Film — Animated
- In Incredibles 2, one part of Evelyn's plan is to have the Supers appear to be bitter at the Super Relocation Act and deliver a chilling New Era Speech on how they are not going to tolerate it anymore.
- Megamind: The premise of this Superhero Deconstruction film has the titular Supervillain try to create a new superhero after his traditional opponent, Metro Man, dies. Megamind ends up giving the Flying Brick powers to a seemingly lovable loser, Hal Stewart, and tells him to be a hero. When the girl Hal is obsessed with rejects him, he decides to give up being a superhero and use his powers for petty crime instead. When Megamind taunts Hal in an attempt to get him to oppose him like Metro Man did, Hal turns into a flat-out supervillain, takes over the city, and creates real havoc as opposed to the comparatively harmless villainy of Megamind.
- The Powerpuff Girls Movie has the eponymous characters treated as outcasts after their game of tag destroys most of the city.
- Superman vs. the Elite, which is based on one of the definitive Superman stories, What's So Funny About Truth, Justice & the American Way?. At the end, Superman seemingly takes on the Elite's brutal style of heroics during their fight. The results terrify even the Elites, who'd been espousing their style for the entire movie, and proves why Superman holds himself to such a high standard. However, this ends up being an act as a means to scare the Elite without resorting to murder.UN Official: Is that... Superman?
UN Official: Not anymore. - In Superman: Doomsday, when Superman comes back to life following his battle to the death with Doomsday, he starts behaving more like a violent vigilante. The least offending act has him berating an old lady whose cat couldn't get down from a tree, and very subtly warning that it better not happen again, or else. When Toyman kills a four-year-old girl, Superman goes to the police station where he's being taken, flies him up several hundred feet and lets go, killing him. When it's revealed that Superman is acting the way he is because Luthor cloned him, and unknowingly conditioned him to be like him, Superman rips out the red-sun room Luthor tried to lure him into from Lex Tower, and drops it hundreds feet onto the street. Seeing that Superman is getting out of control, the military is sent to apprehend him, and goes exactly as expected. He's only stopped because the real Superman arrives to confront him, and used a kryptonite bullet to put him down.
Film — Live-Action
- Hancock plays with this trope. Hancock is mostly a good guy but is also a drunkard, extremely arrogant, ends up causing millions of dollars worth of collateral damage when he doesn't need to, and is just plain rude. At the start of the movie, it is quickly pointed out that the public doesn't really want him around and that he's actually wanted by the police for all of the damage he's done whilst "saving" people. Obviously, no one can arrest him unless he wants to be. He does get nicer by the end, though.
- My Super Ex-Girlfriend plays this trope for laughs when an average Joe breaks up with his girlfriend who just happens to be a superhero... and abusive, too.
- There is a sub-plot in Superman III where he becomes temporarily evil due to Applied Phlebotinum. In one scene, he starts flicking bar nuts through a wall while drunk.
- Chronicle shows what many believe to be a semi-realistic version of what would happen if three random teenage boys were given powers: at first, nothing (several scenes early in the movie show them using their powers to goof off, play pranks, or be more popular at school). Later, however, after Steve is killed and Andrew's father becomes more abusive, Andrew (who wasn't in a good mental place even before the events of the movie) starts to become this trope, using his powers to commit crimes and torture/kill his bullies. Matt, who has his same powers but was mentally stable, averted this trope and tried to stop Andrew from going too far though he sadly failed.
- In Spider-Man 3, we get elements of this when Spidey is influenced by the symbiotic suit, turning him evil. The public perception of him throughout the series sometimes reflects this as well. Specifically, J. J. Jameson plays up this perception to sell newspapers, much to Peter Parker's dismay. Jameson only does this because Spider-Man won't do an exclusive for his paper.J.J. Jameson: He doesn't want to be famous? Well I'm gonna make him infamous!
- X-Men Film Series:
- The series plays with this trope, although it's more along the lines of Beware the Supermen. Generally, this attitude of not trusting superpowered mutants is seen in a negative light, but considering the villains that pop up, some audience members might understand why non-mutants are so afraid.
- X-Men: First Class appears to end in a manner which puts the world into such a setting. Up until the Cuban Missile Crisis, mutantkind was an unnoticed breed, but then the whole thing is blown wide open due to Magneto's actions against the fleets of ships at the climax. However, X-Men: Days of Future Past reveals that the US government had kept the mutants' involvement a secret from the public, with one member even pointing out to Trask that, Magneto's actions aside, mutants have obviously been living peacefully (and silently) alongside humans for decades.
- X-Men: Days of Future Past: Dr. Bolivar Trask's goal in building the Sentinels is to prevent the extinction of Homo sapiens by Homo superior. Naturally, he doesn't account for the fact that the Sentinels copying the mutants' powers inevitably makes them the new-and-crapshooted Homo Superior.
- X-Men: Apocalypse is about an ancient Egyptian God-Emperor who did use his superpowers to rule as a tyrant, and seeks to make a comeback in the 1980s. This is deconstructed, as over time all of his (surviving) minions (including Magneto) lose faith in their arrogant, destructive bully of a leader and turn on him or flee.
- The trope is fundamental for the DC Extended Universe's beginnings:
- Jonathan Kent believes that he is preventing this reaction in Man of Steel by trying to keep Clark's talents under wraps through his childhood. He even willingly gives his life just to maintain his position. However, Clark can't resist his instinct to prevent unnecessary tragedies when he can do something about it and eventually he is forcibly outed by Zod's invasion. Zod's invasion does indeed provoke this response from humanity (and rightfully so; Zod's scheme likely left a six-digit death toll in its wake), though they also learn to believe Superman is their ally through the same experience, though the military is still wary at the end of the movie, with Clark disabling one of their drones, telling them to trust him.
- In Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, the massive destruction wrought by Zod and Clark's fight leads to widespread distrust of Superman from a significant portion of the world, including Bruce Wayne, who was present in Metropolis as he saw many of his employees die. This is also Lex Luthor's reason for opposing Superman, alongside what seems to be a hatred of Godlike figures. Furthermore, Bruce Wayne receives an Ominous Message from the Future from The Flash in a Bad Future with Supes becoming The Dragon to Darkseid.
- In Zack Snyder's Justice League, after Superman comes Back from the Dead he's confused and disoriented, delivering a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown to the rest of the League, law enforcement, and the military. Thankfully he quickly comes back to his senses with a Cooldown Hug from Lois before any casualties occur and helps save the day, but both Cyborg and Batman have additional visions of the Bad Future above.
- And in Suicide Squad (2016), this fear of what a Superman-like entity could do if he decided to act against the world (or at least the interests of the U.S. Government) is the driving force behind the creation of the eponymous squad of supervillains pressed into government service.
- The trope is heavily discussed in SHAZAM!. The last remaining member of the Wizard Council is aware of the consequences of giving his magic to the wrong person since their previous champion eventually went evil, so he wants to be sure that he gives it to a human pure of heart. However, since Humans Are Flawed, he takes too long to find one that meets his criteria, and is ultimately forced to give his powers to a flawed kid (Billy Batson) and hope for the best.
- In Perfect Creature, the Brothers are a Christian order of vampires that live in peaceful coexistence with humans, who view them as benevolent creatures that are closer to God whose purpose is to teach and protect humans rather than prey on them. This trope comes into play when a rogue Brother named Edgar goes on a killing spree, seeing humans as nothing more than blood-bags to feast upon.
- Played on multiple levels in the Marvel Cinematic Universe:
- There are regular Joes and politicians who think that the "supermen" like the Avengers should not be allowed to act on their own (one important reason being their collateral damage). These viewpoints get explored in Iron Man 2 and are the main driving factor behind the Accords in Captain America: Civil War.
- On a grander scale, mankind finding out that gods exist in Thor causes a few scares for mankind. The Avengers (2012) shows the effect a few times (mainly S.H.I.E.L.D.'s reaction), and by the end of that film actual aliens have caused massive damage in Manhattan, providing additional arguments for this trope in future movies.
- Jessica Jones (2015) takes a rather Capepunk approach to the latter. Some civilians distrust Jessica, one accusing her and the other supers collectively of causing all the destruction. Because Jessica is a leather-wearing punk and doesn't identify with her universe's authority figures, rather than correcting the civilian or threatening to leave them to the alien menace like some characters would, she simply reminds the civilian to direct those complaints to "the flag waver" and other capes. Unfortunately, other civilians sometimes don't care. This is Truth in Television as people who have experienced a trauma at the hands of another nation may reject even a later improved version of that nation, and if it eventually abuses people's trust again, even in a smaller way, this will only strengthen the traumatized person's argument.
- WandaVision also explores this, as noted in the Live-Action TV section.
- Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which takes place after WandaVision, shows that the raw power possessed by our heroes is a scary thing when used uncontrollably and irresponsibly.
- Earth-838 Strange's carelessness with magic caused an entire universe to be destroyed.
- Wanda goes to horrific magical lengths to achieve her goals in this film, including brutally killing several heroes and chasing a child across the multiverse. When her actions terrify alternate versions of her own children, whom she had spent the entire film desperately searching for, she realizes how far she's gone.
- Brightburn casts a little boy with Superman's powerset as the monster, and showcases, in true horror fashion, just how frightening someone with these kinds of powers and no concern for humanity can actually be. And then it's revealed that Brandon is not the only superpowered being out there... and they're all as bad as him.
- Glass (2019) toys with this concept in dialogue between Mr. Glass and the Horde, with Glass seeking to bring about this scenario to prove to the world that superpowered beings exist. Meanwhile, the Clover group seen in the climax has apparently been working for 10,000 years to avert this. As explained by Dr. Staple, they have secretly spent millennia killing people with powers, good or evil, specifically to give humanity a fighting chance. With the masquerade having been destroyed by the end of the film, it appears that only time will tell whether their fears were warranted or not.
- In Star Wars, especially the Expanded Universe, this is the reason why falling to The Dark Side is so terrible. Even a single one of the weakest of Dark Jedi and Sith are powerful enough to kill small armies singlehandedly, while some of the most powerful can kill entire planets, as well as raise armies out of similar minded individuals. Just one Force-user going Dark Side is enough to cause galaxy-wide chaos. And to make things worse, the Dark Side is addictive. Even if a Jedi slips into it by accident, it takes incredible willpower to turn back and avoid becoming a monster.
- Even Jedi who haven't turned to the Dark Side can often get this treatment from certain writers.
- This is one of the central arguments that David Brin has against the world of Star Wars, arguing that George Lucas's universe is based on a depraved Might Makes Right morality where Muggles have no role aside from spear carriers for a small, genetically elect elite.
