First Blood script

FADE IN:
INTERIOR CLOSE UP SHOTS OF PASSENGERS IN BUMPY WAGON
Each of the fantasy adventurers are shown only in piecemeal as they approach their destination by monster-drawn wagon.
In particular are the two adventurers bouncing around in anticipation, one human and one halfling-animal, in contrast to the patient if miffed human and the despondent halfling-animal stagecoach.
Multiple shots of each character with nothing but the sound of the wheels and the excited adventurers.

CUT TO:
EXT. MEADOW CLEARING AT THE EDGE OF A FOREST
The verdant forest canopy stretches almost to the hills in the far background.
The WAGON comes in from offscreen, pulled by two hadrosaurs and coached by a small cat person in robes.
The wagon comes to a stop and out the side hops REGGIE the MONSTER HUNTER as well as his supporting hunter REX JR., his feline apprentice, who strike a pose together. The two run off the screen before a whistle is heard from the wagon.
Cut back to a shot of the side of the wagon as CASPER, the MAGE leans out and gesticulates at a sheet of parchment he is holding. Reggie and Rex jr. lean back into frame and stick themselves behind the paper.
POV shot of the heroes, with the parchment on one half of the screen beside the peak of a forested mountain and cliff. Illustrated on the paper is a bulky orange dragon, and out of the cave on the mountaintop hulks an orange reptile which then strikes a pose identical to the stylized illustration as it roars, scattering birds from the treetops.
Cut back to the side of the wagon, Casper looks at Reggie and points at the dragon. Reggie and his cat both nod and both leave.

EXT FOREST
Reggie and his cat stalk about jumping from behind bush to bush pretending to be stealthy. Rex jr. trips and falls into a ditch, before Reggie realizes that that ditch is a monster track. Suddenly, a huge thumping sound grows and comes closer and THE DRAGONKING bursts from the behind the chartreuse and turquoise canopy. The dragon is dense and stout, with a head like a shark and the physique of a bull, with a little yellow crown growing from the top of its fat head.
Reggie and his cat strike a pose, and hardly take one step before being smashed.

[TITLE CARD]
[time-slowed animated stillframe of reggie and his cat being maimed by the dragon's claw, title on the screen]
FIRST BLOOD

EXT. MEADOW CLEARING
Casper unpacks the wagon in one fluid motion, yanking up a wood and metal crate which he shakes out, unfolding it into a fully populated desk of magical artifice, with periphery magical hardware collapsing beside it. Cut to the coach, CAZ JR., Casper’s cat in robes and a hood, about to recline in his seat before being yanked offscreen to a shot of Casper strapping him to a ritual Wheel of Fortune wheel and giving it a hard spin.
Suddenly, a CART comes teetering out of the woods, and Rex jr. dumps Reggie out onto the clearing floor. Cut to a wooden board like a baseball scoreboard, with three big red hearts on panels. Kaz jr. pops up from behind the sign, and flips one of the panels over face down, blows a whistle and crosses and spreads his arms like an umpire. Casper jostles Reggie with his foot and then gesticulates angrily at the sign, and before Reggie can get up, Casper takes a heavy bag, and begins to pour salt in a long line across the floor.

EXT FOREST CLEARING
Two strange dinosaur-like herbivores are peacefully munching on foliage when Reggie leans out of the same foliage and stabs one in the face. Reggie and his cat start monotonously carving slabs of meat and packing them away when a rustle in the brush behind them causes them both to jump. They spring into action-defense mode, nearly cowering behind their weapons, but their faces relax in relief when they see it’s just a tiny chinchilla-thing. Then the dragonking tramples over the canopy behind the chinchilla and roars.
The hunter and his cat jump out of the way of the dragon’s tail slamming into the brush, sending the hunter running and evading swipes from the dragon. Levering up his sword, he parries the dragon’s fist and gets a good swing at the dragon’s head. More importantly, his sword chips one of the points in the dragon’s crown, sending it whimpering and writhing to the floor, unbalanced and trying to right itself, it rights itself right into the fall of the hunter’s sword. Reggie levers back, coiling his weight and charging another attack, but for naught, he is struck perpendicularly by the swipe of the dragon’s tail and sent flying!

EXT MEADOW CLEARING CAMP, MEDIUM CLOSE SHOTS ONLY
Casper is at his magical folding desk, mixing technicolor samples of potions and counting measures of reagents. A cart bumps into the side of his desk from offscreen, knocking free a chorus of delicate artifice which shatters and spills exquisitely. Casper looks down. Pan the cart into frame, with Reggie slumped into it. Kaz jr. hops back onto the scoreboard, blows his whistle and repeats his gesture, and then he flips over the second heart panel, leaving only one. Casper facepalms and then prepares a cocktail of a couple select fluids into one bottle. He then grabs his sheepish brother by the shoulders and brings him up close. Casper looks him in the eyes, he opens his mouth as if he were about to scold him, and then he slaps Reggie in the face. He hands him a bottle and gesticulates to the scoreboard one final time before picking up another heavy bag and becoming hurriedly preoccupied with the ground.

EXT FOOTHILL MOUNTAIN SLOPES
Scaling the mountain, Reggie and his hunting cat make one last attempt at tracking down the dragon. Reggie and his cat had stopped on a flat bit of terrain surrounded by slopes in order to prepare themselves. Groping the potion at his hip, he swings at a hunk of lumber roughly in the shape of the dragon scaled down, cleaving the yellowed wooden crown on top in half. He relaxed in his stance. His cat crawls out from behind the sculpture, carving into it with his claws, really disappointed to see his creation ruined. He picks it up, and tosses it into a pile of perfectly identical sculptures with exactly the same injury. Reggie exhales a deep breath and feels ready. Suddenly, the earth shakes beneath them… and above them. The dragonking is descending the cliffs and slopes of the mountain quite groggily! It seems all the commotion woke him up from his nap. Reggie took the opportunity to hide behind a large rock, and his cat makes the brilliant tactical decision of hiding in front of a small rock instead. Reggie pops out from behind his rock and helpfully picks up the small rock and places it in front of the cat instead.
As the monster slips past them, The hunter and his feline spring into action. They leap up off the cliff towards the monster, silhouetting against the sky. They land on the monster’s back with a sway. As the monster reaches and bucks, they cling onto its back, slowly crawling toward its head. The camera pans up with a shot of Reggie rising to his feet on the monster’s shoulders, and then a cutaway shot of the dragon’s crown. He raises his sword above his head, and counts out three beats before he can fully charge his attack. One, the dragon bucks. Two, the dragon bounds. Three, the dragon shifts right. Now, in slow motion, he brings down his sword to the dragon’s crown, just barely grazing it as the dragon rolls left, Reggie’s stance collapsing underneath him as he falls. Reggie plants to his face as the dragon spins into a death roll, and a huge claw falls onto Reggie from above.

EXT CAMPSITE
Pouring salt and walking backwards, Casper empties his bag and then claps off his hands and smiles. He feels a little tap on his leg, and looks down. He sees the sad, sad face of Rex jr., as well as his own brother’s unconscious body, groaning. A few expressions chase across his face. On the scoreboard, Kaz jr. very slowly and deliberately flips over the last panel, and then gives his whistle a sad blow. Fweeeee-oooo. Casper transitions from concentration, to determination. He grabs his brother, and carries him down to a spot of green grass. The camera slowly pulls up to reveal the concentric patterns of salt that Casper is pouring around him.
Then, a quake, Casper stumbles. From the treeline bursts the dragonking, running at full speed. Casper does not falter, and empties his bag, before wrapping himself in his wizard cloak like a matador. Patiently, he inches towards the stampeding monster as it closes the space to the camp. The monster closes the distance, and jumps. He lunges through the air towards Casper, and right on cue, Casper had already thrown his staff far into the air. The dragon’s eyes widen, and he tries to flail backwards, but is still flying forwards.
Closing his eyes and smiling smugly, Casper claps his hands twice and a great bolt of purple lightning strikes the staff, and the entire salt runic circle Casper had built also burst with energy, all flying together to meet right at the center of the concentric rings, right in the dragon’s heart. Once the dragon is electrified to a magical crisp, the energy spirals back outwards, to an attached circle, at the very center of which Reggie is jolted violently awake, the shockwave knocking over even Kaz jr, with all three heart signs flipping magically back up.
Reggie, a little freaked out, and a little charred, stumbles around on his feet, but then he hears the cats cheering. Looking up, he sees his brother, and they share a bro hug. Their attention is drawn quickly to the dragon, something in its body is still moving.
Its little crown jostles, and wiggles, and pushes, before gently retracting back into the dragon’s skull, leaving a perfectly normal fat dragon head where it once was. Then. Out the dragon’s ear, a slimy green tail pokes out, and spins around before gaining purchase and pulling itself out. Out pops a wriggly green snakelike thing, with two little arms, draconic frills and an oversized yellow crown at the top of its head.
The small, helpless creature notices the two hunters, one intrigued and one disgusted. The little dragon puts on its biggest sheepish grin, and coyly waves at the two before quicky starting to sidewind off. One cut later and the small dragonking walks right into reggie and is already cornered, weapons are drawn, the creature is lifted into the air by two people, and it screams.



INT ZOOBIOLOGICAL SOCIETY CONVENTION
Match cut to the same snaky dragon, but pinned up to a corkboard, with various paper signs next to its dissected and hung out organs.
Cut to Reggie and Casper, in beige uniform, with their hands full of parchment papers, handing one out to everyone who asks. Each person handed a piece of paper promptly opens up a little red book, and tears out a page with an illustration of a bulky orange dragon, and replaces it with the new page featuring a curled green dragon. Outdated bestiary pages flitter around the crowd’s hips and cover the floor. Cut to Rex and Kaz jr, operating a printing press, handing out pages as fast as they can make them. A shot shows every page being stamped with the same stylized curly green serpent, with its golden crown.
Casper, handing out papers, bumps into a large, rugged looking man. Casper is immediately mortified, but Reggie notices and looks incredulous. While Casper is stuttering and gesticulating, Reggie picks up a fistful of discarded dragonking entries and then, holding them up to the guy, realize the signature in the corner of every single one is the same as the signature the man is wearing on his chest. Reggie sheepishly tries to pick up as many papers as he can, and then give them to the rugged hunter, but he refuses. Instead he points to the printing press where the two cats were working. He borrows two small plates covered in ink, and then stamped them onto the blank chests of the uniforms of the two brothers. Having officially been promoted, they were ecstatic, and jumped in the air together, and Casper almost hugged the rugged hunter, and then Reggie actually hugged the rugged hunter, pulling his brother in for a group hug.
Just then, a huge crash and a dopey dragon head is thrust meters into the room and then parks, with its eyes mimicking a car’s headlights when it locks. The yellow crown on its head jostles and wiggles and pushes and then disappears. Then, like one would lean out of a car door, out of the large creature’s ear leans a tiny, orange, snaky serpent with a large yellow crown on its head, which then actually pulls out from behind it a realistic-looking 6-millimeter revolver, and he doesn’t look happy.
END