History Main / CelestialDeadline

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Coco}}'': Miguel will be forced to remain in the Land of the Dead forever if he doesn't get home before sunrise the following day.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Gargoyles}}'' They are stone during the day and flesh at night, in the pilot they are also cursed into dormancy "Until the Castle Rises Above the Clouds".

** Sunrise acts as a magical ResetButton. Many but the most powerful spells either fade completely or weaken considerably when the sun rises.

Magic doesn't obey human-made timepieces but follows the cycles of nature and the movement of the spheres. A spell's duration, then, extends from sunrise to sunset, or during a phase in the lunar cycle, or some other vaguely fairytale measurement of time such as one's DangerousSixteenthBirthday or AYearAndADay or by following a celestial zodiac.

** On the flipside, Aang has to defeat Fire Lord Ozai and end the war before the 100-year arrival of Sozin's Comet, which would boost the firebenders' powers to such high levels that the war would essentially be over. [[spoiler:They fail, but Aang manages to defeat Ozai anyway.]]
** In Book 2 of ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', Unalaq's plan to [[spoiler:open the Spirit Portals, free Vaatu and fuse with him, then use his power to destroy the world]], all hinges on an event known as "Harmonic Convergence" that only happens once every ten thousand years.

* ''Film/SixteenWishes'': Abby's candles that make her sixteen birthday wishes come true won't work anymore after midnight and all granted wishes will become permanent.

* In the vampire movie ''Film/OnceBitten'', the lovely female vampire must have blood from 3 virgin males before Halloween each year to retain her youthful appearance. Although she does drink non-virgin blood, this merely sustains her, not her looks.

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* In ''VideoGame/GhostTrick'', the ghost Sissel is told that he will vanish from this world at dawn. [[spoiler:It turns out that this is a lie to motivate him.]]

** In [[WesternAnimation/{{Shrek}} the first film]], sunrise and sunset were important times for Fiona.

* ''Manga/InuYasha'' has an instance of being a human when the new moon comes around.

* Angels and Demons who have not been fully trained in all magics in the manga ''Manga/{{Wish}}'' follow cycles. Angels are adult form during the day and chibi form during the night and demons are vice versa.

* Literature/{{Bearskin}} must wear the bearskin for seven years.
* ''Literature/{{Cinderella}}'': The magic stops working at [[WhenTheClockStrikesTwelve midnight]].

* Mogwai shall not be fed "after midnight", lest they turn into ''Film/{{Gremlins}}''. Nothing is said about when you can feed them again. In fact, a lot of people make jokes about this rule when the heroes try to warn them about the gremlins. (The one about "if he's eating on an airplane, and passes through a time zone" is probably the most complex. They [[JerkassHasAPoint actually raise a valid point]]: the rule is kind of vague.)

* In ''VideoGame/SpiritsOfAnglerwoodForest'', the BigBad [[spoiler: Ezra]] has turned people [[BalefulPolymorph into trees]] and captured their spirits. When the sun rises on the Winter solstice, all the captured spirits will be lost forever.

* ''TabletopGame/ChangelingTheLost'': if you're lucky, contracts work until sunup or sundown, whichever happens first; or for free if you invoke FoodChains.
** also Pledges, Tokens, Goblins, and the True Fae.
* ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasquerade'' and ''TabletopGame/VampireTheRequiem'' both have a few powers, usually BloodMagic, that end at sunrise.
* ''TabletopGame/PrometheanTheCreated:'' Prometheans regain one point of [[{{Mana}} Pyros]] with every sunrise.
* ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'', around late 1st/early 2nd edition, would often include powers, usually magic items, that could be used "X times per day", but didn't define what the device considered "a day" (e.g., sunset, sunrise, 24 hours from the last use, etc.). This language was clarified in later editions.
** In the ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' campaign world ''TabletopGame/{{Ravenloft}}'', adding a fanciful duration or an escape hatch when laying a curse makes it ''much'' more likely to take hold.
* In TabletopGame/InNomine, different kinds of beings get a bit of spent [[{{Mana}} Essence]] back at different times of day at least when they are on Earth. Angels get theirs at sunrise, humans get it at noon, demons at sunset, and ethereal spirits at [[WhenTheClockStrikesTwelve midnight.]]
* ''TabletopGame/LeviathanTheTempest:'' One of the means by which Leviathans may augment the power of their Rituals is through Portents, auspicious alignments of moons, stars, and other factors. The rarer the Portent, the more time needs to be invested in preparing the ritual to use it, and the more power it generates (so using the full moon to augment your Ritual would only require a scene or so of prep work but wouldn't generate much power, whereas a once-a-century conjunction of planets might have an entire campaign revolve around harnessing its power and could be used to fuel the kinds of effects that permanently reshape the world).

Magic doesn't obey human-made timepieces, but follows the cycles of nature and the movement of the spheres. A spell's duration, then, extends from sunrise to sunset, or during a phase in the lunar cycle, or some other vaguely fairytale measurement of time such as one's DangerousSixteenthBirthday or AYearAndADay or by following a celestial zodiac.

* ''Manga/InuYasha'' has a instance of being a human when the new moon comes around.

* In ''VisualNovel/NanatsuiroDrops'', Tsuwabuki turns into a sheep plushie after sunset and changes back after sunrise. However, when the moon is full, he stays a plushie for a whole day, and during a new moon he stays human all day.

* In the silent film ''Film/TheGolem'', the Rabbi can only create the Golem while a certain astronomical constellation occurs. The occurence of another constellation supposedly causes the Golem to rebel.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Vampirina}}'': The episode "Vampire Weekend" has Vee and Poppy find full moon pendants which switch their lives on the day of a full moon. If they don't switch back before the full moon rises in the sky, they stay switched forever.

** In [[WesternAnimation/ShrekForeverAfter the final film]], Shrek had twenty-four hours to undo his MagicallBindingContract with Rumpelstiltskin, or else his existence will end and the world will remain [[VillainWorld under Stiltskin's rule]].

* ''Franchise/{{Shrek}}'' is big on this. In [[WesternAnimation/{{Shrek}} the first film]], sunrise and sunset were important times for Fiona. In [[WesternAnimation/Shrek2 the second]], Shrek has until midnight to make the effects of his potion permanent. Lampshaded:

* On ''WesternAnimation/WinxClub'', the first third of the fifth season follows the Winx on a quest to obtain the Sirenix transformation. However, this is a TimedMission; they have one lunar cycle to finish it. If they don't earn Sirenix before the end of the day that the lunar cycle ends, they'll lose their powers forever.

If the events happen on their own after astronomical events, see WhenThePlanetsAlign. Not to be confused with CosmicDeadline. Overlap with LiminalTime is considerable. Often combined with RaceAgainstTheClock.