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Throw the Dog a Bone: Difference between revisions
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* Things regularly go horribly wrong for the two leads of ''[[Peep Show]]''. The series 7 opener seems to be building up to things being worse than ever, with Mark [[Heroic BSOD|dazedly walking out on the birth of his child]] and a subplot about the flat being flooded and Jez's unreliable junkie friend Superhans being sent to fix it. But {{spoiler|Jeremy finds Mark before the baby's born, Sophie didn't realise he was gone, the baby's fine and the flat has "minimal water damage". It's the latter that seems to please Mark the most.}}
* In ''[[Crownies]]'', the resident [[Butt Monkey]] Richard gets two in episode nine: he finally impresses a judge who he has a terrible history with (mainly because of uncooperative witnesses) to the point where the accused is sentenced to 20-27 years (Richard's goal was 25, for the accused's impulsive murder of a postman, but the judge added two years for [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|tampering with the mail]]). This is quickly followed by a passionate sexual encounter in his office chair with the psychiatrist whose testimony got the aforementioned conviction. (Though this does cause a hitch when it ruins Conrad's suit and Tatum comes close to letting slip that he's not really gay).
* In ''[[Misfits]]'' Simon the nerd-turned-arsonist spends most of his time in the first season being abused by [[Jerkass|Nathan]] and ignored by the others, with the exception of [[Team Mom|Kelly]]; the fifth episode was particularly cruel, ending with him being emotionally manipulated by Sally the probation worker {{spoiler|and accidentally killing her in a fight}}. However, things start improving for him in the second season:
** In the first episode, he manages to [[Talking the Monster to Death|make peace]] with his friend-turned-shapeshifter without killing her; then, the rest of the Misfits help him {{spoiler|dispose of Sally's corpse.}}
** In the second episode, he ends up being invited to a night out with the other Misfits, and even though he gets [[Slipping a Mickey|his drink spiked]] with the same party drug that the rest of the team are taking voluntarily, he ends up as the only person who enjoys it, because the drug ''reverses'' their powers: while [[Telepathy|Kelly]] is voicing everything that comes to mind, [[Love Potion|Alisha]] is repulsing anyone who touches her, [[Mental Time Travel|Curtis]] is teetering on the edge of a building in the future, and Nathan {{spoiler|has lost his immortality}}, Simon has become noticed and adored by everyone around him.
** Third episode: Alisha actually apologises for how she treated Simon in the past.
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* After years of being Games Workshop's [[Butt Monkey]] (half the units were unplayable, Unwinnable mission types), [[Warhammer 40000|Imperial Guard players]] finally got a codex that's actually good. Everyone else is worried that IG players will go into a [[Who's Laughing Now?]] state.
** If the mediocre IG became a powerhouse, one can only hope they never do get around to that Dark Eldar thing they keep promising.
*** Model-wise, Dark Eldars have pretty much have one of the best ranges now, being the only army to have their entire range overhauled, and having one of Games Workshop's best sculptors working on them. Your Milage May Vary on how they actually look, but they are indeed more detailed than any other range (since their range is one of the few to have a new basic trooper plastic sprue done for them with the new plastic moulding technology, alot of details will be retained).
== Video Games ==
* Johnny Sasaki of ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' finally gets some luck in ''Guns of the Patriots''. {{spoiler|He gets cured of his bowel problems, stars in his own [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]], and then marries his commanding officer/long-time crush Meryl in the ending of the game.}}
* After all the abuse he suffers through in ''[[Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice]]'', Almaz ends up getting what he wants. {{spoiler|He marries Sapphire in the post credits epilogue of the normal ending.}}
* [[Super Mario Bros.|Luigi]], Nintendo's poster boy for [[Butt Monkey]], got thrown a bone by [[Super Smash Bros.]] Brawl. He ends up as one of the four characters who saves the rest of the heroes of the overworld. Granted, it's after a scene where he's scared of [[The Goomba|Waddle Dees]] and gets sneak-attacked by Dedede, but the clumsy little plumber helps Dedede save ''everyone''.
** There's also ''[[Luigi's Mansion]]'', where Luigi finally takes a starring role, and saves ''Mario'', despite being scared out of his wits (this is technically the second time this had happened, but nobody counts ''Mario is Missing'').
** In [[Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story]]'', {{spoiler|Bowser saves the Mushroom Kingdom from the Dark Star and Fawful, only to end up getting beat up by the Mario Brothers once again after challenging them. After the credits, while he's recovering from the injuries, he gets a present from Peach and the Mario Bros. It's a Mario 64-like cake with his face.}}
* ''[[Xenosaga]]'', Allen ends up with his crush, Shion; and the person she cares about more than him has to leave until some [[Reincarnation]] in the future.
* In ''[[Blaz Blue]]'', [[The Woobie|Noel Vermillion]] has nothing but sad endings. Except that one ending involving her getting enchanted with Litchi Faye Ling's cute panda hairpin and pins on it happily. It's the closest thing to 'happy ending' she can get. The true endings also improve things for her somewhat (although the second game is still somewhat bittersweet despite the fact that she's {{spoiler|been convinced she's a person despite her [[Artificial Human]] status and never having been in the timeline before and hanging around with her best friend}} since {{spoiler|her other best friend has undergone a [[Heel Face Turn]] and wants to kill her.}}
** The gag ending for Lambda-11 looks like this when she gets a pet insect and makes friends with [[Fun Personified|Makoto]] {{spoiler|but this turns into a [[Yank the Dog's Chain]] when Kokonoe unknowingly throws the unfortunate creature away and erases L-11's memory of the diversion (made even worse by the fact that had she known Lambda wasn't an [[Empty Shell]] she may well have been much nicer (or as nice as she is to Tager).}}
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== Western Animation ==
* The above quote comes from the series finale of ''[[Transformers]]: [[Beast Wars]]'', where Waspinator, [[The Chew Toy]] [[Cosmic Plaything|of Fate]], is left on earth after leaving the Predacons where he becomes the leader of a village of Protohumans. It's obviously more significant if you [[Fanon Discontinuity|ignore]] ''Beast Machines'', though he wasn't nearly [[The Chew Toy]] there that he was in ''Beast Wars'', as he spent most of the time sharing a body with Thrust, and was one of the only three characters to survive the entirety of both series.
** Waspinator was originally scheduled to die, but because he was popular, one of the writers convinced the executives to let him change it to him surviving the [[Dropped a Bridge on Him|bridge-dropping]] that killed Scorponok and Terrorsaur by the [[Contrived Coincidence]] of falling into a CR Chamber instead of a pit of lava.
** {{spoiler|It could be said that he was thrown a real life bone in his appearance in ''[[Transformers Animated]]'' where instead of being a clumsy bumbler, [[Adaptational Badass|he was shown to clever, psychotic, and just plain dangerous]], although a [[Shout-Out]] to his former incarnation could be where he had the misfortune of being framed for being a Decepticon spy}}.
** Also, whenever he fights Silverbolt. Silverbolt ''never'' beat Waspinator in combat or even landed a real hit. Waspinator, on the other hand, beat him three separate times.
** And now he's an official member of the Transformers [http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers_Hall_of_Fame Hall of Fame], through ''fan votes''. Happy at last Waspinator, Happy at last...
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*** A third example has Squidward managing to compose a musical piece for a competition, and having that piece selected to be played despite Spongebob/Patrick's general annoyingness. When the composition is actually PLAYED, it's revealed that he actually wrote the annoyingness INTO the piece, you'd expect this to be a [[Yank the Dog's Chain]] where everyone goes nuts over Spongebob, but then the people start cheering... for Squidward.
**** The Tiki Island episode is pretty much dedicated to this. Even when it looks like it's undone in the end, it turns out that it's not.
** Another example occurs in an episode where he falls in love with a female Squid. Squidward turns to Spongebob for advice, but it goes wrong. When Squidward finally has enough, he starts yelling at [[SpongeBob]] right in front of his girlfriend. At first, Squid thinks she's going to break up with him for said outburts, but it ends up making her more attracted to him.
* Literal Dog: The ''[[Animaniacs]]'' movie ''[[Wakko's Wish|Wakkos Wish]]'' actually subverted [[Failure Is the Only Option]] for everyone, including [[Badly-Battered Babysitter|Buttons]], who was finally rewarded when Mindy called her Mom "Mommy" and instead of losing a meal, was given a huge pile of steaks.
** There was also had Rita and Runt being adopted by Dr. Scratchinsniff and Brain getting a position of significant power.
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** It should be noted that, due to his [[Chew Toy]] status, many fans expected one of the letters of "Merry Christmas" to fall on him.
** In "Poor and Stupid", Kenny falls in the middle of a Nascar race track, two cars are coming straight a him at full speed, Kenny braces for the inevitable... and then the drivers notice him and manage to dodge him crashing and burning at the sides of Kenny.
*** Don't forget how (in [[The Movie]]) Kenny [[Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence|finally got his just reward]] for his years of [[Butt Monkey]] status, complete with [[Holy Halo|little halo and glowing trail as he went to Heaven.]]
**** Not to mention ascending into a land of giant breasts in the clouds. (Were we watching the same movie?)
* Arnold of ''[[Hey Arnold!]]'' tried to give a nice day to the usually unlucky Eugene, but it's subverted as he fails continually. Then it's [[Double Subversion|Double Subverted]] as Eugene at least ''thinks'' one good thing happened (getting a new fish), even though it was cancelled out (the fish was eaten while he wasn't looking).
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** A nod to the football gag, plus [[Laser-Guided Karma]] was used by ''[[Family Guy]]'' in one episode. In a cut away gag, Lucy yanks the football away as Charlie Brown tries to kick it, causing Peter to appear and ''beat the crap out of Lucy'' for toying with Charlie Brown all this time and forces her to hold the football in place. Charlie Brown kicks it and becomes happy that he finally got to kick the football. Hard to say there wasn't a single soul that wanted Lucy to get what was coming to her.
*** Also used in ''[[Robot Chicken]]'' when Charlie Brown stops at the last minute and kicks Lucy. [[Laser-Guided Karma|"That's for years of humiliation,]] [[This Is For Emphasis|bitch!"]]
** Notably ''not'' employed in the comics themselves, though, where any and all triumphs Charlie Brown achieves are ''always'' dragged down or retconned, such as an example where he hit a home run and won the baseball game, yet it later turned out this was only because the female pitcher had a crush on him. Another time, a winning run was walked in because the pitcher couldn't pitch strikes to Linus' toddler brother Rerun (who thought they were [[Comically Missing the Point|playing for the Stanley Cup]]). Sadly, a "youth sports commission" [[Acceptable Targets|not unlike the Mafia]] forces Charlie Brown to forfeit the victory after it's revealed Snoopy had money on the game.
*** Charlie Brown does get at least one victory in the comics. During the last part of its run, he helps Rerun by defeating a bully in a game of marbles.
*** Another time was when Lucy was berating Charlie Brown at her psychology booth for wasting his life he spent the morning cleaning his closet shelf. To prove her point, she asked Linus what he was doing that morning. When he said he just watched TV, Lucy was humiliated seeing her argument explode in her face while Charlie made the most of this great turn of events with a smug "My closet shelf is real clean!"
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* After being a [[Butt Monkey]] for nearly ten seasons, Kirk Van Houten (Milhouse's dad from [[The Simpsons]]) finally caught a break in a recent season when he married Luanne again and moved back to his old home, and essentially, recovering his good old life.
** This happens occasionally for Grandpa Simpson, who is usually ignored by his family. This usually happens with Bart helping him do something cool, like trying steal the Hellfish treasure, running away to Branson, MO, or escaping the nursing home.
* In ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'', Zuko is finally thrown a bone at the start of the third season; he's finally been accepted back into the Fire Nation by his father, he's restored the honor he's been fighting for two seasons and three years to get back, he's got a girlfriend, and his father has allowed him to sit at his side once more. The problem for Zuko is that he finally realizes that ''he doesn't want any of that'' anymore, that restoring his honor came at the price of betraying his uncle Iroh, that the Fire Nation [[Heel Realization|really are the villains of this story]], and that being the good little prince beside his father is something that fundamentally goes against the man he has become (not to mention that this new title came as a result of a lie on his sister's part)....which leads to his true [[Heel Face Turn]].
** Excepting that he's happy the girlfriend (Mai) is dating him, and she's still with him at the end.
*** One could also assume that Zuko's ''real'' bone is after the ending, where he's the ruler of the Fire Nation, heralded as one of the heroes of the world at the same level as Aang, finally got to show his sister she wasn't so much better than him as she first thought and married to Mai. Life dosen't get much better than that.
** Sokka, the unlucky comic relief for most of the series, gets a bite in one late-series episode where a sword master accepts him for martial training. [[Took a Level In Badass|It only gets better from there.]]
** In retrospect: the [[Butt Monkey|Cabbage Guy]]. After years of having his cabbage cart smashed every time he appears on screen, he becomes founder of one of the most successful businesses in the world. {{spoiler|His successor unfortunately inherits his bad luck when he gets framed for supplying the Equalists. "Not my Cabbage Corps!"}}
* Happens frequently with [[Butt Monkey]] [[Alpha Bitch]] Sissi on ''[[Code Lyoko]]'', particularly in the series finale.
* On ''[[Phineas and Ferb]],'' [[Single Woman Seeks Good Man|cute, ridiculously-nice Jeremy]] embodies this trope for [[Butt Monkey|Candace]]; many episodes have Candace accidentally putting herself through all sorts of grief trying to bust her brothers, only for Jeremy to show up in the last sixty seconds and somehow manage to make her day brighter.
** Also, every now and then this is also delivered by her brothers themselves.
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