Original subtitles

[theme music]

[thunder rumbling]

[thunder rumbling]

[thunder rumbling]

[music continues]

[thunder rumbling]

[camera shutters beeps]

[camera whirring]

[switch clicks]

[camera whirring]

Okay, so, um..

I, uh..

I've got one chance to tell the..

...to explain what happened.

And-and-and if I'm right, I've got about an hour to do it

and I want to get it right, so here goes.

[clears throat]

My name is Howard Fornoy. I was a documentary filmmaker.

I want to tell you about the end of war

the degeneration of mankind

and the death of my brother, Robert Fornoy, the messiah.

[fanfare music]

It's a.. It's an epic story

and it's deserving of hours

but, uh, if you're, anyone's watching this

you'll have to settle for the cliff notes version.

What better way than this?

I guess putting last things first

let's start at the very beginning.

Um..

This is us.

Uh, the-the Fornoys of-of D.C. and New Hampshire.

Um, our summer cabin was overlooking the lake

that, uh, faces the White Mountains.

It's a chain that dates back about 500 million years

which by anybody's definition would be a beginning.

Uh..

Okay, let's forget the very beginning.

Um, my dad, Richard, was a history major

who, uh, made full professor at Hofstra

by the time he was 30.

Ten years later, he was one of six vice-administrators

of the national archives in Washington, D.C.

and in line for the top spot.

By day, dad kept his eye on the Declaration of Independence

the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.

You might say he filed by day and rocked by night.

He was a hell of a good guy, too.

[guitar music]

- Give it up, D.C.! - Yeah!

Whoo!

He had every record B.B. King ever cut

and he was known to play a pretty mean

blues guitar himself.

Four!

♪ Let the good times roll ♪

♪ I don't care if you're young or old ♪

♪ Get together let the good times roll ♪♪

[Howard] As for mom, she graduated Magna Cum Laude from Brown.

Had a Phi Beta Kappa key that she used to wear

on this funky fedora.

She became a successful CPA in D.C.

met my dad one night at a Springsteen concert

and took in her shingle when she became pregnant

with yours truly.

I came along in 1977.

By '80, she was doing taxes for some of my dad's associates.

By the time Bobby was born in 1982

she was handling taxes, investment portfolios

and estate-planning for a dozen powerful men.

She called it her little hobby.

Yeah, me, I, uh, I was no disappointment

to a couple of people with Mensa gold cards in their wallets.

Uh, I maintained A's and B's throughout school

and, uh..

You know, thanks to dad, I

I had a, an affinity for film.

Uh, like a duck to water.

I was wired with the same creative DNA.

The winner for Best Student Film is

Howard Fornoy for "Airborne!"

[applause]

[Howard] I was a good boy with a bright mind

who grew up in an atmosphere of love and confidence.

A faithful boy who loved and respected his mom and dad.

Bobby, well..

Bobby was a whole other story.

Aah! Drugs!

More drugs!

Come on, honey. You can do it.

You can do it, babe.

Just one more push!

This kid is so gonna pay!

[screaming]

[baby crying]

Oh! Oh!

[baby crying]

[Howard] Nobody, not even Mensa types like our folks

ever expects a kid like Bobby.

Not ever.

[Richard] 'Can you say da-da?'

Come on, Bobby.

[imitating airplane whirring]

Come on, honey.

Say da-da.

He's only a year old, Richard. He'll talk when he's ready.

Can you say ma-ma?

'Say ma-ma, honey.'

[imitating airplane whirring]

Howie, leave your brother alone.

[imitating airplane whirring]

I mean it, Howie.

Bow-wow.

Honey?

- Honey, the boy is speaking. - Bow-wow.

[laughs]

He's saying your name, Howie.

- My name is Howie. - Bow-wow. Bow-wow.

[Howard] Bow-wow it was, and Bow-wow it was to be.

In spite of the nearly five years between us

we were inseparable.

He could be a royal pain, and I could be a brat

but when push came to shove

we were the fabulous Fornoy boys

and there was nothing

nothing that I wouldn't do for him.

Bow-wow, faster, Bow-wow!

[Howard] I remember the time we found one of those

thousand-piece jigsaw puzzles up in the attic

except we had lost the top of the box it came in

and no one had a clue what it was of.

[instrumental music]

The forest through the trees

the trees through the forest.

He, uh..

He had that gift.

He read at two and began writing short essays at three.

Now, that was startling enough, but there was more.

If handwriting was no longer a factor

you would have thought you were reading the work

of a bright, if extremely naive fifth grader.

And then, he developed headaches.

Well, he would wake in the middle of the night

screaming in terrible pain.

We were afraid he had some

uh, physical problem.

Hey, son, are you sure this is on?

Yeah. Dad, it's fine.

You don't have to talk so loud.

I can hear you just fine.

- 'Go ahead, mom.' - Yeah.

Well, we were sure it was a brain tumor.

Your son, Mr. and Mrs. Fornoy

is in a state of extreme frustration

because his writing hand isn't working as well as his brain.

[Richard] 'You mean, it's stress?'

You have a child that is trying to pass

a mental kidney stone.

Now, I can prescribe something for his headaches

but he really needs a different kind of drug altogether.

And so, uh, we-we got him a, uh..

- A Commodore 64.. - Oh.

[Richard] ...with WordStar for Christmas.

[panting]

[instrumental music]

[keys clacking]

[beeps]

Then the headaches stopped.

[keys clacking]

I only want to add that for the next three years

he believed it was Santa

who left the word-cruncher under the tree.

[exhales] Deadline.

Um..

I once read a really funny piece

that was titled "The Essential Gone with the Wind"

and it went something like this..

"A war," laughed Scarlet.

"Oh, fiddle-de-dee."

Uh, boom! Ashley went to war.

Atlanta burned. Rhett walked in and walked out.

"Oh, fiddle-de-dee," said Scarlett through her tears.

"I'll think about it tomorrow

for tomorrow is another day." Ba-da-bam.

[exhales] Boom!

The Fornoy boys grow up.

Howard went to university

graduated Cum Laude

and settled down to a successful career

as a freelance documentary filmmaker. New York.

He was a good son. Called home twice a week.

Stepped out with a lot of women.

Uh, married one. Got divorced.

Married another one, got divorced again.

My folks as great role models notwithstanding marriage

was clearly not for me

but career-wise I was doing fine

so, went to Hollywood

managed to get myself nominated for an Oscar.

[female announcer] And the award for Best Documentary goes to

Howard Fornoy for

"Orson Welles, The search for Rosebud."

[Howard] "Fiddle-de-dee," said Howard.

This is the life for me.

[chuckles]

Yeah.

Mmm.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

When I was twelve and he was seven, he told me

that he had invented an airplane.

[dramatic music]

Bobby, I don't know.

I do.

I want you to push me.

Push me hard.

[exhales]

[rattling]

There's no seat belt on that freaky thing!

[Howard] I swear I never would have pushed him as hard as I did

if I thought the damn thing would actually work.

I'll be alright!

Yeah! It's working!

[Howard] They say God protects drunks and fools and children.

They also say that the devil's in the details.

[screaming]

Oh!

Bobby?

Bobby!

I did it. I flew.

You did, and if you ever try it again

I'll kill you.

Ah!

What'd you do that for?

[laughs]

See, I'm crying, but I wonder if it's on a sentiment

or just the, uh, onset?

I think it's the former.

I better hurry it along, though

just, uh, all the same.

The reason I'm telling you this story

is because I think the extreme case best illustrates

the norm that life with Bobby was a constant mind-bender.

Yeah!

[fanfare music]

What I haven't told you is that four hours ago

I killed my brother by shooting him up with his own discovery.

He called it the Calmative.

But..

Very serious mistake..

Might have been a better name.

[ducks quacking]

Okay. We've got about 40 minutes left

depending on my blood type

which I think is A, but I'm damned if I can ever remember

so I'll just get off the dime.

Uh, life with Bobby, the early years!

One day, when he was nine

he blanked out every radio and TV on our street

and the surrounding four blocks with his own voice.

For two hours, roughly 3,000 people

could receive only WBOB

which happened to be my kid brother.

[Bobby] 'So, thank you, Wendell of Georgetown'

'for calling with your question.'

'The reason my dad farts so much in church every Sunday'

is the high sulfur content in the baked beans.

But he gets most of 'em off pretty quiet

or sometimes he holds the real bangers

until it's time for the hymns.

[laughs]

[Howard] He was the youngest student ever to take

quantum physics and advanced algebra classes

at Georgetown University.

Gamma equals the square root

of Y subscript, R minus L

over L, minus Y, subscript F.

[Howard] He graduated high school at ten

but he never got a B.A. or a B.S.

let alone an advanced degree.

He went through a physics period

then he was nutty for chemistry.

[explosion]

[coughing]

[dog barking]

See, guys like Bobby, they come along maybe once in a lifetime.

Uh, the Da Vincis and the Newtons

and the Einsteins and the Edisons,

and they all had one thing in common.

They're like huge compasses

swinging aimlessly for a long time

uh, searching for some true north.

And then one day, they just hone in on it

with fearful force.

[explosion]

Bobby was no different.

You know, by the time he was 14

it was, uh, it was archeology.

[camera shutter clicking]

Then it was anthropology.

He was the only teenager ever invited

on an expedition into the rainforests of Burma.

But just as quickly as Bobby would embrace

these headline acts

he'd, uh, he'd move on

you know, still looking for his true north.

[India] 'Okay, here we go.'

- Excuse me, honey. - Oh.

- Bravo. - Yes, I was up all night.

[Howard] When he came back from his latest adventure

he was cheerful but his little boy exuberance was gone.

He wanted to talk about the news

about how bad it was.

You know, the nightly greatest hits had left us all reeling

as if we were watching a ten-car slam-up.

It depressed everybody.

But it depressed the hell out of Bobby.

Honey. It's the hair.

[female #1] 'I told him he should have a little... '

- The hair? - It looks good.

Thank you. It's always with the hair.

Why are people so damn mean?

[sighs]

Why are they so damn mean?

Are we supposed to answer that?

Well, somebody needs to.

Pretty soon, too, the way things are going.

They're going the way they always went.

'And I guess they're doing it'

'because people were built to be mean.'

Yeah, if you want to lay blame, blame God.

No offense, mom.

- None taken, dear. - That's cynical.

I don't believe that.

'And don't try to tell me that'

'it's because of economic pressure'

or conflict between the haves and have-nots

because that doesn't explain everything either.

Original sin, then. That works for me.

'It's got a nice beat and you can dance to it.'

[laughs]

He-he.

A year later, here we were.

Right here.

Labor Day had come and gone

as had the summer people.

But we'd stayed an extra week

'cause we just couldn't bear to go our separate ways.

Now, most of the stuff was packed up

and the place had that sad

deserted look that it always got.

But it was a sweet, sweet morning.

And it was a beautiful day in the neighborhood.

[India] I remember the light on the water was so perfect.

The TV was on and Diane Sawyer..

It was Katie Couric.

Oh.

That's okay, mom. Go ahead.

The show was interrupted with a special report..

...and your mother said..

Dick! Boys!

You gotta come and see this.

[man on TV] '...tremendous explosion.'

'We can see, uh, thick ash and smoke rising.'

[siren wailing]

'I'll-I'll tell you, but that second tower's'

'not visible from here.'

'There was a shower of sparks'

'and fire, and now..'

'...it almost looks like a mushroom cloud explosion.'

'Large billowing smoke rising'

'from the second tower.'

'This is the second of the two towers hit.'

'You can't see behind us..'

[dramatic music]

[water splashing]

[Bobby] 'Maybe you're right, big brother.'

Maybe it is original sin.

But then what's the instrument?

'Have you asked yourself that?'

[Howard] Instrument?

I'm not following you.

[Bobby groans]

What do you mean?

- Maybe it is the water. - Huh?

It's that old joke. Maybe it's something in the water.

Or maybe something that isn't.

In looking back, I think that was the day

he finally found it.

- His, um.. - His true north.

That was the day.

[Howard] All we could hope was that things would get better.

Of course, as you know, they only got worse.

And the world continued on its merry way.

Looking for a Band-Aid here

a Band-Aid there

a quick fix and fast-fast-fast relief

and I think instant cure wasn't even

remotely possible anymore.

As for Bobby, he continued on to points unknown.

'We'd get a postcard back'

for a birthday or an anniversary

and he always promised that he was coming home soon.

But I didn't see him until he showed up

in my apartment four years later.

[knocking on door]

- 'Bobby!' - Hey, Bow-wow.

[Howard chuckling] Hey!

Come here, you jerk.

- How the hell you've been? - Good.

- I got a lot to tell you. - Yeah. Well, I should think so.

[Howard] It's certainly been a while.

What can I offer you?

- Beer? - Sure.

[Bobby] Ahh.

[insects buzzing]

[Howard] 'What've you got there?'

Bees and wasps.

Wasps and bees.

Okay. What kind of crazy-ass thing are you up to now?

Do you see this?

What is it? Water, white lightning?

Well, it's both, actually, if you can believe that.

It came from an artisan well in La Plata.

It's a little town in Texas.

Now, before I turned it into this concentrate

there were five gallons of it.

It's only water

but it's still the damndest popskull

the human race has ever seen.

[instrumental music]

This is it, Bow-wow.

The big one.

The cure for the worst disease

to which we homo saps fall prey.

Cancer?

No.

Wars. Bar room brawls.

'Drive-by shootings.'

'Meanness.'

This, big brother..

...this is going to change it all.

This is going to bring about

an end to the whole mess.

[insects buzzing]

I think you ought to get your hand out of there now, Bobs.

Relax.

You ever see a bee sting a flower?

You don't look like a flower.

Hell, you think bees actually know what flowers look like?

Unh-unh. No way, man.

They know I'm sweet because I excrete

'sucrose dioxin in my sweat'

although I did eat a box of chocolate-covered cherries

on the plane.

- Jeez, Bobby. - Ow.

[Howard] Some 400 bees had investigated him.

Only one had stung.

Ow. Ooh!

[Howard] Make that two.

[Bobby] So..

Have you directed anything good lately?

Piece on Nazi art theft for PBS this fall.

I could screen it for you if you like while you're here.

Oh, that'd be great.

Bobby, what the hell are you up to?

Hey, could you get this other one?

I keep telling myself if I'm so damn smart

I should be ambidextrous

but my right hand still has the IQ of, like, six.

[Bobby] 'You see, Bow-wow'

Bees are nature's kamikaze pilots.

They don't sting you unless they have to

because it kills 'em.

Remember that time in the cabin when you told me

we'd go on killing each other because of original sin?

- Yeah? - Okay.

Well, if that's true

if, if there is a God who loves us enough

to send us on a rocket sled to hell

just because stupid Eve took a bite out of a bad apple

then maybe the curse is this.

He made us like wasps

instead of bees. Ow! Howie, what the hell are you doing?

Just hold still and I'll get it.

Okay. The two bees that stung me, they're dead.

Because their stingers are barbed like fishhooks.

They slide in easy enough, but when they go to pull out

'they disembowel themselves.'

That's pleasant.

Well, wasps, on the other hand

they have smooth stingers.

They can, they can keep stinging you as long as they want.

Of course, on the third or fourth time

uh, they're out of poison

but they can keep on pumping you full of holes

if they feel like it, and usually they do.

That's the same reason we go on fighting.

On and on and on, Bow-wow.

We got smooth stingers.

Now watch this.

[buzzing]

So, what's with the folks?

They're good. They miss the hell out of you.

You should try to see them while you're here.

Yeah. I will.

- 'Let's roll.' - Hey, what are you doing?

Same old wuss.

[dramatic music]

See, the thing with Bobby is

is that when you were with him for more than five minutes

he hypnotized you.

He was Lucy holding the football

promising this time for sure

and I was Charlie Brown rushing down the field

to kick it.

[buzzing]

- Ah! - Hey!

[Bobby] Hey!

Don't kill 'em!

You might as well kill babies for all the harm they'll do you.

- That's the whole point. - Get that out of here!

I'm gonna ask you to do something for me, Bobby.

- No! - I want you to trust me.

No!

Are you out of your mind?

Come on. Come on.

Come sit down over here.

[breathing heavily]

Come on. Come sit down.

[breathing heavily]

Now, look, they're just dandy.

'Uh, their behavior isn't drugged'

'and yet they're not terminally pissed off, either.'

Watch 'em, watch 'em.

Pretty cool, huh?

[Howard] I think I knew even then that something was going

to go terribly wrong.

[insect buzzing]

Mm. These are amazing.

[speaking in foreign language]

As you know, Texas is, per capita

the most violent state in the union.

Uh, they just love to shoot each other down there.

- It's like a state hobby. - Except for La Plata?

Well, they like their guns there, too.

They just use them on each other a hell of a lot less.

The thing is, when you feed enough statistical data

in the computer about this little town

what you get back is a whopper of an anomaly.

It took us six months

to come up with this program.

- I call it a Calmquake. - What am I looking at here?

The numbers represent the incidence of violent crimes

'in each particular circle.'

'Murder, rape, assault and battery, you name it.'

'Uh, the computer assigns a number by a formula'

that takes population density into account.

'Now, this..'

- It says zero. - So it does, Bow-wow.

You see, the old joke was right.

It is something in the water after all.

And the water in La Plata..

It's a doozy.

We weren't the first to test the water.

Most people there have wells

so the water's tested regularly.

But we were the first to test it sub-microscopically.

And that turned in some really weird stuff.

- What kind of weird stuff? - 'Oh, uh..'

[chuckles] Breaks in the chains of atoms

sub-dynamic electrical fluctuations

and-and this unidentifiable protein.

And the protein was the interesting thing

'cause as far as we know

it only occurs one other place.

Eh, that's the human brain.

[door opens]

[Bobby] What we've come up with will

greatly suppress human aggression.

It'll make people unable or unwilling to fight.

Bobby, I love you, man.

But this, this is the craziest thing that I've ever heard.

You want crazy?

Huh?

[man #1 on TV] 'Protestors continue to clash with..'

That's crazy.

- 'They are talking..' - 'Studies support the..'

[man #2 on TV] 'Bombing raids will continue to target..'

The fire, which is still raging..

That's crazy eight ways to beat the band.

Me?

I'm not crazy.

[clears throat] Okay.

Here we go. Just arrived.

Throat dryness.

Uh, there's not so much so far

but I can't kill myself, so, uh..

God, I got so much to tell.

Suppose it can all be done, Okay?

And suppose it all goes completely according to plan.

You don't have the slightest idea

what the long-term effects might be.

Howie..

D-don't even suggest that you do, Bobby

because you don't.

You remember thalidomide?

'Yeah, nifty little pill'

caused birth defects all across the globe.

Or how about the, uh, AIDS vaccine that they found?

Stops the disease, but all the test subjects

turn into incurable epileptics who died

'within the first 18 months.'

Yeah. Howie, this is...

No, how do you know that this isn't the same thing?

How do you know that this is not going to come back

and bite you in the ass?

I don't.

I don't.

'It's too late, man.'

'The way we're going now, there might not be a long-term.'

The world needs heroic measures.

Maybe we can cure the whole mess.

O-or maybe we're giving heroin

to a patient with terminal cancer.

I don't know.

But either way, we stop what's happening now.

We put an end to the world's pain.

Help me, Bow-wow.

Please.

Please, help me.

Please.

Oh, hell, look at the time.

Uh..

Depending on my blood type, which if I'm wrong is..

Did I already tell you that?

Okay.

[Howard] A week later, I flew to La Plata

where I met up with Bobby and Duke Rogers

geology professor extraordinaire.

- How are you? - Ah!

- You have a good flight? - Yeah.

Not bad at all. Not bad at all.

Uh, Duke Rogers, my brother, Howie.

- Nice to meet you. - Very nice to meet you.

- A pleasure. - Let me take that.

Ohh. Thank you.

[tires screeching]

[crashes]

[clanking]

[groans]

[female #1] 'You see that?'

[grunts]

Watch this. You're not going to believe it.

Two males, 30s.

[burping]

Intoxicated.

[groans]

[door closes]

Talk about a sociological bull moose.

Look at my car, man.

[chuckles]

Anywheres else in the country, them boys would be

in the police blotter with name tags

on their big toes.

[chuckles]

Well, here's to you.

[Bobby] This is what we've been brewing, Howie.

It's pacifist white lightning.

Now, the water in this part of Texas is fierce

but we've been able to make this stuff

I sprayed the wasps with ten times more potent.

We've got near 6,000 gallons now.

By the end of the year, we'll have 14,000.

Come next June, 30,000.

Yeah, but it's not enough.

We need more of it and we need it faster.

And we need to transport it.

Transport it where?

[whirring]

[Bobby] 'Why, to the volcano.'

[Duke] 'This is the island of Gulandio.'

It lies 120 miles due east of Borneo.

The natives call the volcano that's on it, Mount Grace.

It's pretty perfect, isn't it?

Like Krakatoa, Grace is going to explode.

When Krakatoa erupted

debris from it literally encircled the globe.

[Duke] 'Changes in climate lasted five years.'

Nipa Palm, which is grown only in Africa and Micronesia

suddenly showed up in South and North America.

[Bobby] 'Krakatoa seeded them there.'

That's the way I want to seed La Plata water

all over the Earth.

I want people to walk out on La Plata water when it rains

and it's going to rain a lot after Mount Grace goes bang.

I-I want them to drink the water that falls in their reservoir

and bathe in it, wash their hair in it..

Uh, soak their damn contact lenses in it.

And you're going to do this how?

We need to synthesize 50 to 70,000 gallons of the high test

then we airlift it over to Mount Grace..

[clicks tongue] Drop it in.

Of course, it's, it's going to take money to do that.

A lot of money.

And that's where you come in, big brother.

You're sure this stuff is safe?

Of course, you wouldn't want to drink the concentrate.

That's a real brain-buster. But..

The way we're going to disseminate it

it's perfectly safe.

'No problem-o.'

And this little time bomb of yours

when exactly is it wired to go off?

By October next year.

Probably sooner.

How much money?

It cost millions. Lots of millions.

Uh, but still, it was less than a blink in the eye

of what we spent on defense any month that year.

I raised most of it myself.

Some by hook and some by crook.

Uh, I had made a lot of friends in high places.

And some in low places.

Yeah, in short, I-I knew a lot of folks

who thought that things weren't changing that much

no matter who was in the White House.

We did it.

We distilled the water into high-test

and airlifted it over to, ah, Gulandio

Grace, fate, destiny, what have you.

[helicopter whirring]

Oh, man. That blows.

- What is that? - Hydrogen sulfide.

Talk about your ultimate fart, huh?

'It's as if God Himself busted through'

'all the business-as-usual transmissions'

with a special bulletin

"This is your last chance, jerk wads!"

You sure about this, Bobby?

As sure as I can be.

[Howard] I ended up running at the football while my laughing

wildly intelligent brother held it one last time.

That volcano we called Grace

blew just when it was supposed to.

[explosion]

Everything went sky-high, and for a while

everybody's attention turned away from whatever

and towards the skies.

[thunder rumbling]

And then fiddle-de-dee, just like that

it happened pretty fast.

There were three years of Indian summer.

Three years like Eden.

[instrumental music]

I mean, everybody stood down.

The world got like the wasps in Bobby's nest.

The ones that didn't stink-sting too much.

[music continues]

[cheering]

[cheering]

But, uh..

Like they say, the devil's in the details.

[male #3 on TV] 'Okay. Listen, you know how we..'

- Mom? - Hello, dear.

[man #3 on TV] '...nine balloons on the board.'

'Three balloons have prizes.'

'Pop those three and you'll..'

Mom, I've been trying to reach you all day.

'Where you been?'

I've been so busy.

I wanted to get this done before the baby was born.

How was school today, dear?

[Howard] 'It's about mom.'

Dad and I just got back from the doctor.

Bobby, she's got Alzheimer's.

Uh-huh. What do you mean, "Uh-huh?"

[Bobby] 'This is our Calmquake graph'

'charting the acts of violence'

'increasing as you left La Plata.'

Right.

Now this graph shows the incidence of something else.

Something else?

[sighs]

People are going to get very silly very young.

Alzheimer's?

In spades.

It's going to sweep the land.

You're sure?

There was no way to know that the potency

rather than level off gradually like we thought

would keep increasing exponentially.

How many?

Oh, everybody.

Everybody on La Plata?

No. Everybody.

Ain't that a cosmic kick-in-the-head.

My gears are starting to get a little sticky.

Should've hurried more.

Never mind. It's too late to change things now.

Let's move on.

Moving on. Zippity-doo. Roll tape.

All our prognosticators suggest that this new virus

will make the AIDS epidemic

look like a mere blip on the radar.

There appears to be simply no..

And I repeat no way to contain it.

After a brief flurry of optimism

the WHO has acknowledged

'it is having no'

'countering the disease which is.."

...spreading around the globe at an al-alarming rate.

As you know by now, it created worldwide panic.

Me and Bobby were as careful as we could be

for the next two years.

Drank only bottled water and wore

big sleek-slickers in the rain.

So, no war..

But everybody got a little..

...silly.

Almost everybody on this big round world of ours.

It wasn't reversible

there was no immunity to it

no vaccine, nothing we could do.

Nada.Zip.

Now, pop..

...I need you to sign this

so that I can take care of you guys.

Do you understand?

Are you from the government?

No, dad. It's, uh..

It's Howie. I'm-I'm your son.

They're doing things in the basement.

- Terrible things. - It's okay.

It's alright, dad. It's okay.

♪ Hey everybody ♪

♪ Let's have some fun ♪

♪ You only live but once ♪

♪ And when you're dead you're done ♪

♪ So let the good times roll ♪

♪ Let the good times roll ♪

♪ I don't care if you're young or old get together.. ♪

[Howard] My folks died raving and pissing in their pants..

...but I never stopped loving 'em.

♪ Let the good times roll.. ♪♪

[Howard] 'Concentrate, jerk wad. Concentrate.'

Bobby went on with his research at La Plata but to no avail.

Then one morning, he couldn't sleep

and he went into the laboratory early.

Hey, dude, no loafing on the job.

[doorbell rings]

[Howard] Hey.

Hey.

[thunder rumbling]

Don't stand out in the rain, fool.

Glad to see you.

[Bobby] Remember when you could see the high-intensity

arc-sodiums from North Conway?

[Bobby] Not anymore.

Just the White Mountains out there now.

[Bobby sighs]

I need to ask you to do something for me.

I need a favor.

A big favor.

I'm not doing it, Bobby. I can't do it.

[sighs]

- A wuss right until the end. - Yeah, I'm a wuss.

I'm a candyass. Alright?

I always was, I always will be.

- That's who I am. - It's no big whoop, kiddo.

Just one little push and a final ride.

Bobby, come on. There's got to be another way.

Please.

Push me, Bow-wow.

Push me hard.

[Howard] So I did it.

I killed him by shooting him up

with a highly concentrated dose

of his own discovery four hours ago.

I'm sorry.

I made the world..

...full of fools and dumbbells.

Hey, better fools and dumbbells

than a big black cinder in space. Huh?

Forgive me.

[breathing heavily]

Promise me.

Tellid, Ba-wa..

Tell... story..

...what happened.

- 'Swear.' - Yeah.

[Bobby exhales]

I will.

[breathing heavily]

Oh.

Oh.

[sobbing]

[thunder rumbling]

[man on radio] 'This was all predicted.'

'Revelations said the end would come.'

'That God would strike the infidels'

'and that judgment would be His.'

'And now the end has come.'

[thunder rumbling]

[dramatic music]

[Howard] 'And now I think I'm done.'

What do you think?

Is anybody watching this?

Mm. Bobby, Bobby.

[imitating airplane whirring]

[Bobby] Way to go, Bow-wow!

My name is Howie.

Faster, Bow-wow!

Faster, Bow-wow!

[screaming]

Goodbye, goodbye.

[insects buzzing]

Time to stop.

[explosion]

Goodbye, Bobo. Not your fault.

[echoing] Hi, dad.

[laughing]

I forgive you, Bobby. It's not your fault.

I'll be alright!

I did it. I flew!

And if you ever try it again, I'll kill you!

Ah!

What'd you do that for?

I love you.

[gibberish]

Time to stop.

Time to stop.

Goodbye, Bobo.

Goodbye.

Goodbye. I forgive you.

It wasn't your fault. I forgive you.

It wasn't your fault.

I forgive you, I forgive you.

[echoing] I love you.

I love you.

I forgive you.

[echoing] I love you.

[instrumental music]

[camera beeping]

[theme music]

[music continues]