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Ira Kane: Snag it and put it in the bucket Harry Block: I've seen this movie; the black dude dies first. You snag it.
When a character knows that a trope is about to happen, either due to being Genre Savvy or because someone is trying to invoke it, and then actively attempts to avert it, subvert it, or maybe even invert it.
The character might succeed, or might fail. In failing, he might even set the trope off. The point is that the character is at least attempting to avoid a straight run of the trope.
Compare Reality Ensues (which this may sometimes lead to).
Contrast Invoked Trope, Exploited Trope, Discussed Trope.
Not to be confused with a simple Averted Trope, that has no prompting from any characters.
Examples
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Anime and Manga
Comic Books
Fan Fiction
- Reconciliation seems to be headed toward the Netorare Genre at first glance; Hanako, after her Bad Ending, has isolated herself from Lilly and Hisao out of guilt for eight years. During this time, Lilly and Hisao have gotten together, and Hanako still has feelings for Hisao. The twist that forces Hanako out of her self-imposed isolation, however, is Lilly calling her to inform her of Hisao's death.
- In AceCombatTheEquestrianWar, a rookie griffon soldier named Slip almost pulls a Screw This, I'm Outta Here, but he seems to know what happens to deserters in war stories, so he decides to keep fighting. Shortly after this sudden bout of courage, he's killed.
Film
Literature
- Done in It's Kind of a Funny Story, where the main character Craig refuses the possibility of heroin, because "If I were doing heroin, then I'd be a depressed teenager on heroin. I didn't need to be that cliché."
- In Maskerade, once a series of murders begin happening at an opera house, the first thing they do is put extra guards on the giant chandelier, to keep it from being dropped on anybody.
- The Screwtape Letters plays with, but ultimately defies the Deal with the Devil trope. Screwtape explains that it's fallen out of favor ever since Hell made the strategic switch from promoting Satanism to promoting atheism, which is seen as a safer bet.
- The Warhammer 40,000 novel Grey Knights notes that the Inquisition defies Never Found the Body in the case of Ghargatuloth; they sent the Grey Knight expedition down to Khorion IX instead of simply calling Exterminatus on it because they needed eyes on the ground to see him die.
- The short story Another End Of The Empire
 by Tim Pratt features the Evil Overlord Mogrash who is told the following prophecy:
"A child dwells in the village of Misery Chin, in the mountain provinces to the east. If allowed to grow to manhood, he will take over your empire, overthrow your ways and means, and send you from the halls of your palace forever."
- In the Myst novel, Atrus comes across one of the infamous D'ni puzzle-locks and tries to decipher it in the standard Myst Only Smart People May Pass fashion. His father Gehn picks up a blunt instrument and smashes it open.
- Cassandra Truth is defied in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by Professor Kirke. When Peter and Susan tell him they think Lucy is lying about discovering a portal to Narnia in the old wardrobe, the professor suspects she's actually telling the truth (after all, he knows quite a lot about Narnia) and convinces them to trust her.
- Albus Dumbledore defies Cruel and Unusual Death in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Sometime before the novel began, he put a cursed ring on his finger, which would have killed him in seconds had Snape not intervened, and even then the curse still slowly kills him over the course of a year. During the book, the Death Eaters are attempting to infiltrate Hogwarts so they can kill Dumbledore. Dumbledore is aware that the Ax Crazies Bellatrix Lestrange and Fenrir Greyback would just love to kill him slowly and painfully, so he orders Snape to kill him quickly and cleanly with Avada Kedavra.
Live Action TV
- Buffy stabs Dracula again when he tries to resurrect, and then reminds him she's still there when he tries again.
- Mixing this up a bit with Memetic Badass, there's an LJ icon with Spy Daddy from Alias that reads, "I am five steps ahead of you. I kill you in step four."
- Doctor Who, "Utopia":
The Master: Now then, Doctor! Ooh! New voice! ... Anyway, why don't we stop and have a nice little chat where I tell you all my plans and you can work out a way to stop me — I don't think!
- Hannah Montana: Miley is Genre Savvy enough to check for feet under the stalls before talking about her Secret Identity with Lilly in the ladies' room.
Video Games
- Left 4 Dead has one of the guys who write the the saferoom graffiti proclaim that "WE ARE THE REAL MONSTERS". The guy underneath him says "No, that's the zombies".
- Have you been outside JACKASS!!
- I think it's them stupid
- I hope you are DEAD now
- I miss the internet
- Capcom openly defied No Export for You when they worked to clear the legal hurdles and get Tatsunoko Vs Capcom localized overseas.
- Evil Dead: Hail To The King was pretty much a straight up Resident Evil clone with an Evil Dead look, including the puzzles (though, thankfully, most were much less obtuse and nonsensical than RE). However, in the latter part of the game, Ash, in a cutscene, reads the plaque on a door. After noting the overly complicated puzzle mechanism required to open it, and just shoots the door open with his boomstick in the game's Crowning Moment of Funny.
- In Freedom Fighters, you can prevent soviet reinforcements from coming in by blowing up the bridges their armored transport cars cross, and blowing up the helipads supplying assault and transport helicopters.
- Dragon Age II presents this in the guise of one of the final Take a Third Option choices. A player actively seeking to achieve some sort of compromise between two factions is rewarded with a rather large "boom".
- In Portal 2, the Final Boss defies Boss Arena Idiocy by studying the recordings of how you defeated the previous boss and deliberately setting up the arena to avoid those same mistakes. The trope is then zig zagged by having the boss make an entirely new set of glaringly obvious mistakes.
Wheatley: "I also took the liberty of studying the tapes of you killing her, and I am not going to make the same mistakes. Four-part plan is this: One, no portal surfaces. Two, start the neurotoxin immediately. Three, bomb-proof shields for me, leading directly into number four: bombs, for throwing at you. You know what, this plan is so foolproof that I'm going to give you a sporting chance and turn off the neurotoxin. I'm joking, of course. Goodbye."
- And taken further at the end: "STEP FIVE! BOOBY-TRAP THE STALEMATE RESOLUTION BUTTON!"
- Unfortunately for Wheatly, he failed to defy the final Crowning Moment of Awesome trope: Chell opening a portal right under him, with the other side on the surface of the moon.
- Belle defies a Sadistic Choice in Kingdom Hearts II. Xaldin kidnaps her and takes the rose that can lift Beast's curse, forcing Beast to choose which he'll give back. Although Beast chooses for Belle to be safe, she elbows Xaldin, saving herself and the rose.
- Baldur's Gate II: Irenicus: "No, you'll varrant no villain's exposition from me."
Web Comics
- A rare example of a double-defiance: this Irregular Webcomic! strip.
- The DM of DM of the Rings will not tolerate Off the Rails when he can help it. Only twice do the players pull it off.
- Least I Could Do does this with an old classic:
Noel: No he didn't. I beat the shit out of him with a smile on my face.
- Tarquin from The Order of the Stick is so Dangerously Genre Savvy that he hands out guidelines on defying tropes to his guards. They work.
Elan: Will I ever see you again?
Julio Scoundrél: Well, as an older mentor figure, the most likely scenario is that I'd return only to be randomly killed by an enemy of yours so that you can cradle my dying body while swearing revenge — so don't take it personally if I say I sincerely hope we never cross paths again.
- Axe Cop advices the families of crime fighters to hide in the bushes outside their house with guns every night to avert And Your Little Dog Too.
Web Original
- Basically the entire point of the Evil Overlord List.
- In Linkara's "Extreme Super Christmas Special #1" review, the ghosts from A Christmas Carol show up. Linkara flatly tells them that he does not want to make a Yet Another Christmas Carol nor does he need to (he already loves Christmas and comic books), and tells them to promptly GTFO.
- And in the Nostalgia Critic's review of Babes in Toyland, the Ghost Of Christmas Future tries to do this with him, but the Critic defies it as well. The Ghost gets his revenge by making him review The Grinch next week.
- In Spoony's review of the Wing Commander movie, he takes one look at the cover (showing Matthew Lillard and Freddie Prinze Jr.) and shrieks in terror. He explains thusly: "You know that thing, you can't trust a book by its cover? Well fuck you! That's books, not movies!"
- When Film Brain learns that M. Bison's plan amounts to an "evil property development scheme", he interrupts the OF COURSE! saying it doesn't deserve that joke.
- Part two of this video on Mr Coat And Friends defied Previously On, noting that it was on the internet, and we could just watch part one.
- The hentai flash site Zone Archive had apparently been pestered to make a something related to My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic. So they did...however not what you would expect. After bringing up a shot of Pinkie Pie in Naughty Tentacles, selecting pretty much any of the animation options causes this to happen. It speaks for itself.
Western Animation
- The Earthworm Jim episode "Hyper Psy-Crow" almost ends with a "Here We Go Again" ending (actually called that) after a Reset Button of the episode's events. Jim won't stand for it, and just drops a cow on Psy-Crow before he can enact his scheme again.
- Attempted, but failed in the smoking episode of South Park. Kyle wants to just confess what they did to avoid the usual antics, and it doesn't work.
- Done successfully in another episode. The main characters agree that they don't want to have any part in the episode's plot. They actually don't (letting secondary characters run the episode), and agree at the end that they're glad that they didn't get involved.
- At the end of an episode of Darkwing Duck, he's forced to work with Quacker Jack, one of the regular villains, to stop a greater villain. When the greater villain is stopped, Quacker Jack asks if this is where they show the greater villain love and kindness, and he vows to mend his evil ways. Neither Quacker Jack, nor Darkwing think so. They just beat him down further.
- Raven from Teen Titans is aware of the Bad Powers, Bad People trope, and despite the fact that her powers come from her demon father she does her best to be a good gal.
- Jinx eventually does the same.
- In the My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic episode "The Best Night Ever", the ponies are running away from the chaos they've caused at the Grand Galloping Gala and Rarity drops her glass slipper. Pinkie Pie lampshades the trope of The Girl Who Fits This Slipper and Rarity, who has no interest in meeting Prince Blueblood ever again, screams and crushes the slipper into powder.
Real Life
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