History Main / RubeGoldbergDEvice

* The music video for X-Press 2 and Music/DavidByrne's [[[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaNuB52_Irc "Lazy"]][[note]]specifically the original 2002 version, not the ''Music/GrownBackwards'' re-recording[[/note]] features a man who stays on the couch all day, doing things like combing hair, getting food and doing chores by many of these. Eventually, the machine designed to give him his breakfast short-circuits after spilling coffee on itself, forcing the man to settle for eating a dirty half-eaten Snickers bar off the floor.

* X-Press 2 feat. David Byrne's [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaNuB52_Irc "Lazy"]] features a man who stays on the couch all day, doing things like combing hair, getting food and doing chores by many of these. Worth watching for when one of his things fails.

The name is taken from the drawings by American cartoonist Rube Goldberg, which had a ridiculously complicated sequence of events to do something as trivial as giving someone a back scrub. Obviously, this is different from a traditional invention in that it gives a complicated solution to a simple problem, not the other way around. This device is also known as a Heath Robinson contraption in Britain (after cartoonist William Heath Robinson whose ideas came before Goldberg), or a Pythagoras switch (ピタゴラスイッチ) in Japan, among other terms used around the world.

* In order to get a Babel fish in ''VideoGame/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'' computer game, you have to set up a completely absurd series of events that will ultimately cause the fish to land right in your ear.

* In one episode of ''Series/{{Columbo}}'', the murderer uses a RubeGoldbergDevice to create a loud bang - not to [[CacophonyCoverUp cover the sound of the fatal gunshot]], but to make it sound like there were two gunshots instead of one. When Colombo demonstrates an incorrect replica of the device, the murderer corrects it at the last second, [[NiceJobFixingItVillain incriminating himself]] and leading to his arrest.

* There's the Gold Ribbon Grocers in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'', where an entire RubeGoldbergDevice has been set up as an EasterEgg. Upon entering, painted arrows on the floor lead you to a pressure plate to deliberately set off so you can watch it go off (it includes a domino effect using a row of boxes of detergent and several small explosions) and get several goodies when it's finished.

* ''Hamtaro'' has Oxnard's robot repair machine. He says that with a push of a button, he'll repair Robo-Joe in a blink of an eye.

* Joseph Herscher: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOMIBdM6N7Q turning the page of a newspaper]] LIKE A BOSS.

* ''VisualNovel/DanganronpaV3KillingHarmony'': The first murder is committed using one of these. [[spoiler:Saihara's motion sensor and camera set-up in the library is altered so that one camera flashes, luring the victim towards the bookcase, while a shot put - thrown into a vent from the floor above by the culprit - rolls down a staircase of books on top of the bookcases and falls on their head]]. Shirogane even name-drops the trope when the set-up is exposed to everybody. [[spoiler:Only she's lying; the device ''failed''.]]

* A ''ComicStrip/{{Zits}}'' Sunday strip has device for getting teens out of beds that starts with the sun focusing through a pair of spectacles on the windowsill and ends with Jeremy getting hit in the face by his ohone. One of the intermediate steps involves a squirrel nibbling stale pizza.

* At the start of ''Film/DocSavage'', the title character is shown in his arctic Fortress of Solitude laboring on inventions that (TheNarrator declares) may one day be useful to Mankind! After gazing at the stars through a telescope, Doc appears to be building a RetroRocket to take him there, but it turns out to be a tiny rocket he uses for ice fishing that launches into the air when a fish takes the bait, pulling the fish out of the water while simultaneously ringing a bell to let Doc know dinner's ready.

* ''Series/TheXFiles'' had an episode called "The Goldberg Variation" involving [[BornLucky an extremely lucky man]] who would be prevented by attempts to kill him via absolutely ridiculous coincidences that were usually caused by these Goldberg/Robinson sequences. He also constructs Goldberg-type devices, just for fun.

* There's the Gold Ribbon Grocers in VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}, where an entire RubeGoldbergDevice has been set up as an EasterEgg. Upon entering, painted arrows on the floor lead you to a pressure plate to deliberately set off so you can watch it go off (it includes a domino effect using a row of boxes of detergent and several small explosions) and get several goodies when it's finished.

* The video for Semisonic's "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qgCVR2pjXc0 Chemistry]]" uses several simple Ruby Goldberg machines.

* In ''Webcomic/DumbingOfAge'' Carla constructs one that spells her name out in lasers, as well as a box that slams a pie into Mary's face. Why did she do that? Because there's nothing that pisses Mary off more than the fact that [[spoiler:a transwoman like]] Carla exists.

** The ice-making machine Doc made in the Wild West in ''Film/BackToTheFuturePartIII''. Its status as a Rube Goldberg Device is primarily due to the fact that Doc was constrained to 1885 technology.

* ''Anime/Hamtaro'' has Oxnard's robot repair machine. He says that with a push of a button, he'll repair Robo-Joe in a blink of an eye.

* ''[[Anime/Hamtaro]]'' has Oxnard's robot repair machine. He says that with a push of a button, he'll repair Robo-Joe in a blink of an eye.

* In the ''Franchise/FinalDestination'' series of films, a number of characters escape Death's original design due to a premonition. In an attempt to restore order, they are killed one by one by a series of seemingly unrelated events in this fashion, with some sort of malfunction leading to another and so forth.
* The bomb on Tommy Lee Jones' boat near the end of ''Film/BlownAway''.

* In one episode of ''Series/{{Columbo}}'', the murderer uses a RubeGoldbergDevice to create a loud bang - not to [[CacophonyCoverUp cover the sound of the fatal gunshot]], but to make it sound like there were two gunshots instead of one. When Colombo demonstrates an incorrect replica of the device, the murderer corrects it at the last second, [[NiceJobFixingItVillain incriminating himself]] and leading to his arrest.
* Pee-Wee Herman used one of these in ''Film/PeeWeesBigAdventure'' to prepare his breakfast. Ironically, the only part he actually eats is cereal, which he pours himself.
* In ''Film/HoneyIShrunkTheKids'' and its sequels, the Szalinski household housed a few of these. In fact, it seems standard for inventors to riddle their houses with them in fiction.
* On this note, Professor Brainard's breakfast machine in ''Film/{{Flubber}}''.

* At the very end of ''Film/{{Waiting}}'', it turns out the seemingly random items adorning a wall of the restaurant comprise one of these.
** The director merely wanted it to look like it might work, going for the "random crap" look the restaurant was based on. It was the set designers who went out of their way to make sure the thing actually worked.

* One such contraption is seen at work at the beginning of ''Film/TheRock''. Characters don't pretend it's anything but way to fight boredom.
* Aurore's suicide machines in ''Film/{{Delicatessen}}''.
** The same filmmakers (Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet) go even more heavily into Rube Goldberg situations in their later film, ''Film/TheCityOfLostChildren'' (Jeunet even says so on the DVD's commentary track), most notably in an elaborate sequence in which a single tear drop causes a chain reaction of events happening all around the city, ultimately leading to [[spoiler: a barge crashing into a dock]].
* In ''Film/EdwardScissorhands'' there is a highly-stylized contraption used to prepare and bake cookies by the Inventor early in the film.
* In ''Film/TheHobbitTheDesolationOfSmaug'', the Dwarves use one where the end result is [[spoiler:dipping Smaug in molten gold. Unfortunately, this doesn't faze the dragon and only pisses him off even more]].
* ''Film/ShootEmUp''. In order to get into the AbandonedWarehouse he's using as a home, Smith takes a rat out of a cage, removes a brick from the wall and pushes the rat inside. The rat runs down a tunnel into a wire basket on a pulley which drops from the rat's weight, pushing down a latch to open the door.
* Rube Goldberg wrote the 1930 film ''Film/SoupToNuts'' to showcase his namesake inventions, demonstrated by Film/TheThreeStooges.
* A device in ''Film/{{Hatari}}!'' is identified as a "Rube Goldberg."
* ''Film/TheLastLeprechaun'': Finn uses one to wake him up and make breakfast.
* [[Creator/CharlieChaplin Charlie Chaplin's]] film ''Film/ModernTimes'': In the eating machine scene, a device that makes people eat without using their hands is tested on the factory worker played by Chaplin. Due to a malfunction it ends up rubbing a corn in Chaplin's face and pouring soup on his shirt, among other things.
* ''Film/NowYouSeeMe2'': Lula sets one up in Atlas' apartment that, once triggered, ends with her [[OffWithHerHead apparent decapitation]]. This is an EstablishingCharacterMoment that sets her up as a prop magician with a wicked sense of humour.

* The Japanese educational TV show ''Series/PythagorasSwitch'' featured quite a lot of these.

** Parodied in this 118 118 [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eb6Xq7SQjOs ad]].
* [[http://producten.hema.nl/ The]] HEMA product page. (It's in Dutch and you can't buy anything, but wait a few seconds.)
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eP-v95g2RU8 This]] Guinness advert.
** The most expensive advertisement ever produced, for those of you who are interested.
** And parodied brilliantly by [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETL8YbX5upg this]] Pot Noodle ad.
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cpm86NabcsU This]] PSA for U.S. Savings Bonds.
* [[http://youtu.be/oDofsLTo8u4 This]] Panera Bread commercial.
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DripJHW5DO8 This]] Post Fruity Pebbles commercial
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_gp8I-ZyZQ This]] commercial for the Diabetes drug Invokana.
* [[https://www.ispot.tv/ad/n0bd/southwest-airlines-wanna-get-away-rube-goldberg-machine This]] commercial for Southwest Airlines.

* The kids on the second and third seasons of the 1999 revival of ''Series/{{Zoom}}'' tried to build their own Rube Goldberg machines; in the second season, they built a device which would squeeze toothpaste onto a toothbrush, and in the third season, they built a
device which would pour a glass of milk. The kids who built the milk-pouring device later reported that it took them all summer (i.e. the entire taping season!) to do so. Both seasons also feature home video submissions of kids who made Rube Goldberg devices of their own.

* It was the basis for a "Spy Vs. Spy" episode in issue 506 of Mad (published in 2010).