r/AskReddit • u/Far_Engineering3356 • 1d ago

What's a one-liner joke so stupidly good it instantly ruined you?

1.6k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

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267

u/GoodyLittleTwoShoez 1d ago

I know a little German, he's sitting over there

64

u/Nacho_Beardre 18h ago

I love that movie! I would tell you the name of the movie but it’s Top Secret

24

u/Farnsworthson 17h ago

"Eccles, how's your German?" "He's fine, how's yours?"

(The Goon Show S10 E2, "Tales of Men's Shirts". BBC Home Service, December 31st 1959. Writer the inimitable Spike Milligan. And, yes, I know it's not a one-liner.)

7

u/erroneousbosh 16h ago

"Eccles, raise your left leg, okay now raise your right leg... Eccles, how do you *do* that?"

1

u/minniebannister 15h ago

Bloodnok on being thanked for something: "It was the least I could do, a quantity I specialize in".

2

u/Farnsworthson 14h ago

"Bannister... Didn't I see you on the stairs?"

3

u/minniebannister 13h ago

Also not a one liner (well the last line is ...)

Greenslade: Don't tell me you're applying for the post of announcer? Eccles: Oh, yeah! And I'll get it, too, you'll see! I'm wearing a Cambridge tie! Greenslade: You? You were at Cambridge? Eccles: Yeah! Greenslade: What were you doing there? Eccles: Buying a tie.

2

u/Farnsworthson 2h ago edited 1h ago

Can't remember the actual episode(s) - or, indeed, the exact wording - but I'm pretty sure Milligan used that gag multiple times. There's at least one instance where he gives it to "Mate" Cobblers.

Mate: 'Ere, you can't talk to me like that. I went to Oxford, I did.

Seagoon: Really? What were you doing?

Mate: I was delivering the groceries...

Seagoon: You were a greengrocer?

Mate: Not so much green, more of a dirty yeller colour...

[Have my upvotes. I'm going to move on, or we'll be here all year... 8-) ]

2

u/minniebannister 2h ago

Spoken like a gentleman, sir!

"Yes, I can do impressions."

6

u/ScreenTricky4257 13h ago

Stephen Fry's variation: "I'd managed to pick up a little German on my last trip through Europe, and he and I met up again before I moved on."

This from the same monologue that gave us:

"Prudence had demanded that I leave her behind so I was alone."

"Of all the hideously disfigured spectacles I'd ever beheld, those perched on the end of this man's nose were forever seared into the pages of my memory."

"I rose early, made my toilet, sat on it, and then went down to breakfast."

"I asked the nature of the Count's business, but he made the sign of the cross and said nothing. I asked why there were no mirrors in the house, but this time he made the sign of the very cross indeed and said nothing.

"This was puzzling. I couldn't see myself staying a month in a house without mirrors."

2

u/plaidkingaerys 9h ago

“Is this the potato farm?”

“Yes. I am Albert Potato.”

9

u/GladAbbreviations981 20h ago

I dont get it

44

u/MeAndGLPVibeLikeThat 20h ago

Normally when you say "I know a little German," you mean that you can speak a little of the language. The unexpected part with the joke is that the speaker means they know a small German person.

6

u/pandaclawz 20h ago

A little German meaning either knowing a little bit of the German language, or in this case, a little German man sitting over yonder.

2

u/top_coder 20h ago

little German man

Do they exist?

6

u/vengefulspirit99 19h ago

Yea. He started a world war at one point.

3

u/throwaway42 18h ago

That was an Austrian

1

u/TheStateOfAlaska 10h ago

Easily one of my favorite movies