Could Have Avoided This Plot: Difference between revisions

** In ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's]]'', Yusei points out to Z-One at the end that {{spoiler|his attempts to save the future from [[The End of the World as We Know It]] could've gone a hell of a lot easier had he simply ''warned'' Past!New Domino City of the dangers of Momentum and Synchro Summoning than attempting to destroy the city, like he planned. Especially egregious considering how fresh in the minds of its citizens Zero Reverse was, in Past!NDC.}}

*** Though to be fair, {{spoiler|Z-One was behind the cause of Zero Reverse as another alternative plan and it didn't work. He had also tried other plans as well before proceeding with this one.}}

* In ''[[Uchuu Senkan Yamato]]/Star Blazers'', after the crew of the Yamato is forced to [[The End of the World as We Know It|destroy the Gamilas (Gamilon) homeworld]], Kodai (Derek) is depressed about it, particularly because he and the crew had learned that the invasion of Earth was just to help save Gamilas, and the entire war could have been avoided if the Gamilas had just ''asked'' for help...

** Unlike many examples of this trope, Nanoha and the other heroes didn't have any alternate ideas for saving Hayate, although it took them a while to find out about the Wolkenritter's goal. {{spoiler|The incident is resolved when the Book of Darkness is completed, Hayate manages to reach out to the book itself, and the heroes, the Wolkenritter and Hayate team up to defeat the defense program}}.

** The source material being what it is, ''[[Deva Series|Academy Blues]]'' has Hayate offer this fillip to the villains. ''Endless Waltz'' shows that the other side did not really bite.

** To be fair to the antagonist, von Fogler {{spoiler|the antagonist's dad}} ''really'' should've left a note or something for {{spoiler|his son}} to read instead of making a video message that plays ''only'' when [[MacGuffin|all three anti-shizuma drives]] are united. Said antagonist does call von Fogler out on this

*** Justified because Von Fogler loves his son. As his father, he always thought he would become [[The Hero]] capable of [[Forgiveness]] and not an [[Anti-Villain]] consumed by [[Revenge]].

* In ''[[Junjou Romantica]]'', Nowaki disappears from Hiroki's life for a year without so much as leaving a note. Hiroki is understandably pissed off, and when Nowaki comes back they have a fight that lasts for weeks before finally being resolved. It's not until after they've made up and decided to move in together that Hiroki remembers that, um, actually Nowaki ''did'' tell him he was going to leave... and, in fact, Hiroki encouraged him to do so... it's just that Hiroki wasn't paying enough attention to the conversation to remember it afterwards. Ooops. Like Hiroki says, "Wow... that sure makes me look like the bad guy here."

* ''[[Letter Bee]]'': In the "Letter to Jiggy Pepper" arc, a girl named Nelly and her brother were once friends with Jiggy Pepper before he left town to become a Letter Bee. Nello, dying of a disease, wrote a letter to Jiggy and confessed to being "so angry," which Nelly believed meant that he was angry with Jiggy Pepper, and caused her to steal Lag's crossing pass in order to deliver Nello's letter herself. It turns out that Nello was angry with himself for not being able to get better so that he could protect his sister, he encouraged Jiggy to follow his dreams, and Jiggy left to finance building a church in the village.

* ''[[The Wizard of Oz (film)|The Wizard of Oz]]'' subverts this. While Dorothy ''could'' have gone home the second she got the magic slippers, she never would have learned anything about herself if she had, and none of her new friends would have been met - not to mention all of her friends would still be in the messes ''they'' were stuck in. In other words, the journey was far more important than the destination.

** And in [[The Wonderful Wizard of Oz|the book]] the first good witch didn't know how the slippers worked anyway...

* In ''[[Avatar (film)|Avatar]]'', a method of avoiding the conflict between the military and Na'vi had already been put to use in the form of the titular avatars. The main characters were ''supposed'' to research the area and diplomatically convince the Na'vi to allow some [[Unobtanium]] mining. Unfortunately, the main characters were so busy [[Going Native|screwing around]] that they forgot the whole "diplomacy" thing until their deadline was up, leading to a destructive battle, with hundreds of people dead on both sides. In fact, Jake was in the middle of trying to get the Na'vi out of Hometree before when Quaritch yanked him. If the 'dozer had been a bit slower, if he had gotten into the Avatar bed a few minutes earlier, if Quaritch had been a few minutes later, etc. Noted in [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXraSkgssFk How It Should Have Ended .]

** In one of the deleted scenes, Jake Sully admits that he is in a no-win situation and could only stall for more time by giving Quaritch vital info on the Navi while trying to earn enough trust to convince the tribe to leave their ancestral home.

* The [[Tales of the Otori]] series ends with a fairly spectacular disaster that was considerably worsened by {{spoiler|Takeo not telling Kaede that he had gotten another woman pregnant when he left her and thought they would never see each other again.}} It is worth noting that there were ''sixteen years'' during which this information could have been imparted, but every time he considered telling her he kept putting it off. He does, at least, fully acknowledge how stupid he's been, but by then it's too late to solve the problem.

* In the ''[[Wars of Light and Shadow]]'', the Koriathain Order had been searching for the Waystone of the Koriathain, an enormous [[Crystal Ball]] that could amplify their power immensely, for five centuries. Upon learning that Sethvir of the Fellowship had it, they try breaking into his tower and seizing it by force. After being violently repelled by the wards, they are forced to ask him for the return of the Waystone when he returns from a business trip. At which point he mentions that they had asked for the return of the stone (Or assistance in finding it) at any point in the 500 years since they had misplaced it, they would have given it back without any fuss.

 

== Live Action TV ==

* In the ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'' episode "11001001", the Bynars, a cybernetic and mildly hive-minded Federation species whose "[[Planet of Hats|hat]]" is binary thinking, seize control of the ''Enterprise'' in order to save their planetary database, tricking most of the crew into evacuating the ship and then trapping Picard and Riker in the holodeck. When Picard learns about their predicament and asks why they didn't just ask for help, they explain "you might have said no". Riker observes that, as the Bynars [[Straw Vulcan|only think in all-or-nothing absolutes]], the mere possibility of being turned down seemed as bad as a certainty to them.

* The ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]'' episode "The Ship" has this trope as its main premise. The main characters (and several [[Red Shirt]] characters) capture a Dominion battleship. The rest of the episode involves the Dominion trying to capture the ship by surrounding it leading to many deaths on both sides. In the end it is revealed {{spoiler|that the Dominion were only interested in rescuing a founder who dies during the siege. They would have gladly given the ship to the heroes in exchange for the founder, but they were too afraid that the heroes would kill it to ask}}. The episode ends with the characters lamenting the fact that all of these people died unnecessary deaths because they wouldn't trust each other.

* The ''[[Doctor Who]]'' serial ''The Two Doctors'' could have been avoided... ''why did Dastari turn the Second Doctor into an Androgum???''

** The root of the conflict was actually Dastari's compatriots and their time travel research, and the Doctor's having been sent as a deniable agent by Gallifrey to stop that. Dastari was offended that the Time Lords would stoop to sabotage to try and maintain a monopoly (of course, the situation is actually more complex than that but that's how Dastari saw it), and so they came into conflict. The 'turning the Second Doctor into an Androgum' was an attempt by Dastari to resolve the conflict ''without'' killing the Doctor, something he didn't want to do (the man used to be a friend) and also was reluctant to do for practical reasons (the Doctor is the ''least'' homicidal "deniable shadow operative" the Time Lords could possibly send -- killing him only guarantees that the next Time Lord renegade they subcontract this job to will be someone like the Master or the Rani).

* [[William Shakespeare]]'s plays featured this trope many times.

** In ''[[The Comedy of Errors]]'', had Antipholus and Dromio of Ephesus asked politely to be let into lunch instead of raging at Dromio of Syracuse and the other servants (granted, it WAS their own house, but still) they'd have run right into Antipholus of Syracuse and the entire twins debacle would have been prevented.

 

== Video Games ==

''(Snap!)''

'''Black Mage:''' '''''YEARGHBLEBLE!''''' }}

 

== Web Original ==

** While Spike ''did'' try to take steps to prevent a bad outcome, much of "Lesson Zero" could've been avoided had Twilight simply accepted Spike's advice that missing one letter to Celestia wouldn't doom her to Magic Kindergarten. More significantly, Twilight's friends realized that if they had taken Twilight's worries seriously from the start (even if they ''did'' think she was blowing things out of proportion) they could've acted to help Twilight and avoid the [[Hilarity Ensues|hilarity]] that ensued at episode's end.

* ''[[The Pagemaster]]'': In a similar subversion to ''[[The Wizard of Oz (film)|The Wizard of Oz]]'', when Richard Tyler, Adventure, Fantasy, and Horror all reach the Exit and meet the Pagemaster, Richard inconclusively berates the Pagemaster for making him go through all the hell he had to go through until the Pagemaster points out that he sent Richard through it all for a purpose: if Richard had been brought to the Exit, let alone gone home, right from the start, he wouldn't have learned how to face his own fears and his friends still wouldn't have been checked out.

* An episode of ''[[Star Wars Ewoks]]'' features the evil Dulocs trying to steal some of the Ewoks' soap. By mistake they steal a magical invisibility formula that the shaman Logrey has developed to help the Ewoks hide their food supply from another enemy. This not only allows them to cause all sorts of trouble, but also leaves the Ewoks no way to protect their food. Upon learning of the theft, Logrey fumes that the he would have shared the regular soap with the Dulocs if they'd only just asked.

* In ''[[He-Man and the Masters of the Universe]]'' (2002), a technomancer named Sortek disrupts all the technology on Eternia in order to force He-Man and Skeletor into assisting him with a task. The task turns out to be so trivial that He-Man tells Sortek he would have helped if he'd just asked nicely.

 

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