However, with Zaphod's presidential approval, the proper form is submitted and Trillian is released. While being held prisoner, Trillian learns that Earth was destroyed and that Zaphod himself had been the one to approve the plans, evidently having thought the paper to be a request for an autograph. She is sentenced to death and dangled over a cage containing a Bugblatter Beast of Traal (a very nasty creature with gnashing teeth), only to be released at the last moment.
Exhausted, and with her clothes torn up, she yells at Zaphod for signing the form to destroy Earth and berates Arthur for not telling her earlier. They return to the ship and Trillian and Arthur reconcile. Though Kavula's coordinates have been installed, the group takes a rest until the Improbability Drive is activated by the two white mice seen earlier. The ship jumps through hyperspace and arrives at Magrathea.
However, as the ship begins its descent, an automatic hologram message appears on the ship's screen (Simon Jones) and issues an apology that the entire planet has been closed. Ignoring the message, Zaphod continues the landing procedures but the hologram appears again and announces that, since the ship will not adhere to its previous instructions, two thermo-nuclear missiles have been launched to intersect the ship. The ship quickly takes evasive maneuvers until Arthur, in desperation, hits the Improbability Drive.
Instead of leaping through time and space elsewhere, they find that they've remained on Magrathea but, in an odd and highly improbably turn of events, the missiles have been transformed into a large, sperm whale and a bowl of petunias. The poor whale, thrown unexplainably into existence, has very little time to ponder what's going on before he is forced to violently meet the Magrathean surface. The bowl of petunias, as it falls, merely says to itself, "Oh no, not again."
Our Guide offers that, if we knew why the bowl of petunias thought that in the first place, we'd know a lot more about the universe than we do now. Landing on the frozen planet surface, the group discovers three portals which offer no clue as to which one would definitively take them to Deep Thought. Tired of hearing the arguing between the men, Trillian takes a leap of faith and dives into the first activated one, followed closely by Zaphod and Ford.
Uncertain and fearful of what would happen, Arthur hesitates until he makes the dive...and comes through the other side. The portal has closed on him, leaving him alone with Marvin to keep company. Marvin offers a depressing forecast of misery and Arthur can do nothing but wait. Meanwhile, Zaphod, Ford, and Trillian find that they'd chosen the right portal and ascend the steps toward a very bored-looking Deep Thought, watching television. Zaphod asks if she's figured out the ultimate question yet, to which she says 'no'.
She tells them she designed another computer to figure out the ultimate question, but that the computer was destroyed to make way for a hyperspace bypass. She does give them the other item they seek, the gun that Kavula requested. It's the Point of View Gun, created by Deep Thought but commissioned by a group of intergalactic angry housewives, the gun is designed to make whomever the target is see the point of view of the person using the gun (the Guide states that those users were tired of ending arguments with their husbands with "You just don't get it, do you?").
When Trillian's agitation is questioned by Zaphod, she fires the gun at him and he realizes that she's on edge because her planet was destroyed and she is traveling with the man who signed the order and that she may have lost the opportunity to be with the one man who understands her: Arthur. They are then interrupted by the opening of a door at the back of the room from which Zaphod notices two white mice emerge.
Arthur remains waiting at the three empty portals when a figure clothed in a large fur coat emerges and attempts to threaten Arthur into coming with him. When that proves unsuccessful, the figure introduces himself as a Magrathean named Slartibartfast (Bill Nighy) and tells Arthur that he has something to show him before activating one of the portals. It takes the two of them to a loading bay where Slartibartfast explains that he's an engineer and that he and his company create planets.
He takes Arthur on a tour of the massive work floor where various planets are under construction, including Earth Mark 2. Taking him in for a closer look, Arthur is amazed to see various parts of Earth being rebuilt and is stunned when he's delivered to a very familiar site, his home. He walks inside and finds Ford, Trillian, and Zaphod waiting for him, dining in one of the rooms with two speaking white mice.
The mice kindly offer Arthur some tea before they explain to him their pursuit of the ultimate question and how they were nearly 5 billion years in the midst of their experimentation to find out what that was before it literally blew up in their faces. As such, they commissioned the reconstruction of Earth 2 to continue their trials but need Arthur's brain to complete it. As he's tied down in his chair and a circular saw is placed around his head, Arthur cries out to the others but finds they've been drugged by the food.
In desperation, he attempts to provide a question to the answer 42 before stumbling on one that the mice appreciate. He advises them to take it but the only question and answer he's ever found any happiness from is if Trillian is the girl for him; he answers to himself 'yes', realizing that he loves her.
Confused by Arthur's love-babble, the mice decide to take his brain regardless, but Arthur manages to break free and takes a teapot, smashing the mice flat and revealing that they were actually the pan-dimensional beings who created Deep Thought in alternate form. Arthur gets the others to their feet and they leave the house to find that the Vogons have surrounded it, led by Rontok.
The Vogons open fire and the group takes refuge behind a trailer while Marvin, having arrived and ambling slowly towards them, criticizes the Vogons for being the worst shots in the galaxy...that is until one shot hits the back of his head. He collapses as Rontok attempts to cease the Vogon's assault; she merely wants Zaphod safely back in office, not shot to death. Marvin then, miraculously, gets up and aims the Point-of-View gun (dropped earlier by Zaphod) at the Vogons.
Rontok ducks as Marvin fires a concentrated blast at the Vogons and they all collapse to the ground, utterly depressed. They are all then seen being packed into a van and driven away. Once everything has calmed, Ford, Zaphod, and Trillian come out of their drugged stupors and Slartibartfast arrives, asking Arthur if there's anything he'd like changed about the new Earth before it's released.
Arthur says no and then asks Trillian if she'd like to go somewhere. Ford offers a good restaurant at the end of the universe and the group disembarks on the Heart of Gold once more, activating the Improbability Drive as they continue to tour the galaxy.
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