The View Askewniverse

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The Verse of the six films in Kevin Smith's New Jersey Trilogy. It is virtually identical to the "real" world save for a few key differences -- some hidden (active divine and infernal forces) and some visible ("Mooby's" fast food chain and several other multinational corporations). And the occasional giant poop monster.

The Askewniverse films are as follows:

• Clerks (1994)
• Mallrats (1995)
• Chasing Amy (1997)
• Dogma (1999)
• Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001)
• Clerks II (2006)

Two animated adaptations:

• Clerks the Animated Series
• Clerks: The Lost Scene

The Askewniverse comics are also:

• Clerks (comic)
• Clerks Holiday Special
• Chasing Dogma
• Bluntman and Chronic
• Jay and Silent Bob in Walt Flanagan's Dog

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Some features of the View Askewniverse:

• Acting for Two: All over the place, of the You Look Familiar variety.
  • Jason Lee plays two different characters (different names, but suspiciously similar) in Mallrats and Chasing Amy, and a third, definitely different character in Dogma. He then reprises his first two roles in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, and plays a completely different role in Clerks II.
  • Matt Damon has a cameo appearance as a minor character in Chasing Amy, plays a more major character in Dogma, and appears as himself in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.
  • Even more bizarre, Ben Affleck plays one character in Mallrats, very different ones in Chasing Amy and Dogma, and in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back he appears as his Chasing Amy character and as himself. He only has a brief cameo in Clerks II, though.
  • Brian O'Halloran plays a relative of Dante's in every VA film where he's not playing Dante.
  • Jeff Anderson plays a clerk in a gun store in Dogma.
• All There in the Manual:
  • The comic series Chasing Dogma, which bridges Chasing Amy and Dogma, and explains just how Jay and Silent Bob ended up in Illinois;
  • Various director commentaries point out things never explained in the film, like Brodie Bruce and Randal Graves' relationship (they're cousins), or that Rick Derris is Jay's older brother.
• Ambiguously Gay: "When you do it, you think about guys!"
  • "Dude, not all the time!"
• Anything That Moves: Jay proudly proclaims this in Clerks.
• Aside Glance
• Back to School: See below under What Could Have Been.
• Brand X ("Nails" cigarettes, Chewlie's gum and Mooby's restaurants, among others)
• Cameo: Jay and Silent Bob have a short cameo on the movie set of the Show Within a Show "Stab" in Scream 3. Then, when in ...Strike Back, they interrupt the filming of a fictional Scream sequel to rescue their monkey.
  • That scene is a lot funnier since Scream 4 was released.
• Book Ends The 'Verse begins with Clerks and ends with Clerks II and as a result, begins and ends with scenes filmed in black-and-white.
• Catchphrase Spouting Duo
• Cluster F-Bomb
  • In song form, even.
• Deconstruction Fic: The fandom tends to explore the dark side of Jay and Silent Bob, who are generally considered a simple comic relief duo. Themes include tragic back-stories to explain Jay's outlandish behavior and Bob's silence, the realities of drug use/abuse, and the angst of being secretly in love with your best friend. The Reality Subtext also comes into play.
• Did Not Do the Research: Jay and Silent Bob's plan to find Shermer, Illinois from John Hughes' films was ultimately flawed because there is no such place.
  • Y'see, they thought no one in Shermer was dealing, and thus they were going into an untapped market. Assuming Shermer, Illinois even existed, and was accurate to the John Hughes films, they would have been muscling in on Charlie Sheen's turf anyway, as evidenced by Ferris Buellers Day Off. Plus, they must have missed that long freaking scene in The Breakfast Club where the entire Club, aside from Ally Sheedy, shares some weed. Unless J&SB watched the weed-free TV edit.
• Everything's Better with Monkeys (Suzanne the orangutan)
• Executive Meddling (A rare positive example: the original ending of Clerks had Dante killed by a robber.)
  • He definitely wasn't supposed to be there today.
  • Also, when making Mallrats, Kevin Smith had to fight like hell to keep Jason Mewes in the role as Jay, and it paid off.
• The Ghost (Cousin Walter mentioned by Randal and Brodie is the subject of many stories but is never actually seen or heard from in any of the films).
  • Probably because he died sometime before the films' continuity takes place. Randal's first story about him actually details the events of his death.
• Good Adultery, Bad Adultery: Usually played for laughs of the 'ex-girlfriend cheated on the hapless hero' variety - Caitlin cheated on Dante a lot (mostly with painters), as did Gwen with T.S, though Gwen at least seems too feel a bit guilty.
• Fan Service: Joey Lauren Adams topless in Mallrats.
  • Eliza Dushku, Ali Larter, Shannon Elizabeth and Jennifer Schwalbach-Smith in Spycatsuits in ...Strike Back.
  • Jay doing a Silence of the Lambs tribute striptease in Clerks 2. Sadly instantly becomes Fan Disservice when it cuts to him fully nude and posing like Buffalo Bill, but the start ... Ooh, chapstick.
  • Salma Hayek playing a muse turned stripper in Dogma.
  • Lee and Affleck's lip-lock in Chasing Amy
• Finagle's Law
• Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today? (Jay)
• Head-Tiltingly Kinky
• Heterosexual Life Partners (The Trope Namer)
  • A big trademark of Smith's is that the leads of these films are often a duo of this variety. See: Dante and Randall, Brodie and T.S., Banky and Holden, Bartlebee and Loki and of course Jay and Silent Bob.
• High School Rejects
• Ho Yay: Most of the two male platonic couples revel in this. In Chasing Amy, it's actually addressed by the plot; and it's lampshaded in Dogma. Mallrats was supposed to have quite a bit more of this, but Executive Meddling left a lot of it on the cutting floor.
• Interspecies Romance - It's not bestiality. It's interspecies erotica, fucko!
• Invisible to Normals
• It Will Never Catch On / Vindicated by History (Kevin Smith was told during production of Mallrats that a gag where semen gets stuck in Joey Lauren Adams' hair had to be cut. Because it was gross, would never sell and it would doom the movie, etc. Except for, you know, that other movie that did it three years later and grossed over $350 million freakin dollars.)
• Jerkass (Shannon Hamilton)
• The Jester (Randal)
• Joisey - Portrayed sympathetically, as Kevin Smith and most of the cast are natives.
• Last Het Romance: All of Randall's exes discovered they were lesbians.
• The Messiah - The Scion
• Noodle Incident The events from Julie Dwyer's wake in Clerks are never clear after we see the two main characters running from the family.
  • Subverted in the comic, and later when the wake was animated and added to the Clerks X 10th anniversary edition.
• One Degree of Separation
• Only Six Faces - The small number of actors involved in Clerks caused a live-action version of this trope.
• The Other Darrin: Debatable; it has been assumed that the William Black played by Ethan Suplee in Mallrats is the same person as William "Snowball" Black played by producer Scott Mosier in Clerks and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, though many have said that they are two different individuals.
• Physical God (Somewhat subverted)
• Powers That Be
• Punny Name: In Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Federal Wildlife Marshal Willenholly is named for the characters Marshall, Will and Holly on the 1970's children's TV show Land of the Lost.
  • Made even more amusing because the character in question is played by Will Ferrell, and Ferrell later starred in the Land of the Lost feature film.
• Reference Overdosed
• Santa Claus: Clerks Holiday Special
• Seinfeldian Conversation (Several, with memorable inquiries such as the Moral Dissonance of the Rebels in Return of the Jedi, and the merits of not/going ass-to-mouth)
• Shout-Out: Even the entries that aren't so over-the-top get their share, like the pastiche of a memorable Jaws scene in Chasing Amy.
  • A substantial portion of the dialogue in Dogma is either quoted from or referring to several movies and shows, including Indiana Jones, Star Wars, The Karate Kid, and The Six-Million Dollar Man.
  • Also, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is essentially one long parade of cameos, with nearly every single one of them accompanied by a Shout-Out to that person's most famous previous movie role. That, and the bong-lightsaber scene.
    • Look kids, it's Mark Hamill! [applause]
      • In fairness, he did that because test audiences failed to recognize Hamill.
• Shrug Take

Silent Bob: I got nothing.

• Silent Bob (Also the Trope Namer)
• The Slacker: Pretty much every single male character in the universe.
• Squick (Poor poor Caitlin Bree...)
• The Animated Series
• The Stoner (Jay)
• Thematic Series: The only direct sequel in the series is Clerks II. The rest of the series is loosely knit around New Jersey and the citizens of Red Bank.
• Translator Buddy: Jay to Silent Bob.
• Those Two Actors: Lampshaded in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.
• Uncanny Family Resemblance: Dante Hicks and his sundry cousins, all played by Brian O'Halloran.
• The Voiceless (God, Silent Bob)
• What Might Have Been: If Jay Mewes had not continued to play Jay (see above under Executive Meddling), he would have been replaced by either Seth Green or Breckin Meyer.
  • Word of God is that the only reason Jay And Silent Bob Go Canadian, Eh hasn't been made as an actual movie is that it was the Degrassi writers' concept and Smith would have to pay Epitome Pictures to use it.