Brainwashed And Crazy / Live-Action TV

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• The 100:
  • The Reapers, who are Grounders forcibly given a drug to turn them feral.
  • People chipped by A.L.I.E. harm themselves and others to coerce more people to join the utopian City of Light.
• Ace Lightning gets one of these in episode thirteen of his first series complete with dreary monotone voice. He was snapped out of it by a data transfer, because you know, he's a video game character, they can do that.
• Angel has Jasmine brainwashing the entire town of L.A. into becoming her servants. When Fred, later Angel, and then the rest of the team are freed from her control, she proceeds to send all her possessed minions after them.
• In Season 7 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer Spike is brainwashed by the First Evil to start killing again whenever he hears the tune "Early One Morning".
  • In Season 8 this happens to Angel, who kills Giles under the control of Twilight.
• Two different episodes of Charlie's Angels have one of the Angels being hypnotized into killing people; in "The Séance" it is a spur-of-the-moment tactical decision by the villain, while "Attack Angels" has the villain running a business that turns women into programmed killers-for-hire.
• Charmed (1998): Prue was brainwashed by the demon of fear and Paige was brainwashed by the Source of All Evil. All the sisters and their boyfriends and children have at times been collectively brainwashed, such as the time they became warlocks, became "too good", had their morality reversed, etc. etc.
• In Chinese Paladin, this happens to Ah Nu near the end of the series, due to making a Deal with the Devil to save her lover Tang Yu. She unknowingly kills her own father in this state.
• Danger 5: Ilsa in "Lizard Soldiers of the Third Reich".
  Jackson: Get off me, you crazy tramp!
  Ilsa: There was something in my head!
  Jackson: You've always got something in your head!
• Doctor Who:
  • Jo Grant, in her first appearance ("Terror of the Autons"), gets brainwashed by the Master and sent to open a box at UNIT HQ — which contains a bomb. The Doctor specifically defines it as this trope, saying that an ordinary hypnotist can't force anyone to do something they don't want to do. Yet the Master can manipulate people any way he likes.
  • The series contains numerous other examples; the instance in "The Masque of Mandragora" is interesting, as Sarah Jane, in her altered state of mind, becomes after thirteen years the first companion to notice the oddity of everyone in the universe speaking English.
  • "The Unicorn and the Wasp" contains an accidental example: The villain is acting like a typical Agatha Christie murderer taken way over the top. This is because he's a Half-Human Hybrid whose human birth mother was left with a necklace designed to beam him his true identity the first time he assumed his alien form. However, she happened to have been reading The Murder of Roger Ackroyd at the time, thus adding in Christie's murder mystery format and making him think that's how the world works.
  • A particularly serious example of this is the Twelfth Doctor in "The Lie of the Land", who is not only brainwashed along with the rest of humanity by the Reality Warper Monks but becomes their Propaganda Machine, ensuring their continued hold on Earth. Though it turns out he's just faking it.
• In Dollhouse, this is what happens to the entire world in ten years' time, with an imprinting signal turning everyone who picked up the phone into mindlessly violent "butchers" who attack everyone else.
• The Equalizer. The episode "Splinters" features an experimental setup in which sidekick Mickey's memories of McCall saving his life are switched out for a scenario of cruel betrayal, thus giving him the motivation to assassinate McCall. And it still doesn't work, since it turns out that The Power of Friendship is enough to break through his conditioning.
• Used in several episodes of Hawaii Five-O. One episode explicitly made the "can't do something they wouldn't do otherwise" statement, but then showed a theoretical way around it when, as a demonstration, one character was hypnotized to "shoot" another (with an unloaded weapon) by the hypnotist telling him the person was a double who was about to start a nuclear war and shooting him was the only way to stop it. Other episodes, however, including the Pilot Movie, used the standard fictional "make 'em do anything" portrayals.
• In Helix, The Virus NARVIK-B has incredibly "focused behavioral patterns" that cause its victims to behave in this way, as they are compelled to spread the contagion. Though violent and paranoid, Vectors are also cognizant enough to form plans to access uninfected, like Patient Zero Peter Farragut, who manages to find a workaround for a biometric lock via Borrowed Biometric Bypass, severing the arm of a security tech at the research base where he works.
• Most of the Kamen Rider "construction" involves this as a stage in the building, however, before that stage usually happens, they get out. There are a few exceptions, such as ZX, Shadow Moon, and Ichigo.
• Knight Rider. The Villain Of The Week does this to Bonnie in order to get his hands on KITT. It gets bad enough that she pulls a gun on Michael.
• Logan's Run: In "Carousel", Logan is struck with a dart containing a memory warp. He loses his memory of the past year and is convinced that he is still a loyal Runner-killing Sandman.
• The main antagonist of Lost, the Man in Black infects certain people with a sickness which turns them into crazy psychopaths. Known victims of the Sickness are Claire, Sayid and most of Rousseau's science team.
• In the Magnum, P.I. episode "Did You See the Sunrise" it turns out that Magnum's friend TC was brainwashed to become a sleeper assassin by Russian agents while he was a P.O.W. of the North Vietnamese.
• In the BBC'S Merlin:
  • Merlin is infected with a snake creature by Morgana and brainwashed to kill Arthur. Fortunately, the snake apparently makes him forget about his magic, and he proves to be the single worst assassin in the history of mankind.
  • Several of Arthur's knights later suffer this at the hands of Lamia.
  • In Season 5, Gwen falls prey to this at the hands of Morgana.
• The newer series of Mission: Impossible had a psychiatrist at his facility "hypnotizing" select patients, with a combo of drugs and bio-microchips, then sending them out as hitmen. He gets ahold of undercover Nick.
• NTSF:SD:SUV::: The team thinks that Trent has been brainwashed to assassinate the President of the Navy when he returns from his holiday in Hawaii with a Surfer Dude persona. Meanwhile, Alphone has just returned from his holiday "with the great and hospitable people of Yemen", but everybody just ignores how obviously robotic he acts.
• The Outpost: In Season 2, Garrett is captured by the Prime Order. They then proceed to use a combination of torture, drugged medication, a "friendly" nurse, and faked evidence to break his will and convince him that Gwynn is an imposter who deceived him into serving her. By the time they're done with him, Garrett has been rendered an utter fanatic dedicated to serving The Three.
• In Resurrection: Ertuğrul, this happens to the title character's close friend Turgut in Season 1 after being captured by Petruchio and given liquid narcotics to alter his behavior. The Kayis are convinced he may have willingly betrayed Ertugrul after literally stabbing him in the back, almost killing him.
  • Season 3 has Toktamis Bey being fed a poison created by Master Simon, causing him to start going on an uncontrollable rampage in the marquee before his brother Candar executes him, believing him to be a traitor. Several episodes later, the same substance is given to Ertugrul, causing him to undergo a similar scenario to Toktamis. Though, unlike Toktamis, he survives the ordeal.
  • Season 4 contains a group of villainous mercenaries called The Warriors of Hell, a small cult whose members are most likely in some form of this as a result of their erratic behavior whenever they appear on-screen.
• Stargate SG-1:
  • In "Family" (2x08), Rya'c is brainwashed in this way by Apophis.
  • In "Enemies" (5x01), Teal'c, Rya'c's father, has the same thing happen, again inflicted by Apophis. A whole episode is devoted to making Teal'c rethink his life and fight through the brainwashing. Initially, he manages to convince everyone on the base that he's been cured... until his mentor Bra'tac looks into his eyes.
  • Za'tarcs are another form of brainwashing. This this case, the subject becomes a Manchurian Agent, acting normally until triggered by a specific event.
  • Adria tries to do this to Daniel, but the remnant of Merlin in him protects Daniel from her powers, although he convinces Adria that she succeeded.
• In the Starsky & Hutch episode "Murder on Voodoo Island", Hollywood Voodoo causes Starsky to try to kill Hutch. Weirdly, once he's shocked back to normal it's ignored for the rest of the episode.
• The Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Mind's Eye", in which Geordi LaForge is brainwashed by the Romulans to kill a Klingon dignitary, draws heavily on The Manchurian Candidate.
• Supernatural:
  • Sirens can evoke this trope with their saliva, as once dosed (usually through kissing, but sharing a drink also works just fine) the victim becomes obsessively devoted to the Siren and will be perfectly willing to murder their own family members if the Siren wants them to.
  • Castiel is this in Season 8, having been "programmed" through some sort of horrifying process to obey Naomi, no matter how reprehensible he might find her instructions. Although the "and Crazy" bit really only manifests a couple of times — when he's ordered to kill Samandriel and then Dean . Most of the time he's a Manchurian Agent who just gathers intel. Interestingly, even at his most brainwashed there's some part of him that's still completely rational and can make contact with Naomi to beg her to stop making him hurt people.
• This is a recurring trope in both Super Sentai and its adaptation Power Rangers as several episodes are dedicated to one of the rangers being brainwashed into fighting the rest. Most of the time, the brainwashing is done by a Monster of the Week, who works on No Ontological Inertia as its destruction usually reverts the brainwashing effect. In some cases, the Monster actually is the brainwashed person. Several of the Sixth and Eleventh Hour Rangers also started out as brainwashed minions of the villains.
  • Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers
    • Tommy Oliver, the Green Ranger, had it happen three times within the same series. In fact, his whole career started with him being Rita's evil Ranger. He also has it happen during Power Rangers Zeo.
    • Katherine Hillard also made her debut as a brainwashed minion of Rita Repulsa.
    • Two of the monsters in the third season were actually humans turned into monsters, namely Bulk and a schoolteacher of the rangers.
  • Power Rangers in Space
    • Astronema, Princess of Evil, was always the Superpowered Evil Side of Karone, but only fit this Trope for the second half (roughly) of the series. Originally, she simply had cloudy memories of her childhood and didn't know Red Ranger Andros was her long-lost brother. When she remembered, she honestly tried to make a Heel–Face Turn, but Dark Specter had other plans, and used brainwashing to keep her under his control until she was ultimately saved in the Season Finale.
    • One early episode features a crossover between Power Rangers in Space and the then-current Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation in which Astronema brainwashes the Turtles to help her against the Rangers.
  • Power Rangers Wild Force had an interesting variation in "Taming of the Zords", when Lion Tamer Org essentially brainwashed the Red Lion Wildzord, which allows him to control the Wild Force Megazord and various other Wildzords as the Rangers are forced to fight with their other available zords.
  • Power Rangers: Dino Thunder: has quite a few examples.
    • During the annual crossover episode with Power Rangers Ninja Storm, the original three Ninja Storm Rangers are brainwashed by Lothor and sent to fight the Dino Rangers until the other three Ninja Storm Rangers arrive and break the spell.
    • Mesogog is revealed in the series finale 2-parter to have done this with Elsa.
    • Trent could be argued to be that as well, as his Dino Gem is seemingly encased in an evil coating or otherwise made evil.
    • Kira's even brainwashed during the series due to the MOTW in one episode.
  • Power Rangers S.P.D.: It's strongly implied that Broodwing attempted to do this to the Dino Rangers before they escaped.
  • In both Mahou Sentai Magiranger and Power Rangers Mystic Force, the pink ranger is turned into a vampire and brainwashed into serving one of the villains. It also turns out that Wolzard, The Dragon, is the ranger's father. Mystic Force's Korrag is the same, but he is only the Red Ranger's father.
  • Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger has Hakaizer, who is actually the brainwashed and cybernetically enhanced father of The Hero. While the original brainwashing wasn't really severe, as he still retained his original personality, the villains later brainwashed him into a cold-blooded killer.
  • Blue Ranger Ollie Akana from Power Rangers Cosmic Fury has the unlucky distinction of being the first Ranger to be brainwashed and crazy for the majority of his season. He is sprayed with a mind control potion in Episode 1 and isn't saved until Episode 9 out of 10.
• Teen Wolf:
  • In "Night School", Scott gets this from Alpha Peter Hale. He snaps out of it pretty quickly, but still...
  • Jackson as the Kanima. Can be snapped out of it when people he cares about are in danger to be hurt by him.
• Total Recall 2070: A mine worker is implanted with a brain chip that forces him to assassinate a union leader in public.

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