Diabolus Ex Machina: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

 

Observers of this trope should note three things:

* Firstly, note that the Diabolus Ex Machina is often brought in simply because if the villain were to lose, [[Failure Is the Only Option|the work of fiction would be over]]. Like the Deus Ex Machina, it only applies if it comes out of left field.

* Secondly, like the Deus Ex Machina, a Diabolus Ex Machina does not necessarily occur at the end, but is simply a common find there, and should not be confused for an [[Ending Trope]].

 

 

 

 

** Something happens like this in the Gundam Side-Story ''Space, to the End of a Flash'', where the pilot of the Gundam Unit 5 survives the battle of A Baoa Qu and is returning to the ship... {{spoiler|only to be shot in the back by a barely alive Gelgoog}}.

*** And again in the ''Gundam Evolve'' story involving the [[Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory|Dendrobrium Orchis]], {{spoiler|where the pilot is shot by a dying Zaku when he back was turned just as they were cutting to the credits}}

** What makes {{spoiler|the "kill all Japanese"}} incident SO much worse is that Lelouch clearly was about to confess all his wrongdoings to {{spoiler|Euphemia}} and leave his villainous ways behind. Only to slip up and stumble right into the [[Moral Event Horizon]] without even wanting to. After this you just know {{spoiler|there will be no happy ending for Lulu.}}

** Given the number of times Lelouch has horrible events happen right in his moment of triumph, one might expect that he leaves an open place setting at his dinner table just for Diabolus.

* ''[[Weiss Kreuz]] [[Oddly-Named Sequel 2: Electric Boogaloo|Gluhen]]'' never promises better than a [[Bittersweet Ending]], but the final scene of the series is pure Diabolus Ex Machina; having cut ties with everyone he ever knew and left Japan, Aya goes walking down a sidewalk in New York and {{spoiler|Diabolus, in the form of a scruffy little boy, runs up and stabs him in the gut. He ends up collapsed against a mailbox, having a flashback of his former teammates, while the pedestrians walking past pay no attention to the guy apparently bleeding to death all over the sidewalk.}}

* ''[[End of Evangelion]]'', or even ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion|Evangelion]]'' in general loves this. In ''EoE'' {{spoiler|Asuka finally snaps out of her depression coma and gets a [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]] when she kills nine Mass Produced Evas in three minutes.}} She barely finishes, but it's looking up. The {{spoiler|1=Seele army has been driven out, Rei, Shinji and Asuka are alive, Ritsuko's plan to detonate the entire complex failed, Shinji isn't in his psychopathic mother and [[Instrumentality]] has been averted. Then [[Cruel and Unusual Death|[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Bpx66Ld-TI Asuka gets speared by a Lance of Longinius, right as her power runs out. Her Eva is then partially EATEN ALIVE by the Mass Production EVAs]]], [[Egregious|who simply regenerated the wounds Asuka inflicted on them]], [[Human Pincushion|and skewered to death by even more fake Lances]]; Shinji gets in Unit 01 and Rei fuses with Lilith, becomes a giant white god and turns all of humanity into orange juice on Shinji's orders.}} You could say [[It Got Worse]].

** While in normal Eva, everything is going fine, if not a tad [[True Art Is Angsty|angsty]]. Shinji's social skills are improving, Asuka's teamwork is going well and Rei is beginning to show some humanity. A few episodes later and {{spoiler|Asuka's been [[Mind Rape]]d, Shinji is catatonic and Rei is dead, replaced by a clone.}}

** Kiriko laughs? Black Jack curses the heavens. In fact, thanks to the new releases of Black Jack manga, it can be seen that just about one fourth of his cases end like this. A running theme seems to be that even the world's best doctor isn't omnipotent.

*** This isn't just restricted to Black Jack, either- many of [[Osamu Tezuka]]'s works feature such occasions. The 1980 ''[[Astro Boy (anime)|Astro Boy]]'' anime, for instance, has many bit characters who exist only to die so that Astro can question why humans made robots this way.

* [[Mad Doctor|Faust]] from ''[[Shaman King]]'' has the unfortunate distinction of getting one in his [[Start of Darkness|origin story.]] He works for years to save his wife from a terminal disease, finally succeeding a few months before a burglar shoots her.

* At the end of ''[[Cowboy Bebop]]'', Spike finally finds his lost love Julia, {{spoiler|only for her to be shot dead by a random mook when the Red Dragon makes their move on them both, setting off Spike's final [[Storming the Castle]] moment and the final showdown with Vicious}}.

* ''[[Kurokami]]'' ends in this way, in the last minutes of last episode everyone discovers that final sacrifice is required, even if nobody dies.

* ''[[Tsukihime]]''. "And then Arcuied blew Roa into tiny pieces. Her and Shiki have a long, happy life in store as Shiki shows her all of the things she never thought to experience, and their mutual love is sure to last fore- '''SLICE'''."

* In the FRLG arc of ''[[Pokémon Special]]'', yay! The good guys defeat the bad guys, stop an airship from crashing into Vermillion, free Deoxys to let it go where ever it wants, have a happy reunion of sorts... then WHAM! They get [[Taken for Granite]].

* Several in ''[[Rave Master]]''. Gale, after failing to talk down King, asks to government to arrest him, but they shoot down his family instead. King and Gale manage to end the cycle of war between the Raregroove and Symphonia family with a [[Heroic Sacrifice]], only for King's [[Axe Crazy]] son to turn up and start the cycle back up. In order to defeat Endless Elie not only has to {{spoiler|fake her death and leave her time period}} but must also {{spoiler|kill her lover interest, Haru}}. Etc.

* In episode 278 of ''[[Bleach]]'', we have {{spoiler|Wonderweiss}} coming out of nowhere {{spoiler|unfreezing Halibel from her icy death, putting out the flames that are keeping Aizen out of combat, and stabbing Ukitake making it so he is unable to fight.}}

** The final fight with Aizen. {{spoiler|It's revealed that the Hougyoku has left him immortal so he can't be killed. Instead he's imprisoned, which means he has the potential to return.}}

* In ''[[Pokémon (anime)|Pokémon]]: Sinnoh League Victors'', [[Idiot Hero|Ash]] is finally so skilled a trainer that only 3 of his League matches are shown, the rest briefly touched on in a montage. Just as he {{spoiler|narrowly wins against Paul in a 6-on-6 full battle}}, in comes Tobias, aka the ''[[Olympus Mons|Darkrai Trainer]]'', who proceeds to curbstomp Ash thoroughly in ''minutes.'' This serves no purpose to the plot ''whatsoever'', other than to keep Ash from winning a League tournament.

** In the opening two-parter of ''[[Pokémon (anime)|Pokémon]]: Best Wishes'', Zekrom appears purely in order to shock Pikachu and screw up his ability to use Electric attacks (catching both him and Ash off-guard and causing him to lose to a newbie), provide a 'climactic' cliff-hanger which is resolved within the first minute of the next episode, and then disappear.

* ''[[Shin Mazinger Shougeki! Z-hen]]'' has a pretty brutal one at the end. {{spoiler|Kouji confronts and defeats Dr. Hell in one last climatic battle and it seems that Mazinger-Z stands triumphant. However, it turns out to be a [[Xanatos Gambit]] by ''Baron Ashura'', who sacrifices his/herself to allow the Mycene Empire to arrive on Earth. Cue [[Cliff Hanger]] Ending.}}

** This is based on the ending to the original [[Mazinger Z]], which had the Mycene Empire come out of nowhere to wreck the titular robot, only for [[Great Mazinger]] to equally [[Deus Ex Machina|come out of nowhere]] and save Kouji.

 

== Comic Books ==

* Remember at the end of ''[[Watchmen (comics)|Watchmen]]'' when {{spoiler|the good guys have Ozymandias cornered?}}

{{quote|{{spoiler|Ozymandias}}: {{spoiler|Do it? Dan, I'm not a Republic Serial villain. Do you seriously think I'd explain my master-stroke if there remained the slightest chance of you affecting its outcome? I did it thirty-five minutes ago.}}}}

* Messiah Complex. The ''[[X-Men (Comic Book)|X-Men]]'' have finally defeated all of their enemies and {{spoiler|Scott has given the mutant baby to Cable to take into the future.}} Everything seems great. {{spoiler|Until Bishop, who's been trying to kill the baby to prevent his horrible future, shoots at the baby and Cable.}} And {{spoiler|Cable is already disappearing from that point in time, leaving the shot to go through and hit Professor X in the head.}} It really sucks to be a mutant. Granted he got better since this is a comic book and {{spoiler|Professor X missing at the end was a hint.}}

 

** To be continued...?

** And the second installment, after the defeat of the evil boss, ends with the dead Gordon Freeman becoming a ''zombie goast''.

** This is followed up with a glorious [[Deus Ex Machina]] in the third chapter, when even further into the future, John Freeman descends from the heavens to assist his son in defeating the Combines and sending them back to science and outer space.

* ''[[Star Trek: Voyager|Voyager]] Virtual Season 8'' uses one of these after the crew is almost home, getting them lost again in order to [[Fix Fic|fix a few plot holes]] as well as to set up a more satisfying climactic battle in Virtual Season 9.

 

 

* ''[[Vertigo]]''. Just as it seems [[Earn Your Happy Ending]] ensued, {{spoiler|a nun enters, scaring Judy who falls to her death.}}

* ''[[Dr. Strangelove]]'' they finally uncover the plot by the madman base commander to start a nuclear war and order back all their planes ... only it's too late because one plane doesn't get the message since their radio is damaged and World War III begins.

* ''[[Haywire]]'' has a particularly bizarre one where, in a movie that otherwise strives for realism, the heroine manages to outmanoeuvre her opponents in a car chase only for the car to crash anyway because a freaking ''deer'' jumped into it.

* In the last minute of ''[[The Cube (film)|The Cube]]'', the man finds out that his escape was an illusion and he's still in the cube.

* [[Scream]]: {{spoiler|[[Sacrificial Lion|Tatum]] manages to really hold her own against the killer when her time seems to have come. She manages to knock him on his ass ''twice'', and puts up the best fight so far. One might think she could escape to warn Sidn- wait why is she [[Idiot Ball|crawling through the cat flap]]?}}

 

== Literature ==

* Ian Irvine goes all out in his ''Well of Echoes'' trilogy (which [[Trilogy Creep|became a quadrilogy]] almost, it seems, so Diabolus could strike). The world is saved! All is harmonious! At which point one of the [[Big Bad]] ''whose son explicitly identified him as dead earlier'' turns up. To top it all off, the heroes then destroy all the world's magic, hoping to overload his personal magic source, but that backfires, leaving him the only one with any real magic in the entire world and the rest of civilization pawns to his whims. All so the author could go on and write a dictatorial dystopian trilogy as a follow up. Go figure.

** The author loves his [[Cliff Hanger|cliffhangers]], with only one of his fantasy books actually having a proper, satisfactory ending. The others have such glorious situations as {{spoiler|one character inadvertently summoning an interdimensional invasion force to her world, the magical field failing at a pivotal battle, rendering the vital magically powered walking tanks useless in the face of a horde of giant winged and clawed mutant monster things, and all the protagonists being captured by a [[Big Bad]] and sentenced to be flayed alive.}} No happy endings here, folks.

** Poor {{spoiler|Sehra Muril, the red-haired girl with a "deliciously dirty laugh". She was going to be first FEMALE VERGHAST SCOUT if it hadn't been for Cuu!}}

* [[Hans Christian Andersen]], "The Flying Trunk": Things are going well for the beggar guy with the titular trunk with his romance with a princess, {{spoiler|until the trunk gets destroyed by shrapnel from celebratory fireworks. Seriously. For a Hans story, that's pretty rough. Guess that's why it's not as well known as his other tales...}}

* ''[[The Kite Runner]]'', by Khaled Hosseini. The protagonist and his best friend's son are getting along well and all set to move to America when {{spoiler|the main guy tells boy he might have to go back to the orphanage for a short time, and the little boy tries to commit suicide and stops talking.}}

* ''The Princetta'': The main characters return from their adventures and are all set to live [[Happily Ever After]], Malva and Orpheus get together... {{spoiler|and then Orpheus is murdered at the last minute.}}

* In [[Robert A. Heinlein]]'s ''The Cat Who Walks Through Walls''. All fictional universes are real alternate universes in their reality. One of the characters points out that a hero (a writer) is not permitted to resurrect the [[Big Bad]] of his favorite fictional universe because of this trope. The character asks if the hero can just retire as head of the training school but apparently the risk is that the story will evolve to need a serious villain, who will come into existence if written.

* The end of the ''[[Redwall]]'' series book ''Martin the Warrior'' does this to a degree that the flashback story it's based on ends on a [[Tear Jerker]]. Everything seems great, {{spoiler|Martin gets his father's sword back and kills his enemy Badrang the Tyrant...but right after it's revealed that the mouse Rose, Martin's friend and possible love interest for the entire book, was killed during their fight against Badrang. Martin then leaves his friends and promises never to mention his interactions with them again so they won't be put into danger.}}Of course then it fast forwards to the present day in Redwall where everything is okay and they discuss how Martin founded Redwall and was a great hero. But it still puts a damper on the entire ending and is one of the few Redwall books to do this.

* In Lord Sunday, the final installment of [[Keys to the Kingdom]], Arthur finally collects the 7 Keys. Up until this point, the series has been fairly predictable, although things have been getting kind of real in the background, what with {{spoiler|the deposed Trustees being mysteriously murdered & some people dying from plagues}}. However, it's here where everything truly goes downhill for Arthur. All he wants to do is end the fighting, but {{spoiler|the Will has other plans. It uses him to bring in a tide of Nothing to destroy the Universe, because it turns out it's 1/2 of the Architect of said Universe, & wants to die, but it can't until its creation is destroyed. The main characters are frozen by the power of the Keys, unable to do anything to save themselves for the few moments they have until destruction.}} Fortunately, it gets better. It turns out that {{spoiler|they were frozen because the Atlas was recording the Universe for Arthur to recreate it.}} The catch? {{spoiler|Arthur's mother had died just moments before.}} A series that had been very light-hearted up until this point takes a sudden turn: Arthur went on that entire quest with the only result being {{spoiler|the death of his adopted mother.}} The closing dialogue of the main story? "Wow, Arthur! You won!" "Yeah...I guess we won." Freaking. Ouch.

* [[Secret Histories|In From Hell with love]] {{spoiler|at the end of the book An Immortal disguised as Isabella stabs Eddie. Then, bites his poison tooth and dies. While Eddie is slowly dying}}

** Though Trelawney did predict it a chapter before it happened, so anyone keeping track knew how it would turn out.

* At the very end of "Nuclear Holocaust Never Again", the second book in the "Never Again" series by R. J. Rummel, things are looking pretty good. The heroes have managed to [[Set Right What Once Went Wrong]] and have confronted the parents of the at-this-point still an infant villain, who have willingly [[Raise Him Right This Time|let the heroes adopt him so that he doesn't grow up to become a nuclear-war-causing dictator.]] Then, {{spoiler|John, Joy, and the child are blown up by a religious extremist's bomb.}} At least the world is safe, {{spoiler|[[Reset Button|until the sequel anyway.]]}}

* The end of Part 1 of ''[[The Sex Gates]]''. Lee and Rita are going to have a baby, Rita is finally opening a facility that should make the lives of technologically-deprived poor people much better... and then one of those same poor people fatally stabs her when he's supposed to be shaking his hand. They're forced to push Rita through one of the titular gates, which saves her life at the expense of [[Gender Bender|turning her into a man]] and [[Tear Jerker|destroying her unborn child in the process]] - and Lee loses his balance and falls through as well, turning into a woman.

* ''[[The Jungle]]'' is ''made'' of this, at least until [[Author Tract|Jurgis discovers Socialism]]. Even then, the [[What Could Have Been|original ending]] had one of these come out of absolutely nowhere in ''literally'' the last sentence of the book to render the entire novel [[Shoot the Shaggy Dog Story|completely pointless]]. This ending was ultimately cut.

 

== Live Action TV ==

** Servalan is some form of walking Diabolus Ex Machina generator - most grievous example is what was meant to be the finale, her trapped on a ship on the edge of the galaxy that was about to explode, orbiting a planet that was also ''soon going to explode''. Come next season, it is confusingly revealed that somehow the fact that the ship was being eaten apart by a ravenous space virus made the teleport TEN THOUSAND TIMES STRONGER than ever before, and even though she had no idea how to operate it by pure luck managed to land herself NOT in empty space for a start (because the teleport had no safety mechanism to prevent that), and then of all the thousands of possible planets not only a habitable one, not only a populated one, but one governed by her own people... COME ON!!!

* Just think: if it weren't for the miniseries, this is how ''[[Farscape]]'' would've ended: {{spoiler|They're finally safe from the Scarrans and the Peacekeepers, the wormhole to Earth has been closed forever -- but it's okay! Because John is going to marry Aeryn! And then a completely unforeshadowed alien descends from the sky and blasts them into little pebbly bits.}} And vice versa, since the cliffhanger was pretty much why there was such a demand for a miniseries to begin with.

** Another example—a lesser one because it's a newly introduced, comparatively minor character, but still a punch in the gut—is in the next season finale, "Posse Comitatus," when C.J.'s stalker is apprehended and she ''just'' begins a relationship with the special agent who'd been assigned to protect her... and he leaves her sight for a minute to pick up a candy bar and a flower from a convenience store, finds himself in the middle of an armed robbery and is shot and killed.

* ''[[Good Times]]'', James Evans, Mississippi. For a ''comedy'' titled "Good Times", Diabolus sure was busy [[Yank the Dog's Chain|depriving the Evanses from having any...]]

* By way of [[Crack Defeat]], an example where the demon is revealed ''after'' the fact: One of ''The Torkelsons'' has made it to the final of a contest whose winner will get to be a foreign exchange student in Paris. After her final interview she comes out and announces that she lost. [[Status Quo Game Show|No biggie, so?]] Well, she recounts her interview and ends with saying that she got the highest score. Why did she lose then? Because the exchange student deal is a homestay (we already knew this), and the French family involved would like a boy ([[Ass Pull|but not this]]). Well, [[Ungvichian|ISTR]] that would have made the final interviews [[Shaggy Dog Story|meaningless]], because there was only one boy amongst the three finalists.

* The ''[[Law & Order|Law and Order]]'' franchise loves using this trope to turn a slam-dunk case into an hour-long question of "Will they get away with it". Several [[Egregious]] examples:

*** This Diabolus was essentially just an excuse for Diane Neal and Adam Beach to leave the show, as Novak is disbarred for falsifying the evidence and Lake {{spoiler|shoots the perp in a [[Vigilante Execution]] and is arrested}}.

** "Zoontic"(CI). The creepy doctor that had been infecting people with diseases and the sleazeball he hired to rape his old girlfriends are behind bars without a trial. Everything is going swimmingly. And then at the literal last minute, it's revealed that the doctor got 5 grams of anthrax from South America, and he only had 3 grams in his apartment.

** Of course, sometimes the same person will show up a few seasons later where they actually will get what's coming to them.

* The [[Syfy]] adaptation of the short story "[[The Cold Equations]]" ends on this. The basic premise of the story is that a young girl has stowed away on a spaceship carrying urgently needed medical supplies to a distant colony - and, because of her added mass, there isn't enough fuel to land the ship without crashing (and killing everyone on board), so, according to regulations, the pilot is supposed to throw the girl out the airlock so the cargo can arrive safely. It's established fairly early on that the cargo weighs about the same as the girl, and that jettisoning either the cargo or the girl would save the ship. Near the end, the two of them discover that the cargo wasn't what they thought it was, and jettison it, so they're safe now. That's when Diabolus shows up. To the surprise of the pilot and audience, the ship ''still'' has too much mass, because they waited too long and are now closer to the planet. So [[Someone Has to Die]] anyway.

* The Series One finale of ''[[Sherlock]]'' has {{spoiler|Moriarty walk out fairly close to the end. Sherlock removes John's explosive-laden outer layers, [[Ho Yay|jokes are cracked]] and all seems to be right with the world. Then Moriarty comes back, and the series ends with Sherlock and John being aimed at by multiple snipers while Sherlock aims his own gun at the explosives, which are now at Moriarty's feet.}}

* The sixth-season ''[[Degrassi the Next Generation]]'' episode "Rock This Town" involves many of the main characters attending a birthday party for their friend Liberty. It soon gets out of control when a group of kids from another school show up, but it turns out to be fairly harmless, and everyone has a number of embarrassing moments...until the very end, where Diabolus strikes its head by having one of the main cast (J.T.) stabbed out of the blue by a guest character who never appeared in any episode before or after the one in question.

* In ''[[The Walking Dead (TV series)|The Walking Dead]]'', Rick and Glenn spread walker blood all over some raincoats and wear them to blend in with them. Just when you think their safe, an absolutely random rainstorm shows up, stays just long enough to dull the smell from the blood by washing it away, and it stops raining after the zombies have noticed they're not undead.

* In the second season of ''[[Robin Hood (TV series)|Robin Hood]]'' every single thing that can go wrong, ''does'' go wrong in order to kill off Maid Marian. Marian acts wildly [[Out of Character]]. Robin and the other outlaws are inexplicably missing at a crucial moment. No one bothers to give Marian a weapon to defend herself with. Every single one of Guy's [[Berserk Button]]s are pressed. The [[Idiot Ball]] is thrown about with such abandon that it leaves [[Plot Hole]]s in the scenery. The contrived sequence of events unfold with the sole purpose of forcing Guy and Marian into the "right" frame of mind that lead to her murder. (And it ''still'' doesn't make any sense).

* This is the driving force behind the plot, and the source of much of the humor, in ''[[Curb Your Enthusiasm]]''.

 

== Music ==

* [[Depeche Mode]]'s song "Blasphemous Rumors" is about a girl who tried to commit suicide at age sixteen. She fails, and learns to love life again. Then she dies in an accident.

 

 

== Newspaper Comics ==

** Which is of course nonsense. Your term of service is what are you obligated to serve ''unless excused''. The government can discharge you from military service at any time it wants, for any reason it wants, and shazam, you are legally discharged. They just usually ''won't'' because they went to all the trouble of training you, so are they going to get their full use out of you. But if they fill out your discharge papers one day early, sign them, stamp them, and put them into effect... that simply means that you have been excused from one day's worth of military service. Pack your seabag and go home.

** Ironically, the author's [[Did Not Do the Research|complete ignorance]] on military discharges was such that he overlooked an entirely ''legal'' way to suddenly recall Wally to service. All initial enlistment contracts are for ''eight'' years of service obligation, not four. The typical arrangement is only four years of active duty and then four more years of 'Individual Ready Reserve' status, the practical upshot being that short of medical disability, Bad Conduct Discharge, etc., you can be yanked back in entirely at their discretion up until eight years have passed since your initial enlistment. The recruiter is required to make durn sure you understand this before you sign.

 

== Professional Wrestling ==

* To some ''[[BattleTech]]'' fans, Diabolus is behind the Jihad storyline. Let's see, the Clan invasion is finally called off, the Star League tentatively reestablished, and while there are still loose ends left over (like the threat of the Wolf Khan to come invading anyway once the original truce is up, or the aftermath of a nasty civil war) things finally seem to be ready to calm down a bit...but hey, we can't have that, right? This game isn't called ''[[Status Quo Is God|PeaceTech]]''! So the Star League declares itself a sham and disbands again for no good reason just in time to cause the suddenly uber-powerful pseudo-religious lunatics known as the Word of Blake to go [[Ax Crazy]] and start pulling cyborg super soldiers, nuclear weapons, and other stuff out of their nether regions in an all-out war against everybody...

* The [[Metaplot|ending]] to the ''[[Deadlands]]: Hell on Earth'' setting involved the [[Player Party|PCs]] getting a chance to kill the [[Big Bad]]s of the game. After going through a bunch of [[Rail Roaded]] scenes, they're presented with the opportunity to win and a ship to do so ({{spoiler|but they have to [[Powered by a Forsaken Child|sacrifice one of their own]] to the demonically-powered engine to do so}}). Then you get to a distant planet... and the ship crashes and the [[Big Bad]]s are re-released. At least the [[Game Master]] ''should'' have been implying that this was the best possible result from the start; the [[Sealed Evil in a Can|can]] that had the [[Big Bad]]s in it was always shaky at best. [[All Up to You|Guess who gets to hunt them down]] and [[Killed Off for Real|finish the job]] now?

 

 

* A lot of the moral choices in the second [[Army of Two]] game end this way. You either choose the "bad" option, or you choose the "good" option...except that the guy you gave up some advantage to save turns out to be corrupt AND selling weapons to terrorists. Or a guy you choose to save instead of killing in exchange for money is later killed in a plane crash accident.

* The updated ending to ''[[Portal (series)|Portal]]'' - The first independently mobile entity apart from Chell turns up just to drag her back right after you thought she was free.

** [[Left 4 Dead]] had the infamous Chopper pilot dying at the end of the first campaign. It was nixed when many people found the ending too depressing and cheated out of their feeling of accomplishment. Ironically it was the fan backlash that caused Valve to create a filler campaign between No Mercy and Death Toll, reinstating what was taken out. They use this again in the sequel, to link all of the campaigns together. This meant that some sort of Diabolus Ex Machina would show up in the ''beginning'' of each campaign, serving as the Machina of the last campaign (this included a chopper pilot dying as well).

** In [[Serious Sam]] 3, after seeing at least two choppers get shot down, (one of which he was ON at the time), Sam decides he's not going to get on any more choppers.

** Justified in that said [[Creepy Child]] was essentially the avatar or representative of said things falling out of the sky. We probably should mention that said things are ''pissed off as hell'' after she dies and with no seal holding them back...[[The End of the World as We Know It|well]]...

** The real kicker is the fifth ending. The heroes cross over into another dimension to kill the mother of all the aforementioned elderitch abominations. She and the heroes are transported to modern day Tokyo and, after a climatic boss battle, get shot down by missiles from an aircraft. Wow...

* ''[[Apocalypse]]'': Bruce Willis/Trey Kincaid has defeated the four horsemen, (i.e. the [[The Dragon|Dragons]]), and is about to take down the [[Big Bad]] Reverend. Unfortunately, he gets a [[Demonic Possession]] ex machina. [[Downer Ending]]. Or maybe intended to be a [[Cliff Hanger]] leading to a [[Vaporware]] sequel?

* Raiden's ending in the original ''[[Mortal Kombat]]''. Evil vanquished: check. BBEG dead: check. Hey fellas; let's break the world ourselves!

* ''[[Dragon Age]] II'': the Hawke family farm is gone, one of your new allies is dying of darkspawn taint, and just when you think it's safe to stop for a breather, an ogre comes out of nowhere to brutally smash one of your siblings into the dirt, reducing your party to you, your other sibling, and Aveline against the ogre and its hurlock buddies.

** No, those aren't dramatic spoilers; that is the ''prelude to the game, which mostly consists of the player trying to build his/herself and the family back up from less-than-nothing.

* ''[[Metroid]]: Zero Mission'' is a [[Video Game Remake|remake]] of the original ''Metroid'' that continues after the original ended. It accomplishes this by {{spoiler|having Samus shot down by Space Pirates while leaving Zebes, destroying her ship and suit}}.

** Which is followed up by {{spoiler|an inversion of sorts in the form of an ancient Chozo temple giving Samus an older yet far more advanced Power Suit (the one she's pictured with in most incarnations). It even is capable of recognizing the incompatible Upgrades she received earlier in the game.}}

* ''[[Mass Effect]] 3's'' ending. {{spoiler|The Catalyst gives Shepard a choice between a few different ways to [[Reset Button|hit the reset button]] on galactic civilization and end the violent Reaper cycle}}. However, no matter how the Crucible is used, {{spoiler|the dissemination of it's energy either shuts down or outright destroys the mass relay system}}.

** Slightly earlier in the ending, when the heroes' huge assault force are planning to assault {{spoiler|the teleportation beam leading to the orbiting Citadel/Catalyst}}, Harbinger shows up. No, not a [[Villain Override|mook possessed by Harbinger]] like in the previous game; the actual, kilometers-tall, leadership-caste Reaper himself, who proceeds to utterly massacre the entire assault force; {{spoiler|only Shepard and Anderson survive, with Shepard mortally wounded}}.

 

== Webcomics ==

* ''[[The Order of the Stick]]'' pulls two Diabolus Ex Machinas at various points to save the (un)life of its [[Big Bad]], Xykon - first {{spoiler|when [[Knight Templar|Miko Miyazaki]] unwittingly pulls the rug out from a paladin who's about to smite Xykon and his [[The Dragon|lieutenant]],}} and second when {{spoiler|Xykon's Soul Jar narrowly misses utter and permanent annihilation by falling ''just short'' of a portal to another dimension - after the bird that was supposed to drop it in from point-blank range stopped shy for what was then no apparent reason.}}

* Din and Jin from ''[[Las Lindas]]'' seem to be this trope personified. Their latest "prank" rivals the [[Code Geass|Euphinator Incident]] in terms of everything going to hell in the worst way possible just when things were going good for the cast.

* In [[Homestuck]], {{spoiler|the Scratch}} and the resulting arrival of {{spoiler|Jack Noir in their universe}} just in time to stop them from winning SGRUB was this from the perspective of the Trolls.

* Maria's death in ''[[Anders Loves Maria]]''. Occurs in the second-to-last strip, wtih next to no foreshadowing, and Anders spends two splash panels just staring off into space before a [[Time Skip]] to his life as a single father.

* Season 5 of ''[[Survivor Fan Characters]]'' was full of these, given that the season was tagged "The Cursed Islands". Such "curses" involved having someone divvy up the tribes, but then get sent to Exile Island and have no control over which tribe they're sent to at the end of Day 3; a tribe being absorbed into the other tribes; someone having the choice to send themselves to Exile Island until the merge, but have absolutely no contact with their tribe mates until then; a random mutiny - one of the challenges was full of these; mainly, contestants would vote as to how many tribal councils they would be willing to go to with such debilitations as not being able to vote, having an extra vote against them, and not being applicable to win immunity. Miranda won the first, Brock won the second {{spoiler|and subsequently led to his elimination}}, and Marius won the last {{spoiler|although he managed to ''win'' because of this curse.}}

* In ''[[Our Little Adventure]]'', [http://danielscreations.com/ola/comics/ep0249.html the clone's escape is called this.]

 

== Web Original ==

** Diablous ex Machina struck once before. In ''Sims Big Brother 2'', there was a week in which 6 people were taken into the Solitary chamber, making themselves immune from the vote during Public Voting Week (in which ''everyone'' was up on the block, sans the 6 in the chamber). However, the person who lost all of the challenges was more or less screwed. They couldn't use any of the luxuries, couldn't compete for Head of household, were automatically nominated for three weeks in a row, had to eat an instant meal diet, and if any of those rules were broken, they'd be expelled. Dora unfortunately lost....meaning she had many of the worst weeks of her life in the house. Is it any wonder that after becoming the Unlucky Houseguest, she [[Suicide by Cop|asked everyone to nominate her and vote her out?]]

* [[Parodied]] in [[The Nostalgia Critic]]'s review of ''[[Moulin Rouge]]:'' he spent practically the entire review complaining about the movie before the [[The Nostalgia Chick]] and [[Brental Floss]] convinced him it was fine as a [[Guilty Pleasures|guilty pleasure]]. But this being a review of ''[[Moulin Rouge]],'' it needed to end tragically, so he randomly shot Brental Floss and mourned his loss.

** In another ''Simpsons'' episode, "Brother From Another Series", Sideshow Bob appears reformed and gets work release when his brother Cecil offers him a job for a dam project. Bart is convinced that Bob is up to no good, but in the end it turns out Bob really ''has'' reformed and Cecil was trying to embezzle millions from the dam project. Bob actually helps stop Cecil and saves Bart and Lisa's lives, but when the police arrive to arrest Cecil, Police Chief Wiggum insists on arresting Bob as well for no good reason.

{{quote|'''Bob''': (In the backseat of the police car with Cecil) But I ''saved'' the children!

'''Bob''': ''You'll live to regret this!'' ...Oh, great. Now ''I'' sound crazy. }}

* ''[[Hey Arnold!]]!'': The Devil sure loves stalking [[The Chew Toy|Eugene Horowitz]]...

* Pretty much the entire purpose of the Kanker Sisters in ''[[Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy]]''. They tend to show up anytime something's actually going ''right'' for the titular characters for a change (ex. "Over Your Ed", "Look Into My Eds").

* Happens on a regular basis in ''[[Invader Zim]]'', usually with [[Butt Monkey|Dib]].

* This trope is a recurring theme in ''[[G.I. Joe: Renegades]]'', where [[Failure Is the Only Option]]. Every time the Joes find something that will clear their names, it's a safe bet it will either get burned, blown up, smashed, stolen, or stabbed. {{spoiler|That is until the season one finale where the Joes returned to the Pentagon with all the evidence they needed to clear their names after destroying Cobra Mansion and defeating Cobra Commander, who survived and is ticked off by the way. The series is now on hiatus until the second live action movie is finished but it's doubtful the Joes will suddenly become wanted crinimals again when it resumes.}}

* During the [[Christmas Episode]] of ''[[Metalocalypse]]'', Doctor Rockzo, The Rock and Roll Clown (he does cocaine) sells all of Toki's Secret Santa gifts, for some cocaine. When Toki finds out, he prepares to give the clown a sound thrashing. Unfortunately, before he can reach him, Murderface's drunk Grandma crashes her scooter into a cross, trapping Toki under it. Rockzo escapes punishment, and even gets a handjob from Skwisgar's mom.

 

== Real Life ==

* There has been at least one real life occurrence of a person who just won the lottery being run over by a car. On a positive note, he ''was'' 73.

* General George S. Patton, after serving through [[World War I]] ''and'' [[World War II]], and was the sort of fighting man who should've died on the battlefield or in old age, gets killed in a car accident in Germany two months after the end of the war and a day before he was to return to America.

* A certain stuntman who rode a barrel over Niagara Falls later died from slipping on an orange peel.

** He also tried to swim the Niagara river twice. He had to get rescued both times, but at least he survived those.

* "We knew a croc (or something) would get him". ''[[Crocodile Hunter]]'' Steve Irwin, after dodging death from crocs, snakes, sharks, etc. for years, was offed by one of the world's least aggressive toward humans creatures, a stingray.

** Moreover, contrary to popular assumption, Irwin was just swimming by it, rather than actively provoking it in any way. He was, in fact, there to save the stingrays.

** The stingrays, as a species, have tried their best to avert this by causing a statistically abnormal rash of deaths in the wake of Irwin.

*** Doesn't help people have been [[Too Dumb to Live|provoking them]] by trying to kill them in [[Completely Missing the Point|revenge for Steve's death.]]

* [[Blues]] musician [[Stevie Ray Vaughan]] recovered from a nearly deadly addiction to cocaine and alcohol, returned to form with his comeback album ''In Step'' in 1989, then died tragically in a helicopter crash a year later (along with the pilot and the rest of the crew) after playing a concert in Colorado.

* The great explorer and soldier T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) died in the most ignoble way after the life he had led, in a motorcycle accident as he was pulling out of his drive.

* In 1980, Kenny Waters was sentenced to life imprisonment for a crime he didn't commit. His sister Betty Anne spent the next 18 years trying to get him released, even going through law school to able to defend him, at the cost of her marriage. She finally managed to get him released in 2001... only for him to die 6 months later from head trauma after falling off a wall. The [[Hilary Swank]] movie [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1244754/ Conviction] is based off this story, though the producers omitted the detail about the brother dying [[Sudden Downer Ending|for obvious reasons]].

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Plot Device]]

[[Category:Rule of Drama]]

[[Category:Older Than Dirt]]

[[Category:Bad Writing Index]]

[[Category:Ind Ex Machina]]

[[Category:Sadness Tropes]]

[[Category:Diabolical Plots]]