History Main / YouAreTooLate

** [[Film/RevengeOfTheSith Episode III]], anyone? Yoda ''loses''. The Old Republic is in ruins, the Jedi have been slaughtered, Palpatine is triumphant.

* In ''[[WesternAnimation/{{Heavymetal}} Heavy Metal]]'', Tarnaa is summoned to protect a city under attack, but arrives too late; everyone is dead and the bad guys are long gone.

* In ''Series/{{Smallville}}'', "Veritas", [[spoiler:Brainiac tells Kal-El he is too late to save Lana. By possessing her catatonic body ForTheEvulz. Clark closer her eyes and starts to cry. Watching from a distance, so does Chloe. AlasPoorScrappy.]] While Clark would eventually deal with Brainiac, it is far enough to be counted as TheBadGuyWins...for now.

* An interesting example in ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'': [[spoiler:Ruby succeeded in tricking Sam into releasing the devil (at which point she is superfluous), and then Dean comes through the door.]]

* Literature/TenThousandHannahs

** In ''Disney/{{Cinderella}}'', Jaq and Gus fail to warn Cinderella in time that Lady Tremaine is following her up to her room to lock her in there so she can't try on the glass slipper, forcing them to steal the key and carry it all the way upstairs to free her before the Grand Duke leaves.
** In ''Disney/SleepingBeauty'' the fairies are too late to prevent Aurora from pricking her finger, forcing them to fall back on the escape clause that Merryweather added to Maleficent's curse.
** In ''Disney/TheLittleMermaid'', the heroes arrive too late to complete Ariel's contract, as Ursula gleefully points out.

* In an early quest for a Forsaken character in ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'', the player is told by Silvanus to find and slay Lord Crowley in order to convert him, a task that, if successful, would assimilate all of Gilneas into the Forsaken and into the Horde, while disposing of competition to her lands. Unfortunately, Crowley and most of his subordinates have made a deal with the Worgen, joining them for mutual protection. (Worgen cannot become undead, and while this was a MortonsFork for Crowley, he saw it as a preferable one). The player arrives just as the ritual is finalized, and cannot do much except flee. (The player's goal is, of course, DoomedByCanon.) Silvanus is forced to use an alternative strategy to oppose Crowley, eventually kidnapping his daughter and using extortion to get him to leave.

* ''Film/YoungFrankenstein'':
-->'''Dr. Frankenstein:''' (''to Igor'') Damn your eyes!\\
'''Igor:''' (''looks to camera and points to his eyes'') Too late!

* ''ComicBook/WonderWoman1987'': Diana confronts her mother after realizing there was some kind of trick behind the events of ComicBook/TheContest and realizes both that ComicBook/{{Artemis}}' life is in danger and that Diana's newest friend is Circe, who branwashed herself in a plan gone awry. Di is able to get Circe to help her get to Artemis to save her but is only in time for Artemis to die in her arms.

* In the climax of ''Film/WarCraft2016'', Lothar speeds to save Llane and his men, but by the time he arrives, they've all been slaughered and all Lothar can do is to take Llane's body back to Stormwind.

* The rule of thumb of ''anything'' concerning [[TheChessmaster Revolver]] [[MagnificentBastard Ocelot]] of the ''Franchise/MetalGear'' series, the moment you're even minorly involved, you're helping his plans along and you won't know it even if you could read minds. Old Snake stopped Ocelot and prevented JD's nuking, but [[MindScrew since it is Ocelot]], it was either part of the plan or he had a contingency for such an occassion. In the end, your ultimate goal is achieved, which is to say you accomplished Ocelot's objective, which is to liberate the world from [[AIIsACrapshoot The Patriots']] control.

--> '''Aqua:''' ''(uncloaking herself from shadow to reveal white hair and gold eyes)'' Mickey... you're too late.
** ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsIII'' [[spoiler:reveals that Aqua's corruption was the result of being struck by a darkness attack from Ansem, Seeker of Darkness. Combined with the effects of the Realm of Darkness in the Dark Margin, and her despair at ever getting out, Aqua was easily vulnerable to TheCorruption and becoming a dark version of herself, her despair manifested as anger, bitterness, hatred, and malice against Mickey and Riku for leaving her stranded in the Dark Margin for well over a decade]].

[[folder:ComicBooks]]

* In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaALinkToThePast'', you are too late to save Zelda from being sent into the DarkWorld, forcing you to venture into it yourself to save both her and the other maidens.
** [[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaSkywardSword "The truth of it is you were late. You were late, and you failed to protect Her Grace."]]

* FanFic/{{Loyalty}} has the climax of the Desert retreival arc. [[spoiler:Sakura has just spent the better part of Two chapters chargeing alone through the desert, chaseing a hunch that Hinata is still alive. Amazeingly she picks up the trail, and locates the kidnappers. The chase culminates with her spotting Hinata leaned against a tree, tied up. She spends the better part of two hours painstakingly setting up her retreival tunnle and sabatogeingher opponent. Only to discover Hinata was dead long before, her body is boobytrapped. Her eyes have been plucked out. This all leaves Sakura in shock. Hinata was, for all intents and purposes, Sakura's only friend. The Rain chuunin who murdered Hinata sees Sakura in shock, and thinks he'll simply walk up and cut her throat. Instead he gets the surprise of his life when Sakura engages an epic murdurous rage and attacks him. She is nearly killed in turn, but manages to take him down.]]

* A ''DonaldDuck'' comic features Donald desperately trying to find and deliver a recycled can of soda to the soda manufacturer, thereby making his total number of returned cans ten thousand and granting him a yacht to a tropical island. He arrives ''just'' a few seconds too late, and is greeted by the manufacturer with this line.

** The story gives a glimmer that his plan may yet at least be exposed, potentially mitigating its intended result, but the story ends before it can be explored. Though mitigating the intended result of the villain's plane would almost certainly make things ''even worse''.

%% The ending of ''Manga/DeathNote''.

** The story gives a glimmer that his plan may yet at least be exposed, potentially mitigating its intended result, but the story ends before it can be explored.

* ''ComicBook/MightyAvengers:'' As part of the scheme of The Four Who Rule, Blade is trussed up and has his blood drained. He reveals he was only holding back so he could figure out their plans, and busts free. Only the Four Who Rule have already gotten what they need from his blood, and their plan has therefore (technically) succedded.

* In VideoGame/Onimusha2SamuraisDestiny'', when Jubei finally confronts DemonKingNobunaga, Nobunaga immediately tells Jubei that he is too late and that Nobunaga has completed the final step of his plan, animating a giant golden statue. (Considering that you could only learn of this plan through a couple of notes left laying around, players who either didn't find or pay attention to these notes could conceivably have no idea what Nobunaga is talking about). Fortunately Jubei gets an EleventhHourSuperpower from the {{MacGuffin}}s he has been collecting, enabling him to take Nobunaga down in a not terribly difficult boss fight.

* In ''[[Film/{{HeavyMetal}} Heavy Metal]]'', Tarnaa is summoned to protect a city under attack, but arrives too late; everyone is dead and the bad guys are long gone.

* One particularly memorable episode of ''Series/BabylonFive'' has the doctor engaged in a RaceAgainstTheClock to stop ThePlague that is about to wipe out an entire species. He discovers a cure, and just when you expect a JustInTime ending, the doors to the quarantine zone are opened to reveal EverybodysDeadDave. It's not a ''complete'' loss, since the disease had spread to other species by then.

* In the second issue of the WesternAnimation/InvaderZim comic, Dib travels deep into space to stop Zim from activating an ancient alien war relic. When he tackles Zim in the control room gloating about how he saved the world, Zim alerts Dib that he already activated the machine and the only thing Dib managed to interrupt was him admiring his victory.

--> '''The Doctor''': ''You think you can stop me now?''IF YOU WANT MY LIFE...'''[[PunctuatedForEmphasis COME. AND. GET. IT!]]'''

[[folder:Fan Works]]
* In ''Fanfic/{{Game Theory|LyricalNanoha}}'', the TSAB is not able to stop Precia from completing her spell. [[spoiler:Only it turns out that she had found a way to revive Alicia without traveling to Alhazred, and she had already carried it out successfully before the TSAB even got a chance to send their troops in. The entire confrontation on the Garden of Time was just a smokescreen so that Precia could [[FakingTheDead fake her death]]. However, given that her goal was to bring her daughter back to life, her success can actually be considered a good thing.]]
* In ''Fanfic/TheMiracleAtPalaven'' a ''Franchise/MassEffect'' fanfic taking place during the period of Mass Effect 3, the [[EldritchAbomination Rea]][[LivingShip pers]] fall victim to this from the heroes, the Turian/Krogan forces defending the Turian homeworld of Palaven. By the time that the Reapers figure out that these uprisings at the processing camps aren't isolated but coordinated, the suicide bomber squads carrying explosive [=WMDs=] have made it into them. A moment later, ninety one Reapers are obliterated from the inside nearly simultaneously: it is the titular Miracle at Palaven.
[[/folder]]

* In ''FanFic/ANorthernDragoness'', Aemon the Dragonknight is sent to Lys to rescue a noblewoman who was abducted by pirates. The problem was that when he found her, the elderly lady had already been in Lys for ''sixty-five years''. Though flattered by the rescue attempt and considering returning home to see her family, the lady had already established a small empire and had been living the good life for decades already. Rechecking the original letter, Aemon finds that it was originally sent to Viserys I, his ''grandfather'', gotten lost, and found out again without anyone realizing when it had been sent.

* Not sure which of these it fits, it seems mixed, but "The Green Candle" from ''MightyMorphinPowerRangers''. Rita makes a candle made from the magic wax Tommy was covered with when she turned him into the Green Ranger. If it burns out while in her hands not only will it strip Tommy of his powers, they will bolster her own magical strength. At the end of the two-parter Jason is too late to stop the candle from burning out while in Rita's possession. They're able to stop the drained power from being added to Rita's own by giving Tommy's coin to Jason (granting Jason the Dragon Shield), but the fact remains that they're down a man, meaning their fight has gotten that much harder.