History Main / MalfunctionMalady

** The plan ultimately turns on the Predacons when Rhinox gets sick of being an AnnoyingPatient and decides to [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sk7sqHdl0Ws inflict himself on them]].

* ''SabrinaTheTeenageWitch'' used it at least twice. One was when Sabrina caught spellfluenza, which is a 24-hour sickness that causes one's powers to be transferred to the nearest person when one sneezes. Assuming they are the nearest person again during the next sneeze, the powers come back. Surprisingly, the person who got her powers was Ms. Quick. The other was when Hilda caught punitis, a disease in which everything she said resulted in a bad VisualPun occurring (for example, when she asked for some ice cream, a screaming disembodied eye appeared in the freezer).

** Another example occurs in "Centennial Charmed" when Paige gets a cold and accidently teleports whenever she sneezes.
* {{Smallville}}: Clark Kent discovers his super breath when he catches a cold, sneezes, and blows the barn door off its hinges and across the entire county, almost decapitating Lois. Much of the episode is spent trying to come up with believable reasons why the Kent barn door appeared in the middle of nowhere.
* When [[ThatsSoRaven Raven]] becomes ill with the flu, she reads people's minds.

* In one episode of [[CareBears Adventures in Care-a-Lot]], Funshine got a case of Bubbles, which made him cough up bubbles every time he hiccuped and start floating away.

* Negi from {{Negima}} creates gusts of wind when he [[SneezeOfDoom sneezes]]. Wind that seeks out and strikes [[ClothingDamage girls' clothing]] like a heat-seeking missile.

* ''SabrinaTheTeenageWitch'' used it at least twice. One was when Sabrina caught spellfluenza, which is a 24-hour sickness that causes one's powers to be transferred to the nearest person when one sneezes. Assuming they are the nearest person again during the next sneeze, the powers come back. Wouldn't you know it, the person who got her powers was Libby. The other was when Hilda caught punitis, a disease in which everything she said resulted in a bad VisualPun occurring (for example, when she asked for some ice cream, a screaming disembodied eye appeared in the freezer).

** The plan ultimately turns on the Predacons when Rhinox gets sick of being an AnnoyingPatient and decides to inflict himself on them.

** Turning the trope on its head, a magical overdose from Konoka's [[WhiteMagic Healing]] simulated the effects of a high fever.
* ''EsperMami'' had the eponymous teenager's telekinetic powers disassemble items when she sneezed--thankfully she was lifting a truck, not a person, when she discovered this. I'm not sure if her teleportation going wonky when she got drunk counts.

* ''Series/{{Bewitched}}'': The same thing happened with the witches and warlocks in Samantha Stevens' family. I'm sure it happened to Samantha, Serena, and Aunt Clara on separate occasions.

* It's either an inversion of this trope or CursedWithAwesome, but every time Glitter the sidekick fairy sneezed in KiddVideo, she temporarily gained super strength. This troper doesn't recall if there was any explanation ''why'' sneezing did this for her.
** This is KiddVideo , a perfect example of WhatDoYouMeanItWasntMadeOnDrugs. If they explained ANYTHING I'd have been amazed.

* ''StarTrek,'' "Plato's Stepchildren": One of the Platonians (or whatever they were called) was sick, and since they had telekinetic powers, that made furniture fly around as if there was a hurricane. Dr. [=McCoy=] cured him, and they showed their gratitude by forcing the Starfleet officers to star in a [[KissingUnderTheInfluence sadistic puppet show]].

* In ''{{Charmed}}'', witch pregnancy seems to result in a lot of unusual and uncontrolled magic effects, though this is explained more as the magical fetus messing with things than the mom's magic going haywire as a result of pregnancy.

* ''{{Bewitched}}'': The same thing happened with the witches and warlocks in Samantha Stevens' family. I'm sure it happened to Samantha, Serena, and Aunt Clara on separate occasions.

* Katara the waterbender gets sick like any ordinary person, but airbender [[AvatarTheLastAirbender Aang's]] sneezes launch him ten feet into the air; though that may be Aang being playful.
* In ''{{Transformers}}: BeastWars'', [[TheStarscream Tarantulas]] infects [[GeniusBruiser Rhinox]] with a virus that makes him hiccup destructive bolts of electricity in the first season episode, "The Low Road." The episode plays pretty straight to the trope, with the other Maximals alternately nursing their new AnnoyingPatient and running on a FetchQuest for the antivirus.

* Yin in ''YinYangYo'' came down with the [=WooFoo=] Flu which caused inanimate objects to come to life. She was the AnnoyingPatient for her brother Yang. Until he came down with it, and put Yo in the position of caretaker to the sick sibs.

* ''AmericanDragonJakeLong'' had an episode like this.

* This happened in a first season episode of ''{{Ben 10}}''. Wildmutt was effectively blind, Fourarms was more disgusting and clumsier, and Heatblast became AnIcePerson.

* It was used as a gag in ''{{X-Men Evolution}}'' that when Kurt had a cold he would teleport everytime he sneezed.

* In {{Animorphs}}, Rachel suffered this after scanning an animal she was apparently "allergic" to. This caused her to randomly assume her various animal forms and only ended with her expelling the new shape by [[{{Squick}} vomiting up an entire alligator]].

Worse yet, sometimes the effects are caused by something perfectly natural, like puberty or pregnancy.

* Happens in {{Discworld}}. In ''The Last Continent'', The Librarian at Unseen University catches a cold and turns into something new every time he sneezes, thanks to his "morphic field" being weakened by his original transformation from a human into an orangutan.

Being sick is no fun for anyone. There's the fever, the aches and pains, the need to sleep, the runny nose, and a plethora of other unpleasant symptoms to contend with.

For [[MagicAndPowers magical or powered]] characters in fiction, particularly in animation, the above can come along with a MalfunctionMalady. Regular symptoms of the common cold or other condition may be compounded by PowerIncontinence, or a form of it. Powered characters who come down sick may find their powers firing off uncontrollably with every sneeze.

If this wasn't all bad enough, there is almost never an easy cure. Usually the hapless victim of the malady wonking their powers has to wait it out, or their friends and teammates have to go on a FetchQuest for some strange, arcane, rare or mysterious item (perhaps a FlowerFromTheMountaintop) to get them over this disease and its dangerous side effects.

[[AC:{{Anime}}]]
* Negi from {{Negima}} creates gusts of wind when he [[SneezeOfDoom sneezes]]. Wind that seeks out and strikes [[ClothingDamage girls' clothing]] like a heat-seeking missile.

[[AC:FanFiction]]
* The ''{{Homestuck}}'' fanfic [[http://archiveofourown.org/works/158726 "SWIMMING WITH SHARKS"]] points out the potential for such with [[BlindSeer Terezi]]'s abilities. She normally perceives the world synaesthetically, via smell and taste... But in the fanfic, she gets a cold, effectively making her blind and entirely debilitated.

[[AC:{{Literature}}]]

[[AC:LiveActionTV]]

[[AC:WesternAnimation]]
* ''AmericanDragonJakeLong'' had an episode like this.
* Yin in ''YinYangYo'' came down with the [=WooFoo=] Flu which caused inanimate objects to come to life. She was the AnnoyingPatient for her brother Yang. Until he came down with it, and put Yo in the position of caretaker to the sick sibs.

* In an episode of ''FairlyOddparents'', Cosmo's Phygigly Gland (which controls a fairy's transforming powers) starts acting up, necessitating a transplant from Cosmo's EvilTwin Anti-Cosmo.

[[AC:WebOriginal]]

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* When Beast Boy got a cold in ''TeenTitans'', every sneeze caused involuntary morphing.

* ''Esper Mami'' had the eponymous teenager's telekinetic powers disassemble items when she sneezed--thankfully she was lifting a truck, not a person, when she discovered this. I'm not sure if her teleportation going wonky when she got drunk counts.

* The entire plot of the ''Ebenezum Trilogy'' (and further sequels) by Craig Shaw Gardner revolves around this. Ebenezum, a talented hedge wizard, accidentally summons a demon and is somehow cursed by the Netherhells while sending him back. This causes him to develop an "allergy" to magic, interrupting every one of his spells with a thunderous sneeze. At first this is thought to be the work of said demon, but later even he proves unable to reverse it. So his bumbling apprentice Wuntvor has to help him get from one place to another looking for a cure. In case it wasn't obvious, this is a quite funny modern fantasy parody.

* A variation found in ''TheSlayers'': female mages suffer a severe loss in power when it's "that time of the month".

[[AC:{{WebOriginal}}]]

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