History Main / SweetAndSourGrapes

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** The TARDIS (the essence of which is now in a human body) drops a big one in Recap/DoctorWhoS32E4TheDoctorsWife, recontextualizing almost 50 years of adventures up to that point, in a majorly positive way:

** During "The Day of the Doctor" the War Doctor is set to use the Moment to destroy both the Time Lords and the Daleks in order to save the rest of the universe until he is sent to see how doing so changed the Tenth and Eleventh Doctors. The War Doctor is at first worried by what he sees, only to realize that in the end they are still the Doctor and will still save lives. He returns to activate the Moment only for the Tenth and Eleventh to appear and help him TakeAThirdOption, apparently saving Gallifrey while destroying the Daleks.
** In one episode, Amy is left on an alien planet, dodging medical robots that will kill her unintentionally, until Rory and the Doctor can come and save her. Because of time travel, they find both her present-day self and her future self, who was abandoned for years and became a rather cynical badass as a result. Throughout the episode, the Doctor insists that both Amys can't be saved and Rory agonizes over which one to rescue since he loves both and both love him in return. Finally, the Doctor figures out a way to rearrange the TARDIS so that both Amys can be saved. [[spoiler:And then it's horribly, horribly subverted when it turns out the Doctor was lying so he could trick Rory and the present-day Amy to go in the TARDIS and let him lock the future Amy out. Everyone's upset about this, but it's just impossible to save both. The future Amy ends up accepting this and lets the medical robots kill her, as she remembers Rory.]]

** In ''Literature/HarryPotterAndTheDeathlyHallows'', Harry is urged by Aberforth to save himself and leave the task of killing Voldemort to someone else. Harry refuses to do so, despite this goal causing him to separate himself from Ginny and lose all hope of a safe, normal life, on the grounds that he'd rather sacrifice his personal desires to ensure no one else is hurt by Voldemort. Even when he learns that [[spoiler:he needs to let Voldemort kill him to ensure Voldemort's demise, completely removing any chance at all of returning to his loved ones]], he goes through with it. [[spoiler:It turns out the whole thing was a gambit set up by Dumbledore. Turns out that Voldemort damaged his soul so much that when he tried to kill Harry and gave him that scar as an infant, he made Harry into an ''7th [[SoulJar Horcrux]].'' This explains their connection, Harry's ability to speak Parseltongue and so on. Harry willing letting himself be killed instead kills off the soul fragment in him and leaving Voldemort more vulnerable (with the last horcrux being destroyed in Nagini thanks to Neville) and leaves him just as himself. Not only that, but because Harry willingly died to protect everyone helping him, he invoked the same magical protection his mom gave him, ensuring that Voldemort really ''can't'' hurt anyone else for the rest of the battle. Voldemort loses when he tries to use the Elder Wand on Harry (but due to wand rules and disarment, Harry became the master after disarming Draco who became it after disarming Dumbledore). The wand refuses to kill its master and backfires, ending Voldemort once and for all.]] And then the WhereAreTheyNow epilogue confirms that Harry ends up marrying Ginny and having the family he's always wanted.

* ''WesternAnimation/KungFuPanda'':

* ''VideoGame/{{BioShock|1}}'' has an infamous example. Whenever you encounter a [[CreepyChild Little Sister]], you're given two options: "Harvest", which kills the Little Sister [[EvilPaysBetter but gives you more]] [[BioAugmentation ADAM]], or "Rescue", which cures the Little Sister of her [[BodyHorror sea slug]]-induced possession [[BeingGoodSucks but gives you less]]... ''in theory.'' [[MamaBear Dr. Tenenbaum]] will reward you for saving the Little Sisters with free [[PowersAsPrograms Plasmids]] and bonus ADAM; all things considered, resisting temptation and playing the hero is ultimately just as rewarding, if not more so, than choosing the evil route. Harvesting every Little Sister grants 280 ADAM which is more than one will get for rescuing. However when you account for the free plasmids and gene tonics you get from Tenenbaum, some of which can only be acquired in this manner, the value of Harvesting disappears entirely; from a rewards perspective, virtue is the superior option. It's especially worth it when you consider the 100G Achievement that comes with rescuing every little sister. This is further helped by how DLC or later versions of the game provide NewGamePlus which allows players to keep the ADAM they collected from previous playthroughs, meaning regardless of the path you take, you'll unlock everything eventually with enough playthroughs and rescuing the Little Sisters would simply speed up that process even further.

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' In the episode "Tapestry", Picard suffers a complication with his artificial heart (the complication involving a [[spoiler:phaser shot to the chest after a peace talk went horribly awry]] and dies, only to find himself in an "afterlife" with [[SufficientlyAdvancedAlien Q]]. Picard regrets picking a fight in his youth that led to the need for an artificial heart in the first place, so Q allows him to go back to that moment in time and [[SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong change things so he doesn't die]]. [[ForWantOfANail Unfortunately, as he learns in a new timeline, not having gone through that brush with death caused him to never take risks and ultimately never truly succeed in life]]. So Picard asks Q to change things back to the way they were before, accepting the eventually fatal consequences of the fight along with the valuable lessons that helped him lead an accomplished life. And then he wakes up in the present, once again captain, and ''his heart is working again''. So much for the ''negative'' consequences of rash actions.

* Riku of the ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'' franchise gets this in his character arc. In the prequel, ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsBirthBySleep'', he is chosen by Terra from the beginning, when he and Sora are much younger, and before Kairi joined the islands, to wield the Keyblade to alleviate his boredom from always being on the same islands and visit other worlds. However, come ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsI'', he loses it upon becoming one with the darkness and so the Keyblade chooses Sora instead. The rest of the game has Riku aligning with Maleficent, being tricked into thinking Sora replaced him and Kairi for Donald and Goofy, and berating Sora for his failure to protect Kairi. He briefly gets the Keyblade at Hollow Bastion, but upon being defeated and Sora getting the Keyblade back, Riku becomes desperate for power to the point of allowing Ansem to take over his body. When Kairi regains her heart and Sora loses his, Riku makes a HeelFaceTurn and finally breaks free in time to close the door to Kingdom Hearts. From there, he spends Castle Oblivion fighting off the darkness in his heart and stops trying to have the Keyblade. Finally, come ''VideoGame/KingdomHearts3DDreamDropDistance'', [[spoiler:not only is he acknowledged as a Keyblade Wielder but after finally rescuing Sora, is chosen over him to become a Keyblade Master, the highest rank]].

** Picard himself theorizes he was never in any danger and the whole thing was a hallucination created by Q to teach Picard a lesson. Another possibility is that Q, satisfied with the lesson Picard learned and perhaps respecting him as a friend, fixed Picard's heart. A third possibility is that Picard was not in danger of dying and that Q wanted to test him anyway.
** Q does a number of things to benefit humanity that seem like dick moves, so any of the three is possible.
** Or it was all DyingDream Picard was suffering before Dr. Crusher could revive him and it never really happened. [[spoiler:One of the novels written about the series has Q cryptically telling Picard that it was both a Dying Dream and something that actually happened.]]

* This trope comes up in a vision of the past in ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia''. All For One shows his brother a man whose Quirk causes his parents to be disgusted by him, and a Quirkless man who can't defend himself from those with powers. He solves the problem by giving the former's Quirk to the latter, with the expectation that both men will be in his debt and help him when he needs it.
* In the oneshot ''Pluses and Minuses'', [[DCupDistress Yuka is uncomfortable with her classmates staring at her large breasts]], while [[ACupAngst her friend Chinatsu is angry about said classmates making fun of her for being flat-chested]]. They decide to try fondling each other's breasts, with Yuka believing it will make hers shrink and Chinatsu believing it will make hers grow.

* ''VideoGame/TheDig'': Maggie makes Commander Low promise not to resurrect her with a life crystal if [[spoiler: (when) activating the alien device kills her]] as its creator warned it would. It's possible to break this promise, which prompts the horrified Maggie to commit suicide; in the end, however, it doesn't matter, as once you've rescued the aliens, they bring both of your dead teammates back to life, with no ill effects. (Except that Maggie slaps you if you tried to resurrect her.)