History Main / LockingMacGyverInTheStoreCupboard

* ''Series/TheATeam'': Pretty much every episode involves the A-Team getting trapped somewhere like a barn where they could bust out via an armored car [[ATeamMontage quickly]] thrown together using the materials at hand. This trope could just as easily have been called "Locking the A-Team in the Motor Pool Workshop".

** In the episode "A Better World", when Batman is captured and put in a prison, his alternative universe counterpart, Lord-Batman, points out not to bother trying a certain technique since he build to prison specifically to counter anything Batman could think of (since being another version of Batman, he can think of everything Batman would). [[spoiler:Flash then escapes by speeding up his heart rate so it appears like he has flatlined, causing Lord-Batman to open the prison to check on him. It works because Batman, and therefore Lord Batman as well, didn't know he could do that]].

* ''Hollow Man'' is parodied in ''Film/ScaryMovie2''. Two main characters find themselves locked in a freezer while running from an angry spirit. After a "[[ADateWithRosiePalms heartwarming]]" monologue, the heroine takes a couple of screws, cups, strings, and other extraneous items and somehow manages to create an entire bulldozer, destroying the wall and allowing them to escape.

** ''Film/DiamondsAreForever''. When Bond turns up at the oilrig he's using, Blofeld insists that his guards thoroughly search Bond (twice), then ruins that by having him locked in a storage room which has a hatch to the underside of the rig, and a rope long enough so he can climb out. You'd think Blofeld would have learnt his lesson [[Film/OnHerMajestysSecretService after Bond was able to escape from the cable room]] at Piz Gloria--and that was a lot harder to do.

** When Bond turns up at the oilrig he's using, Blofeld insists that his guards thoroughly search Bond (twice), then ruins that by having him locked in a storage room which has a hatch to the underside of the rig, and a rope long enough so he can climb out. You'd think Blofeld would have learnt his lesson [[Film/OnHerMajestysSecretService after Bond was able to escape from the cable room]] at Piz Gloria--and that was a lot harder to do.

* ''Film/JamesBond'': In ''Film/TheWorldIsNotEnough'', M is locked in a cage with a clock left on a stool so she'll know when a bomb will kill her (and the rest of the city). The cage is filled with artifacts being excavated from the site, most of which are useless. There is, however, a broom, which she uses to knock over the clock. When the villain comes back, they leave the clock on the cell door instead of setting it back up. M promptly uses the clock to power a tracking chip in her pocket, which they never bothered to search for.

* In ''Film/WarGames'', the Air Force brings David (Matthew Broderick) to NORAD because he hacked into the missile control system computer. The first example happens when they leave him alone in [=McKittrick=]'s office where he has access to a computer terminal. Next, they lock him up in the infirmary where he (not surprisingly) finds enough supplies to facilitate a crafty escape using medical supplies and a tape recorder.

* ''Series/{{Columbo}}'', "No Time to Die" (1992). The bride of Columbo's nephew is kidnapped and trapped in a room. She uses vinegar left with her dinner to help remove the rust from the door hinges, while lubricating the pins. She scrapes away the rust with a fork and is able to push the pins out, freeing herself from the room. Sadly not from the rest of the house.

* Mort in ''Literature/GhostStory'': "You probably shouldn't have left a freakin' ''ectomancer'' a pit full of wraiths to play with."

* The surreal reverse example in an episode of ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'' where three criminals get out of prison thanks to three conveniently placed man-sized Powerpuff Girl disguises within the jail cell. "This is going to be harder than I thought."

* [[http://gargles.net/suicide-at-san-quentin/ The suicide of William Kogut in San Quentin Prison in 1930]] when he fashioned a pipe bomb out of a pack of playing cards, a hollow wooden bed leg, and some water.

* OlderThanFeudalism with Myth/GreekMythology: In the legend of Theseus and the Minotaur, Daedelus and Icarus escape from their Cretan prison by the use of hot wax and birds' feathers. [[ForegoneConclusion Of course]], [[ItWasHisSled we all know]] [[IcarusAllusion how this one ended]].

* In ''Film/TheEqualizer'' [=McCall=] inverts the trope and takes it UpToEleven by [[spoiler: taking down [[TheMafiya Pushkin's entire operation]] this way, including ''locking the bad guys in with him'' in a huge hardware store, and proceeding to use anything and everything he gets his hands on to tear them apart.]]

* The Man in Room Five from ''ComicBook/VForVendetta'' is given access to gardening chemicals at Larkhill. He seems to be building a RoomFullOfCrazy, it turns out he's made Napalm and Mustard Gas.

* ''Literature/ASeriesOfUnfortunateEvents'' had its characters escape from prison with an improbable set of equipment that included the bread they were given to eat. This isn't the only example in the series.

* The whole point of the ''VisualNovel/ZeroEscape'' gameplay. You're in a room that has exactly the items and mechanisms you need to escape your sore doom. Subverted in that the rooms are built ''in order'' for the protagonists to escape.

* In Creator/MNightShyamalan's ''Film/TheLastAirbender'', the Fire Nation's [[TooDumbToLive stupidity]] is TurnedUpToEleven. In the show (see the Western Animation folder), they keep Earthbenders imprisoned on a large metal platform far out to sea, where no earth is available for the Earthbenders to use against their captors until they discover that the ship runs on coal. In this movie, however, they keep the Earthbenders imprisoned ''in a quarry'', with only a handful of guards keeping the order. Even the fact that they've been psychologically broken doesn't excuse putting them in a prison '''that is literally made out of weaponry'''.

** "Quarantine" has the main characters in a, yes, quarantined room with dwindling oxygen. It just so happens that the group is locked in along with a [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Luck Virus.]] With an injection of artificial luck, Lister is able to open the door by randomly pressing buttons on the keypad-lock. Of course, it does take them five days to figure that out.

* In one episode of the old ''WesternAnimation/{{Birdman}}'' cartoon, a GadgeteerGenius supervillain was allowed to spend his prison sentence working in the prison's metalshop. He built a suit of powered armor complete with a jetpack and escaped. The episode ends with the warden sensibly deciding that putting him in a metalshop isn't a good idea and switches him to laundry duty. In a later episode starring the same villain, he adds flight capability to a dryer and escapes in it. The warden finally figures out that putting the guy near any machinery is a bad idea and sends him to work in the prison's library.

* In ''Series/BreakingBad'', Walter White is tied to a heater within reach of a glass electric coffee jug. He accidentally flings the jug out of reach, but then escapes by ripping the wire out of the base, plugging in the other end and soldering his bonds. {{Justified}}, as his bondage was an improvised solution and his captor had no time to thoroughly sweep the room for possible avenues of escape.

** In the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "Unification Part II", a group of Romulans lock Captain Picard, Lt. Commander Data, and Ambassador Spock, the supreme examples of the SmartGuy, in a room with a computer terminal and holographic projectors.

* Franchise/{{Batman}}'':