Unobtainium: Difference between revisions

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Compare [[Mineral MacGuffin]] and [[Spice of Life]].

== Anime & Manga ==

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** {{spoiler|It's actually the menstrual blood of the Angel Lilith, which adds all sorts of retroactive squick when you realize they've been "breathing" it the whole time.}}

* Orichalcum (or a variant spelling) is a metal with magical properties that makes appearances in several anime, including ''[[The Slayers]]''.

* ''[[Digimon]]'' as a whole has the Chrome Digizoid metal ([[Spell My Name With an S|also spelled]] ChronDigizoid). It's characterized as a highly sought after super-metal (with a silly name) of any colour which is very strong and cannot be damaged, except by other samples of it; in addition to being mined in some Digimon canons, a small number of Digimon species are either made of/plated in it (e.g. MetalEtemon) or wield weapons made of it (e.g. Zudomon, who killed the aforementioned MetalEtemon in ''[[Digimon Adventure]]''). The only time it's been referenced in the anime itself was briefly in the aforementioned ''[[Digimon Adventure]]'' incident between Zudomon and MetalEtemon, and then only mentioned offhand to give Zudomon, a lower-level Digimon, a way to revenge-kill MetalEtemon; as such, most mentions of the substance [[All There in the Manual|occur in the broader source material]]. According to said source material, there exist several varieties with different properties denoted by specific colours: Blue, which provides high speed (as seen on [[Digimon V-Tamer 01 (Manga)|UlforceV-dramon]]); Red, which provides even higher defence (e.g. [[Digimon Savers|Sleipmon]]); Gold, which increases a Digimon's offensive power (e.g. [[Digimon Xros Wars|Shoutmon DX]]); and the vaguely described Black (e.g. [[Digimon Savers|Craniummon]]) and Obsidian (e.g. [[Digimon Frontier|KaiserLeomon]]).

* ''[[Digimon]]'' as a whole has the Chrome Digizoid metal ([[Spell My Name With an "S"|also spelled]] ChronDigizoid). It's characterized as a highly sought after super-metal (with a silly name) of any colour which is very strong and cannot be damaged, except by other samples of it; in addition to being mined in some Digimon canons, a small number of Digimon species are either made of/plated in it (e.g. MetalEtemon) or wield weapons made of it (e.g. Zudomon, who killed the aforementioned MetalEtemon in ''[[Digimon Adventure]]''). The only time it's been referenced in the anime itself was briefly in the aforementioned ''[[Digimon Adventure]]'' incident between Zudomon and MetalEtemon, and then only mentioned offhand to give Zudomon, a lower-level Digimon, a way to revenge-kill MetalEtemon; as such, most mentions of the substance [[All There in the Manual|occur in the broader source material]]. According to said source material, there exist several varieties with different properties denoted by specific colours: Blue, which provides high speed (as seen on [[Digimon V-Tamer 01 (Manga)|UlforceV-dramon]]); Red, which provides even higher defence (e.g. [[Digimon Savers|Sleipmon]]); Gold, which increases a Digimon's offensive power (e.g. [[Digimon Xros Wars|Shoutmon DX]]); and the vaguely described Black (e.g. [[Digimon Savers|Craniummon]]) and Obsidian (e.g. [[Digimon Frontier|KaiserLeomon]]).

* ''[[Gundam Wing]]'' has the alloy Gundanium, which is incredibly tough, nearly immutable, heat-resistant, electrically neutral, and a natural radar damper. The "rare, hard-to-find" part comes from the fact that it can only be manufactured in space and the fact that at the start of the show, only six people in the world know how to make it.

** [[Reality Is Unrealistic|This has some basis in real-world science]]. The crystalline structures that form as liquid metal solidifies can be ''very'' different in microgravity. The odds of creating an alloy with ''all' the aforementioned properties remain fairly small, however.

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** The first version of the ''[[Legion of Super-Heroes]]'' used "inertron" for this purpose, an invulnerable metal.

** The [[Pre Crisis]] DCU also featured the invulnerable metals "Supermanium" (a metal once created by Superman) and "Amazonium" (the metal [[Wonder Woman]]'s bracelets were made from), both invulnerable metals akin to inertron.

* The ''[[Tintin]]'' adventure ''[[Tintin (Comic Book)/Recap/The Shooting Star|The Shooting Star]]'' revolves around a mission to retrieve a sample of unobtainium (dubbed "Phostlite") from a fallen meteorite. The only obvious property of the stuff is making mushrooms grow really fast. And other plants. And animals, like butterflies and spiders. Fortunately, germs don't seem to be included.

* The ''[[Tintin (Comic Book)]]'' adventure ''[[Tintin (Comic Book)/Recap/The Shooting Star|The Shooting Star]]'' revolves around a mission to retrieve a sample of unobtainium (dubbed "Phostlite") from a fallen meteorite. The only obvious property of the stuff is making mushrooms grow really fast. And other plants. And animals, like butterflies and spiders. Fortunately, germs don't seem to be included.

** In ''[[Tintin (Comic Book)/Recap/Destination Moon|Destination Moon]]'', Professor Calculus has invented a new substance - calculon - which can "resist even the highest temperatures", with which to make the nuclear fission motor for the rocket.

* In an early Marvel/DC crossover featuring the X-Men and the New Teen Titans, the villain Darkseid keeps both teams shackled, and states that Kitty Pryde's shackles are made of a rare metal with molecules so tightly packed, not even she can phase through them.

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* Turbinium from ''[[Total Recall]]''.

* In ''[[District 9]]'', the unnamed nanofluid is found in prawn technology in extremely small amounts, and is apparently quite precious. It has the power to {{spoiler|activate the aliens' ship as well as transform a human into a prawn}}.

* In ''[[Doctor ~~Horribles~~ Sing Along Blog (Web Video)|Doctor Horrible]]'', the good doctor powers his freeze ray with Wonderflonium, not far removed from Unobtainium as it has the power to stop time. However it only seems to paralyze or turn to stone a single target, rather than actually stopping time itself.

* In ''[[Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog (Web Video)|Doctor Horrible]]'', the good doctor powers his freeze ray with Wonderflonium, not far removed from Unobtainium as it has the power to stop time. However it only seems to paralyze or turn to stone a single target, rather than actually stopping time itself.

** Wonderflonium doesn't freeze time as suggested here. It merely makes the impossible possible and powers the freeze ray -- [[I Thought It Meant|which freezes time]] -- for a short time, at least. Wonderflonium should also never be bounced for some reason.

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* Wells also had a previously undiscovered element present in the titular comet in The Day Of The Comet.

* [[Harry Harrison]]'s 1973 Golden Age SF spoof novel, ''Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers'' features Cheddite (a fuel created from cheese). In another scene the heroes' 747 jet is turned into a spacecraft by means of windows armored with ''armolite'', vacuum insulation with ''insulite'', fuel tanks filled with ''combustite'', guns firing pellets of ''destructite'', batteries replaced with ''capacitite'' and a space-warp drive powered by ''warpite''.

* Melange, also called spice, in the ''[[Dune]]'' novels, extends life and grants limited prescience, allowing [[Faster Than Light Travel]]. And it [[Arson Murder and Jaywalking|tastes like cinnamon]]. Oh, and there are other uses. If it seems like something that would be extremely valuable and important, that's because it is. It's generally thought to be an [[Alternate Company Equivalent]] to oil in the way that it drives the greater economy and is controlled by warlike tribes.

* Melange, also called spice, in the ''[[Dune]]'' novels, extends life and grants limited prescience, allowing [[Faster Than Light Travel]]. And it [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|tastes like cinnamon]]. Oh, and there are other uses. If it seems like something that would be extremely valuable and important, that's because it is. It's generally thought to be an [[Alternate Company Equivalent]] to oil in the way that it drives the greater economy and is controlled by warlike tribes.

* Iridium, a natural element that is extremely rare on Earth, is often used in more dramatic [[Sci Fi]] stories.

* The German SF/pulp series ''[[Perry Rhodan]]'' has over the course of its history collected a fair bit of unobtainium in various forms. Classic examples are Ynkelonium, a metallic element that does not react with antimatter and can to an extent prevent such reactions from occurring in its immediate vicinity, and Luurs-Metal, which always maintains a constant temperature of about 3.4 degrees Celsius. Both materials occur naturally in the universe and cannot be synthesized.

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** Vertenium-Cortenide, a compound of ''two'' non-existent substances, used in the warp coils themselves.

** Archerite, another Ass Pull, this time by the Andorian Shran when explaining to another alien commander what he was doing in their territory.

** Transparent aluminum. which gets bonus points, given that a normal modern chemist could apparently figure out what it was ''just by looking at the atomic structure''. Naturally, [[No Plans No Prototype No Backup|he would still be helpless to reproduce it without a diagram of said structure]].

** Transparent aluminum. which gets bonus points, given that a normal modern chemist could apparently figure out what it was ''just by looking at the atomic structure''. Naturally, [[No Plans, No Prototype, No Backup|he would still be helpless to reproduce it without a diagram of said structure]].

*** Transparent aluminum exists now. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminum_oxynitride See here]

*** Aluminum Oxynitride is a ceramic, however. Transparent aluminum metal remains unobtainium.

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* ''[[Shadowrun]]'', true to its fantasy-scifi-blend form, borrows from myths for its [[Unobtainium]], such as orichalcum, an alloy of copper, gold, silver, and mercury that couldn't even ''begin'' to exist if there wasn't magic in the world.

* In ''[[Warhammer 40000]]'', almost every race has a form of this, from the psychic wraith bone to the ubiquitous armour plate the humans use on tanks, adamantium. Adamantium's properties are never really explained, though, in the books, it seems to suffer from a mineral variation of [[The Worf Effect]] ("How could they cut through X many feet of adamantium that easily?!"); another worf effect example is the material used in Space Marine power armour, Ceramite (often such examples involve either cutting blades, or melta/heat weapons as ceramite is reckoned to be extremely resistant to heat). This also happens a lot with human building materials in that universe, all of which have odd but recognizable names and are supposedly better than what we have now, but which can be reduced to rubble in the first bombardment.

** The [[Schizo Tech|technology levels]] in the setting also cause some rather strange applications for the unobtainium, such as adamantium bayonets fitted to the [[Frickin Laser Beams|lasguns]] of the [[Redshirt Army|Imperial Guard]].

** The [[Schizo Tech|technology levels]] in the setting also cause some rather strange applications for the unobtainium, such as adamantium bayonets fitted to the [[Frickin' Laser Beams|lasguns]] of the [[Redshirt Army|Imperial Guard]].

* In ''[[Warhammer (Tabletop Game)|Warhammer]]'' (fantasy setting of 40000), glowing green 'warpstone' is used to create mutations, enhance magical powers, bring the dead to life, and as an energy source for powerful technology. In the Skaven rat-men society, it is even used as currency. Warpstone is considered rare, and is mined and collected by nearly all factions in the Warhammer setting.

** That's not quite right. Warp energy spewing out of the Old Ones' polar gates blows across the world, refracting into the eight colours (winds) of magic. The unrefracted leftovers (dark magic) settle in areas of evil and death, congealing into warpstone over time. The Warhammer world also has a moon composed entirely of warpstone, Morrslieb, which rains warpstone meteor showers on occasion. Warpstone is also not collected by any faction except the evil ones, most notably the Skaven.