For some of us, the news of a Christian Broadcast Network satellite crashing to earth would be good news. Not so John and Billie, who are cruising through New Mexico, discussing “Gilligan’s Island.” John decides he needs to take a leak and rather than just pull off onto the shoulder (or find a frigging gas station…I’ve driven through New Mexico, they do exist) and take his chances, he meanders down a dirt road which leads them to the site of the fallen satellite. While he’s doing his business, Billie discovers the body of another hapless traveler, which is oddly run through with wires and circuitry.
At this juncture, we have to at least give them credit for trying to use their cell phones. As is sometimes the case in the hinterlands of Nuevo Mexico, however, they don’t work. Billie declares she wants to stay with the body, while John wisely wants to go get help. Their mutual discovery of what I guess is the fallen satellite causes both of them to lose what’s left of their common sense, and they both enter the mysterious structure.
Given that the “satellite” looks like the tool shed behind my neighbor’s house, perhaps they can be forgiven for this momentary lapse of reason. Still, upon finding the weird cyborg dude in a Jesus Christ pose and the apples shot through with tungsten filaments, I’d be well on my way back to the car. Billie and John investigate further, resulting in John getting assimilated by the low-budget Borg and Billie fleeing back to civilization. The end?
The metaphor is laid on pretty thick here: the crucified machine-man, the apples, and the “Christian Broadcasting Network” satellite all paint a none-too-subtle canvas. And the ending really makes me wonder how creator Chad McKnight is going to continue the story in “Integration: Parts Two – N.” Maybe later installments could feature a horde of fundamentalist Christian terminator-style cyborgs laying waste to adult bookstores and gay nightclubs before being defeated by an elite cadre of medicinal marijuana proponents and animal rights protestors. Ah, movie magic.
