As a Death Trope, there will be spoilers. Read on at your own risk.
Hesitant Sacrifices in Live-Action TV series.
- Ryan Chappelle in the third season of 24. Despite making every effort to avoid such an outcome, Ryan eventually allows himself to be killed by Jack so Saunders wouldn't retaliate.
- Black Adder Goes Forth has a heartbreaking one at the end of its run when basically the entire cast admits to this, even the idiotically optimistic George.George: But this is brave, splendid and noble...sir?
Blackadder: Yes, lieutenant?
George: I'm scared, sir.
Baldrick: I'm scared too, sir.
George: I mean, I'm the last of the tiddly-winking leapfroggers from the Golden Summer of 1914. I don't want to die, I'm not overly keen on dying at all, sir.
Blackadder: How are you feeling, Darling?
Darling: Er- not all that good, Blackadder. Rather hoped I'd get through the whole show...go back to work at Pratt and Sons, keep wicket for the Croydon Gentlemen, marry Doris. Made a note in my diary on the way here. Simply says: "Bugger".
Blackadder: Well, quite. - Buffy in the first season finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer has to face The Master and is prophesied to sacrifice herself to defeat him. She tells Giles, her Watcher, that she's only sixteen and that she doesn't want to die.
- In the last episode of Chernobyl, Khomyuk visits Legasov and implores him to reveal everything that he knows to the scientists who will be attending the trial of Dyatlov, Bryukhanov, and Fomin. Legasov has already obfuscated in Vienna (also against Khomyuk's wishes) for fear of KGB reprisals and sees no point in telling it all when it's a Kangaroo Court in the first place and any scientist who's been allowed in will be unlikely to oppose the party line. He's already sure to die of cancer from doing so much at Chernobyl and asks if that isn't enough. Khomyuk says "I'm sorry, but it is not." For the sake of all the ordinary people who gave their lives and health to contain the disaster and for the sake of everyone who is at risk in the future from RBMK reactors, Legasov is convinced to speak up at the trial and reveal the fatal design flaw that allowed the disaster.
- Doctor Who:
- "The Family of Blood" has a character named John Smith, who learns that he is actually an amnesiac human version of the Doctor. The problem is that if he turns into the Doctor, his own memories and desires would essentially be overwritten, killing the human identity. If he doesn't sacrifice himself, the aliens will kill everyone in the town, trying to find him. The pure raw anguish and fear make this scene
a particularly strong Tear Jerker. - "The End of Time" comes from a season-long set of Arc Words, "He will knock four times". The words are meant to tell the Doctor when he will die, and the Doctor keeps getting the source wrong. When poor old Wilfred knocks on the door of the radiation chamber, the Doctor realizes what will happen. Wilfred will die if the Doctor doesn't go into the chamber next to him, and doing so would force him to regenerate. Regeneration would mean a new persona, with a new body and identity, and the Tenth Doctor views it as "killing" the previous doctor. He throws a (excellently done) childish fit as he tries to avoid "dying". Word of God states that this is because he experienced "death" once before as John Smith.
- The Eleventh Doctor spends the whole of the 6th Series running from his own final death, in a "fixed point" at Lake Silencio. In this series, certain times are "fixed", and trying to stop them from happening can destroy the universe as time collapses. Which is exactly what happens when River Song tries it. He succeeded in postponing it by 200 years (in his own personal timeline), before finally being confronted by Dorium's head telling him that he can not run anymore. But he still manages to cheat his own death, which is why he was now willing to sacrifice himself.
- "The Family of Blood" has a character named John Smith, who learns that he is actually an amnesiac human version of the Doctor. The problem is that if he turns into the Doctor, his own memories and desires would essentially be overwritten, killing the human identity. If he doesn't sacrifice himself, the aliens will kill everyone in the town, trying to find him. The pure raw anguish and fear make this scene
- The Haunting Hour: At the end of "My Imaginary Friend" Shawn listens to his older brother David's advice and lets go of his imaginary friends. Including David. As David fades away, his last words are "I don't wanna go..."
- Star Trek: Voyager: In "Tuvix", a Teleporter Accident causes Tuvok and Neelix to become a single person. Eventually, the Doctor works out how to reverse the accident. The problem is that Tuvix regards himself as having as much right to exist as anyone else. In one of Captain Janeway's most controversial decisions, she orders Tuvix taken to Sickbay by force, stating that Neelix and Tuvok have a right to exist as well.
- Star Trek: Enterprise: In "Similitude", after Trip is mortally injured in an accident, Archer and Phlox are forced to clone him so they can harvest some of the clone's neural tissue for a transplant. When the three of them discover that this procedure will actually be fatal to "Sim", he briefly tries to flee the ship, but ends up giving up and going through with the Heroic Sacrifice anyway. Partly because he doesn't want to spend the rest of his life in a cramped shuttle, but mainly because he knows that Earth's survival depends on Trip being alive to keep the ship running.
