Funny / Mistborn: The Original Trilogy

The Final Empire

• Kelsier's crew has a meeting in the beginning for starting to formulate a plan to take down the Lord Ruler. Kelsier gets them to list the problems they're going to have to deal with and write them down on the blackboard. After everyone lists a lot of problems, Yeden adds something pessimistic along the lines of "The fact that this plan is doomed to fail and we're all going to die," and Kelsier writes on his list of problems they have to deal with, "Yeden's bad attitude." He then explains that, if they think about it long enough, they may be able to solve these problems. Except Yeden's bad attitude. This one they can do nothing against.
• Kelsier and Sazed have decided to claim that Vin (who will be infiltrating the nobility) is from a small country house.
  Kelsier: Which would explain why she's a bit less refined than other court members. No offense, Vin.
  (Vin looks up from hiding a roll in her shirt pocket)
  Vin: Why would I be offended?
• Vin's first attempts at Ironpulling and Steelpushing are this, in a darkly comedic way. First, Kelsier warns her that he'll explain the other aspects of Iron and Steel later, but Vin gets suspicious and experimentally "tugs" on one of the little blue lines she sees, only to have a loose nail come flying out of the dark at her. Later, Kell tries explain how she can use Steel to cushion a fall by having her jump off the top of Luthadel's walls. Vin Pushes too hard and winds up flying up past the top of the wall, startling two guards on patrol. One can only imagine their shocked, confused faces as Vin shoots past them, then starts dropping like a rock again.
• When reading (what they think is) the Lord Ruler's journal, it's full of moralistic and philosophical ramblings. Vin laments that an evil god of darkness has no right to be this whiny.
• Ham's Insane Troll Logic for why he was perfectly justified in tearing the sleeves off his rebel army uniform, after Dockson laments that those things cost money:
  Ham: Everything costs money. But what is money? A physical representation of the abstract concept of effort. Well, wearing that uniform for so long was a pretty mean effort. I'd say this vest and I are even now.
  • This is even funnier because moments later Kelsier says to Dockson that the crew is going to need more "abstract representations of effort."
• Eventually Ham and Kelsier learn to understand and speak in Spook's dialect. The following conversation ensues.
  Spook: Niceing the not on the playing without. ^translation"It's not nice to play with people like that."
  Breeze: I have no idea what you just said, child. So I'm simply going to pretend it was coherent, then move on.
  Kelsier: [rolls eyes] Losing the stress on the nip. Notting without the needing of care.^translation"Oh, don't worry about what he does to you. He's not worth your concern."
  Spook: [nods] Riding the rile of the rids to the right.^translation"You're probably right."
  Breeze: What are you two babbling about?.^translation"What are you two babbling about?"
  Spook: Wasing the was of brightness. Nip the having of wishing of this.^translation"He wants to be clever. He pushes people around because he wants to prove that he is clever."
  Kelsier: Ever wasing the doing of this.^translation"He's always been like that."
  Ham: Ever wasing the wish of having the have. Brighting the wish of wasing the not.^translation"He's insecure. I think he worries that he's really not that clever."
  Breeze: [to Dockson] I believe our companions have finally lost their minds, dear friend.
  Dockson: Wasing not of wasing is.^translation"Wasing not of wasing is" — it's not actually a coherent expression in Eastern Street Slang.
• After Kelsier comes back from destroying the atium crystals in the Pits of Hathsin:
  Ham: Where were you? We've been worried sick that you were out doing something...well, stupid.
  Breeze: Actually, we took it for granted that you were doing something stupid. We've just been wondering how stupid this particular event would turn out to be. So, what is it? Did you assassinate the lord prelan? Slaughter dozens of noblemen? Steal the cloak off the Lord Ruler's own back?
  Kelsier: I destroyed the Pits of Hathsin.
  [stunned silence]
  Breeze: You know, you'd think that by now we'd have learned not to underestimate him.
• Elend's reaction to finding out Vin is Mistborn. Might have had something to with the fact that she was, yet again, in her underwear.

The Well of Ascension

• Vin buying a dog. All of it.
• When the chivalrous Elend enters Vin's private rooms.
  Vin: Why did you knock?
  Elend: Well... you might have been changing.
  Vin: So...?
  • Contrasted with how, after they get married, Vin mentions that if they get attacked during the night, she might have to fight naked. Elend is very much onboard with that idea.
• Vin's assessment of morality.
  OreSeur: What about you? Are you a good person?
  Vin: Oh, no, not me. I'm not a good person or a bad person. I'm just here to kill things.
• For fans of black humor, Ruin's voice in Zane's head can be rather hilarious when you're not expecting it.
  Ruin: [about a random guard] Kill him, he's not that important.
• OreSeur or, actually, TenSoon, really likes trolling Vin:
  OreSeur: Mistress, you do realize that you just left the writing desk behind to sit on the floor.
  Vin: And?
  OreSeur: The purpose of a writing desk is, well, writing.
  Vin: But my papers are all over here.
  OreSeur: Papers can be moved, I believe. If they prove too heavy, you could always burn pewter to give yourself more strength.
• Despite her... complicated feelings regarding kandra, she can appreciate their humor:
  OreSeur: I could always eat one of them (Breeze and Ham, sidetracking the group with another argument), if you wish. That might speed things up.
  Vin: (Beat)
  OreSeur: Kandra humor, Mistress. I apologize. We can be a bit grim.
  Vin: (smiling) They probably wouldn't taste very good, anyway. Ham's far too stringy, and you don't want to know the kinds of things Breeze spends his time eating. . .
  OreSeur: I'm not sure. One is, after all, named "Ham." As for the other. . . (nods to Breeze's ever-present winecup) he does seem quite fond of marinating himself.
• Vin's first impression of Allrianne:
  Vin: All right, what was that pink thing I just passed in the hallway?
• Vin goes to Sazed for advice on relationships. He, in his typical manner, gives it, she thanks him and leaves. Then, not five minutes later, Elend comes to do the exact same thing, worried that he and Vin are too different to make it work. Sazed dryly says that they're more alike than they know. Meanwhile, the person Sazed was in the middle of talking to is reacting appropriately.
• When Elend does something stupidly risky:
  Elend: Stay here, wait to see if I get back. If I don't, tell Vin what happened.
  Ham: Sure, I'll tell her. Then I'll proceed to remove her daggers from my chest.
• Elend needs to know how Jastes is controlling his Koloss. Koloss being Koloss, Elend has witnessed them suddenly attack each other, offering the most trivial reasons why after the fight is over and one of them is dead, then taking the loser's sword and the strange pouches they have tied to the sheathes. So, Elend decides that when among Koloss, do as the Koloss do, and attacks one. He manages to kill an (admittedly small) Koloss with nothing but a glass dagger. The other Koloss in the group were just watching, and after the fight, stare at Elend. He realizes they're waiting for him to justify his attack, so Elend says the first thing that comes to mind: "He ate my horse." The Koloss nod in response, and proceed to finish escorting Elend out of the camp.
• Vin and Elend getting married. While a Heartwarming Moment as well, it's also this. Vin is bloodied and wounded after her fight with Zane, including a stab wound through her left breast. Sazed is stitching up her wounds, including her breast, when Vin asks Sazed which of the over two hundred marriage ceremonies he knows is the shortest. Elend and Sazed are both rather taken aback, even after Vin and Elend have both done the requisite declarations of love required for the very short marriage.
  Vin: (to Sazed) Well?
  Sazed: (looking as his bloodied fingers) This is a very strange time for such an event, I think.
  Elend: (nods in agreement)
  Vin: It's just a little bit of blood. I'm really alright, now that I've sat down.
  Sazed: Yes, but you seem somewhat distraught, Lady Vin. This isn't a decision to be made lightly, under the influence of strong emotions.
  Vin: The decision to get married shouldn't be made because of strong emotions?
  Sazed: (floundering) That isn't exactly what I meant.
• Breeze convinces Allrianne to leave the city with Elend and Vin. Once they're out, she unceremoniously rides off on her own, to their bafflement. Later, we find out that she got lost and accosted by bandits. We only find this out after she's convinced the bandits to escort her to her father's camp with only the vague promise of a reward. Cett responds with as much exasperation as if she keeps bringing back stray puppies.
  Cett: More bandits, Allrianne? It took forever to get rid of the last group.
• Cett drops this little gem while he and his daughter, Allrianne, are discussing Breeze:
  Allrianne: Father! Breezy is a good man.
  Cett: Good men die quickly in this world, Allrianne. I know—I've killed enough of them.

The Hero of Ages

• What is the first line of Harmony, the new Physical God of the land?
  "I am, unfortunately, the Hero of Ages."
• Cett has a tendency to throw things at Breeze, like insults. And knives.
• When Breeze and Sazed finally discover the identity of the fabled "Survivor of the Flames" and that apparently their friend Spook hasn't exactly been idle during his time spent in Urteau:
  Breeze: Well... that was somewhat unexpected.
• When Elend told Vin that killing his fiancée, God, brother and father, ...In That Order was a homicidal hat trick. And then he notes he's somewhat glad he doesn't have any other close relatives.
• Vin, on her mysterious acquisition of a ball gown in the last book:
  Elend: Seriously, Vin, the army's tailors are good, but there's no way that dress came from materials we had in the camp. Where did you get it?
  Vin: It's a mystery. We Mistborn are incredibly mysterious.
  Elend: Um... I'm Mistborn, too, Vin. That doesn't make any sense.
  Vin: We Mistborn need not make sense. It's beneath us.
  • This, incidentally, is a Call-Back to Kelsier's use of the same explanation in the first book.
• When at court, Vin looks around at the other women ogling Elend, with his warrior's body and neat white uniform, and gives them a Death Glare, as she loved him before he became Mr. Fanservice, so there.
• When Elend and Vin are just about to have their first dance; while Vin is very excited, actually burning pewter to steady her nerves, Elend pulls a book out of nowhere and promptly starts reading, much to Vin's chagrin.
  • The fact that he had a servant go and find the very book he was reading the night they first met (and that Elend remembers which book that was) is also this, crossing over into Heartwarming Moment.
• Elend and Ham have just decided not to send a force of 40,000 Koloss to attack Fadrex City, which would likely have resulted in the deaths of most of the population.
  Ham smiled. "Cett's going to be furious."
  Elend shrugged. "He's a paraplegic. What's he going to do? Bite us?"
• From the same scene, Ham finally finding a captive audience for his philosophical ponderings. It's easy to imagine that only the convenient scene transition prevented a Big "NO!". Especially because the captive audience was (the paraplegic) Cett, who absolutely hated listening to Ham's philosophical ponderings.
  Ham: So... you can't go anywhere unless someone carries you, right?
  Cett: [grunt]
  Ham: Well then, I've got quite a number of philosophical puzzles you might enjoy...
• As Preservation uses his last moments alive to get some information to Elend, he tries to write something in the ash-covered ground. His opponent, however, has the power to change things written in anything but metal. We don't find out whatever Preservation intended to say, but the Ruin-altered phrase says the following:
  I WILL KILL YOU. DEATH DEATH DEATH.

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