Image: This image was created as a parody for The Quak.
On Monday afternoon, at approximately 1:30 p.m. PST, officials from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), accompanied by a contingent of LAPD officers and several disapproving film critics, arrested two dozen Sony Pictures Entertainment employees at the company’s headquarters on West Washington Boulevard. Eyewitnesses on the scene claimed the officials arrived in time to discover Sony Pictures employees attempting to incinerate all their financial records with pyrotechnics equipment.
According to a press conference from the IRS’ office in Glendale, Sony Pictures has been charged with tax fraud that the IRS discovered as part of an audit of the company’s finances. The IRS spokesperson claimed: “While we cannot yet disclose the complete findings of our investigation into Sony Pictures Entertainment, we can confirm that Sony attempted to classify their recent motion picture, ‘Madame Web,’ as a corporate tax write-off.” The spokesperson continued: “According to one of our sources, Sony Pictures attempted to make a deliberately bad film in hopes of ‘making more money with a flop than they could with a hit.’”
Sony Pictures’ latest “Spider-Man” film, “Madame Web,” had released back in February to poor reviews from critics and audiences, but was able to make back its budget at the box office.
When asked for comment on the recent charges from the IRS, Sony officials refuted the charges as “baseless and malicious.” In addition, the company spokespersons claimed: “Even if, hypothetically, Sony Pictures Entertainment deliberately committed corporate tax fraud — which it did not — it is only because the company had to in order to make ends meet for our shareholders. Hypothetically, of course.”
When asked to comment on the sudden action taken by the IRS, “Madame Web” star Dakota Johnson told a Quad reporter: “After everything that happened with that insipid production, I’m not surprised. I remember this one time, one of the producers of the movie came up to me in the studio one day and said, ‘I want you to really phone this one in as much as possible; just really act like you’re acting as much as humanly possible.’”
S.J. Clarkson, speaking with another Quad reporter, stated bluntly: “This had to happen eventually. Despite most of us wanting to make a decent film, the studio kept telling us, ‘You know ‘The Room’? Do that, but with almost no unintentionally funny bits at all.’” The director went on: “You know, I’ve heard of movies being designed by committee, but this was actually that. No seriously, it’s like we had every other executive with us during the shoot. One marketing guy even chastised me, saying, ‘If you keep trying to make this picture work, we’ll replace you with Uwe Bowl.’”
The ghost of Stan Lee, who had been present at the IRS press conference, spoke with another reporter from The Quad, stating: “It used to be back in my day, all of the movie studios didn’t give a fig about making a good superhero movie. Strange to see them making a deliberately bad superhero movie for a cash grab! But hey, what would I know, I’m just a ghost.”
Sony Pictures Entertainment, which had originally acquired the rights to produce “Spider-Man” related movies and television back in 1999, has been suspected of doing everything it can to keep the rights from defaulting back to Marvel Studios. It is unclear whether more arrests and charges from the IRS are to follow, but The Quad will have more on this story as it develops.
Disclaimer: This article is part of The Quak, a satirical series of articles that are released in commemoration of April Fools Day.
Kelly Baker is an alumnus of West Chester University of Pennsylvania.