. Eventually, the two older men rape and murder Karin. Ingeri, after having caught up to the group, witnesses the whole ordeal hidden from a distance. The two older men then prepare to leave the scene with Karin's clothing. The younger boy is left with the body, but he takes the situation poorly, and is racked with guilt. He even tries to bury the body by sprinkling dirt but stops midway, and runs along with the older men.

The herders then, unknowingly, seek shelter at the home of the murdered girl. During the night, one of the goat herders offers to sell Karin's clothes to her mother, and she suspects the worst. After they fall asleep, the mother locks the trio in the dining chamber and reveals her suspicions to Töre. Töre prepares to discover the truth about the situation and encounters Ingeri, who has also returned. She breaks down in front of Töre and tells him about the rape and murder. She confesses that she secretly wished for Karin's death out of jealousy. In a fit of rage, Töre decides to murder the herdsmen at the crack of dawn. He stabs one of the older men to death with a butcher knife and throws the other into the fire. He kills the boy too, lifting and hurling him against the wall, while his wife watches horrified.

Soon after, Karin's parents, along with the members of their household, set out to find their daughter's body with Ingeri leading the way. Töre breaks down on seeing Karin's body and calls upon God. He vows that, although he cannot understand why God would allow such a thing to happen, he will build a church at the site of his daughter's death. As her parents lift Karin's body from the ground, a spring emerges from the spot where her head rested. Ingeri proceeds to wash herself with the water while Karin's mother cleans the dirt from her daughter's face.

Kleinman is awakened from his sleep by a vigilante mob, which claims to be looking for a serial killer and therefore to be needing his help. Kleinman's landlady gives him a bag containing pepper. Irmy and her boyfriend Paul, a pair of circus performers, quarrel about getting married and having a baby. Paul leaves and goes to another tent where he has sex with Marie, another artist. Seeing this, Irmy runs to the city and enters a brothel. Irmy also ends up having sex with a student named Jack.

Kleinman visits a coroner's house and has a glass of sherry with him. But after he leaves, the coroner is murdered by the killer. Kleinman comes to the police station to protest a local family's eviction. There, the police talk about the coroner's murder, saying that they have a clue about the killer in the fingerprints on the sherry glass. A panicked Kleinman meets Irmy in the police station, who had been arrested at the brothel for prostitution. She protests against the police calling her "whore,” and in the confusion Kleinman confiscates the evidence. Irmy is allowed to leave the police station after a $50 fine, and she meets Kleinman outside. Together they start exploring the city, seeing its different scenes — a man peeping into a woman's room, a starving mother and child, a church — and decide to go back.

Paul arrives in the city looking for Irmy. He goes into a bar where Jack is having a drink. The student reflects on the wonderful experience he had with "a sword-swallower,” shocking Paul. Kleinman and Irmy return to his place to stay but are refused entry by his fiancée. They go to the pier but are ambushed by the vigilante mob who find the sherry glass in Kleinman's pocket. Thinking him to be the killer, they decide to lynch Irmy and Kleinman, but the latter uses the pepper spray and they escape.

Meanwhile, Irmy and Paul meet, and at first Paul is ready to kill Irmy for sleeping with another man. They break off their fight when they find the starving woman murdered, and the baby lying on the ground. They decide to keep the child and return to the circus. Kleinman comes to the brothel searching for Irmy but is unable to find her. From his rival at work, he learns about the circus leaving the town and decides to follow it. At the circus, Kleinman meets the magician Armstead, whom he greatly admires. The murderer arrives and tries to kill them but is thwarted by Armstead. Kleinman becomes Armstead's assistant on the circus and Irmy and Paul continue their careers as circus performers, while raising their newfound child.

The plot follows Johnny, the protagonist and narrator, and his boss, McDunn, who are putting in a night's work at a remote lighthouse in late November. The lighthouse's resonating fog horn attracts a sea monster. This is in fact the third time the monster has visited the lighthouse: he has been attracted by the same fog horn on the same night for the last two years. McDunn attributes the monster's actions to feelings of unrequited love for the lighthouse, whose fog horn sounds exactly like the wailings of the sea monster himself. The fog horn tricks the monster into thinking he has found another of his kind, one who acts as though the monster did not even exist. McDunn and Johnny turn off the fog horn, and in a rage, the monster destroys the lighthouse before retreating to the sea. The lighthouse is reconstructed with reinforced concrete and Johnny finds a new job away from the lighthouse. Years later, Johnny returns and asks McDunn if the monster ever returned; it never did. McDunn hypothesizes that the monster will continue to wait in the depths of the world.

Four socialites unexpectedly clash: heiress Brooke Carter runs into the Italian gambler Johnny Spanish at the race track while playboy Michael O. Pritchard nearly runs into stage star Kitty O'Kelly with his car. Backstage at Kitty's show, it turns out she and Brooke are old friends who attended public school together. The foursome do the town, accompanied by Brooke's companion Elizabeth, who throws herself at Michael's butler and chauffeur Rodney James.

The four friends change partners at a party, where Brooke and Michael step outside behind Kitty and Johnny. In an effort to make the others jealous, Kitty, Johnny, Brooke, Michael, Elizabeth and Rodney begin their romance.

In the fictional small town of Charlestown, Pennsylvania, the local steel mill is about to close permanently and lay off 10,000 workers, indirectly threatening the existence of the town's minor league hockey team, the Charlestown Chiefs, who are also struggling with a losing season and an increasingly hostile crowd. After discovering the hometown fans responding positively to an on-ice brawl with the opposing goalie, player-coach Reggie Dunlop goads his own team into a violent style of play, eventually letting the overly-aggressive Hanson Brothers, the club's recent acquisitions, loose on their opponents. The brothers' actively violent and thuggish style of play excites the fans, which increases revenue, potentially saving the team.

The team's new style produces unintended consequences that affect not only Dunlop, but the Chiefs' star player, Ned Braden, along with the rest of the team. Braden refuses to take part in the violent antics, as Dunlop attempts to exploit Braden's marital troubles in his efforts to get him to take part in the team's brawling, but to no avail. Several games degenerate into bench-clearing brawls, including one that takes place before the opening face-off, and another that brings the local police into the locker room to arrest the Hanson Brothers after they attack the opposing fans in the stands. Nonetheless, the Chiefs rise up the ranks to become contenders for the championship, and a rumor (started by Dunlop himself to further motivate his teammates) spreads that the team's success could possibly lead them to be sold to a buyer in Florida.

Eventually Dunlop meets team owner Anita McCambridge, and discovers his efforts to increase the team's popularity (and value) through violence have been for naught, as McCambridge's better option is to fold the team as a tax write-off. By the time Dunlop decides to abandon the new strategy of violence over skill, the Chiefs' main rivals in Syracuse have already upped the ante by stocking their team full of violent "goons" (many of whom were previously suspended from the league for flagrant violations) in preparation for the league's championship game. After being crushed during the first period while playing a non-violent style of "old time hockey," the disgusted general manager tells them that various National Hockey League scouts accepted his invitation to the game, as he was hoping that the Chiefs' habitual escapades would get the players signed to the major leagues.

Upon hearing this news, Dunlop decides to have his team revert to their previous violent approach, much to the joy of the spectators. When Braden witnesses his now-estranged wife cheering for the Chiefs, he realizes the absurdity of the violence, and adopts a similarly radical (but still non-violent) way of participation by performing a live striptease on the rink amidst rousing cheers. When the Syracuse team's captain protests against this "obscene" demonstration and hits the referee for dismissing him, Syracuse is disqualified, granting the Chiefs the championship. After their win, and with the Chiefs now effectively folded and finished, Dunlop accepts the offer to be the player-coach to the Minnesota Nighthawks, bringing his teammates with him.

The New York-based private investigation firm Odyssey Detective Agency employs three agents: the middle-aged, womanizing John Russo, the younger, hippie-ish Arthur Brodsky, and the nervy and anxious Charles Rutledge. Their cantankerous boss, Leon Leondopolous, tries to keep his bumbling agents in line while carrying on a poorly-disguised affair with his secretary Amy. Odyssey is investigating two separate married women: Angela Niotes, the aged but glamorous wife of a British tycoon, and Dolores Martin, a beautiful blonde. While attempting to follow Angela from the Manhattan heliport, John meets a taxi driver named Deborah Wilson. The two are instantly infatuated, and John makes plans to see Deborah (whom he calls "Sam") later that night. At the same time, Charles falls for Dolores as he spies on her in the lobby of a hotel. Arthur (who juggles a series of passionate romances throughout the film) is worried for each of his co-workers, but assists each of them in growing closer to their objects of affection: he helps John get away from his on-again off-again partner, country singer Christy Miller, and devises a plan for Charles to have a conversation with Dolores at a roller rink. He learns that Dolores is indeed cheating on her husband with Jose, a playboy with whom she plans to elope.

The next morning, John recounts his tryst with Deborah to Leon; he worries that he has become too old for younger women. Meanwhile, Christy, who has figured out what John has done, decides to get back at him by starting a relationship with Charles. The two head to Midtown, where they run into Dolores at an upscale clothing store. Christy later tries to initiate a sexual encounter with Charles, but he is already too infatuated with Dolores to reciprocate. Meanwhile, John and Arthur track Angela and her young son to a toy store. John confesses who he is, but Angela is not surprised, as she knows that her husband is himself cheating on her. An attraction grows between John and Angela; once again Arthur helps his friend by pretending to be John's son. Deborah runs into Angela and John at the latter's apartment; she does not appear to be bothered by John's simultaneous desire for the two women. Meanwhile, Dolores almost kisses Charles at one of Christy's concerts, while Christy herself confesses her attraction to Jose. When Charles follows Dolores back home, she eventually leaves her apartment and kisses him before running away.

Charles spends the night on a bench outside of Dolores' apartment, following her to a courthouse where Christy observes her and Jose enter a judge's chambers. Christy invites most of the other characters to another concert as Deborah and Angela have a secretive conversation. Later, Angela tells John that she is returning to Europe with her husband and son; she has arranged Deborah to take her place and nurse his broken heart. At the concert, Charles is reunited with Dolores, who reveals that she went to the courthouse to obtain a divorce. He proposes marriage to her (which she accepts). Christy introduces Jose, her fiancé, to the concert's audience. The following day, Charles and Dolores as well as Christy and Jose are married in a double wedding. John tearfully sees Angela off, then returns to his cab, where Deborah is waiting.

Cahit Tomruk is a Turkish German in his 40s. He has given up on life after the death of his wife and seeks solace in cocaine and alcohol. One night, he intentionally drives his car head-on into a wall and barely survives.

At the psychiatric clinic where he is treated, a young woman named Sibel Güner approaches him, recognizing him as being Turkish-German. She asks Cahit to marry her, but he rudely declines. Cahit later realizes she is at the hospital after also trying to commit suicide. He sees her interacting with her conservative family who condemn her behaviour and threaten her. Offering him a beer, she confides that her brother broke her nose when he saw her holding hands with a man, and she is desperate to escape her family and needs to marry a fellow Turk to do so.

When Cahit again declines to marry her, she stabs herself in the wrists with a broken bottle. The incident shakes him up, and Cahit agrees to marry Sibel after all on the basis that it is a sham, enabling her to leave her family home and live a sexually free life. He goes to her family pretending he saw her at the hospital where her injuries were treated and seeking their approval to marry her. Despite the age disparity and not knowing much about him, Sibel's family agrees to the marriage.

They live separate private lives but eventually fall in love. After Cahit accidentally kills one of Sibel's former lovers when the lover insults her in public, Cahit is sent to prison and Sibel, her infidelity exposed, is disowned by her family.

While Cahit is in prison, Sibel tells him that she will wait for him and, with nowhere else to stay, goes to Istanbul to her cousin Selma, a single career woman who manages a hotel. Sibel takes a job as a maid in Selma's hotel and stays with her, but finding her new life to be restrictive and conventional, leaving Selma's apartment to live with a bartender who offers her drugs and alcohol. Eventually, he rapes her when she passes out and throws her out. Roaming the streets that night, she is accosted by three men who eventually beat her up. One of them stabs her and they leave her for dead.

Several years later, Cahit travels to Istanbul upon his release from prison, hoping to find Sibel. Selma tells him that Sibel is in a relationship and has a daughter. Cahit waits in a hotel for Sibel's call. It eventually comes, and they meet and make love for a weekend while her boyfriend is on a business trip. After their tryst, Cahit asks Sibel to take her daughter and run away with him. She agrees but, while packing at home, she hears her husband talking on the phone to her delighted daughter. Cahit waits at the bus stop but she never shows up. The film ends with Cahit on a bus, presumably traveling to Mersin, the city where he was born.

Dwarfs confined in an institution on a remote island rebel against the guards and director, also dwarfs, in a display of mayhem. They gleefully break windows and dishes, cackle maniacally, abandon a running truck to drive itself in circles, engineer food fights and cock fights, look at pin-up magazines, set fire to pots of flowers, kill a large pig, torment some blind dwarfs, and perform a mock crucifixion of a monkey.

The film Lamerica is a story of two men caught up in the startup of a scam shoe company. The main characters Gino and [https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0224076/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm Spiro] (later discovered to be Michele), go on an adventure of misfortune. Gino is a young man originally from Sicily who is involved in a company that is trying to “give every Albanian good shoes,” but it truly is a scam. Mr. Fiore (Gino’s boss) and Gino were unsatisfied with the officials that were originally set up to run the company. With the help of an Albanian middleman, they decided to find their own candidate who would be a “man of straw”, meaning he would do what they say. Spiro, or Michele, was the old man that the company hired to be their Albanian figurehead “chairman” of the company. We later learn that Spiro was a Sicilian named Michele and the problems ensued.

This film compares and contrasts the old Italian man and the young Italian man and their seemingly varying identities as two men. The major contrast between the two is not the country in which they are from, but the time period in which they lived. Spiro is from the “old” Italy, where fascism and a hard life was all he knew, and Gino is from the “new” boom years where the emphasis is on money and materialistic items. This difference is substantially indicated throughout the film. This adventure unravels Spiro's tragic personal history and allows Gino to become intimately acquainted with the full extent of Albanian poverty. This Albanian poverty is a mirror of how Italy used to be during Spiro's time. Gino's car tires are stolen, while the fancy shoes he gave Spiro are also stolen by children. Gino and Spiro follow a group of Albanians who are headed for Italy in search for a better life, first by truck and later by ship. The Albanian exodus parallels that of Italians for the United States, which is where Spiro believes that they are heading.

Doris Robertson, a depressed teenager, is grieving the death of her grandfather and resisting her foster sister Lauri's efforts to engage socially. Upon learning that her parents will be away for a two day business trip to the Poconos, Doris' tear hits her television remote, as ''Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids'' is on. The tear opens up a portal to the cartoon world, Fat Albert jumps out of the television upon seeing Doris (except real-life), knowing she has a problem.

Rudy, Dumb Donald, Mushmouth, Bucky, and Old Weird Harold jump out, too; Bill tells Russell to stay put and cover for them. Doris insists she is fine, but the gang knows otherwise. When the show ends, they have to wait until tomorrow's show to come back. They follow Doris to school and are amazed by the new technology.

Albert becomes infatuated with Lauri. Reggie, an annoying schoolmate with an obsessive crush on Lauri, challenges Albert to a track race that Albert wins. In another attempt to help Doris, the gang persuades cheerleaders to invite them all to an outdoor party. With some reluctance, Doris agrees to attend. While at the party, Lauri dances with Albert. Reggie desperately attempts to make her jealous by dancing with Doris. When Lauri does not notice him, he tries to forcibly kiss Doris. Doris yells at him and runs off. Albert warns the boy to stay away from Doris.

The next day, Doris goes to school but asks the gang to go to the park instead of following her. Harold, normally clumsy, joins in a basketball game and is able to play perfectly. Mushmouth, who cannot talk normally, is taught how to speak by a little girl. Donald goes to the library, where he can read and remove his pink face covering hat.

When Doris takes them home, three of the gang members – Bucky, Harold, and Donald – jump into the television. ''Breaking News'' interrupts the show before the other four can enter. Albert and Bill have an argument in private about going back. The gang takes Doris and Lauri to a fair on a junk made car. Doris says she would date Rudy if he was a real person when he asks.

Searching for guidance, Fat Albert meets his creator, Bill Cosby, and tells him of the dilemma. Though frightened and skeptical at first, Cosby proceeds to explain to him that his character is based on Doris' grandfather, Albert Robertson, which explains Doris' confusion over why Fat Albert seems so familiar. Mr. Cosby warns Fat Albert he has to return to the cartoon world, or he will turn into celluloid dust.

Devastated, Albert tells Lauri he must leave, but she thinks he is being insensitive. The next day, Mushmouth, Rudy, and Bill jump back into the television. Albert goes to a track meet where Doris and Lauri are competing and encourages Doris to a victory. Reggie, who witnessed that the gang is from the television, attempts to threaten Albert, but he pushes him aside. Albert rushes to the girls' house on a borrowed skateboard. He says goodbye to Doris and Lauri and jumps back into the television, and manages to take back the focus of the show from a gang of bullies that threatened to do so earlier in the film, as seen by Russell.

Sometime later, Cosby and his friends, who helped inspire the cartoon characters from the show, stand in front of their old friend Albert Robertson's grave. As the camera pans on each of the men, images of their counterparts are seen. Doris watches them from afar as the old men race away, showing that they are still kids at heart, the same kids from the television show that they helped Bill Cosby inspire. Before the ending credits start, Fat Albert encourages the audience to finish watching the credits and help each other.

The main plot of the novel is generally concerned with the rise of Marius, his marriage to Julia, his success in replacing Metellus as general in charge of the Numidian theatre of war, his defeat of King Jugurtha of Numidia, his re-organization of the Roman Army system, his unprecedented consecutive consulships, his defeat of a massive invasion of German tribes (the Teutones, the Cimbri and the Marcomanni/Cherusci/Tigurini), and the details of his relationship with his subordinate and close friend Sulla.

However, although Marius can be considered the protagonist, Sulla occasionally becomes the central figure of the narrative; there are several lengthy sections dealing with his plot to murder the two wealthy women with whom he lives, his use of the newfound wealth in establishing himself politically, his homosexual relationship with the Greek child-actor Metrobius, and his marriage to the (fictitious) younger daughter of 'Julius Caesar Grandfather', Julilla. McCullough explains that, while it is certainly known Sulla's first wife was a Julia, it is not known to which branch of the Julii she belonged, but she was certainly a relation of Marius's better-known Julian wife, hence the decision to assign her the role in the novel of a younger sister.

A third storyline is focused on the figures of Marcus Livius Drusus and his sister Livia Drusa who both feature more prominently in ''The Grass Crown'': and their own growing friendship with the Servilius Caepio family resulting in a double marriage, which proves disastrous when Quintus Servilius Caepio Senior is not only accused of embezzling more gold than there was in the Roman Treasury, but also is responsible for Rome's most disastrous military defeat for generations – a defeat which so ruins the credibility of the conservative leaders of the Senate that it lets Marius into power far earlier than he expected, and for a longer time.

Much of the narrative is also told in the form of letters between the protagonists – Marius, Sulla, Old Caesar and frequently their friend, Publius Rutilius Rufus – himself a man somewhat torn in allegiance: conservative by instinct, but partisan of Marius by friendship.

The novel closes with Marius's sixth consulship, in which he proves not to be as adept politically as he is militarily: and the tribune whose help he needs, Lucius Appuleius Saturninus, has an agenda of his own, leading to an armed insurrection which Marius himself has to put down. To cap it all, he also suffers a minor stroke during the summer, although he makes a full recovery. Tarred by association, his political career seems over: but after fighting many battles together, there is some reason for Marius and Sulla to hope that Rome will have peace for a few years.

Set in the Shōryaku and Chōtoku eras of Japan's Heian period, ''Kai Doh Maru'' is set against a background of a capital under threat from disease, outlaws, and political plots. The story reworks themes from Japanese folklore, focusing on the relationship between Sakata no Kintoki (Kintarō) and Minamoto no Raikō, one of the first military Minamoto and "monster hunters" of folklore. The story replaces the traditional image of Kintaro - a strong, ruddy-cheeked man - with that of a determined, tomboyish girl, while retaining much of the traditional character such as the carrying of an axe. Other historical figures from the period who have also become objects of folklore, such as Fujiwara no Michinaga and the rebel Taira no Masakado also make an appearance.

The story begins at Mount Ashigara in Sagami Province in the Shōryakuera, where the young Kintoki is caught in a bloody family feud. Disguised as a boy by her father to protect her from her uncle's ambitions to take over the family, Kintoki's memories of her childhood indicate that she was intended as the next head of the family. She is almost killed by her uncle when he kills her family in a coup, but is rescued by the arrival of the warrior Minamoto no Raikō, who takes her back to the capital.

There she grows up and joins Raikō's band of warriors, known as the "Four Heavenly Kings" Shitennō, and grows very close to Raikō, though their apparent feelings for each other remain undeclared. Five years later (in Chōtoku 1) she joins Raikō and his associates in policing the capital during a period of unrest caused by an outbreak of disease and bandits from Oeyama. Unbeknownst to Kintoki, the bandit leader Shuten Dōji is in fact her cousin, Ohni-hime. Ohni-hime is unaware that Kintoki is not a man, and has come to Heian-kyō to "rescue" him. The Oeyama bandits are secretly acting in cooperation Fujiwara no Michinaga, who hopes to use the chaos they cause to extend his control over the government. This results in the burning of the capital by Shuten Dōji and her follower Taira no Masakado. In the fighting, several of Raikō's associates are killed and Kintoki is abducted by Ohni-hime, forcing Raikō to seek her out in the bandit's Oeyama lair.

''Simulacron-3'' is the story of a virtual city (total environment simulator) for marketing research, developed by a scientist to reduce the need for opinion polls. The computer-generated city simulation is so well-programmed, that, although the inhabitants have their own consciousness, they are unaware, except for one, that they are only electronic impulses in a computer.

The simulator's lead scientist, Hannon Fuller, dies mysteriously, and a co-worker, Morton Lynch, vanishes. The protagonist, Douglas Hall, is with Lynch when he vanishes, and Hall subsequently struggles to suppress his inchoate madness. As time and events unwind, he progressively grasps that his own world is probably not "real" and might be only a computer-generated simulation.

Bruno Stroszek (Bruno S.) is a Berlin street performer. Released from prison and warned to stop drinking, he immediately goes to a familiar bar where he meets Eva (Eva Mattes), a prostitute down on her luck, and lets her stay with him at the apartment his landlord kept for him. They are then harried and beaten by Eva's former pimps, who insult Bruno, pull his accordion apart and humiliate him by making him kneel on his grand piano with bells balanced on his back. Faced with the prospect of further harassment, Bruno and Eva decide to leave Germany and accompany Bruno's eccentric elderly neighbour Scheitz (Clemens Scheitz), who was planning to move to Wisconsin to live with his American nephew Clayton.

After sightseeing in New York City they buy a used car and arrive in a winter-bound, barren prairie near the fictional town of 'Railroad Flats'. There Bruno works as a mechanic with Clayton and his assistant (played by Ely Rodriguez). Eva works as a waitress at a truck stop and Scheitz pursues his interest in animal magnetism. Eva and Bruno buy a mobile-home which is sited on Clayton's land; with bills mounting, the bank threatens to repossess it. Eva returns to prostitution to supplement her wages, but it is not enough to meet the payments. She tires of Bruno's worrying and leaves him, accepting a ride with truck drivers bound for Vancouver.

A man from the bank (Scott McKain) visits Bruno, who is now drinking steadily, and has him sign off on the repossession. The home is auctioned, and he and Scheitz, who is convinced that the world is conspiring against him, set off to confront the "conspiracy." Finding the bank they wish to rob closed, they hold up a barber shop beneath it, make off with 32 dollars and then go shopping in a small store across the street. The police arrive and arrest Scheitz for armed robbery without noticing Bruno.

Holding a large frozen turkey from the store and the shotgun, Bruno returns to the garage where he works, loads the tow truck with beer, and drives along a highway into the mountains.

Upon entering the small town of Cherokee, North Carolina, the truck breaks down and Bruno pulls over to a restaurant, where he tells his story to a German-speaking businessman. He then starts the truck, and leaves it circling in the parking lot with a fire taking hold in the engine compartment. Bruno then goes into a roadside amusement park across the street, where he starts a ski-lift and rides on it with his frozen turkey. After Bruno disappears from view a single shot rings out. The police arrive at the scene to find the truck is now fully ablaze. The film ends with a sequence showing a chicken dancing, a duck playing a drum and a rabbit riding a toy fire truck, in coin-operated attractions that Bruno activated on his way to the ski-lift.

''Zozo'' tells the story of a Lebanese boy (Imad Creidi), during the civil war, who gets separated from his family and ends up in Sweden.

From a region known only as the Land of Ice and Snow emerges Gulo the Savage, a vicious wolverine in command of a horde of a hundred white vermin (foxes and ermine) who eat the flesh of their enemies. After murdering his father, Dramz, Gulo assumed control of his father's territory. However, only he who possess the Walking Stone may rule, and after his father's death, Gulo's brother, Askor, steals the stone and sails to Mossflower Woods. Gulo pursues his brother with the vermin under his command. Most notably with his captain the white fox named Shard and his mate the vixen Freeta. Although Shard is the captain of this horde, it is Freeta that holds the real power, intelligence and sway.

Meanwhile, the mercenary squirrel Rakkety Tam MacBurl, along with his companion Wild Doogy Plumm, find themselves at odds with their current rulers, Squirrelking Araltum and Idga Drayqueen, both arrogant, foolish creatures who spend more time on ceremonies in their honour than ruling the kingdom.

US cover of ''Rakkety Tam'' When the forces of the Squirrelking are ambushed by Gulo and 30 squirrels are slaughtered, Tam and Doogy are given the chance to escape the trivialities of the kingdom and track the invaders. Gulo had stolen the king's new Royal Banner, so Tam and Doogy are sent off to find it. The king promises to release them of their bonds after long minutes of persuasion from Idga (they had sworn allegiance to him some seasons before) if they succeed in finding, and returning, the banner. They eventually meet up with the Long Patrol and continue their hunt.

The Long Patrol, however, has its own problems. Eight hares were ambushed and lost a precious drum, which was supposed to be going to Redwall Abbey as a present. It turns out that Gulo has possession of the drum as well as the banner.

At Redwall, the cousin of the Abbot and his travelling companion arrive with a story and a riddle. When two maidens, Sister Armel (the infirmary sister), a squirrel, and the niece to Skipper of Otters, Brookflow (often called Brooky), try to solve the riddle, the spirit of Martin the Warrior appears to Armel, telling her to take his sword and bring it to 'the Borderer who sold and lost his sword', that being Rakkety Tam. Armel and Brooky head out into the woods, but are captured by Gulo's army.

Meanwhile, a volethief named Yoofus Lightpaw is up in a tree when he sees Gulo's army beneath with the king's banner. He steals it from them and flees with it. Tam, Doogy, and the goshawk Tergen are sent to find Gulo's army. There, they find Sister Armel and Brooky held captive, and upon rescuing the two maids, Armel gives Tam the Sword of Martin, taken back from Gulo's captain, Shard. The freed captives and the rescuers then return to Redwall.

When the army of hares reaches Redwall, a brief skirmish takes places in which one hare is killed and the Long Patrol Brigadier Crumshaw is wounded by arrows. Rakkety Tam takes command of the force and splits them into two groups: one to constantly harass the flesh-eating enemy, and the other to guard Redwall. Tam and Doogy take the harassment force out to find Gulo's army, encountering the Guosssim, Log-a-Log Togey, and Yoofus. They join forces to fight off Gulo. However, when crossing the pines, they lose Doogy and Yoofus.

Yoofus and Doogy end up in the house of one of Yoofus' neighbours, a dormouse named Muskar Muskar, and his family, who are being held as servants by a small group of thick-headed but violent vermin. Yoofus and Doogy fight off the vermin in there. They want to go back to Yoofus's cave before continuing back to Redwall. When the two arrive, the volewife feeds the hungry travellers sausages and they meet Rockbottom, a tortoise (who is actually the Walking Stone). They head back to Redwall with Rockbottom for safekeeping. At Redwall, the other part of Gulo's army attacks the Abbey after slipping past the Long Patrol, led by Shard's mate, Freeta. It is she that is responsible for entrance of the Abbey for it was her cunning that thought up the plan. The vermin are all killed by armed Redwallers led by Armel and Brooky, but in a fierce battle, Freeta mortally wounds Crumshaw.

Meanwhile, Tam and the rest of his force are buying time for their Guosim allies to clear the Broadstream of a massive fallen tree. Tam's force is ambushed on the banks of a river by Gulo's forces, resulting in the death of Corporal Butty Wopscutt. They swim for their Guosim allies who manage to free the Broadstream and pull the hares on board. Then, they lure Gulo (who is in pursuit on the recently moved tree trunk) so that he tumbles over a waterfall. Thinking Gulo is gone for good Tam's forces head for home. Surprisingly, Gulo doesn't die. The wolverine even manages to capture Doogy, who was escorting Yoofus and his wife back to Redwall. To save his friend, Tam challenges Gulo to single combat. The winner would gain possession of the 'walking stone'. In the end, Tam wins by launching Gulo onto his shield, onto which he had carved a sharp edge, and severing his head.

Tam eventually marries Sister Armel, and they have a daughter, Melanda. Together, they journey back with Doogy, Brooky, and Tergen to the Squirrelking and Queen, who have had a son named Roopert. When Doogy and Tam are freed of their old bonds and the Squirrel monarchs are overthrown, two old friends of Tam's, Hinjo and Pinetooth, ask Tam and Armel to be the new king and queen, but Armel takes the crowns and throws them into the sea. Then they all continue on to Salamandastron, where Tergen stays, and all the others return to Redwall.

This article is licensed under the [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License]. It uses material from the [https://redwall.fandom.com/wiki/Rakkety_Tam Redwall Wiki article Rakkety Tam].

The film centers on Dr. Kyoji Fujisaki, a young, idealistic doctor who, during his service as an army physician during World War II, contracted syphilis from the blood of a patient when he accidentally cut himself during an operation.

Contaminated with this infectious, typically shameful, and then-virtually incurable disease, Fujisaki returns home from the war to the clinic presided over by his obstetrician father, Dr. Konosuke Fujisaki. He comes into contact with the patient who contaminated him, in the process seeing the consequences of ignoring the disease. Treating himself in secret with Salvarsan and tormented by his sense of injustice for not being able to help the man, he rejects Misao, his fiancé of six years, without explanation, as he does not wish her to have to wait for a number of years until he is cured. Heartbroken, Misao becomes engaged to another man. She makes one last plea to Fujisaki, but he stands firm in rejecting her.

The game begins with the court jester of the kingdom of Trodain, Dhoulmagus, stealing an ancient scepter and casting a spell on Trodain castle. The spell turns the king, King Trode, into a troll; the princess, Medea, into a horse; and the rest of the castle's inhabitants into plants. The only one left unaffected is the unnamed protagonist, a Trodain guard. The guard, King Trode, and Princess Medea set out on a quest to track down Dhoulmagus and break the spell. They are joined by Yangus, a bandit whose life the hero saves from a collapsing bridge; Jessica, a mage seeking to avenge her brother; and Angelo, a Templar Knight with a penchant for flirting and gambling. Tracking Dhoulmagus' murderous path, the party journeys west, across the ocean. Eventually, the group hunts down Dhoulmagus and kills him, but Dhoulmagus' death fails to break the spell. Jessica claims Dhoulmagus' scepter, and soon after disappears.

Jessica later returns, possessed by the staff and battles the remaining party members in an attempt to murder a young man. After the party releases Jessica from her possession, Jessica tells them that the scepter contains the spirit of Rhapthorne, the Lord of Darkness, who was imprisoned in the scepter long ago by seven sages. He seeks to escape from his prison by killing the descendants of the sages. She proceeds to speculate that it is Rhapthorne, and not Dhoulmagus, who maintains the curse on Trodain: therefore, Rhapthorne must be defeated if the curse is to be broken. When Jessica explains this, the scepter takes control of a magician's dog, Sir Leopold, and kills the magician's assistant, who was one of the descendants of the sages. The party attempts to seek out and defend the remaining descendants, but Leopold manages to murder another descendant of the sages. Eventually, the scepter comes into the possession of Marcello, Angelo's power hungry half-brother. Marcello kills the last remaining descendant of the sages, but manages to contain Rhapthorne for a time. Eventually, the party engages Marcello and exhaust him to the point of losing control and releasing Rhapthorne. The party, aided by the godbird Empyrea, faces Rhapthorne and defeats him. With Rhapthorne dead, King Trode, Princess Medea, and the people of Trodain are returned to normal. Months later, the protagonist escorts Medea to Savella Cathedral for her arranged marriage to the spoiled Prince Charmles of Argonia, but before the ceremony can take place, the protagonist and Medea escape from Savella Cathedral and live happily together. In an unlockable extended ending, it is discovered that the protagonist is the lost prince of Argonia, and upon this revelation, the King of Argonia decides to allow the protagonist to marry Medea. In the 3DS version, the player can choose to instead begin a romance with Jessica. In the traditional ending the hero goes traveling the world with Jessica while in the unlockable ending the hero can choose to marry Jessica instead of Medea.

''Deadhouse Gates'' begins a few months after the conclusion of ''Gardens of the Moon'', though few characters and almost no settings bridge the two novels. The main action of ''Memories of Ice'', the third novel in the series, partially overlaps that of ''Deadhouse Gates''.

Prologue and Raraku

Felisin Paran, the youngest sister of Ganoes Paran, a protagonist of the preceding novel, and Empress Laseen's new Adjunct Tavore Paran, is caught up in a cull of the nobility by Laseen, who is intent on removing rival centers of power. Felisin makes acquaintance with Baudin, a thug, and Heboric, an excommunicated High Priest of Fener, a war god, who has been punished by the removal of his hands. The three are sent to an otataral mine off the coast of the continent of the Seven Cities, where Felisin offers her body to the slaves’ self-appointed leader Beneth in exchange for protection for the trio, and becomes addicted to narcotic durhang.

Meanwhile, Icarium, a half-Jaghut immortal inventor and warrior whose wantonly destructive past has been removed from his memory to protect the world, travels in the company of Mappo Runt, a Trell warrior, who is secretly charged with monitoring and, ultimately, controlling Icarium's rage. The two are caught up in a battle between and amongst Soletaken and D’ivers, shapeshifters who can take the form of one other beast or many beasts, respectively, to follow the Path of Hands to Tremorlor, an Azath House in the Holy Desert Raraku, that may offer Ascendency and ultimately godhood. The two make their way through the battle to shelter in the temple of Iskaral Pust, a High Priest of Shadow, who may be mad.

Meanwhile, the Wickan warleader Coltaine takes command of the Malazan Empire's 7th Army, with orders to escort Malazan civilians in the Seven Cities to the imperial continental capital in Aren, hundreds of leagues away, on foot, to protect them from the expected rebellion of the Seven Cities under the inspiration of Sha’ik, a prophetess in the Holy Desert Raraku. The continent's High Fist, Pormqual, refuses a naval convoy, preferring to shelter in Aren itself. The Imperial Historian, Duiker, accompanies the 7th.

Meanwhile, Fiddler, Kalam, Crokus, and Apsalar (formerly Sorry), following the events of ''Gardens of the Moon'', land in Ehrlitan, one of the Seven Cities. Their original mission was to return Apsalar to her home village, but Kalam and Fiddler now plan to kill the Empress to check her growing power by using the Seven Cities’ Rebellion as a way for Kalam to work his way to her. Fiddler meets a Tano Spiritwalker, a mage who uses song to work spells, who offers a song of power that may grant ascension to the Bridgeburners, whom he believes fought honorably in their empire's dishonorable war to take the Seven Cities. Kalam, a native of the Seven Cities, makes contact with the lingering resistance to Malazan rule, and agrees to deliver Dryjhna's Holy Book, which will unleash the rebellion's Apocalypse, to Sha’ik in Raraku. Kalam is tailed by a Red Blade loyalist captain, Lostara Yil, who uncovers his mission. Yil follows Kalam to Sha’ik, watches him deliver the Book of the Apocalypse to her and receive the gift of an aptorian demon bodyguard, and kills her after Kalam departs, despite Sha’ik's guardians Leoman of the Flails and Toblakai. As Fiddler, Crokus, and Apsalar travel separately through Raraku, Apsalar's memories gradually confirm that the Rope, the patron god of assassins, who possessed her as Sorry, was the previous Emperor Kellenvad's assassin Dancer, and that Kellenvad and Dancer must have escaped Laseen's assassination efforts by ascending to godhood over the new Warren and House of Shadow.

Whirlwind

Baudin and Heboric arrange, with Duiker's help, to escape from the mines during a slave mutiny and give Felisin the chance to go with them, and she agrees. En route to the coast, Heboric finds an enormous jade pillar that turns out to be merely the finger of an enormous figure, and touches it with his stumps of hands, which draws his god Fener into the mortal realm. Fener flees and Heboric's hands become tangible, mixing his Denul warren with the magic-deadening properties of otataral. Duiker sends the mage Kulp on a Malazan boat to retrieve the trio from the otataral island, but the company's drawn into a mad mage's watery warren where they board the ''Silanda'', on which they find headless Tiste Andii oarsmen still capable of accepting commands and probable Tiste Edur corpses in the captain's cabin. Soon they encounter Logros T’lan Imass warriors under Bonecaster Hentos Ilm pursuing an unnamed quarry, who inform the humans that they are in Kurald Emurlahn, the Tiste Edur Elder Warren. One of the T’lan Imass sacrifices himself to heal the breach in the warren, and the Imass take one of the heads, but they leave the humans behind to find their own way out.

Pust tells Icarium and Mappo that Sha’ik will be resurrected, as an enormous wall of deadly whirling sand surrounds Raraku and the winds within reveal buried roads, structures, and evidence that the desert was once coastal. They leave to seek her out and find instead Fiddler, Crokus, and Apsalar, who have made their way through storms, rebel pursuers, and the ongoing shapeshifter battle. The company returns to Pust's temple, where his servant Servant turns out to be Apsalar's father, transported he knows not how clear of the Shadow Hound attack at the beginning of ''Gardens of the Moon''. Fiddler, Crokus, Apsalar, and Servant set out for Tremorlor, which may offer a path to the Deadhouse, the corresponding Azath house in Malaz City, where Laseen rules.

Coltaine defeats the rebel army of Hissar, the city where he takes command of the 7th, and begins the march to Aren, which comes to be known as the Chain of Dogs. Kamist Reloe, a High Mage of the empire, rebels to lead a second army against Coltaine's refugees. Coltaine's Wickans defeat one of Kamist Reloe's tribes, though outnumbered seven to one, thus convincing Duiker that Coltaine means to do more than merely flee the rebellion. When the refugees are caught at a wide river between two armies, Coltaine insists on giving the Malazan nobles under Nethpara no special treatment, despite their protests, and it turns out that he insisted on sending the wagons of wounded across the river first in order to conceal the laying of a road under the water that his sappers then detonate when the peasant army starts to cross it behind the fleeing refugees, while Coltaine leads his forces to defeat the army ahead of the refugees. Coltaine's warlocks, led by Sormo E’nath, defeat a Semk tribal god by loosing the spirits of the land against it.

Kalam heads south toward Aren, accompanied by Apt and pursued by Yil. He learns of a traitor Jhistal within Pormqual's camp in Aren from rebels he affects to join as he travels, and joins a Malazan family fleeing toward Aren after he helps them defeat the rebels, including Captain Keneb and his wife's sister Minala, both warriors.

Chain of Dogs

Mappo reveals to Fiddler that he and Icarium have found carvings in Pust's temple that resemble the Deck of Dragons, but with ancient Holds rather than modern Houses, and suspect that the shapeshifters’ Path of Hands may end at the temple itself, and that Pust hopes that he and Icarium will defend it. Servant leaves for the suspected site of Sha’ik's rebirth and Icarium, Mappo, Fiddler, Crokus, and Apsalar pursue him, suspecting that Pust, Shadowthrone, and Cotillion may intend Apsalar to replace Sha’ik as the rebellion's prophetess in order to draw in and kill Laseen.

Kulp manages to open a rent from Kurald Emurlahn to his own Meanas warren, drawing the attention of an undead Soletaken dragon, which grants Kulp the power to heal the rent. The dragon leads the ''Silanda'' into a fire warren, and Kulp, Heboric, Baudin, and Felisin fall or leap to safety in the mundane world near Raraku as the ship moves between warrens, on fire. Stormy, Truth, and Gesler, Kulp's escorts, are trapped on the ship. Baudin's heroic saving of Felisin during their flight makes Heboric and Kulp suspicious, and he admits that he is a Talon assassin sent by Tavore to protect Felisin. The company takes refuge in a cave network to avoid Raraku's whirling sand and finds a First Empire city of T’lan Imass, destroyed in hours by the outbreak of conflict between the Soletaken and D’ivers, and signs in a Deck of Holds that the Beast Hold throne is empty. After leaving the city, they meet a mage who identifies himself as Nawahl Ebur but turns out to be the Soletaken Gryllen. Gryllen consumes Kulp, but Baudin wounds him and Gryllen flees. Baudin is critically injured, and Felisin and Heboric leave him behind, only to come across Leoman and Toblakai guarding Sha’ik's corpse; they recognize her as Sha’ik reborn, a mantle Felisin accepts.

As water grows scarce and raiders harry the refugees, Coltaine's group approaches the river P’atha. His warlocks Nil and Nether at one point open a tunnel into a raider encampment to destroy it, incidentally revealing water underground, and learn that a Semk tribesman has a piece of the destroyed Semk god sewn into him. At P’atha crossing, Nil and Nether sacrifice a mare to gift Coltaine's heavy cavalry with strength enough to charge up Kamist Reloe's artificial ramp, and they are helped by the wayward sappers who hid themselves in the ramp the night before; the marines ably guard the wounded and a Wickan band guarding the refugees destroys its attackers, though not without losses of refugees, and attacks the flanking tribes’ flanks to drive them away.

Kalam and company use a stone Quick Ben gave to Kalam that puts them into the Imperial Warren, which is full of bones, to bypass Korbolo Dom's additional army of the rebellion. Laseen's Claw Pearl detects the breach and meets Yil there. Apt, at Kalam's behest, removes 1,300 Malazan children crucified by Korbolo Dom's army to the warren of Shadow and saves one child, Panek, to ride on and merge with her, then trails Pearl and Yil into the Imperial warren and follows them as Pearl challenges the Semk-bound warrior and Apt kills it. Kalam and company exit the warren in Aren to learn that Salk Elan, who claims to be Kalam's friend, is waiting for him with a ship, and though Kalam's suspicious he has little choice but to investigate. Arriving in Aren, Yil's detained with the other Red Blades on suspicion of treason. Keneb joins the city's garrison.

Deadhouse Gates and Epilogue

Icarium finds one of his own time-measuring devices intact and 94,000 years old in the midst of a destroyed First Empire city, but accepts Fiddler and Mappo's assurances that an ascendant or god must be responsible for the destruction. Apsalar and Servant lead Fiddler, Crokus, Icarium, and Mappo to the threshold of what Iskaral calls a knotted torn piece of warren to which his false Path of Hands has led the shapeshifters, but they enter it because Servant can use what's in it to take them home. Inside the warren, they find the Azath house Tremorlor. Icarium can tell that the house is under siege by the shapeshifters and the damaged warren, and plans to fight to defend it. Mappo fears that the Azath will take Icarium, which the Nameless Ones who chose him to guard Icarium would favor. Icarium senses his hesitation and tells Mappo he would die for him, and Mappo tells Icarium the truth about the First Empire city. Icarium tells Mappo to let the house have him if it takes him, even though it would mean eternal imprisonment. Shadow Hounds join them as they approach the House through the battle in its surrounding maze and try to take Icarium after he defeats some shapeshifters, but Mappo, Fiddler, and even Apsalar threaten to protect him, and Pust is forced from his deal to give the Azath Icarium in exchange for not taking the Hounds. Fiddler's conch shell with its Tano song and munitions delivered from Quick Ben by the Trygalle Trade Guild help to restrain the shapeshifters, as does Crokus's bhoka’rala, who turns out to be a soletaken demon who becomes the guardian of Tremorlor after opening the door for the company. The interior of Tremorlor is like a map of all Azath Houses, and Pust and then Icarium and Mappo disappear to other parts of the world before Fiddler, Crokus, Servant, and Apsalar find their way to Malaz City, where the Deadhouse's Guardian Gothos reveals that Icarium is his son and his crime was to wound a warren while trying to free Gothos from the Azath (though Gothos wanted to be there). (Pust, later en route home, finds the spider d’ivers Mogora hiding in his clothing, but uninterested in the Path of Hands, and sees the dragon T’lan Imass Bonecaster, guardian of the real gate at his temple, leave into a warren.)

Kalam meets Salk Elan to learn that the ''Ragstopper'' and the whole Aren fleet has been impounded and Admiral Nok arrested by Pormqual, who plans to flee by sea. Minala sneaks on board a trader following the ''Ragstopper'', which Pormqual puts in the charge of his treasurer. The treasurer turns out to be in league with pursuing "pirates", and Elan and Kalam work with the Marines on board to foil his plan. Kalam gets the sense that the captain is under a glamour not to tell him something important, so he contacts Quick Ben for help, who says that the ship is indeed under a glamour of confusion and that he will try to get help to Fiddler and company as they approach Tremorlor due to the active warrens. The ship arrives at Malaz City and Elan reveals himself to be Pearl and that, though the Empress wants to speak with Kalam, the Claw takes care of its own business and stabs Kalam and throws him overboard to face three Hands of Claws in the city, and Minala catches up to him and helps. Apt and Panek appear to force Pearl to retreat before he can kill the captain and crew of the ''Ragstopper''; the captain's mate refers to him as "Carther" before the captain stops him. Kalam reaches Laseen's audience chamber where she's concealed, as he accuses her of killing the Bridgeburners deliberately (she denies it), outlawing Dujek (it's a ruse), killing Dassem Ultor (true but he threatened civil war), killing Dancer and Kellenvad (true but the Empire required it), and incompetence in the Seven Cities (revenge is afoot); he leaves after hearing her defense. Apt and Fiddler's group appear as Kalam and Minala leave Mock's Hold and Shadowthrone takes them all into Shadow to save them from the Claws that are still after Kalam. Apsalar, Crokus, and Servant ask to go to Apsalar's home in Itko Kan; Kalam and Minala join Apt in the new Shadow warren home of the 1300 crucified children; and Fiddler re-enlists to join Tavore's host.

Coltaine refuses the nobles’ entreaty to retake Ubaryd; Duiker believes that it is because the approaching Korbolo Dom is an experienced general and greater threat, whereas Kamist Reloe was merely a mage. Coltaine makes the former slaves soldiers of the Seventh. When the Chain reaches the river Vathar, the ''Silanda'' is there, and Stormy, Gesler, and Truth take the most seriously wounded on board. One of Coltaine's officers recognizes Gesler as a former captain, and when Gesler threatens to punch him if he's promoted again, Coltaine punches Gesler and breaks his own hand; Nil concludes that Gesler, Stormy, and Truth are nearly ascended. Coltaine rejects an offer from Korbolo to let the refugees cross the river, but the nobles and refugees cross anyway, and Korbolo sends archers on floating bridges to kill them. Coltaine's sappers are among the refugees and save many, as does Sormo, who's killed in combat; 20,000 refugees die all told. Coltaine promotes a particularly effective sapper to sergeant, only to learn that he's demoted their captain. Past Vathar the column passes through the remains of a war between the Jaghut and pursuing T’lan Imass. The Trygalle Trade Guild arrives via warren to provide food and water from Dujek and friends in Darujhistan and a bottle for Coltaine to crush against his chest when the time comes ("never underestimate the Empress"), and all present realize that Dujek's alleged treason is false and he fights alongside his former enemies against the Pannion Seer at the Empress's behest. One of the three tribes facing the Chain attacks the other two and Dom's army, defeating the tribes but not the army, but declares the Wickans the most powerful after they survive the multiway fight around them. The Chain continues south, harried by Dom's forces; Coltaine sends the refugees to buy passage with a biddable tribe to Aren while the Wickans and even the wounded stand and fight to cover their retreat. Coltaine insists that Duiker keep the bottle Dujek sent him because it is more important that the empire's memory survive than its soldiers.

Aren's gates open for the refugees but Pormqual's army does nothing to cover their flight. Kamist Reloe finally captures Coltaine before the city and crucifies him, but the archer Squint kills him from the city wall at Duiker's urging and thousands of crows arrive to carry off his spirit (which in the epilogue enters the body of a previously motionless infant in a Wickan widow's belly). Mallick Rel urges Pormqual to sally to face Dom rather than wait a week for Tavore's fleet, and the army is surrounded and surrenders at Rel's urging. When Duiker refers to Rel as a Jishtal, Keneb recalls Kalam referring to a Jhistal traitor in Aren, and Keneb flees into Aren. Dom crucifies Duiker and 10,000 other soldiers. Icarium and Mappo later emerge from the Azath warren on the Aren way to find Stormy, Gesler, and Truth searching for Duiker's corpse among the crucified, but Baruk's bhok’arala servants from Darujhistan find him first and take the bottle with his spirit in it and his body. Icarium has lost memory of most of the events of the book and he and Mappo continue their journey.

Felisin and Heboric travel to Sha’ik's oasis with Leoman and Toblakai, whom Heboric says carries chained souls. Felisin tells the others to open the holy book: Leoman sees nothing, Toblakai weeps, and Heboric refuses to touch it and disarms and throws Toblakai when he attacks him for it. Felisin dons Sha’ik's clothing and, using something of the goddess's power, she reads the thoughts of the High Mages: Bidithal abused Sha’ik as a child, Febryl tried to poison her thrice, and L’oric is an enigma, but all kneel before her with the crowd in the end. Felisin accepts the goddess's power but does not give herself up entirely, and adopts a young girl and names her Felisin. The Whirlwind turns out to be a warren that Sha’ik's armies can use to travel quickly. Felisin/Sha’ik and her army travel via the warren to learn that Dom did not take Aren and return to Raraku to await Tavore's advance on their own terms.

''Memories of Ice'' takes place simultaneously with the events of ''Deadhouse Gates'', beginning about four months after the events of ''Gardens of the Moon''. Dujek's 2nd army allegedly goes renegade, with Whiskeyjack as second in command, to join Anomander Rake and Caladan Brood to attack the cannibalistic and wantonly destructive Pannion Domin led by the Jaghut Pannion Seer. The White Face Barghast join as well after Trotts proves himself in single combat against a key chief's son. The chief's other children discover that the Barghast are descended from T'lan Imass who didn't bind themselves to the Ritual of Tellann and release their gods from Capustan.

The first major battle is at Capustan, where the Fener-worshipping Grey Swords stave off the brunt of the assault until Dujek and company arrive. Grey Sword Shield Anvil Itkovian takes the suffering of the tens of thousands of dead upon himself, even though Fener's no longer available (after the events in ''Deadhouse Gates that take place shortly before'') to relieve him, and the Grey Swords turn to the other gods of war for new sponsorship (Togg and Fanderay). Caravan guard Gruntle becomes the Mortal Sword of Treach when his friend Stonny is raped and beaten at Capustan, and he joins the campaign against the Pannion.

Toc the Younger, having disappeared during ''Gardens of the Moon'', emerges from the warren of chaos through a rent near Morn with the elder god Togg present within and occasionally possessing him to meet Onos T'oolan and Draconus's daughter, Lady Envy, her pets, one of whom has the elder god and Togg's long-lost lover Fanderay present within, and her Seguleh swordsmen thralls. Lady Envy's group attacks the Pannion from a different angle and drives the Seer to Coral, though not before Toc infiltrates the Pannion and is then captured and tortured by the Seer.

The Bridgeburners reach Coral first and blow their way into the city with Moranth help while Quick Ben, with the Bargast Shaman Talamandas (whom he rescues from a spirit trap) and the support of Hood, evades the Pannion poisoning of the warrens in order to trap the Seer. Whiskeyjack is lost in the battle when Kallor—who as emperor tens of thousands of years earlier killed the population of a continent rather than letting them rebel (the bodies now form the imperial warren) -- betrays the attack when promised the position of king in the new House of Chains by the Crippled God, who is sponsoring the Pannion from behind the scenes. Anomander Rake submerges Moon's Spawn in the ocean off Coral to stealthily approach and crush the Pannion's redoubt in the end.

The Mhybe—Tattersail, Bellurdan, and Nightchill's host Silverfox's mother—ages rapidly and thinks herself ruined when Silverfox appears not to love her, but Kruppe persuades them to reconcile in the end after Silverfox with Kruppe's help prepares the warren of Tellann—seeded to fertility with Itkovian's memories of the pain of the T’lan Imass who gather to Silverfox’s call—to receive Togg and Fanderay as lords of the Beast Hold.

The Pannion Seer turns out to have been driven to insanity and mad vengeance by his and his sister's entrapment when hidden by Tool's sister Kilava in the rift at Morn to protect them from Pran Chole's intended genocide of the Jaghut hundreds of thousands of years earlier. The Seer uses the K'Chain Che'Malle Matron, who was freed from the rift when he and his sister were put there, to torture Toc and to generate K'Chain soldiers. When Paran as Master of the Deck chooses mercy, Quick Ben helps free the Seer's sister from the rift. The Seer then cooperates in using his Omtose Phellack warren's ice to slow Burn's poisoning by the Crippled God. For restoring Fanderay to him, Togg puts Toc's soul into the Seer's servant Anaster's soulless body and restores Tool's mortality and flesh.

Moon's Spawn is greatly damaged during the attack on the Pannion, and the fallen Bridgeburners, along with the leader of the Black Moranth, are laid to rest inside it. The remaining Bridgeburners (including Paran who with Dujek's help is listed among the casualties) retire to Darujhistan to open a bar, where the epilogue shows them listening to the Imperial Historian Duiker tell the story of the Chain of Dogs.

Sideplots involve the Mott Irregulars, Bauchelain and Korbal Broach's necromancy and repeated drubbings by Quick Ben and the Bridgeburners, love emerging between Whiskeyjack and the Tiste Andii Korlat, and the Seguleh and Tool having to be repeatedly dissuaded from testing their prowess against one another by Lady Envy.

The first volume of ''House of Chains'' takes place prior to the events of the previous three books. A mighty Teblor warrior named Karsa Orlong descends from his mountain fastness on Genabackis, beginning a campaign against civilisation that leads to the deaths of his brothers and his capture by the Malazan Empire. Karsa is brought to the subcontinent of Seven Cities via a slave ship, where he befriends local rebel Leoman of the Flails. The two escape the Malazans and travel to the holy desert of Raraku to join Sha'ik, where Karsa is revealed to be the Toblakai who previously appeared in Deadhouse Gates.

The action moves forward to immediately after the events of Deadhouse Gates. The Chain of Dogs - the evacuation of 50,000 Malazan civilians across 1,500 miles of hostile territory - has ended in the tragic loss of the entire 7th army and its heroic commander, Coltaine. However, their sacrifice has bought the lives of nearly 30,000 refugees. The Chain of Dogs has become a legend spreading across Seven Cities, cowing even those responsible for its destruction. Now, Adjunct Tavore Paran arrives in Seven Cities at the head of the 14th Army, largely consisting of untried recruits. Their mission is to advance into the heart of the Holy Desert Raraku, the very heart of the rebellion known as the Whirlwind, and destroy Sha'ik and her forces once and for all.

However, the newly-instated Sha'ik is in fact Tavore's sister Felisin - a fact known only by her companion Heboric Light Touch. Though the rebels outnumber the Malazans vastly, all is not well in Sha'ik's camp. Internal conflicts threatens to destroy her army before the Malazans can, while Karsa refuses invitations from the Crippled God to become his Knight of Chains. Elsewhere, Kalam, Cutter, and Apsalar find themselves drawn into a desperate struggle for control of the Throne of Shadow, while a Tiste Edur warrior named Trull Sengar embarks on a journey across several realms with a T'lan Imass named Onrack.

The Malazan army reaches Raraku, and witnesses the disintegration of the rebel forces amidst several betrayals. An armoured Felisin is liberated from the control of the Whirlwind Goddess, but goes unrecognised by her sister and is tragically killed by her. The Malazan forces are also assisted by a ghostly army of Bridgeburners, who have achieved a state of ascendancy, and the desert of Raraku is flooded. Leoman escapes with the remnants of the rebel forces, while Karsa departs on his own journey.

In an epilogue, Trull and Onrack arrive at the First Throne - where Trull begins a story that is told in full in Midnight Tides.

The Tiste Edur tribes are to meet with a delegation from the Kingdom of Lether to discuss a treaty. Meanwhile, the city of Lether is preparing for the fulfillment of a prophecy which states that at the Seventh Closure the King shall become Emperor.

To increase his power, the Warlock King sends Trull Sengar and his brothers Fear, Binadas and Rhulad on a quest to recover a sword. When they find the sword, they are attacked by a tribe of Soletaken. Rhulad takes up the sword in combat and is killed while bearing it. The Sengar brothers return bearing Rhulad's corpse. The corpse will not relinquish the sword, causing a feud between the Warlock King and the Sengars. While his body is being prepared for its funeral, Rhulad returns from the dead through the machinations of the Crippled God. Rhulad regains his sanity and seizes power over the Edur. He expels the Letherii delegation and begins preparations for war. Hull Beddict stays and swears his allegiance to Rhulad.

Tehol Beddict evacuates non-citizens from Lether, outmanoeuvres Gerun Eberict, and keeps his partners outwitted. His brother Brys Beddict attempts to maintain order in the city, and forms an allegiance with an ancient god. King Diskanar crowns himself Emperor while Letherii forces under the Queen and Prince are routed and destroyed in battle. The Azath House is dying and entrusts an undead child named Kettle to feed it blood to keep it alive. She is contacted by Bugg, who has more knowledge than one would suspect for a lowly manservant. He gives her advice. Later, a number of beings escape the Azath House, only to be dealt with by the mysterious Bugg.

Simultaneously, the Edur enter the city and take the palace, despite resistance by the Ceda and Brys Beddict. Trull Sengar kills the Ceda and Brys challenges Rhulad. Brys incapacitates Rhulad without killing him. The rest of the Edur cannot bring themselves to kill their emperor, so he lies on the ground screaming. Newly crowned Emperor Diskanar commits suicide using poisoned wine, as he expected to lose. Upon maiming Rhulad, Brys is pushed to drink from the poisoned chalice, and thus dies. His body is taken by his forgotten god.

Back in the Azath house, in the midst of a fierce battle, Udinaas arrives and frees Silchas Ruin. Ruin helps destroy the other creatures. Despite the opportunity to escape, Trull decides to return to Rhulad to aid him in finding his sanity. Tehol, meanwhile, is attacked and nearly killed. His brother Hull is murdered for betraying the Letherii, leaving only lowly Bugg to protect him. Bugg, revealing himself as the Elder God of the Seas, Mael, saves Tehol. As the book ends, Bugg/Mael leaves to confront the Crippled God.

''The Bonehunters'' begins two months after the events of ''House of Chains''. The Malazan Fourteenth Army has destroyed the army of the Whirlwind, and Adjunct Tavore Paran has executed Sha'ik. The Fourteenth is now pressing westward, pursuing the remnants of the Whirlwind rebellion (under Leoman of the Flails), as it seeks refuge in the fortress city of Y'Ghatan, where the Malazan Empire had previously faced its greatest defeat. When the Malazan forces attempt to take the city, Leoman unleashes a destructive fire that tears the city apart. Those few Malazans that escape are re-christened The Bonehunters.

Meanwhile, Onearm's Host, restored to the favour of Empress Laseen, has landed on Seven Cities' north coast to complete the task of subduing the rebellion, but a deadly plague has been unleashed. Ganoes Paran, the new Master of the Deck of Dragons, arrives from Genabackis to help deal with the chaos. With the assistance of the god Shadowthrone, Paran is able to contain the plague by outwitting the goddess Poliel - now an ally of the Crippled God - but is too late to save Dujek, who succumbs to the disease. Paran is declared the new leader of the Host.

Elsewhere, Mappo is separated from Icarium due to the machinations of the mysterious Nameless Ones. The manipulative Taralack Veed is instated as Icarium's new companion, who leads him into the clutches of the Letherii Empire. The Letherii are seeking challengers to fight the Emperor Rhulad, and this call is also answered by Karsa Orlong. The Letherii clash at sea with the Bonehunters, who are able to escape due to a display of magic by Quick Ben.

The Bonehunters return to the heart of the Malazan Empire, where a confrontation between Tavore and the Empress Laseen results in a fraught flight from the city. Laseen's endless scheming has trapped her in an allegiance with the ruthless Mallick Rel. The escape seemingly claims the life of the assassin Kalam, while Quick Ben is spirited away by Shadowthrone to join a defense of the First Throne against the Letherii. There, Icarium unleashes his full power, placing Taralack Veed in a state of permanent terror. As the Bonehunters depart the Malazan Empire, they are joined by a group of Tiste Andii, among which is Anomander Rake's son Nimander.

''Dust of Dreams'' returns to the continent of Lether, last seen in Reaper's Gale. Adjunct Tavore leads the Malazan army into the Letherii Wastelands to fight against an unknown threat.

Immediately following the events of ''Dust of Dreams'', Adjunct Tavore leads the Bonehunters further into the Letherii wastelands.

The main narrative thread that runs through the opera is the story of the life of Abraham, as it is told in the various religious texts, and how this story is now understood and interpreted, using modern-day accounts by individual people from three different major religious and cultural contexts. During the individual interviews, Steve Reich and Beryl Korot asked questions such as "Who is Abraham?", "Who is Sarah?" and "Who is Ishmael?" and recorded answers that were given by Israeli, Palestinian and American interviewees. These three groups of people viewed the story of Abraham/Ibrahim and his immediate family in varying ways.

Brief spoken extracts from the interviews were used both as they were recorded during the interviews, but also as repeated musical phrases. The melodic phrases used in the opera are all taken directly from the intonation, tone, stress, and rhythm of the natural spoken phrases and sentences used by the individuals interviewed. In other words, the musical phrases are based on the prosody which can be heard in the phrases and sentences spoken by the individuals. Images of the interviewees are also shown on an array of video screens.

Act I

Typing Music (Genesis XVI)

Who is Abraham?

Genesis XII

Who is Sarah?

Who is Hagar?

Typing Music Repeat

Who is Ishmael?

Genesis XVIII

Who is Isaac?

Genesis XXI

The casting out of Ishmael and Hagar

Machpelah Commentary

Genesis XXV (chanted in Hebrew from the Torah by Ephrim Isaac)

Interior of the Cave

Act II

Surah 3 (chanted in Arabic from the Koran by Sheikh Dahoud Atalah, Muqri of Al-Aksa Mosque)

Who is Ibrahim?

Who is Hajar?

The near sacrifice

El Khalil Commentary

Interior of the cave

Act III

Who is Abraham?

Who is Sarah?

Who is Hagar?

Who is Ishmael?

The Binding of Isaac

The Cave of Macpelah

Challenger sends telegrams asking his three companions from ''The Lost World''— Edward Malone, Lord John Roxton, and Professor Summerlee— to join him at his home outside London, and instructs each of them to 'bring oxygen'. During their journey there, they see people's behaviour become excitable and erratic. On arrival, they are ushered into a sealed room, along with Challenger and his wife. In the course of his research into various phenomena, Challenger has predicted that the Earth is moving into a belt of poisonous ether which, based on its effect on the people of Sumatra earlier in the day, he expects to stifle humanity. Challenger seals them in the room with cylinders of oxygen, which he (correctly) believes will counter the effect of the ether.

Cover of a later printing of the Arthur Conan Doyle novella ''The Poison Belt''

The five wait out the Earth's passage through the poison belt as they watch the world outside, human and animal, die and machines run amok. (Challenger's servants are left outside the sealed room, and they continue to perform their duties until the ether overtakes them.) Finally, the last of the oxygen cylinders are emptied, and they open a window, ready to face death. To their surprise, they do not die and conclude the Earth has now passed through the poison belt. They journey through the dead countryside in Challenger's car, finally arriving in London. They encounter only one survivor, an elderly, bed-ridden woman prescribed oxygen for her health.

After returning to Challenger's house, they discover that the effect of the ether is temporary, and the world reawakens with no knowledge that they have lost any time at all. Eventually, Challenger and his companions manage to convince the world what happened— a task made easier by the tremendous amount of death and destruction caused by runaway machines and fires that took place while the world was asleep—and humanity is shocked into placing a higher value on life.

Notorious womanizer Michael James wants to be faithful to his fiancée Carole Werner, but every woman he meets seems to fall in love with him, including neurotic exotic dancer Liz Bien and parachutist Rita, who accidentally lands in his car. His psychoanalyst, Dr. Fritz Fassbender, cannot help, since he is stalking patient Renée Lefebvre, who in turn longs for Michael. Carole, meanwhile, decides to make Michael jealous by flirting with his nervous wreck of a friend, Victor Shakapopulis. Victor struggles to be romantic but Carole nevertheless feigns interest.

Fassbender continues to have group meetings with his neurotics and obsessives and cannot understand why everyone falls for Michael. The group sessions get stranger—including an indoor cricket match. Michael dreams that all his sexual conquests simultaneously bombard him for attention, listing where they made love.

Fassbender goes to the River Seine and fills a rowing boat with kerosene and wraps himself in the Norwegian flag - preparing to commit suicide in the style of a Viking funeral. Victor appears and sets up a small dining table nearby and asks what he is doing. Distracted, Fassbender forgets his idea of suicide and starts giving Victor advice. Despite his attempts to womanise, Fassbender is revealed to be married with three children.

Meanwhile Carole's plan seems to work and Michael asks to marry her. She agrees and they settle on marrying within the week. She moves in but Michael finds fidelity impossible. When a second "fiancee" arrives, she knows the worst. Simultaneously, a woman parachutes into Michael's open-top sports car and he ends up sleeping with her, also meeting other conquests at the bar. This takes place at a small country hotel, where all parties materialise in the format of a typical French farce. Some are checked in, but most just appear. This includes Carole's parents who wander the corridors, causing Michael to jump from room to room. A rumour has also started locally that an orgy is taking place so side characters such as the petrol station attendant also start to appear. Carole appears and wishes to see Michael's room. As they speak, all the other participants chase each other around in the background. Fassbender's wife tracks him down.

Everyone ends in Michael's room with most of the females half-naked. The police arrive and form a line. Anna—Dr. Fassbender's wife—charges in operatic Valkyrie costume, complete with a spear. They all escape to a go-kart circuit. They leave the circuit and go first to a farmyard then through narrow village streets still on the go-karts then back to the circuit.

After a mayor marries Michael and Carole in a civil marriage ceremony, the couple are signing the marriage certificate when Michael calls the young female registrar "Pussycat", infuriating Carole. They leave and Fassbender attempts to court her instead.

One night, an American special forces team invades Saddam Hussein's palace and a nearby prison camp to rescue captured soldiers from Operation Desert Storm and to assassinate Saddam, but they find the Iraqis waiting for them, and the entire rescue team is captured. This failed operation turns out to be the latest in a series of rescue attempts which were foiled by the Iraqis, and consequently the advisors of President Benson suspect a mole in their own ranks. Colonel Denton Walters suggests that they gain the support of war hero Topper Harley for the next mission, but Topper has retired from the United States Navy and become a reclusive Buddhist in a small Thai village. Walters and Michelle Huddleston, CIA, arrive and try to persuade him out of retirement in order to rescue the imprisoned soldiers and the previous rescue parties.

Topper initially refuses, but when yet another rescue mission (this one, in turn, led by Walters) fails, he agrees to lead a small group of soldiers into Iraq. He is joined by Harbinger, Williams, and Rabinowitz, the sole escapee of the prior rescue mission and whom Topper suspects to be the mysterious saboteur. They parachute into an Iraqi jungle close to the heavily guarded hostage camp and set off to meet their contact, who turns out to be Topper's ex-girlfriend, Ramada. Ramada guides them to a fishing boat that she prepared for their transportation. As they move towards the camp, she and Topper reminisce, and she explains that she was married before she met him. When she was informed that her husband, Dexter, was still alive and a prisoner in Iraq, she volunteered to participate in his rescue, but was instructed to keep this strictly confidential, forcing her to break up with Topper just as they were preparing to elope; this also led to Topper's decision to retire from the Navy.

Topper's team proceeds to the prison camp disguised as river fishermen, but a confrontation with an Iraqi patrol boat defeats them. When President Benson hears of the apparent demise of another mission, he decides to help the fight and joins additional forces in Iraq. However, Topper and his teammates have survived, and soon reach the Iraqi hostage camp. In the course of the operation, the alarm is raised and a gunfight ensues, during which Topper finds out that Harbinger is not the saboteur, but has merely lost self-confidence in fighting, and manages to inspire him. After the prisoners are freed, Topper goes back to free Dexter, who is imprisoned in Saddam's palace.

While the squad evacuates the hostages, Topper enters Saddam's palace and encounters the dictator himself, who pulls out his machine pistol and commands Topper to surrender. Topper overpowers Saddam, and they engage in a sword fight. President Benson arrives and orders Topper to rescue Dexter while Benson and Saddam continue the duel. Benson defeats Saddam by spraying him with a fire extinguisher, upon which he and his dog freeze and crack into pieces, only to subsequently melt, combine and reform as Saddam with his dog's head, fur, nose and ears. In the meantime, Topper manages to find Dexter, but is forced to carry him out on his shoulders as the Iraqis have tied Dexter's shoelaces together.

The squad heads back to the army helicopter, where Ramada, after an intense revelation involving unfounded jealousy, reveals and arrests Michelle as the saboteur who betrayed the previous rescue attempts to the Iraqis. Dexter arrives with Topper and insists on taking a picture of him and Ramada, but backs away too far and falls over a cliff. President Benson joins the escapees, and the evacuation team lifts off; Saddam is about to shoot down the chopper when Topper and Ramada get rid of extra weight in it by pushing a piano out the open door, which crushes him. Reunited, Topper and Ramada kiss as they fly off into the sunset.

The story begins in 1963, where George Stickle (a naval officer) and Admiral Harlock discuss how porpoises in the ocean are displaying unique characteristics and suspect that a former top-secret asset, Henry Limpet, may be teaching the creatures these abilities.

The story flashes back to September 1941 just before the attack on Pearl Harbor. Henry Limpet, a shy bookkeeper, loves fish with a passion and wishes he could be one. His friend George Stickle is a machinist in the United States Navy. Limpet's wife Bessie is fiercely patriotic and Limpet tries to enlist but he is rejected, classified as 4F because of his poor eyesight and other reasons.

While Stickle is on leave, he visits Limpet and Bessie, and they go to Coney Island, where Limpet deliberately falls into the water and turns into a fish for unexplained reasons. Since he never resurfaces nor can he swim, Bessie and George assume he has drowned.

The fish Limpet, complete with his signature pince-nez spectacles, discovers a new-found ability during some of his initial misadventures: a powerful underwater roar, his "thrum". He makes friends with Crusty, a misanthropic hermit crab. After saving a female fish he names Ladyfish (the concept of names being unknown to her), he falls in love with her despite already being married.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Limpet directs a Navy convoy to a nearby German U-boat. Determined to help the Navy on an ongoing basis, Limpet contacts the convoy and requests to see George. With George's help, Limpet gets himself commissioned by the Navy, complete with an advanced rank and a salary, which he sends to Bessie. He helps the Navy locate Nazi U-boats by signaling with his "thrum", and plays a large part in the Allied victory in the Battle of the Atlantic. In his final mission, he is nearly killed when the Nazis develop a "thrum"-seeking torpedo and is further handicapped by the loss of his spectacles. He manages to survive using Crusty as his "navigator", and sinks U-boats by redirecting their torpedoes. After the battle, he swims to Coney Island to say goodbye to Bessie, who gives him a replacement set of glasses. He then swims off with Ladyfish.

In the film's coda, back in 1963, George and the Admiral travel out to sea to contact Limpet about whether he is training the porpoises.

Jackson Smith, Brian Palmer, Derrick West and Terry White are lifelong friends since childhood. The film has separate subplots with each character, showing how their friendships binds them.

Jackson, a physician, struggles with commitment issues and often has nightmares with a bride. When working through his issues with a therapist, she suggests he meet a woman that night and "give his heart to her." He soon meets a beautiful freelance photographer who makes Jackson realize that he may be capable of true love and commitment. When he finds out that Denise once dated his father, his new outlook on love takes a turn.

Brian, an attorney, realizes that his chronic womanizing is catching up to him in ways he didn't imagine when a former lover (also the judge in a case he is currently working) sends him to jail. He makes a vow to not date African-American women because he believes that they carry unnecessary drama. Brian is working to gain custody of his younger brother who currently lives in a affection-less household with his mother.

Derrick, the only married member of the group, loves his wife and daughter, but is struggling with the idea of his wife not giving him the type of sex he desires. After many attempts to convince his wife that pleasing your partner is an important part of a successful marriage, he and his wife separate. In addition to wanting more in the bedroom, Derrick is trying to convince his wife to let his ailing mother live in their home.

Terry, a former womanizer who is tired of playing the field and ready to settle down, is preparing to marry his girlfriend of two months, Bebe, despite the warnings of his friends who feel that he is rushing into the commitment. As his wedding day fast approaches, he'll have to decide if he is truly ready to make the leap into the rest of his life.

At Moe's Tavern, Moe informs Homer and his friends that one of them must be a designated driver, and Barney loses the choosing draw. After Barney drives the drunken men home in Homer's car, Homer allows him to use it to drive himself home, expecting Barney to return it the following morning. In his distressed state, Barney disappears with the car. Two months later, Barney returns to Moe's Tavern, unable to recall where he left the car. Homer later receives a letter from the New York City government, which informs him that his car has been found parked in the World Trade Center plaza and will be destroyed (by "crushing it into a cube and sinking it in the East River at your expense") if not picked up in 72 hours. Homer reveals to the family that he had once been to New York before when he was 17 years old, and had a horrible experience. Marge and the children persuade Homer to go retrieve the car, and he reluctantly agrees.

When the family arrives in Manhattan, they decide to split up. Upon arrival at his car, Homer discovers it has been issued many parking tickets and has been wheel clamped. While waiting for a parking officer to come and remove the clamp, Homer drinks an excessive amount of crab juice from a food vendor and needs to urinate, but is afraid to leave his car behind. Several hours later, he rushes into the restroom at the South Tower's indoor observation deck, but discovers that it is out of order and must use the one at the top of the North Tower. The officer arrives while he is away from the car; finding no one present, he issues another ticket and leaves, to Homer's extreme frustration. Meanwhile, the rest of the family tours the Statue of Liberty, Little Italy, Chinatown, and the Empire State Building. Bart leaves the group to visit the offices of ''Mad'' magazine, and is in awe when he sees Alfred E. Neuman. The family attends a Broadway musical about the Betty Ford Clinic, and then takes a carriage through Central Park to where they are planning to meet Homer.

Upon returning to the car, Homer realizes he must reach Central Park, pick up the family, and leave before nightfall. Ignoring the wheel clamp, he tries to drive away but destroys the car's fender. He steals a jackhammer from a road construction crew and uses it to remove the clamp, but damages the car further as well. Homer races to Central Park and reunites with his family. While driving back to Springfield, the family reflects on their wonderful time, while Homer's hatred for New York remains as debris from a garbage truck flies through the car's broken windshield and splatters across his face.

Nineteen-year-old André Maciel (Lázaro Ramos) works as a photocopy machine operator in a convenience store in Porto Alegre. Disillusioned with his life and obsessed with material wealth, he dreams of being an illustrator, but his comics, though well drawn, are rejected by publishers. After André returns home from work, he spends time in his room drawing or spying on Sílvia (Leandra Leal), a neighbor who lives in an apartment across the street with her father Antunes, with binoculars.

Following Silvia to work one morning, André finds that she works at a lingerie store, coincidentally called ‘Sílvia’s.” Once he follows Sílvia inside the store, he realizes he needs an excuse to be in there, and tells Sílvia that he is looking for a birthday gift for his mother. Sílvia suggests that he buy a robe that costs R$38. However, André cannot afford this, and he promises Sílvia that he will return and buy it later.

One evening, he visits a club with Marinês (Luana Piovani), an attractive co-worker, who introduces him to a friend of hers Cardoso, (Pedro Cardoso), who works in antiques. André is initially impressed by the well dressed Cardoso, whom he assumes is well off. Later, when they are alone, Cardoso hits on Marinês and she refuses him, all but admitting that she is a gold digger and having suspected earlier that Cardoso is poor from his resoled shoes, and that she dislikes Cardoso's smoking.

Leaving the club, Andre boards a bus and sees Silvia, wanting to make small talk, he promises to buy the robe at next opportunity.

Still believing that Cardoso is rich, André visits him at his place of work and finds that he sells junk for a living. Over coffee, André realizes that Cardoso also has no money and in a later scene, that Cardoso is as obsessed with material wealth as him, believing it to be necessary to woo Marinês.

By chance, André's boss leaves him with a R$50 bill in order to run some errands. Giving in to temptation, André photocopies the note bank notes at his job. To dispose of the note, André begins gambling in the lottery. One of André's counterfeit notes is accidentally used by Cardoso to buy them drinks and André reveals his counterfeiting to Cardoso. On their lottery runs, André plays the sequence of numbers ‘1 2 3 4 5 6', earning him the mockery of Cardoso, who believes that that combination will never come out.

A relationship blossoms between André and Sílvia, and eventually, André asks for her hand in marriage. Sílvia says yes, however, André tells her that they cannot get married right away; André feels as though he needs more money in order to provide for Sílvia – more money than he can get from counterfeiting.

André hatches a plan to pull a bank heist with Cardoso and purchases a gun (using more counterfeit money) from Feitosa, a drug dealing acquaintance of his. The heist is successful, however, André was unmasked and was subsequently forced to shoot Antunes, a passerby, to make his getaway.

André and Cardoso are both relieved to find that the police sketch of the bank robber looks nothing like him. That joy is compounded when the pair find out André won the lottery. However, André is worried about being recognized should his lottery win be published in the news in light of the bank robbery. The pair rope in Marinês to help them claim the winnings.

Flush with cash, André, Cardoso and Marinês go on a shopping spree. Cardoso and Marinês check into a luxurious hotel, where they have sex. André asks Silvia to leave with him, but she believes that Antunes would not allow it. André agrees to meet Antunes.

Meeting at a restaurant, and while the other party is not present, André learns that Silvia hates Antunes, who she believes isn't her real father, Antunes reveals to André that while he recognizes him, he will not turn André in nor does he want any of the heist money, but half of the lottery money.

Leaving the restaurant, André is accosted by Feitosa, who had been arrested earlier when he tried to spend some of the counterfeit money given to him by André but managed to get released quickly due to having underworld connections. Feitosa had figured out that André is the bank robber, having been questioned about the gun that he sold André, and demands the heist money. André agrees to pass the money to Feitosa the following day.

That night, Silvia confronts André, having learnt about his part in the bank heist from Antunes. André initially proposes to pay off Antunes with the heist money, but Silvia proposes to kill him instead.

The next day, André double crosses Feitosa and leads him into a trap, killing him. Later, André, Cardoso, Marinês and Silvia set a trap for Antunes. Initially, the plan goes awry, but they succeed in killing him and framing him for the bank heist.

The film ends with the four friends at the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro, where Sílvia meets the man she believes is her father, Paulo (Paulo José), while also subsequently revealing that she had orchestrated some of her initial coincidental meetings with André.

Veronica Guerin, a crime reporter for the ''Sunday Independent'', becomes aware of how much Dublin's illegal drug trade is encroaching upon the lives of its working class, especially the children, and vows to expose the men responsible.

Guerin begins by interviewing the pre-pubescent addicts who shoot up on the street or in abandoned buildings in the housing estates. Her investigation leads her to major suppliers and John Traynor, a notable source of information about the criminal underworld. Traynor is willing to assist her to an extent but is not above misleading her in order to protect himself from nefarious drug lord John Gilligan. To steer her away from Gilligan, Traynor suggests Gerry Hutch, a criminal known as The Monk, is in charge of the operation. Guerin pursues Hutch and discovers he is not involved.

As Guerin nears the truth, she and her family become targets. A bullet fired through a window in her home as a warning fails to stop her. She is then shot in the leg, and her young son Cathal is threatened. Her husband Graham, mother Bernie, and brother Jimmy implore her to stop, but when Guerin confronts Gilligan at his home and is savagely beaten, she becomes more determined to expose him. Rather than press charges, which would necessitate her removal from the story, she forges ahead with the investigation.

On 26 June 1996, Guerin appears in court to respond to parking tickets and speeding penalties that she had ignored. She is given a nominal fine of IR£100. En route home she calls her mother and then her husband to report the good news. She is speaking to her office while stopped at traffic light on the Naas Dual Carriageway when two men riding a motorcycle pull up beside her. The driver breaks the window of her car and shoots her six times. The two flee and dispose of the bike and gun in a nearby canal.

Guerin is mourned by her family, friends, associates and the country. Her violent death results in the establishment of the Criminal Assets Bureau, and Gilligan, along with several of his henchmen, are tried and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. The epilogue states that "Veronica Guerin's writing turned the tide in the drug war. Her murder galvanised Ireland into action. Thousands of people took to the streets in weekly anti-drug marches, which drove the dealers out of Dublin and forced the drug barons underground. Within a week of her death, in an emergency session of the Parliament, the Government altered the Constitution of the Republic of Ireland to allow the High Court to freeze the assets of suspected drug barons."

The novel's protagonist, Joan Foster, is a romance novelist who has spent her life running away from difficult situations. The novel alternates between flashbacks from the past and scenes from the present. Through flashbacks, the reader sees her first as an overweight child whose mother constantly criticizes her, and later, hiding her career, her past as the mistress of a Polish count, and her affair with a performance artist called The Royal Porcupine, from her bipolar husband Arthur.

In the present, she has recently published a volume of feminist poetry which becomes a breakthrough success and is overwhelmed by the pressures of sudden fame. Joan panics after receiving a blackmail attempt from someone who has found out about her secrets. With the help of two acquaintances, she fakes her own death and then flees to Italy.

In Saint Petersburg, Yakov Petrovich Golyadkin works as a titular councillor (rank 9 in the Table of Ranks established by Peter the Great.), a low-level bureaucrat struggling to succeed.

Golyadkin has a formative discussion with his Doctor Rutenspitz, who fears for his sanity and tells him that his behaviour is dangerously antisocial. He prescribes "cheerful company" as the remedy. Golyadkin resolves to try this, and leaves the office. He proceeds to a birthday party for Klara Olsufyevna, the daughter of his office manager. He was uninvited, and a series of ''faux pas'' lead to his expulsion from the party. On his way home through a snowstorm, he encounters a man who looks exactly like him, his double. The following two thirds of the novel then deals with their evolving relationship.

At first, Golyadkin and his double are friends, but Golyadkin Jr. proceeds to attempt to take over Sr.'s life, and they become bitter enemies. Because Golyadkin Jr. has all the charm, unctuousness and social skills that Golyadkin Sr. lacks, he is very well-liked among the office colleagues. At the story's conclusion, Golyadkin Sr. begins to see many replicas of himself, has a psychotic break, and is dragged off to an asylum by Doctor Rutenspitz.

On the Kidabanesee reserve in Northern Ontario lives Silas Crow (Ryan Black), a young man looking for direction in life. He is uncertain about taking an automobile mechanic's course in college. His general confusion with life is most readily evident in his appearance. He wears an old ratty black fedora, a strange assortment of cargo pants, as well as a long, black trench coat. Frank Fencepost (Adam Beach) is Crow's best friend, and Sadie Maracle (Jennifer Podemski) is his girlfriend.

A young girl from the reserve is murdered by Clarence Gaskill (Hugh Dillon); the white man's sentence is light, leading the community to demand justice or vengeance.

Jadzia Dax undergoes her Zhian'tara, the Trill rite of closure, in which she has the chance to meet Dax's previous hosts by temporarily transferring each one's memories from the symbiont into the minds of her friends. Commander Sisko, Major Kira, Dr. Bashir, Odo, Quark, Chief O'Brien, and Leeta have agreed to participate.

Kira accepts Lela Dax, and Jadzia sees that she is the origin of many of Dax's personality traits, which she herself now exhibits. O'Brien becomes the shy but friendly Tobin Dax. Leeta receives the personality of Emony Dax, a cheerful and talented gymnast. Quark is annoyed by having to take on the personality of the female Audrid Dax, who tells Jadzia about motherhood. Bashir is Torias Dax, an adventurous pilot. Sisko is restrained in a holding cell to receive the personality of Joran Dax, a violent murderer. When Jadzia comes to meet him he tricks her into lowering the force field between them, and tries to strangle her. After a brief struggle, Sisko regains control of his body.

Jadzia expresses anxiety about meeting her next host, Curzon. Curzon trained Jadzia when she was applying to receive a symbiont and recommended that she not be approved for joining. She later reapplied and was accepted, but despite having the Dax symbiont within her, she does not know Curzon's motivations for flunking her.

Odo, a shapeshifter, accepts Curzon Dax, reshaping his face to resemble Curzon. He evades her questions and declares he intends to stay within Odo, leaving Jadzia's self-esteem in tatters. Sisko offers to talk to Curzon, who was his mentor and friend many years ago, but Jadzia resolves to face the Old Man herself. When she demands to hear Curzon's story he finally admits that he flunked Jadzia because he was in love with her. When Jadzia reassures Curzon he will always be a part of her, he is satisfied and leaves Odo's body.

Also in this episode, Nog takes the exam that will allow him to later take the Starfleet Academy entrance exam. He is despondent when he learns that he failed, but his father Rom discovers that Quark rigged the exam so that Nog would fail. Furious, Rom confronts Quark for interfering in Nog's choice to enter Starfleet and threatens to destroy Quark's bar if Quark continues meddling. Sisko allows Nog to retake his exam, and this time he passes.

Captain Josiah Peabody, United States Navy, in command of the ''USS Delaware'', is the viewpoint character. Peabody has served in the Navy since its earliest days; he also overcame alcoholism by sheer will power, having come from a family of alcoholics. To help save his brother from the same fate, he ships him aboard as captain's clerk with the rank of midshipman.

The ''Delaware'' escapes from blockaded New York City in the winter of 1813-1814 and sails south to destroy British commerce in the Caribbean. In doing so, a French vessel appears, and neither the Americans nor the British know that Napoleon has surrendered, the French monarchy has been restored, and France is now at peace with Britain. The French vessel carries the new Royalist French governor of a Caribbean Island and some of his beautiful relatives.

The ''Delaware'' proceeds to capture a British post-office packet carrying the pay for the British Army in Canada, then raids several islands, including St. Kitts. In the course of action, off the weather shore of Martinique, ''Delaware'' encounters the frigate ''HMS Calypso'', Sir Hugh Davenant, commanding, accompanied by two smaller ships. The action between the four is interrupted when the French inform both parties that they will not allow French neutrality to be violated.

Both belligerents are trapped by a rule of international law which requires twenty-four hours to pass before ships of one belligerent power can sail after a ship of the opposing side can sail. Davenant, a man of hot-tempered speech, insists he sail first, because he cannot allow the Americans a free hand at sea; to do so would lead to his court-martial. Peabody replies "We have courts-martial in our service, too." The Governor suggests anchoring overnight.

The next morning, at the exact minute of dawn, both the ''Calypso'' and the ''Delaware'' cast loose and set sail for international waters. They are so closely matched that the French fire on both ships, warning them to come about. This time, the Governor suggests an armistice of a week.

During the week, Peabody falls in love with Anne de Villebois, the daughter of the Governor, and marries her. Unfortunately, his young brother, who hates the rigid discipline of naval life, deserts the ship and marries a wealthy French widow.

Both sides accept a temporary agreement to work together to eliminate a pirate who is plaguing local commerce under the assumption neither frigate can chase him. Peabody is wounded, though not seriously; Davenant insists that his surgeon examine the wound. Both ships return to Martinique under the terms of the previous armistice. During this period, two British sailors desert the ''Calypso'' for the ''Delaware.'' Davenant requests that they be returned, but Peabody must refuse. Davenant comments that American deserters marry rich planters, especially if they are captain's brothers. Peabody demands a duel.

The duel is fought. Neither man is wounded, to each other's relief. Peabody then challenges Davenant to a ship-to-ship duel, as the only way the ''Delaware'' can be free to take action against a British convoy forming to attack New Orleans. The novel ends with the Americans and British learning that peace has been declared in their war. The American and British captains both end up marrying beautiful French women, becoming friends and in-laws.

The hero of ''The Good Shepherd'' is Commander Krause, the captain of the fictional US Navy ''Mahan''-class destroyer USS ''Keeling'' in World War II. Krause is in overall command of an escort force protecting an Atlantic convoy in the Battle of the Atlantic, shepherding it through the Mid-Atlantic gap where no antisubmarine aircraft are able to defend convoys. He finds himself in a difficult position. The voyage in question occurs early in 1942, shortly after the United States's entry into the war. Although he is a career Navy officer, with many years of seniority, this is Krause's first wartime mission. The captains of the other vessels in the escort group are junior to him in rank, and much younger, but they have been at war for over two years.

The story covers 13 watches (52 hours) aboard the ship's bridge and is told in third person entirely from Krause's point of view as he fights to save his ship, detailing his mood swings from his intense and focused excitement and awareness during combat to his resulting fatigue, depression, and self-doubt as his self-perceived inferiority and inexperience relative to the other captains under his command trouble him—although as the story progresses he is shown to be quite capable. He broods over his career and the wife who left him, partly because of his strict devotion to duty. He is troubled when the press of duty forces him to neglect his prayers (unlike most of Forester's other heroes, Krause is devout). He is troubled by recollections that the Navy review board had twice passed him over for promotion, returning a judgment of ''fitted and retained'' because there was little or no opportunity in the prewar Navy. His promotion to commander only came when the United States entered the war, leading him to fear that he may be unsuited to his command.

The book also focuses on the intense combat between the ''Keeling'' and multiple U-boats, with the ''Keeling'' eventually racking up multiple kills, and on the ship's daring rescue missions as the convoy increasingly falls prey to the U-boats, all in a race against time to escape the undefended stretches of the Atlantic. The book is a rich, detailed accounting of naval warfare, ship handling, and the inner logic of an experienced officer wrestling with the many minute judgments necessary to maintain rigid discipline during conditions of relentless tedium punctuated with extreme danger.

David and Linda Howard are typical 1980s yuppies in Los Angeles, California, dissatisfied with their bourgeois lifestyle. He works in an advertising agency and she for a department store, but after failing to receive an expected promotion and instead being asked to transfer to the firm's New York office, David angrily insults his boss and is fired. David coaxes his wife to quit her job as well and seek a new adventure.

The Howards decide to sell their house, liquidate their assets, drop out of society, "like in ''Easy Rider''", and travel the country in a Winnebago recreational vehicle. They leave LA with US$100,000 but their plans change drastically when Linda loses all their savings playing roulette at the Desert Inn Casino in Las Vegas, where David desperately and unsuccessfully persuades a casino manager to give the money back as a publicity gimmick.

With nowhere to go, the couple quarrels at Hoover Dam, eventually arriving in small-town Safford, Arizona. David unsuccessfully applies for a delivery job at a local pharmacy and resorts to an employment agency. After a counselor obnoxiously reminds him that he was fired from his high-paying job in advertising, David accepts the best position available — as a crossing guard, taunted by local schoolchildren. Linda, meanwhile, finds employment as the assistant manager at the local Der Wienerschnitzel, working under a person half her age.

Only a few days after beginning their pursuit of the dream of dropping out of society, David and Linda are living in a trailer park, nearly broke, and working dead-end jobs where they are accountable to brats. They decide that it is better to return to their old lifestyle as soon as possible. They point the Winnebago toward New York, where David begs for his old job back. An end card reveals he is rehired with a substantial pay cut but better dental care.

Cincinnati college senior Matt Larkin seems to have a picture-perfect life: he comes from a well-to-do family, he is well-liked at his college, from which he is soon to graduate, and has a fiancée, friends, parties, and good times. When Matt meets Jewel, though, his carefully constructed house of cards falls apart and changes him forever.

Matt is content with his very proper fiancée and his safe life, so when his best friend Tipton relates a story of a night spent in a rough country house filled with seedy characters, beer, music, and women, Matt initially scoffs at the idea of visiting, but as he ponders his imminent marriage, he decides to check it out–no harm done, just a little fun before life gets serious.

The two drive out to the house, expecting a wild party. Instead, they find only the aftermath of the previous night—cigarette butts and bottles strewn everywhere, a solitary biker playing pool, and a woman's muffled giggle coming from upstairs. Disappointed, Matt goes to fetch a beer for Tipton and in doing so, in the kitchen, meets Jewel.

Jewel is all mystery and trailer park at the same time. She's a poor Kentucky girl, obviously uneducated, yet Matt is instantly drawn to her. He returns to seek her out and the attraction they share is obvious. Despite their social differences, Matt is completely infatuated.

His life soon does a 180. He breaks off his engagement, sneaks out at night, and stops seeing his friends. Matt has yet to figure out who exactly Jewel is, and discovers the secrets she is hiding (including an abusive husband and stepfather, the shady people who hang around the house, as well as the fact she is underaged).

As a result, the two worlds collide, and they seemingly are doomed by circumstance. After Matt has a run-in with Jewel's spouse, the ultra-seedy Green, Matt and Jewel break up. Jewel separates from Green and Matt takes a job in Chicago. A year later, Matt returns home to visit his family for Christmas, he runs into Jewel who has since divorced her husband, obtained her GED, and is now attending a trade school to pursue a career in nursing and make a better life for herself, she has also met a new man at her school. The two wish each other well and the film ends as they both walk away.

The novel opens with Brown, wounded and dying, on fictional Resolution Island in the Galápagos Islands. The story is then told in flashback.

The first part of the story tells of Brown's birth, as a result of a liaison between his mother, Agatha Brown, and a Royal Navy officer, Lieutenant Commander Richard Saville-Samarez. It describes his upbringing in late Victorian and Edwardian England, with Agatha as an unmarried mother pretending to be a widow, and her instilling into him a sense of duty to the Navy and to his country. As soon as he is old enough (fifteen years of age), Brown joins the Navy, and at the start of World War I is serving on the cruiser HMS ''Charybdis'' at Singapore.

In the second half of the story ''Charybdis'' is sunk by the fictional German armored cruiser SMS ''Ziethen'' in the eastern Pacific, and Brown, along with two severely-wounded men, is picked up as POWs by the German ship. As the ''Ziethen'' was damaged in the exchange, her captain postpones his commerce raiding mission to Australasian waters, and has to find a deserted anchorage to repair his ship. In the novel, he chooses the fictional Resolution Island in the Galápagos Islands. The resourceful Brown steals a rifle and a small amount of ammunition, water and food, escapes, and makes his way ashore, where he is able to pick off exposed crew members who are trying to repair the ship's damaged hull. As her captain has already careened his vessel, the ''Ziethen'''s guns cannot be brought to bear on Brown, and German landing parties are sent ashore to hunt him down. In Forester's description, Resolution Island is an almost-impenetrable tangle of sun-blasted sharp-edged lava blocks covered with cacti, making it extremely difficult for the Germans to locate Brown.

Brown is able to delay the repairs for two days, but is eventually mortally wounded by a lucky rifle shot from a German sailor as the crew is being recalled to the ship. He never learns that his actions delayed the ''Ziethen'' long enough to ensure that she is intercepted and destroyed by a pursuing Royal Navy force. Coincidentally, the senior officer of the British force is the now Captain Saville-Samarez, Brown's father, although they never know of each other's existence.

There is a saying in the land that someone who drinks the Wine of the Gods before he is ready is only half a man thereafter. Amatus, the prince, manages to swig down a significant amount of the Wine of the Gods, and his entire left half vanishes. His father, the normally gentle King Boniface, orders the executions of the four people responsible for this travesty—the maid, the alchemist, the witch, and the captain of the guard—and then begins the long and arduous process of interviewing to fill these four positions.

A year and a day later, four strangers arrive in the kingdom. This is a magical time, and noted by all as being very auspicious. The strangers are hired by the king and become known as the prince's Companions.

The rest of the tale deals with Amatus's growth into manhood, kingship, and love. It is filled with adventure, laughter, tragedy, unexpected reunions and royal pomp.

The protagonist of the novel is Rebel Elizabeth Mudlark, the recorded personality of a dead woman which has become the property of a corporation that intends to sell it as entertainment. Rebel escapes by taking over the body of Eucrasia Walsh, a woman who rents herself out for temporary testing of new wetware programming. While escaping the corporation Eucrasia's latent personality is beginning to reassert itself.

Rebel's adventures take her throughout the widely colonised Solar System. She initially lives in canister worlds orbiting the Sun in a trojan orbit, where she sometimes works removing bioengineered weeds (''vacuum flowers'', the space-tolerant flora of the title) from the canisters' exterior ports. Since the recording omits most of her memories, she must rely on strangers to help her survive, though she cannot trust any of them. Rebel meets and falls in love with Wyeth, a leader whose personality was reprogrammed into a team of four complementary personas. Together they form an uneasy alliance with The Comprise, the hive mind which rules Earth, and encounter Dysonworlders, who live on genetically engineered artificial comets (Dyson trees).

The story takes place in the world of Rebus, primarily within the areas of Cross Land, Idorus, Nordia and Pentagram. The game is broken into 36 chapters, 18 in Toxa's scenario and 18 in Lacryma's scenario.

Story

In the Nordia Encrypter School, Akueldo rebel leaders plan to transport the druid Mona through Cross Land and into Idorus. Mona carries a forbidden original Nothingness Kartia that can destroy all of existence. Using a local band of thieves, Mona is escorted from Cross Land to eastern Idorus lands belonging to Count Shinon. The Count's daughter, Ele, discovers this plot and mounts a rescue with the free knight Toxa and two members of Vigilance, Alana and Duran. They save Mona and capture the Akueldo contact Misty. The remaining thieves attack the estate and Misty joins the party to redeem herself. Meanwhile, at Vigilance headquarters in the city of Kainas, Lacryma is left in command while chief Rimazan is away at Pentagram with her adopted father, Bishop Aile. Lacryma, along with Vigilance members Troy, Posha and Kun arrive at an inn overrun with stray Phantoms. The following morning, Troy is arrested by Encrypter police who suspect him of Kartia theft. One of the guards on duty is questioned using evidence found at the inn and exposed as the Akueldo rebel Zakuro. He is subdued and jailed, but later released by a fellow rebel named Cross. Rimzan returns to Kainas to defend the local Shrines' World Tree from the Akueldo agent Karis. Aile is forced to reveal to the Shrine council that Lacryma is the blood daughter of the hero Kainas, whom the city is named after. Many on the council want to make her an Inquirer - a Shrine Warrior that is unrestricted by the law.

Misty encounters Zakuro, and unaware of her desertion, he reveals the plans to attack Vigilance. Duran, Alana, Toxa and Misty set out for Kainas, while Ele sneaks along without permission. Toxa supports Rimzan against the thieves' attack on the headquarters, and using Misty's knowledge, they plan a counter-offensive. Former Vigilance member Bachstail arrives and re-enlists, much to the chagrin of Lacryma. Rimzan assigns two parties to fight the thieves, each led by Lacryma and Duran. Before leaving, Troy gives Alana sketches of an illegal text and later asks Bachstail to read another copy. Bachstail states that they pertain to a forbidden original Kartia. Each party runs into problems during the operation. Toxa repeatedly leaves for the Shinon estate to visit Mona when he should be fighting, Ele accidentally tells Lacryma about Misty's past and Bachstail's actions causes Karis to retreat as soon as she spots him. After dealing with these struggles, the two teams are able to stop the thieves led by Cross and Zakuro. Rimzan departs for Nordia, leaving Lacryma in charge of Vigilance. Rimzan is seriously injured fighting Akueldo leader Saradiart, while Karis observes with Akueldo commander Raguruzet. Saradiart seems immortal, but Raguruzet states that he can be killed with the original Death Kartia. After the battle, Karis stays behind to treat Rimzan's wounds and vows to stop Saradiart. She later discovers both the original Death and Life Kartias in the Idorus Encrypter School and plans to inform Bachstail.

Cross threatens to fully expose Misty's past connections with Akueldo, resulting in her divulging that Mona is still at Shinon's estate. She confesses what she knows about the rebels to Duran and he pledges to stay with her. Bachstail receives Karis' note and lets the messenger know that Lacryma can be made an Inquirer, even without Aile's permission. Bachstail compares the two sketches of the forbidden Kartia from Karis and Troy and concludes that one of them is fake. A missive from the King of Cross Land orders Vigilance to support the Cross Land knights against Akueldo. Lacryma's group accepts and heads to the frontlines, while Toxa's party declines and returns to Shinon's estate to secure Mona. Before leaving, Lacryma visits the Kainas Shrine where she spots Bachstail confronting Aile about Kainas' death. Aile denies using an original Kartia as doing so would also kill the user. Bachstail's presence on the mission clearly distracts Lacryma and hinders her ability to lead. Kun ends up going on patrol on his own and runs into the Akueldo commander Vandor. Kun recognizes the commander from a painting as Kainas and asks him to meet Lacryma. Vandor declines, stating that his old life is long gone but he will wait for her at Idorus Fortress. Kun tells Troy, Ele and Bachstail what he has learned and they agree to keep it secret from Lacryma. After defeating the rebels within Cross Land, Lacryma receives orders to join the Inquirers. To further convince her, Bachstail states that Kainas is alive and has joined the rebels.

After fighting off the rebels at the Shinon estate, Mona reveals that druids like herself are half-elves and that Saradiart is her twin brother. The rebels wish to create the floating paradise of Eden, which requires the original Heaven and Earth Kartias made of elven bone and blood. Despite Toxa's objections, Shinon and Duran send Mona away to Pentagram. After she leaves the estate, Duran and Misty realize that the escort was a disguised rebel. Toxa's party pursues Mona, but are blocked by Idorus knights that have joined the rebellion. Misty distracts a large number of the enemy but is captured, while Karis comes to Toxa's rescue. She reveals that she and Bachstail are Inquirers and that she will help Toxa free Mona and Misty if he takes the Death Kartia from the Idorus Encrypter School. Toxa agrees to the plan and is able to retrieve the original. Lacryma volunteers to bait the rebels in Idorus, both to see her father and prove she doesn't need to be an Inquirer to do her job. At Idorus Fortress she questions Vandor as to why he has joined the Akueldo rebels. He reveals that her deceased mother, Shell, can be revived using the original Human Kartia located on Eden. Mona visits Lacryma in her cell and gives her the Nothingness Kartia, believing she'll do right with it. Back at Vigilance's camp, Karis arrives and informs Bachstail of the plan to rescue Lacryma, Mona and Misty from the rebels.

Toxa's party attacks Idorus Fortress from the front, while Lacryma's friends break her out of the dungeon and escape by boat. Karis is able to free Misty, but Mona has been moved to the Akueldo headquarters. Saradiart arrives and Toxa uses the original Death Kartia from the Idorus Encrypter School, which seems to kill Saradiart. Later, the Pentagram Cardinal Belthshumeltz cuts off Saradiart's left arm to create a new original Heaven Kartia. Back at the Kainas Shrine, Lacryma confronts Aile about her parents. He recounts how Lacryma died from disease twelve years ago and that Shell used the original Life Kartia to bring her back, killing Shell in the process. Lacryma opens Shell's grave but discovers no remains and runs off, but Bachstail stays behind and finds the real original Death Kartia inside. Since Toxa used a forgery, Saradiart revives and swears vengeance on his former allies. He summons Eden with the original Earth Kartia, which falls and crushes Idorus. Saradiart's elven blood allows him to use an original without fear of death.

Bachstail abandons Vigilance with the real Death Kartia in his possession and Lacryma accepts the position of Inquirer. Both parties make their way towards Nordia to confront the remains of Akueldo. Lacryma meets up with Rimzan, who seized part of a broken text from the rebels. Troy uses it to complete his illegal sketches, determines that it is the original Human Kartia and that Vandor will be unable to create a copy without it. Meanwhile, Toxa meets with an elder elf and learns that Eden is the native home of Phantoms. The elder elf also mentions that Mona's powers can stop Saradiart and end the chaos. The elves give Toxa's party flying dragons to hasten their journey towards Nordia. They head towards the Nordia Encrypter School, where Lacryma's group awaits. Toxa gives a speech to rouse the troops, but Ele notices that Lacryma is still visibly shaken. Lacryma's party fights Vandor, but Kun stops her from killing her father. With new found resolve, Vandor calls himself Kainas once again and Troy gives him the finished text for the Human Kartia. Kainas asks Lacryma to stop Belthshumeltz while he battles Raguruzet.

Toxa's party fights Saradiart, but the half-elf proves too powerful. Before Saradiart can defeat them, Bachstail enters with the real original Death Kartia and kills Saradiart, but vanishes soon after. Lacryma takes the flying dragons to Pentagram Cathedral and stops Belthshumeltz, but he unleashes the original Heaven Kartia before dying. To prevent another disaster, Lacryma uses Mona's Nothingness Kartia to counter the destructive sky created by Heaven. Lacryma disappears from Rebus but finds herself on Eden. She encounters Bachstail, who explains that Kartia is merely a means of transporting materials and creatures from Eden to Rebus, and that those that use originals are transported back. Eden's resources have depleted with the heavy use of Kartia and Bachstail now wishes to find a way to restore balance to both dimensions. Kainas uses the original Human Kartia to bring Lacryma back to Rebus and is transported to Eden himself. During the interim, father and daughter say goodbye to each other. Toxa learns that Saradiart actually made clones of himself and only a single copy was destroyed. Mona seals her brother's power and gives Toxa a fighting chance. After finally beating Saradiart, all of Eden returns to their home dimension, including the wild Phantoms, Mona and the other elves. However, Mona makes a clone of herself to simultaneously live on Rebus with Toxa.

Georgie Soloway (Dustin Hoffman) is a rock music composer who experiences personal conflicts when trying to track down a man named Harry Kellerman, who had been spreading outrageous lies about him. Soloway is a rich and successful man who lives in a fancy penthouse apartment and seemingly has everything, but he's beginning to think he is losing his mind; he can't sleep, women he's dated are rejecting him after getting calls from the mysterious "Harry", and he fantasizes committing suicide by leaping off his balcony. Regular visits to his psychiatrist are not helping. At night he struggles with insomnia and can only sleep when his long-suffering accountant comes over and reads his earnings statements to him. When he does sleep, he dreams again about jumping to his death.

As Georgie tries to make sense of his life, he thinks back on his experiences. Although Georgie is a love song writer, he's never had a successful, lasting relationship. His first love, Ruthie, broke up with him after he got her pregnant and she had to have an abortion. He later met a kind waitress named Gloria whom he also got pregnant; he married Gloria and they had two children, but then he cheated on her and she asked for a divorce. More recently, he met an aging actress named Allison (Barbara Harris) who had just miserably failed an audition for a rock musical. Allison turned out to have a lot in common with him, including a failed marriage and thoughts of suicide. When he learns it's her birthday, he takes her for a ride in his private plane and they spend one romantic evening together.

Georgie visits his aging father, who runs a small restaurant and has always had a dream of opening a bigger place. Georgie asks him why he doesn't move elsewhere and open the large restaurant of his dreams with the checks Georgie has sent him, instead of always sending back the checks. His father explains that he is starting to suffer the effects of arteriosclerosis and that it's too late for him to open a new restaurant now, because he will soon die. Georgie goes for a ride over New York City in his private plane and looks for the cemetery where his father said he wanted to be buried. Then he tries to call first Ruthie and then Allison on the sky phone in the plane. Neither of the women recognize his voice, so he hangs up, but not before revealing that he himself is "Harry Kellerman."

At the end, Georgie is shown crashing his private plane into the buildings of Manhattan, then cheerfully skiing away with his psychiatrist.

The plot is an adaptation of the first three story arcs of ''Dragon Ball Z'' with a "What If" storyline for each arc.

In Vegeta's What If storyline, ''Vegeta: Saiyan Prince'', Vegeta and Goku duel, and Vegeta defeats him with minimum effort. Krillin and Gohan turn up, and Vegeta beats them separately. After the battle, Vegeta speaks to himself while Yajirobe sneaks up behind him. Vegeta hears Yajirobe, and impressed by Yajirobe's bravery, offers him to become his next pupil. Yajirobe refuses, stating that he does not want to end up like Nappa. Enraged at being reminded of Nappa's death, Vegeta screams in anger, and becomes a Super Saiyan.

In Frieza's What If storyline, ''Rampaging Frieza'', Frieza successfully beats Goku, Piccolo, Vegeta, Krillin and Gohan in battle. He succeeds in wishing for immortality with the Dragon Balls. After blowing up Namek, Frieza returns to his spaceship, deciding to destroy Earth next.

In Cell's What If storyline, ''A Cold-Blooded Assassin'', Cell attempts to absorb 17 and 18, and successfully beats 16 in battle. He absorbs 17, but while attempting to absorb 18, Krillin jumps in the way, causing Cell to accidentally absorb Krillin. As a result, he shrinks to Krillin's size, gains similar colors to Krillin's attire, and loses much power. Yamcha and Tien show up to challenge the weakened Cell. He barely manages to beat Yamcha, but he is attacked by Tien's Tri-Beam. The real Cell wakes up in the middle of the Cell Games arena, realizing that it was a nightmare and saying that ten days was too long to wait.

"United" continues from the events in "Babel One". On Romulus, Admiral Valdore (Brian Thompson), Romulan scientist Nijil (J. Michael Flynn), and their pilot continue to control the mysterious "marauder", cloaking it to look like ''Enterprise'' and then using it to destroy a Rigelian vessel. Despite this success, Senator Vrax (Geno Silva) chastises them for losing full control of their drone since Commander Charles "Trip" Tucker III (Connor Trinneer) and Lieutenant Malcolm Reed (Dominic Keating) are still on board. Valdore and Nijil then work to trap Tucker inside a service junction as he attempts to divert power. After incapacitating him with leaked radiation coolant, Valdore then orders Reed to re-establish the damaged warp matrix on the drone or see his crewmate die. Reed complies in order to rescue Tucker.

Meanwhile, aboard ''Enterprise'', Commander T'Pol (Jolene Blalock) and Ensign Travis Mayweather (Anthony Montgomery) devise a surveillance grid that will require the coordinated effort of 128 spaceships. After seeking help from Earth and Vulcan, Captain Jonathan Archer (Scott Bakula) realizes that he will need to obtain Andorian and Tellarite support too. Archer's attempt hits a snag when Lieutenant Talas dies from the phaser wound sustained earlier. A devastated Commander Shran (Jeffrey Combs) openly challenges Naarg (Kevin Brief) to a blood-duel using ''Ushaan-Tor'', an Andorian ice-miner's tool. Realizing that a death will derail trade negotiations, Archer announces himself as the Tellarite's substitute. The duel proceeds and Archer is fortunately able to win, and spares Shran's life after severing an antenna.

With the duel completed, Shran promises continued Andorian support for the grid, and the Tellarite's Ambassador Gral (Lee Arenberg) does the same. ''Enterprise'', as a flagship, soon relocates and re-engages the drone. Reed and Tucker, caught in the crossfire and unable to be transported out, narrowly escape death by ejecting themselves into open space. A mixed fleet of "allied" vessels then arrive, forcing Vrax and Valdore to recall the drone at warp speed to Romulan space. Archer then invites the Andorians and the Tellarites to begin their negotiations early. On Romulus, the drone's pilot is revealed to be an Aenar, another species of the Andorian race.

The hero is Matthew Dodd, a rifleman in the 95th Regiment of Foot of the British Army. The novel takes place in Portugal early in the Peninsular War. The British had sent a small force of about 10,000 men to the aid of her ally, Portugal. Rather than face the overwhelming numbers of the opposing French forces under Marshal André Masséna, the British commander, Lord Wellington, secretly constructed the Lines of Torres Vedras and withdrew behind them, leaving the French force no options but to lay siege to the lines, or retreat. For three months the French encamped outside the lines, waiting for reinforcements from the other side of the Tagus River, but in the end hunger and disease forced them to retreat.

During the British withdrawal, Dodd becomes separated from his regiment and is cut off from the British forces, with the entire French army between him and the lines at Torres Vedras. In an attempt to get around the French, he heads for the Tagus River, hoping to follow it to Lisbon. However, the French are there ahead of him, and he has no option but to live off the land and try to survive. He joins a group of Portuguese guerrillas and spends two months with them, harassing the encamped French army, killing sentries and laying ambushes for scouting parties and supply animals.

After two months of guerrilla fighting, Dodd hears artillery fire from about ten miles away. He can tell by the sound that it is neither a battle nor a siege. He knows that anyone exchanging artillery fire with the French is an ally of his, so he takes his friend Bernardino and sets out to see what is happening. They meet another Portuguese guerrilla, whose name they never learn, who leads them to the site of the firing. There he sees British soldiers on the other side of the Tagus firing rockets at the town of Santarém, and the French returning cannon fire to stop them. Dodd deduces that there must be something in the town that the British want to set on fire; furthermore, it must be something near the river. From this he can guess what the target must be: the French are trying to construct a pontoon bridge across the Tagus, and the British are firing the rockets to try to burn the pontoon boats, rope, timber, and paint that are warehoused by the river.

Unable to dislodge the British rocketeers from their entrenchments on the far side of the river, the French gather up all the bridge-building supplies and move them farther up the river, to a position where the British can neither see them nor fire on them. Dodd determines to destroy the bridge material himself. He, Bernardino, and the unnamed guerrilla return to their band's headquarters, only to find that while they were gone the French had discovered and destroyed the whole band, hanging the men on trees and taking away the women and the food.

The three have nothing to eat, so the unnamed guerrilla visits the French encampment that night, kills a sentry and steals a pack mule. They slaughter the mule and smoke the meat, giving them enough food in their packs for several weeks. Then they set out to find the new bridge-building headquarters. Before they find it, they are surprised by a French patrol; they run for cover, but Dodd's two friends fall and are captured. From the safety of the rocks, Dodd looks back to see his friends hanged. He resolutely goes on alone and finds the French encampment. He patiently hides in the rocks watching the business of the camp for several days. Finally, he goes in by night, kills two sentries, and spreads highly flammable grease and oil (kept in cauldrons by the French for tarring rope, greasing cordage, and waterproofing their boats) over the pontoons and timber and rope, and sets it all on fire. From his hideout in the rocks, he sees the whole encampment burn, and is pleased with his success; he never learns that orders had arrived only that day for the French to burn the encampment themselves since Masséna had ordered a retreat.

Dodd avoids the retreating French army and happily rejoins his regiment, unacknowledged, unthanked and unconcerned about his months of demanding effort. Dodd does, however, get something that to him is more important; a new uniform, new boots, a shave, and his first ration of bread & salt in months.

Queens private detective John Shaft is contacted by his old friend Cal Asby, an insurance salesman and mortician, who tells him he's in trouble and asks him to come immediately. As soon as Shaft arrives, Asby is killed by a bomb planted inside of his house. Shaft is questioned by a suspicious police Captain Bollin, but is quickly released due to a lack of evidence.

Asby's business partner Johnny Kelly owes mob boss Gus Mascola $250,000 in past gambling debts, money he had planned to take from his partner but had been moved and hidden before his death. Asby's house is ransacked before Shaft, Kelly, and Asby's sister Arna can investigate. When the perpetrator runs out, Kelly blocks Shaft from chasing him while pretending to help. Suspicious, Shaft tells Arna that he wants to inspect Asby and Kelly’s partnership papers, warning Kelly he intends to protect Arna.

Bollin reveals to Shaft that Asby and Kelly were running a numbers racket with the insurance company and funeral parlor as profitable fronts but because they agreed to keep the scam clean, he looked the other way. Now that Asby is dead, however, Bollin fears that the mob will move in to take over their businesses. Although Bollin suspects that Shaft may be involved with one of the gangsters, he asks him to help, and Shaft coolly agrees.

Shaft forces one of Kelly's numbers runners to reveal the location of the operation's headquarters. Upon arriving, he is seduced by Kelly's mistress Rita as revenge for her lover's mistreatment. While the two have sex, Kelly is threatened by Mascola, who demands not only to be paid but to be made an equal partner in the operation. Kelly is reluctant, telling the mobster that he is worried about Shaft’s interference on Arna’s behalf, but after Mascola promises to “take care” of Shaft, Kelly agrees to a 50-50 partnership.

Shaft goes over the partnership papers with Arna and explains that although her brother was involved in gambling, he was reinvesting in the community, unlike the greedy Kelly. He also tells her that Asby had agreed to buy Kelly out, and that Kelly was going to use the money to pay his debts. Shaft believes that Kelly instead killed Asby to gain control of the businesses and the numbers racket, as well as to retain the $250,000 to pay Mascola. As they are talking, two of Mascola's hitmen arrive to murder Shaft but he outwits them and, after killing the assassins, takes Arna to hide at his apartment.

Kelly offers Harlem racketeer Bumpy Jones a partnership in the Queens numbers game if he will help him break with Mascola. Knowing that the action will cause a major turf war, Bumpy agrees but demands a 60-40 split. Shaft goes to Mascola’s nightclub, which fronts for his gambling operations in the back rooms. Seeing Shaft at the club, Kelly, who is attempting to double-cross both Mascola and Bumpy, confronts Mascola, demanding to know why Shaft is still alive. Mascola reveals that Shaft killed the two men he sent, and when he declares that their deal is off, Kelly lies that Shaft works for Bumpy and is there to muscle in on his territory. Infuriated, Mascola has his men beat Shaft, then orders him to tell Bumpy to stay in Harlem. Shaft relays the message to Bumpy just as Mascola's men attempt a drive-by shooting, leading to Bumpy agreeing to join forces with the detective.

Shaft overhears that Kelly has discovered the location of the $250,000 in a nearby cemetery, and with Rita's help manages to evade police and make his way there. Mascola and his men take a helicopter to the cemetery, and just as Kelly raises the coffin with the money, killing him and taking it. Shaft arrives and holds up the group, taking the money and Mascola hostage. They flee via speedboat as Mascola's men pursue in a helicopter, shooting and destroying the boat and inadvertently killing Mascola. Shaft escapes the explosion and hides the bag, clambering over the docks in a cat-and-mouse chase with Mascola's men before destroying the helicopter and killings its occupants. Police led by Bollin arrive and demand to know the location of the money. Shaft refuses, but implies he will be donating it to a child care clinic, as Asby had always intended.

In the story, Tom, Huck, and Jim travel to Africa in a futuristic hot air balloon, where they survive encounters with lions, robbers, and fleas to see some of the world's greatest wonders, including the Pyramids and the Sphinx. Like ''Adventures of Huckleberry Finn'' and ''Tom Sawyer, Detective'', the story is told using the first-person narrative voice of Huck Finn. It is a sequel, set in the time following the title story of the Tom Sawyer series.

Walking home one night through the streets of Minneapolis after quitting her rock band and breaking up with her boyfriend, Eddi McCandry discovers that she is being pursued by a threatening man and an even more threatening black dog. They turn out to be one and same: a shapeshifting prankster faerie known as a phouka, who drafts Eddi to be the linchpin in the ongoing battle between faerie's good and noble Seelie Court and the evil Unseelie Court, ruled by the Queen of Air and Darkness. Eddi soon finds herself in a struggle for survival against the Unseelie Court, all while trying to put a new rock band together. Meanwhile, her initial feelings of resentment toward the phouka develop into gratitude for his efforts to protect her against the dark queen, and ultimately turn into love. The novel climaxes in a rock concert playoff between Eddi and the Queen of Air and Darkness, which decides the fate of both faerie courts, as well as the fate of her loved one.

The novel is fundamentally the story of five months in the lives of David Bourne, an American writer, and his wife Catherine. It is set mainly in the French Riviera, specifically in the Côte d'Azur, and in Spain. The story begins with their honeymoon in the Camargue, then moves to Spain, then back to France (at a "long low rose-colored Provençal house where they had stayed before... in the pines on the Estérel side of la Napoule" (within easy driving distance to Cannes). However, early in the book, Catherine seemed to change (from David's point of view—the novel is entirely from his vantage). While at le Grau du Roi, Catherine announces "I have a big surprise", but does not tell David what it is other than to hint "Oh it's very simple but it's very complicated" and "...I'm going to be changed." She bicycles into town, then returns with "Her hair... cropped as short as a boy's." Later, that night, she tells him "Don't call me girl." and "Please love me David the way I am." and implies that he is changing also ("You are changing," she said. "Oh you are. You are. Yes you are and you're my girl Catherine.")

While in Spain, Catherine twice acts jealous about David reading clippings of reviews of his latest book—rudely saying "you clipping reader" the second time—and they have a mild spat. (He: "Why don't you just shut up about the clippings." She: "Why should I shut up? Just because you wrote this morning? Do you think I married you because you're a writer? You and your clippings.")

After their return to France, the Bournes soon meet a young woman named Marita, with whom they both fall in love. Catherine seemingly continues to explore gender roles, while David gets increasingly uncomfortable. Both Catherine and David sleep with Marita, although not at the same time. David's relationship with his wife deteriorates as she stops adhering to the gender roles expected of her—sometimes acting jealous of both Marita and his work, then reversing herself. Meanwhile, Marita gradually transitions into the supporting wife role.

It eventually develops that Catherine only wants David to work on what is referred to as the "narrative", which is apparently a narrative of their lives, and not his "stories", tales of his childhood and his father. (Catherine characterizes the "stories" as "The dreary dismal little stories about your adolescence with your bogus drunken father.") David (who has been somewhat passive in his reactions so far) really starts to react, however, when Catherine suddenly declares that she had "made decisions and planned things", which turns out to mean that she's going to "have the [narrative] manuscript typed up to where it is now and see about getting illustrations." David takes this as interference in his work ("And if I don't want it copied yet?") and gets very upset. He tells Catherine "I'm sick of all of it, Devil [his private name for her]. Sick all the way through me."

It culminates when Catherine tells David while they are on the beach that she burned the press clippings. After they return to where they are staying, he finds that the stories he had written are missing too while the "narrative" is intact. "Now he knew that it had happened but still thought it might be some ghastly joke." Catherine confirms that she destroyed the "stories" too: "They were worthless and I hated them." It later develops that she burned them beyond recovery. David is stunned, but lashes out "I'm sorry I ever met you. I'm sorry I ever married you--" Catherine then announces that she is going to leave for Paris "to see about artists for the book [the "narrative"]" and that she will pay him for the destroyed "stories". Although she says that she loves him and will return, the ending implies a separation of David and Catherine is imminent.

As the opening credits appear, Bugs Bunny comes on the screen while eating an obligatory carrot and absentmindedly begins reading them, grossly mispronouncing all of them in the process (e.g. for "Avery" over the correct ), except for the words "story," "animation," the first names of Charles McKimson, Dave Monahan, and Fred Avery, and all of Carl W. Stalling's name. As he finishes, he sees the name of the cartoon and becomes infuriated, spitting out his mouthful of the carrot he was eating. After a brief tirade involving ripping apart the opening credits, he finds Cecil Turtle and bets him ten dollars he can win against him in a race.

Cecil accepts and, after Bugs takes a big lead, hurries to a telephone center, to a phone intended for turtles only, and rings up his cousins on a telephone. He devises a scheme in which they will double as him at significant points along the track while he himself crosses the finish line ahead of Bugs. The plan works, with Bugs being befuddled at what looks like Cecil always being one step ahead of him. After reaching the finish line, thinking he's won, Bugs finds Cecil waiting for him, the apparent victor. Bugs, both furious and perplexed, pays Cecil his owed ten dollars. As Bugs somberly walks away, he suddenly wonders if he'd been tricked. When he turns around, Cecil and his cousins, each with one of the ten dollars in hand, say to him in unison, "Ehhh, it's a possibility," and all of them then kiss Bugs.

In 2007, the U.S. government sends a probe to Adelpha, an alien world in a parallel universe. The probe starts transmitting video images of the world back to Earth. Minutes into the mission, an alien life form discovers the probe and damages it, causing an unforeseen backlash of energy that creates a black hole, threatening Earth. After being briefed on the situation by his old friend Major Vernon, former U.S. Navy SEAL Cutter Slade is given the job of escorting three scientists (William Kauffmann, Anthony Xue and Marion Wolfe) on a mission to this alien world to repair the probe and close the black hole. Arriving in Adelpha, Cutter is separated from the three scientists and, to his surprise, is hailed by the natives as their messiah, the Ulukai.

The main population of Adelpha are a bipedal species called the Talan. Their technology is comparable to those of ancient China or medieval Europe, however they have psychic abilities that vary depending on each Talan's "essence": fire, earth, water, or spirit. Talan soldiers with the ''fae'' (fire) essence use energy weapons that are powered by their psychic abilities. Adelpha is split into several regions that are connected by a system of intercontinental portals known as ''daokas''. These are relics of an ancient civilization, about which the Talan know little. At the time of Cutter's arrival the fire Talan have taken over society and rule through violence and intimidation. This is a relatively recent state of affairs; previously the Talan lived in harmony.

As the game progresses, Cutter learns that the four members of the expedition were separated not in location, but in time. Marion arrives shortly after Cutter, but Kauffmann and Xue arrived decades earlier, and the original probe has not arrived yet. Upon learning of their predicament Xue became unstable, fell out with Kauffmann, and took over the Talan warrior caste, teaching them to be violent and xenophobic. This directly led to a Talan warrior attacking the probe on sight when it arrives, causing the creation of the black hole that threatens the Earth. Kauffmann realised that he could not stop Xue, and started the cult of the Ulukai among the non-warrior Talan before his death, preparing them to help Cutter when he arrives.

Cutter weakens the warrior Talan and unites the other castes, and ultimately defeats Xue and his warriors. With Marion's help, he retrieves the lost computer cards needed to repair the probe. Marion is killed by Xue before the repairs can be completed. Following instructions left by Kauffmann, Cutter repairs the probe and strips down its internals so he can use it as a vehicle to return to Earth, where the return of the probe was expected to close the black hole.

The game begins with the protagonist; a young boy known as Andy being abused by his teacher for sleeping in class where it is revealed that he has nyctophobia (fear of the dark). Being instructed that same day by his teacher to watch the solar eclipse, Andy takes his beloved dog Whisky to the park where dark forces steal Whisky away, prompting Andy to use his assortment of inventions and machines to get him back. Andy travels to another world called the Darkland in a homemade spaceship which promptly crashes and he has to face an assortment of obstacles to rescue Whisky and find his way home.

Throughout the game, Andy is tasked with fighting living shadow creatures and dark monsters while traversing several hostile alien environments such as a canyon, swamp, underwater cave, and lava river. He receives help in this quest from a peaceful alien race called Amigos whom he befriends, and from magic powers he obtains from a meteor referred to as the "magic rock" that can kill all the shadows of fear. The main antagonist is an evil sorcerer known as the Master of Darkness who intended to capture Andy instead of his dog. Somewhat resembling Andy's teacher from the beginning of the game, the Master of Darkness has an interest in capturing Andy and sends his minions to pursue him. Another major antagonist is the Vicious Servant; a sniveling pink creature that serves the Master but is quick to betray him for personal benefit.

After traveling across the varying alien environments and fighting alongside the Amigos, Andy finds himself inside the Master of Darkness' lair where he proceeds to free Whisky and join forces with the Vicious Servant to help overthrow the Master of Darkness. Planning to use the magic rock's power to destroy the black hole at the lair's center. However, Andy is double-crossed by the Servant who kicks Whisky into the black hole and sends Andy into an ambush. Andy ends up fending off droves of shadow creatures and successfully following through with his plan, but falls into the black hole himself along with the Master of Darkness as the structure around him collapses.

The black hole's center is the heart of darkness and there Andy must fight the Master and face his fears once and for all. Upon succeeding the darkness dissipates and Andy awakens in his treehouse, believing the experience was all just a dream but after Andy and Whisky go to sleep and it is shown Andy has likely gotten over his fear of the dark, the player is shown the Amigos cleaning up the wreckage of Andy's ship and proving the adventure was perhaps real.

Roy Strang narrates the book from an (at first) unexplained coma, which he has been in for the previous two years. His life in this state is a miserable affair, surrounded by uncaring doctors and his extremely dysfunctional family. In his fantasy life, he is an adventurer in the wilds of South Africa, where he and his loyal guide, Sandy Jamieson, hunt for the marabou stork.

When not hallucinating, Strang tells his life story, beginning in a "scheme" (local authority housing) in Muirhouse, Scotland, with his violent, delusional parents, two half-brothers (one a womanizer, the other flamboyantly gay), and his promiscuous sister, all of whom he despises. When Strang is 12, he and his family relocate to apartheid-era South Africa, where he is repeatedly molested by his uncle. After his father is jailed for the violent assault of a taxi driver and his uncle is killed in a terrorist bombing, the Strangs are forced to return to Scotland, a mere 18 months after they left.

Strang grows into a violent, misogynistic thug. He maintains a full-time job as a systems analyst for the fictional investment group, "Scottish Spinsters" (a reference to Scottish Widows). He joins a gang of football hooligans who are attached to Hibernian F.C., the Capital City Service, and led by the fearsome Lexo. Strang enjoys his life as a "top boy," feared by the entire town, until the gang kidnaps a young woman who rejected their advances and gang rapes her; Strang is horrified, but too intimidated to try to stop them.

The gang evades prison, but Strang is stricken with guilt and withdraws completely into depression. He briefly revives a few months later when he meets a woman and genuinely feels love for the first time. Around the same time he begins to take ecstasy, and befriends his gay half-brother. His happiness is short-lived, however; the memory of what he has done continues to haunt him, and his depression soon completely engulfs him, taking him away from his lover and his drug-driven escapism. He attempts suicide by asphyxiation, but survives, putting him in a coma.

One day, the gang's rape victim visits him in the hospital. She tells him that she has been murdering her rapists one by one, and now she has come for him, revealing that he was by far the most brutal. She then cuts off his penis and stabs him to death. In his final moments, Strang realizes that the only person he has ever really hated is himself, and makes peace with everyone he has wronged and who has wronged him.

The novel's other, more stream-of-consciousness narrative, intertwined with the story of Strang's past, takes place in the fantasy world he creates for himself in the coma. At first a bizarre but rousing adventure, it gradually becomes darker as Strang reveals the uglier parts of his life and personality, involving surreal images of brutality and sexual violence.

One summer on Lake Springfield, Green Day, after finishing a concert, tries to engage the audience in a discussion about the environment, angering the audience into throwing garbage at them, causing the pollution in the lake to erode and sink the band's barge, drowning them. During their memorial at Reverend Lovejoy's church, Grampa Simpson has a spiritual experience and frantically prophesies that a disaster will befall Springfield, but only Marge takes it seriously. Concerned about the terrible state of the environment, Lisa and her new love interest, Colin, hold a seminar where they successfully convince Mayor Quimby to tell the town to clean up the lake. Meanwhile, after a series of dares, including one with Bart skateboarding across Springfield naked and getting in trouble with Chief Wiggum, Homer and Bart go to Krusty Burger, where Homer adopts a pig that Krusty the Clown was about to have killed after filming a commercial there. Marge, identifying the pig as a part of Grampa's prophecy, warns Homer to get rid of it, but Homer refuses. Homer's fawning over the pig makes Bart, now fed up with his father's carelessness, look to their neighbor, Ned Flanders, as a father figure.

Homer stores the pig's feces in an overflowing silo, disgusting Marge. Homer attempts to dispose of it safely at Marge's request, but his friend Lenny calls him to inform him about Lard Lad Donuts giving away all their donuts for free due to failing a health inspection. In a rush to get to the giveaway, Homer dumps the silo in the lake, critically polluting it. Moments later, a squirrel stumbles into it and becomes severely mutated. While bonding on a hike, Bart and Flanders notice the squirrel, which the EPA capture. Russ Cargill, head of the EPA, informs President Arnold Schwarzenegger on Springfield's pollution crisis and presents five solutions. Without reading them, the president randomly picks the third solution: imprisoning Springfield under a giant glass dome. When Homer's silo is discovered on live television, the townspeople, including Grampa, the school staff, and the Simpsons' friends and neighbors (except for the Flanders and Colin) form an angry mob, ransack their house and attempt to lynch them. The family escapes through a sinkhole, which destroys the house soon after. The family flees to Alaska using a truck that Lisa helps Homer win at a motorcycle contest, where they try to restart their lives.

Within ninety-three days, Springfield completely exhausts its daily supplies and the townspeople go crazy as they attempt to escape from the dome using brute force to destroy it, causing cracks to form. Cargill, not wanting news of what he has done to spread around the world, plots to destroy Springfield by tricking the president into choosing a solution that involves its demolition. The Simpsons see a television advertisement for a new Grand Canyon on the site of Springfield. Realizing that their hometown is in danger, the family decide to save it except for Homer, who refuses to help the people who tried to kill them. The family soon abandons Homer for his selfishness, with Marge leaving behind a recorded message about it recorded over their wedding video, causing him to run off in search of them. The family are captured by the EPA and placed back inside the dome. After an encounter with a mysterious Inuit shaman who saves him from a polar bear, Homer has an epiphany about saving the town in order to save himself.

Homer returns home and learns about his family's capture as a helicopter lowers a time bomb suspended by a rope through a hole at the top of the dome. Homer enters the dome and descends the rope, knocking the escaping townspeople and the bomb off, inadvertently shortening its countdown, much to the townspeople's anger. Taking a motorcycle, Homer drives to the church and reunites with Bart. After reconciling with him, he and Homer uses the motorcycle to travel up the side of the dome. Bart throws the bomb through the hole seconds before it detonates, shattering the dome and freeing the town. Homer and Bart land safely at Springfield Gorge where a shotgun-wielding Cargill confronts the pair and attempts to kill them for foiling his plan. But before he can do so, Maggie knocks him out by dropping a large rock on his head. As Cargill is fired from his job and sent to prison for his actions, the townspeople decide to forgive Homer and hail him a hero for saving their lives and for saving Springfield from destruction. He rides into the sunset with Marge and Maggie, whereupon the townspeople restore Springfield to normal. As a symbol of their gratitude, the townspeople also help the Simpsons rebuild their house that was destroyed by the sinkhole earlier.

The game begins following the events of ''Syberia'' with the law firm that American lawyer Kate Walker worked for in New York, calling in a private detective. The firm instructs the detective to locate and find Walker since heading out to oversee a business takeover of an automaton toy factory, who has since abandoned her job, hoping to appease her family in bringing her back home. In the fictional Russian town of Romansburg, Kate provides assistance for eccentric inventor Hans Voralberg, who seeks to find living prehistoric mammoths, and his automaton train engineer Oscar, by prepping his specially crafted clockwork train with coal. Shortly after completing this, Hans falls ill, forcing Kate to seek treatment for him at a nearby monastery perched on a clifftop.

When she learns that the patriarch believes he cannot be cured and decides he should be given spiritual salvation, Kate opts to find a cure for Hans, learning about a friend of his who uncovered information on Youkol medicine. Finding his notebook hidden in the monastery, Kate recreates the medicine and uses it to treat Hans, before being forced to create an escape route for the pair when the patriarch refuses to let them leave. Returning to Romansburg, Kate agrees to take a mechanical part to a local tavern and repair an automaton device he created there for its owner. Upon completing the task, Kate hears the train leaving the station, and learns that two locals, brothers Ivan and Igor, hijacked with the intention of reaching the fabled island of Syberia (inspired by the real-life location of Wrangel Island in Siberia, the last place on earth where mammoths survived), so as to profit from harvesting mammoth ivory. Forced to pursue them, Kate makes use of a railroad gangcar, used for maintenance, which she powers with a friendly Youki - an animal that is part seal, part bear, with dog-like traits.

Kate manages to catch up with the train, only to see that the two men abandoned it after it got stuck at a collapsed bridge, and fled by snowmobile with Hans. Disconnecting the passenger car from the locomotive, Kate, after restoring Oscar to full functions, continues pursuing them. The pair eventually track the thieves to a large statue in front of the railroad tracks. Kate discovers from Igor, who is having second thoughts and wants to return home, that Hans disappeared shortly after the brothers arrived. Confronting Ivan over her friend's location at the base of the statue, Kate is quickly trapped by him on the belief she intends to steal his ivory. Just before he is about to kill her, the ice beneath the statue they are standing on cracks and breaks up, sending Kate plunging underground.

Upon awaking, she finds herself within a hidden underground Youkol village, in which Hans is being treated by a local shaman who reveals he is on his deathbed. After managing to bring the locomotive into the village, Kate acquires the means for the shaman to transport her into Hans' dreams, which recreate the village of Valadilène, and manages to reach him. Although she convinces him to wake up, she finds herself given cryptic words by him before exiting the dream world. When she asks Oscar what these means, the automaton leaves the locomotive to join his creator, whereupon Kate discovers that he was designed with a primitive exo-skeleton/life-support system to provide Hans the means to stay alive and fulfill his dreams. After witnessing Hans being placed within this, Kate learns that to reach Syberia, she must thaw out a Youkol boat within the village, and does so through using the locomotive, discovering Hans designed it for this purpose.

Boarding the boat, Kate, Hans and their Youki partner, soon become stuck in an ice floe. When Kate works to free them, the boat is hijacked by Ivan, who intends to leave Kate and continue to Syberia, but finds himself unable to operate the craft. Kate manages to return onboard and forces him off, whereupon he attempts to toss a penguin egg (a fictional North Pole species resembling emperor penguins) in defiance at her actions, only to anger the penguins guarding their nest and causing them to kill him. Eventually Kate and Hans arrive at Syberia, whereupon they manage to use ancient Youkol horns to summon a herd of mammoths. Hans, delighted to meet them, is gladly allowed on their backs and rides off with them, as Kate waves him a tearful goodbye. Meanwhile, the law firm learn from their private detective that despite his best efforts following her, he calls it quits on his job, claiming she has vanished without a trace.

The poem, which in detail bears almost no resemblance to the actual history or cultural setting of the Crusades, tells of the initial disunity and setbacks of the Christians and their ultimate success in taking Jerusalem in 1099. The main historical leaders of the First Crusade feature, but much of the poem is concerned with romantic sub-plots involving entirely fictional characters, except for Tancredi, who is identified with the historical Tancred, Prince of Galilee. The three main female characters begin as Muslims, have romantic entanglements with Christian knights, and are eventually converted to Christianity. They are all women of action: two of them fight in battles, and the third is a sorceress. There are many magical elements, and the Saracens often act as though they were classical pagans. The most famous episodes, and those most often dramatised and painted, include the following:

'''Sofronia''' (in English: Sophronia), a Christian maiden of Jerusalem, accuses herself of a crime in order to avert a general massacre of the Christians by the Muslim king. In an attempt to save her, her lover '''Olindo''' accuses himself in turn, and each lover pleads with the authorities in order to save the other. However, it is the arrival and intervention of the warrior-maiden Clorinda which saves them (Canto 2).

'''Clorinda''' joins the Muslims, but the Christian knight '''Tancredi''' (in English: Tancred) falls in love with her (Canto 3). During a night battle in which she sets the Christian siege tower on fire, she is mistakenly killed by Tancredi, but she converts to Christianity before dying (Canto 12). The character of Clorinda is inspired in part by Virgil's Camilla and by Bradamante in Ariosto; the circumstances of her birth (a Caucasian girl born to African parents) are modeled on the lead character (Chariclea) from the ancient Greek novel by Heliodorus of Emesa. To prevent the crusaders from cutting timber for siege engines, the Muslim sorcerer Ismen protects the forest with enchantments, which defeat the Christian knights, even Tancredi (Canto 13). Eventually, the enchantments are broken by Rinaldo, and the siege engines built (Canto 18). (1619).

Another maiden of the region, the Princess '''Erminia''' (or "Hermine") of Antioch, also falls in love with Tancredi and betrays her people to help him, but she grows jealous when she learns that Tancredi loves Clorinda. One night she steals Clorinda's armor and leaves the city, in an attempt to find Tancredi, but she is attacked by Christian soldiers (who mistake her for Clorinda) and she flees into the forest, where she is cared for by a family of shepherds, with an old man who weaves baskets (Cantos 6–7). Later in the poem, we find her again in the company of Armida's ladies, but Erminia abandons her Muslim people and goes over to the Christian side. When Tancredi is dangerously wounded in combat, she heals him, cutting off her hair to bind his wounds (Canto 19).

The witch '''Armida''' (modeled on Circe in Homer and the witch Alcina in Ariosto's epic) enters the Christian camp asking for their aid; her seductions divide the knights against each other and a group leaves with her, only to be transformed into animals by her magic (Canto 5). Armida comes across the sleeping '''Rinaldo''', the greatest of the Christian knights, and abducts him in her chariot (Canto 14). He has the same name as a Carolingian paladin count who is a character in Ariosto's ''Orlando Furioso'' [III, 30]; he is the son of Bertoldo and was the reputed founder of the House of Este. She intends to kill him but she falls in love with him instead and takes him away to a magical island where he becomes infatuated with her and forgets the crusade.

Carlo and Ubaldo, two Christian knights and close companions of Rinaldo, seek out the hidden fortress, brave the dangers that guard it and find Rinaldo and Armida in each other's arms. By giving Rinaldo a mirror of diamond, they force him to see himself in his effeminate and amorous state and to return to the war, leaving Armida heartbroken (Cantos 14–16). Rinaldo is deposited on a shore where he finds a shield and sword, and the "Mago d'Ascalona" ("Wizard of Ascalon") shows him a vision of the future in the shield, including the glories of the House of Este (Tasso drops in several prophecies of the time between 1099 and his own at various points). Rinaldo resolves to pursue the crusade with all his might (Canto 17)..Armida is grief-stricken and raises an army to kill Rinaldo and fight the Christians, but her champions are all defeated. She attempts to commit suicide, but Rinaldo finds her in time and prevents her. Rinaldo then begs her to convert to Christianity, and Armida, her heart softened, consents (Canto 20). (This sequence echoes a similar storyline in Ariosto: the witch Alcina ensnares the knight Ruggiero, but the spell is broken by a magic ring that the good sorceress Melissa brings him; earlier antecedents include Calypso's attempt to keep Odysseus on her island Ogygia and Morgan le Fay taking Ogier the Dane off to a faraway island.)

After the enchantments on the forest are broken, finally the Crusaders breach the walls and take the city, with some Muslims remaining in the Temple Mount. But an Egyptian army is known to be arriving in a few days (Canto 18). When they arrive there is a great battle outside the walls, which the Christians win, completing their quest (Canto 20).

A washed-up TV action hero—who at the peak of his career was ceremonially deputized by local law enforcement—falsely believes he can solve crimes in real life. His student Jason (played by Todd Field) becomes his sidekick.

Ferdinand Griffon is unhappily married and has been recently fired from his job at a TV broadcasting company. After attending a mindless party full of shallow discussions in Paris, he feels a need to escape and decides to run away with ex-girlfriend Marianne Renoir, leaving his wife and children and bourgeois lifestyle. Following Marianne into her apartment and finding a corpse, Ferdinand soon discovers that Marianne is being chased by OAS gangsters, two of whom they barely escape. Marianne and Ferdinand, whom she calls Pierrot – an unwelcome nickname meaning "sad clown" – go on a crime spree from Paris to the Mediterranean Sea in the dead man's car. They lead an unorthodox life, always on the run, pursued by the police and by the OAS gangsters. When they settle down in the French Riviera after burning the dead man's car (which had been full of money, unbeknownst to Marianne) and sinking a second car into the Mediterranean Sea, their relationship becomes strained. Ferdinand reads books, philosophizes, and writes a diary. They spend a few days on a desert island.

A dwarf, who is one of the gangsters, kidnaps Marianne. She kills him with a pair of scissors. Ferdinand finds him murdered and is caught and bludgeoned by two of his accomplices, who waterboard him to make him reveal Marianne’s whereabouts. Marianne escapes, and she and Ferdinand are separated. He settles in Toulon while she searches for him everywhere until she finds him. After their eventual reunion, Marianne uses Ferdinand to get a suitcase full of money before running away with her real boyfriend, Fred, to whom she had previously referred as her brother. Ferdinand shoots Marianne and Fred, then paints his face blue and decides to blow himself up by tying sticks of red and yellow dynamite to his head. He regrets this at the last second and tries to extinguish the fuse, but he fails and is blown up.

James J. Braddock is an Irish-American boxer from New Jersey, formerly a light heavyweight contender, who is forced to give up boxing after breaking his hand in the ring. This is both a relief and a burden to his wife, Mae. She cannot bring herself to watch the violence of his chosen profession, yet she knows they will not have enough income without his boxing.

As the United States enters the Great Depression, Braddock does manual labor as a longshoreman to support his family, even with his injured hand. Unfortunately, he cannot get work every day. Thanks to a last-minute cancellation by another boxer, Braddock's longtime manager and friend, Joe Gould, offers him a chance to fill in for just one night and earn cash. The fight is against the number-two contender in the world, Corn Griffin.

Braddock stuns the boxing experts and fans with a third-round knockout of his formidable opponent. He believes that while his right hand was broken, he became more proficient with his left hand, improving his in-ring ability. Despite Mae's objections, Braddock takes up Gould's offer to return to the ring. Mae resents this attempt by Gould to profit from her husband's dangerous livelihood, until she discovers that Gould and his wife also have been devastated by hard times.

With a shot at the heavyweight championship held by Max Baer a possibility, Braddock continues to win. Out of a sense of pride, he uses a portion of his prize money to pay back money to the government given to him while unemployed. When his rags to riches story gets out, the sportswriter Damon Runyon dubs him "The Cinderella Man", and before long Braddock comes to represent the hopes and aspirations of the American public struggling with the Depression.

After wins against John Henry Lewis and Art Lasky, a title fight against Baer comes his way. Braddock is a 10-to-1 underdog. Baer is so destructive that the fight's promoter, James Johnston, forces both Braddock and Gould to watch a film of Baer in action, just so he can maintain later that he warned them what Braddock was up against.

Braddock demonstrates no fear. The arrogant Baer attempts to intimidate him, even taunting Mae in public that her man might not survive. When he says this, she becomes so angry that she throws a drink at him. She is unable to attend the fight at the Madison Square Garden Bowl or even to listen to it on the radio.

On June 13, 1935, in one of the greatest upsets in boxing history, Braddock defeats the seemingly invincible Baer to become the heavyweight champion of the world.

An epilogue reveals that Braddock would lose his title to Joe Louis and later worked on the building of the Verrazano Bridge, owning and operating heavy machinery on the docks where he worked during the Depression, and that he and Mae used his boxing income to buy a house, where they spent the rest of their lives.

To keep her secrets confidential, Lisa wants a Turbo Diary, which electrocutes anyone who tries to read it besides the owner. Homer and Bart go to the mall to get the diary, but Homer gets sidetracked by the loads of free food samples and by the time they get to the toy store, the diaries are sold out. After seeing a personalized animated film Ned made for Rod, Homer does the same for Lisa, but when Lisa watches it, she realizes Homer knows nothing about her, upsetting her.

Feeling sad, Homer gets an idea from Moe to hire Dexter Colt, a private detective, to find out facts about Lisa. Colt spies on her and builds up information for a report, which Homer uses to bond with Lisa by playing songs she likes and going to a protest against animal testing at a research lab. When Homer goes to Colt to thank him, he gives him a bill for $1000 which includes frivolous expenses including steak dinners and silver bullets (Colt having worked on the assumption that Lisa was a werewolf). Homer refuses to pay the bill and runs off to his house as Colt swears revenge.

The next morning, someone has vandalized the research lab and stolen all the animals. Chief Wiggum says that, based on the clues, Lisa is the main suspect. Lisa says she is innocent and Homer realizes that she has been framed by Colt. They escape as fugitives, in disguise. While on the run, Homer confesses about the report and Colt to Lisa, upsetting her once more.

The police track the pair to a motel, but they escape again and find themselves at a circus, where they discover all the stolen animals. Colt shows up and chases Homer into a hall of mirrors. As Colt is about to kill Homer, Lisa catches up. After Homer mentions her strong sense of hearing, Lisa, impressed he actually remembered something about her, blinds Colt with a laser pointer (Bart's gift to her), and Colt is soon arrested. Lisa is exonerated, and the animals are all released back into the wild, until Cletus and his family adopts them.

Later, Lisa eventually gets her Turbo Diary, which Bart uses one night to play a prank on Homer.

Lynn and her sister Sue are computer hackers, assassins and espionage specialists who use their late father's secret satellite technology to gain an advantage over their rivals and law enforcement agents. At the beginning of the film, they infiltrate a high security building and assassinate Chow Lui, the chairman of a top company in China.

After their successful mission, a police inspector named Kong Yat-hung is assigned to investigate the case and she manages to track down the assassins. In the meantime, Chow Lui's younger brother Chow Nung, who hired Lynn and Sue to kill his brother so that he can become the chairman, wants to kill the assassins to silence them. The cat-and-mouse chase becomes more complicated as both the police and the thugs are out to get Lynn and Sue.

Sue has always been playing the role of the assistant by staying on the computer and helping to disable the security systems and giving instructions on navigating the area, while Lynn, who is older and more experienced, does all the field work. Sue is jealous and thinks that Lynn refuses to let her participate more actively because she is less adept, but actually Lynn is trying to protect her sister from danger. Their relationship becomes strained when Lynn falls in love with her friend's cousin Yen and wants to give up her job and marry Yen. Sue intends to continue her career as a contract killer so that she can prove that she is as good as her sister.

Kong Yat-hung tracks down Sue in a bakery, where Sue is buying a birthday cake, and this leads to a frantic car chase. When Sue realises that she is being cornered by the police, she calls Lynn at home and asks her sister for help. At the same time, Chow Nung's assassins break into the house and kill Lynn and frame Kong Yat-hung for the murder. Sue escapes from the police and finds out the true identities of her sister's killers from the CCTVs in the house. She rescues Kong Yat-hung from custody and offers to help her clear her name, but Kong must assist her in avenging her sister. Left with no choice, Kong Yat-hung agrees to team up with Sue to hunt down and kill Chow Nung and his henchmen. Over the course of planning the counter-attack, Sue and Kong Yat-hung bond.

Sue and Kong Yat-hung succeed in defeating Chow Nung. Both of them agree that if not due to the nature of their line of work (one a police and the other a criminal), they might have been best friends. With that, they part ways.

Sue visits Lynn's grave, saying thank you for everything that her sister have done, and she can now take care of herself. She promises Lynn that she will tell Yen the whole ordeal, knowing that Yen is “the guy Lynn loves the most”. The film ends with a scene where Yen is still waiting for Lynn at a restaurant which they had promised to meet.

After a series of countrywide auditions, twelve young dancers gain entry to the American Ballet Academy (which is loosely based on the School of American Ballet), the affiliate school of the American Ballet Company (which appears to be based on either the American Ballet Theatre or the New York City Ballet). They work hard, attending classes every day for weeks to make them the best dancers they can possibly be, and in preparations for a final dance workshop which will determine the three boys and three girls who will be asked to join the company. The workshop will also provide an opportunity for the students to showcase their talent to other ballet companies across the country. Gaining a leading part in the workshop is therefore essential.

Tensions mount between Jonathan Reeves (Peter Gallagher), the company's aging choreographer and director, and Cooper Nielson (Ethan Stiefel), his best dancer, who also wants to choreograph. They also have issues because Kathleen Donahue (Julie Kent), Cooper's ex-girlfriend and fellow dancer, left him to wed Jonathan. Star student Maureen (Susan May Pratt), a closet bulimic who seems poised for success, discovers that life is passing her by when she meets a pre-med student (Eion Bailey) who shows her the merits of a life without ballet, to the dismay of her controlling stage mother (Debra Monk), herself a failed ballet dancer and current ABC employee. Sweet Jody Sawyer (Amanda Schull), despite underdeveloped turn out, body type issues, and poor footwork, is determined to dance professionally, but it appears less and less likely as the movie progresses that she will be good enough. Jody's parents, Jonathan, Maureen, and ballet teacher Juliette Simone (Donna Murphy) try to convince Jody to move on from dance and attend college. Jody refuses to give up on her dream of being in a professional ballet company. Talented, but smart aleck Eva Rodriguez (Zoe Saldana; doubled by SAB alumna and former NYCB member Aesha Ash) from Boston loves to dance but seems destined to be stuck in the back of the corps because of her bad attitude. Tensions also arise between Charlie (Sascha Radetsky), a naturally gifted fellow advanced student from Seattle, and Cooper over Jody; Charlie has a crush on Jody, who had a one-night stand with Cooper and remains infatuated with him.

Despite Jonathan's objections, Cooper choreographs a rock/pop music-based ballet for the workshop. Three ballets are presented; Jonathan and another choreographer create the other two respectively—the two more "traditional" ballets are not danced to actual ballet music, however. The first (not shown, beyond entrances of the corps and soloist from the wings) is to Mendelssohn's ''Italian Symphony'', while Jonathan's ballet (choreographed by Christopher Wheeldon) is set to Rachmaninov's 2nd Piano Concerto. Cooper's ballet (choreographed by Susan Stroman) mirrors the relationship between himself, Jonathan, and Kathleen. Jody, Charlie, and their gay friend Erik (Shakiem Evans) are set to dance the three lead roles when Erik sprains his ankle in a final rehearsal. To Jonathan's protests and Jody's apprehension, Cooper steps in to fill the role, and the tensions between Jody, Charlie, and Cooper play out on the stage.

After the final workshop, Cooper starts his own dance company, much to Jonathan's chagrin, as Cooper's financial backer is a wealthy widow (played by Elizabeth Hubbard) who Jonathan was hoping would donate to American Ballet Company. Cooper asks Jody to be a principal dancer, as her dancing style, though technically deficient, is perfect for his company. He also asks to date her, but Jody turns him down in favor of Charlie. Maureen decides to give up ballet because she finally realizes that ballet is just something she does well and not what she wants in life. She decides to attend regular university and also seek help for her eating disorder. Eva is picked by Jonathan to join ABC after proving her worth in the workshop, surprising everyone by dancing in place of Maureen as the lead in Jonathan's ballet. When Nancy confronts Maureen for quitting, she calls her mother out for her behavior. She points out that ballet was Nancy's passion and that she only did ballet to make Nancy proud because she never got the chance to be a ballet dancer herself. After realizing how unhappy she is, Maureen decided she wants a normal life in attending college and follow her own dreams away from Nancy. Charlie, and fellow advanced students and friends Anna (who was always favored by Jonathan and who danced "Gelsey Kirkland's part" as the lead in the ''Italian Symphony'' ballet; played by SAB alumna and former NYCB corps member Megan Pepin) and Erik are also asked to join the American Ballet Company, and Sergei (Ilia Kulik), Charlie and Erik's roommate and friend, joins his girlfriend Galina in the San Francisco Ballet Company.

Ellen Pendleton, an aspiring writer, takes a job at a private library. The librarian, Gloria, admits her employer has in fact not given her permission to hire an assistant, but she feels incapable of managing the massive responsibility on her own: the library contains one book for every person alive, with a complete account of their life, accurate to the latest second. When a person dies, that book is removed. No one is allowed to read the books.

While trying to write, Ellen is disturbed by her noisy neighbors, Edwin and Carla, who have just moved into Edwin's apartment from a room downstairs. Using correction fluid and a pen, Ellen rewrites a passage in Edwin's book to make him a Catholic priest, rendering him ineligible to share an apartment with Carla and preventing all their boisterous lovemaking. When Ellen gets home that night, she finds her sister Lori consoling the now-single Carla, who is nearly suicidal from loneliness.

Ellen rewrites Carla's book to make her happily married to another neighbor, Doug. When she gets home, she finds Doug is bankrupt from buying gifts for Carla and regrets not getting into real estate. Ellen changes Doug's book by giving him real estate wealth, but now he is her landlord and her sister is organizing a rent strike.

Ellen rewrites her own book so that she and Lori live in a house by the sea instead. She returns home to find that Lori drowned while rescuing a boy from the ocean. Ellen dashes back to the library and is caught by Gloria, who is incensed when she learns Ellen tampered with the books. She orders Ellen to gather all the books she rewrote and ushers her out of the library. Ellen is met outside by Lori, alive and well. Ellen tries to return to thank Gloria, but the door is answered by a man who claims no one named Gloria is there.

Fed up with her dead-end job with a Minneapolis car rental agency, Martha quits, cashes her final paycheck, and uses the money to purchase an airline ticket to the least expensive international destination she can find - London. At the airport, she meets Daniel, a successful music label executive, who covertly arranges for her to be upgraded to First Class and seated next to him on the flight. When she sells the ticket to another passenger and Daniel finds his seatmate is an obnoxiously loud woman instead of the girl of his dreams, he moves back to the Economy section and takes the vacant seat next to Martha. Before landing in London, he offers her the use of a deluxe suite in a luxury hotel at his company's expense in exchange for a lunch date the following day.

Through a series of flashbacks and flashforwards, we learn Laurence, a former bridge champion who now teaches the game to wealthy women, went to the airport to pick up Daniel but missed him because the flight landed early. Instead, he literally runs into Martha, who hits him with a luggage cart while searching for the exit. She coerces him into taking her into the city and invites him to the suite for dinner. While she is in the bathroom, a bouquet of flowers from Daniel is delivered to the suite, and when Laurence sees the attached card, he departs without explanation.

The following day, Martha meets struggling actor Frank, who has fled an audition in a panic and has gone to the park to console himself with a half-bottle of whiskey. Having heard about her from Daniel, he realizes who she is and calls Laurence to boast that he is about to make her his conquest. He takes her to a nearby art gallery. Martha slips away and heads for the exit, where she reunites with Laurence, who was looking for the pair. He invites her back to his flat and she accepts.

Torn between loyalty to Daniel and love for Martha, Laurence seeks advice from Pederson, a neighbour he mistakenly believes is a psychiatrist, in the early morning hours. In the interim, Martha awakens and seeing a photograph of the three friends, assumes she has been the target of an elaborate practical joke. To get even, she separately invites each of the men to meet her for breakfast and when all three arrive, bearing floral arrangements of varying size, a brawl ensues. Laurence sees Martha running off in the distance but is unable to catch her. Despondent, he goes to a travel agency to purchase a ticket anywhere he can go for £99, which proves to be Reykjavík. At the airport gate, he is told he is being seated in First Class and when he boards the plane, he finds Martha waiting for him. She reveals she was responsible for the upgrade, a trick she learned from Daniel.

When Claire (played by Lola Naymark) learns that she is five months pregnant at the age of seventeen, she decides to keep the baby and not to tell the father (who seems to be married). Instead, she quits her current job at a local supermarket and goes to work as an assistant for Madame Mélikian (Ariane Ascaride), an embroiderer for haute couture. Mélikian has just lost her only son in a motorcycle accident. Claire shows her willingness in taking her duties, as well as taking over Mélikian's private order when she is treated in the hospital.

In the 2002 OVA Mazinkaiser, Tetsuya fights alongside Kouji against Doctor Hell's forces. The OVA version of Great Mazinger is physically identical to the original, but with black coloring on the arms and legs instead of blue. Great is seriously damaged during the initial battle in the series. It became worse when the captured Mazinger Z attacks the Photon Power Labs even though Tetsuya does his best to defend the lab against Mazinger Z. Lastly, the rampaging Mazinkaiser leaves him badly injured while Great Mazinger is a complete wreck. Consequently, he leaves together with Jun to get treated for his injuries.

Near the end of the OVA, Tetsuya returns with a new and much more powerful Great, which is discovered in Doctor Juzo Kabuto's laboratory. This is said to be the real Great Mazinger (or "Shin Great Mazinger"). The "''true''" Great is structurally the same as the earlier version, but the color scheme for the forearms and legs is blue, as in the original 70's version. It is explained that the Great Mazinger made by Doctor Kenzo Kabuto (Kouji's father) is the prototype version seen in the early episodes, whereas Doctor Juzo Kabuto (Kouji's grandfather), who secretly works in an underground laboratory, managed to finish the final version of Great Mazinger. With a tremendous power compared to the prototype version, Tetsuya asked Kouji to confront Dr. Hell in Bardos Island. Kouji, without knowing the true Shin Great Mazinger, was worried and asked Tetsuya if he can handle an entire army of super robots. However, having the confidence with Shin Great Mazinger, Tetusya scolds Kouji of his cockiness. Therefore, Kouji flies off to fight Dr. Hell leaving Tetsuya against an entire army of mechanical beasts. Consequently, Shin Great Mazinger defeated the entire army of Doctor Hell including the possessed Venus Ace (although most of the battle was not shown). After the battle without damage, Great Mazinger decided to find and help Kouji in the Floating Fortress of Dr. Hell. The concept of Shin Great Mazinger is to bring Great Mazinger to the ranks of modern and more powerful robots such as Mazinkaiser and Shin Getter Robo.

Young housewife Bonnie (Annie Potts) is on a bus to Toronto. She is pregnant, which her husband Stanley (Robert Carradine), an auto mechanic and aspiring race car driver, is delighted about. However, Stanley is unaware he is not the real father of the baby and Bonnie is seeking an abortion. On the bus, Bonnie meets Rita (Margot Kidder), a free-spirited itinerant between jobs. The two women become friends and decide to get an apartment together in Toronto, eventually finding jobs at a mattress factory. Dealing with romance and poverty, they learn that they have more in common than they thought.

Rita sets her romantic sights on Marcello (Winston Rekert), the factory owner’s nephew. As Bonnie contemplates getting an abortion, Stanley tracks her down and she is forced to admit the truth. Rita’s affair with Marcello ends in betrayal when his fiancée from Italy arrives. Stanley and Bonnie eventually reunite after he comes to terms with Bonnie’s infidelity and agrees to help raise the baby as his own.

Max Dembo, a lifelong thief in Los Angeles, is released from a six-year stint in prison and forced to report to a boorish and condescending parole officer, Earl Frank. One of the conditions of parole is that Max finds a job. At the employment agency, he meets young Jenny Mercer, a newly-hired secretary who helps him land scale-wage work at a can factory. Jenny accepts Max's invitation to dinner, clearly smitten by his worldly and seemingly gentle demeanor.

Earl pays a surprise visit to Max's room, finding a book of matches that Max's friend Willy Darin recently used to cook heroin. Although Max clearly has no track marks or other signs of drug abuse, he is handcuffed and dragged back to jail, out of a job and a home. Jenny visits him in jail and gives him her number to call when he gets out.

After urine tests prove he is clean, Max is picked up by a smug Earl, who feels he actually gave Max a break by not pursuing the fact that someone had been using drugs in his place of residence, which would result in three more years in prison. During their car ride to a halfway house, Earl pushes Max to name the user. Max, realizing he will never get a break, pummels Earl, takes control of his car, and handcuffs him to a highway divider fence with his pants around his ankles.

This stunt now makes straight life impossible. Max returns to a life of crime, robbing a Chinese-owned grocery store and planning bigger heists with some willing old accomplices. After robbing a bank together, Max and his friend Jerry Schue decide to up the ante and clean out a Beverly Hills jewelry store. The job is botched when Max takes too long in trying to steal everything. Willy, acting as getaway driver, panics and takes off, leaving Max and Jerry to flee on foot as police converge on the store.

While the men attempt to hide in a residential backyard, Jerry is shot and killed, while Max shoots a police officer. Max escapes with the loot, settles the score with Willy by murdering him, and flees Los Angeles with a loyal Jenny by his side. While driving through the Antelope Valley, Jenny hears a news bulletin on the radio detailing the extent of Max's crime, and the various deaths that occurred. She becomes upset, and forces Max to stop the car so she can vomit.

A short time later, the couple arrive at a lone service station and diner near Palmdale. The two have drinks there, but Max has second thoughts as to their prospects on the lam, and implies that Jenny return to Los Angeles by bus. He decides to leave Jenny for her own good, resigning himself to a criminal life. Outside the diner, Jenny asks Max if he will call her. He says he wants to get caught, and drives away. The movie ends with a montage of his booking photos dating back to his teen years.

''The Word for World is Forest'' begins from the point of view of Captain Davidson, who is the commander of a logging camp named Smith camp. Many native Athsheans are used as slave labor at the camp, and also as personal servants. The novel begins with Davidson travelling to "Centralville", the headquarters of the colony, hoping to have a sexual encounter with one of a number of women who have just arrived on the predominantly male colony. When Davidson returns to Smith Camp, he finds the entire camp burned to the ground, and all of the humans dead. He lands to investigate, and while on the ground is overpowered by four Athsheans. He recognizes one of them as Selver, an Athshean who was a personal servant at the headquarters of the colony, and later an assistant to Raj Lyubov, the colony anthropologist. A few months prior to the attack, Davidson had raped Selver's wife Thele, who died in the process, prompting an enraged Selver to attack Davidson. Davidson nearly kills him, before he is rescued by Lyubov; however, he is left with prominent facial scars, which render him easily recognizable. The Athsheans allow Davidson to leave and carry a message about the destruction of the camp back to the colony headquarters.

After the attack, Selver roams through the forest for five days before coming upon an Athshean settlement. After recovering from the effects of many days of travel, Selver describes to the people of the town the destruction of his town, known as Eshreth, by the Terrans, who then built their headquarters at the site. He also tells them about the enslavement of hundreds of Athsheans at the various camps. He says that the Terrans are crazy because they do not respect the sanctity of life in the same way that the Athsheans do, which was why he led the attack against camp Smith. After some discussion, the people of the town send messengers to other towns sharing Selver's story, while Selver himself travels back towards the Terran headquarters.

An inquiry into the destruction of camp Smith is held at Centralville. In addition to the personnel of the colony, two emissaries from the planets of Hain and Tau Ceti also participate. Lyubov states that the colony's mistreatment and enslavement of the Athsheans led to the attack. Colonel Dongh, the commander of the colony, blames Lyubov's assessment of the Athsheans as non-aggressive. The emissaries state that the rules of Terra's colonial administration have changed since the colony last heard from it; they present the colony with an ansible, which can communicate instantly with Terra and the colonial administration (communication which would otherwise take 27 years in one direction). They also state that Terra is now a member of the "League of Worlds", of which they are emissaries. The colony is forced to release all its Athshean slaves, and minimize contact with them. Davidson is transferred to a different camp under a higher-ranking commander, as punishment for a retaliatory raid that he carried out. However, Davidson violates his orders and leads further attacks against Athshean towns, without the knowledge of his superiors.

Following the inquiry, Lyubov visits the Athshean town he had been studying. He meets Selver, hoping to rebuild their friendship, but Selver rebuffs him, telling him to stay away from the town center. Two nights later, Selver leads the Athsheans in a massive attack on Centralville. Although the attack deliberately avoids Lyubov's house, Lyubov leaves during the attack and is killed by a collapsing building. The attack kills all of the women in the colony; the men that survive are herded into a compound and held prisoner. Selver tells them that the attack was in retaliation for Davidson's killings in the south, which the survivors are ignorant of. Selver states that if the Terrans agree to restrict themselves to a small area and agree to avoid conflict with the Athsheans, they will be left in peace until the next Terran ship arrives to take them off the colony. The survivors agree to his terms, and order all their remaining outposts to withdraw, including the one at which Davidson lives.

However, Davidson disobeys orders and continues to attack Athshean towns, refusing to return to Centralville. After a couple of weeks, the Athsheans attack Davidson's camp, killing or capturing everybody except Davidson and two others, who escape in a helicopter. Although the others want to return to Centralville, Davidson orders them back to fight the Athsheans. The Helicopter crashes, killing all but Davidson, who is captured. He is taken before Selver, who says that Davidson gave Selver the gift of murder, but that Selver would not kill Davidson, because there was no need. Instead, the Athsheans abandon Davidson on an island that Terran logging has rendered barren. Three years later the Terran ships return and take the surviving colonists off the planet; the commander of the ships states that the Terrans will not return except as observers and scientists, as the planet has been placed under a ban by the League of Worlds. Selver gives Lyubov's research, which he has saved, to one of the emissaries, who tells him that Lyubov's efforts to protect the Athsheans will not be forgotten, and that his work will be given the value it deserves. Selver reflects that although the planet may have been won from the Terrans, his people have now learned the ability to kill without reason.

In March 1912, in the event some called the "Miracle", Europe and parts of Asia and Africa, including its inhabitants, disappear suddenly overnight and are replaced with a slice of an alien planet, a land mass of roughly equal outlines and terrain features, but with a strange new flora and fauna which seem to have followed a different path in evolution.

Seen by some as an act of divine retribution, the "Miracle" affects the lives of people all around and transforms world history. Having been "The New World" settled by Europeans, America now becomes involved in an effort to re-settle the strange new Europe. Lord Kitchener - who, with no World War I breaking out, lives on past 1916 - tries to hold together the remnants of the British Empire and re-settle Britain, though the refounded London is little more than "a raw frontier town".

Against this background, the book describes the life and the adventures of Guilford Law, a young American photographer. As a 14-year-old boy, Guilford Law witnessed the "Miracle" as shimmering lights moving eerily across the ocean sky. As a grown man, he is determined to travel to the strange continent of Darwinia and explore its mysteries. To that end, he enlists as a photographer in the Finch expedition, which plans to travel up the river that used to be known as the Rhine and penetrate the bizarre new continent's hidden depths as far as possible. He lands in the middle of the jungle in the midst of nationalistic skirmishes, in which partisans attack and wipe out most of the party of the Finch expedition on the continent that they believe to belong to them.

Law brought an unwanted companion with him, a mysterious twin who seems to have both lived and died on an alternate Earth unchanged by the Miracle. The twin first appears to Guilford in dreams, and he brings a message that Darwinia is not what it seems to be, and Guilford is not who he seems to be.

At the end of the story, it is revealed that the end of time is swiftly approaching and that the universe, the Earth, and all the consciousness that ever existed are really being preserved in a computer-like simulation known as the Archive. The Archive was built by a coalition of all the sentient beings in the universe in an effort to save consciousness from death. However, "viruses" (parasitic artificial life-forms) known as psions have invaded the system of the Archive. Guilford Law eventually learns that he and those like him serve as instruments in a cosmic struggle against the psions for the survival of consciousness itself.

''Crystal Dreams'' follows the adventures of Kyle Bartley, a disgraced Robotech Defense Force veritech mecha pilot turned mercenary who fights to protect the Earth and the SDF-3 from new Zentraedi enemies.

This game follows this story of aviator ace pilot Jack Archer. After serving as a mercenary in the Global Civil War, flying both with and against Roy Fokker impressed him enough to recommend Jack for the RDF. The early stages of the game cover Jack's final training and his fighting during the Battle of Macross Island, Jack not being close enough to the SDF-1 when it space folds to Pluto and being left behind on Earth, rejoining his friends upon their initial return home. The majority of the game is set in the Post-Rain of Death era and involves Jack and his Wolf Squadron defending various human outposts against Malcontent Zentraedi forces led by the warlord Zeraal.

The final mission has Jack going up against Zeraal at his base, which is a crashed Zentraedi Carrier. However, the ship makes a spacefold jump with him on it, and it leads him to a distant region of space. Out of contact with the RDF, he seemingly dies from a lack of energy.

Nathan Barley, played by Nicholas Burns, is a webmaster, guerrilla filmmaker, screenwriter, DJ and in his own words, a "self-facilitating media node". Whilst desperate to convince himself and others that he is the epitome of urban cool, Nathan is secretly terrified he might not be, which is why he reads ''Sugar Ape'' magazine, his bible of cool. ''Sugar Ape'' has been described as a spoof of ''Dazed & Confused'' and ''Vice'', although Brooker has stated that "the ''Sugar Ape'' "Vice" issue from Ep5 wasn't an assault on ''Vice'' magazine I think it just (understandably) ended up looking that way".

The website consists of stupid pranks caught on camera, photos of him with attractive women and famous figures (some of them digitally edited to insert himself), and photos of him standing on street corners in major cities around the world.

The humour derives from the rapid rise of both the Internet and digital media, and the assumption by publishers and broadcasters that almost any such work is worthy of attention. Barley and his peers are often hired ahead of actual journalists and talented writers trying to make intelligent points, such as the earnest documentary filmmaker Claire Ashcroft (Claire Keelan), and her brother Dan (Julian Barratt), the series' two other central characters. Claire seeks to highlight the plight of the inner city's homeless and drug-dependent; Dan is a jaded, opinionated and apathetic hack who, having written an article for ''Sugar Ape'' entitled "The Rise of the Idiots", is appalled to find that "the idiots" in question – Nathan and his contemporaries – have adopted him as their spiritual leader, failing to see that they are the very people he was criticising.

While Dan sees a clear distinction between himself and the "idiots", he's frequently forced to compromise his own ethics in order to earn a living, and seems to be fighting the dawning realisation that he may actually be the very thing he despises. At the same time, Claire, who clearly wants to see herself as socially responsible and philanthropic, is doggedly determined to further her own career.

Other recurring characters include Nathan's idiot flatmate Toby (Rhys Thomas) and the staff at Dan Ashcroft's magazine, ''Sugar Ape'': asinine chief editor Jonatton Yeah? (Charlie Condou), Ned Smanks (Richard Ayoade) and Rufus Onslatt (Spencer Brown), a pair of gormless graphic designers, and receptionist Sasha (Nina Sosanya). Barley has an inoffensive young assistant called Pingu (Ben Whishaw). The eccentric and ludicrous Doug Rocket, founder member of The Veryphonics, and played by comedian David Hoyle (a spoof of Dave Stewart of Eurythmics), also appears in several episodes.

Dan Ashcroft's flatmate is a DJ called "Jones", who appears blissfully unaware of the antisocial cacophony he creates. Jones is played by Noel Fielding, Barratt's partner in comic duo The Mighty Boosh.

In 1757, British Army Major Duncan Heyward arrives in Albany, New York, during the French and Indian War. He is assigned to Colonel Edmund Munro, the commander of Fort William Henry in the Adirondack Mountains. Heyward is tasked with escorting Munro's two daughters, Cora and Alice, to their father. Before they leave, Heyward asks Cora to marry him, but she asks for more time before giving her answer.

A Mohawk named Magua is tasked with guiding Heyward, the two women, and a troop of British soldiers to the fort, but he is actually a Huron who leads them into an ambush that kills most of the soldiers. Mohican Chingachgook, his son Uncas, and his white, adopted son "Hawkeye" arrive and kill all of the Hurons except Magua, who escapes. The trio agrees to take the women and Heyward to the fort. During the trek, they find another massacre at a farm, but do not stop to bury the victims so as not to alert the Hurons to their presence. Cora and Hawkeye are attracted to each other, as are Uncas and Alice.

They find the fort under siege by the French and their Huron allies, but manage to sneak in. Colonel Munro is surprised to see his daughters, as he had sent a letter warning them to stay away, but it was never delivered by Magua. Heyward becomes jealous of Hawkeye when Cora tells Heyward she will not accept his marriage proposal. A militiaman sets out at night to try to reach General Webb at Fort Edward for reinforcements, with Hawkeye, Chingachook and Uncas providing covering fire from the fort.

After Munro refuses to honor an agreement made by Webb that the militiamen could leave to protect their homesteads if they were threatened, Hawkeye helps them sneak away. He is arrested for sedition and sentenced to hang. However, when he learns that Webb will send no soldiers, Munro is forced to accept French General Louis-Joseph de Montcalm's terms of surrender: the British can leave the fort honorably with their arms. Magua is furious because he bears a personal grudge against Munro.

Once Munro, his soldiers and civilians leave the fort, Huron warriors attack and massacre them. Munro is captured alive, but mortally wounded, and Magua personally promises him that he'll kill his daughters, then cuts out his heart. Hawkeye, Uncas, and Chingachgook fight their way out, taking Cora, Alice, Heyward, and a few British soldiers. They hide in a cave behind a waterfall, but Magua finds them. Before Hawkeye, Uncas, and Chingachgook escape by leaping from the waterfall, Hawkeye tells Cora to stay alive and swears that he will find her.

Magua takes his three prisoners to a Huron settlement. While he is addressing a sachem, Hawkeye walks in unarmed as a parley to plead for their lives. The sachem rules that Heyward is to be returned to the British, Alice be given to Magua for the wrongs done to him by Munro, and Cora be burned alive. Although Hawkeye is told he may leave in peace for his bravery, he offers to take Cora's place. Heyward, who is acting as interpreter, instead tells the Hurons to take his life for Cora's. After Hawkeye leaves the village with Cora he shoots Heyward, who is being burned alive, as a final act of mercy.

Chingachgook, Uncas, and Hawkeye then pursue Magua's party to rescue Alice. Uncas races ahead and kills several of the Hurons in combat, but is killed in a duel by Magua and thrown off the cliff's edge. Devastated to see Uncas’ demise, Alice refuses to remain with Magua and commits suicide by jumping off the same cliff. Enraged, Hawkeye and Chingachgook catch up to the Hurons and slay many of them. Hawkeye then holds the rest at gunpoint, allowing Chingachgook to fight and kill Magua, avenging Uncas’ death. Afterward, Chingachgook prays to the Great Spirit to receive Uncas, proclaiming himself "the last of the Mohicans."

In November 1987, Jamaican sprinter Derice Bannock trains to qualify for the 100 metres in the 1988 Summer Olympics. He fails to qualify when fellow runner Junior Bevil accidentally stumbles, knocking himself, Derice, and Yul Brenner down.

Derice vents his frustrations to Barrington Coolidge, the President of the Jamaica Olympic Association. He spots a photograph in Coolidge’s office, featuring his late father Ben, standing next to a fellow Olympic gold medal winner. Coolidge identifies the man as disgraced American bobsled medallist Irving Blitzer, who was disqualified for cheating in the 1972 Winter Olympics. Derice realizes he could participate in the 1988 Winter Olympics by forming a bobsled team, recruiting his friend Sanka Coffie, a pushcart derby champion.

Blitzer, working in Jamaica as a bookie, at first refuses to help Derice, until learning he is Ben Bannock’s son. A recruitment drive fails, but the arrival of Junior and Yul allows Derice to form the required four-man bobsled team. The team train with Blitzer, though Coolidge refuses to fund the $20,000 needed to participate in the Olympics, believing the team's inexperience will bring shame to Jamaica. The team find various ways to raise the money, ranging from singing on the street to arm wrestling. Junior, who avoids telling his father about the team, sells his car to finance the trip to Canada.

In Calgary, Blitzer registers the team, receiving an old bobsled from his former teammate Roger. The Jamaicans struggle to drive the bobsled and adapt to the cold, though exercise and hard work eventually pays off. Derice begins to copy the techniques of the Swiss team. Sanka, Junior, and Yul get into a bar fight with the snobbish East German team, and are reprimanded by Derice.

After weeks of training, the team successfully qualifies for the finals, only to be disqualified by the Olympic committee, as retribution for Blitzer’s prior cheating scandal. Blitzer confronts Kurt Hemphill, his former coach, now a judge in the committee, asking him not to punish the Jamaicans, as they had nothing to do with his cheating scandal. That night, the team are informed that they have been reinstated. On the night the Olympics formally open, Junior’s father arrives to retrieve his son, but Junior stands by his commitment to compete, earning Yul’s respect.

The team’s first day on the track is a disaster, finishing in last place. Sanka disapproves of how Derice is copying the Swiss team’s methods, and encourages the team to 'bobsled Jamaican'. They drastically improve on the second day, finishing in eighth place. During their final race, one of the bobsled’s blades detaches, causing it to flip over and crash. Determined to finish the race, the team pick up their bobsled and carry it across the finish line, earning the applause of the other teams and the spectators, including Junior's father, despite their loss. An epilogue explains the team would return home as heroes, then return to the Winter Olympics four years later to participate as equals.

Ganon has kidnapped Link and stolen the seven celestial signs, creating an "Age of Darkness" in the kingdom of Tolemac. Princess Zelda (Diane Burns) is recruited by the court astrologer Gaspra (Mark Andrade) to collect the signs to defeat Ganon and save Link.

Guided by the words of Shurmak, Zelda must first travel through the forest to the Shrine of Rock, where she encounters Llort, a greedy minion of Ganon who protects the first celestial sign. Gaspra appears to congratulate Zelda and direct her to the Shrine of Illusion where she faces Pasquinade to earn the second celestial sign. Guided by the inhabitants of Tolemac, Zelda then makes her way to the mountains to conquer the Shrines of Air and Destiny before crossing the great south sea to challenge Agwanda at the Shrine of Water for the fifth sign. Gaspra directs Zelda once more to the Shrine of Power in the southeast where her strength is tested, before traveling to the Shrine of Fire where she will face Warbane. As Zelda reaches to collect the final celestial sign Ganon's claw stops her, and she is drawn into his lair for the final battle.

In the game's final scenes, peace returns to Tolemac. Link is revealed to be safe, holding hands with Zelda where the entrance to Ganon's lair once stood, the land now thriving with new growth.

A Japanese teen named Yamato Hino, a young sports enthusiast, during a quiet and ordinary day begins to feel strange calls from an indefinite dimension. Frightened and confused, the boy thinks that he had hallucinations but during a thunderstorm a lightning bolt drags him into a parallel world: the ancient kingdom of Mu, ruled by King Muraji whose concern is to defend the capital of his kingdom, attacked by monsters commanded by the evil Dorado of the Empire of Dinosaurs.

In the kingdom of Mu, a legend tells of a titanic being that stands ready to defend the population from any threat and the king wants to awaken the giant statue of the god Mazinger; to do this he needs a brave boy whose name is Yamato, the only one capable of awakening the mighty giant. The devout prayers of the king and the princess are heard: the boy arrives to the dimension of Mu and the statue suddenly becomes alive. A luminous beam covers the boy that is absorbed into the body of the statue, which begins to move. When the monsters of Dorado broke through the defenses of the kingdom, God Mazinger defeats the dinosaurs and makes the enemy army flee. And thus the legend becomes a reality.

Yamato joins the court of newly crowned Queen Aira Mu, becoming the champion of the Kingdom of Mu, always ready to repel the attacks of the evil Dorado and his fearsome dinosaurs.

Fifteen-year-old Billy Casper, growing up in the late 1960s in a poor South Yorkshire community dominated by the local coal mining industry, has little hope in life. He is picked on, both at home by his physically and verbally abusive older half-brother, Jud (who works at the mine), and at school by his schoolmates and abusive teachers. Although he insists that his earlier petty criminal behaviour is behind him, he occasionally steals eggs and milk from milk floats. He has difficulty paying attention in school and is often provoked into tussles with classmates. Billy's father left the family some time ago, and his mother refers to him at one point, while somberly speaking to her friends about her children and their chances in life, as a "hopeless case". Billy is due to leave school soon, as an "Easter Leaver", without taking any public examinations (and therefore no qualifications); Jud states early in the film that he expects Billy will shortly be joining him at work in the mine, whereas Billy says that he does not know what job he will do, but also says nothing would make him work in the mine.

One day, Billy takes a kestrel from a nest on a farm. His interest in learning falconry prompts him to steal a book on the subject from a secondhand book shop, as he is underage and needs – but lies about the reasons he cannot obtain – adult authorisation for a borrower's card from the public library. As the relationship between Billy and "Kes", the kestrel, improves during the training, so does Billy's outlook and horizons. For the first time in the film, Billy receives praise, from his English teacher after delivering an impromptu talk about training Kes.

Jud leaves money and instructions for Billy to place a bet on two horses, but, after consulting a bettor who tells him the horses are unlikely to win, Billy spends the money on fish and chips and intends to purchase meat for his bird (instead the butcher gives him scrap meat free of charge). However, the horses do win. Outraged at losing a payout of more than £10, Jud takes revenge by killing Billy's kestrel. Grief-stricken, Billy retrieves the bird's broken body from the waste bin and, after showing it to Jud and his mother, buries the bird on the hillside overlooking the field where he had flown.

The show revolves around the adventures of Denver, the eponymous last dinosaur, who was released from his egg by a group of California teens: Jeremy, Mario, Shades, Wally, and Casey, along with tag-along younger sister, Heather. The kids taught Denver the finer points of skateboarding and other pastimes while protecting him from rock concert promoter Morton Fizzback who wanted to use the dinosaur to make money.

The series begins when Jeremy, while preparing for his Natural History test, and his friends visit the La Brea Tar Pits – a place in Los Angeles which contains a large collection of extinct animal and plant fossils - and go to the Museum there. At the museum, the friends encounter a gang of bullies. The friends escape the bullies by hiding behind a fence near the tar pits. Behind the fence they find a pit that contains a large prehistoric egg. As the friends are playing with the egg it suddenly cracks and a green friendly dinosaur emerges who, inexplicably, understands English. The kids name him Denver after they spot an advertisement for the city of Denver on a passing bus.

The children decide to keep Denver and to keep his existence a secret. Denver is first hidden in a pool house at Wally's home. After Wally's sister discovers Denver they move Denver to the old school gym. After a while, Denver gets kidnapped by the manager Morton Fizzback, who puts Denver on a stage in front of an audience to become rich.

When the children confront Morton about his abduction, he becomes paranoid that someone might find out that Denver is a real dinosaur. At the end, Denver is sold to a scientist named Professor Funt, who wants to examine and experiment on him, and use him to become famous. Eventually, Denver gets to return to the gang and rescue them from Nick and his thugs.

In addition to his natural skills and abilities, Denver can also, with the help of a piece from the shell of his egg, take the gang with him back to the time whence he came.

State trooper Dennis Wells takes shelter from a downpour at a roadside diner. He describes to Bob the cook and the server a massacre that he is investigating that occurred at a local motel. After almost getting into a collision outside, a Vietnam veteran named Price enters the diner. Concerned by Price's reckless driving, Wells interrogates him.

Price is compelled to describe how he fled and abandoned his unit during the war, leaving all of them dead in the jungle, and that he has a recurring nightmare in which his unit, "The Nightcrawlers," are hunting him down to exact revenge. Wells instructs Price to sleep the night off at a local motel, but Price says he can't stay at a motel because he becomes a danger to everyone around him when he sleeps. Price explains that he and four other soldiers were sprayed with a chemical that gave them the power of mind over matter, which he demonstrates by materializing a t-bone steak on the grill. He says such manifestations quickly fade while he is awake, but are more dangerous when he dreams. Wells, realizing Price caused the massacre he's investigating, tries to arrest him, but Price melts his gun with his mind. Enraged, Wells knocks Price unconscious with a ketchup bottle, unintentionally bringing Price's nightmare into the world. Soldiers materialize, destroying everything in the cafe with machine gun fire and explosions. Trying to escape, Wells is shot and killed. Bob tries to kill Price with a pan, but is shot. Price regains consciousness as the soldiers force their way in. A spotlight is cast upon him, and he calls out, "Charlie's in the light!", prompting the soldiers to shoot and kill him. The cafe in flaming ruins, Bob is taken away in an ambulance. He reminds the others that Price said there are four more soldiers out there who have the same ability.

A man delivers money to an unknown recipient in Belfast, in the process taking some of the cash for himself. As the recipients are counting the money in a country farm house they are attacked by uniformed gunmen. Soon afterwards Phil, the driver for the delivery, is kidnapped and killed. Later the delivery man, Colin, is murdered at a London swimming pool.

Harold Shand, a London gangster, is aspiring to become a legitimate businessman and is trying to form a partnership with Charlie, a boss of the American Mafia, with a plan to redevelop London Docklands, in association with local construction boss Councillor Harris. Shand's world is suddenly destabilised by a series of bomb attacks on his property and murders of his associates, including his old friend Colin. He and his henchmen try to uncover his attackers' identities by threatening corrupt police officers, informers, and other criminals, whilst simultaneously trying not to worry their visitors, fearing the Americans will abandon him if they think he's not in full control. Shand's girlfriend, Victoria, tells the Mafia representatives he is under attack from an unknown enemy, but assures them Shand is working to quickly resolve the crisis. She starts to suspect Shand's right hand man, Jeff, knows more about who is behind the attacks than he claims.

After some investigation, Shand confronts Jeff, who confesses that under pressure from Councillor Harris he sent Colin and Phil to Belfast to deliver money to the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) on behalf of Harris. He explains that three of the IRA's top men were killed on the same night, after the money was delivered. Shand realises the IRA have come to the conclusion that he sold them out to the security forces and pocketed the missing cash for himself, and are targeting his organisation in revenge. Vowing to destroy the terrorist organisation in London, Shand loses his temper and kills Jeff in a frenzy.

After confronting Harris, Shand sets up a meeting with the IRA's London leadership at a stock car racetrack. He ostensibly offers them £60,000 in return for a ceasefire but double crosses them and has them and Harris shot as they are counting the cash. Believing his enemies are dead and the problem solved, Shand travels to the Savoy Hotel to triumphantly inform Charlie and his assistant Tony, only to find the Americans preparing to leave, having been spooked by the carnage. In response to their derisory comments about the UK, Shand berates them for their arrogance and dismisses them as cowards.

Leaving the hotel, Shand steps into his chauffeur-driven car only to find it has been commandeered by IRA assassins. He sees Victoria being also kidnapped in another car. As the car speeds to an unknown destination, Shand contemplates the inevitability of his fate.

During the Second World War, the cargo vessel ''S.S. Cabinet Minister'' is wrecked off a remote fictional Scottish island group – Great Todday and Little Todday – with fifty thousand cases of whisky aboard. Due to wartime rationing, the thirsty islanders had nearly run out of the "water of life" and see this as an unexpected godsend. They manage to salvage several hundred cases before the ship sinks. But it is not all clear sailing. They must thwart the efforts of the authorities to confiscate the liquor, particularly in the shape of misguided, pompous Home Guard Captain Paul Waggett. A cat-and-mouse battle of wits ensues.

Although the wreck and the escapades over the whisky are at the centre of the story, there is also a lot of background detail about life in the Outer Hebrides, including e.g. culture clashes between the Protestant island of Great Todday and the Roman Catholic island of Little Todday. (Mackenzie based the geography of these islands on Barra and Eriskay respectively, but in real life they are both Catholic islands). There are various sub-plots including those of two couples who are planning to get married.

Mackenzie's prose captures the various accents of the area and also includes much common Gaelic that was in use at the time. The book includes a glossary of both the meaning and approximate pronunciation of the language.

Chas is a member of an East London gang, led by Harry Flowers; his specialty is intimidation through violence, as he collects pay-offs for Flowers. Chas is very good at his job, and has a reputation for liking it. His sexual liaisons are casual and rough. When Flowers decides to take over a betting shop owned by Joey Maddocks, he forbids Chas to get involved because he feels Chas' complicated personal history with Maddocks may lead to trouble. Chas is angry about this and later humiliates Maddocks, who retaliates by wrecking Chas' apartment and attacking Chas, who in turn shoots him, packs a suitcase and runs from the scene.

When Flowers makes it clear that he has no intention of offering protection to Chas, but instead wants him eliminated, Chas decides to head for the countryside to hide out, but after overhearing a musician talk about going on tour and leaving his rented room in Notting Hill Gate, Chas goes there and pretends the musician was a friend who recommended him. He tells Pherber, a woman living there, that he is a fellow performer, juggler Johnny Dean. She lives there with Turner, a reclusive, eccentric former rock star who has 'lost his demon', and Lucy, with whom he enjoys a non-possessive and bisexual ménage à trois. Floating in and out of the house is a child, Lorraine.

At first, Chas is contemptuous of Turner, who himself attempts to return the rent paid in advance, but they start influencing each other. Pherber and Turner understand his conflict, and want to understand what makes him function so well within his world. To speed up the process, Pherber tricks him by feeding him a psychedelic mushroom, and Chas accuses her and Turner of poisoning him. He soon accepts it, and in his hallucinogenic state, he experiments with clothing and identity, including the wearing of feminine clothes. Chas opens up, and he begins a caring relationship with Lucy.

Before all this, he phones Tony (a trusted friend who refers to Chas as 'Uncle') to help him get out of the country. Flowers and his henchmen use Tony to track Chas to Turner's flat. They allow him to go and collect his things upstairs. Chas tells Turner and Pherber he is leaving, then shoots and kills Turner before being escorted into Flowers' car. As the car is driving away, Chas still wears his feminine clothes and wig, but his face is identical to Turner's.

Omar Ali is a young man living in South London during the mid-1980s. His father, Hussein, once a famous left-wing journalist in Pakistan, lives in London but dislikes Britain's society and its international politics. His dissatisfaction with the world and a family tragedy have led him to sink into alcoholism, so that Omar has to be his caregiver. By contrast, Omar's paternal uncle Nasser is a successful entrepreneur and an active member of the Pakistani community. Hussein asks Nasser to give Omar a job and, after working for a brief time as a car washer in one of his uncle's garages, he is assigned the task of managing a run-down laundrette.

At Nasser's, Omar meets a few other community members: Tania, Nasser's daughter and possibly a future bride; and Salim, who trafficks drugs and hires him to deliver them from the airport. While driving Salim and his wife home that night, the three of them get attacked by a group of right-wing extremist street punks. Their apparent leader turns out to be Johnny, Omar's childhood friend. Omar tries to reestablish their past friendship, offering Johnny a job and the opportunity to adopt a better life by working to fix up the laundrette with him. Johnny decides to accept and they resume a romantic relationship that (it is implied) had been interrupted after school. Running out of money, Omar and Johnny sell one of Salim's drug deliveries to make cash for the laundrette's substantial renovation.

On the laundrette's opening day, Omar confronts Johnny on his fascist past. Johnny, feeling guilty, tells him that though he cannot make it up to him, he is with him now. Nasser visits the laundrette with his mistress, Rachel. As they dance together in the laundrette, Omar and Johnny make love in the back room, narrowly escaping discovery. At the inauguration, Tania confronts Rachel about having an affair with her father. Rachel accuses Nasser of having invited Tania on purpose to have her insulted, and storms off despite his protests. Later that night, a drunk Omar proposes to Tania, who accepts on the condition that he raise money to get away. Soon after, Salim reveals to Omar that he is on to them, and demands his money back. Omar's father stops by late in the night and appeals to Johnny to persuade Omar to go to college because he is unhappy with his son's role.

Offering Salim a chance to invest in his businesses as a much needed 'clean outlet' for his money, Omar decides to take over two laundrettes owned by a friend of Nasser. Salim drives Johnny and Omar to view one of the properties, and he expresses his dislike of the British non-working punks in Johnny's gang. He attempts to run them over and injures one of them. Meanwhile, Rachel falls ill with a skin rash apparently caused by a ritual curse from Nasser's wife, and decides it is best for all that she and Nasser part ways. The next day Tania drops by the laundrette and tells Johnny she is leaving, asking him to come along. He refuses, implicitly revealing the truth about himself and Omar and she departs wordlessly. After Salim arrives and enters the laundrette, the punks, who had been lying in wait, trash his car. When he runs out, he is ambushed and viciously attacked. Johnny decides to interrupt and defend him, despite their mutual dislike, and the punks turn their attention to him instead. As he refuses to fight back, they beat him savagely until Omar returns and intervenes, protecting Johnny as the punks smash the window of the laundrette and flee the scene.

Nasser visits Hussein, and the two discuss their respective failures, agreeing between them that only Omar's future matters now. Nasser sees Tania at the train platform while she is running away, and he shouts to her but she disappears. Meanwhile, at the laundrette, Omar nurses Johnny, and the two bond. The film ends with a scene of them shirtless and playfully splashing each other with water from a sink.

Middle-aged Ezra Cobb helps operate a farm in the rural Midwest with his elderly mother, Amanda, a religious fanatic who has indoctrinated him since childhood to abhor women. Amanda dies following a protracted illness, and Ezra withdraws. Nearly a year after her death, he experiences auditory hallucinations that compel him to exhume his mother. He arrives at her grave one night and digs up her decomposed body, returning it to his home where he cobbles it together using discarded fish skin and wax.

Ezra becomes acquainted with Maureen Selby, an eccentric middle-aged woman and proclaimed psychic. One night during a preemptive sexual encounter, he murders her, an event that sets him off on a chain of serial killings. He first sets his attention on a 34-year-old waitress, Mary Ransum, whom he becomes acquainted with. He slashes her tires one night, leaving her stranded at the restaurant after-hours, and then appears under the guise of offering her a ride. She reluctantly agrees to ride with him to his house, where he says he has spare tires. After waiting in the truck for an extended period of time, Mary goes to look for him. In the house, she finds Ezra in a bedroom surrounded by the corpses of his mother and others, his face obscured with a mask made of human flesh. She attempts to flee, but he incapacitates her.

Later, Mary awakens bound in a closet, wearing only undergarments. Ezra escorts her to the dining room, where he seats her at a table surrounded by corpses. He becomes aroused and begins molesting her, during which she convinces him to free her arms. She manages to smash a bottle over his head, but he beats her to death with a human femur bone after she enrages him by flinging his mother's corpse at him, damaging it. A short time later, Ezra visits his friend, Harlon, at his house, where they discuss Mary's disappearance. In conversation, Ezra references her "being over at his place", a comment Harlon takes in jest. Harlon's teenage son, Brad, arrives with his girlfriend, Sally Mae, who immediately catches Ezra's interest. He later visits her while she works her cashier job at a local store, and shoots her with a rifle; the bullet grazes her head, but does not kill her.

Ezra places Sally Mae in the bed of his truck and drives away, but she awakens and escapes on foot, fleeing into the woods. She inadvertently runs over a bear trap earlier set by Harlon and Brad. The trap mangles her foot, and she attempts to hide amidst the underbrush, but Ezra finds her and shoots her to death. Harlon and Brad return to the store and find blood and broken glasses at the cash register, but no sign of Sally Mae; Brad recalls to the sheriff that Ezra was the last person he saw at the store.

Ezra brings Sally Mae's corpse to his farm, where he hangs it upside down in the barn and begins skinning the body. Harlon, Brad, and the sheriff arrive and find him in his kitchen, laughing over a bowl of blood. The picture freezes on this shot and a voice-over by Leslie Carlson states that "A few days later a group of townspeople, reportedly led by Harlan Kootz, under cover of night, burned the Cobb farm... to the ground.", the line getting progressively quieter until "ground" is barely audible.

Following the events of ''Invasion of the Dinosaurs'', Mike Yates was discharged from UNIT and is now attending a Tibetan meditation centre in rural England. Sarah Jane Smith visits him and they witness some curious events, seemingly organised by a resident called Lupton, and his cronies. Mike and Sarah stumble across Lupton performing an incantation, which conjures up a giant spider. It jumps on Lupton’s back and then disappears. The spider manifests itself in Lupton’s head, telling him to seek out and locate a certain blue crystal.

The Third Doctor has developed an interest in psychic ability, but his testing of a clairvoyant called Professor Clegg backfires when his subject has a fatal heart attack. It is triggered when Clegg comes into contact with a blue crystal from Metebelis Three (sent back from the Amazon by Jo Grant), which caused him to see the image of deadly spiders. Sarah returns from the retreat and she and the Doctor swap spider tales. Meanwhile, Lupton has also arrived at UNIT HQ and steals the crystal from the Doctor’s laboratory. A multi-vehicle chase ensues which Lupton escapes by teleporting himself back to the monastery. Once there, the spider reveals that it is plotting against some of its sisters back on Metebelis Three. The spiders and the crystal originate from the same blue planet in the Acteon Galaxy the Doctor last visited during ''The Green Death''.

The Doctor and Sarah now make for the monastery and tell the deputy abbot, Cho-je, that something is very amiss. The crystal is taken by Tommy, a handyman with learning difficulties, whose mind is opened by the power of the crystal. Lupton is teleported to Metebelis Three, unwittingly allowing Sarah to follow him. She soon meets the human slave inhabitants of the planet, a generally dispirited bunch, other than the rebellious Arak, who is in hiding.

The planet is ruled by the Eight-Legs or giant spiders, and their Queen is the supreme ruler. They govern using guards chosen from among the planet's Two-Leg (human) population and their own phenomenal mental powers, amplified by the blue stones of the planet. The Doctor arrives and meets Arak, who explains that the Metebelians are the descendants of the crew of an Earth space ship, which crashed hundreds of years before. A spider on board found its way to the Blue Mountains where, through the effect of the crystals, its progeny grew larger and cleverer. The Doctor works out that a “negative” stone can absorb and reject the power of the blue crystals. He starts a revolt among the humans, now protected by these stones, but this is not effective. The Doctor explores the Blue Mountains and encounters the Great One, an enormous spider which controls Metebelis and desires power over other domains too. She craves the crystal as it will complete a lattice of hundreds of similar crystals on her web and magnify her mental powers immensely. She knows the crystal is still on Earth and sends the Doctor there to get it for her. He flees back to Earth with Sarah, not knowing the Queen spider has now implanted itself in his companion's mind.

Tommy has given the crystal to the abbot, K’anpo Rimpoche, who is an elderly Time Lord and the one-time hermit mentor of the Doctor. He now lives in peaceful exile on Earth. He tells the Doctor of Sarah's control and they work together to expel the Queen Spider. A fight breaks out in the monastery between Lupton’s cronies and Tommy. The Abbot advises the Doctor to take the crystal to the Great One. He suggests that, as the Doctor started this chain of events by removing the crystal in the first place, it is up to him to put it back. He departs in the TARDIS with the crystal.

On Metebelis Three, Lupton has been killed by the spiders after falling out with the council. When the TARDIS lands, the Doctor heads to the cave of the Great One with the crystal. He warns her of the danger of completing the lattice but she does so anyway. However, the forces unleashed are too strong for the Great One and the positive feedback causes agonizing deaths to her and the other spiders. A vast wave of deadly radiation floods the cave. The Doctor, now very weak, staggers back to the TARDIS.

Weeks later, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and Sarah are in the Doctor's laboratory when the TARDIS materialises and on exiting it the Doctor collapses on the floor. The abbot K’anpo arrives in his new body, having regenerated into the form of Cho-je, who was a sort of forward projection of his soul. He tells them that the Doctor will change too and before their eyes the Doctor regenerates into his fourth incarnation.

The story is about a robot's confession. Some weeks earlier, its builder, Dr. Charles Link, built it in the basement. Link teaches his robot to walk, talk and behave civilly. Link's housekeeper sees the robot just enough to be horrified by it, but his dog is totally loyal to it. The robot is fully educated in a few weeks, Link then names it Adam Link, and it professes a desire to serve any human master who will have it. Soon afterwards, a heavy object falls on Dr. Link by accident and kills him. His housekeeper instantly assumes that the robot has murdered Dr. Link, and calls in armed men to hunt it down and destroy it. They do not succeed; in fact, they provoke the robot to retaliate, both by refusing to listen to it and by accidentally killing Dr. Link's dog. Back at the house, the robot finds a copy of ''Frankenstein'', which Dr. Link had carefully hidden from the robot, and finally somewhat understands the prejudice against it. In the end the robot decides that it simply is not worth killing several people just to get a hearing, writes its confession, and prepares to turn itself off.

The youthful Harold, cloyed with the pleasures of the world and reckless of life, wanders about Europe, making his feelings and ideas the subjects of the poem. In Canto I he is in Spain and Portugal, where he recounts the savagery of their invasion by the French. In Canto II he moves to Greece, uplifted by the beauty of its past in a country now enslaved by the Turks. Canto III finds him on the battlefield of Waterloo, from which he journeys down the Rhine and crosses into Switzerland, enchanted by the beauty of the scenery and its historic associations. In Canto IV Harold starts from Venice on a journey through Italy, lamenting the vanished heroic and artistic past, and the subject status of its various regions.

When he is caught by the police for robbing a bakery, Smith is sentenced to be confined in Ruxton Towers in Essex, a borstal (young offenders institution) for delinquent youths. He seeks solace in long-distance running, attracting the notice of the school's authorities for his physical prowess. Smith is offered a light workload for his last six months at Ruxton Towers if he wins in an important cross-country competition against a prestigious public school. For Ruxton Towers to win the cross-country race would be a major public relations boost for the borstal administrators.

However, when the day of the race arrives Smith throws victory away: after speeding ahead of the other runners he deliberately stops a few metres short of the finishing line, though well ahead and easily able to win. He lets the other runners pass him and cross the finishing line, thereby losing the race in a defiant gesture aimed against his Ruxton Towers administrators. In deliberately losing the race, Smith demonstrates his free spirit and independence. The response of the borstal authorities to Smith's action is heavy-handed: Smith resigns himself to the drudgery of manual labour he is returned to. However, looking back on his actions, he has no regrets.

The film begins with Joe Kavanagh at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, relaying an experience from his past. Then, faking a police raid, Joe spooks his friends whom he coaches in a local football match. On the way to pick up Liam, a former junkie who Joe is fond of, they are cut off by a woman who is a health visitor serving Liam, his girlfriend Sabine, and their son Scott, assessing their culpability for welfare. Joe insists that Liam come to the game but Sarah, the health visitor, protests. Dropping off Liam after the match, Joe watches as Liam and Sabine have a confrontation outside their home with some thugs. He later spots Sarah outside the local health center, and flirts with her, offering to help her with her wallpaper. While working on Sarah's flat with his close friend Shanks, Joe spots a social worker taking photographs of him working, which violates his welfare policies. Joe grows enraged and threatens the social worker, attacking the car with his painting supplies. Later, while eating dinner, Joe reveals to Sarah that he is a recovering alcoholic.

Joe is called before social services to explain his alleged breaking of welfare policy, and the worker reveals that Sarah wrote in and insisted that the work was done as a personal favor, not for money. Joe visits the local health center to thank Sarah for intervening on his behalf and asks her on a date. Sarah is apprehensive about going on a date with Joe based on his strange behavior, but her receptionist friend Maggie says she is overthinking things. After the date, Sarah locks her keys out of the flat and Joe suggests that she stay with him, stressing that he is not trying to sleep with her. Joe shares stories of his past with Sarah, and she presses him about why he stopped drinking. Joe is hesitant at first, but explains that he stopped drinking because he brutally beat a previous romantic partner while he was heavily intoxicated, and that he is deeply ashamed of himself.

The next day at the local football match, the same thugs who hassled Liam at home arrive at the pitch and assault him, leading Joe to wonder if Liam has returned to drugs. Liam insists that the assault occurred as retaliation for a bar fight. At the health centre, Sabine causes a scene by refusing to put out her cigarette, and later captures Sarah's attention when she is found out for stealing a prescription pad. Her doctor insists that she be removed from the local register and sent to another clinic, but Sarah reminds the doctor that they have done much to help the family. At home, Liam confronts Sabine, who lied about where she has been, and accuses her of having sex with other men after finding condoms in her purse, as well as being on drugs. Later, Joe arrives, finding Sabine preparing to inject heroin. He reluctantly helps her inject, and she reveals that Liam has been abducted by the thugs, who work for local drug dealer and crook McGowan, whom Joe knows from his youth. McGowan reveals that Liam owes him money, and has repeatedly failed to pay it back. Liam tells Joe that he stopped dealing heroin when he went to prison, but that Sabine took over and owes 1,500 pounds to McGowan because she uses the drugs rather than sell them. Liam was not aware of the dealing until very recently, and tells Joe that McGowan's thugs have threatened to cripple him if he cannot pay the money back. Joe threatens McGowan over this, but McGowan proposes Joe traffick drugs for him as a way of solving Liam's debt. Joe and Liam return home, and he lies to Sarah that the matter has been sorted.

After an intimate night with Sarah, Joe goes to Kintyre to pick up a car that is implied to contain drugs. He has doubts while driving back to Glasgow, flashing back to a conversation with Shanks who deeply disapproves of what Joe is doing. In a later scene, Joe gives Sarah a pair of earrings, as well as a ring. Joe tells Sarah that he loves her. Sarah tells him that she does not want the ring and Joe cannot understand what he has done wrong, throwing the ring into the river in a fit of rage. Later, Sarah arrives at his door and apologizes. The next day, Joe unwittingly plays getaway driver for his football team, who rob a shipment of jerseys at a sporting goods store. Meanwhile, Sarah reveals to her co-worker Maggie that she is pregnant. Sarah meets with Sabine and Liam in a park, where Sabine inadvertently reveals Joe's lie, insisting that he paid McGowan off. Liam complicates things further by telling Sarah that Joe simply got them an extension on their payments, and Sarah accuses him of lying. She goes to Joe's flat and presses him for more information about his dealings with McGowan, expressing her concerns. Joe seems to have placated her, but Liam arrives abruptly and warns Joe about Sarah's questions. She grows enraged that Joe is complicit in dealing drugs, but he insists that he does not have the same resources as her, and had no other way to help Liam. Sarah leaves the apartment in tears after discovering her presents were bought with an advance from McGowan.

Joe goes to Liam's flat and gives him money to leave town, saying that he will not complete the second job for McGowan. After this, he goes to Sarah's and unsuccessfully tries to reconcile with her. At McGowan's snooker hall, he says he will not complete the job. McGowan brushes him off, and tries to get Joe thrown out. After one of McGowan's thugs makes lewd comments about Sarah, Joe flies into a rage and brutally beats all of McGowan's men. Knowing he has marked himself for death, he buys liquor and returns home. Later, Liam arrives and finds Joe in a drunken stupor. He tells Joe that McGowan's men are pursuing both of them, but Joe drunkenly insults Liam for not following his instructions and refuses to move. Backed into a corner, Liam ties a rope around his neck and jumps out of the window. Joe awakes and tries to pull him back up, but is too inebriated to lift Liam, who dies. Joe spots Sarah at Liam's burial, and the two walk off together.

Three teenage brothers – gang member Bobby, artistically-minded Alan and 13-year-old Lex – are growing up with their mother on Glasgow's South Side in 1968. Events which will have consequences for all concerned start to spiral out of control when Lex accidentally shoots Malky, the leader of the Garaside Tongs street gang, with an air gun.

Sir Sidney Ruff-Diamond (Sid James) is Queen Victoria's Governor in the Indian province of Kalabar near the Khyber Pass. The province is defended by the feared 3rd Foot and Mouth Regiment, who are said to not wear anything under their kilts. When a soldier, the inept Private Widdle (Charles Hawtrey), is found wearing underpants after an encounter with the warlord Bungdit Din (Bernard Bresslaw), chief of the warlike Burpa tribe, the Khasi of Kalabar (Kenneth Williams) plans to use this information to incite a rebellion in Kalabar. He aims to dispel the "tough" image of the Devils in Skirts by revealing that, contrary to popular belief, they actually wear underpants underneath their kilts.

A diplomatic operation ensues on the part of the British, who fail to publicly prove that the incident was an aberration. The Governor's wife (Joan Sims), in the hope of luring the Khasi into bed with her, takes a photograph of an inspection in which many of the soldiers present are found wearing underpants, and takes it to him. With this hard evidence in hand, the Khasi would be able to muster a ferocious Afghan invasion force, storm the Khyber Pass and capture India from the British; but Lady Ruff-Diamond insists that he sleep with her before she parts with the photograph. He delays on account of her unattractiveness, eventually taking her away with him to Bungdit Din's palace. Meanwhile, the Khasi's daughter, Princess Jelhi (Angela Douglas), reveals to the British Captain Keene (Roy Castle), with whom she has fallen in love, that the Governor's wife has eloped, and a team is dispatched to ensure the return of both her and the photograph.

Disguised as Afghan generals, the interlopers are brought into the palace and, at the Khasi's suggestion, are introduced to Bungdit Din's sultry concubines. Whilst enjoying the women in the harem, they are unmasked amid a farcical orgy, imprisoned, and scheduled to be executed at sunset alongside the Governor's wife. Princess Jelhi aids their escape by disguising them as dancing girls, but during the entertaining of the Afghan generals, the Khasi, contemptuous of an annoying fakir's performance, demands that he see the dancing girls instead. After their disguises are seen through, the British and the Princess flee, but Lady Ruff-Diamond drops the photograph on leaving the palace through the gardens. The group returns to the Khyber Pass to find its guards massacred and their weapons comically mutilated, in a rare (albeit tainted) moment of poignancy.

All attempts to hold off the advancing Afghan invaders fail miserably, and a hasty retreat is beaten to the Residency. The Governor, meanwhile, has been entertaining, in numerical order, the Khasi's fifty-one wives, each one of them wishing to "right the wrong" that his own wife and the Khasi himself have supposedly committed against him. After a browbeating from his wife, Sir Sidney calls a crisis meeting regarding the invasion, in which he resolves to "do nothing". A black tie dinner is arranged for that evening. Dinner takes place during a prolonged penultimate scene, with contrapuntal snippets of the Khasi's army demolishing the Residency's exterior, and the officers and ladies ignoring the devastation as they dine amongst themselves. Shells shaking the building and plaster falling into the soup do not interrupt dinner, even when the fakir's severed - but still talking - head is served, courtesy of the Khasi.

Only Brother Belcher fails to display a stiff upper lip, and breaks his calm by panicking. Finally, at Captain Keene's suggestion, the gentlemen walk outside to be greeted by a bloody battle being waged in the courtyard. Still dressed in black tie, Sir Sidney orders the Regiment to form a line and lift their kilts, this time exposing their (implied) lack of underwear. The invading Afghan army is terrified, and retreats at once. The gentlemen walk back inside to resume dinner, whilst Brother Belcher displays a Union flag bearing the slogan I'm Backing Britain.

On a hot summer weekend lunchtime, Andy (a senior chef in a large London catering facility) impulsively buys a dilapidated fast-food van touted by a disreputable acquaintance, Patsy, who has unexpectedly called at his home. Andy plans to restore the van for use on a local fast-food round. Wendy, his hard-working, good-natured and innuendo-prone wife, is sensibly sceptical about the project but understands her husband's ambitions. Their twin 22-year-old daughters (Natalie and Nicola) have profoundly different attitudes: tomboyish Natalie, thinks it is a good idea if it will make her father happy, whereas the bitter, shut-in Nicola, contemptuously and typically dismisses Andy as a "Capitalist!" Late that night, an anguished Nicola binges on chocolate and snacks, then forces herself to vomit. Natalie, awake in her adjacent bedroom and looking through USA travel brochures, overhears: her reactions indicate this is something she is painfully familiar with.

Meanwhile, Aubrey (Timothy Spall) - a hyperactive but emotionally labile family friend- is opening a Parisian-themed restaurant named The Regret Rien. Wendy accepts a part-time job as waitress in the restaurant, but her and Andy's initial confidence in the scheme is undermined by Aubrey's unorthodox approach to the interior décor (a cluttered, half-realised combination of outmoded French clichés, such as a bicycle in the bay window, and of tasteless Victoriana, such as a stuffed cat's head framed by broken accordion sconces) and by his menu. His singularly grotesque interpretation of the excesses of nouvelle cuisine includes dishes such as saveloy on a bed of lychees, liver in lager and pork cyst.

During the afternoon, whilst the rest of the family are out at work, Nicola's lover comes to the family home to have sex with her. It appears that Nicola only can be aroused by a combination of light bondage and the consumption of chocolate spread from her chest – a practice to which he only reluctantly agrees. Trying to engage and understand her, he ultimately loses patience with her combative attitude, concluding she is "a bit vacant" and incapable of having a sincere, adult conversation or allowing herself to enjoy his companionship. Nicola calls his bluff and loses: frustrated but resolute, he leaves, and her fragile emotional state deteriorates further.

The opening night of The Regret Rien is a disaster. Volunteering her help when Aubrey's waitress has let him down, Wendy discovers that Aubrey has neglected to advertise the opening, with the result that no customers turn up. Aubrey proceeds to get helplessly drunk, taking to the pavement and railing against the world. Wendy gets him back inside, where Aubrey blubbers that he fancies her, starts to undress and passes out: "a quivering, sobbing gelatinous blob of disappointment". Wendy has to deal not only with him but with his glum and passive sous-chef/dogsbody Paula.

Meanwhile, Andy and Patsy have gone to their local pub, where Andy gets uncharacteristically but emphatically drunk and ends up sleeping inside the decrepit fast-food van in his driveway. Wendy returns home to find him there. Unnerved by her bizarre evening, she loses her temper with the whole family.

Phlegmatic and dry-humoured Natalie enjoys her unconventional work as a plumber, the simple pleasures of a pint and a game of pool, and dreams of visiting the U.S. In contrast, the fidgety and isolated Nicola becomes increasingly agitated, aggressive and reclusive, and Wendy finally confronts her. During the course of their long and anguished confrontation, Wendy makes it clear to Nicola that she is deeply worried about her, wondering why she makes no attempt to get involved with the causes she claims to believe. She tells Nicola of the struggle that she and Andy endured to care for their baby daughters – how it meant she never went to college and Andy working in a "job he hates". It emerges that during an earlier phase of Nicola's bulimia, she almost starved to death. Ashamed and angry, Nicola is convinced that Wendy and the rest of the family hate her. Instead, as the exasperated Wendy tells her "We don't hate you! We love you, you stupid girl!" and leaves the room, deeply upset. The brittle behavioural armour that Nicola has protected her psyche with is now shattered, and she breaks down sobbing.

Meanwhile, Andy is seen running his kitchen at work with energy and authority but slips on a spoon, breaking his ankle. Wendy receives the news with a characteristic mixture of sympathy and amusement. She drives him home from the hospital; aided by Natalie she makes him comfortable, and then goes to see Nicola, still in her room. Mother and daughter reconcile.

The film ends with Natalie and Nicola sitting peacefully in the evening sunshine in the back garden. Natalie observes that Nicola must own up to her parents about her bulimia. She then asks Nicola "D'you want some money?" and Nicola accepts gratefully, the first time in the film where she has accepted an offer of help.

Two veteran cars and their crews are participating in the annual London to Brighton Veteran Car Run. Alan McKim (John Gregson), a young barrister, and his wife, Wendy (Dinah Sheridan), drive ''Genevieve'', a 1904 Darracq. Their friend Ambrose Claverhouse (Kenneth More), a brash advertising salesman, his latest girlfriend, fashion model Rosalind Peters (Kay Kendall), and her pet St. Bernard ride in a 1905 Spyker.

The journey to Brighton goes well for Claverhouse, but the McKims' trip is complicated by several breakdowns, and they arrive very late. As Alan cancelled their accommodation in their usual plush hotel during a fit of pique, they are forced to spend the night in a dingy run-down hotel (with a cameo performance by Joyce Grenfell as the proprietress) leaving Wendy feeling less than pleased.

They finally join Ambrose and Rosalind for after-dinner drinks, but Rosalind gets very drunk, and insists on playing the trumpet with the house band. To the surprise of all, she performs a hot jazz solo before falling fast asleep moments later, to Wendy's great amusement. (Kendall mimes the performance of "Genevieve" to a rendition by jazz trumpeter Kenny Baker.)

Alan and Wendy have an argument over Ambrose's supposed romantic attentions to her, and Alan goes off to the garage to sulk. Whilst he works on his car in the middle of the night, Ambrose turns up. Angry words are exchanged, and Alan impulsively bets the other man £100 that he can beat Ambrose back to London, despite racing not being allowed by the club. Ambrose accepts the bet—"First over Westminster Bridge."

The following morning, despite Rosalind's massive hangover and Wendy's determined disapproval of the whole business, the two crews race back to London. Each driver is determined that his car is the better, come what may, and they both resort to various forms of cheating. Ambrose sabotages Alan's engine, and Alan causes Ambrose to be stopped by the police.

Finally, on the outskirts of London (West Drayton), both cars are stopped by traffic police and the four contestants are publicly warned after Alan and Ambrose almost come to blows. At Wendy's insistence, they decide to call off the bet and have a party instead. But whilst waiting for the pub to open, words are exchanged and the bet is on again.

The two cars race neck-and-neck through the southern suburbs of London. But with only a few yards to go, Genevieve breaks down. As Ambrose's car is about to overtake it, its tyres become stuck in tramlines (London's tram network had closed in 1952, but many of the tracks were still in evidence when the film was made that same year) and it drives off in another direction. The brakes on ''Genevieve'' fail, and the car rolls a few yards onto Westminster Bridge, thus winning the bet.

In an unnamed Victorian town, Victor Van Dort, the son of nouveau riche fish merchants, and Victoria Everglot, the neglected and unloved daughter of impoverished aristocrats, prepare for their arranged marriage, which will simultaneously raise the social class of Victor's parents and restore the wealth of Victoria's family ("According to Plan"). Although they fall in love instantly, the nervous Victor ruins their wedding rehearsal by forgetting his vows and accidentally setting Lady Everglot's dress on fire. Fleeing to a nearby forest, he rehearses his vows with a tree and places his wedding ring on an upturned root. However, the root is revealed to be the finger of a dead bride named Emily, who rises from the grave, proclaims herself as Victor's wife, and spirits him away to the Land of the Dead.

During his time with Emily, Victor learns that she was murdered years ago on the night of her elopement by her fiancé, who stole the family jewels and gold she had brought ("Remains of the Day"). Emily reunites Victor with his long-dead dog, Scraps, and they bond. Desperate to return to Victoria, however, Victor tricks Emily into returning them to the Land of the Living by claiming he wants her to meet his parents. Emily brings Victor to see Elder Gutknecht, the kindly ruler of the underworld, who grants them temporary passage. Victor reunites with Victoria and confesses his wish to marry her as soon as possible. Before the pair can share a kiss, Emily discovers them and, feeling betrayed and hurt, drags Victor back to the Land of the Dead ("Tears to Shed"). Victoria tries to tell her parents of Victor's situation, but nobody believes her and they assume he has left her. Against her will, Victoria's parents decide to marry her to Lord Barkis Bittern, a presumed-wealthy visitor who appeared at the wedding rehearsal.

After reconciling with Emily, Victor learns of Victoria's impending marriage to Barkis from his family's newly deceased coachman. Upset over this news, Victor decides to marry Emily, learning that this will require him to repeat his wedding vows in the Land of the Living and drink a deadly poison in order to join her in death. The dead swiftly prepare for the ceremony and head "upstairs" ("The Wedding Song"), where the town erupts into a temporary panic upon their arrival until the living recognize their departed loved ones and joyously reunite. The chaos causes a panicked Barkis to expose his own poor financial standing and his intentions to marry Victoria only for her supposed wealth, leading her to reject him.

Victoria witnesses Victor and Emily's wedding as Victor completes his vows and prepares to drink the poison, only for Emily to stop him when she realizes she is denying Victoria her chance to live happily with him. Just as Emily reunites Victor and Victoria, Barkis arrives to kidnap Victoria; Emily recognizes Barkis as both her previous fiancé and murderer. Victor duels with Barkis to protect Victoria, and Emily intervenes to save Victor's life. Accepting defeat, Barkis mockingly toasts Emily for dying unwed and unwittingly drinks the poison, causing him to die and allowing the dead – who cannot interfere in the affairs of the living – to take retribution against him for his crimes. Emily, now freed from her torment, releases Victor of his vow to marry her and returns his ring, allowing him to marry Victoria. As she steps into the moonlight, she fades away into a swarm of butterflies that fly into the sky as Victor and Victoria watch and embrace.

A cat named Lorenzo lounges on a cushion. A black cat passes by, and Lorenzo can't help but express his glee that the stray is missing his tail. Lorenzo flaunts his own luxurious backside accessory, and goads the cat with expansive displays of tailery. As Lorenzo laughs the black cat casts a hex, bringing Lorenzo's tail to energetic life. Lorenzo is little more than perturbed until the tail's incessant motion begins to take its toll. The pampered cat grows both exhausted and desperate, as it becomes apparent that even the most extreme measures (such as high voltage electrocution, drowning, and being run over by a train) will not quiet his tail. At junctures the black cat appears and offers Lorenzo a knife, his intentions clear. Lorenzo resists him just as strongly as he does his tail's advances. Lorenzo is however, finally driven to capitulate and severs his own glorious tail.

With the climactic events of ''The Bourne Ultimatum'' behind him, Jason Bourne is able to once again become David Webb, now professor of linguistics at Georgetown University. However, this serenity does not last for long and, when a silenced gunshot narrowly misses Webb's head, the Bourne persona awakens in him yet again.

Bourne's first objective is to get to his longtime friend and handler at the CIA, Alex Conklin.

However, unbeknownst (as yet) to Bourne, a Hungarian by the name of Stepan Spalko has now drawn Jason into a web—one which he cannot escape as easily as his professorial façade.

Finding Alex dead along with Dr Morris Panov, Bourne realizes the trap as soon as he hears the police arriving. With his car outside and his fingerprints in the house, he immediately understands that he has been framed.

So, with only Conklin's cell phone and a torn page from a notebook to go on, Jason Bourne sets off to find out who is trying to kill him and who killed his friends.

After warning Marie and his two children, Jamie and Alyssa, to proceed immediately towards their safe house, he slips through the CIA cordon and makes his way to an independent agent who was talking to Conklin when he was killed. Having received travel plans to Hungary and a mission to meet Janos Vadas, Conklin's contact in Hungary, Bourne proceeds to unravel the truth behind why Conklin and Panov were killed.

Meanwhile, a group of Chechen terrorists have been fighting a losing battle against Russian invaders when a man named Stepan Spalko appears to solve their problems. Spalko, we later discover, had Conklin and Panov killed and kidnapped a doctor by the name of Felix Schiffer. Schiffer is an expert in bacteriological particulate behavior.

Spalko intends to release a bacteriological weapon during peace negotiations between many world leaders to be held in Reykjavík, using the terrorists he is cultivating as a diversion.

The book charts Bourne's course from the United States, to France and then to Budapest in Hungary where he learns the final thing he needs to do—to stop Spalko's attack in Iceland.

This, of course, all has to be done in the face of a CIA sanction for him to be immediately terminated, as he is believed responsible for the deaths of Conklin and Panov.

There is also the matter of Spalko's hired assassin, Khan, who is able to track Bourne where everyone else cannot. Khan is revealed to be Joshua Webb, David Webb's son from his first marriage, who believes erroneously that he was left for dead by his father in Vietnam. Bourne, however, refuses to believe that Khan is Joshua, convinced that Joshua was killed decades ago, and continually tries to avoid him and the truth.

Though Khan is at first working for Spalko, he eventually realizes that he has been used as a pawn in Spalko's personal game. After revealing later on to Bourne that Annaka Vadas, the daughter of Janos Vadas, is a traitor, he begins to feel that Bourne is not the hateful father that he had imagined.

Unfortunately, Bourne is still unable to believe Khan is Joshua—until he hacks into the CIA database and discovers that Joshua's body had never been found. In a fit of rage, he attacks Khan, first believing that it is a conspiracy to hurt him, but is later captured by Spalko.

After rescuing Bourne from Spalko, Khan makes an uneasy peace with his father. While on the plane to Iceland, however, Khan reveals a piece of information that finally convinces Bourne that Khan is his son. When Bourne subsequently reveals that he lost his memory while undercover as Cain, Khan begins to rethink his views regarding his father.

After completing the operation and stopping Spalko, Khan makes up with his father and realizes that his hatred was always a reflection of his personal struggles and that, in truth, he truly loved Bourne. He requests Bourne, however, not to reveal his identity to Marie, in whose life he feels he has no place. Meanwhile, a mole in Spalko's company reveals to Deputy Director of Central Intelligence Martin Lindros that Spalko was behind everything, clearing Bourne's name.

Daniel Daréus (Michael Nyqvist) is a successful and renowned international conductor whose life aspiration is to create music that will open people's hearts. His own heart, however, is in bad shape. After suffering a heart attack on stage at the end of a performance, he retires indefinitely to Norrland in the far north of Sweden, to the village where he endured a terrible childhood of bullying.

Daniel buys the old elementary school in the village, and soon after is asked to come along one Thursday night and listen to the local choir. He is only asked to listen, and maybe offer some helpful advice, but their intentions of persuading him to help are obvious. He eventually agrees to help, albeit reluctantly. Daniel approaches the parish minister to seek for the position of cantor. He starts helping the choir grow and develop, rediscovering his own joy in music.

Almost immediately, Lena (Frida Hallgren), an attractive young girl in the choir, catches his attention. As they grow closer and fall in love, he realises that he is surrounded by the villagers' personal problems. Inger (Ingela Olsson) is married to the respected minister, Stig (Niklas Falk), but has failed to develop a loving sexual relationship with her husband. Siv (Ylva Lööf) is so obsessed with morality that she cannot enjoy herself. Arne (Lennart Jähkel) is so ambitious for the choir's success that he obsesses over tiny mistakes, failing to see that he is making bigger mistakes himself. Tore (André Sjöberg) is mentally handicapped and shunned but is eventually included in the choir; Holmfrid (Mikhael Rahm) has put up with being called "Fatso" by Arne since childhood and eventually stands up to him. Gabriella (Helen Sjöholm) is beaten and abused by her husband, Conny (Per Morberg), a fact that is known and ignored by the whole village. She eventually finds the strength to leave him, as the whole village finds its strength to help her. Conny himself turns out to be the bully who was at school with Daniel and drove him from the village. He blames the choir and Daniel for his wife's decision and beats him up. This lands Conny in jail. The minister, Stig, is jealous of the choir's success and tries to close it down. His failure precipitates his eventual nervous breakdown. The heart of each member of the choir starts to open, as it has always been Daniel's dream.

The choir is accepted into the annual "Let the Peoples Sing" competition (Arne has decided to register the choir without previous notice), and they journey to Innsbruck, Austria, to perform. Lena fears Daniel will leave her for his sophisticated friends from the music world, when she see their kissing and hugging him. He dares at last to tell her he loves her and then they make love. On the day of the competition, the choir is ready on stage but Daniel is nowhere to be seen. His heart has been affected by his anxiety, and he has another heart attack. Daniel staggers into the restroom, unsure of how to handle the situation, then stumbles and hits his head on the pipe below a sink, causing him to bleed severely. He lies helplessly on the tile, blood gushing from his head, listening to the choir harmonising over the loudspeakers. The audience in the auditorium is enchanted and sings along. Daniel smiles to himself and turns motionless, thus leaving the viewer to decide whether he lives or dies, completely fulfilled by reaching his goal.

The final scene shows Daniel rushing towards his younger self within the wheat fields as he embraces his life's goal, to "create music that will open a person's heart".

Daisuke Jigen is asked by a reporter to tell the story of how he met Arsène Lupin III and the rest of the gang. He tells about the time he was hired by a millionaire named Galvez to help guard the Clam of Helmeth, a green cylinder made of unbreakable metal. The cylinder contained instructions on how to forge a metal similar to the one that composed it. The Clam has also gained the attentions of both Lupin, a fellow thief named Brad, and Brad's partner, Fujiko Mine.

Brad manages to steal the Clam, but is murdered by Galves' henchman, Shade. Lupin and Fujiko now have possession of it, but no means to open it. Meanwhile, Inspector Koichi Zenigata has been dispatched by the Japanese police to hunt down and arrest Fujiko. He is paired with George McFly, an American detective who is his only resource. And on the other side of the world, Goemon Ishikawa XIII is seeking a sword worthy of his skills.

The key to opening the Clam of Helmeth is now the focus of everyone's efforts, but who will come across it first? And, more importantly, how much of Jigen's story is the truth?

The show that focuses on Mimi Mortin, a clever, redheaded girl in the sixth grade who lives in the Canadian town of Starfish Bay with two friends, Elaine and Russell and her family, but rivaled with Sincerity.

''Journey to the East'' is written from the point of view of a man (called "H. H." in the book) who becomes a member of "The League", a timeless religious sect whose members include famous fictional and real characters, such as Plato, Mozart, Pythagoras, Paul Klee, Don Quixote, Puss in Boots, Tristram Shandy, Baudelaire, Goldmund (from Hesse's ''Narcissus and Goldmund''), the artist Klingsor (from Hesse's ''Klingsor's Last Summer''), and the ferryman Vasudeva (from Hesse's ''Siddhartha''). A branch of the group goes on a pilgrimage to "the East" in search of the "ultimate Truth". The narrator speaks of traveling through both time and space, across geography imaginary and real.

Although at first fun and enlightening, the Journey runs into a crisis in a deep mountain gorge called Morbio Inferiore when Leo, apparently a simple servant, disappears, causing the group to plummet into anxiety and argument. Leo is described as happy, pleasant, handsome, beloved by everyone, having a rapport with animals – to a discerning reader, he seems a great deal more than a simple servant, but nobody in the pilgrimage, including the narrator, seems to realise this. Nor does anyone seem to wonder why the group dissolves in dissension and bickering after Leo disappears. Instead they accuse Leo of taking with him various objects which they seem to be missing (and which turn up later) and which they regard as very important (and which later turn out not to be very important), and they blame him for the eventual disintegration of the group and failure of the Journey.

Years later, the narrator tries to write his story of the Journey, even though he has lost contact with the group and believes the League no longer exists. But he is unable to put together any coherent account of it; his whole life has sunk into despair and disillusionment since the failure of the one thing which was most important to him, and he has even sold the violin with which he once offered music to the group during the Journey. Finally, at the advice of a friend, he finds the servant Leo and, having failed in his attempt to re-establish communication with him or even be recognized by him when he meets him on a park bench, writes him a long, impassioned letter of "grievances, remorse and entreaty" and posts it to him that night.

The next morning, Leo appears in the narrator's home and tells him he has to appear before the High Throne to be judged by the officials of the League. It turns out (to the narrator's surprise) that Leo, the simple servant, is actually President of the League, and at points seems like Pablo, from Hesse's ''Steppenwolf''. The crisis in Morbio Inferiore was a test of faith which the narrator and everyone else flunked rather dismally. H. H. discovers that his "aberration" and time spent adrift was part of his trial, and is allowed to return to the League if he can pass any new test of faith and obedience. What he chooses, and the final dénouement, is a stroke of Hesse's typical Eastern mysticism at its finest.

An on-screen title sets the action in Korea, 1951. The film tells the story of a young boy, Manuk, who roams a seemingly deserted town to glean and recycle the debris of war. We first meet him in the wreck of an aeroplane, looking for a particular piece of war refuse – a bolt – to turn into a toy soldier for his collection. He sings a song about a bear. Upon hearing the unmistakable low whistle of a train in the distance he runs to the track and places the bolt on the rail. The train thunders past on its urgent mission to carry tanks to the front. Manuk stands mesmerised, and grins widely. Once the train has passed he retrieves the bolt which has become magnetised. He makes his way through the town, pretending to be a soldier engaged in house-to-house fighting until his attention is captured by the drone of aeroplane engines. Silently he watches them slowly cross the sky. His war game begins again as he crouches behind rocks on a ridge overlooking an area with houses jumbled together. A postman cycles down the road below Manuk’s hiding place. Manuk imagines he is with his dad, pinned down by enemy fire. “Dad, there are too many of them,” he cries as the sound of machine guns and artillery fire fill his head. “But we are braver than them,” his father replies in the game. Manuk picks up a rock as if it is a hand grenade, expertly pulls the pin with his teeth and hurls it at the enemy crying “Dad, get down!” He waits, crouched, fingers in ears for the explosion which never comes. Instead, we hear the postman cry in surprise and pain, before crashing his bicycle and shouting at his unseen tormentor. Manuk slinks away and climbs the hill towards his home. He takes a key from a special hiding spot, and approaches the verandah in front of his house. He notices a parcel and hurries to open it. He pulls out an old leather wallet containing a faded black and white photograph of a man crouching with a child dressed as Manuk is now, but much younger. Manuk gently caresses the photograph with his thumb. He then pulls out a set of dog tags, and an old boot. He marches up and down in front of his house, wearing the boots as if he is a soldier on guard. Later, inside the house, he plays with the toy soldiers and tanks he has made from bits and pieces of metal he has found and falls asleep on the floor. His mother appears at the door, saying “Manuk, Mum is home”.

Part One: Love and Agony

The action starts on a ship traveling from Okinawa. Kameda, who suffers from "epileptic dementia" (which he refers to as "idiocy"), is heading to Hokkaido.

The movie explains that "Dostoyevsky wanted to portray a genuinely good man. It may seem ironic, choosing a young idiot as his hero, but in this world, goodness and idiocy are often equated. The story tells of the destruction of a pure soul by a faithless world."

Kameda has been confined to a mental asylum since he suffered a mental breakdown after he was mistaken for a war criminal and almost executed by a firing squad following World War II. During his journey, he meets and becomes friends with Denkichi Akama, who "hadn't laughed for years. He was the son of an old Sapporo family, and his father's harsh discipline had made him feel like a caged animal. Oddly, he came to like Kameda, who made him laugh heartily. Akama told him (Kameda) about Taeko Nasu, whom he'd met six months earlier. One look at her had been enough to release his pent-up passions." Akama is returning home to Hokkaido for the first time since he stole money from his father to buy a diamond ring for Taeko. Taeko was the beautiful mistress of a rich man named Tohata since she was a child, but she ran away six months earlier, at the same time as when Akama had bought her the ring. Akama's father has since died, and he is on his way to claim a large inheritance. Akama and Kameda are both on the same train to Sapporo. Kameda is on his way to see Mr. Ono, "his only relative in the world".

Mr. Ono's wife asks her husband what he is going to do about Kameda. He tells her that he will try to find Kameda work and that Kameda can rent a room from Kayama, a man who is to marry Taeko in exchange for Y600,000. Kameda's father had left Kameda a large ranch, which Ono had sold through Kayama.

Kameda is unaware of his inheritance, which Ono's daughter, Ayako, later teases him about.

Tohata, in an attempt to sever his ties with Taeko and avoid public disgrace for his long-term abusive treatment of her, which has twisted her psyche and made her a social pariah, offers a dowry of Y600,000 to Kayama if he will marry Taeko, a deal which was brokered by Mr. Ono. Kayama secretly loves Ono's daughter Ayako. When Akama finds out about the dowry offer, he offers Kayama Y1,000,000 not to marry her in a threatening confrontation. Kameda and Taeko meet, and he is immediately drawn to and wants to help her with the sadness he sees in her, while she is drawn to the kindness she sees in him, which gives her the strength to run away from all of these men treating her like chattel. Kameda and Akama both follow Taeko, while Kayama, who is really attracted to Ono's daughter Ayako, does not.

Kameda tells Akama he should not marry Taeko as it would mean the ruin for both Taeko and Akama. Akama tells Kameda she really loves Kameda and Akama gives her to him.

Part Two: Love and Loathing

Taeko seems to love Kameda, but she thinks it would ruin his life to marry someone with her reputation, so she considers marrying Akama and writes to Ayako encouraging her to marry Kameda, since he is known to have written her a complimentary letter. Kameda proposes to Ayako. Ayako vacillates violently between expressing love and hate for Kameda and cannot understand what Taeko's true motives are, since they have never met. Ayako arranges for them to talk at Akama's house, and Taeko realizes that she has been putting Ayako on a pedestal and is no less worthy of Kameda's love than Ayako is. Ayako leaves, Kameda follows her to make sure she gets home safely, and Taeko faints, thinking Kameda has chosen Ayako over her.

When Kameda returns to Akama's house, he discovers that Akama, who is insanely jealous of the feelings he knows Taeko has for Kameda and not for him, but has been unable to make himself dislike Kameda when they see each other in person, has killed Taeko. He does not want her corpse to start to smell, so the two men do not light a fire and spend the night huddled around candles and bundled under blankets before they both, seemingly, die the next morning. Upon hearing this news, Ayako remarks that she is the idiot for not having been able to love without hatred, like Kameda did.

The ever-optimistic Joline faces a challenge when her husband, flaky news photographer Carl, leaves her to find himself in Texas. Joline tracks Carl down and observes him, acquainting herself with his schedule and new friends, including his new girlfriend, Carmen, and his quirky neighbor Niko. Eventually Carl spots Joline, and Joline seeks new ways of returning Carl to her life, up to and including mystic remedies provided by Carmen's grandfather. Eventually Joline is committed, hence the title, and her belief in true and lasting love is broken... or is it?

Yesterday is a Zulu mother living with her seven-year-old daughter, Beauty, in their rural village of Rooihoek (English translation means literally "red corner"), in Zululand, South Africa. Every day of her life is spent in the hard work of tilling the field to plant enough food for them, fetching water, cutting firewood and hauling it home, all while also trying to keep her daughter stimulated and occupied. She strikes up a friendship with the new teacher who arrives in the village.

Yesterday is plagued by a persistent cough and feelings of weakness. She goes to the local clinic, which is an extremely long walk for her and Beauty. She waits all day in the long queue to see the doctor, only to be turned away at the end of the day without having seen the doctor. She brushes it off, saying that she is not that ill. When Beauty finds her mother collapsed on the doorstep of their home, she runs to call her mother's friend, the teacher. Yesterday consults a traditional healer, but her teacher friend insists she return to the clinic. The teacher pays for a taxi to the clinic so that she can get there early enough to see the doctor; the teacher also takes care of Beauty for the day. The doctor who sees Yesterday asks her where she got her name from, and Yesterday explains that her father named her Yesterday because, "He said things were better yesterday than today." The doctor tells Yesterday that her illness is AIDS-related and that she probably got it from her husband, who is away working in a mine. After hearing the news, Yesterday is very upset. Yesterday understands that she will die from this disease, leaving her daughter alone.

She makes a plan to travel to the mine where her husband, John, works to tell him the news and to tell him that he also is sick. He reacts to this news very badly and beats her, while his supervisor looks in and then looks away. Yesterday goes home and tries to continue living her life as best she can. She asks her teacher friend to take care of Beauty when she dies. A few months later John comes home to her. He is very ill from AIDS-related illnesses and begs Yesterday's forgiveness for blaming her and for beating her for telling him the truth. He explains that he has been fired from the mine, as he is now incontinent and there are no toilets down in the mine, so all day he would stink "like an animal". The other villagers, who do not understand HIV/AIDS, protest at having John living amongst them and say that he must leave or go to hospital. Yesterday tried to get her husband into a nearby clinic but was unsuccessful, as there were no available beds for him and he would need to be put on a waiting list. Due to this, she sets out to make her own hospital on a nearby hill. Using sheet metal and pieces of old cars and taxis, she puts together a building, which she then helps her husband to with her daughter's assistance.

As they are making the laborious journey to the "hospital", John comments that when he was young he could run from one end of this field to the other and not think of it, now it seems like the longest journey of his life. Yesterday and Beauty take care of him as well as they can until he dies. Yesterday's focus then falls on preparing Beauty for school. Yesterday never went to school, so her single goal becomes living long enough to be able to see Beauty attend. When the doctor tells her she has a strong body that keeps the illness somewhat under control she replies it's not the body but her mind. Yesterday watches as her daughter starts her first day at school and then walks off as the camera pans back from her.

The Earth has entered the 21st century and it is in peril. The “Green Earth” project has been abandoned and scientists look to the stars to find a “Second Earth.” The Space Angel, on its mission to find this “Second Earth,” is attacked by a group of aliens named the “Waldarians.” The Space Angel is destroyed and with it the hope of mankind. Dr. Amachi manages to create “Pegas” and the “Teksetter” system, designed to combat the aliens by augmenting a human with a certain wavelength into a Tekkaman, giving them enhanced strength abilities. Test pilots George Minami and Hiromi Amachi, along with Andro Umeda and Mutan, two alien beings from the planet Sanno, rid the dying Earth from the threat of the “Waldaster” and continue to research the “Leap Flight Engine” to reach a new home for humanity.

Act One

''True West'' is about the sibling rivalry between two estranged brothers who have reconnected. The play begins with brothers Austin and Lee sitting in their mother's house. This is the first time they've seen each other in five years. The two are not on good terms, but Austin attempts to appease his older brother, who is more dominant. We learn that their mother is on vacation in Alaska and that Austin is housesitting. Austin is trying to work on his screenplay but Lee continually distracts him with nonsense questions. The two brothers seem on edge with each other. When Austin suggests that Lee leave, Lee threatens to steal things from the neighborhood. Austin calms him down and the night ends with the two of them on neutral terms.

Lee talks about the security level of their mother's house, and how Lee went into the desert to find their dad. Austin then tells Lee to leave the house because a film producer, Saul, is coming by to look at Austin's screenplay (described as a “period piece”). Lee agrees to leave in exchange for Austin's car keys. Austin is reluctant at first but relents, and Lee promises that he will have it back by six. Lee departs.

Saul and Austin are discussing their agreement when Lee enters with a stolen television set. Saul and Lee discuss golf and make plans to play the next day, excluding Austin because he doesn't play, despite his desire that Lee have nothing to do with Saul. Lee proposes a script idea to Saul and Saul reacts positively.

Lee describes his story out loud. Austin writes it down, but stops, saying it doesn't resemble real life. The two brothers quarrel and Austin asks Lee for his car keys back. Lee assumes Austin is trying to make him leave, and Lee says he can't be kicked out. Austin says he wouldn't kick him out because he's his brother. Lee counters that being brothers means nothing because in-family murders are most common. Austin assures him they won't be driven to murder over a movie script. The two admit to being envious of each other's lives, Lee returns the car keys and the scene closes with Austin typing Lee's story.

Act Two

Lee returns from his golf game at noon, with a set of golf clubs that Saul has given him. He tells Austin that the clubs are part of an advance that Saul has promised him for the story idea outline that he "dictated" to Austin. They celebrate until Lee informs Austin that he expects Austin to write the screenplay. Austin questions this, knowing he has his own work, but Lee goes on to inform him that Saul has chosen to drop Austin's screenplay. Austin warns Lee that he needs to be careful with messing about with this line of work and that he has a lot at stake on his own project. The scene ends with Austin threatening to leave and go to the desert as Lee tries to calm him down.

Austin confronts Saul about his decision to buy Lee's screenplay. He argues that Saul only offered to buy the screenplay because he lost a bet on the golf course. Saul wants Austin to write both his and Lee's story, but Austin refuses. Austin thinks that Lee's story is without merit or plausibility. Due to Austin's rejection of the job, Saul decides to drop Austin's story and to find a different writer for Lee's story. The scene ends with Saul making plans for lunch with Lee.

Austin is drunk and annoying Lee, who is now at the typewriter, laboriously trying, hunt-and-peck style, to type out a screenplay. Austin taunts his brother with advice and says that this is the first time he has enjoyed spending time with Lee since he arrived. He insists that Lee is not a real screenwriter, and when Lee informs him that he has an advance coming on his script, Austin claims he could burgle houses just as well as Lee can. Lee bets that he couldn't even steal a toaster, but they can't agree on the stakes. Instead Lee asks in earnest for Austin's help with the technical parts of the writing, offering to pay him money and then disappear like their father did and leave Austin alone. Austin argues about how well their father ended up, and the scene closes as they drink together.

Austin is polishing toasters that he stole while Lee is smashing a typewriter early in the morning. The two continue to do this while they are carrying on a conversation. Austin is proud of what he has done. Lee wants to see a woman, but Austin refuses because he is married. Lee throws a fit while on the phone with the operator because he cannot find a pen to write down what the operator is saying. In his search for a pen or pencil, Lee strews the contents of all the kitchen drawers on the floor. Austin begs Lee to go to the desert with him because he thinks there is nothing for him where he is. The brothers make a deal that Austin will write the play for Lee if Lee takes him to the desert.

In the final scene, the house is in shambles, and Lee and Austin are working vigorously on their script when their mother walks in the door, suitcases in hand. She stares at her sons, mouth agape, until Lee finally notices her. She is stunned by her sons' appearance and the state of her house. Austin tells her that he and Lee are going to take off into the desert, but Lee says they might have to postpone the trip because he doesn't think Austin is cut out for the desert life-style. Austin responds by attempting to strangle Lee with the telephone cord, and their mother storms out of the house. Lee ceases struggling and lies inert, and Austin finally lets go. He is worried for a second that he's killed his brother. As Austin moves for the door, Lee rises with fire in his eyes. The two brothers face one another, fists raised, as the lights fade.

Nita and Nora—who were Twiinz—get ready to join Cloe, Jade, Sasha and Yasmin at the daycare center—which was located at the mall. Snappy, Nita's puppy, jumps into Nora's bag when no one's looking, and Nora, hurrying to keep up with Nita, rushes out without knowing Snappy is in her bag. Once at the daycare center Snappy gets out and escapes into the mall. They also try to escape and find Snappy—being dog-napped by Duane, the bully at the mall. He demands $50 from the Bratz Babyz as a ransom for the dog. Having their ideas were different, and Jade, Cloe and Nora try to get Snappy back one way, while Sasha, Yasmin and Nita try to get her back another. When time starts to run out, they decide the only way to get $50 is for Nora to win it in the karaoke contest. They learn to team up and overcome the bully and get the puppy back.

The Babyz dream to be like their favorite superheroes. When the Babyz go to a super-hero theme park, their babysitter, Gran, buys them an alien matter exchanger, thinking it's a toy. With the help of the matter exchanger, the Babyz wake up with super powers—known for do good deeds by getting a cat down from a tree, saving two kids from a bully and preventing a bus from falling off a cliff. But the four aliens want their matter exchanger back, and kidnap Sasha. The Babyz save her, but they lose their powers and get locked in the aliens space ship, while the aliens change into human Babyz and take place. Sasha, Jade, Cloe and Yasmin must take on the aliens as regular Babyz.