The Abridged Script
FADE IN:
EXT. SNOWY SUBURB
CHRIS PINE frolics through the snow in a just-barely-non-lethal-enough fashion with DAKOTA GOYO, which is apparently the actual name of a male human who exists.
CGI CHRIS PINE
Hey hey, I'm Jack Frost, the mythical personification of winter! Although I've only been around for a couple hundred years and all I do is instigate isolated snowfights, so I guess it's more like "invisible guy with ice powers and delusions of grandeur".
CGI DAKOTA GOYO
Whereas I'm a kid who really, REALLY believes in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny and the Abominable Snowman and pretty much everything BUT Jack Frost! This is because of my abnormally high level of innocent wonder, which in sufficient quantities is apparently indistinguishable from BATSHIT INSANITY! BZARP!
CGI CHRIS PINE
Sigh, I wish kids believed in me. Unfortunately they can't see or hear me. They can only see and hear the everyday objects I can move around like a normal person, which is completely useless to me.
Suddenly he is summoned to the NORTH POLE and brought before ALEC BALDWIN.
CGI CHRIS PINE
SANTA!
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
That's me! Sort of. I mean, I'm a heavily-tattooed, vaguely Russian muscleman who goes by the name "North". But I do have all Santa's trademarks, like his toy-making yeti, and his six, count 'em, SIX flying reindeer.
CGI CHRIS PINE
I don't get it. Is there some copyright deal I should be aware of? Should I be calling myself "Joe Sleet" or something?
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
Apparently not, as you'll see by the other members of the team. Roll call!
CGI HUGH JACKMAN
The randomly-Australian Easter Bunny, with the powers of egg-hiding!
CGI ISLA FISHER
The Tooth Fairy, with the powers of having underlings who collect teeth for me!
CGI NOBODY
(miming frantically)
And The Sandman, with the power to instantly knock out even the most powerful supernatural foe, to control the thoughts of billions of people simultaneously, and to manifest any object or weapon out of sand a la the other Sandman!
CGI CHRIS PINE
Psst, Santa, we've got a way of getting rid of him before it becomes obvious how ridiculously overpowered he is, right?
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
Don't worry, he'll be gone by Act Two. Now, to business: you've been drafted into the war between The Man in the Moon and The Boogeyman. They-
CGI CHRIS PINE
The - the Man in the Moon... and The Boogeyman?
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
Yes, they're sort of the analogues for God and The Devil here. Now-
CGI CHRIS PINE
The MAN IN THE MOON. And THE BOOGEYMAN.
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
What are you implying, that our "hip and edgy" marketing is utterly failing to hide the fact that we're a totally toothless piece of kiddy holiday nonsense that should be in claymation? Pshaw! Look at my tatts. Look at the bunny's Angry Eyes. This movie is so badass, we-
Suddenly JUDE LAW shows up looking like EDWARD CULLEN IN A BATHROBE.
CGI JUDE LAW
Mwa ha ha, I've just kidnapped all the little tooth fairies! It's phase one of my plan to remove all joy from the world, very much like a Care Bears villain!
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
...Oh, who am I kidding. This is the most juvenile thing I've ever been in, and I was in the Spongebob movie AND Thomas the Tank Engine AND Pearl Harbor.
CGI ISLA FISHER
Nooo, he took my slaves! As well as my creepy-ass hoard of human teeth!
CGI CHRIS PINE
Ew, you hang on to those things? Why?
CGI ISLA FISHER
Because baby teeth hold your memories. In fact, any time somebody fondly remembers the past, they're actually communing with their old teeth.
CGI CHRIS PINE
Yes. Yes, that makes sense.
CGI ISLA FISHER
I even had the teeth containing our old memories from when we were mortal.
CGI CHRIS PINE
Wait, we have backstories?! I don't remember mine, for no adequately explained reason! I just remember waking up underwater, with this name and these superpowers and no other clue as to who I am!
CGI HUGH JACKMAN
Hey, BACK OFF, buddy.
CGI ISLA FISHER
The important thing is, if the teeth aren't being harvested, kids will lose faith in me, and if kids don't believe in us we lose our powers!
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
Yes, that's why we go to extreme lengths to make sure we're never ever seen and don't leave any tangible proof of our existence.
(pause)
Wait. Hold on. I think there may be a flaw in our reasoning.
CGI ISLA FISHER
We need to collect those teeth! If only I had the ability to personally visit every house, like I do in every other depiction ever!
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
Fortunately, the rest of us do have that power, which kind of emphasizes just how fucking useless you are.
They COLLECT ALL THE TEETH with CONSUMMATE EASE, making JUDE look even more ineffectual than he already did.
CGI CHRIS PINE
And by insultingly huge coincidence, look whose room we finished up in.
CGI DAKOTA GOYO
Wow, Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy and the Sandman, I knew you guys were real!! But where's the flying leprechaun who eats my thoughts?!
CGI CHRIS PINE
Ugh, shut him up please.
CGI NOBODY
(accidentally knocking out half the people in the room)
Whoops! Zoinks! You'd think I'd have gotten the hang of this "sleep" thing after the first hundred bajillion times I did it.
In passing out, ALEC happens to drop his personal TELEPORTATION ORB, then while nobody's looking DAKOTA'S LITTLE SISTER randomly wanders into his room at THREE IN THE MORNING and happens to pick up the orb, then accidentally sets it to EASTER LAND, then accidentally ACTIVATES IT, then blithely WANDERS THROUGH THE PORTAL.
WRITER DAVID LINDSAY-ABAIRE
Don't worry, I'll come up with a less horribly contrived way around that later.
(forgets)
CGI JUDE LAW
Grr, so you good guys rendered phase one of my plan laughably moot. But you do realize we've reached Act Two now, right?
CGI NOBODY
Whoops!
(obliterated)
CGI JUDE LAW
Ba ha ha, now I've taken over all dreams and converted them into nightmares!
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
Wait, so everybody sleeping right now is having nothing but horrible nightmares? Including, say, people with serious heart conditions, and the frail and elderly?
CGI HUGH JACKMAN
Or emotionally unstable people already on the brink of suicide? Or a killing spree?
CGI CHRIS PINE
Or people like doctors or police officers, whose level of stress and/or sleep is a matter of life and death to others every single day? You do realize that someone, somewhere, is going to die because of this.
CGI JUDE LAW
Er, let's pretend that's not true, and just focus on the sad little children, okay?
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
You sure? Okay. You nearly seemed like a bit of a threat for a second there, but whatevs.
CGI JUDE LAW
OH NO WAIT LET'S GO BACK TO THE KILLING SPREES-
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
(leaving)
Too late, we're off to make sure you don't fuck with Easter, which is tomorrow!
CGI JUDE LAW
Easter. Right. OF COURSE a movie released right before Christmas, starring Santa Claus, where it snows in pretty much every scene, is set at Easter. That's not confusing AT ALL.
EXT. EASTER LAND
All the GOOD GUYS go to EASTER CENTRAL, which is populated by SENTIENT, AMBULATORY EGGS preparing themselves for Easter.
CGI CHRIS PINE
AAAHHHH!! AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!! WHAT - I DON'T - ARE THEY STILL ALIVE WHEN THE CHILDREN EAT THEM?! WH-WHEN DO YOU RIP OFF THEIR LEGS?!
CGI HUGH JACKMAN
Hold it, we've got a bigger problem - it seems Dakota's little sister got here by what was surely completely believable means.
CGI CHRIS PINE
Someone better take her home. As the one that Not-God singled out as being absolutely indispensable to our main mission, I'll do it.
CGI HUGH JACKMAN
Er, can't we just teleport her home? You know, using the exact same method that got her here?
CGI CHRIS PINE
Look, the story is clearly clubbing me over the head right now with a sign saying "split off from the group now so bad shit can go down". This'll all go more smoothly if I just do what it says.
CHRIS delivers the kid back home, but on his way back to EASTER LAND, he is distracted when he finds the KIDNAPPED FAIRIES, his OLD TEETH, and JUDE!
CGI JUDE LAW
Join me, Chris! You and I are a perfect match!
CGI CHRIS PINE
What the hell are you talking about? I want all the kids of the world to play in a happy laughing snowfight forever, while you want them shivering in the fetal position trying to remember what hope feels like. Those goals are kind of mutually exclusive.
CGI JUDE LAW
You know what? One day, ONE DAY, some hero somewhere is going to say, "Sure, let's go be evil together, sounds swell"! And when that day comes, us two-dimensional supervillains will all LAUGH and LAUGH!
CHRIS heads back to EASTER LAND, only to find that in his absence JUDE'S BAD-PUN ARMY has smashed all the HORRIBLE LITTLE EGG MONSTERS.
CGI HUGH JACKMAN
NOOOO! The three kids in the entire world who still give a shit about painted eggs are going to be CRUSHED! This is all your fault, Chris!
CGI CHRIS PINE
Sure, for the sake of the story let's pretend it is. Boo hoo, I suck!
(runs off angstily)
But then CHRIS remembers about his OLD TEETH and pries his backstory out of them.
CGI CHRIS PINE
Oh hey, it seems I was a happy-go-lucky teenager who drowned rescuing my little sister! My little sister who must be long, long dead now, along with all the other loved ones I remember now!
(pause)
That's actually really fucking depressing. But it's supposed to inspire me and restore my will to live, so, whatever. I'M A GHOST OR A ZOMBIE OR SOMETHING, YAAAYYYY!!
He goes and confronts JUDE.
CGI JUDE LAW
You're too late! A few bad dreams and some disappointing Easter egg hunts have caused every single child on the face of the planet to lose faith in all of you! Fickle little shits, aren't they?
CGI CHRIS PINE
Hang on, according to this convenient belief-tracking globe, on which individual children are marked by lights big enough to denote entire cities, one kid still believes in us! It must be Dakota's sister, since just last night she was hanging out with us all in Easter Land with a bunch of walking eggs and yetis and stuff.
CGI JUDE LAW
Nope, she too has decided none of you actually exist. What did I say about fickle?
CGI CHRIS PINE
So, wait, the one kid who still believes must be...
CGI DAKOTA GOYO
(crafting foil hat)
GAH! Bush was behind nine eleven, and the Illuminati were behind Bush, and the Lizard People were behind the Illuminati! AGHBRFLBN!!
CGI CHRIS PINE
Yeesh. Well, a general goes to war with the army he's got.
He goes to DAKOTA'S HOUSE, only to find that even his indiscriminate faith is slipping.
CGI DAKOTA GOYO
Why hast thou forsaken me, Easter Bunny? Give me a sign!
(pause)
No, seriously, we've been exaggerating and all, but this is an actual no-fooling scene where a little boy prays to the fucking Easter Bunny for a sign. What the FUCK.
CHRIS draws a bunch of Easter crap on the window in frost to reaffirm DAKOTA'S belief in Easter magic. Then he makes it snow inside, because, like, snow is Eastery, right?
CGI DAKOTA GOYO
Wait a minute, you're not the Easter Bunny, you're Jack Frost! You made me believe in you using methods you could have used at any time if you had half a brain!
CGI CHRIS PINE
You're right! And I can use the same methods to bring belief back to even more kids, and thus fight Jude! Like, six or seven kids ought to do it. That's all I could be bothered with, honestly.
He DOES THIS, and ALEC, HUGH and ISLA randomly turn up.
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
Good work, Chris! The belief generated by this puny gaggle of children is enough to grant us all full strength again! Isn't it great how pathetically little effort is required to solve every one of our problems?
CGI JUDE LAW
Don't be so sure! I've got the entire town surrounded by my terrifying spectral army, and-
The laughter of little children KILLS JUDE'S ENTIRE ARMY so hard that SANDMAN COMES UN-OBLITERATED.
CGI JUDE LAW
BAW! Defeated with the power of love?! I really wasn't kidding with that Care Bears remark, was I?
CGI ALEC BALDWIN
Well, Chris, you saved all the children of the world from a slight, silly threat. What do you say, want to be a part of this team?
CGI CHRIS PINE
Sure! No more itinerant wandering for me, now that I've found a surrogate family in this secret team of superheroes led by a wise old-
CGI HUGH JACKMAN
THAT'S IT. I am CALLING MY LAWYER.
END.