This is Emily Yeung's Real Life

I just want to start off by saying if you want an answer at the end, prepare to be disappointed. There just isn't one.

I was an intern at Treehouse TV for a year in 2008 for my degree in educational kids shows. It wasn't paid of course, most internships aren't, but it did have some perks beyond education. To adults it might not seem like a big one, but most kids at the time would go crazy over it.

Now, since I worked directly with the editors and animators, I got to view the new episodes days before they aired. I'll get right to it without giving too many unnecessary details. They had very recently made This is Emily Yeung and the Wizard of Oz and the entire staff was somewhat sapped of creativity so it took them longer to start up the season. But the delay lasted longer for more upsetting reasons. There was a problem with the series premiere that set everyone and everything back for several months.

Me and two other interns were in the editing room along with the lead animators and sound editors for the final cut. We received the copy that was supposed to be "This is Emily Yeung Dressing Up" and gathered around the screen to watch. Now, given that it isn't final yet animators often put up a mock title card, sort of an inside joke for us, with phony, often times lewd titles, such as "How sex doesn't work" instead of "This is Emily Yeung making Juice". Nothing particularly funny but work related chuckles. So when we saw the title card "This is Emily Yeung's Real Life" we didn't think it more than a morbid joke.

The episode started with a text saying,"Toronto, Canada" It featured an orange, Mediterranean looking home, which I assumed was Emily's. It seemed rusty and boarded up, it had toys scattered all over. It zoomed into a front window that featured a messy bedroom with chipped wallpaper. The bed had an unkempt Emily with ratty hair. She woke up and said," Hi, i'm Emily."

Emily continued on," I need your help. Will you help me find something to do?........You will? Come on! Let's go!" Then after she got downstairs, she told her parents she was exploring, but they weren't answering. Emily just continued and said,"We're going to the Big City!"

Emily said she had to cross a bridge, go in the spooky forest, and then to the big city. Emily then repeated the destinations, and when she said Come on, she also whispered,"Lord, please help me change this world, Amen."

Emily walks for a few yards, then stops and asks where the troll bridge is, although there is no bridge in sight. She randomly goes a path and says thank you and come on. She wals down a hill. She randomly stops and says,"We made it to the troll bridge!"

Suddenly, a homeless man is on the screen with Dora. He looks in his mid-fifties, very filthy with a long, frizzy beard. He then says to Emily ,"Do you have some money?"

Emily then beams and says, "Hi."

The man then says,"What the hell are you saying, girl? Why do you always have to do this every day!?"

Emily is obviously confused and says," Thank you for letting me over the bridge!"

The man then says, "Burn in hell, bitch."

Then Emily asks where the spooky forest is, thanks you, says come on, and then sings. This is when things get worse. The streets get more polluted and you can see more graffiti and gangs. Emily stops and says, "We made it to the spooky forest. Be careful, there can be spooky bats and witches!"

Suddenly, a man came up and said, "Get out of my fucking way or I'll cut your throat and TUBE your family!" Emily said very scared, "No swiping!" "Swiper" then shoved Emily. Emily's knees were gushing blood from scraping on the concrete.

After that little strip of conflict, Emily said, "I feel so alone, should I end it? What is life?" She started to tear up and silently cry, while walking to the "big city". When she finally got to the big city, she was extremely worn out. Her eyes were red from crying and she had blisters on her knees from the man's attack. She said in a depressed voice,"We made it to the big city. We did it..." Emily said," What was your favorite part?.........I didn't like any parts." Emily then walks up to the screen and says," I need to confess, your adventures with me... were never true. the others, were never real. I never had friends, I had to make up my own, so I found you guys. We did everything, until now. I can't explore with you guys anymore. I'm sorry. I couldn't have done it, making friends, without you. Thanks for helping."

The screen stayed black for a while. I was about to eject the DVD until the screen faded white and read,"3 days later" It faded to a forest. It revealed to be that on one tree, you can clearly see a decayed Emily, with intestines dangled in a grotesquely real fashion, blue-colored fingers, gouged out eyes, and other disgustingly real features. A note on the tree read,"The Lord has saved me from this bad death hell of a place, which was a suicide. Suicide is your escape."

The picture got more distorted until the scene changed to a news cast saying, "Earlier this week, a seven-year-old girl named Emily Yeung was found on a noose in a forest in coastal Canada, revealing to have commit suicide. Beside her was a suicide note. She was the star of the beloved children's show 'This is Emily Yeung'. We will all miss her dearly in our hearts." The odd thing was that the news reporters, which were a man and a woman sounded just like Tom Tucker and Diane Simmons from Family Guy.

The words echoed in my mind.

There were no credits. The screen faded to black and that was it. I kept the DVD in my closet and still keep it in there today so my two children don't see it. But anyway, I burnt the video onto my computer and emailed Marblemedia, saying how inhumane to make an animation like that out of a children's show. I also attached the video to the email. They actually told me that they made it in 2006 because they were having secret plans to make it into an adult party cartoon, like Ren and Stimpy's fate was, but it got canceled due to negative response from test viewers. That made me ban This is Emily Yeung from my children.