History Main / DreamTellsYouToWakeUp

->'''Coulson:''' I thought I'd lost you.\\
'''Rosalind:''' Nope. I'm still right here.\\

* One creepypasta posits that this is a common occurrence with people experiencing a traumatic event [[https://creepypasta.fandom.com/wiki/Wake_Up implying reading the creepypasta is one such dream.]]

* The second half of Music/KateBush's album ''Music/HoundsOfLove'' is about a shipwrecked woman trying to stay alive while waiting to be rescued. At several points (particularly "Waking the Witch" and "Hello Earth" she drifts off to unconsciousness only for voices in her dreams to interject that she has to wake up and get out of the water.

* A RunningGag ''within'' the RunningGag of AllJustADream[=/=] ButWasItADream endings in ''Webcomic/{{Housepets}}''. Before long, characters are ''anticipating'' that their conversations with the gods are going to end with the god saying "But now, you need to wake up", and cannot ''believe'' that they're pulling that one ''again''.

* ''ComicBook/HeroesForHire 2011''. [[ComicBook/DaughtersOfTheDragon Misty Knight]] is in a coma, and the Puppet Master manipulates her by controlling her dreams, focusing on those that stimulate the primal reactions. In one of those recurring dreams she sees a familiar boy in the street, tries to catch him, and when he turns she discovers that he's a walking corpse (this kid would be the son that she lost in a miscarriage). Eventually Misty started to realize that there is AGlitchInTheMatrix, and struggles to wake up. To prevent that, the Puppet Master tried to induce fear by starting a dream where she is attacked by all her friends, to no avail. This dream gets mixed with the one of the boy, but now he turns, shows to be a normal looking boy, and tells her to wake up. And so she does, and the Puppet Master must now rely on Plan B...
* In ''ComicBook/HouseOfM'' the ComicBook/ScarletWitch rearranged all reality into a world where mutants rule and everyone was living his ideal life. Wolverine realized that it was false, and started to gather heroes to stand against Wanda. They got the help of Layla Miller, who could make heroes remember their old life. She was a new character, and Dr. Strange even suspected that she was created by Wanda herself. Ultimately subverted, as Layla ''did'' exist before the whole House of M thing.

* In ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'' stories:
** ''ComicBook/Superboy1994'': Dubbilex wakes up ComicBook/{{Superboy}} by having the cruel dream version of himself that was already in Superboy's dream stop his actions and instead tell him that he needs to wake up and help stop an invasion.
** ''ComicBook/Supergirl2005'': In issue #22, ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} is dreaming that she has been reunited with the ComicBook/LegionOfSuperHeroes after being knocked out and buried under a railway car by a super-villain. Her happiness is cut short when Lightning Lad tells her she is dreaming, and she really should wake up before her friends get killed by the guy who dropped a train on her.
* In one issue of the Eclipse Comics series of ''WesternAnimation/JonnyQuest'', Jonny spends his whole life hunting and being hunted by the masked assassin X-7, who kills his victims by strangling them. Finally, as an old man, he faces X-7 one last time while a recording of his father repeats that he must "wake up" to the dangers of X-7. It turns out that "X-7" is actually an experimental pesticide, a cannister of which broke open during a test and began filling the room with toxic fumes; Jonny manages to break a window and throw it outside before activating the lab's ventilation system.

* In a previous draft of ''WesternAnimation/CodeLyoko''-''Literature/MaximumRide'' crossover ''Fanfic/CodeWings30'', Cassidy dreams of being on [[Film/TheAdventuresOfSharkBoyAndLavaGirl Planet Drool]], where Shark Boy yells at her to wake up in Jeremie's voice.

* ''Film/TheCell''. Happens in universe when the detective enters the VR device [[BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind after Catherine becomes trapped there]]. At one stage he's literally having his guts pulled out while screaming at her to wake up.

* ''Series/{{Arrow}}''. After the Ninth Circle collapses a building on top of Oliver Queen, he spends the next episode having a MaybeMagicMaybeMundane conversation with Tommy Merlyn who died at the end of season one (also when a building collapsed on him). At the end Tommy tells Oliver that it's time to wake up and snaps his fingers, and just then Oliver's friends turn up to dig him out of the rubble.

* Throughout the first three Books of ''VideoGame/DreamfallChapters'', Zoë is repeatedly told, in various wordings, that she needs to "wake up" (including, particularly sneakily, the phrase popping up all over the screens on Europolis streets... in Arabic). That despite the fact that she woke up from her coma midway through Book One. Then Book Four reveals that she actually didn't: in Book One, she merely used her RealityWarper powers to create a secondary body for herself--a kind of physical AstralProjection--while her real body is still in coma in a lab somewhere.
* At the end of ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaLinksAwakening'', the Windfish tells Link to use the MagicMusic to wake them both up.
* At the end of the last episode of ''VideoGame/CriminalCasePacificBay'', Tesla, an evil A.I., is plotting to install everyone's mind inside a virtual reality and destroy all Pacific Bay in the real world. Frank has been the last victim, and Karen died in an earlier episode, but their minds (and their late children) had been uploaded to the virtual reality. The Agent and Amy have the means to destroy Tesla and his virtual world, but that would mean "killing" Frank a second time. What does Frank say? Do it. Kill Tesla, end all this. The Knight family accepts that they are all dead and that their existence within a virtual reality is meaningless.

[[folder:Visual Novels]]
* In one of the protagonist's dreams about the title character in ''VisualNovel/{{Melody}}'', Melody tells him that it’s time to wake up.

[[folder:Webcomics]]
* In ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'', a Lespuko skull [[https://www.egscomics.com/comic/2002-03-18 tells]] Grace that it’s time to wake up.
[[/folder]]

* "[[Recap/FuturamaS4E12TheSting The Sting]]" episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}''. Fry died to save Leela from a giant killing bee from space. Leela constantly blames herself, and keeps dreaming with Fry, who always ends the dream suddenly telling her to wake up. In the end, she ''does'' wake up... from a coma, and the nested DreamWithinADream. Fry was fine, next to her bed, and repeating all the time "you have to wake up".
* "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS17E2TheGirlWhoSleptTooLittle The Girl Who Slept Too Little]]", episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons''. Lisa is afraid of the graveyard, fell unconscious, and dreamed with evil monsters that scare her. Eventually, the monsters stop trying to scare her, and gave her AnAesop about being OK to be scared from time to time. So now, it's time to wake up.

* ''ComicBook/XMenBlue'': Returning home from their space mission, and with Jean killed by the Poisons, The 4 remaining X-Men suddenly find themselves outside the mansion, with their original uniforms, and Jean is there. The best realizes what happens: the ship (a sentient version of the Danger Room) thinks that they are going to die, because it had been badly attacked by meteors, and tries to comfort them with a pleasant reality. Hank wants to turn down the program, to make repairs, but Scott does not want to. Then Jean (who is just an holographic representation) intervenes and tells them not to fight over something, herself, that isn't even real.

Our hero is not in the real world. He's inside a LotusEaterMachine, or just sleeping, unconscious or in a coma, and having a dream, while he should be awake and dealing with the things going on. Sometimes his friends will mount an OrpheanRescue and get inside the dream to make him aware of it, and then escape. But sometimes not. Sometimes it is a character ''from within the dream itself'' who tells the hero that everything is a dream, and that he has to leave. May involve a DreamWithinADream, CrashingDreams (when you're physically woken up) and result in a CatapultNightmare. May have AnAesop about letting the past go, and not be trapped in nostalgia of the old days.

* For a period in time in the ''ComicStrip/LittleNemo'' comic strips, Flip was jealous that Princess Camille of Slumberland has chosen Nemo to be her playmate over him, and would regularly sabotage it by telling Nemo to wake up, [[AllJustADream which he inevitably would.]] He soon got over this though and he and Nemo eventually became friends.

* A mild case in ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsonsMovie''. Marge says to Homer " I know it's easy for your mind to wander...", and yes, Homer was thinking of a dancing monkey while Marge was talking. She added "...but I want you to really concentrate on me": the monkey stopped his dance, saw Homer with disdain and pointed to Marge. Pay attention to what she says!

* ''WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2012'': The episode "In Dreams" has a subversion. When the Turtles are trapped in unending nightmares by the Dream Beavers, April tries to use her psychic powers to enter them (either as herself or talking through one of the dreams' inhabitants) and tell the Turtles to wake up, but this has no effect.

* ''ComicBook/HeroesForHire 2011''. ComicBook/MistyKnight is in a coma, and the Puppet Master manipulates her by controlling her dreams, focusing on those that stimulate the primal reactions. In one of those recurring dreams she sees a familiar boy in the street, tries to catch him, and when he turns she discovers that he's a walking corpse (this kid would be the son that she lost in a miscarriage). Eventually Misty started to realize that there is AGlitchInTheMatrix, and struggles to wake up. To prevent that, the Puppet Master tried to induce fear by starting a dream where she is attacked by all her friends, to no avail. This dream gets mixed with the one of the boy, but now he turns, shows to be a normal looking boy, and tells her to wake up. And so she does, and the Puppet Master must now rely on Plan B...

* In one issue of the Eclipse Comics series of ''WesternAnimation/JonnyQuest'', Jonny spending his whole life hunting and being hunted by the masked assassin X-7, who kills his victims by strangling them. Finally, as an old man, he faces X-7 one last time while a recording of his father repeats that he must "wake up" to the dangers of X-7. It turns out that "X-7" is actually an experimental pesticide, a cannister of which broke open during a test and began filling the room with toxic fumes; Jonny manages to break a window and throw it outside before activating the ventilation system.

* One issue of the ''WesternAnimation/JonnyQuest'' comic (by Eclipse Comics) shows Jonny spending his whole life alternately hunting and being hunted by the masked assassin X-7, who kills his victims by strangling them. Finally, as an old man, he faces X-7 one last time while a recording of his father repeats that he must "wake up" to the dangers of X-7. It turns out that "X-7" is actually an experimental pesticide, a cannister of which broke open during a test and began filling the room with suffocating gas; Jonny manages to break a window and throw it outside before activating the ventilation system.

* At the end of the last episode of VideoGame/CriminalCase, ''Pacific Bay'' edition. Tesla, an evil A.I., is plotting to install everyone's mind inside a virtual reality and destroy all Pacific Bay in the real world. Frank has been the last victim, and Karen died in an earlier episode, but their minds (and their late children) had been uploaded to the virtual reality. The Agent and Amy have the means to destroy Tesla and his virtual world, but that would mean "killing" Frank a second time. What does Frank say? Do it. Kill Tesla, end all this. The Knight family accepts that they are all dead and that their existence within a virtual reality is meaningless.

It is not always revealed before that point that the dream is a dream, so this trope may include spoilers.