Missed episode four? Here it is.
Want to watch along? Here is the video.
Before finding out Donnie’s fate, let’s honor someone very dear to his heart.
To make this patchy drink, you’ll need:
- 1/4 ounce blue curacao (DeKuyper)
- 2 ounces creme de violette (Rothman & Winter; the flavored syrup is okay)
- 1 cup Extra Creamy Cool Whip or similar whipped topping
- Pour chilled blue curacao into the center of a champagne flute.
- In a bowl, mix together chilled creme de violette and Cool Whip. Mix it until the clumps are gone and it’s a muted lavender color.
- Immediately pour into the flute, as close to the center as possible.
- Enjoy the changing patterns as you sip.
Serves 1 person pining for a lost loved one
As soon as I heard about creme de violette, I knew I had to include it in at least one of the cocktails in this batch. It’s difficult to find in stores, so ordering it may be your best bet, but even that can turn into a hunt. If you don’t feel like going through the trouble, the syrup is readily available through most online retailers. The only difference is that the alcohol content is decreased for this cocktail.
Unfortunately, depending on your taste buds, the violette may not be potent. By itself, the violette is intense; it’s like drinking crushed and strained flower petals, and the aroma can knock you over like a perfume counter. For me, the Cool Whip lessens the violette’s potency in both taste and bouquet. (Since my cocktails tend to be brain-punchingly powerful, that may work in your favor.) The blue curacao remains untouched for the most part, even when it streams through the violette-whip mix. The small patch at the bottom knocks against the palate for a strong finish, adding a bit of force behind what is supposed to be a gentle cream.
Why Cool Whip instead of heavy cream? It created the consistency I was looking for. But if you let it sit for too long, it’ll give you a thicker mix that barely moves. One time I made the mistake of mixing it and then storing it in the fridge for later. When I poured it into the flute, I ended up getting it on the sides of the glass, and it stuck. The sloppy ribbons were almost frozen in place, not so much defying gravity but viciously mocking it, even as I turned the empty flute all around.
It looked like one of those obnoxiously messy drinks that the other food blogs do, where they pour caramel, chocolate, or some other topping with wild abandon and get it all over the glass and table, and it’s supposed to look artsy or some shit. How the hell are you supposed to pick it up? What about the waste?
Anyway, don’t let it sit for too long after you’ve poured it, either. The violette-whip thickens and refuses to budge. Not even the blue curacao can get through. But it does try, and it’s kind of neat to watch it move like a lazy stream amid the “clouds.”
The stuff will get stuck to the sides, so finish it up with a spoon, preferably with a demitasse spoon for flair. (Or you can be like me and use a plain soup spoon and pretend you’re not blue-collar “faux-ncy.”)
Unlike the Bromance drink where I had to be careful with how I poured in order to create the gradient, this is a different design every time. Some drinks have more blue veins, others have white spaces that resemble clouds, and some looked more like tie-dye art. It’s as mercurial and beautiful as Elissa Hoffman herself may have been.
With a Blue Patches in hand, let’s watch the not quite final episode in the Demo Reel series.
We tune back in to find the Demo Reel Trio still watching their found footage. At this point, it feels like I should have a silhouette of them in theater seats taped to the bottom right corner of my laptop screen while I imagine them riffing.
In the video, Tacoma is gawking at Donnie’s prized binder. He’s got a shocker for us.
TACOMA: You’re not going to believe this.
With as much flair as he can muster, Tacoma flips around the open binder to reveal his shocking find…
Rebecca instantly recognizes the kid as Jimmy Boyd, a “godawful” child actor who starred with Ahnuld in a Christmas movie called Jingle Sells and spouted his even more godawful catchphrase of “Whoopee!”
She’s on the money. But there’s more. Tacoma takes a marker and makes some adjustments to the sheet protector so the startling truth can be revealed.
Oh, dear gods, I was right. Tacoma did unearth an embarrassing childhood photo! But I have no room to speak, for I also was an ugly duckling who grew into a mallard with a sparkling personality.
We rejoin Donnie… or Jimmy… no, we’ll keep calling him Donnie. *ahem* We rejoin him as the camera films him. That isn’t unusual. What’s unusual is that he’s in bed; he can barely move save for leaning his head forward, speaking, and making facial expressions (particularly of the horrified variety); there’s a public domain instrumental version of Jingle Bells playing on an infuriating loop; and someone else is holding the camera.
If you thought it was the lone member of SWAG, you’re wrong. That would require action on SWAG’s part, and as we’ve seen, he’s taking his sweet time almost bothering the rest of the Demo Reel crew. No, Donnie is up against something more dangerous, more awful than a blood enemy.
Obsessed fans.
Worse yet, obsessed fans who have the joy of meeting one of their most favorite child-now-grown-up-actors. Who are these people who are helping Donnie out by letting him rest in one of their beds and feeding him mystery pills? Meet Adam (Jason Laws), Jill (Jori Laws), and Liz (Briana Laws).
DONNIE: That’s the ghost girl!
ADAM: No, no, that’s just our daughter, and she’s been a very bad young lady. Haven’t you, Liz?
LIZ: Maybe…
DONNIE: I-I-I saw her in the woods!
ADAM: She was following you around for a while, while you were out there. Say you’re sorry, Liz.
LIZ: Sorry…
DONNIE: But… she was whispering horrible, creepy things to me!
ADAM: Yeah, she was trying to scare you while you were out there. Say you’re sorry, Liz!
LIZ: Sorryyy…
DONNIE: But… she was in the corner.
ADAM: Well, she was being punished for trying to scare you. Say you’re sorry, Liz!
LIZ: Sorry!
DONNIE: But somebody knocked me out!
ADAM: You were an intruder in our house and you were staring at our daughter!
JILL: *cuffs Adam in the shoulder* Adam, say you’re sorry!
ADAM: Sorry.
As an aside, these people are kind of adorable. The Lawses pull off the hyped stalker fan personas very well. Their characters express genuine joy for a once-in-a-lifetime coincidence with the awful smear of possessiveness lurking underneath it all.
Pulling off these incongruous traits is impressive, and they inspire a strange emotion in me. They’re like delightful versions of Kathy Bates’s Annie Wilkes in Misery. I shouldn’t like these characters, and yet I find myself wanting to smush their faces while admonishing them for being terrible human beings.
Oh, lord, that movie poster. Tacoma is finding all kinds of gems lately. This is an entry of Jingle Sells from an obviously fake IMDB. Yes, they call him Ahnuld in this universe, which kind of makes me want to live here.
The realization that they’ve been working with famed child actor Jimmy Boyd is still sinking in. More questions are bubbling and Tacoma will have to dig deeper to find out why their boss has kept his true identity a secret all this time.
REBECCA: Did you know about this, Quinn?
QUINN: Are ye kiddin’ me? The worst child actor of all time, roight undter our noses? And not a single crack at his expense? *scoffing sniff* Ye don’t sit on a joke that long.
Donnie revives again. Silent Night plays in the background, but all is not calm and all is not bright, especially with Adam and Jill staring lovingly down at him. You know, the family isn’t given a last name, so I’ll make up one for them. How about the Obsesserellis?
The Obsesserellis are just brimming with fan bliss. Here, in their house, drugged to the point of paralysis, is the Jimmy Boyd. What a gift from the heavens to have him coincidentally—or serendipitously—rambling in the woods nearby. But how did they know he was really Jimmy?
LIZ: We’ve seen your movies, like, a gadillion times!
ADAM: Yes, we recognized your bone structure!
DONNIE: My bone structure?!
ADAM: Your movies were so bad we had to watch them over and over again!
LIZ: It’s a family tradition!
JILL: And… we have a surprise for yooouuu…
A DVD of Galaxy Battle, “one of the worst space operas of all time starring one of the worst child actors of all time.” Donnie looks like he wants to crumple into tears, but he’s not getting out of this. It’s impossible, since the pills he keeps trustingly swallowing have rendered him weaker than a newborn hamster.
Man, if looks could kill… Donnie’s would probably lightly bruise.
This forced togetherness is only going to get worse. (By the way, if you ever want to know how I appear during holiday gatherings, Donnie’s expression is spot-on.)
ADAM: Well, I got another little surprise for you. Can you guess what it is?
DONNIE: Does it rhyme with “single hell”?
ADAM: *whips out DVD* Jingle Seeeeellllllssss!
Meanwhile, using the power of IMDB, Tacoma has unearthed another shocker.
TACOMA: Well, I figured out that a few bad movies wasn’t the only reason he changed his identity.
REBECCA: What, did he make some bad shows, too?
Oof.
TACOMA: She was middle-aged. The roles just dried up. Single mom, divorced, battling depression for all these years… Guess it was too much.
REBECCA: That’s horrible.
TACOMA: Donnie’s career was on the rise as hers fell. Poor kid found out while he was on set. Had to shoot the rest of the film with a fake mother and an Austrian muscleman. What do you suppose something like that does to a kid?
Let’s slow it down for some real talk. You may suspect that Elissa Hoffman is based on a real actress. You’re not wrong. And if you guessed Elizabeth Hartman, you’re… also not wrong.
I’ll get more serious now, because this isn’t a joking matter. If you want to fill in the blanks, read along with me as I summarize her IMDB page. Elizabeth Hartman made her big screen debut as a blind, abused girl who falls in love with Sidney Poitier’s character in the 1965 movie A Patch of Blue (based on the novel of the same name, and good luck finding a copy of that as it’s rarer than coconut Pocky).
Battling depression, she maintained a fairly consistent career until 1975. She returned briefly in the early 80s, with her last ever role being the voice of Mrs. Brisby in The Secret of NIMH. Despite this seemingly optimistic climb back into a thriving acting career, it wasn’t to last. Depression, in its tenacious and destructive mission to turn the mind against itself, eventually won over Hartman, and she took her own life—out of her fifth-floor apartment window. Sadly, she’s mostly forgotten except by devoted cinephiles and Don Bluth fans.
His friends now know why Donnie mocks the movies he’s remaking. In his small, inept way, he’s trying to get back at the industry who may have had a hand in his mother’s death. And now I really want to hug the guy.
Meanwhile, at family movie night, we listen to some iconic heartwarming dialogue from the bane of Donnie’s existence.
AHNULD: Dahn’t worree, JohnEE, I’ll get yoo that Speedy Man doll for Christmas AARH.
JIMMY: *monotonously* I love you, Daddy.
AHNULD: I love yoo, JohnEE BAARGGH.
Adam and Jill lose it while they watch a stunned Jimmy plod through his lines. They can’t believe he could be such a failure at his own craft.
By the way, if little Jimmy’s lackluster acting rings any bells for you (yes, I should be drawn and quartered), then you may have some buried memories of Jingle All the Way lodged somewhere in your gray matter. If that’s the case, I find that banging the back of my head against a hard surface while the movie is playing does wonders. It won’t help you forget it or alter your memories of the movie, but it does make watching more bearable. But Doug is making fun of Jake Lloyd’s acting in the movie, which is kind of a balm.
ADAM: There’s, like, no emotion in your voice! What was going through your head at the time?
DONNIE: Well, my mother killed herself for one.
*shocked silence*
DONNIE: Oh, yeah. Yeah, they, uh, they didn’t talk about it that much, they felt it dampened the Christmas spirit, but… it happened. And I tried to press on as best as I could under the circumstances. *chuckle* In the end it doesn’t matter, ’cause I gave a bad performance. And in the end, that… is everything. I mean, that’s enough to judge a person for the rest of his life, for people to, uh, shout things across the street, call him names, say he’s a horrible person. Because I gave a bad performance.
*heavy pause*
DONNIE: I-I-I didn’t think acting was really anything to be ashamed of. I mean, I didn’t seem to be hurting anyone, I loved doing it, it was following in my mother’s footsteps… But in the end… no. I gave a bad performance, and I should really, really be sorry for it. And I am. I’m so sorry that I did that. Can you forgive me? C-can you forgive me, that my mother died and because of that, I couldn’t give it my all to entertain you? Because I’m really sorry about that. I am. I am so fucking sorry.
This is the worst we’ve seen Donnie in terms of emotion. His voice is not just dripping with sarcasm, it’s soaked through to the marrow. Even Adam and Jill are taken aback. It’s downright frightening. I find myself shrinking a little whenever I hear the last line.
ADAM: *cracks up* You almost had me going there for a minute, I was really starting to believe that!
JILL: Someone must have taken acting lessons!
ADAM: No kidding! Oh, oh! Here’s the scene where you’re about to fly around with Ahunuld’s rocket pack!
AHNULD: YAARRGGGHHHAAAGGHHHwagawagaAAAGGGHHRRRR!
Rebecca and Tacoma are still coming to terms with their discovery. Rebecca’s comment about how Donnie is forty-two and has “nothing to live for” is especially sobering. But her boss’s tragedy has sparked something in the actress. She’s on fire, railing against the system and how it chews up people and their dreams.
REBECCA: We can’t let Donnie keep destroying himself!
TACOMA: Well, what do you want to do?
REBECCA: Let’s make a movie.
TACOMA: Um… that’s what we always do.
REBECCA: No, I-I-I mean a real movie! A good movie!
TACOMA: Oh. One of those.
Nothing can dampen Rebecca’s resolve. Sure enough, Tacoma’s caught it, and he’s ready to write with the help of a diet Red Bull and vodka cocktail. (Damn, there’s a recipe I could’ve put a spin on for this batch. Oh, well. Hindsight.)
*the tune of end credits mercifully plays out*
JILL: Okay, time to get you back to bed!
ADAM: Yeah, you need your rest so we can watch this again tomorrow!
DONNIE: *achy-sounding* How long are you guys planning on doing this?
JILL: Until you feel better…
ADAM: Oh! And until one of my friends come over and they can watch with you, too!
LIZ: Whoopee!
THE OBSESSERELLIS: Whoopeeeeee!
Rebecca has probably never been on a roll like this. She’s bursting with ideas on what this new project should be. But Demo Reel doesn’t just make movies, they base their movies on other movies. Tacoma readily supplies information about Elissa Hoffman’s Oscar-winning role in Blue Patches, which he describes as “kind of like Helen Keller meets Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.”
Rebecca has it: A sequel!
Back at the cozy rabid fan den, Adam and Jill are sleeping in what appears to be Liz’s bed. The poor kid seems to be doing okay, though. She’s adopted the Demo Reel custom of filming everything, recording her parents as she alerts them to a glaring oversight.
LIZ: Tss! Dad? Aren’t you supposed to give Jimmy his medicine?
ADAM: Medicine?
LIZ: Yeah, like the really important medicine?
ADAM: *confused pause*
LIZ: The heavy narcotics?
Realizing their error, the family rushes to the other bedroom to find the bed utterly Donnie-less. A voice comes from the other side of the room. Its owner leans against the door, shutting it and trapping the Obsesserellis inside with him.
DONNIE: The funny thing about muscle relaxers… is they have to be taken consistently in order for them to take effect. Especially ones as strong as these. *drops the medicine bottle like a mic*
Oh. My. Sweet lord. Dorky guy morphs into an alpha male… The grim set of the mouth. The glare under the lowered eyebrows. Anger and determination mixed with level headedness and a possible intent to maim or kill. My other weakness! Oh, Donnie, I take back the hand turkey crack in episode two. You could probably do better than a bread knife for a weapon, but I’ll overlook it.
Adam and Jill cower while Liz bravely films on, possibly from the Demo Reel-ness need to film everything already becoming second nature to her.
ADAM: We… w-w-we were just having a little fun!
DONNIE: “Fun”?
JILL: Yeah, we…we didn’t mean anything by it…
DONNIE: You people… You never “mean anything by it” when you really think about it, it’s when you don’t think about it that your inner dicks come out!
Donnie is hot. He’s also pretty incensed, and has he got some strong words for his kidnappers.
DONNIE: You… you took something that was miserable from the past and you just obsessed over it! You made it into your lives! Wh-why can’t you think of something that’s important like people or their feelings or…
Suddenly, his rage cools into an epiphany.
DONNIE: No, no. This is good. This is good. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, this—this is real good. You wanna know why? You wanna know why? I almost became you. I almost became… what you are… I almost let something really stupid, really painful, really hurtful from the past… consume me. Well, no more. I am done obsessing, I am not doing this anymore…
With his piece said, Donnie makes his escape. Admittedly, the epiphanic speech is kind of dampened by his verbal blundering from that point on, but damn, he really laid into them.
I have to add that it’s a good thing Donnie didn’t wale on his captors. That might have required him to throw off his jacket or roll up his sleeves. To see those arms in action, biceps bursting with adrenaline-infused muscle, forearms bolstered to drive blows, knuckles taut and bloodied…
Oh, yeah, these guys. If Rebecca’s acting career doesn’t pan out, she can give screenwriting or another form of storytelling a shot. She’s determined to give Donnie a gift he never knew he wanted. It will be the “greatest love story ever told,” something bigger and better than Demo Reel itself.
With Rebecca playing the lead, Tacoma playing the other lead, Quinn operating the camera (natch), and Fabrizio playing a supporting character—
TACOMA: Do you have any acting experience?
FABRIZIO: Yeah, ‘specially under oath.
—they are ready to film the sequel to Blue Patches.
The movie they made… it’s… well…
It tells a story of love rediscovered and lost again, and how inescapable loss can break a heart, yet heal and rebuild. The movie condenses what could have been a two-hour drama into a six-minute feature. It hits all the points in perfect measure; there are no hiccups, and it all flows perfectly.
Let me put it this way: It makes me want to become a better writer.
Look at these lines.
“You feel that? That’s the same heart that fluttered in Central Park. It’s the same heart that beats in your chest. So long as you feel that beat, we’re alive.”
“I would spend a million lives in darkness just for this moment.”
“I see a woman of extraordinary courage. A woman so powerful, so beautiful, that not even this world can contain her.”
I hear them first as a viewer, then I feel them as a writer. They’re words that can hit the heart, or rip it apart and form it back into a beating core. They’re words from a book you’re reading that take you out of your own body and put you right there in the scene, with the characters, or as the characters, and the real world seems to stop just for you so you can actually live those words, even for a moment.
I think back to the emotional scenes I’ve written and wonder if I hit every beat, if I actually reached into my characters’ inner worlds and brought out their truths. Hearing lines like those above makes me hope I one day have that kind of power as a writer. And goddamn if I don’t tear up every time I watch the ending.
Yes, all this from a silly sitcom about a group of people making crappy movie remakes. All this in six minutes. Telling an emotionally loaded story no easy task, especially when done in such a short amount of time. In terms of storytelling, at least for me, it’s damn near perfect.
(And I’ll give Fabrizio some credit. He does try.)
The crew are proud of themselves, as they have every right to be.
REBECCA: Wow. That was… really good!
TACOMA: Yeah, it was a little cliched in some parts, but…
REBECCA: Yeah, but for us?
TACOMA: Oh, that is Citizen Fuckin’ Kane for us.
Rebecca takes the SD card out of the computer. She declares that they have to save it, which begs the question of why they don’t back it up to an external hard drive. Why have the one copy on removable media?…
But who should finally show up! The lone member of SWAG snatches the card from Rebecca’s hand. She regards him with annoyance rather than terror. Given his half-assed attempts at terrorizing them, it’s appropriate.
With fumbling flourish and a frustrated gasp as he throws off his blank mask, we meet…
D’aw, lookit him! He’s too bright-eyed and adorable to be evil!
I mean, finally, after all this time, we meet…
COLLINS: Tom Collins, Grand Leader Master of SWAG! And I believe this—*holds up the SD card*—is mine!
TACOMA: Says who?
COLLINS: *pulls out a gun*
TACOMA: Okay, we coo’, we coo’!
COLLINS: *slides the lock back on the gun for whatever reason and aims again*
TACOMA: I said we coo’! I even took out the L for emphasis!
Collins (Steve Harper) is serious. He’s also pretty incompetent. I mean, more so than what we’ve already witnessed.
Notice anything off about the gun? I’ll give you a hint: It isn’t the safety.
That position is for changing or inserting a magazine, or to put the safety on. In addition to all that, the firing pin is in the slide. When the slide moves forward, it strips off the first bullet from the magazine and chambers it. I don’t know if Harper locked the slide as a precaution, if he was treating the slide like the hammer on a pistol, or if he thought doing this looked cool and dangerous, but with the slide locked to the rear, that gun ain’t firing.
Now I can buy Tom Collins not knowing how to operate his own weapon. I can buy Rebecca and Tacoma thinking their lives are still in danger. But I cannot buy Quinn simply standing by and not taking the opportunity to do something while the gun has been rendered inoperable. Unless Quinn’s sole duty was getting supplies for pipe bombs, Mr. “I May or May Not Have Been in the IRA But I Definitely Was” McStereotype has no excuse to not seize the opportunity to use a well-toned arm to clothesline the guy. Gads!
The triptych still doesn’t feel right without Donnie. Collins has forced the crew out to the main area and holds them at gunpoint. Quinn is free to keep recording the events, either because Collins wants Donnie to see how he destroyed his friends and company, or he just loves the spotlight that much.
If you’re wondering about Fabrizio…
… he’s not gonna be of any help. Probably too busy preparing another batch of pasta sauce.
Tacoma calls Collins’s bluff. Sure enough, the SWAGgart isn’t going to kill anyone.
But he will destroy the SD card containing the only copy of the best thing Demo Reel has ever made, you fucksquatch!
If you’re pissed off, don’t worry. Your anger will never match that of Rebecca’s. She is a beast, blinded by her own hair, yet fists still aiming for Collins’s face. And what the hell is Quinn doing? Pretty much nothing, as he’s so conditioned to filming everything that he gets the camera too close to the violence and loses the device on the floor. I’m thinking he just printed out the propaganda posters.
Tacoma makes the mistake of pulling Rebecca off Collins, which frees him up to collect his gun. Just as he’s making his slow, lazy escape…
Oh, dear lord. From inept survivalist tenderfoot to full-on wild man. Donnie’s face is smudged with dirt and darkened from days-old growth. Animal skins adorn him. His voice is commanding. His unbuttoned shirt reveals a patch of chest hair. And he’s still wearing his glasses! It’s raw masculinity blended with modern nerd culture gone native. My third weakness! There aren’t enough Quinn or Tacoma arms to match this.
With a soft hit from his makeshift spear, Donnie takes down Collins. Then he stands over the corpulent foe, brandishing his camera.
DONNIE: All right, SWAG. You called down the thunder, well, now you’ve got it! *holds up camera* You see that? It says that I’m a filmmaker. Take a good look at it, SWAG, ’cause that’s the way you’ll never end up! The Swedes are finished, ya understand me? I see a Swedish flag, I kick the ass wearing it! So run, you cur! Run! And tell all the other curs that Donnie DuPre is coming! You tell them Jimmy Boyd is coming! And film’s coming with me, you hear? Film’s coming with me!
Ohhh, Donnie, I take back half the bad things I said about your wilderness incompetence!
Compelled to flee like the yellow-belly he is, Collins skitters through an archway and just as soon fall backwards…
CARL: And vhere are you going, mein friend? Ze ass kicking iz here!
Our beloved war criminal only gets in a few kicks, but Carl thoroughly enjoys himself. But I must ask again, why not get the cops involved… ah, forget it. Carl may as well count as an entire police force. He even gets Collins to hand over his gun before he kicks the Swede out.
DONNIE: Carl! You came back for me.
CARL: A good German never leaves a comrade behind. Besides, you have my paycheck.
Our heroes wind… aw, damn, Donnie cleaned up. Anyway, our heroes wind down after a thrilling evening. A muffled news broadcast plays in the background. Tacoma apologizes to their boss for snooping around his files. Donnie doesn’t seem to mind.
DONNIE: Ah, it’s okay. You know, being… out there for those days made me realize something… Y’know, bad, strange stuff can consume people… like a certain group of people that I came across. But, the way I see it, you can either be… taken over by it, or you can choose to move on with your life. And I can say for sure now, that I know what’s important, who’s important, and why they’re important.
Wise words, and some that people should really take to heart—particularly by those in the YouTube community.
The broadcast announces the new year rolling in and the crew drinks a toast to “good times, good people,” and to a future that simply doesn’t exist for Demo Reel. It kind of ends on a low note—well, slightly high note if you count Carl yelling at Quinn for drinking his schnapps—but it’s a tidy little ending for a short-lived series.
But we’re not done yet. Things must be made right. The slate must be wiped clean again. A hero must return and one must fall. And I must do another Demo Reel triptych.
Ahh. Better.
After this, it’s the true ending of Demo Reel.
Prep Episode 1 Episode 2 Episode 3 Episode 4 Episode 5 Episode 6 Cleanup
