Down The Up Movator (Staircase)
ASTRID & LILLY SAVE THE WORLD – Season 1 Episode 4 – SPOILERS
Frank Frick in his classroom, on the phone to Officer Drew
We learn a lot about science teacher Frank Frick (Colin Furlong). His favourite hobbies are dessert bars, finding interesting Korean food, and improv. His significant other is Officer Drew (Andrew Tremblett), and the couple recently adopted. Officer Drew is surprised to learn that Michelle (Megan Hutchings) has agreed to be their child’s godmother, but Frick tells him “That’s how we become friends.”
Frick encourages Eggs Walczak (Michael McCreary) to audition for the school play (which this year is Romeo and Juliet). “Anybody can act,” Frick tells him, and besides, Michelle, who has taken over drama class from the missing Jonas, asked him to rustle up some interest in the auditions. No one knows that Jonas has been abducted by the beast in the church basement, because Christine (Geri Hall) sent a note to the school saying the missing teacher has gone to LA to become the “next Banksy”.
Officer Drew watching the strange dance behaviour from the bushes
Officer Drew heads for the local convenience store to pick up some baby wipes. He notices people dancing in the street, apparently oblivious to everything around them, and concludes (incorrectly) that there is a new drug in town. Carla the Cashier (Renรฉe Hackett) hasn’t seen anything unusual but tells him that yesterday she thought the entire store was crawling with spiders, but it was just her imagination. (No arachnids are visible in the episode, and it is not clear if this event was in any way tied to the portal.)
Just then two people wearing pink steal a large quantity of “baby painkillers” and drive off in a car with an Ohio license plate and a Coppers Cove plate holder, possibly identifying the area where the show is set. (Remember that the coordinates Eggs gave Lilly and Astrid in Episode Two were in Elyria, Ohio.) Officer Drew, however, has an accent that does not sound Ohioan.
Renรฉe Hackett as Carla the Cashier. A rainbow flag is prominently displayed in the store where she works, next to the apples
The people wearing pink (if they are anything like the pink-wearing pair Lilly observed in class) have matching tattoos, and we see some of them get those tattoos from the strange being called The Guardian (voiced by Mike Shara) in the church basement. The Guardian (it’s called that in the credits) bathes his claw in a bucket of blood at least some of which likely once belonged to Jonas. Christine refills the bucket because the original batch has “turned”. (The amount of blood used is more than could be provided by one person.) The beast senses that Christine is becoming uncomfortable with things and worries that she might be starting to doubt his heavenly credentials.
GUARDIAN: “Don’t lose faith. If you stay the course with me, you’ll have all the power you ever could
have wanted. And you’ll find certain annoyances cease to exist.”
CHRISTINE: “I didn’t see you mentioned anywhere in the bible.”
GUARDIAN: “Does it matter?”
CHRISTINE: [Thinks for a minute.] “Can I make my own title?”
GUARDIAN: “Interesting. I’m sure that can be arranged.”
Brutus and the Movator
Brutus (Olivier Renaud) tells Astrid and Lilly that there has been no breach of the portal, and therefore no monster to hunt. (He’s wrong about that. Something called a Jzzxxshh is in town causing something akin to St. Vitus Dance.) “I have a whole list of things I want to do while I’m on Earth,” he tells them. “Shoe shopping, the laundromat, which I think is some sort of ride, and something called pegging. Ooh, maybe we could go together? Like a little three-way?” Astrid and Lilly decline the invitation. (The captioning for the episode left out the line about pegging.) Later we see Brutus having fun at the local Mall. He seems to particularly enjoy riding the Movator (a term for a moving staircase for both carts and people, which might rhyme with elevator but it hasn’t enough syllables for that so it more naturally rhymes with humidor).
The Shipping News (Landace Fortwell and Astrow)
Sparrow (Spencer Macpherson) and Astrid (Jana Morrison) finally go on a date. We learn that Astrid used to ice skate with her father a very long time ago, and that Sparrow has an Iguana named Philbert. Spencer calls the lizard a “little monster”, and defines “monster” as someone who doesn’t fit in. (The only other father mentioned on the show so far is Tate’s dad.) The date goes well, but immediately after they kiss, Astrid leaves abruptly to help Lilly deal with the monster behind the spreading aberrant dance-like behaviour. Sparrow is left behind, bewildered.
(clockwise from top left) Valerie, Bradley, Eggs, and Candace auditioning for the school production of Romeo and Juliet
Candace (Julia Doyle) and Lilly (Samantha Aucoin) both sign up to audition for the play. Candace asked her boyfriend Tate to come but, as usual, he’s busy with soccer practice and can’t be bothered.
Everyone but Val (Christina Orjalo) takes their monologue from a screenplay. Bradley (Noah Perchard), takes his from Vin Diesel and THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS. Eggs (who, it turns out, can act very well) delivers something from JAWS, and manages to impress even Michelle. Candace chooses lines from ERIN BROCKOVICH, and might get cast as Juliet because, before Val could perform, she was afflicted with the strange dancing behaviour that Officer Drew observed earlier, and Lilly has to (literally) sweep her off the stage.
Miscellaneous Info
Renรฉe Hackett and Shawn Doyle in the 2019 short film SOME SATURDAYS
Renรฉe Hackett wrote and starred in the 2018 short film SOME SATURDAYS about Hank (Shawn Doyle) and his wife Jules (Hackett), both in their 40s, who set out for what seems to be a leisurely summer boat ride. The eleven-minute film directed by Steve Cochrane (co-creator of THE HARDY BOYS) is on YouTube.
Stand-up comic Michael McCreary‘s memoir: Funny, You Don’t Look Autistic: A Comedian’s Guide to Life on the Spectrum, is available in Kindle, Audiobook, and Paperback formats from Amazon.