History DealWithTheDevil / LiveActionTV

* This is the entire premise of the Egyptian series ''Series/TheDevilsPromise''. Desperate to cure his terminally ill wife, Ibrahim goes to a man who people directed him to thinking he's a blessed man who can help him. In exchange of curing his wife he makes a deal with the mysterious guy not knowing he's the devil or Iblis.

* Subverted on an episode of ''Series/JonathanCreek'', in which Lenny Spearfish ''believes'' that he's sold his sold to the devil in exchange for wealth, power and immortality, only for Jonathan to discover that all the "miracles" that happen to him were in fact [[spoiler:orchestrated by MI5. Having recently discovered that Lenny's wife was the illegitimate and unacknowledged daughter of a royal, they were commissioned to ensure that she was provided for. This not only involved rigging up a buried treasure in her back garden, but also protecting her against the criminal that her husband managed to enrage whilst high on his newfound success]].

** The main plot line in ''Series/KamenRiderDenO''. Imagin would form a contract with a human and grant them one wish, whether they want to or not. After fulfilling it [[LiteralGenie in a]] [[JackassGenie way]], they will travel to that persons past and destroy it.

** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZone1959S4E14OfLateIThinkOfCliffordville Of Late I Think of Cliffordville]]", William J. Feathersmith is approached by the Devil in the form of a beautiful young woman named Miss Devlin. She agrees to send him back to his home town of Cliffordville, Indiana in 1910 with all of his memories of the intervening 53 years intact in exchange for $1,412.14. Feathersmith initially believes that the price will be his soul but Miss Devlin reveals that his unscrupulous business practises mean that he is already going to Main/{{Hell}}.

* The ''{{Series/Dinosaurs}}'' episode "Life in the Faust Lane" had Earl Sinclair make a deal with the devil to get a very exclusive mug.

* Played for laughs in the Music/AliceCooper episode of ''Series/TheMuppetShow'', Cooper acts as an agent for the devil, offering a contract that will give the muppet who signs it anything they want. Gonzo is ecstatic, but can't find a pen. ("I'll sell my soul for a pen! No, I have other plans for that.") Ms. Piggy goes through with the deal for great beauty, but is turned off by what Cooper considers beautiful. After giving Piggy a refund, Cooper radios the devil to report...
-->'''Cooper''': Hello, boss... No, no, I didn't make a sale... Listen, Do I get any commission on hourly rentals?\\
(Radio spews flames)\\
'''Cooper''': Touchy.
** Then the trope gets one last joking when Gonzo appears in an explosive flash just before the ending. Kermit thinks Gonzo made the deal, but Gonzo reveals he has something even worse: ''[[ShockinglyExpensiveBill the bill for all the special effects]]''! Everyone (Cooper, Kermit, and the Monsters on stage) basically unites in an, "Oh no!"

** There's a comedic variation in "[[Recap/TheTwilightZone1985S1E12 I of Newton]]". A mathematician named Sam accidentally summons a demon through an equation he was working on, and the demon announces that Sam's soul is already forfeit, unless he can give a question the demon can't answer or a task he can't perform. [[spoiler:Sam is allowed to ask two (well, three, but one gets wasted) questions about the demon's powers, from which he ascertains that the demon can travel anywhere in the multiverse, and can find his way back from anywhere he has traveled.

'''Sam:''' Not a question. A command.]]\\

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', "Hide and Q."
** Another episode, "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS4E13DevilsDue Devil's Due]]", involved an alien race who believed that their ancestors made a deal with the devil for a thousand years of peace and progress for their world. On the date when the contract was supposedly due, a woman named Ardra appeared, claiming to be the demon of their mythology, come to claim the planet. Picard ultimately proved that [[TheCon Ardra was merely a con artist]], using [[MagicFromTechnology technology to recreate magical effects]] to convince the populace of her demonic origins.
* The ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'' episode "Crossroad Blues" concerns the main characters trying to save several people who have made deals with the Devil, or rather Crossroad Demons. Upon making the deal, the person has ten years before the demons come to collect. They do in the form of hell hounds, who tear the victim to shreds. Notably, the only one they succeed in saving is the one who made a deal to benefit someone else (to save the life of his terminally-ill wife), whereas all the characters who made wishes for success or talent end up being taken down to Hell as planned. Robert Johnson (mentioned above) even puts in an appearance.
** It must [[ItRunsInTheFamily run in the family]]: [[spoiler:Mary gave permission for Azazel to enter her house, which he used to poison Sam with demon blood (in 1983, the year that she died) in exchange for John to be alive again]], John makes a deal with Azazel in the first episode of season two: his soul and a mystical gun made by Samuel Colt for Dean's life. When Sam dies in ''All Hell Breaks Loose'', Dean summons a crossroads demon and trades his soul in order for Sam to live again and while he failed, Sam still tried to make any deal he could in order to save Dean from hell. ''God'', that family is screwed up.
** Another surprisingly depressing example occurs for Bela in season 3's "Time Is on My Side." [[spoiler:She was fourteen, it's implied her father was abusing her sexually, the Crossroads Demon (in form of a child) killed her parents for her, and the ending is her hearing the hellhounds coming to get her.]]

** "Season Seven, Time For A Wedding" features an interesting example: a demon makes the standard "You get what you want and die ten years later" deal with people -- then has his partner kill them within days, thus exploiting a loophole in the deal-making process (the demon making the deal can't collect early; nothing says another demon can't). When [[LawfulEvil Crowley]] finds out about this, he is ''pissed'', because their whole business model depends on people knowing Hell will hold up its end of the bargain.
-->'''Crowley''': This isn't Wall Street, this is Hell! We have a little something called "[[EvenEvilHasStandards integrity]]"!

** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E6EscapeClause Escape Clause]]", the [[{{Hypochondria}} severe hypochondric]] Walter Bedeker makes a deal with the Devil, calling himself Mr. Cadwallader, for {{Immortality}} in exchange for his soul.
** {{Subverted|Trope}} in "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E76StillValley Still Valley]]". Making a deal with the Devil is necessary to access all of the spells in the warlock Teague's book of BlackMagic. However, the Confederate soldier Sgt. Joseph Paradine burns the book as he would rather let the Confederacy die and be buried in hallowed ground than renounce Main/{{God}}.
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS4E109JessBelle Jess-Belle]]", after buying a LovePotion from Granny Hart, Jess-Belle Stone learns that her soul has been extinguished and that she has been become a witch.
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS4E111PrintersDevil Printer's Devil]]", Douglas Winter, the editor of the failing newspaper ''The Dansburg Courier'', hires a reporter and linotype operator named Mr. Smith, who lends him $5,000 to keep the paper going. Winter eventually discovers that Smith is the Devil who wants his soul in exchange for saving the newspaper.
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS4E116OfLateIThinkOfCliffordville Of Late I Think of Cliffordville]]", William J. Feathersmith is approached by the Devil in the form of a beautiful young woman named Miss Devlin. She agrees to send him back to his home town of Cliffordville, Indiana in 1910 with all of his memories of the intervening 53 years intact in exchange for $1,412.14. Feathersmith initially believes that the price will be his soul but Miss Devlin reveals that his unscrupulous business practises mean that he is already going to Main/{{Hell}}.

** There's a comedic variation, "I of Newton". A mathematician (Sherman Hemsley) accidentally summons a demon through an equation he was working on, and the demon (Ron Glass) announces that the man's soul is already forfeit, unless he can give a question the demon can't answer or a task he can't perform. [[spoiler:Hemsley is allowed to ask two (well, three, but one gets wasted) questions about the demon's powers, from which he ascertains that the demon can travel anywhere in the multiverse, and can find his way back from anywhere he has traveled.]]
-->[[spoiler:'''Demon:''' Now, a question I cannot answer.]]\\
[[spoiler:'''Professor:''' Not a question. A command.]]\\
[[spoiler:'''Demon:''' Lay it on me.]]\\
[[spoiler:'''Professor:''' Get lost!]]
** A variant that may or may not involve infernal forces happens in the story ''Button, Button,'' (later made into the movie, ''The Box'') where a poverty stricken couple are given a box with a button on it and are told that if they press it, they'll get a lot of money but someone whom they don't know will die. [[spoiler: They press it and the person who gave it to them comes to collect the box. They are given the money and are told that someone they didn't know has died. They are also told that the box will now be given to someone ''they'' don't know.]]
** In "Crazy as a Soup Sandwich", a man gets help escaping a demon to whom he owes his soul. [[spoiler:Said help turns out to be a mob boss who's also a demonologist. Oops.]]
** "Time and Teresa Golowitz" has an interesting variant: the deal is offered to someone who has just died, and the deal is not for the person's soul. A music composer is offered to be allowed to revisit a moment in his past to have another chance with a popular girl in school in exchange for simply coming "down below" once in awhile to share his music. He agrees, but learns afterward that his tampering with history (preventing a shy girl's suicide and causing her to be a successful singer in the present) is apparently frowned upon "top side", necessitating that he spend a little while "lying low" in Hell for a bit. To be fair, it's implied to be a [[AHellOfATime nice place in Hell]] (possibly Limbo) and he's told that the arrangement is only temporary.

* On ''Series/GoodEats'', a LouisCypher character appears to a woman who had just lost a cake-baking contest and promises her a new recipe in exchange for her soul. (She agrees, and wins the next bake-off with Devil's Food Cake.) The LouisCypher character then appears to her longtime rival and makes the same pact with her, giving her the recipe for Red Velvet Cake.

* ''Series/TheHauntingHourTheSeries'':

** "Headshot", another ''Haunting Hour'' episode, is also a DealWithTheDevil episode, only it's more based on ''The Picture of Dorian Grey''.

* In an episode of ''Series/FantasyIsland'', a couple came to the island hoping to get out of a deal they'd been tricked into making with the Devil, played by Roddy McDowell. Roark gets the Devil to agree to discussing letting them out of the contract by offering up his own soul as well if the Devil doesn't agree to break the contract. (The dialogue between Roark and the Devil makes it clear they know each other and have butted heads before.) Roark makes a reasoned plea for the couple, which the Devil rejects and says he's taking all three souls. Roark then points out that there are ''four'' souls involved, as the wife is pregnant. The Devil does an OhCrap and Roark reminds him that he's forbidden to touch the unborn child. Since he can't take the child's soul, he can't take anyone's soul from this deal and the contract is voided.

-->'''Crowley''': This isn't [[AcceptableTargets Wall Street]], this is Hell! We have a little something called "[[EvenEvilHasStandards integrity]]"!

* ''Series/InterviewWithTheVampire2022'': Multiple mortals believe that Louis, Lestat and Claudia must have made one due to their immortality and eternal youth. Some even ask for details on how it works.