History ShootTheDog / LiveActionTV

* ''Series/{{Chuck}}''
** Played for laughs in one episode. Morgan has to go undercover as a crime boss. To sell his story, when he enters a meeting, he is on a cellphone (pretending to ) convince/order his lackey to shoot a dog. The other crime bosses there look either confused or disgusted.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
** The Doctor has often found himself taking this role; it's especially become a character trait in his ninth and tenth incarnations. Instances include, in "Dalek" sealing his companion in a bunker with a Dalek in order to prevent the Dalek from escaping, and drowning the ''children'' of a GiantSpider [[HiveQueen Empress]] in "The Runaway Bride" rather than letting them devour the Earth.
** However, the Ninth Doctor [[CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming gloriously subverts]] this trope in "The Parting of the Ways". Poised with a weapon capable of destroying the Dalek Emperor's fleet - along with all of Earth - he cannot pull the trigger. It's all the more satisfying (though [[{{Tearjerker}} heartbreaking]]) given his actions in "Dalek".
** Arguably the worst example shown so far is in "The Fire of Pompeii", [[spoiler:causing the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, and the destruction of Pompeii, in order to save the rest of humanity from being turned into Pyroviles.]]
** He also [[spoiler:destroyed his entire species in order to end the Time War? Sure, the Time Lord authorities had gone OmnicidalManiac by that point, but he killed everyone on Gallifrey, which presumably included innocents.]]
*** In ''The Day Of The Doctor'', [[spoiler: Eleven meets the former self who actually shot this particular dog, as well as Ten, and together [[CrowningMomentOfAwesome they manage to avert the trope by forcing Gallifrey to disappear intact, rather than destroying it.]]]]
** In the Literature/DoctorWhoNewAdventures novels set during his seventh incarnation, he would commit such morally questionable acts so often that he quickly turned into a KnightTemplar, and remained so for most of the series.
** In Eleventh Doctor episode "The Girl Who Waited", [[spoiler: the Doctor tricks an older version of Amy into believing she can escape after thirty six years imprisonment, so she'll help him save the younger Amy from being imprisoned and thus becoming her in the first place. [[ILied He's lying]] - the paradox cannot be maintained and one Amy must die. When she attempts a MeadowRun towards him, he slams the TARDIS doors closed, leaving her to die. And then he gives the gun for Rory to shoot with a SadisticChoice: Rory must pick which Amy he wants to save.]]
** The stand-out moment for the Fourth Doctor doing this has got to be him forcing Davros into ordering the destruction of the prototype Daleks by holding down his life support shutoff switch to torture him.

** In the episode "The Brothers of Nablus," Cameron guns down three thieves who stole from their house, simply because they knew where the Connors lived. [[spoiler: Sarah spares the last robber, who was hiding in the bathroom. Cromartie eventually comes along and susses the location of the Connor's house from him.]]

* ''AshesToAshes'': Season 2 sees Gene Hunt shoot the dog.

* In the AgentsOfSHIELD episode [[Recap/AgentsOfSHIELDS2E3MakingFriendsAndInfluencingPeople "Making Friends and Influencing People"]], Skye is forced to shoot [[AnIcePerson Donnie Gill]] to save Hunter and May. Donnie, while certainly dangerous and unstable, only wanted to be left alone and was only a danger to the SHIELD as he had been [[BrainwashedAndCrazy brainwashed]] by HYDRA.

* ''Series/{{ER}}'' gives several characters one of these over the course of the seasons. In one season, Dr Green called child services on a father, whose son had obvious signs of prolonged abuse. The child gets taken away and the father is enraged, swearing revenge, even going so far as to specifically target Green's family (including his recently-born second daughter). Eventually, the man is shot by the police and brought to the ER and Green is assigned to him. When circumstances cause Green to be alone with the man on a gurney in an elevator and the man goes into asystole, Green hesitates for a moment: save the man as his oath says or let the bastard die, who made it beyond clear that he'll continue to terrorize Green and his family? Green grabs the defibrilator paddels and uses them in the air, letting the man watch and die.

* ''Series/Chuck''

** In ''The Train Job'', he kicks the KingMook into Serenity's engines-- shredding the man into a mist of blood-- because he threatened to hunt them down over a deal gone bad.

** The culmination of Mal's "Shoot the Dog for the crew" mentality is shown in ''Ariel'' where he fully intends to space ''one of his own crew'' for trying to sell out two others for reward money.

* ''Franchise/{{Terminator}}: Series/TheSarahConnorChronicles'':

* ''Bangkok Hilton'': In the backstory, Hal Stanton thwarted a plan by Allied soldiers to escape from a Japanese POW camp in Thailand, as he knew that their captors would execute two prisoners for every one that escaped, a factor that the escapees refused to take into account. As a result, eight escapees were executed. The worst part? If he had let them go, the war would have been over before any reprisals would have happened.

* ''Bangkok Hilton'': In the backstory, Hal Stanton thwarted a plan by Allied soldiers to escape from a Japanese POW camp in Thailand, as he knew that their captors would execute two prisoners for every one that escaped, a factor that the escapees refused to take into account. The worst part? If he had let them go, the war would have been over before any reprisals would have happened.

** The Chinese gangster in the second episode was an ''idiot'' for [[BigBrotherInstinct tripping off John's protective instinct towards Sherlock]] when he tries to kill him, despite the fact John's [[CombatPragmatist tied to a chair at the time.]] [[TooDumbToLive It ends badly for the gangster,]] since [[BadassAdorable John]] [[TranquilFury calmly]] kills him.

** Sherlock killing Magnussen in the Series 3 finale, "His Last Vow", definitely qualifies, in a literal example (though more of a case of Shoot the Son of a Bitch). Sherlock blows Magnussen's brains out in front of John, Mycroft, and the police; since neither Sherlock nor John was under direct physical threat from Magnussen at the time, it's considered to be outright murder, [[RealityEnsues and Sherlock is promptly exiled for it]]. However, Magnussen was an AssholeVictim who ruined countless lives with his blackmailing schemes, and was threatening to use his information about John's wife, Mary, to destroy both of their lives as well (and possibly even get them killed). Sherlock killed Magnussen in front of witnesses to protect them from this fate and to ensure that John was not blamed for the crime.

** The culmination of Mal's "Shoot the Dog for the crew" mentality is shown in ''Ariel'' where he fully intends to space ''one of his own crew'' for trying to sell out two others for reward money.
** In {{Film/Serenity}} River kills the Reavers [[TooDumbToLive when they threaten her brother's life.]]

** [[AbusiveParents Lionel]] and Main/LexLuthor have both done this at some point, although in the most iconic cases of both, [[TheDogShotFirst they were protecting someone else]].

* ''Series/BattlestarGalacticaReimagined'':

* ''Series/{{The 100}}'' Season 2 is built around taking Clarke, originally an ActualPacifist and AllLovingHero, and putting her in situations where she has to ShootTheDog. These include executing her LoveInterest to secure an alliance with the Grounders, allowing hundreds of her allies to die to avoid blowing a double agent's cover, and ultimately committing full-on genocide against Mount Weather, all in the name of protecting her people. By the season finale, she's shot the dog so much that she can no longer see herself as a good person, and instead views herself as someone who [[NecessarilyEvil commits evil so that others don't have to]].

** Mal is the rare lead character who never needs a side character to shoot the dog for him. He's more than willing to kill someone to protect his crew, and he does it on multiple occasions, even when killing them isn't strictly necessary.

** In the pilot, he shoots Dobson (a federal agent) in the face without hesitation because Dobson was threatening River.

** In ''The Message'', he shoots Tracy for trying to take Kaylee hostage, when a simple explanation of the situation would have solved everything. But would Tracy have listened?

** And in another episode he [[GoodIsNotSoft murders]] a group of [[WhatAnIdiot idiots]] that ''captured'' [[TrueCompanions the rest of his team.

* ''Series/{{Merlin}}'': In the new BBC series, Merlin is forced to [[spoiler: poison Morgana, who he has been lying to about her magic and hiding his own from, because she is the vessel for a curse that has caused all of Camelot to fall into a sleep they cannot awaken from. Admittedly, his hand was forced by Kilgharrah the dragon and Morgause only made things worse, but up until that point, he had viewed Morgana as a great friend and there was even a little bit of romance between them. He also betrayed the location of a Druid camp that he'd led Morgana to in hopes that she would learn more about her magic because Uther was hunting down innocent people and killing them to find her. This also kickstarted Mordred's hatred of Merlin.]]

* ''Series/{{NCIS}}'': Gibbs shooting through Agent [[spoiler: Michelle Lee to take out the Weatherman. And she asked him to do it]]! Complete TearJerker, right there.

* ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'': [[TheLancer John]] kills the [[SerialKiller killer cabbie]] in the [[RecapSherlockS01E01AStudyInPink first episode]] to stop [[HeterosexualLifePartners Sherlock]] from [[InsufferableGenius giving into his ego]] and eating a pill that has a 50/50 chance of killing him. [[JustifiedTrope Understandable,]] he ''did'' think [[LivingEmotionalCrutch Sherlock's life was threatened.]]

* ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'': [[TheLancer John]] kills the [[SerialKiller killer cabbie]] in the first episode to stop [[HeterosexualLifePartners Sherlock]] from [[InsufferableGenius giving into his ego]] and eating a pill that has a 50/50 chance of killing him. [[JustifiedTrope Understandable,]] he ''did'' think [[LivingEmotionalCrutch Sherlock's life was threatened.]]