YMMV / The Chocolate War

• Ensemble Dark Horse: Obie and Archie. Jerry is the main character of the first book but the narration follows the other two far more often.
• Fridge Brilliance:
  • Archie's actions at the end of Beyond The Chocolate War. Before he graduates from Trinity, he manipulates the Vigils to become little more than a violent gang of Drug Dealers, which is strange considering his former leadership. His motivations for doing so are much clearer viewed as a final Take That! to Brother Leon. Early in the book Brother Leon smugly brags to Archie about how little effect he actually has the school, and threatens to destroy the Vigils if he disrupts the status quo. The finale shows Archie proactively setting up the downfall for both the Vigils and the school.
• Moment of Awesome: Henry Malloran gets one in the second book when he throws a tomato into Brother Leon's face in front of the entire school. He becomes the unanimous class president.
  • Another moment belongs to Carter, also in the second book - he riggs the the Assigner's box with four black marbles and one white right under Archie's nose. When Archie draws a black marble for the first time, there is only a shocked silence. Downplayed when Archie later admits to knowing about the rigging the entire time.
  • Also in the second book, Jerry stands up to Janza without fighting back. He gets the crap kicked out of him and yet Janza gets no satisfaction out of it. Considering throughout the book Janza mentions how horny he gets beating someone up, the fact he didn't feel it at all fighting Jerry was a moral victory. It also ties into the fact Jerry decides to go back to the Trinity instead of running away. Determinator, indeed.
• Moral Event Horizon: Archie crosses it in the end of the first book when he manipulates the whole school into turning against Jerry even though the chocolate sales are over.
  • He crosses it over again in the second book, when he persuades his successor Bunting into moving the Vigils towards becoming a violent gang, with extortion, drug dealing, and outright rebellion the norm. "If I can't rule the school, then no one will."
• Values Dissonance: In the first book, the Vigils get Jerry to fight Janza by accusing him of being gay. Jerry says in the narration: "The worst thing in the world - to be called queer."
  • Slightly mitigated by the fact that the Vigils are clearly supposed to be in the wrong here.

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