Paranoia Fuel/Live-Action TV: Difference between revisions

* For a different flavor of medical paranoia, go watch ''[[Orifice Invasion|Monsters Inside Me]]'' to meet ameobas that eat your brains and worms that live in your eyes.

* ''[[Doctor Who]]'' is well known for having ostensibly started off as a somewhat educational sci-fi series that would be fun for the whole family... but instead provides prime examples of every kind of [[Nightmare Fuel]] there is.

*** What makes it worse is that the episode establishes that the angels cannot move when someone is watching them. Watch the episode again, and notice the various times where an angel is stationary even though none of the characters are looking at it. Why is it not moving? [[The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You|YOU are watching it!]]

*** In Series 5, we learn that {{spoiler|anything that bears the image of a Weeping Angel becomes a Weeping Angel in and of itself. So, if you're watching a Weeping Angel through another medium, like, say, ''your television set'', then eventually it's going to crawl out and come after you... And looking into its eyes will ''burn it into your mind and start to [[Mind Rape]] you''. And since it's ''an image burned into your vision receptors,'' [[Nightmare Fuel|it will come out of your EYES]]!}}

** Just the fact that someone as psychotic as the Master could show up and ''run for office'' in your country while hypnotizing you with your ''phone'' should scare you more than just a little bit.

** Even once you can get the Vashta Nerada out of your head, the Library double episode also uses another reliable source of [[Paranoia Fuel]]: a particularly terrifying variant of the [[Lotus Eater Machine]]. Donna is "saved" by the planet's computer, and her mind is placed in an artificial world. The frightening thing is how well [[Steven Moffat]] captures the idea of a "dream-world": Donna notices that she is at any destination as soon as she expresses a desire to go there, only for false memories of the journey to implant a moment later, just as happens in dreams, making the feeling very relatable. It gets worse when we are treated to her "waking up." Sounds like a good thing, right? But just because she knows about her situation doesn't mean she can escape - and now the children she thinks she's been raising for years ''disappear right in front of her'' because she can no longer retain the [[Your Mind Makes It Real|belief]] required to keep them in existence in her dream-world.

** From "The Eleventh Hour", we are given the '[[Nightmare Fuel|wonder]]' that is Prisoner Zero. {{spoiler|It could be right behind you, or hiding in your house for ''years'', and you'd '''''never notice'''''.}}

** Have a look at the walls in your bedroom. Or anywhere in your house. See that little crack? Yeah. Sweet dreams.

** [[Arc Words|Silence will fall]]!!!

** The Vashta Nerada. Turns out, there's a reason all sentient species have an instinctive fear of the dark. They're not in every shadow, but they could be in ''any'' shadow.

** ''[[Are You Afraid of the Dark?]]'' traumatized a generation of children, in particular making some afraid of the shower for years after seeing ''The Tale of the Dead Man's Float''.

** For a show that jumped into the Narm territory often, ''[[Are You Afraid of the Dark?]]'' went on record of having one of the most creepy introductions. It's a string of normally harmless objects, but with the [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jitg-3xbmKU blue filter and creepy music], it made rowboats, swings, shuttered windows, skateboards, clowns, dolls, fans, and closed doors spooky. [[Schmuck Bait|Never watch that intro alone.]]

* Any show along the lines of ''Mystery Diagnosis'' or ''Diagnosis: Unknown'', which feature true stories of bizarre (and often fatal) diseases people get, often living for years without knowing they're inflicted. Imagine sitting for a nice, relaxing evening of watching television, only to hear something along the lines of "John Doe collapsed a month after developing a mild cough, which turned out to be an incurable disease which horribly kills the sufferer over the course of five years."

** This also happens when you get sick and try to research your own symptoms on medical websites. Oh sure, the mild headache you're having could just be caused by eyestrain, or it could be some ''hideous tumor trying to explode its way out of your skull!'' These sites are doubly traumatic if you happen to be a natural hypochondriac. Perhaps fittingly, [[wikipedia:Cyberchondria|it's now a medical condition.]]

* Don't watch the ''[[X-Files]]'' episode "Wetwired" at two o'clock in the morning. May cause general paranoia.

** Hell, a good 80% of all X-Files episodes involved Paranoia Fuel of some sort. "F. Emasculata" and "Brand X" for your corporate conspiracies, for example.

** One of the show's taglines was "Trust No One." ''There was a reason for that.''

*** Can't we just declare the whole of ''The X-Files'' to be Paranoia Fuel and be done with it?

* Speaking of ''[[X-Files]]'', there was also ''[[Millennium (TV series)|Millennium]]''. There is a secret organization devoted to stopping ''some'' vague, never specified threat. All we know about it is that it will be very, ''[[The End of the World as We Know It|very]]'' bad.

* There was an episode of ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'' called "Killed by Death," featuring a demon that a.) could only be seen by sick little kids and b.) ''kills them by sucking out their life through its eyes''.

** The episode "Normal Again" from season Six. Buffy couldn't tell whether the world where she was in a mental institution or the world where she's the Slayer was the real one. The episode ends it ambiguously.

** That person you've met online may be a demon that will kill you by offering love...

* [[Unsolved Mysteries]], which most certainly could make you suspicious of EVERYONE in your neighborhood.

{{quote|'''Harvey:''' I won't trouble you again... until I need to. There's an exit to your left which will no doubt take you back to the surface of this commerce planet. I leave you to your shipmates, John. But rest assured, '''I'll be with you always. Keeping you safe.'''}}

** In season two, it's revealed that the Nebari infect their rebels and dissidents with an extremely communicable sexually transmitted disease before sending them out into the galaxy. It has no effects on its victims... until the Nebari Establishment are ready to invade en mass. Chiana claims to have been purged of it, but that doesn't stop anyone from shitting bricks when she showed up on Earth in the eighties and, [[Anything That Moves|well...]]

** Not to mention that this database will most likely kill a muggle like you.

* ''[[Dollhouse]]'': Your entire life - everything you've done, everything you've experienced, everyone you know, have spoken to, or loved, cared about, or hated, all of your lifetime experiences and ambitions and beliefs and goals - in short, everything that makes you who you are - could be a complete fabrication, ''and you would not be able to tell.''