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¦Gifts of the Magi
From the pages
of 2000AD
1459 we bring you both the pitch and the original script to Al Ewing's
Future Shock. See how the story develops...
GIFTS OF
THE MAGI
THE
PITCH
The streets here
are similar to those on Earth – the people walk along pavements at a leisurely
pace, some floating as they enjoy the morning air. Between the pavements is a
wider strip, on which human figures flash by, blurring in the air. Beautiful,
ideal, they dodge playfully between one another in a never-ending stream, occasionally
slowing to take their place on the sidewalk, conversing idly with friends and
neighbours before lifting themselves off the ground by the force of their will
and flying into the air. To join a flock of men and women soaring through the
sky like birds.
There are no stairs on
the World Of The Magi.
There are no bombs, no
belching cars. There is no war, no crime. Religion is nonexistent, sexuality is
fluid and skins are many-hued, with no distinction drawn between green or blue
or burnished gold. The Magi live in a paradise, and they make sure we know it.
It was more than two decades
ago that they first landed on Earth, the men with their rippling muscles, their
sparkling smiles, their charisma, the women with their impossible waists and chests
and legs. The aliens who could do such amazing feats competed on the news with
the planet-wide wave of suicide, depression, anorexia and divorce as ordinary
men and women saw physical perfection made real. We reacted as best we could:
we shot at them, we bombed them, we screamed and rioted and worshipped them as
gods and through it all they stood and watched with all the condescension of a
parent waiting for a child to end its tantrum. And then they told us what they’d
like to give us.
The first thing the Magi
gave to Earth was sub-space travel. Technically it was an exchange - they took
some payment for it in gold, for electronic components – but that was to
make us feel better more than anything else. They told us that their aim was to
bring us up to their level, so that we could heal our own planet and help to manage
the galaxy around us. Of course, now humans could travel in sub-space, our planet
wasn’t good enough for the Magi to walk on. We had to go to their world.
We had to see how they lived.
They seemed confused by
our reaction to that – more suicides, more riots, which they watched from
space like doctors looking at a mental patient. Perhaps that‘s why they
handed us the next of their gifts – the means to understand and conquer
any disease. Whatever their intentions, it ended badly. For all their intelligence
they didn’t understand things like budgets or private sector healthcare
or even the boundaries between nations. So when we tore each other to pieces attempting
to decide who would be made well first, they simply shook their heads. But by
this point they had other concerns.
Every year, Earth sent
an ambassador to discuss the gifts. And every year the ambassador died. They got
gangrene in the bloody stump that was their hand after it was shaken. Their insides
burst after a light slap on the back. A passer-by stared at an ambassador for
too long and set him on fire. The ambassadors took more and more protection –
finally encasing themselves in hermetically-sealed suits – but they still
died. The Magi saw humanity as being hideously weak, a species made from precious
porcelain that shattered at the slightest touch. As usual, they were concerned,
and they smiled, and they gave us their final gift - their genetic information.
Now, they said, we could change our children in the womb and become as they were,
strong and swift and wise. And then they had the gall to be shocked when Earth
erupted into war on a global scale over this.
There are no stairs on
the World Of The Magi, but they’ve installed an elevator for the benefit
of the poor unfortunate Earth beings. That’s how we are to them - poor and
unfortunate and stupid. That’s presumably why they’ve offered to take
over the running of our planet and ‘manage’ us for a few hundred years.
The concept of simply leaving us along to manage ourselves probably conflicts
with their superior ethics.
So they smile their damnable
superior smiles and they avoid shaking my hand in the nicest possible manner...
and then I open up the hermetic suit, and the air inside gets out. And their smiles
widen. And widen. The flesh of the face shrinking, then liquifying, running off
the bone in gobbets as the skeleton beneath is revealed. I can’t help but
hope they used their microscopic vision to take a good look at the gift I brought
them – humanity’s gift to their species - before their eyes rain down
their melting wax faces and burst on the floor like raindrops.
They had the best
of intentions, of course. Otherwise they’d never have given us the keys
to their kingdom. The medical technology to create a targeted retrovirus using
their DNA profile – which they so charitably donated. And the subspace drive,
to colonise their world and a hundred others. This is what you get, you bastards.
This is what you get when you tell human beings how to live their lives. I
think the first thing we’ll do is put in some stairs.
THE
SCRIPT
THARG’S
FUTURE SHOCKS: THE GIFTS OF THE MAGI
PAGE ONE: Four
panels. A tier of three with a big fat one below.
PANEL ONE: Close
in on a man in a cross between an astronaut suit and a Hazmat suit. We’re looking
through the visor at his eyes, which look empty and hopeless. The rest of his
face is covered by the design of the helmet – maybe a NASA decal on it somewhere.
CAP: THE STREETS
HERE ARE SO MUCH LIKE OURS.
CAP: EXCEPT THEY’RE
CLEAN.
PANEL TWO: Pull
out. Our astronaut is standing on a street, with a large briefcase-ish thing –
the kind of case you’d use to carry rock samples around in - in one hand. The
setting here is an alien world populated by supermen – there aren’t any cars,
or steps, but the buildings are quite human-like and there’s an approximation
of a sidewalk that he’s standing on. It’s got a very fifties-Americana vibe –
an idealised past. People are walking around him, giving him a wide berth – they’re
dressed in fifties-type science fiction duds, looking like Jor-El. All of the
people on this planet are powerfully built, with the kind of perfect beauty generally
seen on the heroes of American comic mags. Same goes for
any women from
this world – they’re all as anatomically improbable as the standard Yank comic
heroine, although let’s not overdo it. No Power Girl type chest windows in their
space-costumes. The astronaut is slumping, hanging his head slightly.
CAP: THEIR BUILDINGS
AND PAVEMENTS SHINE AND SPARKLE LIKE THEIR SMILES. EVEN THE AIR IS CLEAN
– LIKE STANDING ON A MOUNTAIN.
CAP: THERE ARE
NO CARS ON THE WORLD OF THE MAGI.
PANEL THREE: Pan
out further to get a proper look at the street of the superpeople. Some of them
are buzzing around him at superspeed, others are taking off from the pavement.
By now the astronaut is totally slumped, looking down at the ground. Everything
in his posture suggests despair.
CAP: THERE’S NO
POLLUTION HERE. THERE’S NO RELIGION. NO DISCRIMINATION.
CAP: NO WAR,
NO CRIME, NO DISEASE, NO PAIN, NO FEAR...
PANEL FOUR: From
a different angle, close to the ground. The astronaut is in the forefront, slouching
as before, but from this new viewpoint we can see that the sky is thick with superpeople,
flying back and forth, some with capes, all with impossible good looks and big
grins. Really play up the difference between the slumped, defeated look of the
protagonist and the playful nature of the superbeings. If we have colour, I’d
like a huge rainbow of skin colours, straight out of old DC space comics, but
otherwise just a good mix as can be found in any metropolitan city.
CAP: THEY DON’T
EVEN HAVE STAIRS.
TITLE & CREDITS
PAGE TWO: Eight
panels – nine panel grid, but with the first two panels joined together.
PANEL ONE: A main
street somewhere in the USA. A round craft like a bathysphere – big enough for
five or six people - has impacted hard with the pavement, at a diagonal angle.
It’s a primitive thing, essentially two hemispheres of metal bolted together –
very Jules Verne. On the left of the panel is a glowing energy portal – the bathysphere
has fallen through it to smash into the pavement at an angle. Passers-by gaze
at it in shock, and a cop has his gun drawn and is screaming something. (All the
earth people should be a bit short, balding, chubby, not overly good-looking –
play up their imperfections.) A hatch on the side of the bathysphere is being
opened from the inside by one of the superpeople – we can see a human-like hand
lifting it up.
CAP: I REMEMBER
WATCHING ON TV WHEN THE MAGI ARRIVED.
PANEL TWO: One
of the superpeople rises out of the hatch, floating under his own power, wearing
a beatific smile. The cop’s gun is in silhouette in the foreground, pointed at
him – or else the bullet is speeding towards his chest.
CAP: A COP PANICKED.
THEY JUST HANDED HIM HIS BULLET BACK AND LAUGHED LIKE HE’D SHARED A JOKE
WITH THEM.
CAP: I’D NEVER
SEEN ANYTHING LIKE IT.
PANEL THREE: The
same superhuman, flanked by three or four others, male and female, all wearing
their smiles. They’re floating above the earth, scrutinising it – the reader is
looking up at them from the perspective of a bystander.
CAP: THEIR SPARKLING
SMILES AND BRIGHT EYES, THEIR PERFECT FACES, THEIR IMPOSSIBLE
BODIES, FLYING LIKE BIRDS. LOOKING DOWN AT US.
PANEL FOUR: Zoom
out. The last panel is on a TV screen in a small, dimly-lit room. In the foreground,
a pair of feet, wearing carpet slippers, dangle from the ceiling. Maybe have the
silhouette of a hanging figure if there’s room. The TV screen is splashed with
a little blood.
CAP: WHILE WE
LOOKED BACK AT THEM.
PANEL FIVE: Change
angle. We’re looking down at the scene now, past the dangling feet. From this
angle we can see that the hanged man stabbed his wife before he did the deed –
her corpse is on the floor in a pool of blood, with a knife sticking out of it.
It’s her blood that’s spattered on the TV, which is now showing Panel Six on the
screen. Needless to say, the wife is fat and old, unlike the eternally youthful
and beautiful superwomen.
CAP: AND THEN
WE LOOKED AT EACH OTHER.
PANEL SIX: The
President shakes hands with the lead Superhuman we saw earlier, behind one of
those podiums with the presidential seal on or behind it – a real press conference
vibe. The Superdude is all big smiles and charisma, stealing the show from the
Prez and his aides, who look uneasy.
CAP: THE MAGI WATCHED
THE SUICIDES, THE CULTS AND THE NERVOUS BREAKDOWNS LIKE PARENTS
WATCHING A DIFFICULT CHILD HAVE A TANTRUM.
CAP: EVENTUALLY
THEY INTRODUCED THEMSELVES.
PANEL SEVEN: Extreme
close-up of the Superdude’s dazzling smile.
CAP: AND THEY
TOLD US WHAT THEY WANTED TO GIVE TO US.
PANEL EIGHT: Extreme
close-up on the astronaut, his eyes looking even more hopeless through the faceplate
of the all-concealing visor.
CAP: AND WHAT
WE COULD GIVE THEM IN RETURN.
PAGE THREE:
Nine-panel grid.
PANEL ONE: Our
astronaut stands with his sample case on Earth, waiting to walk into a portal
at the right of the panel – the same shimmering energy as in panel one of the
last page. The setting is probably fairly clinical and very official. Lots of
electronics and monitors.
CAP: NOW THAT THEY’D
SEEN OUR WORLD, THEY WANTED US TO COME TO THEIRS INSTEAD.
CAP: SO THE FIRST
THING THEY GAVE US WAS SUB-SPACE – THE SAME QUANTUM TUNNEL THEY’D DROPPED
THROUGH TO REACH EARTH. IN EXCHANGE, WE GAVE THEM GOLD.
PANEL TWO: The
astronaut walks through a tunnel of swirling energy – just the energies of the
portal with the astronaut superimposed on it, walking on nothing. Maybe even have
this panel linked to Panels One and Three, a literal tunnel between the two panels.
CAP: THE MAGI
DON’T HAVE THAT EITHER.
CAP: THE MINERALS
THEY DO HAVE ARE LESS DUCTILE, MORE EASILY TARNISHED – AS THOUGH
THEIR VERY PERFECTION WAS SOMEHOW DRAINED FROM THE WORLD THAT MADE THEM.
PANEL THREE: We’re
on the Magi Planet. Ideally, I’d like the other end of the portal to come out
right on the street. (If not the end of the portal, then a door into an official
building.) Whichever, the astronaut is standing outside the door/portal, which
is to the left of the panel, looking around. Everything is sunny, bright and happy
here. People are walking past smiling and nodding. Coming towards the astronaut,
and also the reader, is a small flying child (in the science fiction costume and
cape, natch) poking a hoop along with a stick. The precocious little beast looks
like he’s having a gay old time.
CAP: AS A RESULT,
THEY’VE NEVER BEEN ABLE TO MAKE USEFUL, WORKING ELECTRONICS. THEY’RE MORE
THAN HALF A CENTURY BEHIND US IN TERMS OF TECHNOLOGY.
PANEL FOUR:
Same shot as last time, with the angle slightly lower, so the happy child with
the hoop dominates the panel. The astronaut turns and looks after him wistfully
in the background.
CAP: THEY SHOULDN’T
BE SO MUCH BETTER THAN WE ARE.
PANEL FIVE: We’re
in the meeting room on the Magi Planet – the place where the Magi meet with the
Earth ambassador. Plush, tastefully appointed with the same retro-sci-fi chic
that comes up all over this planet. A man in an astronaut suit – not our hero,
but a different one - is staring at a ream of notes, while three important-looking
Magi hover in the air, looking down at him with genial smiles. If they look patronising,
then... good.
CAP: THEY MUST
HAVE BEEN THINKING THE SAME THING.
CAP: WE OFFERED
THEM URANIUM. IN RETURN, THEY SAID THEY HAD A CURE FOR ALL DISEASE.
PANEL SIX: In a
laboratory on Earth, two doctors in lab coats are looking through the notes while
cross-referencing with a computer screen. On the screen, there’s an image of a
virus or some sort of bacteria. The scientists are pretty flabbergasted by the
arcane secrets they’re finding out about the common cold.
CAP: THEIR NOTES
SHOWED HOW TO UNDERSTAND AND UNLOCK ANY VIRUS OR INFECTION. WE COULD
MAKE VIRAL CURES, RECONFIGURE CANCERS TO GENERATE NEW ORGANS.
CAP: IT WAS A
COMPLETELY NEW WAY OF THINKING.
PANEL SEVEN: The
front bench of the House of Commons. We’re watching the Prime Minister, or the
Leader of the Opposition, make a speech. He’s making a fine point about something
– facial and body language should say ‘this is actually very complicated, not
simple like my foolish opponent will tell you’. So kind of like explaining very
slowly to a mentally deficient five-year-old about why he has to wear shoes. Ministers
are around him looking bored and fidgety – this is a debate that’s been going
on for some days.
CAP: WE COULDN’T
JUST RUSH INTO SOMETHING LIKE THAT. THE ENTIRE MEDICAL PROFESSION
WOULD NEED TO BE TURNED UPSIDE DOWN.
PANEL EIGHT: A
venal corporate suit making a presentation on behalf of GlaxoPharm or some even
less legally actionable equivalent. It’ll probably be a lot like that episode
of House, ‘Role Model’. I can’t find a screenshot, so... some kind of podium,
with the suit oozing behind it and the GlaxoPharm logo behind him. Maybe mirror
this with the panel before – have the venal suit making the same hand gesture
as the politician.
CAP: THERE HAD
TO BE TESTS MADE. PATENTS FILED. BUDGETS TALLIED. THE PHARMACEUTICAL
INDUSTRY NEEDED TIME TO GET ON BOARD.
CAP: ROME WASN’T
BUILT IN A DAY.
PANEL NINE:
A five-year-old child in Laos suffering from some kind of grotesque facial swelling.
It doesn’t have to be Laos, really, this is just a naked attempt to tug at the
heartstrings. She’s sitting on the ground outside a hut – there’s no need for
much in the way of background – with half her face being eaten by some hideous
disease. If you wanted to be overly clever, then maybe mirror the last two panels
– have the child zooming her hands through the air in a vague approximation of
the gestures used in the last two panels.
CAP: THE MAGI
DIDN’T SEEM TO UNDERSTAND THAT.
PAGE FOUR:
Seven panels. A tier of three, a big horizontal panel and another tier of three.
PANEL ONE: Back
on the Magi Planet, the astronaut is walking along the street, past a series of
stone or marble bollards. Another small child (I’m putting them in plain sight
to make the twist at the end a bit more gruesome, and also to continue the theme
from the last panel) is playing with one of the bollards, gripping it in tiny
little hands. Its mother is sitting on a bench at the back of the shot, reading
a book or the equivalent.
CAP: THEY DIDN’T
UNDERSTAND A LOT OF THINGS.
CAP: WE WERE SENDING
AMBASSADORS TO THEIR PLANET TWICE A YEAR...
PANEL TWO: Same
shot – but now the little tyke has torn the bollard up with its bare hands, raining
little chunks of masonry down onto the pavement. The mother is looking up at this
and shouting something disciplinary. This is like a child splashing in a puddle
on earth.
CAP: ...AND EVERY
YEAR SOMEONE DIED.
CAP: LIMBS
TORN OFF BY AN ENTHUSIASTIC HANDSHAKE... ORGANS PULPED BY A FRIENDLY
PAT ON THE BACK...
PANEL THREE: Close
on the chunks of stone falling through space – maybe have the astronaut looking
wide-eyed in the background.
CAP: ...PEOPLE
SET ON FIRE WITH A LINGERING STARE...
CAP: WE TOOK TO
WEARING HERMETICALLY SEALED, SHOCK-ABSORBENT SUITS, BUT TO NO AVAIL. THE
MAGI WERE VERY UPSET BY THIS.
PANEL FOUR: Big
wide panel – a mob scene. This is on Earth, and we have a crowd of people hurling
bricks and molotovs at the camera, faces twisted with fury. There are a couple
of placards in the crowd, reading NO FRANKENSTEIN CHILDREN, E.T. GO HOME, KIDS
NOT MONSTERS, BURN THE PORTALS... It’s a shot of a riot. Possibly have a smaller
crowd with riot cops wading in with truncheons – it’s up to you. Whatever looks
best.
CAP: SO, IN RETURN
FOR ALUMINIUM, THEY GAVE US THEIR DNA CODE. I REMEMBER THEY MADE
QUITE A SPEECH ABOUT IT.
CAP: BY MINGLING
OUR DNA WITH THEIRS IN THE WOMB, THEY SAID, OUR CHILDREN COULD TAKE
TO THE SKIES AND NEVER BE HURT.
CAP: EVIDENTLY
THEY STILL DIDN’T UNDERSTAND US.
PANEL FIVE: Okay,
we’re back on Planet Magi, and the astronaut has made it into the same plush meeting
room we saw on Panel Five of Page Three. The three ambassadors we saw last time
are waiting for him, only slightly above the ground. They’re grinning as usual.
The astronaut reaches up to take hold of his helmet.
CAP: AND HERE WE
ARE AGAIN, STILL TALKING ABOUT WHAT WE CAN GIVE EACH OTHER. THEY’RE BEING
STERN TODAY, LIKE PRIMARY SCHOOL TEACHERS.
CAP: THEY SAY WE
HAVEN’T BEEN MAKING PROPER USE OF WHAT THEY’VE GIVEN US. THEY’RE VERY DISAPPOINTED.
PANEL SIX: Closer
in on the astronaut as he takes the helmet off – it’s not quite over his head
yet, but tendrils of mist are escaping from inside the suit, seeping into the
air.
CAP: I UNLOCK
MY HELMET AND THE AIR INSIDE SEEPS OUT.
CAP: THEY TELL
ME THAT – IF WE WANT – THEY CAN ‘MANAGE’ US. ‘SHEPHERD’ US.
SHOW US HOW TO USE WHAT THEY GAVE US CORRECTLY.
PANEL SEVEN: A
close shot of the astronaut’s face. It’s lined and weathered, visibly beaten and
old in comparison to the youthful looks of the Magi, and surrounded by tendrils
of the mist. He’s wearing a smile. It isn’t a nice smile. It’s cruel and vengeful
and pretty nasty to look at.
CAP: JUST IF
WE WANT.
CAP: AND THEY
SMILE.
CAP: AND SO DO
I.
PAGE FIVE:
Five panels.
PANEL ONE: Right
– here’s where you get to draw something disturbing and foul. Well, next panel,
but still. This panel here is a close shot of one of the Magi ambassadors in a
three-quarter profile, smiling with his usual patronising good humour. Maybe his
eyes have gone a little glassy. The tendrils of mist are wafting by him.
CAP: AND THEY
SMILE
CAP: THEY NEVER
DID UNDERSTAND US. WE ALREADY KNOW HOW TO USE THEIR GIFTS CORRECTLY.
PANEL TWO: The
same shot, only now the face has begun to melt. The flesh is slowly liquidising.
The smile remains, obscenely wide as the lower half of the mouth droops and flows.
One of the eyes has come loose from the socket and is starting an inexorable slide
down the face.
CAP: AND THEY
SMILE
CAP: WE KNOW HOW
TO USE THE MEDICAL BREAKTHROUGHS THEY GAVE US TO BUILD A VIRUS.
A FAST ACTING, AIR-BORNE VIRUS.
PANEL THREE:
The same shot again. Face melting has progressed – it’s now almost down to the
skull, although enough is left to look really frightening and hideous. Possible
one eyeball left? One dangling down the face, about to burst on the floor? Or
both gone? These are aesthetic considerations best left to you, the artist. Have
fun.
CAP: AND THEY
SMILE
CAP: A VIRUS THAT
ATTACKS THEIR DNA, USING THE MAP THEY GAVE US.
PANEL FOUR: Wide
shot. Something of a nightmare. We’re outside in the street on the Magi Planet
– the same street the astronaut was walking down – and everybody is melting, including
women and children. The Magi who were flying are crashing to the ground, skeletal
hands clutching at runny throats. Others are just sinking down clawing at themselves.
It’s unbelievably painful and should ideally make the reader want to go to the
toilet and throw up.
CAP: THIS IS
WHAT WE’RE GIVING YOU, YOU BASTARDS -- THIS IS WHAT YOU GET
WHEN YOU TRY TO TELL HUMAN BEINGS HOW TO LIVE THEIR LIVES
--
CAP: THIS
IS WHAT YOU GET WHEN YOU TRY TO BE BETTER THAN US.
PANEL FIVE:
Wide shot. The astronaut is standing in the meeting room, with three skeletons
lying around his feet in pools of gore. He’s got his helmet under his arm and
is looking around him, like a proud explorer on a newly conquered world. His smile
is carefree and happy.
CAP: THE SCREAMING
STOPS AFTER A WHILE. THE AIR STILL SMELLS CLEAN.
CAP: I THINK
THE FIRST THING WE’LL DO IS PUT IN SOME STAIRS.
Art by Lee Townshend and Chris Blythe. Thanks to Al Ewing for providing the script
and to Matt Smith for letting us publish it. Look out for another script very
soon...
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