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{{quote|''A [[Chainsaw Good|chainsaw]] can [[An Arm and a Leg|remove a limb]],
''or [[Evil Dead|act as a replacement]].''
|'''Showbread''', "Dead By Dawn"}}
A number of heroes and villains in video games, anime and science fiction either start off with or receive an artificial limb over the course of the story, usually to offset the [[Scars Are Forever|poignant loss of an appendage]]. This can either be due to [[An Arm and a Leg|an injury]], or in rare cases [[Life or Limb Decision|intentional mutilation]]. Said prosthetics [[Cyborg|will almost always function perfectly]], as if the character had [[Reset Button|never lost the limb to begin with]], save for malfunctions that relate to the story.
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* In ''[[Vision of Escaflowne]]'', [[The Dragon]] [[Aloof Big Brother|Folken]] has a pretty nifty-looking right arm given to him by the [[Big Bad]] to replace the one that got eaten by a dragon.
* Kurogane of ''[[Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle]]'' has, in the manga, recently required a prosthetic arm from the technologically advanced world of Piffle after he sacrificed his own arm to save Fai. Despite being a rush-job and therefore not covered in synthetic skin, it appears to work just as well as his organic arm. However, he has recently admitted {{spoiler|that the arm does not fit him right and causes him pain. Hard to conceal bleeding when your boyfriend is a vampire.}}
** In ''[[
* Ginkotsu of the Band of Seven in [[Inuyasha]] starts out with a heavily prosthetically amplified body and ends up as torso attached to a Feudal style tank.
** Arguably, the Band of Seven and Kikyou have prosthetic bodies which store their souls. Ditto for Akago/Mouryoumaru, kinda.
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* A number appear in ''[[Karakuri Circus]]'', including Arlequin's weapon of choice.
* In ''[[Naruto]]'', Chiyo's right arm is artificial and controlled through her puppet jutsu. She can use it to create a chakra shield similar to the puppets in the likeness of her son and daughter-in-law, but it's also vulnerable to getting clogged.
* Karl and {{spoiler|James}} of ''[[Blood
* ''[[Yami no Aegis]]'': Tate has a metal arm with which he can deflect bullets. It's also his primary weapon.
== Comic Books ==
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* Bunnie Rabbot in the Archie Comics' ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog (comics)|Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' becomes a type of cyborg when she's halfway tossed into a (''very'' fast-working) "roboticizing" machine. Her legs and one arm are turned into robotic limbs.
** Additionally, in this comic's universe, the echidna are presented as an advanced people that embrace progress while not forgetting nature and spiritualism. To this end, they shunned over-reliance on technology, something not every echidna agreed with. This caused the expected infighting and social divide, culminating in the formation of the Dark Legion, whose purpose in life was to antagonize their hippie, tree-hugging brethren and to demonstrate their complete embrace of technology... by implanting ALL of their members with bionics, sometimes an eye, sometimes a limb or two, or sometimes their entire body. Talk about hardcore.
* Lightning Lad of the original ''[[Legion of Super-Heroes (comics)|Legion of Super-Heroes]]'' got a bionic arm after losing the original to a [[Space Whale]]; he also had one in the post-''Zero Hour'' reboot, although in that case it was because [[Cain and Abel|his brother]] had blown the arm off. Ouch.
* In the [[Marvel Universe]], Misty Knight was a cop until she lost her arm in a bombing; [[Iron Man]] then designed a new bionic one for her.
* British sci-fi comics love this one.
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* [[Sgt. Rock]] adversary "The Iron Major," had his right hand replaced with one of solid iron.
* The crime boss Johnny Woo Woo from the [[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]] "Body Count" arc had metal hands.
* Former [[Captain America (comics)|Captain America]] sidekick [[Bucky Barnes]] has a cybernetic left arm to replace the one he lost at the end of [[World War
* The [[X-Men|X-
** The younger mutant Hellion later gains metal prosthetics that he animates with his telekinesis after his hands are blasted off by a sentinel.
* [[Scud the Disposable Assassin]] inverts this trope - he's a robot whose model was discontinued, and when he loses his arm he gets a human one as a loaner until his replacement parts can be ordered in. The problems with his meat arm {{spoiler|which once belonged to a werewolf}} fuel a whole story arc.
* In ''[[All Fall Down]]'', {{spoiler|the now-paraplegeic speedster, Pronto, resorts to this in order to regain his super speed.}}
* Several examples in ''[[Invincible]]'': Rex Splode gets a robotic hand after having one bitten off by a Lizard Man, Bulletproof
== Fan Works ==
* The main character of ''[[Christian Humber Reloaded]]'' loses an arm fighting his corrupted self, and gets a robotic arm as a replacement.
* It's safe to say that every character in ''[[That Guy with the Glasses in Space]]'' has these or are complete cyborgs by the time the story starts.
* ''[[Celebrity Deathmatch]]'' [[Continuation]] Fic, ''[[Final Stand of Death]]'' , [[KISS| Gene Simmons]] has these replacing his lost limbs, which he doesn't seem to be bothered. He considers them an improvement thanks to the abilities he can pull-off, such as creating [[Projected Man| projecting ghosts]].
** In Episode 10, {{Spoiler|Spice Girls}} received them as well.
== Film ==
* ''[[RoboCop]]'' performs the ultimate version: in the words of OCP's project manager, "total body prosthesis". They even mention how useless the reverse situation would be: when one of the doctors notes they were able to save one of Murphy's arms, the project manager promptly orders it thrown out and the originally planned robotic arm installed in its place.
* Kushana from ''[[Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind]]'' has multiple prosthetic limbs, and according to her (at least in the 2005 English Dub), whoever becomes her husband will see ''worse''. Think about that.
* ''Reach For The Sky'' is the dramatisation of the story of Douglas Bader, a double amputee who stil proved a better fighter pilot than many Germans. After Bader's capture by the Luftwaffe, an unprecedented local truce was concluded so that a British pilot could courier Bader's best set of false legs to German-occupied France...
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* ''[[Young Frankenstein]]'': Inspector Kemp's wooden arm.
** A spoof of Inspector Krogh's wooden arm in ''[[Son of Frankenstein]].''
* Interestingly enough, the [[Star Trek: The Next Generation|Star Trek TNG]] movie ''[[Star Trek: First Contact|First Contact]]'' does this ''[[Inverted Trope|backwards]]'' with the [
* Dr. No from the first Bond movie ''[[Dr. No]]'' has mechanical hands, having lost his hands in an accident during his research into radioactivity. His mechanical hands could crush stone to powder, but {{spoiler|could not grip a vertical beam well enough for him to lift himself out of the reactor's cooling tank}}.
** The henchman Tee Hee from ''[[Live and Let Die (film)|Live and Let Die]]'' had a mechanical right arm strong enough to break Bond's Walther PPK, but he fell afoul of a simple pair of nail clippers...
* [[Lindsay Lohan]] gets two in ''[[I Know Who Killed Me]]''. Granted, the movie's a thriller, so they're the more realistic version, which
* In Enki Bilal's ''Immortal'' (in both the comic and the film) [[Physical God|Horus]] forges a new leg for Nikopol out of a subway rail. It still needs Horus' power to function.
* In ''[[Repo Men]]'', one of the past-due artiforg recipients whom Remy and his partner chase down on the cargo ship has a robotic arm, and uses it to put up quite a fight.
* [[Michael Ironside]] gets fitted with one in ''[[Starship Troopers (film)|
* Gobber from ''[[How to Train Your Dragon (animation)|How to Train Your Dragon]]'' has an artificial arm and leg, the arm which he exchanges for a hammer, axe, tankard for his booze, etc. Toothless has an artificial half tail fin and {{spoiler|Hiccup gets an artificial leg after fighting Green Death
* Silver from ''[[Treasure Planet]]'', who has an
* {{spoiler|Dr. Gordon}} has one after {{spoiler|he escapes from the bathroom}} in ''[[Saw]]''. It is of the realistic variety, with {{spoiler|Dr. Gordon}} needing a cane to walk with the prosthetic foot. Also, {{spoiler|the woman who survives the opening trap from ''[[Saw|Saw VI]]''}} has a prosthetic arm and complains of needing to use handicapped parking because of it. Because this is ''[[Saw]]'', both of these characters have these Artificial Limbs because of a [[Life or Limb Decision]].
* Probably the most common type of [[Cyborg]] visible throughout the 2019 film ''[[Alita: Battle Angel]]'' is people with a single limb replaced, like Doc Ido's nurse and some of his patients.
== Literature ==
* ''[[Quantum Gravity]]'' books ''Lila Black'' Become cyborg after an accident.
* [[Martin Caidin]]'s 1972 novel ''Cyborg'' introduced Colonel Steve Austin to the world. This novel was later adapted into ''[[The Six Million Dollar Man]]''.
* In ''[[Neuromancer]]'', Ratz, the German bartender at the Chatsubo in Chiba City, has an old Russian military cyberarm, "a seven-function force-feedback manipulator cased in grubby pink plastic." At one point, he uses the arm to crush a hard plastic ashtray to make a point about the bar's strict "no-fighting" rule.
** In the short story ''Burning Chrome'', set in the same universe, the narrator, Automatic Jack, has a seemingly more advanced prosthetic, which he is implied to have received after being injured in a military operation gone wrong.
* The Ultranauts in [[Alastair Reynolds]]' ''Revelation Space'' trilogy replace their body parts as they age and fail. [[The Captain|Captain John Brannigan]] is almost ''entirely'' robotic at the start of Revelation Space; he can last for hours in total vacuum. [[Really Seven Hundred Years Old|He's very old]]
* In ''[[Harry Potter (novel)|Harry Potter]]'', Peter "Wormtail" Pettigrew is forced to cut off his own hand in the ritual to recreate Voldemort's body. As Voldemort returns to full power, he gives Wormtail a gift for his efforts, a hand made of silver which functions just as well as his old hand. {{spoiler|Except for the fact that the hand was eternally devoted to Voldemort and ended up choking Wormtail when he hesitated to attack Harry in the seventh book.}}
** Mad Eye Moody.
* Spoofed by [[Terry Pratchett]] in ''[[
* Manuel Garcia O'Kelly Davis from the ''[[Robert A. Heinlein]]'' book ''[[The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress]]'' had a variety of artificial arms that allowed him to carry out electronics work with the built-in tools.
* [[Scary Dogmatic Aliens|The Yuuzhan Vong]] of the ''[[Star Wars]]'' [[Expanded Universe]] ritually chop off their own limbs to show their devotion to the gods, then get them replaced with a [[Organic Technology|Biotech]] appendage. Warriors get limbs from the various predatory animals of their homeworld, while the [[Mad Scientist|Shapers]] replace their fingers with ''surgical instruments''.
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*** If the above is about Tsavong Lah, it wasn't a rancor arm, it was a radank (a creature from the Vong's galaxy) arm.
* Nick Chopper, the Tin Woodsman from ''[[The Wonderful Wizard of Oz]]''. For those who don't know his [[Secret Origin]], his axe was cursed by a witch, and one by one, he chopped off his own limbs. Every time he lost one, he had it replaced with a prosthetic made by a local tinsmith — up to and including ''his head and torso''... but not, alas, his heart.
** For an extra dose of [[Mind Screw]], [[Land of Oz|a sequel]] reveals someone later reassembled and ''reanimated'' the discarded body parts with use of some magic glue... creating a ''whole new character''.
*** [[Fridge Logic|Why didn't he dump the stupid axe?]]
*** The witch ''kept'' cursing the axe while he was working.
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* In the book of ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]]'', Zaphod Beeblebrox has a third, artificial arm fitted to improve his ski-boxing. As is often the case with the franchise, the reason changes in the TV series/computer game/movie - in the radio series, he claims he grew the arm "for Trillian".
** [[The Movie]] features handkerchief-cultist Humma Kavula, who uses a "platform" of dozens of tiny metal legs... and one gimpy one.
* The ''[[X Wing Series]]'' enjoys this trope. Nawara Ven's cybernetic replacement leg synched up relatively (95%) poorly with his body, so he switched careers from [[Ace Pilot]] to executive officer. Ton Phanan had an ever-increasing percentage of himself [[Emergency Transformation|replaced]] since he was allergic to bacta, and [[Cybernetics Eat Your Soul|cybernetics ate his future.]] Krennel, a villain, had an extremely obvious prosthetic hand that [[Red Right Hand|glowed red]].
** When the team infiltrated Empire-controlled Coruscant as part of a covert operation, getting Wedge through security posed a problem, since he was a well known rebel hero. He disguised himself as an imperial officer with a bulky cybernetic arm and metal plating on his face and throat, apparently on his way to a specialized hospital to receive more sophisticated implants. People who saw him looked more at the prosthetics than the remaining flesh, and remembered him more for that than anything else. He was counting on that; many Imperials [[Fantastic Racism|are uneasy around cyborgs]]. Wedge took this guise again in ''Isard's Revenge'', this time in smoother-looking prosthetics.
** [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Derek_Klivian Hobbie Klivian], being [[Captain Crash|prone to crashes]], has an artificial left arm, an artificial right leg, and an artificial left leg, probably more. ''Darklighter'' also had a scene where Biggs hinted that the same fight that took Hobbie's arm also left him needing artificial genitalia.
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* In the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' story "Revelation of the Daleks", [[Evilutionary Biologist]] arch-villain Davros gets his right hand (his only unparalysed limb) shot off. In the following story, he's only seen from the neck up due to heavily upgrading his wheelchair, but when he returns in "The Stolen Earth"/"Journey's End" he has a rather Freddy Krueger-esque metal hand with clawed fingertips. He has the talent to make something more realistic, so one can only assume he thinks it looks cool.
* In ''[[All the Small Things]]'', {{spoiler|Olive has an artificial leg}}.
* Subverted in the remake of ''[[Battlestar Galactica
** In another startlingly realistic touch, his stump itches. He can't find a suitable lotion; the itch may be partly psychosomatic. Just before the end of the series, {{spoiler|after he commits mutiny with Tom Zarak, Adama's forces retake the Galactica. When Zarak and Gaeta are standing in front of the firing squad, he smiles and says, "It stopped."}}
* ''[[Highlander the Series]]'' had Xavier something or other, a recurring villain who after his first appearance got his hand chopped off. He replaced it with a [[Hook Hand]].
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** The same tale is ascribed to Lugh Llaw Ereint in the Welsh mythological cycle '' Y Mabinogion'' and may spring from the same Ur-Root.
* Similarly, the [[Aztec Mythology|Aztec god Tezcatlipoca]] lost a foot fighting a gigantic earth monster; depending on which version of the story you hear, he either replaced it with a snake or a smoking mirror with magical properties.
* The Brothers Grimm tale [https://web.archive.org/web/20131020110357/http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/armlessmaiden/index.html The Armless Maiden] features a girl whose hands are replaced with silver after her father chops them off to appease the devil.
* There is a variation of a Norse myth involving Sigurd and his battle with the dragon Fafnir. During the fight his hand is bitten off, but he afterwards receives a fully articulated metal replacement with intricate wiring in place of tendons.
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* Subverted: Raidies F. von Branstein of ''[[Super Robot Wars]]'' fame has a prosthetic hand. It apparently doesn't look realistic despite its functionality, so he wears a glove over it. He also never shows any kind of increased strength or anything. In fact, he likes to pretend it doesn't exist...
* Dr. Eli Vance in [[Half Life]] 2 has an artificial right leg, although it is crude and amounts to a curved, springy metal strip. His original leg was eaten by an alien animal.
** Eli Vance's leg [[wikipedia:File:Wtcrun-001.jpg|is]] [[Truth in Television]], although the springy metal strip type is usually used by [https://web.archive.org/web/20110606042108/http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/aimee_mullins_on_running.html athletes], because it's hard to stand still on one.
*** [[Fridge Brilliance]]: Not only would the Seven Hour War have limited his choices for a replacement, but one that allows the user to run would be very useful for a rebel.
* Kanon from ''[[Wild ARMs 2]]'' has had an arm and part of her trunk replaced by cybernetics; she not only has enhanced strength, but also neat gadgets like a hookshot. Considering the generally low-tech or steampunk feel of the game, one wonders how they can function as well as they do.
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** Both characters eventually had their bodies regenerated properly. At least three times in Der Trihs' case: the last time it turned out that he had his skull reinforced specifically so he could survive being blown up again.
* [[Dominic Deegan]] has an artificial leg. He lost the original leg in an explosion set off by his [[Evil Counterpart]]. Unusually, it's a standard prosthetic limb with no special powers.
* Characters ''Drowtales'' have 2 options - golem limbs (see ''Magitek'') or demon limbs. The latter is rare and seen only in a private section (at least so far). A notable example is Nihi'Liir [https://web.archive.org/web/20100815000203/http://www.drowtales.com/mainarchive.php?order=chapters&id=596 here] after she lost it [https://web.archive.org/web/20100815032459/http://www.drowtales.com/mainarchive.php?order=chapters&id=455 here]
* Shogun in [[Harkovast]] has a mechanical hand (and forearm) which is strong enough to crush the blades of [https://web.archive.org/web/20100822094351/http://www.drunkduck.com/Harkovast/index.php?p=478164 swords]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120526221422/http://dresdencodak.com/wp-content/gallery/doodles/cyborg_big.jpg Kimiko Ross] in [[Dresden Codak]] [http://dresdencodak.com/2008/10/22/the-end/ replaced her ''own'' arm, legs and eye] shortly after losing the originals in a battle with time-traveling luddites (lucky for her she was already a transhumanist) and that's ''after'' she [http://dresdencodak.com/2008/10/02/epilogue-2/ escaped from the hospital using thermite, a parachute, and the one arm she had left.]
* [http://www.webcomicsnation.com/eddurd/everydayheroes/series.php?view=single&ID=119656 Mecha-Nicole] of [[Everyday Heroes]] was a former mad scientist who gave herself an artificial ''head''.
* Jason in ''[[The Ends]]'' gets a cyborg arm to replace one that was torn off by a monster.
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]▼
[[Category:Autonomous and Artificial Appendage Index]]
[[Category:Robot Roll Call]]
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[[Category:Disability Tropes]]
[[Category:Transhuman Tropes]]
▲[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]
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