Thanks for Stopping By

Tales from the Cartoon World episode

**"Thanks for Stopping By"** is the second episode of the British animated anthology series *Tales from the Cartoon World*, which was first shown on Murro on the 21st of August 2018. This episode follows a group of soon-to-be college students who stop by a hotel in Wyoming only to be met with an evil force when one of their friends gets injured. The episode was written by Gary Arrowman and directed by Daniel Tolins.

The episode leans more into psychological and supernatural horror elements, with a hint of science fiction near the end.

## Plot

After finishing college, Jack Barnett and his friends Lee, Raphael, Mitchell, Tony, Austin, Charlie, Barney, Matt, Mary, and Scarlet head on vacation to Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming for the summer. After stopping off for some coffee for Austin’s boyfriend Charlie, the two cars carrying the passengers start to get in an argument. Tony complains about Lee and Mitchell snogging next to him, whilst Austin and Charlie start to get into an argument over the latter’s coffee consumption. Mary, Jack’s girlfriend, tells him about the argument, much to Jack’s annoyance, while she also berates Jack for not allowing her and Lee from getting into a good work deal. Raphael then makes a joke about Mary’s vagina, which Barney innocently tells him off for. Jack shows Barney the seemingly desolate wasteland around them. After Barney unintentionally annoys Mitchell, Lee tells him not to take it out on the former, which Mitchell says that he is the “easiest target”. After that, the two get into an argument about assumption and lies. Lee then insists that going to Boston will improve on his education life, which Mitchell scolds to because Lee will seemingly be forgotten. Afterwards, Lee promises access to Mitchell’s penis.

Tony tries not to watch as Lee and Mitchell soon start making out and tells them not to get naked in his car. Matt’s girlfriend, Scarlet, soon notices that Lee and Mitchell’s make out session has moved to the back of the truck. Tony then calls Mary and tells her to tell the passengers in Jack’s car not to every ride into the trip. Despite Tony’s warning, Lee and Mitchell soon get naked and have sex. Annoyed, Tony starts ranting again but Scarlet stops him and tells them that there is nothing wrong with them having sex. Austin then gets overprotective of Charlie, telling off Scarlet for comparing Charlie to a “spastic man”. Soon, Tony stops all of them by honking the horn, earning him a middle finger from Lee and Mitchell, with everyone except Scarlet and Charlie returning the favour to them. A few hours later at ten o’clock at night, the two cars have been driving for at least nine hours. Tony, exhausted and unable to handle Lee and Mitchell’s sex actions anymore, calls Mary and asks her to find a room. They take a right turn, disturbing Lee and Mitchell and waking Raphael up from a long nap, much to his anger.

They drive up a side-path, nearly covered by a large thicket as Lee and Mitchell finally look around at their surroundings after finishing their sex. The cars park as Lee wonders if the hotel is open but is sabotaged when he and Mitchell fall out of the truck, landing hard on the pavement road. Tony demands that his car be first in line by the next day, which Jack sarcastically agrees to do. After Lee teases Scarlet on accident, Mary demands that they all go inside due to the sweltering night-time heat. Confused as to why an independent business has managed to stay open in the desert, they enter the building. Barney then smells cigarette smoke, which Mitchell enjoys. Matt approaches the front desk where a thin, tall and lithe man with black hair and grey eyes named Bub greets them and tells them that the hotel is called the *Freshspock*, nicknamed “the last American hotel for miles”. Staring at the kids is Lamia, the only other employee who works at the Freshspock. Bub wants them to share a room as there aren’t enough rooms for one each but tells Raphael that there are rooms with adjacent suites with an extra bed included.

After establishing what rooms they want, Lamia wants to separate the groups that will share the beds for insurance and tax reasons. Separating the three couples, Lamia brings out a folder and to write down the groups names. Lamia explains that the hotel is a family business and over sixty years old. Handing Matt his credit card back, the girls, Barney and Charlie head to their rooms, whilst the rest carry the bags into their rooms respectively. Heading up, the couples are separated onto each floor on one room, the rest are stuck on floor one. Lee then abruptly announces to Jack his moving plans with Mitchell, Jack however is concerned as Mitchell may not be capable of doing the home chores. This angers Lee and they get into a heated argument which ends with Mary agreeing with Lee as he storms up the stairs in anger. After that, Jack and Mary make amends to become a stable couple like Lee and Mitchell by renting rooms between college and paying bus fares. Then, the two get into kinky school roleplay with Mary as the teacher and Jack as the student.

Meanwhile, Austin and Charlie are having passionate and seemingly safe sex which only lasts fifty-eight seconds. Charlie then takes 300mg of some pharmacy drugs in order to stable his anxiety issues. As they change into pyjamas, Charlie asks Austin if he’s bothered about him not sleeping in a single bed, of which he isn’t. Then they reaffirm their love for each other. Matt and Scarlet meanwhile are having fairly rough sex, with him making her orgasm several times. Afterwards, they discuss how Lee and Mitchell can afford presents and gifts for each other. Knowing they want a love life like them, they agree to improve upon their relationship just like Jack and Mary did. In Lee and Mitchell’s room, Lee complains to Mitchell about how Jack went about their moving plans, and he promises to assault Jack with a box of their used condoms. They then take a shower together, but as they strip and kiss, Lee starts hearing strange high pitched decibels in his ears. It soon fades but then violently comes back, pinning Lee to the floor. Mitchell, worried, grabs some water to help him but the sound fades once again. Concerned that Lee has contracted tinnitus, they forget about the shower and just head straight to bed.

Just as they settle, the sound returns high pitched again. Mitchell, very concerned, just calms him as the sound dies off once again. Meanwhile in another room, Raphael is planning the trip with Barney by his side. Annoyed after being called gay by the former, Tony goes off to take a shower, lamenting his psychological distaste for heading on the trip and for not bring his girlfriend, Fiona. Suddenly, his nose clogs, leading him to have an asthma attack. He falls over, just in time for the other two to enter the bathroom and lament that he doesn’t appreciate Raphael’s bacterial comments. Back in Austin and Charlie’s room, they are both having sex, including penetration with Austin’s penis, showing their love during and after it. A bang at the door interrupts them however and Austin attempts to assault the perpetrator but finds no one out of the door. But then the electricity in the hallway goes off, leaving them both in the dark. Charlie, fearing the worst, hands Austin his phone when told to do so. Then some bashing starts happening from the ceiling, shivering Charlie to his core. When Charlie finds all the sockets having been disconnected, he leaves his phone uncharged, spooking him, scaring him more when Austin doesn’t respond to him. Austin then responds, worried as to how Charlie wasn’t responding to him, showing first signs of supernatural behaviour.

Back in Matt and Scarlet’s room, Scarlet is doing her makeup in the nude, reminiscing on how the boys in her group act the way they do. When the lights start to flicker slightly, the mirror in front of her starts to smudge slightly, when it suddenly smashes into pieces and flies towards her face. This causes the inside of her throat to be sliced open, making her bleed internally. Matt runs in and tries to stop her slitting her wrists open, he then tries to get help from the others to stop a tragedy. Heading upstairs, Matt gets Lee to come and assist in helping Scarlet, with Lee asking Mitchell to get Raphael to carry her if necessary. Raphael doesn’t believe the fiasco but is shocked when he finds out the truth. Matt, trying Kyle or Kenny’s phone, starts to panic over the loss of his girlfriend. He finds Kyle’s phone and dials 911 but the phone line tone grows loud and deafening, causing Matt to leg it out the room. Downstairs, Lee is still thinking of a plan whilst Raphael elates in his mind over the thought of none of this happening at all. Jack and Mary then appear, the latter horrified over the sight of Scarlet’s lifeless body. As Mitchell gets a first aid kit for Jack, the locks on the doors disappear, pinning further suspicion to the hotel.

Jack then rushes to smash down the doors so they can escape to a town with a hospital, due to them being locked in for unknown reasons. When the plan fails, Matt points to the invisible supernatural entity being *it*. With the room getting more crowded, pressure continues to mount up in Lee who can’t seem to take it much more. Scarlet, psychologically, starts to get surrounded by black mist and can’t hold on much longer. Eventually, she falls unconscious, much to the horror of Mary. Desperate for an ambulance, Mary orders Lee to remove the glass shard from her throat as it causes the most damage to her organs. Lee, with no other option, yanks the shard out of Scarlet’s throat, causing more blood to seep out. With Raphael counting her heartbeat, Lee looks around to find a way to stitch up the wound. However, with a final nodding from Raphael, Scarlet dies. Out of anger, Matt attacks Lee but is stopped by the others, arguing that she already died prior to the glass being removed. They attempt to leave again, by throwing a couch into the window, to no prevail. Lee decides that they should split up to find Barney and Charlie, much to Raphael’s dismay.

Eventually they find Barney being attacked by it, it being a demon. They bully the monster away and save Barney, when the others return as they have found Charlie, where he is reunited with Austin. Three months later, it is revealed that the fire brigade had found the kids locked up after being posted missing by their town. The forcefield had been abruptly dissolved, due to it’s powers being too weak by then. A month afterwards, a funeral had been held in Scarlet’s honour, where the kids see no hope in their current relationships for the future.