History Main / ExplosiveLeash

* In ''Anime/DigimonDataSquad'', Kurata puts one of these on [[spoiler: ''Thomas's little sister, Relena''. An 8-year-old or so IllGirl confined to a wheelchair! It turns out Thomas's apparent FaceHeelTurn was due to his having to obey Kurata long enough to find a way to save her.]] There's a ''reason'' this guy is considered the worst in the whole ''Franchise/{{Digimon}}'' franchise.

* In ''Series/PersonOfInterest'', Kara Stanton fits Reese and Mark Snow with explosive vests. [[spoiler:She gets them to do her bidding and then triggers the vests anyway. Finch is able to deactivate Reese's vest, whereas Snow hides in Stanton's car in order to take her out with him.]]

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* In ''VideoGame/DeusEx'', this is how [[spoiler: Anna and Gunther's]] killswitches work; [[WordsCanBreakMyBones say the right passphrase,]] and they'll stutter for a moment as their augs shut down before [[LudicrousGibs blowing up spectacularly]]. [[spoiler: Nano-augmented agents like Paul and JC have a much more subtle killswitch, causing their nanites to replicate uncontrollably and pretty much turn into the [[SyntheticPlague Grey Death]]. More or less the same effect, if not as flashy.]]

* A variant of this trope happens in the WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants episode "The Other Patty". Mr. Krabs took measures of the security where all Krabby Patties explode at 10 feet beyond the Krusty Krab, which Plankton learns the hard way. A female fish mentions that they have to chew before swallowing, which the male fish learns the hard way as well.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Geneforge}} 5'' Shaper Rawal implants a number of his servants (including the player character) with a control tool, a living tentacle burrowed into their chest. Mouth off to him and he uses it inflict pain, while attacking Rawal causes the tool to rip apart your heart. One of your mid-game objectives if you side with another faction is getting the damned thing out of you.
* ''VideoGame/GuiltyGear'': In his first appearance, Potemkin's collar is an explosive collar that will detonate and kill him if it's removed, as he's a slave of the nation of Zepp. The tyannical government is overthrown by the end of the game, at which point the bomb is defused. Potemkin, now the NumberTwo of President Gabriel of Zepp, continues to wear it anyway, both as a PowerLimiter and as a reminder of what he's fighting for.

* In ''VideoGame/MegaManAndBass'', Burner Man was provoked into destroying the forestation under the belief that King installed n explosive collar on him.

* The ''modus operandi'' of the "Task Force X" a.k.a. the ''ComicBook/SuicideSquad'', starting with ''[[ComicBook/LegendsDC Legends]]''. In one issue, Captain Boomerang convinces Slipknot that they aren't real bombs, and encourages him to make a run for it... because he wanted to see for himself whether or not they were real. Seeing Slipknot's arm get blown off confirmed that they were.

* ''Anime/CyberCityOedo808''. The three main protagonists are all criminals who are earning reduced sentences by capturing other criminals. To keep them in line they wear explosive collars. At the start of episode 2, Gogol tracks down one of their own who has gone rogue and is now trying to defuse his own collar. [[YourHeadASplode IHe doesn't make succeed.]]

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In ''Webcomic/{{Earthsong}}'', BigBad Belousous keeps his minions in line by infusing part of their soulstones with his own element. This forces anyone who'd be squeamish about working for him to comply because he can use that fragment to kill them, and he uses it to inflict pain even on willing minions who are pissing him off in some way. This is why Haven's Guard is always in such a rush to find new arrivals and prevent Belousous from infecting them.
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* A variation on this trope is used in [[Recap/ThunderbirdsS1E7ThirtyMinutesAfterNoon an episode of Thunderbirds]]; a gang of criminals want to bomb a building, so they attach an explosive bracelet to one of the employees and tell him the key to unlock the bracelet is in the filing cabinet in his office, forcing him to race there, find the key, and leave the bomb as he makes his escape.

* In the 2014 Korean film ''Big Match'', one of the tasks that the protagonist Ikho is forced to complete is finding his brother (who has been held hostage and brutalized as incentive to make Ikho play the “game”) in a crowded stadium during a soccer match. To make matters worse, he has a bomb strapped to his ankle that will detonate and kill them and thousands of other people if he doesn’t find him in time.

* Slade uses the "deadly nanites" variant to recruit Robin as his [[BoxedCrook Boxed]] [[InvertedTrope Hero]] apprentice in the ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans'' 1st series finale. Since, like most superheroes, Robin would tell him where to stuff it if he was just threatening him, Slade [[IHaveYourWife secretly slaps the leash on the rest of the Titans instead]], forcing Robin to follow his orders or his friends will die (And since the Titans have no idea, they think Robin has pulled a FaceHeelTurn!) [[spoiler: By the end of the episode, Robin puts the "leash" ''on himself'' to TakeAThirdOption, [[OutGambitted checkmating]] Slade and forcing him release them all.]]

* In ''WesternAnimation/XMen'', Genoshan slavers outfitted a few of the X-Men and other mutant prisoners with [[RestrainingBolt power-suppressing]] [[SlaveCollar Slave Collars]] and forced them to use their powers to build a dam. The collars just [[PowerNullifier turned off their powers]] if they tried to escape but would explode if a prisoner tried to remove them.

** In the first season, a secret organization ([[spoiler: Centipede, a subsidiary of HYDRA]]) equips some of their operatives with bionic eyes that explode if they're captured or turn rogue.

* Alan Fitch from ''Series/TheBlacklist'' was fitted for a blast collar [[spoiler:and was killed by one, too, showing the VillainsDyingGrace when he refused to allow the bomb tech to risk his life trying to remove it.]]

** In "Bounty", the crew of the Liberator are captured by SpacePirates who force them to wear explosive collars until they can be handed over to the Federation. [[MasterOfUnlocking Vila]] is able to remove Blake's, who used it moments later to blow up a guard. Then there's a MexicanStandoff between a character pointing a gun at the pirate leader, who's holding the activator to a leash worn by his own daughter. Fortunately Blake intervenes and the pirate tries to activate Blake's collar instead, only he's removed it.

* ''{{Series/Bones}}'' had “The Goop on the Girl”, where a man with a bomb strapped to his chest robbed a bank and was then blown up by a radio broadcast on the same frequency. The guy was a pest control person who was kidnapped on a call and forced to rob the bank. The story was based on the 2003 case listed in the RealLife folder.

* In ''Series/DarkAngel'' Alec had a tiny bomb implanted in his brainstem to coerce him into killing transgenics.

** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E5RevengeOfTheCybermen "Revenge of the Cybermen"]]: The Doctor, Lester, and Stevenson are sent by the Cybermen to destroy Voga, because its gold was being used to exploit the Cybermen's weakness. They're attached to harnesses that will cause an explosion if they try to remove it, and can be detonated remotely if they try to go off course. [[spoiler:Lester makes a HeroicSacrifice by jumping on a Cyberman and undoing his harness. The Doctor later manages to disarm his own device.]]

* ''Series/{{Flashpoint}}''

* In ''Series/KamenRiderBuild'', [[spoiler: Gentoku Himuro/Kamen Rider Rogue]] was implanted with a chip on his heart when he was empowered [[spoiler: into a Kamen Rider]] by the villains that can shock him to submission/death if he ever acts out of line [[spoiler: preventing him from making a HeelFaceTurn even though he's now experiencing the full guilt of everything he did when ''he'' was a full villain, as well as everything he's now forced to do in service of his employers]]. Eventually, he gets a copy of the chip's remote, which allows [[TheHero Sento]] to scramble the chip's signal, effectively disarming it.

* ''Series/{{NCIS}}''
** Subverted in one episode. Gibbs wraps det-cord around a mob boss' son and rigs it to a deadman switch so they won't shoot him. When the crisis is over he walks away and drops the switch. Of course, nothing happens.

* In ''Series/PersonOfInterest'', Kara Stanton fits Reese and Mark Snow with explosive vests. [[spoiler:She gets them to do her bidding and then triggers the vests anyway. Finch is able to deactivate Reese's vest, whereas Snow hides in Stanton's car in order to take her out with him]].

* A variation on this trope is used in one episode of ''Series/{{Thunderbirds}}''; a gang of criminals want to bomb a building, so they attach an explosive bracelet to one of the employees and tell him the key to unlock the bracelet is in the filing cabinet in his office, forcing him to race there, find the key, and leave the bomb as he makes his escape.

* In ''Film/KingsmanTheSecretService'', those loyal to Valentine are fitted with a head-detonating implant. [[spoiler:It also doubles as a counter-signal to the HatePlague, which means [[KeystoneArmy all of his mooks have one]]]].

* In an early arc of ''Manga/JojosBizarreAdventureStoneOcean'', prisoners (including the heroes) volunteering for a job to find a guard gone missing in the swamp are outfitted with exploding armbands that detonate if they go too far from the guard looking after them.

* In ''Videogame/DeusExMankindRevolution'' [[spoiler:Viktor Marchenko]] also has a killswitch, though rather than being word-activated the trigger is an actual object that can be found and used in the confrontation with him.