As You Know / Webcomics

• In Champions of Far'aus, in the beginning of the story, this is how the announcer for the Champions Tournament tells the audience in the stadium the rules for the tournament fights.
• The Order of the Stick:
  • Spoofed/lampshaded repeatedly. At one point, Elan compliments Roy for working the exposition into his angry tirade so smoothly. (He also cries at weddings, but only when there's really good exposition.) Another time, Roy complains about Elan saying things they already know, but he's actually aware that they're supposed to recap and was only complaining about it to help by bringing in more detail. ("I know, it was my idea and I did it yesterday.")
  • In Strip 149, Redcloak says "Remind me why I'm doing this again," and the Monster in the Darkness, being Literal-Minded, tells him and the audience why he's doing what he's doing.
  • Terrifyingly subverted in Strip 1139, regarding how the world is supposed to contain the Snarl. Thor's following line reveals that the Snarl has destroyed countless worlds in the past, not just one.
    Thor: Anyway, after the first world was lost, we got together to make a second world. One that would serve both as a home for mortals as well as a dimensional prison for the Snarl, which was still rampaging around empty space. We put that world's gravestone over there.
• Lampshaded in Starslip Crisis:
  Admiral: I know what it is! There was no reason for you to say that out loud!
• Darths & Droids:
  • The character playing R2-D2 gives an awesome recap in this strip.
  • Darths and Droids is absolutely full of this stuff, as one of the characters or NPCs regularly recaps the convoluted plot resulting from the players' actions.
  • In episode 1571 and onwards, the Game Master gives one of the Player Characters a note to read aloud that represents his character saying stuff about the campaign background all the characters already know but the players don't.
  • Episode 1835 comments on using this to say "your character would definitely know this person even if you didn't."
  • Episode 1956 features a complicated version, the character expositing thinks Jim's character Xasha already knows this, but Jim definitely doesn't, and it's entirely possible Xasha doesn't either.
• Jokes about recaps are one of the most common running themes on Sluggy Freelance: an As You Know is never played straight. Some jokes played on the concept include:
  • "Quit recapping and keep your eyes on the road!"
  • The legacy of the ancient Greek island of Wrekappe, home of the primeval festival that eventually became America's Thanksgiving, is upheld by the Recappers, warriors dressed as pilgrims who will recap at the slightest opportunity.
  • "But Sweral, you quit your recapping habit years ago!"
  • A different kind of example, but still a subversion: In "Years of Yarncraft" (See: World of Warcraft), Torg is in the game fighting an NPC enemy who talks mostly in character (even though he knows he's an NPC) and tries to start talking about the backstory that brought Torg to fight him. Torg interrupts him and says he doesn't care about the story, only the loot.
  • A fairly straight but till humorous example is found in "Chapter 21: The Hunt" when a bunch of action (involving a demon at a Halloween costume party) is skipped over with such an exposition:
  "What did I miss?"
  "The Red Ranger got the demon by the face with the hand of his robot arm, but the demon got him in the face with a squid-on-a-stick. Then the demon grabbed the human taco by the leg which started a tug of war with the dragon-decoration that sprung to life to save him. Then, as the generic super hero tried to pry the squid tentacles off Riff's face, they all collapsed on each other and are stuck in this big knot of bodies. Oh, and the demon hunter's narrating things from the ceiling fan."
  "Well, I sure picked the wrong time to take a leak."
• A footnote in Intragalactic lampshades this here.
  "... this is more or less the equivalent of a customs inspector lecturing people on what an orange is."
• Goblins:
  • Played for drama and done very well in this strip.
  • Goblins also has "As you know Bob comic strips" consisting of nothing but info-dumps.
  • Psimax delivers one to his version of Kin here.
• Lampshaded in one of Dinosaur Comics' many Alternate Universe panels:
  "Wow, personal jetpacks are so compact, efficient, safe and easy to control!"
  "Uh, obviously I already know that, we live in the same universe! Duhhh..."
• As you know, Irregular Webcomic! hangs a lampshade on its use of tropes, and then gives us a Shout-Out in the Alt Text. And they've done it again.
• Lampshaded in this Antihero for Hire: "I'm just making sure we're on the same page."
• Played for Laughs in a Precocious strip, aptly titled "Relive those memories".
• Head Alien from the Walkyverse loves this. Lampshaded in one strip.
  Alien: Hey, Boss? We know all this.
  Head Alien: Hush. I enjoy this.
• El Goonish Shive: One of the immortals following Elliot recaps the plot points related to them. When her companion calls her on it, she points out that it helps compensate for their Easy Amnesia.
• Lampshaded in this Slightly Damned strip.
  "My master spared your life and allowed your 'children' to remain in hell as long as you acted as The Grim Reaper."
  "Yes, I remember. I also remember your punishment for abandoning your post. He decapitated, cursed and ordered you to help fulfill my promise in disguise.
  "Rub it in, why don't you?"
  "Sorry, I thought we were supposed to explain things we already knew to each other."
• Exterminatus Now: Sometimes it's because your co-conspirators just weren't paying attention.
• The B-Movie Comic does it as unsubtly as possible in the fourth movie. In the very first scene after the credits.
• Homestuck: Used very tongue-in-cheekly in the Act 6 Act 3 Intermission walkaround. Through the first part of the flash, Meenah, who has been missing for a really long time, has been playing something of The Watson to the other characters, allowing them to fill her (and the audience) in on what has happened in the meantime. At the end of the first part, however, Aranea starts explaining at length about things that she does know but the audience doesn't. Why? Because Aranea is an extremely wordy writer and a very dedicated Ms Exposition, so much so that she offers to pay Meenah to listen to her lecture. Meenah agrees reluctantly, though not without complaining about the pointlessness of the whole thing.
• Used in Hanna Is Not a Boy's Name, though it's really more a case of Don't Explain the Joke:
  Hanna: Whoa. She just called you a pussy. Sorry, dude.
  Conrad: YES, Mr. Cross, I know. I was there.
• ShiftyLook's Katamari does this twice with the Future!Prince. First he feels obligated to explain to his present self how their cousins like to hang out on the Space Mushroom from the original game, then later summarizes the plot of Katamari Forever while explaining how the RoboKing pulled a Face–Heel Turn afterwards.
• The Adventures of Dr. McNinja:
  • Slightly parodically done in "A Cumberland Ninja in King Radical's Court":
  "You're familiar with Cumberland's zombie defense system, put in place by the late mayor Chuck Goodrich?"
  "Yes, the city retrofitted every single building with defense equipment, and networked them all together so that the mayor's office could activate them all at once should it have to."
  "Yes, I know that. I was just asking if you knew that."
  "I know that."
  • Inverted in "All the King's Dirtbikes and All the King's Men", where King Radical tells his newly arrived friend what's been going on, and the friend really doesn't know all that, but it ends up sounding like he's really addressing the audience while knowing they do know unless they just jumped in.
• In Schlock Mercenary, Tagon pretends to provide a slice of exposition for the crew, who already know all that. He's not recapping for the benefit of the audience, however, as Pi seems to think: it's a neat little ploy to renegotiate their contract with the Gavs.
  "If the walls don't have ears, I'll eat your pills."
  "Ohh, paranoia that pays off on cue. It's giving me chills."
• Kill Six Billion Demons:
  • "Wielder of Names" starts with an explanation of how various species of intelligent beings were created. This turns out to be one angel talking to another. To the readers, it's partly new information (at least if they haven't read the additional material) and partly recap, but in-universe, it's a kind of "This is why the universe is corrupt and we must do something about it" speech.
  • When our heroine Allison agrees to a drinking contest with a demon, she gets a glowing spot on her wrist. This calls forth this comment from a bystander (who probably doesn't believe she's who she says she is):
  A devil's kiss. A parasitic piece of the pure hot black flame. Granter of the art. Mark of a contract. But surely you know this, Magister Usagi.
• Sandra and Woo: In the comic "Dropping the bomb", Larisa reveals her Wolfram syndrome to the audience by mentioning it to Sandra, in a tone that implies Sandra already knows.
• Star Mares endeavors to only go into expository mode when it's information that at least one of the other characters in the scene doesn't know, but it's still phrased in such a way as to make it obvious that it's for the benefit of the audience.
• Beneath the Clouds starts an Exposition Diagram page with the remark:
  Don't you know that illness is caused by wandering spirits of the dead?
• Stand Still, Stay Silent introduces its version of The Plague by having a character worried about his grandmother catching it reminded of its symptoms by a friend of his. Already knowing the symptoms is the reason he's worried in the first place.
• Tails Gets Trolled has one shadowy figure say to another, "Father, what should we do? you are the leader of the trolls!" While establishing the addressee's role and relationship to the speaker is necessary, there were better ways to provide that information.
• Tower of God: In episode 41, Quant takes time to explain more about how the "Lighthouses" used by Light Bearers in the Tower function, enabling the viewers to understand the tricks he and Khun are playing with them.
  "Now, since you don't even know about your own job, let me give you a brief class on Light Bearers."
• Grrl Power: Discussed in the Author's Note for the Feb 10th, 2014 strip, and how it's mainly for the audience's benefit. With a link back to this page, even.
• Used frequently by Bill Holbrook in Kevin & Kell, likely inspired by Peanuts and other newspaper comic artists, given his origins in that field.
• Quentyn Quinn, Space Ranger: After giving an extensive exposition on the purpose and function of the Rangers to his A.I. companion Omnibus, Quentin points out that Omnibus should know all that already. Omnibus explains that while he does possess extensive information archives, as a young A.I. he doesn't yet know how to correlate and cross-reference information in the way that organic minds do instinctively.
• In this Housepets! strip, characters keep asking Tarot to remind them how she convinced them to board a flight to Egypt, so she can recap it for the reader. She eventually realises there may be a problem with the plane's oxygen levels.
• In Magic Hat from Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, while a woman is frantically searching for a magic hat with her husband so she can save her mother from execution, she recounts a lengthly explanation of the situation to her husband. He replies with "Don't you think I know that?!"