Techno Babble/Quotes

"Activate the supersonic decelerating contrarotating turbines vertically, we're getting a little too close to the Sun. Depress the aerothermic thermoreceptors! Accelerate the isothermal axio tractor beam value of parameters! Invert the compressor radio ratio. Energize the tandem of elerons vertically while I turn up this interplanetary microphone."

—Joker, Batman, though probably a Mondegreen

"The early attempts to construct a sufficiently robust spiral decommutator failed largely because of lack of appreciation of the large quasi-pietic stresses in the gremlin studs; the latter were specially designed to hold the roffit bars to the spamshaft. When, however, it was discovered that wending could be prevented by the simple addition of teeth to socket, almost perfect running was secured.
The operating point is maintained as near as possible to the HF rem peak by constantly fromaging the bituminous spandrels. This is a distinct advance on the standard nivelsheave in that no drammock oil is required after the phase detractors have remissed."

—Description of the fictional Turboencabulator

Fry: Usually on the show, they came up with a complicated plan, then explained it with a simple analogy.
Leela: Hmmm... If we can re-route engine power through the primary weapons and configure them to Melllvar's frequency, that should overload his electro-quantum structure.
Bender: Like putting too much air in a balloon!
Fry: Of course! It's all so simple!
(Later)
Leela: It's not working! He's gaining strength from our weapons!
Fry: Like a balloon, and... something bad happens!

—Futurama, "Where No Fan Has Gone Before"

Fighter: What you've got here is your basic system total failure. The upper support rig is three degrees out of nominal operation range. Just right out of it. Your L Beam is cracked in at least three places. I wouldn't attempt impulse speeds with that kind of damage. On the subject of propulsion, the anti matter regulator is coughing up a lung. If you have any interest in not being vaporized, don't switch it on till we can replace the unit. The entire GN/DN tube network is shot.
Thief: Not the tubes!
Fighter: They may as well be for decoration at this point.
Thief: Damn it all. Is that all?
Fighter: It's the best list I can work without running a level 3 diagnostic.
Thief: Where do you suggest we start?
(Beat Panel)
Fighter: First, it'd be nice if we knew what any of this stuff meant or did.

—8-Bit Theater

Doctor: Looks like a spatio-temporal hyperlink.
Mickey: What's that?
Doctor: No idea, just made it up. Didn't want to say "Magic Door
Doctor Who]], "The Girl in the Fireplace"

(Avoiding technobable) "It is my timey-wimey detector. It goes "ding" when there's stuff."

—The Doctor, Doctor Who, "Blink"

"No 'if'! I want a definitive answer, no more of your weaselly technobabble!"

—Colonel Tigh, Battlestar Galactica

^[context?]

Rayyan: Looks like a nasty sprain.
Fatima: You don't have to dumb it down for me. I came for your medical opinion.
Rayyan: You vitiated your anterior cruciate ligament.
Fatima: Oh no... What does that mean?
Rayyan: Looks like a nasty sprain.

—Little Mosque on the Prairie, "Swimming Upstream"

Technician 1: Ready to begin speaking in technobabble, sir.
Technician 2: Oh, Shut up, it's just us. Turn it on!

—Buck Godot: Zap Gun for Hire

Character: Switch the system over to analog!
Mike: It has a warmer sound!

—Mystery Science Theater 3000, Repeatedly

And I say
Bounce the graviton particle beam off the main deflector dish
That's the way we do things lad, we're making shit up as we wish
The Klingons and the Romulans pose no threat to us
Because if we find we're in a bind, we'll just make some shit up.

—Voltaire, "The USS Make Shit Up"

Yuki Nagato: A localized, non-corrosive amalgamation of asynchronous space is independently occurring in restricted condition mode.
Kyon: It almost sounds like you're flipping through a dictionary, pulling out words at random.

—The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya

"Explain all that," said the Mock Turtle.
"No, no! the adventures first," said the Gryphon in an impatient tone; "explanations take such a dreadful time."

—Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Gwen: So what's that supposed to do?
Jack: I'm using satellite tracking data to determine the intra-trajectory of the meteorite.
Toshiko: He means he's trying to find out where it's come from.
Jack: Hey! Sometimes a little technobabble is good for the soul.

—Torchwood, "Day One"

"Some of us don't speak Star Trek."

—The Flash, Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths

Lucius Fox: I analysed your blood. Isolated the receptor compounds and the protein-based catalyst.
Bruce Wayne: Was I supposed to understand any of that?
Fox: Not at all. I just wanted you to understand how hard it was.

—Batman Begins

Bob: You really can't fix it?
Galatea: Impossible! I've quantum destabilized the blah blah blah yakkedy shmackedy blah blah polarity of the neutron flow!

—The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob

"Okay, I didn't understand a word of it... so it must be scientifically accurate!"

—Shinji Ikari, Evangelion 01 Neon New Menace

Fry: Bender?! What happened to you?
Bender: I'll try to put it in terms you can comprehend. I passed the existential singularity.
Fry: Try harder!

—Futurama, "Overclockwise"

Nova: You're a worthy adversary, Misho. But even you could not anticipate that I would invert the photon charge of the deflector array... ... AGAIN.
Misho: SOL DAMNIT THAT SHOULDN'T DO ANYTHING EVEN IF IT IS POSSIBLE!!

—Keychain of Creation #148

Attila the Hun: Stop! Don't shoot fire stick in space canoe! Cause explosive decompression!
Zapp Brannigan: Spare me your space age technobabble, Attila the Hun!

—Futurama, "Kif Gets Knocked Up a Notch"

Back to Techno Babble