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| The homeless are so poignant.CM Columbus McKinnon 490-M852G 3-4 Inch Anchor Shackle Galvanized W-Bolt-Nut (Google Affiliate Ad) |
Okay-- spitballing here-- counting on you readers to give me some more ideas-- but how about a movie about a fourteen year old little twerp who learns a series of valuable lessons from the homeless man to whom he is accidentally shackled. It all takes place in Philadelphia.
And then, like, later in the movie or in the sequel, he tries to open a restaurant and a lot of the lessons he learned from the homeless guy apply? And he's like "That homeless guy taught me a great deal?" And he renames the restaurant Homeless Wisdom? Could work for sure, but how to get them unshackled! Here's a quick list of ways two people might be unshackled after having been accidentally shackled together. Do me a hugie and let me know which ones appeal to you the most dramatically.
LIST OF WAYS TO GET HOMELESS MAN AND TWERP UNSHACKLED
1. Get key to shackles.
2. Make key to shackles.
3. Pick the lock on the shackles.
4. Have a professional lockpick pick the lock of the shackles.
5. Have an amateur lockpick pick the lock of the shackles.
6. Freeze shackles with liquid nitrogen, hit shackles with sledgehammer.
7. Heat shackle chain until it melts.
8. Saw shackles.
9. File shackles with shackle file.
10. Cut shackles with chain/shackle cutter.
11. Lose weight so that foot can slip out of shackles.
12. Dip shackles in melted butter, slip feet out.
13. Wish on magic genie lamp to be unshackled from shackles.
14. Get magician character to magic away shackles.
15. Get magician character to make feet and ankles much smaller to enable slipping away from shackles. Later, he makes feet and ankles normal size.
16. Acid on the shackles.
17. Shark bites through shackles (great white sharks have ~4000 psi bite pressure)
18. Shackle the shackles, canceling out both shackleings.
19. Use salty spray near an ocean beach to "rust away" shackles.
20. Use James Bond Chain Cutter from "Tomorrow Never Dies" Beamer to cut through shackles.
21. Super strength potion allows twerp and/or homeless man to tear off shackles.
22. Set story in alternate universe where "shackles be-gone" is a thing. All else is the same.
23. Houdini Juice.
24. Lasers from Goldfinger's Laser room from the James Bond Film "Goldfinger" used to cut through Shackles.
25. Make a spell that unshackles shackles.
26. Unearthly tone destroys shackles.
27. Make anti-matter shackles and rub them on the matter shackles.
28. Time Travel and murder Ernest Shackleton, inventor of shackles.
29. Breaks ankles and painfully pull feet out of shackles.
30. Bear bites off feet, rendering shackles ineffective.
31. Turns out shackles are only a dream.
32. Turns out everything but shackles is dream
33. Bend shackles back and forth until they break, like doing that to a paper clip.
34. Invent ants that eat shackles. The ants do the rest.
35. Put shackles in front of jet exhaust, they melt.
36. Tell Uncle Sam shackles are taxable income. He'll do the rest.
37. Bring shackles to life, kill them. Ghost shackles easy to escape from.
38. Just have shackles be missing the next time you cut back to Homeless Man and Twerp.
39. Lightsaber cut shackles
40. Darksaber® cuts shackles
41. Twerp bolted down on one side of San Andreas Fault, Homeless man on other. Timelapse.
42. Small Asteroid hits shackles.Too fakey?
43. Turns out Doozers from Fraggle Rock are real, pay them to use their tiny sticks of dynamite to blow apart the shackles. This is my top one as of now.
44. Karate Master chops shackles chain in half.
45. Judo Master throws shackles chain over his shoulder, breaking shackles
46. Aikido master uses the weight of the shackles against inself, breaking the shackles
47. Krav Maga Master stabs shackles with a ball point pen or rolled up magazine he finds, opening the shackles up.
48. After rules of Thunderdome are changed from "two men enter, one man leaves!" to "one man and two men wearing one pair of shackles enter, one man and two other men or one pair of shackles leave!," Master Blaster defeats shackles.
49. Close proximity to a black hole "spaghettis" the shackles. Spaghetti shackles are somehow easy/easier to escape from.
50. Homeless Man and Twerp fall in love, power of love unshackles shackles.
51. Trick nitwit employee at Radio Shack into thinking the "Shack" in "Radio Shack" stands for Shackles; employee unlocks shackles as courtesy.
52. At home depot, twerp and homeless man deliberately trip into active tablesaw, neatly slicing off their feet. Hospital reattaches feet, and does not reattach shackles to legs per previously purchased medic alert bracelets stating "in case of emergency throw away the shackles." Home Depot foots the bill plus free nails for life.
53. Learn secret of shackle escape from Shackeele O'Neal, basketball player and real-life shackle expert.
54. Homeless man and twerp clone themselves but do not include shackle DNA in the process. Once the process is complete, Homeless man and Twerp turn over their lives to their new, unshackled doubles before jumping into lava.
55. When Marc Maron exhorts Homeless Man and Twerp to support his podcast "WTF with Marc Maron" by "kicking in a few shekels" by shopping at justcoffee.coop or purchasing old episodes through the popular WTF iphone app, they (deliberately or not) instead kick in a single "shackles."
56. Twerp and Homeless Man both get blackout drunk in Las Vegas and "Hangover" themselves until the shackles are gone when they wake up.
57. A hydraulic metal press "pinches" the shackles off.
58. Homeless Man and Twerp go fishing, catch magic talking fish. Fish says he will grant three shackle based wishes if they set him free. Wish 1: Wish for shackles to disappear. Wish 2. Doesn't matter. Wish 3. Doesn't matter.
59. Commit a footbag-related crime and get sent to hacky-sack prison. In hacky-sack prison shackles constitute cruel and unusual punishment; Twerp and Homeless Man hire hot-shot lawyer to prove this in court. Hot-shot lawyer wins the case, shackles are removed by court order.
60. Cut shackles with scissors.
61. Homeless Man and Twerp somehow convince a world class motorcycle stunt rider like Kyle Sliger to tape a razor blade on his helmet and blast toward them at 60 mph (or TBD speed the production's science consultants agree would easily cut through shackle material.) Homeless Man and Twerp, positioned on an elaborate scaffolding, stretch their legs apart and the shackle chain is cut cleanly in two. Unless, of course, Kyle Sliger makes even the slightest miscalculation. If he does that, every one dies ugly, decapitated or delimbed.
62. Open a pawn shop that pays top dollar for used Slipknot 'Shackles' Tee (Google Affiliate Ad)shackles in any condition. Goddamn junkies do the rest.
63. Homeless man and Twerp coat the shackles in 24 carat gold and the finest jewels, then mail themselves to a rapper. Rapper, delighted, wears the "blinged up" shackles chain to the club, then has chain "snatched" by hooligans. Homeless Man and Twerp are free.
64. Sandpaper "sands" through shackles chain.
65. Set the movie in 1989. Homeless Man and Twerp dig a hole next to and parallel to the Kola Super Deep Borehole, then, once reaching a depth deeper than that of the borehole, cut a tunnel to intersect the path of the bore-holes drill. Homeless and Twerp then lay across the tunnel
66. Slow hot-sauce drip on shackles.
67. Homeless Man and Twerp win scratch-off tickets, giving them the financial means to eat only ribs and butterfingers NON-STOP until their legs swell, bursting the shackles.
68. Big beach party; they dance so hard that the shackles break.
69. Conceal shackles chain in Hulk's sandwich.
70. Hack into Hershey database, "find and replace" "Krackel" with "Shackle." Chocolate completists, rabid for more information about this exciting new chocolate bar from their favorite company, create international run on Shackles, including those worn by Homeless Man and Twerp.
17 comments:
17 is no good. This movie carries itself. Don't want to make it an "animal movie" (this was the mistake Air Bud made.)
Against 25, unless played by Megan Fox/ Kate Upton type. Then, obviously pro.
43 brings up all sorts of legal issues.
Same for 51.
66- NICE! Lot of tie in opportunities
68 is probably a no go. Unless beach people are played by Megan Fox/ Kate Upton type. Then, obviously pro.
Do another draft of this! It has legs! IN SHACKLES (lol)
Hey Stephen,
Pretty great list here. Only thing I'd like to comment on is that you didn't really explore the possibility of shackles being made of other things. I've added a few more of my own ideas.
71. Shackles are made of silly putty and maybe they get really thin and break when they're using them to copy the funny pages
72. Shackles are made of a series of cooked spaghetti noodles and one day they're out at a nice dinner and a la Lady and the Tramp they're eating spaghetti and all of a sudden the twerp or the homeless man is all "Hey! They were made out of delicious spaghetti and we didn't realize it until we ate them all up.
73. The shackle is made out of Leprechaun skin, but when they come to the realization that Leprechauns aren't real, the (green?) shackles suddenly disappear.
74. The shackles are made out of aluminum foil, and they happen to peel it away when trying to keep some BBQ'd hot dogs warm (or cool)
75. The shackles are made of regular shackle metal, but they're owned by Tracey Gold of Growing Pains. One day she decides she wants those shackles back so she just up and takes them.
76. Again, metal shackles, but maybe it turns out that nobody actually closed the shackles and the shackles were open shackles - ie. nobody was fully shackled, they were just wearing unshackled shackles.
77. What shackles?
78. Metal shackles again. The homeless man gets a gun and he's about to shoot the shackles off. Very dramatic. But then the twerp says something to the effect of the real shackles we wear are those of our own preconceptions and prejudgments. How about if instead of shooting these off, we remain shackled as a symbol of the injustice of our once great nation?
79. The homeless man shoots off those fucking shackles with a gun.
80. It turns out the shackles are actually the animal magnetism that both the twerp and homeless man share. They are "unshackled" over time as the animal magnetism fades when they keep fighting about things.
81. He ain't gonna chainsaw those shackles!?
82. For some reason the Twerp starts sweating acid. The homeless man for some other reason sweats glue to keep the shackles together, but the glue sweat isn't acid proof and nor are his feet.
83. The shackles become self-aware and they really start to question themselves. "Why am I doing this? Is this really making anybody happy?" The shackles unshackle themselves and take a long walk on the beach and aren't seen again. "Hey have you seen those self-aware shackles?" "No. I'm kinda worried about it actually. Seemed like they were kind of upset last time I saw them. Hope they're okay."
84. Self-aware shackles again, but instead of unshackling themselves out of self-doubt, the shackles make a deal with the Twerp and Homeless man. "If you take me to my shackle mother, I'll unshackle myself and you two will be free" The Twerp and Homeless man make the journey to the shackle factory, but it closed down a couple of years ago and the shackle will never be able to meet its shackle mom. "It's okay, Twerp and Homeless Man are my family now," the shackles would think before unshackling itself.
85. The self-aware shackle has to go the bathroom. It asks the Twerp and Homeless man to wait, but when it gets back, they're long gone. "Now what?" thinks the shackle, "What do I do with myself now?"
86. "Phone call, for Mr. Self-aware Shackles. It's Rose, the daughter you didn't know you had." "What!? Wait right here, guys, I've got to take this!" The Twerp and Homeless man would exchange a look, wait for the Mr. Self-Aware Shackles to leave, and then just book it on out of there.
87. The shackles are recalled due to a safety defect. The Twerp and Homeless man are freed, and Rose, distraught, paces around her home. What will happen to the father she only just came in contact with? Will he be destroyed or simply refurbished. Even if he is refurbished, will she even recognize him the next time she sees him?
88. The shackles just conveniently break with no explanation. Sometimes this happens. Of course Rose is a complete sobbing mess about this.
89. The Twerp suddenly absorbs the Shackles into his skin. "How is this happening?!" screams the Homeless man.
90. The shackles are just Chinese finger-cuffs and get stretched out over time and break. "Just Japanese fingercuffs?!" thinks Rose, an 18-year-old single mom who is also a Chinese fingercuff. "Racist."
91. The shackles are part of a new reality TV series, "Shackle/Unshackle," in which people get shackled. At the end of the show someone unshackles them.
92. The shackles, like all true believers, are part of The Rapture. They disappear from Earth but live in glory forever.
93. The Twerp and Homeless man don't even realize they're shackled as they coincidentally go to the same exact places at the same exact times for the rest of their lives, which also end at the same time.
94. Rose bursts onto the scene. "Daddy, it's time to come home. We miss you. Mommy and I miss you. If you're going to be shackled to anyone, be shackled to Mommy and me. We forgive you. We do. Just come home." The shackle hangs his shackle, ashamed at his selfishness and pride and upset at all the time he has wasted. "Okay, Rose. I've missed you." Then the shackle would unshackle and Rose and her Shackle daddy would take the next bus to their home in Hollywood, California.
95. The Shackles would go in for enhancements and come out computerized and even more secure. Or so the shackles thought, because little did the shackles know, but the Homeless man was a famous hacker with the handle "h0m3l355," and he'd decrypt the shackles and open them up with a virus. "What..is...happening...to me?!" the shackles would think, before succumbing to the electronic disease.
96. The Twerp invents a shrink ray and he shrinks himself and the homeless man into a tiny size. They go inside the shackle's locking mechanism and with great effort, unlock the shackles from the inside of the shackles themshackles! Once they do this, the step out from inside of the shackles and use a reverse-shrink ray to shackle up to normal size.
97. The Twerp bakes a metal file into a cake and gives it to the Homeless man. The homeless man uses it to file through the shackles.
98. Same as 97 but with a shackle key and cupcake.
99. Same as 98 but with a metal file and a cake.
100. Searching the Internet, H0m31355 finds a YouTube video someone has posted showing that if a series of dance steps are done in order and done perfectly - I mean super perfectly, the locking mechanism of the shackles will open. They practice and practice but the dance and YouTube video proves to be a hoax. The Twerp gets so mad he kicks the shackles and breaks them. This wouldn't have been possible if he hadn't built up so much muscle doing the "hoax" dance - which of course was the point of the YouTube video all along.
101. The Twerp and the Homeless man are cryogenically frozen for an extremely extended amount of time. During this time the shackles decay (due to the half-life of its composite material) and break away. Featuring Bill Nye.
102. Bill Nye uses science to break it away. He is also very impressed with the Twerp's homemade shrink ray.
103. Put shackles on the train track. Train runs over shackles and breaks the shackles. The train slows down and Bill Nye pops his head out from the engine and tips his hat to the Twerp and the Homeless man. Watching from the bushes is Rose, a girl who just witnessed the murder of Shackles, her father. Her face an emotionless mask, Rose picks up a sharp rock and drags it across her face, cutting deep. She'll see Bill Nye again. She'll see him soon.
104. Instead of an exorcism, they have a "Shacklecism" and it works.
105. The Twerp and the Homeless man pretend to be friends with the shackles and eventually the shackles let slip that he's allergic to strawberries. "This soup tastes funny," the shackles would say. "Do you like it? It's got a secret ingredient: Strawberries." The shackles would require immediate emergency care, would go away. "You didn't have to use strawberries," the shackles would say, "I thought we were friends. You could have just asked."
106. The Twerp and/or the Homeless man just ask the shackles to let them go.
107. The Twerp, the Homeless man, and the shackles go to Mexico City, and the shackles get kidnapped. The Twerp and the Homeless man pay the ransom, on the condition that the shackles stop shackling them.
108. The Twerp and the Homeless man sing the shackles a lullaby. It slowly relaxes and falls asleep. While the Twerp is looking away, the Homeless man takes a shiv and slides it into the key slot of the shackles. As he does he whispers in the ear of the shackles: "This was never going to end the way you wanted it to. It ends my way. It ends now." The shackles gives a final scream and the Twerp turns to see what has happened. "The Homeless man, what are you doing?! What are you doing?" With the shackles undone, the Twerp flees for his life, that final image of the Shackles and unremorseful The Homeless man forever burned into his mind.
109. A clown makes the shackles laugh so hard that it lets go.
110. The shackles get a new girlfriend and little by little stop hanging out with the Twerp and the Homeless man.
111. The shackles decide to stop shackling and try his hand at skateboarding.
112. The Twerp and the Homeless man go to Disneyland. When they get to Space Mountain, the Shackles are not tall enough to ride. The Shackles wait for the Twerp and the Homeless man at the exit, but he somehow misses them. The shackles spend the rest of the day alone in Disneyland trying to find the Twerp and the Homeless man, but he never realizes that they weren't also looking for him. At closing time, as the Shackles are ushered out of the park, he realizes what it is to be truly alone.
113. While the Twerp and the Homeless man are out to eat, a waitress mistakes the shackles for an empty plate and takes them away.
114. The Twerp and the Homeless man give the shackles the silent treatment until the shackles take a fucking hint and hit the bricks. "Glad that guy's gone," the Twerp would say. The homeless man would look at him in disgust. "Those shackles are twice the man you'll ever be, Twerp. I was only giving the shackles the silent treatment because I thought we were playing the Quiet Game."
115. By the by, it comes up that the Twerp and the Homeless man are both "Furries." Soon it's all they ever talk about. To each his own, I guess, but the shackles are kind of weirded out by it and eventually agrees to go its separate way.
116. The shackles drinks and drives. DON'T drink and drive.
117. The Twerp starts spinning around faster and faster, faster and faster. The centrifugal force causes the Homeless man to spin in the air, and eventually rips his foot from his body. Fortunately the stump of the Homeless man lands in Lava, and this immediately cauterizes his wound.
118. The Homeless man falls into a hole. The Twerp, shackled from the shackles, is almost dragged into the hole as well, but he clutches to a tree. The Homeless man calls out, "Twerp, there are rats in here. They're starting to eat me." The Twerp stars to panic, "Don't worry, the Homeless man, I'll get help!" "Don't Twerp. Let this happen. I'm tired of living on the streets and asking for hand outs. This time, I'm going to give you something. Once they finish eating me, you'll be able to pull yourself up and you'll be free. Let me do this for you." So the Twerp would wait their, clutching to the tree as rats devoured the Homeless man in the hole. He'd finally be able to let go of the tree and pull out the skeleton of the Homeless man from the hole. OR, did the Homeless man fake his death?!
119. It becomes clear that Twerp and the Homeless man can't afford the shackles, and they are way behind on payments. The shackles are then repossessed and not only that, but the credit score rating of both the Twerp and the Homeless man is screwed.
120. The Twerp and the Homeless man buy a shackle to shackle the shackles' shackles, making it unable to shackle. Time explodes.
121. They go to Las Vegas and hire a prostitute for an epic "Furry" 3 way (plus shackles). When they wake up, that damn whore stole the shackles!
122. The Twerp and the Homeless man use "The Secret" to believe that they will be unshackled. Through inaction and positive thinking, they suddenly become unshackled.
123. The Twerp, the Homeless man, and the Shackles, all play a game of Truth or Dare. "Dare," says Twerp. "Okay...ummm...call Trudy up and tell her she's pretty," says Shackles. The Twerp rolls his eyes, but is obviously nervous. He dials the phone. Ring....Ring... "Please let it go to voicemail," thinks the Twerp. "Hello?" someone answers. "Is this Trudy?" "Yes." You're pretty!" Click. Phew. "Truth or Dare, the Homeless man?" "Truth." "Let's see...what is your biggest secret?" The Homeless man is obviously uncomfortable. "I...I have a home. I don't have to live on the streets, but I do. It's paid for and everything - I'm even current on the property tax. It's just...my wife died there and I don't want to go back." The game has taken a somber turn and everybody stares at their hands for what feels like forever. Twerp finally speaks up. "Shackles...it looks like it's on you. Truth or Dare?" "Dare." "Unshackle us." "Fuck," says the shackles.
124. Nanobots.
125. The Twerp and Homeless man go to France. One man, a poor and friendless soul named Pierre Entraves, notices the bond of friendship emerging between the Twerp and the Homeless Man. Jealous, Pierre Entraves waits until the Twerp and the Homeless man are asleep. Then, he stealthily breaks into the gated French mansion they bought and unshackles the shackles. He wakes them up when he does this, but the Twerp and the Homeless man can't get the shackles back because Pierre Entraves is using them kind of like nun-chukkas and keeps hitting them in the face with the end of the shackles in a fusion of French and Asian martial arts. As the Twerp and the Homeless man roll on the floor, clutching their noses and trying not to cry, Pierre Entraves would silently slip off the balcony and disappear into the night. Gathering themselves together, the Twerp and the Homeless man would look at their unshackled feet. They'd look so naked and vulnerable - the physical manifestation of their friendship literally unshackled from them. If you want friends, Pierre, that is not the way to do it.
126. The Twerp and the Homeless man wake up, hoping the shackles were just a dream. The shackles are real. But then I wake up and Stephen's post was just a dream. This leads to questions of reality and what exactly is real? Many scientists seem to think it is just as possible that we are all existing in some sort of Matrix - With our current civilization, we'll be pessimistic and say we're maybe 500 years away from creating a Matrix-style virtual reality. This could easily have already happened in another time or a "Real" Universe. Existing in someone else's virtual reality seems more likely than the fact that our "Reality" is real and we'll be the first ones to create a "Matrix." It is more than possible - it is probable(!) that we are simply bits of code running in someone else's reality.
127. Neo from the Matrix Kung Fus the shackles.
128. The Twerp and the Homeless man take a Disney cruise together. After a few days of pretending everything is normal and getting autographs from Jack Sparrow and Mickey and Pluto and Mulan, they sneak out one night onto the deck of the ship. Making sure they're not being watched, the Homeless man ties their inflatable raft to the cruise ship and with 600 yards of rope, they hoist themselves into the ocean. Their cruise ship far off in the distance, the Twerp and the Homeless man feel all but alone in the vast sea. Wordlessly and in unison, they drown the shackles, fighting them until the shackles finally unshackle. The moment changes everything. The Twerp and the Homeless man will define themselves internally by this dark moment. Together, they are murders, and whatever friendship they might have had is forever fouled by this single act. Their feet are free, but their conscience and their ability to relate and communicate with anyone will be from this point forward shackled in shackles that drown only if they do. Quietly, the Twerp and the Homeless man gather the rope and slowly pull themselves back to the cruise ship.
Back in their cabin, the Twerp looks through his Disney autograph book, eyes glazing over Mickey's bubbly signature. It doesn't even matter. Nothing does.
129. There's a rumor going around that if the shackles hear an exact musical sequence, they will automatically unshackle. The Twerp stars playing indie pop music nonstop, and the Homeless man starts playing speed metal. They both become very adept at music criticism and develop fine taste in their chosen specialties. Still, while they continue to listen to thousands and thousands of different speed metal and indie songs, the shackles remain shackled. "Good Grief," thinks Charlie Brown, in a classic Peanuts comic the Twerp reads while listening to yet another indie pop song. "My sentiments exactly," says the twerp to no one in particular, although the Homeless Man is shackled to him, so he can hear the Twerp very clearly. Is the twist that the song is just "Happy Birthday"? No. The Twerp and the Homeless man are right in that the music sequence they're looking for is either an Indie pop song or a speed metal song. It's just that there are seriously a lot of these and it takes a really long time before they stumble onto the right one.
130. The Twerp confronts the shackles vis a vis: "Shackles. How much are they paying you to be shackled to us?" and the "Shackles responds: "More than you can afford." And the Twerp says back "I'll double it." And the shackles says "Impossible. They're paying me infinity gold." And the Twerp responds with "First off, they've mathematically proven that you can double infinity. So yeah, that is doable. However, let me clue you in on something, Shackles: You're getting scammed. There is no way they are going to actually pay you infinity gold - it's impossible and nobody would ever pay that much. My guess is that when you try to collect they'll just kill you. In fact, I bet what will happen is..." Just then the Twerp would be struck by a blow dart and immediately lose consciousness. "This shit just got real!" the shackles would think, and he and the Homeless man would start running as blow dart after blow dart whiz by their heads. Of course, poor Twerp is just being dragged the ground as they run, his head hitting all manner of things. They escape, but only just, and when the shackles sees what his greed has done to poor Twerp, he unshackles and says "Look. No amount of infinity gold is worth the pain I've caused you two. Go. Hide. Keep safe. I'll hold them off as long as I can." The Homeless man and the Twerp (who is awake now but is suffering from significant brain damage, slip out the back door. Just as they're leaving, the Homeless man looks back and sees the shackles get hit by something like infinity blow darts.
131. h0m31355 hacks into the CIA database and puts shackles on the no-fly list - all unbeknownst to shackles. "Hey! Let's go to Paris!" the Homeless man says. Everyone thinks it's a good idea, but when they go through Airport security, the shackles are immediately stopped, while the Twerp and the Homeless man pass easy breezy through the gate. The Twerp and the Homeless man fly off to Paris and celebrate with a drink of champagne on the Champs Elysees. As the clink glasses to toast their freedom, Pierre Entraves (#125), the friendship thief watches them alone from across the street. Pierre, if you need that sort of friendship, don't try to steal it. Instead, try to forge it with practiced listening skills and true compassion.
132. The Homeless man, using knowledge gained from his time in the circus, swallows the shackles bit by bit. For 3 days he sits in the rain with the Twerp, his mouth open and skyward, with shackle coming out of his mouth. After this time, his stomach acid has digested the shackle to the point of it breaking. Everyone cheers, but what nobody realizes is that when the Homeless man digested the shackle, he also absorbed part of the shackle into him. I'm not sure what sort of powers a shackle gives someone, but the Homeless man definitely has it in spades.
133. The self aware shackle says, "Twerp and the Homeless man, let go of me!" and we realize that it's really a question of perspective. History is told by the winners and so forth. Who was shackling whom may be up for debate, but when it is clear that the Twerp and the Homeless man think that they're being shackled by the shackles, and at the same time the shackles think they're being shackled by the Twerp and the Homeless man, the one perspective that both can agree on is that nobody wants to be shackled. So they all just agree to go their separate ways.
134. The Twerp and the Homeless man are in a bus complaining non-stop to the driver about the shackles and how they can't get rid of them. The bus driver nods patiently, being careful not to roll his eyes. It turns out the destination of the bus is a mental hospital for loonies, and it is revealed that the shackles were just a shared hallucination brought on by having too much fun at Burning Man.
135. A series of poor decisions and incompetence culminates in the shackle factory producing papier-mâché shackles to cut costs. When the Twerp and the Homeless man are caught out in the rain, the shackles start making a huge mess all over some poor woman's patio. Eventually they just disintegrate. Great, but now the Homeless man feels like he needs to clean up the papier-mâché mess. Of course the Twerp just stands there not doing anything, totally oblivious to the fact that he should also be helping. The Homeless man gives the Twerp the evil eye and breathes through his nose noisily.
136. The Shackles are stolen by Somali pirates. "We leave no one behind!" says the Homeless man. But they do, and the shackles are forced into the sex trade.
137. The shackles has a dream that it is falling, but it doesn't wake up before its dream self hits the ground so it dies in real life.
138. It's all part of an elaborate prank and the Homeless man is really the Twerp's broseph Joe in disguise. Joe makes the Twerp go to the bathroom with him and wait next to a bed while shackled while Joe nails this chick. At then end the Twerp is all "Joe, dude! Of course! I should have known it was you! You totally got me! I thought you were homeless!"
139. Because he hasn't eaten for almost a week, the Homeless man eats the shackles while the Twerp looks on in horror. The homeless man loses a lot of teeth this way, but he again digests the shackles and gains whatever power they have. The Twerp becomes his sidekick and then, as you say, eventually opens a restaurant called "Homeless Wisdom."
140. After a few weeks of being shackled, the Homeless man sits the Twerp down. "Okay. You know how being shackled has really made us both better people? Like, you got to see how homeless people live and I got to see that I'm partially to blame for my living situation?" and the Twerp, confused, replies "Yes...and....?" The Homeless man, nervous, continues. "And we're friends now, too, right? We're friends and we never would have been without the shackles. I mean, maybe being shackled wasn't so bad after all." The Twerp looks bewildered but says "Yeah, I guess there were some upsides. What's your point?" The Homeless man, unable to actually say the words, simply lifts up the leg of his pants, revealing that the shackles have been shackled to his peg leg and that he could have removed the shackles all along simply by sliding them off of his peg leg. The two friends have a laugh about it, hug it out, and then later the Twerp shackles the Homeless man's real leg to a mannequin, which he then throws into a wood chipper.
141. I don't know...a T-Rex eats the shackles?
Etan! Thanks for reading-- it's always good to see a new name grace the comments sections of the blog. That said, the idea that the team behind Air Bud made any mistake whatsoever as they created the most enchanting and profitable pet sports movie OF ALL TIME offends me to my marrow, and I hope you drown.
Another draft? At first I was irritated by this comment, because WTF this is obviously more a list of ideas than it is a draft of anything. But then BOOM IT HIT MY BRAIN this would make a great movie if you just had a celebrity reading the different things that can happen to unshackle shackles. So great! BUT WHICH CELEB? LIST TO FOLLOW.
UGH! U GUYS KEEP SAYING SHACKLES TOO MUCH!!!!
Were there any other pet sports movies besides Air Bud? I don't mean this in a complimentary way, no one else thought this was a genre worth making besides those who cashed in after the fact on Air Bud rip-offs. Also all of this is just awful. I thought it was sort of a joke, but there are so many attempts... this would never get made into anything anyone would want to consume.
Do you have any other ideas for unshackling? No offense, but none of these are tickling my fancy.
Hello Stephen,
Initial thoughts: As a bass guitarist, I take offense to this screenplay. Not all bass guitarists are homeless or starving and "shackled" to others and dependent on them for food, shelter, etc.
When I was 22 years old, I got a job as a CPA (certified public accountant). I've had this same job for 15 years now, and I have a steady income and a nice home. I'm financially secure and any one of my neighbors will tell you that I am trustworthy and considerate of others. I am not, nor have I ever been homeless.
DESPITE this fact, I have played bass guitar since I was 14. Rather than making me homeless, playing bass guitar has proven, time in and time out, to be a very enriching and rewarding experience for me. It has shaped who I am and who my friends are. It has literally zero negative effect on my housing situation, and indeed, some people at work are even impressed to hear that I play the bass guitar. Because people find this fact interesting and it helps them get to know me better, in a way, playing the bass guitar has actually given me MORE job security rather than less.
So frankly, the implications you make in this screenplay are without merit, and in my case do not apply at all. I think if you take an unbiased look at the bass guitar community (http://www.talkbass.com/), you'll see that being homeless is far, very far from common with bass guitar players. I urge you to reconsider and rewrite your screenplay.
cut off feet.
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