History Main / FirstLawOfTragicomedies

In the worst cases, however, over the course of a series of books, films, television episodes, or other media, the subject might start out mainly comedy, switch to dramedy at about the halfway point, then continue to become [[DarkerAndEdgier darker and less comedic]] until [[AnyoneCanDie beloved characters start getting wiped out with frightening regularity]]. Fans are then more justified in complaining that the series JumpedTheShark with a GenreShift.

* A lot of light-hearted operas (e.g. ''Theatre/LaBoheme'', ''DonGiovanni'', ''La Traviata'' or pretty much any opera in the "fallen woman" genre, etc.) take a dive toward the dramatic in the final act. Mozart himself said that any good comic opera needs at least one ''seria'' (read: dramatic opera) character or arc.

* ''WesternAnimation/SamuraiJack'' swings erratically between the SlidingScaleOfSillinessVersusSeriousness, but it's relatively rare for an episode to have significant amounts of comedy and drama.

* Almost totally averted by ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers''. The jokes almost never stop, no matter how serious things get. WordOfGod claims it actually ruined an intended MoralEventHorizon - The Monarch once put a hooker through a death course, making references to shows like ''Series/{{Lost}}''. The creators intended this to be his big creepy MoralEventHorizon, but people just found it hilarious. Otherwise, it's done very well.

* ''TheSagaOfTuck'' also follows this to a T: when [[spoiler: Tuck is beaten and left near death StuffedIntoALocker, all the cracking wise grinds to a halt until he's out of the hospital]]. This annoyed a few fans who accused it of CerebusSyndrome.

In the worst cases, however, over the course of a series of books, films, television episodes, or other media, the subject might start out mainly comedy, switch to dramedy at about the halfway point, then continue to become [[DarkerAndEdgier darker and less comedic]] until [[EverybodysDeadDave beloved characters start]] [[KillEmAll getting wiped out with frightening regularity]]. Fans are then more justified in complaining that the series JumpedTheShark with a GenreShift.

* A lot of light-hearted operas (e.g. ''LaBoheme'', ''DonGiovanni'', ''La Traviata'' or pretty much any opera in the "fallen woman" genre, etc.) take a dive toward the dramatic in the final act. Mozart himself said that any good comic opera needs at least one ''seria'' (read: dramatic opera) character or arc.

* ''Film/ThirdStar is hilarious throughout, despite having [[BlackComedy very dark subject matter]] but in the last half hour everything starts to go horribly wrong.

* ''Series/{{Mash}}'' is the ultimate example of this trope in American pop culture. Its reputation shifted from being among the zaniest of zany sitcoms (by the standards of the time) to TearJerker-a-minute episodes.

** Although there was plenty of serious stuff in ''Series/{{Mash}}'' early on -- take "Sometimes You Hear The Bullet." The main difference is in the (dis)integration of the elements rather than the amount of either: in the early days comedy and tragedy often happened back-to-back in the same situation, whereas in later years episodes would often feature distinct "funny" and "serious" plotlines.

** In fact, the term "tragicomedy" was originally coined to describe plays that started out like tragedies but ended with redemption and reconciliation instead of KillEmAll. Two of Shakespeare's younger contemporaries, John Fletcher and Philip Massinger, were particularly well known for their tragicomedies, and for a time the form was so popular that some of Shakespeare's darker tragedies were given LighterAndSofter revisions with happier endings.
* Up until Act III, and aside from the opening, ''RomeoAndJuliet'' is essentially a RomanticComedy.

** The same thing applies to ''Theatre/IntoTheWoods'', also by Sondheim. The first half is set up as a mix of traditional fairy tales, with plenty of humour, although some of it is BlackComedy due to not going with a Disneyfied version of all of the tales (the fate of Cinderella's stepsisters in particular stand out). The second act shows the fallout of everything that happened to achieve the "happily ever after" of the first act. Despite starting with some very funny scenes, it quickly takes a turn for the worse and character start dropping like flies. There's even a reprise of a very funny song, ''Agony'', a duet for the two Princes talking about wanting unreachable women, which is still hilarious but has a darker undertone due to the fact that they are now cheating on the wives they spent the first act trying to get.

* You know you're watching ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'' when, apart from the one or two [[BreatherEpisode Breather Episodes]] they do a season, the episodes have about ten minutes worth of cracky fun and the other thirty is laced with a deep depression. And then of course, one of those [[BreatherEpisode Breather Episodes]] will be something like "Mystery Spot," where the cracky fun/depression ratio is reversed: "Hilarious, hilarious... ''TearJerker Oh my god!''"

* ''Series/{{Mash}}'' is the ultimate example of this trope in American pop culture. Its reputation shifted from being among the zaniest of zany sitcoms (by the standards of the time) to TearJerker-a-minute episodes vying with ''Literature/AllQuietOnTheWesternFront'' for the title of "most depressing anti-war screed ever".

** Parodied on one episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'', where iHawk (a robot expy of Hawkeye) actually has a switch on his side that goes from "irreverent" to "maudlin".

** Which kinda makes sense, considering the doctors are trying to avoid the unbearable soul-crushingly inevitable depression of their jobs by focusing on the lighter moments. Only when they ''have'' to confront the bad stuff do they actually lose their humor.
** Scrubs strikes a great balance between the two, and for this reason they never have a very special episode, since in a way every episode is one.
* ''Series/StargateSG1'' episode "[[GroundhogDayLoop Window of Opportunity]]" is very funny in almost every scene -- with the exception of the very dramatic climax.

* You know you're watching ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'' when, apart from the one or two [[BreatherEpisode Breather Episodes]] they do a season, the episodes have about ten minutes worth of cracky fun and the other thirty is laced with a deep [[strike:angst]] depression.
** And then of course, one of those [[BreatherEpisode Breather Episodes]] will be something like Mystery Spot, where the cracky fun/depression ratio is reversed: [[CrowningMomentofFunny Hilarious, hilarious. . .]] ''[[TearJerker Oh my god. . .]]''

* ''Film/TheCableGuy'' (most notable for starring JimCarrey) starts out as a comedy about a man and his goofy cable guy, and [[MoodWhiplash evolves into a disturbing thriller]] about a man and his criminally insane stalker cable guy.

* ''Anime/SummerWars'' shifts quite quickly and often between "Seriously, people might die" and "Let's play hanafuda you guys! OZ is WAY fun!", but does so at a pretty good pace not to kill the mood completely.

* ''City of Craftsmen'' is a Russian film about peaceful people opposing the invaders who occupy their city. The film alternates between deadly serious scenes and total slapstick.
** For example, in the climax the citizens, which secretly armed themselves before, start fighting with the soldiers. We see many being killed with swords and spears, on both sides. This culminates in battle in which [[spoiler: both the leader of the invaders and the leader of LaResistance die]]. Then [[spoiler: the resistance leader comes BackFromTheDead]], and we are treated to the fight where citizen [[CurbStompBattle totally pwn]] the invaders with large spoons, brooms, frying pans, and the like.

* ''Series/{{Mash}}'' is the ultimate example of this trope in American pop culture. Its reputation veered from being among the zaniest of zany sitcoms (by the standards of the time) to TearJerker-a-minute episodes vying with ''Literature/AllQuietOnTheWesternFront'' for the title of "most depressing anti-war screed ever".

** Although there was plenty of serious stuff in ''Series/{{Mash}}'' early on -- take ''Sometimes You Hear The Bullet.'' The main difference is in the (dis)integration of the elements rather than the amount of either: in the early days comedy and tragedy often happened back-to-back in the same situation, whereas in later years episodes would often feature distinct "funny" and "serious" plotlines.

* Creator/JossWhedon's raison d'etre: ''Series/{{Buffy|The Vampire Slayer}}'' and ''Series/{{Firefly}}'' contain frequent switches in tone between comedy and drama/tragedy frequently - some episodes will be extremely comedic in tone, some almost completely without humour and terribly bleak. Almost every episode of both shows will generally contain elements of both. Whedon particulary delights in cutting straight from comedy to tearjerkers and vice versa (for instance, in Firefly Mal tells Simon that Kaylee is dead. Cue slow-mo run to her bedside, accompanied by desolate strings on the soundtrack. Kaylee's fine. Mal's psychotic. Everyone splits their sides at Simon's expense). In Buffy, in keeping with the trope described on this page, the lighter subplots and snappy dialogue tends to fall away a lot as seasons near their climax.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'', due to being a LongRunner and veering all over the SlidingScaleOfComedyAndHorror, has engaged with this in all sorts of different ways over the years:
** The Doctor has been a naturally funny character since his second story, "The Daleks". Many stories throughout the show's entire run have exploited this along with his heroics - by having him mostly removed from proceedings that are supposed to be terrifying, then showing up and being hilarious when it's time for him to defeat the monster, defusing both the narrative tension and the in-story threat at the same time. The most obvious use of this is probably "The Christmas Invasion", in which the Doctorless and Doctor-heavy portions of the story differ in tone so much it's almost to the point of {{Lampshading}} this - note particularly how the TranslationConvention only switches on when the Doctor emerges, which immediately makes the Sycorax less threatening by making them more like - well - ''Doctor Who'' villains.
** Creator/RobertHolmes's writing in general and tenure as script editor is characterised by heavily hammering the horror and comedy simultaniously, as he had a [[BlackComedy very morbid sense of humour]] but also relished the opportunity to make ''Doctor Who'' genuinely disturbing. This approach is typified in things like the intentionally outrageous AttackOfTheKillerWhatever NightmareFuel that are the Autons, the CuteButPsycho, CreepyGood characterisation he [[EnforcedTrope Enforced]] upon the Fourth Doctor, the way the Sontarans take the ProudWarriorRaceGuy trope to comical yet horrible extremes, mixing BloodierAndGorier and CrapsackWorld content with [[ToiletHumour plenty of fart jokes]], hilarious ThoseTwoGuys dialogue about {{Gorn}}-tastic BodyHorror, even the odd bit of planned SpecialEffectsFailure for dramatic effect... all of which is used as deliberate MoodDissonance to make things as disturbing as possible.
** The Creator/RussellTDavies approach relies a lot on witty dialog and funny jokes, but it also knows how to make things serious in particularly epic and/or sad moments. He also has a very similar love of combining horror and comedy, but in a more [[PostModernism self-aware]], {{Camp}}y way rather than in exploiting the resulting {{Bathos}}.
** The Creator/StevenMoffat approach is somewhat more segregated. Unlike RTD or Holmes he doesn't use silly monsters at all (with the exception of a heroic funny Sontaran), and while the Doctor can do comical things to defeat them (holding them up with Jammie Dodgers, etcetera) it's only temporary defeat, never his final solution for dealing with the monster, which is usually something much more serious. He also wrings a lot of drama and angst out of his characters. However, he likes to surround pure {{Horror}} and drama material with snappy sitcom-style dialogue, with pure comedy sequences becoming common (where RTD's would usually be bittersweet in tone) and WorldOfSnark supporting casts. The result of this is that MoodDissonance is avoided, and he lightens scenes that aren't meant to be scary and pumps in the darkness when they are - the traditional approach to this trope.

* ''VideoGame/{{Nier}}'' is a generally grim adventure with what can only be described as [[WhamEpisode Wham-packed]], but it also has a vast number of optional sidequests with truly hilarious developments and resolutions. Even during the main plotline, the banter between the main character, DeadpanSnarker Weiss, and foul-mouthed Kaine can get riotously funny.

* ''VideoGame/MetalGear'' likes to intersperse dark, solemn and thought-provoking cutscenes with [[TheGuardsMustBeCrazy rather comical gameplay]], within which the player can access funny optional radio conversations, silly EasterEggs and ToiletHumour. This provides quite an interesting way of allowing the mood of the game to respond to the player's playstyle - sneaking around by wearing a cardboard box over your head or by disguising yourself as a statue is hilarious, tranquilising guards or knocking them out non-fatally is usually quite funny (they collapse with intentional comic timing, CirclingBirdies appear around their head and if another guard finds them they'll wake them by kicking them in the head with a comical punch sound effect) but shooting guards dead is usually just bloody and grim ([[VideoGameCrueltyPotential unless you really make an effort to engineer some funny deaths for them]]). ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid4'' was not ''all'' horrible, but had the saddest mood thus far, and so contained only about half as much funny content as the games usually do by stripping away the funny Codec conversations and providing the player with many more guns, and setpieces where people are already shooting at each other.

* Similar to ''Cowboy Bebop''[='=]s varying levels of Ed and Ein, ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'' used [[TeamPet Momo]]. If Momo is around, the plot is generally going to be funny, or at least lighthearted. When things go all life-and-death and serious, Momo is nowhere to be found.
** Lampshaded in the GrandFinale, when Aang actually ''sends Momo away'' before engaging the FinalBoss.
** Subverted in the episode "Tales of Ba Sing Se." While the episode has its share of drama ([[TearJerker/AvatarTheLastAirbender Iroh's Tale]] specifically), Momo's segment of the episode is the only one that actually advances the plot.

* ''EverythingIsIlluminated''. It's rather pronounced in the [[FilmOfTheBook film]].

* While the book doesn't fit this trope, and the film is pretty [[SlidingScaleOfCynicismVsIdealism cynical]] overall, ''Film/AScannerDarkly'''s film adaptation was rather lighthearted for the first 53 minutes. [[spoiler: Then Luckman collapses.]] Things get progressively darker after that.

If it does this by pushing comedic characters OutOfFocus or having them PutOnABus, that's ShooOutTheClowns. If the work frequently shifts between tragedy and comedy without warning, that's MoodWhiplash. If the ''actual plot'' has jumped the tracks and gone in a completely different direction, it's HalfwayPlotSwitch - the trope on this page only applies a tone change.

* ''Anime/SummerWars'' shifts quite quickly between "Seriously, people might die" and "Let's play hanafuda you guys! OZ is WAY fun!", but does so at a pretty good pace not to kill the mood completely.

* ''Disney/{{Frozen}}'' plays this pretty straight, with the funnier moments and musical numbers concentrated more in the first half while the harder drama comes into play more in the second half. Ironically, PluckyComicRelief character Olaf doesn't show up until the halfway point, which explains why his comedy is more limited than the [[NeverTrustATrailer trailers]] would have you believe. He does help counteract the increased seriousness of the main characters at that point, however.

* Notably averted in ''JusticeLeagueInternational'', the classic Giffen-[=DeMatteis=] run, with the story arc "Breakdowns." As the name might suggest, "Breakdowns" was one of the darkest times in the entire history of the Justice League, in any of its incarnations. It was also hysterically funny.

* ''{{Bone}}'' starts out with characters right out of a cartoon short before they get caught up in epic fantasy. There's elements of both at all points of the story, but notably more silliness in the beginning and more of the epic stuff at the end.

* ''RosencrantzAndGuildensternAreDead''.
* [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] by [[TheZerothLawOfTropeExamples William Shakespeare's ''A Winter's Tale'']], one of the earliest tragicomedies. The first half is a gloomy, melodramatic, and heartbreaking tragedy of a king who wrongfully suspects his wife of infidelity. Then a guy gets [[BearsAreBadNews eaten by a bear]], and it becomes a pastoral romantic comedy.

* [[{{Lampshading}} Lampshaded]] in ''TheSlayers'', when a comedic moment happens in the middle of the dramatic battle against the BigBad. When the funny is over, a character breaks the FourthWall to explain that the show had gotten a little ''too'' dramatic, so the funny moment had to happen.
* ''TengenToppaGurrenLagann'' veers sharply into drama after episode sixteen, presses that throttle down, and then abruptly releases it for the last three episodes... only to slam it back down for its ending. Viewers were sharply divided.
* MahouSenseiNegima does a good job with this once the CerebusSyndrome kicks in, with the heavily dramatic moments more or less balanced out by comedic moments.

* ''ChronoCrusade'' starts out as a fun action-adventure show with supernatural elements. Although there's hints of a darker tone from the start (the main characters are fighting demons, after all), the ending takes a stark turn for the dramatic after a climatic battle at a festival midway through the series. The manga keeps enough comedic moments in the series that it might be closer to MoodWhiplash, but the [[DarkerAndEdgier anime]] heads full throttle into deep, dark tragedy until it heads straight into an infamous TearJerker ending. In both versions, [[spoiler:TheHeroDies]] at the end of the series.

* ''{{Trigun}}'' notably was very light hearted in the first half, and barring some of the really deeper moments such as episode six's ending never really loses its humor. Things took a deeper turn when the main plot kicked in during the second half but still threw in an occasional gag, usually in the first half of the episode. Then during the final 5-6 episodes the comedy was all but dropped. In the case of the manga it was mostly averted: while the main, more dramatic story kicked in much earlier, the humor, while a little more sparse, never completely disappeared even as things got even more serious. For an example: [[spoiler: take the following events after Wolfwood's death. In the anime, the episode after we see Vash breaking down at the beginning of the episode and [[FromBadToWorse it goes downhill]] from there for him. In the manga, the chapter after Wolfwood's death has Vash connecting with his new ally Livio and there's a humorous breakfast scene with the two eating to get their strength back up.]]

A tragicomedy (better known as a {{dramedy}}) is a mix of lighter and darker material that uses humor to lighten the tension and drama as a way to show the audience that something serious is going on. This is a difficult balancing act to carry out, and only a few shows have ever done it successfully.