Argai: The Prophecy (Original title: Argaï: La Prophétie) is a 26-episode French animated series created in 2000, in which all characters are anthropomorphized.
Year 2075. The evil Dark Queen Orial is ruling with an iron fist in what is a Crapsack World, from her levitating base located on top of New York City. She's immortal, as throughout time, she has stolen the youth of several maidens, and keeps them in eternal sleep to maintain the effects of her immortality. But back in 1250, she stole the youth of sweet and beautiful Angèle, who happens to be the fiancée of Prince Argaï, the protagonist.
This guy, who's one hell of a Determinator, goes then on a journey to save his beloved, and engulfed in a lightning flash, finds himself transported to New York City in 2075. He then meets private detective Oscar Lightbulb, his assistant Barnaby and their secretary Miss Moon. They decide to help Argaï, and discover that a book of prophecies details the antidote, as well as the 13 ingredients needed to create it, that would take out Angèle of her slumber, and thus at the same time save Angèle and destroy Queen Orial. They get a hand on the book and have the wise move of making a copy of it by scanning it, before Queen Orial steals the original from them. Now starts a quest throught time to gather the antidote's ingredients, with Queen Orial knowing their every next move.
Argaï: The Prophecy provides examples of:
- Ace Pilot: Captain Billy, who happens to be a child. He can pilot anything in the universe that flies.
- All for Nothing: Without Angele, making the antidote is pointless.
- Alliterative Name and Repetitive Name: Moony Moon.
- Ancient Tomb: The second ingredient, the Pharaoh's Amulet, is in one.
- An Offer You Can't Refuse: Oscar Lightbulb tries this with the Dark Queen.
- Arranged Marriage: Argai promises Angele that they'll get married after the war ends.
- Back for the Finale: Almost all good characters from throughout the series.
- Back from the Dead: Hugsley Barns. He drowns in 1250 and since people can only die in their own time, he comes back alive and well in 2075.
- Bad Future: What is 2075 ruled by Queen Orial, now known as the Dark Queen.
- Because Destiny Says So: Everything in the story happens because the Book of Prophecies says so.
- Becoming the Mask: Oscar's friend Hector, who the police thinks he studies dreams, but really does brain research and has a machine that can erase certain memories from one's head.
- Berserk Button:
- Argai was not very fond of learning his beloved Angele was enchanted. And he doesn't like when people make fun of him.
- The Dark Queen after many failures, decides to destroy entire places.
- Big Applesauce: A good portion of the series takes place in New York City.
- Big Bad: Dark Queen Orial is the cruel serpentine tyrant responsible for Angele's curse in the middle ages and the dystopia of the future.
- Black Knight: In Chapter XVIII, the Dark Queen dresses like that and challenges Argai to a death tournament. Little did she know, she did the heroes a favour by doing so.
- Book Ends: In the first and last episode, a lightning strikes inside the monastery. Prince Argai says that everything started in the monastery and there it will end.
- Burn the Witch!: In Chapter XIII, while deciding punishments for Argai, the Dark Queen refuses to burn him since she says that this is punishment for witches, not for princes.
- The Bus Came Back: Many of the characters the heroes met in previous episodes, appear in the last few episodes of the series.
- Carnivore Confusion: In one episode, a pig person is cooking a normal pig.
- Catchphrase: Oscar will 'be a Monkey's Uncle' once every episode.
- Cave Mouth: In Chapter XIII, after running away from a crocodile, Oscar and Moony ended up going inside a skull-shaped tunnel.
- Chekhov's Gun:
- The blind man stealing Barnaby's futuristic stuff, including his phone, which led to the Dark Queen taking it from him, which allowed our heroes to contact Queen Orial to offer her a deal she can't refuse.
- Also the 3 items Kargal gave Oscar and Moony in Chapter XIII.
- Chekhov's Skill: Master Wang's ability to transport anyone (even himself) into the place he or she is thinking of. This comes very handy in the last episode, in which he transports himself from Asia to TirLoch, and then transports Argai into the Dark Queen's spaceship so he can find Angele.
- City of Canals: Chapther XI titled "Venice submerged".
- Climbing the Cliffs of Insanity: A lot of dangerous climbing happens in the series.
- Cloudcuckoolander: The bar manager in 1250 thinks Moony is this after she tells him their time travelling adventure.
- Deal with the Devil: The Dark Queen straight up invokes Lucifer for her powers.
- Did You Actually Believe...?: After all the adventures, The Dark Queen tells Geko to stop claiming that their enemies have finally died.
- Dirt Forcefield: Argai and Barnaby jumped into a big tank full of fuel oil and ended up with just a few spots.
- Disney Villain Death: In Chapter X, Oliban falls off a high balcony while trying to kill Argai, and is presumably dead.
- Doppelgänger:
- Geko is temporary replaced by a robot version of himself.
- In Chapter XX, Queen Orial's Mad Scientist creates one of Oscar Lightbulb, and sends him to kill Argai and find out where the ingredients are hidden.
- In the last episode, the Dark Queen brings a clone of Angele to the throne room and leaves the real Angele in her spaceship.
- The End of the World as We Know It: The Dark Queen was about to destroy the Earth, but was defeated Just in Time.
- Evil Overlord: Queen Orial, who actually managed to Take Over the World by 2075.
- Excalibur: Argai fights with it in Chapter IX.
- The Faceless: The white lady and her husband in Chapter XXIV.
- Fainting:
- Moony, the first few times after hearing she'll be travelling to the Middle Ages.
- The king's daughter in Chapter XVIII after seeing Geko.
- Fountain of Youth: Queen Orial enchants young maidens to gain eternal life.
- Friendly Local Chinatown: Pascha's base of operations in New York.
- Furry Confusion: Normal animals are shown to exist alongside the anthropomorphic animal cast.
- Gladiator Games: In Chapter XVI, Argai battles a giant scorpion in an gladitor arena.
- Good Colors, Evil Colors: Queen Orial wears a purple dress with a dark purple cape. Prince Argai wears mostly white.
- Good Is Not Dumb: Moony, as she saves both herself and Angele from being taken to the Dark Queen.
- Good-Times Montage: Argai's memories of Angele.
- Great Escape: Chapter XIX titled "The great escape".
- Haunted Castle: In Chapter XXIV, a castle is haunted by the ghosts of the king and queen.
- The Hedge of Thorns: Queen Orial's hideout in The Middle Ages is surrounded by thornbushes.
- Honor Among Thieves: Argai runs into and befriends 3 noble thieves, who in a later episode assist our heroes.
- Humanoid Female Animal: The majority of female characters.
- Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: The majority of the series is the Dark Queen trying to capture Argai, as she senses he represents a great danger to her.
- I Choose to Stay: Moony decides to stay in 1250 so that she can be with Jason.
- Immortality Seeker: Queen Orial. She achieves it by magically draining the life of young women that she put in a coma.
- Informed Attractiveness: Angele is the most beautiful out of all the Queen's victims.
- In the Hood: Geko. And also Queen Orial so she can get close to Angele and enchant her.
- I Want Them Alive!: The Dark Queen demands for her troops to bring certain people to her alive. This is either because she needs them for interrogation or because the show's rule of time travel deaths means she has to kill them in the correct time.
- Left for Dead: After getting the Sacred Pearl, Argai and Barnaby jump into the river below from a great height, just in time to avoid been blown to bits by one of the Queen's battleships, and survuve. The Dark Queen thinking she killed Argai and Barnaby is justified by her having put up wanted posters with only Oscar's and Angele's picture on them and no one else.
- Life Drinker: Queen Orial has enchanted enough maidens to gain eternal life, but she can still be killed by a physical force and she's probably vulnerable to sickness and diseases.
- Locked in a Freezer: In Chapter I, Barnaby hides prince Argai in the freezer so the police won't find him.
- Love at First Sight: While waiting for Moony to get well, Jason tells her that's how he fell in love with her.
- Love RedeemsWhen two people love each other, they can't be separated. Queen Orial learned it the hard way.
- MacGuffin: The 13 ingredients needed to make the antidote - a Mandrake, an Amulet, the Holy Grail, the Antidote Recipe, Oil, Stardust, Mistletoe, a Lotus Flower, an Ancient Manuscript, Demon Blood (taken from Queen Orial herself), a Wild Orchid, the Sacred Pearl and a Thurible (incense burner).
- Living MacGuffin: In Chapter II called "The man in the mask", said man is the guy who first saw Argai. The Dark Queen tries to hunt him down for information, and our heroes hunt him to make sure the Dark Queen doesn't get him.
- Mad Scientist: The Dark Queen has one, a shifty coyote who builds her the replacement Gecko. He promises that it will be perfect, but the very first time it screws up, the Queen has him killed.
- Magic Antidote: What the heroes attempt to make to lift the curse put on Angele.
- Mecha-Mooks: The Dark Queen's main troops.
- Merlin: He appears in the last episode.
- Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: After the Queen replaces Geko with a robot, he decides to get back at her by helping the heroes find Hugsley's time machine. However, once his robot double is destroyed, he goes right back to serving the queen.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: The Dark Queen.
- Narrator: Before an episode starts, he briefly sums up what happened from Episode 1 till the current episode, and after the episode ends, he prepares the audience for the next episode.
- Near-Death Experience: Argai almost dies after sinking to the bottom of the ocean, but is saved by mermaids and Angele's spirit.
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: The Dark Queen unintentionally provided the heroes with an extremely hard to get ingredient needed for the antidote.
- No Immortal Inertia: If even one of the enchanted girls awakes or dies then Queen Orial will be destroyed.
- Obviously Evil: Pretty much every bad guy the heroes encountered.
- Offscreen Moment of Awesome: A bad habit of the show. In an episode where Argai has to break a monk out of prison before his execution, we see him recruiting local thieves to help him, starting a conversation on what he wants him to do...and then we never see the breakout attempt, just the monk meeting Argai's companions at the inn.
- Old Friend: Several of the characters have friends from their past. Of note is Pascha, a crime boss that detectives Oscar and Barnaby are still good friends with.
- Ominous Latin Chanting: Both the opening
and ending contain phrases in Latin. - Opening Narration: Before an episode begins, a brief explanation is given of what happened in the past episodes.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Argai and Barnaby while roaming the Dark Queen's spaceship.
- Parental Abandonment: Angele. Brother Tich has been a like a father to her her whole life.
- Planetville: The Turbulent Planet ruled by princess Lorelei.
- Powered by a Forsaken Maiden: Queen Orial and the source of her immortality.
- Race Against the Clock: Everybody has 30 minutes to escape from planet F.107 before it self-destructs.
- Robot Me: Geko gets temporarily replaced by a robot version of him.
- Royals Who Actually Do Something: Prince Argai. He gets in from his father, who led the fight against the barbarian queen personally until he was forced to retreat.
- Second Hour Superpower: The fact that you can only die in your own time.
- Shoot the Fuel Tank: The Dark Queen's spaceship explodes thanks to fire in the ship's fuel tanks room.
- Smart People Play Chess: Oscar and Barnaby. After a debate in the first episode whether it was check or checkmate, they decide to resume their game of chess at the end of the series.
- The Smurfette Principle: Moony is the only female in the group. And there aren't many female characters in the show.
- Snake Woman: Queen Orial/The Dark Queen.
- Sneaky Departure: Argai in Chapter XVII.
- Spikes of Villainy: After Queen Orial became the Dark Queen, she gains a spiky High Collar of Doom.
- Stock Footage: Few scenes and animation bits are recycled.
- Stuff Blowing Up: Many times. A hilarious example is when the death of a thief who hits a low bridge while riding on top of a train gets the same stock explosion effect as a starship hit by missiles.
- Surrounded by Idiots: The Dark Queen often feels like it after her minions fail to get the job done.
- Taken for Granite: In Chapter XIII, Queen Orial turns Barnaby's body from the neck down into stone.
- Talking Is a Free Action: Instead of pressing the Earth-destroying button right then and there, the Dark Queen takes her time to talk about how's she's gonna destroy everyone because only she decides her destiny. 50 seconds later, she's destroyed before pressing the button.
- This Way to Certain Death: Argai falls through a trapdoor which leads him to a room filled with bones.
- Time Bomb: By deactivating the prison, the alarm for self-destruction of F.107 is triggered and everyone has 30 minutes to escape.
- Time Travel: This series plays with a lot of tropes in this category. And there's an added twist in time travel in this series, not seen in any other time travel fiction: When a character is killed in another time than his own, he does not die, he just comes back to his own time. This is why it's necessary for the heroes to defeat Queen Orial in 2075, and for Queen Orial to kill Argaï in 1250.
- True Love's Kiss: After receiving the antidote, Angele needs to be kissed by Argai in order to wake up.
- Villainous Breakdown: Happens several times to the Dark Queen.
- Water Wake-up: In Chapter XXII, Argai splashed Barnaby with water in order to wake him up.
- You Have Failed Me: The Dark Queen's minions often fail her. At least one minion in the past did everything she asked for but couldn't find the macguffin before she arrives...so the Queen has her killed.
- You Monster!: The Dark Queen gets called a monster by the characters at some points.
