History Main / TooDesperateToBePicky

* ''Series/FawltyTowers'': In "The Kipper and the Corpse", Dr Price orders Basil to have the kitchen scrubbed before any more food is prepared there, as a dead body has been in the kitchen. However, as he is desperate for his own breakfast, he adds "sausages excepted, you may cook them immediately, I'll take the risk".

** The chaos in the Jihad had lead to supply shortages, and the lost of many equipment and mechs. This resulted in the rise of [=RetroTech=], where manufacturers build mechs that are low tech, and primitive by Inner Sphere standards. But with the war raging almost everywhere, armies and Mechwarriors are desperate enough to take any mech they can get into the battlefield.

* ''Literature/BeastTamer'': Sora is the more polite and reserved of the fairy sisters, but she can be frightening when angry. The group gets a good look at this when Sora is infuriated at Runa for casting poison magic on Rein out of nowhere to confirm his newly revealed status effect nullification. Sora starts shaking and scolding Runa to explain herself, and does so again when Runa tries to claim the ends justify the means. The scene scares newly introduced Nina while both Rein and Tania remark that they should avoid getting on Sora's bad side.

* ''LightNovel/RebuildWorld'': Comes up a lot, there’s even a name for it, paying ''"The Wasteland Price"''.
** It's mentioned that hunters can't be picky about their {{Nanomachine}} HealingPotion because of how much they need it to patch wounds and stave off exhaustion while fighting. So they're often forced to buy whatever medicine they can find because of how difficult it is to verify its effectiveness.

[[folder:Light Novels]]
* In ''Literature/TheRisingOfTheShieldHero'', Naofumi initially buys the sickly and weak Raphtalia from a slave trader because he needs a way to damage enemies to grow stronger, and she's all he can afford.
* ''Literature/ReincarnatedAsASword'': This is how Fran and Teacher met. Fran was forced by slavery magic to fight a two-headed bear and needed a weapon, any weapon, damn the consequences, or she'd die and he's just happy that someone pulled him out of the ground after being stuck in it for a month.
[[/folder]]

** The chaos in the Jihad had lead to many supply shortages, and the lost of many equipment and mechs. This resulted in the rise of [=RetroTech=], where manufacturers build mechs that are low tech, and primitive by Inner Sphere standards. But with the war raging almost everywhere, armies and Mechwarriors are desperate enough to take any mech they can get into the battlefield.

* ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddysBigPictureShow'': When he believes that Ed and Eddy have sunk into quicksand, [[NeatFreak Edd]] resorts to clawing through the muck to save them.

* ''Literature/IWasASwordWhenIReincarnated'': This is how Fran and Teacher met. Fran was forced by slavery magic to fight a two-headed bear and needed a weapon, any weapon, damn the consequences, or she'd die and he's just happy that someone pulled him out of the ground after being stuck in it for a month.

* ''LightNovel/TheFruitOfEvolution'': Hiiragi Seiichi is forced to consume a number of potentially deadly mushrooms, herbs, and grasses in the early chapters, because he's stranded in the middle of the wilderness with nothing but his wits to survive on. It luckily pays off for him when it leads to him stumbling across the titular PowerUpFood.

** ''ComicBook/TheTransformersMoreThanMeetsTheEye'' later introduces "pink alchemy": a process that turns the lifeblood of organics into a reasonable facsimile of Energon. It's such an inefficient process that it apparently needs the blood of thousands of organics to make enough Energon to fuel a small group of Transformers. Unsurprisingly, it was a Decepticon innovation.

* In ''LightNovel/TheRisingOfTheShieldHero'', Naofumi initially buys the sickly and weak Raphtalia from a slave trader because he needs a way to damage enemies to grow stronger, and she's all he can afford.
* ''LightNovel/IWasASwordWhenIReincarnated'': This is how Fran and Teacher met. Fran was forced by slavery magic to fight a two-headed bear and needed a weapon, any weapon, damn the consequences, or she'd die and he's just happy that someone pulled him out of the ground after being stuck in it for a month.

* This trope rears its ugly head in the ''TabletopGame/{{Traveller}}'' adventure "High and Dry", where the player party is given the ultimate prize: a free starship (usually, any ship the players acquire either in creation or during play comes with a mountain of debt, is on long-term loan, or [[SpacePirates has been gained in a manner that raises legal complications]]). This adventure counts on the players being both gullible and TooDesperateToBePicky. [[spoiler:The ship is free, but the players have to go to the caldera of a dormant-but-still-active volcano to fetch it. And [[FromBadToWorse the previous crew pretty much trashed the ship.]] And if that's not bad enough, [[UpToEleven Just as the party gets the ship into working order, the volcano is ready to erupt]]. Finally, [[HumiliationConga the referee is encouraged to remember that the ship's previous crew were ne'er-do-wells who burned a lot of bridges in the subsector...]] For all that, they'd have to be damn desperate to go through with the ordeal.]]

* This trope rears its ugly head in the ''TabletopGame/{{Traveller}} adventure "High and Dry", where the player party is given the ultimate prize: a free starship (usually, any ship the players acquire either in creation or during play comes with a mountain of debt, is on long-term loan, or [[SpacePirates has been gained in a manner that raises legal complications]]). This adventure counts on the players being both gullible and TooDesperateToBePicky. [[spoiler:The ship is free, but the players have to go to the caldera of a dormant-but-still-active volcano to fetch it. And [[FromBadToWorse the previous crew pretty much trashed the ship.]] And if that's not bad enough, [[UpToEleven Just as the party gets the ship into working order, the volcano is ready to erupt]]. Finally, [[HumiliationConga the referee is encouraged to remember that the ship's previous crew were ne'er-do-wells who burned a lot of bridges in the subsector...]] For all that, they'd have to be damn desperate to go through with the ordeal.]]

* ''LightNovel/TheFruitOfEvolution: Hiiragi Seiichi is forced to consume a number of potentially deadly mushrooms, herbs, and grasses in the early chapters, because he's stranded in the middle of the wilderness with nothing but his wits to survive on. It luckily pays off for him when it leads to him stumbling across the titular PowerUpFood.

** The MadScientist Yatsubiyashi offers discounts in exchange for [[PlayingWithSyringes being subject to his experiments]], specifically setting up a clinic [[WrongSideOfTheTracks in the slums]] knowing he get a lot of experiments done. In his field clinics, he over-charges and demands hunters do missions for him in exchange for a discount on their treatment, too. While those that don’t accept are stuck in debt or are left to brave the journey back to the nearest base while injured.

* ''Manga/TheQuintessentialQuintuplets'': Downplayed with male lead Fuutarou Uesugi, whose rather precarious economical situation has lead him to like anything so long as it is edible. This has lead to several comical situations, like when [[LethalChef Miku]] gets into a CookingDuel with [[SupremeChef Nino]], and he compliments both dishes equally, and in a later chapter he eats some croquettes that Yotsuba thinks look more like stones and doesn't find tasty at all.

* In the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "Chain of Command, Part II", Gul Madred has captured Captain Picard, and is torturing him for information. One method is by starvation. One morning, Madred comes into Picard's prison with a "taspar" egg for himself and one for Picard. Famished, he opens the top of the egg, only to find it does not contain a cooked yolk and white, but a dead, unpleasant, slimy, cooked-spinach-looking creature. With no other real choice, Picard downs the contents.

* Famously, Islam forbids the consumption of pork, dog meat or alcohol (the word "haram" means "forbidden"). However, in desperate situations (e.g. no other source of nourishment is available), then a Muslim is permitted to consume any of the aforementioned in order to survive. Refusing to do so to the point of dying is viewed as a SenselessSacrifice, since a dead Muslim can no longer pray or do good works (but crucially is '''not''' viewed as suicide).

* ''WebVideo/{{Alantutorial}}'': During his time lost in the wilderness, Alan posts videos of himself eating from dumpster bags and getting his water from eating snow; of course, they're framed as tutorials teaching his audience how to survive being homeless in the woods. Later, Alan becomes desperate for the money given to him by his captors and willingly gives up his own free-will to make tutorials for them in return, even though he was initially insistent on defying them.
* ''WebVideo/GameGrumps'': In the "10 Minute Power-Hour" episode [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PG_dS-1W1dE "Making TIE DYE!"]], Ryan gets sent out to find tie-dye materials. He ends up wandering for a while, becoming confused, hungry, and thirsty. He digs out of trash-cans, spends some time looking for extremely cheap food including a mention of a homeless shelter, and manages to end up lost in the desert, where he resorts to drinking from a waterfall and eating leaves off of a tree.
* ''WebVideo/TheHumanPet'': Eric gets so hungry and thirsty while he's trapped that he scarfs down cat food and drinks bleached pond-water, despite the humiliation and risk. It's especially dangerous because the "menu" was chosen by the viewers; if he was given the wrong thing, it'd kill him anyway.