Crosses The Line Twice / Dimension 20

Crossing the line twice is a staple of Dimension 20 humor.

• Gilear Faeth (yeah, he has his own section):
  • His day-to-day life in Elmville at the beginning of the campaign is truly sad, but oh so hilarious by the absurd ways his bad luck manifests. To note, he's the first elf ever to be balding and not to be fit, perpetually broke, victim, he's spilled stuff (mostly yogurt) on nearly every shirt he has, and he eats truly disgusting food.
  • Fig, after deciding to make up with him, decides to have him work at Aguefort Academy. Both she and Gilear expect him to become the counselor, but this position instead ends up being given to Jawbone, a former criminal with a very fucked up lifestyle before that, and Gilear is instead christened "Lunch Lad" by his daughter after he takes the job offer for lunch lady. This job is rough, with Gilear being constantly abused by the students and having his car stolen by the Bad Kids because he's the closest one.
  • This gets truly ridiculous in Sophomore Year. The Bad Kids, against all common sense, decide to take him for their dangerous adventures. Being completely out of his depths, he does so poorly and bizarrely for his attempt to hide in his first fight that a couple of Barlguras fully ignore Fabian, even risking opportunity attacks from him, to concentrate on him and he fully dies in one hit. This event caused half the Bad Kids to believe he is the Nightmare King at first, then The Chosen One, to his deepest consternation. The absurdity and intensity of the abuse (sometimes self-inflicted) only gets worse. Highlights include being forced to run over a bunch of pirates trying to kill him and the Bad Kids, getting stuck in the wheel of the van for a while, and being shot in the chest by his girlfriend's dead-husband-turned-Archdevil, Bill Seacaster, and getting revived only to die again later when Fabian crashes Bill's ship into the prison to save Riz.
  • One would think that this would have stopped by Junior Year, but nope: during the Boys' Night one-shot, as part of a crazy plan on their part, he gets kidnapped by Fabian, Riz, and Gorgug. He even thanks them for helping him determine how far he was going to walk to his car, as he was persuaded that he was bound to lose it again, and outright says that there'll be no consequences for his kidnapping.
• Fantasy High:
  • Fabian walking up to Gorgug, the biggest dude at the school, getting offered a friendship flower, and immediately slugging him in the gut to prove himself would just have been horrifying if it weren't for their players playing up just how terrible it is.
  • In the immediate aftermath, Kristen tries consoling Gorgug and telling him how violence is never the answer.

    Gorgug: I go into a Rage.

  • Doreen's long-winded guilt trip of an already obviously traumatized Adaine for killing her in self-defense, made worse by Brennan's grisly description of the aftermath.
  • Brennan describing how everyone from the Tiefling gang had broken homes and unhealthy upbringings qualifies, mostly because it came directly after the party brutally dispatched several of them.
  • The Cubbys being hardcore Bomb-Throwing Anarchists would have been merely surprising if it wasn't coming from an otherwise unassuming little halfling family. This returns with a vengeance when Bud springs the kids from prison with what is apparently an experienced cell of anarchist halflings who gleefully laugh about making bacon as he orchestrates a violent escape.
  • Adaine and Aelwyn's incredibly fraught relationship culminating in a fight to the death with one another is not funny, but the incredibly petty way in which this conflict plays out even when they've badly injured each other is.

    Fig: How does [Aelwyn] cast her spells?
    Adaine: Like a little bitch.

  • Riz attempting to sew Biz Glitterdew's fingers back on after having shot them off in a brutal Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique before learning he was the victim of magical mind manipulation.
  • During their stay on Leviathan, Riz is threatened and held at gunpoint by a racist dwarf. Fig decides to disguise herself as him and, prompted by Kristen and Riz, convinces him that he's been dead for days and to let go of this life, which leads him to kill himself right after.
  • A 15-year old disguising herself as an adult woman to repeatedly flirt with and make out with middle-aged men should be disturbing, but the sheer audacity of Fig's lies make it absolutely hilarious.
• Escape from the Bloodkeep:
  • Someone hanging themselves is not funny. Keldriel's therapist being so horrified by her life that they jump off the top of the Bloodkeep, turn into a cloud of bats, and then the bats all hang themselves is hilarious.
  Do you know how committed you have to be as a bat to hang yourself?! You can fly!
• The Unsleeping City:
  • Pete's drug addiction and ties to the criminal world are a clear indicator of his darker nature in contrast to the rest of the cast and played quite seriously. Him microdosing whenever someone explains him the Unsleeping City's different features is not.
  • Misty Moore's has a tendency to offer locking problematic people away in caves forever, whether they're an undead mummy, a fucked-up and dangerously close to amorality Vox Phantasma, or an innocent Sephora worker. Her not seeing the problem with it and even trying to convince the others by making it a nice cave only add to it.
  • Ox's many deaths are not funny In-Universe, but they're almost always Played for Laughs out of it, particularly the first time he almost dies, with every player cursing Brennan out and him rolling with it.
• A Crown of Candy:
  • The concept of the show itself is quite an example. A cutthroat political intrigue with almost unfair and brutal fights, even less fair story twists and developments, and a low fantasy setting is not the most unexpected thing of a Dungeons and Dragons campaign. This campaign being set in a world where the inhabitants are food people, with the deity of this world being the light bulb of a fridge, is.
  • Swifty is an endless well of these. He's a small gingerbread man with a high-pitched voice and a cute Peter Pan hat who's a 43 years-old twice-divorced/self-widowed, drug-addicted murderous sociopath with zero morals and deeply aware of that.
  • Ciabatta’s ambush on Liam, Ruby, and Jet is one of the most terrifying moments of the season, and ends in the absolute gut punch of Jet’s death. It also takes place in a lingerie shop, and afterwards Liam wraps Jet’s body in tear-away underwear.
  • Liam brutally assassinating a priest by disguising as himself is equal parts horrifyingly tragic and hilariously ludicrous.
• A Starstruck Odyssey:
  • Gunnie's body is torn asunder in the void of space, which would be horrifying if it wasn't immediately preceded by him confidently refusing insurance coverage, and immediately followed by a paramedic making him sign papers with his mouth because that's all he can use.
  • Gust Weatherall accidentally poisoning a bunch of Amercadian cadets to death with tainted champagne that makes their heads explode, and then Norm cravenly agreeing to help cover it up? Not funny. The face Zac Oyama makes while acting out Norm getting splattered with head goo, plus the fact Sidney is pouring champagne immediately after the brain surgery to unlock this memory? Definitely funny.
• Neverafter:
  • La Bête tells Ylfa how she became a monster by eating her spouse... and then talks about the various ways that she prepared and consumed his entire corpse, bone marrow and all.
    Ylfa: "How long did it take for you to-"
    La Bête: "A friggin' LONG TIME!"
  • Rosamund's completely unintended There Is No Kill Like Overkill slaughter of the tiny army with Ice Knife. Brennan wastes no time in describing how violently they're all murdered and the rest of the party cracks jokes about how she's secretly the meanest of them all.
• Burrow's End:
  • The Audio Logs from Dr. Wernabocker? High-Octane Nightmare Fuel. The reactions from the players, with Brennan briefly leaving the table before returning to declare "That's TOO FUCKING SCARY!" and Erika falling out of their seat? Brings it back around to being funny, albeiet in the sense of Schadenfreude.