Xanatos Gambit / Live-Action Films

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• Aladdin (2019): Upon suspecting that Prince Ali is really Aladdin, Jafar has him captured for interrogation. Upon Ali's denials, Jafar threatens to have him thrown into the sea if not told the location of the lamp. If he dies, then Jafar will know he was telling the truth and will have also eliminated a powerful rival. If he survives, then Jafar will know exactly who he is.
• In Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Lex Luthor sets up the fight between Superman and Batman so that whoever wins the fight, he wins. He's been manipulating Bruce into a paranoid rage, so that the Dark Knight is prepared to kill the Man of Steel, seeing him as a dangerous alien and a threat to humanity. Then Lex kidnaps Martha Kent, offering Clark a Sadistic Choice — kill Batman or let Martha die. So the possible outcomes:
  1. Batman kills Superman — Lex has engineered Superman's death and proven that Superman is not "all powerful", plus Clark'll die knowing he failed to save his mother, just to twist the knife).
  2. Superman wins and is forced to kill Batman — Clark now has blood on his hands, and Lex has proven that Superman is not "all good". Lex can then play his trump card, Doomsday, an almost unstoppable Kryptonian monster even more powerful than Superman. So even if Clark wins, Doomsday will kill him, so Lex still ends up with Superman dead.
  3. Clark is able to convince Bruce to help him and they team up — this is what actually happens, and something Lex didn't really see coming, but he still has Doomsday, simply releasing the monster to kill both of them. And yes, it ends up with Superman dead. So while it's a Pyrrhic Victory — Lex goes to jail, losing his reputation and his fortune, and Superman is even more beloved by the public as a martyr than when he was alive — but it's a victory nonetheless. Of course the plan only works if Doomsday and Superman killed each other. If Superman survived, then Lex would go to jail and if Doomsday won, he would kill the entire human race.
• In The Dark Knight, the Joker set up several situations where either outcome would please him.
  • When he attacked Dent's motorcade, he won regardless — either he killed Dent or Batman, Batman killed him and broke his 'one rule', or the Joker was caught by police — in which case he had a goon with a stomach full of dynamite, and two buildings full of timed explosives ready to go.
  • Later, he made people choose between killing a man or restraining themselves, letting him blow up a hospital. Finally, he gave two ships' occupants the choice to choose which ship would blow up. He didn't care how they chose — either would have delighted him. He was furious when neither chose to attack the other, but he was ready for that as well and prepared to blow them up himself.
  • After his ferry plot failed the Xanatos test by virtue of getting some new scars, he still had one last gambit to play: corrupting Harvey Dent, which Batman thwarts with a Zero-Approval Gambit. While forcing Batman to taint his own reputation and even break his "one rule" against Dent in the process is arguably a win for the Joker in and of itself, the fact this lie eventually falls apart in The Dark Knight Rises grants him another victory in the long term.
• In Deewaar, Vijay concocts a plan wherein Daavar's man Darpan will tell Samant's gang where Vijay will be, giving them a chance to kill him. He reasons that regardless of whether they succeed in killing him, they will trust the Fake Defector Darpan.
• Die Feuerzangenbowle has one of these as a simple but effective school prank: The alleged student Johann Pfeiffer (actually the successful author Dr. Johannes Pfeiffer incognito) hangs up a "Closed due to construction" sign on the school gates. Of course, the teachers want to remove it, but if they do, they'll show everyone that they've all been fooled. No day off, but they lose their dignity. Pfeiffer wins. What they actually do is leave the sign in place and simulate construction works to make it more credible. They keep their dignity at the price of a day off. Pfeiffer wins.
• The Emperor's Club: During the second historical knowledge competition, Sedgewick knows that whether he wins or loses, he'll still have an opportunity to grandstand for his wealthy former classmates to support his Senate bid.
• In The Exorcist, the demon(s) possessing Regan are actually after the soul of Father Damien...either the little girl or the priest; either way they win. Except that Damien sacrifices himself to outwit them in the end.
• Final Destination: Death always wins, regardless of what those on Death's list do to spite it. Given that nobody lives forever, no survivor can elude Death indefinitely. There is only one proven way for a survivor to escape the list which is to kill someone else and take their lifespan- but this gives Death its desired victim anyway and fills the rift in its design.
• The villains' plan in G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. First, Destro develops Nano-mite warheads for NATO, in order to secure their funding to build his criminal empire. He intends to use them in major population zones to scare the world into the arms of the "world's most powerful man". OK, that's a cute little Batman Gambit he has going. However the Nano-Mites themselves are the brainchild of The Doctor (not that one), who himself is using Destro (oh wait, there he is) as a Unwitting Pawn. All The Doctor wants is to invent bizarre new methods to kill and torture (For Science!) and needs the funding from the plan to succeed. When the heroes foil the plan and ruin his chances, he uses the chaos of the escape and Destro's sudden loss of his power base to usurp control and devote the groups actions to his scientific endeavors while assuming the mantle of Commander. Ah, but there's more to it than that. The success or failure of the Nano-mite attack was irrelevant to the long-term plan. All that matters was that it was launched, providing an opportunity to get the President of the USA (the "world's most powerful man") into a position where he could be replaced by a doppelganger (who is probably still under the Commander's control, even if he thinks that he isn't). Now that this has been done, scaring up a terrorist threat large enough to justify seizing extraordinary powers should be child's play. Which leads on to the next stage of the plan — if Joe remain oblivious, Zartan will be in a position to cripple them, and if they find out and attempt to remove him, the attempt could easily be portrayed as a military coup, which would cause their allies to turn on them. Even if Joe succeeds in exposing Zartan, they will have suffered substantial damage and will be under a lingering cloud of suspicion; the world's governments having been driven into a crippling and eminently exploitable state of paranoia by the twin prospects of a renegade military and high officials being replaced by duplicates. Meanwhile the Commander and Destro will certainly have been freed, and the seeds of the Cobra organisation laid.
• The Hunger Games: Katniss and Peeta, the last survivors, are told that the rule that allowed them to win together has been revoked, so one has to kill the other. Katniss decides to have both herself and Peeta eat the nightlock berries, denying the Games their champion and giving District 12 two martyrs instead. Doing so forces Seneca to decide between letting them both win or letting there be no champion, thus stoking further civil unrest. Seneca chooses the former, and is then forced to offer himself as the final casualty of the Games.
• In Iron Man 2, Whiplash/Ivan Vanko pulls off one of these. During the events of the film, Iron Man/Tony Stark is continually under fire for taking on too much in his attempt to, as he says it, "privatize world peace." Vanko wants revenge against Stark and aims to kill him, but he knows that even should Stark defeat or even kill him, Stark's inability to stop the damage Vanko did at the Stark expo will tarnish Iron Man's reputation and put a dent in his legacy. Either way, he gets his revenge.
• In Jurassic World, Vic Hoskins forms an elaborate plan which has him and Dr. Wu intentionally engineer the breakout of the I. rex and have the ACU, his own team of InGen mercenaries or eventually Owen's trained Velociraptors to bring the beast down. If the ACU succeed, he earns himself a promotion within the Masrani company. If InGen succeed, he gets all the praise for resolving the situation and gets plastered all over the news as a hero. If Owen's raptors win, or they all fail to defeat the I. rex, he can market the winning dinosaur as a bioweapon to the military. And even better, nothing blows back onto him and he can simply walk away as Masrani are left to pick up the shattered remains of the park and their reputation. Eventually subverted, as Hoskins didn't count on the I. rex establishing itself as the raptors' alpha and siccing them on his hapless men, then eventually killing him.
• The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen consists of a by-the-book example: the bunch are called together with the sole reason of acquiring their "components" for super soldiers, their employer was the Big Bad, and the plan comes together the moment they save the day. Something similar happened in the comic, but instead of stealing their powers, Moriarty was trying to steal the cavorite from First Men in the Moon from Dr. FuManchu.
• Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels: Hatchet Harry wants revenge on Ed's dad for winning a large sum of money of him at cards, and wants the pub he bought with the money. To get it back, he invites Ed to play cards, and cheats until Ed is a quarter of a million in debt to him. What can happen is three things:
  1. Ed doesn't come up with the money, and Ed's dad refuses to help him out by handing over his pub, giving Harry a good reason to kill both Ed and his dad.
  2. Ed doesn't come up with the money, but Ed's dad is willing to trade the pub for his son's life, giving Harry the pub he wants, as well as revenge for the loss which bought the pub.
  3. Ed comes up with the money, and Harry walks away without revenge or pub, but with a quarter of a million pounds.
• In Mary, Queen of Scots (1971), Elizabeth remarks about Mary's choice of suitors and aptly describes this very trope.
  "If she chooses Dudley, then we are safe from foreign Catholic princes, though I admit it will be a hard price for me to pay. If she takes Darnley, we have given nothing and she has a weak, degenerate fool as her consort. Win or lose the wager, I cannot lose the game."
• In National Treasure, the Freemasons performed one by hiding part of the location of the Templar treasure from the British government on the back of the Declaration of Independence. If the U.S. became independent, the Declaration would become an artefact of national importance, any measures put in place by the Freemasons to protect it would seem reasonable, and the treasure would remain in Masonic hands. Conversely, if the British won, the Declaration would be declared seditious materials and destroyed, forever keeping the treasure out of British hands.
• The plan to get rid of The Pit in PCU. Either they don't get the money in time, or they try a plan that would get them in trouble, even if it's in the form of having the student body file complaints. The latter is what happened.
• In the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, Jack Sparrow allowed himself to be shackled in the first movie so he could use them to take Elizabeth hostage. Either they let him escape or she becomes a distraction for his escape. Or taking one of the Aztec coins? Barbossa can no longer win because he himself cannot be killed, but once Will dispels the curse, he can finish Barbossa off with his pistol.
• This is used to humorous effect in The Princess Bride, where Westley and Vizzini play a game of wits: Vizzini has to guess which goblet Westley has poisoned and select one to drink, Westley being forced to drink from the other one. After Vizzini has (with much complicated exposition) made his choice and drunk, Westley reveals that both the goblets are poisoned and that he has a resistance to that particular poison. Notable in that this gambit's against a minor foe, and foreshadows that the true enemy, for all his resources, is wholly Westley's inferior. Even if Vizzini realized that both cups were poisoned and refused to drink (or drank from the bottle), Westley is now close enough to overpower him with little threat to Buttercup.
• Promising Young Woman: Cassie plans to maim Al to punish him for raping Nina and driving her to suicide in the past. It apparently fails because Ryan betrayed her and Al kills her... but Cassie planned for this event by scheduling to have the video evidence of Nina's rape sent to Jordan along with information on where she was going and who would be responsible if she went missing.
• In Sherlock Holmes (2009), Lord Blackwood pulls a minor one in being caught by Holmes and executed by hanging so he could later demonstrate that the Powers That Be are behind him by "returning" from the grave. Holmes doesn't catch him, he's still free and powerful. Holmes does catch him, he can become even more powerful.
• Star Wars:
  • Darth Sidious/Emperor Palpatine attempts this. There are two Skywalkers: one's already his apprentice but he's more machine than man now, which limits his abilities in the Force; the other is young and idealistic and a potential threat. So he tries to tempt Luke to The Dark Side with a duel with his father. If Luke wins, he gets an upgraded apprentice; if not, he's rid of a potential threat and Darth Vader's loyalty no longer has another possible recipient. It doesn't work, however, as Luke refuses to turn to the dark side. Sidious then tries to kill Luke, but that doesn't work either because Vader is still capable of throwing the Emperor off a balcony.
  • Obi-Wan is polite enough to warn Vader that "if you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine" before setting Vader up to do just that. On the other hand, if Vader did not strike him down, he would leave Obi-Wan free to kill him.
  • Sidious's plan in The Phantom Menace is a Xanatos Gambit from all angles. By convincing the Trade Federation to blockade Naboo and coerce Queen Amidala to sign a treaty legitimizing the Federation occupation, he has already won the day and now must keep up appearances with the Trade Federation so they don't rat him out. Having the Federation attack the Jedi, symbols of the Republic's power, he only strengthened his position. No matter what, all roads led to Valorum's removal, and the path forward for his ascendancy to the Chancellorship was clear.
    • Should Queen Amidala sign the treaty, Palpatine can lobby against this action in the Senate for Valorum's removal due to allowing this to take place.
    • Should Queen Amidala escape into exile or be killed, Palpatine has himself a martyr to use for this same lobby. Should the Jedi be killed, the Republic would be forced to acknowledge the under-the-table actions Valorum had taken to try and avert this without taking a stand.
    • With Queen Amidala's successful escape, she fell right into his lap for him to demonstrate the corruption of the Republic firsthand, manipulating her into calling for Valorum's removal, with public support on her side due to their plight.
  • The entire prequel trilogy of Star Wars is one by Sidious: he controls both sides in the Clone Wars (the Republic as Chancellor Palpatine, the Separatists as Darth Sidious) so whichever side wins, the Jedi will be destroyed, he will become Emperor, and he will have a powerful Sith apprentice (Count Dooku or Darth Vader: this is decided — possibly along with the outcome of the entire war — by their duel at the beginning of Revenge of the Sith). This was planned as well, with Palpatine convincing Dooku to defeat Kenobi while losing to Anakin, thereby allowing the two to convert Anakin to the dark side. Dooku doesn't realize until too late that Sidious means to replace him if he loses, instead of just recruiting Anakin as an enforcer.
  • Obi-Wan's mission to kill General Grievous is described as one of these (as well as a Uriah Gambit) in the novelization. Obi-Wan succeeds and kills Grievous? That's one less pawn that Palpatine would otherwise have to dispose of later. Grievous kills Obi-Wan? One less Jedi in Palpatine's way. The end result of the battle is irrelevant; the entire point is to make sure Obi-Wan isn't on Coruscant, where he would otherwise likely be able to stop Anakin from turning to The Dark Side. In addition, should the Council allow Anakin to battle Grievous, he becomes one more foe for Anakin's growing desperation and reliance on the Dark Side to dispatch, further steeping Anakin further away from the Order and ever closer to Palpatine's clutches.
  • It's entirely plausible that Leia and Luke were set up for one by Obi-Wan and Yoda. You have Palpatine and Vader, the two remaining Sith. You also have the Rule of Two that means there's only two Sith at a given time. So, hide Leia with an ally and put Luke in plain sight on his dad's homeworld. If Vader and Palpatine avoid Tatooine, Obi-Wan is there to train the boy as a weapon against his father when he comes of age. If Vader went after Luke, Palpatine would attack Vader. If Palpatine went after Luke? Well, Vader has a Berserk Button about family members and would attack Palpatine. Either way, you would end up with one dead Sith one (likely) badly-wounded Sith, and (worst-case) a half-trained Luke, who could be turned back or killed by bringing out their ace in the hole over on Alderaan, who was given most of a conventional Jedi education already.
  • In an unusual variation, Qui-Gon sets one up for Watto at his own expense in order to convince him to let him borrow his slave Anakin Skywalker and sponsor him in the podrace. "If we win, you keep all our winnings, minus the cost of the parts we need [to fix the ship's hyperdrive]; if we lose, you keep my ship." Nearly averted in the novelization where Watto has trouble believing such a generous offer, but since he can't find a downside, he ends up agreeing to it.
  • Palpatine pulls this again in The Rise of Skywalker, his body is very heavily deteriorated, but he needed Rey alive because she could undergo a ritual where she could Strike Him Down With All Of Her Hatred and his spirit could enter a younger body. When she instead passes a lightsaber to the redeemed Kylo Ren and he comes onto the scene to help her, Palpatine reveals he can drain the energy of a diad in the Force, taking life energy from Rey and Kylo to heal himself instead. He didn't even really need Rey to kill him, as long as there was also the possibility of finding a way to get himself healed.
• Spider-Man: Homecoming: A small one. At the end, when he drops Peter and Liz off at the dance, Toomes tells Peter to back off or "I'll kill you. I'll kill everyone you love." However, he also calls in Shocker to watch the back door and kill Peter if he makes the wrong choice.
• Narrowly averted but still lampshaded in Terror of Mechagodzilla. When Dr. Mafune releases Titanosaurus to attack Tokyo against Mugal's wishes, Godzilla comes to battle his monster. Rather than get angry as he does in his appearances, Mugal insists that he and his forces do nothing. If Titanosaurus wins, Godzilla would be killed in battle and it'd be easier for his plan of World Domination to go through, and even if Godzilla won and killed Titanosaurus, Godzilla would've been too banged up to stand up to Mechagodzilla, who would kill him too. It would've worked, if Katsura wasn't shot and killed again, and Dr. Mafune didn't call Titanosaurus back before his fight with Godzilla could get brutal.
• TRON used as an Establishing Character Moment for Alan Bradley. Suspicious of Encom's Master Control Program, he's been working on an independent security monitor software (the title character) for months, dutifully submitting all the necessary paperwork and keeping on good terms with Walter Gibbs, the only one who outranks Dillinger.
  1. Alan is allowed to complete Tron and run the software. Master Control's scheme and Dillinger's shady dealings get exposed. Both of them are shut down - Alan wins.
  2. If Dillinger fired Alan without letting him complete Tron, it would draw the attention of Walter Gibbs, who would likely investigate (especially given Alan submitted all the necessary paperwork with the i's dotted and t's crossed), which would likely expose Dillinger and Master Control's scheming. Alan still wins.
  3. Tron is deleted and Alan is not fired. There is nothing stopping Alan from having another try, and it would also get Gibbs's attention. Again, Alan wins.
  4. The only scenario that wasn't planned for was the one in the movie; Master Control steps up the timetable to take over both sides of the Cold War and blackmails Dillinger into compliance, while Alan and Lora recruit Flynn, who proves to be a massive distraction for Master Control, gets Tron free, and the whole thing shuts down anyway.

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