Hey Flist: What's your favorite television quote?

[timepiececlock]

I know you can't pick just one.

But give me the first tv quote that pops into your mind, one of your eternal favorites, and what makes it stand out.

I'll put mine in the comments too.

Comments

BTVS, episode "Fool For Love"

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

"You think we're dancing?"
"That's all we've ever done."

I could write whole essays about why I love this piece of dialogue exchange so much, but I won't bore you too long. It's just one of the most strangely romantic and sexy moments between these two characters, and its so charged with energy that's half aggression and have sexuality, and you don't know which half is which. The quote has a three way metaphor overlap: violence as a dance, violence as sex, and dance as sex as violence. Not only does the quote neat-as-you-please sum up several seasons of interactions between the two speakers, but it sets the stage for the rest of their interaction in the end of season 5 and season 6. It's part of why I've always liked the Buffy/Spike romance better than the Buffy/Angel or Buffy/Riley romances: it felt the truest to her nature as the Slayer and her personality, something that was both dark and light and it's impossible to draw the line between sexuality as a Slayer and sexuality as a woman, and devotion or love as something dark or something light, because there is no line and it's all the same and whether they're fighting or fucking or arguing or saving they're always dancing around each other.

On top of that, the quote is just hot. Hot and tightly worded and very precise; says a lot in only a few words. Brevity at its best. Instantly re-frames all their previous scenes together in a new context.

He said it mostly to goad her, but it rang true and that's why I love it so much.

Re: BTVS, episode "Fool For Love"

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Word.

That is one of the best episodes of Buffy, ever.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

"...and now, one of your idiot pilots is acting like a child and refusing to take her meds. So she either says, 'yes, sir' and obeys a direct order or you smack her in the mouth and you drag her sorry ass down to sickbay and you make her take those pills." *pause* *they hold the tension**two characters crack up* Second person: "Well, I'm glad I don't work for you." First person, breathless, "Damn right you're glad."

Also: "I walk, I talk, I shop, I sneeze. I'm going to be a fireman when the floods roll back."

And: "Yessir, Captain Tightpants."

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

I've always loved the bizarre and contradictory imagery of "I'm going to be a fireman when the floods roll back."

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Yes. It's gorgeous in it's incomprehesible poetry.

[clodia-risa.livejournal.com]

Another favorite of mine is now "My gods, what about Ellen?"

[faoiltiamatani.livejournal.com]

"There's red ships and green ships but there's no ships like partnerships."

[stardreemer.livejournal.com]

Kind of long, but:

"The more things change, the more they stay the same. I'm not sure who the first person was who said that. Probably Shakespeare. Or maybe Sting. But at the moment, it's the sentence that best explains my tragic flaw, my inability to change. I don't think I'm alone in this. The more I get to know other people, the more I realize it's kind of everyone's flaw. Staying exactly the same for as long as possible, standing perfectly still... It feels safer somehow. And if you are suffering, at least the pain is familiar. Because if you took that leap of faith, went outside the box, did something unexpected... Who knows what other pain might be out there, waiting for you. Chances are it could be even worse. So you maintain the status quo. Choose the road already traveled and it doesn't seem that bad. Not as far as flaws go. You're not a drug addict. You're not killing anyone... Except maybe yourself a little. When we finally do change, I don't think it happens like an earthquake or an explosion, where all of a sudden we're like this different person. I think it's smaller than that. The kind of thing most people wouldn't even notice unless they looked at us really close. Which, thank God, they never do. But you notice it. Inside you that change feels like a world of difference. And you hope this is it. This is the person you get to be forever... that you'll never have to change again."

[flickums.livejournal.com]

I can't remember word for word the entire speech, but the words "I've seen the best and the worst of you" from Spike to Buffy always impressed me.

Mostly because Spike is probably the first person to acknowledge her as a human, not a slayer and not a hot piece of ass as Angel and Xander did in the earlier seasons. He's seen her do some amazing and some disgusting things (the latter mostly being aimed at him personally) and yet he loves her, all sides of her.

In a show occasionally hit with Mary Sues and in which there are seemingly no ugly people (and the few that are serve as comic relief), that line stuck with me because it's Spike pointing out that Buffy isn't the superhero she sometimes thinks she is and feels people want her to be.

She is a human who does human things and he loves the woman, not the slayer.

The monorail episode of The Simpsons

[flutingfrenzy.livejournal.com]

"Homer, I've got someone here who says he can help."
"Is it Batman?"
"No. He's a scientist."
"Batman's a scientist."
"It's not Batman!"

Because it never stops being funny.

[clodia-risa.livejournal.com]

"Now get the hell out of our galaxy!"

John Sheridan, Babylon 5.