the "wait - are you telling me..." thread

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

wherein we keep an inventory of those lines of dialogue where one character asks another for expository details, or to recap the story so far for audience members who weren't paying attention

― jones (actual), Wednesday, 7 May 2003 21:01 (twenty-two years ago)

catch me if you can:

"carl, for those of us who are unfamiliar with bank fraud: you mind telling us what the hell you're talkin about?"

― jones (actual), Wednesday, 7 May 2003 21:01 (twenty-two years ago)

All those scenes in Star Wars where Darth Vader marches through some corridor talking to one of his deputies. At least they're walking fast.

― amateurist (amateurist), Wednesday, 7 May 2003 21:09 (twenty-two years ago)

yes except to be clearer: i'm after the lines which elicit those long passages of exposition. i don't expect anybody to know any offhand; but this is where to make a note when you hear one.

― jones (actual), Wednesday, 7 May 2003 22:08 (twenty-two years ago)

this has been done about 365,000,002 times on every single television series ever: "so let me get this straight..." or "do you mean to tell me..."

― Justyn Dillingham (Justyn Dillingham), Thursday, 8 May 2003 02:51 (twenty-two years ago)

sorry, I just realized that's not what you're asking for. I'll try to keep an eye out for specific examples.

― Justyn Dillingham (Justyn Dillingham), Thursday, 8 May 2003 02:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Ricardo Montalban in ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES. Scene starts with -- "You're asking me to risk imprisonment for the sake of two fugitive apes"?

― PVC (peeveecee), Thursday, 8 May 2003 06:01 (twenty-two years ago)

we always call this "As you and I know..." dialogue. it's very popular with Dr Who writers. Although that's TV, and therefore beyond the scope of this forum.

― DV (dirtyvicar), Thursday, 8 May 2003 11:22 (twenty-two years ago)

Oh you mean scenes where the information related to the audience would be strictly redundant for the characters themselves? Yeah, that's a case where the scriptwriter obviously failed to master the Hollywood codes. There's always a way to get around this if you're clever enough. The information can be relayed visually, or parcelled out in small bits across several scenes and among different characters.

I mean I think of this less as a "haha Hollywood is stupid" thing as a "haha the screenwriter is stupid" thing.

― amateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 8 May 2003 13:27 (twenty-two years ago)

i guess the basic archetype of this is the character on the phone repeating everything the other person is saying to them for the benefit of the audience.....

― j fail (cenotaph), Thursday, 8 May 2003 14:18 (twenty-two years ago)

This makes me want to think of a good (ie neccessary) example of the phenomenon.

― slutsky (slutsky), Thursday, 8 May 2003 14:28 (twenty-two years ago)

it should have happened in the adventures of buckaroo banzai!

― lauren (laurenp), Thursday, 8 May 2003 14:56 (twenty-two years ago)

This makes me want to think of a good (ie neccessary) example of the phenomenon.

Hmm...maybe the end of Manhattan Murder Mystery (done in a slightly self-aware style)?

I love in Waiting for Guffman how at the beginning of the "Covered Wagons, Open-Toed Shoes" segment they parody the clumsiness of theatre story-exposition (calling people by their full names, talking about obvious stuff)...

"That'll be quite enough of that, Billy Whittaker. There'll be plenty of time for that in California...if we get to California..."

― Ernest P. (ernestp), Thursday, 8 May 2003 18:55 (twenty-two years ago)

With mysteries it's a bit of a different story, as the mystery genre usually has the explanation built-in to the structure of the narrative--look at the end of most of Raymond Chandler's stories for example.

― slutsky (slutsky), Thursday, 8 May 2003 20:06 (twenty-two years ago)

(jones: "I said SPECIFIC EXAMPLES!")

― slutsky (slutsky), Thursday, 8 May 2003 20:20 (twenty-two years ago)

It's not frased as a question but the very first scene of Another 48hrs has one. The evil biker "explains" to his evil biker buddies just why he wants to kill Eddie Murphy so bad even though they already know.

Spoken in breathy sub-Jack Palance style:
"He was in my brothers gang. First he dropped a dime on 'em. Then he ratted him to the cop who blew him away".

Thanks for telling us.

― PVC (peeveecee), Thursday, 8 May 2003 21:25 (twenty-two years ago)

terminator 2:
"I need a minute here - you're telling me that this thing can imitate anything it touches?"

― jones (actual), Sunday, 11 May 2003 17:20 (twenty-two years ago)

(i'm surprised there were none of these in Deep Impact, but it used just about every workaround in the book: news broadcasts, visuals on tv screens, breaking the info up among multiple characters/conversations in party & office scenes, speeches from the president etc.)

i like these lines cuz it's like the host of the party coming over to ask if your drink needs freshening

― jones (actual), Sunday, 11 May 2003 17:23 (twenty-two years ago)

I was so glad that there was precious little of this in X2. I kept waiting for awkward recaps of the mutants' powers or events of the last movie but they pretty much stuck to show-and-not-tell.

― Jordan (Jordan), Sunday, 11 May 2003 18:56 (twenty-two years ago)

That's one of the things that made x2 as good as it is.

― PVC (peeveecee), Sunday, 11 May 2003 19:40 (twenty-two years ago)

four months pass...

Slutsky, wnat happened to Jones???

― adaml (adaml), Monday, 22 September 2003 19:07 (twenty-two years ago)

the bitch is back! only seems to be on ILE these days though

― s1utsky (slutsky), Monday, 22 September 2003 20:19 (twenty-two years ago)

haha i was just wondering "what happened to nordicskillz??" then i noticed yr email address there - hi

i watched Mission Impossible 2 yesterday waiting for a line like this and it NEVER CAME bah - Reason To Hate MI:2 #5495032

― jones (actual), Tuesday, 23 September 2003 19:46 (twenty-two years ago)

I actually wish this gimmick would've been used at the end of Matrix 2. Or did anyone actually understand everything the old dude told to Keanu?

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Thursday, 25 September 2003 13:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Matrix 2 was just part of a string of recent movies that just made me think "whatthefuuuh?". Add Intacto to that list.

― adaml (adaml), Thursday, 25 September 2003 17:08 (twenty-two years ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.