EXT. NONDESCRIPT SUBURB

JOSH HUTCHERSON flees the police on a motorcycle.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

WOOOO!! THIS REALLY HELPS ESTABLISH MY CHARACTER AS A SELF-SERIOUS SCIENCE GEEK!

(stunt jump into pool)

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Damnit, Josh! You're lucky they're not pressing charges after you - what did he do, officer?

POLICEMAN

He broke into a satellite research facility.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Wait, seriously? You scrambled all cars for a high-speed pursuit of some teenager who snuck into a lab at night?

POLICEMAN

We get so fucking bored around here, I swear to God.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

I needed the satellite to hear this encoded radio message from my grandfather.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Encoded? Give me a look, I used to be a professional code breaker.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

(cracks up laughing)

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Shut up. Now, let's see...

Thirty seconds and two hundred insane intuitive leaps later:

DWAYNE JOHNSON

All right, so it's telling us the location of The Mysterious Island is hidden in the book, as well as the books Treasure Island and Gulliver's Travels.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Which makes sense because they all had an island in them!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

There were like seven islands in Gulliver's-

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Yes, the one with the tiny people, and none others, everybody knows that.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Okay, each book contains a map. And if you sort of smush them all together, and squint real hard, they look a bit like one single island.

(tilts head)

Or a starfish.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

According the these coordinates, it's off the coast of Palau. Hey, can I ditch school to go on some crazy spur-of-the-moment trip to Palau on your dime?

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Sure thing buddy, but obviously not unaccompanied.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

WHAT?! YOU SUCK! I HATE YOU!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Wow. You're quite the ungrateful little shit, aren't you?

EXT. PALAU

Dwayne and Josh go to hire LUIS GUZMAN and his CRAPPY HELICOPTER.

LUIS GUZMAN

Hi there, I'm Luis. I'm a cowardly, stupid lickspittle with no dignity who never shuts up.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Again?

LUIS GUZMAN

It's a bitch of a typecasting job, I know. Later in this movie my character gets literally shat on. SHAT. ON.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Can you take us to this place here? The blood-red area of the map, with the skull-and-crossbones motif?

VANESSA HUDGENS

Take our scrapheap of a helicopter into the Zone of Death? We like our limbs where they are, thanks.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Well, would you do it for...A MODERATE AMOUNT OF MONEY?!

VANESSA HUDGENS

Woot, our corpses are going to be ever-so-slightly rich! Hop aboard!

They fly off to the coordinates, where the helicopter is TORN APART by a GIANT TYPHOON. They plummet towards the ocean in the flaming wreckage.

LUIS GUZMAN

CRAAAAAAP! HOW THE HELL ARE WE GOING TO SURVIVE THIS?!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

ONLY THE EDITOR CAN SAVE US NOW!

EXT. ISLAND

They are all unharmed on a calm beach.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Phew, that was close. Are we there yet?

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Yeah, check it out! Giant butterflies! Tiny elephants! This all follows the natural law of the island which states that all creatures are whatever the hell size they need to be for the purposes of the story. Jonathan Swift described it in Gulliver's Travels!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Nope. Not even close.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Okay, that's about as much time as we can spend establishing a sense of wonder. Quick, an action scene, before the audience's ADHD kicks in!

They're chased by a GIANT LIZARD MONSTER! Eventually it has them cornered.

LUIS GUZMAN

Oh no! We're trapped!

VANESSA HUDGENS

There's nothing we can do! It's going to kill us now!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Yes, it's going to just reach out and bite our heads off!

(pause)

We're dead!

(pause)

Any moment now!

Finally the lizard is taken out by SEVERAL LOG TRAPS.

MICHAEL CAINE

Hey there, it's me! Good thing the lizard stopped exactly where all those log traps converge, huh?

DWAYNE JOHNSON

I'm just impressed that a septugenarian was able to haul those massive trunks up to the treeline single-handedly.

MICHAEL CAINE

Ah, Dwayne. Reduced to taking Brendan Fraser's rejects, I see. What is it with you and doing sequels to movies you weren't in? Practicing for the inevitable direct-to-DVD phase of your career?

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Dude, what the hell? This is literally the first time you've ever laid eyes on me, why are you being so hostile?

MICHAEL CAINE

I guess the screenwriters figured that being a smarmy family-neglecting prat didn't make my character unlikeable enough. You roided-up meathead. Anyhoo, guess what I figured out about this island: it's actually the Lost City of Atlantis!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Oh, fuck it, why not. It's whatever island we want it to be. It's all the islands. Let's all go hang out with Gilligan and Hurley by the T-Rex enclosure.

MICHAEL CAINE

I know Atlantis is supposed to have sank, but see, it's actually on a 140-year cycle of rising and sinking!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

...And the wildlife, what, starts from scratch each time? Is amphibious?

MICHAEL CAINE

Yes, it's amphibious. Stick through the credits, that's the actual explanation. Anyway, we've got about a month until the island submerges again, by my calculations.

The island SINKS SEVERAL FEET.

MICHAEL CAINE

Although there is a margin of error.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Michael, you idiot! I've got geology powers now, and this island is going to be underwater in a day or two!

MICHAEL CAINE

Okay, fine, we'll run for our lives.

(pause)

You constantly-mugging human cartoon.

VANESSA HUDGENS

Hey, would you stop ragging on Dwayne? He's clearly the most intelligent and competent person in the movie.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

(ruining character)

CHECK OUT MY DANCING PECS! HEY, HEY, BOUNCE SOME CRAPPY CGI BERRIES OFF OF MY DANCING PECS! YEAH!

VANESSA HUDGENS

Uh. Never mind.

MICHAEL CAINE

We'd better head to the convenient submarine on the other side of the island.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Oh, a submarine, good. I was afraid it was going to be something that required special skills and training to operate.

They hike for a while. Eventually they spot off in the distance a VOLCANO THAT PUKES GOLD.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Hey, check it out! That must be the "treasure" Robert Louis Stevenson was talking about.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Oh, FUCK YOU. Has anybody involved with this movie ever even read a book?

JOSH HUTCHERSON

I've got a great idea: let's stop fleeing for our lives so we can go to an active volcano on a geologically unstable island!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

I've got a better idea: how about we NOT do the single dumbest thing possible?

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Screw you, Dwayne! That volcano is probably the scientific discovery of the century!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

...Really? That? I would've picked the submersible island full of dinosaur lizards in the middle of a perpetual storm, myself. But no, you're right, it's that unusual mineral deposit. Man, geology geeks are weird...

They keep going until they reach the bottom of SEVERAL HUNDRED FEET OF SHEER CLIFF FACE.

MICHAEL CAINE

By the by, when I suggested this route I was just assuming we'd think of a way past this completely unclimbable obstacle when we got here. Any thoughts?

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Uh. Geez, I don't know. I'd suggest we ride some giant bees or something, but catching and subduing one, let alone mounting it-

MICHAEL CAINE

Oh look, I'm on one now. I did it offscreen. And I can steer it by, uh, it going where I want it to.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Seriously, how do screenwriters this lazy even manage to feed themselves?

They fly for a while, having a BORING CHASE SEQUENCE during which they HORRIBLY INJURE SOME BIRDS. Then they make camp, Dwayne sings for a bit - wait, what?

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Yes. That happens.

Jesus. Anyway, when they get up next morning, Luis is gone!

VANESSA HUDGENS

Oh no, he must have gone back to the gold volcano!

MICHAEL CAINE

Don't worry, we'll just go there and get him.

VANESSA HUDGENS

But it took us half a day's journey to get here from there. And we were flying for a lot of that. And there are still those impassable cliffs in the way. How are we going to get back there in the next couple of hours?

MICHAEL CAINE

We'll just travel by SHUT THE FUCK UP. Dwayne, Josh, you go get the submarine and meet up with us at the vague place. You know, the one that none of us have ever been to. I won't even point it out on the map.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

We shall navigate our submarine there unfailingly, because that's a thing we can do. First, let me take a photo of the island map so we both have a copy.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

How is it that the only photo we've taken on this cockamamie trip is of a piece of paper we brought with us?

While Michael and Vanessa use their OFFSCREEN TELEPORTATION SKILLS, Dwayne and Josh go and find that the submarine is UNREACHABLY SUBMERGED.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Oh no, we're screwed!

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Hey, haven't you figured this movie out yet? We will always have the exact skills and resources we need. Now, let's get these plastic bags, rolls of duct tape and lengths of plastic hosing out of our backpacks and jury-rig us some scuba equipment!

They DO THAT, then jumpstart the submarine using an ELECTRIC EEL, completing the film's transformation into a Looney Tunes cartoon.

EXT. VOLCANO

Luis is trying to pick up a GIANT GOLD BOULDER, officially making his character RETARDED for the sake of a SIGHT GAG.

VANESSA HUDGENS

Seriously, Dad? If you wanted something valuable, why not grab one of the amphibious pygmy elephants? You moron.

They run for the ocean as the island starts SHAKING ITSELF COMPLETELY TO PIECES, making the idea that all the wildlife and ancient buildings have survived this dozens of times PATENTLY ABSURD. After hitting the water, they are saved by the submarine with its PERSON-SWALLOWING ACTION.

DWAYNE JOHNSON

Quick, Luis, take the controls! It's just like flying a helicopter. It may be a completely different size and shape, moving through a completely different medium via a completely different mode of propulsion, but you use a stick thingy to steer, so you know, identical.

LUIS GUZMAN

Hooray! I get to do something other than fuck up!

They submarine to safety through the INEXPLICABLY NON-TURBULENT WATER.

INT. DWAYNE'S HOUSE

Six months later, DWAYNE AND JOSH are BEST BUDS and MICHAEL is a FAMILY MAN and VANESSA is in COLLEGE and LUIS is RICH and BRENDAN is STILL NOT IN THE MOVIE and EVERYTHING IS MEGA AWESOME FOREVER.

MICHAEL CAINE

The Super Happy Ending, good choice. Say, did we ever wind up telling anyone about the amazing underwater island that we totally know how to get to?

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Maybe? I don't know, it doesn't come up.

MICHAEL CAINE

Oh well, that's neither here nor there. I really want to talk about our NEXT adventure, which is-

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Jesus, another one? Look, the first movie had subterranean dinosaurs, and somehow this one was even dumber. Please don't-

MICHAEL CAINE

Our family is going to build us a rocket and fly to the moon!

Everyone's WILLING SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF finally SNAPS FROM THE STRAIN.

JOSH HUTCHERSON

Ow! Wait a minute, how come I could breathe in space in Zathura?

END.