History Main / InSpiteOfaNail

* In one SilverAge {{Superman}} story, Supes asked the supercomputer in his fortress to extrapolate what his life might have been like if Krypton had never exploded. The extrapolated story finally ends with an odd circumstance where this alternate Kal-El acquires super-powers and becomes Superman ''on Krypton.'' Supes and Batman turn away from the screen with just priceless expressions of astonishment.

* One of the few things that remains true throughout the DCU's Multiverse is that {{Superman}} and LexLuthor will always be enemies.

* In a special story written for the 500th issue of ''Detective Comics,'' {{Batman}} is offered the chance to save Bruce Wayne's parents in an alternate universe, knowing that doing so could mean that world never has a Batman to protect Gotham. He does so anyway, and it is later revealed that the deed inspired the alternate Bruce to become Batman as a tribute to the costumed man who saved his parents.

* Very common in HarryPotter fan fiction that changes what happened the night Voldemort tried to kill HarryPotter. Sometimes Voldemort is somehow defeated despite Lilly not [[HeroicSacrifice dying]]. Sometimes Voldemort isn't defeated at all. Harry will still usually be the "Boy Who Lived", even if his mother, father, and [[OriginalCharacter twin sister]] also survived. Regardless, everything else that happened before the fic begins will be exactly the same, even if Voldemort should still be waging war against the wizarding community.

** In "A Different Dursley Family", it's said Vernon and Petunia were destined lovers. The "nail" of this fic was Vernon trying to steal a statue from Smeltings (his secondary school) for a prank. In that fic, Vernon was caught and expelled for this, which resulted on him being cut from his father's will and becoming a mechanic to earn a living. This prevented him from being the intolerant man who'd force HarryPotter into CinderellaCircumstances and yet, he and Petunia met, fell in love and had a child. Prior to the fic's proper beginning, the author briefly mentioned other alternative timelines coming from the statue prank and the only one specifically stating Vernon wouldn't marry Petunia was one where the statue fell on him, causing his death. And even then Harry's life wouldn't be different from canon since Petunia would marry a squib who was so envious of his magical relations as Petunia was of her sister.

** The episode, "Parrells," has Worf going through several dimensions, and while Enterprise remains mostly the same, the changes keep mounting to the point where Wesley was the tactical officer, Picard died during the events of a "Best of Both Worlds" (leaving Riker as Captain), and Troi had married Worf. They also ran into a Riker from a universe where the Borg had conquered the galaxy.

** As well as the finale; [[spoiler: Madoka's wish [[RetCon Ret Cons]] all witches out of existence, meaning every death at the hands of a witch (MagicalGirl ''or'' {{Muggle}}) didn't happen, saving countless numbers of lives who could then do more things and impact the world. Needless to say, this should radically change the course of human history... yet Mitakihara, at least, looks more or less the same]].
*** Actually, that not even the tip of the iceberg of the FridgeLogic that comes with Madoka's wish.

* In [[EternalDarkness Eternal Darkness]], three Ancients manipulated Pious Augustus in becoming their champion, but the parallel realities created by choosing one artifact instead of the two others, differs very little between them: you still end up fighting a undead roman centurion, while his patron deity still gets his ass kicked and horribly mutilated by the opposite one you summoned earlier. [[spoiler: Wich then still proceeds to [[NiceJobBreakingItHero try and destroy the world and enslave humanity]], while your dead grandpa still fixes it for you]].

* It is generally agreed among serious historians that despite the legions of "What if?" alternate historical fictions out there, neither the American Confederacy nor Nazi Germany had a chance. If things had gone differently, the conflicts may have been longer or shorter or more or less people may have died, but given the general circumstances, you don't win wars without a Navy or invade the USSR while your other enemy develops nuclear weapons, even if you had a tank powered by steampunk or a magnetic powered UFO-bomber. Its never been a matter of debate of whether the US would be celebrating Jefferson Davis' birthday if things had gone differently, is merely a question of whether 700,000 Americans would have died vs. 500,000. Likewise, if things had gone better for Nazi Germany, the only difference would be that parts of Berlin would still be slightly radioactive.

** [[ZigZaggedTrope Zig Zagged]] because Shane's leadership puts the group at much worse odds than their canon counterparts.

* A major frustration to Homura Akemi in ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica''; no matter what she does in her indeterminate number of attempts to rewind the events of the series and start them over differently, the outcome is always the same. She refers to it herself as an "endless maze".

** The Naruto/One Piece crossover fanfic ShinobiOfTheHighSeas take InSpiteOfANail to ridiculous extremes. Despite Naruto being there and regularly interacting with the Straw Hats (including adding Nami and Robin to his harem), every major event of the anime/manga happens without fail, even if he's there. It's to the point he completely misses the entire Marineford arc, only hearing of it second-hand.

*** This happened to Kirk as well who was born two months earlier than he should've been. Nero's arrival somehow caused Kirk's mom to go into labor (maybe intense stress or something) causing Kirk to be born in January instead of March like his original timeline counterpart. The novelization of the 2009 movie reveals that Kirk's mom had an inhibitor device to impede the pregnancy while she was still on assignment aboard the USS ''Kelvin''. However, as soon as Nero showed up, the device had somehow failed.

An alternate universe could arise where the human race never developed money and society is radically different, but you'll find that you were still born, still live in the same house, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and still have that tattered old]] [[Film/ETTheExtraTerrestrial E.T.]] [[ArsonMurderandJaywalking doll sitting on the mantlepiece]].

* In ''AstroCity'', one of the powers of Samaritan (and his arch-enemy Infidel) is immunity to RetGone. Samaritan was originally sent back in time to prevent the Challenger explosion, and because of his meddling undoes his world's past, he was never born. No matter what happens to the timeline, Samaritan and Infidel will still exist. In fact, Infidel once destroyed all of space-time, and they ''still'' existed.
** Another ''AstroCity'' story, "The Nearness of You", averts the trope. A man is haunted by dreams of a woman that he has never met; he knows her well enough to draw her picture, yet utterly fails to track her down. A supernatural character explains to him that the woman is/was his beloved wife, erased in a time-war, and offers to erase his residual memories of her; he declines, and is told that "no one forgets".

** A quick study of Marvel's ''What If...'' series will confirm that, in the multiverse of MarvelComics, that there's only two universes in which Peter Parker doesn't ever become Spider-Man. One of them has no superhumans at all, and the other has no Peter Parker at all. In every other MarvelUniverse variant, Peter Parker exists, and he '''''will''''' become Spider-Man at some point.

* In MichaelCrichton's ''{{Timeline}}'', the CorruptCorporateExecutive uses an extended analogy about how the main characters couldn't make the Mets beat the Yankees to reassure them that the few individuals travelling can't really change anything major. When one of the characters directly questions the GrandfatherParadox, he changes the subject.

** In "Rise of the Cybermen", the Doctor, Rose, and Mickey visit an AlternateUniverse where history is different enough that Britain has a black President (yes, president) and a thriving [[ZeppelinsFromAnotherWorld zeppelin industry]] -- but Mickey was still born and lives at the same address (though he's named "Ricky" and implied to be gay, and his grandmother is still alive). Both of Rose's parents also exist in this universe under the same names, and were still married, although Rose herself was explicitly never born and Pete never died in the eighties. There doesn't appear to be a Doctor, though, or he's seriously shirking his world-saving duties. [spoiler: Until the [[ReplacementGoldfish season 4 finale,]] that is.]]

** In "Rise of the Cybermen", the Doctor, Rose, and Mickey visit an AlternateUniverse where history is different enough that Britain has a black President (yes, president) and a thriving [[ZeppelinsFromAnotherWorld zeppelin industry]] -- but Mickey was still born and lives at the same address (though he's named "Ricky" and implied to be gay, and his grandmother is still alive). Both of Rose's parents also exist in this universe under the same names, and were still married, although Rose herself was explicitly never born and Pete never died in the eighties. There doesn't appear to be a Doctor, though, or he's seriously shirking his world-saving duties.