Hero Of Another Story / Live-Action TV

Shows with their own pages

• Babylon 5
• Hogan's Heroes
• Jeremiah

Other Shows

• Curtis on 24, plus several other less notable CTU agents, who lead tactical teams whenever Jack Bauer can't be there for plot reasons.
• 30 Rock does this occasionally. Entire storylines will be mentioned in passing, often to Liz's relief.
• On The 4400, we have Jed Garrity, another NTAC agent who seems to be the only other person in that department. Incidentally, he's played by the same actor who played Lorne over on SGA.
• The A-Team: Season 5 saw the team arrested, then quickly broken out by shady spymaster General Hunt Stockwell, who promised them a pardon in exchange for carrying out certain missions for him. While Stockwell is largely a manager in the present day, allusions are made to his having been a very prolific secret agent in his younger years. One episode also introduces his former partner, Ivan Trigorin, a Shout-Out to The Man from U.N.C.L.E. as Stockwell and Trigorin's actors had been the stars of that show.
• Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. gives this treatment to Phil Coulson, a character who previously appeared in a secondary role in Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Thor and The Avengers.
  • Agents of SHIELD has now generated a few Heroes of Another Story of its own. Any SHIELD agent who survived the events of the first two seasons but didn't join either HYDRA, Team Coulson, or a neutral third party like Stark Industries or the CIA counts (named examples include Mike Peterson, Agent Weaver and the other surviving members of "The Real SHIELD", who are presumably still off doing SHIELD-y stuff somewhere). The biggest examples, though, are Bobbi Morse and Lance Hunter, new leads introduced in Season 2 who eventually depart for their own spinoff, Marvel's Most Wanted - except the show was never picked up. Still, Hunter later returns for a single episode and mentions how their wedding got interrupted by ninjas, so clearly their adventures are still happening, just now offscreen.
• A third season episode of Andromeda reveals an alternate timeline where Rhade, Dylan's second in command in the first episode, kills Dylan in their fight in that episode. It results in him taking the role of trying to revive the Commonwealth, and showcases a few important episodes of Season 1 with him in command. In the end, Harper mentions that he seems like a scumbag, and Dylan replies "everyone is the hero of their own story."
• The Arrowverse has several series, all of whom are "Another Story" with respect to each other.
  • On Arrow, John Constantine and Mari McCabe fill this role, implying that their adventures haven't ended just because their series had ended. When Thea asks why Constantine can't help with their latest mystical problem, Oliver explains that currently Constantine is in Hell. Literally. No more details are given on the subject. Meanwhile, Mari's introduction in the series has her in the middle of handling a case in Detroit. Another DC hero whose story happens offscreen is Christopher Chance / Human Target, a friend of Oliver who is called twice to help in Team Arrow's missions. In Season 6, Slade Wilson chooses to find his sons on his own, despite Oliver offering help,^note The original plan was for Oliver to reunite with and help Slade later, but rights issues pertaining to Deathstroke's inclusion in the DC Extended Universe shelved the plans, so the showrunners ended up having to leave the plot point hanging. while Thea leaves Team Arrow to locate and destroy other Lazarus Pits around the world, alongside Roy and Nyssa. In Season 7, Laurel returns to Earth-2, reformed as Black Canary, to protect her Star City much as Oliver protects his.
  • The Flash has Jessie Quick and Jay Garrick, both of whom have their own adventures as speedsters on Earth-2 and 3 respectively. In one episode, it's briefly mentioned that Jessie has formed a Team Flash of her own. After becoming a speedster, Wally chooses to leave Team Flash in Season 4 so he can step out of Barry's shadow and help people outside Central City. Cisco's rival-turned-girlfriend Gypsy also has off-camera adventures as an inter-dimensional bounty hunter.
  • In Supergirl, Supergirl is the defender of National City. Superman is busy defending Metropolis, so he's usually only mentioned, but occasionally shows up to lend Supergirl a hand. A few lines indicate that, other than James, Superman's circle of friends (possibly the same ones from Smallville, as Canon Foreigner Chloe Sullivan is mentioned) exist in the series as well. Others suggest that Batman is an active hero. In Season 2, Miss Martian leaves Earth to lead the resistance against the White Martians. Season 3 introduces the Legion of Super-Heroes, a superhero team from the 30th century, whose members include Mon-El, Brainy, and (later) Winn.
  • In Legends of Tomorrow, Jonah Hex, Rip Hunter's old friend, appears only when the Legends are visiting the Old West. Season 2 introduces the Justice Society of America, whose offscreen adventures happened during The '40s and The '50s, though one of its members, Amaya, eventually joins the Legends. In Season 3, Rip creates an entire time-travel agency, the Time Bureau, that by all accounts is better at what they do than the main characters, though they still (begrudgingly) need the Legends' help from time to time.
  • Crisis on Earth-X shows a rebel group led by its version of Winn Schott resisting the Nazis from taking over Earth-X completely. Naturally, the Earth-1 and 38 heroes help them liberate Earth-X from the Nazis. Their adventures are expanded in the animated prequel spin-off Freedom Fighters: The Ray.
  • Crisis on Infinite Earths has a boatload of cameos from all over the DC multiverse, showing heroes of other worlds and their reactions to the Crisis as it happens. Some of them play more meaningful roles (including Earth-96 Superman), but perhaps the biggest cameo of all was from Movie!Barry Allen, who meets his Arrowverse counterpart in the Speed Force, apparently lost and unaware of the Crisis (Arrowverse Barry ends up giving Movie!Barry the idea to use "The Flash" as his alias).
• Babylon 5 has It’s own page.
• At the end of the Band of Brothers episode "Crossroads," we meet Second Lieutenant George C. Rice of the 10th Armored Division, played by Jimmy Fallon in a cameo. Knowing that Bastogne was going to be surrounded, and knowing that the 101st was going to be really short on ammunition, Rice made nine separate trips in a jeep that was towing a trailer back and forth from a nearby supply depot to Bastogne in order to bring what ammo he could to the troops digging in against the German advance. He did this on his own volition. His last trip was technically made after the Germans had surrounded the town, and the only reason he didn't make a tenth trip was because he was specifically ordered by his CO to stand down. Rice was nominated for a Medal of Honor for his actions.
• Battlestar Galactica (2003) does this to some extent - there are many, many recurring characters who clearly have a lot going on that doesn't impact on the main plot, such as the ever-busy Doc Cottle and some of the pilots such as Racetrack (who, as of the end of series 3, had been a recurring character since the beginning but had never had A Day in the Limelight) or Hotdog, who had been a supporting player from his introduction in series 1 up until the point in series 4 when it was revealed he was baby Nicky's real father.
  • The standalone features Razor and The Plan tell the other stories: in Razor the protagonist is an officer on the Pegasus, while The Plan retells events from the Cylons' viewpoint.
• Better Call Saul shows the lives of the supporting cast members of Breaking Bad and what they were doing before they met Walter White.
• Blackadder: In "Head," Lord Farrow's brother is only mentioned (and only briefly), but he spends the episode trying to get his brother (who Queenie eventually concedes is probably innocent) pardoned when he risks the displeasure of the very Ax-Crazy monarch who sentenced Lord Farrow to death.
• Blake's 7:
  • It features the System, a cybernetic civilization that built the mysterious starship Liberator; they are the villains of another story.
  • After Jenna is Put on a Bus, it's implied that she had some serious adventures of her own before suffering a Bus Crash. Her individual heroics were finally expanded on in some of the Big Finish audio productions.
• In Bones, occasionally Booth and Brennan will run into another odd pair of team of crime fighters that they will have to work with in order to solve the mystery of the week including a crossover with another (short-lived) crime show about an eccentric and talented "Finder" and his hard-line Law Enforcement Handler. There is also "The Yanks In The UK" where they team up with (in Booth's words) "The British Version of me and you!" (A top-line forensic anthropologist who consults with Scotland Yard and his Detective Partner).
• Even Buffy the Vampire Slayer touched upon this. Xander gets left behind as the characters take on a world-shaking threat. He himself has to deal with a clearly homicidal school bully. It gets much, much worse. Xander's story only briefly intersects with the 'Let's stop the world from ending' the other cast members are involved with...but if he had failed, the bully would have interfered with the aforementioned world-saving, triggering fun times.
  • Over the course of the show, Riley, Oz, and the entire cast of Angel.
  • More specifically, in the penultimate episode of the series, Angel arrives in a Big Damn Heroes moment. Unusually, this is a character who used to be one of the heroes of this story, left to be the hero of another story, comes back as both of the above, and then gets sent away explicitly to be the hero of another story if The Plan fails.
  • During season 2, Kendra had off-screen slayer adventures.
  • Holtz was a heroic vampire hunter, before Jumping Off the Slippery Slope.
• Charmed (1998): Savard from "Repo Manor" and his apprentices are escaped slaves who have spent years training hard and trying to harvest some of the Charmed Ones magical powers to free their people (including by hunting dangerous demons). Unfortunately, the only way he can succeed at being the hero of his story is to be a Villain of the Week for the Charmed ones.
• Community:
  • Meta Guy Abed sees his life as a collection of tropes. In one episode he remarks that "we did lean on that pretty hard last week. I could lie low for an episode." He doesn't have many lines in the rest of the episode but he can be seen in the background of another scene delivering a baby, which gets a call back in the next season when Troy asks if he just always has his own little adventures, which include ticking off a list of the "quintessential list of college experiences," a list of college film tropes. In another episode we learn he became the mask during a trip to the set of Cougar Town and had several imaginary adventures. Presumably, other characters like Annie's Boobs have active off-camera lives.
  • There's another study group on campus that apparently features Jack Black, Owen Wilson and Starburns.
  • Troy Barnes becomes this in Season 5 after he leaves Greendale to sail around the world with Levar Burton.
  • Later, in Season 6, Shirley Bennett also leaves and moves to LA to solve crimes along with an unnamed detective who's lost both his wife and the use of his legs.
  • Todd is apparently a war hero.
  • Lampshaded, frequently: overheard remarks from classmates include such gems as “We almost had a class that wasn't about them” and "Do you remember the time they went fishing?"
• In Dad's Army, whatever assignment the series regulars weren't handling tended to be handed off to Private Sponge.
• Davy Crockett (1954): The fourth episode guest-stars Mike Fink, the most feared riverman on the Mississippi. In an unusual example, both of them are Historical Domain Characters, though their exploits were greatly exaggerated as they became legendary figures in American folklore.
• The chipper and eccentric Special Agent Lundy from Dexter has had a long and very successful career catching serial killers. That would make a great tv show.
• Doctor Who:
  • Supporting characters often choose to stay behind on Earth, or similar, in order to have their own adventures. Sarah Jane (twice) and Captain Jack got their own spinoffs. These "adventures" are often referenced when the character returns to the main show.
  • According to the two-parter "The Sontaran Stratagem"/"The Poison Sky", the Brigadier still takes assignments to Peru in his old age. After years of frustrated fans clamoring "Come on! Nicholas Courtney's not getting any younger!" he finally appeared on TV for the first time since 1989 in series 2 of The Sarah Jane Adventures.
  • Rory spent two thousand years protecting his fiancée's tomb so that she could be brought Back from the Dead, all while reality itself fell apart around him. All we know about it is that by the end, he's one of the most well-known figures in Earth's history.
    The Doctor: So. Two thousand years. How did you do?
    Rory: Kept out of trouble.
    The Doctor: How?
    Rory: Unsuccessfully.
  • Kate Stewart (aka "The Brig's Daughter") followed in her dad's footsteps as the head of UNIT, and is pretty much openly stated to be having her own fascinating adventures when the Doctor isn't around. So much so that she got her own audio spinoff, voiced by her actress Jemma Redgrave.
• The Equalizer: The main character, Robert McCall, is a former CIA field officer who became disillusioned with his job, the moral compromises it required, and the emotional toll it took on him; in the present day, he's set up shop as an unofficial Private Detective who Helps The Helpless as a way to atone for his previous career. A recurring character from his past is "Control," his former friend and boss at the Company, who still works there and continues to live out a more classic Spy Fiction story (albeit the Stale Beer kind). Their lines of work still intersect regularly, as Control will sometimes allow McCall to "borrow" his assets for his current line of work, in exchange for which McCall has to run the occasional mission for him. And then there are the times when their jobs clash, as when a foreign dictator affiliated with Control kidnaps a journalist that McCall has been hired to rescue.
• Farscape:
  • Scorpius' loyal Dragon and confidant Braca, who has his own story about slowly rising through the ranks thanks to his loyalty and good conduct, with Scorpius serving as his mentor (and maybe-love interest).
  • Rygel mentioned one of his ancestors had served on the front lines during a war alongside his troops.
  • Jotheb, the ruler of the Consortium of Trau.
  • Post-Heel–Face Turn Crais and Talyn, during the period between them leaving Moya and her crew and meeting up with them again, were implied to be having as much adventures as the main cast did, which we only ever got to see fragments of.
• The SRU of Flashpoint had a total of five teams, but the show only focuses on Team One. Teams Three and Four make a few brief appearances each, while Two and Five are only mentioned, but it's implied their days are much the same as the series cast. Notable individuals include Rolie, who is Team One in the first episode but is promoted to Sergeant and never seen again, and Donna Sabine, who fills in for Jules after she's shot and transfers to Team Three when Jules returns. Wordy becomes this as well after he resigns from SRU. (The latter two do make occasional appearances after their departures.)
• Friends:
  • In an early episode, Monica and Rachel date a pair of ER doctors (played by George Clooney and Noah Wyle) who are implied to have their own regular sitcom style dating misadventures.
  • "The One with the Ultimate Fighting Champion" had Robin Williams and Billy Crystal as "Thomas" and "Tim" who take up space in the usual sofa the titular Friends sit on in Central Perk. They proceed to have a very eccentric discussion about their lives which leads to Joey interrupting causing Tim to realize Thomas had been sleeping with his wife. They then promptly leave and are never mentioned again.
• From the Earth to the Moon:
  • The series was produced by director Ron Howard and lead actor Tom Hanks from Apollo 13, retelling the story of NASA and the different missions going to the moon. The episode focusing on Apollo 13 was this, as instead of showing the astronauts (as the film had already done that) it instead focused on the media's coverage on the incident.
  • Also, the episode "The Original First Wives Club", about the wives of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo astronauts and what they had to put up with, handle on their own, and do as wives of astronauts, shone a spotlight on women who were, in their own way, just as heroic as their husbands.
• On Gilmore Girls, this happens to Jess. In a weird twist, he's not a minor character. He's related to Luke and Rory's Second Love, plus he's in the title cards for both seasons he makes a regular appearance, but what his life is like when he's not onscreen is a mystery. He gets very little backstory, and whenever he pops up in the story, he's always in a different place—literally and figuratively. In four seasons, all offscreen, he manages to go from being a high school drop-out to co-running a publishing house and writing his own novel, and has a massive dose of Character Development that turns him from a Jerk with a Heart of Gold to a Self-Made Man and The Reliable One. There's no explanation given for any of that. Even in the revival, the only information we get on what he's been up to in the decade since the show ended is that he's dated a bit, but he's not married, and he still works in publishing. But his impact on the plot is significant, both for Luke and Rory.
• In Haven, Audrey, Nathan, and Duke eventually meet other people who help protect the town from the Troubles like Dwight Hendrickson (the guy who cleans up disasters and fight scenes to keep the public in the dark about the Troubles) and Claire Callahan (the shrink who helps people recover and deal with the Troubles).
• Hogan's Heroes has its own page.

• The day shifts on Homicide: Life on the Street and CSI. The CSI shows CSI, CSI: Miami, CSI: NY, and CSI: Cyber, share a continuity with Cold Case, and Without a Trace, making them all "another story" to each other. CSI: NY had Quinn Sullivan, head of the New Jersey Crime Lab, in two episodes of season 4's Cabbie Killer arc. They also wrote their original female lead character, Stella Bonasera, out by having her transfer to head up the New Orleans Crime Lab between seasons 6 and 7.
• In Horatio Hornblower, "Retribution", "Colonel" Francois Lefanu, a slave leader in the Haitian revolution, parlays with the British, revealing his men killed a group of deserters from the Renown, mistaking them for Spanish, and demanding the British leave the area, asserting it is not their fight.
• On How I Met Your Mother, Stella (Sarah Chalke) guest stars as Ted's love interest for several episodes. Her character has a child from a prior marriage, which initially makes her reluctant to date Ted. In the end, she leaves Ted to reunite with her former husband. Ted's final voice-over narration observes:
  Ted: It was the perfect ending to the perfect love story, it just wasn't mine.
  • Later on we get to see (parts of) that story from the other guy's perspective after a movie was made about it, with Ted's character as a flanderized villain. Ted is not happy about this.
  • The 200th episode "How Your Mother Met Me" is centered on the Mother and what kind of life she was living before she met Ted, from 2005 up until the wedding. It also shows just how close she could have crossed paths with Ted but always just missed him, including when Ted was teaching in the wrong classroom, when she mistakenly believed she was in the wrong classroom and was about to head back to the right classroom when Ted rushed past her and again, when the Mother went out for drinks with Louis and walked by Ted who was wearing a dress without seeing him.
  • Robin, despite being a protagonist (and Ted's future wife) gets this in The Front Porch episode, where she asks the group to stay up and watch her deliver the news. They do so, but Ted and Lily get into a fight just as the show starts, and Robin's actions during it (which include delivering a baby and saving two lives) are not noticed by them at all.
• JAG: Several.
  • Commander Turner was the most visible of several JAG officers who served this purpose. While the show does place an unusual amount of emphasis on the half-dozen or so heroes, sometimes verging on The Main Characters Do Everything, at least in principle there was a much larger cast of JAG officers carrying out their own investigations who were simply never shown.
  • Commander (eventually Admiral) Thomas Boone, who when we meet him is the commander of an aircraft carrier wing. If main character Harmon Rabb's career is described as "a cross between Top Gun and A Few Good Men," Boone's is simply Top Gun. He's effectively what Harm could have been, if an accident hadn't ended his career as an aviator.
  • Retired Navy veterans Artemus Sullivan, Wendell Freeman, and Harold Greene, from the episode Yesterday's Heroes. Picture a geriatric but still very effective version of the A-Team, with a particular grudge against drug kingpins. Their target in the episode is a wealthy Venezuelan drug dealer with diplomatic immunity who killed Sullivan's nephew; since the episode ends with him expelled from the United States and his drug network in shambles, Harm ends the episode reasonably satisfied that "they'll behave themselves" from now on. Cut to the three of them eagerly planning their next operation...
• On Jane the Virgin, this is done with Jane's First Love Adam, who has his own Narrator (who is a woman, as opposed to Jane's male narrator) and all.
• Jericho (2006):
  • Chavez is a member of Hawkins' team of spies and is first mentioned about halfway through season one, but spends most of the series offscreen having adventures of his own. He only shows up in person for a few episodes of season 2.
  • Fire Chief Carroll is never seen after the pilot, with Gail briefly mentioning that he and his men left town to try to provide aid to the bomb victims in Denver.
• Justified':
  • The fifth season gives us DEA Agent Alex Miller, essentially an older, more world weary version of protagonist, Raylan Givens. It's very easy to imagine that Miller's past is as exciting as Raylan's present, with recurring villain Hot-Rod Dunham as his Boyd Crowder.
  • The series also has Raylan's fellow US Marshals, Rachel Brooks and Tim Gutterson. If some of the hints they let drop are indicative, Tim, and Rachel are dealing with cases that are every bit as interesting as the ones that end up on Raylan's desk.
• The majority of protagonists in Kamen Rider usually continue having the adventures offscreen after their story ends. This is most explicit with the Showa Era Riders, who were often said to be busy fighting evil syndicates worldwide after saving Japan (and presumably still do so), but still present with many of the others. Kamen Rider Double is still acting as the protector of their city, Eiji is off using his powers to help people (and according to a book singlehandedly ended a war his politician father helped start using his powers) and on a quest to resurrect his friend Ankh by fixing his broken Core Medal, and Kouta is busy literally being God for a planet on the other side of the universe for example. Sento Kiryu/Kamen Rider Build also qualifies, as his story is the first one that takes place outside of the Shared Universe concept established by Decade (at least until he engages in multiversal shenanigans in the finale).
  • The original series had Takeshi Hongo, the first Kamen Rider, leave Japan to fight Shocker in Europe with his friend Ruriko, while Hayato Ichimonji (Kamen Rider #2) took his place in Japan^note An example of Real Life Writes the Plot, as Hongo actor Hiroshi Fujioka was recovering from a stunt gone wrong. While what became of Ruriko remains unknown, Hongo temporarily returned to Japan to assist Ichimonji, leaving behind new assistants Emi and Mika. Later, Hongo returned to Japan permanently, whilst Ichimonji continued the fight with Shocker in South America, dropping in from time to time before the two Riders defeated Gel-Shocker's Leader in the finale.
  • Kamen Rider V3 has Riders #1 and #2, safe in the knowledge that the eponymous third Rider, Shiro Kazami, will fight the Shocker successor Destron in Japan, perform a Heroic Sacrifice only to reveal later on that they had survived, continuing to fight Destron overseas. The two Riders would temporarily return on a handful of occassions, including the movie Kamen Rider V3 vs. Destron Mutants where they are said to be taking a break from combating Destron in Australia. Ultimately, V3 finishes Destron alone after meeting enemy turned ally Joji Yuki (Riderman), who also seemingly sacrificed himself to save Japan.
  • Kamen Rider X eventually reintroduces Shiro Kazami, who is introduced by Tobei Tachibana to Keisuke Jin (X-Rider), followed by Ichimonji. The Non-Serial Movie Five Riders vs. King Dark has all four Riders return from different places across the world to assist X-Rider: #1 has been in New York, #2 in Paris, V3 in Moscow, while the presumed dead Riderman returns from that magical place known as Tahiti. Yes, seriously.
  • Kamen Rider Amazon fought his enemies alone in Japan before returning to his home in South America. Then came Kamen Rider Stronger, who met all six of his predecessors as they returned to Japan to finish off the Delza Army, some following overseas Delza generals: #1 from the United States, #2 from India, V3 from Egypt, Riderman from Greece, X-Rider from Spain, and Amazon from South America.
• Leverage: The series finale has the heroes getting their hands on "the Black Book," a record of the dirty dealings all the Corrupt Corporate Executives and Morally Bankrupt Bankers whose lifetimes of fraud and corruption caused the 2008 financial crisis. They then release it on the dark web, painting a giant target on the backs of all these characters and effectively ensuring that any other hacker, grifter, or thief in the world who wants to follow in their footsteps knows exactly where to find their ill-gotten money. The series reboot, Leverage: Redemption, shows that they've taken full advantage of this phenomenon to expand their business model: there's no longer one crew of Leverage, Inc. thieves targeting the rich and powerful or helping their victims, but dozens of such teams across the entire world. (The fact that one of the original main characters, Hardison, now rarely appears is explained partly as him having transitioned to being more of a manager/coordinator helping all of these other teams as well as the original one).
• In the first Lexx movie Thodin the Arch-Heretic was almost the hero of the story, but then he and his compatriots all got killed and we ended up with three losers and an undead assassin.
• Inspector Zenigata of the Lupin III series stars in his own live-action dramas where he gets ensnared into several dangerous cases that were made to look like Lupin was the culprit. Zenigata, being the premier Lupin expert, sets out to prove his nemesis was being framed and it shows that when he's not on Lupin's trail, Zenigata really is the most accomplished detective on the force.
• MacGyver (1985):
  • Similar to General Stockwell above, Peter Thornton is mostly a manager at the time of the series, but it's made clear that he's had a very distinguished career first as an Army officer and later as a secret agent. In fact, the Big Bad of the series, Murdoc, was originally his archnemesis, only transferring this enmity to MacGyver when he broke up one of their confrontations and prevented Murdoc from killing Pete.
  • The Coltons, a Los Angeles based family of bounty hunters. They're originally introduced as antagonists in Season 4, where one of them was hired by a pair of crooks to track down the mother of one of Mac's friends. By the end of the episode, he's been talked into switching sides, and he or his relatives reappear from time to time for the rest of the series, usually when they and MacGyver are working the same case from opposite ends. They were originally supposed to get their own spin-off, but it was never picked up, and all that's left of it is a Poorly Disguised Pilot in Season 7.
• Miami Vice: The number of colorful characters who appear for one episode but whose stories could easily have sustained their own TV show or at least a movie, is not small. Jack Gretsky, Castillo's old friend from the CIA who fell in love with a KGB agent and started a family with her, now leaving them with both agencies gunning for them. Hank Weldon, the former star cop who quit the Miami PD in disgust and went on a personal crusade against the drug kingpin he almost brought down but who got Off on a Technicality. Ira Stone, the Intrepid Reporter who's spent his career risking (and eventually losing) his life to expose the various dirty secrets of the military-industrial complex. And so forth.
• In NCIS, the recurring characters Tobias Fornell (FBI) and Abigail Borin (CGIS) are portrayed as being the counterparts of Gibbs in their respective agencies.
• NUMB3RS:
  • Though he's usually a part of the main story, Larry Fleindhart takes a trip into space in Season 3 and spends several months living in the desert in Season 6. He never gives more than very fleeting details about those experiences, but they would no doubt be interesting stories in their own right.
  • Megan Reeves also goes on special assignment for the latter half of season three (a case of Real Life Writes the Plot, as actress Diane Farr was pregnant). Becomes a bit of a subversion in that she seems to have come away from that feeling that she was more of a villain than a hero during that time.
• Odd Squad has any agents besides the main characters. Occasionally we get glimpses of their adventures or A Day in the Limelight.
• On Once Upon a Time most characters are quite literally heroes from another story as we often encounter various fairytale and mythical figures from widely known tales, even DISNEY films. The show usually has entire flashback episodes showing the story of these characters even if they are not main characters within the show itself or will even appear in more than one episode.
• Person of Interest:
  • One episode was told from the point of view of Sameen Shaw, a counter-terrorist agent tasked with chasing the numbers the government does consider Relevant. She later became a main character.
  • Another episode had brief flashes of Det. Fusco protecting a supermodel from Albanian gangsters. His story is unrelated to that of the main characters and we only see glimpses of him doing some extremely heroic things. It demonstrated that while Fusco might be the Butt-Monkey of Team Machine, on his own he is actually a highly competent police officer.
  • Zoe Morgan is the Number in one episode, and is occasionally called in to help Team Machine, but is also shown doing her own job. One episode has John Reese, working undercover as a bellhop, step into a hotel elevator which just happens to be carrying Zoe. Both give each other an amused look and don't pry as to what the other is doing there.
  • Hersh and Control are borderline examples due to their immorality and frequent bouts of You Have Outlived Your Usefulness, but are still trying their best to protect America as a nation.
  • Root evolved into this after becoming an "analog interface" for the Machine, running ops around the world in order to prevent rival Machines being activated.
  • Fifth season episode "Synecdoche" features an eccentric tech genius millionaire, a former soldier and a career criminal saving... Reese, Shaw and Fusco. In the end, Logan Pierce mentions that Reese's number wasn't the first to turn up and they were working with the Machine for some time. It's implied there are similar Team Machines working cases in other cities.
• Power Rangers:
  • The Aquatar Rangers were this whenever they showed up in the Zordon Era. From their first appearance in Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers, it was made clear that they were already experienced in fighting evil-doers.
  • Both the first and second Sixth Rangers of Power Rangers Zeo qualify. Trey of Triforia was the solo Ranger of his planet and his temporary successor Jason was the original MMPR Red Ranger before leaving for a peace conference in Switzerland. There is also the alien hero Auric the Conqueror.
  • Power Rangers Turbo: The Blue Centurian and the Phantom Ranger both appeared to have off-screen adventures before and after being introduced.
  • Power Rangers in Space: Andros and Zhane, the season's Red and Silver Rangers respectively, were experienced Rangers before they were joined by the Rangers from the previous season. One of their missions was what resulted in Zhane being put in a Convenient Coma. Adam from MMPR - Zeo also guest starred in one episode.
  • Power Rangers Lost Galaxy: One of the monsters of the weeks was a Fallen Hero named Loyax who once fought for the forces of good but became disillusioned when it seemed evil was the better side. In the end,Loyax was returned to the side of the heroes but was killed by Deviot.
  • Power Rangers Wild Force: In addition to the team up with the Rangers of the previous season, the Red Ranger of Wild Force also teamed up with the Red Rangers from the previous seasons in a Milestone Celebration episode to wipe out the remnants of the Machine Empire, the villains from Zeo.
  • Dr Thomas Oliver, or "Tommy" as he is known to his friends and fans in Power Rangers: Dino Thunder. His history as a Ranger was covered in the franchise's 500th episode along with a history of every previous Power Rangers team up to that point.
  • Any Ranger team that returns for a team-up with the current one will qualify.
• The Purge: Good Samaritan triage van drivers Lars and Anna, the Matron Saints Vigilante Militia, the resistance fighters targeting Villain of Another Story Albert Stanton, and the Intrepid Reporters documenting how evil the Purgee is are all pretty busy throughout the night. However, but only about a few minutes of each group's efforts are shown onscreen.
• Red Dwarf had Ace Rimmer, a parallel universe duplicate of Rimmer whose life was identical to that of "our" Rimmer until a single incident played out differently and compelled Ace to get his shit together and become the hero of countless off screen adventures.
• Quite literally true on Schooled. Barry is one of the main characters, and the person whose romance with Lainey we're supposed to be rooting for, on The Goldbergs. On the spin-off he guest stars as the rival keeping Lainey from being available for series regular C.B.
• Sekai Ninja Sen Jiraiya has heroic World Ninjas such as Baron Owl and Oruha, whose paths occasionally cross with Toha's but for the most part spend the series having their own (offscreen) adventures.
• After the Smallville season 6 episode "Justice", Oliver Queen's Justice League was frequently made mention of (usually by Chloe) as they travelled the world dismantling Lex Luthor's secret metahuman labs. Every so often a Leaguer (or combinations thereof) would return for a guest appearance, and during the season 9 finale multiple heroes (including those from the Justice Society) provided cameos via the Watchtower's monitors to establish Zod's threat as a global one.
• Stargate SG-1:
  • This trope used to be named after Colonel Makepeace, the leader of SG-3. Makepeace was even briefly put in charge of SG-1 after O'Neill's 10-Minute Retirement as the highest-ranking officer in SG teams — right before he was exposed as The Mole. The new leader of SG-3, Colonel Reynolds, picked up the trope after that, and held it longer than Makepeace ever did. Colonel Makepeace gets a moment when he leads an assault team composed of half a dozen SG teams to rescue SG-1 from Hathor. Of course he fails, the rescuers being rescued in turn by Bra'tac, Teal'c, and General Hammond (in one of his rare off-world trips).
  • You could say this is true for all of the other SG teams who are off on their own assignments, which sometimes include assisting SG-1. In the two-part episode "Heroes", SG-13 is shown off on a mission of their own.
  • Outside of Stargate Command, former buddies of Jack O'Neill from his career in Air Force Special Ops show up from time to time. The most memorable of them is probably Burke, now a CIA agent stationed in Central America. To his credit, despite his total lack of knowledge about the Stargate or the existence of alien life, he isn't even remotely fazed when faced with what is effectively a zombie^note a dead body reanimated by an alien device, simply blowing it away with a grenade launcher before commenting to O'Neill that he's "into some crazy crap."
  • Speaking of Bra'tac, as a leader in the Jaffa Rebellion, he can also qualify as this, as can other rebel leaders such as Ishta. In ten thousand years of being the dominant power in the Milky Way, the Goa'uld have spawned quite a few rebel movements against their authority, most of whom can be considered this trope.
  • Agent Malcolm Barrett, NID. His job could be described as an unlikely cross between The X-Files and NCIS. Originally assigned straight from the White House to clean out his agency from the Rogue Agents infesting it, he now leads the NID's efforts to track down the remnants of that conspiracy, currently reorganized into a nefarious world-spanning organization with connections to the highest levels of political and corporate power on the planet.
  • In a unique example for a military-centric show (let alone in the early 2000s), Emmet Bregman is effectively this, not only to Stargate Command but to the entire U.S. military. A journalist and former war correspondent who's assigned to do a (for now, classified) documentary on the SGC's activities, he spends most of the first episode being treated with amused contempt at best and hostility at worst by the main characters and all of their co-workers, until having his camera ordered turned off one too many times causes him to snap and go on a tirade about exactly why people like him exist. Unusually, the heroes recognize that he's got a point, and he leaves the base with an apology from Hammond for having misjudged him.
    Bregman: Why is that camera off? You don't know what you're doing here. Maybe I know what I'm doing here. These people are risking their lives for us! I want to see what they're going through, even if they don't want us to! And I want other people to see it! What do you think they're doing out there? Protecting and defending secrecy?!? That's the world of Mao, the world of Stalin, the world of - of secret police, secret trials, secret - secret deaths! You force the press into the cold, and all you will get is lies and innuendo! And nothing, nothing is worse for a free society than a press that is - that is in service to the - to the military and the politicians, nothing! You turn that camera off when I tell you to turn it off! You think I give a damn what you think about me? You serve the people? So do I!
• Stargate Atlantis:
  • The spinoff also features such a character, Major Lorne. Sheppard, Rodney, Teyla, and Ford (later Ronon) are the "main" Atlantis team that we follow most of the time. Meanwhile, Lorne and his crew are busy with their own missions on other planets that we rarely get to see, only showing up occasionally when he is needed as support for the main characters.
  • The cast of SG-1 is actually sometimes this for SGA. It's understood that they're still doing big important things that we just don't see. (Especially while their show was actually still going on. There'd often be references to the SG-1 plot — nothing too detailed, but... y'know, just in case you forgot that the Ori and Baal are bad.)
• Stargate Universe:
  • Also showed up in this show more than once; in the first episode, we see a number of starships (one of which is being captained by Samantha Carter of SG-1), who then slide out of focus as the main plot kicks into gear. They're alluded to a few times afterwards, and a few episodes in the second season involve characters from the previous two series working to get SGU's cast home.
  • The alternate crew created by a time travel incident, thought to have been killed, actually landed on a planet a thousand years in the past. They were just as much "them" as the crew that remained on the ship (of whom they were unaware), and although they didn't know they'd traveled back in time, Eli theorized it was possible that they had. The "real" crew go to see their alternate lives play out in "episodes" captured by the Kinos. Had the show gone onto a third season, it's likely that their descendants would have weaved in and out of the main story.
• Star Trek:
  • TOS tended to suggest that the other Constitution-class starships generally did have their own 'only ship in the sector' and 'stumbled upon a dangerous mystery while exploring' incidents off-screen whenever other Constitution-class starships showed up. No specific individual served the Hero of Another Story role well, though.
  • Star Trek: The Next Generation:
    • In "Parallels", Worf shifts between various quantum realities, the last of which involves Captain Riker and the crew of the Enterprise in a universe where Picard died during the events of "The Best Of Both Worlds". Their adventures after Wolf 359 could make for an interesting series.
    • Spock became the hero of another story on TNG when he dedicated his life to leading an underground dissident movement on Romulus to reunite the Vulcan and Romulan people.
  • Star Trek: Deep Space Nine:
    • Quark and Rom's mother, Ishka. She is seen challenging the degrading treatment of females on Ferenginar, is a genius businesswoman, secretly becomes the consort of the Grand Nagus and effectively takes over running the entire Ferengi Alliance, but is only seen when she becomes a problem for Quark.
    • Subverted with a former classmate of Bashir. He assumes she has interesting stories to tell about her deep space assignment, and she says it ended up being a charting expedition. It seems a starship having exciting adventures on a regular basis, like the Enterprise, is the exception. Space is huge and mostly empty.
  • The Enterprise that became a generation ship in Star Trek: Enterprise had plenty of adventures after the crew went back in time. No wonder the Xindi accused the main timeline's Enterprise of having sister ships (before any were completed).
• Supernatural did this in its first season, alluding to other hunters associated with the Winchesters, most notably Pastor Jim and Caleb, each mentioned in multiple episodes before a demon who was hunting down the boy's contacts killed them. This same storyline introduced Bobby, who they were able to warn in time, and who has become the longest-living recurring character of the show.
  • Early season six has an episode focusing on Bobby, with the brothers only appearing briefly.
  • Also since the Apocalypse arc came to an end, Castiel. A focus on HIS story would be frankly too effects-heavy for the show.
  • Spoofed with Garth, a hunter who teams up with Team Free Will in season 7; as well as having a name drop in season 6.
    Bobby: "Yeah, Garth, what do you got? ... Never heard of a vamp doin' that. It doesn't sound like our kind of thing. Better drop a dime to the FBI."
    Bobby hangs up the phone. Another phone labeled FBI Tom Willis rings.
    Bobby: "Willis, FBI. ... No, Garth, not me the FBI. The real FBI! How are you still alive?"
  • Season 8 reveals that during the Time Skip between seasons 7 and 8, Garth has been rebuilding the hunter network and has assumed the mentor/Mission Control role that Bobby used to have.
• Titans: The Justice League, being the older, more experienced superhero group compared to the titular Titans and including such big-name figures as Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman. The whole reason why Dick forms the Titans in the first place is because he wants to be remembered as someone other than Batman's sidekick.
• In The Walking Dead's first season the protagonists meet a group of what at first they think are gangbangers who turn out to be protecting a bunch of senior citizens too fragile to be moved. We never find out what happens to them (a discarded plotline from the season two premiere reveals they were murdered, implied to be by The Governor). Likewise Morgan and his son until two seasons later.
• The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles: The series, befitting its status as half-action, half-edutainment, tends to cross this trope with Historical Domain Character. Indy is regularly crossing paths with historical figures, many of whom had their own colorful and adventurous lives (to cite only a few of the more famous ones, Theodore Roosevelt, Pancho Villa, Ernest Hemingway, T. E. Lawrence...) This gets a callback in Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull, where Mutt has never heard about Indy's own exploits, but is blown away to learn that he once crossed paths with Pancho Villa.