Memorable (and Visceral) American Gods Quotes
American Gods is a fantasy drama TV series based on Neil Gaiman’s 2001 novel of the same name, in which Gaiman served as an executive producer.
Ricky Whittle plays the series’ lead Shadow Moon, who meets a strange man named Mr. Wednesday (Ian McShane) after being released from prison and soon becomes embroiled in a large-scale conflict between the Old Gods and the New Gods, who grow stronger each day. In May 2017, the series was renewed for a second season, which premiered on March 10, 2019. The following week, Starz renewed American Gods for the third season, which premiered on January 10, 2021. Sadly, in March 2021, the series was canceled after three seasons.
Despite only three seasons, this Neil Gaiman intellectual property included so many memorable moments. Moments which were captured in time with timeless monologues, courtesy of the talented crew. We’ve decided to capture the quotes of these moments which range from the pilot episode all the way until the end of season three.
1. “We have reprogrammed reality. Language is a virus, religion an operating system, and prayers are just so much fucking spam.”
– Technical Boy (American Gods)
2. “I offer you the worm from my beak and you look at me like I fucked your mother.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
3. “Tomorrow can’t do anything, today hasn’t already managed.”
– Shadow Moon (American Gods)
4. “Shadow, we’re going to be releasin’ you later this afternoon. You’ll be gettin’ out a coupla days early. There’s no good way to say this, so I’ll put it plain. This came in from Johnson City Hospital from Eagle point. Your wife, she died in the early hours of this morning. It was ah, an automobile accident.”
– Warden (American Gods)
5. “Rigged games are the easiest to beat.” – Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
6. “The devil’s in the details.” – Mad Sweeney (American Gods)
7. “You want help? Fine. Let me tell you a story. “Once upon a time, a man got fucked.” Now, how is that for a story? ‘Cause that’s the story of black people in America! Shit, you all don’t know you black yet. You think you just people. Let me be the first to tell you that you are all black. The moment these Dutch motherfuckers set foot here and decided they white, and you get to be black, and that’s the nice name they call you. Let me paint a picture of what’s waiting for you on the shore. You arrive in America, land of opportunity, milk and honey, and guess what? You all get to be slaves! Split up, sold off and worked to death! The lucky ones get Sunday off to sleep and fuck and make more slaves, and all for what? For cotton? Indigo? For a fucking purple shirt? The only good news is the tobacco your grandkids are gonna farm for free is gonna give a shitload of these white motherfuckers cancer. And I ain’t even started yet. A hundred years later, you’re fucked! A hundred years after that, fucked! A hundred years after you get free, you still getting fucked outta jobs and shot at by police! You see what I’m saying? This guy gets it. I like him. He’s gettin’ angry. Angry is good. Angry gets shit done. You shed tears and call for Anansi, and here he is, telling you: you are staring down the barrel of 300 years of subjugation, racist bullshit and heart disease. He is telling you there isn’t one goddamn reason you shouldn’t go up there right now, and SLIT THE THROATS OF EVERY LAST ONE OF THESE DUTCH MOTHERFUCKERS, AND SET FIRE TO THIS SHIP!” – Mr. Nancy (American Gods)
8. “You already dead, asshole. At least die a sacrifice for something worthwhile. Let the motherfucker burn! Let it all BURN!”
– Mr. Nancy (American Gods)
9. “Time and attention, better than lamb’s blood.”
– Media (American Gods)
10. “You can’t look out for yourself, how the hell are you going to look out for me.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
11. “There are bigger sacrifices one might be asked to make than going a little mad.” – Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
12. “No cow killing stories during dinner.”
– Zorya Vechernyaya (American Gods)
13. “I’m going to tell you something and you’re going to want to hurt me, but what I say has got to be said. So I want you to consider my words very carefully and refrain from knocking my teeth out.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
14. “The best things about these states we’re heading towards: Minnesota, Wisconsin, is that they have the kind of women I loved when I was younger. Pale skin, blue eyed, hair so fair it’s almost white, wine colored lips, full round breasts with veins running through them like a good cheese.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
15. “The world is either crazy or you are. They’re both solid options. Take your pick, and when you decide, come and tell me. But don’t rush into it. Take your time. Difficult decision.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
16. “Kissing is disgusting, but in a nice way, like a blue cheese or brandy.”
– Zorya Vechernyaya (American Gods)
17. “Shadow, at best you suffer from a failure of imagination. We’re gonna have to fix that.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
18. “The only thing that scares me is being forgotten. I can survive most things, but not that.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
19. “Don’t blame the parent, plenty of suffering and blame to go around. Although Jesus could stand a little more suffering. He’s doing very well for himself these days.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
20. “It’s so much easier grieving someone when you’re glad they’re dead.”
– Audrey (American Gods)
21. “Get out of my house you zombie whore!”
– Audrey (American Gods)
22. “Love will always have you at a disadvantage.”
– Anubis (American Gods)
23. “Many is the man who would take any version of his lost love rather than leave his love lost. He will say thank you to whatever god sent you back to him.”
– Mr. Ibis (American Gods)
24. “In life you believed in nothing. You will go to nothing. You will be done. There will be darkness.”
– Anubis (American Gods)
25. “You just have to think of this as like a sweet memory, like a naughty little secret. Something you think about when you’re old and you’re worried that you never did anything with your life.”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
26. “Religion inspires in those who fear nothing, fear of the gods, and using that fear requires a certain element of fucked up.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
27. “What’s a god? Can we even know they exist? People believe things, which means they’re real. That means we know they exist. So what came first, gods or the people who believed in them?”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
28. “Shame is the reason dead people only go out at night.”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
29. “There is no end to the cruelty of men threatened by strong women. So what’s a queen to do? She gets on her knees, she takes what she don’t want to, and we watch in easy fucking judgment and pretend we’d do a single thing different in her shoes.”
– Mr. Nancy (American Gods)
30. “Like all fortunes, Shadow: opaque on arrival, inevitable in retrospect.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
31. “I still don’t understand how such a sweet old man could have so many enemies.”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
32. “You are the standard of my world, for it might not be your way, I honor you in the most holy way that I know. A looming locomotive is the flaming arrow that soars through the heavy air from the bow of a Viking king. Let it strike you true and light your path to Valhalla!”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
33. “You things are not gods, by the way. You’re made by people. People who need answers and they’re too fucking lazy to look for them themselves.”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
34. “I don’t believe in luck. I don’t. I’m an atheist.”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
35. “The advantage of love at first sight is it doesn’t require a second look.”
– Mr. Ibis (American Gods)
36. “You sleepwalked though your life while you had one, then I had you killed. And now you’re sleepwalking through your death. It’s my hand up your skirt, puppet.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
37. “The truth is just information. And information will win the war for you, if you let it.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
38. “I am sorry about Zorya. But when you strike with lightning, you should expect consequences.” – Mr. World (American Gods)
39. “Humans are dead longer than they’re alive.”
– Mr. Ibis (American Gods)
40. “Playing dead convincingly is an underrated skill.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
41. “Oh, I know that smell. That smells like a hot bottle of whisky and sex in an alleyway with a top note of failure! Hey, yeah, eau de fuckup, it’s gotta be – it is – the one and only Mad Sweeney!”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
42. “Your spear is the sun’s treasure, now, you one-eyed cunt.”
– Mad Sweeney (American Gods)
43. “There was a girl. I remember that much. She had the sight. And she let me play with her boobies under the stars, and she told me my fortune. Told me I’d be undone and abandoned west of the sunrise, and that a dead woman’s bauble would seal my fate. And I laughed and I poured more barley wine and played with her boobies some more, and I kissed her full on her pretty breasts. Those were the last of the good days.”
– Mad Sweeney (American Gods)
44. “You love fear. You love horror. You pay money for a pair of three-dimensional glasses and popcorn for an hour and a half of anxiety.”
– Mr. World (American Gods)
45. “People like the idea that love makes the world go round. It doesn’t. You don’t lock you doors at night because you love thy neighbor; you deadbolt with reinforced steel because you fear thy neighbor. Fear is order. Fear is control. Fear is… safety.”
– Mr. World (American Gods)
46. “People like the idea that love makes the world go round. It doesn’t. You don’t lock your doors at night because you love thy neighbor, you deadbolt with reinforced steel because you fear thy neighbor. Fear is order. Fear is control. Fear is safety. Fear is fiction.”
– Mr. World (American Gods)
47. “I strongly recommend, my young friend, you view the news through the smoky glass of skepticism, and remember: all writers have a bias.”
– Mr. Ibis (American Gods)
48. “Fear has no end. Fear is limitless. Fear thrives and feeds on itself, preparing you for calamity, preparing you to believe that the most important things are the most dangerous. If it’s real in your mind, it’s real in the world.”
– Mr. World (American Gods)
49. “Man’s free will is his most prized asset.”
– Mr Wednesday (American Gods)
50. “Believe it not, I’m just trying to save the human race from itself.”
– Mr Wednesday (American Gods)
51. “You can be your own man all you want until destiny kicks in.”
– Mr Wednesday (American Gods)
52. “Oh, the universe is always on schedule. Besides, punctuality, virtue of the bored.”
– Mr Wednesday (American Gods)
53. “Half the art of war is knowing when to switch sides.”
– Mr Wednesday (American Gods)
54. “Nearly froze to death twice, and almost got my head blown off. But yeah, the food’s good.”
– Shadow Moon (American Gods)
55. “You know, if you’re rich you live in Monte Carlo. And if you’re famous, you live in California. But if you’re lucky, you live here in Lakeside.”
– Ann-Marie Hinzelmann (American Gods)
56. “Well, nudity is not lewdity, as they say.”
– Mr Wednesday (American Gods)
57. “Is that the sound of you covering your anus?”
– Ms. World (American Gods)
58. “Apology not accepted. Not now, not ever.”
– Shadow Moon (American Gods)
59. “A journey of spiritual awakening is better with French fries.”
– Bulquis (American Gods)
60. “Do you know what happens when you die? Nothin’. Really, absolutely fuckin’ nothing. And even once you’ve been dead for a hundred million years, you still haven’t even begun to be dead.”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
61. “Either you are very generous or you really want me to leave.”
– Salim (American Gods)
62. “Do you know what happens when you die? Nothing. Really, absolutely f***ing nothing. And even once you’ve been dead for a hundred million years, you still haven’t even begun to be dead.”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
63. “Why am I not surprised that the Buckeye State is a freakin’ Norse underbelly?”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
64. “Hank, I will always think of you as more of a friend than a mere purveyor of sponge baths.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
65. “Hank, the art of love is to be passed on to worthy lovers, and those worthy of love.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
66. “When my boss announces he’s a god and someone is killing his followers, which apparently explains why it’s partially cloudy with a chance of human remains! I mean, what the fuck!”
– Cordelia (American Gods)
67. “So you don’t trust the guy who refused to kill you, but you fell in love with the guy who did?”
– Salim (American Gods)
68. “Does it look like I’ve got a choice to do anything? I couldn’t even scratch my own fucking balls if I wanted to.”
– Technical Boy (American Gods)
69. “I am going to live my life as I please.”
– Salim (American Gods)
70. “You have to understand. They are a necessary sacrifice, in accordance with Norse tradition. Just one child every few years to give thousands of townsfolk a lifetime of prosperity. You know anyone here could put the pieces together if they wanted to, but they don’t. They don’t want to know the price, and you don’t have to burden them with it. The world is a dark and dangerous place. I provide shelter from the storm.”
– Ann-Marie Hinzelmann (American Gods)
71. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re very cynical and more than slightly overdramatic? I’m not talking about destiny. I meant you needed a challenge, like bowling.”
– Doyle (American Gods)
72. “I’m very happy for you with your lucky powers or whatever…”
– Laura Moon (American Gods)
73. “The truth doesn’t get me out of bed in the morning. It doesn’t do my job, or take Leon to school or hockey practice or sleepovers, so don’t fuckin’ preach to me about the truth!”
– Marguerite Olsen (American Gods)
74. “The stars: frontier to the future and map to the past.”
– Mr. Wednesday (American Gods)
75. “Trickery is what I do best.”
– Mr. World (American Gods)
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