History Main / ToxicWasteCanDoAnything

* In "Literature/TheCorpseOfCharlieRull," radiated waste leaking into a [[SwampsAreEvil swamp]] turns the drowned corpse of heart attack victim [[DisposableVagrant Charlie Rull]] in an unstoppable killer [[NuclearNasty radioactive zombie]].

* In ''Literature/TheCorpseOfCharlieRull'', electrically-radiated waste leaking into a [[SwampsAreEvil swamp]] turns the drowned corpse of heart attack victim [[DisposableVagrant Charlie Rull]] in an unstoppable killer [[NuclearNasty radioactive zombie]].

* ''Film/LaMorteVivante'' (i.e. ''The Living Dead Girl'') takes this to even further extremes: it revives a human corpse that has been ''DEAD FOR TWO YEARS'' into a vampire-like ghoul.

That holds true in fiction...maybe 3/4 of the time. Otherwise, toxic waste serves as yet another form of [[AppliedPhlebotinum Phlebotinum]]. When you don't want to use [[LightningCanDoAnything electricity]], [[ILoveNuclearPower radiation]], or [[GeneticEngineeringIsTheNewNuke tweaking something's DNA]], just dump the issue you need into a pool of what is SUPPOSED to be deadly poisonous; whatever comes out will surely have more beneficial changes than negative.

[[folder: Comics]]

* Being accidentally tossed in a vat of chemicals is famously one of ComicBook/TheJoker's most popular origins (though [[MultipleChoicePast not the only one]]). One story lampshades that the vat in question was filled with an absurdly deadly concoction, and Mr J still came out with bleached skin, green hair, a damaged psyche, and absolutely no proper ''health'' problems — he is even [[MusclesAreMeaningless a bit more athletic than his light frame would let you suppose]], though ''that'', at least, doesn't seem to have anything to do with the chemicals.[[note]]Do note that the Joker's insanity itself may not have been caused by the chemicals so much as by the psychological ''trauma'' of being disfigured by them.[[/note]]

[[folder: Film ]]

* ''Film/TheToxicAvenger'', of course. While it does make the titular character very ugly and the [[PainfulTransformation transformation is painful]], it also grants him '[[SuperStrength superhuman size and strength]]' and once he has fully transformed, he seems quite capable of living a normal life with no side effects.

* ''Film/LaMorteVivante'' (ie ''The Living Dead Girl'') takes this to even further extremes: it revives a human corpse that has been ''DEAD FOR TWO YEARS'' into a vampire-like ghoul.

[[folder: Live-Action TV ]]

[[folder: Multimedia]]

* ''Franchise/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles''
** If it's not explicitly presented as MutagenicGoo, the 'ooze' that created the title characters is this: a garbage chemical mix on its way to be disposed that grants four turtle babies and a rat bipedal humanoid forms, sapience (at least in the Turtles' case; sometimes Splinter is suggested to have been far smarter than the average rat before mutation), enough physical gifts to be trained as master martial artists/weapon wielders, and in Donatello's case, near-genius level intelligence with mechanical devices. Not bad for a bunch of waste chemicals.[[note]]And if you follow the meta-joke in their origin, it also empowered Daredevil, or woke his powers up according to some sources, though Matt Murdock suffered the cost of losing his sight.[[/note]]
** This fact makes a scene in the second live action film, ''[[Film/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtlesIITheSecretOfTheOoze The Secret of the Ooze]]'', strangely more poignant. Donatello is upset when he finds out the titular ooze's creation was just a mistake and that he had felt like that the truth would mean he and his family were 'special'. For being the smart one, he doesn't seem to realize that the fact that a bunch of chemical garbage instead of a purposely designed product made him and his family what they are makes them very special indeed.

[[folder: Newspaper Comics ]]

* Referenced in a ''ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes'' comic where Calvin's dad gets him to eat his Mom's cooking by telling him that it is "toxic waste that will turn [him] into a mutant".

[[folder: Tabletop Games ]]

* ''TabletopGame/{{Champions}}'' supplement ''Enemies''. One day a truck carrying a load of toxic waste drove by Barney O'Tumey. One of the containers fell out of the truck, broke open and spilled toxic waste all over him. Barney gained the super powers of SuperStrength and ImmuneToBullets and became the supervillain Shamrock.

[[folder: Video Games ]]

* ''VideoGame/DayOfTheTentacle'': The toxic goo dumped into the water by Dr. Fred's Sludge-o-Matic causes Purple Tentacle to grow arms and become an insane, evil genius.

[[folder: Web Comics ]]

* ''Webcomic/LongExposure'': While investigating a fenced off area of a nearby forest, Mitch and Jonas slip into some weird puddle. Next day, they develop powers and discover people in hazmats suits trying to clean the mess up.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Western Animation ]]

* ''Toys/TheGrosseryGang'' webseries reveals that a toxic leak in the poorly-maintained Yucky Mart convenience store is the reason that the Grosseries have come to life.

* Toxic waste from the Mushroom War is the cause for much of everything in ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime'', as all life on Earth has been mutated by it. Specific demonstrations include Shoko's sudden mutation into a huge monster immediately upon plunging herself into a river of the stuff and Farmworld Jake being turned into the Lich.

Not the same as ToxicPhlebotinum (which is an actual power source, just dangerous to use), SuperSerum, or MutagenicGoo (which is something that might be actually and intentionally designed to cause changes). This applies when something that is nothing more than waste material that should just kill anything living instead makes it stronger. Often has a strong relationship to ILoveNuclearPower, as toxic and radioactive waste can and will be lumped together. Also related to FreakLabAccident. When the waste itself becomes a living threat, see MuckMonster. See also ChemistryCanDoAnything.

That holds true in fiction...maybe 3/4 of the time. Otherwise, toxic waste serves as yet another form of Phlebotinum. When you don't want to use [[LightningCanDoAnything electricity]], [[ILoveNuclearPower radiation]], or [[GeneticEngineeringIsTheNewNuke tweaking something's DNA]], just dump the issue you need into a pool of what is SUPPOSED to be deadly poisonous; whatever comes out will surely have more beneficial changes than negative.

* In the ''ComicBook/{{Madballs}}'' comic book published by Star Comics (a now defunct subsidiary of Creator/MarvelComics), the Madballs came to be when ordinary rubber balls fell into and were mutated by a pond of toxic chemicals.

* ''Film/EightLeggedFreaks'': Spiders consume toxic waste. Spiders get taste for human and ability to grow far beyond their maximum size. The film gets a little slack as it has a strong comedic bent and doesn't take itself too seriously.

!!Examples

* ''Film/TheToxicAvenger'': The Toxic Avenger of course. While it does make the titular character very ugly and the transformation is painful, it also grants him 'superhuman size and strength' and once he has fully transformed, he seems quite capable of living a normal life with no side effects.

* ''Creator/SyFy'' network original horror film ''Shark Swarm'' has the villain dump toxic poisons into the water to SPECIFICALLY kill marine life (instead of just dumping random waste to get rid of it) to bankrupt someone. It kills fish and marine life...and instead of killing sharks, makes them hyper-aggressive and gives them a semi hive-mind, despite being both a fish and marine life.

* ''Film/TheHost'': The movie uses this twice. First, a specific chemical, formaldehyde (known to being a ''carcinogen''), creates a rhino sized fish/running monster that can move incredibly fast and shrugs off bullets. Secondly, the US government tries to kill it with ANOTHER toxic chemical, Agent Yellow. [[spoiler: It WORKS...a little. It doesn't mutate the creature into a stronger form and it clearly doesn't like it, but it doesn't kill it or render it much less dangerous, forcing the main characters to KillItWithFire and add some [[ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice impaling on top of that.]]]]

[[folder: Franchise ]]

* Being a Saturday morning cartoon version of the aforementioned ''Toxic Avenger'', ''WesternAnimation/ToxicCrusaders'' takes this UpToEleven, with toxic waste not only providing Toxie with his powers, but perfectly fusing a man and a dog into a hybrid were-creature-like being (that being Junkyard: the rest of Toxie's companions were changed by exposure to radioactive materials), and then going even further by empowering a buried junked car(!) and a mop (!!).

* The 1994 animated series ''WesternAnimation/MutantLeague'' was produced as a tie-in to the video game by Electronic Arts. The premise of the show is that an earthquake ruptures the turf of a sports stadium, venting toxic gases from long-buried industrial waste. The athletes get dosed with this gas, which mutates them into ugly but superhuman creatures that can suffer horrific damage without dying or being convalescent more than a few hours.
* Neptunia from ''WesternAnimation/DarkwingDuck'' was mutated from a regular fish into a humanoid half-fish by a barrel of radioactive waste .

** This fact makes a scene in the second live action film, ''The Secret Of The Ooze'', strangely more poignant. Donatello is upset when he finds out the titular ooze's creation was just a mistake and that he had felt like that the truth would mean he and his family were 'special'. For being the smart one, he doesn't seem to realize that the fact that a bunch of chemical garbage instead of a purposely designed product made him and his family what they are makes them very special indeed.

* ''Slugs'' (the movie version, at least) might have the most triumphant example: while all the other animal-into-monsters films listed here have animals that can be dangerous in and of themselves, ''Slugs'' has toxic waste turn slugs, slow tiny gastropods who at worst eat carrion or other small gastropods, into creature that can kill and eat humans, and do so despite gaining no extra physical abilities.

* While the first ''Film/{{Alligator}}'' gained its giant, mutated form by eating discarded animal corpses spiked with growth hormones, the one in the sequel was exposed to toxic waste, which worked just as well.

* ''Film/ModernProblems'': Max is given super powers (specifically, telekinesis) when a toxic waste truck leaks all over his car while he was stuck in traffic behind it. To add to this, it crosses with LightningCanDoAnything when a lightning bolt transfers his powers to someone else at film's end.

[[AC:Film]]

[[AC:Live-Action TV]]

[[AC:Franchise]]

[[AC:NewspaperComics]]

[[AC:TabletopGames]]

[[AC:WesternAnimation]]

* ''Film/TheToxicAvenger'', of course. While it does make the titular character very ugly and the transformation is painful, it also grants him 'superhuman size and strength' and once he has fully transformed, he seems quite capable of living a normal life with no side effects.

* ''Film/{{Prophecy}}'' actually has a specific chemical instead of a generic 'waste': mercury, and unlike most films, it actually gives a little explanation for its effects: if ingested, it confuses the body into thinking its another, beneficial chemical, and exposure to it scrambles the genes of developing fetuses. While in the film this produces the expected birth defects among humans and animals, it also manages to produce a grizzly bear that's twice the size of a normal one, smarter than a normal one (it's quite willing to sit and wait outside a hole for people to emerge from), fully functioning beyond severe skin deformities, and viciously, demonically hostile.
* ''Film/TheHost'' ([[Literature/TheHost No, not that one]]) uses this twice. First, a specific chemical, formaldehyde (known to being a ''carcinogen''), creates a rhino sized fish/running monster that can move incredibly fast and shrugs off bullets. Secondly, the US government tries to kill it with ANOTHER toxic chemical, Agent Yellow. [[spoiler: It WORKS...a little. It doesn't mutate the creature into a stronger form and it clearly doesn't like it, but it doesn't kill it or render it much less dangerous, forcing the main characters to KillItWithFire and add some [[ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice impaling on top of that.]]]]
* ''Film/EightLeggedFreaks''. Spiders consume toxic waste. Spiders get taste for human and ability to grow far beyond their maximum size. The film gets a little slack as it has a strong comedic bent and doesn't take itself too seriously.

* In ''Film/SkyHigh2005'', it's established that being dipped into a pool of toxic waste will either grant the person superpowers, if they're lucky, or kill them, if unlucky. [[spoiler:In the epilogue, Will reveals that Ron Wilson, Bus Driver, was dipped into toxic waste, and is now a giant]].
* ''Film/ModernProblems'' gives Chevy Chase's character super powers (specifically, telekinesis) when a toxic waste truck leaks all over his car while he was stuck in traffic behind it. To add to this, it crosses with LightningCanDoAnything when a lightning bolt transfers his powers to someone else at film's end.