That which was veiled – chapter one page titles

One of the things I amuse myself with in Beyond the Tree is coming up with all manner of clever page titles to use. Though it certainly isn’t true for all pages, a vast majority of them contain some sort of reference or play on words or other thing that I found somehow fitting. One of the things I tend to be curious about is how many of them that people actually pick up on!

So, here’s a comprehensive checklist for the page titles of Chapter One: The Twilight’s Hammer, the chapter title itself a reference to the Twilight’s Hammer cult that Chapter one spends a fair bit of time dealing with. If you don’t want to spoil what the page titles mean, stop reading here. 😉

#00 – “All Adventures Start Somewhere”
The start of everything. The page title is more or less purely factual.

#01 – “Auberdine”
Second serious page title, before they started to become more clever.

#02 – Intermission: “The Next Level”
With the central joke being a fourth wall one about levelling up, the title the next level was more or less given.

#03 – “Ancient of Bore”
Onu is an Ancient of Lore indulging in a whoooole lot of not-too-exciting exposition. A play of words on the fact.

#04 – “Twilight’s Hammered”
A play of words on the cult named the Twilight’s Hammer. Previously named “Dork Stranded” (play of words on the Dark Strand cult) because I got things mixed up something fierce for awhile early on there.

#05 – “Onu Says”
One of the things that always amused me was the mini-event happening after you finish the Return to Onu quest, where Onu is truck by a backlash of magical energy. It ends with Onu says: “Hmm.”. This page title refers to that.

#06 – Intermission: “Onu Also Says”
Being basically a joke/outtake based on Onu Says, I thought Onu Also Says would be a good name for this particular intermission.

#07 – “Not Some Simple Jest”
One of the things that the Shade of Aran – a boss in the Karazhan instance – might end up yelling when you fight him is “I am not some simple jester! I am Nielas Aran!”. Seeing how this page takes place in Ameth’Aran, I thought it was a fun reference to sneak in.

#08 – “Hellish Fiends”
Another thing the Shade of Aran might say is “Burn you hellish fiends!”. As we moved on to Bashal’Aran, I snuck in two quotes in a row, just to make it slightly more an obvious reference.

#09 – “Radio Na Ga”
The first in a long line of song references, this is a reference to the Queen song Radio Ga Ga.

#10 – “Run Run Away”
Another song reference, Run Runaway is a song that I thought was made by Great Big Sea but was apparently a cover version with the original made by a group called Slade, Wikipedia tells me.

#11 – “Sweet Dreams are Made Of..”
Our first Tyrande Dream is titled after the song Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) by Eurythmics

#12 – “Just Passing Through”
A boring, uninventive and mostly factual title, though Hani Foonmall does state “Just passing through” fairly early on in it.

#13 – “Piscis Iactus Est”
A latin phrase meant to mean “the fish is cast” – a play on the famous Alea Iacta Est (“the die is cast”) reportedly said by Julius Caesar.

#14 – “Ever Dance with the Devilfish..”
A reference to Batman, or rather the Joker in Tim Burton’s Batman – Jack Napier / the Joker is fond of saying “Ever Dance with the Devil in the Pale Moonlight?” to his ‘prey’ as he “likes the sound of it”.

#15 – Intermission: “A Different Kind of Burning”
An Intermission that openly and utterly mocks the Burning Legion, hence a different kind of burning.

#16 – “Tree’s a Crowd”
Play of words on the saying Three’s a Crowd, seeing how Onu is, essentially, a walking and talking tree.

#17 – “The Beached Ashenwhale”
Play of words on Ashenvale Forest – I’ve been known to occasionally state “The Ashenwhale has been Beached!” in the guildchat of my old guild, the Lights of Elune.

#18 – “Prior Aquaintances”
Boring factual title, meant as emphasis that Te’len Nila (first introduced here) and Tiny already know eachother (not that it needs further emphasis).

#19 – “Maestra’s Posted”
This page, like nearly all pages involving Maestra’s Post, has some play of words regarding postal services, because I’ve been unable to resist.

#20 – “A Walk in the Woods”
Boring factual title, couldn’t come up with anything better at the time.

#21 – “Kneel before Zoram”
Reference to Superman II where villain General Zod has a line that goes “Come to me, son of Jor-El! Kneel before Zod!”

#22 – “It’s Unfathomably Deep”
Play of words on Blackfathom Deeps, which’s where we’re headed into.

#23 – “It’s Also Unfathomably Black”
Also a play of words on Blackfathom Deeps – why waste a perfectly good joke?

#24 – “Dead Pan Speech”
Reference to the ancient greek god of nature, Pan, connected to greek Satyrs (as the duo are killing one in this page). It’s also a play of words on the term Deadpan, which arguably the duo employ throughout this page.

#25 – “Not so Teenage”
Seeing how the duo is fighting a turtle in this page, it’s totally a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles reference.

#26 – “Cult Status”
Play of Words (well, not really) of the term Cult following, as the duo happen upon the Twilight’s Hammer cult again.

#27 – “Last Man Stumbling”
Play of words on the saying Last Man Standing, as the duo don’t quite keep standing at the end of it.

#28 – “A Disturbance in the..”
..Force, obviously. Also because Twilight Lord Kelris has a habit of yelling Who Disturbs my Meditation?! when he enters combat.

#29 – “Fighting Style”
Play of Words, both on the generic concept of a Fighting style, as well as the fact that the duo spends some time in the page fighting a mysteriously green and rather stylish cultist.

#30 – “I See Double Doors”
A very obscure MacGyver reference – there’s an episode of MacGyver where MacGyver’s friend Jack Dalton has been brainwashed and they use hypnosis to try to find out who did it and why; when asked what he first sees, he responds “Double doors”. Yes, I know it’s far-fetched.

#31 – “I’a Hydra”
Reference to Mother Hydra consort to Father Dagon, in the Cthulhu Mythos. “I’a” is a term of reverence of some sort, I think. (I’a Cthulhu, I’a Dagon and I’a Hydra are all repeated in Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth)

#32 – “Bravedwarf”
Obscure Braveheart reference – Morridune the dwarf was set free, so perhaps he’s in a position to yell “Frrrrreeeeeeeeedooooommmmmm!”?

And that’s all of them, complete with random links to just about everywhere. I suppose this also serves as a handy quick-jump to specific pages until I can be bothered to make an archive of some sort, eh?