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'''Egon''': "Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light."<br />
'''Ray''': "Total protonic reversal."<br />
'''Peter''': "Right. [[Captain Obvious|That's bad.]] Okay. All right. Important safety tip. Thanks, Egon."|''[[Ghostbusters (Film)|Ghostbusters]]''}}
 
Remember [[Chekhov's Gun]] that was on top of the mantel? The one Little Bobby was told ''never'' to touch, under ''any'' circumstances? Now's the time to grab it. This is a specific subtrope of the [[Chekhov's Gun]] where some points out the "gun" and ''explicitly warns against using it''. It doesn't have to be a [[Matter of Life and Death]]. It can be as simple as being told not to push a button, then later being told to push it.
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* ''[[Slayers]]'' offers another example with the Giga Slave. In order to keep it from being Lina's answer to every problem, a [[Godzilla Threshold]] aspect was introduced. Lina learns that the spell could cause the world to turn to chaos, and vows to never use it again; naturally, she's forced to do so at the end of Slayers Next.
** Interesting to note, however, is that it's not always used when there's a climax. The end of the first season, like the end of NEXT, is one big attempt to get her to perform the spell. She doesn't. Almost the entirety of Try, once the characters learn who the [[Big Bad]] is, is about finding a way NOT to use it. They succeed, but Lina always accepted that she may have to use the Giga Slave if their plan didn't work.
* Sugata of ''[[Star Driver (Anime)|Star Driver]]'' has access to an extremely powerful first phase ability, the King's Pillar. However, every previous bearer of Samehk's mark who used the ability [[Dude, She's Like, in Aa Coma|never woke up again]]. Of course the time comes when he has to protect Wako, and well, you can guess what happened. Luckily for Sugata, his [[Level Up At Intimacy Five5|libido]] was strong enough overcome that effect.
 
 
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* ''[[Ghostbusters]]'' has the iconic warning "Don't cross the streams," which they inevitably have to do at the end of the movie. As former [[Trope Namer]], it was also causing confusion, since this overlaps with [[Godzilla Threshold]]. In this case, the non-disaster when they do end up crossing the streams makes internal sense: they are firing into a {{spoiler|[[Parallel Universe]] and presumably, [[Inferred Holocaust|the disaster Egon predicts happens]] '''[[Inferred Holocaust|there]]''' - and closes the gate}}.
* In ''[[Orgazmo]]'', Choda Boy swears off using his dangerous "Hamster Style" at a young age due to its unpredictability, but at the movie's (heh, heh) climax, he employs it with great results.
* Agent J in ''[[Men in Black (Filmfilm)|Men in Black]]'' is told by Agent K to never, ever touch the red button inside their car. When the two need to get across the city in a hurry and the tunnel is jammed, he is told to at last push the button -- transforming the car into a high-speed rocket that drives along the ceiling of the tunnel.
** In the second movie Jay uses "Pressed the Red Button" as a type of code, indicating that it is reserved only for the [[Godzilla Threshold|biggest emergencies]]. They seem to prefer to not even use the neuralyzer if they don't have to, so going for a rocket car ride would likely be a last ditch number on their list of priorities.
* The Omega 13 from ''[[Galaxy Quest (Film)|Galaxy Quest]]''. Somewhat played with. None of the characters even ''know'' what it does, including the aliens who built it. So they don't want to use it, because they don't know what it will do.
* The [[Super Prototype|Gunstar's]] [[Spin Attack|Death Blossom]] attack in ''[[The Last Starfighter]]''; not so much that's it's insanely overpowered (although it is) as that it leaves the ship vulnerable just before and after it's engaged.
* ''[[Iron Man (Filmfilm)|Iron Man]] 2'', kind of. When Iron Man and Rhodey fight in Tony's villa, they both fire their handcannons at each other at the same time and basically cause a huge explosion, a dangerous side-effect they hadn't predicted. So a [[Show, Don't Tell]] version of the warning. This is then used later on to take out the [[Big Bad]] when he has the upper hand.
* In the ''[[Lost in Space]]'' film, ships have hyperspace engines, but it is not a good idea to jump without coordinates or a jump gate as the exit vector would be random. The crew does this anyway when the ship is sabotaged and crashing into the sun.
 
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* The Door to Nowhere and Nowhen serves this function in ''[[The Redemption of Althalus]]''.
* ''[[Discworld]]''
** In ''[[Discworld (Literature)/The Colour of Magic|The Colour of Magic]]'', one of the '''eight spells''' (eight is an important number on the Disc) has lodged itself in Rincewind's mind. He doesn't know exactly what it does, but popular wizarding opinion is that it will destroy the Disc. As a semi-sentient entity, it tries to cast itself. Rincewind ''barely'' prevents himself from casting it several times through the course of the first two books (which is one story) ''[[Discworld (Literature)/The Colour of Magic|The Colour of Magic]]'' and ''[[Discworld (Literature)/The Light Fantastic|The Light Fantastic]]''. {{spoiler|When he does lose control, it turns out it's '''not''' a spell to destroy the world... but to create others.}}
** In the back-story of ''[[Discworld (Literature)/Going Postal|Going Postal]]'', an automatic letter-sorting device with extradimensional components (it accesses a dimension where pi is exactly equal to 3) goes out of control, filling the Ankh-Morpork Post Office with letters. Wizards called in to inspect the device warn that shutting it down is likely to destroy the universe. Fed up with the machine, a veteran mail-carrier starts smacking the device with a crowbar until it shuts down. When the mail-carrier started hitting the device, the wizards ran away. As the doer of the deed testified; unless they had some other universe to run to, they weren't really sure about the danger. The wizards insist that the universe ''really was'' destroyed, but was instantaneously replaced by a complete, identical universe. {{spoiler|Of course, that exact thing has actually happened before in that series. Twice, depending on how you count.}}
*** An unusual example, in that this was a ending-the-universe danger, but never actually crossed the [[Godzilla Threshold]] before it was destroyed.
* The [[Chronicles of Thomas Covenant]] (at least the second one), after spending the last two series trying to prevent Lord Foul from obtaining Covenant's [[Cosmic Keystone|white gold ring]] in the final confrontation {{spoiler|Covenant just hands him the ring. It turns out to be a massive [[Batman Gambit]], as Covenant had finally come to understand how the whit gold worked, and was able to trick Foul into destroying himself with the power.}}
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== Live Action TV ==
* [[Babylon Five|Babylon 5]]: The "Bonehead Maneuver" as mentioned in the Season 3 premiere. Basically, you have two ways of going in and out of hyperspace. If your ship is powerful enough, you can open your own jump point, or, if your ship isn't that powerful, you have a Jump Gate open one for you. You never want to open a jump point inside a jump gate, because this causes one massive explosion of a [[Negative Space Wedgie]]. Aside from the loss of a very hard to replace jump gate (typically a star system will have one at most) and potentially stranding people in the system if they lack massive starships, this doesn't actually cause any huge universe-altering affects. Just a huge explosion that is difficult for most ships big enough to open a jump point to [[Outrun the Fireball|outrun]] (So, not really a [[Godzilla Threshold]]). They end up using the trick in a tricked-out new spaceship that MIGHT be fast enough to get away after using this trick to kill an enemy they DEFINITELY weren't big enough to fight.
 
== Real Life ==
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** And I'm sure we all can see when they would feel it appropriate to [[Nuke'Em|let the cores go critical]], but such circumstances are very rare and very controversial.
* The Higgs Boson A.K.A The God particle. The way to discover it ''could'' turn Earth into a black hole.
** Or cause the vacuum of space to drop to a more "stable" state, [[The End of the World Asas We Know It|destroying the universe as we know it]].
** [[Conspiracy Theorist|That's according to weirdos and pseudoscientists]].
* Albert Einstein once observed that "you cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war."
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== Theme Parks ==
* In the ''[[Men in Black (Filmfilm)|Men in Black]]: Alien Attack'' ride at Universal Studios, a [[Big Red Button]] like the one mentioned in the above example appears in every ride car. Like in the film, you are told never to press it. However, by the end of the ride you face a giant alien that's immune to your weapons. Guess what you have to do?
** A cheesy instruction video seen while in line on the ride explains exactly WHY you don't press the button; it's basically a ''nuke'' capable of frying the more [[Kaiju]]-esque aliens.
 
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** Though, as a result of some [[Applied Phlebotinum]], {{spoiler|Using the Dominus glyph union against Dracula is the one case in the game where it doesn't kill Shanoa.}}
*** {{spoiler|Less of [[Applied Phlebotinum]] than [[Heroic Sacrifice]]. Turns out that the glyph consumes ''a'' soul, not necessarily ''the user's''. It just so happens that Albus was forced to hang around after his defeat and was able to take Shanoa's place. Mind you, this is in the Good End. The Bad End has Shanoa die after using the glyph.}}
* ''[[Fate/stay Stay Nightnight]]''. Specifically, using Excalibur, the first [[Deus Sex Machina]] (maybe), Shirou's arm, taking on Caster/Kuzuki directly on their turf (not a dangerous ''technique'' but the strategy is essentially suicide) and projection in general. Maybe it would have been best to simply leave this with no details considering how prominent this is?
* '[[Tsukihime|Shiki]], you've got about thirty seconds before Roa takes over your mind? ''What are you going to do now?''' Answer: Stab himself in his own point of death on the assumption that if his will is stronger than Roa's, he'll live through it and Roa will die instead. Still, it's not like Ciel had any other ideas, and Arcueid provided backup by way of a single drop of her blood. (Thus sharing her will with his and allowing him to overpower Roa with relative ease.)
* In ''[[Pokémon]]'' - [[Taking You Withwith Me|Perish Song.]] Especially if you're in a double battle.
* ''[[Magicka]]'' allows you to do this quite literally with the Arcane element and other elements to alter the beam's qualities, resulting in a combined, powerful beam. But if beams of opposing elements cross, a huge explosion occurs that will likely kill anyone nearby. Players may exploit this when fighting goblin shamans and other enemies that use beam attacks, intentionally or accidentally.
* In ''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]'', {{spoiler|Ultimecia's master plan is to compress time. The heroes' plan to prevent her from doing that involves letting her do exactly that.}}
* In ''[[Chrono Cross (Video Game)|Chrono Cross]]'', the [[Big Bad]] is defeated by literally crossing the time streams.
* Happens again in ''[[Ghostbusters the Video Game]]'', {{spoiler|except this time due to being in the ghost world - where the same rules of physics don't apply, such as the lack of gravity on the actual landmass - one can probably assume that you can [[Forbidden Chekhov's Gun|cross the streams]] without frying your ass to bits because the chances are ''reversed'', thus making it more safe to try.}}
* The Great Clock's purpose in ''[[Ratchet and Clank Future A Crack In Time]]'' is specifically stated several times throughout the game to be ''maintaining'' time, not reversing it. Time-travelling with it would cause the entire universe to collapse on itself. Naturally, {{spoiler|Clank has to use it to turn back time by only a couple of minutes at the end of the game after [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|Azimuth]] kills Ratchet}}.
* The command that stops the [[Big Bad]] from sacrificing you to end the world in ''[[Chzo Mythos|Trilby's Notes]]'' is {{spoiler|DIE. Yeah.}}
* ''[[Metroid: Other M]]'' combines this with [[A Taste of Power]] for the {{spoiler|Power Bombs}}. You test them out in the beginning of the game, and are promptly told to ''never'' use them, and in fact attempting do so will fail. {{spoiler|Until the final boss, where you HAVE to use them after being swallowed.}} Also a [[Guide Dang It]] since you have, most likely, completely forgotten they exist by that point and wouldn't think to use them after all the hubbub about not using them previously.
 
 
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** The dog can talk, and they ''always'' team up.
*** They did this gag before. "We have to cross the creams!"
* In ''[[Over the Hedge (Filmanimation)|Over the Hedge]]'', characters tell Hammy not to drink caffeine, it could be dangerous to him, as he's already hyperactive. Later, they tell him to drink caffeine to go in [[Caffeine Bullet Time]] mode.
* In one episode of ''[[The Real Ghostbusters]]'', the GBs were falling toward a body of water from high enough to kill them on impact. Egon's solution? Have them fire at the water and cross the streams; the resulting explosion kicks up a huge column of water which breaks their fall enough for them to land safely. Upon landing safely, one of them asks how Egon knew it would have that effect. Egon's response? He didn't; he just thought it might help. We ''are'' talking about a guy who engaged in this exchange;
{{quote| '''Peter''': "Egon, this reminds me of the time you tried to drill a hole through your head."<br />
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