Pheromones

In Real Life, one of the primary means of communication between animals is scent. Pheromones may be used to attract mates, mark territorial boundaries, signal danger, or leave a trail for others to follow.

In some works of fiction, characters might be able to communicate by pheromones too. Those with a superhuman sense of smell may be able to sense these, even to the point of sensing sexual attraction. In many cases they are even portrayed as a means of Brainwashing.

Super-Trope to Smells Sexy. May lead to Living Aphrodisiac, Love Is in the Air, Supernatural Fear Inducer, or Hate Plague.

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Examples

Anime and Manga

• Franken Fran:
  • In Chapter 19, "Lust", Fran comes up with a way to make the male students stop hitting on the girls; she creates a gelatinous creature that emits pheromones causing the guys to see it as a room of naked women, with whom they have sex.
  • Fran uses pheromones in chapter 36 in an attempt to make an actor more "charismatic", but her calculations are a little off and the situation gets out of control. Notably, she acknowledges that they normally don't have much of an effect on people, but somehow makes it work anyway.
• Gakuen Alice: Narumi-sensei is able to emit pheromones that can make anyone, regardless of age or gender, become infatuated with him. In some cases (such as Natsume), the target may become so enamored that all they can do is faint from the shock.
• Killing Bites: Brute Civet has the ability to disperse pheromones into her surrounding area. Not only does it cause intense feelings of lust in the victims, it also causes them to temporarily Feel No Pain.
• Toriko: Warden Love can manipulate pheromones to tame the ferocious giant monsters in her jail and to fight. More often than not, she uses them to make others see her as a gorgeous, scantily clad beauty rather than the short granny she is.
• Urara Meirocho: When exposed to alcohol, Chiya releases wild pheromones that attract and put in heat animals and humans equally. It also works with the same sex, considering that she successfully attracted Koume and Nono.
• You Are Being Summoned, Azazel: Azazel Atsushi has the ability to elevate a man's pheromones to make him irresistible to women. It works too well.

Comic Books

• Batman:
  • Poison Ivy can use pheromones to get men to do her bidding. Depending on the Writer, it can also work on women as well, especially if that woman is a lesbian or bisexual. Since she's a scientist, however, she's able to upgrade her abilities or develop new pheromones that compel a person regardless of sexual orientation or target. For instance, one concoction causes two men (who were previously shown to be attracted to women) to start making out with each other uncontrollably.
• Desolation Jones: Emily Crowe underwent an experiment to augment her pheromone production, but it backfired and she now triggers fear and revulsion in everyone she meets.
• Marvel Universe:
  • "The Mandrill"/Jerome Beechman has mutant sex pheromones that turn him into a Living Aphrodisiac with mind control tier potency for women. His pheromones have even been established as being addictive with prolonged exposure. As he is a raging misogynist, he has no hesitation about raping the women he enthralls.
  • Daredevil:
    • The Purple Man secretes pheromones that can be absorbed through the skin or inhaled. They allow him to control affected creatures with verbal commands. For extra-special squick, he used it to father at least one daughter with a mind-controlled lady friend. That daughter, known as the Purple Girl, inherited the power, and used it to mind control Northstar in her first appearance (though unlike her father, she didn't take it past going swimming together).
    • Mister Fear uses pheromones to (you guessed it) induce fear in his victim. This is also (Depending on the Writer) a power of the Scarecrow (the Marvel version, not the DC Comics version).
  • Spider-Man: Several spider characters have pheromone abilities, particularly Jessica Drew (Spider-Woman), who has them as a major gimmick. Likewise, Veranke, the Skrull Queen, who impersonated Drew. However, it is also revealed that Spidey himself and Silk also have them, and they work exponentially well on each other. When Peter and Cindy are anywhere near each other, they are compelled to start making out on the spot, and can only resist for so long.
  • X-Men:
    • Omega Red can produce lethal pheromones that weaken or kill everyone else in the vicinity.
    • Wolverine's son, Daken, can produce pheromones that he uses to manipulate people.
    • Stacy X was a former prostitute who could control other's pheromones through skin contact, producing sensations and physical reactions in anyone she touches. Yes, she can make people orgasm just by touching them.
    • New X-Men: Academy X features Wallflower, a mutant girl who can cause people to experience any variety of emotions through pheromone release. She inherited her powers from her father, who had used them to seduce her mother. The father is also introduced in the series, but Wallflower is killed off before the subplot can go anywhere.
• Racket from The Others (1995) has the innate ability to emit chemical odors that repel men of her own species, but has a Charm Person effect on the males of other species.

Fan Works

• All-American Girl (Shinzakura): Aroused Equestrian mares emit a pheromone called phenethylamine, causing them to smell of dark chocolate.
• Empath: The Luckiest Smurf: In "Papa's Big Crush", Papa Smurf pursues Smurfette following his Hulking Out moment because he can smell her pheromones.
• Friendship is Witchcraft: When Fluttershy talks about her Hilariously Abusive Childhood, one of the things she mentions is that her Abusive Dad wrote her a message in an ant pheromone. It attracted dangerous ants that attacked her, and tried to get to the queen larva her father had stuck in her Cheerios.
• In the Miraculous Ladybug fic Lady and the Tomcat, Marinette learns that thanks to her bond with Tikki, she has a "mating cycle" (despite the same bond making her temporarily infertile) in which she gives off pheromones that will make people around her more relaxed, but will have a much more intense effect on her partner Chat Noir. "If he's around you too much during this time, it'll set off the mating hormones in him too. And those will reflect back at you, and the connection will drift back and forth until it's painfully hard to manage." Unfortunately, while Ladybug can alert Chat to this and tell him to stay away from her outside of battle, the two have no idea that their civilian identities are in the same class.
  Tikki: You two can fight akumas together, but long periods of time where he's exposed to the pheromones will be the most detrimental. Like if you two were to sit near one another for an extended period of time.
  Marinette: Well, we don't do that.
  Tikki: Exactly.
• Vow of Nudity: When cornered in a cave by four murderous gnolls, Fiora magically conjures the scent of their sex pheromones to confuse them into seeing her as a mate instead of a meal.

Film

• Pheromones form a key part of Black Widow (2021), as the Widows are regularly dosed with a mind control serum that makes them highly suggestible. It's revealed that Big Bad Drekyov made it react to his own pheromones so that Widows are incapable of harming him. Natasha then smashes her nose to block her sense of smell so she can go to town on him.
• Max Keeble's Big Move: The main characters sabotage their principal's mouth spray with animal pheromones.
• In Ocean's Thirteen, Linus uses a powerful pheromone that makes Abigail Sponder go crazy for him, successfully distracting her and buying time for the other team members.
• Starship Troopers: When the replacement soldiers arrive at the outpost, they find everyone dead, the corpses ripped to shreds. The commanding officer, however, is intact except for a hole in his skull where his brains were sucked out. One soldier remarks about the dead officer's odor, and is told that the enemy "bugs" use that scent to mark the man as "important", so that the mooks don't destroy useful intelligence.
• Star Trek: The Motion Picture: Ilia emits sexual pheromones that can create reactions in other species. Unfortunately you'd have to read the novelization to realize why men are acting strangely around her, as this is never mentioned in dialogue.
• Transformers (2007): Ratchet apparently has the ability to sense pheromone levels; specifically, he can sense Sam's pheromone output whenever Mikaela is around.

Literature

• Dream Park: Pheromone technology plays a big part of one part of the plot. Dream Park's Chief of Security works to solve a murder that occurred when an industrial spy stole some emotion-enhancing pheromone technology from the park's labs.
• Gor: The Priest-Kings communicate exclusively through scent.
• In Hellstrom's Hive by Frank Herbert, key workers in the Hive can release pheromones that affect the emotions of other members of the Hive, as well as human intruders.
• Liaden Universe: The aelantaza are genetically-engineered assassins whose enhancements include the ability to emit pheromones that make people more trusting and likely to accept their cover story.
• Liminal World: Pheromone control is one of Samantha's powers.
• Perdido Street Station: The khepri (humanoid people with giant scarab beetles for heads) communicate with each other by emitting scents. To communicate with humans, they have to use sign language.
• Ringworld: "Vampires" are a nearly mindless branch of the Pak (ancestors of humans, and also of every humanoid species on the Ringworld) that secrete pheromones which are "close enough" to affect all other Pak-descendants (it's implied that there are some hallucinogenic properties as well). The pheromone-fueled orgy that follows serves as a distraction to allow the vampires to feed.
• The Runelords: The Reavers 'speak' by pheromone scents (and anti-scents, since they have to erase the previous 'word' before they can say anything else).
• Star Wars Legends:
  • Weequay have the ability to communicate by pheromones with members of their own clan — a complete language, even.
  • The Falleen have pheromones that can basically drain the willpower of females of most species. In Shadows of the Empire, even Princess Leia temporarily falls to the Falleen Prince Xizor's "charms", before getting interrupted by Chewbacca plus her own strong willpower throws it off (cue a Groin Attack). He also says that females have the same ability, with it being very difficult for male Falleen (or presumably those of other species) to resist when they "blossom".
  • The Zeltrons are a race of rosy-skinned near-human hedonists with powerful pheromones. However, they also have strong receptive empathy, so it really is in their best interest to make sure everyone around them is truly happy and consenting.
• Sword of Truth: The mriswith, a race of eusocial Lizard Folk, are ruled by a dragon-sized Hive Queen that communicates through pheromones.
• David Harstein, a.k.a. the Envoy from Wild Cards. Harstein's ace gave him the ability to emit pheromones that make anyone who scents them immediately like, trust and listen to Harstein above all others. The only weakness of this skill is that the effects of the pheromones vanish when Harstein leaves the vicinity, but the influenced individual still retains the memories of what they have done while affected.
• In Zoo by James Patterson, pollution-altered pheromones — Hive Mind-generating ones in other mammals and attack-inciting ones in humans — are to blame for the animal uprising.

Live-Action TV

• Alphas: One-time villain Matthew Hurly has the ability to release pheromones that cause a Hate Plague.
• Something of a recurring theme in Criminologist Himura and Mystery Writer Arisugawa, albeit in a non-fantastical way. When meeting Arisugawa for the first time, Akemi comments that he and Himura have the same scent. Then, when Himura first meets Moroboshi, she gets up close and personal and remarks that they have the same scent, then asks him why he hasn't joined "her side" yet. "You have the same scent as me" then becomes a phrase that Himura uses to identify Moroboshi as Arisugawa's kidnapper.
• Farscape: Commandant Grayza has a gland implanted in her chest that secrets Heppel oil, a extremely powerful pheromone that allows her mind control. She uses this power to "interrogate" Chricton.
• The villain in the Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman episode "Pheromone, My Lovely" has created a pheromone perfume called Revenge that removes the sexual inhibitions of those who are sprayed with it for 48 hours. Unfortunately, she's in love with Lex Luthor, and when he snubs her, she attempts to use a crop duster to spray all of Metropolis with an undiluted version with permanent effects. Luckily, Superman is immune.
• Mutant X: Lorna can release a pink pheromone gas from neck pores, causing men to become obsessed with her, due to her being spliced with scorpion DNA.
• The Orville: Darulio's species of Rubber-Forehead Aliens secretes pheromones that works on other species as well, causing them to become romantically obsessed with them. This worked on both Kelly and Ed Mercer, although it's further complicated in that he claims it's something he can't control (the pheromones are not being secreted around the clock), and his people's customs mean it would be insulting for him to turn down an offer of sex. The pheromones were also unintentionally transferred to the alien blob Yaphit, causing Dr. Finn to throw herself at him.
• ReGenesis: Bob, as a side-effect of the effort to regrow his optic nerve, ends up getting his Jacobson's organ (the same organ animals use to sense pheromones) activated. This grants him empathic abilities.
• Smallville: In the episode "Heat", the meteor freak of the week Desiree Atkins emits Kryptonite-enhanced pheromones that can enthrall men, but not Kryptonians.
• An episode of Special Unit 2 deals with a Link who emits powerful pheromones when scared (it's stated that Links like that are the inspiration for the Cupid myth). He ends up doing it outside a courthouse, and the pheromones (besides causing everyone around him to start making out with strangers) cause a Hanging Judge to suddenly start letting hardened criminals go free. The team has to find the Link and get him to undo the effect on the judge before a high-profile criminal is set free.
• Star Trek:
  • The Ramurans from the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Unforgettable" emit a pheromone that causes Laser-Guided Amnesia, making members of other races forget them after a few hours.
  • The Star Trek: Enterprise episode "Bound" shows that Orion women produce pheromones that induce lust in men and illness in women.
• Torchwood: Owen Harper controversially (with the viewers, as the effect was depicted as so strong that it approached a drug-rape metaphor) uses alien pheromones to make people of both sexes want to have sex with him.
• Wicked Science: Toby creates "super-pheromones" meant to make guys irresistible to girls. It doesn't end well.
• The X-Files: In the episode "Gender Bender", Scully and Mulder investigate a man who died from pheromone overdose. They discover a Monster of the Week that seduces its prey with human pheromones, kills them with sex, and assumes their identity.

Tabletop Games

• Eclipse Phase has the Enhanced Pheromones biomod that gives the user a bonus to social tests against other creatures that can smell. There's also a number of drugs that cause the user to emit pheromones, Alpha stimulates threat pheromones that make the user seem more threatening (and has other effects that make them a domineering asshole), BringIt calibrates the pheromones so that others want to stab the user instead, while Hither makes you smell sexier of course.
• Guardian parahumans in GURPS Bio-Tech have a combination of sex pheromones and dominance pheromones. They're specifically designed to be masters of normal humans.
• Rocket Age: Some Martian castes appear to have modified pheromones to make them more attractive, more persuasive and commanding, or both. The Royal and Priest castes tend to have the full package, while the Courtesan caste appear to only have pheromones designed to enhance their attractiveness, although given how often they seem to rise to power...
• Shadowrun: In the 1st Edition supplement Shadowtech, the Tailored Pheromones bioware is an alteration to the recipient's sweat glands that causes them to release pheromones. The pheromones only affect normal humans and metahumans (i.e., elves, orks, trolls and dwarves). The game effect is to provide a bonus to the user's Charisma and Social Skill use.
• Talislanta: Batrean women give off pheromones that are just this side of mind control. Luckily, not only are most Batrean women nice people, but the pheromones can be countered by wearing nose plugs.
• Warhammer 40,000: One theory for the way Tau Ethereals get Undying Loyalty from their troops is via pheromones that cause mind control in their subordinates.

Video Games

• Deus Ex: Human Revolution: The upgraded CASIE enhancement allows Adam to emit pheromones that make his vis-a-vis more receptive to his suggestions and demands (provided the player had figured the NPC's personality type correctly in the preceding dialogue).
• Disco Elysium: Morell the Cryptozoologist carries a spray-can of pheromones to attract the elusive Insulindian Phasmid, and offers to spray the Detective if he's enthusiastic about finding it. Accepting the offer is crucial to interacting with the Phasmid at the end of the game; an un-pheromoned Harry will just make it flee.
• Drunk on Nectar: The ability to sense pheromones as an insect is a major gameplay feature. Depending on your chosen class, they allow you to detect both predators and potential food sources. Certain animals also might only release pheromones at certain times as well, which can make them much more elusive to the player.
• In FTL: Faster Than Light, the Mantis cruiser Gila Monster and its variations come equipped with Mantis pheromones, an augment that makes your crew walk much faster.
• Half-Life 2: The Antlions are controllable by acquiring an Antlion Guard's pheromone gland.
• Halo: Pheromones are a part of the Drones' Starfish Language.
• Mass Effect:
  • The elcor communicate between each other using pheromones, along with infrasound and incredibly subtle body language. Their speech is otherwise so monotone that they preface it with the intended tone when communicating with other species in order to minimize misunderstanding.
  • If this exchange is any indication, Javik can sense pheromones.
    Javik: You and the human soldier/asari/turian/quarian are... joined?
    Shepard: You could say that.
    Javik: I'm not. Your pheromones are.
• The Gek from No Man's Sky use pheromones as means of communication alongside speech and body language, which help them immensely in what their culture revolves around: trading. These pheromones can cross species barriers to induce tailor-made hallucinations, such as when you ask a Gek for help with their language and they make you hallucinate (described in text only, not shown) symbols for groups they might teach you a word from.
• Pokémon Sun and Moon introduces Salandit, Salazzle, and Pheromosa. Females of the former two species produce pheromones that can control males of any species, human and Pokémon alike, and there is some implication that this is how they find mates. The latter's pheromones make opponents hesitant to fight, and thus serve as a defense mechanism.

Visual Novels

• Hatoful Boyfriend: Anghel Higure has a condition causing his body to produce hallucinogenic pheromones... to which he is himself not immune. His odd behavior and confusing descriptions of things are both caused by him being on a permanent acid trip — though sometimes, there seems to be more to it.

Web Animation

• Half Full: Billy harvests human pheromones in one storyline. When a test subject falls into a vat of collected sweat, the pheromone overdose transforms him into a monster with the power to allure women.
• Humans-B-Gone!:The giant insects and arachnids that live in Tricularia primarily communicate through smell.

Webcomics

• Blood Bank: The vampires in the comic can produce pheromones that enslave human minds, allowing them mastery of the human race. One's immunity is what drives the comic.
• Does Not Play Well With Others: Craig claims that his dad is remembered by the public as a great and noble superhero, despite being an asshole to everyone, thanks to his "mood altering super pheromones".
• El Goonish Shive: Some of the Transformation Ray variants (especially Ellen's Venus Beam) cause the target to produce super-pheromones, which makes them attractive to everybody regardless of gender and sexual orientation. The effect wears off after about 48 hours. One result of this was that Nanase acknowledged her feelings for Ellen by rationalizing them to be a result of the latter's pheromones, then found out that there were no such things.
• Harbourmaster: Entomorphs apparently have an olfactory language.
• Jungle Juice: Nanami was fused with a Gossamer-Winged Butterfly, allowing her to control the minds of Insect Humans with an Ant Complex through her pheromones.
• Quantum Vibe: Terra has a caste system enforced by genetic engineering to produce pheromones. Executives have pheromones that make them seem more likable and attractive than their personalities would suggest, Associates make you want to kick them, and both castes are susceptible to the effects of their own scents. It's not clear what the other castes have in regard to pheromones, but they probably follow the pattern.
• In Steel City Moon, werewolves release pheromones that make them incredibly attractive to the opposite sex the day before they transform (and possibly more attracted, considering that the amount of PG-rated Male Gaze that coincides with this). To his credit, protagonist Justin is much more concerned with avoiding girls during these periods than trying to take advantage of the situation.

Western Animation

• The Amazing Spiez!: In "Operation: Sunrise Tan", the Villain of the Week creates a tanning machine for women that coats them with a spray tan containing female pheromones. This causes all of the men around them to fall obsessively in love with them, and fight everyone who is also affected. Tami receives this tan process and enthralls all of the boys at school, including the Clark brothers, leaving Megan to stop the bad guys for the episode.
• Futurama: In "The Deep South", Professor Farnsworth uses a fish-attracting pheromone to speed up fishing. He accidentally sprays some on himself, causing several marine animals, and Dr. Zoidberg the lobster-like alien, to become attracted to him.
  Zoidberg: I'm so into you.
• Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts: Scarlemagne's sweat is a powerful mind-control agent that works on any primate, including humans, due to all the experiments done on him.
• My Gym Partner's a Monkey: Jake and Adam use a perfume that says "100 percent animal pheromones"... which leads to them being chased by all the animals in the school.
• The Simpsons: In "Bye Bye Nerdie", Lisa discovers a pheromone given off by nerd-types which forces bully-types to beat up on them. She experiments by spraying Drederick Tatum (the show's version of Mike Tyson) with the scent, which compels school bully Nelson to beat up on Tatum, even though Nelson doesn't want to. Lisa names the new discovery "Poindextrose".

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