Belgariad/Funny

• When Belgarath remarks on Polgara's sympathy to Mandorallen's love life:

Belgarath: Polgara spent too many years associating with the Wacite Arends. They were as bad or worse than the Mimbrates. You can't wallow in that kind of sentimentality for that long without some of it rubbing off. Fortunately it hasn't totally blotted out her good sense. She's only occasionally girlish and gushy. If you can avoid her during those seizures, it's almost as if there were nothing wrong with her."

• After Garion manages to make the rock move with the Will and the Word by saying "Push!" we have this exchange:

Belgarath: Push?
Garion: You said to say push.
Belgarath: I said to push. I didn't say to say push.
Garion: It went over. What difference does it make what word I used?
Belgarath: It's a question of style. Push sounds so--so babyish. After all, Garion, we do have a certain dignity to maintain. If we go around saying 'push' or 'flop' or things like that, no one's ever going to take us seriously.

• • This one prefers another rock-related scene, when Garion leaps in to help Belgarath stop rocks being rolled down on the party.

Belgarath: Did I ask for help? Do I look like an invalid?
Garion: There's another rock coming.
Belgarath: Don't change the subject. I think you're getting above yourself, young man.
Garion: Grandfather! * telekinetically hurls rock away*
Belgarath: Tacky, Garion, very tacky. You don't have to throw them all the way to Prolgu, you know. Stop trying to show off... fine, as long as you're here anyway, but stick to your own rocks. You throw me off-balance.
Garion: I just need a little practice.
Belgarath: You need instruction in etiquette, too. You don't just leap in with help; it's very bad form.
Garion: Another rock coming. Do you want to get it, or shall I?
Belgarath: Don't get snippy, young man.

• • In the Malloreon, Garion has matured and learned a bit more about the style of sorcery. Then he goes and creates a door by saying the mystical Word "Door." Much to Beldin's horror.
    • Later on, when he and 'Zakath are "competing" in a tourney, he tries to reinforce his lance so it won't break. He's distracted and can't think of a suitable word, so he says, "make it that way."
      • Which ends with it working too well, as in his lance was throwing opponents out of their saddles without even touching them.
  • From the Malloreon, after Garion has stolen the boat at Lake Karand (and argued with Silk as to whether it was stealing or just borrowing, and fielded complaints about the boat being ugly):

Belgarath (speaking of the Grolim they've captured): What did you hit him with?
Garion: My fist.
Belgarath: Use an axe next time, you almost killed him!
Garion (speaking to everyone): Does anyone else have any complaints? Why don't we just pile them all up right now?

• • Ce'Nedra's Big No definitely counts - even more so because Garion initially had no idea what caused it.
  • For this exchange to make sense, keep in mind the following: Angaraks worship Torak. In the first series, Belgarion KILLED Torak. Belgarion is at a gala on Angarak soil.

Angarak Noble: "Torak's Beard, I-" (said as a curse)
Belgarion: "He didn't have one."
Angarak Noble: "Pardon me?"
Belgarion: "Torak. He didn't have a beard."
Angarak Noble: (turns pale) "You mean the stories are true?"

• • Another extremely funny moment happens when Ce'Nedra goes into labor. Garion's brain clicks to "Off". By the time Polgara arrives, he's about to start breaking furniture to throw into the fireplace. Fortunately, she recognizes the problem and sends him away until the business is finished.
    • Killing a god was a big deal, but becoming a father? Brain-breaker. Subverted with the salvation of reality. When his daughter is born, he gathers his son and goes back to sleep at the other end of the castle until it's over.
  • The group needs to get information from a simple worker. Silk's not available, so Durnik takes the helm. His first move is to order Belgarath around like a servant.
  • A beautiful one happens, right at the very end of the Mallorean. Geran is a bored two-year-old and Garion wants to keep him entertained... so he hands his son the Orb of Aldur, the blue gem that eats Gods for breakfast.
    • And then, when he takes the Orb away from Geran, the Orb grumbles in Garion's ear for the next hour.

Beldin: That's really very disturbing, Garion. You've turned the most powerful object in the universe into a child's plaything.

• • I recall one exchange from the Belgariad: An assassin who had been tailing the party and trying to kill them for most of the series up to this point attempted to lunge at and kill Silk... while they were standing near the parapets of a city built on a mountaintop. The consequences were predictable.
    • The two of them actually fought for several moments Neo/Agent Smith style, with Garion the only witness.

Belgarath, upon reaching the site of the fray:Where is he?
Silk: Last I saw... trying to learn to fly. (a loud crash of a body hitting rocks far, far below) He wasn't doing it very well.
Belgarath: Maybe it'll come to him in time
Silk: He doesn't really have all that much time (a second and final impact echoes from below) Does bouncing count?
Belgarath: I don't think so.
Silk: Then I'd say he didn't learn in time starts to walk away, staring up at the stars What an absolutely beautiful night!

• • Also, there's exactly one week between Lelldorin's summons to Riva and him actually getting there. His explanation of what happened during that week (he fled the country with his Mimbrate girlfriend-turned-wife) to Garion is one of the series' funnier moments, reaching Crowning status halfway through with "the priest had it coming, though..."
    • Considering that Arendia was a homage to English/French Romance (in the traditional sense), it's no surprise that he managed that in only a week. It both plays straight and mocks it at the same time.
  • Garion meets a commoner in a Mallorean tavern:

Commoner: Watch yer fate.
Garion: (alarmed) Fate?
Commoner: Fate. Them thangs you got on the end of yer laigs.

• • Queen Layla's is shared with the Sendarian royal children when they all work together to reduce the Tolnedran Ambassador to tears of frustration as he tries to persuade her to allow the Tolnedrans to take over the "chore" of administering the main port of the country. He assumes that since she's a woman, she's stupid, so she puts on an astonishing imitation of The Ditz. Then two of the children interrupt with an argument about a string of beads, and the youngest prince caps it off with a jam-smeared face—that Layla wipes clean with the treaty.
  • Mandorallen manages one that lasts for roughly 2 pages in the twenty-seventh chapter of the Seeress of Kell, the funniest bit for this troper being when he 'misses' the floor when casting his gauntlet in challenge and 'accidentally' hits an offensive young baron in the face.
  • Also worthy of note is Velvet's response to Garion's epic There Was a Door moment.

Velvet: After all, there are so many fragile things around. You know, windows, doors, people, the city of Rak Hagga...

• • Near the end of the Malloreon, a Mimbrate aristocrat insults Lelldorin (of Asturia, the most bitter enemy of Mimbre), who is also the friend of Mandorallen (also a Mimbrate). Mandorallen's response qualifies for a crowning moment of Awesome as well as Funny:

Mandorallen: My lord, I find thy face apelike and thy form misshapen. Thy beard, moreover, is an offense against decency, resembling more closely the scabrous fur which doth decorate the hinder portion of a mongrel dog than a proper adornment for a human face. Is it possible that thy mother, seized by some wild lechery, did dally at some time past with a randy goat?

• • • The entire exchange continues for another page and a half.
• When Belgarath and Silk return from their sidequest to rejoin the group, Belgarath has a mysteriously broken arm and Silk is sporting a slightly malicious grin. Efforts to find out what transpired are hampered by Silk breaking down in hysterical laughter when Belgarath finally grudgingly admits that a tree fell on him. Polgara is distinctly unimpressed.
• At the very end of Seeress of Kell, after everything is over, Silk and Garion are chatting about what they're going to do now that the course of the world is back on track. (paraphrasing)

Silk: So what are you going to do now.
Garion: I'm going to be very busy being a father. The Prophecy said to expect a large amount of daughters.
Silk: Garion, there comes a time when women are past childbearing age.
Garion: Do you remember Xbel? (a youthful dryad (tree nymph) Do you think she's past childbearing age?
Silk: Of course not.
Garion: Silk, Xbel is over 300 years old. Trees live a long time you know. Ce'Nedra's a dryad too.
Silk: Well then maybe you'll get too old to . . . (looks at Belgarath who had his kids at the age of 4000) Oh my! I guess you do have a bit of a problem.

• Every instance of a character, particularly Barak, telling Mandorallen that he REALLY needs to sort out his nickname of "The Bastard of Vo Mandor" in The Belgariad ALWAYS manages to crack This Troper up.

Barak: You're going to have to do something about that one of these days.
Mandorallen: It would seem so.

• • Another good one is when Mandorallen recovers from his fear and starts kicking ass but less recklessly...for a few pages, anyway. Barak and every other character has commented on this.

Mandorallen: They cannot be over a hundred. Shall we attack them?
Barak: One of these days you and I are going to have to have a long talk about a few things.

• • • And this exchange:

Mandorallen: Then we must teach them to fear our trail and avoid it.
Barak: You're falling back into your old habits.
Mandorallan: (after a Curb Stomp Battle) We must seek them out. Better to destroy them now.
Barak: He's definitely backsliding.

• • • And here:

Mandorallen: All else failing, we must of necessity resort to main force. (starts putting on his armor)
Barak: You're backsliding again.

• Silk has been at the Market and basically ripping off everyone there. Despite making an extraordinary profit, he is moody and irritated because he can't tell who "won" in a trade for a perfume bottle that he doesn't know the value of. He takes it anyway because he didn't want the merchant to know he doesn't know its value. To solve the dilemma, he gives the bottle to Pogara who calls it a "princely gift". Silk couldn't figure out if she was serious or not and stomps away, muttering about Rivans and their deceptiveness.
• When the group gets captured...again, Silk picks the locks of the jail cells, complaining about how it's the rust's fault it's taking such a long time. Then, in a moment of necessity, Belgarath turns around and opens a lock with magic

Silk: When we've got some leisure, I'll want to talk to you about that.
Belgarath: You were having such a good time with the locks that I didn't want to interfere.

• When Garion starts experimenting with his new powers and manage to bury himself in the ground up to the neck. After unsuccessfully sending his pet colt to look for help (got distracted by a particular patch of grass), he was stuck there for half the day before Silk and Hettar finds him.

Silk: How in the world did you manage to do that?
Garion: I don't want to talk about it.
Hettar: He probably can do many things that we can't. The thing I can't understand is why he'd want to do it.
Silk: I'm positive he has a good reason for it.
Hettar Do you think we should ask him?
Silk: It's probably very complicated. I'm sure simple men like you and me wouldn't be able to understand it.
Hettar: Do you suppose he's finished with whatever it is he's doing?
Silk: We could ask him, I suppose.
Hettar: I wouldn't want to disturb him, it could be very important.
Silk: It almost has to be.
Garion: Will you please get me out of here?!

• In this exchange, we realize how stupid it is to insult a Cherek:

Barak: I am Barak, Earl of Trellheim, kinsman to King Anheg of Cherek, and I see that certain nobles in Arendia have even fewer manners than they have brains.
Sir Haldorin: The Lords of Arendia are not impressed by the self-bestowed titles of the pig-sty kingdoms of the north.
Barak: I find your words offensive, friend.
Haldorin: And I find thine ape face and scraggly beard amusing.
Barak: (proceeds to effortlessly knock the knight unconscious with one hit) Would anyone else like to comment about my beard?

• Belgarion forcing Mandorallen and Nerina to get over their wangst and marrying them literally at swordpoint.
  • With a doily on her head.
• The first royal decree of King Fundor the Magnificent: "I prithee, good sirs, have a care for thine finery. I have just manured the field you are kneeling in."
• Polgara attempting to scare Sadi into submission. Sadi, however, is stoned out of his mind and thinks her projection is "pretty".