History Main / SorcerersApprenticePlot

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[[caption-width-right:350:Mickey's biggest OhCrap moment.]]

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* [[Literature/VorkosiganSaga Miles Vorkosigan]]'s first adventure, ''The Warrior's Apprentice'', is a reference to this in both name and plot. Miles starts with a hastily-conceived get-rich-quick scheme while on vacation; this snowballs into a takeover of a mercenary fleet, breaking a wormhole blockade, and eventually to him being [[spoiler:tried for treason due to owning a private army]], all as Miles frantically tries to stay on top of things. [[spoiler:Unlike the original story, he more or less succeeds in all of this: the fleet succeeds in breaking the blockade, and he gets out of the treason accusation by giving the army to the Emperor.]]

Someone only semi-qualified, [[TheApprentice the "apprentice"]], gets hold of the [[AppliedPhlebotinum Phlebotinum]] when its normal user, the "sorcerer", is away. The apprentice uses it for his own advantage, but soon ends up with far [[GoneHorriblyRight too much of a good thing]].

At the end of the episode the wizard returns and delivers a quick [[AnAesop aesop]], which may often degenerate into a FantasticAesop depending on how relevant it actually is to the real world. Typically, it's either a hero misusing his [[{{mentors}} mentor's]] phlebotinum or a {{sidekick}} misusing that of the hero.

* There is a Norse fairy tale about a poor man who came into possession of a magic mill that can grind out everything its owner whishes for. The mill got eventually stolen by his rich, evil and greedy brother who took it on a ship and set it to grind out salt (which was very precious back in the medieval times). However, the poor brother didn't teach him how to stop it, so the mill ground out salt until it sank the boat, and then went on grinding in the sea, [[JustSoStory turning the sea salty]]. Similar stories exist in German, Polish and Greek folklore.

* ''Literature/StregaNona'': A young man sees that the local witch can magically produce pasta from her cooking pot...but doesn't pay attention to how she gets it to stop. When he tries to use it while she's gone, the village is drowning in pasta by the time she gets back.

Not to be confused with [[Film/TheSorcerersApprentice the 2010 film]] (though that ''does'' have an homage to the original Disney short, being also a Disney movie). Compare ItWontTurnOff and RadishCure. Compare and contrast AccidentalIncantation, in which an unqualified person calls up magic inadvertently.

* ''WesternAnimation/JackieChanAdventures'' has Jade's constant use of the talismans for mischief or honest attempts to help.

* ''ComicBook/GreenLantern'' #162: The ''Tales of the Franchise/GreenLantern Corps'' story "The Apprentice" does this with the GreenLanternRing. Deeter, a young Lantern apprentice, steals his master's ring while he sleeps and quickly encounters a deadly enemy and finds that it takes expertise to be a hero.

Not to be confused with [[Film/TheSorcerersApprentice the 2010 film]] (though that ''does'' have an homage to the original Disney short, being also a Disney movie). Compare ItWontTurnOff and RadishCure.

* Occurs in the ''WesternAnimation/DefendersOfTheEarth'' episode "A Demon in His Pocket". Kshin, wanting to get his own back on the school bullies without breaking the Defenders' Code of Honour by fighting unnecessarily, disobeys a direct order to stay away from Mandrake's sorcery books and finds a spell for summoning a demon named Shogoth. However, once Shogoth has dealt with the bullies, he refuses to return to his own dimension and goes on a rampage through the streets of Central City. With Shogoth increasing in size (and power) with each passing minute, Kshin eventually has no choice but to tell Mandrake what he has done.

* Another fairy tale, possibly Russian, has a young man working as an assistant to an elderly witch learn that her pot (which she had forbidden him from touching) has the power to generate an endless supply of pasta after he secretly sees her perform the spell to activate it, but he wasn't watching when she canceled the spell. When she goes on a trip without him, he copies the spell to activate it and shares the pasta with everyone in the nearby town, but when everyone is done eating, he can't stop the pot from generating more pasta since he didn't see how to cancel the spell and it creates a flood of pasta that threatens to destroy the town. The witch finally comes back before anybody gets hurt and cancels the spell. The angry townsfolk want to lynch the young man by hanging him with pasta for causing the disaster, but the witch convinces them to change the punishment to [[CoolAndUnusualPunishment making him eat '''all''' of the pasta flooding the town]].

At the end of the episode the wizard returns and delivers a quick [[AnAesop aesop]], which may often degenerate into a FantasticAesop depending on how well it is delivered. Typically, it's either a hero misusing his [[{{mentors}} mentor's]] phlebotinum or a {{sidekick}} misusing that of the hero.

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