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{{trope}}
[[File:brown-
A sound, image, or written work that has a physical or psychological effect on anyone who hears/sees/reads it. This can range from wounding/killing someone, causing them to [[Go Mad From the Revelation|go insane]], or become obsessed with the
Usually, [[Take Our Word for It|we don't get to see or hear it ourselves.]] Possibly, it is a type of [[MacGuffin]].
A
When it is specifically a book, it can be a [[Tome of Eldritch Lore]] or a form of [[Reality Writing Book]]. Musical examples are extreme cases of [[Hell Is That Noise]], [[Ear Worm]] or possibly [[The Power of Rock]]. See also [[Magic Music]]. A lighter version used for torture would be [[Cool and Unusual Punishment]]. Can overlap with [[Suckiness Is Painful]], when the note is a [[Stylistic Suck|really bad work]].
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== Comics ==
* ''[[The Invisibles]]'' must be the chief proponent of the trope, filled with "superdimensional" sounds and words with both positive and negative effects. There's sounds that cause rapid cancer, sounds that opens your consciousness similarly to an explosive, permanent LSD trip, sounds that make you throw up but only if you're a secret agent with multiple cover stories and at one point a hyperdimensional villain is ''defeated by the word "POP"''. (It makes him go pop.)
** ''[[The Invisibles]]'' even posits that ''the alphabet itself'' is a
* The comic book ''[[Transmetropolitan]]'' has a literal brown note in the form of the bowel disruptor gun, which has settings including "loose", "watery" and "prolapse".
** And more creative later settings like "Intestinal Maelstrom", "Unspeakable Gut Horror", "Rectal Volcano", and everyone's favorite, "Shat Into Unconsciousness".
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** Of course, if you read the quote page, you will find that that equation does not work out at all.
*** Of course, you probably didn't say it out loud...
* Pied Piper, usually a mostly harmless reformed villain in [[The DCU]], turns out to be able to cause a
** In that same event, [[Superman]] destroyed Darkseid by creating a sound that disrupted his energy form.
* An old ''[[Casper the Friendly Ghost]]'' comic had a story about a scarecrow so un-scary that the Ghostly Trio gave it the scariest face in existence: a photo of the Ogre of the Black Pool. It was so scary it even scared ghosts! In fact, the only thing it couldn't scare was a sweet little old lady who painted over the scarecrow's face with a friendly one when it came to life and went berserk. (Those old Harvey comics could get ''weird''.)
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* [[David Cronenberg]]'s ''[[Videodrome]]'', about a TV signal that causes brain tumors and hallucinations. The discoverers of the signal attach it to a violent [[Gorn]] show {{spoiler|in order to clean up society by killing everyone who watches violent television}}.
* In ''[[Mystery Men]]'', Casanova Frankenstein built a machine that could warp [[Reality Warper|reality itself]]. Apparently the equations underlying it were so complex that anybody who studied them would go insane. Fortunately for Frankenstein, he was [[Obfuscating Insanity|already insane]] and had spent a decade in [[Bedlam House|the asylum]] with several of those scientists.
* ''[[Monty Python and the Holy Grail]]'' has the Knights who say Ni!. [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|Like their name makes clear]], they utter the word "Ni!" in a very screechy high pitched voice to hurt passing travelers and scare them into doing their bidding. {{spoiler|Its later revealed the word "it" serves as a
** "Ni!" works whether it's the Knights saying it or someone else, as when King Arthur is [[It Makes Sense in Context|harassing that old woman to find a shrubberer]].
* In ''[[Mars Attacks!]]!'', it is discovered that the Martians' main weakness is the singing voice of Slim Whitman, which causes [[Your Head Asplode|their heads to explode]]. Seriously.
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== Literature ==
* The word "{{spoiler|fnord!}}", from the ''[[Illuminatus]]!'' trilogy by Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea; at a young age, everybody is trained to unconsciously ignore the word, but feel unspecified fear and anxiety when they see it.
* The play ''[[The King in Yellow]]'', from a collection of horror stories by [[Robert W. Chambers]], caused anyone who read
* ''The King In Yellow'' is later used by [[August Derleth]] for the [[Cthulhu Mythos]], with a performance of the play acting as a [[Speak of the Devil|summoning ritual for]] Hastur. Anyone who ''wasn't'' driven insane by reading or viewing the play can say goodbye to their sanity once ''he'' shows up.
* In the novel ''[[Infinite Jest]]'', a movie known only as "The Entertainment" was described as so fascinating, anyone who watched it became obsessed with it.
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** Some [[Post Cyber Punk]] writers who've used the concept have [[Shout-Out|acknowledged]] Langford as inspiration: [[Greg Egan]] calls it the "Langford Mind-Erasing Fractal Basilisk"; [[Ken MacLeod]] has the "Langford Visual Hack"; and [[Charles Stross]] has "neural wetware-crashing Langford fractals" and the "Langford Death Parrot". (MacLeod also has his narrator claim it's completely impossible, but now the ''idea'' of it is out there people feel they have to take precautions, concluding "What kind of twisted mind ''starts'' these things?")
* [[H.P. Lovecraft]] created the fictional black magic tome, the ''Al Azif'' aka ''Noise of Demons'' by the "mad poet" Abdul Alhazred. It was written under the influence of some pretty heavy, although unspecified, drugs; among other things. It ''is'' supposed to cause or trigger madness in the careless reader.
** Almost everything in Lovecraft's stories is described as being just a little bit harmful to sanity. He must have been fascinated by the idea of things so horrifying and/or alien they're inherently upsetting. Besides of all the [[Eldritch Abomination
** Played utterly straight in the story ''Out of the Aeons'' (co-written with Hazel Heald). The [[Eldritch Abomination]] featured there is so horrible and/or accursed that not just its appearance, but even any sufficiently-accurate ''image'' thereof will cause a human onlooker to soon afterwards grow stiff and be transformed into their own mummy -- {{spoiler|while their brain remains alive and [[And I Must Scream|helplessly trapped inside their skull]]}}.
* One of Ramsey Campbell's more notable additions to the [[Cthulhu Mythos]] was {{spoiler|Y'Golonac}}. Part of the reason why was how easily {{spoiler|Y'Golonac}} could be summoned: if you just ''read'' his
* ''[[The Dragon Below]]'' trilogy has a [[Eldritch Abomination|Daelkyr]] whose telepathic voice gives sane people horrendous headaches and insane people orgasms.
* The plot of Neal Stephenson's ''[[Snow Crash]]'' revolves around the titular Snow Crash virus which ''resets'' a person to speaking and understanding only ancient Sumerian, which is described as a programming language for human beings. It allows people to be programmed directly, but leaves them gibbering crazy people spouting glossolalia until then, and shows up in the form of a bitmap image. All hackers are vulnerable, because they can understand the embedded binary code in this bitmap, which causes their unconscious to be able to pick up and mentally "run" the virus. Any [[Hackers]] who sees the bitmap, whether in cyberspace or in real life, becomes infected with the virus and instantly turns into a wandering bag-lady (or, erm... bag-lord?).
** In [[Cyberpunk]] novels, the concept of "ice" capable of killing people in [[Your Mind Makes It Real|virtual reality]] is often based on the same idea of an image [[Go Mad From the Revelation|or piece of data]] that the [[You Cannot Grasp the True Form|brain cannot process]].
* [[Logic Bomb
** The ''[[Discworld]]'' also features the [[Warrior Poet|gonagles]] of the Nac Mac Feegle, who fight by reciting atrocious poetry and by playing music on their painfully high-pitched mousepipes. They can make it rain.
** [[Great Big Library of Everything|The Library of the Unseen University]] is full of books that do [[Tome of Eldritch Lore|horrible things to people]]. In particular the Necrotelecomnicon (Written by Achmed the Mad, who preferred to be known as Achmed the I Just Get These Headaches) will drive mad any man who attempts to read it. Fortunately [[No Man of Woman Born|The Librarian isn't a man]] (but an orangutan) so he has no problem with it.
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* Palahniuk also included a box in ''[[Haunted 2005]]'' with an eyepiece. Looking inside had some horrible effects such as madness and consequent suicide.
* ''[[Harry Potter/Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets|Harry Potter]]''
** Passing references to books that burn out the reader's eyeballs. And also books that can't physically be put
** A more harmless example is the occasionally-mentioned ''Sonnets of a Sorcerer'', which makes you speak in limericks for the rest of your life.
** The big threat of the book is a
** The legend of the Mandrake (see below). The students have to wear hearing protection when pulling them out of the ground. Immature mandrakes just cause fainting. One can even tell their level of maturity by what they
** ''[[Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them]]'' has, along with the basilisk, the Fwooper. Prolonged exposure to Fwooper call is said to make listeners go insane. One wizard who tried to prove that Fwooper call was ''beneficial'' to health came back wearing nothing but a dead badger on his head.
* The protagonist of [[Ian McDonald]]'s novella ''Scissors Cut Paper Wrap Stone'' has discovered visual patterns with various effects on human
* ''The Euphio Question'' by [[Kurt Vonnegut]] was about a device which picked up the "music of the spheres" (though it wasn't called that.) Anyone who heard it experienced pure happiness and, because they had no desire to fulfill their needs, stopped whatever they were doing to listen to it.
* Will Ferguson's novel ''Happiness™'' is about a self-help book which tells you how to lose weight, make million of dollars, have great sex and be
* A [[China Mieville]] short story features a disease which causes the victim to slowly go insane while [[Madness Mantra|constantly repeating]] a phrase referred to only as the "worm-word." The disease is caused by pronouncing the word properly; it is theorized that the sufferer repeats it so that the listeners will repeat it in confusion, risking infection through proper pronunciation. (There is mention of young Victorians who would live dangerously and take turns reading the word aloud, each time gambling with accidentally getting the pronunciation right.) This story first appeared in ''The Thackery T. Lambshead Pocket Guide to Eccentric and Discredited Diseases'' as "Buscard's Murrain" and was reprinted in his collection ''Looking for Jake''. For those who like to live dangerously, the word is {{spoiler|yGudluh}}.
** That story isn't the only one in the Lambshead Guide, either. There's actually a warning marker for diseases which can be contracted by reading the descriptions - and it gets used several times.
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* The scrimshaw Turtle in ''[[The Dark Tower|Dark Tower VI]]'', a [[Clingy MacGuffin|Clingy Artifact]] which posesses whoever sees it in a ''good'' way, hypnotizing them and leaving a chain of forgetful, happy people in its wake. The turtle is possibly a [[Shout-Out]] to [[Jorge Luis Borges|Borges]] above, given its presumably divine origins.
** The [[Artifact of Doom|"Black Thirteen"]] crystal ball from the ''[[Dark Tower]]'' series has similar effects from an evil perspective. Left alone, it would kill everyone it comes in contact with by causing them to kill or commit suicide and/or [[Speak of the Devil|release the Beast into the world]]. Fortunately, the heroes, who are [[I'm Not Afraid of You|pressed for time]], decide to leave it in a long-term storage locker {{spoiler|under the World Trade Center}}.
* The {{color|blue|house}}, particularly the deeper parts of it (such as the Grand Hall and the Spiral Staircase), in ''[[House of Leaves]]''. Some would argue that ''[[Tome of Eldritch Lore|the book itself]]'' is a [[Real Life]]
** Not to mention the '''{{color|red|Minotaur}}'''. Seriously, [[Incredibly Lame Pun|don't mention it]].
* [[Mark Twain]]'s witty essay/short story ''Punch, Brothers, Punch!'' (also known as "A Literary Nightmare") concerns a tune which the narrator is unable to force from his head, and is unusual in that the killer verse is presented for us in
{{quote|Conductor, when you receive a fare, Punch in the presence of the passenjare! A blue trip slip for an eight-cent fare, A buff trip slip for a six-cent fare, A pink trip slip for a three-cent fare, Punch in the presence of the passenjare! CHORUS Punch brothers! Punch with care! Punch in the presence of the passenjare!}}
* ''Centerburg Tales: More Adventures of Homer Price'' by Robert McCloskey has a story where someone puts a horrible song on the jukebox in the lunch counter. Anyone who hears the
** The flip side of the same record causes the listener to {{spoiler|get hiccups at the thought of the words "pie" or "Mississippi".}}
* In [[Thomas Pynchon]]'s ''[[The Crying of Lot 49]]'', Dr. Hilarius, [[Those Wacky Nazis|That Wacky ex-Nazi]], claims to be able to cause madness by making weird faces at people. And then those nice young men in their clean white coats come to take him away (ha ha).
* The [[Words Can Break My Bones|Deplorable Word]] from ''[[Narnia]]'' was used by [[God Save Us From the Queen|Jadis]] to destroy [[Alternate Universe|Charn]], her homeworld. We don't learn what the word
{{quote|'''Aslan:''' While mankind has not yet reached the levels of corruption that Charn has, there ''is'' the possibility that man could learn the Deplorable Word.}}
** Presumably it doesn't work in Narnia either, else she surely would've used it there when she realized she was about to become lion-chow.
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* ''[[The Magician's Nephew]]'', which mentions the [[Words Can Break My Bones|Deplorable Word]], was written in 1955, just as the Cold War was starting to get serious. Aslan's final speech reads 'some wicked one of your world will find out a secret as evil as the Deplorable Word and use it to destroy all living things.' He then goes on to reference the World War. One might [[Author Filibuster|almost think]] [[C. S. Lewis|CS Lewis]] was making a thinly veiled anti-WMD speech there. (Magician's Nephew is set in the late 1800s.)
** In fairness to Lewis, the [[Atomic Hate|Bomb]] ''is'' the first weapon humanity has ever invented that ''seriously'' has the potential to depopulate the planet. Given the antagonistic politics of the day, and the fact that the Soviet Union had until recently been ruled by a genocidal madman, and well, the ongoing danger of nuclear weapons, he was right to be worried.
*** And despite the fact that the [[Cold War]] has ended and the Soviet Union disbanded, the fact that the United States and China still hold more nukes to destroy the world at least four times over more or less turns this into an allegory for "''He who launches a single nuke on a populace effectively ends all humanity''".<ref>
* Peter F. Hamilton's ''[[Nights Dawn Trilogy]]'' introduces a mind-destroying version as a weapon. This is a universe where the soul is immortal, and the souls of the dead are coming back to possess the living, gaining "[[Reality Warper|energistic]]" powers in the process. The "Anti-memory device" is humanity's response: a laser beam that carries a mind-virus. When viewed by human eyes, the virus is processed into the cortex, where it proceeds to destroy the "mind" (i.e. thought processes), thus killing both the possessing soul and the soul of the body's owner, leaving the body in a vegetative state. The resident [[Sufficiently Advanced Aliens]] are {{spoiler|unsurprised by the fact that humanity was the first to perfect such a terrible weapon. They theorize that the virus might even transmit back into the afterlife (with which the possessing souls still have a connection), kill every lost soul in there, and even go past the "human spectrum" and attack alien souls as well}}. It's ''that'' bad.
** [[It Got Worse|It gets worse]]: {{spoiler|[[Big Bad|Quinn]] [[Omnicidal Maniac|Dexter]] gets the weapon at one point. He's very happy when he finds out what it does. Turns out it facilitates possession when the body is soul-less.}}
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* Ted Chiang's short story ''Understand'' features two super-intelligent people duelling by trying to implant deadly Brown Notes in each other. {{spoiler|The one that succeeds had been subconsciously planted in its victim in the previous few days; it is then triggered when his enemy tells him to "Understand"}}
* One of [[Bentley Little]]'s perverse stories involves a numerical code that causes anyone who looks at it to suffer a crippling orgasm. The military considers using it to end all wars.
* The hero of one of [[Mercedes Lackey]]'s ''SERRAted Edge'' novels uses the entire discography of [[They Might Be Giants]] to do this to a group of psychics sicced on him by the [[Big Bad]]; the theory was that the nonsensical nature of the band's lyrics made it impossible to sing along to without devoting a considerable amount of conscious thought to them, meaning his (and their) minds would be too preoccupied with thinking about the lyrics to do much of anything else. (It helped that the psychics trying to pick his brain were culturally stuck in the Middle Ages and had no ''possible'' context by which to even begin to grasp what the hell was going on in his head; one of them was led off wailing helplessly about alchemical formulae.) Also, they were [[Ear Worm
** However, one of the hobgoblin servants found the tunes quite catchy and was also singing them before {{spoiler|being bitch-slapped by his boss}}.
* In ''[[Animorphs]]'', at one point they fight a race of aliens called Howlers, who have a screaming cry that has very nasty effects on any sentient creature who hears it.
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* The overlord of the Redeemers in ''[[Star Trek: New Frontier]]'' knew words that could...do things. From inflicting severe pain, to forcing a person to reveal everything they know (which was actually used, and it wasn't a pretty sight). Their one weakness is that they can be blocked by Starfleet Universal Translators because they're from a language the Translators don't recognize.
* [[Larry Niven]] has a couple of short stories set in his ''Draco Tavern'' universe that use this trope, with Niven's typical twist applied:
** ''The Subject is Closed''
* In the ''Dance of the Gods'' quadrilogy by Mayer Alan Brenner, has a character named {{spoiler|Jurtan Mont}} who has a mental illness that causes him to hear a soundtrack to his life, to the point that hearing music outside of his mind made his brain jealous and knocked him out. Later on he finds that playing {{spoiler|(or in some cases just shouting)}} the music in his head knocks out or puts others to sleep.
* In ''Dream Park'', an industrial spy steals samples of 'neutral scent', an odor that causes a person's pre-existing emotions to become hyperintense. Too strong an exposure can make people lose all control of their fear, anger, lust, etc.
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** In ''Fury from the Deep'', {{spoiler|[[Damsel in Distress|Victoria Waterfield's screaming]] defeats the weed monster.}}
** In "The Time of Angels" we learn that any image or recording of an weeping angel can become an angel. {{spoiler|This goes double if you look an Angel in the eyes...}}
* [[Blipvert
* ''[[The Outer Limits]]'': In "Music of the Spheres", the titular music is a signal from space which, in addition to being extremely addictive, ends up causing a series of dramatic physical transformations in listeners. Notably, unlike most examples of the
* In ''[[Torchwood]]: Children of Earth'', when the frequency emitted from Jack's grandson {{spoiler|makes the 456 explode in a shower of blood (and then somehow teleport away in their flaming pillar) and also kills Stephen}}.
* ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation|Star Trek the Next Generation]]'':
** One episode features an alien who uses this to distract Deanna Troi from probing his mind, basically by [[Ear Worm|sticking a song permanently in her head]]. Apparently, Troi is allergic to ethereal, tinkly music-box music, because while it's mildly annoying to the viewer Troi reacts not like she's going mad, so much as she's in intense, head-exploding pain.
*** Troi's example doesn't really count, as there is nothing compulsive about the music. It is simply that the alien ''forces'' Troi to hear it, constantly, day and night, 24/7. No matter how innocuous the music, after a while ''anyone'' would start to crack up, begging for it to stop, especially if it was in your ''head''. And he keeps turning up the volume. Since nobody other than Troi can hear the music, this is more of a case of [[Terrible Ticking]].
** There's was also the episode "The Game," which features an addictive video game which stimulated the brain's pleasure centers.
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** The Food episode of series two featured [http://i49.tinypic.com/1539xdg.jpg an image so frightening] that it causes users of the Slimby diet shakes to sweat all of the fat out of their bodies.
* One episode of ''[[The Middleman]]'' involves a cursed tuba from the ''Titanic'' that causes anyone who hears it to "drown in the icy waters of the North Atlantic". Including people who are on dry land at the time.
* The Green Clarinet sketch from ''[[That Mitchell and Webb Look]]'' ends with {{spoiler|a put-upon waiter countering the Clarinet's forced-truth effect with a literal
* In the ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]'' online comic, a man with [[Make Me Wanna Shout|sound control]] powers ("[[Meaningful Name|Echo DeMille]]") makes use of the
* ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series|Star Trek the Original Series]]'' episode "Is There In Truth No Beauty". Anyone seeing the true form of a Medusan becomes dangerously insane.
** An example of the [[Surreal Horror|surreal]], ''[[Twilight Zone]]''-y, [[Space Is Magic]] philosophy that ''[[Star Trek]]'' started out with. The old writers didn't feel any need to [[Hand Wave|"explain"]] everything, much less with the same [[Techno Babble]] every week. The Medusans don't emit dangerous radiation or anything, they're just supposed to ''look so weird that you'll lose your mind if you see one.'' (When traveling among [[Five Races|mundanes]] they hide in little coffins like [[Our Vampires Are Different|vampires]].)
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* ''[[Chuck]]'' has this as its core trope, in the form of the Intersect, a pattern-recognition and confidential storage computer designed to be installed into human brains through a long, high-speed sequence of seemingly random images. Watching the Intersect installation program run paralyzes you temporarily and makes you nauseous at best, and has been shown to kill people at worst.
* This theme also becomes an important plot point in ''[[Dollhouse]]''. {{spoiler|In the first season, we see an example of a "remote wipe", which removes the imprinted personality of the doll and restores him or her to their doll state. In the second season, Topher develops a device that can wipe anyone you point it at, even normal humans.}}
* MTV's ''FurTV'' features an episode where Fat Ed's Heavy Metal band Stinkhole discovers the literal
* On ''[[Supernatural (TV series)|Supernatural]]'', seeing Castiel's true face (and presumably the true faces of all other angels) causes one's eyes to burn out of their sockets, as seen [[Nightmare Fuel|memorably]] in the fourth season premiere, and his true voice causes windows to shatter and ears to bleed. In vessel form, however, they can be heard and seen normally.
** He does mention that certain gifted people can perceive his true visage. His vessel Jimmy is one of them, and John Winchester is strongly hinted of also being one, given that [[Archangel Michael|Michael]] directly spoke to him at one point.
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* The Basilisk and/or Cockatrice. Depending on who you ask, they are either the same monster or two entirely different monsters that always get confused with one-another. If they are different, then they also look different: the Basilisk is either a lowly lizardy thing or a snakelike thing and the Cockatrice is essentially half rooster, half demonic monster.
** The main points about these creatures ''are'' basically the same: they are small and can easily hide and sneak about and pop up anywhere, they are [[Made of Evil|pure evil]], they must come into this world by unnatural means (often by a '''rooster''' laying an egg), and to meet their gaze is to drop dead on the spot. Or to turn into stone. Or they kill/petrify you just by ''looking at them''. Or by touching you or breathing on you. [[Walking Wasteland|Or they leave a path of desolation ("creating a desert") wherever they walk]]. Or... it may be easier at this point to say that the [[Reptiles Are Abhorrent]] trope is very old, and has much to do with the wildly exaggerated dangerousness of poisonous snakes.
** One other thing about basilisks must be mentioned, though, because it's just wicked awesome: these
* [[Older Than Feudalism]]: The sight of Medusa and her Gorgon sisters either [[One-Hit Kill|kills you instantly]] or [[Taken for Granite|turns you into stone]] depending on what version of the legend you read. In most versions, this power remains with her hideous visage even after she's been beheaded, and it ends up mounted on Athena's shield or breastplate for exactly that reason. Note that Medusa was killed by the hero Perseus who had ([[Supernatural Aid|along with various god-given tools]]) a mirrored
* The Sirens are like an auditory version of the Gorgons, as they lure sailors to their death with their song.
* The Catoblepas is a hideously ugly oxlike creature who, likewise, either kills you or turns you into stone if it meets your gaze. Sometimes just looking at it will have the same effects. This monster is also sometimes called a Gorgon. Fortunately, most versions subscribing to the "gaze" version of events go on to add that the catoblepas finds [[Weaksauce Weakness|its head incredibly heavy to hold up]], and is thus not much of a threat to anyone who isn't lying on the ground.
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== Toys ==
* ''[[Bionicle]]'' has several:
** Tren Krom and {{spoiler|Anonna}}, [[Eldritch Abomination
** The Klakk's scream, which can cure Shadow Matoran of their corruption.
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* The [[Infocom]] interactive-fiction game ''[[Hollywood Hijinks]]'' features an unfinished film called ''A Corpse Line''; the reason it's unfinished is that it's so horrific, anyone who watches it, even its creator, dies of a massive heart attack.
* The ''[[Condemned]]'' series makes use of this in the second game. In fact, it's the main plot point of the whole series -- {{spoiler|the conspiracy responsible for the homeless population of the City going insane relies on sounds that, when heard/felt, have effects ranging from minor cranial hemorrhaging, causing omnicidal psychosis which just happens to coincide with protecting the conspiracy -- and did I mention they're only omnicidal to people who are not Influenced? -- to causing heads to explode -- for emitters and your average conspirator, just birds, while the main character can generate sounds that explode human heads.}}
* In one of the first [[Visual Novel
* Mystia Lorelei from the ''[[Touhou]]'' series has an unusual variation on this trope: her singing can cause ''night-blindness''.
* The game ''[[Rez]]'' was purposefully designed to confuse the player's neural processing of sensory input.
* The (possibly) fictional game ''[[Polybius]]'' is attributed with the power to mess up the brain causing amnesia, nightmares and death.
* This is the implied way Harps kill in ''[[Final Fantasy]]''
** In ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'', ''books'' cause damage by the user ''reading'' from it. (Or you could [[Throw the Book At Them|Throw]] it via the Ninja class.)
* In ''[[Loom]]'', the [[Big Bad]] mentions a legend that says that anyone who looks under the hood of a member of the Weaver's Guild will die instantly. The main character (a Weaver himself) is uncertain as to the veracity of this legend, but late in the game, one of the [[Big Bad]]'s henchmen succumbs to curiosity...
** Playing the game in hard mode lets the player actually see this happening. In any other mode, [[Take Our Word for It|the game cuts away to another scene for a few seconds]], then back to the main character, who is now mysteriously alone and completely unscathed.
** In fact, the basic premise of most of this game could be considered a
* In ''[[Tales of the Abyss]]'', Tear's Fonic Hymns are songs that have a myriad of effects, ranging from putting everyone that hears it to sleep (Nightmare) to a mass healer (Revitalize) to summoning [[Frickin' Laser Beams|beams of]] [[Kill It with Fire|firey death]] (Judgment).
** It's also implied that all magic in that game is some sound- "Oh Admonishing Melody,...".
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* ''[[Ys]] I and II'' has a corridor in Darm Tower where [[Ominous Pipe Organ|evil organ music]] is played that damages Adol. You must break the pillar on the balcony that is piping in the music to advance.
* The [[MOTHER]] series has a lot of these. Examples include {{spoiler|singing Giegue into submission}} in the first game, Frank saying something nasty in the second, or [[That One Boss|Lucky's bass]] in Mother 3
* At one point in ''[[Forum Warz]]'', you're hit by a
* ''[[Quest for Glory IV]]'' has the Ultimate Joke (apparently about the wizard and the farmer's daughter, that John Rhys-Davies calls "a killer"). Telling it will make anyone laugh, no matter the situation. It's just that funny. The catch is that you can only use it once, under the principle that a joke is less funny the more often you hear it. You use it {{spoiler|against Ad Avis in the final battle, to distract him long enough to prepare and unleash your killing blow.}}
* {{spoiler|Zelenin's Hymn}} in [[Strange Journey|Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey]].
* In ''[[Star Control II]]'', learning too much about other dimensions draws the attention of some rather nasty [[Eldritch Abomination
* The "Correspondence" (ancient alphabet whose purpose nobody knows for sure) in ''[[Echo Bazaar]]'' can drive you insane, or even cause your hair to catch fire.
* In ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask|The Legend of Zelda Majoras Mask]]'', when Link reaches the source of the river in Ikana Valley, he is attacked by a ghost who plays an evil melody that drains his hearts. The only way to get past is by playing the Song of Storms to counter it. This will restore the river, giving power to a giant sound system on a nearby house, and the song it plays will kill the mummies outside.
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== Web Comics ==
* For a one-shot gag in ''[[Sam and Fuzzy]]'', [http://samandfuzzy.com/archive.php?comicID=597 here], Fuzzy creates a
* In ''[[Megatokyo]]'', the ''Necrowombicon'' was probably a Brown Note, because Largo's life can be divided in two. Before reading it, he was just a superconfident, super-spirited hardcore gamer; after reading it, he became obsessed with zombie rampages, though that Miho was the "3V1|_ Z0MB13 QU33N", and suddenly started seeing the world through the glasses of [[B-Movie|B Movies]], shooter games and online RPGs. But if we consider that Largo is also a big [[Cloudcuckoolander]], it might as well have been caused by something else.
** This happened about the time the authors were transitioning from a loosely connected series of jokes to a more comprehensive narrative, so the clichés Largo was built on were ramped up overnight to Cloudcuckoolander status to help lead into his plot arcs. It's later mentioned that he's always been this way. In addition, [[Author Avatar|the "other" Largo]] was becoming less influential on the comic's creation by that
* In ''[[8-Bit Theater|Eight Bit Theater]]'', Black Mage explains that anyone who sees his face will go insane. This happens to a random passer-by {{spoiler|which comes back to bite the Light Warriors much later}}. Later on, an as-of-yet unnamed Dark God tells Black Mage that hearing his true voice will cause a person's brain to eat itself.
* ''[[Starslip Crisis]]'' has the sculpture known as "The Spine of the Cosmos". Looking at it by itself is harmless, but when its artistic context is described to the viewer, they are either granted ultimate understanding of the universe or driven
** Also, Cirbozoids can kill people by crying.
** The context involves [[Creator/Yeats|Yeats]]' [[Vagueness Is Coming|poem]] [http://starslip.com/2007/11/30/starslip-number-664/ The Second Coming]
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* In ''Star Harbor Nights'', a close-up look at the insanity causing molecule in Rhyme's blood at just the right angle causes viewers to scream until they pass out.
* An [[Easter Egg]] in the ''[[Sonic Shorts]]'' collection volume 2 features an extremely terrifying version of the Tails Doll that allegedly causes grown men to scream like a little girl.
* The ''[[SCP Foundation]]'' has enough of these to call them "memetic hazards"
** A "Langford-Berryman Memetic Kill Agent" triggers a fatal neurally-induced heart attack into any "un-innoculated" personnel trying to view the SCP-001 entry. [http://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/proposals-for-scp-001 Try your luck here]. ** SCP-701 is [http://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-701 play] very reminiscent of ''[[The King in Yellow]]''.
** SCP-298 is [http://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-298 this pipe organ].
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* The Brown Note itself appears in the ''[[South Park]]'' episode "World Wide Recorder Concert", here referred to as "the brown noise".
** Let's not forget the deadly Mexican Staring Frog of Southern Sri-Lanka.
** ''The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs'', a [[Show Within a Show|novel within the series]] made by the boys on an episode with the same title. It causes everyone who reads it (with the possible exception of the boys themselves, who just laugh) to vomit from the [[Squick
*** The twist of all this is that despite this reaction, it is agreed-upon in-universe to be an excellent work of literature.
** Another, ''[[Lord of the Rings]]''-themed episode, has the porno ''Backdoor Sluts 9'', which inflicts [[Mind Rape]] on Token and Butters.
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* The anti-McCollough effect sticks around for quite a while too.
* Not to be confused with the real-life [[wikipedia:Brownian noise|"Brown noise,"]] which is completely harmless.
* The movie ''[[Avatar (film)|Avatar]]'' seems to be getting a reputation for this. Several people walked out with motion sickness from watching it in 3D, [http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/Movies/01/11/avatar.movie.blues/index.html others suffered depression and even suicidal thoughts,] and one man even died, [http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,583351,00.html apparently from over-excitement.] <ref>
* This trope is the source of the common [[Fridge Logic]] expressed about how we know what deadly gases smell like ([[Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick|almonds, fresh hay, etc.]])
** Toxicity is relative; any toxin on earth is only deadly in sufficient quantities, and the quantities needed to ''smell it'' are often (but not always) miniscule enough to avoid injury. This is how [[Scarily Competent Tracker
* Regarding the [[Beach Boys]], one of the things that made Brian Wilson reluctant to finish ''"Smile"'' was a fear that he had created a
** This prompted him to not release the album for 35 years and bury the original tracks in the vaults in a fit of panic, refusing to finish the album until 2004. Some other tracks of the original song were destroyed. Brian Wilson went into seclusion for decades, fearing that his hallucination-induced music would cause more fires. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LI-KazTKw8 Listen to it here].
* "The Elephant's Foot", a formation of reactor core lava in Chernobyl<ref>so-named because it is shaped like an [[Eldritch Abomination]], apparently.</ref> which was so radioactive, just ''looking at it'' [http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/bf822b7d3b8e.gif would kill you on the spot]. Like the classical Medusa, a heroic Russian physicist risked his life to [[To Hell and Back|journey into the bowels of the reactor]] to take pictures and find out what was going on down there; he had to use ''a mirror'' to take pictures of it from the adjoining hallway. Why did he "[[But Thou Must!|volunteer]]" to do this? Because (a) he was [[Badass Grandpa|old enough not to worry]] about inevitably dying of cancer from background exposure (which he did later; [[Heroic Sacrifice|they all did]]) and (b) the robot they sent to take photos of the reactor core lava had its ''[[Phlebotinum Overload|circuits fried due to radiation]]'', while a human could move quickly through the same hallway as long as he did not look into the open doorway itself.
** A person able to actually see critical fissionable material up close will die a horrible death, although all they will see is a glimmer of (deadly) light, along with a weird buzzing. (Note that the light ''itself'' is deadly, as it contains gamma rays.)
** [[STALKER|We finally learn the truth about the Wish Granter!]]
* In the real world,
** Back in the 1950s French Professor Vladimir Gavreau invented a [http://davidszondy.com/future/war/infrasound.htm real infrasound weapon.] (It's not clear whether he designed it ''as'' a weapon or just to explore the potential of infrasound effects.)
** The musical artist [http://www.lustmord.com/ Lustmord] combines ambient noises (recorded in, for example, caves and slaughterhouses) with bass rumbles ''just'' this side of audible. Listening with headphones: not really recommended.
** [[Irreversible|Gaspar Noé's]] notorious 2002 film [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0290673/ Irréversible] specifically includes lengthy portions of almost sub-audible 28hz frequencies on the soundtrack for the first half-hour, so as to cause people to walk out feeling inexplicably ill. The DVD sleeve proudly notes that there 200 walk-outs at the film's Cannes premiere alone. Of course, they were gone before the [[Film]] [[It Got Worse|got REALLY unpleasant]].
** [[Lou Reed]] also claimed to use these frequences on his album ''Metal Machine Music'', but he was probably full of shit.
** There's been speculation that local infrasound resonance might be responsible for many places appearing to be "haunted." In a few experiments, soundwaves around 18
** Given that our early hominid ancestors would've only experienced infrasound when something very, ''very'' big and dangerous (e.g. an elephant, hippo or rhino) was vocalizing nearby, it makes sense that we ''would'' find the associated tactile sensations unnerving.
* Likewise, high frequency sound is usually considered to be highly annoying and painful to those who can hear it. Since the ability to hear higher frequencies fades as one gets older, a British engineer once created a [[Child-Hater|"teenager repellent"]]: a little thingamajig that creates a loud high frequency blast, which annoys and scares away anyone that can hear the sound, and that usually means anyone under 30 years. In an ironic twist of fate, this "anti-teenager" weapon was reversed, and turned into an "anti-adult" weapon: a high frequency ringtone that allows teenagers to listen to their phones in the classroom, without the giving-away buzz of a vibrating phone, safe from the usually 40-something ears of their teachers.
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* According to Viscount Palmerston, the Schleswig-Holstein Question (a complex German/Danish territorial dispute of the 19th century). "Only three men in Europe have ever understood it. One was Prince Albert, who is dead. The second was a German professor who became mad. I am the third and I have forgotten all about it."
* Erik Satie's ''Vexations'' probably counts. The piece consists of a slow, simple theme that the composer insists should be repeated 840 times in a performance. It was first performed by a relay of 10 pianists, and took over 18 hours; reputedly, by the end the audience had dwindled to a handful of masochists. At the end, a sado-masochist shouted 'Encore!'
* [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16962788 This] is a wonderful interview with a researcher in search of "The Ultimate Yawn"
** Also reading about yawning. Having stopped yet?
** Slowpoke used Yawn! *player yawns*
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** Similarly, the Anons later found that playing a recording of [[L. Ron Hubbard]] reciting the infamous Xenu story would cause any Scientologists who haven't reached OT3 to back off and leave the area. This is due to the fact that they have been told that anyone who hears it before they're spiritually ready will get sick and die.
* In the DVD commentary for one of the Alien movies, it is mentioned that in one of the test screenings, groups of older people kept excusing themselves. Upon asking them about this, it was revealed that they were leaving to use the restroom, due to sudden urges. It turned out that apparently the composer for the score had used brown notes in the score, unknowingly. When they changed the score, the problem stopped.
* The short story ''Guts'' from the larger book ''[[Haunted 2005]]'' by [[Chuck Palahniuk]] has been known to have this effect in real life. According to [[That Other Wiki]], [[wikipedia:Haunted (Palahniuk novel)#.22Guts.22|more than sixty people have fainted]] while Palahniuk was doing readings. Palahniuk himself talks about it [http://www.randomhouse.com/doubleday/palahniuk/haunted/html/haunted_aboutAuthor.html here]. Note: he doesn't consider ''Guts'' to be worst, most horrifying, or darkest part of ''Haunted''. In fact, ''Guts'' is the first of an entire book of often horrifying and/or [[
* The bizarre angles of the [https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Oregon_vortex Oregon Vortex] will cause most people to lose their balance trying to cross it, or even become physically nauseous. In this case, it's the mind trying to correlate the ear's sense of gravity with the eye's [[Alien Geometries|wildly different impressions]], until it just reboots.
* Recently, several [[Let's Play]] gamers have left the community. Some of their fans claim this is because of the "curse of [[I Wanna Be the Guy]]", as most of them have played the [[Nintendo Hard]] indie game before their abandonment.
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* The music of the [[wikipedia:Glass armonica|glass armonica]] was said to cause both its players and listeners to go insane. Some today believe these were symptoms of lead poisoning due to many armonicas being made of lead glass.
* The [[wikipedia:Bucha effect|Bucha effect]].
* Merely learning the premise of ''[[The Human Centipede]]'' can leave you feeling unsettled for the rest of the day.
* The flier mentioned [http://xfinitytv.comcast.net/tv/Criss-Angel%3A-Mindfreak/94633/2098057375/Celebrity-Minds/videos?skipTo=818&cmpid=FCST_hero_tv here], apparently.
* Under the right conditions, parts 1, 4, 5, and 6 of Jliat's ''Still Life #5: 6 Types Of Silence'' would cause electrical fires in the sound system they were being played through. The album had to be packaged with a disclaimer.
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