%% Image selected per Image Pickin' thread: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1331152462015120100
%% Please do not change or remove without starting a new thread.
%%
[[quoteright:293:[[ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/carefulwhatyouwishfor1_9344.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:293:"I DIDN'T ''MEAN'' IT!"]]

->''"So this is it; this is what I wished for; just isn't how I envisioned it..."''
-->--'''Music/{{Eminem}}''', from [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qzqn0ZOljEM "Careful What You Wish For."]] [[note]](Referring to fame.)[[/note]]

...you just might get it.

A character [[MakeAWish makes a wish]] and actually ''gets'' what they wished for, only to find that the reality does not live up to their fantasy.

This trope is all about how a character who makes a wish comes to regret it; the actual circumstances vary. The wisher may or may not have known that his/her wish was actually going to be heard. The one which grants it may be anything from a wish-granting Genie [[BenevolentGenie who wants to show the character the error of their ways]] to a JackassGenie who just wants them to suffer. A sudden appearance by LouisCypher, ready to offer a DealWithTheDevil, is not out of the question either. Sometimes the character gets a tour through an AlternateTimeline. Other times the mechanism of the granted wish is not even explained -- the wisher gets what s/he wants through nothing more than an ironic and coincidental twist of circumstances.

The "deal breaker" that makes the wish not worth it also comes in a lot of possible flavors. Perhaps the character finds out that what they wanted comes at the cost of something they wanted even more. Maybe the element of their life they wanted gone is really essential to who they are; maybe their wish isn't all they thought it was cracked up to be; or maybe it just comes true in an unanticipated manner.

In many cases the character repents of his/her ill-considered wish and things revert to normal -- though in some stories the character is stuck in the new situation and forced to deal with the consequences of his/her thoughtless wish.

This is an elementary form of {{deconstruction}} - The character wants X, and then they find out [[RealityEnsues X has unpleasant, unforeseen consequences]]. Thus, X is deconstructed -- the plot shows that X isn't as great as you think it is and may not be what you wanted at all. Nine times of ten this is an outright {{Aesop}}, though strictly speaking it doesn't have to be. A crucial element of playing that angle well is making the "deal breaker" a meaningful, inherent flaw to the original wish rather than something tacked on or that could have easily turned out differently if the character had more common sense. Otherwise, a BrokenAesop is almost guaranteed.

Often a cause of BlessedWithSuck, though not the only one; wont to count as an OpinionChangingDream; Contains the same type of irony as IronicHell. In some cases the experience may lead the wisher to discover an AwfulTruth.

SubTrope of BeCarefulWhatYouSay. SuperTrope of ItsAWonderfulPlot, IWishItWereReal, IWishedYouWereDead, PleaseDumpMe, and RhetoricalRequestBlunder.

Compare GoneHorriblyRight, when science or logic is involved rather than wishes.

Contrast the LiteralGenie, which ignores the intent of the wish in favor of the exact words; ''this'' trope is about the complications that arise when you get exactly what you ''wanted'', rather than exactly what you ''said''. A JackassGenie is likely to cause this to happen, if he doesn't just twist your words entirely.

However, in some cases, it can go ''right'' for the character, if the writer wants to play TheDog with a character or group of them, and the phrase is used [[{{Irony}} ironically]].

----
!!Examples:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
* ''Manga/{{Arisa}}'' takes this trope and tweaks it. Rather than the wishes themselves that are messed up, it's the ''desire'' to have one's wishes granted. Most of the people are overlooking the obvious with rationalizations of "it could never happen to me" until it actually does, making selfish and arbitrary wishes without considering the side-effects. that is, rather than being about wish corruption, it's about the corruption by wishes (having your desires constantly fulfilled). Understandably, the entire class as a result is just a few shades short of psychopathy.
* Van Hohenheim of ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'' spends his entire long life (over 400 years) wishing his life would end. When the end finally comes, however, he wishes he would not die yet.
** [[spoiler:Father heartily lauds how Truth gives humans despair when they get conceited, to keep them in line. Then, following a long, action-packed sequence of events, he winds up in front of Truth himself, who reminds Father of his exact words, and points out how conceited Father was to think he could absorb a god. [[FateWorseThanDeath He gets plenty of despair]].]]
** Al and Ed wanted to see Shou Tucker's talking Chimera. They find out just what goes into [[PoweredByAForsakenChild making a talking chimera]]. [[MoralEventHorizon They want to kill the bastard after seeing what goes into a talking chimera]].
** The King of Xerxes wanted to live forever. He got his wish [[AndIMustScream as one of the tortured souls in Father's body]].
** Human transmutation is wrought with this. By the laws of alchemy, it is forbidden, since the value of human life is immeasurable, so attempting it will cause those involved to lose that which was most precious to them. When Izumi attempted it to revive her stillborn child, she lost her reproductive organs. When Ed and Al tried it to revive their mother, Ed lost AnArmAndALeg, and Al was lucky for Ed's quick thinking that he only lost his entire body.
* In ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'', Aizen tries to help Ichigo get stronger because he wants a WorthyOpponent. Well, he got what he asked for... [[spoiler: right through his stupid face.]]
** Ichigo tells Keigo after he loses his powers that he always wanted a normal life...then sees the folly of that when Ginjo and Xcution start messing up his life.
* The series ''Manga/AsatteNoHoukou'' begins with a single (well, double) instance of this, with a dash of SwappedRoles. The rest of the series consists of the characters dealing with the results.
* Making wishes under the old sakura tree in ''DaCapo'' can have major consequences. For some it's even worse though when those wishes get reverted.
* The 'Suruga Monkey' arc of ''LightNovel/{{Bakemonogatari}}'' initially appears to be a minor twist on the traditional story of the Monkey's Paw (the twist being that the paw has grafted itself to its owner's arm) but turns out to be rather more of a twist than usual. The owner's first wish was to run faster than her classmates to stop them from laughing at her; everyone in the class faster than her was mysteriously beaten up the day before the athletics carnival. The real twist is that [[spoiler:the paw isn't a Monkey's Paw, it belongs to a malevolent spirit called a Rainy Devil that grants your true subconscious wish- even though Kanbaru wished to run faster than her classmates she really wanted revenge on them, so the Rainy Devil possessed her and beat them up]]. Things get ''worse'' when [[spoiler:[[MurderTheHypotenuse the sempai she had a long-term crush on gets a boyfriend]]]]. The final twist is that [[spoiler:[[DealWithTheDevil after granting her third wish, the Rainy Devil will take her soul]]]].
* The ''Anime/RayearthOVA'' starts this way - the heroines fear their graduation, as they will be separated. So they wish something prevents this... then all the mayhem starts.
* The scientists in ''{{Utawarerumono}}'' wanted to live forever. Unfortunately [[spoiler:Iceman was a god and they just REALLY pissed him off, so he gave them all bodies that would be immortal [[AndIMustScream by turning them all into red jelly.]]]]
* In ''[[DGrayMan D.Gray-Man]]'', the unlucky Miranda Lotto loses her one hundredth job. She says: "Day after day, things always go wrong for me. I wish tomorrow would never come." What's the problem? Her Innocence-superpowered clock hears it, and it grants her wish. The whole town where she lives gets stuck in October 9th for more than a month.
* Quite a few ''FrankenFran'' stories end this way. One, for example, has a modern Elizabeth Bathory asking for eternal youth and eternal life. Fran gave her what she wants by turning all of her cells into the one type of cell that isn't programmed to die: [[spoiler:[[AndIMustScream Cancer Cells]].]]
** [[spoiler: Actually Fran just gave her what she wanted. The woman went way overboard with the treatment and Fran was trying to warn her when it was too late. Still an example but not Fran's fault.]]
* ''Manga/XxxHolic'' features a chapter and episode involving a monkey's paw, which, as in the original W. W. Jacobs short story, grants wishes for its holder - five wishes in this case, one for each finger of the mummified paw, which break one at a time as wishes are granted. Also as in the original story, the young woman who gets hold of the paw finds her wishes backfiring on her, particularly when she thoughtlessly wishes that there would be a railway accident so that her lateness would be excused, causing a bystander to be suddenly pushed in front of the train. The paw and her own careless wishes end up killing her.
* ''Franchise/DragonBall''
** Definitely the instance that most people think of in ''Anime/DragonBallZ'' is when [[BigBad Perfect Cell]], wanting to get a good fight before he destroys the Earth, hears from Gohan who, not wanting to fight, will let loose and kill him if Cell pushes him too hard. Cell, [[BloodKnight being Cell]], goes ahead with that anyways, pulling some heavy KickTheDog moments by nearly killing the rest of the cast and [[TearJerker killing Android 16]], and which pushes Gohan to go Super Saiyan 2 and [[NoHoldsBarredBeatDown beat Cell half to death]] and drive him to VillainousBreakdown. Gohan even invokes the whole trope by pointing to Cell that him letting loose is what Cell wanted in the first place.
** Garlic Jr. is the perfect example of this trope. [[spoiler: Enjoy being trapped in a void forever unable to die.]]
** Another key example is in Anime/DragonBallGT, when Pilaf, having summoned the Black Star Dragon, gets distracted by Goku. Pilaf, frustrated at Goku's supposed thwarting of his plan, absentmindedly wishes that Goku was a child again. The Dragon grants his wish.
** In general though, the Dragon Ball series is actually a massive subversion. Since fairly specific wishes are made and the dragons aren't assholes, every wish they make ends up doing exactly what they want. Example: King Piccolo wishes for youth. He doesn't turn into a fetus or baby, but instead turns to his prime.
* General Wolf of ''Anime/{{Monster}}'' comes to regret asking Johan how he's feeling. Johan can't put it into words, so he demonstrates it by [[spoiler: killing everyone close to the general. This lets the General feel Johan's own isolation.]]
** This trope happens to be the one that catalyzes the ''real'' story for Tenma, and thus the entire series. Tenma, after being demoted by the corrupt hospital director for saving a patient and dumped by the director's daughter, states that his superiors "would be better off dead" to that same supposedly comatose patient. [[spoiler:Should've thought that one out better; turns out his patient, Johan, is a sociopathic mass murderer who would gladly oblige such a request.]]
** There were experiments done on children to create an emotionless and perfect killing machine. [[GoneHorriblyRight Then, Johan became one of the experiment subjects.]]
* Mostly subverted in ''Manga/AhMyGoddess''. Goddesses grant wishes to humans, and they don't try and cheat them out of anything. It does, however, apply when [[DealWithTheDevil a demon is granting a wish]], since A; they might [[JackassGenie cheat you on it]], and B; they will ask for something in return proportionate to the wish, though according to [[{{Satan}} Hild]] at least, that means a demon won't ever grant a wish to destroy the world, since no mortal could possibly have anything to offer of equal value to that wish.
** Well, you CAN wish for the end of the world if you really want, but the demons will then [[AFateWorseThanDeath get their price from you by any means possible.]] [[YouDontWantToKnow Pay back all the suffering you caused by ending the world?]] That tends to turn most people off.
** Gets played straight with revelations in the manga Chapter 285. While a lighter example in things, it begins to [[HandWave explain]] some things.
** One other danger in wishes with demons is that even if they don't cheat you on the wish, you still can't back out of it if it being granted is something they want.
* Zelgadis of ''{{Slayers}}'' wishes to be strong. And then he gets his wish. And it [[CursedWithAwesome sucks]].
** Actually, it's a funny case with Zel. He mentions that he ''could've'' lived with the effects if [[spoiler: he wasn't being used as a guinea pig for his grandfather Rezo]].
* ''FushigiYuugi'' Especially in the manga, Miaka wishes to be rid of her problems with school and her [[EducationMama mother]], and that there was a god she could pray to. Well, in a way, she gets her wish: she is in an alternate dimension where there ''is'' no school, and she gets to be the [[ChosenOne priestess]] to a god in this dimension. But, it's not all roses. She's in a CastFullOfPrettyBoys, but she has VirginPower. She is constantly getting the DistressBall, too. Oh, and then there's that whole thing about the Beast God [[VirginSacrifice consuming his priestess' body and soul]] as she makes her wishes.
* In ''NightmareInspector'', Hiruko often lets the dreamer's wishes be fulfilled. Whether they were actually beneficial to the dreamer is a different question ...
* ''Anime/YuGiOhGX'': Professor Cobra wanted to be reunited with his dead son. Yubel promised to do so. He thought that meant she would bring him back to life. She/He had other ideas, consisting of erasing the memory that his son died in the first place and dropping Cobra to his death. But, hey, if you believe in the afterlife... Yubel was like that about a lot of things.
* This is a very important theme in ''TenshiNiNarumon'' [[spoiler: where the strength of one of the main characters' wish almost erases him and other two individuals from existence]].
* Analyzed in ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica''. [[DealWithTheDevil Kyubey]] grants wishes in exchange for the wishee becoming a MagicalGirl and fighting monsters for him. The problems that arise from the granting of the wish aren't exactly because of the wish itself, or from Kyubey - while he's not exactly trustworthy, he has no incentive to screw with peoples' wishes: when he says he can grant ''any'' wish, he ''means'' it, and he has no reason to influence what a Magical Girl wishes for, or to decide for her what she think fighting Witches for the rest of her life is worth. The problem is ''the person making the wish is almost never honest about what they really wanted''. Veteran Magical Girls repeatedly warn potential ones against the perils of a selfless wish, and that's part of what makes it so tragic: [[spoiler:''There Is No Such Thing As a SelflessWish''. Every selfless wish has a selfish motive behind it, and seeing the chance for that selfish desire slipping away with the rising happiness of someone else sends a Magical Girl deeper into despair... which is what Kyubey [[TheChessmaster wants]]. The fact that the Incubators only contract with willing girls and offer no-strings-attached wishes is their idea of equal payment for what the Magical Girls inevitably have to suffer in the end.]]
** The ending, though, turns the whole situation on its head. [[spoiler:Madoka makes a truly selfless wish--an act heavily foreshadowed by her inability to think of a wish for herself and statements that she really just wants to help people--and lessens the tragedies of everyone else's wishes. At the same time, her wish is a straight version of the trope for ''Kyubey'', who tried to prod her towards making a contract by telling her she has the power to become a god who could save magical girls from their tragic fates...which is precisely what she does, and Kyubey's race really gets the short end of the stick on that deal.]]
* In ''{{Himitsu no Akko-chan}}'', (the original version from 1969), the titular heroine, Akko-chan, upon meeting a deaf-mute kid, asks her magic mirror to turn her into a deaf-mute version of herself, reasoning that, after her brush with disability, she'll be able to restore herself with a second wish. However, since the mirror works only by clearly enunciated utterances, and since it was [[LiteralGenie enough literal to strip Akko-chan of the ability to speak at all]], the unfortunate wishee finds herself deaf, voiceless and cut off of her power source. She gets better later, though, as the ResetButton simply presses itself after imparting a much needed {{Aesop}}.
* ''TokyoMagnitude8'' begins with the narrator saying she hates Tokyo and wishes it would just break, the whole city. Cue the titular earthquake.
* In ''PrettyCureAllStars DX 3'', [[SuitePrecure Hibiki]] wishes Hummy would disappear after she crashes a fashion show featuring [[HeartcatchPrecure Tsubomi, Erika, Itsuki and Yuri]]. [[spoiler:At the end of the movie, [[DownerEnding she does - along with the rest of the Precure's mascots.]] They come back, though.]]
* Goku from ''Manga/{{Saiyuki}}'' thinks it would be okay if he died. WAIT HE DIDN'T MEAN THIS SECOND!
* Up against Olegmon, one of the Death Generals in DigimonXrosWars, when Sutyr, one of his shoulder devils, taunts the team by suggesting he'll grant a wish, Kiriha defiantly shouts that the only wish he has is to defeat Olegmon, who interprets that as a world without Olegmon. Sutyr grants this wish by ejecting Kiriha and his Digimon clear across the world.
* In ''Manga/ArataKangatari'', Arata wishes that he would go to a faraway world in the manga's opening chapter. Likewise, Hinohara wishes that he would disappear in his introductory chapter. The moment that latter makes his wish, both of them are fulfilled by their switch.
* In ''FateZero'' Kiritsugu wants the Holy Grail to grant world peace, but when he finally has the chance to make his wish the corrupted Grail explains how it intends to grant it: by ''killing off all of mankind but Kiritsugu and his daughter'', because Humans would always fight. Then it's subverted when Kiritsugu [[ScrewDestiny destroys the Grail]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Comic Books]]
* In the "Id" story line of ''{{JLA}},'' a group of 6th-dimensional beings release an entity capable of granting wishes... unfortunately, it's a LiteralGenie. It affects the league, splitting them into their superheroic and secret identities, and wreaks havoc (most hilariously when some guy wishes his boss would go to hell). In the end, [[spoiler: Plastic Man's alter-ego]] pulls the league [[IncrediblyLamePun back together,]] comes up with a plan to defeat Id, and saves Earth.
* In ''Avril Lavigne's Make 5 Wishes'' since [[spoiler: '''''there is no ResetButton at the end.''''' Protagonist Hana, having used up all five wishes and finding herself no better off, maybe even worse, than at the beginning of the story, decides to jump off a bridge so as to get rid of the demon Romeo and prevent his magic from harming anyone ever again. Romeo somehow escapes from the box before they reach the riverbed, claiming that he "can't die." The last page shows a news report saying that Hana's body has still not been found.]]
* "Wish You Were Here", a 1953 story from the ECComics horror title ''The Haunt of Fear'', uses a variation of "Literature/TheMonkeysPaw" story: A businessman's wife discovers an enchanted Chinese figurine and wishes for a fortune. Learning that her husband was killed while driving to his lawyer's office (after naming her the beneficiary of a generous life insurance policy) and [[GenreSavvy remembering what happened in "The Monkey's Paw"]], she wishes for him to be brought back to the way he was "just before the accident"; unfortunately, he's still a corpse since his actual death was due to a heart attack. She uses the third and final wish to make him "alive ''now'', alive forever!"...which condemns him to eternal pain and agony, since his dead body had been embalmed. Even her hacking him to tiny bits can't put him out of his misery. (The comic was later adapted for the 1972 movie anthology: ''[[Film/ECComics Tales From The Crypt]]''.)
* From ''ComicStrip/KnightsOfTheDinnerTable'':
** When given the opportunity for a Wish, resident RulesLawyer Brian pulls out a 20-page legal document he's [[CrazyPrepared been carrying around for just such an opportunity]]. It's so complex that the DungeonMaster has to call several other [=DMs=] to help him interpret it.
** Ultimately, B.A. is able to invoke this trope. While the wish was airtight the immortality granted to Brian leaves a vengeful deity he previously pissed off free to attack him with full force. Fortunately for Brian, a clause of the wish stated that if he died as a direct consequence of the wish, all effects of the wish would be undone and Brian would get a 25,000 gp consolation prize.
* In the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' comic "Artificiality", [[TheCaptain Captain Picard]], at a crewmember's funeral, wishes that all of his crew were as durable as [[RidiculouslyHumanRobot Data]]. Q obliges him by turning the whole crew into Soong-type androids.
* This tends to happen quite often in the GrimmFairyTales comic series.
* The 2011 "Heart of the Monster" arc in [[ComicBook/IncredibleHulk The Incredible Hulks]] is built around this trope - Hulk and his team encounter a Wishing Well. Everyone involved is GenreSavvy enough to know what it will twist every wish it grants. What they don't know is the intentions of the Red She-Hulk, who used it to wish doom on her ex-husband.... if she meant it, his circumstances are going to improve, but if she ''liked'' him... [[spoiler:As it turns out, she hated him at the time, meaning all of his dreams briefly came true.]]
* [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]] by {{Garfield}}:
--> '''Garfield''': Reruns! Yesterday's news... Leftovers! There's never anything '''new''' around here!
--> '''Jon''': Run for your life! The plumbing backed up, and thousands of piranha are spawning in the toilet!!
--> '''Garfield''': '''[[OhNoNotAgain Again]]?!'''
** In another strip, Garfield wished for a fifty-pound pan of lasagna. It fell on him. (At which point he mused, "Now wouldn't you think I'd know better than to make a wish like that on a Monday?")
* Comicbook/DoctorStrange, in a moment of grief after losing Clea, wished he were dead. Enter [[DespairEventHorizon D'Spayre]], who put him through a series of {{Mind Screw}}s so painful that Strange nearly [[DrivenToSuicide took his own life]].
* In a ComicBook/TransformersMoreThanMeetsTheEye sidestory, Trailcutter briefly wishes that he no longer had his signature forcefield before going to sleep as he feels that is the only thing people remember about him. When he awakens, an malfunctioning pulse weapon has frozen everyone else on the ship and taken away his ability to project forcefields. He later learns that his forcefields are what protected him from the inventions effects.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Fan Fiction]]
* The ''Franchise/MyLittlePony'' fanfiction [[https://docs.google.com/document/d/11ajdmb55raU6Ik7pAD2GWtauRc_1-wQ_72qYKISm5kk/edit?pli=1 The Curse of Beauty]] involves a story within a story about six pony princesses, each named for a fairy tale heroine, who each recklessly used a spell from a magic tome called "The Excess Magic of Wishes", with disastrous and ironic results: Princess Snow White wishes she weren't so tall, and shrinks to a tiny size; Princess Goldilocks wishes to be more "sensitive", and suddenly everything feels too hard or too soft, too cold or too hot, etc.; Princess Rapunzel wishes for a longer mane, and ends up with enough hair to swamp a tower; and so on. Princess Cinderella "merely" gets trapped in a giant pumpkin after losing her concentration while casting a powerful spell.
* In TheSecondTry, Shinji and Asuka were [[PeggySue sent back in time]] because of an offhanded wish they made one night. They got their wish, but it came with a heavy cost. [[spoiler: They wished that they could do something to allow their 3-year old daughter a normal life; a life where she could have friends. By going back in time they got their chance to make such a world, but it also [[RetGone erased their daughter from existence.]]]] Shinji doesn't take this very well when he learns of it.
* ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3036180/1/When_All_Your_Dreams_Come_True When All Your Dreams Come True]]'', a [[FridgeHorror horrifyingly plausible]] ''AvatarTheLastAirbender'' fanfiction, in which Zuko’s dream of catching the Avatar and being reinstated as his father’s heir comes true…and promptly turns into a scene so nightmarish that he eventually loses himself in increasingly desperate daydreams trying to wish the new reality away.
* ''[[Fanfic/AFutureOfFriendshipAHistoryOfHate A Future of Friendship, A History of Hate]]'': Episode 5 is built on this trope -- Scootaloo, tired of the downsides of being a kid, accepts Miserain's aid in becoming an adult... only to figure out pretty fast that she has ''no idea'' how to be one, getting her into all kinds of trouble, eventually leaving her [[HeroicBSOD completely depressed]]. [[spoiler: Which is [[ManipulativeBastard what Miserain wanted]], as Scootaloo's despair fed the woebeghoul sealed in the [[ArtifactOfDoom Tear of Covet]].]] Once everything is over and done with, Scootaloo learns the episode's {{Aesop}} about waiting to grow up.
* The ''Fanfic/PonyPOVSeries'' has this as the origin story of [[GeneralRipper General-Admiral Makarov]]. The Hooviet Empire was struggling to stay afloat after the Dragon-Hooviet War (which ended with the Dragon's leader [[PhysicalGod Queen]] [[{{Kaiju}} Tiamat]] {{Curbstomp|Battle}}ing their entire military and leaving half the empire blazing ruin) and sought to create the UltimateLifeform to enable them to lead them back to greatness. The resulting SuperSoldier experiment created Makarov. The good news? He's doing exactly what they wanted him to do. The bad news? He's playing his leaders for pawns and has his own goals of world domination. [[spoiler:Made more literal by the fact he's actually a [[HumanoidAbomination Equineoid Abomination]] called the Shadow of Chernobull created by Pandora and [[SealedEvilInACan imprisoned in her box.]] A Hooviet experiment with an imagination engine ended up releasing him from his prison, after which he fed off their desires and wishes to become Makarov, in the process [[SpacetimeEater eating the existences]] of countless deer and threatening the entire world.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Fairy Tales]]
* King Midas. A notoriously greedy man, he once made a wish that everything he touched would turn to gold. When his wish was granted, he was ecstatic... [[BlessedWithSuck at least until the first time he tried to eat something]]. In another version of the story, he turns his daughter into gold. Thus this is OlderThanFeudalism.
* In ''[[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/sixswans/stories/twelvewilducks.html The Twelve Wild Ducks]]'', a queen says, "If I only had a daughter as white as snow and as red as blood, I shouldn't care what became of all my sons." A troll witch hears and takes her sons.
* In ''Literature/TheSevenRavens'', the father wishes his sons were ravens for their being so forgetful. (To add to the irony, he was mistaken about why they hadn't done as he said.)
* In ''[[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/pentamerone/2myrtle1911.html The Myrtle]]'', a woman [[WonderChild wishes for a child, even a sprig of myrtle]].
* In ''[[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/authors/grimms/108hanshedgehog.html Hans the Hedgehog]]'', the father wishes for a son, even a hedgehog.
* Similar stories went around in seventeenth century England. In some cases a Catholic or Anglican parent would rather their unborn child to have no head than be a Roundhead, in others, a Puritan would wish for their child have no head than have a priest make the Sign of the Cross on it. Either way, they ended up with a headless baby.
* There is a fairy tale about a poor couple that rescues an elf and is granted three wishes in return. The wife, being hungry, wishes she had a nice, tasty sausage. Her husband scolds her for wasting a wish on such a mundane thing and blurts out in anger: "I wish that stupid sausage would stick to your nose!" which is exactly what happens next. In the end, they have to use the third wish to get the sausage off the poor woman's face and have thus wasted all three of them.
* There's a story from somewhere in Africa about a tribe that doesn't exist any more, because when seeking a reward from some supernatural being, the men said that the best thing that could happen to them was for their wife to give them a son, and for their cattle to give them female calves. -- So be it, all your children shall be sons and all your calves shall be heifers. -- They rejoiced, until...
* [[http://www.surlalunefairytales.com/russian/oldpetersrussiantales/princeivan.html Prince Ivan, the Witch Baby, and the Little Sister of the Sun]] Your son does not talk. Wish for any child at all, because things can't be worse, and you get [[WitchSpecies a witch child]] born with her iron teeth who eats you up.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Film - Animated]]
* In the WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes compilation movie ''Daffy Duck's Fantastic Island'', Daffy, Speedy Gonzales, Yosemite Sam and the Tasmanian Devil are stuck on an deserted island with only three wishes after the map that works a wishing well is destroyed. Speedy and Daffy play this trope straight when Speedy wishes for a burrito and Daffy, annoyed over the wish, wishes it was on his nose. When Daffy suggests using the last wish to get it off, he finds out that Sam and Taz has averted the trope by wishing for a new ship, leaving the other two behind.
* Disney's ''Disney/{{Aladdin}}'' uses this idea, but even without a LiteralGenie it doesn't turn out as desired.
** Aladdin wishes to become a prince, but he only ''wants'' for Jasmine to love him. He certainly gets to be a magnificent prince, but Jasmine is put off. Once he starts acting like a street rat, Jasmine is once again attracted to him.
** Jafar caught this too - he wants power, and eventually to get the level of power he wants, he becomes a genie and is [[OurGeniesAreDifferent bound to a lamp]]. So he had vast power but at the same time, no power at all.
*** In the sequel, Jafar becomes a LiteralGenie and tricks Abis Mal into wasting two wishes by making him wish for a sunken treasure... and teleporting him to the bottom of the sea, making him use his second wish to go back to Agrabah.
* In ''Disney/{{Bolt}}'', the director pulls one of these when Mindy-from-the-Network asks for a less than happy ending. He ends it abruptly and says to Mindy "How does your audience feel about... cliffhangers? You wanted unhappy 18-35 year olds, I'll give you unhappy 18-35 year olds. Small example but it works."
* A cover for the film version of ''WesternAnimation/{{Coraline}}'' features the trope name, word for word, written on a wall.
* ''Disney/ThePrincessAndTheFrog'': [[MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate Dr.]] Facilier promises to "make all [Lawrence and Naveen's] wildest dreams come true." To quote ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'', remember some of your dreams?
** In this case, Facilier uses ExactWords and double-meanings to convince the pair to accept his deal; Facilier identifies Naveen as "Wanting to be free" and offers "Green" to get that (The card for future shows Naveen on a lily pad). Lawrence is recognized as always being a servant, but is offered a chance to improve his station (Lawrence's future card shows him and Naveen in switched positions). When they accept, Naveen is turned into a frog and Lawrence is given Naveen's appearence.
* This drives the movie ''WesternAnimation/{{Shrek}} Forever After''. When Shrek wants "one day where I can be an ogre like I used to be," he gets it. Too bad the deal he made with the BigBad has rather unpleasant consequences.
* This happens to Merida in ''WesternAnimation/{{Brave}}'' when she wished that [[spoiler: her mother would "change" without saying specifics]] and to the prince of the legend [[spoiler: who wishes for "the strength of ten men", was turned into a bear and caused him to ''kill everyone in the throne room'' and his brothers were among the victims.]]
* In ''WreckItRalph'', the Nicelanders challenge Ralph that if he can get a medal, he can get the keys to the penthouse. [[spoiler: Ralph does manage to get a medal, but because of his and Fix-It Felix's (who went to find Ralph) absence, ''Fix-it Felix Jr.'' has already been declared out of order and will be unplugged soon. As promised, Ralph gets the key to the penthouse but it is now abandoned.]]
* ''ToyStory3'' has the main characters wishing early on that they would get played with again. When they do, it's at a day care where they happen to be assigned to toddlers who handle them too roughly. (All the main characters are toys meant for older kids than toddlers.) [[spoiler:(And when Buzz Lightyear tries to negotiate with Lotso, the toy in charge of all the other toys, to get himself and the rest of the main characters put into the room with the older kids, Buzz and eventually the other toys find out that Lotso [[PrisonEpisode runs the place like a prison]].)]] [[note]](On a sidenote, ''ToyStory3'' might actually double as a meta-example on top of that; all series have some fans who wish the series would explore DarkerAndEdgier themes, but before the third installment came out, discussions of this idea had more of a "wouldn't this be interesting" prevailing tone, while after it came out discussions of the dark themes that actually ''were'' involved ranged from {{Running Gag}}s about how dark the movie was to [[http://www.momlogic.com/2010/06/toy_story_3_too_dark_for_little_kids.php serious concerns about whether or not the movie was too dark for children]].)[[/note]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Film - Live Action]]
* In the Frank Capra classic ''Film/ItsAWonderfulLife'', protagonist George Bailey's life falls apart so dramatically that he wishes he was never born. His guardian angel, Clarence, decides to show him exactly how much of a suckfest his home town of Bedford Falls would have become without his influence. This in turn was [[ItsAWonderfulPlot parodied relentlessly.]]
* In the "Fiction" section of ''Storytelling'', white girl Vi wants to fuck her black literature professor Mr. Scott. The actual experience turns out to be traumatic; she realises she is the latest young, impressionable white girl in a series of sexual conquests, and Mr. Scott has a proclivity for [[spoiler: racial epithets]] that makes the scene memorably disturbing.
* This is how ''Film/{{Labyrinth}}'' starts. Frustrated at her baby half-brother, Sarah carelessly wishes that the villain from her favorite book would take the brat away and is more than a bit shocked when he actually ''does''. Whoopsie.
* This is the main plot of the TomHanks film ''Film/{{Big}}''.
* Ditto for the JenniferGarner movie ''13 Going on 30'', which is the same premise [[RecycledInSpace with a girl]].
* In ''SeventeenAgain'', Mike O'Donnell wishes that he could go back in time to change his life. Courtesy of a [[SwirlyEnergyThingy whirlpool]], he does. It's not quite what he thought it would be.
* ''Film/{{Bedazzled 1967}}'' has this as its main premise.
* In the Disney Movie ''Film/BlankCheck'' the protagonist feels left out because he has no money while everyone else in his family does. While blowing out the candles on his birthday cake, he wishes to be rich. Shortly afterwards , his bike gets run over and he is handed a blank check to cover for his bike, he cashes it for 1 million dollars. After buying a house and loads of fancy toys, he realizes that he is just as friendless as before. The final scene has him considering his wish for his next birthday while admiring the attractive female FBI agent that saved him from the villains.
* The DisneyChannel movie ''16 Wishes'' combined this trope with AnAesop about appreciating what you have.
* IndianaJones:
** In ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheKingdomOfTheCrystalSkull'', the BigBad [[spoiler:asks the movie's extradimensional aliens for all of their knowledge]]. She gets it all, so much in fact that [[spoiler:she explodes from the information overload.]]
** Played for laughs in the second movie ''Film/TempleOfDoom'', where Indy, after having stopped a mining cart with his foot and resulting in his boot smoking, cries out "Water! Water!". Mere seconds later...
* The Russian film ''Adventures of Petrov and Vasechkin'' (two children) has a subplot about wishes. For example, Vasechkin states how great it would be to be invisible, only to collide with other person and shout: "What are you thinking, didn't you see me?!" When they really get wishes granted, things get even uglier.
* ''TheIncredibleMrLimpet.'': Ultimately the trope is subverted, as it turns out he really is happier as a fish.
* In ''Film/{{Leatherheads}}'', "Dodge" Connelly (played by George Clooney) wants professional football to become a legitimate, respectable way to make a living. A variant in that there's nothing supernatural to grant his wish. [[spoiler: The government steps in and appoints a Commissioner to clean things up. Once this happens, he discovers there's no longer a place for him or his style of play.]]
* ''Film/ADayWithoutAMexican''. The film starts with several Californians expressing their contempt and animosity for Mexican immigrants (mostly the illegal ones), then suddenly all Mexican immigrants start vanishing all over the state forcing them to see how much they relied on them and then making them long for their return.
* In the Olsen twins movie ''Double, Double, Toil and Trouble'', Agatha wishes that she and her identical twin Sophia were "completely different". Agatha grows up to be an evil witch who relatives avoid unless they need money, and Sophia grows up to be a kindly woman who everyone loves.
* In ''FreakyFriday'', the heroine and her mother both wish to be each other "just for one day". Since they make the wish at the same time, this being Hollywood, it happens. HilarityEnsues.
* In ''Film/TheThiefOfBagdad'', Abu accidentally wishes Ahmad away this way.
* In ''BernardAndTheGenie'', the Genie warns Bernard "Use the words 'I wish' with the caution you used to reserve for the words 'Please castrate me.'"
* In ''Film/StarTrekIIITheSearchForSpock'', the Lieutenant working with Uhura at the Transporter station asks for "a little excitement"...and he gets it, but not what he had in mind.
* It's somewhat overshadowed by the main "foiling the burglars" plot, but ''HomeAlone'' plays this straight with the protagonist wishing his family didn't exist, and ultimately coming to regret their being gone.
--> "I made my family disappear!"
* The horror movie ''Open Graves'' (as reviewed by {{Phelous}}) ends with the character being granted a wish, and using it to rewind time to before the tragic events of the film occurred. Since he neglected to mention that he wanted some kind of [[RippleEffectProofMemory foreknowledge of what was going to happen]] it proceeded to just [[StableTimeLoop happen over again]]. To make it worse, the witch who created the cursed game that set this in motion showed up to tell him his wish was stupid and maybe he should make a different one, and he just insisted that was what he wanted.
* The plot of the Grade-Z horror film ''{{Hobgoblins}}''.
* ''The Banker''. The titular character invokes this trope on a fellow who is blackmailing him. Let's just say that things don't go too well for the blackmailer after that.
* In ''DeadFriend'' (aka ''The Ghost'') [[spoiler: Su-in, completely by accident, got what she wished for - She ''becomes'' Ji-won.]] Unfortunately for her, there were some [[GhostlyGoals nasty consequences.]]
* Lenina Huxley, a huge fan of the pre-Utopia history, wished for some real action in ''Film/DemolitionMan'' and then Simon Phoenix broke out of the cryo prison.
* TheMovie of ''WizardsOfWaverlyPlace'' had it too. Alex yells at her mother when the latter grounds the former, ultimately wishing that her parents never met. At all. And because she is holding the wand, the wish that Alex unintentionally makes comes true. Ironic that she'd wish that on vacation in the one place where her parents first met.
* In ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'', Mike challenges Pearl Forrester to a game of chance and ends up winning. He asks for ''{{Hamlet}}''. Boy, ''does she'' give him ''Hamlet''!
* Essentially the plot of most ''Film/{{Hellraiser}}'' films, especially the first two and the ninth where the cenobites are simply {{Sense Freak}}s. Hedonists who open the box looking for sensation the normal, dull, unfulfilling world can't provide learn this lesson ''very'' quickly, but far too late. In ''Deader,'' Pinhead delivers the trope name to Winter for trying to cheat death but messing up and delivering himself right into Pinhead's waiting chains.
* ''Interstate 60'': O.W. Grant often [[JackassGenie grants wishes this way]] if he thinks the wish is boring or doesn't like the person making the wish. As he explains: "Now one young couple wished to be married and live happily ever after. So I blew up their car at the church on the way to the honeymoon. Another guy he wanted great, perfect sex every day with his choice of gorgeous women - no pregnancies. So everyday he gets a Fed Ex delivery of a skin magazine and a box of tissues."
* In ''Film/InTime''. Sylvia was bored of her sterile, rich life and wanted a life of adventure. Then, Will kidnaps her and she nearly dies a few times. After getting over the initial shock, she falls for him and joins him in his quest.
* In the movie ''Film/{{Battleship}}'', Earth people want to contact another planet, known to be circling a similar star in a similar ''Goldilock'''s zone (not too hot, not too cold). What they don't realize is, if the civilization has the technology to actually send their people here, while all we can do is send a radio signal there, they might be a little more advanced technologically. [[spoiler: And they might want to use that same technology (ours) to call for reinforcements.]]
* ''The Sex Monster'' is about a man who wants his [[GirlOnGirlIsHot wife to agree to a threesome with them and another woman]]. She eventually does agree, and has such a good time that she ends up going on what can only be termed a lesbian rampage. He ends up being very unhappy about this; this trope, then is effectively the plot of the whole movie.
* In ''Film/TheDarkKnightRises'', Selina Kyle wishes for the rich to "wonder how you ever thought you could live so large and leave so little for the rest of us." Her opinion changes after seeing just how destructive Bane's "liberation" of Gotham is.
** Also, twice, this happens with Daggett. First time is when he's going to his office:
-->'''John Daggett:''' And can we get some girls in here?
-->'''Selina Kyle:''' Careful what you wish for. ''[immediately pounces on Daggett, throws him across the room, and pins him against the wall with her left boot and right hand]'' Cat got your tongue?
-->'''John Daggett:''' You dumb bitch!
-->'''Selina Kyle:''' Nobody ever accused me of being dumb!
** There's also Daggett's confrontation with Bane:
-->'''John Daggett:''' How the hell did Miranda Tate get the inside track on the Wayne board?! I mean, has she been meeting with him?! Has she been sleeping with him?!
-->'''Philip Stryver:''' Not that we know of.
-->'''John Daggett:''' Ah, clearly you don't know much of anything, do you?! Where is Bane?!
-->'''Philip Stryver:''' Well, we told him it was urgent.
-->'''John Daggett:''' Oh, where is the masked-
-->'''Bane:''' [[SpeakOfTheDevil Speak of the devil]]....[[RightBehindMe and he shall appear]]. ''[Daggett whirls around to see Bane has instantly appeared]''
** This second time does not go so well for Daggett's neck.
* The old pilgrim in the beginning of ''Film/TheSwordOfDoom'' ''was'' praying for death, but he probably wasn't asking for it in the form of Ryunosuke cutting him down right then & there.
* In "Breaking the Waves" every time any character prays, this happens, along with lots of [[FromBadtoWorse it got worse]]

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Literature]]
* In the first book of ''Literature/{{Animorphs}}'', Tobias states he's all right with his red-tailed hawk morph and ''doesn't want to be anything else''. Consequently, the end of that episode (and the whole rest of the series) sees him trapped in that shape.
* In the medieval ChivalricRomance of Robert the Devil and all its variants, the parents wish for a [[WonderChild child]] -- whether from God or the Devil. The son is therefore born possessed by evil. (Fortunately for him, in due time, he repents and does penitence for his evil. This results in either [[RagsToRoyalty marrying]] [[StandardHeroReward the princess]] or becoming a saint.)
* In Creator/HansChristianAndersen's ''The Galoshes of Fortune'', the titular shoes grant the wishes of whoever is wearing them. This usually ends badly, as the characters are unaware of their power. For example, the Councilor of Justice held the view that in the time of King Hans, around 1500, everything was better; when the galoshes transport him to that age, he finds out that it was actually much worse.
* The EdgarAllanPoe story ''Never Bet the Devil Your Head'' is an odd case of this. A man tells a story of a friend who says he'd "bet the devil his head" that he could perform a particular trick; out of nowhere, [[LouisCypher a mystery man]] shows up eager to take him up on his bet, and sure enough, he manages to decapitate himself and the man runs off with his prize.
* In ''Wedding Shirts'', a ballad by [[http://new.radio.cz/en/article/58317 Karel Jaromír Erben]], a woman makes the following wish in a prayer: "O Mary, full of power / Oh, help me at this hour / Bring my beloved home / Lord knows where he does roam / Bring him, I reck not how / Or finish my life now." You know what followed ... Yes, her beloved returned to her from the grave, almost leading to the second part of the wish coming true as well.
* Both subverted and not in the short story [[http://books.google.com/books?id=H7BNAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA938 "The Wish Ring"]]. A farmer is kind to an old woman, and gets a wish ring in return. He shows it to a jeweler to see how much it's worth, and the jeweler steals it from him and replaces it with an identical copy. The jeweler then wishes for a million gold pieces, which promptly begin raining from the sky and crush him to death. In the meantime, the farmer goes home still thinking he has the real ring. Every time his wife suggests something they could wish for, he says no, they can work for that and earn it instead. Eventually they become happy and rich because of their hard work, and die with the wish still unasked.
* In ''Literature/ThePictureOfDorianGray'', the titular character makes a DealWithTheDevil to stay young and good looking forever; instead, a life sized portrait of him will age in his place. While he enjoys his life of consequence-free debauchery at first, eventually the picture begins to serve as his conscience, reminding him of things to prefer to forget. Comes complete with a heavy dose of symbolism, as after he commits murder blood appears on his portrait's hands. Eventually, trying to eliminate the portrait and the evidence of his sins causes his own death.
* Forms most of the plot of the Edwardian children's novel ''Literature/FiveChildrenAndIt'' by Creator/ENesbit -- the "it" of the title is a cantankerous sand-fairy, whose granted wishes always backfire on the children.
* W.W. Jacobs' classic short story "Literature/TheMonkeysPaw" concerns a married couple who receive the title item as a gift from a friend who served in the British Army in India. The paw grants its owner ThreeWishes, and the husband uses the first of these to wish for 200 pounds; the couple subsequently learns that their grown son was killed after falling into the machinery at the factory where he worked, and they are offered £200 as compensation from the employers. The wife then begs the husband to wish for the son to be brought back to life; after he does so (with great reluctance), they hear a steady knocking on their door. As the overjoyed wife runs to unlock and open the door, the husband realizes to his horror that the son will have come back [[CameBackWrong in his mutilated state]], and quickly uses the third wish; when the wife finally gets the door open, there's nobody there, implying that the third wish was for the son to be returned to the grave.
* Gelsomino, whose voice could shatter even stone, wished to come into a land "where everything is inversed, and people don't worry about my voice". He then arrives into Land of Liars, where everybody is obliged by law to lie, naming night day, black white etc. Naturally, they don't care about his voice - they have other problems!
* Most of the works of CliveBarker have this theme; want to know where the mysterious girls are coming from? [[spoiler: [[GenderBender you become one yourself]]]]. Want to gain notoriety for finding out that an UrbanLegend is true? [[spoiler: You will... as his next victim.]] Want to find a [[HellRaiser dimension of limitless pleasure?]] The Cenobites have such sights to show you...
* Literature/LordOfTheRings:
** Frodo always [[InHarmsWay wished for adventures]] when he was small... didn't work out well, either.
** Also part of the backstory of the Nazgul: they were once mighty, arrogant Kings of Men who desired power and long life. So Sauron gave them magic rings. Now they are immortal...undead slaves to Sauron's will.
* In ''The Literature/ChroniclesofThomasCovenant: The Land'', drinking the Blood of the Earth gives the power to command absolutely anything to happen, but limited human minds simply cannot know all consequences of a sudden change to reality. So it's usually safest not to use it.
* In Creator/UrsulaKLeGuin's ''Literature/TheLatheOfHeaven'', the protagonist is repeatedly asked to dream of a solution to a pressing problem, and the solution turns out to be worse than the original. For example, asked to make sure that there is enough food for everyone, he dreams of a plague that has killed most people in the past, and the survivors have enough to eat. Then, he's asked to find a way to avert a threatened global war, so dreams that the nations of the Earth united... against the threat of an alien species that has taken up residence on the Moon. Then, when he is asked to dream that the aliens are no longer on the moon, so he makes them leave the Moon for...Earth.
* The basic premise of Creator/JohnBrunner's novel ''The Traveller in Black'' is that of a man who grants wishes in ways that are almost ''never'' to the wishers' liking; the ultimate goal of which is to replace Chaos with Order. At least, those who are selfish get their comeuppance, but the few who are unselfish (e.g. someone who wishes the Traveller success in his present quest, a little girl who wants to make the fire burn brighter so the family hut will be warm) are rewarded. Moreover, the Traveller often simply accelerates a comeuppance that the character was bound to suffer anyway, as when he splashes Lorega with the transformative water she'd intended to jump into already.
* There's a short story about a world where wishes came true automatically. In this setting, people lived idyllic lives as their every needs were met. Unfortunately, there was [[TheFool a fool]], whose wishes were so poorly conceived that they always backfired on him. After making a number of increasingly short-sighted wishes, he finally thought of one that would put an end to this chain of misfortune: he wished "that wishes would no longer automatically come true." The next and final line of the story reads, "Things were tough all over."
* ''Literature/WitchWeek'' by Creator/DianaWynneJones has Charles use his new-found powers to torment Simon, the classroom bully. How does he do this? With a literal game of Simon says; [[TooDumbToLive anything Simon says comes true]]. After a few mishaps (with Simon saying everything from 'You girls stink' to 'I'm not clever at all!'), Chrestomanci comes in, gets Simon to shut up and tells Charles how horribly everything could've gone if Simon had said something like 'Two plus two equals three' or the like.
* Bill Brittain's ''Literature/TheWishGiver'' is all about this. Three children in a small American town (along with the {{narrator}}, a man from the general store who answers to the nickname "Stew Meat") get cards that supposedly grant wishes from a mysterious vendor at the county fair, and the three stories in the book deal with the consequences of [[LiteralGenie the kids' ill-thought-out wishes]]: A sharp-tongued tomboy named Polly wishes people would start being glad to see her, and much to the amusement of her peers she starts to croak like a bullfrog whenever she starts insulting people; a sentimental girl named Rowena wishes the handsome young traveling salesman she has a crush on would "put down roots in Coven Tree and never leave", and he starts turning into a tree; a farm boy named Adam wishes his family's farm had more than enough water, and it ends up flooded. In the epilogue, the trio have learned their lessons, and beg Stew Meat to [[{{Wishplosion}} undo their wishes with his own wish card]].
* Non-supernatural example: In Margaret Atwood's ''TheHandmaidsTale'', the character of Serena Joy is a former conservative televangelist who preached that women belonged in the home and helped to support the overthrow of the United States by the theocratic Republic of Gilead; by the time of the novel, she has been stripped of her public role, reduced to the role of subjugated housewife, and forced to be present while another woman - the Handmaid of the title - has sex with her husband every month. As Atwood wryly notes, "How furious she must be, now that she's been taken at her word."
* Along the same lines as ''TheHandmaidsTale'', Sinclair Lewis's ''It Can't Happen Here'' details the takeover of the U.S. government by a fascistic regime led by a demagogue named Buzz Windrip. Some characters who initially support Windrip's regime wind up becoming imprisoned or executed by it.
** TruthInTelevision: among the many, many victims of the Nazis were some of the senior members of the Nationalist and Center Parties, which had originally supported Hitler (under the impression that it was him or the Communists, and the Communists were worse.) Windrip isn't quite a Hitler Expy, but Lewis was writing in the 1930s and almost certainly expected his readers to spot the parallels.
* In Creator/CJCherryh's Russian trilogy (''Rusalka'', ''Chernevog,'' and ''Yvgenie''), wizards work magic by wanting something. Since the form of the wish takes the easiest path, a wish, for example, for the five-year-old wizard's father to not hit him again could — and did — result in the house burning down and both his parents dying in the fire. Every wish is fraught with the potential for disaster, and not wanting things is like not thinking of elephants, so wizards, by and large, end up insane hermits.
* A ''{{Goosebumps}}'' book with this very title has this as its premise, with the term ''ResetButton'' loosely applied.
* ''ASongOfIceAndFire'':
** It doesn't ''quite'' come true, but there is a scene where Arya (disguised as a servant-girl) is talking to an annoying Frey squire who keeps jabbering about how he's going to marry a princess. At some point Arya just snaps at him, yelling "I wish your princess was ''dead!''" not knowing she just wished her own demise. Averted in some ways in that she's still alive, although whether she's still Arya Stark is questionable.
** And also when at the beginning of "A Game of Thrones" Catelyn prayed to the Seven Gods that they let Bran stay in Winterfell. He ended up falling from a tower and not being able to walk ever again.
** And at one point, [[spoiler: Jeyne Poole]] remarks about how when she was little, she often dreamed how it would be like to be a Stark. Now she does know for sure - and this involves massive BreakTheCutie.
* A principal point in the novel ''Literature/{{Coraline}}'' by NeilGaiman -- even used as a tagline in the film. Coraline wants her life to be more interesting, exciting, and engaging... she gets it, but not the way she wants.
* One of the characters in "[[TheEschatonSeries Singularity Sky]]" by Charles Stross receives three wishes. His first wish is to be young again; he becomes eight years old. Not quite what he had in mind, but as certain people sought to kill him, he was not going to complain. His second wish is for some "real friends"; he gets some talking animals. His third wish is for adventure. Bad idea.
* A running theme in the ''Tiffany Aching'' series (the young adult ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' books):
** In ''Discworld/TheWeeFreeMen'', Tiffany's baby brother is stolen by the Queen of the Fairies, who will give him whatever he wants - and since he wants sweets, he'll get sweets, and nothing else, for the rest of his life.
** In the third book in the series, ''Discworld/{{Wintersmith}}'', Tiffany doesn't want the titular AnthropomorphicPersonification of Winter to continue making her name in frost, or icebergs that look like her, but feels sorry and lets him make all the snowflake portraits of her that he wishes. As the story opens with a FlashForward of the entire Chalk covered in tens of feet of snow, you can see where this is going.
** In ''Discworld/AHatFullOfSky'', this trope is explicitly dissected, with Granny Weatherwax pointing out that if someone in a story gets three wishes, the third will always be "undo the harm caused by the first two wishes". And in the beginning of the book it's noted that had Tiffany said aloud that she'd like to marry a prince, the Feegles might well show up at her door with an (unconscious) prince and a (tied up) priest ready to perform the ceremony.
** There's an example in the main series as well: in ''Discworld/{{Eric}}'', the titular character demands three wishes from Rincewind the wizzard [sic]: mastery over the kingdoms of the world; to meet the most beautiful woman who ever lived; and to live forever. Oh, and a chest of gold. The first wish (granted by [[spoiler:Vassenego]] ''through'' Rincewind) sends them in orbit above the Disc, and then to one of Eric's new dominions for tribute (the Tezuman empire, the inhabitants of which want to sacrifice them for being a bad landlord, metaphorically speaking). The second wish takes them to the Tsortean Wars, where they meet Elenor of Tsort (an {{Expy}} of Helen of Troy), the most beautiful woman who ever lived- ten years and seven children too late. As for the third wish, well, if you want to live for ever, you have to go back to the start of "ever", right?
** Also PlayedForLaughs when it's noted that "yes, but ''not this bit!''" has not been recognised as a valid clause in magic spells ever since the late Funnit the Forgetful's [[ExactWords arguably successful]] spell to destroy the entire tree he was sitting in.
* Common in ''JonathanStrangeAndMrNorrell'', especially when fairies are involved. The [[TheFairFolk Gentleman with the Thistledown Hair]] even invokes this, as one of his plans for defeating Jonathan Strange is to appear to him and offer him whatever he wants, on the basis that it's bound to cause him trouble. That plan rather backfired when Strange doesn't ask for infinite gold, the most beautiful woman in the world or something distracting and troublesome like that, but instead asks for various lost pieces of information about magic The Gentleman doesn't want him to know, leaving him flustered and trying to convince him to pick something else.
* Serwe's backstory in ''SecondApocalypse'' has a lot to do with this trope. Her prayers to gods come true several times but not in a way she wants.
* ''Fairy Haven and the Quest for the Wand'' by Gail Carson Levine. The Neverland fairies get a wand to repay a mermaid, but, unaware that all wands have a mind of their own, accidentally pick one of the meanest wands.
* In ''Literature/DeathStar'', Imperial gunner Tenn Graneet, after Alderaan, remembers his grandfather's saying about being careful what you wish for.
--> Now he understood exactly what that meant. He had wanted to fire the big gun, and he had gotten to do just that. The only man in the galaxy who had shot it for real, at real targets, and look what it had brought him: [[HeelRealization misery beyond]] [[BeingEvilSucks his]] [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone ugliest dreams]].
** Unstated, but in ''Literature/GalaxyOfFear: The Doomsday Ship'' Zak Arranda, tired from ten books of constant adventure and hazard, just wants to stop and have nothing to do for a while. In the next book, ''Clones'', the family has been on Dantooine for two weeks traveling with a local tribe with anything dangerous being quickly and easily resolved by the adults, and the tech-minded Zak is bored out of his mind.
* In Franny Billingsley's ''Well Wished'' this trope is the main basis of the plot. The antagonist sets up the protagonist to fall for this trap. [[spoiler: She tricks the protagonist into a making wish that she knows will exchange her crippled body for the protagonist's healthy one.]]
* In Melissa Marr's ''[[WickedLovely Ink Exchange]]'' Leslie wishes for 'no more fear and pain' when she gets her tattoo...she ends up being used as a conduit by some very [[DarkerAndEdgier dark]] [[TheFairFolk faeries]] with a HorrorHunger for negative emotions, unable to feel anything for more than a few seconds and barely lucid.
* Mat from ''Literature/TheWheelOfTime'' books is granted three wishes, but doesn't realise it and goes on a rant. Luckily, he manages to get some useful stuff from it.
* Creator/CSLewis:
** In ''Literature/TheVoyageOfTheDawnTreader'': one of the seven lords is stranded on an island where all of your dreams come true. The lord and his sailors come to a frightening realization: daydreams don't count, but nightmares do.
** Also, in ''TheMagiciansNephew'', the fruit that Digory picks for Aslan grants wishes. But as the writing on the garden wall warns...
-->''Come in through the gold gates or not at all.''
-->''Take of my fruit for others or forbear.''
-->''For those who steal or those who climb the wall''
-->''Shall find their heart's desire and find despair.''
* In Creator/LordDunsany's ''Literature/TheKingOfElflandsDaughter'', the commoners want a magical lord. This means the lord has to send his son after the title character for a bride and causes all the subsequent problems.
* In ''The Emperor's Winding Sheet'' by Jill Paton Walsh, the last Emperor of Constantinople said that in his youth he plotted and schemed to become Emperor, and God punished him-by making him Emperor.
* In Edward Everett Hale's short story "[[http://www.bartleby.com/ebook/adobe/3106.pdf The Man Without a Country]]", Philip Nolan, as a young man enamored with Aaron Burr, cries out at his court-martial, "Damn the United States! I wish I may never hear of the United States again!" The court grants him his wish by sentencing him to [[FlyingDutchman forever live on ships sailing away from the United States]] and be forbidden from ever hearing or reading anything about the United States ever again. He comes to really and truly regret his wish, and makes sure to tell the narrator not to make the same mistake he did.
* At the end of L. Jagi Lamplighter's ''[[ProsperosDaughter Prospero In Hell]]'', Miranda reflects on how she had wished to have a common enemy for her family to unite against. She got one. (It's the second in a trilogy.)
* ''[[ForgottenRealms Elfsong]]'' by Elaine Cunningham includes a stanza from [[RichIdiotWithNoDayJob Danilo Thann]] which says this in the chorus. [[http://forum.candlekeep.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1888&whichpage=22#61128 It's]] a BawdySong. [[spoiler:"Your wish bespoke how long it [[BiggerIsBetterInBed WAS]], and not how long 'twould [[SpeedSex LAST]]!". And yes, it's about a knight's lance.]]
* One implication of a Cautionary Tale - "A tomboy who became a real boy". A girl wants to do boyish things, and now she '''has''' to do boyish things, since she just [[GenderBender became a boy]].
* A short story "The Dumpster". Sick of your asocial family?, The dumpster will replace it with copies that behave perfectly, '''but''': 1) They will be creepy in their own way, and, most important 2)YOU are now held to the same high standards - slack off and the dumpster will replace you with a perfect copy as well.
* In Peter Freund's ''Mysteria'' series, there is a teenage girl Jessie who, when her father starts a book about the titular land, is excited of it and wants to go there; and then she accidently gets stuck in Mysteria, which is '''very bad''' because [[spoiler: she requires insulin injections and Mysteria doesn't have this, even with the magic, so she must find a way back before her supply runs out...]]
* The Literature/InDeath series: Eve is doing paperwork, which she hates, at the beginning of ''New York to Dallas''. She wishes that there was some murderer out there for her to go get. She gets it in the form of Isaac [=McQueen=], a rapist and pedophile, who was the first murderer she took down while she was in uniform, and is out for {{Revenge}} against Eve. It goes FromBadToWorse when Isaac goes to Dallas, the place where she killed her father in self-defense at 8 years old. Paperwork suddenly looks very good right about now.
* In TheObsidianTrilogy and TheEnduringFlameTrilogy Wildmages can make wishes to the Wildmagic which will grant it for a price which varies depending on the difficulty of the wish. Since the magic will grant you what you ask for, not what you want, Wildmages are warned to think carefully what they really want/desire in order to not waste time and energy paying off a wasted wish, and to minimize the cost of any necessary wishes.
* ''Literature/SeptimusHeap'': {{Lampshaded}} with Marcia becoming [=ExtraOrdinary=] Wizard, since she wished it all the time and it eventually became true... by Alther being shot on the day she became EOW: "Beware what you wish for, lest it come true"
* ''HalfUponATime'' gives us a great moment right from the beginning. Jack, whose father was Jack from Literature/JackAndTheBeanstalk, is arguing with his grandfather about Jack's lack of ambition.
--> '''Jack''': ''I should be able to just stick out my arms, and have a princess fall right into them!''
* ''Literature/EnchantressFromTheStars'': Young, overenthusiastic Elana wants to be a part of expedition on Andrecia. She gets her wish when [[spoiler: Ilura, another agent, is killed]] and from then on is on for a ''very'' harsh mission from which she now can't back down.
* ''CharlieAndTheChocolateFactory'': Seemingly every child on planet wanted to get the Golden Ticket, enabling one to visit Willy Wonka's factory. For four out of five children who did found it (and of those four, at least three actively sought the ticket) the visit turned to a horrible experience. This is subverted with TheHero, who [[spoiler: now got the factory]].
* A recurring theme in ''[[Literature/{{Chalion}} The Curse of Chalion]]'':
--> '''Ista''': The gods' most savage curses come to us as answers to our own prayers. Prayer is a dangerous business.
* In a 1941 Creator/TheodoreSturgeon short story "Shottle Bop", a seer-of-ghosts sees a ghostly couple in an endless feedback loop, repeating a conversation, summed up as follows: "If we kill ourselves, we're sure to be together.... forever.... just like this." "Will we, Tommy?" "I promise.... just like this."
* In ''TheABCMurders'', HerculePoirot says his ideal mystery would be murder at a bridge game, where everyone was so intent upon the game that noone noticed when one of them, the dummy that round, got up and killed the host. A few books later, he faces exactly that.
* In Creator/EDBaker's ''Literature/TheWideAwakePrincess'', Literature/SleepingBeauty's parents want to protect their second daughter and assure the FairyGodmother they would do anything to prevent such a curse on her. The fairy godmother makes her immune to magic. Which means she doesn't get the standard gifts that make her beautiful, talented, charming, etc.
* In ''{{Literature/Airframe}}'' after a strange incident involving a plane, the manufacturer takes it up to recreate it, and a reporter that's been following them demands to go along. She winds up regretting it.
* ''HouseholdGods'' begins when Nicole, fed up with life in modern-day LA, tells what she believes to be perfectly ordinary statues of the Roman gods Liber and Libera that she wished she could live in ancient Rome. Liber and Libera deem it an excellent request, and are all too happy to grant it.
* As John Galt explains towards the end of ''AtlasShrugged'', society has claimed for decades that wealthy businessmen, executives, and entrepreneurs are evil villains who harm, exploit, and enslave others. Well, he has made them all vanish, liberating society of their evil... so what does anyone have to complain about?
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Live Action TV]]
* In ''{{Smallville}}'', ''Hex'', Chloe wished to become Lois. [[LiteralGenie Zatanna]] complies. HilarityEnsues.
** In Apocalypse, Clark wishes he hasn't existed as he brought so much pain and suffering. [[spoiler:ItsAWonderfulPlot.]]
* Series/SesameStreet: The Amazing Mumford and Abby Cadabby lack both the skill to control their magic and the ability to undo their mistakes. A number of episodes are based on this.
* In an episode of TopGear devoted to Lamborghini, James May learns this the hard way when he finally gets to drive the car of his dreams, the Countach. He lampshades this without mentioning the trope by name.
--> '''James''': And [the Countach] looked so good on the poster. In fact, I wish it had ''stayed'' there. I'm absolutely ''gutted''. But you know it's not the car's fault; it's ''mine''. I've broken the Golden Rule: You never, '''ever''' meet your childhood heroes. ...Stick with the memories. They're just ''better''.
* The plot of ''{{Beetleborgs}}'' centers around three kids who wish to be their favorite comic book superheroes. Consequently, the villans also appear, handing out several {{Curb Stomp Battle}}s over the course of the series. The first episode of the second season, ''Metallix'', also showed that the wish had a second part - you get the powers, you get the bad guys. No more bad guys? No more powers. Thankfully, new bad guys showed up and the kids were back in action.
* ''TheSecretWorldOfAlexMack'' did this when Alex wished she had ''never been born.'' She wakes up in a world where her mother got into the chemical truck accident instead of her and was kidnapped by the Plant to be a research subject, her father was fired from his job as a scientist to keep this fact hidden from him and had to take a job unloading cargo trucks, and Annie (shown in this "world" as an only child) had to get a job to support them, causing her genius level grades to drop.
* ''TheCosbyShow'' did this plot, with Theo as the teenager who wanted to be treated like an adult, in its first season, but it has appeared in other series as well.
* ''Series/ICarly'': The ChristmasEpisode ''iChristmas''. Carly wishes for Spencer to be normal, and an ''It's a Wonderful Life'' style homage ensues, ending with Carly more appreciative than ever of her life.
* Standard episode plot for ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer''.
** Ensnaring wronged people with BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor is the whole modus operandi of vengeance demons in Buffy. They find somebody who's been wronged, get them to make a wish, and then make the wish come true in a gruesome manner that the wisher never intended.
** In the episode entitled "The Wish," Cordelia wished that "Buffy Summers had never come to Sunnydale." In the [[BizarroUniverse Bizarro World]] which resulted, Cordelia's friends, Willow and Xander, had been killed and changed into vampires, and Cordelia herself was eventually killed.
*** Which means that Cordelia never actually learns anything after the snapback at the end of the episode.
** In "Older and Far Away," Dawn makes a wish to Halfrek that everybody would spend more time with her. Halfrek makes the dream come true by [[spoiler:magically making it impossible for any of the guests at Buffy's party to leave the house]]. And then promptly picks up the IdiotBall by entering the house herself, causing the curse to affect her.,
** In "Selfless," a girl who was cruelly dumped by her boyfriend in front of a dozen or so of his frat mates wishes that they all learn what it feels like to [[spoiler:have their hearts ripped out from their chests. So Anya summons a huge spider demon that [[LiteralGenie massacres the frat boys by ripping out their hearts from their chests]]. Willow later finds the girl locked in a closet, in fetal position, saying "I take it back" over and over.]]
** Later in "Selfless," Anya makes a wish to D'Hoffryn that her vengeance curse be undone. D'Hoffryn answers that undoing the curses requires the death of a vengeance demon. [[spoiler:Anya agrees to the price, assuming that she's the one who will die, but then D'Hoffryn summons Anya's friend Halfrek and kills her to undo Anya's curses]].
** In another example from the series, Buffy wishes that her parental figures, Joyce (her actual mother) and Giles (her Watcher) would stop forcing her to be responsible. Later in the episode, entitled "Band Candy," when the adults lose their ability to act responsibly, Buffy sees the disasters that can result when no one does what they are supposed to do, e.g. [[SpaceWhaleAesop vampires can steal babies to feed to giant demon snakes if no one cares to watch out for such things]]. The Reset is rarely complete though - quite a few memories and changes were kept until the end of the show.
** A more terrifying example occurs in the episode wherein Dawn [[CameBackWrong uses a spell to bring Joyce Summers back to life]]. It's the classic Monkey's Paw, and the horror is only increased by the fact that [[spoiler:except for her feet walking through the cemetery, we never see what Joyce looked like. She had been dead for some time, so...]]
** Eventually, they knew better than to say they wished for things aloud, given every time they do, something perverts the wish. This is much to the chagrin of Anya, who was trying to get them to wish for something so she could pervert it.
** Cordelia actually has this happen to her ''twice''--given the opportunity in ''Series/{{Angel}}'' to wish she had never reunited with Angel or gotten the visions which were killing her, she found herself in a world where Angel was insane, Wesley was missing an arm, and Fred was nowhere to be found.
* ''{{Newsradio}}'' did a hilarious variation on this where Dave and Lisa put Bill in charge of the station for a day in order to show him how hard their jobs were; the twist was that Bill knew what they were doing from the start (going so far as to ask if they were doing it), but he still played along until they admitted to what they were doing.
* Subverted in ''Series/DadsArmy'', when Captain Mainwaring decides to give persistent grumbler Private Frazer a week's experience in commanding the unit in order to see that it is not as easy as he thinks, only for Frazer to grow increasingly tyrannical and arrogant with power; the catch is that Frazer, although unpopular with the rest of the men, actually proves himself a competent commanding officer whose skills are even recognized and rewarded by a superior officer.
* In the ''Series/{{The X-Files}}'' episode "[[BilingualBonus Je Souhaite]]", Mulder meets a female genie who can grant anyone three wishes... but she is forced to interpret the wishes rather literally, causing her much frustration at the stupidity of people who don't think things through. It is revealed that she used to be a poor peasant woman in the Middle Ages, who found the original genie and squandered her first two wishes asking for a mule and a magic sack of turnips that never ran out. For her third wish, she asked for great power and eternal life: the other genie promptly turned her into a genie, too. The downside: She is now bound to act on the decisions of whichever idiot unrolls her from the carpet she is mystically connected to, and she cannot grant wishes to herself. When Mulder wishes for "peace on Earth", his wish is granted... by making every other person in the world disappear except him. The genie tells him it is impossible for her to change the minds of 6 billion people, but making them disappear was within the rules. Mulder uses his final wish [[spoiler:by giving it to her, granting her the ability to make her own decisions and become a mortal woman again.]]
* ''Series/{{Charmed}}'' has several genies corrupting the wishes of the characters that made them.
* ''AreYouAfraidOfTheDark'':
** One episode has a boy running into a genie who grants him several wishes, but they all end up backfiring on him. For example, when he wishes for a brand new car, the boy gets it, but is later arrested when the police discover that the car is stolen. In order to end his torment, the boy finally wishes that he had never met the genie, effectively pressing the ResetButton.
** Another episode uses a thinly-veiled version of ''The Monkey's Paw'': One of the kids wishes to win a race, so a wild dog shows up and breaks his rival's leg, etc. The wishes escalate until one of them wishes his grandfather (who's dead) were there, at which point Zombie Gramps starts knocking on the door (you don't get to see it, though) until one of the kids wishes they'd never made the wishes.
** In another one, a girl wishes to live in a fairy tale world, and her wish is granted by the JackassGenie Sandman.
* ''Series/BattlestarGalacticaReimagined'':
** The surviving Colonials tried their best to find Earth for three and a half seasons. They found Earth [[spoiler: and it is utterly devastated.]]
** In the Miniseries novel, Gaius Baltar is depicted as "somebody who spends first half of his life trying to get famous, then spends the rest wearing sunglasses [to be unrecognised]".
* ''Series/BabylonFive''.
** In response to being asked what he wanted, by Mr Morden.
--->'''Londo:''' ...All right. ''Fine''. You ''really'' want to know what ''I'' want?! You ''really'' want to know ''the truth''?! I want my people to reclaim their rightful place in the galaxy. I want to see the Centauri stretch forth their hand again, and command the stars. I want a rebirth of glory, a renaissance of power. I want to stop running through my life like a man late for an appointment, afraid to... To look back, or to look forward. I want us to be what we used to be. I ''want''... I want it ''all back'', the way that it was! Does that answer your question?\\
'''[[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Morden:]]''' ...Yes. ''Yes it does''.
** Another thing Londo desires, is to get a better position at court [[ReassignedToAntarctica rather than the ambassador to Babylon 5]]. He eventually gets everything he asked for, [[spoiler:and ends up Emperor of the Republic for good measure]]. The process takes the next three seasons to fulfil and leads to several major galactic wars and millions of casualties.
* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'' had an episode with a whole town full of this trope because of a wishing well that worked, involving most notably (and hilariously, in [[MoodWhiplash that depressing ''Supernatural'' way]]) a little girl wishing for a giant talking Teddy Bear. Who spent most of the subsequent episode drinking, watching porn and trying to commit suicide. Life as a giant talking Teddy Bear, apparently, makes [[Franchise/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy Marvin the Paranoid Android's]] life seem full of cheer and meaning. In a possible aversion though, the brothers stop the wishing well before things go catastrophically bad.
* The third season finale of ''Series/{{Heroes}}'' seems to drop a load of this in Sylar's lap if one looks back at his words from season 1:
-->'''Gabriel Gray/Sylar:''' [to Chandra] When I was a kid I used to wish some stranger would come and tell me my family wasn't really my family. Oh, they weren't bad people, they were just...insignificant. And I wanted to be different. Special. [[spoiler: I wanted to change. A new name, a new life]].
* The Imagin of ''{{Kamen Rider Den-O}}'' operate on this trope. They seek out people and grant their wishes, but only in letter. In one episode, when a park groundskeeper wished to make his park a safe haven for strays, the Imajin granting the wish responded by attacking any human who set foot in the park and barricading the entrances.
* DisneyChannel had a weekend special where they did this with 3 of their shows:
** ''HannahMontana''- Miley wishes she was just Hannah Montana all the time. It is granted and her dad married a GoldDigger, her best friend became AlphaBitch, and her brother became a hobo.
** ''CoryInTheHouse'' - Corey Baxter wishes that he was president of the U.S.A. After it's granted, Corey uses his authority to get rich, and slacks off on his presidential duties. This leads to being completely unprepared for an alien invasion, and a literal ResetButton is pressed at the end.
** ''TheSuiteLifeOfZackAndCody''- Zack and Cody wish that they were superheroes. After having to defeat now-supervillian Mr. Moseby, the twins learn they'll have to fight evil 24/7 and give up all their free time. This prompts them to try and fix things by running fast enough to travel through time, to before they made the wish.
* Though not an actual wish, also in ''TheSuiteLifeOfZackAndCody'', the episode "The Suite Smell of Excess", Zack and Cody get a chance to go to an alternate world where everything is reversed and they can play around as much as they like and do whatever they want when they want. However after a few days of excess, they realize that the "preferred" alternate universe Tipton is NOT the perfect place they thought it would be.
* A 1965 episode of ''TheAlfredHitchcockHour'' features an adaptation of the ''Monkey's Paw'' story.
* As does an episode of ''Series/TalesFromTheCrypt'', "Last Respects", which features three sisters. After one sister wishes for a million pounds, another sister dies in a car crash with the third sister (who survives). Guess what the insurance payoff was? When she wishes that the sister ''hadn't'' died in the accident, she gets a call from the morgue, and finds out that she was ''murdered'' before the accident. When the third sister admits to the murder and comes after her, she deliberately invokes the "Comes back as a Zombie" part to let her slain sister avenge herself.
* Many ''Series/TheTwilightZone'' episodes used this trope. One notable one being "Time Enough at Last" starring Burgess Meredith. He wanted to be left alone so he could read and wound up the lone survivor of a nuclear war...[[CruelTwistEnding with broken glasses]].
** From the same series, "Of Late I Think of Cliffordville": A ruthless, aging businessman desires to return to his hometown in the time when he was a young adult, [[GraysSportsAlmanac so he could make a business deal for land that he knew was valuable in the present.]] He's sent back, but forgot a couple of details: (1)he didn't ask for his money to be converted to older currency, so when he tries to make the deal, it's dismissed as counterfeit; and (2) although he wished to look like his younger past self, his physical body is still that of an old man (which he learns the hard way after getting into a fight.) Well, what did you expect from a DealWithTheDevil, even one played by Julie Newmar? (Although this devil is more sympathetic, and lets him return to the present [[BreakTheHaughty at the cost of his fortune.]])
* ''Series/MontyPythonsFlyingCircus'' used this in a sketch parodying a fairy tale; a witch invokes a curse upon the attendants of a wedding, turning everyone present into chickens. After a brief second, her eyes widen and she adds "EXCEPT ME!" It's too late, though.
-->'''Witch Chicken:''' Oh, ''bugger.''
* Perhaps unsurprisingly, ''FantasyIsland'' employed this trope quite often.
* The ''Series/TalesFromTheDarkside'' episode ''The Milkman Cometh'' featured a milkman that granted wishes that his customers wrote down and left in their discarded milk bottles. One guy gets addicted to having his wishes granted, and the family soon becomes rich, but his GenreSavvy son begs him to stop before they get screwed over. He refuses, and wishes that they had a second child, only for the milkman to grant it by ''breaking into the house and raping his wife''.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'' had the Family of Blood, who wanted immortality so badly that they hunted the Doctor for months, then on finding him proceeded to slaughter their way through a village in order to draw him out of hiding. When he does, there's hell to pay.
-->'''Brother:''' We wanted to live forever, [[FateWorseThanDeath so the Doctor]] [[AndIMustScream made sure that we did.]]
* The genie from the episode "Fruit of a Poisoned Tree" in ''Series/OnceUponATime'' says that he has granted 1001 wishes and 1001 times seen things end badly. We see three wishes granted during the episode, the King's wish [[spoiler: for the genie's freedom, which results in the genie falling in love with the Queen and murdering the King,]] the second wish was for the genie to have the third allowing the genie's own wish [[spoiler: to be able to stay with his true love forever and always be able to gaze on her face, resulting in him turning into the Queen's Magic Mirror]], and they would seem to confirm the genie's statement.
* On one occasion in ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'', Ted was angry at Barney, who offered Ted one free hit anywhere but the face. [[GroinAttack He didn't hit him in the face.]]
* One Episode of ''TheAdventuresOfShirleyHolmes'' has a teenage girl who was constaltnly harassing the ChildStar boy for some [[ShowWithinAShow unknown series]], with the intent to get him out of the show, so that she could the star instead. The boy actually '''did''' want to quit, but the CorruptCorporateExecutive wouldn't let him. Shirley exposes the executive and helps the boy to nullify his contract, but didn't find any evidence against the girl. The narration then states: "But she did got what she deserved: her own studio contract, with lots of fine print..." Cue the sight of the girl, forced to do a "take 12" of some stupid episode, exhausted, angry, and clearly miserable after just a few days - and earlier it was established that the contracts with this studio have a minimum term of two years. For the girl, those years will be '''very''' long.
* ''Franchise/StarTrek''
** ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries''
*** "Shore Leave" has the story conclude with the Caretaker of the strange planet the landing party is on explain that it's a essentially a giant recreation area where anything they think of will be created. He invites the crew to live it up for a while, as long as they follow this trope.
** ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration''
*** In "Tapestry", Picard dies from his artificial heart failing him, and he encounters Q in what seems to be the afterlife. After much prodding by Q, Picard reveals he regrets getting into a fight with Nausicaans ([[ContinuityNod mentioned in an earlier episode]]), in which he suffered a near-fatal wound to his heart, necessitating his artificial heart. [[SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong So Q takes Picard back to that time so he can avoid the brawl]]. He does, but this new, "play-it-safe" Picard doesn't have the same drive that made him captain of the ''Enterprise'', instead being stuck as a lowly science officer with no career prospects. Picard regrets this, so with some pleading, Q takes Picard back to that time again to let him get into that fight once more, believing that if he has to die, he wants to die as someone who did something with his life. He does, but in the present, he ends up recovering from his artificial heart's problems, [[PetTheDog perhaps a token of appreciation by Q]].
** ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine''
*** Odo desperately wanted to find his people and learn where he had come from. When he finally does, he discovers his people are a ruthless, xenophobic, egomaniacal race that has already conquered the Gamma Quadrant and is now bent on conquering the Alpha Quadrant. He is, suffice it to say, devastated.
*** Garak desperately wanted to return home from exile. He eventually gets his wish at the very end of the show after Cardassia has been ravaged by an Occupation that caused war with the entire Alpha Quadrant, the loss of over eight hundred million lives and the complete devastation of its government, security forces, military forces, culture and infrastructure. It goes without saying that this is ''not'' the homecoming he dreamed of.
*** Martok, holding a grudge against aging Klingon warrior Kor for trying to ruin his career before it began, would like nothing better than to see the living legend slip up. When a bout of senility finally gets to the old man mid-battle, though, Martok can't take any pleasure in it. All he sees is a man losing a battle to the one enemy no Klingon can beat: time.
*** In the tie-in novel "Behind Enemy Lines" Ro Laren, after seeing her home devastated by the Dominion, swears to fight until Cardassia is equally devastated. In the later book, she reflects on her previous wish and how horrified she is now of Cardassia's plight.
* From ''Series/{{Castle}}'':
** Detective Beckett spends most of the first season and the beginning of the second mortified and annoyed that Castle's following her around [[ItsForABook for inspiration and research for his novel]], and not-so-subtly wishing he'd just go away, stop writing about her and leave her alone. Then, in "When the Bough Breaks", not only is Castle's novel about to be finished, but he's been offered a very lucrative job writing a series of thrillers starring "[[WritingAroundTrademarks a certain]] [[JamesBond British secret agent]]", meaning everything that Beckett's been counting the days down about is about to come to pass. Only now that it's happening, Beckett is clearly a bit upset both about him leaving and the fact that he's apparently not interested in writing about her any more. When [[StatusQuoIsGod the contract for his series about her is unexpectedly renewed]], she's clearly annoyed but, it's strongly hinted, a bit relieved as well.
** In "Knockout", after an argument with Castle about her mother's case (and the [[{{UST}} unspoken feelings between them]]) has gotten out of hand and become very vicious, Beckett angrily goes to her boss demanding that Castle be kicked out of the precinct. His nonchalant agreement with her request completely throws her off-balance. Subverted, since her boss clearly could tell that she was just venting and her flustered back-tracking only confirmed that she wasn't serious.
* The short film "[[http://www.archive.org/details/CaseofSp1940 A Case of Spring Fever]]", as featured on ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'' episode 1012, has an oddly specific example. A man, tired of trying to fix the sofa, wishes he never sees another spring in his life, only for it to be granted by the [[EvilLaugh insanely cackling]] spirit "Coily, the spring sprite". HilarityEnsues as his door locks, phone dial and car pedals stop working. ''Noooooooooo Springs!''
* From ''MST3K'':
** The crew parodied Coily in episode 317 (the famous "waffle episode"), with Willy the Waffle, the Wonderful Whimsical Wisecracking Waffle granting Tom's wish for a world without waffles ("Noooooooooo Waffles! * coil spring noise* "). Willy appeared again in 423 to show Tom a world without advertising ("It was all I had, I had to work fast"). After Willy's spiel, Joel and Tom agree that they prefer the world without advertising.
** They also parodied Coily in the host segments for the episode in which they watched "A Case of Spring Fever". While discussing the skit, Tom wishes never to see Mike again, which prompts a visit by Mikey the Mike Sprite, who makes Nelson disappear. The Bots aren't too bothered, but Mikey eventually badgers them into at least pretending they've learned their lesson, and brings Mike back. Then Crow says he doesn't want to see Mike's socks again; cue Mikesocksy...
* In ''{{Game of Thrones}}'', Sansa Stark, begs her mother to give her permission to leave Winterfell and marry Prince Joffrey Baratheon, because she wanted to live the privilege life of a Queen and give birth to the future King's children. [[spoiler: Sansa quickly regrets this, after she realized what a monster his is at the end of season 1 and during season 2. He has her father beheaded, despite promising her, he'd show mercy if he admitted to treason. Then during season 2, he mentally and physically tortures her.]]
** Then there's Arya, the tomboy of the Stark family. She never wanted to be a lady. [[{{ExactWords}} She said it herself]]. By the end of Season 1, her hair is cut and she is forced to disguise herself as a boy to escape Joffrey and the Lannisters.
* LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit had an episode where a borderline retarded man raped an old woman to death ([[HitlerAteSugar he saw it in a porno and wanted to try it, too]]) via a second heart attack. There's no arguement that he did it so much as if he's ''competent'' enough to be charged with him banking on an insanity plea under the belief that an asylum beats prison, but [[OhCrap the look on his face upon entering the ward says it all how much he really lost as the episode closes out.]]
* ''NoelsChristmasPresents'' (which ran 1989-1999, then 2007-2011, with no episode in 1992), and its SpiritualSuccessor ''AllStarChristmasPresents'' play this trope '''entirely differently'''; the wishes are [[CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming entirely positive]] or [[CrowningMomentOfFunny humorous]], but never the usual case of how this trope plays out in most live-action TV shows. Well, it is a documentary, not a drama. A [[SubvertedTrope subversion]], in that there is nothing supernatural, and that the presenter is (metaphorically) SubbingForSanta.
* There's an episode of TalesFromTheCrypt about a scriptwriter who continuously fantasizes about his hot neighbour being sexually obsessed with him. His creepy landlady gives him a bottle of something to slip into her drink, which he does, and it works too well: she's now continuously badgering him for sex at every moment of the day, until he commits suicide to get away from her. Even that doesn't work because [[spoiler: she throws herself out the window to be with him, and her (now horrifically disfigured ghost)continues to nag him for sex ]].
* Julian Priest (Music/DavidBowie), the MadArtist HorrorHost of the second season of the anthology ''The Hunger'', cites this trope by name as a way of summing up the events of his debut episode "Sanctuary", though the desire and its granting are unusual. [[spoiler: Julian hated death and desired artistic immortality; he realized he could achieve it by making ''his suicide'' a piece of performance art. Now he's a lonely ghost, haunting the abandoned prison that was his home -- perhaps Death's punishment for his defiance.]]
* In one episode of ''TheMonkees'', one of them finds a Monkey's Paw. They don't realize how dangerous it is until the owner says "I wish I could stop talking about it", only to have the wish granted before he can say the last two words of that sentence.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Music]]
* The titular character of MarilynManson's concept album ''Antichrist Superstar'' rises to become the PhysicalGod he always dreamed of being, but crosses the DespairEventHorizon in the process and destroys the earth in a nihilistic rage. The last words of the album are actually "[[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor when all of your wishes are granted, many of your dreams will be destroyed]]" - [[BrokenRecord repeated]] over and over amidst a wall of static.
* The titular King in Music/{{Metallica}}'s "King Nothing" did get the title he worked for, but alienated his would-be subjects in the process, leaving him alone to attend to a crumbling kingdom.
* The Music/TalkingHeads song, "Burning Down The House" opens up with "Watch out, you might get what you're after"
* Kinda done in Music/WeirdAlYankovic's "Albuquerque":
-->"I see this guy Marty tryin' to carry a big ol' sofa up the stairs all by himself. So I, I say to him, I say 'Hey, you want me to help you with that?' And Marty, he just rolls his eyes and goes '[[AskAStupidQuestion Noooo, I want you to cut off my arms and legs with a chainsaw!]]' So I did."
* Eurydice in ''{{Hadestown}}'' wants to "lie down forever," so she's taken to the underworld.
* The narrator of Rush's song "Xanadu" wishes he could visit the stately pleasure dome of Coleridge's poem and gain immortality by drinking honeydew and the milk of paradise. He succeeds, but finds himself eternally trapped within the dome.
** The song "Carnies" from ClockworkAngels has the protagonist realizing that wishing to get away from his ordinary life wasn't going to go the way he meant it to.
* Mentioned in the ArtOfDying song "Completely;" the lead-in line to the chorus in (both versions) is "watch what you wish for, you know you just might get it..." In the original, there is a line in the chorus about how "everything you want/ain't always what you need..."
* The song "Black Fox" by Heather Dale. Whilst out on a unsucessesful fox-hunt, the master huntsman proclaims "If only the Devil himself come by, we'd run him such a race!". A little black fox then appears, and the huntsmen chase it until it crosses a river... and promtply turns into the devil, whereupon the huntsmen have a collective OhCrap moment and flee, pursued by the (now-laughing) little black fox.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Newspaper Comics]]
* The trope image comes from ''ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes'', during an storyline where Calvin gets sick.
* Two arcs of FoxTrot relating to one of Jason's money making schemes are a direct result of this trope: The first one related to Jason making his own website, and the second dealt with a greeting card, both times were the result of Roger, his father, ranting about how he would make a lot of money creating a site and at the cost of buying christmas cards, respectively. The second time, Jason wasn't even in the same room as Roger, implying that Roger was talking about to Andy loud enough for Jason to hear it from another room.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Religion and Myth]]
* From Literature/TheBible:
** Even God could be harsh in granting wishes when the wishers were being too whiny. In response to the Israelites complaining about all manna and no meat, he gave them meat for a month "until it come out at your nostrils, and it be loathsome unto you" (KJV).
*** Ten of the twelve Israelites sent to spy out the Promised Land insisted that its people were too strong to conquer, even though they had God on their side. The people declared that it would be better to die in the desert than try to conquer the Land. God, furious, declared that they wouldn't enter the Land until every man who complained had, in fact, died in the desert. Cue 39 more years of wandering.
** Jephthah in the book of Judges gets a lesson in Be Careful What You Pray For, when he prays to God, "If thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon into mine hands, Then it shall be, that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall surely be the LORD's, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering." (Judges 11:30,31) God gives him the victory, but when Jephthah comes home, the first thing that greets him at the doors was his only daughter! The jury is undecided over how Jephthah actually goes through with the sacrifice, whether he does make her a burnt offering or, as some believe, keeps her a virgin for the rest of her life, which in that culture at the time was considered a sacrifice.
** And him making the oath was pretty pointless, since God had already promised him that he would win.
** Continuing the story: During the time of the Judges, Israel had no king (except for God himself). The Israelites decided they didn't like this situation and wanted a human king like all the surrounding nations. So God tells them, "Alright, I'll give you your king, but [[http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Samuel%208:10-18&version=NIV you won't like him very much]]". What followed was a whole succession of mostly bad kings, which led to the split of Israel into two nations, followed eventually by a long period of captivity in Babylon.
* One particular instance is Draupadi, the Pandavas's wife, in the ''{{Mahabharata}}'' yearning for a husband in her previous life. She wanted her husband to be as strong as Vayu, as talented as Indra, as moral as Dharma and as beautiful as the Ashwini twins. She forgot to specify that she wanted '''one husband'''. As a result, in her next incarnation, she married five men and was the wife of five husbands simultaneously.
* The legend of King Midas (the first part, at least) is a good example. Upon finding the drunken satyr Silenus, a follower of Dionysus, trespassing on his property, Midas treated him hospitably for ten days rather than punishing him. Dionysus offered Midas a reward for his charity, offering him anything he wanted; Midas asked that anything he touched be turned to gold. Although the god warned him that he had made a foolish wish, he still granted it. Though Midas was happy at first, it soon became obvious that he had indeed been foolish. His daughter was quickly [[TakenForGranite turned into a statue]] by this power, and Midas couldn't even touch food without it turning to gold. When faced with starvation, he begged Dionysus to take the gift back. Dionysus did so, but sadly for Midas, this would not be the last time he did something foolish involing his interactions with the gods...
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Theatre]]
* In Igor Stravinsky's ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rake%27s_Progress The Rake's Progress]]'', the hapless (and gormless) Tom Rakewell's troubles start with him wishing he had money, upon which a mysterious manservant appears to inform him that an estranged uncle has left him a fortune. Once Tom realises that urban decadence and high living are no substitute for the love he left behind in the countryside, he wishes he were happy, and his servant convinces him to marry a genderbending circus artist. Once the marriage falls apart, he dreams of a machine that turns stone into bread and, upon waking, wishes it were true; the servant wheels in a prototype. The machine is a complete fraud, and Tom is bankrupted. You'd think the fact that the servant gives his name as "[[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Nick Shadow]]" would have [[DealWithTheDevil rung a bell at some point]]...
* Stephen Sondheim's ''IntoTheWoods'': Everyone wishes for something at one point - in fact, the beginning prologue song comprised of mostly the lyrics "I wish, more than anything, more than life" - but it typically backfires. Cinderella wishes to go to the Festival but doesn't count on a prince chasing her around the woods. The Baker and his wife wish to have a child but don't intend to also run around the woods trying to get stuff for the Witch. This theme carries through the whole thing. Just when you think everything is resolved, someone whispers [[TemptingFate "I wish..."]], which kicks off the whole [[DarkerAndEdgier second half of the play.]]
* In Shakespeare's ''HenryV'', Henry asks three traitorous nobles what he should do with a drunk who called him a nasty name. The nobles, unaware that Henry knows of their treachery, tell him emphatically that he should show no mercy for this (minor) infraction and punish the drunk harshly. In doing so, they leave themselves no room to ask for mercy when Henry reveals his knowledge of their betrayal. He has them executed.
* Shows up in ''IMarriedAnAngel''.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
* Notorious warning given by almost all [=GMs=] in fantasy roleplaying when a player acquires a magical artifact or spell that grants them wishes. Often leads to almost comic wordings of wishes to avoid the GM taking it too literally and punishing the player. Apparently the fact that ''wish'' is 9th level (requiring the character to be at 17th level with genius-level Intelligence to be able to cast it at all) and ''ages the caster five years'' (In pre-3rd edition TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons) isn't bad enough.
** notably the description for the Wish spell (in 3rd ed at least) contains a standard list of things it can do and then says it may be able to do other things, but if a player makes a wish not on the standard list the DM should feel free to be a JackassGenie and screw over the player.
* ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'':
** The game has a cycle of Wish cards, the flavour text of each of which is a variant on the following: "He wished for X, but not for the Y to [Verb that means use effectively] it."
** [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Braid%20of%20Fire Braid of Fire]] is based around this. It gives you increasing amounts of mana at the start of your upkeep, and by its mana given/casting cost ratio is one of the best mana accelerants ever made. But unlike most it happened uncontrollably, and it was also made in the days of mana burn; if you couldn't find something to spend all that mana on before your mana pool emptied you'd take increasing amounts of damage, giving you a choice between hoping something turned up before it killed you and giving up so much lovely extra mana.
* ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}'': In the background fluff of the Changeling, the Dark Angels besieging the fortress of a rogue planetary Governor who'd turned to Chaos. The governor asks the daemon of Tzeentch for a way to break the siege, the daemon asks for the Governor's daughter in exchange for the favour. The Governor grimly complies and the Changeling hands him something and disappears. The governor just has time to wonder what it is before he is surrounded by the hulking blue force fields heralding teleporting SpaceMarine Terminators; the Changeling had stolen a teleporter homer from a nearby Ravenwing biker, which was keyed to that of the attached Deathwing Terminator Squads. The siege was indeed swiftly ended.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Video Games]]
* This is one of the main subtexts of ''MetalGearSolid2'', as the game shows exactly what the players who wanted to be Solid Snake would have to go through with Raiden.
* Calypso, from the ''TwistedMetal'' games. He grants the winners of his competitions their wishes in a manner that either kills them or results in an outcome ''different'' from what they had envisioned.
** A case of the former in ''Twisted Metal: Head-On'' is when the driver of Spectre, Chuckie Floop, wished for a lot of money and was then buried alive underneath a massive pile of cash. In Warthog's ending for ''Twisted Metal 2'', Calypso delivers a sickeningly brilliant example of the latter when he grants the 105-year-old Captain Rogers' wish for a youthful body ... [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-iCbYgWQfw sans the head to match]].
** Occasionally, Calypso will grant a wish straight, only for the winner to experience the inevitable or natural consequences of their wish.
** And for all his trickery, Calypso has indeed suffered a reversal of this ([[spoiler:Sweet Tooth in ''Twisted Metal: Black'']]).
** Carl Roberts (Outlaw) to his sister Jamie: "I wish you'd shut up!" [[WipeThatSmileOffYourFace Jamie's mouth grows shut]].
* Most of the "bad" endings in ''[[VideoGame/{{STALKER}} S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl]]'' consist of this, with the player character succumbing to the temptation to make a wish to the mysterious artifact in the middle of Chernobyl (the wish chosen depending on certain conditions). All of these wishes end up backfiring on him:
** "I want the Zone to disappear": [[spoiler:the PC goes blind]]
** "Mankind is corrupt, it must be controlled[[note]]In the original Russian he says ''destroyed''[[/note]]": [[spoiler:Images of war and death start flashing followed by the PC standing in a black void]]
** "I want to be rich": [[spoiler:the PC sees gold coins falling from the sky...which turn out to be an hallucination: the "coins" are actually bolts falling from the ceiling which collapses on the PC, killing him.]]
** "I want to rule the world": [[spoiler:the PC is absorbed into the [[HiveMind C-Consciousness]].]]
** "I want to be immortal": [[spoiler:the PC is turned into a metal statue.]]
* In ''BaldursGate II: Throne of Bhaal'' you get the ''wish'' spell. It's a lot more powerful than the ''limited wish'' spell and also level 9. It's also extremely tricky to cast, as the Djinn that you summon is a grumpy so-and-so who's out to get you and as such you will need a very good Wisdom score to be able to handle him okay. A WIS of 18 is nigh-on essential to get the most out of this spell, and anything under 9 WIS is catastrophic. When you cast the spell, time is stopped and the casting character negotiates with the Djinn for some hours - finally he presents you with "a list of 5 ways I can interpret your wish - choose one".
* A major concept behind the Game of ''VideoGame/{{Afterlife}}'' by LucasArts. This is even billed as rule #1 of the afterlife. Specifically, it's stated that souls are treated differently after death based on what they believed in while living.
* ''PlanescapeTorment'' utilizes a classic and particularly chilling [[{{Pun}} incarnation]] of the trope. An [=NPC=] named Yves Tale-Chaser will trade stories with the Nameless One and his companions. One of them begins with a man who comes to in an alley, remembering nothing. An old woman is in front of him, and she asks, "And your third wish?" He says he doesn't understand, and she explains she had offered him three wishes, and he'd already used two - and the second wish was to undo and forget his first wish. So, for the third, he asks to know who he is. She cackles softly as she prepares to grant his wish, and he asks what's so funny. "[[OhCrap That was your first wish]]." It's heavily implied in another part of the game that this actually occurred between the Nameless One and the Night Hag Ravel Puzzlewell.
* Anyone who's gotten ''VideoGame/{{La-Mulana}}'''s BrutalBonusLevel BraggingRightsReward (''without'' spoiling it for themselves) can tell you this.
* The same goes for people who have [[SaveThePrincess Saved The Princess]] in ''{{Eversion}}''.
* ''EternalDarkness'' has this happen once. Bored Cambodian temple dancer Ellia finds herself all alone with nothing but [[GreatBigBookOfEverything what she thinks is an innocuous book of legends]] to entertain herself, wishes that something exciting would happen to her, and ends up immediately getting locked inside the temple, finding herself entangled and directly involved in the book's "legends," and [[spoiler: killed as a result of all this]]. Now, was that exciting enough for you, Ellia?
* Discussed in detail in ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'', but for the most part averted. Except for Archer. [[spoiler:I want to save everyone! I know, how about I make a contract with the world? Guardian Spirits gets to save people all the time! Oh wait, they actually kill people en masse indiscriminately to ''prevent'' them from killing even ''more'' people. Woops.]] Other than that little mistake, it seems the idea is 'do what you can with your own ability, and accept your own failures if it doesn't work.
* One of the side stories in ''[[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Kagetsu Tohya]]'' has Shiki living in a world based on TwinThreesomeFantasy fantasy scenario he had. The problem is, he realized such a thing could never happen unless they were in a world all by themselves plus he's currently already trapped inside a GroundhogDayLoop. So the DreamWithinADream he has just traps him a world where he's living forever inside the mansion grounds with only Kohaku and Hisui, doing whatever he likes with them while slowly going insane.
* There's a wish-granting [[{{Familiar}} Mana]] ([[spoiler:the ''main character'']]) in ''ManaKhemiaAlchemistsOfAlrevis''. The first wish it ever granted was death, although, in a subversion, that wish was ''exactly'' what the person who wished it was asking for.
* ''JakAndDaxter'':
** The {{Precursors}} offer to turn Jak into one of them as thanks for his services. All of a sudden [[AristocratsAreEvil Count Veger]] arrives with a gun demanding that HE be turned into one instead. The Precursor says "BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor" and does something to Veger. Shortly afterwards it's revealed that the EnergyBeing they were talking to was just a hologram and that the Precursors... [[spoiler:are ottsels.]] Cue KarmicTransformation when Veger realizes the implications of this.
** Later, Daxter, finally in peace with his ottsel appearance, asks for a set of pants. His girlfriend then says that those pants are so cute, she wished she had a pair of them herself. Cue the precursors' "BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor" a second time, and the girl getting a pair of pants just like that... and turned into an ottsel so she could fit into them.
* In NetHack, it is possible to be granted a wish. A common choice is to wish for a blessed Archon figurine, which when used has an 80% chance of netting you an extremely powerful pet. There is, however a 10% chance that it will instead be generated hostile. HaveANiceDeath!
* ''FinalFantasyTacticsAdvance''.
* ''{{Persona 2}}: Innocent Sin'' puts a spin on this. You don't so much have to be careful what you wish for, as be careful about wishing at all. Having your wildest dreams handed to you without struggle or effort will eventually rob you of your ideal energy, causing you to fade away to nonexistence.
* ''VideoGame/Left4Dead'':
** This was the case on the production level for ''VideoGame/Left4Dead2''. Valve is notoriously known for their Valve Time due to how long they take to produce games in order to perfect them and/or delaying games after they get close to a release date. People got sick of Valve taking too long to produce anything, so Valve made Left 4 Dead 2 nearly one year after the first game was released in order to prove to people that they CAN release on time and on a fixed schedule. While Left 4 Dead 2 was generally well received, the more dedicated fans complain to this day about random bugs and balance issues with some people stating Valve Time is actually a good thing and Valve should not be rushed.
** Similarly, corner camping became a huge issue in Left 4 Dead 1; it was a technique used by survivor players where they huddle in a corner or in a closet and mow down all infected that came their way. People complained about the exploit and started to make suggestions to counter corner camping, which Valve implemented for Left 4 Dead 2 with new infected that dealt with survivors that holed up in a spot (Spitter, Charger, and Jockey), allowing common infected to rush in from more places, and included gauntlet crescendos where survivors have to keep moving through a never ending horde and stop the source (such an an alarm). This worked ''too'' well since now most survivor players will always rush the maps and hardly stop, making it difficult for zombie players to be able to spawn in time or attack effectively. Naturally, people are complaining about the changes and want even more special infected that has the ability to stop a survivor from running.
* In ''Videogame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'', the [[OurDemonsAreDifferent Daedric Prince]] Clavicus Vile is essentially this trope given corporeal form. The cave in which you find his shrine is populated with vampires that wished for an end to their suffering, which they presumably thought meant a cure for vampirism. He gave them [[PlayerCharacter a heavily armed adventurer]]. Vile sends you after the Rueful Axe, which he granted to a wizard who wished to end his daughter's lycanthropy.
* ''VideoGame/MagicalGirlLyricalNanohaAsPortable: The Gears of Destiny'': As [[GenkiGirl Levi]] mentioned [[spoiler:[[HeroicSacrifice with her dying breath]]]], [[EvilOverlord Lord Dearche]] finally got the nigh-unlimited power that she had always wanted. However, it came at a price she was never willing to pay, namely, [[spoiler:[[BequeathedPower the lives of]] [[HypercompetentSidekick Stern]] and [[BoisterousBruiser Levi]], [[UndyingLoyalty her two loyal retainers]]]]. Unsurprisingly, her main motivation for the rest of the game is to reverse this [[spoiler:so she could get Stern and Levi back]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Webcomics]]
* Also the title (more or less) of [[http://www.p-synd.com/careful.htm this furry cartoon]] ({{NSFW}}), where the wish leads to the heroine [[spoiler:being TakenForGranite (or at least metal)]].
* ''Webcomic/RealLifeComics'':
** A character playing a D&D game gets a ring of three wishes, much to the chagrin of the DM. The character immediately wishes for more gold than he knows what to do with, and his player is instantly crushed by a giant gold boulder. When the previous wish is reversed while still losing the wish, he then wishes for a million gold pieces, and receives gold pieces so small that he "might be able to afford an ale with them". When he finally gets a wish written up by a ''lawyer'' in order to avoid any exploitable loopholes, the DM relents and has no choice but to grant the wish. And then the player's character gets eaten by a dragon.
** Another DM had a player who wished for an infinite gold mine. His wish was granted, and the player's character was instantly teleported into a mine of solid gold, stretching forever in all directions...
* Death of Insanely Overpowered Fireballs from ''IrregularWebcomic'' wished to get his job back after getting demoted. He got his job back, to process all the people who have died when the Irregular Universe was torn apart from TimeParadox.
* [[http://pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF126-One_More_Day.gif this comic]] from ''PerryBibleFellowship''.
** [[http://pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF210-Wishing_Well.gif And this one]]. Although in this case it's more like "dammit, I wasted my wish."
* ''{{Minus}}'':
** [[http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus25.html when]] you ask to be sent back in time, specify ''when'' first.
** From the very end: "Who do you want brought back?" Think carefully. [[spoiler:"Everyone" is a ''lot'' of people... and animals...]]
* ''Webcomic/GirlGenius'' has a variation: Castle Heterodyne seems to delight in [[http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20080820 creative]] [[http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20080924 interpretation]] of Agatha's orders. Not so much because of malice as much as because it's too AxeCrazy to imagine she might NOT want to kill everyone.
* [[http://www.viruscomix.com/page428.html This]] ''Webcomic/{{Subnormality}}'' strip shows how to have everything you could ever need in life.
-->So you're one of '''[[LiteralGenie those]]''' genies.
* ''{{Weesh}}'' has this as its premise. However, the wish-granter is not malicious (mischievious, perhaps) or literal, but the wish-makers often fail to see the implications of their wishes.
* [[http://lowroad75.comicgenesis.com/d/20090522.html Wishing wells don't like cheapskates.]]
* ''Webcomic/{{Erfworld}}'':
** The comic puts an interesting spin on this trope after Parson [[spoiler:erupts a volcano to destroy the invading army and [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone realizes what exactly he's done]].]]
-->'''Parson:''' "I mean, then... what's the lesson supposed to be here, Wanda? 'Be careful what you wish for?' This isn't what I wished for!"
-->'''Wanda:''' "Hah! You didn't wish for this world, Parson Gotti. It wished for you.
** Also, the "Ultimate Warlord" spell. Why did Stanley get Parson? Well, this is how he described what he wanted:
--> "I want him to be ''obsessed'' with war! Somebody who plans wars and kills his enemies for ''fun!''[[hottip:* :Parson enjoys playing table top wargames, a ''lot'']] I want somebody who snacks on Gwiffons[[hottip:* :Gwiffons look ''exactly'' like marshmallow Peeps.]] and eats Marbits for ''breakfast!''[[hottip:* :Parson calls marshmallow bits (like the kind you find in Lucky Charms) "Marbits= ''Mar''shmallow ''bits''".]]
* [[http://www.whatisdeepfried.com/2004/03/17/pipe-dream/ This]] ''DeepFried'' gives a possible solution.
-->'''Roadkill:''' Wish ''One'': I want all my wishes loopholed out of any negative or ironic consequences. Wish ''Two'': Apply wish number one to itself ex post facto. Wish ''Three'': Make me the effin' master of the Universe '''NOW'''.
* Any plot in ''TheWotch'' involving Djinn will feature at least one of these types of wishes. It is explained that some Djinn do it out of spite for the human race, others do it because they've been summoned through a curse bottle that ''mandates'' their wishes backfire.
* ''Webcomic/{{Sinfest}}'':
** The comic got a wishing well... and [[http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=3451 Slicky wasn't very specific]] the first time.
** [[http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=3831 Kundalini]] arc when [[LoonyFan Lil' E]] tried himself in this "serpent power" thing. He awakened a dormant serpent power, all right...
** [[http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=2569 Monique tells the world to do its worst]]. Then cites this trope.
** [[http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=2140 Slick tells God that the world is boring.]]
* ''{{Spiderwebs}}'' is a rare webcomic built around "Be careful what you wish for" that doesn't involve a LiteralGenie: Selena was perfectly willing to explain [[GenderBender the consequences of Luke's wish]] to him but Luke was too impatient to listen.
* In a RealLife example, fans of ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'' were looking for a [[FanCommunityNicknames nickname for themselves]], so they asked the creator to choose one for them. They now refer to themselves as 'Bunnies'
* [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]] in ''TalesOfTheQuestor'': Quentyn--[[GenreSavvy fully aware]] of [[LiteralGenie what he's dealing with]]--''is'' careful what he wishes for and uses his ThreeWishes to [[HumiliationConga utterly screw over his fae enemy]] [[spoiler:(specifically, wishes that the fae would render null and void every favour and debt owed him, rendering the fae broke, to return all he stole to the duchy of Fenwick, and to return to the Fae world, ''never to hunt the mortal realms again'')]].[[DoubleSubversion Doubly subverted]] when he later realizes that he could have used those wishes to get back the artifacts he's looking for and [[DanceTropeDance TREBLY subverted]] when a fae ally tells him that wishing for the artfacts back wouldn't have worked.
** He still gets bitten a little. He wished that everything the enemy had stolen be returned to Fenwick. Not just things that had been stolen from Fenwick. And the enemy had a very long career of stealing things. There are now entire store-rooms of 'returned' loot, much of which is unidentifiable and now worthless.
* In ''SquidRow'' [[http://squidrowcomics.com/?p=923 what Randi learned last year]]
* Ashley should have been more careful with her wishes during her modeling session in ''TalesOfGnosisCollege''. [[spoiler:Wishing that people could gaze on her beauty forever she [[TakenForGranite turns into a statue]].]]
* ''AmazingSuperPowers'' got [[http://www.amazingsuperpowers.com/2009/02/toys-are-alive/ this]]. As to what the kid should have beware, see AltText.
* Very old Vera Salt of ''{{Magellan}}'' found a genie and wished herself [[http://magellanverse.com/?p=2280 to be younger]]. She started to age backwards until she was a child. Then, she [[http://magellanverse.com/?p=2295 wished for a way to age herself]] and had to siphon age from others over several centuries in order to maintain a stable age. Finally, when she was in custody, she used her last wish to wish [[http://magellanverse.com/?p=2324 herself free]] and ended up dying of old age.
* In ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'', the pre-[[CosmicRetcon Scratch]] troll players are hinted (and stated outright in one case) to have gotten exactly what they wanted for their lives in the retconned universe they created... at a tremendous cost.
** Aranea wished she could be outgoing and adventurous without caring about what other people think of her. Then she helped perform the [[CosmicRetcon Scratch]] and got her wish, at least vicariously... but at the cost of her people being enslaved by a devil-figure and being driven to near-extinction; because she didn't really care about other people, she did nothing to prevent any of the suffering.
** Kankri wanted to fight for social justice, and his Scratched counterpart was TheMessiah... who ended up with an even more painful end than Jesus, for significantly less accomplishment.
** Damara wanted to serve [[BiggerBad Lord English]], and her counterpart suffered so much in doing so that she was DrivenToSuicide.
** Meenah wanted to be a horrific absolute monarch without personal responsibility regarding her society's rigid WhiteMansBurden (which fell on her the heaviest), and her counterpart was just such a tyrant... who was secretly forced to obey the BiggerBad and who was so cruel a tyrant that she tortured the counterpart of one of Meenah's friends, who Meenah never wanted to harm.
*** Same for Kurloz, who became head of his church and likewise killed those his counterpart cared about
** Porrim wanted to take care of Kankri; she did so, then watched him killed and was made a slave
** Meulin wanted true love, got it, and then saw it killed in front of her
** Latula wanted to bring justice and protect the innocent, and was lynched for it
** Cronus wanted to be part of an interesting story and have a dramatic rival; he was killed by that rival
** Mituna wanted to help his friends and was made into a living battery/engine part by one of them
** Rufioh wanted to be a hero, and led a great rebellion... which failed and made things worse
* In ''Webcomic/NoRestForTheWicked'', after September scared November with the story of a mother who turned her daughter into a raven, [[http://www.forthewicked.net/archive/05-07.html their mother assured November that she would never wish her daughters away, being aware of the dangers.]]
* In the ''Webcomic/SpareKeysForStrangeDoors'' story "Kill the Romance", Trisha attempts to use magic to create a perfect boyfriend.
* In ''Webcomic/DocRat'', Wilbur Fuzz is shaken when after all his jokes about heart attacks, he actually has one. He thinks of CryingWolf. The paramedics -- wolves -- tell him that they came, and he should be careful what he wishes for.
* In ''WebComic/CommanderKitty'', CK's at first excited to realize his new passenger is apparently a BadAss being pursued by the [[SpacePolice Triple-I]]...[[http://www.commanderkitty.com/2010/01/24/didnt-think-that-one-through/ until he realizes that means the Triple-I are now after him]].
* In ''{{Oglaf}}'', we got a wishing dolly that [[JackassGenie ruins people's wishes on purpose]]. For example [[http://oglaf.com/unattainable/1/ an ugly girl wished to be beautiful]], and she became so fancy ''everyone'' thinks she's out of their league. [[http://oglaf.com/laundryday/1/ Then there's a guy]] who wanted to be able to [[PowerPerversionPotential see everyone naked]] and can't tell anymore whether he ''himself'' is wearing clothes or not.
-->'''Wishing Dolly:''' Awww! Are you sad? Tell wish dolly what you really want.
-->'''Girl:''' Quick! [[TimeTravel Wish to go back in time]] and stop the wish from happening.
-->'''Wishing Dolly:''' He's tried that! How do you think he got the horn?
-->'''Boy:''' Piss off, wish dolly.
-->'''Wishing dolly:''' Heeey! Why don't you '''wish''' that I piss off? [[SchmuckBait What's the worst that can happen]]?
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Web Original]]
* Rob from ''DimensionHeroes'' wishing for a less boring summer. Boy, did he get that wish granted...
* The Creepypasta titled "The Wishes".
* Invoked in an intentionally nonsensical manner in the ''Website/SomethingAwful'' parody "horror film" ''Doom House''. "My name is Reginald P. Linux, and ever since my wife died, I've been very depressed. This is why I've been searching for the house of my dreams. But as a philosopher once said, be careful what you dream for, because you ''just... might... get it''." Since he wasn't "dreaming for" a house haunted by [[CreepyDoll an odd-looking figurine]] and [[spoiler: built over a terrorist burial camp]], this makes no sense, and it's only put there as a parody of bad writing.
* ''WebVideo/DoctorHorriblesSingAlongBlog'' is this trope played deadly straight. Billy/Dr. Horrible wants to be a supervillain and join the Evil League of Evil. He also wants to get a girlfriend. Well, he gets one of his wishes when the Evil League demands that he commit a heinous crime ("a murder would be nice of course") as a membership test. This turns out to be {{Foreshadowing}}, as the final confrontation with his ArchEnemy, Captain Hammer, ends with the latter's humiliating defeat and the world bowing to him in fear due to the murder of... [[spoiler:his girlfriend, Penny]]. Cue his entry into the Evil League, having both gained and lost everything he wanted.
* From one of WebVideo/TheCinemaSnob's reviews, ''Beware Children At Play''...
-->'''Snob:''' You know, the kids are evil, just fucking kill them!
-->''(Massacre of children begins as the Snob watches in horror)''
-->'''Snob:'''...I wasn't serious about killing them!
* ''DragonBallZAbridged'':
** Gohan points out this trope in his nerdish way after he and Krillin realize the recently-revived Picollo was brought back to Namek...on the other side of the planet from where they are standing.
--->'''Gohan:''' Oh, so it's a sort of monkey's paw. You have to be careful with the hubris in your wishes.
--->'''Piccolo:''' (in the distance) [[CatchPhrase NEEEEEEEERRRRDDD!]]
** Krillin wished for the perfect Christmas tree. [[JackassGenie Shenron delivered.]] Thanks for the special, you two!
---> '''Reject Mall Santa''': Turles, sir! Our ship has mysteriously changed course for a new planet: Earth!\\
'''Turles''': Does it contain the sufficient amount of joy?\\
'''Reject Mall Santa''': According to our sensors... yes!\\
'''Turles''': Well, then... ''merry Christmas''!
* ''WebVideo/{{Retsupurae}}''
** In one showing a kid who wanted all of his [[IKnowKungFaux "fighting moves"]] to be used for MUGEN, LetsPlay/{{Slowbeef}} comments that it couldn't get any worse... just before he shows [[DancingTheme off]] [[TheMelancholyOfHaruhiSuzumiya his]] Super Attack.
** This tends to happen whenever Slowbeef says "[[TemptingFate how could this get any worse]]" and variants...[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=27VeT3dVQE8#t=348s with one notable exception]].
* In WebAnimation/LuckyDayForever, [[spoiler: 514 finally wins the lottery in this film, but he gets locked into the Lotus-Eater Machine and gets used as resources for the Whites]].
* In ''WebVideo/DoomHouse'', when Reginald informs the audience of his ambition to move into the house of his dreams in his OpeningNarration, he is still quick to remember the words of a philosopher, "Be careful what you dream for because you just might get it."
* A Caution to the Wise from TheWanderersLibrary.
* In the ''Tales of the Folly'' series in the ChakonaSpace setting, you really should be careful what you wish for on the [[CoolStarship Folly]], as there are a number of fairly mischievous, and meddlesome Rakshani Deities hanging around. The trope is lampshaded word-for-word on a couple of occasions.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Western Animation]]
* This trope is the entire premise of ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddparents'', and played various ways in different episodes.
* The ''WesternAnimation/SamuraiJack'' universe has a well that grants any wish. Once, three men wished that they would become the ultimate warriors. And they did! By becoming the well's eternal gaurdians.
* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Reboot}}'' episode "Enzo the Smart", Enzo fiddles with the system clock in order to make himself smarter than everyone else, and instead makes everyone else ''half'' as smart as he is. Since he's JustAKid, this ends up making everyone else in the city of Mainframe really dumb.
--> '''Enzo:''' Dude! Everything's gone 8 bit!
* ''WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom'':
** The wishing character was not aware that their wish would be granted, but still wound up regretting voicing the wish. Notable for the fact that at the end of the episode the ResetButton remained largely untouched. All the characters retained full memories of everything that had transpired, and a permanent change to Danny's ghost costume was made.
** There was another, earlier episode with the same villain with the same premise where Tucker wished he had ghost powers. The ResetButton was pressed because Tucker did not handle them all that well...
* The pilot of ''WesternAnimation/TransformersAnimated'' had Optimus Prime nostalgically wishing that he'd been around to fight Decepticons in the Great War. Ten minutes later the biggest, baddest Decepticon of all time shows up with his warship. It's not pretty.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheGrimAdventuresOfBillyAndMandy'':
** Parodied in the episode "A Dumb Wish". Grim's mom gives Billy, Mandy, and Grim three wishes. Billy squanders his wish, and his arguing with Grim bugs Mandy enough that she wishes they would shut up, causing Billy and Grim's mouths to become sealed shut. Since Grim can't talk, Mandy gets his wish, and Grim and Billy compete to see who gets their mouth fixed by buttering up to Mandy. They only succeed in driving Mandy to the point that she shouts "I wish everyone in the entire world would just ''go away''!" After everyone else on the planet disappears, Mandy seems to [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone regret what she did]], only to instead smile for [[PerpetualFrowner one of the only times ever]] and say "Perfect".
** Another episode, "Wishbones," also played with this trope. A LiteralGenie trapped in the form of [[RhymesOnADime a talking, rhyming skull]] named Thromnambular spends most of the episode granting various characters wishes, which inevitably backfire. (It's explicitly said that it ''doesn't matter'' what they're wishing for, it'll screw them over regardless.) Thronambular is condemned to grant nine wishes before it can be freed from its skull form, more on that later. One example of a wish (and its reworking) is General Skarr wishing to be ruler of the world. A giant statue of himself rises from the ground beneath him and grows so large, he ends up in the upper atmosphere and suffocates. When it's Mandy's turn to make a wish, she [[GenreSavvy realizes that any wish she makes will only turn out badly]], so instead she decides to sell her wish to the highest bidder. A frustrated Grim pushes the ResetButton when he declares "I wish you two had never found that skull!" This wish does not backfire, instead returning everything to the way it was before Billy and Mandy found the skull. Grim then wishes that he was free of his promise to be Billy and Mandy's best friend, and that Thronambular was free of his imprisonment, hoping that Thronambular would be grateful enough not to stab him in the back. To Grim's horror, Thronambular grants the wish by trading their dilemmas: Thronambular had to keep Grim's promise, but gained a body. Grim found himself trapped as a skull, and bound to carry out the eight remaining wishes.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'':
** There was one Halloween episode based on ''Literature/TheMonkeysPaw''. Homer buys the magic paw at a BazaarOfTheBizarre and he and his family try wishing for fame and wealth (which backfires when [[HypeAversion everyone gets sick of hearing about the Simpsons]]) world peace (which backfires when aliens attack the now defenseless Earth) and a turkey sandwich (which backfires because the turkey's a little dry; at least Homer was GenreSavvy enough by this point to specify, "I don't want any zombie turkey, I don't want to turn ''into'' a turkey when I eat it...".) Homer gives the monkey paw to Flanders in the hope that it backfires on him too, but the RuleOfFunny ensures that no such thing happens.
** The end of the episode ensures that Flanders' wishes don't backfire (that we get to see). Indeed, Kang and Kodos imply that his first wish, to rid the world of alien invaders, will backfire because humans will develop "[[BiggerStick bigger boards, with bigger nails, until they build a board with a nail it in so large, it will destroy them all!]]"
* "Wish World" from the ''WesternAnimation/MightyOrbots'' series. Oh-No wishes to be human--and thanks to one of the BigBad goons, she becomes human--but discover that Oh-No can't power up the Mighty Orbots in this form.
* ''MyLittlePony''
** The episode "The Magic Coins" features this trope.
** Also, in "The Prince and the Ponies", the First-Tooth Baby Ponies were jealous of the extra attention the newborns were receiving and wished them ill only to be sorry when they saw it had actually happened. An important and applicable lesson for the target audience.
* The entire premise of the {{Celebrity Toon|s}} ''WesternAnimation/WishKid''. Nick gets a magical baseball glove that lets him have one wish a week - and that's it. And they're all temporary and can end at any time, meaning that every single wish he makes disappears at the worst possible time. All so he can learn this trope as a moral ''every single episode''.
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Gargoyles}}'':
** When we first meet Puck, he plays LiteralGenie to Demona. Later, it's revealed that when Puck revealed himself to Xanatos for the first time, he offered him either a single wish or [[spoiler: a lifetime of loyal service as Owen Burnett. ]] Proving himself to be the smartest person in the entire series, Xanatos chooses the latter.
** Puck ended up on the receiving end of this too. One of his major motivations throughout the series is delaying his return to Avalon because he finds the mortal world too fun. At the end of "The Gathering", Oberon decides to give Puck what he wants...by trapping him in human form (except for the purposes of training Alexander in magic) and banishing him from Avalon ''forever''.
* The ''WesternAnimation/ChipNDaleRescueRangers'' episode "A Lad in a Lamp" has the heroes meet a malicious genie who would teach them just this if the episode didn't come with its very own built-in ResetButton.
* A similar thing happens in an episode of ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales'': both Scrooge [=McDuck=] and Flintheart Glomgold find a magical lamp. To decide who gets it, the genie tells them to race each other back home. Glomgold wins, and his first wish is for Scrooge to be stranded on a desert island. However, his ''second'' wish is that he could see the look on Scrooge's face, and he's sent to the same island to do so. Then he wishes that he "had never found this blasted lamp". Cue the ResetButton, and Scrooge this time wildly chases Glomgold out of the cave without finding the lamp, just before a cave-in traps it forever.
* ''WesternAnimation/ExtremeGhostbusters'': The team fought a wish-making ghost who functioned as a LiteralGenie. It turned Eduardo into Kylie's cat (because he "wanted her to treat him with the same respect she does her cat"). The episode was actaully titled "Be Careful What You Wish For".
* A preview episode has ''WesternAnimation/{{Ben 10}}'' easily dispatching criminals, and, in the end, he was wondering if there was any challenge left for him. The episode in question is the [[spoiler:SeriesFinale]], which introduced the [[spoiler:Negative 10]].
* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Wunschpunsch}}'' revolved around it - Wizards created a spell that granted one wish for every person in the city, but always in the way to backfire. The wizards used it later for themselves, sure they'd found a wish that would let them get rid of their boss and not backfire at them in any way. They were wrong.
* Towards the end of ''[[DisneyFairies TinkerBell and the Last Treasure]]'', Tink accidentally uses the [[PirateBooty Mirror of Incanta]], which she intended to use to repair the [[MineralMacGuffin broken moonstone]], when she snaps at her NonHumanSidekick, "I wish you would be quiet for just one minute!"
* ''WesternAnimation/TheSpectacularSpiderMan'': In ''Group Therapy'', just before going to sleep, Peter remarks, "I wish I could just wake up tomorrow, with Doc and his merry morons back in jail." Oh, he gets his wish alright. But at the cost of losing himself to the symbiote, waking up exhausted, and being out of the loop for a whole day that his aunt has had a heart attack.
* ''WesternAnimation/SpongebobSquarepants'' had an episode that featured Mr. Krabs wishing for the power to be able to talk to money. It turns out that money always wants to be spent.
* ''WesternAnimation/CowAndChicken'' also had this in an self titled episode. It turns out Chicken wished Cow would shut up, which backfires as Cow cannot warn Chicken of the dangers of the road to prevent him from getting hit and she cannot speak during the testimony when Chicken is put into prison for 50 years.
* The Human [=CentiPad=] epsidoe of ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' has Cartman demanding God to "give me a courtesy lick before I get fucked!" after Cartman loses his [[Film/TheHumanCentipede Human Centipede]]/iPad hybrid. God complies by smiting Cartman with a bolt of lightning, landing Cartman in the hospital.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheMarvelousMisadventuresOfFlapjack'': In "Wishing Not so Well", K'nuckles wishes to be left alone and is immediately finds himself in a Stormalong that contains no other people. It doesn't work out so well for him.
* In ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb Get Busted'', Candace busts Phineas and Ferb on building an unsafe airlift, and their mother sends them away to a reformatory school; at first, Candace is glad they are away, but it is not too long before she begins to miss them. [[spoiler:Then when she finds out [[TheAlcatraz how the reformatory school is run]].]] Candace's friend Stacy even calls her out on this:
-->'''Stacy:''' You finally have everything you ever wanted. Call me when you get over it!
* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'':
** In the episode "The Cutie Pox", Apple Bloom uses a magical flower called "Heart's Desire" to finally get her Cutie Mark. Unfortunately, over the course of the day she gets several ''more'' cutie marks, each of which brings [[BlessedWithSuck both a new talent and a compulsion to practice that talent endlessly]], whether it's window-washing, tap-dancing, speaking French, or ''lion-taming''.
** The theme also shows up in "Sisterhooves Social," when Rarity wants to get away from Sweetie Belle earlier on but misses her later on, or "Green Isn't Your Color," when Rarity is so jealous of Fluttershy's fame as a model that she wishes Fluttershy would just humiliate herself on-stage, and Rarity feels awful when it actually ''happens.'' Even the first two episodes seem to have a hint of this with Twilight Sparkle at first not wanting to make new friends, only to find out later that "just when I learn how wonderful it is to have friends, I have to leave them." That is a milder case, though, [[spoiler:as it turns out Celestia lets Twilight stay in Ponyville with her new friends anyway]].
** A hint of this also shows up in "May The Best Pet Win," with Rainbow Dash insisting earlier on that she wanted a fast, agile, flying animal for a pet... and after putting the animals through competitions testing these (among other) traits she found out that the falcon met her standards the most... but by the time she found this out, she had evidently changed her mind about what she wanted in a pet after all, as she clearly wasn't happy about being told that the falcon won. [[spoiler:Of course, she found out a [[LoopholeAbuse loophole]] in her rules that allowed her to adopt a tortoise instead, in a clear contrast to what she at first wanted.]]
** In "Too Many Pinkies", Pinkie Pie wishes she had a way to spend time with all of her friends at once. Then she finds a magic pond that creates magical copies of herself which she immediately sends out to have fun with her friends. Things go downhill from there since the copies are wholly focused on having fun and lack real empathy for others.
* In the ''WesternAnimation/YoungJustice'' episode "Misplaced", Zatanna tells Artemis how she wished her OverprotectiveDad would give her some space. The very next second, her father (and the rest of the adults) disappear before them. [[spoiler: At the end of the episode, Zatara sacrifices himself so that Nabu wouldn't possess Zatanna. She may never get her father back.]]
** [[spoiler: Cut to Season 2; we get a confirmation...[[TearJerker She didn't]].]]
* ''WesternAnimation/GarfieldAndFriends'': In one episode, Garfield found a wishing well and wished there were no more mondays. At first, when he learned the wish became true, he was happy. A few weeks later, Garfield felt the drawbacks of a world without mondays: the streets were full of garbage because garbagemen only came at Mondays; gyms that used to be open for all days of the week were closed; movie theaters never showed new movies because they only changed their movies at Mondays; Jon couldn't buy more food because he always received his paychecks at Mondays; and he always made lasagna at Mondays. Being a BigEater, the two last bits were what horrified Garfield the most. He then returned to the wishing well, desperately asking for the mondays to be back. The well refused and threatened to remove other stuff, until the well's mother, who revealed they were actually aliens who look like wells, forced him to restore everything back to normal. Garfield then started loving Mondays. At least until he was reminded of why he hated them in the first place.
** In another episode Garfield gets a fairy godfather who grants him three wishes. The first wish is for lasagna, which the godfather steals from a nearby chef. The chef immediately suspects Garfield and takes it back. Then Garfield wishes for money to buy lasagna with. The godfather zaps in money from a bank and Garfield is promptly thrown in jail.
* "A Case of Spring Fever", was parodied in ''TheSimpsons''; a 1950s educational film has a young man foolishly wish that ''zinc'' didn't exist (?!), which proceeded to ruin his life because he couldn't (a) drive his zinc-less car to pick up his girlfriend for a date; (b) call his girlfriend to postpone their date with his zinc-less telephone; and (c) shoot himself in despair (as even the hammer in the gun was made of zinc). The young man is quick to regret his desire for a world without zinc ("Zinc! Come back!"); fortunately, it turns out to be AllJustADream.
* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'': An Earth Kingdom general wants Aang to get into the Avatar state. Despite Aang's warnings that he can only enter it when he's in genuine danger and YouWouldntLikeMeWhenImAngry. The general presses the issue and threatens his friends. [[GoneHorriblyRight Well, he sure did succeed.]]
* In the season 5 premiere of ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime'', Finn and Jake chase the Lich into a mysterious room in an alternate dimension where a creature named Prismo offers to grant each of them a wish. Finn tries to wish that the Lich never existed, and ends up in an AlternateUniverse where [[spoiler: Simon Petrokov/The Ice King [[HeroicSacrifice sacrificed himself]] to prevent the Mushroom War, but wound up freezing the world for 400 years after getting slowly crushed to death by a frozen bomb. Finn ends up putting on the Ice Crown himself in an effort to save his family from a gang, and proceeds to go mad with power and accidentally set off the bomb.]] When Jake tries to make a wish to fix things, Prismo even gives him a brief speech warning him about this trope, as Prismo can't control the outcome of the wishes and the vaguer they are the more likely it is the wish will go wrong.
** An earlier episode had them find a being in the center of a maze who granted wishes, but had this trope in mind in granting them. Finn ultimately outwits it by actually ''being'' careful about what he wished for and [[spoiler:wishing for an Ancient Psychic Tandem War Elephant and then having ''it'' wish for everyone to be healed.]]
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Real Life]]
* [[http://www.homeonthestrange.com/phpBB2/viewforum.php?f=4 The Open-Source Wish Project]] tries to find perfect, loophole-less wordings for wishes to avert this trope. While it might work against the JackassGenie, it doesn't really strike at the heart of the lesson of this trope; if you get exactly the thing you wanted, there's still the possibility you'll find you don't like it.
* In a rough flowchart of the endings for ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'', BioWare writer supposedly noted that he wanted the endings to cause [[MemeticMutation LOTS OF SPECULATION FROM EVERYONE]]. He/They got his/their wish; ''VideoGame/MassEffect3's'' ending is quickly becoming as infamous for being infuriatingly confusing and nonsensical as that of ''Series/{{Lost}}'' and that of ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'', the TropeCodifier for {{Gainax Ending}}s.
* In 2001, the city of Buffalo, NY had no snow in November and most of December, and it was possible that the city would have no snow on Christmas. So on Christmas Eve, everyone in Buffalo wished for a white Christmas. The next day, they awoke to the beginning of a 5-day blizzard that killed 4 people and dropped ''seven feet of snow'' onto the city. Whoops.
* During the years 2005-2006 many people in USA and UK desperately wished for real estate prices to fall. They did fall in 2007 - resulting the current (2008 - onwards) financial crisis.
* Richard Heene's attempt to become a reality star with his ''Balloon Boy'' stunt on October 15, 2009. Looks like he succeeded, just not in the way he had hoped for.
* After viewing his teammate going past him for the win as an act of betrayal, [[FormulaOne Gilles Villeneuve]] vowed never to speak to Didier Pironi ever again. He got it: Villeneuve was killed in qualifying the very next race.
* RobertPattinson, star of the highly divisive ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'' saga only auditioned [[OnlyInItForTheMoney for the money]] and the chance to work with [[KristenStewart his celebrity crush]]. He now is stalked by fans and receives death threats from haters. And it gets worse - he [[CreatorBacklash thinks the saga is stupid]] in every way. At least he did get to date her, but then later she admitted to cheating on him.
* As it was entering its third season, the producers of ''WesternAnimation/MoralOrel'' asked the creators to give them the darkest season they could. And boy did they get it. One episode in particular, the infamous "Alone" was so dark, the producers sliced season three's original episode count in half, and axed the show.
* Chicago Bears fans wished to be rid of Rex Grossman for throwing too many interceptions (despite leading them to the Super Bowl in his first season as a starter). Then came along Jay Cutler who lead the NFL in interceptions.
* Fanboys of {{Creator/Nintendo}} wanted the company to reign supreme in the ConsoleWars after taking a beating from Sony for two generations in a row. The {{Wii}} comes along and puts Nintendo back on top, but at the expense of the hardcore fans as Nintendo marketed the majority of its gaming to the casuals. [[ItsPopularNowItSucks Cue nerd rage]].
* There is the most common consequence of a phenomenon known as "Punishment voting", when people vote ''in masse'' for the ideological opposite of whoever is in power now, just to get that person out of office and have a different face and political party, only for the candidate to become the opposite of what the voters (and, sometimes, the candiate sponsors) wanted. If you combine that with NostalgiaFilter, the results can be awful...
* When Lena, a young German girl, moved out from her Parents' house at 18 (this was in 2007), they were ''not happy'' about it and had repeatedly tried to convince her to come back. Then Lena got caught in the 2010 Love Parade Disaster. Since then, she returned to her parent's house - and she refuses to leave and constantly clings to her parents.
* Many lottery winners encounter this, due to not being used to handling such large amounts of money. It's estimated 60% of them wind up bankrupt within a year. See AFoolAndHisNewMoneyAreSoonParted.
* The [[DrugsAreBad temperance movement]] in America got its wish with the Prohibition in the early [[TheRoaringTwenties 1920s]]. But while it did significantly reduce the rate of alcohol-related diseases and injuries, it also forced an industry into the hands of the BlackMarket, encouraged illicit alcohol production and drinking in [[ViceCity speakeasy parlours]], and led to a difficult-to-enforce ban that [[BadCopIncompetentCop underpaid and corrupt police officers]] struggled to uphold. Prohibition was repealed in 1933, but the problems never quite disappeared: Prohibition transformed the American alcoholic beverages industry from one that made traditional drinks from across Europe and a number of homegrown ones as well to purveyors of swill only good for getting drunk, and it would be decades before American beer and wine[[note]]Spirits weren't affected quite as badly, as the primary liquor--American whiskey--has a very slow production process, so there was more continuity.[[/note]] would reach a reasonable level of quality.
* Surely a lot of people must have wished growing up that pizza could be considered a vegetable. [[http://www.thejournal.ie/us-congress-rules-that-pizza-is-a-vegetable-282033-Nov2011/ Now that it is,]] one cannot help but think many of these same people must find it bittersweet.
* Carrie Fisher had complained about how boring Princess Leia's wardrobe was from the [[Film/ANewHope first]] [[Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack two]] ''Franchise/StarWars'' movies, so Creator/GeorgeLucas had wardrobe make the iconic [[GoGoEnslavement Slave]] Leia [[TheissTitillationTheory costume]] for ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi''. She would describe it as "what supermodels will eventually wear in the seventh ring of hell".
** Natalie Portman did something similar and got the black corset number she wore in ''AttackOfTheClones''.
* LyndonJohnson was actually rather peeved when he got the Democratic nomination for vice president in 1960--you see, he wanted the top job, not the post that his predecessor and fellow Texan John Nance Garner had described as "not worth a pitcher of warm piss." Then JohnFKennedy got shot, and LBJ became one of the most unpopular presidents in US history.
* "If the Germans want a war of extermination, then they will get one." - JosefStalin, in a speech in November 1941.
** "Better Hitler than Blum!" - Slogan of the French ultra-conservatives. Sometimes fate can be a LiteralGenie.
** "It is humiliating to remain with our hands folded while others write history. It matters little who wins. To make a people great it is necessary to send them to battle even if you have to kick them in the pants. That is what I shall do." - BenitoMussolini, April 11 1940, before having Italy enter WorldWarII without being anywhere near ready for it.
* For that matter, we can add ItsPopularNowItSucks to this - a lot of people wish for certain franchises and the like to be more popular. Then all of a sudden, half their fans turn their backs on it when it ''does'' become popular.
* Common in revolutions. "Our government sucks; I wish we had a different one!" "Wish granted! MeetTheNewBoss, [[FullCircleRevolution same as (or worse than) the old boss!]]"
** Particularly common after the end of longstanding governments, as the people who know how to run the country after the revolution will still be those who learned it under the previous regime, so specific measures have to be taken to prevent this (often at the expense of experience and ability).
* Specific for LiveActionTelevision, many shows that were UnCancelled of with PostScriptSeason suffer from this. By the time the continuation is greenlit, many actors and authors have moved on, and the remaining cast often cannot compensate, meaning that the show now sucks. Cue disappointment from all those who fought so hard for continuation.
* Wall Street got its wish when Elizabeth Warren was blocked from taking the top spot at her brainchild the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. After the notoriously outspoken consumer advocate wasn't even nominated - because the President knew he could never get her confirmed in the Senate - Warren went back to Massachusetts and launched her campaign against incumbent Senator Scott Brown. She won the election by an eight-point landslide, Wall Street lost its favorite Senator, and ''Senator'' Elizabeth Warren, who has no intention of stopping her crusade any time soon, is now not only part of the very body that wanted to send her back to her ivory tower, but (thanks to John Kerry's promotion) Massachussetts' senior Senator ''and'' a member of the Senate Banking Committee -- which is where Wall Street absolutely ''did not'' want her. Oooops!
* Chrysler wanted to discontinue the minivans (Dodge Caravan, Chrysler Grand Voyager, Chrysler Town & Country). They almost did...
* This could apply to any kids who wish to get out of school by being sick. Most don't get their wish, but the ones who do, realize that getting out of school by being sick requires that you, well, ''be sick'', as in "feeling horrible enough that you spend your days off in ''bed'' and it becomes utterly boring."
[[/folder]]

----