Contact Lenses

References

• People Swallow 8 Spiders a Year While They Sleep
• Brian Regan
  • Clip: Getting your prescription updated
• Monet
  • Monet’s failing sight
• The Evil Dead
• Art Film
• Flowers for Algernon
• Cowboy Bebop
  • Red Eye
• Strange Days
• Vodka Eyeballing
• Y2K Bug
• What Women Want
• Free Guy
• They Live
• The Host (the Stephanie Meyer film)
• The Host (the Korean film)
• Tetrachromacy
• Midi-chlorian
• Limbal Rings
• Magic Eye
• Mallrats
  • Clip: Magic Eye
• Serenity
  • Reevers
  • Wash
• Sally Jessy Raphael
• The Cure
• The Mist
• Deus ex machina
• Cloud Seeding
• 28 Days Later

Transcript

[Intro music begins]

[Shep]
People swallow eight contact lenses a year on average in their sleep.

[Emily]
I’m pretty sure it’s more than that.

[Shep]
Contact lenses like warm, dark places, so…

[Thomas]
It’s because one out of every eight spiders is wearing contact lenses.

[Shep]
Only one spider needs to be wearing contact lenses to get your quota for the year.

[Thomas]
That’s right. It averages out. Some people will swallow 16, 32, whatever.

[Shep]
Some multiple of eight.

[Thomas]
Yeah.

[Intro music]

[Thomas]
Hey there, story fans. Welcome to Almost Plausible, the podcast where we take ordinary objects and turn them into movies. Far from ordinary are my co-hosts Emily-

[Emily]
Hey, guys.

[Thomas]
And F. Paul Shepard.

[Shep]
Happy to be here.

[Thomas]
I’m Thomas J. Brown. And today the object like we’re focusing on is contact lenses. Now, I’m fortunate not to have needed my vision corrected so far in my life. I don’t know how glasses would look on me, but I’d probably be stuck with them since I cannot imagine sticking my fingers in my eyes every day. Emily, Shep, do either of you wear contact lenses? And if so, how do you do it?

[Emily]
I do not because of the same reason, I don’t want to stick a finger in my eyeball. It’s not happening.

[Shep]
I do not, because my prescription is too strong. So I don’t think you could fit Coke bottle bottoms into your eyes.

[Thomas]
You wouldn’t be able to shut your eyes to blink.

[Shep]
Right. My whole head would fall forward.

[Thomas]
Yeah. The idea of doing that, ah, don’t like it. Don’t like it.

[Emily]
I also only need mine for reading and computer screens. It’s not worth my time.

[Thomas]
Yeah. I think I’m getting to the point where I’m going to need reading glasses soonish.

[Shep]
Yeah. Get on my level. So I went through the stereotypical not getting glasses until later in life because I grew up poor, we couldn’t afford it. And so it was a bizarre, as an adult to see individual blades of grass, individual leaves in a tree, that kind of thing. I’m not unique in that experience.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
That mind blowing, the first time you see clearly having not seen your entire life.

[Thomas]
I think Brian Reagan has a whole bit about that, about getting your prescription updated.

[Emily]
Right.

[Thomas]
Suddenly you can see again.

[Emily]
My mom saw Monet paintings in DC when we lived back east as a kid, and she’s like, “But that’s what it looks like when I don’t wear my glasses.” She’s like, “I think he had cataracts.”

[Thomas]
Alright, well, let’s get to our pitches. It is Shep’s turn to go first.

[Shep]
Alright, so I’m thinking for contact lenses, there’s two categories of possible pitches.

[Thomas]
Okay.

[Shep]
So one that alters the wearer and one that alters how you see. So pitch one, contact lenses that alter the wearer. One evil contact lens that takes over one eye and starts taking over the body from there. So sometimes it takes over the mouth and the person says something that they don’t mean to say. And then it starts to take over the arm on that side and so on, and begins to spread. So the race is on to find a way to remove the lens and save the host before they do something unforgivable. I’m thinking kind of like Evil Dead where Ash has one hand that’s possessed.

[Thomas]
Oh, right.

[Emily]
Yeah.

[Shep]
So kind of like that, except it starts in his eye.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Shep]
My other pitch is, the other category, contact lenses that let you see an altered world. So this one, I was thinking could be interesting visually. So not much in a story sense, so we probably won’t pick this one. But contact lenses that allow color blind people to see colors, but they only work temporarily and then never again. So I’m thinking kind of like a pseudo-documentary style about these types of lenses and about the scientists behind them and then following one such person and their one day with color as their friends and the scientists take them around to experience different visual feasts of color until the sensory input is too much and they have to stop. But knowing once the contacts are removed, they go back to being color blind forever. I was thinking at the beginning you film it with a color blind filter so everyone watching it sees the same color blindness, whatever the most common is, until the lenses are in, and then it’s more and more colors becoming more and more saturated until it’s overwhelming. Include the soundtrack so the sounds get louder and louder as it goes on until everything’s sensory overload. And then they take the contacts out and it goes back to muted colors and silence.

[Thomas]
So it’s an art house film.

[Shep]
Yes.

[Emily]
Yeah. I like the concept, but it also makes me a little sad.

[Shep]
Flowers for Algernon, but color blindness.

[Thomas]
Yeah. So what about the idea of, you actually become more color blind afterward?

[Shep]
That could be as well. I was thinking that the scientists are researching how to make this last longer and perhaps permanent.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
They’re not there yet, and everyone who takes part in it now will not be able to have the cure later. That’s the cost. That’s the thing they’re giving up, is potentially seeing color forever in order to see it for a day now. But maybe it will never be cured. Maybe there’ll never be a solution. So at least they’ll have that day.

[Emily]
I could see older color blind people being like, “Well, I’m going to die soon, so give me my color so younger people can have it later.”

[Shep]
Yeah. Anyway, those are mine.

[Thomas]
Alright. I have three. One of them actually is very similar, Shep, to your first one. So I have a symbiotic contact lens that’s made of a living alien tissue. So they feed on the blood through the vessels in your eyes, and eventually they merge with your eyeball tissue. In return, they give you some sort of ability like better vision or increased perception or strength or something. But eventually they turn you into a drone for the alien army. No idea how they get on your eyes in the first place.

[Shep]
I mean, obviously evil corporation.

[Emily]
They just fly into it.

[Thomas]
Yeah. I can just see like, you know how contact lenses can kind of fold up a little bit, I could see it, like, inching along, like an inchworm and crawls under your eyelid while you’re sleeping.

[Emily]
While you sleep.

[Thomas]
Gross.

[Emily]
And you just wake up itching.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
People swallow eight contact lenses a year on average in their sleep.

[Emily]
I’m pretty sure it’s more than that.

[Shep]
Contact lenses like warm, dark places, so…

[Thomas]
It’s because one out of every eight spiders is wearing contact lenses.

[Shep]
Only one spider needs to be wearing contact lenses to get your quota for the year.

[Thomas]
That’s right. It averages out. Some people will swallow 16, 32, whatever.

[Shep]
Some multiple of eight.

[Thomas]
Yeah. My next idea, a designer drug is taken by placing one time use contact lenses into your eye.

[Shep]
That reminds me of the first episode of Cowboy Bebop where they have the drug that they spray into the eye.

[Thomas]
That’s right, yeah.

[Emily]
It reminds me a little bit of Strange Days with Ralph Fiennes. I don’t know why. Even though that was more of a virtual reality thing.

[Shep]
Strange Days, also color blindness.

[Thomas]
But I mean, the idea, I guess, of, like, having your brain state altered through your eyes in some way.

[Emily]
I mean, it’s not unreasonable. There was that god awful trend. Was it when we were in college or just after college? Where people were taking vodka shots in their eyeballs and blinding themselves? Because it gets into your bloodstream faster through your eyes?

[Thomas]
Just doing vodka enema or something. I mean, come on.

[Shep]
And those people, they vote.

[Emily]
Yeah, they do.

[Shep]
Just saying.

[Thomas]
And my third one a serial killer. Sorry, Emily. There’s room for multiple serial killers. Alright. Okay. A serial killer is caught when a woman he kidnaps is wearing contact lenses that have cameras in them and transmit their video. So video only. No audio.

[Shep]
Is it transmitting live?

[Thomas]
Yes. Or maybe there’s a delay. I don’t know.

[Shep]
So it’s a murder mystery. But the person hasn’t been murdered yet.

[Emily]
They’re kidnapped in a basement waiting to be-

[Thomas]
Right. And so the people who have access to the video feed have to try to figure out where in the world is this person. You know, the GPS technology is not small enough to fit on the contact lenses, so they can’t tap into that. I don’t know.

[Emily]
And she didn’t get her air tag implanted into her boob.

[Thomas]
Right. You would think that the lenses would connect your phone, which would have GPS.

[Emily]
Right.

[Thomas]
So I don’t know. Maybe it’s problematic from a technological standpoint, but.

[Shep]
Don’t think about it. It takes place in the far future of 1999.

[Thomas]
Right. And then the Y2K bug causes problems somehow.

[Emily]
That’s it.

[Shep]
That’s how it’s resolved at the end.

[Thomas]
Yeah. They figure out what time zone the criminal is in because of that.

[Shep]
Oh, we got it. Are we done?

[Emily]
Good job.

[Thomas]
Those are my three. Emily, what do you have?

[Emily]
I have very short pitches this week. I have contact lenses that change your appearance while you’re wearing them. So they kind of do like, some sort of digital thing over your body out through your eyes.

[Shep]
So they just have, like, QR codes, but everybody’s got AR contact lenses all the time, so it just overlays.

[Emily]
Yeah.

[Thomas]
There you go.

[Shep]
What’s the app that has the- I’m old, so I don’t know what the apps are. But the app that has the filters.

[Thomas]
Instagram, TikTok.

[Shep]
Yeah, I don’t know.

[Thomas]
I think Snapchat has filters.

[Shep]
Right.

[Thomas]
Zoom.

[Shep]
AR. So everyone else has the AR contact lenses, sees you with that filter on because of the QR code in the contact.

[Emily]
And then my second pitch is contact lenses that allow you to see people’s true emotions. So sort of like a lie detector type-ish thing where you can say, “I’m fine”, but really, I can see that you’re seething with anger and want to murder me.

[Shep]
Yeah, I’ve been in relationships before.

[Emily]
Yes.

[Shep]
I know what “I’m fine” means. I don’t need contacts for that.

[Emily]
“I’m not mad. I’m upset.”

[Shep]
So What Women Want, but not reading their minds, just knowing how they feel.

[Emily]
Right.

[Thomas]
So it’s Free Guy meets What Women Want, or They Live meets What Women Want. Alright.

[Shep]
Alright.

[Thomas]
Is there a particular one we like?

[Emily]
I like the symbiotic alien and the color blind people.

[Thomas]
I agree. I think those are the two I like the best.

[Emily]
Those are the two we should choose from.

[Thomas]
Real quick, we could kind of go over each one and figure out what the overarching story is. I don’t really have much of a plan for the symbiotic tissue one, other than there’s an alien invasion that nobody realizes is happening. This is how they take over, I suppose. And then it’s essentially a zombie film, but instead of zombies, they’re alien drones.

[Emily]
Did you ever see The Host?

[Thomas]
Maybe.

[Emily]
Why would you have watched The Host?

[Thomas]
Oh, probably not then.

[Emily]
It’s based on a Stephenie Meyer’s book, who she wrote-

[Thomas]
Oh, definitely not then.

[Emily]
Yeah,

[Shep]
So not the Korean film, The Host.

[Emily]
No, and I might be getting the name wrong. Anyway, maybe it’s not The Host. Anyway-

[Thomas]
Maybe it was The Toast. Maybe you’re thinking of what you had for breakfast.

[Emily]
Maybe. Stephenie Meyer’s body swapping movie. And they have little aliens that they implant into you, and then you can tell whether you’re one of them or not based off of their eyes because they get, like, this weird gold ring around their eyes if they’re invaded by the alien species. So with this one, what would be the tell that you’ve been-? Would there be a tell? Is this the first victim of the alien?

[Thomas]
So there’s sort of two tells. One, obviously, if they’re trying to attack you, but the idea essentially is that the ring around where that tissue is starts to get more and more red because it’s drawing more blood to that spot. So you sort of get this red ring in one of the eyes so that’s how you can see. “Oh, there’s something feeding.” I imagine there would be a transition period where before, because I feel like once you see that, it’s too late.

[Emily]
Yeah.

[Shep]
Okay, so let’s just do this one because I already have ideas now, and the color blind one basically doesn’t have a story because it’s a pseudo-documentary and so it’s just what visual things could you show with more and more color? The end. Okay, so the symbiotic contact lenses, we don’t know that it’s alien tissue at first. It’s just a corporation, big international corporation comes up with this new technology which are these, basically a cure for vision problems in a contact lens that you put in once and wear forever. So it’s an instant cure. Eye surgery you can do at home for a low, low cost, which just sounds amazing, especially if it can cure other things like color blindness. It gives you better than 20/20 vision, but it allows you to see four colors. It gives you telescopic at-will vision and so on. So who wouldn’t want this? Whoever could afford- it’s covered by your insurance. Everybody would want this.

[Thomas]
Even if you don’t have vision issues, there are other benefits that are absolutely worth-

[Shep]
Like I said, it gives you that four color vision that some women have.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
So you’re not just, you’re anti-color-blind, you have exceptional color vision, which now you can see everything much more clearly. It makes it easier to drive, it makes it easier to read, it makes it easier-

[Thomas]
Yeah, better night vision.

[Shep]
Better night vision. Yeah, perfect night vision without night vision goggles.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
It makes you basically a superhuman when it comes to your eyes.

[Thomas]
So is the corporation upfront about the fact that it is tissue and it will connect with your eye and draw blood? Are they trying to hide the fact that that’s what’s going to happen?

[Shep]
No, they say that’s it, but if they don’t say it’s alien tissue, they say it’s genetically engineered.

[Thomas]
Well, right, that’s what I mean though. They’re coming up with excuses like “This is going to happen to your eyes, but don’t worry, that’s normal, that’s part of it.”

[Emily]
“It’s just the transition period.”

[Shep]
Oh yeah, they totally probably fake you out. You come in, you got a blood drawn like as if they’re going to generate accustomed lenses for you using your own blood. So your body doesn’t reject the new lenses.

[Thomas]
Do they just go in the back and squirt it in their mouth?

[Shep]
No, but they have your blood for something. So just think maybe for cloning, maybe for who knows what. For some reason they draw your blood so nobody suspects.

[Thomas]
So they can put it in their big machine and activate everybody at once and then they’ll know the midi-chlorians in your blood will connect to the midi-chlorians in you.

[Shep]
Once again, midi-chlorians are the answer. So it’s only later like people start to see the red limbal rings. Limbal rings are the ring around the color in your eye. And some people’s limbal rings turn red, and they haven’t gone crazy yet and attacked people yet. And so they are concerned, and they bring it up with the corporation and they’re like, “Oh no, that’s just temporary. That’s just as it’s bonding, it’ll go away.” It doesn’t go away and more and more people are having this effect and people stop caring about it and it’s faint. If you have the implant, if you have the contact lens, you can see the other people that have that ring really easily.

[Emily]
Right.

[Shep]
And if you don’t, you can’t, it’s faint and maybe you can’t see it at all. Maybe it’s like an infrared or ultraviolet or something color that you normally wouldn’t be able to see, but people that have it can spot it in other people that have it. But basically it indicates that at that point it has merged with the eye and you can no longer take it out. So that later when people get activated and start attacking people and the regular non-enhanced people realize that it’s the people that have the implants in their eyes that are doing it, then they have something to go on. But because you have to have the implant or the lens on to see the people that have the ring, then they would be putting the lenses on and then taking them off before they attach so that you could have a scene at some point where they can’t take it off anymore and they have that red ring around their eye and you know it’s too late for them. They haven’t been activated yet, but they can no longer detach the lens. So what do you do at that point? Do you cut your eye out?

[Thomas]
So I was thinking about the activation thing because it’s going to take time to get a lot of people wearing these contacts and you don’t want that transition happening slowly over the course of time. You want a lot of people transitioning in a short period so you have a large scale attack that happens all at once. I like what you brought up with people complaining about that ring forming. So they’re getting concerned and so the company says, “Okay, well, it’s harmless but we’re going to look into it and see if there’s something we can do just cosmetically to help clear that up.” So then they come out with some eye drops that they distribute for free to everyone. When you use the eye drops, that’s the activator.

[Emily]
But then you’re not activating everybody all at once, necessarily at the exact moment, but-

[Thomas]
Right. It’s like a 24 hour thing. So they distribute the eye drops and maybe they do like a big mailer because you would register with the company, they know who has what, so they would send it all out so that it would all sort of arrive within the same couple of days period and people would use the drops and then within 24-48 hours, something like that, it would activate everybody. The other thought is after you get the contact lenses put in there, if they’re straight up and they’re like, “Hey, look, this is living tissue, it’s going to bond with your eye eventually. But in the meantime, you need to be putting these drops in.” So people are putting in the drops and then they could just stop having the drops available at any point in time. And so the drops are actually an inhibitor.

[Shep]
That’s really good.

[Emily]
I like that.

[Thomas]
And then the benefit to that too, is that you don’t need to do anything else to have it. So that person later who has it in their eye, who didn’t want to have it in their eye, hey, too bad. And there’s nothing inhibiting it from taking over. If you have to add eye drops, just don’t add the eye drops and you’ll be fine. You get all the benefits with none of the drawbacks. Whereas if you have to do it as an inhibitor, you get all the benefits and all the drawbacks.

[Shep]
Right, I like that because now you have the eye drops as a resource, after people start turning and it’s clear that the people that stopped taking the eye drops are the ones that turn because the company stopped sending out the eye drops, they cut everybody’s supply off all at once and people that used up their eye drops all begin turning. And so once the characters know that that’s what it is finding eye drops to have that couple more days of sanity, of individuality, become important.

[Thomas]
Also, they would probably want to get the eye drops to a lab to try to figure out what’s in these? What is the inhibitor chemical? Can we mass manufacture that?

[Emily]
So where are we starting out with our main characters? Are we starting with them, everybody knows about these new contact lenses, and it’s becoming more and more popular?

[Thomas]
I could see that. I could see somebody, either the main character or somebody adjacent to the main character has their appointment scheduled to go in and have their blood drawn and get their contact lenses made up. And so they’re very excited about it.

[Emily]
And the main characters a little like “I don’t know, it’s just so creepy and weird. They make it out of your blood.”

[Thomas]
Right. “It’s like a living thing. They stick in your eye like that’s pretty gross, man, I don’t know if I could do that.”

[Shep]
Perhaps they’re even more closely tied to it. Like they work at an advertising firm that has a contract with that corporation for an ad campaign about these lenses. And because they work in advertising, they have more motivation. Their co-workers are getting the lenses so they have the greater color discrimination, so they can see better, so they can make their ads better and so on. But the main character has perfect 20/20 vision. They’ve never needed to wear glasses; they’ve never needed to wear contacts. Why would they start now?

[Thomas]
Right. “I’m not color blind, I’m fine with the colors I have.”

[Emily]
“I’m a woman who already has the-“

[Shep]
Right.

[Thomas]
Yeah.

[Shep]
That’s how they got into the advertising in the first place. They have literally no reason to get the lenses and also they can have that guilt later for having been part of the problem and now they’re extra motivated to get the eye drop solution to some scientists to figure out a cure or whatever, because they blame themselves.

[Thomas]
There’s a case of the eye drop solution that they have back at the office because they had it for a photo shoot, so they know where to find some.

[Shep]
And a lot of the people in the office got the lenses and they work for the company, so they get big cases of the eye drops to serve the office.

[Thomas]
Yeah. Are these actually aliens? Is this an alien invasion?

[Shep]
I say sure, because what’s the aliens’ motivation? The aliens’ motivation is to take over half the population and have them fight the other half because they don’t care which side wins.

[Thomas]
Right. Do the dirty work for them.

[Shep]
They just want to reduce the population enough so that they can come in later and take over the rest of the way.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
Which makes it even worse, because even if they get a cure, maybe it’s too late.

[Emily]
The aliens are already approaching.

[Shep]
Yeah. The aliens are already here. They just need to wipe out the majority of the people.

[Thomas]
I guess that brings up the other question, which is what is the end of this movie?

[Emily]
Is there hope for humanity?

[Shep]
No. Oh, you mean in the movie?

[Emily]
Yeah. In the movie.

[Shep]
Also no.

[Thomas]
Are all the people who have alien contact lenses just hosed?

[Emily]
Yes.

[Shep]
What do you mean, just them? It’s everybody.

[Thomas]
So the aliens succeed in their plan?

[Shep]
Yes, I’d say the aliens succeed in their plan. You have that triumphant moment where the scientists figure out a cure or they figure out how to mass produce the eye drops so that the people stop turning. And even people that have turned baby can be unturned. They can start re-inhibiting their lenses, but it’s too late. Two thirds of the population have been wiped out already in the fighting that’s gone on for the past few days or weeks or however long it takes.

[Thomas]
Right right.

[Shep]
And right when there’s the triumphant ending, the aliens reveal themselves and basically take over. You’re just outnumbered at that point.

[Emily]
Then it just ends.

[Thomas]
Yeah. I would say you just end it with like, “Yay, we’ve succeeded.” And then the aliens are like “And now we are here.” End of film. So how do we get there from where we were? I guess, what’s the overall story arc? So we’d like that the contact lenses have been introduced before the beginning of the film. Right?

[Emily]
Right. I like that. Yeah.

[Thomas]
And so our main character, she’s working on the campaign. Is that where we see, like, in the office? And she’s working on it. And that makes a lot of sense, too, because they could be having a strategy meeting and talking about “What are the features we should focus on for this ad?”

[Shep]
Yeah, that’s good. It’s a good way to show the audience.

[Thomas]
Right. You have different ads on the wall that show the different features and you’re just sort of panning past those. So very quickly, the audience is brought up to speed with what this is and maybe even that’s the first scene where someone’s talking about, “Oh, yeah-” So they’re just sort of BSing, maybe in a meeting room and the camera is panning past the posters they’ve made. “Okay, here are the different ad campaigns we’re going to run.” And they’re talking about, “Are you going to get it?” “Oh, yeah, I’m already scheduled.” And this and that. And so that’s when it comes up that our character, our main character, she’s not going to get it. And so the teasing of her or criticism or whatever of her starts right there at the beginning and so we find out what the benefits are and we find out why she’s not doing it. So I think that’s great. We’re launched right into the story. How long does it take before people start turning?

[Shep]
I mean, a while. How much of a setup do you want?

[Thomas]
I guess I’m kind of wondering what other stuff is going on in this movie besides this main plot? What are those subplots that we’re following? Because we can explain the whole plot in a few minutes.

[Shep]
Right.

[Emily]
Right. Is there like a background news event that is innocuous enough?

[Shep]
Yeah. There’s rioting in some island country. They don’t say why, they’re just saying “There’s rioting continues” “We’re at the 6th day of rioting,” because shipping was interrupted and they didn’t get their eye drops. And that comes out later, but you hear that news report at the beginning, but it has no significance yet. I would like if there were some sort of advertising campaign that’s like the Magic Eye stuff. Do you guys remember Magic Eye where you see a boat.

[Thomas]
Yeah, I love those.

[Emily]
It’s a schooner.

[Shep]
Except it only works for people that have the lenses already. So you see these signs all over the place. So like in the office they have one when they’re going through the various campaigns and like half the office people already have the lenses and so they go, “Oh, wow.” And the people that don’t have it yet are like, “What do you see?” Because we can’t see it yet. “Oh, you should get the lenses you’re missing out.”

[Thomas]
Yeah, there’s a big Magic Eye scrambly looking block and then below it, in big block text, it says, “See what you’re missing.”

[Shep]
Yeah.

[Emily]
Oh nice.

[Shep]
So when the main character is on the bus going home, they have the advertisements above the rail and there’s some of those. And so some people get on the bus and they’re just mesmerized by the Magic Eye stuff. And it’s clear that these young people have the lenses in. She sees them and sees what they’re enjoying, but can’t take part in it because she doesn’t have the lenses. So maybe she’s even considering it at that time. She said earlier-

[Emily]
Is she slightly cynical about it, though? Because the whole ad campaign is based off of what you aren’t a part of. Is she that kind of hipster pixie dream girl that’s like “Yeah, I don’t know. It’s too mainstream.”

[Thomas]
I can see that she doesn’t like the cliquishness of it.

[Emily]
Yeah. I was just thinking because I know I would be, if there was an ad campaign like that where it was like, “You’ve already participated in it, so you get it. If you know, you know” kind of an ad campaign, I would be like, “Well, I don’t want to know anyway. I’m not going to fucking do it.” So I mean, you’re going to get half the people not doing it anyway.

[Thomas]
Does she have a particularly compelling reason not to? Beyond just not wanting to or feeling content with herself as she is?

[Emily]
Or is she, like Shep brought up, considering it now because- Oh! She can be considering it now because the ad campaign was so successful. They’re starting to come out with things like movies and TV shows-

[Shep]
I was just thinking that.

[Emily]
That you have to have the lenses for. And she’s like, “Well, now I’m really actually missing out.”

[Thomas]
And so we start to see that where people are talking at the water cooler about last night’s episode and she just has no frame of reference.

[Shep]
Right.

[Thomas]
And they’re like, “It’s so hard to explain.”

[Emily]
Yeah.

[Shep]
She can’t even watch the show because to her, it’s visual noise. I was thinking if she were in a relationship, she comes home and her boyfriend is playing a video game, and the video game, the screen is just that noise. He can see it because he has the lenses and she can’t.

[Emily]
And he’s just having a gay old time without her.

[Shep]
Yeah.

[Thomas]
Wow, what a great statement. Her boyfriend is having a gay old time without her.

[Shep]
She can’t take part.

[Thomas]
It’s a very queer thing to say, Emily. Shep, you want to step in here with your own boner?

[Shep]
I was thinking for couples where one of them has the lenses and the other one doesn’t, it really limits the shows they can watch together.

[Thomas]
Oh, yeah.

[Emily]
Yeah.

[Shep]
They’ll have to watch traditional shows together if they want to both see them. And the one with the lenses can talk about how boring traditional shows are because they’re just flat, 2D, whatever. It’s not realistic.

[Emily]
And the person who doesn’t have them is like, “Well, what’s it like with the lens?” And they’re like “There’s just no way to describe it. You have to see it for yourself.”

[Thomas]
There would be memes, like entire meme sites of just those things.

[Shep]
Oh, yeah.

[Emily]
So what prevents our protagonist, let’s call her Samantha from getting it? Is it they start to turn before she finally gives in?

[Thomas]
I feel like she gets very close or maybe even goes through with the procedure initially.

[Emily]
So once people start turning, she knows where the store of eye drops is. So she’s got a leg up on some people.

[Shep]
Well, how long before they know that it’s the eye drops that are causing the problem? So you have to have the scientist that is in the know of the situation.

[Thomas]
Depending on how many eye drops are at the office, it could be the sort of thing where the supply gets cut off and she says, “Ah, don’t worry about it. There’s a whole bunch of the office. I’ll bring you some.” So they have a much longer supply than most other people.

[Shep]
Her and her boyfriend.

[Thomas]
Yes.

[Emily]
Right.

[Thomas]
So even though he has, I guess he’s infected, we could say, he doesn’t turn because he can continue to use the eye drops. How long does it take for the contact to fuse with your eye?

[Shep]
A week.

[Emily]
Yeah, a week or two.

[Thomas]
A week straight? If you take it out after six days, the clock resets>

[Shep]
And that’s the question, because they have someone who keeps taking theirs out and putting it back in so that they could see who else has the lenses in. But it’s not a week straight. It doesn’t reset all the way.

[Emily]
There’s always a little bit of damage left for it to cling too.

[Shep]
Yeah. Because the lens is adjusting to you and it’s going to clamp down and that’s when it turns red.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
So once it clamps down, it’s a very sudden, it’s not a gradual turning red, it’s just one day. There are red rings.

[Thomas]
Is that our character, then? Is she the one who does that? Is she alone or does she have a group of people with her?

[Shep]
I say you have a group.

[Emily]
Yeah, it’s always better with a group.

[Shep]
So you have her, her boyfriend, the scientist person, whoever, whenever they get into the party, the person in the party that keeps putting the lenses in and taking them out, and then one more. So you have five.

[Emily]
So just so I’m understanding this correctly, the main character does not ever get the lenses? We’ve decided she’s going to be straight the whole time?

[Shep]
I think it could go either way. If she does get the lenses, she is like one of the last people to get the lenses before everything goes haywire, and otherwise she just never gets them. Oh, no, she can’t get them because the supplies of the drops are already cut off before she gets it.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Shep]
Because her boyfriend is like, “Oh, my supply didn’t arrive. They sent me an email. There’s going to be a two-week delay,” or whatever. And she’s like, “Oh, don’t worry, we have the eye drops at the office. I’ll bring them home tomorrow” or whenever. So she gets the big supply of eye drops before the world goes kablooey, because otherwise she’d have to fight for them.

[Emily]
Right.

[Shep]
But she just picks them up and takes them home.

[Emily]
So how do they figure out that-? Do they start seeing neighbors going like crazy? Are they zombie like when they go crazy? What is this?

[Shep]
Yeah. They want to kill everyone that doesn’t have the red rings in their eyes.

[Emily]
So it’s just violence for the sake of violence against those without the red rings.

[Shep]
Right. Only those without the red rings, because the whole purpose is to whittle down the population.

[Emily]
Right.

[Shep]
Make the two halves fight against each other.

[Emily]
So they’re reavers.

[Shep]
Yeah.

[Thomas]
Alright, we’ll take a quick break and when we come back, the rest of our story about contact lenses.

[Break]

[Thomas]
Alright, we are back. We were talking about whether the people who have the contacts in who have the red rings, whether they’re like zombies, are they fully aware, are they zombie like in that they sort of stagger around, are they more humanlike in that they’re living their normal lives, but when they see somebody who doesn’t have the contact lens, they attack them? How does that work?

[Emily]
Yeah.

[Thomas]
The reason I’m asking this question is I’m trying to establish not if, but when our characters are being pursued, hunted, chased, whatever, how easy or difficult is it for them to get away, especially as more and more of the remaining population are infected?

[Shep]
That’s a very good question, because if they’re just mindless zombies, it’s not terribly difficult. But if they’re smart, if they’re basically regular people that have a desire to hunt you down and kill you, it’s going to be very difficult.

[Thomas]
We could have a scene. I know we said that our main character was never going to have the context lens, but somehow maybe she gets her hands on one. And so we can have a scene where the only way for them to get to where they need to go is to go out in public. And so she has to put a lens in to blend in.

[Shep]
Just wear sunglasses.

[Emily]
And then a cop can be like, “Is there something wrong with your eyes, ma’am?”

[Thomas]
I don’t know that would even happen. If she is with her boyfriend and somebody else who have it but are still using eye drops, so they’re not aggressive, everyone will see the red rings and they’ll see her with people with red rings and think she’d be dead if she weren’t one of them, so weren’t one of us. So they just assume. Although I feel like that requires some sort of an explanation to the audience and they could have that conversation. “Are you sure this is going to work?” “We don’t have a choice. We have to hope.”

[Emily]
I was just thinking it would build good tension if they somehow were at like a traffic checkpoint or something for something else. And she’s wearing the sunglasses and everybody else isn’t. And the cop is like, “Hey-“

[Thomas]
“Why are you wearing sunglasses at night?”

[Shep]
She’s not driving.

[Emily]
Yeah. Or “What’s going on with your eyes? Is everything okay?” Because maybe she’s avoiding eye contact, but I think she would be smart enough because our main characters are always smart enough to just make direct eye contact through her sunglasses.

[Thomas]
How did they get out of that situation?

[Emily]
If we’re making them intelligent and they’re hunting down people, I would think that there would be some sort of organized checkpoint thing to look for that.

[Thomas]
Makes sense. Yeah.

[Shep]
That’s horrifying. Especially if the organized checkpoint system is very peaceful and they’re escorting people that don’t have the rings. “I’m sorry, could you folks come with me? We need to have a conversation.” And then they take them some more and then kill them all. They’re just murdering people. Stacks of bodies. Terrifying. I don’t know if I like this story anymore.

[Thomas]
What is our group’s goal?

[Emily]
Yeah. What is the group’s goal? What are they trying to do?

[Thomas]
Is there a cabin that they’re trying to escape to? Is there a lab that they’re trying to get to to formulate more of the drops?

[Shep]
I think they have to be going to a lab because they know of a lab in a secure facility.

[Thomas]
Yeah. This scientist is a prominent figure, because we don’t get the scientist as part of their group until pretty late in the film, relatively halfway or thereabouts.

[Emily]
Right.

[Thomas]
We’ve got to meet them in the first third of the film. We can’t be introducing new characters that late. So they’re on TV as part of some of that stuff. We maybe see a clip where the scientist is saying something, either shilling or speaking out against it. Maybe they’re being skeptical.

[Emily]
I think they should be shilling it. I think maybe the scientist has their own supply because they have contact lenses themselves.

[Thomas]
Well, it would be interesting. I was just thinking, you asked how do they get out of that roadblock situation? The scientist is recognized. Although if the scientist is recognized, how does everybody else get away? Because even the people with the contacts would then be suspicious.

[Shep]
Right. I don’t think the scientist should be with them at that point. If they’re not part of the group from the first 3rd, then they’re not with them. They’re already at the secured lab or facility.

[Emily]
Oh, so the group is going to find the scientist.

[Shep]
They’re going to get to the lab. The scientist is in contact with them. They need a supply of the drops. They have an idea for an experiment. They need someone to get to them. But the whole lab is secured with iris cams that don’t work through the lenses. So all of the scientists there don’t have the lenses. They can’t have the lenses to work in the lab. And anyone who did get the lenses can’t get in the lab anymore. So it’s a secure location. Perhaps militarily hardened, like, this would be a safe place. If they can get there and the scientists will let them in because they have the eye drops, they might survive this. So that’s their goal, is to get the eye drops to the scientists, not to cure it. I mean, the cure is nice as well, but to get into the secure location.

[Emily]
Okay, I buy that.

[Thomas]
Once they’re brought into the secure location, are they put in a sort of quarantine type of thing or a holding cell to demonstrate that they’re not a threat? What’s that security process like? Or am I going down a rabbit hole that doesn’t need to be gone down?

[Shep]
Oh, no. I think it’s a very logical step to secure people that come in.

[Emily]
Well, she’ll be admitted sooner because she doesn’t have the lenses.

[Shep]
Well, she’ll still be quarantined. They’re all going to be quarantined just in case. Because zombie movies are stupid and people get infected and it spreads inside supposedly safe areas in stupid ways, and I don’t want that to happen here.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Shep]
If we could have a zombie movie where everyone’s smart, that would be nice. Although in this particular example, they lose anyway.

[Thomas]
It doesn’t matter for them.

[Shep]
So it doesn’t really matter. But they made all the right choices and that’s the important part. It doesn’t matter that they lost. What matters is they use their brains.

[Thomas]
Have the scientists developed a method for detecting who has the contacts and who doesn’t?

[Shep]
Oh, sure, like a special camera or something.

[Thomas]
Right. So they’re able to look and see. “Okay, she’s good. This person’s good. He’s infected.”

[Shep]
Yup.

[Emily]
Yeah. Which is why I was saying she would get out of quarantine sooner, but still be quarantined for a good amount of time. Because I think also they would want to know, “What is your purpose here? Why are you hanging out with these guys? Don’t you feel like you’re in danger?”

[Shep]
No, they’re not in danger. They have the eye drops.

[Thomas]
“The only danger is running out of eye drops. And that’s why we’re here.” Is the end of the movie, or not the end of the movie. But at some point towards the end of the film, is there a big assault on the facility and they have to leave the secure facility.

[Shep]
Is that what you want? You want that to happen?

[Thomas]
I mean, they have to lose somehow.

[Shep]
They lose because the aliens show up. They win until that point. So they secure the facility. They defend the facility successfully.

[Emily]
Are they able to reproduce their drops to generate more?

[Shep]
Yeah, they make it into an aerosol form so they could just flood hallways with this gas, this mist and that suppresses the lenses. And the people that were crazy are now sane again, you hear them wailing over the horrific things that they’ve done as they’re filled with regret.

[Thomas]
If the aliens showing up at the very end is a twist ending, then they should not only develop massive amounts of the eye drops, they should develop a method of killing the contact lenses.

[Emily]
Of being able to detach them or permanently inhibit them.

[Shep]
Yeah.

[Thomas]
Right. So now you’re no longer under their control. Hooray, we’ve saved humanity, and then turn around and what’s that in the sky?

[Shep]
Right. I don’t think the alien showing up is a complete twist. If we establish that it’s some sort of alien genetic material-

[Emily]
Is that in the beginning of the third act that we find out it’s a-

[Shep]
Yes. The scientists know what it is and they’re explaining it to the main character for some reason, I don’t know why.

[Thomas]
What’s their lowest low moment for the group?

[Shep]
Someone’s going to die in the group?

[Emily]
Yeah. Who’s going to die? Who’s the Wash? Too soon?

[Shep]
Yes. Too soon. Always too soon forever.

[Thomas]
Always.

[Emily]
Been, like, 20 years.

[Shep]
Not long enough.

[Emily]
Should the boyfriend die?

[Shep]
No.

[Emily]
No.

[Shep]
The boyfriend’s got to survive to the end because he is in the facility when they’re being attacked and he starts to turn and figures out a way to break out of his secure room that he’s in because he’s already past the main doors.

[Emily]
Right.

[Shep]
So he just needs to figure out how to get out of this room.

[Emily]
So who else is in our group? We have a scientist.

[Shep]
He’s not in the group. The scientist isn’t in the group. We decided. So it’s the main character, her boyfriend, maybe one of their neighbors or two of their neighbors. Yeah. Some other couple that they’re friends with.

[Thomas]
Yeah. Either neighbors in their building or maybe somebody she works with. And their significant other.

[Emily]
Right, okay.

[Thomas]
People they know pretty well and have known for years.

[Shep]
Right. So that’s when one of them turns or whatever, they didn’t put enough eye drops in, or maybe they turned to ration the eye drops, so they put a half dose in, and that turns out to not be enough.

[Thomas]
One of them is pretending to take the eye drops so that the other person has enough.

[Shep]
Yes.

[Thomas]
They’re sacrificing themselves.

[Shep]
Well, how much eye drops do they have?

[Thomas]
I guess, yeah. If they’re going to be bringing it to the- Maybe this person has never been convinced that there’s going to be enough. Maybe there doesn’t feel like there’s enough. They have some, but it’s not enough for three people for however long it’s going to take.

[Shep]
If they can drive to the lab, they have plenty. It’s not a big deal. But because of that checkpoint that they don’t make it through, they escape, but they lose the car. So now they’re on foot, and now it’s going to take them a couple of days. And so that’s when they ration it, because they’re like, “Okay, we need at least 6 vials or whatever to give to the scientists,” because they’re communicating with scientists.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
“We need half a dozen vials,” whatever. And they’re like, “Okay, now it’s going to take us four days to get there, so if we do half doses for you three, then maybe that will be enough.” It turns out it’s not enough. And they start to turn. The boyfriend has been faking taking it because he turned, but just because they turned doesn’t mean they’re completely mindless.

[Emily]
Yeah. They’re just violent and cunning.

[Shep]
And so he pretends to take it because he’s thinking the larger goal is to kill all the scientists. “I have to get in there and kill all the scientists, so I’m going to pretend to take it.” So he has turned from that rationing point onward. So it’s good that they’re all quarantined or the survivors are quarantined, but they were already turned. Like they’re given drops when they’re in the secure area, they’re just not taking it. They’re pretending to take it. That’s why when the place starts getting attacked outside, they’re like, “This is my chance, this is my opportunity. They’re distracted. I’m going to break out and attack the main character now.”

[Thomas]
And the boyfriend turns because they don’t have enough drops. They were already running low. They had to have a certain amount for the scientists, so they don’t have more to give him.

[Shep]
Right.

[Thomas]
He’s just locked up in quarantine.

[Shep]
Well, no, they have some. I’m not saying that they cut them off. If they cut them off, why would they keep them in quarantine?

[Emily]
Right.

[Shep]
Just put them outside. “He’s going to turn. We can’t keep them. He’s got to go.”

[Thomas]
Well, but they’ll need someone to test things on. Maybe he’s strapped down or I don’t know.

[Shep]
I don’t know. My thinking was one of them turns. One of the two friends turns and goes completely violent and ends up being killed by the group. And now they have enough drops. So it’s bittersweet because they don’t have to give her any drops anymore. She’s dead. And now we have enough drops for her boyfriend and the main character’s boyfriend. Which are wasted because like I said, they’re not taking them.

[Emily]
I like that. I like that they’re not taking them and that she doesn’t know that. Oh, and he can save her. That’s how they kill the other person, is because he’s got to save her from the violent outburst of the one who’s full blown turned and can’t control itself.

[Shep]
Right. Because her boyfriend’s not going to kill her because they’re in a relationship. And so the main character’s boyfriend-

[Thomas]
And she could be turned if she just stops taking the drops.

[Shep]
Oh, we need names for these people.

[Emily]
Yeah. Give us names. Pick a name, any name.

[Thomas]
Alright. Sally, Jesse, and Raphael.

[Shep]
So what was the main character’s name?

[Emily]
I said Samantha earlier on.

[Thomas]
Samantha. Okay.

[Shep]
Samantha and Sally and Jesse and Raphael.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Shep]
I think it’s fine. It’s just for us.

[Emily]
It works.

[Thomas]
Just for us. Yeah.

[Shep]
Right. Sam’s, the main character, is it Jesse or Raphael? That is her boyfriend?

[Emily]
Jesse.

[Thomas]
Jesse.

[Shep]
Okay. Sam and Jesse and-

[Thomas]
Sally and Raphael.

[Shep]
Sally and Raphael.

[Emily]
Sally goes full blown nutzo.

[Shep]
Right. Sally goes full blown nutzo. Raphael can’t kill her because he can’t bring himself to do it.

[Thomas]
Right. Okay.

[Shep]
So Jesse does because that’s the hard choice. But really Jesse is trying to pass as not turned yet. The goal is to get into the lab and I think the three that turned were actually in on it together.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Shep]
So Raphael and Jesse can exchange a look at some point.

[Thomas]
So she just wasn’t able to hold back her rage?

[Shep]
Oh no.

[Thomas]
She couldn’t control it?

[Shep]
She intentionally came out as violent so that Sam will think the other two haven’t turned yet. That’s the cover.

[Emily]
Is Sally aware that she’s going to die in this scenario, or is that a surprise to her?

[Shep]
Yes. No.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Shep]
The goal is to die.

[Thomas]
Does Sam realize something’s up because they have too many drops? If nobody’s taking drops, everyone’s pretending.

[Shep]
Only at the end. Only when they’re already in the secure facility.

[Thomas]
Right. Only when it’s too late.

[Shep]
Right. Like before the attack on the facility. Sam has come to that realization and is talking to Jesse through the glass.

[Thomas]
All the vials are there in the lab. And she notices a 7th vial that’s like half full.

[Shep]
Right.

[Thomas]
She’s like way a minute.

[Shep]
“You weren’t taking the drops.” And maybe even Jesse confesses at that point because what would be the point of pretending any longer?

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
And then the facility is attacked and Sam is rushed off somewhere for her safety.

[Emily]
And then they’re maced with the cure?

[Shep]
I think Jessie escapes from the room and is hunting down the scientists. So you have them attacked externally and internally at the same time. This is your big finale.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Shep]
So this is where the cure comes in.

[Thomas]
And which songs do they play?

[Shep]
So Sam is faced with the same dilemma that Raphael was supposedly faced with, which is to kill her partner. And maybe Raphael has also escaped.

[Thomas]
Sure. One would let the other out.

[Shep]
Oh yeah, absolutely. Once one of them escapes, they’re both out and so they’re going through and killing everyone.

[Thomas]
They’re walking around with a decapitated scientist head to use the eye to get into different rooms.

[Shep]
Oh, yeah. Gross.

[Emily]
Of course.

[Shep]
But yes.

[Emily]
I like that.

[Shep]
And so Sam is, like, faced with maybe she’s got a weapon, and she’s facing off with Jesse. And that’s when they have the aerosoled cure. So she ends up not having to, it’s not The Mist ending where she kills them and then they have the solution.

[Emily]
So it feels like a very deus ex machina kind of ending where you’re a little like, “Wait a minute, that’s too easy.”

[Shep]
No, they’ve been working on it.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Thomas]
Yeah.

[Shep]
They’ve been working on it.

[Thomas]
So Sam and the scientist are several rooms back. He’s furiously trying to get something formulated and into a container and whatnot, she’s got the weapon. And the two guys, Jesse and Raphael, who we said they were, they’re coming through doors and they’re killing scientists. And she can see through, like, multiple layers of glass. So Jesse is just, like, looking right at her, and Raphael is running around killing everybody, and Jesse is just opening the next door, and he’s just looking right at her. And they get into the room, and she’s got the gun. She’s holding it up, like, aiming at him. She’s about to do it. And then the scientist reaches up and sprays him real quick. He finally finishes in the nick of time.

[Shep]
I think that… So it can’t be, like, totally ready. The machine is still processing it, and the scientist cuts off the tube, and so it sprays into the air, and that’s how he gets it.

[Thomas]
Oh, yeah.

[Shep]
There’s not enough time to put it in the canister.

[Thomas]
That’s good.

[Shep]
They’re setting it up for that, but they didn’t have time for that, so it just goes everywhere. And then their lenses shrivel up and fall off, and they’re like, “Oh my God, what have I done?” And it’s like “It’s okay. It’s over now.” And then you see them putting it in the air system, so it’s spreading it throughout the whole building. Now they have time and they’re like, “Okay, we can figure out how to seed clouds with this stuff.” And it’s going to just spread through the weather system and cover the globe. And you see reports on the news that the horrific events are finally over. And then the aliens show up, and you have the aliens marching through the street, and it’s like, “Oh.”

[Thomas]
Do you or you just see the ship in the sky.

[Shep]
However you want to do it. But the point is, they say, “We don’t have the manpower to face off against them. It’s over.”

[Emily]
Do the people infected, are they aware of the aliens and the plan?

[Shep]
No, I don’t think so.

[Emily]
Okay.

[Shep]
I think that they just see the people that don’t have the lenses on as monsters. That’s it. They’re following, their instinct is when you see a monster, you kill it.

[Emily]
Right.

[Thomas]
What do we think? Are we done? Is this a complete story, more or less? Is this a movie we would go and see?

[Emily]
I would see it, but I would see anything.

[Shep]
I don’t know if I would see it. Really, it’s kind of scary and suspenseful for me. I’m delicate.

[Thomas]
I like the take on it as a zombie film, but not really a zombie film.

[Emily]
Right.

[Thomas]
It’s just sort of a fresher idea than most zombie films, which just kind of rehash the same stuff over and over again.

[Emily]
Yeah. I feel like it’s a better version of 28 Days Later where 28 Days Later was trying to explain the zombie disease, but they can never quite get there. It’s still on that supernatural level, and this definitely brings it more plausible. You know, this is how the zombie apocalypse works.

[Thomas]
One more thing I want to go over before we wrap this up is how do they get out of that checkpoint? We never did figure that out.

[Emily]
We know that they don’t, but they have to escape the car somehow.

[Thomas]
But that’s what I mean. How do they escape? And why aren’t they just killed immediately? What’s going on there?

[Emily]
What if they’re taken out of the car and taken to where they’re going to execute them? However they’re choosing to execute them.

[Thomas]
Oh, right. Because they don’t do it right there.

[Shep]
Right.

[Thomas]
They take people away, as we established.

[Emily]
Right.

[Thomas]
Yeah.

[Emily]
So they’re taken away and they just manage to fight their way out. I mean, you have three zombies.

[Shep]
Oh, perhaps this is after they started rationing the eye drops. Oh, no. Shit. That was because they were on foot. I was like, They’ve already turned.

[Emily]
That’s right. Yeah.

[Shep]
And so some of them were thinking, the end goal is to get past these guys and get to the scientists, but these guys don’t know that, so I have to kill them. They’re already having the violent urges.

[Thomas]
So because the three of them can pass and this is a checkpoint where people are killed, their cover is, “We brought this person to turn in to you.” And so they’re all taken in. “And they had all these extra eye drops, too, with them that should probably be destroyed as well.” So they all go in, and then maybe they aren’t given more than just one guard because it’s one woman and four of us. So the three of them or four of them overpower the one guard and make their escape.

[Shep]
Okay, maybe two guards. So they don’t say, “Hey, we have eye drops with us.” They just have backpacks with eye drops in it. And so they’re escorting, two of the guards are escorting the one uninfected woman into the area, which could be just a horrific blood everywhere. So she could be screaming and whatever. And maybe Sally is looking queasy because she’s trying to pass as infected, but she’s not. And so anyway, one of the guards is like, “What’s in the backpacks?” And opens one up, and it’s like, “Why do you have the eye drops? It doesn’t make any sense. What would you even need that for?” And that’s when they know their cover has been blown and they have to attack these guards.

[Emily]
They grabbed some guns and shoot some people. No?

[Shep]
If it’s loud, if it’s a gun…

[Emily]
That’s true. They steal some knives and slits and throats.

[Shep]
Right, but it’s two on one, times two.

[Thomas]
Right.

[Shep]
So it’s not an instant-over fight. It’s a hard fight.

[Emily]
No.

[Shep]
So they can overpower the two guards and they can’t go back to the car because there’s more guards out there.

[Emily]
They have to crawl through the mass grave to get to the other side.

[Shep]
Oh, gross. But yes.

[Emily]
I love that you two are grossed out by this stuff.

[Shep]
Oh, yeah. Fragile. I’m very fragile.

[Emily]
I’m the one that’s like, “Let’s make this as gross and creepy as possible.”

[Thomas]
Are you grossed out by this stuff? We’d love to hear your thoughts on today’s show. Was it a sight for sore eyes or something you would recoil at the sight of? Let us know by leaving a comment on our website, reaching out on social media, or sending us an email. Links to all of those can be found on our website AlmostPlausible.com Emily, Shep, and I will see you again next week on another episode of Almost Plausible.

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