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The Big Four

183 statements
35 feature instances
5 referencing feature instances

The Big Four	type	TVTItem
The Big Four	label	The Big Four
The Big Four	page	TheBigFour
The Big Four	comment	The Big Four is a 1927 novel by Agatha Christie. Almost immediately after Captain Hastings' return to England on business and to visit his friend Hercule Poirot, an uninvited guest appeared in Poirot's apartment coated from head to foot in dust. The man's gaunt face stared for a moment, then he swayed and fell.Who was he? Was he suffering from shock or just exhaustion? Above all, what was the significance of the figure 4, scribbled over and over again on a sheet of paper? Poirot finds himself plunged into a world of international intrigue, risking his life to uncover the truth about 'Number Four'.As you might have seen by the above summary, this particular installment is considered...strange for a Poirot novel. Agatha Christie apparently wrote it on the heels of a divorce and in need of money. Many of the chapters were originally short stories that she tied together with the overall plot.In 2013, the book was adapted for the thirteenth and final season of Poirot, with a vastly differing plot, due to the screenwriter finding the novel to be "an almost unadaptable mess". Tropes for this adaptation are listed on the series page.
The Big Four	fetched	2024-04-17T11:45:47Z
The Big Four	parsed	2024-04-17T11:45:47Z
The Big Four	isPartOf	DBTropes
The Big Four / int_19d1c1ae	type	Always Someone Better
The Big Four / int_19d1c1ae	comment	Always Someone Better: Subverted; not even Hercule Poirot's brother Achille is smarter than he is! Because he's nonexistent, for a start. Hercule does have some indication of this thought for Li Chang Yen, and it's indicated that the feeling is mutual.
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The Big Four / int_1b65dfad	type	The Cameo
The Big Four / int_1b65dfad	comment	The Cameo: Vera Rossakoff's role in the story basically amounts to this.
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The Big Four / int_1ba17583	type	The Ghost
The Big Four / int_1ba17583	comment	The Ghost: Number One. He stays in China for the duration of the story, though he's clearly masterminding things.
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The Big Four / int_25b5600	type	Captain Ersatz
The Big Four / int_25b5600	comment	Captain Ersatz: Li Chang Yen and the Destroyer are pretty much exactly Fu Manchu and Carl Peterson.
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The Big Four / int_2c7dc9c6	type	No One Should Survive That!
The Big Four / int_2c7dc9c6	comment	No One Should Survive That!: The Big Four plant a bomb in Poirot's apartment, which explodes while he and Hastings are there. Poirot presumably walks away unscathed (how exactly he survives is unclear, but he let them think it worked). Hastings is hit on the head and loses consciousness, but makes a full recovery relatively quickly. Thank goodness the two remembered to wear their Plot Armor.
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The Big Four / int_30a0067b	type	Supervillain Lair
The Big Four / int_30a0067b	comment	Supervillain Lair: Poirot and Hastings finally confront (three of) the Big Four in their massive lair in the Italian Alps. The lair is even blown up in the end, Dr. No style.
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The Big Four / int_391d6577	type	Sequel Escalation
The Big Four / int_391d6577	comment	Sequel Escalation: Poirot usually has to solve one or two (though three or more occur in the odd case) murders and capture the suspect(s). Here, he's up against a criminal organization bent on world domination. Yeah.
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The Big Four / int_403b6f3	type	Fainting
The Big Four / int_403b6f3	comment	Fainting: A convenient transition between moments quite often is to have Hastings, who's narrating everything, lose consciousness. It happens at least four times in the novel, at the end of essentially every action scene.
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The Big Four / int_4389e368	type	Actionized Sequel
The Big Four / int_4389e368	comment	Actionized Sequel: This novel is decidedly more action-packed than any other Poirot outing, including an unusually high body count, multiple characters employing disguises, explosions, stun gases, and fainting episodes. Oh, and there's that scene when Poirot and Hastings climb out of an upstairs window down some ivy...that isn't something you see every day in Agatha Christie's works.
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The Big Four / int_4604fd4d	type	Worthy Opponent
The Big Four / int_4604fd4d	comment	Worthy Opponent: Poirot considers Li Chang Yen this, though they never meet.
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The Big Four / int_464dd7cc	type	The Unfought
The Big Four / int_464dd7cc	comment	The Unfought: Li Chang Yen never appears on-page.
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The Big Four / int_46754750	type	Inadvertent Entrance Cue
The Big Four / int_46754750	comment	Inadvertent Entrance Cue: Poirot has been given a job in South America, and he says that, despite Hastings' appeal to stick around, he, Poirot, has to keep his word. Hastings jokes that only "an unexpected guest" could delay Poirot's departure. The very next paragraph has the duo hearing a noise coming from the next room, that noise soon being revealed as a strange, mostly incoherent man who brings news of the "Big Four".
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The Big Four / int_471a505f	type	Four Is Death
The Big Four / int_471a505f	comment	Four Is Death: Literally. Number Four is the Destroyer, the assassin of the group.
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The Big Four / int_48d9e12d	type	Funetik Aksent
The Big Four / int_48d9e12d	comment	Funetik Aksent: Christie enjoyed making fun of American accents. In this novel, Ryland the American millionaire talks about the "dooks" that may be visiting his mansion.
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The Big Four / int_4a3e547f	type	Leaning on the Fourth Wall
The Big Four / int_4a3e547f	comment	Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Poirot asks Hastings to summarize the latest case, and Hastings does so in such a clear and precise manner that Poirot says "I say to myself, it is a book that talks, not my friend Hastings."
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The Big Four / int_4e11940e	type	Mythical Motifs
The Big Four / int_4e11940e	comment	Mythical Motifs: Pondered upon by Hastings after Poirot tells him about his possibly fake brother Achille; he wonders about Poirot's mother and her choice in names for her children.
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The Big Four / int_52fbbe7	type	Yellow Peril
The Big Four / int_52fbbe7	comment	Yellow Peril: Unfortunately, there's a bit of this. The mastermind of The Big Four is Chinese (although the other three are Caucasian), among other things.
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The Big Four / int_6201e8b0	type	I Have Your Wife
The Big Four / int_6201e8b0	comment	I Have Your Wife: The Big Four do this to Hastings, promising to release her if he manages to lure Poirot to them. Luckily, Poirot already thought they'd try this and has had her safe and hidden for months now.
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The Big Four / int_6d56d241	type	Patchwork Story
The Big Four / int_6d56d241	comment	Patchwork Story: Originally a series of short stories that were published in The Sketch before being converted into a novel.
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The Big Four / int_737a65f4	type	The Watson
The Big Four / int_737a65f4	comment	The Watson: Hastings is back to serve as this.
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The Big Four / int_7570a10c	type	Bond Villain Stupidity
The Big Four / int_7570a10c	comment	Bond Villain Stupidity: One of the greatest problems with the novel. Number 4 casually murders someone in Poirot's flat in the very first chapter, has effectively unfettered access to him at any time, and shows that even together Poirot and Hastings have no chance against him alone, much less the army the Four commands. The Big Four go through significant expense to try to bribe, threaten, or capture the detective and even Hastings. Therefore, when a bomb appears in their living room it isn't a matter of surprise, but a matter of "what took you so long".
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The Big Four / int_92c112f7	type	Bitter Almonds
The Big Four / int_92c112f7	comment	Bitter Almonds: Cited by Poirot as evidence that the dead man in his apartment was murdered. When Poirot and Hastings got back home and found the man dead, Poirot concludes that the man was killed by cyanide and the windows were opened by the killer to dissipate the smell of bitter almonds.
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The Big Four / int_9ae8eea9	type	Character Tics
The Big Four / int_9ae8eea9	comment	Character Tics: Claud Darrell's odd manner of eating bread is one of these. It helps Poirot know if a man he's just met is really the Destroyer.
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The Big Four / int_babc974	type	Sadistic Choice
The Big Four / int_babc974	comment	Sadistic Choice: Hastings, captured by the Big Four, has one of these forced on him: lure Poirot into our clutches or your wife will die. Not that they have her at all, but he doesn't know that.
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The Big Four / int_bc00493f	type	Precision F-Strike
The Big Four / int_bc00493f	comment	Precision F-Strike: Hastings is being dangled over the Thames to try to convince him to write a letter to lure Poirot into the hands of the Big Four. His response? "To hell with your letter!"
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The Big Four / int_c5a0b4d3	type	Brain Fever
The Big Four / int_c5a0b4d3	comment	Brain Fever: Discussed, and debunked. The incoherent man talking about the Big Four is still mumbling when Hastings suggests "brain fever" as the problem. Dr. Ridgeway is contemptuous.
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The Big Four / int_daef39ee	type	Elaborate Underground Base
The Big Four / int_daef39ee	comment	Elaborate Underground Base: The Big Four have their worldwide headquarters hidden beneath a mountain in the Italian Alps.
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The Big Four / int_ec0bf4a1	type	Take Over the World
The Big Four / int_ec0bf4a1	comment	Take Over the World: The Big Four's ultimate goal is world domination.
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The Big Four / int_ecdb8790	type	Decapitation Strike
The Big Four / int_ecdb8790	comment	Decapitation Strike: Hercule disguises himself as his non-existent brother Achille, in order to trick the titular group into thinking that Hercule is still at large, so that they can be taken out all at once in the planned operation.
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The Big Four / int_f068cba	type	Oddball in the Series
The Big Four / int_f068cba	comment	Oddball in the Series: An easy way to explain this novel is "Hercule Poirot hijacks a Bond novel". Christie wrote several Spy Fiction and "nefarious secret society" novels, but they were either in the Tommy and Tuppence series or one-offs like The Secret of Chimneys or They Came to Baghdad. This is the only Hercule Poirot Spy Fiction novel, as opposed to Poirot's more regular work solving murders.
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The Big Four / int_f16da697	type	Undying Loyalty
The Big Four / int_f16da697	comment	Undying Loyalty: Hastings is shown to have this towards Poirot in this book a few times, notably being willing to die rather than let him be captured by the Big Four.
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The Big Four / int_f516f938	type	Never Found the Body
The Big Four / int_f516f938	comment	Never Found the Body: Hinted at with Number Four, whose body was said to be unrecognizable. Nothing ever comes of it, though.
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The Big Four / int_f9876f7e	type	Faking the Dead
The Big Four / int_f9876f7e	comment	Faking the Dead: Poirot this time, to throw the Big Four off the scent.
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The Big Four / int_fd7267dd	type	Master of Disguise
The Big Four / int_fd7267dd	comment	Master of Disguise: Number Four, the Destroyer. He appears in multiple guises throughout the novel.
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The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

The Big Four	hasFeature	Beneath Notice / int_a2dd8e62
The Big Four	hasFeature	Elaborate Underground Base / int_a2dd8e62
The Big Four	hasFeature	Master of Disguise / int_a2dd8e62
The Big Four	hasFeature	Patchwork Story / int_a2dd8e62
The Big Four	hasFeature	The Unfought / int_a2dd8e62

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