Take a Third Option/Quotes

Trinity: "Neo... nobody has ever done anything like this before."
Neo: "That's why it's going to work."

—The Matrix

"A strange game. The only winning move is not to play."

—Joshua, WarGames

"There is a third option. It involves... murder."

—The Cat in the Hat Live Action Adaptation

Riku: What are you making me choose now?
DiZ: Will you take the road to light — or the road to darkness?
Riku: Neither. I'm taking the middle road.
DiZ: You mean the twilit road to nightfall?
Riku: No... The road to dawn.

—Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories (technically taking the fourth option)

Dr. Rumack: What was it we had for dinner tonight?
Elaine Dickinson: Well, we had a choice of steak or fish.
Dr. Rumack: Yes, yes, I remember, I had the lasagna.

—Airplane!!

"Doakes said I had two choices - kill him or let him go. But he neglected to look behind door number three..."

—Dexter

"One day, someone showed me a glass of water that was half full. And he said, "Is it half full or half empty?" So I drank the water. No more problem."

—Alexander Jodorowsky

David: "What? There's a third option? Crazy and daring?"
Fatebane: "Daring, definitely daring... possibly fatal..."
David: "So what else is new?"

—Associated Space

"My vengeance will be neither swift nor entertaining! I will mete it out over decades, so that you will wonder if the misery in your life is manifest, the machinations of Leonardo Leonardo, or... some third thing. Good day!"

—Leonardo Leonardo, Clerks, the animated series

Batman: I've made my choice... none of the above!
D.A.V.E.: How very predictable. I anticipated you would try to create a third, more favourable option.

—The Batman, Gotham's Ultimate Criminal Mastermind

"When forced to choose between the universe and the woman you love, choose both and have the courage to back it up"

—The Laws of Super Robot Anime

"There's an old Talaxian expression. 'When the road before you splits in two... take the third path.'"

—Neelix, Star Trek: Voyager

Umbridge: So are you Team Edward or Team Jacob?
Sorting Hat: Neither. I'm TEAM DUMBLEDORE!
Umbridge:: Dumbledore's not a fictional character.

Dr.Porkchop: You must choose, sheriff Woody. How shall she die!? Shark!? Or death by monkeys!? CHOOSE.
Woody: I Choose... BUZZ LIGHT-YEAR!
Dr.Porkchop: WHAT!? That's not a choice!

—Toy Story 2

Serenity: Okay, Nesbitt! Which came first: the chicken or the egg?
Nesbitt: The rocket-powered fist!
Serenity: But, that wasn't one of the *hits by a rocket-powered fist*

—Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Abridged Series

VII. And Grimma said, We have two choices.
VIII. We can run, or we hide.
IX. And they said, Which shall we do?
X. She said, We shall Fight.
From The Book of Nome, Quarries, Chap. 3, v. VII-X

—Diggers by Terry Pratchett

"Well either one or the other is going to happen. There's no weird third thing."

—Liz, Thirty Rock

"I'm not going to deal with this now. It's like the classic debate of why measuring the position of an electron changes its momentum and vice-versa. The only correct answer is to get drunk and set fire to things."

—Gordon Freeman, Freeman's Mind

"Choosing isn't always right! Sometimes, not choosing is the correct answer! It may be referred to as the "harem" option!"

—Red, Hyperdimension Neptunia (optional skit)

In 2020, everyone is either a collaborator or a dissident. [...]
You also have your own life. You have to care about that, too! It's all very stressful. But also—it's all very exciting. Hm.
This kind of stressful, exciting situation makes one sort of person ask: which side should I fight for? Or: how can the dissidents win? Or even: how can we crush the dissidents? These are certainly interesting questions.
Another sort of person asks: how did we get here? How can I get out? How can we get out? What would getting out even mean? What else is there? What else could there be? Can we imagine any possible way in which all these increasingly strange and dangerous manias could turn themselves off, and everything could just be sensible, not scary, work and work well?
If you have found yourself asking this other type of question—perhaps you are not interested in spending the rest of your life as either a collaborator or a dissident—this text is for you.

—Gray Mirror Of The Nihilist Prince by Mencius Moldbug

"Here's the Rock: If I win this duel, I have to go up against Andy, Stan, or Francesca in the semi-finals, and judging by what might have happened to Aesop and Chico, that will be bad for me and worse for whoever my opponent is.
"Here's the Hard Place: If I lose the duel, that's going to fall on Drake's shoulders, and I don't know if I could live with that.
"And the worst part is, I'm pretty sure Drake's trying to choose between the same Rock and Hard Place right now too. If we do what the Queen wants, it will be bad. If we refuse to duel, it will be worse…
"This seems a no-win situation, like one of those deathtraps some sadistic comic book villain will use to hurt a hero badly, like how Lex Luthor might hold Lois Lane and Lana Lang hostage, and use some insidious machine that will kill one of them if Superman saves the other. Of course, Superman will always find a way to save them both, because Luthor's plan, as foolproof as it looks, always has some flaw that Superman can find and exploit. He's the kind of guy who can always see the third option. That's how stories like that work.
Of course, I'm not Superman, and I never claimed to be. Matching wits with an evil genius isn't something I'm used to, nor something I think I'd be good at. I really don't think the Queen is the overconfident egotist that a lot of comic book villains are portrayed as…
Still, I can see a third option… But it's likely gonna be the hardest move I've ever tried to pull off in my career as a duelist…

—Kyle (narrating the start of a chapter) in Yu-Gi-Oh! The Thousand Year Door