Gas Leak Coverup: Difference between revisions

* ''[[Higurashi no Naku Koro ni]]'''s "Hinamizawa Disaster" is said to be a gas leak -- {{spoiler|a bit of a borderline example, as gas really ''was'' released into the town... it just [[Gas Chamber|wasn't accidental]]. And by "not accidental", we mean the town was herded into schoolrooms and killed with poison gas grenades.}}

* Hollow attacks in the first few episodes of [[Bleach]] were designated as such.

** In the second season, Gemna gives an early hint of his craziness by the fact that once he and his partner start attracting attention with an urban battle, he deliberately creates a gas explosion to give some [[Plausible Deniability]], and in a later episode, his boss makes an irritated reference to a supposed gas explosion in Russia rumored to be a massacre by Contractors.

* In ''[[Magical Record Lyrical Nanoha Force]]'', the official records give a combination of earthquakes and poisonous fumes as the reason behind the complete destruction of Tohma's [[Doomed Hometown]] in the world of Vaizen. Considering how he actually saw the possible culprits, Tohma understandably questions the truth behind that statement.

== Film ==

* The trope is exaggerated and played for laughs in the first ''[[Men in Black (film)|Men in Black]]'' movie; the typical cover story for UFO sightings given by MIB agents (quoted at the top of the page) mentions multiple elements from every standard, individual variant of the trope (swamp gas, weather balloons, Venus) and combines them into a single cover story. Though the MIB do put more effort into making it seem legitimate (such as having a crew of cleanup agents use flamethrowers to both burn away evidence of aliens and scorch some of the nearby terrain) and they have the added benefit of [[Laser-Guided Amnesia|a memory-erasing device]]. The neuralizer goes a long way for [[Justified Trope|justifying]] the whole ordeal: the brain will invent new memories to fill the gap, during which time it becomes very impressionable.

* Used in ''[[Transformers (film)|Transformers]] 2: Rise of the Fallen''. Sort of. Here, it's used in the same ways as in ''Close Encounters'', right down to the excuse:

{{quote|'''Maj. Lennox''': All right. China's cover story this time is "Toxic Spill", they had to evac the area for Search and Rescue.}}

 

== Live Action TV ==

* Subverted in the ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]'' episode "Tabula Rasa," Noah uses a carbon monoxide leak as a cover-up for Jeremy Greer who {{spoiler|accidentally killed his parents with his power}}. {{spoiler|Nobody is fooled, and in the end, a group of vengeful cops murder the kid.}}

* The government is fond of using explanations similar to this one in ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'', but the only time the "gas leak" excuse is used, it's done by the heroes.

* ''[[Shin Megami Tensei]]'' games seem to love this trope a lot:

** In the "Golden UFO" case in ''[[Raidou Kuzunoha VS King Abaddon]]'', the dragon Kohryu tells Raidou to make up an excuse to cover up sightings of him, suggesting swamp gases as a possibility.

** In ''[[Devil Survivor]]'', this is the excuse given for the Yamanote lockdown.

* ''World of Warcraft'' subverts this trope as a joke; upon entering 'Area 52', the player sees a flash of light and is given a tooltip that persists for 30 seconds and says 'The flash of light you did not see has erased the memories you did not have'.