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| 12 | [[quoteright:350:[[Series/{{Fringe}} https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/2hnaql0_6685.jpg]]]] |
| 13 | |
| 14 | ->''"And when at last it is time for the transition from megacorporation to planetary government, from entrepreneur to emperor, it is then that the true genius of our strategy shall become apparent, for energy is the lifeblood of this society and when the chips are down he who controls the energy supply controls the planet. In former times the energy monopoly was called "The Power Company"; we intend to give this name an entirely new meaning."'' |
| 15 | -->-- '''CEO Nwabudike Morgan - "The Centauri Monopoly"''', ''VideoGame/SidMeiersAlphaCentauri'' |
| 16 | |
| 17 | '''For the best experience, try listening to''' '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzMt1A7yBIk this,]] ''' '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrYZAW6pVhE this]]''' '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gs6yseO7f4w this,]]''' '''or''' '''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tokliS_6tFE this]]''' '''as you read this page.''' |
| 18 | |
| 19 | ScienceFiction, especially of the {{Dystopia}}n and {{Cyberpunk}} sorts, loves its massive corporations. These corporations are umbrella corporations, controlling dozens of smaller companies that manufacture [[AcmeProducts everything]] from clothing and pharmaceuticals (which will usually overlap with PredatoryBigPharma) to advanced information technology (such as smartphones, ArtificialIntelligence and [[{{Cyborg}} cybernetics]]) to military hardware. They can [[LawEnforcementInc be the police]]. Perhaps there is one company that is a PrivatelyOwnedSociety in its own right. This goes beyond the definition of "monopoly." |
| 20 | |
| 21 | Traditionally, it was rare for Mega Corporations to be portrayed other than negatively. Rather than being a simple business making things that people want to buy, they are the villains of the setting, depicted as exploitative, oppressive and [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney screwing the rules]] with their money while maintaining a PeaceAndLoveIncorporated façade. However, in PostCyberpunk stories, some Mega Corps can aspire to be BigGood, providing the hero with [[WhereDoesHeGetAllThoseWonderfulToys amazing equipment]], or are owned by and support a hero who is CrimefightingWithCash. There do exist some benevolent portrayals of a Mega Corp; in which they are a large business which employs a lot of people and isn't shown practicing in unethical trade practices. These benevolent portrayals have become increasingly common in early 21st Century media, until increased scrutiny in the late 2010s. |
| 22 | |
| 23 | The nastier version are home to the CorruptCorporateExecutive, MeanBoss, PointyHairedBoss, and ObstructiveBureaucrat, and have {{Amoral Attorney}}s on the payroll. In line with their corporate ambition, Mega Corps invest an ungodly amount of money in security, employing not only large contingents of PrivateMilitaryContractors as staff and guards, reaching [[CorporateWarfare military levels in numbers and hardware]], but also HiredGuns in order to take out the competition. As a sign of their omnipresence, they will SigilSpam all over the place and bombastically announce the company's name, which will be almost always a single word followed by "Corporation", "Industries" or "Enterprises". [[JapanTakesOverTheWorld Japanese Mega Corps]] might prefer "Group" or "Zaibatsu".[[note]] the latter of which is actually an AnachronismStew from UsefulNotes/ImperialJapan[[/note]] Korean Mega Corps meanwhile prefer "Chaebol". |
| 24 | |
| 25 | Mega Corporations are shown to be private institutions that don't have to play by the rules, because "nobody is forcing you to work for them or buy from them or use their institutions or buy their products." Dark versions will show these guys buying off and eliminating their competitors, brainwashing the masses, and coming up with {{Evil Plan}}s to ensure they have a monopoly. Their employees are portrayed as oppressed, paid pitifully low wages, if paid at all, who are expendable. |
| 26 | |
| 27 | The Mega Corp may control the government by either having employees in important positions or by all-powerful lobbyists. Taken to its extreme, it may have OneNationUnderCopyright, an entire country or world at their disposal, becoming [[NGOSuperpower superpowers]] in their own right. |
| 28 | |
| 29 | CorporateWarfare may result if financial means are not enough to accomplish the company's goals. In shows seeking a GreenAesop a Mega Corp could also be ToxicInc. |
| 30 | |
| 31 | '''RealLife''': Monopolies, monopsonies (only one ''buyer'' of goods in the market), duopolies (only two sellers in the market), and oligopolies (only a small handful of Mega Corp entities that are selling in the market) ''do'' exist in real life, and indeed, very large multinational corporations do exist. And yes, ''some'' of these corporations do engage in unethical practices or political influence, and there ''are'' historical examples of Mega Corps acting either as a state within state or as an semi-independent political entity, such as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanseatic_League Hanseatic League]]. There have been huge corporations with their own armed forces, such as the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_India_Company East India Company]], which at one point had twice as many soldiers as the British Army. However, it is still an exaggeration to claim that ''all'' [[ThereAreNoGoodExecutives corporations act in this way]]. And in the modern world real life governments tend to be well-organised enough to discourage any corporation or [[NGOSuperpower NGO]] from usurping their power to this extent. |
| 32 | |
| 33 | The term "megacorp" comes from the works of Alfred Eichner (an economist), who defined a megacorp as a large, corporate enterprise that places survival and growth as key objectives -- using its impressive resources to protect itself and its interests, but to also constantly look for avenues of expansion. |
| 34 | |
| 35 | [[noreallife]] |
| 36 | |
| 37 | ---- |
| 38 | !!Examples: |
| 39 | [[index]] |
| 40 | * MegaCorp/{{Literature}} |
| 41 | * MegaCorp/VideoGames |
| 42 | [[/index]] |
| 43 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 44 | |
| 45 | [[folder:Alternate Reality Games]] |
| 46 | * ''ARG/OmegaMart'': It's based around a massive grocery store chain that doesn't exactly obey the laws of this reality. Everything is overpriced and is made with rare ingredients/materials that can only be obtained in a globalized, capitalist world. According to the mart's lore, Dramcorp has at least one big industry in every human industry conceivable. But that's not all, Dramcorp ambitions to be worshipped as a god-like figure. |
| 47 | [[/folder]] |
| 48 | |
| 49 | [[folder:Anime & Manga]] |
| 50 | * ''Anime/AKB0048'': The Deep Galaxy Trade Organization is a huge corporate oligarchy who stamps out all forms of entertainment to maintain its galactic empire. |
| 51 | * ''Anime/TheBigO'': The Paradigm Corporation controls everything inside Paradigm City. |
| 52 | * ''Anime/BloodPlus'': Though Cinq Flèches is described as a pharmaceutical corporation, it also operates in other fields such as technology, food production, military contracting, and, of course, Chiropteran-based genetic manipulation. They even own and run an all-girls high school in Vietnam. |
| 53 | * ''Anime/TheBraveExpressMightGaine'': The Senpuuji Concern, owned by the series protagonist Might Senpuuji (after inheriting it from his father and grandpa), is one of the rare examples of a honest and good MegaCorp, running through Nouvelle Tokyo and being an overall benevolent corporation. Might himself tends to reject proposals that do not put human welfare and decency in high regard, sometimes after seeing the horrors it brought. |
| 54 | * ''Anime/BubblegumCrisis'': Genom Corporation is a sprawling global economic powerhouse which manufactures everything from toasters to military cyborgs (Boomers). It exerts tremendous influence on the world's governments and entertains plans for overt world domination through the use of the so-called Overmind Control System, which is presumably capable of remotely controlling all [=AI=]s on the planet. |
| 55 | * ''Anime/DarksideBlues'' had the company Persona Century, which had bought over 90% of Earth's surace. |
| 56 | * ''Literature/DateALive'' has Deus.Ex.Machina Industries, or DEM, run by [[BigBad Sir Isaac Ray Peram Westcott]], who plans to seek and harness all Spirit powers, then plunge the world into chaos and destruction. |
| 57 | * ''Manga/DeathNote'': The Yotsuba Corporation. According to ''How to Read 13'', it is a massive international corporate conglomerate that employs over 300,000 people and is involved in everything from heavy industry to resort development to military weapons. It gets even more powerful when the [[CorruptCorporateExecutive Yotsuba Group]] uses the [[ArtifactOfDoom Death Note]] to kill off Yotsuba's rivals. [[TheGuardsMustBeCrazy Their security is very lax though]] and [[spoiler:after Light kills the Yotsuba Group, the Megacorporation's stock plummets and the Yotsuba Corporation loses much of its influence.]] |
| 58 | * ''Anime/DecaDence'' has the Solid Quake Corporation. Unbeknownst to the humans in the show's AfterTheEnd setting, the company not only controls the titular Deca-Dence, which holds the last remnants of the species, but they also turned what remained of a terribly polluted Earth into a real-life {{MMORPG}} for their cyborg workers; humans serve as the [=NPC=]s in the game, and the monsters that regularly threaten their continued existence were created by the corporation itself to serve as enemies and {{Boss Fight}}s. |
| 59 | * ''Franchise/DragonBall'': |
| 60 | ** Capsule Corp. introduced in ''Manga/DragonBall'' produces everything from houses to cars, and then puts them in a small portable (as in, pocket-sized) capsule. The Brief family is so rich that they build people space crafts for free. One of the few examples of a Mega Corp that's an unambiguously positive force in society. Eventually their product line is expanded to spaceships and (in alternate universes) a time machine, but those aren't for sale and instead are just used by the Brief family and their personal friends (who happen to be the heroes of the story). |
| 61 | ** Less positive is Frieza's Planet Trade Organization in ''Anime/DragonBallZ'' -- although it deals in selling planets, it still has its own army, it owns territory, and is led by a monarchic governing body. |
| 62 | * ''Franchise/GhostInTheShell'': There are several to be had, both the films and the series: a significant majority of cases that Section 9 involves itself it has to deal with massive levels of corporate corruption in the government, and often it seems like Section 9 is the only organization bothering to keep such issues in check. |
| 63 | * ''Franchise/{{Gundam}}'': |
| 64 | ** Anaheim Electronics from [[Franchise/{{Gundam}} the Universal Century Gundams]], which grew to power after acquiring the assets of the defeated Principality of Zeon's three rival military supplies: Zeonic, Zimmad, and MIP, after the [[Anime/MobileSuitGundam One Year War]]. For perhaps that reason, they had a bad habit of selling out to both sides in future conflicts, which may have been part of the reason they lost their contract with the Earth Federation to [[Anime/MobileSuitGundamF91 SNRI]], although this wasn't always the case. The stuff that happened in [[Anime/MobileSuitGundam0083StardustMemory Operation Stardust]] wasn't actually their fault. And the profiteering mindset came about after [[Anime/MobileSuitZetaGundam the Gryps Conflict]] as they actually threw in their lot with [=AEUG=] but were contractually bound to supply the Titans despite all the restrictions that were forced onto them.\ |
| 65 | It also helped that the Moon, their main base of operation, was kind of a [[RecycledInSPACE Space]] UsefulNotes/{{Switzerland}}, and consistently remained neutral in the most conflicts around the Earth Sphere. Though real-life Switzerland rarely sells weapons larger than a handgun to foreign militaries. By the events of ''Manga/MobileSuitCrossboneGundam'', set 10-13 years after ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamF91 F91]],'' it's mentioned that Anaheim has weakened to the point of desperation. Which SNRI and the Crossbone Vanguard take advantage of. Anaheim does return back to prominence by the time of ''Victory Gundam.'' Especially when it's revealed that ''they're'' the true benefactors behind the League Militaire, reminiscent of the vital support they provided to the AEUG back in ''Anime/MobileSuitZetaGundam''. In ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamUnicorn'' however, it's also revealed that Anaheim is just the main front corporation for the much more secretive and elusive Vist Foundation. |
| 66 | ** ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamTheWitchFromMercury'': The Benerit Group is a corporate group consisting of everything from relatively minor corporations like the Shin Sei Development Corporation and Ochs Earth, to massive groups like Jeturk Heavy Machinery or Grassley Defense Systems. The group appears to act as de facto government of the solar system (no other government is seen at least), and its president, Delling Rembran, doesn't deny the accusation that he acts as a king. It also runs the Asticassia School of Technology, where students are divided into houses based either on what planet they're from, or what corporation sponsors them. To give an idea of how wealthy the Benerit group is, Peil Technologies, one of its top three earners, is perfectly fine with taking a 120 ''billion'' credits loss as part of a gambit to take out its rival, and Delling Rembran himself can spend over 7 billion credits on what amounted to allowance. |
| 67 | * ''Manga/JojosBizarreAdventure'': The Speedwagon Foundation, founded by Robert E.O Speedwagon, actually an ex-robber who turned over new leaf after meeting Jonathan Joestar. Throughout the generations, the corporate has been far reaching, but Speedwagon made sure that strong company ethics are rooted deep within his foundation, and thus it's always a benevolent and helpful organization that always helps out supplying the Joestar family with needs during their increasingly even more bizarre adventures forward. |
| 68 | * ''Anime/MartianSuccessorNadesico'': Nergal is a somewhat more benign example than usual, but it's a private company with enough resources to build and crew its own ''spaceship''. Everything on board is a Nergal product. |
| 69 | * ''Anime/KillLaKill'' has REVOCS and the Kiryuin Conglomerate. The company supplies Honnouji Academy's Goku Uniforms and [[spoiler: eventually all the world's clothing]], and is effectively running Japan, with Satsuki Kiryuin's mother Ragyo being the [[CorruptCorporateExecutive CEO]] and effective dictator. Through their superpowered uniforms, they are able to establish hierarchal dominance by only allowing the uniforms to those who are obedient to them. |
| 70 | * ''Anime/KirbyRightBackAtYa'': Holy Nightmare Corporation/Nightmare Enterprises, the owner of the company being a GalacticConqueror known in the original version as the "Emperor of Darkness". |
| 71 | * ''Locke the Superman'', the manga series by Yuki Hijiri, features various example of this trope in several episodes, such as Universal Plastic Co. ("Tiger of the Flames"), Khan Foundation ("Millennium of the Witch"), Astris Conzern ("Lord Leon"), UAI ("Battlefield in Empty Space - Part 2"), and so on. These corporations usually play the role of BigBad or sponsors for other evil entities. Sometimes the author doesn't give the name for the MegaCorp in certain episode and just calls it ''The Company''. |
| 72 | * In ''Manga/MagicalRecordLyricalNanohaForce'', a recent developing one is the Vandein Corporation. It's unknown what else they sell, but they have recently been the manufacturers behind mass-produced AntiMagic weapons based on incredibly powerful LostTechnology. Since their arrival, the manga has been having some EvilVersusEvil as both the TSAB and the Hucks see them as a problem. |
| 73 | * ''Franchise/{{Patlabor}}'': Schaft Enterprises is a multinational conglomerate specializing in Labors, from domestic, to military models. They even smuggle foreign models into the country and conduct illegal field tests, by targeting the [=SVU2's=] Ingrams, in order to gather live combat data. |
| 74 | * ''Literature/RebuildWorld'': Being a {{Cyberpunk}} {{Dystopia}}, the story takes place within a federation of OneNationUnderCopyright megacorps. |
| 75 | ** The most prominent is Sakashita Heavy Industries, which dominates the area protagonist Akira lives. Despite them being steeped in corruption (with a whole page of GovernmentConspiracy and Akira regularly taking hush money from them) and using the PropagandaMachine to disguise many of their conflicts as terrorist attacks, Sakashita's CEO Sugadome is portrayed as a BenevolentBoss, and they're ALighterShadeOfGrey compared to [[AIIsACrapshoot the A.I.s in the setting]]. |
| 76 | ** Another megacorp is the Lion Steel Corporation. This was [[TheRemnant (re-)founded]] when a hunter named Lawrence was recognized as the master of a RobotMaid A.I. he found in the ruins, or so goes the official story, as he's actually a puppet to said A.I. Alice. Nonetheless, Lawrence's [[MassivelyNumberedSiblings huge number of offspring]] form TheClan and a DecadentCourt who jockey for influence and appointments in their multi-city owning empire. Lion Steel also employs armies of NinjaMaid and BattleButler servants RecruitedFromTheGutter and brainwashed into absolute loyalty. |
| 77 | * ''Manga/SchoolLive'' has Randall Corporation, who while not directly named in the series itself, helped build most of the city through its funding. [[spoiler:They're also an expy of the [[Franchise/ResidentEvil Umbrella Corporation]], which means their research into using diseases as bioweapons helped cause the ZombieApocalypse in the setting. Oops...]] |
| 78 | * ''Manga/{{Strider}}'': The manga has Enterprise, which is said to deal with food distribution as well as warfare and weapon research, and to have its own special forces unit as security personnel and a secret MindControlDevice project to rule over the world. It also figures in the NES game that adapts the manga, though much less prominently. |
| 79 | * ''Anime/{{Vexille}}'': Daiwa Heavy Industries succeed in [[spoiler: assuming complete control of Japan, eradicating most of its population and turning the survivors into cyborg drones. They also have plans to do the same on a worldwide scale.]] |
| 80 | * ''Franchise/YuGiOh'': |
| 81 | ** Paradias/Doma in ''Anime/YuGiOh'', which possessed shares in every company on the planet and held sway over world governments in addition to being a front for the {{Cult}} and its AncientConspiracy. |
| 82 | ** One rather interesting thing about the dub of ''Anime/YuGiOh''. In the Japanese version, Alistair's grudge against Kaiba Corp was that they supplied the tanks that killed his brother. In the Dub? [=KaibaCorp=] bought the land he (among many others including his family) were living on and were forcing them out with tanks. Sound like something you'd expect out of a Cyberpunk story. Then it's revealed [[spoiler:Paradias was the actual culprit and they mislead Alistair into thinking it was [=KaibaCorp=] because Paradias' head wanted Alistair to hate Kaiba.]] |
| 83 | ** Yiliaster from ''Anime/YuGiOh5Ds'' is even closer to this, considering they have so much technology and money that they can actually [[spoiler:manipulate the time stream.]] |
| 84 | ** [=KaibaCorp=] is a comparatively benign example, as it's (usually) helpful to the protagonists or society at large, depending on how Seto Kaiba is feeling at the moment. It's the world's largest gaming corporation, but in a world where DuelsDecideEverything, especially the later spinoffs, it also happens to be an essential cog in society, and is shown having a major hand in everything from education to construction to theoretical physics to power generation to computers to space programs. In ''Anime/YuGiOhTheDarkSideOfDimensions'', it's claimed that Kaiba outright ''owns Domino City'', and even made it mandatory to own his products. Indeed, the only thing it ''doesn't'' seem to control is the military, as Kaiba DoesntLikeGuns. |
| 85 | ** In ''Anime/YuGiOhSevens'', Goha Corporation is this. They run Goha City and are so pervasive that they're able to suppress topics they don't like (like Rush Duels) from ''showing up in search engine results''. |
| 86 | [[/folder]] |
| 87 | |
| 88 | [[folder:Card Games]] |
| 89 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Netrunner}}'': One of the players controls an evil mega-corporation that controls most of the world by force or by controlling the goods they sell the people. Haas Bioroid creates androids and new technology for robots. Wetland Consortium has built the space elevator which becomes part of the storyline for the game. Jinteki works in the computer and Internet industry. And NBN controls the news showing. |
| 90 | [[/folder]] |
| 91 | |
| 92 | [[folder:Comic Books]] |
| 93 | * ''ComicBook/AmericanFlagg'' has The Plex, which runs the former United States and Soviet Union from its new "temporary" headquarters on Mars. Another Mega Corp, Four World Industries, appears to essentially control the government of one of Earth's two superpowers, the Brazilian Union of the Americas. |
| 94 | * ''ComicBook/TheAuthority'' once battled an interdimensional mega corporation. |
| 95 | * Franchise/TheDCU: |
| 96 | ** ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'': Wayne Enterprises is a rare example of a Mega Corp out to do ''good''. Bruce Wayne took over his late father's corrupted company and turned it into a force against poverty, unemployment, and other societal ills he couldn't handle with a Batarang. Like Luthor's company, it controls most business in Gotham City. This probably explains why Gotham is still a bustling growth city considering the fact that people like Joker run amok on a nightly basis. It is usually second only to [=LexCorp=] in international clout, as well; similarly, Wayne is usually described as the second-wealthiest man in the world. |
| 97 | *** This becomes particularly relevant in ''Film/BatmanBegins'', as Wayne Tower is the central hub of everything in Gotham, and that becomes critical to the BigBad's plan. |
| 98 | *** As the No Man's Land arc finishes Bruce Wayne ends up becoming more important than Batman as it's only his downright massive spending on rebuilding Gotham that keeps Luthor from taking control of it like Metropolis. Well, that and the recovery of records that prove land ownership that prevented Luthor from taking land for himself. |
| 99 | ** [[ComicBook/LexLuthor LexCorp]], which employs roughly a third of the people in Metropolis, runs everything from the supermarket to the daily news, and exists primarily as a tool in its CEO's plan to destroy [[ComicBook/{{Superman}} one single individual]]. At one point its CEO was Lana Lang, who had to explain to Superman that the structure of the company is such she can't ''stop'' it making Kryptonite weapons without laying off a lot of people. She was removed from the position when it turned out all Lexcorp contracts had a standard clause automatically firing people who used Lexcorp resources to help the Kryptonian. Ironically, the CEO who did the most good with [=LexCorp=] was Talia Al Ghul, an [[AntiHero Anti-Heroine]] / AntiVillain at best and the ''loyal'' daughter of an immortal eco-terrorist bent on [[MisanthropeSupreme eradicating humanity]]. Her solution? Sell everything, and leave Lex with nothing (she did it for [[Franchise/{{Batman}} her boyfriend]]). Didn't last very long, though. |
| 100 | ** There are also smaller mega-corporations owned by other heroes, like [[ComicBook/GreenArrow Queen Industries]] and [[ComicBook/BlueBeetle Kord Technology]]. |
| 101 | * In ''ComicBook/DeepGravity'', the Maelstrom Science and Technology Corporation has an exclusive licence to explore the planet Poseidon, supposedly in the name of science but in practice for profit. However, that licence can be put up for tender again if anything goes wrong with their operations... such as the disaster that the comic is about. [[spoiler:It turns out that the event was deliberate sabotage by someone in the pay of a rival company which wanted Maelstrom's monopoly for itself]]. |
| 102 | * ComicBook/DisneyDucksComicUniverse: Scrooge [=McDuck=] started out as prospector and used that capital to buy a small bank, and from that he put together a Mega Corp so massive he sometimes ''forgets parts of it'', producing items in pretty much every possible business save for weapons (at least we never see those) and owning almost all of Duckburg (at some point the only thing he didn't own in Duckburg was Grandma Duck's farm, but sold some lands and allowed smaller companies to be born). It's also a very benign one, as Scrooge is a fair and honest person (even if extremely greedy and tight-fisted) and respects the environment, and any executive trying to use one of the smaller companies for crimes or ruining the environment is liable to be personally exposed by Scrooge, fired and turned over to the authorities. |
| 103 | * In ''ComicBook/{{Drowntown}}'', Drakenberg Corporation is a huge company with many fields of work, although it seems to have a specialization in genetic engineering. Gina Cassel, one of the main characters, gets romantically involved with the heir to the company (who is a long way above her in status and wealth). [[spoiler:Although she can't remember it, Drakenberg seems to figure into whatever happened to her -- she's got a Drakenberg pendant, the record of her supposed "death" indicates that Vincent Drakenberg was the one who identified her corpse, and a Drakenberg-owned [[LawEnforcementInc law enforcement company]] was involved in declaring the death an accident.]] |
| 104 | * In ''ComicBook/GoddessMode'', Hermeticorp controls Azoth, the god-like AI that everyone relies on, which means they pretty much control everything. |
| 105 | * ''ComicBook/{{Hellboy}}'': The Zinco company, which serves as the setting's rough Lexcorp equivalent. Was run by a pair of Nazi occultist supervillain fanboys until they both got themselves killed in separate attempts to defeat the BPRD and kick-start TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt. |
| 106 | * ''Comicbook/LastManStanding'': Armtech controls all of [[AlternateUniverse Amerika]]. |
| 107 | * Creator/MarvelComics: |
| 108 | ** The Marvel Universe counterpart to Wayne Enterprises is [[ComicBook/IronMan Stark Industries]], grown from an extensive armaments and weapons company before branching out in several other fields through mergers and buyouts, and the source of Tony's wealth. |
| 109 | ** While their counterpart to [=LexCorp=] is [[Characters/MarvelComicsNormanOsborn Oscorp]]. |
| 110 | ** The universe also features a few smaller megacorps, like the hero-run Rand Industries (Iron Fist) and Worthington Industries (Angel). |
| 111 | ** There's also Hexus the Living Corporation. |
| 112 | ** If you need a corporation that's only ''usually'' up to no good (as opposed to the always evil Oscorp) it's Roxxon Energy Corporation, formerly Roxxon Oil, or its subsidiary the Brand Corporation. Heck, Roxxon has actually managed to gain its own sovereign state. |
| 113 | ** Shaw Industries was run by the evil mutant Sebastian Shaw, and was a major US and international military contractor. Ironically, Shaw built at least one series of the mutant-hunting [[KillerRobot Sentinels]]. |
| 114 | ** The Kronas Corporation was sufficiently big to ''buy up'' Roxxon and various others. It was [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything run by rogue Russians to finance a right wing populist Florida Manial candidate]]. |
| 115 | ** ''ComicBook/Marvel2099'' has the world run by Mega Corps, such as Alchemax. How bad were things, you ask? The person that eventually overthrew their control and ushered in a fairer regime was none other than ''Doctor Doom''. Alchemax eventually appears in the 616-verse as well and is just as nasty in the present day as it is in 2099. Probably because two of its three founders are Tiberius Stone and [[spoiler:Norman Osborn]], both utterly amoral villains with no conscience or empathy. |
| 116 | * ''ComicBook/PS238'': Clay Industries, which seems to sell all the materials needed to build the elaborate superhero bases, security systems and other useful pieces of equipment used by the school, many of the superheroes and [[spoiler:Praetorian Academy]]. They're also implied to sell "instant-buildings", explaining how a universe so rich in superheroes manages to survive all the inevitable property damage. It seems to be a fairly benign company, as the founder and owner appears to be the school's janitor. |
| 117 | * ''ComicBook/TrishTrashRollergirlOfMars'': The Arex Corporation was originally a transit company that oversaw the migration of lots of humans to Mars during the environmental difficulties before and during "[[GaiasLament The Meltdown]]". In time, it became a Mega-corporation that oversaw and pretty much owned all the Martian Colonies and their residents. |
| 118 | * ''ComicBook/{{Watchmen}}'': Veidt Enterprises, run by Adrian Veidt. Makes everything from hairspray to music television to tachyon particle emitters. |
| 119 | [[/folder]] |
| 120 | |
| 121 | [[folder:Fan Works]] |
| 122 | * '''Fanfic/AbraxasHrodvitnon'': In this ''Franchise/{{Godzilla}}'' Franchise/MonsterVerse fanfiction, [[spoiler:Apex Cybernetics]] are straight up called a "mega-corporation". Indeed, they're pretty famous and are building a FuturisticPyramid in one of the largest cities in the world, and now they're interested in collaborating with the government-founded organization Monarch. |
| 123 | * ''Fanfic/ChildOfTheStorm'' has the benevolent Stark Industries (stated by Lucius Fox to have a stranglehold on high end tech) and Wayne Enterprises, and the less benevolent Luthorcorp, Oscorp and Roxxon. |
| 124 | * ''Fanfic/CoreLine'' has multiple Mega-Corporations, which sell all kinds of resources and hold their own private armies (and are one of the reasons the world has managed to rebuild itself as fast as it did), as well as some of them having their own CorporateSponsoredSuperhero teams. One of these is "The Champions," a sub-division of Stingray Industries, and its rivalry (mostly invoked by its competitors) with the Avengers Infinity (sponsored by Stark Industries) and the Justice League Unlimited (sponsored mostly by Wayne Enterprises) is a detail that occasionally pops up (and is the cause of many a headache, even when people try to invoke "United We Stand (Better)") within the stories. Other companies within the setting include [=BoomCo=]. and Torque-Urdnot, which have rival Diggers Technologies in the "who can create the bigger BFG" field. |
| 125 | * ''FanFic/EventHorizonStormOfMagic'' features the rather imaginatively named "The Company,™" who seem to be powerful enough that they operate numerous space colonies, build [[RidiculouslyHumanRobots "Nexus-8 Synthetics"]] just for waging CorporateWarfare against their rivals, and yes, they've [[TradeSnark even managed to trademark the name "The Company."]] |
| 126 | * ''Fanfic/{{Fledglings}}'' has the Company, who controls all shipping in the area the story takes place, and makes those islands under its influence pay protection money, ''or else''. They're also heavily based upon both the Dutch and British East India Companies. |
| 127 | * ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3137871/1/Hero_High Hero High]]'' and its sequels have Sphinx Corp. Hinted at the end of the first, played strait with practically owning the town in book two, and in book 3 it grows so powerful they purchase a city and becomes recognized as a major government power by the end. |
| 128 | * ''Fanfic/InvaderZimABadThingNeverEnds'': Coathanger Electronics is evidently a rapidly rising technology company that has managed to earn Professor Membrane's interest, which should speak volumes about its capabilities. [[spoiler: They also seem to have a shady side, being the ones who created the mutant creature that Zim's team hunts in Chapter 3.]] When properly introduced to them in the second StoryArc, we learn that they have their fingers in a lot of fields, all as part of their CEO's master plan to [[spoiler: harvest enough [[PoweredByAForsakenChild Childergy]] to warp reality and wipe out all children, whom he has an IrrationalHatred of]]. |
| 129 | * ''Webcomic/{{Jerkcity}}'' has an official ''VideoGame/{{Minecraft}}'' [[http://minecraft.jerkcity.com server]] constructed by fans over the course of several years. Unlike most Minecraft servers, you will rarely find in-world mention of any individual who built something, as almost everything has been attributed to the Pisswangs Corporation or one of it's subsidiaries (which range from Foodservice to [[https://twitter.com/JerkcityNewsNet Cable News]]). |
| 130 | * In ''FanFic/KingsOfRevolution'', the Britannian Empire is backed by the Donovain Technological Conglometerate, which provides technological breakthroughs to aid in its expansion, including the creation of Knightmare Frames. [[spoiler:This is a front and main public face of Earth for LOGOS, allowing it access to resources for its war against the TSAB.]] |
| 131 | * ''Fanfic/KitsuneNoKenFistOfTheFox'': Konoha Town has two of these, the Uchiha Zaibatsu and the Hyuga Corporation (or Hyuga Corp for short), as explained to Naruto by Shino soon after the former's arrival in the town. According to Shino, the Uchiha Zaibatsu owns most of the businesses in Konoha Town, including supermarkets, hardware stores, boutiques, and at least one bank; on the other hand, Hyuga Corp specializes in shipping imports and exports, electronic technology, and local transportation maintenance (meaning they have control over the local bus and taxi service); and both companies are rivals to each other, and are in a race to see who can land the country's biggest military contract first. Shino adds that his father is a telecommunications engineer for a mobile-phone company whose parent company is Hyuga Corp, and that any of Ino's family's greengrocery customers could be earning money from either of the two groups. |
| 132 | * ''Fanfic/MassEffectHumanRevolution'' has Europa Genomics, the main provider of gene therapy treatments for the Systems Alliance military. Among others, they bought out the canonical Noveria Development Corporation, itself another example of this, and funded the construction of an {{Arcology}}. It directly employs millions and has influence on the lives of many times that. |
| 133 | * ''Fanfic/NeitherABirdNorAPlaneItsDeku'' has multiple Mega Corps running the economy, including [[ComicBook/LexLuthor LexCorp]], [[WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond Wayne-Powers]], [[ComicBook/GreenArrow Queen Consolidated]], and Fries Financial. |
| 134 | * ''Fanfic/{{Origins}}'': The Band of Brothers, seven titanic smuggling organizations (they prefer the term [[InsistentTerminology "alternative shipment"]]) who [[EvenEvilHasStandards play nice]] with the government to keep the status quo intact. They also may have had something to do with smuggling cloaking and superlaser technologies to Cerberus a galaxy over, and are acting as private contractors to do the intelligence service's dirty work. |
| 135 | * ''Fanfic/PrehistoricParkReimagined'' features Novum, which serve as one of the major forces behind the creation of the titular park (complete with its founder and CEO being the inventor of the [[CoolGate time portal]] the park uses to rescue/acquire the prehistoric animals to be put on display at said park). |
| 136 | * ''[[http://sosdan.conforums.com/ Suzumiya Haruhi no Yaku-Asobi]]'' has [=TsuruyaCom=], which spans multiple star systems in ''[[TheMultiverse multiple dimensions]]''. Its products include everything from [[CarrierBattleship interstellar warships]], to [[MemeticMutation smoked cheese]], to clones, to dimensional gateways. |
| 137 | * ''Fanfic/TarkinsFist'': The Earth's surviving richest multi-national corporations coalesce into about a half dozen megacorporations and gain official representation in the government of the Confederacy of Earth Nations. These corporations are explicitly said to have been inspired by the megacorporations that opposed the Old Republic during the Clone Wars, and are even inspired to adopt similar names, to the point that the Earth develops its own Trade Federation. Those corporations that oppose the government, such as the American big three automotive companies, are nationalized and their board members are imprisoned. Those surviving independent corporations that do not sign on with the megacorporations, but are otherwise loyal, are driven out of business by the megacorporations and their government allies. |
| 138 | * ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/27736435 Zero Context: Taking Out the Trash]]'' depicts [[PunnyName Aryu-Madd Tech, Inc.]] (run by two people named Aryu and Maddhouse, natch), which has a spiderweb of business holdings both legal and not throughout Muffinville. By the time the story starts, the sheer number of resources at the business' disposal rivals that of the rabble-rousing Brotherhood, which forces Missy Coco to agree to an alliance devoted to the corporation's destruction. |
| 139 | [[/folder]] |
| 140 | |
| 141 | [[folder:Films -- Animation]] |
| 142 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheLegoMovie'': Octan. Like the ''WALL•E'' example below, the president of Octan is also the president of the world, and the BigBad. |
| 143 | * ''WesternAnimation/WallE'': Buy-n-Large, a [[BrandX barely-disguised]] scathing satire of Wal-Mart. It's so large that the CEO is President of the World -- we even see the White House press room redone with the Buy n Large logo. |
| 144 | [[/folder]] |
| 145 | |
| 146 | [[folder:Films -- Live-Action]] |
| 147 | * ''Franchise/{{Alien}}'': |
| 148 | ** The Weyland-Yutani Corporation. Famously evil enough to sacrifice squads of colonial marines, entire colonies, and the security of the Earth in its attempt to weaponize the eponymous alien critters... and in the [[Film/AlienResurrection fourth film]] eventually buys out by an even ''more'' evil rival... [[TakeThat Wal-Mart]]. In most franchise spin-offs, Weyland-Yutani control every Earth government, have colonized many star systems, and have a private army with a bioweapons division. Note that Creator/JamesCameron did not make the mega corp, which was introduced in Cameron's franchise entry ''Film/{{Aliens}}''; it was already present and evil in the [[Film/{{Alien}} original film]], Cameron just fleshed it out. |
| 149 | ** The ''Franchise/AlienVsPredator'' films introduce the separate Weyland Industries and the Yutani corporation in a fictionalised current-day Earth. While not much is shown of either, Weyland at least appears to have its own spy satellites and mercenaries, suggesting it must be at least getting towards mega territory. Yutani meanwhile apparently has enough pull with the United States military to have a general bring an alien weapon to ''her'', rather than his ''actual'' superiors in the military and government. |
| 150 | ** Creator/RidleyScott[='s=] ''Alien'' prequel ''Film/{{Prometheus}}'' (which regards the ''Alien vs. Predator'' films as CanonDiscontinuity) instead has Weyland Corp as the precusor to Weyland-Yutani, founded in 2012. How "mega" are they? Over the course of the 21st century to the 2090s, Weyland and his company discovered and/or are responsible for biotech, nanotech, fusion energy, M-theory, deep space exploration and colonization and {{Artificial Human}}s. Note that this takes place before the merger into Weyland-Yutani. |
| 151 | * ''Film/AustinPowers'': Virtucon, Dr. Evil's criminal organization. As Number 2 states, the company owns cable companies in 38 states, a steel mill in Cleveland, shipping in Texas, oil refineries in Seattle, and a factory in Chicago that produces miniature models of factories. They also make $9,000,000,000 a year through legitimate business practices alone. |
| 152 | * ''Film/BatalhaDosGuararapes'': The Dutch East India Company is the direct antagonists of the movie, representing the Dutch Republic's interest to take sugar plantations from Northeast Brazil. |
| 153 | * Moramax from ''Film/BigBusiness1988'' is a pharmaceutical firm. Their products are known to be unsafe and their CEO gets sexually aroused from committing white collar crime. |
| 154 | * ''Film/BladeRunner'': |
| 155 | ** The Tyrell Corporation, which controls the production of androids. With this and Weyland-Yutani, both of which predate the cyberpunk genre, Creator/RidleyScott could be considered this trope's [[TropeCodifier Codifier]], if not outright [[TropeMaker Maker]]. |
| 156 | ** In ''Film/BladeRunner2049'', Tyrell has since gone bankrupt and was bought out by the Wallace Corporation, which now controls the world's food supply. |
| 157 | * ''Film/CloudAtlas'': The Corpocracy in 2144. Doubles as TheGovernment and PoliceState. |
| 158 | * In ''Film/Cube2Hypercube'' there's the Izon organization, which is implied in this film to be behind the cube. It has multiple secret subsidiaries and connections with the U.S. military and Washington think tanks, while having enough power for black ops experiments in building extra-dimensional mazes. |
| 159 | * Creator/DavidCronenberg is another director who likes to use this trope: |
| 160 | ** ''Film/TheFly1986'': Bartok Science Industries is the company that funds brilliant inventor Seth Brundle's work in teleportation technology. |
| 161 | ** In ''Film/TheFlyII'' (not directed by Cronenberg himself, but contuining on from his version), Bartok Industries is much more evil, forcing Seth's son, Martin, to unlock the code that his father used on the telepods. The company's CEO, Anton Bartok, first tested the telepods with a golden retriever, which survived the experiment but become horribly deformed, and later lied to him that the dog was euthanized, but was actually kept alive for observation. The company records him having sex with his girlfriend, and then attempts to use his unique biology and relationship to the telepods for power and control. |
| 162 | ** ''Film/{{Scanners}}'': Played with, as [=ConSec=] is given much the same role as TheGoodKingdom would be in a standard fantasy, with a ReasonableAuthorityFigure and an EvilChancellor. Two evil chancellors, if you count [[spoiler: Dr. Ruth]]. |
| 163 | ** In ''Film/{{Videodrome}}'', the Spectacular Optical corporation is revealed to have stolen Videodrome (a mysterious force that can give people the power to warp reality) from its creator, Dr. Brian O'Blivion, and assassinated him with it. While O'Blivion wanted to use Videodrome to help the human race, Spectacular Optical uses it to further their own evil goals of world domination. According to its CEO Barry Covex, the company makes everything from cheap glasses to missiles. |
| 164 | * ''Film/District9'''s MNU is a private security firm tasked with managing the millions of aliens on earth, but in reality are only interested in the aliens' weapons. They force the aliens to live in slum-like conditions, treat them like crap and spread lies about them to keep the them in a bad light. Even MNU's own employees are in the dark about most of their activities, for example that they have been [[spoiler:experimenting on aliens, vivisecting them and trying to create human-alien hybrids]]. |
| 165 | * ''Film/{{Elysium}}'': [[MeaningfulName Armadyne]], which makes everything from security robots to the all-cure machines known as the Med-Pod 300s. |
| 166 | * ''Film/TheFifthElement'': The Zorg Corporation has business interests ranging from taxi service to weapons manufacturing, plus a CEO [[spoiler:who sells out humanity to the BigBad in exchange for a couple extra bucks and personally attempts to kill the heroes when his hired guns can't do it.]] |
| 167 | * ''Film/TheGirlFromMonday'': Triple M (Multi-Media Monopoly), a huge corporation which rules the US as the result of a revolution. |
| 168 | * ''Film/{{Idiocracy}}'': Corporations in the world of 2505 have achieved substantial governmental powers. |
| 169 | ** The most plot relevant is Brawndo, a corporation that makes an electrolyte-laden sports drink and was able to take control of both the FDA ''and'' the FCC. Their influence meant that they were able to displace water for both domestic consumption and agricultural use in favor of a sports drink. When Joe, [[spoiler:as Secretary of Interior, forces people to use water, the company collapses, putting ''half the American workforce'' out of work]]. |
| 170 | ** Costcos in the same time period are ''city-sized'', and offer not only offer consumer goods but law degrees. |
| 171 | * ''Film/InspectorGadget1999'' has Scolex Industries, which produces technology such as robots and androids (such as the [=RoboGadget=] line). |
| 172 | * ''Film/TheInternational'' is about efforts to investigate an international bank that finances third world revolution, money laundering and arms trading. Based on the real life [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank_of_Credit_and_Commerce_International BCCI.]] |
| 173 | * ''Film/JamesBond'' villains will usually control at least one company to serve as their public face or front organization, many of which are large enough to qualify as Megacorps. In chronological order: |
| 174 | ** [[Film/{{Goldfinger}} Auric Enterprises]]: officially, an international engineering and metallurgical company. Actually a front which its director, Auric Goldfinger, uses to smuggle gold across international borders (and, eventually, to conceal grander and more criminal projects). |
| 175 | ** [[Film/YouOnlyLiveTwice Osato Chemicals]]: officially, one of the largest industrial concerns in Japan. Actually a front for SPECTRE, which uses it to develop a secret launch pad from which it can enter UsefulNotes/TheSpaceRace and manipulate it for its own ends. |
| 176 | ** [[Film/DiamondsAreForever Whyte Enterprises]]: unusually for this franchise, a benevolent example. It's an enormous multinational whose creator, Willard Whyte, is an eccentric but benign HowardHughesHomage. Unfortunately, his reclusive nature makes it easy for SPECTRE to kidnap him, impersonate him, and begin using his corporate empire for their own ends. |
| 177 | ** [[Film/TheSpyWhoLovedMe The Stromberg Shipping Line]]: officially, one of the world's largest shipping lines, run by a philantropic tycoon. However, some of its tankers have been modified to the point where they can hijack nuclear submarines. It also funds the development of at least one underwater city in which its CEO plans to hide out in order to survive the coming WorldWarThree he intends to foment. |
| 178 | ** [[Film/{{Moonraker}} Drax Industries]]: officially, a large international aeronautics firm, which among other things builds space shuttles for Western governments. Similar to Stromberg Shipping, but oriented towards outer space rather than the oceans, it's also a front through which its CEO has built a secret hideout in which he plans to seek refuge while exterminating most of the human race. |
| 179 | ** [[Film/AViewToAKill Zorin Industries]]: officially, an Anglo-French computer supplier specializing in microchips. In reality, it was set up with KGB money and is run by a KGB agent as a front for industrial espionage. By the time of the movie, however, the KGB agent has become more interested in being a businessman than a spy, and is planning to wipe out most of his competitors to make ZI the world's leading manufacturer of microchips. |
| 180 | ** [[Film/TomorrowNeverDies The Carver Media Group Network]]: officially, the world's largest media conglomerate. In reality, its CEO not only reports but frequently ''creates'' the news through various criminal actions, then covers it in such a way as to benefit himself. The movie revolves around its attempts to break into its last untapped media market, China, by orchestrating a war between China and Britain. |
| 181 | ** [[Film/TheWorldIsNotEnough King Industries]]: a downplayed example in that King Industries is far from the only company of its kind: it's shown to be competing with three other pipelines in its main area of operation, the Caucasus. The movie revolves around the new CEO's attempts to take her competitors out of the picture, leaving her with a monopoly. |
| 182 | ** [[Film/DieAnotherDay Graves Diamonds]]: officially, a major diamond producer that built itself on unusually wealthy deposits mined in Argentina, and run by a major philantropist with an interest in outer space technology. In reality, a front company set up by a North Korean colonel with African conflict diamonds, in order to build an apparently innocuous KillSat. |
| 183 | ** [[Film/QuantumOfSolace Greene Planet]]: officially, a corporation with a large presence in Latin America and the Caribbean, whose CEO is a major environmental activist. In reality, a front company for the NebulousEvilOrganization Quantum (later revealed to be a forerunner of SPECTRE), through which it's trying to monopolize water resources. |
| 184 | * Creator/JamesCameron seems to love this trope. |
| 185 | ** ''Franchise/{{Alien}}'' has Weyland-Yutani (see above). |
| 186 | ** ''Film/{{Avatar}}'' brings us the Resources Development Administration (RDA), an interstellar mining and transportation firm which swings more meat than most countries. |
| 187 | ** ''Franchise/{{Terminator}}'' has Cyberdyne Systems. While not exactly evil like Cameron's other Mega Corps, they're certainly unscrupulous to the point that they can convince the military to have all its defenses run by Skynet. Their high-tech invention ends up causing TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt and the subsequent RobotWar. |
| 188 | %%* ''Film/JohnnyMnemonic'': [=PharmaCom=]. |
| 189 | * ''Franchise/JurassicPark'': |
| 190 | ** [=InGen=] ('''In'''ternational '''Gen'''etics Technologies, Inc.) is the primary one from the franchise, being a genetic research company capable of cloning dinosaurs from prehistoric DNA on top of being lucrative enough to fund an elaborate theme park on a privately-owned island with their main cloning facilities on a second island. ''Film/TheLostWorldJurassicPark'' indicates that they could still fund an expedition to the second island despite the catastrophe the park ended up being, in contrast to the company being completely liquidated in [[Literature/TheLostWorld1995 the novel]]. |
| 191 | ** The Masrani Corporation, the park's new sponsors in ''Film/JurassicWorld'', very much fit here, being large and lucrative enough to buy [=InGen=] outright after the events of ''The Lost World'' and Hammond's death. In fact, it's even implied that Jurassic World represents only a tiny percentage of the Corporation's annual revenue, as their main business investments are in oil, renewable energy, and telecommunications. Hoskins even remarks that the corporation is so big and diversified Masrani himself doesn't even know about everything he owns, [[spoiler:foreshadowing that elements within [=InGen=] want to [[LivingWeapon break into military applications]] without Masrani's approval]]. Unusually for a megacorporate owner, Simon Masrani himself is decidedly uncorrupt and cares much more about the wonder of dinosaurs and happiness of those in the park, both human and dinosaur. |
| 192 | * ''Film/MontyPythonsTheMeaningOfLife'': The Very Big Corporation of America in the ''The Crimson Permanent Assurance'' short that leads. The board room is covered with the names of the smaller businesses they gobbled up. |
| 193 | * ''Film/{{Parasite|1982}}'': Xyrex, which commissioned the creation of the title creatures. |
| 194 | * ''Franchise/PiratesOfTheCaribbean'': The East India Trading Company. It even gets control over an armada of over [[AllThereInTheManual 300 warships from the British Royal Navy]]. Not surprising, given its real life counterpart [[TruthInTelevision is also an example]]. |
| 195 | * ''Film/RepoTheGeneticOpera'': The BigBad, [=GeneCo=], definitely counts, what with the selling you organs which will be repossessed if you don't make payments for 90 days (which is common in the future), getting you hooked on drugs, and generally being jerks. But they did save the world at one point. |
| 196 | * The ''Film/ResidentEvilFilmSeries'' is a series of live-action ActionHorror films based on the video games of [[Franchise/ResidentEvil the same name]]. In the series, the Umbrella Corporal is a a mega-corporation that produces pharmaceuticals and bioweapons in huge complexes. Umbrella has their own military, including soldiers and rotary wing aircraft. |
| 197 | * ''Franchise/{{Robocop}}'': Omni Consumer Products (OCP) is another iconic example: they have divisions in such diverse fields as consumer products, healthcare, prisons, space exploration, law enforcement to military grade weaponry and their ultimate goal is to turn Detroit into Delta City, [[OneNationUnderCopyright One City Under Copyright]]. They're bought out by Kanemitsu in the third film. |
| 198 | * ''Film/{{Rollerball}}'': All governing power around the world is in the hands of large corporations. |
| 199 | * In the "unofficial" ''[[Film/TheTerminator Terminator]]'' sequel ''Film/ShockingDark'', the Tubular Corporation is a mega-corporation based somewhere in Italy that is heavily involved with the arms trade and excels in the field of robotics and time travel in a similar fashion as Cyberdyne. However, the Tubular Corporation is considerably more malevolent than Cyberdyne, and their war machines are much more primitive. |
| 200 | * In ''Film/SilentMovie'', by Creator/MelBrooks, Mel's little movie production company is in danger of getting stomped into a little greasy spot on the pavement by the ultra-gigantic Mega Corp studio Engulf & Devour. |
| 201 | * In ''Film/TheSixthWorld'', The Omnicorn Corporation colonizes Mars with their special breed of corn. |
| 202 | * [=GloboTech=] from ''Film/SmallSoldiers'' is an arms manufacturing company which is moving into consumer products. It has absorbed a toy company when the movie starts. |
| 203 | * ''Film/SoylentGreen'': The Soylent Corporation, which controls half of the world’s artificial food supply. |
| 204 | * ''Film/SpeedRacer'' features the conglomerate "Royalton Industries" name after its [[CorruptCorporateExecutive owner]] E.P. Arnold Royalton. |
| 205 | * ''Franchise/StarWars'': Gigantic, shady corporations are a staple of the universe: |
| 206 | ** The Trade Federation in the prequel trilogy is wealthy and influential enough to maintain its own navy (albeit one composed of converted cargo ships) and blockade entire planets at a whim, as well as have its own seat in the Galactic Senate. Yeah, they were rich enough to explicitly buy political power -- and they were only the largest one. The whole Separatist Army during the Clone Wars was led by factions like this, such as the Banking Clan, the Techno Union, Geonosian Industries, and the Commerce Guild, which as a baseline completely control the planets they're based on -- many are powerful enough to make bids on additional planetary takeovers, at least in the frontier. The entire reason the conflict started seemed to be a dispute over new trade tariffs, which [[BigBad Palpatine]] was quick to take advantage of. Officially, their senators represented the sectors the corporations had their headquarters in, but everyone knew the truth well enough to address them for what they actually were. |
| 207 | ** The presence of fellow Mega Corps the Techno Union and Banking Clan in the Separatist army suggests that maintaining a giant army of killer Deathbots is a standard business practice in the ''Star Wars'' galaxy, as most of the Federation's early army came from consolidating the various megacorps' private armies. It was, until (explained in the ExpandedUniverse) the Galactic Empire outlawed military droids and seized most of the corps' assets -- though this didn't stop many criminal and quasi-legal organizations from employing large forces of "security guard droids". It's heavily implied that the armies were originally designed as what amounted to planetary-scale legbreakers, as a way to make sure that, for instance, nobody would attempt to stiff them on a deal, though the official explanation is that they're used for defense against criminals (for example the Trade Federation's military, the Trade Defense Force, was authorized to allow the Trade Federation to deal with a series of pirate attacks the Republic's Judicial Forces were failing to suppress). |
| 208 | ** Also from the ExpandedUniverse, Kuat Drive Yards is the Empire's primary manufacturer of starships. This company is powerful enough to have a security fleet comprised mostly of Star Battlecruisers and Star Dreadnoughts that dwarf the Empire's iconic [[TheBattlestar Star Destroyers]], each of which is in turn, powerful enough to scare ''a star system'' into submission. Talk about overkill. Granted, Kuat is under exclusive contract with the Empire, and is thus allowed to maintain said security force. In addition, the Empire has ''even more'' of said Star Dreadnoughts, the most famous of which is the ''Executor'', Vader's Super Star Destroyer. And also includes the Emperor's personal Super Star Destroyer, the ''Eclipse''...which has as its main armament a ''[[WaveMotionGun miniaturized Death Star Superlaser]]''. Which luckily was still under construction at the time of the movies. |
| 209 | ** As with KDY, the Corellian Engineering Corporation (CEC) enjoys its own ''huge security fleet'', though it is not involved purely in military contracts (which one could argue simply makes CEC all the more alarming). Its success has made it arguably the most prolific of the huge manufacturing supercorporations in the ExpandedUniverse. Oh, and they happen to jointly own a military subcontractor with Kuat, and purchased one of their Corellian rivals when a ''travel accident'' killed off the executive staff. |
| 210 | ** Other major players in the galactic war include Incom Corporation (makes X-Wings), Sienar Fleet Systems (makers of the entire TIE line, as well as Darth Maul's ship), and [=BlasTech=] (makes all those blasters). |
| 211 | ** Czerka Corp. in ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'' doesn't have its own navy, but it does own and enslave entire planets (Kashyyyk being one of them) and is utterly indifferent to the outcome of the Jedi Civil War. They're also outside the law. One of the loading screens in the game says that companies like Czerka police themselves because they're too big for authorities to handle. |
| 212 | ** The Corporate Sector Authority, first seen in the early ''Han Solo Adventure'' novels, owns a sector of space (the Corporate Sector), in which the Empire permits it to harvest and exploit resources with impunity. Strip-mine entire worlds? Enslave whole populations? Execute workers for conspiring to form labor unions? Check, Check, and Check. As long as they pay their tribute to the Emperor (which is much lower than what their taxes would be if they operated in the Empire proper), anything goes. |
| 213 | ** ''Literature/JediApprentice'' has the Offworld Mining Corporation. |
| 214 | ** ''ComicBook/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'': The comic series has Adascorp and its ally Czerka Corp, another pair of corporations with more pull than some planetary governments. |
| 215 | * ''Film/{{Tron}}'': The corporation known as ENCOM tends to display Mega Corp tendencies whenever it's not being controlled by idealists like founder Dr. Walter Gibbs or Kevin Flynn. |
| 216 | * ''Film/TwentyFourHoursToLive'': The main antagonists is Red Mountain, a military company that does unethical experiments to resurrect people for profit. |
| 217 | [[/folder]] |
| 218 | |
| 219 | [[folder:Live-Action TV]] |
| 220 | * ''Series/TheAdventuresOfPeteAndPete'': The ''[[http://pnp.norecess.org/kreb.html/ Krebstar]]'' company, which appears to manufacture or own nearly every product and service in the show's universe, may be a rare benign example. |
| 221 | * ''Series/{{Andor}}'': In "[[Recap/AndorS1E1Kassa Kassa]]" Pre-Mor is a huge corporation that controls the planet and star system as a whole. |
| 222 | * ''Series/{{Angel}}'': |
| 223 | ** Wolfram & Hart, although ostensibly a law firm, also maintain departments of real estate, entertainment, transmutational science, and Interment Acquisitions (read: GraveRobbing). |
| 224 | ** As an added bonus, they are the lawyers representing the MegaCorp, counting Weyland-Yutani, Cyberdyne, and [=NewsCorp=] among its clients according to a Season 5 episode. |
| 225 | * ''Series/BabylonFive'' |
| 226 | ** Captain Sheridan makes an offhand reference to "Disney Planet", implying that the Walt Disney Company is dabbling in planetary government by the 23rd century. |
| 227 | *** Explained in the ExpandedUniverse: Walt Disney Company bought a lifeless moon in the Orion system and is ''making a theme park out of it''. So far they only built one city-sized domed attraction, but is already a huge financial success. |
| 228 | ** Edgars Industries, "the biggest biochemical conglomerate on Mars." William Edgars specifically enlightens Garibaldi about the real power in the Alliance. One of the major reasons Clark is giving the Psi Corps extraordinary powers is because he is worried of the amount of control exerted by the Mega corps and want to return the power to the politicians... well, specifically to him. |
| 229 | --->'''William Edgars:''' The Megacorporations have been in charge for years. |
| 230 | * ''Series/BadRobots'' has [=TezCorp=], a Megacorp created by a malevolent robot, who manufacture all forms of robotics and electronics that screw over human victims. |
| 231 | * ''Series/BetterOffTed'': Veridian Dynamics is at least almost there. |
| 232 | -->''"And we never part with money unless a more powerful nation forces us to, and there are only three of those left."'' |
| 233 | * ''Series/BloodDrive'' has Heart Industries, who appear to own ''literally'' everything, including [[LawEnforcementInc Contracrime]] and the mental facility that Grace's sister was committed to. [[spoiler:They are also [[TheHeavy Julian's]] employers, plus they created the gasoline additive that in turn created the [[HumanoidAbomination Glimmers]], [[FantasticDrug Smax candy]], and, for [[ForTheEvulz some reason]], the [[TheVirus Dionysus Strain]].]] One conversation between Grace and Slink sums up how much power Heart really has: |
| 234 | -->'''Grace''': Meadville, Steel City, LA... how many towns has Heart Industries fucked over?\ |
| 235 | '''Slink''': [[WeAreEverywhere How many are]] ''[[WeAreEverywhere on the map?]]'' |
| 236 | * ''Series/TheBoys2019'': [[Characters/TheBoys2019VoughtInternational Vought International]] are a Type 2 EvilInc who are responsible for managing the country's superheroes and who are powerful enough to challenge the CIA. They have a ''ton'' of resources and all kinds of products and services despite technically being just a pharmaceutical company, and they're so powerful that in Season 2, they survive a series of scandals that would run any other company out of business for good. Their media empire is ''so'' massive that they own in-universe equivalents of everything you can think of including CNN, FOX, Disney, Amazon, Spotify, Lifetime, every streaming service and every other form of media down to Telemundo. By the end of season 3, they're on the road to making the [[PresidentEvil Florida Man]] their PuppetKing. |
| 237 | * ''Series/BreakingBad'' features Madrigal Electromotive, a conglomerate based in Germany with interests in fast food chains, laundry service, industrial chemicals, laboratory equipment, and [[BreadEggsMilkSquick crystal methamphetamine production]]. |
| 238 | * When Brazilian group Casseta e Planeta got their own show, they were told spoofing real ads like they did on print could be a legal nightmare, hence they created {{Parody Commercial}}s of [[ACMEProducts all sorts of products and services]] sold by a fictional "monopolist megaconglomerate", Tabajara Organizations. While the focus was always in the products, whenever Tabajara's inner workings were discussed it was in typical Mega Corp fare. |
| 239 | * ''Series/CharlieJade'': Vexcor is the largest and most prominent of the five Mega Corps that run the {{Dystopia}}n parallel world the protagonist is from. It's headquartered in their CompanyTown, [[{{Afrofuturism}} Cape City, on the coast of the Cape of Good Hope and in the shadows of Table Mountain]] and the [[EvilTowerOfOminousness skyscraper]] [[BreadEggsMilkSquick of those that own you]]. |
| 240 | * ''Series/TheColbertReport'': Stephen often shills for The Prescott Group. A shady conglomorate with companies such as Prescott Pharmaceutical, Prescott Oil and Prescott Finance. |
| 241 | * ''Series/{{Corporate}}'': All the main characters work for Hampton Deville, an EvilInc with the slogan, "We don't make anything. We make ''everything''!" |
| 242 | * The galaxy of ''Series/DarkMatter2015'' is dominated by several rival corporations who wield great influence with the corrupt Galactic Authority, possess their own fleets, and routinely hire mercenaries to do their dirty work (like stepping on rebellious mining colonies who are using land the corporations want). At the end of Season Two, the crew is unsuccessful in preventing the eruption of an all-out galactic {{Corporate War|fare}}. |
| 243 | * ''Series/DoctorWho'': The Doctor goes up against shady corporations a fair bit. Sometimes they're fronts for alien invasions, sometimes they're just destructively greedy. |
| 244 | ** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS15E4TheSunMakers "The Sun Makers"]]: The Company, which makes planets like Mars and Pluto habitable for humans — and then runs the population into the ground through taxation. When the Doctor compares them to an invading army, their leader cheerfully admits they've done that, too, but found economic imperialism more efficient. |
| 245 | ** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E5RiseOfTheCybermen "Rise of the Cybermen"]]: The Doctor visits a parallel Earth where society is heavily influenced by Cybus Industries. |
| 246 | ** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E3PlanetOfTheOod "Planet of the Ood"]]: Ood Operations, which is basically an interstellar slave trade. |
| 247 | ** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS37E7Kerblam "Kerblam!"]] presents the titular company, the galaxy's largest retailer, which seems to be a cross between Amazon InSpace and a standard big-box retailer. |
| 248 | ** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS38E1E2Spyfall "Spyfall"]]: VOR is a search engine/data-handling company that is portrayed as the Whoniverse's equivalent of Google, and is explicitly described as having more power than most of Earth's nations thanks to the sheer volume of work it's subcontracted to do by various governments. |
| 249 | %%* ''Series/{{Dollhouse}}'': The Rossum Corporation. |
| 250 | * ''Music/DougAnthonyAllStars'': In ''DAAS Kapital'' the world is run by the corporation-government Shitsu Tonka, which has declared history officially over and all art dangerous. |
| 251 | * ''Series/TheExpanse'': |
| 252 | ** Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile, the founder and funder of the protoparticle conspiracy, which has advanced stealth ships and SuperSoldier troops and overall a more advanced tech base than what the other power blocs have. The trope is {{Deconstructed|Trope}} and SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome occurs, though, in that [[spoiler:events such as the Eros Station massacre and the attempted ColonyDrop of said station (and its protomolecule cargo) on Earth was seen by many (even some of their higher-level administrators) as an incredibly blatant crossing of the MoralEventHorizon and are now hunting Jules-Pierre Mao down for his crimes, even if for some of those performing said hunt it's essentially a "TakingYouWithMe" action]]. |
| 253 | ** Deconstructed when Avasarala points out that the reason [=MegaCorps=] get away with so much isn't because there are no laws to stop them, but that those laws are hardly ever enforced by bureaucrats who are hoping for cushy private sector jobs. When [[spoiler:MKM meets with a genuinely motivated and concerted government opposition, it's helpless to fight back.]] |
| 254 | * ''Series/{{Extant}}'': Yasumoto Corporation, which owns the ISEA, a private futuristic version of NASA. |
| 255 | * ''Series/{{Firefly}}'': Blue Sun Corporation, which makes any kind of consumer products you can name in the 'Verse and among other things may have been responsible for the Academy and what they did to River. |
| 256 | * ''Series/{{Fringe}}'': Massive Dynamic (pictured). When your name is "'''Massive''' Dynamic" and the slogan is "What do we do? What ''don't'' we do?", that should be a major hint to anyone. In an unusual subversion, they're not particularly evil or corrupt, just occasionally secretive. They usually cooperate with the FBI investigations and offer valuable resources for most cases, and their head, Nina Sharp, is a classic case of a RedHerring (in that she's ''never'' guilty of anything, and is usually just trying to help). There is, however, to consider the ''alarmingly'' high number of evil bioweapons, immoral experiments and {{Mad Scientist}}s that were once part of their research, before being closed down, dismissed or fired from the company. Amusingly, their founder, William Bell, only [[JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope turns evil]] in the timeline when he's ''no longer'' CEO of the company. |
| 257 | * ''Series/GameOfThrones'': The Iron Bank can finance entire kingdoms and is not above taking sides in foreign conflicts to secure its investments. |
| 258 | -->'''Tyrion Lannister''': "One way or another, they always get their gold back". |
| 259 | * ''Series/TheGirlFromTomorrow'': In the year 2500, Global Corporation, better known as [=GlobeCorp=], pretty much owns the world. |
| 260 | * ''Series/TheGrandPoseur'': The titular Megacorp, with its board/locker-room chant MEGACORP! MEGACORP! MEGACORP! |
| 261 | * In ''Series/{{Helix}}'' the action is set at Arctic Biosystems, a ResearchInc that is "Big Pharma" in-universe, and must be rich indeed to afford an Arctic ElaborateUndergroundBase base that can house and employ over 120 people. And it's a subsidiary of the '''even bigger''' Ilaria Corporation. The GenreShift twist halfway through the first season somewhat justifies Ilaria's extensive resources, as it turns out to actually be run by [[spoiler: a group of {{immortal|ity}}s]] who would have had plenty of time to build it all up. |
| 262 | * In ''Series/HeroesReborn2015'', Renautas Corporation quickly establishes itself as a leading science innovator in regards to abilities, especially since [[spoiler:they're basically reviving Primatech and Pinehearst's methods of capturing and studying specials to profit off them. They orchestrated the Odessa bombing that killed thousands of people in order to speed along a plan to create a new post-apocalyptic world without special humans.]] |
| 263 | * ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'', has the company that Barney works for, Altrucel. They are implied to make all sorts of weapons for war, but want people to remember they make the yellow fuzzy stuff on tennis balls. Altrucel later acquired an ailing Mega corp, the fictional Goliath National Bank. It's taken to the extreme in one episode: |
| 264 | -->'''Marshal:''' This is a bit out of my league. For one thing, if these contracts aren't executed ''exactly'', I think we're at war with Portugal...\ |
| 265 | '''Barney:''' Please, that's just Tuesday for me. ''(shreds contracts)'' |
| 266 | * ''Series/{{Incorporated}}'': Spiga Biotech, one of multiple corporations that have become more powerful than the world's governments, ravaged as they were by environmental disasters. The world is divided into "Green Zones" owned by Spiga and other corporations, and "Red Zones" that are essentially slums. |
| 267 | * ''Franchise/KamenRider'' has several of these. Most of the time, these are affiliated with the antagonist. |
| 268 | ** ''Series/KamenRider555'' has Smart Brain, a prominent electronics manufacturer who by the time the series begins are the dominant company in the industry. They also created the belts used by the Riders in the series. And that's not even getting into the fact that they're actually run by Orphenochs, the self proclaimed next step in human evolution, who try to use this company to unite all of their kind to wipe out humanity. |
| 269 | ** The final antagonist in ''Series/KamenRiderDouble'' and recurring antagonist in some of the recent {{Crossover}}s is Foundation X. They are a shady organization who financially back somewhat amoral research projects. Most of their investments go into research involving making humans more powerful, with most of their test subjects being unwilling captives. |
| 270 | ** ''Series/KamenRiderOOO'' has a somewhat benevolent or at least neutral example in the Kougami Foundation. While their leader Kougami has some responsibility in awakening the villains, he does assist the heroes by giving them new gadgets from time to time. However, he only seems to do so as the battle between the Kamen Riders and villains really excites him. |
| 271 | ** In ''Series/KamenRiderGaim'', there is one called the [[MeaningfulName Yggdrasill Corporation]], which has its HQ be a building in the shape of a giant tree and ruling the city of Zawame with an iron fist. Their main leader, however, insists that it's ''not'' an all-imposing company but rather a foundation dedicated to the betterment of humanity. With TheReveal that [[spoiler:the Helheim forest is actually an alternate world which was completely overrun by the [[EldritchAbomination Inves generating vines/fruits]] and Earth is gonna end up the same way in 10 years at best, Yggdrasill's secret plan to mass-produce as many Rider belts as possible to immunize around 1/7 of the world population, and ''kill'' the other 6/7 to prevent them from becoming dangerous Inves puts the corporation firmly in the WellIntentionedExtremist field... [[DragonWithAnAgenda not that most of the higher members of the staff ever care]].]] |
| 272 | ** ''Series/KamenRiderBuild'' has Namba Heavy Industries, a massive conglomerate involved in (among other things) [[ArmsDealer arms manufacturing and selling]]. They're big and influential enough to effectively be a fourth player in the MeleeATrois between Japan's [[BalkanizeMe divided regions]] of Touto, Hokuto and Seito, all of whom depend on Namba Heavy Industries for the [[MechaMooks Guardians]] they use as military police, and who all have Namba's TykeBomb spies embedded in various influential positions in their governments. |
| 273 | * ''Series/{{Kings}}'' features [=CrossGen=], a corporation so powerful that its backing can (and has) unilaterally put someone on the throne of Gilboa. During the course of the series, its CEO makes other demonstrations of its vast power, singlehandedly bringing the nation to the verge of bankruptcy and blacking out half the countryside with a single phone call. |
| 274 | * ''Series/MaxHeadroom'' placed the television networks, and Zik Zak, into this role. |
| 275 | * ''Series/{{Monk}}'': The villainous [[FatBastard Dale "The Whale" Biederbeck]] runs one of these. Though he's officially on the books as being involved in world finance, Dale either owns, runs, or has general power over everything from baseball teams to politicians to real estate, with Monk commenting seriously that Biederbeck "owns half of San Francisco, with a controlling interest in the other half." Biederbeck is also rich enough to buy up entire newspaper companies -- something he does several times a year -- to put them out of business and therefore prevent them from running negative stories on him, making this an interesting example of a mega-corp that very few people know about. A later episode reveals that Dale uses various subsidiaries and shell companies (including fake businesses that own ''other'' fake businesses) to cover his tracks. What's particularly notable about all this is that Dale initially ran this empire from a single bedroom: he's over 800 pounds and completely unable to walk. He also keeps the corporation running during his stint in prison for arranging a murder. |
| 276 | * ''Series/MrRobot'' has E Corp, which is referred to as Evil Corp because the protagonist Elliot has conditioned himself to perceive any mention of E Corp as Evil Corp. Evil Corp seems to be a BlandNameProduct version of Enron, even having a similar logo. |
| 277 | %%* ''Series/MrShow'': Globochem. |
| 278 | * ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'': |
| 279 | ** A recurring joke names some fictional company (either featured in the movie or derived from someone's name) as "a subsidiary of [=ConHugeCo=]." |
| 280 | ** In the series's finale [[spoiler:Gypsy appears to have founded a Mega Corp of her own, "[=ConGypsCo=]"]] |
| 281 | * ''Series/TheOuterLimits1995'': In "[[Recap/TheOuterLimits1995S6E14Abaddon Abaddon]]", the United States became the North American Corporation, otherwise known as the Company and Noramco, in 2102. American citizens became shareholders but they effectively lost all of their rights, becoming nothing more than commodities to the Company. |
| 282 | %%* ''Series/{{Profit}}'': Gracen & Gracen. |
| 283 | * ''Series/RedDwarf'': In the [[SarcasmMode creatively titled]] "[[Recap/RedDwarfSeasonXIIMCorp M-Corp]]", the crew download an overdue software update from the 26th century from their mining company, only to learn that at this point in history said company was taken over by the titular evil corporation, which had in fact had managed to TakeOverTheWorld and control vital necessities like food, water and air and could even charge people for their subversive thoughts. Since Lister is the only registered crew member on board, M-Corp goes so far as to edit his perceptions and prevent him from even seeing or hearing anything that isn't owned by them, including Rimmer, Kryten and Cat. He eventually transports to an unknown location run by an M-Corp A.I. that forces him to buy things and is willing to inflict pain on him and put his life in danger just so he can buy items to save himself, and eventually starts charging him in his time and lifespan. This Mega-Corp was so powerful that it was essentially a RealityWarper as it could offer you -- or take ''from'' you -- anything it wanted in order to charge you more. |
| 284 | * ''Series/{{Smallville}}'': [=LuthorCorp=] has been in the hands of one CorruptCorporateExecutive after another, going from [[MagnificentBastard Lionel Luthor]] to [[ManipulativeBastard Lex Luthor]] to [[TheBaroness Tess Mercer]] and back to [[ArchEnemy Lex]]. Under all of them it has performed illegal activities and conducted human experimentation. In the AlternateUniverse of Earth-2, Lionel was able to fuse the corporation with the Metropolis underworld, essentially letting him TakeOverTheWorld. |
| 285 | * ''Series/StargateSG1'' has the Tech Con Group, a major conglomerate on Hebridan that makes a wide range of products, owns the planet's major TV station, and runs a lottery. They are not specifically referred to as evil; in fact their ads during "Space Race" are played for laughs, since they apparently make everything from engine parts to funeral arrangements. Their power is evident when SG-1 is sent to negotiate with the company CEO rather than the planetary government. Given that [[spoiler:Hebridan was conquered by the Ori]], the company's current state is unknown. |
| 286 | * ''Series/TimAndEricAwesomeShowGreatJob'': Cinco Corporation: it does everything from make toys and inventions to give insurance consultations. Cinco is unique in that it's neither wholly good or bad -- the whole place is more ChaoticNeutral, as its products range from the odd-but-harmless (a "toy" that's a bat and owl smashed together, a mask you wear on your face to appear interested at a party when you're actually sleeping, etc.) to the just-plain-dangerous (such as iJammer, a "digital music box" for children that produces [[BrownNote dangerous high-frequency tones]] which cause insanity, seizures, and general mayhem). |
| 287 | * ''Series/TorchwoodMiracleDay'' has Phicorp, a major pharmaceutical company, which later starts pretty much running most of the world. Of course, it's later revealed that Phicorp is actually innocent, as one of its chief executives has no idea what's going on. In fact, the entire thing is being run by [[spoiler:the Families who have somehow grown from three mobster groups to running the world]]. |
| 288 | * ''Series/TotalRecall2070'': Each branch of industry is apparently dominated by a single Megacorporation each. Rekall does information technology, Uber Braun robotics (and androids), Minacon produces energy and raw materials and so on. Each company has a private army and a legion of lawyers to pursue their own interests, often trying to strong-arm the civilian law enforcement agency that the protagonists represent. Interestingly, Uber Braun may be based off real-world consumer electronics company Braun, which is now part of real-world mega corporation Proctor & Gamble, so maybe TruthInTelevision. |
| 289 | [[/folder]] |
| 290 | |
| 291 | [[folder:Music]] |
| 292 | * Music/MyChemicalRomance: Better Living Industries [[StealthPun (BL/ind)]] |
| 293 | [[/folder]] |
| 294 | |
| 295 | [[folder:Podcasts]] |
| 296 | * ''Podcast/KakosIndustries'' has the named company that is capable of infiltrating the lives of everyone and do so all for the sake of Evil. They have an iron grip on their Shareholders -- [[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou the listener included]] -- and will invade their privacy and ruin their lives as they desire. But given the population is constituted of people who adore being a CardCarryingVillain, this is rarely ever considered a problem and just a way of life. |
| 297 | * ''Podcast/TrialsAndTrebuchets'' has Crowe Mercantile Corporation, which manufactures and [[WeSellEverything sells an extremely wide variety of products]]. |
| 298 | * ''Podcast/WelcomeToNightVale'': [=StrexCorp=] Synernists, Inc., which has taken control of and runs most industries in Desert Bluffs, and [[spoiler:does the same to Night Vale after [[WhamEpisode Episode 32.]]]] |
| 299 | * ''Podcast/Wolf359'' has Goddard Futuristics, some kind of enormous technology conglomerate. Exactly how big the company is and what they do is not yet clear, but they're powerful enough to be financing experimental and reconnaissance missions in ''deep space''. |
| 300 | [[/folder]] |
| 301 | |
| 302 | [[folder:Puppet Shows]] |
| 303 | * ''Series/{{Dinosaurs}}'': Three words, Wesayso. |
| 304 | -->We know what you want. We know what you need. ''We know where you live.'' |
| 305 | * ''Series/LesGuignolsDeLInfo'', a French satyrical puppet show, has the World Company. It's a generic evil corporation in which every single CorruptCorporateExecutive is a dead ringer for Sylvester Stallone. The Stallone puppet was originally used for any generic [[Franchise/{{Rambo}} war-mongering]] American General during the first Gulf War; after the end of the war, a sketch showed him having turned to the private sector and it stuck. |
| 306 | * ''Series/LosLunnis'', a Spanish muppet show, once did a parody of ''Film/TheMatrix'' called ''Lunatrix'', where their world had been taken by an unsubtle Mega Corp called Títere Corporation. |
| 307 | [[/folder]] |
| 308 | |
| 309 | [[folder:Radio]] |
| 310 | * ''Radio/JourneyIntoSpace'': In ''The Host'', large parts of Earth are controlled by huge corporations in 2079. There are only a few remaining governments. |
| 311 | [[/folder]] |
| 312 | |
| 313 | [[folder:Roleplay]] |
| 314 | %%* ''Roleplay/NexusGate'' has the Kovolis Corperation. |
| 315 | * ''Roleplay/OpenBlue'' has Remillia, essentially a nation whose main political parties are competing Mega Corps. |
| 316 | * ''Roleplay/{{Netland}}'': TOAST Industries is a rare heroic, or at least protagonistic (that is, they're against universal annihilation), example. |
| 317 | [[/folder]] |
| 318 | |
| 319 | [[folder:Tabletop Games]] |
| 320 | * ''TabletopGame/BattleTech'': |
| 321 | ** [=ComStar=] held an absolute monopoly on interstellar communication and secretly fielded the ''largest'' military in known space (at ''least'' 144 [=BattleMech=] regiments and three dozen [=WarShips=], just prior to the [[BigBadassBattleSequence Battle of Tukayyid]]). They owned the Earth's solar system (admittedly small potatoes compared to the other interstellar empires of the setting) and their company Scrip was the standard currency of intergalactic trade. At least until after the [[OutsideContextProblem Clans]] invaded. In the wake of the invasion, [=ComStar=] ended up splintering into two groups (the other being the Word of Blake), and then following the Word of Blake Jihad, Comstar was left with far less power and influence due to the fact that nobody really trusted them anymore. When the Blackout occurred and almost all the Hyperpulse Generators were knocked offline during the Dark Age, Comstar was reduced to a shadow of its former self since they no longer had a service they could provide and no other assets with which to generate revenue. Unless the Blackout ends soon, they're at very great risk of disappearing entirely. |
| 322 | ** Even outside of [=ComStar=], there are a number of major Megacorps, including Irian Technologies, Defiance Industries of Hesperus II (which is the defacto and dejure government of Hesperus II, though that's because the city-sized Defiance Industries factory is basically the only inhabited part of the planet), Interconnectdness Unlimited, the Ivory Trade of the Order of the Five Pillars (which morphed from an ivory cartel into a quasi-mystical order that is fanatically devoted to House Kurita and intimately connected with the ruling family), and the Ryan Iceship Cartel (which held a monopoly on the vital trade in ice to water-poor planets in the early days of colonization). |
| 323 | * ''TabletopGame/BleakWorld'': Two exist. The first is the Blackwood Company, which is slightly better as it urges its employees to obey all laws and not harm bystanders when they're kidnapping and experimenting on monsters. The other is [[CorruptCorporateExecutive The Dark Skies Corporation]] who not only have [[NGOSuperpower their own private military]] that they use to [[BadBoss hold their employees hostage]] and take over rival companies, but they are also led by a group of [[AmoralAttorney Amoral Attorneys]] who [[EvilLawyerJoke sold their souls for immortality and the knowledge of all laws]] ([[DidYouJustScamCthulhu which they immediately used to weasel out of their deal with Satan]]) |
| 324 | * ''TabletopGame/BluePlanet'', a hard-science RPG, has several Mega Corporations that are states unto themselves called Incorporate States. Given that Earth itself is a CrapsackWorld in the Blue Planet universe, the Incorporate are very interested in the colony of Poseidon where the game is set. |
| 325 | * ''TabletopGame/CallOfCthulhu'' supplement ''The Fungi from Yuggoth''. New World Incorporated (NWI) is a large international corporation that has interests in mining, oil, aircraft manufacture and ship building, international banking and munitions. Unknown to the general public is the fact that NWI is controlled by the forces of the Franchise/CthulhuMythos and is being used to bring about the Day of the Beast and cause worldwide devastation. |
| 326 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Cosmopol}}'': Hudson-Cosmos, Stahl, Phi, Trilex Pharmaceuticals and... too many others to name. Most people are not aware that Hudson-Cosmos and Stahl actually outright own ''almost all of the other companies'' and the ''entire cities'' that they are based in. |
| 327 | * ''TabletopGame/CthulhuTech'': A game best described as an unholy lovechild of the Franchise/CthulhuMythos and ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'', has the Crysalis Corporation. The corporation produces everything from household supplies to military hardware. In addition it secretly strives to dominate the world, supplying various cults and terrorist organisations and creating mutated creatures to fight for it. Furthermore, its CEO is actually an avatar of the god Nyarlatothep disguised as a mortal man. Talk about a CorruptCorporateExecutive! |
| 328 | * Naturally in the ''TabletopGame/{{Cyberpunk}}'' RPG series (including ''Cyberpunk 2020'', ''Cyberpunk V3'', ''Cyberpunk RED'' and their videogame adaptation ''VideoGame/Cyberpunk2077''), considering how megacorps are a recurring theme in the genre. Due an economic crash in the 1990s, corporations became all-powerful extra-governamental entities who basically control the world's economy and society. They are so powerful that can [[CorporateWarfare wage war against themselves]] and all the world can do is watch. Arasaka and [=MiliTech=] are the two most prominent examples, the former pure evil and the latter unscrupulous but not ''as'' evil. For reference, [=MiliTech=] more-or-less openly owns and operates the US government, and the CEO of Arasaka is referred to in fairly formal contexts as "the Emperor" without a hint of irony. |
| 329 | * ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'': |
| 330 | ** ''TabletopGame/{{Eberron}}'' has the 13 Dragonmarked Houses, DungeonPunk equivalent to Mega Corps, each with their own specializations (Entertainment & Espionage, Banking, Consummer Goods, Private Security, Animal Breeding, Notary, Prospecting, Magical Detections, Overland Travel & Teleportation, Overseas & Air Travel, Hostelling, Healing). Each house descends from a bloodline blessed with a dragonmark, a unique set of birthmarks that grant them powers and skill bonuses relating to a particular theme. Each family used their advantage to corner the market on a particular good or service, as no non-dragonmarked could really match them. |
| 331 | ** Elsewhere in ''D&D'', the ''TabletopGame/{{Mystara}}'' setting's Minrothad Guilds are a nation, made up of several islands, that's organized like a huge corporation. Each island, and each race that lives there, operates like a manufacturing division of the company, while the fully-incorporated "service guilds" are the equivalent of government departments (defense, etc.). |
| 332 | * In ''TabletopGame/EclipsePhase'', the Mega Corps that were unable to adjust to a post-scarcity economy died out while those that could evolved into the Hypercorps. Most are small and decentralized, often existing wholly in CyberSpace ([[WeWillUseManualLaborInTheFuture as labor is almost fully automated]]), but hold a great deal of influence in the Inner System. Mars is run wholesale by the Planetary Consortium, which poses as a republican democracy, but whose power is divided proportionally among the hypercorps who own shares in it. Venus used to be under Consortium rule until the habitats formed the Morningstar Constellation almost by accident. |
| 333 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Exalted}}'' has a high fantasy example in The Guild, a vast trading concern that uses mercenaries and assassins to dispose of its rivals, is the world's biggest trader in narcotics and slaves, and sells live humans by the thousands to the Fair Folk who devour their minds for food. And because that isn't evil enough, they buy the emotionless unfeeling husks ''back'' from the Fair Folk so they can be resold as obedient manual labourers. The Guild also distributes medicine (when it's profitable), and by selling the soul-eating trickster fairies meals, they hold back a second Balorian Crusade... well, except the one time they nearly started it, but that was an accident. |
| 334 | * ''TabletopGame/FadingSuns'': The Guilds are descendants of the Second Republic's megacorps who adapted to a FeudalFuture. The massive corporations essentially ran both Republics. |
| 335 | * In ''TabletopGame/HcSvntDracones'' megacorps have pretty much replaced nations. The most notable is [[http://hcsvntdracones-game.tumblr.com/post/89910939431/much-of-the-character-flavor-and-differentiation MarsCo]], the oldest (due to being off-world when the Earth-bound governments and corps nuked each other) corp, which has billions of employees, created the [[LegoGenetics Vectors]] that [[HumanitysWake replaced humanity]], and is involved in so many industries characters with [=MarsCo=] as their educational background can choose any proficiencies. |
| 336 | * ''TabletopGame/HeavyGear'': The Paxton Corporation is one of the largest and most powerful corporations on Terra Nova. Being able to manufacture almost anything. From food, clothing, to weapons and mechs. They were able to turn the tide of battle against the Earth forces when they finally join the War of the Alliance. |
| 337 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Mindjammer}}'': While the Core worlds of the Commonality consider capitalism to be a disgusting atavism, they've found soulless Corporacies, which often end up owning entire planets, a necessary part of their campaign to assimilate the Fringe worlds. |
| 338 | * In ''[[http://misspentyouthgame.com/ Misspent Youth]]'' by Robert Bohl, you play bomb-throwing teenage anarchists in a Dystopia with an Authority that is out to personally destroy them. Groups who choose to play with a Corporate Authority frequently create evil Mega Corps. |
| 339 | * In ''TabletopGame/MutantChronicles'', the big powers of the solar system are called "mega corps" and fit pretty well with this trope, but in a slight aversion they have by now evolved into FeudalFuture noble houses of a sort. Exceptions are [[{{Eagleland}} Capitol]], which is still technically a corporation, and hence a democracy of sorts -- you have one vote per piece of stock you own, and the company president serves the same role as an [[FantasyCounterPartCulture American]] president. There's also Cybertronic which is focuses on creating electronics and cybernetics, it does have bits of an Orwellian society style. |
| 340 | * ''TabletopGame/PokemonTabletopAdventures'': The {{Cyberpunk}}-flavored Babel campaign setting takes Silph Co. and the Devon Corporation from the main ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' games and gives them the sort of reach and influence you would expect from mega-corporations in such a setting, while also elevating Team Galactic to the level of a mega-corp. The three mega-corps run the LayeredMetropolis of Heizhou and are in covert conflict with one another, employing teams of deniable mercs to conduct corporate espionage and sabotage. |
| 341 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Rifts}}'': A number of these exist even on [[AfterTheEnd post-apocalyptic]] Earth. Triax of of the New German Republic, the Cyberworks Aerospace Networks on the Moon, plus numerous smaller megacorps in the Republic of Japan. Elsewhere in the Megaverse, most notably in the Three Galaxies, you have Bushido Industries, Galactic Ship Corporation, Hartigal Combine and Naruni Enterprises among others. Any given Splugorth realm could be considered a megacorp as well given their brand of alien mercantilism. |
| 342 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'': Megacorps are a major part of the setting, and in some cases have outright displaced national governments as major power players in the global stage. They typically have worldwide reach and fingers in almost every pie, although most tend to specialize to some degree -- most 'corps focus on things like informatics, biotech, armaments and so on. They're ranked from "A", which are merely multinational in scope; to "AA", which start to fit the trope due to the sheer size of their assets and extensiveness of their presence across the world economy (some may even rival AAA-rated corps), earn the highly coveted privilege of extraterritoriality, and gain the title of "megacorp"; and finally "AAA", also known as "Prime Megacorps", which are truly global giants with enough economic power, clout and military capability to push around most national governments, and of which there are currently only ten (originally eight). Megacorps are rarely monolithic entities, however -- all, but especially the largest, end up being complex systems of shell companies, fronts, subsidiaries, branches of branches of branches, leased territories and independent companies controlled through majority shareholding, all operating around a more or less compact central core. |
| 343 | ** The problem is so bad that there are "Megas" all over the place that run much of the world in the place of national governments, partly because political corruption and corporate capture are quite commonplace. The Triple-As don't so much [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney flaunt the law]] as much as [[ScrewTheRulesIMakeThem make their own for their own territory]] thanks to the concept of extraterritoriality, which makes that particular corporation a sovereign state of itself and makes every piece of land it owns count as part of that "nation", complete with their own "corporate citizens". |
| 344 | ** The biggest ten corporations (called the "Big Ten") have an influence over the Corporate Court, a separate U.N. made to negotiate treaties between the megas. The main difference is that the Corporate Court, despite being comprised of corporate judges drawn from the Big Ten, has real teeth, and the Megas listen when it puts its foot down; and it's also the child organization of Zurich-Orbital Gemeinschaft Bank, a financial istituion and a AA Mega that has sway over the Big Ten by dint of how much money they borrow from it. |
| 345 | ** One particular example of the Megas that demonstrates how far the Megas reach and [[OneNationUnderCopyright acting as governmental entities]] is Aztlan, a country that used to be Mexico and Central America, and it's "only" the biggest subsidiary of Aztechnology, one of the Big Ten. Another one is the Pueblo Corporate Council, a nation built from the Navajo Nation (and quite a bit of the US's land from when it was still a thing), where the government is officially a corporate entity, but lacks the backing of one of the Big Ten to wield influence for them. |
| 346 | * In ''TabletopGame/SLAIndustries'', the eponymous Mega Corp effectively constitutes a state; its numerous subsidiaries (some big enough to be Mega Corps in their own right) compete with each other in a kind of internal market. Real competitors Thresher Inc and [=DarkNight=] Industries are corporations in name only, operating as paramilitaries opposed to SLA. |
| 347 | * In ''TabletopGame/TheSplinter'', Earth is controlled entirely by Gamescorp which has, by the time of the setting, absorbed every other corporation. Seeing as they have no competition or entities capable of imposing regulations on them, they're pretty nasty. |
| 348 | * ''TabletopGame/StarDrive'': The following Stellar Nations, which control large regions of space, all fall under this category: Austrin-Ontis Unlimited, Insight, the Rigunmor Star Consortium, the Starmech Collective, and Voidcorp. Although not all to the same degree -- Austrin-Ontis have gone so far into OneNationUnderCopyright that they are more nation than copyright these days, whereas Voidcorp is all about profit. |
| 349 | * ''TabletopGame/{{Traveller}}'': Interstellar corporations, such as [=GSbAG=], Hortalez et Cie, Sternmetal Horizons, Ling-Standard Products and [=SuSAG=]. Traveller megacorporations make good foils, and can potentially add drama to a [[IntrepidMerchant Free Trader]] centered game. Alternatively in a court intrigue centered game they can be among the things a PC princeling has to take account of. The nobility and the megacorporations are interlaced subtlely just as the nobility are interlaced with the Imperial government. |
| 350 | * ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'': |
| 351 | ** The [[MachineWorship Adeptus Mechanicus]], despite being a religious organization at the same time. They are a nearly-autonomous corporate polity separate from the rest of the Imperium, but only sticking around because of the bargaining agreements they had with the Emperor of Mankind. Despite their autonomy, they have an almost-complete monopoly on the production of technology in the Imperium, owning hundreds if not thousands of Forge Worlds (basically factory planets) and, with this industrial power, having the economic leverage to dictate what tech could they sell to the Imperium's war machine. They can sell cheap laser weapons to the Imperial Guard, but all the really cool things such as [[HumongousMecha Titans]] are only for themselves. They are so monopolistic that whenever somebody invents a new form of technology, the Mechanicus will do everything, from buying the invention, to having the inventor assassinated. |
| 352 | ** There are also Economic cartels like the [=DeVayne=] incorporation, which are more powerful that most governments on border worlds; they have private armies and small fleets to their name, more than enough to conquer a backwater world, and these are small scale. Larger, more powerful Mega corporations may actually ''be'' the Government, similar to corporate towns there are corporate ''planets''; the very biggest can hold direct control over dozens of worlds and be influential in hundreds more. And yet despite all of this, it's just a drop in the ocean compared to the Imperium's million worlds and the Adeptus Mechanicus. |
| 353 | ** Individual Rogue Traders own at least one kilometers-long starship worth the GDP of a fair-sized hive city, Rogue Trader [[TheClan dynasties]] might command whole armadas and govern multiple planets. |
| 354 | * ''Franchise/TheWorldOfDarkness'': |
| 355 | ** ''TabletopGame/OldWorldOfDarkness'': [[TabletopGame/WerewolfTheApocalypse Pentex]]. It's a front for the [[EldritchAbomination embodiment of entropy]] and its efforts to poison the entire universe. They have hands in everything from fast food to toys to pharmaceuticals to energy to firearms to [[SelfDeprecatingHumor Role-Playing Games]] -- in fact, most people in the setting don't even know Pentex ''exists'', or if it does, that it's simply an independent entity without any ties to its constituent companies. |
| 356 | ** The ''TabletopGame/NewWorldOfDarkness'' has the Cheiron Group from ''TabletopGame/HunterTheVigil'', a gigantic multinational organization that controls a dozen front businesses. One of those departments [[TheydCutYouUp hunts, captures and studies supernatural creatures]], both to find new product possibilities and to utilize their powers (by harvesting bits of them) for the company's own use. Their employees are given a handbook containing near-useless information as their only guide to what they're dealing with, so turnover is insane (giving the player characters a job opening). |
| 357 | *** Then there's [=DevaCorp=], a Delhi-based international technology conglomerate with subsidiaries in everything to architecture to medicine. It also happens to be [[TabletopGame/DemonTheDescent the largest God-Machine cult in existence]] and is always looking for [[TheyWouldCutYouUp demons to use for raw materials]]. |
| 358 | * ''TabletopGame/QuantumBlack'': set in the very near future, Quantum Integrated Technologies is a technology company that has recently come close megacorp levels of influence in the world. The players usually work for the subsidiary dedicated to studying and stopping the growing number of supernatural threats to the world (often of a Lovecraftian bent). In fact, they and other corporations know more about what is happening than most governments. |
| 359 | [[/folder]] |
| 360 | |
| 361 | [[folder:Theatre]] |
| 362 | * ''Theatre/{{Urinetown}}'': [[{{Pun}} Urine Good Company]]. |
| 363 | * ''Theatre/WeWillRockYou'': Globalsoft. It's also become the government of the entire planet, which it has renamed Planet Mall. |
| 364 | [[/folder]] |
| 365 | |
| 366 | [[folder:Theme Parks]] |
| 367 | * Creator/{{Disney}}: |
| 368 | ** X-S Tech in the former [[Ride/DisneyThemeParks Magic Kingdom]] attraction, the Ride/ExtraTERRORestrialAlienEncounter. |
| 369 | ** In RealLife, in order to run all of the facilities at Ride/WaltDisneyWorld, Disney lobbied and received complete autonomy[[note]]Disney still has to pay property taxes and submit to state elevator inspection.[[/note]] in the 44 square miles owned by Disney (more land than Manhattan) as the cities of Bay Lake and Lake Buena Vista, which are controlled by the Reedy Creek Improvement District (RDIC). These "cities" are run by a board of governors who are elected by the citizens of the RDIC controlled land, all of whom are Disney employees. The RDIC website even declares it's "where business and government effectively work together to resolve the problems that neither can solve on its own". Disney being a Real Life MegaCorp is a well known fact, but it's probably the only one that has effectively merged with government. If they so choose, they could have their own police force (in reality, they contract local police forces to have actual arresting and ticketing power. Their own security can cite employees and set up as traffic control, but have no road arrest authority). |
| 370 | [[/folder]] |
| 371 | |
| 372 | [[folder:Visual Novels]] |
| 373 | * ''VisualNovel/AnOctaveHigher'' has Magical Mechanical (or just MM), the single largest manufacturer of [[{{Magitek}} magic machines]] in the kingdom of Overture and possibly in the entire world. Given that magic machines are ''everywhere'' in the kingdom of Overture and that they run the gamut from drinking fountains to kitchen stoves to flying cars and everything in-between, it should come as no surprise that Magical Mechanical is very powerful and employs a vast majority of Overture's proletariat in its factories. |
| 374 | * ''VisualNovel/BionicHeart'': The company that Luke and Tom work for. It deals with nanotechnology, but uses this information to illegally build androids [[spoiler:with human brains from PeopleJars]]. |
| 375 | * ''VisualNovel/{{Demonbane}}'': The Hadou Financial Group, which is described as more or less holding absolute power in Arkham City, the most prosperous city on the planet. Fortunately, they are a benevolent Mega Corp: the reason they amassed such power in the first place was to gain the means to fight against {{Eldritch Abomination}}s. |
| 376 | %%* ''VisualNovel/{{Policenauts}}'': The Tokugawa Conglomerate. |
| 377 | [[/folder]] |
| 378 | |
| 379 | [[folder:Web Animation]] |
| 380 | %%* ''WebAnimation/BrokenSaints'': BIOCOM fits the bill.%%How? |
| 381 | * ''WebAnimation/{{Interface}}'': Greeting Robotics seems to have control of the mysterious Cerebral Electricity, which seems to manifest in many parts of society and civilization; the advertisements on television seem to show that the corporation has a presence everywhere and is monitoring people. It has enough power to convince multiple countries and investors to create KAMI and are able to make a speech in the freaking UN about it. |
| 382 | * ''WebAnimation/GwainSaga'': The Moon Tech Incorporation, being the biggest provider of technology in the kingdom. Ironically enough, the Incorporation is managed, with all of it's products and techs being designed by Luna, whom is the primary antagonist for the series. |
| 383 | * ''WebAnimation/MetaRunner'' has [=TASCorp=], who has a very large presence in the video-game obsessed Silica City. Several other megacorps, like [=AlphaMax=] and [=Cloud7=], are name-dropped throughout season one. |
| 384 | * The Schnee Dust Company in ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'', which is one of the largest producers and exporters of [[PowerCrystal Dust]]. It's so big that it has its own security force and fleet of airships. It used to be run in an ethical way, but became much more exploitative of its workers after [[CorruptCorporateExecutive Jacques Schnee]] took over such as forcing them to work in unsafe conditions and it's mistreatment of Faunus workers. Even it's human workers were mistreated by how easily be considered laying them off in order to make up for company losses after General James Ironwood placed a Dust embargo on the kingdom of Atlas. [[spoiler:Among it's victims were Illia Amitola's parents who died in a mining accident and Adam Taurus who has his face branded with the company logo which eventually led to both of them joining the White Fang.]] |
| 385 | [[/folder]] |
| 386 | |
| 387 | [[folder:Webcomics]] |
| 388 | * ''Webcomic/AmongTheChosen'': Heirotus, ETL, and PLAMPT are galactic-level Mega Corps. |
| 389 | * ''Webcomic/ArthurKingOfTimeAndSpace'': [=Excalicorp=] is a good Mega Corp, at least since Arthur started influencing policy. The strip doesn't directly state how big it is, but if you pay attention you'll notice that everything from computers to cars has a sword-in-the-stone logo. |
| 390 | * ''Webcomic/BreakpointCity'' has Sploz Co, makers of everything from advanced holography operating systems to fat-free yogurt. They provided the funding to build the titular city, and have their headquarters there. |
| 391 | * ''Webcomic/CaptainUfo'': It's hinted that there are several of these in the [[TheFederation USC]]. The plot of the second season involves the Brimen-Fukuoka corp. |
| 392 | * ''Webcomic/{{Freefall}}'': The closest the setting has is Ecosystems Unlimited. They control most of the colonized planet, own most of the robots, and one of the main characters' ''species'' (and they owned her too until they sold her). This may be due to the planet not being {{terraform}}ed yet, so it's not very populated, and E.U. ''has'' to be there for the terraforming to be done: It's their job, after all. |
| 393 | %%* ''Webcomic/FriendlyHostility'': Creed Corporation |
| 394 | * ''Webcomic/{{Gengame}}'': Gencorp seems to sell/produce everything we hear about or come across, to almost dystopian levels. However, because of the comic's generally light nature, this is more of a source of humor than anything. |
| 395 | * ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'': Crockercorp from the new [[spoiler:post-Scratch]] timeline. It's Betty Crocker expanded from baking goods to superscience, with handheld teleportation devices and telepathic personal computers. Rumors circulate that Betty Crocker herself is an evil alien "Batterwitch" controlling it all and trying to brainwash the population. [[spoiler:They're right; she's actually Her Imperious Condescension, the troll empress having survived the destruction of the trolls' universe.]] |
| 396 | * ''Webcomic/LovelyPeople'': The World Council cooperates with a large retailer named Alizongle to provide those who have good ratings in the social credit system with gifts and various other monetary rewards. Take a wild guess as to which retailer people need to buy from to score the most social credit points. The situation may be even worse than that, as there is no indication of retailers who aren't associated with Alizongle in some way existing at all. |
| 397 | * ''Webcomic/MyLifeAtWar'': Mega Fun Food LLC is by inference a massive agriculture Mega Corp. They're wealthy enough to hire their own private army in the form of the 1st Investment Recovery Battalion. |
| 398 | * In ''Webcomic/QuantumVibe'' Earth is split between two gigantic Mega Corps, and all the other off-world planets and stations seen so far have been owned by corporate joint ventures except for Luna. Luna has had its government nearly-completely swallowed by Omega Tek. Joe's Diners and Muc Ar Foulain, from the asteroid belts and the L5 Colony respectively, are a lot less evil than the conventional Mega Corp, though. |
| 399 | %%* ''Webcomic/SarahZero'' has [[FunWithAcronyms PISSS]]. |
| 400 | * In ''Webcomic/{{Skyvein}}'', the Core is the government/corporation fusion that controls all of the remaining (not-so-free) world. |
| 401 | * ''Webcomic/SluggyFreelance'': |
| 402 | ** [=HeretiCorp=]. |
| 403 | ** A later arc deals with other corporations run by supervillains such as Nofun corp and Crushestro industries, though they are more specialized (mutagens and weapons in the case of the two stated). |
| 404 | * ''Webcomic/{{SSDD}}'': The Maytec Consortium essentially owns [[DividedStatesOfAmerica California]], has a standing army, and claimed all of Mars (until the Anarchists went there and found better mineral deposits). They're essentially the third greatest superpower in the solar system, due partially to their selling weapons to both sides of the CORE/Anarchist cold war. |
| 405 | * The eponymous ''Webcomic/SteamgearInc'', the largest tech company in the world that effectively has its own police force. |
| 406 | * ''Webcomic/TheSuburbanJungle'' had [=MegaHugeConGloMaCo=], which was acquired by Amalgatronix Corporation. From the FAQ: |
| 407 | -->'''What does [=MegaHugeConglomaCo=] do, exactly?'''\ |
| 408 | They merge with, take over, or establish corporate relationships with other huge companies with similarly vague names. |
| 409 | * ''Webcomic/{{Unsounded}}'': Beadman's Betters is a giant company that produces just about everything, from food items, to sex toys, to weapons and magical constructs, and the owner of the company, Jab Beadman, is the power behind Sharteshane's PuppetKing. |
| 410 | [[/folder]] |
| 411 | |
| 412 | [[folder:Web Original]] |
| 413 | * ''Literature/AboveGround'': Precision Horizons is an all-powerful corporation ruling the underground human community. The Guild plays a similar role on the surface of the planet. |
| 414 | * ''Website/GaiaOnline'': G-Corp. Founded by death-fearing megalomaniac Johnny Gambino, and Edmund, G-Corp was responsible for a majority of Gaia's technological, scientific, and medical advances. Unfortunately, when Edmund left the company, things took a turn for the worse. Now everything G-Corp makes (from pet dinosaurs to hair growth formulas) has a penchant to [[GoneHorriblyWrong go horribly, horribly wrong]]. (To put this in perspective, G-Corp has caused the ZombieApocalypse ''twice''. In fact, zombies seem to be their chief product.) Ironically, G-Corp is actually the ''good'' company. [[spoiler:The evil company is [=NeXus=], run by [[BigBad Labtech X]]. [=NeXus's=] sole purpose is to provide X with the means to take over the world. Their most famous achievement is using [[AppliedPhlebotinum G'hi]] to create a self-replicating, almost invincible army of [[EverythingTryingToKillYou Animated]]. They also build a cool UnderwaterBase, a HumongousMecha, and a ScarfOfAssKicking.]] G-Corp also has a copy in S-Corp, which consists of "Elftechs", and is owned by the Claus family. |
| 415 | * Website/JibJab's Big Box Mart counts in regards to big box stores like Wal-Mart and their negative effect on people. |
| 416 | * In ''Website/OrionsArm'': The solar system was ruled by Megacorporations led by transapient AIs up until the [[GreyGoo Nanodisaster]]. Now [[DeusEstMachina Archailects]] control most of the population of Terragen space and have by and large displaced them, but Mega Corps still have a great deal of influence in the Non-Coercive-Zone ([=NoCoZo=]), a lack-of-a-country built on the principles of extreme libertarianism, and the Periphery. |
| 417 | * Website/TVTropes has its very own TropeCo/TropeCo, which primarily acts as a way to make JustForFun faux-infomercials out of tropes. |
| 418 | * ''Literature/WhateleyUniverse'': Goodkind International. They make a big deal about taking care of the "little people" and being a responsible corporation. But the CEO disinherited and disowned his own son when the boy became a mutant, and ''turned the kid over to a company mad scientist for experiments''. They're also behind the highly anti-mutant "Humanity First!" organization and the main backer of the anti-mutant paramilitary Knight of Purity, as well major funders of the international Mutant Commission Office. |
| 419 | * Music/TheStupendium song "The Fine Print" [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvANy49Kqhw&list=RDMM&index=13 (which you can watch here)]] is a song based on the video game Videogame/TheOuterWorlds about the Halcyon Holding Corporation and poor living/working conditions of those employed by the corporation and their never-ending debt which has them working until death. The song ramps up much of this narrative, having an executive who couldn't care less about those below him, workers who are exasperated but do their job because they don't have their choice, and a series of appearances by the mascot Moon Man who presents dystopian statements with a chipper demeanor. |
| 420 | --->And you’ll be grateful for seats at the table |
| 421 | --->Though it dips at one end and the bench is unstable |
| 422 | --->You may waste your days but at least you were able |
| 423 | --->To pay off your grave since we leased you your cradle |
| 424 | [[/folder]] |
| 425 | |
| 426 | [[folder:Web Videos]] |
| 427 | * In ''WebVideo/TheKaskadeRegion'', a fan-created Franchise/{{Pokemon}} region of the North American Pacific Northwest, the biggest company around is Amaze-All, a major parcel delivery service, and also the parent company behind Poryphones, the Goomaze web search application, and the [=FaceDex=] social media app (effectively an {{Expy}} of Amazon if it also did the work of Apple, Google and Facebook). Headed by CEO Tom Bezzle, it effectively controls 100% of the delivery services in the Kaskade region, a majority in Orre, Unova, Galar and Kalos, and is steadily making inroads into the Japanese regions. It has been known to buy out rivals and news companies that criticize it, has rumored connections to organized crime, and is also doing research into Kaskade's weather for... some reason. |
| 428 | * ''LetsPlay/{{Mahu}}'': The Ahadi Conglomerate in the "Second Chance" series. An alien race which works mostly as a mega corporation spanning several star systems, everything in Ahadi society is focused on business. Profit and profit alone dictates alliances and war. |
| 429 | [[/folder]] |
| 430 | |
| 431 | [[folder:Western Animation]] |
| 432 | * ''WesternAnimation/BoJackHorseman'' has "AOL-Time-Warner-Pepsico-Viacom-Halliburton-[[Franchise/{{Terminator}} Skynet]]-Toyota-Trader Joe's" starting in Season 3, which itself is eventually bought out by White Whale Corp. in Season 6. White Whale Corp. also buys up "Girl Croosh" that same season in order to kill a negative story. |
| 433 | -->'''Steffonie''': Well, technically they bought Fuddrucker's and merged it with Dow Chemical to create a new media venture called Spronk. Spronk acquired Univision, which will incorporate Girl Croosh into the Gizmodo mist of [[AdvertisingDisguisedAsNews advertorial]]. |
| 434 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheBoondocks'': Ed Wuncler I is in charge of a family-owned conglomerate called Wuncler Enterprises, which controls most of the local economy and politics in Woodcrest; the Wunclers own most of the businesses, houses, and other real estate in town, and they've also [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney bought off]] [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections all the authorities]] [[KarmaHoudini to get away with illegal activity]]. |
| 435 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheBotsMaster'': The Robotic Megafact Corporation, also known as the "RM Corp" or simply "The Corp". |
| 436 | * This is mentioned in ''WesternAnimation/ACharlieBrownChristmas''. Lucy remarks that "We all know that Christmas is a big commercial racket. It's run by a big eastern syndicate, you know." |
| 437 | %%* ''WesternAnimation/DaftPlanet'' has [=GigantiCorp=]. |
| 438 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Detentionaire}}'': Mann, Wurst and Finnwich, whose logo appears on pretty much everything, from soft drinks to technology to paint. |
| 439 | -->'''Cassandra''': Our company is not only the largest in the world, it ''runs'' the world. |
| 440 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' has Mom-Corp, a massive company that seems to have stocks in everything and a hand in every business, from Mom's Friendly Robot Company, to Mom's Babies Your Packages, with the joke rapidly expanding. It got to the point where the plot of a video game was that Mom actually owned over 50% of the planet and was legally able to turn the Earth into a warship to take over the universe. |
| 441 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Gargoyles}}'': Xanatos's company. He's the wealthiest man, with the tallest tower, and several other "-est"s. The scary part is that the comic series is busily ''subverting'' this trope, as Xanatos is [[spoiler:a raw recruit in the Illuminati, the group that secretly runs the world]]. |
| 442 | %%* ''WesternAnimation/GIJoeRenegades'': Cobra. |
| 443 | * ''WesternAnimation/HarveyBirdmanAttorneyAtLaw'' has Sebben & Sebben, the legal firm where Harvey works, which is later revealed to have sister branches that cover numerous products: |
| 444 | -->'''Narrator''': The affiliated companies of Sebben & Sebben are leaders of industry worldwide: rice, soy, hemp, flavored breastmilk, LSD, [[BreadEggsBreadedEggs breastmilk-flavored LSD]], those twirly things on strippers' breasts, textiles, tiles, text, baltimization, and vintage pointed sticks. |
| 445 | %%* ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim'': Depending on how one looks at it, the Irken Empire could be this or is at least striving to be.%%How? |
| 446 | * ''WesternAnimation/JimmyTwoShoes'': Misery Inc.. Its CEO, [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Lucius Heinous VII]], is wrongly identified as the mayor of [[AHellOfATime Miseryville]] on the Creator/DisneyXD website, but that ''still'' accurately describes his position. |
| 447 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'' features a few budding Mega Corps: |
| 448 | ** The first is Future Industries, which starts out as an automobile manufacturer, but also produces weapons, airships, and airplanes on the side for the police and military [[spoiler:as well as for the Equalists]]. When ownership turns over to Asami, it further delves into arm dealing, construction, and even clothing (WordOfGod states that Asami designed the wingsuits for the new Air Nation). |
| 449 | ** The other is Varrick Global Industries, which began as a shipping enterprise, but over the course of the series, is shown to also produce its own vehicles (like snowmobiles, yachts, and jet skis), weapons, movers (effectively pioneering the Avatar universe’s film industry), as well as [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking baked goods and hair dyes]]. |
| 450 | ** A third business, Cabbage Corp, isn't quite on the same scale but maintains a significant presence by taking the niche of lower cost you-get-what-you-pay-for alternatives to the products the other two make. |
| 451 | %%* ''WesternAnimation/{{Motorcity}}'': Kane Co. |
| 452 | * ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb'': {{Lampshade|Hanging}}ed in "[[Recap/PhineasAndFerbGotGame Got Game]]", where we see a company named "Mega[[MyNaymeIs lo]]corp" in passing. |
| 453 | %%* ''WesternAnimation/RandyCunninghamNinthGradeNinja'': [=McFist=] Industries. |
| 454 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheReplacements'': [=FleemCo=], which evidently produces and/or runs absolutely ''everything'' the characters use. |
| 455 | * ''WesternAnimation/RockosModernLife'': Conglom-O, who slogan is "We Own You". "They even own City Hall!" |
| 456 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Rugrats}}'' has [=MergeCorp=] (later called "[=MegaCorp=]"), of which [[BrattyHalfPint Angelica]] [[BigBad Pickles]]' mother, [[CorruptCorporateExecutive Charlotte]], is the CEO. In one episode where Charlotte's forced to bring her daughter and nephew with her to work (when she and Drew couldn't find a babysitter to watch them for the day), Charlotte describes her job to Angelica as this: "A corporation is like a big, hungry monster. ''My'' job is to find smaller, weaker monsters for it to eat." |
| 457 | * ''WesternAnimation/SummerMemories'': Soda With A Marble, the producers of Jason and Ronnie's favorite soft drink, is a recurring backdrop of the show's setting, even getting its own focus episode. What we see of it shows it to be classic Mega Corp material - incredibly pervasive, constantly pushing products on the populace, and owning an absurd amount of businesses that sell products completely unrelated to its main line of products. [[spoiler:In the show's DistantFinale, they've taken over the entire town.]] |
| 458 | * ''WesternAnimation/TaleSpin'': There is little that Khan Industries does not produce and/or sell. This Mega Corp has got the tallest skyscraper in Cape Suzette and even has its own Navy and Air Force. |
| 459 | * Creator/WarnerBros: Surely Acme, makers of innumerable cartoon products, must qualify. Certainly they're the only company big enough to arrange ProductPlacement whenever [[WesternAnimation/WileECoyoteAndTheRoadrunner Wile E. Coyote]] makes a purchase. |
| 460 | * ''WesternAnimation/JorelsBrother'': The company ''Shostners & Shostners'' is behind almost every product seen in the show. The son of the company's owners, William Shostners, is very spoiled and selfish as a result of this. |
| 461 | [[/folder]] |
| 462 |
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