Hand Wave: Difference between revisions

** It's stated that you have to "cross dimensions in exactly the right way", and that the monster that brought the protagonist there is "a perfectionist". Presumably, if you cross ''precisely'', you can rearrange someone's brain in ''just the right way'' that they start speaking a different language. Telepathy, which appears into the series a lot, is probably also involved. It's still a major [[Hand Wave]], but at least you could say that it's the work of the one creating the dimensional bridge, rather than a natural effect.

* In one of Harlan Ellison's short stories, he has the protagonist trapped in a situation that, judging by the description, there is absolutely no way he could logically escape. The author then stops the story to tell us that the protagonist remembers a time he once bought a pulp novel that ended with a [[Cliff Hanger]] in which its hero was likewise trapped in a seemingly inescapable situation. When the next chapter finally arrived, he very eagerly snapped it up, only to discover that it tied up all the stuff left hanging in the last episode in ''the first sentence'' by turning the hero into an action figure and having him punch his way out of the trap. Getting back to the story, the author then tells us the protagonist was still thinking of how cheated he'd felt about that pulp novel's hand-wave--[[Hypocritical Humor|when he finally escaped]].

{{quote| "Miss Gerraghty," Johnny said sternly, "[[Dangerously Genre Savvy|if you had ever read science fiction]], you'd know that the dullest part is always the explanation. It bores the reader and clutters up the story. Especially when the author flunked high-school physics and simply doesn't know how it works."}}

 

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