Basic Trope: An ending that has elements of both happiness and sadness.
- Straight: Alice, The Hero, saves the world from the reign of Emperor Evulz, but only after her Love Interest Bob makes a Heroic Sacrifice.
- Exaggerated: Alice saves the universe from Evulz's wrath, but only after her entire family makes an incredibly painful Heroic Sacrifice.
- Downplayed:
- Bob is alive, but loses his memories which never return.
- Bob and Alice are both fine, but they have to go their separate ways.
- Justified: Bob died in the end, and Alice misses him.
- Inverted: It seems that Evulz has captured Alice and Bob and is executing them the next day, but then Alice sees a sharp knife that she can use to cut through the cells. End of the work.
- Subverted:
- Bob is Only Mostly Dead, and he reunites with Alice.
- The ending seems to be bittersweet, but then Evulz comes back to life, kills Alice, and destroys Alice's hometown.
- Double Subverted:
- But it turns out Bob's injuries were fatal, just not as immediately fatal as Evulz thought. As soon as Bob's Heroic Second Wind wears out, he dies in Alice's arms.
- But then Alice is revived by the fairy she saved earlier, and kills Evulz and restores her hometown. However, Bob is still dead...
- Parodied: Alice eats some ice cream at the end, but it was bitter.
- Zig-Zagged: Bob dies, and then he gets resurrected, but then Alice dies, and then she gets resurrected, but then Bob dies, and then he gets resurrected, wash, rinse, and repeat.
- Averted:
- Enforced:
- "We can't use the original ending. It's way too depressing to be kid-friendly. Slap happy faces on everyone and call it a day."
- "The original ending ignores a lot of issues we have learned of since then… let's acknowledge them instead."
- Lampshaded: "I'm so happy we saved the world. It's just too bad Bob didn't make it." "Who is this Bob you speak of?"
- Invoked: Bob sacrifices himself to stall Evulz long enough for Alice to defeat him.
- Exploited: ???
- Defied:
- "This story can only end in two ways: Either I save the world with Bob still safe, or let Evulz kill us both and destroy the world!"
- Evulz being fully aware that even if Bob dies, the latter will die in a way that will defeat the former, decides to create a device connected to his heart-rate monitor that will trigger once Evulz’s heart-rate stops for more than 10 seconds. When the device is triggered, a plague that will catalyze the events of a Zombie Apocalypse will instantly get developed, so when Evulz is alive, he'll win, and when Evulz is dead, he'll still win anyway.
- Discussed: "Luckily you didn't die, Bob! Or this ending wouldn't be too happy like these soap operas!"
- Conversed: "Oh, I thought it was going to be a Happy Ending."
- Implied: The work ends with a Dance Party Ending. However, Bob is not shown, implying that he died in the final battle.
- Deconstructed: The loss of Bob drives Alive into depression, ultimately preventing her from looking to the bright side.
- Reconstructed: Alice's friends help and support her through her grief.
Back to Bittersweet Ending
