Friday Challenge 5/9/08

This is my entry for Bruce Bethke's Friday Challenge for 5/9/08.

The Lifetime Original Movie of the week is called Rabbit Ears.

It's February 2009. The warnings have aired relentlessly between episodes of American Idol and Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? for well over a year. No matter. The timing couldn't have been worse. The downturn in the economy has made it difficult to afford a converter box, much less a digital HD widescreen television with surround sound. What the government didn't foresee was that, while they may over-tax the citizenry, fail to educate their children, and encourage an invasion from south of the border, you don't f*&% with our TV sets!

The story is told from the point of view of Kevin Martin (Maybe we can get Patrick Swayze?), head of the Federal Communications Commission. He spends the entire film is his high-rise DC office under siege by mobs of worker drones below whose brains have accidentally started working.

In the crowd is Mildred Paige, an elderly woman (Kathy Bates, no?) who has had to choose between fuel for her Escalade and Matlock reruns. She is not a happy camper. Mildred leads the angry hordes in an attempt to seize the building and the chairman. A set of "rabbit-ears" becomes the official symbol of the movement. And every man, woman and child waves them aggressively at the window on the forty-fifth floor.

Mildred and her commandos eventually make it past security to the stairwell just outside the F.C.C. lobby. Martin is barricaded in his office with only his overweight administrative assistant as protection. The oppressed masses burst through the door and hang him on his coat rack by his briefs. Mildred presses her nail file to the man's throat and says "Bring... back... my... stories!" The crowd bursts into cheers! Martin yelps as the file draws blood.

Suddenly, the plate glass window shatters and President Hillary lands squarely in center of the office, sword drawn! "Get away from him," she shrieks in her own special way. The crowd starts to close in on her, but the blade takes several of the protesters to the ground in a pool of sticky redness. The rest back off respectfully.

Finally, she squares off with Mildred and her nail file. The old woman (Mildred, I mean) swings her weapon, but Hillary ducks, then leaps to the dangling light fixture, slamming her heavy heels into the old woman's chest. Mildred is knocked to the ground, but she's up again instantly. In a desperate attempt, she throws her rabbit-ear antenna. Hillary swats it away with her sword and, presses her blade to her opponent's chest, demanding surrender.

"Never!" Mildred shouts. But Hillary produces a calico cat from her power pantsuit and turns the blade on it. "NOOOOO!" The crowd is shocked as Mildred concedes.

President Hillary turns to the camera and gives a speech about the future belonging to digital. Besides, it frees up more frequencies for the government to use. You do like the government, don't you?