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Fridge Brilliance

  • When Oberon is reduced in power in "Ill Met By Moonlight," he is forced to use spoken incantations to invoke elemental magic, instead of just pointing.
    • Also in that episode, Elisa, Tom and Katherine have to scrounge up the iron chains the Magus used to defeat the Weird Sisters to make a weapon to use against Oberon, despite Tom wearing a full set of plate mail. Of course, being that Tom got to Avalon at around 10 years old, the armor must have been made there. Given Oberon and his children's weakness to iron, there probably isn't any on Avalon, so Tom's armor would have been made with a different metal.
  • I was making chocolate milk when it suddenly struck me what makes David Xanatos the greatest villain. It's not that he's an Evil Genius who can trick the heroes into doing his plans for him, it's not that he has the capacity to feel love and other human emotions, it's not his Dissonant Serenity and simple amorality as opposed to being a one-dimensional Card-Carrying Villain. It's the complete lack of a Freudian Excuse! They don't try to humanize him or make us sympathize with him because of some painful past or bad childhood. He's the type of person he is and does what he does entirely because he wants to be. And we're still drawn to him! That more than anything confirms for me that this guy really is in total control. ~ Lale
    • Wow! You had chocolate milk?
    • Concurred, though for an additional reason. Unlike the vast majority of villains, he fully embodies the Aesop of, as he puts it, "Revenge is a Sucker's Game," and refuses to indulge in any sort of scheme that makes things personal... he refuses to let his antagonists define his goals! The real Fridge Brilliance moment comes when you realize that the thirst for vengeance is a handicap for nearly every other character (even occasionally, the heroes!) of the show, and his lack thereof is a main reason Xanatos is consistently stays one step ahead. - Rothul
      • What I realized about Xanatos that made me appreciate him even more was that he is the ultimate human trickster. He's such a successful trickster that he managed to hold his own against a real Trickster, Coyote. He even had the ultimate Trickster, Puck, working for him! Also, not counting Xanatos, the show featured no less than four Trickster gods; Puck, Coyote, Raven, and Anansi. The trickster myths are among my favorites, and if ABC hadn't changed the format, it would have been really cool to see them going at it.
      • And speaking of Coyotes, the fact that Xanatos named his robot double Coyote was a bit of a clue as well. Although given the robot's lack of success, I always suspected that the show's producers were homaging a different Coyote entirely. Namely Wile E. Coyote.
    • This is the reason why I don't really see Xanatos as a villain at all. While even he admits that he plays the villain every now and then when it furthers his goals he is by and large a trickster and con man. He's probably the most "realistic" villain ever put into animation because there are plenty of people like him, some of whom do run massive corporations and are just as adept as he is at playing both sides against each other for their own gain and they're not necessarily bad people, but they are very, very good businessmen.
      • Only half a very good businessman. He may "never live for the sake of another man," but his reliance on deceit and willingness to exploit others for his own unjust gain earned at their expense instead of dealing fairly to mutual gain of all parties he deals with proves he's very willing to "ask another man to live for mine," which makes him a (great) villain even from a point-of-view that condones selfishness.
  • Actually, my moment is when I was given the first season on DVD, and it occurred to me that the head Gargoyle is named GOLIATH, and his main adversary is named DAVID Xanatos. DAVID vs. GOLIATH!
    • Also, tying in with Xanatos' obsession with immortality, in Greek mythology, Thanatos was the god who escorted spirits to the afterlife to be judged. According to Word of God, David Xanatos is of Greek descent.
    • Adding onto this, while Goliath is strong and intelligent, it's easy to argue that Xanatos is the Goliath and the gargoyle is the David, since Xanatos has so many Mecha-Mooks and is so good at planning ahead that he usually gets something out of any encounter. Meanwhile, despite Goliath being physically intimidating, he often relies on his allies to help him succeed.
  • I just realized the fact that Broadway's Evil Clone is named Hollywood has two layers. First of all, Broadway is in New York, and Hollywood is in L.A. However, both are entertainment capitals of the world: Broadway of theater, and Hollywood of film. It's a perfect contrast
    • Also:Lexington Avenue is on the East Side of Manhattan, Brentwood on the Westside of LA. Brooklyn and Malibu are both beach areas.
  • Spending ten-thousand-dollar bills is rather tricky, since banks don't circulate them and very few people would have sufficient funds to make change for them; hence Xanatos' decision to bring the $20 million payment to Thailog with him in the form of those bills. Considering that being a gargoyle on top of that would make depositing the money in a bank account (already likely to raise some eyebrows due to the bills' denomination) exceedingly difficult, Thailog must have had some human help with laundering the money after he made off with it. The most likely suspect? His partner-in-crime Demona, who'd already worked out some means of paying off her human Mooks sight-unseen in "The Mirror" and now has the convenience of being turned into a human during the day. Since Thailog invested the money in his Nightstone Unlimited joint venture with her, she was likely able to get the money deposited in her company's corporate account with a lot fewer questions asked than anyone else would have gotten while trying to open a personal account.
  • While the missing particle-beam guns being out on the streets at the end of "Deadly Force" does indeed explain why all the street thugs and Mooks seen later in the series are packing Family-Friendly Firearms, this explanation does require certain other events to have taken place off-screen. Specifically, only a few dozen of these energy weapons were in circulation, yet everybody (in a city populated by upwards of six million people) seems to be packing them later on, which means someone must have copied and mass-produced them. That someone was likely Xanatos himself; after all, he dispatched Owen to buy back the stolen firearms in the first place, and they were all intended to be prototypes for his company's new line of weapons.

    Presumably, after the initial shipment was destroyed, Owen found some of the other buyers and bought their weapons off of them at a premium. With the rest of the stray guns providing a kind of free advertising, the new particle-beam weapons sold very well first to wealthier buyers as status symbols, and then as practical tools to the masses. Even Elisa Maza probably owns one by now! Yet another Xanatos Gambit pays off...
  • I always wondered why Fox's transformation when she donned the Eye of Odin was so marked different from the Archmage and Goliath. I figured it was always because the writers hadn't yet formally established the rules. But then it dawned on me upon re-watching... Fox is part fey. If she was fully fey, she'd probably even fully embrace its power and transform, but because she's half-human (and not aware of her lineage), she was likely fighting the transformation, which is why she only transformed at night (the full moon probably influenced it, making it stronger), and wasn't able to keep her mind intact when changed.
    • Another possible explanation is that Goliath and the Archmage were intentionally using the Eye's power, but Fox thought it was just a piece of jewelry. Since she wasn't making any conscious attempt to control the Eye, the Eye took control of her.
  • Xanatos wanted his father to witness the creation of the Stable Time Loop that resulted in his fortune, to show him that he was a self-made man. If Xanatos wasn't so arrogant he would have seen that his plan would never have worked because it only proved the opposite. Xanatos wasn't a self-made man at all, he didn't create the time loop he just played his part in it by following the instructions of his future-self, then repeated those same instructions to his past-self, and he didn't even realize it until a few weeks before completing the loop. His fortune was really a gift from a power far greater than himself (the writers).
  • In "The Gathering: Part 2" Puck mentions that he offered Xanatos the choice between any one wish or a lifetime of servitude from Owen Burnett (Puck's human alter ego). I never understood his choosing Owen, as fond as he may be of the man there's no way he would ever give up his chance an immortality like that (especially since it was one of his main motivations for much of the series) until I realized that one of his defining characteristics is that he's savvy, he probably knew that no matter what wish he made Puck would probably find a way to screw him over. This is why he chose Owen, this is what impressed Puck so much as to instill such a sense of loyalty to a measly human (that and Xanatos is never, ever boring).
    • Or, as Xanatos would probably put it, there are many paths to immortality but good help is so hard to find.
      • Seconded. Prior to Oberon imposing the limitations on Puck, he refrained from restoring Owen's left hand back to flesh. That's because doing so would violate the deal with Xanatos. And as demonstrated with The Weird Sisters, there are other ways to achieve immortality, but finding someone like Owen isn't so easy.
  • I never figured out why Oberon took Goliath's suggestion about Alexander staying with his parents after Fox's magical powers manifested more seriously than any other possibility regarding the boy until I realized what when he did so Goliath bowed to him and spoke with reverence and respect, while previously everyone else simply opposed him outright. Oberon is big on humility (even though he doesn't practice what he preaches). Goliath allowed himself to be humbled before him and that's why his request was granted.
    • Also in the old tales the Fair Folk are big on respect. Treating them with curtsey, paying them the respect they are due, and acting with humility towards them are traditional ways to get on their good side and being granted boons by them.
  • After Maggie is turned into a mutate, she said that she's from Ohio. At first, I thought this was pointless. Then I realized that most astronauts and pioneers of aerospace are from Ohio. Maggie has the ability to fly unaided by machines— one of the first humans to be able to do so
  • While the Archmage uses the Phoenix Gate to create a paradoxical time loop to save himself from his fall in the chasm and give himself the tome, amulet and phoenix gate that will empower him to save himself (and loop the loop), there is a much larger loop in play here. The Phoenix Gate exists because nobody ever created it. It came into existance because in the future, Puck tries to trick Goliath into giving it to him, and he instead gets rid of the Gate by hurling it into the far past where it is first discovered. Even the later TimeDancer material keeps this intact, as the Gate vanishes back into the time stream once it has dropped Brooklyn and his family back into the present.
  • This troper found it brilliant that Macbeth's backstory, which is quite distant from Shakespeare's play, is in fact extremely close to the story of the real, historical Macbeth! Duncan was a young, incompetent conquerer, and Macbeth was celebrated as a hero for killing him!
  • In Avalon times flow differently. The ration is one normal day-one Avalon hour (24hs:1hs). In that case, the fact that Tom is on his late-fifty when he appears in the present makes complete sense, because more than a thousand years have passed, meaning that at least 42 years have passed in Avalon. (1000Years:42Years)
    • In fact, Tom was probably older than that. He clearly did not learn the fighting skills he used against the muggers from Katharine and the Magus. He said he left Avalon once every century to see if Goliath and his clan had awoken. Each time probably involved a world tour during which he aged in regular time, not Avalon slow-time.
  • The Magus never let Katherine know about his love for her and let her fall in love with Tom while he remained alone. He argues this is because without his magic he has nothing to offer her, but this plainly isn't true as his wisdom and friendship are indispensable to all who live on Avalon. In the same conversation he also says that what he did to the Gargoyles (turning them to stone for 1000 years) is unforgivable. That's when I realized that he viewed his pain as penance for his "crime." He's been punishing himself for a thousand years (okay, 42 by his count, but still) and feels that it still isn't enough. Someone give this poor man a hug!
    • Actually, think of it this way: one of the mightiest spells he ever worked was one that sealed Goliath and his clan away. He used his magic in a horrific way to punish someone who was innocent. For the Magus, that's kind of the equivalent of a great swordsman deliberately murdering or injuring someone who was innocent with his blade in a fit of rage. The resulting My God, What Have I Done? would eat at him and make his question whether he has the wisdom or judgment to exercise his skills. He thinks he doesn't have the wisdom to offer others because of that mistake, and thus all he has is his magic - something he horribly misused. No wonder he doesn't feel good enough, as the only thing he feels he has to offer is something he has abused and has never forgiven himself for. Poor guy.
    • Another way to look at it is that the Magus was driven to commit his crime by his love for the Princess. He thought that the gargoyles, by trying to rescue the hostages, drove Hakon to kill her instead of ransom her. He cursed them in revenge, obligating him to care for their children. The fact that watching over them necessarily meant a life of longing for the Princess was fitting punishment and poetic justice.
  • The final scene in "The Mirror" was basically a metaphor for Demona's entire life. She says she hates humans because they're bigoted and treacherous, yet those are her defining qualities, a fact she utterly refuses to acknowledge and her denial regularly drives her to screw herself over. In the final scene she turns into a human (the physical embodiment of everything she hates), when she sees herself in the mirror she is so horrified by what she sees that she smashes the mirror, screwing herself over (this particular mirror happened to be a magical item which could have been useful).
  • I recently realized why the Archmage chose that particular cave as a lair. After Hakon and the Captain fall into the cave, they come back as ghosts thanks to the magical aura, and came very close to becoming alive again. Therefore, if the Archmage died in that cave, he would have come back as a ghost, and had a chance to come back to life
    • Except the Archmage was using that cave before Hakon and the Captain ever die there, and it's stated that they exist as ghosts due to Unfinished Business rather than any magic inherent to the place where they died.
    • Yet the Archmage was probably able to recognize the power of the ancient sarsen at the bottom of the cave. If he was able to tap that artifact's power, it makes sense of the question, "Why lurk in a damp cave when you could be allied with one of Castle Wyvern's enemies and living in a comfortable apartment?"
  • If you look carefully, Puck's design subtly changes in almost every scene he's in. Sometimes its the width of his chin, sometimes its the shape of his nose, or the size and shape of his ears. Sometimes he's very lithe and slender, sometimes he's a bit bulkier. Sometimes his eyes are black, sometimes blue without pupils. This used to bug me a lot, until I realized something. It's not just bad animation! Puck is a shapeshifter, and when his design changes, it's usually in scenes where he's agitated, emotional, excited, or just plain distracted. In short- he's not paying attention to the particulars of his shape, so they keep changing on him! Owen isn't immune to this phenomenon either! But the changes in Owen's design are much more subtle and infrequent, which indicates that while Puck is in his role as Owen, he's being much, much more diligent about what he looks like, since humans don't shapeshift like faeries do. ~Silver Gryphon 8
  • Remember those two henchmen Macbeth has? The one we only see when he's going after Merlin's scrolls and Excalibur? There's a reason we only see them at those times - Macbeth isn't going after Demona during those episodes and after all these years he knows better than to bring ordinary humans along when he picks fights with Demona!
  • Something of a Fridge Injustice. Oberon banished his children because of their lack of humility. Yet of all the faeries in the show, he's the haughtiest of them all. This is because he felt he didn't need the lesson, and he has remained as humble as he was before the banishing. Yet Puck, the trickster, has taken the lesson to heart by staying to honor his agreement with Xanatos. Instead of praising him for learning the lesson, Oberon banishes him and strips him of his power because he stands by his agreement. The injustice of it makes you want to give Puck a hug.
    • There is no injustice. Puck deserved what he got. Regardless of what else Puck may have committed himself to Oberon was still his lord and master and Puck ignored the command to return to Avalon for the Gathering. Then when Oberon shows up in person Puck attacks him, and no it is not a necessary attack, Alexander was in no actual danger and Oberon was deliberately not using lethal force (and he easily could have killed all of them repeatedly). Three of Oberon's Children failed to show to the Gathering, Banshee, Puck and Titania. Oberon says Titania may come and go as she pleases and even she submits when he directly orders it. Banshee refused the call and started a fight with Odin and ended up having her power restrained. Puck refused the call and attacked him personally and ended up with his power restrained and banished from his homeland. Honestly, Oberon punished pretty fairly and consistently if you think about it, he even left enough loopholes to allow Puck to remain immortal. It's Puck who made his choice and has to live with the consequences.
      • Plus, Puck never really wanted to go back to Avalon, anyway, saying that it was "boring." He'd much rather have stayed with the Xanatos family, because they were anything but boring. Now, thanks to Oberon's decree, he never has to go back to Avalon again, and he will live out the rest of his very long life in service to a very interesting family. Plus, he can work any magic he likes as long as he's either defending or teaching Alex Xanatos...and, as the resident master of Loophole Abuse, Puck can construe anything as teaching or defending Alex. All in all, he got exactly what he wanted out of life by pulling off a Did You Just Scam Cthulhu? on Oberon. And now you know why we never see Xanatos playing chess with Owen.
      • Not exactly true, Puck DID want to go back to Avalon eventually. It's his home. He just wasn't ready to go back when Oberon fetched him. It's like wanting to stay at a friends house a few more days and getting kicked out of your house in doing so. Just look at Puck's reaction when Oberon makes that decree. I believe his words were "No! Not eternally!"
      • You're assuming Puck wasn't playing along to ensure Oberon didn't catch on that he'd been conned. And that Puck doesn't realize he can probably convince Oberon to rescind that order eventually, given that "eternally" gives him a very long time to figure out how.
      • After all, it's not as if Oberon hasn't broken his rules before- he openly does so several times in the two-parter, such as "Goliath's Clan will not be attacked by me." And just before that, Puck was trying to get the Phoenix Gate to bribe Oberon- so there is at least some evidence backing up the supposition that he could undo that little command.
  • Having given it some thought, it is quite easy to realize just why Alex Xanatos seems to be maturing rapidly, and was also able to speak at the age of four months. Not only is Alex actively using magic, but when he possesses Lexington, that was his first time speaking. He learned to speak so quickly because he first spoke through Lexington.
  • In the episode "Deadly Force", Broadway almost kills Elisa while playing with her gun. Later, in the episode "The Price", Broadway accidentally turns to stone in mid-flight, and Elisa saves his life by shooting a rope which held a crate containing some carpets that were able to break his fall. This shows how guns can be used to kill and how they can protect someone depending on how they are used.
  • Why does Demona hate Macbeth, despite the fact that she knows perfectly well he never betrayed her, and he's worked harder than she has at preserving the gargoyles? Because he never betrayed her, and he's worked harder than she has at preserving the gargoyles. They've known each other for centuries, and every time Demona lays eyes on Macbeth, she realizes that he's everything she claims the humans are not, and that everything she says about humans, is true of herself.
    • Why does Demona hate Elisa so much? It's not just that she is now "dating" Demona's ex; her relationship with him also bears a striking resemblance to Demona's relationship with Macbeth back in the mid-11th century.
      • Correct, but it's also because Demona has a strong need to use humanity as her scapegoats (what with being unable to take responsibility for her mistakes). Elisa proves her claim of humanity to be somewhat false.
  • Watch 'Vows', examine closely what the Stable Time Loop told Demona about her own future (and what she didn't learn), and then watch 'Awakening' and 'City of Stone' again - focusing on Demona's actions. Her older incarnation showed her what would happen, but Goliath interrupted before the older Demona could explain exactly how this had come to happen. All Demona's actions from the day she and Goliath exchanged vows to the very moment she saw the Vikings sneaking into position were attempts to prevent that future from happening with the incomplete information she had. The writers either decided 'all Demona's actions stem from a visit from her future self long before the events of the pilot' while they were writing the pilot, or they executed one of the most skillful continuity re-interpretations in the genre. Then, a thousand years later, Demona completes her Stable Time Loop and realizes only afterwards that she was doomed to fail. If she seems to have gotten even more vengeful and crazy after 'Vows', it may be a result of her feeling that destiny itself is against her.
    Demona: It would seem that history is immutable.
    Goliath (meaningfully): More's the pity.
  • In "City of Stone, Part Two", Duncan informs Macbeth that Gillecomgain is the Hunter, to manipulate Macbeth into going after Gillecomgain. And yet, after Gillecomgain is killed, Duncan decides to take up the Hunter's mask to avenge his death. But why would he want revenge against Macbeth and Demona for Gillecomgain's death, if that was what he sought? And I realized that his goal in that episode was not to get Gillecomgain killed. Gillecomgain had earlier refused to kill Macbeth because it would lead to questions of who killed Findlaech, and probably lead to his execution and a coup against Duncan. But if Macbeth went to Castle Moray to kill Gillecomgain, Gillecomgain could "legally" kill him in self-defense, and it would not cause people to look further into Findlaech's murder. It would have worked, if it were not for that pesky gargoyle Demona.
  • As a continuation of the main series, The Goliath Chronicles is a little lacking in some parts. But if you think of it as a fanfic that just happened to get animated, it's actually halfway decent. -Blazar
    • Actually, the creator of the first series says that at least some episodes, mainly "The Journey", "The Dying of the Light", and "Angels in the Night" are cannon. Though everything else being a fanfic is still workable.
      • Greg Weisman most certainly never said that "The Dying of the Light" and "Angels In the Night" are canon. Quite the opposite, in fact
      • "Dying of the Light" is not canon but the fact that Jeffery Robins knows about Hudson was made canon in the comics. The only canon episode is "The Journey."
  • Given David Xanatos's actions in the series prior to becoming a father, it's incredibly heartwarming to see him become an excellent father to his son and practically changed him for the better in regards to the gargoyles. Always finding the time to be with him, even ignoring a meeting with the Illuminati, even when he knew it wasn't a smart thing to do. When Oberon came that close into taking away his son, Xanatos realize how much his time with his son meant to him, so he is spending every moment he can with him and it wouldn't have been possible if Goliath hadn't talked Oberon into letting him stay, effectively ending his feud with the clan. Having a child really can change a man.
  • Vinnie's revenge on the face of it is kinda lame: A pie in the face equals the loss of two jobs and a drivers' license? But think: A) actually killing Goliath would have been cartoonish supervillainy levels of overkill, and B) if you can hit someone with a pie, you can hit them with a bullet. Vinnie's revenge was Goliath knowing that if it had been real, he'd be dead.
  • When Goliath and co. visit the Bad Future in Manhattan at the conclusion of the "Avalon World Tour" arc, the very first sound that they hear (which first lets them know that something's amiss) is an electronic recording of Owen's voice telling them that they've violated "Manhattan national sovereignty". Somewhat conspicuously, Owen is one of the few major supporting characters whose ultimate fate we never learn in that episode. Of course, we learn a few episodes later that Owen was actually Puck's human alter ego all along, and that the Bad Future was an illusion built by Puck. It makes perfect sense that the illusion would start with Puck's voice essentially "announcing" the charade from offscreen. And of course, Puck wouldn't appear in his "Owen" disguise, because he was busy pulling the strings behind the whole illusion. And he wouldn't have thought to give Owen his own unique future, because he knew that Owen was just a disguise, and had no independent existence.
    • A massive clue that things are not as they seem in "Future Tense?" We witness the destruction of Demona at the hands of Xanatos inside the Erie Pyramid... which is not supposed to be possible. Per the Weird Sisters' enchantment, she can only die by the hand of Macbeth (something of which neither Puck nor Owen were aware.) Since we see no sign nor hear any mention of Macbeth in the episode, it's safe to conclude Puck had no idea of their connection.
  • A big hint that Angela and Broadway would become mates is in their first meeting: Broadway gave her chocolate, albeit most of them were eaten. In romantic moments, a person (usually a man) will give chocolates as a sign of affection and/or love to another person (usually a woman).
  • In "A Lighthouse in the Sea of Time", Robbins looks up a phone number in a directory, causing Hudson to mutter "Magic book." (Robbins shoots back, "Aren't they all?") But although Hudson is illiterate, he certainly understands the concept of books and looking up information in them. Then you remember that Robbins is blind, and realize he is using a Braille phonebook. What Hudson sees is a blind man looking up a phone number in a book that appears to have blank pages. Magic, indeed.
  • Once you know Owen's secret what he says and the way he says it in a lot of previous episodes takes an amusing new light. For instance when he tells Goliath "You should know I can't tell you." (because he doesn't know, they just think he does) when asked where Hudson and Broadway are in A Lighthouse in the Sea of Time it goes from being an Obstructive Bureaucrat to a full blown troll channeling his inner Puck. Owen's modus operandi and dialogue is littered with things that take on a new light once you know the full story.
  • In "Hunter's Moon", after the Hunters attack the clock tower and the gargoyles are blamed, Xanatos and Owen are seen watching the news and discussing the fact that it's obviously not true: the gargoyles would not attack their own clock tower. Which indicates that Xanatos must have known for a while — maybe the whole time — where the Gargoyles were hiding out, but prior to this episode he never gave any sort of indication. Which would be both plausible (he's a genius multi-billionaire; surely he could find some gargoyle statues that disappear at night with his resources) and completely in-character for him (at this point, he considers the feud over, but even if he'd learned it before then, he doesn't believe in revenge, and knowing their hideout would possibly give him some leverage if it had ever come to that).
  • According to Goliath, humankind fears what they don't understand and their kind, Gargoyles, do not. This explains why when awakening in the future they adapt relatively easily. While initially tentative regarding new technology, like television, they are quick to adapt to it because they are not afraid of it, and are not afraid of learning something new.
  • In the Gargoyles-verse, there were two prominent women in King Macbeth's court- Gruoch, the king's wife, a kindly Chess Master mainly motivated by a desire to protect her family, and Demona, a self-destructive murderer. Either William Shakespeare or his sources must have combined them to create the original Lady Macbeth

Fridge Logic

  • Biologically speaking, the gargoyles are mammalian, and yet we see they reproduce by laying eggs. This means they're part of that odd class of mammals (which includes the duck-billed platypus) known as monotremes. This in part explains their somewhat odd views on family (Goliath's insisting to Angela that she think of herself as the whole clan's daughter, not just his and Demona's) and also suggests their typical sexuality might be... a bit different from humanity's. Note that while Demona hates Elisa, it's only because she hates all humans, and Elisa is one; also, while she regularly castigates Goliath for "betraying" the gargoyles (by befriending humans), she never specifically takes him to task for being unfaithful to her with Elisa, probably because she doesn't see it that way.

    Moreover, this leaves us with some questions of what might become of the potential romance between Goliath and Elisa if the author pursues it further. Monotreme reproductive organs are more like avian ones, which would give the gargoyles their own unique version of the Mermaid Problem when pursuing a romantic relationship with humans. Goliath surely knows how to show a lady a good time, but if he were ever to get hitched with Elisa, he'd either have to enlist the help of one of Oberon's children to change one of them into the other's species, or else he'd have to get rather... inventive on the wedding night.
    • Word of God has addressed some gargoyle mating habits and suggested that when they choose a mate, they tend to be exclusive to just one (with Goliath's situation with Elisa being the exception rather than the rule). It hasn't ruled out intervention of some sort should Goliath and Elisa seek to have their own family, but odds are they can always adopt.
    • Also Gargates (The proper "scientific" term for Gargoyles) aren't mammals but something of a "missing link" between reptiles and mammals.

Fridge Horror

  • The witches salute both Macbeth and Duncan as "kings" and "fathers of kings" of "Scotland". We know that Duncan was king before Macbeth, And Macbeth was king before his son. But we have never seen Duncan's son as a king, meaning that he is going to be declared king after Macbeth's son. All this implies that Duncan's son won the war.
    • That is what happened in real life Macbeth's (step)son ruled as king for only a year before Duncan's son Malcolm seized the throne.
      • Not only that, but the Weird Sisters and Macbeth confirm that Canmore defeated Luach:
      Phoebe: Did your own death save your son Luach from Canmore?
      Macbeth: No.
      • A tearjerking moment. Over the centuries Macbeth might have forgiven Demona for toppling his kingdom or betraying his trust... but never for the death of his son.
  • Demona has spent a thousand years plotting and scheming. All the people she cares about have died because of her, or she has alienated them. City of Stone's conclusion implies that she knows this on some level, and her hatred of humanity is so great because of her displaced and immeasurable self-loathing. After that four-parter, she only willingly works with someone else again once: Thailog, who presumably played on her feelings for Goliath before cloning her and mixing Elisa's DNA just to Twist The Knife. After these episodes, and Puck's spell turning her human, she's utterly alone and miserable, spending half her time as a hated human, and no longer able to entirely pretend humans are at fault for what's happened in her life. She has to endure all of that... but she either can't bring herself to or is unable to commit suicide. Even the unpublished spinoffs imply that she'll still be like this even in Brooklyn's clan, and will remain a tortured and self-hating immortal forever.
    • She can't commit suicide, thanks to her link with Macbeth. She must die by his hand, or not at all, which provides a whole new layer of Fridge Horror to her constant provocation of him.
    • According to Ask Greg, Demona, no matter how much she hates herself, is too much of a survivor to seriously entertain suicide as an option for long. Macbeth, on the other hand, is pretty much suicidal (at least up until the events of "City of Stone" caused him to rethink things, and unlike Demona he didn't ignore his epiphany).
  • Fridge Horror meets Nightmare Fuel: Demona's actions in "City of Stone". Those people DIED. ONSCREEN. ON A KIDS' SHOW.
    • Even worse when it's revealed that the humans turn back to flesh in the morning. Considering how much rubble there was in the streets and the fact that one woman had her arms shot off, New York was certainly in for a grisly sight that morning
      • Actually, when you consider that Gargoyles themselves don't become piles of meat after being destroyed during the day, they probably remained piles of rocks. Brings different fridge horror for the cleanup crew though...
      • That depends on the exact mechanics of the spell.
      • Word of God confirms them remaining as stone on Greg's website.
      • Even worse Fridge Horror: Imagine if you were one of the people who didn't see the enchanted broadcasts, so remained flesh when the sun went down. Now, imagine if you're riding in a car at the time, whose driver did not miss it. Better hope they aren't accelerating or making a turn when it happens, because you might just have to break their limbs to bits to avoid crashing...
      • Even Greg Weisman realized the Fridge Horror and wrote a spooky second person POV story about someone who entered New York City Limits just after the spell was cast. Read it here. Scroll down to question 14.
      • Actually it seems likely that the people Demona smashed were resurrected when the spell was broken. This is illustrated as Margot Yale and her husband (the couple who consistently have run-ins with the gargoyles) were among the "statues" smashed by Demona except they reappear two episodes later in High Noon.
      • The above is incorrect, nobody was resurrected. Greg Weisman himself has clarified that the couple that was smashed by Demona were not Brandon and Margot Yale ("that guy wore a toupee, that woman was a brunette") it was just an unfortunate re-use of animation models. The people Demon smashed (and any that were destroyed through accidents resulting from the sudden petrification, like car accidents or being off-blaance ona flight of stairs) stayed dead even after the spell was broken.
      • On the same note, imagine being a mother giving birth when the sun sets. CREEPY.
    • On the same page as the spooky story above are questions about the time Goliath was under a slave spell. Except it's not WAS. He's ''still' under it, just forced to act like he's free. This could be very And I Must Scream if it means what I think it means.
      • That is not how I interpreted that scene. It is more of a Fridge Brilliance moment, than anything. By being told "to act as if you are not under a spell", it triggered a paradox that caused the spell to cancel itself out. How can a spell that allows you to command someone to do anything maintain its existence if the person who is under it is order "to act as if you are not under a spell"? That specific order for the 'slave spell' essentially a Logic Bomb.
      • I've always thought that particular order may have unintended consequences. Goliath is order to acts as if he was not under *A* spell. Not "The" spell, but "A" spell. I think this order may have inadvertently made him immune to all forms of magical mind control.
    • Thousands of people should have died in "The Gathering", when Oberon puts the entire city to sleep - including everyone who was driving, flying planes, performing surgery... Imagine Flash Forward in a lesser scale.
      • This may be clutching at straws, but Oberon reversed everything at the end, saying that it would be 'as a Midsummer Night's Dream...' It's possible that Oberon is powerful enough to undo anything he's done if he felt like it, including deaths.
      • Nope. Word of God is that only Oberon would consider calling the offscreen Inferred Holocaust "as a midsummer night's dream," because to him all those deaths don't matter any more than a dream.
    • Nothing compared to the Episode in Egypt. Jackal unleashes Anubis' power to kill all life in a certain radius encompassing at least one town. He is defeated afterwards - but remember, Anubis refuses to bring back the dead on principle!
      • Actually, if you pay attention to his words at the end, he is specifically stating that he is restoring the stolen energies. While Jackal was controlling Anubis's power, he was taking away life before it's intended time and therefore those were all unnatural deaths and it is the Jackal god's job to put things as they should be. All those people Jackal killed were revived.
      • You're missing part of Anubis' quote - the most important part. "What is dead and gone cannot be restored, but the stolen energies can be rechanneled." The latter clause refers to the rapid aging of the protagonists and de-aging of the Pack, which could be undone easily because none of them had crossed over yet. But as Anubis constantly spells out in the episode and as Word of God has confirmed multiple times, there is no distinction made between "natural death" and "unnatural death;" there is only death, which comes to us all. Tragic as the situation is, the dead can never be restored in the Gargoyles Universe (barring ghosts and the like), because the death gods make no exceptions. Begin to do so and you open the floodgates.
      • If that is what an Avatar of Anubis could do, then what would happen is someone like Jackal were to become an Avatar to a more powerful being say Oberon?
  • "Eye of the Beholder": Word of God's timeline confirms that Fox was pregnant when she turned into that wolf-creature. Imagine what that may have done to her kid...
    • This tropette is more concerned about City of Stone. Fox may have turned, but how could little Alex if he didn't actually see the broadcast himself? At least a werefox's body could supply some nutrients to the developing fetus, but I can't help but wonder if his latent magical abilities were the only thing that kept Alexander alive.'
      • Given that the people's clothing turned to stone as well, for sanity's sake, I go with the idea that a fetus would qualify as still being a part of the mother, and so also subject to the spell. The REAL infant concern is in NYC's maternity wards - those babies wouldn't have seen the spell, but most of the attending nurses would have...
  • Really, any episode that affects the whole city (or at least all of Manhattan) leaves you to wonder what kinds of panic and mayhem might have been taking place on the outskirts of town. With Puck's meddling in "The Mirror" turning everyone in town into gargoyles, for instance, there must have been a lot of violent encounters on the outskirts of the city between the unaffected humans just entering and the humans-turned-gargoyles who believed (while under the spell's influence) that they'd always been gargoyles, and that ordinary humans were some kind of alien species. A lot of the unaffected humans would be convinced that they'd stumbled into an enclave of terrifying monsters, while the humans-turned-gargoyles would be convinced that terrifying alien creatures were invading their city; this would not end well for either species.
  • Regarding the 'Conveniently Cellmates' trope on the main page... I just pictured Jackal or Hyena in a cell with some hapless drug-dealer or mugger doing time. It doesn't end well for the mook in this scenario. Yuck. No wonder the warden ended up putting them in with Fox and Wolf.
  • Matt Bluestone mentioned that Jason, Robyn and Jon have been leaving a trail of violence wherever they go... meaning that they might have successfully tracked some Gargoyles and maybe even killed them.
  • The Wyvern massacre was already horrific, but it gets even worse after you read Greg Weisman's Word of God about gargoyle breeding cycles, and realize that the clan would have included a bunch of gargoyle children equivalent to 9-year-old human kids.
  • When the Matrix broke loose, you can see houses next to the research facility. Even if the Matrix was stopped at the end, what happened to the poor people inside those houses?
  • Let's assume Titania can bend reality, and the world in "For It May Come True" was real, if Goliath was never a gargoyle, then that world would have been destroyed by aliens and super villains sooner or later. Even if most of the rogues gallery don't exist without Goliath, you still have an alien to worry about. It's nice to see Goliath married to Eliza, but their universe would be screwed without his abilities, leadership, and strength.
  • In the season 2 episode "Grief", Goliath mentions that gargoyles age at half the rate of humans. At first it may seem like a convenient excuse for why he and Angela were not as debilitated as Elisa when they are magically aged, but it makes sense when one remembers that gargoyles spend about 12 hours a day as stone, and their bodies don't age in this state.
    • It's not horror, but it also makes sense when you consider Avalon. Only 41 years would have taken place there, but Angela looks like she's younger than Elisa. She's only around 20 years old, biologically speaking. Or, for a non-Avalon case, Hudson- despite being over a century old, he's still moving around and spry as his rookery brothers and sisters. Biologically, he's still in his fifties- mind you, a very spry fifties, but fifties nonetheless.

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