List of fictional plants explained

This list of fictional plants describes invented plants that appear in works of fiction.

In fiction

a monster plant of very large proportions in the movie Godzilla vs Biollante.

sentient races of cactus people from China Miéville's Bas-Lag series (unlike the real xerophyte family Cactaceae).

a hypothetical genetically engineered plant (perhaps resembling a tree) capable of growing on a comet, suggested by the physicist Freeman Dyson

a creeping plant frequently used to whip in the slave cribs in the Dune universe

enormous trees from the science-fiction novel The Integral Trees by Larry Niven. They are 100 kilometers long and have a leafy "tuft" at each end oriented in opposite directions forming an ∫, the integral symbol.

a tree featured in the comic strip Peanuts

extraterrestrial carnivorous plant in episode "The Seeds of Doom" from Doctor Who TV series

a tree that grows when lies are whispered to it, and bears hallucinogenic fruit, in Frances Hardinge's award-winning novel The Lie Tree.

a race of humanoid plants from the Martian novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs

a red plant from Mars brought to Earth possibly accidentally by the invading Martians in the novel The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells.

large electrified trees from the planet Hyperion in Hyperion Cantos novels by Dan Simmons. They appear to store up electricity inside their body during certain seasons, releasing all of it in huge arcs of lightning from their crown, burning away all that was growing or walking near them and thus getting fertilizer.

the ancestor of yams, with similar appearance and taste, from Larry Niven's Known Space novels.

In J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth

the White Tree of Númenor, a seedling of Celeborn, a seedling of Galathilion, created in the image of Telperion[8] [9] [4]

magic trees that illuminated the Blessed Realm in ancient times[4]

In J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series

tubers that look like babies when young. Their screams can kill when fully grown. A potion made from mature mandrakes can restore victims who have been petrified. A different kind of mandrake is a real plant. Whilst the mandrake as it appears in the books and films is fictional, J. K. Rowling's description does reflect genuinely held beliefs about the mandrake, in particular, the danger surrounding its screams. This led to the practice of using dogs to collect the mandrake and the blocking of ears during collecting.

In Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere Series

On the planet Roshar (The Stormlight Archive)
On the planet Nalthis (Warbreaker)
On the planet First of the Sun (Sixth of the Dusk);
On the planet Taldain (White Sand Series)

In Dungeons & Dragons

The role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons has a number of imaginary, according to Charles Elliott "not-very-ingenious", plant species,[16] as well as "a taxonomy of fungal horrors", which Ben Woodard considers eerie not only for their poisonous nature, but because many have the ability to move.[24]

sentient trees with human characteristics that typically protect forests from antagonists[26]

In Monty Python's Flying Circus

The following plants appear in the David Attenborough sketch of the last Monty Python episode.

In Avatar

In the Avatar franchise, plants on Pandora have evolved according to the characteristics of their environment, which has an atmosphere that is thicker than on Earth, with higher concentrations of carbon dioxide, xenon, and hydrogen sulfide. Gravity is weaker in Pandora, thereby giving rise to gigantism. There is a strong magnetic field, causing plants to develop 'magneto-tropism'. A particularly intriguing quality of flora and fauna in Pandora is their ability to communicate with each other. This is explained in the movie as a phenomenon called 'signal transduction', pertaining to how plants perceive a signal and respond to it.[31] [32]

In video games

Video games frequently feature fictional plants as items that can be collected by the player, or occasionally appear as non-player characters.

a flower found in the video games Pikmin and Pikmin 2.

a plant found in several of LucasArts' games.

Collectible fruits from Crash Bandicoot.

a race of kind, sentient plant creatures from Star Control computer game series.

In DC Comics

Appearing in DC Comics, the Black Mercy is an extraterrestrial hallucinogenic plant used a weapon by the supervillain Mongul. Mongul first uses it in "For the Man Who Has Everything", a story by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons that was first published in Superman Annual #11 (1985). The story was later adapted into the Justice League Unlimited episode of the same name. Supergirl has an episode called "For the Girl Who Has Everything", where in this version the plant was sent by Kryptonian Non. The story also served as an inspiration for the episode of Krypton, "Mercy", where in this version the plant was put on Lyta-Zod by her son from the future, General Zod. Described in the original story by Mongul as "something between a plant and an intelligent fungus", the Black Mercy attaches itself to its victims in a form of symbiosis, and feeds from the victim's "bio-aura". The organism is telepathic, and reads its victim's heart's desire, giving them a logical simulation and an ending that the victim wants, which the victim experiences an entirely immersive, virtual experience in which their actual surroundings are masked to them. According to Mongul, victims are capable of "shrugging off" the hallucination, though some find the experience too compelling to do so unaided.[34]

The Black Mercy is typically depicted as consisting of dark green, thorned vines that attach themselves to a humanoid victim's upper torso, with a set of pink flowers, each with a long, red, tentacle-like stigma, growing in the center of the victim's chest. When Mongul first uses the Black Mercy on Superman, they burrow through his costume and into his body, able to penetrate his otherwise invulnerable skin because, Wonder Woman senses, they are at least partially magical, which is one of Superman's weaknesses. During his experience with the organism, Superman's breathing appears faint, and his ability to sense the fraudulent nature of the simulation it feeds him and fight it manifests as tears produced by his actual eyes. The Black Mercy can be pulled off a victim by a strong humanoid such as Batman, and Mongul uses special protective gauntlets to handle the plant safely.[34] Superman is not able to awaken from the Black Mercy's simulation without help from Batman, though Oliver Queen and Hal Jordan are both able to do so in a subsequent storyline when they are both trapped by the same plant, as this meant that the two were sharing an illusion and Hal's strength of will caused Oliver to experience what Hal believed was his friend's greatest desire rather than Oliver making the choice himself.[35]

In the episode My Adventures with Superman, "The Death of Clark Kent", Brainiac uses this device to invade and manipulate Superman's memories, intending to transfer his AI to the latter's body before Kandor falls apart. Lois Lane stole the Black Mercy and uses it on herself in an attempt to save Superman.

In the video game Injustice 2, Supergirl mentions Black Mercy in pre-battle dialogue with Scarecrow. She states dealing with him is no different than dealing with Black Mercy, causing Scarecrow to ask her what is Black Mercy out of curiosity, causing Supergirl to describe it as an evil space plant.

Characters who have experienced the Black Mercy include:

In mythology

a tree which grows from the start of the Sun's daily journey across the sky in Latvian mythology

a magic plant in Baltic mythology thought to only bloom one night, sought by lovers

a plant in Greek mythology bearing a fruit that caused a pleasant drowsiness. It may have been real (a type of jujube (perhaps Ziziphus lotus) or the date palm).

a magic herb in Greek mythology with a black root and white blossoms

a magic plant in Serbian mythology which can open any lock

a mythical plant supposed by medieval thinkers to explain the existence of cotton

the World tree of Norse mythology

Hoaxes

a tree from which spaghetti is harvested. It was an April Fool's Day joke launched by the BBC TV programme Panorama in 1957.

See also

Further reading

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Mark of the Vampire (1935) - Overview - TCM.com. Turner Classic Movies.
  2. Web site: Synopsis: "By Any Means Necessary". www.midwinter.com.
  3. News: Think Your Family Is Strange? Spend Time With the Starkadders. Cynthia Crossen. The Wall Street Journal. 9 December 2005. 10 July 2020.
  4. Book: Judd . Walter S. . Judd . Graham A. . Flora of Middle-Earth: Plants of J.R.R. Tolkien's Legendarium . 2017 . Oxford University Press . 978-0-19-027631-7 . 73–346.
  5. The Fellowship of the Ring, "Flight to the Ford"
  6. The Return of the King, "The Houses of Healing", Index IV
  7. The Fellowship of the Ring, "Lothlórien"
  8. The Silmarillion, "Quenta Silmarillion", ch. 3 "Of the Coming of the Elves and the Captivity of Melkor"
  9. The Silmarillion, "Quenta Silmarillion", ch. 8 "Of the Darkening of Valinor"
  10. The Lord of the Rings, "Prologue"
  11. The Return of the King, "Homeward Bound"
  12. Unfinished Tales, "A Description of the Island of Númenor"
  13. The Two Towers, "The King of the Golden Hall"
  14. Book: Rowling, J. K.. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. 2005. Bloomsbury. 0-7475-8108-8. Lord Voldemort's Request.
  15. Book: Rowling, J. K.. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. 2007. Bloomsbury. 978-0-545-01022-1. The Tale of the Three Brothers.
  16. Book: Elliott, Charles. Why Every Man Needs a Tractor. registration. 2011. Frances Lincoln. 978-0711232396. London. ?.
  17. Book: Sanderson, Brandon. Oathbringer. 978-0-7653-2637-9. First. New York. 969863614. 2017-11-14.
  18. Book: Sanderson, Brandon. The Way of Kings. 978-0-7653-2635-5. New York. 471819495. 2010-08-31.
  19. Book: Sanderson, Brandon.. Words of Radiance. 2014. 978-0-7653-2636-2. First. New York. 867184929.
  20. Web site: The Way of Kings - Rockbuds by Inkthinker on DeviantArt. www.deviantart.com. October 2010 . en. 2020-02-20.
  21. Book: Sanderson, Brandon.. Warbreaker. 2009. Tor. 978-0-7653-2030-8. 1st. New York. 276334993.
  22. Book: Sanderson, Brandon. Sixth of the dusk : a Cosmere novella. 978-1-938570-07-0. [American Fork, UT]. 894996388. 2014-10-17.
  23. Book: Sanderson, Brandon. White Sand Volume 1. Hoskin, Rik,, Gopez, Julius M.,, Campbell, Sophie, 1979-. 2016. 978-1-60690-885-3. Mt. Laurel, NJ. 953421413.
  24. Book: Woodard, Ben. Slime Dynamics. 2012. Zero Books. 978-1-78099-248-8. Winchester, Washington. 32.
  25. Book: . Monster Manual II. August 1983 . . 0-88038-031-4 . 15.
  26. Book: Doug Stewart. Monstrous Manual. June 1993. TSR, Inc.. 1-5607-6619-0.
  27. Web site: Dungeons & Dragons: 10 Most Powerful (And 10 Weakest) Monsters, Ranked . Baird . Scott . May 20, 2018 . . March 16, 2022.
  28. Book: . . July 2006 . . 0-7869-3920-6.
  29. Book: . . July 2003 . . 0-7869-2893-X.
  30. Book: . . September 2004 . . 0-7869-3430-1 . 196.
  31. Web site: Avatar's New Twist on Plants .
  32. Web site: Don't Miss These Amazing Disney Details in Pandora – the World of Avatar . 4 May 2017 .
  33. Web site: Starflight Command . 2007-04-07 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20070518063251/http://home.att.net/~starflight.choreo/races/elo.htm . 2007-05-18 .
  34. [Moore, Alan]
  35. [Johns, Geoff]
  36. [Jurgens, Dan]