History Main / AesopCollateralDamage

* ''Franchise/SpiderMan'': Uncle Ben's death teaches Peter that he should use his powers with responsibility, and most versions of Spider-Man across the multi-verse, (non-Peter versions of Spider-Man substituting Uncle Ben for another character, like Peter for Spider-Gwen or Miles Morales,) and in most adaptations of the comics, have this tragedy as a central feature of his backstory.

* [[AntiHero Lelouch]], the protagonist of ''Anime/CodeGeass'', started war against the empire of Britannia, but early on didn't fully understand the consequences of war. Sure, he knew that he's putting his life on the line and that he'll have to kill in order to win, but he didn't care much about casualties on any side, and while he tried to avoid or at least minimise collateral damage he didn't give much thought to it when it happened. Then, in episode twelve, [[spoiler:he learns that one of the Britannian soldiers killed in his latest battle was a good friend's father]].

* [[AntiHero Lelouch]], the protagonist of ''Anime/CodeGeass'', started war against the empire of Britannia, but early on didn't fully understand the consequences of war. Sure, he knew that he's putting his life on the line and that he'll have to kill in order to win, but he didn't care much about casualties on any side, and while he tried to avoid or at least minimise collateral damage he didn't give much thought to it when it happened. Then, in episode twelve, [[spoiler:he learns that one of the Britannian soldiers killed in his latest battle was a good friend's father.]]

* ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'': Dr. Leslie Thompkins purposely let Stephanie Brown die just to demonstrate to Batman the dangers of letting kids fight crime. The subsequent {{Retcon}} held that it never happened; Dr. Thompkins faked Steph's death and lied to Bruce about it.

* In ''Film/SpiderMan1'', Peter refuses to stop a fleeing criminal as petty revenge against the fight promoter, who refused to pay Peter his award, and subsequently the hero's beloved Uncle Ben is killed by that criminal, teaching our hero that valuable lesson that WithGreatPowerComesGreatResponsibility.
** This lesson is flipped on its head in the third film when we see that Uncle Ben wasn't shot by the man that Peter let escape but by the man's partner, and, in fact, the shooting was a complete accident for which the shooter felt tremendous remorse.

* A horrific and intentional example of Aesop Collateral damage is found in Ryūnosuke Akutagawa's short story ''Hell Screen''. An obsessive and sadistic painter cannot paint anything he hasn't seen, so when he is commissioned to paint a picture of Hell by the tyrannical Japanese lord he serves, he tortures his apprentices to get the references he needs. Finally, he decides he needs to have a carriage set on fire and the woman inside to ''burn alive.'' The lord agrees. The victim? A pure, innocent and intelligent young woman [[spoiler:...the painter's daughter, and the one thing on Earth he truly loved]]. According to the servant narrating the story, the Lord does this to teach the painter a lesson about putting art above all other duties and concerns. However, the servant is [[UnreliableNarrator unlikely to be telling the precise truth]], out of fear of or devotion to his lord, so it seems more likely that [[spoiler:this was the lord's twisted revenge on the daughter, Yukimi, for spurning his advances...advances that the narrator claimed never happened, despite ''witnessing'' his attempted rape of Yukimi.]] After the execution, the painter finishes his screen [[spoiler:and is DrivenToSuicide - the lord is a KarmaHoudini]].

** King Midas had made a stupid wish for that everything he touched to turn to gold. But after this wish had been granted, it started to backfire on him - the original myth {{Avert|edTrope}}s this since Midas quickly realizes when eating that 'Food' is part of 'everything', and gold isn't consumable, begging for the original god who granted him the wish to take it back - but later retellings makes Midas an AdaptationalDumbass by immediately afterward hugging his daughter, thus turning her into this trope.

* This is parodied on ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': The "WesternAnimation/TreehouseOfHorror XII" story "Hex And The City" had a fortune teller curse Homer's family because he insulted her. They suffer through freakish transformations, and Bart actually dies, but Homer goes on refusing to [[CurseEscapeClause reverse the curse by apologizing]] because none of it is happening to ''[[ItsAllAboutMe him]]''. It's especially [[{{Jerkass}} cruel of Homer]] because the apology wouldn't just reverse the curse, it would even resurrect Bart.
-->'''Homer:''' Apologizing won't bring Bart back.\\

* In the final segment of the full version of the 1970s UK educational film ''Play Safe'', a boy who partakes in vandalizing electrical equipment causes his sister to die in a traffic accident via being struck by a car due to said vandalism causing the traffic lights and streetlights to not have power as a way of driving home the fact that vandalizing electrical equipment is dangerous.[[note]]This segment of the film was not broadcast on television on its own unlike the previous 3 segments of the film.[[/note]]

* In Disney's ''WesternAnimation/BeautyAndTheBeast'', the household staff are cursed, as well as the Beast himself. The Broadway version and live-action remake (see below) soften the collateral damage by having the staff discuss that they were the ones who had let the Beast turn into a SpoiledBrat in the first place, however it still doesn't justify turning a ''seven year old'' into a teacup.

* ''Film/BeautyAndTheBeast2017'' tries to deal with the implications in the Disney version by having the servants take some blame for the Prince's behavior since they did not protect him from his abusive father after his mother died. However this still does not explain Chip (a child) and Garderobe and Cadenza (performers who were hired and simply happened to be at the party that night). The opening scene makes it look more like the curse just hit whoever didn't get out of the room in time. Even worse, once the last petal falls the objects will turn ''inanimate'', effectively ''killing'' the servants and others who got caught in the curse. Belle's town is also collateral damage as they all magically forget about the nearby castle and all its inhabitants [[spoiler:which includes family members and loved ones]] for the duration of the curse. [[spoiler:No wonder the Enchantress shows up herself to fix things once the last petal falls right before Belle can say she loves the Beast. A cut scene even has [=LeFou=] call her out on it!]]

* [[AntiHero Lelouch]], the protagonist of ''Anime/CodeGeass'', started war against the empire of Brittania, but early on didn't fully understand the consequences of war. Sure, he knew that he's putting his life on the line and that he'll have to kill in order to win, but he didn't care much about casualties on any side, and while he tried to avoid or at least minimise collateral damage he didn't give much thought to it when it happened. [[spoiler:Until he finds out that during one battle he accidentally killed his friend's father.]]

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "Q Who". Irritated by Picard's arrogance, Q sends the ''Enterprise'' light years across the galaxy to an unexplored region of space and then disappears. They run into the Borg, who kill eighteen crew members. Picard learns his lesson, but eighteen innocents die for it: Picard calls Q out on what he has done and says that while he understands the lesson and appreciates its message, there must've been a way to teach it that didn't result in the deaths of eighteen people, to which Q retorts "[[ShutUpKirk If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you should go home and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here, it's wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But, it's not for the timid.]]" Later episodes revealed that [[CruelToBeKind Q actually did this in part to provide the Alpha Quadrant with a disguised warning about the existence of the Borg so that Starfleet could start mobilizing and be ready before they arrived]].

* This is parodied on ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': The "WesternAnimation/TreehouseOfHorror XII" story "Hex And The City" had a fortune teller curse Homer's family because he insulted her. They suffer through freakish transformations, and Bart actually dies, but Homer goes on refusing to [[CurseEscapeClause reverse the curse by apologizing]] because none of it's happening to ''[[ItsAllAboutMe him]]''. It's especially [[{{Jerkass}} egregious]] given that the apology would even resurrect Bart.

* This is parodied on ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': The "WesternAnimation/TreehouseOfHorror XII" story "Hex And The City" had a fortune teller curse Homer's family because he insulted her. They suffer through freakish transformations, and Bart actually dies, but Homer goes on refusing to [[CurseEscapeClause reverse the curse by apologizing]] because none of it's happening to ''him''. It's especially [[{{Jerkass}} egregious]] given that the apology would even resurrect Bart.

* ''VideoGame/PuyoPuyo7'': Playing tricks isn't good, but playing matches is! [[spoiler:Then you possess Satan to make your point...]]

This is quite common in many mythologies, where the gods teach someone a lesson by cursing his entire family -- but not necessarily them -- or setting up his descendants for misery. Sometimes this is the result of severe ValuesDissonance. In comic books and the like, in StuffedIntoTheFridge's purest form, female supporting characters die so that male heroes can learn vague lessons about the price of heroism, after which said heroes usually find new love interests and generally get on with their lives. It's also a part of ItsAWonderfulPlot stories, as the people around the hero have to suffer in the alternate timeline to persuade him that he needs to return to existence. It's definitely part of ThePunishment where the punished usually becomes some kind of monster that hurts innocent people.

* In John Ostrander's take on ''ComicBook/TheSpectre'', this was sometimes used to illustrate the dangers of the AntiHero protagonist's extreme BlackAndWhiteMorality, which bordered on BlueAndOrangeMorality at times. In one example, the Spectre threatened to slay every living person in the state of New York if an innocent man was executed, since technically the State of New York passed the sentence. The children, anti-death-penalty protesters, and the man's defense attorneys would presumably be among those killed.

* Happens a lot in ''ComicBook/ChickTracts''. A particularly nasty example is ''[[https://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/1068/1068_01.asp Mean Momma,]]'' where the title character and her delinquent sons commit various crimes, from petty grudges to robbery. What follows is that the elder son dies in a crash, driving a truck he stole, then the middle kid immediately hangs himself for hearing that the late son was his mom's favorite. Then, while the mother is away from town to buy medicine for her feverish baby, ''a tornado razes their house with the baby still inside''. All happened with the implication that it was God's handiwork, so that the mother will repent. And the mother thanks God for his kindness in saving her, ignoring that the children whom she raised to be hateful and bitter individuals are now burning in hell.
* ''Franchise/SpiderMan'': Uncle Ben's death teaches Peter that he should use his powers with responsibility, and most versions of Spider-Man across the multi-verse, (non-Peter versions of Spider-Man substituting Uncle Ben for another character, like Peter for Spider-Gwen or Miles Morales,) and in most adaptations of the comics, have this tragedy as a central feature of his backstory.

* In Disney's ''WesternAnimation/BeautyAndTheBeast'', the household staff are cursed, as well as the Beast himself. The Broadway version and live-action remake (see below) soften the collateral damage by having the staff discuss that they were the ones who had let the Beast turn into a SpoiledBrat in the first place, however it still doesn't justify turning a ''seven year old'' into a teacup.

* In the cheesy sci-fi movie ''Film/{{ROTOR}},'' the protagonist Barrett Coldyron eventually learns a valuable philosophical lesson, albeit at the cost of his robot killing or maiming several people.
* ''Film/BeautyAndTheBeast2017'' tries to deal with the implications in the Disney version by having the servants take some blame for the Prince's behavior since they did not protect him from his abusive father after his mother died. However this still does not explain Chip (a child) and Garderobe and Cadenza (performers who were hired and simply happened to be at the party that night). The opening scene makes it look more like the curse just hit whoever didn't get out of the room in time. Even worse, once the last petal falls the objects will turn ''inanimate'', effectively ''killing'' the servants and others who got caught in the curse. Belle's town is also collateral damage as they all magically forget about the nearby castle and all its inhabitants [[spoiler:which includes family members and loved ones]] for the duration of the curse. [[spoiler:No wonder the Enchantress shows up herself to fix things once the last petal falls right before Belle can say she loves the Beast. A cut scene even has [=LeFou=] call her out on it!]]
** This is especially unfair when one considers that as servants, especially in the given time period, there was no way they could have protected the Prince or corrected his later behaviour as it would be seen as completely going above their social rank and suggesting that they had the audacity to tell their masters what to do -- both big no-no's. [[ScrewTheRulesIMakeThem A noble]] would throw such rebellious servants out without job references at best, making it very difficult to secure future employment and leaving them in poverty.
* ''Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse'': Happens a whole lot to Wanda/The Scarlet Witch. She learns that RevengeMyopia is a bad thing when her MindRape of Tony Stark pushes him to create Ultron, who then proceeds to destroy her country and kill her brother. When she gets reckless dealing with Crossbones, she accidentally gets a lot of people killed in his suicide bombing (albeit this one is shared with the rest of the Avengers). [[spoiler: [[Film/DoctorStrangeInTheMultiverseOfMadness When she finally learns for good that she can't get a family by force]], it comes at the cost of hundreds of people who tried to stop her and severely traumatizing an alternate Wanda and her family.]]
* In the final segment of the full version of the 1970s UK educational film ''Play Safe'', a boy who partakes in vandalizing electrical equipment causes his sister to die in a traffic accident via being struck by a car due to said vandalism causing the traffic lights and streetlights to not have power as a way of driving home the fact that vandalizing electrical equipment is dangerous.[[note]] this segment of the film was not broadcast on television on its own unlike the previous 3 segments of the film. [[/note]]

* In the children's book ''Sam, Bangs & Moonshine'', Sam is warned that her habit of making up false stories, or "moonshine", will get her into trouble. She tells her friend, a little boy named Thomas, that her mother is a mermaid who lives in a distant cove. Thomas believes her and goes off to the cove, followed by Sam's cat Bangs, and both are presumably lost in a storm. Sam is very remorseful about their loss and learns AnAesop about not lying to people. Thomas and Bangs are eventually recovered alive, but Thomas is ill from his ordeal.
* A horrific and intentional example of Aesop Collateral damage is found in Ryūnosuke Akutagawa's short story ''Hell Screen''. An obsessive and sadistic painter cannot paint anything he hasn't seen, so when he is commissioned to paint a picture of Hell by the tyrannical Japanese lord he serves, he tortures his apprentices to get the references he needs. Finally, he decides he needs to have a carriage set on fire and the woman inside to ''burn alive.'' The lord agrees. The victim? A pure, innocent and intelligent young woman [[spoiler:...the painter's daughter, and the one thing on Earth he truly loved]]. According to the servant narrating the story, the Lord does this to teach the painter a lesson about putting art above all other duties and concerns. However, the servant is [[UnreliableNarrator unlikely to be telling the precise truth]], out of fear of or devotion to his lord, so it seems more likely that [[spoiler:this was the lord's twisted revenge on the daughter, Yukimi, for spurning his advances...advances that the narrator claimed never happened, despite ''witnessing'' his attempted rape of Yukimi.]] After the execution, the painter finishes his screen [[spoiler:and is DrivenToSuicide - the lord is a KarmaHoudini]].

* ''{{Literature/Wulfrik}}'': For most of the book, Wulfrik is trying to undo the curse he brought on himself through his hubris (boasting that he was the greatest warrior in the world, which the Dark Gods demanded he prove endlessly or be tortured by daemons for eternity). Once he has finally learned that YouCantFightFate, everything he used to want, [[spoiler:leadership of the Sarls, the death of Viglundr, the hand of his daughter Hjordis]], has been destroyed by his hand. [[spoiler:He sets Viglundr up for destruction by multiple tribes, leaving him alive to see it, and reluctantly sacrifices Hjordis to the gods.]] He reflects that he has lost a lot in trying to escape his fate, [[spoiler:his tribe, his love, his friends]], but it made him even more famous and powerful than if he had succeeded (he never wants for volunteers on his flying teleporting longship which he also obtained thanks to his curse).
* ''Literature/LookingForAlaska'' is one of the most famously gutwrenching examples in teen literature, featuring the friends of the eponymous HardDrinkingPartyGirl encouraging her self-destructive behavior due to seeing it as endearingly rebellious rather than a cry for help, and learning their lesson after the ultimate result is her being killed while driving drunk.

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "Q Who". Irritated by Picard's arrogance, Q sends the ''Enterprise'' light years across the galaxy to an unexplored region of space and then disappears. They run into the Borg, who kill eighteen crew members. Picard learns his lesson, but eighteen innocents die for it: Picard calls Q out on what he has done and says that while he understands the lesson and appreciates its message, there must've been a way to teach it that didn't result in the deaths of eighteen people, to which Q retorts "[[ShutUpKirk If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you should go home and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here, it's wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But, it's not for the timid.]]" Later episodes revealed that [[CruelToBeKind Q actually did this in part to provide the Alpha Quadrant with a disguised warning about the existence of the Borg so that Starfleet could start mobilizing and be ready before they arrived]].
* In a ''Series/SabrinaTheTeenageWitch'' episode, Sabrina's boyfriend Harvey is turned into a beast by her saintly but ugly cousin Susie, who has green skin and warts, to teach her a lesson about shallowness. Cousin Susie is treated as entirely justified in teaching Sabrina her lesson, while everyone ignores the fact that the blameless Harvey is the one who finds himself growing fur, claws and tusks.

* ''Series/Merlin2008'' has an episode, which is about Prince Arthur being cursed after he killed a unicorn and didn't even show any remorse. Which would have been fine, except for that this just leads to his innocent subjects suffering from hunger and thirst (all the crops suddenly wither and all the wells also dry out at the same time) until things are back to normal by the end of the episode. Unusually, it is actually ''stated'' in this case that this is completely unfair. The innocent poor people shouldn't have to lack both food and water, just so their prince can learn a lesson about not being arrogant!
* ''Series/YediYuz'': Happens pointedly in the episode "Refakatçiler". To prove her point, Vildan draws Serdar's attention to Semih's new car, which seems a [[SuspiciousSpending tad too expensive]] for his family's income bracket. Jumping to immediate conclusions, Serdar storms to Alihan's apartment in a rage, accusing the father and son of shamelessly stealing from him. Alihan and Semih are naturally hurt and offended by the accusation, and the unpleasant incident prompts them to sever their relationship with Serdar, who while regretful, seems too proud to apologize.

* [[ChristmasSongs The Christmas Shoes]] gets a lot of hate based on this trope. The narrator interprets a young mother dying of cancer as a deliberate attempt by God to teach him the meaning of Christmas.

* ''VideoGame/GodOfWar'', in a nutshell, is two angry gods trying to kill each other with this.

--> '''Homer:''' Apologizing won't bring Bart back.
--> '''Marge:''' The fortune teller said it would.
-->'''Homer:''' (''crosses arms, looks away sulkily'') She's not the boss of me.
* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'': After [[spoiler:Iroh's son died during the Earth Kingdom campaign,]] Iroh went into HeroicBSOD and wanted nothing to do with ruling the Fire Nation. His scheming brother Ozai tried to convince his father Azulon to name him as heir. Azulon did not take it well and ordered Ozai to kill his own firstborn, Zuko. And Ozai would cheerfully have done it too, but he made a deal with his wife: she would make an untraceable poison with which to kill Azulon, in exchange for letting Zuko live. Ursa then fled the Fire Nation, leaving Zuko a WellDoneSonGuy, his sister Azula a DaddysLittleVillain, and Ozai free to continue trying to TakeOverTheWorld.

* Season 2 of ''WesternAnimation/InfinityTrain'' introduces Grace Monroe, a teenage passenger who leads a group of fellow child passengers called the Apex; they are shown to actively be trying to make the numbers on their hands go ''up'' (when the numbers are actually supposed to go ''down'' so they can leave the train), and do so by frequently attacking the train's native denizens. Season 3 sees Grace and her best friend and second-in-command, Simon, get separated from the rest of the Apex and have to find their way back, working together with a little girl named Hazel and her denizen companion, Tuba. [[spoiler:It turns out to be Grace's RedemptionQuest, and at the end of the season, she's made a HeelFaceTurn, convinced the rest of the Apex to do the same, and they're all working to get their numbers down so they can go home. However, it comes at a great cost: Simon murders Tuba just as Grace is becoming attached to her; Hazel (whom Grace had come to love like a little sister) is so traumatized by her time with them that she leaves them forever; and Simon [[JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope jumps off the slippery slope]], becomes worse than ever, tries to murder Grace even after she saves him from falling off the train, and then dies in front of her. Though Grace is becoming a better person, it's clear by the end that she's quite emotionally worn down by everything that happened to reach that point.]]
* Parodied in ''WesternAnimation/AquaTeenHungerForce'' when Master Shake fails to lay the electrical bills, and Frylock refuses to pay them instead so that Shake will be forced to learn his lesson no matter how much all of the Aqua Teens suffer. As it turns out, Shake's too much of a lazy, selfish bastard to learn from his mistakes, and he just starts mooching off of Carl instead, while Frylock continues to refuse to pay the bills for the sake of Shake learning the aesop.

* In ''ComicBook/{{Hellblazer}}'', John Constantine constantly [[DidYouJustScamCthulhu pisses off powerful beings like Heaven and Hell]] and [[FlippingTheBird flips them off]] when he's satisfied. Though his enemies can't touch him, his family and friends substitute to pay the price which was supposed to be his in the first place. He ends up mourning them afterwards.

* A horrific and intentional example of Aesop Collateral damage is found in Ryūnosuke Akutagawa's short story ''Hell Screen''. An obsessive and sadistic painter cannot paint anything he hasn't seen, so when he is commissioned to paint a picture of Hell by the tyrannical Japanese lord he serves, he tortures his apprentices to get the references he needs. Finally, he decides he needs to have a carriage set on fire and the woman inside to ''burn alive.'' The lord agrees. The victim? A pure, innocent and intelligent young woman [[spoiler:...the painter's daughter, and the one thing on Earth he truly loved]]. According to the servant narrating the story, the Lord does this to teach the painter a lesson about putting art above all other duties and concerns. However, the servant is [[UnreliableNarrator unlikely to be telling the precise truth]], out of fear of or devotion to his lord, so it seems more likely that [[spoiler: this was the lord's twisted revenge on the daughter, Yukimi, for spurning his advances...advances that the narrator claimed never happened, despite ''witnessing'' his attempted rape of Yukimi.]] After the execution, the painter finishes his screen [[spoiler: and is DrivenToSuicide - the lord is a KarmaHoudini]].

* ''{{Literature/Wulfrik}}'': For most of the book, Wulfrik is trying to undo the curse he brought on himself through his hubris (boasting that he was the greatest warrior in the world, which the Dark Gods demanded he prove endlessly or be tortured by daemons for eternity). Once he has finally learned that YouCantFightFate, everything he used to want, [[spoiler:leadership of the Sarls, the death of Viglundr, the hand of his daughter Hjordis]], has been destroyed by his hand. [[spoiler:He sets Viglundr up for destruction by multiple tribes, leaving him alive to see it, and reluctantly sacrifices Hjordis to the gods.]] He reflects that he has lost a lot in trying to escape his fate ([[spoiler:his tribe, his love, his friends]]), but it made him even more famous and powerful than if he had succeeded (he never wants for volunteers on his flying teleporting longship which he also obtained thanks to his curse).

** The 5e update makes it clear that the vast majority of native Barovians really are just soulless constructs who exist to fill out the world. That said, some people , like Ireena, the reincarnation of Tatyana, Strahd's "lost love" (ie, constant stalking victim) are ''still real'', and Ireena/Tatyana hasn't done anything to deserve being repeatedly reincarnated and tormented to teach Strahd a lesson he'll never learn (though at least if you do the [[GuideDangIt exact right sidequest]], [[spoiler: you can bust her out of the cycle]]). Some plot points also cross back into WhatMeasureIsANonHuman; Ireena's brother Izek, who is a construct, clearly feels genuine love and grief for her, albeit in a warped and unhealthy way (he's been commissioning dolls of her and will try to kidnap her).

* ''VideoGame/PuyoPuyo7'': Playing tricks isn't good, but playing matches is! [[spoiler: Then you possess Satan to make your point...]]

* ''Film/BeautyAndTheBeast2017'' tries to deal with the implications in the Disney version by having the servants take some blame for the Prince's behavior since they did not protect him from his abusive father after his mother died. However this still does not explain Chip (a child) and Garderobe and Cadenza (performers who were hired and simply happened to be at the party that night). The opening scene makes it look more like the curse just hit whoever didn't get out of the room in time. Even worse, once the last petal falls the objects will turn ''inanimate'' effectively ''killing'' the servants and others who got caught in the curse. Belle's town is also collateral damage as they all magically forget about the nearby castle and all its inhabitants [[spoiler:which includes family members and loved ones]] for the duration of the curse. [[spoiler:No wonder the Enchantress shows up herself to fix things once the last petal falls right before Belle can say she loves the Beast. A cut scene even has [=LeFou=] call her out on it!]]

* ''Film/BeautyAndTheBeast2017'' tries to deal with the implications in the Disney version by having the servants take some blame for the Prince's behavior since they did not protect him from his abusive father after his mother died. However this still does not explain Chip (a child) and Garderobe and Cadenza (performers who were hired and simply happened to be at the party that night). The opening scene makes it look more like the curse just hit whoever didn't get out of the room in time. Even worse, once the last petal falls the objects will turn ''inanimate'' effectively ''killing'' the servants and others who got caught in the curse. Belle's town is also collateral damage as they all magically forget about the nearby castle and all its inhabitants [[spoiler:which includes family members and loved ones]] for the duration of the curse. [[spoiler:No wonder the Enchantress shows up herself to fix things once the last petal falls right before Belle can say she loves the Beast. A cut scene even had Lefou call her out on it!]]

* In Disney's ''WesternAnimation/BeautyAndTheBeast'', the household staff are cursed, as well as the Beast himself. The Broadway version and live-action remake (see below) softens the collateral damage by having the staff discuss that they were the ones who had let the Beast turn into a SpoiledBrat in the first place, however it still doesn't justify turning a ''seven year old'' into a teacup.

* [[ChristmasSongs The Christmas Shoes]] gets a lot of hate based on this trope. The narrator interprets a young mother dying of cancer as a deliberate attempt by God to teach the son the meaning of Christmas.

* ''Franchise/SpiderMan'': Uncle Ben's death teaches Peter that he should use his powers with responsibility, and most versions of Spider-Man across the multi-verse (non-Peter versions of Spider-Man substituting Uncle Ben for another character, like Peter for Spider-Gwen or Miles Morales) and in most adaptations of the comics have this tragedy as a central feature of his backstory.

* ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'', though most famous for mocking corny sci-fi films from the '50s and '60s, also featured a lot of corny ''crime'' films from the same period, which employed this trope in spades due to the standards of UsefulNotes/TheHaysCode mandating that criminals could not be shown profiting from their misdeeds, something Joel, Mike, and the Bots laid into with utter glee. Standout examples include ''Film/TheGirlInLoversLane'', where the title character is raped and murdered by a stalker mere minutes after her boyfriend decides to resume his life as a [[{{Hobos}} drifter]] rather than settle down with her (and the boyfriend himself is nearly lynched by her vengeful father, who believes he is the killer, for good measure); and ''Film/HighSchoolBigShot'', where a hapless teenager's intended-to-be-bloodless attempt to lift some mob money from his boss' safe to impress his crush abruptly blooms into a gory MexicanStandoff between his group of thieves, the mobsters, the cops, and the girl's [[CrazyJealousGuy sociopathic ex-boyfriend]] that leaves most of the participants dead and everyone else shipped off to jail.

* [[ChristmasSongs The Christmas Shoes]] gets a lot of hate based on this trope. The narrator interprets a young mother dying of cancer as a deliberate attempt by God to teach him the meaning of Christmas.

* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'': After [[spoiler:Iroh's son died during the Earth Kingdom campaign,]] Iroh went into HeroicBSOD and wanted nothing to do with ruling the Fire Nation. His scheming brother Ozai tried to convince his father Azulon to name him as heir, Azulon did not take it well and ordered Ozai to kill his own firstborn, Zuko. And Ozai would cheerfully have done it too, but he made a deal with his wife: she would make an untraceable poison with which to kill Azulon, in exchange for letting Zuko live. Ursa then fled the Fire Nation, leaving Zuko a WellDoneSonGuy, his sister Azula a DaddysLittleVillain, and Ozai free to continue trying to TakeOverTheWorld.

->''“Once upon a time, in the most lavish of palaces, an enchantress came along and gave some little [[Series/GameOfThrones Joffrey]] [[Music/JustinBieber Bieber]] shithead prince exactly what was coming to him. However, the spell he was placed under also transformed his servants that lived in the castle. Because, you see, the enchantress was kind of a bitch herself.”''

* In a ''Series/SabrinaTheTeenageWitch'' episode, Sabrina's boyfriend Harvey is turned into a beast by her saintly but ugly cousin Susie, who has green skin and warts, to teach her lesson about shallowness. Cousin Susie is treated as entirely justified in teaching Sabrina her lesson, while everyone ignores the fact that the blameless Harvey is the one who finds himself growing fur, claws and tusks.

** The 5e update makes it clear that the vast majority of native Barovians really are just soulless constructs who exist to fill out the world. That said, some people , like Ireena, the reincarnation of Tatyana, Strahd's "lost love" (ie, constant stalking victim) are ''still real'', and Ireena/Tatyana hasn't done anything to deserve being repeatedly reincarnated and tormented to teach Strahd a lesson he'll never learn (though at least if you do the [[GuideDangIt exact right sidequest]], [[spoiler: you can bust her out of the cycle]]).

* ''{{Literature/Wulfrik}}'': For most of the book, Wulfrik is trying to undo the curse he brought on himself through his hubris (boasting that he was the greatest warrior in the world, which the Dark Gods demanded he prove endlessly or be tortured by daemons for eternity). Once he has finally learned that YouCantFightFate, everything he used to want, [[spoiler:leadership of the Sarls, the death of Viglundr, the hand of his daughter Hjordis]], has been destroyed by his hand. [[spoiler:He sets Viglundr up for destruction by multiple tribes, leaving him alive to see it, and reluctantly sacrifices Hjordis to the gods.]] He reflects that he's lost a lot in trying to escape his fate ([[spoiler:his tribe, his love, his friends]]), but it made him even more famous and powerful than if he'd succeeded (he never wants for volunteers on his flying teleporting longship which he also obtained thanks to his curse).

* ''{{Literature/Wulfrik}}'': For most of the book, Wulfrik is trying to undo the curse he brought on himself through his hubris (boasting that he was the greatest warrior in the world, which the Dark Gods demanded he prove endlessly or be tortured by daemons for eternity). Once he's finally learned that YouCantFightFate, everything he used to want, [[spoiler:leadership of the Sarls, the death of Viglundr, the hand of his daughter Hjordis]], has been destroyed by his hand. [[spoiler:He sets Viglundr up for destruction by multiple tribes, leaving him alive to see it, and reluctantly sacrifices Hjordis to the gods.]] He reflects that he's lost a lot in trying to escape his fate ([[spoiler:his tribe, his love, his friends]]), but it made him even more famous and powerful than if he'd succeeded (he never wants for volunteers on his flying teleporting longship which he also obtained thanks to his curse).

* In ''Film/SpiderMan1'', Peter refuses to stop a fleeing criminal as petty revenge against the fight promoter, who refused to pay Peter his award, and subsequently the hero's beloved Uncle Ben is killed by that criminal, teaching our hero that valuable lesson that With Great Power ComesGreatResponsibility.

** King Midas had made a stupid wish for that everything he touched to turn to gold. But after this wish had been granted, it started to backfire on him (for example, he could no longer eat without turning all his food into gold). But the culmination was that Midas accidentally turned his ''daughter'' into gold.

* ''VideoGame/PuyoPuyo'': Playing tricks isn't good, but playing matches is! [[spoiler: Then you possess Satan to make your point...]]

* ''VideoGame/GodOfWar'', in a nutshell, is two angry gods trying to kill each other with AesopCollateralDamage.