Mass "Oh Crap"

Holy crap, look at that girl, she isn't smiling!

T-Rex: Wow! The plants are nice and the birds are singing and the sun is almost down from the top of the sky. What a beautiful day!
Dromiceiomimus: But T-Rex, what if beauty is nothing but an illusion? What if we're all nothing but dreams within dreams that, for an instant, imagine themselves to be real?
All: OH SHIIIIIIII-

—Dinosaur Comics, "add a few Is every time you do it"

Sometimes serious, but often a comedy trope. When faced with something, most or all cast members in the scene PANIC. Related to Crowd Panic, except it's not about the Living Prop characters. Expect The Stoic or Only Sane Man to get everyone to shut up for long enough to deal with the problem.

Examples of Mass "Oh Crap" include:

Anime and Manga

  • In Code Geass, Lelouch gives an Oh Crap moment to the whole world (that includes some 90% of the cast, too) in the end.
    • Of all people, Nina gives one to dozens of people when she shows up with the Ganymede, packing what is essentially a home-built nuke. The nuke is not actually operational but no one knows that at the time, resulting in Lloyd Asplund's shrill "IKENAI!!" when he sees the Ganymede and remembers just what Nina was working on. The second part of this particular Mass Oh Crap comes in the second season when a fully working version goes off... and vaporizes a spherical chunk of real estate into thin air. Then to hammer it in even further, the next one has a blast radius measured in the tens of kilometers. And what allows Lelouch to pull his aforementioned global Oh Crap moment is getting control over an entire arsenal of these things. So yes, when it comes to Mass Oh Craps, Code Geass delivers.
  • Dragon Ball does this a lot. When Goku or his opponent powers up, Krillin and anyone watching will get really scared. Just like with the Big Eater thing, they never, ever get used to seeing this done, and stand gape-mouthed throughout the entire scene. Jeez, Krillin, at least make yourself useful and bring the guy some Gatorade!
  • Dead serious one in End of Evangelion when Instrumentality starts. Repeated in Rebuild of Evangelion under slightly different circumstances.
  • Bleach likes this trope:
    • A parody of a Bleach example of this trope is in this image.
    • Chapter 364 ends up like this for all the Shinigami. Chapter 376, too. Kubo loves this one.
    • Again, in Chapter 392 where it turned out that the person Hitsugaya stabbed was not Aizen, but Hinamori.
  • A Running Gag in One Piece is the normal folks' responses to the Straw Hats' overpowered antics.

(After Zoro has just cut a train car in two)
Lulu: Y'know, if you guys are gonna keep doing stuff like that, you should tell us first!
Luffy: You heard me say "cut this," right?
Lulu: I didn't think he COULD!!

    • That, along with the faces the Straw Hats themselves make when ever they're surprised by something.
      • The fact that Robin never has such expressions is a running gag within a running gag, no matter how insane the situation is. Even if the utterly fearless Luffy and Zoro have Oh Crap expressions, Robin will always be completely unfazed.
  • The grand finale of Death Note, where team leader Light is outed as the mass murderer Kira that the team have been hunting. Their reaction is mostly this strong because Light's reaction to Near's accusations is to take an Evil Laugh and make it quite thoroughly his own.
  • A huge one in the FullMetalPanic: The Second Raid finale. As Sousuke unleashes the full power of the Lambda Driver and blows away Gates, his teammates are like holy crap.
    • A smaller one is also in the first season finale. After defeating Gauron one last time, The Stoic Sousuke uses the opportunity of parting words to pull off a Precision F-Strike. Cue to everyone gasping loudly. Justified in that he never, ever swears - not even by accident so him calling someone an S.O.B. is quite a shock for others.
  • In Digimon, split screens of the whole cast staring in horror is pretty much standard procedure whenever last week's Finishing Move proves to be this week's Worf Barrage. Typically, one character after another is added to the split screen with a rapidfire choom-choom-choom sound effect until all are shown.
  • The manga Little House With an Orange Roof has one of these after Shoutaro and Natchi realize they both got conned into buying the same house.
  • In Yu-Gi-Oh GX when Judai's eyes turn gold after Mad King Brron 'killed' his friends in front of him and he begins to be as brutal as you can be in a card game, everyone watching the duel but Judai.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh 5 Ds: Everyone in Neo Domino City when Aporia is formed, summons his Machine Emperor and starts pelting them with lightning. Then when they think it's all over, the sky cracks, and the Ark Cradle appears, on a collision course with the city.
  • Fullmetal Alchemist had a couple of these, but the most memorable would be when the Briggs troops subdue and capture 90% of Central Headquarters, and everyone starts celebrating. All of a sudden:

Bradley/Wrath: *over the broadcasting system* Hello everyone.

    • A more humorous one in the 2003 anime version where Edward hides in a crowd while duking it out with Mustang, not that it stops Mustang from unleashing a huge fireball at Ed and everyone else in range.
  • Pokémon gives us one through Facing Fear With Eyes Wide Open.[1]
  • Toriko tops them all with a global Oh Crap. Zebra getting released from jail made... the entire human world crap itself. A fortune teller told his Crystal Ball the word 'Zebra' and the ball wisely broke itself. The global economy nearly crashed. Predicted damages would be in the quadrillions of yen. A few small countries disappeared. This is just from the rumor that he would be released. To put it into perspective, Zebra was sent to jail for eating over two dozen species into extinction. An appetite like that would make any food-themed world panic.
  • Fairy Tail: Played for Laughs with Erza's first appearance.
  • Mobile Suit Gundam SEED is very fond of the spit-screen version of this trope. Especially noticeable when ZAFT fires the GENESIS for the first time; pretty much the whole cast goes slack-jawed at the massacre.
  • Happens in Naruto, when the real Uchiha Madara shows up and starts dropping asteroids on people.


Comic Books

  • In Cerebus: Church & State, Cerebus has become (a very cranky) pope. His every word is therefore divinely true. At one point, a bunch of his followers are cheering him as he walks into his HQ. Cerebus interrupts them with, "ANYONE WHO MOVES BEFORE MOST HOLY COMES BACK OUT WILL SPEND ETERNITY SIPPING LAVA THROUGH AN IRON STRAW!" The next panel is a hundred frozen followers, and a hundred separate "Oh crap" thought bubbles.
  • Issue 224 of Archie Comics Sonic the Hedgehog: the last few panels are everyone in New Mobotropolis staring in fear up at the rebuilt Death Egg.


Fan Works

  • In An Entry With a Bang!, the marauding pirates get this reaction when they find out that Earth has nukes and isn't afraid of using them.
  • In Cruising for a Jobbing, this happens when JBL, Michael Cole, and Byron Saxon saw Anna without her mask during a casket match against Charlotte.
  • In Astral Journey: It's Complicated, those checking out a football (soccer) game are met with this, especially when the narrator (Emma) takes the worst of the damages when she pushes Geri and Brandy out of the pathway of the car. Later in Part 5, Emma and Nick have this reaction when Melanie grabs a still electrify metal pole at the pitch.
  • In Chapter 55, In The Dark, Melanie is put under hypnosis in order to receive critical information about her time with a random cult, that kidnapped her and suppressed. After coming to, Melanie was greeted with pretty much this response from those listening to the whole thing.
  • Pretty much the reaction when word of Fusion Gundam coming to life and searching for Marilyn Manson in Final Stand of Death.

Film

  • In Airplane!, this happens because the stewardess is asking if anyone knows how to fly a plane. In the sequel, it's because they're out of coffee.
    • From the same creators, The Naked Gun: 33 1/3 showcased this during a confrontation on-stage at the Oscars between Drebin and Rosco. Rosco's got a gun, Drebin has the bomb Rosco wants to trigger. Drebin's solution? Trade the gun for the bomb. Cue Face Palms from everyone with their hands free.
  • A planetwide version happens offscreen, but sensed by Obi Wan Kenobi in Star Wars: A New Hope:

"I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened."

    • The movie's manga adaptation makes a point of portraying that one exact Mass "Oh Crap".
  • At the end of Jaws 3D, when everyone sees the shark heading their way.
  • In the movie Speed 2 Cruise Control, there's several different shots of people looking out and saying "Oh, shit!", because they realize the ship is going to crash into a port.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. At first when the pirates saw the first ship of the company they started cheering to attack, but they soon stop when the fog reveals the rest of the armada.
  • In Clash of the Titans (the new version, not the classic), when Hades makes his appearance in the throne room scene, you can tell every person in the room just thought "Oh Crap", or some variant of it, most especially the queen who had just finished saying that they were the new gods.
  • This happened with Biff and his thugs in Back to The Future, when they were chasing Marty and realized they were about to run into a manure truck!
  • Rise of the Planet of the Apes: Caesar speaks. The camera jumps around the room, showing that everyone—even the apes—can't believe it.
    • And if you saw it in theaters, the audience probably had the exact same reaction.
  • In The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy movie, after the Vogons announce to the entire Earth that it is to be demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass, we get shots of various locations indicating that every single person on earth is screaming in terror. This lies somewhere between hilarious and utterly terrifying.
  • Revenge of the Nerds has one where the Alpha Betas' Partygoers realize a fire-breathing reveler has just set their dorm on fire

Everyone: "Oooooh, shit!"

Literature

  • In The Wheel of Time, the tenth book, Crossroads of Twilight could be essentially summed up as 800+ pages of every channeler on the planet going through an epic freak out. Granted, it's because they're sensing enough of the One Power to "crack the world like an egg," and they don't know whether it's being used by the good guys or the bad guys. Though, eventually, several characters get tired of freaking out, and basically state that if the beacon of power was going to destroy the world, it would have done so already.
  • The good guys in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows when they think Harry died.
  • In the Left Behind book Glorious Appearing, during the 'sheep and goats' judgement, this is the reactions of the unsaved and those who had taken the Mark of the Beast when Jesus condemns them to the Lake of Fire for not caring for "the least of My brethren", referring to Israel. Basically saying that if you're not a friend to Israel and the Jews during the Tribulation, you're going to Hell.

Jesus Christ: Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave Me no food; I was thirsty, and you gave Me no drink; I was a stranger, and you did not take Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick and in prison, and you did not visit Me. Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me. You will go away into everlasting punishment.

"Aslan, who seemed larger than before, lifted his head, shook his mane, and roared. The sound, deep and throbbing at first like an organ beginning on a low note, rose and became louder, and then far louder again, till the earth and air were shaking with it. It rose up from that hill and floated across all Narnia. Down in Miraz’s camp men woke, stared palely in one another’s faces, and grasped their weapons. Down below that in the Great River, now at its coldest hour, the heads and shoulders of the nymphs, and the great weedy-bearded head of the river-god, rose from the water. Beyond it, in every field and wood, the alert ears of rabbits rose from their holes, the sleepy heads of birds came out from under wings, owls hooted, vixens barked, hedgehogs grunted, the trees stirred. In towns and villages mothers pressed babies close to their breasts, staring with wild eyes, dogs whimpered, and men leaped up groping for lights. Far away on the northern frontier the mountain giants peered from the dark gateways of their castles."

    • Another in The Last Battle, when every thinking being in the world sees Aslan standing in a doorway. This is one of the most heavy-handed of the Christian images in the whole series, as Aslan is literally separating good from evil, with good going past him through the door to Heaven, and evil...not going through the door. And everyone approaching the door is completely terrified of him every moment of it.
  • In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the sailors react this way when they realize the implications of landing on "the island where dreams come true." (It sounds like a nice enough place... until you remember that Nightmares are dreams.)

There was about half a minute’s silence and then, with a great clatter of armor, the whole crew were tumbling down the main hatch as quick as they could and flinging themselves on the oars to row as they had never rowed before...


Live Action TV

  • In Doctor Who, the entire world goes into panic when "EXTERMINATE" is broadcast over and over on the public airwaves.
    • Also in "The Time of Angels", when the Doctor and his team realise that every one of the statues in a 6-story maze full of them is an Angel. And they're waking up.
    • And in "The Fires of Pompeii", when Vesuvius explodes.
  • After all the characters of Buffy the Vampire Slayer suffer magic-induced memory loss, they collectively freak out (all in the same shot at once) at seeing two lowly vampires at the door, because they have forgotten they're superheroes, providing us with this hilarious image.
  • Boomer of Battlestar Galactica Reimagined in Exodus, Part 2 is able to do this to a room full of Cylons on Colonial One with two simple words: "Adama's back."
  • In the Series Finale of Seinfeld the private plane the Main Characters are on looks like it's gonna crash and they're all freaking out . . . except Kramer, who shouts, "Oh, I'm ready! GLORY HALLELUJAH!!"
  • In the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "The Die Is Cast", all inhabitants of the Warbird bridge (including Garak) get this when they realise that they were set up - the Founders are no longer at their planet, but the Jem'Haddar are at full force.

Garak: It was all a trap. They were waiting for us all along...

  • Happens in the Power Rangers Samurai episode "The Master Returns" when Xandred actually gets pissed enough to leave the Netherworld despite his exponentially quicker dryout rate, this is the reaction from everyone nearby. And oh boy, is it justified.
  • In Game of Thrones, during the episode "Baelor", the majority of the nobles and counselors attending the judgement of Ned Stark suffer one when Joffrey decides to execute him, something that wasn't in the plan. Also, you can notice one person who isn't surprised, and who is actually smiling:Littlefinger.

Pro Wrestling

  • When similar gong was heard during the 2009 Royal Rumble, those in the ring had one question… “What Am I Doing Here”?
  • Kevin Nash cause the same thing at 2011 Royal Rumble, especially the look on Kofi Kingston says it all.

 Jerry Lawler: Look at your face.

Theater

  • The famous "silent scene" in The Government Inspector (or The Inspector General) by Nikolai Gogol is an epic, several minute long Mass "Oh Crap" moment, described in great detail.


Video Games

  • This trope was the result of the original Leeroy Jenkins' charge into the Upper Blackrock Spire Rookery in World of Warcraft.
    • Also the reaction of the entire raid when a main tank dies unexpectedly or the boss hits his enrage timer.
  • Wild ARMs 1 had the Quarter Knights pull this off when Mother tells them about her true objectives. It was even worse in the remake.
  • Final Fantasy VI has this when a message is brought to the Elder of Narshe about the Empire attack. Everyone present (the Elder, his men and all the player characters so far) take on their shocked face.
  • Final Fantasy XIII has an excellent instance of this, with looks of abject horror from the entire party when Primarch Galenth Dysley reveals his true form as the fal'Cie Barthandelus.
  • In the final mission of Mass Effect 3, Hammer Task Force is preparing to storm the Conduit, when Harbinger lands on the far side. The entire force panics, and makes a desperate charge. It almost works.


Web Animation


Web Comics

Web Original

  • Whateley Universe story Ayla and the Great Shoulder Angel Conspiracy, when Elite League finds out just how horrific their simulation battle is going to be, and just how badly boned they all are.

Gunnery Sergeant Bardue: Okay Elite League, welcome to a little simulation that I like to call DARK TENNYO!
entire team: Oh fuck.


Western Animation

Troy: Hi, I'm Troy McClure!

  • Alarm proceeds to go off as every single worker in the room retreats into a sealed room*
  • A fairly funny yet serious one from A Bugs Life happens after Flick sees a feather on the ground. Flick stares for a second, has his personal Oh Crap moment, and runs off screaming. The other bugs watch him go, and the bird lands right behind them, chirps, and the circus bugs all run after Flick, screaming as well.
  • On Moral Orel the main Running Gag is that some adult in Moralton will give Orel a piece of advice which he'll misinterpret, leading to him doing extremely bad things while trying to do good. When Reverend Putty finally realizes this root cause of so much havoc, he addresses the whole town, telling them, "The next person that inadvertently sends Orel Puppington down the wrong path could be responsible for damning all our souls". Everyone in town gulps simultaneously.
  • In Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy episode, Rent-an-Ed, Rolf is revealed to be naked under his towel, screaming everyone inside the makeshift sauna, with Kevin telling him that he's on his own while laughing. Eddy demands to know what was going on, only for him and eventually Edd having the misfortune of finding out.

Real Life

  • A Real Life version literally resulted in NORAD having its Emergency Broadcast System privileges revoked. The EBS, originally designed to warn of nuclear attack, would have NORAD or the White House send out a weekly test. On 20 February 1971, a NORAD staffer accidentally loaded the tape instead for an Emergency Action Notification. An Emergency Action Notification was the EBS's own Mass "Oh Crap" It's The End of the World as We Know It warning (thus being an example of this trope in and of itself). The only expected reason that an EAN would be issued would involve either nuclear weapons, alien attack, or something else that would count as Apocalypse How.
    • And this isn't the only time this has happened—the Emergency Action Notification Mass "Oh Crap" alert exists in the EBS's successor the Emergency Alert System, and there was an instance on June 26, 2007 when an EAN intended for test circuits ended up being broadcast on live air in the Chicago metro area. (The hiccup was related to FEMA testing of a new method of sending Emergency Alert System messages over satellite networks. In this case, someone at the Illinois emergency management agency forgot to reset a switch to the "test circuits only" setting.)
    • There's also been a number of state-level accidental Mass "Oh Crap" warnings sent by the Emergency Alert System, such as a typo by a National Weather Service employee of an EAS code resulting not in a weekly test but a Mass "Oh Crap" warning that the entire state of Florida needed to be evacuated due to nuclear fallout, an EAN sent by mistake by a Las Vegas-area TV station (that was an upstream "relay" station for most of Nevada), and a mistaken Mass "Oh Crap" warning calling for the entire state of Connecticut to be evacuated.
    • A real Emergency Alert System message tends to have this effect as well.
  • In one hilarious case, a bunch of Somali pirates were sailing in the night then they spotted a big ship, they thought a big ship would mean big ransom, so they opened fire hoping to intimidate them to surrender. But they soon realized what they fired on was a US Frigate USS Nicholas. You can guess how they reacted when they soon realized what they were really up against.
  • Pop Quizzes
    • Usually subverted if you can talk with a friend in an earlier class. Not to mention a lot of teachers give very obvious hints on days there will be quizzes.
    • But if you have a troll teacher in your first hour, well... May God have mercy on your soul.
  • In 2006, Australia had finally qualified for the soccer World Cup after years of just failing to make it. Then, when the draw was made, most of the nation did this when we were drawn in the same group as Brazil. (On the other hand, the coach and team themselves said they were looking forward to the challenge. In the end, the score in Brazil vs Australia was only 1-0, which is a damn good result to have, even for a loss against the five-time world champion, and Australia made it into the second round.)
  • In 2007, a Brazilian viral video called 2 Girls 1 Cup pretty much caused this to anyone or any group watching, like these radio DJs did. It’s best not to know to get into details, seriously.
  • In 2013, the Boston Marathon Bombing caused this.
  • Dramatic and unexpected news about an important public figure often causes this kind of response, particularly if the news is of that person's death.
  1. ↑ The entire premise of the episode is that Ash is trying to get his Oshawott to stop freaking out and closing his eyes whenever he goes underwater - the point of all this is that it will give Aqua Jet a non-zero accuracy rating. As a result of Scraggy agitating a bunch of Foongus, Ash and Oshawott are forced to go underwater and grab some seaweed to cure the resulting poison; needless to say, the local Tympole and their Palpitoad boss aren't willing to share. Oshawott is getting bombarded by Bubble attacks from every direction and attacking aimlessly in the process... up until he finally decides to give opening his eyes a shot. Once he realizes that there's no problem with his vision underwater, Oshawott effortlessly thwarts the latest barrage with one swing of Razor Shell. While a Tympole's eyebrows never really move, their facial expressions and the sound of their voices at this development literally scream "WE'RE FUCKED!!!"
  2. ↑ played by Douglas Adams' mother
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