Professor Layton/WMG

Refusing the fortune was pointless.

Either way you end up with an Inferred Holocaust on your hands. St. Mystere is, as of Flora leaving, populated by Bruno, possibly with Matthew and one or two others, and a bunch of robots which are known to wear out and need repair. Layton, Luke, and Flora rejected the fortune because it might cause the village to shut down, and they want it to keep going as it was. Then Bruno is bound to keep working on robots in a self-sustaining, more-or-less visitorless, and ultimately pointless ersatz town with no or few real humans to keep him company, with nobody to care for him when he becomes ill, toiling for nothing until he dies; or he considers his obligation to the Baron fulfilled and leaves St. Mystere to its own devices. Either way, once he's gone, the robots will wear out and fall apart and the town will slowly come to a halt, everything that Layton & co. wanted to save still dying, delaying the inevitable for but a few years at most. And for this they sacrificed the fortune?

- Not necessarily. With the objective complete, there's no reason the town needs to remain ignorant of its nature. At the very least, a few could be told, and thus take up the responsibility of repairing the others and the like.

The recording stating that the town will shut down completely, if the fortune is touched, was a Secret Test of Character.

It was fairly clear that the Baron didn't know very much about robotics. But having lived there so long, he had to see they were at least somewhat sentient, and raising his daughter at that. Considering that the whole goal was to find a kind guardian, it seems strange that the baron would encourage them to effectively wipe out the entire town. What would have actually happened I can't say, but it seems far more likely to me that it was a "fail safe" should an uncaring individual manage to get that far.

- What. How would deactivating the robots if the inheritance was disturbed discourage a Jerkass from taking it and leaving Flora~~'s corpse~~ in a ditch somewhere? There's no way that it would...
  - A Jerkass wouldn't care if the robots deactivated... I understand the idea of the WMG, yet it seems like it should be the other way around. If it is a Secret Test of Character, then it shouldn't be set up to where a Jerkass that shuts down the robots gets Flora her money, but a nice guy that lets what's essentially her family live gets her none of her money.

The Professor takes care of Luke because he himself was abandoned or ignored by his parents.

Judging by the recent trailers, Luke's father doesn't seem to be around for his child, although his presence in the fourth game is confirmed. Maybe Layton went through the same thing as a child (this series loves the Parental Abandonment trope, after all) and took Luke in as a surrogate son because he didn't want others to go down the same route. However, officially and legally they have no relationship -- that's also why the Un Reveal mentioned in the article happens. Layton enjoys things being perfectly right, and when he tried to speak up, he was actually going to correct the Inspector on the nature of their relationship. Luke was simply stopping him from revealing the illegal nature of their relationship.

Additionally, this theory would result in Luke being the actual brains of the outfit, at least in real-life situations... which fits in with a later event in the second game where Layton (deliberately or not) takes the request for 'that hat' in its most liberal sense and gives an NPC the nearest matching hat to his own that he can find. Layton seems genuinely mistaken, but oblivious to this fact at the same time.
- Layton acknowledges that he took it in a sense more liberal than possible, and then states that, quite simply, he will not remove his hat.
Luke lives with his parents and has a good relationship with them, so Luke's half of the WMG is jossed.
- However, this theory could just as easily be applied to Layton's relationship with Flora.

Layton is Luke's Uncle.

Bear with me, (I've only played the first game,) but this was inspired by what Luke says if you give him the violin. "Perfect! I'm learning the violin at home!" This implies that he does in fact have a home separate from Professor Layton. Luke's parents wouldn't like him running around with a someone completely unrelated, so he must be related in some way.

Layton and Luke's father are best friends, so it's not completely farfetched. I wouldn't be surprised if he was Luke's godfather, though.

Professor Layton actually knows every puzzle on earth.

This is why he's called the puzzle master. He only teaches classes when he's bored.

Actually, he's an archeology professor. Now if you'll excuse him, he has to go find the Lost Ark.

Luke is Flapjack's brother.

From The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack. Think about it. Similar hairstyles, both wear hats, similar personalities, hang out with older men, the list goes on and on.

Professor Layton takes place in an alternate Europe where the dominant religion is centered around puzzles.

It would explain everyone's fascination with them.

The 'alternate Europe' part is pretty nearly canon, considering the Anachronism Stew and everything, so this is extremely plausible.

Folsense isn't a complete sham.

The city is definitely dilapidated, but it and its residents exist and are real. And many of them are much older than they appear. A few of the little kids will mention that they get tired faster than they used to, and wonder if they're getting old. The fact is, they are getting older. But because of the hallucinogens around Folsense, they fool everyone around them and themselves into seeing them as children by insisting that they are children.

This troper has always assumed this to be true, mainly because it rather neatly ties up a lot of the things people get confused over.

How the NPCs get to the floors of the tower before our heroes...

Okay, we know that the residents of St. Mystere are actually robots, and part of a test to see who was worthy to take care of the Baron's daughter. This opens up a few possibilities: 1. As their creator is still alive, it would perhaps not be too much trouble to make multiples of some of them and place them on certain floors. 2. The robots are built for puzzles. It may be that when they want to go up or down, they solve the puzzle on the gate, go through, and reset the puzzle. If this is the case, then it's likely that Flora and Bruno know the solutions by heart, or Bruno may have them written down somewhere. 3. NPC service entrance. This would, of course, only be accessible to those involved in the administration of the test: NPCs, Bruno of course, and Flora.

I think #3 is the most probable. The service entrance probably leads to an elevator, so Bruno can do things like check on Flora and bring her meals and stuff without putting too much strain on his aging knees. They didn't use the elevator to escape because it would have been too easy to become trapped, much like how you're never supposed to use an elevator during a fire.
- Or Flora isn't actually involved in the administration at all (why go about town in disguise if you're the only real person walking the streets?), and therefore doesn't know about the service entrance at all. It's entirely possible that she worked out all the puzzles beforehand though.

Professor Layton never takes off his hat because...

...he actually has a huge brain that occupies all the space inside his hat and doesn't want anyone to find out. This the the reason for his high intelligence and ability to remember an almost infinite amount of puzzles.

- Spoiler for Unwound Future: he does take off his hat at the end and he has a perfectly normal head.

Clive's name will be changed back to Klaus when the 3rd game comes to Europe

Please, Level 5, please!

- No such luck.

Beasly (the puzzle bee) was Subject 2.

He says it himself during the cutscene, his story is "a gripping tale of a lonely drone's triumph over adversity... To become a puzzle bee!" We know that the parrot is Subject 1, the rabbit thing was Subject 3. Things they all had in common? They all talked, and according to Subject 3, had pretty horrible lives as research subjects.

- Considering the fact that his backstory was otherwise unexplained, he shared traits with the other Subjects, and it is otherwise unexplained as to how he can talk, I'd say this one was as good as confirmed.

Granny Riddleton is an incarnation of Ravel Puzzlewell.

Because it is just too obvious.

Pavel is The Man Behind the Man.

There is no legitimate reason for this goofball to wander into every game and claim that he got lost on his way to somewhere else. He speaks multiple languages -- sometimes at the same time -- and is very good at putting on an innocent act. I submit that when the series comes to its eventual conclusion, we will discover that Pavel was the Big Bad pulling everyone's strings all along.

Rando Ascad and Jean Descole are one and the same.

Layton's close friend from school, Rando was obsessed with archaeology — a trait shared with Descole. It would explain how Descole seems to know Layton so intimately, and why Layton gets the feeling he's met Descole somewhere before.

In the Ace Attorney crossover, Maya will, at some point, be Don Paulo in disguise.

Because Don Paulo only disguises himself as major characters, has been known to imitate girls Maya's age (Flora), and Wright is a playable character. Otherwise, Don will probably impersonate another AA character; probably Gumshoe, Edgeworth, or The Judge, in order of likelihood of being impersonated/present. Also depends on what characters show up from each series.

Dr. Schrader was saved by his analyical mind.

We know that the Elysian Box killed people because it was infused with the Folsense gas, which caused people to believe their expectations to be true. Dr. Schrader undoubtedly believed that the box was genuinely deadly, but also believed that there must have been a rational medical explanation for those deaths. Thus, instead of dying outright as if from a curse, he went into a deep but potentially survivable coma as if from a strange biologically dangerous substance.

This is quite close to the canon explanation.

Puzzlette is closely related to Professor Layton.

Well, think about it for a second. If you've seen the latest Mask of Miracle trailer, you've seen how crazy the Professor's jewfro was, and Puzzlette's beehive is about as outlandish; her hair is about the same color, as well. They're exceedingly similar, right down to the dot eyes, button noses, and their fixation with puzzles. So then, that begs the question: is she Layton and Claire's daughter from a skewed timeline (assuming Riddleton is one of Bruno's robots)? Are they related through Granny Riddleton (assuming she's NOT one of Bruno's robots)? Or is it something else entirely?

The third game was all a hallucination caused by the leftover gas from the Elysian Box

How else do you explain plot twists as frigging insane as "the future is actually underground"?

It's explained by it being from the Professor Layton series, where everything is awesome and logic-defying.

When Layton opened the Elysian Box, Luke subconsciously expected not death, but a twist.

Layton believed that it would be empty, but Luke hadn't come to that conclusion. Subconsciously, he'd simply assumed that it would contain a dramatic and plot-deepening twist. He may have seen the precise twist of an empty box because it matched not only his expectations, but also reality.

Only Luke saw the Elysian Box glow when Layton first opened it.

He's a kid. That's exactly the kind of dramatic effect he'd expect.

Professor Layton is the same type demon as Neuro in Majin Tantei Nougami Neuro.

Professor Layton is not solving puzzles out of curiosity but to feed himself and keep himself alive. Layton hired Luke because he has trouble understanding human emotions.

Luke is developing a serious illness as of Unwound Future.

When you tap around at different locations to examine things and find hint coins, he mentions being dizzy. If it only happened when he looked at the gears just over the bus stop, that would be one thing -- but he says he's dizzy practically a dozen times throughout the game. Maybe he just assumes it's because of the scenery, but no one else seems affected.

He also seems to feel very sick after time travelling even though they're really just in a shaky elevator. No one else appears to be seriously affected by this except for Flora, but she's probably just a lightweight.
Maybe part of it comes from anxiety over moving away from the Professor at the end of the game.
And that would also go with the comparison to the statue of the old man, and the boy who died of an illness.

Professor Layton is a Time Lord.

Seriously, he's not even trying to hide it. His study of "archaeology" consists of going back in time and taking notes.

The Laytonmobile is his TARDIS, and we've already seen that his trunk can hold a suspiciously large amount of objects...
This is now my own personal canon.

Mr Beluga is a human Goomba.

He has the small fangs, the black angry eyebrows.. His head is even almost the exact shape of a Goomba's! Also, I'm pretty sure that there's at least one Goomba somewhat like him in the Paper Mario series.

Professor Layton is transgendered.

It's why he's so obsessed with being a gentleman -- it was drilled into him by his father after he discovered his son was behaving like a girl -- growing out his hair, wearing dresses, etc.. It's also why he constantly berates Luke for not being a proper gentleman. Don't blame me, blame the Layton Meme.

I understand the nature of this WMG, but it was actually Claire who made him 'realise the importance of being a true gentleman'. ~~Also, the prompt was 'being a woman on the inside', not transgendered.~~

Descole is doomed to die, or is trying to save someone who is dying.

Apparently, in the Specter's Flute, Descole was trying to draw out the guardian of Mist Haley, who was the only thing that could lead him to a rumored kingdom under the town called Paradise. Also, the legends said that anyone guided to Paradise by the guardian would be completely healed of all illnesses. Then, in The Eternal Diva, he's trying to find Ambrosia, a kingdom that invented a miracle medicine that could cure everything and grant eternal life. Is anyone else noticing a trend here...?

Maybe he's Dimitri.
This would totally explain why he keeps getting angry and throwing tantrums if he doesn't find what he's looking for right this minute. He's frightened and desperate and taking out his frustrations on what he perceives to be the barrier in his way, not realising that he should really listen to all those useless hint coins and look at the puzzle from a different perspective. He can't look at it differently because he's in a panic and believes himself to be running out of time. And this is now my new canon.

Luke has bulimia.

They DO say that he has a legendary appetite in the second game and this is further shown in the third game. However, he's too thin despite being such a big eater. He was somewhat plump in the fourth game and movie, so it might no be that he has a fast metabolism and he doesn't seem to have grown taller in the three years of difference between the fourth game and Curious Village (using the professor's height as a reference here), so it couldn't have been a growth spurt.

Layton has a mullet.

Come on, you can totally see in the flashbacks XD

Don Paolo is Flora in disguise.

Consider the following:

Flora grew up surrounded by mechanical contraptions. Don Paolo builds mechanical contraptions.
They never, ever, EVER appear together. (With the exception of that one cutscene at the end of Curious Village... I mean, it's not as if someone could build a robotic doppelganger or something crazy like that.)
She always wants to be around the Professor. Don Paolo can't leave the Professor alone, to the point of pretty well constantly seeking him out.
Flora has difficulty talking to strangers. Don Paolo has the air of a man who shuns all company but his own (and the Professor's).
Flora gets left behind all the time while Luke goes on adventures with the Professor. Don Paolo can't stand Luke.
Flora is a girl. Don Paolo's manliness is arguable.
And most importantly, they are both masters of disguise.
- In Unwound Future, they spend loads of time on-screen together. He treats her very nicely.
  - See caveat to the second dot point above.

In Folsense, Layton and Luke subconsciously knew its secret all along.

Although the strange gas of Folsense caused then to see the town as a lively place, they subconsciously knew it to be a tragically abandoned place, likely inhabited by people unknowingly living a lie (see the 'Folsense isn't a complete sham' WMG above). This is why they find the place unsettling, and why subdued music plays throughout.

Hershel's middle name is Edwin.

It's gotta be something nerdy like that.

Inspector Gilbert was killed by Bill Hawks.

After completing the core 155 puzzles in Last Specter, the player unlocks an 'episode' which shows Chelmey's past and his old mentor/boss/friend, Inspector Gilbert. Gilbert sacrificed his life to save Chelmey's, promoting him to Inspector with his last words. However, the episode just finishes mentioning an experiment catching fire with two scientists trapped and a woman killed, which is obviously the time machine accident. It's unlikely that the accident would have been mentioned if the two things weren't linked, subtly implying the criminal was the instigator of the original fire... ergo, Bill Hawks! Considering how hostile Chelmey was toward Hawks at the end of Unwound Future...

Melina never really left Janice

She just didn't want her father obsessing over her. Though she is allowing her personality to take a back seat to Janice, and she's just enjoying the ride.

Luke is actually related to Clive

I mean, come on. Clive's disguise consists entirely of dressing in a similar style to Luke, and when he reveals himself, all he does is take off his hat, instead of, say, a wig, and he still looks quite a bit like an older Luke. To say nothing of the fact that, in that flashback picture, young Clive looks almost identical to Luke!

Two people who look that much alike is way too convenient, even for the Layton series. My guess is that Clive and Luke are perhaps cousins (or even second cousins, as Luke doesn't seem to be familiar with him) who have a very Uncanny Family Resemblance. Hey, it makes much more sense than what we're given.

St. Mystere wasn't set up to find Flora a new guardian

For solving the mystery, Layton was supposed to become her spouse. If you're trying to find someone to raise your child once you're gone, you don't give specific instructions to hold off the search until she's out of childhood.

Dear God. If this is true, I really hope the search happening as soon as it did was simply because Bruno got impatient. Otherwise, Flora's damn lucky that Layton misinterpreted Baron Reinhold's final wishes.
- Not to mention she'd be incredibly lucky that the Professor is such a gentleman. If this WMG is true, it's a good thing the village is set up like a Secret Test of Character...
- Bruno is an old man. It might be less that he got impatient and more that he worried he was running out of time, especially since they couldn't possibly have guessed that someone smart enough to solve all the riddles would show up that quickly and might have expected it to take years more (then once it didn't he just went along with the 'adoption' idea, yes, that's totally what the plan was for, nothing else, really).

The whereabouts of Emmy in the first trilogy

The Last Specter introduces us to Emmy, and she's a prominent character in the prequel trilogy and the Eternal Diva. Where then, is she in the original trilogy? This troper's theories are:

Layton assigns her to other assignments
Emmy leaves Layton in between the two trilogies.
To give the final game a huge bang in vein to the Unwound Future, Emmy will die.
- This seems Laytonesque, but to do that, Emmy's character will have to developed more and more emotional attachment will have to be placed on her for her death to be dramatically successful.

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