History Main / FreakLabAccident

* ''Franchise/SonictheHedgehog'': In the original American canon, BigBad Doctor Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik was a kind veterinarian called Ovi Kintobor whose attempt to purge Mobius from evil using the Chaos Emeralds to power up a machine ended in a accident that transformed him into a cruel, megalomaniac EvilGenius. Of all the spinoffs in the franchise, ''ComicBook/SonicTheComic'' was the only one that followed this backstory closely (see the Comicbook folder above).

* The initial origin-story for ComicBook/SwampThing followed this trope. {{Subverted|Trope}} when Creator/AlanMoore got ahold of the character and [[{{Retcon}} revised him]] from a formula-altered scientist to a plant elemental who ''thought'' he was a formula-altered scientist.

* Origin of all villains in the ''Film/SpiderManTrilogy'', save Venom, who was the result of an alien symbiote.

* {{Subverted|Trope}}, along with NoPlansNoPrototypeNoBackup, in ''Series/TheIncredibleHulk1977.'' In principle, anyone could recreate the experiment that changed Dr. David Banner, it's just that nobody has any reason to. One of the two-part episodes revolves entirely around a much earlier experiment in another part of the country that had turned another man into a Hulk, and the discovery of a cure, [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption which Dr. Banner cannot use]] [[spoiler:because the former Hulk has re-exposed himself, become a murderous Hulk, and there's not enough of the needed compounds for two treatments]].

* The whole premise of ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'' revolves around a freak accident that occurred while the girls were being ''created'': Professor Utonium's pet chimp Jojo accidentally shoved the Professor while he was trying to create the perfect little girl, effectively causing the Chemical X spill that created the Powerpuff Girls (the blast from the spill also gave Jojo super-intelligence, and his jealousy of the girls eventually drove him to become their arch-enemy Mojo Jojo). Why the Professor had that Chemical X [[NoOSHACompliance located where someone could break it]] and cause it to spill inside the pot is anyone's guess.

* {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d in an episode of ''WesternAnimation/AquaTeenHungerForce'' when Shake tries to gain superpowers using barrels of toxic waste. First he tries to get some worms to eat the waste before [[Franchise/SpiderMan biting him]]. This doesn't work, so he dumps a spoonful of the waste over his head, shouting, "Oh, no! A horrible accident!". [[HilarityEnsues This doesn't work either]].

* This is the origin of BigBad Ava Starr/Ghost in ''Film/AntManAndTheWasp''. Her father, Alias Starr, created an unstable Quantum energy machine that exploded, killing Ava's parents and turning her into a ghost.

[[quoteright:342:[[Franchise/TheFlash https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Barry_Flash_Origin_Recap_1287.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:342:[[DarthWiki/WarpThatAesop Remember kids: if you douse yourself in chemicals in a lightning storm enough times, you too may become a superhero!]]]]

* The original ''Comicbook/{{Firestorm}}'' was created by sabotage (a bomb) in an experimental nuclear reactor, fusing the teenage Ronnie Raymond and the designer of the reactor, Professor Martin Stein into a single super-powered hero. Also affected by the explosion was Stein's evil assistant, who became the villain Multiplex. A later attempt by Multiplex to recreate the "accident" produced the heroine Firehawk.

[[folder:Anime & Manga]]

* ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' ''might'' count, what with the contact experiments infusing the test pilot's soul into the Eva's core. This happened twice with different circumstances: first, Yui was completely swallowed by Unit 01 and gained [[EmpathicWeapon limited control]] in the form of [[UnstoppableRage going berserk]]; second, Kyoko's transition was incomplete and a clinically insane body was left behind that eventually killed herself, making Unit 02 the most stable one. [[ThePlan Subverted in that Yui '''knew''' what's going to happen but did it anyway]]; unfortunately, it just made things even worse as she hadn't bothered to tell anyone and when her peers tried to extract her, she resisted and made it look like the operation failed (when the same happened to her son, everyone believed the same because Yui was holding them back until Shinji left on his own). Considering the fans' habit of deifying Yui-sama, it's a definite subversion.

* The classic SuperHeroOrigin of ComicBook/TheFlash involved {{lightning|CanDoAnything}} and a shelf full of chemicals in a police lab.

** The origin of UsefulNotes/{{the Golden Age|OfComicBooks}} Flash involved Jay Garrick being exposed to ''hard water vapors.'' Apparently, there was a rumor at the time the comic was written that the chemicals typically found in hard water could increase the metabolic speed of animals who ingested or inhaled them.

** In ''Comicbook/{{Flashpoint}}'', Barry recreates the accident in an attempt to regain his powers. [[spoiler:It didn't work and Barry instead suffered the RealLife consequences of being struck by a bolt of lightning while being doused with dangerous chemicals. He has to fry himself ''two more times'' before it works.]]
*** Before that, Wally West (the third Flash) tried recreating the accident after losing his powers. It ''almost'' worked right... [[spoiler:he got the SuperSpeed, but not the necessary reflexes to maneuver, blasting a trail of destruction across the country in the split-second before he could stop running.]]

** Slightly changed in the [[Series/TheFlash2014 2014 TV series]] to a lightning that is the result of a particle accelerator malfunction at S.T.A.R. Labs, which results in the release of dark energy into the city. The same release also creates a number of other "meta-humans".

** Marvel Comics in general (due to copious amounts of "Creator/StanLee Science") and Spider-Man in particular loves this trope. Many of Spidey's big foes (Doc Ock, Green Goblin, Lizard, Molten Man, etc) were created by some sort of lab accident or experiment gone wrong.
** Retooled again and made more plausible in the modern re-imagining, ''ComicBook/UltimateSpiderMan''. It was a genetically altered spider high on [[AppliedPhlebotinum OZ]] instead of radiation. The Green Goblin and Dr. Octopus got their own ones in a second lab accident, that attempted to repeat the circumstances of Parker's accident, but which has GoneHorriblyWrong.
* The initial origin-story for Comicbook/SwampThing followed this trope. Subverted when Creator/AlanMoore got ahold of the character and revised him from a formula-altered scientist to a plant elemental who ''thought'' he was a formula-altered scientist.

* This works for villains as well. In UsefulNotes/TheSilverAgeOfComicBooks, it was shown that ComicBook/LexLuthor turned villainous after ComicBook/{{Superboy}}'s "interference" in a Freak Lab Accident resulted in his life being saved, his experiments being destroyed, and his hair loss. Furthermore, when Luthor tried to retaliate with grandiose tech projects to show up Superboy, they went wrong disastrously enough to force the superhero to intervene, embarrassing Luthor enough to hate him even more.
* This somewhat applies to ComicBook/TheJoker of ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' fame, who gained not superpowers but his clownish appearance and SlasherSmile from falling into a vat of chemicals. Even the "no-superpowers-gained" thing is debatable, as some speculate [[HollywoodPsych that the Joker's insanity is actually a form of Fourth Wall breaking "super-sanity"]] gained at the same time.
** In a 1989 ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' storyline, a mad Joker-wannabe hurls himself into a chemical vat in an attempt to replicate the transformation. However, as Batman unsuccessfully warns him, the industrial acids therein are much stronger than the ones that disfigured the Joker years ago, and the wannabe simply disintegrates.

* The post-''ComicBook/ZeroHourCrisisInTime'' ''Comicbook/LegionOfSuperHeroes'' hangs a lampshade on the trope when Spark, in an effort to regain her super-power, attempts to recreate the circumstances of her freak origin -- and gets herself killed as a result. (However, the rest of the Legion [[OnlyMostlyDead manages to revive her]], and afterwards she does indeed have her powers back.)

* Although it actually took place on a testing range, the original origin of the ''Comicbook/IncredibleHulk'' is for all practical purposes a Freak Lab Accident. Later versions -- most notably the TV series and the two motion-picture adaptations -- make it a more literal lab accident.
** A number of the classic Hulk's foes had Freak Lab Accident origins involving nuclear power and nuclear radiation (originally, anyway). One of them was a janitor exposed to nuclear waste.
* In ''Comicbook/{{Watchmen}}'', the apparatus that created Dr. Manhattan by "removing his intrinsic field", i.e. disintegrating his body, is for some unspecified reason impossible to use to repeat the process. It's not so much the effect of the device that gave Dr. Manhattan his powers, but the force of his will and mind maintaining their integrity afterwards and subsequently learning how to reassemble himself. That's an individual, possibly unique, factor that renders the result possibly irreproducible. And who ''wants'' to try to create a new Manhattan. One alone messes up the geopolitical situation seriously. What if the new guy would be even less stable and more detached from the human condition? The risks are way too great, even for the USSR to try to replicate. They did try at first, but stopped when they realized that forcefully disintegrating people in the hopes of turning them into gods [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge might backfire]].
-->'''Ozymandias''': You get to be a superhero by believing in the hero within you and summoning him or her forth by an act of will. Believing in yourself and your own potential is the first step to realizing that potential. Alternately, you could do as Jon did: [[SarcasmMode fall into a nuclear reactor and hope for the best]].
* One of the versions of WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck's superhero identity Paperinik (though not the one in ''ComicBook/PaperinikNewAdventures'') faces a parody of Spider-Man villain Sandman called Sand''ham'' (as he's a pig, natch). Sandham was a janitor in an oatmeal porridge factory who gained his powers when he was accidentally exposed to a procedure to "remove those nasty lumps from oatmeal porridge". Donald ends up having to dissolve him with it, and finally tosses his head, the only thing left of him, into a vat of porridge.
* Inverted with ComicBook/{{Superboy}} (Kon-El). He was being grown and programmed in a lab to be a replacement for Superman, but a freak lab accident interrupted his maturity leaving him as Superboy.
* Parodied in the [[ComicBook/TheSimpsons Bongo Comics]] crossover, "When Bongos Collide!", when a nuclear plant meltdown (caused by Itchy and Scratchy) grants superpowers to nearly everyone in Springfield (and somehow automatically gives most of them costumes), whereupon everyone starts pummeling each other.
* ComicBook/SpiderGirl's foe Mr. Abnormal is both an {{expy}} of ComicBook/PlasticMan and a parody of this. His origin is that "he had an improbable accident with a chemical at a toy factory that had a unique effect with his body chemistry", as quoted from [[ComicBook/NewWarriors Speedball]].
* In ''Comicbook/SheHulk'', Daniel Jermain became "Danger Man" when a workplace accident at Roxxon Industries transformed him into an atomic superhuman. The interesting part is that he has no desire to be a superhero or villain. Daniel just wants Jennifer to help him sue Roxxon because of all of the hassle his new powers have brought into his life.

* Less heroically, ''The Fly'', involving a teleportation mishap when a fly is merged with the scientist who used himself as a guinea pig. In [[Film/TheFly1958 the 1958 version]], the scientist changes heads and one hand with the fly. In [[Film/TheFly1986 the 1986 version]], he slowly mutates into a sickened man-fly hybrid.

* Done rather subtly in ''Literature/TheStrangeCaseOfDrJekyllAndMrHyde'', [[spoiler: Dr. Jekyll's elixir only worked because of an unidentified impurity, something he only discovered after running out of the contaminated batch. At which point Hyde had become his "default form" and he needed the elixir to be Jekyll.]]
* Played in ''Literature/{{Animorphs}}''. This was how the Ellimist became a godlike being. Having his consciousness spread across multiple advanced bodies, some remaining in space and some in Z-space while the rest was sucked into a black hole, allowed his consciousness to integrate with the fabric of the universe. However, his EvilCounterpart Crayak was unfortunately watching when this happened (being the guy who pushed the Ellimist into said black hole), and was thus able to replicate the feat and become god-like himself.
-->'''Ellimist''': The odds of it happening once were astronomical. The odds of it happening twice were inevitable.
* Parodied in Creator/DouglasAdams's ''Literature/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'' series. At the beginning of ''Literature/LifeTheUniverseAndEverything'', we are introduced briefly to Wowbagger the Infinitely-Prolonged, an alien who was granted immortality in a freak ''office'' accident with "[[NoodleImplements an irrational particle accelerator, a liquid lunch, and a pair of rubber bands]]". All attempts to recreate it "have left people looking very silly, dead, or both". Wowbagger deals with [[WhoWantsToLiveForever the growing tedium of immortality]] by seeking to insult everyone in the Universe -- individually, personally, and in alphabetical order.
* A variation appears in the Creator/IsaacAsimov short story "Lenny". A small child (lost on a guided tour) plays around on an unlocked keyboard in a robot factory. This results in a robot which has no superpowers -- indeed, it has roughly the intelligence of a human infant -- but is a scientific gold-mine, functioning without the Three Laws and having the ability to learn rather than simply be programmed.
** Lenny still has the Three Laws, it just doesn't have the knowledge to apply them properly. It acts on a Third Law imperative to protect itself due to a blow aimed at it (Not understanding that the blow aimed at it couldn't actually hurt it), and injures a human by accident in the process (Not understanding how relatively fragile a human is).

** So did [[spoiler: Erica Lowenstein, the ComicBook/LoisLane to [=CoreFire's=] Franchise/{{Superman}} and Dr. Impossible's ComicBook/LexLuthor, who followed a lead]] on some villains and ended up falling into a vat of chemicals and becoming virtually indestructible and transparent.

* Carl Castanaveras in ''Emerald Eyes'' by Creator/DanielKeysMoran, was the first in a series of telepaths created by Project Superman by gene manipulation. Played straight because at the time he was created, the scientists admitted that the technology to create him didn't work yet, and only the inexplicable (at least to the scientists working on him) radiation at the moment of his conception, made the fetus viable. Averted because the source of the radiation was the time traveller Named Storyteller deliberately showing up at that moment to perform the gene manipulation that the scientists were incapable of performing, in order to make sure that Carl (his distant ancestor) existed at all.
* Not a superhero, but Cheery Littlebottom's career change from alchemist to forensics officer with the Literature/{{Discworld}} Ankh-Morpork City Watch took place after she left her previous workplace through the roof. Explosions at the Alchemists' Guild are hardly freakish; blowing up the entire Guild council, however, causes comment.
* In Kathy Reichs' ''Literature/{{Virals}}'' series, a spinoff to the Temperance Brennan novels, Temperance's niece Tory is a teenage girl who, along with her friends, accidentally contracts a genetically engineered parvovirus (a virus that normally only affects dogs) and is turned into a sort of hairless [[OurWerewolvesAreDifferent werewolf.]]

* Peter Brady, (no, not [[Series/TheBradyBunch THAT]] one)''The Invisible Man'' from the 1958 TV series, fits this trope ''and'' subverts it: While ''he'' became {{invisib|ility}}le in a lab accident, he is perfectly able to reproduce it and make anyone invisible (of course, reversing the process is another story). At one point, he was even able to detect when a rabbit had been invisible for a short period of time.

** Referenced jokingly to warn one character away from [[CycleOfRevenge escalating vengeance]] against a [[JerkAss misanthropic]] [[TVGenius genius]]:

* Subverted, along with NoPlansNoPrototypeNoBackup in ''Series/TheIncredibleHulk1977.'' In principle, anyone could recreate the experiment that changed Dr. David Banner, it's just that nobody has any reason to. One of the two-part episodes revolves entirely around a much earlier experiment in another part of the country that had turned another man into a Hulk, and the discovery of a cure, [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption which Dr. Banner cannot use]] [[spoiler:because the former Hulk has re-exposed himself, become a murderous Hulk, and there's not enough of the needed compounds for two treatments.]]
* Subverted in ''Series/TheFlash2014'': Barry's SuperheroOrigin resembles the one from the comics, [[spoiler:except that the "accident" was nothing of the sort. He would have got his powers this way eventually, but a time travelling Eobard Thawne deliberately engineered it to turn Barry into the Flash "ahead of schedule" due to losing his speed after doing what he came there to do]].

* ''Music/DaftPunk'' claims that their [[KayfabeMusic onstage robot personae]] were created in "an accident in our studio. We were working on our sampler, [[Anime/QueenMillennia and at exactly 9:09 a.m. on September 9, 1999, it exploded.]]"

* Every other [[HollywoodScience Science origin]] NPC or PlayerCharacter in ''VideoGame/CityOfHeroes'' gains their powers this way (the rest are unwilling test subjects). This game [[{{Troperiffic}} loves its tropes and knows it]]. For Professor Backfire, gaining superpowers was an inevitability.
* Played with in VideoGame/TronTwoPointOh - emails in the game indicate Lora Baines-Bradley suffered one with her Shiva laser misfiring. [[spoiler: It apparently killed her, but there was enough of her [[BrainUploading mind left behind in]] {{Cyberspace}} to compile her into BenevolentAI [=Ma3a=] ]]

* Late in ''VideoGame/DigitalDevilSaga'' ''2'', it's revealed that the first carriers of the Demon Virus were infected after an experiment where [[spoiler:a psychic child (Sera) communicated with God]] went horribly wrong. However, one subject was killed ([[spoiler:Serph Sheffield as Varuna]]), and the other was imprisoned ([[spoiler:an unknown individual as Meganada]]). While the virus was reproducible, the incident itself was not.

** Lena Oxton, call sign "Tracer", was a test pilot flying an experimental fighter jet capable of teleportation. The teleportation matrix malfunctioned, [[UnstuckInTime dislocating Tracer from time]]. She would appear and disappear at random, unable to interact with the world like a ghost until Winston invented the Chronal Accelerator. The device not only stabilized Lena but granted her [[TimeMaster a limited control over her place in time,]] letting her travel forward and back in time for a few seconds.

[[folder:Web Comics]]
* Subverted in ''Webcomic/M9Girls'': The Freak Lab Accident makes the eponymous M9 Girls terminally ill by radiation exposure. Their mentor then proceeds to cure them with LegoGenetics.
* Parodied by [[http://www.man-man.org/?comic=&date=20030710 Man-Man]] who was bitten by a radioactive man, and so gains the powers of ... a man. Apart from a mutant head on top of his own, these "powers" merely make him invisible to women.
* In ''Webcomic/SecondLeague'' a rat gains superpowers from being bitten by a mutant superhero.

* Parodied in ''Webcomic/AntiheroForHire'', where one character got super-powers in a freak ''skateboard'' accident.
* It's implied that ''some'' sort of lab accident caused Othar, of ''Webcomic/GirlGenius'', to come to his "Great Truth" that all Sparks have to die (or to become suicidally insane, as anyone else who knows about this "Truth" would consider it). The exact details are left as a NoodleIncident for the readers, but it may have involved the Great Wall of Oslo. (It's also all but stated by WordOfGod in the first adventure on Othar's Twitter that [[spoiler: Othar was always just one freak accident away from becoming a suicidal maniac ''anyways'' -- every single version of himself had realized this "truth" through various accidents. One involved waffles.]] It's unknown right now, however, how canon the Twitter is.) The man is also surprisingly resilient, even for a Spark; this may be a side-effect of the accident.
** The world of ''Webcomic/GirlGenius'' is populated by {{Mad Scientist}}s. If your lab work doesn't involve freak accidents of some kind (most likely deadly instead of empowering, but still), you're probably doing it wrong.

* ''Webcomic/RubysWorld'' heroine Ruby gains her enhanced size, strength, and power from a freak lab accident [[spoiler: that was actually engineered post-mortem by her late mother, as a means to give her the capabilities to fight the BigBad]]

* Parodied in a FourthWallMailSlot on ''Webcomic/VGCats''. Dr. Hobo is asked how he became a hobo, and recounts his OriginStory:

* In ''WebComic/TalesOfSchlock'', Roux's butt and Fukumi's boobs accidentally get hit with zafti-gamma rays and they start to grow dramatically when they get excited. Roux uses her powers to become the super heroine "Queen 'B'" while Fukumi gets brain damage and becomes the diabolical "Double D."

* Most of the supers in the Literature/WhateleyUniverse are mutants, but Sam Everheart got his powers this way. It wouldn't have been a Freak Lab Accident if bad guys weren't trying to steal the nanotechnology that Sam was guarding. The resulting explosion ended up with Sam getting a body reconstructed by the nanites.
* Literature/LightningDust's Klaus Melfton becomes the eponymous character via a strange invention of his father. [[spoiler: After getting his powers stolen, he successfully repeats the accident to regain them]].
* Frances "Pythos" Graye of ''Roleplay/{{AJCO}}'' participated in a experiment involving the magical, regenerating blood of a Hydra and ended up with rather more than she bargained for. She didn't end up with the regenerating abilities of the original creature, but she DID get freakish teeth and a forked tongue that she likes to freak people out with.
* This was how LetsPlay/{{Yogscast}} [[LetsPlay/DuncanJones Duncan]] caused [[LetsPlay/KimRichards Kim]] to become "fluxed" in their VideoGame/{{Minecraft}} series, although she didn't get superpowers, she just turned kinda purple.

* Parodied in ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'' with the origin of The Crimson Chin (voiced by Jay Leno). Before he was a crime fighter, the Chin was a talk show host, much like the guy who voiced him. He got bit on the chin by a radioactive handsome actor, and that is how he became The Crimson Chin!
** At least it was, until the comic story "Untold Tales From the Big Superhero Wish!" revealed that this origin story caused a lawsuit, and as a result, The Chin was given a new origin all to similar to Superman.

** While doing repair work at a genetics lab, electrician Max Dillon is first electrocuted by machinery, then by bioelectric shock from [[GeneticEngineeringIsTheNewNuke genetically-modified]] eels swimming in extra-conductive AppliedPhlebotinum. He becomes Electro, a {{Power Incontinen|ce}}t human generator of [[PsychoElectro bioelectricity]], and subsequently [[FreakOut freaks out]] and goes [[WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity on a rampage]].
** Thief and low-level [[TheBrute thug]] Flint Marko is recruited as an [[SuperSoldier experimental subject]] for a procedure designed to give him subdermal silicon [[MadeOfIron armor]], but the machinery overloads and bombards him with silicon particles until he [[BodyHorror explodes]]. He then rematerializes as the Sandman, a being of [[BlobMonster living sand]], and is unusually happy with the results.

** Danny got his powers from an ectoplasmic form of [[ILoveNuclearPower nuclear blast]] when he accidentally activated his parents' experimental Ghost Portal while standing inside it. [[GeneticEngineeringIsTheNewNuke The resulting blast altered his DNA, thus making him half-ghost.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/DarkwingDuck'' tries to give himself super powers in one episode by deliberately standing in front of a TransformationRay, claiming that it works in [[LampshadeHanging the movies]] all the time. His {{sidekick}} Launchpad doubts the plan, specifically pointing out that you can only gain superpowers from a lab ''accident'', and not on purpose. Darkwing brushes off the advice, fires the ray, and is reduced to cartoon ashes.

** Subverted by Monkey; Dexter deliberately experimented on him, which gave Monkey his superpowers. The subversion comes from Dexter never figuring out that he succeeded.

* {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d in an episode of ''WesternAnimation/AquaTeenHungerForce'' when Shake tries to gain superpowers using barrels of toxic waste. First he tries to get some worms to eat the waste before [[Franchise/SpiderMan biting him]]. This doesn't work, so he dumps a spoonful of the waste over his head, shouting, "Oh, no! A horrible accident!". [[HilarityEnsues This doesn't work either.]]
* In ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManTheAnimatedSeries'', Tombstone had the very Jokeresque origin of falling into a vat of chemicals during a bungled factory robbery. Spider-Man even lampshades it later.

** ComicBook/{{Morbius}} gets his powers when he is bitten by a vampire bat that was exposed to a neogenic recombinator's beam whilst he was trying to use it to break down the genetic code of a sample of Spider-Man's blood -- it got zapped feeding on the blood sample, and when Morbius tried to shoo it away, it bit him on the hand, which mutated him into a "living vampire". He then gets zapped with the same recombinator beam in a TakingTheBullet fashion, transforming him into a humanoid bat-creature.

* Parodied on ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy''. After the entire Griffin family gain superpowers and start causing trouble, Mayor Creator/AdamWest tries to give himself superpowers by rolling around in toxic waste. The result? [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome He gives himself lymphoma]]. His doctor [[LampshadeHanging berates him for the stupidity of such an action.]] He just made the same mistake as WesternAnimation/DarkwingDuck. It has to be an ''accident''. Trying to give yourself superpowers leads to you becoming a super-villain, at best. He does at least stop the Griffins' rampage, since they feel guilty about his cancer.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "Three Men and a Comic Book" [[AffectionateParody affectionately parodies]] ''the Comicbook/IncredibleHulk'' with Radioactive Man's origin: he gains his powers when trapped at the site of a nuclear detonation.

** In the Bongo comic series a pre-nuclear [[UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfComicBooks Golden Age]] version of Radioactive Man, 'Radio Man' is hinted at, who looks a bit like Golden Age [[Franchise/TheFlash Flash]]. God knows what his origin is.

* Brain of ''WesternAnimation/PinkyAndTheBrain'' once had a plan than hinged on this concept. He posed as a human and got a job at a big corporation, which [[FrivolousLawSuit he planned to sue for the money to fund his latest world-domination scheme]] by staging a freak accident involving a microwave and non-dairy creamer, reasoning that no one understands either well enough to argue against the claim.

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheMask'' animated series, a couple comic book fans try to replicate the accident that created their favorite superhero Insector the Bugman by breaking into a nuclear power plant and getting bitten by a bug after they become radioactive. Unfortunately they forget to bring a bug with them to the power plant and succumb to radiation poisoning. Then their ambulance crashes en route to the hospital. One guy crashes into a putty shop and is mutated into Clayface expy Putty Thing. The other guy crashes into an aquarium and becomes Fish Guy, who has the awesome power of being a fish. Who still can't swim.
* In ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'', Jack Ryder was a talk show host doing a set piece on the Joker's origin. Joker (from ''ComicBook/TheJoker'') barges in and decides to have some fun by dosing Ryder with Joker Venom and throwing him into a vat of chemicals similar to the one that transformed the Joker. This backfires on the Joker when the combination of the Joker Venom and the chemicals gives Ryder a Superpowered Side that calls himself Creeper (crossing over from ''ComicBook/TheCreeper''). The Creeper then proceeds to ''scare the crap out of the Joker''. By the end of the episode, the Joker is begging Batman to save him from the lunatic.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'' lampshades this. When Phantom Limb is creating the Secret Society, One of the people taking up the offer explains he got his powers from a freak lab accident, to which they immediately point out they understand as they themselves have had a freak lab accident that changed them into what they were.

* The ''WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond'' episode "Heroes" presents a dark {{Deconstruction}} of the concept. Three scientists are accidentally irradiated and become "The Terrific Trio" (with obvious parallels to the ComicBook/FantasticFour). Then it turns out that their transformations are [[spoiler:slowly killing them and driving them insane, and were caused by a colleague's scheme to MurderTheHypotenuse]].
* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Freakazoid}}'', A computer chip with a computer bug is somehow able to suck a person into cyberspace, instantly granting them all of the information on the Internet, but also turning them into a Freakazoid, if the person hits a specific sequence of keys ("@[=g3,8d]\&fbb=-q]/hk%fg") followed by Delete. Dexter gained his powers when his cat pawed across his keyboard chasing a butterfly (inadvertently typing said sequence) and he tried to delete the resulting gibberish.

* Tom of T.H.U.M.B. (a segment of the 1966 ''King Kong'' cartoon on ABC) was a janitor in a secret agent office lab who took a spill while cleaning. His friend, Smilin' Jack, helped him up, only to trigger a ray that reduced both to thumb size. Together, Tom and Smilin' Jack tackle assignments that the regular agents couldn't take conspicuously.

* The post-''ComicBook/ZeroHourCrisisInTime'' ''Comicbook/{{Legion of Super-Heroes}}'' hangs a lampshade on the trope when Spark, in an effort to regain her super-power, attempts to recreate the circumstances of her freak origin -- and gets herself killed as a result. (However, the rest of the Legion [[OnlyMostlyDead manages to revive her]], and afterwards she does indeed have her powers back.)

** HarsherInHindsight when Creator/AdamWest died of leukemia.

* The post-''ComicBook/ZeroHour'' ''Comicbook/{{Legion of Super-Heroes}}'' hangs a lampshade on the trope when Spark, in an effort to regain her super-power, attempts to recreate the circumstances of her freak origin -- and gets herself killed as a result. (However, the rest of the Legion [[OnlyMostlyDead manages to revive her]], and afterwards she does indeed have her powers back.)

* Parodied on ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy''. After the entire Griffin family gain superpowers and start causing trouble, Mayor Creator/AdamWest tries to give himself superpowers by rolling around in toxic waste. The result? [[RealityEnsues He gives himself lymphoma]]. His doctor [[LampshadeHanging berates him for the stupidity of such an action.]] He just made the same mistake as WesternAnimation/DarkwingDuck. It has to be an ''accident''. Trying to give yourself superpowers leads to you becoming a super-villain, at best. He does at least stop the Griffins' rampage, since they feel guilty about his cancer.

[[folder:RealLife]]
* There are lab coats reading "Screw Lab Safety, I Want Superpowers!". [[JustForFun/TelevisionIsTryingToKillUs Please do not ignore lab safety rules.]]
* Parodied by the image on [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Muses071KatirnaFridgeSuperpowers.jpg this parade float]], where a superheroine gains powers from opening one of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katrina_refrigerator the refrigerators left behind after hurricane Katrina]].
* [[https://people.com/archive/blasted-in-a-radiation-accident-eight-years-ago-harold-mccluskey-is-still-the-hottest-human-alive-vol-22-no-23/ Harold McCluskey]] was exposed to 500 times the ''lifetime'' dosage of radiation in mere seconds during an accident at Hanford Nuclear Reservation in 1976. Afterwards, he could trip a Geiger counter from [[https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2014/07/07/atomic-man-gets-closure-at-nuclear-weapons-site/#717080b627a7 fifty feet away]]. Amazingly, he did not suffer from radiation sickness or cancer and died from a pre-existing heart condition.
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* ''Film/{{Darkman}}'' was hideously scarred and became unable to feel pain in such an accident (caused by TheMafia, no less). However, his ability to disguise himself came afterward, through more proper applications of the lab in question.

* In ''Film/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles 2: The Secret of the Ooze'', it is learned that one of these resulted in the formation of the MutagenicGoo that resulted in the Turtles coming into being -- namely, an unknown mixture of discarded chemicals being accidentally exposed to radiative waves.

* Subverted, along with NoPlansNoPrototypeNoBackup in the 1970s version of ''Series/TheIncredibleHulk.'' In principle, anyone could recreate the experiment that changed Dr. Banner, it's just that nobody has any reason to. One of the two-part episodes revolves entirely around a much earlier experiment in another part of the country that had turned another man into a Hulk, and the discovery of a cure, [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption which Dr. Banner cannot use]] [[spoiler:because the former Hulk has re-exposed himself, become a murderous Hulk, and there's not enough of the needed compounds for two treatments.]]

** Hilariously {{lampshade|Hanging}}d when, in an attempt to create a fourth Powerpuff Girl, the sisters recreate the circumstances of their origin by ''elaborately pretending'' that they're adding the Chemical X to the pot by sheer accident. [[spoiler:Takes a tragic turn since the new Powerpuff Girl has problems, physical and mental, because of the substitutes the girls used for "sugar, spice, and everything nice" in the concoction.]]

* Subverted in ''Series/TheFlash2014'': Barry's SuperheroOrigin resembles the one from the comics, [[spoiler:except that the "accident" was nothing of the sort. He would have got his powers this way eventually, but a time-traveller deliberately engineered it to turn Barry into the Flash "ahead of schedule".]]

** Slightly changed in the [[Series/TheFlash2014 2014 TV series]] to a lightning that is the result of a particle accelerator malfunction at S.T.A.R. Labs, which results in the release of exotic energies into the city. The same release also creates a number of other "metahumans".
** Professor Zoom, Barry's EvilCounterpart and ArchEnemy, had this retconned into his origin story, only in his case he deliberately recreated the accident that gave the Flash his powers (he was an obsessive Flash fan from the far future who even went as far as to surgically reconstruct his own face to resemble Barry). Prior to this retcon, his ''original'' backstory outlined that he only had his super-speed whenever he wore his costume, which was a Flash costume he'd found in a time-capsule and scientifically increased its residual speed-energy (from Barry's constant use of it) before then dyeing it in reverse-colors.

* Subverted in ''Series/TheFlash2014'': Barry's SuperheroOrigin resembles the one from the comics, [[spoiler: except that the "accident" was nothing of the sort. He would have got his powers this way eventually, but a time-traveller deliberately engineered it to turn Barry into the Flash "ahead of schedule".]]

* This is a common origin for both heroes and villains in the ''Roleplay/GlobalGuardiansPBEMUniverse''. Anole was bitten by a venomous snake that had been subjected to genetic experimentation, turning him into a reptile-man. Embrace was accidentally exposed to a mutagenic gas in a lab explosion. Koorogi was almost electrocuted when a gene sequencer shorted out while he was working with it. Polaris got caught in an overpoweringly powerful magnetic field when his lab equipment activated accidentally during an experiment. Aurora gained her powers when the experimental fusion reactor she was working on exploded. There are many more.

* Peter Brady, (no, not [[Series/TheBradyBunch THAT]] one)''The Invisible Man'' from the 1958 TV series, fits this trope ''and'' subverts it: While ''he'' became {{invisib|ility}}le in a lab accident, he is perfectly able to reproduce it and make anyone invisible. At one point, he was even able to detect when a rabbit had been invisible for a short period of time.

[[caption-width-right:342:[[JustForFun/WarpThatAesop Remember kids: if you douse yourself in chemicals in a lightning storm enough times, you too may become a superhero!]]]]