Coming-Out Story is supposed to be about a character coming to terms with their gender/sexual/other identity out and learning to accept who they are over the course of the story. However, the trope is often misused to refer to any time a character comes out of the closet, which is only one part of the trope, and that name is doing no favors. A rename would probably be a good place to start.

Summary of Coming Out Wick Check:

• 17/51 are about characters coming to terms with their identity over the course of the story
• 15/51 are just a character coming out
• 4/51 are a character coming out to negative reception
• 7/51 are ZCEs
• 1/51 is a trope relationship (and a misused one at that)
• 7/51 are unsorted

1. Characters.Sandra And Woo - Coming-Out Story: Her Day in the Limelight revolves around dealing with her unrequited crush, her heart getting broken, and her admitting she's a lesbian (and not bi).
2. Heartstopper The comic depicts the joys and difficulties of being LGBTQ+ teenagers or young adults and shows how these characters figure out their identity, romantic/sexual orientation, discover love, hope and make friends throughout the story.
   1. Subverted in that Charlie is already out at the time of the story, as are Tara, Darcy, and Elle. Played straight (as it were) with Nick.
3. Recap.Schitts Creek S 47 The Barbecue - Coming-Out Story: Patrick has been coming to terms with his sexuality since meeting David, and this episode fills in the backstory.
4. Recap.The Owl And The Frog Chapter 8 - Coming-Out Story: Luz did research and found several of these online in order to figure out her recent feelings for Anne. She eventually realizes she's bisexual since she's always been attracted to guys up until now.
5. Characters.Arrowverse The DEO - Coming-Out Story: Part of her Season Two story arc where she starts developing an attraction to Maggie, which ends up making Alex realize that she is attracted to women. This leads to her coming out to Kara and expressing her feelings for Maggie and recalling that she had these feelings before for a childhood friend that she had a falling out with years ago.
6. Glee - Coming-Out Story:
   1. Everyone (with the exception of Mercedes) already knows Kurt is gay before he actually comes out. He even pretends to be straight in "Laryngitis" in hopes that his dad will like him more, and fools pretty much no one except, of course, Brittany.
   2. Santana's got one, too. A couple seasons worth, after a half season spent for her to realize she's a lesbian, before abruptly being forced out and even then there's another season of her coming to terms with this and confirming her sexuality. According to Finn, though, "everybody" knew. Conversely to Kurt, Brittany seems to be the only one who knew all along.
7. Dark Heaven - Coming-Out Story: Part of the story is about Conor coming to grips with his sexuality and working to make things better for people like him and Simon.
8. Characters.Luz Clawthorne Main Characters - Coming-Out Story: After sharing a kiss with Amelia that he doesn't feel anything from along with never feeling romantic attraction to girls or any other gender, Gus gives it some thought and accepts that he's an aromantic asexual in "After the War".
9. Blue Rose - Coming-Out Story: The sample adventure contained in the core rulebook involves helping a confused young gay teenager from a rural community sort out his feelings (and his uncontrolled magic).
10. Almost Family - Coming-Out Story: Edie's realization that she's a lesbian, coming to grips with it, and telling her husband is a continuing story arc in the series.
11. YMMV.The Little Mermaid 1989 - Rainbow Lens: Ariel falls in love with someone her father disapproves of, and said romance leads to him nearly disowning her. On top of Ariel's love for Eric, there's coding in her isolation towards others. Her "I Want" Song "Part Of Your World", highlights her feelings of isolation and her desires to be accepted by others. She eventually deviates from the norm in order to achieve her desires, similarly to a queer character in a Coming-Out Story.
12. Headscratchers.Penny And Aggie:
    1. This is factually incorrect on all points. Aggie had reason to question her sexuality prior to her Coming-Out Story; remember her crashing into Karen's chest and getting "tingles?" And Penny's questioning of her sexuality has been a recurring theme ("Campaign Trail," "Second Looks," "20 2020 Pennies," "Bridge Out," "Darren, Darren Danforth, Who Are You?"), hardly "sudden." Sara's Coming-Out Story was heavily foreshadowed over the two years (Real Life time) before she finally realized she was gay. Fred and Daphne have known and been comfortable with their homosexuality since long before the strip began. As for the characters in question "all" being girls, how about Stan's fantasizing about Rich while having sex with Michelle?
    2. Why are people so much quicker to point to Aggie's Coming-Out Story than Penny's? Penny has the Homoerotic Dream from her time with Duane, the fantasy from "2020 Pennies," the whole "rape" fiasco, the hanging-by-a-thread denial from the Darren Danforth storyline, and Aggie has briefly touching on the idea early on, getting a little flustered when she ran into Karen, Karen's assumptions, that blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment in the tiger dream, the single Homoerotic Dream about a mannequin, and another brief flirtation with the idea (and Xena). Still, on the forum and on this wiki, people are routinely putting her next to Sara and ignoring Penny completely. In short, Penny's thoughts have unconsciously run back to Aggie every time her thoughts have turned to romance at all, and Aggie's twice considered the idea, and those times more or less deliberately, had two dreams that rather obliquely hint she might be attracted to girls/Penny, and had one Stupid Sexy Flanders moment. I'm sorry, but all I can think of is that you're jumping headlong into stereotypes.
13. Characters.Call Me By Your Name - Coming-Out Story: What Elio's story-arc amounts to. The film doesn't establish whether he has ever explored an attraction to men before, but he falls head over heels for Oliver during the summer of 1983, and the film explores their budding relationship and unspooling admittance of mutual attraction. After some gentle prompting, he is able to come out about his love for Oliver to his father who, as he already suspected it, is encouraging and supportive.
14. Characters.Dumbing Of Age - Coming-Out Story: Ethan comes out to Amber as gay on prom night, and the two of them spent the summer before the comic starts dealing with the fallout from his parents. Once in college, Ethan fears being rejected by men and having his gayness be his only defining trait, and puts himself back in the closet. He finally comes out "for real" in Book Five, his attempts at straightness having become unsustainable for a motley of reasons.
15. Pride (2014) - Coming-Out Story: Part of the film deals with Joe's accepting his sexuality and dealing with The Reveal to his parents.
16. Trivia.The Owl And The Frog - Initially, the author wrote Luz's Coming-Out Story with the intent of her fallout with Anne leading them to make up and remain friends. The experience would be the reason Luz would've been oblivious to Amity's crush on her but she still would end up with her. But since "Lumity" is official now and the author liked the idea of Luz and Anne recovering from their fallout and becoming lovers, they decided to go with "Luzanne", which means "Lumity" won't happen in the story.
17. You Built This House - Coming-Out Story: The fanfic is themed around Apple White realizing and coming to terms with being lesbian.

1. Alternative Joke Interpretation: In The Emperor's New Groove, while Pacha is introducing Kuzco to the diner waitress as his spouse and explaining how it's their honeymoon, she dryly replies, "Bless you for coming out in public." It's probably scripted as a reference to Kuzco's llama appearance, but with how Disney has become more open with LGBTQ+ representation over time, it could also be suggested that she's aware Kuzco is male.
2. Characters.Bowsers Koopalings - Coming-Out Story: He indirectly tells his siblings that he's gay.
3. GoodParents.Live Action TV - Avocado Toast: Molly's mom and dad are very loving, completely supportive to her. When she tells them she's bisexual, they give her immediate acceptance. Later, on learning she's in the hospital, her mom reacts by immediately telling her dad to get plane tickets (since they're both in the Netherlands at the time for a vacation), and give her warm support over the phone.
4. Ugly Girl - Coming-Out Story: Cynical Sis comes out of the closet to Queerboy and his boyfriend
5. Melissa Brayden - Coming-Out Story: Sarah and Elle, noted in the Closet Key examples, have to navigate revealing their sexuality to their families.
6. Characters.The Gay And Wondrous Life Of Caleb Gallo - Coming-Out Story: He starts out as Caleb's unattainable straight crush. It turns out he's actually bi, and is plenty attainable.
7. LGBTFanbase.Music: Does Your Mother Know is written as a song about a teenage girl/ young woman going out dancing/ partying and who might be too young for that. The original lyrics addressing a girl with both male and female vocals are arranged that way. However, the main chorus line "Does your mother know that you're out?" is very easy to be interpreted as coming out of the closet. It's amazing how obvious this becomes when just the addressed person's gender is flipped (like in the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus cover version).
8. Compressed Adaptation: The twenty-ninth chapter of Asteroid in Love suffers from this when it is adapted as part of the ninth episode, mostly because that episode adopts a total of 4 chapters, and this chapter is considered the least important of them. The process of Mikage making her Platonic Valentine with Moe is compressed into a montage since the part about Moe's Love Confession (and Coming Out, since she's confessing to another girl) is considered more important of the chapter.
9. Trans Ponies - Coming-Out Story: Trans Ponies revolves around Rainbow coming out and how his transition affects his life. Seems better for Trans Tribulations
10. The Real O'Neals - Coming-Out Story: When Kenny comes out, most of his friends and family members are supportive, and he doesn't face a lot of challenges for it. When Allison is introduced in Season 2, it's pointed out that since she comes from a fairly conservative Asian family, she doesn't have any guarantee that coming out to her parents would work out nearly as well as it did for Kenny. The reality is, as far as the LGBTQ community has come in the United States, homophobia is still very much alive.
11. Plan B (2021) - Coming-Out Story: As a secondary plot, Lupe plans to tell Sunny she's queer (bi or pansexual, from what she says). However, Sunny realizes for herself on meeting Logan, who's Lupe's girlfriend (Sunny'd thought it was a guy's name). Lupe still hasn't told her dad by the end, but has been reassured he would never kick her out and he'd love her no matter what.
12. Recap.Black Lightning 2018 S 3 E 9 Earth Crisis - Coming-Out Story: Turns out Earth One Anissa still didn't have hers, as Jefferson is a conservative in this reality. She is dating Shaquandalyn here, the daughter of Lawanda.
13. Characters.Oyevitne - Coming-Out Story: What Philip's story-arc amounts to, aside from his involvement as a witness to the murders that fuel the main plot. Having previously told his mother about he and Henning, in the final episode, with Henning in a coma, he finally comes out to Sven, tearfully explaining that he and Henning are in love — "vi er glade i hverandre". Sven, being the kind supportive man that he is, simply says "well I think that's wonderful".
14. FF - Coming-Out Story: Issue #6 has Tong coming out as transgender to her brothers. They hug her and tell her they love her no matter what.
15. Between Three Rogues - Coming-Out Story: After Vyse's Relationship Upgrade with Aika and Fina, the three of them find themselves either hiding their polyamorous relationship from their crew (and fueling the notorious betting pool) or trying to explain it to those that do find out (like Vyse's mother). It isn't until before the final battle that Vyse decides to stop hiding what he's fighting for, and announces their relationship in public.

1. Characters.Dawn Of A New Age Oldport Blues Non Player Characters - Coming-Out Story: An important part of his backstory is when he came out to his parents. They were initially scandalised, thinking it ruined their image of an ideal Christian family, but they were eventually able to reconcile with him.
2. Recap.Timeless S 2 E 8 The Day Reagan Was Shot - Coming-Out Story: At Lucy and Jiya's urging, Denise comes out to her mother and breaks off her Arranged Marriage. Her mother slaps her for that. However, by 2018, her mother has come around and accepted her daughter for who she is. This never happened originally, resulting in Denise distancing herself from her mother and keeping her family a secret from her.
3. V for Vendetta - Coming-Out Story: Valeria details her own in a flashback. When she told her parents she was a lesbian, her mom cried and her dad disowned her. The last we see is them tossing a baby picture of her in the trash.
4. Recap.Batwoman 2019 S 1 E 14 Grinning From Ear To Ear - Coming-Out Story: Sophie comes out to her mother, who doesn't take it well.

1. YMMV.Madagascar Escape 2 Africa - Ho Yay: It's been pointed out that Alex's interaction with his father seems like a metaphor for a Coming-Out Story. # The Movement - Coming-Out Story
2. Characters.Crazy Ex Girlfriend Main Characters - Coming-Out Story: He has one in the second half of the first season.
3. YMMV.Beverly Hills 90210 - Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Teddy is much better received when he received the Coming-Out Story.
4. BirthdayEpisode.Live Action TV - Schitt's Creek: David throws a surprise party for Patrick in Season 5 and invites his parents. This leads to Patrick's Coming-Out Story.
5. Dead Like Me - Executive Meddling: Bryan Fuller in this interview talks about his thoroughly unpleasant time on the show, where he and Showtime (who largely supported him) frequently butted heads with MGM Television over story decisions, such as Clancy's Coming-Out Story being cut out, and making homophobic comments to Fuller (Fuller is openly gay). He eventually left after five episodes not wanting to risk a Creator Breakdown.
6. Virginity Makes You Stupid: Jessica in Loserz. See this strip (and the following ones). She eventually gets over the first part... which leads to her getting over the second part.
7. Characters.Dumbing Of Age - The Beard: Was Ethan's after he came out as gay to her, although she was aware of it and the two agree to a rather ill-advised "relationship". However, after Becky's Coming-Out Story, Joyce breaks up with Ethan in "Goodbye, my friend."

1. Queer as Tropes - Coming-Out Story: A character reveals to other characters that they're gay (or otherwise queer). Related trope, but misused as "character comes out"

1. PlayingWith.Pair The Suitors - Enforced: It was originally a Queer Romance or Yaoi Genre work to begin with: the Love Triangle was just to add drama, almost certainly involving a Coming-Out Story. Not sure if enough context
2. HilariousInHindsight.Marvel Universe: Bizarre Adventures #27 had a black-and-white short story that opened with Bobby lovingly admiring an ice sculpture of Angel, noting how handsome and impressive it looked. Decades later in All-New X-Men, the time-displaced teenage Bobby would admit to Jean that he found Angel quite attractive. It also included a scene where Bobby, while modifying one of the statues, compared himself to Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo Buonarroti, both of whom are widely contended to have been gay by modern scholars. The Bizarre Adventures story was so heavy on unintentional Foreshadowing that it was later reprinted in X-Men #600, the issue where the adult Iceman came out of the closet.
3. YMMV.Legends Of Tomorrow - Fan-Preferred Couple: Due to Amaya/Nate being a Romantic Plot Tumor, a lot of fans have instead shipped Nate with Wally during season 3, from before Wally was even added to the show, which has only grown as the two spend increasing amounts of Ho Yay together. Adding to this is that Keiynan Lonsdale (Wally's actor) came out as bisexual shortly before joining the show, which has lead some fans to petition the creators to give Wally a Coming-Out Story to reflect Lonsdale's sexual identity. Not sure if valid
4. Stranger Things - Out-of-Genre Experience: The novel Rebel Robin is a fairly mundane Coming-Out Story with no supernatural elements.
5. Stray - Yaoi Fanboy: Otacon, although it's only mentioned in passing via an Expospeak Gag. (The context is the brief and anti-climactic tale of How Snake Found Out Otacon Was Bi.) Not sure if enough context
6. Shocking.Video Games - Guilty Gear -STRIVE-: When Bridget was added as a DLC character, audiences expected them to be played similar to their previous appearances as an effeminate man. What no one saw coming was Bridget getting an emotional Coming-Out Story as a transgender woman, completely upending all of the Unsettling Gender-Reveal jokes and memes that defined her character in the fandom for decades. Bridget's story is a valid example of the trope, but I don't know if this entry has enough context.
7. TearJerker.Fun Home - Alison's horror on learning that one of her dad's lovers was Roy the babysitter, someone she idolized. It's a small wonder that she hangs up the phone after hearing that, overwhelmed that her father not only cheated on her mother, but usurped her Coming-Out Story and preyed upon a trusted friend. Not sure if enough context.