History Main / KarmicTwistEnding

** This particular variant (hideous narrators and all) was a staple of pre-[[UsefulNotes/TheComicsCode Comics Code Authority]] horror comics, particularly those published by Creator/ECComics.

* A diminutive, mean-spirited, cheating jockey wishes he wasn't so short, and his wish is granted... [[LiteralGenie Turning him into a 10-foot tall freak who can't ride horses any more]].[[note]]This is the plot of ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'' episode "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS5E125TheLastNightOfAJockey The Last Night of a Jockey]]".[[/note]]

--->'''Scientist:''' If only I'd programmed the robot to [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor be more careful what I wished for]]! [[HypocriticalHumor Robot, experience this]] [[DramaticIrony tragic irony]] [[HypocriticalHumor for]] [[IgnoredEpiphany me]].\\

''(the scientist sips a beer and sighs contentedly)''

** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZone1959S1E6EscapeClause Escape Clause]]", a man granted immortality in a FaustianBargain, having accidentally killed his wife, casts it as a premeditated murder to see what the electric chair will do to him; his lawyer gets him a life sentence instead, and he calls on the Devil to collect rather than face centuries in prison.

* Made famous by ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'' (which was the former TropeNamer), though, ironically, it's the episodes that ''avert'' this trope that tend to be remembered best.
** "Time Enough at Last" is famous as an aversion, because of its CruelTwistEnding, but most of that came about because of Creator/BurgessMeredith's sympathetic performance. Without that, Bemis comes across as much more of an asshole and thus the ending as much more deserved and much less sadistic.
** Averted in one of its most famous stories: "Literature/ItsAGoodLife", about a boy named Anthony with godlike powers. Arguably not as much, however, in "It's Still a Good Life", the sequel to the story in [[Series/TheTwilightZone2002 the 2002 series]]. Anthony has grown up and has a daughter named Audrey. She has powers similar to her father's, but she can also bring things ''back'' from "the cornfield." The remaining townspeople (including Anthony's mother) try to turn her against her father, but it backfires and she banishes them all from existence. Anthony winds up saddened by this development, so she brings ''everything'' back. The two plan a trip to UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity, as Anthony states Audrey did a "real good thing" -- acknowledging he is less powerful than she is and had better think happy thoughts himself. [[TwistEnding The closing narration reveals that there was no moral. "Just an update from Peaksville, Ohio."]]
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E6EscapeClause Escape Clause]]", a man granted immortality in a FaustianBargain, having accidentally killed his wife, casts it as a premeditated murder to see what the electric chair will do to him; his lawyer gets him a life sentence instead, and he calls on the Devil to collect rather than face centuries in prison.
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E15IShotAnArrowIntoTheAir I Shot an Arrow into the Air]]" the crew of a spaceship crashes on a hot, barren landscape with little hope of being rescued. One of the crew members, seeing that their water supplies are running low, kills the other surviving crew members to take their water. Then he finds out they weren't on a foreign world like they thought, but were actually in the Nevada desert, just a few miles from the road, and he breaks down upon realizing how pointless his actions were. The closing narration even refers to this twist as "A practical joke perpetrated by Mother Nature and a combination of improbable events, practical joke wearing the trappings of a nightmare of terror, of desperation."
** "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E28ANicePlaceToVisit A Nice Place to Visit]]" had an interesting version of this: a bank robber is killed during one of his heists, and is happy to find himself where he gets everything he'd ever want, instead of "the other place" (i.e. hell). Trouble is, ''he gets everything he'd ever want'' and quickly grows bored. It turns out [[NoChallengeEqualsNoSatisfaction he can't do anything exciting (like rob a bank) because he'd always succeed.]] In frustration, he decides he doesn't belong in Heaven and asks to go to "the other place". The guide retorts that this ''is'' [[ThisIsntHeaven the other place]].

* At least three ''Literature/{{Goosebumps}}'' books:
** ''A Shocker On Shock Street'': The TV ending at least; the book ends on a CruelTwistEnding, as the two protagonists find out they're robots and are deactivated by the girl's "father" to be reprogrammed. In the TV episode, the two wake up again and decide to kill their creator after putting them through so much torment and trying to replace them with new versions.
** ''Click'': The protagonist has abused the universal remote to suit his own ends. When he's confronted about this he tries to use the device against the accuser but it doesn’t work properly, so he presses the "off" button in frustration, and the entire world vanishes as he finds himself in a black void. Then the battery runs out.
** ''The Cuckoo Clock of Doom'': The protagonist has been abused by his AnnoyingYoungerSibling all his life, with the biggest event being when she ''triggered'' the titular ArtifactOfDoom and caused him to come within an inch of being {{Ret Gone}}d out of existence. Luckily, he manages to set it back to normal -- but, because the clock is missing the year in which his sister was born, ''she'' is the one who winds up RetGone. Needless to say, although he says he'll "think about" bringing her back, he obviously settles for his new CloseEnoughTimeline.

* When it doesn't feature [[DownerEnding Downer Endings]] or [[CruelTwistEnding Cruel Twist Endings]], ''Manga/ZekkyouGakkyuu'' does this.
** In the story ''Supplements for the Brain,'' a young girl wishes to be as smart as her best friend, but no amount of studying seems to help. She finds a magazine ad promising a supplement that will boost brain power and make the user smarter without even trying. After she gets her pills, she is instructed to write down her progress daily, and above all, ''only take one pill a day.'' She follows suit at first, but when she overhears her classmates and friend wondering if perhaps her sudden good grades is a result of cheating, she takes an entire fistful of pills at once out of spite. The next day, she even surpasses her best friend in test scores and smugly rubs her face in it, thinking it's all thanks to the pills. When she goes home that day, she finds a letter from the company, saying that she has broken instruction and they will be coming to collect her to run some tests on her brain. As she hides, terrified and alone, in her house, she receives a message from her friend, apologizing for thinking she was cheating and admitting that she was just really jealous because her friend made everything look effortless while ''she herself'' had to study all day. Realizing that she was wrong about her friend, and that she spitefully took the pills for nothing, the girl breaks down and does nothing as the company takes her to their labs to run tests on her brain--presumably forever.
** In ''Kasako-san is Coming,'' two girls meet a ghost named Kasako-san, a spirit missing her umbrella who will kill anyone sees her in three days unless they present her with her umbrella. The girls spend three days looking for it and finally find it on the third day. But the girls are always competing with one another, tied in everything in their gym class, and each thinks that if ''they alone'' present the umbrella, the other will be killed and they won't have anymore competition. After a brief struggle, one girl successfully steals the umbrella from the other, leaving her to be spirited away by Kasako-san. Then, some weeks later, that girl is stopped on her way to school by a ''new'' spirit missing an umbrella and willing to kill anyone who doesn't appease her--the friend she betrayed.

* In the 1970s, Creator/DCComics had a short-lived comic titled ''Plop!'', in which a crew of ghoulish-looking folks present stories, all of which end have that kind of ending. For example, a kindly old man is actually a secret grave robber who visits funerals only to inventory the jewelry of the deceased. However, when the doctor tells him his time is coming, he's frantic to avoid the same treatment at the hands of his apprentice, so he stipulates that he be buried only in everyday clothes. Alas, he forgot that a dentist who believed the man's public image had given him a free overhaul. And in the last scene, the apprentice is happily bashing out the gold teeth from the old man's corpse. After each story, the presenters cackle over the misfortunes of the characters before going on to the next story. Naturally, at the end of each issue, something goes "Plop!" on the presenters as well.
** This particular variant (hideous narrators and all) was a staple of pre-[[UsefulNotes/TheComicsCode Comics Code Authority]] horror comics, particularly those published by Creator/ECComics.
** Later comic series like ''ComicBook/HouseOfMystery'' did these out of nostalgia for the old Creator/ECComics horror lines like ''Tales from the Crypt'' and its sister titles, ''The Vault of Horror'', ''The Haunt of Fear'', and ''Shock [=SuspenStories=]''.

* The ending of ''ComicBook/AmazingFantasyNumber15''. It might be one of the all-time famous examples of ItWasHisSled, but the death of Uncle Ben, one of the only two people [[ComicBook/SpiderMan Peter Parker]] cared for, certainly qualifies for this trope because it resulted from Peter's own apathy and selfishness.

* Shows up as a recurrent theme in the stories written by Chloe and Parker in ''FanFic/InfinityTrainBlossomingTrail'':

* In ''Film/WildInTheStreets'', a group of twenty-somethings and teens manages to exile everybody over 30 to retirement camps. Then at the end, a group of kids starts scheming to exile everybody over 10.
* [[DoubleSubversion Double subverted]] in ''Film/KindHeartsAndCoronets''. The story revolves around a man who attempts to become the Duke of Chalfont by murdering everyone (but one) in line to inherit the dukedom. Then he is sentenced to death for the one murder he ''didn't'' commit. He is exonerated at the last moment, but as he leaves the prison, he realizes that he left his memoirs--describing the murders he actually committed--in his cell.
* In ''Film/RightAtYourDoor'', after a biological weapon goes off, one guy hermetically seals his house and refuses to let anybody in, including his wife. In the end it turns out that the virus can infiltrate the house... and concentrates in there, so the government seals the house from the outside and kills the guy. His wife, being outside in fresh air, is implied to be treatable in the end.
* ''Film/LayerCake'' ends with the protagonist, a cocaine dealer, having risen to become leader of his own gang, eliminated his rivals, and gotten the girl - and, as he gloats as he walks down the steps of his club, having done all this without ever revealing his name. Seconds later a minor character shoots him dead. NoHonorAmongThieves, dude.
* ''Film/TalesFromTheHood'' ends with the trio of thuggish gang-members learning from their mortician host that "[[WelcomeToHell This...ain't no funeral home!]]"

* ''Film/Saw3D''[='s=] ending is a notable departure from the ''Franchise/{{Saw}}'' franchise's typical use of {{Cruel Twist Ending}}s. After the climax, Hoffman managed to win over the police in his final schemes before escaping the city, including finishing with Bobby's game and killing Jill. Just as he was going to the airport, Gordon, revealed to be Jigsaw's most entrusted accomplice with a plan to take out Hoffman, gets on his way (alongside Brad and Ryan, the survivors of the film's opening trap) and captures him, then locking him up to die in the bathroom where Gordon had previously been imprisoned in by Jigsaw during the [[Film/SawI first movie]].

* The short story "Those Three Wishes", by Judith Gorog, is a literal case of BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor. The selfish and spoiled protagonist is granted a wish, and uses it to wish for 1000 more wishes. Later, when reminded of a test she forgot to study for, she facetiously blurts out "I wish I were dead."

* Creator/StephenKing's ''Literature/{{Thinner}}'' is also a pretty good example, if tending toward a CruelTwistEnding. Rather than a Monkey's Paw wish, the story revolves around a curse brought on largely by the main character's irresponsibility. In the end his curse is removed and placed into a pie; whoever has a piece will be cursed. In what is possibly an even less responsible move, he leaves the pie in his own refrigerator overnight. When he finds that his wife (who he wanted to eat the pie) and daughter (who he very much ''didn't'' want to eat the pie) have eaten some, he says "to hell with it," and eats some too. The End.
* "Literature/TheNecklace" by Creator/GuyDeMaupassant contains one of the most famous literary examples. A beautiful and haughty woman insists that she can't attend a ball without fine jewelry and borrows a diamond necklace from a wealthy friend, only to lose it. Not wanting to admit her blunder to her friend, she and her husband buy a replacement necklace and have to spend the next ten years doing grueling work to pay off the debt. By the end of these ten years, she's lost her looks from all the hard labor she did and finally tells her friend the truth about the necklace -- whereupon her friend tells her the necklace was actually a fake (only made of glass) that cost a tiny fraction of the money paid to replace it.
* Another classical example is ''The Queen of Spades'' by Creator/AlexanderPushkin. The story concerns a young gambler who wishes to gain the secret magic formula of getting three good cards in a row from an elderly countess. After she refuses to tell him, he ends up threatening and frightening her to death, and is then visited by her ghost with the secret ([[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane probably in a nightmare]]). Wishing to marry his much wealthier sweetheart, he places all of his money on a bet. Magic formula works ([[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane probably by coincidence]]), but gambler loses everything because he picks the wrong card by mistake ([[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane or because he is cursed by the dead countess]]).

* In the short story "Give Her Hell" by Donald Wollheim, a man who abused his wife and daughter all the time makes a DealWithTheDevil to prevent his crimes from coming to light. He continues to beat up his wife, consigns his rebellious daughter to an asylum, with measures in place to keep her there after his death, and he thinks he got the better end of the deal by making the devil reincarnate him after his death. Only on his deathbed does he learn that there are certain rules about such reincarnations - the life must be one of a person already born. Also, the person must be related to him and of opposite gender. His daughter fits the bill perfectly.
* In "ICU" by Creator/EdwardLee, a man working for a criminal syndicate and specializing in kiddie porn loses AnArmAndALeg in a confrontation with the police. He expects a lifetime in a comfortable federal prison with reasonable immunity from harm... until it turns out he's been captured not by the police, but by a rival syndicate. These guys have [[EvenEvilHasStandards a strict no-no on CP]]... an amputee getting a twelve incher up his, however, is quite in line with their regular repertoire.
* In Creator/IsaacAsimov's short story "Star Light", two people plan ThePerfectCrime. They intend a BlindJump with a large amount of a substance that's valuable on any planet, and from there, to get to the nearest inhabited planet and sell it. One of them murders the other, makes the jump... and ends up close to a recent nova. Nowhere nearly close enough for it to harm him, mind you, but enough for the autopilot to notice it. Since it has to determine the ship's position before the second jump... well, with that new bright star there is no matching location, meaning the computer will attempt recalculating until the passenger starves to death. After all, the dead guy is the one who programmed the computer - and the murderer even left the weapon behind.
* From ''Literature/ScaryStoriesToTellInTheDark'', "The Bed by the Window." Richard and George are two bedridden old men in a nursing home, sharing a room. George's bed is by the window, and he spends his days describing what he sees for Richard's benefit. But Richard grows jealous of the view he's missing, and eventually hides George's medication so he dies of a heart attack. With George gone, Richard asks to be moved to the other bed, ''finally'' gets to look out the window himself, and sees... the brick wall of the building next door.

* Made famous by ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'' (which was the former TropeNamer), though, ironically, it's the episodes that ''avert'' this trope that tend to be remembered best.
** "Time Enough at Last" is famous as an aversion, because of its CruelTwistEnding, but most of that came about because of Creator/BurgessMeredith's sympathetic performance. Without that, Bemis comes across as much more of an asshole and thus the ending as much more deserved and much less sadistic.
** Averted in one of its most famous stories: "Literature/ItsAGoodLife", about a boy named Anthony with godlike powers. Arguably not as much, however, in "It's Still a Good Life", the sequel to the story in [[Series/TheTwilightZone2002 the 2002 series]]. Anthony has grown up and has a daughter named Audrey. She has powers similar to her father's, but she can also bring things ''back'' from "the cornfield." The remaining townspeople (including Anthony's mother) try to turn her against her father, but it backfires and she banishes them all from existence. Anthony winds up saddened by this development, so she brings ''everything'' back. The two plan a trip to UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity, as Anthony states Audrey did a "real good thing" -- acknowledging he is less powerful than she is and had better think happy thoughts himself. [[TwistEnding The closing narration reveals that there was no moral. "Just an update from Peaksville, Ohio."]]
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E6EscapeClause Escape Clause]]", a man granted immortality in a FaustianBargain, having accidentally killed his wife, casts it as a premeditated murder to see what the electric chair will do to him; his lawyer gets him a life sentence instead, and he calls on the Devil to collect rather than face centuries in prison.
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E15IShotAnArrowIntoTheAir I Shot an Arrow into the Air]]" the crew of a spaceship crashes on a hot, barren landscape with little hope of being rescued. One of the crew members, seeing that their water supplies are running low, kills the other surviving crew members to take their water. Then he finds out they weren't on a foreign world like they thought, but were actually in the Nevada desert, just a few miles from the road, and he breaks down upon realizing how pointless his actions were. The closing narration even refers to this twist as "A practical joke perpetrated by Mother Nature and a combination of improbable events, practical joke wearing the trappings of a nightmare of terror, of desperation."
** "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E28ANicePlaceToVisit A Nice Place to Visit]]" had an interesting version of this: a bank robber is killed during one of his heists, and is happy to find himself where he gets everything he'd ever want, instead of "the other place" (i.e. hell). Trouble is, ''he gets everything he'd ever want'' and quickly grows bored. It turns out [[NoChallengeEqualsNoSatisfaction he can't do anything exciting (like rob a bank) because he'd always succeed.]] In frustration, he decides he doesn't belong in Heaven and asks to go to "the other place". The guide retorts that this ''is'' [[ThisIsntHeaven the other place]].

* In an episode of ''Series/{{Angel}}'', the Fang Gang rescues a woman who was newly changed into a werewolf from a group of people who consider the flesh of newly turned werewolf a delicacy. When she bites TheMole scientist as Angel is taking her away, Angel dryly comments that, now all they have to do is wait a month. The scientist begins pleading for his life as the mooks take him away.
* ''Series/{{Medium}}'':
** In one episode, the [[MonsterOfTheWeek Villain of the Week]] had a particularly clever method of killing his victims: he would strike them with the faucet taken from their own bathtub, then use plastic sheeting to transfer their bodies to the tub so as to avoid leaving any blood in the house, replace the faucet, and turn the water on, [[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident making it appear that they had simply slipped in the shower and hit their head]]. Even though Alison ''knows'' he did it and has convinced the District Attorney of it, no-one can arrest the guy because he's simply too good and leaves no evidence that it was anything but a tragic accident. While he escapes to a tropical country and seems to have gotten away with it all, [[KarmaHoudiniWarranty the universe sees fit to ensure that not only does ''he'' slip and bash his own head in the next time he takes a shower]] (in the only legitimate "accident" he was ever involved in), but also takes care to inform Alison of it in her dreams. She seems happy that things have been sorted out karmically.
** Another, more arguable, another medium begins interfering with Alison's dreams, preventing her from helping people as she normally does -- he believes he's karmically "keeping the balance" because Alison's precognition is an unfair advantage. In the end, the ghosts of all the people he stopped Alison from helping come after him, because if he hadn't interfered, they'd still be alive (and unable to harm him). Whether this is karmic justice or a subversion is not clear.
* A few episodes of ''Series/TheHauntingHour'' had this ending. Although the show favored the CruelTwistEnding because it had more scares, this ending did pop up in the episodes that revolved around {{Jerkass}} protagonists. In "Wrong Number", a girl named [[AlphaBitch Steffani]] loves to bully others, including ''an old lady'' who lives next door to her apartment. In the end, said old lady turns out to be a witch and the grandmother of one of the kids she bullied. She punishes Steffani by trapping her in her own phone as a video. The witch sends the video to her granddaughter and she promptly deletes it.
* Parodied in ''Series/TheBenStillerShow'', by the sketch "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1x_BLhreRs Low Budget Tales of Cliched Horror]]", which spoofed the ''Series/TalesFromTheDarkside'' episode "Devil's Advocate" (which starred Ben Stiller's father Jerry Stiller). The sketch focuses on a shock jock who hates his listeners ([[RunningGag almost as much as he hates himself]]) and gets tormented by {{Satan}} ([[NothingIsScarier who refuses to show himself as he thinks "it will be a lot scarier for you to imagine what I look like"]]), and in the end Satan reveals the shock jock is in hell and gives him his ultimate punishment: being turned into a demon and... being trapped in a mildly hot room. The shock jock is less than impressed.
-->'''Shock Jock:''' I think maybe I should fall into a fiery pit or be engulfed by something. I think it should be something more-- I dunno, maybe insects should eat me or something. I feel like it should be-- I dunno, is it just this? I'm not even hot.\\
'''Satan:''' Look, we are in a recession. ''I'm on a budget!''
* ''Series/NightVisions'' usually went for a CruelTwistEnding, but on occasion it had one of these, such as in "Dead Air", where it turns out that for the entire episode, the {{Jerkass}} DumbassDJ that enjoyed playing his callers and coworkers for fools and stringing them along for his own amusement had himself been strung along for the entire episode by a disturbed caller who happens to be a VoiceChangeling, who desires to pull a BreakTheHaughty on the guy... with a knife. Better yet, the caller admits he wouldn't have come after the guy if he hadn't been insulted and cut off in the middle of his call.

--->'''Guy:''' Finally! Solitude! I can read books for all eternity! ''[glasses fall off]'' It's not fair! IT'S NOT FAIR! Wait, my eyes aren't that bad. I can still read the large print books. ''[eyes fall out]'' IT'S NOT... Well, lucky I know how to read Braille. ''[hands fall off, screams, tongue falls out, head falls off]'' Hey, look at that weird mirror!\\

''[He pours the DNA mixture into the cloning machine and it activates. The door opens and out steps...]''\\
'''Man:''' ''[completely deadpan]'' [[HumansAreTheRealMonsters It turns out it's Man.]]\\
''[ScareChord]''

--->'''Scientist:''' If only I'd programmed the robot to [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor be more careful what I wished for!]] [[HypocriticalHumor Robot, experience this]] [[DramaticIrony tragic irony]] [[HypocriticalHumor for]] [[IgnoredEpiphany me]].\\
'''Robot:''' ''[falling to knees]'' ''[[BigNo NOOOOOOOOO!!]]''\\
''[the scientist sips a beer and sighs contentedly]''

* ''Film/Saw3D'''s ending is a notable departure from the ''Franchise/{{Saw}}'' franchise's typical use of {{Cruel Twist Ending}}s. After the climax, Hoffman managed to win over the police in his final schemes before escaping the city, including finishing with Bobby's game and killing Jill. Just as he was going to the airport, Gordon, revealed to be Jigsaw's most entrusted accomplice with a plan to take out Hoffman, gets on his way (alongside Brad and Ryan, the survivors of the film's opening trap) and captures him, then locking him up to die in the bathroom where Gordon had previously been imprisoned in by Jigsaw during the [[Film/SawI first movie]].

* ''Film/Saw3D'''s ending is a notable departure from the ''Franchise/{{Saw}}'' franchise's typical use of {{Cruel Twist Ending}}s. After the climax, Hoffman managed to win over the police in his final schemes before escaping the city, including finishing with Bobby's game and killing Jill. Just as he was going to the airport, Gordon, revealed to be Jigsaw's most entrusted accomplice, gets on his way (alongside Brad and Ryan, two of the victims of the film's opening trap) and captures him, eventually locking him up to die in the same room where Gordon had previously been imprisoned in by Jigsaw during the [[Film/SawI first movie]]. Gordon himself was acting on the order of Jigsaw, who put him a contract to take Hoffman out if he went after Jill; in the case of success, Gordon would be given access to the remaining material that Jigsaw had kept secret to him. Although, it's unknown what Gordon did afterwards, since [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse he doesn't return]] in the following movies, whick took a TimeSkip on the timeline.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'': In the episode "The Boy Who Cried Rat", because of Ren confessing of being and Asthma-Hound Chihuahua, so he wouldn't get eaten by Stimpy again, Ren ordered Stimpy to give the husband and wife their five dollar bill back, but Stimpy revealed that talking about food made him hungry and he at the five bucks, forcing Ren and Stimpy to work off their debt to the couple with endless chores, as punishment for their deception.

* In the 70's, DC had a short lived comic called ''Plop!'', in which a crew of ghoulish looking folks present stories, all of which end have that kind of ending. For example, a kindly old man is actually a secret grave robber who visits funerals only to inventory the jewelry of the deceased. But when the doctor tells him his time is coming, he's frantic to avoid the same treatment at the hands of his apprentice. So he stipulates that he be buried only in everyday clothes. Alas, he forgot that a dentist who believed the man's public image had given him a free overhaul. And in the last scene, the apprentice is happily bashing out the gold teeth from the old man's corpse. After each story, the presenters cackle over the misfortunes of the characters before going on to the next story. Naturally, at the end of each issue, something goes "Plop!" on the presenters as well.
** This particular variant (hideous narrators and all) was a staple of pre-Comics Code Authority horror comics, particularly those published by EC.
** Later comic series like ''ComicBook/HouseOfMystery'' did these out of nostalgia for the old EC horror lines like ''ComicBook/TalesFromTheCrypt'' and its sister titles, ''The Vault of Horror'', ''The Haunt of Fear'', and ''Shock Suspenstories''.

* The ending of ''[[ComicBook/SpiderMan Amazing Fantasy #15.]]'' It might be one of the all-time famous examples of ItWasHisSled, but the death of Uncle Ben, one of the only two people Peter Parker cared for, certainly qualifies for this trope because it resulted from Peter’s own apathy and selfishness.
* Marvel Comics thrived on this trope, or tried to, in its pre-superhero days. The company's 50s anthology titles - ''Strange Tales'', ''Journey into Mystery'', ''Tales to Astonish'', ''Tales of Suspense'' - were stuffed with short strips that aimed for a Karmic Twist Ending or a CruelTwistEnding. Transparently inspired by Creator/ECComics and then Series/TheTwilightZone1959, the strips were weakened by repetitiveness and sheer lack of quality. Creator/SteveDitko was an especially prolific producer; he floated an entire series that presented five such strips a month every month in 1961-1962. It wasn't a success; fortunately he and Creator/StanLee took a different direction with the final issue: ''[[ComicBook/SpiderMan Amazing Fantasy #15]]''.

** In the episode "Top Billing", a struggling actor played by Creator/JonLovitz competes with his more handsome and successful former rival for a role in a production of ''Theatre/{{Hamlet}}''. When his rival is chosen for the role based purely on his looks, Lovitz's character murders him, and in his absence is accepted to fill in his role... which the murderous director reveals to be the role of [[AlasPoorYorick Yorick's]] skull.
** A similar example happens in the episode "Beauty Rest" where a would-be pageant queen murders a rival in order to win the contest... only to discover that it's "Miss Autopsy" where the winner is eviscerated and displayed for the audience.
** In "Dead Right", a GoldDigger marries a hideous and abusive man after being told by a fortune teller that he will inherit a large amount of money and then die. This turns out to be a ProphecyTwist -- the woman wins the money and then tells her husband she's leaving. He murders her in a rage and then inherits her winnings right before being executed for the murder.
** "Easel Kill Ya", with Creator/TimRoth as an artist who creates paintings using material from recently killed people. When his girlfriend finds out, she gets struck down by a car and needs a life-saving, expensive operation. The artist tells the hospital staff to get the specialist who can perform it. When his benefactor demands another painting to pay for the hospital fee, he murders a passer-by to create it. Too bad the guy he killed was the specialist, just as the cops find his casually discarded paintbrush.

* Creator/RoaldDahl's ''The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar'' digresses to suggest "what a competent writer of fiction would have done" for the sake of a TwistEnding: to give Henry, who used his powers of XRayVision for personal gain, some inventive manner of KarmicDeath. In this suggested ending, Henry, feeling a pain in his chest, uses his X-Ray Vision to see all his internal organs and a blood clot slowly moving towards his heart. But Henry's story is not fiction ([[DirectLineToTheAuthor so Dahl claims]]), so it must continue to the actual, not-so-dramatic ending. In fact, this kind of twist occurs in many if not most of Dahl's short stories.
* In ''William and Mary'', this trope gets pulled twice over; first, the titular JerkAss protagonist William dies, and Mary is happy, because he was an emotionally abusive spouse and now she'll be free of him. But then, it turns out that William volunteered for a science experiment that preserves his life as a BrainInAJar. And then it turns out that he can't really enforce his demands on her anymore, so while he's still alive, Mary feels no fear of him anymore, and resolves to enjoy her life and do all the things that William would prevent her from doing, [[AndIMustScream all while he's incapable of doing anything but helplessly watching as she defies his will]].

!!This is a SpoileredRotten trope, which means that ''EVERY SINGLE EXAMPLE'' listed below is a spoiler by default and will be unmarked without a tag. [[Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned This is your last warning]], only proceed if you really believe you can handle this list.

--->'''Scientist:''' If only I'd ordered the robot to make me [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor be more careful with what I wished for!]] [[HypocriticalHumor Robot, experience this]] [[DramaticIrony tragic irony]] [[HypocriticalHumor for]] [[IgnoredEpiphany me]].\\

* The revival series ''Series/{{The Outer Limits|1995}}'' did this fairly often, though not as much as the CruelTwistEnding.
** In "New Lease", two scientists invent a device that can revive the dead. They test it on various cryogenically frozen animals, then a person, but they find that every test subject can only last a day before it dies again. When one of the scientists is killed by a mugger, his partner decides to bring him back so they can have one last day together. The revived scientist, unable to let go of his desire for revenge and feeling he has nothing to lose, wastes the day tracking down the mugger, ignoring his friend and his family. When he finds the mugger, he murders him in public. To his horror, he finds out that the problem all along was the cryogenic freezing; having been revived as a fresh corpse, he's going to get to live to be arrested for the murder and most likely sentenced to life in prison.
** "Decompression" has a recently-elected senator aboard a plane that's going to crash. A time traveler tells him that he has to open the door and leap out, sacrificing the lives of all on board, so he can live to be elected President and usher in a new enlightenment, or else his opponent would be elected and become a ruthless tyrant. In the end, he jumps out with seconds to spare... whereupon the time traveler tells him that ''he'' was destined to become the tyrant, and lets him fall to his death while the plane lands safely.
** "Skin Deep" has a nerdy guy gain a device that lets him change his appearance. He murders a handsome coworker and steals his identity, reveling in his new popularity and hot girlfriend and letting it all go to his head. Some mob enforcers whom the handsome coworker apparently had dealings with and cheated murder him.
** "Second Thoughts" has a guy regularly murder people and use a device to absorb their memories and intelligence. He is greedy for knowledge. He makes the mistake of absorbing the mind of a suicidal artist, which causes him to go crazy and shoot himself in the head.
** "Bits of Love" has a nuclear war survivor living in a bunker with holograms for companionship. Even though the holograms think and feel emotion like him, he treats them with incredible disrespect, saying things such as that they are not real so their opinions don't matter. In the end, the holograms reprogram themselves to completely ignore him and create a holographic society for themselves. [[GoMadFromTheIsolation The man lasts about a minute before he cracks from loneliness]].
** "To Tell The Truth" has a discredited scientist discover that his newly-founded colony is about to be wiped out by a solar flare. Given that his discrediting was due to a prediction of volcanic activity that caused the colony to be moved at great expense but failed to occur, [[CassandraTruth no one believes him]] except his assistant and his mentor. He keeps on raising a fuss, until the colony's security chief reveals that evidence was found of an indigenous alien race when the colony was set up on the most valuable land on the planet - and not only accuses the scientist of being a shape-shifting saboteur trying to break up the colony, but condemns him with a DNA test that shows bizarre readings. He is then imprisoned and threatened with dissection, but the assistant, holding one last ounce of trust in her mentor, meets him in secret and tests him again to reveal that he is in fact human. As time is running out, the scientist, mentor and assistant attempt to escape the planet in the single emergency shuttle - and the scientist is mauled to death by a crazed mob while ensuring the escape of his two supporters. Afterward, the security chief mourns the scientist, and is mocked by the colony administrator for caring about an alien. The chief then reveals that ''he'' is the alien saboteur - ''he used his own DNA to fake the test'' - and states that it's ironic that the scientist, [[HumansAreBastards the only human in the colony he wished he could have spared]] for being "the gentlest of you", was the first to die, and at the hands of other humans - and then the solar flare hits, wiping out the colony and triggering the rebirth of the alien civilization.
** "Family Values" has Creator/TomArnold play a workaholic, neglectful dad. He's annoyed by all the stuff his family wants him to do that keeps piling up while he spends nights and weekends with his boss and clients, so after being (deservedly) relegated to the couch by his wife, he sees an infomercial for a servant robot called the 'Gideon 4000.' He orders one for no money down. Initially, his family is creeped out, but the robot looks out for them and they grow to like it. However, after Tom Arnold sees the thing teaching his son how to play baseball, he sees it as moving in on his family. He can't return it without his wife's signature, which she won't grant. After an unsuccessful attempt to destroy it, the robot points out that he's become nothing but a money faucet because of his neglectfulness and that he's easily disposed of. The episode ends with the dad meekly apologizing to Gideon for forgetting to wear a tie to dinner and a montage shot of several families sitting down to dinner with their Gideon robots.