History Main / TheShutIn

* PlayedForLaughs in ''Series/TheBigBangTheory'' episode "The Cruciferous Vegetable Amplification." Sheldon becomes obsessed with extending his life expectancy. Deciding that the outside world is too dangerous, he shuts himself in his room and builds a remote-controlled "Mobile Virtual Presence Device," equipped with a monitor, camera and speakers so that he can interact with others.

* In the backstory of ''Literature/UnnaturalIssue'', Richard Whitestone [[TheMourningAfter spends the bulk of his widowerhood]] in his chambers and library on the second floor of his country manor. He would have remained comparatively harmless[[note]](an Earth Master in that state of mind [[FisherKing would have done the local countryside absolutely no good]] were a mage of comparable strength not sealing the house off with wards)[[/note]] had he not [[FromBadToWorse gotten fixated on bringing his

* The [[Literature/MilleniumTrilogy ''Millenium'' saga, by Stieg Larrson, has a recurring secondary hikikomori character with the class-A hacker Plague, who suffers from social seclusion at a point that he is officially recognized as "socially incompetent" by the State and given a disability allowance.

* The Protagonist in ''The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant'' is an example of this, hiding himself away from the world after developing leprosy.
wife]] ''[[{{Necromancer}} back]]''.

* The [[Literature/TheMilleniumTrilogy ''Millenium'' saga, by Stieg Larrson, has a recurring secondary hikikomori character with the class-A hacker Plague, who suffers from social seclusion at a point that he is officially recognized as "socially incompetent" by the State and given a disability allowance.

* The Millenium saga, by Stieg Larrson, has a recurring secondary hikikomori character with the class-A hacker Plague, who suffers from social seclusion at a point that he is officially recognized as "socially incompetent" by the State and given a disability allowance.

* ''Film/TheOthers'': The kids cannot go outside because of a genetic disorder ([[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xeroderma_pigmentosum Xeroderma pigmentosum]]), as they might be exposed to sunlight and die. [[spoiler:Once they realize they are already dead, they get to enjoy sunlight for the first time.]]

* ''Literature/FinalGirls'': In a [[HeroicBSOD PTSD]] sort of example, one of the main characters is unable to cope with leaving the house at all after the events they've been put through. They were essentially forced to live a horror movie.
* ''Literature/GreatExpectations'': Miss Havisham was jilted on her wedding day and spent the rest of her life shut up in her mansion, still wearing her wedding dress, as the house decays around her.
* ''Literature/TanteiTeamKZJikenNote'': Nanaki is this in the beginning due to the application of OnOneCondition -- he's required to stay in his family mansion until 20 as a condition of inheriting the family estate. Unlike most examples of this trope, he doesn't see it as too much of an issue, despite TheTeam found the whole idea appalling. [[spoiler:Rendered moot eventually due to the bankruptcy of his father.]]
* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'': Bella Swan falls into a deep depression and loses the will to leave the house in ''New Moon'' after [[SatelliteLoveInterest Edward]] moves away [[BreakHisHeartToSaveHim to protect her]].
* In ''Literature/HouseOfLeaves'', Johnny Truant becomes one, after working on The Navidson Record for a while. It has an unhealthy effect on any reader's sanity... including ''yours'', dear reader.
* Eri Asai from Haruki Murakami's novel ''After Dark''. After being deprived of a normal childhood because of her hectic modeling career, she abruptly locked herself in her room and went into deep periods of sleep, awakening only to eat and use the bathroom.
* OlderThanRadio: Ilya Ilyich Oblomov, the protagonist of [[Literature/{{Oblomov}} the eponymous novel]] by Ivan Goncharov (1859), goes in a self-imposed exile from public life, not leaving his [[UsefulNotes/TsaristRussia Saint Petersburg]] apartment for ''years''. What's most interesting here is that such behavior wasn't seen as something really extraordinary for a wealthy Russian landlord -- a class that had such high proportion of oddballs and weirdos that you might seem out of the line if you ''didn't'' have any eccentricities.
%%%* The main character of Creator/FyodorDostoevsky's ''Notes from Underground.''

* Except to purchase food (and the next copy of Misery's romantic escapades, of course), Annie from Creator/StephenKing's ''Literature/{{Misery}}'' rarely if ever leaves her secluded cabin.

* Mommy is one in the beginning of ''Literature/TheFireUsTrilogy''. This causes problems when the family has to leave home.
* The Protagonist in ''The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant'' is an example of this, hiding himself away from the world after developing leprosy.
* In the backstory of ''Literature/UnnaturalIssue'', Richard Whitestone [[TheMourningAfter spends the bulk of his widowerhood]] in his chambers and library on the second floor of his country manor. He would have remained comparatively harmless[[note]](an Earth Master in that state of mind [[FisherKing would have done the local countryside absolutely no good]] were a mage of comparable strength not sealing the house off with wards)[[/note]] had he not [[FromBadToWorse gotten fixated on bringing his wife]] ''[[{{Necromancer}} back]]''.
* In ''Literature/AMacabreMythOfAMothMan'', Ozzy is agoraphobic and refuses to leave the home he set up after escaping the lab. He monitors the world through a TV he rigged up, and has Moth-Man run various favors for him. Brett also stayed indoors quite a lot before dating Nina, because of a skin condition that made him sunburn very easily. After he discovered [[spoiler:being out in the sun caused him to contract Melanoma]], he stayed inside to such an extreme that his friends became very worried.
* This is the lifestyle of choice for Spacers of Solaria in Isaac Asimov's ''Literature/TheNakedSun''. Each Solarian inhabits his or her own nation-sized 'estate' physically remote from their fellows. Husbands and wives share estates but have separate quarters and meet only on rare and uncomfortable occasions. All this is enabled by highly advanced holographic communications and innumerable robots.

* Miss Havisham in ''Literature/GreatExpectations'', who reacts to being jilted on her supposed wedding day by locking herself away in one room of her house for thirty years.

* ''Literature/TheGirlFromTheMiraclesDistrict''
** Karma never leaves her house, which is secured and armoured like a fortress, to the point Nikita nicknames it Castle in her narration. She's rather antisocial, tolerating only Nikita and Ilya (her caretaker) in her vicinity, and spends most of her time in front of the computer.
** Kosma never leaves his library and tries to limit his interactions with other humans to a minimum, as he's afraid that any factor of his life that he cannot control will cause his [[UnstoppableRage berserk spirit]] to manifest. [[spoiler:As of the end of the second book, he's starting to overcome it with Nikita's help.]]
* ''Literature/TheReformedVampireSupportGroup'': Most vampires end up this way. Most [[{{Muggles}} ordinary people]] think of vampires as the deadly predators they're portrayed as in the media. However, in reality, vampirism is a debilitating and unpleasant disease -- which means that someone acting out a heroic fantasy of slaying evil vampires is ''really dangerous'', and the safest way to prevent that is to [[TheMasquerade prevent anyone from learning that vampires are real]].
* Literature/NeroWolfe, the GreatDetective in the series of mysteries by Creator/RexStout, is one of the self-imposed variants. He absolutely refuses to leave his luxurious Manhattan brownstone on business and is reluctant to leave it at other times if he doesn't have to, and usually only ever leaves if extreme circumstances demand it. It's downplayed, however; contrary to the popular impression he's not especially agoraphobic (at least, not in the "panics at being outdoors" sense it's commonly understood as since several of his [[DefectiveDetective other issues]] would technically fall under that banner), and ''can'' leave the house if necessary or if he chooses to. He's simply a homebody who prefers not to since he has everything he could want inside his house.
* Tendril from ''Literature/TheColdMoons'' is the badger equivalent. She lives by herself in a sett near a river. Several years ago, her parents and siblings were mauled by dogs. Tendril narrowly survived but was left crippled. and unable to walk far. She HatesBeingAlone but no other badgers go near the area. Bamber is the first badger she's seen in over six years, but Bamber is only able to stay a few weeks before he must go back on his journey.

Compare TheHermit, ReclusiveArtist, and CrazySurvivalist. Compare and contrast YouAreGrounded, which is typically short and doesn't include school. NPCScheduling, especially in older games, may make characters look like shut-ins, but that's just due to the simplistic AI. Compare ConvenientComa and the like, where being a shut-in is merely a side effect of being unconscious and therefore completely incapable of going anywhere. [[PrisonTropes Prisoners]] and rare cases like [[Film/TheTrumanShow Truman]] who are prisoners in wide open spaces don't really count, as they still have interactions with peers of their social standing within their microcosm. Prisoners in solitary tend to fall under GoMadFromTheIsolation and/or PunishmentBox.

* Henry, in ''Manga/BlackClover'', has a rare condition that causes him to be physically very weak while absorbing mana off of anyone near him, which [[PowerIncontinence he can't shut off and which he needs to do in order to live]]. As a result, he is unable to leave the house he was born and grew up in. He makes up for this by having the equally rare Recombination Magic, which he uses to roam about (technically speaking) by restructuring it into the setting's equivalent of a HumongousMecha. Said house, by the way, is [[spoiler:the Black Bulls' HQ, and Henry is one of the quirky guild's founding members.]]

** Similarly, because she was sick all of the time, Satsuki started out as something this, until she had a [[spoiler: near fatal asthma attack]] the one time she did go outside, which lead her to become full on {{Hikkikomori}}, after the whole event traumatized her.

** After Regulus betrays Voldemort by stealing his Horcrux, he goes into hiding in his estranged brother's flat, and has never stepped out of the house ever since.
** Orion is a more self-imposed version of his trope. An unsociable {{workaholic}}, he prefers to remain in his study, and only leaves the room unless there are more pressing obligations, such as meeting his father's summons, or going to appointments. His niece mentions that getting him out of the house is a rare occurrence.

* ''WesternAnimation/Frozen2013'': Elsa and Anna are this way in the prologue. Due to fears of [[AnIcePerson Elsa]] being attacked because of her PowerIncontinence, their parents decided to keep them locked in the castle until Elsa could control her powers. Anna would play outside but not be able to leave the castle walls, and it's unknown how often Elsa went outdoors (if ever). The real plot starts at the now 21 year old Elsa's coronation, where she and Anna break out of this.
* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Rio}}'', since Linda picked him up, Blu almost never went outdoors, and had trouble socializing with other birds.

* ''Film/IAmSam'': Annie, the elderly neighbor who babysits Sam's daughter Lucy when Sam works, is an agorophobe who had not been outside in years. When testifying on behalf of Sam to his fitness as a father in his custody battle, her credibility is attacked with a lawyer bringing up this psychological condition.

* In ''Film/Paris36'' (set in 1936), the old musician and singwriter Max (Creator/PierreRichard) never wants to leave his house for some reason, pretending he knows the world as well as if he went outside thanks to his TSF radio receiver. Then, one day, hearing rising singer Douce sing a song of his on the radio motivates him to go outside, though not without a little effort (depicted onscreen with a VertigoEffect).

* ''Literature/TanteiTeamKZJikenNote'': Nanaki is this in the beginning due to the application of OnOneCondition -- he's required to stay in his family mansion until 20 as a condition of inheriting the family estate. Unlike most examples of this trope, he doesn't see it too much of an issue, despite TheTeam found the whole idea appalling. [[spoiler:Rendered moot eventually due to the bankruptcy of his father.]]

* This is the lifestyle of choice for Spacers of Solaria in Isaac Asimov's ''Literature/TheNakedSun''. Each Solarian inhabits his or her own nation sized 'estate' physically remote from their fellows. Husbands and wives share estates but have separate quarters and meet only on rare and uncomfortable occasions. All this is enabled by highly advanced holographic communications and innumerable robots.

* Victoria Victrix from the ''Secret World Chronicles'' by Creator/MercedesLackey became one of these through a combination of being betrayed by a lover and set on fire by a crazy relative. Her writing career allowed her to make a living without needing to leave her apartment for anything other than the horrifically stressful ordeal of grocery shopping, which she has to steel herself to perform for days, and does as early in the morning as possible so that she doesn't have to encounter many people. She starts opening up more after becoming a superheroine, but [[MissionControl her]] [[VoiceWithAnInternetConnection duties]] to her team are still arranged so she can perform them without leaving home, and her idea of hanging out with her teammates is to send an elemental to the bar where the others are hanging out to pick up drinks while she chats with them over the radio.

* Literature/NeroWolfe, the GreatDetective in the series of mysteries by Creator/RexStout, is one of the self-imposed variants. He absolutely refuses to leave his luxurious Manhattan brownstone on business and is reluctant to leave it at other times if he doesn't have to, and usually only ever leaves if extreme circumstances demand it. It's downplayed, however; contrary to the popular impression he's not especially agoraphobic (at least, not in the "panics at being outdoors" sense it's commonly understood as, since several of his [[DefectiveDetective other issues]] would technically fall under that banner), and ''can'' leave the house if necessary or if he chooses to. He's simply a homebody who prefers not to, since he has everything he could want inside his house.
* Tendril from ''Literature/TheColdMoons'' is the badger equivalent. She lives by herself in a sett near a river. Several years ago, her parents and siblings were mawled by dogs. Tendril narrowly survived but was left crippled. and unable to walk far. She HatesBeingAlone but no other badgers go near the area. Bamber is the first badger she's seen in over six years, but Bamber is only able to stay a few weeks before he must go back on his journey.

* ''Series/BetterCallSaul'': Jimmy [=McGill's=] brother Chuck suffers from electromagnetic hypersensitivity, and at the beginning of the show, he is revealed to have been a complete shut-in for years, aided by his assistant Ernesto. At the beginning of the show, his house is merely devoid of technology and he wraps himself in a tin foil blanket. Throughout, he ventures outside a few times but sometimes falls back harder. Near the end of season 2, he converted his living room into a Faraday cage.

* ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'': Mycroft Holmes is portrayed as morbidly obese shut-in who was barely able to move in ''The Abominable Bride''.

* One episode of ''Series/{{Wonderfalls}}'' concerns a morbidly obese man who hasn't left his trailer for a very long time. It turns out that he actually isn't morbidly obese anymore, but he still sees himself as fat. At one point, the protagonist Jaye admits to him that a part of her envies the Hikikomori lifestyle, and that she'd be tempted to try it if she thought her family would leave her alone.

* Mollwitz in ''Literature/{{Fame}}''. He's 38 and living with his mother, who doesn't allow him to talk to women. He has an office job, but refuses to actually do work or talk to people.
* In one episode of ''Series/LawAndOrderSVU'', the VictimOfTheWeek was a woman who had been raped ''several'' times in her life and in particular was being stalked by her rapist as well, and as a result, she almost never leaves her house. She has a neighbor pick up groceries for her, and works from home (only stopping by the office once a week to deliver paperwork).

** In "A Room with a View", an elderly shut-in named Amy Jeffries has observed the goings-on at St. Eligius, which is across the street from her apartment, since the 1960s. As she does not know any of their names, she gives the staff and patients at the hospital nicknames: Dr. Craig is Dr. Little Big Man, Dr. Auschlander is Dr. Kindly Grandfather and the heart surgery patient Margaret Kimbrough as Miss Yellow Nightgown. When she sees Craig packing to leave, Amy becomes extremely upset as she is particularly fond of him. She calls the hospital to find out his name and leaves numerous messages for him. Craig eventually visits her apartment and it becomes clear that the St. Eligius staff are the closest thing that she has to friends. In "A Coupla White Dummies Sitting Around Talking", Amy is admitted to the hospital with a broken hip and meets several of her "friends" for the first time. Ten days after her operation, Dr. Gideon insists that she be discharged and sent to a convalescent home. However, Dr. Kiem takes pity on Amy, who is desperately lonely. She begins an adoptive grandparent program at the hospital with Amy as the first volunteer.
* The VictimOfTheWeek in a ''Series/WithoutATrace'' episode is an agoraphobic. The agents fear she's met with foul play as she hasn't even left her apartment in years and probably wouldn't be gone for long even if she had finally worked up the nerve to leave.

* In the Music/PinkFloyd album ''Music/TheWall'', the main character Pink shuts himself in his hotel room half way through the album upon completing his personal wall. Although this is darkly subverted when his manager literally breaks down the door to force him to perform that night, casing him to crack and lose what little sanity he had left and [[ANaziByAnyOtherName become even worse.]]

* The Pub Rock song [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SECVGN4Bsgg "Who Can It Be Now?"]] by Men At Work. When getting a knock on his door, the singer makes excuse to why he shouldn't answer or actively sneaks around to make others think he's not home. He caresses his "childhood friend" (a guitar amplifier) while insisting that [[BlatantLies his mental health is fine]].

* In the ''ComicStrip/TheBoondocks'' comic, Jazmine was [[ChuckCunninghamSyndrome missing for two years]]. The in-series reason was that she is locked herself in her room after since 9/11 due to fearing terrorists. [[NotAllowedToGrowUp Yet, she didn't age a bit]].

* Dr. Schlock from ''Webcomic/SluggyFreelance'' has been devolving into a shut in after taking charge of [[spoiler: Hereti corp]], often using video conferencing or inflatable decoys to communicate with people while staying locked in his office. His growing list of enemies and set backs is not being kind to his sanity.
* Rob, a side character in ''Webcomic/MenageA3'', lives in the same building with the protagonists, and apparently hasn't left his apartment since the '80s.

* Malaya from ''Webcomic/HowToBeAWerewolf'' is a downplayed and justified example. Between how werewolves are most comfortable in their own territory in general and Malaya's absolute terror at the prospect of harming anyone if she loses control [[MyGreatestFailure (again)]] in particular, she only leaves the house she lives in with her parents to work at her father's coffeeshop.

* ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'': Brian has to do [[HeroDoesPublicService community service]] for a DUI, so he's made to be a home health aide, to a grouchy and mean elderly woman named Pearl. Though they originally hate each other, Brian eventually finds out Pearl she was a great singer who become famous for jingles, was booed when she tried to become do opera, and hasn't left her house in years. Brian falls in love with her, and sings an Emmy Award-winning song to her, convincing her to leave her house -- and she's immediately hit by a truck.
* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'': In the episode "[[Recap/GravityFallsS2E12ATaleOfTwoStans A Tale of Two Stans]]", it's revealed that [[spoiler: Stan refused to leave his brother's house for several days after he inadvertently shoved him into an interdimensional portal, until he ran out of food. When he went to buy food from a nearby store, the people there gave him the idea to impersonate his brother in order to make some desperately-needed cash by inviting them to the Mystery Shack, thus averting this trope]].

* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Hughes#Later_years_as_a_Las_Vegas_recluse Howard Hughes]] shut himself inside his Desert Inn suite for long periods of time. He purchased the Desert Inn writ large, along with a number of other casino hotels for often trite reasons...such as to remove a neon sign that shone through his drapes. After his nine year stay in said suite, his drapes were found to be rotten and never opened.
* Became standard practice under [[UsefulNotes/CoronavirusPandemic the early onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.]] Those who were able to worked at home, as [[ThePlague the virus was easily transmitted through social contact]], making it necessary to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_distancing reduce physical contact]] between individuals as much as possible until vaccination reached a critical mass.

* Princeton becomes this at the end of Act 1 of ''Theatre/AvenueQ''. The second act opens with his friends coming to get him... after two weeks. Good to know they care.

* Not usually, but when her friends are absent for a while, Jodie from ''Webcomic/{{Loserz}}'' becomes this: [[http://web.archive.org/web/20160412055942/http://the-qlc.com:80/loserz/go/279 here]].

* Music/{{Nerdcore}} artist Ultraklystron has [[http://ultraklystron.bandcamp.com/track/hikikomori a single devoted to this]].

* Laura in ''Theatre/TheGlassMenagerie''.

* The title character of ''Series/{{Monk}}'', Detective Adrian Monk, was a complete shut-in immediately after his wife's death. The canon story was that while he was always a neurotic freak, Trudy Monk was the one person who helped him keep his anxieties at bay and function normally. Once she died, he had a HeroicBSOD and shut himself up in his San Francisco home, not leaving for three years straight. It isn't until the arrival of his nurse Sharona that he starts transitioning back into society -- well, transitioning as best as Mr. Monk can. Even as the series progresses, Mr. Monk is still getting used to simple things like going outside.

* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'': Bella Swan is like this in ''New Moon'' after [[SatelliteLoveInterest Edward]] moves away [[BreakHisHeartToSaveHim to protect her]].

* Columbus in ''Film/{{Zombieland}}'', prior to the ZombieApocalypse.

* ''WesternAnimation/Frozen2013'': Elsa and Anna are this way in the prologue. Due to [[AnIcePerson Elsa]] almost killing Anna by accident as a child, their parents decided to keep them locked in the castle until Elsa could control her powers. Anna would play outside but not be able to leave the castle walls, but it's unknown how often Elsa went outdoors (if ever). The real plot starts at the now 21 year old Elsa's coronation, where she and Anna break out of this.

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* ''Series/BarneyMiller'': In one episode, Wojo arrests a man after the man's landlord complains of non-payment of rent. The man hadn't left his apartment for 20 years; shortly after coming to the precinct, [[spoiler:he dies]].

* In ‘’ComicStrip/InSecurity’’ Sedine’s cousin Roy has a wife named Charlene who is absolutely terrified of being outside.

* In ''Fanfic/TheBlackSheepDogSeries'', after Regulus betrays Voldemort by stealing his Horcrux, he goes into hiding in his estranged brother's flat, and has never stepped out of the house ever since.