Foregone Conclusions in western animation TV.
- Any Christmas Special that's set in the ancient Middle East should be a dead give away to its subject matter. Even more obvious if the main character is a donkey.
- In Adventure Time, the climax of "Simon and Marcy" has Simon manage to use his abilities and still remain semi-sane, making it look like there might be hope for him to eventually gain control over the Crown... but this is a backstory episode, with the Framing Device — to say nothing of the rest of the show — making it painfully clear that he ultimately failed at this, losing his mind and having to abandon Marceline by the time she's a teenager.
- Bluey: In "Baby Race", Chilli tells a story of how she worried when Bluey was the last in her mothers' group to learn how to walk. In the present, her little sister Bingo asks if Bluey eventually did learn to walk, seemingly forgetting that she must have done, since Bluey can clearly walk now.
- Celebrity Deathmatch:
- Before a classic match between OJ Simpson and Joe Namath was shown, Nick started making OJ jokes. Johnny explained the fight took place before the ugliness in a simpler time.
- In the episode with the match between Kevin Spacey and Michael Caine, there was this parody of the opening line from American Beauty:Spacey: My name is Kevin Spacey, and I'm 49 years old. This is my life. In less than half an hour, I'll be dead. I'll also be dressed like a giant hamburger.
This was sort of a subversion, because he won the match with Caine, but was then killed by Dave Thomas, who was in the show's previous match.
- Book 4 of Infinity Train has a scene at the end of its first episode where a human woman is assisting an odd, spherical robot in managing the titular train, with the woman questioning how the place is run. If you've watched the previous three seasons of this anthology series, then you're immediately aware that this partnership is going to go south in near future (which it does by the end of Book 4) and have some horrible effects on the train over the next thirty years.
- Martha Speaks: In "Martha's Life of Crime", we see Martha as a puppy getting adopted by two robbers. However, because the episode takes place in the past, we know that the robbers don't keep Martha and she ends up with the Lorraines instead. Likewise, the Lorraines are seen wanting to adopt a cat, but since they don't have one in the present (and the flashback takes place only four years ago, meaning that the cat can't have died unless it was already old or there was some tragedy), the viewers can tell that they don't adopt one.
- The Phineas and Ferb episode "Candace Gets Busted". Two guesses as to what happens at the end.
- Samurai Jack: 50 years later, Jack is still in the future. During the flashback in the episode "XCVIII" revealing how he lost his sword, he finds a portal that will take him back in time and immediately jumps in... only for Aku to just reach in and pull him back out before destroying the portal, which according to him was the last one on the planet, explaining why Jack is still there.
- The Simpsons:
- Spoofed when Homer fears the worst when reading a wilderness survival story.Homer: [reading] Then I heard the sound that all Arctic explorers dread... the pitiless bark of the sea lion! [gasp] He'll be killed!
Marge: Homer, he obviously got out alive if he wrote the article.
Homer: Don't be so... [flips ahead] Oh, you're right. - Likewise, any flashback episode that shows problems with Homer & Marge's relationship (i.e. "That 90's Show"). Since they're married in the present, it's pretty obvious they're going to be fine. "The Way We Was" in particular acknowledges this:Lisa: Everything I know tells me this story doesn't end with us sitting here and you telling it to us.
Bart: Get off the edge of your seat. They got married, had kids and bought a cheap TV, okay?
- Spoofed when Homer fears the worst when reading a wilderness survival story.
- She-Ra and the Princesses of Power: Anyone familiar with the original 1985 show will recognize that many of the characters, while different in design, are similar in personality and story. And then there's Entrapta, who has done a complete 180 from the main tech supplier of the Horde to a helpful member of the Princess Alliance. It should be little surprise to these viewers when, near the end of the first season, she switches sides and joins the Horde.
- Star Wars: The Clone Wars:
- Any time the Republic comes close to capturing or killing an important figure in the Separatist Alliance, or if any of the Jedi appearing in Revenge of the Sith are in peril. You already know that Nute Gunray is going to escape and that Obi-Wan somehow escapes the supposedly inescapable trap. The Clone Wars does avert this to a degree whenever they feature clone troopers, since you never know which among them will get offed the next minute. The main exceptions include the likes of Thire, Gree, Bly, Odd Ball, Appo, and most prominently Cody, Obi-Wan's second-in-command who tried to kill him during Order 66.
- As The Clone Wars is an interquel set between Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith and Kid-Appeal Character Ahsoka Tano, Anakin's Padawan, is nowhere to be found in the latter, something is going to happen to her eventually which removes her from being able to do anything to influence the events of the films and make Anakin, who is quite attached to her, not want to talk about her. It turns out that she is expelled from the Jedi Order after being framed for a crime she didn't commit. Though the truth eventually comes out and she is acquitted, she declines to return to the Jedi afterwards due to the Council's lack of trust in her. She reappears in the Disney+ exclusive Final Season, which takes place partly during and immediately before the events of Revenge of the Sith, but the rule still applies and Ahsoka is far away from the events of the film itself even while they're explicitly addressed as taking place concurrently to those she's personally involved in (Anakin and Obi-Wan are prevented from joining Ahsoka on her mission by Palpatine's capture, which Revenge of the Sith opens with, and later on Obi-Wan remarks the death of Count Dooku and his being sent to finally assassinate General Grievous) and the climax of the season begins as Ahsoka feels a huge disturbance in the Force concurrently to Anakin's intervention in the assassination of Palpatine and Order 66 is activated immediately after.
- While The Clone Wars obviously cannot touch any named Jedi that appear in or after Revenge of the Sith, they do manage to off some important characters. Since The Clone Wars is part of the new Star Wars Expanded Universe, these deaths are final. This becomes quite shocking in "The Wrong Jedi", in which Barriss Offee is arrested as a terrorist. She was supposed to die by her master's side during Order 66, which was ultimately cut from the movie but appeared in a comic.
- The Order 66 arc revolves around ARC trooper Fives investigating Order 66 after it is triggered prematurely in his friend Tup by accident. Since the order is successfully executed in Revenge of the Sith, we know he's going to fail to expose it. Indeed, the story ends with Fives being shot dead, the Jedi believing him to have gone insane and dismissing his claims, and all of the evidence being quietly swept under the rug by Palpatine, Dooku and the Kaminoans.
- A number of these occur with the Domino Squad of clone troopers, due to the way the episodes focusing on them aired. Their first appearance is on the Rishi moon, where all but 2 of them bite it. Given that they are full-on clone troopers (albeit rookie ones), this means that in their origin episode (where they have to pass their examination, and which aired two seasons after their first appearance), we know they will overcome their problems and that Hevy won't actually abandon the squad. The show itself realizes this, as the episode immediately following it is one where Echo and Fives (the last two survivors of Domino Squad) return to Kamino to defend it against Grievous and greeting clone 99 (who had formed a bond with Hevy, who died during the Rishi base incident).
- Thanks to the uncancelled seventh and final season coming after a Sequel Gap in which the entirety of Sequel Series Rebels aired, fans know that Ahsoka, Captain Rex, Bo-Katan, and Darth Maul, none of whom had a guarantee of survival in the original run, will survive the Siege of Mandalore arc because all of them appear alive in Rebels, along with the Rebels characters Ursa Wren and Gar Saxon who also make appearances here. Additionally, Ahsoka feels through the Force that something very, very serious is happening while she's returning to Coruscant with a captive Maul, which is actually Palpatine's final move to seize power, but what she "hears" through the Force is just ambiguous enough that she knows something bad has happened to Anakin but doesn't know what, which was basically inevitable since she believed he was dead up until her duel with Vader during Rebels when she damaged his mask and realized that Vader was Anakin.
- Star Wars: The Bad Batch: Fennec Shand, who was introduced in The Mandalorian, makes her first chronological appearance here, meaning that she'll survive no matter what happens in Bad Batch since Mandalorian is set after the fall of the Empire. Similarly, any future appearances by Cad Bane will keep him alive thanks to his return in The Book of Boba Fett.
- Star Wars Rebels:
- "Secret Cargo" is about the Ghost crew having to deliver Senator Mon Mothma, who's recently become a fugitive after publicly denouncing the Emperor, to her destination after a routine refueling mission goes wrong. Despite the tension of the Imperials chasing them, we know the heroes will succeed, because Mothma appears in Rogue One and Return of the Jedi as the leader of the Rebellion. She will even live past the Empire's fall.
- Ahsoka Tano reappears in the series after her departure from Clone Wars and is established as being part of the Rebel Alliance. Of course, since she never appeared in the Original Trilogy, she obviously isn't going to be sticking around. Indeed, she disappears in the two-part episode "Twilight of the Apprentice" and doesn't come back until after the Battle of Endor.
- Star Wars Resistance:
- The show zig-zags the trope. It starts roughly six months before The Force Awakens, and thus during the first season, the First Order is not confronted, and BB-8 doesn't stick around for its entirety. However, around the end of season 1Episodes and beginning of season 2Episodes, the show catches up to the events of The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi, so what happens afterward is up in the air. The Rise of Skywalker will come out during season 2's mid-season break, but until then, things are wide open.
- This is definitely the case for the fate of main character Kazuda's home planet, Hosnian Prime, destroyed by Starkiller Base during the events of The Force Awakens. Kaz not only sees it happen, but reacts about like you'd expect.
- At the end of "No Escape, Part II", the Colossus escapes into hyperspace, with Kaz having given Neeku the coordinates to D'Qar, location of the Resistance's base, all this happening shortly after the Hosnian Cataclysm. However, as the Colossus is nowhere to be seen in either The Force Awakens or The Last Jedi, they're obviously not going to make it. Indeed, in the last scene, Kaz and Yeager are not happy to learn that Neeku ran out of time and didn't input all of the coordinates, meaning they have no idea where they're going to end up. Descriptions of "Into the Unknown" indicate that the Colossus emerges from hyperspace 3 parsecs from D'Qar, but then has to stop for repairs due to the failure of the Artificial Gravity.
- For Transformers: Prime, everyone is waiting for Optimus Prime to die
and come back to life, just to get it over with.- There's a twist for the season 1 finale. Since a dead character can't come back in this series, they killed Prime metaphorically. Unleashing the Matrix on Unicron took away all of his memories of being Optimus Prime. He is now Orion Pax, and has joined the Decepticons via Megatron taking advantage of his current state. The Autobots eventually went back to Cybertron to reload the Matrix, giving Optimus his memories back.
- Come the end of season 2, Prime was in the base when the 'Cons blew it up, and his arm can be seen amongst the wreckage. He might be dead this time, but it's highly doubtful.
- Played completely straight in that Prime did die and come back to life in season 3, although subverted in that he was ready to pass the mantle on, just as the original Prime did in the movie. Ultra Magnus even shows up to take command of the Autobots in their darkest hour. Smokescreen's Screw Destiny move, however, ensured that Prime's habit of cheating death will live on.
- Played straight by the sequence of events spanning the Predacons Rising finale movie and the beginning of its successor, Transformers: Robots in Disguise (2015). In Predacons Rising, Optimus becomes one with the AllSpark in order to defeat Unicron. In Robots in Disguise, it is revealed that he was plucked out of the AllSpark and sent to the Realm of the Primes, setting the stage for his return as co-leader of the Bee Team.
- The Winnie the Pooh special Winnie The Pooh: A Valentine For You has Christopher Robin become "smitten" with an unseen girl named Winifred. If the movie Christopher Robin is to be taken as canon to Disney's other 'Winnie-The-Pooh'' works, it's come clear that he and Winifred don't become a couple or that their childhood romance doesn't last, given that he marries another girl named Evelyn.
