->''"Those things had to happen to me. That was my destiny. But you'll understand soon enough that there are consequences to being chosen...because, destiny, John, is a fickle bitch."''
-->-- '''Ben Linus''', ''Lost''

->"''... me? I'm '''[[SuicidalOverconfidence inevitable]]'''.''"
-->-- '''Dark Danny''', ''DannyPhantom''

A prophecy (or in TimeTravel, something that is known to have happened in the past) comes true despite all attempts to prevent it ([[SelfFulfillingProphecy and often because of those attempts]]).

Often happens with an obvious (or not so obvious) ProphecyTwist on the language used in the prophecy. [[OlderThanDirt As old as]] Oedipus Rex, used by Shakespeare and Tolkien, and still fresh at least as recently as the mid-80s sitcom!

Depending on the mood of the series, the final fulfillment of the prophecy may or may not be a DownerEnding. Sometimes, the heroes still manage to put right the wrong the prophecy promises. In such situations, they usually conclude that fate only said something bad would happen, not that they couldn't eventually right it. AnAesop usually follows about free will being stronger than destiny.

One technical term for the TimeTravel version of this trope is the ''predestination paradox'', a concept very popular with the Ancient Greeks, who believed [[YouAlreadyChangedThePast there is only one possible future]].

If the prophecy comes true because of being made (in the most common scenario, because of everyone's attempts to prevent it), it's a case of a SelfFulfillingProphecy. If the universe appears to self-correct any attempt at change, then OntologicalInertia is in play.

Since it's Older Than Dirt, most examples rely on a ProphecyTwist. If time travel is involved, it's called YouAlreadyChangedThePast. See also StableTimeLoop and PrescienceIsPredictable.

TheFatalist is characterized by their strong belief in fate.

Compare with BecauseDestinySaysSo, ButThouMust. Contrast with ScrewDestiny.
----
!!Examples
* OlderThanFeudalism - remember the ancient Arab legend about a man who saw Death staring at him and fled to faraway Samarkand to avoid him. When somebody asked Death why he'd been staring at the man he said, "I was surprised to see him here because I'm appointed to meet him in Samarkand next week."

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder: Anime and Manga ]]

*In ''MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha'', this is embodied in the sympathetic DarkMagicalGirl who is actually named "Fate." She feels that she has no choice in her life and in her actions, and thus no hope. Ironically, this is her power at first, as her ruthlessness (as there are no other options to her) gives her the edge. The Heroine [[ContemplateOurNavels contemplates a few times]] on how she, on the other hand, ''chose'' to be a MagicalGirl, because it's something she wants to be. (Rather rare; most {{Magical Girl}}s are that way BecauseDestinySaysSo.) Thus, Fate and Nanoha's battle in the first season is symbolic of Fate vs. Free Will.
** Which means that with enough firepower, you can not only Fight Fate, but you can also [[DefeatMeansFriendship befriend Fate]]. Befriend her right into the hospital. Then start [[ThereIsOnlyOneBed sharing a bed]] with her in [[TimeSkip a few years]]...
* In ''MahouSenseiNegima'', it's totally possible to fight Fate. But look out, he can turn people to stone and his [[PowerLevels power level]] is around 3,000, so... what? [[IThoughtItMeant Wrong Fate? Oh. Um... never mind, then]].
** Asuna Kagurazaka in the first anime's [[OvertookTheManga alternate story]] was doomed to die on her 15th birthday due to a DealWithTheDevil so the demons would stop following her and bringing destruction wherever she went. The series' lead's DisappearedDad attempted to save her and was promptly [[DroppedABridgeOnHim crushed under a bridge]]. [[spoiler: She has to die and comes back in time to break the deal. And not before Negi has an HeroicBSOD upon seeing her death.]]
* In the ''MermaidMelodyPichiPichiPitch'' manga, Lucia Nanami is prophesied to go through great hardship, so she is raised as a civilian. It happens anyway, but it could be argued that because she didn't know she was a princess, she met Kaito, gave away her pearl, and caused everything to happen that gave her a {{Nakama}} to get through it. The anime, however, has all this happen while she ''does'' know.
* Neji Hyuuga in ''{{Naruto}}'' used to be a firm believer in this, until Naruto shows him that DefeatMeansFriendship.
* Played with in the ''Sonic X'' anime with the character Cosmo, whose actual destiny ([[spoiler: i.e. turn into a tree, die, save the universe, in that order]]), is not revealed until the final two episodes of the series in what feels like a bit of an AssPull on the writers' parts: the spirit of her mother reveals to her that [[spoiler: the stone she wears around her neck, similar to that worn by all species is in fact a [[AppliedPhlebotinum Magical Amulet]] which, when activated, will accelerate her growth into maturity, allowing her to become a tree, attach herself to the BigBad and weaken it to the point at which it can be destroyed]]. Because she had spent most of the series struggling with survivor’s guilt, abject terror and low self esteem, Cosmo saw this sudden revelation of her destiny as her redemption – she no longer felt that she had to stand by and watch their enemies destroy everything; she has a purpose at last. As such, she [[HeroicSacrifice follows her newfound destiny willingly]].
* Sartorius (Takuma Saiou) was always talking about this in ''YuGiOhGX'' when he was the BigBad. Aster (Edo) Phoenix did a bit, too, although this is more in the dub (where his catchphrase is "You can't fight destiny").
* In episode 26 of ''ZettaiKarenChildren'', an Esper dolphin whose visions have always been 100% accurate is introduced. He has two particularly dire predictions: the first being his death by several gunshots; and the second one, where [[spoiler: a war erupts between Normals and Espers, and a grown Kaoru has become the Queen of Catastrophe leading the Espers. Minamoto ends up gunning her down]]. Needless to say, Minamoto is determined to ScrewDestiny. He actually manages to subvert the first vision; his interference causes [[spoiler:the dolphin to die from only ONE bullet]], proving that just maybe the visions aren't infallible.
* In ''RaveMaster'', if your a guy whose last name is Raregroove you are destined to be a good person who suffers a horrible tragedy that causes you to turn evil and try to destory the world. If your a guy whose last name is Glory you are destined to stop whichever Raregroove guy from the same generation as you (who always shares your birthday, apparently). Gale and King don't believe this since they're best buddies. How could they possibly fight against one another when they're trying to save the world together? ...Until Gale accidentally gets King's wife and kid killed when the later thinks they need to dirty there hands to accomplish their goal. They later try to put an end to this [[spoiler: when King kills himself and Gale sacrifices himself to save Haru]], but it turns out King's kid ''wasn't'' dead after all, so the cycle repeats.
* ''{{X 1999}}'''s main theme is that the future has already been decided and it can't be changed. Every time a dreamgazer looks at the future, they see the destruction of the world and the extinction of mankind. This did not end up coming true in the anime, and it remains to be seen if it will in the manga (if they ever finish it).

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Comic Books ]]

* Present throughout ''BoosterGold'', but particularly in the issue where he tries to keep Barbara Gordon (the first Batgirl) from getting shot by the Joker. He tries and fails to stop the event from happening multiple times before accepting that there are some things he isn't capable of changing because of solidified time (i.e. changing the past purposely, already extremely dangerous in "normal" cases, becomes impossible because certain events are literally too important to change, such as preventing Barbra Gordon from being crippled preventing her from becoming Oracle and saving BlueBeetle, preventing the Max Lord / Checkmate conspiracy from being revealed).

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Fan Fiction ]]

* In the ''SonicTheHedgehog'' fanfic A Rose And A Thorn 4, Mirage goes back in time to try and stop Ashura from causing the fall of the ARK. It turns out that BECAUSE she did this and knew what was going to happen, she made Sonic blue, and gave birth to [[spoiler: Knuckles]]. The experiment she mated with caused the rampage of the Artifical Chaos because she told him it was going to happen. She still couldn't save Maria even though she knew about it and was right there. But she did manage to kill Ashura so that A Rose And A Thorn 3 didn't happen, and because it didn't happen, A Rose And A Thorn 5 happened instead.
**.......What?

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Film ]]

* ''Knowing'' (2009) stars Nicolas Cage as a HollywoodAtheist who rushes around trying to find a way to prevent [[spoiler:(or personally survive) the EndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt]], but by the end we see there was nothing he could have done to change it.
* ''MinorityReport'' exemplifies this trope.
** To the contrary, the characters are able to prevent crimes by seeing that said crimes will happen. And there's a further level of subversion in the minority reports of the title, suppressed because they show that [[spoiler:some of the crimes might not have happened anyway, as there was a one in three chance the criminals would have reconsidered.]]
*** [[spoiler:Not quite correct. The chance of the criminals reconsidering is unknown: It is only stated that only one of the precogs would have the "correct" premonition only.]]
** The said minority report always differs from the other two, which is used in the XanatosGambit of the film.
* The SandraBullock Film ''Premonition'' mixes this trope with a partial TemporalParadox. In the future Linda sees, her husband Jim dies, she goes crazy, is suspected of hurting her daughter, and gets committed to an insane asylum. Her efforts to prevent Jim's death create SelfFulfillingProphecies, and the film's "happy" ending consists of a reveal that she was eventually released from the asylum, now pregnant with another child.
* In ''Sex and Death 101'' (2008), the main character is emailed (by a MagicalComputer) a list of 101 women's names. It turns out to be a list of all the people he has slept with, or ''is going to sleep with'', before he dies. Initially, he thinks it's just a joke, as his current fiance happens to be #29 out of 101, but, regardless of how he tries to avoid it, he ends up sleeping with every woman on the list, in exactly the order in which they appear, and, to his dismay, the last name on the list happens to match that of a notorious FemmeFatale SerialKiller who seduces men before drugging them into permanent comas. [[spoiler: Indeed, she is the last woman he ever sleeps with, because [[ProphecyTwist they get married]] and live HappilyEverAfter.]]
* The ''{{Terminator}}'' films, as a whole, are an example of this. In the first movie, Sarah Connor learns that the fate of her unborn child, John, is to lead the remaining humans against the machines AfterTheEnd; the second movie is all about Sarah and John trying to stop the end from happening, and seemingly succeeding. However, both continuities which AlternateContinuity explain that Sarah's actions did not prevent, but only ''delayed'' the rise of Skynet and the nuclear holocaust, from 1997 when it was originally supposed to happen, until 2003 (in the [[DisContinuity fan rejected]] ''Rise of the Machines'' continuity) or 2011 (in ''TheSarahConnorChronicles'' continuity, althought it's implied that they may still be able to prevent it altogether). Of course, the series [[TimeyWimeyBall makes a hash of fate]] in general; compare that with what Kyle told Sarah in the first film, which gets repeated by John in the second: "The future is not set in stone. There is no fate but what we make." And then compare ''that'' with the fact that Kyle, John's father, only met Sarah because John sent him back in time to save her from the killer cyborgs bent on stopping John's birth.
** The plot of {{Terminator}} 1 is that in order to save humanity in the future Kyle got sent back in time to save Sarah thus saving the future John Connor from the Terminator that was created by Skynet that was created from the very Terminator that was sent back in time to kill Sarah and the future John Connor in order to screw the humanity in the future. Headache!
* ''TwelveMonkeys'' is an excellent example.
** As is the film it's based on, Chris Marker's ''La Jetee''.
* The ''FinalDestination'' series is a variation, which basically says "If you're supposed to die, you will".

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Literature ]]

* Happens occasionally in ''TheBible''. Jonah in particular is mostly about this.
* The plot of PhilipKDick's novel ''The World Jones Made'' is driven by the titular Floyd Jones, who has the power to see one year into the future. Unfortunately, after he sees the future, he loses the ability to change the decisions he makes in that future - possibly because he's actually sending his memories ''back'' through time to his younger self.
* In David Eddings' ''TheBelgariad'', Ce'Nedra stubbornly refuses to accept the truth: that she is in love with Garion, whether she likes it or not, and that she has to go to Riva. It takes a god with a stare to die for to change her mind. The series makes a point of driving this home with a large hammer. Numerous times Polgara and Belgarath say that "Everything has already been decided." Which turns out to be true. Even minor, never to be seen again characters were born just for one particular purpose (such as the soldier heckling Ce'Nedra when she needs prodding to make an important speech).
** Possible lampshading in the related books ''Belgarath the Sorcerer'' and ''Polgara the Sorceress''. In those books, the titular characters spend thousands of years on assorted errands to ensure that the prophecy ''will'' be fulfilled. For example, Belgarath and Polgara practically dictated a major treaty to a sovereign power at swordpoint to make sure that, 500 years later, Ce'Nedra would be sent to Riva.
*** Definite lampshading in the former. The Prophecy's method of revealing information (concealing it in cryptic words until the right moment) is pretty much a necessary ploy to keep Belgarath (who hates the implications this trope) from doing things he's not supposed to.
** While the characters can't fight their fates, at the same time, the core of the plot actually concerns two competing prophecies. One prophecy triumphing ultimately means the other gets [[ScrewDestiny screwed.]]
* This is one of the two overriding themes in all of Thomas Hardy's work, the other being ItGotWorse. Of course, Hardy did believe in a philosophy called "fatalism", in which this trope is ''the'' central tenet.
* Cersei Lannister in George R.R. Martin's ''ASongOfIceAndFire'' is haunted by a childhood prophecy that has successfully predicted several events of her life; this prophecy also predicts that she will outlive all her children, that she will be supplanted by a younger and more beautiful queen, and that her little brother will strangle her. All of her attempts to prevent these things from happening only serve to alienate those around her.
** Running tally: [[spoiler:Joffrey is dead, Tommen's fate is largely dependent on her own (outlook not good), and Myrcella is surrounded by people who, while they don't wish her harm, will use her to gain power. Sansa Stark is being groomed for rulership by Littlefinger, Margaery Tyrell isn't dead yet (and let's not forget Daenerys Targaryen). ''And'' she has begun to alienate Jaime--also her younger brother, if only by minutes--while Tyrion yet lives]].
** On the other hand, The Stallion That Mounts the World, a prophesied warrior destined to become the greatest of kings and lead the Dothraki across the sea died, stillborn. Unless of course, the prophecy actually referred to Denaerys and the ones speaking got it wrong. Given that this is apparently the case with Stannis and Melisandre, it's quite possible.
* A major plot point in Audrey Niffenegger's ''TheTimeTravelersWife''. Henry realizes there is absolutely nothing he can do to change the past, when he tried (and failed) numerous times to warn a mother that her child is about to be in an accident, and when he [[spoiler:had to witness his mother's death]] over 50 times without being able to prevent it. The story doesn't delve into what would happen if any of the characters ever did try to change their fate - they simply accepted the fact that they couldn't.
* In [[HBeamPiper H. Beam Piper]]'s short story ''The Edge of the Knife'', a history professor remembers flashes of the future as well as the past; what he doesn't always remember is "the edge of the knife" - the knife-blade moment of the present separating the two - and so he gets into trouble for things like looking for books in the university library that won't be written for several hundred years, because he wants to draw analogies between two different historical situations. He copes with all this by thinking of events being just as much historical facts if they happened yesterday or will happen in the future.
* The TimPowers novel ''Three Days to Never'' has an interesting twist on this: one character, a Mossad agent, keeps having premonitions of things he will ''never'' do again (e.g. he hears a ringing phone and realizes that's the last time he will ''ever'' hear a ringing phone). The first time it happened -- he touched something and received the premonition that he would never touch it again -- he immediately tried to prove the premonition wrong, and not only failed but got his hand horribly disfigured instead. In the end, [[spoiler:we're never actually shown why he has these premonitions, but they all come right when he dies]].
* TerryPratchett and NeilGaiman's ''GoodOmens''.
** [[spoiler: Adam decides that it doesn't matter what is Written, [[ScrewDestiny because you can always cross it out]]]].
* Played straight and subverted in [[{{Discworld}} The Colour Of Magic]] by TerryPratchett
** Early in the book a psychic sees [[spoiler: the future burning of Ankh-Morpork]], and races off away only to be killed in an avalanche - proving that Death also has a sense of humour
** Later, Rincewind sees Death, who's surprised to meet the failed wizard, since he has an appointment with Rincewind the next day in another city. Death even offers to lend Rincewind a fast horse, but wisely he doesn't take up the offer.
* Norman Spinrad's short story "The Weed of Time". The victim - er, narrator - remembered the entirety of his 110-year life from the moment of his birth. An expedition to another planet brought back the weed which caused the precognition effect and it had been released accidentally and grew wild. The experience drives him insane, because he cannot change any of the events he experiences.
* Kurt Vonnegut's ''Slaughterhouse 5'' takes this to the extreme, with the protagonist hallucinating himself a theory about the non-existence of free will, involving MentalTimeTravel and aliens. He does this in to make sense of what he saw during {{World War II}}.
* In LordOfTheRings, Iluvatar (God) acts mostly through fate: Gandalf tells Frodo that "there are other forces at work in the world... one could say Bilbo was ''meant'' to find the Ring, in which case you were also ''meant'' to have it." Being a demi-god, he has seen a vision of the history of the universe before it was made, and therefore is able to predict that [[ItWasHisSled Gollum]] would destroy the Ring.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Live Action TV ]]

* Partially subverted and partially played straight in ''{{Angel}}'': a dark and seemingly inevitable prophecy forming one of the major plots of Season Three was [[spoiler:ultimately revealed to be an elaborate XanatosRoulette on the part of time-traveling BigBad Sajjhan, who wanted Connor killed off before he could fulfill the true prophecy: causing the death of Sajjhan. Ultimately, however, the true prophecy comes to pass]].
* ''BuffyTheVampireSlayer'', "Help": A teenager has had premonitions about her own untimely death. Buffy saves her from homicidal maniacs, a demon, and a DeathTrap, but she has a heart condition and dies anyway.
* Similarly (only with TimeTravel), the ''Series/{{Heroes}}'' ep "Six Months Ago" has Hiro finding out that the waitress that he's been trying to save from Sylar is already dying from a blood clot on her brain.
* On seasons 3 & 4 of ''{{Lost}}'' [[spoiler:many characters cannot be killed or die (Michael, Locke, Jack) because "the island needs them". Similarly, many characters are fated to die and any attempts to save them only postpone the inevitable]].
* The ''MontyPython'' episode "The Cycling Tour" plays with this trope for comic effect. Mr. Pither accepts a lift from Mr. Gulliver, whose company has been developing food that can predict accidents and avoid them ("Even if it's in your stomach, and it senses an accident it will come up your throat and out of the window"). While Gulliver is explaining this one of his experimental tomatoes ejects itself from the car. Gulliver is so excited that it works that he loses control of the car, causing the very accident that the tomato had predicted.
* The ''RedDwarf'' episode Cassandra featured a computer that could tell the future. In a perfect example of YouCantFightFate, after it had foretold that certain characters would leave alive, a gun was pointed in their face and the trigger pulled. Naturally, it jammed. When pointed at another character who she foretold would die, it worked perfectly. This trope was then used almost word for word to seduce another character, since the computer had foretold he'd die while having sex with her. (When her boyfriend caught them in the act) But in the end, it turned out she was lying to cause jealousy. She foresaw that the boyfriend would kill her. He realized this and tried to avoid it, saying he wasn't going to kill her, but through a Rube Goldberg series of events ends up killing her anyway.
**Note: Lister, who was foretold would kill Cassandra, wasn't dating Kochanski but it was foretold that he would kill Arnold with a harpoon gun as 'Rimmer' died of a heart attack after being told he would, but it was actually the captain of the squad wearing Rimmer's jacket with Rimmer's name on it. This was Rimmer's attempt at screwing destiny. This was all part of Cassandra's scheme as she knew she would die and rather sees 'visions' of the future rather than actual predictions as some of her 'predictions' are unclear even to her and thus attempts to take down whoever she can before she dies.
** [[http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=7LiMdrRoCJo 'Future Echoes']].
* In the ''StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode, "The City on the Edge of Forever", Edith Keeler must die so that Germany doesn't win World War II and wipe the Federation from existence. (Had she lived, she would have founded a peace movement that would have delayed the United States' entry into the European front of WWII, allowing Nazi Germany sufficient time to develop the atomic bomb and thus win the war.)
* ''Every'' DealWithTheDevil on ''{{Supernatural}}'' ends with hell, no matter if you're a guest star or one of the leads.
** Well, they did save the one guy who only made the deal to save his wife...but no one since.
** Of course, as the fourth season opener reveals, [[spoiler: you can still get out with a little help from above.]]
** In a more typical example of the trope, the episode "The Monster at the End of This Book" reveals that [[spoiler: there's a man with the gift of divine prophecy whose prophecies ''always'' come true, even when Sam and Dean try to avert them--which doesn't discount the possibility of a ProphecyTwist if the prophet doesn't see the whole scene.]]
* ''PowerRangers'' features a variant across several series- you ''can'' change the future, but it makes things worse. [[ItGotWorse Much worse]]. In ''PowerRangersTurbo'', a robot goes back in time to prevent a war. As a result, in ''PowerRangersInSpace'' Zordon dies (in that very war), and in PowerRangersRPM ''the entire planet is razed''.
** Though we don't yet know how or if the ''RPM'' future was affected by the Blue Senturion.
** For a Sentai example, the original Sixth Ranger Burai of Zyuranger is told shortly after his introduction that he will die in 40 hours. This can be halted for awhile so long as he doesn't try to fight the bad guys but he needs to save the others often and whenever he does more of his remaining time ticks away. Just about every moment he appears in has somebody trying to find a way to prevent this, but they eventually find out that no, not even the gods can save him, his time has come. Sure enough he dies shortly before the finale, although he managed to make peace with himself and his impending death and dies with no regrets.
*** Another variant for another Sentai is another Sixth Ranger of Timeranger [=TimeFire=] who is also destined to die. Here it's not as specific. [=TimeFire=] will die, but as the ranger and not the person, meaning anybody could fulfill this destiny as [=TimeFire=]. The original [=TimeFire=] found this out and did his best to make sure somebody else took over for him ASAP. Sure enough the new [=TimeFire=] dies in the battle he was destined to die in, but the original's selfish scheme is discovered by the other Rangers, who promptly kill him anyway.
* In StarTrek, if you attempt TheKobayashiMaru scenario, it will result in failure, no matter what you do. [[spoiler: Unless you hack the simulation program.]]
** You can also refuse to do the main part of the simulation claiming it's a trap.
* On ''Reaper'', one guy manages to weasel out of his DealWithTheDevil. [[spoiler: The Devil gets his soul anyway.]]
*"Profile in Silver", an episode of the 80s revival of TheTwilightZone, played with this trope. A historian from the future(who happened to be a direct descendant of John F. Kennedy) prevented Kennedy's assassination, only to set in motion events that would bring about a nuclear exchange between the U.S. and Russia. [[spoiler: He manages to set things right by taking JFK's place in the motorcade, and Kennedy himself becomes a history teacher in his descendant's future.]]
*What, no mention of the DoctorWho episodes "Father's Day" and "Fires of Pompeii"?
**New addition, The Waters of Mars. The Doctor handles it differently though, instead [[spoiler: breaking his own rules and challenging time. Of course, [[ItGotWorse everything then goes wrong]] and the womann he saved kills herself to stop him.]]
*The entire point of ''{{Flashforward}}'''s plot, where everyone on earth blacks out and, if they survived, sees a vision of themselves six months into the future (except for [[HaroldAndKumarGoToWhiteCastle Harold]]). For instance, Joseph Fienne's character sees that he's on a taskforce to find the source of the blackouts, and when he wakes up his investigations land him on... a taskforce to discover the source of the blackouts.
*"A Determined Woman", an episode of the DawnFrench comedy anthology series ''Murder Most Horrid'', tells the tragicomic story of an inventor (French) working on a time machine, who gets so annoyed with her idiot husband disrupting her work that she hits him with a spanner, a little harder than she intended... Some years later, after serving time for his manslaughter, she completes her time machine and goes back to try and save him, only to discover that her attempts to prevent his death were what caused it in the first place.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Mythology ]]

* The ancient Greeks loved these types of stories. Two especially famous ones involve the Oracle at Delphi; in the first, a man prophesied to die in the sea spends his life avoiding the ''ocean'', only to die in a forest the locals call "The Sea"; in another, King Croesus is told that a great empire will fall if he goes to war, wrongly assuming it will be his enemy's.
** Gaia and Ouranos prophesied that Kronos would be overthrown by one of his sons, so he ate each son as it was born. His wife kept their last son, Zeus, hidden, so that Zeus could eventually fulfill the prophesy.
** Acrisius consulted the Oracle, and found that he was fated to be slain by the son of his daughter. As such, he locked his still-maiden daughter in a tower. Zeus came to her in a shower of gold and fathered Perseus. So Acrisius puts Perseus and his daughter in a wooden chest and throws them into the sea. Eventually, Perseus kills his now-old grandfather in an accident at the Olympic Games.
* Oedipus and his story is very much a tale that exemplifies this trope. He was prophesied to slay his father and wed his mother. Despite the great lengths his parents and Oedipus himself took to avert this, naturally it comes true.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Theater ]]

* Subverted in Calderon's ''Life is a Dream'', where Segismund is prophecied to kill his father, King Basil of Poland, and become an EvilOverlord. Because of this, Basil locks Segismund away in a tower in the mountains, which [[SelfFulfillingProphecy angers him]]. For a while, the play ''really, really'' looks like it's going to end with Segismund killing Basil. [[ScrewDestiny It doesn't.]] Although he does actually kill his mother, but [[DeathByChildbirth that was an accident.]]
* A TearJerker example is the theme of ''OurTown''.
* {{Macbeth}}. A whole bunch of {{Macbeth}}.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Tabletop Games ]]

* In ''{{GURPS}}: Thaumatology'' there are items that force a Destiny on the owner, causing them to fulfill it whether they want to or not. The Destiny doesn't run out either, an item that makes one person King of England will also make the next person who picks it up into the King of England.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Video Games ]]

* In ''GodOfWar'', Kratos finds you can not only fight Fate, you can ''kill'' them too.
* Half of the ''LegacyOfKain'' series revolves around this trope. The other half revolves around ScrewDestiny. [[UnderStatement It's complicated]].
* ''MegaManX 5'' has three different scenarios (two for X, one of which is non-canon, and one for Zero), depending on the LuckBasedMission of the game. However, whichever scenario is played out, the BossBattle in the penultimate stage will ''always'' be [[spoiler:X vs. Zero, their prophecy finally being carried out]].
* [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt The Armageddon]] in OdinSphere. [[spoiler: You can't stop it, but you ''can'' [[MultipleEndings make it even worse]] if you don't fulfill the prophecy exactly.]]
* The main plot of ''Summoner''. The evil emperor Murod is told that his reign will be brought to an end by a summoner. So he spends his life finding the summoner, causing the destruction of his village, and later of the kingdom the summoner is from. This causes the summoner to fight and eventually kill Murod. Ironically, had he done nothing about it, said Summoner would have lived a happy life as a mere farmer.
* Kratos from ''TalesOfSymphonia'' tends to mention fate a lot in his battle quotes, such as saying "You can never escape fate." Considering what happened to him, it might be very justified.
* In spite of the TimeTravel, [[RedAlert Allies will always win]]
* Present for the BigBad in FinalFantasyCrystalChronicles: Echoes of Time. Larkeicus's plan is to stop an event that's about to happen from causing crystals to disappear from the world 2,000 years in the past [[TimeyWimeyBall (...somehow)]]. He calculates the exact time and location of the event, [[spoiler: which is in the middle of the air. So he builds a tower to reach that point. After you defeat him, Sherlotta tells him something along the lines of, "If there wasn't this tower, what could have possibly happened, all the way up here?". She then follows up by essentially [[InvokedTrope stating this trope.]] ]]

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Western Animation ]]

* In the ''ChipAndDaleRescueRangers'' episode "Seer No Evil", a gypsy moth named Cassandra gives a series of unlikely predictions to everyone but Zipper. All come true in unexpected ways, including a prediction that ''seems'' to forecast Chip's death... but she never actually ''says'' he dies, so the prediction, as dire as it sounded, doesn't quite turn out as expected...
* ''DannyPhantom'''s [[FutureMeScaresMe future self]]. The circumstances will be different, but the outcome generally the same. His present/past self says "ScrewDestiny" and appears to have avoided that fate... but did gain a useful ability.
* ''TheFairlyOddParents,'' "The Secret Origin of Denzel Crocker"
* Comes up several times in ''{{Gargoyles}}'', thanks to the Phoenix Gate's ability to {{time travel}}:
** During his first experience with {{time travel}}, Goliath ends up in his own past and implores the past version of Demona not to make the same bad decisions that led to her becoming his enemy. When he returns to the present, Demona taunts him with the knowledge that she remembers that confrontation and that his efforts changed nothing.
** Later, Goliath attempts to use the time-travelling Phoenix Gate to save Griff from being killed during the Blitz in WWII London, after being accused of abandoning or murdering Griff by his companions. With increasingly improbable incidents occurring that indicates the universe has decided Griff is its new ChewToy, Goliath ultimately concludes that fate will not allow Griff to get home and uses the Phoenix Gate to bring Griff back with him to the present, thus causing his original disappearance.
** By the end of the Avalon arc, Goliath has learned his lesson enough that, faced with a dystopian future vision of things that will happen to his friends and allies and asked by Elisa to give her the Phoenix Gate in order to fix things, he refuses, stating that time and fate are immutable and cannot be changed. As it turns out the whole experience was staged by Puck as a gambit to obtain the Phoenix Gate for himself, so Goliath is presented as making the right choice.
* In Disney's ''{{Disney/Hercules}}'', Hades is given a prophecy by the Fates that Hercules will defeat Hades' rule over Mt. Olympus in 18 years. You can guess how THAT went down!
* ''ThePowerpuffGirls'': After some TimeTravel, Mojo Jojo chucks a young Utonium into the town volcano. However, the [=PPGs=] have travelled as well, and not only do they save Utonium, it turns out that this incident is what got him into science... and eventually led to the [=PPGs=]' creation.
* Parodied in ''Red vs Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles'', when Church uses a {{time travel}} device to try and prevent many of the events that occurred in (or before) the first and second seasons, only to find out that either his plan fails, or actually ''causes'' the event he was trying to prevent, ''including his own death.'' His seems to selectively forget his mistakes though, as he still blames Caboose for the tank incident.
* This trope was done in ''The Ned Zone'', one of ''TheSimpsons Treehouse of Horror'' episodes where Ned has a vision about killing Homer.
* In the ''SouthPark'' episode "The Startling", Craig Tucker.
* ''TeenTitans'' spent several episodes of the fourth season dealing with Raven's prophesied role as the instrument by which [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt her father would enter and end the world]]. Despite hers and her friends' efforts of preventing it, she ''does'' become the portal for Trigon to get to Earth and destroy it... [[ResetButton they just fix it afterward]].
** In a way, Raven kind of retroactively says ScrewDestiny. She realizes the [[EndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt prophecy]] only came true because she let it, and then turns the DeusExMachina UpToEleven.
* ''TheFairlyOddParents'', "The Secret Origin of Denzel Crocker":
-->'''Timmy:''' NO! This is exactly what I was ''trying! To! Prevent!''

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