History Main / MadScientist

* ''Fanfic/AdventureOfTheMorningStar'': Singed, like in canon ''VideoGame/LeagueOfLegends'' and ''WesternAnimation/{{Arcane}}'', is a deranged man fueled by his twisted scientific curiosity. He turns people and rats into strange Shimmer monsters that tear apart whoever he or his employer, Silco, order them to.

[[AC:''Series/{{Arrowverse}}'']]
* ''[[Fanfic/ToHellAndBackArrowverse To Hell and Back]]'': It's implied Barry dabbled in this while he was a member of the League of Assassins.

* Elon Musk has reached MemeticBadass status for his [[BuffySpeak mad sciencing]], having built and sold a ([[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial not a]]) flamethrower for the hell of it and shooting his car into space just to prove what the Space-X rocket was capable of. [[UpToEleven And this is only a few specific examples]]. A common joke is he's allowed to do what he wants out of fear he'll turn into [[Film/SpiderMan1 The Green Goblin]] if anyone tries to stop him. Granted Musk isn't directly involved in most of the research and inventions conducted by his companies and is more of a mad "investor" than a scientist, but the internet simply doesn't care.

* Yet another article from ''Website/{{Cracked}}'' about the [[ScienceIsBad dangers of science]] [[http://www.cracked.com/article_17039_9-real-life-mad-scientists.html here]]. Surprisingly, Josef Mengele didn't get mentioned. Perhaps [[EvenEvilHasStandards the Cracked writers]] [[DudeNotFunny didn't want to dedicate an entry]] to a guy whose idea of "science" was torturing helpless prisoners for kicks. Seanbaby's article about exploring the depths of the human mind with ''VideoGame/TheSims3'' pokes at the whole Nazi scientist thing. Why, without ethics, he says, scientific knowledge increased by leaps and bounds! But then World War II ended and the Nazis that were left were forced to treat Jews, gypsies, and assorted other non-Aryans like human beings again, and that all stopped. So isn't it wonderful now that EA has created a people simulator we can use for the same thing?

* [[NamesTheSame Victor Frankenstein]] from ''WesternAnimation/{{Frankenweenie}}'' [[spoiler: and the other kids who resurrect their pets]]. Subverted with the science teacher, who just has [[DiggingYourselfDeeper a very poor way of explaining himself]].
* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Igor}}'' mad scientists are like rock stars, and one of the most well known is Dr Schadenfreude. In a subversion, Schadenfreude is actually a fraud (no pun intended). He doesn't have the brains to be an actual Mad Scientist, so he instead uses his FemmeFatale girlfriend to steal other scientists' inventions and claim them as his own. The titular character wants to be a Mad Scientist himself, but Igors are forbidden from doing anything on their own lest they be "[[HumanResources recycled]]". So far, his successes include keeping a functional BrainInAJar (who can't spell "Brain" right) and making an intelligent rodent immortal, while also giving him a death wish.
* The professor from ''Animation/TheIllusionauts''. Bonus points for having [[Creator/ChristopherLloyd Doc Brown]] to provide the voice.
* Syndrome from ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles''. [[spoiler: Created rocket boots before he hit puberty, as part of a youthful desire to become a crime-fighter. But when his hero told him to back off,]] he spent more than a decade plotting against all the heroes-in-hiding and [[HeroKiller killing them off one by one]]. His ultimate goal [[spoiler:is to sell his inventions for profit to make superheroes obsolete, ''after'' he'll grow bored of being a "superhero"]]. His hair wasn't the only thing about him that was loco.
** Edna Mode, the GadgeteerGenius that the heroes turn to when they need a fashionable skintight costume that's also bombproof, laser-resistant and machine washable, is of the 'tame' variety and specializes in textile engineering.
* Strangely enough in ''WesternAnimation/Incredibles2'' all actual villains are mad scientist. The Underminer [[spoiler:-- has a super-drill that digs through rock at high speed, prosthetic limbs with enhanced strength]] as well as the Screenslaver [[spoiler:-- hypnotizing others through remotely hacked screens with very fine control of the actions of the victim]] both have a level of technology at least several decades ahead of the movies setting.

-->"I'm not a quack, I'm a mad scientist!"

* ''Film/{{Nightwish}}'': The professor eventually takes his students captive to force them to cooperate with his dangerous experiments to investigate ghost activity. He even fatally stabs his assistant in the gut when he threatens to expose what the professor is doing.

** It's up to ''TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}}'' to take up slack for the others on this trope. Being a "Gothic horror" game-setting, it does so in spades, with golem-crafters (Victor Mordenheim, Emil Bollenbach), MixAndMatchCritter-makers (Frantisek Markov, Vjorn Horstman), Mind-Raping psychiatrists (Daclaud Heinforth, Celeste d'Honaire-Levode), and Woobie-ish crackpots trying to reconstruct their dead loved ones (too many to list). (It also abounds in mad ''wizards,'' but that's a different trope.)
** ''Literature/{{Dragonlance}}'' developed the concept of tinker gnomes, and ''TabletopGame/{{Spelljammer}}'' imported some as they spread from Krynn in their insane space-steamboats. Mad science is their principal business, religion, and means of defense. They're the creators of such creatures as the giant space hamster, the carnivorous giant space hamster, the fire-breathing phase doppelganger giant space hamster or the miniature giant space hamster. And Al-mi'raj ("experiment 72"), known for non-tinker gnomes as "[[KillerRabbit Blink bunny]]". They tend to build [[RubeGoldbergDevice overcomplicated contraptions]] prone to slapstick malfunction.
** ''TabletopGame/ForgottenRealms'' has Lantan, the land full of followers of Gond, [[OddJobGods the patron of invention]]. A good example is Tinkersdam of Gond, an alchemist who, after far too many accidents involving explosions, was exiled from several cities and ended up in a cave in Tethyr. He made high explosives just for fun, and directed charges at that... but sucked at making time-fuses. He also made pre-ordered weird stuff, like a mask that allowed a sleeping half-elf to pose as an elf in reverie because it did flawlessly fit over his client's face and has quite convincing open and ''blinking'' eyes (no magic). He also got some sort of hyper-awareness in his lab -- he not only never knocked over anything by accident, but didn't even let a kettle he didn't see boil out. Which may be the main reason why he lived that long. Another example is Nadul [=DaRoni=], gnomish [=DaVinci=] {{expy}} whose ads appeared in Aurora's Catalogue with a comment "Madman, perhaps; genius, perhaps; annoying, most definitely".

* Dr. Desmond Bradford, head of Lone Star in ''TabletopGame/{{Rifts}}'', is notable in that his madness doesn't manifest in cackling insanity or hideous cruelty. He conducts his experiments like a good scientist, with controls and careful measures. The problem is that he ''literally'' believes [[AGodAmI he is a god]], and as such is above such petty things as "laws" and "morals". Given that Lone Star is a ''genetics'' lab, this results in experiments and creations that [[EvenEvilHasStandards would utterly horrify the Coalition States]] if they were ever exposed.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}'':

* ''[[http://archiveofourown.org/works/11447304 Mad Scientists Anonymous]]'' plays with the idea that Dr Nambu from ''Anime/ScienceNinjaTeamGatchaman'' along with all the iterations from ''Anime/BattleOfThePlanets'', ''Anime/GForceGuardiansOfSpace'', ''Anime/EagleRiders" and the OAV version were all "as mad as a box of frogs," and sent them to a meeting of the eponymous support group. It goes about as well as you might expect.
* Blog/AskBrainyTwilight. In an odd play on this trope, she struggled with admitting she was one of these until she made a sapient flaming chainsword for a friend.
* Similarly, [[http://askresearchertwilight.tumblr.com/tagged/ResearcherTwilight/chrono Ask Researcher Twilight]], although it's more Grimdark sprinkled with BlackComedy. Twilight has gone completely insane, and is hiding from the government after attepting to [[TheyWouldCutYouUp vivisect]] Celestia.
* It's implied in ''FanFic/ToHellAndBackArrowverse'' Barry dabbled in this while he was a member of the League of Assassins.
* ''Fanfic/CaptainsCrash'': Gyro Gearloose, as per his canon. Launchpad was stranded in Equestria by one of his inventions going wrong.

* ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13545968/1/Wilhuff-Tarkin-Hero-of-the-Rebellion Wilhuff Tarkin, Hero of the Rebellion]]'' has a few examples:
** Raith Sienar is portrayed as an extremely intelligence but morally challenged GadgeteerGenius, whose main issue with the Imperial Navy deciding to put in mass production the [[MookMobile TIE Fighter]] as it is when it was simply [[FlawedPrototype a stripped down and somewhat cramped prototype]] supposed to simply demonstrate the SIE-TIE's engine potential isn't that it will cost numerous pilot lives, but that it would make him appear a hack fighter designer. And when he finds out one of his ideas will be developed in the Death Star, [[DoWrongRight he doesn't really appreciate but considers that the main engineer is competent a boon]]. The narration points out that Sienar's loose morals (as long as they don't mess with common sense) are why he's still friends with [[TheSociopath Wilhuff Tarkin]].
** The head designers of the Death Star are this, in their own ways:
*** Orson Krennic (project director and main engineer) doesn't really care of the destruction it will cause, only to have his name remembered in history for building the Death Star.
*** Galen Erso was forced in... And [[PapaWolf sabotaged the station so it's vulnerable to a fighter attack, knowing that almost two million people will die, to protect his daughter]] and [[CrusadingWidower avenge his wife]]. He's also quite giddy when Qwi Xux' team speeds up his job by years, and when Tarkin admits his true allegiances and declares that less than two million dead are a small revenge for being separated by their child he admits they were ''collateral damage'' to his real goals (Krennic and Tarkin himself).
*** While in Legends she was naive enough to not know the real use of her inventions, here Qwi Xux knows [[EarthShatteringKaboom what the Death Star is going to be used for]]... And still actively collaborates.
*** As of this writing Umak Leth and Bevel Lemelisk haven't received characterization yet, but they too don't care about.
* ''Fanfic/ForTheGloryOfIrk'' has Professor Membrane (as per [[WesternAnimation/InvaderZim canon]]) and his new wife Moira. From gifting their son hypercubes that be used for both storage and combat, to [[AbnormalAmmo weaponizing animals as ammunition for cannons]], they will never let morality or common sense stop them from doing things ForScience.
* ''Fanfic/SeventhEndmostVision'' has Dr. [[AdaptationalVillainy Lucrecia]] [[BigBad Valentine]], who is a ''sedate'' version of this trope, one oriented not around wild scientific discoveries, but around efficiency. A glimpse of her laboratories in Shinra HQ reveal the fundamental difference between her and her canon counterpart, Dr. Hojo; her laboratories actually give the [[BenevolentBoss best pay and best hours]] in Shinra, and it's all focused on incremental improvements [[PragmaticVillainy which give a guaranteed return.]] Her calmness in this regard seems to have paid off for her; [[spoiler: she's become the fic's equivalent of ''Weiss the Immaculate'', all through her own efforts, making her tremendously dangerous.]]

* ''Fanfic/BecomingATrueInvader'': In addition to Zim, there's his old Vortian colleague Crax, [[EveryoneHasStandards who even he thinks]] is crazy.

%%* ''Fanfic/TheButcherBird'': This is Grigori Vinci's role as Captain of the [[VillainProtagonist Nightmare Pirates]].
* ''[[https://www.fimfiction.net/story/489758/great-minds-think-alike Great Minds Think Alike]]'': Two of the future villains who time-travelled to the past to defeat Twilight on her coronation day are mad scientists of different sorts. Voyager is an insane cyborg {{trans|human}}equine who considers her unnatural melding of flesh and machine to be the next step of equine evolution, intends to force it on Equestria over any objections to her plans, and has an extremely self-important personality and tendency towards gloating and angry ranting. Diachrony is a studiously mundane social scientist, whose plan is to assassinate Twilight and throw society into chaos in order to have interesting social trends and upheavals to study.
-->''"You're a mad... sociologist?" she asked.\\
A few guards snickered and Diachrony bristled. "As I've said before, Milady," he said testily, "my science may involve studying ponies and critical reasoning with fuzzy data rather than brute-forcing equations and banging atoms together, but that hardly means I'm not a legitimate mad scientist!"''
%%* ''Fanfic/RiseOfEmpressMidnight'': Twilight's great uncle, Boris Sparkle, could qualify for this, [[spoiler:considering he made the Alicorn Amulet]].%%Making one powerful item doesn't in itself qualify for the trope.
* ''[[http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/transformers-fan-fiction/828948-transformers-meta.html Transformers Meta]]'': Wheeljack reprises his traditional role as this. Appropriately, he has pulled [[BigDamnHero some pretty crazy stunts]], and has invented [[StuffBlowingUp some pretty implausible things]], like [[spoiler: grenades on a sword]].
* ''Fanfic/DungeonKeeperAmi:'' Invoked. Ami's favorite running gag is dressing up in a white lab coat, flipping a large power switch and laughing maniacally; all in good fun.
* ''Fanfic/ChildOfTheStorm'' has the usual example of Doctor Arnim Zola, an AI in (usually) an LMD version of his original body, which as the Head of HYDRA, Lucius Malfoy, observes, makes him look harmless, even contemptible. As Lucius inwardly notes, this is also very much a mistaken impression; Zola's brilliant enough to perfect Extremis, turning it from its MCU variant (superhuman abilities and HealingFactor in exchange for literally explosive volatility) to its 616 variant (able to grant any superpower within ill-defined power limits), and use Jane Foster's research to build a "Nexus Engine" (giant teleporter) for HYDRA's massive vibranium hulled Helicarrier, the ''Dreadnought'' -- which he can control, all by himself.

* In ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7093738/8/Brutal-Harry Brutal Harry]]'' Hermione's uncle George Granger's reaction to being told that magic exists is mad laughter followed by shouting "THERE WILL BE! SO MUCH '''SCIENCE'''!"
* ''Fanfic/RiseOfTheChosen:'' In this ''VideoGame/MegaManZX'' fanfic, the OC Lateral is the Guardians' resident scientist. 99-percent nutter and 1-percent rational, the people who can put up with her eccentric and scatterbrained personality can be counted on one hand.
* King Sombra in [[FanFic/EquestriaAHistoryRevealed Equestria: A History Revealed]] was said to have initially been a normal king, with a love of scholarly pursuits. When he stumbles upon dark magic, he still takes a very scholarly, scientific approach, dutifully recording his observations, before he starts to lose his mind. Even when he performs his dark magic experiments, according to the questionable LemonyNarrator, he still felt the need to publish the results of his evil experiments with the rest of the world as a continuation of his science-loving side, and possibly his need for peer-review.
* Twilight Sparkle in ''Fanfic/PagesOfHarmony'' is very much this, having an entire multi-roomed laboratory to [[spoiler: extract the genetic essence of the Elements of Harmony from her friends]].
* Twilight also became an amoral Mad Scientist in ''FanFic/FalloutEquestria'', torturing and killing countless zebra war prisoners and pony political dissidents and subjecting Discord to a FateWorseThanDeath in an attempt to create a serum that would transform normal ponies into [[PhysicalGod alicorns]]. She [[LaserGuidedKarma pays for her misdeeds]] when her serum manages to [[spoiler: mutate Trixie into an EldritchAbomination that promptly [[CannibalismSuperpower devours her]] and [[TheAssimilator absorbs her mind]].]]

* [[IHaveManyNames Virgo Zodiarts/Tachibana/Kunieru Emoto]] in ''FanFic/{{Horseshoes and Hand Grenades}}'' who has not only been treating Sonada and Kijima with Cosmic Energy injections so that they can bring back their lost Horoscopes powers, he also [[spoiler: transformed Ryusei into a brainwashed cyborg]] for reasons still not yet explained.
* In ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/9007910/2/Altered-Histories Altered Histories]]'' Harry sees a goblin healer called [[{{MeaningfulName}} Fangcutter]] who wears a bloodstained lab coat and possesses some rather dubious instruments, cuts Harry's skull open to remove the scar [[SoulJar Horcrux]] ''while he's conscious'' and performs unspecified "experiments" after Harry's ''finally'' unconscious due to another medical procedure.
* Fanfic/TheCadanceverse version of Carrot Top is a comedic mad scientist, always seeking new improvements in farming and food development, usually with hilarious results when things go wrong.
* Fanfic/{{Eugenesis}} explicitly labels the Guardian droids, each of which has an annoying tendency to be ludicrously overpowered and liable to turn on its creators on a dime, as the creations of Wheeljack.
* Eirin, [[spoiler:later, Hisataka Nou]], has developed a serum that turns humans into war beasts when searching for a potion of immortality in ''FanFic/GameOfTouhou''.

* ''FanFic/MythosEffect'' features Herbert West (of ''Film/ReAnimator'' fame) employed by the [[TabletopGame/CthulhuTech New Earth Federation]] and actively encouraged in his obscene work. In his one scene so far, he's dissecting a [[Franchise/MassEffect Turian]] corpse and describing every way he can improve biological weapons to use against them, [[DissonantSerenity all with a smile on his face]].
* Pinkie Pie gets this in ''FanFic/TheMareWhoOnceLivedOnTheMoon''. While titled [[UsefulNotes/NikolaTesla 'TESLA']] for some FunWithAcronyms, she does have a worrying enthusiasm for the then-new discoveries of atomic science. And is entirely insane.
** Twilight ''again'' ends up in this territory too. Shining Armour has to remind her that some of her plans, innocent to begin with, don't need much to turn into devastating weapons. "You don't mean to but, Twilight, there's stuff here that could change the world, and for a lot of ponies and horses and zebras it wouldn't be for the better."

* Dr. Laurience in ''Film/TheManWhochangedHisMind''. Already obsessed with the idea of transferring souls between bodies, he descends into full insanity when the scientific community rejects his theories and literally laughs him out of the room.

** The F.B.I. was immediately brought in and after learning of the rest of the cyanide from Konopka and his accomplice, the entire [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Line_(CTA) Blue Line]] was shut down to sweep for traps and chemical weapons. Konopka denied having any sort of purpose for the cyanide with the vial he kept on him presumably [[CyanidePill to avoid going back to prison]], but regardless he was convicted for conspiracy to commit acts of terror and spent 16 years in prison before being released in 2019. He spent his time in prison MacGyvering [[PlayAlongPrisoner electronic escape tools capable of disabling surveillance equipment and alarmed fences]] ''for fun'', disassembling and reconfiguring them to pass the time. Since then he's [[TheAtoner turned over a new leaf]] and expressed an interest in working in computer security.

* Dr. [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Abian Alexander Abian]], a mathematics professor at Iowa State University, became famous for his proposal to ''blow up the Moon'' to fight climate change and [[TheyCalledMeMad compared himself to Galileo]]. His theories were debunked by astronomers (including NASA), who asserted that not only would the entire nuclear arsenal of mankind be insufficient to destroy the Moon, but if we actually could it would have the ''opposite'' effects from what he purported and the debris alone would be harmful to all life. What is it with mathematicians (see Kaczynski above) and explosions?

* Alexander Bogdanov -- Russian-Soviet biologist, science fiction writer, Communist revolutionary, economist and possibly a real-life VampireWannabe. He is renowned for his saner moments such as creating an early precursor to systems theory, but Bogdanov was much more (in)famous for his obsessive experimenting with blood. He believed that treatment and transfusion of young blood to old people was the way to reverse aging, cure diseases and achieve immortality. Even among early Bolsheviks who were a quite eccentric and innovative bunch, he stood out. He died during a blood transfusion experiment on himself in 1929, just in time to avoid being executed along with other Old Bolsheviks in [[ThePurge The Great Purge]].

* DARPA, the US Government's official program to fund Mad Science. Their only mission is "radical innovation". They fund all sorts of seemingly off the wall projects. Among their successes are night-vision goggles, GPS, and a little thing called the Internet... oh, and funding a little thing called the [[http://www.darpa.mil/grandchallenge/index.asp DARPA Challenge]], for self-driving cars.

** Surprisingly, Bogdanov wasn't the first [[VindicatedByHistory or last]] scientist to experiment with blood in this manner, as German physician [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andreas_Libavius Andreas Libavius]] allegedly performed a similar experiment in 1615 and experiments to treat Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease in the elderly using proteins found in young people's blood plasma are currently ongoing.

* Psychologist [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Harlow Harry Harlow]] was infamous for his experiments on monkeys to simulate the effects of ParentalNeglect, possibly as a result of his [[FreudianExcuse own parents]] [[NecessarilyEvil and a desire to prevent more children from suffering as he did]]. He was a LargeHam as well, utilizing dramatically-named devices like the "rape rack", "iron maidens", and the "[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pit_of_despair pit of despair]]". As horrible as it all sounds, [[WellIntentionedExtremist his work formed the foundation of what we know today about cognitive development]].

* ZigZagged by [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/He_Jiankui_affair He Jiankui]], a Chinese biophysicist who created the first [[DesignerBabies genetically-modified humans]] in 2018 in order to bolster the newborn twins' resistance to HIV. While this doesn't sound like much compared to the other examples on this page and he's perfectly sane, human germline engineering is a ''[[EvilutionaryBiologist massive]]'' no-no to the scientific community and virtually all the world's governments, [[EvenEvilHasStandards even]] RedChina, as the technology isn't yet fully understood and can easily lead to unintended consequences. In fact, his experiment may have actually enhanced their brains as the altered [=CCR5=] gene is linked to improved memory function in mice ([[AmbiguousSituation whether this was intended or not is yet to be determined]]). While Lulu and Nana are reported to be in fine health as of December 2021, He himself was sentenced to three years in prison and fined the equivalent of almost half a million USD.

-->-- '''Victor Frankenstein''', ''Literature/{{Frankenstein}}''

** Once the authorities caught up with him, he was facing up to 30 years in prison but violated his bail by fleeing to UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}} and using abandoned sections of the subway system as an ElaborateUndergroundBase. His reign of terror ended when he discovered in an abandoned warehouse several crates of industrial cyanide (illegal to possess in the state of Illinois without a lawful reason), which he took home with him because he thought it was cool. After being caught by the campus police of the University of Chicago after repeatedly using their tunnel systems for burglaries, they found various tools, schematics, and one of the cyanide vials. [[OhCrap Half a year after]] [[UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror September 11, 2001]].

** The F.B.I. was immediately brought in and after learning of the rest of the cyanide from Konopka and his accomplice, the entire [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Line_(CTA) Blue Line]] was shut down to sweep for traps and chemical weapons. Konopka denied having any sort of purpose for the cyanide with the vial he kept on him presumably [[CyanidePill to avoid going back to prison]], but regardless he was convicted for conspiracy to commit acts of terror and spent 16 years in prison before being released in 2019. He spent his time in prison MacGyvering [[PrisonEscapeArtist electronic escape tools capable of disabling surveillance equipment and alarmed fences]] ''for fun'', disassembling and reconfiguring them to pass the time. Since then he's [[TheAtoner turned over a new leaf]] and expressed an interest in working in computer security.