Aza Holmes has to reject that thought on a daily basis.

She’s terrified of bacteria. More specifically, she’s mortified that she’ll wake up with C. diff. colitis, a potentially fatal inflammation of the colon caused by bacteria. That’s why she makes sure to remove her Band-Aids, wash and clean her wounds and apply more Band-Aids day-by-day.

The truth is that Aza struggles with anxiety and obsessive compulsion disorder (OCD). More specifically, it causes her to suffer from intrusive thoughts about how everything she touches might be the thing hosting the bacterium that’ll infect her with C. diff. She knows the prospect is unlikely. She even argues with the intrusive thoughts as she walks to change her Band-Aid. But her “thought spirals” often overwhelm her and force her to act anyway.

And, as it often goes, more things in Aza’s life are primed to spiral out of control, too. She and her best friend, Daisy, see a news story about Russell Pickett. He’s a billionaire who has gone missing—likely because someone tipped him off about his upcoming arrest for fraud and bribery. And the FBI’s offering a $100,000 reward for information on his whereabouts.

Well, neither Aza nor Daisy have a clue where the man could’ve gone. But Aza was once pseudo-friends with his son, Davis, and she and Daisy figure they might be able to use the connection to figure out some information to nab that reward.

But when Aza and Davis reunite, well, the two hit it off quickly. They start dating. And Davis convinces Aza to forget the reward so that the two can focus on their relationship.

But then Aza begins to spiral again. Because relationships mean kissing and touching. And kissing and touching means bacteria. And bacteria means C. diff.

And that means Aza can never have a normal relationship.

The post Turtles All the Way Down appeared first on Plugged In.

Mina could use a change.

Oh sure, Mina actually changes plenty. Every night the woman goes out to the bar, the 28-year-old shows up as someone else. She might be a brunette ballerina. Or a red-headed singer. The blond just dons a wig, slaps on a new personality and voila! No more Mina.

Just as well, she figures. Who’d like Mina anyway? Mina doesn’t even like Mina that much.

But still, a change of scenery would be nice. So when her pet-store-owning boss asks her if she’d be willing to transport a pricey golden conure (think large parakeet) across Ireland, she’s happy to do so. A little road trip might do her good.

But when that road takes her deep into the dwindling Irish forests, something goes mysteriously awry. First, her car conks out. Then, when she gets out of the car to search for help, it vanishes altogether.

And let’s not forget the strange flocks of birds overhead. Or the rumbling ground. Or the creepy sign that says, “Point of No Return 12.”

Mina—still toting her own bird around in its nifty little cage—is getting seriously creeped out when she spies a concrete bunker, with an elderly woman standing in the doorway.

“If you care to live, you’re going to have to run,” the woman tells her.

Run where? Well, to the bunker, presumably. So run Mina does, golden conure swinging by her side. She rumbles into the bunker, takes a breath and eyes her new surroundings.

It’s a simple place: a table. A couch or two. A tube TV and an old-timey phonograph. Oh, and three people. The old woman introduces herself as Madelyn. Danny’s a young man—not much more than a boy, really. And then there’s Ciara, a young woman around Mina’s age. She’s still hopeful that her husband might come back after leaving the bunker—a place they call the “Coop”—six days ago. 

Then there’s that wall of glass. Mina’s barely had time to take a second breath before Madelyn asks everyone to line up and face that glass, so that they can get a good look at the Coop’s newest resident.

They? The Watchers, of course. Those outside the Coop, those who rule the forest, those who hide in in the day and run wild and ravenous in the dark.

Those who kill anyone they catch.

The forest stretches too far in every direction to leave before nightfall. Ciara’s been in the Coop for five months. Madelyn? She might’ve been there for years.

Yeah, Mina needed a change.

But this? Not the change she had in mind.

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“We’ve come to it at last, the great battle of our time.” – Gandalf

The Return of the King, the climactic chapter in J.R.R. Tolkien’s epic Lord of the Rings trilogy, draws to a close the events of The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers. Gollum continues leading Frodo and Sam toward Mordor. But he has no intention of letting the hobbits destroy his “precious” by casting the ring into the fires of Mount Doom. The emaciated, desperate and devious creature plants seeds of doubt in Frodo’s mind about Sam’s loyalty (which remains unwavering). That allows Gollum to lure Frodo, alone, into the lair of a giant spider named Shelob. With Sam alienated and Frodo dead, the ring would be Gollum’s for the taking.

Concurrently, the armies of men begin marshaling their forces to defend Gondor’s seven-level city of kings, Minas Tirith. Soaring more than 700 feet above its main gate, and fortified with numerous walls and battlements, Minas Tirith would seem impregnable. However, the dark forces massing against it are formidable. Orcs. Haradrim. Easterlings. Nazgul. Huge trolls that tote battering rams and wield massive maces. Rampaging, elephant-like giants called Mumakil.

There’s no king to defend Gondor from within. Denethor (father of Boromir and Faramir) is the city’s steward, but pride, grief and an unsound mind have rendered him ineffective at protecting his people. Only Gandalf and Aragorn (the one, true king) can lead the ragtag armies of Middle-earth in what could be their last stand against Sauron. Among the human armies that ride to Gondor’s aid is Rohan, led by King Theoden. Hidden among their ranks, the lady Eowyn and an impassioned hobbit seize the chance to fight for all they love and believe in. The troops are vastly outnumbered. To even the score, Aragorn hopes to collect on a centuries-old debt and enlist a legion of cursed undead to fight on their side. Little does Aragorn know that his true love, the elf princess Arwen, has foregone immortal bliss in the Gray Havens in favor of a mortal life with him. But she grows weak. Only the defeat of Sauron will restore her health and secure their royal future. That, of course, is up to Sam and Frodo. Can they survive Gollum’s nefarious schemes? And if so, can the armies of man buy them the time they need to fulfill their calling and drive a stake into the heart of evil?

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The confrontation of good vs. evil in mythical Middle-earth continues. Let’s jump right in—as the film does—to the second act in the The Lord of the Rings trilogy [for information about act one, see our review for The Fellowship of the Ring]. With the fellowship broken, warriors Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli embark on a rescue mission, tracking the detachment of battle-bred Orcs that made off with Merry and Pippin. In the process, they encounter horsemen of Rohan and visit a kingdom facing extermination at the hands of Saruman’s Uruk-hai army. The Rohan monarch, King Theoden, has had his mind poisoned by a traitorous advisor named Grima Wormtongue, leaving Theoden incapable of ruling his people. But intervention by Gandalf (we learn that he conquered the fiery Balrog and emerged as Gandalf the White) restores Theoden to full health. Wormtongue is exiled, and returns to his true master, Saruman, who plans to wipe out Rohan at the hands of 10,000 Uruk-hai soldiers in a climactic battle at Helm’s Deep.

Merry and Pippin escape the Orcs on their own and wander into Fangorn Forest where they meet Treebeard, part of a race of tree-like creatures called Ents. The Hobbits appeal to the Ents to join the fight against Saruman, but the complacent Ents are reluctant to do so until they realize their future may be threatened as well.

Meanwhile, ringbearer Frodo and his trusty companion, Sam, must proceed alone toward Mount Doom to fulfill their mission of destroying the seductive gold band coveted by the dark lord Sauron. The pair realizes they’ve been followed when a pathetically emaciated, psychologically tormented creature named Gollum is caught stalking their camp. Gollum’s history with—and addiction to—the ring make him both a valuable asset and a potential liability to their quest. Gollum can guide them to Mount Doom. But are his intentions honorable? Is he simply biding his time in order to kill the Hobbits and steal the ring? It’s a risk Frodo—who is beginning to show wear and tear from his immense burden—believes they should take.

The post The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers appeared first on Plugged In.

It’s helpful to think of the three-hour epic The Fellowship of the Ring as the first act of a three-act play which includes the films The Two Towers and The Return of the King. Middle-earth, with its diverse population of men, elves, hobbits, dwarfs and wizards, stands at a crossroads. For generations, these races and tribes have battled to keep the dark lord Sauron at bay. Insulated from this ongoing conflict are the hobbits, a carefree, simple-hearted colony of little people too busy farming the land, enjoying food and raising families to care much about the ominous occurrences outside of the Shire. But their pastoral existence, indeed the future of all Middle-earth, is threatened when Sauron, obsessed with recovering an evil ring that would give him supreme power, learns that his prize is somewhere in the Shire.

Of course, one might assume that a righteous hero could use the potent ring of gold to thwart Sauron’s mounting forces. Not so. Many have tried . . . and failed. Created for evil, the ring can only be used for evil and corrupts whomever wears it. It can yield no good. That’s why fate has chosen a virtuous hobbit named Frodo Baggins to guard the ring until it can be thrown into the fiery bowels of Mount Doom where it was forged.

After learning about his destiny and the dangerous ring’s history from a wise wizard named Gandalf, Frodo embarks on his journey alone. He’s barely out of the Shire when he gets company. His hobbit pals Sam, Merry and Pippin join him, though they have no clue what they’re getting themselves into. A series of scary scrapes and narrow escapes lead the youths to a pub where they connect with a mysterious wanderer named Aragorn. Pursued by black-clad Ringwraiths (mounted, sword-wielding spectres) and a growing army of orcs (hideous, screeching goblins), the young heroes head for Rivendell, where representatives of Middle-earth’s inhabitants form a fellowship to escort Frodo on his perilous mission to Mount Doom. The fellowship is made up of Frodo, Gandalf, Sam, Pippin, Merry, Aragorn (revealed to be heir to the throne of Gondor), Boromir (a warrior of Gondor), Gimli (a burly dwarf) and Legolas (an archer elf). After three hours of thrills, chills and impressive visual effects, the fellowship is broken, and these characters chart separate courses in the protection of all that is good.

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Koichi Shikishima didn’t die when he was supposed to.

It’s 1945, and the Japanese kamikaze pilot has just launched into what’s supposed to be his sacrificial mission. But instead, Koichi takes a detour, landing at a Japanese mechanical outpost, Odo Island. He claims his plane was having some issues—issues that no one on Odo Island can seem to identify.

The truth is, Koichi is a coward.

One mechanic doesn’t blame him for backing out. They’ve been fighting a losing battle against the United States for a couple of years now.

“Why obey an order to ‘die honorably’ when the outcome is already clear?” The man says.

But Koichi has no time to grapple with his actions: Alarms blare. The outpost is under attack. And when they shine a light on their attacker, they find a massive reptilian creature dubbed Godzilla whose claws tear through the base like a hot knife through butter. The others task Koichi with running to his plane and shooting the beast, but he freezes in terror. And by sunrise, he’s one of a mere two survivors.

A couple of years later, Koichi’s still plagued with guilt over the deaths of the men at Odo Island. It certainly doesn’t help that others constantly remind him of his failure. After all, kamikaze pilots aren’t exactly supposed to come back home. The disgraced man takes a job on a small minesweeper crew, sailing the Pacific Ocean to find and detonate leftover bombs.

It’s not long before Koichi and his crew come face to face with Godzilla. And thanks to United States atomic bomb testing at Bikini Atoll, the beast is even bigger and stronger than Koichi remembers, having been mutated by the radiation. What’s more, the seemingly invincible monster is on a crash course to collide with the Japanese mainland, and the war-weary nation is nowhere near prepared to defend itself.

But for a coward, Koichi sure seems to gravitate to jobs with high mortality rates. And fighting a nuclear reptilian beast with no discernable weakness certainly fits the bill.

Perhaps it’ll even let Koichi finally die with honor—even if the outcome is already clear.

The post Godzilla Minus One appeared first on Plugged In.

Take Ezra, a joke-cracking, Dostoyevsky-loving, hug-hating kid on the cusp of puberty. Oh, he’s autistic, too. His dad, Max, will be happy to tell you all about it during his comedy sets.

“He didn’t speak for years,” Max says as his audience sips their drinks. But then, “when he started speaking, he wouldn’t shut up.”

Funny? Sure, autism can be funny—just like Max’s own myriad dysfunctions can be, assuming they don’t land him in prison or the hospital. (And even then, they might supply some pretty great material.) But even as Max mines Ezra’s condition for laughs, he knows those yucks come with tears, too. And worry. And issues.

Oh, so many issues.

Take today, for instance. In school, something set Ezra off. He stormed out of his class and into the street—taking most of his classmates along with him.

Ezra’s a great kid, and a smart one, too. But that little stunt earned him three Ds: a dangerous, disrespectful disturbance. Even though Ezra has done reasonably well in a normal-school setting, his teachers say there’ve been just too many disturbances. They tell Max and his ex-wife, Jenna, that it’s not fair to the other students. It’s not fair to Ezra. He needs to go to a specialized school.

Jenna gets it. Ezra’s special needs require special care. “A school built for him, how he needs to learn,” she tells Max. “No bullies. Kids just like him.”

“I’m a kid like him!” Max says. “And kids like us? We need to be with all kinds of kids!”

But when Ezra runs into the street again—this time at home, in the dead of night—Jenna and Max lose the ability to choose. The legal system takes over and forces both medication and a special school on Ezra. And when Max tries to punch the doctor prescribing the meds—well, he lands in the system’s jaws, too. With Max deemed a bad influence on his son, the court slaps Dad with a restraining order: no contact with Ezra for three months.

Max isn’t having it. His boy doesn’t need drugs. He needs a dad who’ll stand up for him. Who’ll do what needs to be done.

So late one night, Max leaves a critical comedy set early, sneaks Ezra out of Jenna’s house and packs him into the car.

Nothing wrong with Ezra that a secret, illegal, multistate road trip can’t cure, right?

The post Ezra appeared first on Plugged In.

They worked together, laughed together. And even though they were so very different, they became the best of friends. Through thick and thin they were held together by Ginny’s strong and persuasive personality. For years, these girls would endure a boring year just waiting for summer and another exhilarating summer camp together. 

Five or six decades later, though, their BFF “exhilaration” has, well, waned.

Mary is now an ER nurse who has a rather unhappy marriage. Nora is a widowed workaholic CEO of a chemical company. And Ginny? Ginny Moon is a Dr. Phil-like famous personality known far and wide for her catchphrase: “Get your sh-t together!”

Ginny is also a force of nature. So when she decides that it’s high time to gather the girls together for a summer camp reunion, it will happen. She spares no expense or effort to rent out Camp Pinnacle and to create a massive reunion for all the many campers from years ago.

And the three besties? Well they get nothing short of a decked-out, three-person cabin, redecorated and stocked by Martha Stewart herself.

Hey, even way-back-when camp crushes Tommy and Stevie D show up, much to Mary and Nora’s delight. Ginny, you see, has plans to not only rekindle the flames of friendship with her girls but maybe to spice up her friend’s lives with a little shoehorned-in-place romance as well.

I mean that’s what a relationship guru does, right?

The post Summer Camp appeared first on Plugged In.

Back when Atlas was just a girl, her mother, Val Shepherd, was a groundbreaking scientist who championed the development of neural links, taking human/AI interaction to new heights.

Val created “Harlan,” a truly sentient robotic man. Atlas was, in a sense, raised alongside Harlan as a sibling. There were servant robots before, but Harlan was something no one had ever dreamed of.  

However, that robotic dream became a nightmare. Atlas was part of a mishap that transformed Harlan into what amounted to the first AI terrorist. He killed Val Shepherd … and millions of others. He raised up an army of AI fighters and used his strategic brilliance to spread terror around the globe

The ICN was created to deal with that terror. They were, in fact, so effective that Harlan was forced to flee Earth. He’s been hiding somewhere in space for the last 28 years.

In all that time, Atlas Shepherd has been searching. She’s helped the ICN develop Earth safety measures. She’s sought out clues to the robot’s whereabouts. And she’s devised scenarios to deal with his potential moves. Harlan is still the greatest threat that mankind has ever faced. And he promised to come back and finish what he started. He will be back.

Out of the blue, one of Harlan’s robotic lieutenants shows up on Earth. Was he scouting for a new attack? After a great battle, the robot is captured. Atlas outfoxes the AI bot and discovers Harlan’s current location: the unexplored and generally uninhabitable planet GR-39.

This could be the break that the ICN has been looking for. It could also be … a trap. But whatever it is, the ICN rangers and their neural linked robotic ARC suits are convinced they’re up for the task.

Atlas isn’t so sure.

But she’s worked so long for this moment that she won’t be left behind. She’ll be there and face this AI demon, win or lose.

The post Atlas appeared first on Plugged In.

Yeah, right. Tell that to Maddy and Owen.

The show in question, The Pink Opaque, chronicles the supernatural adventures of Isabel and Tara, two teen girls who battle the big bad, Mr. Melancholy, and his legion of monsters. And while some might dismiss the show as an adolescent X-Files, Maddy would say that it’s far more than that. “Sometimes,” the adolescent outcast admits to Owen, “The Pink Opaque feels more real than real life.”

But the show comes on at 10:30 p.m.—way past the curfew for 7^th-grade Owen. He’s never seen The Pink Opaque. Not, that is, until he meets Maddy. She encourages Owen to sneak out of his house and spend the night at hers, so that he can see for himself what The Pink Opaque is all about.

And once he sees, he’s hooked.

But curfews are curfews, and Owen can’t pretend to have sleepovers every week. But years later, Maddy comes up with a solution. She’ll record every episode on VHS. She’ll give those tapes to Owen—along with some notes to help him navigate the show’s complex mythology. And then he can watch on his own sweet time.

It’s a good, though not perfect, system. Owen would much rather watch the show with Maddy when he can. One night, years later, he sneaks away again to do just that. And the next morning, Maddy tells Owen that—as soon as she can—she plans to leave home. “I’ll die if I stay here,” she says, and she means it. And Maddy asks Owen to come with her.

“Where will we go?” Owen asks.

“We’ll know when we get there,” Maddy tells him.

But he won’t go. He can’t. And not long after, Maddy disappears without a trace. The only clue? Her family’s TV set was found in the yard, on fire.

And yep, that might’ve been the end of the shared story of Maddy and Owen and The Pink Opaque. After all, Maddy’s gone. Owen’s growing up. And The Pink Opaque is just a TV show.

Or is it?

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