FADE IN:
EXT. THE MOTHER OF ALL TRAILER PARKS
TEENAGER TYE SHERIDAN lives in a TRAILER which is stacked on top of a pile of OTHER TRAILERS like a game of JENGA for GIANTS.
TYE SHERIDAN
You’re probably wondering what the deal is with this weird, visually arresting setting, aren’t you? And maybe you’re puzzled as to why I’m going to now go play some VR inside an abandoned van down at the dump, instead of just playing at home. There’s actually interesting backstory for all of this but you don’t give a shit do you, you’re waiting for all the pop culture references aren’t you, WELL LET’S NOT WASTE ANY MORE TIME HERE WE GO AND IT WILL NEVER STOP!
He puts on a VR HEADSET and dives into virtual universe THE OASIS.
TYE SHERIDAN
This is a virtual reality MMORPG, it’s like World of Warcraft if instead of set in Azeroth it was set in EVERY POSSIBLE PLACE REAL OR IMAGINED and the available races to play were FUCKING WHATEVER AND WHOEVER YOU FEEL LIKE. Naturally, faced with the ability to be any creature that springs forth from the wildest recesses of your imagination, most people have decided to just cosplay as Overwatch characters and shit. Let’s check ’em out!
He heads out into a crowd of EVERY REFERENCE STEVEN SPIELBERG COULD SECURE THE RIGHTS TO.
TYE SHERIDAN
Awright here we go, there’s Freddy Krueger over there and there’s Duke Nukem and there’s Marvin the Martian and there’s the car from Christine and - wait, six guys just ran past and I think one of them was like a Power Ranger or something - what was that in that blurry whip-pan? Looked like it was supposed to be something, I don’t know - shit, slow down - was that Zaphod Beeblebrox? - damnit - SLOW THE FUCK DOWN, I CAN’T MAKE ANY OF THIS OUT, JESUS! Oh well, I guess I’ll just wait for the YouTube videos to catalogue all this shit.
(pause)
As for me, you’ve probably recognized that my avatar is based on my favorite superhero, Random Shit Scribbled All Over His Gross Clammy Skin Man.
TYE goes to get into his BACK TO THE FUTURE DELOREAN and take part in a RACE with like TEN BILLION OTHER CARS.
TYE SHERIDAN
Oh the race, let me explain. The Oasis was created by a world-famous tech god called Mark Rylance. When he died, he released the following cheesy video:
MARK RYLANCE
(in flashback, in cheesy video)
Hi there! I died with five hundred billion dollars to my name, and no heirs. I could have left all that money to various charities, to help alleviate all the crushing poverty going on in this dystopian future, but I decided fuck that, I’m having a NERD-OFF!
(grins)
Are you the biggest fucking nerd on the face of the planet? Are you obsessed with pop culture trivia to the point that you have nothing else going on in your sad, wasted life? Well I’m here to reward that behavior with untold wealth and power! I’ve hidden three keys in The Oasis behind a hodgepodge of geeky references, riddles and challenges. Find them all and you win an Easter Egg which grants you all my money, plus total control over The Oasis, because who better to run a multinational corporation than a socially crippled couch potato?
TYE SHERIDAN
Somebody figured out his first clue, and it turns out to get the first key you have to win this crazy-ass car race full of deadly hazards, about half of which come in the form of yet more pop culture references, because every scene of this movie has to meet the quota somehow.
TYE races the race, moving from the REAR OF THE PACK to the FRONT by the brilliant tactic of EVERYBODY IN FRONT OF HIM DYING HORRIBLY. But then at the very end of the track KING KONG smashes a huge hole in the road and he brakes.
TYE SHERIDAN
Damnit, this one obstacle which has made the race unfinishable by anybody every time it’s been raced since the history of ever, has happened AGAIN! I just figured if I tried to drive the course real fast, the exact same strategy which has always failed for everybody, that that permanent scripted event would just not be there this time.
The same plan has occured to fellow racer OLIVIA COOK3, except she figures FUCK THAT BRAKING THING, SHE’S GOING FOR IT, but then TYE grabs her and stops her so she just smashes her MOTORCYCLE rather than HERSELF.
TYE SHERIDAN
Ooh, don’t worry, my friend Leonard is the best mechanic in The Oasis, he can fix your bike.
OLIVIA COOK3
Why the hell does a digital bike need a mechanic? Why can’t I just spend some of my in-game money and make it instantly go “BING!” and be new again? Are all the other twenty thousand cars that just crashed gonna need to be taken to be repaired? Are the people who got injured in the race going to have to go see a virtual doctor? Maybe have virtual surgery? This makes no fucking sense.
Nevertheless, they go to see TYE’S FRIEND LEONARD WAITHE, who’s like an URUK-HAI or something.
LEONARD WAITHE
Check out my other projects! I’m particularly proud of this hoverboat I invented, I took inspiration from the natural form of the manta ray-
TYE SHERIDAN
(clears throat)
LEONARD WAITHE
Oh, whoops, what I clearly mean is that I don’t have a single original design to my name and instead have just made a whole bunch of vehicles from movies and TV because REFERENCES REFERENCES REFERENCES. Look, I can make you the Sulaco from Aliens, if you want an intense action-packed space adventure kind of thing, and I apparently also have the Valley Forge from Silent Running, if you’re a total weirdo and want more of a depressing ecoterrorism vibe.
OLIVIA COOK3
Cool, but all I want is to get my bike fixed and rag on Tye’s life choices. Tye, you shouldn’t have bailed on the race like that, even though completing it was impossible! Brave people never hold back from doing stupid things which can’t possibly succeed, it’s only cowards who stop and think twice about whether there’s a better way than just beating their head against the wall uselessly forever. Chew on that, loser!
(rides off on bike)
(oh and it’s the bike from Akira because of course it is)
TYE SHERIDAN
Wow, she’s really given me a lot to think about. I’m really going to take that advice to heart, by going and doing the EXACT OPPOSITE of what she said, and immediately succeeding as a direct result.
