History Literature / LifeTheUniverseAndEverything

-->"If it was a coincidence," roared the voice, "then my name is not Agrajag!"
"And presumably," said Arthur, "you would claim that was your name."
"Yes!" hissed Agrajag, as if completing a rather deft syllogism.

* OrMyNameIsnt: Arthur states that his killing all of Agrajag's reincarnations was purely a coincidence.
-->'''Agrajag:''' If it was a coincidence, then my name is not Agrajag!!!

* BigStupidDoodooHead: Wowbagger's insults are... kind of lame. All he has to say to Arthur Dent is that he's "a jerk" and "a real kneebiter." Later on, he calls Arthur Deodat a "no-good dumbo nothing."

* SidetrackedByTheAnalogy: Ford says that if they go up against the Krikketers they wouldn't stand "a whelk's chance in a supernova". He tries to elaborate on why he thinks that, but Arthur keeps interrupting to ask what the whelks have to do with it.

* DistractedByTheAnalogy: Ford says that if they go up against the Krikketers they wouldn't stand "a whelk's chance in a supernova". He tries to elaborate on why he thinks that, but Arthur keeps interrupting to ask what the whelks have to do with it.

* TakingTheFightOutside: PlayedWith when Thor takes offense at Arthur interrupting his conversation with Trillian at the flying party. As the situation escalates, Arthur asks Thor if he wants to step outside. Thor agrees and does so. Arthur does not follow, and resumes talking with Trillian.

* TookALevelInBadass: Arthur, being the UnfazedEveryman, takes the next step in his CharacterDevelopment and stands up to a thunder god (and lives). Trillian goes from being a passive bystander to being an important character, and works out the mystery of what was really going on before the Krikkit Wars began.

* KilledOffscreen: Most of the Golgafrinchans Arthur and Ford arrived on prehistoric Earth with are revealed to have died during a harsh winter (which is [[RealityEnsues hardly surprising]], considering none of them actually possessed anything in the way of the practical skills needed to build a colony on a new planet). The few survivors set out on a raft together; Arthur believes they must have survived (presumably to become the [[HumanityCameFromSpace ancestors of humanity]], as Ford predicted they would in the previous book), but [[UncertainDoom it's never confirmed one way or the other]].

* EmnityWithAnObject: The Silastic Armorfiends of Striterax, in an attempt to channel their bloodthirstiness away from mass-murder, were ordered to spend forty-five minutes a day beating up a bag of potatoes. This worked for about a week, until they decided to just shoot the potatoes, and went right back to wholescale slaughter.

* GoneHorriblyRight:
** ''[The Silastic Armorfiends of Striterax] ordered Hactar to design for them an Ultimate Weapon.''

** ''"What do you mean," asked Hactar, "by Ultimate?"''

** ''To which the Silastic Armorfiends of Striterax said, "Read a bloody dictionary," and plunged back into the fray.''

** ''So Hactar designed an Ultimate Weapon.''

** ''It was a very, very small bomb which was simply a junction box in hyperspace that would, when activated, connect the heart of every major sun with the heart of every other major sun simultaneously and thus turn the entire Universe in to one gigantic hyperspatial supernova.''

''Life, the Universe and Everything'' (published in 1982) is the third installment of the [[TrilogyCreep increasingly inaccurately-named]] ''Literature/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'' trilogy (although, of course, when it was first published the series was still a perfectly accurately-named trilogy). Since franchise creator Creator/DouglasAdams had told his original story in its entirety by the end of ''Literature/TheRestaurantAtTheEndOfTheUniverse'', this one was a [[DolledUpInstallment re-imagining]] of a ''Series/DoctorWho'' screenplay called ''Doctor Who and the Krikkitmen'', which Adams wrote but never produced. He simply recast his original idea with characters from ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' instead of ''Doctor Who'' characters, and instant history was made.

* ButWhatAboutTheAstronauts: Hactar believes that making all the stars go nova is effectively destroying the universe. He doesn't account for ships in interstellar space. MatterReplicators exist and people could probably exist indefinitely if they used the stars for energy.

* BigStupidDoodooHead: Wowbagger's insults are...kind of lame. All he has to say to Arthur Dent is that he's "a jerk" and "a real kneebiter." Later on, he calls Arthur Deodat a "no-good dumbo nothing."

* SpaceClouds: The Krikkit people have never seen stars and are entirely unaware of the night sky specifically because their planet lives inside a cloud of [[spoiler:Hactar's debris]].

* WhoWantsToLiveForever: Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged, initially enjoys immortality, but eventually gets bored and resentful of mortals, so he finds an unusual way of coping with his predicament.

* AbsoluteXenophobe: The Krikkiters were so isolated and convinced that they were alone in the universe that instant they discover that there is more of the universe beyond Krikkit, they decide "It'll have to go." [[spoiler:Of course, the circumstances were arranged by Hactar so they'd reach that conclusion. By the time of the book most of them have long since gotten over it and quite look forward to meeting aliens, but their military is on autopilot; the ones Arthur speaks to seem completely oblivious to the fact that they've committed genocide on a galactic scale.]]

** ''"What do you mean,'' asked Hactar, "by Ultimate?"''

* TakeThat: The RunningGag about Music/PaulMcCartney, noting that the royalties from even a single Macca song would enable him to buy first a medium-sized town, then the whole of Hampshire (one of England's most affluent counties) and finally, should Macca hit on a theme half as lovely as the one hummed by the Krikkiters, escalating to ownership of massive swathes of the South of England. This derives from performing rights issues for the LP version of ''[=H2G2=]'', where Trillian faces death and oblivion whilst humming ''A Day In The Life''. [=McCartney=]'s copyright lawyers hammered Adams and his production company for serious money, for the use of just two bars of a Beatles' song. Sung by somebody else. Adams worked this experience of being fleeced into this novel.

* TakeThat: The RunningGag about Music/PaulMcCartney, noting that the royalties from even a single ''Macca'' song would enable him to buy first a medium-sized town, then the whole of Hampshire (one of England's most affluent counties) and finally, should ''Macca'' hit on a theme half as lovely as the one hummed by the Krikkiters, escalating to ownership of massive swathes of the South of England. This derives from performing rights issues for the LP version of ''[=H2G2=]'', where Trillian faces death and oblivion whilst humming ''A Day In The Life''. [=McCartney=]'s copyright lawyers hammered Adams and his production company for serious money, for the use of just two bars of a Beatles' song. Sung by somebody else. Adams worked this experience of being fleeced into this novel.

:''[The Silastic Armorfiends of Striterax] ordered Hactar to design for them an Ultimate Weapon.''

:''"What do you mean,'' asked Hactar, "by Ultimate?"''

:''To which the Silastic Armorfiends of Striterax said, "Read a bloody dictionary," and plunged back into the fray.''

:''So Hactar designed an Ultimate Weapon.''

:''It was a very, very small bomb which was simply a junction box in hyperspace that would, when activated, connect the heart of every major sun with the heart of every other major sun simultaneously and thus turn the entire Universe in to one gigantic hyperspatial supernova.''