History Main / SchrodingersButterfly

* ''Series/TheXFiles'' episode "Field Trip" dealt with this trope.
-->"Name me one hallucinogen that loses its effectiveness because you know you've taken it. ''We're still there.''"

* ''Film/{{Nightwish}}'': DiscussedTrope at the end. Kim wakes up, the whole movie apparently having been a nightmare, but it turns out that either she hasn't woken up for real or she's still trapped in a cave being fed on by alien parasites. As well, when she was in the dream she fell asleep at one point and dreamt that she was elsewhere as well.

* In ''Anime/{{Ghost in the Shell|1995}} 2: Innocence'', Batou and Togusa meet a cyborg hacker with the ability to completely alter the perception of people with any kinds of brain implants. When they notice they are trapped in an illusion, they manage to break out, only to realize they are just in another illusion, before they finally manage to break free for real. Of course, they wonder if perhaps they never actually left the false realities, and if they might unknowingly live out the rest of their lives in an illusion. Scary!

* Dream Machine in ''Anime/DoraemonNobitasThreeVisionarySwordsmen'' can swap reality for dream, which means that if the users of the machine are killed in the dream, instead of waking up in the reality, they are ''KilledOffForReal''. And the DreamLand the said users are in is [[NightmareFuel full of creatures capable of killing them instantly]]. They now also perceive their original reality as a dream, wondering why there is someone in it called 'Mama' ever bother to annoy them and tell them to 'wake up'...
* ''Anime/UruseiYatsura'' Movie 2: Beautiful Dreamer references this several times. Once by Mujaki, the dream demon, explains this verbatim while attempting to lull Sakura into a false sense of security. The second is [[spoiler:near the end while Ataru tries to escape the dream and continuously wakes in an new dream.]] And a third time at the end when [[spoiler:the whole cast awakens from the dream world only to find Mujaki may or may not still have them trapped in a dream.]]

* At the end of Creator/GrantMorrison's run on ''Comicbook/DoomPatrol'', Crazy Jane finds herself trapped on a mundane [[AlternateUniverse alternate Earth]], being treated by Marcia, a psychologist who regards her strange memories and dreams as delusions. The vividness of Jane's stories and the ineffectiveness of psychotherapy in explaining them away leads Marcia to doubt whether she's doing the right thing. After another doctor forcibly subjects Jane to electro-convulsive therapy, Jane appears to be cured of her delusions and her multiple personalities, but she gives Marcia the "Mystery Coin" she described in her stories, confirming Marcia's suspicion that Jane was not simply mentally ill.
** Morrison uses it again in ''Comicbook/TheInvisibles'', when Jack Frost tries to engage in one-on-one psychic combat with [[EldritchAbomination the King-of-All-Tears]]. Among the various tactics it uses (such as MindRape) is having illusions of his teammates show up, telling him that they've managed to win, and he can break that warding circle now...
* ''Comicbook/TheInvisibles'' actually provides several alternative explanations of how everything that happens in it may be a case of RecursiveReality: the whole story might have been a [[spoiler:drug hallucination]] experienced by one of the characters, or an [[spoiler:in-universe example of SelfInsertFic]] by another character, or a [[spoiler:futuristic video game]] produced by a third character, or...
* One ComicBook/DonaldDuck comic, "ComicBook/TheCallOfCRusso", revolves around the world being the dream of an ancient cephalophoid monster slumbering in a city at the bottom of the sea. Yes, there exists ''a Donald Duck CosmicHorrorStory''.
* In Creator/NeilGaiman's ''Comicbook/TheSandman'', Dream subjects a character (who'd accidentally captured Dream in an attempt to seal Death and gain immortality) to a punishment of "eternal waking". The character in question continually dreams that he's woken up, only to see some nightmarish thing that [[OrWasItADream tells him he's still dreaming]], only to wake up from that dream... [[spoiler: For five real-time years!]]
* Invoked in one ''Comicstrip/CalvinAndHobbes'' strip, when he wakes up, gets dressed, eats breakfast, walks outside, and hears his mother telling him to get up. Then he wakes up again in his bed.
-->'''''Calvin:''' My dreams are getting way too literal.''
** And [[http://i.imgur.com/kuiCm.jpg later played for laughs and drama]] when he puts on a coat, walks outside, trips over a rock, and falls off a cliff miles into the air. Then he wakes up, gets dressed, leaves the house, and falls out the door through the sky. Then he wakes up, and is clearly ''terrified to get out of bed.''
* ''Comicstrip/{{Garfield}}'''s [[http://www.gocomics.com/garfield/1989/10/26/ delusional Halloween strip week, anyone?]] While WordOfGod has apparently stated that this was a one-off event and that the comics aren't really the result of a delusional Garfield, some fans still speculate.

* Creator/SteveDitko and Creator/StanLee did a story in the old EC style (wordless panels with heavy narration) in ''ComicBook/AmazingFantasy'', in which a sleeping man wakes up to find himself floating in the air above his bed, then wakes up to find himself safely in bed, only to have the bed begin to float upward, at which point he wakes up and ... for three pages on a nine-panel grid.

* In one ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'' story, Batman has been subjected to a nightmarish fantasy CuckoosNest PsychologicalTormentZone by the Mad Hatter in an attempt to break him. After making his way through it and returning to reality, the Mad Hatter tries to taunt Batman with this trope and the fact that he can never be certain what is or isn't reality after what he's experienced. Unfortunately for the Mad Hatter it's subverted, however; Batman, who by this point [[RageBreakingPoint is in no mood for any of this nonsense]], simply notes that if this is true, and he is still trapped in his own fantasy, then this means that he no longer has to worry about holding back when beating the ever-loving shit out of someone in case he goes too far and kills him. Someone such as the Mad Hatter, for instance. After [[NoHoldsBarredBeatdown a few seconds preview]] of what this means for him, the Mad Hatter is quick to respond along the lines of "Hahaha, actually, forget that funny joke I made about you maybe still being trapped in a dream, this actually ''is'' reality (''oh god I'm sorry please don't hurt me'')."

[[folder:Films — Animated]]
* TheReveal of ''WesternAnimation/TheLEGOMovie'' pushes it into this territory [[spoiler:because while it turns out the movie is all being played out by a child, we see nearly all of it from the perspectives of the LEGO figurines. While the scene with Emmet moving on his own proves that they have minds of their own, it's unclear to what extent they have free will or influence.]]

[[folder:Films — Live-Action]]

* ''Film/EXistenZ''. How many levels of this virtual reality are there? And how do you know when you're in real life?
* ''[[Film/FourteenOhEight 1408]]'': The whole movie plays with this concept a lot but especially when [[spoiler: the main character (as well as the viewing audience) is tricked into thinking that he escapes the hotel room and has returned to a normal life before he realizes that it was all a vicious illusion. This arguably comes to an end when he burns the place down and escapes, but there's still the feeling that too could possibly be an illusion.]] Only in the theatrical ending, though. In the director's cut [[spoiler: it's clear he burned the entire room down, though at the cost of his life.]]

* Dream Machine in ''Manga/{{Doraemon}}: Nobita's Three Visionary Swordsmen'' can swap reality for dream, which means that if the users of the machine are killed in the dream, instead of waking up in the reality, they are ''KilledOffForReal''. And the DreamLand the said users are in is [[NightmareFuel full of creatures capable of killing them instantly]]. They now also perceive their original reality as a dream, wondering why there is someone in it called 'Mama' ever bother to annoy them and tell them to 'wake up'...

* In ''Anime/GhostInTheShell 2: Innocence,'' Batou and Togusa meet a cyborg hacker with the ability to completely alter the perception of people with any kinds of brain implants. When they notice they are trapped in an illusion, they manage to break out, only to realize they are just in another illusion, before they finally manage to break free for real. Of course, they wonder if perhaps they never actually left the false realities, and if they might unknowingly live out the rest of their lives in an illusion. Scary!

* In [[http://www.jsayers.com/thingpart/thingpart218.html this]] ''[[http://www.jsayers.com/thingpart/thingpart.html thingpart]]'', is the boy hallucinating on a subway, is he hallucinating that he's playing with psychologist dolls, is he hallucinating that he's hallucinating on a subway, is he hallucinating that he's hallucinating on a subway from the other direction, is he not hallucinating at all and either the whole thing is a MindScrew or the second through fourth panels or first through third panels are hypothetical, or doe the rabbit hole go even deeper in unseen panels?
* ''Webcomic/TheDreamer'' relies heavily on this trope, as Beatrice and the audience is unsure whether or not her dreams are simply that, or an AlternateUniverse.

* ''Webcomic/BobAndGeorge'' [[http://www.bobandgeorge.com/archives/010304c Can the characters change the past of the Megaman games so that the author never gets hooked on them and so never starts the strip?]] (Note that The Author is a character in the story, too.)
** A more straightforward example: [[http://www.bobandgeorge.com/archives/011223c Waking up from the Megaman universe]] is [[http://www.bobandgeorge.com/archives/011224c just a dream]]

* In ''Webcomic/KoanOfTheDay'', the guru begins to worry that he is [[http://www.koanoftheday.com/21/ merely a reflection in the lake.]]
* In ''Webcomic/{{Sinfest}}'', [[http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=2526 Pooch is confused by memory]] -- [[http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=2527 what if he's not really in the time he thinks he is, but in the future, remembering.]]
* In ''{{Webcomic/Freefall}}'', [[http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff300/fv00279.htm Sam asks for all virtual reality to be turned off. Helix prankishly covers his eyes.]]

* In one ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'' story, Batman has been subjected to a nightmarish fantasy CuckoosNest PsychologicalTormentZone by the Mad Hatter in an attempt to break him. After making his way through it and returning to reality, the Mad Hatter tries to taunt Batman with this trope and the fact that he can never be certain what is or isn't reality after what he's experienced. It's subverted, however; Batman, who is by this point [[RageBreakingPoint in no mood for any of this nonsense]], simply notes that if this is true, and he is still trapped in his own fantasy, then this means that he no longer has to worry about holding back when beating the ever-loving shit out of someone in case he goes too far and kills him. Someone such as the Mad Hatter, for instance. After [[NoHoldsBarredBeatdown a few seconds preview]] of what this means for him, the Mad Hatter is quick to respond along the lines of "Hahaha, actually, forget that funny joke I made about you maybe still being trapped in a dream, this actually ''is'' reality (''oh god I'm sorry please don't hurt me'')."

* In one ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'' story, Batman has been subjected to a nightmarish fantasy CuckoosNest PsychologicalTormentZone by the Mad Hatter in an attempt to break him. After making his way through it and returning to reality, the Mad Hatter tries to taunt Batman with this trope and the fact that he can never be certain what is or isn't reality after what he's experienced. It's subverted, however; Batman, who is by this point [[RageBreakingPoint in no mood for any of this nonsense]], simply notes that if this is true, and he is still trapped in his own fantasy, then this means that he no longer has to worry about holding back when beating the ever-loving shit out of someone in case he goes too far and kills him. Someone such as the Mad Hatter, for instance. After [[NoHoldsBarredBeatdown a few seconds preview]] of what this means for him, the Mad Hatter is quick to respond along the lines of "Hahaha, actually, forget that funny joke I made about you maybe still being trapped in a dream, this actually ''is'' reality (''please don't hurt me'')".

* There was a ''Series/TheTwilightZone'' episode in which the entire story consisted of a woman's repeatedly waking up from nightmares, only to find each time that [[DreamWithinADream she was still dreaming]].
* ''Series/TheTwilightZone2002'': Happens InUniverse as part of a condemned criminal's sentence: he's doomed to have nightmares of being murdered by his victim over and over again, "waking up" from one nightmare to the next.

* ''Literature/Liar2009'' by Justine Larbalestier is told from the point of view of a [[UnreliableNarrator compulsive liar]], who lies to the reader. To make things worse, she even lies about her lies, most notably on the issue of [[spoiler: whether Jordan is alive or not, or even if he's ''real'']].

* Solipsism is also both a philosophical belief and a common argument against empiricist and sceptic philosophy (we can only know what our senses tell us and what we experience, but since we are often mistaken, and our senses deceive us sometimes, maybe we can't). The idea is that if you doubt everything, then what is left is total uncertainty, a life which is near-impossible to lead and one which most people would find utterly pointless. Philosophical solipsism can be summed up as "My mind is something I know for sure exists, but as for anything or anybody else..."

** "[[LotusEaterMachine Better Than Life]]" from Season 2, and at least one novel. By the end of the series, it's impossible to tell whether they've really escaped the game, or the game just lets them ''think'' they have. (It does explain a lot of the [[LampshadeHanging self-admitted]] [[MohsScaleOfSciFiHardness implausible science]].) The episode plays it almost entirely for laughs. The book version was much darker. The show version was basically the Holodeck driven by whatever your surface wish was; no mistaking it for reality. The book lets us go a good while thinking the cast has fully made it home. Over much of the rest of the book they manage to escape, and find that things were still a ''little'' too good to be true. When they escape for ''real,'' a message left by the creator of the game appears to congratulate them, and they finally return to the real world. Hopefully. Apparently, they ''wanted'' to do it this way all along in the show but budget or something didn't allow - in "Future Echoes," elderly Lister has "U=BTL" etched into his arm. No attention is called to it at the time (or ever, in the show. In the book, we see this happen in book 1 and Lister notices. Better than Life is book 2.)

* Dream Machine in ''Anime/{{Doraemon}}: Nobita's Three Visionary Swordsmen'' can swap reality for dream, which means that if the users of the machine are killed in the dream, instead of waking up in the reality, they are ''KilledOffForReal''. And the DreamLand the said users are in is [[NightmareFuel full of creatures capable of killing them instantly]]. They now also perceive their original reality as a dream, wondering why there is someone in it called 'Mama' ever bother to annoy them and tell them to 'wake up'...

[[caption-width-right:350:[[Film/{{Inception}} BWWOOOOOOOOONGG]]]]

*** An undeveloped script idea for ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' had Chief O'Brien and Julian Bashir trapped in a virtual reality prison. They escape and make it back to [=DS9=], only to find that they're still in prison, so they escape again and make it back to [=DS9=]. The episode was to end with O'Brien telling his wife that he didn't know for sure if he'd actually escaped, and he never will.

[[folder:Fanfiction]]

** [[Recap/DoctorWho2014CSLastChristmas "Last Christmas"]] plays out this trope while {{Deconstructing}} the show's "isolated base under attack" trope. There are enough dream layers and ambiguities that viewers have questioned if the "top level" is still just the dream.

* Zhuangzi's poem is the source of all the butterfly symbolism in the ''Franchise/{{Persona}}'' games, as referenced by ''Megami Ibunroku VideoGame/{{Persona}}'s'' intro. The remake even references this in the opening lyrics.
--> ''Dream of butterfly / Or is life a dream? / Don't wanna wake up / [[{{Foreshadowing}} Cause I'm happy here]]''

* Zhuangzi's poem is the source of all the butterfly symbolism in the ''Franchise/ShinMegamiTenseiPersona'' games, as referenced by ''Megami Ibunroku VideoGame/{{Persona}}'s'' intro. The remake even references this in the opening lyrics.

* ''Series/{{Angel}}'' has a mini-version of this in a Season 4 episode. [[spoiler: Angel is seen to defeat the demon and (finally) go to bed with Cordelia. Then we realize it was a dream designed to make Angel lose his soul in a moment of perfect happiness (understandably, sleeping with Charisma Carpenter = perfect happiness).]] It intersects with YourMindMakesItReal; it qualifies here because the audience doesn't realize it's a dream until it's over, and this event blurs the lines between (in-show) reality and dream.
** Also used in the fifth season episode "Soul Purpose". Angel is under the influence of a parasite the makes him go through his worst fears and insecurities; while under its effect each time it seems like he's finally woken up it turns out he's still under the effects of the parasite and is dreaming.

* One ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' episode has her [[CuckooNest "wake up" in an insane asylum]], having dreamt the last few seasons in a fugue. In the end, Buffy decides that Sunnydale is real and saves her friends... and then we see her psychologist pronounce her too far gone to save. Presumably the rest of the series is her continued hallucinations; how ''Series/{{Angel}}'' fits in is anybody's guess.

When a story introduces the possibility of [[RecursiveReality worlds within worlds]], be they a LotusEaterMachine or perfectly lucid dreams, there will always be a nagging doubt in the back of a viewer's mind whether the story is real (that is to say, at the highest possible level of reality inside the work of fiction) or if they aren't dreaming or "still plugged in".

Compare EveryoneIsJesusInPurgatory and DreamApocalypse. Compare also OpeningACanOfClones, which has this effect regarding a character's uniqueness. Contrast OrWasItADream. See also UnreliableNarrator, MentalWorld, CuckooNest, DyingDream, ThroughTheEyesOfMadness, {{Masquerade}}, TheEndingChangesEverything, and {{Brainwashed}}.

* ''Film/{{Nightwish}}'': Directly referenced at the end. Kim wakes up, the whole movie apparently having been a nightmare, but it turns out that either she hasn't woken up for real or she's still trapped in a cave being fed on by alien parasites. As well, when she was in the dream she fell asleep at one point and dreamt that she was elsewhere as well.

[[folder:Fan Fiction]]

[[folder:Films -- Animated]]

* TheReveal of ''WesternAnimation/TheLegoMovie'' pushes it into this territory [[spoiler: because while it turns out the movie is all being played out by a child, we see nearly all of it from the perspectives of the Lego figurines. While the scene with Emmet moving on his own proves that they have minds of their own, it's unclear to what extent they have free will or influence]].

[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]

* One ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' episode has her [[CuckooNest "wake up" in an insane asylum]], having dreamt the last few seasons in a fugue. In the end, Buffy decides that Sunnydale is real and saves her friends... and then we see her psychologist pronounce her too far gone to save. Presumably the rest of the series is her continued hallucinations; how Series/{{Angel}} fits in is anybody's guess.
** The writers of that episode admitted in the commentary that they were going for a MindScrew and didn't think so many people would go as far as to declare the entire series and its spinoff a delusion. Creator/JossWhedon told the New York Times that the matter is open to interpretation and that he personally subscribes to the belief that Buffy's life in Sunnydale is not a delusion.
* ''Series/StargateAtlantis'':
** "Home" ends with [=McKay=] asking if they were really relased from the fake mental world projected to them by a cloud of sentient gas. The gas then yells at him that it's real.
** "The Real World" ends with the heroes briefly wondering if the reality they're in is real or another Asuran deception, then quickly deciding [[BellisariosMaxim they'd rather not know]].

--> "Name me one hallucinogen that loses its effectiveness because you know you've taken it. ''We're still there.'' "
* ''Series/RedDwarf'':
** "[[LotusEaterMachine Better Than Life]]" from Season 2, and at least one novel. By the end of the series, it's impossible to tell whether they've really escaped the game, or the game just lets them ''think'' they have. (It does explain a lot of the [[LampshadeHanging self-admitted]] [[MohsScaleOfSciFiHardness implausible science]].) The episode plays it almost entirely for laughs. The book version was much darker. The show version was basically the Holodeck driven by whatever your surface wish was; no mistaking it for reality. The book lets us go a good while thinking the cast has fully made it home. Over much of the rest of the book they manage to escape, and find that things were still a ''little'' too good to be true. When they escape for ''real,'' a message left by the creator of the game appears to congratulate them, and they finally return to the real world. Hopefully. Apparently, they ''wanted'' to do it this way all along in the show but budget or something didn't allow - in "Future Echoes," elderly Lister has "U=BTL" etched into his arm. No attention is called to it at the time (or ever, in the show. In the book, we see this happen in book 1 and Lister notices. Better than Life is book 2.)
** "Back to Reality", the season 5 finale. The crew dies, only to see the "Game Over" text appear and shortly afterwards wake up in VR-game chairs... The series continued after that episode, of course. It plays the concept very seriously. Not only did this sort of go hand in hand with the series "growing up" over time, it also helped create multiple levels of mindscrew.
** At the end of series VI in "Out of Time." Just before the cataclysmic ending, Starbug hits a "reality mine" -- a pocket of alternate history space. Followed immediately by Rimmer deliberately triggering a strange sort of GrandfatherParadox. Followed immediately by the [[spoiler: future Dwarfers]] triggering ''another'' GrandfatherParadox. How many layers of unreality can two minutes of airtime possibly layer ... ?
** Season 8, episode 3, when they [[spoiler:return to the reconstructed Red Dwarf, courtesy of the Nanites,]] and are placed in the brig after signing agreements to participate in a trial involving psychotropic drugs that will cause them to hallucinate. They engineer a daring escape before the trial and make it out into space, at which point they realize that the entire escape attempt has been a hallucination. They enlist the aid of the reconstructed Rimmer and break out again... and realize that, once again, they've all been duped. When they finally make it out of their hallucinated trial, Rimmer asks, "Is this reality? But how can we be sure?" Cat poignantly states, "Why do we care? Nothing makes any sense no matter where we are!"
* A CruelTwistEnding from the ''Series/TheOuterLimits1995'' episode "Tempests": did the hero escape early in the episode, or at the end? Neither--he's still hallucinating.
* ''Series/TheTwilightZone2002'': Happens InUniverse as part of a condemned criminal's sentence: he's doomed to have nightmares of being murdered by his victim over and over again, "waking up" from one nightmare to the next.
* Played with at the end of a LotusEaterMachine episode of ''Series/StargateSG1''--the protagonists are certain they're in the real world. The guy who trapped them in virtual reality wouldn't be freaking out over the other people they've led to escape ruining his beloved garden if it were virtual.
* In the American version of ''Series/TouchingEvil'', Creegan befriends Cyril, a homeless man who believes that he's dreaming the show's reality, and that when he goes to sleep, he's really waking up in the "real" world, the space colony Alpha 9.
* An episode of ''Series/{{Farscape}}'' has Chiana introducing John to a buggy VR program based on his memories. John manages to find an exit, only to end up getting captured when [[MagnificentBastard Scorpius]] escapes from confinement and takes everyone hostage. After a great deal of [[CouldntFindAPen bloodshed]], John finally breaks out of his cell... only to realise that he's still playing the game when he finds one of the hint-vouchers in his pocket.
** Interesting to note in this case is that typically, when this trope occurs in an episode/issue of a running series, the possibility of still being trapped in the illusion is almost NEVER brought up in later episodes. ''Series/{{Farscape}}'' features an aversion in that, at the start of the next episode, Crichton and Noranti pull up to Moya in a transport pod, only to find that there's no response, exactly as it had happened in the game's simulation of the real world. John momentarily wonders if they had not actually escaped at all... only to realise that Moya's been invaded by a gang of bounty hunters.
* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'':
** The show's [[OurGeniesAreDifferent version of the genie]] seen in "What Is And What Should Never Be" works that way: he grants you your wish by making you hallucinate he did, while feeding on you till you die. Because ''Supernatural'' is [[SarcasmMode optimistic.]]
** The Season 3 episode "Dream A Little Dream Of Me" follows a similar plot to the movie ''{{Film/Inception}}'' (although the episode predates the film by a couple of years), with people hopping in and out of one another's dreams and controlling them; the similarity extends to the episode being a total MindScrew in places.
** [[InvokedTrope Invoked]] in season 7. Sam's hallucination of Lucifer taunts him with the idea that he never escaped from Hell and the events of seasons 6 and 7 was just Lucifer using his RealityWarper abilities to mess with him. After a confrontation with Dean, Sam (and the show) decide that this isn't the case, but that hasn't stopped the EpilepticTrees.
* There was a ''Series/TheTwilightZone'' episode in which the entire story consisted of a woman's repeatedly waking up from nightmares, only to find each time that [[DreamWithinADream she was still dreaming]].
* Played with in ''Series/{{Chuck}}'' but only for a moment. After an episode putting Chuck's mental health in question the end of the episode shows that Chuck is not crazy. However, then he wakes up back in the mental ward. However, the mental ward scene is only for a moment before it becomes clear that it is another vivid dream, and not!crazy Chuck is in fact reality.
* ''Series/DoctorWho''
** Played with in ''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E7AmysChoice Amy's Choice]]''. The "Dream Lord" traps the Doctor and his two companions in two deadly situations which they switch between by falling asleep every five minutes or so, claiming one of them to be real and one of them to be a dream. In the end, the Doctor, in a twist of genius, realises that [[spoiler:the Dream Lord gave them a choice between two dreams, because he "conceded defeat" and revived the dead TARDIS when he is supposed to have no power over reality. The Doctor subsequently blows up the TARDIS to kill them all and they all wake up in reality. It turns out that they were brought into a collective hallucination by a few grammes of psychotropic dust, and the Dream Lord is just an inner demon within the Doctor.]]
** The 2014 Christmas special "Last Christmas" plays out this trope while {{Deconstructing}} the show's 'isolated base under attack' trope. there are enough dream layers and ambiguities that viewers have questioned if the 'top level' is still just the dream.
* ''Series/{{Lost}}'': Hurley spent an episode believing that the Island was a hallucination and that he was still back at Santa Rosa Hospital. Desmond seems to have these reality doubts sometimes too.
* ''Series/{{Angel}}'' has a mini-version of this in a Season 4 episode. [[spoiler: Angel is seen to defeat the demon and (finally) go to bed with Cordelia. Then we realize it was a dream designed to make Angel lose his soul in a moment of perfect happiness (understandably, sleeping with Charisma Carpenter = perfect happiness).]] It intersects with YourMindMakesItReal; it qualifies here because the audience doesn't realize it's a dream until it's over, and this event blurs the lines between (in-show) reality and dream.
** Also used in the fifth season episode "Soul Purpose." Angel is under the influence of a parasite the makes him go through his worst fears and insecurities; while under its effect each time it seems like he's finally woken up it turns out he's still under the effects of the parasite and is dreaming.
* The basic premise of ''Series/{{Awake}}'', in which Detective Michael Britten has one life in which his son died and his wife is still alive, another where it's vice versa. Both are equally real to him.
* One very simple [[OntologicalMystery interpretation]] of ''Series/{{Life On Mars|2006}}'' and ''Series/AshesToAshes2008'' is that it is all in the mind of the main characters.
* The final episode of ''Series/{{Being Human|UK}}''. The devil creates different dreamworlds for all the main characters in which they have to choose their previous lives or the new ones.
** [[spoiler: There is also a big debate whether the trio is now in the real world or in a dream after killing the devil.]]
*** If you want a more definite answer [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30fnJqB_3Cw there is an extra scene.]]
* The ultimate example of this is the [[Series/StElsewhere Tommy Westphall]] Universe theory. The final episode of ''Series/StElsewhere'' reveals the entire show to be in the imagination of an autistic boy named Tommy Westphall. The show had a crossover with ''Series/HomicideLifeOnTheStreet'', a show that has JustForFun/JohnMunch who appeared on eight other shows, meaning that all these shows and all the shows those shows had crossovers with and so on and so on are a figment of his imagination. There are, of course, arguments against this theory, such as saying that Tommy Westphall simply watched the show ''Series/HomicideLifeOnTheStreet'' and imagined his characters having a crossover with them. Another is that if a person has a dream about something, i.e. a real place like London, that doesn't mean that place exists only in that Universe. It was simply that Universe's version of the place or person. Because of this, we'll never know if dozens (if not ''hundreds'') of shows take place in his imagination or not.
* The GrandFinale of ''Series/{{Community}}'' features a parody of the idea. In TheTag, we see a fake commercial for the family playing Community the board game. The characters have a debate as to whether the show is really just them playing the game or if the game is a part of the show. At one point, after revealing the snow globe that claims the show is their game, another character reveals the script of the episode they are in. At that point, the first character comments that this means they don't actually exist.
* ''Series/{{Sherlock}}''. A special episode between the third and fourth seasons goes back and forth between the present-day setting and a 19th-century setting. Sherlock is dreaming one of them and keeps "waking up," but it's unclear which one is the dream. On one hand, the episode is framed as an alternative special set in the 19th century; on the other hand, the present-day setting continues where the third season finale leaves off. In the end, it's left ambiguous which setting is "real": present-day Sherlock claims he went deep inside his mind to run an elaborate thought experiment and 19th-century Sherlock claims [[AllJustADream he imagined what a future world might look like and how he would fit in it]]. Just to make it complicated, one segment of the present-day part turns out to be ''definitely'' a dream, and several characters in the 19th century sprinkle modern words in their dialog.
* ''Series/UltramanMax'' had an episode titled "The Butterfly's Dream" in reference to this concept. It is ''[[BizarroEpisode completely insane]]'', and revolves around the worlds of a writer for ''[[BreakingTheFourthWall Ultraman Max]]'' and Kaito becoming disturbingly warped and their lives getting switched around due to the machinations of a mysterious monster-making lady and a protean egg-like entity Madeus. It's ''a lot'' weirder than it sounds.

* The opening lyrics of the [[Music/{{Queen}} "Bohemian Rhapsody"]] is a well-known example.
-->Is this the real life?
-->Is this just fantasy?
-->Caught in a landslide,
-->No escape from reality.
* Music/JonathanCoulton's song Creepy Doll ends something like this:
-->You decide that you've had enough
-->And you lock the doll in the wooden box
-->You put the box in the fireplace
-->Next to your bag of big city money.
-->As the smoke fills up your tiny room there's nothing you can do
-->And far too late you see the one inside the box is you.

[[folder:Theater]]

[[folder: Web Comics]]
* In [[http://www.jsayers.com/thingpart/thingpart218.html this]] ''[[http://www.jsayers.com/thingpart/thingpart.html thingpart,]]'' is the boy hallucinating on a subway, is he hallucinating that he's playing with psychologist dolls, is he hallucinating that he's hallucinating on a subway, is he hallucinating that he's hallucinating on a subway from the other direction, is he not hallucinating at all and either the whole thing is a MindScrew or the second through fourth panels or first through third panels are hypothetical, or doe the rabbit hole go even deeper in unseen panels?

[[/folder]]

* Happens in-universe in the ''StarTrek'' fan story "A Private Anecdote". Cpt. Christopher Pike was captain of the ''Enterprise'' when it visited Talos VII, where he was subject to very realistic mental illusions by the Talosians. In this story, years later, he thinks back over his adventures he's had since then; each time, he would briefly wonder: "What if this isn't real?" In other words, was he actually still on Talos experiencing yet another illusion?