Host Jon's Notes on his Episode 9 pitch:
A young boy with big round glasses stares at an Egyptian mummy as the credits roll across. He barely blinks.
Twenty years later a young man with big round glasses is cutting a body apart just out of frame. He places the organs in to jars. The man also carefully removes the heart and places it in a silver bowl. We see his face and his face is streaming with tears and he is whispering ‘I love you’ repeatedly. He grabs a long handled instrument which is crams up the nose of the body; it is a close shot to there is no detail of the whole body but enough to see that it is an elderly woman. He swirls the instrument around and exacts the brain as it pools out. Once this is done, he moves over to a sink and vomits in to it, whilst still weeping. He then grabs the heart with the bowl and a jar of coloured liquid with leaves and spices floating in it and moves back to the body to continue his labour. We hard cut to the same man sitting alone on a sofa; he is pale and obviously shaken by his macabre work.
Act 1 will establish that this is Joshua, he is in his mid-twenties and until recently was living with his mother until she passed. He is reluctant to share many details of this to the few people who ask about her. He works at the front desk of a funeral home where is duties are mainly administrative. The funeral home is run by an elderly couple, their son Andrew and a few part time members of staff. They all treat him well but it is clear that they do worry about him and politely suggest that he find other work. He had originally intended to work with the cadavers but became far too emotional when he did. The family kept him on because he is a hard worker and they like him. Andrew also has a mildly flirtatious relationship with Joshua which he enjoys as it makes Joshua humorously uncomfortably but also seems to suggest a genuine attraction between the two. Another person in his life is his elderly neighbour Clive who was good friends with his mother. It seems that Clive has helped support Joshua and his mother for some years in many small ways. He is quite upset as Joshua made it clear that his mother will be receiving no funeral or memorial.
There is also a couple of school friends called Sally and Tomas who are now a couple but still make time for Joshua, particularly as they observe that their usually reserved friend has become even more closed off and difficult to reach recently. Also Sally and Joshua did use to have a romantic relationship many years ago, so she knows Joshua better than most. They have moved to the opposite side of the state for Tomas’s job, but they check in with Joshua as much as they are able.
Act 1 ends with Joshua heading towards the basement in his house to finish the final stages of his deceased mother’s mummification. Her body has been dried, covered with scent oils and stuff with sand. Joshua proceeds to wrap the body carefully, pausing to kiss the dried forehead once before applying the final bandages. We have another hard cut to Joshua sitting by his mother’s bed with her prone mummified body lying upon it. He is stroking her body, smiling as he is pleased with his work.
He is interrupted by a harsh knocking at the front door. It is a drunk Clive, demanding to know where Joshua’s mother is and why he won’t let him see her. It transpires that Clive was in a romantic relationship with his mother which Joshua was unaware of. Clive forces his way in and eventually finds the mummified body, this leads to a physical altercation as Joshua tries to explain that his mum died naturally and he was making sure that she would be happy and complete in the afterlife. As Clive gets increasingly aggressive and attempts to call the police, Joshua sees a large looming figure of Anubis standing over Clive which it’s claw on his shoulder. The giant god’s glowing white eyes are expressionless but it’s mouth curls in a slight snarl. Joshua smashes Clive round the face with a
bedside lamp and proceeds to cave in his face and head. He then drags the body to the basement where he dismembers and burns the body in the furnace.
Act 2 consists of Joshua beginning to lose his grip on reality as he starts to see Anubis more often in his life. No one else is aware but the dog headed god is sighted most around Andrew, Sally and Tomas. Every night he sleeps beside his mother’s body, with Anubis crouching on the other side of the bed facing him. His health begins to obviously degrade as he stops eating. He interrupts a funeral they are hosting at his work by screaming that their loved ones will suffer in the afterlife because they are not properly prepared. Throughout the whole scene, Anubis looks expressionless from behind the coffin. Andrew eventually manages to reach Joshua and holds him until he calms down. Joshua looks over at Anubis who is no longer there. Andrew takes Joshua home as he is barely responsive after the funeral. He promises to stay the night, affection and concern written all over his face. Joshua falls sleep on his sofa as Andrew sits on an armchair close by worriedly watching over him.
Joshua is woken by Andrew talking frantically on the phone to someone, it is evening outside. He completely ignores the stirring Joshua. It becomes clear that he has found the mummified body upstairs and is talking to most contacted person on Joshua’s phone and that is Sally. Joshua’s eyes are filled with tears as he sees Anubis step into the room and stalk Andrew. Andrew sees that Joshua is awake and tells Sally to come as fast as she can. Andrew then begs Joshua to tell him what happened to his mother as in did he kill her? Joshua tells him that she died because she was elderly and ill and that now she would be healthy forever in the afterlife. Andrew argues that that is not how life works and that they are going to need to do something with the body. Joshua screams that that is not a body, it is his mother. This scares Andrew who goes starts to move towards the door. Anubis who has been behind him the whole time, snarls aggressively. Oddly enough Andrew reacts to this and looks around, and then Joshua lunges for him. Andrew runs to the basement to escape the now out of control and snarling Joshua. Eventually Joshua kills Andrew down here by cutting his throat. Joshua weeps as he stares in to Andrew’s eyes; he kisses him and promises that he will be whole in the afterlife.
Act 3 is Sally and Tomas reaching the house sometime during the night. After breaking in to the dark house, they go upstairs calling out to Joshua as they go. They discover the mother’s body and this causes them to panic. Tomas goes for his phone immediately but Joshua attacks him as he was standing in the corner of his mother’s room unseen. He uses one of the implements, a large curved blade, from the basement to injury Tomas severely by slashing a deep cut down his forearm. Tomas tries to push him back weakly from Sally but soon passes out from the great loss of blood. Joshua stands between the exit and Sally. She is screaming for him to stop doing this, calling him a monster. He replies that he just wants to make sure that the people he loves will be safe in the afterlife, and that he knows the secrets ways to make sure that they are. As he says this Anubis looms behind Sally out of the shadows. Joshua says that this life is constant decay and if we do nothing to preserve ourselves then we will continue to rot forever. In an effort to distract Joshua, Sally smashes her fist down on the mummified body on the bed, caving in the face, Joshua howls and rushes over to the body. Sally takes the chance to shove past Joshua, but he turns too quickly and slides the blade straight through her chest. She stares in to his eyes as she dies. Joshua falls to his knees amongst the bodies as Anubis stands over him and places a hand on his shoulder.
Epilogue
The police break in to the locked house and find four mummified bodies on the upstairs beds. They are surrounded by empty clothes and jars containing organs. The police search the cellar and find the floor sticking with dried blood and Joshua’s corpse. He died whilst trying to preserve his own organs. Anubis stares expressionless from the darkness, his ear flicks.
The End
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