History Recap / TalesFromTheCryptS3E9UndertakingPalor

[[caption-width-right:350:It's early FoundFootage! But ''what'' will they find?]]

->'''Crypt Keeper:''' ''(dressed as a film director and yelling into a megaphone)'' Quiet on the set! ''Deathly'' quiet. Ah, fond felicitations, fiends! And welcome to the Crypt. Tonight's sordid saga is about a couple of kids with time to ''kill''. See, they're just ''dying'' to get into the horror movie business. And if they're lucky, that's ''exactly'' what'll happen to 'em. Lights! ''(a skeleton dressed as a crewmember activates the lights)'' Camera! ''(he closes a clapperboard whose top half is a knife)'' '''Action!'''

Teenagers Aaron (Aron Eisenberg), Jess (Creator/JasonMarsden), and Norm (Scott Fults) leave the local movie theater in the midst of a snack-related argument. They soon find themselves being stalked through a dark alley by a hooded figure with a glowing red eye. It turns out to be their friend Josh (Creator/KeHuyQuan), who puts them through a good scare with his video camera. When Josh tells the guys that he's hoping to become a horror filmmaker, the others offer him a chance to accompany them to the mortuary to see a dead body. He joins the trio as they sneak into the morgue and find a body on the table. They recognize the body as that of Lucy Groves, the town librarian, who none of the kids knew had even been sick. Mortician Sebastian Esbrook (Creator/JohnGlover) arrives unexpectedly, prompting the kids to scatter and watch in horror as he beats the librarian's face with a sledgehammer and vacuums out her stomach contents to the sound of opera music. Norm's friends flee in a panic, leaving him behind, though this allows him to overhear a conversation between Esbrook and the town pharmacist, Nate Grundy (Graham Jarvis), who has been conspiring with Esbrook to kill his customers with poisoned medicine in exchange for a cut of Esbrook's profits from the funerals. Shocked by what he's heard, Norm slips out without being noticed.

The next day, as Norm tells Aaron and Jess what he overheard, the trio spot Josh crying on his front porch, the boy telling them that his father has just died from an asthma attack; Norm remembers that Esbrook and Grundy had discussed an asthma patient as one of their targets, and gravely realizes what has happened. With the help of Josh's camera, the boys resolve to get the evidence they need to bring Grundy and Esbrook down. They film themselves as they manage to identify Grundy based on the snakeskin shoes Norm saw him wearing. Norm antagonizes Esbrook by delivering a container full of battery acid he says is from Grundy and prompts him to give chase, drawing him away from the mortuary so the others can sneak in and search it, Josh hiding on a storage shelf with his camera. Aaron and Jess discover that Esbrook has been shorting Grundy on his share of the proceeds, and decide to anonymously send Grundy the incriminating material.

That night, an indignant Grundy confronts Esbrook at the mortuary, having received the invoices the boys sent him. Grundy holds Esbrook at gunpoint, but Esbrook overpowers his former partner and kills him by way of pouring battery acid down his throat. Josh reveals himself, but as Esbrook starts to move toward him, the other boys emerge, all carrying their own video cameras. Esbrook picks up his knife and Grundy's gun and threatens to kill them, but the teens incapacitate him and impale him through the chest with his suction hose. As Esbrook dies, his internal organs being sucked out and discharged into the sink, the boys notice that the librarian's corpse is now smiling.

!!Tropes:
* AbhorrentAdmirer: Esbrook talks to Lucy's corpse, revealing that he repeatedly sought her love and she kept turning him down. It's hinted that he killed her after one rejection too many.
* ActorAllusion: Creator/KeHuyQuan, once again, is a member of [[Film/TheGoonies a wisecracking group of friends who team up and go on an adventure to put a stop to nefarious evildoers.]]
* AdaptationalBadass: All of the boys. In the comic, they only manage to escape Sebastian's clutches when he trips over a rock in the cemetery and bashes his head on a tombstone. Here, not only did they bring video cameras so they would have proof of his wrongdoings, they actually fight him, and end up killing him by sticking his suction pump hose into his abdomen.
* AdaptationalNameChange: Esbrook's surname in the comic was "Es''prock''".
* AdaptationalNiceGuy: Downplayed with the boys. In both versions, they genuinely want justice, but in the comic, they deliberately get a stray cat killed in a ploy to turn the pharmacist and undertaker against each other. Here, they manage to accomplish their goal without harming any animals.
* AdaptationalVillainy: Sebastian. In the comic, while Grundy suspects he's been holding out on him, it's never revealed if that's actually the case, and he only turns on his partner when he suspects he tried to poison him. Here, not only is Sebastian actively screwing Grundy out of his... "fair" share, but he kills Grundy without much provocation.
* AndThisIsFor: Josh gives one as he watches Esbrook die.
-->'''Josh:''' That's for my father, you asshole.
* ApocalypticLog: The tape that Josh and his friends make as they embark to bring Esbrook and Grundy down opens with the boys declaring how they may likely end up killed, and if such is the case, they urge anyone who finds the tape to bring it to the authorities.
* AssholeVictim: Sebastian Esbrook and Nate Grundy, if that wasn't obvious.
* AstonishinglyAppropriateInterruption: Just as Esbrook hears Jess make a noise and nearly uncovers his hiding spot, Grundy rings the mortuary's bell, prompting three of the kids to make a run for it as Esbrook lets him in.
* AutopsySnackTime: Sebastian snacks on pizza and soda as he goes to work on Lucy's corpse. Near the end of the episode, he's seen stuffing his face with chips as he works on the corpse of a Mr. Schwartzberg.
* BaldOfEvil: Nate Grundy, the pharmacist who has been poisoning his customers and had already done so to his wife, is noticeably balding.
* BigEater: Norm, the resident "fat kid" of the group, who throws a mini tantrum because his box of Junior Mints was a candy short, then helps himself to the unpopped kernels in a pool of butter at the bottom of his popcorn bucket. Aaron even jokes that Josh could make a horror movie out of him eating a Twinkie.
* BittersweetEnding: Josh's dad is dead, but Sebastian is killed by the boys, and he had previously killed his accomplice, so the two of them will never be able to kill again.
* {{Blackmail}}: Esbrook threatens Grundy to stay his partner by telling the cops that he poisoned his wife. Things go downhill (mostly for Grundy) when Grundy pulls out a gun on Esbrook.
* BlackmailBackfire: One of the rare instances of it winding up with the blackmail victim dead instead of the blackmailer. But as stated above, Sebastian tries to blackmail Nate, and ends up killing him when the latter pulls a gun on him.

* CallBack: Esbrook is seen having lunch from Zemeckis Pizza, which is the same pizza joint that Lou Paloma from [[Recap/TalesFromTheCryptS3E3TheTrap "The Trap"]] got fired from.
* ChromosomeCasting: Every character with a speaking role is male. The only female present is Lucy, who has been dead for a good while.
* ClusterFBomb: Norm's EstablishingCharacterMoment has him dropping four different swears within the first five seconds as he exits the movie theater with his friends, all because his box of Junior Mints had 53 mints instead of 54.
* CreepyMortician: Sebastian, since he's more than willing to scheme with a corrupt pharmacist to kill said pharmacist's patients to enrich himself.

** In the comic, Sebastian met his end when [[DeathByFallingOver he tripped over a rock while chasing after the kids, crashing into Percy's father's tombstone]]. In the show, the kids stick his vacuum hose into his abdomen, [[CruelAndUnusualDeath sucking out his blood and intestines]].
** Grundy also met a different fate in the comic. There, Sebastian just pulled a knife and stabbed him to death. Here, he gets knocked out with a sledgehammer and gets battery acid poured down his throat.
* DeliberateVHSQuality: The episode's last third is filmed through the perspective of the boys' video cameras, complete with heavy static.
* DistinguishedGentlemansPipe: Grundy smokes one to offset how innocent looking he is on the surface.
* EurekaMoment: Norm remembers that the person who was discussing the murder racket with Sebastian was wearing snakeskin shoes. The other boys identify that person as local pharmacist Nate Grundy, who always wears a pair of said shoes.
* ExactEavesdropping: In an accidental case, Norm hides under a casket in the morgue to keep Esbrook from seeing him. While this does mean he's left behind as his friends flee, it also lets him figure out Grundy and Esbrook's scheme.
* FanDisservice: A shot of Mrs. Groves bare breasts... on her corpse. Just after Esbrook has smashed her face with a sledgehammer and just before he pricks her body to let out gases, then sucks her guts out with a vacuum.
* FingerForcedSmile: Esbrook does this to Lucy's corpse to get her to smile for him, with some assistance from a sledgehammer.
* ForceFeeding: Grundy is fed battery acid that Norm delivered to Esbrook allegedly by the man himself, which kills him.
* FormulaBreakingEpisode: The last third of the episode is portrayed as FoundFootage from the boy's camera, the only episode where such a gimmick is employed.
* FoundFootage: The episode switches to this format for its third act, one of the earliest examples of the genre in media.
* FramingTheGuiltyParty: The boys manage to turn Grundy and Esbrook against each other by the climax of the episode.
** Norms delivers a container of what's revealed to be battery acid to Esbrook, which he says is on Grundy's behalf, to make it seem like Grundy was attempting to poison him. Esbrook even lampshades it as Grundy holds him at gunpoint.
** At the same time, Josh and Aaron infiltrate Esbrook's office to discover that Esbrook was shorting Grundy's cut of the profits, and they anonymously give Grundy the invoices as proof.
* GenuineHumanHide: Josh shares a rumor that his dad told him, about how Esbrook supposedly crafted a dead writer's book with the writer's skin.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Twice in the episode.
** Grundy dies after Sebastian force-feeds him battery acid, which Grundy supposedly sent him (it was actually the boys who sent it, but he doesn't know that).
** Esbrook himself meets his end after the teenagers impale him and suck out his internal organs using his own organ sucking hose.
* {{Homage}}: This movie-centric episode can be seen as one of ''Film/TheGoonies'', ''Film/StandByMe'', ''Film/TheMonsterSquad'', ''Film/TheSandlot'', and numerous other films in the 80s and 90s which featured a group of wisecracking kids as the main protagonists. Ke Huy Quan, Data himself, even plays one of the main characters of the episode.
* ILoveTheDead: Esbrook had the hots for Lucy when she was alive, but was often turned down. After she died, he still admits his playful attraction to her dead body.
* ItsAllAboutMe: Esbrook only cares about himself and getting rich/revenge, no matter who he has to kill to get it.
* ItsPersonal: Jess and Aaron initially don't believe Norm's claims of what he overheard the night before, but as soon as they discover that Esbrook's latest victim was Josh's father, all four boys take it upon themselves to take Esbrook and Grundy down.
* LighterAndSofter: While there is a good amount of gore, the episode leans slightly toward the playful side, having a group of mischievous and foul-mouthed amateur sleuths conspiring to take down a crooked mortician and his pharmacist accomplice.
* MedicationTampering: The crux of Sebastian and Grundy's scheme is that Grundy has been poisoning the medicine he gives to his customers, so that Sebastian can make money from the funerals and split the take with Grundy. Grundy is said to have done the same thing to his wife.
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: Pharmacist Nate Grundy has been conspiring with Esbrook to kill his customers with poisoned medicine, so he can split the take from the resulting funerals. He even poisoned his own wife and wasn't tried for it.
* TheMovieBuff: All four kids are pretty big cinephiles, with Norm, Jess, and Aaron beginning the episode by exiting a theater, and aspiring filmmaker Josh making his entrance by pranking the others with a phony horror movie scenario. According to the Crypt Keeper, they grew out of that movie-loving phase.
* NauseaFuel: The continuous scene of Esbrook removing Lucy's organs with his suction hose, which utterly disgusts the boys.
* NobleShoplifter: To lure the pharmacists inside Grundy's shop out in the open to identify their shoes, Aaron swaggers into his pharmacy and swipes a nudie magazine without paying. Even though the pharmacists manage to stop him, Aaron can be seen reading the magazine during the next scene, implying that he either paid for it or managed to swipe it again.
* NoHonorAmongThieves: Esbrook turns out to have been shorting Grundy's share of the profits, and thanks to a little ingenuity from the boys, he kills the crooked pharmacist when he comes confronting Esbrook.
* OffscreenTeleportation: While checking the windows of Grundy's pharmacy to catch a glimpse at his shoes, the boys are caught off guard when the man himself approaches them outside.
* PostMortemOneLiner: One of the boys exclaims "That sucks!" as Esbrook's guts are sucked out.
* RagtagBandOfMisfits: The main quartet, who team up to expose Sebastian and Grundy after they kill Josh's father.
* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: After he's nearly found by Esbrook, Jess ropes Aaron and Josh into getting out of the mortuary. Norm tries to catch up, but he's forced to stay behind.

** The movie theater that the kids exit from in the opening scene is shown to have been screening ''Film/LethalWeapon1987'' and ''Film/RadioFlyer'', both of which were directed by Richard Donner, a producer of the series.

* SirSwearsALot: Norm drops four different cuss words in the span of a few seconds during his first moment onscreen. His friends are equally swear-happy.
* SoundtrackDissonance: Esbrook working on the librarian's corpse to the sound of opera music.
* TrueCompanions: While they spend a good amount of time ribbing on each other, Norm, Aaron, and Jess learning that Josh's father wound up being a victim of Grundy and Esbrook's scheme is what convinces the boys to drop the comedy, and work together to put a stop to the murderous duo.
* WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue: The Crypt Keeper tells us that after the incident in the mortuary, Josh gave up on filmmaking, and the rest of the boys became lawyers.

* WouldHurtAChild: Esbrook was more than willing to gun down the boys when they announce their presence to him.

->'''Crypt Keeper:''' ''(sitting in a director's chair)'' Oh, well. Poor Sebastian. A brilliant career going down the ''drain''. ''(makes a sucking noise, then cackles)'' As for the kiddies, Josh gave up on making movies. Seemed he didn't have the ''guts''. And the others, they became lawyers. Must have been the taste of blood. After all, they were ''certain'' they'd gotten themselves a killer. I mean, ''(gestures to show that he's wearing Grundy's snakeskin shoes)'' who wears shoes like ''these'' except a killer? So until next time, see ya later, ''alligator!'' ''(cackles)''

* ItsPersonal: Jess and Aaron initially don’t believe Norm’s claims of what he overheard the night before, but as soon as they discover that Esbrook’s latest victim was Josh’s father, all four boys take it upon themselves to take Esbrook and Grundy down.

* DropTheHammer: Esbrook uses a sledgehammer to smash Lucy's face into a smile, then later uses it to knock Grundy out to put him on the slab.

* DiesDifferentlyInAdaptation: In the comic, Sebastian met his end when [[DeathByFallingOver he tripped over a rock while chasing after the kids, crashing into Percy's father's tombstone]]. In the show, the kids stick his vacuum hose into his abdomen, [[CruelAndUnusualDeath sucking out his blood and intestines]].

* DiesDifferentlyInAdaptation: In the comic, Sebastian met his end when [[DeathByFallingOver he tripped over a rock while chasing after the kids, crashing into Percy's father's tombstone]]. In the show, the kids stick his pump hose into his abdomen, sucking out his intestines.

* ShoutOut: The movie theater that the kids exit from in the opening scene is shown to have been screening ''Film/LethalWeapon1987'' and ''Film/RadioFlyer'', both of which were directed by Richard Donner, a producer of the series.

** The view from Josh's camera as it bathes the darkness with its red light makes it resemble the heat-seeking vision from the namesake creatures of ''Film/{{Predator}}'', directed by Joel Silver, another producer of the series. One of the boys even makes the comparison himself.

* ActorAllusion: Creator/JonathanKeQuan, once again, is a member of [[Film/TheGoonies a wisecracking group of friends who team up and go on an adventure to put a stop to nefarious evildoers.]]

* {{Homage}}: This movie-centric episode can be seen as one of ''Film/TheGoonies'', ''Film/StandByMe'', ''Film/TheMonsterSquad'', ''Film/TheSandlot'', and numerous other films in the 80s and 90s which featured a group of wisecracking kids as the main protagonists. Jonathan Ke Quan, Data himself, even plays one of the main characters of the episode.

Teenagers Aaron (Aron Eisenberg), Jess (Creator/JasonMarsden), and Norm (Scott Fults) leave the local movie theater in the midst of a snack-related argument. They soon find themselves being stalked through a dark alley by a hooded figure with a glowing red eye. It turns out to be their friend Josh (Creator/JonathanKeQuan), who puts them through a good scare with his video camera. When Josh tells the guys that he's hoping to become a horror filmmaker, the others offer him a chance to accompany them to the mortuary to see a dead body. He joins the trio as they sneak into the morgue and find a body on the table. They recognize the body as that of Lucy Groves, the town librarian, who none of the kids knew had even been sick. Mortician Sebastian Esbrook (Creator/JohnGlover) arrives unexpectedly, prompting the kids to scatter and watch in horror as he beats the librarian's face with a sledgehammer and vacuums out her stomach contents to the sound of opera music. Norm's friends flee in a panic, leaving him behind, though this allows him to overhear a conversation between Esbrook and the town pharmacist, Nate Grundy (Graham Jarvis), who has been conspiring with Esbrook to kill his customers with poisoned medicine in exchange for a cut of Esbrook's profits from the funerals. Shocked by what he's heard, Norm slips out without being noticed.

* DiesDifferentlyinAdaptation: In the comic, Sebastian met his end when [[DeathByFallingOver he tripped over a rock while chasing after the kids, crashing into Percy's father's tombstone]]. In the show, the kids stick his pump hose into his abdomen, sucking out his intestines.

* FanDisservice: A shot of Mrs. Groves bare breasts just after Esbrook has smashed her face with a sledgehammer and just before he starts slicing her open.

* AdaptationalVillainy: Sebastian. In the comic, while Grundy suspects he's been holding out on him, it's never revealed if that's actually the case, and he only turns on his partner when he suspects he tried to poison him. Here, not only is Sebastian actively screwing Grundy, but he kills Grundy without much provocation.

* AutopsySnackTime: Sebastian snacks on pizza and soda as he goes to work on Lucy's corpse. Near the end of the episode, he's seen stuffing his face with chips as he works on the corpse of Mr. Schwartzberg.

* {{Blackmail}}: Esbrook threatens Grundy to stay his partner by telling the cops that he poisoned his wife.

* DiesDifferentlyinAdaptation: In the comic, Sebastian met his end when he tripped over a rock while chasing after the kids, crashing into Percy's father's tombstone. In the show, the kids stick his pump hose into his abdomen, sucking out his intestines.

** Grundy dies after Sebastian force-feeds him battery acid, which Sebastian supposedly sent him (it was actually the boys who sent it, but he doesn't know that).

* NoHonorAmongThieves: Esbrook turns out to have been shorting Grundy's share of the profits, and thanks to a little enginuity from the boys, he kills the crooked pharmacist when he comes confronting Esbrook.