A Series Of Unfortunate Events Explained (Books & Show) | Mystery Box Review 

i think the reason everyone's answer to the contents of the sugar bowl is different is to illustrate how stupid war is, nobody knows what they're truly even fighting over.

Inside you there are two wolves: one who appreciates unsolved mysteries, enjoys the speculation, and believes some things, in fact, don't need answers; and another who desperatly wants things to make sense and have fitting resolutions. ASOUE creates a schism between them and places them at war...

I truly believe that the sugar bowl contained exactly what it says-sugar-and every rumor spread and every iteration of it just made it seem like that sugar bowl was such an important thing in the schism. The sugar bowl was a metaphor that people fight over the most crass and simple things in life that they never really stopped and reevaluated if what they were trying to get was worth more than the harm they're causing to each other. Esme Squalor probably just thought that the sugar bowl was very "in" that's why she got infuriated when Beatrice stole it from her.

To this day, I still remember distinctly the crushing disappointment I felt when I read the last book. There was an endless paragraph about how some mysteries are better left unsolved and that's when I realised that was the author's way of justifying to me, the reader, that he never planned what was inside the sugar bowl and couldn't find an answer that would live to the hype he created. He was great at creating compelling mysteries, but he literally gave up on solving them...

One clever part about putting something valuable in a sugarbowl is that the sugarbowl is ceramic and therefore very resistant to fire. Ceramics are fired and hardened at temperatures way hotter than that of a standard house fire. Perfect for VFD.

Anyone else still have questions about Olaf’s henchmen? Specifically the white-faced women, right before turning on Olaf they mentioned that they lost their parents and sister to a house fire. It could be irrelevant but it never really left my mind. I wish we knew more about them.

What I always noticed is the repetition of the number of 3, there's three Baudelaire children, three Quagmires, three Denoumonts, three Snickets, the adult siblings also had consecutive letters(Jaques, Kit, Lemony) It might never have ever been important but props to The author for that

I always bought into the theory that the sugar bowl was a macguffin, meant to drive the plot. Sunny even says it at one point in the books. I think it holds up a mirror to how conflicts can have legitimate reasons for existing, such as morality, but devolve into fighting after somethibg meaningless or small happens. It’s like World War I. The easiest answer people give as to what started it, was the assassination of Arch Duke Ferdinand (mentioned in the books as well) but in reality it was much more complicated than that. I think the sugar bowl is much the same way. It was the trigger for the organization to devolve into conflict. The spark that started the fire. Fighting in relationships might start over something silly and deepen into the actual problems in the relationship

I see the series as a metaphor for life in general. Bad things happen and you will never truly know why they do. We will never know everything in this life, there are mysteries all around us that we can’t find answers to and in the end “it is the best for which you can hope for”

I read a theory online that the sugar bowl contained a audio recording device. VFD would have picnic baskets containing codes based off of the foods in the picnic(like when the Bauldalaires solved a code from the food in the fridge at the burned VFD headquarters), this also served as a means for their agents to meet to exchange information or receive orders. In these picnics a bugged sugar bowl would be placed to record their agents conversations because VFD is all about being excessively paranoid. This also explains why VFD agents always take their tea and coffee bitter, because otherwise if wanted to sweeten their drinks they’d have to use the sugar bowl and there is no sugar in the sugar bowl. Eventually something really juicy got recorded but got mixed up with the other sugar bowls and the race for that particular one started the Schism.

As I read this when I was a child, I definitely had the feeling that the story was not about all the convoluted plot and side stories of every non-sensical character, but really about children fraternising and enduring the absurdities and sufferings of adults' world. So thank you, but I really don't care what is in the sugar bowl.

I’ve never hated and loved a story so much the way I hate and love a series of unfortunate events. I wish we could get new stories of the grown up orphans :(

This book series was such a part of my childhood. I am a fan of the movie, just disappointed it didn’t do well enough to continue. I love that this series was given its proper justice on Netflix. The world was expanded, the characters and actors were great, while some of the special effects are iffy with CGI, it’s all around the adaptation that the books deserved.

The horseradish appletree could’ve been the Baudelaires’s “Plan B”. Like they thought “well the sugarbowl was a fiasco, but we might as well develop something ELSE to fight the Mycelium and all we have here is a bigass appletree. Maybe we can add horseradish to the apples et voilá!”

The series plays on biblical themes and the question of knowledge vs ignorance. On the island aka the garden of Eden there is a tree with the knowledge of good and evil. A snake presents the apple to them to partake and live. The orphans chose to seek knowledge even though it cases them great pain and ultimately they chose to leave the island/garden. Other characters (especially authority figures) chose to live in ignorance. Sometimes ignorance is bliss but it also tends to lead to death. The series deals with questions of authority and knowledge.

The thing about sugar bowls is that the contents can change, at any point in the time line. At the opera we see the sugar cubes have been removed from the bowl, so it seems unlikely that the bowl was, at that time, just wanted for its sugar content, hybrid or otherwise. Esme is more concerned about the sugar bowl itself, as it completes her tea set. In the opera scene we only know it contains vaguely defined 'research' - so I do wonder if there's details on a slip of paper, or in the design on the outside or inside of the bowl, of this unknown research.

I think it's one of those things to teach us that tragic things happen that have no answers. The Baudelares likely wonder why their lives were a lightning pole for tragedy and thought they could find answers by discovering the secrets of VFD and the sugar bowl, which turns up nothing. All that mattered in the end if they were together and were able to move forward together as a family and find happiness despite the trauma, abuse, and dangers they survived.

I remember in the first episode when Lemony mentioned a volunteer fire department and when they started mentioning VFD my mind drifted back to the volunteer fire department as a pure joke only to find out I was right

One of the strong suits of the series is that the author of the books is the one who helped to expand the stories.

I still remember being a kid and watching the movie at the cinema. We had no idea what to expect, and were so captivated by everything. I didn’t feel the same way about the show, but then I was also a lot older, so it makes sense. I did like the show though.

The contradicting sugar bowl stuff is cool, because we can never know what actually happened, every side has a different account of what happened. Some say it held sugar, others a cure, or maybe it was never significant and it’s importance was over exaggerated by years of recounting events that may or may not have happened.

Absolutely love this video! One small correction for the problems with the sugar bowl timeline. The show states that the Baudelaire parents were trying to RECREATE the botanical hybrid on the island. The sugar bowl contains the original.

25:35 "I made a mistake" is the coded message

As a kid I thought ASOUE was a good series of kids books and nothing more. I recently had a thought though, that we never actually learned what made the sugar bowl so important in the books and looking into that has made me realize that these books go so, so much deeper than kid me ever realized. VFD is really well done, and the realization that although it wasn't mentioned until Austere Academy and didn't really become a fully fleshed-out organization until around Hostile Hospital or Carnivorous Carnival I think, it's been influencing pretty much every aspect of the series since Bad Beginning.

i like the Netflix cannon, but it isn’t all that faithful. The biggest difference is the fact that it far clearer who is meant to be wicked and who is supposed to be noble.

Also….at the very end Olaf literally says he didn’t start the fire that killed their parents, but the book never tells us who did! Why!?

That first "ring!" had my ears prick up so fast! Great deep dive, you've drawn similar conclusions to what I have. My best friend and I were obsessed with the books growing up, so much so I got myself an eye tattoo 😅

The earliest we hesr about the sugar bowl in the show is actually in episode 2 when count olaf makes a remark about missing it while drinking his coffee

36:21 "run now" is a coded message too

fun fact: the bombinating beast makes an appearance in the netflix version of the end, one of the islanders holding a tiny statue of it side note: a major flaw for me in netflix series was that the bad beginning was too long (two episodes) for the shortest book in the series, and the end was (almost?) the longest book and only got one episode, so too much content was cut

I truly believe that the sugar bowl is a metaphor. I think nobody really knows what it contains but wants to have it, showing how people fight over nothing. The sugar bowl was a sparkle that started the fire of the Schism, but a huge problem that we dont know was already there. The Great Unknown is both a metaphor for death and a true monster, probably the sea beast of All The Wrong Questions (amazing series, you should read it)

This book series taught me that I'll never figure out EVERYTHING in my life, but that doesn't mean I can't do wild things

One of violets best line's Klaus: Do you think we can trust Kit? Violet: Since we got into her taxi, she's broken at least nine traffic safety laws, driven into a hedge, and recruited us to spy for a secret organization. I like her. Klaus: Me too.

To me, The Great Unknown is also part of the theme of that particular book. We assume it's a terrible malevolent beast, simply because we fear the unknown, but we never actually have any proof of malice or evil, and I think it's even implied it may be in fact a benevolent force trying to help, or one that can neither be considered evil nor noble. And if it's a metaphor for death, I suppose you could also read that as a grim way of saying that death can be terrible or a relief, depending on the circumstances of ones life leading up to it.

But I still have one question, how are violet, klaus and sunny alive. In the first scene in the show the children question why their parents randomly told them to go to bring beach. That means that the parents might have known that something was going to happen that day. Right? Idk

I was deep down the Harry Potter rabbit hole when my older cousin recommended these books to my brother. I couldn't be bothered, because they're really geared towards a younger audience (my cousin was in graduate college lol), but my little brother actually latched onto them. He hated reading, and had no interest in HP (which I pre-ordered and went to the midnight book releases for), but something about the LS books just drew him in (he's 6yrs younger than me). It was so cool to see a kid who just hated reading, absolutely devouring this series. If ask him about it, and he'd always be so excited to share the latest mystery or reveal. He had something to be passionate about, like I was with HP. After I finished HP, I revisited LS, and the first thing I noticed was what you said, they don't talk down to the audience. Yeah, the first person narration is definitely more kid friendly, but they're good books at any age. I could live without the constant explanations of vocabulary, but it's something that's really helpful for those kids that hate reading.

anybody else notice he uses VFD acronyms throughout the video like at 24:42 a Very Frustrating Dilemma

I think count olaf burt the baudalaire mansion because in the show we get a flashback from the day before of olaf telling Mr. Poe that he was the nearest relative of the baudalaire. And I remember him saying something like “If the baudalaire mansion happens to burn down and their parents die I am their nearest living relative and could inherit their fortune”

I like how the show gives answers and happy endings to the hench people and most of the people at the hotel denouement (implied)

I think the VFD warm up was the disagreement of how to handle knowledge. The “good side” wanted it to just be unbridled. Whereas the “Bad Side” wanted it contained and controlled. I believe the boiling over due to the sugar bowl was bc that unspoken agreement was gone. The “Good Side” has knowledge that was dangerous (The Spores) and the “Bad Side” had something that could destroy that knowledge (The Cure and Immunization), but when the Bowl was taken… it meant one side had both. So that stalemate was now gone. So the “Bad Side” went “Alright… I guess the gloves are off”

The "all coming together joke" was p clever. Subbed.

This was the first book series that I really enjoyed as a kid that I read on my own

The whole Winnipeg thing was also like a "plot escape", quite smart tho

I have an unnecessary amount of obsession for the show. I will forever crave a prequel.

This series is just so well made I loved the books and its so well cast, Neil Patrick Harris is an excellent count olaf

This is a masterpiece of a video. Everything is organized in such a meticulous way and I love how you disclose the way you will be approaching/backing up each point. I will definitely be checking out your other videos. I wish I had found this sooner.

A lot of the "extra" stuff from the TV show came from the additional books, The Beatrice Letters and Lemony Snicket's Unauthorized Autobiography. The show just ties them into the story. The movie theater showing the zombie film is in the Unauthorized Autobiography, along with the poison darts at the opera, and a lot of the rest. It's been a long time since I read them but I felt like pretty much every part of the show that wasn't in the main books came from those.

This is such a criminally underated video this gave me so much closure about the plot thank you 🙏🏼

I’m currently rewatching the Netflix series, I remember keeping up with it when it first came out and how excited I was for each new season. Never got around to reading the books, but still this series is a big part of my middle school years I love the unanswered mysteries and trying to solve them

This channel is so underrated this video deserves more views and likes

“What I like to call…” is a phrase that here means, “The proper subcategory of a genre to which everyone refers to a story as belonging.”

the SECOND i heard a bell i knew what you were doing. amazing video, all the kudos!

My friend and i both read the series as kids and watched the show when it first came out, and we decided to reread them in a sort of weekly book club. We just finished #5 and im excited to get to the VFD stuff and reinvestigate it all

This was my Harry Potter as a kid. I was glued to these books and watched the movie over and over. I was such a nerd I would look for the initials VFD everywhere at school

Your voice actually sounds like Klaus's voice. From the netflix series. That alone gave me so much comfort 🤧

Excellent video packed full of great info...BUT...you failed to mention Daniel Handler (with some help) wrote the teleplay for all 25 episode...so anything ''added'' to Netflix's ASOUE was Lemony approved 😜👍👍

Thank you so much for making this video! It was exactly what I was thinking when I finished the show and even if not all mysteries are solved, this clears things up and helps so much!

in the books, it was never known if Lemony and Beatrice ever meet in person. it is implied that Beautrice was looking for Lemony but, it was never revealed if they ever did meet, leaving everything to the readers imagination and adding another question left unsolved.

Subbed, awesome video, just finished the series, it was beautifully dark, and really made me feel every emotion, by the finale episode, I somehow was able to take the Offhand comments, flashbacks, snippets of notes and dialogue between characters, and by the end of it all, was proud of myself because I was able to figure out what i needed to, to understand everything, and still left with questions, yet satisfied with the ending, your video is an amazing summary, explanation and breakdown, enjoying hearing the story really dug into and explained fully, you are amazing! 😃

Very well put together video! Glad to see you also added subs since I'm italian. Bravo!

Thanks for this video, that was super comprehensive! Sent it to my friend (who doesn't mind spoilers) in hope of making her want to watch or read it~ It definitely worked on me at least! Still trying to figure out the secret code!

Still wiping away the tears from the ending.. The world was too quiet there- so I had to look for another place to stay at that wasn't as quiet.. I watched the show thinking it's kind of A comedy but I was obviously wrong. This show will wreck ur evening ur whole life and your day..So look away

When i watched the series come to me the schism began long before olaf and lemony generation as the original hq of vfd was already on fire in the mountains and all of them were part of the same school. Every side started a armamentistic escalation that conclude with the mycelium been developed. As the mycelium become a problem. Beatrice began the investigation to find a cure, and then a way to immunization everyone, but it was to bitter-discusting it must be put on sugar cubes. The second generation fight began when Beatrice hides the cure on a very valuable sugar bowl property of Esme and any of them is aware of the true value of the sugarrbowl or the inmunization sugarcubes. This ends on olaf father's dead and made young adults olaf join the "arsonist" side of the vfd. After that the parents go on a trip and get lost for almost a year, an then create the radish-apple tree. The vfd try to prevent the arsonist to get the cure in anyway and esme was only looking to complete her collection that's why she never been reach by the arsonist at all. At the end olaf destroy the vfd and the arsonist as nothing of the schisms really matters to him.

the sugar bowl only containing sugar just doesnt make sense, when the show depicts the sugar bowl being gone, the blocks of sugar are right there on the dish. if the show is to be believed, then the sugar is the immunizer that is just so valuable, but beatrice took the sugar bowl without the sugar? that's like taking the case but not the jewelry. i could just be misunderstanding it, but it would make a lot more sense if the sugar bowl itself was the value instead of whatever inside, like any sugar put inside the sugar bowl would make you immune to the medusoid mycellium, but it still doesn't work

Theory about the setting and schism: First of all, the dart thrown at Count Olaf's father was just a tranquilizer, and he didn't die right there. It just seemed like he was killed there, and it was easy to lie about. The series takes place in and around Viña Del Mar, Chile, and the schism was in late 1973. For context, on September 11 of that year, the military disposed of the left wing Salvador Allende in favor of Augusto Pinochet, a right-wing dictator. The firefighters supported Pinochet, while the firestarters opposed him. As a result, they were killed extrajudicially (usually thrown out of helicopters). Due to internal political disputes, VFD split, with the firefighters being supported by Pinochet. Because of this, the fire starters didn't do much until 1990, when they were emboldened by the transition to democracy, in which, Chile elected a center left government, under president Patricio Aylwin. That year, they burnt down the Quagmire home, then burned down the Beaudelaires' not long after. Viña Del Mar fits in perfectly with the series's geography and the city's history lines up with the backstory.

How do u not have more subs?! This content is quality!

Here's a bit of a stretch bc I just rewatched the whole show and really want the sugar bowl to have an answer and am happy to settle for what they told us, even if it isn't perfect or if not knowing is more poetic or fitting to the story: The objections you raise to the sugar bowl containing the cure to the fungus (I'm not even gonna try to spell it) can be solved, if you're willing to suspend a little disbelief. Yes, the schism is older than the sugar bowl, but, as you later say, its theft only worsened it, not created it (any characters who say otherwise are dramatizing what happened or have simplified it in their heads, which many sides fighting wars often do); the Baudelaires wrote down that they were figuring out how to create a cure and Beatrice would put it in the sugar bowl - well, if Beatrice stole the sugar bowl, she could've kept it and brought it with her to the island, where they had the cure, but not the means to make more of it. Eventually, they figure it out, and add to the little of it they already had, in the sugar bowl; Captain Widdershins states its contents are too dangerous for children to know, not because of its actual contents, but because he doesn't want to explain the story of the sugar bowl, its theft, and specifically how Beatrice steals and kills for it, aka, how the volunteers can do bad things in the name of good - that's what he doesn't want the children to know (btw, could this be why the Captain wasn't in the show? They wanted to avoid his not-answer to the sugar bowl?); and finally, that it can exonerate Lemony and incriminate Olaf, could be that, again, it's not about its contents, but its story - that Lemony stole it, and was an accomplice to killing Olaf's father, would prove that Olaf has it out for him and was the one to wrongly accuse him of his crimes.

i don't think the show was wrong about the sugar bowl. quigley was at anwhistle aquatics and could have put it in there then. but for the rest of the time it is likely it was empty and was a convenient vessel for whoever used it, mostly important for the symbolism in the story.

I see what you did there with the bell cipher. I am too lazy to rewatch and decode it plus i do not know the cipher, but that was a pretty cagey way to get ppl to rewatch the video..excellent job great video!

This was one of my top 10 favorite nextflix shows. I wish they had more.

Hotel Denouement REALLY reminds me of New Pork City "it may be possible the Master Porky has gathered everyone here for one final, twisted party, before the end of the world" I just found that to be a bit similar.

This blast to the past reminded me about other mystery adventure book series i once read - Ulysses Moore and turns out the more thrilling mystery then whatever happens there is fact it and its author have literally no presence on the internet xD

My headcannon is that the theft of the sugar bowl did not start THE schism. It caused the schism between Esme and Olaf, and the Snickers and Boudelairs.

The straw that broke the camel's back

I love this show its actully tragic and heart wrenching

btw, the apples don't have horseradish, they actually have a recreation of the median from the sugar bowl, which was explicitly stated in the show.

One question I don't think is ever answered is why VFD's logo is made to look like an eye. I know it's supposed to be the letters V F D, but in the cover art for book 13 "The End" it's quite obviously stylized to look like an eye, and it's always mistaken for an eye by almost every character who sees it, so it can't just be a coincidence. It just seems weird that an organization called Volunteer Fire Department would use an eye for symbolism.

I only read the season 10 and it was wow.. even though it leaves the readers with some sort of mental issues

The problem is that people assume the theft of the sugarbowl caused the schism. That event is important but for the reason it allowed for Olaf to join the schism, and VFD to lose its leader, probably the reason the noble side couldnt easily fight back. The schism was already cooking as Beatrice was already wary about the Man no hair, Women no beard. Im sure the schism was caused by the inevitble greed developed by some members after this noble organization gained fortunes and developed offical headquarters. It also couldve easily been cause when the posions and cures were first found out about and obrained, but the theft of the sugar bowl is important for our main cast, but not why the whole organization was fighting in the first place.

this makes so much sense! thank you for this video!! how did you get the scenes?

I remember thinking Kit Snicket was played by Stephanie from game theory

So guys this is from my theories/what I think: In the sugar bowl is sugar, but the sugar is a cure to the fungus (forgot what it was called lol). Beatrice and Lemony Snicket wanted to use the cure to cure all the people, but Esme was just greedy. She wanted the sugar to herself to complete her tea set. Another thing I think was that when in episode 9 or 10, there was the flashback and the note said “Olaf knows”. I think this means that he knows that Beatrice threw the poison dart, not Lemony, so he killed Beatrice. That’s all I know/theorizing, what do you think? This was only from the show, I read 3 of the books

It is confirmed that the cure for the Medusoid Mycelium was in the sugar bowl because if you see the opera scene with Esme and Kit , Esme says that the sugar would be bitter and we never see Kit drink her tea. That would explain why Kit died because she never drank her tea and when she was on the island she got the Medusoid Mycelium and died. Also many people think that Olaf burned the Baudelaires house down because when Olaf and Esme see Beatrice and Lemony run away with the sugar bowl Olaf says that Beatrice will burn. Also it would make sense because that would have probably been apart of Count Olaf's plan from the beginning. I personally think that because Beatrice killed Count Olaf's father, Count Olaf took his hate and anger upon the the Baudelaire children. This would make sense we never got why Count Olaf wanted the Baudelaire's fortune.

I really loved the movie and the show. It’s honestly such a special franchise to me. I love the way Netflix did the series and I also love the gothic concept they used in the movie.

Before finishing and just seeing comments: I’m really glad I didn’t finish the series since there is no real ending to the bs. Makes me realize how much I dislike mystery and always want the truth and answers. Even though I used to say that I liked mystery books when I was in elementary 😂.

The VFD in the eye symbol is what it looks like if you make those letters with your right hand. The F is even at an odd place to account for the rotation of your wrist bringing it lower

This is a great video! Could u do one of these on The Mysterious Benedict Society?

I think my biggest question is Jacquelyn since she is an actual character in the show and just an actor in the books but I wonder what happened to her cause she stopped showing up around Ersatz elevator also another one is what was in Peru that they wanted Monty to find/see it always confused me why it was so important cause even Count Olaf was on the boat same with Jacquelyn, I do know that in the books there was a boat run by V.F.D members kind of like Madam Lulu with them switching turns from time to time but it was Sailors still not sure I wish those 2 were answered..

Also, the events 8n my opinion, likely go like this: sugarbowl is stolen while parents leave island. because a horseradish factory already exists, then the rest of the events play out. So horseradish is a common cure for meducoid mycelium, but the sugarbowl is a secluded experiment by VFD.

Frankly: I never really wanted to know what was in the sugar bowl, same way I don't really want to know about The Great Unknown

It feels weird to watch these kinds of videos because I never read the books I’ve only seen the (2004 film) and (2017) show , the film which I absolutely adore, I’m not really sure why everyone gives it so much crap , I would however like to know if the books are worth reading,all in all great video.

This confuses me so much but I can't let it go

Great video!!

I can’t believe you’re going to make me watch the whole video again because I forgot about that one secret code… I couldn’t be happier

This sires is one of the best I've ever read,even though I haven't seen the show I have to say I enjoyed reading them all the way through!It's honestly up there with my favorite books sires' such as Wings Of Fire,Fazbear's Frights and Infinity Ring!

all good and dandy, but the third season just said to the author "you know what, I think I can write a better story than you" and throws out most of the important stuff out, leaving only shallow traces of what it was. It changes the ending and gives it a definitive happy vibe ending, which the books did not. the books leave you wanting more, because there is more that you will never know, or until handler decides to write about it. which I doubt he will.

Beautiful video

In atwq lemony is supposed to meet kit snicket to steal something very important, this thing is so important that kit says it is an opportunity that she could not pass up even if she had to do it alone. I believe this thing is the sugar bowl. In the book When Did We See Her Last, on the last page, we see a sketch of kit running away from the cops holding an object wrapped in burlap, that looks suspiciously like a sugar bowl.

What I think, is that the immunity was put into the sugar bowl after Beatrice stole it.

I know no one will read this but here's my opinion on the content of the Sugar bowl, the identity of the Question mark and all the other unanswered questions- We'll never know and we never were supposed to know. This is the story of the Baudelaires and how they survive the schism'd after effects and Olaf's schemes, not of V.F.D or the bowl. Lemony didn't include those details because they're not part of Violet, Klaus and Sunny's situation or story, and if Lemony revealed the information we want it would absolutely destroy the noble side of V.F.D as the information would be public knowledge.