Mwahahaaa! Finally, my Index is near completion! They said it was impossible to compile all the Mad Science tropes in one page! They Called Me Mad!, those fools! Mad! Well I'll show them — I'll show them ALL!!! Igor, throw the switch!!
Now, Make My Index LIVE!
Characters
- Doctor von Turncoat: A scientist switches sides in a conflict and avoids punishment because their expertise is considered too valuable.
- Dr. Frankenstein: The now public domain title character of Frankenstein, who creates artificial life forms.
- Emperor Scientist: A Mad Scientist who has taken over the world.
- Escaped from the Lab: A character who from an early age was raised in a lab as a test subject, but eventually escaped.
- Evil Genius: A villain with a high intellect.
- Evilutionary Biologist: An evil geneticist who has the goal of improving the human race on their terms.
- Fate of the Frankensteins: A mad scientist who is descended from Dr. Frankenstein.
- Gadgeteer Genius: A scientist whose expertise is in inventing gadgets.
- Herr Doktor: Scientific genius of Germanic origins.
- The Igor: The short, deformed assistant of the Mad Scientist.
- Mad Artist: He'll do the most grotesque, evil things for the sake of creating his art.
- Mad Doctor: An insane physician.
- Mad Mathematician
- Mad Scientist: A scientist who is of questionable sanity and tends to conduct unorthodox experiments.
- Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter
- Maker of Monsters
- Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: A villain who is addressed as "Doctor" or "Professor".
- Professor Guinea Pig: A scientist who uses themselves as a test subject.
- Raised in a Lab: A person who is raised as an experiment in a lab.
- Recursive Creators: Artificial life that creates artificial life.
- Reluctant Mad Scientist: A scientist discovers a new technology with the hopes of making humanity more peaceful and prosperous. Said technology is used for war and devastation.
Experiments/Plots
- Artificial Animal People: Creating animal-like people or human-like animals using science.
- Artificial Zombie: Bringing someone back to life through scientific means.
- Brain in a Jar: A disembodied brain is kept alive in a jar.
- Brain Theft: Someone's brain is removed without their consent.
- Brain Transplant: Someone's brain gets removed and put into someone else's body.
- Clone Angst: A clone has emotional issues from the knowledge that they're just a genetic duplicate of someone else.
- Creating Life
- Creating Life Is Awesome
- Creating Life Is Bad
- Creating Life Is Unforeseen
- Frankenstein's Monster: A being sewn together from dead body parts and brought to life.
- Gender Bender: Someone has their gender changed.
- Gone Horribly Right: The solution works so well that it becomes a new problem.
- Gone Horribly Wrong: The attempted solution ends up failing spectacularly.
- Mister Seahorse: A man becomes pregnant.
- Mix-and-Match Critters: Want to invent a new monster/animal/whatever? Just take two or more existing creatures and combine them!
- Playing with Syringes: Unethical experiments to create something.
- Pointless Doomsday Device: An ancient device with the singular purpose of destroying the world.
- Replacement Goldfish: A replacement for a lost loved one.
- Science Is Bad: The work has the moral that scientific progress is evil.
- Smorgasbord Test: Someone discovers a new creature and tries to find out what it eats by offering it many different foods.
- Synthetic Plague
- Take Over the World: Evil scientists oftentimes desire global conquest.
- Two Beings, One Body
- Working for a Body Upgrade
Tools
- Artistic License – Biology: Rules of biology ignored for sake of story.
- Big Electric Switch
- Fertile Blood: When blood is spilled onto the ground, life (usually plants) sprout up from it.
- Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke: Genetic engineering replacing radiation as the new Phlebotinum du Jour.
- Guinea Pig Family: The scientist uses their own relatives as test subjects.
- Kidnapped for Experimentation: A character is abducted to be a scientific test subject.
- Lab Pet: Animals used in lab experiments, often some type of small rodents (like mice, rats, hamsters, or guinea pigs).
- Lightning Can Do Anything: Anything can happen from getting struck by lightning.
- Nanomachines: Microscopic robots.
- Radiation-Induced Superpowers: People get mutated by radiation.
- Scale of Scientific Sins: Secular vices to be very, very wary of.
- Self-Made Superpowers: Giving yourself superpowers on purpose.
- Soviet Superscience: Soviets with technology noticeably more advanced than their historical counterparts.
- Strapped to an Operating Table: Mad scientists tend to keep their victims strapped to operating tables...
- Strapped to a Rocket: ...Or rockets.
- Stupid Jetpack Hitler: Exaggerated Nazi super-science.
- Tested on Humans: Using live human beings as guinea pigs for lab experiments, often against their free will.
- Test Subject for Hire: Recruiting paid volunteers into serving as lab rats for an experiment.
- Toxic Waste Can Do Anything: Toxic waste is depicted as enabling mutations and superpowers.
- Unwitting Test Subject: Someone is tricked and coerced into participating in a science experiment without their fully informed consent.
Trademarks
- Dr. Brainpart: A Mad Scientist whose name includes "brain" or a related concept.
- Dr. Fakenstein: A Mad Scientist whose name is obviously a play on Frankenstein.
- Dr. Genericius: A Mad Scientist whose surname ends with "-us".
- Evil Laugh: The villain laughs maniacally.
- For Science!: The willingness to do anything to benefit scientific progress no matter how unethical or weird it may be.
- Just Think of the Potential!: Think about what this baby could do for achieving not-so-altruistic ends!
- The Madness Place: The hyper-productive creative fugue state of the Mad Scientist.
- Science-Related Memetic Disorder: Mad Science as a medical disorder.
- The Spark of Genius: Reality isn't a limit for creative science.
- They Called Me Mad!: The scientist rambles on how their peers ridiculed them and called them crazy.
Settings
- Enigmatic Institute: A secret lab is the perfect place to indulge in some mad science.
- Halloweentown: A Halloween-themed Setting.
- Haunted Castle: Velcome to... zer Castle! *KRAKOOM*
- Mad Science Fair
- Mad Scientist Laboratory
- Safely Secluded Science Center
- Steampunk: An alternate 19th century setting where primitive technology is widespread.
- Tesla Tech Timeline: Nikola Tesla used to handwave Lightning Can Do Anything.
- Überwald: Generic creepy Eastern European country, which is frequently where a Mad Scientist may live.
Yes! It's alive! IT'S ALIIIIIIIIIIIVE!!! AHAHAHAHAHAAA!!!
