History Main / CliffhangerCopout

** Part Two of [[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E4GenesisOfTheDaleks "Genesis of the Daleks"]] is another well-known example. Sarah Jane is leading a prison escape up a giant scaffolding tower, when she slips and falls in a dramatic freeze-frame. Unfortunately, Part Three begins with her landing on a previously-unmentioned plank just below. The most frustrating thing is that she clearly fell on the outside of the tower, but the plank could only have been on the inside.

* Lampshaded in ''Film/JMenForever'', which ends in a montage of Cliffhanger cop-outs, showing that the J-Men supposedly killed during the {{Gag Dub}}bed movie were all NotQuiteDead.

* ''Film/{{Misery}}'' has Annie Wilkes vent about this trope. She explains to Paul that her favorite Superhero, Rocketman was seemingly killed in a firey crash in one episode but that the next installment had him leap from the vehicle just before it crashed and caught fire. She mentions that all of the children cheered except for her because [[SuddenlyShouting "he didn't get out]] [[LargeHam of the Cockledoodie Car!!!"]]. This exchange is notable because it's one of the first clues that [[MaskOfSanity Annie isn't quite right..]]

** In the middle of ''ComicBook/TheDarkPhoenixSaga'', Cyclops is struck down by a psychic bolt. The issue ends with the other X-Men exclaiming, "Cyclops is dead!" The next issue begins with Cyclops staggering back up, and the other X-Men saying, "Look, Cyclops is alive!"

* ''Manga/GetterRoboArc'': In the manga, after [[TheLancer Kamui]] witnesses [[BadFuture a future]] where monstrously evil Getter-evolved humans destroy the universe, he pulls a FaceHeelTurn and kicks off a plan to wipe out humanity before it can happen. Kamui is so powerful and [[GodzillaThreshold the situation so dire]] that Hayato cracks open the radiation-proof sarcophagus built around the mutated Getter Robo G, unleashing a WalkingWasteland MechanicalAbomination which apparently ruled over a planet of wormlike humans in another BadFuture ([[AmbiguousSituation or maybe the same one]]). This cliffhanger was to be continued in Part 2, only for Creator/KenIshikawa to [[AuthorExistenceFailure die before writing anything]]. The anime adapts this cliffhanger, with the further complication that another team member [[IChooseToStay chose to stay behind]] in the BadFuture with no way back... and then ends on a TimeSkip to a few years ahead where the team are somehow together again and [[AndTheAdventureContinues fighting a new threat on Mars]].

** At the end of "The Halloween Apocalypse", the TARDIS is about to be hit by the Flux, a NegativeSpaceWedgie that is destroying the universe, with the doors flying open to expose the Doctor and companions to it. At the start of "War of the Daleks", the Doctor and companions are in Sevastopol during the Crimean War, and the TARDIS is sealed up behind them. Neither the Doctor nor anyone else has the slightest idea what just happened.

* In ''Manga/FairyTail'', Wendy gets hit by a spell and vanishes into thin air at the end of the chapter. At the start of the next, she's just inside Horologium, who conveniently popped up right then and is clinging to the ceiling. Pretty funny that, before we realize that Wendy is safe and not hit by Hades' attack, Hades keeps a very calm face, as if Wendy disappearing was supposed to happen.

* Inverted in a 1960s ComicBook/CaptainAmerica story. At the end of one issue, our hero jumps out of a plane, wearing a parachute. At the start of the next issue, Captain America is falling through the air with no parachute (and no explanation of where the parachute went). The first few pages explain how the Captain survives this. Creator/StanLee later admitted that when he wrote the later issue, he had forgotten how he ended the earlier issue.
* ''ComicBook/TheIncredibleHulk'' Vol 1 #116 ends with The Leader pushing a button to launch an American nuke in an attempt to start WorldWarIII, so he can [[TakeOverTheWorld rule over what's left.]] Meanwhile, The Hulk is [[AntiInterferenceLockUp trapped in a "cage of living plasti-thene".]] Come #117, and apparently the button needs to be pushed ''twice'' to actually launch, giving Hulk a chance to escape and SaveTheWorld.
* ''Franchise/SpiderMan'':
** One issue was a hugely emotional for Peter Parker; him asking his clone to take care of his wife, and in general as heartfelt a sendoff as you could ask for a beloved character. The first thing that happens in the following issue is his corpse convulsing back to life with his super-powers restored.
** The "Gathering of Five" arc ends with Green Goblin receiving a massive power boost and killing Spider-Man. The following issue it's revealed Gobby had gone crazy and most of the previous issue had been his hallucinations.
* In the middle of the ''Comicbook/XMen'' storyline ''ComicBook/TheDarkPhoenixSaga'', Cyclops is struck down by a psychic bolt. The issue ends with the other X-Men exclaiming, "Cyclops is dead!" The next issue begins with Cyclops staggering back up, and the other X-Men saying, "Look, Cyclops is alive!"
* ''ComicBook/UncannyXMen'' issue #100 has Jean Grey in the cockpit of a damaged shuttle, flying through a massive radiation storm which we have been explicitly told several times ''will'' kill her. The issue ends with the radiation shielding giving out, and Jean faces certain, horrific death...two months later, issue #101 comes out, and the ''cover itself'' reveals Jean's fine and dandy. [[TookALevelInBadass More than that, actually.]] Ultimately subverted in that [[HumanoidAbomination what survived isn't actually Jean Grey]].
* ''ComicBook/{{Wolverine}}'' v3 #46 ends with a Mandroid about to sever Logan's neck and spine with an adamantium buzzsaw. The next issue opens the same way, except the Mandroid realizes the buzzsaw he's holding isn't made of adamantium and can't cut through.
* In ''Comicbook/CountdownToFinalCrisis'', one such instance features [[ComicBook/TheFlash Wally West]] employing a JackBauerInterrogationTechnique on Pied Piper and the Trickster by yanking a pair of cuffs attached to the two that's programmed to shock the both of them if something happens to it, and threatens to continue it until they tell him what happened to his murdered cousin Bart Allen. The following issue reveals that Piper and Trickster just imagined Wally pulling on the cuffs.
* ''Franchise/GreenLantern'' vol. 4, #3 had Hal Jordan fly into the Yellow Central Power Battery with a Green Lantern (the object), with the goal of basically forcing the thing to enter its failsafe mode and shut down once a Green Lantern enters it. This plan was even devised by Sinestro himself, who created the Yellow Central Power Battery. Instead, the Power Battery disintegrates him, with it even saying "disintegration compete". The next issue instead opens with the Power Battery recognising that Hal isn't Sinestro, and instead aborts its attempt to transport Hal to the anti-matter universe (why it was doing this is not explained).
* Routinely done deliberately and for laughs in the ''ComicBook/{{Viz}}'' strip "Billy the Fish." Typically, the villain who is menacing the club will turn out to be a just a cardboard cutout with a tape recorder on the back or that one of the club had arranged for Jeremy Beadle to play a trick on his teammates.

* At the end of one episode of the second season of ''Series/BronBroen'', a group of armed AnimalWrongsGroup terrorists attack Saga in her hotel room. At the beginning of the next episode, she [[CurbStompBattle curb-stomps them]] in seconds.

* The third season of ''Series/ThirtyRock'' ended with Jack having just discovered his real father, played by Alan Alda. He reveals he needs a kidney, so Jack creates a "Music/WeAreTheWorld"[=-esque=] fundraiser to get him one. Then the next season starts and none of this is ever mentioned again. We eventually catch a glimpse of a published copy of the book, ''From Peanut To President'', that Alda's character would only have had time to finish writing if he got his kidney. So presumably it all worked out somehow. Similarly, Kenneth must have somehow escaped the Chinese assassin in the second-season finale, since he's alive in the third season.
** A fifth-season episode confirms that Jack did manage to give his father a kidney - Elvis Costello's.

* ''Film/QuantumOfSolace'' ends with Bond's vendetta unresolved, with Mr White still at large and the Quantum organisation still active. This thread is completely forgotten about in the next film ''Film/{{Skyfall}}'', and when it's ultimately taken up again in ''Film/{{Spectre}}'' Quantum is simply retconned as being a daughter organisation to Spectre and receives no further attention.

** Famously, in [[Recap/DoctorWhoS21E6TheCavesOfAndrozani "The Caves of Androzani"]], you actually see the Doctor and Peri get shot, execution style, and [[WhatCliffhanger fall down dead]]. The following episode resolves the conflict [[PseudoCrisis ten seconds]] in, when it is revealed that the executed parties were [[ActuallyADoombot actually robot look-a-likes]].

* ''ComicBook/UncannyXMen'' issue #100 has Jean Grey in the cockpit of a damaged shuttle, flying through a massive radiation storm which we have been explicitly told several times ''will'' kill her. The issue ends with the radiation shielding giving out, and Jean faces certain, horrific death...two months later, issue #101 comes out, and the ''cover itself'' reveals Jean's fine and dandy. [[TookALevelInBadass More than that, actually.]]

* The end of ''Manga/JojosBizarreAdventurePhantomBlood'' has Dio's still-living head in the grip of a dying Johnathan, left aboard a burning, sinking ship as Erina takes the [[VampiresSleepInCoffins reinforced vampire coffin]] Dio planned to escape into. Decades later, ''[[Manga/JojosBizarreAdventureStardustCrusaders Stardust Crusaders]]'' begins with Dio (who put his head on Johnathan's body) dredged up inside a coffin--which the narration claims is the ''same'' coffin, even though we saw Erina being rescued from it.

* This was so common in the ''Film/UnderseaKingdom'' serial that Wiki/{{Wikipedia}} [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undersea_Kingdom#Cliffhangers keeps a list of these.]] When [[Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000 Joel and the Bots]] watched the first two chapters in the serial where the cliffhanger saw Crash and Billy trapped on top of a cliff while it collapses underneath them from missile fire, the resolution in the following installment shows Crash and Billy climbing back down from the cliff before the collapse, prompting Tom Servo to [[ShoutOut reference]] the line from ''Literature/{{Misery}}'', "How did they get off the cock-a-doodie cliff? This is ''wrong!''"

* ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'':
** "[[Recap/SherlockS01E03TheGreatGame The Great Game]]" ends with John and Sherlock at gunpoint from all angles with no possible escape in sight, with Sherlock pointing his gun at a bomb near Moriarty. In "[[Recap/SherlockS02E01AScandalInBelgravia A Scandal in Belgravia]]", Moriarty decides to let them go because someone calls him with "a better offer".
** Subverted during the resolution to the cliffhanger tying Series 2 to Series 3. [[Recap/SherlockS03E01TheEmptyHearse "The Empty Hearse"]] appears to show several glaring continuity changes from the end of [[Recap/SherlockS02E03TheReichenbachFall "The Reichenbach Fall"]], where Sherlock jumps from a rooftop to his apparent death (even featuring a closeup of his blood-stained corpse). When the scene is revisited, Sherlock is very obviously attached to an elastic cord that has magically appeared out of nowhere, and what appeared to be Sherlock's corpse was really that of Jim Moriarty in a latex mask (brushing aside the very noticeable height difference between the two men). However, it's then revealed that this retelling is all just Anderson's crackpot theory.

* ''Series/{{Smallville}}'': Season 3 [[SeasonFinale finale]] "[[Recap/SmallvilleS03E22Covenant Covenant]]" ends with Chloe's house exploding the instant she closes the door upon entering it, but a {{flashback}} in the second episode of Season 4, "[[Recap/SmallvilleS04E02Gone Gone]]", shows her escaping, with the time between closing the door and the explosion miraculously expanding to fit Lex's men getting her to safety.

'''Paris:''' Well they brought people back to the theaters.\\

* The second episode of ''Series/TrueDetective'''s second season ends on a completely unexpected cliffhanger that had people talking for a week, as it seemed as if Colin Farrell, billed as the star of season 2, was killed by a man in a bird mask with a shotgun. In the next episode it turned out the shotgun was loaded with riot rounds] leading [[http://kotaku.com/true-detective-s-massive-cliffhanger-was-a-letdown-1716002979 several critics]] [[http://www.vox.com/2015/7/5/8899279/true-detective-recap-colin-farrell-ray-lives to call the show out]] for turning a game-changing twist into a total copout.

* ''Literature/TheRollingStones'': In Creator/RobertAHeinlein's story inside a story, "Scourge of the Spaceways", John Serling ends one season in an unsurvivable DeathTrap. He starts the next season out of the DeathTrap and, hero that he is, is too modest to tell people how he managed to escape. Then the next adventure starts.

* One old ''Comicbook/IncredibleHulk'' issue ended with The Leader pushing a button that would launch a missile. The next issue started with him saying something along the lines of "Now, when I push the button a second time, the missile shall launch!"

* At the end of "The Halloween Apocalypse", the TARDIS is about to be hit by the Flux, a NegativeSpaceWedgie that is destroying the universe, with the doors flying open to expose the Doctor and companions to it. At the start of "War of the Daleks", the Doctor and companions are in Sevastopol during the Crimean War, and the TARDIS is sealed up behind them. Neither the Doctor nor anyone else has the slightest idea what just happened.