History Main / PerspectiveReversal

* One [[UsefulNotes/TheBronzeAgeOfComicBooks Bronze Age]] ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' story begins with Batman unsuccessfully trying to convince the parole board not to let Penguin out of prison. When Penguin gets out, Batman keeps a close eye on him, convinced that his apparently innocent activities are [[FalselyReformedVillain a front for some new criminal scheme]]. Sure enough, he exposes Penguin's plan... to give legitimate jobs to ex-cons, which he had to do secretly because associating with them at all was a parole violation. The story [[BookEnds ends]] with Batman unsuccessfully trying to convince the parole board not to send Penguin back to prison.

* ''Manga/AttackOnTitan'' begins with protagonist Eren Jaeger’s hometown of Shiganshina under assault by Titans, with this becoming the first confrontation in the new conflict between humans and Titans. The Colossal Titan appears suddenly to kick in Wall Maria and is reinforced by the Armored Titan. [[spoiler: Years later, a regretful and broken Reiner Braun - the Armored Titan - loses his hometown of Liberio to an strike by the Attack Titan - Eren Jaeger - reinforced by the Scouts. This becomes the first battle in the new war between Marley and Paradis. Reiner’s hatred of the Eldian people which motivated the attack is replaced by overwhelming guilt, while Eren’s anger against the Titans is displaced by hatred of Marleyans.]]

* It's subtle, but this a major theme in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX'' and its sequel, ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX2''. In the first game, Tidus (the protagonist) is a carefree teen who does not see the value of crusading to defeat Sin if he only temporarily stays defeated and considers it AllForNothing. It isn't until he learns that his LoveInterest (Yuna) will [[spoiler:have to sacrifice herself]] to defeat [[BigBad Sin]] that he starts to undergo CharacterDevelopment and ''refuses'' to [[spoiler:let Yuna sacrifice herself]] to save the world. There's a conversation roughly a third of the way through the game which highlights their different philosophies, in which Tidus questions whether [[spoiler:sacrificing your life]], even when [[RegularlyScheduledEvil the Big Bad is sure to come back]] is worth it and Yuna disagrees and says she feels ''any'' sacrifice is worth bringing just a ''little'' happiness to the world. In the end, [[spoiler:Tidus has to make a HeroicSacrifice ''himself'' in order to destroy Sin and break the ViciousCycle, ''devastating'' Yuna, who had been prepared to sacrifice herself, but not her loved ones]]. Then, in the sequel, Yuna is a HeartbrokenBadass ActionGirl whose perspectives on sacrifice have completely changed. When another character offers to sacrifice himself in order to defeat the new BigBad, Yuna shoots his plan down ''immediately'', stating how much she's grown to hate having to [[PyrrhicVictory "lose in order to win"]]. To make this juxtaposition even more poignant, Yuna's outfit throughout the second game is a direct homage to her dead love.

-->-- '''Nick''' [[LampshadeHanging commenting on]] an example of this, ''Webcomic/GeneralProtectionFault''

* A subplot in ''ComicBook/{{Invincible}}'' has Robot and Monster Girl being transported to an alternate dimension where time flows at a faster pace - they help free a community of slaves from TheEmpire, and in less than a decade, see the former slaves grow into opressors who discriminate against imperial descendants.

* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/DextersLaboratory'', Dee Dee crushes a bunch of ants, because she thinks they're filthy. Dexter, who find ants interesting, shrinks them both down to ant size so Dee Dee can get a better idea of their society. After some adventures, they return to normal size, at which point Dee Dee happily thanks Dexter for showing her just how cool ants really are - while Dexter is squashing them.

* The Wiki/SCPFoundation {{verse}} is rife with these, both within individual SCP's and tales and in the broader lore, but one of the most shining examples is the Church of the Broken God. Once the [=CotBG=] was seen as a zealous cult of {{Machine Worship}}ers and the Foundation as the only group preventing them from initiating an apocalypse out of blind adherence to doctrine. Several years of plot development and lore exploration later, however, and there is a growing possibility that the Foundation's blind adherence to the doctrine of contain first, dissect and ask questions later, has been crippling the keepers of humanity's only weapon against one of the greatest threats the foundation has ever known.

** In their respective debut films, [[Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger Steve Rogers]] just wants to join the Army and do his part for his country, and [[Film/IronMan1 Tony Stark]] is an egotist who has little use for authority. By the time of ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar'', the fallout from his reckless actions have made Tony believe that the Avengers need to be subject to oversight while Steve, having witnessed how corrupted and obstructive governing bodies have become in the modern day, distrusts the idea, to the point where the two end up leading opposing factions of the team.

** Early in the films, [[ComicBook/CaptainAmerica Steve Rogers]] just wants to join the Army and do his part for his country, and [[ComicBook/IronMan Tony Stark]] is an egotist who has little use for authority. By the time of ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar'', the fallout from his reckless actions have made Tony believe that the Avengers need to be subject to oversight while Steve, having witnessed how corrupted and obstructive governing bodies have become in the modern day, distrusts the idea, to the point where the two end up leading opposing factions of the team.

* In ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'' episode "Mommy Fearest", when the girls attempt to sneak into the house after after fighting crime despite the Professor's new girlfriend Ima Goodlady forbidding them to, the lights turn on to reveal her angrily waiting for them on the couch. When the girls later figure it out that it's really Sedusa, it then goes to Sedusa sneaking into the house with a bag of jewels and the girls turning on the light while looking smugly on the couch.