History Main / NowYouTellMe

* ''Machinima/RedVsBlue'': Church, having traveled back in time, leaves a recorded message of what not to do and the consequences if the others do it in an alien base. All of it happens right as he's speaking it, prompting Caboose to beg "Stop saying these things! Or at least... say them sooner." [[WhatAnIdiot To the recording.]]

** In "[[Recap/BuffyTheVampireSlayerS4E4FearItself Fear Itself]]", while the gang is attempting to stop the demon possessing a Halloween haunted house, Giles reads that "there are two ways of stopping the demon from being fully summoned. Destroying the mark of Gachnar--". Buffy promptly tears up the floorboards that the symbol is painted on. Giles continues "--is '''not''' one of them and will in fact bring forth the fear demon itself." Oops. [[spoiler: Of course, the demon in question is only six inches tall.]]

*** Of course, you learn this ''after'' [[spoiler: Shepherd and his men have shot Roach/you and Ghost, and are busy dousing you in gasoline and setting you on fire.]]

'''Terry:''' Thanks for telling me ''now.''
* ''WesternAnimation/JackieChanAdventures'': During the Season 4 finale, the J-Team discovers that a part of the tablet they found at the beginning of the season that detailed about the Oni Generals and their masks was flipped over. It turns out to be a warning [[spoiler: to not reunite the masks in one place, as doing so would break the masks and free all the Oni Generals. Naturally, they only learn about this [[NiceJobBreakingItHero after they did just that]].]]

** The cartoon "Tick Tock Tuckered" has Porky and Daffy efforting to not be late for work with the threat of termination looming over their heads. They arrive to their workplace on time, only to find a sign that says that it's closed because it's Saturday. (Daffy: "Mmmm...now he tells me!") Similarly done in the short's original edition, "Porky's Badtime Story" (with Porky and Gabby Goat, where they just shrug).

* TruthInTelevision or UrbanLegend? A zoo allegedly had a sign on its monkey enclosure reading, "Warning: These monkeys steal glasses." Of course, this mostly happened whenever anyone wearing glasses leaned forward to read the sign....

** The Japanese Ambassador was supposed to deliver a declaration that they considered the negotiations - it's complicated - to be over ''right before'' the attack was to take place. However, the final declaration was 5000 characters long; consequently the Embassy failed to meet the unrealistic deadline they had been given. It did not help that the Embassy used native Japanese typists, rather than the usual locals out of fears of espionage, which dragged out the time needed to type and transmit the message even longer. Moreover, just when they had ''finally'' gotten it all written down and printed out on nice paper and everything, the ambassador got stuck in traffic....
*** Amusingly, the fact that the US had thoroughly broken the Japanese Diplomatic Cypher (codenamed ''Purple'') meant Signals Intelligence had the declaration before the Japanese ambassador.

* During the shooting of ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack'', this was practically director Irv Kirschner's CatchPhrase whenever one of the special effects failed spectacularly. R2-D2 is skidding all over the place? We didn't test to see if it could run on the artificial snow of the Echo Base set. [[EpicFail One of the X-Wing's wings snapping off while Yoda is lifting it from the swamp,]] in full view of a horrified Creator/GeorgeLucas? We forgot to test if the model could withstand being underwater. "Now you tell me!" Irv would snap.

* In a Franchise/NancyDrew Files book, Nancy and the [[GirlOfTheWeek Guy Of The Book]] have been tied up and left to die on a boat rigged to explode. When they free themselves, Nancy explains that they have to jump and swim for it, at which point he tells her, "I can't swim". She responds by name-dropping this tropes.

* Variation on ''Series/{{Angel}}''. Cordelia is snooping around an empty house when she has a vision of being attacked by a big ugly demon. As she recovers from the headache, she turns around and finds herself face to face with the very same. "Real helpful!" * Concussion*

** Used when Goku asks Old Kai how long Potara fusion lasts for, the latter says it's permanent. ''After'' Supreme Kai and Kibito have already demonstrated it. Luckily, ''Anine/DragonBallSuper'' reveals that the Dragon Balls can reverse it (and that it's only permanent if one of the people involved is a Kai).

* ''Anime/DragonballZ'':
** Used when Goku asks Old Kai how long Potara fusion lasts for, the latter says it's permanent. ''After'' Supreme Kai and Kibito have already demonstrated it. Luckily, ''Super'' reveals that the Dragon Balls can reverse it (and that it's only permanent if one of the people involved is a Kai).

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* ''WesternAnimation/JackieChanAdventures'': During the Season 4 finale, the J-Team discovers that a part of the tablet they found at the beginning of the series that detailed about the Oni Generals and their masks was flipped over. It turns out to be a warning [[spoiler: to not reunite the masks in one place, as doing so would break the masks and free all the Oni Generals. Naturally, they only learn about this [[NiceJobBreakingItHero after they did just that]].]]

* In the ''WesternAnimation/HouseOfMouse'' short "How to Haunt a House", Goofy puts a bedsheet over his head to scare Donald, only to mess up from not being able to see through the sheet. The narrator then tells Goofy to put eyeholes in the sheet, promoting him to say this.

Compare CantYouReadTheSign, CueCardPause and YouDidntAsk.

--->'''Vegeta:''' Imbecile, you tell me now? Don't you think that’s important information!?

* In the ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'' episode "Tea At The Treedome", Patrick [[FailedASpotCheck didn't notice there wasn't any water in Sandy's treedome]] until he went into it himself.

* ''Film/BackToTheFuture'': Marty is blown across the room when he tries to hook up to the amplifier. Then the Doc calls and warns Marty not to do that.

* In ''WebComic/TheOrderOfTheStick'', Roy's Outer Planar girlfriend Celia gives him a talisman that would let him summon her by breaking it. When Roy was falling to his doom, he tried to break it so Celia would save him, but was unable to do so, resulting in him splatting on the ground. Later on, the talisman accidentally breaks when it ends up getting zapped by lightning, with Celia explaining that the talisman was designed to be broken by magical energy, [[IThoughtEveryoneCouldDoIt which she assumed all humans were capable of generating]]. Needless to say, both Hayley and Roy's spirit are a bit annoyed.

* In ''WesternAnimation/OverTheGardenWall'', the first few episodes have Wirt, Greg and Beatrice trying to find a witch named Adelaide who can seemingly get the former two back home and restore the latter to her human self. It ultimately turned out to be a trap due to Adelaide trying to enslave the boys. They managed to beat her and Wirt and Greg meet an old woman and her niece in the following episode. After solving that episode's situation and the two prepare to continue their journey, the old woman reveals that Adelaide is her evil sister and to avoid her at all costs. Wirt's expression, understandably, has this trope all over it.

* At the end of ''WesternAnimation/Invincible2021'''s season one, Allen returns to Earth with an urgent message for Invincible: [[spoiler:there's a Viltrumite on the planet that could begin their plans to conquer it any second]]. Unlike most examples, however, the ''best'' case scenario of the characters learning this ahead of time probably would have been things going exactly as bad as they already did.

** The ''WesternAnimation/WileECoyoteAndTheRoadrunner'' cartoon "Hopalong Casualty" sees Wile E. Coyote feeding the Road Runner a bunch of [[AcmeProducts Acme]] Earthquake Pills. When this doesn't do anything to the Road Runner, Coyote swallows the rest of the pills in disgust. Only then does he [[ReadTheFinePrint notice the small print]] on the bottle: "Caution: Not Effective On Road Runners". At which point the Earthquake Pills start to take effect on Coyote with (of course) hilariously disastrous consequences.

* One of the ''RoadRunnerVsCoyote'' cartoons sees Wile E. Coyote feeding the Road Runner a bunch of [[AcmeProducts Acme]] Earthquake Pills. When this doesn't do anything to the Road Runner, Coyote swallows the rest of the pills in disgust. Only then does he notice the small print on the bottle: "Caution: Not Effective On Road Runners". At which point the Earthquake Pills start to take effect on Coyote with (of course) hilariously disastrous consequences.

* Happens a lot in ''VisualNovel/ShukufukuNoCampanella''. Salsa will do something, and Ritos will tell her about a certain hazard too late for her to avoid it. Salsa shouts the trope name, which then brings GravityIsAHarshMistress into things.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'' episode "Tea At The Treedome", [[FailedASpotCheck Patrick didn't notice there wasn't any water in Sandy's treedome]] until he went into it himself.