Special Hors d'oeurves

[RockSunner]

It's interesting to speculate on the villains' plans for the cocktail party that never happened. Esmé said there would be "special hors d'oeurves" (TPP p. 87) and that the guests would not be able to see the surprises they had in store for them.

I think that the special hors d'oeurves were going to be made from Medusoid Mycelium mushrooms. The guests would not be able to see the tiny spores. Another clue is that Colette's "chemist" disguise had a surgical mask, which would be useful in preparing the mushrooms. On p. 336, Hugo asks if the hors d'oeurves plan was still in operation.

What do others think? Can we rcconstruct anything else about Olaf and Esmé's original plan?

[Antenora]

I remember Esme saying that they'd have their associates hidden under slipcovers on the couches, and put electric eels in the fountains. They also said they'd hang volunteers from the ceiling; perhaps they'd do that to whomever they captured who didn't die from the Mycelium hors d'oeurves.

[Jacques the Environmentalist]

Yes, the Hors d'oeurves were definitely the mycelium.
I still find myself wondering which cocktail party lemony was at as he was writing book 12 "Under the coffee table of a notorious villain."
Olaf's house?

[Sugary Snicket]

So the snacks were poisonous, and they planned to hang people? Not much of a plan. Esme noted that there would have been some way to keep them from escaping. Maybe they decided to put SOME mycilium in the food, and release the REST later.

[Antenora]

I'm pretty sure they mentioned blocking off the exits as well, putting their associates there to stop the volunteers from escaping.

And Lemony could have been at the house of one of the Sinister Duo, since he was under a backgammon table, and the woman broke her finger in a dispute over a game of backgammon.

[Grace]

Yeah, that's still confusing. The whole backgammon is still confusing, of the breaking the finger, the underneath the table, the Baudelaire parents playing backgammon.

[Dante]

I agree that the hors d'ouvres were probably going to be made from the Mycelium - maybe they were going to be kept in a covered dish of some sort until everyone was inside and the exits were blocked, electric eels in place etc. Then Olaf would present them - he'd probably have some horseradish for himself and his comrades - and the whole thing would become a general slaughter, really.

It's difficult to say how the whole thing would be arranged, as it's never really specified how the Medusoid Mycelium works. They give off spores, but according to TGG, they don't get very far. And Olaf only actually had a few spores with him. But then again, the spores supposedly grew best in an enclosed space, so perhaps they'd grown into a fair few mushrooms within the diving helmet by the time of the cocktail party.

[Flaneur]

I'm certain the Medusoid Mycelium was involved in the party plans, but upon the rereading I have just engaged in I was struck by another idea. On pages 335 and 336, we glimpse the Baudelaires' glimpse of the freaks conversing as the Baudelaires try to warn them of the fire.

[...]they saw Hugo and Colette and Kevin, who were holding the birdpaper Klaus had hung outside the window of the sauna [...] They heard Hugo ask if the plan for the hors d'ouvres was still in operation, and they heard Colette ask about plucking the feathers off crows, and they heard Kevin complaining that he didn't know whether to hold the birdpaper in his right hand or his left hand...

What if they were planning to serve the crows, too? To show just how much they had triumphed, or what. It would be an interesting complement to Hal and Dewey's (coded) exchange about eating the birds.

[Dante]

That would actually be a very good idea, and would explain why the freaks were holding the birdpaper (I'd wondered about that). Both ideas, that of the Mycelium and the "eating crow" theory, have their merits. I'm not sure if Olaf's really subtle enough to plant Mycelium in the hors d'ouvres, but I'm not sure if the villainous group are unsubtle enough to serve up crow.

[RockSunner]

ffwf said:

That would actually be a very good idea, and would explain why the freaks were holding the birdpaper (I'd wondered about that). Both ideas, that of the Mycelium and the "eating crow" theory, have their merits. I'm not sure if Olaf's really subtle enough to plant Mycelium in the hors d'ouvres, but I'm not sure if the villainous group are unsubtle enough to serve up crow.

This is the only indication in the story that the crows actually fell onto the birdpaper instead of into the lake. Really, the whole sequence is absurd.

1) Using Carmelita to shoot the crows. We know that Esmé is an excellent harpoon shot (she can hit two falling notebooks with one shot). Why use an inexperienced brat for this? I would understand if it was Carmelita's idea and she insisted on it, but Olaf seems to have given her the idea.

2) The birdpaper strip is the width of one window, which is less that 1/50 of the total width of the building (100 rooms on a floor, 50 on each side). How could they expect that the crows could be shot just as they flew over the birdpaper?

3) Expecting the sugar bowl to fall into the funnel and not into the lake. The probability of the latter is far greater. I can see why Olaf might be bluffed into thinking this -- he seems to be losing more of his intelligence with each book -- but the Baudelaires? Violet knows mechanics and physics.

[Antenora]

I was wondering about the width of the birdpaper and Carmelita's aim, too. But it does make sense that the villains would serve up crow hors d'oeurves, as a symbol of their victory over the volunteers(and to horrify said volunteers even further).

[Dante]

rocksunner said:

This is the only indication in the story that the crows actually fell onto the birdpaper instead of into the lake. Really, the whole sequence is absurd.

*etc.*

I quite agree. The villains' whole scheme was insane. No part of it made sense. At least Klaus was appropriately sensible, and originally thought that the sugar bowl would fall into the pond, but Sunny suggested it would have gone into the funnel. But I guess there are many unrealistic events in the books, as well as unfortunate ones.

[Ennui]

Good old suspension of disbelief. We don't need to explain it...

[Hooky]

I also figured that it was a pretty impossible thing to happen. To actually expect the crow to fall on the birdpaper is simply absurd. It could not have worked very well at all.

[Sugary Snicket]

Yet Maybe some DID. So maybe the snacks were going to be made from crow and stuffed with the mushrooms, and like Dante said, it'd become a massive slaughter.