malicious hoaxes in society theme
A deliberately fabricated falsehood is widely propagated to the public with malicious or mischievous intent.
Examples
NASA faked a manned mission to Mars in "Capricorn One" (1978).
17 total · 9 major · 8 minor
| Story | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| columbo1971e9x02 | major | The story turns on the Dian and Sean elaborately faking Dian's disappearance as a publicity stunt to increase sales of their smutty magazine. |
| movie: Bad Channels (1992) | major | Everyone dismissed the shock jock Dan O'Dare's desperate pleas over the airwaves for help in stopping an alien from collecting a number of beautiful women as an outlandish publicity stunt, but he was being genuine in his requests. |
| movie: Capricorn One (1978) | major | NASA faked a manned mission to Mars. |
| movie: Simone (2002) | major | The fading film director Victor Taransky fooled the world into thinking the virtual actress who was starring in his hit films was a real woman, and he took elaborate measures to keep her virtual nature a secret as pressure from the media for her to make public appearances mounted. |
| movie: Spaced Invaders (1990) | major | Much was made of the Orson Welles' 1938 The War of the Worlds radio dramatization hoax. |
| movie: SpiderMan: Far From Home (2019) | major | Mysterio hatched a plot to manipulate everyone's love of superheroes and that need for heroes to trick the world (using holographic-illusions and killer drones) into thinking that there was an existential threat and that only he could save them. |
| rbt1985e4x08 | major | Stiles staged bringing back photographs from a marvelous age 100 years in the future to spur present society to change its ways and reform itself. |
| rbt1985e5x04 | major | The 12-year-old boy Charlie and the titular old man Colonel Stonesteel perpetrated an elaborate hoax involving an ancient mummy that whipped their whole town up in a frenzy. |
| shortstory: Flight to Venus (1928) | major | Professor Morteshang plotted to fool the public into believing that he had gone on an expedition to Venus, but after his plan went wrong and he actually ended up going to Venus the press made the public think it was a hoax. |
| movie: Contact (1997) | minor | Michael Kitz contended in a Congressional hearing that the message from space was an elaborate hoax perpetrated by the industrialist S. R. Hadden. |