Reality Warper / Live-Action TV

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• Adam Conover of Adam Ruins Everything. Since it's his show, he can manipulate the environment in a number of ways, with time travel, teleportation, and Medium Blending being the most common. "Adam Ruins Sex" reveals that these powers can be temporarily stolen by anyone who knows more about the current topic of conversation than Adam does.
• Babylon 5: Sufficiently powerful telepaths can create an illusion of reality, although this does not extend to altering reality itself.
  • While not actually warping reality, a tiny fraction of telepaths have telekinetic ability, and the Psi Corps conducted experiments on them to increase said ability. The Psi Corps are amateurs next to the Vorlons, though, who probably planted telepathic traits in the human gene pool in the first place. They "changed" Lyta Alexander, who started as a registered telepath of modest ability, to make her into a psychic doomsday weapon. When Garibaldi warned her that they shouldn't discuss her abilities in front of a security camera, she casually asked "what camera?" and caused it to short out.
  • There was also Jason Ironheart, the mostly-successful attempt at creating a super-telekinetic. Unfortunately, his powers quickly got out of control as they kept exponentially increasing, eventually turning him into an Energy Being. He killed the scientist who created him in order to ensure the process couldn't be repeated.
  • The techno-mages appear to have this ability, but it is, in fact, highly advanced technology created by the Shadows mixed with illusion and theatrics.
• Robert Daly in Black Mirror: USS Callister when he's in the Infinity Star Fleet Game Mod. He cannot be killed and he can do anything he wants, an "asshole god" in the words of his unfortunate crewmembers. He has only two limits: he can instantly transform people but not at a distance, and he can't override the built-in speeds of the space vessels. He probably could remove those limits outside the game but it may be he wants the game mod to be authentic to his favourite TV show he based it off. In the end both of these weaknesses are exploited to undo him.
• The classic: Samantha of Bewitched and all her relatives — when they could control their powers. Also, Jeannie from I Dream of Jeannie, who once made every day of the week Sunday!
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel:
  • Anya, and several other supernatural beings. Anya in particular can only warp reality while granting other people's wishes for vengeance (though she has a lot of leeway in how she grants them), which at one point leads to a Travelling Salesman Montage of her uselessly trying to cajole everyone she knows into making a wish that'll let her use her powers.
  • The Order of Dagon was a group of monks who altered reality to make Dawn fit in the world. Not exactly a straight example though — rather than actually altering history, it's more implied that they altered the memories of everyone who would have known Dawn in order to insert her (the past is implied to have not changed at all, given how little her presence was even recalled to have impacted it), as well as evidence such as family photos and records. But they were able to go far enough to use Buffy's own blood to create Dawn from the Key, so that she's truly a Summers despite not having existed for very long.
  • Likewise, evil sorcerer and demon Cyvus Vail led the team of wizards who altered reality to give Connor a new life.
  • Ultimately, any sufficiently powerful magic user can pull it off, even accidentally, in Willow's case.
• In the V-World in Caprica, the Virtual Ghosts (Zoe and Tamara) can alter the entire environment at will if they concentrate their power. At one point they turn all of New Cap City into a mountain kingdom.
• Charmed (1998) has a character named Billie Jenkins who has the power of thought projection. She managed to bring plants to life, turn her parents into assassins, and time travel. Several other characters also had Reality Warping as part of their power sets, like Wyatt, the Avatars, and the Cleaners.
• Project Moloch in Season 2 of Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency is a reality warper and a very powerful one at that. As an adopted child with bizzare origins he was able to turn his nightmares into reality letting lose a flying purple people eater at the farm of his parents. He was later able to trap it in a pocket dimension mirroring the house he lived in. He also materialized small oddities like a toy gun that could shoot compressed air shockwaves without having mechanical parts and scissors stabbing a permanently bleeding table in the pocket dimension house, after witnessing an argument between his parents which ended with his father being stabbed in the head by scissors. Involuntarily he send the car of his mother flying into the night sky and trapped his dying father in a tree, as he lost control of his emotions. When Blackwing agents showed up to capture him, he retreated to his room and tried hard to retreat into the fictional world of Wendimoor he made up. Although he didn't succeed to escape and was captured, put into an artificial coma for decades, his attept to flee caused another big bang in the multiverse, creating the world of Wendimoor in the state he imagined it to be in. The culture and some of the localities of Wendimoor were highly symbolic of the struggles the boys parents lived through, right until the end. Giant scissors for example were used as a weapon instead of swords, the same applied to guillotines. Also the act of creating a whole new universe from scratch caused a power outage for the entire town of Bergsberg where he lived at. In the present time events in Wendimoor escalated since the boy creating the world wasn't there to preside over its events, which in turn led to several character crossovers between the "normal" world and Wendimoor. Dirk Gently eventually stated that although Wendimoor was created by the fantasy of a little boy, it is just as real as Earth is and so are it's inhabitants, as they feared to be insignificant because they were part of a "dream world". The old man the boy became was later rescued and brought to Wendimoor, where he reverted into his younger self, setting things right and watching over his world. Pieces of armor of Wendimoor soldiers were later recovered in the Blackwing facility, again confirming that everything concerning Wendimoor is real, although the armor was made out of unknown material foreign to Earth.
• Doctor Who:
  • Quite a few of the Sufficiently Advanced Aliens, such as the Celestial Toymaker in the old series story of the same name, and "the psychic girl with the crayons" (to quote a Sketch Comedy parody) in the new series episode "Fear Her".
  • Much of the superscience of the Time Lords is based on the concept of "block transfer computations", a form of advanced mathematics that can warp reality like no-one's business (in "Logopolis" an organization of mathematicians has been holding back the heat death of the universe for millennia). It's implied that this involves working out the Schrödinger Equation of the object you want to create and then meditating really hard on it. The Carrionites in "The Shakespeare Code" can do similar tricks with language (something the Expanded Universe refers to as "quantum linguistics"). All of these powers, while capable of nearly anything, require extensive time and calculation to pull off correctly.
  • In one of the Eighth Doctor Adventures novels, the Doctor demonstrates a mild form of this. Since all things are mostly empty space, supposedly, there's a probability two items will pass through each other. The Doctor spends several hours throwing a ball at the wall, and eventually "collapses the wave function" to make the ball finally go through the wall... just for the cheap thrill of hitting Fitz in the head with a ball through a wall. Oddly, he never tries this under plot-relevant circumstances. He also once teleported with math. Or something. He got teleported right back to his original location eventually, though. (This actually isn't too different from real quantum tunneling)
  • Anything the Master (no, not that one) writes in "The Mind Robber" becomes true. In the fifth episode of the serial, the Doctor is wired into the computer, giving him the same powers.
  • In "The Parting of the Ways", Rose temporarily acquires this ability, at the ultimate cost of the Doctor losing another regeneration by absorbing the power's source, the Time Vortex, from Rose. The implication is that if Rose held on to it for too long, it would kill her. The ensuing Deus ex Machina does make you wonder why the Doctor never used the trick before; presumably, the effects of swallowing the Time Vortex are too unpredictable to depend on it, plus the aforementioned cost of one's life. Also, he later references it, saying "No one's ever meant to have that power. If a Time Lord did that he'd become a god — a vengeful god.", so it's probable that he doesn't dare risk it. Especially after his time as the Time Lord Victorious.
  • "School Reunion": The Skasis Paradigm gives those who crack it these kinds of powers, which the Krillitanes wanted so they could reshape and "improve" reality. Their leader, Mr. Finch, offers the power to the Doctor.
  • There's also the Trickster, although his powers are rather limited; he would need to trick others into making a choice which would change reality. He'll often attack the Doctor's companions, such as Sarah Jane or Donna.
  • "The Big Bang": It turns out that long-term proximity to a time crack made Amy Pond a low-level version. When the universe is rebooted, she's able to reverse several retgoned elements (namely her parents and, later, the Doctor) by remembering their existence.
  • George in "Night Terrors", who makes his nightmares become real by believing in them so much.
  • "The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos": The Ux, a highly religious two-member species, can affect the shape of the universe through thought. Tim Shaw melds Stenza technology with this ability to enable them to place entire planets in stasis crystals that can be carried by one person.
  • In the web animation Death Comes to Time, it is claimed Time Lords are this but hold back their power as using it damages the Universe. However this is mainly considered non-canon as when the Doctor uses the power to kill another Time Lord he kills himself.
• Eerie, Indiana: In "Who's Who", Sara Bob gains the ability to manipulate reality through her artwork when she begins to sign her sketches with an Eerie No. 2 pencil. The effects can be reversed by ripping up the relevant sketch.
• Farscape:
  • Einstein, the representative of the True Ancients: in his first episode alone, he opened a wormhole at will, created a dimension for Crichton's temporary use, and "wrapped time around his little finger."
  • Maldis, the villain of "That Old Black Magic" and "Picture If You Will", used a mixture of this and illusionism: sometimes crafting whole worlds for his minions to wander, sometimes taunting them with hallucinations and visions. And he even has A Wizard Did It quote to explain himself to Crichton:
    The words I need elude translation's grasp./Suffice to say I simply wished you here.
• Good Omens (2019):
  • Adam's power. He can make things become real, or unmake them (even Satan himself).
  • To a lesser degree this is the ability of every angel and demon. Angels refer to is as "Miracles". Neither can perform the kind of wide-ranging changes Adam is capable of.
• Several Troubled characters on Haven have this ability, the catch being that they usually have Power Incontinence. One character could alter the real world through her drawings. Anything that happens to the drawings happens to the person/object drawn (i.e. if you tear the drawing in half the person gets torn in half). Another was able to create an Alternate Universe through wishes, and accidentally created a world where the Troubles never existed by wishing for it.
• Kamen Rider:
  • Kamen Rider Gaim: This is the power gained by whoever manages to obtain the Forbidden Fruit that the Helheim Forest produces a single one of whenever it invades a world. The Fruit's wielder is at one point attacked by the combined nuclear arsenals of most of the rest of the world, at which point he freezes the missiles in mid-air and disintegrates them with a single gesture. Much of the series is about characters competing over who will be the one to claim the Fruit and what kind of world they'll make with it.
  • Kamen Rider Ghost: The Great Eye is an otherworldly entity capable of granting any wish to whoever contacts it, although because of its overwhelming power, you need a specialized piece of technology to even make the attempt without being disintegrated on contact. By the end of the show, the title character has evolved from a regular ghost into another deity of similar nature to the Great Eye, although he opts to give most of his power up in order to return to his human body.
  • Kamen Rider Ex-Aid: The Bugster Virus can do virtually anything as long as it's phrased in the form of a video game. In the last of the post-series movies, Kuroto Dan takes advantage of this by making a god simulator game, which allows him to grant himself new powers on the fly.
  • Kamen Rider Zi-O: The title character's ultimate form, Oma Zi-O, combines the abilities of all Kamen Riders past, present, and future, which includes everyone else on this list. Even before he reaches this peak of his power, Sougo is capable of altering reality simply by thinking about the future: the middle arc of the show consists primarily of his newfound fears about his own power spontaneously creating an entire alternate timeline built around producing someone who can kill him.
  • Kamen Rider Saber: The Omni Force Wonder Ride Book grants its wielder the power to do anything they can imagine, fueled entirely by the wielder's arrogance. The Grimoire Alter Ride Book that uses Omni Force as one of its components is even more omnipotent on paper, but also comes with complete omniscience, so its wielder is aware that he has no free will and is only carrying out acts of villainy that he was predestined to.
• In Lost, Jacob is seemingly an example of this, though his powers do apparently have certain limitations. He can grant immortality, heal people, and prevent people from being able to kill themselves, all just by touching them. He can also see into peoples' lives and draw them to the Island at will. And his powers seem to remain active even after his own death. He can't bring people back from the dead, though. And he prefers not to interfere too much with people in the first place. After bringing them to the Island, he takes a hands-off approach instead of helping them.
• In the novelization of the 1998 Merlin series, it is explained that fairy magic relies on illusion, and humans cannot use such magic. However, Half-Human Hybrids can combine fairy illusion with human feeling, causing the illusions to come to life in reality, giving them this power.
• In Misfits, Nathan eventually buys the power of limited reality warping from Seth, in the form of essentially doing real close-up magic tricks like changing cards in a deck, pulling a small object out of thin air, or controlling the roll of a dice (including getting an 11 in a game of craps with a 4 and a 7 on a pair of 6-sided dice).
  • Peter also has the ability to control future events by drawing them.
• Art Kanji-Daemon of My Little Town.
• In an episode of The Secret World of Alex Mack, Alex temporarily gets the uncontrollable power to make her daydreams reality, leading to several awkward situations where she's nearly caught by Vince and Dave.
• The Star Trek universe also has a few, such as Q, the Organians, The Douwd, Trelane, Charlie X, and Wesley Crusher. A trip through the galactic barrier can give you such abilities and the power to pass them on, but With Great Power Comes Great Insanity...
  • Depending on who you ask, Trelane was a Q.
  • Some novels also claim that the Galactic Barrier was either created or influenced by the Q (in one trilogy, it was created by the Q Continuum to keep a Big Bad out; in the book where Trelane was a Q, our "beloved" Q was nearly destroyed and spent millennia in the Barrier, causing anyone who passed to go insane and gain a portion of his power - he is what happened to Kirk's old pal Gary Mitchell in the second pilot of the original series).
• In this sketch by Studio C. The Interactive Narrator can change the story as he sees fits, preferably (but not necesarrily) in rhyme. Turns out that his powers can also be hijacked by anyone that finishes the rhyme for him.
  Narrator: You sure are determined
  despite all the hassle
  Hero: Then magically appeared
  At the Dark Wizard's castle!
  [the narrator and the hero are warped to the dark wizard's castle]
  Narrator: I can't believe that worked!
• Supernatural
  • The Trickster, a demi-god that likes to roam around, deflating egos, breaking the haughty, and causing mayhem in general. While not actively evil, the Trickster's sense of humor can, on occasion, be quite lethal. As of Season 5, it has been revealed that the Trickster is not a demi-god at all but is actually the Archangel Gabriel posing as the Norse god Loki. He ran away from his family because he couldn't take all the fighting. Season 13 does feature the actual Trickster who lent Gabriel his appearance, and he's just as much as, if not more so, of a magician.
  • Some of the more powerful angels have reality warping powers. Zachariah is the biggest user but other angels, including a promoted Castiel demonstrated mild reality warping powers.
  • Jesse, The Antichrist, made childish stories come true by merely believing them.
  • Apparently, this can also happen to powerful psychics. Fred Jones was a powerful psychic who grew senile and lost control of his powers, making cartoon physics come true.
  • Double Subverted by the Djinn, who appear to grant wishes by altering reality, but are in fact simply trapping their victims in a Lotus-Eater Machine while draining them of their blood. In Season 14, the evil Archangel Michael has given them a "power-up" making them into a straight example, now able to read their victims' minds and bring their nightmares into actual reality.
• The Twilight Zone (1959):
  • In "The Mind and the Matter", a man named Archibald Beechcroft learns how to control reality by reading a book and applying extreme concentration to his surroundings. Because he's a self-centered Jerkass, he decides to "improve" the world by eliminating everyone but himself from it. After a few enjoyable hours, Beechcroft gets bored and lonely, so he tries to conjure up some excitement (like earthquakes), but it doesn't help. He decides that the best way to make the world better is to make everyone like himself, only to get a harsh reality check when everyone acts rude and nasty to him. Chastened, Beechcroft uses the book's power one last time — to put everything back to the way it was — and swears off reality warping for good.
  • Anthony from "It's a Good Life" can shape the world to his whim, seemingly without any limits.
• The Twilight Zone (1985): "The Curious Case of Edgar Witherspoon" is an interesting take on this trope. Psychiatrist Jeremy Sinclair is summoned to an eccentric loner's apartment by his landlady and family, who are tired of putting up with his weird habit of only leaving his apartment to ask people for strange objects, like a doll's head. The loner — Edgar Witherspoon — turns out to be a kindly, if befuddled, elderly man with a very good reason for not leaving his apartment: it contains a giant, Rube Goldberg-like device composed of seemingly random junk. Witherspoon explains that this machine represents reality itself, and if he isn't around to maintain it via instructions from a voice only he can hear, things will go "poof". Sinclair scoffs, but Witherspoon is ultimately proven to be right: moving a few paper clips is enough to wipe out an entire Pacific island nation. Witherspoon is eventually relieved of his reality-maintaining duties — because Sinclair's been tapped for the job. The episode ends with the former psychiatrist being told to attach a tambourine to the device immediately.
• The Twilight Zone (2002):
  • "It's Still a Good Life" is a Sequel Episode to "It's a Good Life", above, which reveals that Anthony Fremont, the Warper from the original episode, has a daughter who is even more powerful than he is. Anthony is able to wish things into the cornfield; his daughter can as well, but she can also bring them back.
  • Another episode has a scary take on this trope with a harried woman in a less-than-ideal family. After moving to a new home, the family's ill-behaved mutt of a dog suddenly transforms into a pedigree poodle, a change which only the woman seems to notice. As the episode progresses, reality keeps changing all around her—the house is rearranged, her rebellious children are replaced with kinder, politer versions of themselves, and her husband becomes a much younger and more attractive man — and everyone keeps treating it as if nothing's wrong, leading her to doubt her sanity. The Twist Ending reveals that the identity of the Reality Warper — the "world" is actually a computer simulation game like The Sims, and a little girl has been playing it the whole time.
• Ultraman: One of Ultraman's weirdest enemies Bullton has this power. Essentially a giant semi-sentient meteor, Bullton turns its surroundings into an Eldritch Location by slipping into the Fourth Dimension with results that range from just plain weird to potentially catastrophic.
  • Bullton was later homaged in Return of Ultraman with Priz-Ma, a living iceberg that absorbs matter and manipulates light for an arsenal of deranged abilities that leave Ultraman Jack's and the viewer's heads spinning.
• Westworld: As of Season 2, Episode 5, Maeve is one due to extreme emotional stress and physical peril (at least, she have total control over machinery, which in the Delos theme parks means she can control anything and anyone). It remains to be seen just how strong she will become.
• Wizards in Wizards of Waverly Place have an almost absurd ability to do this with almost no effort. A casual spell used by Alex early in the series allowed her to rewind time, and in the movie an equally unintended magical effect allowed her to rewrite the last 16 or so years of reality. The effect in the movie used a special magic wand. She's not normally capable of doing this. And many series with characters who don't normally have such powerful abilities can rewind time, because it feels like a small change—only when Fridge Logic takes effect do you realize how big it really is.

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