Best exposition dump

[uchytjes]

Simple thread titles that also serve as the explanation for a thread? GENIUS!

Well anyway, My vote goes to the first half of the first episode of kotoura-san, a new anime that wandered onto my radar recently. I could gush on about how good it is, but its better to watch it yourself.
Its sad and heart-wrenching but gets you up to speed without explicitly telling you EVERYTHING. It honestly reminds me of the beginning to UP, but that thing could be a story within itself while this sets up the rest of the episode (have yet to watch episode 2) and I suppose the rest of the series. Also, I loved the 180 it did in the middle of the episode.

So, What is your favorite exposition dump?

Note: it doesn't have to be at the beginning of something. A lot of good exposition dumps come at the middle or even end of stories. For instance, that one story-relevant side quest in Deus Ex: Human Revolution, where you track down the nurse that knew your parents. Its a dump of exposition that is just a simple conversation with a senile old lady. It comes relatively close to the end of the game and is very missable.

 

[Sixcess]

"I know a bloke who knows a bloke who knows a bloke. Now you know this bloke."
"Do I?"
"This is a bloke you know."

From Sexy Beast, when Don Logan explains to Gal the back story of the robbery they're setting up. The scene jumps back and forth (sometimes literally mid-sentence) between Gal and Don in Spain, Don and another heavy two months earlier, and Teddy Bass, their boss, three months before that. Since the film isn't really interested in 'the job' itself except as a reason to bring these characters together it gets it all out of the way in about five minutes, doing so with great style.

I can't find it up to link to it, but if you've seen the movie you'll remember the scene. If you haven't seen it then you should. I guarantee that you will never look at Gandhi the same way again.

 

[Ranorak]

Elan has a special magic bard spell for it!

Spoiler

 

[Vault101]

exposition dump...is that were they basically give you a whole bunch of information pretating to the the plot/background info?

I'm not really sure if it counts but the intro to fallout kind of sets up everything we need to know

 

[the clockmaker]

This is, probably not just my favorite exposition dump ever, but also probably my favorite summary of the war on terror.

 

[Erja_Perttu]

the beginning to UP,

It think you just said the best one right there, but other than that one, my favourite would be the first couple of minutes of Drive.

Driver: [on phone] There's a hundred-thousand streets in this city. You don't need to know the route. You give me a time and a place, I give you a five minute window. Anything happens in that five minutes and I'm yours. No matter what. Anything happens a minute either side of that and you're on your own. Do you understand?
...
Driver: Good. And you won't be able to reach me on this phone again.

It's simple, it sets everything up. I love that movie.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I don't know many good expo dumps but here's a fine parody:

Spoiler

 

[flying_whimsy]

In Primordia, there's an exposition dump just before the end of the game involving a memory reader; without spoiling anything it's timing and presentation just blew my socks off. I'll be talking about that one for years.

 

[Megalodon]

The one from the tutorial of Fire Warrior was quite good, optional, slighlty interactive (you had to turn on the recordings). Plus voiced by Tom Baker. The bit I mean starts at 9 minutes or so. Did a pretty good job of summing up enough 40K for the purpose of the game.