Introduction

Black screen-- A VOID. Then, flickering torch light as music comes on, resembling the prologue opening from 1982's "Conan the Barbarian". Restive drums, ferocious primordial stirrings. Have we entered the wrong movie? Text comes on over black screen:

Drums grow more fierce, the quickening of mighty blood-- pure and strong. Show screen still from movie:

Text continues:

"Sent to purgatory for his wickedness, our fallen hero endured decades of torture in the netherworld where no light shines. . . . .

Music comes on in mighty flourish, as if curtain was drawn back: "Anvil of Crom" from "Conan the Barbarian".

Show screen still of poster-- "Beetegeuse as we Remember Him"

Darts are thrown at the poster with whistling sounds. Someone offscreen whirls a tumbling meat cleaver and it hits our wicked hero in the crotch. Then someone lights the canvas on fire. Then various medieval woodcuts flash, of otherworldly tortures-- boiling oil, tarred & feathered, pitted in gladitorial combat with Tim Burton creatures-- close-up shots of woe & despair. Water-dunking, burned at the stake, medieval and ghoulish tortures at hands of peasant mob. Very gothic/Transylvanian.

Anvil of Crom is still playing

Text continues:

"That's what you get when you think with your pecker instead of your head. . . . ."

Shot of first movie, Geena Davis riding on the striped Tim Burton Sand Worm that has burst through the roof and swallows Beetlegeuse whole. Show sequence from the movie, Lydia (Winona Ryder) in her red wedding dress throwing boquet of flowers through the giant hole made in the floor.

Anvil of Crom is still playing, working towards a mighty crescendo

Text continues:

"And some miscreants never learn!"

Anvil of Crom crescendos, like Conan the Barbarian raising his sinewy arms up in the air in triumph.

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Introduction Part II/
Opening Credits

Overhead shot of rushing highway-- gray asphalt, yellow dividing line spitting across the screen. Music comes on: a cover of Billy Idol's "White Wedding"-- an upbeat, bouncy, yet edgy song. But this version is outrageous and excessive. Camera straightens out with a revolving motion until it's level, showing the barren "Red State" heartland rushing past in a smooth, almost ethereal motion. Desolation for sure. Purgatory on earth. Roll opening credits-- but in these credits, everything is by "Michael Adams". Song fades out.

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Scene 1: Lydia's Parents/
Beetlegeuse's Emergence

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Scene 2: Vagrancy Lock-Up

Scene 3: New Left Craft Fair

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Scene 4: Hoboes

Scene 5: The Old Hutchings Place

Shot of Beetlegeuse's back walking toward seedy looking farm property. He knocks on the door, and an old seedy farmer opens it. A dull, vinegary, small-minded man in glasses with his corncob teeth hanging crooked-like in his mouth

"Uh, you have work?".

Farmer stares on a beat, than says-- "Shoveling cow shit, balin' hey. 50¢ an hour"

Beetlegeuse grimaces in disbelief. "50¢ an hour?".

"Take it or leave it"

Beetlegeuse takes a step back, and deliberates loudly within himself, the absurdity of the situation. Manic, rapid-fire. Hungry. Broke. No place to go. Reaches a conclusion and says "O.K."

"Meet me out back"

The anticipation of hissing cymbals. They stop when a giant cattlefield is revealed-- 10,000 "mooing" cows.

"Awww, shit" from Beetlegeuse.

Next shot shows shovel burying itself into disgusting earth. A view from the fluttering windowdrapes of Beetlegeuse cussing and swearing, wiping his brow. He trips and falls over. More cussing and swearing. He stands up and entreaties the sky of how he ended up here, his arms extended, the sound of buzzing flies.

Swing-down sound of low-down blues harmonica

Shot of sun setting in the sky.

Beetlegeuse walks into the barn, caked in shit. The shovel is bent. The farmer calls out "I suppose you're wanting to get paid"

"Yeah!" from Beetlegeuse.

The farmer comes in and pays him with a 1930's era $5 dollar bill, shining in the dim yellow light of the light-bulb.

Beetlegeuse studies it, furrowing his brow.

Rapid fire montage of charming, naive children's book illustrations from same era with a rushing sound. Chicks pecking in barnyard, ducklings in pond by whipping reeds near a half-rotted barrel, a wholesome basket of produce spilling out like the horn of plenty.

This is clearly ridiculous.

"Uh, that's not real money"

The farmer is indignant at this naive "fellar".

"Why, that's as good as Herbert Hoover's word!"

Cut to shot of black & white photograph of flinty President Hoover in an immaculate, starched business suit staring icily into the camera. The text underneanth reads, "President of the United States: 1929-1933".

"Herbert Hoover?"

The farmer begins raving on about the federal reserve, the New Deal, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the imminent coming of king Jesus and his angels riding in on the four horses of the apocalypse with the sounding of seven trumpets and the breaking of seven seals.

This is hard-core, hackneyed, and utterly ridiculous. The man is senile, and scatter-brained too.

Beetlegeuse is perplexed, he's really more of a rock n' roll type of guy.

"Rock n' Roll is an agent of Bolshevism!"

Cut to still shot of Jerry Lee Lewis and his band jamming on the porch, an album cover of milk-fed all-American wholesomeness

Beetlegeuse doesn't know what to say to this, and jerks his head about in disbelief.

"What about whoring?"

Cut to shot of first movie, of Beetlegeuse dancing/reveling outside the whorehouse.

The farmer swings a bucket and hits Beetlegeuse on the head.

"Ahhhhhhh!", on his knees, covering his head.

"Repent for your sins!"

"Forgive me! Forgive me!", in a pathetic, broken-down voice.

"You're a sinner! Bring the good Lord Jesus into your life!"

Beetlegeuse moans-- "This is what I have to do to get paid?"

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Scene 6: County Fair

Black screen

Text comes on. Reads: "One Month Later"

Shot shows Beetlegeuse in overalls, and farmer Hutchings, kneeling down to pray forehead to forehead in the straw. This is the county fair, and tons of booths and tents are up. A carnival whirls in the nighttime distance. Folks are walking by.

"Bring them to the tent, Brother Beetle"

"I sure will, Brother Hutchings" Beetlegeuse answers in a croaky voice.

Beetlegeuse goes around, looking for teenagers, speaking in a voice low-down and conspiratorial that they ought to come down to this tent in particular. All he can scare up are a few shy 13, 14, and 15 year-old boys.

He leads them back to the tent, where Brother Hutchings, in grave seriousness, starts lecturing on the evils of masturbation. The medical perils, hair on the palms, loss of eyesight, lack of vim, vigor, and vitality. The boys stare at him with wide-eyed mortification. The talk ends and the salespitch begins for the patent medicine "to cure the craving for this dastardly deed", and Beetlegeuse is swirling a steaming amber liquid with a stick.

"I'll need a brave volunteer to take a sample sip!"

A young man does, he says with surprise that it tastes like alcohol.

"Well, alcohol it strictly a preservative"

Cut to shot of cheap gin bottles tipped over in back, laying empty in the straw

Next shot shows boys from behind retching into a pig trough, hogs grunting quizically, while Beetlegeuse and Hutchings count the money between them.

Next, a musical montage to Lynard Skynard's "Gimme back my Bullets": Beetlegeuse putting his arms around the shoulders of some kids. Brother Hutchings speaking in grave seriousness. Kids bursting out laughing. Beetlegeuse collecting the money. Kids retching outside the tent. The two patent medicine salesmen counting the money. Hogs grunting.

Brother Hutchings needs to stock up on more provisions (-- to drive off to the liquor store) and Beetlegeuse is told to mind the tent. Well, "The Ghost with the Most" has better ideas and simply wanders off. He makes small-talk, steals candied apples, and makes his way over to the hootchie-kootchie girlie show.

He pays his admission to a mean, seedy looking cowboy with a belly pushing out beneath his button-down white shirt and sits down with the other floor-stampers. Girls come out, shake it, and dance-- stepping from side-to-side. Feeling is very 1940's and sleazy.

Beetlegeuse goes back to the tent, sipping from a bottle of the patent medicine, and jacks off-- just as Brother Hutchings comes through the tent. Through sillouettes on the tent, we can see Hutchings disowning Beetlegeuse in fury, and running him out-- Beetlegeuse hitching up his pants in protest. Beetlegeuse runs off, and Brother Hutchings stands in the tent flap door, open-mouthed and corn-cobbed toothed as always.

Beetlegeuse walks off, and comes across a throw-a-dart, pop-the-balloon booth. The carnies present are dim-witted and slow. Business over here is not booming, and Beetlegeuse offers to get people coming. He whips out a carny hat and a stick, and brings people in with hoopla-- the magic of self-interest.

Finally a biker gang shows up, and a young, brash, angry biker wearing a Harley shirt that reads: "If you can read this, the bitch fell off!" swaggers up with his gum-chewing biker girlfriend. Attendant in the air is the magic of the carnival, and the mean undercurrent of violence underneath. Beetlegeuse hands him three darts, and the biker tests out the sharpness on his tongue, and feels it isn't good enough. The bikers shake their heads "no". He takes out some throwing knives and pops all three balloons. But the only prizes at the second-rate fair run by slow, dim-witted people are the deformed stuffed animals-- the ones with missing heads and arms sticking out of their butts.

Beetlegeuse offers a full refund, trying to be charming, and offers to bet some money instead. The bikers laugh over this, and chew. Beetlegeuse, the biker, and the biker's girlfriend play poker. Beetlegeuse, making sly expressions, wins. The bikers growl, loop chain around the stand, and with a roar of their bikes pull it down. The booth workers look at him ruefully, because that was their home. Beetlegeuse shrugs and walks off, saying "I'll pay ya later!".

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Scene 7: Slaughterfest

The music starts, the most god-awful racket of atonal thumping, and Beetlegeuse covers his ears in wincing agony. He wanders around the stage, doubled over, eyes squeezed shut, bumping into the band members, and walks into a nest of towering speakers, which totter over and fall on him. The music stops.

The blond youth who went into the speech about "a handful of maggots" says with shocked disquiet, "that's not cool!".

Shot of Beetlegeuse's legs sticking out from under Marshall stacks and sound of him cussing from underneanth. Feedback shrieks.

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Scene 8/9: Brandy Station/Small-mart

Beetlegeuse wakes up backstage, and the promoters are treating him real, real nice so he won't sue them. They give him t-shirts, CD's, and an autographed guitar. For being such ghoulish, pale, blasphemous people they sure can be nice! Beetlegeuse holds a beer against his head and groans. He asks if they can give him a lift into town.

And here he is in the Midwestern boonies. Land of lawn chairs, "Motomart" gas stations, and affable outlawry for a grin. George W. Bush Walmart country, but only out here in this film universe we call it "Small-mart". Incidentally too, meth capital of the world out here in this slice of Missouri.

Beetlegeuse settles down into "Brandy Station Apartments", an apartment complex of one bedroom rat's nests. The place is clean when the unfriendly, flat-affected, fat landlady in pearls and a dress shows him the layout, but soon the place is absolutely filthy. "Dirt Cheap" beer cans strewn about, "Swisher Sweet" cigar ashes all over the floor, pure slovenliness. Beetlegeuse plunks around on the guitar. Somewhere he's been able to find an amplifier, probably in the garbage, and a cord taped together with duct tape. He has an "Elvira: Mistress of the Dark" stand-up, and finds himself falling into the hypnotic vortex of "those jugs". Meth labs blow up, police cruisers sweep in, and pit-bulls gnaw on steroid-injected steaks. Chaos and marginality saturates everything-- domestic disputes, wiggers blaring their music, but things are mostly quiet. Beetlegeuse meets these characters, and much of this is ad-libbed as he moves along, running into low-lives and pathetic characters worse off than he is.

In the course of things he meets Scott and Janeane, a retarded couple who work as greeters at "Small-mart", pushing carts and such like peasants on a medieval manor. They pull some strings and get him a job. Beetlegeuse feigns enthusiasm, as he's forced to sit down and watch the boring corporate team-work video, slouching the whole time. This is definitely not his scene, here in working-class hell as he capers around with dodgy small-talk. He's shown the employee breakroom, the soda machine, and is led out to the sales-floor to straighten out merchandise. In the food aisle, hours later, in agony with this straight job, Beetlegeuse rips open a jumbo bag of beef jerky and tears into it maniacally. The boss turns the corner at the least opportune moment-- strips of jerky hanging out of his employee's mouth ferally-- and hollers that it's theft. It's an ugly snarl of a situation.

Security shows up, and they chase Beetlegeuse around the store to the strains of George Thorogood & The Destroyer's "Gear-jammer" as he knocks down aisles of clothes, beach balls, tears through the electronic section, and finally runs through the lady's dressing room to their screams. He attempts to burst through the fire exit, but "Small-mart" routinely chains it shut. But the door opens wide enough to start the fire alarm. Beetlegeuse scrambles into the box compacter/crusher. The entire store empties out into the night, dismayed.

The manager figures that Beetlegeuse got away, and fumes at the loss of business in the confusion. The employees come back in, and press the "EJECT" button on the box crusher and spits Beetlegeuse and the demolished boxes into the dumpster. Beetlegeuse thought he was about to die, and is thanking the heavens that he was spared in a broken-down, pathetic voice. Then he hears someone scratching around the dumpster. He thinks he's going to get busted, but it's only Scott-- who's in the habit of rummaging through the trash for tin cans for extra money, climbing around in there and getting filthy.

One time Scott found a box of old porno tapes in a dumpster behind a gas station, and he, Janeane, and Beetlegeuse stayed home and watched them. Scott had to walk to work, and Janeane and Beetlegeuse ended up going at it in the living room, simply throwing a sheet on the couch. Her cries could be heard through the ajar door out into the street, where a bunch of hoosiers hoisted beer in reverence.

So Beetlegeuse is a little paranoid, to say the least.

"What you doin' in dere?" Scott asks in a slow, halting voice.

"Uh, uh, just lookin' for cans! That's it!", Beetlegeuse making something up on the spot.

"Dah, dat's da cardboard dumpster. You want dis one over here".

So Scott and Beetlegeuse are filling up a rusty shopping cart with old scrap metal, and wheel it home to Brandy Station through the dark, awash aglow in the orange sodium-arc lights.

They come through the apartment door, and Janeane's crying. She's pregnant with Beetlegeuse's child.

"Oh, SHIT!".

Music comes on: Banjo music from "Raising Arizona".

And with that, Beetlegeuse runs back to his apartment and hides while Scott pounds on the door, yelling. He picks up a discarded beer keg in the street and smashes in the sliding glass door with it. "There goes the security deposit!", Beetlegeuse jerking his head toward the locked bathroom door. He's already trying to squeeze through the bathroom window, rubbing soap all over himself so he'll squeak through, getting his foot caught in the toilet. He tries to jerk his foot out of the toilet and only succeeds in flushing. Scott picks up the guitar amplifier and smashes it against the refrigerator. He picks up the guitar and smashes it against the locked bathroom door, howling.

An exterior shot of Beetlegeuse falling out of the bathroom window and getting up, running away with a limp. Dogs barking in the night.