History Main / ThousandOrigamiCranes

* The most famous attempt and (sad) subversion: Hiroshima bombing victim [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadako_Sasaki Sadako Sasaki]], who reached one thousand and continued to fold more up 'til her death. (Which is only one version of the story -- another states that she completed 644 before she could not continue, and her friends finished the thousand.)
** ''TabletopGame/PerplexCity'' had a card entitled "Sadako Sasaki" based on this.

* LightNovel/HaruhiSuzumiya combines this with IfIHadANickel in ''Fanfic/KyonBigDamnHero'':

* Played for laughs in ''Manga/KaguyaSamaLoveIsWar'' spin-off series ''We Want to Talk About Kaguya'', where Erika folds 1000 cranes for Kaguya's health when she's out sick for two days with a fever. Of course, Kaguya had already gotten better by the time she finished and Karen wouldn't allow her to give them too her personally on the grounds that it would be creepy, so they just hang them in their club room instead.

* Parodied in one ''Anime/CrayonShinChan'' comic strip where the Nohara's neighbor, Michi - one half of the SickeninglySweethearts duo alongside her husband Yoshirin - gets a bad cold, which, while a terrible disease is an inconvenience at worse and by no means fatal. Yoshirin as usual drags Shin-Chan and Hiroshi into his antics, including asking them to fold a thousand cranes for Michi to recover ''[[SeriousBusiness else he hangs himself]]''.

* The opening of a case in ''VideoGame/LANoire'' shows a man in a dark room folding origami cranes amongst many others. Later on, Phelps makes reference to this particular legend when he sees the room.

* In ''VideoGame/Disgaea3AbsenceOfJustice'', the apply named Asuka Cranekick is known to enjoy folding paper cranes. She even once promised to [[spoiler:Almaz, who is covering the fact that he is slowly dying by pretending to be sick]] that she will fold thousand paper cranes to them so that they can rest in peace. She even suffered from demon leukemia, and would have suffered from it even to this date if Raspberyl hadn't donated bone-marrow for her.
* In ''VideoGame/Persona4'', the PlayerCharacter can spend time in his room folding cranes, which increases his Understanding statistic. Unlike other jobs this can be done during spare time, doesn't bring money, but once the set's complete it gives an item. How long it takes to do so depends on which choices are made and whether they work out well - generally, one choice gives you the standard progress, while another can either make the PC work faster or slow down.
* ''Franchise/FireEmblem'':
** In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemFates'', the supports between Princess Hinoka and Hayato involves her teaching him to fold cranes.
** In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemWarriors'', Hinoka and Elise's support has the two rival princesses bonding by learning how to fold origami cranes, and with Hinoka being surprised that Elise knows about the "thousand crane" legend.
* PlayedForDrama in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheOrigamiKing'': [[spoiler:King Olly is hoping to fold 1000 cranes so he can make a wish to ''[[FinalSolution eradicate all the Toads]]'' because the Toad who created him scribbled on his paper which he took as a great insult, and [[YouAllLookFamiliar all Toads look alike]], so he was seeing the face of the guy he hated everywhere he went. By the end of the game, he's folded 999 cranes, and plans to fold Mario into the 1000th. After he is defeated and learns that the "scribble" was actually a message from his creator hoping he would be a kind and wise king, he suffers MyGodWhatHaveIDone and requests that Olivia fold ''him'' into the 1000th crane and make a wish. She does and makes a wish to undo all of his creations, which unfortunately includes herself]].

* In ''VideoGame/MegamanBattleNetwork 3'', there is a ''senbanzuru'' hanging on the wall of one of the hospital rooms. You need to find it and retrieve one of the paper cranes from it to advance the plot, but the lack of a CulturalTranslation around this makes the whole hint LostInTranslation and comes off as obtuse to anyone who doesn't know of this trope.

* In ''VideoGame/MegamanBattleNetwork 3'', there are 1000 (unseen) origami cranes in a room of the hospital. You need to take one in order to advance the plot.

* Another variation: In ''Manga/BarefootGen'', Gen and his brother Shinji decide to make "a thousand-stitches belt" and go to town to ask people to contribute stitches. The belt is meant to be a gift to their oldest brother, who's going off to fight in the war soon (this is also TruthInTelevision, see the "Real Life" folder below and the trope description above).

* This is the main hinge of Manga/CaterpillarGirlAndBadTexterBoy, where a wish will be granted if someone writes it on a piece of paper, folds it into a crane and leaves it as an offering to a small shrine in the forest. This is how Suzume became a [[BalefulPolymorph giant caterpillar]] and the first place Akane starts looking for to restore Suzume to human form.

There is something similar called Senninbari. Senninbari was a strip of white cloth, approximately one meter in length, decorated with 1000 stitches in red thread from 1000 women, used as an amulet given to soldiers on their way to war as a part of the Shinto culture of Imperial Japan. The belts were believed to confer courage, good luck and immunity from injury (especially bullets) upon their wearers. See [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senninbari this]] entry in Wiki/TheOtherWiki for more, though really the fact that today the UsefulNotes/KaijuDefenseForce uses kevlar ballistic armor like everybody else (not to mention the fact that it's a ''defense force'' and not an actual army anymore) should tell you just about everything you really need to know.

* As mentioned in the trope description, this is a major part of ''Literature/{{Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes}}''. {{Based on a true story}}, Sadako, born in Hiroshima two years before the atom bombs fell, contracts leukemia and attempts to fold 1000 paper cranes because of the legend that doing so will grant her one wish. [[spoiler: She dies with only 644 completed, but her classmates finish the rest and she is buried with them. According to Sadako's brother, however, it is untrue that Sadako died without meeting her goal, and she actually managed to fold around 1400.]]

* In ''Kodomo no Jikan'', after Rin's IllGirl mother Aki began to falter in health, Rin started making cranes day after day in an attempt to keep her alive, and Aki was covered in them when she finally died. [[spoiler:Worse still, in Chapter 70 she states that she felt that the reason Aki died is that she couldn't complete all thousand.]]

** Similarly, in an otherwise unrelated fic, titled ''Paper Cranes'', we have an IllGirl Satsuki being mentioned to have done this in letters dated "June 3rd" and "October 15th" that Ryuuko addresses to her.
* ''Fanfic/CindersAndAshesTheChroniclesOfKamenRiderDante'' [[EstablishingCharacterMoment establishes Kotoha]] as an IllGirl through a hospital visit where Honoka quickly notices two dozen or so paper cranes and puts two and two together.

* In ''Webcomic/HannaIsNotABoysName'', a paper crane appears before [[FanNickname [...] ]] as a sort of spiritual guide. According to Hanna, the guide takes on the form of something with emotional significance for each individual, but since [...] [[LossOfIdentity doesn't remember anything about his life]] [[OurZombiesAreDifferent before he died]], whatever meaning it had for him is more or less gone. Hanna decides that's too depressing, so he starts folding 1,000 cranes to grant a wish, "so it can mean something again." (Touchingly enough, fans of the series have started folding their own cranes to help out. You can find their progress on their Website/DeviantArt [[http://hinabn-1000-cranes.deviantart.com group page]].)

* PlayedForDrama in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheOrigamiKing'': [[spoiler:King Olly is hoping to fold 1000 cranes so he can make a wish to ''eradicate all the Toads'' because the Toad who created him scribbled on his paper which he took as a great insult, and [[YouALLLookFamiliar all Toads look alike]], so he was seeing the face of the guy he hated everywhere he went. By the end of the game, he's folded 999 cranes, and plans to fold Mario into the 1000th. After he is defeated and learns that the "scribble" was actually a message from his creator hoping he would be a kind and wise king, he suffers MyGodWhatHaveIDone and requests that Olivia fold ''him'' into the 1000th crane and make a wish. She does and makes a wish to undo all of his creations, which unfortunately includes herself]].

* In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemFates'', the supports between Princess Hinoka and Hayato involves her teaching him to fold cranes.

* As mentioned in the trope description, this is a major part of ''Literature/{{Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes}}''. {{Based on a true story}}, Sadako, born in Hiroshima two years before the atom bombs fell, contracts leukemia and attempts to fold 1000 paper cranes because of the legend that doing so will grant her one wish. [[spoiler: She dies with only 644 completed, but her classmates finish the rest and she is buried with them.]]

* The story of Sadako Sasaki is referenced in the 1993 Creator/MushiProductions anime film ''Tsuru ni Notte: Tomoko no Boken'' (On a Paper Crane: Tomoko's Adventure), about a girl named Tomoko (played by Creator/KotonoMitsuishi) who visits the Hiroshima Peace Memorial and befriends Sadako's spirit.

* Similarly, in an otherwise unrelated fic, titled ''Paper Cranes'', we have an IllGirl Satsuki being mentioned to have done this in letters dated "June 3rd" and "October 15th" that Ryuuko addresses to her.

* After [[DeusAngstMachina the latest in a long line of traumatic experiences]], ''Manga/{{Narutaru}}'''s ShrinkingViolet Akira Sakura cut school for weeks and holed herself up in her room. When her friend Shiina (and... acquaintance Sudo) came to see her, they find she's (apparently) been spending her time trying to make a thousand paper cranes, one for each of the soldiers Satomi previously killed.

* PlayedForDrama in ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheOrigamiKing'': [[spoiler:Olly is hoping to fold a thousand cranes so he can make a wish to ''eradicate all the Toads''. In the end, when he is defeated, he requests Olivia to fold him into a crane and make a wish. She does and makes a wish to undo all of his creations, including herself]].

* Sadly, not everyone agrees with the legend of a thousand cranes. The Book of Ratings has [[http://web.archive.org/web/20100906050442/http://www.bookofratings.com/origami.html this]] to say about them.