Jokes I didn't get (SoD spoiler)

[Moonself]

Hi,
first of all, I remember there was a previous thread with "un-gotten" jokes but I wasn't able to locate it, so sorry about this one.
I recently got my copies of OotPC and SoD (Yay! Good for me!) and read them all (and really enjoyed them, if you are interested).
However, I fail to get to references in SoD:


- pag. 16: Keith Baker. I know he is a game designer, and that Gloom is a game. I quite don't get why he is there.
- pag. 23: Mr. Belvedere. Here I'm totally lost. Who is he? Why is he following Orace and singing?


Thanks in advance for any explanation.

[derfenrirwolv]

- pag. 16: Keith Baker. I know he is a game designer, and that Gloom is a game. I quite don't get why he is there.

To add insult to injury for Xykons not getting picked to be the evil dude's right hand man. Probably also a shout out to his friend


- pag. 23: Mr. Belvedere. Here I'm totally lost. Who is he? Why is he following Orace and singing?

Because its completely random. It forces the reader to try to imagine circumstances under which Mr. Belvadere would follow eugene out of the oracles tower and start following Eugene.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NoodleImplements


Its also a setup for the next page where it says "Mr Belvedere had a lot more hit points than I'd expected" indicating that Eugene had killed him.

[Kish]

Hi,
first of all, I remember there was a previous thread with "un-gotten" jokes but I wasn't able to locate it, so sorry about this one.
I recently got my copies of OotPC and SoD (Yay! Good for me!) and read them all (and really enjoyed them, if you are interested).
However, I fail to get to references in SoD:


- pag. 16: Keith Baker. I know he is a game designer, and that Gloom is a game. I quite don't get why he is there.


Because he and Rich have a humorous "feud." See the line about Rich Burlew near the bottom of this (http://www.giantitp.com/articles/gk7uKJeF296jRcx1NJw.html).



- pag. 23: Mr. Belvedere. Here I'm totally lost. Who is he? Why is he following Orace and singing?


This (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._Belvedere) is the limit of my knowledge on the subject, I'm afraid.

[The Blackbird]

Probably also a shout out to his friend


Or foe (http://www.giantitp.com/articles/gk7uKJeF296jRcx1NJw.html) read the bottom of this.

EDIT: Ninja'd

[Logalmier]

Or foe (http://www.giantitp.com/articles/gk7uKJeF296jRcx1NJw.html) read the bottom of this.

EDIT: Ninja'd

I found it amusing that he would describe his arch enemy as someone who tried to become head lackey of the Helldeathdoomfire Volcano.:smallamused:

[FoE]

On the subject of Keith Baker ...

KB beat out Rich in the 2002 Wizards of the Coast Fantasy Setting Search. Since then, they've had a friendly rivalry.

I think Baker beating out Xykon (Rich's creation) in the competition to select a new head henchman is a reference to Baker beating out Rich in the Fantasy Setting contest.

Also, it allows Rich to poke fun at Baker's weird fascination with hellcows. :smalltongue:

As for the appearance of Mr. Belvedere, I haven't a clue. Random weirdness, I guess.

[Jimorian]

Don't have the book, but there was a Mr. Belvedere TV show in the 80s about an English butler serving an American family. Don't recall anything beyond that.

[Moonself]

:smallsmile:
Thanks for the replies.
Now the Baker reference is much clearer (I had completely missed the footnotes in the Gleaner page).

About Mr. Belvedere, I though there was something more "US culture" related while, apparently, his only purpose was weird fun (and yes, the "had more hitpoints than expected" was surely funny).

Thanks again. Now I'll go back to patiently wait for strip #664.

[Totally Guy]

Keith Baker is a good guy. When I ran one of the "UK in the Playground" meetups I wrote to the giant asking for a few words to say to his fans. Of course my request went unanswered so I asked Keith Baker instead and he wrote a speech.

It read a bit like an almost copy-paste of the pages already linked but there really is only so much you can sayon that before you cover the same ground again.

[Rev. George]

The opening sequence of the Mr. Belvedere TV show included multiple photos of the english butler serving very famous people (Pouring tea for churchill stalin and FDR at yalta, for example) He then answered a random advert in ohio to clean house for a middle class family.

I'm guessing he is in SOD either as a parody of his alleged famous ties, or of his willingness to answer random want ad. That or it was just funny to throw in a pop culture reference to a famous fictional butler.

-+G

[Douglas Limmer]

About Mr. Belvedere: Eugene was compared to Bill Cosby earlier in the strip. I was thinking that maybe the Mr. Belvedere show followed The Cosby Show on TV. But, I'm not sure that they did. I think they were on different networks.

[Jimorian]

Yes, on ABC instead of NBC for Cosby. Different nights too, so not direct competitors. It's probably just a follow-on reference to another 80s family sitcom to cement the joke, then.

[Mitth'raw'nuruo]

hum...and I thought that the butler was just there for the joke on the next page about HP...

[Prowl]

I thought it was a reference to the actor who played Mr. Belvedere being a gay man with an unusually close relationship with one of the child actors.

[Optimystik]

hum...and I thought that the butler was just there for the joke on the next page about HP...

The "HP" joke could have been made with any pop culture figure.

"Britney Spears had more HP than I expected."
"Carlos Mencia had more HP than I expected."
"Elmo had more HP than I expected."

The issue is finding out why the Giant chose Mr. Belvedere in particular, if indeed there is a reason other than "he was watching/thinking about it while writing SoD" or "it's a reference I was sure that few people would get."