Awesome / Asterix

• Years before the start of the series, Vercingetorix had to surrender to Julius Caesar; the war was lost, and Gaul was conquered, but not broken, and the Great Chief of the Gauls delivered one final moment of defiance by throwing his weapons down ''on'' Caesar's feet rather than in front of them, leaving the Roman emperor hobbling off in pain even in his moment of triumph. Tellingly, in The Mansion Of The Gods, Caesar recalls Vercingetorix kneeling before him in defeat, implying that Caesar doesn't want to accept the fact that he couldn't truly break his enemy, or at least not acknowledge it publically.
• Cleopatra calling Caesar out on his sabotage of the palace construction. Complete with one of the biggest of all Big Entrances taken straight out of Cleopatra.
  • During her entrance Cleopatra claims she was in such a hurry she left her palace without even changing her clothes-and she is indeed wearing the same (relatively) modest clothes and jewels she had when she got the warning. If this is her in a hurry, what would have she done if she had enough time to prepare?
• Dogmatix, drinking a life-saving drip of magic potion in the Asterix in Britain movie. Bulldog-asskicking ensues.
• In Asterix and Obelix All at Sea, when the Romans capture a de-powered, de-aged Obelix, the dog fights back to the point the Romans have to beat him with a spear.
• Obelix (while de-aged and without his Super-Strength in Asterix and Obelix All at Sea) sees Asterix get knocked out and about to be thrown to the sharks. This results in him growing back to adult size and strength. Ass-kicking ensues.
• In Asterix and the Soothsayer, when Prolix the Soothsayer decides he wants to read Dogmatix's entrails to fortell the future, Obelix has one thing to say:
  THE FIRST PERSON TO TOUCH DOGMATIX GETS A BIFF UP THE HOOTER!
• In Asterix and the Roman Agent and The Mansions of the Gods, when the villagers get over their quarrels and proceed to kick ass. There's something deeply satisfying in watching the bunch getting their differences fixed by busting fools. In the former, after completely annihilating all four Roman camps at once (and the Pirates, who were just passing by), they give Tortuous, the man who caused conflicts between the villagers, his just deserts: they act like he was their double agent, with gifts, cheers and all. Cue the Roman General sending him back to Rome with the accusation of high treason.
• Speaking of Tortuous, the man demonstrates his innate ability to sow discord by making all of Caesar's advisors argue and fight with each other. How does he do it? By entering the room without saying a word. He then follows it up with this:
  Tortuous: Gentlemen, please! I wouldn't like to be the cause of any disagreement. If, in the past, you have taken advantage of Caesar's gullibility...
  Caesar: GULLIBLE, ME???
  (Tortous smiles smugly at Caesar, who reels back in shock)
  Caesar: ...You're great!
• Whenever Cacofonix gets invited to the big feast at the end of the book, instead of being hogtied as always. Because it always happens if the bard did something utterly badass, intentionally or not. Just to name a few examples:
  • In Asterix and the Normans, it is Cacofonix' singing that finally teaches the Normans what it is to be afraid, and also inspires the first display of bravery by Vitalstatistix' nephew Justforkix (who actually enjoys Cacofonix' singing). Not only does Cacofonix attend the banquet, he gives a musical performance while his usual tormentor, Fulliautomatix, is the one tied to the tree with parsley stuffed in his ears.
  • In The Mansions of the Gods, Asterix and Obelix cause one of the couples in the eponymous block of flats to leave, then give the flat to Cacofonix. His singing causes the entire block to empty; when the legionaries from Aquarium are moved in and Cacofonix is forcibly evicted, the Gauls use this "slight" as an excuse to demolish the entire building. Cacofonix is invited to the banquet as a show of gratitude for his role in the scheme.
  • While he isn't invited in the banquet and gets kidnapped in Asterix the Gladiator, he still saves himself from the lions because of his bad singing.
  • It also should be noted that when he DOES get to sit at the table, apart from the Early-Installment Weirdness case in Asterix the Gaul and when he thinks the other Gauls burned his house in Asterix and the Falling Sky he doesn't even try to sing and is generally well-behaved.
• Obelix's birthday in Obelix and Co. They got him a whole camp full of brand new Romans, for Jupiter's sake. While they stood in the background singing "Happy Birthday", too!
• Asterix and the Laurel Wreath:
  • A Roman slave has our heroes thrown into prison for attempted murder of Caesar, then winds up "ab-so-lute-ly blotto" in a pub. Asterix waking him up, paired with his reaction, is the stuff of legends.
  • Asterix's speech during his and Obelix's trial. Fed up with both his lawyer and the prosecutor's antics (as both lawmen are just there to show off their oratory skills), Asterix delivers an awesome speech that brings everybody in the courtroom to tears. What really puts this over the top is that Asterix was trying to get himself and Obelix declared guilty, specifically so they could get thrown into the arena when Caesar was in attendance.
  • The guys were sent to Rome to steal Caesar's laurel wreath, so that Vitalstatistix can use it for cooking. They succeed.
  • Vitalstatistix finally giving his insufferable brother-in-law a well-deserved Megaton Punch at the end feast, when he's served said laurel wreath in a stew, and the jackass complains that it's overcooked and the meat isn't good enough, even though it's spiced with something so impossible to obtain it might as well be from another planet.
• In Asterix and Caesar's Gift, the page image was from when a drunken veteran Roman tries to take over the village by threatening the innkeeper whom he sold it to. Asterix enters the fray and fights the veteran. He defeats him without using his potion, using only his sword.
  • Later, Orthopaedix, the aforementioned innkeeper, returns the gift by smashing it on the veteran's head. The drunk tried to sell out his more competent fellow veteran, which not only didn't work, but meant the other veteran gave him a second beating, showing who was the better legionnaire of the two.
• In Asterix and the Secret Weapon, after the female legion proves to be more competent than their male counterparts and exploit the fact the gauls won't punch them, they find out there is a man who can do so. Cacofonix forces them all to flee with his singing.
• In Asterix and the Actress Obelix punches Asterix in a temper and Getafix gives Asterix some magic potion, thus causing Asterix to go completely insane.
• Asterix and the Cauldron ends with the pirates, of all people, enjoying an unexpected windfall when the eponymous cauldron filled with Whosemoralsarelastix's hoard of sestertii falls into their ship. Beforehand, there was also a swordfight between Asterix and Whosemoralsarelastix, with the former facing his first actually hard opponent, only for karma to beat the latter in an epic fashion, as even the pirates deserved the money more than he did.
• Vitalstatistix gets one in Asterix and the Big Fight. Challenged to a duel by a traitorous Gaul chief with both of their villages at stake, Vitalstatistix finds himself in the fight WITHOUT the magic potion, against a bigger, very strong opponent, as Getafix has suffered memory loss. As such, he spends the beginning and middle of the fight fleeing from his opponent. When Vitalstatistix learns that Getafix has recovered and there's magic potion to go around, the chief of the indomitable Gauls instantly wins the fight by One-Hit KO. Without pausing to drink said potion. One could argue that he was also so easily able to send his opponent flying is because the latter was exhausted from constantly chasing after him. But that in itself is a sheer testimony to Vitalstatistix's badassery. Thanks to some earlier training with running, he was able to constantly outrun his opponent without being so much as being visibly winded or tired when Asterix brings him the good news. His much fitter-looking, constantly training, and more imposing opponent, on the other hand, is slowly worn down, and can barely speak or stand. Vitalstatistix won by sheer endurance, stamina, and using his at-the-time lone advantage against his opponent the moment his morale got high. Though still doesn't change the fact that he did punch the bigger man out of the ring hard with no potion — a testament to his strength. Rank Scales with Asskicking indeed!
• In Asterix and the Magic Carpet, Cacofonix brought a drought to end, saving a princess in the process, by singing. The princess was of India and it was due time for the Monsoon, only it wasn't coming. Short story, unless the rain would come of its own volition, the princess would be sacrificed, leaving the way open for a certain evil figure to ascend the throne. But the Indians had heard of a man whose voice could cause rain. In other words, by being a lousy musician, Cacofonix is already a legendary musician. And when he sings this time, everyone enjoys it with glee.
  • Asterix pulls of what is probably his all-time greatest Big Damn Heroes moment when he arrives at literally the last second to save the beautiful Princess Orinjade from having her head cut off by a giant axe-wielding executioner.
  Crowd: Five! Four! Three! Two! One!
  Asterix: ZERO! *TCHACK*
• Also a funny moment, but in Asterix in Corsica, the corrupt, and oppressive Roman leader was ready to abandon his soldiers to the Corsican rebels. When the soldiers find out, they decide to bring him to the front lines. Literally, they put him directly in front.
• Many linguists today date the Proto-Germanic sound shift known as Grimm's law (p, t, k > f, þ, x; b, d, g > p, t, k; bh, dh, gh > b, d, g) no earlier than 100 BC. If this is correct, it is a CMOA that Getafix never says the wrong word by accident in Asterix and the Goths. He'd have had to learn the language all over again, after all.
• In Asterix and Obelix All at Sea, the initial fight has Asterix deliver a Badass Boast. When a Roman tells him he is just doing a parade, Asterix replies that only the Gauls do parades outside of their village.
• Asterix and the Chariot Race:
  • Mount Vesuvius erupts, sending a huge boulder crashing onto the road. Obélix, who's had it up to here with the deplorable state of Roman roads, grabs the boulder and throws it right back, plugging the volcano so effectively the narration states it won't be heard about until Pompeii gets buried.
  • When the man using the alias of Coronavirus quits the race for honor reasons, Caesar pulls off a very risky gambit: take up Coronavirus' costume and secretly enter the race himself(!). While this almost worked, he only lost due to the bad road, you have to give props to Caesar for having even thought of this solution at all. For a Non-Action Big Bad, it's impressive how he nearly beat the Gauls personally.
• Once in a while, the Roman army reminds everyone there's a reason if, even in-universe, the Undefeatable Little Village is seen with such awe, especially when they use siege engines:
  • During the entire series there's reminders of just how complete the Roman victory at Alesia had been through the sheer hopelessness the Gaulish survivors feel. One of said survivors is Vitalstatistix, and even he can't conceive any victory against Rome beyond his village's continued resistance.
  • In Asterix the Gladiator, the gladiator trainer can actually avoid and counterpunch Obelix, and only the magic potion is the reason why the latter doesn't get hurt. The two gauls actually have to think outside the box to beat him.
  • In Asterix and Cleopatra Caesar has his troops try and arrest Asterix and Obelix, and when they fail he has them demonstrate that, if they wanted, they could wipe out their village in an afternoon by catapults and all, as not even Obelix' strength can stop projectiles from a hundred catapults.
    • This one gets even better in Asterix and Son, when Brutus' men burn down the village from distance with fire from ballistae and we discover why the Roman garrisons never tried: they knew fully well the Gauls would just beat them up harder than usual and rebuild, and they weren't stupid enough to get a beating for nothing.
  • In Asterix in Britain the Britons initially resist the Romans... Then they realize the Britons will drop anything at five o' clock to get a spot of hot water, and wipe out their army by attacking at that precise hour.
  • In Asterix the Legionary Asterix, after enrolling in the Roman Army to rescue Panacea's fiancé, is at his first meal in the army and quips that the mightiest an army is, the nastier is the food, done on purpose to keep the soldiers angry. Then he tastes it... And discovers just how powerful Rome is: the food is so bad that Obelix can't eat it... But the Roman soldiers can.
  • In Asterix in Spain they conquer the last Iberian strongholds (except one in a very inaccessible place)... As an afterthought of their civil war, and for no other reason they already had troops in place and Caesar was there.
  • In Asterix in Belgium, Vitalstatix and the Belgian chief engage in a contest to have their Gaulish tribe be declared the bravest by Caesar, and do so by destroying Roman camps. Obviously Caesar shows up for war, the Belgians, realizing they just escalated, decide to face the Romans alone... And find themselves at the wrong end of a Curb-Stomp Battle at the hands of a single reinforced legion (reinforced because Caesar brought with him a court from another legion plus his bodyguard). Had the added court not stumbled on Vitalstatix, Asterix and Obelix while they were preparing to finish off the Belgians from behind, thus getting the three Gauls with Super-Strength involved, the Romans would have annihilated the entire fighting force of the Belgians in a single afternoon.
    • The sheer horror of the Belgian chiefs when they learn Ceasar has arrived is one for Rome, reminding exactly why there were those camps in Belgium: because Rome had already conquered the place years ago and wiped out an entire tribe to teach everyone else a lesson, and this was just a revolt of a single deluded village until Caesar arrived to repeat himself.
  • In Asterix and Caesar's Gift, exploiting the political dispute, the Romans nearly beat the Gauls with their catapults, and only Obelix delays the devastating siege enough for the other Gauls to unite and fight back. Beforehand, when they realized Asterix was spying on them, they were about to flee... until they realized he has no potion, which made them charge at him instead.
  • It's subtle, but the Time Skip sequence in Asterix and Obelix's Birthday: The Golden Book implies that the Romans will win, and in Asterix and Obelix' lifetimes. How is not shown, but by 1 BC the village is fully integrated in local Roman economy, its palisade is run down, and Petibonum has been turned into a village and the local commerce center.
  • The 2018 movie The Secret of the Magic Potion give some much needed awesome to the garrisons besieging the village:
    • Upon finding out that Getafix has left the village with Asterix and Obelix, Caesar orders them to attack the village to exhaust the supply of magic potion and then wipe it out. The garrisons oblige... Without getting relief and fully knowing they were going to receive dozens of beatings and they'd know the supply was exhausted only when the beatings would stop.
    • After the village women (as all the men but Cacofonix had left to help Getafix find his successor) do indeed exhaust the supply, what do the Roman do? They wreck the village with their catapults, because they aren't stupid and know the warriors may come back any moment. And when they do flying while hanging on potioned-up chicken they simply fire arrows, because this time they hold the advantage.
    • Due various events the evil druid Sulfurix has turned into a giant that can shoot fireballs from his hands and is so tough to No-Sell a concentrated attack from the entire village (men and women plus Obelix) and the Roman garrisons, who had been given the magic potion to take out the mad druid. All seems lost... Then Getafix uses an old spell of his to pile the Romans up Combining Mecha-style, and, after a moment to realize what had just happened, they proceed to give him a hilariously one-sided beating while the chorus of "You Spin Me Round" plays. It can be seen here in all its awesome and funny glory.
    • For added humor (and awesomeness), Obelix joins in, takes over the controls of the mecha and delivers one final titanic Megaton Punch that sends Sulfurix soaring into space!
• The bad guys have one in Asterix and the Vikings when Asterix and Obelix faces the Vikings. Used to be able to Megaton Punch their foes through, they at first treats the Vikings with the same type of arrogance that they usually treats the Romans and the Pirates, only to soon find out that the Vikings are an entire different type of foes. Both Asterix and Obelix finds out to their shock and horror that their magic potion-powered punches barely works against the Vikings; at best they just gets them slighty dizzy and at worst, gets them madder, and they really have to use all their strenght and endurence to fight the Vikings off. For once in their adventures, Asterix and Obelix faces foes that forces them to actually fight. To which Obelix is quick to cheerfully point out after the fight, of which the Vikings are so far the only foes that earned the status of Worthy Opponent in his eyes.
  Obelix: "Now that's what I call a real fight! Much more fun than the Romans! You know, we should invite them down to invade our village sometime."

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