Give Me a Reason

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"You wanna settle down now? Please say 'no.'" —Hawkgirl, Justice League, "Hereafter"

Alice has Bob more or less where she wants him. There's no need for violence to enforce her will, and there are a dozen ways it might be a bad idea. That doesn't mean that, knowing she shouldn't, she doesn't want to. She goads, provokes, pushes for any excuse to beat the crap out of him. And if Bob so much as twitches in the wrong direction, he winds up with a sword at his throat. Alice may even tell him to go ahead and make her day.

This is an instance where one character is begging for an excuse to be violent to another, verbally or otherwise. This can overlap with Implied Death Threat if Alice doesn't want to merely hurt Bob, but kill him. Has a similar, but opposite effect to Don't Make Me Destroy You, where Alice doesn't want do hurt Bob, and doesn't want the provocation, but certainly will if given.

Has nothing to with a romantic Stock Phrase where a character begs their love interest to "give me a reason to stay."

Examples of Give Me a Reason include:

Comic Books

• In Sillage #4, when the protagonists are ambushed by the antagonist , which turns out not to be evil:

Moneva: I have your spawn of the devil [at my mercy]! Lay down your weapons! General Rammasz: And if we refuse? Moneva: You would cause grief for you... and joy for me!

• In one Spider-Man story, Silver Sable catches up to the villain - a Nazi war criminal - shoves the barrel of her revolver in his mouth and says, "Give me an excuse." Not surprisingly, he declines.

Film

• Poor Boy's Game.

Chris Webb: You give me an excuse, Donnie. You give me one f*cking excuse!

• Sudden Impact:

Dirty Harry: Go ahead, make my day.

• Take the Lead

Principal: Keep talking. Give me a reason to kick your butt out of my school. Give me one.

• Predator. Anna (the captured guerilla) tries to escape from Dillon, her captor. After she's recaptured he says to her "Try it again...please", a threat of what he'll do to her if she does.
• The Street Fighter's Last Revenge has Terry do this to Frankie Black before a deathmatch that ends with Terry burning the latter to death.

Terry Tsurugi: Hey, Black... come on.

Literature

• In Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Snape uses those exact words when threatening escaped prisoner and longtime nemesis Sirius Black.

"Give me a reason," he whispered. "Give me a reason to do it, and I swear I will." Black stopped dead. It would have been impossible to say which face showed more hatred.

• Thud! has Vimes wishing that a bunch of dwarves he sees in the street would give him a reason to arrest them. He was really pissed at dwarves for warmongering against trolls, and also for trying to kill him and his family.

Live-Action TV

• In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Defector", the Enterprise is staring down three Romulan Warbirds and gets this from the Romulan Commander.

Tomalak: First, Captain, you will return the traitor Jarok, then you will surrender as prisoners of war. Picard: Do you seriously expect me to accept those terms? Tomalak: (smirks) No, Captain Picard, I expect you won't.

• Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Major Kira pulled this on Damar in the episode "Favor the Bold". After being given an excuse. Guess what happens.

Ziyal: It should be obvious, even to you, Damar, that I am not a true daughter of Cardassia! Damar: What is obvious to me is that your father should have left you to rot in that Breen prison camp. But he didn't. He took pity on you. And it's your duty to repay him! Now, come with me! Kira: Let her go. Damar: And if I don't? What happens then? Kira: I was hoping you'd ask. (proceeds to beat the ever-loving tar out of Damar)

• Johnny Ringo episode "Die Twice"

Johnny Ringo: Make a move - give me an excuse. Boone Hackett: I got my hands up. Johnny Ringo: Put one of 'em down - that's all it takes to draw.

• Babylon 5:
  • Ivanova does this often:

Sinclair: Commander, please remove Major Kemmer from C&C. Ivanova: With pleasure. (Beat) You are going to resist, I hope.

• • When the mole who shot Garibaldi in the back is arrested, the arresting officer invites him to "make my solar year".
• In the Doctor Who episode "Utopia", Chantho points a gun at the Master. The Master was probably planning on killing her anyway, but upon having a weapon pointed it him, his observation is that now he can claim he was provoked.
• In the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode "Becoming, Part 1", Principal Snyder uses this on Buffy in the context of giving him a reason to expel her.

Western Animation

• Justice League:
  • In the episode "Hereafter", Lobo crashes Superman's wake, and is eventually subdued by the rest of the League. Hawkgirl, however, really wants to keep hitting him, resulting in the page quote.
  • Hawkgirl is a fan of this:

"We gonna do this the hard way, Lex? Please say 'yes.'"

• • The episode "The Once and Future Thing: Weird Western Tales: Part 1" has Batman facing off with a cowboy, armed only with his utility belt.

Batman: Go ahead - give me an excuse.

• Generator Rex episode "The Hunter"

Rex: What's you damage, man? I was this close to curing that thing! Hunter Cain: Didn't look that way to me, filthy evo! Rex: "Filthy evo?" Hunter Cain: Give me a reason. Just one.

• An Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog episode has Sonic decide to let Scratch and Grounder catch him to spring a cartoonist from jail from the inside. But not before fucking around with them for a while first, including a scene with him on a scaffold dressed as a window washer. Of course, this couldn't have been invoked at all if they weren't standing directly underneath the scaffold to begin with.

Scratch: Hold it right there, Hedgehog! Sonic: Boy, you guys are fast! You must've taken your vitamins today! Scratch: Shut your yap! Sonic: Okay, I will! Scratch: Feet apart! Grounder: Hands on top of your head! Scratch: NO! Sonic: (directly to the camera) I was hoping he'd say that. (does as he's told, releasing the scaffold wires and dropping it on top of them)