Phlebotinum Overload

Lesson learned: Don't load too much purple into your Wave-Motion Gun.^note Screencaps from AvatarSpirit.net

"No matter how tempted I am by the prospect of unlimited power, I will not consume any energy field bigger than my head."

— Evil Overlord List, Rule #22

A major danger of energy sensors, Energy Absorption and Deflector Shields is the risk of a Phlebotinum Overload. Too much energy thrown at a given piece of Applied Phlebotinum can cause a catastrophic Phlebotinum Breakdown. If enough energy was thrown at the target in the first place, the resulting explosion can resemble a Weapon of Mass Destruction.

Differs from Explosive Overclocking in that the Applied Phlebotinum is here being used to protect against the incoming energy (from an outside source such as Energy Weapons or Ki Manipulation), rather than having Tim Taylor Technology applied to it.

May cause a Heroic or Villainous RRoD and/or Superpower Meltdown.

Not to be confused with Phlebotinum Overdose, which is when it's the phlebotinum's user instead of the phlebotinum itself that loses stability.

Overclocking Attack is a specific subtrope. Compare to Going to Give It More Energy, which is essentially the inverse of this trope where the Phlebotinum user's offender enforces it on them. Compare and contrast Pent-Up Power Peril when the power builds up from within, but with the same danger. When a villain falls prey to this trope, it often overlaps with or shares themes with Evil Is Not a Toy.

---

Examples

Anime & Manga

• YuYu Hakusho: Kuwabara vs. Byakko. Kuwabara repeatedly attacks Byakko with his spirit sword, the beast absorbing the spirit energy and growing with each attack. Eventually, he absorbs so much that he bloats up and gets propelled away by the "worst case of gas [Yusuke's] ever seen!"
• Beyblade: Michael, the American team captain loses when his weaponised spinning top builds up more power than it can handle.
• Dragon Ball Z: Goku vs. Yakon. Goku feeds Yakon so much "pure light" (the aura of his ki when he is transformed into a Super Saiyan) that the monster explodes.
• In One Piece, if anybody eats more than one Devil Fruit, they explode. This info is very important as potential final Big Bad in the series Blackbeard is able to possess two Devil Fruit powers, albeit via unknown means (it's speculated it's because of Blackbeard's unique body structure).
• The Super Dimension Fortress Macross's Omni-Directional Barrier does this every time it's turned on: it will block pretty much any attack, but then it explodes, leaving the Macross in the center unharmed, since all the energy goes outward. The first time it's used, it blows up a Canadian city during a Zentraedi attack (this is probably the reason the technology is abandoned in all later installments). The heroes do use it to their advantage against Bodolzaa, though, when they fly the Macross into the middle of his flagship and turn the barrier on, as in that case they didn't care about collateral damage.
• In Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles, the shadows can overload synchro cannons.
• The first confrontation between Arika and Nina in My-Otome, and the one between Nina and Miyu.
• When Naruto is captured by the chakra-absorbing Pain's body and has his chakra drained, he cleverly starts gathering sage chakra, knowing that it will be absorbed. The result? Pain's body turns into a stone frog.
• There was one battle in Pokémon: The Series where the opposing trainer's Kingdra gets ready to launch a Hydro Pump, only to be countered by Ash's Totodile by biting the Kingdra on the mouth until the water that was supposed to be shot out overloads and sends Kingdra flying like a Jigglypuff filled with gas.
• The first instance of this in Witchblade causes Shiori to turn into a crystalline statue, and then shatter into a pile of glittery dust.
• Kinnikuman has Buffaloman trying to absorb the main character's Burning Inner Strength. It proves to be too much for his body to handle and he quickly reinserts it into his victim.
• Bread in Yakitate!! Japan is Serious Business enough that, if made well enough, can cause crazy reactions, transformations and even hurl the eater back in time or temporarily send them to heaven. Just before the final bake-off, Azuma tries to perfect his ideal "Ja-pan" ^*'Pan' is Japanese for bread to defeat Kirisaki with, and has Kawachi taste test all the bread that comes out of it. After suffering so many reactions in so short a time, his body eventually degrades into a tiny blob-like thing for the rest of the arc (though he eventually gets better.)
• In Don't Meddle with My Daughter! Athena gets sexually assaulted by a plant that feeds off women's ecstasy. Athena's libido ends up being to much for it so it explodes trying to absorb all of her ecstasy.
• Invoked and downplayed in Devil & Devil: An early tentacled monster can suck time out of people, regressing them into babies. Ios takes advantage of that, and lets the monster feed on his time as much as it likes; unlike the monster's previous human victims (A young woman and two teenage girls), Ios is an angel who has lived far longer than any human ever has. However, it doesn't cause the creature to destroy itself as Ios hoped it would, and merely damages it, as the creature was quick to catch on that it would have been boned if it had continued.

Comic Books

• The DCU:
  • The Parasite, an energy vampire in Superman, is normally able to absorb Superman's energy with no ill-effects, but there have been a few occasions when an overpowered Superman caused him to lose control.
  • Starfire and her sister got most of their powers from an alien race experimenting with when the phlebotinum actually overloads. They were stopped at the last moment.
• In Doctor Who Magazine, the Warden of the space prison "Thinktwice" keeps his inmates in line by draining their memories, ensuring they have no sense of identity to motivate a rebellion. When he tries this on the Doctor, however...
  Computer: WARNING... WARNING...PSYCHIC INPUT EXCEEDING AGREED PARAMETERS BY 100 PERCENT. 200 PERCENT. 10,000 PER— [SKRA-KOOM]
• Marvel Universe:
  • Sebastian Shaw's mutant power of absorbing kinetic energy is pretty useful, but can be circumvented if you drop something on him quick and hard enough.
  • The Absorbing Man, in his first battle with Thor, tried to absorb the power of the Earth. He blew up. The same thing happened to the Absorbing Man while fighting the Sentry. Sentry simply fed him his own power, and the Absorbing Man stopped enjoying it very quickly and begged Sentry to stop before exploding.
  • Bishop, the X-Men's resident energy absorber, can be overloaded given enough time and fuel. This usually results in a fairly splashy explosion, though he himself is rarely injured from it... well, except maybe his uniform.
  • In the Havok/Wolverine 4-part graphic novel, Havok almost experiences a Phlebotinum Overload when he absorbs the radiation from inside a nuclear reactor. He has to shoot all the absorbed energy out into space to prevent it. In a later storyline, Havok gets dropped into a star. He absorbs a ridiculous amount of energy and uses some of it to propel himself out. Luckily, the Big Bad of the story is right in front of him afterward, providing a convenient target for all that energy.
  • Squadron Supreme's Expy of the Parasite, the Lamprey, actually explodes after this happens to him. He doesn't get better.
  • X-Factor's Strong Guy can absorb the kinetic energy from anything that strikes him and add it to his own strength. When he was punched by the Hulk, the power was too great for his body to handle, and he had a heart attack. His deformed appearance comes from the first time his power manifested. Guido got hit by a bus, and he didn't realize that he needed to quickly use the absorbed energy. As a result, his body is permanently over-muscled and he's in constant physical pain for the rest of his life.
  • In Marvel: The End this is subverted when Thanos finds that the only way to win is to absorb the Heart of the Universe. It's noted and warned that this might happen, but he actually does manage to control it (although he gives it up later).
  • This is how Rachel Summers takes down Necrom, the Big Bad for the first 50 issues of Excalibur (Marvel Comics). Rachel realizes that the ever more powerful attacks they're throwing at each other aren't actually causing each other any damage, but with the exponentially increasing power being thrown around, they're liable to soon destroy the universe; thus, she stops keeping him distanced and charges him, allowing him to grab her and use his energy draining ability. Necrom thinks that this is an act of desperation and is gleeful that he can finally absorb the Phoenix Force like he'd been planning for thousands of years. It turns out that absorbing an infinite amount of energy is a bad idea.
• Paperinik New Adventures: Having Xadhoom's powers comes with this risk if there's not absolute self-control. The effect apparently varies on when or how self-control is lost: if control is lost when the power is mastered or by attacking without control, the effect is literally going nova and then becoming a black hole (or so Xadhoom says, though we never saw it happen on-screen so she could be wrong), but if it's lost (or never was there) when the power is still to be mastered or is simply used to its full extent verging on Reality Warping, you simply dissolve into nothingness (this did happen on-screen to Zoster, who Xadhoom duped into getting the instructions to obtain her powers without being told of that little bit), hence why Xadhoom always limited herself to nothing more than planet-shattering blasts.

Fan Works

• In The Awakening of a Magus the only thing known to have killed one of the Magi is pushing beyond his limits. Harry comes somewhat close a few times during the training, though the worst result seems to be some exhaustion and bruising. And he blows up his wand at one point.
• AWE Arcadia Bay (Rogue_Demon): Jesse purging The Monolith through Orzai overclocks them in a way not unlike being in a microwave, killing Orzai and nearly killing Jesse.
• Enter the Dragon (Harry Potter): Harry actually has very good control of his magic, relative to how much of it there is. But there is just so much that he greatly struggles to use it. His levitation charms break the sound barrier, his transfigured needles look more like construction equipment, and his broomstick shoots off and buries itself into a grassy knoll before bursting into flames.
  It quickly became apparent that Harry was suffering control problems to a degree that Septima Vector declared to be 'epic'.
• In the Harry Potter fic The Problem with Purity Harry came up with a shield that could destroy physical objects and sent medium-strength spells rebounding in odd directions. When Hermione shot several stronger spells at it in quick succession it resulted in a blindingly bright outward explosion.
• The wraiths in With Strings Attached feed on Paul's Life Energy until they explode.

Films — Animated

• Kai of Kung Fu Panda 3 is a powerful spirit capable of absorbing other people's chi to empower himself. Po defeats him by channeling the super-powered chi that his fathers, Tigress, and the entire panda village had shared with him, causing Kai to explode when he tries to absorb all of that at once.
• Batman vs. Two-Face: Hugo Strange's "Evil Extractor" overloads when used on five villains at once, disfiguring Harvey Dent and turning him into Two-Face.

Films — Live-Action

• The Ang Lee Hulk features the Absorbing Man (who is also Banner's father) trying to absorb all the power of the Hulk. Banner gladly lets him do so, and Absorbing Man is ecstatic, until the power drives him insane, leaving him vulnerable to be killed by a mixture of gamma radiation and a nuke.
• In Firestarter 2: Rekindled, the boy Cody has the ability to absorb energy. He uses this against Charlie but finds out too late that he can't absorb everything she gives him and explodes.
• In X-Men: Days of Future Past, in one iteration of reality, Bishop blows up after absorbing too much energy from three Sentinels' beams.
• In Marvel Cinematic Universe, this is the major disadvantage of using the Infinity Gauntlet. Even with a container to channel their power, the stones output a lot of gamma rays and energy as well, which the Gauntlet can't fully contain. Thanos's left side was crippled when he destroyed the Stones, the human-made Gauntler crippled Banner's right arm when he used the Stones to bring everyone back, and it killed Tony Stark when he used the Gauntlet to snap Thanos and his army out.

Literature

• In Dune, hitting a shield with a lasgun beam results in a nuclear explosion. It will always result in the destruction of the shield and the lasgun in question, but the resulting explosion can vary from merely killing the users to stronger-than-nuclear.
• In the Keith Laumer book Rogue Bolo, the phlebotimum in question is a "universal catalyst" — used to make an alien crystalline beast so big that it breaks under its own weight, burying the titular Bolo in the process. This of course is done completely by the Bolo itself, from escaping its testing area, to fabricating the catalyst, to getting to the Moon, etc. As a Bolo is a intelligent supertank weighing in at around 30,000 TONS, how it's able to do all this covertly AND without notifying the humans that supposedly control it, is a handwaved mystery. It does account for the "rogue" in the title, though.
• Warships in the Niven/Pournelle The Mote in God's Eye stories are protected by shields that absorb all energy directed at them — up to a point. Go beyond the capacity, and all the absorbed energy is released. Inward.
• In the Chaos Gods series, demons instinctively try to consume and absorb as much energy as they can. Demons whose appetite exceeds their intelligence will feed until they literally explode.

Live-Action TV

• Doctor Who:
  • "The Tenth Planet" has the Cybermen attempt to revitalize their world Mondas by draining Earth's energy into it. Naturally, they drain too much and an Earth-Shattering Kaboom ensues.
  • "Planet of the Spiders" ends with the Great One, ruler of Metebelis Three, activating a device she has constructed to amplify her mental powers without limit... and is consumed by the power, taking her entire species with her.
  • "The Rings of Akhaten" features a sentient planet that feeds on the life experiences of others. The Doctor nearly overloads it with his centuries of experience, and Clara finishes it off with the item that brought her parents together, which represents not only their experience but the impossibly varied number of ways their lives could have gone.
    The Doctor: Are you full? I expect so. Because there's quite a difference isn't there? Between what was and what should have been. There's an awful lot of one but there's an infinity of the other. And infinity is too much. Even for your appetite.
• Kamen Rider:
  • In the final battle of Kamen Rider Double, the Utopia Dopant tries to absorb the power of CycloneJokerXtreme; it actually causes scarring on the hand he attempts to use.
  • In the backstory of Kamen Rider OOO, the original OOO from 800 years ago did this to himself. For context, when Eiji (the modern OOO) activates his Finishing Move, he scans three of the Medals he uses as Transformation Trinkets; the original OOO scanned over twenty at the same time, which caused him to turn into the "coffin" that sealed away the Greeed.
  • In the same series, the Greeed can at least theoretically gain even further powers than their natural set of nine Medals grants them by cannibalizing Medals from another Greeed's set. Kazari, who first theorizes this, is smart enough to realize that this trope is probably in play and makes sure to test the idea on Dumb Muscle Gamel first. Sure enough, absorbing too many off-color Medals at once turns Gamel into a mindless giant monster that OOO quickly dispatches, and Kazari makes sure when he does it himself to only eat one Medal at a time.
  • Kamen Rider Zi-O is entirely built around Swartz's master plan to seed the title character with a fragment of his own powers, lure Zi-O into a scenario where he absorbs the powers of every Kamen Rider past, present, and future, then use the fragment of Swartz in him to take all the power for himself. Zi-O, as the destined heir of the power, can safely contain all of it within himself. Swartz can't, and nearly explodes after taking only a tiny fraction, while now having a very angry and functionally omnipotent Zi-O staring him down. Vengeance only takes a few seconds.
• Mahou Sentai Magiranger and its American adaptation, Power Rangers Mystic Force: In the final episode, the Big Bad, who feeds on the magic of others, is finally defeated when the Rangers draw on the strength of their "infinite courage" (Magiranger) or the faith of the citizens and magical forest dwellers (Mystic Force) to feed him more magic than he can handle. Result: kerblooey.
• In the Smallville episode "Persona", the blue kryptonite that was establised to remove Clarks powers in a previous episode instead increases the powers of Bizarro, too much and...
• One word: Naquadriah. In Stargate SG-1, it is an isotope of Naquadah, which is already extremely energy-dense. Naquadriah takes that extreme power, enhances it, and gives it even more extreme unreliability. Before the advent of ZPMs, it was generally considered the most potent power source in the galaxy, but no-one could harness the power for anything other than rather nasty explosions (which might be seen as a metaphor for nuclear fusion — everyone knows nuclear fusion would be incredibly powerful, but right now the only fusion we can reliably produce is in bombs).
  • A nation on the planet where naquadriah is found didn't see a problem with this, and simply made naquadriah bombs. And planned to use them on the planet's other nations.
• After the discovery of ZPMs, the heroes of Stargate Atlantis found a source that was even more powerful. Unfortunately, activating it would inherently create exotic particles that violate the laws of physics. Attempts to use the technology destroyed five sixths of a solar system and permanently damaged a parallel universe whose fate is unknown.
  • The latter happened when the heroes tried to overcome the problem with this power source by shunting the exotic particles into another universe, under the assumption that with an infinite number of universes, odds were that most would be lifeless. Unfortunately, this one wasn't, and the inhabitants were understandibly miffed. They later tried again, this time with the idea of shunting the particles into every universe, figuring that when spread across an infinite number of universes there'd be too few particles in each one to cause any real damage. But of course, this went wrong too.
• In Star Trek, every time a panel explodes or the warp core breaches when phasers or torpedoes hit the shields. Lampshaded in the subtitle commentary for the Director's Cut of Star Trek II with Micheal Okuda idly wondering if Starfleet ships even have surge protectors or circuit breakers.
  • Omega Particles are theoretically capable of providing unlimited power. Theoretically, since in practice they remain stable for a nanosecond before blowing up. This is very bad since an Omega Particle blowing up doesn't just create an explosion big enough to wipe out a Borg fleet; it also damages subspace, making warp travel impossible in that region. The Federation takes this threat very seriously: the Omega Directive requires Federation personnel to do whatever it takes, even if it violates the Prime Directive, to prevent anyone from creating an Omega Particle. And people do try to make them despite the risks. The whole "limitless power" thing is too tempting. It doesn't help that the Borg worship the Omega Particle seeing it as a symbol of perfection.

Tabletop Games

• Happens with regularity when the Warp gets involved in Warhammer 40,000, usually to fatal consequences. Unless it goes badly. Then what happens doesn't bear thinking about.
• Promethean: The Created:
  • This is cited as the reason fire damages Prometheans so badly — the Divine Fire that gives them life is overstimulated when put in direct contact with flame. Electricity can stir up the "like attracts like" quality to heal Prometheans, but exposure to fire is like taking a human's natural tendency to heal all the way into cancer territory.
  • What's more, if a Promethean screws up badly enough while channeling Pyros (the "consumable" form of the Divine Fire), it can touch off a Firestorm. Firestorms have a number of effects, ranging from "burning-hot rain" to "hallucinations of your dead friends" to "raise corpses to attack those in the area", but the end results are rarely if ever even slightly positive for those in the vicinity.
• Parapsychics in CthulhuTech have a minor problem. If they overuse their abilities and Cast from Hit Points, they tend to Burn. And while Burning, their abilities are vastly increased.
• In the first version of Dungeons & Dragons' Manual of the Planes, any living creature entering the Positive Energy Plane regain 1d20 Hit Points by round, even past their normal total as Temporary HP. A quick and efficient way of healing or supercharging oneself, huh? Problem his, if the Hit Points ever reach twice your normal total... you explode.
• In Star Fleet Battles, Andromedan power absorption panels are Exactly What It Says on the Tin. They absorb incoming damage and store it as power, which can be used to power ship systems, or slowly radiated into space if it is not used. Each panel can only hold a certain amount of energy, though; if a panel is overloaded, all the stored energy is discharged as internal damage on the Andromedan ship.
• Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay: One possible Gift of Tzeentch raises the character's Magic score, increasing the power they can access for spells and inflicting no direct harm. However, if their Magic rises above the soft Cap, they perish in an explosion of pink fire.

Toys

• In BIONICLE, the Toa Nuva allow the Bohrok Kal to absorb all of their power. The Kal are unable to control the power, causing them to overload and destroy themselves with their own powers.
• In several incarnations of Max Steel, the main antagonist, Dredd, is defeated by being overloaded with the Turbo drained from Max.

Video Games

• Agent Intercept features one of these, in the side mission "Beneath The Surface." After accidentally exposing a power core in the middle of a lake, HQ has you attempt to disable it for study... by shooting it with energized microparticles. The ambiguous timeline of the side missions could justify this as not having access to the Aegis Pulse, but nevertheless, the added energy just accelerates the meltdown.
• In Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, being exposed to large amounts of Phazon will send Samus into a dangerous form of Hypermode where she's required to continually vent it from her body/suit or risk Terminal Corruption. In general, anyone trying to use Phazon for a power source may get some benefits from it but always runs the risk of their device backfiring fatally (as happened to some GF Phazon Troopers during 3). Regardless, the Space Pirates keep playing with the stuff in order to energize their own forces.
• In World of Warcraft, Festergut can impose this on players. Over the course of the fight he adds stacks of Gastric Bloat to his current target. Each application increases the damage that player does by 10%. The fight requires two tanks who swap which one is under attack at 8-9 stacks, then must absolutely avoid drawing his attention again until the bloat wears off. Or they explode at 10 stacks.
• In the Adventure Game Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Indy must use Reverse Psychology (in one of the endings) to convince Those Wacky Nazis to absorb too much (or too little) energy when powering up the God Machine.
• As per the Literature example above, in the RTS Emperor: Battle for Dune, any time a unit with a laser weapon hits a unit with a deflector shield, both are instantly killed. This makes House Ordos mirror matches somewhat farcical since their mainline Hover Tank is both shielded and armed with a laser cannon.
• In the Geneforge series, the titular Geneforge in the first game is a vat of Mutagenic Goo that alters the body of the user and makes them much more powerful. Altering someone so extensively will kill them horribly if done too fast, so the user is supposed to just lightly touch their hands to the surface of the goo and wear special gloves that only allow a tiny bit to seep through. It's possible to kill Trajkov by giving him a sabotaged pair of the safety gloves.
• In Disgaea D2: A Brighter Darkness, this is ultimately what Xenolith is trying to prevent from happening to Etna, using the Artifact of Absolute Doom on her when she was young to drain her massive demon magic. Depending on the ending the player goes for, Etna can still have this happen to her or she'll be able to contain her power.
• Fire Emblem: Three Houses has this as a potential hazard of using the Heroes' Relics: if someone overuses one such weapon without a Crest, the Crest Stone in the weapon will cause the user to transform into a monster. It is actually possible to become a monster even if the user has a Crest; possessing a Crest that is compatible with the Relic reduces the risk significantly, but never fully eliminates it.
• In NetHack, scrolls of charging can be used to refill your Magic Wands and tools, and increase the enchantment on your rings. Tools aren't subject to this trope, but wands and rings charged too many times will explode, damaging you. Wands of wishing, being Purposefully Overpowered, are extra-picky; they can only be charged once, ever, and if they already have the maximum three charges, they'll explode even if it was the first try.
• Perfect World has Tyrant Prince Mushi, Final Boss of a dungeon called Flowsilver Palace, who fires off an area-of-effect move every 30 seconds that will fill the Chi meter of every player in the party to its full capacity. Players must keep headspace in their Chi meters (by continuous use of Celestial/Demonic Eruption and other Chi-costly skills) at all times while Mushi is on the battlefield, or this move will One-Hit Kill them. Blademasters consider Mushi a joy to fight for this reason, as they have the widest array of Chi-costly debuffing moves that they can use to their advantage.
• In The King of Fighters '95, Final Boss Rugal Bernstein tried to claim the power of one of the heralds of Orochi, but because he wasn't part of the Orochi bloodline it ended up overloading his body and killing him. In Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium Rugal demonstrates that he still hasn't learned his lesson and steals the Satsui no Hadou from Street Fighter's Akuma, becoming a god-like being. After his boss battle, however, Akuma's personality takes over Rugal's body, destroying him in a completely different way.
  • On a related note, CVS2's other hidden boss is a version of Akuma who had the Orochi power forced into his body by a dying Rugal, causing him to go berserk. After his boss battle, he suffers the same fate that Rugal did back in KOF '95.
• Magical Tetris Challenge: In Mickey's ending, Pete tries to draw more and more power out of the magical stone. It ends up creating a portal that sucks him in, transporting him to who knows where.
• Shantae: Half-Genie Hero: In "Friends To The End", Shantae's knocked unconscious due to being "overloaded" with magic energy.
• Warhammer 40,000: Darktide: The Plasma Rifle can overheat and explode, killing the user.

Webcomics

• In Special School, a villain lampshades this rule and actually measures to ensure the phlebotinum he is about to consume is smaller than his head.
• In Fans!, Cassiopeia Chattan the emotion-vampire falls for this twice, gorging herself until she collapses. It's pointed out that she can stop absorbing whenever she feels like it; she's just a glutton.
• In Drowtales, Sene'kha explains that despite their seed, attempting to summon a Demon God would overwhelm the best of casters. She believes there to be an exception in Kharla'ggen, the World's Strongest Woman... But she ultimately proves to not be a perfect exception after all. While it doesn't directly kill her like it would anyone else, she does end up losing all control over herself and her abilities, resulting in a city spanning disaster.
• In 8-Bit Theater this is the ultimate fate of Sarda after absorbing the power of the elemental orbs and Black Mage's evil, transforming him into the earthly vessel for Chaos He was not happy about it.
  Sarda: My plans will not be undone by such amateur-hour horseshit as absorbing too much power and exploding.
• In The Story of Anima, Catalysts are devices that can use Anima to produce an effect. Kit Vulpes merely has to touch one to cause it to explode.

Web Original

• In Madness Combat - Abrogation, the Auditor suffers this throughout the flash, and as Hank learns to channel the lightning through his organic Power Fist, the Auditor starts absorbing all the dead dudes that Hank killed (as well as several others). Everything goes well until he makes the mistake of absorbing the remains of Tricky the Clown, leading to the Auditor's temporary demise.

Western Animation

• Futurama:
  • "Where No Fan Has Gone Before": Parodied. Leela tries to defeat Melllvar by overloading him with energy, or as Bender puts it, "like putting too much air in a balloon". Instead, Melllvar just gets more powerful, or as Fry puts it, "like a balloon, and something bad happens!"
  • "Rebirth": The Professor rebuilds Bender with a nuclear reactor. He instructs Bender to burn off the excess energy to avoid a meltdown... by partying nonstop. Bender is at first keen on the idea, but eventually gets tired of it and refuses to party any longer. Fortunately, he is eaten by an alien monster just as the reactor explodes, absorbing the blast.
  • "The Thief of Baghead": When Bender shows Langdon Cobb (a quantum lichen) a picture of himself, his narcissism ends up inflating his ego so much that it explodes and restores everyone else's lifeforce.
• Megas XLR:
  • "TV Dinner": Kiva suggests to destroy the consumer planet by overloading with energy enough to blow it up from within by firing an EMP torpedo. Except Coop "tweaked" the torpedo into a refrigerator abundantly filled with rock pops and soda, causing an entirely different overload that makes its remains rain over Jersey.
  • The Thanksgiving Episode has Coop defeating the Blob Monster by overfueling it with heat, its preferred energy source that makes it explode.
• Star Trek: Lower Decks: "Strange Energies": T'Ana suggests doing this to the newly godlike Ransom by blasting him with phasers until his powers short-circuit. Freeman shoots him once but doesn't stick with it, instead trying to talk him down.
  Freeman: Ugh, more power is just giving him more power!
• Superman: One of the early animated shows has a plot with a bad guy getting hold of an energy-absorbing cream. After using it to steal the strength of several random people, he's strong enough to take on Superman. He beats him, but absorbing that much strength is too much for his body, and he explodes (inexplicably giving Superman back his strength).
• In Robotomy, Frenemy is defeated when everyone on the planet sends him thousands of notifications.
• In Transformers: Animated, Sari tries to upgrade herself with the Allspark Key... and ends up absorbing all of its energy, which leads to an uncontrollable rampage as she loses control of her upgrades.
• In the Superman: The Animated Series episode "Legacy", Superman defeats Darkseid by covering Darkseid's eyes right when he's about to use his Omega Beams. The resulting explosion does far more damage to Darkseid, and it shows.
• In Wakfu episode 22, Rubilax the major Shushu is freed from the sword to fight Sadlygrove. The hero soon discovers that, the more you hit the demon, the bigger and stronger he becomes. So what does Grovy do? He Uses His Head, repeatedly, on Rubilax until the demon is so huge and heavy that he starts sinking in the desert sand. Unwilling to die from suffocation, the Shushu has no choice but to return to his prison.
• In The New Adventures of Superman, Superman deals with the Parasite by letting him absorb his nigh-infinite powers until he simply explodes, fatally.
• Batman: The Brave and the Bold: This is how Captain Atom defeats Major Force in "Powerless!". And how Blue Beetle and Stargirl defeat Mantis in "Cry Freedom Fighters!".
• In the Action Man (2000) CGI animated series, Dr. X at one point had created a power converter into his body (based on magnetism and a metallic body) whilst in Paris, when he faced off against Action Man, he managed to use his Bullet Time / Action Commands superpower to grind him into the Eiffel Tower (which was set up as an antenna to his secret base). This caused his then current form to overload so he couldn't maintain it, and stuff blew up.
• The Legend of Korra: In the Grand Finale "The Last Stand", the Spirit Ray Cannon gets ripped off of The Colossus and tossed aside by the mech's pilot, Kuvira in a desperate attempt to thwart Lin and Suyin tearing up the mech's internals after having already ripped up its ammo feed system (as well as the actuators in the arm the cannon is mounted on). The cannon breaks free of the arm and lands in the Spirit Wilds. Later, after the rest of the mech is destroyed, Kuvira flees into the wilds and finds the cannon. She makes a last-ditch effort to obliterate Korra with it and fires it. It begins feeding on all the spirit vines it's entangled in and begins spinning out of control and intensifying. Only because Korra is the Avatar is she able to tank the hit when it sweeps towards the horrified Kuvira. And then it lights off in a Fantastic Nuke. The weapon was developed in the first place when Varrick's experiments with the vines as a new source of energy go awry and it blows out the back of the train car he was using as a lab. And the mountain behind it when the event occurred.

Real Life

• Sonar is subject to this. In World War II, one could lose a contact right after dropping a pattern of depth charges because of all the noise spilling around.
• Caffeine overdose. Drinking four Rockstar energy drinks or using a whole jar of coffee for one drink is akin to sculling a bottle of Jack Daniels straight: a feeling of euphoria and the sense of time slowing down or reaction being sped up. The downside is when you come down from such a sugar or caffeine high, you crash. Headaches, nausea, and diarrhea are not uncommon, supplements or food rich in dopamine serve as a milder yet safer alternative.

---