Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Peace: Difference between revisions

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Line 1: {{trope}} [[File:SeedDestinyWedding 4196.jpg\|link=Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny\|frame\|Something tells me that he objects.]] {{quote\|'''Donkey''': Shrek! Hold up, Shrek! You got to wait for the line! '''Shrek''': [about to burst into the cathedral] What are you talking about? '''Donkey''': [[Lampshade Hanging\|The line, the line you gotta wait for:]] [[Genre Savvy\|the priest's gonna say "Speak now or forever hold your peace", and you rush in and say "I object!"]] '''Shrek''': I don't have time for all that!~~\|''[[Shrek]]''}}~~ \|''[[Shrek]]''}} [[Seen It a Million Times\|We've all heard this one before.]] Line 15: Sure enough, [[Just in Time]], [[The Hero]] bursts in with a flowery declaration of love (and/or a denouncement of the hypotenuse as the utter [[Jerkass]] he/she really is). Or if it's the hero and love interest at the altar, some other lover will object. Either way, once that line's uttered, someone's ''bound'' to not hold their peace. Or, [[The Rival\|groom-to-be]] harbors a sinister secret that is known to the audience but has managed to keep it well concealed from his bride-to-be, her family and guests. The hero – – not necessarily a romantic rival – – bursts in, exposes the villain, and [[Wedding Smashers\|all hell breaks loose]]. Or, one of the prospective spouses is [[Oops, I Forgot I Was Married\|already married]], but believes in legally good faith their first love to be deceased (ie: last seen just before a disastrous shipwreck several years ago, long missing and ultimately declared by a court of competent jurisdiction as presumed dead). Imagine the shock when the long-missing sailor walks into the chapel during the ceremony after seven years absence — trapped on a [[Deserted Island]], [[Gilligan's Island\|Gilligan-style]] — to make one frantic last attempt to reclaim a lost love. In the end, most of the time, [[The Rival]] is deposed, the hero and [[Love Interest]] kiss and make up (and might even get hitched on the spot, after all; [[Why Waste a Wedding?]]?), and they all live [[Happily Ever After]]. ~~Nevermind~~Never mind that the original point of asking was to check if an unknown legal reason would invalidate the wedding, such as [[Oops, I Forgot I Was Married\|an existing marriage]] or [[Incest Is Relative\|consanguinity]]; any reason will suffice when true love is at stake. On the other hand, it ''is'' before the [[Wedding Deadline]]. Usually subverted these days: either the officiant doesn't even have time to get to the line before the seething tensions break loose, or the one character who objects to the union is petty, superficial, and thankfully silent at the fatal moment. On the other hand, sometimes when the line is said, everyone turns to a person present who obviously seems to have a problem with the marriage, only to have that person in embarrassment tell the officiant to keep going. Line 25 ⟶ 27: Bleah! We really [[Dead Horse Trope\|don't need to see this one again]]. Little wonder it's hardly ever played straight anymore, [[Undead Horse Trope\|though if handled correctly]], may be the setup to a [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]] or [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming]]. It's not even played straight in [[Real Life]] these days; the officiant's words and the couple's vows are different for every wedding. Many weddings exclude this line altogether, but it's still legally significant in some jurisdictions—for example, in the Church of England. In the era before faceless government bureaucrats issued marriage licences, it was not uncommon for a minister of religion to read the "banns of marriage", asking if there was any reason why these two should not be married, on consecutive Sundays for several weeks before the ceremony – mostly as a safeguard against one of the spouses already being married to someone else. Legally, this tradition is largely still ~~perfectly~~a valid alternative – although its use may only make sense if both of the pair are known to the local community and neither have been through a prior marriage and divorce. ~~The only place most people will ever hear of it is through the media.~~ Interestingly, one of the reasons it was removed from many liturgies was the tendency of [[Jerkass\|certain self-important and arrogant jerks to disrupt strangers' wedding ceremonies]] by objecting, usually by accusing the bride of being [[My Girl Is Not a Slut\|a disease-ridden whore]]. [[Sarcasm Mode\|Ha. Ha.]] And why not throw in an [[Unsettling Gender Reveal]] against fiancé or fiancée for good measure? (Or better yet, the intruder is a [[Stalker with a Crush]] who somehow believes he/she and the target were [[If I Can't Have You\|somehow meant to be together]].) See also [[The Graduate Homage Shot]]. {{examples}} == Advertising == * The Volkswagen television commercial "Big Day" features this as the ''only'' line of dialogue. The rest of the commercial is a man [[Race For Your Love\|frantically driving cross-country]] in a race against his beloved's wedding to another, and throwing the church doors open right as the priest says, with dramatic reverberation, "speak now or forever hold your peace". The commercial ends with the caption "fasten your seatbelts". Line 51 ⟶ 52: * The manga ''[[Negima Neo]]'' has a moment for this which degenerate into ranged battle. Curiously, in this verse Fate was the perfect [[Prince Charming]] Asuna was marrying. Negi stopped the wedding just because he felt it was a waste — there is not the slightest reason to think Fate was secretly evil. * In ''[[Strawberry Panic!]]'', Nagisa and Tamao are possibly about to be announced Etoile. Most Etoile pairs end up becoming couples if they aren't already, and Shizuma bursts into the chapel at the last minute to prevent this. * In the ''[[Rental Magica]]'' episode with the wedding (episode 21 in broadcast order, the final episode in chronological order), the show's protagonist objects to the wedding – and {{spoiler\|[http://gallery.minitokyo.net/view/627674 runs off with ''both'' of the prospective spouses]}}. == [[Comic Books]] == Line 60 ⟶ 61: {{quote\|Anyone? This's your window. Right here. Take your time, I can wait. Junior. ''sigh'' Very well. }} * Lampshaded in ''[[The Batman Adventures]]'' at Joker and Harley's wedding. Joker keeps pressing the justice of the peace to speed up the ceremony—and when he gets to this part, Poison Ivy surfs through the window on a vine. {{quote\|'''Ivy''': I object! '''Joker''': [[Genre Savvy\|I knew it! I KNEW IT!]] }} * ''[[Titeuf]]'' ~~make~~makes it occur ''because of the trope's name''. You know, in French the sentence is "Speak now or keep quiet forever". Titeuf, who was instructed to keep quiet during the wedding, yelled that he agreed to keep quiet for a few hours, not forever! * ''[[Elfes (comics)\|Elfes]]'' parodied it with orcs (and one stray elf) being attacked by a whole pack of hungry sabertooths. {{quote\|'''Killrok''': If someone's got a plan to get us outta here, speak now, or forever hold your peace!}} == [[Fan Works]] == Line 137 ⟶ 139: {{quote\|'''Betty''': ''[Barging in]'' I object! '''Priest''': We haven't gotten to that part yet! }} * Subverted in ''[[~~MASH\|~~M* A* SH (television)\|MASH]]'' during Margaret's wedding. The priest gets to that line and everyone (including Margaret) turns to Frank, who was Margaret's lover for the past few seasons and eventually fell in love with her. Frank shifts awkwardly and replies, "Well, I'm not going to say anything!". * An episode of ''[[Monk]]'' involved Monk interrupting a woman's wedding to convince her to take back her ex-husband. Then, when Monk figured out that the ex-husband was a murderer, he interrupted their remarriage ceremony to convince the woman not to take him back after all. * In ''[[Waterloo Road]]'', Tom discovers that the 16 year-old girl he's looking after is going to marry her long-term boyfriend. He rushes to the Registry Office, enters at the correct point and states the marriage is unlawful. It isn't- she's got the required permission from her estranged father, her mother was killed at the end of the previous season and he has no legal authority over her. Turns into a fight afterwards, though. Line 200 ⟶ 202: == [[Professional Wrestling]] == * Subverted in the wedding of Edge and Lita on ''[[World Wrestling Entertainment\|WWE]] Monday Night Raw'', as the minister said the famed line, only for (the recently fired) Matt Hardy's entrance music to fill the arena. The whole proceedings stopped for several seconds... only for Edge to start laughing uproariously at the joke he had just played on the [[Smart Mark]]s in the audience. Line 230 ⟶ 232: ** Strangely enough, priest Gordon ''never'' says the line and you get to choose to steal the bridge ''after'' the vow. So, basically, you're destroying a freshly established marriage, rather than prevent one. * In ''[[Sakura Wars]]'', the cinematic that shows during a combo between [[The Ojou\|Sumire]] and [[Dogged Nice Guy\|Ookami]] is him crashing her wedding in a scooter and her riding away with him into the sunset. Every time. The current (unfinished) [[Let's Play]] by Spirit Armor posits that each time the cinematic plays represents [[Butt Monkey\|Ookami]] going back in time to crash ''his own wedding''. == [[Web Animation]] == Line 236 ⟶ 237: ** Phil was waiting for Rick to say "I do", specifically so he could punch him and say "Looks like you ''don't''." {{quote\|'''Phil:''' "If I had done it that way, I wouldn't've gotten to use the one-liner!"}} == [[Web Comics]] == Line 247: * Episode 17 of [[The Joker Blogs]], at Harleen's wedding: {{spoiler\|1=Joker shoots Father McHale before he can get to 'peace'.}} * ''[[Arby 'n' the Chief]]'' does this twice - first played for laughs ("Wedding"), then for drama ("Collapse"). == [[Western Animation]] == Line 258 ⟶ 257: * In ''[[Justice League]]'', Wonder Woman vehemently objects, ''with a tank'', to Princess Audrey of Kasnia's wedding to Vandal Savage. {{spoiler\|Vandal Savage, however, simply knocks Diana out and continues with the service}}. * Variant in an episode of ''[[The Proud Family]]'', where the objector is the groom's ''son''; the groom is apparently senile and unaware of what year it is, among other things. He had a tendency to get in relationships with (and even marry) other women, only to wander off and forget about them. * ''[[~~Re Boot~~ReBoot]]''. Dot is about to marry who she thinks is Bob and just as they get to the line, the real Bob comes in to interrupt. * When this question pops up in one episode of ''[[The Simpsons]]'', Homer knows that Troy McClure doesn't love Selma. So what does he do? He hums to himself, missing the opportunity all together. ** In another episode, Marge interrupts Patty's wedding to another woman. At first Patty thinks it's because Marge can't accept the fact that she's gay (which did happen earlier in the episode), but in reality it's because Marge learned that Patty's spouse-to-be was a man in drag who was deceiving her. Line 269 ⟶ 268: '''Peter:''' (looking around) Really? Nobody's going to speak up? I'm the one who's going to have to say it? ahhh. Alright. GENITAL WARTS. }} * ''[[The Princess and the Frog]]'': When the priest asks if "anyone objects to this union..." during Charlotte LaBouff's marriage to Naveen's impostor, the real Naveen, trapped in a box in frog form, tries screaming, "Me! Me! I object!" he and Ray are forced to become [[Wedding Smashers]]. * One of the many spots of ''All My Circuits'' on ''[[Futurama]]'' makes fun of this trope. But then, they cover all the soap opera cliches with that [[Show Within a Show]]. * Parodied in ''[[Pucca]]'', when Garu's enemy, Tobe, is about to get married. Since Garu [[The Voiceless\|never]] [[Heroic Mime\|talks]], he raises his hand and waves it around, unnoticed, while the presider looks around, saying, "What's that? Nobody? Oh well, moving on then." * While they don't wait for the line (they miss it), this happens in the second [[Season Finale]] of ''[[My Little Pony: ~~Friendship Is Magic\|My Little Pony~~ Friendship Is Magic]]'', with a twist. The one who does it is {{spoiler\|Princess Cadence and Twilight to stop Queen Chrysalis, Cadence's impostor and the shapeshifting [[Big Bad]] from marrying Cadence's husband-to-be, Shining Armor.}} == [[Real Life]] == Line 278 ⟶ 276: ** Speaking of [[World War I]], there was an isolationist political cartoon drawn near the end of the war that showed Uncle Sam getting married to a woman with the words "League of Nations" written on her dress. When the priest said the trope words, a man with the word "Congress" written on his clothes smashed through the window holding a piece of paper saying "will of the people." * The long-established common-law practice of reading official banns of marriage for three consecutive weeks in the prospective couple's home church, as an alternative to approaching a city clerk for a marriage licence, was successfully exploited by Rev. Brent Hawkes of the Metropolitan Community Church during the battle to legalise same-sex marriage in Toronto, Canada after the turn of the millennium. Presumably he'd ask "if anyone dost know a valid reason why these two shalt not be joined together in holy matrimony...", wait for someone to object that the pair were same-sex, then respond that his religious beliefs dictated that this was not a valid just cause or impediment to his performing the marriage ceremony. This bit of freedom of religion then became the "foot in the door" to take the battle to recognise these religious marriages through the courts. ** Conversely, the use of "banns of marriage" read on multiple consecutive Sundays, which was once required by English law, was an obstacle in cases where a [[Parental Marriage Veto]] necessitated marrying in secret, then presenting the union as a ''fait accompli''. [[Elopement]] to Gretna Green, the first town across the [[Scotland\|Scottish border]], was the traditional workaround as Scottish law was historically more permissive. It's still done sometimes for tradition's sake, although the legal basis for it being necessary is now gone. * Subverted by at least one pastor when he performed wedding ceremonies. He would replace the normal line with, "If anyone has reason why these two should not be wed, SHUT UP!" * When same-sex marriage was legalized in New Jersey in 2013, outgoing Newark mayor Cory Booker officiated the state's first same-sex marriages at Newark City Hall. When he got to the line, a heckler jumped up and shouted, "This is unlawful in the eyes of God!" The heckler was quickly thrown out by security, and Booker then said, [[Crowning Moment of Awesome\|"Not hearing any substantive, worthy objections, I will now proceed,"]] to [https://www.huffpost.com/entry/cory-booker-gay-marriage-heckler_n_4136594 a standing ovation.] ---- [[The Straight Man]]: [[The Stinger\|''Yes! Me!'']]