The Only One Allowed To Defeat You - Television Tropes & Idioms

"This is how it ends, Joker. No big schemes. No grand fight to the finish with the Dark Knight. Tomorrow, all the papers will say that the great Joker was found, blown to bits in an alley, alongside a miserable little nobody. Kind of funny. Ironic, really. See, I can destroy a man's dreams, too. And that's really the only dream you've got, isn't it?"

— Charlie Collins, Joker's Favor

Joker: Do you really think I'd send a flunkie to eliminate my favourite sparring partner? I reserve that pleasure for me alone.

Batman: Then why-

Joker: BECAUSE I MISS YOUR COMPANY, BATMAN!

— Topsy Turvy

One person or group considers another person or group as their rival, and will not allow anyone else to be the one to defeat them. This can sometimes lead to them helping their rival against other enemies, justifying it with a lame excuse, to make sure that they survive until the final battle between the rivals. Sometimes, this trope can become the basis of a Heel Face Turn. It also frequently leads to Not So Different and Antagonist In Mourning.

This is also the one-sided obsession of the Unknown Rival. It's also a big no-no on the Evil Overlord List.

Can lead into Foe Yay if this excuse is used too much; and opportunities to defeat the rival are not taken.

Compare Leave Him To Me.

Examples:

Anime/Manga

Goemon and Lupin from Lupin III is an archetypal example of the Heel Face Turn variant of this trope in Anime. In addition, Detective Zenigata and Lupin are another example from the same series.
Nagi and Ryoko in the Tenchi Muyo anime.
Kougaiji's group and the Sanzo Party in Saiyuki.
Akira and Kyo in Samurai Deeper Kyo.
Kamishakuji Renko and Akiyama Tokino in Kujibiki Unbalance.
Kuwabara is like this to Yusuke in Yu Yu Hakusho, at least for the first few arcs. It doesn't come up for a while afterwards, but then, in the Chapter Black storyline, when Yusuke's about to die, Kuwabara reveals that his only dream is to one day defeat him, and basically, for him, mostly everything worthwhile about his life has been getting there.
To an extent, Mireille Bouquet and Yumura Kirika in Noir.
Rimelda and Madlax in Madlax.
In a strange inversion in Naruto, Itachi Uchiha basically says that the only one allowed to defeat him is his younger brother, Sasuke. Also, Naruto and Sasuke, mutually.
- Gaara at one point declares a statement like this, marking Sasuke as his prey. This is prior to his Heel Face Turn after fighting Naruto.
- Also, the sound ninja Dosu wants to be the one to fight Sasuke in the Chunin exams, so he tracks down Sasuke's assigned opponent, planning to kill him. Unfortunately that opponent was Gaara, who dispatches Dosu in about five seconds.
- Plus, Raikage wants to be the one who defeats/kills Sasuke.
Suzuka and Gene Starwind in Outlaw Star (The Heel Face Turn variant again, and probably a Homage to Lupin III).
Suzu and Tetsunosuke in Peacemaker Kurogane (though Suzu later feels this much more than Tetsunosuke).
Jin and Mugen, mutually, in Samurai Champloo.
- Created an interesting situation in which one of Mugen's old partners shows up and subsequently betrays Mugen, seemingly killing him. Jin proceeds to kill him for killing the man he was supposed to defeat, but when Mugen shows up alive, he is extremely angry at Jin for killing the other man he thought only he was allowed to kill.
Hajime Saitou and Himura Kenshin in Rurouni Kenshin. Also, to a lesser extent, Aoshi Shinomori and Himura Kenshin.
- And Sagara and Saito, thought that is one sided on Sagara's part.
Kirisawa Fuuko and Hanabishi Recca, Ishijima Domon and Recca, and Kurei and Recca (mutual) in Flame Of Recca.
Takayanagi Mitsuomi and Natsume Shin in TenjouTenge.
Van Fanel and Folken Fanel in Vision of Escaflowne.
Oogami Souma and Tsubasa in Kannazuki No Miko. In an odd, twisted way, also Himemiya Chikane and Kurusugawa Himeko.
Hydra and Warukyure (Valkyrie) in UFO Princess Valkyrie.
Sakurazuka Seiishirou (Sakurazukamori) and Sumeragi Subaru in X/1999.
Seto Kaiba and Yugi Mutoh in Yu-Gi-Oh. To Kaiba's defense in one case, Yugi's adversary was impersonating him, which this editor considers a valid reason to be pissed off.
- Not to mention that if Yugi lost, Kaiba could wave bye-bye to his company rights.
Goku and Vegeta in Dragonball Z. Also, for much of the first two arcs, Piccolo and Goku.
- And what about Piccolo in the last two arcs of Dragonball (pre-Z). The last arc especially.
- In one of the non-canonical movies, Vegeta hilariously shouts "Kakarotto wa Ore no Mono da!!" ("Kakarot is mine!") when Android 13 is beating his rival to death, and charges in to protect Goku. Obviously in context it's something like "he's my prey, screw off," but it was all too easy for Yaoi Fangirls to squeal "Ho Yay!"
In the second season of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, the protagonists and antagonists both constantly forsake team combat and outside intervention in favor of fighting the same opponent they faced in the first episode one-on-one. This most notably produces the Fate/Signum rivalry, for which the Heel Face Turn, Not So Different, and Antagonist In Mourning options are all realized.
In Afro Samurai, the hero is, literally, the only one allowed to defeat the main villain. In contrast, for the sake of multiple action sequences prior to the climactic battle, just about everyone and his uncle is allowed to challenge the hero. The reason: the main villain has the "Number 1" bandanna, while the hero has the "Number 2" bandanna. Only the Number Two can challenge the Number One, but anyone can challenge the Number Two.
- Based on the final fight between Justice and Afro it would seem in reality that the only one who should've been allowed challenge the Number 2 was the Number 3, Number 10 being the one anyone and everyone could challenge. Given the other 8 headbands had been lost/collected by Justice and nobody knows about them Afro is the one left dealing the the irritating hoards of wannabes.
Suzuhara Misaki in Angelic Layer has Hatoko, and in the anime, Oujirou and Shuu have the same relationship.
Soukou No Strain: Sara and Lottie's initial roadblock to being nakama is that they both claim to be the only one that can or should defeat Ralph. Lottie eventually relinquishes her claim to Sara.
Tyson and Kai in Beyblade. And Tyson and Ray. And Tyson and Max. And Tyson and Daichi. And...
Ichigo and Zaraki Kenpachi in Bleach. Although, Ichigo wants nothing to do with that fight.
- Later, Ichigo with Grimmjow, to the point where there is not one rematch, but two. Also, Grimmjow gets inordinately pissed when he finds out other rival Ulquiorra's been going after "his prey."
- Used again in the recent manga, where Ichigo is straight-up told that he is the only one who can defeat Aizen
In Kikaider, Hakaider/Saburo's Prime Directive is to destroy the titular android. He resolves the existential crisis of that being his only reason to exist by destroying any other Monster Of The Week that comes close to killing Kikaider, while pushing him to his limits so he can get his money's worth out of his goal when the time comes.
Kyuzo embodies this trope with regards to Kambei in Samurai 7.
Variant: Golgo 13 makes a point of not allowing anyone else to kill his target when hired for an assassination. Not even themselves. When they die, it must be by his hand.
Sesshoumaru from Inuyasha initially seem to pretty much just want his brother Inuyasha dead, but by the time he starts actively declaring his claim on Inuyasha's life, his "nobody kills my brother but me" attitude comes off mostly as Sesshoumaru making excuses.
The homonculus Envy from the first Fullmetal Alchemist anime literally bases his entire existence on killing his father/homunculi-creator, Hohenheim of Light.
- Not only that, he throws a floor-destroying temper tantrum when he thinks Dante beat him to it.
Rukawa and Sakuragi to Sendoh, and later Rukawa to Sawakita in Slam Dunk
The reason Van and Ray are opposed to each other in Gun X Sword is because both are determined to be the one who kills the Claw.
Papillon goes extremely far out of his way to try to defeat Kazuki fairly in Busou Renkin. As they both regard the other as a Worthy Opponent, this is hardly surprising.
In Rozen Maiden Träumend, the first season's Big Bad Suigintou gives an entire speech about how she will be the one to ultimately defeat Shinku while taking a fatal barrage of crystal arrows, shielding Shinku from harm and dying in her arms.
Pixy Misa in Magical Project S often talks about how she will be the one to defeat Pretty Sammy and nobody else.
Kyouko, the main character of the manga Skip Beat, views her relationship with Shou in this way.
This is pretty much Aptom's raison d'etre in Guyver, his sole goal in life is to defeat Sho in combat.
C'mon guys, Pokemon! The only reason Team Rocket continues to exist in the show is for the sole purpose of capturing Pikachu, giving it to their boss, and becoming ridiculously wealthy, according to their fantasies of how well their boss will reward them.
- Also, if you think about the movies, Team Rocket often helps out Ash and company because, as they put it in the third movie, "If you guys died, we'd be out of work!"
Rather explicitly used in Cowboy Bebop with Vicious and Spike, with Vicious even telling Spike in the final episode: "I've told you before that I am the only one who can kill you."
Atobe Keigo's attitude towards Tezuka Kunimitsu in The Prince Of Tennis. In the manga it's more like the most prominent of several rivalries that Atobe has with several players (Sanada and Echizen are the other two), while the anime (and the fandom) exaggerates it to the point of almost stalkerish obsession.
The Lucifer and Biscuit Hammer: "Princess" Sami is determined to save Earth from a mage bent on cracking it open with a gigantic hammer... so that she can destroy it herself!
In Baccano!, while Ladd Russo and Lua Klein are not rivals, Ladd does promise to be the one to kill her, and will let no one else do it.
- He gives a similar response to Graham Spectre, stating, "I like brazen, impudent guys that only I can kill." Graham may as well have taken it for a love confession.
Yajirou towards The Jester in Grenadier after he finds out who he really is.
Hilariously subverted in Clannad ~After Story~ episode 2, where Sunohara wrongly imagines himself and Tomoyo to be this:
Youhei: "It's got nothing to do with you."
Tomoyo: "Exactly. See you." (begins to walk away)
Youhei: "No! You're supposed to say, 'I don't want to see you lose to anyone other than me.'"
In Battle B-daman, Anti Hero Enjyu is obsessed with defeating The Hero Yamato Delgato and ends up secretly helping the main gang because doing otherwise would let Big Bad Marda-B defeat Yamato.
Yami from To Love Ru acts this way towards Rito, to the point of saving his life repeatedly so that she can kill him. Of course, she's had dozens of opportunities to off him, but never actually does, so it seems that the whole "only I can kill him" thing is just an act to justify saving him all the time.
Graham Aker of Gundam 00 believes that he's the only one allowed to defeat Setsuna F. Seiei (or more to the point, Setsuna's Gundam). Setsuna has more important things to do.
- In the side stories, this trope is how Fon Spaak's relationship with Celestial Being begins. In 00P, he manages put together some clues and begins to suspect the existence of some sort of secret organization. He then organizes an ambush and has his ass promptly handed to him a Gundam, but Celestial Being's supercomputer orders the pilot to let Fon go, because he's too good to just kill off and won't leak the information anyway because... well, see the page title.
Hermit to Kenichi in Kenichi The Mighties Disciple.

Comic Books

When Superman was killed by Doomsday, Lex Luthor (disguised as his own son; long story) starts attacking the corpse of Superman-killer Doomsday in a rage with a chair. The people present assume it's because he's angry at Superman's murderer. He is, but not for the reasons they think.
- He reacted the same way (and for the same reason) when he thought the Silver Banshee had successfully killed Superman.
- The film adaptation of the Doomsday storyline, Superman: Doomsday, has a similar reaction from Lex. He's pretty ticked off that an "intergalactic soccer hooligan" robbed him of the change to defeat Superman with some sort of brilliant gambit. Of course, Lex was responsible for releasing said hooligan, but even then he can't take credit because Mercy Graves destroyed the evidence. So he kills Mercy instead.
In Doctor Strange, Dormammu is so obsessed with destroying Strange himself that he practically gave up godhood just to fight him. What's more, he has fought Strange hand-to-hand, rather than obliterating him with his superior power and subsequently lost in an attempt to feed his ego. He has probably done a veritable list of stupid deeds purely to spite his nemesis.
The western animation section already goes into the Batman - Joker thing. But here is the place to mention that comic Batman is now dead (sort of) in canon. This troper wishes Darkseid had survived, because he would like to see the Joker attempting to wreak horrible vengeance on friggin Darkseid.
- Joker extended this trope to Robin(Tim Drake) at the end of the mini-series Robin: Joker's Wild. After being defeated by Robin while Batman was out of town, Joker sat angrily in his cell at Arkham, warning the other inmates, "No one touches the boy, d'ya hear? He's mine!"

Film

In Once Upon A Time In The West, Harmonica (Charles Bronson) is the only one allowed to defeat Frank (Henry Fonda). When several of Frank's own men are paid to kill him (Frank), Harmonica shoots one of them. When he is accused of saving Frank's life, he defends his actions with, "I didn't let them kill him, and that's not the same thing."
In Die Hard, after John McClane kills Karl's brother, when Karl goes to the roof with two other henchmen, while riding in the elevator, he instructs both of them about John: "No one kills him but me."
In Enemy at the Gates, the German ubersniper Major Konig is informed that Vassili has been killed. Konig replies "He's not dead, because I haven't killed him."
In The Dark Knight, just after Batman has saved the Joker.
The Joker: "Oh, you. You just couldn't let me go, could you? This is what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object. You are truly incorruptible, aren't you? Huh? You won't kill me out of some misplaced sense of self-righteousness. And I won't kill you because you're just too much fun. I think you and I are destined to do this forever."
X-Men Origins: Wolverine: as Weapon XI is about to decapitate Logan, he is tackled away by Victor Creed. "Nobody kills you but me!"
In the aftermath of the climatic battle at the end of Gangs Of New York, Bill the Butcher is mortally wounded by shrapnel from a random cannon blast. Amsterdam is furious that he wasn't able to kill Bill himself and properly avenge his father.
In Enemy At The Gates, the Nazi sniper tells one of the characters, "He isn't dead. Do you know how I know that? Because I haven't killed him yet." It should be mentioned that the line is rendered extra-creepy by the fact that it's Ed frickin' Harris.
Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen, Optimus Prime is the only one capable of killing The Fallen.

Literature

Harry Potter was, in fact, prophesied to be the only one to defeat Voldemort; it was a Self Fulfilling Prophecy, since Voldemort's preemptive strike gave Harry both means and motive.
- Additionally, Harry's life was spared a few times through this trope when he was being held captive by the Death Eaters. They could easily have killed him, but Voldemort wants to be the only one to kill Harry.
In one of the Battle Tech novels, Phelan Kell gives a speech that typifies this trope: "I saved him because if Vlad is going to die, it will be at my hands."
Sandor Clegane in A Song Of Ice And Fire gets particularly irritated when anyone apart from him expresses an interest in killing his brother, the pathologically nasty Gregor Clegane, who permanently disfigured Sandor in his youth.
In Stardust, all the heirs of Stormhold are trying to kill each other and this is right and proper. But when an outsider kills one, the victim's ghost demands his remaining brother avenge him. The brother immediately sets out to do so.
Inverted: In Charles Stross' The Jennifer Morgue a villain sets up a geas making him vulnerable to only one hero, one who suffers under the handicap of being (in the novel's universe) fictional.
In Dan Abnett's Gaunts Ghosts short story "In Remembrance", Rawne tells the unconscious Gaunt that he can't die, because Rawne wants to be the one to kill him.
- Also, in Ghostmaker, Rawne and Gaunt team up to survive the blizzard and the Ork assault. Despite Rawne hating Gaunt's guts, he helps Gaunt and himself partly for this reason. (The other part was I Owe You My Life Whether I Like It Or Not.)
In Greg Rucka's second Perfect Dark novel, the Big Bag does this in concern to Joanna Dark, the hero. Joanna points out that she herself is ill, mainly because of a barely-healed gunshot wound to the stomach. The Big Bad pulls a gun, reverses and blam. Now both have a gunshot wound to the stomach. Now nobody can say the fight was unequal.
Agrus Kos from the Ravnica Block Magic The Gathering novels is an unlucky police officer chosen by the Guild-master of the hidden guild Dimir to be the only one who can defeat him, by making him the only one who can defeat him, which would nullify the guildpact, essentially making him a Quantum Immortal... until Agrus finds YET ANOTHER LOOPHOLE and instead of killing him, merely arrests him.
In the epic Mahabharata, Karna after The Reveal vows to his mother that either he will kill halfsibling and eternal rival, Arjuna or he would be killed by him. For Karna, Arjuna is the only one allowed to defeat him.

Live Action TV

Triple H and Chris Benoit in WWE, during their World Championship feud. This reached a point where, when Randy Orton, Triple H's protege, defeated Benoit for the title, Triple H turned on Orton out of jealousy.
- This Troper thought it was more like "no one can be the champion but me", the idea of a underling surpassing Triple H was inexcusable to him.
- This trope applied to The Rock and Stone Cold at Backlash 2000, where longtime rival of the Rock helped Rocky beat HHH for the WWF title so that HHH couldn't beat him.
The Master from Doctor Who, despite often trying to kill the Doctor, agrees to try and save his life in "The Five Doctors", because (in his words) "the cosmos without the Doctor scarcely bears thinking about."
Inversion: Lindsay in Angel seemed to think that Angel had to be the one to kill him, as his last words, after being shot by Lorne, were "You kill me? A flunky?! I'm not just... Angel... kills me. You don't... Angel..."
- This is a common Joss Whedon technique: a character may think that only one person is able to defeat them, but Joss delights in pointing out that unless they're supernaturally powerful (and sometimes not even then), they die just the same from one gun as another.
In Kamen Rider Black villain Birugenia decides that he will be the one to defeat Kamen Rider and constantly gets in the way of his allies plans when it seems possible they might actually defeat Kamen Rider.
A version of this shows up in the Babylon Five episode "The Coming Of Shadows", in which G'Kar was about to assassinate the Centauri Emperor at a reception, but was interrupted when the Emperor keeled over from illness. He later complains about this to his contact back home, and hopes that the Emperor will recover so that he'll have an opportunity to try again later.
In Stargate Atlantis, Ronon wants to be the one to defeat a Wraith bruiser, telling Sheppard that he'd kill him if Sheppard killed the Wraith before Ronon. The Wraith beats the living crap out of Ronon until Rodney and Carson hit him with a missile. Ronon thanks them.
This troper recalls an interview with William Campbell, the actor who played the Klingon Koloth on the Star Trek episode "The Trouble with Tribbles". Campbell revealed that the original plan was to make Koloth a recurring villain, sort of the Klingon's opposite number to Kirk. He saw Koloth as someone who respected Kirk as an adversary, and would even protect Kirk from other assailants on occasion, explaining that "No one can kill you but me."

Video Games

Alexander and Zetta in Makai Kingdom — although it's mainly one-sided, because Zetta doesn't take 'Alex' very seriously.
Jin Uzuki and Margulis in the Xenosaga games.
Bass is actually a playable character in a few Mega Man games because he doesn't want any of Wily's other robots to kill Mega Man before him (and because he sees their creation as an insult to him).
Inversion from the Suikoden series: Clive, Kelley, and Elza started as Two Guys and a Girl being raised by a group of assassins. The story ends pretty much like you'd expect: Elza, The Chick, on the run from Clive after being framed for Kelley's murder. What makes this different: she secretly wants to be caught, making this a case of "You're The Only One Allowed to Defeat Me". (Naming all the times the trope was played straight in the series could very well overtake the page.)
Scorpion wants to kill Sub-Zero in Mortal Kombat, to pay him back for killing him (as illustrated in Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero). At the end of the first Mortal Kombat, he succeeds. Then after discovering that Sub-Zero had a younger brother, Scorpion then subverted this to some extent by vowing to be the younger Sub-Zero's guardian as an act of penance for killing his brother. Quan-Chi then reverts it back to normal for Mortal Kombat 4 and MK vs. DC by convincing Scorpion that this Sub-Zero was responsible for the death of his clan and family. However, by the 5th game, Scorpion learns the truth and the two end up having another truce.
In Star Fox, The Rival Wolf acts this way towards Fox. The games thus far have never really provided a reason for this though, and the more recent games used it more as an excuse for Enemy Mine situations (involving Wolf saving Fox so that he can "tan his hide" after the big threat has been dealt with). They still clash in every game for no real reason other than this, of course. Maybe he's just a sore loser.
Initially, it was stated that only a Belmont could defeat Dracula when he resurfaces in the Castlevania games, but since then he's been beaten by his own son, the Belnades clan, and the Morris family.
- The Morris family is related to the Belmonts by blood, so they technically can kill Drac without any consequences regarding this trope. But then again, they do lose time of their lives the more they use it.
- Not to mention that somehow or another he defeated himself in Order of Ecclesia. Darn those glyphs!
Heather in Silent Hill 3, when Claudia eats the baby God fetus, and proceeds to give birth to it (seriously, how does that work?). Shortly afterwords, the God presumably killed Claudia, as she was pulled down the hole at over 300 mph. Heather then proceeds to state, "No! You can't die! I wanted to kill you!"
A variant of this is used in two of the Mario games. In Super Mario RPG, if Mario tries to leave Marrymore through the alternate exit after saving Peach and says no to everyone, Bowser will eventually come out and say "No one, NO ONE, is authorized to kidnap the Princess except ME! It's just wouldn't be right!" In Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, upon finding out that Peach was kidnapped by the X-Nauts, he says practically the same thing, going as far to say it's a rule against it.
Ocelot and Naked Snake in Metal Gear Solid 3. Especially noticeable when Snake chose to jump off the waterfall rather than get shot by Ocelot. A Slow Motion Fall scene occurred, while Ocelot ran in slow motion towards Snake while calling his name. Right after, Ocelot whispered, "Don't die on me yet."
- Yeah. He got over that fast. Especially since he ends up joining Big Boss after Major Zero brings them all together and in MGS 4 Big Momma says that Ocelot was fighting for Big Boss. Kind of a heel face turn right there. From wanting to kill him to following him around.
- This ended up being one of those cases where the Ho Yay actually became canon. That's right, Ocelot fell in love with Big Boss.
Regulus takes this to the extreme in Bomberman 64: The Second Attack by saving the hero from another enemy's last resort attack. Immediately after that he killed said enemy, despite the fact that she was his own ally, claiming that killing Bomberman was a pleasure he reserved for himself long ago. Right before finishing her off he adds "Oh, and make sure you apologize to Molok, will you?"
In Metal Gear Solid, Liquid was the only one allowed to kill his father, but Snake had already killed the old man twice. This makes Liquid seriously pissed, and he take up his father's mantle of destroying the world to prove himself better than his father once and for all. And to kill Snake in revenge. Those two goals go hand in hand.
In the first Samurai Warriors game, the wife of Oda Nobunaga cites this as the reason for being at his side (historically, there had been suspicions that she was married to Nobunaga so she'd assassinate him), but in both of her endings she seems to have more or less given up on the idea of actually killing him (except to threaten it every once in a while halfheartedly as a very kinky form of foreplay). In later games she's pretty much head over heels in love with him from the get go, though still very much a sadist.
The rivalry between Kyo Kusanagi and Iori Yagami in The King Of Fighters is this from Iori's point of view.
This troper wants to know how Super Robot Wars OG hasn't been mentioned yet. Zengar's Grungust Type-3 has just been pretty well demolished by one of the Inspectors, when who should show up but Wodan Ymir, Zengar's doppleganger from a different dimension. Everyone thinks he's here to finish Zengar off...and instead he attacks the Inspector. A few minutes later, when Zengar gets into the Daizengar, only to find none of its weapons work, Wodan once again makes the save by throwing him the Type-3 Zankantou. His whole reason for doing this, as he points out, is that he will be the one to defeat Zengar, so that he can stop being one of the Shadow Mirrors' soulless puppets and finally be his true self.
Frog to Magus in Chrono Trigger, if he's in your party when they try to stop Lavos and Magus goes down. Later on if you chose to fight Magus, he'll insist on doing it alone.
Batman and The Joker's relationship, detailed below, is subverted in Arkham Asylumn. In the game over screens where Joker comes up to gloat, he will usually just toss off a pithy one liner followed by "Someone finish him off". Also, he will continually mock and threaten his henchmen and tell them to kill Batman themselves. He also makes sure Batman has to cross paths with a number of enemies who try to kill Batman themselves.
- Not quite subverted. The Joker actually makes it pretty clear he expected Batman to survive each and every encounter with his henchmen and his other rogues. Otherwise what would be the point of the climax involving Joker throwing a 'party' with Batman as his 'special guest'. And then of course, he attempts to force Batman to break and effectively, lose his mind like him. When that doesn't work, Joker attempts to kill him himself.
  - One of the game over screens even has the Joker saying, 'Gotta say, I thought you'd last longer'. With that in mind this trope has definitely NOT been subverted.
In Yakuza, one of Goro Majima's henchmen attempts to kill Kazuma Kiryuu with a dagger while his back is turned. Majima throws himself in front of the blade, taking a near-fatal stab wound to the gut rather than risk Kiryuu dying at anyone's hands but his own.

Web Comics

Seen here in Dominic Deegan: Oracle For Hire, but subverted over the next three strips, which make it clear that Jacob's motives for killing the Chosen were purely selfish.
In Adventurers!, when Big Bad Khrima (a Harmless Villain) saves the heroes from Eternion in a Big Damn Heroes moment, he does it because he doesn't want another villain upstaging him.
And the obligatory Order Of The Stick example, Belkar helps rescuing Elan from bandits who've captured him, because "if anyone is going to get XP from him, it'll be me".
- Also lampshaded When Crystal is more than willing to let Haley go so that she can take another level of Assassin from all the free XP she gets in order to be at exactly the same level as Haley whenever they meet.
Narbonic: When Helen hears that the Dave Conspiracy has hired Mell to kill Dr. Narbon, she exclaims, "I don't care if they are a powerful top-secret conspiracy! No one takes out a hit on my mother! Her head is mine, darn it!"
Parodied in Looking For Group when Benny heals the mortally wounded man who killed her lover, just long enough to smash his head with a mace.

Web Original

In a recent fight between Laeil Burbank and Melina Frost in Survival Of The Fittest, Madison Conner suddenly appears and attacks Laeil to keep her from killing Melina before she can. Laeil also swears to be the only one to kill Melina, as well as kill anyone who tries to beat her to it. She fails on both accounts as Melina and her killer both kill each other. She doesn't take it well.
Near the end of Marvel/DC: After Hours, the Green Goblin turns on and beats the hell out of Lex Luthor.
Lex Luthor: You fool, this was never about you!
Green Goblin: The hell it wasn't! You threatened to wipe out Spider-Man and everything he stands for! That's my job!

Western Animation

Kim Possible: Shego's only mildly annoyed (by her standards, anyway) when she gets imprisoned by Drakken's new alien sidekick. But when she realizes that the new girl has a chance of beating Kim, that pisses her off enough to break free and put a stop to it: "I am not gonna let this she-thing just walk in and destroy Kimmie! That's my job! Ya hear me?"
Danny Phantom. Skulker is constantly agreeing to work together with Danny and co. in order to save the world, Ghost Zone, or anything else on a massive enough scale to matter. Normally these occurrences are justified by the fact that EVERYONE would die if all the bad guys didn't help, but he tries to make excuses anyway and the fangirls eat up.
Transformers. Especially in the Unicron Trilogy, it seems like Megatron always seems to single out Optimus in combat. Also, in the third series of The Original Series, Cyclonus occasionally saved the life of Ultra Magnus because so he could be the one to kill him.
- Forget the Optimus/Megatron rivalry... Starscream, a Dragon so treacherous he's got his own trope, is so obsessed with being the only one allowed to defeat, defy or otherwise annoy Megatron; he goes into an apparently righteous rage when Skyfire, Thrust, Sideways and the Constructicons even allude to an Enemy Civil War.
The Venture Brothers: The Monarch and Baron Ünderbheit compete for this role against Thaddeus Venture, with The Monarch's unexplained obsession forming the basis of a comical deconstruction of this trope as a form of addiction.
Proto Man and Mega Man in the US series of Mega Man.
- Specifically, in the very first episode when Wily wants to blast Megaman, Protoman smashes the necessary button before Wily can press it and tells Wily that Mega is "his". And in "Future Shock", Mega's attempt to use the stolen time machine (long story) is thwarted by a low-powered bomb planted in the cockpit—by Protoman, no less; it was only so he and Mega could have a proper fight. And don't get me started on "Bro Bots"...
Prince Zuko in Avatar The Last Airbender needs to capture Aang to regain his honor and be allowed back into the Fire Nation. This has led him to rescue Aang from other Fire Nation soldiers.
- Also somewhat inverted later when Zuko decides the one to kill his father has to be Aang, not himself, even when he had the opportunity.
- Likewise, in the series finale, Iroh refuses to fight Fire Lord Ozai (despite being the only other person powerful enough to beat him), because the Avatar has to do it himself to truly achieve peace. He also rightfully predicts that Zuko WON'T be the only one allowed to defeat Azula and has him take Katara with him, and she's the one who defeats Azula in the end.
  - This makes more sense than it seems. Iroh explains that if he or Zuku killed Ozai, then history would see it as a family power struggle. But if the avatar killed Ozai, then history would see it as a mission for peace. This doesn't explain how the history books won't see it as a story of revenge. You know, considering that the Fire Nation killed all of the Avatar's people.
  - Supposedly, most people will believe the Avatar to be above such things and will recognize that the death of his people is secondary to the fact that the Fire Nation needed to be stopped.
In a literal sense, Demona and Mac Beth in Gargoyles, who due to sorcery are immortal unless one kills the other.
In more than one episode of Batman The Animated Series the Joker displays this attitude towards Batman: only he gets to kill Batman, or, failing that, he (the Joker) dies in one last climactic battle between the two. He even tried to kill a lowly henchman who was thought to have killed the Bat.
- Brutally lampshaded in Mad Love when Harley captures Batman with the idea of getting him out of the way, so she and "Mistah J" can be together at last. Batman suckers her into calling the Joker so, supposedly, he knows the deed's been done. What the Joker does to her next has even the Bat disgusted. (She tries to calm Joker down by pointing out how he inspired her scheme, but that doesn't help.) Earlier in that same episode, after Batman's been caught in a cloud of knock-out gas:
  Harley: That's a real gasser, huh, Mistah J?
  Joker:I give the punchlines around here, got it?
  Harley:Yes sir.
- This is carried over to The Batman, where Joker actually goes so far as to incapacitate Evil Counterpart Evil Duo Wrath and Scorn with Joker Gas (after the duo had gone out of their way to repeatedly help the villains of Gotham in escaping Batman and Robin, Joker included) because they threatened to reveal Batman's secret identity to the entirety of Arkham.
- Also displayed in Batman The Brave And The Bold, during an episode where Batman is fighting his evil alternate self Owlman and has teamed up with the Joker to give himself an advantage. At one point, the Joker rescues Bats from being killed. When Batman acts surprised, the Joker just says "Nobody kills my wingman but me."
Sinedd to D'Jok in Galactik Football, apparently.
Megavolt and Darkwing Duck, sorta, when they team up to stop Negaduck: "If he destroys St. Canard, there'll be nothing left to rob!"
- That seems to be more of an Enemy Mine situation.
In the Legion Of Superheroes cartoon, Superman clone Kell-El was literally created to fight galactic despot Imperiex; when Brainiac 5 wiped him out with the wave of a hand, Kell seemed a lot more disturbed by the appropriation of his nemesis than by Brainy's Face Heel Turn or his subsequent "murder" of Superman.
Batman Beyond: this was the reason given by the Stalker after he rescued future-Batman (Terry).

Only Child Syndrome

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