Scanners: Difference between revisions

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{{quote|''Scanning is not mind-reading. It is the merging of two nervous systems, separated by space.''|'''Dr. Paul Ruth'''}}

* [[Badass Longcoat]]: Cameron Vale.

* [[Berserk Button]]: Don't tell Revok he sounds like Dr. Ruth. Even though Dr. Ruth has one of the coolest voices ever.

* [[Bizarre Baby Boom]]

* [[Blessed with Suck]]

* [[Billing Displacement]]: Top-billed Jennifer O'Neill doesn't appear until the 37 minute mark and is more of a supporting character to Stephen Lack's character. Michael Ironside is billed fifth despite arguably being the most memorable character of the film.

* [[Body Horror]]: It's a [[David Cronenberg]] film, what did you expect? Specifically, the final face-off between Revok and Vale.

* [[Brain Bleach]]: Revok tried to drill a hole in his skull to let the voices out. This is referenced in ''[[X-Men]] 2'' when Brian Cox's character explains how his wife was telepathically [[Driven to Suicide]].

* [[Broken Pedestal]]: The Ripe Program {{spoiler|brings out some rather bad memories for Dr. Ruth right before Keller kills him}}.

* [[Calling the Old Man Out]]: "That was Daddy."

* [[Creepy Monotone]]: Vale. Holy shit, Vale.

* [[Deconstructor Fleet]]: Analyzes and subverts many of the tropes relating to the classic Hero's Journey, including [[The Mentor]], the [[Love Interest]], the [[Big Bad]], and even the evil student.

* [[Establishing Character Moment]]: Revok's famous [[Your Head Asplode|opening scene]].

* [[Explosive Instrumentation]]: Justified, kind of. If Revok can blow up people's heads, Vale can blow up computers.

* [[Fantastic Racism]]: Revok seem to have developed a hatred for normal humans due to his experiences, seeing scanners as inherently superior to them.

* [[Fetus Terrible]]: A major clue in unraveling the mystery.

** Benjamin Pierce's art becomes less weird when one considers the fact that he is a scanner.

* {{spoiler|[[Guinea Pig Family]]}}: Dr. Ruth's great crime.

* [[Heroic BSOD]] / [[Villainous BSOD]]: Some kinda BSOD, anyway, is suffered by Dr. Ruth. Which type depends on how ready you are to forgive him.

* [[Left Hanging]]: {{spoiler|Vale and Revok merge into a single being (though not in a [[Body Horror]] sense), but there's still some ambiguity about which consciousness is more in control. [[Grand Theft Me]] of Revok by Vale would be the nicer possibility.}}

* [[Mad Artist]]: Inverted by Benjamin Pierce, whose art keeps him sane. Well, sane-ish. Although his art is pretty friggin' weird. He's also a [[Reclusive Artist]].

* [[Mega Corp]]: ConSec, a rare sympathetic example. They fill much the same role in the story as [[The Kingdom]] would in standard fantasy.

* [[Mind Rape]]

* [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast]]: Darryl Revok.

* [[Present Day]]: Unusually for a film about super-psychics, this doesn't take place in the future (although the original script treatment ''Telepathy 2000'' did, [[Turn of the Millennium|as you might have guessed from the title]]). Which is to say, it's set in [[The Eighties]].

* [[The Reveal]]: {{spoiler|At the end, Revok [[Luke, I Am Your Father|reveals]] that [[Cain and Abel|both he and Vale]] are the [[Long Lost Sibling|sons]] of Dr. Ruth.}}

* [[Screw the Rules, I Have a Nuke]]: {{spoiler|Breadon Keller}} orders a ConSec technician to do a blank swipe of the ConSec computer system in an attempt to hurt Cameron while he's mentally connected to it through the telephone system, but he refuses to do so because that would wipe out all stored computer files, something he couldn't do without the written authorization of the ConSec leadership. {{spoiler|Braedon Keller}}'s response is to shove a gun in the guy's face.

* [[Self-Made Orphan]]: Benjamin Pierce tried this.

* [[Stuff Blowing Up]]: When Vale is disconnected from the computer, both the computer and the gas station from where Vale hacked into it. Of course, that's not [[Your Head Asplode|the only thing]] that blows up.

* [[Your Head Asplode]]: One of the most infamous examples.

 

 

* [[Asshole Victim]]: The store robbers that David kills to save his girlfriend.

* [[Ms. Fanservice]]: Helena and Yoyce in the third film.

* [[My Greatest Failure]]: Alex [[Accidental Murder|accidentally kills his best friend]] at the start of ''Scanners 3'', going into self-imposed isolation for many years in a Buddhist monastery.

* [[Psycho for Hire]]: Peter Drak. Lampshaded by the other characters.

* [[Psychic Nosebleed]]: Continuing the convention from the first film.

* [[Sequel Hook]]: {{spoiler|Helena transforming into some sort of energy creature at the end of the third film (taking a note from ''[[Gremlins|Gremlins 2]]'', perhaps?), but it's forgotten in favor of ''Scanner Cop''}}.

* [[Shallow Love Interest]]: Yoyce to Alex in the third. Alice also seems like this to David in the second, but that one at least establishes [[Precious Puppies|why she wants to become a vet]].

** Drak is playing an arcade game. Then he does it ''without his hands''. Then he takes control of the entire arcade hall, setting a panic, and [[Stuff Blowing Up|blowing it up]].

** Helena mind controls people straight through cameras and television sets.

* [[Twenty Minutes Into the Future]]: The second film seems to take place in a near future where many North American cities have become largely overrun with rampant crime and lawlessness, and air pollution is a standard part of the weather report. The third, which as one would assume is set after two, takes place in the present (1992) again.

* [[Unusually Uninteresting Sight]]: Nobody seems to notice that Gelson's eyes have just turned stark white when he's under David and Julie's mind control.

* [[Your Head Asplode]]: ''Scanners 2'' blatantly tries to copy the head explosion from the first film by having {{spoiler|Officer Gelson}}'s head blow up likewise. ''Scanners 3'' does it as well.

* [[You Killed My Father]]: {{spoiler|Drak murders David's adoptive mother with glee. He gets his in return}}.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Horror Films]]

[[Category:Films of the 1980s]]

[[Category:Films of the 1990s]]

[[Category:Film]]