Funny / Runaways (2017)

Season 1

Episode 1 - Reunion

• Stacey non-chalantly advises Molly to masturbate to deal with her Menstrual Menace, much to Gert's exasperation.
• While discussing why the group doesn't hang out anymore, we get this conversation;
  Gert: It's kind of hard to stay friends with someone when all they care about is being the perfect church girl.
  Karolina: Better than the insufferable social justice warrior.
  Alex: Or a dumb jock.
  Chase: Yeah, or Molly. [Beat as Molly gives him a weird look] ...I've got nothing against you, you're really nice.

Episode 2 - Rewind

• Frank's agent tells him that a significant portion of the female population discovered their sexuality by masturbating to his picture. Frank preens and feigns modesty.
• When Geoffrey asks if anyone else feels bad about sacrificing a teenager the same age as their own children:
  Dale: I've found denial to be a very effective coping mechanism.

Episode 3 - Destiny

• The kids theorizing about why their parents could be up to besides ritual murder. Gert suspects LARPing, which Chase assumes is “that thing where people dress up as animals and have sex with each other.” Nico corrects him by saying "no, that's furries."
  • Molly's reaction to that part of the conversation.
  Molly: That's a thing?!
  Nico: (nods solemnly)
• Alex reacting to Nico creating snow in the room.
  Alex: So when you said snow, you were being literal.
  Nico: You think my smarthouse is having a cocaine malfunction?!
  • Also, Alex's stubbornly refusing to accept this can be actual magic, insisting the staff has some sort of scientific capabilities.
• Nico covers for Alex's presence in her house: How? By letting Tina find them on her bed, with her straddling him.
  • Made even better by how they're arguing about it up until the moment where Tina finally opens the door, stopping the conversation dead. It involves a lot of furious instructions to him about where he may not put his hands, since they're just pretending, and where he should put his hands, in order to pretend convincingly.
  • Even funnier right before this Nico made Alex look the other way while she took her top off just get him into a position where he'd be forced to look at her topless.
• While on a date with her husband, Tina removes her underwear and puts it in her husband's hand. Robert is not amused, due to the stress of the sacrifice as well due to the deep strain in their marriage. When she claims that it works for Dakota Johnson, Robert rebuffs her by saying that they are in real life and not some trashy movie.

Episode 4 - Fifteen

• Gert meeting her club members and one of them having made his Hillary shirt say "I'm with Gert!"
  Guy: This shirt no longer fills me with crushing sadness!
• Dale and Stacey's expression on opening the house's door to see Gert and Molly with Old Lace.
  • Dale: I guess we found the dinosaur.
• When the barista asks if anyone owns a silver Prius, half the kids in the coffee shop raise their hands.

Episode 5 - Kingdom

• Nico shows off the Staff's powers by asking it to find Alex. After a pause, a blast of light erupts and flows down the street.
  Gert: What was that?!
  Nico: I don't know but I think I'm in love. (caresses the Staff)
• Karolina Drives Like Crazy on the way to save Alex, to Gert's terror and Molly's glee.
• Alex asks how they managed to track his dad. A young member of Darius' gang proceeds to give a super Techno Babble explanation.
  Gang member: What, you think the only people good with tech live in Brentwood?
• The glorious "WTF" faces on Gert, Nico and Karolina when Molly holds up the car. Then it's topped when Karolina takes off her bracelet to unleash her own powers.
  Gert: She's beautiful and she glows. Great.
• And then, Chase comes up and unleashes a blast from his gauntlets.
  Gert: What is happening right now?!
  Nico: I think we're kicking ass!
  • She and Chase do a high five which causes a massive backlash of energy to knock him back.
• Darius' reaction through all this is priceless as he's tossed back several times but keeps coming back, unable to believe this is happening. It takes seeing his bullets fly off Nico's force field for him to finally say Screw This, I'm Outta Here.

Episode 6 - Metamorphosis

• The flashback to the first Pride sacrifice... where they're all talking of how stupid and itchy the robes are.
• In the flashback, Robert mentions that Tina has been sleeping with the Staff, to Tina's annoyance. In the present, we find out that Nico slept with the Staff under her pillow.
• While teaching Nico to use the staff, Tina tells her to just focus on the first thing that pops into her head. Nico puts her mother on mute, leading to some silent offended shouting. Nico is visibly smirking throughout the whole thing too:
  Nico: You said the first thing that came to mind.
  • Tina was smirking to herself.
  • Tina's explaining how the Staff of One works to Nico. Depending on how you look at it, Nico's response is a straight up Take That! moment to the MCU for its portrayal of magic.
  Tina: An electrical current just traveled from your neural pathways into the staff and made that happen.
  Nico: Explain it however you want, but it needed my blood and it read my mind. It's just like Wicca.
  Tina: It is science, Nico.
  Nico: If by "science" you mean high-tech magic, then sure.
• While the Runaways start discussing their plans for the PRIDE gala, Chase complains about how they always assume that Alex has a plan and no one else. Only to back down when Alex asks him if he has one.
  Chase: ...I just meant hypothetically.
• When Gert dashes the idea of individual limos for them all, Alex and Chase use that as an excuse to basically ask out Nico and Karolina respectively. Cue one awkward moment of silence before Gert settles on one limo for all of them.
  Molly: Some of us are too young to date.
  • The fact that the Nico and Karolina end up an Official Couple at the end of the season makes this Hilarious in Hindsight.
• During the infiltration they send Gert to distract the security guard, which she's not sure how to do - until she discovers he's reading The Metamorphosis for a class called "Dehumanization of the Proletariat", allowing her to move right back into her comfort zone.
• Gert, Kincaid and the Security Guard playing the old arcade game in the Wizard lobby while the two guys express amazement that Gert is still single.
  • Before then, they both specifically told her that the arcade machine was off limits and in Kincaid's words, Tina is "a killer". Considering what she knew about Tina, Gert was probably thinking "Holy crap" behind her fake smile.
  • Taking the above into account, Tina walks in on them still playing the game. Kincaid tries to cover it up while Gert tries to get on her good side, but Tina visibly couldn't care less and heads straight to the elevator without saying a word.
  • Speaking of Gert getting on her good side, that involved gushing about how romantic it was that Robert gave the arcade to Tina as a present and that she's lucky to be married... not knowing that Tina just found out about her husband was cheating on her. Tina only just stares while the elevator doors close.
    Kincaid: She's a lot scarier when she's quiet.
• Chase going onto the roof to see Karolina drinking straight from a bottle and sitting on the edge of the roof. He asks her if she wants to come down, causing her to think for a moment before peppily saying she was good.
• Karolina's reaction when Chase kisses her. She was probably thinking at that moment, "... Yup. Definitely not into guys."
• Nico can't believe how her ultra-tech savvy mom's password to her highly secure vault is..."Password."
• Alex and Nico's reaction to Chase telling them that Karolina can now fly. Specifically, their literal 2 seconds of shock before shrugging it off.
  Nico: Big night.
  Chase: That's an understatement.
  • Chase follows up by telling Nico about their parents' affair. Only he's not specific and she briefly gets mixed up.
    Nico: What? My mom and... your dad?
    Chase: No, my mom and—
    Nico: Oh my god! And my mom!?
  • There's also how she simply can't believe her father would be the one to have an affair with someone else.
• Victor gives his wife and son a large, warm hug. The camera focuses on their utterly baffled "what is happening?" expressions.

Episode 7 - Refraction

• When Molly tells the others that the Wilders know she saw the ritual and what she's been doing to avoid them, the first thing Chase says is complaining that she's the reason their favorite coffee shop is down to one bathroom.
• Dale's behavior throughout the whole episode, since he's high on Jonah's serum.
  Dale: That was the best kiss I have ever experienced. It was like, an explosion of color. In my mouth!
  Dale: What are crocs? CROCS ARE A GIFT FROM GOD, DON'T YOU THINK?
  • "Molly? Oh, I love Molly. With her little kitty-cat ears? Hey, we should get a cat!"
• When Chase and Karolina see the Wilders and the Yorkes talking, they assume it's about Molly.
  Chase: Text everyone to meet up.
  Karolina: [mildly offended look] You do it.
  [both lift their right hands at each other several times]
  Chase: [confused] Fine.
• Chase walks in on Victor struggling with a problem.
  Chase: Okay, I'm not sure I'm following all, or any, of this, but based on how many times you circled the last number...
  Victor: Yeah! I cracked it!

Episode 8 - Tsunami

• Gert letting Old Lace into her room. The excited dinosaur almost sits on the furniture, but Gert worries she could break something and tells her to sit on the floor.
  • Later on, she tries to get Old Lace to be quiet... while the dinosaur is jumping over the roof of Chase's house.
• Janet tells Chase that she invited the Yorkses over to help because they're doctors. Gilligan Cut to the Yorkses looking at Victor, clearly 200% out of their depth.
  Dale: You do realize we're not... doctors.
  Stacey: Well, not surgeons.
  Catherine: You went to medical school.
  Stacey: Yeah, in the nineties.
• Gert's cell phone recording:
  Recording: Hi, it's Gert. How about instead of leaving a message, you sign my petition for better wages for the Chinese factory workers who made this device?
• Molly readies her super strength to break open the window... before stopping and just opening the latch.
• The argument over who to sacrifice to save Victor is full of Black Comedy as our heretofore inscrutable villains are reduced to petty bickering right out of high school over who's done the least for the group.
  • Janet lashes out after Tina mocked her for never actually doing anything for PRIDE and essentially being useless without her husband. Janet starts calling Dale out (largely because he and Stacey failed to save Victor), openly asking Dale what he ever did for PRIDE, only for Dale to sheepishly tell her that he invented the mind-wipe serum among other bioengineering stuffs. Then Stacey awkwardly adds that both her and Dale work on them together in case, you know, Janet also starts calling her never contributed or anything.
    • When Janet argues that they should vote on who goes, Dale makes a slight lampshade of their situation.
  Dale: This isn't Survivor, Janet. You can't convince us to vote someone else off the island.
  • Robert suggesting that they use Frank, since he isn't even a member of PRIDE. Leslie is disturbingly open to the idea of sacrificing her husband.
  Leslie: Not the worst idea.
  • When Jonah says that if Victor isn't revived, everyone else in PRIDE will be killed, along with their children. The parents immediately begin arguing, when Dale goes full Papa Wolf to protect Molly and Gert, grabs Janet's gun, and demands someone gets in the box. Someone grabbing a gun and threatening everyone would normally be Nightmare Fuel, but Dale is so clearly out of his depth that it's hilarious.
    Dale: Now, somebody is getting in the goddamn box, and personally, I... don't mind if it's Tina. That's my vote. I'm just putting it out there.
    Tina: (gives Dale a "what was that for?" look)
    Stacey: Dale! What are you doing with a gun?!
    Dale: It was on the table—
    Leslie: Do you even know how to fire it?!
    Dale No. And that means I am unpredictable. And therefore, much more dangerous.
  • Then Geoffrey sneaks up on Dale, puts his gun to Dale's head, and tells him to put the gun down. And Geoffrey's tone doesn't even sound threatening, but more annoyed, like Geoffrey's lecturing Alex for breaking a rule.
    • After Geoffrey tells Dale to "drop it", Dale does drop it, causing it to misfire and shatter a nearby window.
    Robert: What the hell, man?!
    Geoffrey: Who does that?!
    Janet: See?! Box him!
    Jonah: (Checks his watch)
  • After Tina destroys the other box to prevent Robert from sacrificing himself, Leslie and Tina are about to brawl it out, with Leslie tugging off her earrings as she makes a beeline towards Tina. Jonah not only wants it, but thinks it would be utterly awesome if they went at it, calling it a battle of the ages. He was very giddy to see it...if they weren't pressed for time that is.
    • Prior to that, when Leslie is chewing Tina out for destroying the box, Tina adopts a defensive posture with the Staff of One. Leslie asks if Tina is going to blow her up as well, and Tina admits that she was "thinking of smacking you with it" instead.
• Molly reacting to a VHS tape like it's something from another planet.

Episode 9 - Doomsday

• Molly is legitimately happy to see Old Lace again. Considering they were trying to kill each other when they first met, it's odd seeing Molly so affectionate towards her. It's even odder seeing a 14 year old kissing a dinosaur on the nose.
  • Chase left his equipment with Molly after arriving at the dance. Just as she's excited about possibly using the Fistigons, Gert forbids her from touching anything.
  Molly: Even the X-Ray goggles?
  Gert: Especially those.
• Gert bringing up the Love Dodecahedron in the group while talking about Chase smashing the laptop.
  Karolina: It might still work out. I mean, I'm not saying what he did was right-
  Alex: Please do not try and defend him.
  Gert: Even if you did hook up with him.
  Karolina: Could you please not tell everyone that?
  Gert: What, like Nico hasn't already told them?
  Karolina: How would Nico know unless you told her?
  Gert: Why would it bother you if I did?
  Alex: Yeah, no worries right now. Nico isn't even talking to me.
  Nico: (walks in) He speaks the truth.
• Molly shows up at Atlas with the VHS tape to ask the others for help. Alex suggests using a VHS machine in the library that the AV club used to use. But everyone else reacts to the part where he said he was in the club. Gert and Chase have fun ribbing him over it.
  Alex: What, it was a cool club!
  Nico: No, yeah.
  Karolina: (Insincerely) Definitely.
  Gert: It's literally the club they use in every teen movie to show how uncool someone is.
  Chase: Guys, come on. Don't take away his one thing.
  Alex: ...You're all assholes.
• Gert laments not going to the dance due to having to go stop their parents again... and the fact that she probably won't get a refund for the tickets after calling Eiffel a hateful bitch. Then she goes back to regretting nothing when Alex suggests using the dance as a cover up.
• This whole exchange as the others get tired of waiting for Gert and Chase.
  Nico: I'm gonna go look.
  Alex: Want some company?
  Nico: Sure. Karolina, you wanna come?
  Karolina: (smiling) Mmm-hmm.
  Molly: Someone's in the doghouse...
  Alex: Yep. I got it.
• Chase and Gert walk down the hall after clearly just having had sex, and bump into Karolina and Nico, who were just making out. They all just stare awkwardly for a few seconds until Chase just says "We should go."
• Jonah again reveals someone in the group reported a secret to him. Everyone immediately looks at Tina, who can only say that sure, she would do it, but she didn't this time.

Episode 10 - Hostile

• While all the kids flaunt their stuff, Stacey says Gert hasn't and Dale states she's "just an ordinary kid." Right on cue, out comes Old Lace with the Pride staring in shock at the dinosaur.
  Tina: There's only one place that could have come from...
  Stacey: Yeah, I meant to bring you up to speed on that...
• When the kids are getting disguises at a local Good Will, Molly gets some flashy glasses and a headband. Nico says it's a little stand out, and Molly counters that they're supposed to be under the radar, "not invisible".
  • Then Nico sums up their current state:
    Nico: Look at us. Brentwood's finest in clothes other people gave away.
    Molly: The struggle is real.
  • Alex meets with Gert after a "journey" to find someone at a coffee shop who could loan him a laptop.
  Gert: And instead?
  Alex: Instead I saw several grown men urinating, I had to stop a fist fight between two shoeless meth heads fighting over an empty cottage cheese container. Oh, and if you want a tour of star's homes or catch a double feature, I can hook you up.
  Gert: Oh, I love old movies.
  Alex: Also, there's a map of the church in here, handed out by an alcoholic Elmo.
• The kids find Vaughn at the coffee shop, complaining about what the barista wrote on his cup.
  Vaughn: Who would name their kid "Yawn?"
• Nico steals Vaughn's coffee, and is surprised to find it has six shots of espresso. She then refuses to give it back because she likes it.
  • Everyone else won't give it back to him out of spite for refusing to believe PRIDE's evil.
  Vaughn: Can I have my coffee back?
  Molly: No chance, dude.
  Chase: Absolutely not.
  Gert: Brainwashed dick.
  Nico: I think I might actually like this.
• When Jonah tells the Wilders that they won't be talking to Karolina and makes an Implied Death Threat, he sends them on their way with one last instruction:
  Jonah: Make sure you validate your parking. The first two hours are free.
• Alex, after sharing his feelings of home sickness with Nico, suddenly goes missing from camp. Nico (incorrectly) assumes the worst with this zinger:
  Oh my god. That little shit went and called his parents.
• While the scene where Gert set Old Lace free is sad, it's also funny in meta way: certain MCU shows have been having problems in portraying animal characters like Shou Lao and Lockjaw, you'd think Runaways also had this problem and the showrunners intended to solve this by putting Old Lace on a bus. Except they're not, as Old Lace returns to Gert and remains with the team by the end of episode. It helps that Old Lace is also portrayed with animatronic in some scenes.

Season 2

Episode 11 - Gimme Shelter

• After a quite self-aware comment about how long it took the kids to actually run away, the show feints toward a Cliffhanger Copout of them immediately being caught, except the cops just picked up a bunch of kids who happened to be dressed similarly. You half expect to hear "You've captured their stunt doubles!"
• The group chasing a thief, complete with Gert lagging behind as she's pushing Old Lace in a shopping cart. Once it fails, Nico notes "We suck at being runaways".
• The group successfully takes a car by acting so stuck-up that the valets believe they own it.
  Gertie: Pretty white privilege for the win.
• Chase isn't always the best at taking a hint.
  Gertie: (forced cheer) [Old Lace]'s great! She's really settling in! She's actually quite the dumpster connosseiur! And if I'm calm, then she's calm!
  Chase: You don't seem calm.
  Gertie: (clearly at the verge of a breakdown) That's a really helpful thing to say to someone when they're trying to be chill so their psychically linked dinosaur doesn't freak out, which would be so much easier if I had my meds, but they're in my room, which is next to my parents' room, which, if we need a little reminder, tend to murder people.
  Chase: (uncertain) So... what you're saying is you're not calm?
• When Alex asks Darius for more money, Darius insists that he earns it. He gets Alex to put his fingerprints on a gun, gives him a plastic poncho, hands him power tools, leads him up to a room... and reveals that he wants Alex to paint a nursery for his unborn baby.

Episode 12 - Radio On

• For Kingdom Hearts fans, it's hard not to chuckle when Tina says "Freeze!" to cast ice spell and freeze the swimming pool.
• Chase and Gert spend the episode trying to fix the power. First Chase causes a blackout, then the power company comes to investigate, then Gert uses Old Lace to scare them off, then Chase's distraction goes off, and finally he is ecstatic that he got the blender working, because he can now use the protein packets he had in his suit jacket.

Episode 13 - Double Zeros

• On why Gertie and Chase are so tired this morning:
  Gertie: [We] stayed up all night talking! About the inherent racism of the early women's movement. Also, how technology is shaping Fourth Wave feminism. But really also if that waterstain on the ceiling looks more like an acorn or Danny DeVito.
  Nico: Chase talked about all that?
  Gertie: He may have mostly listened.
  Nico: No wonder he's still sleeping...
• Alex has Nico saved in his phone under "Not the One", while Nico has Alex saved under "Asshole".
• Victor and Janet's VR reunion goes better than expected.
  Janet: I'm surprised you're so happy to see me... since I shot you.
  Victor: You shot me? I thought it was Robert!
• When they are rescuing him from his father, Molly picks up Alex and carries him, despite the latter being perfectly able to walk.
• Molly tries to become a legit superhero, and comes up with Bond One Liners just as lame as you'd expect for her age.
  "Ask who rules the world."
  "Pimped yo' ride!"

Episode 16 - Bury Another

• Jonah yells at the group.
  Jonah: The day after tomorrow, I never have to see your faces again!
  Dale: Because...you're going to pull off our faces?

Episode 18 - Past Life

• Gert and Chase pretending to be a newlywed couple, with their argument eventually driving the hotel employee away.

Episode 19 - Big Shot

• "And did you just say 'dinosaur'?" To the point that when Karolina appears, Livvie asks "Who are you? Do you have a bionic dinosaur too?"
• Molly eventually reveals her powers and easily subdues Flores.

Episode 21 - Last Waltz

• "Don't drink it, Chase! It might be poison!" Cue Chase getting knocked out and the Yorkes making condescending faces.
• Leslie's continuous annoyance at being sent for doctrination.
• Chase being a doofus during interrogation is very funny. A highlight is "We had some great times together. Naked...", specially when Gert's parents mention it to her.
• The girls take a selfie with their crowns, with Nico scowling as everyone else smiles.
• Gert's speech about Molly is both mentioning and hilarious, with her mentioning that it filled that she wanted either a brother or a dog.

Episode 23 - Split Up

• After a lengthy debate if Alex should take Chase's phone call, Molly just shouts to pick anything because his ringtone is annoying.
• When Alex has Chase on the phone and tells the rest of the group that he wants to meet, the response is a quadruple middle finger.
• Nico's brain being scrambled by the PRIDE drugs makes her language center produce funny words.
• When Xavin shapeshifts into Nico, Nico's reaction is to look at her double and ask if she's really that small. It doesn't help when the others immediately say yes.
  • Also, the terrific look on Leslie's face as even after all she's seen, this is something crazy.

Season 3

Episode 24 - Smoke and Mirrors

• Nico's reaction to her mother dressed in pink and speaking with "totes."
  Nico: What is my mom doing?
  Molly: Channeling 2012 Miley Cyrus?
• Alex tries to pair Molly with Xavin.
  Molly: No way, she doesn't even have facial expressions!
  Nico: Accurate.
• Now no longer having to hide herself, the Daughter-in-Tina cuts loose, giving us the sight of a 40-year old woman acting like your cliche bored teenager.
• The Wife reacts to "Gert's" phone call.
  Wife: My whole chest cavity is experiencing pressure.

Episode 25 - The Great Escape

• Chase just sitting bored inside the Algothrim as "Gert" pleads with him to help.
  Chase: Gert, I know you're not real. Because you haven't talked about patriarchy or gender bias or micro-aggression once since I got here!
• When Stacey shows up, Dale goes for his trank gun...and finds Gert took it just in case Dale decided to drug and mind-wipe her. Stacey agrees "that sounds like you."
  • Dale fires at the Wife with the dart not working...so he just tosses the gun at her.
    Wife: Seriously?
• Molly and Xavin are in the car when the Daughter drives it off, hitting the radio.
  Xavin: She knows we're here. Otherwise why the barbaric sound torture?
  Molly: Shhh, it's just K-Pop.
• Xavin's Tina impression using military terms on the car valet.
  Molly: Can you handle this?
  Xavin: Molly, I am a certified interstellar galactic pilot. I believe I can handle a tiny rolling vessel.
  (nearly jams up the brakes)
  Molly: I think maybe I should drive.
  Xavin: No, I just need to find the...stabilizer button...
• The great "WTF" looks on the faces of Tina's staff when their usually cold and terrifying boss is doing things like drinking coffee and spitting it back into the cup and then drinking from a soap dispenser. She then goes around selecting people for her project...including the food delivery guy.
  Delivery Man: I'm the Grub Mates guy.
  Daughter: I do not know what that means. But I am intrigued by the word "mate" in your title.

Episode 27 - Rite of Thunder

• The Son assuming all Leslie has to do is "stop off, give birth and then we get back on the road."
  • He also thinks that just because Tamar has a baby, she must know how to deliver one.
• After seeing a possessed Alex blasting her with light, an alien codex and alien baby seen to by a shapeshifter, Tamar can only say one thing.
  Tamar: When this baby situation is taken care of, can you all literally never come back here again?

Episode 29 - Merry Meet Again

• Dale's "off the grid" life is...not going well. As in he developed a rash from the wrong herbs and when he tried to set a fire in the cabin, it angered a pack of raccoons to attack him, forcing him to stick to a tent.
  • It then turns out his "off the grid isolation" was literally five feet away from a public park's camp.
• Stacey and Victor seek therapy...from a group of people who think they've been abducted by aliens. Victor's matter-of-fact explanation of the entire experience leads to the group kicking him out for "triggering" them with his "crazy" story.
• Chase is arguing about the magic feather turning a Wizard phone to ash.
  Nico: Um, Chase blew up Gert's phone.
  Chase: Why do you immediately believe her?
  Nico: Um, feminism?

Meta

• The show's Instagram account has many funny moments, with a particular highlight being Old Lace announcing the show's third season.
• Ryan Sands (the actor who plays Geoffrey Wilder) posted a sketch he drew of his character being chased by Old Lace.

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