History Main / IKnowWhatYouFear

->'''Pitch''': I ''know'' so! It's the one thing I always know; people's greatest fears.

It goes without saying that this is usually a [[BadPowersBadPeople bad guy power]]. If it's a power used by a DeadlyDecadentCourt, OmniscientCouncilOfVagueness or just a plain evil enough version of TheGovernment, then it will almost always take the form of {{Room 101}}. It can, however, be used by a TerrorHero who ultimately fights for the good guys -- though, naturally, these tend to be some shade of AntiHero.

* ''Film/{{Poltergeist}}''. According to their psychic medium consultant, the ghost causing the Freelings all the trouble has this ability.

* ''WesternAnimation/DastardlyAndMuttleyInTheirFlyingMachines'': In "Spy in the Sky," (Fun-In #3, August 1970 Gold Key) Dick Dastardly sends Muttley on a secret mission to learn Yankee Doodle Pigeon's greatest fear. Sensing a spy in his midst, Yankee Doodle makes Muttley think he's scared of lightning. The Vulture Squadron takes off armed with devices to shoot lightning bolts, [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption but it backfires]]--Yankee Doodle's flight helmet is equipped with lightning rods.

** Since a phobophages' intended victim is at a horror movie convention, this results in {{Captain Ersatz}}en and {{Shout Out}}s aplenty.

* In the ''Literature/{{Belgariad}}''[='s=] prequels, Polgara's MindRape persuasion method is revealed to be this. It only failed once, because the target was on drugs (note that if she put much effort into it, she probably could have un-drugged him like Belgarath did in the prequel).

* ''WesternAnimation/RiseOfTheGuardians'': Pitch Black has this power- being the Nightmare King and the original Boogeyman, this is only expected.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheGrimAdventuresOfBillyAndMandy'': TheMovie had Horror's Hand, which was able to bring one's worst fears to life. For Billy, it was a spider-clown-mailman; Irwin had to stand-up comedy in front of bears; and Mandy saw a future in which she's now the fat and cheerful wife of Irwin. As for Grim, it had no effect on him because he was already experiencing his worst fear: being enslaved and bossed around by children.
* The Gremloblin from the ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'' episode "Boss Mabel" is a Fear Inducer; anyone who looks into its eyes will be confronted by a vision of their worst fear. Unfortunately for the Gremloblin, Dipper manages to use a mirror to [[HoistByHisOwnPetard subject it to its own fear-gaze]] [[note]]"You've become your own father!"[[/note]].

* Barbas, the Demon of Fear in ''Series/{{Charmed|1998}}'', is a Fear Perceiver. Played by Billy Drago (John Bly from ''Series/TheAdventuresOfBriscoCountyJr'').

* ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "And The Children Shall Lead". Gorgon the Friendly Angel taught the children the power of learning another person's fears and using the fears to disable and control them. The kids caused Sulu to see swords surrounding the Enterprise so he wouldn't change course and used Uhura's fear of dying to prevent her from calling Starfleet Command.

** The alien monster in the story ''The Mind of Evil'' attacked people with hallucinations of their worst fear.
** Similarly, the hotel in the ''God Complex'', with the added twist that [[spoiler: the ''fear'' is a trap to draw out their ''faith'']]
** The episode ''Frontier in Space'' has the Master using a "hypnosound" to induce the worst fear. Humans see the alien Draconians, while the Draconians see humans. Jo Grant sees a monster from one of her past adventures.

** Episode "Blood" dealt with people whose phobias were heightened to unbearable levels because they were exposed to drug called LSD-M and they were possibly receiving subliminal messages. (Or they might have been hallucinating them.) The fears included {{Claustrophobia}}, fear of being raped and [[AfraidOfBlood fear of blood]].
** "Wetwired": Government controlled people through SubliminalSeduction transferred through TV broadcasting and caused them very vivid {{Hallucinations}} of their worst fears which compelled them to murder even their loved ones. Scully thought that Mulder is collaborating with TheConspiracy and he helped them to abduct her.
** In "X-Cops", the monster of the week could sense people's worst fear and made them real. Some were literal monsters (a wasp man or a generic villainous killer). A man panicked because he thought his partner is going to leave him. One woman died of exotic disease simply because Scully happened to mention its name.

* In ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'', "The Scarecrow" uses a hallucination-inducing gas to discover and induce a person's greatest fear. (Ironically, poetic justice proves his ''own'' greatest fear turns out to be-- a fear of BATS!)

* This is the central concept of ''Film/GalaxyOfTerror'' where a group of space travelers sent on a rescue mission are trapped on a planet with a mysterious pyramid that's revealed to be able to bring the characters' worsts fears to life. These manifestations are usually monsters that kill them. For example, one character is terrified of maggots, which leads to her [[FanDisservice squicky]] death.

* In ''Literature/TheMysteriousBenedictSociety', the Whisperer, a machine invented by the BigBad Ledroptha Curtain, is able to detect an individual's worst fear when they're seated in it. It then sends out powerful contentment to deny that fear so that the individual will be docile and do what Mr. Curtain wants.[[/folder]]

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** In the earlier iteration of the Peter Pan mythos, {{Hook}}, Peter, and the Lost Boys capitalize on Hook's fear of ticking clocks (and the Croc who made such noises) to encircle him with clocks, driving him briefly into a panic during the final duel.

* The Shadow of Fear from ''WesternAnimation/XiaolinShowdown'' uses a combination of Perception and Inducement. In order to know what a person fears, one has to use its first power to literally enter someone else's mind; the person using the Shadow of Fear also has some serious reality warping abilities in this state. Once a person has delved into victim's mind long enough to know what they fear, a person can then later use that knowledge to bring their fears to life in the real world.

** This seems to be a major theme in ''Film/TheDarkKnightSaga'', especially in the first part, ''Film/BatmanBegins''.

* Barbas, the Demon of Fear in ''Series/{{Charmed}}'', is a Fear Perceiver. Played by Billy Drago (John Bly from ''Series/TheAdventuresOfBriscoCountyJr'').

* Tatari from ''[[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Melty Blood]]'' is a [[OurVampiresAreDifferent vampire that is repeatedly created from rumors]], and has the ability to [[RealityWarper manifest people's subconscious fears as reality]].

[[folder: VisualNovels]]
* The King in ''VisualNovel/HatofulBoyfriend Holiday Star'' [[spoiler: is capable of this and uses it to try and drive visitors over the DespairEventHorizon. If he can take away their desire to leave and face the real world and the real problems in their lives [[AssimilationPlot they can stay with him]] and [[GettingSmiliesPaintedOnYourSoul be happy]]. Mostly he talks to them and gives them picture books with simple stories about allegories of themselves inevitably failing and dying, but he also tries to guilt trip Yuuya by talking about what he did and conjuring broken eggs.]]

* In ''MagicTheGathering'' the black mist that exudes from the empty space where the top half of the planeswalker Ashiok's head used to be enhances Ashiok's ability to see the worst nightmare's of anyone it touches, and bring them to life.

** It should be noted that this is imperfect--he went through four forms trying to find a weakness in TheIncredibleHulk (who, as it turns out, isn't afraid of anything), and got tossed into a parked car for his troubles.