History ShootTheHostage / LiveActionTv

-->'''Angel''': You missed.
-->'''Kate Lockley''': No I didn't.
* Implied as a threat in the short-lived series, ''Series/{{Boomtown}}''. A corrupt cop is exposed and takes the widely-hated internal affairs investigator hostage. One of the cops points this out and mentions that nobody would be particularly troubled in the investigator got shot in a firefight.

* ''Series/{{The 100}}'': When a Mountain Man holds a knife to Lincoln's throat and uses him as a human shield, Clarke shoots both of them: [[ImprobableAimingSkills her bullet passes through Lincoln's shoulder and hits the Mountain Man in the chest]], killing the Mountain Man and leaving Lincoln with OnlyAFleshWound.

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In "[[Recap/DoctorWho2005CSTheChristmasInvasion The Christmas Invasion]]" the Sycorax use blood control to make a third of the Earth's population go walk to the edge of a cliff and threaten to make them jump unless they are allowed to take humans as slaves. Then the Doctor wakes up, seemingly delirious from regeneration sickness, stumbles over to the BigRedButton that would make the hostages jump, and slaps it down. Which is when it turns out blood control can't overpower survival instinct, the Doctor called their bluff.

** The ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' episode "The Magnificent Ferengi" has [[AxeCrazy Lekk]] do this during a VirtualTrainingSimulation -- his reasoning is that the practice rescue has already gone to hell and he's just putting the hostage out of her misery.
** In the ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' episode "Repentance," a convicted murderer takes the Doctor hostage--until Tuvok fires a phaser shot through him (being a hologram) and [[ShootTheHostageTaker hits the murderer]].
** ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'': During a shoot-out on a [[PlanetOfHats Wild West planet]], T'Pol gets a six-shooter put to her head. Reed shrugs, shoots her, then the hostage taker while he's still gaping at Reed's apparently ruthless action. His phase pistol is [[TheParalyzer set on stun]].
* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'': Season 6 reveals that soulless [[spoiler: Sam]] once shot a woman being used as a HumanShield by a monster he was hunting. Once she falls over dead, he then kills the monster.

* ''Series/{{NCIS}}'': [[spoiler: Agent Lee got Gibbs to shoot through her to take out the Weatherman]].

* ''Series/{{Chuck}}'': Bryce did it when Chuck was being held hostage. He did make sure Chuck was wearing a BulletProofVest first, though... by asking him in Klingon.

* ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'': During a shoot-out on a [[PlanetOfHats Wild West planet]], T'Pol gets a six-shooter put to her head. Reed shrugs, shoots her, then the hostage taker while he's still gaping at Reed's apparently ruthless action. His phase pistol is [[TheParalyzer set on stun]].

** The ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' episode "The Magnificent Ferengi" has [[AxeCrazy Lekk]] do this during a VirtualTrainingSimulation--his reasoning is that the practice rescue has already gone to hell and he's just putting the hostage out of her misery.

* ''For the Term of His Natural Life'': In this Australian mini-series, an attempt by convicts to escape ends with a sergeant being held hostage, facing a small cannon aimed by his fellow marines. The sergeant orders them to light the fuse and kill them all. Realising he's not bluffing, the convicts are forced to surrender.

* ''Series/OurFlagMeansDeath: When [[spoiler:Jim takes Geraldo hostage to get information out of Jackie]], she fatally shoots him.

-->'''Rich Dotcom:''' You shot the hostage. Your obsession with the movie ''Film/{{Speed}}'' has become very unhealty.

* ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'': During a shoot-out on a [[PlanetOfHats Wild West planet]], T'Pol gets a six-shooter put to her head. Reed shrugs, shoots her, then the hostage taker while he's still gaping at Reed's apparently ruthless action. His phase pistol is [[StunGuns set on stun]].

** The SGC is also aware that the hosts of System Lords have been driven nearly insane by millennia of being trapped in their own bodies. Consequently, when Apophis argues after being captured that they can't kill him without killing his host it falls completely flat. They note that death of the host is arguably a positive outcome.

* ''Series/StargateAtlantis'': Genii commander Colya, after being forced to abandon Atlantis, takes Weir hostage and tries to goad Sheppard into shooting them both. Unfortunately for him, the Atlantis team has much more accurate guns, and Sheppard calmly puts a bullet right through Colya's shoulder.

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In "Recap/DoctorWho2005CSTheChristmasInvasion" the sycorax use blood control to make a third of the Earth's population go walk to the edge of a cliff and threaten to make them jump unless they are allowed to take humans as slaves. Then the Doctor wakes up, seemingly delirious from regeneration sickness, stumbles over to the BigRedButton that would make the hostages jump, and slaps it down. Which is when it turns out blood control can't overpower survival instinct, the Doctor called their bluff.

** Oddly enough, hostage taking tends to work in ''StarTrek'', despite the characters carrying NonLethalKO weapons, thus making the logical response shooting them both.

* ''Series/{{Charmed}}'': In the episode "Which Prue Is It, Anyway?", when [[ItMakesSenseInContext Prue's duplicate]] tries to make the warlock of the week surrender his weapon by holding his ally hostage. He instead kills his ally before killing the Prue duplicate.

* ''Series/LawAndOrder'': A totally horrible example comes when an escaped convict holds a classroom full of students before anything can be done, he shoots all of the hostages in the room. His reason "Why not".

** Sam and Fi think, at first, that Jesse deliberately shot Michael, as he has recently found out that Michael is the one who accidentally got him burned. It's possible it ''may'' have been a little of that.