The Meeting That Led to the New JJ Abrams Trailer (Probably)

Chaz Blazer, elite Hollywood executive and proud Interracial Fight Club Member, glided silently into Geoff Chaser’s office. “Chazzykins! What it do?” exclaimed Geoff, rising from his chair to greet his comrade. “What’s with the skates?” “Oh these?” Chaz was impeccably dressed, as always. An impossibly expensive, stylishly cut black suit, hand-made to his order by mentally deficient Italian tailor-savants, hugged every inch of his frame. The effect was absolutely ruined by the bright, neon-green rollerblades he was also wearing. “They're ironic. Get it?” “No, I’m not sure I do,” Geoff replied, making his way over to the bar which was, like everything in the office today, actually a Hispanic man being paid to serve as furniture.

Oh, this is a thing; I did not make this thing up.

“Yeah, me neither to be honest,” Chaz rolled the wheels back and forth against the carpet-Latino, “but I honestly don’t give a fuck about life enough to think these things through anymore. As long as it gets any sort of reaction, I feel validated. But enough about my desperate cries for attention: What’s this secret project you’ve been on about?” “Why, only the new, incredibly classified, buzz-worthy J.J. Abrams trailer!” Geoff cried out, kicking over the coffee table for emphasis. According to the pamphlets, he didn’t have to pay the object-men if they broke their pre-determined “furniture body-shape.” He was almost disheartened to see that the man firmly maintained the table posture. He lay perfectly still, like a frozen turtle tipped on its side. “Fuck your lying whore mouth!” Chaz exclaimed, abruptly standing and skating over to take Geoff by the lapels – or rather, what would have been his lapels if those weren’t sooo 2006. “No way that’s you! You’re behind Super 8, the password-locked ultra-encrypted teaser trailer for the new Abrams movie debuting with

Iron Man 2? The Internet has been cyber-texting that valuation spread throughout all core e-demographics!”

A lot of people went to school for a long time just to learn how to say “people are retweeting it.”

“I have no idea what any of that means,” Geoff calmly answered, separating himself from Chaz’s grasp and stepping over to his desk (or rather, his carefully stacked desk-shaped mound of illegal immigrants). He removed a mirror and mound of powder from one of the drawers, a concept that still confused him, and offered it to Chaz. He daintily tucked into it with all the refinery of an English prostitute. “But yes,” Geoff continued, “that's all me, baby. I saw the inexplicable success of the Cloverfield marketing campaign--basing itself entirely on secrecy despite essentially just being a remake of Godzilla set in an Abercrombie and Fitch catalog--and I thought ‘fuck it; let’s just do that again.”

“Yeah, you’d look great in our 'Cotton Breeze' boat-neck and OHMYGODISTHATAMONSTER!?”

“How do you like it?” Geoff gestured to the steadily diminishing powder in Chaz’s lap. “Well I certainly don’t mean to offend your hospitality, but uh... shit. How do I put this delicately? This is like trying to coax anal out of a nun: I’m getting nothing here, and if I don’t get what I want soon I’m gonna lose my shit and start committing hate-crimes. What is this crap?” “Just ordinary ol’ powdered white rhino, buddy. But about the project: You know how these ‘lack of information’ teasers drive people crazy, right?” “Of course! Viral marketing campaigns based exclusively around tantalization and scarcity as opposed to the honest promotion of a quality product always have fantastic results.” “Well, that was a bit heavy-handed, Chaz. Is the inherent disassociation and bitterness of Hollywood finally eroding the foundations of your humanity? I’ve got a prescription for that here somewhere. Open up, Jorge,” Geoff snapped at the man doubling as his liquor cabinet. A single tear streaked down his face and across his naked body but, to Geoff’s consternation, he remained unquestioningly in a cabinet shape. He slowly creaked open.

Why would you think I’d make something like this up? You’ve seen the Internet; it’s horrible.

“These guys are fucking pros,” spat Geoff, plucking a mason jar full of industrial-grade cocaine from the man’s distorted abdomen. “Here.” “Oh Jesus my lord and fucking savior! I haven’t had any in easily 15 feet,” Chaz, all refinement forgotten, buried his face in the jar and his entire body shook with the great, gasping inhalations. “Feet?” “I find it’s easier to measure my cocaine intake in distance rather than time, these days.” “Better?” Geoff asked. “Fucking shitfucks,” Chaz replied, bleeding from his ears. “I’ll take that as a 'yes.' Where was I?” “Something about ‘lack of information’ teasers driving people crazy,” Chaz answered monotonously. “Excellent memory, Chaz!” Geoff exclaimed. “No. I can temporarily see through time,” he replied dully, “you die in four years. But matter can neither be created nor destroyed; what you mourn is not the loss of yourself, but the loss of your sense of self.”

“Cell decay is merely the transient state of form. I could really go for some tapas after this. You guys down?”

“Ha ha! Fantastic. I hope I get to watch you die in my office today so I can keep an erection tonight. But I digress. Super 8! Keeping information private, I realized, is the single best way to make the public desire it. Literally all this trailer consists of is grainy old film footage of stupid kids fucking around, and then a bigfoot-style reveal of some weird creature. But the fact that I won’t show anybody has them all buzzing on this Twitter thing. I don’t even fully understand what that is, but I know anybody under 20 gets wet when I mention it. It matters little if the product being advertised has a notorious reputation for being disappointing, a la Cloverfield. Hell, remember the

Segue?” “You spelled that wrong.” “Good god, you’re right. How could you possibly know that? They’re homophones – they sound exactly the same when spoken aloud.” “I can see the text you are composed of,” Chaz’s eyes were bulging out of his skull, but the rest of his face remained expressionless. It was as if he was being exposed to the hidden machinations of the universe itself... and just did not give a single fuck about it.

“I SEE THE INFINITY OF NOTHING. IT’S ALL RIGHT I GUESS.”

“The Segway is a punchline now,” Geoff continued, obviously disconcerted by the exchange, “but people forget about how effective its ‘hidden information’ campaign really was. Back when they refused to tell anybody what it was, the rumors said it would change personal transportation forever. A lot of people--good, intelligent people--seriously thought it was a flying car or a hoverboard. We gave them a scooter with the word ‘fag’ printed on the side, and they still bought it. All because we kept it a secret.” “Is there more rhino powder?” Chaz’s infinite stare swiveled in the vague direction of Geoff, lounging extravagantly on a throne of desperate Costa Ricans. “Sure thing,” Geoff pushed the mirror toward Chaz, and continued. “Tomorrow when everybody sees Super 8, it’s going to be stupid as hell. But they paid me today, and that’s all that matters.” Chaz bent to the powder, his eye-line immovably fixed on the horizon. When he came up, there was a sense of shaken normalcy about him. “Holy shit, man. I think I'm OK again! I have no idea why that leveled things out, but thank fuck it did. I think I shared a meatspace with God there for a minute,” he said, laughing. “Seriously? What’d he say?” “He said that ‘there’s more to life than pointlessly tweaking the psychology of the consumer to make them temporarily want things.’” Chaz spoke as if from afar. He abruptly shook his head clear. “Wow. And what’d you say?” “I asked him if he does anal,” Chaz replied laconically.

“Only when I’m really drunk, but I’m too coy to admit I like it.”

“But man, about this rhino," he continued, "I think it just saved me from a furious deity. It’s like it was the exact opposite of a sacred and religious experience. But why? Why do you even have it?” “Well, folklore has it that it’s a powerful aphrodisiac, but honestly? It’s not even about the drugs anymore. It’s about the sacrilege, and I think I understand why it saved you,” Geoff said, unzipping his pants and delighting in the terrified expression of his soon-to-be seat cushions. “Clarify,” Chaz prompted. “Well you see, sweetheart, this is not just an endangered species here – I actually went out of my way to develop a personal connection with the beast. Four years ago I flew to Africa to scout out my own white rhino: Like picking a lobster from a tank. And I found one: A beautiful mare with sensitive eyes. I paid to have her inseminated, and fed her a handful of cocoa beans every day at sunset until she gave birth. I watched that calf being born. I named him after my firstborn son: Maddox,” as he set his bare ass-cheeks on the throne, Geoff thought he felt the first tell-tale squirm of defiance. He reveled in it. “I brought him back to my estate in the west hills,” Geoff continued, rotating his buttocks in a figure eight pattern, “where I raised him to adulthood, making sure to spend several hours a day stroking and reassuring him. Yesterday morning, I took him out to the parking lot of an abandoned Wal-Mart, tied him to a stake and then ran a first-run original 1950 Rolls-Royce Phantom IV into him at 60-miles an hour. Totaled the car. The doctors say I likely have extensive internal injuries from it. Maddox, of course, died on the spot.”

R.I.P. Maddox: A Bright and Shining Star in the Darkness.

“Good lord! So that’s what all that hemorrhaging was about! I thought you were just wearing make-up – you know, to counter the crushing nihilistic boredom.” “What is this, amateur hour? No, I'm purple because my lungs are bleeding and I am simply exulting in the newness of it. Regardless, I promptly had Maddox boiled in a solution of champagne and exotic oils, and then ground into dust. I believe it was the unholiest thing a human being could possibly inhale for fun, and that’s what either saved you from a furious omnipotent being, or possibly cost you some theological ass sex. If it’s the former, you’re welcome; if it’s the latter, I owe you a latte. But more importantly: What’s that aftertaste, Chaz? Can you identify it?” “It’s like… it’s not really a taste. It’s like… old blues records and Shakespeare. It’s…” "Yes?" Geoff was on the edge of his seat. The seat was choking back tears. “...sadness and betrayal,” Chaz finished. “Magnificent!” Geoff literally bounced up and down with excitement. At that, his throne of South American Furniture Performance Experts collapsed,  at last breaking form. Two ran for the door, one took a wild swing at Geoff, and the third simply cried himself to death. “You motherfuckers are crazy if you think I’m paying you!” Geoff screamed at the traumatized backsides of the fleeing chair-men, his shriveled genitals swaying in arrogant victory. “FUCKING AMATEUR HOUR!”

---

You can buy Robert's book, Everything is Going to Kill Everybody: The Terrifyingly Real Ways the World Wants You Dead, or find him on Twitter, Facebook and his own site, I Fight Robots because he- no, hold on a second. Did he really just say God likes anal? What the fuck is this guy’s problem?