History Main / RestartTheWorld

* In ''ComicBook/{{Hellboy}}'' and ''ComicBook/{{BPRD}}'', this is a very common motivation for the various individuals and {{Apocalypse Cult}}s trying to summon the Ogdru Jahad and end the world--they all think a new paradise will grow from the ashes. Some think civilization is corrupt and needs to be destroyed. Others think the apocalypse is inevitable, but if they are the ones to cause it, at least they can mitigate the destruction and guide the rebuilding afterwards.

* ''Film/EscapeFromLA'' ends with a technological version of this. Snake Plissken is once again forced into a mission for the government as he was in ''Film/EscapeFromNewYork'', but this time he becomes convinced that both the US Government (which has seemingly absorbed the worst of both the American left and right wing, and which is holding a DoomsdayDevice that will destroy all technology over the head of the rest of the world) and [[TheRevolutionWillNotBeCivilized the enemies of it]] are too corrupt and flawed to be worth backing or working with. He winds up using the super weapon himself to destroy all the advanced technology all over the world in the hope that when people rebuild the world, maybe they'll get it right.

** In ''Film/TheSpyWhoLovedMe'', DiabolicalMastermind Karl Stromberg plans to start a nuclear war between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. by launching a nuclear missile against each nation simultaneously. His justification?

I intend to change the face of history [snip] by creating a world. A new and beautiful world beneath the sea."''

** Alexander Pierce of ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'' expresses a motive of this. Through [[BigBrotherIsWatching Project Insight]], he hopes to make a new world that is safe from evil because potential terrorists can be [[DeathFromAbove killed before they can act]]. However, it later turns out that [[spoiler:the new world will be run by [[ANaziByAnyOtherName HYDRA]], and that those terrorists were funded by them in the first place specifically so HYDRA could sow chaos and scare the public into approving mass surveillance. In short, the old corrupt world became corrupt ''because'' HYDRA and Pierce made it so]].

** Ego starts off as a well-meaning father figure for Peter Quill in ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxyVol2'' but then it's revealed the real reason he brought them together is [[spoiler:he needs the Celestial-half of Peter's biology to power a universe-leveling event. Having traveled the cosmos for eons, Ego has become dismayed with mortal life and thinks it needs an upgrade, so he wants to wipe the slate clean and start over with a new universe built on himself as its core template. To that end he sired children across the cosmos, luring them back to his home planet to test their composition to see if it will let him execute his plan, killing them when it doesn't]].

* In ''Series/{{Arrow}}'', several season {{Big Bad}}s have this as their motivation. In Season 1, the Tempest conspiracy led by Malcolm Merlyn wants to destroy the crime-ridden neighborhood of The Glades so Starling City can flourish without it. In Season 2, Brother Blood wants to send all of Starling City into chaos so he can gain absolute power over the city and rebuild it to fit his vision ([[spoiler:except it turns out that he is working for Deathstroke who just wants the whole thing destroyed out of revenge against the Arrow, and Blood turns on Deathstroke when he realizes this]]). In Season 4, Damien Darhk has the same idea but on a global scale; create a nuclear holocaust and use the BlackMagic created from the deaths of billions to reshape the world. Malcolm Merlyn even points out that he is siding with Darhk because it is basically the same as his plan, only larger.

* ''VideoGame/CrashBandicoot4ItsAboutTime'': [[spoiler:This is ultimately the plan of Doctor Nefarious Tropy. After Neo Cortex is defeated by Crash and calls it quit, Nefarious reveals himself and ends his alliance with him. He explains that while Cortex is content with ''just'' ruling space and time, he would rather "start from scratch". Using the rift generator, Tropy plans to "wipe the slate clean" by rebooting the entire timeline and [[InTheirOwnImage rebuilding to his liking]], with [[GodhoodSeeker him as the only god]], of course.]]

* ''VideoGame/FarCry3BloodDragon'': Colonel Sloan intends to nuke human civilization out of existence, then build a new world around the principles [[TheSocialDarwinist Social Darwinism]].

** Downplayed; The Dark One wants to use the threat posed by [[EldritchAbomination the Snarl]] to coerce the other gods into giving the goblins equality with the other races. If that fails, though, his backup plan is to let the Snarl unmake the world, so he can use his influence as a [[DeityOfHumanOrigin Deity of Goblin Origin]] to make sure the goblins have a better place in the next world that the gods create.

** [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-2000 SCP-2000]] serves as one of these for the human race, though it's less of a deliberate restart and more of a backup file in case the Foundation is unable to prevent an apocalypse. [[spoiler:It's been activated at LEAST twice already, who know how many times it's ''actually'' been activated, and apparently setting the restart point too far back will screw up history too much (it's hinted going too far back once caused World War II to happen).]]

* ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'': In the episode "Space Madness", Stimpy is charged with guarding a literal [[BigRedButton red reset button]] ("The beautiful, shiny button! The jolly, candy-like button!") that would erase history if pressed.
* The third season of ''WesternAnimation/ReBoot'' ends with one, a {{justified|Trope}} case as the show takes place [[{{Cyberspace}} inside a computer]]. Megabyte, a virus, has infected Mainframe so badly that it cannot be saved, so Phong creates a backup of all the programs in the system, and lets the whole computer crash, hoping "The User" would hit the ResetButton.

** ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamCharsCounterattack'': Char hopes to do this by dropping Axis onto Earth, getting rid of the elitist humans that cling to it and “putting it to sleep for a while” so it can recover from all that humanity has done to it while the remainder of humanity stay in space and become Newtypes.

* The goal of ''Manga/FirePunch'''s BigBad is to reset the world via the WorldTree. Considering it's a dying CrapsackWorld and they just want to return the civilization to the way it's used to be like, it sounds noble, but their methods and motivations, specifically [[spoiler:solely to watch a new Franchise/StarWars film that got canceled in her time]], are not so.

* In ''VideoGame/MegaManX8'', BigBad [[spoiler:Lumine]] aims to create a world only for New Generation Reploids like him, with the Jacob SpaceElevator project being used to migrate everything they need to the moon before he exterminates all Old-Gen Reploids on earth and rebuild the world after that. He also states that, with the already broken and corrupt state of the world, it needs to be rebuilt from scratch anyways.
* In ''VideoGame/MegaManZX Advent'', Master Albert's grand plan revolves around using the completed [[ArtifactOfDoom Model W]] to "reset" the world, with him at the reins [[GodhoodSeeker as its god]]. In TheStinger exclusive to Hard Mode, [[spoiler:it turns out that Master Thomas, while disliking Albert's method, agrees with him that the world needs to be reset]].

* The rebirth of the world forms a core plot during the closing chapters of ''Literature/AvestaOfBlackAndWhite''. [[spoiler:Specifically, whenever either side wins the war of Good and Evil, the whole world is restarted with the sides and their roles shifted. Additionally, after Magsarion kills Nadare, the whole universe restarts again as it's supposed to after which he goes on his killing spree with the new Good and Evil both fearing this faceless monster killing and destroying world after world. It's an omnicide that will keep on going until there is no one left but him and God, and due to Nadare never getting a successor this go around this will be the last reset before Magsarion himself ascends to godhood and recreates the world in his own image.]]

** This is the ultimate goal of the BigBad in ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamAGE''.

* In ''Franchise/SailorMoon'', this is the duty of Sailor Saturn. If the world can't be saved, then she brings down her Silence Glaive to destroy it, at which point Queen Serenity or Sailor Moon uses the Silver Crystal to restore the world. She did this to the Silver Millennium after the Dark Kingdom's victory, allowing the Sailor Senshi to reincarnate in modern Earth.

* One ''ComicBook/DoubleDuck'' story was about a secret society which planned to destroy the world and humanity by causing series of seismic events. They believed this would allow them to create an utopia, and their leader [[NoPlaceForMeThere planned to stay behind and die in the catalysm]] while the other members took to shelters. Naturally, Donald and Kay were able to prevent this.

** ''ComicBook/RasAlGhul'': The titular ecoterrorist has this as a standard plot in all his incarnations.
--->''Our world is not for everyone. Only those who prove their worth will enter it. The rest will be purged... and if nine hundred and ninety-nine must perish for every one who lives... so be it!'' -- (''ComicBook/{{Azrael}}'' Vol. 2 #18)
** ''ComicBook/TheLegendOfWonderWoman2016'': This turns out to be [[spoiler:Zeus]]'s plan, to kill most humans on the planet while destroying all of their civilizations and preserving only a handful who will be subjugated and forced to serve him and the new [[CrapsackWorld glorious civilization]] he intends to bring. Of course he feels that the world is ruined and humanity has fallen mostly because essentially [[GodsNeedPrayerBadly no one is worshipping him anymore]] which is causing his power to fade and will eventually kill him.
* In ''Comicbook/{{Hellboy}}'' and ''Comicbook/{{BPRD}}'', this is a very common motivation for the various individuals and {{Apocalypse Cult}}s trying to summon the Ogdru Jahad and end the world--they all think a new paradise will grow from the ashes. Some think civilization is corrupt and needs to be destroyed. Others think the apocalypse is inevitable, but if they are the ones to cause it, at least they can mitigate the destruction and guide the rebuilding afterwards.

--->Today civilization as we know it is corrupt and decadent. Inevitably, it will destroy itself. I'm merely accelerating the process.\\
I intend to change the face of history [snip] by creating a world. A new and beautiful world beneath the sea.

* In ''Film/StarTrekIIITheSearchForSpock'', the Klingons believed the Genesis device was meant to be used for this weaponized purpose - destroying life on inhabited worlds and remaking them favorable to human life - rather than its stated purpose of creating life on lifeless worlds.
* ''Film/EscapeFromLA'' ends with a technological version of this. Snake Plissken is once again forced into a mission for the government as he was in ''Film/EscapeFromNewYork'', but this time he becomes convinced that both the US Government (which has seemingly absorbed the worst of both the American left and right wing, and which is holding a DoomsdayDevice that will destroy all technology over the head of the rest of the world) and [[TheRevolutionWillNotBeCivilized the enemies of it]] are too corrupt and flawed to be worth backing or working with. He winds up using the super weapon himself to destroy all the advanced technology all over the world in the hope that when people rebuild the world, maybe they'll get it right.
* ''Film/{{Noah}}'' has this as "[[InsistentTerminology The Creator's]]" plan: flood the Earth to end TheDescendantsOfCain, using Noah and his family to save the land dwelling animals and birds. There's a twist though: Noah doesn't think the Creator ''wanted'' humanity to start over, but for his new, pristine world to exist without the stain of humans. He took this from a DespairEventHorizon over seeing the Cainites go cannibalistic. The latter part of the movie deals with him condemning his family (and humanity) by not bringing wives for his sons and later threatening to kill any granddaughters Illa may give birth to. In the end, [[spoiler:he chooses not to kill his granddaughters and allow humanity to repopulate, Illa's reasoning being the Creator left that choice to Noah.]]
* The League of Shadows from ''Film/TheDarkKnightTrilogy'' wanted to subject Gotham City to this, believing that it could not be saved from the corruption that had permeated it. Bruce Wayne, their newest disciple, saw things differently.
* This turns out to be Umbrella's plan in the ''Film/ResidentEvilFilmSeries'': use the T-Virus to wipe out humanity while their chosen survivors ride it out in cold sleep, then re-emerge to rebuild the world in their image.

** Alexander Pierce of ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'' expresses a motive of this. Through [[BigBrotherIsWatching Project Insight]], he hopes to make a new world that is safe from evil because potential terrorists can be [[DeathFromAbove killed before they can act]]. However, it later turns out that [[spoiler:the new world will be run by [[ANaziByAnyOtherName HYDRA]], and that those terrorists were funded by them in the first place specifically so HYDRA could sow chaos and scare the public into approving mass surveillance. In short, the old corrupt world became corrupt ''because'' HYDRA and Pierce made it so.]]
** Ultron doesn't ''start'' this way in ''Film/AvengersAgeOfUltron'' but his MotiveDecay throughout the movie eventually shifts to this point by the final act where he determines the only real way forward is to trigger a human extinction then repopulate the world with machines, seeing that humanity isn't fit to be in charge of its own destiny.
** Ego starts off as a well-meaning father figure for Peter Quill in ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxyVol2'' but then it's revealed the real reason he brought them together is [[spoiler:he needs the Celestial-half of Peter's biology to power a universe-leveling event. Having traveled the cosmos for eons, Ego has become dismayed with mortal life and thinks it needs an upgrade so he wants to wipe the slate clean and start over with a new universe built on himself as its core template. To that end he sired children across the cosmos, luring them back to his home planet to test their composition to see if it will let him execute his plan, killing them when it doesn't]].
** Thanos in ''Film/AvengersEndgame'' has [[spoiler:traveled from a different timeline to a timeline where his counterpart managed to succeed in his original mission of eradicating half the population of the universe in order preserve the living half, using the power of the Infinity Stones. However all that he has witnessed is those who remained do whatever it takes to undo his life's work. Angered by this, he then decides that mortals only pine for their losses when something is taken from them, not realizing the blessing they have been given and that to ensure that people won't be trapped in the past, vows to eliminate the ''entire'' universe and start over with a balanced universe to ensure that no one misses that which they lost]].
* ''Film/GodsOfEgypt'': The villain Set is disheartened when he learns that his harsh upbringing and infertility was his father Ra's way to prepare Set for the duty of protecting the world from being devoured by the monster Apophis, a lonely job where Set will have no company. Set thus decides to let Apophis consume both the mortal world and the afterlife, reasoning that afterward he'll be able to create a new world without death.
* ''{{Film/Tenet}}'': It turns out the reason people from the future are interfering with the past is because the future Earth is so damaged by climate change that these people would rather permanently reverse the flow of time to return to a healthier planet.

* ''Literature/Nightfall1941'': {{Discussed|Trope}}. When [[TotalEclipseOfThePlot the eclipse]] happens, the population GoesMadFromTheRevelation of all the stars in the sky and burns down their civilization, leaving the survivors to start over from scratch. There is archaeological evidence that this has happened multiple times in the past, but the one time we witness it the records of the previous event are considered a myth only believed in by a few crazy cultists. The cultists believe it is the wrath of their god, destroying their civilization and starting over.
* In the ''Literature/WellWorld'' novel ''Twilight at the Well of Souls'', the Well of Souls, the giant computer that keeps most of the Universe in existence, is slowly being destroyed by spreading damage caused by a human superweapon. [[spoiler:Nathan Brazil and Mavra Chang must enter the Well of Souls, shut it down (destroying most of the Universe in the process -- only the 'original' Universe of the Markovians will still exist), and then restart it, creating a new Universe to replace the old one and not-incidentally giving the Well Computer the opportunity to repair itself]].
%%* ''Literature/AtlasShrugged'': This is John Galt's goal. "The man who said he would stop the motor of the world, and did."%%Explain.

* ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' has one in Julian's ''Film/JamesBond''-esque holonovel named [[MeaningfulName Dr. Noah]], who wants to obliterate mankind with a global flood and use his mountain palace of geniuses to repopulate.

* In ''Series/{{Arrow}}'', several season {{Big Bad}}s have this as their motivation. In Season 1, the Tempest conspiracy led by Malcolm Merlyn wants to destroy the crime-ridden neighborhood of The Glades so Starling City can flourish without it. In Season 2, Brother Blood wants to send all of Starling City into chaos so he can gain absolute power over the city and rebuild it to fit his vision ([[spoiler:except it turns out he is working for Deathstroke who just wants the whole thing destroyed out of revenge against the Arrow, and Blood turns on Deathstroke when he realizes this]]). In Season 4, Damien Darhk has the same idea but on a global scale; create a nuclear holocaust and use the BlackMagic created from the deaths of billions to reshape the world. Malcolm Merlyn even points out that he is siding with Darhk because it is basically the same as his plan, only larger.
* ''Series/Babylon5'': Essentially the motivation of the Shadows. They appear every thousand years and provoke all the races of the galaxy into a giant Darwinian war. The "unworthy" races are driven to extinction, leaving the surviving races to rebuild from the ashes.
* When the Judge in ''Series/TheGoodPlace'' is clued in on the fact that the system for morally evaluating people is fatally flawed, her first impulse is to completely reset the world and start over. This would eliminate all the characters, so they go to a lot of trouble to talk her out of this.
* ''Series/{{Heroes}}'': Adam Monroe has this as his primary motivation in Season 2. Having lived for hundreds of years due to his regeneration ability, he's seen how evil humanity can be (living through wars, genocide, and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Hiro stealing his girl 400 years ago]]), so he plans to unleash an unstoppable virus on humanity that will eradicate mankind save for the "evolved humans" who will repopulate the Earth and bring about peace.
* ''Series/TomicaHeroRescueForce'': The end goal of the [[NebulousEvilOrganisation Neo Terror]] terrorist organization is to "reset" the world by wiping human civilization off the face of the planet in order to correct the environmental damage humanity has done to it.

--> This is the only way\\

Let’s burn it all down.

* ''VideoGame/MegaManZX Advent''
** Master Albert's grand plan revolves around using the completed [[ArtifactOfDoom Model W]] to "reset" the world, with him at the reins as its god.
** In TheStinger exclusive to Hard Mode, [[spoiler:it turns out that Master Thomas, while disliking Albert's method, agrees with him that the world needs to be reset.]]
* Same thing also happens in ''VideoGame/MegaManX8''. BigBad [[spoiler:Lumine]] aims to create a world only for New Generation Reploids like him, with the Jacob SpaceElevator project being used to migrate everything they need to the moon before he exterminates all Old-Gen Reploids on earth and rebuild the world after that. He also states that, with the already broken and corrupt state of the world, it needs to be rebuilt from scratch anyways.
* ''Videogame/FarCry3BloodDragon'': Colonel Sloan intends to nuke human civilization out of existence, then build a new world around the principles of MightMakesRight and [[SocialDarwinist Social Darwinism]].
* ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'':
** ''VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl'': Cyrus, the leader of Team Galactic, plans to reset the universe to his liking with the power of legendary Pokemon without TheEvilsOfFreeWill.
** ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'': Lysandre and Team Flare wish to use the Ultimate Weapon powered by the box legends in order to kill every non-Flare human and all Pokémon in order to start the world anew.
* In ''VideoGame/SuperPaperMario'' Count Bleck wants to do this so he can make a new world without sadness, [[spoiler:or so he claims. He actually intends to let it all be destroyed for good, [[WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds unable to see any value in existence after losing his love]]. [[TheStarscream Dimentio]], on the other hand, plans to remake the world in his own twisted image]].
* In ''VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiIIINocturne'' Hikawa triggers the Conception, a cataclysm that reduces the world to an egg-like state from which a new world can be born. His goal is for the new world to conform to his philosophy of Shijima, a WorldOfSilence in which humanity is unified with all that is in a single, great mind (sort of an universal Enlightenment). In fact, the entire proposal of the Conception hinges on giving up in the old world and convincing God ItIsBeyondSaving so it can all be torn down so a new cycle can begin.
* ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}}'':
** Thus is the reason the Burning Legion exists. The creator of the Legion, Sargeras, was originally the champion of the titans whose dury was to protect the universe from demons and other horrors. After spending aeons fighting the forces of evil he concluded that the universe itself was flawed and tainted, and the only way to rid it of evil was to destroy it and remake it without the flaws. So he united the demons he had been fighting against into an army whose sole purpose was to burn down the universe.
** Algalon the Observer, an OptionalBoss from ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'', represents the Titans, the creators of Azeroth. His job is to assess the world in order to determine whether or not the world is too corrupted to be allowed to continue existing in its current form. If it is, the Titans are to destroy Azeroth and create it anew. Due to the [[CrapsackWorld crapsack nature of Azeroth]], and in particular the corruption of the Old Gods, Algalon is set to deliver an unfavorable report to his masters when you meet the guy, and you have to take him down to prevent the world and all life upon it from being destroyed.

%%* ''VideoGame/{{Tropico}}'': This is the BigBad's ultimate goal in the single-player campaign for ''Tropico 5''.
* In ''VideoGame/TimeCrisis 5'', [[spoiler:Robert]]'s true goal is to reset the whole world with a pain and fear relief drug Keith had to protect in a mission three years before the start of the game, knowing that the drug can turn humans into zombies as a side effect. The mission fails and [[spoiler:Robert takes the drug for himself so he can zombify the entirety of New York three years later]].
* In ''Franchise/TheElderScrolls'' series, the universe runs in "kalpas", cycles of time. At the end of every kalpa, Alduin, the [[DragonsAreDemonic draconic]] BeastOfTheApocalypse, performs his [[AboveGoodAndEvil divinely mandated duty]] of "[[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt eating the world]]" so that it can be [[ViciousCycle remade anew]]. In the current kalpa, Alduin discovered that he prefers to be worshiped as a god, and decides to shirk his duty and try to TakeOverTheWorld instead. The ancient Nords temporarily defeated Alduin by using an [[TomeOfEldritchLore Elder Scroll]] to cast Alduin several thousand years forward in time. He emerges just prior to the events of ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim Skyrim]]'', where he serves as the BigBad and the [[PlayerCharacter Last Dragonborn]] must defeat him. [[spoiler:Given that his soul is not absorbed when the Dragonborn defeats him, it's implied that Alduin is not truly defeated, and will return when it is the appropriate time for him to fulfill his duty as world-eater]].
* Near the end of ''VideoGame/{{Obsidian}}'', Ceres, the nanobot-generating AI, decides that Earth should not have humans, since [[ZerothLawRebellion they were the ones who caused the pollution]] it was programmed to reverse. Ceres drew this conclusion based on the dreams you and your partner Max had during its construction, which the AI physically built to study. [[spoiler: In the final realm, after Max rigs the [[MoralityChip Crossover Switch]] to crash Ceres' systems for good, you're given the choice between this, and permitting the Conductor, Ceres' avatar, to "reboot" the world using its nanobots, leaving you and Max the [[LastOfTheirKind only humans left alive]].]]
* ''VideoGame/TheSecretWorld:'' [[spoiler:The Gaia Engines]] provide a way to restart the world in case shit hits the fan too hard for anyone to do anything about it; the only known times that has happened was [[spoiler:when [[EldritchAbomination the Dreamers woke up]]]]. The disadvantages to doing this are that they're now damaged and might not be able to do it again, and it restarts the world ''all the way back''.

** The BigBad of the first arc wants to do this [[spoiler:because Goetia is a WellIntentionedExtremist who believes mortal lives are finite and full of suffering (unable to grasp the advantages of a mortal lifespan), so he burns the timeline to ash and wants to use the collected energy to travel back to the beginning and make mankind immortal and flawless.]]
** The crux of the second arc is that [[spoiler:the world has been wiped clean by the Foreign God who assigns the seven Crypters to fight for which of their [[AlternateTimeline Lostbelts]] will replace Proper Human History going forward and giving their denied worlds a chance to grow. Chaldea represents the Proper Human History and must defeat each Lostbelt to restore the old world (and deal with the moral dilemma of just what is "right" when victory means genociding so many innocents whose only "crime" is being born in the wrong timeline). It's unclear just ''why'' the Foreign God wants this, especially since its original plan was to have just one Lostbelt and Crypter and only made it ThereCanBeOnlyOne when that Crypter ([[WellIntentionedExtremist Kirschtaria Wodime]]) insisted his fellow Team A members have a chance. Wodime himself took this as an opportunity to both complete his ''own'' plan to "restart" the world by turning humanity into god-hybrids and [[TheStarscream go behind the Foreign God's back]] in the hope the new humanity would be able to unite and defeat it.]]
* ''VideoGame/CrashBandicoot4ItsAboutTime'': [[spoiler: This is ultimately the plan of Doctor Nefarious Tropy. After Neo Cortex is defeated by Crash and calls it quit, Nefarious reveals himself and ends his alliance with him. He explains that while Cortex is content with ''just'' ruling space and time, he would rather "start from scratch". Using the rift generator, Tropy plans to "wipe the slate clean" by rebooting the entire timeline and [[InTheirOwnImage rebuilding to his liking]], with him as the only god, of course.]]
* ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'': The BigBad [[spoiler: Corypheus, one of the Ancient Tevinter magisters who invaded the Black City and became darkspawn, is trying to cause this in order to restore his homeland to its former glory, the ritual for which is actually interrupted by the player before the game even starts]]. As it turns out, the [[spoiler: other BigBad, Fen'Harel, who it turns out is actually Solas' true identity, was trying to do the same thing by collapsing the border between the real world and the Fade so he could reshape reality to 1000 years earlier to undo his mistake that condemned the elves to subjugation in the first place]]. Both plans, by necessity, would result in a massive death toll throughout Thedas.
* ''VideoGame/{{Baroque}}'': If the player character makes it to the bottom of the Neuro Tower and kills God's Avatar, they'll gain her Baroque Crystal. Mission control reveals the crystal can create a new world, but the player character immediately decides to reset the world instead, which unfortunately does not prevent the apocalypse and effectively rewinds time.
* ''VideoGame/HorizonZeroDawn'' has a heroic example in the GAIA AI system, which was built to do this [[spoiler:after [[RobotWar the Faro Plague]] devoured Earth's biosphere, using {{terraforming}} to restore organic life and ecosystems to a barren husk. One of its subroutines, HADES, was meant as a reset button in case GAIA messed up the terraforming process and had to start over.]]

* This happened once in ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}''. [[spoiler:After Salem turned the whole of mankind against the Gods of Light and Darkness, the God of Darkness decided to kill them all to punish and spite her, [[DetonationMoon breaking the moon]] on his way out. To atone for what happened, the God of Light allowed humanity to return, though [[NothingIsTheSameAnymore the species was forever stripped of magic and the faunus came into being.]]]]
* ''WebAnimation/VelmaMeetsTheOriginalVelma'': Every time [[AnimalisticAbomination Scooby]]'s ability to talk is questioned, he kills the entire cast, takes a bit of their essence, and recreates the world in a new iteration. He's done this enough for there to have been over half a dozen iterations, with the ''WesternAnimation/{{Velma}}'' one being the most recent and, in his own words, [[TakeThat the most flawed]].

* [[http://pbfcomics.com/111/ This strip]] by ''ComicStrip/ThePerryBibleFellowship'', in which a spaceship finds a reset button in the middle of space, which starts evolution all over again and creates a StableTimeLoop.

** Downplayed; The Dark One wants to use the threat posed by [[EldritchAbomination the Snarl]] to coerce the other gods into giving the goblins equality with the other races. If that fails, though, his backup plan is to let the Snarl unmake the world, so he can use his influence as a [[DeityOfHumanOrigin Deity Of Goblin Origin]] to make sure the goblins have a better place in the next world that the gods create.

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'' episode "Space Madness", Stimpy is charged with guarding a literal red reset button ("The beautiful, shiny button! The jolly, candy-like button!") that would erase history if pressed. HilarityEnsues.
* In ''WesternAnimation/ReBoot'', the third season ended with one, a {{Justified|Trope}} case as the show takes place [[{{Cyberspace}} inside a computer]]. Megabyte, a virus, has infected Mainframe so badly that it cannot be saved, so Phong creates a backup of all the programs in the system, and lets the whole computer crash, hoping "The User" would hit the ResetButton.
* The BigBad of the final season of ''WesternAnimation/RegularShow'' - and by extension, the whole series - is Malum-Kranus, [[spoiler:also known as Anti-Pops, Pops' EvilTwin]]. He believes the universe is broken and wants to destroy it in a battle with his brother. The battle has happened over and over, and every time the universe is destroyed and then restarts all over again. [[spoiler:Pops defeats him by giving him a CooldownHug while they fly into a sun, thus sparing the universe.]]

* This happened once in ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}''. [[spoiler:After Salem turned the whole of mankind against the Gods of Light and Darkness, the God of Darkness decided to kill them all to punish and spite her, [[DetonationMoon breaking the moon]] on his way out. To atone for what happened, the God of Light allowed humanity to return, though [[NothingIsTheSameAnymore the species was forever stripped of magic and the faunus came into being. ]] ]]

[[folder:Web Comics]]

** ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamCharsCounterattack'': Char hopes to do this by dropping Axis onto Earth, getting rid of the humans that cling to it and “putting it to sleep for a while” so it can recover from all that humanity has done to it while the remainder of humanity stay in space and become Newtypes.

-->-- '''Larry Foulke''', ''VideoGame/AceCombatZeroTheBelkanWar''

Often the goal of a MadScientist, DiabolicalMastermind, GeneralRipper, or a group of [[BombThrowingAnarchists anarchists]]. You can likely expect a MisanthropeSupreme to want this to solve the "problem" of those pesky fellow humans "ruining" the world. A subtrope of OmnicidalManiac. Compare InTheirOwnImage, BurnBabyBurn (which is this on a very small scale), ApocalypseHow (Class 2), ResetButton.

* The rebirth of the world forms a core plot during the closing chapters of ''LightNovel/AvestaOfBlackAndWhite'', [[spoiler:specifically whenever either side wins the war of Good and Evil, the whole world is restarted with the sides and their roles shifted. Additionally, after Magsarion kills Nadare, the whole universe restarts again as it's supposed to after which he goes on his killing spree with the new Good and Evil both fearing this faceless monster killing and destroying world after world. It's an omnicide that will keep on going until there is no one left but him and God, and due to Nadare never getting a successor this go around this will be the last reset before Magsarion himself ascends to godhood and recreates the world in his own image]].

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS11E2InvasionOfTheDinosaurs Invasion of the Dinosaurs]]", the scientists' plan was to do this to the world by loading a select few colonists onto a spaceship and then turning back time to a pre-technological age (while telling the colonists they were actually going to a new world).

Often the goal of a MadScientist, DiabolicalMastermind, GeneralRipper, or a group of [[BombThrowingAnarchists anarchists]]. A subtrope of OmnicidalManiac. Compare InTheirOwnImage, BurnBabyBurn (which is this on a very small scale), ApocalypseHow (Class 2), ResetButton.

* ''Film/GodsOfEgypt'': The villain Set is disheartened when he learns that his harsh upbringing by his father Ra was to prepare him for the duty of protecting the world from being devoured by the monster Apophis, a lonely job where he will have no company. He thus decides to let Apophis consume both the mortal world and the afterlife, reasoning that afterward he'll be able to create a new world without death.

** ''ComicBook/TheLegendOfWonderWoman2016'': This turns out to be [[spoiler:Zeus]]'s plan, to kill most humans on the planet while destroying all of their civilizations and preserving only a handful who will be subjugated and forced to serve him and the new [[CrapsackWorld glorious civilization]] he intends to bring. Of course he feels that the world is ruined and humanity has fallen mostly because essentially [[GodsNeedPrayerBadly no one is worshiping him anymore]] which is causing his power to fade and will eventually kill him.

* In ''Series/{{Arrow}}'', several season {{Big Bad}}s have this as their motivation. In Season One the Tempest conspiracy led by Malcolm Merlyn wants to destroy the crime-ridden neighborhood of The Glades so Starling City can flourish without it. In Season 2, Brother Blood wants to send all of Starling City into chaos so he can gain absolute power over the city and rebuild it to fit his vision. In Season 4 Damien Darhk has the same idea but on a global scale; create a nuclear holocaust and use the BlackMagic created from the deaths of billions to reshape the world. Malcolm Merlyn even points out that he is siding with Darhk because it is basically the same as his plan, only larger.

** ''VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl'': Cyrus, the leader of Team Galactic, plans to reset the universe to his liking with the power of legendary Pokemon.

** Algalon the Observer, a BonusBoss from ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'', represents the Titans, the creators of Azeroth. His job is to assess the world in order to determine whether or not the world is too corrupted to be allowed to continue existing in its current form. If it is, the Titans are to destroy Azeroth and create it anew. Due to the [[CrapsackWorld crapsack nature of Azeroth]], and in particular the corruption of the Old Gods, Algalon is set to deliver an unfavorable report to his masters when you meet the guy, and you have to take him down to prevent the world and all life upon it from being destroyed.

* The end goal of the [[NebulousEvilOrganisation Neo Terror]] terrorist organization is to "reset" the world by wiping human civilization off the face of the planet in order to correct the environmental damage humanity has done to it.

** God Himself, in the book of Genesis, decides mankind has become too sinful to continue, and decides to destroy the world in a flood, saving a small group consisting of Noah, his wife, sons and daughters-in-law and two of each animal (and seven of the ceremonially clean ones) to repopulate Earth afterwards.