History Main / ShaggydogStory

* LetsPlay/PartyCrashers: In "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eay58RkhQmA Mario Party 3 is the MOST TOXIC, and this game proves why...]]", Sophist receives the Koopa Kard from a Hidden Block on turn 1, a rare item that allows the user to receive all of the coins saved up in the Koopa Bank by simply passing it rather than landing on the space... It ends up never getting used, [[YankTheDogsChain as Nick steals it with a Plunder Chest the very next turn]] and then (to add insult to injury) proceeds to never use it due to the Bank never having enough coins to justify using it.

* In the LetsPlay/PartyCrashers[='=] game on ''VideoGame/MarioParty3''[='=]s [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eay58RkhQmA Spiny Desert]], Sophist receives the Koopa Kard from a Hidden Block on turn 1, a rare item that allows the user to receive all of the coins saved up in the Koopa Bank by simply passing it rather than landing on the space... It ends up never getting used, [[YankTheDogsChain as Nick steals it with a Plunder Chest the very next turn]] and then (to add insult to injury) proceeds to never use it due to the Bank never having enough coins to justify using it.

* In the LetsPlay/PartyCrashers[='=] game on ''VideoGame/MarioParty3''[='=]s [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eay58RkhQmA Spiny Desert]], Sophist receives the Koopa Kard from a Hidden Block on turn 1, a rare item that allows the user to receive all of the coins saved up in the Koopa Bank by simply passing it rather than landing on the space. It ends up never getting used, [[YankTheDogsChain as Nick steals it with a Plunder Chest the very next turn]] and then (to add insult to injury) proceeds to never use it due to the Bank never having enough coins to justify using it.

* In the LetsPlay/PartyCrashers[='=] game on ''VideoGame/MarioParty3''[='=]s [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eay58RkhQmA Spiny Desert]], Sophist receives the Koopa Kard from a Hidden Block on turn 1, a rare item that allows the user to receive all of the coins saved up in the Koopa Bank by simply passing it rather than landing on the space. [[spoiler:It ends up never getting used, [[YankTheDogsChain as Nick steals it with a Plunder Chest the very next turn]] and then (to add insult to injury) proceeds to never use it due to the Bank never having enough coins to justify using it.]]

* LetsPlay/PartyCrashers: At one point during their game on ''Mario Party 3''[='=]s [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eay58RkhQmA Spiny Desert]], Sophist receives the Koopa Kard from a Hidden Block on turn one, a rare item that allows the user to receive all of the coins saved up in the Koopa Bank by simply passing it rather than landing on the space... It ends up never getting used, [[YankTheDogsChain as Nick steals it with a Plunder Chest the very next turn]] and then (to add insult to injury) proceeds to never use it due to the Bank never having enough coins to justify using it.

Not to be confused with Disney's ''Film/TheShaggyDog'', the web series ''WebAnimation/ShaggyDogStories'', or Shaggy's dog Franchise/ScoobyDoo. Also unrelated to "Shaggy God Story", an alternate name for EarthAllAlong.

* ''WebVideo/PeanutButterGamer'' did videos about Goodwill games. In the sixth installment, the final game he plays is a CallBack to the second installment, in which he plays the first game from the ''VideoGame/MiasBigAdventureCollection'', ''Mia's Reading Adventure: The Search for Grandma's Remedy''. At long last, [=PBG=] had come prepared with everything that prevented him from completing a single Mia game; he never encountered a single GameBreakingBug, and he had the second disc, and he is excited to see what finally happens after all these years...only to discover that it went to nothing. All that happens is that Mia simply hops on a bird, thanks the player for helping her before saying farewell to the player, and it just cues an IrisOut with Mia giggling. [=PBG=] is not pleased.

--> And the moral of the fable is: [[spoiler:When you go into a bakery, make sure it is not run by... A ''STUPID BITCH!'']]

** One example was when he was on Conan, and it tells the story of a moth who goes to a pediatrist's office, and laments about how his life. His job is soul-sucking, his life has no purpose, his marriage is joyless and lacking love, his youngest child died, he can't love his other child, and [[DespairEventHorizon he has contemplated suicide]]. The Pediatrist asks the moth why he would tell him instead of a psychologist. The moth replies:[[spoiler: "Cause the light was on".]]
** Another involves his encounter with two midgets in Vegas. The two midgets proceed to hire several prostitutes. They take the ladies to their rooms, but one of the midgets is too drunk to "perform", and blames the prostitute, kicking her out. He then goes by the wall where his buddy is in the other room and hears from the other side "One, two, AAH! One, two, AAH!" The first midget thinks that the other midget is having a good time. The next morning, they talk about the previous nights and how bad they were. The second midget also explains that he was having a bad time because [[spoiler:he couldn't even reach the bed]].

** There was a very ''long'' series of strips involving Peppermint Patty training for an ice skating tournament that ran over a whole winter. First, she hired Snoopy as a coach. Then she convinced Marcie to make her a skating dress; Marcie tried her best, but she couldn't sew, and made an awful dress. It almost ruined their friendship, until Marcie's mother made Patty a beautiful dress. Then Patty needed to get a new hairdo to go with it; Marcie was no good at that, so Patty went to Charlie Brown's dad - who's a barber. Unfortunately, he mistook her for a boy, and gave her a boy's haircut. Patty averted another disaster by buying a wig... [[spoiler:but in the end, it all turned out to be pointless, because the tournament was actually a roller skating competition.]]
** In another long arc, Linus' teacher Ms. Othmar asked him to bring eggshells to school so that his class could make model igloos, but again and again, Linus either kept forgetting or something would happen to foil his plans. (One time he remembered to bring them - on Saturday.) [[spoiler:Finally, he remembered, and brought them to school, only to find that Ms. Othmar had quit her job and was getting married. (As Linus said, "I knew the eggshells were only a manifestation of a deeper problem!") The story did end on a high note: Linus sent her a box of eggshells as a wedding present.]]

* In ''ComicStrip/TheWackyAdventuresOfPedro'', Pedro's roughly two-year search for fruit that could make his homemade ice cream blue ''and'' flavorful becomes this when upon returning [[ItMakesSenseInContext from outer space]], [[spoiler:a friend offers him some blue and flavorful indigo plum ice cream]].

* In ''Theatre/AGentlemansGuideToLoveAndMurder'', Monty has already murdered several people to get closer to inheriting the D'Ysquith family fortune. But the next target, Lord Asquith D'Ysquith, Sr., had shown him nothing but kindness and treated him like a son, and he can't decide if he has the nerve to kill the man. [[spoiler:Lord Asquith dies painlessly of a heart attack mid-song. Monty doesn't waste a beat plotting the next and final murder.]]

* The entire play ''Theatre/WaitingForGodot'' consists of two guys [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin waiting for a guy named Godot]], [[spoiler:who never shows up]].

* In ''VisualNovel/NineHoursNinePersonsNineDoors'', if the Safe ending hasn't been cleared beforehand, then the True ending route ends with [[spoiler:several of the group, including the main character, forced to hopelessly try and work out a passcode for which they lack the necessary clue]].
* In the brilliantly-written ''VisualNovel/TimeHollow'', the intrepid hero finds himself in a completely altered reality, with no memories whatsoever of how it happened and no idea how to set things right. All he has is a mystical pen with the ability to alter something that happened in the past, each time changing his present reality in drastic and unpredictable ways. Sometimes solving a problem creates an entirely different problem, which he must then seek out and fix. After countless twists, turns, harrowing confrontations, and narrow escapes, the pieces ever-so-gradually fall into place (with several pieces falling out in the meantime). It turns out that if the hero goes to a certain location to save a certain person's life, this will avert the long chain of events which caused time to go out of whack, and everything will return to normal. Of course, by then it should be readily apparent that had he just known that beforehand, he could've just done that right away and saved several weeks of trouble. [[spoiler:Even better, once you finish the game, you can start a new one and do just that! Meet your enemy on the street, let him know that you're onto his scheme, and offer to set things right. He'll grudgingly give you one night to make good on your offer, which is more than enough. Go to the school, get the pen from your dad, save the girl, done. You even get a special ending for your trouble.]]

* ''WebAnimation/MonkeyWrench:'' "The Ghost Egg": Shrike and Beebs need to perform an escort mission for Nobert, a very paranoid and annoying bird who drives Shrike insane. [[spoiler:After suffering through 6 days of Nobert, delivering him to the agreed spot, fending off rival forces, and cornering the assassin Kara, Monkey Wrench's contract is rendered void when Nobert's mother, Queen Potoo, arrives and aggressively convinces him to return to his princely duties. Kara leaves, having completed her bounty, while Shrike is left distraught and Beebs needs to carry him away.]]
-->[[spoiler:'''Shrike:''' "After all of that, w-we didn't get paid" (proceeds to [[CryLaughing laugh/cry]] maniacally)]]

* In the ''[[LetsPlay/AchievementHunterMinecraftSeries Achievement Hunter Let's Play Minecraft]]'' mini-series "YDYD" (short for "Ya Dead, Ya Dead"), bit by bit, each of the Achievement Hunters are KilledOffForReal, leaving Creator/MichaelJones the SoleSurvivor. In the final episode, he moves on, lives fifty years later and dies of old age in a castle he built. [[spoiler:He ends up arriving in Hell, where the other Hunters are waiting for him. As it turns out, they've remained young and will always will be and Michael will remain old and decrepit. Even worse, his wife Lindsay gave up on waiting for him and hooked up with a demon named Gary.]]
* In the ''WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall'' storyline "Contest of Champions" ends with this: [[spoiler:after spending five years competing in trying to obtain the Infinity Gauntlet so no other evil entity can use it, Linkara learns that the Gauntlet is useless. In fact, the entire contest hinges on the fact that no one realizes any of the items don't work outside of their native universes]].

* WebAnimation/CharlieTheUnicorn usually ends up on nonsensical quests that wind up to be excuses for the Blue and Pink Unicorns to rob and screw with him. The Grand Finale [[spoiler:subverts this as Blue and Pink's latest quest and straight up attempt to kill Charlie leads him to the means of [[EarnYourHappyEnding finally banishing his two tormentors for good]]]].

* [[https://youtu.be/wpfbuAVmYhU This]] satirical video from the Website/YouTube channel "Circlejerk" (devoted to parodying Website/{{Reddit}}) starts out like a typical rant about "social justice warriors." The punch line (based on a popular {{meme|tic mutation}} of 2015) is that one of the SJW Reddit moderators is actually [[spoiler:Wrestling/JohnCena]].
* The first half of Episode 24 of ''WebVideo/CriticalRole''. Tiberius is attempting to access a teleportation sigil that will take him and his team to Kraghammer to retrieve some reward money. After muddling around in the Lyceum bureaucracy, flying back to the keep to pick up a bribe, then flying ''back'' to the Lyceum with the rest of the party, he finally gets access to the sigil...[[spoiler: only to realize that he's burnt through all his spells for the day, and needs to sleep for another eight hours before he can actually cast the teleportation ritual.]]

* ''WebVideo/PeanutButterGamer'' did videos about Goodwill games. In the sixth installment, the final game he plays is a CallBack to the second installment, in which he plays the first game from the ''VideoGame/MiasBigAdventureCollection'', ''Mia's Reading Adventure: The Search for Grandma's Remedy''. At long last, [=PBG=] had come prepared with everything that prevented him from completing a single Mia game; he never encountered a single GameBreakingBug, and he had the second disc, and he is excited to see what finally happens after all these years...only to discover that it went to nothing. All that happens is that [[spoiler:Mia simply hops on a bird, thanks the player for helping her before saying farewell to the player, and it just cues an IrisOut with Mia giggling.]] [=PBG=] is not pleased.

* In ''WebAnimation/RedVsBlue'', Project Freelancer was created as a means to fight aliens [[spoiler: and find a way to bring back Allison]]. To do so, the Director tortured the A.I. Alpha into fragmenting itself so it could provide A.I.s for experimental purposes. However, the Project practically failed in its objectives, with all its Freelancers becoming crazy, going rogue, abandoning the project or dying and [[spoiler: Allison/Tex staying dead.]]

** This is more or less Simon Wood's entire arc is one of these. Poor guy couldn't even pull a [[spoiler:HeroicSacrifice]] off right.
** Alex Rasputin; killed two people in v4, and was on the path to redemption. Suddenly, [[spoiler: Liz Polanski destroys a camera, and [[YourHeadAsplode Danya blows his collar]]]].

* The Great White Sheet Game: Typically played at co-ed college parties with some amount of alcohol, often on road trips where the participants have multiple hotel rooms. One person who has never played before is chosen as the Player, while all those who have played before take on the roles of "Master" (for the leader of the game) and "Others". The Player sits on a bed, and has a sheet tented over him. The Master then explains that this is a test, and that the Player must follow the instructions that the Master or the Others give, to the letter. The game then proceeds, first with the Master describing a scene: "You are walking through the desert. It is hot, and you are thirsty. You realize you don't need to be wearing as much as you are. Take something off, and pass it to me." Usually, the Player removes something inconsequential--jewelry or shoes. The Others then continue in the same vein--embellishing and otherwise confounding the statement, but always with the admonition to remove something the Player is wearing needlessly. As time goes on, articles of clothing start coming off and getting passed out. [[spoiler: The game ends when the Player figures out he's supposed to take off the damn sheet. If he's already [[NakedPeopleAreFunny naked underneath]], well, then the Master and Others won the game.]]

* [[http://knowyourmeme.com/photos/712563-ruined-childhood This GIF]] is an extremely abridged version of ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' movies, except [[spoiler:the characters forgot the Ring at home and find out only at the end]].

Not to be confused with Disney's ''Film/TheShaggyDog'', or the web series ''WebAnimation/ShaggyDogStories''. Also unrelated to "Shaggy God Story", an alternate name for EarthAllAlong.

[[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Not to be confused]] with ''Franchise/ScoobyDoo'', which is a cartoon featuring [[{{Pun}} Shaggy's dog]] (when a Scooby-Doo style mystery turns out to be a Shaggy Dog Story, it is MocksteryTale). Also not to be confused with Disney's ''Film/TheShaggyDog'', or the web series ''WebAnimation/ShaggyDogStories''. And also unrelated to Shaggy God Story, an alternate name for EarthAllAlong.

Not to be confused with Disney's ''Film/TheShaggyDog'', the web series ''WebAnimation/ShaggyDogStories'', or with "Shaggy God Story", an alternate name for EarthAllAlong.

** In Season 3, Franchise/{{Sonic}} and co. attempt to rob [[VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2 Casino Zone]] of all its loot. After the initial disaster of their first attempt, they manage to get everything out, until they realize all they've stolen are [[WorthlessCurrency rings]], which have no value anywhere.

[[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Not to be confused]] with ''Franchise/ScoobyDoo'', which is a cartoon featuring [[{{Pun}} Shaggy's dog]] (when a Scooby-Doo style mystery actually turns out to be this trope, it is MocksteryTale). Also not to be confused with Disney's ''Film/TheShaggyDog'', or the web series ''WebAnimation/ShaggyDogStories''. And also unrelated to Shaggy God Story, an alternate name for EarthAllAlong.

* Challenger Andy's video [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCS1_W-xMyg "Can You Beat a Level 100 Hoppip With a Level 5 Totodile?"]] ultimately ends this way, several times. After spending more than 20 hours theorycrafting a way to make it past the first mandatory victory in a copy of ''[[VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver Pokémon Crystal]]'' that has been hacked to make all the wild and trained enemy Pokémon level 100 while resetting any of his own catches to Level 1, using information from ''[[Website/{{Smogon}} Pokémon Showdown]]'' and [[TheWikiRule Bulbapedia]], he first finds out that the calculations used by ''Showdown'', according to which his question would indeed be answered in the affirmative, are based on a false premise. This forces him to reverse-engineer the ''Pokémon'' damage formula by hand, which ''also'' turned out to be pointless since Bulbapedia, his source, was also wrong, which he didn't suspect for another 35 hours. He then had to consult with dataminers for another 10 hours after that to determine the true damage formula... which revealed that it is mathematically impossible to beat a level 100 wild Hoppip that retains the moves it would normally have when encountered at its intended level before the Trainer Joey battle with a level 5 starter Pokemon obtained from Professor Elm that has not won a single battle in ''Pokémon Crystal'', only after the viewer sits through 22 minutes and 10 seconds of the video. Then after that, he reveals that while this particular event is impossible, his original challenge (beating a hack of the Generation II games in which all enemy Pokemon are level 100 and none of the player's Pokemon are) is still possible, and implied that he would release a follow-up video explaining how he did it [[labelnote:Explanation]][[CuttingTheKnot He caught a Weedle and fainted the Hoppip with poison damage]][[/labelnote]]... only for him to lose the ROM file, preventing him from finishing the challenge or ever making the follow-up video.

The classic example is a man who finds a shaggy dog similar to one in a "Lost Dog" poster from a rich family, and bankrupts himself trying to return it to them in England for reward money -- when he finally makes it there, he's told that the dog "wasn't ''that'' shaggy" before the door's slammed in his face. The End.

'''Spoilers Ahoy!''' Since this trope is about stories' endings, spoilers are inherent and will be unmarked.

** ShaggyDogStory/DailyLivesOfHighSchoolBoys
** ShaggyDogStory/{{Robotech}}