Shmorgh is Bored – the Interweb Home of Randy Henderson

Due to cutbacks, the PsyPhy Network’s Holiday Classics Crappy Remake Department and their Scifi Classics Cheesy Remake Department have been merged. Here are some of the resulting projects that are now in various stages of production.

A Charlie Brown War of the Worldsmas

Good grief! Aliens invade the earth, and not even Linus’s nuclear-blue slanket can stop them. Charlie Brown tries to escape his new alien masters, but is caught, and Woodstock is roasted as punishment. Charlie is admonished by Lucy (“Charlie, you bonehead! You’ll get us all killed!”), and then is sent out by his masters to fetch biological samples for preservation.

Charlie wanders the wasteland that is the invasion’s aftermath, where he discovers his old bioengineered smartpet Snoopy decorating a bomb shelter, and mutant children with abnormally large heads try to capture falling ashes on their tongues for the meager nutrients. At last he stumbles across a group of children huddled in a school auditorium where they sing Christmas carols in the hopes that Santa Claus will save them from the aliens. Inspired to teach the aliens the spirit of Christmas, Charlie takes one of the last surviving pine trees back to the mothership. The aliens quickly succumb to Pine Needle Scale (Chionaspis pinifoliae) and all die, whereupon everyone cheers Charlie Brown as a hero.

Original Classics: A Charlie Brown Christmas & War of the Worlds

The Year that Santa Claus Stood Still

Nobody believes in Santa, so Santa refuses to go anywhere on Christmas Eve. Klatu the elf goes into town with his little reindeer, Gortzen, to give humans one last chance to prove themselves worthy of Christmas. When Klatu is shot and Gortzen is captured by local scientists, it is up to Missus Claus to seek the aid of the Heat Miser, Snow Miser, and Mother Earth to convince the nations of the world to unite in a promise of Christmas cheer, or else die beneath the floods of melted polar ice. In the end, children and grownups everywhere are shouting, “We believe in you Santa! Please, for the love of egg nog, we believe in you!”

Original Classics: The Year without a Santa Claus & The Day the Earth Stood Still

Frosty the Snow Blob

Astrophysicist Professor Hinkle is laughed out of a scientific convention when he claims that his crystal Mayan helmet is really an alien communications device. Frustrated, he throws it away. A group of children find it, and put it on a snowman they made. The snowman promptly comes to life, proclaiming, “Happy birthday! Resistance is futile!” Frosty immediately rolls over the children, absorbing them and growing in size faster than a snowball rolling downhill. Soon, the entire town is threatened, as the snowblob picks up everything in its path like a Christmas Katamari Dam-Icy. Only Santa, a saintly alien who had been guarding against the return of the Frostarians, can stop the snowblob. But can even his vaunted powers succeed?

Original Classics: Frosty the Snow Man & The Blob

Rudolph and This Island Earth of Misfit Toys 2

Rudolph is gifted a bizarre Build a Radio kit. After using his nose to power it he receives a message to fly to the mysterious Island of Misfit Toys, where he finds his old pal Hermey the Elf already there. Rudolph and Hermey are beamed onto a saucer sled by the winged lion Exeter and flown to the planet Northpolia, where they learn that the Northpolians are in danger from the evil Toytakerons.

The Northpolians hope to develop a new weapon to defend their planet before it is destroyed entirely – and the mysterious energy source of Rudolph’s nose is their best hope. But the Toytakerons begin a final assault, bombarding the planet with cheap plastic crap from Christmases past. Rudolf and Hermey battle the abominable snowbrain — a hideous creature made of white fur and a giant exposed brain – and then escape back to earth where they support an entire new merchandising line of toys and Christmas ornaments happily ever after.

Although originally scripted for a 90 minute movie, the actual planned film has been shortened to 17 minutes to allow for more commercial breaks.

Original Classics: Rudolph and the Island of Misfit Toys & This Island Earth

How the Grinch Snatched Bodies

The Grinch, fed up with Whys in Whysville and their constant laughing and singing and playing games during the holidays, sneaks into everyone’s homes and plants grinchpods in their basements. The pods open in the night and send forth creatures that take over the Whys’ sleeping bodies.

Soon, the Grinchified are stripping all personal joy and meaning out of the season, proposing white elephant exchanges of practical household goods even for personal family gatherings, jetting between holiday parties like club hopping celebrities, declaring themselves sick of holiday songs due to mall music inundation, and taking this year to really focus on themselves since they go all out on others every other year. But one Why, Mindy Ly Why, wakes in the night and realizes what is happening, and attempts to stop it. Will she find others who have not been Grinchified and avoid getting caught? Can she succeed in restoring true holiday spirit? Or will she end up as roast beast?

Original Classics: How the Grinch Stole Christmas & Invasion of the Body Snatchers

When Nestor’s Worlds Collide

Nestor the long eared donkey is horrified when his mother (and several national monuments) are smote by falling meteors. He is taken in by a kind pregnant woman, who is a message courier and needs a reliable method of transportation. She delivers messages between three wise scientists and learns that they have spotted a star in the sky – a star that is rapidly getting closer and is destined to consume the earth in fire. They manage to build a spacecraft, an ark of sorts, to carry a select group of humans to the new planet that is orbiting the coming star of doom.

Oh no! The ship is all full, with no seats for the pregnant woman! But wait — the kind-hearted pilot allows the woman and Nestor to stay in the cargo hold with the livestock and supplies. A child is born as the ship lands on the new planet. The child is named Hope, and seen as a symbol of a fresh start – but will she truly be a herald of hope, or will she only help to carry the bigotries, fears, and superstitions of the human race into the new world?

Only the sequel will tell.

Original Classics: Nestor the Long Eared Donkey & When Worlds Collide

—–

I originally published this on Fantasy Magazine