FOREIGNERS #1: Act One

Created and written by Fred Van Lente // © 2022 FVL

ONE
NOTE: Make these four LONG, PAGE-WIDTH PANELS.

Panel 1: A tight close-up of the LABEL ON A SHATTERED METAL CANISTER about the size of
a small propane container as it spirals through the air. At the moment we can only see the
label itself, detailed below.

1. LABEL TEXT (SMALL): WARNING: EXPERIMENTAL NEUROTOXIN ***HIGHLY

TOXIC*** CLASSIFICATION: NZ-25 • LEAVE AREA IMMEDIATELY IF
CANISTER SEAL IS BROKEN • ONLY HANDLE IN CONTROLLED
ENVIRONMENT WITH APPROPRIATE PERSONAL PROTECTIVE
EQUIPMENT • CONTINUED EXPOSURE RISKS SERIOUS PERMANENT
BRAIN DAMAGE AND/OR DEATH

Panel 2: SAME SHOT: The shattered canister is spinning away from us. We can now see it
IS canister, and as it is spinning. It was hit by a bullet and decompressed explosively--
perhaps we can see the bullet hole in its side from this shot.

LETTERING NOTE -- the letters on the label BEGIN TO CHANGE ... from English (or
whatever language this 100% hot, hit comic has been translated into, fingers crossed) into
a kind of INCOMPREHENSIBLE GLYPH LANGUAGE that represents the ... well, altering of
their brain chemistry from exposure to this experimental nerve gas.

2. LABEL TEXT (SMALLER): WARNING: EXPERIMENTAL NEUROTOXIN ***HIGHLY TOXIC***

CLASSIFICATION: NZ-25 • LEAVE AREA IMMEDIATELY IF CANISTER SEAL IS
[NOTE: START REPLACING WITH NEW SYNTHETIC ALPHABET HERE]

Panel 3: SAME SHOT -- more spinning -- and now the label has COMPLETELY CHANGED to
the incomprehensible glyph language. The room around it comes more into view--it's a
dirty, mostly empty basement beneath a large warehouse.

If we haven't already, we now see that there is a UK-style HAZCHEM sticker on the side of
the canister, namely: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazchem

3. LABEL TEXT: [Now entirely just glyph gibberish]

Panel 4: SAME SHOT - except now we see the canister fully as it strike the concrete floor
and bounces.

NO COPY

FOREIGNERS #1/Van Lente

TWO
Panel 1: SPLASH: AERIAL VIEW OF THE GRIMY BASEMENT, right after some kind of
massive GUNFIGHT. Five forms lie on the ground, four are unconscious -- one is dead.

Those among the living are about to wake up, and when they do, they will have no memory
of who they are -- or how to communicate with anyone else. (These two things are related.)
They don't know their own names, much less anyone else's, so in classic animation
character design style, we will identify them by their silhouettes, or, more precisely, by their
haircuts.

Placed around this splash are FOUR INSETS showing close ups of our (living) characters:

Panel 2: BOBBI -- white, female, 30s, with close-cropped bangs, like so. She wears what
appears to be a TRENCHCOAT over an Emma Peel-style catsuit.

Panel 3: DREDS -- Asian, female, late 20s, with dreds pulled back in a ponytail, like so. She
wears very loose, baggy clothing, including a green army jacket, and is not terribly clean--
perhaps borderline homeless-looking.

Panel 4: CONK -- a very handsome, 40s Black man in a tux (with loosened bowtie) and an
anachronistic CONK style haircut. Thin mustache. He has an OPEN, EMPTY BRIEFCASE
handcuffed to his wrist.

Panel 5: A 1980s era PUNK with a MOHAWK and a nosering. Mid-20s. He's wearing leather
jacket, boots, ripped jeans -- the complete outfit.

READ THE WHOLE SCRIPT before laying this out! There are some important elements
discovered in subsequent pages that should be indicated in panel 1.

NO COPY THROUGHOUT.

FOREIGNERS #1/Van Lente

THREE
Panel 1: TALL, PAGE-HEIGHT PANEL: Bobbi sits straight up, gasping, scared--but why, she
has no idea.

1. BOBBI (BIG): >gasp<

Panel 2: SMALL PANEL - She looks down at her hand, as she raises it up, feeling something
sticky on it...

2. BOBBI: ???

Panel 3: TIGHT PANEL - REVERSE ANGLE - OVER BOBBI'S SHOULDER - She sees it's
covered in blood!

3. BOBBI: Aaaaahhh!!

Panel 4: Mohawk staggers to his feet, one hand to his head, scowling like he has a
hangover.

4. MOHAWK: Oi! Stop hollering, luv, hanh?

5. BOBBI (OFF): B-b-blood--

Panel 5: Tight on the corpse of MANBUN, a kind of hippy chemist type, white, young-ish,
with, you know, a man-bun, oh, and also a BULLET HOLE in the center of his forehead. He's
lying on his back so it's kind of hard to tell, but there's a massive EXIT WOUND that's blown
out the back of his skull.

Bobbi is lying closest to him and the blood seeped from under the body over to her.
Fortunately, she's wearing all BLACK so if she got more blood on her clothes it doesn't show.

6. MOHAWK (UP): Yeah, I see...

7. MOHAWK (UP): At least it's not yours.

8. MOHAWK (UP): So you've got that going for you.

Panel 6: A standing Mohawk offers a hand to the still-seated Bobbi. Suspicious, she does
not take it.

9. MOHAWK: Need a hand?

10. BOBBI: I-I can manage...

11. MOHAWK: Suit yourself.

FOREIGNERS #1/Van Lente

FOUR
Panel 1: Conk sits up, slowly, painfully, bones creaking.

1. CONK: Nggh...

Panel 2: Conk discovers the open, empty briefcase locked to his wrist. He shakes it,
ineffectually.

2. CONK: ???

3. SFX: rattle rattle

Panel 3: Mohawk helps Conk to his feet. SEMI-IMPORTANT: Later we'll learned he palmed
something out of Conk's pocket when he did this.

4. MOHAWK: Must have been quite an evening, eh, guvnor?

5. CONK: Must have been...

Panel 4: Meanwhile, Dreds has gotten to her feet all on her own. She puts her hand in her
army jacket pocket...

6. CONK (OFF) ...it's all a bit fuzzy...

Panel 5: SMALL PANEL - DREDS' POV - She has discovered an old-fashioned skeleton style
KEY with a HEART-SHAPED FOB (like from a Honeymoon Suite) on one end, with the
number "13" on it.

NO COPY

Panel 6: Dreds looks up, quickly pocketing the key so Mohawk can't see. He's approaching
her with his devil-may-care grin.

7. MOHAWK: Oi! Dreds! What's your story, mate?

FOREIGNERS #1/Van Lente

FIVE
Panel 1: TWO SHOT - Dreds guardedly interrogates Mohawk.

1. DREDS: You first.

2. MOHAWK: Come again?

3. DREDS: Who are you?

Panel 2: CU - Mohawk looks uncharacteristically chastened. He chuckles uneasily.

4. MOHAWK: I, uh...

5. MOHAWK: Heh...

Panel 3: SAME SHOT - CU - Mohawk scratches the back of his head.

6. MOHAWK: That's the funny thing, innit?

7. MOHAWK: I feel like I should know.

Panel 4: SAME SHOT - CU - Mohawk smiles bashfully.

8. MOHAWK: But I don't.

9. DREDS (OFF): Yeah.

10. DREDS (OFF): Me neither.

Panel 5: Conk goes through his pockets, fruitlessly.

11. CONK: Lot of that going around.

12. CONK: Does anyone have any I.D. in their pockets? A phone?

Panel 6: Bobbi, now on her feet, goes through her pockets, too. She pulls out a PHOTO
STRIP from one of those coin-operated booths.

13. CONK (OFF): Nada, mate. We all been pinched, maybe, while we were
floor-side?

FOREIGNERS #1/Van Lente

SIX
Panel 1: TALL, PAGE-HEIGHT PANEL: BOBBI'S POV - The strip is comprised of four photos
of Bobbi, in the cat suit without the coat on, sitting in the photo booth with a young BLONDE
GIRL about six. As one does in such booths, they are mugging for the camera, laughing and
hugging. Her daughter? Maybe?

1. CONK (OFF): In a total vacuum of knowledge, anything is possible.

2. CONK (OFF): Let's catalogue what we do know:

Panel 2: CONK'S POV - Down at his feet are guns that may or not have been dropped by
our protagonists.

3. CONK (UP): Right. A lot of guns.

Panel 3: CONK'S POV - The concrete walls of the basement appear to be riddled with bullet
holes. There was a firefight here, and recently.

4. CONK (OFF): Would explain all the bullet holes...

Panel 4: Conk removes a silk handkerchief from his tux jacket pocket and uses to pick up
one of the pieces of the shattered canister from Page One.

5. CONK: Some kind of...pressurized canister?

Panel 5: CONK'S POV - SMALL PANEL - THE LABEL has the same weird characters on it
from Page One, panel 4.

6. CONK (OFF): Labeled in gibberish. Anyone recognize this alphabet?

7. CONK (OFF): Me neither.

Panel 6: Conk stands over Manbun's body. Dreds, Mohawk, Bobbi behind him, receding in
that order.

8. CONK: Manbun, here.

9. CONK: And the four of us.

FOREIGNERS #1/Van Lente

SEVEN
Panel 1: Dreds points down at the ground, near the pool of blood that Manbun lies in.

1. DRED: Five.

Panel 2: Dreds, Conk and Mohawk look. The footprints go across the room...

NO COPY

Panel 3: Tighter on Bobbi: She hangs behind, turning over the strip to see if there's
anything on the back...

NO COPY

Panel 4: The bloody footprints go up to a METAL DOOR in the wall and STOP. (Possibly up a
short flight of steps, if that is an element that can be added...)

NO COPY

Panel 5: EXTREME CU ON Bobbi: She looks SHOCKED.

NO COPY

Panel 6: The other three stand by the door, hesitant to continue further.

2. MOHAWK: Be my guest, toff.

FOREIGNERS #1/Van Lente

EIGHT
Panel 1: BOBBI'S POV - There is something SCRAWLED in red marker on the back of the
filmstrip:

1. SCRAWL (BIG): ONLY YOU CAN SAVE HER

Panel 2: Shoot from the other side of the metal double doors as the Conk throws it open.
He, Dreds, and Mohawk, are SHOCKED:

NO COPY

Panel 3: BIG PANEL: On the other side are bunch of EUROTRASH MOBSTERS. They are at
the top of stairs leading into the ground floor of the warehouse. They are furious to see our
heroes. They are all armed to the teeth with Russian assault rifles and shouting. But here's
the thing -- the same brain damage caused by the nerve gas that has robbed our heroes of
their memories has rendered the language of these gunsels unintelligible!

2. GUNSEL #1: [SAME GIBBERISH ON CANISTER LABEL]

3. GUNSEL #2: [SAME GIBBERISH ON CANISTER LABEL]

Panel 4: TIGHTER IN - They fire their Kalashnikovs at the reader!

4. SFX: BRRRAPPP BRRRAAAAPPP

FOREIGNERS #1/Van Lente