Saved by the Awesome

...."The council calls Captain James Tiberius Kirk....."

The audience: WHHAAATTT??!!!

—Audience reaction to the Awesome Moment of Crowning scene from the 2009 Star Trek.

In short, you've done something so Awesome; so undeniably Badass; that it makes up for the hundreds of rules you broke along the way.

This is the reason that the Military Maverick and the Cowboy Cop have careers. This is how I Did What I Had to Do gets you off the hook (mostly). It's one thing to say Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right. But it's another thing, when doing the right thing actually WORKS.

Now the end result must be sufficiently awesome to override the righteous fury that has built up in Da Chief when his subordinate flouted the rules. Because hey, success is never blamed and victors aren't judged.

See also Hero Insurance, "Get Out of Jail Free" Card, and Wrongful Accusation Insurance. Likely to be referenced when discussing Arson, Murder, and Lifesaving.

This trope applies to specific examples. In fiction, if the heroes are generally on the money but they disobey a high directive, they may still suffer some degree of recrimination, but still be allowed to continue on their way. In this trope, the awesome deed either cancels out punishment mostly or completely; and it is specifically stated as such. In rare cases, this trope will show someone being rewarded for their disobedience (check out the quote up top.)

Examples of Saved by the Awesome include:

Animated Films

Disney's Mulan.

The Emperor of China: I've heard a great deal about you, Fa Mulan. You stole your father's armor, ran away from home, impersonated a soldier, deceived your commanding officer, dishonored the Chinese Army, destroyed my palace, and... you have saved us all.

Anime and Manga

In StrikerS Sound Stage X, Teana is nearly put on trial for unwittingly collaborating with the terrorist mastermind but is let off with a warning thanks to her efforts in containing the damage caused by the incident.

Film

The granddaddy of these must be Captain James T. Kirk. He put this trope into action when he cheated on an Academy test, and rather than be kicked out, he was given a commendation. For original thinking.
- The new Star Trek movie takes it farther, but first subverts it. Kirk is actually about to be kicked out for cheating on the test. But somehow he ends up on the Enterprise and tops his cheating with actually attempting a mutiny against Spock and disobeying the acting Captain's orders. Being that it was his disregard of orders that led to the defeat of the Big Bad and the saving of (almost) every planet in the Federation, one can begin to see how he actually skips all the way to the Captain's chair at the end.
- At the end of Star Trek IV the Voyage Home, Kirk and his bunch manage to nearly completely duck the surefire court-martialing and dismissal from Starfleet that was coming their way for stealing the Enterprise and subsequently blowing it up. The Federation President states that it is specifically because Kirk avoided having the the mystery probe destroy the Earth by rescuing the humpbacked whales from extinction.
  - Of course, there has to be some kind of punishment, so Kirk gets demoted. From the desk job of Admiral he hated so much.

Literature

Harry Potter eats this trope for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. In fact, in the second book, Dumbledore tells him he broke about a hundred school rules, then gives him an Award for Special Services to the School because saving Ginny and the rest of the school from Tom Riddle (aka Voldemort) outweighed the rule breaking.
In Aquarium, the protagonist is advised by a more experienced spy:

If you break the rules and get into difficulties you will end up before a GRU tribunal. If you keep carefully to the rules but have a failure, again it is you who will be to blame, on the grounds that you applied the rule book too dogmatically. But if you are successful, everybody will back you up and forgive you everything, including breaches of our most important rules, on the grounds that you applied the rules in a creative and flexible manner, ignoring out-of-date and obsolete rules.

In Death series: Eve Dallas is one of the best cops there is. She has broken a lot of rules and laws to achieve actual justice. While it seems that her superiors don't know about the methods she uses to achieve results, there are indications that they know she is working around the law, but as long as she succeeds, they have no problem with that.
Harry Dresden is able to get away with some Black Magic in Dead Beat through a combination of Loophole Abuse, necessity, and the fact that reanimating a Tyrannosaurus Rex was so unspeakably awesome that even some of the Wardens were impressed.

Live Action TV

The Badass Crew of Stargate SG-1 always tended to bend the rules a little (their leader is a Colonel Badass, after all), but in the season one finale they outright disobey Congress and launch an unauthorized mission right after the Gate has been ordered buried. The fact that they save Earth from an invasion is what keeps them from being spending the rest of their lives in Ft. Leavenworth.
Lt. Cmdr. Data in Star Trek: The Next Generation outright disobeys Capt. Picard (on a hunch, no less) and refuses to regroup with the fleet. He also manages to not only catch the disguised Romulan ships but also owns them magnificently, putting an end to their incursion. Picard smilingly tells Data afterward that rather than court-martial him, he's actually issuing him a commendation. This one isn't quite a straight example, however; Data was in command of another starship at the time, and The Captain of a ship has a measure of leeway with orders from on high.
- Admiral Kathryn Janeway violates nearly 154 rules by traveling back in time and swindling the Klingons. The fact that her actions get Voyager home nearly 15 years early and with added technology as a bonus results in her past self getting a promotion... to Admiral.
In the pilot of Airwolf, Stringfellow Hawke robs the United States Freakin' Government and withholds their prize titular helicopter (though he agrees to fly it on their behalf in the future). He wisely did this after stealing said helicopter from terrorist dictators and the Mad Scientist that invented it. He also killed said Mad Scientist, who'd pissed off the government by murdering a bunch of Feds during a test run.
Several characters from Mash, most notably Hawkeye, get out of trouble this way on a regular basis.
Subverted on CSI, when the team manage to solve the case despite all the evidence being stolen while they were having breakfast at a nearby diner. Ecklie says it won't be a case of "No harm, no foul" and that there will still be an internal investigation. Played straight in that he's implied to only be doing it to get at Grissom.

Video Games

Oni: In one level, you can find a computer terminal that reveals information on Terrance Griffin himself. It turns out that the Board he answers to are aware that he cares more for results than in following procedure. They turned a blind eye to it because he has done more to oppose The Syndicate than any other agent in the Technological Crimes Task Force. Despite this, it says that they feel that they can't keep turning a blind eye to it for much longer.

Web Original

The Henchman Guide (a corollary to the Evil Overlord List) mentions, in its section on Trusted Lieutenants:

7: If you follow orders and fail, the Evil Overlord will claim he told you to do something different, and your body parts will be used a castle decorations. If you disobey orders and succeed, the EO will act as if what you did was his idea, and you will be commended. The Moral: Do what works.

Western Animation

Invoked in the Exo Squad episode "The Price of Courage", when Simbacca encourages Marsh to bypass the chain of command and personally lead a vital massive counterattack against Neosapiens. True enough, Marsh wins and is not even reprimanded for bending the regulations.
- Even earlier, in the first season finale, Marsh's squad effectively mutinies in the middle of a battle but ends up saving the Terran flagship and so they are merely grounded for a year instead of execution.

Real Life

When James Cameron directed Titanic, he ran almost a half-a-year over schedule, nearly doubled the allotted budget, drove nearly the entire cast and crew to revolt, and even assaulted a Fox executive. A bajillion dollars at the box office and 11 Academy Awards later, all is forgiven.
Admiral Horatio Nelson who could technically have been court-martialed at least once and probably several times got away with it because he was to much of a Badass to throw away.