Difference between revisions of "813: One-Liners"

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
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|[[Cueball]], who appears to be at an advantage since he has a gun and his opponent only has a knife, is pointing out an arithmetic error in his opponent's calculations. This may simply be Cueball adding insult to injury "I'm about to shoot you, but first I'm going to point out that you suck at maths". Alternatively, it could be a ruse to distract the knife wielding opponent, or a case of well-timed nerd-sniping.
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|[[Cueball]], who appears to be at an advantage since he has a gun and his opponent only has a knife, is pointing out an arithmetic error in his opponent's calculations. This may simply be Cueball adding insult to injury "I'm about to shoot you, but first I'm going to point out that you suck at maths". Alternatively, it could be a ruse to distract the knife wielding opponent, or a case of well-timed [[356|nerd-sniping]].
 
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Revision as of 22:47, 3 July 2015

One-Liners
"Upgrade to the latest version of Adobe Flash player to view THIS content, bitch." ::triggers detonator::
Title text: "Upgrade to the latest version of Adobe Flash player to view THIS content, bitch." ::triggers detonator::

Explanation

In this comic, Randall presents a series of phrases, ordered by how likely they are to be used as a one-liner by a character in an action movie. One-liners are short, punchy phrases, typically witty or funny, and are routinely used in films by the antagonist to taunt the protagonist (or vice versa). The perfect one-liner leaves the recipient at a loss for a comeback, and should make sense immediately. If the phrase doesn't make sense or has to be explained, the effect is lost.

While the phrases shown start off adhering to the witty and punchy stereotype of the one-liner, they quickly become absurb and non-sensical.

Panel No. Phrase Explanation
1 You're going down the memory hole now, asshole. The Memory hole is a mechanism for redacting documents, photographs, etc., and a reference to George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. In this instance it implies that the character on the floor is about to be 'erased' from existence.
2 Hey! You forgot to carry the two. Cueball, who appears to be at an advantage since he has a gun and his opponent only has a knife, is pointing out an arithmetic error in his opponent's calculations. This may simply be Cueball adding insult to injury "I'm about to shoot you, but first I'm going to point out that you suck at maths". Alternatively, it could be a ruse to distract the knife wielding opponent, or a case of well-timed nerd-sniping.
3 Looks like the Fed just lowered the interest rate. The Federal Reserve System, usually referred to as The Fed, is the central banking system in the United States. While interest rates are usually lowered during a recession or a crisis, this phrase appears to be completely out of context, and lacks any humor.
4 Guess you should've scrolled all the way to the bottom before clicking "Agree." A common feature encountered when registering for user accounts or installing software is a very lengthy Terms of service document, describing the things you agree to abide by. The vast majority of people simply click Agree without reading the document, essentially agreeing to anything and everything that the author decided to include. In the context of this panel, perhaps the user agreed to be executed at random.
5 Bangarang, motherfucker. This phrase is very similar to the line "Yippee-Ki-Yay motherfucker" used by John McClane in the Die Hard series. Bangarang is, among other things, the Jamaican word for "uproar." It was popularized (without the addition of 'motherfucker') as the cheer of the lost boys in the film Hook.

The title text is another suggested one-liner phrase, referring to an update reminder that frequently pops up when one attempts to view Adobe Flash content on a webpage. After delivering the line, the character triggers a detonator (Double colons are sometimes used in text to denote an action), presumably setting of an explosive of some kind.

The sentence doesn't make much sense, and is too convoluted and wordy for an effective one-liner, which suggests that this is a continuation of the scale towards 'Less Likely'. This phrase also proves that simply adding Bitch, Asshole, Motherfucker or similar to the end of a phrase does not necessarily turn it into a great one-liner.

Transcript

Probability of phrases becoming action movie one liners:
[Panels are arranged from More Likely on the left to Less likely on the right.]
[A woman points a gun down at a man who is on the floor, his gun just out of reach.]
Woman: You're going down the memory hole now, asshole.
[Man on ground points gun up at blade-armed man standing next to a board with science on it.]
Man with gun: Hey! You forgot to carry the two.
[Woman on desk points sword at man standing on floor.]
Woman: Looks like the Fed just lowered the interest rate.
[Man with gun looks down at woman slumped on floor.]
Man: Guess you should've scrolled all the way to the bottom before clicking "Agree."
[Woman holds pistol to the back of the head of another woman holding a rifle.]
Woman with pistol: Bangarang, motherfucker.


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Discussion

I dunno, "Bangarang, motherfucker!" seems a lot more quotable to me than most of the others. Actually, I think I'm going to try to use it in my daily life. 173.245.55.210 15:54, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

I guess that it is deemed least likely since it comes from a children's movie about children who do not wish to grow up (which back in Peter Pans day meant not to use swear words). But this is a very sketchy draft like explain - hope someone can do it better now that it has been marked incomplete. --Kynde (talk) 14:28, 8 January 2015 (UTC)

I think the last frame is the most quotable as well. It's very similar to John McClain's one-liner from the Die Hard movies: "Yippie Ki-Yay, Mother Fucker". 173.245.56.85 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Well, I'd gladly use the one in the title text daily; now that I've seen this comic, I probably will.--NSDCars5 (talk) 11:14, 10 March 2014 (UTC)NSDCars5.

I have been saying "Bangarang, motherfucker" for 4 years now because of this cartoon. OK, I am lying, I have never said in my life, but I will this week. Next week at the latest. --173.245.54.11 16:13, 12 May 2014 (UTC)

I can recall one or so squabbles in infant school and am sure the mentality carried to primary school where those that didn't take their shot when you called bang were decidedly unfair. I always died heroically when it was my turn. Why not them? Bastards!

Anyway I am over it now. I wouldn't approach a crashed car with an empty gun if I could see the bank robber was still alive in it. I would suspect that he wouldn't take his shot and die heroically. Or that his brother was tumbled over in the back seat waking up just in time to become a problem.

How come Dirty Harry never read "Shooting to Live with the One-Hand Gun"?

I used Google News BEFORE it was clickbait (talk) 00:11, 26 January 2015 (UTC)

Is the "forgot to carry the two" a reference to Laser Tag? The advertising for this many years back featured an action sequence followed by the question "did he fire six shots, or only five?" Miscounting the number of rounds available is a common action movie trope, though it would be a rather extreme form of calculation that would require carrying the two (the result of adding or subtracting a pair of larger numbers than the carrying capacities of most hand weapons). - Andrew, 7:15pm, Saturday 10th January 2015.

I hadn't thought of it that way. To me the chalkboard filled with maths/physics in the background and the fact the other character only has a knife suggests that it isn't relating to bullets. --Pudder (talk) 15:45, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

I removed the incomplete tag which called for an explanation of what "Carry the two" means. I could add a description of what is meant by 'carrying' in arithmetic, but it doesn't really matter. As I read it, the only thing that matters is that Cueball is pointing out a maths error, which is already in the explanation. It could be "You've divided by zero", "You've forgotten to add the 5", "You missed the exponent". --Pudder (talk) 15:45, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

Number four is pretty great ( :-) ). 108.162.221.150 06:42, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

I think "You forgot to carry the two" is about pointing a flaw in the other's plan, which led to him losing the fight. It's funny because it's a really stupid flaw. 141.101.70.22 11:00, 13 April 2016 (UTC)

A variation of number four appears in the Doctor Strange movie, about not reading all the warnings before casting spells. It is even used as a (sort-of) one-liner near the end! 108.162.216.94 08:53, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

I first read the line as; "Batarang, motherfucker!". I was so confused at what I thought was a Batman reference :P -- The Cat Lady (talk) 14:47, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

I've added another possible explanation for the "carry the two", which was my initial reading of it. Hope it doesn't seem too bizarre... 172.70.162.147 19:15, 16 March 2022 (UTC)

I'd have to agree that "Bangarang, motherfucker" is actually the most quotable... SilverTheTerribleMathematician (talk) 19:25, 9 February 2023 (UTC)