Hideous Hangover Cure: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
{{quote|''"No, no, no," said the Dean. "This can't be right. Everyone knows a good hangover cure has got to involve a lot of humourous shouting, etcetera."''
|''[[Discworld|Hogfather]]''}}
The only reliable cure for hangovers is time and lots of water, but that doesn't stop fictional characters from trying all sorts of other methods to speed up the process. The '''Hideous Hangover Cure''' comes in two varieties, the first is something that will catapult you back into full sobriety within minutes, sometimes even seconds. The second variety is the one you take to stop feeling awful the next day.
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Regardless of the intent, it's almost always a vile concoction, whether it's provided by a bartender or a well-meaning friend. To qualify for this trope, the cure must be effective (or at least the character proffering it must believe it is); otherwise this is just "let's play pranks with the drunk guy."
Note that "[[Hair of the Dog]]" (having a little more of the same stuff that caused your problem in the first place)
Often involves [[Blazing Inferno Hellfire Sauce]]. Related to [[It Tastes Like Feet]] (because it usually does), [[Gargle Blaster]] (because it usually requires one), and [[I Drank What]] (a common response from the subject afterward). Sub-trope of the [[Horrendous Home Remedy]].
{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==
* ''[[Utawarerumono]]'': Oboro accepts a hangover cure from village medic Eruruu. There isn't any buildup or indication of a gag, but the poor man's expression after throwing it back makes it fall squarely under this trope.
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== Fan
* In the ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'' fanfic ''[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6245901/1/Three_Years_At_Sea Three Years at Sea]'', Zuko's crew swears by a noxious mixture of [[wikipedia:Century egg|century eggs]], [[wikipedia:Stinky tofu|stinky tofu]], and kimchee all drenched in hot sauce.
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** Though this was used to wake him up, and he apparently had a headache afterward.
* Sally Bowles from ''[[Cabaret]]'' swears by Prairie Oysters, which involves raw eggs and Worcestershire sauce beaten together. Drink it from the tooth glass and it tastes just like peppermint!
** Being raised on a cattle farm in Western Canada, I feel obliged to point out the fact that; to me, Prairie Oysters are not raw eggs with Worcestershire sauce, but are fried bulls testicles.
* [[John Wayne]] uses one of these on the drunk sheriff in the classic Western ''[[El Dorado]]''. One of the ingredients is gunpowder (along with cayenne pepper, hot mustard, ipecac, asafoetida, and croton oil).
* ''[[The Hairy Bird]]'': Momo gives Ipecac to the boys of St. Ambrose Academy, causing a [[Vomit Chain Reaction]].
* In ''[[Reno 911!|Reno 911!: Miami]]'', a hungover Deputy Junior drops a shot into a cup filled with Pepto-Bismol and chugs the concoction while sitting on a toilet.
* In [[The Parent Trap (1998 film)|the 1998 remake of
* In ''[[Revenge of the Nerds]]'', the Japanese student wins a tricycle-riding contest because he's given a prophylactic dose of an instant-sobriety drug, hence is unimpaired when he has to chug a beer after every lap.
* In ''[[My Man Godfrey]]'', Godfrey gives Mrs. Bullock "Pixie Remover," namely tomato juice and lots of Worcestershire sauce.
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** This placement seems to be the only semblance of responsibility in Adams's entire universe.
* In the first ''[[Jeeves and Wooster (novel)|Jeeves and Wooster]]'' story, Jeeves gets the job by curing Bertie's hangover, and afterwards often dispenses the concoction following Bertie's latest night on the town. As in ''Cabaret'', Jeeves' mixture includes eggs and Worcestershire sauce.
* [[Robert A. Heinlein]] uses several of these. In ''[[I Will Fear No Evil]]'' hangovers are cured by a thermos of coffee with a Danish pastry and by a [https://web.archive.org/web/20150605112108/http://www.cocktail.com/recipes/s/SilverFizz1930.htm Silver Fizz] made with vodka instead of gin. In ''[[Glory Road (novel)|Glory Road]]'' another cure is mentioned with unspecified ingredients, but the mnemonic used to remember them is the witches' lines from Macbeth ("Eye of newt and toe of frog...")
* It is mentioned in one ''[[Star Wars]]'' novel that there are anti-veisalgia drugs one can take to prevent winding up with a hangover.
* The Drive-Right pill in [[Harry Harrison]]'s ''[[The Stainless Steel Rat|The Stainless Steel Rat's Revenge]]''. It's a small round pill that will make you absolutely stone cold sober seconds after swallowing it... it's completely black except for a skull and crossbones on each side. Unfortunately it's rather unpleasant to take.
** The description of its effect includes the words "[[Fire-Breathing Diner|fire hose]]".
** Harry Harrison must have felt the world needed this; it shows up again in ''[[Bill the Galactic Hero]]'' with a "[[
* [[H. Beam Piper]] referred in ''[[Recycled in Space|Space Viking]]'' to "alcodote-vitimine" pills which prevent the user from getting drunk no matter how much he drinks. Rather disappointing to a man who'd like to get wasted enough to forget [[My God, What Have I Done?|what he saw and did]] on his first Viking raid.
* In ''[[Sten|The Court of a Thousand Suns]]'' by Alan Cole and Chris Bunch, the hero gets drunk with his boss, the [[Really Seven Hundred Years Old|Eternal Emperor]], who then sobers them up with "Angelo stew."
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* A ''[[Wing Commander (novel)|Wing Commander]]'' novel featured [[Life of the Party]] [[Ace Pilot]] Hunter unexpectedly having his leave canceled, just after a night full of drinking incredibly potent alien alcohol. So when he's picked up in the morning, the fleet puts him through a clincal hangover cure, complete with several pages of an agonized reaction to it.
* ''[[Honor Harrington|In Enemy Hands]]'' has Theisman use an inhaler to sober up. It's explicitly described to be a very unpleasant system shock, but it's not specified if the vomiting a few pages later is because of the drug or realizing {{spoiler|he had accidentally given Cordelia Ransom ideas on how not to get caught mistreating prisoners of war}}.
* In ''[[Over the Wine Dark Sea]]'' the captain of a Hellenistic trader puts returning drunkards on an oar and works them mercilessly. That does not cure their hangover but it does make sure they do not drink to much next liberty.
== Live Action TV ==
* The Prairie Oyster also makes an appearance in ''[[Studio 60
* ''[[Red Dwarf]]'' has both versions of these. "Gunmen of the Apocalypse" has a character forced to eat a bowlful of coffee-grounds to cause sobriety and in another
* ''[[Brainiac: Science Abuse]]'' once did an experiment to find which of three hangover cures worked best (Greasy breakfast, hair of the dog, or nothing at all). Hair of the dog had good short term effects (because the body stops working on the difficult to process stuff which causes hangovers and starts on the easier just added alcohol) but bad long term (you just delay your hangover for the same reason). A greasy breakfast was the best of the options presented.
* ''[[Bottom]]'' does this with a concoction made out of various kitchen-cleaning chemicals and a few organic ingredients (past their expiration date, for preference). It has to be taken through the nose.
* ''[[
** Oddly enough, the only cure close enough to qualify for this trope was the black coffee. Which doesn't seem anywhere near as bad as some of the other 'cures'.
*** Have you ever tried running on a treadmill while drunk? Anything short of eating nails would be more pleasant.
*** As evidenced by Adam, who fell over, managed to right himself, and ''tried to get back on the treadmill''.
* Strop's hangover cure from ''[[The Paul Hogan Show]]'': an oyster, a raw egg, salt, pepper, Vegemite and beer. The most remarkable aspect is that the actor actually mixed and drank this concoction in front of the cameras before dashing off the set to throw up.
** No the amazing thing is he mixed
* In ''[[30 Rock]]'' episode ''Generalissimo,'' after Tracy goes out with the new interns and has a huge hangover, Kenneth gets his uncle Harlan's hangover cure.
{{quote|'''Kenneth''': Mix two cups boiled possum meat with one messload ragweed. Stir in alcohol-}}
* In ''[[M*A*S*H (television)|
{{quote|'''Rosie''': Don't worry, Radar. Even if he's
'''Radar''': What's in it?
'''Rosie''': Just coffee, egg, and a little gunpowder!
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* ''[[Get Smart]]'' had a curious cross between this and the [[Gargle Blaster]]: A pill intended to be covertly held in the mouth which absorbs all the alcohol from drinks before you swallow them, but if itself swallowed, will instantly render you drop-dead drunk.
* During the California series of ''[[Oz and James]]'s Big Wine Adventure'', James spends a morning cooking these for a hungover and very surly Oz, using miscellaneous and leftover food items found in their RV fridge.
* An episode of ''[[Brotherly Love]]'' had the mom making a hangover cure for the eldest brother. She never said what was in it, but, "If it starts to taste like ranch dressing you're drinking it too slowly."
* Used on ''[[Twin Peaks]]''. When Sheriff Truman has a hangover, Agent Cooper and Cole list the ingredients of their own personal hangover cures. They're so disgusting, Sheriff Truman rushes to the bathroom to vomit. (Which was the real
* ''[[Sanford and Son]]'' featured one at least once. It
* In ''[[Supernatural (TV series)|Supernatural]],'' Dean tells Sam the best cure for a hangover is a greasy pork sandwich served in a dirty ashtray. However, instead of being hungover, Sam was still very visibly drunk (as in, head in toilet bowl drunk.) Dean's intention was probably to make Sam puke again, and try to get the alcohol out of his system before the hangover hit him like a bulldozer the next day. How effective that really is remains to be seen.
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== Video Games ==
* ''[[The Curse of Monkey Island]]'' has a [[Chekhov's Boomerang|particularly useful one]]. All it takes is an egg, some pepper, and [[Hair of the Dog|the hair of the dog that bit you]]. Dangerous if mixed, and surprisingly so for a [[
** The hard part is finding a sufficiently angry/careless dog.
* There is an Alka-seltzer looking concoction in ''[[Conkers Bad Fur Day]]'' that seems to cure hangovers like a miracle, including the little Harp sound.
* Your Russian buddy in ''[[Tony Hawk Pro Skater|Tony Hawk's Underground]]'' (the first) gets drunk, and you need to help him clear his hangover. Cure consists of pills, rotten eggs, vodka, dog shavings, unknown liquids, vodka, grapes, more vodka, and other curious ingredients.
* ''[[
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* ''Water'' is touted by the health sciences community as being the best thing for a hangover, the argument being that the splitting headache is a result of massive dehydration. Some take aspirin along with their water.
** Dehydration is only one of the reasons to hangover headache, the other being toxic action of acetaldehyde, the alcohol metabolite. So rehydration only lowers the headache, but does not remove it completely.
** For some people, drinking a large amount of water with the alcohol seems to work better than waiting until the morning after to drink it. First, if you're drinking water, then you aren't drinking as much alcohol. Second, the hydration helps mitigate (not prevent) the dehydration caused by the alcohol that you are drinking.
** IV fluids and vitamins also seems fairly popular.
* Large amounts of fatty foods help reduce hangovers as the fat sticks to the stomach walls and helps dilute the alcohol. Other cures include activated charcoal (which helps absorb most of the toxic byproducts of alcohol), bananas (which are rich in potassium, helping counteract the dehydration which causes the headaches associated with hangovers) and anti-hangover pills (the effectiveness of which can vary). Contrary to popular belief, strong coffee does not help, as the caffeine will both further dehydrate you and act as a vasoconstrictor (cause blood vessels to become thinner), making headaches worse.
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* Narcan, when injected into the victim of a heroin overdose, reverses the drug's effect completely and has saved many lives as a result. (It's also gotten a lot of ambulance officers beaten up because they deprived the user of their high, too.)
* Gatorade actually started as a semi-Hideous Hangover Cure. In 1965 University of Florida medical researchers created the original Gatorade formula because the Gators' players were showing up to football practice dehydrated and hung over; two years later the team won their first Orange Bowl, which encouraged its creators to remove some of the sourness from the recipe and make it commercially available.
* A solution practice by medical professionals (
** Also featured in an episode of ''[[Scrubs]]'', and gets mentioned at least once (as "Lactated Ringer's") on ''[[M*A*S*H (television)|M*A*S*H]]''.
** In an episode of ''[[House]]'', Cuddy catches Thirteen attempting to recover from a night of debauchery with some sort of self-administered IV solution.
* According to the Scottish, Irn Bru. It contains caffeine, quinine (a mild opiate) and lots of sugar. Now you know why it's the most popular soft drink in the country.
** The incredible amounts of sugar also makes it a good "cure" for overly spicy food, Truly, Irn Bru is the wonder drink!
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[[Category:Hard-Drinking Tropes]]
[[Category:Food Tropes]]
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