History Main / DilatingDoor

** Amusingly averted in the 2009 reboot of ''Film/StarTrek''. Whereas the Star Trek universe does other things (see below), the Starfleet facility on Delta Vega has a normal exterior door with a panic bar.

* A bizarre aversion in ''Film/TronLegacy''. The interior of [[spoiler:Flynn's]] house in the Grid has obviously visible hinges and door knobs on all of the doors, such that they wouldn't be out of place in a regular modern house. This, of course, is taking place in the entirely virtual world where CoolButInefficient is king. Even stranger when compared with the AsceticAesthetic design of the rest of the house. In particular, the windows stand out, as they are not made of a solid substance, but instead seem to be SomeKindOfForceField, marking a pretty stark contrast with the doors.

-->-- '''Literature/BeyondThisHorizon''' by Creator/RobertAHeinlein.

** Most other doors and hatches in ''VideoGame/MetroidPrime'' are pretty complex as well. Rarely do they simply slide open - there are often many interlocking parts and convoluted mechanisms going on, ''especially'' on the [[EternalEngine Pirate Homeworld]] in ''[[VideoGame/MetroidPrime3Corruption Corruption]]''. Some even require [[EverythingIsBetterWithSpinning spinning the Morph Ball]] to operate.

* Doors in ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' open upwards, primarily due to limitations of the engine. "Polyobjects" from the version of the engine used in ''VideoGame/{{Hexen}}'' and later source ports can be used to make doors that actually imitate real-world door behavior.

** This is explained in the ''VideoGame/MetroidPrime'' games as being a method of bypassing the door's normal opening mechanism; you're basically lowering a weak shield that's there to keep wildlife (or you in the case of stronger ones) out and the doors are opening automatically (presumably there's a more peaceful manner of opening the doors). The ones that need missiles explicitly have a blast shield (which disappears after being removed the first time) on them for extra security. Some areas of ''VideoGame/SuperMetroid'' have doors which lack the shields and just let your straight through when you approach.

** On the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "The First Duty", the Academy dorms have doorknobs and hinges.
*** Probably to give the cadets more things to polish.

** Parodied in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'' in the Mechanist's Lair where the main entrance is a ridiculously complex set of doors that take easily couple of minutes to open entirely. It's also a ShoutOut to ''Series/GetSmart'' and/or ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'', being exactly the same as one of the doors in both those series' famous door sequences.

** The defensive iris used on the titular gate of ''Series/StargateSG1''. Arguably, this can be justified because the alien gate didn't come with a convenient slot to allow sliding a solid metal door over the event horizon. But then they completely forgot to explain where the iris disappears to when open and where the presumably complex mechanism for operating it is. By ''Series/StargateAtlantis'', they just had a more prop-friendly generally-invisible ForceField that prevented invasion via "Unscheduled Off-World Activation."

* ''Franchise/{{Halo}}''. Most Covenant and Forerunner doors are like this. Covenant doors beep before they open though. The Flood-overrun High Charity in the third game has sphincter doors similar to ''Prey''.

* [[{{Squick}} Sphincter]] and other doors from ''VideoGame/{{Prey}}''.

This trope refers to a particular sci-fi convention of connoting a "futuristic" setting with doors and hatches that open in unusual, hi-tech ways - doors that dilate like an iris, doors that slide up into the ceiling, doors that ''dissolve'' and rematerialise... Apparently, plain old hinges are extinct in the future.

!!Examples

[[folder:AnimeAndManga]]
* The doors on the industrial ship in ''Anime/GhostInTheShell: Innocence'' don't make any sense. They consists of four squared panels fixed to two hinges on each side of the doorframe at middle height which are tilted sideways and into the walls. However, it [[RuleOfCool looks quite cool]] when Batou charges through the coridors and every 15 meters one of these opens just a split second before he reaches it.
* Seriously, any SciFi anime (especially pre-2000) has these doors.

[[folder:{{Film}}]]

[[folder:{{Literature}}]]

* Creator/SamuelRDelany's ''Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand'' had "the door deliquesced".
** Parodied in Creator/DavidLangford's [[http://www.ansible.co.uk/writing/drabbles.html first drabble]].

** This sort of doorway is also explored by Creator/MichaelMoorcock in TheElricSaga. Elric must enter the perilous '''[[FreudianSlipperySlope Pulsating Cavern]]''', which has a certain ''organic'' quality to it...

[[folder:LiveActionTV]]
* The defensive iris used on the titular gate of ''Series/StargateSG1''. Arguably, this can be justified because the alien gate didn't come with a convenient slot to allow sliding a solid metal door over the event horizon. But then they completely forgot to explain where the iris disappears to when open and where the presumably complex mechanism for operating it is. By ''Series/StargateAtlantis'', they just had a more prop-friendly generally-invisible ForceField that prevented invasion via "Unscheduled Off-World Activation."
* On the original ''[[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries Star Trek]]'' they did everything possible to make the doors interesting; except for having it descend into the floor. That was too expensive.

* ''Series/DoctorWho'' has far, far too many "dilating doors" to list here, but special mention goes to a door in ''Day of the Daleks'' which curls up toward the ceiling in a slow, sinister fashion. ''The Ark in Space'' also features a sliding door that almost takes the Fourth Doctor's arm off. "I'm rather attached to it," he said.
** And, of course, out of universe the classic series TARDIS interior doors qualified--they were supposed to swing open or closed with the push of a button, but (like many of the show's mechanics) rarely functioned correctly. The new series solved this by doing away with the interior doors entirely.
* In ''Series/{{Firefly}}'', on ''Serenity'', the doors to the crew quarters were these elaborate swinging ladder/door combination things. Quite space-efficient, if a bit easy to lock from the wrong side. (And not wheelchair-accessible, although the guest quarters were.)
** Still quite modest for this trope, since all the doors on the ship are opened by hand. The guest quarters have perfectly ordinary, manual sliding doors, again a matter of saving space.
* In ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'', the main characters are compelled through an elaborate series of variously opening doors and into the screening room.
** Well, Cambot is. The audience never sees the other characters during the door sequence; they might be going into the theater through a side door.
** And this might just be a shout out to the opening and ending sequences of Get Smart!
* The doors to personal quarters on the eponymous ''Series/BabylonFive'' open by rotating clockwise. They have been known to fall on cast members. Others open like modern automatic doors, sliding to either side.
** Those doors are actually quite clever, as they're held up by electrical power when open and are closed by the ArtificialGravity produced when the station rotates, with no need for a motor to close them. In the event of a hull breach or life support failure the doors would slam shut on their own without any active safety system required.

[[folder:TabletopRPG]]

[[folder:VideoGames]]

* ''VideoGame/{{Half-Life|1}}'' - quite a lot of the doors in the Black Mesa Complex do this vertically and horizontally. VideoGame/{{Half-Life 2}} introduces Combine doors, which look like a ton of scrap metal held in place, and each piece individually slides out of the way when the door is opened.

[[folder:WebComics]]

[[folder:WesternAnimation]]

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', the doors in the police station are a semi-complex pattern of sliding metal slats. Justified, because the main body of the police force are trained [[ExtraOreDinary Metal Benders]], and it's their powers - not mechanisms - that move the doors around. Most of the other doors in the series are traditionally hinged or manually slid doors.

* In ''MysteryScienceTheater3000'', the main characters are compelled through an elaborate series of variously opening doors and into the screening room.

** Parodied in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'' in the Mechanist's Lair where the main entrance is a ridiculously complex set of doors that take easily couple of minutes to open entirely. It's also a ShoutOut to ''Series/GetSmart'' and/or ''MysteryScienceTheater3000'', being exactly the same as one of the doors in both those series' famous door sequences.

** This sort of doorway is also explored by Creator/MichaelMoorcock in TheElricSaga. Elric must enter the perilous Pulsating Cavern, which has a certain ''organic'' quality to it....

* ''{{Halo}}''. Most Covenant and Forerunner doors are like this. Covenant doors beep before they open though. The Flood-overrun High Charity in the third game has sphincter doors similar to ''Prey''.

* The doors on the industrial ship in ''GhostInTheShell: Innocence'' don't make any sense. They consists of four squared panels fixed to two hinges on each side of the doorframe at middle height which are tilted sideways and into the walls. However, it [[RuleOfCool looks quite cool]] when Batou charges through the coridors and every 15 meters one of these opens just a split second before he reaches it.

* James White was fond of this in his ''SectorGeneral'' books, even having a speech about what kind of doors there are in the universe. Essentially, doors can open through hinges, slide in or out, open up or down, dilate clockwise or counterclockwise, or create a quantum-physics manipulating field around themselves so that every atom of a person can pass through without hitting the atoms in the door. The person making the speech went on to say that no civilization in the universe was known to be advanced enough to use the last option, and if any were ever to be encountered, [[SufficientlyAdvancedAliens "we will be sure to be very polite."]]

* In ''{{Traveller}}'', spaceships could have iris (dilating) doors.

[[folder:WebComics]]
* Subverted in [[http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20100116.html this strip]] from ''TheInexplicableAdventuresOfBob,'' when Bob is surprised that alien doors have doorknobs.
* In ''{{Drowtales}}'', the forest-dwelling light elves make use of a magical version of this trope, formed from living, moving wood that spirals open.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:WesternAnimation]]
* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Cyberchase}}'', the kids go to Symmetria to find Ava. The building they encounter has a round door with four holes in it, mounted into a wall with four holes in it. By default, the holes don't align, but every once in a while, the door rotates so that they do align briefly. The trick to getting through is to jump through ''while it's moving''. Nobody gets stuck in it, but it's just asking to happen. Good thing those kids are fairly nimble...
* In ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', the doors in the police station are a semi-complex pattern of sliding metal slats. Justified, because the main body of the police force are trained [[ExtraOreDinary Metal Benders]], and it's their powers - not mechanisms - that move the doors around. Most of the other doors in the series are traditionally hinged or manually slid doors.
[[/folder]]

* The doors in {{Descent}} have a variety of opening animations, from just two panels sliding vertically apart, up to to six-part dilating doors, and several in between.
* The ''{{Metroid}}'' series is an excellent example given that pretty much every door needs to be shot to open. Sometimes they require multiple shots. Sometimes they [[LockedDoor need missiles]].
** This is explained in the ''MetroidPrime'' games as being a method of bypassing the door's normal opening mechanism; you're basically lowering a weak shield that's there to keep wildlife (or you in the case of stronger ones) out and the doors are opening automatically (presumably there's a more peaceful manner of opening the doors). The ones that need missiles explicitly have a blast shield (which disappears after being removed the first time) on them for extra security. Some areas of ''VideoGame/SuperMetroid'' have doors which lack the shields and just let your straight through when you approach.

* ''QuestForGloryIV'' has a cave with doors that look like [[{{Squick}} giant sphincters]]; however, this is Justified since [[spoiler:the "cave" is actually the fossilized corpse of an EldritchAbomination]].

* ''StarshipTitanic'''s arboretum has a door that 'grows' open and closed and is made of metal plants.

* In ''PlanetSide 1'''s [[UndergroundLevel Core Combat caverns]], the [[AdvancedAncientAcropolis Ancient Vanu facilities]] all feature large round doors which vanish when approached, then re-materialize. The doors in human facilities such as the bases and towers feature sliding doors which split along the center. Vehicle bay doors in the Tech Plants slide into the ground when a vehicle leaves the vehicle pad.

->''Walker pressed through the labia of the shop entrance into the heat and noise and stink of the street.''

* ''VideoGame/{{Half-Life|1}}'' - quite a lot of the doors in the Black Mesa Complex do this vertically and horizontally. VideoGame/{{Half-Life 2}} introduces Combine doors, which look like a ton of scrap metal held in place, which all individually slide out of the way when opened.

* ''Film/{{Alien}}'': The sections of the air duct system on the starship ''Nostromo'' are seperated by dilating hatches.

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', the doors in the police station are a semi-complex pattern of sliding metal slats. Justified, because the main body of the police force are trained [[ExtraOreDinary Metal Benders]], and its their powers - not mechanisms - that move the doors around. Most of the other doors in the series are traditionally hinged or manually slid doors.