Times where Karma Houdini Warranties ran out in Live-Action TV series.
- 13 Reasons Why:
- Bryce Walker. After years of being a Karma Houdini, karma was really hard with him in season three. He loses his friends, nobody wants him close, is bullied in his new school because everybody there knows what he's done, is brutally beaten by Zach, and is finally murdered by Alex. Truth in Television at its finest: many rapists or sex offenders who escape justice in the courts generally suffer the consequences from society, exposing themselves to being completely hated, losing their friends, and/or being killed by some vigilante.
- Monty as well, who was framed for Bryce's murder and then beaten to death by other inmates in jail while awaiting trial.
- Throughout Arrow, Amanda Waller gets away with some pretty dubious things as the head of A.R.G.U.S, despite being The Sociopath, prone to Stupid Evil behavior, and being an In-Universe Hate Sink absolutely nobody likes, even those ostensibly under her command... until roughly halfway through season 4 when she gets taken hostage. After it's confirmed that the sociopathic Waller will let her entire staff be killed without even blinking, the leader of the terrorists immediately shoots her in the head in disgust and starts bargaining with the next best candidate instead.
- Prohibition Agent Nelson van Alden of Boardwalk Empire does some pretty heinous things in his pursuit of Nucky Thompson, eventually being caught out for a past murder and going on the run. Once he flees Atlantic City and starts a new life in Chicago, living under an assumed name with his baby and the nanny he later married, everyone pretty much gives up hunting him and he settles into an honest civilian life, the hardships and humiliations of which he sees as his penance. What drags him back into the dark is that his wife, who he's given vague warnings about his shady past, murders an innocent visitor who she mistakes for one of the "bad men", and covering up the crime puts him in debt to the Chicago mob.
- And seven years later when a member of said mob turns out to be an undercover government agent who figures out who he really is and arrests him, he's told he'll have to betray Al Capone in order to avoid serious jail time. Good luck with that one, Nelson
- Nucky Thompson himself is a straight example. Just when it seems like every rival during each season is about to get the best of him, he finds a way to outsmart them and come out on top. Until the final season where he is completely outsmarted by Lucky Luciano, which Thompson himself admits, and shortly afterwards, is gunned down by the teenage son of Jimmy Darmody out of revenge for his dad's murder at the hands of Thompson.
- Black Lightning (2018): Tobias Whale is the main villain for much of the series and has a history of avoiding justice for a number of heinous crimes, including the murder of the titular protagonist's father and crippling Khalil twice. This makes the moments where karma hits him hard all the sweeter.
- The season 2 finale sees Whale soundly defeated in a fight against Black Lightning and Lightning, and imprisoned in an off the books prison called The Pit. The season 3 premiere also reveals that the serum that slows his aging is wearing off and he is dying. Subverted when he regains his powers and takes back his criminal empire.
- In season 4, Whale wastes no time using his resources to further torment the Pierces, including framing Jefferson for embezzlement. Whale finally dies in battle against Jeff in the series finale and it is suggested that all of his crimes will finally be made public by Looker's testimony.
- Breaking Bad has this trope as one of its principal themes. As Vince Gilligan himself stated, he believes that at some point everyone will have to face the terrible consequences of their evil deeds, no matter how long it takes. This is why at the end of the series several of the drug dealers are either dead (including Walter White himself, who would have died anyways due to cancer) or, if left alive, either had nothing to look forward to (such as Saul) or bore the stigma of guilt (such as Jesse).
- The prequel series Better Call Saul looks like it's carrying this idea over too. For the first half of the first season, it seemed like the Kettlemans would invert this trope, but thinking about it, they were never gonna get away with it to begin with. They just wanted the dignity of not caving in and confessing their involvement. Plus, they thought that no matter what happened, as long as they kept the money, they'd win. Ultimately, thanks to Mike, that plan soon became moot.
- The series finale reveals this became of Saul Goodman himself, who after evading justice for a long time, is busted by the mother of his robber underling, and is captured and sentenced for a really long time.
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer: D'Hoffryn is last seen in Season 7 victorious, being allowed to kill Anya's friend Halfrek to punish her before disappearing, and continuing this streak throughout the Season 9 comics. His streak finally comes to an end at the end of the Season 10 comics, where he's been elevated to Big Bad; after killing the members of the Magic Council to steal their powers and killing the Anya replica for defying him, he's abandoned by his fellow Vengeance demons for betraying one of his own, stripped of his stolen powers, and rendered helpless before Buffy, who slices his head off.
- Bunk'd: Hazel Swearington, who is The Dragon to Gladys, spends the whole first two seasons tormenting and insulting the Rosses in every way; she finally gets a proper comeuppance in the Season 2 finale where a scented candle in her possession ends up burning down the cabins, and Emma and Ravi are promoted to counselors while Hazel gets demoted to CIT.
- Burden of Truth: Just after David gets Off on a Technicality for committing statutory rape with two underage girls (at least) he's murdered (for something else).
- "Chucky'': The second to last episode of Season 3 sees Tiffany be executed for her crimes against humanity. With the Good Guy dolls all gone forever, this means that Tiffany has been permanently killed.
- Criminal Minds often has this due to the premise being that the BAU are brought in to catch UnSubs who the police can't, but some examples in particular stand out:
- After his escape in "No Way Out", Frank returns in "No Way Out 2", in which he is cornered by the BAU and chooses to invoke Better to Die than Be Killed.
- "One Hundred" sees Hotch finally get the drop on The Reaper and kill him after he attempts to pull an I Surrender, Suckers.
- At the end of Season Six, Ian Doyle outwits the BAU and gets away with everything, up to and including seemingly killing Prentiss and forcing her into hiding. The Season Seven premiere, "It Takes A Village", revolves around a Senate inquiry into the events surrounding his killing.
- "Wheels Up" sees Mr. Scratch finally defeated after four seasons, as he ends up on the receiving end of a Batman Gambit that eventually nets him a Disney Villain Death.
- The final episode of the original run has the BAU finally invalidate Everett Lynch's warranty as he is killed trying to flee in a stolen FBI jet.
- Denshi Sentai Denziman had the villain, Queen Hedrian, ultimately escape the team after the complete destruction of the Vader Clan even after her minion Banriki tried to usurp her. Then in the next season, Taiyou Sentai Sun Vulcan, she tries betrayal at Black Magma herself, and although she does kill Hell Saturn, he comes back as a ghost and kills her for real.
- The Devil Judge: Young-choon scammed thousands of people out of their money and got away with it for years. Then Ga-on and Yo-han find him and take his money while revealing his true character to his family.
- Dinosaurs: For the entire run Earl's Bad Boss Richfield got away with all of the corrupt schemes he had done. Even at the very end, he's never seen getting his comeuppance, but it's certainly implied he soon will receive his Offscreen Karma. After all, even the richest man in the world can't survive the Ice Age (that he indirectly caused, no less) for very long.
- Drake & Josh: Megan regularly torments the titular duo and is never actually punished outright. However, she does get some degree of karmic retribution when Drake and Josh start working at the movie theater. She blackmails Drake into letting her and her friends see a PG-13 horror film called Monsters from the Drain and winds up traumatized and scared of drains. It's not much, but it does leave her brothers with some satisfaction.
- ER's Kerry Weaver pulled numerous unethical stunts in order to advance her career, never incurring punishment for any of them, eventually becoming Chief of Staff after the worst one of all—hiding an alderman's STD diagnosis instead of reporting it to the department of health as she's legally obligated to do and treating his similarly infected boyfriend off the record, essentially killing the man when he suffers a severe allergic reaction to the antibiotics she gives him. She's finally demoted and eventually fired when she finally has the guts and decency to admit to her fault in hiring a mentally unstable physician and ignoring repeated complaints about the man's erratic and violent behavior.
- This is a major theme in Fargo, as characters who engage in crimes ranging from murder to petty blackmail often end up dead by the series' end. Seasons one and two dish out some pretty standard black-and-white examples, but season three shows that even the morally ambiguous are not exempt when they dabble in crime.
- From season one: Lester Nygaard and Lorne Malvo spend the whole season diverting the authorities. A year after the case on their crimes closes, they run into each other again in Vegas and kick off a series of events that eventually leads to both of their downfalls.
- From season two: Basically every main character that's not in the police force is committing some sort of crime, including the Blumquists, Kansas City Mafia, and Gerhardt family. All of the Gerhardts are dead by the end of the season, Ed Blumquist is also dead, and Peggy is arrested. Mike Milligan survives and undergoes a promotion under Kansas City, but it's far from what he'd had in mind, and the entire organization undergoes Laser-Guided Karma offscreen before the events of season one. Hanzee Dent also double subverts this trope when he adopts a new name and cleans himself from any involvement in the Sioux Falls massacre, only for his new identity to be revealed as one of a mobster who was taken out by Lorne Malvo in the first season.
- From season three: Nikki Swango escapes authorities and goes on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge against Narwhal. She succeeds in bringing them down with the help of Mr. Wrench but dies at the hands of a state trooper when she tries making a move against Emmit. Emmit also manages to avoid paying for his crimes for a majority of the season. After rebuilding his life over the course of five years, he's taken out by Mr. Wrench.
- The Flash (2014):
- After spending all of Season 2 running circles around Team Flash and getting away with it, Zoom gets taken by the Time Wraths and forcibly turned into an enforcer of the Speed Force in the season finale.
- Savitar, after spending the second half of Season 3 curb-stomping Barry and other speedsters and nearly killed Iris to ensure that his existence remained intact, meets his downfall the moment he unknowingly kills H.R. Wells instead of her. His plan soon unravels as his existence starts to fall apart before finally he is fatally shot in the back by the very woman he planned to kill.
- Zigzagged a lot by Barry's arch-nemesis Eobard Thawne, who killed his mother and has escaped being erased from the timeline not once but twice. Then in Season 5, it seems that someone has finally caught him in the future, and he's shown in an Iron Heights cell watching the clock that's ticking away the hour left until his execution. Then it turns out that he's been running a massive Batman Gambit all season via his manipulation of Nora, which he sees him escape and go free at the end of the season. But then in Season 8, he causes the events of "Armageddon" by screwing with time and creating a Bad Future where he's The Flash and Barry is the Reverse Flash, giving him everything he wanted and screwing Barry over so badly. Barry is able to undo this timeline, which causes Thawne to start fading from existence. Given everything he'd done, Team Flash is content to let it happen, but Joe chews them out and convinces them to save his life. They do so by cutting him off from the Negative Speed Force, saving him, but depowering him, which he considers a Fate Worse than Death. Then it's revealed Barry doing so angered the Negative Forces and killed the Negative Speed Force's Avatar, so they manipulated events to sacrifice Iris so that Thawne could return in the body of his temporally-resurrected duplicate from Legends of Tomorrow, making him a being capable of destroying the entire universe as he sees fit. Barry refuses to fight him, causing Thawne to build up too much power and destroy himself.
- Frasier: In the episode "Bad Dog", Bulldog is lauded as a hero for stopping an armed robber at the local coffee shop. However, he actually saved the day by using a pregnant Roz as a shield. Only Frasier saw what he did, however. Bulldog shows an absolute Lack of Empathy, saying he has no sense of guilt at all. Frasier attempts to guilt him by bringing his mother, former counselor, and other people to his medal ceremony, but none of it works. Rather than have Frasier whine about the injustice afterward, Martin yells at Bulldog, "Hey, Bulldog, there's a guy right there with a gun!" Bulldog immediately pushes his own mother in the direction of the phantom gunman, exposing him as a coward and not a hero, with his mother, Roz, and others verbally lambasting him.Frasier: (almost laughing) Thanks, Dad.
Martin: (grinning) Hey, I'm no hero, I just wanted you to shut up. - Game of Thrones:
- This happens to Jaime Lannister early on in Season 3. After two full seasons of getting away with stuff like trying to kill a child who discovered him committing incest with his twin sister and actually killing his own cousin for momentary advantage, he got off pretty lightly as a relatively well-treated prisoner of war who was to be returned home as part of a hostage exchange. In fact, one of the first genuinely kind and (almost) selfless things he's ever shown doing is intervening to prevent Brienne from being raped when it becomes apparent she's too outnumbered by attackers to defend herself for long. And it works... but their captors take umbrage at Jaime's superior attitude in doing so, and cut off his sword hand in what basically amounts to an act of senseless spite.
- Janos Slynt, the penultimate Smug Snake of the series, gets merely banished to the Wall in Season 2 after betraying Ned Stark and carrying out the murder of deceased King Robert's bastard children, even going so far as to tear a baby from his mother's arms and murder it right in front of her. Fast forward a few seasons and he makes a comeback at the Wall, becoming an Obstructive Bureaucrat enemy to Jon Snow. His warranty expires after Jon's promotion to Lord Commander in Season 5 when he makes the fatal mistake of assuming he can get away with defying the new Lord Commander's authority without reprisal. He gets a death sentence for his insubordination, causing him to degenerate in his last moments to a pathetic blubbering mess that Jon kills as much out of disgust as out of duty.
- Roose Bolton manages to get away with the Red Wedding in Season 3 and the conquest of Moat Cailin in Season 4. He also manages to repel the army of Stannis Baratheon in Season 5 without suffering any particular losses. He finally meets his end thanks to his only decent act shown onscreen: wanting to protect Walda and their newborn son.
- Ramsey Snow/Bolton always gets away with the horrible things that he did since Season 3 such as hunting down and flaying his victims, torturing and castrating Theon, and raping Sansa during their wedding night. Despite that his dad, Roose Bolton, called him out on his needless violence which would affect their relations to the rest of the Northern houses, Ramsey had none of it and killed his own father, taking control of their house. Then, he continues being a murdering asshole much to the viewers’ annoyance. Unfortunately for Ramsey, his time is up in the penultimate episode of Season 6, when his forces are overrun by the combined forces of Stark loyalists, the Wildings and Knights of the Vale, and Jon Snow cornered him at Winterfell and beat him up into a bloody pulp. To add the cherry on top, Sansa finally got back at him for his horrible actions by having him fed to his own dogs.
- Petyr Baelish, AKA "Littlefinger", is a morally bankrupt Smug Snake whose motto is "Chaos is a ladder". His first act of treachery happened before the show even began; the murder of Jon Arryn, Hand of the King. He then betrays the next Hand, Ned Stark, to the Lannisters usurping the throne. He then has a hand in the assassination of King Joffrey, and then personally murders Jon Arryn's widow Lysa, whom he was plotting and consorting with. Then he sells his own Bastard Understudy, Sansa Stark, to a previously mentioned Karma Houdini family (whose warranty also ran out): the Boltons. Combined with Sansa finally (and covertly) coming on to the fact that he's the real enemy and Bran Stark (at that point the Three-Eyed Raven who sees all) seeing through all his lies with his farsight powers, Littlefinger dies like the Dirty Coward he is when called out in court and is quickly murdered by Arya as punishment for his treachery.
- Ellaria Sand and the Sand Snakes get away with poisoning Myrcella Baratheon in the Season 5 finale despite that they had been told several times that she's just an innocent girl who has nothing to do with Oberyn's death. Then in the Season 6 premiere, they proceed to murder Oberyn's brother and nephew and take over Dorne before disappearing in the story until the Season 6 finale where they form an alliance with Olenna Tyrell and Daenerys Targaryen. Their warranty expires in Season 7 when Euron Greyjoy kills two of the Sand Snakes and captures Ellaria and Tyene Sand so they can be delivered to the vengeful Cersei Lannister, who wants them to pay for Myrcella's death. Cersei gives them a crueler punishment which is to force Ellaria to watch her own daughter die of the same poison that killed Myrcella while in chains and to spend the rest of her life seeing her daughter's corpse rot.
- Ser Gregor "The Mountain" Clegane is the strongest knight of the Seven Kingdoms who committed a lot of atrocities during the Sack of King's Landing such as raping and killing Elia Martell and her children and is responsible for burning half of Sandor's face. He also brutally kills Elia's younger brother, Oberyn, while smugly admitting his past crimes. Though Oberyn's poison renders him comatose, he comes back as a Humanoid Abomination who becomes Cersei's loyal and powerful bodyguard. He eventually meets his end in the last season where his younger brother, Sandor, confronts him for one last fight, culminating in a Taking You with Me dive from the collapsing Red Keep tower to the burning ground of King's Landing.
- Cersei Lannister has caused a lot of torment since the beginning of the show, particularly with her treatment of Sansa and Tyrion. She even gets both Margaery and Loras Tyrell locked up by the Faith Militant; though she too gets arrested by the Faith Militant and is forced to do the walk of shame. However, she manages to get away with it and is crowned Queen of the Seven Kingdoms after burning the Sept of Baelor, which killed the Tyrells and the Faith Militant. In Season 7, she dismantles Daenerys's Dornish and Reach allies and refuses to aid her and Jon Snow in their fight against the White Walkers. Despite sitting out in the first half of the final season, her warranty expires after she has Euron Greyjoy kill one of Daenerys's dragons and has Missandei executed in front of Daenerys. This culminates in Daenerys unleashing her fury by destroying the Golden Company and Lannister army, slaughtering the civilians, and burning down much of King's Landing and the Red Keep. Eventually, Cersei breaks down after Daenerys wins, forcing her to flee with Jaime, and they both meet their end when the escape tunnel collapses above them, killing them both.
- Here's an example of a Warranty running out due to real-life examples: At the start of Season 6 of House of Cards (US), Frank Underwood, the corrupt President, dies offscreen from a heart attack. This was caused by his actor Kevin Spacey being exposed of committing sexual misconduct, requiring that Underwood be removed from the show.
- Law & Order: Special Victims Unit: In "Design", April Troost is guilty of multiple counts of rape, frames one of her victims to make it look like ''he's'' the rapist, fakes her own death (and tried to frame the same victim for that), and finally kidnaps a baby. She and her mother manage to successfully Out Gambit everyone and force the detectives and DA's office to let them walk. They then both get their comeuppance in the Law & Order episode "Flaws".
- "Community Policing" starts with the detectives desperately searching for "The Push-In Rapist", guilty of multiple counts of rape (including a twelve-year-old). Some of the (non-main cast members) detectives wind up shooting an innocent (African-American) man mistaking him for the rapist. The rest of the episode focuses on that, and the rapist gets away clean. "Townhouse Incident" features The Push-In Rapist being caught by the police in the first quarter...still not the main focus of the episode. Poor guy never managed to be the primary villain of an episode.
- The SVU two-parter "Entitled" sees the unidentified Serial Killer from the original show's episode "Mayhem" identified and apprehended after the episode's other villains implicate the serial killer in their crimes, leading to a renewed hunt for him.
- Serial Rapist Kenneth Cleary ends up getting released without charge in "Closure" after two victims fail to identify him in a line-up. A year and a half later, he returns in "Closure Part II" and is charged again. While he does get Off on a Technicality, his wife finds out the truth about him and performs a Vigilante Execution.
- In season two of Lucifer (2016), the man who murdered Chloe's father is finally caught and facing trial, but because he arranged the murder of the key witness and had a very good lawyer, he walked. Unfortunately, the key witness was a high-ranking member of the Russian mafia, so Maze and Dan inform them who killed him. The last we see, the perp is getting dragged into a black van...
- Lost in Space (2018): A rare invocation on the villain's part, but Dr. Smith—or rather, Jane Harris—had spent the entire series lying and manipulating her way through danger in order to survive, erasing crucial evidence of her crimes, briefly turning Robot against the Robinsons, and Faking the Dead a few times to save her own skin. After S.A.R. and his robots nearly destroy Alpha Centauri in the series finale, Smith realizes she can't continue to live this way after everything that's happened and confesses to her crimes. Maureen, at least, offers her a place amongst the Robinson family when she gets out.
- Luke Cage (2016): After essentially being the one bad guy that wins in Season One by virtue of killing the witness that could have put her in jail (thanks to a brief screw-up by Misty Knight), Mariah Stokes loses her Karma Houdini throughout Season Two. Knight's investigation is able to obtain more viable evidence, she loses a significant amount of her inner circle and soldiers to the power plays of Arc Villain John "Bushmaster" McIver, her own personal dragon (and possible lover) "Shades" Alvarez finally had enough of her increasing brutality when she massacres an entire restaurant full of innocents to get back at McIver (by killing one of the few people he loves — everybody else was in the way) and provides the heroes with information that will help put Stokes in jail, and when it seems she will try to forge herself a crime network behind bars like The Kingpin did... it turns out that minor character Tilda Johnson (a.k.a. "Nightshade"), pissed off at Stokes (because Mariah is her mother, but she hates her) and looking to forge her own criminal rep, gave her a time-delayed Kiss of Death that tears her apart from the inside shortly after being placed in custody.
- Married... with Children: Peg Bundy takes advantage of her family in some pretty awful ways, and constantly manages to avoid punishment for her actions... which makes it all the more sweeter during the rare moments when she does get a comeuppance. After being tricked by Peg into having sex with her for nine months in order to conceive another child and get a $500,000 inheritance, Al learns that she's been taking birth control pills to keep from getting pregnant. In full Tranquil Fury mode, he fakes Peg's home pregnancy test to make it look like she's really got a bun in the oven. Peg is completely horrified, and when she tries to console herself with the $500,000 Al points out to her that another relative beat them to it (the lawyer who read the will married a Bundy relative who was in prison, and is planning on having him killed so she can keep the money for herself). This makes Peg suffer a complete Villainous Breakdown, as Al tortures her with the thought of the coming morning sickness, weight gain, and diaper changes. The episode ends with Peg running upstairs screaming and puking from morning sickness, as Al contentedly plans to continue the torture and realizes that he can't buy that kind of satisfaction for half a million dollars.
- Midsomer Murders;
- Implied in "Faithful unto Death". Simone gets off scot-free thanks to Sarah Lawton taking the blame for her and walks away with over three hundred thousand pounds of ransom money... leaving Sarah behind to spend the next twelve years in jail. At first, it looks like Simone really is going to get away with everything, but then Troy reveals to Sarah that her lover has shacked up with Vince Perry - her other accomplice in the murder - proving that Sarah was being manipulated all along. In the finale, Sarah calls Barnaby from prison, and it's implied that she provides him with the information that will get Simone arrested.
- Serves as the motive in "A Sacred Trust". By chance, a woman meets the son of a man who, 40 years ago while working as a mercenary in Africa, committed a war crime in the village where she was volunteering as a teacher. To get some revenge for his atrocity which left several of her students dead, she blackmails him to donate a million pounds to a charity dedicated to repairing the damage men like him caused. He knew she was a nun and attempted to murder her but killed one of her convent sisters instead because they both wore glasses. This led to the police getting involved and his being arrested.
- My Name Is Earl
- The show begins with an uneducated lowlife (the eponymous Earl) winning a modest amount of money off a scratch ticket, only to have an unfortunate encounter with the front end of an old woman's Cadillac. To add insult to injury, his wife comes by to see him in the hospital...and serves him divorce papers while he's all doped up on morphine so that she can get married to a mutual friend she'd been cheating on him with for years. He turns on the TV in the hospital and sees Carson Daly interviewing Trace Adkins. Adkins asks Daly about the secret to his amazing life, and Daly attributes his good fortune to (the Theme Park Version of) karma. It occurs to Earl that possibly, the reason he's in this mess, and the reason things hadn't ever really gone his way in general, is that he's spent the past 35 years of his life doing bad things: stealing, bullying, mistreating women, getting drunk and acting like an idiot, and not making any effort to better himself in any way. He starts to worry that if he continues on the path he's been on, he'll probably end up dead (and even says as much to Kenny). So he makes a list of everything wrong he can remember doing in his life (and adds to it when something comes up that he didn't remember, or that was an indirect consequence of something on the list). And he tries to make up for each one.
- Earl's brother Randy was an accomplice to almost every item on Earl's list, but doesn't receive nearly the same degree of karmic retribution as his brother. For instance, Earl and Randy's parents still have a good relationship with Randy despite having cut ties with Earl, which their mother explains is because "One of you (Earl) is bad, one of you is slow (Randy)." However, there are a few episodes where Randy feels karma's wrath as well, such as when he embarrassed a TV reporter on-air and she got back at him by editing the story that she did on Earl's list in a way that made Randy look even more mentally challenged than he was and another episode where he won a lottery ticket like Earl and was hit by a speeding bike, which was karma telling him to make up for having previously split up two brothers out of jealousy because they liked Earl but not Randy.
- In one episode, Earl makes up for stealing a fast-food worker's honeymoon fund, by sitting in for him at work while he's on his delayed honeymoon. The fast-food worker has a terrible boss; he treats his workers like crap, pays them abysmally, embezzles money from the restaurant, is cheating on his wife, and when he accidentally dents someone else's car in the parking lot, he writes a rude note and doesn't leave any relevant information. Earl can't figure out why a guy like that has such a great life; he has a hot wife, a Big Fancy House, a nice car, lots of friends, and even a huge dick. Earl resists the temptation to punch him like he had done with all his previous bosses, but eventually his insults just get to be too much. The punch is hard enough to land Mr. Patrick in the emergency room, which kicks off a chain reaction of events: his wife and his mistress both rush to the ER and find out about each other, his wife destroys all his "world's best whatever" mugs in a Defenestrate and Berate, she finds the money he was stealing and turns him in to law enforcement, and she files for divorce and gets the restaurant in the divorce settlement, while Mr. Patrick is sent to prison (and apparently becomes his cellmate's prison bitch, complete with a dented tin mug with "World's Best Bottom" scrawled on it). His ex-wife promotes the worker that Earl subbed for to manager, and he gives everyone raises and benefits (like health and dental insurance).
- The Series New Tricks is essentially built around a gang of retired detectives trying to track down Karma Houdinis and invalidate their warranties. The best example of the series is probably Ricky Hanson; the closest thing the series has to a Big Bad. After killing the wife of one of the main characters, his own brother, and countless victims in between, he is brought to trial in the first episode of season 5. Tragically, following a furious mudslinging match against the thoroughly discredited witnesses, some glaringly obvious jury tampering, and possibly a bit of muckraking from an insider (thus explaining how his lawyer knew so much about the UCOS team), he walks away scot-free and takes immense delight in cruelly rubbing Jack's face in it. Fortunately, he comes back into the picture in the season 6 episode "The Last Laugh" and is finally nailed, not just for the murder the team were investigating at the time, but also for several other crimes he had committed (including incest). The episode ends with the team breaking out the champagne and Jack sitting by his wife's grave assuring her "we got 'im!".
- NUMB3RS: In "Dark Matter" Jake Porter (Who raped Karen Camden) ALMOST got away with his crimes, since Karen's own crimes mean no one will believe her...but unfortunately for him it turns out one of his friends was stupid enough to take photos of the incident. Upon being informed of this, Porter promptly tries to run, only to get forced to the ground and arrested.
- Oz: Mark Miles murdered his own family, but pleaded an Insanity Defense and was simply sent to a mental asylum for a few years before being released. Then he murdered his new family, which got him put on death row.
- Perry Mason (2020): It looks like Ennis will escape any punishment for his many crimes but he is then murdered on Holcomb's orders.
- At the end of The Pinkertons episode "Old Pap", it seems that General Sterling Price, a Politically Incorrect Villain and ruthless sadist who attempts to take over Missouri and revive slavery just after The American Civil War, is going to walk free since Will and Kate can't prove anything against him. But then, we learn that Price has gotten cholera from drinking contaminated water, although he had his own supply. It's implied he was poisoned by ex-slave John Bell, whom he'd maimed earlier in the episode. While the end of "Old Pap" leaves his fate ambiguous, in the Clip Show "Review" we learn that Price did indeed die of cholera, just as his Real Life equivalent did.
- Power Rangers Beast Morphers: After escaping deletion through the Morphin Grid at the end of Power Rangers RPM, Venjix finally meets his end at the hands of the new generation of Power Rangers in the final episode when they corrupt his virus, making him unable to survive.
- Rake: Right after being acquitted of all charges against him, Edgar's shot to death by his girlfriend, who walks in on him having sex with another woman.
- Resurrection: Ertuğrul: Chances are, even if a villainous character is not seen dying on-screen or is not hinted to have died by the end of the season they last appeared in, their death will be mentioned in passing sometime during the next season. Examples include [Afsin Bey during season 2, Colpan Hatun/Ekaterina]] in the 4th, and Baiju Noyan prior to the events of season 5.
- Ruyi's Royal Love in the Palace: Yanwan literally gets away with murder several times. But Ruyi and Hailan gather evidence of her crimes and finally Hailan reveals them all to Hongli.
- Scream Queens (2015): At the end of Season 1, Hester frames the Chanels for the Red Devil killings and walks away scot-free. By the time Season 2 picks up, however, it's revealed that she's since been tricked into confessing, and subsequently locked up.
- Spartacus: Gods of the Arena has the utterly depraved Roman nobleman Cossutius, whose prime act in the series is raping the virgin slave girl Dionna, deliberately ensuring that her first sexual experience is as painful and degrading as would be possible without killing or physically injuring her. After she runs away from slavery and is recaptured, he is seen in the final episode taking sadistic pleasure in watching her execution. As would happen in Roman society, he gets away scot-free. In the (in broadcast order) next series Vengeance, he appears at a party taking an enthusiastic part in torturing a captured rebel, but later gets killed with satisfying gruesomeness when he is hit by a spear that Spartacus threw at Glaber but Glaber dodged.
- Scrubs: The Janitor constantly pulls all sorts of nasty pranks on people, particularly JD, to the extent that in "His Story III," he gets off totally scot-free for trapping JD in a water tower for an entire day. However, he does get his comeuppance in "My Own Personal Hell" and "My Perspective", probably the only episodes where the Janitor's pranks on J.D. backfire and J.D. finally gets the last laugh on him. A final-season episode also has him playing one of his pranks on someone as retaliation for something petty... and being caught by the Chief Doctor, who fires him on the spot (and has security kick him out when he comes the next day, thinking that Status Quo Is God).
- Seinfeld: According to Word of God, this is why the core cast got convicted in the Grand Finale, though the fans are divided on whether or not they deserved it, let alone the convoluted way that it came to pass.
- Supernatural: The American branch of the Styne Family, an Ancient Conspiracy behind events such as 9/11 and the Holocaust, are all brutally taken out by Dean Winchester in a Curb-Stomp Battle during the penultimate episode of Season 10. Only problem is that Dean is being powered by Mark of Cain.
- The Wire: Stringer Bell runs into this during season 3. He managed to avoid capture by the police in the first season then spend the next two seasons backstabbing and manipulating people including his best friend Avon. However, just when it seems he is going to get away again, Omar and Brother Mouzone gun him down.
- The Punisher (2017): Big Bad William Rawlins, the piece of shit who made Frank Castle's life miserable for no other reason than to prove he had no power over him, finally bites off more than he can chew when he goes on a rant to his Dragon, Billy Russo, calling him a powerless pawn who is no different from Frank in that regard, and basically humiliates his closest ally for a power trip. Cue the 'pawn' knocking the king off the chessboard.
- In The Twilight Zone (1959) episode "Death's-Head Revisited", an SS Captain who escaped the Nuremberg Trials returns to the death camp he was in charge of to reminisce about the good old days. Too bad the ghosts of his victims are still haunting the place...
- Twin Peaks: 25 years after the series's infamous Downer Ending, BOB is finally destroyed in the penultimate episode of the 2017 series.
- Veronica Mars: Aaron Echolls manages to worm his way out of being convicted for Lilly Kane's murder and is cleared of all charges. He spends the next several days celebrating in a high-class hotel and even taunts Veronica (who he previously tried to kill as well to cover it up when she found out he did it) about it before he is assassinated by Clarence Wiedman on orders of Lilly's brother Duncan.
- Victorious: After tormenting Tori with impunity, Jade finally gets a comeuppance when she tries to spoil the Hollywood Arts prom. While Jade's attempts are initially successful, Tori is able to humiliate her in front of everyone by naming her prom queen along with Doug the Diaper Guy (someone she'd hired to help her ruin the prom) as her prom king.
- The Walking Dead:
- The Governor in Season 3 had been getting away with picking off other groups of survivors for the past year of the apocalypse while enjoying a public persona of a beloved, benign leader of Woodbury. The failed raid on the prison convinces the Woodbury citizens to abandon his crusade against Rick’s group, and The Governor massacres most of them in a rage. One survivor manages to warn the rest of Woodbury’s citizens who quickly join the prison group. The Governor lost his empire and it was entirely his fault.
- Gareth and the cannibals of Terminus also lured in, killed, and ate countless people up to an including children, but Carol’s attack on their compound levels it and wipes out most of them. Many of them are even eaten alive by walkers, and the remainder are butchered messily by Rick’s group after trying to confront them again.
- Negan and the Saviors enslaved several communities of people and tortured and bullied them into serving them, and frequently even when they were compliant, they still tortured and bullied them. Season 8 sees the Saviors brought down by the combined war effort of the enslaved communities, with Negan being sentenced to life in prison so he can watch the communities thrive without his tyrannical rule.
- Alpha struck a horrific blow against the Coalition by massacring ten survivors during the Fair, and was able to get away with it because she revealed the colossal horde at her command that she’d unleash on the communities if they crossed her. It only got worse when the following year, she instigated a long, grueling campaign to break down the Coalition with sabotage, paranoia, and walker attacks. She finally gets her comeuppance in midlate Season 10 when Negan assassinates her after having won her trust and her heart, with the Whisperers soon being wiped out afterwards.
- Pamela Milton is revealed to be a corrupt tyrant who has abused her son Sebastian to try to force him to be her successor as dictator of the Commonwealth, and still thinks he should rule even after his crimes are exposed to the public. The final arc of the series sees her also imprisoned for life when her own troops turn on her when she tries to sacrifice the lower class to walkers to buy time to protect the upper class.
- Watchmen (2019) sees Ozymandias evade punishment for his crimes in the original Watchmen, though he ended up spending several years in a Gilded Cage on Eurpora after Tempting Fate by asking Dr. Manhattan to send him there. After he gets back to Earth and foils Lady Trieu's plan, he gets hit with Adaptational Karma and is arrested by Laurie and Looking Glass for his crimes.
- Yes, Minister: Although Sir Humphrey usually wins in the end, Hacker sometimes triumphs over him, including in the final episode, The Tangled Web. Of course it's debatable how far Humphrey can be considered a villain, especially as this triumph is Hacker blackmailing the civil servant into lying in his favour before a Committee. In fact, the episodes where Hacker gets a win over Humphrey are usually the ones in which Humphrey holds the moral high ground (e.g. "The Greasy Pole")
- The novelisation goes even further, having Humphrey eventually going mad and dying in a mental hospital.
