The Laundry Series: Difference between revisions

* [[Animate Dead]]: The Laundry uses zombie security guards. {{spoiler|Of former employees.}}

* [[Artifact of Doom]]: Mo's violin is clearly an evil device that, in any other story, would be the subject of a quest to destroy it. In this universe, however, it's a useful tool for the good guys.

** They'd like to make more like it, but rules are rules, and "just owning the necessary supplies probably puts you in breach of the Human Tissues Act of 2004, not to mention a raft of other legislation." {{spoiler|In fact, Mo tries to go out of her way to prove to her superiors that CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN won't require the production of more violins.}}

* [[Apocalypse How]]:

* [[Betty and Veronica]]: Mo and Ramona in ''The Jennifer Morgue''.

* [[Big Damn Heroes]]: {{spoiler|Mo and Alan Barnes' team}} in ''The Jennifer Morgue''. Then in ''The Fuller Memorandum'', {{spoiler|they're set up for a repeat but [[Averted Trope|arrive too late]] to do more than clean up after Bob's giant summoning.}}

* [[Bond Villain Stupidity]]: Billington was already a Blofeldian figure ([[Corrupt Corporate Executive]], planning a scheme to [[Take Over the World]], using a yacht converted from a warship), so casting a "destiny trap" to ''create a James Bond-like figure'' is risky at the very least. It's [[Justified Trope|justified]], partly because Billington thought he could turn it off at any time and partly because {{spoiler|he was insane and possessed}}. It's later pointed out that if Billington had simply approached the Black Chamber with his salvage scheme he would have gotten away with it.

* [[Brick Joke]]: {{spoiler|Bob keeps making references to "paperclip audits" through the series. It seems like a [[Running Gag]], until we actually get to see the start of one. Shortly therafter, we learn that if you have a paperclip from the same batch as a classified document, you can use it to track said document.}}

* [[Geometric Magic]]: all magic in this series is based on "Dho-Nha" curves, easily derived by proving Turing's last theorem. These curves amplify through space-time, tearing through reality and causing magic to happen.

* [[Ghostapo]]: ''The Atrocity Archives'' deals with the consequences of Nazi attempts to harness an [[Eldritch Abomination]] ...[[Blood Magic|via the Holocaust]].

* [[Godzilla Threshold]]: "The Concrete Jungle" shows that SCORPION STARE is supposed to be {{spoiler|fed over every CCTV camera in Britain, regardless of the potential body count}} when CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN comes about.

** Angleton mentions in ''The Jennifer Morgue'' that one of the support vessels for the operation, open for a "direct line of credit", is ''[[Ultimate Defence of the Realm|HMS Vanguard.]]'' Considering that the Blofeldian supervillain {{spoiler|wants to resurrect an ancient Cthonian war god}}, having a sub full of ICBMs on standby suddenly looks like a reasonable precaution.

* [[I'm a Humanitarian]]: The cultists in ''The Fuller Memorandum''. Nom nom nom!

* [[Incompetence, Inc.]]: The Laundry finds it easiest to deal with people who can't be let go by simply giving them a pointless paper-pushing job until they can retire with a pension. It's cheaper in some ways, and it avoids a ''lot'' of nasty legal and PR issues.

* [[Invoked Trope]]: The destiny trap in ''The Jennifer Morgue''.

* [[It Came From the Fridge]]: [[Noodle Incident|the reason temporal multiplexers are no longer allowed in the Howard residence.]] Cricket bats are involved.

** They actually look passably human as long as they don't spend too much time in salt water. Otherwise they eventually change into Deep Ones, Innsmouth-style.

** {{spoiler|Ramona Random}} says that those like herself are intended to look good and associate with humans more, while the "bumpkin cousins" sporting the ugly half-transformed "Innsmouth look" are decidedly more common.

* [[Plot Tailored to The Party]]: ''The Jennifer Morgue'', in keeping with the James Bond theme, features the typical bunch of random gadgets. {{spoiler|[[Double Subversion|Doubly subverted]] - near the end of the story, Bob [[Inspiration Nod|muses]] that he ended up using all the gadgets except for an unmodified Zippo lighter that "he's going to keep". It then ends up playing an essential role in the epilogue.}}

** Ramona also [[Discussed Trope|mumbles about this in a conversation with Bob]], much to his confusion.

** Angleton. Not ''[[Good Is Not Nice|nice]]'', but reasonable.

** In ''The Fuller Memorandum'', Iris.

* [[Revealing Coverup]]: Averted. The Laundry only uses assassination as an absolute last resort for this very reason. They find it much more useful to recruit people who find out instead. This also doubles as punishment, since the job tends to force people to retire early.

* [[Role Playing Game Terms]]: in ''The Fuller Memorandum'', Bob has just gotten his PDA fried and needs to pick up a new one. He just happens to stumble upon the <s>Jesusphone</s> iPhone sitting pretty in a display case. [[Crowning Moment of Funny|In Mo's words:]]

* [[Self-Fulfilling Prophecy]]: Averted. When Dr. Kringle prophesies that there will be no Christmas party next year, everyone assumes that it's because the Laundry will be overrun by gibbering squamous horrors by then. When Bob asks if they couldn't avert that by just canceling the party themselves, Andy derides the idea as ridiculous.

* [[Senseless Violins]]: Mo's ''actual'' violin in ''The Jennifer Morgue'' is a [[Double Subversion]] into necromantic [[Musical Assassin]] territory.

** Bob Howard, named after [[Robert E Howard|Robert E. Howard]], collaborator and friend of [[HP Lovecraft|H.P. Lovecraft]] and [[Clark Ashton Smith]].

*** Bob also has a pair of middle names, Oliver & Francis, making his initials [[Bastard Operator From Hell|BOFH]].

* [[Theory of Narrative Causality]]: Powers Billington's Hero-trap geas. He casts himself as the villain in a James Bond plot, limiting his opposition to one hero archetype, and at the critical moment plans to destroy the geas, leaving himself ascendant and unopposed. {{spoiler|Of course, that would only work if he captured the true Bond figure, instead of the designated [[Bond Girl|love interest]] -- at which time, [[Wrong Genre Savvy|the plot becomes one of the variations.]]}}

** He also failed to consider {{spoiler|that [[Bond Villain Stupidity]] inflicted on him by the geas will also influence his attempts to shut down the geas.}}

* [[Those Wacky Nazis|Those Really Messed Up Nazis]]: Creators of the titular Atrocity Archives.

* [[Too Dumb to Live]]: Fred the Accountant.