History ParanoiaFuel / ComicBooks

** A one-shot featuring Galacta, the daughter of Galactus, is ripe Paranoia Fuel [[FridgeHorror if you think about it too much]]. That cute girl with the glasses you always see ordering lunch at the local cafe? She's a PhysicalGod that is always hungry and is constantly suppressing the urge to ''eat you''. ''You and everybody else''. And she thinks of ''everything'' as food.

** ''ComicBook/SecretInvasion'': Earth is invaded by shape-changing, reptilian aliens called Skrulls -- and some of the invaders have supplanted certain people on Earth. Even worse, there is so far no way to distinguish the impostors from the people they're impersonating. To make matters still worse, the Skrull impostors have gained access to Earth's most advanced technologies -- and sabotaged a lot of them. And furthermore, it's been suggested in places that some of the people they have replaced are sleeper agents who don't know that they're Skrulls until they've been "activated" -- ''you'' could be one... the "Skrulls'" [[http://www.embracechange.org official website for the Embrace Change campaign]], which portrays them as a benevolent but DyingRace that have come to help us, really isn't helping the Paranoia Fuel any. It's just making it worse.

** ''ComicBook/MsMarvelVol4'': In-universe. During her first confrontation with Doc.X, a sapient virus, Kamala finds it particularly intimidating due to its ability to enter and look through any electronic or online network. In the information age, nothing is truly private -- there's always a wifi-capable object on your person, a security camera on a wall, or at least a passerby with a cellphone, and someone with enough tech savvy can theoretically spy on every second of your life from halfway around the globe. As a result of this combination of effective omnipresence and unlimited access to private information, Kamala considers Doc.X to be the most intimidating foe that she has ever faced.

** ''ComicBook/MsMarvel2014'': In-universe. During her first confrontation with Doc.X, a sapient virus, Kamala finds it particularly intimidating due to its ability to enter and look through any electronic or online network. In the information age, nothing is truly private -- there's always a wifi-capable object on your person, a security camera on a wall, or at least a passerby with a cellphone, and someone with enough tech savvy can theoretically spy on every second of your life from halfway around the globe. As a result of this combination of effective omnipresence and unlimited access to private information, Kamala considers Doc.X to be the most intimidating foe that she has ever faced.

* ''ComicBook/{{Batgirl}}'': One of Barbara Gordon's enemies, a guy called Fugue, is seeping with this. Imagine: your old friend from when you were younger rides into town, and you let him crash at your place for a bit. Except he's not your friend at all--he's a complete stranger who wants to make your life miserable for something you did to him in the past, and his method of doing so is to ''tamper with your memories'' to convince you he's your friend so he can get close to you and gaslight you into believing you can't control your own life anymore. Oh, and in the process of toying with your mind, you gave up all of your secrets to him, and he's explained his endgame to you multiple times, and forced you to forget.
* ''ComicBook/DeathOfTheFamily'': Picture this... a MonsterClown has returned from a year-long, retrieved his own face, and wears it like a mask. He has always been unpredictable, but he's sticking to the shadows and leaving you to wonder when and where he's going to strike. Then he reveals that [[spoiler: he knows your secrets, including your identity]]. Now you wonder if he's lying or if he's telling the truth. You know what he is capable of doing, and may have been on the receiving end of it yourself. He'll go after you, or he'll go after the people you care about most. If none of this makes you paranoid, then nothing will!
* In the ComicBook/DisneyDucksComicUniverse ten-parts story "Threat From the Infinite", the villains. They're weird beings that wield incredibly advanced technology and are looking for ''something'' in the Arctic, messing with the ecosystem there in the process, and once foiled there they just resume doing it somewhere else. It takes time before even ''their name'', the Tz'oook, is revealed, and while they're confirmed to be aliens what they're looking for and why remains unexplained for over half the story... And when [[TheReveal it's revealed]] it's even scarier: [[spoiler:they're the ancient inhabitants of Earth before the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event, that they ''caused'', and they're looking for their ancient cities to wreck human civilization and retake the planet]].
** The finale, that reveals they're actually [[spoiler:from a parallel universe and they crossed into ours by accident]], restores the paranoia, because if the Tz'oook didn't cause [[spoiler:the Permian-Triassic Exctinction Event]], then ''who did it''?
* Downplayed for the end of ''Literature/FungusTheBogeyman'': It ends with "fear not the Bogeymen by day, but at night, watch out!", however Fungus and his family seem pretty harmless.
* The mostly funny one-shot featuring Galacta, the daughter of Galactus, is ripe Paranoia Fuel [[FridgeHorror if you think about it too much]]. That cute girl with the glasses you always see ordering lunch at the local cafe? She's a PhysicalGod that is always hungry and is constantly suppressing the urge to ''eat you''. ''You and everybody else''. And she thinks of ''everything'' as food.
* ComicBook/TheGiganticBeardThatWasEvil: Everyone in here is always paranoid about the idea of There. There eventually breaks through to Here in a way nobody would have suspected - through a man's facial hair. RapidHairGrowth has never been so existentially terrifying.

* ComicBook/TheInvisibles. Gods and angels exist, and they are ''not your friends.'' Demons are watching you through closed-circuit television systems, and God is being dissected in an underground lab.
** Or, depending on your interpretation of the GainaxEnding, it could be construed as the precise opposite of paranoia fuel.
* If you're unlucky enough to live in ''[[ComicBook/MarvelZombies Earth-2149]]'', then... [[SarcasmMode well, congratulations]]! Hiding is useless since Zombie Daredevil is gonna find you with a Quinjet, in order to trick you into thinking he's there to rescue you! [[spoiler: Good thing he just proposed such an idea... not that it makes the horror any more bearable, that is.]]
* ''ComicBook/NightOfTheOwls'': You will never look at owls the same way again. "Beware The Court of Owls, that watches all the time, ruling Gotham from a shadow perch, behind granite and lime."
* ''The ComicBook/{{OMAC}} Project'' in the lead-up to DC's ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis''. The shadowy spy organization Checkmate has cameras everywhere on Earth. Anyone on the street could be one of their deadly O.M.A.C. cyborgs. Their leader, a psychic, can make you do anything he wants from any distance. And Brother Eye is always watching.

* If you're a teenager who gets along reasonably well with your parents (Like Karolina), the whole first ComicBook/{{Runaways}} series is this. No matter how nice your parents seem, they could be evil... and how would you ever know?
** Speaking of the Runaways, in the Runaway/Young Avengers Civil War crossover, there's this gem. Imagine you're a teenage superhero. You decide to help another team. This leads to [[spoiler:you being kidnapped and forced to watch as the boy you love gets sliced open and operated on, while you can hear and see everything, and '''can't''' do anything about it.]] This leaves you [[TearJerker brokenly wishing that the man doing this will die, and you can escape this nightmare.]] All because you wanted to help...
* ''ComicBook/TheSandman'': your bad dreams are living entities that can kill you if they so choose. The only thing keeping them under control is a vindictive, spiteful, and petty godlike entity who can easily condemn you to hell, or fates worse still with ease.
** And your adorable cat, stretching her claws in her sleep? Yeah, she's dreaming about a world where giant cats hunt and eat humans. If enough of them dream it, it may even become real...
** This was used as a punishment in Hell for Edwin Paine, one of the 'young' Dead Boy Detectives-- he was murdered and he awoke in an endless corridor. He began walking down it; soon, he became aware of a very menacing presence following behind him. He realized that if he confronted it at all-- looking over his shoulder, breaking into a run-- he would be destroyed utterly. Cue walking down a hallway in absolute, unacknowledged terror for a few dozen decades.
* Marvel's ''ComicBook/SecretInvasion'' definitely fits this trope. In it, Earth is invaded by shape-changing, reptilian aliens called Skrulls -- and some of the invaders have supplanted certain people on Earth. Even worse, there is so far no way to distinguish the impostors from the people they're impersonating. To make matters still worse, the Skrull impostors have gained access to Earth's most advanced technologies -- and sabotaged a lot of them. And furthermore, it's been suggested in places that some of the people they have replaced are sleeper agents who don't know that they're Skrulls until they've been "activated" -- ''you'' could be one...
** The "Skrull's" [[http://www.embracechange.org official website for the Embrace Change campaign]], which portrays them as a benevolent but DyingRace that have come to help us, really isn't helping the Paranoia Fuel any. It's just making it worse.
** Plus, our only hope is Deadpool...
*** WOOOOO!!!! BRING IT ON YA SKRULL SONSA BITCHES!! DP TO THE RESCUE!
* Superman is very self-controlled, but his cousin ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} is just so powerful... and more short-tempered and reckless. [[ComicBook/RedDaughterOfKrypton Short-tempered enough to draw a Red Lantern Ring]] and become a mindless, living "extinction level threat".
* If Franchise/{{Superman}} knows you well enough, he can identify your heartbeat from across the city. [[DependingOnTheWriter Sometimes]], he can hear it from the ''moon''. It's not as bad as it could be, seeing as [[NiceGuy it's... well... Superman]], but still... And keep in mind the little fact that this flying indestructible superfast juggernaut with the laserbeam eyes has low resistance to the legions of mind-controlling psychopaths that infest your world.
* Three villains from ''ComicBook/TexWiller'' easily invoke it:

** Sumalkan, the Black Tiger, is already terrifying in normal conditions, to the point one of his minions decided to betray him and talked about it to Madison, another minion. Madison then leaves the room to take something that should make the other think about what he's proposing... And then ''the Black Tiger comes in, very far away from his lair, and knows everything, because '''Madison was him in disguise'''''. [[MasterOfDisguise He's so good with disguises]], and smart at using them, [[DevilInPlainSight you could be talking with him while he's planning to murder you and not know unless he decides to drop the disguise]].

* ''ComicBook/DeathOfTheFamily'': Picture this... a Monster Clown has returned from a year-long, retrieved his own face, and wears it like a mask. He has always been unpredictable, but he's sticking to the shadows and leaving you to wonder when and where he's going to strike. Then he reveals that [[spoiler: he knows your secrets, including your identity]]. Now you wonder if he's lying or if he's telling the truth. You know what he is capable of doing, and may have been on the receiving end of it yourself. He'll go after you, or he'll go after the people you care about most. If none of this makes you paranoid, then nothing will!

** Yama, [[InTheBlood Mefisto's son]], has his own ways. He's not as good at disguising himself, and his AstralProjection can only appear relatively close to him unless there's an AmplifierArtifact near the apparition zone... But his AstralProjection can interact with the physical world by grabbing things. Including weapons.

* Downplayed for the end of ''ComicBook/FungusTheBogeyman'': It ends with "fear not the Bogeymen by day, but at night, watch out!", however Fungus and his family seem pretty harmless.
* The mostly funny one-shot featuring Galacta, the daughter of Galactus, is ripe ParanoiaFuel [[FridgeHorror if you think about it too much]]. That cute girl with the glasses you always see ordering lunch at the local cafe? She's a PhysicalGod that is always hungry and is constantly suppressing the urge to ''eat you''. ''You and everybody else''. And she thinks of ''everything'' as food.

** The "Skrull's" [[http://www.embracechange.org official website for the Embrace Change campaign]], which portrays them as a benevolent but DyingRace that have come to help us, really isn't helping the ParanoiaFuel any. It's just making it worse.

* The "15 Minutes" storyline in the latest rewrite of {{ComicBook/Gen 13}}. The less said about it the better.
* ComicBook/TheGiganticBeardThatWasEvil: Everyone in Here is always paranoid about the idea of There. There eventually breaks through to Here in a way nobody would have suspected - through a man's facial hair. RapidHairGrowth has never been so existentially terrifying.

* If you're unlucky enough to live in ''[[ComicBook/MarvelZombies Earth-2149]]'', then... [[SarcasmMode well, congratulations]]! Hiding is useless, since Zombie Daredevil is gonna find you with a Quinjet, in order to trick you into thinking he's there to rescue you! [[spoiler: Good thing he just proposed such an idea... not that it makes the horror any more bearable, that is.]]

* ''ComicBook/ROMSpaceKnight'': The entire premise of the book has ROM searching down Dire Wraiths, who wielded black magic, could shapeshift and furthermore had a disgustingly long tongue/drill-thing that could pierce skulls and suck out both the memories/personality and lifeforce of human victims, leaving behind nothing but a pile of dust and allowing the Dire Wraith to impersonate their victim flawlessly. All this for a child's action figure robot comic-book tie-in.

* ''ComicBook/TheSandman'': your bad dreams are living entities that can kill you if they so choose. The only thing keeping them under control is a vindictive, spiteful and petty godlike entity who can easily condemn you to hell, or fates worse still with ease.

* Marvel's ''ComicBook/SecretInvasion'' definitely fits this trope. In it, Earth is invaded by shape-changing, reptilian aliens called Skrulls -- and some of the invaders have supplanted certain people on Earth. Even worse, there is so far no way to distinguish the impostors from the people they're impersonating. To make matters still worse, the Skrull impostors have gained access to Earth's most advanced technologies -- and sabotaged a lot of it. And furthermore, it's been suggested in places that some of the people they have replaced are sleeper agents who don't know that they're Skrulls until they've been "activated" -- ''you'' could be one...

* Marvel's ''ComicBook/SecretInvasion'' definitely fits this trope. In it, Earth is invaded by shape-changing, reptilian aliens called Skrulls -- and some of the invaders have supplanted certain people on Earth. Even worse, there is so far no way to distinguish the impostors from the people they're impersonating. To make matters still worse, the Skrull impostors have gained access to Earth's most advanced technologies -- and sabotaged a lot of it. And furthermore, it's been suggested in places that some of the people they have replaced are sleeper agents who don't know that they're Skrulls until they've been "activated" -- ''you'' could be one...
** The "Skrull's" [[http://www.embracechange.org official website for the Embrace Change campaign]], which portrays them as a benevolent but DyingRace that have come to help us, really isn't helping the ParanoiaFuel any. It's just making it worse.
** Plus, our only hope is Deadpool...
*** WOOOOO!!!! BRING IT ON YA SKRULL SONSA BITCHES!! DP TO THE RESCUE!
* If you're unlucky enough to live in ''[[ComicBook/MarvelZombies Earth-2149]]'', then... [[SarcasmMode well, congratulations]]! Hiding is useless, since Zombie Daredevil is gonna find you with a Quinjet, in order to trick you into thinking he's there to rescue you! [[spoiler: Good thing he just proposed such an idea... not that it makes the horror any more bearable, that is.]]

* ''ComicBook/HackSlash''. All those unkillable fiends you see on the big screen? They're REAL. And they will kill you just because they can.
* The "15 Minutes" storyline in the latest rewrite of {{ComicBook/Gen 13}}. The less said about it the better.
* ''The ComicBook/{{OMAC}} Project'' in the lead-up to DC's ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis''. The shadowy spy organization Checkmate has cameras everywhere on Earth. Anyone on the street could be one of their deadly O.M.A.C. cyborgs. Their leader, a psychic, can make you do anything he wants from any distance. And Brother Eye is always watching.
* The mostly funny one-shot featuring Galacta, the daughter of Galactus, is ripe ParanoiaFuel [[FridgeHorror if you think about it too much]]. That cute girl with the glasses you always see ordering lunch at the local cafe? She's a PhysicalGod that is always hungry and is constantly suppressing the urge to ''eat you''. ''You and everybody else''. And she thinks of ''everything'' as food.

* Superman is very self-controlled, but his cousin ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} is just so powerful... and more short-tempered and reckless. [[ComicBook/RedDaughterOfKrypton Short-tempered enough to draw a Red Lantern Ring]] and become a mindless, living "extinction level threat".
* If you're a teenager who gets along reasonably well with your parents (Like Karolina), the whole first ComicBook/{{Runaways}} series is this. No matter how nice your parents seem, they could be evil... and how would you ever know?
** Speaking of the Runaways, in the Runaway/Young Avengers Civil War crossover, there's this gem. Imagine you're a teenage superhero. You decide to help another team. This leads to [[spoiler:you being kidnapped and forced to watch as the boy you love gets sliced open and operated on, while you can hear and see everything, and '''can't''' do anything about it.]] This leaves you [[TearJerker brokenly wishing that the man doing this will die, and you can escape this nightmare.]] All because you wanted to help...
* ''ComicBook/NightOfTheOwls'': You will never look at owls the same way again. "Beware The Court of Owls, that watches all the time, ruling Gotham from a shadow perch, behind granite and lime."
* ''ComicBook/DeathOfTheFamily'': Picture this... a Monster Clown has returned from a year-long, retrieved his own face, and wears it like a mask. He has always been unpredictable, but he's sticking to the shadows and leaving you to wonder when and where he's going to strike. Then he reveals that [[spoiler: he knows your secrets, including your identity]]. Now you wonder if he's lying or if he's telling the truth. You know what he is capable of doing, and may have been on the receiving end of it yourself. He'll go after you, or he'll go after the people you care about most. If none of this makes you paranoid, then nothing will!
* ComicBook/TheGiganticBeardThatWasEvil: Everyone in Here is always paranoid about the idea of There. There eventually breaks through to Here in a way nobody would have suspected - through a man's facial hair. RapidHairGrowth has never been so existentially terrifying.
* ''ComicBook/ROMSpaceKnight'': The entire premise of the book has ROM searching down Dire Wraiths, who wielded black magic, could shapeshift and furthermore had a disgustingly long tongue/drill-thing that could pierce skulls and suck out both the memories/personality and lifeforce of human victims, leaving behind nothing but a pile of dust and allowing the Dire Wraith to impersonate their victim flawlessly. All this for a child's action figure robot comic-book tie-in.