The Ice Storm

Ben Hood:
The only big fight we've had in years is about whether to go back into couples therapy.

Wendy Hood:
I'll show you mine if you show me yours.

[Saying grace at Thanksgiving]

Wendy Hood:
Dear Lord, thank you for this Thanksgiving holiday. And for all the material possessions we have and enjoy. And for letting us white people kill all the Indians and steal their tribal lands. And stuff ourselves like pigs, even though children in Asia are being napalmed.

Ben Hood:
Jesus! Enough, alright? Paul... roll?

Janey Carver:
A person's body is his temple.

Janey Carver:
Ben, you're boring me. I have a husband. I don't have a need for another one.

Ben Hood:
What's the name of this girl with a fancy New York address?

Paul Hood:
Libbets. Libbets Casey.

Ben Hood:
Libbets? What sort of a name is Libbets?

Philip Edwards:
Sometimes the shepherd needs the comfort of the sheep.

Elena Hood:
I'm going to try hard not to understand the implications of that.

[Explaining the facts of life to his son]

Ben Hood:
On the self-abuse front - and this is important - I don't think it's advisable to do it in the shower. It wastes water and electricity and because we all expect you to be doing it there in any case. And, not on... under the linen... Well... Anyway, if you're worried about anything at all, just feel free to ask and we'll look it up.

Mikey Carver:
Because of molecules we are connected to the outside world from our bodies. Like when you smell things, because when you smell a smell it's not really a smell, it's a part of the object that has come off of it, molecules. So when you smell something bad, it's like in a way you're eating it. This is why you should not really smell things, in the same way that you don't eat everything in the world around you because as a smell, it gets inside of you. So the next time you go into the bathroom after someone else has been there, remember what kinds of molecules you are in fact eating.

[Mikey rides up behind Wendy]

Mikey Carver:
I don't ever want to see you.

Wendy Hood:
Then why did you come after me?

[Mikey stops, turns his bike around and rides off]

Janey Carver:
Mikey's been out of it since the day he was born.

[Stopping by his son's room, momentarily putting down his luggage]

Jim Carver:
Hey guys, I'm back!

Mikey Carver:
You were gone?

Wendy Hood:
Are you watching this?

Paul Hood:
What?

Wendy Hood:
Nixon, dufus, its incredible, he should be shot.

Sandy Carver:
[Sandy needs help with homework] Hey Mikey?

Mikey Carver:
Yeah.

Sandy Carver:
Geometry?

Mikey Carver:
Sure, anything but this English.

Sandy Carver:
How come your so good at Math, but not at English?

Mikey Carver:
I'm not good at Math, just good at Geometry. It's like you now when they say you have 2 squared, you think it mean 2 times 2 equals 4, but really they really mean a *square*. Its really space, its not numbers, its space. And it's perfect space. But only in your head, because you can't draw a perfect square in the material world. But in your mind, you can have a perfect space. You know?

Sandy Carver:
Yeah, but I just need some help with my homework...

Janey Carver:
Mikey have you heard the explosions coming from the back yard?

Mikey Carver:
...I dunno

Janey Carver:
Do you know what you brothers been up to?

Mikey Carver:
I... I dunno.

Sandy Carver:
Where are you going?

Mikey Carver:
Out.

Sandy Carver:
Its freezing!

Mikey Carver:
Yeah

Sandy Carver:
Then why are you going?

Mikey Carver:
When its freezing, Because it means the molecules aren't moving, so when you breath, theres nothing in the air, you know, you breath into your body, the molecules have stopped, its clean.

Wendy Hood:
[playing with a soldier doll] Well, looks like someone got to his private parts before us.

Sandy Carver:
Communist Viet Cong.

Wendy Hood:
They left it in the jungle.

Paul Hood:
To find yourself in the negative zone, as the Fantastic Four often do, means all every day assumptions are inverted. Even the invisible girl herself becomes visible and so she loses the last semblance of her power. It seems to me that everyone exists partially on a negative zone level, some people more than others. In your life, it's kind of like you dip in and out of it, a place where things don't quite work out the way they should. But for some people, the negative zone tempts them. And they end up going in, going in all the way.

[first lines]

Train Conductor:
Good morning ladies and gentlemen. This train, originating from New York's Grand Central Station, is back in service. Next stop will be New Canaan, Connecticut. New Canaan, Connecticut next stop.

Paul Hood:
[narration] In issue 141 of the Fantastic Four, published in November, 1973, Reed Richards had to use his anti-matter weapon on his own son, who Aannihilus has turn into the Human Atom Bomb. It was a typical predicament for the Fantastic Four, because they weren't like other superheroes. They were more like a family. And the more power they had, the more harm they could do to each other without even knowing it. That was the meaning of the Fantastic Four: that a family is like your own personal anti-matter. Your family is the void you emerge from, and the place you return to when you die. And that's the paradox - the closer you're drawn back in, the deeper into the void you go.

Philip Edwards:
Perhaps you find in books what I try to find in people.

Elena Hood:
That sounds vaguely like an insult.

Ben Hood:
Well, that's the whole point of the holidays, Paul. So you and your sister can mope around the house, and your mother and I can wait on your hand and foot, while the two of you occasionally grunt for more food from behind the hair in your faces. Believe it or not, we actually enjoy it.

Paul Hood:
When you think about it, it's not easy to keep from just wandering out of life. It's like someone's always leaving the door open to the next world, and if you aren't paying attention you could just walk through it, and then you've died. That's why in your dreams it's like you're standing in that doorway... and the dying people and the newborn people pass by you... and brush up against you as they come in and out of the world during the night. You get spun around, and in the morning... it takes a while to find your way back into the world.

Paul Hood:
Your family is the void you emerge from, and the place you return to when you die. And that's the paradox: The closer you're drawn back in, the deeper into the void you go.

Janey Carver:
[caught his youngest son Sandy playing with explosives] Sandy! You idiotic little dope! You could blow yourself f***ing sky high with this demented crap!

Paul Hood:
I've been thinking, Francis. You are one drug-addled, elitist freak. And when the revolution comes I do not want to be lined up with you and shot because you're f***ing ripe for political reeducation. You know, like in the fields.

Francis Davenport:
Let me enlighten you about something here. You and I exist on opposite sides of a great existential divide, that being your pathetic virginity on the one hand and my astonishing number of sexual conquests on the other. You're simply jealous.

Mikey Carver:
When Worlds Collide.

Wendy Hood:
What?

Mikey Carver:
It's the name of the movie. When Worlds Collide.

Ben Hood:
What the hell are you kids doing down here?

Wendy Hood:
What do you think we're doing dad?

Ben Hood:
What do I think? I think you're probably... touching each other. I think... You're touching that reckless jerk for God's sake and I think he's trying to get into your slacks! I think at 14 years of age, you're getting ready to give up you're girlhood!

Mikey Carver:
Hey, hang on there, mister.

Ben Hood:
Hey, don't you direct a single word at me, Mikey. I don't wanna hear it. I'll be discussing this matter with your parents very soon! [to Wendy] Young lady.

Wendy Hood:
Talking to me dad?

Ben Hood:
Who else would I be talking to? Take that thing off!

[She takes the mask off]

Wendy Hood:
Forget all this stern dad stuff.

Ben Hood:
I'm not interested in your smart remarks right now, young lady. Let's go, right now! You and I are gonna discuss it on the walk home.

Ben Hood:
Your toes cold?

Paul Hood:
Libbets? Hey, Dostoyevsky- I'm also really a fan. And, uh, what you were saying, you know- have you ever read The Idiot?

Libbets Casey:
The ldiot ?

Paul Hood:
If you liked Notes From Underground, you'll love The ldiot.

Libbets Casey:
Great. Thanks for the tip.

Paul Hood:
The ldiot!