CRESPI CRISPY APPLE: NEAR-FUTURE HUMAN ENHANCEMENT

 

Gladyce: when it rains hard i step outside the Treehouse DELIBERATELY IN MY SOCKS. no shoes. no pointy clogs. i love the sensation of my socks quickly welling up with water, getting soaked, soaked socks, that wetness heals me as my toes glide along the cobblestone.

Doryce: dear the WINDS ARE BLOWING!!!

Gladyce: i know, babe, you gotta do something about it.

Doryce: fret not, dear, i never give floods i only give fucks. atmospheric rivers are the gentle antlers of rain deer. you and the whole town knows my mouth is BIG ENOUGH in area and circumference to SWALLOW ANYTHING. all the wind will enter my mouth and fall in love.

me: i wish i were a machine to escape my problems.

Avo: what kind of machine would you be? i'd be a zamboni.

Michaela From Safeway wearing a twinset cardigan: i'd be one of those Terminator red-lazer checkout conveyor-belt computers at the grocery-store register. what, i like my job.

Mr. Diamond: i know what i'd be, he says as he rubs his bald head looking longingly out at the ocean, i would be the oldest Kinko's printer in the junkyard.

I Want To Eat Your Pancreas: it wasn't disgusting, it was sad.

alternative assets: the life of Kurt Cobain is an annuity, it will be worth the world forever, it's as if Kurt Cobain lived to be 100 years old. you can't contain the Cobain.

The Pope: pope tits. think about it, those are MY sets and assets and they are worth heaven hell and the afterlife.

me: hey Phone, why the fuck would i call back potential spam? thanks for the reminder of that missed call on my phone.

rizz: charisma in Baltimore

Princess Peach: if you want to fall in love, set up an interview with the person. that person will soon become your person, that's how i got to REALLY KNOW Luigi.

The Mighty Ducks: it was a solar-powered ice rink on top of the roof, not a skylight. 

Cotard: yeah, a skylight was known as a clerestory back in my day, you know, like the windows on a VW bus.

Codrus: i hate lightwells, they're sneaky little bastards. daylighting goes against my religion.

Michael Weiss: my weird uncle Larry sings the Who's the Boss theme song.

Pat is strangely inside an office again. Princeton Professor Julian Zelizer's office.

Zelizer: want a seltzer?

Pat: where's Julia Ioffe?

Zelizer: no idea. i have no idea where that attractive ginger is. 

Pat: but you're Julian and she's Julia. 

cheat day: every day

alternative art: art done not in art school

Archway fruitcake: Medieval monk munchies

me: you'll never see a Walmart order like this again from any human: one laptop computer, one can of beans.

University of Maryland Global Campus: yes, Leo Messi is enrolled with us here.

Tosin Cole: i didn't slight Doctor Who by not appearing on the Special, i was busy doing the House Party reboot. turns out House Party was a better franchise overall than Doctor Who.

Michael Weiss: the people on Instagram HAVE TO BE THERE FOREVER, 75% of them are disabled.

Dirg: and doable.

Michael Weiss: disabled physically or mentally. the other 5% like me, the narrator, and Santy Claus are BOTH!!! love amongst the broken people. the bank cable suspension is a ONCE-IN-A-LIFETIME OPPORTUNITY!!! this is your chance to FINALLY LEAVE INSTAGRAM FOREVER!!! 

Pele: these 4 days of the blackout bank cable suspension have been hard, i still have no idea how that Buffalo Bills player with the arrythmia is doing, i hope he's okay.

Cristiano Ronaldo: i'd have to literally step outside and get a paper newspaper to find out about that Buffalo Bills player Hamlin.

Luke Skywalker hanging from a skylight like Spider-Man: i sent him Force vibes, my brother will recover survive and be alright.

Cristiano Ronaldo: i don't like going outside, i don't like being outside, i'm a homebody. i like just staying in my man cave with the 4 garages.

cutthroat trout: you find them in prison toilets.

bottle job: natural peroxide

kin keeping: works well with innkeeping.

Eye Luggage: Ghost in the Shell (2017) and go.

Takahashi: sponsored by HONDA.

Dirg: i mean is she naked or is that supposed to be a see-through lycra bodysuit?

Scarlett Johansson: both. unfortunately. Colin Jost modeled it for me.

William Gibson: the world here is RENDERED AWESOME. it's a cool computer world, 3D titillation, expansive, neon worldbuilding, floaty cars, ramen carts, green garbage trucks with the Anarchy A symbol spraypainted in black, teenage turtles doing mall karate, neo-futuristic, Neo Tokyo in the classic sense. 

Keanu Reeves in a black leather jacket and white shades: and classicist sense.

William Gibson: it copies from me my cyberpunk i mean Blade Runner, Blade Runner. 

The Major: Mira Killian, that's my Americanized name.

me: i don't get this, the cyberbrain, my life has been OBSESSED with the cyberbrain. imagine a human being fitted with a cyberbrain instead of a real brain. what could she or he know? they could calculate the speed of light to make a nuclear-fusion chamber for the world. but would they still be human thinking through a computer? here, Motoko has a real brain not a computer brain.

Bjork: All Is Full of Love music video, 1999.........which version did you like better? the album version or the hip-hop version?

Rila Fukushima: shame that my geisha-robot costume covered up all my real-life assets...

machine: it's an augmentation, not an improvement...

"Beat" Takeshi Kitano: beat in the good sense, the nice sense, the music sense. don't you love how i speak Japanese and everyone somehow understands me?

ScarJo: we're all building a global village here, folks.

Juliette Binoche: i have a heart, i wasn't a cold doctor. i wanted Scarlett as my own daughter cos she's cool and European-continental and can pass for French. people confuse me for Julia Ormond but i got kicked out of police psychiatry so i ended up in cybernetics, easier to deal with robots than Goren. 

Cutter: not the sexy doctor, not the healer of humanity, not a grouch's goddess, i'm a cutthroat businessman...

shell: i mean i'm better than AI for the future of Earth, right?

ghost: a cooler name than spirit.

The Major: can i ask you one thing?

Ouelet: anything, darling, my love.

the Major: does Casper the Ghost have an artificial body? 

Ouelet: you can plug into me anytime, i am a human outlet. how's the sex life? i'm only asking as your doctor.

Major: i only like women, but is that me or you programmed my sex drive into me with a flash drive?

Ouelet: yeah we had to, you'd never be able to work with others in an office setting, the environment would be too electric, if you were straight, we couldn't hire any men.

Codrus: remember, humans were born to be weapons only.

Major: i'm experiencing glitches.

Binoche: those are just dreams, very existential, very French. come on, let's dance.

Major: i like girls, but i'm only doing a deep dive into this hot geisha robot for work, okay? GET ME THE FUCK OUTTA HERE. you'd think a trillion welcoming hands groping your body welcoming you to another plane of existence would be warm and comforting but it's not.

Major: i fell in love with your ice-blue eyes.

Batou: you did? damn, too late. how do i look with my new eyes?

Major: weird.

Batou: think of my eyes as really tiny but still cool John Lennon glasses. plus they're cool mirrors when i shave.

yakuza nightclub: it's not sexual assault if they're robots.

Kuze: only you understand me, ScarJo. we are experiments, not people. we're not people to them. we were childhood friends but they took us before we could become more than friends. tore us from our mother's arms, wrenched by the state. how about we sex now? in the goofy way only we can, by hanging on wires. i'm a virgin in the, uh, human sense, that's why i joined a band. you don't remember any of this?

Major: no. i take my vitamins.

Kuze: throw away the drugs they give you, they don't come in a recyclable orange bottle. pucker your lips, they won't be dry now. drugs suppress and repress. live life FREE. by not taking drugs it's like you're TAKING DRUGS!!! all your memories are YOURS, remember, your brain is real. it's the ultimate Transmission. love will tear us apart.

Major: you look familiar without your glistening silver face makeup. Ian Curtis?

Kuze: i killed myself but my consciousness was uploaded into this body, i'm fucking immortal. and immoral cos i'm a computer. hi let me shake your hand nice to meet you i've always wanted to meet you i'm Sam Riley.

Major: you can't fool me that's how we link.

Dr. Dahlin: Jules Smith

Kuze: what? i was just standing up for my fellow trashmen. the garbagemen guild is a powerful union and they demand equal pay in this new trashless society. trashless cos of all the hikikomori.

garbagemen: cyber sanitation workers. you ain't our brother.

worker: i thought i was a trash man. on a floating garbage truck. i never wanted to join an evil organization. i never wanted to be in a glass box with cheese air-holes like on that Twilight Zone episode where i cut my own throat for money, that's how paltry our salary is.

Binoche: do i have your permission?

Major: yes.

Binoche: we never needed your permission, i was just being polite. i am so sorry, i implanted your memories, it was the only way i could save you from the military. 

Major: i'm still wondering why you didn't implant in me that you were my mother.

Binoche: here, the address of your real mom, go before the glass shatters and it doesn't go your way. i can take a few bullets, it's bulletproof glass.

Aramaki: don't fuck with the old man, ya hear? capiche, goomba?

Shia LeBeouf: Aramaki reminds me so much of Yama from Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War. 

Monsignor Navin: which is an EXCELLENT ANIME. i want Yamamoto's stylish black robe. 

Shia: you finally get to see Yama kick ass in battle, how HIS FIRE really works. 

Dirg: and Orihime still has those DISPROPORTIONATELY BIG TITS.

Mardith: Yama can't be dead!!! is Head Captain really dead?!! i was just beginning to REALLY KNOW him.

Shia: sometimes as i'm slowly becoming a Catholic, integrating into Altar Boy, i feel like Twice fending for his bad-guy friends cos it's better than being alone and good. like Skins. 

Skins: Skins is more neutral than anything else.

Shia: and that GORGEOUS wavy colored-pencil-etchings animation of Lupin Zero!!! so nostalgic and warm and wondrous and wiggly. it's done in 2022 but it evokes the 1960s, that is rad!!!

Lupin: the 1960s in Japan was a time of great economic boom and boon, that's why kids could afford having guns.

Jigen smoking: so we're finally getting your origin story, Lupin!!! for real this time!!!

Dirg: i wanna see Grandpa Arsene Lupin in a threesome with two bimbos when he's old not young.

me: is it evoke or invoke? why or by? for or with? in or at? between or neoprene? i gotta go back to grammar school, i gotta take grammar class again. 

Batou: oh Motoko, can you hear me now?

Major: i hear you better when you talk than when you think, that is not good.

Batou: i switched to MCI.

Major: what's the meaning of life, Batou?

Batou: life is meaningless, it's all noise.

Major: so Heaven is silence?

Batou: huh. yeah i guess so. retracted. don't make me fish you out of the water, Motoko. SAY IT!!! SAY IT PROUD!!! LET ME CALL YOU BY YOUR NAME!!! YOUR REAL NAME!!!

ScarJo: Motoko Kusanagi, ScarMo.

Batou: i'm your only friend out here, the whole rest of the world is hunting you. i'm the only one you can trust.

Major: i trust you cos we lift weights together. excuse me while i change. clothes. can i get better work clothes than this wetsuit?

Batou: here girl, let's talk it over some tall cans of Arizona Iced Tea.

Major: hello? is this the apartment? are you my real mom?

mom: yes. my daughter ran away from home, but she's not a runaway. she had a nice privileged life with me in this dingy one-room apartment in the cyber-projects. she was a trust-fund kid. i know rebellious teenagers like to experiment...

Major: uh no they experimented ON ME!!! why would i kill myself? look at me!!!

mom: you are my daughter?!!! you look totally Japanese, like those pop idols with the really heavy orange tans. do you still like atomic fireballs?

Major: the alcoholic drink yes, the gum sticks to the wires which are my ribs. my ribs are wired, they're hearing and recording everything you're saying right now, mom, lie like you used to do when you talked to me.

Major: we were anti-augmentation brats.

Kuze: but not religious necessarily.

spider-tank: how can i be this big? isn't it more sense to have a Kraken-tank?

Tachikoma: missed opportunity, imagine me live-action...

Kuze: i will always be in your ghost. that's kinda like sex, right?

ScarJo: close enough.

Kuze: oh shit you forgot to download me before i died!!!

Aramaki: fall back.

Cutter: finally we're communicating, you want to work with me, we have an understanding, an agreement, we can be dance partners.

Aramaki: no, fall back into this indoor river as i shoot you with a big bullet. guns are so handy. 

Major: TAKE ME TO YOUR LEADER!!!

Tom Hanks: hello, i'm the leader of this organization. sorry about everything, things just kinda got out of hand. my eyes started spinning and getting misty when i saw that first check from IBM, i don't know anything about robotics.

ScarJo Motoko: mom, you don't have to visit me at this gravestone anymore. we can hug instead. 

mom: i know. what's your address?

ScarJo: 9 something. Section 69, go down the elevator. the scientists say anyone can rail me i won't feel it.

mom: besides, this place is creepy, all the gravestones are on the sidewalls not the ground. 

Scarlett Johansson: as the future gets more fucked up, watch more anime. hey, as i do my famous fall from the high skyscraper into the cybercity below and disappear, can i wear a Japanese schoolgirl uniform instead? wait i coulda just been invisible this whole time and still gotten paid for this? that would have saved me a lot of grief.

Dirg: what was all the fuss about?

Laertus: despite myself i enjoyed this movie. it was a nice enjoyable little ride. 

Mardith: a nice tight ride.

Eye: i had fun. but imagine Utada Hikaru as Motoko.

Mary Elizabeth McGlynn: i mean if you're gonna go with a white woman why not ME in the part!!! imagine ME in the part!!!

William Gibson: HEY LOOK!!! i'm the Craft Assistant on this movie!!!

me: hey i recognize this chanting at the end credits here. oh yeah it's the choir from the original anime film from the '80s. nice touch.

Monsignor Navin: i know that boys choir.

Laertus: this movie fails to grapple with the tension of the original manga and anime, the central existential question the philosophical problem posed by this world.

ScarJo: i know.

Dirg: which is?

Michaela From Safeway slapping Dirg upside the head with a plastic spoon: you dolt. it's the cyberbrain. did you feel that in your head?

Eye: namely, what is the soul? can you have a soul if you don't have a real body? can you have a soul if you don't have a real brain? when does the brain become the mind? does a soul require flesh and sponge?

Avo: think of meat. think of an egg trapped inside an Armenian hamburger.

me: and what of God if you're cybernetic? who or what is the cybernetic god? is God just a computer? do robots have souls?

Data: i can be funny with goth makeup on.

William Gibson: yes they do. it's called a cybersoul. and i am CyberGod. g'night folks.