History Main / WalkingDisasterArea

* Schleprock on ''WesternAnimation/ThePebblesAndBammBammShow''. Wowzie wowzie woo woo. He could make someone's baking cake fall from the other side of town. Pebbles and her pals tried to help Schleprock change his luck in an installment only to find you can't change a leopard's spots.

%%* Schleprock on ''WesternAnimation/ThePebblesAndBammBammShow''. Wowzie wowzie woo woo.

* ''WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButthead'': The titular characters tend to wreak havoc wherever they go simply by being present, creating traffic collisions, mass destruction, and public disarray, among other things. In ''[[WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButtheadDoAmerica Do America]]'', the duo creates more havoc than ''actual terrorists'' with their stupidity, such as causing a massive power outage and flooding by setting foot in the Hoover Dam.

Like WeirdnessMagnet, except for disasters, death, widespread unpleasantness, explosions, alien invasions, zombies, crazy terrorists and jaywalkers. Wherever they go, cities crumble, villains show up, and weeping is heard. Not because they themselves cause it, but the worst of the worst are constantly drawn to them.

* ''Series/TheColbertReport'' lampshaded this trope when Richard Engel, NBC News' Chief Foreign Correspondent, was a guest on the show. Engel has been sniffing out (and reporting on) trouble spots all around the world -- but mostly in the Middle East -- since the 1990s, and has a reputation for always being in the middle of wherever the world is going to hell in a handbasket that week. So Stephen wanted to know if local governments go "OhCrap" whenever they see Engel coming. [[note]]Turns out, some of them actually ''do''. When Engel turned up in Lebanon at one point, the government wanted to know if he'd had advance warning of something bad coming their way. He hadn't, fortunately -- but sure enough, two weeks later...[[note]] Not coincidentally, Engel's third book (published 2016) is titled ''And Then All Hell Broke Loose''.

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'' episode [[Recap/TheAmazingWorldOfGumballS5E39TheList "The List"]], Gumball and Darwin mess up any room they walk into, meaning anything not strapped down falls out of place on its own by their mere presence, due to being kids.

* ''WesternAnimation/CodenameKidsNextDoor'': In, "Operation: M.A.C.A.R.R.O.N.I.", there's Numbuh 13, the biggest jinx and klutz in the organization, causing accidents everywhere he goes. Sector V is told by central command to give the Toilenator to the Mr. Boss villains in a PrisonerExchange, and are horrified to find out that the prisoner they're getting back is him. They can't tell the villains [[YouCanKeepHer You Can Keep Him]] (because he has information they need) and the team of operatives he belongs to refuse to take him back, so they're stuck with the disasters he causes until the end of the episode, when Mr. Boss accidentally kidnaps him again, [[PityTheKidnapper much to his horror.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': Homer Simpson. He was able to cause a radioactive meltdown in an area without an radioactive material. The cleanup crew knew him by name. Also [[DependingOnTheWriter depending on the episode]] this means [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome insurance agencies absolutely refuse to cover him]] because they know he is a ticking time bomb on a very short fuse.

* Seina Yamada in ''Anime/TenchiMuyoGXP'' is a comic example. Accident and misfortune dog his every step, even causing him to be accidentally recruited into the Galaxy Police. Once he's there, though, his bad luck becomes an asset because it attracts pirate ships which the GP can then arrest. At the end of the series he somehow ends up with ''eight wives'' - whether that's good or bad luck is anybody's guess.

* In ''Fanfic/AshesOfThePast'', Ash Ketchum is this, so much. Lampshaded a number of times, to the point where characters wonder why he is not preceeded by an army of Absol (Pokemon that sense impending disasters) warning people about his approach. Eventually he does encounter an Absol...who promptly attempts a ScrewThisImOutOfHere. Pity the window she tried to escape through was made of safety glass.

* The videocamera-toting cast of ''Film/{{Cloverfield}}'' probably fit nicely into this trope - wherever they go, whatever they do, the monster is there as well.

* ''Literature/TheDresdenFiles'': Harry Dresden. Ever since he started working in Chicago, there's pretty much three gigantic magical disasters per year. Also it is also due to living in a Disaster Area — the Chicago area is strongly magical, drawing in all kinds of things. A ''mobster'', who is so badass that he joins a magical legal organization containing entities like ''demigods'' and ''wizard councils'' purely based on being a badass muggle, complains that Harry threatening to ''show up'' is more blackmail than he ever does. It turns out that being a PersonOfMassDestruction and hanging out with a surprisingly large number of beings who are at least as powerful does ''wonders'' for the insurance collection rates. [[Literature/GhostStory Later]] [[spoiler:it's revealed most major forces in the Supernatural World knew who Dresden was, by reputation, and stayed out of Chicago for their own safety. Arguably, Chicago being the location for the battle(s) in Literature/PeaceTalks[=/=]Literature/BattleGround2020 was the result of Dresden ''going missing'' for several months, starting at the end of Literature/{{Changes}}-- it allowed the Fomor to move in unopposed]].

** One of the prequel comics indicates that it's actually the other way round - Buffy is drawn to weirdness, not vice versa.

* ''Series/TheColbertReport'' lampshaded this trope when Richard Engel, NBC News' Chief Foreign Correspondent, was a guest on the show. Engel has been sniffing out (and reporting on) trouble spots all around the world -- but mostly in the Middle East -- since the 1990s, and has a reputation for always being in the middle of wherever the world is going to hell in a handbasket that week. So Stephen wanted to know if local governments go "OhCrap" whenever they see Engel coming. (Turns out, some of them actually ''do''. When Engel turned up in Lebanon at one point, the government wanted to know if he'd had advance warning of something bad coming their way. He hadn't, fortunately -- but sure enough, two weeks later...) Not coincidentally, Engel's third book (published 2016) is titled ''And Then All Hell Broke Loose''.

* The Doctor from ''Series/DoctorWho''. This is ''heavily'' lampshaded and emphasized to the point of {{Anvilicious}}ness in the revived series.

* ''Series/ICarly'': Carly's brother Spencer is a mild example. Possibly due to RuleOfFunny, anything he does has a small chance of spontaneously combusting. Particularly glaring examples involve ringing a small desk bell...and having it burst into flame, and hitting a cymbal with a drumstick, which then began burning. Reaches its apex when, fed up with constant calls, the local fire department just gives Spencer some fire extinguishers for use around the house. Spencer pulls the pin on one, expecting a spray of foam...and gets a [[FireBreathingWeapon spray of fire!]]

* ''VideoGame/Fallout3'' tends to spawn enemies around the player character. At higher levels, approaching civilization can be dangerous - odds are the enemies will far outclass any inhabitants of a given settlement.

** In the ''Citadel DLC'' for the third game, Shepard is responsible for the destruction of a posh sushi restaurant after being ambushed by a group of mercenaries. ''No-one'' lets Shepard [[OnceDoneNeverForgotten forget it]] - mostly because Shepard's exit from the restaurant involved falling through the aquarium-floor.

* ''WesternAnimation/InspectorGadget''. Seriously, he'd likely cause more problems than he'd solve if Penny and Brain weren't helping him, and when he accidentally helps the villains (which happens rather often) [[AlasPoorVillain you almost feel sorry for them.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim'', who once accidentally shut down the power for ''half a military training planet'', for a ''snack'', is this trope. At two minutes old, he blew the power for most of a planet. His leaders put him in military science to try and turn his capacity for horrible oblivious destruction in a useful direction, but it didn't really work out. For instance, Zim caused another power outage when he decided to visit the surface of Irk, killed the two previous Tallests by creating a Lovecraftian horror that nearly wiped out all space, and caused a planet to explode just by standing on it. To keep him contained during an invasion, his commanders confined him to a circle drawn on the ground. Zim promptly decided was too simple a task for his GENIUS and hijacked a HumongousMecha invasion machine, whereupon he commenced with the invading and the exploding and the uncontrolled fires blissfully unaware he had not yet left Planet Irk and bringing the entire invasion down single-handed. For their ''next'' invasion, Zim's commanders exiled him to Earth - as far away from them as possible. From there, he still managed to destroy a large part of the invading fleet with an out-of-control rapidly moving planet Mars. In one unused script, there was to be a montage of everything Zim had ever destroyed. [[OverlyLongGag ...It would have gone on for a while.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButthead'': The titular characters tend to wreak havoc wherever they go simply by being present. Their colossal stupidity has created traffic collisions, mass destruction, and public disarray, among other things. In ''[[WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButtheadDoAmerica Do America]]'', the duo creates more havoc than ''actual terrorists'' with their stupidity, such as causing a massive power outage and flooding by setting foot in the Hoover Dam.

* If you play as a shroud with the misfortune dominion in ''TabletopGame/{{Anathema}}'' then you are this. The misfortune dominion allows you to magically cause fatal accidents.

* ''WesternAnimation/SpiritStallionOfTheCimarron'': Spirit. Ever since he was first captured at the beginning of the film, calamity and destruction followed him, from sending a U.S. army fort in and uproar, the Lakota village that he was staying at being ransacked by said army, to him indirectly causing [[StuffBlowingUp AN ENTIRE FOREST TO GO UP IN FLAME.]] One horse caused all of that - [[HomeSweetHome and all because he wanted to get back home.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButthead'': The titular characters tend to wreak havoc wherever they go simply by being present. Their colossal stupidity has, among other things, created traffic collisions, mass destruction, and public disarray. In ''[[WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButtheadDoAmerica Do America]]'', the duo creates more havoc than ''actual terrorists'' with their stupidity, such as causing a massive power outage and flooding by setting foot in the Hoover Dam.

* ''Literature/TheStormlightArchive'': In ''Literature/TheWayOfKings'', everyone around Kaladin dies, especially when he tries to help them. Lampshaded constantly throughout the book. Eventually partially justified. [[spoiler:Syl is an Honorspren and has been giving Kaladin unconscious Surgebinding powers. Kaladin continually strives to do the right thing, getting himself into dangerous and disastrous circumstances. Syl's bond has given him the strength to survive them, when others haven't]].

* ''Literature/{{Slayers}}'': Lina Inverse, the "Dragon Spooker". It doesn't help that she's a DestructiveSaviour [[PersonOfMassDestruction Of Mass Destruction]], such that her companions know to get everybody out of Dodge when she decides to bust out her signature spell, Dragon Slave, on the MonsterOfTheWeek.

* ''WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButthead'': The titular characters tend to wreak havoc wherever they go simply by being present. Their colossal stupidity has, among other things, created traffic collisions, mass destruction, and public disarray. In ''[[WesternAnimation/BeavisAndButtheadDoAmerica Do America]]'', the duo create more havoc than ''actual terrorists'' with their stupidity, such as causing a massive power outage and flooding by setting foot in the Hoover Dam.

* In ''WesternAnimation/CodenameKidsNextDoor'', "Operation: M.A.C.A.R.RO.N.I.", there's Numbuh 13, the biggest jinx and klutz in the organization, causing accidents everywhere he goes. Sector V is told by central command to give the Toilenator to the Mr. Boss villains in a PrisonerExchange, and are horrified to find out that the prisoner they're getting back is him. They can't tell the villains [[YouCanKeepHer You Can Keep Him]] (because he has information they need) and the team of operatives he belongs to refuse to take him back, so they're stuck with the disasters he causes until the end of the episode, when Mr. Boss accidentally kidnaps him again, [[PityTheKidnapper much to his horror.]]