Original by Larry Hama, MiST by the Icehole
(SOL bridge. We hear the unsettling melodies of the Spice Girls playing over the loudspeaker system. Mike, Big John, Gypsy and Crow hold their hands over their ears. All grimace in pain.)
Mike: Can't we turn that down, Gypsy?
Gypsy: I'm afraid not, Mike. It's being sent in by Pearl.
Music: Colours of the world, Spice up your life/ Every boy and every girl, Spice up your life/People of the world, Spice up your life!
(Big John puts a pillow over the speaker, muffling the sound somewhat.)
Mike: Oh, thank you, Big John.
Big John: God that was horrible.
Tom: You had it easy. My arms don't work, so I couldn't put my hands over my aural sensors!
(The screen comes to life, and shows Pearl, the Observer, and Bobo there.)
Pearl: Well, what do you think of the music I'm sending you?
Mike: It's nice, really.
Pearl: Well, if you like that, I've got something else you're going to love... this week's comic book, it's a wonderful piece by that Marvel writer notorious for not being good... Larry Hama.
Tom: Bring it on! We've survived in this God-forsaken satellite this long, we can survive anything!
(Pearl flips a switch.)
Pearl: As you wish...
(The comic book light comes on.)
Mike: Ah! We got comic book sign!!
(Door sequence. Theater. We see Mike and the bots sitting down.)
>Elektra #16:
>Credits: Writer: Larry Hama
Crow: No Hama please, I'm Jewish.*
Tom: He really botched up Generation X, didn't he?
Big John: Yea. We got to read almost every issue in his tenure there... thanks to Pearl.
Mike: Sometimes, being a writer is a thankless job.
Crow: Well, I hope he doesn't mind if we don't thank him.
>Artist: Mike Deodato, Jr.
Big John: Ah, I loved his work on Thor.
Tom: This is definitely a step down.
>Inker: Scott Koblish
Crow: Never heard of him.
Tom: Sometimes, the best go unnoticed.
>Colors: Christine Scheele
Tom: Who made Elektra's blue eyes gray for no apparent reason.
>Letters: Jack Morelli
Crow: [sings] You go back/ Jack/ Do it again.
Tom: A proud graduate of the Tom Orzenchowski school of lettering.
>Editor: Bobbie Chase
Big John: You know, considering that Hama did a good job with her over in Wolverine, one would reason that the reason why we're getting this piece is because of her.
>Elektra�
>Crosses swords with Shang-Chi� and the Kingpin�!
Mike: Funny, I've never known either Shang-Chi or the Kingpin to use swords.
Big John: I don't think we have either.
>Bad girl.
Mike: So go sit in the corner.
Big John: I'd rather she'd be sitting -
Mike: It's too early for that, Big John.
Crow: Well, they say bad girls have more fun.
>Rejected by the light.
Tom: Well, it might help if you had actually paid the electric bill.
Crow: And use fresh batteries.
>Elektra is a new super-heroine on the verge,
Mike: I thought she was introduced over 15 years ago.
Tom: Sure was. She's older than a lot of characters, Gambit, Marrow, Maggott, Deathcry, Meggan, etc.
>Using her superior martial arts skills to fight her way towards redemption.
Tom: Well, look what it got her. A cancelled series, and now she's having to content herself with the once in a blue moon appearance over in J2, which is about to be cancelled.
Crow: True, but they're replacing it with Wild Thing.
>Elektra once defined herself by the men in her life: daughter of a powerful Greek diplomat
Big John: And his horny wife.
Mike: Big John!
Crow: It's true, Mike. She had quite a reputation for being sleazy.
Mike: But that's not what we saw in Elektra #18...
Tom: How many times do we have to tell you, Marvel comics constantly rewrites the past. Therefore, you can say that Professor X really wasn't the son of Sharon Xavier and get away with it.
>And girlfriend of Matt Murdock, aka the super hero Daredevil.
Crow: But then she read The Feminine Mystique and realized she was being played for a sap.
>When tragedy struck and her father was killed, Elektra fell into the darkness.
Tom: Her dad was paying the electric bill.
>As a member of the Hand, she used her powerful martial arts abilities to become a master assassin.
Big John: Hey, make love, not war I say. She's really too much of a babe to be a cold-blooded killer.
>Now, she's torn between her blood lust...
Big John: Well, I'll help you satisfy your lust, babe!
Mike: Not that kind of lust, Big John. Blood lust. She want to kill.
Crow: She'd probably play Lorena Bobbitt with you.
Big John: AAAHHHH!!!
>And redemption!
Tom: Well, let's see here... blood lust is $2.99 per package, and redemption is $3.00 per pound...
>Nina: Elektra's roommate, an orphan whose father was killed accidentally during a battle between Elektra and Bullseye.
Crow: In other words, they're rehashing Elektra's origin again.
>Elektra feels responsible for her, and empathizes with her as well.
Tom: Ah feel your pain.
>Wolverine: Very little is known about this X-Man whose past remains shrouded in mystery.
Crow: That's because Marvel keeps writing things over and over again.
Tom: Sounds like a clear lack of decision making.
>Wolverine is endowed
Big John: Well, who'da thought? I guess that's why Elektra married him.
Mike: Not quite.
>with animal-keen senses of smell, sight, touch, and hearing - as well as a healing factor that mends almost any wound quickly, and even retards his aging.
Crow: And the wounds he most recently mended was Deadpool.
Tom: Ah yes, that's why they call him Santa Claws.
>His greatest weapons are his razor-sharp, extendable claws, composed of the same dense bone as his skeleton.
Big John: (looking over his handy Handbook in a notepad computer) Well, says here in the 1983 and 1985 handbooks that Wolverine's claws were composed of solid adamantium and that they were implanted by the scientists at Weapon X.
Crow: And everyone's been bugging Marvel to give him his adamantium skeleton back, and they still won't do it.
>Shang Chi: A master of Kung Fu, Shang Chi is a living weapon.
Crow: Which makes it really hard for him to pass through airport security checkpoints.
>Kingpin: Wilson Fisk, a.k.a. the Kingpin of crime, is a criminal organizer and mastermind, and martial arts expert. He is first and foremost known as a major foe of both Spider-Man and Daredevil.
Big John: And secondly known for being big.
>Hong Kong.
>I haven't been back here since it reverted to Communist China.
>Not much has changed.
Crow: Well, it was less than a year ago! Like, Duh!!
>Especially down here between the Mong Kok district and Yau Ma Ti.
Tom: Bet you can't say that three times fast.
>Even Shelly's is still a going concern.
Mike: Why are you concerned about a seedy bar in skid row?
Tom: I'd rather not know.
>Same letters still burnt out on the sign...
Crow: And it pretty much sums up Hama's writing...
>maybe it was intentional.
Tom: [sarcastically] Now what would give you that idea...?
>The clientele has remained remarkably consistent.
>Rejects from Dante's ninth circle.
Tom: So that's where Marvel gets its staff from...
Big John: That was cold, man.
>And Ne'er the Twain Shall Meet
Tom: Well, of course they aren't going to meet Mark Twain! He's been dead for almost 90 years now!!
Crow: Not only that, he would never have been caught dead in a bar like that.
Big John: No, no, no. They mean she won't meet the train. I think Hama used a Dictaphone and his r's sound like w's.
>Man: Hey girlie! You with the sais--
>Man: -- How's about you slide onto my lap and lemme whisper sweet nuttins in yer ear!
Big John: Now there's a man to whom I can relate.
Mike: So you've lost your hand and had it replaced with a prosthetic hook too?
>Elektra: The only thing I want whispered in my ear is the whereabouts of the low-born dogs who call themselves the Five.
Big John: Gang Bang?
Mike: No!!
>Man: The F-f-five?
Crow: Yea, it's the number after four and before six...
>Shang Chi: Close the door, you inconsiderate cow --
>Shang Chi: You're letting in the flies
Tom: You're in one of the seediest dives in Hong Kong, surrounded by people who haven't bathed in weeks, and all you care about is the flies?
Crow: How could you tell that she brought them in and not those seedy bar patrons? I mean, she's probably bathed yesterday, and those patrons haven't seen a shower in weeks....
>Shang Chi: One should also be more discreet in bandying about the name of the Five...
Tom: I wonder why they bold the name the Five?
Crow: Beats me, Tom. The Five are certainly bigwigs, though...
>Shang Chi: You are bound to arouse hostility in those who are more adept in the arts than you.
Crow: But Elektra's supposed to be one of the top martial artists in the world.
>Elektra: I am not impressed.
Big John: Who does she think she is, Charlie Sexton?
Tom: Whatever happened to him?
Big John: He's still in Austin performing at some chicken shack club.
>Shang Chi: A clean decapitation....
Crow: Wow... she must be really talented if she could decapitate a fly and still leave the legs intact, even though the legs were in the way...
>Shang Chi: You have talent, woman. Even if you are impertinent.
Big John: [as Shang Chi] But I like my women with spirit!
Mike: Cut it out, Big John.
>Shang-Chi: And just what business do you have with the Five?... Those faceless recondite, high mucky-mucks of that arcane order of assassins known as the Hand!
Crow: Well, they owe me some money here..
Big John: I'm gonna tear them limb from limb because they wanted me to -
Mike: No.
>Elektra: And why should that be of any concern to you -- unless you yourself -- were an agent of the Hand!
Tom: [as Shang Chi] Actually, I just didn't have anything better to do!
>Shang Chi: A scathing accusation... from one who was known as an assassin of the hand herself!
Mike: Those in glass houses should not throw stones..
Crow: Ooh... out of place Zen moment.
>Shang Chi: Is that so, Elektra?
Mike: Let me get this straight. Elektra throws her sais, they stick into the table. Then Shang Chi kicks the table, the sais dislodge themselves, reverse direction, and fly back to Elektra???
Crow: Oh, I'm sure it's physically possible.
>Elektra: I was one of them... but I did not belong to them.
Big John: I'm my own woman... besides, none of them were real hunks.
>Shang Chi: A rather fine detail, is it not?
Tom: Just like that plate of Chinese noodles coming back together like that.
Crow: Oh, well, I'm sure that's physically possible as well.
>Elektra: God lives in the details.
Mike: Doesn't the bible say that God is everywhere?
Tom: Sure does.
Big John: Never could stand the fundamentalist right.
>Shang Chi: Mies Van Der Rohe said that. Are you taking to quoting dead architects, Elektra?
Big John: Nah, she's into dressing in tight red clothing, going around and beating on street punks, and generally attracting leers from men.
>Elektra: And are you taking to haunting scurvy saloons, Shang Chi, master of kung fu?
Crow: You mean he's a ghost?
Mike: So that explains that dead and resurrected thing!
>Shang Chi: You managed to stick a sai in me that time, Elektra ... it wasn't so easy for you
Big John: [as Elektra] Well, you went and felt me up without me -
Mike: Cut it out, Big John.
>Shang Chi: Now that I know your tricks, eh?
Tom: She's a magician too?
Big John: Actually, those kind of tricks aren't for kids.
>Elektra: Oh, I don't count your supposedly surreptitious surveillance in New York.
All: Stalking!
Big John: Well, if you're gonna stalk someone, better make it a total babe like her.
>Shang Chi: I gave up the ways of deceit and death to find my own peace, Elektra...
Tom: [as the Godfather] But they keep pulling me back in!
>Shang Chi: But lately events have been drawing me back into what Kipling called "The Great Game."
Mike: So they're quoting authors now.
Tom: It's the only way he can get halfway decent lines in a story.
>Shang Chi: I came back to Hong Kong with a group of mutants to stop a great evil.
Crow: Fight the real evil - the people who make stuff like this.
>Shang Chi: One of the mutants was a shambling beast
Crow: Since when did Beast take to shambling?
Mike: I'm not too sure I want to know.
>A beast with great heart and will of adamantium.
Crow: You know, I wonder why Marvel keeps telling us Wolverine's going to get his adamantium back then doesn't do it.
Tom: To keep us reading the stories, Crow. It's called bait and switch.
>Elektra: That would be Logan. They call him Wolverine.
Big John: He was an animal when it came to a lot of things...
Mike: [coldly] like eating.
Bots: Ugh.
>Shang Chi: You know this one?
Big John: Well, we spent a few days in a cabin in the woods of Canada, then I took him to meet my old friends in Greece... but we're... just friends.
>Elektra: In passing.
Mike: Speaking of passing, pass me an antacid.
>Shang Chi: So, how is it, Elektra:... that you were one of the Hand, but did not belong to them?
Big John: I wouldn't do it with Jonin. He's slimy.
Mike: Just say no, people.
>Elektra: I joined the Hand under false pretenses
Tom: They promised me a comprehensive medical plan, with full dental benefits, and they didn't deliver!
Crow: And they salary they actually gave me wasn't enough to keep a mouse alive for a week!
>to prove to the Chaste I was worthy.
Crow: But darnit, they just won't take rejects from the other side!
>Elektra: Somewhere along the way, things went awry.
Big John: It was the perfect plan! I would betray the Hand and then get in the Chaste and Daredevil! But darnint, I couldn't get the Hand to lay down and die just by my saying so.
>Like you I had to find my own way.
Mike: I wonder why they feel like they need to bold All these words?
Crow: Beats me, Mike. Maybe they had a surplus of ink for this issue and wanted to use it up.
>The hand sent Kuroyama, a dead man who walks. He ripped her heart out. Tore it from her chest and took it with him!
Big John: I know some guys take souvenirs of women they have loved, but that's kinda disgusting.
>The Hand Said it was partial payment for my debt to them.
Tom: Gee, just because they brought you back to life, you'd think they'd just let things go...
>Logan and I raided a den of ninjas in the east village of New York City...
Crow: Because, after all, they were making too much noise every night with their practice.
>They told me under extreme duress that the reason why I can't feel certain things the way I used to
Big John: Hopefully, one of them isn't sex.
Mike: Big John!
> is because I was missing something...
Big John: You sure don't look like you're missing anything... but then again, we haven't seen you naked since you were brought back to life...
Mike: Cease this line of reasoning right now.
>That when the Hand brought me back from death and put the lift that had been taken from me back inside -- they left something out!
Tom: Well, it was these darned instructions. You know that when you assemble something, there's always a nut or bolt left over...
>He said that what was stolen from me could be found in the Hand stronghold in central Japan.
Crow: But he wanted $20 dollars for a map...
Big John: And I fill this outfit so much there's no room for a billfold.
>A whisper of the Five.
Tom: (whispering) The five.. the five... it's the number before six and after four.
>A very private banquet on yon floating pleasure palace to celebrate some secret victory...
Crow: [as Shang Chi] And I'm hacked off because they didn't invite me.
Big John: Yea, and one of the Five promised me he'd have a hot Asian babe for me too!
Mike: Big John, must you always think with your private parts?
> Elektra: A celebration, you say... too quiet for that!
Big John: Oh, well, they're just in the undressing and groping part of the orgy.
Mike: Big John! They are not having sex over there!
Big John: Well, there's no better way to celebrate.
>Shang Chi: Those statues depict guardians of the celestial jade emperor... mayhap the Hand feels that is all the protection they require.
Tom: First yon, now mayhap? Methinks Shang Chi doth suffer an attack of Thoritis!
>Elektra: Those aren't statues!
Tom: Of course. Nothing is as it seems in the Marvel universe. Nice to know she knows that.
>Ninja: The time for pretense is over!
Crow: O.k., Tom, it was me who accidentally broke your Paul McCarthy CD.
Tom: What!? You broke my copy of Tug of War?
>Ninja: Death to the interlopers!
Tom: Oh boy! Mindless violence time!
Big John: Can't we all just get along?
Crow: [as the ninja] If there's one thing I can't stand, it's a party crasher.
>Elektra:Si Fan ninjas, masked by holographic projections!
Crow: Ah, the holographic projector. A definite need in the Marvel Universe.
Big John: So that's how all the women appear to be total babes while all the men appear to be hot studs.
Tom: Is it live, or is it Memorex?
>They are adept killers but not of the Hand!
Crow: You know, if I was celebrating something, I'd want to have my men guarding the place, wouldn't you?
Big John: Only if they didn't want to party with me.
>Shang Chi: That explains the Fujikawa corporation helicopter that passed us on the way over!
Mike: You saw that you were being watched, yet you didn't tell Elektra about it. Makes good sense, doesn't it?
Tom: Who cares? It's mindless violence time!
Big John: [sings] Violence rules/ Guns are cool/ And we've got guns/ In our school!
Tom: Who was that?
Big John: The Dead Milkmen.
Crow: Did they go to Columbine High School?
>Fujikawa is a front for a criminal organization... with nefarious ties
Crow: [prays] Otto Flippa, hear my call, smite the wearers of the nefarious ties!
Mike: Like any God is going to heed your call here.
>That included my own late father!
Big John: [as Shang Chi] Dad never could be on time.
Mike: No, no, he means he's dead.
Crow: Mike, what have we taught you about death in the Marvel Universe?
Mike: Death in Marvel is a temporary thing.
>You know him, of course.
Crow: [sings] My Fu Manchu...
Tom: Who was that?
Crow: Frank Black. He used to sing lead for the Pixies.
>Elektra: "Many men smoke, but--"
Tom: Those that do end up getting lung cancer!
Crow: And emphysema, and a hacking cough, not to mention they stink all the time, and -
Mike: I think we get the point now.
(The lights come up, and the doors open. Door sequence. Bridge. We see Crow and Big John there. Crow is armed with two sais, and Big John has a circular table next to him, and holds a plate of noodles. Tom is nearby.)
Big John: All right, Crow. Give it a try.
(Crow throws the sais, and Big John knocks over the table, then throws the plate of noodles into the air. The sais stick into the table.)
Crow: So far, so good...
(Big John kicks the table as the noodles go everywhere. They land with a splat on Big John, the table, and the floor. The table rolls around for a bit, then stops.)
Tom: I told you it wouldn't work.
(Enter Mike.)
Mike: What in the world is going on here...?
Tom: They were trying to recreate the scene where Shang Chi kicks the table and has the sais that Elektra threw go back to her.
(Big John starts cleaning up the noodle mess.)
Tom: This should teach you a lesson. Things aren't always the same in fantasies.
Crow: Yea, if that were true, Big John would be surrounded by gorgeous women now.
Mike: We'll be back after this.
(Commercials. When we come back, SOL bridge. We see Big John finish sweeping up the mess he made.)
Mike: I can't believe you'd try to recreate this, Crow.
Crow: I know, Mike. But it just sounded so crazy and unbelievable that it just might have worked...
(The comic book light comes on.)
Mike: We've got comic book sign!!
(Door sequence. Theater. Mike and the bots sit.)
>Kingpin: Com in and help yourselves. Plenty left over.
Crow: After all, we found out the food had been poisoned.
>I'm afraid my five other guests had to leave early; a full schedule, you know.
Crow: [as Shang Chi] Darnit! I was hoping to get their autographs too!
>You should start with the cold jellyfish.
Crow: Aren't jellyfish poisonous to humans?
Mike: Yes.
Big John: [sings] Jellyfish heaven is a place where jellyfish go/ To get away from Mormons/ And drunk Eskimos/ Jellyfish heaven/ Is a lot/ Like L.A.
Tom: I don't think I want to know who that was.
>Shang Chi: I knew this one was affiliated with Fujikawa as of late... but I had heard he returned to New York to pick up where he left off!
Tom: Man, that's going to send Fujikawa stock plummeting....
>Kingpin: Simply tying up loose ends. Things have a way of unraveling unless you're tidy about the loose ends.
Big John: Those Five bunch are really starting to get on my nerves now...
>The Five are too powerful to offend blatantly, but I find some of their endeavors to be excessively wasteful of precious resources...
Crow: They leveled a whole forest in Brazil just to make one wooden spoon!
Tom: They polluted the waters around New York City, making water from the East River the most toxic substance known to man!
Big John: They've been using my condoms!
Mike: Not quite.
>And a bit too luridly melodramatic.
Crow: [as Captain Kirk] Why, It's just, that, we, like to do, our things, you know?
>Such hubris on the part of the Five. They actually boasted of this to me.
Big John: But I'm really mad because I didn't think of it myself.
>That they were meddling in my own bailiwick, upsetting the hierarchies of crime to suit their own nefarious purposes...
Crow: People in glass houses should not throw stones, Kingpin...
>While they feted me to celebrate a few paltry assassinations, coup d'etats, and hostile takeovers.
Big John: Some people will party at the drop of a hat. I'd like to meet 'em if they're good looking and single women. Otherwise, forget it.
Tom: [sinisterly] We party while our plans for world domination come to life!
>Elektra: These gang murders -- they can't still be trying to pin them on me, can they?
Tom: Oh, just because you joined them and then betrayed them, they're not going to hold a grudge, right?
Crow: Tom, this is Marvel. Normal logic doesn't apply here.
Mike: >I don't think any logic applies here.
>Haven't been keeping up with the hometown papers, have you, Elektra?
Crow: Well, they've upped the price again, and it's getting so that I had to choose between newspapers and food...
Tom: She's been in several cargo holds for several weeks! How could she keep up with the news?
>Or you would know about the latest exclusive photos.
Tom: Definitely not her good side on that one, hmm?
>Elektra: What? That was taken yesterday!
Big John: Hmm... must have borrowed Fatale's ability to teleport.
Tom: Then why did she spend several days locked in the hold of a cargo ship?
Crow: Cover story?
Mike: Stop it, please... you just can't successfully rationalize anything Marvel does anymore...
Big John: Just wait until we get around to rationalizing Spider-Man: Maximum Clonage.
>I was still in transit from Tokyo!
Big John: And you wouldn't believe what I had to do to get passage!
Mike: They made me swab the deck!
>Kingpin: Obviously, the Hand has inserted a doppelganger.
All: Oh no! It's the old evil twin plot!
Crow: [sings] My evil twin/ Runs home again/ Searchlights look for an alibi/ But I'll be home by then.
>The Five boasted that this new assassin of theirs was even better than Kuroyama.
Big John: Well, she's a lot better looking... then again, so is Roseanne...
>They mentioned something about completing "the circle."
Crow: [sings] In the Circle/ The Circle of life.
>Shang Chi: Why would you give up this information on your partners in crime?
Tom: [facetiously] Oh, we should trust him, even though he's the head of the biggest mob around, and he's been known to stab his opponents in the back....
>Kingpin: Because good partners don�t make messes in each other�s back yards.
Crow: And it�s really starting to stink!
Big John: Well it�s dog -
Mike: [interrupts] Big John!
Big John: What have you got against Mojo Nixon?
Mike: Nothing, it�s just that we shouldn�t say certain words here, all right?
Big John: Man, that takes the fun out of everything...
>Caption: I believed him.
Crow: [sings] Do you believe in love after love?
Mike:I got a feeling this is going to get Elektra in deeper trouble.
>His reason for divulging the information were all self-serving.
Big John: [gangster accent] So, youse tryin� to muscle in on our territory, huh? Bugsy, show �em what we do to boys who try to step on our turf.
>And that was true to character.
>Two days later, I�m back in New York City...
Big John: [sings] I�m two days from New York City/ And I�m two days from you/ �Cause everyone�s your friend/ In New York City
Crow: I bet whoever wrote that never went there.
Tom: Well, if I have friends in New York City, can I get them to get me off this satellite?
>In an office tower that houses the headquarters of Babylon Construction and demolition corporation.
Big John: Let�s see here, the thing the Babylonians were best noted for construction-wise was trying to make a tower to heaven, but God sent down the curse of different languages on them.... good choice for a construction company name...
>The Kingpin said that BTC&D was the cover for the mob that was muscling in on his turf.
Tom: So the Hand is muscling in on his turf, and this other mob is too? My, the Kingpin is being attacked from all sides now!
>The Five had mentioned that they would �take care of it.�
Crow: You scratch my back, I stab yours, he?
>Woman: EEEEEE
Crow: Must have seen the new Marvel Swimsuit issue which has the Kingpin, Wolverine, Absorbing Man, and Deadpool in swimtrunks.
Big John: Must have gotten a look at the Playgirl issue with Wolverine naked in it.
All: Ugh.
>It is being taken care of in an egregiously heavy-handed manner...
Mike: Much like this comic book...
>Judging by the screams of the fleeing secretary and the coppery tang of blood in the air.
Tom: Blood is based on iron, not copper!
Big John: Actually, a crab�s blood is blue, because it has copper and not iron in it.
Mike: So they�re crabs.
Crow: Well, being in the Marvel Universe with no way out, wouldn�t you turn into a crab?
>Sounds from the office down the hall...
Big John: [as if reading a romance novel] The heavy moaning and gasping of two bodies locked in a passionate embrace of love. She wanted him badly, and her heart pounded like a jackhammer against her heaving bosom... nothing, she thought, would get in the way of having him...
Mike: Nice thought. Too bad it�s not true.
>Scuffling, heaving breathing, the muffled sounds of terror...
Big John: S & M?
Mike: No.
>He was dead before he came through the door.
Tom: Gee... and his hair suddenly transformed from blonde to brown as if by magic!
Crow: Maybe he thought he could get better help as a brown hared man.
>The office behind him is a charnel house.
Crow: Well, with all this carnage, we had to do something with the bodies....
>This is the lair of the big boss, Tu-tone Tommy Tiparillo...
Tom: He�s named after a cigar?
Mike: I can�t stand cigar smoke.
Big John: Yea. Pearl can�t stand it either.
>who is now pinned to his executive chair like a moth on a display card.
Crow: Well, his doctor told him to stay off his feet, and we had to do something to get him to sit down...
>The broken window... is this the egress point of the killer?
Tom: P.T. Barnum would turn over in his grave.
>No! The killer is still here!
Mike: So you�re just going to stand there awed while he or she gets away, hmm?
>She�s as fast as I am, and seemingly skilled!
Tom: Well, DUH!! She was trained by the Hand like you were!
>Elektra: Turn and face me, imposter!
Big John: [sings] You don�t believe what you write/ You�re an imposter/ You don�t believe what you write/ You�re an imposter/ You don�t don�t don�t don�t believe what you write!
Crow:Who was that?
Big John: Oingo Boingo.
>Nina: With pleasure, Elektra.
Big John: Aw man, why do all the really hot ones turn out to be gay?
Mike: Nina isn�t gay!
Crow: Well, it�s never really been said one way or another...
Mike: (to Crow) Don�t encourage him.
>What�s the matter?
Big John: What�s the matter? I�ll tell you what�s the matter! I�m stuck on some god-forsaken satellite with Oliver Cromwell here and two cobbled together robots! I have to endure endless amounts of terrible movies, books, fan fiction, and even music that would drive a man crazy. And to top it all off, I haven�t had sex in months!!
Mike: It�s not a picnic being with you either, Big John.
>Aren�t you happy to see me?
Big John: Well, this is about as close to a sexual experience that I�ve gotten lately. I will say she�s really hot, though.
>Elektra: Nina --! But -- you�re dead!
Mike: Oh, come on! nobody stays dead in the Marvel Universe too long. You should know, you�re living proof of that.
>I saw Kuroyama rip out your heart!!
Tom: And you whined about breaking up with him for weeks!
Big John: Well, if he was disappointing, you should have came to me, babe...
>Nina: They put it Back...
Crow: Well, I�m sure that just sticking someone�s heart back in them will make them tick again...
>And something else as well!
Crow: The uncanny ability to look ultra hot in blue?
Tom: The knack for looking like a blond Elektra?
Big John: Breast augmentation?
Mike: Not quite...
(The lights come up, and the doors open. Door sequence. Bridge. We see Mike and the bots standing there.)
Big John: I tell you what, if any of those babes were here, I�d give them plenty of reason not to fight...
Crow: But Big John, the comics code frowns on sex. Take that away and what have you got? Violence. So that�s what they do.
(The screen comes to life and shows Pearl and an Observer there.)
Pearl: Well, feeling a little insane now, are we?
(Mike thinks.)
Mike: Well... no.
Pearl: (taken aback) No? That was terrible! How do you do it? How can you manage to stay sane in all the garbage I send you each week?
Big John: Dumb luck I guess. Then again, if you really wanted him to suffer, you should take him to bed with you.
(Pearl gets angry.)
Pearl: Shut up!! Well, I�ll get you yet, Mike Nelson... and your little bots too!!
(The screen goes blank.)
Crow: I wonder what she has for us next week?
Mike: Let�s wait until then to find out.
*Apologies to Maggie the Cat.