History ParanoiaFuel / LiveActionTV

* ''TwentyFour'', outside of the main characters that survive for more than one season, nearly anybody can turn out to be TheMole, or be aiding the terrorist plot, even people in CTU or politicians in the White House.

* ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine''. The [[ShapeShifter Changelings]] of the Dominion infiltrating TheFederation. The fact that they were able to push a galaxy-spanning, peaceful society to the brink of collape with something like ''four'' moles sowing suspicion and mistrust is ''deeply'' unsettling. Plus the [[WhamLine classic line]] from Odo:

* ''Series/HouseOfAnubis'', If your best friend is randomly called down to the principles office, they are not coming back. They are getting kidnapped by all the teachers in the school, her existence erased, because she is the Chosen One.

* ''OneThousandWaysToDie'': If there's anything that that show has taught us, it's that ''anything'' can kill you. Death is waiting for you around every corner, and it's nothing short of a miracle that you've managed to avoid him for this long.

* True-life ''Mystery Diagnosis''! At least for House's victims the symptoms just suddenly "appeared" - imagine living with mysterious, disfiguring, incredibly painful and seemingly incurable symptoms ''that all your doctors dismiss'' for '''decades''' because the diseases that cause them are so rare that most doctors never even know they exist. Even worse, many of the diseases are autoimmune diseases-a kind of illness where the immune system, which protects the body from disease, [[MinorInjuryOverreaction gets its programming scrambled and mistakes body parts and organ tissue for foreign pathogens]], causing it to attack those parts and tissues to horrifying effect. The thought that the system that protects you from disease could suddenly go haywire and start destroying your body in so many ways ought to keep you up for many nights.

* ''TheSarahConnorChronicles''. There might just be a time-traveling, implacable killing machine hiding inside the walls, floors, or ceiling of your house, right now, with a weapon, waiting to burst out and kill you. Or, if not in your house, in someone else's. Or inside any other building. Waiting. Waiting...

* ''[[{{V-2009}} V]]'': This trope looks to be the remake's bread and butter. Not only do the humans have to worry about anyone being a Visitor, but the Visitors have to worry about anyone being part of the Resistance, even other Vs. It gets even worse in "It's Only The Beginning". You know that swine flu cure that everyone's been so desperate to get? There might be V chemicals in there that will eventually turn you into a mummified, dessicated corpse. And there's no way to tell if the chemicals are present or not.
** See also the Vs tagging humans.

* Original flavor ''Series/LawAndOrder'' usually deals with murders, which while horrible are usually over quickly. Now, watch ''LawAndOrderSVU'' while you're a woman alone in the house and you'll be sleeping with a knife under your pillow just in case someone breaks into your house to torture and rape you.
** The ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' episode "Confrontation" ensures that you will never sleep soundly again. It opens with a rapist leaving the apartment of his most recent victim. When she calls one of the SVU detectives, we find out that this is not the first time this woman was raped by that man. She follows the guy down an alley where he looms suddenly out of the shadows and they fight. Then Detective Stabler shows up to a crime scene and finds her dead body. ...Did I mention this is only the pre-credits teaser?

** You think that's bad? In the ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' episode "Perverted" Olivia Benson is framed for murder. How? By replacing the DNA in a blood sample with hers using a standard laboratory centrifuge! The only way the culprit is discovered is because of his poorly-timed [[Literature/TheSilenceOfTheLambs Hannibal Lecter speech]]. But, to quote the lab technician responsible, "Any biology undergrad can do it. It's a whole new world. Guess your free ride is over." Or so you would think. The very next episode Olivia Benson proceeds to threaten a suspect (unsuccessfully) with ... [[FridgeHorror DNA evidence]].

* Creator/StevenMoffat strikes again with the BBC series ''Series/{{Sherlock}}''. Anybody want to watch "A Study in Pink" while waiting for a cab? And that's just the beginning.
** And "The Reichenbach Fall"... What if everything you read in newspapers and watch on television and accept as accurate is as ''far from the truth as you can get?'' [[spoiler:How many people watching the episode were horrified at themselves for starting to doubt who Sherlock really was? I know I was.]]

* ''Series/PersonOfInterest'', You are being watched. There is a government surveillance system that sees everything. Every security camera, cell phone, webcam, and everything you do on the internet are all being monitored. If you ever find out anything about they try and kill you. Just try and walk anywhere around security cameras without thinking about this.

** The Silents. They look as creepy as hell, [[spoiler: may kill you [[ForTheEvulz for the lulz]], ''and you forget about them the moment you stop looking at them.'' Not helped in "the Day of the Moon," in scenes which seem to run continuously... and then you realise something has happened off-camera between frames. The camera hasn't shown everything... Or has it? Are you sure you haven't just forgotten?]] [[spoiler: To make matters worse, the Silence are not all that memorable looking.]] Ever watch footage of the moon landing? How many Silents have [[spoiler: you killed]]?

** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E10VincentAndTheDoctor "Vincent and the Doctor"]] has a monster that only [[Creator/VincentVanGogh one person]] can see? For a delightfully dark alternative interpretation, consider this; you are an unsuccessful and unstable artist. You are convinced a monster is stalking you. Then a man shows up who tells you ''there really is'' an invisible monster -- oh, and after you've killed it, he takes you in a time machine to a museum in the future to see your paintings on the wall and have the curator tell you that you're the greatest artist in the history of ever. Then he dumps you back where you were and disappears, and ''you never see him again''. You find yourself back among people who are certain you're mad, and who think your art is dreadful. How long do you think it would take before you began wondering if any of it had actually happened? [[NiceJobBreakingItHero About a year, say?]]

** How about the little girl in the mirror. Every mirror.
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E16TheWatersofMars "The Waters of Mars"]]. Water that will turn you into a martian zombie-thing. With one drop. Anyone thirsty?
* ''Series/{{Torchwood}}'' managed to pull this off with TheFairFolk in "Small Worlds." They exist outside of time, so they can never truly be tracked down. They can kill invisibly. They control the weather, and can possibly drown the world if they're ever angry enough. And every so often, they get attached to a human, and will do anything to get her to "play" with them. By the way, shouldn't your kid be back from school by now? How would you feel if you found out that your elected government is perfectly willing to let 10% of its children be forcibly taken from their parents and handed over to aliens to be kept in an AndIMustScream state, so their bodies can be pumped for substances that get said aliens high? Also, how do you know that any person around you isn't affiliated with [[spoiler:the Families]]?

* On ''Series/{{Battlestar Galactica|Reimagined}}'', anyone you know could be a Cylon android infiltrator. You could even be a Cylon and not know it. Unless you can confirm the existence of human parents (memories, photos, and data files are not enough), because they don't copy people. Just themselves. [[MesACrowd A lot]]. While you're snuggling up to your hubby, thousands of his duplicates could be working to destroy you.

* Certain episodes of ''{{Goosebumps}}'' and ''AreYouAfraidOfTheDark''. The intro sequence for ''Goosebumps'' is one example.
** ''AreYouAfraidOfTheDark'' traumatized a generation of children, in particular making some afraid of the shower for years after seeing ''The Tale of the Dead Man's Float''.
** For a show that jumped into the Narm territory often, ''AreYouAfraidOfTheDark'' went on record of having one of the most creepy introductions. It's a string of normally harmless objects, but with the [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jitg-3xbmKU blue filter and creepy music]], it made rowboats, swings, shuttered windows, skateboards, clowns, dolls, fans, and closed doors spooky. [[SchmuckBait Never watch that intro alone.]]

** As TheBigBangTheory's Sheldon pointed out, if Skynet were real, an excellent strategy would be for it to send Terminators to pose as actors that have played Terminators. Such as the Governor of California, for instance. The one who is frequently rumoured to be taking a shot at the White House sometime soon.
* From ''CriminalMinds'' - aside from the "anyone can be a serial killer" thing, there's also the [=CDC's=] ''virus vault''. Imagine the warehouse from ''Franchise/IndianaJones'', only instead of mysterious artifacts it's filled with bio-engineered viruses that can kill you quickly and/or horribly.

* ''Series/TheOuterLimits'' is teaming with this. "O.B.I.T" features machines that can track down and monitor anyone, and has this chilling line:

* ''{{Chuck}}''. No joke. Not only does the government have a massive database of ''everything'', but it can be stored in a human brain. That guy on the subway who just looked at you funny? Better hope your parking tickets have all been paid. And this database can be put in ''your'' head through the simple act of opening an email from an old friend.

* ''{{Dollhouse}}'': Your entire life - everything you've done, everything you've experienced, everyone you know, have spoken to, or loved, cared about, or hated, all of your lifetime experiences and ambitions and beliefs and goals - in short, everything that makes you who you are - could be a complete fabrication, ''and you would not be able to tell.''

* Cheerfully lampshaded in an episode of ''Series/TheWestWing'', where the following exchange takes place when President Bartlett goes to get a flu shot.
->'''President Bartlet:''' I don't need a flu shot.\\

'''Bartlet:''' [[AfraidOfNeedles How do I know this isn't the start of a military coup]]? I want the Secret Service in here right away.\\

The fgollowing works have their own pages:

* The third episode of ''UnnaturalHistory'' gave us the idea of Soviet/Russian sleeper agents in America. It doesn't seem like ParanoiaFuel at first, ''until news of actual Russian spies in the US came shortly after.''

* ''KamenRiderRyuki'', [[MonsterOfTheWeek Mirror Monsters]] can show up from any reflective surface, and when they target you, they never stop and will pursue you until you're dead or they're dead. People that know about them go so crazy they won't go outside and cover every mirror and window in their house to keep them away.

* ''Series/{{Alphas}}: Is your cell-phone ringing in your pocket right now? The guy on the other end is waiting to brainwash you. See that autistic guy gesturing with his hands? He's secretly reading your texts, e-mails, and social media postings. The beautiful woman chatting you up on the bus? She's hypnotizing you right now and you don't even know it.