History Main / MisfortuneCookie

* Fortune cookies in ''VideoGame/NetHack'' are one of the game's way of providing {{Player Nudge}}s. Some of them have true rumors, while others provide advice that leads to YetAnotherStupidDeath.

:: Shortly afterwards, Miss Fortune Cookie gets crushed, revealing a fortune reading "Thumb". So guess what happens to the first fortune cookie? Then Apple is revealed to be NotQuiteDead ("[[OnlyAFleshWound It's just a peel wound]]", he says), and the first fortune cookie's fortune is revealed to read "Knife". You can probably guess what happens to Apple.

:: Shortly afterwards, Miss Fortune Cookie gets crushed, revealing a fortune reading "Thumb". So guess what happens to the first fortune cookie? Then Apple is revealed to be NotQuiteDead, and the first fortune cookie's fortune is revealed to read "Knife". You can probably guess what happens to Apple.

* An episode of ''Series/{{The Twilight Zone|1985}}'' aptly titled "The Misfortune Cookie" has Harry Folger, a [[CausticCritic nasty food critic]] for a newspaper, visit a new restaurant--Mr. Lee's Chinese Cuisine. He starts writing a negative review ''before he goes'', then refuses to eat any of the massive order he places before demanding the check. Mr. Lee instead offers a fortune cookie -- "A grand reward awaits you just around the corner." After leaving, Harry turns a corner and immediately bumps into a crook who just robbed a jewelry store; the owner gratefully gives him a thousand dollars, or a ''grand'', in thanks. Harry realizes that Mr. Lee's cookies can predict the immediate future and demands another, which predicts that "April arrives today bringing romance" despite it being September--and sure enough, he bumps into an attractive woman named April on the way to the office and asks her for a date. When they go to Mr. Lee's again that night, April's cookie warns that she'll soon realize "a grave error in judgment," while Harry's simply says "You're going to die." Harry causes a massive scene, and April realizes that the "error" was dating him, so she leaves. Mr. Lee explains that the fortunes always come true, but Harry storms out anyway, only to suddenly become so famished that he can barely walk. He finds himself facing an endless series of Chinese restaurants, visiting each and devouring as much as he can only to find that he's still hungry. A final fortune cookie reveals the truth--"You're dead"; he'll be spending all of eternity [[IronicHell eating plate after plate but never feeling a bit satisfied.]]

* ''Franchise/{{Peanuts}}'': In ''WesternAnimation/BeMyValentineCharlieBrown'', Charlie Brown gets one that simply says, "Forget it, kid!"

* An inversion of sorts in the ''WesternAnimation/StarVsTheForcesOfEvil'' episode "Fortune Cookies": Star begins relying on fortune cookies for guidance, so [[MagnificentBastard Toffee]] suggests that [[BigBadWannabe Ludo]] send a minion to replace a cookie in her bag with a cookie containing a forged fortune telling her to become an ActualPacifist, so she'll be distracted trying to make friends with Ludo's minions long enough for him to steal her MagicWand. It almost works, until one of his minions that Star was giving a hug comes clean about it. Played straight at the end of the episode when Star gets a fortune that reads, "A great evil has been unleashed." Star and Marco dismiss it, but the camera then focuses on Toffee, hinting [[KnightOfCerebus he is this great evil]].

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* ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'': This is what kickstarts the plot of the episode "Final Desmithation", when Jerry gets the bizarre fortune that he will have sex with his mother. He gets so paranoid that it will happen that Rick begrudgingly helps him get to the bottom of the mystery fortune. The two discover that fortune cookies are actually the [[RealityWarper reality-warping]] excretions of an alien beast Fortune 500 has imprisoned; most fortunes are intentionally written to be meaningless so that genuinely useful fortunes are more valuable, but the caretaker of the creature has been writing a few "you will have sex with your mother" fortunes in the hopes that someone will investigate where they're coming from and rescue him. [[spoiler:Jerry is able to narrowly avoid having sex with his mother when Rick creates a secondary fortune that Jerry ''won't'' have sex with his mother, which cancels out the first fortune.]]

** In episode "The Last Temptation of Homer", Homer is tempted to have an affair with an attractive co-worker and it looks like the universe itself is encouraging him to do so. At one point he gets a fortune cookie that says "You will find happiness with a new love", causing him to lament "Even the Chinese are against me!" Then we cut to the kitchen, where one employee says that they're out of "new love" cookies and his co-worker tells him "Eh, open up the 'Stick with your wife' barrel."
*** In a later episode where Homer was talking about that story, he said that the fortune cookie "predicted doom".
** Also discussed in the episode "A Milhouse Divided," when the Van Houtens decide to divorce after a fight at Marge's dinner party:

* Pictured above, the ''WesternAnimation/RockosModernLife'' short "Fortune Cookie" had Filburt (nicknaming himself "Mr. Lucky" after scoring a spot on a game show) receive a bad fortune from his cookie. And in ''dozens'' of cookies afterward, proving it wasn't just a one-off. This triggers a chain of bad luck he suffers throughout the rest of the short, until he gets one little spot of good luck in the wake of causing disaster for everyone else around him.

** In episode "The Last Temptation of Homer", Homer is tempted to have an affair with an attractive co-worker and it looks like the universe itself is encouraging him to do so. At one point he gets a fortune cookie that says "You will find happiness with a new love", causing him to lament "Even the Chinese are against me!" Then we cut to the kitchen, where one employee says that they're out of "new love" cookies and his co-worker tells him "Eh, crack open a barrel of 'Stick with your wife'."

** [[Film/ItChapterTwo Chapter 2 of the live-action film adaptation]] features a variation where, instead of scary messages, the fortunes each are only one word, which the Losers rearrange into a message from Pennywise that both mocks them and reveals the fate of Stan, who didn't come back to Derry.

* In ''[[VideoGame/AnimalCrossing Animal Crossing: New Leaf]]'', you can buy fortune cookies from Timmy and Tommy's shop, then give the fortune to them for a prize. Usually, it's a piece of Creator/{{Nintendo}} memorabilia, but there's a 1 in 10 chance you'll get a pessimistic-sounding fortune that will yield you a random piece of furniture, flooring, or wallpaper.

* Pictured above, the ''WesternAnimation/RockosModernLife'' short "Fortune Cookie" had Filburt (nicknaming himself "Mr. Lucky" after scoring a spot on a game show) receive a bad fortune from his cookie. And in ''[[UpToEleven dozens]]'' of cookies afterward, proving it wasn't just a one-off. This triggers a chain of bad luck he suffers throughout the rest of the short, until he gets one little spot of good luck in the wake of causing disaster for everyone else around him.

** It Happens to Jon in [[https://www.gocomics.com/garfield/2007/10/07 this comic]]; while Garfield's cookie is an overly long praise, Jon's cookie simply reads "it stinks to be you".

* ''Series/LetsMakeADeal'': A popular game in the iconic game show involved Monty Hall handing out giant fortune cookies to contestants, each bearing messages. After deciding whether to take a cash buyout, Monty would open that contestant’s cookie. The trope, then, fits if the contestant decided to keep the cookie (i.e. declined the cash and took what was behind the curtain) and the message referred to a Zonk (eg, “Not a good prize for you today, sorry.”), meaning he/she decided wrong and lost.

* ''ComicStrip/{{Garfield}}'': Happens to Jon in [[https://www.gocomics.com/garfield/2007/10/07 this comic]]; while Garfield's cookie is an overly long praise, Jon's cookie simply reads "it stinks to be you".

** ''Film/ItChapterTwo Chapter 2 of the live-action film adaptation'' features a variation where, instead of scary messages, the fortunes each are only one word, which the Losers rearrange into a message from Pennywise that both mocks them and reveals the fate of Stan, who didn't come back to Derry.