The player character Paul is a Templar knight on his first Crusade, to stop the end of the world by fighting his way through the sombre gloom of European monasteries and villages to the colourful bazaars and powerful bastions of the crusader castles under the blazing sun of the Holy Land and by entering the realms of hell and face his worst nightmares.

An evil Bishop has abducted Adelle, a mysterious young woman with divine powers and Paul's beloved childhood friend. With his entourage of disciples and their captive Adelle he embarks on an Unholy Crusade, moving along the initial routes of the historic holy wars. By misusing Adelle's powers against her he plans to complete the Unholy Circle and to perform dark rituals at sacred places to desecrate them. This way he intends to eventually unlock and gain access to the Gateway to Hell.

Paul finds upon him the tough task of starting a mission to uncover the Evil Conspiracy, to interrupt the Unholy Circle and to prevent the Evil Bishop from fulfilling his plan. Only by saving Adelle can he save the world from Evil.

In the final confrontation with evil, the powers of hell have been unleashed and the corrupt bishop has gained limitless powers. Paul fights him and his henchmen, resurrecting countless of evil minion where Paul struggles to fight. Eventually the bishop was defeated and thrown into hell, and Paul, although weak and wounded, saved the world from darkness. He then brings Adelle home to her mother where they say that Paul's victory was the will of God, something to which Adelle agrees. However, whilst Paul and her mother look away, Adelle's eyes turn black, indicating that she has been possessed by a demon.

It begins with Lucy, on a night in 1921. She is the only child of an Anglo-Irish land owner on the coast of County Cork. It starts during the Irish War of Independence, when Loyalist Protestant landowners caught in the battle between the IRA and the British army had their houses burned. The place is under martial law and Captain Gault is disturbed by young arsonists from the nearby village. When he fires a warning shot with his old rifle, he injures a boy in the shoulder. Out of fear, the family plans to move to England. Lucy is not told why her family wishes to move and longs for the house she was kept from and the sea close by. On the eve of their departure, she hides in the woods. Due to a series of events, her parents are led to believe that she drowned in the sea.

By the time she is discovered, her parents are gone. She thus gets what she wished for, to live in the house, being taken care of by the house servants turned caretaker-farmers. Lucy lives a very lonely life, reading books and keeping bees. She feels very guilty about running away and thus feels that she deserves her loneliness. When another character, Ralph, tries to relieve her of her sad life, she feels that she cannot let him love her without, one of the characters opines, getting forgiveness from her parents. Her father returns after the Second World War, having spent the previous years in Italy and Switzerland, too late to salvage her happiness. They settle into an uneasy companionship, with too much unspoken.

Having lost the love of her life, she forms a bond with the person who was wounded by her father. Lucy spends many years visiting the asylum where the person is incarcerated in his confusion and his silence. Lucy in old age sees people with phones to their ears and hears on the wireless about the Internet, and wonders what it is.

Part I

On an alien planet, Kathryn Janeway happily shows up for her first day of work at an energy plant, eager to take up her new position. None of the other ''Voyager'' crew members are visible, and it appears ''Voyager'' has abandoned its attempts to return to the Alpha Quadrant and Earth.

After being shown to her work station, Janeway meets a man named Jaffen, who intervenes when Janeway inadvertently misconfigures her console and sets off an alarm. They soon run afoul of Annika Hansen (Seven of Nine), the plant's stern new "efficiency monitor". Tuvok, a fellow employee, approaches Janeway in apparent confusion, though neither Janeway, Tuvok, or Seven of Nine recognize one another. Tuvok claims that they do not belong there, which attracts the attention of a doctor and mystifies Janeway and Jaffen.

A doctor diagnoses Tuvok with "dysphoria syndrome" and begins treatment. Tuvok shows signs that he has recalled his time on ''Voyager'' and attempts several more times to contact the others.

Tom Paris, who was employed at the plant with Janeway and Tuvok, is fired despite there being a labor shortage. He takes a job at a bar, and befriends B'Elanna Torres, a pregnant woman who also works at the energy plant.

Meanwhile, Chakotay, Neelix, and Harry Kim return to ''Voyager'' from a short mission away to find the ship empty other than the Emergency Command Hologram (the Doctor), who is in command and attempting to make repairs on the damaged ship, while contending with a damaged and uncooperative computer system. The ECH explains that the ship was damaged by a floating mine, which was a ruse allowing unknown parties to abduct the crew.

Chakotay has himself surgically altered to resemble the planet's native race, and beams down to the planet, masquerading as "Amal Kotay." After following Torres for several minutes, he assists Neelix in abducting and transporting her to ''Voyager'' (where the Doctor reverses the mental conditioning). Chakotay is unable to be beamed back to the ship, but avoids capture.

Part II

With Neelix's help, Torres begins to remember her life as a starship engineer. On the planet, Chakotay (who has managed to escape capture thus far) approaches Janeway, but is unable to overcome her skepticism.

A young doctor begins to become suspicious of so many people of the same species having the apparently rare "dysphoria syndrome," and almost all of them getting jobs at the energy plant at the same time, and none of them having any previous file references. After gentle inquiries result in an official "hands-off" warning from local law enforcement, the doctor approaches Annika Hansen, who is initially skeptical, but begins taking Tuvok's rants seriously.

What the Efficiency Monitor discovers breaks the spell: the workers at the plant were diagnosed with dysphoria syndrome (and treated with mind-altering drugs), specifically so they could be placed in the plant to alleviate a labor shortage. Examining the files of the plant's newest "employees," she discovers they are all ''Voyager'' officers and crew, and begins to launch a deeper investigation.

Meanwhile, Chakotay, Kim and the Doctor discover the planet's own government is unaware of the kidnappings. Working with the plant's doctor, Annika unmasks the conspiracy and frees ''Voyager'' s crew, and the planetary government pledges to end the forced-labor practices begun by plant staff.

New York City in the 1920s is where gambler "Honey Talk" Nelson crosses paths with bookie "Jumbo" Schneider. Nelson has two choices, cement shoes or "fixing" a horse race in Maryland. Naturally, Nelson heads to Maryland with his cousin Virgil Yokum tagging along.

Once in Maryland, Nelson falls for the owner of the horse that has been chosen for the "fix". Virgil has also fallen in love, with the horse's veterinarian.

Nelson decides that love should prevail and refuses to go along with the plan. Meanwhile, an English jockey, who is to ride the horse, is prevented from performing his job by Schneider's mobsters and Yokum winds up riding the horse to victory.

Supposedly filmed in 'Schizophrenoscope' ("the New Split-Screen"), it concerns Superintendent Quilt of Scotland Yard's attempts to retrieve a 'Mukkinese Battle-Horn' stolen from a London museum. Along the way he meets characters not dissimilar to Eccles, Henry Crun and Minnie Bannister from ''The Goon Show''.

The plot finds Nancy, Bess, and George investigating a mysterious boy from India. The boy, Coya, works for a traveling circus, and is treated poorly by his guardian, Rai, also a native of India, who is in charge of the circus. Coya runs away from his abusive guardian and seeks asylum at the Drew home in River Heights. Soon after his arrival, the girls begin investigating property owned by the unusual Miss Anita Allison. They encounter a house "with no insides," and a hidden tunnel. The property mysteriously catches fire, revealing a hidden cache of jewels. Nancy traces Coya's parentage and uncovers a sinister kidnapping plot involving both Miss Allison and Rai. The climax also reveals a secret about the ivory charm, and its mysterious powers.

Brian MacLean irritates fellow bush pilots Johnny Dutton, Tiny Murphy, Blimp Lebec, and British expatriate Scrounger Harris by outcompeting them for business in rugged Northern Ontario, Canada in 1939, as the Second World War is beginning. Dutton, whose ambition is to start his own airline, flies by the book, but MacLean is a seat-of-the-pants kind of pilot, mirroring the differences in their personalities.

Dutton saves MacLean's life after he is struck in the head by a still-moving propeller by transporting a doctor under dangerous flying conditions. MacLean is grateful and joins Dutton in a temporary partnership to help Dutton earn the seed fund for his airline. When Dutton rejects MacLean's warning about his girlfriend Emily Foster, MacLean marries her in order to save Dutton from wrecking his life. Dutton, however, does not know this and abruptly ends their friendship. Dutton impulsively gives his savings to charity and enlists in the Royal Canadian Air Force.

Later, after hearing Winston Churchill's "We shall fight on the beaches" speech on the radio, MacLean and the other bush pilots enlist in the Royal Canadian Air Force, only to discover that they are considered too old for combat. They reluctantly agree to train as flight instructors for the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan. Their commanding officer is none other than Dutton. MacLean, with his brash and fiercely independent nature, clashes with the military way of doing things, and he is court-martialed and dismissed from the service for flying too low, resulting in a cadet being severely injured. For revenge, he and "Tiny" buzz the airfield when renowned Canadian First World War ace Air Marshal William "Billy" Bishop (playing himself) is speaking during the group's graduation ceremony. "Tiny" blacks out while pulling out of a dive, and his plane plummets into the ground, killing him. MacLean loses his pilot's license as a result.

Later, when two transport aircraft crash, killing all 44 ferry pilots aboard, there is an urgent need for pilots to ferry a group of unarmed Lockheed Hudson bombers from Gander to Britain. The flight instructors are assigned the task, but their numbers have to be supplemented with civilian pilots. MacLean uses "Tiny" Murphy's papers to participate. Dutton recognizes him, but as Emily has told him why MacLean married (and abandoned) her, they reconcile and Dutton permits him to fly.

Dutton commands a flight of five. Nearing the coast of the British Isles, they are attacked by a German Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter. First, Blimp Lebec is shot down. Then after Scrounger, MacLean's navigator, is killed, MacLean uses his flying skills to crash his unwieldy bomber into the nimble fighter, sacrificing himself to save the others.

The play takes place in London, primarily in the home of Morose. Morose is a wealthy old man with an obsessive hatred of noise, going as far as to live on a street too narrow for carts to pass and make noise. He has made plans to disinherit his nephew Dauphine by marrying. This is due to the schemes and tricks Dauphine has played on him in the past. To combat this, Dauphine concocts a plan with Cutbeard, Morose's barber. Cutbeard presents Morose with a young (and supposedly) silent woman to marry. When Morose meets Epicœne, he tries to find out if she is really a silent woman, testing her obedience. He tells her not to succumb to the temptations of the court and tells her about the virtues of silence. Under the assumption that his fiancée, Epicœne, is an exceptionally quiet woman, Morose excitedly plans their marriage. Unbeknownst to him, Dauphine has arranged the whole match for purposes of his own.

At the same time there is an alliance of women with intellectual pretensions called the Ladies Collegiates. They are married women who live away from their husbands and speak their minds. They talk about how women can use sex to control their husbands.

Truewit, hoping to secure his friend's inheritance, attempts to persuade Morose that marriage would not be good for him. Truewit says that no matter what, Morose will find himself unhappy in marriage, regardless of whether she is pretty, ugly, rich, poor, or even if Morose loves her. Truewit tells Morose that it is not the women's fault; all of them are corrupted. He also tells Morose to kill himself instead of getting married. The couple are married despite the well-meaning interference of Dauphine's friend Truewit. Morose soon regrets his wedding day, as his house is invaded by a charivari consisting of Dauphine, Truewit, and Clerimont; a bear warden named Otter and his wife; two stupid knights (La Foole and Daw); and an assortment of Collegiates. The house is overrun with noise and clamor, much to Morose's chagrin. Worst for Morose, Epicœne quickly reveals herself to be a loud, nagging mate.

Mistress Otter has a dominant personality compared to her husband. She has the same characteristics as Katherine from ''The Taming of the Shrew''. She is intimidating and in charge of domestic resources. She yells at him in front of Truewit and his friends and she tells him that he is sullying her image. It appears that she had great options in life but she ended up settling for him.

Desperate for a divorce, Morose consults two lawyers (who are actually Dauphine's friends Cutbeard and Otter in disguise), but they can find no grounds for ending the match. Finally, Dauphine promises to reveal grounds to end the marriage if Morose agrees to give him his inheritance. The agreement made, Dauphine strips the female costume from Epicœne, revealing that Morose's wife is, in fact, a boy, and therefore their marriage cannot be upheld. Morose is dismissed harshly, and the other ludicrous characters are discomfited by this revelation; Daw and Foole, for instance, had claimed to have slept with Epicœne.

Nozomi is a former actress who moves back to Japan from New Zealand. Upon arriving, she meets her fellow high school student neighbor Ryōtarō Shiba, who decides to join the high school boxing club.

Skyhawks, Inc. was a family-run air transport and rescue service based at San Marcos Field in Southern California, and headed by widower Mike "Cap" Wilson. Cap Wilson learned how to fly during World War II, during which he achieved the rank of Colonel. Cap's father, famed aviator Pappy Wilson, had been a World War I flying ace. A warm and encouraging father, Cap had 17-year-old fraternal twins named Steve and Carolyn. He also sponsored two foster kids: 14-year-old Baron "Red" Hughes and his 9-year-old sister Cynthia, usually referred to as "Cindy", though she was also nicknamed "Mugs". The Wilson crew also included Cap's girlfriend. Maggie McNally. Joe Conway was the Skyhawks' chief mechanic. The team saved troubled charter planes, rescued helicopter pilots, transported air freight, even ran secret government missions. San Marcos Field also was the home base of the Skyhawks' unscrupulous competitor, Buck Devlin, and his gang of pilots.

Gary Webster (Alexander D'Arcy), a nightclub manager, flies a group of women from New York City to dance in his club in Singapore. While flying over the Pacific Ocean, their plane catches fire, splits in half, and plummets into the ocean; oddly enough, no one in Gary's group is killed. We next see the group a few days later, suffering from dehydration on a life raft, before they finally spot a small island and stagger to dry land.

Shortly thereafter, they discover fresh water and decide to go exploring. They are quickly relieved to find a cabin, but delight turns to horror when they open the door to discover a dead man hanging from a gigantic spider web. According to his journal, the man was a Professor Green researching and mining for uranium, but he feared something terrible was about to happen to him. There's no indication how long the professor planned to be on the island, but the women estimate there is enough food to last them about a month.

That night, Gary proceeds alone out onto the island where he is bitten by a giant spider and turns into some type of spider-man beast. He flees into the woods, leaving the women to wonder what has happened to him. The next day, seemingly possessed by uncontrollable violent urges, Gary kills one of the girls. The remaining women, still unaware of what has happened to him, have no idea that he is the one who has done this.

Twenty-eight days pass, and the women are running low on food when they spot a ship on the horizon. They are unable to signal it before it leaves, but two men arrive in a rowboat with supplies for the professor. They soon find the women, who tell them the professor is dead. As they all wait for the ship to return, they celebrate their last night on the island with a wild party. One of the men sneaks off to rendezvous with a woman, but both end up being killed by Gary. Finally aware of Gary's fate, the remainder of the group hunts him down with torches until he flees into quicksand and dies.

''Episode One''

The game begins with the narrator reading the first verse of a poem, later called ''The Quartet for the Dusk of Man''. The player then designs a character of their choosing; with an introduction in the 1920s suburban neighborhood of the Player. A mysterious voice instructs the Player, whose home is quickly destroyed by a giant robot (a steampunk version of Fruit Fucker Prime), while smaller steampunk Fruit Fuckers attack. After a brief tutorial, the player teams up with Tycho Brahe, a scholar of Apocalyptic Studies turned detective, and his exceedingly violent partner who fought with the devil, Johnathan Gabriel, in search of information on Fruit Fucker Prime.

The three meet with Tycho's mechanically gifted niece, Anne-Claire, who suggests they search New Arcadia for evidence of Fruit Fucker Prime and parts of it. Tycho, Gabe, and the player begin collecting evidence of the giant robot, while also searching for a new home for the player and running afoul of a cult of mimes. They discover the smaller Fruit Fuckers are built in a factory underneath the Shithole, an apartment building the player briefly considers renting from, and that the mimes are devotees of Yog Sethis, also known as the "Silent One". The Necrowombicon, an ancient book that has no text but can be interpreted by a mime, describes the Silent One as "a horrible deity of unending quiet", a giant mime with Cthulhu's head.

Tycho is horrified that he allowed himself to miss the signs of an ancient God's return previously, and despairs that all hope is lost. He then tells the others it's impossible to kill a god, but they can stop it from entering their world. The Silent One is transferring its energy into their world and putting it into a body. If they can destroy its body before the process is complete, the Silent One will go back to the other side. The player asks Anne-Claire for her input, upon which she theories that there might be special items that can endow Tycho, Gabe, and the player's weapons with metaphysical properties capable of harming the Silent One's physical form. They gather the required items (a vacuum tube, scorched hobo urine, and the soul of the mime cult's leader), transform their weapons, and defeat the Silent One.

After the final battle, Tycho, Gabe, and the player watch the Silent One's form explode. Fruit Fucker Prime watches them from the beach, and walks into the ocean after Yog Sethis is destroyed. The second verse of the opening poem is then read aloud by the narrator.

''Episode Two''

Several months after ''Episode One'' ended, the Player has rebuilt his/her house (a tent), and Tycho and Gabe have set out to destroy Fruit Fuckers and try to find a lead on Fruit Fucker Prime. While escaping from a swarm of them, they crash a truck into the Player's (partially rebuilt) house, and recruit him/her to help them track down their lead. A trip to Anne-Claire's reveals that they have found the original designer of the Fruit Fuckers: Dr. Jonathan Crazoir, presently incarcerated in the same sanatorium as Tycho's father and grandfather when they succumbed to the insanity inherent to dealing with otherworldy affairs. She also demands they collect various pieces of equipment for one of her experiments: Five bolts of silk thread, preferably spider silk, a golden bolt, a truck or tractor engine, and a molecule of Energite, a highly unstable element. They enter the sanitarium to find Crazoir, who promises to give Tycho, Gabe, and the Player everything related to his research, as well as a "robot monkey card", if they can free him from the madhouse. After wooing the receptionist, they encounter huntsman/sanatorium owner Dr. Wolfington, who has used the millions made from the Brahe family's inevitable descent into madness to hunt down and kill every rare animal in the world. He declares the Player, Tycho, and Gabe all unfit for society after a rigged ink blot test, and has them injected with various chemicals to induce insanity.

The Player fights off the drugs with the help of Twisp and Catsby, and rescues Tycho and Gabe. A guard catches them, and locks down the facility. This seals off Dr. Wolfington's doors with Strengthium, an unbreakable compound. Anne-Claire donates spare parts to fix the doors, but the power difference between her experimental fuse and the security system unseals all doors in the facility, releasing several giant spiders. The trio harvests them for their silk, as per Anne-Claire's request, collects the engine from the truck that Tycho crashed into the Player's house at the beginning of the game, and return to confront Wolfington. After the fight, they forge release papers for Crazoir and read Wolfington's journal. Crazoir is revealed to have been committed as a favor to the mysterious "M", whose address is written down. The now-free Dr. Crazoir gives over his research, which suggests the Fruit Fucker to originally have been a farming tool called "Harvest Buddy", before the designs were stolen by someone as he was abducted by Dr. Wolfington.

The Player, Tycho, and Gabe travel to the apartment formerly owned by "M", in hopes of renting it. There, they confront Charles DuBois, an old enemy of Tycho and Gabe's and a ruthless treasure hunter. He plans to outright purchase the apartment out as his "Mid-late-Fall home" (or "early Spring home"; he hadn't decided), and Tycho insists that the Player must thwart him. A chase to the apartment ends in the landlord deciding he will give the apartment to whoever wins in a one-on-one fight to the death. Gabe goes to the kitchen to make a pie, and Tycho ransacks "M"'s apartment, finding various demonic items, including the Black Ledger, a tome that catalogs every deal made between demons and mortals. He pockets the Ledger, and returns to the Player, who has easily won the "sissy boss fight". Gabe finishes his pie, and accidentally sets the building on fire; leaving the player homeless yet again.

Anne-Claire directs the trio next to the "Symposium on the Future of Man" to find more information on Fruit Fucker Prime (as well as the autograph of her idol, Dr. Lars Krangle). They gain credentials with the other scientists by winning a robot monkey fighting tournament, the first-place trophy of which happens to be a molecule of Energite. Unfortunately, at the end of Dr. Krangle's keynote speech, Fruit Fucker Prime attacks, killing everyone in attendance, save Tycho, Gabe, the Player, and the enigmatic Dr. Blood, distinguished by his "timely appearance in the narrative". The robot is revealed to be piloted by Dr. Mordo von Mundo, also known as "M". Dr. Blood hastily explains that the Fruit Fuckers run on Darksteam, a steam mechanism that is infused with pure evil. Mundo then admits creations are stolen designs, and he himself is ostracized from the scientific community because of his radical theories on combining science and arcane magic. He intends to prove his abilities through manipulation of Fruit Fucker Prime, which is powered by the Necrowombicon itself, while the smaller units are powered by inscriptions from the book. After Mordo leaves to enact his scheme, Dr. Blood reveals to the Player and Gabe that Fruit Fucker Prime is the avatar of yet another god: Yog Kathak, the God of Gears, which Tycho was aware of, but hid from the other two. The four unite regardless, and leave for the 1922 World's Fair to stop Mordo von Mundo once and for all.

Anne-Claire is mysteriously no longer in her room, and at the fair, Fruit Fucker Prime is occupied, violating a building-sized orange against Mundo's will. After fighting through demon-possessed fairgoers, the team reaches the orange, where they do battle with Fruit Fucker Prime. They succeed in destroying its "chute", but the god's essence within heals all damage rendered to its main components. As the four prepare for their deaths, Anne-Claire arrives piloting a giant robot of her own; a massive doll powered by a truck engine and Energite, wearing a Spider-Silk dress. Anne-Claire destroys Prime, Tycho and Gabe kill Mundo, and the Player retrieves the Necrowombicon. The narrator reads the third verse of the Quartet for the Dusk of Man.

After the credits, it is revealed that Dr. Blood is in fact, Dr. Raven Darktalon Blood, who took mortal form to seek out and destroy the Necrowombicon.

''Episode 3''

''Episode 3'' was released almost 4 years after ''Episode 2'' on June 25, 2012. Unlike the first 2 episodes it will also be available on Android OS and iOS devices in addition to Xbox Live Arcade, PC, and Mac. Also unlike the previous episodes it is not available for Linux or PS3.

''Episode 3'' features a completely different art style which is similar to the pixel graphics of the SNES era. Combat is similar to the early Final Fantasy games with heroes being positioned on the right side of the screen and the monsters on the left side of the screen. Unlike the first two entries in the series ''Episode 3'' does not feature any voice work and the player no longer plays as the player-created character from the first two episodes. The title also received two free packs of downloadable content after release: ''The Lair of the Seamstress'', which added a bonus dungeon to the game that became unlocked after getting all the class pins up to level 40, and ''The Beginning of the End'', which reveals the fate of the player character between the events of Episodes 2 and 3.

''The Beginning of the End''

The prelude begins with a small explanation on what terrifies Gabe: dentists, witches, a coven of witch-dentists, a fight with a massive sorcerer made up of other sorcerers. Tycho chimes in that he's been thinking about how "antiquated" the English language is, the pronouns in particular. He then proclaims to quit English pronouns cold turkey and start using "ze, hir, and hirs" from that point on. A skeptical Gabriel then goes back to sleep, only to be awakened by Tycho five seconds later and given a mysterious black substance to drink. After Gabe drinks it, the floor starts shaking and the pair suddenly remember something that Tycho keeps in their basement, prompting them to leave. Upon leaving the office, Gabe asks where they're going, to which Tycho replies Desperation Street. Turning the corner at the end of their block, they find a large pile of inventions called "Duplicators" and their inventor, who was unfortunately crushed to death by said pile after somehow making the Duplicator duplicate itself.

The pair quickly journey to Desperation Street, with Gabe asking why they are there. Tycho gives two answers: one, a mysterious hunch, and two, to visit the "Rake Guy" (a.k.a. the player, who will be referred to as "You"). When Gabe notices the large burlap sack Tycho is carrying, Tycho weakly plays it off that he likes burlap sacks. Making their way to the ruins of the player's house, they find You huddled in the threshold asleep, wearing a large hat and a trench coat. Although Tycho still sees You as he always has: a vibrating being, a superimposed cluster of possibilities. Just as Gabe starts to say hello, Tycho quickly jumps You, stuffing them into the burlap sack he was carrying. The trio enter the fallen house, where Tycho and Gabe find out why it was in ruins again, as a sinkhole formed underneath the house and its filled with squatters. Fighting their way through the house, they find the opened sewer system that caused the sinkhole and within it, the cause of all the bad luck that has befallen both Desperation Street and the house. The sewer system below Desperation Street was littered with crystalline physical manifestations of literal bad luck, with Your house at the epicenter of it all. As they make their way further into the sewer, they happen upon a kismetite golem, made entirely of good luck, whose torso Tycho fails to diplomatically obtain. After destroying the golem, a frustrated Tycho leads Gabe and You further in, finding a massive kismetite crystal in the back of the room, with a portal right next to it. Dispatching of the crystal's guardian, Tycho and Gabe heft the crystal through the portal into the Periphery.

With crystal in tow, the trio make their way through the Periphery, wandering its stone pathways until they find reach some far off corner within the Never. As Tycho sets the crystal into place, another being shows up from out of nowhere. A hulking version of Tycho, with glowing red eyes, a manifestation of Tycho's guilt, the Brahirim, who questions whether he knows better than his ancestors and proclaims that Tycho will find no comfort in his "philosophy". Tycho asks who will continue the Brahe Clan's work, knowing that the Brahirim wouldn't harm him. The Brahirim answers with a vague "You know how. You know.", to which Tycho does indeed know the answer. After defeating the Brahirim, Tycho takes out a tuning fork and taps it against the crystal, the tone causing it to turn into a jelly. As You begins to get away, Tycho orders Gabe to put You and the kismetite into the crystal. After the Rake Guy is put into the crystal, Tycho says that nobody must know of the events that just happened. Despite Gabe saying he isn't going to tell anyone, Tycho knows that he will fail to keep his promise, and word-of-mouth will spread between those who won't believe him to someone who can potentially use it against him. Tycho then pulls out his trump card to keep Gabe from telling anyone: calling upon the spirit of Lucifer within Gabe's body to forget the day's events. Afterwards, Gabriel slumps to the ground and Tycho puts him over his shoulder, returning home for the day.

''Episode Three''

The main game begins with Tycho receiving a phone call which is described as 10 minutes of silence, prompting Tycho and Gabe to go to the Arcadia boardwalk where they had previously defeated the mime god and members of his cult. Teaming up with Anne-Claire, they fight past the cultists, and eventually face off against a crabomancer, then, upon defeating it, recover pins which bestow classes on whomever wears one (similar to the job system in early Final Fantasy games). They return to their office, only to find that Dr. Blood has orchestrated the theft of the Necrowombicon. Anne-Claire returns home, Tycho and Gabe team up with Jim, a former colleague who lost his body in a work-related incident, reducing him to a skull floating in a jar of green liquid. Jim is unable to speak, but can follow Tycho and Gabe, as well as participate in combat. Following leads, they arrive at the museum of contemporary and ancient works, where Tycho is reunited with Moira, his ex-wife, who joins the party. When asked if they can re-recruit Anne-Claire, Tycho answers she is on vacation with her parents. The party discovers that a painting has been stolen from the museum, the painting being one of four representing the god of doors, Yog-Modaign, a death-god like figure.

Now also investigating the theft of the painting, the party, acting on advice of Dr. Euripides Hark, head for the Hark ancestral home. However, as the Harks are an old family and possess superior arcane know-how to Tycho, Tycho forces the party to use an alternate entrance, a trans-dimensional door accessible only via another dimension. The party returns to the detective agency to pick up a device capable of allowing them to enter this dimension, but it is revealed that, in his ignorance of what the object was (it resembles a stein), Gabe gave it to a local homeless man. The party goes to Hobo alley to recover it, and then head into the other dimension called the Periphery, represented by a stone path leading to multiple gateways, dotted with floating crystals. Tycho explains that the crystals are in fact, coffins, or time capsules, usually containing powerful mages or mythical creatures. Since the other dimension would survive any apocalypse, the contents of the crystal time capsules would inevitably be used to determine the properties of the world to come after the end of ours. The Brahe clan's long project, which Tycho and his family frequently speak of, is to wipe out these time capsules, as everyone would "get it wrong" and recreate the universe poorly.

Exiting in the Hark mansion, they find more class pins, and are trapped in a temporal shift, leaving Gabe and Jim trapped in the past. However, without anyone to tell him otherwise, Gabe smashes through the house, leaving open paths for Tycho and Moira, and indicating where they could eventually be found. At the end of the Hark house, they encounter Elizabeth Hark, head of a society worshiping mankind, who are trying to stop the revival of Yog-Modaign. She warns Tycho that even if the god is let loose, not to kill it, as having banished (or killed) two gods earlier, he is in danger of creating a power vacuum which a surviving god-entity could exploit to disastrous effect. At the end of their conversation, Dr. Blood appears again and steals another piece of the Yog-Modaign painting from the Harks.

In anticipation of Dr. Blood's next move, they go to intercept him at the Bank of Money. Unfortunately, they find that some of the vaults lead to other dimensions, including one similar to a medieval fantasy, and one resembling a starship from Star Trek. This slows them down considerably. They finally discover that the last painting is still in the hands of the Harks and that the four paintings are a prison of sorts for Yog-Modaign, as gods cannot be bound in cages, but can be bound in perfect representations, hence the painting so accurately represents the god, that it is the god, and when it is disassembled, so is the god. Before they can move to recover it, Tycho is alerted to some disaster by an amulet he is holding, and he forces the party to head to the Periphery. While there, they discover that Tycho has placed Anne-Claire in one of the crystal time capsules, in the belief that she would be an ideal candidate to remake the world after the upcoming apocalypse. Moira attempts to free her niece but they are interrupted by Yog-Modaign, whose avatar appeared near Anne-Claire specifically to lure Tycho to the periphery and buy Dr. Blood more time to assemble his painting. They defeat him only because he is unable to muster his full power.

The party finally heads to the Hark stronghold, which is full of cultists. They fight their way to the bottom where they defeat Elizabeth Hark and then Dr. Blood. After the last boss battle, Yog-Modaign makes a final appearance and tears Tycho apart, creating some kind of tear in the universe. Gabe and a weakened Dr. Blood are sent hurtling through empty space, while Gabe punches Dr. Blood repeatedly. Moira and Jim are sent to someplace resembling hell; while there, Jim appears as a humanoid made of green goo with his skull for a head. Jim is also able to speak and appears to know their location. Tycho is seen wearing a brown robe in a dark place where he recites the last verse of the poem by his dead father.

''Episode 4''

The fourth episode begins with Gabe and Dr. Blood crashing down onto a hellscape. Without other options, Gabe is forced to pair with Dr. Blood, who gleefully explains that when they defeated Yog Modaign, the apocalypse happened and the world was destroyed. Those closest to the epicenter were tossed into a dimension called Underhell, so-called because it resembles a massive floating continent, directly below the massive floating continent of Hell. Gabe reasons that Jim, Moira and Tycho must have been sent to Underhell as well and bargains with Dr. Blood to aid him in searching for them. Dr. Blood reveals his motivations: in his youth, he traded the soul of his lover Hestia for knowledge. He since had come to regret his actions, and engineered a premature apocalypse in order to send himself to Underhell, where he hoped to reunite with Hestia. Dr. Blood also informs Gabe that since they are not of the same make-up as Underhell, they cannot harm its inhabitants, meaning they must use Underhell monsters to fight for them (similar to Pokémon). They head towards a large pillar structure where Dr. Blood believes he will find Hestia.

Meanwhile, Moira and Jim have a similar conversation where Jim informs Moira they must use proxies to fight. Jim informs Moira that the Apocalypse failed to end all creation because there remains a single God maintaining Hell and Underhell. They fight their way through a castle filled with clones of Tycho (revealed to be his damned family) until they encounter the real Tycho, who can attack Underhell denizens with a magical sword he acquired. Tycho reveals that the structure of Hell and Underhell is such that Hell is held over Underhell by three massive pillars, and that if these are brought down, the resulting collapse would kill or at least reveal the location of the remaining God. He sends Moira and Jim to the first pillar, while he heads to the second.

At the first pillar, Gabe and Dr. Blood ascend and find that Hestia is present and seemingly the hostage of the Pillar boss. They defeat him, which causes the pillar to destabilize. Hestia accuses Dr. Blood of only making her life worse and reveals that she was in fact controlling the Pillar boss and his minions; she then kills Dr. Blood as the pillar collapses. Jim and Moira arrive in time to see the pillar fall and find Gabe and Hestia in the wreckage. Moira sends Gabe (now paired with Hestia) to the second pillar to meet Tycho, while they head to the last pillar.

At the second pillar, modeled after the tree Yggdrasil, Gabe and Hestia discover that a zoo had been built in the branches and that all the animals had escaped. They fight their way to the top, along the way freeing a flying demon whale. At the top, they team up with Tycho to kill the second pillar boss, a chimera composed of six animals. They defeat the pillar boss, causing the pillar to collapse. Tycho escapes by teleporting away, while Gabe and Hestia are rescued by the demon whale they released earlier.

At the third pillar, Moira and Jim find more of the damned Brahe family locked in combat with a group of technologically advanced librarians. The Brahes are trying to bring down the pillar while the librarians wish to safeguard it. Moira learns that Tycho is somewhat different from the rest of his family, in that he let Moira go, a first for a Brahe, which possibly saved her from their family curse. They assault the pillar and meet Tycho at the top, where they defeat the last pillar boss and bring down the pillar. This however, fails to destroy Hell or Underhell, and it is revealed that the Hell continent above Underhell is in fact the body of the last God, capable of remaining afloat on its own. Furthermore, the last God is revealed to be the series narrator, and the one who put the Brahes on the path to destroy the universe. It did this as it was completely omniscient and this drove it to madness. Tycho teleports again, leaving Moira and Jim behind.

Gabe and Hestia arrive on their demon whale, and the party, combined for the first time, flies to Hell/the body of the last God. There they fight their way through its body, destroying its Spleen and Heart before joining Tycho to kill its Brain. This however, is not enough and the last shred of the God's mind possesses Tycho. Gabe, Hestia, Moira and Jim defeat the God possessing Tycho, though Tycho still asks that he be killed so as to destroy the God for good and end creation. However, before he requests this, he summons the spirit of Lucifer inside of Gabe and commands it to merge with Gabe himself. Tycho tells Gabe that he is the Lightbringer named Lucifer, created to assist the Brahes in the Long Project. Gabe comes to terms with this and forgives his friend. Tycho says what remaining goodbyes can be given under the circumstances before Moira shoots him in the head.

In the epilogue, Tycho's niece, who he hid in a pocket dimension, wakes up and begins to create a new universe, thanking her Uncle for his sacrifice and saying she and "You" will take over. Two constellations appear in space: one of a wrench and one of a rake.

In Hill's prologue, a scientist, Dr. Eric Zinthrop (Michael Mark), is fired from his job at a honey farm for experimenting with wasps.

The founder and owner of a large cosmetics company, Janice Starlin (Susan Cabot), is disturbed when her firm's sales begin to drop after it becomes apparent to her customer base that she is aging. Zinthrop has been able to extract enzymes from the royal jelly of the queen wasp that can reverse the aging process. Janice agrees to fund further research, at great cost, provided she can serve as his human subject. Displeased with the slowness of the results, she breaks into the scientist's laboratory after hours and injects herself with extra doses of the formula. Zinthrop becomes aware that some of the test creatures are becoming violent and goes to warn Janice, but before he can reach anyone, he gets into a car accident. He is thus temporarily missing and Janice goes through great trouble to find him, eventually taking over his care.

Janice continues her clandestine use of the serum and sheds 20 years in a single weekend, but soon discovers that she is periodically transformed into a murderous, wasp-like creature. Eventually, Zinthrop throws a jar of carbolic acid at her face, and another character, using a chair, pushes her out of a high window, and falls to her death.

The story begins with a narrator explaining that he is on his deathbed and feels the need to share a particular story before he dies. He tells of a quiet and slightly mad older man who lives in the Gray's Inn with his pet cat. The mad is haggard and haunted, looking older than his years and terrified of church bells. A young man named Williams (the narrator) moves into the Inn and tries to befriend the old man and get him to share his knowledge. It is revealed that the man is Lord Northam of England. Williams' attempts are largely rebuked until one day, Williams acquires a copy of the ''Necronomicon'', the book of the dead that captures the minds of so many intrigued by the dark arts. When Williams asks Northam to help translate the book's old Latin, Northam is horrified and begs Williams to burn the volume. Northam is forced to reveal his own history. His line goes back to Roman times in England when soldiers first took to the land. However, they encountered a cave-dwelling cult that they couldn't vanquish, despite their best efforts. This cult was said to be of a people who had lived there for a long time before and were from an ancient land which had sunk into the sea. This was the place where Northam's family castle was built. Generations later, Lord Northam still felt the haunting power of the place which let him to pursue the tales of the supernatural and even to witness it himself. This led him eventually to the Nameless City of Arabia and to believe that there are points in the world where one can transcend to some other place not of this universe. The unfinished story ends with him wondering if this is all in his mind or something that is actually real.

The Stooges play Ted Healy's children who refuse to go to sleep unless they are told a bedtime story. Healy first tries singing a comic version of ''The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere'' which ultimately fails putting the young lads to sleep. Healy's date, the Good Fairy (Bonnie Bonnell) then tells them her own bedtime story, courtesy of a musical revue.

The trio eventually turn in for the evening, only to have Curly request a second bedtime story. Healy and the Good Fairy then proceed to tell the children about ''The Woman in the Shoe''. When that fails to work, a frustrated Healy smacks the three lads over the head with a rubber mallet, knocking them unconscious.

Billy is a boy who resides in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan who brings home numerous animals and spends time with his two best friends, Bruce and Murray. Billy winds up finding two great horned owls, which join his larger pet collection. The first bird, Wol, is larger and lighter in colour with a bold personality and was found by Billy and his friends under a bush after a storm. Soon afterward, Billy finds Weeps, a smaller mottled brown owl in a barrel filled with oil. When Billy witnesses children throwing stones at Weeps, who is unable to fly, he trades his scout knife for him. Unlike Wol, Weeps has an anxious disposition and sits on the handlebars of Billy's bicycle due to his inability to fly.

Billy has a number of adventures with Wol and Weeps, including tough times and happy moments. When Billy and his family move to Toronto, Ontario, he entrusts the owls to Bruce.

The Legend of Himiko is probably based on an ancient Japanese tale told in the Chinese history book Sanguo Zhi. The nation of Yamatai is under threat from the overseas kingdom of Kune (probably based on the nation of Kunekoku). In an attempt to stave off an invasion, the people of Yamatai attempt to install a Queen to rule over their kingdom, which is to be chosen by the mysterious Bokka.

However, the Kune army attacks Yamatai before the selection of the Queen can be completed, and the Bokka disperse the six queen candidates across the nation. The Bokka themselves take shelter in a newborn girl named Himiko and the pendant she is wearing and transport her to modern times, where she is found by Masahiko Kutani.

Several years in the future, Himiko and Kutani attend high school together. When the two are wandering around an archeological dig, Himiko's pendant activates, sending both back into ancient Japan where they are found by Imari, one of the queen candidates, and Iga within Kune's place in Yamatai, three years after Kune's initial attack.

Both Himiko and Kutani learn about the Bokka and what relationship they have with it. The six queen candidates also finally all join back together, for the first time since they were dispersed when Kune first attacked. They eventually fight against Shikara, the governor-general of Yamatai and the son of the king of Kune, in order to free Yamatai from Kune's rule.

Secombe plays the part of Harry Flakers, a man who has a big win on the football pools. He and his friend Spike Donnelly (Milligan) decide to go to the same shabby seaside boarding house that they have always patronised for their summer holiday, but this year all the other guests (including two young women out to marry money, a dodgy investment advisor and a master forger and assistant) are intent on taking the fortune off them in one way or another.

Ultimately the forgers manage to substitute fake five-pound notes for the real ones that Flakers keeps in his suitcase, but before they can abscond with the money one of the girls is given cash by Flakers to buy some cigarettes, and accused of passing false currency when the forgery is detected. A grand chase follows with half the characters pursuing the other half through a waxwork museum in which the true crooks have taken refuge. Justice is served when the chief forger boasts of his crime in front of what he thinks are two waxwork policemen, but who turn out to be real members of the force.

In the final scenes Harry and Spike marry the two women.

There are sequences featuring a night out at the theatre where a stage hypnotist mesmerises Flakers and the girl Christine into performing an operatic duet, he singing soprano and she baritone, and a scene in which Harry Secombe wordlessly mimes out an entire heart operation being carried out by a nervous surgeon.

Before the main feature, a faux theatre concession stand advertisement plays. A group of anthropomorphic theater snacks, The Soda Dog Refreshment Band, sings a spoof of ''Let's All Go to the Lobby'' until they are interrupted by another snack band (performed by Mastodon). They proceed to loudly sing some of their own bizarre theater rules as a death metal song before finishing on a guitar solo.

The film starts properly in Egypt in a purposely indeterminable time, where Master Shake, a milkshake, Frylock, a box of french fries, and Meatwad, a ball of ground meat, break free from within the Sphinx and are attacked by an oversized poodle who kills Frylock before Shake defeats it. Shake and Meatwad flee with Frylock's corpse and meet "Time Lincoln", who revives Frylock. When the Central Intelligence Agency break into his house, Time Lincoln helps the Aqua Teens escape in a wooden rocket ship. Time Lincoln is shot, changing history and resulting in the Confederate States of America's winning the American Civil War, with the CIA agents being made slaves to a Black Kentucky Colonel as punishment for their crimes against the South. All this, however, is just an elaborate story concocted by Shake to explain their origin to Meatwad. Meanwhile, a slice of watermelon named Walter Melon observes events of the Aqua Teens from his watermelon spaceship, including a backyard concert performed by Meatwad and his dolls.

When Shake plans to use his new exercise machine; the Insanoflex, Frylock notices that it is not assembled properly, and the instructions cannot be found. After searching for them online, he finds a message warning not to assemble the machine. Frylock calls the website's listed phone number, which is revealed to be that of Emory and Oglethorpe, the Plutonians. Before bothering answering the phone, they discover the Cybernetic Ghost of Christmas Past from the Future on board with them. The Ghost explains to the two aliens the story of the Insanoflex: the machine, when assembled, will exercise a man into a super-being, who will attract all the women on Earth, leading to massive inbreeding and the eventual extinction of mankind. To prevent this, the Ghost travels to the past (not before traveling forward to The Bahamas first) and steals a screw that holds the machine together. The Plutonians, now determined to get the machine, point out to him that the screw could easily be replaced: someone can buy another screw or shove a pencil into the screw hole.

Back on Earth, Frylock finishes re-building the Insanoflex with a pencil in the screw hole, but he discovers the circuit board is missing. The trio visit their short-tempered, foul-mouthed, sarcastic neighbor Carl Brutananadilewski, from whom Shake had stolen the machine, to see if he has the missing piece. After Carl refuses to tell them, Meatwad finds the address in the Insanoflex's box. Dr. Weird, who's abandoned asylum has been purchased and turned into a condominium, is visited by Shake, Frylock, and Meatwad. Frylock retrieves the missing circuit board and installs it into the machine. Carl insists that as the rightful owner he should be the first to test the machine. The Insanoflex straps him in and transforms itself into a giant one-eyed robot. The robot plays techno music and heads for downtown Philadelphia, all while Carl's strapped-in form is forced to exercise. Eventually, the robot begins laying metallic eggs, which hatch into smaller versions of the machine.

The Aqua Teens, aided by an instructional workout video, find that the Insanoflex can be destroyed using music. After a failed encounter with MC Pee Pants (reincarnated as a fly) The Aqua Teens have no choice but to have Shake play his music. Shake poorly plays his original song "Nude Love" on acoustic guitar, forcing the Insanoflex to commit suicide. Carl (now bulging with so much muscle) leaves with his newly found date, a bodybuilder named Linda, and they head back to her condo while the Aqua Teens try to figure out a way to stop the newly hatched machines from destroying the city.

After a pointless time travel, the Aqua Teens travel back to Dr. Weird's condo to confront him, where Frylock begins to tell the origin story of the Aqua Teens: they were created by Dr. Weird, along with a chicken nugget named Chicken Bittle. In the flashback, Dr. Weird proclaims that the Aqua Teens were created for one purpose: to crash a jet into a brick wall. Realizing the pointlessness of this mission, Frylock diverted the jet and set a course to Africa, where they would try to solve world hunger. Upon entering Africa, Bittle was eaten by a lion and the presence of the Aqua Teens scare a tribe of natives. After realizing they couldn't be much help, they returned to the United States and rented a house in New Jersey, where they would start their new lives as regular civilians. Shake and Meatwad do not recall their missions, due to the fact that they've been playing with their Game Boy to pay any attention.

Meanwhile, Carl and Linda recline in her room, where she reveals "herself" to be Dr. Weird in disguise. He cuts off Carl's muscles and grafts them onto his own body. Frylock and Dr. Weird do battle while they argue back and forth about who created whom. Dr. Weird claims that it was Frylock who created him, not the other way around. Dr. Weird shows Frylock a teddy bear filled with razor blades. Shake tries to take the teddy bear, but he loses his hand. Dr. Weird then reveals that the blue diamond on Frylock's back hides a VCR, in which a videotape with false memories of Dr. Weird creating Frylock had been playing in Frylock's head. Frylock also admits that he is a transsexual lesbian trapped in a man's body. Just then, Walter Melon arrives in his ship. Meatwad mentions he saw the ship earlier. Shake calls him a liar and shoots him with a shotgun. Shake gets concerned when Meatwad does not reform like always. Walter tells his partner, Neil Peart, the drummer of the rock band Rush, to play the "Drum Solo Of Life" to bring Meatwad back to life. Meanwhile, Shake tries to pick up the teddy bear for the second time, losing his other hand. Melon explains he created the Aqua Teens and all the other characters, including the Insanoflex. His plan was that they would kill each other and Walter would inherit their real estate in order to create the "Insano-Gym". The others inform Walter that they rent and do not own property, proving Walter's plan pointless. Walter storms off. The Teens see their alleged mother standing before them, revealed to be a burrito. Shake suddenly jumps out the window upon hearing this news, Meatwad hugs her, and Frylock states, "That's neat". The movie ends with The Soda Dog Refreshment Band singing the audience out again, only for the band to insult the audience instead.

In a post-credit scene, The Cybernetic Ghost is seen humping the TV in the Aqua Teens living room. Then Frylock (who went through a sex change) tells him that it's time for bed.

A few months ago Dan had to make a choice. Go to Geneva with his parents for a year, board at school or move into a house with his uni student bass-playing aunt, Jacq, and her friend, Naomi. He picked Jacq's place.

Now he's doing his last year at school and trying not to spin out. Trying to be cool. Trying to pick up a few skills for surviving in the adult world. Problem is, he falls for Naomi, and things become much, much more confusing.

As Dan fumbles through the process of forming a relationship with someone of the opposite sex, he also learns about making pesto, interpreting the fish tank scene from the film ''Romeo + Juliet'', why almost all birds are one of the 48 shades of brown, and why his best course of action is just to be himself.

Emily is a seventeen-year-old schoolgirl who lives with her mother Susan. Emily never knew her father. According to her mother, he was a "tom cat"—a tourist who wandered into town one summer and was never seen again.

Susan is struggling to forget the past. She hasn't spoken to her fervently religious parents for years, not since she shamed the family by falling pregnant at fifteen.

Emily actively pursues a friendship with father-figure Stephen, who spends his days fixing boats at the harbour. But Stephen has his own troubles, constantly haunted by the past, unable to keep the loss of his wife and baby daughter from his thoughts.

Stephen's sister Elizabeth is married to the town policeman Carl. Elizabeth suspects Carl is being unfaithful but is scared to uncover the truth. Her son Joel has a secret love of his own.

When a Bible turns up with an intriguing inscription, Emily is the first to realise that hoping for change is not enough.

When he enters ''The Nag's Head'' for a drink, Del Boy is surprised to see his old school friend and business partner, Jumbo Mills, who emigrated to Australia in 1967, back in Peckham. Before he left, Del had given Jumbo his last £200, and by a way of returning the favour, Jumbo offers Del the chance to renew their old partnership by helping to run his car business back in Australia. Believing his opportunity to become a millionaire has finally arrived, Del accepts the offer. But things soon go awry. First, Albert refuses to leave, having already spent most of his life travelling the world with the Royal Navy and wanting to settle down in Peckham during his retirement. Rodney, too, is unable to go, after his criminal conviction for possession of cannabis results in him being denied an immigration visa.

Regardless, Del is still keen to go, and hands ownership of ''Trotters Independent Traders'' over to Rodney. The two have a fierce row, where Rodney accuses Del of interfering when he had opportunities to be a success and using family ties as the excuse, and Del retorts that having to look after Rodney since he was a child after their mother's death had stopped him realising his own dreams. Rodney storms out of the flat in tears, with Del refusing to back down, and Albert completely disgusted by the row.

Later that night, Albert suggests to Del that he ''should'' go to Australia and become a millionaire while he has the chance, which means that Rodney will have to learn to grow up. With his mind made up, Del phones Jumbo to confirm what time he will be arriving. But instead, Del turns down Jumbo's offer, reluctantly admitting that he cannot leave his family behind. As Albert goes to bed, Rodney returns home to apologise to Del for the row they had earlier, and to tell his older brother that he needs to go to Australia. But Del tells Rodney that he's already turned down the offer. The Trotter brothers then talk about how Rodney was right when he told Del during their earlier argument, "The real opportunity lies here." Britain is in a bad way, people want a good bargain, and they turn to men like the Trotters, who will be there, and that this time next year, they will be millionaires. The Trotter brothers make up, Rodney goes to bed happy, and Del secretly laments his lost opportunity for wealth by singing "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?".

In the late 1930s, Rupert Kathner and Alma Brooks began a movie-making spree that took on the Hollywood barons, a corrupt Police Commissioner and the cultural cringe, all in their passionate pursuit to make Australian films. On the run from police across thousands of miles, they would stop at almost nothing to get their films made.

Frank Merrill, a Great Lakes pilot, loses his life in a storm and his wife, Edith, to support her child leaves for the city where she steals and is imprisoned. Three years later, upon her release, she takes her child from the state orphanage and goes to another city where she secures employment in a department store. She marries the superintendent, Jim Roberts. Mabel, who served time with Edith, is freed and arranges with Mickey Bill to enlist the aid of Edith in a robbery under threat of exposure. The burglary is committed, and, when Mabel is trapped, Edith, fearing a revelation of her past, says that she is responsible. In a trap laid by Detective Jordan to get Mabel the truth comes out and Edith's past is laid bare to her husband. He forgives her and the thieves are rounded up.

Katrina (Emily Barclay) is a 19-year-old single mother who is planning to get away with murder. Katrina lives in a world of petty crime, fast cars, manicures and fornication. A master manipulator of men, she lives at home with a deadbeat father in suburban Golden Grove. Katrina will stop at nothing, including murder, to get what she wants. When her father threatens to contact Social Services and take away her child, Katrina sets in motion a plan to wreak suburban mayhem that will leave a community in shock and make Katrina infamous in a way even she never dreamed of.

It is loosely based upon a series of notorious murders by Mark Valera, who killed Frank Arkell and David O'Hearn, and upon his sister Belinda van Krevel and her then-partner Keith Schreiber, who killed Jack van Krevel.

After the events in ''The Sleeping Dragon'', George Stobbart is running a bail bonds office in New York with his partner Virgil. George meets Anna Maria, a girl with an old manuscript who wants his help to decode it. A group of mobsters after the manuscript ransack Anna Maria's hotel room, as well as George's bail bonds office, and steal the manuscript. George discovers that the mobsters are led by Fingers Martino, who runs an old meat packing factory. George sneaks into the factory and overhears a conversation between Fingers and Mr. Spallaci, who has obtained the manuscript. George manages to covertly take back the manuscript, which he examines with Anna Maria. George figures out that the fortified city on it must be Istanbul.

In the Pasha Palace hotel in Istanbul, a waiter named Mevlut informs George about a citadel that is located beneath the Topkapi Palace. George and Anna Maria enter the palace and its catacombs where they find a golden cherub; they take it back to the hotel. After a romantic night with Anna Maria, George wakes up without her, and Mevlut comes in armed with a gun. George is locked up in a cell, as he is suspected to be a terrorist. In his cell, George gets a visit from Father Nicolas and Sister Immaculata, who says that he should meet her on the roof. George escapes from the cell and meets with Immaculata, who turns out to be Nicole "Nico" Collard (his companion in previous installments). They return to the hotel, where George finds out Anna Maria has an apartment in Rome. In Rome, in front of Anna Maria's apartment building, George meets Brother Mark. After George figures out how to enter the building, Mark is not willing to give him a package that has arrived for Anna Maria. Inside her apartment, he finds a photo of Anna Maria who, dressed as a nun, is standing in front of a Vatican wall. Another clue mentions a place near the Vatican, and he also discovers an airline ticket to Phoenix, Arizona.

At a monastery in the Vatican, George covertly enters a wafer factory and finds Anna Maria's file in an office. After George is discovered and is being escorted outside by Cardinal Gianelli, Father Gregor tells him that Anna Maria used to work there, but that she has stolen a manuscript, and he hands over his business card. By showing the card to Mark, he is willing to help and gives George Anna Maria's package. From Mark, he learns about the Black Cat club. The package contains a DVD with an interview with a man called Maynard, who has managed to make "monatomic gold". Nico leaves to Phoenix to check things out. George gains access to the Black Cat club, where he meets Duane (who he has met before in previous installments). Duane reveals that Spallaci owns the club. Afterwards, George is caught for stealing a towel and tied to a chair. Spallaci interrogates him about Anna Maria, and he overhears the recorded voice of Nico. Shots are being fired, so he thinks Nico has been killed. When he finds a way to escape, he goes for a drink, trying to forget the loss of Nico. The next day, still drunk, he arrives at Anna Maria's apartment, where Nico returns and George faints.

In a flashback scene, Nico explores an old facility in Phoenix, where she is confronted by Spallaci's men, but is saved by Maynard. However, Maynard dies after he gets locked in the centrifuge, and Nico manages to escape by tricking Spallaci's men. Back in Rome, Nico informs George that the monatomic gold is being used to build a weapon called the Ark. They return to the monastery and witness Father Gregor shoot Gianelli; Nico is taken away and George is knocked out. When he awakens, the dying Gianelli hands over a manuscript in Latin, and tells him that the Ark's purpose is to use the monatomic gold to destroy the unbelievers. George goes to rescue Nico and meets Anna Maria in the catacombs, who tells him her side of the story and that the Ark needs a human interface to be activated. George arrives at the ceremony to see Nico chained to the Ark, ready to become the new Angel of Death. Mevlut, who is in fact ex-Turkish security and only pretended to be a waiter and priest, enters the scene armed with a gun, but Anna Maria points her gun at him as well. George succeeds in stopping the ceremony in time and frees Nico, but Anna Maria and Mevlut shoot each other and die.

Six months after the events of ''The Shadow of the Templars'', George Stobbart returns to Paris after attending to his father's funeral and reunites with his friend Nicole Collard. George learns that Nicole recently begun researching a new story when she found herself receiving a mysterious Mayan stone from a contact. Seeking answers, she invites George to join her for a meeting with an archaeologist named Professor Oubier to learn more about it. Upon arriving at Oubier's home, the pair are ambushed by Central Americans; Nicole is kidnapped, while George is knocked out and trapped in a burning room. Escaping his predicament, George contacts Andre Lobineau, whom arranged the meeting, for assistance, and soon learns that Nicole was taken to the warehouse of Condor Transglobal in Marseilles. Upon rescuing her, George learns from Nicole that the company is headed by a man named Karzac - the head of a drug smuggling ring she was investigating - and that he is seeking the stone for unknown reasons, with Oubier working for him.

The pair find themselves travelling to Quaramonte City, where Oubier has been for the past several months, and soon learn that the region's leader, Presidente Grasiento, and her son Raoul, are in league with Karzac. Discovering they are conducting a secret excavation deep in the jungle, the pair proceed towards it by river boat, but an attack helicopter strands the pair, and leaves Nicole being poisoned by a snake. Aided by a Christian missionary, George visits the shaman of a local village for a cure, and in the process learns about the stone in their possession. The shaman reveals the stone to be one of three created by Mayan shamans centuries ago, in order to fully entrap the god Tezcatlipoca inside a mirror before he could lay waste to the world. All three were taken by Spanish explorers - while the pair's stone reached Spain, the other two were taken by privateers. The shaman reveals the god will be freed soon during a solar eclipse, marking the end of the fifth age in the Mayan calendar.

After curing Nicole and explaining what he learnt, the pair split up to locate the other two stones. George proceeds to the Caribbean to track down the home of the Spanish pirate that stole the second stone. Befriending the owners and their granddaughter, George locates where the stone was hidden, and retrieves it. Meanwhile, Nicole heads to London to track down the third stone, after discovering it was stolen by an English pirate. Before she can retrieve it, Oubier steals it, and forces Nicole to use an abandoned subway station to escape. Tracking him down to the city's docks, Nicole discovers Oubier was merely being used by Karzac, who promptly kills him. Nicole quickly recovers the stone and escapes with it. Returning to Quaramonte, Nicole heads for the village in the jungle, only to discover it burned to the ground.

Finding that George hid the stones in the village, one held by a midget Central American he freed in Marseilles named Titipoco, Nicole proceeds to track him down, and soon discovers him being prepared to be sacrificed at the top of a Mayan pyramid. Creating a diversion, Nicole frees him, and the pair rush into the pyramid, while Raoul finally decides to oppose Karzac's plans, deeming it evil. Inside the pyramid, the group become separated, but overcome traps and puzzles to reach the chamber housing Tezcatlipoca's prison, with Karzac preparing to release the god. Nicole promptly puts a stone into its place. Titipoco handles the second stone, and is rescued by Raoul when his mother attempts to stop him, leaving her to fall to her death. As Tezcatlipoca emerges from the mirror, killing Karzac, George secures the third stone in place, imprisoning the god completely into the mirror. Relieved, the group head outside to watch the eclipse end and celebrate, and the final cut-scene fades into the credits.

The Royal Navy (RN) is concerned about attacks on convoys by German submarines while having to keep "half the fleet" guarding against the German battleship . ''Tirpitz'' is 60 miles from the sea inside a Norwegian fjord, and attempts by the Royal Air Force (RAF) to sink her have failed. Commander Fraser (Mills) is determined to prove that attack by human torpedoes is practical, despite scepticism from RN higher echelons.

Fraser assembles and trains a force of British commando frogmen officers and ratings to use the Mk I Human Torpedo manned torpedoes (Chariots) at their Scottish base. After being refused permission to attack ''Tirpitz'', due to the RN policy of avoiding unproven weaponry, the team manage to attach dummy limpet mines to the admiral's own ship.

Their success results in Fraser's force being authorised to attack ''Tirpitz'' with the initial operation using the Chariots. The attack fails and the crew are forced to abandon ship and land in Norway. They walk to neutral Sweden from where they are returned to Scotland.

For the next operation, the crews are trained to use small X-Craft submarines: ''X1'', ''X2'' and ''X3''. The three craft are initially towed over the North Sea by conventional submarines and then left to penetrate the fjord where ''Tirpitz'' is anchored.

They manage to approach undetected to lay their "side-cargoes" under the ship's hull, each containing two tons of explosive amatol. ''X2'' is badly damaged and cannot re-surface, but the crew decide to stay on board to prevent "giving the game away". The other two submarines succeed in laying their mines before the crews scuttle them. They are captured by the crew of ''Tirpitz'', to be taken away as prisoners of war. While some German crew are aggressive, attempting to machine gun the men in the water, the captain of ''Tirpitz'' salutes them as "brave men", providing them blankets and schnapps.

The mines explode as planned, badly damaging ''Tirpitz''. The crew of the stranded ''X2'', hearing the explosions, attempt to escape. However, ''X2'' s side cargoes have flooded, which causes them to spontaneously explode, destroying ''X2'' and killing her crew.

Padayappa is a mechanical engineer who returns to his village near Tanjore after three years of work in Madras to attend his sister's engagement. His sister is engaged to Suryaprakash, the son of their maternal uncle. During his stay, he comes across Vasundhara and falls in love with her. However, the shyness and fear of Neelambari, her landlady, prevents Vasundhara from initially expressing her feelings. In addition, Neelambari is Suryaprakash's sister, who had recently returned from abroad after studies, and she falls madly in love with Padayappa due to his charm, strength and bravery.

In a turn of events, Padayappa's father's brother Mani demands a share in the family property. Padayappa's father, the chieftain of the village, follows the customs of his forefathers by giving grand donations to all wedding of the village, under the stipulation that they must happen under consent of both bride and groom, and only under the eyes of the Chieftain in front of the Murugan temple. Out of anger, he reveals that Mani was the son their dad's mistress, and he compelled his mother raise him as their own. He refuses to divide the property and instead gives the entire property to Mani. This makes Padayappa's family to sign over the entire wealth and to leave their home the same evening. Mere steps out of their home, unable to bear the shock, Padayappa's father passes away. Padayppa's family moves to a vacant land on the outskirts of the village, which was purchased with the money saved from Padayappa's engineer work. Within days, Suryaprakash marries the daughter of Mani without the village's knowledge, albeit support from both his dad and Mani. Though shocked by this betrayal from her own brother, Padayappa's mother blesses the couple and returns.

Meanwhile, Padayappa sets to clean his land for agriculture. Mani's spy from there gives small rocks from that plot to Mani, who discovers that a hill on that property is solid granite, which will propel Padayppa to even greater wealth. He makes a drama claiming that the ghost of his brother has taught him a lesson, and makes a deal to exchange the entire ancestral wealth for the empty land. Padayappa's mother agrees with this, but after several misfortunate incidents, cancels the deal in Mani's home. Mani reveals the reason for the deal, and forces them to go ahead. Padayappa bashes Mani and his men, and leaves. Padayappa starts the granite business from which he becomes extremely rich. He uses the money to help the poor in his village, and provide them jobs. As his business flourishes, his family is able to once again settle down within months in a palatial residence. Padayappa assumes his father's position as village chieftain, and his sister marries one of the chief engineers who work in his company.

A year later, Neelambari learns about Padayappa's love for Vasundhara and she becomes jealous of her, and tries to harm herself. Her parents beg Padayappa's widowed mother to allow Neelambari to marry him. However, to everyone's surprise, Padayappa's mother proposes marriage for Padayappa and Vasundhara to Vasundhara's mother, her brother's servant and embarrasses Suryaprakash and his father in front of the entire village. This was in retaliation for Suryaprakash's humiliation of her after Padayappa's father death. Not able to bear the humiliation, Neelambari's father commits suicide the same night. When Neelambari tries to kill Vasundhara by letting a bull loose on her after giving her a red sari, Padayappa saves her, by pouring turmeric water on her sari, after which the two marry. Subsequent to the wedding, Neelambari locks herself in a room in Suryaprakash's house, watching and re-watching Padayappa's wedding on video record, thinking of harming Vasundhara about Padayappa for 18 years.

Padayappa helps his father's foster brother, who has fallen on hard financial times. As a result, Padayappa's father's foster brother becomes indebted to him and seeks Padayappa's pardon for his misdeeds. Padayappa forgives him.

Neelambari plans her revenge on Padayappa, now a father of two daughters. Suryaprakash also has a son, Chandraprakash aka Chandru, who studies at the same college as Padayappa's elder daughter, Anitha. Neelambari advises Chandru to make Anitha fall in love with him. At the same time, Padayappa plans to get Anitha married to his sister's son. Neelambari, having made Chandru pretend to fall in love with Anitha, plans to humiliate Padayappa by making Anitha say that she does not wish to marry a groom of her parents' choice, and that she is in love with someone else. At the marriage ceremony, after Anitha does what Neelambari told her to do, Padayappa then makes an oath to unite Anitha with her lover by the next ''Muhurta'' day. Padayappa discovers that Chandru really did fall in love with Anitha, even though he was only initially pretending to do so, on Neelambari's orders. When Padayappa takes Chandru and Anitha to the temple to get married, Neelambari and Suryaprakash give chase to stop them. During the chase, Suryaprakash is killed in a car accident.

Armed with a machine gun, Neelambari reaches the temple where Chandru and Anitha are married, and tries to kill Padayappa. Instead, Padayappa saves her life by preventing a bull from attacking her, while at the same time dodging the bullets she fires at him. Rather than live with the humiliation of knowing she was unsuccessful in avenging her father's death, as well as having her life saved by her enemy, Neelambari commits suicide, promising to take revenge on Padayappa in her next birth. Padayappa prays for her soul to be at peace and eventually attain salvation.

Phaedra (Sophia Loren) is a poor Greek sponge diver on the island of Hydra. She works from the boat of her boyfriend, Rhif (Jorge Mistral), an immigrant from Albania. She accidentally finds an ancient Greek statue of a boy riding a dolphin on the bottom of the Aegean Sea. The statue brings pride to the city of Hydra and has been lost for around 2000 years. Her efforts to sell it to the highest bidder lead her to two competing individuals: Dr. James Calder (Alan Ladd), an honest archaeologist who will surrender it to Greek authorities, and Victor Parmalee (Clifton Webb), an aesthete and an unscrupulous dealer in historic artifacts.

Calder and Parmalee each try to win Phaedra's cooperation. She works in concert with Parmalee, while developing feelings for Calder. When she seems to waver, Rhif decides to make the deal with Parmalee work. The film reaches a happy conclusion, with virtue rewarded, the statue celebrated by the people of Hydra, and Phaedra and Calder in each other's arms. Parmalee, a man with no apparent national loyalties or heritage, sets course for Monte Carlo.

Since she was orphaned, Sue Trinder (Sally Hawkins) has been brought up amongst thieves and charlatans. She has been protected and cared for by Mrs Sucksby (Imelda Staunton) and taught to become a fingersmith (a pickpocket). But when Mrs Sucksby's old friend Richard Rivers (Rupert Evans), known as Gentleman, offers 20-year-old Sue £2,000 to assist him in one of his scams, she cannot resist.

Passing himself off as a proper gent, Rivers has befriended a young lady, Maud Lilly (Elaine Cassidy), who stands to inherit a fortune when she marries. However, Maud's maid has recently left her service and, without a chaperone, Rivers' access to Maud is limited. He wants Sue to be accepted as the new maid and to help him win Maud over. Once married, Rivers plans to have Maud committed to an asylum and he will then take her fortune for himself.

Arriving at Briar, the estate where Maud lives with her wealthy bookish Uncle Lilly (Charles Dance), Sue enters another world. Maud and Sue are of a similar age and appearance but their experience of life could not be further apart. Maud's existence is one of wealth and prosperity inside a grand house, where she is her uncle's secretary and also has the duty of reading to her uncle and his friends. Over the course of a few months, Sue and Maud become friends and, briefly, lovers. Despite Sue's growing feelings for Maud, she is convinced to proceed with Rivers' scam. On Sue's advice, Maud accepts Rivers' proposal of marriage as a way of gaining her freedom from her uncle.

Once married to Maud, Rivers' next plan is to get her admitted to the asylum. But in a dramatic twist, Sue is taken to the madhouse as "Mrs Rivers" and she realises that Maud has been in on the plan from the very beginning.

Having disposed of Sue, Rivers takes Maud to London to Mrs Sucksby's house. There Maud learns that Mrs Sucksby is the mastermind behind her escape and Sue's downfall. Maud is plagued by doubts over her treatment of Sue and the fake life that she presented.

In reality Maud was orphaned and brought up by her uncle, a cruel man, who hardened her heart. The nightly readings in his library were not as innocent as it appeared to Sue. Maud was forced to read pornography to her uncle and his friends. Tormented by the cruelty of her existence, Maud found in Rivers a way out.

By marrying him, she could escape the prison of her uncle's house. But what Maud had not expected was to be so affected by her friendship with Sue – or indeed that she would fall in love with her. In order to save herself from her uncle, Maud had to reconcile herself to hurting Sue.

But even Maud could not have imagined that her world would be further turned upside down. Mrs Sucksby reveals that through a series of twists and turns Maud and Sue were switched at birth – they have been living each other's lives. Mrs Sucksby arranged the whole scheme. Marianne Lilly, before being incarcerated in the asylum by her evil brother, changed her will, leaving one half of her wealth to her own daughter, Susan, and the other half to Maud.

Mrs Sucksby explains to Maud that she has no choice but to comply with the rest of the plan. Maud is further devastated to learn that they have no intention of rescuing Sue from the asylum.

Acknowledging the wrong she has done, Maud knows she must escape Mrs Sucksby if she is to rescue Sue. She manages to get out and finds her way to an old business associate of her uncle's, but he refuses to help and sends her away. Alone in the alleyways and streets of London and unaware of the dangers that lurk, Maud realises she has no choice but to return to Lant Street. Mrs Sucksby is overjoyed to see her and Maud discovers that she is in fact Mrs Sucksby's own daughter.

Meanwhile, employing all the underhanded tricks that her childhood has taught her, Sue escapes from the asylum. She heads for London where she plans to get her revenge on Maud for what she sees as betrayal.

At Mrs Sucksby's, Sue confronts Maud, Mrs Sucksby and Rivers; a huge row ensues and in a struggle Rivers is killed. Despite Maud being guilty of Rivers' murder, Mrs Sucksby confesses to protect both girls and soon after is executed for the crime.

Maud disappears and Sue, realising that Maud was just an innocent in Mrs Sucksby's scheme, sets off to find her. Acknowledging their feelings for one another, the two women are reunited.

In 1465, honorable but penniless Scottish knight Quentin Durward agrees to go to France to find out if the beautiful young heiress, Isabelle, Countess of Marcroy, would be a suitable wife for his aged uncle. The marriage has been arranged by Charles, Duke of Burgundy, for his allegedly rich ward to cement an alliance with Scotland. She wants nothing to do with it, so she runs away and seeks the protection of Charles' great rival, Louis XI, King of France. Quentin pursues and manages to foil an attempted robbery by brigands under the command of Count William de La Marck, though Isabelle continues on her way unaware of her protector's identity.

Nearing the court of King Louis, Quentin tries, but fails, to save the life of a gypsy. However, the dead man's brother, Hayraddin, is grateful for his efforts. Louis, who had ordered the man's hanging as a Burgundian spy, and distrusts such honest men as Quentin, orders him to leave France. However, the Scotsman is not easily deterred. He sneaks into the heavily guarded castle and awakens Louis in his bed with a dagger at his throat. Louis is impressed and enlists Quentin in his service.

Upon the unexpected arrival of Count Phillip de Creville, a Burgundian ambassador seeking Isabelle, Louis orders Quentin to guard her and to keep her presence secret. During the time they spend together, she and Quentin begin to fall in love.

Having lied about Isabelle's being there, Louis commands her to depart. She tells him that she will seek sanctuary with an old friend, the Bishop of Liege. Louis concocts a plan to have De la Marck kidnap and forcibly marry Isabelle to keep her strategically important lands out of Burgundian hands. He has Hayraddin, who is a spy in his employ, take the information and a large bribe to De la Marck. Louis provides Isabelle with a detailed itinerary (the better for De la Marck to find her). He also lends her a few guards, including Quentin, so that when they are killed, it will divert any suspicion away from him. Hayraddin is also sent as a guide. However, when he discovers that Quentin is to be one of the victims, he warns the Scotsman. The three manage to escape the trap and reach Liège, though Quentin is wounded.

When he has recovered, he finally tells Isabelle of his obligation to his uncle, which prevents him from courting her himself, and leaves. De la Marck attacks the castle, captures Isabelle, and kills the bishop when he refuses to marry them. Hearing the sounds of battle, Quentin rescues his love. He slays De la Marck in an unusual duel in a burning bell tower, in which they swing from the ropes used to ring the church bells.

Meanwhile, the Duke of Burgundy arrests Louis when he comes to continue peace negotiations, accusing him of orchestrating the murder of the bishop. However, Quentin arrives and exonerates the King, providing as proof De la Marck's severed head. Out of gratitude (and in France's best interests), Louis tricks Charles into letting Isabelle decide whom she will marry. Quentin has received news that his uncle has died, so he too is free to follow his heart.

The plot develops around a mercenary named Emerald "Deadeye" Flint, who takes up a seemingly simple task to escort a cargo ship, transporting the nearly worthless delivery of sulfur, through quiet waters. Shortly after the beginning of the voyage, the protagonist becomes the sole hostage after an anarchistic group of Shogunate mercenaries raid the convoy. However, he is released by their leader, Hóng Lóng, who is a well-known arch-enemy of, and has formed a love–hate relationship with the protagonist after helping him escape prison.

Emerald "Deadeye" Flint is soon picked up by a freighter and dropped off in Magellan where his first mission is to bring himself and an attache to Emerald's boss, El Topo's base in a rusty old ship named 'Hiob'. After the player completes several missions as repayment to El Topo for the failure of the escort mission, the player is ordered to move to another location to look for a mercenary to assist him in obtaining the black box of the submarine Big Fat Mama.

Eventually the player's ship is replaced by a faster scout called the 'Gator'. As the player continues to progress through the main story line his ship is replaced two more times, first by the slightly sluggish Atlantic Federation bomber 'Zorn', which introduces the player to a ship with significantly greater firepower. Finally the player ends up in a prototype EnTrOx bomber called 'Succubus', which is the fastest and most advanced submarine in Aqua. The Succubus gets confiscated from EnTrOx after their CEO is impeached and the company dissolved to end their monopoly on and control over Aqua's energy, transport, and oxygen resources.

After several other missions, the player encounters a mysterious mothership during a simple recon mission that is traveling at higher speeds than any other submarine in Aqua. As the game progresses, they encounter more and more scouts of similar make, dubbed Bionts, due to the ships being of a bionic build where pilot and machine are fused together. In one mission, the player is required to paralyse a Biont scout (using EMP weapons) and allow the group to analyse the ship. Near the end of the game a great war breaks out between the Bionts and humans. During the war, the player's last mission is to escort Hóng Lóng who sacrifices herself in order to destroy the main control entity of the Bionts called Survion.

South Boston teenager Jason Tripitikas is a fan of martial arts films. He dreams of a battle between Sun Wukong and celestial soldiers in the clouds. He visits a pawn shop in Chinatown to buy wuxia DVDs and discovers a golden staff. On his way home, Jason is harassed by some hooligans, whose leader Lupo attempts to use him to help them rob the shop-owner Hop, who is shot by Lupo. Hop tells Jason to deliver the staff to its rightful owner and Jason flees with the staff. He is cornered on the rooftop before being pulled off the roof by the staff.

When Jason regains consciousness, he finds himself in a village in ancient China under attack by soldiers. The soldiers attempt to seize his staff. He is saved by the inebriated traveling scholar Lu Yan, a supposed "immortal," who remains alert and agile even when drunk. Lu tells him the story of the rivalry between the Monkey King and the Jade Warlord. The Warlord tricked the King into setting aside his magic staff, Ruyi Jingu Bang, and transformed the immortal into a stone statue, but the King cast his staff far away before the transformation. Lu ends the tale with a prophecy about a "Seeker" who will find the staff and free the King. Just then, they are attacked by the Warlord's men again, but manage to escape with the help of Golden Sparrow, a young woman whose family was murdered by the Warlord.

Meanwhile, the Warlord, upon learning about the staff, sends the witch Ni-Chang to help him retrieve it in exchange for the elixir of immortality. Tripitikas, Lu and Sparrow meet the Silent Monk who joins them in their quest to free the King. As the four travel to Five Elements Mountain, Lu and the Monk teach Jason kung fu along the way. After crossing a desert, they encounter Ni Chang. Ni Chang offers to return Jason home in exchange for the staff. When Jason refuses, a battle ensues. Ni Chang shoots an arrow which mortally wounds Lu. Jason's team escapes and takes refuge in a monastery, where they learn that Lu is not an immortal as he claimed to be, and only the Warlord's elixir can save his life. Jason goes to the Warlord's palace alone to exchange the staff for the elixir.

Because the Warlord can only give the elixir to one of them, he orders Jason to duel Ni Chang - the winner will receive the elixir. Sparrow, the Silent Monk, and the monks from the monastery arrive to join the battle. Silent Monk fights the Warlord. Sparrow fights the witch. While the witch is distracted, Jason manages to grab the elixir and tosses it to Lu, who drinks it and recovers. Lu then fights Ni Chang on the balcony then kicks her off it. Ni Chang tries to strangle Lu Yan with her hair to climb back up to the balcony, but Lu Yan cuts her hair and causes her to fall to her death. The Monk is mortally wounded by the Warlord and passes the staff to Jason, who uses it to smash the King's statue. The King is freed and the Silent Monk is revealed to be one of the King's clones. Sparrow is killed, the Warlord is eventually stabbed by Jason after being defeated by the Monkey King and falls into a lava pit to his death. The Jade Emperor, having returned from his meditation, praises Jason for fulfilling the prophecy and grants him one wish. Tripitikas asks to be returned back home.

Jason finds himself back in the present. He overpowers Lupo and drives the other hooligans away. Hop survives being shot and claims that he is immortal (indicating that he is actually Lu). Before the film ends, Jason is delighted to meet a woman who resembles Sparrow. Jason then continues honing his kung fu skills, while Lu narrates the King's search for truth.

With the land in anarchy, warring overlords Arthur Pendragon and his half-sister Morgan LeFay meet as arranged by the sorcerer Merlin to discuss how to end the bloodshed. Merlin leads them to Excalibur, a sword embedded in an anvil and says that according to legend, whoever can remove the sword shall be King of England. Arthur removes the sword easily. Morgan's lover Modred accuses Merlin of witchcraft and a hearing is arranged with the Council of Kings at the Ring of Stones. The next spring, Arthur goes to war against Modred and wins, earning him the crown.

French knight Sir Lancelot rescues Arthur's fiancée Guinevere from being kidnapped by a mysterious knight. After Arthur and Guinevere's wedding, Lancelot pledges his allegiance. Arthur swears to join the select group of knights at the Round Table and England enjoys a period of peace and prosperity. During this time, Lancelot rides north to defend England's border with Scotland and Sir Percival goes in search of the Holy Grail.

Morgan and Modred continue to harbor ill feelings against Arthur, and note with interest the growing warmth between Lancelot and Guinevere. Modred calls a meeting of Arthur's enemies in Scotland and urges them to make peace so that Lancelot will be exposed as Guinevere's lover.

Late one night, jealous after seeing Lancelot kiss another woman, Guinevere goes to his rooms, and Modred's men soon arrive to arrest them for high treason. Lancelot and Guinevere are tried in absentia at the Round Table and declared guilty. Lancelot walks in and surrenders, and when he confesses his chaste love for Guinevere, Arthur revokes their death sentence. Outraged, Modred turns the other knights against Arthur, and civil war returns to the land.

Arthur is mortally wounded in battle. With his dying breath, Arthur commands Lancelot to destroy Modred and give Guinevere his love and forgiveness. Lancelot conveys Arthur's message to Guinevere, then rides to Modred, challenging him to a fight to the death.

A king went on a sea voyage. His ship was blown to an island, where they were attacked by lions who killed many of the King's men. They eventually come to a garden with fountains of gold, silver, and pearls, with a large castle and lake nearby. The Lake warned them that the seven-headed serpent-king of the island would soon wake and bathe in it; it would devour the men alive if they were found. The only way they could limit their punishment was to spread their clothing over its path, as the softness would appease it. When it discovers the men and what they have done to soften his path, in exchange for their lives the serpent demanded twelve youths and twelve maidens every year, or it would destroy their country. For many years, brave youths and maiden volunteered to save their country, yet all perished.

The king and queen in the meantime had no children. One day, an old woman from the Spinning Convent offered the queen an apple that would give her a child. The queen ate the apple, and threw the peel into a pasture where a mare ate it. She had a son, and the mare a foal. When the prince and the horse were grown, the horse said the sacrifice would soon ruin the country and had the prince ride it to the Spinning Convent where the abbess was spinning. She told him to take cotton and go by a secret tunnel to the serpent's palace. There, he would find it sleeping in a bed, hung with bells, and with a sword over it. The sword was the only one that could kill the serpent; it would regrow a new blade for every head, if it broke. He was to stuff the bells with cotton and then wound it in the tail. It would put its heads up, one at a time, and he should cut each one off.

He obeyed her and killed it. The animals of the island chased him, but be escaped.

Isadore "Izzy" Daniels (Corbin Bleu) is a star boxer in Brooklyn, hoping to win the Golden Gloves, like his father and coach Kenneth (David Reivers). Izzy competes in an exhibition match against Rodney (Patrick Johnson Jr.), his classmate and the neighborhood bully, and wins using strategy and focus, giving him a chance to go to the Golden Gloves.

Izzy's neighbor, Mary Thomas (Keke Palmer), is a competitive Double Dutch player on a team called the Joy Jumpers; though the two often argue with each other, their friends know that they have mutual crushes. Izzy brings his younger sister, Karin (Kylee Russell), and her friends to the Double Dutch regional competition, to watch Mary and her teammates, Shauna (Shanica Knowles), Keisha (Laivan Greene), and Yolanda (Jajube Mandiela). Though Izzy tries to hide it, he enjoys the competition. The Joy Jumpers take fourth place, barely qualifying for the city finals. Upset with Mary's freestyle choreography, Yolanda leaves the team and joins their main competitors, the Dutch Dragons. The Joy Jumpers need to find another teammate, or they can't compete in the city finals. Not taking Double Dutch seriously, Izzy mocks them. Mary then challenges him to jump rope and prove that it's easy. Izzy does so, having done jump roping to train for boxing. The girls convince Izzy to be a temporary replacement until they can find someone else, and he secretly practices with the Joy Jumpers before school at his father's gym.

Over the next several days, Izzy spends more time with the Joy Jumpers and improves tremendously at Double Dutch, though his boxing skills and punctuality suffer as a result. His fellow boxer, Tammy (Rebecca Williams), finds out but promises to keep it a secret if he stops teasing her. With some help from Izzy, the Joy Jumpers are able to put together a better freestyle routine. Izzy agrees to join the team permanently, and suggests they change the name to Hot Chili Steppers instead, to which Mary agrees. Izzy plans to perform with them at a Double Dutch exhibition to practice their routine. That day, though, Izzy's dad shows up with tickets to a boxing match. Reluctant to tell the truth, Izzy goes with his dad, bailing on Mary and the Hot Chili Steppers. Upset, Mary kicks him off the team, ignoring his apologies.

Rodney, meanwhile, is furious over losing to Izzy, and demands a rematch, though Izzy ignores him. He discovers Izzy's secret, and takes pictures of him, leaving them all over their school, exposing and ridiculing Izzy. After seeing this, Mary tries to convince Izzy to come back, but Izzy coldly turns her down. Kenneth gives Izzy a gift for his boxing match but discovers the pictures Rodney posted and confronts Izzy about it. Izzy admits that he didn't tell his dad because ever since Izzy's mother died, all he ever talks about is boxing. Izzy admits that he no longer likes the sport, and only does it for his father. Izzy apologizes, while Kenneth accepts the apology, then leaves the room.

Izzy takes out his anger practicing at the gym until Tammy comes over and reminds him that she's been teased by him and others constantly for being a female boxer, but she's overcome it to become the best girl boxer in Brooklyn. That night, Rodney shows up at the gym with a large crowd. He demands again that Izzy gives him the rematch, and Izzy agrees. In the ring, Izzy responds to Rodney's mockery with cool analysis about Rodney’s behavior as a loud-mouthed bully. He uses the tricks he honed in freestyle practice to dodge Rodney's attacks and push him against the ropes repeatedly, finally stating that they both had a lot to be mad about, but fighting would not improve matters. He leaves the ring, and Rodney angrily follows, but trips and falls. Everyone urges Izzy to finish him, but he refuses before leaving the gym. Rodney is impressed, admiring Izzy for standing up to him.

The Hot Chili Steppers come to the city finals with an abysmal replacement until Izzy shows up. He apologizes and Mary forgives him. The Dutch Dragons show up, with Yolanda and their leader, Gina (Paula Brancati), making snarky comments toward Mary and her teammates. Mary shows a new attitude, not letting it get to her. During the compulsory competition, the Steppers stun the Dragons by taking first place while the Dragons take second. The Dragons take first in the speed competition while the Steppers take second, which means the Freestyle round is the tiebreaker. Tammy shows up with Izzy's friends, Chuck and Earl (Mazin Elsadig and Micah Williams), to support the Hot Chili Steppers. Rodney also comes to watch. Just before the freestyle routine, Izzy is surprised to see his father and Karin. The Hot Chili Steppers take the stage, with Izzy showing the skills he's learned, impressing his friends and family. After they finish their performance, Kenneth apologizes to Izzy, explaining that boxing was his way to stay close to Izzy after they lost Izzy's mom. He tells Izzy that he's proud of him, and the two make amends. Rodney also tells Izzy that he's impressed by the Double Dutch, and hopes Izzy can show him the moves he made in the ring. Izzy agrees, and they call a truce.

The results are announced, and the Dutch Dragons take second place. Before the winner is revealed, the screen suddenly freezes and cuts to a group of kids at the boxing gym, who are listening to Izzy's story narrated by Rodney. He tells them that the Hot Chili Steppers went to state, but didn't win until the next year, and Mary and Izzy are still together. As he sends the kids to gear up, Rodney remembers that day, revealing that the Hot Chili Steppers won. They happily accept their first-place trophy, stunning the Dutch Dragons. The movie ends with the Hot Chili Steppers and Karin teaching Kenneth how to Double Dutch.

K (Shinji Takeda), a young Japanese debugger and free-lance programmer (also Techno LPs collector in his free time), is a vigilante who non-fatally shoots wrong-doers as he encounters them in his daily life.

Before each shooting, he puts on a pair of thick glasses. The local media quickly names the mysterious attacker "Four-eyes" (''Le Bigleux'' in the original version, lit. "the poor-sighted") based on the police composite.

Hinano (Hinano Yoshikawa) is a seventeen-year-old girl who works part-time as a hairdresser. She lives with her older brother Roy, a police officer (Tetta Sugimoto) assigned to the "Four-Eyes" case. While in the subway, she notices a young man secretly filming other passengers, and, intrigued, begins to follow him. Later, she asks her friend and co-worker Naomi (Kaori Mizushima) to join her investigation into the strange young man.

She finally approaches K, and they quickly become friends. He invites her to his apartment and shares his interests of trance music and video games with her. Hinano is suspicious, but she relents, and finds herself in the middle of a romance with the unconventional young man.

In the meantime, Four Eyes is still at large, and Roy's investigation is not closer to finding the shooter. Hinano witnesses one of K's shootings, and is conflicted about what she should do with this knowledge. Hinano confronts K, and K explains that he modified his pistol to be inaccurate, presumably so that the bullets don't actually hit its target. However, later on K accidentally kills one of his victims - a man who was breaking up with a girl for a different girl.

In a second confrontation, K reveals that he uses the thick glasses to cause his victims to hold still, and so that he himself cannot see his victims clearly. He admits that he would not be able to shoot his victims if he looked them in the eye. In addition, he takes video because of a desire to see what is going on in the world, not just look. Despite having much video footage of people, he says it is hard to see. But K explains to Hinano that he is willing to give it all up, and refers to Four-Eyes as someone he can separate from, which puts Hinano at ease.

K is visited by a low-ranking yakuza member (Beat Takeshi) who comes to pick up K's handgun which was apparently on loan, but it is accidentally fired into K's lower abdomen. K does not go to the hospital, but instead meets Hinano and walks around with her. K asks Hinano to meet him at the top of the tallest building in Tokyo. Hinano waits at the top of an observation deck, but K, succumbing to his wound, sways dangerously by the curb of a busy street. In the last sequence, Hinano is walking down the street. Her hand is grabbed; she looks up and sees K's smiling face.

The ending is ambiguous, since it is not clear whether K died. It should be pointed that the international version, including the Japanese one, features seven minutes of additional footage, and possibly a more explicit ending compared to the original cut.

The film essentially follows the storyline of the Soviet original, with Rathbone and Domergue replacing two Soviet actors in roles as space-station monitors of the primary action. The rest stars the remaining Soviet actors dubbed into English.

In this retelling, it is 2020 and the Moon has been colonized. After traveling 200,000,000 miles, the first group of men land on Venus, where they find a mist-shrouded prehistoric world in which the crew are attacked by various monsters and giant plants.

Four cheerleaders from the Happy Valley High Hamsters are blamed by a group of Church Ladies for the invasion of "Internet smut" into their children's bedrooms. The Church Ladies hire Stephen, a gay teacher from the local Parochial Reform School, to teach the cheerleaders a lesson by training a group of evil Catholic school girls.

In the other side, Mr. X, an evil mastermind is using the cheerleaders as guinea pigs to test his Internet Zombie Domination software. So the cheerleaders turn to their arch social enemies, the computer geeks, to help them learn Ninja abilities and defeat the evil Catholic Girls, Stephen and the mysterious Mr. X.

The story starts off with Donald and his nephews reading an ad about the Oolated Squigg company and its second annual contest. The first prize is a south seas cruise on an ocean liner, which Donald wants to win. It will be difficult, since Gladstone Gander who is Donald's extremely lucky cousin also wants the prize.

The rules say there is no limit for the number of entries each contestant may submit, so Donald intends to pick all entry forms to make sure Gladstone and his luck won't stop him. Picking the entries won't be as easy as it's originally thought. The company decided to send the 10,000 entry forms inside squigg-shaped balloons through Duckburg.

Still determined to get all the raffle tickets within the balloons, Donald tries to grab them as soon they are released. Unfortunately, it causes Donald to float away with the balloons. The nephews point out a balloon floating near Gladstone, who doesn't want to make the effort of lifting his arm to get it, saying that either a bird will pop the balloon for him or it simply doesn't have the winning ticket.

Eventually, Donald seems to have caught all the balloons, which, as he points out, must have been placed together via a thermal inversion, meaning they must be floating above a place with a low temperature. The place happens to be the Money Bin. Scrooge McDuck, fearing the balloons could be another plot of the Beagle Boys trying to steal his money, shoots them down. As a multitude tries to get the entry forms, Scrooge, who doesn't know about the contest, tries to make the contestants who followed the balloons go away. When he hears about a contest, the idea of paying more taxes because of the prizes horrifies Scrooge where he agrees to give the balloons to the first person who claims them.

Donald, who was under all the balloons, claims them all for himself and heads for the Oolated Squigg company to claim his prize. As they arrive at the company, the contest organizers are shocked by the idea of one person having all the tickets, but Huey, Dewey, and Louie say there are only 9,999 of the 10,000 ballons. Donald doesn't like the way it sounds, specially with Gladstone in the vicinity. One of the organizers says that a single entry got stuck in the factory and never was released. Donald tries to get it before Gladstone, but trips and accidentally kicks the ticket right to Gladstone's hands.

Donald asks what Gladstone was doing there, since he had no entries, and he says the last year's winner gets to draw the winning ticket for this one. Hearing this, Huey, Dewey, and Louie figure a way to make Gladstone's luck work against him. They submit only one ticket in the name of Donald. All others are for Gladstone. While Gladstone is picking the winning ticket, the nephews comment about Gladstone's luck beating the odds. That's when Gladstone figures out their plan: They've put the odds for him and against Donald so Gladstone would be beaten by his own luck. The plan seems to work, as Donald wins the cruise and Gladstone gets a one-year supply of oolated squiggs as the second-placer.

While trying to enjoy his "prize", Gladstone thinks about the contest and deduces that losing a contest is bad luck, regardless of for or against whom the odds were. Then he reads an article in the newspaper about the cruise ship getting grounded on an iceberg, and he later finds a diamond ring eaten by a squigg. The story ends with Donald on the iceberg, having nothing to eat except squiggs recently fished from there.

Matthew Poncelet, who was sentenced to death for the murder of a teenage couple, has been on death row at the Louisiana State Penitentiary for six years. He committed his crimes with Carl Vitello, who was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. As his scheduled execution date approaches, Poncelet asks Sister Helen Prejean, with whom he has corresponded, to help him with a final appeal.

Sister Helen decides to visit Poncelet, who is arrogant, sexist and racist, and does not even pretend to feel remorse. He protests his innocence and insists Vitello killed the two teenagers. Convincing an experienced attorney to take on Poncelet's case ''pro bono'', Sister Helen tries to have his sentence commuted to life imprisonment. After many visits, she establishes a relationship with him. At the same time, she gets to know Poncelet's mother, Lucille, and the families of the two victims. The victims' families do not understand Sister Helen's efforts to help Poncelet and claim that she is "taking his side". They desire "absolute justice" i.e. his life for those of their children.

Sister Helen's application for commutation is refused. Poncelet asks Sister Helen to be his spiritual adviser through his execution, and she agrees. Sister Helen tells Poncelet that his redemption is possible only if he takes responsibility for what he did. Just before he is taken from his cell, Poncelet tearfully admits to Sister Helen that he had killed the boy and raped the girl, before Vitello killed her. As he is prepared for execution, he appeals to the boy's father for forgiveness and tells the girl's parents that he hopes his death brings them peace.

Poncelet is executed by lethal injection and given a proper burial. The murdered boy's father attends the funeral ceremony; although he is still filled with hate, he soon begins to pray with Sister Helen.

The story takes place in the jungles of Kenya and its capital city Nairobi. Despite the English-language title, there is no island (and no "Kong"). Mad scientist Albert Muller is experimenting with small radio transmitters implanted in the brains of gorillas that control their minds. These are test subjects with the ultimate goal of doing this to humans.

Diana, the daughter of bar owner Theodore (no last name is mentioned), is abducted by apes under Muller's control during a safari. A rescue team led by mercenary adventurer Burt Dawson (Brad Harris) heads into the jungle to find her. Hostile natives attack his group, and Burt is captured along the way. After he escapes, Burt meets a legendary white jungle girl the natives call the Sacred Monkey (In the English dubbed version, he first calls her Eve, but later everyone refers to her as Eva).

Eva is a Tarzan-like orphan who grew up alone in the jungle. She wears only a leather loincloth, and her waist-length black hair covers her breasts. She does not speak English but can communicate with animals and has a pet chimpanzee. She has one of Diana's bracelets and eventually leads Burt to a cave where she is being held prisoner by Muller. This is where the final conflict and resolution takes place.

Unlike virtually every other film which features a jungle girl character, this story concentrates on Burt and his love interest Diana, with Eva confined to a marginal supporting role.

Deep in the Latin American jungles, plantation manager Barney Chavez (Burr) kills his elderly employer in order to get to his beautiful wife Dina Van Gelder (Payton). However, old native witch Al-Long (Gisela Werbisek) witnesses the crime and puts a curse on Barney, who soon after finds himself turning nightly into a rampaging gorilla-like beast. When a wise but superstitious police commissioner Taro (Chaney) is brought in to investigate the plantation owner's death and a rash of strange animal killings, he begins to suspect that all is not as it seems. Taro interviews local farmers who have seen the bloodthirsty animal; they identify it as the "''Sukara''," a mythical jungle demon resembling a gorilla. Meanwhile, Dina is also becoming suspicious of Barney, who seems to be more in love with the jungle than with her. She follows him one night into the jungle, only to be attacked by the feral Barney. Taro and his friend Dr. Viet (Conway) follow her screams in the jungle and shoot Barney. Before he dies, Barney peers into his reflection from a pond and sees ''sukara'' staring back at him.

Separated from their guided tour group while in Japan, Big Bird and Barkley find help from a friendly young woman who is planning to leave Japan at the same time they will be, and from the same town, Kyoto. She offers to take the pair to Kyoto as she says goodbye to family and friends along the way.

Big Bird witnesses some of Japan's beauty, its landscape and culture, with the help of the mysterious young woman and the friends of hers he stays with. She introduces him to a Japanese family, and teaches him some simple Japanese vocabulary (e.g. ''ohayō'' (おはよう) = "good morning"). Big Bird is increasingly vexed by his not having learned the young woman's name, and that she has a tendency to have disappeared quite suddenly when he turns to speak to her. One night, finding difficulty in sleeping on a futon, he happens to catch sight of her standing in the garden, singing an achingly melancholy song to the moon.

Attending an elementary school on the day he, Barkley and their mysterious helper are supposed to leave on the Shinkansen for Kyoto, Big Bird is treated to ''The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter'' as acted out by some of the students. One of the highlights of the special, Big Bird (and the viewing audience) learns the story of Kaguya-hime, a young girl found in a shining bamboo stump, who later reveals herself as a magical princess to her adopted family. She then must return to the moon and leave her adoptive family behind.

Big Bird and Barkley arrive at the Shinkansen station almost too late, and their worried companion scolds them lightly once they're on board. Once they disembark, she orders them to stay put so that they don't get lost and miss meeting up with their tour. But Big Bird and Barkley are much too intrigued by their surroundings, and end up at the Sanjusangendo Temple. Barkley becomes frightened by the statues inside and runs away, with a distraught Big Bird in pursuit.

Long after dark Big Bird returns to the spot where their young guide had told them to stay. Finding her there, he apologizes in shame, explaining what happened. The young woman forgives Big Bird, and reveals that she has found Barkley and also located their tour, which is now certain to wait for the wayward pair. Big Bird, trying to find the words to thank her, says that he doesn't even know her name. Her name is revealed to be Kaguya-hime, their guide says softly.

After their last thank yous and goodbyes, Big Bird suddenly recalls where he'd heard the name before, and rushes off to find her. However, Kaguya-hime is walking, trance-like, through the deep green of a bamboo forest. Seven imposing men in 10th century garb enter from all sides. To chilling effect, they are colorless. They surround her, and upon drawing back, reveal a young girl in ''jūnihitoe'' (ceremonial costume). She turns colorless as well, and the procession marches slowly from the clearing to the movie's most majestic music.

Big Bird and Barkley arrive on the scene, seeing no one else. Big Bird convinces himself that he was just being silly, thinking the friendly young woman really could be the Bamboo Princess. Safely in a plane going home to Sesame Street, Big Bird reminisces on everything he has learned during his adventure, while through Big Bird's window, unseen, Kaguya-hime's procession walks in stately elegance across the face of the full moon. As the closing credits roll, the bamboo forest is revisited, and the shining bamboo stump that Kaguya-hime had come from is revealed.

Having escaped enslavement by Zarien Kheev, Twi'lek Rianna Saren is a successful mercenary opposing the Empire. Kyle Katarn of the Rebel Alliance hires her to destroy an Imperial shipment of mirkanite going through a Black Sun warehouse on Coruscant. Rianna is captured during the operation, but escapes with the help of a droid named Zeeo. Rebel leader Princess Leia then sends Rianna and Zeeo to Alderaan on a new assignment to destroy an Imperial ship.

On Alderaan, Rianna and Zeeo make their way through an Imperial base, opposed by Stormtroopers and Black Sun guards. Discovering that the Empire is experimenting on its own scientists, they blow up the ship and the lab. They learn that a last shipment is heading to Mustafar, and Leia sends them after it. Rianna and Zeeo search an Imperial mining facility on Mustafar, eventually finding and destroying the drill. Rianna finds out that Kheev is going to Tatooine, and heads there herself.

Rianna's ship is shot down over Tatooine by Boba Fett in his ''Slave I''. Rianna and Zeeo track down Kheev, who sets a Rancor loose on them in an arena. They kill it, but are captured and brought to Despayre where the Death Star is being constructed. Escaping, they hear Kheev talking to Darth Vader about the construction on the Death Star. Donning a huge robot suit, Zheev attacks Rianna. She kills him, and tells the Alliance that she and Zeeo have found the plans to the Death Star.

The story begins in the attic of an ancient house. The narrator’s companion refers to the former owner of the house and the presumably violent end that befell him. He advises the narrator not to stay after dark or touch anything, especially the small object on a table, which the companion seems to fear considerably.

The narrator is then left alone in the attic; he notes the many theological and classical books, and one bookshelf in particular containing books on magic. He feels a considerable curiosity for the forbidden object on the table. The narrator finds a strange flashlight-like device in his pocket that produces a peculiar violet glow. He attempts to illuminate the object on the table with this strange light, which he describes as being composed of particles. The object makes a crackling sound like a sparking vacuum tube, and takes on a pinkish glow with a vague white shape taking form from its center. The narrator, feeling that his surroundings are taking on strange new properties, realizes that he is not alone; the sinister newcomer is described as wearing clerical garb typical of the Anglican Church. The newcomer begins throwing magical books into a fireplace.

The narrator notices other men within the room, all dressed in clerical attire, including a bishop; they confront the first man, who reaches for the object on the table with a wry smile. The other men, looking terrified, make a quick retreat. The man then proceeds to retrieve a coil of rope from a cupboard and ties it into a noose as if to hang himself. When the narrator attempts to intervene, the man notices him and approaches threateningly. The narrator shines the strange light on the man as if it were a weapon, causing him to fall backwards down an open stairwell.

When the narrator proceeds towards the stairwell, he finds no body below, but rather three people approaching with lanterns. Two of them see the narrator and flee shrieking, leaving only the companion who had accompanied the narrator to the attic. The companion says that the narrator should have left the object alone, that interfering with it had altered him. The man then leads the narrator to a mirror, where he is presented not with his own reflection, but that of the evil clergyman.

This story is alluded to in Ramsey Campbell's "The Return of the Witch" from ''The Inhabitant of the Lake'' where the spirit of Gladys Shorrock tries to take over the body of her home's current inhabitant, using the Evil Clergyman's secrets to do so. The story also gives the location of Lovecraft's story as Severnford, one of Campbell's towns.

George Birch, undertaker for the New England town of Peck Valley, finds himself trapped in the vault where coffins are stored during winter for burial in the spring. When Birch stacks the coffins to reach a transom window, his feet break through the lid of the top coffin, injuring his ankles and forcing him to crawl out of the vault.

Later, Dr. Davis investigates the vault, and finds that the top coffin was one of inferior workmanship, which Birch used as a repository for Asaph Sawyer, a vindictive citizen whom Birch had disliked, even though the coffin had originally been built for the much shorter Matthew Fenner. Davis finds that Birch had cut off Sawyer's feet in order to fit the body into the coffin, and the wounds in Birch's ankles are actually teeth marks.

In the story, the unnamed narrator describes the final fate of his good friend, Denys Barry, an Irish-American who reclaims an ancestral estate in Kilderry, a fictional village in Ireland. Barry ignores pleas from the superstitious local peasantry not to drain the nearby bog, with unfortunate supernatural consequences.

With the onset of Prohibition, the Sheehan Billiard Room in Chicago became a sordid haunt for hard drinkers. A certain Old Bugs, a mature man corroded by vices but capable of showing, at long intervals, the typical sensitivity of educated people works as a kitchen cleaner. When the young Alfred Trever, initiated by his friend Pete Schultz on the way of drinking, arrives at the Sheehan's tavern, Old Bugs will try to convince him not to make the same mistake as he did.

The story traces the history of the titular street in a New England city, presumably Boston, from its first beginnings as "but a path" in colonial times to a quasi-supernatural occurrence in the years immediately following World War I. As the city grows up around the street, it is planted with many trees and built along with "simple, beautiful houses of brick and wood", each with a rose garden. As the Industrial Revolution runs its course, the area degenerates into a run-down and polluted slum, with all of the street's old houses falling into disrepair.

After World War I and the October Revolution, the area becomes home to a community of Russian immigrants. Among the new residents is the leadership of a "vast band of terrorists," who are plotting the destruction of the United States on Independence Day. When the day arrives, the terrorists gather to do the deed, but before they can get started, all the houses in the street collapse concurrently on top of each other, killing them all. Observers at the scene testify that immediately after the collapse, they experienced visions of the trees and rose gardens that had once been in the street.

My fat beauty tells the story of Valentina Villanueva Lanz (Natalia Streignard), a sweet and pleasant young woman but with serious problems of overweight who will face great obstacles to achieve her happiness. Its history dates back approximately twenty-five years ago; her family was then one of the most important and distinguished families in Caracas and was made up of her parents, Luis Felipe Villanueva (Manuel Salazar), and his wife, the famous singer Eva Lanz de Villanueva (Mimí Lazo); her paternal uncle, Juan Ángel Villanueva (Flavio Caballero), and her great-uncle, Don Segundo Villanueva (Carlos Márquez).

Juan Ángel, who was already engaged to Camelia "La Muñeca" Rivero (Belén Marrero) —member of a wealthy and distinguished family—, met a beautiful young woman on the beach who introduced herself as Olimpia Mercouri (Hilda Abrahamz) and explained that she had just survived a horrible shipwreck where her parents, two Greek citizens, had died. Juan Ángel was dazzled by the beauty of Olimpia and soon after he married her after breaking his engagement to Muñeca and took her to live in the family mansion.

It was there that the problems began for the Villanueva family; Olimpia and Luis Felipe detested themselves because he suspected that she was not the person she claimed to be. Months later, the two women were mothers: Olimpia had a son, Orestes (Juan Pablo Raba), who is not the son of Juan Ángel but Captain José Manuel Sevilla (Daniel Alvarado), the only true love of Olimpia, and Eva, a daughter, Valentina. Also, in the following years, Olimpia had three more children with her husband: Pandora Emilia (Marianela González), Aquiles (Carlos Felipe Álvarez), and Ariadna Margarita (Aileen Celeste).

After investigating for quite some time, Luis Felipe obtained evidence that Olimpia was an impostor. Her real name was María Joaquina Crespo and she was not a young millionaire of Greek origin, but a port prostitute. However, a small part of her story was true: she had survived the wreck of a yacht in which she worked as a waitress for a marriage of Greek millionaires, Aristotle Mercouri and Olimpia Vasilopoulos, causing her thanatophobia (panic to the ocean) and. arsonphobia (fire panic). María Joaquina simply invented that she was the daughter of this marriage and calls herself as her supposed mother.

Unable to bear the thought of losing her new position, Olimpia confronted Luis Felipe when he threatened to unmask her and murdered him by throwing him from the balcony of the mansion before making the evidence disappear. Everyone thought that Luis Felipe's death was a suicide, which sank Eva and Valentina morally and psychologically: the first began to drown her sorrows in alcohol, prompted by Olympia, and the second to compulsively eat and gain more and more weight.

With Luis Felipe dead and Eva turned into a heavy alcoholic, Olimpia stands as the matriarch of the family, since Juan Ángel spends most of his time working or traveling on business. With the excuse of protecting Valentina from her mother, the girl is sent to a boarding school in the interior of Venezuela.

Eighteen years pass, and Valentina's graduation day arrives. Eva, who has managed to fully recover from alcoholism, goes to look for her daughter in her private helicopter. After the party, Eva has to continue with her work as a singer, but when she leaves, the device explodes in the air due to provoked sabotage. by Roque at the request of Olimpia. Heartbroken, Valentina decides to go live with her maternal aunt, Tza-Tza Lanz (Emma Rabbe), but her uncle takes her to live with her at home.

Valentina's life changes when she meets her cousin Orestes, with whom she has been in love since she was a child. Orestes, who will become her protective angel, will be loving and kind to Valentina, but she will also meet new enemies, such as Chiquinquirá "Chiqui" Lorenz Rivero (Norkys Batista), Orestes' whimsical fiancée, or her first cousin, Ariadna. However, Valentina's great enemy will be Olimpia.

Over time, Chiqui's relationship with Orestes breaks down and he begins dating Valentina. The day the couple gets engaged, their ex organizes a surprise party for Orestes, who ends up totally drunk, but in reality, the party was a farce to make Valentina believe that Orestes and Chiqui had gone to bed, which did not happen but Valentina believed it and with a broken heart, she decides to go live in Madrid with Aunt Celeste (Amalia Pérez Díaz).

Upon arriving in Spain, Valentina begins with discomfort, so they turn to the doctor, who after some analysis concludes that she was being poisoned. The poison came from the chocolates that Orestes gave her but it was not she who injected it, but Roque at the request of Olympia, but Valentina believed that it was him, which increases her hatred towards Orestes.

Due to a large amount of poison in her body, Valentina is forced to undergo treatments, exercise, and a strict diet with which, over a year, she loses several kilos. With great resentment towards Orestes and his mother, Valentina is refusing to return to Venezuela and decides to stay in Spain and develop her life working there.

During a work trip for Valentina, the employee who cared for Celeste, who was in very poor health, communicates with her family in Venezuela, with Olimpia who attends and travels immediately to Madrid alone. The employee, without knowing Olimpia, trusts her and leaves her alone with Aunt Celeste, whom she forces to sign some papers during her agony, transferring all of Valentina's money to her.

Filled with hatred, Valentina decides to radically change her appearance, take on another character and return to Venezuela with a new identity, that of Bella de la Rosa Montiel, to take revenge on Olimpia and Orestes and fight for her due. For his part, Orestes, heartbroken, decides to dedicate himself to doing good by stealing from the rich and corrupt to give to the poor, under the mask of a hero called "The Silver Lily", taken from the stories of Captain Seville that Roque told Orestes when he was a boy.

Over time, Bella de la Rosa falls in love with El Lirio de Plata, not knowing that it is Orestes, who in turn feels guilty because he loves Bella and Valentina, without knowing that they are the same person. Over time, the true identity of Valentina is discovered who will fight to recover her fortune stolen by Olimpia, who in turn is unmasked by Juan Ángel who contacted the investigator who had hired his deceased brother to investigate it.

Olimpia, already again as María Joaquina Crespo, is imprisoned and lives an ordeal, her faithful servant Roque on a visit to the prison tells her about his plan to free her and ends up stabbing her to get her out of there. Olimpia resigns herself to death, regrets all the evil she did to her family, but Roque ends up forcing her to flee in a ship, still wounded, to save her from prison.

Already on the ship and running away, Roque and Olimpia have an altercation because he is hopelessly in love with her but Olimpia sees him only as a servant. After her refusal, Roque tries to abuse Olimpia, who defends herself with a weapon, both struggle with the pistol, which causes a shot to escape and hit containers full of gasoline for the ship, which ends up causing an explosion, killing both of them.

Without Olimpia in between, Orestes and Valentina were happy with two children and Valentina recovered all the kilos she had lost.

The story involves a mine that uncovers a very deep chasm, too deep for any sounding lines to hit bottom. The night after the discovery of the abyss the narrator and one of the mine's workers, a Mexican called Juan Romero, venture together inside the mine, drawn against their will by a mysterious rhythmical throbbing in the ground. Romero reaches the abyss first and is swallowed by it. The narrator peers over the edge, sees something – "but God, I dare not tell you what I saw!" and loses consciousness. The next morning, the narrator and the deceased Romero are both found in their bunks. Other miners swear that neither of them left their cabin that night. The chasm has vanished as well.

In the series’ backstory, thousands of years ago on the planet GoBotron of the Proxima System, there lived a race of human-like organic beings called GoBeings. Civil war erupted on the planet when the power-hungry terrorist group known as the Renegades arose, led by a madman dubbed "Stron-Domez the Master Renegade", who waged war against the peaceful Guardians.

When a Renegade sabotage operation inadvertently resulted in a gigantic asteroid colliding with GoBotron, the natural disasters that resulted from the asteroid's impact pushed the GoBeings to the verge of extinction. However, the genius referred to as Ex-El the Last Engineer saved his people and took his experiments to replace parts of his own body with mechanical substitutes to the ultimate extent and transferring the essences of the GoBeings into large cyborgs known as GoRobotic Machine Men, or simply GoBotic Machines or GoBots.

The GoBots possessed an additional ability; after being run through the device named the Modifier, the GoBots’ bodies were able to transform into other vehicles. His work done, the Last Engineer intended to retreat to a pre-prepared workshop elsewhere in the galaxy, but the Master Renegade stole his ship and escaped in his stead. The Last Engineer placed himself into suspended animation beneath the surface of GoBotron, while above, the war continued to rage between the Guardians and the Renegades, now all encased in GoBot shells.

In the last quarter of the 20th Century, the planet Earth became involved in the conflict between Leader-1's Guardians and Cy-Kill's Renegades. During one of these battles, one of Leader-1's lieutenants, Turbo, became severely damaged. Unwilling to let his friend and teammate die, Leader-1 began his quest to find the legendary Last Engineer. Leader-1 found the person he believed to be the Last Engineer, but Leader-1 had unwittingly released the Master Renegade (though he did repair Turbo to gain the Guardians’ trust).

The Guardians later found the true Last Engineer, who was instrumental in frustrating the alliance between Cy-Kill's Renegades and the Master Renegade. The Master Renegade later escaped the custody of the Renegades, and plagued both factions, notably attacking the UniCom colony of New Earth.

Film footage from a news crew shows a story about an immigrant man killing his wife and son before committing suicide. The son and wife turn into zombies and kill several medical personnel and police officers, but leave one medic and a reporter bitten before being killed. The narrator, Debra, explains that most of the footage, which was recorded by the cameraman, was never broadcast.

A group of young film studies students from the University of Pittsburgh are in the woods making a horror film along with their faculty adviser, Andrew Maxwell, when they hear news of apparent mass-rioting and mass murder. Two of the students, Ridley and Francine, decide to leave the group, while the project director Jason goes to pick up his girlfriend Debra (the narrator) from her university dorm. When she cannot contact her family, they travel to Debra's parents' house in Scranton, Pennsylvania. On route, the group, Jason, Debra, Professor Maxwell, Eliot, cameraman Tony, couple Gordo and Tracy and Mary run over a reanimated Pennsylvania State Trooper and three other zombies. The group stops and Mary attempts to kill herself. Her friends take her to a hospital, where they find the dead becoming zombies, and thereafter fight to survive while traveling to Debra's parents.

Mary becomes a zombie and is slain by Maxwell, and the group dispatch several reanimated patients and staff, including Debra killing one with a defibrillator. Whilst escaping Gordo is bitten by a zombie and soon afterward dies from it. His girlfriend Tracy begs the others not to shoot him immediately but later is forced to shoot him herself when he reanimates. Soon they are stranded when their RV's fuel line breaks. They are attacked by zombies but are rescued by a deaf Amish man named Samuel, who blows them up with dynamite. Tracy then repairs the broken fuel line with the aid of Samuel, but before escaping, he is bitten and kills himself and his attacker with a scythe.

Passing a city, they are stopped by an armed group of survivors, the leader being a member of the National Guard. They are taken to their compound where Jason uploads his footage and Tony kills a zombified guard with acid. Whilst there, Debra receives a message from her younger brother, who informs her that he and their parents were camping in West Virginia at the time of the initial attacks and are now on their way home. The students then leave for Debra's house. Their only reliable source of information is now the Internet, aided by bloggers.

When they arrive at Debra's house, they find her reanimated mother and brother feeding on her father and Maxwell kills them with a bow and arrow. They escape from the house and are stopped by different National Guardsmen, who rob them, leaving them only their weapons and their two cameras. They arrive at Ridley's mansion, where Ridley explains that his parents, the staff, and Francine were killed and he buried them out back. Ridley shows Debra and Tony that he "buried" his parents, the staff and Francine by dumping their bodies into his family's swimming pool.

Ridley then abandons Debra and Tony and is revealed to have been bitten by a zombie himself, explaining his odd behavior. Ridley soon dies and reanimates, then kills and infects Eliot and attacks Tracy and Jason. Jason is able to distract Ridley long enough for Tracy to escape at last minute. Mad at Jason for not leaving the camera to help her, Tracy leaves the group in the group's RV. The remaining survivors hide in an enclosed shelter within the house, with the exception of Jason, who left the group to continue filming and is subsequently attacked and infected by Ridley. Maxwell kills Ridley with an antique sword and Debra euthanizes Jason, while continuing to film. Later, a large number of zombies begin to attack the mansion, including a reanimated Eliot. This forces Debra, Tony and Professor Maxwell to take shelter in the mansion's panic room.

Debra watches Jason's recording of a hunting party shooting people who were left to die and be reanimated as shooting targets, and wonders if the human race is worth saving.

''Escalation'' begins by showing Prime deciding to send the humans home for their own safety. Escorted by Ironhide and Sunstreaker, they are attacked by the Machination, a shadowy organization wanting to acquire Transformer technology for themselves. Sunstreaker and Hunter are seemingly killed. The Autobots rally to find his corpse, but the Machination prove more than ready for Jazz and Wheeljack. Optimus Prime stops the truck with Sunstreaker's corpse, and they discover it is a fake.

While this has been going on, Megatron has begun his campaign, sending his troops to escalate tensions in trouble spots (with Skywarp and Thundercracker bombing a Middle Eastern power station) and activating facsimiles (loyal clones) to see that tensions rise accordingly. Megatron, having taken the form of a pistol, personally journeys to the disputed Soviet state of Brasnya, attacking both sides. The Autobots mount a response, trying to capture the facsimile and a battle breaks out, with Prowl and Hot Rod capturing the facsimile. Prime confronts Megatron, but is no match for the Ore-13-enhanced Megatron and seemingly killed. Prime survives by briefly transferring his consciousness into his trailer and alerts the Autobots to Megatron's weakness: the more he exerts himself, the faster Ore-13 will burn out. Prowl's troops distract Megatron long enough for Prime to recover and put the now severely weakened Megatron to flight. However, their mission has failed, as the facsimile is dead.

Back in America, Ratchet and Ironhide disobey orders to track down Sunstreaker, as Jimmy tracks the materials used to make the decoy to a specific garage. The Autobots are unable to enter because of the sophisticated defenses, so Verity and Jimmy go in, but are knocked out by the defense systems and trigger a self-destruct mechanism. Ironhide intervenes and manages to rescue them, but the self-destruct goes off and seemingly kills him. However, Verity has snagged something from the Machination base.

The story ends with several revelations. Megatron decides to call in Sixshot to accelerate Earth's destruction, unaware the Reapers will be following in his wake. The Machination and their backer, a shadowy, badly damaged Decepticon, have completed some sort of surgery on Hunter, and begun to produce copies of Sunstreaker's body for use in their "new world order". And it is revealed that Skywatch, a mysterious defense organization, has not only dug up the bodies of Shockwave and the Dynobots, but have in their custody Laserbeak and Ravage.

The story begins with Nightbeat puzzling out the Machination events of both ''The Transformers: Infiltration'' and ''The Transformers: Escalation'' to Optimus Prime and Prowl. Prime attempts to get proactive by moving the Ark-19 to the Gulf of Mexico. Megatron has called Sixshot to Earth, and his blatant disregard for protocol forces the other Decepticons to awaken Starscream. Sixshot nevertheless shoots down the Ark as it leaves Lake Michigan. Narrowly missing Knoxville it crashes in the sea, but not before jettisoning an escape pod with Ratchet, Verity and Jimmy. After a long cross-country chase, the three are saved from Sixshot by the arrival of the rest of the Ark's crew emerging from the water. The subsequent battle exposes the Transformers to the world at large thanks to news footage. The Autobots pull out due to a human carpet bombing strike, but the humans are killed in the process by the teleport used. Ratchet manages to revive the humans, but Prime makes the decision to pull out of Earth due to the events of ''Spotlight: Arcee''.

Elsewhere Hot Rod (after talking with Dealer) and Wheeljack have been sent to recover Ironhide, but are ambushed by a group of Sunstreaker clones. Despite outwitting them and escaping several, they are confronted by more - who reveal themselves as Headmasters, though the two use Wheeljack's gadgets to escape. At the Machination compound, a surgically altered Hunter escapes captivity, and finds the severed head of the real Sunstreaker, who begs Hunter to kill him, revealing his mind is being used as the hub of the Machination army. A defiant Hunter decides to fight back by learning how to be a Headmaster. Elsewhere the Reapers arrive and attack the Decepticon base, forcing Megatron to recall Sixshot, while in the Dead Universe Nova Prime (now known as Nemesis Prime) dispatches Galvatron to Earth.

The reappearance of the Reapers allows Sixshot to defect to their side, but he is taken out by Starscream, who uses an "off" code learned during his time as Megatron's bodyguard. A full-scale battle ensues, with the other Decepticons (including Megatron) coming to Starscream's aid. They eventually win, with aid from Galvatron who disappears with Sixshot's body, while the Decepticons' location is exposed to the US military. In the Machination compound Hunter escapes and locates a Sunstreaker copy body. He is attacked by Scorponok (the "head" of the Machination seen in ''Escalation'', now bonded with a human), but successfully bonds with the body and the real Sunstreaker's personality and escapes. The Headmasters catch up to Hot Rod and Wheeljack, immobilizing the latter. Hot Rod is saved by Hardhead, but vows to stay on Earth to find out what has happened to Sunstreaker. Skywatch, having lost control of Ravage and Laserbeak due to interference from Soundwave, reactivate Grimlock to use against the increasing Transformer activity as the Ark leaves orbit, with Nightbeat beginning to suspect someone has tampered with his memory. The final page has Galvatron, Nemesis Prime and Jhiaxus promising that the endgame is about to begin.

Notes

As with ''Escalation'', ''Devastation'' picks up on several other plot threads introduced in other IDW G1 stories.

In relation to ''The Transformers: Spotlight''

• Scorponok, here revealed as the "Head" of the Machination, was introduced in ''Spotlight: Ultra Magnus''. Likewise, the concept of "transformable men" was also introduced in that story, which here evolves into the Headmaster process.
• Soundwave was trapped in his alt-mode by Bludgeon in ''Spotlight: Soundwave''. This is his first in-continuity appearance since.
• The story of Sixshot and the Reapers was first explored in ''Spotlight: Sixshot''.
• The Dead Universe storyline has been referred to ''Spotlight'' one-shots focusing on ''Nightbeat'', ''Galvatron'', ''Optimus Prime'', and ''Arcee''. Nightbeat had his memory tampered with in his own Spotlight and was asked to investigate Leadfoot's death in ''Galvatron''. Nova/Nemesis Prime's background was detailed in ''Optimus Prime'', as was that of Jhiaxus.
• Dealer/Doubledealer was introduced in ''Spotlight: Hot Rod'' as a Decepticon spy tasked to retrieve a powerful object called the Magnificence from Hot Rod. *The events that cause Prime to pull out of Earth are detailed in ''Spotlight: Arcee'', where the Decepticons take the Monstructor components from Garrus-9.

In relation to ''The Transformers: Escalation''

• The Dinobots and Shockwave were taken by Skywatch in issue 5 of ''Escalation'', and are still being excavated as Grimlock is reactivated here.
• Sunstreaker and Hunter were abducted by the Machination in issue 1 of ''Escalation'', but their overall fate was not expanded on until Devastation.

In relation to ''The Transformers: Infiltration''

• In issue 1, Nightbeat explains the events of the first three issues of ''Infiltration'' as a plot by the Machination to acquire a Transformer, locating them via a homing device in the computer from that story.
• Starscream's return here marks his first appearances since issue 6 of ''Infiltration'', where he was blown almost in half after a failed power play against Megatron.

Charles Raynor, is the outwardly "perfect" doctor husband of Katherine. But Raynor is actually a psychopath, who is carefully plotting the murder of his wife. As the horrible truth slowly dawns upon Katherine, she must find some way to prevent her murder—and to alert disbelieving authorities of her husband's duplicity.

After serving time for the attempted murder of his first wife, the main character, a doctor, begins plotting to kill his second.

Lionel Luthor (John Glover) shows up at the Smallville LuthorCorp plant, and announces that "management failure" has forced him to shut the plant down. Effectively blaming the problem on Lex (Michael Rosenbaum), Lionel informs his son he wants him to return to Metropolis. Clark (Tom Welling), Pete (Sam Jones III), Chloe (Allison Mack), and Lana (Kristin Kreuk) make plans for the spring formal. Whitney (Eric Johnson) informs Lana that he is enlisting in the Marine Corps, and he leaves for basic training the day of the dance.

Lex tries to initiate an employee buyout, and convinces the employees to mortgage their homes to help provide the financial resources to complete the buyout. Lionel learns of Lex's plans and buys the Smallville Savings & Loan, so that he may immediately foreclose on all the property when Lex's employees miss their payments. Roger Nixon (Tom O'Brien) tests Clark's abilities by setting off a bomb in his truck, while he is inside. Nixon confronts Clark in the Talon coffee shop, but Lex intervenes on Clark's behalf. Nixon follows Clark home and overhears a conversation about Clark's ship being in the storm cellar, and that Lex has the missing piece from the ship. Nixon goes to the Luthor mansion and steals the octagonal key, and immediately returns to the storm cellar with a video camera.

Clark, Chloe, and Pete arrive at the dance, and say their goodbyes to Whitney before he leaves for training. The weather begins to deteriorate, and a storm picks up, as Lana takes Whitney to the bus stop. Jonathan (John Schneider) and Martha (Annette O'Toole) decide to head to the storm cellar to seek cover from the storm, and they discover Nixon just as the octagonal disk activates the ship. Nixon attempts to escape with the videotape, and Jonathan chases out into the storm after him. The ship levitates off the ground and flies out of the storm cellar. Lana says goodbye to Whitney and drives home. On her way, storm winds force her off the road, right next to three tornadoes that have touched down. The students at the dance are alerted to the tornados that have been sighted, and Clark races off to make sure Lana is all right. The three tornadoes merge into one large tornado and move in Lana's direction. Clark arrives just as Lana, in the truck, is sucked into the tornado's vortex; Clark speeds into the tornado to rescue her.

In a Mexican cantina across the border from El Paso, Texas, government agent Harry Hannan is romancing his wife, Dorothy, when he observes an informant he is supposed to meet in a few days. Realizing he is about to be attacked, he shoves his wife to the ground and starts shooting at the informant's companions who return fire and flee the restaurant. Dorothy is killed in the attack, and he suffers a nervous breakdown. Harry spends five months in a Connecticut sanitarium before being released.

On his way back to New York City, Harry stumbles and nearly falls into the path of an express train. He goes to the makeup counter at Macy's Herald Square to retrieve his next assignment, but the assignment slip inside the lipstick case is blank. He accosts his contact who assures him that the agency probably does not have any work for him.

When Harry returns to his apartment, he finds it is occupied by a doctoral student named Ellie Fabian. She explains that she had a sublet arranged while she was in the last semester of her studies at Princeton University. Ellie claims that the housing office said the Hannans would be gone indefinitely. She gives Harry a note that was slipped under the door, but it contains only a few Hebrew characters that he cannot read.

Paranoid that he is being targeted by his own agency, Harry visits his supervisor Eckart, who assures Harry that the agency has higher priorities. Eckart insists that Harry is not ready to return to the field, but that he is perfectly safe.

Harry takes the Hebrew note to a local rabbi who can only partially decode it, and explains that it means "[http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=2162&letter=A Avenger of Blood].". The rabbi then calls Sam Urdell, and informs him that Harry has visited him. Harry notices that he is being surveilled, loses the tail and goes to the American Museum of Natural History, where Ellie is working.

He gives her some money and urges her to stay in a hotel, because he fears she will be accidentally targeted. He then visits his wife's grave, where he confronts her brother, Dave Quittle. Afterwards, Quittle visits Eckhart, who orders Harry's murder.

Ellie stays in the apartment despite Harry's request. Ellie suggests that they take the note to her friend at Princeton who specializes in Hebrew studies. When Harry wakes from a nightmare, he tells Ellie about the death of Dorothy. He takes a prescription pill, but spits it out, realizing that it is cyanide. The next morning, they leave for Princeton. On the train, Ellie tells Harry about her grandmother, when Harry notices Quittle, and an old man, watching them.

At Princeton, Richard Peabody decodes the note for Harry. Peabody has accumulated several notes, all attached to very peculiar murders. Harry is the first one to have received the note and lived. He also relays a message that someone wants to meet Harry in the bell tower courtyard the following day.

In the courtyard, Harry is lured into a trap by Quittle. Harry manages to kill Quittle during a shootout in the bell tower, and then encounters Sam Urdell, the old man on the train. Sam explains that he is part of a committee investigating the blood murders. They investigate the various clues, and they piece together that Harry's grandfather owned a brothel on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

In a hotel at Niagara Falls, Ellie is dressed as a prostitute and lures Bernie Meckler into a bathtub with her. As she has sex with Meckler, she drowns him. As Harry and Sam put together their information, they are led back to Princeton. Harry realizes that Ellie is the one murdering men, on behalf of victims of white slavery like her grandmother. They drive up to Niagara Falls, where they have an emotional confrontation. She tries to kill him, but confesses that she loves him. He is conflicted, but he tells her that he will turn her in. Ellie runs from him, and he chases her through the Robert Moses Niagara Power Plant. She escapes onto a tour bus and he steals another tour bus and follows her to the Cave of the Winds, where he chases her through the tunnels until they have a final confrontation at the edge of the falls. They break through the railing and Harry grabs Ellie, but she struggles and takes a deadly plummet.

Henri Boulanger (Léaud), a French man living in London, is laid-off from his job after fifteen years of service. He tries to commit suicide but because he continuously fails, decides to hire a hitman (Kenneth Colley) to finish the job. After making the contract he meets Margaret (Margi Clarke) and finds new meaning to life, however, he is unable to call off the hitman.

The film is set in 1982.

Orphaned and left in the desert as an infant, Evil Roy Slade (John Astin) grew up alone—save for his teddy bear—and mean. As an adult, he is notorious for being the "meanest villain in the West", so he is thrown for quite a loop when he falls for sweet schoolmarm Betsy Potter (Pamela Austin). Nelson L. Stool (Mickey Rooney), a railroad tycoon, along with his dimwitted nephew Clifford (Henry Gibson), attempts to get revenge on Evil Roy Slade for repeatedly robbing him, and sets out to hire legendary retired singing-sheriff Marshal Bing Bell (Dick Shawn) to bring Slade to justice.

The story revolves around a German Wirehaired Pointer named Moreover who has a strong relationship with a boy named Lonnie (Johnny Whitaker). Moreover is given away to Willie Dorsey (Godfrey Cambridge), a gas station clerk, but Lonnie and his best friend Text gain possession of the dog through somewhat deceitful bargaining, securing the reluctant respect of Willie. The boys train Moreover to be a prize-winning bird dog, entering him in a field trial.

The dog was initially raised by Lonnie's father, Harvey McNeil, who is an award-winning dog-trainer. Although Lonnie viewed Moreover as a personal pet and a close friend, his father considered the dog to be untrainable and a lackluster hunting dog due to his predilection to eat chicken eggs and biscuits instead of learning to train to be a bird dog. As he did not wish for Moreover to negatively influence the other hunting dogs on the farm, Harvey gifts the dog to Willie, who had previously asked Harvey for a dog to keep as a companion. Lonnie, distraught over the loss of his pet, conspires with his best friend, Text, to trick Willie, who infamously loves to engage in various trades with local individuals, to regain possession of the dog by having Willie trade them the dog for assistance with manual labor. Text, who lives on a farm, takes several eggs from his family's chicken coop to Willie's gas station and gives them to Moreover. Willie, who had initially been hesitant to take possession of the dog due to its reputation of eating eggs, finds Moreover eating the eggs, which he believes to be from his personal stash of eggs, and becomes irate at the dog's behavior. Lonnie and Text are overjoyed that their plan to deceive Willie worked and quickly offer to trade the dog in return for helping Willie carry firewood to his home. Willie agrees to the trade, and the boys decide to secretly train the dog together to become a prize-winning bird dog. Much to the chagrin of Lonnie's father, Lonnie and Text decide to enter Moreover in the state championship field trial. Moreover does well and an incident makes the boys think that Lonnie's father (Earl Holliman) will lose his dog training job if his dog, last year's champion SilverBelle, loses to their dark horse entry.

Diego Vega, the eighteen-year-old scion of a local landowner, returns from studying in Spain and discovers that his homeland has fallen under the dictatorship of Commander Raymond and Lieutenant Gabriel. Outraged by the oppression, Diego decides to fight the tyrants. Disguised as Zorro, a masked swordsman, he helps the weak, riding away on his horse, Viento.

In his day-to-day life, Diego portrays himself as a clumsy and cowardly boy who flees when faced with dangerous situations only to appear moments later as Zorro. As the local hero, he is known to punish his enemies by cutting a "Z" shaped mark into them with the tip of his blade. Diego is accompanied by Bernard, his sidekick, who wears a similar costume and has the nickname "Little Zorro."

Diego's childhood friend and sweetheart, Lolita Prideaux, believes that Spain changed him and she scolds him relentlessly for his idiotic behavior. Lolita is a sweet-tempered girl who wants to fight evil and protect the people by helping Zorro from behind the scenes. She later develops feelings for Zorro, though she is unaware of his true identity.

Meg asks Lois and Peter if she can have a birthday party, preferably a teenager-type party with a band playing at her house. Unfortunately, Peter and Lois do not even know how old Meg is going to be. They have bought sixteen candles, but Meg overreacts when telling them that she is turning seventeen years old, and calls them jerks. Meg notices that her birthday party is kiddie-type, with games such as Pin the Tail on the Donkey.

At the party, Peter dresses up as "Pee Pants the Inebriated Hobo Clown", "an adorable tramp who wears found clothing and eats out of your garbage can". Peter then tells Meg that he got her a scarf for her birthday. Meg declines, while Peter then says he got her "a dozen scarves" which Peter then proceeds to regurgitate as one long scarf, as he has actually tied and swallowed them (which Lois says he was not supposed to do). This causes him to cough and vomit. Peter hands Meg the long scarf from his tongue, but Meg refuses to hold it. Peter then urges Meg to hold them, and then asks if his long johns are tied to the end of them. When Meg says they are not, Peter then says "Oh, god" and regurgitates them as well, and then crouches in pain following the ordeal. Meg asks Lois if she can open her gifts, and Meg notices Stewie opening most of them. Peter gets drunk, and attempts to ride a unicycle down the steps, but falls off and crushes his father, Francis, who later dies in the hospital from the accident. Just before Francis dies, he calls Peter "a fat stinking drunk".

Peter is disappointed since Francis did not care about him – so he gives up drinking and does crack instead. Brian notices this, and tells Peter that crack is not a good substitute for drinking. As a result, Peter sees a hypnotherapist (Bruce), who helps him discover that Francis was not his biological father. When Peter goes to his mom, Thelma Griffin, about it, she reveals that she had an affair with an Irish man named Mickey McFinnigan and that Mickey is Peter's biological father.

Brian and Peter travel to a village in Ireland to find Mickey, who they discover is the town drunk. At first horrified, Peter finds out it is considered an honorable position in Ireland by the locals. Mickey refuses to believe that Peter is his son and mocks him. Dejected, Peter laments he would only be able to convince him of the truth if he were a "fat stinking drunk", but then recalls Francis' last words to him, which gives him an idea.

In an attempt to persuade Mickey, Peter challenges him to a drinking contest, which Peter wins. Mickey finally believes that Peter is his son, feeling that nobody but a member of his own family could beat him in something like a drinking contest. Peter is excited to have formed a bond with his real father, and they and the bar patrons sing and dance to "Drunken Irish Dad".

Subplot

After discovering Stewie opening Meg's presents, Lois realises he is going through the "mine" phase. She later discovers him going through her jewelry, and when she tells him to stop and take everything off he snaps a pearl necklace to pieces so she spanks him. He runs off in fear and tears, but quickly realises that he actually enjoyed being hit and might be "one of those people" so he goes to great lengths in order for him to get spanked again. Lois gets annoyed at his antics but, not wanting to hurt her child again, refuses to punish him despite him begging her to. When Stewie hears himself begging Lois to rub dirt in his eyes and violate him with a wine bottle, he realises he has problems and stops.

Genevieve is one of twelve princesses who share a passion for dancing and live in a castle with their widowed father, King Randolph. King Randolph summons his cousin, Duchess Rowena, to help educate the princesses. However, the Duchess wants the throne and removes all color, music, and joy from the palace, trying to break the girls' spirits.

On their youngest sisters’ birthday, the other sisters gift a copy of their late mother's favorite story, wherein a princess discovers a magical land and dances there for three nights before it vanishes. Looking at the story and the tiles on their bedroom floor, Genevieve discovers how to open a portal into the magical land. Upon entering, they dance the night away. They learn the hanging golden flowers grant wishes, the statues can come to life, and the water has healing properties.

The next day, the princesses appear tired and Rowena finds their new dancing shoes worn out, arousing her suspicions. King Randolph falls ill, so Genevieve asks the royal cobbler, Derek, to investigate Rowena's true intentions. That night, the princesses return to the magical land; Derek confronts a local apothecary and deduces that Rowena has been poisoning the King.

The next morning, the sisters are again exhausted. Rowena, refusing to believe the sisters when they tell her the truth, forces them into servitude. After overhearing Rowena maneuver the King into referring to his daughters as burdens, the heartbroken princesses return to the magical land for a third time, and Rowena finds them missing the next morning.

Derek figures out how to open the portal; Rowena's pet monkey, Brutus, spies on Derek and leads Rowena through after him; she steals one of the wish-granting flowers. The princesses decide to go home and help their father; however, Rowena returns to the palace ahead of them and has her henchman, Desmond, destroy the portal. Derek and Genevieve figure out how to activate another portal by dancing together, freeing the group.

Once home, they find out that the King is dying and that Rowena has taken over as Queen. The Duchess uses the golden flower to wish for Genevieve to dance forever without rest, but Genevieve blows the magic dust back at her with a hand fan, forcing Rowena to dance uncontrollably. When Desmond tries to help Rowena, he is pulled into the spell, and the two dance their way out of the castle. Lacey uses the healing water she took from the magic land to revive her father. King Randolph affirms his unconditional love for his daughters and Genevieve and Derek celebrate their wedding.

''My Brother's Blood Machine'' is connected to the story of The Amory Wars (as told in the Coheed and Cambria albums). ''My Brother's Blood Machine'' is told from the perspective of the character ''Jesse'', "The Prise-Fighter Inferno". Writer and singer of the album, Claudio Sanchez explains the story in an [http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1542051/20060929/story.jhtml interview] with MTV News, September 29, 2006.

"Well, this story actually acts as a prequel to the Amory Wars," the center of the Coheed and Cambria mythology, Sanchez explains. "The Inferno character, who appears in the Coheed concept as a man named Jesse, dies in the ''Good Apollo: Volume One'', and is resurrected on present-day Earth. So he leaves the solar system that the story takes place in, and gets resurrected in the present day. But before he can tell the story of the Amory Wars, he needs to tell the story of the Blood Machine."

"The Blood Machine revolves around three families, one being the Bleam family, who are our horrific sort of 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' family," he continued. "There's the McCloud family — where we have our main character, Cecilia — and the Early family. And [Cecilia's] love interest is the son of that family, Johnny. And there are so many subplots. One, for example, talks about how Cecilia's father happens to molest her, and eventually she can't take it anymore and tries to convince Johnny to leave with her. She steals her two brothers, who happen to be twins, and Johnny decides not to go. So she ends up running away with the twins into the woods, where she meets the Bleam family."

Sanchez said that there are two Bleam brothers — Long-Arm and Butchie — who are horrific monsters. "Their mother happens to be crazy, and she ends up telling these two kids that 'God has come to me with a higher calling for you — you need to be the new Death,' and she tells them that they have to go out and collect souls for God," he explained. "And so, out of their mind, they're like, 'OK, so when a body dies, how do we get the soul out of it?' They construct this Blood Machine, which basically tears a body to shreds, and they think that releases the soul."

The kingdom of Keanor is under attack by dark forces and much lie in ruins. The old king has died and the son Prince Sartor's whereabouts are unknown.

Sartor is raised as a lumberjack in a village, unaware of his royal lineage as Prince. One day, mercenaries seeking Sartor raid the village, killing his uncle. A wizard named Ghiron arrives in time and saves him, revealing his royal lineage and promises to help restore the kingdom to its previous glory. Ghiron takes him to find allies, such as his father's guard captain Woolin. They save the capitol from being completely destroyed. The trio seek more and more allies, growing enough to be confident in the final battle. Having enough resources, they lead massive armies against the Messiah of Evil, the manifestation of evil on Earth.

Sartor slowly gains allies. He travels far and wide to find people. He finds allies in the Asians on a far northern continent and finds favor when he kills their old time foes. Sartor soon finds Arabian allies on a far continent. He gets taken prisoner one time and his allies break him out of his imprisonment. Eventually, he gets the confidence and his allies to find the final allies.

Then the now-King Sartor leads his army to defeat the Messiah of Evil and his city in one large battle. In the end, he recognizes that evil shall always remain.

Rocky Jones, a leading member of the Space Ranger force, attempts to save the inhabitants of Ophecius, a planet about to collide with a moon. However, Cleolanta - the empress of the planet - is suspicious. While Rocky and his crew succeed in evacuating the planet in time, Cleolanta's pride and vanity are a major hindrance. As the last of the planet's population leaves, Cleolanta arrogantly declares that she will stay behind. Her assistant refuses to allow this, and picks her up against her will and carries her on board Rocky's own ship, the Orbit Jet. She watches in despair as the moon crashes into her planet, the two bodies destroying one another instantly. As the ship heads for the new home that has been chosen for her people, Cleolanta realizes that she had been wrong, and that, as stated by one of her underlings, "it is the people that make a nation, not the land itself". She reconciles with Rocky and his crew, and sincerely thanks them for their efforts on her behalf and that of her people.

Homer Flagg is a railroad worker in the small town of Desert Hole, New Mexico. His big dream in life is to visit New York City while he is young.

One day he finds an abandoned automobile at an old atomic proving ground. His doctor and best friend, Steve Harris, diagnoses him with radiation poisoning and gives Homer three weeks to live.

Wally Cook, a reporter for a New York newspaper, hears of Homer's plight and convinces Oliver Stone, her editor, to provide an all-expenses paid trip to fulfill Homer's lifelong fantasy of seeing New York.

Steve, however, realizes that he made an error and Homer is only suffering from a sinus condition. Steve agrees to keep this new diagnosis a secret after Homer begs him ... particularly after meeting the attractive reporter. Steve announces that only he can provide medical treatment to Homer and must accompany him on the trip.

New York embraces Homer and he becomes a celebrity, with everyone following his every move in the paper. Homer even makes plans to marry Wally, despite the fact that she has fallen for Steve.

Meanwhile, editor Stone is anxious for Homer to die. Every day it costs the newspaper money to support the dying man's extravagant requests, which includes ordering 3,000 shrimp cocktails for his hotel suite. Stone hires three specialists to examine Homer, who is given a clean bill of health.

To escape the fix that they have gotten themselves into, Homer fakes suicide. The newspaper gets the exclusive story. Wally marries Steve, and the two guys get new jobs in New York as street sweepers.

Max is a young lesbian college student in Chicago who has gone ten months without having sex. She and her roommate and college professor Kia are in a coffee shop when they run into Ely, a hippieish woman with long braided hair, whom Max initially dismisses. Max and Ely do end up going to a film together. After the film they return to Ely's place and, after some flirtatious conversation, they kiss. Suddenly a call comes in from Ely's (unseen on-screen) partner Kate, with whom Ely has been in a long-distance relationship for more than two years, which puts a bit of a damper on things.

Ely decides to cut off all her hair, ending up with a very short butch style. She runs into Max in a bookstore and Max almost does not recognize her.

Kia's girlfriend Evy returns home. Her ex-boyfriend Junior is there. Evy's mother confronts her, saying that Junior told her that he had spotted Evy at a gay bar. Evy's mother kicks her out and Evy flees to Kia's place and Max invites her to live with them.

Ely and her roommate Daria throw a dinner party and, after a spirited game of I Never, Max and Ely reconnect. They make plans to go out again and then begin kissing. They have several phone conversations, in the course of which Ely reveals that she's "sort of broken up" with Kate. They get together for a second date but they never make it out of the apartment. Max ends up trimming Ely's fingernails. This turns into foreplay and they have sex. Intercut with the closing credits are shots and short scenes of Max and Ely's burgeoning relationship.

The Junior Woodchucks organized a raffle in order to raise funds to further research on the original Junior Woodchucks Guidebook, based on findings made by an expedition sponsored by Scrooge McDuck in ''Guardians of the Lost Library'' and offered a trip as first prize. Donald Duck doesn't understand why they bother to organize a raffle in Duckburg, since Gladstone Gander always wins. He's then told that the winner for this one must be there to get the prize, thus inspiring him on how to keep Gladstone from winning.

Acting quickly, Donald tricks Gladstone into a knot-making machine. While he was out, the Junior Woodchucks R.A.F.F.L.E.R. draws a ticket and picks Donald Duck as the winner. Since he wasn't there because he was busy trying to keep Gladstone away, Donald is disqualified and another raffle ticket had to be picked. Soon, Gladstone becomes the new winner. At this point, Donald arrives and doesn't know his name had been previously picked. Gladstone escapes from the machine on time to get the prize and asks where's he going for the trip. He's disappointed as it was a fishing trip to Canada. Donald commented about how unfair it is. One of his nephews tried to tell him about Donald being previously picked, but another one said "he's better not knowing".

Gladstone, wanting to know why he won such a prize, invites Donald to go with him. Donald's nephews asked him to accept, since this trip is to where they're going to study the chart, located in the original Junior Woodchucks Guidebook. There, a fisherman feels sorry for Gladstone not getting any fish, but he replies by saying he's learned there's another purpose for the trip: recovering valuable objects from the sea. One of them turns out to be the Golden Helmet. The fisherman said he had spent a lot of time and money trying to get it. He's surprised that Gladstone got it just by seer luck. The fisherman tells them the history behind this helmet. Donald asks how he knows about it and the fisherman reveals himself to be Azure Blue.

Donald then tells Gladstone a very summarized version of their original adventure, and asks him to throw the helmet back at sea. Blue suggests Gladstone throw something else in (i.e. Donald). Meanwhile, the nephews discover the lost charts of Christopher Columbus and maps of other claims to North America. Afterwards, Donald asks them to find one older than Olaf's. Back in Duckburg, our heroes see Gladstone leaving a press conference and ask him if he was claiming ownership of North America. Gladstone says he doesn't want the responsibility of being a landlord and that he isn't a descendant of Olaf the Blue. Azure is announcing his claim when Donald and his nephews tell the press about an older claim made by an abbot, Saint Brendan, which nullifies Olaf's plan.

Unfortunately, this causes a lot of people to search for evidence of this claim in order to own North America. The artifact which proves this claim was later found by Lawyer Sharky, who, since the abbot took a vow of chastity, instead of trying to prove to be related to him restored his congregation and claimed ownership of North America in its name. His victory, just like Azure's, was also short-lived as the nephews find an even older claim made by a Chinese explorer named Hui-Shen.

At this point, Azure Blue decides to give the Golden Helmet to our heroes, as it's no longer useful for his plans of world domination by controlling America. The quest for ownership of North America leads our heroes to the ruins of Teotihuacan, where they find a big old teak wheel proving this claim. Sharky finds it and our heroes (mainly Donald) have a lot out trouble keeping him from destroying the wheel. When Sharky finally gets the wheel, Azure shows up trying to get the clam and tell Sharky it's too late to destroy the wheel since many witnesses have already saw it. Sharky says he found a way to use the wheel to make them both emperors of North America, and brings out their contract Sharky recovered after learning Blue recovered the Golden Helmet.

After the villains leave, the nephews recall that Columbus believed there are other maps that were never copied. As such, they suspect that the Guardians of the Lost Library may have held a chart made in leather and return to Alexandria to find out. There, they learn about an even older claim supposedly made by an ancient civilization (which they theorize to be the Phoenicians). Meanwhile, in a Brutopian hotel, Blue and Sharky are waiting until they have letters from enough descendants of the Chinese explorer to be allowed to rule America in their names. Upon learning from the newspapers about our heroes' discovery, which led them back to the Library of Alexandria (see ''Guardians of the Lost Library'' for details), Blue and Sharky go to a desert land where, on the remains of an old Native American ship, our heroes have found a stone tablet containing a claim that predates, and thus nullifies, their other ones.

After retrieving the tablet from our heroes, the villains throw away the wheel (now useless) and decide to use the tablet to rule North America for themselves instead of for the descendants of the Chinese explorer. During the press conference at their hotel, a mysterious reporter asks our villains if they now consider the other claims null and void. Sharky says yes, as they were misled by false information. For their finale, Azure and Sharky summon a university professor to translate the Punic script on the tablet. The professor looks at the tablet and says the language is not Punic at all. The reporter opens his trench coat and reveals himself to be Donald and his nephews (standing on Donald's shoulders), translating the language as Native American, meaning the tablet is, likewise, native to the Americas and cannot be used to stake a claim. Since Blue and Sharkey have now disavowed their earlier claims, they have nothing left. Eventually, both are arrested for failing to pay the enormous bills they incurred for the Brutopian hotel's services, and the several ads taken out in China to contact the Chinese explorer's descendants.

In the epilogue, Donald and his nephews look at the tablet upside-down and learn it's actually a claim to Europe, made by Native American explorers who sailed east and discovered "a new world" - meaning that, by Europe's own Charlemagne Laws, the Native Americans own Europe. Donald and his nephews comment about how it will finally make the U.N. revoke the Code of Discovery law. In the corner of the last panel, a portrait of Columbus is shown wrinkling his face in disgust.

Thanks to his mother's help, Arthur Tate somehow makes a remarkable rise from a lowly constable to the ruler of a South America country.

His story begins with Inspector Hobart's investigation into dressmaker Violet Lawson's missing husband. Hobart suspects foul play and digs up Violet's cellar, looking for the body. Violet did indeed kill her spouse, but doesn't bury the corpse there until after Hobart has dug the hole. A helpful tip from Arthur's mum makes him the hero who solves the case.

Baron von Lukenberg is then arrested for creating a species of deadly spiders. But it is actually his wife, the Baroness, who is responsible. Arthur, with his mum's aid, once again saves the day. President Esteda of the South American nation of Guanduria is so favorably impressed, he hires Arthur to be his personal liaison.

Marigold Marado turns up, telling Arthur she wants to make a film about his heroism. What he doesn't know is that Marigold is a revolutionary who hopes to overthrow Esteda's government. The film she ends up creating inadvertently turns Arthur into a great revolutionary hero, and it is he who becomes Guanduria's new leader.

Arthur can do no wrong. The Earl of Aldershot learns of his great deeds and leaves Arthur the grand sum of 15 million pounds in his will. Arthur goes back to England to the Earl's mansion to collect, intending to give all the money away to charity, but leaving it to his mother in case of his death. She blows up the mansion with her son in it.

The series stars Enta, a boy who has dreams of becoming the strongest pokémon trainer, but due to his lack of skill and the fact that he's a rookie trainer, he constantly loses. But with the help of Rald, an experienced trainer (also his training master), and Mitsuki (a pretty boy), who is forced to help Enta whenever he wants to participate in a double battle. The owner of the Battle Frontier Enishida (a.k.a. Scott) who introduces Enta to the Battle Frontier and occasionally gives him pointers on how to be a good trainer. The series doesn't seem to follow any regular story line (fighting to obtain the symbols in this case for example) but instead is more focused on putting Enta into a random set of adventures. Following Enta is a mysterious photographer who turns out to be the strongest Frontier Brain: Salon Maiden Anabel.

This manga was translated into English by Chuang Yi in Singapore under the name '''Pokémon Battle Frontier''' in 2007.

The album, which is meant to be read as an "operetta in three acts", is set in Bohemia, in the year of 1913, and tells the story of Atrament, a young wandering occultist who just arrives in the village of Jilemnice with the intent of furthering his studies on the occult arts there (since at the time the village was a major venue for occultists and Spiritist mediums). He settles at an inn ran by the rich landlord Spiritus, and falls in love at first sight with his beautiful daughter, Kalamaria (who is secretly a witch), being requited. However, the village's ''hejtman'' (captain), Satrapold, also loves Kalamaria. After injustly arresting Atrament, he kidnaps Kalamaria with the help of his groom Blether and takes her to his castle. Satrapold plans to escape to Cairo with her (betraying Blether in the process, who flees to the nearby town of Železný Brod in disgrace, never to be seen or heard from again), but before he can do so she uses her mystical powers to discover that he is actually the villainous Poebeldorf under disguise, and that he also imprisoned the real Satrapold. Formerly Satrapold's ''aide-de-camp'', Poebeldorf rebelled against his master and planned all along to take his place as the village's captain, steal all its riches and Kalamaria's fortune, and flee to start a new life in a different land, but Kalamaria thwarts his evil plans thanks to her powers; subsequently, both Atrament and Satrapold are freed from prison and Poebeldorf himself is arrested. The album then ends with a huge celebration taking place at Spiritus' inn.

The only track unrelated to the album's story is "Suchardův dům (V Nové Pace)". Suchardův dům, or "Sucharda's house" in English, was the residence of the noble Sucharda family of woodcarvers and sculptors from Nová Paka, originally built in 1896. Since 1908 the City Museum of Nová Paka functions in the house. Notable members of the Sucharda family include brothers Stanislav and Vojtěch Sucharda.

When the original editor of the ''Loose Limbs'' series of splatter films commits suicide, the head of "The Splatter & Gore Department", Sam Campbell, assigns Edward Tor Swenson, an editor for European Distributors, to finish what the original editor was doing, and allows Edward the use of his private country cottage so Edward can go about his work in peace.

Over the course of a few days, Edward begins to lose touch with sanity. One night, he dreams about a mental asylum patient telling him to kill others to "correct the world". When Nick, a young employee of European Distributors pulls up to Edward's house to deliver developed film to be edited, he is rudely reprimanded by Edward. Edward begins to have hallucinations about demons, monsters, and other creatures. When Sam comes to check up on Edward's work, Edward hallucinates that he is a white demon, and accidentally kills him by snapping his neck in a panic.

The next evening, Nick comes by Ed's cottage to deliver more developed film, but is attacked by Ed, and left in critical condition. After this, Edward kills two intruders who break into his house. Worried for her husband, Edward's wife, Barbara, and daughter go to visit him, but are almost killed by Edward, until Barbara shoots him in the shoulder with one of the intruders' revolver. He is taken to a psychiatric ward immediately after the attack, while Nick, who managed to crawl outside where he was noticed by a passing car, is taken to the same hospital.

In the mental ward, Edward is sedated by doctors, but he hallucinates that the attending doctors are demons and kills them. As he leaves the ward, he also kills a mental patient, which catches the attention of a security guard, who quickly calls a SWAT team. Edward assaults Nick in his hospital room, and abducts his girlfriend, Mel, who came to visit him.

Edward sedates Mel and props her on a hospital bed. Edward soon gets into a gun battle with the SWAT team, killing all of them, and gets into a stand off.

Edward kills Mel by impaling her with hospital equipment. As he's about to perform surgery on Mel, he hallucinates that Mel is the mental patient, who tells Edward that he has to pay for his terrible job of correcting the world. As he's about to stab Mel again, Nick shoots Edward's hand off with the SWAT Team Captain's shotgun. He shoots him again, blowing his arm off, and finally his head, killing him.

Nick walks up to Ed's dead body, and then to Mel's body, while a voice over of him is heard telling the audience that one day the world will be a happy place, and "it will happen" eventually.

Setting

North America in the ''Crimson Skies'' universe.

The game takes place in the ''Crimson Skies'' universe, set in an alternate history of the 1930s. In this fictional setting, increasing sectionalism within the United States of America has caused the country to splinter into numerous sovereignties, whereas in the southern sovereignty, slavery had been reinstituted, and was a major driver of conflict between the established nation-states resulting in a constant state of war with one another, and thus an interstate highway system never developed. This in turn caused the primary means of transportation to shift from the car and train to the plane and Zeppelin; consequently came the formation of air pirate gangs who plunder aerial commerce over North America.

As a result of the events surrounding the world of ''Crimson Skies'', advancements in technology within the game universe proceeded at a faster rate than actually occurred in the same era. Certain designs and technologies were created specifically for the game, some beyond the scope of actual 1930s technology, examples of which include remote-controlled rocket launchers, magnetic rockets, weather control devices, and a Tesla coil-like weapon. The game's aircraft were designed to be true to the era yet unique, with some models inspired from actual period aircraft or from the experimental designs of the Luftwaffe. Art director Robert Olson has stated that his team faced challenges in developing content that "fit the time setting" and was also "both fantastical and believable", particularly in the design of the game's bosses.

The game takes place in four regions set in North and South America. Sea Haven is an island in the Nation of Hollywood; it is a refuge for various pirate groups, but the Hollywood militia attempts to uproot the raiders. Arixo is a desert nation-state, formed from the remnants of Arizona and New Mexico. Due to its vast, desolate, and lawless expanses, Arixo has become a haven for bandit activity. The Navajo Nation is an isolationist and militant haven for the Navajo Native American tribes that encompasses territory from the former states of Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, and Colorado. Chicago remains an industrial city, while the "Lost City" is a complex of ancient ruins located deep in South America. In designing many of these environments, developers used inspiration from real-world locales, but reworked them to incorporate flight spaces accordingly with the ''Crimson Skies'' universe. For example, Chicago was significantly redesigned for ''High Road to Revenge'' with the addition of avenues for aerial commerce among its skyscrapers and landing areas within the buildings themselves.

Characters

The player character is Nathan Zachary (voiced by Tim Omundson), leader of the Fortune Hunters air pirate gang. The character of Nathan Zachary was redesigned from his previous role in the PC game ''Crimson Skies'', redefined by the darker tone of ''High Road to Revenge'' in comparison to the "campy" and "pulpy" tone established in the PC game. Zachary's character was also modified to have a number of flaws and weaknesses in addition to his strengths. He is described as having a dry sense of humor, and is also portrayed as a somewhat reckless character. Overall, developers wanted to maintain that Zachary was not "born a hero" and instead was forced to become one as a result of extraordinary circumstances.

Other members of the Fortune Hunters include Zachary's wingmate, "Brooklyn" Betty Charles; and "Big John", who captains the Fortune Hunters' Zeppelin base, ''Pandora''. Later joining them is the adventurer Maria Sanchez, who owns a fuel station in Arixo. Another ally of the Fortune Hunters is "Doc" Fassenbiender, a scientist who has developed new technologies for the pirate group and is a close friend of Nathan Zachary.

Opposing the Fortune Hunters include rival pirate gangs such as the Ragin' Cajuns, led by Louis "Wild Card" Thibodeaux; and the Red Skull Legion, led by Jonathan "Genghis" Kahn. The game's primary antagonist is Dr. Nicholas Von Essen, a German expatriate and leader of ''Die Spinne'' (German, "''The Spider''"), a fascist militia force. The game originally featured a larger cast of onscreen characters and more abundant character development. These, however, were removed when the game's "playable movie" concept was scrapped.

Storyline

''Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge'' begins the morning after Nathan Zachary (Tim Omundson) the leader of the "Fortune Hunters" air pirates, has gambled away his signature fighter plane "Gypsy Magic" (a Hughes Devastator) and his pirate zeppelin, the ''Pandora'', to the Ragin' Cajuns, a rival band of air pirates. Thibodeaux (Jimmie Woods), the Cajuns' leader, attempts to claim Zachary's fighter and Zeppelin; Nathan, however, with the aid of Betty, another member of the Fortune Hunters, manages to recover them both. Nathan and his crew have another run in with the Ragin Cajuns when Thibodeaux steals Betty's plane, which prompts Nathan to destroy his pirate gang. Later, Nathan receives a distress call from Nathan's old friend Dr. Fassenbiender (Neil Ross), who reports a break-in at his lab. He informs Nathan of what he believes had been the target of the attempted burglary: his plans to construct a wind turbine, a device capable of artificially generating storms. He warns Nathan about Von Essen (Charles Dennis), a scientist who had unsuccessfully tried to engineer a wind turbine for a German superweapon earlier during the Great War. Suspecting that Von Essen had been behind the break-in, Doc entrusts Nathan with the schematics for the turbine.

Nathan and the Fortune Hunters with the aid of a pirate ship captain, destroy the hidden base of the "Hollywood Knights", a militia run by the "Nation of Hollywood" dedicated to stopping Sky Piracy in the surrounding land. They then receive a distress call from Doc who reports being under attack. When Nathan and the Fortune Hunters return to Fassenbiender's lab, they find it under attack from ''Die Spinne'', a large group of planes with advanced weaponry. They destroy the attacking group's Zeppelin, causing it to crash. Although they repel the threat, they find that the attackers have still succeeded in killing the Doc. Nathan, along with Betty (Tasia Valenza), Big John (Wally Wingert), and the other Fortune Hunters, embarks on a campaign to find those responsible and have them "brought to justice." He and the Fortune Hunters travel to Arixo, seeking out a mine producing titanium, the only material that could be used to build the wind turbine; there, they hope to gain clues as to the identity of Doc's murderer. During his search, Nathan comes across Maria (Nika Futterman), who agrees to lead him to the titanium mine on the condition that she is allowed to join the Fortune Hunters. They run into a road block, as to get to the mine they must cross Navajo Nation which has had its borders closed. The Fortune Hunters retrieve a sacred statue and return it to the Navajo as a show of good will. Nathan also passes three tests set by the Navajo to prove his worth. Together they all continue to the mine, and discover that the mining operation is controlled by the Red Skull Legion, headed by a man named Khan, who Nathan personally knows. Nathan then proceeds in destroying the Red Skulls and a giant mechanical worm created by Die Spinne.

With the knowledge that the Red Skulls are working with ''Die Spinne'', the Fortune Hunters proceed to Chicago, which is the Red Skulls' home base. When Nathan goes to confront Kahn, he and Betty are attacked. Betty is captured and Nathan escapes in a hijacked Red Skull plane. Nathan and the Fortune Hunters ally themselves with the DeCarlos, a Pirate gang battling Kahn for Chicago. After several clashes with the Skulls, Nathan rescues Betty and confronts Kahn (Keith Szarabajka) about his connection to Von Essen. Kahn reveals to Nathan that he had struck a deal with ''Die Spinne'': in exchange for the titanium ''Die Spinne'' would help him destroy the DeCarlos, but Von Essen had gone back on their agreement, and begun using him to collect information. Kahn also discloses that ''Die Spinne'' is preparing to attack Chicago. Joining forces, the Fortune Hunters and Red Skulls successfully defeat Von Essen's invasion force. During the ensuing victory celebration, however, Maria betrays Nathan and steals the blueprints for Doc's wind turbine.

The Fortune Hunters track Maria's movements southward to a "Lost City" in South America, which they identify as Von Essen's principal base of operations. Nathan infiltrates the base and there witnesses Maria and Von Essen have a falling out, following which Von Essen kills her. A firefight then ensues between Nathan and Von Essen, during which Von Essen reveals his plan to use the ''Starker Sturm'' —his completed wind turbine weapon—to force Chicago and eventually all of North America under his fascist rule. Von Essen activates hidden explosives causing the hide out to collapse. Nathan escapes but the Pandora is damaged by debris in the explosion and Von Essen escapes. After repairing the Pandora, Nathan and the Fortune Hunters return to Chicago and find it already besieged by ''Die Spinne''. The Fortune Hunters and the Red Skulls once again join forces to stop the invasion. Von Essen then appears in the ''Starker Sturm'', and begins to attack Chicago's vital commercial and governmental structures. Nathan destroys the war machines' power turbines causing it to explode, killing Von Essen in the ensuing explosion. As the game ends, Khan invites Nathan and the Fortune Hunters to a party to celebrate, saying he'll call ahead and tell them to put the drinks on ice. Remembering how the whole ordeal started, Nathan declines, saying that he is going to stay away from the gambling tables for a while.

A young man squanders his inheritance until he has nothing left but a few shillings, a pair of slippers, and an old dressing-gown. A friend sends him a trunk with directions to pack up and be off. Having nothing to pack, he gets into the trunk himself. The trunk is enchanted and carries him to the land of the Turks. He uses the trunk to visit the sultan's daughter, who is kept in a tower because of a prophecy that her marriage would be unhappy.

He persuades her to marry him. When her father and mother visit her tower, he tells them a story. They are impressed and consent to the marriage. To celebrate his upcoming marriage, the young man buys fireworks and flies over the land setting them off. Returning to the earth, a spark incinerates the trunk, and the young man can no longer visit the princess in the tower. Instead, he wanders the world, telling stories.

In the woods stands a little fir-tree. He is preoccupied with growing up and is thoroughly embarrassed when a hare hops over him, an act which emphasizes his diminutiveness. The women call him the baby of the forest and again he is embarrassed and frustrated. A stork tells him of seeing older trees chopped down and used as ship masts, and the little tree envies them. In the fall, nearby trees are felled and the sparrows tell the little fir-tree of seeing them decorated in houses.

One day while still in his youth, the fir-tree is cut down for a Christmas decoration. He is bought, carried into a house, decorated, and, on Christmas Eve, glows with candles, colored apples, toys, and baskets of candy. A gold star tops the tree. The children enter and plunder the tree of its candy and gifts, then listen to a little fat man tell the story of 'Klumpe-Dumpe' "who fell down-stairs, and yet was raised to high honours, and obtained the princess's hand". (Most English translations render 'Klumpe-Dumpe' as "Humpty Dumpty", which sounds similar, although Mette Norgaard points out that the story is different, of the "Blockhead Hans" type.)

The next day, the fir-tree expects the festivities to be renewed, but servants take the tree down and carry him into the attic. The tree is lonely and disappointed, but the mice gather to hear the tree recite the tale of "Klumpe-Dumpe". Rats arrive and, when they belittle the simple tale, the mice leave and do not return. In the spring, the fir-tree – now withered and discolored – is carried into the yard. A boy walks on the tree and takes the star from its topmost branch. The fir-tree is then cut into pieces and burned.

As World War II ends in Europe, ''Stars and Stripes'' journalist Charles Wills (Van Johnson) is on the streets of Paris, covering the celebrations. He suddenly is grabbed by a beautiful woman, who kisses him and disappears. Charles follows the crowd to Café Dhingo and meets another pretty woman named Marion Ellswirth (Donna Reed). The mutual attraction is instant, and she invites him to join her father's celebration of the end of the war in Europe. Charles, Marion and her persistent French suitor Claude Matine arrive at the Ellswirth household, and we find that the woman who had kissed Charles is Marion's younger sister Helen (Elizabeth Taylor).

Their father, James Ellswirth (Walter Pidgeon), had survived World War I and promptly joined the Lost Generation. Unlike most drifters, he never grew out of it, raising his two daughters to desire such a lifestyle. Helen takes after her father and uses her beauty to sustain a life of luxury even though they are flat broke. Marion goes the other way and looks for serious-minded and conventional young men such as Claude, an aspiring prosecutor, and Charles, the future novelist.

Charles and Helen start dating and fall in love. After Helen recovers from a near-death case of pneumonia, they get married and settle in Paris. James good-naturedly joins the happy family of Charles, with Helen eventually having a daughter, Vickie. Marion, having lost Charles to Helen, agrees to marry Claude. Charles struggles to make ends meet with his meager salary, unsuccessfully works on his novels and looks after Vickie.

At about this time, the barren oil fields in Texas that James had bought years before finally begin to produce. Charles, to whom James had given the oil fields as a dowry, quits his job, and Helen and James begin to host parties instead of going to them. Sudden wealth changes Helen, who becomes more responsible, and Charles parties his wealth away after quitting his newspaper job and having all his novels rejected by publishers. They also each start to pursue other interests: Helen flirts with handsome tennis player Paul Lane (Roger Moore), and Charles competes in a local Monte Carlo-to-Paris race with professional divorcee Lorraine Quarl.

After the race, Charles returns to Paris, only to find Helen sitting in Café Dhingo with Paul. A fight breaks out between Paul and Charles, and an angry Charles goes home first and puts the chain on the door, preventing it from being opened all the way. When Helen comes home and tries to enter she can't. She calls out to him, but Charles is in a drunken stupor on the staircase, and the bottle drops from his hands as Helen calls. Helen has to walk all the way to her sister's in the snow and rain. She catches pneumonia again and dies.

Marion petitions for and gets full custody of Vickie, and Charles returns home to America. A few years later, having straightened himself out, published a book, and stopped boozing, Charles returns to Paris, hoping his reform will persuade Marion to give Vickie back to him. Charles tells Marion that he only has one drink a day now. Marion refuses, still feeling resentful towards Charles' having fallen for Helen instead of her and for his being responsible for Helen's death. Seeing that Charles and Vickie belong together, Claude steps in and tells Marion that she is punishing Charles for his not realizing that Marion loved him, but marrying Helen instead, and the penalty for it is taking away the only thing he had left: his own daughter. Claude asks Marion to accept him and wanting their own child out of love and not out of defeat (as a result of Charles allowing Helen to die).

Marion goes into Café Dhingo (on whose main wall is a big picture of Helen) to look for Charles (who is gazing at the painting) and tells him that Helen would not have wanted him to be alone. Outside the cafe, Claude is with Vickie. The child runs to Charles, and Charles and the child walk away together.

Part One

In 1975, St. Vincent Orphanage is run by the young Brother Peter Lavin. Kevin Reevey, a 10-year-old abused child, tries to avoid Lavin's attentions by running away, but he is returned to the orphanage by police. When Lavin tries to embrace and caress him, Kevin resists and protests, "You're not my mother!" This causes Lavin to violently react to the boy, and Kevin is severely beaten with the buckle end of the brother's belt. Steven Lunny is another abused boy whose older brother Brian tries to protect him.

Finn, the orphanage's janitor, notices Kevin's injuries and worriedly sends him to a hospital. Lavin fires Finn, but Finn hires a detective to investigate the orphanage, and word starts to spread in the local community about possible abuse at St. Vincent. However, an investigation is hampered by an institutional cover-up. Because the orphanage is about to receive a grant from the government that would go towards renovations, the town's police chief wants to avoid the stain of a political scandal. The investigation is ultimately buried by the head of the justice department and church officials, and no arrests are made. Lavin and several Brothers are merely transferred.

Part Two

Fifteen years later, Lavin has left the priesthood and lives in Montreal with his wife and two sons. A cop comes to his door to arrest him on charges of sexual assault, gross indecency and misconduct, to which Lavin pleads not guilty. The St. Vincent victims, now men in their mid-20s, are called upon to give evidence in the trial. Brian has since happily married and has two children, but has not seen Steven in years; the two brothers reconcile at the trial. Kevin is haunted by his abuse and has nightmares. Steven is emotionally destroyed by the defence advocate, who reveals that he abused seven-year-old boys at the orphanage when he was sixteen. Steven then takes his own life with an overdose of drugs. His death ultimately prompts Kevin to give evidence against Lavin. Lavin remains in denial, even to his wife. His fate is left unanswered as is the question, posed by his wife at the end of the second film, as to whether he ever molested his own two young sons.

Pete Nelson, a smooth operator who has just been discharged from the Army, joins forces with his old buddy, the loud Jerome X. Hotchkiss, and together they join a circus. The Clyde Brent Circus, to be exact. Jerry has taken a job as apprentice lion tamer. He is set on being a circus clown, but his plans are squandered when they meet the circus manager Sam Morley and owner Jill Brent, who is also ringmaster. The circus has financial problems, so the only way that both Pete and Jerry can be hired if they help out wherever needed.

Jerry dutifully reports to the designated lion tamer, Colonel Schlitz, but is terrified when Schlitz forces him into the lions' cage with only a whip and chair for protection. Schlitz keeps calling at him to behave coolly and to show no fear, but all Jerry can do is to nervously try to befriend the beasts. Schlitz pulls him out of the cage.

Later in the day Jerry and Pete are washing the elephants when Jill stops by to chat. Pete starts flirting, which she finds both attractive and annoying. Jerry sneaks into Puffo the Wonder Clown's tent and tries on his hats. Morley catches him red-handed and scolds him.

One night while working in a custard stand. Pete and Jerry are overwhelmed by the crowd and lose control of the machine. Morley sends Jerry to help Puffo dress for his performance. The arrogant clown rejects Jerry's help. Jerry's next assignment is to hand Nero, the tightrope walker, a unicycle. The audience roars with laughter at Jerry's fumbling attempts to climb a rope ladder while holding the bike. When Jerry accidentally ends up riding the unicycle on the tightrope, the crowd hushes. Pete and the clowns rush in with a net and catch him when he falls.

Saadia, the Queen of the Trapeze, is up to perform. She goes into the ring and Pete is indeed breath-taken by her great beauty. Jill, however, dislikes the egotistical, greedy Saadia. Morley insists the circus would go bankrupt without her. To Jill's disgust, Pete agrees to become Saadia's personal assistant.

Morley then talks Jerry into becoming a human cannonball. Pete, wearing nothing on his upper body, shows off for Saadia, giving her a private demonstration of his skills on the parallel bars. Saadia is attracted to Pete, and they end up kissing. They are interrupted by the slightly jealous Jill, who informs Saadia that, for financial reasons, there will be an extra show on Saturday.

Saadia is well aware that the survival of the circus depends on her, but she refuses to do the extra show. Pete, watching her perform to a capacity crowd, gets an idea of how to save the circus.

Morley finally allows Jerry to go into the ring in place of a sick clown. Jerry is ecstatic, but one performer unhappy with Jerry's big break is Puffo. He resents the cheap laughs that Jerry gets from the audience and starts bullying him in the ring. The audience is upset and starts to boo Puffo, wanting him to go off. After the show, Jerry tells Puffo that he is not angry with him.

Pete flirts with a very receptive Jill, but when he asks about the circus's profits, she is furious and slaps him. Soon after, in Saadia's tent, Pete explains to Jill his plan to increase his profits with gambling. A skeptical Jill, who inherited the circus from her father, allows Pete to set up some gaming tables on the midway.

The circus continues its tour. On Jill's birthday, Pete and Jerry throw her a big party. Puffo gets quite drunk and interrupts the festivities to declare he is quitting. He will consider staying on if Jerry and Pete are fired. Pete gets angry and punches Puffo in frustration. Jill later fires Puffo from the circus and replaces his act with Jerry.

Jerry starts performing under the name Jerricho. He is an instant hit with the audience, even bigger than Saadia, who gets jealous. So jealous she too threatens to quit unless the circus gets rid of Jerry. Tired of her ego, Pete tells her "drive carefully" and sends her on her way. Jill is quite relieved that the alluring Saadia is out of her way.

However, her relief is short-lived. She witnesses a fight between Pete's shell-game operator and a customer then demands that Pete stop the gambling operation. Pete refuses and announces he is leaving the circus, too. Sure that the loyal Jerry will go with him, Jill insists on leaving instead, preferring to leave the circus to Pete than lose it entirely.

Jerry verbally attacks Pete for canceling a benefit performance for disadvantaged children. Pete then tells Jerry he "ain't nice" anymore, and quits. Jerry and the other clowns decide to perform the show anyway, and Jill meets them at the outdoor arena.

Jerry's words ring in Pete's head while Jerry performs and delights the children with his clowning. Jerry goes to great lengths to get a sad-faced handicapped girl to laugh. A car arrives in the ring out of it comes Pete, dressed in a clown suit. Jerry and Jill are delighted to see Pete join in the fun.

Christopher returns to Aurverelle in 1400, more than three years after the Ottoman Empire's victory at Battle of Nicopolis, his health and sanity severely damaged. He is soured on religion and nobility, having seen hypocrisy of all kinds while away. Etienne of Languedoc, a representative of Roman Pope Boniface IX, arrives to have an audience with him, but Christopher refuses to see him. Staying at the local inn, Etienne takes out his frustration on Vanessa, granddaughter of the elf Varden, by brutally beating her nearly to death when she rejects his advances. Christopher kills him and takes Vanessa in.

Just as he is about to give up hope of Vanessa recovering from her wounds, Mirya and Terrill arrive, posing as healers from far away, and they heal her completely. Christopher befriends Vanessa and helps her to make sense of the images in her head that make her fear for her sanity, those images being the patterns of reality she can see because of her part-elven blood. She departs for Saint Blaise, but, arriving at the gates of Saint Blaise, she decides at the last minute to seek out whatever family of hers may still remain in Saint Brigid.

Christopher's cousin, Yvonette a'Verne, baron of Hypprux, has designs on the wealth of the city of Ypris, so he arranges for several bands of mercenaries to sack the town and split the proceeds with him, not foreseeing that when the bands are done with Ypris, they will begin looting the rest of Adria. Using blackmail, Christopher persuades Yvonette to join an alliance of other noblemen of the area to fight off the mercenaries when they do decide to strike off on their own.

After the fall of Ypris, one band of mercenaries, the Fellowship of Acquisition, sacks the Free Town of Saint Blaise and takes over Shrinerock, a nearby castle. Realizing the potential of a castle to hold people in as well as out, Christopher convinces Natil to use her otherworldly powers to fuse the castle's walls, doors, windows, and gates into solid stone, thus giving Terrill time to shepherd the survivors of Saint Blaise's and Shrinerock's fall through Malvern Forest to safety in Aurverelle.

Christopher goes to Saint Brigid to rescue Vanessa. He is trapped there with Vanessa, Mirya, and Natil when the Fellowship besiege the town. Using Mirya's elven powers and Christopher's command of unorthodox fighting tactics, they hold the mercenaries at bay. With discord setting in among the ranks of the Fellowship, Berard of Onella, the leader of the Fellowship, is assassinated by one of his own. At the same time, the remaining members of the alliance ambush the Fellowship and slaughter them.

Natil returns to Adria convinced that she is the last of the elves on Earth. This realization, as well as the gradual fading of her powers, has provoked a crisis of faith in her; she still wants to aid and comfort all whom she meets, but with every day, her powers wane and she becomes more and more human. She has begun to sleep, something she has never done before. While she sleeps, she dreams of humans in 1990 Denver, George and Sally, who are becoming Elves.

Near the fishing town of Maris, she encounters Omelda, a nun recently escaped from Shrinerock Abbey, who is tormented by voices in her head. Every day, Omelda hears the rituals marking the Canonical hours in her head, without fail. Though she fights them, they take over her mind and make her little more than a zombie for people to take advantage of as they wish. On her way to commit suicide by casting herself off the cliffs overlooking Maris, Omelda falls afoul of some village guardsmen, who barter her safe passage for sex. Continuing on, she sees Natil's campfire, hears her harp music, and she finds that the harp music quiets the voices in her head.

Traveling with Omelda, Natil takes employment with Jacob Aldernacht, a prosperous merchant: she as a harper, and Omelda as a housekeeper. Omelda quickly falls into the clutches of Jacob's grandsons, Edvard and Norman, who make her their sex toy. Dazed by the constant voices in her head, Omelda can only endure. Natil becomes friends with Jacob and starts trying to comfort him; though he is rich, he is lonely and bitter. One night Natil realizes what the grandsons are doing to Omelda, finds them in their secret lair in the Aldernacht house, and kills them both.

Fleeing the Aldernacht house, Natil determines to return Omelda to Shrinerock Abbey. Omelda has developed an infection and is deathly sick due to her misuse by Edvard and Norman, so Natil and she stop in the Free Town of Furze for medical assistance. Due to Omelda's delirious ravings, they fall into the clutches of the Inquisition and are taken to the Inquisition's prison. Hanging in chains, Natil gets a glimpse of the Lady after not having seen her for years. This restores her fully to an Elven state, and while being sentenced, she denounces the Inquisitor for all of the wrongs done to Elves by humans through the ages.

When her infection becomes too severe, Omelda gives herself entirely to the song in her head and dies in her cell. Later, forces loyal to the Aldernachts break into the prison and free Natil and everyone else being held there. After healing those torture survivors she can, she leaves Jacob Aldernacht's employ, at a loss about what to do. Imagining she will fade as many of the other Elves have, she stops by the ruins of Saint Brigid for final goodbyes. While lingering there and debating what to do, she spies a strange glow in the distance. Fighting her way to it through a torrential rainstorm, she finds a mystical gateway, resembling one she has seen in her dreams, in the fork of a tree. Stepping through, she finds herself in modern-day Denver with a new mission: guide the newly awakened Elves.

Natil is a gardener at Kingsley College, a private university in Denver. She has found a small group of people who have started transforming into Elves and need guidance, though she has not revealed many details of the early portions of her existence, nor has she revealed the divine vision she once had but now cannot even describe to them.

In one narrative thread, Sandy Joy comes to Denver at the invitation of a man named Terry Angel. Exploiting the weak emotional condition of the Dean of Kingsley College, Maxwell Delmari, he has been given free rein to set up a sham program, named Hands of Grace, that purportedly uses music to heal people. Referring to obscure or bogus publications and fake references, Terry has hidden the fact that there is no program and no factual basis for his work.

Thoroughly insane and plagued by fleeting partial visions of a hidden higher power, Terry tortures himself with self-mutilation in an effort to finally see this higher power. When Sandy states that she has had a vision of a higher power, he comes to envy and loathe her. After she realizes the falsity of his convictions and tries to distance herself from him, he attacks her, slashing her hands with a knife. Fighting for her life, she sprays him in the face with oven cleaner, blinding him.

In another narrative thread, T.K. has just recently returned from Desert Storm missing a leg. A Vietnam veteran and a black man, he has been marginalized his entire life and is now working at the same security firm that once employed George Morrison, who is now the elf Hadden. Living in Denver's projects, he sees a crack house operating every day just down the street from him, and he is powerless to do anything about it. Finding employment at Treestar Surveying, he finds his barriers eroding as he comes to realize that he is becoming an Elf too and is no longer subject to the same hopeless future he once had.

After Heather, one of the Elves, is shot by drug dealers for TK's efforts at evicting the crack house from his neighborhood, he steals military ordnance and demolishes the crack house with two pounds of C4 after a desperate gun battle that destroys his artificial leg. Concluding his transformation into an Elf while he sleeps a few nights later, he wakes up the following day whole, his leg intact, having finally discharged his last tie to his old life. When the police come to question him about the pieces of his artificial leg, which he left at the ruins of the crack house when Sandy drove him to safety, the presence of both of his legs deflects their attention away from him.

As both narrative threads come together, Sandy is held by the police for assault after Terry lies and says that Sandy attacked him first. Out on bail, Sandy's overwhelming grief at her predicament serves as the final catalyst for helping all of the Elves finally learn how to draw strength from the patterns and use all of the powers at their disposal. Natil, seeing no choice, strikes a deal with Terry and uses her regained powers to heal Terry's eyes so that he will tell the truth of what happened to Sandy. Consumed with shame and grief at the banality of bargaining her healing powers for the truth from Terry and knowing that he will soon commit suicide because of what she has done for him, Natil finally gives up her immortal existence of four and a half billion years and fades from the earth. The others search for her and finally find her grieving in the land of sunlight with the Lady.

Nero Wolfe is approached by heiress Sarah Rackham and her cousin Calvin Leeds, a breeder of Dobermans, to investigate Sarah's husband Barry, who maintains an unusually lavish lifestyle despite having no income or support from Sarah. After Wolfe reluctantly accepts the job, a tear-gas bomb disguised as a package of sausage is delivered to the brownstone the next day. Wolfe is warned to drop the case by Arnold Zeck, a shadowy criminal mastermind who has matched wits with him twice before. Although it is clear that Barry Rackham is one of Zeck's operatives, Wolfe orders Archie to investigate further.

Soon after Archie arrives at Sarah's estate, he discovers that she and her dog have been murdered. Archie calls Wolfe with the news and returns to the city, suspecting that Barry or someone else in Zeck's enterprise may be responsible. When he arrives, however, he discovers that Nero Wolfe has disappeared during the night, leaving only instructions that Archie should not look for him and a newspaper advertisement announcing Wolfe's retirement from the detective business. The Westchester authorities refuse to believe that Archie does not know where Wolfe is, and he is briefly detained as a material witness. While Archie is in jail, his cell-mate, Max Christy, implies that he is part of Zeck's organisation and offers Archie work.

After being released, Archie is hired by Sarah's daughter-in-law Annabel Frey to investigate her murder, but his attempts soon stall. Over the following months, as Wolfe seems unlikely to return, Archie opens his own detective agency. He is eventually approached by Christy, who renews his offer of employment in Zeck's organisation. Suspecting that Zeck is connected to Sarah's murder, Archie agrees. He is put in contact with Pete Roeder, a high-ranking operative in Zeck's organisation. During a private meeting, however, Roeder reveals he is in fact Wolfe, having lost weight and changed his appearance. After fleeing, Wolfe travelled to the West Coast and established his identity as Roeder to infiltrate Zeck's organisation in order to dismantle it from within, and now needs Archie's help to spring his trap.

Archie persuades Lily Rowan to pose as Roeder's mistress so that the three of them can use her apartment as a covert meeting place. Zeck formally employs Archie to track down Barry, and Archie hires Saul Panzer, Fred Durkin, and Orrie Cather to do so. Barry soon realises what is happening and confronts Archie, but is terrified to learn that Zeck is also interested in his whereabouts; Barry had attempted to leave Zeck's employment, only to be threatened with exposure as a murderer. As Wolfe's trap nears completion, Archie is detained by the Westchester district attorney; Sarah's secretary Lina Darrow has formally claimed that Barry murdered his wife. Realising that Darrow's claims, although based on lies on her part, could get Barry convicted and thus ruin Wolfe's plan, Archie discredits Darrow by revealing that she was Barry's mistress and has been spurned by his refusal to marry her.

Archie takes Barry to meet with Zeck to negotiate an end to his employment. During the meeting, Archie overpowers Zeck, and Wolfe reveals his true identity. Wolfe has gathered enough evidence to destroy Zeck's criminal empire, but is willing to trade it for an end to hostilities and the evidence Zeck has against Barry. Realising that he is doomed either way, Barry shoots Zeck with a concealed gun before being killed by Zeck's bodyguards. With Zeck dead, Wolfe returns to the brownstone intent on exposing Sarah's murderer. He summons the key witnesses to his office and reveals that Leeds, not Barry, killed Sarah. Leeds, who had raised and trained Sarah's dog, was the only person who could have gotten close enough to kill her and it without the dog raising an alarm or attacking. Barry had in fact committed an unrelated murder several years previously that Zeck had used to blackmail him. Afterwards, Archie takes a well-deserved vacation in Norway with Lily, where he receives a letter describing Wolfe's return to his normal routines — and informing him of Leeds' suicide in jail before the start of his trial.

The setting is an ancient Greek amphitheatre, circa 500BC. Diabetes, an actor, and Hepatitis, a writer, sit on stage lamenting about how Hepatitis' new play lacks a good ending. They begin to frequently break the fourth wall, interacting with the audience and making note about how they are fictional characters in a play. Hepatitis asks if anyone has a major in philosophy, resulting in an audience member named Doris Levine joining the action on stage, while Diabetes calls the play's author Woody Allen for advice on how to proceed.

Another playwright, Trichinosis, joins the stage, saying that he has a machine that will help give the play a satisfying ending. The machine creates thunder and lightning effects, and allows an actor to descend from the roof in a harness in order to play God descending from the heavens to intervene at the conclusion in Hepatitis' play. Doris notes that this is a ''deus ex machina'', while Hepatitis begins questioning God's existence. Eventually, another playwright named Lorenzo Miller enters and says that he author of a greater play, and that the real audience is fictional. Blanche DuBois enters, saying that she is tired of the brutality of Tennessee Williams' play. Hepatitis finally accepts Trichinosis' machine, and his play begins.

The play-within-a-play involves Diabetes playing a slave who is forced to courier a message to the king. He is nervous after being told that if the message is bad news, the king will execute him; he opens the message, but is not reassured when it reads only the word "Yes". He eventually reaches the king's castle and realises that "Yes" is an affirmative, and thus fundamentally good. However, the king reveals that the question that the message provides the answer for is: "Is there a God?", which enrages the king as it means that he will go to Hell for his sins. Just as the king is to execute Diabetes' character, Trichinosis' machine malfunctions and strangles the actor playing God. Hepatitis hurriedly tells Diabetes to ad-lib the ending, but several other fictional characters appear and several members of the audience begin to run amok at the breakdown of reality. Eventually, all the other actors leave and Diabetes and Hepatitis sit on stage alone together, repeating their lines from the beginning about the need for a good ending, suggesting that the entire play exists in an infinite loop.

Lovecraft originally serialized the story in ''Home Brew'' Vol. 1 #1–6, an amateur magazine published by his friend George Julian Houtain.

From the Dark

The narrator recounts his history with the title character, who has recently disappeared. He details his time as a medical student at Miskatonic University, which is when the narrator became fascinated by West's theories, which postulate that the human body is simply a complex, organic machine which can be "restarted." West eventually realizes he must experiment on human subjects. The two men spirit away supplies from their medical school and set up their lab in an abandoned farmhouse. At first, they pay a group of men to rob graves for them, but none of the experiments are successful. West and the narrator then rob graves themselves. One night, they steal the corpse of a construction worker who died that morning in an accident. They take it back to the farmhouse and inject it with West's serum, but nothing happens. Later, an inhuman scream is heard from within the room containing the corpse. Moved by instinct, they flee into the night. West accidentally sets the place on fire, after tripping over a lantern while on the way out. West and the narrator escape. The next day, however, the newspaper reports that a grave in potter's field, violently molested the night before, displays the claws of a beast.

The Plague-Daemon

Some time after the fire, West's research is stunted when Dr. Allen Halsey, the dean of the medical school, refuses to allow him access to human cadavers or the university's dissection lab. West has a stroke of luck, though, when a typhoid epidemic breaks out and West and the narrator are called to help tend to the many dying victims. West begins injecting his patients with a new serum, which has no greater effect than to cause some of the bodies' eyes to open. Eventually, Halsey succumbs to typhoid, and, as a final act of twisted respect for his former rival, West steals his corpse to reanimate. West and the narrator take Halsey's body back to West's room at a boarding house, where they inject it with the new serum. Halsey does, in fact, reanimate, but, inexplicably, he is less intelligent and more violent than their previous experiment. After beating West and the narrator into unconsciousness, Halsey embarks on a killing spree, beating and murdering over a dozen people before he is apprehended by the police. The cannibal murderer is soon committed to a local mental institution. West curses the fact that too much time has elapsed and that Halsey's brain has deteriorated.

Six Shots by Moonlight

Now licensed doctors, West and the narrator go into practice together in the small New England town of Bolton, purchasing a house near the local cemetery to have easy access to corpses. The two experiment on several corpses with varying outcomes, but they do not achieve a breakthrough. Still intent upon successfully reanimating a human being, they claim the body of a boxing champion who died of a head wound in an illegal back-alley street fight. Gamblers betting on the fight arrange for West to dispose of the body, as it clears them of any crime. West and the narrator hurriedly take the body back to the lab and inject it with another new serum. When nothing happens, they take the corpse out to a meadow and bury it. Several days later, there are reports around town of a missing child. The child's mother dies during a fit of hysteria due to her weak heart, and the father tries to kill West in a fit of rage because West could not save her. That night, West and the narrator are startled by an aggressive pounding on their back door. Opening the door, West and the narrator come face to face with the boxer's corpse, covered in mildew and dirt and hunched over at the back entrance. Hanging from the boxer's mouth is the arm of the missing child. Almost instantly, West kills the boxer by emptying an entire revolver into him.

The Scream of the Dead

Some time after West's killing of the reanimated boxer, the narrator returns home from vacation to discover the perfectly preserved corpse of a man in the home he shares with West. West explains that during the narrator's absence, he perfected a type of embalming fluid that perfectly preserves a corpse as it is the moment the chemical is injected into the bloodstream; injected at the precise moment of death, the chemical prevents decomposition from even beginning. West reveals to the narrator that the dead man is a traveling salesman who had a heart attack during a physical examination; as the man died before West's eyes, he was able to preserve it with the embalming fluid and has been waiting for the narrator to return so that the two of them can reanimate the body together. West injects the body with his latest serum. Signs of life gradually begin to appear. When the narrator questions the man, he mouths words with seeming rationality and intent. Just before the man returns to the dead, he begins screaming and thrashing violently, revealing in a horrible scream that he was in fact murdered by West.

The Horror from the Shadows

Five years later, West and the narrator become involved in World War I as a means to procure more bodies. Serving as a medic in Flanders, West has gone beyond the point of simply trying to reanimate corpses; his experiments now include isolating parts of the body and reanimating them independently in an attempt to prove their machine-like quality. On the battlefield, West befriends his commanding officer and fellow medic, Major Sir Eric Moreland Clapham-Lee, and shares with him his theories and methods on reanimation. Shortly thereafter, Clapham-Lee suffers near-decapitation and dies when his plane is shot down. West immediately begins work on Clapham-Lee's body and injects the trunk of his body with his serum and places the head in a vat. The corpse comes to life and begins thrashing violently, reliving its last moments of life. Clapham-Lee's severed head begins shouting from across the room. The building is then destroyed by a bomb shell. West and the narrator survive, but there is no sign of Clapham-Lee's head or body. The two men assume that he was vaporized in the blast, although West is since known to speak fearfully of a headless doctor with the power of reanimation.

The Tomb-Legions

A year after returning from the war, West has moved into a house which is directly connected to an ancient system of catacombs from settler times. While reading the newspaper one night, West comes across an article detailing a series of strange, seemingly nonsensical events involving a riot at an insane asylum. A wax-headed man (Clapham-Lee) followed by a group of disturbing-looking followers carrying a box had demanded that the detained "cannibal" killer (Halsey) be released to them. When the invaders were refused exchange for the killer, they took him by force. West spends the remainder of the night in a near-catatonic state until someone comes to the door. The narrator answers only to find a group of men. One of the figures presents the narrator with the large box, which the narrator then gives to West. West refuses to open the box and insists that they incinerate it. The two men carry it to the basement and burn it. As soon as the box burns, the zombies tear through the wall of West's home via the catacombs. Leaving the narrator alone, the zombies soon attack West. Realizing that his own death is imminent, West allows the zombies to disembowel him. As a final insult, Clapham-Lee decapitates West's corpse before leading his army of zombies off into the night. The narrator doesn't reveal much to the police about West, and they disbelieve the information he does reveal since the catacomb wall seems intact and undisturbed. The narrator is forever haunted, considered mad, by his knowledge of what transpired and the lack of resolution regarding the raised corpses.

Raptor is an historical novel set in the late fifth and early sixth centuries. It purports to be the memoirs of an Ostrogoth, Thorn, who has a secret: he is a hermaphrodite and takes on the name, "Thorn the Mannamavi", "a being uninhibited by conscience, compassion, remorse- a being as implacably amoral as the juika-bloth and every other raptor on this earth." Thorn discovers his sexuality rather unorthodoxly during his early teens. After he is banished from both a monastery and, later, a convent, he travels throughout the dying Roman Empire on a quest to meet his fellow Ostrogoths (even though it was never confirmed that Thorn was an Ostrogoth; he simply assumed it by reaching several logical conclusions), meeting several characters; among the most crucial to the storyline: Theodoric and the retired Roman legionary-turned-woodsman Wyrd, with whom he forms close friendships.

Thorn lives his life chiefly as a man but can easily pass for a woman (he is beardless, has shoulder-length hair, and is relatively small-statured), and he uses this ambiguity for his own benefit. Throughout his life, Thorn conducts affairs with both men and women.

The novel treats actual historical events, the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the deposition of Romulus Augustulus by Scirian soldiers on 4 September AD 476, and Theodoric's assassination of Odoacer among them. Taking place in most of western Europe (the British Isles and Spain notably excepted), the story has an international feel, heightened by the appearance of several characters from different cultures (not only Romans and Goths but also Greeks, Celts, Huns, Jews and Syrians appear).

As is typical in Gary Jennings's novels, the plot is developed with historical detail (including extensive use of Gothic words, which the narrator calls "The Old Language") supplemented by graphic violence and bizarre sexual situations. Again typically, the story not only spans virtually the central character's entire life but also has a recurring theme: those whom Thorn loves, die.

During the 1830s, in a country workhouse somewhere in England, a very young woman outcast of unknown history dies giving birth to a boy. Nine years later, the boy in particular who has been given the unlikely name of Oliver Twist by the cruel parish beadle Mr. Bumble, after losing out in a secret draw with the other orphan boys, gets into trouble with the workhouse authorities for daring to asking for more supper - if you can call one pathetically small bowlful of gruel a supper (asking "Please, sir...I want some more?").

As a result, Mr. Bumble apprentices him off to Mr. Sowerberry, an uncaring undertaker who mistreats the boy so badly that one day he rebels for the first time in his life, then runs away to London to seek his fortune. Shortly afterwards, Mr. Bumble is summoned to a private meeting with a sinister man calling himself Mr. Monks who inquires information about Oliver, and easily bribes the greedy official into yielding him a gold locket that was the only thing of value found on Oliver's mother after her death, as well as the only proof that she along with her son are actually from a wealthy family. Mr. Monks charges Mr. Bumble to remain silent about their transaction and goes on to London to track Oliver down.

As for Oliver himself, on the road to London he is befriended by a cocky street urchin calling himself the Artful Dodger, who offers to take the orphan to his home which is located in one of the filthiest London slums. There the Dodger and several other boys like him are living under the care of an odd and seemingly benign old Jewish miser named Fagin, who gladly takes Oliver in. Little does the innocent orphan suspect that his newfound benefactor is in reality a crafty local crime lord, who has taken all these boys to order to train them to steal and to pick pockets for him and his brutal, thieving partner-in-crime Bill Sikes. Fagin subtly introduces Oliver to the world of crime, getting him to participate with the other boys in a deceptively innocent game in which they each have to pick handkerchiefs and other articles out of the old man's many great coat pockets without him feeling anything. Oliver succeeds on his first try, and Fagin rewards him with a coin.

Shortly afterwards, Oliver meets Sikes' doxy Nancy who takes an instant liking to the boy on sight. Eventually Oliver gets caught in his first pickpocketing mission, even though it is the Dodger and another boy who steal a handkerchief from a kindly old gentleman. At his trial however, the victim Mr. Brownlow takes pity on the boy and arranges for him to be released into his custody.

At Mr. Brownlow's home located in one of the wealthier sections of London, Oliver experiences true kindness for the first time in his life. Unfortunately fearing exposure, Fagin and Sikes have him tracked down and kidnapped through Nancy, who immediately regrets her part in the abduction.

During all this Mr. Monks finally tracks Oliver down to Fagin's den and hires Fagin and Sikes to help him prevent the secret of Oliver's parentage from coming to light, and tells him to keep the boy with the gang. Nancy gets wind of their scheme though, and at the risk of her life arranges a midnight rendezvous at London Bridge with Mr. Brownlow, whom she informs about Monks and of his plans for Oliver, and arranges with him to rescue Oliver from the gang's clutches. But her efforts are discovered by Fagin and Sikes, the latter brutally murdering her for interfering.

After a thrilling rooftop chase, Sikes accidentally hangs himself and Fagin is arrested by the police while Oliver is happily reunited with Mr. Brownlow, who successfully tracks Monks down. Monks confesses that Oliver is his long lost step brother, and the true heir to a vast fortune left by their late father. Oliver forgives Monks and persuades Mr. Brownlow, who has become his guardian, not to turn him over to the police. His quest for love has ended in fulfilment.

From the blurb of Cape's first edition: 'The situation as far as I'm concerned,' says the young-narrator-hero of ''MF'', 'is an interesting one. In two days in a strange country I've acquired a mother in the form of a Welsh-speaking Bird Queen who scares me. I've spent some hours in prison, I've discovered the works of an unknown superlative artist in a garden shed and I've been shot at by a riddling lion-faced expert on Bishop Berkeley. Most interesting of all I'm due tonight to be married by a circus clown to my own sister.' Almost twenty-one, a college throw-out, Miles Faber embarks on a defiant pilgrimage across the Caribbean. His destination: the shrine of Sib Legeru, Castitian poet and painter. In the streets of Castita's capital, gay with a religious festival, a series of bizarre revelations await him: his obscene double, the son of a circus sorceress Aderyn the Bird Queen, and a sister-plump fellow offspring of his father's incestuous union. Unspeakable crimes of blood and lust are perpetrated against both before Miles, solving the final riddle, wakes-like Oedipus to find himself a willing victim of the machinations of dynastic destiny.

The film opens on the evening of 24 April 1974, as a young conscript soldier (Daniel) kisses farewell to his girlfriend (Rosa) before boarding a train from Lisbon back to his Army base at Santarém. Both are fearful that he will be sent to fight in the Portuguese Colonial War. Late and depressed, Rosa then travels by tram to Antónia's flat to babysit for her daughter Amelia. On arriving back (late) at his base, Daniel is oblivious to the imminent coup. Captain Salgueiro Maia arrests the base commander at gunpoint and orders the soldiers to assemble on parade in the middle of the night; he asks them to come with him to Lisbon to overthrow the government. Maia's erudite but cynical and cautious colleague Major Gervasio refuses to take part, as does Lieutenant Lobão.

Meanwhile, in Lisbon, left-wing journalist/lecturer Antónia is having a row with her estranged husband Manuel, a Portuguese Army captain, over atrocities he has been involved with during the Colonial War. Rosa having arrived to babysit, Antónia then goes to a formal reception where she pleads with her brother (Filipe Correia), a minister in the government, to release one of her students who had been arrested by the DGS (secret police). Filipe refuses to help and returns to his conversation with Brigadier Pais. The head of the DGS (Salieri) is also present at the reception; he recognises Antónia and subsequently assaults her in a toilet. Antónia returns home in despair, not realizing that her estranged husband Manuel is also a coup plotter. Manuel and his colleague prepare to seize control of the Rádio Clube Português, a radio station, from which communiques on behalf of the Armed Forces Movement will be broadcast.

Meanwhile, simultaneously, Maia and his troops are preparing to set off for Lisbon, and the other coup plotters are also preparing to move into position. The signal for the coup to start is the playing of Grandola, Vila Morena on the radio shortly after midnight on 25 April. Maia's troops set off in a column of armoured vehicles. Manuel, Fonseca, Botelho and Silva capture the Rádio Clube Português in Lisbon. A signal is given by morse code by car headlights to prisoners being held in prison by the DGS. Maia's armoured column has to stop in open countryside due to a breakdown by one of the key armoured vehicles; at this point Major Gervásio arrives in a conspicuous red sports car and joins the rebels. Maia's troops arrive in the Praça do Comércio in Lisbon, but are threatened by a naval warship and by a column of tanks commanded by Brigadier Pais (who remains loyal to the regime). Following a stand-off, with Labão and Maia both threatened with being shot, many of Pais' troops defect to the rebels. On entering the Government offices in the Praca do Comercio, Maia discovers that the ministers have fled to the GNR headquarters at Carmo in Lisbon. There are several asides, including where the young conscript soldier in the opening scenes of the film meets Rosa again, placing a carnation in the barrel of his rifle (and are later discovered inside a military armoured car whilst making love).

At the GNR barracks, a further stand-off ensues, with the regime leaders (including Marcelo Caetano) trapped inside. Also trapped in their nearby headquarters, a group of DGS officers open fire from the windows at the crowd in the street outside, killing four - the only fatalities of the Carnation Revolution. Virgílio is one of the casualties. Maia eventually ordering his troops to shoot at the building with machine-gun fire. Following this atrocity, Maia threatens to blow up the building with artillery.

Shortly before Maia's deadline expires, emissaries from General António de Spínola arrive, to negotiate the surrender of the regime's leaders. Spinola himself arrives, places Gervásio in local command (despite having spent almost the entire day avoiding any action) and orders Maia to convey the arrested Caetano, Correira and the other leaders to an air force base, from whence they are flown to Madeira and then on to exile in Brazil. The film closes with the release of the political prisoners, including Antónia's lover (Emílio), and Manuel and Maia narrowly avoid being attacked by a crowd when they are mistaken for DGS/PIDE officers rather than soldiers.

It is then revealed that Antónia and Emílio will both go into politics, she on the left but he ultimately on the centre-right; after two years together they separate. Manuel will drift into alcoholism and Maia was to die from cancer in his late 40s. Nevertheless, the revolution leads to the downfall of the Estado Novo regime and its replacement by democracy and the rule of law for Portugal.

Movie star Laurel Stevens (Jane Russell) has made a new film. It is called ''The Kidnapped Bride'' and gives a brainstorm to a couple of small-time crooks, Mike (Ralph Meeker) and Dandy (Keenan Wynn), to kidnap Laurel.

While they take her to a Malibu beachfront hideout, agent Barney Baylies (Robert H. Harris) and studio chief Martin (Adolphe Menjou) can't figure out why Laurel's a no-show at the premiere. Gossip columnist Daisy Parker (Benay Venuta) is dying to know, too, so a decision is made to avoid a scandal at all costs and not report Laurel missing to the police. Mike and Dandy want a $50,000 ransom. Laurel is insulted, feeling she's worth ten times that.

Laurel also fears this thing could hurt her career by looking like a publicity stunt. When Los Angeles police sergeant McBride (Fred Clark), who once sent Mike to prison, comes to Malibu to do a routine check on him, Laurel alters her appearance and pretends to be Mike's girl. The studio finally goes to the cops and also offers a $100,000 reward. The ransom money is taken to the airport, which is where the not-too-bright Dandy has a job. McBride notices a portrait of Laurel at the studio and suddenly realizes where he's just seen her.

Laurel has begun to fall for Mike for real. This time when McBride shows up, Laurel knocks him cold. She and Mike steal the cop's car and race to the airport. They get nabbed by the cops, but dim Dandy has picked up the wrong suitcase. There is no crime so there are no arrests, particularly since Laurel and Mike are now in love.

The poem, set in 18th-century rural England, tells the story of an unnamed highwayman who is in love with Bess, a landlord's daughter. Betrayed to the authorities by Tim, a jealous ostler, the highwayman escapes ambush when Bess sacrifices her life to warn him. Learning of her death, he is killed in a futile attempt at revenge ("so they shot him down on the highway, like a dog upon the highway"). In the final stanza, the ghosts of the lovers meet again on winter nights.

in 1545, the world was in the Warring States period. The servants surpassed the lord and defeated them frequently, and the Sengoku daimyo repeated fierce battles and were devoted to trade-in.

Among the ninjas who served them was a group of ninjas called the "Kage Clan". They serve the Sengoku daimyo Hidenobu Togo, and while faithfully performing all missions to unify the world, they make weapons and armor with metal that is stronger than any substance called "invincible steel" and meet mysterious ninjutsu. However, after a long time, the "invincible steel" dissipates and the number of people who can use the technique gradually decreases, and the legitimate successors of the Kage clan are the three people, Akakage, Aokage, and Asuka, who remain under the white shadow who is the leader. It was only leaving the young man. And I felt a big gap with the lesson passed down from generation to generation to the clan, "Working as a shadow for a peaceful world with light" to Togo, and the minds of Akakage and others began to get lost.

John Kelly and Andy Sipowicz are detectives in the 15th squad. Sipowicz is the elder partner but is a drunk and a threat to the partnership lasting much longer. Kelly has a genuine affection for his partner but becomes increasingly exasperated by Sipowicz's behavior. In the pilot, Sipowicz is shot, and nearly killed, by Alphonse Giardella, a gangster whom Sipowicz, while drunk, insulted badly in public. This leads to his decision to stay sober (after involuntarily drying out while in a coma) and save his job. While his partner is recuperating, Kelly is teamed up by the squad's Lieutenant, Arthur Fancy, with a young cop from Anti-Crime, James Martinez.

Kelly's personal life is no less complicated, as he is reluctantly going through a divorce from his wife, Laura, and is embarking on an affair with a uniformed cop, Janice Licalsi. To complicate matters further, Licalsi has been ordered to do a 'hit' on Kelly by mob boss Angelo Marino, otherwise Marino will turn in Licalsi's father, who is on his payroll. Instead, Licalsi murders Marino and the repercussions come back to haunt both her and Kelly.

Sipowicz begins a relationship with A.D.A. Sylvia Costas while another detective in the squad, Greg Medavoy, embarks on an affair of his own with the squad's new police administrative aide (P.A.A.), Donna Abandando.

Gambler Nathan Detroit seeks to organize an unlicensed craps game, but the police, led by Lieutenant Brannigan, are "putting on the heat." Nathan's usual locations are turning him away due to Brannigan's intimidating pressure. The Biltmore garage will allow Nathan to hold a game, but the owner requires a $1,000 security deposit, which Nathan does not have. Adding to his problems, Nathan's fiancée, Miss Adelaide, a nightclub singer, wants to get married after being engaged for 14 years. She also wants him to go straight, but he only is good at organizing illegal gambling.

Nathan spots an old acquaintance, Sky Masterson, a gambler willing to bet on virtually anything and for high amounts. To win the $1,000 security deposit, Nathan bets Sky that he cannot take a girl of Nathan's choosing to dinner in Havana, Cuba. Nathan then nominates Sergeant Sarah Brown, a sister at the Save a Soul Mission, which opposes gambling.

Sky pretends to be a repentant gambler as a means to meet Sarah. Sky proposes a bargain: He will recruit a dozen sinners into the Mission for her Thursday-night meeting if she will have dinner with him in Havana. With General Matilda Cartwright threatening to close the Mission's Broadway branch due to low attendance, Sarah agrees to the date.

Meanwhile, confident that he will win the bet, Nathan gathers all the gamblers, including a visitor that Harry the Horse has invited: Big Jule, a mobster. When Lieutenant Brannigan appears, Benny Southstreet claims they are celebrating Nathan marrying Adelaide. Nathan is shocked, but is forced to play along. Later, he realizes he has lost his bet and must marry Adelaide.

Over the course of their short stay in Cuba, Sky breaks down Sarah's social inhibitions with Bacardi-spiked "milkshakes." They begin to fall in love. They return to Broadway at dawn and meet the Save a Soul Mission band, which has been parading all night on Sky's advice. Police sirens are heard, and the gamblers, led by Nathan Detroit, flee out through the back room of the empty Mission where they were holding a crap game.

The police arrive too late to make any arrests, but Lieutenant Brannigan finds Sarah and the other Save a Soul members being absent unlikely to be a coincidence and suspects Sky. Sarah is equally suspicious that Sky has had something to do with organizing the crap game at the Mission, and she angrily takes her leave of him, refusing to accept his denials.

Sky still has to make good his arrangement with Sarah to provide sinners to the Mission. Sarah would rather forget the whole thing, but Uncle Arvide Abernathy, who acts as a kind of father figure to her, warns Sky that "If you don't make that marker good, I'm going to buzz it all over town you're a welcher."

Nathan has continued the crap game in a sewer. With his revolver visible in its shoulder holster, Big Jule, who has lost all his money, forces Nathan to play against him while he cheats, cleaning Nathan out. Sky enters and knocks Big Jule down, and removes his pistol. Sky, who has been stung and devastated by Sarah's rejection, lies to Nathan that he lost the bet about taking her to Havana and pays Nathan the $1,000. Nathan tells Big Jule he now has money to play him again, but Harry the Horse says that Big Jule cannot play without cheating because "he cannot make a pass to save his soul." Sky overhears this, and the phrasing inspires him to make a bold bet: He will roll the dice, and if he loses, he will give all the other gamblers $1,000 each; if he wins, they are all to attend a prayer meeting at the Mission.

The Mission is near closing when suddenly the gamblers arrive, filling the room; Sky won the roll. They grudgingly confess their sins, though with little repentance. Nicely-Nicely Johnson however, recalling a dream he had the night before, seems to have an authentic connection to the Mission's aim, and this satisfies everyone.

When Nathan tells Sarah that Sky lost the Cuba bet, which she knows he won, she hurries off to make up with him. It all ends with a double wedding in the middle of Times Square, with Sky marrying Sarah, and Nathan marrying Adelaide.

Almost as soon as she mastered talking as a young child, Meirin Kanzaki discovered her feng-shui powers and developed them to such a degree that she has developed an online help desk where she guides and counsels people under the pseudonym of »Dr. Rin« with such skill that she inadvertently leeches away significant commerce from her father Shou. As is usually the case with 7th grade girls, Meirin is not immune to developing infatuation for boys her age; in Meirin's case, the boy of choice is her childhood friend Asuka who has a difficult time placing occult phenomenon such as feng-shui in perspective. Unfortunately for Meirin, securing Asuka's acceptance is the least of her worries when she has visited upon her mysterious events and paranormal phenomenon of such complexity and treachery that she will need all the help and luck she can muster to save the day with her feng-shui divination and the hakke crystal bestowed unto her.

After many years working together, Mike and his coal-powered steam shovel Mary Anne (whose name is a reference to the Marion Power Shovel Company) face competition from more modern gasoline, electric, and diesel shovels. Searching for work, they find a small town about to build a new town hall. Mike offers that if he and Mary Anne can't do the job in a single day, the town won't have to pay them. The town's selectmen who believe the work would take a hundred men a week hire Mike and Mary Anne, expecting to get their new cellar at no cost. Privately, even Mike has some doubts.

At sunup the next day Mike and Mary Anne begin work. When sundown comes they have just finished the job, but realize they have neglected to leave a ramp by which Mary Anne can get out of the cellar. A child suggests that Mary Anne be converted to a boiler for the new building's heating system, and that Mike become its janitor. Mike and Mary Anne settle contentedly into their new jobs.

Asparia, Queen of the Hellenes, has been captured by the Babylonians, but she manage to hide her identity and lives as a common slave in Babylon. Hercules, played by Peter Lupus (credited as Rock Stevens), is sent to free her. The Babylonian slavers begin to hear rumors and stories of a single man who can overcome any army he faces. Asparia conspires with another slave to send a message of her whereabouts to Hercules, who soon is heading towards Babylon.

The three siblings who rule Babylon—beautiful Taneal, warlike Salman Osar and more conservative Azzur—are visited by King Phaleg of Assyria. Phaleg showers the three with gifts, offering up untold riches in exchange for all of the slaves in Babylon. The siblings are suspicious of Phaleg's motives, thinking he means to raise an army from the slaves. Taneal seduces and drugs the Assyrian king, discovering that he intends to find Queen Asparia and marry her, creating a powerful empire of Assyria and Hellas. The siblings agree to stop this, and send troops to ambush the king. Hercules discovers the plan and aids the Assyrians, as the Babylonians are his enemy, and saves the life of the king. Phaleg makes Hercules take a loyalty oath, and then sends him to Babylon, along with several of his men, to retrieve Asparia.

In Babylon, each of the siblings is conspiring against the other; Salman Osar and Azzur both wish to marry Asparia and form an empire, while Taneal intends to steal the wealth of the city and then destroy it by the means of a giant subterranean wheel which supports the foundation of all Babylon. Hercules is able to locate Asparia, and then begins to turn the giant wheel and destroy the city. Salman Osar kills his brother, then is crushed by falling debris while attempting to kill his sister. As Hercules' Assyrian escorts attempt to steal Asparia away to Phaleg, Taneal takes the Queen hostage herself. Phaleg and his large contingent of cavalry ride in to claim his new bride, but they are met by Hercules as well as the freed Babylonian slaves. Phaleg is killed by Hercules, and his soldiers routed; Taneal seemingly poisons herself rather than face the judgement of Hercules and Asparia. In the end, Hercules leads Asparia and the Hellenes back to their homeland.

Licalsi is found guilty of the manslaughter of Marino and his driver and is given a two-year sentence. Because of his involvement with Licalsi, and the belief that he withheld evidence that could have given her a longer sentence, Kelly is transferred out of the 15th and chooses to leave the department altogether. He is replaced by Bobby Simone, a widower whose previous job was that of driver for the Police Commissioner. This does not sit well with Sipowicz but in time he learns to accept his new partner and, as his relationship with Sylvia leads down the aisle, asks Simone to be his best man.

After an affair with a journalist who uses information that he gives her in an article, Simone begins a relationship with another new officer in the squad, Diane Russell. Sipowicz, a recovering alcoholic, recognizes in Russell's behavior that she also has a problem and, after much prompting, she herself goes to AA. Elsewhere, due to his lack of self-belief that a woman like Donna could love him, Medavoy's relationship with her breaks down, due in no small part to Donna's visiting sister.

Main Cast

The film begins in late 2109. At the Slipgate Complex in Dallas, Texas, the military are overseeing development of a teleporter called a Slipgate. The top-ranking officer at the installation is General Blake. Another General, McQuiggan, has sent detachments of Grunts and Enforcers to the Complex for security purposes; these being genetically engineered soldiers with lowered intelligence and a killing instinct, brought on by electronic brain implants. Blake threatens to resign unless the Grunts leave, as he believes it is dangerous to toy with nature. The Enforcer commander shares his apprehensions. Another new arrival is Major "Bent" Benton, a swaggering officer whom the soldiers immediately dislike.

Eventually, the scientists perfect the Slipgate and begin using it to transport equipment between bases. The film then jumps ahead to 2110, when Major Bent unwisely orders the activation of an overheated Slipgate. The heat causes a malfunction which sends several crates of demolition equipment into another dimension, to an area which was occupied by an Ogre. The Slipgate automatically brings the Ogre back to the Complex, where it is met by a party of soldiers led by the misanthropic Sergeant Lawrence Maxwell, who has a supernatural ability to translate any language. It communicates its peaceful intent to Maxwell, but a God-fearing soldier mortally wounds it as it flees back to its home dimension through the Slipgate. His dying words identify the humans, as "naked Knights"—Knights being a militaristic, humanoid species that enforces control over the Ogres.

They report the murder to the Knights, who express dismay at Maxwell's translating abilities; this skill is exclusive to the Immortal race, which was thought to have died out. The Knights in turn report to the cultists of the god Shub-Niggurath, who order an invasion of the human dimension. Meanwhile, a military hearing was held to assess the aliens' intentions during the transporter incident, in which Maxwell defends the Ogre's innocence, but is discredited as a witness when Major Bent, using classified intel leaked to him by his father, Senator Bentley, reveals that Lieutenant Maxwell went against orders by retreating and persuading others to do the same during a doomed battle five years prior. The knights teleport to a base in Tucson and slaughter all of its occupants. While doing so, they discover that both Grunts and Enforcers can be bent to their will through their military implants. Using Jack Torres, an ex-Navy Seal with remote viewing abilities, Blake identifies Shub-Niggurath as the leader of the Knights. McQuiggan sends soldiers into the other dimension, including Maxwell and Corporal Phil, an annoying joker, against Blake's protests.

The residents of the dimension massacre the soldiers, except for Phil, who escapes, and Maxwell who is captured. The priests explain Maxwell's situation: he is dead by the mortal definition of the term, and will regain his Immortal powers and memories. He is treated well because Shub-Niggurath fears he may revive his creator, her enemy, the god Nehahra. The memories enhance his misanthropic outlook, such that he now wants to annihilate humankind. He also allies with an underground resistance movement, led by an Ogre named Zin and a Gaunt named Priam who controls the realm's various portals, that aims to overthrow Shub-Niggurath. Doing so, however, requires a human.

Meanwhile, many of the soldiers are reassigned in light of the war against these creatures, except Major Bent, whose father denied his transfer request. Shortly thereafter, Grunts and Enforcers attack the Dallas Slipgate Complex. Blake and Torres escape into a safe room, where they figure out how Shub-Niggurath has been controlling the Grunts and Enforcers, but the Enforcer commander commits suicide to avoid being turned into a servant of Shub-Niggurath. After murdering Director Keith, the creator of the slipgates, Maxwell kills Major Bent as revenge for his previous abusive treatment. Phil has decided to avenge his comrades and invade the other dimension on his own: he goes through the Slipgate and begins slaughtering enemies by the hundreds. Maxwell overhears him on his helmet radio, and guides Phil through the levels of ''Quake'' until he reaches Shub-Niggurath's pit, which can only be unlocked by ancient runes found at the end of each of the four chapters of ''Quake''. After helping Phil slay Chthon, the boss of the first chapter of Quake, Max travels to the deadly Realm of Shades, populated by Wraiths: the ghosts of Immortals who sift through the memories of the dead for clues of their creator, Nehahra. Max promises to help break Nehahra's curse on them by providing them with the soul of Shub-Niggurath, which would show them the location of Nehahra, in exchange for immortality.

Blake orders his amphibious war machines to attack the Knights and Ogres in order to help Phil. Having overheard that teleportation is the most deadly force in the universe, Maxwell sets up a Slipgate for Phil to go through and emerge at Shub-Niggurath's location. This defeats the god, and Phil survives. However, Maxwell has ambitions: he kills his resistance allies so he can take over the dimension with the help of the Wraiths. The film ends as the Immortal conspirators open a gigantic vault door to unleash Nehahra.

The Nehahra mod takes place five years later, where Max becomes ruler of the Quake dimension using powers granted to him by Nehahra, and human soldiers have set up a colony therein called Forge City. After hostile forces overrun the city, Jack Torres escapes and navigates through the levels of the Nehahra campaign with some help from the surviving soldiers, collecting power-up artifacts and slaying the hostile monsters he encounters. Among these include human-ogre hybrids, who have now begrudgingly accepted Maxwell's command after being created and later shunned by Archgaunt Hierarch Zagheida, the former cultist leader who was killed late in the film. After Jack kills General Ghoro, the leader of the knights from the film, Maxwell schemes to use him to kill Nehahra. For while Nehahra granted Maxwell far more power than he himself possesses, he also made Maxwell unable to kill him directly. Wanting to be beholden to no one, Max secretly guides Jack to Nehahra's Den, where Jack kills Nehahra. In the final level, Maxwell decides to take care of Jack Torres himself in a battle of "cat and mouse", but despite Maxwell's constant teleportation and multiple lives, Jack manages to finally slay the immortal human tyrant and free the innumerable spirits he held captive. With Max dead, Torres's life on Earth awaits him, but he can't help but feel taunted by a Gaunt proverb that Max repeated to Bent just before he ended his life: "Death is just the beginning".

In 1765, the inhabitants of Arkham, Massachusetts, are suspicious of the strange phenomena surrounding the grand "palace" that overlooks the town. They suspect the palace's owner, Joseph Curwen, is a warlock.

A young girl wanders up to the palace in a trance-like state. She is led by Curwen and his mistress, Hester, down into the dungeons. The girl is subjected to a strange ritual, in which an unseen creature rises up from a covered pit. The townspeople observe the girl wandering off, and they storm the palace to confront its owner. Though the girl appears unharmed, the townspeople surmise that she has been bewitched to forget what happened to her. They drag Curwen out to a tree where they intend to burn him. The mob leader, Ezra Weeden, insists that they do not harm Hester (to whom he had been previously engaged to marry). Before being burned alive, Curwen puts a curse on Arkham and its inhabitants and their descendants, promising to rise from the grave to take his revenge.

In 1875, 110 years later, Curwen's great-great-grandson, Charles Dexter Ward, and his wife Anne arrive in Arkham after inheriting the palace. They find the townsfolk hostile towards them and are disturbed by the horrific deformities that afflict many of Arkham's inhabitants. Charles is surprised by how well he seems to know the palace and struck by his strong resemblance to a portrait of Curwen. He and Anne meet Simon, the palace caretaker, who persuades them to stay at the palace and to forget the townspeople's hostility. Charles becomes more and more obsessed with the portrait of Curwen, and at times seems to change in his personality.

Charles and Anne befriend the local doctor, Marinus Willet. He explains the circumstances surrounding Curwen's death, and that the townspeople blame the deformities on the curse. He tells them of a black magic book, the ''Necronomicon'', believed to have been in Curwen's possession, and which Curwen used to summon the Elder Gods Cthulhu and Yog-Sothoth. Curwen's plan was to mate mortal women with these beings in order to create a race of super-humans, which led to the deformities. The townspeople are terrified that Curwen has come back in the form of Charles to seek his revenge. Dr. Willet advises Charles and Anne to leave the town.

Charles seems to be falling under the control of something and insists that they stay in Arkham. One night, Charles is possessed by the spirit of Joseph Curwen. Curwen reunites with two other warlocks, Simon and Jabez, who also have possessed their descendants. They make plans to continue their work and resurrect Hester. Curwen's hold on Charles is limited, and he tells Simon and Jabez that Charles is fighting him.

Curwen begins his revenge on the descendants. He kills Ezra Weeden's descendant Edgar by releasing Weeden's monstrously deformed son from his locked room and attacks Micah Smith's descendant Peter with fire. Curwen takes complete control of Charles and he attempts to rape Anne. Anne seeks help from Dr. Willet, whom Curwen then attempts to persuade that Anne is insane. Curwen and his associates succeed in resurrecting Hester.

The townspeople discover Peter Smith's charred corpse and storm the palace. Dr. Willet and Anne try to rescue Charles and discover a secret entrance to the dungeons. They are ambushed by Curwen, Simon, Jabez, and Hester. Anne is offered as a mate to the creature in the pit, while the residents break in and begin to raze the palace. The portrait of Curwen is destroyed, breaking Curwen's hold over Charles. Charles releases Anne, then urges Dr. Willet to take her away from the palace. While Curwen's associates seize Charles, Dr. Willet shepherds Anne from the burning palace. He returns to rescue Charles, and finds that Simon, Jabez, and Hester have escaped and left him to die. Charles and Willet barely escape the flames. Charles and Anne fervently thank Willet for saving their lives. However, it is apparent that Joseph Curwen still inhabits Charles' body.

Since ancient times, there has existed a race of flesh eating monsters called , which could either assume a human-like form or otherwise live in the shadows while feeding on humans. The martial arts style school was created to hunt down these mythical creatures and its teachings have been passed down through the generations to the Momota family. The fictional story revolves around the forbidden romance between Toshihiko, the latest heir of the ''Kifūuken'' school and Yuka, a young woman who is also a ''shokujinki''.

Fifteen years after the original shipwreck, the seven castaways are still stranded on the island. Meanwhile, in a Soviet Union-type country, military scientists destroy an orbiting satellite that has a disc containing top-secret information to prevent the satellite from crashing to Earth. The metal disc survives and lands on the island.

The Professor realizes the disc has a unique alloy that can be used to make a new barometer. Using the barometer, the Professor deduces a tsunami could destroy the island. To survive the deadly wave and potentially effect a rescue, the castaways build a raft by tying their huts together.

The next morning, the castaways awaken and realize they were swept off the island on the makeshift raft. When Gilligan accidentally sets the raft on fire, the United States Coast Guard spots the smoke and rescues them. Once back in modern society, the castaways are initially confused by how different everything is. After much media hype, the group reunites at Christmas aboard the S.S. ''Minnow II''.

Foreign spies have discovered that Gilligan has their lost disc and set out to recover it. Meanwhile, Skipper and Gilligan learn that the insurance company refuses to issue a settlement payment for the first ''Minnow'' unless all their former passengers sign a statement testifying that the Skipper was not responsible for the shipwreck. They first visit Ginger, who has been cast in a movie, though she is dismayed by how much film industry standards have changed. She agrees to sign the statement. Gilligan and the Skipper then reconnect with the Professor who has found that his castaway celebrity is overshadowing his research work at the university. The Professor also signs the insurance statement while the foreign spies continually attempt to secure the disk from Gilligan. The Skipper and Gilligan next go to see the Howells. They sign the insurance statement after ejecting snobbish friends from their house when they overhear them making disparaging remarks about Gilligan and Skipper. The spies, hidden among the guests, are also ejected.

The two then go to see Mary Ann, who is about to marry her old fiancé, Herbert. She no longer loves him but feels obligated to go through with the wedding. To spare Mary Ann from an unhappy union, Skipper and Gilligan deliberately disrupt the ceremony where the foreign spies are among the guests. Mary Ann is relieved to learn that Herbert actually loves someone else and she signs the insurance statement.

The insurance company finally pays for the first ''Minnow'' and the former castaways gather for a reunion cruise aboard the ''Minnow II''. The spies make one last attempt to obtain the disc, but are thwarted by the FBI. During the cruise, the ''Minnow II'' is caught in a storm. Gilligan unknowingly rendered the compass useless by removing its magnet when cleaning it, causing the Skipper to sail in the wrong direction. The group lands on a beach and realize they are on their old island after finding a piece of wood from the original ''Minnow''.

Cliff and The Shadows travel to a Spanish town for a gig. When they arrive they are puzzled to find the area empty. They find out that a small bomb has accidentally been dropped on the town and the villagers have fled in panic that it will go off. The boys decide to find the bomb and restore peace in the village, with some musical numbers along the way.

Act 1: The Barbershop

Mr. Bean goes to Derrick (Tony Haase)'s barbershop to have a haircut. After he chooses what hair style he wants by pointing to a calendar of Prince Charles, Derrick attempts to make the first snip, but is unable to do so as Bean keeps tilting his head forward to read a magazine. The office phone then rings, and Derrick reluctantly goes to answer it. All alone, Bean entertains himself by pretending to give someone a haircut until two customers come in and assume Bean is the hairdresser. The first customer is Jamie, a young boy whose mother leaves him in Bean's care as she runs to retrieve her purse she left at a shop. Bean places a bowl over Jamie's head and cuts his messy shoulder length mullet and fringe into a neater bowl hairstyle. He then accidentally shaves off a small piece of Jamie's hair while trying to use a hair clipper, and ends up shaving a bald stripe down the middle of his head to even it out. Although it looks ridiculous, Jamie is nonetheless satisfied with his new hairstyle.

After Jamie's mother returns and pays Bean for the haircut (which she cannot see as Bean has covered Jamie's hair with a cap), he returns to his seat just as Derrick returns from the phone, only for it to ring again; Bean then resumes being the substitute hairdresser, with his next customer being a man with a ponytail (Colin Wells) (which took virtually two and a half years to grow). While trimming the ponytail, Bean becomes distracted by the magazine the man is reading and accidentally detaches the ponytail. After finishing, Bean uses a portrait of a different ponytailed man over a mirror to deceive him and the man pays Bean and leaves, unaware that his real ponytail has gone.

Bean's final customer is Roger (Frederick Treves), a man who is supposedly a regular at Derrick's. After taking off his glasses, Roger mistakes Bean for Derrick due to his poor eyesight and asks for his usual haircut. Bean then proceeds to use the hair clipper but, despite being as careful as he can, he accidentally shaves off Roger's toupee, causing it to get stuck in the clipper. He remedies it by applying mousse on Roger's bald spot and using bits of hair from the floor to create a new "toupee".

Derrick finally returns from his phone call just as Roger pays him and leaves, and Derrick's initial confusion intensifies when Jamie's mother and the man who had the ponytail storm in and demand to know where his supposed assistant (who is nobody other than Bean himself) is as they hate the strange haircuts he gave (even though Jamie insists that he likes his haircut while his mother does not). Bean sneaks out by disguising his face with the Prince Charles calendar in order to avoid being recognized. Roger then storms in and mistakenly greets Bean as Prince Charles himself thanks to his poor eyesight, before going over to and berating Derrick for his haircut. Bean then finally sneaks out of the door and makes a run for it.

Act 2: The Fête and the Pet Show

Bean heads to a fête where he is unable to find somewhere to park his Mini, so he instead parks in one of the sheep pens after sounding the horn in order to get the sheep out of the way. Upon going inside the fête tents, he cheats at the indoor games, such as nudging a young boy playing a wire loop game, causing him to lose the game. He then plays the game himself, but after failing on the first attempt, he unplugs it and wins; the owner only realizes it has been unplugged after giving Bean his prize. Afterwards, Bean plays a game called "Hit the Headmaster", where he must throw wet sponges at the "headmaster" (George Webb) in which he gets a bit carried away by throwing random objects, such as canned peas and cereal boxes, at the "headmaster". He almost throws a chair, but a nearby teacher stops him.

Later, Bean participates at a pet show by entering Teddy into the competition (the other participants being dogs). Luckily for Bean, Teddy's inanimacy turns out to be an advantage, thus winning the contest. At the end of the show, two kids are awarded a ribbon each while Bean is awarded a huge bone by one of the contest organizers. However, Bean does not want it, so he instead takes a jar of honey to his satisfaction. Following this, he throws the bone back into the tent, inadvertently creating chaos off-screen involving the children and their dogs, who are presumably fighting for the bone. As the chaos ensues, Bean promptly exits the tent with Teddy.

Act 3: The Railway Station

Bean gets off a train at London St Pancras railway station. Unfortunately, he has lost his ticket on the way, so he decides to sneak past a security guard (Robin Driscoll). After several failed attempts, he hides inside a mail bag and crawls towards the gate. When the guard leaves once the clock bell rings, Bean climbs onto the gate, but two station workers turn the gate around to which Bean crawls off the gate (while celebrating that he has made it through) and ends up falling onto the railway tracks. Two station workers appear and put the mailbag (with Bean still inside) on board a train carrying cargo and mail that is destined for Moscow. As the end credits roll, we see short clips of a ship sailing through a rough sea (most likely carrying the mail and cargo from the train earlier), and then of a French steam train and of marching Russian soldiers in Moscow's Red Square (indicating that Bean indeed ended up in Russia).

Taken from the game's instructions:

Frustrated TV producer Chris is a self-opinionated wannabe screenwriter (with a particular dislike of British films featuring quirky secondary characters and plastic gangsters) who is forced to leave his unreliable flatmate Bob in charge of showing a series of estate agents around the house he is trying to sell. Worried by Bob's habit of spending all day "working" in the basement playing loud music, Chris asks his friend to listen out for the door bell and show anyone who comes calling inside. Bob promises to do exactly that and for once, not to let him down.

Over the course of the day, whilst Chris struggles to cope with a loathsome colleague – back at the house it is soon clear that Bob is taking his promise to Chris rather too literally. Bob has indeed, allowed anyone inside, including a couple of archetypal movie-style gangsters – an incompetent young Brit played by Danny Dyer and an incontinent American.

That evening, Chris is surprised to return home and find his flatmate, four estate agents, two Jehovah's Witnesses and a terrified children's entertainer being held hostage by a couple of characters straight out of a British gangster film.

Ted Healy and his Stooges are entertainers. But because Healy is much more interested in women than he is in performing, they are thrown out of the Happy Hour Theatre. Unable to keep a job anywhere else, they are reduced to waiting tables at a high-class restaurant. This, of course, ends up being a disaster as the restaurant is thrown into chaos because of them. So, yet again, they are thrown back out on to the streets.

Miranda is sixteen and concerned with being sensible, while Cassandra, nine years and eleven months, likes and believes in magical things. Miranda is outnumbered in this family, because Professor Aisling lectures on mythology and legends at his university, and believes in mysterious and magical things too.

But some of the members of the university think that it is nonsense to teach about myths and legends, because magical and mysterious things cannot be dissected, weighed and measured. One member in particular, Mr. Bilgewallow, takes delight in tormenting Professor Aisling, who wishes, and dreams, of a ship that would take him to the worlds where he might find the creatures of legend.

One evening, his wish comes true. As he and his daughters walk along the river, they come across a curious little ship, with a crew of dwarfs and gremlins. One of the dwarfs introduces himself as Malachi, captain of H.M.S. ''Basset''. He says that it is Professor Aisling's ship, conjured from his wishes and ready to sail on the "tides of inspiration". Aisling is astonished and delighted, and he and Cassandra waste no time in going aboard. Miranda needs a bit more coaxing.

The Aislings set sail on a magical voyage where they meet a number of creatures from mythology that join them on board the ship. Their first stop is the island of fairies, where the crew are approached by Oberon and Titania, who present them gifts to help them on their journey. The manticore, who guarded the entrance of the fairy king and queen, joins them along with the sphinx, who Cassandra thinks they both love each other. The crew next include among them the harpies, who take over the galley, the minotaur and a dryad, complete with a tree. Disaster strikes when Aisling becomes distracted by the potential of bringing back measurable proof for Bilgewallow and his ilk, which is a dragon skull he steals from Skotos, who lives on the island of the trolls. He also insists on bringing the lovely but deadly Medusa on board, with predictable results for one of the crew. But through the help of his daughters and Medusa, he recovers his belief and his balance, as all of them must unite against the evil trolls, who pursue him. They visit the island, where the Wonderful College of Magical Knowledge is to find out how to change Sebastian back from stone to normal. They find out that a unicorn can break the curse, so they set off to the island, where the ogre Olaf is having his birthday. They give him a deck of cards as a present, and then Olaf leads them to the forest, where Miranda dresses in a beautiful dress to call upon the unicorn, who changes Sebastian back to normal. They are attacked by the trolls, who seek revenge on professor Aisling for stealing their dragon skull. The trolls are defeated by a dragon, who burns their leader Skotos. They head back to the island of fairies, where their victory is celebrated by King Oberon and Queen Titantia. King Oberon presents the dragon skull to Professor Ailsing, who instead gives it to the dragon, feeling there is no need to prove existence of magical creatures. The Professor seeks an island to leave all the magical creatures there and live together, who they say their sad goodbyes. Professor Aisling, Miranda, and Cassandra go home sad that they have to leave their friends but happy they have made them.

In the game's intro, U.S. Marine Captain Frank Castle enjoys a picnic with his family in Central Park. The Castle family accidentally discovered a mob killing. Fearing any witnesses, the killers gunned down the family. To avenge them and all others like them Frank becomes The Punisher. The game begins in an illegal casino and the streets of the New York City, with the merciless vigilante Frank "the Punisher" Castle (optionally partnered with S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Nick Fury) in pursuit of the Mafia enforcer Bruno Costa who ordered the killing of Castle's family; the chase ends with a fight against Chester Scully (a minor villain from the comics). Frank "interrogates" Scully, gets the information he needs, and then promptly shoots him. Still on track of Bruno, the Punisher infiltrates the mob's Pantaberde resort in Florida via a water duct. He breaks into a hotel and corners Bruno, who is suddenly killed by a robot called Guardroid, who tells Frank the Kingpin has programmed him to terminate him, which the Punisher must then take on.

The Punisher then raids a major drug-smuggling ring at the local harbor, which ends with him confronting Bonebreaker in a waterfront warehouse. After that, the Punisher attacks the Kingpin's poppy field at a cave in Arizona. The Punisher boards and destroys a freight train which is commanded by Bushwhacker.

At that point, the Kingpin decides that he has lost enough henchmen and money to the Punisher's actions. He puts a hefty contract out on him, and he is chased by assassins from his hideout and through a forest. After defeating another Guardroid, the Punisher in turn assaults the King Building skyscraper. He fights his way through Jigsaw and other enemies to the final showdown against the Kingpin himself. After the Kingpin is defeated, the entire tower collapses, but the Kingpin is not found among the many dead criminals in the rubble.

The game share its plot with that of the movie. A mystical diamond called the " The Blue Monkey Diamond" is stolen from Daffy Duck by the Acme Corporation. The Looney toons must set of on an adventure to get it back.

Christine "Chris" Ramsey (Phoebe Cates) lies in bed narrating a trashy romance novel to Betsy (Kathleen Wilhoite), her roommate at the Cherryvale Academy for Girls in Northern California. Meanwhile, three students of the nearby Freemount Academy for Men, including Jim Green (Matthew Modine) and his overweight, slobbish friend Bubba Beauregard (Michael Zorek), sneak into Cherryvale to peek on the girls. Jordan Leigh-Jensen (Betsy Russell), showering at the time, sees that the boys are peering at her and enlists Chris and Betsy's help to drive them away; the three boys fall off the side of the building. In response to being disturbed, the roommates light a bag of horse manure on fire and put it in front of Jordan's door.

About a week later, at a co-ed dance, Chris reveals that Jim is her boyfriend; as the couple dance, Chris tells Jim that she has decided she wants to surrender her virginity to him. After a speech by headmistress Miss Dutchbok (Fran Ryan), the band plays a slow song while Jordan dances alone and conspires against Chris. Bubba, sporting an erection from slow dancing, sneaks off to the headmistress' office with Betsy to drink and have sex; however, the two are caught in the act by the headmistress and her friends. The following day, after morning aerobics, Chris books a hotel for Jim and herself.

After another period of time, students of the two schools are riding horses together. Jordan trots past where Chris and Jim are talking and flashes her breasts at Jim. In revenge, Betsy steals Jordan's shirt, forcing the latter to ride topless in front of the headmistress ''et alumni''. That weekend, Jim goes to buy condoms, but is confused by the pharmacist (Martin Mull in an uncredited role) and ends up buying dental hygiene products; when Chris goes to buy the protection herself, she is distracted and eventually seen by Miss Dutchbok.

After playing video games for a while in the arcade, Jim is embarrassed to talk romantically over the phone to Chris, while Jordan swears greater revenge. The following day, Jim, Bubba, and another friend dress as women and sneak into the girl's dorm. Jim is caught by Jordan, who teases him with a cold bottle and forces him to give her a massage. Meanwhile, Bubba meets up with Betsy for a tryst, but he leaves to smoke a cigarette before they have sex. As Bubba is on the ledge outside of Betsy's bathroom, he peers into Jordan's dorm room where Jim is massaging her on the bed. When Betsy goes to look for him, he is startled and falls off the ledge. Meanwhile, after Jim confesses to Jordan that he is in fact really a boy (which was already known to Jordan), she pretends to scream and kicks him out of the room, leading to Chris finding out about their indiscretion. Chris leaves the girl's sorority house, embarrassed and heartbroken.

After several weeks of unsuccessfully trying to get Chris back, Jim asks Chris' father for his help in the matter during parent visitation day. After Betsy and he tell Chris to take Jim back, she does. Chris and Jim then leave for their night of romance at the hotel. After failing to have sex that night because Chris finds the hotel too kitschy, as well as getting sick from the room-service food, they have sex on the beach in the morning.

Meanwhile, Jordan's father (Frank Aletter) has sex with her new stepmother while the chauffeur Chauncey (Ray Walston) listens in. Not long afterwards, Miss Dutchbok, who has mistaken Chauncey for Mr. Leigh-Jensen (Jordan's father), has sex with him in the back of Leigh-Jensen's car. Bubba and Betsy, looking to have another tryst, climb into the front seat and turn on the loudspeakers, ensuring that the chauffeur and Ms. Dutchbok's indiscretion is known by everyone present at the program. Upon realizing what Bubba has done, Miss Dutchbok lunges at him, eventually resulting in the car rolling out of control down a hill, and going into the pool. Afterwards, Bubba begins hitting on Jordan, eventually leading to Jordan paying him a midnight visit; when Betsy catches them together, she is apoplectic. The film ends with graduation day, where the graduating girls in the first row moon the headmistress, Miss Dutchbok.

Dr. Alan Aisling is an antiquities professor who has lost his wife and struggles to keep his daughters' spirits high and his loneliness at bay. His younger daughter Cassie daydreams about the mythical world her illustrator mother left behind in her drawings and annoys her older sister Miranda.

Then something magical happens: the family find themselves fleeing a plague of monstrous trolls by boarding a mysterious ship called The Unicorn. They are given a quest to find the benevolent dragon that once ruled the legendary faerie isles, before the demon trolls arrived.

They partake of the quest that shows them the wonder of the mythological worlds: fire-breathing dragons, the mermaids' siren songs and the Minotaur's labyrinth, and try to re-ignite an enthusiasm for life within the family.

Conan finds himself in the kingdom of Zamora, a fugitive under suspicion of kidnapping Jamilah, the queen of Turan. Discovering she has actually been captured by devotees of the Zamoran spider god Zath, he journeys into the city of Yezud (first mentioned in the Howard story "The People of the Black Circle") to rescue Jamilah. Incidentally, Conan steal some opals used as eyes in the god's temple image.

Characteristically, de Camp's Conan is a more credible if less elemental figure than Howard's, carefully assessing the situation in Yezud and taking the time and effort to lay the groundwork for his foray rather than just barreling in swinging his sword.

Chronologically, ''Conan and the Spider God'' comes between the short stories "The Curse of the Monolith" and "The Blood-Stained God".

In 2116, ''Interplanetary Chronicle of New York'' reporter Ray Peterson (Rik Van Nutter) launches aboard the spaceship Bravo Zulu 88, joining the crew of an orbiting space station. Peterson is assigned to write a story about the "infra-radiation flux in Galaxy M12", but soon tension develops between Peterson and the station commander (David Montresor). He believes the reporter is in the way, calling him a "leech", but he has orders not to interfere with Peterson. A complication arises when Lucy (Gabriella Farinon), the station botanist and navigator, becomes attracted to both the commander and Peterson.

When the errant Spaceship Alpha Two enters the inner solar system, its photon generators radiate enough heat to destroy the Earth. In efforts to intercept Alpha Two, crew members Sullivan (Franco Fantasia) and space station pilot Al (Archie Savage) sacrifice themselves in separate but futile attempts to destroy the dangerous spaceship with missiles.

With both crew members now dying from their attempts, Peterson uses Space Taxi B91 to get aboard the errant spaceship. His goal: to disarm Alpha Two's photon generators. Once inside, he is directed to disable the spaceship's computers and shut down all power sources. He soon finds himself trapped inside when the power loss also disables the emergency hatch.

Despite orders from the high command not to intervene, the commander and his assistant disobey and attempt to intercept the out-of-control Alpha Two and rescue Peterson. They are finally able to reach the reporter as he is collapsing and bring him back safely. With Alpha Two now safely redirected away from the Earth, Peterson wins Lucy's affection and the commander's respect for his heroic actions.

Marty the zebra, Alex the lion, Gloria the Hippopotamus and Melman the Giraffe live in the Central Park Zoo in New York. On Marty's tenth birthday, Marty starts to have doubts that the zoo is where he belongs, and finds that life in the zoo is boring. That night, a penguin living in the zoo named Skipper decides to break out of the zoo, and invites Marty to come with him, and gives Marty directions on how to clear paths. Skipper, in order to escape himself, is forced to abandon Marty in the process, but gives him more directions. Marty manages to make it to the main exit and leave. Realizing this, Alex, Melman and Gloria decide to go and look for him. As they find him, they are surrounded by police, tranquilized, and sent to a wild life reserve. Skipper and his team of penguins: Private, Rico and Kowalski are also on board. They escape from their crate and head for the bridge where they knock the captain unconscious and turn the ship around to Antarctica. Marty, Alex, Melman and Gloria fall into the ocean in the process. Alex is washed onto a beach unconscious, and soon wakes up. Finding an opened crate which belonging to Marty on the beach, he concludes that his friends are there too, and goes off to find them. In the jungle, he helps different animals with their tasks, and in return they give him his friends' whereabouts and finally reunites with his friends.

They go search for help, and find an entire tribe of lemurs having a party. The lemurs introduce themselves, and explain that the island they are on is called Madagascar, but as they talk, they are attacked by the fossas, the enemies of the lemurs. The animals protect the lemurs, and help them collect food for another party. After the party, Gloria finds that Alex is acting strange because he didn't eat any food during the party, and tells Melman to go find steak while she goes to find Marty, Melman fails in finding steak, and meets up with Maurice, Gloria and Marty. Marty announces that Alex bit him on the butt. Maurice explains that lions are supposed to eat other animals, and that Alex never harmed animals before because in the zoo food was given to him, and the four flee to the beach. A warthog named Wilbur, who falls in love with Gloria and agrees to give them information if she gives him a kiss after the work, tells them that the rescue beacon on the beach is broken, but there are many things lying around the beach that they can use to rebuild the beacon. They collect enough materials and finally, they build a beacon resembling the Statue of Liberty.

Marty decides that he must go back for Alex. Meanwhile, Alex is hiding in the lair of the foosa, feeling ashamed of himself. He encounters the king of the fossa and defeats him, after which Marty arrives and rescues Alex and they give the leader to the penguins and reunite with Melman and Gloria at the beach. There, the lemurs thank the gang for their help.

In the Montmartre district of Paris, a dance known as the can-can, considered lewd, is performed nightly at the Bal du Paradis, a cabaret where Simone Pistache is both a dancer and the proprietor. On a night when her lawyer and lover François Durnais brings his good friend chief magistrate Paul Barrière to the café, a raid is staged by police and Claudine and the other dancers are placed under arrest and brought before the court.

Paul wishes the charges to be dismissed, but his younger colleague Philippe Forrestier believes that the laws against public indecency should be enforced. Visiting the café and pretending to be someone else in order to gain evidence, Philippe becomes acquainted with Simone and develops a romantic interest in her, but she is warned by Claudine that he is actually a judge.

Despite his attraction to her, Philippe proceeds with again raiding the café, and Simone is arrested. François attempts to blackmail Philippe with a compromising photograph in an effort to force him to drop the charges. However, Philippe had already decided to stop the case. He then shocks Simone by proposing marriage to her. When François comes to visit her, she warns him that she will accept the proposal if he does not marry her himself, but he refuses the notion of ever marrying. Meanwhile, Paul tries dissuade Philippe from the marriage, believing such an arrangement would end his career, but Philippe ignores his advice. Conspiring to sabotage the engagement, Paul arranges a party for the couple aboard a riverboat, during which François gets Simone drunk and encourages her to perform a bawdy routine in front of the upper-class guests. Humiliated, Simone jumps off the boat and refuses to see Philippe again, writing to him that she cannot in good conscience become his bride.

Simone obtains a loan from François to stage a ball, insisting he accept the deed to the café as collateral. On the night of the ball, Simone gets her revenge by arranging for the police to raid the café and arrest François, now the legal proprietor. At the ensuing trial, Simone is called to testify but does not have the heart to give evidence against François. As the case is to be dismissed for lack of evidence, the president of a local moral league demands that action must be taken against the lewd performance. Paul suggests that the court view the dance firsthand to determine that it is indeed indecent. A can-can is performed to the approval of all, who agree that it is not obscene. When the police nonetheless escort Simone to a jail wagon, she is startled to find François inside, and even more surprised when he finally proposes.

Taken from the game's instructions:

''A wave of insurrection has left the earth littered with bombs primed to explode and destroy mankind. Your commission is to clear the pyramids of ancient Egypt, castles of medieval Britain and hustling, bustling modern day New York City of this danger before their history becomes just a history. Hurry time is not on your side, neither are the many enemies left to harass you.''

The events of the novel take place between 1946 and 1948, primarily on the Near Northwest Side of Chicago. The title character is Francis Majcinek, known as "Frankie Machine," a young man of about 30 who is a gifted card dealer and an amateur drummer. While serving in World War II, Frankie is treated for shrapnel in his liver and medicated with morphine. He develops an addiction to the drug, although initially in the story he believes he can control his habit.

Frankie lives in a small apartment on Division Street in a Polish neighborhood with his wife, Sophie (nicknamed "Zosh"). Sophie has been using a wheelchair since a drunk-driving accident caused by Frankie (although the novel implies that her paralysis is psychological in nature). She spends most of her time looking out the window and watching the nearby elevated rail line. She takes out her frustrations by fighting with her husband, and she uses his guilt to keep him from leaving her. The turmoil in their relationship only spurs on his addiction.

Frankie works nights dealing in backroom card games operated by "Zero" Schwiefka. He aspires to join the Musicians' Union and work with jazz drummer Gene Krupa, but this dream never materializes. His constant companion and protégé is Solly "Sparrow" Saltskin, a feeble-minded half-Jewish thief who specializes in stealing and selling dogs; Frankie gets Sparrow a job as a "steerer," watching the door to the card games and drawing in gamblers.

Often referring to his drug habit as the "thirty-five-pound monkey on his back," Frankie initially tries to keep Sparrow and the others in the dark about it. He sends Sparrow away whenever he visits "Nifty Louie" Fomorowski, his supplier. One night, while fighting in a back stairwell, Frankie inadvertently kills Nifty Louie. He and Sparrow attempt to cover up his role in the murder.

Meanwhile, Frankie begins an affair with a childhood friend, "Molly-O" Novotny, after her abusive husband is arrested. Molly helps Frankie fight his addiction, but they soon become separated when Frankie is imprisoned for shoplifting and she moves out of the neighborhood. Without Molly, he begins using drugs again when he is released.

Nifty Louie owed money to politically connected men, and finding his killer becomes a priority for the police department. Sparrow is held for questioning by the police, and he is moved from station to station to circumvent ''habeas corpus'' requirements. Eventually he breaks down and reveals what he knows, and Frankie is forced to flee.

While on the run, Frankie manages to find Molly at a strip club near Lake Street. He hides in her apartment and beats his addiction, but in the end the authorities learn where he is hiding. He barely manages to escape and gets shot in the foot, leaving Molly behind. He flees to a flophouse, but without any hope of reuniting with Molly or staying free, he hangs himself in his room on April Fools' Day, 1948.

The novel ends with a transcript of the coroner's inquest, as well as a poem for Frankie entitled "Epitaph."

Anita Halstead (Loretta Young) goes to see a magic act performed by Tony (David Niven), the "Great Arturo", after her bridal shower for her wedding to Don Burns (Broderick Crawford). Anita and Tony are immediately attracted to each other and get married. She becomes his assistant in the act.

One night, Tony becomes drunk in the company of a woman reporter and boasts he will jump out of an aircraft at with his hands handcuffed behind his back. When she prints his claim, he first tries to get out of it with a fake cast on his arm, but when he sees the thousands of fans, he goes through with it, freeing himself in mid-air and parachuting safely to the ground. He promises Anita that he will not attempt the dangerous stunt again, but soon breaks his word and performs it repeatedly all over the world.

Anita becomes weary of the constant travel and longs to settle down and start a family. Secretly, she sells her jewelry and has a house built in the Connecticut countryside. When it is completed, she shows Tony a picture of it, but his uninterested reaction stops her from telling him it is theirs. When he signs up for a two-year, round-the-world tour rather than take the vacation he had promised, she finally gives up. She leaves him and gets a divorce in Reno. Anita's grandfather, Bishop Peabody (C. Aubrey Smith), breaks the news to the distraught Tony.

On a sea cruise with her Aunt Abby (Billie Burke), Anita is surprised to run into her old fiancé Don. She gets the ship's captain to marry them. However, she spends their honeymoon night with her grandfather. The next night, Don insists on introducing her to his boss, Harley Bingham (Raymond Walburn), at a nightclub. The entertainment is none other than the Great Arturo, with his old assistant, Lola De Vere (Virginia Field). He soon persuades Bingham to let him perform at Bingham's company retreat at a resort, much to Anita's discomfort.

Mrs. Bingham (ZaSu Pitts) has a dilemma, though. They have not booked enough rooms to provide separate bedrooms for the unmarried Tony and Lola. Tony suggests he and Don share one room, while Anita and Lola take the other. During his stay, Tony tries unsuccessfully to persuade Anita to take him back. Meanwhile, the hapless Don becomes sick, and the doctor prescribes no physical activity of any sort for a month.

Bishop Peabody is told by his lawyer that Anita's divorce is not legal. Later, he informs his granddaughter that Tony will be doing his parachute stunt that day. She attends. Tony tells his valet and friend Benton (Hugh Herbert) that he hid a lockpick in the wrong airplane, but goes ahead with the trick anyway. He frees himself dangerously close to the ground. After he is pulled unconscious out of the water, Anita rushes to his side. When he regains consciousness, they are reconciled. In the final scene, they enter their Connecticut home.

Airos gets an invitation to a birthday party,but theres no room for the guy. Madly,he walks to the park,only problem:He doesn't know were the park is!Saria,Darunia,Story,Grim,Pit,and Ruto arrive,Angered,the mayor is worried where Airos is,and REALLY have a problem now! *'''Declined'''. We cannot accept unsourced suggestions or sources that are not reliable per the verifiability policy. Please provide sources with your suggestions. '''_{talk to} JD ^{wants e-mail}''' 23:51, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Airos gets an invitation to a birthday party,but theres no room for the guy. Madly,he walks to the park,only problem:He doesn't know were the park is!Saria,Darunia,Story,Grim,Pit,and Ruto arrive,Angered,the mayor is worried where Airos is,and REALLY have a problem now!

Meanwhile,Airos asks where he is,but is surrounded by a bunch of Ganster-bike riders called The Chums.After a while,he becomes a member of the chums,this is bad cause the kids at the party want our HERO REALLY BAD!

Airos had three ways to get out but is embarresed:

During one summer in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, three high school girls and best friends navigate changing realities and new feelings. Lanisha, Maria, and Joycelyn each have different family situations, romantic interests, moral codes and aspirations, but are close confidantes. The girls live in the same housing project and are all dedicated members of the Jackie Robinson Steppers, a community marching band that holds daily rehearsals in a local parking lot. The girls want to master the instruments they play in order to impress their conductor.

Aspiring singer Joycelyn works in a makeup boutique, while both Maria and Lanisha work at a bakery. Sometimes they talk about what they'll do after high school, but most of their conversations are about the immediate issues that face them daily. Foremost among them is the closing of the girls' high school due to an asbestos contamination, and the resulting challenge of finding a new school with a good reputation and planning the daily commute. These decisions become the catalyst for the girls setting out on increasingly divergent paths.

Maria learns she is pregnant by her boyfriend and has to make a decision about whether to keep the baby. Lanisha has faced a teen pregnancy herself before but chose to have an abortion. Maria eventually drifts towards the idea of having her baby.

A valuable diamond is stolen at a Los Angeles hotel and a man guarding it is killed. The thief, Noonan, hides it from police, first in the jacket of a customer, Bob Miles, and then in the pocket of a barber's apprentice, Wilbur Hoolick.

Wilbur, boarding a train to go home to Blitzen, Washington, pretends to be an eleven-year-old in order to purchase a ticket for half price. Noonan sits beside him, still trying to retrieve the stolen jewel. Wilbur gets the impression that the thief is a jealous husband. He hides in the compartment of Nancy Collins, a teacher at a private girls' school. Feeling sorry for "young" Wilbur traveling alone, she allows him to stay there for the duration of the train ride.

During a stop-over, Gretchen Brendan, the jealous daughter of the school's headmistress, boards the train and finds out that Nancy is sharing her compartment with "a man." Gretchen hurries to the school to let Nancy's fiancee, Bob, in on this news, then tries to get Nancy dismissed. In order to protect Nancy's job and reputation, Wilbur must continue the charade of pretending to be a child. He accompanies "Aunt Nancy" to the all-girl school. The jewel thief follows them.

Along the way, Wilbur falls in love with Nancy, although she still thinks of him as a little boy. Noonan pretends to be Wilbur's father and regains possession of the diamond. But the police have arrived and a speedboat chase ensues. In the end, the thief is captured and Wilbur's identity is revealed. Nancy still loves Bob, but he is off to join the Army and discovers that Wilbur is his barber.

Rick Todd is a struggling painter and smooth-talking ladies' man. His goofy young roommate Eugene Fullstack is an aspiring children's author who has a passion for comic books, especially those of the mysterious and sexy "Bat Lady".

Each night, Eugene has horrific screaming nightmares inspired by those ultra-violent comics, which he describes aloud in his sleep. They are about the bizarre bird-like superhero "Vincent the Vulture" who is, according to Eugene's nocturnal babblings, the "defender of truth and liberty and a member of the Audubon Society" and is "half-boy, half-man, half-bird with feathers growing out of every pore" and a "tail full of jet propulsion". Also known as "Vultureman" or more simply "The Vulture", the golden helmeted hero soars through space from his "homogenized space station" orbiting the Milky Way to battle his shapely but sadistic purple-eyed archenemy "Zuba the Magnificent", who hates Vincent because "she's allergic to his feathers" and who enjoys blasting big "oooozing" holes into his highly resilient flying form ("It'll take more than that to stop me!") with her "atomic pivot gun".

A neighbor in their apartment building, Abigail Parker, is a professional artist who works for a New York comic book company called Murdock Publishing and is the creator of the "Bat Lady". Her energetic horoscope-obsessed roommate is Bessie Sparrowbush, who is secretary to her publisher Mr. Murdock and Abigail's model for the flying bat-masked superheroine. Bessie develops a crush on Eugene, who is unaware that she is his beloved "Bat Lady" in the flesh.

Abigail becomes frustrated at work at the increasingly lurid and bloodthirsty stories the money-hungry Murdock demands. She quits to become an anti-comics activist, dragging Eugene into her crusade as an example of how trashy comic books can warp impressionable minds at the same time that Rick gets a job with the company after pitching the adventures of "Vincent the Vulture" from Eugene's dreams. Rick attains success at his new job, but after falling for Abigail he keeps his work a secret from both her and Eugene.

Unbeknownst to all, Eugene's dreams also contain the real top-secret rocket formula "X34 minus 5R1 plus 6-X36" that Rick publishes in his stories. With spies all around them, they manage to entertain at the annual "Artists and Models Ball" and capture the enemy, preserving national security.

The book is told in first-person narrative by an unnamed Catholic priest who appears to be Andrew Greeley. The narrator makes frequent allusions to other works by the book's author, claiming them as his own, although the author denies this relationship when writing as himself in the book and refers to the narrator as a separate person.

The narrator volunteers to beta test a new type of computer game for a programmer friend named Nathan. Called ''Duke and Duchess'' (though the title is changed to ''God Game'' at the end of the book), the game puts the player in the role of God for a small swords and sorcery world. However, after a violent lightning storm, the narrator discovers that the game's crude CGA graphics have become live video, and that he is now responsible for the inhabitants of a small, but very real, world somewhere else in space and time — a world that threatens to run away from his control and into total chaos.

Reluctantly cast into the role of God (often referred to as "The Lord Our God"), the book's narrator continues playing the game and strives to create peace between the two warring sides. He finds that both sides pray to him or to the "Other Person", aka, God. His closest ally in trying to create this peace is Ranora, an ilel - a fairy-like character who is attributed with supernatural powers by the game's inhabitants but mostly seems to distract and inspire them through her flute-playing and dancing. The ilel has been assigned to the Duke, but dances wherever she wishes to go. The priest finds that it is "hell being God," as most of his characters, even when obeying, create further problems for him. Minor characters want to be major ones, then change their mind. Since he is not actually God and lacks omniscience, the narrator cannot always predict the outcome of his directives. There is comic relief provided by groups of dissidents who try to sabotage God's plans and whom he repeatedly smites by "divine" wrath using the game's controls.

As the narrator continues to play the game, he starts to see parallels between characters in the game and people in his own life with similar events happening on both sides of "Planck's Wall" as he refers to it. He starts to suspect that the universes are influencing each other in some way and questions his own responsibility in both. At times, characters from the game crossover to speak to him directly in his dreams, and he later finds evidence that they were actually there in his home, not mere figments. During the dreams, they have extended conversations that provide deeper insight into the personalities of the characters and their relationships to the narrator as God.

Finally, the narrator is able to broker peace in the game but, when he leaves the game for an extended period, those opposed to peace strive to undo all his good work. Ranora crosses the Wall to implore him to return, and he must work a miracle to save the Duke's life as the bad guys have convinced the Duchess he needs to be sacrificed in a pagan ritual.

Throughout the book, it is indicated that the game is later successfully marketed with its original CGA graphics and significant enhancements. The recordings of the gameplay that the narrator made are analyzed by teams of scientists but kept from the public due to concerns that the content would be too disturbing with its implications of a real alternate universe.

After Philip's older sister and sole family member Helen marries, he goes off to live with his new step sister Lucy. He has trouble adjusting at first, thrown into the world different from his previous life and abandoned by his sister while she is on her honeymoon. To entertain himself he builds a giant model city from things around the house: game pieces, books, blocks, bowls, etc. Then, through some magic, he finds himself inside the city, and it is alive with the people he has populated it with. Some soldiers find him and tell him that two outsiders have been foretold to be coming: a Deliverer and a Destroyer. Mr. Noah, from a Noah's Ark playset, tells Philip that there are seven great deeds to be performed if he wants to prove himself the Deliverer. Lucy, too, has found her way into the city and joins Philip as a co-Deliverer, much to his chagrin.

Friends and future seventh-year (upper primary school) students Sofie, Amanda and Emma anxiously await the start of term. This is virtually no major change education-wise, but a social watershed moment when cliques come into play, more or less serious relationships start being developed, and students, to hear them tell it, leave behind childish things to move into their teens; certainly the three girls are confident in how grown up they now are.

Sofie develops a crush on Mouse, a ninth-year and the local heartthrob. Mouse takes slight notice of her and tells her about an upcoming party. There he tries to hook up Sofie with Sebastian "Sebbe", a relatively quiet and awkward boy from his group. Sebbe and Sofie end up alone and drunk in a bedroom. At the prodding of his friends Sebbe asks for a blow job, which Sofie refuses to do; then Sebbe requests a hand job, which she agrees to do but doesn't know how. He compares the act to emptying a ketchup bottle. Ideally he would have described it more accurately; in a scene featuring prosthetic frontal male nudity, Sofie grabs his penis and, thinking Sebbe meant a glass ketchup bottle, delivers a few sharp strikes with her palm. The situation then breaks up.

After this, knowing that Sebbe has been hurt, Sofie leaves the room and gets extremely drunk. Mouse then proceeds to take advantage of what has occurred by assaulting her while she is passed out. The guys take pictures of her in compromising positions, but Sebbe holds back from joining in. The next day, the pictures of her are all over the place and Mouse is spreading rumours about her. Every time she has to pass him, he and his friends grope her. To the teachers, it looks like he has a harmless crush on her. Her dad finds out when someone sends him a picture anonymously. He tells her that if she didn't dress so provocatively, the guys might not respond in such a crude manner. Sofie leaves and is at the underground station when she runs into Sebbe again. They see Mouse coming and so they run to his house. They have the awkward first conversation, as Sebbe knows more of what went on than she did. They listen to some of his music and he starts to hit on her a bit. At one point, while at the underground station, he compliments her breasts, which she doesn't appreciate and leaves. He realises he's said the wrong thing, but it's too late.

Sofie's best friends don't understand what is going on with her. They hear what other students say about her, and they care what others think of them. They therefore dump her as a friend and try to get accepted into the "in crowd" at school, which means becoming friends with Beatrice, the queen bee. They get invited to a party at someone's house. Sofie shows up at the party, uninvited. Her friends ignore her. She goes to a window and jumps. Next, she is shown being taken to the hospital. Amanda runs after the ambulance and the paramedics let her in. At the hospital, Sofie is shown, not paralysed, but unable to move. Her dad arrives at the hospital, and when Amanda tries to open up to him, he turns a blind eye and goes straight to his daughter's side. After Sofie returns home, Amanda and Emma repeatedly call her mobile phone, but she refuses to answer it. When they come to her house, Sofie tells them to "go to hell" because they did not stand by her like good friends should.

Sofie eventually returns to her school, dressed the way an upper primary school student should. She sees Mouse again and, as a safeguard against future assault, injures him in the groin. He then screams "that fucking whore" and tries to throw a chair at her, but Amanda puts her foot in front of him causing him to slip onto the floor. Everyone in the school is laughing at him, and his friends do not stand behind him. After Sofie and her friends run away, Sebbe runs after them. He proceeds to apologise, and tells her that he likes her a lot and wants to be friends with her. He suggests that he cook them dinner at his place, to which she responds "maybe". The final scene shows the two eating dinner, with a bottle of ketchup on the table.

Two years after Box Network executives canceled Planet Express' contract, the executives are fired and Planet Express is back "on the air." As the crew celebrates, Hermes is decapitated, causing his wife LaBarbara to leave him. His head is placed in a jar while his body is repaired. Lars, who performs the procedure, flirts with Leela, much to Fry's chagrin.

During a delivery to a nude beach planet, Leela discovers a tattoo of Bender on Fry's buttocks. Alien scammers (Nudar, Fleb and Schlump) obtain the crew's personal information and infect Bender with an obedience virus, allowing them to seize control of Planet Express. The scammers discover that Fry's tattoo has a code that allows time travel into the past. Nibbler warns the scammers against using the code.

The scammers have Bender use the code to steal valuable objects from Earth's past, storing them in a cave beneath the Planet Express building. Hermes has Bender retrieve an earlier version of his body so he can win back his wife. Leela and Lars date, further depressing Fry.

Once the scammers have history's treasures, they decide to eliminate the time code by killing Fry. Fry uses the code to escape to January 1, 2000, just after he was frozen. The scammers send Bender after him. Bender arrives before Fry, creating a duplicate of himself when he has to use the bathroom. Another Bender from "way at the end" appears, opens Fry's cryogenic tube and puts the tattoo on his butt. When Fry arrives, the first duplicate of Bender inadvertently initiates a self-destruct due to not going to the bathroom. Fry shoves that Bender into another tube, then escapes. The original Bender spends twelve years hunting Fry before seemingly killing him by blowing up his apartment.

Bender reports his success to the scammers, who erase the time code and the virus. The crew holds a memorial for Fry, but he suddenly appears. Fry says he created a duplicate of himself, which remained in the past while he accidentally fell into his cryo-tube. When Fry (plus the Fry that was originally frozen) awoke 1,000 years later, the present Fry froze himself until the current year. The Fry in 2000 spent the years before Bender's attack working at Panucci's Pizzeria, then at an aquarium caring for Leelu, an orphaned narwhal. He also spent time with his family and tended to his beloved dog Seymour Asses. Nibbler removes the tattoo from Fry to keep the scammers from further abusing it. Leela and Lars decide to marry, but during the wedding, Hermes is again decapitated. Professor Farnsworth says that Hermes' body would have died anyway; time paradox duplicates are doomed to die prematurely. Lars panics and breaks up with Leela.

The scammers trick Earth President Richard Nixon into giving Earth to them. Exiled to Neptune, the population assembles a fleet with the aid of Robot Santa, Kwanzaabot and the Hanukah Zombie. Hermes has his brain wired into the ship's battle computer, allowing him to destroy the scammers' fleet and win back his wife.

Fry arranges for Leela to meet with Lars at the cryogenic lab. Having survived the attack, Nudar ambushes them. Lars tricks Nudar into approaching the Bender duplicate on self-destruct and holds him against the duplicate, who explodes, killing them. The explosion reveals the Bender tattoo on Lars.

During Lars' funeral, the Planet Express crew learn from his video will that he was the duplicate of Fry who survived Bender's attack in 2012; the explosion changed his appearance and voice. Lars froze himself to return to the future and be with Leela. When he learned that time paradox duplicates were doomed, he canceled the wedding to spare Leela the pain of his death.

Bender removes Lars' tattoo and travels to 2000 to place it on Fry in the cryogenic tube so that the events that transpired "make any sense at all". Upon returning, Bender emerges with all the duplicates from his stealing sprees. Nibbler urges everyone to evacuate the universe before swallowing himself. The Bender duplicates explode, causing a tear in the fabric of space, leading to the events of "The Beast with a Billion Backs".

In Adelaide, Australia, airline pilot David Keller survives the crash of his Boeing 747-200, unhurt despite all of its 300 passengers dying in the accident. With no memories of the accident, he starts to suffer strange supernatural visions, guiding him to suspect that something happened in the crash and that the accident maybe was not an accident.

Back at home, Keller attempts to return to his normal life, but is troubled by photographers attempting to photograph him and sell the images to newspapers. One photographer, whom Keller assaults, returns home where his girlfriend begins to develop the photographs. The man witnesses a young girl in his yard, and follows her as she beckons to a nearby cemetery; he is perplexed as she seems to appear and disappear right before him. The apparition of the child—a victim of the plane crash—reveals herself to have burn scars on her face, terrifying the photographer. He attempts to flee, but is cornered by the apparition on a set of train tracks, where he is killed by a passing train.

A vigil is held at the crash site, where a Catholic priest gives a sermon for the victims' families and others. After the vigil, Keller is approached by Hobbs, a clairvoyant who witnessed the plane crash from the ground, and who claims to have been contacted by the spirits of the victims. Keller visits Hobbs at her home and rebuffs her, after which she attacks him and the two get into a physical altercation, in which both seem to lose control of their bodies, experiencing the untethered emotions of the victims.

Later, Hobbs is impelled to visit the home of the photographer who was killed by the train. As Hobbs observes the house from outside, the photographer's girlfriend begins developing photographs in their dark room, only to find the photographs develop into disturbing portraits of the burned crash victims. The woman, attacked by supernatural forces, is chopped to death by a large paper cutter.

Hobbs brings Keller to visit with the Catholic priest before the two decide to return to the crash site. Hobbs brings Keller inside the plane wreckage, where she seats him in the intact cockpit. Keller begins to experience regressive memories of the events leading up to the crash, which entail a passenger finding a bomb onboard the plane which subsequently detonated, causing the plane to lose control. Keller awakens from the vision and he and Hobbs flee the crash site. Tewson, one of Keller's peers investigating the crash, arrives shortly after and is stabbed to death by an unseen figure.

Utilizing Hobbs's psychic impressions, Keller drives around the city as she directs him. The two arrive at an airplane hangar where Keller finds Slater, one of his peers from the airline, armed with a shotgun. Slater admits to having planted the bomb on the aircraft, hoping to kill Keller so that he could wrangle further control of the airline. Slater shows no remorse for the crime, deeming the 300 passengers as "nobodies". Moments later, the screams of the victims fill the hangar, and a large airplane propelling suddenly bursts into flames, triggering an inferno that burns both Keller and Slater to death. Hobbs watches from outside the hangar in horror as Keller stumbles out of it, engulfed in flames.

The following day, as the wreckage crew hauls away portions of the crashed plane, they discover Keller's burnt corpse seated in the cockpit.

The story opens with a short explanation of Earth's ancient history. The Earth was once populated by a great empire that was at war with an alien race of pure energy. The enemy attacked with weapons that took over metal machinery and turned it against its builders. Earth finally gains the upper hand with a new weapon, but it runs out of control and the planet is destroyed. Only a single example of the enemy weapons survives, falling into slumber in a shelter as no Earth machines remain to possess. After countless years, humanity arises.

An eight-man construction crew is building an airstrip and related facilities on a small Pacific island during the course of World War II. As part of their construction equipment, they have a Caterpillar D7 bulldozer. It has been nicknamed "Daisy Etta" by one of the workers, a mispronunciation of De-Siete, D7 in Spanish. To build the airstrip, they plan on filling a swamp with stone from an outcrop at the top of a nearby hill. Daisy Etta is sent to break up the stone, which the foreman realizes is unlike anything he has seen before.

As they dig, they break open the ancient shelter, releasing the enemy weapon which possesses the bulldozer. It goes on a rampage, hunting down the crew and killing them. Ultimately, only three of the original crew remain and one of them goes insane. The two remaining men review what they have seen and realize that there was a brief lull in the action after the bulldozer was hit by an arc welder. They lure the dozer into water that is connected to the welder power supply, electrocuting the being.

While trying to write a report on what happened, the two sane workers are despairing of anyone believing them. Then, a Japanese air raid bombs the whole area below them, including the places that the bulldozer damaged and the graves of their fellow workers. One worker tears up the report he was writing and throws it in the air, thrilled that an explanation is now available — enemy action in wartime.

Hoping to improve his financial lot, petty thief Hawk Chovinski (McGrail) hires a dancing instructor to teach him how to bear himself like a gentleman. His lessons completed, Hawk then poses as a European nobleman, intending to trap a wealthy wife. Yolande Cowles (Baird) sees through Hawk's pose but falls in love with him anyway.

The plot is a version of Bram Stoker's ''Dracula'', with inspiration from F.W. Murnau's ''Nosferatu'' and John William Polidori's ''The Vampyre''. The protagonist, James Patterson, is travelling in Transylvania after losing in the Olympic fencing event being held in Sweden. James is on his way to the wedding of his sister, Rebecca, at Castle Malachi, where she is to be wed to the son of the wealthy Romanian Count. The Pattersons are a poor, but proud, aristocratic family of the British nobility.

When James arrives at the castle, something seems wrong, as there are crosses nailed to the castle's door. After entering the castle, he finds Father Aville, a friend of the Pattersons, and he tells James that his future brother-in-law is a vampire, his family members are being held prisoner, and the Count has intentions to use Rebecca as a virgin sacrifice to release Lord Malachi. Father Aville has several volumes of an "Encyclopedia of the Undead", that James can optionally collect throughout the game. James must fight his way through hellish demons and vampires that guard his friends and family as quick as he can. If James does not locate and rescue certain family members in time, they will be sacrificed, one by one; the more allies James fails to save, the stronger Lord Malachi will become.

Regardless of how many people James rescues, he is unable to prevent the Count from sacrificing Rebecca. After a struggle that ends with the Count being destroyed by sunlight, James battles and defeats the newly summoned Lord Malachi. Although James is left distraught over the death of his sister, the closing narration states he proved himself to be a true hero.

A fictional documentary about changing Japanese eating habits and the colorful thieves that swindle the restaurants which serve them. The film begins with the origins of Japanese food stalls following the countries defeat in World War II. The first grifter introduced is Moongaze Ginji. He requests soba noodle soup with a raw egg (also known as "Moongaze Soba"). He declares the dish to be an imitation of a landscape.

The main body of the film follows a predictable pattern. A grifter is introduced, his food preference demonstrating the continued decline of traditional food in Japan, and his grift comically illustrated. Intercut at random are popular news event stories that always emphasise Japan losing its way and America and its allies' cultural and military despotism. Vignettes include Japanese children exploding from hula hoop use, drunk businessmen imitating Neil Armstrong, as anomalies of natural disasters coinciding with the ongoing cultural transformation underline nature itself disproving changes in Japan. Yukio Mishima's suicide is also referred to as an effect. Mishima committed suicide by seppuku to illustrate his support for Imperial Japan and the Emperor as a god.

One of the last grifters is Frankfuter Tatsu whose monologue is censored in each sentence because it refers to Disney Land. "I could only think of "beeeep-Land" he declares over and over. He is obsessed with American culture while simultaneously being censored by American Legal system despots. When asked why he is so interested in Disney Land he says he knows it is empty and fake, but full of everything, and nothing.

The story is technically set in the present day (the first episode briefly shows a contemporary Earth; it is destroyed on the first page, and the last human in the universe, a survivor from the International Space Station, is ignominiously killed on the third), but revolves around a host of bizarre aliens using very advanced technology.

In the first series little is explained about the lead figure other than it is nearly indestructible, seeking out and destroying other aliens for reasons unknown. In the second series the character is shown to be some kind of liquid being encased in the suit. By the third, it becomes clear that 'Shakara' is an instrument of vengeance created by a now-extinct race of the same name, although the being is beginning to think for itself.

Unwanted and ignored by her eternally squabbling parents, a young girl is spiritually torn apart by forces beyond her control. Her parents do further damage to her battered psyche by giving her mixed messages concerning sex and religion. However, her self-esteem dwindles to microscopic proportions on account of a series of worthless boyfriends. After suffering a nervous breakdown, she is placed in an asylum, where she is treated for the first time as a human being rather than a nuisance by a compassionate psychiatrist.

The comedy centres around Peter, a bachelor in his mid-thirties. He desperately wants to win back his girlfriend Jana and asks his friend Midge for help. Midge, another loner unable to form a long-lasting relationship with a woman, has gone through many break-ups and therefore considers himself an expert. Peter also has to visit his discontented parents.

Peter's mother ruined the family with her endless preaching. She has developed a strong passion for blood donation, and is agitated about the war in Chechnya. Peter's father, a former commentator for Communist newsreel, escapes to his own thoughts. He is preoccupied with the idea of whether a light bulb would fit in a mouth. Peter's neighbour, a composer engaged in a battle to receive royalties for performances of his music by synthesizers in elevators, is also very eccentric.

The cast includes 15 characters. The character of Petr's pedophile boss is sometimes omitted.

Driving at night with his lights off, high school sports star Chris Pratt crashes into a combine stalled on the road. Two of his passengers are killed, while he and his girlfriend Kelly survive. The crash leaves Chris with lasting mental impairments, including anterograde amnesia and anger management issues.

Four years later, Chris takes classes to learn new skills, including the simple sequencing of daily tasks to compensate for his inability to remember, and keeps notes to himself in a small notebook. Challenged by a tough case manager to build a life despite his injuries, he is emotionally supported by his roommate, a blind man named Lewis, but receives only financial support from his wealthy family. Chris works nights cleaning a small-town bank, and his only friend besides Lewis is Ted, a Sheriff's Deputy who checks in on Chris regularly. Chris repeatedly tries to convince the bank's manager, Mr. Tuttle, to allow him to apply for a teller job, to no avail.

Chris comes under the scrutiny of a gang planning to rob the bank. Their leader Gary, who knew Chris from high school and resented his wealth and popularity before his accident, befriends him and uses a young woman, Luvlee Lemons, to seduce him. Taunted by the gang about his limitations since the accident, Chris initially goes along with their scheme. His frustrations trickle down into confrontations with Lewis and Ted.

When the gang arrives the night of the robbery, Chris tells them he has changed his mind, but is forced to empty the vault at gunpoint. Bringing Chris doughnuts, Ted stumbles upon the robbery. Realizing they've been discovered, one of the robbers, Bone, begins shooting. Ted kills two of the robbers, Marty and Cork, and seriously wounds Gary before Bone maneuvers around and shoots Ted in the back, executing him with a second shot. Escaping in the getaway car, Chris realizes he has the stolen money, and is compelled to return to the site of his accident, where he buries the money. Gary, seriously wounded, escapes with Bone. Returning to his apartment, Chris sees the lights on and realizes something is wrong. He calls and learns Gary and Bone have taken Lewis hostage to get the money back. Chris, using his new sequencing skills, hatches a plan to stay alive and save his friend, but the robbers catch him napping at the arranged meeting place and force him to take them to the buried cash.

While Chris digs in the snow for the money, Gary's condition deteriorates. Chris gives one of the two bags to Bone, who is preparing to execute Lewis, but Chris kills Bone with the shotgun stashed in the other bag. Gary collapses and dies. Chris returns the money and turns himself in, but the FBI investigation concludes that he was not responsible due to his mental condition and, because the robbers failed to disconnect the video surveillance, the FBI was able to see Chris was forced to act at gunpoint.

Chris and Lewis reconcile and open a restaurant together with a loan from the bank. Chris hopes Kelly will forgive him for the loss of her leg in the accident and that one day he will find the courage to talk to her again.

The tale traces the fortunes of the family of Loring of the Manor of Tilford in Surrey, many of whose members had been prominent in the service of the Norman and Angevin kings of England, against the backdrop of the Black Death. The tale starts with the problems the family and its last scion, Nigel Loring, face at the hands of the monks of Waverley Abbey, up to the coming of Sir John Chandos.

Playing host to King Edward III of England, Nigel asks to be taken into his service. His request is granted and he is made squire to Sir John Chandos. In order to make himself worthy of the hand of the Lady Mary, daughter of Sir John Buttesthorn, he vows to perform three deeds of honour.

Nigel and his follower Samkin Aylward arrive at Winchelsea, whence they take passage to Calais. En route, he manages to intercept Peter the Red Ferret, a French spy who had stolen certain papers of Sir John Chandos. Since these papers had some bearing upon the English defense of Calais in view of a projected French attack, it was considered necessary in the extreme to recover them. Having defeated the spy in single combat, Nigel is overcome by his wounds, and is forced to lay up in the Castle of Calais.

When the king visits the young squire to praise his courage, he mentions that the spy is to be hanged. This outrages Nigel, who had promised the Red Ferret quarter, and he angers the king by opposing the decision. Although the king is enraged by the squire's impertinence, at the intercession of Sir John Chandos, he yields. Nigel Loring then proceeds to set the Red Ferret free after having received his promise not to violate the truce, and then makes a visit to the Lady Mary, to fulfil his promise to her.

Shortly thereafter, Nigel is sent on an expedition to Brittany under the command of Sir Robert Knolles. In the course of their journey, they encounter a Spanish battle fleet in the Straits of Dover, and in conjunction with the English fleet from Winchelsea, inflict a severe defeat upon the Spaniards. The tale is a rendition of the Battle of Les Espagnols sur Mer (August 1351), as chronicled by Froissart, with a fictional storyline weaved in skilfully with the history. Nigel Loring carries himself well, but achieves nothing of note besides boarding a Spanish carrack to assist Prince Edward, the Black Prince, under the directions of Sir Robert, when the prince and his men were outnumbered by Spaniards.

As the army marches into Brittany, a Frenchman is observed tracking the English column. Nigel is entrusted by Sir Robert Knolles with the task of capturing the Frenchman, a task he executes admirably. But when in the act of conducting him to the English camp, they find that the English army had been attacked and some of its longbowmen, among them Samkin Aylward, captured by the robber baron of La Brohinière, nicknamed ''the butcher'', for his practice of executing captives who refuse to join his levées. The English troops try to storm the castle of La Brohinière, by a frontal assault, which fails dismally, with the death of the French captive who, being of noble birth, assists the English in destroying this common nemesis.

With the assistance of Black Simon of Norwich, a very prominent character in the series, and man-at-arms in the army, and some of the peasants of the surrounding country who hate La Brohinière for his cruelty and deeds, Nigel penetrates the connecting passage between the main castle and one of its outworks. In the ensuing assault, the castle is taken and La Brohinière killed by his captives. As a token of appreciation of Nigel's planning and execution of a very difficult task, besides communicating the squire's valour to King Edward and Sir John Chandos, Sir Robert Knolles, at Nigel's request instructs his messenger to convey the news of his deed to the Lady Mary.

The English army proceeds to the Castle of Ploermel, then in the hands of the English knight Richard of Bambro', to advance the English arms in Brittany against the French at Josselin. But news of a truce between England and France precedes their arrival and serves to dampen their spirit until a visit by the French seneschal Robert of Beaumanoir, Master of Josselin. The French lord proposes a passage of arms, and since a reason would be necessary to justify such a violation of the truce, to the two kings of England and France, he proceeds to pick a mock-quarrel with Nigel Loring. Beaumanoir observes that "we have none of the highest of Brittany ... neither a Blois, nor a Leon, nor a Rohan, nor a Conan, fights in our ranks this day". Conan was in fact the personal name of several Dukes of Brittany.

In the jousts that thus ensue, the English arms are initially routed with Bambro' killed and Nigel felled, severely wounded. Though the English rally and sorely press the Bretons, by an underhand act, one of the Breton squires mounts his horse, when the conflict was supposed to be on foot, and rides upon the English crushing them.

This incident is a thinly veiled account of the famed Combat of the Thirty of March 1351, which is of importance in Breton history and in the annals of chivalry, as being an exemplary passage of arms. Sir Robert Knolles, who is held to have participated in the fictional jousts in ''Sir Nigel'', was also one of the original thirty combatants.

Subsequent to the joust, where he tries to take on Beaumanoir himself and is severely wounded, Nigel Loring is left to recover at the Castle of Ploermel by his comrades, and proceeds to convalesce in the course of a year, which sees the breaking of the truce, a defeat of French arms in Brittany and the declaration of another truce.

Nigel is by then made seneschal of the Castle of Vannes. It is then that Sir John Chandos summons him to Bergerac to accompany the Black Prince on a raid into France. This raid concludes in the Battle of Poitiers (September 1356). In the course of the battle, Nigel overcomes King John II of France but fails to receive his surrender not knowing the identity of his opponent and is thus unable to lay claim to the king's ransom. But since the king himself identifies the squire as his conqueror, the Black Prince awards Nigel Loring his golden spurs and dubs him a knight (the historical Neil Loring is older than the protagonist, and was knighted in 1340 at the Battle of Sluys).

Sir Nigel then returns to England where he weds the Lady Mary. The book concludes with a summary of Sir Nigel's life and the future, which had already been documented in ''The White Company''.

Miss Dove (Jennifer Jones), commonly referred to as "the terrible Miss Dove," is a prim and proper geography teacher who governs her classroom with strict disciplinary rules, dependable habits and a common-sense approach to life's everyday challenges. To the residents and former pupils of Liberty Hill, she is regarded as the epitome of gentility and wisdom.

On a typical day, her habits never varying, Miss Dove oils her creaking gate and walks to the schoolhouse, briefly stopping to address her neighbors along the way. As the school bell rings, she stands at the entrance to her classroom as each of her pupils gets in line and greets her with "Good morning, Miss Dove." During this morning's session, she reprimands David Burnham (Biff Elliot) for swearing and tells him that he must remain after class and write "Nothing is achieved by swearing" 20 times in his notebook. During David's detention, Miss Dove suddenly feels a sharp pain at the base of her spine and tells David to run and tell his father that she is ill.

Miss Dove puts her head down on her desk and begins to think about the day when her father died and changed her life forever. She had met a promising new beau when her father suddenly died. After his death, she learns that her father, who had been president of the local bank, "borrowed" a large sum of money and their home is heavily mortgaged. Miss Dove is determined to make the matter right and promises Mr. Porter (Robert Douglas), the new bank president, that she will repay the debt by becoming a teacher. Mr. Pendleton (Marshall Thompson) visits Miss Dove and proposes marriage, but she turns him down upon receiving a call from Mr. Porter telling her that he has obtained a position for her at Cedar Grove School.

Miss Dove returns to the present when Dr. Baker (Robert Stack) and Rev. Burnham arrive and form a seat with their arms to carry her from school through the streets of Liberty Hill to the hospital. She is admitted to her room by a former student, Billie Jean (Peggy Knudsen), who chatters incessantly along the way. Billie Jean, who left Liberty Hill and had a child out of wedlock, has returned to her hometown and is smitten with a police officer named Bill Holloway (Chuck Connors). Miss Dove fondly recalls Bill and tells Billie Jean that he was one of her best pupils. In a flashback, she remembers how he arrived to her classroom, a poor, unkempt boy being raised by his alcoholic grandmother. Over the years, Miss Dove gave Bill odd jobs and even bought him a suit for his grammar school (eighth grade) graduation. As Bill entered the Marines, he wrote to Miss Dove often, and when he returned to Liberty Hill, she was the first person he came to for advice about his future career.

The news of Miss Dove's hospitalization spreads, and she is soon visited by her former students. Another flashback shows Maurice Levine (Jerry Paris) when he came to Cedar Grove as a Jewish boy from Poland unable to speak English and was teased and chased by his classmates. Miss Dove taught him to speak English and arranged for her class to visit the Levine home for a special meal. He became a successful playwright, and Miss Dove traveled to New York to see his first play. Another visitor is amiable, friendly Frederick Makepeace (Eddie Firestone), who is doing time on a prison road-gang for petty theft, and had been in class with Maurice. Miss Dove has another flashback where she recalls how distraught Dr. Baker's wife Virginia ("Jincey") had been after she found out her original fiancé changed his mind about getting married. Jincey turned to Miss Dove for direction. Miss Dove told her she should go to her room at her sister's house and fall on her knees thanking God for His protection, and then look for something to do with her life to help her fellow man. Jincey then considered going into the nursing field. In still another story, there was a "run" on the local bank as frantic depositors waited in line to withdraw their savings. Miss Dove instead deliberately stalled for time as she very leisurely deposited her paycheck just as the teller windows closed at 3:00, angering other depositors. The next morning, the crisis passed as the bank received money from Federal authorities.

Dr. Baker informs Miss Dove that she must have surgery to remove a growth on the base of her spine. Mr. Porter offers to get Miss Dove a skilled surgeon in a distant city and have the civic club pay her full expenses, but she insists that Dr. Baker perform the surgery.

On the day of the surgery, classes are dismissed, and the townspeople wait outside the hospital for news of Miss Dove's operation. As she awakes, Dr. Baker tells her that the operation has been a success and that she will be all right. As the bells begin to ring throughout the town, Billie Jean tells Miss Dove that school was dismissed. In typical fashion, Miss Dove tells Dr. Baker that he must inform Mr. Spivey (Richard Deacon), the principal of the school, that the children must be returned to their classes in order to study for the state proficiency exams the following Monday. She goes into detail about what each class needs to review.

Canada-based Filipino siblings Anna and Johnny are asked by their dad to attend the wake of their grandmother (lola) and to represent their family in the reading of her will in Manila.

Together with their cousin, Vanessa, they inherit their lola's 19-hectare property/farm in rural Bulacan. The three of them get along, especially Johnny and Vanessa due to their shared vice. Johnny also gets along with his lola's adoptive autistic grandson, Tommy, who's also inherited part of the same property.

Mang Dante and Celia act as caretakers of the property and live with the inheritors.

Vanessa takes the siblings to the local marketplace - where a mysterious old woman (implied to be the human form of a manananggal, meaning "the one who removes" - a type of aswang that preys on pregnant women or sick people) briefly touches Anna's belly (an act which "marks" an intended victim) - and later the whole property together with Tommy. She also shows them her very own marijuana plantation there, which she believes will make them a fortune albeit illegally. Anna and Johnny are hesitant, but Vanessa says no one dares to go to their land as locals believe there are supernatural entities inhabiting it. Vanessa herself doesn't believe the tales, but it helped keep the stash a secret.

While checking out a particular mango tree nearby, Tommy appears to be talking to someone up there. Johnny, who was then recording their travel, catches something peculiar on tape.

Through either his dreams or drug-induced stupor, Johnny recalls some details of his time with his lola as a kid. She mainly shares with him the tale of the manananggal. It is revealed that he and his lola saw it in the said property at least once, and that she warned him never to enter the wooded area there. She also says that one day, he'll set things right.

Throughout their stay, the house is slowly revealed to be haunted by their lola's spirit. The spirit makes its presence felt to the trio. Johnny dismisses his experiences.

Tommy is shown to have the ability to "see" the ghost, as well as some other entities that dwell in the land.

The next day, Vanessa and her friends Ronnie, Paolo and Nico harvest some of their plants. Along the way, Ronnie and Nico litter, urinate and spit on some mounds on the forest floor. In Filipino folklore, such areas are considered as homes of dwendes (dwarves) which will curse anyone who disrespects their homes. On the way back, Ronnie and Nico's motorcycles mysteriously stall, prompting Vanessa and Paolo to go on ahead back to the house.

Tommy finds and plays with Johnny's drugs, but the latter does not find out. He is then forced to go sober for some time.

Meanwhile, Ronnie gets his motorcycle to start up, and leaves Nico behind. As Nico walks back to the house, he notices the mango tree. He throws rocks at it to get some of its fruits. He also sees cigars near its base - cigars which were placed by Mang Dante earlier as an offering - and takes some, angering an unseen entity.

Johnny reviews his footage from earlier by the same tree showing an entity called kapre, a tall hairy tree spirit which is benevolent to those who respect it but malevolent to those who are not.

Anna is revealed to be eight weeks pregnant, but not considering marrying her boyfriend. Johnny expresses his support for his sister.

That night, Nico fails to return. Tommy keeps saying that he's dead, but no one takes heed. Johnny suggests they find him, but Paolo advises against roaming the farm at that time. Ronnie suddenly becomes very sick.

Come morning, Paolo hires a local albularyo or medicine woman to cure Ronnie who apparently fell victim to the curse of a black dwarf. After she succeeds, Vanessa then hires her to exorcise the ghost haunting the house. Paolo goes home. Although the albularyo advises against this, Vanessa insists the exorcism to be performed due to her being a current owner of the property, unlike the ghost who is now just a former owner.

Johnny finds Tommy talking to someone at a shrine outside the house. He briefly catches a glimpse of lola (whose ghost he now believes he really has been seeing due to him being sober at the moment but still seeing the ghost) and gets Anna to the spot, who confirms she is able to feel a presence and smell lola's perfume but doesn't see her. Tommy then states that lola told him to go to the mango tree and runs off. Johnny follows, leaving Anna at the shrine. Shortly afterwards, Anna is attacked by the human form of the manananggal while Tommy and Johnny find Nico's body by the tree.

That night, Ronnie and Vanessa decide to have Tommy locked up at the barn as they believe it was him and not a kapre that killed Nico. This, despite the Johnny's footage showing the kapre.

Mang Dante asks Johnny to come with him to the mango tree immediately. As Mang Dante places offerings, Johnny again sees the kapre through his videocam's night vision. Mang Dante comes back and says the kapre wants to talk to lola's descendant. Johnny is reluctant because he's afraid and doesn't speak Tagalog. Mang Dante responds that entities don't use words to communicate. Johnny offers cigars, and the kapre shows him a vision of a manananggal's lair in the forest - a creature that his lola intended to get rid of in her younger days but was unable to.

At the barn, Celia tries to unlock the doors to let Tommy out. His noise attracts the manananggal, forcing Celia to retreat. It terrorizes Tommy for some time.

Back at the house, Anna wakes up at her room and hears Tommy's cries. She asks Ronnie and Vanessa to help her get him but they refuse and reveal that the manananggal is outside. She goes out, only to find the creature at the treetops nearby. The three of them shut all the windows and doors, while the manananggal flies around.

Johnny is able to find the manananggal's lair and throws salt all over its lower body half hidden there. This will prevent the creature from merging its flying part to its lower body. Realizing that the flying part isn't nearby, he quickly goes back to Mang Dante who's at the mango tree and they hurry back to the house.

Celia is able to free Tommy from the barn. They run back to the house to help Anna.

Vanessa tells Ronnie that the manananggal is after Anna only, and that they can escape. Ronnie reluctantly goes, but not before handing Anna a machete. They leave Anna behind.

The manananggal finally enters the house and gets the unborn child out of Anna using its tongue. Unable to fly indoors, it slowly crawls to finish off Anna. Celia and Tommy arrive and splash salt all over the creature, hurting it and momentarily paralyzing it. Johnny arrives, then throws a net to prevent it from flying. Mang Dante sets it on fire, which later burns down the whole house. The five of them escape before it collapses.

As Ronnie drives away on his motorcycle, Vanessa spots a white lady by the side of the desolate road. They pass her by a few times, after which Ronnie begins seeing it too. The white lady, revealed to be lola's spirit which was forced out earlier, suddenly appears in the middle of the road. They crash, causing Vanessa's death. Ronnie walks away dazed and heavily injured.

Johnny, Mang Dante, Celia and Tommy are seen working to rebuild the house. It is implied that Johnny will stay at the farm to take care of it. He and Tommy offer flowers at the shrine, which has pictures of lola and Vanessa. As they walk away, Vanessa's vengeful spirit appears behind them.

The play is set in Napoleonic times.

;Act 1 There is heightened anticipation as the local gossips of the town discuss the developing relationship between Miss Phoebe Throssel and Valentine Brown. Phoebe then confesses to her sister, Susan, that Brown intends to drop by later that day, and both are certain he means to propose. When he finally does appear, it is not to ask for Phoebe's hand in marriage but to announce his intention to join the fight in Europe against Napoleon. This leaves the girls devastated.

;Act 2 Ten years after the departure of Brown, we find the girls have set up a school in order to pay the rent. Phoebe has not accepted any other suitor and has allowed herself to become an "Old Maid" and school mistress. Phoebe, however, longs for her youth, and the return of Captain Brown only deepens her melancholy. "I am tired of being lady-like," she declares. With some encouragement from her maid, Patty, she creates the fictional character of Miss Livvy, a more energetic, flirtatious and naughty version of her younger self, and begins to tease Captain Brown who, captivated by her, persuades her and Susan to accompany him to the ball.

;Act 3

At the ball, and Phoebe is still playing the part of Miss Livvy. In this guise, she has captured the eyes of many of the young men and the scorn of ladies. However, Phoebe is now annoyed that Brown seems to prefer this unsubstantial 'young' flirt that she has created to her true personality and qualities. Her actions cause events to come to a head as her act is almost brought to light by the local gossiping girls Fanny Willoughby and Henrietta Turnbull. In a final confrontation with Captain Brown, we discover that he has found his love for Miss Phoebe and not for Miss Livvy, as he insists that "I have discovered for myself that the schoolmistress in her old maid's cap is the noblest Miss Phoebe of them all."

;Act 4 Miss Livvy still hangs heavy over the sisters: having been created, she is now difficult to dispose of. The local gossips watch for any sign of Miss Livvy and frequently visit the sisters' home. Brown comes to ask for Phoebe’s hand and is turned down without explanation. As a result, he becomes aware of the disguise and the sisters' plight and sets out to right all wrongs, even his own.

Ken is a mild-mannered man in his mid-twenties who, like many men his age, has interests that stopped developing during adolescence. On a visit to a local toy collectors' shop he acquires a rare alien action figure. Unexpectedly, Ken's world is turned inside out as the somewhat silly looking toy alters his life by benevolently giving him everything he has ever dreamed of and then callously taking it all back.

Ken's immature desires and indecisive nature are pit against a collection of seemingly normal, yet equally misguided characters who are meant to illustrate how people are victims of a socially implanted drive for things not in their own best interests.

Five cargo ships have been hijacked in the Irish Sea; ships carrying vast quantities of precious stones and gold bullion. The crews later turn up, but the ships have disappeared. Clearly, the hijackers are getting impeccable intelligence. The British Secret Service, under Rear-Admiral Sir Arthur Arnford-Jason (known as "Uncle Arthur") has planted agents on the ships – but only the ship's masters know of their presence. When no word is received from the agents, Phillip Calvert (who narrates the story) and Hunslett are sent to investigate.

They manage to track the latest hijacked ship – the ''Nantesville'', carrying £8 million in gold bullion – to the Scottish Highlands and the sleepy port town of Torbay on the Island of Torbay (patterned after Tobermory, on the Isle of Mull). Under cover of being marine biologists on a UNESCO project, they travel in the Firecrest, an outwardly normal but very specially equipped motor launch. Calvert boards the ship under cover of night and finds that the two agents planted aboard have been murdered. His chief suspect is Cypriot shipping magnate Sir Anthony Skouros, whose luxury yacht, ''Shangri-La'', is also anchored in Torbay.

Calvert barely escapes the murderous hijackers, and returns to his boat. But late at night, they are boarded by local police and plain-clothes men claiming to be customs officers seeking information on stolen chemicals. After the search and their departure, he finds the boat's well-concealed powerful radio to have been sabotaged.

While searching the surrounding area in a Fleet Air Arm Helicopter, Calvert meets the occupants of a castle, Lord Kirkside and his teenage daughter Susan, who both clearly want him away well from the castle, and a fierce gun-toting local on his private island.

As the helicopter brings Calvert back to Torbay, it comes under attack from the shore by machine-gun; and the pilot, Lieutenant Williams, is killed. The helicopter crashes, explodes and plummets into the sea. Calvert escapes from the helicopter after it sinks to the bottom. When he returns to Firecrest, he finds Hunslett is missing.

Not having received any further communications from his agents, Uncle Arthur arrives himself by commandeered RAF launch. Together, they combat boarders and make ready for sea. On trying to use a concealed radio, they find it has been stolen and Hunslett's body left in its place.

They are joined by Skouras's second wife, Charlotte, who claims to have escaped from his physical and psychological abuse of her. When a pirate speedboat approaches, Calvert rams it, shoots the occupants and blows up the boat in vengeance for Hunslett's death.

On the promise of a share of the insurance reward, Calvert recruits the assistance of Tim Hutchinson, a shark fisherman who has unrivalled knowledge of local water conditions and boat handling. Guessing that the missing bullion ships are being sunk to allow the gold to be offloaded invisibly, Calvert, formerly a marine salvage expert, dives into the bay and finds the Nantesville. He fights and kills Quinn, one of the divers, whom he has previously encountered and who he suspects killed Hunslett.

He then penetrates Kirkside's castle, disabling the guards, and questions Susan. He discovers a powerful radio transmitter and caches of gold bullion. He concludes that the castle's occupants are working under duress with the hijackers, as is the local police sergeant, whose son is being held hostage.

At midnight (eight bells) the shark fishermen ram the gates of the underground dock with their boat. The pirates are expecting them because, in a final twist, Charlotte has been transmitting Calvert's plans to them. Calvert, held at gunpoint and expecting to be killed, asks that the real story be explained to him, which Charlotte does. It emerges that Skouras is also an innocent victim of the pirates; one of several who are working under duress. His real wife is not dead, as is widely believed, but in a French nursing home – Charlotte Meiner is her cousin and also under threat.

The standoff is broken by the sudden but pre-planned arrival of a detachment of Royal Marine Commandos. The pirates are disarmed and the several hostages are freed.

Calvert tells Charlotte that he didn't believe her story, and that he knew from the beginning that she was faking, with information received from Uncle Arthur.

Calvert is a typical MacLean hero, world-weary and sometimes cynical, yet ultimately honorable, who must battle bureaucracy as well as the bad guys to solve the crime. Calvert's frantic search for the hijackers and for the hostages they hold takes him over the remote isles and sea lochs and forces him to make allies of some unlikely locals. As is usual with MacLean, the plot twists and turns, not all characters are as they seem to be at first introduction, and the double-crosses continue to the very last page.

''The Young Rebels'' was the story of a group of youthful guerrillas fighting on the Patriot side in the American Revolutionary War (a.k.a. The War of American Independence). They were part of the fictional "Yankee Doodle Society", based in Chester, Pennsylvania, in 1777. Their goal was to harass the British forces however they could and serve as spies for the rebels. The four main characters were Jeremy (Richard Ely), son of the mayor of Chester, Isak (Louis Gossett Jr.), a former slave, Henry (Alex Henteloff), a bright young, bespectacled man who looked a lot (by design) like a younger Benjamin Franklin, whom he greatly admired, and Elizabeth (Hilary Thompson), Jeremy's even-younger girlfriend. Any parallel between this "youth movement" and the one going on in the United States in real life at the same time that this show was aired was completely intentional. Aiding these young American rebels in their cause was a young French rebel, the Marquis de Lafayette (Philippe Forquet), who had come to their aid not just because he believed in their cause but also to learn how to export many of its principles to his native France.

The principal story follows three protagonists, named Jade, Opal, and Amber after the gemstones associated with them at birth, striving to overthrow the 'Council of Twelve' and 'Army of Darkness' that oppress the story's world. The trio first meet on their 14th birthdays, at the behest of their guardians, and discover a cipher, to investigate which they visit Jean Losserand, an explorer imprisoned for dissent, who directs them to the oracle 'Oonagh'. To reach her, the protagonists and their ally 'Adrien de Rivebel' lead an exodus into the realm 'Fairytale', where humans coexist with super-humans outside the council's rule. During the exodus, Opal is wounded, but is saved at the house of Adrien's friend, Owen d'Yrdahl. Following Opal's recovery, she accompanies Jade and Amber to Oonagh, who reveals that on the coming summer solstice will be a battle between the Army of Darkness and the Army of Light, and that they therefore must persuade Death to end her strike. Having done so, they rejoin the Army of Light, where Amber identifies its leader, called 'Elyador' ('Chosen One' in the story's fictional language), at his own arrival. Thereafter the three protagonists observe the battle alongside their principal antagonist, the Thirteenth Councillor. Upon perceiving the Army of Light in danger, the protagonists leap from the Councillor's tower, provoking a 'golden rain' to inspire the Army of Light, which thereupon destroys the Army of Darkness. This done, the victorious leaders discover a 'Seed of hope', which they plant to ensure their victory.

A second storyline follows Elyador himself, amnesiac and itinerant, until his reaching the Army of Light. A third depicts the thoughts of 'Joa', a child dying of an unidentified disease, who observes the three protagonists in a series of hallucinations. Inspired by them, she summons an estranged friend (identified with Elyador) to convey a final message: "My dreams gave life back to me. Now I must give dreams back to life".

The film has a fairly crude and unfocused plot, but the movie tells the tale of Gwar's conflict with the Morality Squad, after the theft of Oderus Urungus' "Cuttlefish of Cthulhu" (or penis). Gwar is called to New York City to shoot a commercial for Gwar cereal, a cornflake-like food that is sprinkled with cocaine rather than sugar, turning kids into addicts.

As the Morality Squad prepares for their attack on Gwar, their religious representative, Father Bohab, is convicted of child molestation and sodomy of a twelve-year-old choirboy. Despite the clear evidence of Bohab's crimes, the Squad feel he was framed by Gwar (particularly by the band's manager, Sleazy P. Martini, who took part in exposing him); he is released and the charges are dropped. While Bohab is picketing against Gwar along with other protestors, Gwar and Sleazy brutally attack the crowd, culminating in the disembowelment of Bohab and him being sodomized with his own cross.

Gwar travel to a nightclub, where they all become wasted on cocaine. The next morning, the Cuttlefish of Cthulhu (having escaped the Morality Squad's grasp) reunites with a hungover Oderus, and warns them of the imminent attack by the Morality Squad. Gwar emerge victorious over the Morality Squad. The giant T-Rex, Gor-Gor, is born and attempts to destroy the world. Gwar battles Gor-Gor, resulting in the T-Rex's death. The movie ends as the Cuttlefish of Cthulhu is happily reunited with Oderus Urungus.

Some of Riverview City's kids have apparently gone missing. The Rubberobo Gang may be responsible, so it's up to Ikki to stop them again.

Book One

The warriors of the Dark Empire of Granbretan have succeeded in conquering all of Europe, though the vanished Castle Brass still eludes Baron Meliadus. Summoned by Count Shenegar Trott, Baron Meliadus heads back to Granbretan to report to King-Emperor Huon.

While riding in the alternate plane that Castle Brass has been shifted to, Dorian Hawkmoon encounters a swordsman called Elvereza Tozer.

Hawkmoon takes Tozer prisoner and takes him back to Castle Brass. Under questioning Elvereza Tozer is revealed as a famous disgraced Granbretan playwright who hoped to curry favour with the Dark Empire by travelling to Castle Brass and destroying the machinery that kept it in its different dimension. Tozer travelled by means of a special ring constructed by Mygan of Londra, and Hawkmoon determines that to ensure the security of the Kamarg they must find this Mygan before the Dark Empire does.

In Londra, Countess Flana Mikosevaar, King-Emperor Huon's only living relative, witnesses the return of Baron Meliadus.

Baron Meliadus consults his brother-in-law, Taragorm, Master of the Palace of Time, as to whether his experiments will yet enable him to travel through time and destroy Castle Brass.

Count Shenegar Trott has an audience with King-Emperor Huon and is given a secret mission. Baron Meliadus has his own audience to request the assistance of Taragorm in locating Castle Brass, but is told his priority is to act as an envoy to two ambassadors from the mysterious far East Empire of Asiacommunista.

Meliadus greets the two ambassadors – Kaow Shalang Gatt and Jong Mang Shen – and introduces them to the assembled Granbretan Court, in the hope of learning more about Asiacommunista's forces and technology.

Meliadus visits Taragorm at the Palace of Time and learns of the disappearance of Elvereza Tozer. Meliadus vows to find the source of his ability.

Hawkmoon and Huillam D'Averc use Tozer's rings to travel back to Granbretan.

Meliadus spends the day showing the two Asiacommunista ambassadors the sights of Londra, before meeting Countess Flana.

Flana seduces Meliadus to get close to the two ambassadors, whom she finds intriguing.

Flana enters the ambassadors' quarters and discovers that they are really Hawkmoon and D'Averc. Rather than turn them over however she agrees to help them, and the pair disguise themselves as Dark Empire soldiers and flee in her private ornithopter.

Upon discovering the disappearance of the two ambassadors King-Emperor Huon chastises Baron Meliadus, and orders him to forget searching for Castle Brass. Meliadus vows to himself to defy him, and sets off to look for the man who enabled Elvereza Tozer to travel through the dimensions.

Hawkmoon and D'Averc fly to Yel (Wales) and leave their ornithopter to begin their search for Mygan of Llandar. They are attacked by a group of mutants that are all that remain of the local inhabitants of Yel, and take refuge in the city of Halapandur.

Halapandur contains many old scientific devices from the old age and D'Averc pockets the charge from a gun. The pair see Dark Empire forces led by Baron Meliadus searching the area, and leave the city. They find the cave where Mygan lives but it is empty. Hawkmoon and D'Averc are captured by Meliadus, bound and kept prisoner in the cave while Meliadus searches the surrounding countryside for Mygan.

Mygan appears in the cavern and frees Hawkmoon and D'Averc. Meliadus returns, a fight ensues and Mygan is injured. Following Mygan's instructions Hawkmoon and D'Averc use their rings to shift themselves into another dimension. Mygan tells them that Hawkmoon must fulfill his destiny and seek Narleen (New Orleans) and the Sword of the Dawn, then the Runestaff in the city of Dnark (New York). Mygan dies from his wounds.

Book Two

Hawkmoon and D'Averc are picked up in a strange machine sphere by a man called Zhenak-Teng. In this new dimension they are in the land of the Kammps – hi-tech underground cities where the inhabitants hide from creatures called the Charki. Zhenak-Teng tells them that Narleen is a trading city on the coast.

The Kammp is attacked by a group of Charki and Hawkmoon and D'Averc flee in one of the spheres, though Zhenak-Teng is killed in the assault.

The sphere crashes in woodland and Hawkmoon and D'Averc continue on foot. They are attacked by a pool monster in the woods and flee to the River Sayou, where they build a raft to head to Narleen.

Hawkmoon and D'Averc are picked up by a pirate ship belonging to Lord Valjon and are pressed into slavery. The pair manage to free themselves and try to escape when the ship is attacked by another.

The attacking ship belongs to Pahl Bewchard, a sworn enemy of Lord Valjon. Hawkmoon and D'Averc free the other slaves on Valjon's ship and scuttle it. Bewchard offers to transport them to Narleen.

Hawkmoon and D'Averc arrive in Narleen. Bewchard informs them that the Sword of the Dawn is in the possession of the Pirate Lords, who live in Starvel – an enclave within Narleen. The Sword of the Dawn is worshipped by the pirates, as it is said to contain the power of an ancient sorcerer. Hawkmoon and D'Averc learn that they are in Amarehk (America).

At Bewchard's house Hawkmoon and D'Averc meet his sister Jeleana, but are summoned to the quayside by the news that Bewchard's ship has been torched in revenge for his sinking of Valjon's ship. While they are gone Valjon visits Bewchard's house and threatens Jeleana. Bewchard vows to continue his fight against Valjon, now aided by Hawkmoon and D'Averc.

Bewchard takes Hawkmoon and D'Averc shopping for new clothes, but they are attacked by pirates and Bewchard is taken into Starvel.

Hawkmoon and D'Averc scale the outer wall of Starvel and discover Bewchard being prepared for sacrifice by Valjon to the Sword of the Dawn. Hawkmoon and D'Averc attack but are overcome by the pirates.

Hawkmoon and D'Averc are laid out for sacrifice alongside Bewchard when the Warrior in Jet and Gold appears and frees them. Hawkmoon kills Valjon and at the prompting of the Warrior in Jet and Gold calls upon the Legion of the Dawn – a group of ghostly warriors who reside in the Sword of the Dawn – to defeat the pirates.

Bewchard gives Hawkmoon and D'Averc a ship to continue their journey. The Warrior in Jet and Gold tells Hawkmoon that it is his destiny to seek the Runestaff in the city of Dnark, but Hawkmoon decides instead to escape his destiny by returning to Europe.

In ''Men in Black II: Alien Escape'', players take on the role of one of the MIB agents Agent K or Agent J, and are required to stop aliens from blowing up the Earth with a ship based weapon called the Class 7 Ozone Demogrifier. They investigate aliens living on Earth in events similar to the film.

The action of the book takes place in the years shortly after the death of Alexander the Great, and features a pair of Greek cousins from Rhodes, Menedemos and Sostratos, who work as sea-going traders. The plot centers on the cousins voyaging around the Greek parts of the Mediterranean Sea. They trade a great many things on their ship, the Aphrodite, including, much to the chagrin of many on board, peacocks. During their voyage they encounter pirates, other traders and get caught up in conflicts between some of Alexander's former generals, including Antigonos.

Act 1

The calm of a morning street scene in modern Jerusalem is shattered when a police officer orders a Yemenite boy to remove his flock of sheep to a side street. Phil Arkin, an American visiting his married daughter, defends the boy, and in the ensuing fracas he meets Ruth Stein, a tourist travelling with a group of widows from the United States. She is impressed with Phil's command of Hebrew as he explains the meaning of the word "Shalom".

They keep running into each other and together they celebrate Israel's Independence Day ("Independence Day Hora"). Their friendship begins to deepen and Phil's conscience starts troubling him. Although he has been separated from his wife for many years, he does not think it right to continue seeing Ruth since he is still married. Phil's daughter, Barbara, however, likes Ruth and invites her to go with them to her farm in the Negev. After some hesitation, Ruth accepts.

On the farm - called a Moshav - Phil tries to talk Barbara and her husband David into going back to Baltimore with him. But the young man vows his devotion to his country and is joined in its praise by his neighbors, including his cynical friend Adi, who claims he would rather live in the city ("Milk and Honey").

Phil, who is falling in love with Ruth, asks her to stay at Barbara's a little longer. In fact, he is even thinking of building a house of his own there that he would like her to share ("There's No Reason in the World").

Meanwhile, the group of touring widows comes to visit. When they eye the virile young farmers, the ladies, led by Clara Weiss, reveal their hopes of finding suitable husbands. Though their dreams are quickly dashed when all the men turn out to be married, Clara is still optimistic ("Chin Up, Ladies").

Later, Phil tells Ruth that he has bought a lot on which to build a home, and she gives him her approval ("That Was Yesterday"). But Barbara is shocked at the news, and urges her father to tell Ruth that he is married. Reluctantly he does, but he also tells her why she must remain ("Let's Not Waste a Moment"). At a wedding ceremony that they attend, Phil and Ruth, envious of the younger people, express their deep love for each other and, forgetting the consequences for the moment, go off together ("The Wedding").

Act 2

Phil energetically feels the spirit of the new land and goes out to work the fields with the other farmers ("Like A Young Man"). Barbara, however, brings news that Ruth, realizing the consequences of living with a married man, has run off to Tel Aviv, and Phil goes off to bring her back. When they are alone, David, convinced that Barbara really longs to go back to the United States, asserts that he would go anywhere to be with her ("I Will Follow You").

In Tel Aviv, Phil finds Clara at the Cafe Hotok, but she refuses to tell him where Ruth is. When he leaves, Clara accidentally meets Sol Horowitz, a widower from Jerusalem, and they promptly show mutual interest. Alone, she seeks her late husband's permission to remarry if Sol proposes ("Hymn to Hymie").

Back at the moshav, Phil, after much inner conflict, realizes that it would be wrong to live with Ruth. Although she comes back to him, he tells her that she must leave ("As Simple as That").

At Lydda Airport, the touring widows are preparing to board the plane home. Phil and Ruth have their final, brief moment together during which he promises to fly to Paris, where his wife lives, and plead for a divorce. Ruth boards the plane with the hope that somehow Phil will succeed and she will be able to come back to him ("Finale").

In 1940, film star Viviane Denvert sits in the audience of a premiere of her new movie and notices a man who keeps staring at her. She is disturbed, and when the film is over and the audience has finished praising her, she rushes home, discovering she is pursued by the same man. He chases her into her apartment.

An hour later, Frédéric Auger, a young writer, receives a call from Viviane, who was his childhood crush. Viviane, who has long used Frédéric's devotion, asks him to come to her apartment immediately.

Upon arriving, he discovers a corpse, "accidentally" killed, which Viviane asks him to dispose of, claiming that the man had been harassing her and when she slapped him, he fell over the edge of the balcony. He agrees to help her and the two pack the corpse into the trunk of his car; however, as it is raining, he accidentally drives into a curb and hits a police signalling device. The trunk opens upon impact, revealing the dead body to the arriving police, and Frédéric is arrested and sent to prison. On the eve of the German occupation of Paris, all of the city's citizens evacuate, including the prisoners. Prisoners are paired up with another and handcuffed together. Frédéric and his cellmate Raoul take advantage of the confusion to escape. Frédéric takes the train to Bordeaux, where he learns that Viviane is. Raoul is also on the train and he leads Frédéric to a seat near another girl, Camille. Camille, a physicist, works at the elite College de France under Professor Kopolski; the two of them are guarding French stocks of heavy water that they want to ship to England before the Germans can get their hands on it.

The remainder of the film traces the action-packed adventures of the characters, caught between two forces - the German invasion and Viviane's capacity for melodrama. Some decide to stay in France while others go underground or escape to London. In a very short scene, a quite recognizable General Charles de Gaulle is told "Bon voyage" by one of the protagonists .

Frédéric eventually falls for Camille. At the end of the film, he returns from England and meets with Camille at an outdoor café. When the Germans see them, they flee and sneak into a movie theatre. When Frédéric sees one of the Germans enter the theater in search for them, he turns and kisses Camille. They stop once their pursuers leave. Frédéric looks up at the screen and sees Viviane singing and dancing. Frédéric turns to Camille, and they resume kissing as the film ends.

Clayton Poole is a small-town TV repairman whose former sweetheart, Carla Naples, is now a famous movie star. Carla has cultivated a reputation as a virgin who does not have affairs or carouse with men in typical Hollywood fashion. On a romantic fling, she secretly marries Carlos, a famous Mexican bullfighter; the next morning the couple agree it was unwise and plan to have it annulled, but her husband dies that day in a bull-fight. Distraught, Carla tore up her marriage license, not realizing she was pregnant; there's no legal documentation to legitimize the child. Her agent, Harold Herman tries to avoid a scandal by sending Carla into the country to give birth. He suggests that they send the baby back to the town where she grew up, Midvale, Indiana. The cover story will be that she is going into seclusion to prepare for her next role, the lead in a controversial religious epic ''The White Virgin of the Nile''. After, she can adopt her baby. Carla says that her sister is too young and her father hasn't forgiven her for becoming a movie star, so Carla decides on Clayton to take care of her baby.

After she gives birth, Carla asks if Clayton will help her. Still professing his undying devotion, Clayton agrees to care for the child. He is very surprised to discover that it is triplets, not one baby. Carla's sister, Sandy, offers to help Clayton (she is in love with him and will do anything to get his attention).

Clayton works very hard to take care of the triplets, taking on extra work and attending a course on motherhood at a local college, but Midvale's child services want to place them with a well-to-do two-parent family. He earns the respect of Carla's father in his efforts to care for the triplets; both he and Carla's sister, Sandy, support Clayton keeping the babies.

On the final court day, the Naples family jump in to rescue Clayton and the triplets. Sandy enters the court in a wedding gown, pursued by her father, who is carrying a shotgun and claims that the babies are Sandy's. The Judge marries them, the implication being that they can keep the triplets. Meanwhile, Carla has seen the Midvale news and is afraid that her triplets will be taken from Clayton. She releases a press statement that triplets are hers and that she and Clayton are secretly married. Now suspected of bigamy, Clayton goes into hiding with the triplets.

Then, truth comes out: in the wake of the bigamy scandal, Mexican authorities reveal Carla's secret marriage to Carlos, so Clayton isn't a bigamist, nor is he the father of the triplets, nor are the triplets illegitimate. Harold (Carla's agent), who is in love with Carla, proposes. She accepts. Clayton then realizes that he's actually in love with Sandy, who has always loved him, not Carla. While taking a romantic walk and wondering when they can marry, they realize that they are married. Nine months later, Sandy gives birth to quintuplets. A statue of Clayton and his five babies is erected in front of the town courthouse, as Midvale's Hero.

Candidia Maria Smith-Foster, an eleven-year-old girl, is unaware that she is a ''Homo post hominem'', mankind's next evolutionary step. ''Hominem''s have higher IQs, they're stronger, faster, more resistant to illness and trauma, and have quicker reflexes. Their eyesight, hearing, and sense of smell are superior as well.

By the time the narrative opens, Candy has acquired a high school education, some college, and learned karate, having achieved her Fifth Degree Black Belt from her neighbor, 73-year-old Soo Kim McDivott, who she is led to believe is merely a retired schoolteacher. McDivott, whom she calls "Teacher", is actually the discoverer of the ''H. post hominem'' species, and has identified and continues to mentor and lead a group of them, the AAs. As part of her karate training, she has learned to release her hysterical strength, which permits brief bursts of nearly superhuman activity.

With international relations rapidly deteriorating, Candy's father, publicly a small-town pathologist but secretly a government biowarfare expert, is called to Washington. Candy remains at home.

The following day a worldwide attack, featuring a bionuclear plague, wipes out virtually all of humanity (i.e., ''Homo sapiens''). With pet bird Terry, a Hyacinthine macaw, her "lifelong retarded, adopted twin brother," who tends to "parrot" Candy's words even before she speaks, she survives the attack in the shelter beneath their house. Emerging three months later, she learns of her genetic heritage and sets off to search for others of her kind.

First the hunt turns up "Adam", a cheeky, irrepressibly punning, multitalented 13-year-old boy, who immediately sets out to win Candy's heart; next, Rollo Jones, a middle-aged physician with a broad history of survival-in-the-wilds experience ranging from a stint in the Peace Corps to mountain climbing; and finally, Kim Melon, an early-20s mom whose background is in computer engineering with Lisa, her six-year-old daughter. Rollo reveals himself as a sociopath, whom Candy is forced to kill defending Terry and herself. Adam, Kim, and Lisa join Candy's quest for the AA community. As part of the search, Adam reveals that he is an ultralight aircraft pilot. Later he teaches Candy to fly.

Thereafter, an ultralight engine failure separates Candy from the others. After getting it running again, she spots a contrail, which leads her to Vandenberg Space Shuttle Launch Complex, where Teacher and the AAs are laboring to preflight a shuttle, renamed the ''Nathan Hale''. They have identified those who wiped out mankind, the ''Bratstvo'', translated as the "Brotherhood", a cabal of ''H. sapiens'', working from inside the Russian military to destroy all ''H. post hominem''s. As insurance, they have placed a doomsday device in geosynchronous orbit, a Strontium-90 bomb whose fallout will render Earth uninhabitable for 200 years.

At this point, however, the AAs' plans have come unstuck: They have modified the ''Hale'' to reach geosynch orbit, though it is a one-way, suicide voyage for the crew; but the miniature robot handler they have built to penetrate the bomb-carrying rocket and disarm the doomsday device is not up to the task. Candy realizes, with her small size and hysterical strength training, she is the only one who can get inside the warhead chamber and disarm the bomb. Despite the fact that it is a suicide mission, she volunteers.

Meanwhile, as Adam, Kim, and Lisa search for Candy, Terry begins relaying her thoughts, though initially they do not realize that is what they're hearing.

Arriving in orbit, Kyril Svetlanov, thought to be a ''Bratstvo'' defector, kills Harris Gilbert, the mission commander. Kyril turns out to have been a double agent, whose job ultimately was to sabotage the mission, but he does not know about Candy's karate skills. She breaks his neck and assumes responsibility for completing the mission.

Navigating across to the bomb-carrying rocket in a spacesuit, she disables the warhead. Then she resets the navigational computer to land on the dry lake at Edwards Air Force Base and tries to secure herself against a bulkhead in preparation for the stresses of reentry.

As the missile begins to power-up for reentry, Adam finally realizes Terry is in fact relaying Candy's thoughts; that somehow she is in fact in space, about to attempt reentry in a non-human-rated vehicle, and that she'll soon be landing at Edwards. He, Kim, and Lisa arrive as the missile is touching down, just in time to extract her, resuscitate her, and treat her injuries.

The author has left a number of threads trailing at the conclusion, some of which are followed-up on 25 years later in a sequel entitled ''Tracking'', serialized in ''Analog Science and Fact'' magazine in the summer and fall of 2008.

Keaton plays a drifter who cons his way into working at an amusement park shooting gallery. Believing Keaton is an expert marksman, both the murderous gang the Blinking Buzzards and the man they want to kill end up hiring him. The film ends with a wild chase through a house filled with secret passages and trap doors.

The film opens with a Texas sharecropper, Sam Tucker, picking cotton in a sunbaked field alongside his wife Nona and his elderly Uncle Pete. Pete suddenly collapses due to the extreme heat and to what he blames as "my darned old heart". Before he dies, he tells his nephew, "Work for yourself; grow your own crops." Sam heeds his uncle's advice, so Nona, their children Daisy and Jot, "Granny", and he leave the migrant camp and set out to work a vacant 68-acre tenant farm with little more than two mules, a second-hand plow, and some cotton seed and fertilizer. The land the family leases includes only a decaying shack and a dry well. In immediate need of drinking water, Sam visits a gruff neighboring farmer, Henry Devers, who reluctantly allows the Tuckers to share water from his well.

Sam and his family nearly freeze and starve during their first winter on the farm, surviving largely on a limited diet of opossums, raccoons, and other small game that he is able to shoot. As spring arrives, Jot falls ill with "spring sickness". The town doctor informs Nona that the boy needs more diverse, vitamin-enriched foods, including vegetables, fruits, and milk to survive. The Tuckers immediately plant a garden, but its produce will take time to mature. Daily servings of milk would provide the suffering Jot with some timely relief, but the family cannot afford to buy or even rent a cow.

Sam's friend Tim offers to help get him a factory job that pays the attractive wage of seven dollars a day, but Sam remains determined to succeed as a farmer. Soon, the family's prayers are answered when Harmie, who owns the local general store, and Tim arrive in Harmie's flatbed truck with a milk cow, which young Daisy names "Uncle Walter". The family's cotton crop and the much-needed vegetable garden they planted finally begin to flourish. Meanwhile, the embittered Devers and his strange nephew Finley plot to ruin the Tuckers so Devers can buy the tenant farm for a cheaper price from its owner.

After Finley destroys the Tuckers' garden, Sam confronts Devers at his farm. There, Devers, armed with a knife, declares he will no longer share his well water, whereupon the two men have a near-deadly fight. Sam leaves and Devers gets a rifle and follows him. Soon, he finds Sam at the nearby river pulling in a fishing line on which he has hooked "Lead Pencil," an enormous catfish that Devers has been trying to catch for years. In return for the fish and the bragging rights that he was the one who caught it, Devers agrees to give Sam his garden and allow him continued access to his well, a deal that effectively puts an end to the trouble between the two families.

Harmie now marries Sam's mother, and a party is held at his general store to celebrate the wedding. Life at last seems to offer true promise for the Tuckers on that joyful occasion. Unfortunately, a violent rainstorm rolls in as the party is ending. The next day, the family returns to their farm, where heavy winds and flooding have ruined their entire cotton crop and ravaged their home. Sam, stunned by the sudden devastation, lets Tim accompany him as he searches for the family's missing cow, which they find alive but struggling in the swollen river. Tim nearly drowns in the deep water, but Sam rescues him. After pulling his friend to safety, Sam tells him that he is giving up farming and is now willing to take a factory job. Upon returning to the battered farm, though, he reconsiders his decision after he sees the resilience of his wife and grandmother, who are busy cleaning up what remains of the house and professing their resolve to start over again. The film ends with Sam and Nona, months after the flood, standing together in a freshly plowed field preparing for a new season and a new crop.

A wealthy baron (Jouvet) becomes bankrupt through gambling. Contemplating suicide, he finds his gun missing and confronts the thief Pépel (Gabin) who plans to rob him. Instead they share "a drink between colleagues" in a scene played as light comedy and become friends. The baron allows Pépel to leave with a bronze sculpture. Creditors seize the baron's household furnishings. The Baron tells his servant Félix that he hopes all that Félix has stolen from him will cover his unpaid wages, to which Félix agrees. Pépel is arrested for stealing the bronze. Pépel jokes with the police until the baron arrives to identify him as a "dear friend". The story shifts to life in the slums, where men argue at cards. They mock a woman who reads romantic tales, and many individuals have brief character portraits. The baron arrives to become a lodger in the slums and Pépel sets him up with a bed. The baron joins the card game.

The police inspector meets with the slum landlord Kostylev and eyes his wife's sister Natasha. Pépel speaks with Vassilissa, regretting he never loved her but remembering their good times. She wants him to kill her husband, the landlord, who is old and mean. A scene of mourning for a woman who has died follows, with fatalistic comments from the neighbors. Pépel tells Natasha she should leave with him, but she says she'll leave for a man with a job, not a thief like him. Vassilissa finds them speaking and is jealous. The woman who reads romances recounts them to the baron and Natasha as if they were her own adventures. The police inspector tells the landlord an inspection has been ordered. Trying to devise a way to bribe him, the landlord and his wife suggest her sister Natasha. Vassilissa persuades Natasha to serve the inspector tea, though Natasha has declared he disgusts her. The inspector invites Natasha on a date and she cries, but he promises her a better life.

Pépel and the baron discuss life along the river bank. Pépel believes only leaving with Natasha could save him from going to prison one day like his father before him. The inspector and Natasha dine alone indoors while other couples dine outdoors as a band plays. She resists his advances. Those partying outside include Pépel, pursued by Vassilissa. She tells him Natasha is not the innocent dreamer he imagines. Pépel find Natasha drunkenly enjoying the inspector's company. The men fight and Pépel leads Natasha away as the inspector cries for help. Pépel and Natasha confess their love.

Kostylev and Vassilissa insist Natasha make up with the inspector. They beat her and the whole neighborhood listens. Pépel intervenes and soon all the lodgers join him in attacking their hated landlord. The fight ends with Kostylev dead, though no one appears responsible. Vassilissa denounces Pépel to the police as a murderer. The baron tells them it was a brawl and everyone is guilty. Others say how they participated and that "the lower depths killed him". The police find Pépel comforting Natasha and lead him away.

In an epilogue, Vassilissa leaves the slum, Natasha brings Pépel home from prison, and the slum's strangest resident, a combination madman and drunkard called "the actor", commits suicide. Natasha and Pépel take to the road with just a few possessions.

A cargo plane leaves Peru, bound for Panama with two passengers during a storm. When one of the two pilots goes to check on an opened door, Charles Hasso (Marc Krah) claims he tried but failed to prevent the other passenger from jumping to his death. Upon landing, Hasso is questioned by Major Rues (George Givot) of the Panamanian secret police, but is released as there were no witnesses. Hasso takes with him the deceased's briefcase, in which he finds a map.

Hasso hires private investigator Dan Hammer (Pat O'Brien) to be his bodyguard for a couple of days. While Hammer is changing, Hasso secretly pins the map to Hammer's bulletin board.

Hammer receives an urgent summons from oil executive Walter Gredson (Jerome Cowan), so he arranges to meet Hasso later at his hotel room. Gredson hires Hammer to find Hasso and the map, which shows the locations of unregistered oil wells in Peru that his company has bought.

Later, in a nightclub, Hammer is attracted to singer Maxine Manning (Anne Jeffreys). He invites her to come by his office after work, unaware that she is spying on him for her boyfriend, Gredson. Tourist Eric Molinar (Walter Slezak) tries to hire him as a guide, but Hammer turns him down.

When Hammer goes to see Hasso, he finds Hasso's body in the overflowing hotel room bathtub. As the search for the map continues, Maxine starts falling for Hammer and switches sides. Meanwhile, Molinar reveals that he is also after the map. He has his two thugs try to beat its location out of the detective, but Hammer has no idea where it is.

Molinar and his men later go to question Gredson. Hammer has Maxine telephone the executive to say the map is in Hammer's office. Molinar, listening in, sees no further use for Gredson and has him killed. Then he and his goons go to the office. A fight breaks out, during which Molinar finally spots the map. He hastens away with it in a taxi driven by Pop (Percy Kilbride), Hammer's close friend. Molinar takes Pop's suggestion to hide out for a while, only to find that the driver has taken him straight to the back door of police headquarters.

Hammer, who has taken a series short cuts on foot, arrives shortly and bursts into the room. He slugs Molinar, knocking him unconscious, and takes the map out of the murderer's coat pocket. Pop drives him back to his office, where he finds Molinar's thugs being taken into custody, an oil company executive (Jason Robards, Sr.) is waiting, and Maxine is standing by.

The executive eagerly takes the map and gives Hammer his payment. As Hammer and Maxine lean into a kiss, a close up of Hammer's dog's eye, observing them, fades to black.

Former Agent Michael Osbourne is rerecruited by the CIA when his father-in-law Douglas Cannon, the new ambassador to the Court of St. James, is sent to the United Kingdom to promote the peace process between Protestants and Catholics of Northern Ireland, which has been jeopardized by three bloody attempts to derail them. Michael must once again face the elusive and lethal KGB-trained assassin October, with whom he has unfinished business.

''The 13 Lives of Captain Bluebear'' follows the adventures of the character Bluebear in the first half of his 27 lives. The novel intersperses Bluebear's narrative with excerpts from ''The Encyclopedia of Marvels, Life Forms and Other Phenomena of Zamonia and its Environs'' by Professor Abdullah Nightingale, who bacterially transmits it into Bluebear's brain.

The story is set in the fictional continent of Zamonia (location of several other novels by Walter Moers) on Earth before the "great descent" in which Zamonia and many other continents sink beneath the waves. Many of the creatures encountered by Bluebear in the novel are taken from myths, folktales, prehistory, and Moers' imagination, among them Gryphons, Maenads, Trolls, Yetis, and Pterodactyls. Nearing the end of the novel, the mythical city of Atlantis disappears from Earth, an event witnessed by Bluebear.

The plot is supplemented by Moers' drawings of the characters interspersed throughout the book. These illustrations are done in a cartoonish style: Moers is a noted German cartoonist. While the drawings are colored in the German hardcover version, they remain in black-and-white in most other versions.

Summary

Life 1

Bluebear begins life floating in a walnut shell in the north Zamonian sea and in the grip of the Malmstrom, a mysterious and giant whirlpool that all the world's sailors take care to avoid. He is saved by a fearless crew of Minipirates, diminutive buccaneers who adopt the bear as their good-luck charm. He grows up on a diet of exclusively seaweed and water, and begins to apprentice the Minipirates' nautical way of life. Aboard their tiny craft he learns much of waves, sailing, and knot tying, but after five years aboard he grows too large for the ship and the Minipirates regretfully maroon him on an island.

Life 2

On the island, Bluebear discovers a group of Hobgoblins, who raise him to celebrity status for his fantastic displays of crying. Hobgoblins are, according to Nightingale's encyclopedia, semi-ghost invertebrates who feed on emotions. Every night Bluebear cries for their pleasure, and they elevate him to stardom. Eventually repulsed by his lifestyle, Bluebear builds a raft and sets off on his own.

Life 3

Lost at sea, Bluebear is befriended by a pair of "Babbling Billows", or talking waves, who teach him to speak, and encounters the ''SS Moloch'', the world's largest ship. He makes futile attempts to board the vessel, and in his head hears a voice that whispers repeatedly: "Come! Come aboard the Moloch!". Soon afterwards Bluebear is almost eaten by a Tyrannomobyus Rex, a gargantuan black whale with one eye. Bluebear helps ease the creature's pain by pulling harpoons out of its back (originally intending to construct another raft out of them but, becoming too absorbed in the task, tossing them into the water) and the grateful whale deposits him within swimming distance of another island.

Life 4

The island, which Bluebear christens "Gourmet Island", proves to be a fantastic paradise filled with delicious foodstuffs that mysteriously grow in place of normal vegetation. The bear, after sampling them all, develops a monstrous appetite and lavish tastes. He eats so much that he can no longer walk comfortably. Bluebear's last meal (a man-sized mushroom) is interrupted by the discovery that the island is a giant carnivorous plant that ensnares passers-by, fattens them up and eats them at 300 pounds. Seconds from being devoured, Bluebear is saved by Deus X. "Mac" Machina, a pterodactyl Roving Reptilian Rescuer whose job is to save adventurers moments before their death.

Life 5

Bluebear acts as a navigator for the near-sighted Mac, assisting the Reptilian Rescuer in his daring rescues, including saving a farm of Wolperting Whelps from the dreaded Bollogg: a cyclops varying from 50 feet to two miles high that can survive without a head. On flying over the city of Atlantis (Zamonia's capital), Bluebear promises himself that he will visit it someday. Towards the end of his time with Mac, he rescues a human who threw himself off the Demon Range, a man who later appears in Life 10. The year ends with Mac entering retirement and depositing Bluebear at the entrance to the Nocturnal Academy, the headmaster of which (Professor Abdullah Nightingale) owes Mac a favor.

Life 6

At Nightingale's Academy, Bluebear is taught all the knowledge in the universe by the seven-brained Nocturnomath Professor Abdullah Nightingale and his infectious intelligence bacteria. The closer one is to a Nocturnomath, and the more bacteria they absorb, the more intelligent one becomes. Fellow students include Qwerty Uiop (a gelatine prince from the 2364th Dimension who accidentally fell into this world through a Dimensional Hiatus) and Fredda the Alpine Imp (a hairy creature with a crush on Bluebear). Before leaving the Academy, Bluebear is infected with intelligence bacteria, and Nightingale transmits an encyclopedia into his head. In the caves outside the Academy, he meets Qwerty next to a Dimensional Hiatus debating whether to jump in and attempt to return home. Bluebear, acting on an impulse, pushes him in the hope that he will land in the right dimension. Bluebear is led astray in the cavern labyrinth by a treacherous Troglotroll (the most reviled and sneaky creature in Zamonia). With the help of a Mountain Maggot (an annelid made of gleaming steel) Bluebear makes his way out of the caves and into the neighboring Great Forest.

Life 7

Wandering in the Great Forest, Bluebear spots a blue she-bear in the strangely silent Great Forest and falls in love with her. Bluebear attempts to court her only to discover she is an illusion created by the Spiderwitch, a giant spider, to catch prey. Bluebear is caught in an intricate web in place of where he thought the she-bear's house was. He eventually frees himself and flees from the spider moments before it can dissolve and eat him. He runs for eight hours straight to escape the spider, who is in hot pursuit. Because of the oxygen conditions in the Great Forest, he hallucinates that he is the fastest and most agile creature on the planet. When the hallucination ends, his body feels too heavy to run. Just as his strength gives out, Bluebear stumbles and falls through a fortuitous Dimensional Hiatus, the same sort of portal through which Qwerty entered Bluebear's universe.

Life 8

The Dimensional Hiatus deposits Bluebear into the past in the 2364th Dimension, where he sets off a chain of events that led to Qwerty falling into the a Dimensional Hiatus and into our world in the first place. Bluebear jumps into the portal after his friend and comes back out in his own world, where the Spiderwitch is nowhere to be seen.

Life 9

Seeking Atlantis, Bluebear treks across the Demara Desert in the company of nomadic Muggs who are searching for the legendary mirage city of Anagrom Ataf. Bluebear helps the Muggs trap the city with molten sugar, but they find it already populated with transparent ghost-like Fatoms. He sets the Muggs roaming again, this time in search of a non-existent city called esidaraP s'looF. Leaving their company, Bluebear misinterprets a Tornado Warning for a Tornado Stop and decides to wait there to catch a ride to Atlantis on the other side of the desert. A tornado arrives, but Bluebear is sucked into its center and is aged nearly eighty years upon entering.

Life 10

Bluebear and the other elderly denizens of Tornado City search for a way to escape the whirlwind. He is reunited with the cliff-jumper he and Mac once saved, and discovers Phonzotar Huxo, a madman in the tornado who is responsible for the strange laws of the Muggs and their search for Anagrom Ataf. Bluebear is told by the encyclopedia that the tornado stops for one minute once a year, so he and the other old men count backwards for a year in anticipation of the next stop. During that stop, they dig through the tornado wall, aging in reverse as they make their escape.

Life 11

Making his way to Atlantis, Bluebear travels through the discarded head of a Megabollog cyclops. He meets a bad idea named 1600H who saves him from falling into a pool of earwax and drowning. 1600H suggests Bluebear becomes a dream composer. The head, being constantly asleep, must always be dreaming, otherwise it will wake up and throw the brain into confusion as there is no body for it to be attached to. Bluebear takes a job as a dream composer, manipulating the head's "dream organ" in order to purchase a map of the head's interior so that he may find his way out. Insanity (another idea, whose plans were thwarted previously by Bluebear) steals the map and attacks Bluebear, but right before Bluebear is pushed into the Lake of Oblivion, a pool of liquid forgetfulness that totally annihilates anything thrown in, 1600H pushes Insanity into the lake himself. Bluebear escapes the head just as the roaming cyclops body returns to put his head back on his shoulders, and approaches the city of Atlantis.

Life 12

Entering the city, Bluebear meets a Brazilian tobacco dwarf named Chemluth Havanna who becomes his new best friend. Bluebear works his way up the Atlantean professions tree, starting as a sweeper in a spitting tavern and eventually reaching the coveted King of Lies in the Megathon's Congladiator tournaments. The King of Lies and their challenger exchange fictitious stories, with the audience deciding who wins each round. Bluebear defends his throne for over a year, eventually battling against the Congladiating legend and former champion Nussram Fakhir in an epic 99-round Duel of Lies. Bluebear's boss, Volzotan Smyke, asks him to throw this last fight and when the bear wins it, Smyke attempts to sell him onto the giant ''SS Moloch''; which is revealed to be a slave ship. However, Bluebear's guard, one of the Wolperting Whelps saved by Bluebear and Mac, takes the bear below Atlantis, where Bluebear is reunited with Fredda the Alpine Imp and the Troglotroll. Fredda and the Invisibles (creatures from another planet who really are invisible) plan to pilot the city of Atlantis off Earth and to their planet before the continent of Zamonia sinks beneath the waves. Chemluth, inveterate womanizer, becomes smitten with Fredda and decides to stay with her and the Invisibles, but Bluebear elects to remain behind with the Troglotroll as he has no desire to leave Earth. As Atlantis flies away, the Troglotroll betrays Bluebear yet again and deposits him into the hands of the ''Moloch's'' slave crew.

Life 13

Bluebear discovers that the captain of the ''Moloch'' is the renegade Zamonium, the only thinking element. Professor Nightingale reappears piloting a cloud of darkness and reveals reluctantly that he created the Zamonium himself. He does battle with the Zamonium in a war of thoughts. In the midst of the fight, Bluebear manages to throw the Zamonium into Nightingale's cloud of domesticated darkness and frees the crew. The ''Moloch'', without a pilot at the wheel, becomes trapped by the massive Malmstrom, but the crew, minus Bluebear, is saved by the fortuitous arrival of an army of Reptilian Rescuers. As Mac, who now has a large pair of glasses, tries to save Bluebear, the Troglotroll jumps onto his back instead and Mac flies off. The unfortunate bear is the only person left on the ship. Bluebear almost falls into the Malmstrom, which turns out to be a Dimensional Hiatus, and he is saved by the arrival of his old friend Qwerty Uiop on a flying carpet, who is soaring up from the whirlpool. Upon rejoining the rescued crew, Bluebear discovers that many of them are Chromobears, members of his own species. Every Chromobear has different coloured fur, but the soot on the ''Moloch'' made their fur appear to be black until it was washed off in a flooded lagoon in the spot where Atlantis used to be. Bluebear learns that the Chromobears once lived in the Great Forest, but they were forced to leave for the coasts when the Spiderwitch invaded the forest, and were later found by the Zamonium, which enslaved them on the ''Moloch''. He later finds that a bluebear couple (an ultramarine male and an indigo female) who were slaves on the ''Moloch'' who threw their newborn off the ship to avoid a life of slavery, are likely his parents. The Chromobears then decide to reinhabit the Great Forest.

Life 13

At the end of the book, in Bluebear's final "half-life", he meets a real-life she-bear identical to the one he hallucinated in Life 7. He begins a new life with her, but hints that further adventures await them in the future.

The book begins with the birth of both men in 1769 - Arthur as a weak and puny baby, a third son, to a wealthy Anglo-Irish Protestant couple; Napoleone as a healthy second son to a Corsican couple fighting the French for independence.

The story continues with the training of both youths as cadet officers, both encountering social and other difficulties thanks to their birth outside the mainland. Arthur's innate conservatism forms as a result of the Gordon riots and his realization that his Anglo-Irish Protestant lifestyle is dependent on maintaining the status quo. Napoleone, on the other hand, is even more of an outsider, a Corsican among Frenchmen, a quasi-noble among pre-revolutionary noblemen, and an impoverished young cadet among those with money to burn.

Interestingly, both men are depicted as having a brief encounter with each other in the years prior to the French Revolution wherein Wellesley is sent to observe a demonstration that Napoleone's regiment is participating in. Such an encounter did not happen in actuality, though Wellesley, fluent in French, was sent to France on several occasions in his youth as an observer.

The story ends approximately in 1796, with Arthur having been turned down by the family of his ''inamorata'' Kitty Pakenham because of his lack of prospects, and Napoleone, now called Napoleon Bonaparte, mounting a successful attack on Toulon.

Category:2006 British novels Category:Wellington and Napoleon Quartet Category:Headline Publishing Group books

Aggie Anderson was an American working in London as a fashion buyer for an international company. Her job required her to travel often, and when abroad she often got into various troubles and accidents. These situations were often dangerous, and would involve spies and criminals.

''The Adventures of Brigadier Wellington-Bull'' followed the adventures of a retired Army Brigadier, Garnet Wellington-Bull, who is trying to come to terms with civilian life. The other characters were his daughter Jane (played by future ''Blue Peter'' presenter Valerie Singleton) and Captain Pilkington, a young officer who used to serve under him.

Victor (Ronald Colman) joins the French Foreign Legion, along with his faithful valet, Rake (Herbert Mundin). His company is attacked while escorting a caravan. The survivors join a battalion stationed in southern Algeria.

His new commander is Major Doyle (Victor McLaglen), who becomes jealous when Cigarette (Claudette Colbert), a cafe singer, loses her heart to Victor. However, Victor and a refined visiting Englishwoman, Lady Venetia (Rosalind Russell), fall in love. Cigarette finds out and is heartbroken. Doyle learns about Cigarette's true feelings. Meanwhile, a carving of a horse created by Victor leads to Lady Venetia discovering from her uncle, Lord Seraph, that a certain English officer left England due to a scandal. It turns out that the officer was shielding his younger brother. The brother later met with a fatal accident, but lived long enough to exonerate Victor.

When Arab unrest threatens to erupt into open conflict, Doyle is ordered to prevent it. He sends Victor off on suicidal mission after suicidal mission to try to get rid of his rival, but the sergeant returns each time unscathed. Then Doyle orders him to take 20 men to man an isolated fort, where they are surrounded by a vastly larger Arab force. Cigarette learns what Doyle is doing and rides out into the desert. Doyle repents his actions and leads a relief force, but Victor can only watch helplessly as they march into a trap. They manage to hold out until nightfall ends the fighting temporarily. Victor sneaks in, disguised as an Arab, and reports to Doyle. When Doyle tells him that reinforcements could arrive at noon the next day, Victor volunteers to buy time with a ploy of his own devising.

Victor goes to see Sidi-Ben Youssiff, the Arab leader, who turns out to have been a classmate at Oxford. Victor tells him that there is a British force to the Arabs' rear. Sidi-Ben Youssiff scoffs at the idea that the French would allow British troops in their territory, but Victor persuades him to send scouts to check. They find nothing, but before Sidi-Ben Youssiff can execute Victor, French chasseurs (found by Cigarette during the night and informed of the battalion's plight) attack the Arab camp, routing the Arabs and ending the revolt. During the fighting, Cigarette is shot and dies in Victor's arms.

Afterward, Victor is shown in civilian clothes holding Lady Venetia's hand during a ceremony honoring Cigarette.

The story set in an unspecified date, when Elizabeth Dole is President of the United States. When a solar flare erupts, teenager Jon Kent manifests superpowers and learns from his mother, Lois Lane, that his father, ''Daily Planet'' reporter Clark Kent, was secretly the superhero Superman, who mysteriously disappeared in a foreign country 15 years ago. Jon attempts to follow his father's footsteps as the new Superman in his makeshift costume. To find out the truth of his father's disappearance, Jon helps a terrorist organization, led by Pete Ross and Lana Lang, and discovers that his father has been held in an underground facility. Jon frees his father from his captivity, and the Kent family joyfully reunite. During Superman's absence, Lex Luthor has taken control of the Justice League as well as many other aspects of life in the United States. The Justice League's liaison to Lex Luthor, the Martian Manhunter, is told to recruit Superman into the League once again. When Superman voices his disapproval of Pete Ross and Lana Lang's terrorist methods, his son tells him not to be so hard on them, and also says he is not proud of who his father is. Pete and Lana find the spacecraft that carried Superman to earth, and use it to decode a Kryptonian message they found at the facility where Superman was being kept. Superman finds everything in the Fortress of Solitude has been stolen, while Batman finds out Wonder Woman is funding the terrorists. Pete Ross threatens to expose Lex Luthor as the man responsible for holding Superman captive, and agrees not to reveal the information in exchange for two hundred million dollars. In addition to the two hundred million dollars, Pete gives Lex one of the advanced armors the terrorists used for their operations.

An army of men wearing the armor, led by a man who appears to be Superman, destroys the Statue of Liberty. The Justice League is ordered to bring in Superman, but Batman, Superman and Jon defeat them with the help of Wonder Woman, who has been convinced by Batman to regret her mercenary actions. They find out Luthor used the stolen Kryptonian technology and Superman's genetics to give himself superpowers, but only succeeded in gaining half of the Man of Steel's abilities. Because of his anger built up from all the years of growing up without his father, Jon confronts Luthor alone. Jon initially fares poorly against Luthor, but eventually gains the upper hand and Luthor is defeated. Wonder Woman convinces Lana to turn herself and Pete over to the authorities. The Martian Manhunter is revealed to have worked with Luthor to keep Superman captive, because with Superman out of the way, the Manhunter was the world's most powerful and beloved hero. For his part in the scheme, Martian Manhunter is forced to return to Mars. The Justice League retires from fighting crime to "spend more time with their families". Bruce Wayne, no longer donning the cape and cowl of Batman, decides to run against President Dole in the next election to restore democracy to the country. Jon Kent finally establishes a relationship with his father, and continues his career as a superhero wearing his father's costume.

Like all "How To" Disney shorts, this one opens with a narrator explaining how to fish, with Goofy acting as the visual narrator. This short film does not have a plot; all the facts are jumbled together, with several humorous facts and clips.

Gilbert "The Great" Wooley is a down-on-his-luck magician who has been invited to entertain GIs on a USO tour in Japan. However, even before his flight from Los Angeles has taken off the ground, he unwittingly – and with some participation of his pet, friend and co-star in the act, Harry the rabbit – incurs the wrath of the show's headliner, actress Lola Livingston, with a series of unfortunate accidents. Upon their arrival, as he tries to apologize to Lola, he causes her more embarrassment by tearing up her dress, knocking her down the gangway, and rolling her up in the red carpet to cover up her lack of proper attire.

An orphan, Mitsuo Watanabe, who attends the reception in the company of his aunt Kimi Sikita, an interpreter for the United Service Organizations, or USO, witnesses the spectacle and laughs for the first time since his parents died. When Kimi brings the boy to Gilbert to thank him, he and the boy become close. This, however, irritates the aunt's boyfriend Ichiyama, a Japanese baseball player; and his subsequent chase of Wooley, which culminates with Ichiyama's fall into a bathhouse pool that floods the street outside, almost motivates the furious USO commander Major Ridgley to revoke Wooley's entertainment-service status. Wooley's USO liaison Sergeant Pearson, who has fallen for him, is able to reverse that decision – though it is under the condition that Wooley perform for the American troops at the Korean frontlines. However, she becomes jealous of Gilbert's growing relationship with Kimi.

In time, Gilbert, Mitsuo, and Mitsuo's family become inseparable, but Wooley's failure as a troop entertainer makes Ridgley remand him back to the United States. Not wanting to disappoint Mitsuo by letting him find out that he has been a total flop, Gilbert tries to sneak away when it is time for him to return. Mitsuo follows him, and Gilbert is forced to pretend that he no longer cares for the boy, which makes him cry. However, Mitsuo still follows him to America by stowing away on the plane. Once in America, they are reunited, but Gilbert is accused of kidnapping Mitsuo, who is then returned to Japan. Wooley follows in the same way that Mitsuo did, but is "smarter" by hiding in a specially marked trunk. However, when the airliner lands, he cannot get out of the trunk, and the Sikitas have to rescue him from it. Wooley decides to stay and become a successful performer of magic in Japan.

The film ends with Harry the rabbit giving birth to a litter in mid-performance, as Gilbert hollers in shock and disbelief, "Hey, you're not a Harry; you're a Harriet!"

Following World War II, an entire destroyer escort, the U.S.S. ''Kornblatt'', has mysteriously gone missing. Lieutenant John Paul Steckler VII, the last of a long line of good-natured but screw-up U.S. Navy officers, was tasked with commanding the ''Kornblatt'' to its decommission back in the U.S., but somehow the ship disappeared without a trace on its homeward voyage. Now, with a $4 billion appropriation at stake, Congressman Mandeville refuses to approve the funds until the ''Kornblatt'' is found. Steckler's former superior, Vice Admiral Bludde, who has been trying to sugarcoat this embarrassing incident, has no other choice but to comply.

Just as he is ready to embark on a honeymoon with his freshly wedded wife Prudence, Steckler is tracked down by Navy personnel and brought to the Pentagon, where he is charged with treason and malevolent misappropriation of government property. Though he can convince the admirals of his basic innocence, he is nevertheless charged with finding the ''Kornblatt'' within the next ten days, thus upsetting both his wife and his honeymoon plans. Since he is at a loss to explain the whereabouts of the ship, Steckler is teamed up with Naval Intelligence operative Ensign Benson, who happens to be an attractive woman.

Benson employs a relaxing therapy to coax Steckler's memory, succeeding with much effort. In a flashback it is told that on the day hostilities in the Pacific were finally ended, the ''Kornblatt'' was ordered to return to Pearl Harbor for the decommissioning of those crew members with sufficient discharge points. Steckler, assisted by Ensign Stan Wychinsky and the remaining crew, attempted to get the ''Kornblatt'' back to the mainland, but Steckler got the ship stuck on a reef near an island occupied by a garrison of still-entrenched Japanese soldiers. Captured by those soldiers while exploring, Steckler was imprisoned for a night before his impending execution, only for the Japanese commander, Colonel Takahashi, to learn that the war really was over. By the time of Steckler's release and the garrison's surrender to him, however, the ''Kornblatt'' and her crew, believing him dead, had already departed.

With Wychinsky being the only viable lead, Steckler and Benson track him down in Miami, Florida, where he works as a professional wrestler. From him they learn that he has turned the ''Kornblatt'' over as instructed, but being in the middle of a match, he loses the memory of the responsible official's name when his opponent whacks him on the head. Grounded by a hurricane, and unwilling to spend any more time separated from Prudence, Steckler takes a train back to Washington, where he is forced to share a compartment with Benson (who incidentally takes a personal liking to him); this circumstance leads to a prompt misunderstanding with Prudence at the Washington railway station, who leaves him in a fury. In addition, Mandeville has drastically cut the time limit in favor of an immediate inquiry on this very day.

In the meantime, Wychinsky, who has finally remembered what happened to the ''Kornblatt'', has followed Steckler back to Washington and encounters Prudence. The two proceed to the hearing, which is (due to Mandeville's animosity) progressing very badly for Steckler and Bludde. Given a reprieve of 48 hours, Steckler and Wychinsky go to a spot in the ocean where the wreck of the ''Kornblatt'' lies following her last use as a target dummy. After a harrowing dive and struggle with nitrogen narcosis and a hungry kraken, they recover a bell from the ''Kornblatt'', thus confirming the ship's fate, and back at the inquiry Mandeville is revealed as the man who had unwittingly assigned the ''Kornblatt'' for target practice, ignoring the red tape. Finally rehabilitated, Steckler manages to secure a significantly higher appropriation for the Navy, and is happily reunited with Prudence.

Nancy Drew is helping Rose Green, a friend of Nancy's housekeeper Hannah Gruen, with some renovation work in an old Victorian mansion in San Francisco that she is converting into a bed and breakfast. But, there are other uninvited guests, visitors from the past—spirits who want the place all to themselves. Strange accidents are slowing down the renovation, and Nancy is trying to figure out who, or what, is trying to scare everyone away. Nancy suspects that there is another force at work: greed.

Sally McDonald, a friend of Nancy Drew's father, recently purchased a house on Moon Lake in Pennsylvania. The house is the former residence of a Prohibition-era gangster named Mickey Malone. Sally fled from the house in terror on the very night Nancy arrived for a visit. According to Sally, every night a pack of ghost dogs with glowing eyes and mournful howls attack her house. The dogs are believed to be the ghosts of Malone's four loyal Rottweilers. They allegedly vanished into the woods on the day of Malone's arrest and were never seen alive again. Nancy seeks out the truth of Mickey Malone's colorful history amid rumors of buried gold.

When Katie Firestone, a friend of George Fayne, invites Nancy Drew to Deception Island in Washington state for a whale-watching excursion, the sleuth arrives to find Katie's tour boat heavily vandalized. A threatening note that was left behind warns Katie to "stop meddling". Apparently, the residents of the harbor are divided over what to do with an orphaned female Orca whale that recently appeared in the channel, and Katie has ruffled a lot of feathers in the debate. Nancy must hunt down the vandal while unraveling some of Deception Island's hidden secrets.

George Bryan “Beau” Brummell is a fashionable man in London society circles during the reign of King George III. Brummell is known for his exquisite taste and sets fashion trends among the elite. However, despite his lavish lifestyle, he is actually of modest means and is growing increasingly in debt.

He befriends the Prince of Wales, the future King George IV, and becomes a trusted — albeit unpaid — advisor. Brummell initially sees the friendship as the path to a highly placed position, and the prince does, in fact, promise to make Brummell an earl. Eventually, however, the two have a public falling out. The prince accuses Brummell of offering poor advice and of only being interested in the promised titled; in return, Brummell insults the prince at a large public gathering by calling him fat.

Brummell, out of the prince’s favor and deeply in debt, flees to France. To earn money, he writes his memoirs, but once he realizes that the writings will embarrass the prince (who has since been elevated to king)Brummell destroys them, as he come to see that his feelings of friendship were genuine all along.

Likewise, the new king comes to regret the rift, and tries to set things right. On a visit to France, he seeks out the ailing Brummell, and they have a heartfelt reconciliation while Brummell lay dying.

Agent Pendergast visits Medicine Creek, Kansas after a gruesome murder occurs. With the help of local teenaged misfit Corrie Swanson, he continues to investigate as more citizens are killed. Pendergast is soon led to believe that the murderer must be a member of the community. He soon discovers that the murders are connected to an old curse.

Chapters 1–5

Michael Volodyovski has retired to a monastery after the death of his wife, Anna Borzobogati. At Chenstohova. Kharlamp, an acquaintance, goes to see Andrei Kmita to get his help in persuading him to leave it. He and Zagloba make a journey to consult Yan and it is finally Zagloba who offers to speak to Volodyovski.

Making his way to Warsaw, Zagloba meets his old friend, Hassling-Ketling, a Scot, who now resides in Warsaw after being adopted by a noble in Svyenta in Courland, who offers him a bed. Taking place is the Diet to elect a new King of which Prince Boguslav is a candidate and Zagloba is determined to raise support against the traitor.

Chapters 6–16

Zagloba carries a letter from the primate to the monastery of Mons Regius. Michael is now known as Brother Yerzy and is persuaded to leave for the nation's sake and stays at Ketling's house. They are visited by Sobieski, the hetman, and a feast takes place and Michael receives a present of a cream-coloured steed.

Michael's sister, Mrs Makovetski, visits Warsaw and is invited to stay with Krystina Drohoyovski and Barbara Yezorkovski, of whom her husband is their guardian. Michael is immediately attracted by Krysia but Zagloba intends that Basia, who delights him, should be the little knight's. He teaches her fencing and she is disconcerted and embarrassed by his adeptness with the sword for whom she develops a strong admiration. Adam Novoveski, a young cavalier, arrives on the scene and pays court to Basia but she has nothing of it and rejects his eventual marriage proposal.

Michael meets with Sobieski and is sent with letters to Rushchyts in Russia and the Wilderness beyond. He says farewell to Krysia and an unspoken pact is made between them. Michal leaves and Ketling of Elgin returns to his house from Courland and Krysia is immediately enchanted by his looks and manners. Zagloba implements his stratagem to set Ketling at Krysia in order to save ‘his little haiduk’ Basia for Michael. Owing to her pact, Krysia resolves to enter a convent and Ketling vows to return to Scotland.

Chapters 17–22

The Diet continues and on their way back from Warsaw one evening, Zagloba and Basia encounter Volodyovski and his brother-in-law Makovetski. Over time Michael realizes that Krysia no longer loves him and agrees to give her up. However, on learning from Basia that it is Ketling for whom she feels affection, he falls into a rage and rushes off to kill him. Later, Ketling and Michael return having resolved their differences as old friends and Michael, encountering Basia once more, and she reveals her love for the worthy cavalier.

Chapters 23–28

Summer of 1671 finds Michael in Sokol, Basia's paternal villages, happily married and running the estate as efficiently as he does his troops. He is commanded forward to build a stanitsa at Hreptyoff and Basia arrives with Zagloba to a rousing welcome from the troops. In the evenings the officers discuss their experiences of the Turks and their periods of imprisonment. The time is spent crushing the independent detachments of robbers on both banks of the Dniester ravishing the Polish and Moldavian sides. A Cossack band, under Azba Bey, is wiped out and Basia, who observes the conflict, is chased by some fleeing Cossacks and is helped by the young Lithuanian Tartar, Mellehovich, who falls under her spell.

Mrs Boski arrives at Hreptyoff with her daughter, Zosia, journeying to the Khan to pay her husband's ransom and Michael offers to send letters to Pyotrovich to give to Rushchyts at Rashkoff. Mr Novoveski and his daughter, Eva, are also with the party going to Rashkoff to be reunited with Adam, who ran away from the family home to join the army. Eva immediately recognises Mellehovich and then Novoveski, who calls him Azya, and who raised him alongside his son. However, as the young Tartar is now an officer of the hetman and serving under Michael, his commandant, he is out of the old nobleman's clutches and an old officer, Nyenashinyets, now recognises him as Tugai Beyovich, Tugai Bey's son and so a prince.

Chapters 29–35

Azya reveals his plan—a treacherous one—to Bogush to supposedly bring the Lithuanian Tatars over to the hetman's cause to fight against the Turk but in fact to use these troops to attack the unsuspecting Poles. Basia resolves to reunite Eva and Azya and, speaking to the handsome Tartar, leaves him with the impression that it is she herself who is in love with him. Halim, an old Tartar, brings news to Azya who reveals his plan to kidnap Basia.

Bogush travels swiftly from Hreptyoff to his hetman, Sobieski, to inform him of Azya's plan but it is rejected outright. It is now Christmas and old Novoveski is at last reunited with a repentant Adam and the latter is also enchanted by the blue-eyed Zosia Boski.

Chapters 36–50

Adam leaves for Rashkoff after his betrothal to Zosia. Michael agrees to allow Basia to accompany Eva to Rashkoff under the protection of Azya and his Lithuanian Tartars. On the journey Azya commands Halim to occupy Roshkoff and attempts to seize Basia who strikes him in the face with the ivory butt of her pistol. Fleeing back to Hreptyoff as the Lithuanian Tartars slaughter the unsuspecting inhabitants of Roshkoff by the bands of Krychinski and Adurovich. Azya slits Novoveski's throat, keeps Zosia Boski for himself and grants Eva to Adurovich. Zosia, her mother and Eva all are sold off to harems in Turkey and are never seen or heard of again.

Chapters 51–55

After a terrible journey through the wilderness, and losing her horses to wolves and an icy river, Basia makes it back to the fortalice. She collapses exhausted in a fever and Zagloba sends for a doctor from Kamenyets who revives her from near death.

Gorzenski, the commandant at Mohiloff, intercepts Azya's orders to his Tartars and kills the Mazovian infantry as well as sending a message to Yampol, thus saving it from destruction. The Ketlings arrive at Hreptyoff—Sobieski has appointed him commander of the artillery at Kamenyets—and Basia resolves to remain with Michael at Kamenyets as well.

The Sultan is slowly gathering his army and Michael writes to the hetman to grant a pardon to all robbers if they join the infantry. Sobieski commands him to defend Kamenyets to the last.

Chapters 56–62

The Turks finally march from Adrianople and Adam, now a much broken man, joins his friends at Hreptyoff, and then leads an advance guard against the enemy's chambuls, crossing the Danube and advancing as far as Pruth. Adam's dragoons assault Azya's chambul and, capturing him, give him an agonising death by drawing him on a sharpened stake.

Basia and Zagloba join Michalel at Kamenyets which is seething with preparations for its defence against the Turkish invasion. A Council of War is held, joined by Bishop Lantskoronski, Mikolai Pototski, starosta of Podolia, Lantskoronski, chamberlain of Podolia, Revuski, secretary of Podolia and officers and Michael gives them the courage required to defend the town.

Vasilkovski's cavalry dragoons slaughter the leading janissaries at Jvanyets, the remnants fleeing back across the Dniester river.

Chapters 63–67

Individual skirmishes now take place outside Kamenyets and Michael, riding on his Wallachian bay, kills Hamdi, a renowned pagan warrior. The Vizir, Sultan and Khan all arrive on the field of battle and Michael is infuriated by a letter sent via an envoy, Yuritsa, on behalf of the town council seeking an armistice. A meeting takes place outside the castle's walls and the dog-brothers’ arrogant demands are roundly rejected.

The main threat to the castle is from tunnels and mines. The town is also set on fire by Turkish cannon. Michael and Mushalski resolve to attack the Turkish tunnel being dug through the rock and the mission is successful, except for the loss of Mushalski, the brave bowman, but he returns the next day dressed as a janissary.

White flags are spotted from the old castle's battlements the next day and the town surrenders—a message is received that the troops must withdraw from the castle before evening and raise the white flag. The envoys—three commissioners—finally come and state that one of the conditions is for Kamenyets to go to the Sultan forever, who would turn it into the capital of his new province in Central Europe. As the Polish troops leave the castle, a mine explodes and kills Colonel Michael Volodyovski, the Hector of Kamenyets and first soldier of the Commonwealth. In the monastery of St. Stanislav, his body is interred in a lofty catafalque, with his lead and wooden coffins lying on top. Father Kaminski conducts the funeral service and Sobieski makes a grand entrance and kneels at the catafalque to pray for his soul.

Epilogue

Sobieski makes camp at Hotin, with grand hetman, Pats, and field hetman Michael Kazimir Radzivill, who take up position on the heights connecting Hotin with Jvanyets. A huge battle takes place after a bitterly freezing night of rain, storm and darkness. The two sides are evenly matched until the weight of the battle is transferred to the centre. The grand hetman, assisted by the voevode of Rus, sends in his hussars and the Tartar janissaries—led by Hussein, the white-bearded Kiaya, "Lion of God"—are finally vanquished on the Polish lances, many of them dying in a rugged ravine at the opposite side of their camp. Two old valiant knights—Motovidlo and the bowman Mushalski—are killed, along with Adam Novoveski who dies with a smile on his lips and calm serenity on his face. Cries of “Vivat Johannes victor!” ring out in the captured pagan camp of Hussein Pasha as a Thanksgiving Mass is celebrated by Sobieski and his victorious army.

Three years after the events of the first game, the game begins with a prologue with an unknown female narrator explaining the events of the previous game. The scene then cuts to a reunion with Yoshitsune and his older brother Yoritomo. Suddenly, the Heishi return, attacking the main castle of the Genji clan. Yoshitsune and Benkei return, along with Shizuka, this time playing a fighting role. After much fighting and confrontation, a mysterious woman of the Heishi, Atsumori, along with an old lady, escape with an important item belonging to the Genji clan. The Heishi also are now powered by a new force, rivaling the Amahagane, known as Mashogane.

In pursuit of the Heishi, the Genji clan attacks the Heishi camp. Yoritomo seems to be accepting their imminent defeat but not before Yoshitsune and his comrades finish off the battle. The three eventually head up a mountain trail continuing their pursuit only to be interrupted by Kagekiyo from the previous game. After a short battle, it is revealed that this entity is not actually Kagekiyo, but the God of War known as Lord Buson. It is explained that he came to the aid of the Genji clan in defeating the Heishi army, and needed a host body to be able to do anything of use in the human world. Lord Buson chose Kagekiyo's body because he needed the body of a strong warrior as his vessel and Kagekiyo's was apparently most suitable.

Another large scale battle ensues, with the party encountering Mashogane-powered Heishi and giant enemy crabs. Continuing up the trail, the party encounters Atsumori. After the initial fight, she powers up to her stronger form however, upon her defeat, her face was disfigured due to a blow from Yoshitsune and company and goes insane, dying shortly afterward. The four are then trapped in an enemy ambush and are sent to the Netherworld. Here, they encounter "Netherworld" versions of areas players visited in the previous game, including Gojo Bridge, the same area where Yoshitsune and Benkei first battled and met.

Eventually, the party makes it deep into the Netherworld's chambers and locates not only the spirit of Master Kiichi from the previous game but the spirit of the real Kagekiyo as well. After a short reunion, Kiichi is struck down by Kagekiyo once more, but Kiichi is not sent away, merely retreating. It is revealed that Kiichi was "left to roam this realm forever" due to Kagekiyo's influence (Kiichi was killed defending Yoshitsune and Benkei during their escape in the previous game). The party then winds up chasing and finally defeating Kagekiyo, thus freeing both Kagekiyo and Master Kiichi's souls.

After escaping the Netherworld, the party finds themselves at yet another battle which the Genji is losing, suffering heavy casualties since the absence of the four Genji warriors. As the battle rages on, Yoritomo is shown being persuaded by the old lady to use the power of Mashogane to gain power, as she knows he is tired of seeing their forces suffer heavy losses. After this battle is over, the party head to the Heishi forces.

It is here that Noritsune, the Heishi general who has been endlessly trying to seduce Shizuka since the beginning of the Heishi attack, was encountered. After his defeat, Yoritomo along with the rest of the Heishi forces, launch a full-scale attack on the Heishi, approaching their final base with a huge fleet of ships. Upon their arrival, they discover a giant Heishi battleship. The Genji charges directly into the Heishi fleet in order to avoid direct fire.

After much battling and ship jumping, the crew get inside of the battleship. It is here that the party encounters Tomomori, the head honcho of the Heishi thus far. After seemingly being defeated, the rest head onward. Returning to the Heart of the Battleship, Tomomori has possessed the giant Mashogane crystal which powers the ship. After finally defeating him once and for all, the crystal begins to explode, triggering the ship itself to sink, and Benkei jumps on top of Tomomori to finish him off. The floor expectantly falls, with Benkei falling as well.

The scene cuts to Yoshitsune, Shizuka, and Buson on the outer area of the ship, waiting for Benkei's return. Yoritomo appears, along with the old lady, who is revealed to be Kuyo, a Heishi priestess who opposed Yoshitsune and Benkei on Myogyoji Temple (during the events of the first game). Yoritomo is holding Benkei's Amahagane, and it is revealed that Yoritomo has given in to the old lady and the Heishi, in return for his gift of Mashogane. As Yoshitsune lay stunned and speechless on the floor, a few Heishi charge him, with Benkei appearing in a heartbeat, taking the blows for Yoshitsune. Benkei tells the rest to go. Reluctantly, Yoshitsune and Shizuka respect Benkei's wishes and a final shot of Benkei is shown, taking a last stand against the Heishi.

On the escape ship, the twin sisters who arrived with Lord Buson, tell Yoshitsune it is not the time for sadness. They resolve that they must put an end to the war once and for all. The warriors then travel to Hiraizumi castle, where Hidehira requests help once more to quell the Heishi attack on the fortress. After defending the castle, a large Mashogane monster appears and grabs Hidehira, killing him after he refuses to cooperate. In revenge, Yoshitsune and the others slay the beast.

The warriors go to Takadachi, the site of the summoning of the Overworld. Kuyo's plan is to attack the Overworld and become the new ruler of the universe. Following the path, Yoshitsune encounters Yoritomo, under the influence of Mashogane. Yoshitsune tells Lord Buson and Lady Shizuka to step aside, as the two brothers must battle alone. Yoritomo becomes extremely injured, and afterward reveals why he chose the path of Mashogane; as he watched his brother battle, he came to the realization that the Genji needed a strong leader, and eventually, the day would come where Yoshitsune would replace Yoritomo as the leader. Not wanting this, he succumbed to the power of Mashogane. Next, he fully transforms with the Mashogane in order to survive, and Yoshitsune defeats him once more. Accepting his defeat and realizing how foolish he was, Yoritomo gives his brother his swords, to which Yoshitsune reluctantly accepts. As Yoshitsune leaves for the final confrontation with Kuyo, Yoritomo quietly apologizes for his actions and remains alone.

Arriving at the final site, Kuyo opens the portal to the Overworld, and Lord Benkei appears. The warriors were baffled by the sight of Benkei, believing him to have died during previous battle, speak their final words to Kuyo. Benkei tells them that he'll explain his return later. Kuyo is injured and retreats into the Overworld. There, the final battle is waged with Kuyo, defeated twice, attempts to pull Yoshitsune into the Netherworld's portal with her. She fails when Shizuka hits her in the face with her blade, and Benkei reaches out and pulls Yoshitsune to safety.

The warriors and the twin girls have a final reunion. Benkei explains that while it is true that he died, he was only able to remain on Earth due to the power of the gods (Lord Buson and the twin girls). Shizuka asks if she will ever see them again, to which the others reply yes, as they will all meet again in the Overworld eventually. Accepting this, Buson, the girls, and Benkei step into the portal. Benkei, before being fully absorbed into the portal, shouts that he enjoyed his time with Shizuka and Yoshitsune, and peacefully departs.

The unknown female narrator returns and delivers the epilogue. It is revealed that Yoritomo survived the effects of the Mashogane and is now peacefully leading the Genji clan now that the war is truly over. All of the Mashogane were destroyed with the collapse of the Heishi army, and as a result, all Genji soldiers affected by the Mashogane were healed. Shizuka destroyed the Amahagane crystals as well, turning them into small fragments so that they will never be used for war again. The narrator then explains that no one knows where Shizuka left off to afterward. Yoshitsune is then shown, with Shizuka behind him, on horseback, staring into a large grassland, preparing to take off, and start a new life.

Kahoko Hino is a student in the General Education section of Seiso Academy. One day she runs into Lili, a musical fairy, who grants her a magical violin and a place in the school's annual musical competition. Kahoko refuses, only to be pressed on by Lili until she accepts the instrument and place in the competition. As she practices, Kahoko is amazed that she can play any musical piece as long as she knows the tune and plays it with her heart. As the competition goes on, she becomes more and more attached to the people she is trying to compete with.

Kreton is an alien from the planet X-47 who is fascinated by human beings. Against the wishes of his teacher, he repeatedly visits Earth. During his latest visit, his teacher reluctantly agrees to allow him to stay and study the humans. Kreton becomes friends with a suburban family and stays with them after they agree to keep his alien status a secret. Along the way, he falls in love with their daughter. However, there is a force field around him that prevents any physical contact. His race has abolished any form of affection.

Kreton's otherworldly abilities include levitation; the ability to communicate with the family dog; and forcing people he doesn't like to recite "Mary Had A Little Lamb" in public.

After repeatedly breaking his teacher's rule against getting involved in humans' lives, all Kreton's powers are stripped away. This is so he can discover for himself that being human comes with other, less desired, emotions like pain, sadness, and jealousy. Once his cover is blown on Earth and he is reported to the police, Kreton decides that those emotions are not worth the trouble, so he returns to his own planet.

''This synopsis is based on the 2008 UK Tour version.''

Act 1

Camden lad Joe Casey arrives to his house, later joined by his best friends Emmo and Lewis, his girlfriend Sarah, and her best friends Billie and Angie, where a party has been organised by his mother, Kath, for his sixteenth birthday ("Our House"). After the party, wanting to impress Sarah, Joe breaks into a building site to show her his street, Casey Street, from above. When the police arrive, Joe convinces Sarah to run away and is left with the decision of whether to run away or give himself up. The story splits into two paths revealed by the ghost of Joe's dead criminal dad: the right path where Joe gives himself up, and the wrong path where he runs away ("Simple Equation").

On the wrong path, Joe escapes the police but is berated by Sarah, and looked down upon by Dad. Joe, Emmo and Lewis drown their sorrows at the pub ("My Girl"). When Joe wakes up, he encounters Reecey, the school hardman, who offers Joe an opportunity to leave school and get involved with a "business idea" he has ("Baggy Trousers"). On the right path, the judge sentences Joe to go to a young offender institution. Joe is subsequently branded an embarrassment by neighbours and family members. Upon his release, Joe tries to get a job, but all of his interviews fail when he reveals that he is a young offender ("Embarrassment").

On the wrong path, Joe accepts Reecey's offer to work for him and they run a scam alarm company. Emmo and Lewis disapprove of Joe and Reecey's business, but are eventually convinced the business is a good idea when they experience some of the perks of Joe's lavish lifestyle ("Embarrassment – Reprise (Encouragement Version)"). On the right path, Joe has gotten a humiliating job wearing a sign pointing to a golf shop. Reecey offers to let Joe borrow one of his stolen cars, which Joe declines but it also gives him an idea; he rents a low quality car which Billie and Angie laugh at but Sarah loves ("Driving in my Car"). Sarah thanks Joe and invites him to a charity ball and offers to pay for a dinner jacket. He declines and Sarah is devastated ("My Girl - Reprise (Ballad Version)").

On the wrong path, Joe has started a building business, as well as a limousine business for Emmo and Lewis. Joe, Emmo and Lewis go out for drinks, and their waiter is Sarah, who they have not seen since school. Sarah criticises Joe's selfishness and his decision to run away from the building site when he asks about the charity ball, but confirms that he can come if he wants to. On the right path, Reecey approaches Joe as he walks home from work and convinces him to attempt to burgle a house ("Simple Equation - Reprise").

On the wrong path, Billie, Angie, Sarah, and her new friend Callum are at the charity ball. Joe arrives at the ball with a large donation, and he and Sarah dance ("The Return of the Los Palmas 7"). On the right path, Joe and Reecey are caught by the police, and each blames the other for the crime ("Shut Up"). Emmo and Lewis call Sarah, who arrives with Callum. The situation escalates, with Joe eventually punching Callum and a policeman. Joe says he wishes he had never met Sarah, causing her to storm off. Joe is sent back to prison. Meanwhile, on the wrong path, Joe and Sarah share a kiss, having rekindled their relationship ("Tomorrow's (Just Another Day)/The Sun and the Rain").

Act 2

On the wrong path, Joe and Sarah are on a gondola, on their way to get married in Las Vegas ("Night Boat To Cairo"). While there, Joe encounters Mr Pressman, who gives Joe his business card. Joe and Sarah get married and a paradise wedding party ensues ("Wings of a Dove"). On the right path, Joe is released from prison, but doesn't go home. Kath is worried for him, as she now has two family members who went to prison and never came home ("One Better Day"). Mr Pressman meets with Kath to try and convince her to move out of 25 Casey Street so he can build it up; she refuses. Joe overhears Pressman's plans to get rid of number 25, and is now determined to track down Mr Pressman with a new mission: save 25 Casey Street ("Rise and Fall").

On both paths, Joe arrives at Mr Pressman's office ("House of Fun"). On the wrong path, Mr Pressman explains to Joe his plan to vacate and build up 25 Casey Street. Joe agrees to get Kath out of the house. On the right path, Joe enters Mr Pressman's office to argue against his plans, but Pressman doesn't pay attention to Joe.

On the wrong path, while at dinner, Joe reveals his plans to move Kath out of Casey Street and rebuild it as Casey Boulevard. Lewis disagrees with Joe and leaves dinner. Joe looks to Sarah for support, but she also disagrees with him. Joe angrily leaves and Sarah laments on her feelings about Joe, remembering the night he ran away from the police. Meanwhile, Joe tells Mr Pressman he doesn't want to work on Casey Street anymore ("NW5"). On the right path, Joe looks for a lawyer, revealed to be Sarah, now engaged to Callum ("Embarrassment - Reprise (Law Firm)"). Joe decides he should find a different lawyer and leaves. Sarah realises she misses him and wants him back.

On the wrong path, Joe is waiting for Mr Pressman's demolition expert, who is revealed to be Reecey. Joe tells Reecey to break into 25 Casey Street while Kath is out ("Simple Equation - Reprise"). On the right path, Sarah finds Joe sleeping in the now disheveled Morris Minor and they discuss Joe's while thinking about how much they miss each other. She reveals that 25 Casey Street was gifted to the Casey family. Joe praises her investigative skills and they hug, more in love than ever ("It Must Be Love"). Sarah also reveals she didn't get married. Secretly elated, Joe decides to go home to his mother. On the wrong path, Emmo and Lewis tell Joe that Kath didn't get in the limousine because she wanted to wait for Joe. Realising she'll still be home when Reecey breaks in, Joe runs home ("The Sun and the Rain").

On both paths, Reecey sets fire to 25 Casey Street, and both Joes arrive as the house is burning down. On the right path, Kath is safe, much to the relief of Joe. On the wrong path, Kath dies in the fire. At her funeral, Lewis blames Joe for her death and one by one, the others leave. Joe is charged with arson and manslaughter after Reecey names him as an accomplice.

On the right path, Joe and Sarah get married. Joe talks with Kath, where he says he now understands his dad's situation better. He says he wishes he'd done things differently, to which his dad says that as long as he's with the people he loves, he's done the right thing. For a brief moment, Joe and Dad can finally hear each other. They share a touching moment as Dad leaves. Joe returns to the group for the wedding photo and the party ensues. Suddenly, Joe is thrust back to the night of the party and eventual break in. However, instead of breaking into the building site, he kisses Sarah before taking her out dancing ("Our House - Reprise").

'''Chapters I – V'''

The novel begins with a description of the families living in and around the district of Rossyeni, the oldest and most powerful of which are the Billeviches. Aleksandra Billevich, the granddaughter of the chief hunter of Upita, has been orphaned and left in the care of the noble families. She is destined to marry Andrei Kmita (Polish: Andrzej Kmicic), whose father was the best friend of her grandfather, Pan Heraclius. The pair meet, and she is smitten by him on their first meeting, particularly as he is a war hero from Smolensk. However, she is wary of his impetuous character and his companions, ruffians who are almost outlaws and depend on him for their protection from the law.

At his mansion in Lyubich, various misdeeds take place and rumours soon fly around the neighbourhood. They are taken to meet Panna Aleksandra and go on a sleigh ride, interrupted by news that a quarrel has broken out between Kmita's troops and the citizens of Upita over provisions. He deals harshly with the affair and also news reaches Olenka, via an old servant Kassyan, of the debauchery at Lyubich. On a Sunday she again meets Kmita's companions and treats them harshly, arousing their ire and they decide to go to Upita to complain to their superior. On the way, they stop off to drink at the Dola public house they drink vodka and play with the Butryms’ women and are slaughtered by the men.

'''Chapters VI – X'''

Kmita returns to Vodokty with his troops and has to confess to how he mistreated the guilty at Upita e.g. ordering one hundred blows for the town's mayor and councillors. The couple quarrel and he resolves to dismiss his companions who she says are a bad influence on him. At Lyubich he finds the bodies of his murdered colleagues and, in revenge, burns the village of Volmontovichi to the ground. Kmita has to seek refuge with Olenka and she forces him to flee.

The action switches to the troubles inside the Commonwealth, particularly between the Yanush Radzivill (grand hetman of Lithuania) and Pavel Sapyeha factions. Pan Volodyovski, a general who is recovering from a wound, is living with Pakosh Gashtovt in Lauda, and the people want him to marry Olenka. Kmita returns to kidnap Olenka and Volodyovski with his force besieges him and his Cossacks at Lyubich. They fight a duel and the banneret of Orsha is wounded. Saving Olenka, Michal Volodyovski decides to propose to her but is rejected and he knows she loves Kmita, despite everything that has occurred.

War is afoot and Volodyovski is ordered by Radzivill to grant Kmita a commission to raise a force. He visits the wounded knight at Lyubich and knows he will render good service to the Commonwealth as well as blot out his past offences.

'''Chapters XI – XV'''

Great Poland is invaded by the Swedes and the nobles are led by Pan Kryshtof Opalinski, the powerful voivoda of Poznań. However, they have grown soft in peacetime and defeatism is in the air. They decide to parley with Wittemberg, the Swedish commander, as reinforcements fail to come from the Polish king, John II Casimir and Karl Gustav is accepted as King.

In the district of Lukovo, Yan Skshetuski is living with his wife and her adopted father, Zagloba. Stanislaw Skshetuski, Yan's cousin, announces the treachery and all three decide to make for Prince Radzivill's palace at Kyedani via Upita to see Michal Volodyovski. They learn that Pan Gosyevski and Yudytski have been arrested. They are summoned to a private meeting with the Prince who then meets two Swedish envoys (Count Lowenhaupt and Baron Schitte). Before a feast that evening, Kmita is summoned by the Prince and made to swear on the holy cross that he will not leave him until death. Olenka and Kmita are reunited and make peace. The Prince announces his alliance with the Swedes and the Skshetuskis and Zagloba are thrown into prison for dissent. Radzivill explains his thinking to Kmita who decides to remain loyal.

'''Chapters XVI – XXII'''

The Hungarians and a part of the dragoons of Myeleshko and Kharlamp, who attempt to resist, are massacred by Kmita's men. Radzivill is determined to murder Zagloba but Kmita pleads for his life and so the Prince decides to send his prisoners to the Swedes at Birji. On the way, Zagloba tricks Roh Kovalski, the conducting officer, and escapes and the captive colonels are rescued by the Lauda men and they make for the voevoda of Vityebsk and defeat Swedish troops at a village.

Kmita fortifies Kyedani and Volodyovski's squadron is nearly caught by the Prince and the regiments of Myeleshko and Ganhoff but slips through. Kmita sees Olenka again as the Prince wants her and her guardian Pan Billevich, the Prince's sword-bearer, as hostages at Kyedani. However, Volodyovski comes to their rescue and Kmita is sentenced to death. However, he is saved by Zagloba who finds a letter amongst his clothes from the Prince berating him for having saved the Colonels and Zagloba and also his commission and is freed.

'''Chapters XXIII – XXXIII'''

Kmita finds out that Radzivill ordered the Swedes to murder the Colonels. At a feast Olenka and Kmita are obliged to sit next to each other and cannot express their true feelings. A letter arrives from Prince Boguslav, the Prince's cousin, saying his lands are being ravaged in Podlyasye. Kmita gets the Prince to send him on a mission to Charles X Gustav via Podlyasye. On the road he meets Prince Boguslav making his way to Kyedani and learns at last about the Radzivill's treachery. He kidnaps the Prince but the latter manages to escape, wounding Kmita and killing two of his men.

Sergeant Soroka assumes command and they take refuge in a pitch-maker's cabin deep in the forest. The blacksmith escapes and a fight takes place with some horse thieves who turn out to be Pan Kyemlich and his two sons, ex-soldiers of Kmita's and so loyal to him. Kmita, who has lost Radzivill's letters, decides to act as a horse dealer and heads off with the Kyemlichs for the Prussian border after writing a letter to the Colonels under the name of Babinich warning them of Radzivill's movements and strategy. He also writes to Radzivill warning him not to harm Olenka or he will reveal his treacherous letters.

Kmita encounters Jendzian, now a lower noble, who agrees to take the letter to the Colonels. Commonwealth troops arrive at the inn, the Mandrake, and Kmita's men fight with Yuzva Butrym's men and overcome them. Arriving at Shchuchyn with his small retinue, he is reunited with his old master Yan Skshetuski, and tells them about Kmita's conversion. The Colonels are wary but, after receiving a letter signed by Kmita, decide to move for Byalystok to concentrate the Commonwealth forces. Here, Zagloba is surprisingly made temporary leader and immediately starts disciplining and organising supplies for the troops, and building breastworks. Volodyovski is sent to deal with a force besieging a village. Finally, the voevoda of Vityebsk, Sapyeha, arrives with his army, accompanied by a returning Volodyovski.

'''Chapters XXXIV – XXXVII'''

Radzivill has to wait for Swedish troops before descending on Podlyasye. The Swedes have overrun Great Poland, Little Poland and have overcome Cracow. Prince Boguslav arrives at Kyedani and bolsters his cousin's morale as well as laying siege to Olenka who he falsely informs that Kmita is joining the Polish traitor, Radzeyovski, for gold and promising to deliver John II Casimir, taking refuge in Silesia, to the Swedes. He also ensures he befriends Olenka's guardian, the sword-bearer of Rossyeni. A letter arrives from Sapyeha urging the Radzivills to break with Karl Gustav and seek forgiveness from King John Casimir but the Prince decides to march on Podlyasye.

Andrei Kmita, now pretending to be a Catholic nobleman from Electoral Prussia, is disillusioned by the talk of the nobles who are now resigned to Swedish rule. He is forced to sell his horses to a Prussian commandant at Pryasnysh in return for a paper receipt which he can now use as his pass to get to Warsaw. News arrives of the fall of Cracow and the defeat of Charnyetski and, the closer Kmita gets to the capital, the more news he hears about the severe Swedish oppression under Wittemberg, the garrison commander and Radzeyovski, and the looting, particularly by Polish traitors which mostly goes unpunished. Swedish and German plunderers near Sohachev besiege Pan Lushchevski, the starosta, at Strugi, his private estate. Kmita and his men come to his aid and beat them off. He finally leaves for Chenstohova (Czestochowa), filled with hope when the starosta's daughter, also called Olenka, tells him she will be faithful to her lover, also called Andrei.

'''Chapters XXXVIII – XLI '''

The fortunes of the Swedes are increasing. The remainder of the Polish army has revolted and there are rumours that Konyetspolki's division – a hero from Zbaraj – has joined Karl Gustav. John Casimir is living in Glogov with his small retinue but even some of these are deserting him. At an inn, Kmita overhears a conversation in German between Baron Lisola, the Bohemian envoy of the Emperor of Germany and Count Veyhard Vjeshohovich (a mercenary fighting for the Swedes) that Chenstohova will be plundered for its treasures.

Kmita and his band make their way to the sacred monastery of Jasna Gora and he personally warns the prior, Father Kordetski. After a somewhat hostile reception, especially from a suspicious Charnyetski, the fortress takes defensive measures orchestrated by Zamoyski and Charnyetski, using cannon delivered earlier from Cracow. The Swedish force led by General Miller arrives, terms of surrender are rejected and the siege commences – against the advice of the highly experienced Colonel Sadovski – on 18 November. Kmita himself takes charge of firing one cannon and successfully destroys many Swedish cannon and troops. The besieged also make a surprise sortie on November 28 and destroy a further two Swedish cannons. Charnyetski is brought round by the Lithuanian's skill and courage, particularly when Kmita defuses a Swedish cannonball by removing its charge. Prior Kordotski requests Kmita to dedicate the iron ball to the Most Holy Lady once the enemy have left the field.

In the aftermath of World War I, Inge Altenberg (Elizabeth Reaser), an orphan from Snåsa, Norway, arrives in America to a very cold reception. The parents of immigrant farmer Olaf Torvik (Tim Guinee) remain in Norway, where they met her. Dialogue reveals that the four of them have worked out an agreement that allowed her to emigrate to America for the purpose of marrying Olaf. The Minnesota farming village of Audubon, in which her intended husband lives, is horrified to learn that she is a German immigrant with no papers. To make matters worse, she has accidentally obtained membership papers for the American Socialist Party. Scandalized, both the town's Lutheran minister and the county clerk refuse to marry them.

When events lead them to openly cohabit with each other, they find themselves ostracized by the entire town. They are then forced to harvest their crop completely by hand and alone. This particular harvest season brings not only work, but love as well.

Leon Phelps (also known as the "''Ladies Man''") was a ''Saturday Night Live'' character played by Tim Meadows during the 1990s. The sketch was that of a broadcast program in which Phelps, a young, suave black man, would give dubious romantic advice and lovemaking tips. The Ladies Man openly proclaimed that he would court any woman at all including skanks, providing the woman weighs no more than 250 pounds. A night of romance would generally center around a bottle of Courvoisier.

After finally going too far during a broadcast, Leon is fired, but he receives a note from one of his former flames who wants him to come back to her—and is willing to support him in high style. This sounds just fine with Leon, except that the woman didn't sign her name, and now Leon has to backtrack through his numerous conquests of the past and figure out who wants him to work his love magic. Meanwhile, a secret group called the Victims of the Smiling Ass (V.S.A. for short), consisting of the angry husbands and boyfriends whose women have cheated with Leon, have discovered Leon as their target and are now hot on his trail, eager to get revenge.

Jane Lucas now has her own television show, ''Lucas Live'', but as before she neglects her own problems, including her son (who comes out as gay during the series), and focuses on other people's, especially homeless former businessman Richard. She has the beginnings of a romance with Daniel, a social worker. Jane's producer is Debra and her mother Bea, who was determined for her to remarry, is still a main character.

A remote Florida swamp has been targeted for theme park development, and the swamp's inhabitants are none too happy. It doesn't help that the residents are a colony of intelligent, prehistoric, dinosaur-like birds: terror birds. This flock of beasts has escaped the mass extinction that killed off the dinosaurs, relying on stealth, cunning, and killer instinct. The creatures have been living in secret.

As the developers push to have the recently discovered animals exterminated, a billionaire rogue environmentalist steps in to protect these rare, predatory creatures. A naïve young Fish and Wildlife officer finds himself caught in between these two forces and finds conflict.

John Rolfe VI is an infantry captain who comes back from World War II with a war wound and few prospects, but in 1946 a radio he is rewiring malfunctions and creates a gateway to a parallel universe. This universe is one in which Alexander the Great lived a full lifespan, creating an empire that stretched from Iberia to the Indian subcontinent. In this world, the Macedonian Empire proved so strong and durable that it redirected the barbarian migrations of the Goths, Vandals, and others eastward towards China and the rest of the Far East. As a result, what remains of China is a hodgepodge of Indo-European dominated states, the Americas remain undiscovered by the Old World, and technology has barely progressed to a medieval level. Deciding to take advantage of the untapped resources that await in this different California, Rolfe gathers members of his infantry company to help him explore and develop this new world. Over the next 60 years, he builds a new nation, which he calls the Commonwealth of New Virginia.

In 2009, two California fish and game officers, Tom Christiansen and Roy Tully, are trying to solve the mystery of how large numbers of pelts from endangered species are showing up. They finally deduce the secret of the gate to the parallel world, but before they can make the secret known to their superiors, they are kidnapped and permanently transported to New Virginia by Rolfe's granddaughter, Gate Security Agent Adrienne Rolfe (with whom Christiansen had been falling in love).

Once the two rangers get over their resentment of being forcibly and permanently removed from their lives and world, and being brought to this new world, Adrienne enlists them to help sabotage a coming coup in New Virginia. Giovanni Colletta, head of the second most powerful family, and son of a sleazy and amoral war buddy of Rolfe's, has resented the elder Rolfe's control, and he and some allies are planning to take over by force and violence, with the intention of imposing an authoritarian regime. The rangers decide that Rolfe and his allies are the lesser of two evils, and decide to help Adrienne in her effort to prevent the coup. The group discovers that Colletta is arming post-Aztec and post-Mayan Indians to build a couple of battalions of soldiers (something very illegal under Commonwealth law) in an attempt to capture the Gate, holding the Commonwealth hostage.

Colletta duly strikes, giving the other families the grounds to oppose him militarily. The revolt is put down, but at a price: the radio device and the Gateway are destroyed, and with it, the connection to our world. What little talent the Commonwealth has in physics works feverishly to re-establish the Gate. They are successful, but when they look through the new gate, they do not see FirstSide (New Virginia slang for Rolfe's home Earth) Oakland, but instead a snarling saber-toothed cat and a dead giant sloth.

Miguel, a young man from Quezon province, leaves the Philippines for the U.S. After seven years, he returns home, and his family discovers he has had a sex change operation and is now Michelle. Her father is stunned by this development, and other hostile reactions erupt. She declares she will stay until her family accepts her. She has also caused a crisis for an old friend who was going to get married without ever admitting he was gay. Michelle's bravery makes him think again.

The player guides Cuthbert from hell through levels of mines while avoiding railcars and the fireball-throwing devil.

As the novel opens, Rhapsody and Achmed set out to save children sired by the F'Dor's minion, the Rakshas, from the damnation that carrying the Rakshas's blood (and through it, the F'Dor's) conveys. Achmed, lacking Rhapsody's selflessness, seeks the blood in the hopes that he can use it to track and identify the F'Dor. The journey is successful, though Rhapsody is almost killed when promised reinforcements fail to arrive and she is left nearly naked in wintry conditions. After the children of the Rakshas are purified through extraction of the demon's blood, Achmed returns to his kingdom of Ylorc. Rhapsody travels to the nearby city of Bethany to attend a state wedding and covertly liaison with her lover, Ashe. Though Ashe is delayed fighting the F'Dor's minions (who sought to wreak chaos during the wedding), the celebration goes off without flaw. On the way back to Ylorc from Bethany, Rhapsody is met by Ashe's father, Llauron, a fourth-dragon and leader of one of the two major human religions. Llauron stages a ritual duel with one of his own followers (corrupted by the F'Dor), feigning his own death. Rhapsody, as an unknowing part of Llauron's plan, immolates him in starfire with the blade Daystar Clarion, unlocking Llauron's dragon nature and allowing him to, by shedding his humanity, attain both greater longevity and power. Ashe, enraged at the F'Dor's minion (and at Llauron's callous use of Rhapsody), destroys the traitor in a fiery display of power.

Meanwhile, in Ylorc, Grunthor discovers a secret sect of Bolg (the monstrous citizens of Ylorc) - the Finders, who are compelled to seek artifacts of the previous inhabitants of Ylorc. In the process, Grunthor discovers the treasure which the Finders unknowingly sought - the Great Seal of Canrif, a horn which summons all the Cymrians (survivors of the lost land of Serendair) when it is blown.

Rhapsody goes to Tyrian to hide from the world, frustrated and shamed at her self-perceived failure to protect Llauron. In the process, she re-lights the diamond crown of the Lirin, accidentally fulfilling a generations-old prophecy and, accordingly, becoming Queen of the Lirin. At her coronation, attended by the most powerful and influential people in the neighboring countries, Achmed finally identifies the F'Dor: the Blesser of Bethe Corbair, Lanacan Orlando. Realizing that the F'Dor intends to possess Rhapsody, Achmed assassinates the Patriarch, leader of the other major human religion, to provide a distraction. Roughly a month later, Achmed, Rhapsody, and Grunthor travel together to Bethe Corbair, defeating the F'Dor after a very close battle. Rhapsody is worried, however, by the demon's insinuations: that she had unknowingly had sex with the Rakshas, in the guise of Ashe. She grows more concerned in the weeks that follow, as she starts to feel a knot growing in her belly.

To seal a lasting peace in the wake of the F'Dor's death, Rhapsody travels to the Great Bowl just outside Ylorc, wherein the Cymrian Council had convened in times past. Blowing the Great Seal, she calls the Cymrians into a third Great Moot, wherein she plans to re-establish the old Cymrian Alliance, traditionally led by a Lord and Lady. Despite opposition from the previous Lady Cymrian, the Seer Anwyn, Rhapsody is (to her own surprise) confirmed as Lady Cymrian. Ashe is, after more debate, named Lord Cymrian; a fact which causes Rhapsody no little concern, as she, though loving him, had thought him wedded to another for purposes of state. Ashe convinces Rhapsody that, in fact, ''Rhapsody'' was his wife (through a complicated series of events at the end of the previous book), and furthermore informs her that the F'Dor had lied when it claimed the Rakshas had intercourse with her (the growth of her belly was revealed to the product of a 'seed of doubt'.) Anwyn, infuriated by her rejection, steals the Great Seal, calls up a legion of the dead, and transforms into a dragon to wreak havoc. She is defeated by Achmed, though the Cymrians suffer considerable losses, and a new age begins.

The main adversary in this book is Michael, “The Wind of Death” – first seen in ''Rhapsody: Child of Blood'' – now host to a F'dor, a fire demon. He has found out that Rhapsody also survived the destruction of Serendair and is coming for her.

Achmed, King of Ylorc, is attempting to rebuild the Lightcatcher – an ancient device from Gwylliam’s Empire – inside the peak of Gurgus. He enlists the help of Theophila, a member of the Panjeri tribe, who are masters of stained glass. Meanwhile, trouble comes to Achmed and Grunthor from the Raven's Guild in Yarim – the Guildmistress is determined to have revenge on the Bolg kingdom for destroying her foundry.

Rhapsody and Ashe have decided to have a child together, but prophecies speak of trouble, and so they speak to Ashe’s aunt Manwyn, the Seer of the future, in an effort to discover whether harm will befall them.

Soon after the child is conceived Rhapsody is abducted by Michael's men, who nearly kill her protector Anborn in the process. Ashe and Achmed, who still do not like each other much, team together to rescue her. During their search for Rhapsody they meet the legendary warrior McQuieth, Ashe's distant ancestor, who proves to be extremely helpful in the fight against F'dor.

The supposedly dead dragon Anwyn awakes from slumber, suffering from partial memory loss. Soon she becomes obsessed with a single thing: to find and take revenge on Rhapsody.

Achmed and Grunthor continue to rebuild the kingdom of Ylorc. Achmed's determination to rebuild an ancient and apparently extremely dangerous device called the Light Catcher threatens to sever his friendship with Rhapsody.

Talquist, the despotic Emperor Presumptive of Sorbold, brings to life a gigantic earthen statue, which goes on rampage.

Young Gwydion, ward of Rhapsody and her draconic husband Ashe, becomes the new Duke of Navarne and embarks on a mission with his mentor Anborn.

Pregnant Rhapsody visits the dragon Elynsynos and while there, she gives birth to her son, Meridion. Yet soon afterwards Anwyn appears and Rhapsody finds herself in grave danger. She, Achmed and the baby are saved by Ashe's father Llauron in the last second.

Abandoned by his American lover who finished his tour of duty, Pol (Alan Paule) a poor, gay teenager from the mountains is forced to move to Manila and support himself and his family. He enters the underground world of male strippers, prostitution, illegal drugs, sexual exploitation, and sexual slavery. His closest friend is a successful "macho dancer" and call boy, Noel (Daniel Fernando) who takes Pol on as a roommate and acts as his mentor. Noel leads Pol to employment at Mama Charlie's, a male strip club in the district's tourist row frequented by American, European, and Japanese foreigners. Pol is quickly accepted into the community of sex workers and has an immediate rapport with Bambi, a young call girl that often parties on the street with Noel and his friends after work hours.

After their camaraderie grows, Noel reveals to Pol that he initially moved to Manila to fund the education of his younger sister Pining and that she has recently gone missing. He left her with his aunt but fears that she ran away and has been kidnapped and sexually exploited. Pol promises Noel his complete support for the search.

Desperate for extra money to fund his search for Pining, Noel takes on risky jobs. He solicits the jobs from Dennis, a fellow macho dancer with connections to the local crime lord, a corrupt police officer nicknamed Kid. Noel begins to deal drugs to his clients and asks Pol to appear with him in a pornographic film. During their time off, Pol and Noel search Manila's strip clubs and brothels for Pining. To aid their search, Bambi discreetly asks clients and sex workers about new groups of women forced into sexual slavery.

Pol unwittingly receives a public beating from Kid that was meant for Dennis and Noel. Noel is nowhere to be found and Pol is taken in and nursed by Bambi. Pol declares that he is in love with her after they sleep together. Bambi brushes off his declaration and attributes it to his excitement at sleeping with a woman for the first time. Noel later expresses disappointment at their budding romance.

Noel and Pol finally discover Pining being held as a sex slave at a brothel controlled by Kid's minions. The brothel is well guarded and considered extremely dangerous within the sex work community. They visit her disguised as clients. Pining tells them she came to Manila to flee her abusive aunt and find Noel. Lost and hungry, she accepted drugged food and was kidnapped, raped, and brought to the brothel. She is held in captivity there and is expected to service clients at all hours until she is released after about three years. She begs them to leave quickly to avoid suspicion.

Noel despairs because there is no hope of freeing Pining without risking his own life. Having 'lost' Pol to Bambi in addition to the obstacles of Pining's rescue, he heavily indulges in drugs and alcohol with Dennis and other macho dancers. Pol comes back to the apartment to find some members of the group incapacitated and others engaging in self-harm with a razor and Dennis's .22 pistol. He intervenes and puts Noel to bed.

After earning more money, Noel and Pol visit the brothel holding Pining again. They make an improvised escape and Kid pursues Noel, Pining, and Pol during a heavy rainstorm. Kid fatally shoots Noel, who dies in Pol's arms. Pol takes Pining to Bambi's apartment where she can remain hidden until he can arrange for her to leave the city. In mourning and weary from what has passed, he decides to return to the mountains and asks Bambi to come with him. She is tempted, but refuses to go on account of the fact that she has been doing sex work since age twelve and does not think she can do anything else.

Before he leaves town, Pol packs up Noel's apartment and picks up the money saved for Pining. He then stalks Kid from dawn to dusk as the officer goes about his day. Careful not to be seen, Pol follows Kid back to his apartment complex. He shoots Kid in the head and quietly leaves the scene with no witnesses. On his last day in Manila, he visit's Mama Charlie's to say goodbye to his colleagues. The club has been raided and subsequently reopened under the new name Hijos. Although it has a new name, the club is same – same owner, workers, decor, and even the same macho dancer routines. A new corrupt police officer will act as the club's liaison with the law in the place of Kid, whose murder is on the front page of the newspapers. Though some of his friends ask him to reconsider, Pol is resolved to return to the country.

He and Bambi see off Pining and give her the money that Noel saved for her education. Pol implores Bambi to come with him, but she still refuses. They part amicably, but sorrowfully. Pol boards the bus leaving Manila and smiles as it makes its way out of the city.

Char the cook helps on the same ship that is assigned by the captain, husband of the Crossroad's Inn hostess, to look after Ven and uses this as an excuse to follow him every where and sharing in his adventurous life. He is Ven's best friend and shares a room with him in Hare Warren at the Inn

Saeli, a Gwadd, is naturally tiny and can speak to animals and plants. She can make flowers bloom and spring out of the ground. Clemency, more commonly known as Clem is the stewardess of mouse lodge ( the girl's dormitory) and the pastor's assistant in charge of the Spice Folk. She is also friends with Ven. Ida played a more than significant part in ''The Floating Island'' by closing the rover’s box. She's a skinny pick pocket with more potential then she lets out, living at the cross roads inn with more than a knack at solving the insolvable. She is known as an orphan but has a horrifying past and an even more horrifying mother. Ven, the new official reporter living at general ease takes himself and friends Clemency, Nick, Saeli, and Char, on one of his adventures to the Gated City. Saeli is kidnapped, and an unanticipated kindness shines through the grime of Ida and the whole group has a shock, an adventure, and a light at the end of the tunnel.

Ven wakes up to a bad day, from waking up late and finding that Ida has eaten his breakfast. On the way to the castle Ven leaves a packet of cookies for the trolls the Trudy tells him are under the bridge. At the castle the king shows him a secret tunnel in the soon to be garden and gives him a box with a glowing stone. He tells Ven that he has deciphered the writing on it and found that it comes from the Gated City ruled by the Raven guild and he wants Ven to investigate it. Back in the main castle Ven is officially fired as the kings official reporter. Ven returns to the inn and invites all the children who want to go with him to the Gated City's market. Char, Ida, Saeli, Clemency, and Nick agree to go with him. The children are dazzled by the market's brilliant colors and shops, but soon realize all is not what it seems. The children come to a weapon store called Arm of Coates, and go inside. The owner of the store is an old man called Mr. Coates. He tells them that a fortune-teller called Madame Sharra may know what the shining stone King Vandemere gave them is. Before they leave the store, Coates gives them a special gauntlet with many useful functions, and tells them it may come in handy in the future.

Paramutual Pictures decide that they need a spy to find out the inner workings of their studio. Morty S. Tashman, (the 'S' stands for 'scared'), is a paperhanger who happens to be working right outside their window. They decide that he is the man for the job and hire him on the spot. He bumbles his way through a series of misadventures, reporting everything back to the corporate executives.

Lester March is a 25-year-old orphan who is an electronics repairman. However, his real passion is detective novels, and he dreams of becoming a detective himself someday. His best friend, Pete Flint, is a detective, and they see a television program about a wealthy, single woman, Cecilia Albright who is looking for her long-lost nephew. The mention of a $100,000 reward gains their attention.

Flint allows March to join him in sneaking into the Albright mansion in hopes of solving the mystery and collecting the reward. During their break-in, Albright's lawyer sees them and recognizes March as being the long-lost nephew, Charles Albright, Jr. The lawyer was responsible for Charles Albright, Sr.'s death, and his plan is to marry Cecilia and kill her to inherit the entire fortune. With the help of the butler, they plan to kill March so he does not interfere with that plan.

The family nurse, Wanda Paxton discovers March's identity and falls in love with him. The lawyer's plans are foiled, March's identity is revealed, and Paxton and March are married.

Prologue

The prologue to the novel is Carpentier's most often quoted text, in which he coins the term ''lo real maravilloso'' ("marvellous reality") in reference to seemingly miraculous occurrences in Latin America. Furthermore, his trip to Haiti in 1943 is recounted, as well as some of the research he did to gather facts for the novel. Carpentier also denounces the commonplace and formulaic instances of the marvellous that is found in surrealist novels due to its inorganic and false origins, as opposed to the natural magic that is found in Latin America.

Part one

Ti Noel recalls the tales that a fellow slave, Macandal, would regale on the plantation of their master, Lenormand de Mezy. Macandal would tell tales of magical characters and mythical kingdoms with rivers rising in the sky. He is said to not only have irresistible qualities that appeal to black women, but also the ability to captivate men. He suffers an accident in which his left hand is caught in machinery, and his arm is dragged in up to the shoulder. Being useless to his owner, he departs for the mountains and discovers many secret herbs, plants, and fungi that appear to have magical qualities. Ti Noel joins Macandal and both learn about the magical attributes of these natural elements. Macandal suggests that the time has come, and no longer goes to the plantation. After the rain season has passed, Ti Noel meets with him in a cave populated with strange items. Macandal has established contact with surrounding plantations, and gives instructions to ensure the death of cows using secret herbs. The poison spreads, killing livestock by the hundreds as well as Frenchmen, wiping out adults and children. Madame Lenormand de Mezy dies as a result, and the deaths continue with entire families suffering the same fate. At gunpoint, a slave eventually explains that Macandal has superhuman powers and is the Lord of Poison. Death within the plantations returns to normal rates as a result and the Frenchmen return to playing cards and drinking, as months pass with no word of Macandal. Macandal, now with the ability to transform into animal forms, like bird, fish, or insect, visits the plantation to affirm faith in his return. The slaves decide to wait four years for Macandal to complete his metamorphoses and once again become a human. After four years, he returns during a celebration and all present are delighted. The chanting alerts the white men, and preparations are made to capture Macandal. He is captured and tied to a post in order to be lashed and burned in front of massive black crowds, but he escapes, flying overhead, and lands among the crowd. He is again captured and burned, but the slaves are certain that he has been saved by African Gods and return to their plantations, laughing.

Part two

Lenormand de Mezy's second wife has died and the city has made remarkable progress. Henri Christophe is a master chef. Twenty years have gone by and Ti Noel has fathered twelve children by one of the cooks. He has told these children many stories of Macandal and they await his return. A secret gathering of trusted slaves takes place: Bouckman, the Jamaican, speaks of possible freedom for the blacks emerging in France and also mentions the opposition from the plantation landowners. An uprising is planned; as a result of this meeting, conch-shell trumpets sound and slaves, armed with sticks, surround the houses of their masters. Upon hearing the conch-shells Lenormand de Mezy is frightened and manages to hide. The slaves kill the white men and drink much alcohol. Ti Noel, after drinking, rapes Mademoiselle Floridor, who is Lenormand de Mezy's latest mistress. The uprising is defeated and Bouckman is killed. The governor, Blanchelande, advocates for the complete extermination of the colony's black population, as they pose a threat with their voodoo and secret religion. Several of the rebels are gathered to be publicly executed, but Lenormand de Mezy secures the release of his slaves, including Ti Noel, intending to sell them in the slave markets in Cuba. Lenormand de Mezy takes Ti Noel and other slaves to Cuba, where he becomes lazy, conducts no business, enjoys the women, drinks alcohol, and gambles away his slaves. Pauline Bonaparte accompanies Leclerc, her army general husband, to Haiti. On the way there, she enjoys sexually tempting the men on the ship. Solimán, a black slave, massages her body and lavishes loving care on her beauty. Leclerc develops yellow fever, and Pauline trusts in the voodoo and magic of Solimán to cure him. Leclerc dies, and Pauline returns to Paris while the Rochambeau government treats the blacks very poorly. However, there is the emergence of black priests who allow the slaves to conduct more business internally.

Part three

Ti Noel has been won in a card game by a plantation owner based in Santiago, and Lenormand de Mezy dies in abject poverty shortly afterwards. Ti Noel saves enough money to buy his passage, and as a free man, he discovers a free Haiti. Now much older, he realizes that he has returned to the former plantation of Lenormand de Mezy. Haiti has undergone great development, and the land has come under the control of the black man. Ti Noel is abruptly thrown into prison and once again made to work as a slave among children, pregnant girls, women, and old men. Henri Christophe, formerly a cook and now king due to the black uprising, is using slaves to construct lavish statues, figures, and a magnificent fortress. Ti Noel considers slavery under a fellow black man worse than that endured at the hands of Lenormand de Mezy. In times past, the loss of a slave would be a financial loss, but as long as there are black women to continue supplying slaves, their deaths are insignificant. Ti Noel escapes and returns to the former plantation of Lenormand de Mezy, where he remains for some time, and later returns to the city to find it gripped by fear of Henri Christophe's regime. King Christophe is tormented by thunder strikes and ghosts of formerly tortured subjects, and eventually he and Sans-Souci Palace are overrun by the blacks and by voodoo. Left alone, he commits suicide and his body is taken by the remaining African pages to the magnificent fortress where they bury him in a pile of mortar. The entire mountain becomes the mausoleum of the first King of Haiti.

Part four

Henri Christophe's widow and children are taken to Europe by English merchants, who used to supply the royal family. Solimán accompanies them and enjoys the summers in Rome, where he is treated well and tells embellished tales of his past. He encounters a statue of Pauline whose form brings back memories, and sends him into a howl, causing the room to be rushed. He is reminded of the night of Henri Christophe's demise and flees before succumbing to malaria. Ti Noel recalls things told by Macandal, and the former plantation of Lenormand de Mezy has become a happy place, with Ti Noel presiding over celebrations and festivities. Surveyors disrupt the peace at the plantation, and mulattoes have risen to power; they force hundreds of black prisoners to work by whiplash, and many have lost hope as the cycle of slavery continues. Ti Noel, thinking of Macandal, decides to transform into various animals to observe the ongoing events; he metamorphoses into a bird, a stallion, a wasp, and then an ant. He eventually becomes a goose, but is rejected by the clan of geese. He understands that being a goose does not imply that all geese are equal, so he returns to human form. The book concludes with the end of Ti Noel's life, and his own self-reflection upon greatness and The Kingdom of This World.

The show was about the title character, Shane (Skinner), a middle aged taxi driver, and his long suffering family. His wife, Myrtle, is a mature student who enjoys creative writing and amateur dramatics. Their children are daughter Velma, a seventeen-year-old feminist, and son Lenny, a pre-pubescent child who, much to Myrtle's disappointment, shows signs of developing a similar sense of humour to Shane.

Shane's best friend and boss is Bazza, with whom he spends much time down the pub. The barmaid at the pub is Sheila, whom Shane has a keen interest in.