Spock and Captain Kirk jump out of their poses on the revolving Louvre exhibit, and gather themselves under the glass pyramid. Kirk motions ahead for Spock to begin scanning the museum. For what, we don’t know.

This shot gets cut into and out of a few times in the chaos of Amanda’s departure from the Bunker of Evil. It’s also the third head-swap for Dennis. This one is the alternate, unwigged head that came with his puppet. I painted it with dabs of neon paint and let him swing free with his trusty axe.

Note the placard on his cage, with a reference to Otto Warmbier — may he rest in peace. You and I know the story, but perhaps Ambassador Rodman didn’t when he signed up for this.

During his death throes, Dennis bites onto a cage rail and grinds his teeth along it. After a moment, neon paint comes gushing out of his face. Then his neck separates, leaving his head stuck to the cage while his body collapses below the frame. I did this by dripping a very strong adhesive (LocTite 495) into his mouth and letting it set. The electrical effects were done with a handheld flashlight shot in stop motion.

The horror of it all…

This is Amanda’s last showdown with Dennis. She grabs him by his jaw and gives it a bone-crunching twist, as she breaks free from his feeble cockatoo-man-grasp. I love how the UV light makes his white gloves glow through her hair.

This is a rather complex shot, and unfortunately it didn’t turn out quite the way I envisioned. Basically I moved Dennis’ cage to my turntable cyclorama. I removed the top gate, and drilled three eye hooks into Dennis’ back and butt, and suspended him via green fishing line. Up top, I connected the single stretch of rigging to a square wooden bar that I could use both like a pulley and a ratchet.

Then I animated The Ambassador flapping around like he was flitting and flying inside his tight little cage — bumping his beak, wings and legs off the bars as the cage rotates around in timed increments. The ratcheting allowed me to change Dennis’ elevation within the cage, getting his feet up off the floor.

It will take some time to remove all the visible rigging via Photoshop, so the effect will improve greatly once that process is complete. And no, I’m not looking forward to that menial task!

Oh, the best thing about this scene is that my brother-in-law (who voices James Bondáge) and his family were here for summer vacation. So he sat in the studio and watched me animate while we enjoyed a few beers.

Spock then sees a poster advertising a VIP Rave in the Mona Lisa hall, apparently hosted by the same wrong Leonardo.

This was just a Photoshop image. I plan to redo it with my Leonardo DiCaprio puppet and my 1:6 scale Mona Lisa, posed like a diorama.

Spock also notices a diorama honoring Leonardo DiCaprio’s character from Titanic, who Spock misidentifies as Leonardo DaVinci. An honest mistake.

This is another shot where I’m bouncing light off a gold bar. This time bathing Amanda’s briefcase in the reflection while Dennis transitions back into a cockatoo. You can almost read the printing on the bar: “999.9 FINE GOLD”

This is one of my favorite shots in the film. The camera is placed behind the big green screen plexiglas dome behind Kim & Vonky, through a hole that I made with a 3-1/2″ hole saw.

Vonky is frozen with a Pringle in her hand and a gleam on her costume jewelry. Dennis is prone behind Amanda, bathed in golden light. I achieved that by bouncing a halogen spot light off a large plastic gold bar. We also get to see the table and Kim’s laptop covered in cocaine from a previous scene.

Here we start to appreciate Kim & Vonky’s strange relationship. Is she his sex slave? Or is it the other way around? He feeds her a Pringle and then bullies her with his bullhorn, making her hat fly off.

This is a good look at Vonky’s custom hat, crafted by Annette Pardini (@mydollasylum on Instagram). Here, Amanda asks her, “Is that a maxipad, Vonky?”

Meanwhile, Vonky stacks gleaming gold bars into the briefcase — and precisely to the beat of the music. 16 bars for 16 beats, at 10 frames per beat.

That sub-shot is the first time we see evidence that POSERS are capable of existing and operating at variable frame rates. In other words, Amanda suddenly poses to place one bar in the briefcase once every 10 frames. But the MOCO camera continues to move at 24 FPS, to catch all the light reflecting off the gold.