Mind Screw/Live-Action TV: Difference between revisions

* Reality TV example: [[Criss Angel Mindfreak]]. Much like the name of the trope itself, it is also watered down version of the term best used to describe his feats.

* Every last damn thing about the ''[[Battlestar Galactica (2004 TV series)|Battlestar Galactica]]'' season 3 finale. "There's too much confusion", ''indeed''.

** The series finale of ''[[Battlestar Galactica (2004 TV series)|Battlestar Galactica]]'', FULL STOP.

* ''[[Lost]]''. They can fill the rest of this page with arguments back and forth about whether or not ''Lost'' is "really" that much of a Mind Screw, but, in all honesty, this trope is pretty much the show's whole reason for being. Either ''Lost'' ''is'' a Mind Screw, or else this either isn't a trope or ''Lost'' isn't a show. I'll leave it up to you to decide which. Like ''Lost'' does. Some examples from the show include its dream sequences and some particularly odd bits surrounding a cabin. One trippy episode was even set to be directed by [[Darren Aronofsky]].

* ''Reichenbach Falls''. A [[The BBC|BBC Four]] one-off drama based on an idea by Ian Rankin. DCI Jim Buchan is an Edinburgh policeman whose personality and cases are similar to those of Rankin's Inspector Rebus (the Rebus novels sometimes tend towards mildly Mind Screwy in any case). He resents his former friend Jack Harvey (a pen-name used by Rankin) who is a famous crime novelist, and occasionally argues with the ghost of [[Sherlock Holmes|Sir Arthur Conan Doyle]] (hence the title). He gradually becomes aware that {{spoiler|he's a fictional character created by Harvey, and the author is planning to [[Dropped a Bridge Onon Him|Drop A Bridge On Him]]}} (again, hence the title). He therefore decides, at the launch of Harvey's new book, that he's going to kill the author first. After that it gets ''weird''...

** The mind screw aspect comes from the fact that it's possibly the most realistic dream sequence ever in terms of the bizarre scene transitions and staging--allstaging—all four segments of the dream sequence are presented as one coherent scene, locals change nearly at random, characters appear and disappear, damn near everyone speaks in non sequiturs, and all plotlines and the characters in them are subject to change at random (with the exception of the {{spoiler|First Slayer}} trying to take advantage of [[Your Mind Makes It Real]] to assassinate the Scoobies.) However, everything in that episode turns out to be [[Foreshadowing]] (except for the cheese man) so the episode becomes less mind-screwy in retrospect.

** Which would also make the entire ''[[Angel (TV)|Angel]]'' series part of that hallucination, too. At least it's not as bad as that [http://en.[wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Westphall:Tommy Westphall#The_Tommy_Westphall_Universe_hypothesisThe Tommy Westphall Universe hypothesis|Tommy Westphall crap]]...

*** Which has led to quite a bit of [[Wild Mass Guessing|fan speculation.]] The final shot of Buffy in season seven is not really Buffy, but The First. The final shot of her in season six is actually the Buffybot. Buffy, of course, sacrificed her life to save the world at the end of season five, only to be brought [[Back Fromfrom the Dead]].

* The ''[[Angel (TV)|Angel]]'' episode "Awakening" ends with a [[Mind Screw]]. {{spoiler|The entire ''[[Indiana Jones (Franchise)|Indiana Jones]]''-inspired segment where Angel saves the day and ends up with Cordelia is all a fantasy in his head as his soul is removed}}.

* The ''[[Star Trek Deep Space Nine (TV)|Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]'' episodes "Far Beyond the Stars" and "Shadows and Symbols" heavily imply that the events of the entire series may have simply been the imaginings of a mentally unstable African-American pulp-fiction writer in the 1950s. "Shadows and Symbols" does, however, state that at least the latter one was a "false vision" the Pah-Wraiths attempted to use to trick Sisko.

* Elsewhere in the ''Trek'' franchise, ''[[Star Trek: theThe Next Generation (TV)|Next Generation]]'', ''[[Star Trek: Voyager (TV)|Voyager]]'', and ''[[Star Trek: Enterprise (TV)|Enterprise]]'' had their share of these episodes -- andepisodes—and most can be traced back to one inveterate Mind Screwer. Brannon Braga absolutely ''loves'' stories like this, and [[SchrodingersSchrödinger's Butterfly]] in particular. The results are mixed: Braga's Mind Screws include some of the best ''and'' worst episodes of these shows.

{{quote| '''Dr. Crusher:''' Here's a question you shouldn't be able to answer. What is the nature of the universe?<br />

** Another ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine|Deep Space Nine]]'' episode that does this is "Rapture." Because they never really explain whether the visions were actually an important message from the Prophets, and Sisko would have been fine without the surgery, or if they really were hallucinations from the accident and the surgery was necessary.

* Though ''[[Firefly (TV)|Firefly]]'' is notable for being ''extremely'' straightforward in most respects, the scenes in the episode "Objects in Space" involving River's hallucinations can be considered a mild [[Mind Screw]]. It gets worse in [[The Movie|the Big Damn Movie]], where River's hallucinations become much more pronounced and vivid.

* Classic ''[[Doctor Who (TV)|Doctor Who]]'' managed its [[Mind Screw]] with the middle four episodes of [[Story Arc|Trial of a Time Lord]] (it being called ''Mindwarp'' should have been a clue). The final two episodes of the arc attempted to clear up the [[Mind Screw]] elements. Due to a number of reasons, especially [[Executive Meddling]] and [[Author Existence Failure]], it failed miserably.

** And then there's "Midnight". The audience never learns who, what or ''how'' the monster was, why it took over Skye and wanted to kill the Doctor, if there even ''was'' a monster or just a bunch of terribly conjunctive mishaps... the only thing we can be sure of is [[Humans Are Bastardsthe Real Monsters]]. And it's one of the best episodes of the show.

** From the [[Expanded Universe]]: ''The Blue Angel''. Parallel universes. Space warthog Valkyries. The Doctor {{spoiler|''giving birth to a winged baby from his leg''}}. Claims that the Doctor's mother was a mermaid. Giant space owls. A ''[[Star Trek]]'' parody starship called the ''Nepotist''. One character is an elephant (a green one, no less!), another gets turned into a giant squid for no adequately explained reason. Parallel universe Dalek-analogues who are humanoids made out of ''glass''. Twenty questions that manage to be clever, patronising, and headache-inducing all at once...yeah, [[What Do You Mean It Wasn't Made Onon Drugs?|it seems to be a product of an acid trip during a Classic Who marathon]].

** Also, the Troughton story "The Mind Robber". Episode one was written in a hurry with no budget (hence the 'void' set and the robot costume re-used from a version of ''[[RUR (Theatre)R.U.R.|RUR]]''. The weird dream-like setting of episode 1 coupled with the metafictional setting of the rest of the story and the disappearance of one of the characters at the end gave the impression that episodes 2-5 were all a dream.

*** Thankfully, [[Word of God|Moffat has stated]] that it was supposed to be this way, as the arc isn't done yet. The Silence arc will carry over into Series Six, and will explain the cracks, the voice, River Song, and [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|the ducks]].

** At the end of ''[[Doctor Who (TV)/Recap/S32 E2/E02 Day of the Moon|Day of the Moon]]'', the little girl {{spoiler|starts to regenerate.}}

** We discover, in ''[[Doctor Who (TV)/Recap/S32 E6/E06 The Almost People|The Almost People]]'', that for the whole of season six, {{spoiler|Amy has been a Ganger.}}

* ''[[St. Elsewhere]]'': [http://en.[wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Westphall:Tommy Westphall#The_Tommy_Westphall_Universe_hypothesisThe Tommy Westphall Universe hypothesis|The Tommy Westphall Universe hypothesis]]. It is best just to ignore it, it gets even deeper when you consider the ending to ''Newhart'', its connection to "The Bob Newhart Show'' and that it crossed over directly with St. Elsewhere.

** You can't ignore it, they have [https://web.archive.org/web/20060824200044/http://home.vicnet.net.au/~kwgow/crossovers.html charts]!

* Quite a few ''[[Monty Python's Flying Circus]]'' sketches, and all the [[Deranged Animation|Deranged Animations]]s. Not due to an over-reliance on symbolism, but rather ignoring everything except the [[Rule of Funny]].

* ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]'' relies on this to an extent. Much of the symbolism (the "symbol", cockroaches, etc.), the [[What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic|religious subtext]], and the obvious puberty / [[Have You Tried Not Being a Monster?]] themes that generally pop up in this genre. And that's not even getting into the [[Mind Rape|Season 3 finale]]...

* "Failed [[Pilot]]" ''Virtuality'', which I can only describe as [[Two2001: ThousandA Space OneOdyssey|2001]] meets [[Serial Experiments Lain]] meets [[Big Brother]] [[Recycled in Space|IN SPACE]] (with some [[Ghost in Thethe Shell]] and [[eXistenZ]] for flavor) from the producers of [[Battlestar Galactica]]. The Mind Screwiness is made worse by the fact that it's an ''unfinished'' pilot. Breaking it down:

** ''2001'': The crew is trapped on a very long journey with a possibly [[AIA.I. Is a Crapshoot|unreliable AI]]. Hypersleep is averted because the ship is propelled through space by carefully exploding small nukes, which everyone needs to be awake for.

* [[Once Upon a Time]], (June the 11th, 1934, to be more precise,) in [[Useful Notes/Sweden|Sweden]], a child was born. This wasn't especially uncommon in itself, but it just so happened that this child was named Staffan Westerberg... One day, when he was 41 years, 2 months and 22 days old, (in other words, it was now September the 1st, 1975,) [[It Seemed Like a Good Idea At Thethe Time|Staffan became the producer and show host]] of what was ([[What Do You Mean ItsIt's Not for Kids?|supposedly]]) a children's show, ''[[Exactly What It Says Onon the Tin|Vilse i Pannkakan, Lost in the Pancake]]''. This show featured finger puppets that Staffan played with, all of them with [[Meaningful Name|Meaningful Names]]s, like the titular main character, Lost. It also included, amongst many other things, a [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]] potato, a [[Hobos|Hobo]], a firefighter who [[Firemen Are Hot|gets it together]] with a [[Our Angels Are Different|motorized angel]] and, naturally, a moose; [[What Do You Mean It Wasn't Made Onon Drugs?|all living on the titular pancake]]. Oh, and the show was actually [[An Aesop]] about society and politics... These days, [[Nightmare Fuel StationattendantStation Attendant|Staffan Westerberg]] is [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|singlehandedly blamed for the psychological problems of the entire 70's generation.]]

* ''[[Farscape (TV)|Farscape]]'' has "Won't Get Fooled Again": Crichton is suddenly on Earth again, having apparently crashed his module and never gone through the wormhole...except he starts to see his crew mates around, acting extremely out of character, and no one seems to notice that they're, well, aliens. It just gets weirder from there, involving Rygel in bondage, D'Argo as a [[Camp Gay]], repeated recurrences of Crichton's dead mother, Crais as a high-heels wearing police officer, and Scorpius trying to get Crichton to pay attention to him. {{spoiler|It's eventually revealed that Crichton was kidnapped by a Scarran who's been frying his brain in order to get the information Scorpius wants out of his head. Also, there are ''two'' Scorpius in the illusion, because one of them is... something else.}}

** You can just stop at ''[[Farscape (TV)|Farscape]]''. The series as a whole dipped into this so often that Crichton himself lampshaded it in a late episode when he realized their minds were being toyed with by the alien of the week.

* The end of one episode of ''[[The Colbert Report]]'' had Stephen read a story from his book "Colbert Report Bedtime Stories." It gets complicated, to say the least. It can be viewed [http://is.gd/5aRkCU here.]