Good Omens: Difference between revisions

Co-written by [[Terry Pratchett]] and [[Neil Gaiman]], [[Dream Team|each at the top of their form]]. The pair considered working on a sequel, but aside from the potential title ''668: The Neighbour of the Beast'' nothing ever came of this.

 

 

Some useful annotations for the inquiring (or nonplussed) reader can be found [http://lspace-us.puntbow.net.au/books/apf/good-omens.html here].

* [[Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette]]: Anathema. She is a witch.

* [[Elvis Lives]]: A [[Running Gag]] (for the record, he unwittingly works for Famine at a burger joint).

* [[Embarrassing First Name]]/[[Embarrassing Middle Name]]: Pepper's real name is [[The Lord of the Rings|Pippin Galadriel]] [[The Neverending Story (novel)|Moonchild]]. It's also her [[Berserk Button]].

{{quote|"There are only two ways a child can go with a name like Pippin Galadriel Moonchild, and Pepper had chosen the other one."}}

** Newt's Wasabi has a recorded voice that plays to remind riders to fasten unfastened seat-belts (which never goes off, because [[The Alleged Car|hey, it's Newt's Wasabi]]). At one point, the voice is described as saying "Prease frasten your seat bert".

* [[Just Following Orders]]: Invoked and (duh) played with. A lot.

** Its personality changes when it gets Named and its role thus resolved. It is expecting a name like Terror or Stalks-By-Night, but {{spoiler|Adam}} decides to name it simply Dog, whereupon it discovers a tremendous love of its master and a desire to wag its tail.

* [[Knight in Sour Armor]]: Aziraphale and Crowley.

* [[Running Gag]]: Several, but the way every cassette left in a car for too long turns into ''The Best Of [[Queen]]'' is particularly prominent.

* [[Samaritan Syndrome]]: Aziraphale. "Lord, heal this bike."

* [[Science Is Wrong]]: Parodied.

* [[Screw Destiny]]: The entire book is about breaking away from destiny and people's expectations of you, and finding your own path. At the end, {{spoiler|Newton Pulsifer even convinces Anathema Device not to live her life trying to interpret prophecies left to her by a distant ancestor}}. Also, {{spoiler|the Anti-Christ averts Armageddon.}} However, {{spoiler|Agnes may have seen it all coming.}}

** Hilarious that the plot to [[Screw Destiny]] is actually orchestrated by God, and everything might just as His [[Magic Franchise Word|ineffable]] plan intended; even the angels and devils really have no idea.

{{quote|''God does not play dice with the universe. He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of the other players,<ref>i.e. everybody</ref> to be involved in an obscure and complex version of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you rules and '''smiles all the time'''.''}}

* [[Short Title: Long Elaborate Subtitle]]

* [[Shout-Out]]: Many, many of them, ranging from [[Edgar Allan Poe]] to [[Dirty Harry]].

** At the {{spoiler|last paragraph after Adam managed to avert the apocalypse [[Nineteen Eighty-Four|"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot]]... No, imagine a sneakerlace trailing, kicking a pebble; imagine a stick, to poke at interesting things, and throw for a dog that may or may not decide to retrieve it; imagine a tuneless whistle, pounding some luckless popular song into insensibility; imagine a figure, half angel, half devil, all human... [[The Second Coming|slouching hopefully towards Tadfield...]] [[Nineteen Eighty-Four|forever..."]]}}

** Adam's style of speaking is pretty much an homage to William Brown in the ''[[Just William]]'' stories.

** Pepper's real name, [[The Lord of the Rings|Pippin Galadriel]] [[The Neverending Story (novel)|Moonchild]] is twofer reference to ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]'' and ''[[The Neverending Story (novel)|The Neverending Story]]''.

* [[Sidetracked by the Analogy]]: Too many to list. It seems no one can make an analogy without being derailed by their listeners.

* [[Signs of the End Times]]: Naturally, given it's the Biblical Apocalypse.

* [[Steven Ulysses Perhero]]/[[Sue Donym]]: Mr. (Ezra?) Fell, Mr A. Ziraphale.

* [[Strongly Worded Letter]]: R.P. Tyler is the king of these.

* [[Super Senses]]: Crowley can see in the dark, but turns on the headlights anyway so as not to upset the other drivers.

* [[Sweet Tooth]]: Aziraphale.

* [[Take That]]: Aziraphale's dismissiveness of televangelism and the Rapture while possessing a televangelist who's on the air. [[Is This Thing Still On?|"Gosh, am I on television?"]]

** It's made clear that this televangelist believes what he says and really does funnel most of his enormous income back into the ministry, doing "what he really thought was the Lord's work". One can only speculate whose cause ''that'' helps.

** [[Random Teleportation]]: "Don't worry about it. Just send 'em."

* [[Tempting Fate]]: "It's over, don't you think?"

* [[Thanatos Gambit]]: Agnes Nutter.

* [[That Poor Plant]]: Plants, plural, and all of them are Crowley's.

* [[True Name]]: Crowley is made to sign his true name, in receipt of one Antichrist.

** The Horsemen are also made to sign their true names in receipt of their weapons.

** Possibly also God.

* [[Trust-Building Blunder]]

* [[Unlucky Everydude]]: Newt. Literally. He has terrible luck at everything he does, minus finding a job. {{spoiler|Gets out of it at the end}}.

* [[Unstoppable Mailman]]: The same mailman is able to deliver packages to all four horsemen of the apocalypse including killing himself to meet Death and deliver a package.

* [[Unusual Euphemism]] / [[Gosh Dang It to Heck]]: "Oh Go--, Sa--, [[Acceptable Targets|Manchester]]!", also "making an effort".

* [[Urban Fantasy]]

* [[Voluntary Shapeshifting]]

* [[Walking Techbane]]: Newton Pulsifer, to an extraordinary extent.

{{quote|Red unconcernedly withdrew the maraschino cherry from her drink, put it to her scarlet lips, and sucked it slowly off its stick in a way that made several men in the room break into a cold sweat.}}

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:World Fantasy Award]]

[[Category:Comic Literature]]

[[Category:Fantasy Literature]]

[[Category:Literature]]