I was riding in a van with two men who were speaking to me. They looked like famous actors but ones I had a hard time pinning down. One of them looked like Dennis Hopper.
me: "Who are you supposed to be?"
dennis hopper: (pointing) "He's the teacher from the Blue Lagoon. I'm from that movie with Ed McMahon. We're both movie characters, but the problem is you haven't SEEN the movies we're in. So I can't get you more information, as we can only communicate using symbols we both understand."
Note
Never saw or read The Blue Lagoon, but it has no particular "teacher". Fruitless searches for The Blue Lagoon and Ed McMahon interrupted various segments of this dream.
dennis hopper: "You shouldn't think of us as spirits or beings, who are using avatars of 'fictional' characters. We are the incarnations of the characters themselves, residing in the cosmos of ideas."
me: "Hmmm. I am not convinced."
We got out of the van, and a small man who looked like a paper cutout was walking along the sidewalk. I pointed at him.
me: "Let's take that weird little paper cutout guy, for example. Everything I know about virtual reality suggests that these are best explained as animated avatars. It's not reasonable to believe a fictional idea can somehow 'incarnate' in a fully abstract manner and then interact with me."
dennis hopper: "Why is it so hard for you to believe that when you are at a certain level, things are only able to look like what they actually are?"
This conversation was derailed when I touched something I apparently shouldn't have. Suddenly slug-looking started appearing whenever I touched something else. A woman wearing white came over to help--when I put my hand on her leg the slugs would transfer to her, and she'd neutralize them. Eventually they were all gone.