Although you wouldn’t believe it from Your Highness, creative sci-fi and fantasy swearing can be fun, reckons SFX Blogger Matt Risley
On the plus side, if you’re 11 (or have the mental age thereof) there are more than enough fart, willy and booby jokes to keep you entertained.
It’s just frustrating that with excellent production values, action scenes and a dead-on fantasy adventure tone, the comedy is the one part that lets everything down (what’s tittersome at first is plain boring by the 70th time its recycled).
If only it had taken a couple of hints from these classic, cutting and often completely silly putdowns from these sci-fi and fantasy TV and movies.
Pajiba long ago cut together a frankly astonishing and superlative mini-movie of the Top 100 Movie Insults. Admittedly, that seems to cover most of the bases on the movie side, but when they’re this classic, who’s arguing?
MONTY PYTHON & THE HOLY GRAIL
Python fans can all but recall the movie verbatim, but even the uninitiated can’t deny the troupe’s timeless, genius lunacy when it comes to lines like, “I fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.”
Case in point, this inspired insult (at 1:45). If you didn’t think the French were funny before.....
STAR WARS
George Lucas comes in for a fair amount of stick due to his ear for woeful dialogue (before you start ranting, I defy anyone to defend Anakin’s legendary chat-up line from Attack Of The Clones : “I don’t like sand. It’s coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere. Not like here. Here everything is soft and smooth.”), but everything’s forgiven for his magic-ing up of this instant sci-fi nonsensical classic (at 0:35): “You stuck up half-witted, scruffy looking nerfherder.”
THE PRINCESS BRIDE
For a second, I was tempted to use small words so you’d understand the complexity of this insult (at 0:18): “I’ll use small words so that you’ll be sure to understand you warthogged face buffoon.”
BLADE TRINITY
Children, pregnant women and the elderly should probably avert their ears. Despite Jessica Biel’s hip-wiggling best, Ryan Reynolds stole the show in Blade Trinity as smart-ass Hannibal King. And there’s one particular putdown that lingered long after the movie ended. Welcome to what’s probably the lewdest and funniest playground insult around (at 8:34): “You *&£$ juggling thunder@ *&!”
SHORT CIRCUIT
Ah, Johnny 5. Technologically ground-breaking, the best friend a girl could have, and the genius behind the geekiest “Yo Momma” you'll ever hear (at 4:55): “Hey laser lips – your momma was a snowblower.”
But I’m not one to let movies have all the fun – let's not forget these classic TV one-liners.
RED DWARF
Leave it to Rimmer to say something ridiculously inappropriate and brilliantly dismissive (at 4:35) from series two’s “Queeg”: “You’re about as much use as a condom machine in the Vatican.”
BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER
There are almost too many putdowns to mention (darn you and your infernal witticisms, Joss!), but you could always rely on perennial bad boy Spike to lower the tone and raise some laughs. A favourite is probably this exchange from “The Harsh Light of Day”, when Harmony throws a tantrum at Spike’s mission to find the Gem of Amarra:
“You love that tunnel more than me.” – Harmony
“I love syphilis more than you.” – Spike
But seeing as that video’s nigh-on impossible to find online, I'll have to settle for the classically immature riposte (at 1:00):
“What are you doing here... in 5 words or less?” – Buffy
“Out for a walk.... bitch.” – Spike
DOCTOR WHO
I don't understand it, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love it: “You ham-fisted bun vendor.” (From the Jon Pertwee-era Doctor, “Terror Of The Autons”.)
What have I missed out? Surely there are oodles of foul-mouthed or ridiculous putdowns I've left off the list? Let the ridiculous punnery-fuelled debate begin below!
