Wade Owen Watts a.k.a. Parzival Quotes

Wade's friendship with Aech transcends race, even when he finds out that she's an African-American lesbian named Helen. That wins some major points for Wade in our book. Or maybe at this point he's too worried about other stuff to give a hoot about the fact that his bestie is very much not who he thought he was.

By requiring three people to be present in order to open the Third Gate, the Hunt becomes Halliday's way of demonstrating the necessity of friendship. Perhaps he hoped he, Og, and Kira would have held those keys.

In the end, Wade is able to say words that Halliday never could. Halliday never saw the value of friendship, cutting all ties with Ogden and Kira even though he (Halliday) could not have made it as far as he did without them.

Wade has a way of rationalizing his world to keep from getting too depressed about it. Although we're not sure that an energy crisis is going to affect people who have been living without modern conveniences for centuries the same way it affects Americans today.

Early on in the Hunt, Wade shows his intention to go to any lengths and devote any amount of time to finding the egg. Even though this is a digital car he's planning on stealing, if the Hunt required him to hotwire and steal a real car, he'd figure out a way.

That means that Wade's read around 400 books in about four years. In addition to watching all that TV, all those movies, and listening to all that music. That's a lot of devotion to culture from 60 years before his time. That would be like us watching Casablanca 20 times a week. How in the world has he found the time?

That's pretty much three days straight with Matthew Broderick. The only other person with the same level of perseverance is Sarah Jessica Parker, and more power to her.

Not that Wade was exactly an upstanding member of society to begin with, and his never going outside again doesn't really mean anything because he never went outside in the first place. What this shows is his extreme devotion to the quest.

Wade perseveres when it comes to relationships, too. Even though Art3mis doesn't want to team up with him, doesn't want to be his girlfriend, and sometimes doesn't want anything to do with him period, Wade doesn't give up. And he gets the girl in the end.

At first, it's easy for Wade to keep going. He's number one on the scoreboard, kind of full himself, or at the very least confident. After months pass without finding the Jade key, he starts to give up. Once Art3mis finds it, it wouldn't have been surprising if he had just given up altogether, but instead it drives him more.

Wade is like a little digital version of Tim Robbins in The Shawshank Redemption, another story of triumph against impossible odds. At this point in the story, Wade has willingly allowed himself to be imprisoned by IOI in order to pull off a plan that he's not even 100% sure if it'll work. Now that's a commitment to a cause. All that's missing is him spinning in the rain after he escapes.

Everyone's looking for a way to escape, and most people are using some form of media to do it, even if it isn't the OASIS. Wait a second… that sounds eerily familiar.

Wade goes on a diatribe early on about how terrible the Earth is. We can sum it for you with these five words: life stinks, then you die. With that kind of attitude, no wonder he's so eager to wash his hands of the place and fly off into space.

We wonder when this awesome "used to be" actually was. In the '80s, amidst the Cold War, the discovery of AIDS in the U.S., and the murder of John Lennon? Just because there was a lot of incredible pop culture doesn't mean the world was a better place. The grass is always greener in the past. But let's not forget the fashion disasters that plagued the '80s, too.

This is Wade's opinion. If there is anything worthwhile about the real world that he's so dissatisfied with, he doesn't share it with us. But come on, there must be something redeemable.

We're not sure if all the good teachers just moved over to the OASIS and let the public school system continue to decay, or if a few stayed behind to try and fight the noble fight for education. Either way, we're starting to realize that Wade's beefs with the real world sound a lot like some of the political discourse we're hearing today.

You know things are bad when people are on a waiting list to get a job at Burger King. Which came first? This bad economy or the general population's apathy toward life?

Here's another eerily familiar complaint. Looks like in Ready Player One's version of reality, climate change is here to stay. Wade's solution to the world's problems: give up and fly away. Is he sane to escape and try to start a new life, or just really selfish?

It's hard for Wade to see why anyone would re-create their childhood home in the OASIS because his own childhood was so terrible. Seeing these fond recreations makes him think that the world used to be some sort of paradise.

This statement shows us that it's not just Wade's hometown of Oklahoma City that's a dump. Every place is experiencing the same crippling problems. This, ladies and gentlemen, is what we call a dystopia.