broke: taako and lup explaining memes to a confused merle
woke: merle explaining memes to a confused, and horrified, John Hunger
ascendant: taako and lup explaining memes to merle, who then based on his understanding explains them to john, the information getting progressively less accurate along the line
accidental foreshadowing: the hits
Magnus, in Refuge: Listen, either they die or we forget about them, so, either way. ..
***
Griffin: It’s like an airlock in a spaceship
Travis: Which of course we’ve been in before.
Griffin, very nervously: ….no? probably- probably not…
Clint: Maybe in the backstory!
***
Magnus, indignant for all the wrong reasons: Hey, we don’t know shit about history! We don’t even remember where we are right now!
***
Taako in Rockport Limited: It’s BARRY. How quickly you forget, huh?“
***
Travis after the first inoculation, in Moonlighting: Did we remember anything about the umbrella we found in the dungeon or any of that?
Griffin: No.
Travis: Huh.
***
Magnus: “I go and stand where he (the drifting mysterious incorporeal red spectre) is, and I jump around like ‘hey guys look I’m in a red robe!”
***
Travis: hey, are the voidfish’s powers like…selective?
***
Griffin, dodging like crazy: I mean, I imagine Barry’s voice sounds pretty different when he’s engulfed in flames.
***
Griffin in The Eleventh Hour: I imagine it’d be very disorienting, dying like that and then not dying.
Taako, nonchalant: Just another day at the office, baby.
***
BONUS from Rockport Limited; i just know this one was a two-year-long brick joke thanks griff
Jenkins: Remember, don’t leave anything behind, and you can’t take anything.
Magnus: Well, except memories.
Jenkins: The memories will be obliterated…no, no, no. I’m kidding. Nothing could destroy memories.
An incomplete list of inside jokes the ipre crew definitely had going
– trying to guess which clothes in the laundry belong to Lup and which belong to Taako (only last 2 cycles because it gets to easy)
– “MAGNUS!” (lasts 6 cycles after the beach year until Davenport bans it)
– anyone brings any plant on board “Better not let Merle see” (never dies, carries over to the BoB days)
– Holding up a pair of pants that are definitely not blue jeans “hey Barry are these yours????” (lasts 15 cycles, but only because Lup drags it out)
– right after the cycle resets: Magnus, oh my goodness! What happened to your eye?? (never dies but is only funny after certain cycles)
– Making up increasingly wild stories about the years Merle missed after being John’d (lasts 56 cycles, Merle is still thoroughly convinced he missed a plane inhabited
entirely
by 10 foot Della Reese’s)
– The first thing they ask any intelligent species (besides info on the LoC) is if they have Parmesan (lasts 30 cycles, after the one were Lup and Taako had a fit because the locals hadn’t invented it yet)
– Cap’n Port (never technically dies but morphs into a genuine term of endearment)
– Lucretia is Banned From All Kitchens (lasts 22 cycles after she nearly burned one down drying to write and cook simultaneously)
– Pretending to be freaked out by Barry/Lup’s lich forms (never dies but after 18 cycles only Magnus still finds it funny)
do you think merle could pull dead people into parley. like i’m not necessarily referring to someone like kravitz, who is undead, or john, whose aliveness attribute is questionable at best, but like. say taako died at the beginning of the year and he forgot to tell merle where he hid the weed. could merle pull his soul out of the astral plane to ask. lmk.
now i’m imagining a post-canon where merle keeps pulling, say, magic brian or someone into parley. you know, just for a chat. they got off on the wrong foot last time! he calls up gundren rockseeker one day. he’s family, after all. the next time it’s jenkins. noelle. that guy he banished to the astral plane in the middle of a race during that one live show. the sky’s the limit, really.
kravitz has to sit him down more than once to explain that you can’t just steal souls from the astral plane whenever you want to play cards, merle. you can’t just commit more death crimes in the name of a good time, merle.
and merle smiles and nods sagely like he finally gets it but then the next day he pulls kravitz away from a high-stakes bounty to play poker instead.
And that’s the story of how Merle eventually posthumously became friends with each and every one of his former enemies
so voldemort is technically a lich, right? splitting your soul and putting bits of it in objects, those are phylacteries, and he’s a lich, and also a really bad one because he split himself up way too much and also dumped part of his soul into a literal child, what the hell tom.
anyway i can’t get out of my head a scenario in which the kiddos are eating dinner in the great hall and suddenly there’s a raven on the headmaster’s table. and then a second. and then a third, and a fourth, and then there’s a handsome man in a long cowled robe striding in through doors that certainly did not open for him. he stops at the eagle-eyed podium and says, in the worst british accent that britain has ever seen, “are you dumbledore?”
and dumbledore says “yes.”
and the man nods and says. “excellent. i’ve been told you know one thomas riddle?”
there’s a pause this time. then, “yes.”
“do you have a moment?”
he does. and so does mcgonagall, and also snape, and before they adjourn to the headmaster’s space this man looks out over the sea of confused and awestruck upturned faces and picks out a boy with bright green eyes and a scar and says, “what’s your name?”
“harry,” says the boy.
“harry,” the man repeats, and his voice is almost gentle, because this boy reminds him of another little boy he knows, one who has also seen far too much for his age. “my name’s kravitz. would you come with us?”
he does. hermione and ron don’t let him go alone. and instead of harry’s horcrux being the last to go, it’s the first; part of being a reaper is dealing with souls, and prying a parasitic soul from a young, clean one is easy work. important work. after that day, harry’s scar never hurts again.
anyway what i’m saying is: reaper trio cross-country road trip along magical britain to find and destroy the horcruxes, and then voldemort. because that is, technically, their job.
kravitz, staring at the new assignment scroll: er.
lup, snatching scroll from kravitz: what is it lemme se— oh boy
barry, leaning over lup, with professional interest: hm. uh, well this is a disgrace to the profession. this is uh, some real amateur work, boy, this is a real hack job we’re comin’ in to fix. Like uh, the whole splitting the soul into seven—
kravitz, taking the scroll back, incredulous: seven?!
lup: you gotta admire the tenacity, skeletor.
kravitz, even more incredulous: why seven!!
barry, getting real academic for a moment, taking the scroll and scanning it: well, some people want reassurance about you know, sustaining things. But it’s a lot easier to just have backup bodies. This is kind of….actually this is kind of creative?
kravitz: no!!!!!
barry: oh wait nevermind he stuck part of it in a kid?? Jeez. That’s gross as all hell.
the level of chaotic gay energy the McElroys are able to accurately convey in their queer characters despite being straight cisgender men is… genuinely astonishing and really should raise the bar for literally all other straight creators tbqh
like they really hit a commendable sweet spot of “I understand the gravity of representsting marginalized identities that are not my own” and “this is just another character” that really Works for me as a queer listener? because there is that sensitivity and making sure that identities are explicitly stated and treated with respect, while recognizing that it’s not really their place to tell a story About being queer. Griffin, Justin, and Travis all make clear that Lup, Taako, and Aubrey’s hardships do NOT stem from their identities, and it’s so refreshing because 1.) I don’t need background homo/transphobia in my fantasy, thanks and 2.) I especially don’t need those issues being used as plot pieces by straight dudes, thanks.
and that’s just like… never the case. it’s always “oh, she’s trans, and also the biggest badass in this game.” “yeah, he’s gay and dating the grim reaper, but also he’s about to turn into a t. rex so buckle up.” “she’s bi but more importantly she’s about to set a lot of things on fire.” it’s like… literally what I as a queer consumer want to see in my genre and the McElroys deliver like it’s no big.