R.I.P.D.
A monstrous, hulking like figure busts through a door after Nick Walker (Ryan Reynolds) gives a voiceover saying he's probably had a tougher day at work than the viewer. He then says the monstrous hulk isn't him. Nick and his partner chase the hulking figure into the streets, where it bounds off a truck and onto the side of a building. Standing on the side of the building, the figure taunts them. Nick aims a large revolver as he says that three or four days ago, he didn't know this kind of world existed-- but he wasn't in the RIPD.We go back to three or four days ago (Nick isn't sure which), and we see him burying several broken fragments of what appear to be golden disks, in his back yard. He plants a small orange tree sapling in the hole where he buried the gold. In the morning, he's playfully awoken by his wife Julia (Stephanie Szostak), who asks him about the tree. He plays innocent, but says it's a symbol of prosperity, and hopefully soon they can get a good house, better than the one they have now, and a good car. Julia says she's less worried about money than Nick, and having her husband waking up beside her is all she really wants.Nick arrives at work in the Boston Police Dept, greeting his partner, Bobby Hayes (Kevin Bacon). It turns out Bobby and Nick have secretly stolen the golden pieces from a previous drug bust, and nobody else in the department knows about it. Nick and Bobby planned to keep it for themselves. But Nick suddenly tells Bobby that Julia's assertion that she was happy as long as she had him, has changed his mind. Nick won't turn Bobby in, nor tell anyone he has half the gold, but Nick is going to turn his half in to evidence. He's unwilling to risk Julia's happiness on something he realizes she doesn't really need.At that moment, another officer comes up to call everyone to action; an informant has given up a whole meth operation belonging to a drug lord named Garza, and the department is mobilizing to raid the place and put him out of business. As the officers and a SWAT van ride out, Nick briefly ribs Bobby about a St. Christopher medal he wears around his left wrist, 'for protection.'The hideout is breached, but surprise lasts only a few brief seconds before Garza's men come out with all their firepower brought to bear. Nick spots Garza and pursues him up toward the roof of the building. High up on a catwalk, Nick sees Garza has slipped out a window when Bobby arrives. Bobby doesn't look very cheerful as he approaches his partner, and for good reason: he tells Nick that he can't let him turn the gold in. Bobby opens fire, his semi-automatic rifle knocking Nick off the catwalk to fall down to the ground. He lands right on his neck, which is broken by the impact.Nick's eyes open and he stands, looking around dazed. Time appears to be standing still at the moment he hit the ground. He walks around, looking at the frozen scene of the firefight going on, and outside a breached gate where an explosion has a squad car and several officers frozen still in mid air. Nick's attention is caught by a strange whirlpool like formation among the clouds, and his feet lift off the ground, and he's rising ino the air, higher and higher, and into the whirlpool. He flies up through a surreal vision, one of many countless human figures in a stream toward a hole high above. But then he's pulled sideways, landing in a stark white room, seated in a desk chair before a desk. Sitting behind the desk is an attractive dark-haired woman (Mary-Louise Parker) who watches him with a slightly amused expression. The name Proctor is on a name sign on her desk.Proctor tells Nick that she's here to help him, and she understands what he's feeling right now because she's sat in the same chair he's sitting in. Nick was heading toward Judgement, and Proctor assures him that he could probably use a good word and recommendation, especially after having stolen the gold. Proctor's offer: she's a chief for the RIPD, or Rest In Peace Department. Some people 'slip through the cracks' (Earth's population has grown so large that more people die every day than 'the system' can handle) after dying and remain among the living; this rots their soul, although they continue appearing as normal humans to the living. The RIPD's job is to find these 'deados,' as Proctor calls them, and round them up. Nick must serve among the RIPD for 100 Earth years, and will be operating back in Boston. Nick promptly volunteers to do what he's being asked to do, but Proctor shows she's not so easily fooled; she has a thorough 'case file' on Nick's life, and he wouldn't be sent back to be with Julia again.Proctor takes Nick into the main room for Boston's RIPD 'precinct,' manned by officers from many different times, always adapting to Earth's ever-changing society. Nick's first task is to meet his new partner-- a trigger-happy, rough as sandpaper, wise-talking 'lawman' with an attitude, named Roysephus 'Roy' Pulsipher (Jeff Bridges)... who doesn't like having to have a partner. Seeing that Proctor isn't giving him any options, Roy tells Nick to come with him. A bathroom in the department leads them (when the 'toilet' is flushed) into the bathroom of a VCR repair shop on a Boston street. Their car has the shop's logo on it, as a cover identity. Roy tells Nick that Proctor wants to start Nick off 'with some closure.'This closure, for Nick, means watching his own funeral. He's given a full 21-gun salute, a flag draped over his coffin and then folded up and given to Julia, as she cries softly. But Nick gets angry when he sees the partner who betrayed and killed him, Bobby Hayes, go up to Julia and hug her. Roy doesn't try to stop Nick as he starts running off the hill he's standing on, and into the dispersing funeral crowd to try and talk to Julia.Nick reaches Julia, only to find that she doesn't recognize him. Bobby hurries up, aggressively protecting Julia from Nick, and also apparently not recognizing him. Boston officers grab Nick and keep him away as Bobby protectively gets Julia into a car and they ride away.Roy is waiting for Nick's return, and then explains that he no longer looks like Nick Walker, nor has the same voice. His words will come out jumbled and garbled if he tries to tell anyone who knew Nick, that it's him. The higher powers of the universe don't allow RIPD officers to reveal who they are to anyone that used to know them. Roy hands Nick a set of ID's that allow him access to various private places. The ID's show what he looks like to the living: Nick appears as an elderly Chinese man named Jerry Chen (James Hong). As for Roy-- the living see him as a sexy female blonde bombshell (Marisa Miller). Only to other RIPD do they appear as their former selves.As they drive through the streets of Boston, Nick learns one of the reasons for Roy's dislike of having a partner-- like Nick, Roy was betrayed and murdered by his Earthly partner. He was a Marshall in the 1800's and has been in the RIPD since then. Roy also re-iterates that Nick needs to remember that his wife is now a widow and he can't have her back.They arrive at a building where Roy has heard a deado is hiding in. He explains that a deado's rotting soul infects everything around them, and that anything broken is a strong sign of a deado's presence, such as a broken elevator and signal light. Roy hands Nick a special clip for the gun Proctor gave him; as Roy explains, Earthly weapons are useless against deados. The special handcuffs given Nick are the only way to subdue a deado, and if they are unable to bring one in alive and must defend themselves, the 'soul eraser' bullets will disperse a deado soul if they're struck in the head with them, causing the deado to be "erased" and cease to exist. RIPD can also be erased and cease to exist if struck by such bullets, as Roy cautions Nick.Roy finds his way to an apartment door beside a flickering wall light and a moldy wall. The door is answered by a meek, wimpy-looking man who Roy addresses as Stanley Nawicki (Robert Knepper). Roy flashes his Department of Health ID to get in. Nawicki looks hopelessly confused as Roy has Nick read a question off a card, on whether he'd accept a plate of chicken vindaloo from a teenager on an Ash Wednesday. Roy opens a container of take-out Indian food and makes like he's starting to eat it. Nawicki starts to look ill as Roy does this. Roy makes Nick read off more crazy-sounding questions, but all including the name of a dish from Indian cuisine. Nawicki continues acting more odd and more ill as this happens. When Roy starts exclaiming the name of one of the dishes loudly, some of the food spills from his mouth onto the table right in front of Nawicki, who reacts, revealing his rotted deado nature, with a humongous mouth (Roy says he was a snitch in life). Apparently cumin, a spice in Indian food, forces a deado to reveal itself.But as Nick starts to place the deado cuffs on Nawicki, he pulls off the refrigerator door and wields it as a weapon. Nick fastens the other cuff around his own wrist, so Nawicki pulls off his cuffed arm and grabs a container of milk from the fridge as he runs. He swallows the contents before jumping through the building window. Roy charges at Nick, pushing him through and falling after, and on top, of him. They land on top of Nawicki and corner him. When Nawicki mocks Nick over one of Roy's wise-cracks, Nick beats Nawicki silly with the arm he pulled off, causing Nawicki to regurgitate what he'd swallowed-- several chunks of gold looking just like the ones Nick and Bobby found during the Earthly drug bust. When Nick starts examining these chunks, Nawicki suddenly attacks him, and is erased by Roy.Nick is absorbed in the gold chunks as Roy yakety-yaks about Nick's 'grade' during the bust. Losing his patience, Nick grabs Roy and throws him in front of a bus, which runs him over. This can't harm Roy, like the jump out the window couldn't, but Roy's hat is blown off into the wind, which pisses him off royally.Back at HQ, they note that officers are mobilizing for a surge in deado presence in Boston. Nick, however, is still concerned about the gold, even as it's placed in a storage vault in evidence. Nick knows that Nawicki was trying very hard to protect and hide it, and he's sure that means something that should be followed up on. He's sure that a long-time RIPD veteran like Roy will have a deado informant that can help with the investigation.Roy's informant is named Elliot (Mike O'Malley), and he's a huge Red Sox fan who works in Fenway Park. Roy takes him there and busies himself trying on spare hats Elliot has while Nick questions him about the gold. Elliot seems more interested in mocking Nick and the RIPD in general, but gives in when Nick gets rough. Unfortunately, Elliot insists he really knows nothing about the gold, saying that deados are sentimental and that's why they tend to care about useless things, including what Elliot calls 'talismanic junk.' Nick tosses the chunk of gold to Elliot and tells him to keep his ears open.Nick knows, of course, that Elliot was still lying, and let him keep the gold for a reason. Sure enough, Elliot sneaks out of the stadium and waits with shifty eyes. Even Roy is impressed as he and Nick watch Bobby drive up, and Elliot gives him the gold. Roy and Nick follow Bobby, watching him drive... to Nick's house. Nick is sure, however, that Bobby isn't taking Julia for himself. Hiding, they eavesdrop as Bobby questions Julia about whether Nick seemed okay to her the day he died. Confiding in her that Nick claimed to have buried something, Bobby learns about the orange tree and digs up the gold Nick hid there, letting Julia think Nick stole it. Bobby promises that no heat will come down on Julia for this.Roy grills Nick about his apparently being a dirty cop. It escalates into Nick hitting Roy, but that stops when Bobby puts the gold in the trunk of his car and prepares to drive off. They follow him again and watch as he enters a commercial building and sits down on a public bench. As they wait, Roy schools Nick on more post-death recovery, pointing out that he's far from the only one who now has regrets (Nick knows Julia doesn't know what to think of him right now), and Roy, like Nick, can't resolve them himself, so they all have to learn to live with it.A dog starts barking, which alerts Roy. The dog is agitated at a stout man with dark shades, a tan suit, long sideburns, and a short goatee. Roy knows the man is a deado, and Nick is sure that Bobby is here to meet with him. Bobby hands a briefcase to the deado, which contains the gold. Roy and Nick follow him, grab him and push him through a kitchen into a freezer, grabbing some cumin powder from a shelf. The deado, Pulaski (Devin Ratray), sees Roy and Nick as Jerry Chen and the blonde bombshell, but knows they're RIPD. When Nick shakes some cumin into his hand, offering to 'pop' Pulaski and reveal him, Pulaski grabs Nick's hand and inhales the powder deeply. Roy and Nick watch as Pulaski is revealed as the hulking figure they chase in the beginning of the movie. As Pulaski lands on the building wall and mocks them, Roy attaches a harpoon extension to his soul eraser gun, but Pulaski still proves a tenacious target to take down, dragging Roy along on a zany chase scene across the city scape; a multi-vehicle smash-up resulting when a truck driver sees the blonde bombshell swinging from some cable through the air. Nick fires at Pulaski, who shields his head with the briefcase, leaping up onto a roof. When Roy is still holding on to the harpoon, Pulaski smashes through a window into a corporate board room and rips open the elevator doors. Nick and Roy converge there, Nick shooting the elevator cable so its counterweight yanks it upward. The elevator crashes through the roof of the office building and is wrecked atop it. Nick and Roy recover the gold, but Pulaski escapes, creating more mayhem as he goes.Back at HQ, Proctor, now furious, berates Roy and Nick for allowing a deado to be seen by the living, not to mention the amount of destruction to city property resulted by the bungled arrest. Proctor doesn't care about the gold, only about the failure to contain, that resulted in an exposed deado running loose in Boston in the middle of the day, which is now all over Boston TV. Proctor marches Roy and Nick into a room where a container drops down from a golden-colored chute pipe reaching as far, far up as they can see-- RIPD's "Eternal Affairs." Proctor takes the container and opens it. But as she reads the proclamation, she suddenly appears quite chaste. Although Eternal Affairs is pretty angry at Pulaski's revelation and escape, the proclamation says that the golden chunks recovered by Roy and Nick are components of an extremely dangerous artifact known as the Staff of Jericho. As Proctor explains, the cloud tunnel that Nick was rising through when he died, before he was pulled into Proctor's office, is a one-way tunnel to the afterlife. The Staff of Jericho can reverse the flow of deceased humans, bringing them all back down to Earth, eventually causing the Apocalypse. Aside from the golden components, the artifact requires 'the blood of thine enemy' (human blood) to power it up.Another container drops down from the chute. Proctor reads it and looks unhappy. Eternal Affairs is suspending Nick and Roy from the case, even though recovery of all the artifact components is now red alert priority for the whole RIPD worldwide. A hearing is scheduled for tomorrow, and the chances are high that Roy and Nick will both be erased. Sullen at this verdict, Nick walks away, saying he has somewhere more important to be.Nick goes to a track where he knows Julia still goes to run many evenings. Although he still appears as Jerry Chen to Julia, she recognizes this elderly man from the cemetery and stops, wanting to know why he's following her. Nick walks up to Julia and touches her chin with his forefinger and thumb in a way that makes her smile without realizing it. Snapping herself out of this trance, Julia tells Chen to stay away from her and resumes running.Roy is at the track, telling Nick that trying to say another goodbye to Julia isn't helping. Whether or not they get erased, Julia must live on as a widow, and find her own closure. Roy tells Nick he must do the same. This only makes Nick upset and an argument results in Nick insulting Roy pretty close to home.On a pier, Nick and Roy make peace, and Nick decides he's not taking this lying down; suspension or not, he intends to stop Bobby and the threatened apocalypse, which Roy admits paints him into a corner on whether to take part.Nick and Roy know that Bobby is more than a bagman in the whole deado operation to restore the artifact. He's a major operative, and most likely, a deado himself. What bugs Nick is that he was partners with Bobby for five years, and in all that time as a living Boston police officer, never noticed Bobby having any kind of 'soul stank' that deados exude. When Roy mentions he's heard of rare artifacts capable of masking it, and would be something that Bobby would carry on his person at all times, Nick figures out what Bobby meant when he said he wore his grandmother's St. Christopher medallion around his wrist 'for protection.'Bobby meets a man in a sports jersey in a coffee shop, handing him half of some kind of metallic sphere. They talk about how they've finally built the network to take down RIPD and restore the Staff of Jericho, something no deado has ever been able to do in the past 3,000 years. Bobby tells his cohort to 'find himself some trouble.'Come morning, Julia calls Bobby to tell him about the elderly Chinese man finding her at the track. She can't help but think that Nick is trying to reach out to her from the other side. Bobby tells Julia she probably shouldn't be alone, and he'll take her to lunch later on and they can talk. As Bobby hangs up, he sees a VCR repair shop car pull up in front of his house and watches it knowingly. He punches in a code to unlock and open one of two small, secure containers, one of which is already open. In the other container is another metallic hemisphere like the one he gave to the contact the previous night. He takes it out and puts it in his pocket.Nick and Roy walk toward Bobby's house and agree that Roy will take point at the front while Nick goes around the back. Roy knocks on the door, shows an ID and says he wants to ask a question about a tandoori clay oven. Bobby, of course, knows this sexy blonde lady is an RIPD officer, but plays it cool, inviting 'her' in and then offering a drink.Bobby goes into his kitchen, but stops as Nick darts out of hiding, holding a soul eraser rifle Bobby had hidden there. Bobby sees "Jerry Chen" and knows it's Nick. Roy enters and starts to read one of the cards, but Nick reminds him they can skip that part, and tells Bobby to take off his St. Christopher's medal. Bobby agreeably does so, and the house immediately falls apart from the soul stank. Roy finds and extracts a large cross-shaped piece of gold from the water heater.Nick and Roy put the soul cuffs on Bobby, put the gold in the trunk and drive off to take Bobby in to RIPD headquarters. During the drive, Bobby reveals that a time he was shot during a bust and got a medal after miraculously pulling through, actually killed him. He intends to stay on Earth because he doesn't accept someone or something else deciding what happens to him. But his comment about having 'taken a little on the side to pay for lap dances' arouses Roy's suspicion.RIPD officers at the Boston HQ are bringing in a gothic female deado, sitting her on a bench where several other deados await 'booking' and incarcerating to await final Judgement. Among them is the one in the sports jersey. All of the deados are 'popped' and looking non-human.As Roy and Nick book Bobby and take the metallic hemisphere, Roy raises his voice to his usual loud bluster as he reveals what made him suspicious about the 'lap dance' comment: He and Proctor were briefly lovers, and this might have had a hand in Roy being on the RIPD.Bobby is still cocky as Nick pushes him to the bench with the popped deados, and they all look at each other, a few nodding and watching.Roy brings the metallic hemisphere and the cross-shaped piece of gold to evidence for tagging and storing. One of the evidence clerks mentions that another similar metallic hemisphere was just tagged a few moments ago, and she puts the one brought in by Roy, with the other one that is still in a bin, awaiting storage.As the clerk tosses the hemisphere into the bin with the other hemisphere, the two pieces of metal, finally in close proximity, float a little into the air and begin to spin, moving toward each other to assemble into a complete sphere.Right on cue, Bobby 'casually remarks' to his fellow deados that one of the perks of being a deado is that they can't hear certain frequencies so well. Nick looks toward the evidence vault and sees the metallic sphere assembling itself. But just as he shouts a warning, the sphere gives off a huge sonic pulse that paralyzes all the RIPD staff. Bobby taunts Nick, saying he and the other deados let themselves be captured because they were planning a raid on RIPD HQ. The artifact they smuggled in freezes up RIPD officers but doesn't affect the deados. They storm the evidence vault and grab all the golden components that are in storage. By the time the freeze and stun starts to wear off enough for Roy to shoot the sonic pulse bomb and neutralize it, Bobby and the deados have escaped through the makeshift bathroom and storm out of the VCR repair shop back in Boston, living people scattering in terror.A female unpopped accomplice passes Bobby a cell phone, who tells Pulaski that the raid was a success. Pulaski shouts to a number of deados gathered atop the Boston Commonwealth building, all of whom are carrying more components for the Staff of Jericho. Hurriedly, they all begin putting them together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, assembling the ancient artifact. As they build, energy starts to rise from the spot into the sky, opening a hole in the overhead clouds.Nick, Roy and a number of other RIPD officers race in pursuit. Some of the deados are waiting there, exchanging soul eraser gunfire to slow the RIPD down. As several drive off in a sanitation truck, another jumps down from it, blasting automatic fire from a minigun like soul eraser weapon that wipes out a number of the RIPD officers. Nick and Roy duck back into the shop for cover as the deado's minigun jams. He ducks behind a car where the gothic female deado crouches, and works to fix the jam. Meanwhile, Roy is reloading his twin soul eraser revolvers. This 'Dodge City' like environment is just like his old home turf in the 19th Century as a Marshall in the Old West. He stomps back out into the street, ready for a quickdraw showdown. Just as the minigun wielder and the female deado jump out to resume fire, Roy draws both sixguns and blasts them down, erasing them. He and Nick pick off two other deados hiding in ambush, having figured out their hiding spots from Roy's knowledge of Old West fighting.A wind starts to pick up, and Nick and Roy watch various debris swept off by it. Whirling wind funnels start to form as the artifact nears completion.Meanwhile, two Boston police show up to bring Julia to her planned meeting with Bobby. Their tones of voice and facial expressions show they're unpopped deados in league with Bobby.As Bobby and several deados arrive at the Commonwealth building, Pulaski and a number of other deados prepare a barricade and lots of soul erasing firepower to guard all approaches.Roy and Nick see the largest wind funnel massing over the Commonwealth building and know that's where Bobby is heading. Several cars with deado drivers and passengers pursue them and try to stop them. Using some modern Boston police driving, Nick leads them through a wild chase among several collapsing buildings and garages, that drop parked automobiles that destroy the other deado cars.At the Commonwealth, Bobby tells the deados with him to bring the last components up top while he waits for 'the final piece.' Just then, the car carrying Julia arrives. Bobby takes out some cumin powder and inhales it, 'popping' himself and revealing his deado nature in front of Julia. He grabs her and takes her up to the roof of the Commonwealth.A news helicopter flies near the Commonwealth, trying to make sense of what they're reporting, when a small jeep collides with them, and is knocked back atop the Commonwealth roof.As Roy and Nick approach the barricade, Pulaski fires at them, using his deado agility and acrobatics to his advantage. Nick speeds up, scooping Pulaski atop the hood of the car, then driving it up so the barricade's construction launches the car, with Pulaski and several other deados still clinging to it, up over the barricade. It hits the street on the opposite side and races on, most of the other deados being thrown off, but Pulaski tenaciously clinging to the hood. Nick and Roy both shout the mantra 'relax body' as the car speeds up again, plowing into the side of a building. Pulaski is pinned atop the car hood, between its roof and the building wall-- and Roy and Nick with their guns pointed at him through the broken windshield. They both fire and Pulaski is finally erased.On the Commonwealth roof, the many-armed deado holds Julia fast while Bobby finishes assembling the Staff of Jericho; the cross-shaped piece of gold an apparent centerpiece/console. Bobby then tells Julia that one final piece is needed: the blood of a living human sacrifice, which Bobby intends for Julia to serve as.Nick and Roy bust onto the roof, weapons drawn. Bobby grabs Julia and holds her as a shield, and then takes a long metal rebar with a sharp point, and drives it through Julia's body, impaling her. As the free for all shoothout begins, and Roy's Old West sharpshooting blends with Nick's more modern markshmanship to eradicate the deados, Julia's blood is sucked from her wound into the artifact, a small globe of her blood congealing in an opening within it; powering it up to full. The afterlife tunnel is reversed; dead spirits beginning to free fall back down to Earth.It's time for the final showdown, and Nick and Roy are fighting mad. Reloading their weapons, they storm the roof, erasing all the defending deados. Roy reaches the staff and tries to pry out the cross-shaped centerpiece.As Nick reaches Bobby, the last deado standing, his weapon is empty. Bobby attacks him hand to hand, and is clobbering him as Roy struggles to pull the console centerpiece from the Staff of Jericho. Needing to improvise, he grabs a loose power cable and makes a lasso. Spotting the jeep lying atop the Commonwealth sign, he lassos the jeep and, pulling with all his might, finally dislodges it, bring it down atop the artifact, smashing it.Bobby turns around in disbelief as he sees the jeep crush the Staff of Jericho, breaking apart the components and halting the reverse flow of deceased spirits. When he turns to face Nick again, Nick has slipped one last bullet into his soul eraser and chambers the round; the barrel pointed at Bobby's face. Taking great satisfaction at the vengeance moment's poetic justice, Nick fires, erasing Bobby.Nick hurries to the stricken Julia, who lies dying on the Commonwealth roof. Julia looks around, time seeming paused as she sees Nick at her side, seeing him as he used to be while living. Nick knows this is because Julia has just died and is not rising up toward the afterlife tunnel only because seeing Nick anchors her near. Julia kisses Nick, happy to see her husband with her again, but this moment finally helps Nick to do what he has to do: accept his own death and let go, telling Julia she must live her life without him. Telling Julia he'll always love her, he finally says goodbye.Julia awakens abruptly in a hospital room, a doctor watching over her... or someone Julia merely sees as a doctor, but is actually Proctor. Seeing Julia awaken, the 'doctor' nods to her and heads out, where Nick and Roy are waiting. Proctor tells Nick that Julia will recover.As they leave the hospital building, Proctor tells Nick and Roy that Eternal Affairs conducted the disciplinary hearing without them, despite their having missed it only because they were saving the world. As a new recruit, Nick has been let off with a warning, but Roy has had his term of service extended by fifty-three more years. Annoyed, Roy calls Proctor by her first name, Mildred.Proctor reaches into a bag she's been holding and gives Roy back his hat, which she's managed to recover for him. This appeases Roy's anger promptly. Showing her lingering attraction to Roy, Proctor leans in and gently bites on his goatee before walking off.Roy remembers something he's gotten for Nick. He pulled some strings and gotten him some new ID's, so he will appear to the living as someone other than the elderly Jerry Chen. Nick is happy at this, until he sees the new ID's. Roy just shrugs and says that's all he was able to acquire. They enter their car and we see them in their 'avatar' forms-- Nick now appears to the living as an early adolescent girl scout (Piper Mackenzie Harris).
murder, paranormal, violence, good versus evil, psychedelic, humor