History Main / HalfwayPlotSwitch

* ''Fanfic/AllAssortedAnimorphsAUs'': "What if Tom was infested by a member of the Yeerk Peace Movement?" starts as a series of slice-of-life moments with Tom and Aftran bonding and helping the Animorphs. Halfway through, they find a way to overthrow the Vissers, and the rest of the chapter is about them going FromZeroToHero.

* The final arc of ''Manga/{{Beastars}}'' was strongly implied to have been intended to be one of these. On top of being far more action-heavy than previous arcs, there was a new power system called "Imaginary Chimera" introduced, strong hints at a 100-year conspiracy that goes all the way to the top brass of society and personally involves at least one of the main characters, and general undertones that all the chaos caused by the arc villain, Melon, is just him accelerating societal deterioration caused by deeply entrenched flaws in the setting that won't be solved just by beating him. Remember, this was originally a high school drama about a socially awkward teenage wolf prone to fits of violent hunger who wants to date a rabbit, and for the duration of this arc their relationship mostly takes a backseat to establishing the starting point for Legosi and Louis becoming the RedOniBlueOni duo that will save the world. Then the series was cancelled and the author was forced to turn the arc into the climax of the story. Needless to say, it didn't work out well. Fortunately, she was given enough of an advance notice that the manga was being cancelled to have the ending make enough sense to disqualify it from being a Gainax Ending.

* ''Literature/TheHost'' starts out being about an alien adjusting to life as a bodysnatcher, then devotes the entire second act to developing platonic and romantic relationships with the rebels, before focusing on saving the humans near the end.

-->-- '''Homer Simpson''' while rafting down the Zambezi River, ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS12E17SimpsonSafari Simpson Safari]]"

!!Example subpages:

!!Other examples:

[[folder:Asian Animation]]
* ''Animation/PleasantGoatAndBigBigWolf: Joys of Seasons'' episode 99 starts out being focused on Wolffy PlayingSick to avoid her wife's wrath after his attempt to catch a goat falls flat. Once Wolnie discovers Wolffy is faking his ailment and leaves with Wilie, the plot switches to being about Wolffy having to hide Pink Fox from Wolnie when she pays a visit to Wolf Castle.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Films — Animated]]

* ''WesternAnimation/TomAndJerryTheMovie'' starts off as an hour-and-a-half-long ''WesternAnimation/TomAndJerry'' cartoon. But when Puggsy shows up, things start to go downhill...
--> '''Puggsy''': The name is Puggsy. What's yours?\\

** Most of the rest of the plot is about helping a HeartwarmingOrphan escape her RichBitch aunt and find her long-lost AdventurerArchaeologist father.

* The first part of ''Literature/AlouettesSong'' is a techno-thriller about the discovery of a potential means of FasterThanLightTravel and the subterfuge from a secret government agency that wants to suppress it. At almost exactly the halfway point, the starship is built, and [[spoiler:the heroes beat the primary villain in space and are just about to apprehend him]], only for them to accidentally enter warp drive and wind up embroiled in an interplanetary war on the other side of the Galaxy. The original Literature/SkylarkSeries was also split into a terrestrial and an extraterrestrial half, but when they first arrive in space there are several smaller vignettes before they encounter the aliens so that the RisingConflict is more gradual. These scenes were [[CompressedAdaptation cut out]] of ''Alouette's Song'', and therefore the book reads like two separate stories with their own climaxes, told one after another.

* ''[[Franchise/FridayThe13th Friday The 13th The Jason Strain]]'' starts off in the DeadlyGame genre... then shifts to ZombieApocalypse.

** The 5th Edition adventure ''TabletopGame/BaldursGateDescentIntoAvernus'' starts out with the players fighting an evil cult in Baldur's Gate, then has them have to go to the first layer of Hell to rescue the city of Elturel, which has been sucked into it. This is not a surprise to the players, given the name, but the cult's activies have absolutely nothing to do with what happened to Elturel.

[[folder:Webcomics]]

* When it began, ''WebComic/{{Ciem|WebcomicSeries}}'' was about how Candi was different from other girls. Then, it was about her sister being murdered. Then, it was about her going to college. [[RandomEventsPlot Then]], trying to find love. [[OverlyLongGag Then]], it was about her sexual frustrations. Then it was about some guy in a shrew costume murdering everyone. Then, it was about her finding true love again.
* Close to being standard practice for ''WebComic/MountainTime'', such as [[http://mountaincomics.com/2011/05/30/shorts-blaster/ here]], when the plot switches to an entirely new set of characters in a completely different scenario, and much more pronounced in longer story arcs like [[http://mountaincomics.com/2010/08/16/the-unstartled-giraffe/ this one]].
* ''WebComic/YuMeDream''. Goes from a very typical ComingOutStory about a girl named Fiona who goes to a Catholic high school and falls in love with another girl called Lia, to [[spoiler: finding out that it was [[AllJustADream all a dream]], Lia is 900 years old, has been captured by the Queen of Dreams and now Fiona, a bear called Mrs. Butterfield, a woman with a removable head, Fiona's conscience, a blue-haired girl called Clandestine, and a bisexual male called Don must travel through Fiona's dreams to get her back]]. You... you have to read it to wrap your head around it.

* ''Blog/WhatIf'': [[http://what-if.xkcd.com/8/ What would happen if everyone on earth stood as close to each other as they could and jumped, everyone landing on the ground at the same instant?]] After concluding that earth would continue to spin normally, Randall goes on to elaborate how our civilization would come to a halt and humanity would die out, not having any food or water supplies to feed even a fraction of the entire world population until they could get back to where they're from.

* The final arc of ''Manga/{{Beastars}}'' was strongly implied to have been intended to be one of these. On top of being far more action-heavy than previous arcs, there was a new power system called "Imaginary Chimera" introduced, strong hints at a 100-year conspiracy that goes all the way to the top brass of society and personally involves at least one of the main characters, and general undertones that all the chaos caused by the arc villain, Melon, is just him accelerating societal deterioration caused by deeply entrenched flaws in the setting that won't be solved just by beating him. Remember, this was originally a high school drama about a socially awkward teenage wolf prone to fits of violent hunger who wants to date a rabbit. Then the series was cancelled and the author was forced to turn the arc into the climax of the story. Needless to say, it didn't work out well. Fortunately, she was given enough of an advance notice that the manga was being cancelled to have the ending make enough sense to disqualify it from being a Gainax Ending.

* The final arc of ''Manga/{{Beastars}}'' was strongly implied to have been intended to be one of these. On top of being far more action-heavy than previous arcs, there was a new power system called "Imaginary Chimera" introduced, strong hints at a 100-year conspiracy that goes all the way to the top brass of society and personally involves at least one of the main characters, and general undertones that all the chaos caused by the arc villain, Melon, is just him accelerating societal deterioration caused by deeply entrenched flaws in the setting that won't be solved just by beating him. Then the series was cancelled and the author was forced to turn the arc into the climax of the story. Needless to say, it didn't work out well. Fortunately, she was given enough of an advance notice that the manga was being cancelled to have the ending make enough sense to disqualify it from being a Gainax Ending.

* {{Music/Gorillaz}}'s "Empire Ants" song, in the ''Music/PlasticBeach'' album. It starts with 2D singing, backed by sweet almost lift-like tropical tunes. Then, full stop, and it starts what appears a new song, with electro-techno sounds, bass, and even new vocals, from guest artist Little Dragon. And it's awesome.

* {{Music/Gorillaz}}'s Empire Ants song, in the new Plastic Beach album. It starts with 2D singing, backed by sweet almost lift-like tropical tunes. Then, full stop, and it starts what appears a new song, with electro-techno sounds, bass, and even new vocals, from guest artist Little Dragon. And it's awesome.

* This actually happens ''twice'' in Smeyer's ''Literature/TheHost'': It starts out being about an alien adjusting to life as a bodysnatcher, then devotes the entire second act, and much of the third, to developing platonic and romantic relationships with the rebels, before focusing on saving the humans near the end. Really, this is practically Smeyer's signature style.

* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}''. Though, this is more of a 3/4 way plot switch, which is how long it seems to take the author before she suddenly remembers she was planning on writing a vampire novel, as well as an angsty May-December romance. The same things happen in the other books. In ''New Moon'', most of the book is devoted to Bella recovering from Edward leaving her, finding out about the werewolves, and the werewolves hunting for Victoria. Suddenly, the climax of the novel goes to being about Edward planning to commit suicide via the Volturi, and Bella and Alice having to save him. In ''Eclipse'', most of the story is devoted to the Bella/Edward/Jacob love triangle, and only gives focus on the matter of the vampire army and Victoria near the end of the book. In ''Breaking Dawn'', the first two sections of the book (as well as a bit of the start of the third) are focused on Bella and Edward marrying and her having and raising her half-human daughter. Most of the third section is about the Volturi arriving to use Renesmee as an excuse to kill the Cullens, with flavors of a vampire conspiracy and the set up for an epic battle [[spoiler:that never happens.]]

* Tané's plotline in ''Literature/ThePrioryOfTheOrangeTree'' starts out like a ComingOfAgeStory about a commoner at a warrior school, struggling to prove herself against her snobbish rival and her own self-doubt to achieve her dream of becoming a dragonrider. She succeeds at all of it, and shortly after that, the decision she made on the first page of the book crashes back into her life and destroys it all.

* ''Anime/DragonBallZ'''s Cell Saga has this combined with a serious case of TheBigBadShuffle -- after a fake out with Freeza coming back to Earth (only to get on the bad side of TheWorfEffect), the main plot seems to be the KidFromTheFuture Trunks coming back in time to prevent Dr. Gero, a scientist who worked for the [[Manga/DragonBall Red Ribbon Army]], from unleashing a pair of deadly androids in revenge for the Red Ribbon Army's defeat, which caused the apocalypse in Trunks' timeline. Dr. Gero and another android show up [[BigBadWannabe and put on a terrible showing]] before Gero is unceremoniously killed by the two androids who caused Trunks' BadFuture... who don't actually have any interest in destroying the world this time. Then Cell shows up with his own goals, leaving the 'Dr. Gero's Revenge' plot thoroughly by the wayside [[spoiler:except by the very end, when Cell inadvertently ends up killing Goku during his attempted SuicidialCosmicTemperTantrum as per Dr. Gero's original goal, and then attempts to blow up the Earth once he comes back from that]].

Compare DevelopingDoomedCharacters, which is about the time spent examining the mundane lives of the characters before something extraordinary happens that starts the "real" story. Compare to BatmanColdOpen where the opening events not connected to the main plot are resolved before it begins. See TwoActStructure when the two parts are narratively connected but differ in their mood. Contrast WorkingTheSameCase. Compare and contrast MidSeasonTwist, which typically marks the end of the first act or even earlier.

[[folder:Video Games]]
* Zig-zagged in the first case of ''VisualNovel/AceAttorneyInvestigations 2''. It begins with an assassination attempt on the president of a foreign country, with Edgeworth looking for the perpetrator. About halfway through, you find out that the president is fine, but one of his bodyguards has been found dead, shifting the case to a more traditional murder investigation as per the rest of the series. [[spoiler: Then you learn that the assassination attempt was staged, and the murder plotline is put on hold until you can prove it. Afterwards, the murder plot resumes, but at the end of the case you find out that amidst the fake assassination, someone planned to kill the president for real, setting up a SequelHook for the next four cases.]]
* ''VideoGame/BenJordanParanormalInvestigator'': The seventh game, ''The Cardinal Sins'', starts off with investigating the murder of a priest, which then switches to investigating the Knights of Saint Anthony.
* ''VideoGame/DarkSouls'' starts out implying that the player is trying to cure the Darksign, but halfway through the game after ringing the Twin Bells of Awakening, the story switches from focusing curing undeath and instead about an AncientConspiracy and the ForeverWar regarding the First Flame. This event even has its own SacrificialLion.
* ''VideoGame/TheDig'' starts with the discovery of an asteroid on a [[ColonyDrop collision course]] with Earth and the first minutes deal with [=NASA=]'s mission to attempt to divert it; but later it turns out that the asteroid is in reality an alien spaceship which whisks away a group of astronauts to an alien planet, and it becomes a quest for exploration and survival.
* ''VideoGame/DiscworldNoir'': You're playing as Lewton PI. The game starts out with a classic FilmNoir situation of tracking down missing persons, [[FrameUp getting implicated]] in murder and being pulled in different directions over a MacGuffin. Somewhere around the middle of Act 3 you uncover the linchpin and discover that you've just ended up in [[spoiler: a CosmicHorror story]].
* ''VideoGame/{{Disgaea|HourOfDarkness}}''. The first half of the game focuses on Laharl's quest to claim his throne. After he succeeds, the second half, a SpaceOpera spoof, focuses on the human world. When the mastermind behind the [[spoiler: invasion]] is revealed, it leads to a RageAgainstTheHeavens story, and the two stories intertwine together.
* ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'' does this early on. The game is initially about the war between mages and [[ThePaladin templars]], but a meeting for peace talks is blown up, killing everyone present except the PlayerCharacter, and the magical explosion opens a permanent portal into the world of demons, letting them pour into the physical world. You have to choose between siding with the mages or the templars in order to seal the Breach. Once that's done, the person who ''caused'' the explosion appears, and they become the BigBad for the rest of the game. This doubles with ProlongedPrologue since the events described are essentially "Disc One" of the game. [[spoiler: Interestingly, the mage-templar conflict that the game initially revolved around never gets directly resolved. Whichever side you don't recruit gets corrupted by the villain and becomes his mooks, and the surviving uncorrupted members are too few to have a political voice. The whole issue is rather quickly forgotten about once the main villain shows up and is resolved by a mostly unrelated side plot]].
* In ''Videogame/{{Dragonsphere}}'' you play as the king of the land with your goal being to defeat the evil sorcerer Sanwe before he breaks out of his magical prison. You fulfill this goal halfway through the game. [[spoiler: During your encounter with Sanwe you discover you are in fact one of a species of shapeshifters who was magically imprinted with the memories and personality of the king. Meanwhile a usurper tries to proclaim the king died battling Sanwe and ascend to the throne, so your goal now is to find out what happened to the real king.]]
* ''VideoGame/FableIII'': Your tyrannical brother is running the kingdom into the ground, so you gather some allies and incite a rebellion to depose him. The coup succeeds, you take the throne, and everyone lives happily ever... oh wait, [[spoiler: there's an EldritchAbomination on its way to attack the kingdom,]] and as the reigning monarch it's now your job to do something about it.
* ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'' tends to do this a lot, beginning the plot with the heroes rebelling against TheEmpire and escalating it to averting an ApocalypseHow caused by an OmnicidalManiac.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIV'' begins with a rogue knight rebelling against his kingdom when he realizes the monarch has gone mad with power and is trying to conquer the world. At some point, it becomes about fighting the monarch's airship general who wants to go to the moon to release the SealedEvilInACan there.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVI'' starts off as a campaign against the Gestahlian Empire until halfway through, TheDragon becomes a god and destroys half the world, leaving you to recover your lost allies and destroy him.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'' begins with Cloud and AVALANCHE's brave struggle against the evil Shinra company executives, who are draining the life out of the planet to maintain an electricity monopoly. About five hours into the game President Shinra is killed and the Shinra's relevance to the plot is severely diminished, the focus then shifting to leaving Midgar to pursue Sephiroth across the planet and stop his scheme to summon Meteor and become a god.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVIII'' has its first two disks consist of Squall and the forces of [=SeeD=] battling Sorceress Edea and RivalTurnedEvil Seifer as they use the country of Galbadia to try and conquer the world. The ''very first event'' after Disk 2 is TheReveal that Edea was just BrainwashedAndCrazy, and the real antagonist is Ultmecia, a Sorceress in the future who wants to destroy the entire space-time continuum. That's in terms of the overarcing plot -- otherwise focus from this point shifts to Squall searching for a way to get his comatose love interest Rinoa back to normal.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIX'', the first part of the game focuses on Queen Brahne's conquest of the continent, the plot switch occurs when the party decides to go after Kuja, Brahne's weapons supplier, and he becomes the main antagonist when he promptly offs her at the end of the current disk. A plot switch then occurs a second time with TheReveal that [[spoiler:Kuja is an alien from Terra sent by Garland to destroy the world, and Zidane was meant to be his successor and spiritually is his brother that Kuja abandoned on Gaia]].
** Mostly averted in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX'', where the overarching plot is always the pilgrimage to destroy Sin. Once Seymour is revealed as an antagonist, rebelling against Yevon and uncovering the secrets of the organization becomes another major plot point, but it never overtakes the fight against Sin as the game's focus.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX2'' has the first half of the game focusing on Yuna, Rikku, and Paine's adventures across Spira as they hunt for spheres while clashing with [[TheRival LeBlanc]] and her goons, who are also after the same things. The moos is very lighthearted. After Yuna's party takes back the sphere [=LeBlanc=] had stolen from them, the sphere reveals that a WeaponOfMassDestruction sleeps beneath Spira and is powerful enough to destroy the world. Not only this becomes the focus of the second half of the game, but the leaders of all three factions also go missing and fiends are pouring out from the temples. The situation is dire enough to convince [=LeBlanc=] to [[EnemyMine join Yuna's side]] and help her save the world.
* In ''VideoGame/GoldenSunDarkDawn'' the children of the last two games' heroes go on a quest to investigate mysterious Psynergy sucking vortexes. This gets derailed by the appearance of villains, war-hungry countries, xenophobic semi-human cities, and so much else. [[spoiler:After about a quarter of the game, you hear nothing more about them until the Mother of All Vortexes appears [[SequelHook during the ending]].]]
* ''VideoGame/GuildWars Prophecies'' starts off as the story of a war between the human kingdom of Ascalon and the Charr that's not going well for Ascalon. You leave Ascalon after the fourth mission, and most of the rest of the story is about a religious war in rival kingdom Kryta. After the first few quests in Kryta, Ascalon and its refugees are only occasionally mentioned, and even then only in passing. (Ascalon's King Adelbern [[LampshadeHanging lampshades this in the endgame area]]: ''"Maybe now that you are finished with this nonsense, you can come back to Ascalon and help deal with the filthy Charr infestation."'')
* ''Franchise/{{Halo}}'':
** ''VideoGame/HaloCombatEvolved'': The plot was a well-handled but ultimately rather generic "human {{Space Marine}}s versus ScaryDogmaticAliens" affair with a side order of "mysterious {{Precursors}} who might or might not become relevant to the plot sometime soon" for the first half, but then we got... [[HordeOfAlienLocusts The]] [[BodyHorror Flood]]. Bonus points for this not being revealed in advertising or the previews of a very high-profile game.
** ''VideoGame/Halo2'': The plot starts with the Covenant coming across Earth, which is a very big deal considering that this is the homeworld of humanity and the Covenant have glassed every other colony, except you are only there for a short time. Then, you end up discovering another Halo ring. The events on this new Halo ring eventually result in the [[EnemyCivilWar Great Schism]].
** ''VideoGame/HaloWars'': The plot starts with the defense of two human colonies, but eventually shifts to the discovery of a Forerunner Shield World, where humanity has their first encounter with the Flood.
* ''VideoGame/TheLastOfUsPartII'' starts out as a revenge story, where you're playing as Ellie trying to avenge [[spoiler: her surrogate father, Joel]]. Then halfway through the game, [[spoiler: you switch to playing as Abby, Joel's killer, who is on a path of redemption. You eventually come back to Ellie at the end]].
* The whole Blorbs disease in ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiBowsersInsideStory''. It was at the start an important issue alongside the whole 'Fawful taking over the kingdom' thing, but very quickly got dropped and rarely ever mentioned again (the last reference is how the Miracle Cure cured all cases of the disease in the kingdom, just as it smashes down the Dark Star barriers).
* ''VideoGame/MarvelUltimateAlliance 2'' starts with Nick Fury invading Latveria illegally, which leads to the Registration act coming into effect. A superhero Comicbook/CivilWar breaks out... for three missions. Then it is dropped for [[spoiler:The Fold, a sentient network formed from nanites injected into supervillains in order to control them. As the world descends into chaos, everyone, naturally, stops caring about whose side they are on, and both forces unite to defeat The Fold. Afterwards, the Registration Act is pretty much made redundant and void by the Government. Despite the fact that no one actually dies because of their conflict, and neither side really does anything incredibly bad to the other, Cap and Iron Man feel that their team won't be quite the same as it was before the war. But they still are happy to work with one another again]].
* The mother of them all, ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid2SonsOfLiberty''. The player spends roughly the first two hours playing as Solid Snake, the protagonist from the previous game. Then the plot moves forward two years, to a different location, with the player in control of an entirely new character (ambiguously implied to be Snake for the first few minutes) for the rest of the game. The game's creator, Hideo Kojima, went out of his way to minimise the risk of anyone seeing this twist coming. [[BrokenBase Some thought the twist was brilliant. Some wanted Kojima's head on a stake]].
* ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolidVGroundZeroes'' is about Big Boss rescuing 2 people from a naval base in Cuba, which is an apparent success until Militaires Sans Frontieres is destroyed. ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolidVThePhantomPain'' is about his descent to villainy 9 years later, and the plot moves towards Afghanistan and Africa. [[spoiler:It's subverted on the fact that you are playing Big Boss' BodyDouble while the Boss is too busy building Outer Heaven.]]
* ''VideoGame/{{Oddworld}}: Stranger's Wrath'' starts off with The Stranger as a BountyHunter who's earning money for an unspecified operation needed to save his life by capturing outlaws until he's finally captured and stripped of any upgrades he has. His captors soon find out that [[spoiler:The Stranger is actually a Steef, a species that have been hunted to near-extinction and the operation is an attempt to transform him into a true bipedal creature. With this revelation, The Stranger is now hunted down by everyone, including the Clakkerz he used to do business with. However, he soon comes across the Grubbs, the oppressed indigenous population who worship Steefs and eventually takes up the mantle of their protector and fights to bring down CorruptCorporateExecutive Sekto. This affects the gameplay as well since although Stranger has now lost any health upgrades he previously bought, he later gains access to upgraded versions of his ammo and now that he is no longer a bounty hunter, he no longer needs to take enemies alive]].
* ''VideoGame/PerfectDark'' switches half-way from CyberPunk to SpaceOpera.
* ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'' starts off with apparently no plotline, apart from a computer that acts as TheVoice, giving basic information about the tests and promising cake if the players finish puzzle after puzzle. Then it turns out this voice is an [[AIIsACrapShoot insane AI]], who intends to kill you when the test is done.
* ''VideoGame/SilentStorm'' starts as a UsefulNotes/WorldWarII squad-based RPG, where you command a team of Allied or Axis specialists and conduct sensitive missions deep in enemy territory. Halfway through, you discover [[spoiler:the existence of a [[Film/JamesBond SPECTRE]]-like organization that uses advanced technology like {{Energy Weapon}}s and PoweredArmor in order to get both sides of the war to devastate one another before swooping in and taking over the world]]. And yes, there are mods in existence that remove much of the latter part to be replaced by more of the former. Oh, and there's even an extremely rare {{Random Encounter|s}} with [[spoiler:a FlyingSaucer, where you can pick up a rapid-fire energy rifle]].
* The StealthBasedGame ''VideoGame/SpyFiction'' starts off as a campy spy game about secret agents investigating a virus being made by a weapons manufacturer. Then these characters are all killed off and the last half of the plot is about [[VideoGame/MetalGear fighting a terrorist who's disguising himself by wearing glasses and pushing his hair back who is the protagonist's brother who was probably created in a government soldier cloning project and then the protagonist's father (who is a secret agent turned terrorist and wears an eyepatch) shows up out of nowhere and the protagonist abruptly starts lecturing people about the meaning of war and]]... I guess they [[FollowTheLeader knew their audience]].
* In-universe example: In ''VideoGame/TheStanleyParable'', the Narrator's story begins with all of Stanley's co-workers mysteriously disappearing, only to drop this plot thread completely when Stanley stumbles across his boss's secret mind control facility.
* Two ''VideoGame/StarOcean'' games feature this:
** Halfway into ''VideoGame/StarOceanTheSecondStory'', [[spoiler: the planet you're on (and [[TheChosenOne its relevant prophecy]]) is essentially destroyed, throwing away nearly the entirety of the plot that preceded this event]].
** Halfway into ''VideoGame/StarOceanTillTheEndOfTime'', [[spoiler: you come to realize that the entire universe you live in is a computer simulation, pretty much throwing away the entire "war" plotline that had been going up 'till then]].
* A staple of the ''VideoGame/TalesSeries'' is a WhamEpisode in almost the perfect center of each game that provides a sudden twist on its narrative. It's at this point that elements of [[{{Deconstruction}} whatever trope the game is examining]] starts to come to the forefront.
** In ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphonia'', the first half of the plot is focusing on getting TheChosenOne to complete the Journey of Regeneration to save the world. Then after she completes it, the game reveals that she becomes an ApocalypseMaiden for a second parallel world, at which point the game's themes of racism and discrimination come to the forefront, even meeting the Chosen One of this second parallel world.
** In ''VideoGame/TalesOfVesperia'', the game starts with the main character on a journey to recover a stolen piece of technology from his hometown. That plot eventually gives way to a semi GovernmentConspiracy, and even that is resolved by the end of the first act. The rest of the plot consists of [[spoiler: the protagonist becoming a VigilanteMan]] and [[spoiler: an analogy for global warming]], and the thief plot is never mentioned again. (''[[UpdatedRerelease Definitive Edition]]'' added a sidequest that lets you catch the thief and finally bring that plot to a close, but by then it's hardly relevant anymore)
* ''VideoGame/UntilDawn'' plays out like a SlasherMovie involving a masked SerialKiller hunting down and capturing 9 college-age youths, killing them with elaborate ''Franchise/{{Saw}}''-like deathtraps. [[spoiler: Then the killer is unmasked halfway through as the mentally unstable Josh pulling an elaborate prank on his friends in revenge for his two sisters' deaths. After that, the plot switches to a supernatural SurvivalHorror about hiding from the ''very real'' threat of the {{Wendigo}}es who haunt the mountain.]]
* ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'''s Vashj'ir zone. In the wake of the Cataclysm, a new island is formed several miles off the coast of Stormwind. Both factions begin sending troops, with the Alliance seeking to secure Stormwind's coast and the Horde wanting the island as a staging point for an attack. However, on the way there, the PlayerCharacter's ship is attacked and destroyed by the [[KrakenAndLeviathan Kraken-like Ozumat]], and from then on Vashj'ir is about helping the Earthen Ring fight Ozumat and the Naga. Exactly what happened to the island is never explained, and while you can travel to it, other than a flightmaster there's nothing there.
* ''VideoGame/{{Xenoblade}}'' starts off as a typical revenge plot, with TheHero going on a quest to defeat the [[ManVersusMachine army of soulless robots]] that [[DoomedHometown destroyed his hometown]] and [[spoiler:killed his {{Love Interest|s}}]]. The BigBad at this point is a {{Jerkass}} HumongousMecha known only as "Metal Face". Eventually, it's revealed [[spoiler: the Mechon aren't quite as soulless as you once thought.]] Metal Face is promptly dispatched, and his WellIntentionedExtremist boss becomes the new BigBad. Now the plot is still ManVersusMachine, but the focus has shifted from getting revenge on a villain to [[spoiler: stopping a WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds from betraying everything he once stood for]]. Once you confront and defeat ''him''... [[spoiler: Zanza, the '''real''' BigBad reveals himself, and the plot shifts from ManVersusMachine to Man Versus [[JerkassGods Jerkass]] [[OmnicidalManiac Omnicidal]] [[GodIsEvil Evil God]]]].
* ''VideoGame/{{Xenogears}}''. At first, the plot is about two nations that have waged war on each other for generations. Then, the plot changes to [[spoiler:overthrowing Solaris, a hidden country which ruthlessly manipulates world events behind the scenes]]. After ''that'', the plot switches to [[spoiler:killing god (not ''the'' God, who is also in the game and apparently being used as an extremely long-lasting battery, but a sentient interstellar war machine that created humans on the planet to serve as its biological components)]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
* The two-part finale of the second season of ''Series/ThirdRockFromTheSun'' is about the aliens experiencing dreams for the first time (with elaborate, {{Three Dimensional|Episode}} {{Dream Sequence}}s) and thinking they're going mad. This ends up as a season-ending CliffHanger in which Sally, Tommy, and Harry have left Earth without Dick. When they return at the start of the next season, they've brought another alien (Roseanne Barr) who has been assigned Dick's wife by the Big Giant Head. The rest of the two-part season premiere is about this storyline. So essentially, it's a four-part episode in which the first two parts are about something completely different than the concluding two parts.
* ''Series/TwentyFour'':
** In the first season this was enforced because they only had a 13 episode contract to start, so the plot begins at Midnight and every threat is resolved by 1 PM. When the series was extended, they dropped in a Sequel Hook scene and continued the plot from there.
** The first half is either the first phase of the terrorist attack or is a diversion that was meant to waste their time but that would still be deadly if Jack Bauer didn't save the morning!
** In Season 6, Islamic terrorists detonate a nuclear bomb, killing 12000 people and destroying Valencia. However, this plot thread quickly drops from focus in favor of stopping the Chinese from obtaining a MacGuffin that would give them control of Russia's nuclear arsenal and spark WorldWarIII.
* Has happened three seasons in a row with ''Series/AgentsOfSHIELD'' at the fall/spring season transition.
** Season 2 has Whitehall's faction of HYDRA being destroyed, with the second half of the season centering on the introduction of the Inhumans and the conflict with the "Real" SHIELD.
** Season 3 has Ward killed and SHIELD's issues with the ATCU resolved, with the second half centering around Hive escaping from his prison and taking over HYDRA.
** Season 4 has the Ghost Rider plotline wrapped up, Daisy returning to SHIELD, and the old guard possibly coming to an accord with the new Director, only for Ada to start behaving dangerously, possibly as a result of reading the Darkhold.
* ''Series/{{Angel}}'' did this in the second and fourth seasons.
** The second season was more explicit, with the central arc of the season revolving around Angel's arc based around saving Darla and his vengeance against Wolfram and Hart ending early in the 16th episode, with the following two episodes somewhat wrapping up the aftermath. The next four episodes after that involve a complete shift in storyline to Lorne's homeworld and the rescue of Fred Burkle.
** The fourth season builds around the coming of the Beast to bring darkness and destruction to LA, and the gang discovering out that Cordelia was possessed by some kind of evil being and was the Beast's master. Once again, this story reaches its finale in Episode 17 when Cordelia manages to give birth to a magical offspring. While still tangentally connected to this earlier plotline, the offspring is a fully-grown woman named Jasmine who is seemingly benevolent and intending to bring world peace while hiding a dark secret, and the plotline stands completely on its own. The last episode represents yet another switch as Jasmine has been defeated in the prior episode, and the season finale is instead spent setting up the following season.
* ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' usually did this whenever bringing in the BigBad
** Season 2 pulled two switches: First, it seemed like the Anointed One would be targeting her the full season to avenge the Master's death in the previous season, only for Spike and Drusilla to come in just a few episodes later. They were the main adversaries on the show for a while until halfway through the season where [[spoiler: Buffy and Angel consummate their relationship, and in turn cause Angel to lose his soul and turn evil]].
** Season 3 set up Mr. Trick as the main antagonist for the first few episodes, only to bring the Mayor of Sunnydale in and recruit Trick. Then Trick dies halfway through the season and the real [[TheDragon Dragon]] approaches the Mayor with an offer he can't refuse...
** Season 4 had Buffy constantly running across the secret organization the Initiative... then halfway through their creation, Adam awakes and busts out of the place.
** Season 6 had a very late switch. Most of it was spent on the gang coping with their self-destructive behavior and life tearing each of them apart while also dealing with a pain in the ass trio of geeks trying to rub them out for the heck of it. And then by Episode 19, it looks like everything's wrapped up. Buffy's finally getting her life in control, the trio's been disbanded, Willow and Tara have reconciled... wait a minute, there's still three episodes left in the season, isn't there? [[spoiler:Ex-leader Warren shows up and winds up shooting both Buffy and Tara, killing the latter... [[OhCrap which leaves Willow becoming one very pissed off]] and [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge vengeful]] witch.]]
* The first five or six episodes of ''Series/CougarTown'' are about Jules entering the world of the cougar, and after that, the show shifts to a more ensemble-y show about Jules and her family and friends.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E6TheArk "The Ark"]] opens as a story about how the Doctor and his companions inadvertently introduce a deadly virus among the last survivors of humanity and try to put right their error as quickly as possible so that there are no long-term consequences... Except there clearly are as the second half of the story, set thousands of years later, makes very clear: the erstwhile servant race of Monoids have managed to enslave the humans as a result.
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS13E6TheSeedsOfDoom "The Seeds of Doom"]] starts as a ''Film/TheThing1982''-like story about three scientists in Antarctica recovering an alien plant and unwittingly causing great danger to the rest of Earth. The Doctor gets called in to help and arrives after one of the scientists is infected, with the resulting story apparently centering around the Doctor and Sarah having to work with the remaining scientists to stop the plant. By the second part, all three of the scientists have been killed and the base gets blown up, destroying the plant. The rest of the serial focuses on the Doctor and Sarah Jane trying to stop a second plant that's now in the possession of a mad herbologist living in an estate in England.
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS34E7KillTheMoon "Kill the Moon"]] starts off as a bit of a Classic ''Who'' pastiche about the companions and guest characters getting the Base Under Siege treatment from giant orange spiders. There's a ton of ContinuityCavalcade and InternalHomage for ancient stories like [[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E6TheMoonbase "The Moonbase"]] and [[Recap/DoctorWhoS12E2TheArkInSpace "The Ark in Space"]], just to make sure we get the point. At the midpoint of the episode, the story abruptly turns into a drama in which the characters earnestly debate the ethics of an allegorical abortion ''and'' whether the Doctor has any business deciding the fate of humanity for it.
** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS38E5FugitiveOfTheJudoon "Fugitive of the Judoon"]] starts off being about the titular thuggish SpacePolice menacing Gloucester while looking for a fugitive. Once the fugitive is identified, the Judoon take a backseat as the plot shifts to the mystery around the fugitive's true identity.
* This happens frequently in ''Series/{{ER}}'', when a character-oriented episode will be interrupted by a large-scale medical emergency which will provide the drama for the rest of the episode.
* ''Series/FatherTed'' 's "A Christmassy Ted" starts off being about the characters getting prepared for Christmas, which involves getting lost in the largest lingerie section in Ireland. Halfway through the plot changes to being about Ted being eligible for a Golden Cleric award. Graham Linehan has admitted the plots would have worked better as separate episodes.
* The ''Series/FullHouse'' episode "Grand Gift Auto" spends its first two acts revolving Joey buying a stolen car and getting questioned by an officer. The third act revolves around Joey considering moving out, feeling that the Tanners see him as nothing but a joke, and the family trying to convince him that they really do care about him.
* ''Series/TheGoodLife'' episode "The Windbreak War" details the, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin yes]], EscalatingWar over the eponymous garden ornament.. until Jerry forces everyone to sit down and ''talk'' about it, after which they all [[IntoxicationEnsues get plastered]] on Tom's homemade GargleBlaster and start hitting on each other.
* ''Series/{{Homeland}}'' is about {{Deuteragonist}}s Brodie, a celebrated but [[ShellShockedVeteran shell-shocked]] veteran of questionable sanity, and Carrie, a bipolar CIA agent who secretly investigates Brodie. After three seasons, Brodie's story has run its course. From the fourth season on, the show is only about Carrie's continuing and largely unrelated adventures trying to balance her life, psyche, and career.
* Season 4 of ''Series/HouseOfCardsUS'' starts by continuing on from the end of Season 3. After Frank recovers from getting shot by Lucas Goodwin in an assassination attempt a third of the way through the season, the plot switches to Frank scheming with Claire as part of a reinvigorated election cycle.
* The plot of ''Series/KamenRiderDecade'', where Decade is the destroyer of worlds, is outlined in the first episode. The rest of the series is about Tsukasa visiting alternate Rider worlds and solving their problem of the week, all the while wondering why people think he's the "destroyer of worlds." We don't actually get back to that plot until the last episodes and the second movie. The first movie and some of the last episodes didn't exactly help as they introduced a new plot in the form of Dai-Shocker.
* ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' is fond of this, especially as seasons continue. They often end up handling cases that only look sexual that change halfway into something completely unrelated. They never bother to explain why [[TheMainCharactersDoEverything the non-special victims case isn't handed to another department]].
** One example is the episode "Vulnerable", which starts out as a case about an old woman being sexually assaulted and turns into a tangentially related storyline about another, non-sexual victim in a nursing home where the first victim just happened to be.
** Another example is "Responsible" where the entire reason for [=SVU=] to be there was "We found her on a bed that had ejaculate on it" and any sexual motive was ruled out ''right after the opening credits'' so that the plot could dive into an examination of teenage drinking. Although technically it could be considered a child endangerment case (which SVU often dives into) because they were minors.
** An even worse one would be "Wildlife" where they were called to a case because a bodily fluid was found on a victim: saliva. The murder weapon was described as a number of sharp uneven pointed things (obviously teeth) and there did not appear to be any sexual aspect to the crime. This did not stop them from investigating animal smugglers which resulted in them nearly blowing an FBI investigation getting an innocent man (and his pet tiger) eaten by wild hyenas and having Elliot shot (granted it was implied he took the case so he would not have to spend time with his family).
** Possibly the weirdest, though, was the one that had what looked like a case of child molestation ''somehow'' turn out to actually be a GovernmentConspiracy to test new poisons on poor immigrants, essentially ForTheEvulz.
** In a slightly more reasonable case, "Liberties" starts off as a story about a [[StalkerWithACrush stalker]] who set his ex-girlfriend/stalkee up to be raped, but takes a turn when the judge in the case asks Elliot to find the body of the judge's murdered son. Though the rape case is largely sidelined in favor of the latter arc, there does turn out to be a connection between the two halves of the plot.
* Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse:
** Season 2 of ''Series/Daredevil2015'' starts with the Punisher as an antagonist. He is captured four episodes into the season, at which point Elektra and her plotline are introduced, alongside the Punisher plotline.
** ''Series/LukeCage2016'' kills off the first antagonist, Cottonmouth, literally at the seventh episode, the middle episode of the 13 episode season. The same episode introduces Diamondback, who becomes the main antagonist for the rest of the season.
* ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' pulls this with the "Enemies Foreign/Domestic" two-parter. "Enemies Foreign" focuses on trying to stop Palestinian terrorists from assassinating Mossad Director Eli David. The team successfully kills/arrests the terrorists, but the episode ends with [[spoiler: an explosion that kills Mossad Officer Hadar and sends NCIS Director Vance to the hospital]]. "Enemies Domestic" then focuses on Vance's first NCIS mission to Amsterdam, since [[spoiler: someone from that op was responsible for the explosion]].
* ''Series/PoliceCameraAction'' was a {{Documentary}} that aired from 1994 to 2002, and 2007 to 2010, but used this trope fairly regularly. Let's go through them step-by-step:
** "The Wild Side", which aired in January 1998, started out by discussing swans on the motorway and other wild animals, but after the commercial break, went into the dangers of driving while tired, and new police methods to stop stolen cars in London and a hostage situation in Dyfed-Powys area of Wales.
** "Rust Buckets", which aired October 1998. After the first sequence of clips about TheAllegedCar ("rust bucket" is British slang for the alleged car), it then discussed a police pursuit in Blackbird Leys, Oxfordshire, before focusing on the Scottish Highlands, foreign drivers on British roads, and drivers behaving foolishly.
* Happens in a couple of ''Series/RedDwarf'' episodes, including the Series VIII finale: the first half is about how Lister and Kryten playing pranks on each other turns into a potentially lethal situation... then halfway through they discover that a virus is eating the ship, most of the crew evacuates, and our heroes have to cross into a mirror universe to find the antidote. This ''was'' set up at the very beginning of the episode, but most of the events from the first half have no effect on the second half.
** In the episode "Emohawk: Polymorph II" it happens ''twice''. First, the crew is being chased by a rogue Space Corps police probe... this leads them to crash onto a Gelf moon, where they have to deal with the locals to fix their ship's oxygen system... this leads them to being back on the ship with the titular emohawk on the loose. Apart from the connections mentioned above, none of the previous parts have any effect on each new plot.
** The first episode uses this, as well. The first half of the episode is a general snapshot of the routine on board the ''Dwarf'' and an introduction to some of the technology they have. The second half is, well... EverybodysDeadDave.
** "Justice" begins with the crew finding a stasis pod drifting in space. They determine that it came from a PrisonShip and contains either a living human woman or a murderous simulant -- and it will open automatically in a matter of hours. They go to the prison station to learn more, only for the prison's AI to scan their minds and find Rimmer guilty of causing the accident that killed Red Dwarf's crew. Most of the episode is then devoted to getting Rimmer released. That done, they decide to head home...
--->'''The Cat:''' Come on, let's get out of here. I don't know what made us want to come to this hellhole in the first place!\\
'''Lister:''' (staring at the now-open pod) ''I'' do.
*** In the end, the key to defeating the new threat is in how Rimmer dealt with imprisonment.
* ''Series/ResurrectionErtugrul'': Season 3 starts off revolving Ertugrul getting involved in the trade process by setting up shop in the Hanli Bazaar, as well as his subsequent rivalry with Ural Bey. [[spoiler: Then Ural kills the market owner, and the governor of Karacahisar embargoes the Kayi goods that were supposed to arrive in his city,]] thus changing the direction of the arc from that point on. [[spoiler: And that’s not even discussing the fact that Season 4 picks up ''directly'' after the events of the season 3 finale…]]
* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' has had a couple of examples where two plots that couldn't each fill up an episode were joined together.
** "Up The Long Ladder" starts with the ''Enterprise'' evacuating an {{Oireland}}-style colony, complete with AnachronismStew hijinks. They then visit a second colony populated by clones that are only a few generations away from losing genetic integrity -- and the solution is to integrate both groups of colonists into one.
** "Sins Of The Father" starts with a Klingon officer named Kurn coming aboard the ''Enterprise'' as part of an ongoing exchange program and taking his post as temporary First Officer. What looks like an episode of the crew chafing under his DrillSergeantNasty attitude changes course when he reveals himself to be [[LongLostRelative Worf's younger brother]], and brings news that their deceased father Mogh is being falsely accused of treason. The rest of the episode is a Klingon-style CourtroomEpisode as Worf fights to clear Mogh's name and restore his family's honor.
** "The Drumhead" is a CourtroomEpisode that starts with an investigation of espionage and possible sabotage. The spy is caught pretty quickly; the sabotage, on the other hand (which turns out to not have even been sabotage but an accident), leads to a WitchHunt and a serious look at the issue of the security of the state versus the rights of the individual citizen.
* ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' also this happen from time to time.
** Season 2's "Meld." The plot begins with Tuvok investigating a murder that took place in Engineering. He finds out less than fifteen minutes into the episode, when the murderer, an unhinged Betazoid who works in Engineering, reveals himself, without even bothering to give a clear motive. Tuvok, as logical a Vulcan as there can be, cannot accept that there's simply no motive (even though the crewman in question is clearly just ''that'' unhinged), so he administers a Vulcan mind-meld to find out what it is. The plot then changes to the aftereffects of doing a mind-meld on a homicidal maniac, as Tuvok goes down one of the ugliest {{Sanity Slippage}}s in the entire ''Trek'' franchise.
** In season 3's "Worst Case Scenario," B'Elanna finds a holodeck program that simulates a rebellion of the Maquis members on ''Voyager.'' Soon enough, various different crew members are finding it, and, taking it with a good dose of humor, discuss the story possibilities this program has. Tuvok eventually reveals himself as the author, who simply wanted a training scenario to prepare in case the Maquis members ever did rebel, which didn't happen as [[AbortedArc they simply integrated into the crew without much fuss.]] Tuvok and Paris go into the holodeck, arguing over how to finish the story, and then the episode takes a turn, as Tuvok activating the program sets off a trap made by one of the Maquis - ''Seska,'' who had turned the program into a series of attempts on Tuvok's life, just out of petty revenge.
** "Author Author," speaking of holodeck programs. The Doctor is nearly finished his holo-novel, ''Photons Be Free,'' a dramatized version of his own life as the ''Voyager's'' Emergency Medical Hologram, and the struggles and oppressions he faces from being [[JustAMachine just a program.]] He even sent out an early edition to a distributor on Earth, just to sell him on the concept. The problem? The Doctor clearly used facsimiles of his own crew, except with different names. This naturally infuriates his fellow crewmen and friends, including the captain, who holds a meeting over it. The Doctor initially refuses to back down about using artistic license, until eventually he clues in that what he's doing is borderline slander. The Doctor gets back in touch with his distributor to keep him informed, only to find his distributor published the holo-novel already. In a DramaticIrony, the distributor was able to do so because legally speaking, ''holograms have no rights.'' This turns into a court case, defending the Doctor's personhood, for the remainder of the episode.
* ''Franchise/SuperSentai'':
** ''Series/GoseiSentaiDairanger'':
*** The first few minutes of Episode 2 finish the cliffhanger from the first episode, then becomes a focus episode on Shouji trying to redeem himself for letting a kid get kidnapped by the Gorma.
*** The first half of Episode 3 focuses on Shouji and Kazu, while the second switches to Daigo.
** In Episode 24 of ''Series/TokusouSentaiDekaranger'' Umeko interrogated an alien about a bomb; then the rest of the episode was about the alien, and they only picked it up at the end.
** An episode of Turboranger subverts this. It seems to do this with the earlier problem of Youhei being poisoned by the monster of the week being quickly overshadowed 5 minutes later by the fact that in attempts to recover the antidote for him Haruna received a blow to the skull and now thinks she's part of the bad guys with poor Youhei forgotten about. However, it turns out Haruna was only fooling to get the antidote and both plots wind up tying together after all.
* ''Series/TheVicarOfDibley'': The first part of the episode "Summer" deals with the people of Dibley suffering a severe water shortage during a heatwave, with barely enough water to drink and certainly not enough to wash; one scene shows Geraldine and Alice wearing old Halloween costumes because they're the only clean outfits they have left. Halfway through, though, we learn that the local council's solution to this problem is to flood Dibley for a water reservoir, and the rest of the episode deals with the fight to save the village, with no further mention of the problem that led to this in the first place -- indeed, [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse all evidence of the shortage disappears after this point.]]
[[/folder]]

* ''HalfwayPlotSwitch/TheSimpsons''

[[folder:Western Animation]]
* The first part of the last episode of ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime'' focuses on Princess Bubblegum's uncle, Gumbald. After being defeated, the monster Golb appears and the conflict is all about him.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheAmazingWorldOfGumball'':
** "The Saint" primarily focuses on Gumball's attempts to get [[IncorruptiblePurePureness Alan]] to snap. When this [[KarmicJackpot fails spectacularly]], Gumball and Darwin spend much of the rest of the episode following Alan's example of saying yes to life, although it doesn't go as well for them as they hoped.
** "The Countdown" begins as a RaceAgainstTheClock. The writers [[TimeStandsStill mix]] [[TimeTravel things]] [[ButterflyOfDoom up]] in the second half after Gumball and Darwin [[CameraAbuse break]] the clock and then [[NinjaProp start messing with it]]. It was clear that some kind of plot switch was going to happen from the beginning, however, since the clock starts counting down from six minutes and twenty-three seconds even though a ''Gumball'' episode [[SpoiledByTheFormat lasts around eleven minutes]].
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Animaniacs}}'' did this in the short "The Warners and the Beanstalk." It starts out appropriately as a retelling of ''Literature/JackAndTheBeanstalk'' (also showing some influence from [[WesternAnimation/FunAndFancyFree Disney's version]]), but then they persuade the Giant (played by Ralph the Guard) to try some gold eggs and meat, which it then becomes a parody of ''Literature/GreenEggsAndHam'', complete with [[RhymesOnADime rhyming dialogue]].
* The second episode of ''WesternAnimation/CloneHigh'', "Episode Two: Election Blu-Galoo". The whole episode centers around the student body presidential election, but the only reason JFK runs is to abolish term limits and reinstate Cleopatra. By the time Abe enters the race, JFK and Cleo's plan is completely discarded for the story of Abe and JFK's competition for Cleo's affection. By the end of the episode Cleo's presidential ambitions have evaporated in favour of seducing whoever's in office, a plotline abandoned within the first two minutes of the next episode.
* The third ''WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom'' film "Reality Trip" is set up as a BrokenMasquerade story, with Danny's SecretIdentity being revealed during a fight with Freakshow, the hero needing to run from the government's overzealous ghost hunting agents, and getting unexpected help from kids at school who have always been fans of his alter ego. As soon as the main trio escapes the Guys In White, however, Freakshow contacts them and sends them on a mission to recover the {{Mineral Macguffin}}s they were fighting over in the first place. The rest of the movie (until the very end) consists of traveling around the world hunting for the gems, a plot that doesn't rely on the BrokenMasquerade set-up at all.
* The ''WesternAnimation/DextersLaboratory'' episode "Road Rash" starts out with Mom and Dad getting Dexter a bicycle that he tries learning to ride. But as soon as Dee-Dee on her rollerblades starts tormenting Dexter, it changes into a full WesternAnimation/WileECoyoteAndTheRoadRunner ShoutOut, with Dexter constantly trying to catch the Road Runner-esque Dee-Dee with his frequent bicycle modifications.
* ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'' did this almost all the time, giving the impression that the viewer wasn't watching just an 11-minute show, but a brief snapshot of the Eds' lives, implying that this sort of thing goes on 24-7.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'':
** WesternAnimation/SchoolsOutTheMusical'' switches plots four or five times. It starts out with Timmy on summer vacation, then his parents try to send him to a boring camp. Twenty minutes later, it's about kids ruling the world, but this is part of a BatmanGambit so that [[ObstructiveBureaucrat Pixies]] can make Fairyworld and the Earth boring. It wraps up with the owner of the aforementioned camp [[NonIronicClown rediscovering his clown heritage]], saving the world and reuniting with his long-lost parents.
** "Moooving Day" starts off with Timmy's mom upset that she hasn't sold a house in months, so Timmy has to be persuaded into wishing that she could sell any house. This results in her also selling their own house, as they now can afford to move to the newly-opened Dimmadome Acres. The plot then gradually switches to Timmy finding himself in the middle of a conspiracy where everyone is soon brainwashed by drinking a special brand of milk. When it gets resolved near the end, the original plot is brought up again when everyone needs Timmy's mom to sell them back their houses.
* ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'':
** In one episode, they go through several plots in rapid succession: Peter ruins his suit, and buys some adult-size footy pajamas, he becomes a faux-superhero by rubbing his feet on the carpet and shocking people, a fed-up Lois rips up all the carpet in the house, and finds a coin worth a lot of money, which the Griffins use to open a restaurant, the restaurant then becomes a favorite of crippled people, Peter bans the cripples and fights against them and then (after refusing to help Peter after he badmouthed Ben Stiller in a CutawayGag from earlier in the episode by saying that his movies are terrible) becomes crippled himself. The remainder of the plot is devoted to him coming to terms with being in a wheelchair and apologizing to Joe for banning him.
** {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d in one episode. Peter takes Brian to the vet and gets the ownership of a parrot while there, which inspires him to become a pirate, and he finds three pirate buddies. They attack a car filled with spices, and the parrot dies in the resulting fight. Chris, who has a crush on the receptionist, tells her Peter will just find some other wacky adventure. Indeed, he finds a pipe organ immediately, and when he breaks that ten seconds later, the deed to a cattle ranch. The rest of the episode ignored Peter's hijinks in favor of Chris' relationship with her. To make matters worse, this particular episode is named [[NonIndicativeTitle "Long John Peter"]] and the promotional [[https://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/familyguy/images/e/ec/FGLongJohnPeter.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20080419023522 poster]] makes the pirate-theme out to be the main focus of the episode.
** {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d, then averted, in "Welcome Back, Carter", an episode which mostly sticks to one plot. After repairing the relationship between Lois' parents, and in the last [[YourPrincessIsInAnotherCastle five seconds]], Peter exclaims, "Hey, I found a magic lamp! No? Maybe next episode."
** "Episode 420" starts with Peter "accidentally" killing Quagmire's cat. On the way to burying it and hiding the evidence, Peter and Brian are stopped by a cop, who is completely oblivious to the dead cat and the shovel in the back but charges Brian with possession of marijuana. The rest of the episode is about Brian trying to get marijuana legalized, then Peter and Carter trying to get it illegal again. {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d at the very end, when Quagmire goes to the Griffins' house and tells Peter about the new reward for finding his missing cat, Peter tells Quagmire that he killed his cat, takes the reward money, and slams the door on him; the audience had most likely [[BrickJoke already forgotten about the cat by that point]].
** "I Dream of Jesus" starts with Peter being obsessed with his Surfin' Bird record and annoying everyone with it until Brian and Stewie steal and destroy it in true ''Film/OfficeSpace'' fashion. Peter goes to a record store to find a replacement and finds Jesus working at the register. Following that scene, Surfin' Bird is never brought up again until the end of the episode. Talk about bookending plot-points.
** "Family Gay" begins with Peter buying a mentally challenged horse, but then pivots to Peter being injected with the gay gene. At the end of the episode, Mort throws the horse from earlier into the Griffins' dining room, screaming, "TAKE BACK YOUR FUCKIN' HORSE!!!"
** "Wasted Talent" starts off as a WholePlotReference to ''Film/WillyWonkaAndTheChocolateFactory'', but after Peter angers Pawtucket Pat by going into the forbidden room and gets kicked off the tour, Lois notices that he's a great piano player whenever he's drunk.
** Zigzagged with "Christmas Guy" as it starts with Peter trying to get Carter into the joys of Christmas, once the first half of the plot has already been resolved, it focuses more on Stewie missing Brian.
** "Peter-Assment" starts with Stewie getting stage fright, but then, rather than setting up a b-story focusing on him trying to conquer his stage fright, the rest of the episode focuses on Peter becoming a paparazzo, and then [[ItMakesSenseInContext Peter being sexually harassed by his boss]] in order to keep his job.
** "April in Quahog" has three plots in one episode. First having Peter attempt to get out of Jury Duty after finding out it's a civic duty rather than an exclusive selection. It later switches to the Earth getting sucked in a black hole and everyone in Quahog trying to live out the last 24 hours of their lives. When it turns out the whole thing was an April Fools joke by the news crew, the last ten minutes of the episode is Peter trying to win back his children's respect after admitting they get in the way all the time.
** "Passenger Fatty-Seven" starts with Peter ditching Lois to go on a trip to California with the guys, and then turns into a plot about the plane being hijacked by terrorists from an unidentified Eastern European country.
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'':
** In "The Cryonic Woman", the first part of the episode is about Fry, Bender, and Leela losing their jobs at Planet Express, but that plot is dropped in favor of Fry's reunion with his old girlfriend. The ResetButton issue of getting their jobs back is only picked up at the end.
** The first two episode-length quarters of "Bender's Game" are about the Planet Express crew trying to stop Mom from getting a special die. The second two quarters are pretty much the same plot again, in the crazy ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' reality that Bender's accidentally created.
* In ''WesternAnimation/GarfieldAndFriends'', the ''ComicStrip/USAcres'' episode, "Kiddie Korner" begins with Orson Pig narrating the story of ''Literature/DoctorZhivago'', with Wade Duck in the titular role. The story is cut short when Orson's cousin, Aloysius demands that the characters sing NurseryRhymes.
* Two animated shorts from ''WesternAnimation/HouseOfMouse'' starring WesternAnimation/{{Goofy}} are like this: One short, called "How to be a Waiter", is actually about Goofy becoming an actor as a result of him being tired of being a waiter (ironically, at the end of the short, it's revealed that the first character Goofy played in his entire film career is yes, a waiter), while another, called "How to Wash Dishes", is actually about Goofy using a credit card to go on vacation as a result of him being tired of washing dishes. However, at the end of the short, Goofy uses up his entire credit card money, and as a result, he had to [[WorkOffTheDebt make up the lost money by yes, washing dishes]].
* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheJetsons'' does this, with the first half featuring a plot about George trying to get the day off from Mr. Spacely and the second half befriending a bunch of alien circus fleas.
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Kaeloo}}'':
** Episode 85 started with Stumpy playing RockPaperScissors with the others to see who got to use the bathroom first. Halfway through the episode, the plot randomly changes to Kaeloo and Mr. Cat getting into a fight about whether Kaeloo HulkingOut is a good thing or not.
** The episode "Let's Play Hot-Cold" started with Stumpy trying to make himself look tanned and muscular while Kaeloo tried to find someone to play with and halfway through, the plot became about the others trying to teach Stumpy how to impress girls.
* The ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible'' Valentine's Day episode started off talking about Kim and Ron's first V-Day as a couple, then (much to the disappointment of many Kim/Ron shippers) it shifted to Wade developing a crush on Monique.
* Season 2 of ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'' has a few Dark Spirits running around and causing trouble, but most of the emphasis of the first half of the season is placed on the Water Tribe civil war and the strain it's putting on the heroes' relationships. Then ''Beginnings'' rolls around, and the focus turns from ending the war to [[spoiler:preventing an EldritchAbomination from [[SealedEvilInACan breaking out of its can]] and causing TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt]].
* Many ''WesternAnimation/MuppetBabies1984'' episodes start this way. The kids are usually involved in some sort of gang or group fantasy, until a little later, something arises (usually started by Nanny) that completely changes the focus of the episode. Such examples include...
** "Dental Hijinks" starts with the babies pretending they are in a big auto race until they crash, and Fozzie notices he has a loose tooth, triggering the episode's main plot.
** "Eight Take Away One Equals Panic" begins with the babies pretending they are flying on an airliner plane until they overhear Nanny on the phone and think she's planning on getting rid of one of them.
** "Gonzo's Video Show" starts with the babies pretending they are enjoying a day out at the beach until Nanny arrives and lets them borrow her video camera she rented to make some fun videos with it.
** "Piggy's Hyper-Activity Book" begins with the kids trying to build a house out of cardboard boxes until it collapses, and then the babies decide to play with an activity book, thus getting the main plot underway.
** "The Muppets Broadcasting Company" starts with the babies trying a domino setup until it leads to an argument. Then a sudden thunderstorm knocks out the power and Gonzo thinks it's an alien invasion. When the babies complain they can't do anything without electricity, Nanny recommends they listen to some classic radio shows she saved on tape cassettes, which gets the main plot underway.
** "Bad Luck Bear" starts with the babies in the bathtub pretending they are whale-hunting (with Gonzo as the whale) until Fozzie breaks a mirror and everyone believes he has bad luck.
** "Water Babies" begins with the babies pretending they are in a mine tunnel (actually a series of cardboard boxes) looking for treasure until Nanny comes in with an aquarium of fish. Still, it does carry over into a subplot of Skeeter being more focused on looking for treasure than being interested in the fish.
** "Where No Muppet Has Gone Before" begins with the babies reenacting Lewis and Clark's expedition to the Pacific until Nanny comes in with Baby Bunsen and Beaker, who have come over to spend the night. Bunsen then begins teaching the babies about space, getting the main plot going.
** An interesting version in "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Dark", which starts with the babies playing with Scooter's light pen before it leads into the plot of helping Beaker with his fear of the dark. The light pen ends up becoming a ChekhovsGun in aiding Beaker to overcome the slime monster from his imagination.
* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'':
** ''Griffon The Brush Off'' has Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie going on a pranking spree. You may think the outcome will be that one prank goes too far or something, but soon an old friend of Rainbow Dash comes back and the rest of the episode is focused on her.
** ''Bats!'' starts out with pests infesting Sweet Apple Acres and has Applejack who wants to drive them out, arguing with Fluttershy who feels bad for them and wants to let them stay. Then Twilight Sparkle decides to TakeAThirdOption which results in Fluttershy [[ItMakesSenseInContext becoming a Vampire Were-Fruit-Bat]] and the entire story shifts to a Halloween-esque plot about restoring her.
* ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb''; the first part of the two-parter "Night of the Living Pharmacists" plays out like a standard ''Phineas and Ferb'' episode: the boys invent a device that gives them the bouncing properties of rubber, Candace goes to a slumber party with Vanessa Doofenshmirtz to try and get in with her friends, while Perry and Doof fight over a device he invented to make his brother Roger ugly. Then Doof successfully activates the device and turns Roger into a clone of Doof, who can turn other people into clones by way of touching them. The second part is more or less a straight ZombieApocalypse story as the kids and Perry try to find a cure without getting turned themselves.
* ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog'' cartoons:
** ''WesternAnimation/SonicUnderground'' used and invoked this in "Wedding Bell Blues." Since Queen Aleena didn't show for her forced marriage to Robotnik, they'll instead crown Sonia queen in her stead—with Robotnik as the real power.
** The first half of the ''WesternAnimation/SonicBoom'' episode "[[Recap/SonicBoomS1E15AimLow Aim Low]]" is about Eggman losing his confidence after so many defeats at the hands of Sonic and his friends, leading him to hire a motivational speaker and life coach. Halfway through the episode, however, Eggman decides he feels better and fires his coach (who disappears from the episode altogether), only to immediately lose his confidence again since he has no one to motivate him and he confines himself to his couch. Sonic then [[VictoryIsBoring becomes really bored]] and starts annoying all of his friends, who spend the remainder of the episode trying to bring Eggman's confidence back so he can give Sonic something to do.
* ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'':
** In the Imaginationland trilogy, terrorists attack Imaginationland plotting to destroy collective imagination. Their means of doing it is to manipulate the Good and Evil characters, who were minding each other's business on their separate turfs of Imaginationland, into a war so they would destroy each other. By Part 2, when the war started, the terrorists are already killed, but the Good characters have the full support. Sure they are literally Good characters, as the Evil characters are literally evil, but the terrorists are responsible for the war when both sides were previously at peace. In the end, the terrorists were supposed to be the only victors, even posthumously, while all the Good and Evil characters were supposed to be dead. However, the Good characters win the war and those of them who died are resurrected. Also, the Evil characters are imprisoned instead of brought back to their turf.
** The episode "Pinewood Derby" begins with the premise of Randy cheating at the Boy Scouts' Pinewood Derby event through his son Stan. Then, an extraterrestrial criminal on the run lands on Earth and dies, and the rest of the episode is Randy and the leaders of various countries figuring out how to share the fortunes left behind. The plot then switches one more time near the end, where it's revealed that this incident was simply a SecretTestOfCharacter for humanity as a whole, and Randy's actions caused Earth to fail so hard that the examiners create a force field around Earth and its Moon to keep Earthlings from interfering with other lifeforms in case they master intergalactic travel in the future.
* ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'':
** The episode "Pre-Hibernation Week" has the first five minutes focus on [=SpongeBob=] and Sandy doing extreme sports until it suddenly shifts to Sandy forcing the whole town of Bikini Bottom to search for [=SpongeBob=] after he had gone missing (he was actually hiding from Sandy so he wouldn't have to join her in any more dangerous stunts).
** In "Shuffleboarding", the plot starts out with [=SpongeBob=] and Patrick filling in for Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy at the shuffleboarding tournament. It quickly turns into a plot about the two arresting everyone in town. The title is even more misleading considering that there wasn't any shuffleboarding shown ''at all''.
** "Born Again Krabs" starts out with Mr. Krabs trying to make his customers eat a moldy Krabby Patty [=SpongeBob=] found under the grill. When no one does, he takes a bite to prove it's still edible and develops a fatal case of food poisoning. When the Flying Dutchman shows up to spirit him away to Davy Jones' Locker as punishment for living a life of stinginess and greed, Mr. Krabs promises to turn over a new leaf if he's spared. The rest of the episode focuses on his efforts to reform himself (at least outwardly) after being brought back to life.
** "Nasty Patty" starts with Mr. Krabs and Spongebob making sure that the arriving health inspector is treated well and approves the Krusty Krab, only to (mistakenly) assume he's the fake inspector reported by the news, so they make the titular patty as payback. After the inspector chokes ([[ContrivedCoincidence due to a fly]], not the patty), he knocks himself out and Mr. Krabs and Spongebob believe they killed him by mistake, so the plot shifts to them attempting to bury the inspector without the police finding out.
** "Dirty Bubble Returns" starts with the Dirty Bubble's attack on a power plant, then him being reformed into the Clean Bubble. After a few attempts, he finally reverts to being evil and attacks the town while [=SpongeBob=] has to stop him.
** Exaggerated with "Night Light". The starting premise is simple: [=SpongeBob=] reads a scary book, and develops a fear of the dark, so he buys night lights to brighten up his house. The lights attract Patrick, who moves in with him for a sleepover, and then wake up Squidward. Patrick brings his rock through the wall, exposing more darkness, and he and [=SpongeBob=] get bigger lights to block it out, including a lighthouse, which winds up attracting Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy. They're annoyed that there's no real danger, until a supervillain shows up and they stop him, and then daytime comes and Patrick runs into the sun.
** In "Gone", [=SpongeBob=] wakes up to find that he is the only citizen left in town. He begins imitating them in their traditional roles, but while trying to attend Boating School, realizes that he cannot teach himself new material. He is upset, but then realizes that he can finally get his driving license. The episode then focuses on [=SpongeBob=]'s relationship with his new boat, as he suspects it has a mind of its own.
* The ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans'' episode "Fear Itself" spends about its first third dealing with the first appearance of [[LaughablyEvil comedic villain]] Control Freak. Its second two-thirds deal with the Tower being invaded by supernatural monsters [[spoiler: created by Raven having a SuperPowerMeltdown]] and is almost entirely unrelated.[[note]] Robin ''does'' suspect that Control Freak is somehow behind the monsters at one point, but it's a RedHerring.[[/note]] The only thing tying the two sections together is the "cursed" horror movie Beast Boy acquires at the end of the Control Freak section [[spoiler: which indirectly triggered the aforementioned SuperPowerMeltdown]].
* ''Animation/TupTup'' starts out as a humorous story about a man who is trying to go to sleep at night but is distracted by an annoying sound coming from the apartment below. He yells, he bangs on the floor with a broom. Then he, uh, blows up the whole building, and the story is forgotten. The rest of the cartoon plays out as a series of nonsensical, DerangedAnimation fantasy imagery reminiscent of Creator/BillPlympton's later work.
[[/folder]]

* ''Blog/WhatIf'': [[http://what-if.xkcd.com/8/ What would happen if everyone on earth stood as close to each other as they could and jumped, everyone landing on the ground at the same instant?]] After concluding that earth would continue to spin, Randall goes on to elaborate how our civilization would come to a halt and humanity would die out, not having any food or water supplies to feed even a fraction of the entire world population until they could get back to where they're from.

* ''WesternAnimation/TomAndJerryTheMovie'' starts off as an hour-and-a-half-long ''WesternAnimation/TomAndJerry'' cartoon. But when Puggsy shows up, things start to go downhill...
--> '''Puggsy''': The name is Puggsy. What's yours?\\
'''Tom:''' I'm Tom.\\
'''Jerry:''' I'm Jerry.\\
'''Both:''' ''({{Gasp}})'' You ''[[YouCanTalk talk!]]''
:: Most of the rest of the plot is about helping a HeartwarmingOrphan escape her RichBitch aunt and find her long-lost AdventurerArchaeologist father.

** {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d in one episode. Peter takes Brian to the vet and gets the ownership of a parrot while there, which inspires him to become a pirate, and he finds three pirate buddies. They attack a car filled with spices, and the parrot dies in the resulting fight. Chris, who has a crush on the receptionist, tells her Peter will just find some other wacky adventure. Indeed, he finds a pipe organ immediately, and when he breaks that ten seconds later, the deeds to a cattle ranch. The rest of the episode ignored Peter's hijinks in favor of Chris' relationship with her. To make matters worse, this particular episode is named [[NonIndicativeTitle "Long John Peter"]] and the promotional [[https://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/familyguy/images/e/ec/FGLongJohnPeter.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20080419023522 poster]] makes the pirate-theme out to be the main focus of the episode.

** Passenger Fatty-Seven starts with Peter ditching Lois to go on a trip to California with the guys, and then turns into a plot about the plane being hijacked by terrorists from an unidentified Eastern European country.

Compare DevelopingDoomedCharacters, which is about the time spent examining the mundane lives of the characters before something extraordinary happens that starts the "real" story. Compare to BatmanColdOpen where the opening events not connected to the main plot are resolved before it begins. Contrast WorkingTheSameCase. Compare and contrast MidSeasonTwist, which typically marks the end of the first act or even earlier.

[[folder:Films — Live-Action]]
* The ''30 for 30: Fantastic Lies'' film adopts this trope for the infamous Duke Lacross Rape case. It first paints the picture of life and culture at Duke up to the accusation, switching to the accusation as one would expect when it comes up. Then, when its revealed the accusation is false, there's a notable shift to the victim, Nifong, and just how things got this far when there was evidence from the very start that would have cleared the accused.
* 1980s Russian movie ''Air Crew'' (''Экипаж'') starts off as a KitchenSinkDrama and then switches to a DisasterMovie.
* ''Film/AnAmericanTerror'' starts out looking like it will be an ''Film/{{Elephant}}'' or ''Film/ZeroDay''-esque drama that follows a trio of social outcasts as they prepare to commit a school shooting, but then it turns into a SlasherMovie when the man who two of the would-be school shooters try to steal guns from is revealed to be a homicidal maniac complete with TortureCellar.
* Another Russian Movie, "The Arrows of Robin Hood" ("Стрелы Робин Гуда") has the heroes spent the first half helping an [[ImpoverishedPatrician impoverished knight]] reunite with his {{Love Interest|s}}. They succeed, and the two get married, only to be fatally shot immediately afterwards. They are then never mentioned again, and the rest of the movie is devoted to Robin rescuing Maid Marian from the Sheriff.
* ''ComicBook/ArtSchoolConfidential'' is based on a graphic novel by Dan Clowes, composed of one-page descriptions of art students. The film starts off as a riff on the comedic eccentricities of art and design schools... oh wait... there's a murder mystery? Yeah, also slip in an action sequence!
* The first half-hour of ''Assault on Death Mountain'' (the sequel to ''Assault on Devil's Island'') involves the main heroes trying to rescue a little girl from her evil millionaire father, and the final hour of the movie is about the heroes trying to stop an evil Syrian weapons dealer from unleashing killer gas on America.
* Baz Luhrmann's ''Film/{{Australia}}'' hits this midway through the film. Once Lady Ashley and the Drover deliver the cows to the dock, there's a TimeSkip, and it's suddenly revealed that the main villain has been fed to crocodiles by his second-in-command, the narrative has jumped forward several years, and Australia is suddenly in the midst of World War II. During all this, the plot changes from "deliver the MacGuffin" to "rescue the child protagonist and save the Aboriginal children in the midst of Japanese bombing runs".
* ''Film/AvengersEndgame'': The movie starts with the surviving heroes from the last film planning to find Thanos, take the Infinity Stones back and use them to bring back everyone who died. They find him in the first 10 minutes, where it's revealed [[spoiler: Thanos anticipated this and ''destroyed'' the Stones, and is now essentially a heavily injured retired man who poses no threat. He's quickly killed]] and the plot shifts to Earth's surviving population learning to cope in the post-snap world [[TimeSkip for five years]], before Ant-Man returns and introduces another plot-switch: [[spoiler: he accidentally discovered time travel, which will allow the Avengers to recover the Infinity Stones from the past.]]
* ''Film/{{BAPS}}'' begins as a screwball comedy about two girls from the ghetto who are hired to scam a dying millionaire into thinking one of them is the granddaughter of his first love. Halfway through the movie, their conscience gets the better of them and the movie takes a sharp turn for the dramatic as they get him to have fun in his last days while re-evaluating their own lives and relationships.
* ''Film/BetterWatchOut'' starts out as a seemingly run-of-the-mill home invasion horror movie, as a {{ba|dlyBatteredBabysitter}}bysitter and the adolescent boy she's watching over are stalked by an armed intruder. Thirty minutes in, we learn that [[spoiler:the entire thing was set up by the kid and his friend, so that he could impress her by stopping the intruder and "saving the day". Unfortunately for the babysitter, the boy proves to be [[EnfantTerrible far more dangerous than a real burglar would've been]]]].
* In ''Film/BenAndArthur'', the first half features [[NameAndName the titular homosexual characters]] trying to have the state of California legally recognize their marriage; the second half focuses on the two dodging the sinister machinations of Arthur's religious brother Victor.
* ''Film/BicentennialMan'': The film starts as a fairly straight adaptation of the ScienceFiction {{Drama}} "Literature/TheBicentennialMan", but around the start of Andrew's second century, he meets CanonForeigner Portia Charney, and falls in love. This changes to a RomanticComedy as he tries to make her happy, which reframes his drive to [[PinocchioSyndrome become human]] as a demonstration of his love for her. Despite the change in plot, there is no ToneShift, as Creator/RobinWilliams does a good job creating levity whether he's acting as a RobotButler, in search for a soul, or when [[{{Robosexual}} romancing a human]].
* ''Film/{{Birdemic}}'' is about a guy who gets rich off of green technology courting a girl whose modeling career is taking hold, only for birds to suddenly start attacking at the halfway mark. It's meant to be a modernized tribute to ''Film/TheBirds.''
* ''Film/BlindDate'' starts with the first half being about a man trying to survive a horrible blind date. In the second half, he's avenging himself and trying to ruin her wedding.
* The Creator/EdWood-penned ''Film/TheBrideAndTheBeast'' initially starts off as the story about a newlywed who realizes that she is the reincarnation of a gorilla, which is the reason why male gorillas are aroused by her. Then halfway in, she and her new husband, a big game hunter, go on an African honeymoon and the film then turns into a story about the husband going after some escaped Bengal tigers attacking people on his campground. Meanwhile, the titular bride is shoved into the background, and no gorillas are seen until the last 10 minutes when the original plot finally resumes.
* ''Cadillac Man'' starts out following a sleazy two-timing used-car salesman with a quickly expiring KarmaHoudiniWarranty, dealing with the prospect of losing his job, having his girlfriends find out about each other, and a rebellious teenage daughter running away. Just as these combined issues begin to overwhelm the lead, the story takes a dramatic left turn, and [[DieHardOnAnX turns in to a hostage crisis, with the lead as one of the hostages]].
* The South Korean film ''Phone'' starts as a thriller about a journalist who uncovered a pedophilia scandal being stalked by one of the people she accused. She moves into a friend's empty house and changes her phone number. [[spoiler:Then her friend's daughter answers her phone and becomes possessed, and the plot suddenly becomes a supernatural horror movie about how the phone number is cursed by an angry spirit. Said spirit actually kills off the stalker halfway through the movie to put that plot thread permanently to rest.]]
* ''The Cottage'', a British movie, begins as a black comedy about a bungled kidnapping before turning into a dark horror comedy about a Leatherface-type slasher killer half way through. Presumably it was inspired by ''From Dusk Til Dawn''.
* This shows up in a ''science documentary'', of all things. Called ''The Dark Secret of Hendrik Schon'', it's about the titular scientist, a titan in the field of theoretical physics. The first two-thirds of the program are about his early career and work in [[{{Nanomachines}} nanotechnology]]. It builds up some drama around the unnerving applications -- a weapon of assassination, an engineered biowarfare agent, the feared GreyGoo scenario, and so forth. Then around the forty-minute mark, a student reading one of Schon's papers picks up a clue that leads to his real "dark secret": [[spoiler: He was a fraud. His papers were lies built upon fake experiments he never conducted and "evidence" he made up out of whole cloth.]] Whether this is a masterful subversion of ScienceIsBad hysteria, a piss-take on the idea that the scientific community knows everything, a StealthParody of sensational documentaries, or just a flaw in one such documentary is up to the viewer.
* ''Film/DCCab'' changes from a RagtagBunchOfMisfits trying to make it as a cab company in D.C. to a RagtagBunchOfMisfits trying to save one of their own and a couple of kids from kidnappers in the third act.
* ''Film/DearZachary'' already starts off sad, detailing how Andrew Bagby was loved by friends but killed by his mentally-unstable girlfriend Shirley Turner. While she's about to go to trial for Andrew's murder, Turner reveals she's pregnant, and Andrew's parents attempted to battle to get custody of the baby. The film was meant to be a compilation of people talking about Andrew so that his son, the titular Zachary, would know him. [[spoiler: But then, in a horrendously cruel twist of fate, Turner kills herself and Zachary. The rest of the film is about Andrew Bagby's parents getting justice for their grandchild through new laws that would keep people in Turner's situation (about to be on trial for murder) in prison before trial.]]
* ''Film/DeathProof'' is about a group of attractive girls hanging out at a bar who meet a mysterious older named Stuntman Mike. And then... he kills them all, and we move onto a different group of girls.
* ''Film/TheDescent'' is somewhere between this and DevelopingDoomedCharacters, as the film spends a while dealing with the personal interactions and physical hardships of a group of female spelunkers, then adds subterranean cannibals.
* ''Film/EvilDeadTrap'' starts off as a SlasherMovie about snuff films, then becomes a near-incomprehensible supernatural horror story.
* The main focus of the first half of ''Film/{{Exam}}'' focuses on the candidates trying to unveil hidden writing on their paper. Then [[spoiler:White]] makes [[spoiler:Brunette]] burn her own paper, and the rest of the film documents the candidates [[AHouseDivided slowly going insane and turning on each other]].
* ''Film/Flightplan2005'' starts with a recently-widowed woman waking up on a plane with her daughter nowhere to be found with no one on the flight crew or among the passengers remembering a little girl. Soon, even she begins to doubt her own sanity, especially when the captain proposes that her daughter died along with her husband, and that she's in deep denial over this. After discovering that it's all a plot to blackmail the airline for a lot of money and frame her for it, the movie promptly turns from a psychological thriller into an action flick, where she tries to find her daughter, while trapped on a plane with a killer and his accomplice.
* Gene Kelly's debut film ''Film/ForMeAndMyGal'' starts off as lighthearted then becomes serious halfway through as America enters UsefulNotes/WorldWarI.
* ''Film/{{Frequency}}'' goes from a dramatic story about a son reconnecting with his dead father into a SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong thriller.
* The former TropeNamer and one of the premier examples was ''Film/FromDuskTillDawn''. It starts off as a crime-thriller about a pair of brothers on the lam in Texas, who take a family hostage in their RV to cross through the border with Mexico. Halfway through, when they enter a strip club, they basically stumble into a slapstick-gore horror film with vampires. There were actually theater-goers who said, ''out loud'', at the point of the switch, "Wait, [[GenreBusting what the hell kind of movie is this]]?!"[[note]]Which is doubly strange, considering that the genre shift is more of a non-spoiler, as it was HEAVILY advertised as a creature feature as far back as the earliest trailers and promotional materials.[[/note]]
** The film's [[Film/FromDuskTillDawn3TheHangmansDaughter second sequel]] rehashes the plot switch structure with a [[TheWestern western]] style, having a post carriage theft plot preceding the action and horror.
* ''Film/FunnyPeople'' was advertised as a funny yet touching story of a famous comedian coming to terms with the value of his own life when he's diagnosed with a deadly disease. About halfway through the film, however, he's cured, and he spends the rest of the film getting entangled in a romance with his married ex-girlfriend.
* ''Film/{{Hancock}}'', rather infamously. It starts as a comedy about a superhero who really sucks at his job. Then halfway through, [[spoiler:it turns into a dramatic action movie when his PR person's wife turns out to be another superhero who was Hancock's former wife and they're both immortal]].
* ''Film/{{Heckler}}'' starts out as Jamie Kennedy's examination of hecklers, in which he interviews comedians about their thoughts on heckling and confronts actual hecklers who interrupt his stand-up comedy shows. About halfway through, the film twists and starts going after movie critics in the same fashion, with the surprise thesis that critics are really just hecklers.
* ''Film/HighLane'', another mountaineering film, turns into a SlasherMovie for its second half when its protagonists suddenly find themselves being hunted by a feral, cannibalistic MountainMan.
* Creator/AlfredHitchcock:
** ''Film/{{Psycho}}'' starts out following a woman who succumbs to temptation and steals money from her employer. The film changes to a horror story about forty minutes in when she's murdered out of the blue by a psychotic motel manager, and the rest of the film follows him. Hitchcock threw his original audience off even further by [[DeadStarWalking hiring a well-known actress]] to play the DecoyProtagonist. To reinforce this trope, he requested theaters screening ''Psycho'' to not let any more people in to watch once the movie began.
** The classic ''Film/TheBirds'' starts out as a romance and then shifts gears about half way through the movie, turning into a [[ItWasHisSled horror movie]] about the titular animals.
** The driving plot thread of the first half of ''{{Film/Vertigo}}'' is the mystery behind Carlotta Valdes and whether or not Madeline is possessed by her. The second half of the film (after Madeline's death) is centered around Scottie's obsession with Madeline and [[DoppelgangerReplacementLoveInterest the lengths he'll go to]] in order to be with her again.
* Another documentary that manages it is ''Hitman Hart: Wrestling With Shadows''. It starts as a straightforward year-in-the-life documentary of [[Wrestling/BretHart one of the most popular wrestlers of the era]]. Then comes the Wrestling/MontrealScrewjob, and all of a sudden it's about one of the most dramatic betrayals in wrestling history.
* ''Film/HouseOfFlyingDaggers'' starts out as a story about a soldier trying to infiltrate a rebel organization, with the implication that he's going to end up falling in love with the blind girl who is his only lead and have to choose between love and duty. Then the political aspects abruptly get discarded in favor of a love triangle story between the hero, the girl, and his boss.
* ''{{Film/Hugo}}'' spends a good chunk of its runtime detailing the life of the titual street urchin living in a train station, trying to figure out a way to fix an automaton found by his late father, but once he finds out that Papa Georges is actually Creator/GeorgesMelies, most of the rest of the film focuses on his various real life exploits of working on silent films instead.
* In ''Film/{{Icarus}}'', the documentary starts out with Bryan Fogel (the director) trying to win an amateur cycling race through doping and getting past testing as an experiment. [[spoiler: The person he uses to help him with this, Dr. Grigory Rodchenkov, was (at the time) the director of Russia's national anti-doping laboratory. As they become buddies, it's revealed that there is a Russian state-sponsored doping program Grigory runs. As news of this program comes out in the media, Fogel flies Dr. Grigory to the States to testify about it while keeping him safe. The documentary is all about Grigory and the doping program from this point on.]]
* In ''Imposter (2012)'', French career conman Frédéric Pierre Bourdin impersonates a missing boy - Nicolas Barclay -- in order to get to the United States. Throughout the movie, he details all the crazy things he did to trick the family. [[spoiler:He was eventually found out by several authorities (an FBI agent and a private investigator). Then the focus shifts to the family and how they were so inviting of a man who was obviously not Nicolas. The conclusion drawn by several people is that someone in the family killed Nicolas and everyone covered it up. The documentary ends on an uncertain note, though several family members plead to the camera that this is not the case and that Frédéric is a liar. ]]
* ''Film/TheInventionOfLying'' has this. The first half of the movie is about a man in a world where everyone tells the truth discovering he can say falsehoods and people believe him, and the second half [[spoiler: turns into a commentary on love and religion]].
* ''Film/JamesBond'':
** ''Film/AViewToAKill'' starts out with an investigation of CorruptCorporateExecutive Max Zorin and his sale of EMP resistant microchips to UsefulNotes/{{Soviet Russia|UkraineAndSoOn}}. Film/JamesBond investigates by attending a horse sale, where he finds out that Zorin is also trading in illegal augmentations. Neither of these plot points make much of a difference in the end because right after Bond escapes, the real plan to destroy Silicon Valley is introduced and a relatively minor clue (a check made out to a woman from San Francisco) brings Bond to California.
** ''Film/{{Goldfinger}}'' starts as a surveillance mission to determine if the titular character is smuggling gold in and out of England to get the best price. Smuggling is forgotten quickly with the phrase "Operation: Grand Slam" which turns out to be a plot to nuke the gold at Fort Knox.
* The Australian film ''Japanese Story'' is billed as a romantic drama involving an Australian scientist (played by Toni Colette) who ends up having an affair with a married Japanese businessman. About 2/3 of the way into the film, [[spoiler: the businessman dies in a freak accident while swimming, and the rest of the film is spent on Colette's character dealing with the corpse and the aftermath of this man's death]].
* ''Film/{{Jaws}}'' begins as a story about a small town police chief trying to convince the mayor that there's a shark and having to deal with the island being more concerned with the economic impact than lives. The second half is a three man buddy movie as the chief goes on a shark hunt with a grizzled old fisherman and a rich young scientist. We never see anyone from the town again until the sequel.
* ''Film/KillerMountain'' starts off as a fairly standard mountain climbing drama[=/=]thriller, but then the remaining protagonists discover Shangri-La, an immortality serum, and monsters that are implied to have been left behind by AncientAstronauts.
* ''Film/KnivesOut'' starts out as an Creator/{{Agatha Christie}}-esque murder mystery in a BigFancyHouse, but we're very quickly given an answer to "whodunnit", at which point it becomes a cat-and-mouse SympatheticCriminal vs SympatheticInspectorAntagonist crime story. [[spoiler:And then it's revealed that the supposed perp is innocent after all, set up by the real killer, and it wraps up as a classic Whodunnit again.]]
* ''Film/{{Knowing}}'' starts out as a thriller about strange numbers, written down by a CreepyChild. The protagonist, a ScienceHero, tries [[spoiler: to stop accidents from happening]], after he understands what the figures mean -- but utterly fails, as [[spoiler: TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt is near, leading to a ApocalypseHow Class X Event ]]. Though, Creator/NicolasCage's character has a rather spoilerific [[spoiler: ChekhovsSkill]], if you think about it.
* Creator/StanleyKubrick did this a lot with his later films. It's actually a trademark of his that his films were split into two distinct halves, and it got to the point where he'd even explicitly label them.
** ''Film/TwoThousandOneASpaceOdyssey'' does this not once, not twice, but ''four'' times. The first plot focuses on the evolution of man, and then we switch to a plot centered on Dr. Floyd participating in a top-secret mission to the Moon which turns out to be because [[spoiler: they had found the first conclusive evidence of extraterrestrial life]]. Then much of the rest of the film is switched over towards showing the lifestyles of the two conscious astronauts aboard a long-distance flight when some strange things happen, before taking a dark turn where [[spoiler: Hal kills everyone except [[SoleSurvivor David Bowman]]]] at which point it becomes an incredibly surreal series of occurrences that lead to the next stage of human evolution.
** Like the book it was based on, ''Film/AClockworkOrange'' was specifically divided into three parts. The first introduces Alex and shows us the dystopian world in which he lives as we see him and his droogs go out and do all kinds of nasty things. Then we get to the second plot centered around the experimental rehabilitation technique, and finally the third story where Alex must deal with the effects of the technique.
** ''Film/FullMetalJacket'' starts off with Joker in boot camp, focusing on the decaying mental state of Private Pyle and his interactions with Gunnery Sergeant Hartman. After Pyle's murder-suicide, the film follows Joker to [[UsefulNotes/TheVietnamWar war]].
* ''Film/LakeBodom'' starts as an archetypal SlasherMovie (group of teenage friends go camping in the woods where unsolved murders occurred years ago, sexual tension and partying happen, people start dying) until the reveal that half of the group has been plotting to murder the others. The film then follows their effort to dispose of the bodies while extensive flashbacks explain their motives, until a second twist reveals that they are actually being stalked by a crazy murderer, and the film goes back to the slasher genre.
* ''Film/LetterNeverSent'' starts off as a story about four geologists trying to find diamond deposits in the forests of Siberia. The main plot conflict seems to be the LoveTriangle between the pretty young female geologist, her boyfriend, and the older male geologist who covets her. Then the forest catches fire, the second half of the movie is a desperate struggle to survive and escape the burning hell, and the LoveTriangle part is completely forgotten. (Even before DwindlingParty kicks in.)
* ''Film/LifeIsBeautiful'': Starts off as a romantic comedy, where Guido [[UnfortunateNames Orefice]] eventually wins the affection of Dora and they have a son named Joshua. Switch time -- Let's send them all to a concentration camp! Guido tries to make the best of the situation for Joshua by telling him that if he doesn't complain/cry and hides from the guards he would gain "points". 1000 would win a tank. [[spoiler:Just before the camp is liberated by the Americans, Guido gets caught by a guard and unceremoniously shot. The movie ends with [[BittersweetEnding an American tank at the gates to the camp, and Joshua exclaiming that he won]].]] Damn you, Roberto Benigni.
* The John Sayles film ''Limbo'' starts off as a movie about a fisherman in a small Alaskan town who starts a romance with a single mom and the trouble he has bonding with her daughter. Then they go on a boat trip with his wayward brother who is suddenly attacked and murdered by drug dealers the brother owes money to. The three characters are then forced to seek shelter and fight to survive on a nearby uncharted, uninhabited island.
* ''Film/LostHighway'' by Creator/DavidLynch is a particularly wild example. Out of nowhere, Bill Pullman simply turns into Balthazar Getty and a completely different story unfolds...but not really.
* ''Film/MadMaxBeyondThunderdome'' starts off as a typical post-apocalyptic action flick until Max is brought to the Oasis. Suddenly, the whole situation in Barter Town is left behind, and the theme changes to something akin to the Lost Boys from ''Literature/PeterPan''. Only when Max and the kids reach the Barter Town Underground are the two plots combined.
* ''Film/MiracleMile'': What starts out as an indie romance-comedy suddenly takes a right turn when the male lead picks up a ringing payphone and someone at NORAD tells him that WorldWarIII has begun and the missiles are on their way. The rest is about finding his love interest, telling other people that the city is about to be nuked and figuring out how to escape and survive the end of the world.
* ''Mortal Thoughts'' starts off as a BlackComedy, then morphs into a PsychologicalThriller.
* In ''Film/MulhollandDrive'', everything changes after Rita drops the blue box.
* This happens in a few infamous movies shown on ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'':
** ''Film/TheSidehackers'' starts as a lighthearted sports movie, but about a third of the way through it turns into a gritty revenge film after [[spoiler: the rape/murder of Rommel's girlfriend.]] The Brains decided to vet the movies they chose to riff more carefully in the future after this one.
** ''Riding With Death'' changes plots halfway because it's a CompilationMovie based on two unrelated episodes of ''Series/GeminiMan''.
** ''Film/TheGirlInLoversLane'' shifts gears after [[spoiler:the girl from the romantic first two-thirds of the film is outright murdered half-way through the final act]].
* To the extent that ''Film/NapoleonDynamite'' has a plot, it pulls one of these. There's little plot to be seen in the first half, but once Pedro decides to run for school office, most all focus goes to his campaign.
* The "Oedipus Wrecks" segment of ''New York Stories'' has the Creator/WoodyAllen character's [[MyBelovedSmother Beloved Smother]] vanishing during a disappearing act of a magic show. Audience expectations are {{subverted|Trope}}, however, when she appears as a giant head floating over Manhattan, to torment her son in front of the entire world.
* The Creator/RupertEverett and Music/{{Madonna}} movie ''The Next Best Thing'' starts off with a rather sweet and interesting idea about a gay man and his female friend who have sex after a night of drinking and she becomes pregnant -- they decide to raise the child together. The second half of the movie veers unexpectedly [[spoiler: when Madonna's character reveals that Everett's character isn't the real father and she wants full custody. Cue courtroom drama]].
* The movie ''Film/NightClaws'' was pretty much ''Film/{{Jaws}}'' with Creator/RebBrown, Bigfoot, and a horror-flavored ClicheStorm. Suddenly, near the end, [[spoiler: the female lead straight up snaps Reb's neck, is revealed to be a bounty hunter in one of the most {{ass pull}}ed manners, and then suddenly, Frank Stallone, [[AdvertisedExtra who despite being named beside Reb Brown had NO screen time up to this point]], comes out of ''nowhere'' and confronts a generic antagonist who was a Sasquatch hunter about something ''completely different from the main freaking plot''! After that plot's finished, [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment it's never mentioned again]]]].
* The first half of ''Film/Parasite2019'' is a BlackComedy about the poor Kim family conning their way into cushy jobs working for the rich Park family. At the halfway point, the Parks go out of town for a night. This allows for the former housekeeper (whom they'd gotten fired by making it seem like she had TB) to get back to the house. This is when the Kims find out that [[spoiler:she's been hiding her husband in the secret basement for four years]] and at that point it becomes a thriller.
* The little known 1988 film ''Permanent Record'' spends about twenty minutes convincing you it's just throw away teen angst when the kid we thought was the protagonist [[spoiler: leaps off a cliff to his death]] between jump cuts.
* The Thai horror film ''Phii Khon Pen'' (called ''The Victim'' in the US) starts as a movie about an aspiring actress who gets a job playing the victim in crime re-enactments and landing the role of a murdered supermodel, only to become caught up in the investigation of her death when the real model's ghost begins haunting her. Just as that mystery is solved and the plot comes to a climax, [[spoiler:it's revealed that we've been watching a movie-within-a-movie. The plot then switches to following the cast and crew of the movie we've just watched, who are experiencing real supernatural events on the set, which they believe to be related to the true story they based their film on]]. By the end, it turns out [[spoiler:the haunting of the film set actually has nothing at all to do with the story of the movie-within-a-movie after all]].
* The classic ''Film/{{Predator}}'' starts with Creator/ArnoldSchwarzenegger trying with his fellow soldiers to save a US politician from a band of South American terrorists. After he discovers that this was just an excuse to save some Black OPS agents, this plot is conveniently thrown out of the window when an alien with an explosive plasma ShoulderCannon and a [[VisibleInvisibility cloaking device]] begins [[HuntingTheMostDangerousGame hunting them]]. Unlike some other examples, this wasn't a surprise to original audiences, and the film begins with something falling to Earth from space and the team encounters the remains of the alien's previous victims early in the film, albeit first under the impression it was the terrorists who did it.
* ''Film/PrivateBenjamin'' starts out as a story about a woman making it through basic training, but mid-way through the movie, she's not even in the Army anymore and the conflict revolves around her and her lover.
* ''The Queen of Versailles" starts as sort of a puff piece on Time-Share magnate David Siegel and his wife Jackie, as they construct the Versailles House (which would be one of the largest, most expensive homes EVER). [[spoiler:Then the Great Recession of 2008 hits and we see their family struggle to adjust as David's company takes some huge hits.]]
* ''Rat Pfink A Boo Boo''. The plot was altered during filming to accommodate anything and everything that passed through the director's hands. Most notably, when a gorilla suit became available, they wrote a gorilla into the movie. It suddenly shifts from being a gritty crime drama to a superhero spoof.
* The Kaiju film ''Film/{{Rodan}}'' starts with a mining company dealing with a localized infestation of quite-large prehistoric insects, and then switches to two gigantic pterosaurs emerging from the mine, eating all the insects, and causing havoc across Japan through a combination of [[BlowYouAway the downdraft caused by their wings as they fly around]] and [[ATeamFiring the JSDF trying to shoot them down and managing to blow up just about everything]] ''[[ATeamFiring except]]'' [[ATeamFiring the pterosaurs]].
* The 1980s Creator/MelanieGriffith[=/=]Creator/JeffDaniels vehicle ''Film/SomethingWild'' starts off like it's going to be a wacky romantic comedy, but then takes a dark turn halfway through when her ex-con husband shows up.
* ''Film/TheSoundOfMusic''. A cute heart-warming family-friendly musical romp about a nun-turned-governess who teaches her wards the joy of music, and redeems their father, winning his love. And look, at the two hour mark they marry in a show-stopping number. Cue end-credits any time n-- oh wait no, that's right: Nazis. Cue 45 minutes of defiance, heartache, [[TheQuisling quislings]], and {{dark reprise}}s.
* ''Film/SpaceCowboys'' starts out as a comedy about a group of elderly former astronauts training to go back into space on the space shuttle. The second half of the movie suddenly becomes an ''Film/{{Apollo13}}''/''Film/{{Armageddon}}''-esque thriller where the same elderly astronauts have to deal with the revelation that the "communications satellite" they were sent to repair is actually [[spoiler:a nuclear weapons platform]], a malfunctioning craft and find a way to get back to Earth safely.
* The first half of ''Film/SpiderManFarFromHome'' features Spider-Man teaming up with Mysterio to defeat the Elementals, [[spoiler: while the second half reveals he's the BigBad and the Elementals were just illusions.]]
* ''Franchise/StarWars Episode VII: Film/TheForceAwakens'' starts as a search for [[spoiler:the now-reclusive]] Luke Skywalker by both the Resistance and the First Order. But halfway through the movie, Starkiller Base, the First Order's new Death Star-style superweapon, is introduced to provide an ersatz Death Star for the finale.
* The first half of ''Film/{{Stripes}}'' deals with the irreverent recruits just barely pulling it together to pass boot camp. The rest is about their first mission as they're sent to Italy to recover a militarized RV.
* ''Film/{{Submarine}}'': The first half is about the development of Oliver's romance with Jordana, which then shifts abruptly to Oliver investigating his mother's infidelity.
* ''Film/TokyoZombie'': The first half of the movie centers on the main characters trying to escape the zombies on the streets of Tokyo. [[TimeSkip Five years later]], and it's set in a bizarre society controlled by the rich, and Fujio is now a professional 'zombie-wrestler'.
* ''Film/TrailOfThePinkPanther'''s (1982) first half has Inspector Clouseau investigating the latest theft of the Pink Panther diamond. Then he goes missing, and the film switches to the adventures of a [=TV=] reporter investigating this via interviewing his friends, foes, and family. Why? Clouseau's actor Creator/PeterSellers died in 1980, before this film was ''written'', and his scenes in the first half are mostly-deleted scenes from ''Film/ThePinkPantherStrikesAgain'' put into a new context. The second half boils down to a ClipShow of the previous films. All of this sets up the ''next'' film, ''Film/CurseOfThePinkPanther'' (1983), which introduces a new protagonist and leads up to the revelations of what happened to the diamond and Clouseau.
* The Paul Giamatti film ''Film/WinWin'' starts out as a comedy about high school wrestling with Giamatti coaching a young wrestling prodigy...then [[spoiler:the kid's mother shows up and the second half becomes a drama about a battle over an estate]]. It still works though due to Giamatti and Tom Mc Carthy's direction.
* ''Film/TheWorldsEnd'' starts off as a rather bittersweet comedy about a forty-year old ManChild screw-up getting his high school gang back-together to try and complete an incredibly difficult pub crawl. Then, about half-way in, [[spoiler: they discover their old town has been replaced by alien replicants, and it turns into a sci-fi action flick]].
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