Poison Is Corrosive: Difference between revisions

A fairly common trope, where any particularly potent poison is incredibly corrosive as well. This is often used to let a hero identify an attack as poisonous without actually getting poisoned. Alternatively, it can be used to show just how strong a poison is (somehow) by having it dissolve the spoon being used to mix it.

 

 

Compare [[Ate the Spoon]], [[Gargle Blaster]], [[Hollywood Acid]].

== Film ==

* In ''[[Enchanted]]'', a poison apple eats through a biker's helmet.

* This trope shows up repeatedly in ''[[Three Stooges]]'' episodes.

* ''[[The Dark Knight]]'': When the commissioner's poisoned highball glass gets knocked over it starts eating a hole through his desk.

== Video Games ==

* ''[[Pokémon]]'' plays with this. While moves such as Acid are classified as [[Poisonous Person]][[Elemental Powers|-type attacks]], they are among the only Poison attacks that don't have a chance of poisoning the opponent. But [[Dishing Out Dirt|Ground- and Rock-type Pokémon]] resist Poison-type attacks (Poison-type Pokémon are also weak to Ground-type attacks), and [[Extra Ore Dinary|Steel-types]] are completely immune to Poison.

* In ''[[MS Saga]]'', the trope is subverted by being reversed: when you're dealing with [[Humongous Mecha]], the "poison" [[Standard Status Effect]] takes the form of acid, meaning that Corrosive Stuff Is Poison.

* ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' has poisons and acids in the Nature category of magic. And many times if it's poison it's also acidic and vice versa. Though when it comes to some things, how close the two are is weird (mechanical enemies especially, some can be poisoned by a Hunter's Serpent Sting but others are immune, while they can all be harmed by acids; some enemies that are caustic piles of goo can be poisoned but are immune to other types of Nature damage; if you get hit by an acid attack chances are you'll also be poisoned for a duration of time; there's also poison attacks that don't actually poison but only do instant damage, acid attacks that don't do damage but lower your armor and poison that doesn't damage but lowers your speed [in fact one boss battle in the Trial of the Crusader involves having to remove one Jormungar Worm's Paralyzing Poison with another Jormungar's Burning Bile, an acid countering a poison]).

* The ''[[Vindictus]]'' MMORPG has an Acidic Poison Pouch item that contains an acidic poison.

* ''[[Runescape]]'' has a salesman who sells 'all purpose-poison'. In one quest, you learn that it's used for things like polishing family crests and cleaning fountains.

* Cassiopeia from ''[[League of Legends]]'' has an ability called Miasma, which creates a circular pool of poison. It damages anything that walks over it, including robotic entities.

 

 

== Western Animation ==

* In one of the [[Classic Disney Shorts]] (''[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r45taz9Boi0 Mickey's Garden]'', 1935), Mickey prepared an insecticide at his backyard and the broom he was using to stir it "burned" from being inside it.

* ''[[The Real Ghostbusters]]'': Overdone to the point of parody where a poisoned cup of milk eats through several floors. Given they were living through a mystery author's last novel, the surreality of it was intentional.

* The venom of species of snake contain enzymes that kick-start the digestive process. These hemotoxic venoms and myotoxic venoms cause tissue degradation, such as breaking down the muscles around the heart killing their prey.

** Some species of spiders have similar venoms, such as the brown recluse spider, which acts to dissolve the flesh of the victim, which is '''extremely''' painful.

** It'll also take calcium from your blood, which is ''even worse''. Losing calcium from your bones weakens them. Losing calcium from your blood slows or stops your heart. Direct skin contact with even a small amount of hydrofluoric acid is rarely survivable without prompt treatment. Treatment that you're unlikely to get, because the human body also needs calcium to ''transmit pain signals'', leaving many victims entirely unaware that they've even been exposed until it's too late to do much more than say "poor bastard" and start making funeral arrangements.

* Nearly any spit-poison is acidic, as its primary function is usually to blind, which a normal poison wouldn't do.