Capt. Picard: [The Brekkians] know the Ornarans no longer have the plague. They know that felicium is no longer a medicine, so of course, they are willing to give this shipment, because they don't want to take the chance that the Ornarans will lose their addiction. They don't want to lose their only customers.
Dr. Crusher: How would they have known all of that unless the plague had once infected their planet as well?
Picard: They were infected. They used the felicium to cure themselves, but somehow their ancestors realized that it was a narcotic.
Crusher: [getting angry] They broke the cycle of addiction and never told the Ornarans. They let them continue to believe that without the felicium they would die.
Picard: Oh, I think it's worse than that.
Dr. Crusher: How would they have known all of that unless the plague had once infected their planet as well?
Picard: They were infected. They used the felicium to cure themselves, but somehow their ancestors realized that it was a narcotic.
Crusher: [getting angry] They broke the cycle of addiction and never told the Ornarans. They let them continue to believe that without the felicium they would die.
Picard: Oh, I think it's worse than that.
Villains have a wide variety of methods for breaking or controlling someone — mind games, torture, harming friends or relatives, any can be effective depending on the circumstance. Some villains get creative, and attack the victim's mind and body at the same time by turning them into an addict. By getting the victim hooked on something, whether it's an actual drug or some equivalent, the villain ensures that the victim is thoroughly compromised, and can control them by changing the dose, withholding the supply, or threatening to withhold it if the victim doesn't behave. Even if the victim manages to escape, they now face the hardship of trying to recover and keep from relapsing, plus the consequences of whatever they may have done while under the villain's thumb.
This can contribute to a Drugs Are Bad theme in a work, especially if the drug(s) in question form a central part of the narrative. It can also be the basis for a revenge plot, a parasitic or manipulative relationship, and is a very effective tool for enslavement or other involuntary servitude. Human Traffickers, especially those whose deal in girls who are being sold as Sex Slaves, often get their "merchandise" hooked on something to keep them docile and under control.
Food Chains is one specific application. Fantastic Drugs can also be used in fantasy or sci-fi settings. Artistic License – Pharmacology may come into play depending on how the drug and/or addiction are depicted.
Compare and contrast Addiction Displacement, where a character gets themself addicted to something else.
May qualify as Government Drug Enforcement, though that also encompasses cases where the government forces people to take non-addictive drugs. Can overlap with Phlebotinum Dependence, as some cases are treated as actual addiction. See also The Aggressive Drug Dealer, for when this sort of behavior is exhibited by drug dealers who try to force people into doing drugs rather than simply supplying them to interested customers.
Spoilers ahead!
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Et Cetera: After getting separated from Mingchao, Baskerville loses his memory and becomes addicted to opium, getting splitting headaches if he doesn't consume the drug every once in a while. Since the villains' primary trade is opium, they easily enslave him in exchange of the medication, although he thankfully recovers from the addiction once his memory returns.
- Gunsmith Cats: "Iron" Goldie Musou is a Mafia boss who uses the Fantastic Drug Kerasine to force people into becoming her tools. Kerasine puts users in a hypnotic state, making them highly susceptible to suggestion — thus, Goldie brainwashes those forcibly drugged with Kerasine to make them murder their targets (ranging from complete strangers to their own family), after which a return to reality is too painful to bear and the victim will willingly remain a junkie.
- Metamorphosis: Saki Yoshida, even after turning tricks for the clients of Obata's heroin bar to help pay off her boyfriend's debt, is still assaulted by the bar's patrons and Obata, who injects her with heroin to make her more compliant. She gets addicted almost immediately and gets to the point where she accepts drugs instead of money for her services, which eventually leads to her boyfriend kicking her out.
- Mobile Suit Gundam SEED: The Boosted Men are "Biological CPUs", Earth Alliance soldiers who are forced to undergo intense training, psychological manipulation, and use stimulants to increase their aggression and reaction times to levels comparable to ZAFT's Coordinators. However, these same drugs have crippling withdrawal effects that cause agonizing pain, ensuring that the Boosted Men will never defect to another organization.
- Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny: Similar to their Boosted Men predecessors, the Child Soldiers of the Extended Program are also given daily doses of maintenance drugs (in contrast to the Boosted Men requiring doses every few hours) and accompanying treatment in special machines, which, while also enhancing their physical capabilities (albeit to a lesser extent than the Boosted Men), also makes them entirely dependent on and addicted to said drugs being administered. Should they miss this daily maintenance, such as in the case of Stella Louissier, they will suffer from severe withdrawal pains and eventually die, thus preventing them from either defecting or being captured for long periods of time.
- One Piece: Caesar Clown, the Arc Villain of the Punk Hazard arc, controls the children he has been experimenting on by giving them candy laced with a highly addictive stimulant called NHC10. When the Straw Hat pirates attempt to rescue them, the children go through withdrawal resulting in severe pain, frightening hallucinations, and increased aggression. Caesar Clown manipulates the children into returning by promising them more candy if they obey him. What makes this even more upsetting is that they are clearly too young to even understand what's happening. After Caesar Clown's defeat, the children are taken to Dr. Vegapunk for treatment.
Comic Books
- Batman (Grant Morrison): During the "Batman Reborn" arc, Professor Pyg creates an aerosol-based narcotic that he has his "Dollotrons" spread across Gotham by sneezing on people. Dick Grayson describes it as "addiction you can catch".
- Diabolik: Inspector Ginko is forcefully addicted to heroin by some criminals in revenge for him busting too many mob operations. Thankfully, his Heroic Willpower allows him to completely recover in little time once he gets treatment.
- Spider-Man 2099: When Miguel O'Hara threatens to quit his job at Alchemax, Corrupt Corporate Executive Tyler Stone promptly gives him a "parting gift" of a drink laced with "Rapture", a mind-expanding hallucinogen that bonds with the user's DNA, resulting in them needing more to live. Since Alchemax is the only supplier, this essentially forces Miguel to stay with the company.
Fan Fiction
- In A Vicious, Vengeful Sea, Jeyne Poole is forcibly addicted to heroin by the men who traffick her to Ramsay Bolton to control her. In the trial against Bolton, Baelish uses her addiction to undermine her credibility as a witness.
Film — Live-Action
- The French Connection: In the sequel, "Popeye" Doyle travels to France to try to track down Charnier, the ringleader of the heroin trafficking ring from the first movie. He's captured by Charnier's men, who repeatedly shoot him up with heroin to get him addicted and mess with his head while they're interrogating him, then give him an overdose and dump him at the Marseilles police station when it's clear that he can't tell them anything. Doyle barely survives and goes through a grueling withdrawal, but eventually recovers.
- Manila in the Claws of Light: The sex trafficking ring run by Mrs. Cruz turns its women into morphine addicts to keep them compliant. Ligaya tells Julio about fellow prostitutes who go insane from morphine addiction/withdrawal and says that while being a Sex Slave to a rich man sucks, it's still better than that.
- Taken: The girls kidnapped by the Albanian sex trafficking ring are initially transported to a brothel where they're forcibly drugged. This is meant to make them more compliant and dependent once they're eventually sold onto the black market.
Literature
- The Belgariad: When the Nyissan Decadent Court kidnap Garion, they dope him up on Fantastic Drugs with deadly withdrawal symptoms as a carrot-and-stick to make him a docile consort. They weren't counting on him curing himself with sorcery.
Salmissra: Nothing can save him if you attack me... He has drunk athal and kaldiss. Even now their fire is in his veins. He will need more very soon.
- The Infernal Devices: Jem was kidnapped and tortured by being force-fed a drug called yin fen. Such is the addictiveness of the drug that he cannot cure his addiction. He must choose between going cold turkey and dying a quick death or slowly poisoning himself with repeated doses.
- Iron Widow: The convicted murderer Li Shimin is forced to serve as a mech pilot due to his vast spiritual energy, but spends the rest of his time drinking heavily in his cell. Zetian and Yizhi eventually learn that he was Force Fed alcohol to the point of addiction in order to control him, so they get him into treatment, kidnap the government agent responsible, and drown him in liquor.
- The Left Hand of Darkness: Genly is repeatedly drugged as a political prisoner in The Gulag. He assumes it was a Truth Serum with unpleasant side effects, but Estraven speculates that they were giving him addictive mind-altering drugs to "domesticate" him into docility. Either way, he recovers after a short time away.
- The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe: The White Witch gets Edmund under her thumb through false promises, supposed comforting gestures, and by giving him Turkish Delight which has been magically enchanted to be addictive. Using his desire for more of the dessert, she manipulates him into betraying Peter, Lucy, and Susan, which ultimately leads to Aslan's execution.
- Looming Gaia: The Sovereign of Aquaria attaches greenbrite-consuming parasitic hankerleeches on the brains of his enemies, which gives them a terrible addiction to the pods of greenbrite mushrooms with rather unpleasant hallucinogenic effects. He originally did this to his brother Mr. Ocean so he'd be too addicted to rule Tekee so he'd have the kingdom for himself, since they're unable to kill each other due to the unbreakable promise they made to their parents.
- Mary Russell: In A Monstrous Regiment of Women, the villains at one point kidnap Mary, hold her prisoner for several weeks, and forcibly addict her to morphine, as part of a plot to kill her and make it look as if she was a decadent Bright Young Thing who died by accident. Realistically, once she escapes, she has little difficulty in going cold turkey, even though it's physically unpleasant.
- Misery: Though Paul does have a prior disposition towards addictive behavior (having been a heavy smoker and drinker in the past), he is at present "Mr. Clean". When Annie "rescues" him from the car accident, she gets him addicted to painkillers so she can use them to keep him in line.
- Mistborn: The Original Trilogy: Straff Venture keeps an herbalist to treat his repeated poisonings by one of his Psycho Supporters. In fact, the "treatment" is a highly addictive drug, the "poisoning" symptoms are the early stages of withdrawal, and the herbalist is waiting for the right time to let the withdrawal kill him.
- October Daye: In Chimes at Midnight, Toby gets a Pie in the Face made of goblin fruit, which is instantly and unbreakably addictive, requiring her to eat more or starve to death in withdrawal.
- The Ship Who...: In PartnerShip, a Clandestine Chemist creates various Fantastic Drugs that are useful for her schemes as well as profitably sold to the masses. An Addled Addict dosed with a modification on one of those drugs becomes a Functional Addict dependent on her to survive — and given that she and her dependent stooges run the charity ward of a medical clinic without meaningful oversight, she can and does readily force her drugs on impoverished patients if she thinks she can use them.
- StarCraft: The Dark Templar Saga: In book two, Rosemary, already a recovering addict, is taken prisoner on Aiur by a cult of protoss survivors of the planet's fall to the zerg, and forcibly fed a drug they're all addicted to. This is intended to ensure her compliance with their plan to capture Jake and the Ghost Memory of the protoss archivist he's carrying.
- Worm: After kidnapping Dinah Alcott, Coil has a doctor administer carefully selected drugs until Dinah will do whatever he asks in exchange for more "candy". He then pumps her for information from her precognition power, using disposable timelines to push her to her limits over and over again in finding out everything he can. For extra villain points, Dinah is just twelve years old.
Live-Action TV
- Andromeda: Beka's uncle Sid uses flash on her as an interrogation technique in order to get her to spill the beans on some incriminating evidence her father had on him, knowing the substance is so addictive that two doses could get someone willing to sell their first born for a fraction of a third hit. Unfortunately, Beka has no idea what Sid is talking about, and when she figures it out, she manages to turn the tables and blackmail him.
- The Bill: One episode features them facing a vicious pimp, who deliberately gets teenage girls addicted to heroin so that he can force them into prostitution for him.
- Black Lightning (2018): Lynn Stewart is given subliminal messages from her bosses at the ASA to get her to start taking the highly addictive drug Green Light, both to improve her productivity and also to keep her dependent on the ASA.
- Charlie's Angels: "Avenging Angel" features a heroin-addicted ex-con who was busted by Kelly before she became an Angel. After getting out of prison, he tries to get revenge on Kelly by kidnapping her and injecting her with heroin in an attempt to turn her into an addict like himself. However, the dealers the heroin came from think that they're actually working together and come after them both.
- CSI: NY: In "She's Not There", Human Traffickers coerce young women with promises of modeling careers, stage a party and serve them drinks laced with sedatives. This keeps them compliant and curbs their appetites, but it also makes them thirsty, so they're given bottles of water laced with the same drug, and the cycle continues.
- Fastlane: Billie is a recovered heroin addict. In "Iced", Billie is kidnapped by her former protégé, who tortures her by forcing heroin into her system to get her addicted again. Unfortunately, the series was cancelled, leaving this plot ending on a Cliffhanger with no resolution to the ramifications this could have on her character.
- Jessica Jones (2015): Kevin Thompson/Kilgrave forces Malcolm Ducasse to get hooked on drugs in order to make Ducasse dependent on him and use Ducasse as a spy. Kilgrave notably has mind control powers, so Malcolm had no way of resisting. Kilgrave does this because his mind control only lasts 24 hours at a time, and he does not want to have to re-control Malcolm every day, so he forces Malcolm to become addicted, then becomes his supplier. Whenever Malcolm runs out of heroin, he returns to Kilgrave for a resupply, but also gets the mind control reapplied as well. This means Malcolm could escape the constant mind control, but won't because his addiction overrides his judgement.
- Last Resort: After Master Chief Joe Prosser tries to crack down on drug peddlers in Sainte Marina because they've been selling to his crew, local drug lord Julian Serrat has him kidnapped and tortured and then pumped full of fentanyl, leaving him with an addiction that makes him reconsider his crusade against drugs.
- Nikita: Alex was trafficked to the US as a child prostitute, and her pimp got her hooked on heroin. He recaptures her midway through season 1 when a Division op goes south and starts dosing her again, hoping to get her to go along with his plan to get reward money from her oligarch relatives.
- The Queen's Gambit: The Orphanage of Fear in which Beth and Jolene were raised used and abused tranquilizers to make the orphans easier to manage. Beth becomes addicted to them; though it can be assumed she is far from the only one, she is the only one shown.
- Shameless (UK): Paddy Maguire is chained to a bed for days, deprived of food, and forcibly injected with heroin by a mother who blames him for her daughter's addiction and death. She eventually lets him go, but he becomes forcibly addicted to his own product.
- Stargate SG-1: In "Deadman Switch", SG-1 is captured by a Bounty Hunter working for the Goa'uld who turns out to belong to a species of Human Aliens who were enslaved by the Goa'uld by getting them addicted to a drug that has fatal withdrawal symptoms.
- Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: The Jem'Hadar were engineered by the Founders to be addicted to a substance called Ketracel-White. It provides all their nutritional needs, but it's the only source of sustenance they can take, and being deprived of it will cause a Jem'Hadar to become violently insane and then die.
- Star Trek: The Next Generation:
- In "Symbiosis", Enterprise encounters the Ornarans and Brekkians, two races that are joined at the hip over a drug called felicium. As the plot unfolds, it's revealed that the Brekkians created felicium to cure a virus affecting both races, but they realized that it also acts like an opioid, and now they're keeping the Ornarans addicted to it by convincing them that the felicium is only holding the virus at bay when it was cured long ago and what they're actually suffering from is withdrawal. This leaves Picard with a test of the Prime Directive, which he solves by refusing to offer repairs to the Ornarans' ailing ships, which will eventually cause them to not be able to get felicium from the Brekkians and force the two races to deal with their situation on their own.
- In "The Game", the Ktarians enact a plan to take over the Federation through a holographic video game that affects the player's brain; they become addicted to playing it and are compelled to get other people to try it. Riker is the first to fall under its sway, and it quickly spreads throughout Enterprise. Wesley Crusher and his friend Robin Lefler try their best to avoid the game, but in the climax, Robin gets gamed offscreen and the bridge crew trap Wesley and force him into playing the game. Fortunately, Data arrives in the nick of time to deactivate the brainwashing, and the Ktarians are taken into custody.
Tabletop Games
- Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition: As part of the Book of Vile Darkness' Drugs Are Bad theme, the spell Addiction inflicts a drug addiction with a touch, using the drug in question as an Eye of Newt. The extremity of the addiction varies with the caster's level.
- In both Vampire: The Masquerade and its Spiritual Successor Vampire: The Requiem, vampire blood is highly addictive, and drinking the same vampire's blood three times makes the drinker slavishly devoted to the vampire. Less-moral vampires take full advantage of this through force or guile, since it's a quick and easy way to recruit human minions.
Video Games
- Dragon Age: The Templar Order is the Chantry's militant arm, primarily used to police the Circles of Magi. The Templar's abilities are powered by lyrium, the same mystical substance that the mages' Mana Potions are made from, which just happens to be extremely addictive in the long run and largely controlled by the Chantry. In other words, to keep the Templars from getting any ideas, the Chantry lets every member get physically addicted to the resource whose distribution it has monopolized. This becomes a plot point in Dragon Age: Inquisition, where the Templar Order rebels and severs its ties with the Chantry. After their own stockpile of lyrium runs out, they have no choice but to accept a Deal with the Devil and start taking the Elder One's Red Lyrium instead.
- Fallout: New Vegas: Nero and Big Sal, the bosses of the Omertas, run the Gomorrah casino and control all the prostitution occurring around it. To enforce this, they ensure that women get addicted to chems they supply then force them to pay for their fixes, as well as taking cuts of the caps they earn from their johns.
- God of War Ragnarök: Odin, who in this setting is an Abusive Parent to the max, constantly goads and belittles his son Thor into drinking, despite Thor being a recovering alcoholic. The Thunder God is so wracked with self-loathing, trauma, and persistent desire for his father's approval that Odin feeds into his alcoholism in order to keep using him as a tool.
- Mother Russia Bleeds: The four playable characters are all kidnapped to be guinea pigs for a street drug called Nekro. While it seemingly just gives them nightmares, heals them, and grants them strength needed to fight the Bratva, their addiction to it is also slowly driving them insane and crushing them as time goes on. It's not until the very end that their situation hits a head and they either succumb to their addiction and die should they take one more hit, or they ultimately break free of it entirely and live on.
- Transformers: War for Cybertron: In the novelization, Megatron forces some of Starscream's subordinates to consume Dark Energon to study the effects. When he's satisfied that it won't burn users from the inside out, he orders all of his Decepticon followers to use it, since it greatly boosts strength and endurance. However, when he later learns that the test subjects went insane from withdrawal symptoms and the Autobots have successfully shut down Cybertron's corrupted core so no more Dark Energon can be produced, Megatron swears he'd rather drain every single Decepticon dry than suffer that fate himself.
- Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines: The fledgling vampire player character can feed a dying woman their blood to heal her. Trouble is, vampire blood is addictive. If they don't send her away, she'll abandon her life to become a Satellite Character to the fledgling, living with them and doing whatever they want for the chance to get more.
Webcomics
- Jungle Juice: Insect-humans become addicted to the taste of human flesh from the moment they take a bite out of it. One such Ax-Crazy addict describes it as eating the highest grade of steak with drugs poured on top of it. Breeder trains several insect-humans to do his bidding by making them eat human flesh to get them hooked for life, and his right-hand man Pil Henson forces Suchan to eat a chunk of Gigantea's flesh, making everyone around him smell indescribably delicious. Regular doses of a sensory suppression drug, Pumpkin Carriage, are the only thing keeping Suchan sane and in control of himself.
Western Animation
- Captain Planet and the Planeteers: In "Mind Pollution", Skumm's scheme of the week involves making a designer drug called Bliss. His victims include Linka's cousin Boris, who offers to steal Linka's ring after being unable to afford more. Skumm tells him to bring him Linka instead. Boris tries to refuse, but when Skumm threatens to leave him suffering withdrawal otherwise, he gives in and drugs Linka's food. This hampers the team because Linka doesn't have the clarity of mind to use her ring.
- Family Guy: In "Customer of the Week", when a worker at a coffee shop gets close to exposing Lois's attempt at phony heroism, she kidnaps him and threatens to get him hooked on heroin if he doesn't do what she says, which is enough to get him to cooperate.
- X-Men: The Animated Series: In the two-part "Sanctuary" storyline, during his time as ruler of Asteroid M, Magneto was repeatedly given power boosts by his second-in-command Fabian Cortez, ostensibly because his own powers were so heavily taxed by keeping Asteroid M functional. This ultimately left him heavily dependent upon Cortez, as his body became over-accustomed to the boosts.
