LEXX

Two one-man fighters chase each other around a tiny planetoid covered in TV aerials. From the way they are speaking, it is clear that these are the last people of each of their respective races. One is shot down, and the other lands to make sure the pilot is well and truly dead. There is a battle, and the pilots shoot each other. This is the original ratings war.

Their curiosity aroused by an advertisement for TV world, (starring two beatuiful women) Stan, Xev and 790 land on a small planetoid covered in TV aerials. The only signs of habitation are the skeletons of two fighter pilots in town square. Along the street, a video screen offers excitement and entertainment to all who enter. Never wishing to turn down the chance to have some fun, Stan, Xev and 790 go on in. Inside is a long corridor with many doors. They choose a door each.

Each room is a different TV show. Stan finds himself in a cheesy late night sitcom where girls clothes accidently fall off as soon as a man walks in the room. Xev finds herself in classroom full of well muscled 'schoolboys', and 790 is the host of a chat show. All the other 'actors' are mechanoids and most are broken, so it shouldn't be too hard to impress the audience, right? Stan however is not a natural personality, and soon finds his ratings have fallen and he is relegated to a daytime hospital soap. Xev, alternatively, is doing very well and is promoted to having her own show! Until that is the song and dance numbers run out and she finds herself sobbing about how much she loves Kai, and how he can never be hers. Depressing the audience is a cardinal sin on this world, and Xev ends up on an exercise bike infomercial. Stan in the meantime has dropped again to a childrens' show presenter's sidekick. 790 is too busy shouting about Xev to notice his ratings, which have now plummeted to an all time low, and his show is cancelled. He now has to go to the "Speciality Show" which is not all it seems.

790 is taken away by two rather large (mechanoid) guards to the place where the "Speciality Show" is made. This involves beheading the offending low-rater and adding them to the huge bank of disembodied heads in capsules which seem to be the audience to whom the TV shows are played. There are many hundreds of heads, all being kept alive somehow, although some must have been there a while as they are now just skulls. 790 is put in a holding device and has his head cut off. Luckily it's already off, so he just ends up in the capsule. Around this time, Kai, back on the Lexx has somehow roused himself - maybe because the TV signal from the planet has been left on in the cryochamber - and realises the rest of the crew are in trouble.

Taking a moth, he arrives on the planet and wanders in through the door that Stanley originally went into. The sleazy sit-com girls drop their clothes and Kai is, as always, unimpressed. Following Stanley's path through the daytime soap he ends up at the children's programme where he reveals that he "used to like playing with balloons as a child". A stunning personality insight. Continuing, he finds the "Speciality Show" room, just in time to find Stanley about to be beheaded. Pushing him out of the way, Kai ends up in the machine and has his head cut off instead. Stan tries to find Xev while Kai and 790 try to keep her ratings up by laughing at her show. Retrieving Kai's body which had been used for a mechanoid, Stan finds Xev back at the Speciality Show where he manages to rescue her and get 790 and Kai's head and body back together. They eventually escape the planetoid with moments to spare before a silent cloudof mechanical arms descend upon it and consume it completely...