History Main / TheEndoftheworldasweknowit

*** The ''Endwalker'' expansion explores several more "end of the world" scenarios. [[spoiler: It at first appears that Fandaniel and Zenos's plan to recreate the Final Days of the Ancients is just to raise an army of Primals, all controlled by a stronger Primal born of Garlemald's CultOfPersonality reverence of their emperor. It turns out that the Primals were just a diversion from the real plan to harvest enough aether to forcefully break the seal on Zodiark, whom Fandaniel promptly hijacks. This seems like a setup for Fandaniel to rampage using Zodiark's godly powers, but it turns out the ''real'' actual plan was to kill Zodiark, [[NiceJobBreakingItHero which the Warrior of Light helped accomplish]], thus allowing the actual Final Days to begin once more. Sure enough, the events of the Final Days slowly begins to spread, with the main difference being that this time, rather than creating the monsters with rampaging creation magick, the people themselves are transformed into monsters. When the Warrior of Light goes back in time to find out the cause, it turns out that it's caused by an Ancient creation named Meteion, a HiveMind of "sisters" designed to interact with an energy affected by emotion known as Dynamis and travel to other stars to learn about their civilizations. What she ended up finding was countless civilizations that were either dead or dying, which drove the Meteion collective insane nihilism and convinced them to travel to the far edge of the universe and use their power of dynamis to speed to death not just her homeworld of Ethyris, but all life in the universe. When the WoL and the Scions of the Seventh Dawn finally make it to Meteion's nest, they find that she's recreated portions of the dead worlds and civilizations she encountered so that their despair would fuel the dynamis, which the party ends up having to traverse on the way to Meteion.]]

* In ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'', The World As We Know It Ends on October 23, 2077. The prologue of ''VideoGame/Fallout4'' is set on that fateful day.

** The Season 5 finale puts all of these to shame. [[ArcVillain Starlight]] [[UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom Glimmer's]] TimeTravel plan to ruin the Mane Six's friendship results in [[ButterflyOfDoom increasing worse]] {{Bad Future}}s with the various previous {{Big Bad}}s ([[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and the Flim-Flam Brothers]]) conquering Equestria since the Mane Six weren't there to stop it. This eventually culminates into Equestria becoming [[SugarApocalypse a barren wasteland of rock, dirt, and dead trees]] that wouldn't look out of place in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}''. This, plus [[TalkingTheMonsterToDeath Twilight telling Starlight]] [[FromBadToWorse things could become even]] ''worse'' [[FromBadToWorse if she continued]], convinces [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone Starlight]] to put things back to normal.

* In ''VideoGame/GoodbyeVolcanoHigh'', a comet is coming that will wipe out almost all life on Earth, ending the era of dinosaurs. Fang, the player character, has to decide that they'll do with their remaining time.

* "The Grand Finale" by Music/SetItOff shows us the end of the world from two different perspectives.

* From the Music/TomWaits album ''Music/BoneMachine'', we have [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin aptly named]] ''The Earth Died Screaming''. The primitive-sounding percussion([[FridgeHorror implying it's being sung]] AfterTheEnd), [[MindScrew weird lyrics]] and [[GutturalGrowler Tom Waits's voice]] make for one very creepy song.

--->In madness and blasphemy
--->Mankind take a look
--->Take a look what you have done

* Music/{{Gorillaz}}' "Fire Coming Out of The Monkey's Head" from ''Music/DemonDays'' ends like this.

* The basic plot of ''Manga/ApocalypseNoToride'' via the ZombieApocalypse.

* In ''Literature/ThePrecipice'', a hail of meteors created a number of large craters fifty years before the story proper; it is speculated that this was the source of Superpowers, and it is mentioned that millions died, but in the decades since the world has settled into a kind of normalicy.

Hoping life won't pass them by''\\
* Music/{{Megadeth}}'s "[[SoFarSoGoodSoWhat Set the World Afire]]" describes a nuclear war that ends all life on Earth and leaves behind no evidence that humans ever existed.

* In the backstory of the ''TabletopGame/TowersOfHanoi'' puzzle a legend is told of a temple with 64 golden disks; when the priests manage to relocate the tower in accordance with the rules of the puzzle, the world will cease to exist. (Even if it took a single second to make one move, this will take 2^64-1 moves, or about 585 billion years.)

* In [[Literature/ThePrecipice The Precipice]], a hail of meteors created a number of large craters fifty years before the story proper; it is speculated that this was the source of Superpowers, and it is mentioned that millions died, but in the decades since the world has settled into a kind of normalicy.

* This is the state of the world in ''ComicBook/{{BPRD}}'' since the start of the ''Hell on Earth'' arc, following a worldwide invasion of [[EldritchAbomination Eldritch Abominations]] and {{Kaiju}}s. Civilization in pretty much gone and the remnants of humanity are trying to survive by avoiding the monsters.

* ''Fanfic/LeftBeyond'' takes the End Times series [[Literature/LeftBehind]] and gives its ending a new spin, turning it from "foregone conclusion" to "interplanetary conspiracy a century in the making". Notable for being one of the first works written with AI assistance, in 2015-2016.

-->-- '''Music/TheDoors,''' "The End"

* Pacifica Casull the eponymous ''LightNovel/ScrappedPrincess'' is hunted by everyone due to a prophesy that she was destined to literally "end the world as we know it." [[spoiler: subverted in that she "ends the world as we know it" by breaking an artificially enforced MedievalStasis.]]

* Occurs during the {{Timeskip}} between Seasons 16 and 17 of ''Franchise/PowerRangers''. [[DarkerAndEdgier The entire biosphere has been destroyed globally]], except for a single city fighting for survival.

* The ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWarsAlpha'' sub-series's finale had several endings that involved trying to stop the death of all sentient life in the universe. The worst one involved the embodiment of life and rebirth going nuts and using its WaveMotionGun at the party... which kills everyone in the quadrant.

* One would not expect this trope to pop up in a game revolving around baking cookies, but ''VideoGame/CookieClicker'' proves otherwise. Late into the game, [[spoiler:the player could trigger the Grandmapocalypse, an event involving angering [[EldritchAbomination the Grandmatriarchs]]. The more it advances, the grimmer are the news reports from around the world.]] It is notoriously one of the very, very few things that are ''[[SurpriseCreepy not]]'' PlayedForLaughs in the game.

* In ''VideoGame/LiveALive'' [[spoiler: You are actually given the option to end all of existence by your own hands just by selecting the Armageddon option!]]

* ''Rover Red Charlie'' is a story by Creator/GarthEnnis about three ordinary dogs [[InnocentInaccurate who are seriously worried about something]] [[HumansThroughAlienEyes that's made the Feeders go mad]].

If the heroes are slated to succeed in preventing the End, they (and the audience) may be treated to [[StoryboardingTheApocalypse a detailed preview]] of what's coming. The most common subversion keys on the "as we know it" part of the phrase: the world may not actually end so much as be changed beyond of all recognition, thus "ending" an old world and beginning a new one. Depending upon the world, this may actually be an improvement.