Automoderated users, Autopatrolled users, Bureaucrats, Comment administrators, Confirmed users, Moderators, Rollbackers, Administrators
213,951
edits
Cold Iron: Difference between revisions
standardized the section headers, sorted the sections, did other minor cleanup
Looney Toons (talk | contribs) m (Copyedit (minor)) |
(standardized the section headers, sorted the sections, did other minor cleanup) |
||
Line 25:
''MY IRON SHOES!"}}
== [[Film]] ==
* The possessed in the ''[[Night of the Demons]]'' remake are vulnerable to rusted iron.
* Putting a horseshoe over the doorway was considered a way to protect the home from intrusion of [[The Fair Folk]]- this has allusions to the story of the Exodus and the Passover. Sometimes burying a doornail was used this way too. Although often burying iron was a way to conceal the iron from [[The Fair Folk]], and if you could get them to stand over it they would be trapped and bound until they agreed to your demands.▼
* There is an Italian wedding tradition that requires the groom to have iron in his back pocket.▼
== [[Literature]] ==
* [[Andre Norton]]'s novel ''Steel Magic''. Cold iron is defined as being any metal "forged by a mortal in the world of mortals", so the three protagonists end up using their stainless steel picnic cutlery as weapons; respectively a spoon, fork and knife. Fortunately the cutlery develops unusual properties in the magical world (such as changing size) and is pretty dramatically lethal to any magical being it touches.
* ''[[Discworld]]'':
** In ''[[
*** The horseshoe above the door is explained by saying the shape isn't important, it's simply that horsehoes are the closest available source of iron.
** In
* The ''[[Midnighters]]'' series plays with this trope. Any kind of alloyed metal (like steel) hurts darklings, cutting through them like a soft knife through butter. Rex notes that the darklings' real weakness is new ideas (hence the
* [[Poul Anderson]]'s ''[[Operation Chaos]]'' series says the iron is anti-magical, but it's set in an alternate history where one of the famous physicists of the early 20th century found a way of suppressing the effect, allowing mankind to have its cake and eat it too.
* 'Cold iron' is any iron in the ''[[October Daye]]'' series. Changelings have a better resistance to it because of their human blood, and the Coblynau, who are the only Fae able to work with iron, are a very ugly race, implied to be due to their affinity with iron.
Line 63 ⟶ 60:
* In ''[[Supernatural (TV series)|Supernatural]]'' iron can be used to temporarily decorporealize a ghost, along with [http://www.supernaturalwiki.com/index.php?title=Iron other uses.]
* In the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' serial ''The Daemons'', the Doctor successfully uses a trowel to fend off a gargoyle that merely ''thinks'' it's susceptible to Cold Iron.
== [[Oral Tradition]], Folklore, Myths and Legends ==
▲* Putting a horseshoe over the doorway was considered a way to protect the home from intrusion of [[The Fair Folk]]- this has allusions to the story of the Exodus and the Passover. Sometimes burying a doornail was used this way too. Although often burying iron was a way to conceal the iron from [[The Fair Folk]], and if you could get them to stand over it they would be trapped and bound until they agreed to your demands.
▲* There is an Italian wedding tradition that requires the groom to have iron in his back pocket.
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
Line 73 ⟶ 74:
* The 4th Edition version of ''[[GURPS]] Fantasy'' discusses cold iron, and multiple different ways of implementing it. The default is that it's simply a descriptive term for regular iron.
* ''Faery's Tale'' allows you to implement cold iron, though it's optional. Under the game's take, cold iron is simply wrought iron (as opposed to cast iron), and although it can't truly kill faeries ('''nothing''' can kill faeries), the merest touch of it will send a faery into a deep sleep for anywhere from hours to weeks.
== [[Video Games]] ==▼
* In ''[[Final Fantasy IV]]'' the Dark Elf is vulnerable to iron, and has enchanted his cave to be heavily magnetic, requiring you to reach him without wielding anything metallic. When you reach him, at first it is a [[Hopeless Boss Fight]] but {{spoiler|if you talked to Edward in the castle, he gives you a harp which breaks the spell, allowing you to wield metal.}}▼
== [[Web Comics]] ==
* ''[[Tales of the Questor]]'' makes extensive use of this trope. Although it claims "cold iron" is a mistranslation of "north iron" ie lodestone.
Line 78 ⟶ 83:
* Elves in ''[[Dragon Mango]]'' are extremely vulnerable to iron, but through [[Training from Hell]] can [[Charles Atlas Superpower|learn to resist it.]] Afterwards they use iron armors as a [[Power Limiter]]. Half-Elves are completely immune to it, likely due to their human half's iron-based blood.
* In ''[[Munchkin]] Bites'', 'Cold Iron' is a trap card that only affects Changeling characters.
▲== [[Video Games]] ==
▲* In [[Final Fantasy IV]] the Dark Elf is vulnerable to iron, and has enchanted his cave to be heavily magnetic, requiring you to reach him without wielding anything metallic. When you reach him, at first it is a [[Hopeless Boss Fight]] but {{spoiler|if you talked to Edward in the castle, he gives you a harp which breaks the spell, allowing you to wield metal.}}
== [[Western Animation]] ==
Line 89 ⟶ 91:
{{reflist}}
[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]▼
[[Category:Applied Phlebotinum]]
[[Category:Older Than Print]]
▲[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]
| |||