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Misused: Adult Fear

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To-do list:

  • Move examples that fit at least one of the tropes on the Adult Fear disambiguation page, and remove ones that don't.

    Original post 
So, the wick check for this was done by Warjay who never got the chance to slot this in. I'll be making the first post.

Now, this trope is supposed to be "anything in a work that could scare level-headed adults and happen in real life", but is often narrowly defined as "children in peril", even when the threat is supernatural- which is not this trope. The image is almost certainly at fault here- tropers see the image of the truck heading at the kid with the caption "every parent's worst nightmare" and instantly get into their heads that Adult Fear = children in peril.

It doesn't help that when we discussed this trope, concerns arose over whether it was redundant with Realism-Induced Horror or similar tropes.

Here is the wick check.

Edited by GastonRabbit on May 16th 2022 at 6:46:47 AM

Libraryseraph Showtime! from Canada (Five Year Plan) Relationship Status: Raising My Lily Rank With You
Showtime!
#251: May 4th 2022 at 7:51:16 AM

Does anyone have any ideas for these from Sleepless Domain? I feel like there's something here but I'm having trouble pinning it down with the disambig tropes

  • Adult Fear: Putting aside the magical aspects of this comic, there are still some solid examples here:
    • Someday your daughter may not come home from what is essentially war — sure, participation isn't required, but as Zoe shows, there's a lot of societal pressure placed at those that can fight but don't want to.
    • And on topic of Zoe: having a son doesn't save you from the above when "he" turns out to be a trans girl and the Dream forces her out of the closet. Made more poignant by the fact that this is Zoe's parents' second magical girl daughter, and so they know these worries all too well and thought they're past them.
    • Even if your daughter DOES make it through her tour of duty (as it were), she may not make it completely unscathed, such as Mingxing, who lost her arm.
    • Tessa shows signs of PTSD after three of her friends are killed, and her parents are at an utter loss at how to help her since she won't admit to it and she fakes being happier than she is.
    • Kokoro lives in the Future’s Promise boarding house after her father wouldn’t support her becoming a magical girl in light of his experiences.
    • An intruder got in your house and did something to your son.
    • Cassidy dies without even leaving behind a body.

Absolute destiny... apeachalypse?
selkies Professional Wick Checker Since: Jan, 2021 Relationship Status: Star-crossed
Professional Wick Checker
#252: May 4th 2022 at 8:30:58 AM

Paranoia Fuel? If it doesn't fit any of the listed tropes then you can just remove it I think.

RobertTYL Since: Oct, 2019 Relationship Status: Holding out for a hero
#253: May 6th 2022 at 11:22:08 PM

The amount of misuse this trope had fallen into is depressing.

One of the misuse says "Adult Fear: A character winces in pain at the sign of a Groin Attack..." (what?)

Also, examples about teenage characters dying are often lumped as "Adult Fear", since the trope Death of a Child wouldn't apply, the troper who added them decide to use AF as a substitute. Surprisingly common

There's also this line from The Lego Movie (spoiler for an 8-year-old animated film), which claims The Man Upstairs have an Adult Fear because he realized he had "failed as a father" because his son casts him as a villain in his daydream make-believe. note 

Either ways, on the main page, suggestion to put Axes at School, Departmentof Child Disservices, and Social Services Does Not Exist in the list? A lot of the AF misuse seems to overlap with them

Edited by RobertTYL on May 7th 2022 at 8:53:16 PM

mightymewtron Angry babby from New New York Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Angry babby
#254: May 7th 2022 at 11:45:10 AM

In defense of the Lego Movie one, that is pretty much the text of the scene. It's not really Adult Fear though.

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
Cutegirl920fire CG for short from NYC apparently (Rule of Three) Relationship Status: Paris holds the key to my heart
CG for short
#255: May 7th 2022 at 11:49:30 AM

[up][up] I think Axes at School would be fine to add.

Also, ~Robert TYL can you please stop with the bolding and snark? If you want to emphasize something, italics would do as it's less painful to the eyes and the snarking is often unnecessary and rude.

Victor of HGS S320 | "There's rosemary, that's for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember."
Reymma RJ Savoy from Edinburgh Since: Feb, 2015 Relationship Status: Wanna dance with somebody
RJ Savoy
#256: May 7th 2022 at 2:26:49 PM

I think the Sleepless Domain entries can fit under Realism-Induced Horror, since it seems to be aiming for realistic effects of war in a magical context.

Stories don't tell us monsters exist; we knew that already. They show us that monsters can be trademarked and milked for years.
RobertTYL Since: Oct, 2019 Relationship Status: Holding out for a hero
#257: May 14th 2022 at 11:00:15 PM

Someone actually put a Precision F-Strike [lol] in a trope example (deleted since it's ZCE)

  • Adult Fear: The pedophile ring is every parent’s worst fucking nightmare.

Also, isn't Adam Ruins a comedy show? Does it need 12 entries under AF? I'm stumped, any replacement trope suggestions?

(EDIT: I've deleted the whole Adult Fear list under Adam Ruins for misusue. Nevermind.)

Edited by RobertTYL on May 16th 2022 at 10:18:26 PM

GastonRabbit MOD Cake's just a shot away. (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Cake's just a shot away. (he/him)
#258: May 16th 2022 at 4:47:03 AM

I added a to-do list to the opening post and pinned it. The OP's original contents have been moved to a folder.

You can't always get what you want.
RandomTroper123 She / Her from I'll let you guess... (Not-So-Newbie) Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
She / Her
#259: May 18th 2022 at 4:00:10 AM

So, I was doing some cleanup and it said the trope was brought up on Strangers on a Train. However, when I checked the page, Adult Fear wasn't potholed. Is this a glitch?

GastonRabbit Cake's just a shot away. (he/him) from Robinson, Illinois, USA (General of TV Troops) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
Cake's just a shot away. (he/him)
#260: May 18th 2022 at 4:03:19 AM

[up]Sometimes ghost wicks appear on pages that have no wicks at all, and indeed that page has no wicks. I'll add a random wick and then remove it to see if that fixes it.

Edit: I added a wick to Home Page and immediately removed it and it looks like that fixed it.

Edited by GastonRabbit on May 18th 2022 at 6:05:04 AM

You can't always get what you want.
Amonimus the Retromancer from <<|Wiki Talk|>> (Sergeant) Relationship Status: In another castle
the Retromancer
#261: May 18th 2022 at 4:04:26 AM

[up][up] Because it was already removed. Depending on where you were looking at for the check it could just be timing.

Edited by Amonimus on May 18th 2022 at 2:05:27 PM

TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
RandomTroper123 She / Her from I'll let you guess... (Not-So-Newbie) Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
She / Her
#262: May 18th 2022 at 11:48:07 AM

Okay and thanks guys.

AmourLeFou You'll never find out who I am from Colorado Since: Apr, 2021 Relationship Status: One Is The Loneliest Number
You'll never find out who I am
#263: May 19th 2022 at 4:00:56 PM

Do potholes need to be removed too?

Check out my forum game: Rate the above YMMV.
MacronNotes (she/her) (Captain) Relationship Status: Less than three
(she/her)
#264: May 19th 2022 at 4:05:47 PM

Since Adult Fear is a disambig all instances of it being used (except maaybe certain JFF jokes if there's consensus for that) should either be removed or moved to applicable tropes if possible .

Edited by MacronNotes on May 19th 2022 at 7:12:26 AM

Macron's notes
RandomTroper123 She / Her from I'll let you guess... (Not-So-Newbie) Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
She / Her
#265: May 19th 2022 at 4:10:28 PM

From experience with disambiguated tropes, yes, potholes for Adult Fear should also be removed.

WarJay77 Bonnie's Artistic Cousin from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Bonnie's Artistic Cousin
#266: May 19th 2022 at 4:13:51 PM

Basically, there should be no wicks left except for exception pages, like archives and Administrivia.

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
wootzits Since: Apr, 2010
#267: May 20th 2022 at 4:21:08 PM

52 wicks remaining, many of them are ghost wicks.

MacronNotes (she/her) (Captain) Relationship Status: Less than three
(she/her)
#268: May 20th 2022 at 4:24:12 PM

Wow, you guys cleared through the wicks fast. I swear we were at 3k wicks not too long ago.

^Anyways, I'll look the rest of the wicks

Edited by MacronNotes on May 20th 2022 at 7:26:00 AM

Macron's notes
RandomTroper123 She / Her from I'll let you guess... (Not-So-Newbie) Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
She / Her
#269: May 20th 2022 at 4:24:27 PM

Ok, good to know.

WarJay77 Bonnie's Artistic Cousin from The Void (Troper Knight) Relationship Status: Armed with the Power of Love
Bonnie's Artistic Cousin
#270: May 20th 2022 at 4:24:48 PM

Holy shit, blink and you miss it...

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
RandomTroper123 She / Her from I'll let you guess... (Not-So-Newbie) Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
She / Her
#271: May 20th 2022 at 4:38:13 PM

Ikr lol.

MacronNotes (she/her) (Captain) Relationship Status: Less than three
(she/her)
#272: May 20th 2022 at 5:02:23 PM

Cleanup is done! All that's left over are archives and sandboxes. I am going to transplant both Adult Fear wick checks on to this post soon.

Locking.

Adult Fear wick check:

Wicks checked: 112/102

Overall example count: 133

Quick results:

  • Child Endangerment: 91/133 examples, or ~68%
  • Adult Situations: 22/133 examples, or ~17%
  • Death, Murder, and Gore: 14/133 examples, or ~11%
  • ZCE and unsortable: 6/133 examples, or ~5%


  • Objective / In-Universe: 53/112, or ~47%
  • Subjective: 28/112, or 25%
  • Unsure or Mixed: 31/112, or ~28%

    open/close all folders 

    Child Endangerment (91/133) 
  • Creepy Children Singing: In a creepy scene in The Birds by Alfred Hitchcock, schoolchildren sing the nonsense folk song "Risselty-Rosselty" while a mass of Creepy Crows slowly gather on an empty playground, waiting to attack them as soon as they leave. Subverted in that the children themselves are innocent victims, the creepiness coming from the context, suspense, and situation.
  • Ominous Walk: The first pteranodon in Jurassic Park III pulls a brief one at the beginning of the sequence it appears in. Simply put, the creature is surrounded by fog when it does this, and is slowly striding its way toward a thirteen year old boy. No one can blame said boy for screaming. Bonus points for the fact that an animal known for its flying prowess is introduced by walking menacingly.
  • Anime.Astro Boy: The story of Daichi for his father. It's not that different from neglecting your own child and taking them for granted. Daichi becomes resentful awhile playing the part of a model son and threatens to dismantle everything his father built. Tokugawa is more horrified than angry when he realizes.
  • Anime.Heidi Girl Of The Alps: Parents may fear this if they see their children standing at gunpoint even if they're not aiming at them, they still could get hurt.
  • Anime.Pacific Rim The Black: Plenty of it. The opening Jaeger fight follows Ford and Jaeger desperately trying to protect their kids, among other civilians, from a rampaging Kaiju, and it gets worse from there. Shane is also a walking manifestation of this trope; torturing kids for information using drift tech, being all too willing to murder said children in cold blood, and having kidnapped and brainwashed Mei from a loving family, blotting out her memories of a happy childhood so she believed he rescued her from the streets.
  • Anime.Space Battleship Yamato 2202: Touko plays upon Kato's Adult Fear about his terminally-ill son, in return for an actual cure for the disease ailing him. The catch? He needs to scuttle the Yamato using the Anti-Wave Motion particles Keyman inserted into the Yamato's engine, dooming all his friends and crewmates on the ship.
  • Awesome.Wolfwalkers: Hell, Bill admitting to his daughter he's afraid is this, showing emotional vulnerability in a time where men weren't supposed to. It takes some ballsy writing for a kid's movie to explore the very idea that parents can feel something as human as fear. This doesn't have the context, but the preceeding bullets are about the dad admitting he's scared of losing his daughter.
  • Characters.Lightning Dust: James does honestly care about Klaus, and understandably flips out whenever he is captured.
  • Characters.A Song Of Ice And Fire Court Of Aegon II:
    • Adult Fear: His two sons predeceased him.
    • Adult Fear: She watched her eldest son beheaded, while the assassins also threatened to rape her daughter. Her younger son was later torn to pieces by a mob, though it's unclear if she ever learned about this.
  • Characters.Minami Ke: He panically reacts when it seems that his two youngest siblings might be kidnapped. (Of course, it's a misunderstanding.)
  • Characters.Ruby And Nora Faculty: She worries that Weiss has been injured or killed when she sees Ruby's silver eyes activating. Unfortunately, her fears were confirmed. Technically, a younger sibling, but close enough.
  • ComicBook.Batman Year One: The Birthday Boy, who kidnaps young girls, is implied to cut their throats and then keep their corpses rotting in Arkham Manor's basement. The horror of it is really shown when he kidnaps Barbara on Cobblepot's orders, leading Gordon to freak out in terror when he realises what's happened. Later, Bullock falls into the basement where the bodies are buried. It's not shown on-panel, but seeing what's happened is enough to reduce him from the well-meaning crime-fighter he's been up to that point to The Alcoholic with severe PTSD.
  • ComicBook.Yoko Tsuno:
    • For Christmas, Yoko wants to surprise a little girl's family by offering a contract to the jobless father. Except, to get the contract, Yoko has to ride across town with the little girl in tow and didn't notify her parents beforehand. Needless to say, her parents are worried, although the story ends on a happy note.
    • When Yoko accidentally broke her grandfather's watch, she was very upset and ran away. Her parents were very worried and frantically searched for her.
  • DarthWiki.Divine Comedy A Theoretical Fate RPG: In the conversation where you recruit Mordred, her pitiful, heartbreaking, childlike state makes Dante remember his own young children, which particularly breaks his heart. While he has been growing more sympathetic to the shades as the story goes on, he does grow to be less emotional about it as he gets conditioned to Hell and all its horrors; seeing Mordred like this visibly makes his metaphorical heart sink. Even Virgil looks pretty shocked.
  • Fanfic.Co Op Mode: Danny is hit with this earlier, hard, when Taylor returned home even later than she did in canon. This leads to the scene wherein he talks to Taylor and tries to convince her out of being a hero, only to fail and come across as too overprotective.
  • Fanfic.Guardian Angel: In the 2-part chapter 'Wickedness', Twilight goes out of her mind with worry when Scootaloo can't be found in the town, even breaking down in tears at one point.
  • Fanfic.Rise Of The Dragon Child: Your surrogate son leaves to another town for business... and is attacked by Thalmor on the way back. For Dumbledore, the fear of mysteriously losing a child under your care and there being nothing you can do about it.
  • Fanfic.Unwanted Free Ugly Doll: Dave briefly fears that Cronus may have made inappropriate advances toward Sollux, though Sollux assures him that Cronus only ever hits on adults.
  • Fanfic.What Lies Beyond The Walls: Everything involving Tegast in chapter 10 and 11. His entire family is slaughtered and he's forced to wander around Mossflower, alone, with no adults to help him and with only basic survival skills, something any parent would never wish for their child.
  • Film.Cube Zero: Rain sees her daughter hauled off by black-clad soldiers. She then wakes up in the Cube with no idea of where her daughter is, and can't even remember her name.
  • Film.Fruitvale Station:
    • Oscar's mom: Having your son killed in cold blood, and knowing that you might have caused it.
    • Oscar himself: Having your daughter tell you before you leave that she fears for your life, reassuring her that everything will be okay, only to later be fatally shot, proving her fears true — all while she's unaware.
  • Film.A History Of Violence: When Edie thinks her daughter's been taken at the mall.
  • Film.Philadelphia: Part of the reason Charles Wheeler and the others were so upset about Andy having AIDS (and hiding it) was because he went to their company picnics and they feel paranoid he could have gotten blood on their kids or something.
  • Film.What Maisie Knew: Maisie falling asleep outside of her apartment late at night whilst waiting for Susanna. The apartment staff thankfully notice and take her upstairs to be given shelter.
  • Film.Woman In Black Angel Of Death: Once the Woman in Black has been seen, a child will inevitably die a horrifying death. There's nothing anyone can do to stop it.
  • Fridge.The Mitchells Vs The Machines: How many people were killed during PAL's takeover? I mean when those robots landed at the Dinostop they caused some kind of shockwave which resulted in Katie and several others being pushed to the ground. If that shockwave was caused by 2 robots landing, how much destruction was caused by dozens of robots landing all at once and how many people got injured or killed by those shockwaves? Also, there were probably dozens of babies and kids who managed to avoid detection, but were on their own with no idea of what's happened. The babies probably have no idea what happened to their parents and are crying for someone to take care of them. It would be Adult Fear for any parents who don't know what happened to their kids.
  • Heartwarming.Camp Camp: Crossing over with a Funny Moment, Gwen and David watching a nice, relaxing episode of The Joy of Painting. Sure, they're both unaware of Nikki choking to death, but it's nice to see them getting a break from all the insanity for once.
  • JustForFun.Diddle Kid: Imagine having to worry about your child being raped every time they go out into the streets by a masked man that the police can't seem to catch.
  • Laconic.Wake Wood: Grieving parents bring their dead daughter back, but she's not the same.
  • LightNovel.Magical Girl Raising Project:
    • Your kid's life is in constant danger, they're living a double life that you don't know anything about, and if you ask them about it, they can't admit anything, lest they suffer the consequences.
    • A stranger forces you and your students to do something that you know will get them in danger and potentially killed, yet most of your students agree happily to the request. And the only way to protect them is to work with the being who forced you into this situation.
  • Literature.Clifford The Big Red Dog: There's an episode where Mac runs away from Jetta because he accidentally ruined her favorite sweater. Jetta tells Mac, when they find him, that she cares more about him than about a sweater because she doesn't want her dog to be hurt.
  • Literature.In Her Shoes: In Rose's recounting of the day their mother took them on a spontaneous trip to New York, one can only imagine what must have been going through Michael's head when he received the phone call that his daughters never made it to school with his mentally unstable wife nowhere to be found.
  • Literature.Fudge:
    • It's not discussed at length, but this is likely a large part of the reason that Peter's parents freak out when Fudge swallows his turtle and are lenient on him afterwards. At first they have no idea what the effects of that might be, and then they're facing the possibility of their toddler having to undergo surgery. Even Peter briefly gets worried. And Peter also points out that Fudge killed his pet and isn't even sorry about it.
    • Earlier in Tales Of A Fourth Grade Nothing, Fudge briefly disappears while at the movie theater with Peter and their father. He's found quickly, but it's still something that would terrify most parents.
    • In Superfudge, four-year-old Fudge and his friend Daniel decide to run off on their own while telling their respective parents that they're at each other's houses. When the parents realize that the boys lied to them and haven't been seen for several hours, they (and Peter) are understandably panicked.
    • Mini lets Uncle Feather loose For the Lulz, and he starts careening around the apartment. Then he smashes into a window wing-first. Fudge is at first worried his pet is dead, but a vet confirms that Uncle Feather just broke his wing and needs a cast. Peter notes that Fudge behaved well considering the circumstances.
  • Literature.The Raven Cycle (1): In Blue Lily, Lily Blue, the Gray Man is afraid of Blue getting hurt or killed, as he's come to care for her like his own daughter.
  • Literature.Ronja The Robbers Daughter: The things Mattis warns Ronja about when he sends her into the woods alone for the first time are just as worrying to a modern parent. Having your child get lost, fall into a river and drown, be taken by a predator (human or otherwise) or fall off a cliff is just as much a terror to a modern parent as it is to poor Mattis.
  • Literature.The Loop:
    • Your child, with no warning and no explanation, goes ballistic in the middle of class mutilating a fellow classmate and murdering a teacher.
    • Jason Ward’s parents experience this when he goes missing even if it took them two days to report it.
    • For Lucy, finding her adopted parents in a catatonic state from the signal being broadcast on the tv is very much like finding them dead or collapsed on the floor.
  • Literature.You Know You Want This: "Look At Your Game, Girl". Both the brief relationship between Jessica and an unnamed pedophile and the murder of Polly Klaas, though it ends up having no relation to Jessica's story.
  • Manga.Birdy The Mighty: Much of what Sayaka goes through in the first season is presumably designed to be this from the perspectives of her caretakers, since she recovers from a car accident only to start acting strangely, and while they know there's something off about her there's nothing they can do and even she doesn't know exactly what happened, but people start dying around her. Then Shyamalan shows up and tells Nakasugi he's taking Sayaka away....
  • Manga.Please Save My Earth: You leave your child in the care of a neighbor's teenaged daughter, trust her to take care of him and you get called, told that your child is in the hospital. Because your child fell off the balcony. And even worse, it was the girl you left in charge that was at fault for it.
  • NightmareFuel.Ninjago: The reason why Ray and Maya were absent from Kai and Nya's lives: Krux threatened to harm Kai and Nya if Ray and Maya didn't help him forge armor and weaponry for the Vermillion warriors, all out of revenge that they created the Time Blades that took his and Acronix's powers away. Keep in mind that Kai and Nya were at least five and three years old respectively when Krux took their parents away.
  • Podcast.The Penumbra Podcast: Although the parents presumably never find out, a house attacking the children who live in it is several deep-seated fears rolled into one package.
  • Series.CSI Cyber: The show often deals in this, as several of its villains definitely Would Hurt a Child. For example, "CMND:\Crash" has a mother separated from her daughter, who's one of the passengers trapped on a runaway subway train. Elijah rescues the girl, along with everyone else, and reunites her with her mother. Also Invasion of the Baby Snatchers and Roaring Rampage of Revenge below.
  • TearJerker.Superbook 2011:
  • Manga.With The Light: Evident in Hikaru's early childhood, as his tendency of getting lost often scared Sachiko, fearing that he may be kidnapped.
  • Myth.Classical Mythology: Just imagine how poor Aegeus must have felt when he saw his son, Theseus, departure to Crete, along with thirteen other young Athenians, so they would be fed to the Minotaur. And his face, when he saw that the ship which had carried Theseus returned with black sails, meaning that his son hadn't survived the ordeal ( which was not true, as Theseus had killed the Minotaur, he just forgot to change the sails to white ones). To make matters worse, Theseus was Aegeus' only child, which explains why he committed suicide.
  • NightmareFuel.A Goofy Movie: Mazur calling Goofy to tell him about Max's stunt has Adult Fear written all over it. At first, Goofy is gravely concerned that Max might've gotten hurt. Then as Mazur is reading him Max's obviously trumped-up charges, Goofy starts hyperventilating at the mere thought that the son he loves could or would do such things before getting what can only be called a scare tactic to keep Max in line dropped on him. It perfectly captures the fear that all Good Parents have at the though of being unable to protect their children from even themselves.
  • Quotes.Disappointed In You:
John Marston: What's your mother going to say?
Jack Marston: I'm sorry, Pa. Please don't be angry.
John: I ain't angry. I'm disappointed. Don't you ever run off on your own like that again.
Jack: Alright, alright. I told you I was sorry.
— Red Dead Redemption, after John saves Jack from a bear
  • Recap.The Batman S 4 E 1 A Matter Of Family:
    • Bruce has a flashback to when he attended his parents' funeral and says he's adopting Dick so that he won't go through the grieving process alone.
  • Series.Zoo: Since the animals have their sights on the humans, they don't even care if a child gets in their way.
    • Even if animals were behaving normally, the little boy who toddles innocently up to the tiger cage in "Fight or Flight" would be any parent's nightmare.
  • Recap.A Feast Of Crows: Meanwhile, Ser Daven is Surrounded by Idiots; Freys peck at night and day, as does Lord Gawen Westerling, who fears for his wife and child.
  • Recap.Buffy The Vampire Slayer S 1 E 3 The Witch: Amy's dad used to protect her from her mother. When he left, she was completely at Catherine's mercy. He doesn't find out the details but becomes remorseful after gaining custody of his daughter, spoiling her rotten as an apology for neglecting her.
  • Recap.Disney Sing Along Songs V 19: Jewel winds up still being missing after the hide and seek game, causing all the humans and dogs to worry. Fortunately, Perdita finds her much to everyone's relief.
  • Recap.ERS 1 E 02 Day One: Lewis jumps to her feet and runs after the nurse, while a baby is wheeled in with his distraught parents following.
  • Recap.The Lion Guard Return Of The Roar: The hyenas cause a gazelle stampede that Kiara becomes trapped in. Besides being flashback inducing for Simba, it could explain why Simba is so protective of her in the second film.
  • Series.Alphas: One can only imagine what went through the mind of Gary's mother when she learned that her autistic son had been confined to a government holding facility in the season 2 premiere. Or, for that matter, what goes through her mind every day when he leaves the house to do a job that could potentially result in him being killed in any number of gruesome and horrifying ways.
  • Recap.Naruto Confining The Jinchuriki Arc: Minato and Kushina experience this when Tobi goes off with attempting to bomb a baby Naruto to kingdom-come.
  • Series.Chicago Med: Lots of young children are injured or diagnosed with life-threatening diseases.
  • Series.Years And Years:
    • Invoked by Daniel in episode one when he points out that given the current state of the world it's really not the best time to have kids, prompting a sarcastic thanks from his sister Rosie, who has just given birth.
    • In episode three, Bethany and her friend lie about where they're going in order to get an upgrade to further their goal of becoming transhuman. The surgery takes place on a dodgy ship docked in Liverpool. Celeste gets a frantic phone call from her daughter and finds them in a B&B, with Lizzie blind in one eye from the botched surgery.
  • TabletopGame.Werewolf The Apocalypse: The Seventh Generation, a cult that kidnaps and abuses children.
  • TearJerker.Spectacular Seven: Volume II, Chapter 13 is all about the search for Sunset after she's kidnapped by Lamia under orders of Tempest Shadow, only for Sunset to have her soul stolen. It's got an undercurrent of Adult Fear from Artemis and Selena, with Trixie also worried about her surrogate sister. But Twilight gets it the worst, as she's worried sick to the point she ignores several magical goings-on during the search for Sunset, barely keeping herself from crying.
  • Trivia.Bjork: Slightly before recording began on Homogenic, a Loony Fan of hers named Ricardo López made a video diary detailing his obsession over her as well as a letterbomb that he sent to her home (it was intercepted before it could do any harm) before killing himself. After the incident, she stated that it distressed and disturbed her, instilling a deep sensation of paranoia that someone could get so involved in her personal life so as to potentially hurt her or her child. This led to the song "So Broken".
  • VideoGame.A Walk Inthe Woods: Kids being lost in the woods and pursued by monsters.
  • VideoGame.Beyond A Steel Sky: Robots that appear without warning and steal your children ranks high on the list. And then there's the fact that the kids were brainwashed and used in experiments.
  • VideoGame.Driver San Fransisco: During the mission where you help Toby get his son back from a kidnapper, his voice is constantly wavering and on the verge of tears and justifiably so with Cyrus' threats to kill his son if he doesn't give him the money he wants. It's any parent's nightmare where the safety of your child hinges on paying large amounts of money you don't even have.
  • VideoGame.Wizard 101:
    • A side quest in Khrysalis concerns a worried mother whose only daughter wants to join the Umbra Legion as a tribute and sends you to try and convince her otherwise. You fail to convince the daughter and she runs off to become a tribute, but a later quest has her regret her choice after finding out how badly tributes are treated and beg you to help her escape.
    • Your child being kidnapped. Baba Yaga reacts exactly how a parent would when Mellori is taken by Grandfather Spider.
  • VideoGame.Yes Your Grace: You find out that your eldest daughter's new, seemingly friendly, husband beats her on a regular basis and there is nothing you can do about it.
  • WebComic.Tamberlane: Belfry panics when Tamberlane goes missing.
  • WebVideo.Sexy Pokemon: Swalot losing her children.
  • Bubbaruka!: Your loving spouse suddenly becoming abusive towards both you and your child while undergoing Sanity Slippage, eventually resulting in them Offing the Offspring, as happened to Anita Yamazaki and her family.
  • FamilyGuy.Tropes A To C: Parodied in the episode where Brian finds out that he has a 13-year-old (human) son. After hearing a news story, Brian has a rather over-the-top reaction to it, as he could not bear to think of his son in that situation. Peter and his friends find the reaction funny, and take advantage of the situation by asking Brian what he'd do if his son was in various dangerous situations.
  • Fallout4.Tropes A To C:
    • You get to experience firsthand having your baby stolen from you while you are powerless to stop it.
    • Your child grows up to be an incredibly amoral person who barely knows you, and in the endings where you oppose the Institute, hates you.
  • EverybodyLovesRaymond.Tropes A To G: Frank and Marie deeply fear for Robert's safety despite rarely openly showing it. When Ray joined Robert on a ride and they came across a burglary happening at a coffee shop, neither Frank nor Marie want to hear anything of Robert's heroics or his work that night. Both get loud at Raymond, asking him to stop talking.
  • Ato: The warrior's baby gets taken away by a mysterious group of masked people.
  • Blame Him: The plot of the game is kicked off by the Player Character's child being kidnapped.
  • Bulb Boy: Grandpa-raffin gets taken by the dark at the beginning of the game, leaving Bulb Boy on his own for most of it.
  • Recap.Millennium E 17 Walkabout: Dr. Miller tells Black that he had been working on drugs to cure his own visions, which he believes are similar to Black's. One night, years earlier, Miller's left him after he ran into the road amidst oncoming traffic, almost killing himself in a hallucinatory state. He's glad he didn't drag his daughter with him, but fears she might inherit his condition. Frank and Catherine fears the same thing.
  • WesternAnimation.Candy Land: The scene of the father giving his baby to a stranger that can get him candy. More so when we learn the Candy Land king is not as benevolent as he seems.

    Adult situations (disease, money, loneliness, etc) (22/133) 
  • Anime.Full Moon:
    • Wakaoji is concerned that Mitsuki wants to sing when she's ill and has a malignant tumor. He feels responsible for her since her parents have died.
    • In one episode a photographer stalks Full Moon, in the hopes of discovering any secrets. Takuto tries to change her back covertly. He then chases down a detransformed Mitsuki when realizing that she and Full Moon were at the same place at the same time.
  • ComicStrip.Axa: Axa nearly gets lobotomized into a mindless sex doll by a Well-Intentioned Extremist.
  • Fanfic.Jericho MLP: Luna is reduced to tears if she is so much as reminded of the possibility of being along on the moon for another millennium.
  • Fanfic.One Year On Probation: The story goes into detail about how deeply Ann's stalker is terrifying her (even if we the audience know that Yusuke is a harmless art student with No Social Skills).
  • Franchise.Quartermass: The plot runs on this in Quatermass— teens and young adults under an alien influence become violent; scientist Joe Kapp loses his wife and children in one of the alien attacks.
  • Series.Youth With You Season 2: During the phone call home session, several of the trainees' parents warn them about the dangerous ongoing coronavirus situation and tell them to wear masks when they go outside.
  • KidHero.Anime And Manga: In Dragon Ball Z, the role was filled by Gohan, and after the Cell saga, Trunks and Goten. All three are deconstructions. Gohan was put through Training from Hell shortly after being kidnapped by his father's archenemy, at the age of four. During his first battle a year later, he spends some vital moments paralyzed with fear. After losing her husband and her son for a year, Gohan's mother forbids him from fighting (even though he always has to).
  • Literature.A Macrabe Myth Of A Moth Man: Nina's boyfriend left a year ago and never contacted her again. She's noticeably upset and depressed by this, and cries when she writes down what happened. What really happened to him? He was taken advantage of by scientists he trusted to help him, and was used as a pawn by a pharmaceutical company for illegal experimentation.
  • Literature.The Raven Cycle (2): Adam's fear of his abusive father, never being able to get away from him, becoming like his father, being able to pay rent on time, balancing three jobs and school along with his supernatural life, being able to afford college, never being good enough. For Adam, adult fear causes as much panic as the supernatural threats.
  • Literature.The Reynard Cycle: Hirsent can face down Chimera with aplomb and marches off to war without hesitation, but she is terrified by the prospect of miscarriage. Understandable as she has already lost a child due to it. She becomes very protective of Pinsard as a result.
  • TearJerker.Tangled The Series: At one point, Rapunzel momentarily hallucinates that Varian is going to essentially poison her captured father. It's not just simple fear that her father could die or get hurt whilst she's away: she's still very guilt-ridden and afraid that the promise she broke led, or could lead, Varian further down a road where he may never be redeemed.
  • Webcomic.Obsidian Blaze:
    • Evil corporations controlling the world isn't too far off from reality
    • Police officers being a lot crueler than they should be can hit close to home, especially if you take into account the skin tone of the main character.
  • VisualNovel.Buried Stars:
    • Having a building collapse under you, and surviving but having limited access to the outside world when trying to stay calm in a building that shows signs of further deterioration.
    • Hyesung's issues deal with the struggle to obtain a stable career, since with no education or skills, no support from family or friends, and a criminal record, the future can be rather bleak even when it largely wasn't your fault.
    • When joining a talent audition, it is expected to have some part of you exposed. But not to the degree the cast discovered, as WBS have been extensively investigating them to the point of outright illegality, like stealing mail, verifying paternity tests—with the father deceased, no less—and stalking without your knowledge or consent.
    • The internet can remember anything you did. Anything. Even if you think it's been buried and forgotten, attract any attention in the present and strangers online can suddenly whip out humiliating incidents from your past for the world to see. It's little wonder that Seil hates Phater.
  • WebAnimation.ZMDE Animations: There are many of ZMDE's adventures where he got struck into a fear that gets into this level. For instance, when his sister Tabitha got kidnapped by Human Traffickers outside his supervision. Or even trapped in Italy when it was during a lockdown of COVID-19 Pandemic and the police tried to kill him and his family because he was pretty suspicious of getting infected.
  • YMMV.Bruno Mars: The ending of the "Grenade" music video has the narrator commit suicide. There's also the reason for said suicide; he's being brutally abused by his girlfriend. Also crosses over with Adult Fear.
  • YMMV.Wanda Vision: Realism-Induced Horror: Beneath the completely-unreal situation of the Retraux sitcoms that change era on a dime, the reality-altering Hex that facilitates them and even the general weirdness of a superhero universe that's adjacent to all of it, the show demonstrates the dark Adult Fear of how loneliness, depression and unresolved grief can lead to reckless, dangerous and self-destructive behaviour. Wanda has become a Stepford Smiler who'd rather stay in the Hex than face a world without Vision, Monica has become almost reckless and short-sighted due to not being over her mother's death, and living through the aftermath of Thanos' Snap has turned Hayward into a ruthless, paranoid tyrant.
  • Videogame.Ayiti The Cost Of Life: Having to decide which family member to send to school, which one to force to work, or even which one to send for care. And this is supposed to be your own family. It's especially bad if some disaster leaves your family in extreme poverty and in poor health, because then you'll slowly starve to death.

    Death, Murder, and Gore (14/133) 

    ZCE and Other (6/133) 

    Reads objectively / In-Universe (53/112) 

    Reads subjectively (28/112) 

    Unsure / Mixed (31/112) 

Adult Fear Redux (reorganized wicks from the original check using the categories from the Mundanger wick check)

50/50 wicks

    open/close all folders 

    Mundane conflict, fantastical world 
  • Anime.Astro Boy: The story of Daichi for his father. It's not that different from neglecting your own child and taking them for granted. Daichi becomes resentful awhile playing the part of a model son and threatens to dismantle everything his father built. Tokugawa is more horrified than angry when he realizes. I...guess?
  • Anime.Pacific Rim The Black: Plenty of it. The opening Jaeger fight follows Ford and Jaeger desperately trying to protect their kids, among other civilians, from a rampaging Kaiju, and it gets worse from there. Shane is also a walking manifestation of this trope; torturing kids for information using drift tech, being all too willing to murder said children in cold blood, and having kidnapped and brainwashed Mei from a loving family, blotting out her memories of a happy childhood so she believed he rescued her from the streets.
  • Characters.A Song Of Ice And Fire Court Of Aegon II:
    • Adult Fear: His two sons predeceased him.
    • Adult Fear: She watched her eldest son beheaded, while the assassins also threatened to rape her daughter. Her younger son was later torn to pieces by a mob, though it's unclear if she ever learned about this.
  • Fallout4.Tropes A To C:
    • You get to experience firsthand having your baby stolen from you while you are powerless to stop it.
    • Your child grows up to be an incredibly amoral person who barely knows you, and in the endings where you oppose the Institute, hates you.
  • Laconic.Wake Wood: Grieving parents bring their dead daughter back, but she's not the same. I guess this can go here?
  • LightNovel.Magical Girl Raising Project:
    • Your kid's life is in constant danger, they're living a double life that you don't know anything about, and if you ask them about it, they can't admit anything, lest they suffer the consequences.
    • A stranger forces you and your students to do something that you know will get them in danger and potentially killed, yet most of your students agree happily to the request. And the only way to protect them is to work with the being who forced you into this situation.
  • NightmareFuel.Ninjago: The reason why Ray and Maya were absent from Kai and Nya's lives: Krux threatened to harm Kai and Nya if Ray and Maya didn't help him forge armor and weaponry for the Vermillion warriors, all out of revenge that they created the Time Blades that took his and Acronix's powers away. Keep in mind that Kai and Nya were at least five and three years old respectively when Krux took their parents away.
  • Recap.The Batman S 4 E 1 A Matter Of Family: Bruce has a flashback to when he attended his parents' funeral and says he's adopting Dick so that he won't go through the grieving process alone.
  • VideoGame.Wizard 101 (1): A side quest in Khrysalis concerns a worried mother whose only daughter wants to join the Umbra Legion as a tribute and sends you to try and convince her otherwise. You fail to convince the daughter and she runs off to become a tribute, but a later quest has her regret her choice after finding out how badly tributes are treated and beg you to help her escape.
  • WesternAnimation.Candy Land: The scene of the father giving his baby to a stranger that can get him candy. More so when we learn the Candy Land king is not as benevolent as he seems.

    Mundane fear 
  • Anime.Heidi Girl Of The Alps: Parents may fear this if they see their children standing at gunpoint even if they're not aiming at them, they still could get hurt.
  • Anime.Space Battleship Yamato 2202: Touko plays upon Kato's Adult Fear about his terminally-ill son, in return for an actual cure for the disease ailing him. The catch? He needs to scuttle the Yamato using the Anti-Wave Motion particles Keyman inserted into the Yamato's engine, dooming all his friends and crewmates on the ship.
  • Awesome.Wolfwalkers: Hell, Bill admitting to his daughter he's afraid is this, showing emotional vulnerability in a time where men weren't supposed to. It takes some ballsy writing for a kid's movie to explore the very idea that parents can feel something as human as fear.
  • Characters.Lightning Dust: James does honestly care about Klaus, and understandably flips out whenever he is captured.
  • Characters.Minami Ke: He panically reacts when it seems that his two youngest siblings might be kidnapped. (Of course, it's a misunderstanding.)
  • Characters.Ruby And Nora Faculty: She worries that Weiss has been injured or killed when she sees Ruby's silver eyes activating. Unfortunately, her fears were confirmed. Technically, a younger sibling, but close enough.
  • ComicBook.Yoko Tsuno:
    • For Christmas, Yoko wants to surprise a little girl's family by offering a contract to the jobless father. Except, to get the contract, Yoko has to ride across town with the little girl in tow and didn't notify her parents beforehand. Needless to say, her parents are worried, although the story ends on a happy note.
    • When Yoko accidentally broke her grandfather's watch, she was very upset and ran away. Her parents were very worried and frantically searched for her.
  • EverybodyLovesRaymond.Tropes A To G: Frank and Marie deeply fear for Robert's safety despite rarely openly showing it. When Ray joined Robert on a ride and they came across a burglary happening at a coffee shop, neither Frank nor Marie want to hear anything of Robert's heroics or his work that night. Both get loud at Raymond, asking him to stop talking.
  • FamilyGuy.Tropes A To C: Parodied in the episode where Brian finds out that he has a 13-year-old (human) son. After hearing a news story, Brian has a rather over-the-top reaction to it, as he could not bear to think of his son in that situation. Peter and his friends find the reaction funny, and take advantage of the situation by asking Brian what he'd do if his son was in various dangerous situations.
  • Fanfic.Guardian Angel: In the 2-part chapter 'Wickedness', Twilight goes out of her mind with worry when Scootaloo can't be found in the town, even breaking down in tears at one point.
  • Fanfic.Rise Of The Dragon Child: Your surrogate son leaves to another town for business... and is attacked by Thalmor on the way back. For Dumbledore, the fear of mysteriously losing a child under your care and there being nothing you can do about it.
  • Fanfic.Unwanted Free Ugly Doll: Dave briefly fears that Cronus may have made inappropriate advances toward Sollux, though Sollux assures him that Cronus only ever hits on adults.
  • Film.Philadelphia: Part of the reason Charles Wheeler and the others were so upset about Andy having AIDS (and hiding it) was because he went to their company picnics and they feel paranoid he could have gotten blood on their kids or something.
  • Fridge.The Mitchells Vs The Machines: How many people were killed during PAL's takeover? I mean when those robots landed at the Dinostop they caused some kind of shockwave which resulted in Katie and several others being pushed to the ground. If that shockwave was caused by 2 robots landing, how much destruction was caused by dozens of robots landing all at once and how many people got injured or killed by those shockwaves? Also, there were probably dozens of babies and kids who managed to avoid detection, but were on their own with no idea of what's happened. The babies probably have no idea what happened to their parents and are crying for someone to take care of them. It would be Adult Fear for any parents who don't know what happened to their kids.
  • JustForFun.Diddle Kid: Imagine having to worry about your child being raped every time they go out into the streets by a masked man that the police can't seem to catch.
  • Literature.Clifford The Big Red Dog: There's an episode where Mac runs away from Jetta because he accidentally ruined her favorite sweater. Jetta tells Mac, when they find him, that she cares more about him than about a sweater because she doesn't want her dog to be hurt.
  • Literature.In Her Shoes: In Rose's recounting of the day their mother took them on a spontaneous trip to New York, one can only imagine what must have been going through Michael's head when he received the phone call that his daughters never made it to school with his mentally unstable wife nowhere to be found.
  • Literature.Fudge:
    • It's not discussed at length, but this is likely a large part of the reason that Peter's parents freak out when Fudge swallows his turtle and are lenient on him afterwards. At first they have no idea what the effects of that might be, and then they're facing the possibility of their toddler having to undergo surgery. Even Peter briefly gets worried. And Peter also points out that Fudge killed his pet and isn't even sorry about it.
    • Earlier in Tales Of A Fourth Grade Nothing, Fudge briefly disappears while at the movie theater with Peter and their father. He's found quickly, but it's still something that would terrify most parents.
    • In Superfudge, four-year-old Fudge and his friend Daniel decide to run off on their own while telling their respective parents that they're at each other's houses. When the parents realize that the boys lied to them and haven't been seen for several hours, they (and Peter) are understandably panicked.
    • Mini lets Uncle Feather loose For the Lulz, and he starts careening around the apartment. Then he smashes into a window wing-first. Fudge is at first worried his pet is dead, but a vet confirms that Uncle Feather just broke his wing and needs a cast. Peter notes that Fudge behaved well considering the circumstances.
  • Literature.The Raven Cycle (1): In Blue Lily, Lily Blue, the Gray Man is afraid of Blue getting hurt or killed, as he's come to care for her like his own daughter.
  • Literature.Ronja The Robbers Daughter: The things Mattis warns Ronja about when he sends her into the woods alone for the first time are just as worrying to a modern parent. Having your child get lost, fall into a river and drown, be taken by a predator (human or otherwise) or fall off a cliff is just as much a terror to a modern parent as it is to poor Mattis.
  • Podcast.The Penumbra Podcast: Although the parents presumably never find out, a house attacking the children who live in it is several deep-seated fears rolled into one package.
  • Manga.With The Light: Evident in Hikaru's early childhood, as his tendency of getting lost often scared Sachiko, fearing that he may be kidnapped.
  • Myth.Classical Mythology: Just imagine how poor Aegeus must have felt when he saw his son, Theseus, departure to Crete, along with thirteen other young Athenians, so they would be fed to the Minotaur. And his face, when he saw that the ship which had carried Theseus returned with black sails, meaning that his son hadn't survived the ordeal ( which was not true, as Theseus had killed the Minotaur, he just forgot to change the sails to white ones). To make matters worse, Theseus was Aegeus' only child, which explains why he committed suicide.
  • NightmareFuel.A Goofy Movie: Mazur calling Goofy to tell him about Max's stunt has Adult Fear written all over it. At first, Goofy is gravely concerned that Max might've gotten hurt. Then as Mazur is reading him Max's obviously trumped-up charges, Goofy starts hyperventilating at the mere thought that the son he loves could or would do such things before getting what can only be called a scare tactic to keep Max in line dropped on him. It perfectly captures the fear that all Good Parents have at the though of being unable to protect their children from even themselves.
  • Quotes.Disappointed In You:
John Marston: What's your mother going to say?
Jack Marston: I'm sorry, Pa. Please don't be angry.
John: I ain't angry. I'm disappointed. Don't you ever run off on your own like that again.
Jack: Alright, alright. I told you I was sorry.
— Red Dead Redemption, after John saves Jack from a bear
  • Recap.A Feast Of Crows: Meanwhile, Ser Daven is Surrounded by Idiots; Freys peck at night and day, as does Lord Gawen Westerling, who fears for his wife and child.
  • Recap.Buffy The Vampire Slayer S 1 E 3 The Witch: Amy's dad used to protect her from her mother. When he left, she was completely at Catherine's mercy. He doesn't find out the details but becomes remorseful after gaining custody of his daughter, spoiling her rotten as an apology for neglecting her.
  • Recap.Disney Sing Along Songs V 19: Jewel winds up still being missing after the hide and seek game, causing all the humans and dogs to worry. Fortunately, Perdita finds her much to everyone's relief.
  • Recap.ERS 1 E 02 Day One: Lewis jumps to her feet and runs after the nurse, while a baby is wheeled in with his distraught parents following.
  • Recap.Millennium E 17 Walkabout: Dr. Miller tells Black that he had been working on drugs to cure his own visions, which he believes are similar to Black's. One night, years earlier, Miller's left him after he ran into the road amidst oncoming traffic, almost killing himself in a hallucinatory state. He's glad he didn't drag his daughter with him, but fears she might inherit his condition. Frank and Catherine fears the same thing.
  • Recap.The Lion Guard Return Of The Roar: The hyenas cause a gazelle stampede that Kiara becomes trapped in. Besides being flashback inducing for Simba, it could explain why Simba is so protective of her in the second film.
  • Series.Alphas: One can only imagine what went through the mind of Gary's mother when she learned that her autistic son had been confined to a government holding facility in the season 2 premiere. Or, for that matter, what goes through her mind every day when he leaves the house to do a job that could potentially result in him being killed in any number of gruesome and horrifying ways.
  • Series.Years And Years:
    • Invoked by Daniel in episode one when he points out that given the current state of the world it's really not the best time to have kids, prompting a sarcastic thanks from his sister Rosie, who has just given birth.
    • In episode three, Bethany and her friend lie about where they're going in order to get an upgrade to further their goal of becoming transhuman. The surgery takes place on a dodgy ship docked in Liverpool. Celeste gets a frantic phone call from her daughter and finds them in a B&B, with Lizzie blind in one eye from the botched surgery.
  • TearJerker.Spectacular Seven: Volume II, Chapter 13 is all about the search for Sunset after she's kidnapped by Lamia under orders of Tempest Shadow, only for Sunset to have her soul stolen. It's got an undercurrent of Adult Fear from Artemis and Selena, with Trixie also worried about her surrogate sister. But Twilight gets it the worst, as she's worried sick to the point she ignores several magical goings-on during the search for Sunset, barely keeping herself from crying.
  • Trivia.Bjork: Slightly before recording began on Homogenic, a Loony Fan of hers named Ricardo López made a video diary detailing his obsession over her as well as a letterbomb that he sent to her home (it was intercepted before it could do any harm) before killing himself. After the incident, she stated that it distressed and disturbed her, instilling a deep sensation of paranoia that someone could get so involved in her personal life so as to potentially hurt her or her child. This led to the song "So Broken".
  • VideoGame.Driver San Fransisco: During the mission where you help Toby get his son back from a kidnapper, his voice is constantly wavering and on the verge of tears and justifiably so with Cyrus' threats to kill his son if he doesn't give him the money he wants. It's any parent's nightmare where the safety of your child hinges on paying large amounts of money you don't even have.
  • VideoGame.Wizard 101 (2): Your child being kidnapped. Baba Yaga reacts exactly how a parent would when Mellori is taken by Grandfather Spider.
  • WebComic.Tamberlane: Belfry panics when Tamberlane goes missing.

    Mundane thing happens, may or may not be supernatural 
  • Fanfic.What Lies Beyond The Walls: Everything involving Tegast in chapter 10 and 11. His entire family is slaughtered and he's forced to wander around Mossflower, alone, with no adults to help him and with only basic survival skills, something any parent would never wish for their child.
  • Film.Cube Zero: Rain sees her daughter hauled off by black-clad soldiers. She then wakes up in the Cube with no idea of where her daughter is, and can't even remember her name.
  • Film.Fruitvale Station:
    • Oscar's mom: Having your son killed in cold blood, and knowing that you might have caused it.
    • Oscar himself: Having your daughter tell you before you leave that she fears for your life, reassuring her that everything will be okay, only to later be fatally shot, proving her fears true — all while she's unaware.
  • Film.What Maisie Knew: Maisie falling asleep outside of her apartment late at night whilst waiting for Susanna. The apartment staff thankfully notice and take her upstairs to be given shelter.
  • Heartwarming.Camp Camp: Crossing over with a Funny Moment, Gwen and David watching a nice, relaxing episode of The Joy of Painting. Sure, they're both unaware of Nikki choking to death, but it's nice to see them getting a break from all the insanity for once.
  • Literature.The Loop:
    • Your child, with no warning and no explanation, goes ballistic in the middle of class mutilating a fellow classmate and murdering a teacher.
    • Jason Ward’s parents experience this when he goes missing even if it took them two days to report it.
    • For Lucy, finding her adopted parents in a catatonic state from the signal being broadcast on the tv is very much like finding them dead or collapsed on the floor.
  • Literature.You Know You Want This: "Look At Your Game, Girl". Both the brief relationship between Jessica and an unnamed pedophile and the murder of Polly Klaas, though it ends up having no relation to Jessica's story.
  • Manga.Birdy The Mighty: Much of what Sayaka goes through in the first season is presumably designed to be this from the perspectives of her caretakers, since she recovers from a car accident only to start acting strangely, and while they know there's something off about her there's nothing they can do and even she doesn't know exactly what happened, but people start dying around her. Then Shyamalan shows up and tells Nakasugi he's taking Sayaka away....
  • Manga.Please Save My Earth: You leave your child in the care of a neighbor's teenaged daughter, trust her to take care of him and you get called, told that your child is in the hospital. Because your child fell off the balcony. And even worse, it was the girl you left in charge that was at fault for it.
  • Series.CSI Cyber: The show often deals in this, as several of its villains definitely Would Hurt a Child. For example, "CMND:\Crash" has a mother separated from her daughter, who's one of the passengers trapped on a runaway subway train. Elijah rescues the girl, along with everyone else, and reunites her with her mother. Also Invasion of the Baby Snatchers and Roaring Rampage of Revenge below.
  • Series.Zoo: Since the animals have their sights on the humans, they don't even care if a child gets in their way. Even if animals were behaving normally, the little boy who toddles innocently up to the tiger cage in "Fight or Flight" would be any parent's nightmare.
  • VideoGame.Ato: The warrior's baby gets taken away by a mysterious group of masked people.
  • Videogame.Blame Him: The plot of the game is kicked off by the Player Character's child being kidnapped.
  • VideoGame.Bubbaruka: Your loving spouse suddenly becoming abusive towards both you and your child while undergoing Sanity Slippage, eventually resulting in them Offing the Offspring, as happened to Anita Yamazaki and her family.
  • VideoGame.Bulb Boy: Grandpa-raffin gets taken by the dark at the beginning of the game, leaving Bulb Boy on his own for most of it.
  • VideoGame.Yes Your Grace: You find out that your eldest daughter's new, seemingly friendly, husband beats her on a regular basis and there is nothing you can do about it.

    Mundane enemy, fantastical setting 
  • ComicBook.Batman Year One: The Birthday Boy, who kidnaps young girls, is implied to cut their throats and then keep their corpses rotting in Arkham Manor's basement. The horror of it is really shown when he kidnaps Barbara on Cobblepot's orders, leading Gordon to freak out in terror when he realises what's happened. Later, Bullock falls into the basement where the bodies are buried. It's not shown on-panel, but seeing what's happened is enough to reduce him from the well-meaning crime-fighter he's been up to that point to The Alcoholic with severe PTSD.
  • Recap.Naruto Confining The Jinchuriki Arc: Minato and Kushina experience this when Tobi goes off with attempting to bomb a baby Naruto to kingdom-come.
  • TabletopGame.Werewolf The Apocalypse: The Seventh Generation, a cult that kidnaps and abuses children.

    Mundane thing with no supernatural anything 
  • Series.Chicago Med: Lots of young children are injured or diagnosed with life-threatening diseases.

    ZCE 
  • Fanfic.Co Op Mode: Danny is hit with this earlier, hard, when Taylor returned home even later than she did in canon. This leads to the scene wherein he talks to Taylor and tries to convince her out of being a hero, only to fail and come across as too overprotective.
  • Film.A History Of Violence: When Edie thinks her daughter's been taken at the mall.
  • WebVideo.Sexy Pokemon: Swalot losing her children.

    Other/unsorted 

Mundanger

    open/close all folders 

    Mundane conflict, fantastical world 
  • Rape as Backstory: In "Teen Titans" fanfic Transition, this is how Jinx learned to control her powers, as a kid she already had her weird skin, hair and eye colors and things around her tended to break, so her father sent her to a Pedophile Priest to be "exorcised" with the implication that her dad knew exactly what kind of person the priest was and what he would do to her. Jinx ended up killing the priest by shorting out his pacemaker and running away. The story manages to make Raven cry due to how ordinary it is compared to her own issues with Trigon.
  • AudioPlay.Jago And Lifefoot: Despite initial appearances, The Bellova Devil features no science fiction or fantasy elements whatsoever and it's actually a "Scooby-Doo" Hoax. Until the final moments strongly imply that the hoaxer's father really is undead. Putting it here because it seems to be beyond just the villain being normal.
  • Fanfic.Splint: Despite being set in Middle-earth, beyond having Orcs as major characters and Sorcerous Overlords as Predecessor Villains, Splint really doesn't delve that heavily into more fantastical elements, focuses more on personal or small-scale conflicts than an epic-scale good-vs-evil conflict, has rather mundane antagonists and threats and features characters with varying degrees of morality, if not outright Grey-and-Gray Morality at times.
  • Characters.Headless Halloween: Compared to Cal and Vinnie, Maya's peril isn't obviously life-threatening or supernatural and merely has her and her friends lost in a dark, dangerous part of town being menaced by vicious strangers. The situation is terrifying regardless.
  • GravityFalls.Tropes F To O: Sort of, in Not What He Seems. While there is a giant portal that could very well cause The End of the World as We Know It in Stan's basement motivating the plot, it's not technically the biggest threat. The biggest threat would be the FBI agents adhering to proper protocol at times like this, getting children out of a bad situation and arresting a known criminal... which, given the portal and its possible consequences, comes across as Be as Unhelpful as Possible.
  • Literature.Diogenes Club: "Tomorrow Town" and "You Don't Have To Be Mad" are devoid of any supernatural elements. Presumably the Club has to investigate all "impossible" crimes, and some are bound to turn out to be merely improbable. On the flip side, the "green ribbon files" are so otherworldly that even Club members don't have an explanation for them.
  • Literature.Tomorrow Town: The only threat that Richard Jeperson, a veteran fighter of the supernatural, has to deal with in this story is a bunch of rather normal, although highly deluded and in a couple of occasions murderously fanatical, people.
  • Series.K 9 And Company: What is the first threat Sarah Jane Smith and K-9 tackle together? Religious fanaticism.
  • VideoGame.The Return Of The Obra Dinn: Life aboard ship in the 1800s was dangerous enough even without mermaids, crab monsters, and kraken. Four men die of illness and in cargo-handling accidents even before the supernatural elements take hold.
  • VisualNovel.Echo: Especially in Leo and Flynn's routes, it becomes clear that the various townsfolk (including the group itself) are just as dangerous as the ancient evil of the town itself.
  • WeAreAllPokemonTrainers.Tropes F To O:
    • Team Skyclaw goes to solve the mystery of some disappearing mons in PMD-A, only to find out that the reason is not some monster, and certainly not the seemingly obvious culprits of a Gulpin and Swalot family they meet, but some rogue mons.
    • Also within PMD-A, DS nearly gets killed after discovering a fake rescue team that was going around eating "civilized" mons, basically making them the equivalent of a cannibalistic serial killer gang.
  • WebOriginal.Mr Nightmare: A large amount of stories have no supernatural phenomena or unexplained events to speak of, just a nasty or creepy human that harasses or menaces the protagonist in some way. A crazy guy with a gun or knife can be a lot more intimidating than a strange bump in the night or a specter appearing in the corner of your eye.
  • YMMV.Super Comet After The Impact: Throughout all of this, what's the first thing that comes close to directly killing Shiang? A realistic mundanger in the form of a shark. She and Noah and other survivors are out on the open ocean sailing on a yacht, and Shiang spears a shark thinking it's a fish. It drags her into the water, and it comes very close to getting her. As the ocean's food system has been destroyed along with the land's food, the sharks are desperate and hungry and would've eaten her had they gotten the chance.

    Character has a mundane fear 
  • Characters.Lumberjanes: In a forest full of monsters and supernatural phenomena, the one Molly truly fears is her homophobic mother.
  • Recap.Code Lyoko S 1 E 11: The schools' psychologist has been keeping tabs of Jeremie's school progress, and wants him to take an IQ Test. He's sad because if he leaves the school, not only will Xana be free to destroy the world, but Jeremie will miss his friends.

    Mundane thing happens 
  • Awesome.Ghost Story: Oh plus, he was defeated by little magic, and an exploding gas station, which while pretty deadly, is also very ordinary, and not even the worst things Muggles have come up with. And the monster had just mocked ordinary mortals, so no wonder he was holding a grudge, because he had been throughly embarassed and had his words shoved through where he deserved it.
  • Fanfic.Shinra High Soldier: Sephiroth almost never comes close to getting hurt in any combat he's in, even taking on enemy snipers or monsters. Then Julia wraps their car around a lamp post, and Sephiroth nearly dies twice, once because they can't get him out of the car which is on fire, and then again because his injuries from the crash have worsened.

    Mundane enemy stands out in a fantastical setting 
  • Characters.A Certain Magical Index Other: He's just an ordinary serial killer, with no connection to the Science or Magic sides.
  • Characters.King Falls AM: So far he doesn't seem to be involved with the rainbow lights or the Void, but almost every appearance of his has been a Wham Episode for the worst reasons.
  • Characters.Misfits: Mark possesses no superpowers, and in fact has probably never heard of the storm. He's just a completely amoral date-rapist.
  • Characters.The Mask: Before the mask was introduced, Niko had pretty much the entire city in the palm of his hand. The cops couldn't touch him and he had the resources to bribe officials.
  • ComicBook.Hack Slash: The first ever villain we see Cassie and Vlad take down was the coach of a cheerleading camp who had been murdering campers. He appeared completely normal... aside from him wearing a catcher's mask while killing, for some reason. The second Father Wrath also turned out to be a completely human copycat when first encountered.
  • NightmareFuel.The Cult Of Chucky: Dr. Foley sexually abusing Nica while she can do nothing about it. And it's heavily implied that he's been doing this to her for quite a while. Just to show that, even without Chucky, the franchise's universe is a Humans Are Bastards Crapsack World. Even Chucky is disgusted.
    Chucky: And they call me sick?
  • Recap.Lost Girl S 1 E 14 Faetal Attraction: The florist was completely in the dark about the existence of the Fae, and racked up a serious body count.
  • Recap.Smallville S 02 E 08 Ryan: Dr. Garner has no superhuman powers.
  • Recap.Smallville S 02 E 17 Void: Lance, a normal human who creates the Limbo drug.
  • Recap.Smallville S 08 E 03 Toxic: Marcos possesses no special powers.
  • Recap.Static Shock S 2 E 12 Jimmy: In a series of superheroics, the main danger in this episode is a bullying victim who steals his father's gun in order to kill his tormentors.
  • Recap.Supernatural S 01 E 01 Black: Cole is just a man but successfully captures Sam.
  • Recap.Titans S 2 E 6 Connor: Mercy Graves is a normal human that manages to severely injury Conner.
  • Series.Constantine 2014: In order to fend off a gang of people with guns in the end of his pilot episode, John Constantine pours lighter fluid on his hands and sets them on fire, then holds them up in the air.
  • Theatre.Halloween Horror Nights: Any event that includes serial killers alongside ghosts, zombies, and demons.
  • VideoGame.Close To The Sun: After a lot of mysterious build-up, it's rather surprising that when Rose actually encounters the physical threat aboard the ship, it just turns out to be a crazy man with a knife. Though later in the game she learns there really are monsters running around the ship.
  • VideoGame.Condemned 2 Bloodshot: Across the game you deal with enormous hordes of violently-insane homeless and addicts, hallucinations, heavily-armed SWAT-type guys, and some genuinely insane shit. The single most dangerous thing you deal with, however, is a good old-fashioned, rabid bear. Notably, it's the one (non-hallucinated) enemy you directly deal with in the game but never actually kill, even by setting off explosives right next to it.
  • VisualNovel.Angel With Scaly Wings: In a world of dragons and time travel, while there is a more fantastical looming threat, the main antagonist is an unhinged murderer with a knife and a gun.
  • WebOriginal.Gas Station Attendant: One of the night shift male story branches has the reader menaced not by monsters or aliens but a normal human criminal who tries to rob them at gunpoint.
  • WesternAnimation.Corpse Bride: The undead are more than capable of harm, but do none on-screen. The only character who has murdered, and plans to do so again, is the mortal Lord Barkis.
  • WesternAnimation.Moville Mysteries: The villain of "The Day Rico Became Smart" is an entirely human Serial Killer with entirely human motives.
  • YMMV.Ruby And Nora: While Admah Keter is terrifying in his own right as a Serial Killer, he is Laughably Evil and ultimately still too over-the-top to think of as realistic. The villain of Weiss and Pyrrha, Nurse Abigail Lemon, is a more realistic version of a serial killer. Everything about them barring her Semblance is uncannily similar to a type of serial killer found in real life. Her methods as an "angel of death" involve using poison and picking off already vulnerable people so that no one would notice. While a more banal threat, this person could actually exist in our world.
  • YMMV.The Night Gardener: Mister Stubbs and Mister Fig are two of the cruelest loan sharks in England. The pair take great enjoyment in psychologically tormenting their debtors, such as the one wealthy but now poor Windsor family, by threatening their loved ones, raising their interest rates to levels that they know cannot be realistically paid back, and demanding their payment at times when their victims aren't expecting or prepared for them. They are fully prepared to follow through with their murderous threats as well, as seen at the climax when they attempt to slaughter the entire Windsor family—including the children, and would have succeeded had a desperate ploy by the heroine Molly not tricked them into arousing the wrath of the titular vengeful ghost. Would've put this in ZCE if not for the ending revealing that ghosts exist.

    Mundane thing with no sign of supernatural anything 
  • Film.The Boy: As it turns out, the Creepy Doll is just that, a really creepy doll. The real threat is the doll's owner, Psychopathic Manchild Brahms.
  • Film.The Day Britain Stopped: The whole point shows how failing infrastructure, poor politics, and poor planning can severely cripple a nation.
  • UnbuiltTrope.Live Action Film: Targets is widely viewed as being the movie that ushered in a wave of horror films revolving around ordinary and human evils. But it's quite different from many of those that came after it; hero Byron Orlok is an aging actor, while villain Bobby Thompson is a normal-looking, seemingly friendly man whose weapon of choice is a gun. The bad guy's also not an unstoppable physical menace either, but a borderline Non-Action Big Bad: his initial murder spree consists of him shooting at passing cars from on top of an oil storage tank, he's forced to flee to a Drive-In Theater when the police start closing in on him, and he's rendered no threat when Orlok disarms him.
  • VideoGame.Stranded Deep: The game has no supernatural elements (other than the Gainax Ending), and even the game's 3 boss creatures, although larger than any real life examples, are not so large as to be physically or biologically impossible to exist.

    ZCE 

    Other 
  • Anti-Climax Boss: Infinity Train: Blossoming Trail: Mrs. Turner is quite a sad Final Boss and Arc Villain compared to the likes of (motive-wise) Parker, Sara, Yeardley and Class 5-E and (power-wise) Henry and Walter, The Apex and The Unown and UnChloe, especially since she's the last enemy faced in the story, period. While initially a Mundanger threat, all of that goes straight out the window when she reveals herself to be just as cartoonishly evil as the antagonists of Act 1, with very little nuance or depth to her character. Has nothing to do with the trope, and seems to use "Mundager" differently than everything else does. Cartoonish evil can still be "mundane".
  • Film.Grims Prarie Tales: While the other stories feature supernatural horror, Deeds' story is solely about the horror that men can inflict upon their fellow man and themselves. Since these are just stories, I can't really sort it.
  • Recap.Re Boot S 1 E 3 Quick And The Fed: In the real world, magnets are harmless to people. Since Mainframe is a world inside a computer, magnets are treated as incredibly dangerous. Megabyte plans on using it as a weapon, Bob takes it from him for this reason (shielding it as though it was radioactive) and it slowly kills Dot when she accidentally touches it.

Edited by MacronNotes on May 20th 2022 at 9:07:31 AM

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Trope Repair Shop: Adult Fear
1st Mar '22 6:14:08 AM

Crown Description:

What should be done with Adult Fear?

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