Leonardo DiCaprio was born in Mississippi in 1858. He and his father, Calvin Candie, lived on Candie Valley ranch with a host of slaves. Soon after the birth, Candie was shot and killed by King Schultz. One of the white ranchers around Candie's estate owed him a favor, so he rescued the infant Leo from the ensuing firefight with the former slave Django. This rancher was named John Herod. Candie's loss ruined Herod and other ranchers, so they all traveled west in hopes of finding a better life. They couldn't honestly make good living, so they decided to just take it. They invaded the town of Redemption and killed the Marshal there. Herod became ruler of the town and effectively disowned Leo.

As he grew up, Leo retained memories of Herod and was convinced he was his father and was denying it. Herod didn't want to tell him the truth, maybe because he didn't want Leo to gallivant off in search of Django. So Leo never knew his name (he'd never had one, really) and was known only as "the Kid." He had been there almost since the beginning of his life, so he'd always just been the lone youngster in the town to people.

In 1881, Herod held a shooting tournament When the Kid and Herod faced off in one of the final duels, Leo didn't get shots on Herod because of skill. Herod didn't want to kill Leo, but Leo wanted acknowledgment and respect from the man he believed to be his father, so he stubbornly remained in the tournament. Herod won the duel, but he was killed by "the Lady" Ellen soon after.

What viewers of that movie don't know is, both Ellen and the Kid faked their deaths; only difference was, it was necessary for Ellen to reveal herself. Herod did shoot Leo, but there was a thick packet of the same fake blood under his shirt. It didn't completely stop the bullet, so he was still wounded, but not enough to die right away. They did it this way because the Kid had to lose in order for the plan to work. That said, a bullet in the stomach is still a bit of a problem no matter how deep it is. Ever wonder why Ellen left so quickly and the movie ended so quickly? On her way out of the town, she picked up Leo and galloped to the nearest hospital before his intestinal damage was too severe. The doctor who came to see Leo said it was too severe and there was nothing he could do. Except maybe…due to the nature of the injury…there was one thing.

It is generally understood that the science of cryonics began in the second half of the twentieth century, but in fact, the idea had already been thought of. It was not widely known, since doctors believed it would be largely received as against nature, and thus against God. Nevertheless, it was an ongoing endeavor around the world. That option was available for Leo. Ellen agreed, because with Herod dead, there was no one else who could, and it was the only conceivable way to save Leo.

Ellen died in the 1890s, so it fell to the doctors to judge whether or not to revive Leo. He was kept in storage, but pretty much forgotten about―he hadn't been anyone important, after all. Still, he stayed with the stock of frozen bodies as government investigations forced them to be moved every few years. The Roosevelt administration eventually cracked down on cryonic practice (still unknown to the public) to the extent that it no longer was feasible in the United States. So in 1903, the bodies were smuggled to England, a facility in Southampton. In six years, the British government found and arrested the researchers, but not before they ordered the bodies to be unfrozen no matter their condition. They felt it would have been unethical to rob any possible chance at life. Many died, but some didn't. Most of those who lived were on record and still had families. Leo had no name and no living connections. They were able to repair his wounds when he came out of stasis, but soon found that he had forgotten the little he knew about his background. He was a John Doe for six months. No one came to claim him, and he seemed functional enough, so they let him go and were done with it. He couldn't very well keep calling himself John Doe because of its stigma. So he decided to use a variation of it; the first one he thought of off the top of his head was Jack Dawson.

Jack, free of his traumatic past, was a lively and optimistic fellow. Though he lived poorly in Southampton, he made friends easily and was well-liked. Only occasionally did ghosts of his past whisper to him. Most notably, a single word kept coming up in his mind, one he'd heard many a time: "Draw!" He took it as a message, and he spent two years learning how to draw. He bet on sketchpads and stole them when he didn't win the bets. By 1912, his skills were undeniable.

In that year, Jack found a golden opportunity. He had always wanted to travel, feeling too large for one place, and it just so happened that the largest ship in the world was to be docking in Southampton and sailing to New York. He won at poker to gain two tickets for himself and his friend, and they boarded the Titanic with no time to spare.

On the voyage, he met Rose Dewitt Butaker when she ran for the railing with the intention to jump. Jack took it upon himself to talk her out of it. This is when Jack realized his propensity for creating stories. Devoid of a real past, he could easily make one up. He told Rose he was from Wisconsin to make a point about the cold water of the Atlantic. Rose fell off the side, but he saved her, and they spent the rest of the short trip trying to overcome the boundary of class to be with one another. Jack noticed, however, that Rose was uncommonly obsessed with him, given that they'd only just met. It seemed as though she was unsatisfied with her familial circumstances and was just using him as a means of escape.

Soon afterwards, the ship collided with an iceberg, setting the ship on a course, not to America, but to inevitable demise. The destruction was not immediate, so while the ship suffered a chain reaction of water overflow and system failures, the human-sized struggles continued. Jack began to realize how much this relationship could cost him. After Rose's fiancée framed Jack for the theft of a valuable diamond, he was determined to detach himself from her in a way without letting on that he didn't feel the same way about her. When Rose made it onto a lifeboat, he even insisted she go on without him. She jumped back onto the ship for him, and he kissed her to cover up how disappointed he was.

Finally, the massive Titanic sank. Jack and Rose survived the sinking, as did most passengers, but the temperature of the water began to take its toll. They found a piece of driftwood that was clearly big enough for them both to lie on. But Jack had a plan. He made it seem like there was no room for him and made a show of not taking a turn out of the water, insinuating it was because he cared about her. His previous cryonic state had made him resistant to low temperatures, so he waited until the time he should have succumbed to hypothermia, and then he pretended to die. When he slipped underwater, he actually swam under the driftwood and silently broke the surface on the other side. He boarded the rescue boats separately and hid his face until they both arrived in the U.S.

When Rose was asked her name at the docks, he heard her say "Rose Dawson," which meant Jack couldn't use his last name for fear of connection to her. Throwing his first name around probably wasn't smart, either. So when he was asked his name, he hesitated. Straight initials would invite inquiries, which he didn't want. Maybe just the first name. He could still be Jack; he just didn't want the name in plain sight. So he answered, "J…" He remembered one of the patients that had been frozen with him and who hadn't made it: a James Gatz. "Gatz…by. J. Gatsby."

So Jack settled into the persona of Jay. Prompted by his near-death experience, he was determined to do the traveling he hadn't done the first three years of his new life. He wanted to make up for the unconscious decades. He had a fortuitous encounter with the millionaire Dan Cody during a boating mishap, earning him a mentor in the copper tycoon. They sailed on his yacht together for four years before Cody died. Jay returned to New York as penniless as he had left it, but he had gained something: knowledge of gentlemanly ways.

It wasn't long before he traveled again, though it wasn't of his own volition. He was conscripted into the army for the Great War. Before his training was complete and he was called over to Europe, his life changed forever. He met and fell in love with Daisy Fay. She, like Rose, was of a social stature far beyond his reach; but then, what he felt for Daisy was far beyond what he felt for Rose. He went and fought in the war and returned a hero, only to discover Daisy had married Tom Buchanan. He remembered how Caledon Hockley, Rose's fiancée, had bested him so easily, even though he had had the advantage of Rose's love. Daisy was not worth risking that again. He had to put himself into the position that would win her back.

Luckily, he was in the right place at the right time to do that. Never had it been so easy for a man such as himself to acquire vast amounts of wealth using only his wits. He made a covert business bootlegging alcohol, and after five years, there was no denying his prestige.

In that year, in 1922, Jay met a Midwesterner named Nick Carraway, who was in New York to become a bond broker for Wall Street, and who also happened to be Daisy's cousin. Jay sought to use Nick as a liaison to Daisy, since he couldn't bear to approach her himself. So he befriended Nick and wove his stories again, claiming a wealthy background and an Oxford education. Nick eventually arranged a meeting between Jay and Daisy, who started their affair soon later.

Jay cared for Nick, and while he still wanted to keep his past as Jack Dawson a secret, he also wanted Nick to have a better idea of how he grew up so Nick would not know him just as the privileged son of the high class. He switched from one lie to another; he claimed he was once James Gatz, again using the name of his unfortunate cryonic companion, and grew up dirt poor in North Dakota. The story was false, but it contained nuggets of the truth―indeed, more nuggets than he knew. He told Nick the full truth, at least, about Dan Cody.

Contrary to his life's greatest purpose, Jay was unable to fully reclaim Daisy's affections and reconstruct the past; he lost her to Tom once again. Daisy then inadvertently killed a gas station owner's wife while driving Jay's car. Tom, who had been having his own affair with the late woman, passed the information on to the owner, George Wilson, though they both believed Jay had been driving. Overwhelmed with grief and fury, Wilson broke into Jay's house with the intent of killing him. Jay was waiting for a call from Daisy at the time, but as soon as the phone rang, Wilson shot him while his back was turned.

Hit in the heart, Leo the Kid, Jack Dawson, and Jay Gatsby died almost instantly.

He never knew of the baby that he had put in Daisy's belly.

TO BE CONTINUED