The Academy

21. REMAKE CLIP: "THE SHIP THAT SANK (AGAIN)"

Chonk Studios' remake of the famous ship romance plays on a monitor. Icy black sea. A floating door. BLUE lies on it. CHONKSY floats beside it, freezing, delivering a farewell.

BLUE (as heroine): There's room.

CHONKSY (as hero): (teeth chattering) There isn't.

BLUE: There's so much room.

CHONKSY looks. There is an enormous amount of room. He climbs on. They both fit. Violins swell anyway.

CHONKSY: …There was room the whole time.

BLUE: I know.

They float away, alive, slightly awkward.

1. INT. SUNKEN CRUISE SHIP BALLROOM · NIGHT

Present. Flashlights cut through a tilted ballroom forty years underwater: a chandelier hanging sideways, a grand piano on its back, a buffet still set, anemones growing out of the shrimp cocktail.

CHONKSY, SEABEAR and NAVY SEAL drift in.

SEABEAR: (moved, at the buffet) They never got to eat.

He picks up a forty-year-old shrimp, smells it, and eats it.

CHONKSY: Seabear.

SEABEAR: Still good. (chewing, philosophical) Humans preserve everything except each other.

NAVY SEAL lays a flipper on the piano to play it silently. It plays the loudest chord ever recorded underwater. Everyone freezes. A fish swims out of the piano, deeply offended.

CHONKSY's flashlight finds a DVD cabinet: thirty-one copies of one movie, a famous ship-sinking romance.

CHONKSY: They brought the sinking movie. On the boat.

SEABEAR: Is like bringing bear to bear fight.

CHONKSY: That's just a fight.

SEABEAR: With more bear.

Above them the chandelier groans. They look up. It falls in slow motion, enormous and glittering.

CHONKSY: …That's crazy.

TITLE CARD: SEACHONKS

2. FLASHBACK · EXT. OCTOPUS WAR TRENCH · "NINE YEARS AGO"

Desaturated. Black ink bombs burst overhead like artillery smoke. A YOUNGER CHONKSY, slimmer, in a helmet two sizes too big, crouches in a coral trench. Rows of chonk soldiers.

A DRILL SERGEANT (a hammerhead) paces. His eyes are on opposite sides of his head, so he screams at two soldiers at once.

DRILL SERGEANT: YOU. AND YOU. (swiveling) AND NOW YOU TWO.

A propaganda radio crackles, playing a dubbed human war speech translated by vibe:

RADIO (V.O.): We shall fight them on the beaches. (beat) We like beaches. Beaches are nice. Please enlist.

A terrified YOUNG PRIVATE (a small seal) beside CHONKSY:

PRIVATE: Did we win?

YOUNG CHONKSY: Can't see.

PRIVATE: Did they win?

YOUNG CHONKSY: Also can't see. (beat) That's kind of the whole war.

The private has no helmet. YOUNG CHONKSY takes off his own and puts it on the private. It covers the private's entire body. He's a helmet with feet now.

PRIVATE (muffled): Thank you.

YOUNG CHONKSY: Yeah.

3. FLASHBACK · NO-MAN'S-LAND

Between the trenches. Silence. Then a YOUNG CHUMPY walks out into the open in a cook's apron, carrying a picnic basket, humming.

CHONK SOLDIER: Who is that?

OTHER SOLDIER: Conscientious objector.

CHONK SOLDIER: What's he objecting to?

OTHER SOLDIER: I think lunch being late.

YOUNG CHUMPY hands a sandwich to a chonk soldier, then walks across and hands one to an OCTOPUS SOLDIER.

OCTOPUS SOLDIER: (suspicious) …Is this kelp?

YOUNG CHUMPY: My mom's recipe.

The octopus bites. A long pause.

OCTOPUS SOLDIER: …Tell your mom thank you.

SUPER: "THE WAR STOPPED FOR ELEVEN MINUTES."

SMASH CUT: a military court. A stern WALRUS JUDGE.

JUDGE: Private Chumpy. For feeding the enemy, I sentence you to kitchen duty. For life.

YOUNG CHUMPY: (lighting up) So… a promotion.

The courtroom phone rings. The bailiff answers it, listens, and holds it out.

BAILIFF: …It's for you.

4. INT. CRUISE SHIP STAIRWELL · PRESENT

The ship is on its side, so the staircase is a wall. CHONKSY and SEABEAR climb it sideways hauling crates. A loose helmet in a lost-and-found bin clanks. CHONKSY flinches, very slightly.

SEABEAR: In Arctic Shelf, we have saying. The past is a bear. You poke it, it eats you.

CHONKSY: Okay.

SEABEAR: Also the present is bear.

CHONKSY: Is it always a bear?

SEABEAR: (thinking honestly) …Is mostly bear.

5. FLASHBACK · INVESTIGOTTER ACADEMY GRADUATION

A grand hall. Banners with magnifying-glass crests. A row of cadets in tan trench coats and fedoras. YOUNG CHONKSY. YOUNG CHUMPY, whose coat won't close, so he holds it shut like a cape. At the front, smug in a gold top-of-class medal: SEAPHOLK, a grey dolphin.

SEAPHOLK takes the podium. He clicks once. Sonar.

SEAPHOLK: Interesting. Cadet 0451's heart rate rose when the Dean said "honor."

YOUNG CHONKSY: (under his breath) Stop.

SEAPHOLK: And again just now.

He clears his throat for the valedictorian speech.

SEAPHOLK: Trust no one. (beat) Especially the people you love. (beat) Thank you.

Silence. Slowly, out of fear, everyone applauds.

6. FLASHBACK · ACADEMY CLASSROOM

A chalk outline of a clam on the floor. A tiny numbered evidence marker. The INSTRUCTOR (a grizzled seal) paces.

INSTRUCTOR: Cadets. Who killed this clam?

YOUNG CHONKSY crouches with a magnifying glass. We see what he sees: sand scuffed in one direction, a tiny V-shaped bite, a single white feather.

YOUNG CHONKSY: A seagull. Came in low from the east, one bite, flew off. The feather's still dry.

SEAPHOLK: Wrong. It was the clam's wife.

INSTRUCTOR: …It was the seagull.

SEAPHOLK: (unbothered) It's usually the wife.

YOUNG CHUMPY, asleep standing up with drool, jolts awake.

YOUNG CHUMPY: Was it the wife?

SEAPHOLK: (pointing at him) See?

Hold on YOUNG CHONKSY. He's still staring at the scuffs in the sand. He loves this, the noticing. It's the first time we've seen him light up.

7. INT. CRUISE SHIP CARGO HOLD · PRESENT

Empty. The ship's stash has already been looted. NAVY SEAL turns to leave. CHONKSY doesn't. His flashlight lands on one lifeboat still in its cradle, the only one.

CHONKSY: That one.

They pull the cover off. Forty crates of DVDs.

NAVY SEAL: How'd you know?

CHONKSY: It was the only thing on the ship nobody used.

Long silence. That's a bleak sentence.

NAVY SEAL: …Above my pay grade. Arf.

8. FLASHBACK · GOTTER'S OFFICE

Smoke, maps, medals, trophies. A younger but still old GOTTER behind a desk. YOUNG CHONKSY and YOUNG CHUMPY in cadet coats. A bowl of candy sits on the desk.

GOTTER: The Academy teaches you to find out what happened. I need people who can find what's next.

YOUNG CHONKSY: What's next?

GOTTER: Stories. The Big Haul won't last forever. Somebody has to go up there and bring them home.

He slides a dossier across: ACQUISITIONS.

GOTTER: We bring home the stories, and we never—

He falls asleep mid-sentence. Snore bubble. Fifteen seconds. He wakes.

GOTTER: —and that is why we never go to the Trench.

YOUNG CHONKSY and YOUNG CHUMPY look at each other. Neither knows what he said.

YOUNG CHUMPY is staring at the candy. Without looking, GOTTER slides the bowl to him. Their eyes meet. Something starts here.

9. FLASHBACK · ACADEMY STEPS

The two of them walk down the grand steps, fedoras in their flippers. SEAPHOLK watches from the top.

SEAPHOLK: You'll be back. People who notice things always come back to noticing things.

YOUNG CHUMPY: I'm not coming back. I didn't notice anything the whole time.

SEAPHOLK: I noticed.

A chill. YOUNG CHUMPY walks faster.

10. INT. ACQUISITIONS COMMAND ROOM · PRESENT

Alarms. A monitor shows the cruise ship tilting.

SEAVER: Structurally speaking, you have forty seconds.

CHUMPY: And emotionally?

SEAVER: Emotionally, less.

CHUMPY's phone rings: MOM. He answers.

CHUMPY: MOM. NOT NOW. (beat) Yes. (beat) I ate. (beat) A normal amount. (hangs up)

Everyone stares.

CHUMPY: She worries.

PLATRICK: About the ship?

CHUMPY: About the eating.

11. INT. TILTING SHIP · ESCAPE · PRESENT

Slapstick. The floor becomes a wall. Doors become trapdoors. NAVY SEAL surfs down a hallway on a buffet tray, perfectly balanced, deadpan. SEABEAR carries four crates and a PUFFERFISH PASSENGER who refused to leave his cabin.

PUFFERFISH PASSENGER: I was promised a view.

SEABEAR: You have view. View is "leaving."

They burst out a porthole as the ship settles behind them in a cloud of silt.

PUFFERFISH PASSENGER: (inflating) I'm leaving a one-star review.

SEABEAR: Leave it underwater. Nobody will read.

12. EXT. THE SHALLOWS · DAY

A sunny tiki smoothie bar in turquoise shallows. OLD SEACOW (straw hat, pineapple earring) sips a pink smoothie that never seems to empty. CHONKSY sits at the bar still in his gear.

CHONKSY: Did chonks ever make their own movies?

OLD SEACOW: (not looking up) Try the mango. It's seasonal.

CHONKSY: That's not an answer.

OLD SEACOW: It's a great answer. The mango is incredible right now.

She slides a mango smoothie over. He tries it. Beat.

CHONKSY: …That's a great mango.

OLD SEACOW: Mmhmm.

22. THE CITY WATCHING: A SPORTS BAR

A rowdy bar of walruses and seals. On the TV: The Ship That Sank (Again). The door scene.

WALRUS 1: There was room!

WALRUS 2: There was NEVER room!

WALRUS 1: THEY BOTH FIT! IT'S ON SCREEN!

WALRUS 2: THAT'S THE REMAKE!

The SEAHORSE BARTENDER rings a big brass bell.

BARTENDER: DOOR TALK IS A TWO-DRINK MINIMUM.

Everyone orders two drinks. They keep arguing.

13. INT. CRAFT SERVICES · DAY

SEABEAR cooks. PLATRICK reads his phone.

PLATRICK: (reading comments) "He threatened a lobster and then gave it a hug. I'm crying." "Who hurt him." "Nobody. He hurts first."

SEABEAR: I am not famous. I am upset.

The view counter jumps.

PLATRICK: And it's working.

SEABEAR: (stirring furiously) Then I will be upset forever. For the people.

14. INT. UPPER KELPWOOD LOBBY · NIGHT

CHONKSY tries an Academy trick on CHUMPY while they wait for the elevator.

CHONKSY: Your rent receipts come in a purple envelope. Lavender wax seal.

CHUMPY: How do you—

CHONKSY: I'm trained.

CHUMPY: …Next question.

RAYMOND: (appearing) Mr. Chumpy.

CHUMPY: Gerald.

RAYMOND: Still Raymond.

CHUMPY: (stepping into the elevator) We'll see.

16. EXT. STUDIO GATE · MORNING

The jellyfish sign. CHONKSY walks up. Blocking the gate in a dark government suit and sunglasses: SEAPHOLK. Sonar rings ripple off him.

SEAPHOLK: Cadet 0451.

CHONKSY: It's Chonksy now.

SEAPHOLK: (click) Interesting that your heart rate rose when you said your own name.

CHONKSY: It's early.

SEAPHOLK: It's always early for somebody.

He steps aside. CHONKSY walks through. SEAPHOLK doesn't turn around. He doesn't need to.

17. INT. SEAPHOLK'S CAR · NIGHT

SEAPHOLK alone in a parked car, headphones on, eyes closed. A sonar recording of the Ep 1 wrap party plays: CHONKS! CAN'T! DIRECT! CHONKS! CAN'T!

In the waveform printout on his lap there's one tiny flat gap in the chant: the spot where one chonk didn't laugh.

SEAPHOLK circles it in red. Then he turns the volume up on the silence.

END OF EPISODE

PUNCH-UP INSERTS · EP 2

• Sc 1: Seabear on the forty-year-old shrimp: "Tastes like a ghost's armpit. (chewing) Good ghost, though."
• Sc 1: Navy Seal's piano chord makes a passing fish shit itself, visibly. Chonksy: "Respect the dead." Navy Seal: "The dead are mid."
• Sc 2: The hammerhead drill sergeant's propaganda line: "The inkers want your mothers!" Young Chonksy, under his breath: "…Why?" Nobody can answer. (Plant: the war was sold.)
• Sc 2: Speciesist war-poster chant from the soldiers: "Eight arms, zero morals!" One young octopus prisoner in the trench corner, in perfect manners: "We actually have a very rigorous ethical tradition." A soldier: "SHUT UP, INKER." Hold on young Chonksy's face. He doesn't chant.
• Sc 3: Octopus soldier, mouth full of Chumpy's sandwich: "Your people are monsters." Chumpy: "My mom put mayo on it." Octopus: "…Monsters." Takes another.
• Sc 5: Seapholk's graduation speech gets one more line: "And remember: every species lies. Ours just does it in a nicer font."
• Sc 6: The murdered-clam instructor: "Who'd want to kill a clam?" Chumpy, waking: "Anyone who's met a clam." It turns out the clam had debts.
• Sc 8 (heart): Gotter to young Chonksy, half asleep: "You've got a director's face, kid. Tragic. Don't ever use it." He falls asleep before Chonksy can ask what that means.
• Sc 11: The pufferfish passenger's one-star review, read aloud by Seabear later: "'Ship sank. Staff unhelpful. A bear carried me like a purse.'"
• Sc 12: Old Seacow on Chonksy's fame: "You're the one from the movies." Chonksy: "Yeah." Old Seacow: "Mmhmm. Which one?" Chonksy: "…All of them." Old Seacow: "(sipping) That's what I thought."
• Sc 15 (heart): After the fedora pops off, Chumpy's voice through the wall: "You okay?" Chonksy: "Yeah." Chumpy: "(beat) You should make something." Chonksy: "Go to sleep." Chumpy: "I'm believing at you through the wall."

31. FIX: BUT/THEREFORE · Scenes 12 → 13

• Old Seacow deflects ("Try the mango"), therefore Chonksy goes to Seabear's kitchen. Seabear walks him straight to a tank of pistol shrimp that snap like gunfire. Chonksy: "Why is it so loud in here?" Seabear: "Loudest animal in ocean. Dolphins hear everything. (snap snap snap) Except here."
• (First statement of the world rule: underwater, privacy is a surface concept.)
• A one-eyed old seal at the soup line, shouting over the shrimp: "THE GREAT FLOP? MY GRANDDAD WORKED THE FLOP." The shrimp stop. Silence. Everyone in the kitchen hears. He goes back to his soup.

32. BACKGROUND GAG: THE MANGO · Scene 12

• The Shallows' chalkboard, four frames: MANGO: OUT OF SEASON SINCE THE FIRST WAVE. (Mangoes don't grow underwater. They never did. Somebody used to bring them down.)

33. RUNNER: GOTTER'S ROCK · Scene with Gotter

• Otters keep one favorite rock in an armpit pocket for life. Gotter pats his armpit whenever anyone says "First Wave." Chumpy: "What's in the pit?" Gotter: "Rock." "What kind of rock?" "Mine." (Ep 6: it's a painted chip from The Long Reef's desert set.)

40. JERRY SEALFELD · Scene 12, The Shallows, comedy night · Seinfeld

• The city's top comic, a sea lion in a blazer, does only material copied off human tapes. Sealfeld: "What's the deal with airline food?" Nobody in the ocean has ever seen a plane. The room loses its mind. "And the tiny bags of pretzels!" A grouper falls off his stool.
• Chonksy at the bar, the only one not laughing: "What's a pretzel?" Old Seacow: "Nobody knows, baby. That's the bit."
• It's the purest image of the premise, and it pays off in Ep 10.

41. "OCEAN." (FIRST TIME) · Scene 8, Gotter's office flashback · Bernie Mac

• Young Gotter (forty years younger, same exhaustion) turns from the two cadets to the lens. Gotter: "Ocean. Let me explain something. I don't hate kids." (looks back at them) "I hate these kids." (back to us) "One's got talent and no discipline. The other's got discipline about snacks."

42. THE PORTHOLE · Scene 11, the tilting ship · Farley

• The ship is sliding into the trench. Chumpy is wedged in a porthole, front half out, back half in. Chonksy: "Exhale!" Chumpy: "I AM exhaling!" Chonksy: "Exhale MORE!" Chumpy: "I've never finished an exhale!"
• He finishes one. He pops out like a cork and rockets across the ballroom through a chandelier. The ship drops behind them. He floats there in a cloud of crystal. "…I should get in shape."