Christopher C. Starr's Blog, page 19

Celebration of Wickedness Day 3: CRUELLA DeVILLE #atozchallenge

Hey there folks and folksettes—welcome back for another thrilling installment of the runaway internet hit, the Celebration of Wickedness! I submit for your daily dose of dastardly pleasure one Cruella Ann DeVille (ok, so her middle name probably isn't Ann but she had to have a childhood, right? Can't you hear her mother calling, Cruella Ann! Cruella Ann! OK, I'll stop…)

In this series, we've talked about villains that are pure forces of nature or that bring the hero to their lowest by forcing them to battle themselves but we haven't addressed the most basic, fundamental aspect of being a villain: VILLAINS ARE MEAN. Whether their intentions are truly horrible or they exist in some twisted "ends justify the means" reality, what makes the villain the villain is that their wants spell bad news for everyone else. And with Cruella, she takes this to an entirely new level.

If you don't know by now, Cruella is the best part of 101 Dalmatians—honestly, beyond Cruella, her coat and her car, I don't remember shit else about this movie.  And as a registered panda hater, I can totally sympathize with her motivations: here are these animals—in her case, the Dalmatian; in mine, the sorry ass panda—who would be much better served as an accessory to someone's monochromatic personal décor. They're not providing any value to the rest of the world except as fictitious mascots for 1927 firehouses, why not utilize them as props in life-size Ansel Adams displays?

I'm being facetious; this chick is serious: Cruella DeVille steals puppies. New born puppies. She steals them from their mothers. To turn them into coats. Read that again. How foul is that? She spends the entire movie snatching Dalmatian puppies so she can KILL THEM AND WEAR THEM!

When I was writing this, I kept trying to think of real life villains that match Cruella's brand of vile. I mean, this chick even has a theme song about how foul she is. Like Mr. Yuk. But I came up short. I thought about Andrea Yates, but that wasn't mean, that was crazy. I thought about Charles Manson but he convinced others to do his dirty work—he was more persuasive, seductive (we'll talk about that tomorrow). I even considered Bernie Madoff and that was pretty good, but he was just greedy. I weighed high school girls, who are mean simply because they know how, but that doesn't descend to Cruella's level—she's mean because it makes her look better.

I thought about this a lot, probably more than I should have for a Disney villain, and I came to the conclusion that this meanness, this streak of foulness, exists to establish a stark relief between the hero and the villain. There has to be a line somewhere. There has to be that thing—whether it is a worldview or a commitment to a cause or a willingness to pursue a course of action—that runs counter to your hero's sensibilities. That your hero stops at that line and your villain is all too willing to cross it is what separates the two of them.  It's like that Meatloaf song, "I'll do anything for love but I won't do that." He never says what it is he won't do but he's adamant that it ain't happening. That's what I'm talking about, that line in the sand.

So what does this mean for us as writers? Find that line, that demarcation and make it clear. Jolt your readers with horror of what the villain is willing to do to achieve their goals. Be plain about their commitment to their own cause; don't hide it or sugarcoat it with nuance. No matter how flawed your hero or heroine, your readers will sympathize because "they won't do that"—because they, like your hero, are unwilling to compromise their values. I'm no fan of pandas but I wouldn't steal their babies and turn them into socks. I mean, Damn…

And so, we move to the next great villain in our repertoire: the great granddaddy of the vampire genre, the original gothic horror, Count Dracula. But, you won't find me here—you wanna check it out, bounce over to Noah Murphy's blog at k23detectives.com.

See ya!

Celebration of Wickedness Day 2: THE INCREDIBLE HULK #atozchallenge

Back for round 2 in the villains chair we have…wait, is this a typo? Jimmy, are you sure? This says today's villain is…Bruce Banner, the Incredible Hulk?

That's right, true believers, the Hulk is the villain of the day in our continuing Celebration of Wickedness. Yes, I know the Not-So-Jolly Green Giant has his own comic that's been around since 1962. Yes, I am aware he has 2 major motion pictures in which he is the protagonist. Yes, I know he's the best part of the upcoming Avengers movie (and, yes, I am planning on attending the midnight showing). Calm down, geek squad, let me explain myself.

The Hulk is the supercharged, atomic era version of the Jekyll and Hyde story, right? His entire mythos centers around Bruce Banner giving in to his baser emotions—anger, terror, grief—and transforming into a hulking behemoth with forearms that would put Popeye to shame and a penchant for raggedy purple pants. Dr. Banner is the mild-mannered atomic physicist; the Hulk is a being of pure emotion and limited intellect. You know the deal, the madder he gets, the stronger he gets. The problem is, there really isn't a limit and you get stuck in this cycle of destruction. To me, and the United States army, the Hulk is awesome! To Banner, the Hulk is a curse.

And before I go into the philosophy behind my selection of the Hulk as the villain of the day, let's get a couple things straight: the Hulk is not necessarily the BEST choice of folks to hang out with. For you comic book enthusiasts, it was because of the Hulk's actions, threat to general society and constant collateral damage that the Illuminati sent his ass clear across the galaxy. And these same "heroes" were vindicated when the Hulk returned with a storyline titled World War Hulk. Even the Bill Bixby/Lou Ferrigno incarnation sent people routinely flying into trashcans, overturned cars and was hell on Wrangler jeans and cowboy boots. 

(And with that, I earn my geek cred. HOLLA!)

But what this is really about is the internal struggle between Bruce Banner and his raging alter ego. Banner is the hero here, not the Hulk. And if the good doctor is the hero, the Hulk is the villain. Marvel has done a fantastic job of billing the Hulk as protagonist, as a tortured soul who really just wants to be left alone. That's fine for general society. But for Banner, the Hulk destroyed his life. It turned him into something to be feared and exiled, chased and hunted, whether in his human form or not. He can't trust himself, live his life, be who he wants to be. Not anymore. This cat was the pre-eminent nuclear scientist and one act of bravery (in the comic) or hubris (in the television show) turned his life into a freak show. It's tragic, actually. And while the Bruce Banner/Incredible Hulk dichotomy makes for good entertainment, its theme is the age-old conflict of man vs himself. Yes, I used the word dichotomy; I went to college.

We've seen plenty anti-heroes already; that's not what I'm getting at. Bruce Banner is a regular, ordinary guy, like you or me. He wants what we all want: nice home, good job, good woman/man, to excel in his chosen field. To be a good person. The Hulk destroys that image of Banner just as any other inner demon might. What makes the Hulk so compelling as a villain is, for all his destructiveness, it is as the Hulk that Banner realizes his truest self. It's a part of him—sometimes for the better, sometimes the worst—and we get to see it play out in the most heroic and catastrophic manner.

And that, my friends, is why the Hulk is today's villain: because Bruce Banner is his best self when he is his worst self. What did Harvey Dent say in The Dark Knight? "You either die a hero or your live long enough to see yourself become the villain."

Tune in next time when we look at Cruella DeVille, hater of dalmatians.  Excelsior!

Celebration of Wickedness: Day 1 – ALIEN #atozchallenge

It's no secret the movie Alien changed my life. That should actually read "scared the piss outta me." When I was 6, my brother and I convinced my father to take us to see Alien because it scared my mother. Instead, it terrified me.

While I can wax nostalgic about the graphic nature of the monster or the foreboding, ominous atmosphere of the film or even second-guess my father's acquiescence to the whims of elementary school kids. The point of this is it changed everything.

For me, after I had an opportunity to change my underwear and had escaped the safe confines of my parents' bed, it changed how I looked at entertainment. Alien frightened me to the core: it was the first time I'd seen anything that gory, that intense, that painful (honestly, everything about that animal hurt, right?). Until Alien, all my cinematic adventures centered around a group of meddling kids and their big ass dog solving mysteries; a cat and mouse duo devising ever-expensive, increasingly devastating ways of destroying one another; and answering the age-old question of Duck Season or Rabbit Season.

Instead of these traditional hijinks I got an organism that impregnates by attaching itself to your face, is born by bursting out of your chest, and spends the rest of its existence hunting down anything that breathes. So it can eat and make more. That's it. No galactic domination. No reaching for the stars to see what else is out there. No raising the species to the next evolutionary level. The Alien has one imperative: to exist.

This is what makes the creature so frightening—aside from the buckets of thick saliva, the baby teeth that shoot out and crush skulls, the acid for blood—its sole adherence to the first law of nature: self-preservation. The thing exists simply to exist. And its entire structure is predicated and designed for existence in any and all circumstances. Let me put this in better terms: just about everything else we encounter on our own world, including us, has competing priorities—we want to eat, sleep, reproduce, see who's in charge, flirt, dance, make music and build skyscrapers. Most living things have lives to live. And the things that do simply exist to eat and reproduce are small enough for us to step on. The Alien is like 7 feet tall. Bigger than Big Bird.

Check out this exchange from the 1979 film:

Ash: You still don't understand what you're dealing with, do you? Perfect organism. Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility.

Lambert: You admire it.

Ash: I admire its purity. A survivor… unclouded by conscience, remorse, or delusions of morality.

Parker: Look, I am… I've heard enough of this, and I'm asking you to pull the plug.

Ash: [Ripley goes to disconnect Ash, who interrupts] Last word.

Ripley: What?

Ash: I can't lie to you about your chances, but… you have my sympathies.

"You have my sympathies." It's going to win. It's going to survive.

As an author, the Alien is the quintessential villain: it simply is. When writing, it is easy to fall down the rabbit hole of complicated villains whose purpose isn't crystalized or who rationale is murky. The Alien is clear, unambiguously clear. And, its clarity of purpose brings out the best in its hero. In fact, the Alien is the villain only because we sympathize with Ripley. Ripley and the Alien actually want the exact same thing—survival—but survival for one means death for the other.

We all understand that, life or death stakes, self-preservation. When writing I try to go back to the Alien, to ensure my villain has such clarity of purpose and that my story has such singular focus. Everything else is subplot, every other character expendable, all other priorities rescinded.

Thus ends Day One of the Celebration of Wickedness. This is Christopher Starr, sole author of the blog, Crooked Letterz, signing off. Tomorrow it's the Hulk!

…And the Celebration Begins!

Tomorrow begins the month-long 30 Days of Madness literary extravaganza. That means between battling the Day Job Dragon, being a parent to DMFRHs, and reinstating my war with Tony Horton and Shaun T, I'm completing a 100-page script through Scriptfrenzy, writing a 50,000 word novel AAANNNNDDD participating in the A to Z Blog Challenge, blogging for the next 30 days about villains.

And that's what this post is about. Villains. Antagonists. The bad guys. The best part, to me, of any story.

See, as much as we identify with and extoll the virtues of our heroes and heroines, it is the villain that is the source of the conflict. The villain makes the story. Who would Harry Potter be without Voldemort? Some poor, emotionally fragile, mentally abused kid living under the stairs. who learns magic and becomes a non-descript student at Hogwarts. At best. Not even as noteworthy as Neville.

If there's no Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker would have just been some kid—if he existed at all—fighting with his uncle about moisture farming IN THE FREAKING DESERT. Think about it: Chief Brody wouldn't need a bigger boat, Ripley would have made it home on time, and we never would have heard Captain Kirk scream Khan's name throughout the galaxy. Villains make the story.

So, for the month of April, we're gonna take a little tour, you and I. We're going to look at of some of the best villains I've found, pick apart their wicked little ways, and see what makes them tick. And along the way, I get to hop of some other blogs and introduce you to some new voices here. Should be fun.

And here are your 2012 Celebration of Wickedness winners!

Alien

Incredible Hulk

Cruella DeVille

Dracula

Venom

Freddy Krueger

Godzilla

The Clown from It

The House in Amityville Horror

Dr. Claw

Jaws

Joker

Lucifer

Megatron

Lex Luthor

Khan Noonien Singh

Overlook Hotel

Poltergeist

Evil Queen

Voldemort

Scar

Hannibal Lecter

Clubber Lang

Kyzer Soze

Darth Vader

Wicked Witch of the West

Magneto

Teddy Ruxpin

Ernst Blofeld

General Zod

How We Broke Disneyworld Part V

RECAP: If you're just now joining us, where ya been? OK here's the deal: me and the family went to Disneyworld with a dollar and a dream. Our dream was to see magic! We snatched Peter Pan and tried to make him fly…from the top of Cinderella's castle. We made him fall. From the top of Cinderella's castle. And then we ran. We got chased by the Mickeys (Disney's mouse-eared security force), stole a tram full of weary patrons, made our way to Hollywood Studios, got stopped by stormtroopers, The Honey Badger became a rebel spy, The Boy had an "accident," my Wife stole the ruby red slippers, we rode the Tower of Terror (and then it broke down), Tanner fell (HARD), and the Space Rangers took The Boy into custody. And we're still stuck in the park…

Shit Shit Shit.

Now what are we supposed to do? My first inclination is to just walk and leave The Boy as a down payment on Peter Pan's round-the-clock medical bills. I hope the fairy has AFLAC because there's a pigeon chasing us, singing "Pays the doctors, Boyeee!!" But that actually isn't gonna fly with my wife so we have to come up with a strategy to get him back.

Shit.

After mouse-eared Mickeys, leapfrogging Space Rangers, fat Han Solo, and Janey and Tanner's bullshit, I think a full-scale, hair-raising, skin-of-your-teeth, stunt mission is in effect. Lucky for us Disney can afford to license the premier motion picture stuntsman: Indiana Jones. Off to the show.

The Indiana Jones Stunt Show & Casino showcases a small selection of the Raiders of the Lost Ark stunts we've come to know and love. There's the big-ass ball, spears that shoot out of the walls and floor, flames, the Nazi brute and the plane fight. It was pretty cool…well, it would be if time had been kind to Indy. It hasn't. Indiana Jones has gotten a little old over the years. And fat. And drunk.

See, the stunt show has changed a bit as time as passed to accommodate Indy's "maturation." The ball is really a great big Whopper, spears are Nerf darts the size of potbelly pigs, and, to make Indy run, the attendants hide caches of Pabst Blue Ribbon throughout the arena. This is our solution?

Godammit.

But we have to find The Boy and I have no idea where to start. I lose it, grab the first freckled-faced stagehand clad in puffy clothes I can find and try to shake the teeth out of his head. "Where is my kid?!" He starts to cry because no one at Disney is ever upset, he tries to run and, in the process, I rip his shirt. Tattooed on his back, in glittering ink, is a full-color map of Hollywood Studios complete with a sticky You Are Here jewel. And then I see it.

In the center of the map.

The Big Blue Hat.

I spread the kid out on the ground, smooth him out like the map he is. "That's where we have to go." But the show is starting and Indy is shakily leaping over Nerf spears, shuffling toward a rocky ramp with a golden idol at the top. The idol! Wife starts moving before I do, pinballing through flashes of flame, smacking life-size Nerf darts aside, and crashing into Indy. "Hey!" he says. "Beer!" she says, pointing. "Where?" he turns and she's gone, dashing up the ramp. She grabs the idol.

There is no beer. Indy says, "Give me the idol!"

"Help me find my kid!"

The crowd thinks it's part of the show. They say, "Help me find my kid, I'll give you the idol!"

Indy relents. "Where's the beer?"

"In the Big Blue Hat," the Wife says.

We're off and running. Down the ramp to the Nazi warplane in the back. When we get back there, the big burly guy is laid out and the Honey Badger is in the pilot seat. I don't even ask what happened but her knuckles are bloody. Fine. Whatever. We pile in. Indy finds a six-pack in the cockpit and we roll out of the arena to the center of Hollywood Studios.

We round the man-made puddle called Echo Lake into the 138th parade of the day. While the kids are singing old High School Musical numbers, Muppets and Monsters Inc. characters frighten the multitudes of children just trying to leave the park. And then we see The Boy. He's underneath the Big Blue Hat, surrounded by a bunch of kindergartners dressed like Ewoks and the savages from the Recess Kids, getting slow-roasted over a bunch of multicolored glow sticks like Rotisserie Gold.

"You gotta help save him," I say to Indy.

"There's beer back there," my Wife says.

"I'm too old for this shit," says Indy.

The Honey Badger pops the cockpit, stands up and sings the Indiana Jones theme song: "Da-da-da-Daaaah, Da-da-dah, Da-da-DA-DAAH, Da-da-da-da-DAAAH!"

And Indy's feeling it! He snaps out his whip, flips it around a powerline above and executes a beautiful Spiderman-style swing for The Boy. It is majestic! And poorly aimed. He misses. Badly. The parade stops. The crowd goes "Oooh!" The fake Ryan Seacrest from the American Idol pavilion says, "THIS is American—oooh! That's gonna leave a mark."

But Indy falls on the edge of the rotisserie and The Boy is flung in the air. He flips end over end, tumbling above the crowd and lands on the wing of the plane. Perfect!

But now everybody's pissed. We screwed up the parade, stole the idol, broke Indiana Jones, deprived the kindergartners of their lunch (and they are cranky–waaaaayyy past nap time!) They turn on us like we spoke Voldemort's name.

I yell, "Hit it!"

Honey Badger pounds the gas and we rumble out of Hollywood Studios followed by a fake Ryan Seacrest, imitation Troy and Gabriela, Mike and Sully, and 2 Space Rangers, and the extras from Indiana Jones

Good times.

Hoodie Required

My wife asked me why I was so quiet. Why I hadn't said anything. She was asking me about Trayvon Martin. I hadn't said a word. Yet.

What is there to say? What could I say that hasn't already been said? That I'm not surprised? Saddened, but not surprised. That even in 2012 I still have my own moments of second glances and sideways looks, of hastily locked car doors and clutched purses? Should I say that I spend my days terrified of what might become of the other Black male in my house—my 12-year-old son? That I lay awake many a night praying that I can protect him from and prepare him for the world outside my door?

What should I say?

Maybe I should talk about the abject disgust I have that the child on the ground in a puddle of his own blood was treated worse than the man who shot him. That the dead child is treated like a criminal while the assailant sleeps in a warm bed. Should I scream in rage that the word of the shooter was taken over the evidence of a child murdered—in a day and age where there are 3 CSIs, 2 Law & Orders, Crime 360, and the First 48 on TV every week? Perhaps I should drum my chest, pound the table, yell until I've lost my voice about the insanity of the crime itself. A gun-wielding Neighborhood Watchman kills a kid over Skittles and Iced Tea?

It could be the sadness, the grief, that has struck me silent. Pain in my chest becomes sobs in my throat as I wade through photos with Am I Next? captions—full of young boys, still innocent, some young enough to hang on their mother's hip, some unborn. I've seen hundreds of images of people of all shapes and sizes and colors and races wearing hoodies with captions that read, "I am Trayvon." And it makes me sad.

The president said it struck him close to home, that if he had a son, "he would look like Trayvon." The man who wants to be president, Newt Gringrich, says such remarks are divisive, that all children should be safe. They're both right in their own way. All children should be safe. They should be, no question. But the truth is Trayvon Martin is simply the latest casualty in a war on Black males that's been waged since the dawn of this nation. The only thing new here is the name, date and place. We've been here before with Amadou Diallo, Abner Louima, and Rodney King. Sean Bell. Oscar Grant. Aiyanna Jones. Emmett Till.

Now Trayvon Martin.

I'm sad that it has happened again. That another mother has to bury her child. I'm sad that, for one finite news cycle, America will take a cold, hard look in the mirror—and at her president—and realize how far we have come and how far we still have to go. And I'm sad because I know how this ends…and because I know that it really doesn't end. Our collective horror and disgust will fuel a palpable rage, a mighty beast hungry for justice. And that beast will rally and march and post and tweet and YouTube and yell and scream for atonement. Justice will be served: revenge will be delivered in the courts or in the streets and the beast will be satiated. And we will move on, move forward in the silent détente that is race relations in America.

There is a price for silence, I guess. For some, "silence means consent." Keeping quiet means you agree. I don't. Even if it doesn't advance the cause, even if my words only add to the outrage, the horror, the disgust, joining my voice to the chorus is still matters. Even if, in a few weeks or months, Trayvon Martin becomes another painful memory, another tragic occurrence, it matters. Our collective outrage can turn an inhumane act into a human experience. It took this quote, made by a pastor during the Holocaust, for me to understand that:

First they came for the communists,

and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,

and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
a

nd I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for me

and there was no one left to speak out for me.

How We Broke Disneyworld Part IV

RECAP: If you're just catching up, we went to Disneyworld, found Peter Pan, and dropped him from Cinderella's castle. Peter Pan can't fly, folks. He also can't stick a landing. So he'll be blowing into a tube to make his wheelchair go from now on and we're on the run. First from the Mickeys through Tomorrowland; then we stole a tram and kidnapped Mabel, Janey and Tanner (who really needs one of those monkey-leash things); and then escaped to Hollywood Studios, where we eluded the Space Rangers and made our way to Tower of Terror. Got it? Good.

There are 19,000 ways I can describe how ominous the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror looks against the night sky. Cool is not one of them. Let me say this: it is a massive spectacle in a park that's really designed for people under 52 inches: 200 feet of damaged concrete and exposed wiring, venting and plumbing. I can hear the screams of other patrons falling to what sound like horribly untimely deaths. Seriously, it is intimidating. "I wanna go on that!" the Honey Badger says.

Fine.

We run for the Tower, well, most of us do. The Boy is doing that crabwalk thing you do when your pants are wet (or nasty) and it's cold on your giblets. And he is not interested in the Tower of Terror. At all. I should say here that The Boy is not the picture of ignorant bravery you might expect from a 12-year-old. He'd be better suited as a technical consultant on Monk. This kid has an autographed poster of Cringer from He-Man on his wall that says "Be Careful!" and as we walk, he is actually making that Scooby-Doo knee-knocking sound. This should be fun.

In the midst of trying to convince The Boy he's not going to die, here come the Space Rangers, bounding after us, yelling like a cross between Tim Allen and William Shatner: "Lasers set to stun." But the lasers are really red flashlights tied to their wrists so when we don't respond, we get: "Star Command! I got you! You know I got you." The Honey Badger whips around, turns fingers into guns, and makes laser sounds: "Peww! Peww!" Two Rangers fall. "Evasive maneuvers!" they shout and spin away. Off to the Tower.

At first glance, I didn't realize the empty fountain, the decrepit facade, the Munsters-style cobwebs were part of the decor: I thought this was the one ride Disney didn't give a shit about. We jump in line, ease past the vacant stares of the attendees and are funneled into a room with set pieces children CANNOT KEEP THEIR HANDS OFF OF! I never hear Rod Serling tell me I'm going to the Twilight Zone because I'm too busy telling the Honey Badger to "stop touching that!" "Keep your hands to yourself!" "How did you set that on fire?!" I also hear: "TANNER! This is the last time I'm telling you…"

Rod Serling stops talking, the door opens and we are led into…the basement? Seriously? Now I know Disney prides itself on the realism and experience of each and every attraction—the Haunted Mansion seems haunted by both ghosts and the staff; Space Mountain attendees have Star Trek-ish uniforms and it seems like we're on a space station; even the pin dealers in the American Experience in Epcot look like freaking Betsy Ross. But we left a dingy, damaged hotel replete with a zombie staff from 1920 to become HVAC technicians for the ride? It's loud and hot and steam is escaping from odd places. I kept expecting to see Batman fighting the Joker (and I probably will…soon as Disney buys them).

None of this is helping the The Boy. We're in line and this cat is already crying, the Honey Badger keeps throwing her hands up like she's already on the ride, I just want to leave period, and my wife is eying the I Survived the Tower of Terror T-Shirt the kid in front of her is wearing. Elevator doors open, we file in, and we're taken up.

We've been on this ride before—at Disneyland. There the take you up, show you your last glimpse of the outside world and LET YOU GO! And right before you die, hydraulics and brakes kick in and they do it to you again. And again. And again. The Disneyworld version, though, is a little worse. To heighten your terror, the elevator car you are in moves through the building, down a dimly lit corridor that showcases creepy things from dead hotel guests and a surprising number of ventriloquist dummies whose eyes follow you. I hear this kid whimpering, "Mom, what's gonna happen?" She responds, "You know what's gonna happen. You've been on it before. It's just a ride. You're gonna be fine."

And right then, Bzzzhrrooon! The ride shuts the fuck down.

Are you serious? Now?

Lights come on. The mystique is broken. I can see all the wires and pulleys and the bright ass EXIT sign on the door directly to my right. We haven't even gotten to the part where they let you drop. We're still on the top floor, but we're on the floor. If I wanted to, I could get out and walk away, right? There's the exit door, there are stairs beyond it. Now The Boy has a full-blown meltdown. He says, "I wanna get off!" I say, "Get off what? Dude, you're on the floor. What can happen?" "I don't like this, I don't feel safe!" Janey says, "I feel safe. You can hold my teddy bear." Janey is in the first grade and doesn't have her two front teeth.

He takes her bear, the Honey Badger laughs at him while he tries to wriggle out of his seatbelt. Then Bzzzhrripp! Atendant on the PA says, "Your ride will resume NOW." Lights out, The Boy screams, car jerks forward, doors open and we are taken into the elevator shaft. Ride drags us up and I hear The Boy, "Noooooooo! I want to get oooofffffff." Too bad. We hit the top level and I hear "Tanner! Tanner! Why isn't your seatbelt…?" And we drop! It is so fast my scream is left at the top.

The Honey Badger laughs the entire ride. The Boy cries the entire ride. The kid in front of us throws his hands up. My wife snatches the Tower of Terror shirt clean off his body. We hit the bottom, Tanner hits the seat (HARD — Guess his lil ass will sit down next time, won't he?), and we drag The Boy off the ride into the 2 remaining Space Rangers.

"Got ya," they say and grab the Boy. They cuff his hands in those big, white Mickey hands.

"Let him go!" Honey Badger throws her fingers up. Wrist flashlights shine back. Mexican stand off. "Don't make me do it!" she says.

"You won't make it out alive," says one Ranger. "But we do hope you'll come back and see us!" says the other. He throws a packet of papers and some pens us. "Here're some guest surveys; tell us how we're doing!"

Papers distract us and they disappear through a side door.

Now I can't leave.

Godammit.

How We Broke Disneyworld Part III

RECAP: If you haven't been keeping track (and who wouldn't—this story is awesome, right?), we took a vacation to Disneyworld last week and became embroiled in the Peter Pan Affair: we snatched Peter Pan, took him to the top of Cinderella's castle and let him go. Petey didn't fare too well—he couldn't fly but I'm actually surprised he bounced as high as he did. I didn't know pavement was that buoyant. So we became fugitives—ran from Magic Kingdom, kidnapped a bunch of people on a parking tram, tried to make Tanner sit down, and escaped into Hollywood Studios.

I said it was gonna be easy, right? That our getaway could be fast and simple? Wrong. Running into the park to find a ride to get us out of the park proved to be an exercise in futility. For an amusement park dedicated to the movies, Disney's Hollywood Studios has a whopping 4 rides. FOUR. OK there are 5, but you won't be riding Toy Story Mania at Disneyworld, not in this lifetime. People are camped out in the line with tents and shit like they were introducing a new iPhone. Screw that.

But there's Star Wars! The tag line is "a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away," right? I can either a) go back in time and choose never to pick up that little bastard at all; or b) get the hell outta Dodge. Star Tours it is.

For something they don't own, Disney takes its Star Wars shit seriously! Darth Maul is prowling around outside, scaring the crap out of Janey and Tanner; stormtroopers stand posted along the line, cradling blasters; little people—Ewoks or Jawas or munchkins fleeing the Great Movie Ride—keep cutting in front of us. We try to drop our eyes and ease past the stormtroopers.

UNSUCCESSFUL!

We run on the ride amid a cacophony of Stop! Freeze! and heavy Darth Vader breathing. It's us and about 10 assorted Star Wars characters—stormtroopers, droids, a chubby Han Solo whose vest is ENTIRELY TOO SHORT and that white shirt is sheer (yeah, try to get that image out of your head), and a man who takes up 2 ½ seats with a Yoda shirt that says Judge Me By My Size, Do You? A little bit, yeah, I do. You know the rules: click, click, everybody's strapped in, guns are stowed below the seat and the ride begins.

This is no trip to the stars. At all. Hyperspace doesn't actually take us anywhere. Instead we get C3PO moaning and crying, Artoo yelling "Whoooooo!!" anytime the ride moves, the fat Han Solo breathing hard and having "a bad feeling about this." The ride takes us from the loading dock through 2 battles with X-Wings and TIE fighters and then back in time with Clones and droids (I don't know how that works). Then, just as we bounce through the remnants of Alderaan, the Honey Badger gets branded a rebel spy! They post her picture on the ride, outside the ride, on t-shirts that say I Was The Rebel Spy. Everywhere.

Godammit.

We're first off the ride (because stormtroopers' guns keep getting stuck in the stowage nets below their seats) and barrel into the gift shop. The Wife pushes the annoying woman aside (no, I don't want to see my face as Han Solo or Princess Leia) but does snatch her pin of Stitch as Emperor Palpatine (I'm a Star Wars geek—can you tell?). We are met by a group of stormtroopers. One of them stops us. "Hey," he says, "aren't you the ones who broke the fairy?" The person dressed like a droid next to him raises her weapon, "Roger, roger." Janey says, "He's not a fairy. Tinkerbell's a fairy!" The Boy laughs, "They called Peter Pan a fairy." I put up the hood on my Tigger sweatshirt, wave my hand, and say, "These aren't the people you're looking for."

The stormtrooper cocks his head, "These aren't the people we're looking for."

The droid says, "Roger—what?"

"We can move along," I say.

"Wait—what?" The droid takes off her helmet. "Doggone it, Bill, he's not really a Jedi! You know this isn't rea—!" But she doesn't get to finish her sentence: Darth Maul clubs her in the head with his plastic lightsaber and she fakes her death.

"Move along." And the stormtrooper waves us past.

Out in the open, we hear: "Star Command, we have them now!"

The Rangers are back.

Unlike Peter Pan, these cats can really fly. Kinda. It's actually a game of leap frog using glider wings but they keep swooping down on us like crows. Time to run.

Since the Mickeys are tied to the movies here in Hollywood Studios perhaps the best place to escape to is the Great Movie Ride. This is a thrill ride only in the sense a grocery store scooter-paced perusal of the 99¢ aisle at Blockbusters is thrilling. We tumble into the ride and the Rangers pursue, but they run like the gravity is really low—bounding along like they're on the moon. The four of them file into the car behind us and we're all taken through a slow-motion exhibit of great movies that combine real live sets, live action (and flames!), and animatronics that predate World War I.

The ride was so slow, I fell asleep. Until we got the Alien segment. Alien is my favorite movie of all time and the ride features as life-size replica of the cargo hold of the Nostromo, complete a shivering Ripley, Jones the Cat stuck in a box, and Mother counting down the self-destruct sequence. Oh yeah, and there's a full-size Alien in there too. I think The Boy lost control of his bowels. He's curled up in a tiny ball, trying to re-enter the womb, while this Alien with only half a body moves 7 inches toward us. Seven. He screams. The Rangers scream. The ride stops and we carry his funky tail through the Nostromo, past Humphrey Bogart and Ilsa, out the yellow brick road (but my wife did snatch the ruby red slippers from the Wicked Witch of the East) and we're back into the park.

Now where?

"There!" says the Honey Badger. She's pointing at the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror.

Shit. I hate that ride.

How We Broke Disneyworld Part II

RECAP: In the last installment of How We Broke Disneyworld, your intrepid vacationers (us) ventured to Disneyworld—Where Dreams Come True. Our dream was to see Peter Pan fly. We caught his little ass, took him to the top of Cinderella's castle, and let him go. He didn't fly. We watched him fall. Hard. He'll be eating out of a straw from now on. So Disney sent the Mickeys after us—6 security guards chasing us with mouse-ears and cartoon voices. We tried to shake them: went on a couple rides, threw a trashcan at them, and tried to blend in with the crowd. We were almost home-free until we got stuck in the dumb-ass Transportation Center and had to hijack a packed parking tram to get away.

You are joining our escape, already in progress.

We'd been on the run in this stupid tram for a whopping 3 minutes and the vast majority of the riders couldn't figure out we'd commandeered it at all. Kids were crying, throwing shoes and tantrums, losing balloons. Parents were oblivious. That glassy-eyed stare had bewitched them all and they just took it in stride like it was all part of the Disney experience: "Look Janey, they pushed that man off! Isn't that cool? Tanner! Get down! I'm not telling you again." The elderly just sat, didn't move, didn't blink. I think some of them were dead.

Until I skipped that first stop.

I did not slow for Hook or Jafar or Scar. I pressed the pedal to the metal and coaxed the full 8 miles per hour out of that puppy. But when I breezed past the first set of yellow safety pegs and my wife never said, "Please grab your personal articles and supervise your children (or repeat it in Spanish)," folks got upset. Kinda. What I got was a litany of half-hearted protests: "Mabel, isn't that our stop?" "Why isn't he stopping?" "John, should we say something? Didn't we park at Jafar 41?" "Well, where is this?" "I don't want to go!" "We have to, sweetie, the park's closing." "No!" It was the most apathetic response to a kidnapping ever.

And then the Mickeys came. Slicing through the parking lot in their white SUVs, going only 15 MPH (that's one-five, not five-zero. Fif-TEEN people!) Hanging out of the sunroof is a guy waving red and blue flashlights actually going "Whee-oo! Whee-oo!" as they chase us. They get on the loudspeaker and, still in Mickey voices, shout, "Pull it over there, buddy!" Then to a patron, "Watch your step, ma'am." Back to us, "I said stop right there!" They're trying to move through the parking lot and cut us off but I have the straightaway to the exit. It is the slowest getaway in history but we eke past the SUVs and are out onto…what kind of shit?

Disneyworld labels its streets between the parks in a way that makes sense to them and only them: Epcot Resorts Drive. World Drive. Buena Vista Blvd. And then they dot the sides of the streets with advertisements FOR THEIR OWN PARKS! It's their own shit! Like I would ever say, "Wow, that Magic Kingdom was so nice, I wish they had something with more animals. Wait, what's that sign? They have an ANIMAL Kingdom? Let's go!" If you've sold all the plasma you legally can and mortgaged your house to make the damn trip, who doesn't know what's here?

Dropped between those advertisements are street signs for other areas of the park. Not the Department of Transportation reflective green with white lettering, mind you; Disneyworld signs are purple and red and lit by the freaking candlestick from Beauty and the Beast. It's nighttime. I'm not a fucking owl; I can't read that shit in the dark! And by the time I get close enough to read them, I realize the 47 things listed on the sign are broken into 3 groups—Left Lanes for this random collection of stuff, Straight Ahead for another unrelated group of locations, and, for that stuff you actually want to do, Right HERE, Turn NOW, GO!

Good thing for us, the Mickeys chasing us are Magic Kingdom Mickeys—they're lost too. Over the loudspeaker I hear: "…I don't know. I haven't been over there before." And " I reckon that's the Hollywood-thing-a-mob." Still can't understand what the Donald Duck guys are saying. No one's doing anything fast. I whip the tram to the right and it jack-knifes, Janey loses her Mickey ears, Tanner still will not GET THE FUCK DOWN, John hasn't said shit to me yet, and I'm looking dead at my wife. She snatches the 2012 Epcot Flower & Garden Show commemorative pin and belt buckle playset from Mabel's 10-foot long lanyard, makes a heroic, stuntman-like 4-foot jump from the rear of the tram to the driver's area and we are rumbling toward Hollywood Studios.

Disney's Hollywood Studios are a testament to the movies. Well, they're actually a testament to a) things Disney already bought (Pixar and the Muppets); and b) stuff Disney can't afford to buy. Yet. (Which is anything George Lucas and Steven Spielberg made). We're miles ahead of the Mickeys, who probably took the wrong turn and are stuck in the Jungle Trek in Animal Kingdom, abandon the tram and are about to cross the gates when we meet the Hollywood Studios versions of Mickeys: Space Rangers. These cats drop from the sky clad in Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger gear from head to toe, pointing their fists at us and talking, like Tim Allen, into their wrists.

"Star Command! Freeze right there!"

Star Command? Serious—fuck it. I just put my hands up.

We all do. Except The Boy.

The Boy is 12. That means he has ninja-level "Blank Stare" abilities, superhuman laziness, and feet entirely too big for his body. Which makes him clumsy. He's also resolute in his refusal to grow up. He sees the Space Rangers and shouts, "It's Buzz Lightyear! Mom, take a picture!" AND THESE FUCKERS POSE! The Boy runs up, he's hugging them and shit. He gets an autograph from one and they tousle his hair and send him on his way with a "To Infinity and Beyond!" Flashbulbs go off and I hear, "Look, Janey, it's Buzz!" I also hear, "Godammit, Tanner!" and "Mabel, I need to take my back pill." and "John, the car's not here!" And while an impromptu character sighting line queues up, we run willy nilly into the park.

Heh heh heh. This is almost too easy.

How We Broke Disneyworld Part I

Hey, remember when I said we were gonna see if Peter Pan could really fly? Well…four broken bones, a hyper-extended knee, a fused spine and a fractured pelvis later, it turns out he can't. He also can't walk anymore. Ever. Did you know the characters in Disneyworld aren't actually the REAL characters? They're people DRESSED like the characters. That's not what they advertise. I bought magic, dammit, but it's all strings and pulleys and hot air balloons and secret doors. Yeah, I was surprised too! Well, we found out Disney doesn't actually appreciate when you try to kill one of their characters. Even the lame ones.

Oops.

So after the Peter Pan debacle, we ran. Or tried to. Disneyworld does have its own security force called the Mickeys—they're real people with Mickey ears for hats but they are bound by the company to only talk like Mickey, Donald or Goofy. So the four of us are being chased by 6 big, burly guys and we're hearing Goofy yell, "Gawrsh, you gotta stop right there!" and Mickey shout, "Hey, you little bastards, we're gonna get you!" We never did understand what the Donald Duck guys were saying.

We break out of Cinderella's castle but the whole episode happened during the Wishes firework show (yes, we damn near killed Peter Pan in front of thousands of people. Go big or go home, right?). Our exit is blocked! Break left into Tomorrowland. We have two options: Stitch's Great Escape or Space Mountain. Escape sounds like the plan so we jump on the ride. Booooo! Stitch just laughs and spits on you for the whole ride. But here's the thing: the Mickeys have to follow the rules of the park while they're in the park. If we run on a ride, they do too. And they have to stay on it, strapped in and everything. They even get carded for Fastpasses! We don't get anywhere but, Stitch being Stitch, he does help us out: he spits enough water on the ground that our pursuers slip, fall and collapse in a heap.

On to Space Mountain.

There is a 45-minute wait for the ride and we have 6 Mickeys on our tails. Screw the standby line. We ambush a bunch of teenagers with Bieber hair, snatch their Fastpasses and tear up the line. I'm not proud of what we did but, hey, they had Bieber hair—they deserved it on GP. The Mickeys come up right behind us but they get broken up riding as Single Riders. I should point out here that the title of the Space Mountain ride is a misnomer: it takes you neither to space nor the mountains. We're right back where we started.

Dammit.

We need a diversion.

The Honey Badger provides.

In Tomorrowland, there is occasionally a walking, talking trashcan named Push. Wrong day for Push. Because that's what he got: pushed into the yelling, screaming Mickeys. They're down for the count. We wade into the rush of attendees and strollers, Hoverounds and crying kids, bolt up Main Street and make a break for the Main Gate. It's almost too easy.

But leave it to Disney to make things harder than they actually have to be. Rather than escape the park into, I don't know, the PARKING LOT, we are funneled into the ninth circle of Hell—better known as the Transportation Center. This lovely invention is a conundrum of poor signage and bad lighting and arrows that lead no-fucking-where, all trying to direct you to three actual exits: the Tram to the parking lot; the Ferry to God-knows-where, and the monorail.

Everybody and they're mama is on the Ferry boat. And they are slow! Not "old-lady-writing-a-check-in-the-grocery-store-line-how-much-are-those-apples-do-you-have-a-pen?" slow. Not even "new-parents-who-can't-figure-out-how-to-close-the-fucking-stroller-they've-had-for-the-last-10-months-so-it-can-fit-through-the-X-Ray-machine-at-TSA-and-maybe-allow-the-1500-people-behind-them-to-make-their-flight" slow. This is something different. Something worse. These people are "I-have-never-been-anywhere-but-my-80-person-town-where-teeth-are-optional-and-what-is-a-dental-plan?-Janey-come-on-Tanner-get-down-what-does-that-sign-say-where-is-the-car?" slow. Fuck the ferry.

We turn to the Monorail. The Boy starts having anxiety attacks over the monorail because he SAW IT SIT ON THE FUCKING TRACKS AND THE RIDE WAS BUMPY ONCE. Once. This was actually a real conversation. Who the hell is scared of the Monorail at Disneyworld? Oh, I know who! My kid. Monorail's out.

Tram it is. We break for the tram, wade through the crowd, trying to find the one for the Heroes lot (or was it Villains? Shit where is the car?) I hear the operator in the back begin his speech, "This is the tram to—agghhh!" Wife took him out. All I see is his orange and white vest floating in the Florida breeze. Guess the driver is mine. I rush his little cabin, tell him in my best Amityville Horror voice, "Get out!" He does. The tram is ours.

We speed off into the night, no idea where the car is, on a parking tram loaded with 80 tired, angry, confused Disney patrons of all ages, canes and strollers and walkers dribbling off the sides. And as we pull away, I hear over the loudspeakers, still in the Mickey voice:

"…they've got a tram into the Villains lot. This is a Code 626."

Code 626. Fugitives.