Wow! Message from Outer Space (Wow! Nachricht aus dem All)

-Wow! -Wow!

Dad, you have to hear this.

-It explains everything. -Everything.

My first question,

why at 2:30 a.m. on a Wednesday night

is there a boy in our living room that I don't know?

Don't worry, my parents have no idea that I'm here.

Hmm.

Do you wanna hear it again, Dad?

No, thank you.

Here's the key to the translation.

We're just getting started,

but it's definitely a language.

This is the worst excuse for a kid coming home late

that I've-- I've ever heard.

I thought your dad was a real scientist.

Yes, I am.

That's how I know that aliens just don't exist.

-They do! -They do!

They don't.

Then how come they've sent us a message?

You heard correctly, a message from aliens.

But to explain why we of all people received their message,

I better go back to the very beginning.

Everything started when Dad and I moved to a suburb on the other side of town

to be closer to our new school.

Got it.

I started high school after the summer

and Dad got a job teaching Physics and Math at the same school.

Super convenient since it's just the two of us now.

Obviously I didn't know anyone here,

so I went to scope out the neighborhood,

and this is what I found.

Hey, do you need some help?

Hmm?

I didn't think you looked like

someone who could really help.

You neither.

Yeah, so, I fell into the scrap press over there.

Will the limp ever get better?

Nope.

We got this on insurance.

I've tuned it a bit, but it won't get better than this.

What you need is a connection between the electrical current

in your nerve cells and the mechanics.

Exactly!

Come on.

Billie was really cool and she thought the same as me.

So I had to show her something I'd never shown to anyone else in the world.

Wow.

I believe that there are intelligent beings out there

much smarter than us humans.

And I wanna talk to them.

Okay.

But Dino's space telescope wasn't working yet,

so I grabbed a few books from Dad's library.

My dad is actually an astrophysicist, which means he studies space.

My mom was an astronaut, for real.

Here.

Every day, we made our radio telescope a little bit better.

Hmm.

Cool.

So no more police radio.

This was real noise from outer space but...

The signal is too weak.

More copper coils!

Hey!

What are you doing there?

Um, removing copper coils.

Silke, honey, call the police. Roger.

It's okay, Dad, that's Billie.

She's my friend.

Silke, maybe you should come here instead.

Roger.

And what do you say now?

Copper, nickel, tungsten.

Tungsten, the good aluminum from the wheels, right?

Yeah, worth at least 2,500 bucks.

More like 2,700.

Mm-hmm.

Damn, boy, we've been wondering why at the end of the month,

we're always a few roll short, hmm?

These are raw materials.

They go up in price, you know.

At some point, they'll be worth twice as much given the situation in the world.

Sybil, right?

Listen, Sybil--

Billie, it's short for Annabelle.

Annabelle just never suited me.

Huh, right, that's interesting.

Do you even know what we're doing here?

No.

We're in the process of deciphering alien language.

Ah.

Hmm.

Translating.

From then on, Billie was banned from the scrap yard,

- because firstly... -This isn't a playground.

This is a business.

And secondly...

-Yeah, but-- - It's enough if you see Dino at school.

But it's the summer holidays.

Good.

And we don't even go to the same school!

Dino was forced to help with the daily work

for the rest of the holidays, because firstly...

You're old enough.

And secondly...

This way, you earn your own money.

Thirdly, because...

That's life,

even if you have a lame leg and two left hands.

Hmm?

From then on, we could only meet at night,

and our extraterrestrial eavesdropping became a top secret mission.

Here, you two.

We had to figure out a way

to give the old analog technology a digital boost.

So Dino resoldered the entire motherboard again,

and one night...

We finally got it.

The clearest signal ever.

-Billie! -What?

-Wow! -Wow!

We were absolutely sure that we had everything we needed

to prove that aliens were trying to make contact.

We'd just forgotten two small things.

Firstly, let sleeping dogs lie.

And secondly, even my oh-so-smart doctor dad can be really ignorant.

Really, really ignorant.

That's how I know that aliens just don't exist.

-They do! -They do!

They don't.

Then how come they've sent us a message?

Damn, my parents.

Thank goodness.

Where's my son?

I, uh.

Ah!

Wait, Karossa, come!

So, if I catch your daughter anywhere near our son again,

I will set Karossa and Karacho on her.

Is that clear?

And you, little scamp, hmm-hmm.

Come on.

-No. -Yes.

No.

-Why not? -Nope, no, negative.

But why not?

Because you've fallen victim

to a reciprocal logic desire coupling.

What?

I listened to your recordings again,

and it does indeed have a recurring structure.

So what?

Look, this tone sequence, come and look.

This, for example, is also a sequence of sounds with a multiple structure,

from which the word fantasy can be derived.

And what do we hear?

Firstly, suckling piglets on a mother sow.

Secondly, gale force wins on a sailing boat.

And last, we hear raindrops on a steel barrel.

Okay, great.

So we're just idiots, is that it?

Billie.

Billie, Billie, as much as I'd love to.

You get that from your mother.

Be careful, please!

I am being careful!

No, you're not.

You nearly dropped that thing on my head.

Do you know what I used to dream about?

You oaf.

I checked first!

That my parents aren't my real parents.

I saw you, you didn't check.

Why is that?

-Well... - You just kicked it off.

Just two random people that I ended up with.

-Non-sense. -You never know.

I thought a spaceship would land here one day

-and pick me up. -You're being silly!

You used to daydream about being an alien.

Sometimes I still do.

Silke!

Is that bad?

What is it now?

Well, yeah.

-Just give me a hand! -With your parents.

Silke!

Billie, do you really believe something's up there?

Honestly?

Well, when my mom died,

everyone said that,

"Your mom is now up there in heaven,"

but I never saw her there.

I was five.

So I asked my dad,

an expert in all things to do with space.

He explained everything to me, the planets,