Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?

Happy Great Old Ones? Sure!

You are a Magical Girl, and you're currently feeding pancakes to an Eldritchian Horror sitting on your lap.

—Magical Girl Noir Quest

It's big. It's scary. It's horrible. It is so much more powerful than you that it could kill you without thinking, or maybe just by thinking. And it has just invited you to have a nice cup of tea and a bun. Or a nice chat. For whatever reason, be it sinister and self serving or just misunderstood, the big horrible scary thingy treats you in a friendly manner.

This can lead to some troubling questions of etiquette. While traditionally one uses the fork on the far left for salad, it's frequently unclear to the mortal in this situation how this rule is modified by Alien Geometries. And what does a mind warped beyond human understanding consider tasteful dinner conversation? These problems are, of course, magnified by the fact that among Eldritch Abominations it is almost universally considered an appropriate response to breaches of etiquette to reach across the table (hypocritical as that may seem) and eat one's dining companion.

But to make things easier: they usually prefer two cubes of sugar, and a drop of virgin blood for creamer.

Similar to Pals with Jesus, but here we have the added weirdness that the creature seems scary. Related to No, Mr. Bond, I Expect You to Dine and Did Mom Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?, but here the other party seems genuinely friendly. Often used to show the Villain is Affably Evil or an Anti-Villain. May be part of an Enemy Mine. If things go beyond this, you may be in Did You Just Romance Cthulhu? territory. A distant relative of Go-Karting with Bowser. If you didn't know it was a Cosmic Horror until after you had tea, it's ... a twisted subversion of God Was My Co-Pilot?

However, an Eldritch Abomination is not necessarily evil. There's every chance that the creature is misunderstood and actually friendly. Even if it doesn't follow any known laws of reality, it's not a certainty that it's evil.

Sometimes happens in Lovecraft Lite.

Examples of Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu? include:

Anime and Manga

  • In Shakugan no Shana, Shana's god-like master; Alastor the Flame of Heaven; contacts Yuji's mother via phone. She has no idea who he is besides Shana's "legal guardian" and a deep voice on the other line. They have a rather relaxed discussion on child-rearing techniques together; as Shana and Yuji goggle at what's going on.
  • While she was created for the express purpose of bypassing the Mind Screw parts of this trope, Nagato Yuki's teatime with Kyon in The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi still qualifies.
  • Shinigami, the God of Death from Soul Eater. He was never a villain, but he used to have a frightening voice and appearance. Since, he has switched to a comical one with a stylized skull mask and giant cartoon hands to avoid scaring the children at the school he started.
    • This becomes slightly more appropriate, and funny, considering he really is an Eldritch Abomination personifying the 'madness of the rule of law' yet currently hangs out in his very pleasant-looking (or weird, it's like the sky..indoors, with windows) office holding the odd tea party with his Living Weapon for company.
  • In Slayers Next, Lina sits down and eats with the Big Bad as he makes an offer to her.
    • And almost became good friends with the bigger one. As his kind goes, Xellos is benevolent in his own way—volunteers information when it's not against his orders (or his lulz) and even saved humans when didn't need to. He is only one notch below Dark Lords themselves in raw power, and the worst the humans get when he messes with them just for fun? A little frustration and indirect property damage. While in an encounter with lowliest Monster humans are lucky if they don't have their heads bitten off... slowly.
  • In their first meeting with Father, the Big Bad of Fullmetal Alchemist, he is friendly to Ed and his friends and heals their injuries. This isn't because he's a nice guy; it's because he is so powerful that there's nothing they could do to stop him and because (as he tells them) he sees them as useful pawns for carrying out his evil plan.
    • Ironically, at the exact same time, Mustang is actually having tea with Wrath, while the homunculus explains some Backstory and outlines a little of the Evil Plan. Same as Father, Wrath has no interest in killing Mustang since he is a valuable human sacrifice, and pretty much just wants to lay things out on the table so Mustang will get enough answers to placate him for the time being and will also understand just how screwed he is and presumably back off. Which of course doesn't really work.
  • Negi Springfield of Mahou Sensei Negima actually nurses (the super evil 6 million dollar bounty vampire-mage that wants to suck him bone-dry (and rule the universe or something like that) A.K.A.) Evangeline A.K. McDowell back to health after she gets the flu. In her cute little cottage full of stuffed animals while her robot maid serves tea. This is immediately after she faints while attempting to attack him. It's somewhat subverted in that she's easily powerful enough to kick his ass, but a combination of Power Limiter and the aforementioned flu keep her from actually doing it. In fact after she gets better she tells him he can go but changes her mind and decides to attack him anyway.
    • She changes her mind because Negi was spying on her dreams of Negi's father, the Thousand Master, on whom Eva has a crush. Needless to say, the fact that the 10-year-old son of her crush was invading her mental privacy was NOT amusing to her.
    • Negi lampshades the absurdity of the situation, saying that he came expecting to fight her and ended up caring for her instead.
    • He also had tea with Fate. And then got into a fight with him over their beverages of choice. Negi, being British, prefers tea, while Fate, who according to what is likely a cover story comes from Istanbul, sticks with coffee.
      • Fate is remarkably fond of this, really. During his fight with Rakan, he ended it by warping reality so that they were at a tea party. Rakan tries to punch, bam, he's suddenly holding a cuppa and wearing a formal suit. It isn't "did I just have tea with Cthulhu, but "did Cthulhu just stop fighting and force me into a tea party"?
  • This would lead to a Crowning Moment of Awesome for Hercule/Mr.Satan in Dragon Ball, when he hangs out with the world-destroying Buu long enough to convince him that being nice to people is more fun than killing them.
  • Ronnie Sukiart from Baccano!! is a nigh-omnipotent alchemist-cum-Eldritch Abomination with a true form that has freaked out even the most jaded of men. Isaac and Miria introduce him to dominoes. Serious Business ensues.
  • In an episode of Gintama, an alien moves in next door that is huge, green-skinned, red-eyed, horned, fanged, and generally scary. He also sells flowers, which the gang refuses to believe. They then spend the episode trying to figure out his dastardly plan, while he tries to be neighborly. And he does literally invite them in for tea.
  • Gungrave when Blood War (seriously, that's his name) has a smoke with Brandon Heat and offers him the chance to join him on 'his battlefield,' having been impressed earlier by Brandon's skills. The whole scene, with Brandon's protégé hitman being held at gunpoint by necrolised humans, (basically nigh-on invincible zombies) while Blood War attempts to be all chummy, is quite surreal.
  • In the manga version of Spiral, Eyes Rutherford, at this point of the 'good guys', and Kanone, who's just spent several volumes attempting to kill almost everyone else, single-handedly sent the whole main cast to hospital in the process, twice in Eyes' case, and got out of it all without a scratch... have a merry tea party. Then again they're both Blade Children and both seem to think it's a perfectly normal thing to do.
  • Angol Moa, the wielder of the planet-busting Lucifer Spear in Keroro Gunsou and the one prophesied to destroy the world, is far too kindhearted (or dippy depending on how you look at it) to actually do so.
    • Notably, she is only too dippy to go ahead with it because upon landing she hit her head, giving her what is referred to in-story as Kakkarot Syndrome.
      • That and she missed the deadline for the Earth smashing thanks to said landing. It helps her childhood friend Keroro also asked her not to destroy it anyway.
  • Umineko no Naku Koro ni has this happening as the story unfolds. The villains and the hero are passing time in a small tea room... while watching the brutal events surrounding the island murders unfold. This is especially the case with Beatrice, as she starts to develop friendship with Battler (most apparent in EP3), and her demon pals show up and make the small tea room quite lively at times.
  • According to Nanoha A's', the only thing that can stop a world-destroying Book of Darkness is a good ol' hug applied directly to its Anthropomorphic Personification and a new name. Though several tons of ass-kicking applied to its Enemy Without helped too.
  • Hild's debut in Ah! My Goddess. She's the ruler of all demons, her appearance in the anime is given ominous music to odd to her ominous entrance, and then she goes and hugs her daughter Urd. Skuld is terrified of her while Belldandy explains to Keichi how strong Hild is, and then Hild hugs Belldandy and Skuld, and then she flirts with Keichi. Oh, she also turns out to be Hot as Hell, but that's expected.
  • Pet Shop of Horrors takes this trope and runs with it. The protagonists: an ancient Chinese being and his menagerie of monsters and mythical beasts, and an LA cop who wants to arrest him for gruesome murders. They drink tea, eat strawberry cake, and provide Ho Yay.
  • Shinji takes a bath with and has a sleepover with Cthulhu in Neon Genesis Evangelion episode 24: Knockin' On Heaven's Door. It leads to a lot of Ho Yay.
    • Averted in the manga, where Shinji finds Cthulhu a little too creepy to do anything but keep at arm's length.
  • Possible example in Shaman King, where Big Bad Hao has coffee with his younger brother, the main protagonist, Yoh. Although Yoh himself takes this lightly, the people around him are shocked that he can act so casually with him.
  • In High School DxD, Odin decides to pay a visit to Ise's house while drinking tea and leering at Rias' and Akeno's breasts. Then later on, Opfus, known as the Infinite One also hangs out at Ise's home.

Comic Books

  • Frequent in the works of Neil Gaiman, but especially The Sandman. The eponymous character is equally skilled at being a good host and delivering (usually undeserved) fates worse than death.
    • And speaking of Death, she's the Sandman's sister in Gaiman's work, and one of the nicest, most likable people you will ever meet, even if it's not for a while.
      • In The Books of Magic Death and Tim Hunter have a day at the beach talking about life in general, being friends. This while in the process of collecting one of Tim's friends whose life really had ended. Death's very nice, but she does have a job to do, after all.
  • During the Justice League International period of Justice League of America, this happened to Oberon when he inadvertently ended up barging in Darkseid's inner chambers, and finding himself alone with the Dark God of Apokolips... who promptly suggested he join him for a cup and talk about good old times while he got a new change of clothes.
  • In one issue of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, during the "Wolves At The Gate" arc, Xander and Renee go to seek Dracula's help, and have afternoon tea with him. Indeed, by this point it is hinted that almost all of Xander's relationship with Dracula is based on this.
    • Heck, it was even shown that after Season 7 but before 8 Xander was brainwashed by him again and they basically were best friends (they kept each other company and Xander even taught him how to ride a motorcycle). When Buffy and two of the now activated Slayers showed up to rescue him Dracula at first wouldn't let him go but decided he belonged with his friends and they had an, to quote the wiki, "emotional farewell". After Xander left he basically acted like Spike after he lost Dru, but even more pathetic, losing his special powers and becoming a drunken loser not even wanting to kill anymore.
    • Illyria doesn't seem to have mastered human etiquette (or have any desire to), but you can have a chat with her, and she's saved the world at least once already. Considering that she's very literally a Cthuloid horror (albeit currently residing in the shell of a human body), that's saying something.
      • And there was the time she played video games with Drogyn. Neither of them really got it.
    • Practically ALL of the Big Bads in Buffy/ Angel. Obviously the Mayor is the prime example. He is very cordial, only losing it after Faith, whom he loved like a daughter, fell into a coma. All of Wolfram and Hart abides by politeness, but make no mistakes about their ambitions. Even all of the Black Circle could be hospitable and polite at times. Even the First Evil and the evil preacher Caleb popped in just to chat in a friendly way under truce. They always let you know that the next time they came there would be blood, though. I think that is why no one singled out the Angel/ Buffy Bads on this one. In a way they all fit.
  • In the comic Ontot Kukkulat ("Hollow Hills") by Finnish graphic novelist Petri Hiltunen (sadly untranslated to English) the climax is set when the protagonists seek to conquer back an ancient troll-fort from an Eldritch Abomination Gorai that took it over centuries ago. At the last minute they decide to try negotiating before the attack. Just then Gorai appears in all its Gigerian glory, and remarks how that pretty thought saved their lives, gives an encouraging, if bizarre monologue, and leaves the planet Earth for good.
  • The Death Jr. series also features Death Sr., who looks upon his work in a purely impersonal way and is happily married and with a son in his personal life.
    • It should be noticed that neither Death Sr. nor D.J. are really evil or villainous, it's just that, well, they're the incarnations of death.
  • Cable and Deadpool: Deadpool, Cannonball and Siryn (after some dimension hopping adventures looking for Cable) wind up on a farm in the House of M temp reality. There, evil geneticist Mr Sinister invites them to have a home-cooked roast dinner with him and his genetically engineered baby (baby Cable) at his farm house.
    • Something of a subversion, in that the food was poisoned.
  • The first issue of Sovereign Seven has Darkseid drop by for coffee, much to the shock and awe of the main characters.
    • Technically, he dropped by to recover something that was stolen from him (and, possibly, the X-Men); it just ended up with him having tea.

Film

Barbossa: I'm curious, after killing me, what is it you're planning on doing next?

  • In Return to Oz, Dorothy and her companions eventually confront the Nome King, a shapeshifting earth elemental that all but doubles as the mountain that contains his Supervillain Lair. As it happens, he's also a polite and warmhearted host who provides Dorothy with a meal of limestone pie and hot molten silver—up until the conditions of his game are revealed.
  • According to Monsters, Inc.., the Abominable Snowman is actually a very welcoming host, who often wonders why he wasn't known as the 'Adorable Snowman', or the 'Agreeable Snowman'. He also happens to be very good at making lemon snowcones.
    • OSTENSIBLY lemon...
    • The whole movie is built on this trope, since it's about bedtime monsters just trying to get by in life.
      • Plus the general monster population thinks human children are as deadly as children imagine monsters to be, so it applies to both sides of the story.
  • Another one from Pixar: in Finding Nemo, Bruce the 'vegetarian' shark and his friends try and live by the motto "Fish are friends, not food." They invite their fishy friends to meetings dedicated to changing the negative shark image, and actually become good friends of Dory and Marlin after a while.
    • They just have to take care that none of them smells blood...
  • The short animated film of the children's book Lost and Found features a boy and a penguin rowing to the South Pole. Near their goal, they are shipwrecked in a storm - or at least their boat is inverted, they are unconscious on top of it, and their luggage is floating next to them in the water. Cue horrific octopus that rises from the depths and plucks them up on its tentacles... then shakes out the boat and deposits all neatly within before pushing it on its way and waving goodbye. Given that R'lyeh is allegedly near the South Pole, this seems an appropriate fit, especially since we never see the entire octopus...
  • On a similar subject, The Legend of the Titanic. Honestly, once you get past the insult to tragic historical events, the Author Tract, the biological errors and implausibility, the idea of a giant octopus single-handedly (multi-tentacledly?) preventing one of the most massive ships ever designed from sinking is vaguely awesome.

Literature

  • Discworld examples:
    • In The Light Fantastic, Rincewind goes to the house of Death to rescue Twoflower, only to find him teaching the Horsemen of the Aprocalypse how to play bridge.
    • This is Death in general. His house even has a kitchen and dining room, so the rare living guests can have a nice meal, if they don't mind the weird dimensions, the monochrome-ness of the place, and Albert's cooking.
    • Also used in Guards! Guards!, when the dragon King invites the Guild leaders to a banquet to discuss policies of the new regime. Subverted in that, while the dragon doesn't harm anyone at the time, all of the food provided to the guests is extremely fattening.
    • In Soul Music, Susan is playing the role of Death (to the extent that the Rite of Ashk'Ente summoned her instead of him). The wizards don't take her seriously, so she attempts a Deathly glare. Ridcully invites her to breakfast.
    • Tshup Aklathep, Infernal Star Toad with A Million Young. It does not mean to harm its victims, it just shows them pictures of its children until their brains implode or they commit suicide, whichever happens first.
  • A slightly odd (read TOTALLY FREAKING WEIRD) version of this is the dinner scene at the end of the book version of Hannibal. To be fair, Hannibal had most of his victims for dinner. Heh. He’s also polite and smiling, even after he eviscerates you.
    • A similar scene opened Red Dragon; Hannibal is having a dinner party, possibly feeding his guests people. Later his friend Will Graham shows up to ask for advice and when Hannibal steps out, he looks at a book and realizes Hannibal's the killer he's been looking for.
  • In Lucius Shepard's vampire detective novel The Golden, the protagonist meets the Patriarch, father of all the vampires. He's a charming, whimsical, Byronic character, except when his disguise slips.
  • In The Sword of Truth Kahlan goes to a certain meddling witch with an intention to kill her if she so much as looks at her the wrong way. Of course, the witch offers her tea. Later she also remarks that Kahlan didn't even consider the possibility of poison in the tea.
  • In The Dresden Files Harry goes to meet Mother Winter and Mother Summer, entities of such power that they could destroy him with a stray thought. They act like archetypal concerned grandmas and Harry has a pleasant chat with them.
    • Then there's the time Harry goes to a party run by a vampire who's just trying to find an excuse to kill him and has peaceful encounters with a lot of powerful baddies—one of which is Ferrovax, a dragon wearing legionnaire armor he's kept around from his time in Rome and who makes Harry feel like his head is gonna explode by saying just a part of his true name.
    • Harry literally has tea with Odin in Changes.
    • In Small Favour, Harry has a pleasant conversation with Eldest Gruff, one of Summer's enforcers, who has killed three members of the Senior Council by himself and took down a Denarian with one shot.
  • They're not exactly having tea but circumstances in The Gathering Storm conspire to have Rand al'Thor and Ishamael have a fairly friendly chat. You know, in comparison to their other chats.
  • Happens in a Lovecraft story: Randolph Carter, hero of "The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath", gets to have a chat with Nyarlathotep in person. Of course it shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone that, even though the Crawling Chaos is outwardly friendly, he hardly has Carter's best interests in mind.
    • And then in "Through The Gates of the Silver Key", it's Yog-Sothoth.
  • Quite literally in And Another Thing... of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series: Hillman Hunter, director of the planet Nano, when he is holding interviews with many deities to find a new god for everybody to worship. Hilarity Ensues when Hillman Hunter realizes Cthulhu is (sort-of) dead and Cthulhu curses him off when he is forced to leave; he writes on the application "NO CALLBACK".
    • In the original series, Trillian and Arthur have a nice friendly chat with the pulverized, space-borne remains of Hactar, a supercomputer that wants to destroy the Universe. He even creates an image of a tea table for them, although it's just a trick of the light.
  • Sethra Lavode from Steven Brust's Dragaera books has power that rivals or perhaps exceeds the gods, was around when humanity was just beginning to discover this thing called "civilization", and is the most powerful sorcerer in a world of extremely powerful sorcerers. She likes to have her friend Vlad over for a nice dinner from time to time.
  • In The Malazan Book of the Fallen, Tehol Beddict's servant is an Elder God in disguise. Making this less "Did you just have tea with Cthulhu?" and more "Were you just served tea by Cthulhu?"
  • The Maximum Ride books have the Krelp, enormous sea cucumber-like things the size of planes, which are actually pretty beneficial to the heroes.
  • In the Infocom novel Wishbringer, our hero accidentally wanders into the lair of that bloodthirsty scourge of the Zork universe, the grue...where he has a pleasant chat with the grue in question, who even provides some helpful directions. And then later on he brings by his enemies as an afternoon snack. Who says it doesn't pay to be polite to adventurers? This is absolutely not the case in the game itself, where your best options are to provide it with a warm blanket and raid its fridge.
  • Dracula. Sure, there was clearly something creepy going on, but it takes a while before Jonathan actually decides he wants to leave, and the Count remains friendly around him right up until he starts attempting escape.
  • As quoted above, the Shel Silverstein poem "Monsters I've Met."
  • In A Study in Emerald the protagonists have a friendly meeting with Queen Victoria, who speaks perfectly good English with a slight buzzing noise, and is kind enough to heal the narrator's injury.
  • In Star Trek: Gemworld, the Eldritch Abomination responsible for the Negative Space Wedgie threatening the planet Gemworld is actually responsive to diplomacy. Deanna Troi is able to negotiate a peace with it, convincing the intelligence to call off its attack.
  • The climax of Geoph Essex's Lovely Assistant elicits a Did We Just Have a Chat With Cthulhu? moment that even includes a clean white tablecloth and maybe a waiter (heard but not seen). Though it's all just an abstract psychic language that Jenny and the creature use to communicate, and the creature isn't really Cthulhu at all.
  • In Magic Bleeds, book 4 of the Kate Daniels series, the heroine has Erra, the Plaguebringer of Babylonian myth, in her house for tea. The myth is wrong and he is a she. And Kate knows her just a bit too well.
  • Toby's friendship with the Luidaeg in the October Daye novels.
  • Dave Barry once wrote a gag based on this. If women made computer games, instead of killing everything you saw you could ask the bug-eyed monster where the exit is. Surprised that you don't want to kill it, the monster would take you home, serve you snacks, and start showing you pictures of its larvae.

Live-Action TV

  • Kronos at the end of the Doctor Who serial The Time Monster.
    • The encounter with the White Guardian at the opening of The Ribos Operation.
  • Lost nearly does this, back when there was enough mystery surrounding Henry Gale to make Kate's beach-side breakfast with him scary enough to be an example of this.
    • And in the sixth season, you have to assume that our heroes have had at least one casual meal with the Smoke Monster during their journey with him. In fact, even if they haven't had tea with the guy, they seem to forget what exactly he could turn into at any given moment and still strike up normal conversations with him as if he actually is John Locke.
  • Death has a knack for doing this on Supernatural (mostly with Dean), since he has a love for fast food.
  • The Year Without a Santa Claus After being denied help by the cackling anthropomorphic Embodiment of Cold, and threatened by the furious and vengeful Embodiment of Heat, our heroes are left with no options but to beg an audience of the Mightiest of Them All, the Personification of the Natural Forces of the Very Universe, Mother Nature. And She gives them all a nice little snack.
  • In the fourth season of Farscape, Crichton is introduced to Einstein, a representative of the mysterious Ancients. It's demonstrated that Einstein is capable of controlling time, manipulating wormholes, and creating strange and eldritch pocket dimensions for use as meeting grounds; as such, after being warned that Einstein may have to kill him, Crichton is a little bit surprised when Einstein uses all his godlike powers to provide a lecture on wormhole physics.
  • Sylar, the Arch Enemy of Heroes, is extremely fond of pulling this. Whether or not it devolved into Alone with the Psycho depends on his mood at the time.
  • In Reaper the Devil tends to pop in and out to Sam whenever there's an escaped soul, or want to talk to Sam.

Mythology

  • Fairy tales from several different cultures all seem to include one myth in which a horrible baby-eating hag, Death itself, or some similar beast either adopts a foundling or takes a mentor role (such as "Death as Godfather"), and generally proves benevolent to the child.

Religion

  • Ananta Shesha, lord of all nagas, according to the Bhagavata Purana, is a gigantic serpent with a thousand heads. So huge that it can hold all the planets in its hoods. Not only can it spew venom, but it also breathes fire. It's also one of the few beings that will remain after the destruction of the universe. While that sounds like a fearsome Eldritch Abomination, Shesha is a good deity. It prefers to sing and praise the glories of Vishnu, who sleeps on its back, rather than cause destruction with its venom and fire breath.
    • Many Hindu gods have forms that look less than comfortable and still are helpful to mortals—at least, ones approaching them properly. Kali once saw a toddler lying on a wasteland she just made... picked up and began to breast-feed him. Yes, right in that form, usually depicted with some blood dripping from the tongue stuck out between fangs.
  • Christianity. One good look at God kills you stone dead because no evil, no matter how small, can exist in His presence. One of the basic tenets of the religion is to have a personal, one-on-one relationship with Him, and this is the basis of prayers; it's meant to be this trope exactly. In fact, Jesus was A Form You Are Comfortable With/Heroic Sacrifice so this could happen. It's also generally agreed God's got a great sense of humor.
    • Angels are said to look terrifying: vaguely humanoid creatures with four heads, hooved feet and six wings (the classic "angel" picture was actually inspired by Valkyries). They're OK chaps that spend the first few minutes trying to calm down the mortal they appear to (they invariably introduce themselves with something on the lines of "Be Not Afraid"); when they're sent as messengers rather than guardians.
      • Some of the more powerful forms of angels have to actively hide their complete form with a glamor-like ability, because seeing their true, complete form will rip the soul out of any living being and send it directly to heaven.
  • Islam has more or less the exact same thing going with angels, which are, if anything, even more Eldritch than the ones described in the Bible. The second sura (chapter) of The Quran to be revealed (Al-Muddathir--"The Cloaked One"—Sura 74 in the modern order) starts with the words of God trying to comfort Muhammad (the aforementioned "cloaked one") upon the sight of the angel Gabriel, who was delivering the message on God's behalf. (To be a bit flippant, it basically goes, "Oh, it's just an angel, so stop cowering behind that cloak of yours and spread the Word!")

Tabletop Games

  • Much of the action of the Tabletop RPG Nobilis can revolve around this. (The Player Characters, of course, also have god-like powers relative to mortals and other lesser beings.)
    • "Having tea with the moon" is Fan-Speak among Nobilisers for campaigns that center on quirky social interaction.
  • In GURPS, the Weirdness Magnet drawback means that your character is well... a Weirdness Magnet. This doesn't necessarily put you in danger. The horrible eldritch entities may find you to devour the incredibly rare artifact you didn't know was concealed inside you. Or they may invite you over for tea. Entertainingly, the points you gain from taking the Weirdness Magnet disadvantage is exactly enough to purchase the 'Unfazeable' Advantage, which means that your character isn't fazed by this sort of thing.
  • Occasionally happens in Exalted, where many of the greatest threats to creation are bound by various treaties and/or wish to project an image of respectability for at least the time being. Nobody wants to explain why they turned down an invitation to a little soiree hosted by Eye and Seven Despairs at which Ligier will be in attendance.
    • And if anyone's likely to experience this, it's the Eclipse Caste. Thanks to old pacts sealed back in the First Age, they can engage in diplomatic negotiations with gods, elementals, ghosts, demons and The Fair Folk, all under a banner of peace. This can lead to things like attending a dance party with five of Malfeas's component souls, joining the Raksha for high tea with a side of maiden's tears, or enjoying a trip to the theater with a bloodthirsty god of serial murder.
      • Considering the power level Solar Exalted can bring, who is taking the role of Cthulhu?
  • Can happen in Changeling: The Lost; The Fair Folk may turn you into a vicious hunting dog, or they may just want you to join them for a tea party that lasts for seven centuries.
    • And if you come back with the intention of kicking their teeth in? Their reaction runs the gamut from crushing you to death to welcoming you back with open arms and presents for their star pupil. Occasionally, both.
    • Sometimes, they can become human enough to actually have tea with you as a person, which can make interactions with them retroactively tea with Cthulhu.

Video Games

  • The hero becomes bizarre friends with the Baba Yaga in Quest for Glory IV. Provided he brings her taste of food (bones, monster goo, etc) each visit; she'll tolerate him in her hut and even chat. Even her talking skull guard on her gate is weirded out. He has to BRING FOOD; though, or she'll eat him.
    • The skull, in this case, is totally justified in being weirded out, because to say Baba Yaga is not a nice person severely underestimates her capacity for ill will. In some versions of the traditional fable "Vasilisa the Brave", every last one of Baba Yaga's minions lets Vasilisa go free during her escape attempt, because she showed each one a gesture of kindness as she left, which was baffling and refreshing to beings that had previously only known Baba Yaga's cruelty.
  • Orz from Star Control II. Funny, friendly,[1] chatty, rather warlike and a bit creepy [2] Eldritch Abomination.[3] You are help Orz with *parties*.

Orz: Perhaps after the biggest *party* you will understanding the Orz and I can showing you other *levels*.

    • Note that the Orz, if their Berserk Button isn't pushed, are the easiest allies to recruit.
  • While Elizabeth from Persona 3 isn't evil, she is still one of the most deadly foes in the game and the motivations of her and Igor are left highly ambiguous. However in the Updated Rerelease, the protagonist has the delightful option of escorting the princess of darkness around town on several innocent dates where Elizabeth's lack of knowledge on human social behaviour causes hilarity to ensue. For bonus points, you even get to sleep with her, and unlike the other romance options, there is no doubt whatsoever what happened during the Fade to Black.
    • Her brother Theodore from the PSP version is just as dangerous in combat, and possibly even more of a Fish Out of Water when it comes to dealing with human society.
    • And an interesting variation: when the Appriser of Death realizes who he really is and what he will cause, and shares this information with his friends—friends with whom he had eaten ramen with, peeped on girls with, attended classes with, and enjoyed hot baths with at an onsen during a school trip. It hits them all pretty hard with the implications of all the time they've spent together. And even then, although he can willingly change back and forth into his true form, he will still sit quietly and converse with his friends about the ultimate outcome.
  • The Heartless of Kingdom Hearts are bloodthirsty creatures of id that want to consume the hearts of everything...and the White Mushrooms just want to play charades. Also, a minor plot point has Jack trying to get them to help out with Halloween, and they seem sort of into it until Sora and Company show up.
    • That would be because they had been lobotomized by the resident mad scientist.
    • Another example is how willing members of The Villainous Organization XIII are to chat with the Protagonist. Clever banter and light-hearted taunting included!
  • "Tea Parties" are practically a euphemism for the Defeat Means Friendship in Touhou. Considering as most of the Big Bads are either actual Gods, or millennium-old monsters of unstoppable power who just happen to be cute girls, you wind up with an almost literal occurrence of this trope in at least one ending of any given game.
  • The auto-name of the Squamous Gibberer familiar from Kingdom of Loathing always starts with Cth-, the familiar specific equipment are lozenges that increase the mucus in your throat in order to help with evil muttering, and it makes chat messages show up that basically say it is an evil elder god of some sort, but that doesn't stop it from healing you, protecting you from enemy attacks, and giving you extra adventures after using it (chances to do stuff basically).
  • Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines: Wait a minute, did you just get in a cab with motherfucking Caine? Yes. Yes, you did. The dialogue if you're playing a Malkavian confirms it.
  • In Sam & Max: The Devil's Playhouse Episode 4, Doctor Norrington turns out to be a highly depowered aspect of Yog-Soggoth. He's a little snippy towards the main characters, but is mostly a mellow, amiable creature who just wants to return to his home dimension.
  • Halfway through Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, Kain meets Vorador, a vampire many thousands of years old and credited with being the very first of the "human" vampires, creating the Soul Reaver, killing his way through most of the Circle of Nine and kicking Malek the Paladin's ass. He promptly invites Kain to dinner, and over goblets of freshly-drained blood, tells one of his many war stories; he even gives Kain a magic ring to summon him should the need arise.
  • Shin Megami Tensei: Recruiting Olympus Mons is par the course, but Raidou Kuzunoha VS King Abaddon actually addresses the ramifications, especially when demons jump in during negotiations. For example, Hilarity Ensues when the Horsemen of the Apocalypse try to hold a normal conversation only for the other party to flee in terror at the first opportunity.
  • Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy, Laguna fights the Cloud of Darkness, and the cutscene after the battle has her suddenly back off when Laguna takes a moment to admire her "appearance". What follows is a civil and normal conversation where Laguna explains his reasons for fighting for Cosmos, and the Cloud of Darkness tells him where the Manikins are coming from because she's interested in how someone with his attitude towards the war will handle the information. She's an Eldritch Abomination Omnicidal Maniac, but she and Laguna actually get along fine once they take a minute to stop fighting.
  • In the Mass Effect series, Shepard has the option to do this twice to a Rachni Queen, aka the Last of Their Kind of a race of insect aliens that were responsible for the last major war in Galactic history, but are in reality not so bad since they were being manipulated by the Bigger Bad of the Reapers. If so, an Asari who's been in contact with them delivers a personal message from the Queen herself thanking you and offering her support against the Reapers, and if you play your cards right she keeps her word and helps you build The Crucible in the third game, leading to an amusing incident mentioned in an email where the Rachni's presence freaks out most of the staff as yet another example of this trope. Or Shepard can choose to Shoot / Kick the Dog and kill her both times.
    • Also occurs if Shepard is able to makes peace with the Geth and the Quarians. Shepard gets an email about some of the Crucible staff freaking out when they notice Geth Juggernauts aboard the station, before they get the call informing them of what's going on. One guard had to awkwardly apologise to the Geth for the hole they'd shot through it.

Web Comics

  • Happens in Gunnerkrigg Court with Antimony Carver (a twelve-year-old girl) and Coyote (an ancient trickster god of incredible power), who act friendly and seem to more or less treat each other as equals. Word of God holds that one of the reasons Coyote likes Antimony is because she doesn't hesitate to shrug him off. To her ethereal sight he looks much like someone peering into a fishbowl would—if that fishbowl were our three-dimensional space... and she has no problems riding on his back or playing a prank on her teacher together.
  • In The Order of the Stick, the paladin O-Chul made friends with the Monster in the Darkness (generally suspected to be a young Eldritch Abomination on little if any evidence). He taught it about honor, courage, and logic (via the board game Go), and the Monster traded dinners with him (being a prisoner, O-Chul was fed gruel; the Monster, a valued ally to the villains, was fed beef stew, which he happily shared in exchange for gruel).
    • They even have a tea party together!
      • In an earlier, one time instance, Elan meets up with a Mind Flayer Illithid Psionic danger Squid Thingy and the two end up playing a friendly game of Scrabble. In this case, Elan, being Elan didn't have anything of interest to the creature, and so he was in no danger.
  • This Drowtales scene. Mel is Misunderstood Loner with a Heart of Gold / Crazy Cat Lady, not the villain, but this qualifies because she is scary and because Ariel was told she was a monstrous rapist. Mostly because she IS monstrous, but Ariel is her daughter, whose kidnapping by Mel's mother caused her to go psycho
  • In Sluggy Freelance, Torg is kidnapped by an Arachnaseuse, a spider-like monster from the Dimension of Pain that ... gives him a relaxing massage.

Arachnaseuse: How do you feel now, mortal spec of meat-flesh?
Torg: Terrific! Wow, my neck can, like, turn 45 degrees more than before! That was awesome!
Arachnaseuse: Thank you, mortal spec of meat-flesh!

    • There's also a whole dimension (an alternative version of the Dimension of Pain) where the demons capture you and serve you delicious food. Mind you, the weight gained from the demon food never comes off, and you'll be enslaved for eternity if you can't pay.
  • PS238 has a few. Malphast's mother has this effect on people. She's a high-ranking member of the Legions Of Hell Chaos, but is perfectly nice and friendly and very keen on helping her son's friends, though sometimes in return for a 'harmless' favour or two. The Lords of both Chaos and Order, while You Cannot Grasp the True Form, are pretty nice entities too -- though of course they use mortals as pieces for Divine Chessboard all the time and then some more. The low-end minions are much more troublesome, however.
  • Death and The Maiden is about Mercedes, a young woman who has a Will They or Won't They? relationship with Death.
  • Hello Cthulhu.
  • Death was one of Ship's old teachers in Count Your Sheep, from whose expert tutelage Ship gets much of his prodigious sedative skill. In one flashback, Death pokes fun at Ship because they've run into one another while Ship is on a coffee run.
  • User Friendly: Several of the Main Cast, and with Cthulhu himself nonetheless! He still maintains his malevolence.
  • The toddler-ized Rose from Torchwood Babiez ends up having a tea party with Satan. Of course, this is partially due to the fact that she doesn't seem to know it's Satan.
  • Played with in 8-Bit Theater. Garland - actually a nice guy at heart - has captured the Light Warriors, with help from his supposed victim. He offers the Light Warriors cookies to make their stay in his dungeon more enjoyable, and the misconception that he's so powerful and evil he can afford to be nice scares them more than anything "evil" he could have done.
  • The Shadowchild in Digger is, technically, a soul-eating demon. But it's so gosh-darned cute. It wants to be your friend!
    • There also the People, cannibalistic bipedal hyenas who consider any non-hyena sentient fair-game when hunting, who turn out to mostly be very nice people once you get to know them, especially Ed, who after all does start off trying to eat Digger, and a few comics latter serves her tea. And the Statue of Ganesh: although infinitely compassionate Digger instinctively feels all gods are dangerous and best not meddled with but is eventually forced to grudgingly admit the Statue of Ganesh is a good guy. Ursula Vernon likes this trope. A lot.
      • Digger's unease is probably at least somewhat assuaged by the statue's own insistence that whatever his mystical properties might be, he is not, in fact, the actual god Ganesh, and while Ganesh is probably a very nice guy himself, he can't say for sure because he's just a statue who's never met the guy.
  • In Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures, here , we see a very scary creature suddenly turn all friendly, and offer cookies.
    • If you've read a few comics before and after, you find out that the "scary" was all actually an act of kindness. Yes, it's that twisted.
  • At the end of Disc I of Homestuck, You, the reader, have one of these with Doc Scratch. He offers you candy.
  • This and Did You Just Romance Cthulhu? are the entire point of Ow, My Sanity. On one memorable occasion, Dave GM's a game of Call of Cthulhu (tabletop game) played by actual Lovecraftian entities.
  • Most encounters with supernatural beings in Wapsi Square go like this. Monica alone has sat down for tea and cookies with a sphinx, discussed careers with one of the other two gorgons from the Medusa myth (the gorgon turned out to be Monica's biggest fan), and gone clubbing with the entities responsible for the destruction of an ancient, advanced civilization.

Web Original

  • The New York Magician, Michel, winds up talking to various Elders, Cthulhu among them. (A djinn friend of his actually works for Cthulhu.)
  • This Star Wars spoof plays with the trope a bit.
  • One of Ursula Vernon's themes is Happy Cthulhu. Maybe it's his day off. Or maybe it's because R'lyeh rose right off the coast of Jamaica. Jä, cthulhu ftaghn!
  • Sara from Whateley is probably this trope incarnate. As an Eldritch Abomination, she by all rights should destroy the Earth. Thanks to Screw Destiny, she's a main star. (And she does have people meet her in her room and talk.)
    • Her dad can be even worse, since he's PRACTICING, and an active Demon Lord of Lust and Perversion.
  • The concept of Cephalopod Tea Party blog is rather close to this.
  • In the Felarya manga (warning: virtually every page contains nudity), Crisis, the giant man-eating naga (top half woman, bottom half snake), will occasionally befriend a human.
    • Veeeeerrrrrry occasionally, though. 99.9% of the time, she'll just eat you.
  • Possibly meets Chess with Death in "Naught or Cross" by Fredrik K.T. Andersson, where

An certain Ancient One, finding it very hard to think in just two dimensions...

The Blood Red King: Sit down, sit down... if I had wanted to kill you, your entrails would already be hanging from the ceiling fans. Here... have a cup. It's Indonesian. Cream? Sugar?"

Western Animation

  • The Shadow Hog in Invader Zim is a god for everything porcine. It is large, creepy, and powerful... and it becomes fast friends with Gaz.
  • Bender of Futurama has a nice, intelligent discussion. With God. Or the remains of a satellite that collided with God, creating a sentient nebula. Either one is possible.
    • Forget Bender. Morbo and Lrrrr are both prime examples of this, especially with Morbo and his blond ditz co-host. "This tea is exquisite... AND I WILL DESTROY IT!!!!!!!!" "(giggle) Oh, you."
  • While not technically a god, on the kids' show Arthur, there was an episode where Francine got a new and terrifying neighbour who was made out to be akin to Satan. By the end of the episode, though, Francine has made friends with the new neighbour, even having a literal tea party.
  • The South Park episode "Mysterion Rises" has Eric Cartman/Coon befriending the Dread Lord Cthulhu himself, with a simultaneously awesome and terrifying Totoro-esque journey.
    • They also hung out with Satan's son.
    • Hell, Satan even threw himself a big Halloween party.
  • In one episode of Aladdin, Al and company try to protect a city from Zemhir the Destroyer, a giant rhino-like being who comes to destroy a city every night. Genie finds Zemhir's lair, goes in... and ends up having a pleasant conversation him over tea, as he's really a nice guy whose "rampages" are caused by magic dancing shoes he's wearing.
  • Avatar: The Last Airbender features a friendly Lion Turtle.
  • The Darkness from the Fairly Oddparents "Wishology" special turns out to be a harmless Misunderstood Loner with a Heart of Gold.
  • Star Trek: The Animated Series episode "Once Upon A Planet". Several characters end up roasting marshmallows with the dragon that was trying to kill them a few minutes earlier.
  • In Fish Hooks, the main characters fall in a shark tanks and one of the sharks says, "I'm having you for dinner!" Cut to everyone sitting down to a nice dinner with the sharks.
  • In SpongeBob SquarePants the Flying Dutchman has to crash in Spongebobs house till his ghost ship gets fixed.

Oh hello! I do so love having visitors. Tea? But of course! By the way... you have such lovely eyes, could I keep them? Oh, you say you need them? All right, you can keep your eyes. I didn't realize you humans can't get them replaced.

  1. ↑ if you don't ask them about the Androsynth again
  2. ↑ Androsynth are not here. Orz are here.
  3. ↑ Orz are not *many bubbles* , Orz is one with many *fingers*
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