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[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
* [[WordOfGod The director claims]] that the ending of ''Anime/FiveCentimetersPerSecond'' is supposed to be uplifting, because Takaki smiles as he walks away in the last scene, indicating that he has moved on. But most viewers see it as a DownerEnding because he DidNotGetTheGirl.
* ''Manga/AfterSchoolNightmare''. The entire series was taking place in the minds of the unborn babies in a maternity ward. The babies are all born safely, but they grow up knowing nothing about anything that occurred in the series. A scene at the very end shows Mashiro and Sou running into each other and having no idea who the other is, pointlessly teasing readers about possibilities that will never be.
* ''Anime/AkudamaDrive'': Being in a setting of BlackAndGrayMorality cyberpunk world, where [[TheBadGuysAreCops Executioners]] and [[RagtagBunchOfMisfits Akudama criminals]] are both equally bad (except [[ALighterShadeOfGrey Swindler and Courier]] from the Akudama side). The ending is presented as optimistic because Brother and Sister have been saved from being sacrificed to Kanto and have found a place to live peacefully and the people of Kansai have risen up to destroy their corrupt government. But that leaves out the facts that [[KillEmAll every main character is dead]], a large part of Kansai is now ruins and the city is effectively lawless thanks to the people and Courier taking out the police, the millions of human minds stored in [[LotusEaterMachine Kanto]] are doomed to a slow death with nothing to prevent it, and it's never even shown if the sanctuary Brother and Sister were trying to reach is even real or if there is anyone there at all.
* ''Anime/AldnoahZero'': The trope qualifies at least for Slaine. At the end of the show, he is left to rot in prison after being accused of plotting to kill Princess Asseylum ''by Princess Asseylum herself''. In reality, all this time he attempted to protect Asseylum, who only incarcerated him out of political necessity. The writers said his ending is supposed to be a happy one because he is no longer obligated to serve Asseylum. Ironically, his original fate was scrapped for being even more depressing; but even his haters thought the revised ending was still too harsh.
* ''Anime/AquarionEvol'' aimed for an ending that, in [[WordOfGod Kawamori's words]], wouldn't leave a bad taste in the mouth. But in the viewers' eyes, it looks rather upsetting. After Fudo was revealed to be Apollonius all along, [[ManipulativeBastard it makes it very clear that he's responsible for everything that has happened in the show, and that he has been manipulating everyone to solve the problems he himself started]], and in the end he gets free from punishment, shoving all the responsibility on Mykage instead. Nobody, except Crea, knows about this. The love triangle also seems to end on a rather troublesome note: [[OutOfCharacter Kagura's character was completely changed at the last minute to give up Mikono]] and [[CleaningUpRomanticLooseEnds start caring about Zessica instead]], and [[ThousandYardStare Zessica is shown to be completely broken at the end]]. [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic Mikono]] wasn't even allowed to choose who he liked more, since Kagura decided he actually supported Amata's love. [[TheWoobie And Zessica can't ever hope to be with Amata, not even in a future reincarnation, since she wasn't even allowed to make a 12,000 years promise.]] They're all smiling in the end, but the viewers can't say the same...
* At the end of the ''Manga/{{Area 88}}'' manga, Soria, Rishar, and King Zak are left to transition Asran from a monarchy to a modern republic. While Asran's civil war is over and the people are jubilant, Asran's future is far from secure. First, the country's infrastructure and finances have been devastated by years of war. Second, the civil war has probably left Asran's people with deep resentment toward each other. Finally, the whole mess has been inherited by a conservative monarch, a WideEyedIdealist, and an amnesiac who spent the previous two decades in cryogenic suspension. Suddenly, Asran's future doesn't look so bright. Also at the end of the manga, Ryoko reunites with Shin. Shin suffers from amnesia due to head trauma and does not remember his time at Area 88. On the surface, this appears to be a happy romantic reunion, until you realize that Ryoko will need to explain to Shin why he's in Asran and why years of his memory are missing. To boot, Shin will undoubtedly suffer from unconscious war trauma, even if he can't remember Area 88. Finally, Shin broke Ryoko's heart several times throughout the manga, suggesting that he has cold tendencies. In short, Ryoko has chosen to marry a traumatized, amnesiac jerk, raising questions about what their life together will be life.
* The ending of ''Manga/{{Arisa}}'' is played as fully happy, with Tsubasa reconciling with Arisa and their mother and Arisa finding true love with Midori. This ignores that Midori was an ax-crazy killer who manipulated everyone, ''including'' Arisa, and she doesn't seem to have learned anything from the experience.
* ''Manga/ArmedGirlsMachiavellism'': The anime adaptation ends with Nomura beating Amou, who gets expelled from Aichi Academy for causing trouble, but still manages to make peace with her. All's well and good... except for the fact that Amou still declares Nomura to be hers and hers alone, not to mention she never really shows any remorse for her sociopathic behavior. Furthermore, it's implied she didn't actually learn anything from her experiences in Aichi Academy and will continue causing trouble elsewhere, and yet we're expected to believe her love for Nomura has redeemed her somewhat. Not to mention, [[TheBadGuyWins getting out of the effective captivity the school had forced her into was her entire reason for going on such a rampage in the first place.]]
* ''Manga/AttackOnTitan'' ends with The Survey Corps defeating Eren, stopping the Rumbling, and in the process end the Curse of the Titans. The titanized Eldians are all back to normal, and Ymir Fritz and every Eldian stuck in the limbo of the Paths are free, with Ymir also turning all Eldians back to normal humans. However, Eren managed to kill about '''80% of humanity''' and utterly devastate the environment, leaving the world unable to retaliate against Paradis. Something Eren knew and purposefully worked to shoulder the world's hatred and end the cycle of violence, at the cost of losing his connection to his friends, including the girl he loved. The Yeagerists are also still active; they were prepared to go to war with the rest of humanity before the renowned heroes of "the War of Heaven and Earth" return to Paradis, seeking to convince them to a peace treaty. They're still prepared to fight and seem to have convinced Historia, broken by her trauma, to agree with them. The Titans may be gone, but there still remains the possibility that the remnants of mankind will still try to destroy one-another. The extra chapter eventually implies that Armin's attempts at negotiating peace were successful, at least during the main casts' remaining lifetimes, with war ultimately tearing down Paradis only in the ''very'' far future, when the world has basically become as modern as our own. Even then, what is implied to be Mikasa's descendant has survived and is shown to be exploring, showing that whatever misery humanity inflicts upon itself it ''always'' has the ability to bounce back.
* Subverted in ''Anime/BirdyTheMighty: Decode''. At the end of season 1, the Roppongi area of Tokyo gets completely trashed by a combination of the ryunka and the sanctum sanctorum Killsat used to attack it. However, season 2 is mostly about how these events affected people, including the survivors.
* ''Anime/BNABrandNewAnimal'': Yes, the Nirvasil Syndrome is cured, the BigBad has been defeated, Anima City has been opened to let humans and beastmen live wherever they please, and Shirou and Michiru have resolved to live as themselves rather than just their species. But you have to wonder how any of this is going to solve the humans' racism problem, as they've just watched thousands of beastmen go berserk and destroy a city, and been shown that the man behind that incident was another beastman all along. About the only thing that would likely end up doing is making the racist humans' beliefs that beastmen are violent, dangerous, and a threat to their safety more justified—and even without the Nirvasil syndrome to worry about, beastmen are still far stronger than the average human and run on a different moral compass. The last thing humans will want to do is move somewhere that they feel they'll be in more danger, so Anima City will likely remain a largely segregated place to live, even if the doors are open for anyone to come and go, and now it's largely in ruins on top of everything.
* ''Anime/BloodCTheLastDark'' ends with Saya finally getting her revenge after all the crap that she experienced in the [[Anime/BloodC TV series]]. But [[VengeanceFeelsEmpty what's the worth of it]] when she found out that Fumito, the man who tormented her emotionally and psychologically, killed many people in the TV series and turned Mana's dad into an Elder Bairn, happens to be obsessively in love with her and all that he did is for her own survival and to fulfill her desire to feed on humans which he already failed? And considering that one of the people who helped her get to Fumito happens to be in league with him all along, Saya would probably experience more trust issues and never touch a coffee mug again. She can't even go back to Mana after she found out that she killed her dad at the beginning of the movie. Her WalkingTheEarth at the end of the movie just shows that Saya would end up alone because she might not ever trust people again and end up hurting them if she does.
* The ending of ''Anime/BlueGender'' could only be considered happy if [[ScienceIsBad you're a severe technophobe]]. A few humans have survived GaiasVengeance, and they can all live in harmony with mother nature, [[LuddWasRight free at last of technology]]! Then the FridgeLogic sets in - the only survivors will be physically strong people. If you're a person who is crippled, blind, deaf, has a curable terminal disease, etc. then you're hosed. Mother Nature hates you and you have no right to live. And those well-meaning humans who were trying to save the planet by living in a space station (to ease the strain placed on Earth) and eliminating the hostile creatures that had infested Earth? [[KillEmAll Screw them]].
* ''Manga/{{Bokurano}}'':
** The Earth survives the ordeal in one piece and humanity is relatively safe, which when compared to what happened in ''Manga/ShadowStar'' is a positive cause for celebration. All the main characters died, thousands of Japanese died, some 33 thousand other universes and Earths were destroyed, and the game goes on with a new set of players as if nothing has happened... Yay?
** One example of the backlash was the anime's director. The GeckoEnding went on to brighten things slightly: While ''most'' of the above still happens, one of the main characters survives and the last pilot breaks the game and makes sure it cannot be repeated elsewhere. Some fans think this change was a welcome improvement over the manga, while others disagree.
** The concept gets discussed in the manga, when Kirie wonders why people would consider a movie in which [[OnlyTheLeadsGetAHappyEnding many people die but the main characters get what they want]] as having a happy ending.
* ''Anime/CodeGeass'':
** The series ends with an uplifting ending showing all the surviving characters smiling, despite the bittersweet nature of the preceding events and Lelouch's death, which is enough to make certain fans consider the whole thing a tragedy. The ending also leaves open what will happen to the world during the subsequent reconstruction phase. It is possible for viewers to speculate about how all the resulting death and destruction would have affected the social and economic structures of Japan, which may paint a rather pessimistic picture of this fictional world's future when all is said and done. The main culprit of this seems to be Okouchi and Taniguchi letting some of the staff throw out suggestions which caused a few of the visuals to be a little too happy, with one specific scene being borderline TastesLikeDiabetes (the wedding photo) while the narration points out how there is still a lot of rebuilding to be done which we never actually see.
** Another aspect that is open to debate is how Lelouch first had to reach the DespairEventHorizon following the Black Knights' mutiny and Nunnally's supposed demise. ForWantOfANail, Lelouch may well have gone with a less destructive and suicidal method. In addition, a few of the Britannian survivors had committed murderous acts in the series while [[UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom the two specific people responsible]] for [[KangarooCourt aforementioned hasty betrayal]] also got a HappyEnding ([[FridgeBrilliance though it's implied they might be making it up to Nunnally for it]]). Lelouch himself admittedly saw beyond such concerns and recognized that everyone had to move toward the future together regardless of the past, but some viewers found the methods and results at least partially [[BrokenAesop self-contradicting]].
* ''HOO-BOY'' does ''Anime/Danganronpa3TheEndOfHopesPeakHighSchool'' ''Side Hope'' end with one of these. The Final Killing Game, which pitted all the leaders of the Future Foundation against one-another, wasn't actually caused by the remnants of despair, but by ''one of their own'' trying to weed out the despair he believed was hiding among their group and to convince Ryota Mitarai to use his brainwashing video to spread hope to this CrapsackWorld [[BrainwashingForTheGreaterGood by force]]. Second, we learn that Class 77 was brainwashed into becoming the Remnants of Despair against their will. When they're all restored to live by Hajime, they arrive in time to stop Ryota and choose to take the blame for the killing game, then go to spend the rest of their lives in exile on Jabberwock island. Makoto and his friends survive, the Tragedy ends, and Hope's Peak is rebuilt with Makoto as headmaster. So a bunch of kids who were brainwashed into becoming murderous terrorists will now forever spend their lives as pariahs so the truth of the Future Foundation's corrupt leader will remain concealed, while the survivors of Class 78 rebuild the school that caused this entire situation for some reason. Oh, and all the other branch heads die save for Munakata. He'd found out that his girlfriend had been a despair for years and will never know how or why, his best friend ([[ArmouredClosetGay who was secretly in love with him]]) [[HeroicSacrifice sacrificed his own life to end the game]] even after Munakata tried to kill him, and everything he thought he was fighting for was pointless. What happens to him? [[OnlyTheLeadsGetAHappyEnding No idea.]] But hey, at least Makoto and Kyoko are finally together. [[MaybeEverAfter Possibly.]] And let's hope that Makoto learned the lessons from the past to not let HistoryRepeats and doesn't get hit with [[DrunkWithPower the drunk state caused by being in position of power]]...
* ''Manga/{{DNA2}}'' has [[BigBad Mori]]'s elaborate plan of using DNA Manipulation and TimeTravel to create his personal, mind controlled and telekinetically strong army to declare war on the entire world thwarted. Mori is killed, but this comes at the cost of Junta overcoming the Mega Playboy DNA within him, meaning the playboy never awakened, so his descendants that had the playboy's DNA all cease to exist. Which ''also'' included the son Junta and Karin were going to have. And ultimately, Karin shoots Junta with a DMC one final time to fully remove the playboy DNA aspects, and the memories of her and the entire adventure, from him and returns to the future. There is the one bright HopeSpot that Junta and Ami [[VictoriousChildhoodFriend will get together]].
* ''Manga/DeathNote'' appears to end with the villain (and his fanboy successor) dying and the world returning to normal. Until that final scene revealing that a happy-go-lucky Shinigami was the sponsor for the fake Kira three years later, he liked the experiment, and he has an arsenal of Death Notes just waiting for new owners. How did he get them? He bought them from the Shinigami King, who has no problem with selling each Death Note for 7 apples, and has not made any laws against this tourist trend. Which now means that Ryuk and hundreds of Shinigami will be sponsoring hundreds of nonviolent sniping killers, each with their own ideals and agendas, all of whom will inevitably duel and war with each other unless something goes horribly wrong. This is considered a fitting end to this dark series.
* ''Anime/DigimonAdventure02'' seemingly ends on a happy note – bad guy is dead for good, the [=DigiDestined=] get to keep their Digimon, even Oikawa gets redeemed in the end. But what many overlook is that the ending says every human on earth gained their own partner Digimon, which leads to all kinds of disturbing implications. Just imagine how much damage a Digimon could do in the hands of a criminal or a dictator.
* ''Anime/DragonBallSuper'': The ending of Future Trunks arc is supposed to be seen as a bittersweet happy ending with them successfully defeating Merged Zamasu with Whis helping both Future Trunks and Future Mai have a bright future ahead of them by creating a CloseEnoughTimeline just for them. However, it still doesn't change the fact that everyone they knew and loved from their original timeline got erased from existence and Trunks wasn't able to protect them in the end because right after Future Trunks destroyed Zamasu's physical body, his soul became a bodiless EldritchAbomination that wipes out all the remaining survivors left on Earth and is in the process of spreading across the universe and timelines, forcing them to summon Zeno just to stop him but at the cost of the entire timeline. In other words, [[TheBadGuyWins Zamasu had won]] and the heroes [[FailureHero completely failed their goal of stopping him]], even to the point of a DownerEnding for some fans. What mitigates this is that Whis ''does'' warn an AU version of himself about Zamasu, and thus there's now a ''new'' future for Trunks in which Zamasu doesn't get far.
* The anime of ''Manga/ElfenLied'' ends rather positively, because it adds a new ending before the manga crosses the DespairEventHorizon. Subsequently, the manga's ending is iffy - the Diclonii will be completely eliminated within a generation. Their powers are too dangerous to allow them to continue to exist, but they're not all bad people, and their extermination is at ''best'' a necessary evil.
* ''Anime/EurekaSevenAO'' tries to play its ending off as a happy one, but just a little bit of thinking reveals that its anything but. To clarify: The now [[RetGone written-out-of-history]] Scub Corals were EvilAllAlong, rendering the whole point of the first series meaningless. High-density Trapars are apparently [[TakenForGranite fatal]] to Human/Coralian hybrids, meaning [[TheHero Ao]] can [[YouCantGoHomeAgain never return to his real home or see his parents again]] (his ultimate goal was to reunite with his mother). To top it off, his [[CosmicRetcon messing with space-time]] may well have written him out of the memories of everyone he knew or cared about. Yet the ending wants us to believe he's perfectly fine with all this.
** Subverted [[BelatedHappyEnding almost a decade later]], where the studio made one final episode where [[EarnYourHappyEnding Ao is remembered by his friends in the new world]].
* ''Anime/{{FLCL}}'' implies that Naota moves on with his life, but Amarao's entire story is foreshadowing: he fell in love with Haruko at a young age and she eventually abandoned him. Amarao tries to warn Naota but Naota ultimately chooses Haruko, who then predictably abandons him. Naota's subsequent reaction to Ninamori ordering the carbonated drink shows that he hasn't changed or matured as a character; the emphasis on Haruko's guitar in his room reinforces this fact. Naota is going to spend the rest of his life pining for TheOneThatGotAway just like Amarao.
* ''LightNovel/TheFamiliarOfZero'': Saito and Louise get married in the end, even though the latter spent the entire series abusing the former.
* This trope is the main reason why [[GrandFinale the concluding movie]] to ''Anime/FullmetalAlchemist'' (2003) was so controversial. The bad guys are dead and the Elric brothers are finally reunited and their bodies restored... but in order to prevent an invasion of Amestris by the Nazis, the brothers are forced to permanently seal the Gate of Alchemy from Earth's side, trapping them there, alone, for the rest of their lives, however long ''those'' might be since UsefulNotes/WorldWarII is right around the corner and the movie made it ''very'' clear this isn't an AlternateHistory where UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler isn't around. This seems to be an attempt at [[BittersweetEnding bittersweet]] that went too far into the "bitter" ballpark for much of the fanbase's liking.
* ''Anime/GenmaWars'' ends on a supposedly uplifting note as Earth is freed from demons who have enslaved mankind for ages and civilization is stated to eventually rebuild itself. With that said, the leads attempt to travel back in time to prevent the demons from taking over Earth in the distant past, only to '''utterly fail in their mission'''. To make matters worse, they return to their own timeline where nothing really changed despite their efforts, most named characters (including their loved ones) have died over the course of the series and stayed dead. Also the BigBad responsible for influencing all events in the series isn't really destroyed by the heroes with his survival being ambiguous at really best. The only reason his victory isn't absolute is because the twins refuse to turn against each other and become his puppets.
* ''Anime/GodzillaThePlanetEater'': At the end of this movie, which is also supposed to conclude the [[Anime/GodzillaPlanetOftheMonsters entire Godzilla]] [[Anime/GodzillaCityOnTheEdgeOfBattle anime trilogy]], Haruo allows Godzilla to kill him in order to finally end the cycle of hatred between humans and monsters that Haruo believes himself to be perpetuating. The question is... why does he need to do that? The [[StrawVulcan evil]] [[ScaryDogmaticAliens aliens]] manipulating humanity are dead, Ghidorah is trapped in an alternate dimension and Godzilla's relationship with the [[HumanSubspecies Houtua]] makes it clear that humans and monsters can co-exist peacefully, as long as humans don't piss monsters off and/or harm the planet. All Haruo accomplishes is dying because he can't let go of the hatred that has kept him alive and driven him for so long, not to mention [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic he is leaving his pregnant wife to raise their child all by herself]]. [=OmniViewer=] had a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTU6NpSaAUg field day]] tearing this ending to pieces.
* The anime of ''Manga/HisAndHerCirc*mstances''. Hinting that the official couple will break up sooner or later, and that it's OK, is a "happy ending" for Hideki Anno. Thankfully averted in the manga.
* Many people were dissatisfied with the ending of the ''Manga/HotGimmick'' manga. While it was obvious that Hatsumi was going to end up with Ryoki, some readers held on to the hope that there would at least be enough CharacterDevelopment to give [[LoveMartyr Hatsumi]] a backbone or make Ryoki less of a {{Jerkass}}, but the general consensus is that there was little if any sign of any of that ever coming to pass. It didn't help that Azusa's CharacterDevelopment was negated at the end thanks to AesopAmnesia and that Shinogu, suffered from a blatant case of CleaningUpRomanticLooseEnds. In fact, about the only thing most readers liked about the ending were the [[BetaCouple Subaru/Akane]] bits.
* An example exclusive to the Creator/{{Madhouse}} anime adaptation of ''Manga/HunterXHunter'': Gon meets with Ging on the top of the tallest tree on the land, only for Ging to tell him that the tree they're on, is actually a small sprout from the Dark Continent much larger than their own homeland and all of it is taken to be very optimistic and exciting. Now it makes sense in the manga because it's the start of a new arc that will eventually succumb to CerebusSyndrome, but the anime ending implies this will lead to an idealistic adventure. And that's ignoring the unresolved plot threads the anime has. It is unknown if the anime will ever continue considering the Madhouse's [[CutShort track record]] and the [[ScheduleSlip frequent and long hiatuses from the manga]].
* ''Manga/{{Inuyasha}}'': Inuyasha and Kagome are hinted to be married and are living happily with one another, however the probability that Inuyasha will age much slower than Kagome is never mentioned, meaning he'll most likely still be young looking when Kagome (and Sango and Miroku for that matter) are old. Also, it's never confirmed whether they can still use the well, meaning Kagome could possibly be separated from her family forever.
* The ending to ''Anime/JewelpetSunshine'' has the human {{Love Interest|s}} permanently turn into a Jewelpet so he can be with the Jewelpet protagonist forever. Meanwhile, the plot neglects to address the feelings of his parents and sister about this decision, not to mention he disappears for 5 years without telling anyone so he can turn into a Jewelpet.
* In-universe example in ''Manga/KillMeBaby'': Yasuna has a dream where Sonya is the eponymous protagonist of Killtaro, who is out to slay an oni. Upon reaching the island of her destination, she takes a peach from a tree, and is called out by the villagers, who then chant "Ogre! Ogre!" We then have a discretion shot where she supposedly kills them, and then the narrator says "Such a happy ending..." Sonya then retorts "That wasn't happy at all!".
* ''Literature/KoiZora'' ends with Hiro succumbing to his cancer and dies, causing Mika to [[HeroicBSOD suffer]] and once again try to kill herself. She's stopped by her friends who show her Hiro's diary notes, which gives Mika the courage to live on and she learns that she is pregnant with Hiro's child. But the questionable happiness comes from the fact that Mika is not properly established as having a stable home life, job and her emotional instability, which has caused her to attempt suicide twice over the course of the series, is also a big issue. It makes one wonder whether she would be able to take care of the child, especially on her own.
* The final episode of ''Manga/KumaMikoGirlMeetsBear'' is unanimously seen as this trope by fans. The character Machi is a teenage {{miko}} from a small village with social anxiety who dreams of moving to the big city, and spends much of the show becoming familiar with modern tech in order facilitate this. When she finally gets to go in the final episode, she has to do a performance in front of a large crowd visiting the city. She successfully does the performance by going to her HappyPlace, but that's when the entire story goes off the rails. She ends up hallucinating that the cheering crowd is actually throwing rocks at her, causing her to completely break down, terrified of the city and declaring she will never return. Rather than correct her delusions and get her help, her friends Natsu and Yoshio happily celebrate her decision. [[FromBadToWorse Then it gets worse]], with Natsu telling Machi in this fragile state that she never has to think about anything ever again; the final scene is Machi having mentally regressing into a toddler, now more ignorant about the outside world and dependent on Natsu then ever before. All this while cheerful music plays. The manga’s author, Masume Yoshimoto, was heavily [[CreatorBacklash displeased with the ending]], and [[http://www.ricedigital.co.uk/kuma-miko-ending-differs-massively-manga-original-author-hates/ wrote a very politely-worded response]] in his blog while one of the anime's writers [[OldShame completely scrubbed all mention of it from their resume]] after its airing.
* ''Anime/{{Macross}}'':
** ''Anime/MacrossFrontier'':
*** The TV series mostly ends on a happy note; the BigBad is defeated, EveryoneLives (barring a bazillion {{Redshirt}}s), and they definitely [[EarnYourHappyEnding Earned Their Happy Ending]], so what makes it so esoteric? Though the action and overall plot all concluded neatly, the LoveTriangle that composed the greater part of the series was left unresolved to avoid upsetting the fans of either girl, which just upset ''both'' {{Shipping}} factions. Some though preferred it this way. Nevertheless, the debates wage on.
*** Returns with the movies with the ending being a TearJerker. It leaves off with Alto apparently dead and Sheryl in a coma right after Alto confessed to Sheryl. The fandom's going theory was that this was how they ended up, and that Sheryl's earrings, which being made of fold quartz ignore the normal laws of time and space, kept their hearts together, for at the end one was worn by Sheryl and one was worn by Alto, making it a very BittersweetEnding a la TogetherInDeath. [[EpilepticTrees Among other theories]]. An interview with Creator/ShojiKawamori later had him wondering how anyone got this idea and {{Jossed}} it by declaring that Alto survived and Sheryl woke up.
** ''Anime/MacrossDelta'':
*** Hooray! Delta Squadron has liberated the Brisingr cluster and Hayate and Freyja get their happy ending, but the Windemereans make it clear the war is not over and the death toll numbers in the millions. Also, poor Mirage got her LoveConfession rejected...
*** For the Windemereans’ case, their future doesn’t look bright for them. Though Heinz is willing to establish peace talks, at the same time, he wants the UN Government to pay for their sins, which might not go very well, as his kingdom will suffer a lot of backlash from the intergalactic community for their actions. Likewise, Heinz is slowly dying after his singing affected his health, and his brother, who is the strongest pilot in the air force, hass already died, which not only leaves the Aerial Knights in a vulnerable position, but also leaves no successors to take leadership of Windermere once Heinz kicks the bucket.
*** Not to mention, the issue of Windemereans having a significantly shorter lifespan than other species is never resolved, meaning that despite coming out on top of the LoveTriangle, Freyja is still doomed to die long before Hayate does.
* ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamIronBloodedOrphans'' ends with Gjallarhorn successfully disbanding Tekkadan by force. While the ending is portrayed as positive with Gjallarhorn being reformed to be more democratic and granting Martian independence, it still doesn't change the fact that the new Gjallahorn is still run by the old regime with little to stop them from continuing their corruption.[[note]]Of course, they ''technically'' [[PyrrhicVictory won the final battle of the war]], but had to make some concessions to keep their spoils.[[/note]]
* ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'':
** Played with in the case of Sakura Haruno. Her ending sees her married to her longtime crush Sasuke Uchiha and having a daughter, Sarada. Great! Except for the fact that in the intervening years after Sasuke had pulled a FaceHeelTurn, he succumbed to the Curse of Hatred that plagued the Uchiha clan for generations, attacked Sakura both physically and psychologically on several occasions, and tried to murder her friends. But after [[HeelFaceRevolvingDoor turning Face again]], he develops genuine affection for her and marries her in his travels around the world. At one point, Sakura becomes pregnant with their daughter, Sarada. After she gives birth at one of Orochimaru's hideouts, they return in Konoha to raise their daughter together. Unfortunately, he had to leave again to investigate Kaguya, while Sarada was very young. Sakura has no other choice but to raise Sarada alone. Years pass, which means that Sakura doesn't see Sasuke for many years, and he is away from seeing his daughter growing up. In time, Sarada grows conflicted about Sasuke and distrustful of her own mother, after being kept in the dark for her own safety for too many years. Most fans believe that this was another unnecessary drama, and that Kishimoto could have just make Sasuke leaving from time to time, as him being parted from his family for so long didn't affected the plot in the long run. The fact that Kishimoto created this storyline as a "TakeThat" [[TrollingCreator to troll]] the people who couldn't comprehend that Sarada was Sasuke and Sakura's daughter, didn't calm things, making Sasusaku divisive even among their shippers.
** Many fans were also unsatisfied with the fates of the villains, despite being ''mass murderers''. Of the [[BigBadEnsemble Akatsuki]] members, only [[WellIntentionedExtremist Danzo]], [[GenericDoomsdayVillain Kaguya and Zetsu]] receive severe punishments; the rest are either [[RedemptionEqualsDeath forgiven in death]] ([[DragonWithAnAgenda Nagato]], [[TheManBehindTheMan Tobi/Obito]], [[PredecessorVillain Madara]]), get a slap on the wrist ([[MadScientist Orochimaru]], [[DangerousDeserter the aforementioned Sasuke]]), or [[KarmaHoudini just plain aren't punished at all]] ([[DragonAscendant Kabuto]]).
* ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'': ''The End of Evangelion'' is definitely meant to be horrifying, but has a spark of optimism at the very end. It sees every human put through a death of the ego and their bodies dissolved, but Shinji gives them the chance to live again if they have the will (on a world wrecked by at least two disasters on a planetary scale). Ultimately, Shinji learns to accept himself and search for happiness, yet understanding that suffering is unavoidable in life; while some find this reassurance of hope even in the face of the apocalypse uplifting, others inevitably find it difficult to accept. Likewise, he and his [[HeroesWantRedheads red-head]] {{Love Interest|s}} spent the whole series [[ObliviousToLove being unable to realize]] each other's [[EveryoneCanSeeIt blatantly obvious]] feelings, and the final scene hints that Shinji and Asuka at last have made a connection and may start to open up to each other (though some people may not interpret Shinji choking Asuka as a positive connection).
* ''Anime/NowAndThenHereAndThere''. Even setting aside the whole GoodGirlsAvoidAbortion thing, the script seems to entirely forget that Sara's parents are now never going to see her again and she's very likely going to be killed by the Earth's still supernova-ing sun. Shu's optimism seems just a ''little'' misplaced.
* ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica'' has one. On the one hand, Madoka was able to stop magical girls from becoming witches. On the other hand, her solution is basically to make them disappear from the world forever. And she [[RetGone gets erased from existence to boot]]. The ending is still hopeful and optimistic, but it implies that the remaining magical girls won't last long in the new world, and [[TogetherInDeath Homura will only be reunited with Madoka in the afterlife]].
** ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagicaTheMovieRebellion'' invokes this as a {{Deconstruction}} of {{Fix Fic}}s for the above. Homura ''[[EarnYourHappyEnding finally]]'' saves Madoka, gets Kyubey [[KarmaHoudiniWarranty long overdue karma]], brings Sayaka BackFromTheDead, and gets Mami a new friend in Nagisa, and everyone's reunited with their family and friends. But Homura had to FaceHeelTurn and betray Madoka to make this possible, destroying their friendship [[ShootTheShaggyDog that was Homura's whole motive]]. And when they aren't GettingSmiliesPaintedOnYourSoul, everyone objects to the circ*mstances and establish they will fight it once their memories return. This "Happy Ending" is implied to be unsustainable and no-one's truly happy, the one who sought this [[WasItReallyWorthIt least of all]].
* ''Anime/ReCreators'': The world is saved, but almost nobody knows that since they thought the final battle was all a show or weren't aware of it. The villain received no punishment whatsoever and in the end got what she wanted. Most of the fictional characters that came to the real world accomplished nothing and/or died, those who lived in the end still went back to their stories, subjected to their authors' whims, and the authors whose Creations died in the final battle are explicitly shown to be permanently traumatized by the tragedy.. Oh, and there's still a crazy murderer on the loose in the real world. Hooray?
* ''Manga/{{Remina}}'' ends with Earth being devoured by the EldritchAbomination Remina. And after being chased literally all around the world by a group of deranged cultists and seeing her father and love interest get murdered, the human girl Remina, her hobo friend, and a kind family of survivors get lucky enough to reach a fallout shelter and ''survive on a chunk of Earth that flies out of Remina's mouth with said shelter inside.'' So they're saved! The problem is they only have about a year's worth of supplies. And they're left drifting in space with humanity, Earth, and most of the solar system gone. Assuming Remina eats the sun like it did in other systems, then they'll be adrift in interstellar space, with no hope of rescue or chance of even landing on another planet. Not like they could survive anyway. Although, considering how ridiculously lucky they've been so far, who knows what could be out there and what could happen during that year. By Creator/JunjiIto's usual standards, it's downright ''saccharine.''
* ''Anime/RomeoXJuliet'' ends with most of the cast living happily ever after...all because Romeo and Juliet were horribly killed and sacrificed to a tree which had previously kept the city they live in afloat in the sky. What's worse, the show makes it very clear that none of this was Juliet's choice, but that ''every single woman born to the Capulet line'' had been sacrificed to this very same tree, meaning that she could have never reclaimed her throne (something the series had been building up to since the beginning) or ruled Neo Verona even if she wanted to.
* Done deliberately with ''Manga/{{Saikano}}'', which sees the main character and his girlfriend as the last living beings from Earth, drifting through space, said girlfriend now completely inhuman with no hope of ever turning back. This is played as being as happy as they can wish for given the situation. The author's notes at the end of the manga even admit that all hope is gone, "but there are memories, and maybe a future".
* ''Anime/SpaceRunawayIdeon'' has this with ''Be Invoked''. Yep, the universe is destroyed, but the spirits of the dead are preparing to celebrate its rebirth again as the Messiah takes the souls to a new planet. It took ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWars'' to create a proper DownerEnding as [[GodOfEvil Keisar Ephes]] corrupts the Messiah, allowing him to take control of the universe properly this time around.
* ''Anime/SpeedGrapher'': While the ending is supposed to be happy because Japan is saved from greed and corruption thanks to Suitengu [[TheExtremistWasRight succeeding in wiping out Japan's corrupt elite]], the fact is that Suitengu is the BigBad who did this by [[TheBadGuyWins utterly destroying Japan's economy]], which will have a devastating effect on the whole world and [[AMillionIsAStatistic ruin millions of innocent lives]], and [[FullCircleRevolution nothing really changes]] since the old elite gets replaced by Suitengu's corrupt associates, [[ShaggyDogStory essentially making the heroes' efforts completely meaningless]]. The main characters get their happy ending as shown in the WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue, but it's likely that [[OnlyTheLeadsGetAHappyEnding only the main characters are happy]].
* The ending of ''Manga/StrawberryOneHundredPercent'' was meant by the author to be a way to happily resolve the LoveTriangle and leave all parties happy. However, it ended up as a massive BrokenAesop and caused a gigantic BrokenBase, as Tsukasa's "loved him before he knew me" revelation was retconned in very late in the story with no hint that it ever existed beforehand, and Aya's own FramingDevice of her story being about a [[RichSuitorPoorSuitor peasant girl vs a princess for the love of the prince]] was seen by many as an obvious foreshadowing of her inevitable triumph for Junpei's affections. Instead of being an example of an underdog winning through compatible personalities and friendship as a base for romance, the ending simply reaffirmed the real-life CrapsackWorld-view of "pretty, popular girls win over girl-next-doors".
* ''Anime/TengenToppaGurrenLagann'': Yes, the universe was saved and the Anti-Spiral didn't kill off humanity, but many of the crew dies (including Kittan, right after he confesses his love for Yoko), Nia dies just after her and Simon's wedding and Simon himself becomes a [[WalkingTheEarth hobo]] of sorts, which comes off as a rather insulting fate for someone who saved the entire human race from extinction. And the Spiral Nemesis, the thing the Anti-Spiral were trying to stop from happening is still a potential risk that has a very real chance of transpiring and destroying everything. For such an idealistic series, the ending can be especially jarring.
* ''Manga/TsubasaReservoirChronicle'' ends with a happy note as while Syaoran is cursed to travel endlessly across dimensions he believes he will see his love Sakura again. However, the fact that time flows differently in other worlds means that if it takes him a year to return to Clow Country, Sakura could already be dead when he returns. Furthermore, the villain who cursed Syaoran, Fei Wang Reed, was revealed to an artificial being before his death. Despite dying, it has been stated that artificial beings can be reconstructed so it is possible that he will be back.
* In ''Manga/VampirePrincessMiyu'', the artist and her assistant from the TV series episode ''Love of the Dolls''. Surely, they are in a happy relationship at the end, but it is impossible to forget how unhealthy and violent they were to each other either, and one has to wonder what will happen in the future for them.
* At the climax of ''Anime/WeatheringWithYou'', Hodaka saves Hina's life, even if it means the heavy rains and flooding will continue. The audience is shown almost immediately that they do indeed continue, and in fact that rain falls continuously for ''three years'', flooding the majority of Tokyo. Hodaka meets with an elderly person who lost their home as a result, but that's the extent of the damage shown on-screen, and while Hodaka seems appropriately concerned at first about the consequences of his actions, the moment he sees Hina he decides immediately that he did the right thing and this is a happy ending. The story sort of vaguely hand waves all of this as being historically normal and that humans are just becoming more in harmony with nature now, which is kind of a flippant way to shrug off the [[NoEndorHolocaust implied deaths of up to thousands of people.]]
* An in-universe example with ''Manga/YakitateJapan'' during the Yakitate 25 arc, where Azuma starts declaring every victory for Pantasia a happy ending, apparently ignoring the fact that their opponents (who most of the time aren't particularly bad people) have been [[ItMakesSenseInContext transformed by Pantasia's bread]] with no sign of changing back any time soon, or the two occasions where the match ended with Ken becoming a {{Yakuza}} leader against his will or Kuroyanagi suffering from serious internal bleeding. Kawachi is usually quick to point this out.
* ''Anime/YuGiOhArcV'' has one of the franchise's most infamous ending. The BigBad has been defeated, his soul is quelled and leaves the infant Reira's body, freeing her. Yuzu reunited with Yuya after long last, and the four dimensions are united. However, the show also establishes that Yuya and Yuzu's counterparts now reside in them, meaning that those people are trapped in Yuya or Yuzu's bodies. Despite the fact that this is portrayed as the right thing for them and something they're fine with, this would also hurt their friends and family. Particularly Shun, who lost his sister and best friend. Also, Reira has been de-aged from a child to an infant, and this seems to be permanent.
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[[folder:Literature]]
* Creator/HarlanEllison claims that the ending of ''Literature/IHaveNoMouthAndIMustScream'' is intended to be happy. Sure, the narrator ends by saying the title line in utter despair, after mercy-killing every other remaining human in the world, but he's so [[UnreliableNarrator unreliable]] he hasn't realized that his actions represent the final triumph of the human spirit. The game makes it into more a BittersweetEnding, with the humans finally taking down AM and settling into the duty of being a watchdog for the [=AIs=] as they await the reawakening of the humans on the moon.
* By all accounts, Creator/HansChristianAndersen [[CreatorBreakdown was a very depressed man]]. Out of all his fairy tales, there are only a few with unambiguously happy endings.
** ''Literature/TheLittleMermaid'' (not [[{{Disneyfication}} the Disney version]]). The little mermaid is turned into "daughter of air" with the prospect of eventually entering Heaven, very probably a result of revision by Andersen. Initially this was the selected ending, even put in the working title, but there was a happily reworked version in which the mermaid apparently just dissolved into foam in the end. Even the happier version has the FridgeHorror of knowing that the [[DeaderThanDead dissolving into foam]] fate is eventually going to befall the Little Mermaid's sisters and family if they don't act as she did.
** ''Literature/TheLittleMatchGirl''. TooGoodForThisSinfulEarth turned UpToEleven. The tone of the ending is [[BittersweetEnding very sad for the townspeople who discover her frozen corpse, but happy for the girl as she has ascended into Heaven]]. As such, some remakes from our more cynical times either rewrite it to give her a more materialistic HappyEnding ([[DeusExMachina somehow]]) or portray it as a truly tear-jerking DownerEnding. [[Literature/{{Hogfather}} Even Death can't stand it.]]
** While not nearly as dark as the two above, one has to question just how HappilyEverAfter the Prince in ''Literature/ThePrincessAndThePea'' is actually going to live with his new bride. Someone who complains about a single pea under 40 mattresses has got to be ''ridiculously'' high-maintenance.
* ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'':
** It's explored in ''Literature/WitchesAbroad'' where Lilith gives what is usually considered to be a happy ending to people whether they want it or not. This includes convincing a wolf it's human so that it nearly starves to death and goes insane, since it can't live as either human or wolf now, so that it would eat a grandmother and dress up like her a la ''Little Red Riding Hood''. By the time the three witches arrive, all the Big Bad Wolf wants is ''[[SuicideByCop an ending]]''.
** Intentionally played in ''Literature/{{Eric}}'' which ends by saying that three wishes provided a happy ending for most of the people they've affected and giving as examples the Tezumen, who continue to slaughter people but no longer do so because of religion so they don't need to get up so early; the Tsorteans and Ephebians, whose war is over, allowing them to prepare for the next one; the demons and damned souls, who get back to inflicting/experiencing material punishment on immaterial spirit in the knowledge that at least it's not Astfgl's psychological torture; and Astfgl himself, who as Life President of Hell gets to spend his time writing policy statements entirely unaware that the rest of the demonic lowerarchy is completely ignoring him. What happened to our actual protagonists, we don't get told beyond "It could be worse". Lampshaded by the last two lines "And this too was happiness. Of a sort."
* Creator/RobertSilverberg's stories fall into this occasionally because his personal philosophy is so different from how most people (or at least most modern Western readers) view life and humanity. A particularly jarring example is ''The Face Upon The Waters''--the main character spends most of the story trying to maintain his cultural identity after the destruction of Earth and the scattering of its people, but ultimately concludes that people should adapt to whatever culture they live amongst... and joins up with TheCorruption[=/=]AssimilationPlot, which has a stated goal of assimilating everyone it can and killing everyone it can't.
* ''Literature/AGirlCalledBlue'' is about girls growing up in a strict home for children in 1960s Ireland (run by sad*st Nuns). The book ends with Blue rejoicing that she's finally found a family of her own. Except the "family" is two people she's met twice and they're not allowed to adopt her so she has to wait three years before she's old enough to leave the school with them only allowed to visit her twice a year. Also three of her best friends have now left, one being drowned, another going back to live with her father and the last being sent to another school and she has been forced to sleep alone in a cramped room, and will likely still have to endure plenty more abuse from the nuns for the next three years. Oh and she never finds out who her real mother is either and the nuns will keep abusing children for many years in Ireland.
* The ending of Creator/CSLewis's final [[Literature/TheChroniclesOfNarnia Narnia]] book, ''Literature/TheLastBattle'', qualified as this for many young readers. Narnia ends, and everyone except Susan dies. Some minor characters are tormented and destroyed by a horrific many-armed GodOfEvil, while others are judged unworthy and vanish forever into Aslan's shadow. [[OnlyTheLeadsGetAHappyEnding But the important people don't care about that]] because they all go to the "real" Narnia (a stand-in for heaven) as the Christian subtext becomes text. It can be uplifting or inspire nightmares, depending on which scenes stick with you. (Creator/NeilGaiman brilliantly deconstructed this in his short story ''Literature/TheProblemOfSusan'', in which he shows what happened to Susan after her siblings died in a train crash and she had to [[BodyHorror identify their corpses]].)
* Creator/RoaldDahl's ''Literature/TheWitches''. The protagonist learns that he's stuck as a mouse and that mice don't live very long, but he's happy because he'll probably die near the same time as his elderly grandmother and doesn't care about living if he's not with her; they will live out their lives tracking down and destroying other witches together. The two also ponder Bruno's fate. One states that his mouse-hating mother probably drowned him in a bucket, but nobody seems very disturbed by this possibility. The [[Film/TheWitches1990 1990 movie]] has an unabashed happy ending where the last witch, who had undergone a HeelFaceTurn, undoes the mouse spell on the protagonist and is implied to do the same to Bruno. While many were appreciative of this happier ending, Roald Dahl was infamously ''not''.
* Coupled with ValuesDissonance for ''Literature/ALittlePrincess''. The book ends with Sara being restored to her wealth while Becky becomes her personal attendant. Oh and [[sad*stTeacher Miss Minchin]] gets [[KarmaHoudini away with treating them like prisoners]]. However, if one takes into context the period the story is set in (Victorian London) then Becky going from little better than a slave to a powerful position in the household (with a kind and generous mistress too) where she would get a roof over her head and financial security, it's a happy ending for Becky indeed. And while Miss Minchin doesn't get an over-the-top instant comeuppance (save in the film adaptations, which pretty much need one) it's worth remembering that not only has she irrevocably lost her chance at a pupil who could've single-handedly ensured her school's success and her own financial comfort for life; once Sara's story becomes common knowledge in her social circle--as it inevitably will--Minchin's reputation will be in tatters and her school likely ruined. There's also a WhatHappenedToTheMouse for Melchisedec the rat and his family; one hopes kindhearted Sara will remember them and send Ram Dass over there with bread crumbs.
* At the end of ''Literature/AtlasShrugged,'' Galt's Gulch is the only non-Crapsack place left in the whole world. Which is great, because all of the looters and moochers are gone and the good people can rebuild the world, right? Then you remember the [[InferredHolocaust millions of innocent children who were left to starve...]] (Then again, by the book's morality, this is the looters' and moochers' fault rather than anything to blame on the protagonists...)
* ''Literature/RomanceOfTheThreeKingdoms.'' Shu, Wei, and Wu are united into one at last and peace throughout the entire country of China can finally begin. Unfortunately the victors are a splinter group of Wei who usurped the throne, conquered Wu and Shu who at the time were being ruled by Liu Shan (a truly incompetent ruler who defiles everything Shu originally stood for) and Sun Hao (a tyrant almost as bad as Dong Zhuo). The kicker? When these two surrendered they were given lucrative positions and the readers were told they lived out their remaining lives in luxury. To be fair though this novel closely follows the real-life events in history and not a lot could be changed. And historically, the hard-fought reunification of China ended a decade or two later with [[HereWeGoAgain a new barbarian invasion.]] Also, the war to unify China was itself one of the bloodiest in human history, killing (by highest estimates) 74% of China's population, more people than the Second World War. The victors ruled dust and ashes.
* Back when ''The Iron Giant'' was a book instead of [[WesternAnimation/TheIronGiant a movie]], it ended with an encounter with a dragon-like alien that sang in a hypnotic manner. It sang loud enough that the entire world heard it, and everyone in the world spent the rest of their lives alternately taking care of necessities and listening to the song. It's specified that all war was completely eliminated, and the implication would be that art and culture vanished too. If the wording is to be taken literally, people didn't even converse with each other. Now, does this sound {{Utopia}}n, or more like a nightmare?
* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'':
** The last book gave Jacob, who suffered from unrequited love for Bella and who vehemently hated imprinting, his own happy romantic ending by having him imprint on Bella's newborn daughter Nessie. Oh, don't worry; Nessie grows really fast, so she'll be physically 17 years old in 7 years and ready to start a relationship with her "Uncle Jake" then! And what of Jake's loss of free will? Who cares as long as he's still (forced to be) in Bella's life!
** Also, [[InherentInTheSystem there's apparently no good way to get rid of the Volturi or vampires like them]]. Given that the Volturi are growing more and more afraid of human technology, and more and more inclined to lash out at humanity, this is a ''very bad thing''. Das-Sporking's MST, when it gets to the end of ''Breaking Dawn'', points out that their "victory" at the end really isn't one, as while the Volturi are gone ''for now'', they have been given all the information needed to defeat the Cullens should they come around again.
** On a more personal note, Nessie is hardly the "perfect ending" for the rest of the Cullens that Meyer claims. Esme and Rose want biological children of their own to care for and raise. Nessie is already nearly at adult-level independence within weeks of birth, and she's ''Bella's'' daughter, not theirs. Nessie also can't bring back Alice's human memories, she has almost no relationship with any of the other male Cullens, etc. Meyer seems to think that Nessie fixes everything just by existing, but realistically she creates many, many more problems than she fixes for them.
* ''Literature/BendSinister'' by Creator/VladimirNabokov ends with the protagonist arrested by his nation's totalitarian government, and his young son horrifically killed by a crowd of mental patients--on film!--due to a ''clerical error''. But then Nabokov [[{{Metafiction}} reaches through the layers of reality]] and gives his main character the gift of insanity to make him forget all his pain. The novel ends with Adam Krug, as a result of his insanity, rushing the dictator and being shot to death. Nabokov, however, refuses to write this conclusion (after implying its inevitability) and instead describes his room and decides to go mothing. It's a strange case of being incapable of giving Krug a happy ending (even the insanity so benevolently bestowed upon him results directly in his being killed), and so at least giving him the consolation prize of not writing it at all, and therefore not allowing it to happen. It's about as esoteric as a 'happy ending' can get.
* ''Literature/LeftBehind'' gets this a lot for its ending where not only are all non-Christians sent to FireAndBrimstoneHell, but the paradise where all the protagonists end up is depicted as a faintly creepy commune where you can no longer eat meat or form relationships with anyone you want, and nobody experiences any strong emotions other than love of God. [[ValuesDissonance The writers treat this as a utopia.]]
* Nearly all of Zilpha Keatley Snyder's books have one of these. Save the Literature/GreenSkyTrilogy, and only because she was deluged with mail, realized she made a big goof, and authorized a sequel in the form of a video game, possibly the first video game to be acknowledged as {{Canon}} for something written in another medium.
* Creator/HPLovecraft's works:
** "Celephais," which ends with the main character finally returning to the wondrous dream-city that he created in his youth where he is appointed the chief god of all of the regions of Dream; and all he had to do was fall off a cliff and let the tides cast his corpse upon the rocks. Lovecraft {{lampshade|Hanging}}s this later in ''Literature/TheDreamQuestOfUnknownKadath'' when ''that'' story's protagonist meets this exact character who's since come to regret his decision but obviously can never go back.
** The sheer ValuesDissonance of applying this trope to "The Street" is why it's almost impossible to find it in print, as it involves treating the spontaneous collapse of an overcrowded slum that [[KillEmAll kills everybody living there]] as a good thing. Why? Because A: it used to be a beautiful Colonial country lane line with rosebushes and is now a dirty slum, and B: all of the people living in it are [[EvilForeigner dirty non-WASP immigrants ungratefully plotting revolution against America for taking them in]]... at least, [[TakeOurWordForIt so the narration says they are]].
* ''Literature/{{Mindswap}}'' by Creator/RobertSheckley. The protagonist is in the corrupted world but believes he has succeeded in his mission and has returned home.
* ''Literature/HushHush'' has a great happy ending, if you ignore the fact that part of Nora's house was burned down, there's a ClingyJealousGirl of a fallen angel after her, and that she is blissfully dating the guy who spent the book stalking her, sexually harassing her, and outright attempting to ''murder her''.
* At the end of ''Literature/TheGoddessTest'', Kate's beloved mother is actually the goddess Demeter, so she and her mother can be together for eternity. Sounds great, huh? Except if you think back to the prologue, where we hear Demeter outright telling Hades that she's going to have her second daughter take the goddess test and be his wife, even though eleven girls have already died in the attempt and Hades ''says'' he wants to just give up rather than see anyone else die for him. There's also the fact that the last girl who was manipulated into an arranged marriage with Hades later begged for death. Throughout the story, there is a lot of emphasis on the fact that being there is Kate's choice. However, the reason she made the deal with Henry in the first place was to save Ava and then the reason she kept the deal was so that he could keep her mother alive and she could spend time with her before she died. Except you find out that both Ava and Diana are Goddesses and were never in any real danger. So that means that while it was technically Kate's choice, her entire choice was based on a lie. Plus the ending reveals that Diana put her daughter through four years of emotional turmoil by making her think that her mother was on the verge of death for years and forcing Kate to take care of her for no reason other than to set her up for the test.
* The "Susannah in New York" epilogue of ''Franchise/TheDarkTower'' series has Susannah going into an alternate reality version of New York where Eddie and Jake are still alive and in fact are brothers. She appears in Central Park at Christmas time, alternate-Eddie greets her with a cup of hot chocolate, and it's clearly supposed to be her happy ending... Except many readers feel that Susannah abandoned the quest and is now trapped in a world that isn't her own with a couple of ReplacementGoldfish who aren't really the people she loved.
* The end of ''Literature/TheDarkIsRising'' sequence is unsatisfying in several ways. The forces of the Dark have been beaten back; all the main characters are OK and have forged a close bond; Bran has grown up normal, decided to stay with his foster-father, and has realised he's attracted to Jane. But not only do five of the Six have to forget that magic exists and never see their beloved Merriman again, the lovely magic of the Light is going to withdraw from the world altogether. And poor John Rowland is going to believe that his wife has suddenly died (which is presented as better than knowing she was an agent of the Dark). Will gets to remember everything because he's an Old One, but he'll have nobody to talk to about it for most of the time.
* Chris Adrian's ''Literature/TheChildrensHospital'' ends with every single adult left on Earth dying, as the global flooding recedes and the children leave the eponymous hospital to inherit their new Earth. The final image is the main character screaming as her newborn child is taken away and she dissolves into ash. Lampshaded throughout the book by the narrator who, as an angel who was once human, is supposed to wholeheartedly accept the end of the world as righteous, but can't quite do so.
* Whatever Evelyn Waugh may say about God's love and the power for redemption in ''Literature/BridesheadRevisited'', the facts remain as such: Sebastian's a hopeless alcoholic, Julia and Charles, having gone through with their respective divorces, decide never to see each other again, and the entire world is going to be inherited by the likes of [[CorruptCorporateExecutive Mottram]] and [[TheScrappy Hooper]].
* ''Literature/TheSoldierSon''. After almost three books of stressing how bad it is for Nevare's soul to be split, he is finally reunited with Soldier's Boy and absorbed by an ancestor tree, together with his beloved Lisana. Is this the end? No, he is split again. Admittedly, that half gets back together with Amzil, marries her and inherits the Nevare estate, but wasn't it bad to have one's personality split? Other issues concern the discovery of gold that draw the Gernians away from the Speck lands: how long before they'll return? And finally, Nevare completely destroys the source of the Plainspeople's magic in the process, sealing their fate. This is given almost no attention.
* Some of the "good" endings in the ''Literature/ChooseYourOwnAdventure'' books merely consists of the main character surviving, stopping the BigBad temporarily, or implying that ''perhaps'' you will have success in the future, leaving many plot points unsolved.
* The final book of ''Literature/TheDemonsLexicon'' has the surviving magicians pulling a mass HeelFaceTurn and joining the Goblin Market. Except we're given no reason to believe that it's genuine with all or even any of them, and they're probably just planning to destroy the Market from within.
* Inverted with Edmond Hamilton's 1932 short story 'The Man Who Evolved', which is traditionally interpreted as having the soul-crushingly nihilistic ending of learning that the human race is doomed to devolve into primordial ooze, and there is nothing that anybody, not even a Sufficiently Advanced super-intelligence, can do to prevent it. However, FridgeLogic shows that there are two ways in which the ending can be interpreted more optimistically: either Pollard continues down the path of Hollywood Evolution, [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence ascending to a higher plane of existence]] and becoming an {{Energy Being|s}} while leaving his body behind as protoplasm, or the story can be interpreted as set in the same universe as Hamilton's later short story, "Devolution", in which microbes are the most advanced forms of life, which developed an interstellar civilization and only got stuck on Earth after they de-evolved into all other forms of life (in which case Pollard could conceivably have retained his augmented intelligence). Note that neither of these interpretations alleviates the horror of Pollard's steady LossOfIdentity as he travels through the EvolutionaryLevels, however.
* The ''Literature/RevelationSpaceSeries'' ends with humanity ([[StarfishAliens with some help]]) defeating the [[AbsoluteXenophobe Inhibitors]], at the cost of fleeing the Milky Way as humanity's rogue [[AIIsACrapShoot Greenfly terraforming robots]] - now uncontained by the Inhibitors - overrun the galaxy, [[HordeOfAlienLocusts breaking apart worlds and anything artificial to turn into greenhouse habitats]] orbiting stars. ''Galactic North'' shows that the Greenfly has begun to expand outside the galaxy. [[EarthAllAlong The Shadows]] in ''Absolution Gap'' explain that their entire local cluster has been effectively overrun by the Greenfly. The author said that this ending was "[[http://web.archive.org/web/20050204072321/http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue406/interview.html actually quite optimistic]]"
* In ''Literature/TheWormOuroboros'', the 'good guy' princes have lots of battles and perform heroic deeds to overcome the 'bad guys'. Having done so, they're bored. So the gods recreate the bad guys so that the good guys can have fun beating them again. And so the world is condemned to an eternity of warfare because otherwise the princes would get bored. This was because the book is specifically inspired by Nordic myth and legend, retaining the [[ProudWarriorRace original source morality]].
* ''Quest for the White Witch'', the final novel in Tanith Lee’s ''Birthgrave'' trilogy, ends with Vazkor finally meeting his neglectful mother. And the two decide that they like each other enough to enter into an incestuous mother/son marriage. This is considered “all right” because they are both essentially deities.
* Creator/GillianFlynn's ''Literature/GoneGirl'' is deliberately written to be this. Amy finally has someone she can be herself with and Nick has the child he always wanted. They may eventually kill each other but, at heart, they're ''both'' sociopaths. This is averted in the film version, where Nick comes across more sympathetically.
* ''Literature/FiftyShadesOfGrey'' is meant to have a happy ending, but many would argue that marrying and starting a family with a controlling abuser is NOT a happy ending.
** The first book actually has a potential ''inversion''; it ends with Ana deciding she and Christian are incompatible and leaving him, which the book treats as a DownerEnding, but many readers see this as a good thing because the relationship is unhealthy and disproportionately skewed in Christian's favor.
* Most of Creator/FlanneryOConnor's works share this trait--but she herself insisted that she was a writer of comic stories, rightly regarded. Again and again, her protagonists (often ironically and grotesquely) lose everything they thought they wanted and valued--their possessions, their dignity, their self-image, even their lives. Burned down back to the foundations, they are left unarmored, often ridiculous and humiliated, but finally open to the [[GoodIsNotNice terrible incursion of God's grace]]. O'Connor famously claimed that ''Literature/WiseBlood'' had a "very hopeful" ending; this reading, though, absolutely depends on understanding the author's and protagonist's priorities, which many readers have trouble internalizing.
* The plays and stories of Creator/AntonChekhov are ostensibly comedies, and they are still considered comedies in Russia. However, many other cultures tend to miss the unsentimental amusem*nt Chekhov takes in his myopic characters and their future, and consider his works much darker, even tragic.
* ''Literature/TheQuantumThief'' trilogy ends with Mieli breaking the Planck Locks with the aid of the [[MineralMacGuffin Kaminari Jewel]] and using her newfound power to create an entirely new universe to all the people on Saturn, including the uploaded minds of Earth's remaining population. Unfortunately, this also means that the heartless Sobornost collective is left to rule the rest of the Solar System unchecked, now that their worst enemies are out of the picture, and it's only a matter of time before they consume all the remaining small civilisations in the System, including Mieli's own people, the Oortians. On the other hand, the story ends with [[RayOfHopeEnding another copy of Jean le Flambeur being released]], which could result in another wrench thrown in Sobornost's plans -- maybe.
* ''The Beast Within: Literature/ATaleOf Beauty's Prince'' does this to the happy ending of Disney's ''WesternAnimation/BeautyAndTheBeast''. The curse is broken, the Beast is human again, and he and Belle are together... except the novella adds a backstory for the Beast that involves dumping his first fiancee for being poor, horrifically abusing his second fiancee and gleefully allowing her family to go to ruin, and ''ordering a hit on a painter'' because he didn't like the fact that the painting reflected the curse on him. Belle never learns about any of this, which means she's unwittingly ending up with someone considerably worse than she thought, while the Beast himself has forgotten his past for reasons never fully explained, meaning there's no chance of him learning from his past or making amends. The ending is still treated as completely happy, but more than a few readers have expressed a wish for Belle to leave the Beast altogether.
* In a similar case to ''The Last Battle'' above, at the end of ''[[Literature/TheBookOfTheDunCow Peace at the Last]]'', almost all of the named sympathetic characters are killed in a LastStand by a mob of corrupted animals. Meanwhile, Wyrm's HatePlague has corrupted the world and divided its animal inhabitants beyond repair. But it's played as a happy ending since they're reunited in the afterlife, along with characters who died in the previous books.
* The ''Literature/ArabianNights'' stories end with Scheherazade living happily ever after with her husband the king. A king who, when he first met Scheherazade, hated women so much that he [[TheBluebeard married a new one every night and then had her executed after sleeping with her]]. Sure, Scheherazade put a stop to all this, but after his past {{serial kill|er}}ings, many readers wonder "WhyWouldAnyoneTakeHimBack?"[[note]]Wealth and power?[[/note]]
* ''Literature/TheTurnerDiaries'' ends with all the world's Jews and non-whites eradicated in a long campaign of nuclear, chemical, and biological warfare, which has also killed 90% of the world's population and no doubt ruined the Earth's ecology beyond repair. Then again, what else could you expect from a poorly-written piece of racist, ultranationalist propaganda? At the very least, the world being bathed in nuclear fallout means that the [[VillainProtagonist protagonists]] are doomed as well.
* ''Literature/{{Victoria}}'': Yay! The heroes survive the collapse of the corrupt multicultural U.S. government and the warring successor states and are free to build their enlightened, traditional Christian society. Where heathens are banished or burned at the stake, Black people can be hanged for a violent crime within a week, and technology created after the 1930s is severely frowned upon, as are women working or getting higher education. Oh, and Victoria will be serving as a training center for a global crusade against Islam.
* ''Literature/TheWumpWorld'', a children's book by Creator/BillPeet, ends with the [[MeaningfulName Pollutians]] abandoning the titular planet, their cities being reclaimed by nature and the Wumps repopulating their world. It's a perfectly good ending for a GreenAesop... if you ignore the fact that the Pollutians are presumably still out there, doing the same thing to ''other'' planets.
* The ''{{Literature/Goosebumps}}'' books were famous for featuring {{Cruel Twist Ending}}s, but ''The Cuckoo Clock of Doom'' has one that's played as happy and upbeat despite being utterly horrifying in implication: After repairing the titular clock and returning to the present, the protagonist discovers that he has inadvertently erased his [[AnnoyingYoungerSibling Annoying Younger Sister]] from existence. This is played as a good thing for him because the girl is portrayed as a real EnfantTerrible and the vast majority of fans ''despise'' her. To them, the ending is a straight-up KarmicTwistEnding that works out happily for the protagonist. Still, it is DisproportionateRetribution to have her actions result in her complete disappearance. While he does say that there's ''probably'' a way to use the clock to revive her, and he'll ''probably'' do it someday, given that he himself was nearly erased the first time he used the clock, what guarantee is there he'll even survive trying, let alone actually succeed?
* In the gothic fantasy novel ''The Binding'', it's strongly implied that the main characters will get to be together, but thanks to some WhatHappenedToTheMouse it's implied that Lucian's father is going to go on sexually abusing his maids and getting away with it and there's also the rather awkward fact that Lucian left his fiancée at the altar without a word of explanation, probably ruining her reputation for life. Plus with the binding library burned down, a lot of people may end up saddled with memories they paid a lot of money to forget about.
* The ''Literature/MaximumRide'' series ends this way. The apocalypse that the main characters have been trying to prevent comes to pass, killing off the majority of the planet's population (including the protagonist's biological mother and sister, the latter of whom was also the love interest for said protagonist's adopted brother), and the new world is a dangerous place inhabited mostly by mutants...but hey, [[OnlyTheLeadsGetAHappyEnding the Flock survived!]] And Max [[BabiesMakeEverythingBetter gave birth to a daughter!]] [[TeenPregnancy At about sixteen]]...and this is all before ''[[SpinOffspring Hawk]]'' came out and hit it with a HappyEndingOverride.
* One of the major reasons the epilogue of ''Franchise/HarryPotter'' is a big source of EndingAversion is this trope, as it ends up being almost tooth-rottenly cheerful despite the many issues from the book that remain apparently intact. The House system at Hogwarts, which has been demonstrated many times in the very last book to be [[AbsurdlyDividedSchool needlessly divisive and enabling a toxic environment of tribalism]], hasn't changed one iota; the Malfoys are still around (and by extension, probably other Death Eaters as well); the {{Masquerade}} remains firmly in place; and even slavery of the House-Elves is still so accepted that Harry still has one. Add in [[InferredHolocaust the likely massive death toll]] from the events of the last book and the established low numbers of wizards in general, and it's not unlikely that wizards are heading towards extinction.
* ''Literature/TheirEyesWereWatchingGod'': So the great love of Janie's life is dead, she is socially stigmatized by her community, she had surrendered just about everything she had to be with her love, and now she returns to the place she had started from.
to:
[[folder:Literature]]* Creator/HarlanEllison claims that the ending of ''Literature/IHaveNoMouthAndIMustScream'' is intended to be happy. Sure, the narrator ends by saying the title line in utter despair, after mercy-killing every other remaining human in the world, but he's so [[UnreliableNarrator unreliable]] he hasn't realized that his actions represent the final triumph of the human spirit. The game makes it into more a BittersweetEnding, with the humans finally taking down AM and settling into the duty of being a watchdog for the [=AIs=] as they await the reawakening of the humans on the moon.little
* By all accounts, Creator/HansChristianAndersen [[CreatorBreakdown was a very depressed man]]. Out of all his fairy tales, there are only a few with unambiguously happy endings.
** ''Literature/TheLittleMermaid'' (not [[{{Disneyfication}} the Disney version]]). The mermaid is turned into "daughter of air" with the prospect of eventually entering Heaven, very probably a result of revision by Andersen. Initially this was the selected ending, even put in the working title, but there was a happily reworked version in which the mermaid apparently just dissolved into foam in the end. Even the happier version has the FridgeHorror of knowing that the [[DeaderThanDead dissolving into foam]] fate is eventually going to befall the Little Mermaid's sisters and family if they don't act as she did.a
** ''Literature/TheLittleMatchGirl''. TooGoodForThisSinfulEarth turned UpToEleven. The tone of the ending is [[BittersweetEnding very sad for the townspeople who discover her frozen corpse, but happy for the girl as she has ascended into Heaven]]. As such, some remakes from our more cynical times either rewrite it to give her more materialistic HappyEnding ([[DeusExMachina somehow]]) or portray it as a truly tear-jerking DownerEnding. [[Literature/{{Hogfather}} Even Death can't stand it.]]whose
** While not nearly as dark as the two above, one has to question just how HappilyEverAfter the Prince in ''Literature/ThePrincessAndThePea'' is actually going to live with his new bride. Someone who complains about a single pea under 40 mattresses has got to be ''ridiculously'' high-maintenance.
* ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'':
** It's explored in ''Literature/WitchesAbroad'' where Lilith gives what is usually considered to be a happy ending to people whether they want it or not. This includes convincing a wolf it's human so that it nearly starves to death and goes insane, since it can't live as either human or wolf now, so that it would eat a grandmother and dress up like her a la ''Little Red Riding Hood''. By the time the three witches arrive, all the Big Bad Wolf wants is ''[[SuicideByCop an ending]]''.
** Intentionally played in ''Literature/{{Eric}}'' which ends by saying that three wishes provided a happy ending for most of the people they've affected and giving as examples the Tezumen, who continue to slaughter people but no longer do so because of religion so they don't need to get up so early; the Tsorteans and Ephebians, war is over, allowing them to prepare for the next one; the demons and damned souls, who get back to inflicting/experiencing material punishment on immaterial spirit in the knowledge that at least it's not Astfgl's psychological torture; and Astfgl himself, who as Life President of Hell gets to spend his time writing policy statements entirely unaware that the rest of the demonic lowerarchy is completely ignoring him. What happened to our actual protagonists, we don't get told beyond "It could be worse". Lampshaded by the last two lines "And this too was happiness. Of a sort." The
* Creator/RobertSilverberg's stories fall into this occasionally because his personal philosophy is so different from how most people (or at least most modern Western readers) view life and humanity. A particularly jarring example is ''The Face Upon Waters''--the main character spends most of the story trying to maintain his cultural identity after the destruction of Earth and the scattering of its people, but ultimately concludes that people should adapt to whatever culture they live amongst... and joins up with TheCorruption[=/=]AssimilationPlot, which has a stated goal of assimilating everyone it can and killing everyone it can't.being
* ''Literature/AGirlCalledBlue'' is about girls growing up in a strict home for children in 1960s Ireland (run by sad*st Nuns). The book ends with Blue rejoicing that she's finally found a family of her own. Except the "family" is two people she's met twice and they're not allowed to adopt her so she has to wait three years before she's old enough to leave the school with them only allowed to visit her twice a year. Also three of her best friends have now left, one drowned, another going back to live with her father and the last being sent to another school and she has been forced to sleep alone in a cramped room, and will likely still have to endure plenty more abuse from the nuns for the next three years. Oh and she never finds out who her real mother is either and the nuns will keep abusing children for many years in Ireland.important
* The ending of Creator/CSLewis's final [[Literature/TheChroniclesOfNarnia Narnia]] book, ''Literature/TheLastBattle'', qualified as this for many young readers. Narnia ends, and everyone except Susan dies. Some minor characters are tormented and destroyed by a horrific many-armed GodOfEvil, while others are judged unworthy and vanish forever into Aslan's shadow. [[OnlyTheLeadsGetAHappyEnding But the people don't care about that]] because they all go to the "real" Narnia (a stand-in for heaven) as the Christian subtext becomes text. It can be uplifting or inspire nightmares, depending on which scenes stick with you. (Creator/NeilGaiman brilliantly deconstructed this in his short story ''Literature/TheProblemOfSusan'', in which he shows what happened to Susan after her siblings died in a train crash and she had to [[BodyHorror identify their corpses]].)
* Creator/RoaldDahl's ''Literature/TheWitches''. The protagonist learns that he's stuck as a mouse and that mice don't live very long, but he's happy because he'll probably die near the same time as his elderly grandmother and doesn't care about living if he's not with her; they will live out their lives tracking down and destroying other witches together. The two also ponder Bruno's fate. One states that his mouse-hating mother probably drowned him in a bucket, but nobody seems very disturbed by this possibility. The [[Film/TheWitches1990 1990 movie]] has an unabashed happy ending where the last witch, who had undergone a HeelFaceTurn, undoes the mouse spell on the protagonist and is implied to do the same to Bruno. While many were appreciative of this happier ending, Roald Dahl was infamously ''not''.ends with the
* Coupled with ValuesDissonance for ''Literature/ALittlePrincess''. The book ends with Sara being restored to her wealth while Becky becomes her personal attendant. Oh and [[sad*stTeacher Miss Minchin]] gets [[KarmaHoudini away with treating them like prisoners]]. However, if one takes into context the period the story is set in (Victorian London) then Becky going from little better than a slave to a powerful position in the household (with a kind and generous mistress too) where she would get a roof over her head and financial security, it's a happy ending for Becky indeed. And while Miss Minchin doesn't get an over-the-top instant comeuppance (save in the film adaptations, which pretty much need one) it's worth remembering that not only has she irrevocably lost her chance at a pupil who could've single-handedly ensured her school's success and her own financial comfort for life; once Sara's story becomes common knowledge in her social circle--as it inevitably will--Minchin's reputation will be in tatters and her school likely ruined. There's also a WhatHappenedToTheMouse for Melchisedec the rat and his family; one hopes kindhearted Sara will remember them and send Ram Dass over there with bread crumbs.
* At the end of ''Literature/AtlasShrugged,'' Galt's Gulch is the only non-Crapsack place left in the whole world. Which is great, because all of the looters and moochers are gone and the good people can rebuild the world, right? Then you remember the [[InferredHolocaust millions of innocent children who were left to starve...]] (Then again, by the book's morality, this is the looters' and moochers' fault rather than anything to blame on the protagonists...)
* ''Literature/RomanceOfTheThreeKingdoms.'' Shu, Wei, and Wu are united into one at last and peace throughout the entire country of China can finally begin. Unfortunately the victors are a splinter group of Wei who usurped the throne, conquered Wu and Shu who at the time were being ruled by Liu Shan (a truly incompetent ruler who defiles everything Shu originally stood for) and Sun Hao (a tyrant almost as bad as Dong Zhuo). The kicker? When these two surrendered they were given lucrative positions and the readers were told they lived out their remaining lives in luxury. To be fair though this novel closely follows the real-life events in history and not a lot could be changed. And historically, the hard-fought reunification of China ended a decade or two later with [[HereWeGoAgain a new barbarian invasion.]] Also, the war to unify China was itself one of the bloodiest in human history, killing (by highest estimates) 74% of China's population, more people than the Second World War. The victors ruled dust and ashes.
* Back when ''The Iron Giant'' was a book instead of [[WesternAnimation/TheIronGiant a movie]], it ended with an encounter with a dragon-like alien that sang in a hypnotic manner. It sang loud enough that the entire world heard it, and everyone in the world spent the rest of their lives alternately taking care of necessities and listening to the song. It's specified that all war was completely eliminated, and the implication would be that art and culture vanished too. If the wording is to be taken literally, people didn't even converse with each other. Now, does this sound {{Utopia}}n, or more like a nightmare?
* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'':
** The last book gave Jacob, who suffered from unrequited love for Bella and who vehemently hated imprinting, his own happy romantic ending by having him imprint on Bella's newborn daughter Nessie. Oh, don't worry; Nessie grows really fast, so she'll be physically 17 years old in 7 years and ready to start a relationship with her "Uncle Jake" then! And what of Jake's loss of free will? Who cares as long as he's still (forced to be) in Bella's life!
** Also, [[InherentInTheSystem there's apparently no good way to get rid of the Volturi or vampires like them]]. Given that the Volturi are growing more and more afraid of human technology, and more and more inclined to lash out at humanity, this is a ''very bad thing''. Das-Sporking's MST, when it gets to the end of ''Breaking Dawn'', points out that their "victory" at the end really isn't one, as while the Volturi are gone ''for now'', they have been given all the information needed to defeat the Cullens should they come around again.
** On a more personal note, Nessie is hardly the "perfect ending" for the rest of the Cullens that Meyer claims. Esme and Rose want biological children of their own to care for and raise. Nessie is already nearly at adult-level independence within weeks of birth, and she's ''Bella's'' daughter, not theirs. Nessie also can't bring back Alice's human memories, she has almost no relationship with any of the other male Cullens, etc. Meyer seems to think that Nessie fixes everything just by existing, but realistically she creates many, many more problems than she fixes for them.
* ''Literature/BendSinister'' by Creator/VladimirNabokov protagonist arrested by his nation's totalitarian government, and his young son horrifically killed by a crowd of mental patients--on film!--due to a ''clerical error''. But then Nabokov [[{{Metafiction}} reaches through the layers of reality]] and gives his main character the gift of insanity to make him forget all his pain. The novel ends with Adam Krug, as a result of his insanity, rushing the dictator and being shot to death. Nabokov, however, refuses to write this conclusion (after implying its inevitability) and instead describes his room and decides to go mothing. It's a strange case of being incapable of giving Krug a happy ending (even the insanity so benevolently bestowed upon him results directly in his being killed), and so at least giving him the consolation prize of not writing it at all, and therefore not allowing it to happen. It's about as esoteric as a 'happy ending' can get.other than
* ''Literature/LeftBehind'' gets this a lot for its ending where not only are all non-Christians sent to FireAndBrimstoneHell, but the paradise where all the protagonists end up is depicted as a faintly creepy commune where you can no longer eat meat or form relationships with anyone you want, and nobody experiences any strong emotions love of God. [[ValuesDissonance The writers treat this as a utopia.]]the
* Nearly all of Zilpha Keatley Snyder's books have one of these. Save Literature/GreenSkyTrilogy, and only because she was deluged with mail, realized she made a big goof, and authorized a sequel in the form of a video game, possibly the first video game to be acknowledged as {{Canon}} for something written in another medium.they
* Creator/HPLovecraft's works:
** "Celephais," which ends with the main character finally returning to the wondrous dream-city that he created in his youth where he is appointed the chief god of all of the regions of Dream; and all he had to do was fall off a cliff and let the tides cast his corpse upon the rocks. Lovecraft {{lampshade|Hanging}}s this later in ''Literature/TheDreamQuestOfUnknownKadath'' when ''that'' story's protagonist meets this exact character who's since come to regret his decision but obviously can never go back.
** The sheer ValuesDissonance of applying this trope to "The Street" is why it's almost impossible to find it in print, as it involves treating the spontaneous collapse of an overcrowded slum that [[KillEmAll kills everybody living there]] as a good thing. Why? Because A: it used to be a beautiful Colonial country lane line with rosebushes and is now a dirty slum, and B: all of the people living in it are [[EvilForeigner dirty non-WASP immigrants ungratefully plotting revolution against America for taking them in]]... at least, [[TakeOurWordForIt so the narration says are]].have
* ''Literature/{{Mindswap}}'' by Creator/RobertSheckley. The protagonist is in the corrupted world but believes he has succeeded in his mission and has returned home.
* ''Literature/HushHush'' has a great happy ending, if you ignore the fact that part of Nora's house was burned down, there's a ClingyJealousGirl of a fallen angel after her, and that she is blissfully dating the guy who spent the book stalking her, sexually harassing her, and outright attempting to ''murder her''.
* At the end of ''Literature/TheGoddessTest'', Kate's beloved mother is actually the goddess Demeter, so she and her mother can be together for eternity. Sounds great, huh? Except if you think back to the prologue, where we hear Demeter outright telling Hades that she's going to her second daughter take the goddess test and be his wife, even though eleven girls have already died in the attempt and Hades ''says'' he wants to just give up rather than see anyone else die for him. There's also the fact that the last girl who was manipulated into an arranged marriage with Hades later begged for death. Throughout the story, there is a lot of emphasis on the fact that being there is Kate's choice. However, the reason she made the deal with Henry in the first place was to save Ava and then the reason she kept the deal was so that he could keep her mother alive and she could spend time with her before she died. Except you find out that both Ava and Diana are Goddesses and were never in any real danger. So that means that while it was technically Kate's choice, her entire choice was based on a lie. Plus the ending reveals that Diana put her daughter through four years of emotional turmoil by making her think that her mother was on the verge of death for years and forcing Kate to take care of her for no reason other than to set her up for the test.their respective
* The "Susannah in New York" epilogue of ''Franchise/TheDarkTower'' series has Susannah going into an alternate reality version of New York where Eddie and Jake are still alive and in fact are brothers. She appears in Central Park at Christmas time, alternate-Eddie greets her with a cup of hot chocolate, and it's clearly supposed to be her happy ending... Except many readers feel that Susannah abandoned the quest and is now trapped in a world that isn't her own with a couple of ReplacementGoldfish who aren't really the people she loved.
* The end of ''Literature/TheDarkIsRising'' sequence is unsatisfying in several ways. The forces of the Dark have been beaten back; all the main characters are OK and have forged a close bond; Bran has grown up normal, decided to stay with his foster-father, and has realised he's attracted to Jane. But not only do five of the Six have to forget that magic exists and never see their beloved Merriman again, the lovely magic of the Light is going to withdraw from the world altogether. And poor John Rowland is going to believe that his wife has suddenly died (which is presented as better than knowing she was an agent of the Dark). Will gets to remember everything because he's an Old One, but he'll have nobody to talk to about it for most of the time.
* Chris Adrian's ''Literature/TheChildrensHospital'' ends with every single adult left on Earth dying, as the global flooding recedes and the children leave the eponymous hospital to inherit their new Earth. The final image is the main character screaming as her newborn child is taken away and she dissolves into ash. Lampshaded throughout the book by the narrator who, as an angel who was once human, is supposed to wholeheartedly accept the end of the world as righteous, but can't quite do so.
* Whatever Evelyn Waugh may say about God's love and the power for redemption in ''Literature/BridesheadRevisited'', the facts remain as such: Sebastian's a hopeless alcoholic, Julia and Charles, having gone through with divorces, decide never to see each other again, and the entire world is going to be inherited by the likes of [[CorruptCorporateExecutive Mottram]] and [[TheScrappy Hooper]].but
* ''Literature/TheSoldierSon''. After almost three books of stressing how bad it is for Nevare's soul to be split, he is finally reunited with Soldier's Boy and absorbed by an ancestor tree, together with his beloved Lisana. Is this the end? No, he is split again. Admittedly, that half gets back together with Amzil, marries her and inherits the Nevare estate, wasn't it bad to have one's personality split? Other issues concern the discovery of gold that draw the Gernians away from the Speck lands: how long before they'll return? And finally, Nevare completely destroys the source of the Plainspeople's magic in the process, sealing their fate. This is given almost no attention.even
* Some of the "good" endings in the ''Literature/ChooseYourOwnAdventure'' books merely consists of the main character surviving, stopping the BigBad temporarily, or implying that ''perhaps'' you will have success in the future, leaving many plot points unsolved.
* The final book of ''Literature/TheDemonsLexicon'' has the surviving magicians pulling a mass HeelFaceTurn and joining the Goblin Market. Except we're given no reason to believe that it's genuine with all or any of them, and they're probably just planning to destroy the Market from within.
* Inverted with Edmond Hamilton's 1932 short story 'The Man Who Evolved', which is traditionally interpreted as having the soul-crushingly nihilistic ending of learning that the human race is doomed to devolve into primordial ooze, and there is nothing that anybody, not even a Sufficiently Advanced super-intelligence, can do to prevent it. However, FridgeLogic shows that there are two ways in which the ending can be interpreted more optimistically: either Pollard continues down the path of Hollywood Evolution, [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence ascending to a higher plane of existence]] and becoming an {{Energy Being|s}} while leaving his body behind as protoplasm, or the story can be interpreted as set in the same universe as Hamilton's later short story, "Devolution", in which microbes are the most advanced forms of life, which developed an interstellar civilization and only got stuck on Earth after they de-evolved into all other forms of life (in which case Pollard could conceivably have retained his augmented intelligence). Note that neither of these interpretations alleviates the horror of Pollard's steady LossOfIdentity as he travels through the EvolutionaryLevels, however.
* The ''Literature/RevelationSpaceSeries'' ends with humanity ([[StarfishAliens with some help]]) defeating the [[AbsoluteXenophobe Inhibitors]], at the cost of fleeing the Milky Way as humanity's rogue [[AIIsACrapShoot Greenfly terraforming robots]] - now uncontained by the Inhibitors - overrun the galaxy, [[HordeOfAlienLocusts breaking apart worlds and anything artificial to turn into greenhouse habitats]] orbiting stars. ''Galactic North'' shows that the Greenfly has begun to expand outside the galaxy. [[EarthAllAlong The Shadows]] in ''Absolution Gap'' explain that their entire local cluster has been effectively overrun by the Greenfly. The author said that this ending was "[[http://web.archive.org/web/20050204072321/http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue406/interview.html actually quite optimistic]]"
* In ''Literature/TheWormOuroboros'', the 'good guy' princes have lots of battles and perform heroic deeds to overcome the 'bad guys'. Having done so, they're bored. So the gods recreate the bad guys so that the good guys can have fun beating them again. And so the world is condemned to an eternity of warfare because otherwise the princes would get bored. This was because the book is specifically inspired by Nordic myth and legend, retaining the [[ProudWarriorRace original source morality]].
* ''Quest for the White Witch'', the final novel in Tanith Lee’s ''Birthgrave'' trilogy, ends with Vazkor finally meeting his neglectful mother. And the two decide that they like each other enough to enter into an incestuous mother/son marriage. This is considered “all right” because they are both essentially deities.
* Creator/GillianFlynn's ''Literature/GoneGirl'' is deliberately written to be this. Amy finally has someone she can be herself with and Nick has the child he always wanted. They may eventually kill each other but, at heart, they're ''both'' sociopaths. This is averted in the film version, where Nick comes across more sympathetically.
* ''Literature/FiftyShadesOfGrey'' is meant to have a happy ending, but many would argue that marrying and starting a family with a controlling abuser is NOT a happy ending.
** The first book actually has a potential ''inversion''; it ends with Ana deciding she and Christian are incompatible and leaving him, which the book treats as a DownerEnding, but many readers see this as a good thing because the relationship is unhealthy and disproportionately skewed in Christian's favor.
* Most of Creator/FlanneryOConnor's works share this trait--but she herself insisted that she was a writer of comic stories, rightly regarded. Again and again, her protagonists (often ironically and grotesquely) lose everything they thought they wanted and valued--their possessions, their dignity, their self-image, even their lives. Burned down back to the foundations, they are left unarmored, often ridiculous and humiliated, but finally open to the [[GoodIsNotNice terrible incursion of God's grace]]. O'Connor famously claimed that ''Literature/WiseBlood'' had a "very hopeful" ending; this reading, though, absolutely depends on understanding the author's and protagonist's priorities, which many readers have trouble internalizing.
* The plays and stories of Creator/AntonChekhov are ostensibly comedies, and they are still considered comedies in Russia. However, many other cultures tend to miss the unsentimental amusem*nt Chekhov takes in his myopic characters and their future, and consider his works much darker, even tragic.
* ''Literature/TheQuantumThief'' trilogy ends with Mieli breaking the Planck Locks with the aid of the [[MineralMacGuffin Kaminari Jewel]] and using her newfound power to create an entirely new universe to all the people on Saturn, including the uploaded minds of Earth's remaining population. Unfortunately, this also means that the heartless Sobornost collective is left to rule the rest of the Solar System unchecked, now that their worst enemies are out of the picture, and it's only a matter of time before they consume all the remaining small civilisations in the System, including Mieli's own people, the Oortians. On the other hand, the story ends with [[RayOfHopeEnding another copy of Jean le Flambeur being released]], which could result in another wrench thrown in Sobornost's plans -- maybe.
* ''The Beast Within: Literature/ATaleOf Beauty's Prince'' does this to the happy ending of Disney's ''WesternAnimation/BeautyAndTheBeast''. The curse is broken, the Beast is human again, and he and Belle are together... except the novella adds a backstory for the Beast that involves dumping his first fiancee for being poor, horrifically abusing his second fiancee and gleefully allowing her family to go to ruin, and ''ordering a hit on a painter'' because he didn't like the fact that the painting reflected the curse on him. Belle never learns about any of this, which means she's unwittingly ending up with someone considerably worse than she thought, while the Beast himself has forgotten his past for reasons never fully explained, meaning there's no chance of him learning from his past or making amends. The ending is still treated as completely happy, but more than a few readers have expressed a wish for Belle to leave the Beast altogether.
* In a similar case to ''The Last Battle'' above, at the end of ''[[Literature/TheBookOfTheDunCow Peace at the Last]]'', almost all of the named sympathetic characters are killed in a LastStand by a mob of corrupted animals. Meanwhile, Wyrm's HatePlague has corrupted the world and divided its animal inhabitants beyond repair. But it's played as a happy ending since they're reunited in the afterlife, along with characters who died in the previous books.
* The ''Literature/ArabianNights'' stories end with Scheherazade living happily ever after with her husband the king. A king who, when he first met Scheherazade, hated women so much that he [[TheBluebeard married a new one every night and then had her executed after sleeping with her]]. Sure, Scheherazade put a stop to all this, but after his past {{serial kill|er}}ings, many readers wonder "WhyWouldAnyoneTakeHimBack?"[[note]]Wealth and power?[[/note]]
* ''Literature/TheTurnerDiaries'' ends with all the world's Jews and non-whites eradicated in a long campaign of nuclear, chemical, and biological warfare, which has also killed 90% of the world's population and no doubt ruined the Earth's ecology beyond repair. Then again, what else could you expect from a poorly-written piece of racist, ultranationalist propaganda? At the very least, the world being bathed in nuclear fallout means that the [[VillainProtagonist protagonists]] are doomed as well.
* ''Literature/{{Victoria}}'': Yay! The heroes survive the collapse of the corrupt multicultural U.S. government and the warring successor states and are free to build their enlightened, traditional Christian society. Where heathens are banished or burned at the stake, Black people can be hanged for a violent crime within a week, and technology created after the 1930s is severely frowned upon, as are women working or getting higher education. Oh, and Victoria will be serving as a training center for a global crusade against Islam.
* ''Literature/TheWumpWorld'', a children's book by Creator/BillPeet, ends with the [[MeaningfulName Pollutians]] abandoning the titular planet, their cities being reclaimed by nature and the Wumps repopulating their world. It's a perfectly good ending for a GreenAesop... if you ignore the fact that the Pollutians are presumably still out there, doing the same thing to ''other'' planets.
* The ''{{Literature/Goosebumps}}'' books were famous for featuring {{Cruel Twist Ending}}s, but ''The Cuckoo Clock of Doom'' has one that's played as happy and upbeat despite being utterly horrifying in implication: After repairing the titular clock and returning to the present, the protagonist discovers that he has inadvertently erased his [[AnnoyingYoungerSibling Annoying Younger Sister]] from existence. This is played as a good thing for him because the girl is portrayed as a real EnfantTerrible and the vast majority of fans ''despise'' her. To them, the ending is a straight-up KarmicTwistEnding that works out happily for the protagonist. Still, it is DisproportionateRetribution to have her actions result in her complete disappearance. While he does say that there's ''probably'' a way to use the clock to revive her, and he'll ''probably'' do it someday, given that he himself was nearly erased the first time he used the clock, what guarantee is there he'll even survive trying, let alone actually succeed?
* In the gothic fantasy novel ''The Binding'', it's strongly implied that the main characters will get to be together, but thanks to some WhatHappenedToTheMouse it's implied that Lucian's father is going to go on sexually abusing his maids and getting away with it and there's also the rather awkward fact that Lucian left his fiancée at the altar without a word of explanation, probably ruining her reputation for life. Plus with the binding library burned down, a lot of people may end up saddled with memories they paid a lot of money to forget about.
* The ''Literature/MaximumRide'' series ends this way. The apocalypse that the main characters have been trying to prevent comes to pass, killing off the majority of the planet's population (including the protagonist's biological mother and sister, the latter of whom was also the love interest for said protagonist's adopted brother), and the new world is a dangerous place inhabited mostly by mutants...but hey, [[OnlyTheLeadsGetAHappyEnding the Flock survived!]] And Max [[BabiesMakeEverythingBetter gave birth to a daughter!]] [[TeenPregnancy At about sixteen]]...and this is all before ''[[SpinOffspring Hawk]]'' came out and hit it with a HappyEndingOverride.
* One of the major reasons the epilogue of ''Franchise/HarryPotter'' is a big source of EndingAversion is this trope, as it ends up being almost tooth-rottenly cheerful despite the many issues from the book that remain apparently intact. The House system at Hogwarts, which has been demonstrated many times in the very last book to be [[AbsurdlyDividedSchool needlessly divisive and enabling a toxic environment of tribalism]], hasn't changed one iota; the Malfoys are still around (and by extension, probably other Death Eaters as well); the {{Masquerade}} remains firmly in place; and even slavery of the House-Elves is still so accepted that Harry still has one. Add in [[InferredHolocaust the likely massive death toll]] from the events of the last book and the established low numbers of wizards in general, and it's not unlikely that wizards are heading towards extinction.
* ''Literature/TheirEyesWereWatchingGod'': So the great love of Janie's life is dead, she is socially stigmatized by her community, she had surrendered just about everything she had to be with her love, and now she returns to the place she had started from.
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%%* The finale of ''Series/XenaWarriorPrincess''. The writers were actually booed at the final screening.
* ''Series/The100'' ends with the remnants of humanity being assimilated (or “[[InsistentTerminology ascended]]”) into an alien hive mind, becoming immortal “beings of light” without pain or individuality. The explicit other option is the aliens exterminating humanity with an unstoppable chemical weapon. However, Clarke can’t “ascend“, due to the hive mind seeing her crimes as too grave (Clarke herself points out how arbitrary this logic is), so her friends stay behind to live mortal lives on Earth with her. However, the hive mind explicitly states that they can’t have any children and won’t be able to ascend when they die. In the view of most fans, this essentially means humanity has been condemned to extinction in all but the most technical of terms, rendering all of the struggle of the series moot. Clarke and her friends will die without a future or a legacy, and the last one to die will die miserably alone. Meanwhile, the genocidal alien hive mind [[TheBadGuyWins is free to continue its campaign of assimilating species and exterminating those it finds unworthy]].
* In ''Series/BabylonFive'', Marcus Cole sacrifices his life to save that of his beloved Susan Ivanova, using an alien machine that transfers LifeEnergy. His body was placed in cold storage, however, and there was a strong implication that he was OnlyMostlyDead until they could work out a way to replace his LifeEnergy without killing someone else. Creator/JMichaelStraczynski then wrote a prose spin-off short story "Time, Death and the Incurable Romantic", in which Marcus does get resurrected, three hundred years after Susan's death. He then steals Susan's DNA from her tomb, has a duplicate of her created, implants it with Susan's memories up to shortly before the incident that led to her life-threatening injury, and maroons them both on an uninhabited planet, deceiving the duplicate into believing that she's the original Susan and it's still 2261. This was apparently considered to be a happy ending for both of them, but it absolutely horrified many fans who saw it as a grotesque, abusive violation of the duplicate's right to self-determination.
* ''Series/{{Battlestar Galactica|2003}}'''s finale is both very religious and very LuddWasRight, pissing off most of the sci-fi fans who'd watched it (if only because without modern technology, most of the survivors would have greatly shortened life expectancies and greatly reduced quality of life). The fans were even more irritated that this development came completely out of the blue, without foreshadowing or any anti-technology message in previous episodes. WordOfGod is that no {{anvilicious}} message was intended, but that it was just a last-minute fix to explain the lack of remains of the Fleet.
* ''Series/DegrassiTheNextGeneration'': Spinner and Emma's AccidentalMarriage (and deciding to STAY MARRIED). Especially frustrating, since the characters [[StrangledByTheRedString hardly even interacted before that]].
* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E2Mindwarp Mindwarp]]" ends with Peri's body becoming the host to Kiv's brain before King Yrcanos supposedly finishes her. However, it is revealed later in the season that Peri in fact did not die and actually went on to rule Krontep alongside Yrcanos as his queen. While this is portrayed as a good thing, it should be noted that Peri showed no interest in Yrcanos the entire story and objected to the notion of becoming his wife. Expanded material has offered different versions of what becomes of Peri, though Creator/NicolaBryant prefers her original fate in "Mindwarp".
** In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E10LoveAndMonsters Love & Monsters]]," one of the characters becomes a face on a paving slab ([[ItMakesSenseInContext long story]]) and she cannot move, eat or feel. [[FridgeHorror She also will never age.]] Worse, it's stated that she and her human boyfriend [[{{Squick}} still have a love life]]. This is presented as a good fate for the character. On the other hand, WordOfGod has said her boyfriend is an UnreliableNarrator, so there's the possibility that she hasn't suffered this fate. Instead, it may be that she and the rest of their friends are dead and her boyfriend's gone insane from the events of the episode. As for the slab...best not to think too hard about it.
** At the end of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E10Blink Blink]]," Sally has a photo of a Weeping Angel, but in season 5, we find out that Weeping Angels can project themselves through images, meaning that that photo is probably going to turn into another Angel. Fortunately, Sally gave that photo to the Doctor, who can hopefully dispose of it. But regarding the ''original'' Angels, the only thing keeping them immobilized is one bare lightbulb, which could burn out at any moment, and which ''they telepathically turned off earlier in the episode''. Yeah, WordOfGod made the situation less ominous by describing the Angels in "Blink" as weak scavengers, but there are always more Weeping Angels out there. [[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou Any statue could be a Weeping Angel]] -- maybe they ''[[ParanoiaFuel all]]'' are! ([[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking On a less dire note]], the "happy" ending features Sally and Larry making a living by running a video store...which probably is going to end up failing, since the episode took place in 2007, right before video stores started becoming obsolete.)
** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E13LastOfTheTimeLords Last of the Time Lords]]." So the Doctor defeats the Master, hits the ResetButton, and the entire Year of Hell has been undone. This is easily the happiest season ending of any in the RTD era. It wouldn't even be all that esoteric except for a few "little" things. Martha Jones and her family still remember this horrific, PTSD-inducing year. America still lost its President (who, despite being an unflattering {{Expy}} of UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush, seemed like a good man who didn't deserve to die). Britain lost its best political minds when the Master gassed them all, and also lost a courageous woman whom the Toclafane tortured to death for resisting the Master. And speaking of the Toclafane, the final, definitive fate for humanity is that in the last generation, all of the humans (even the best of them) will within that generation degenerate into monstrous, childish thrill-killers, [[ShootTheShaggyDog making everything on the show that has anything to do with humanity feel completely pointless.]]
** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS35E12HellBent Hell Bent]]" (the Series 9 finale) has the Twelfth Doctor defy his people and risk all time and space to save Clara Oswald from her fixed-point death by removing her from her timestream just before she dies, intending to mind wipe her of memories of him and return her to Earth. In the BittersweetEnding, the Doctor repents and ends up being mind-wiped of memories of her, leaving him free to move on with his life, while the now-functionally immortal Clara ends up with her own TARDIS and fellow functional immortal Ashildr/Me. She decides to go back to Gallifrey and her death "the long way 'round" in pursuit of new adventures, as the universe will hold together so long as she returns at ''some'' point. The problems with this come from several angles, only one of which was addressed in the televised continuity by this Doctor's GrandFinale and departure of writer/showrunner Creator/StevenMoffat, meaning they might ''never'' be revisited:
*** Clara can never return to her old life on Earth; though by this point it meant little to her compared to a life of adventure, it's still pretty sad for her loved ones and colleagues who will only know her to have died a mysterious death. And since the universe ''is'' holding together, what finally gets Clara to return to her '''extremely painful''' death? Will she remember she has to go back? Be forced into it? Screw up so badly that death seems the only way to atone?
*** The Doctor didn't take Me on as a companion because as a virtual immortal himself both of them would become detached from mortals and even ''villainous'' -- a problem she was already struggling with and an indirect contributor to Clara's death (she was TrappedInVillainy and had to betray the Doctor, and Clara messed that up). Thus, the women could become what the Doctor feared -- and he wouldn't be able to stop them -- unless they acquire mortal companions. As well, can Clara be happy with a companion who's virtually an anti-Doctor given how much she came to love and need him?
*** After millennia spent pining for them and defending them, the Doctor is now a fugitive from his people and Gallifrey -- again -- for his actions during his SanitySlippage. Rassilon and his cronies are the types who would seek {{Revenge}} for his bloodlessly overthrowing and exiling them, and The Doctor left a power vacuum at the top by abandoning his Lord President post.
*** The Doctor suffered mightily just to save Clara, as depicted in "Heaven Sent". EarnYourHappyEnding should come into play given how the Whoniverse tends to work, but instead he, a '''torture victim''', is given NoSympathy whereas ''Rassilon the murdering dictator'' is. He gives up his TragicDream, and undergoes MindRape -- whereupon Clara and Ashildr/Me ''randomly dump him on Earth'', leaving him wandering about reconstructing the few Clara-related memories he retains and seeking his TARDIS, last seen abandoned in London. The FramingDevice has Clara (whom he no longer recognizes) return the TARDIS to him and he moves on, but he isn't rewarded for choosing the path of right ''and'' has been robbed of his right to grieve and rage. As it's unknown how much time passes between this story and "The Husbands of River Song", how long is the Doctor left bereft and brooding without a MoralityChain (a key reason why he went crazy)? Sure, he has the TARDIS, but it can't hug him. For the record, the MindRape is the ''one'' aspect of this ending addressed and undone (and only at the ''very'' end of the Twelfth Doctor's life, shortly before he regenerates).
** In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS36E2Smile "Smile"]], the Emojibots and Vardy kill a whole bunch of people due to not understanding that grief isn't a virus, but they end up being reset and agreeing to a contract with the awakened colonists afterwards. Problem is, nowhere there do we see the Doctor address the original problem at all, so there's no reason to believe the robots won't do the same thing after someone else dies in a few weeks/months/years' time. Nor does he explain to most of the colonists that their friends and family might be dead after the massive misunderstanding either.
** Later in the same season, [[Recap/DoctorWhoS36E8TheLieOfTheLand "The Lie of the Land"]] ends with Bill Potts undoing her DealWithTheDevil with the Monks; they not only flee Earth and free humanity from enslavement but cause almost everyone on the planet to forget the events of the past six months, with the Doctor and Bill among very few exceptions. Unfortunately, during those six months, dissenters to the Monks were imprisoned, forced into labor camps, and even executed. What will become of people who lost loved ones but can't remember what became of them and why, and of the still-living victims of the Monks' reign? Worse, Bill and the Doctor technically have culpability in the Monks' reign of terror. Granted, she made her deal to save the doomed Doctor's life partially because she knew he was their last best hope to get rid of the Monks altogether. He served as the Monks' PropagandaMachine only as a cover for his resultant plan. But they still ought to feel remorse over all the people who suffered and died in the interim; instead they're more concerned with her overdue essay on free will (overdue ''because'' of the Monks). Suddenly "Last of the Time Lords"' ResetButton, though imperfect, doesn't seem so bad.
** Years after [[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E9TheFamilyOfBlood "The Family of Blood"]] came out, the current writers wrote an "epilogue" where Thirteen rescues Sister of Mine from the mirror. Yay, a little girl can go on to have a happy life! ...except that's ''not'' a little girl, that is a homicidal alien who ''killed'' a little girl and ''possessed her corpse''. Thirteen essentially just granted a murderer an early parole because she ''looks'' friendly.
* ''{{Series/Dollhouse}}'' has a BittersweetEnding at best, but some people are divided on the "Happy Ending" for Echo and Paul, in which Paul dies, but Alpha makes an imprint of Paul's personality for Echo to upload into herself. Questions whether it would be so great to [[SharingABody share a body with your true love]], if Paul would be more significant than [[MindHive the other hundred or so personalities]] inside Echo, and some just didn't like the pairing, which started out as Paul LovingAShadow and TheDulcineaEffect and became serious offscreen during a three-month TimeSkip.
* ''Series/GameOfThrones'': The show ends with Westeros choosing a system of electoral monarchy instead of a hereditary one because of all the problems they've had. However, in the show's other place where it was practiced, the Iron Islands, it just became a rubber-stamp for Greyjoy after Greyjoy to be elected until they got awful leaders like Balon and Euron, and in the books it ended with an Ironborn using the opportunity to slaughter his rivals. Add to it Sansa deciding to just declare Northern independence even after Bran's elected and it leaves serious doubts that they'll be able to avoid either informal hereditary rule or instability. There's also Bran who is the Three-Eyed Raven and has supernatural powers that let him see the past and present, making an omniscient ruler who can see everything. While the narrative guarantees that he's benevolent, the circ*mstances on how he became king after the deaths of Cersei and Daenerys made a lot of viewers suspect at best he's indirectly responsible for Daenerys' downfall, at worst, actually enabled it through selective sharing ''and'' omission of information, which makes Bran come off as an [[AmbitionIsEvil ambitious asshole]].
* ''Series/GossipGirl'' ends with the reveal that Dan Humphrey is Gossip Girl, the blogger who stalked and terrorized the other main characters for years. That wouldn't be so bad if the main heroine and the object of his obsession, Serena, didn't consider the reveal to be the hottest thing ever since [[StalkingIsLove he did it all to get her.]] Everyone else seems fine with it too. In fact, his plan gains him the respect of all the other characters and he finally [[InWithTheInCrowd becomes one of them]].
** Blair & Chuck could only get their happy ending by effectively murdering Chuck's father as he's thrown off a skyscraper rooftop during a fight between the father & son, and they get married simply to avoid having to testify against each other.
* ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'': Barney and Robin divorce and the Mother dies, all so that Robin and Ted can get back together 20 years in the future. By the reaction of the kids -- essentially, "Mom's been dead for 6 years, go bang Aunt Robin, Dad!" -- this is meant to be the ultimate happy ending of two long-lost lovers. You wonder if the writers realize that the blue french horn, which Ted holds up for Robin at the end, has become an object of derision and tragedy in the fanbase. There's also no real reason to believe Ted and Robin are actually going to work out this time since the show had previously spent quite a bit of time deconstructing their relationship and ultimately showing them as incompatible. Most of the issues that caused them to break up in the past haven't been resolved, nor have they ever managed to overcome them in their numerous attempts to get together in the past. It's worth noting that the ending was planned and in part filmed (the parts with the kids) years earlier. As a consequence, many of the reasons for the ending not working (establishing Barney and Robin as a FanPreferredCouple who'd have to be broken up and the various issues the writers had to raise in the Ted/Robin relationship to explain these two single supposedly "perfect for each other" people not being together all these years) hadn't been developed yet. Additionally, the ending relied on the romantic trope of making a big "romantic gesture" and living happily ever after. Unfortunately, the long-running nature of the show meant it ultimately subverted this trope by having characters making these gestures repeatedly only to definitively not end up with the person they made the gesture to, thereby showing how it's definitely not guaranteed.
* The TV movie ''Film/IceAngel'' is about a male hockey player (Matt) who dies and is brought back to life in the body of a female figure skater (Sarah) so he can win an Olympic gold medal on the ice. He is surprised and unhappy at his unasked for GenderBender but adjusts to his new life and learns to let go of his old girlfriend and friends who have moved on. As he (now she) is in the middle of winning the gold medal, the two angels who have been watching over Matt mention that as soon as the performance is over 'Sarah' will forget all about being Matt. This is presented as a happy ending but comes across more like Matt -- who already has his Aesop and seems content to continue life as Sarah -- gets his identity erased for no good reason. This holds true to the source of the story ''Here Comes Mr. Jordan'' (which the film ''Film/HeavenCanWait'' is also based off of) where the soul and habits of the deceased do live on in the new body but they will forget everything else about their adventures and time in Heaven and the Afterlife Bureaucracy. It is meant to help the soul and person go back to living a normal life.
* ''Series/KamenRiderDecade'' does this in a couple of arcs due to forgetting WhatHappenedToTheMouse. Yaaay, the Grongi are defeated, and all the millions of people who have been turned into Grongi have ceased to exist when the main villain was destroyed! Aweso- wait, ''what?'' Using the secret weapon that's the last hope of the few surviving humans on the world where monsters and dark Riders rule, the Riders defeat a few enforcers before leaving forever, taking said device with them! New toy, yay-- wait, ''what?''
* ''Series/KamenRiderGaim'' has the protagonist win the war for the Golden Fruit, and rather than keep his new godlike powers on Earth he moves to a lifeless planet far away, saving Earth from destruction at the hands of the Helheim Forest. Helheim's avatar ultimately approves of this outcome [[InferredHolocaust and moves on to the next world to overrun while tempting its occupants to war with one another]]. The ending appears to be predicated on the audience believing that Helheim is in fact just a mindless plant and doesn't bear any blame for the worlds it invades and ruins, but its avatar being one of the most intelligent and philosophically-driven characters in the show means it instead comes across as a KarmaHoudini.
* ''Series/KamenRiderZeroOne'' ends with the GreaterScopeVillain who caused the entire plot [[KarmaHoudini getting off scot free]] after a hazy redemption, the topic of [[AndroidsArePeopleToo Humagear rights]] going unaddressed even though it's clearly shown some Humagears resent being used as tools, TheHero's cute RobotBuddy effectively [[DeathOfPersonality gone forever]], her killer allowed to go free after being EasilyForgiven, and [[DarkChick As]] also [[KarmaHoudini getting away]], able to create more [[BigBad Ark]]s as she sees fit.
* The Creator/StephenKing miniseries ''Literature/TheLangoliers'' ends with the main characters running towards the camera and leaping into the foreground laughing and smiling -- just in case you were in any doubt that this is meant to be a happy ending. Don't think too hard however about the innocent blind girl who was stabbed to death, [[BlackDudeDiesFirst the black guy]] who was also stabbed to death, Mr. Toomy who was eaten alive (who is implied to have been a good person destroyed by his abusive father), and the guy who just heroically vaporized himself to save all of your lives. In addition, none of you will be able to explain what happened to the hundreds of other people on this flight who disappeared into thin air when the police start to investigate. At best, the authorities will think they are mad, and at worst, they will be tried for hijacking and kidnapping.
* The finale of ''Series/{{Lost}}'' could certainly be seen this way. Everybody from the Island remains friends in the afterlife, except for the ones you don't see for some reason. Okay, fine. But why does Sayid have to be with Shannon and lose Nadia? Why can't Locke stay with Helen? Christian Shepherd seems to have dictatorial powers over the lives of people he didn't even really know. Plus, it's implied that several of the characters who outlived Jack led long lives, yet apparently none of them formed any meaningful relationships during the intervening years--so Kate, Sawyer, and Claire all potentially spent decades mourning their respective love interests and never loving anyone else, while Aaron and Ji-Yeon apparently had such empty lives that they entered the afterlife as babies whose only bonds are with their parents. And Miles just gets abandoned and forgotten in limbo, despite his apparent devotion to Sawyer.
* ''Series/TheManInTheHighCastle'' ends with the Japanese having withdrawn from the Pacific States, the Nazi leadership in Berlin replaced with fresh blood, John Smith dead at the hands of the resistance and his subordinate ripping off his Nazi insignia when he's apprised of this, and the ''Nebenswelt'' portal being permanently opened and masses of people from other worlds arriving in the Axis world. While Smith's soul was so far gone by this point that the world would be better off without him, it's already pointed out that even if he died [[EvilPowerVacuum he would just be replaced with someone else]]. The US has been ruled by the Nazi regime for twenty years, with all the indoctrination and fanaticism of rank and file soldiers and citizens that implies. His replacement would have to contend with hardliners and rogue units in the American Reich attempting to depose him, not to mention the Reichsfuhrer in Berlin might just decide that his deal with Smith is null and void with the latter's death. It's a recipe for a civil war. Japan is also still lording over a massive empire in the Pacific and East Asia, with the withdrawal from North America giving them renewed resources to keep those territories under their thumb. And with the Nebenswelt smack-dab in the middle between two formerly oppressed sub-countries, a massive cache of unforeseen and unprecedented wealth and technological potential in the hands of subversive rebels who made it their mission to tick both sides off, it's implied that a second American Civil War is inevitable.
* ''Series/RebeldeWay'': The series tries to present the season two finale as some wonderful, happy ending where true love triumphed, the students beat the bad guy and reformed the school...But it's not all sunshine and roses as the show implies. Aside from the fact that the series completely romanticized TeenPregnancy (never even alluding to all the emotional and economical problems a sixteen-year-old having a child will have), the finale also failed to address the huge problems both of the main couples had over the course of the series (Manuel dismissing Mia and cheating on her, Marizza misjudging Pablo) and tries to paint a picture of all being forgiven and true love saving the day. For a series that was recommended for trying to tackle real subjects in a realistic manner, this poorly thought-out ending seemed to have come out of some fairy tale kitsch desire.
* ''{{Series/Roswell}}'' ends with the teens marked for death by the FBI Special Unit and forced to leave their families and loved ones and go on the run. Also, Max decides they need to give up on trying to return to their home planet and just worry about themselves, [[ProtagonistCenteredMorality dooming their people to remain slaves]]. Yet somehow, the show tries to spin this as a positive ending, [[MoodWhiplash abruptly]] cutting from Liz's father crying over her farewell note to the teens [[AngstWhatAngst smiling like loons]] as Max and Liz get married in a country chapel and the show ends on Liz grinning into camera as a voiceover announces, "I'm Liz Parker and I'm happy." Er, ''why''?
* ''Series/{{Seinfeld}}'' is an example for an esoteric nonplussing ending. Creator/LarryDavid likely only intended to write an episode that is absurdist UpToEleven, and a setting to have a large number of characters BackForTheFinale, and when talking about the finale, had never hinted at any [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotDidactic intentions]] or stipulated that the show was intended to be about [[{{Fanon}} jerkasses]]. So the four main characters being sent to prison resulted in fans being unhappy.
* ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'': "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS03E12PastTensePartII Past Tense Part II]]" ends on a real high note, with the promise that the human-rights violating Sanctuary Districts will close and that real effort would be made to help the people inside find the jobs, homes and medical care that they need. According to Sisko this is one of the most momentous days in human history and helped pave the way for the Federation (as we see when their actions accidentally wipe it out). Unfortunately, as anyone who is up on their Trek history knows; this episode is set two years before the Third World War. Everyone you see in this episode grinning about how bright their futures now are? Were either killed in the atomic hellfire and radiation of nuclear war, gunned down (or worse) by the enemy or (ironically) found themselves in refugee camps that were just as bad if not worse than the Sanctuary Districts were.
* ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'': In "[[Recap/StarTrekEnterpriseS01E13DearDoctor Dear Doctor]]", Archer and Phlox decide not to give the Valakians and Menk a cure to their illness, likely dooming both races to extinction, and this decision helps Phlox gain new respect for Archer? The excuse was that the Valakians were [[ArtisticLicenseBiology fated to die according to evolution]], and so it would somehow be immoral to cure them. It was supposed to be character affirming as Archer does the 'right' thing no matter how hard it is, but even if we accept this warped HollywoodEvolution, most people don't think that some 'evolutionary plan' is more valuable than billions of lives. This can be blamed on ExecutiveMeddling since the story was supposed to end with Archer and Phlox at odds with each other (Archer wanting the cure, Phlox opposing it), but executives didn't want any disagreements between them. This itself is a meta-example Esoteric Happy Ending, as the executives were happy that they were able to avoid having a proper ethical dilemma and argument in the episode, which is the kind of thing that typical Star Trek viewers generally WANT in the show.
* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'' episode "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS4E107Mute Mute]]" is about Ilsa, a little girl whose parents never speak verbally to her, because they are training her to become psychic. She and her parents ''are'' psychic and can communicate very well, but after they're killed in a fire, she is sent to live with foster parents who are unaware of her psychic abilities and try to get her to speak normally. At school, her teacher basically torments her and makes her life a living hell until she finally begins speaking. Another psychic couple shows up wanting to adopt her and continue developing her psychic powers, but the girl turns them away, saying she'd rather stay with her foster parents. As the couple leaves, they comment that it was just as well that she stayed behind, as her psychic abilities had been destroyed by the horrific treatment she'd received at the school. It is stated by pretty much every adult character that this is a happy ending for Ilsa, in spite of the fact that she was tormented at school and lost a paranormal ability in the process. (The author has claimed that her original parents treated her more as a science experiment than a daughter, but there's nothing in the final version of the story to suggest that.)
* ''Series/WarOfTheWorlds1988'' ends with the Morthren leader (Malzor) dead and the threat vanquished, and the heroes triumphantly [[RidingIntoTheSunset walking at sunrise]] as a heroic theme plays... except a cursory thought into the circ*mstances of the ending reveal that nothing is solved. The remaining Morthren (36 in total) will attempt to integrate into the world -- a place where the air is so toxic to them that getting cut in any way will eventually severely weaken (if not outright kill) them, unless they're put in a recovery machine, not to mention food they can't eat, dwindling resources and no way of getting back home. Even then, there's an unresolved SequelHook of a secondary Morthrai invasion force (the villains from the first season) that were set to arrive in five years. Whatever the case, Blackwood and friends make it clear to themselves that [[IWillFightNoMoreForever "they're done with all of it."]] "Nice morning", indeed.
to:
[[folder:Live-Action TV]]the
%%* The finale of ''Series/XenaWarriorPrincess''. The writers were actually booed at final screening.the
* ''Series/The100'' ends with remnants of humanity being assimilated (or “[[InsistentTerminology ascended]]”) into an alien hive mind, becoming immortal “beings of light” without pain or individuality. The explicit other option is the aliens exterminating humanity with an unstoppable chemical weapon. However, Clarke can’t “ascend“, due to the hive mind seeing her crimes as too grave (Clarke herself points out how arbitrary this logic is), so her friends stay behind to live mortal lives on Earth with her. However, the hive mind explicitly states that they can’t have any children and won’t be able to ascend when they die. In the view of most fans, this essentially means humanity has been condemned to extinction in all but the most technical of terms, rendering all of the struggle of the series moot. Clarke and her friends will die without a future or a legacy, and the last one to die will die miserably alone. Meanwhile, the genocidal alien hive mind [[TheBadGuyWins is free to continue its campaign of assimilating species and exterminating those it finds unworthy]].New
* In ''Series/BabylonFive'', Marcus Cole sacrifices his life to save that of his beloved Susan Ivanova, using an alien machine that transfers LifeEnergy. His body was placed in cold storage, however, and there was a strong implication that he was OnlyMostlyDead until they could work out a way to replace his LifeEnergy without killing someone else. Creator/JMichaelStraczynski then wrote a prose spin-off short story "Time, Death and the Incurable Romantic", in which Marcus does get resurrected, three hundred years after Susan's death. He then steals Susan's DNA from her tomb, has a duplicate of her created, implants it with Susan's memories up to shortly before the incident that led to her life-threatening injury, and maroons them both on an uninhabited planet, deceiving the duplicate into believing that she's the original Susan and it's still 2261. This was apparently considered to be a happy ending for both of them, but it absolutely horrified many fans who saw it as a grotesque, abusive violation of the duplicate's right to self-determination.
* ''Series/{{Battlestar Galactica|2003}}'''s finale is both very religious and very LuddWasRight, pissing off most of the sci-fi fans who'd watched it (if only because without modern technology, most of the survivors would have greatly shortened life expectancies and greatly reduced quality of life). The fans were even more irritated that this development came completely out of the blue, without foreshadowing or any anti-technology message in previous episodes. WordOfGod is that no {{anvilicious}} message was intended, but that it was just a last-minute fix to explain the lack of remains of the Fleet.
* ''Series/DegrassiTheNextGeneration'': Spinner and Emma's AccidentalMarriage (and deciding to STAY MARRIED). Especially frustrating, since the characters [[StrangledByTheRedString hardly even interacted before that]].
* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS23E2Mindwarp Mindwarp]]" ends with Peri's body becoming the host to Kiv's brain before King Yrcanos supposedly finishes her. However, it is revealed later in the season that Peri in fact did not die and actually went on to rule Krontep alongside Yrcanos as his queen. While this is portrayed as a good thing, it should be noted that Peri showed no interest in Yrcanos the entire story and objected to the notion of becoming his wife. Expanded material has offered different versions of what becomes of Peri, though Creator/NicolaBryant prefers her original fate in "Mindwarp".
** In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E10LoveAndMonsters Love & Monsters]]," one of the characters becomes a face on a paving slab ([[ItMakesSenseInContext long story]]) and she cannot move, eat or feel. [[FridgeHorror She also will never age.]] Worse, it's stated that she and her human boyfriend [[{{Squick}} still have a love life]]. This is presented as a good fate for the character. On the other hand, WordOfGod has said her boyfriend is an UnreliableNarrator, so there's the possibility that she hasn't suffered this fate. Instead, it may be that she and the rest of their friends are dead and her boyfriend's gone insane from the events of the episode. As for the slab...best not to think too hard about it.
** At the end of "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E10Blink Blink]]," Sally has a photo of a Weeping Angel, but in season 5, we find out that Weeping Angels can project themselves through images, meaning that that photo is probably going to turn into another Angel. Fortunately, Sally gave that photo to the Doctor, who can hopefully dispose of it. But regarding the ''original'' Angels, the only thing keeping them immobilized is one bare lightbulb, which could burn out at any moment, and which ''they telepathically turned off earlier in the episode''. Yeah, WordOfGod made the situation less ominous by describing the Angels in "Blink" as weak scavengers, but there are always more Weeping Angels out there. [[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou Any statue could be a Weeping Angel]] -- maybe they ''[[ParanoiaFuel all]]'' are! ([[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking On a less dire note]], the "happy" ending features Sally and Larry making a living by running a video store...which probably is going to end up failing, since the episode took place in 2007, right before video stores started becoming obsolete.)
** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E13LastOfTheTimeLords Last of the Time Lords]]." So the Doctor defeats the Master, hits the ResetButton, and the entire Year of Hell has been undone. This is easily the happiest season ending of any in the RTD era. It wouldn't even be all that esoteric except for a few "little" things. Martha Jones and her family still remember this horrific, PTSD-inducing year. America still lost its President (who, despite being an unflattering {{Expy}} of UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush, seemed like a good man who didn't deserve to die). Britain lost its best political minds when the Master gassed them all, and also lost a courageous woman whom the Toclafane tortured to death for resisting the Master. And speaking of the Toclafane, the final, definitive fate for humanity is that in the last generation, all of the humans (even the best of them) will within that generation degenerate into monstrous, childish thrill-killers, [[ShootTheShaggyDog making everything on the show that has anything to do with humanity feel completely pointless.]]
** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS35E12HellBent Hell Bent]]" (the Series 9 finale) has the Twelfth Doctor defy his people and risk all time and space to save Clara Oswald from her fixed-point death by removing her from her timestream just before she dies, intending to mind wipe her of memories of him and return her to Earth. In the BittersweetEnding, the Doctor repents and ends up being mind-wiped of memories of her, leaving him free to move on with his life, while the now-functionally immortal Clara ends up with her own TARDIS and fellow functional immortal Ashildr/Me. She decides to go back to Gallifrey and her death "the long way 'round" in pursuit of new adventures, as the universe will hold together so long as she returns at ''some'' point. The problems with this come from several angles, only one of which was addressed in the televised continuity by this Doctor's GrandFinale and departure of writer/showrunner Creator/StevenMoffat, meaning they might ''never'' be revisited:
*** Clara can never return to her old life on Earth; though by this point it meant little to her compared to a life of adventure, it's still pretty sad for her loved ones and colleagues who will only know her to have died a mysterious death. And since the universe ''is'' holding together, what finally gets Clara to return to her '''extremely painful''' death? Will she remember she has to go back? Be forced into it? Screw up so badly that death seems the only way to atone?
*** The Doctor didn't take Me on as a companion because as a virtual immortal himself both of them would become detached from mortals and even ''villainous'' -- a problem she was already struggling with and an indirect contributor to Clara's death (she was TrappedInVillainy and had to betray the Doctor, and Clara messed that up). Thus, the women could become what the Doctor feared -- and he wouldn't be able to stop them -- unless they acquire mortal companions. As well, can Clara be happy with a companion who's virtually an anti-Doctor given how much she came to love and need him?
*** After millennia spent pining for them and defending them, the Doctor is now a fugitive from his people and Gallifrey -- again -- for his actions during his SanitySlippage. Rassilon and his cronies are the types who would seek {{Revenge}} for his bloodlessly overthrowing and exiling them, and The Doctor left a power vacuum at the top by abandoning his Lord President post.
*** The Doctor suffered mightily just to save Clara, as depicted in "Heaven Sent". EarnYourHappyEnding should come into play given how the Whoniverse tends to work, but instead he, a '''torture victim''', is given NoSympathy whereas ''Rassilon the murdering dictator'' is. He gives up his TragicDream, and undergoes MindRape -- whereupon Clara and Ashildr/Me ''randomly dump him on Earth'', leaving him wandering about reconstructing the few Clara-related memories he retains and seeking his TARDIS, last seen abandoned in London. The FramingDevice has Clara (whom he no longer recognizes) return the TARDIS to him and he moves on, but he isn't rewarded for choosing the path of right ''and'' has been robbed of his right to grieve and rage. As it's unknown how much time passes between this story and "The Husbands of River Song", how long is the Doctor left bereft and brooding without a MoralityChain (a key reason why he went crazy)? Sure, he has the TARDIS, but it can't hug him. For the record, the MindRape is the ''one'' aspect of this ending addressed and undone (and only at the ''very'' end of the Twelfth Doctor's life, shortly before he regenerates).
** In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS36E2Smile "Smile"]], the Emojibots and Vardy kill a whole bunch of people due to not understanding that grief isn't a virus, but they end up being reset and agreeing to a contract with the awakened colonists afterwards. Problem is, nowhere there do we see the Doctor address the original problem at all, so there's no reason to believe the robots won't do the same thing after someone else dies in a few weeks/months/years' time. Nor does he explain to most of the colonists that their friends and family might be dead after the massive misunderstanding either.
** Later in the same season, [[Recap/DoctorWhoS36E8TheLieOfTheLand "The Lie of the Land"]] ends with Bill Potts undoing her DealWithTheDevil with the Monks; they not only flee Earth and free humanity from enslavement but cause almost everyone on the planet to forget the events of the past six months, with the Doctor and Bill among very few exceptions. Unfortunately, during those six months, dissenters to the Monks were imprisoned, forced into labor camps, and even executed. What will become of people who lost loved ones but can't remember what became of them and why, and of the still-living victims of the Monks' reign? Worse, Bill and the Doctor technically have culpability in the Monks' reign of terror. Granted, she made her deal to save the doomed Doctor's life partially because she knew he was their last best hope to get rid of the Monks altogether. He served as the Monks' PropagandaMachine only as a cover for his resultant plan. But they still ought to feel remorse over all the people who suffered and died in the interim; instead they're more concerned with her overdue essay on free will (overdue ''because'' of the Monks). Suddenly "Last of the Time Lords"' ResetButton, though imperfect, doesn't seem so bad.
** Years after [[Recap/DoctorWhoS29E9TheFamilyOfBlood "The Family of Blood"]] came out, the current writers wrote an "epilogue" where Thirteen rescues Sister of Mine from the mirror. Yay, a little girl can go on to have a happy life! ...except that's ''not'' a little girl, that is a homicidal alien who ''killed'' a little girl and ''possessed her corpse''. Thirteen essentially just granted a murderer an early parole because she ''looks'' friendly.
* ''{{Series/Dollhouse}}'' has a BittersweetEnding at best, but some people are divided on the "Happy Ending" for Echo and Paul, in which Paul dies, but Alpha makes an imprint of Paul's personality for Echo to upload into herself. Questions whether it would be so great to [[SharingABody share a body with your true love]], if Paul would be more significant than [[MindHive the other hundred or so personalities]] inside Echo, and some just didn't like the pairing, which started out as Paul LovingAShadow and TheDulcineaEffect and became serious offscreen during a three-month TimeSkip.
* ''Series/GameOfThrones'': The show ends with Westeros choosing a system of electoral monarchy instead of a hereditary one because of all the problems they've had. However, in the show's other place where it was practiced, the Iron Islands, it just became a rubber-stamp for Greyjoy after Greyjoy to be elected until they got awful leaders like Balon and Euron, and in the books it ended with an Ironborn using the opportunity to slaughter his rivals. Add to it Sansa deciding to just declare Northern independence even after Bran's elected and it leaves serious doubts that they'll be able to avoid either informal hereditary rule or instability. There's also Bran who is the Three-Eyed Raven and has supernatural powers that let him see the past and present, making an omniscient ruler who can see everything. While the narrative guarantees that he's benevolent, the circ*mstances on how he became king after the deaths of Cersei and Daenerys made a lot of viewers suspect at best he's indirectly responsible for Daenerys' downfall, at worst, actually enabled it through selective sharing ''and'' omission of information, which makes Bran come off as an [[AmbitionIsEvil ambitious asshole]].
* ''Series/GossipGirl'' ends with the reveal that Dan Humphrey is Gossip Girl, the blogger who stalked and terrorized the other main characters for years. That wouldn't be so bad if the main heroine and the object of his obsession, Serena, didn't consider the reveal to be the hottest thing ever since [[StalkingIsLove he did it all to get her.]] Everyone else seems fine with it too. In fact, his plan gains him the respect of all the other characters and he finally [[InWithTheInCrowd becomes one of them]].
** Blair & Chuck could only get their happy ending by effectively murdering Chuck's father as he's thrown off a skyscraper rooftop during a fight between the father & son, and they get married simply to avoid having to testify against each other.
* ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'': Barney and Robin divorce and the Mother dies, all so that Robin and Ted can get back together 20 years in the future. By the reaction of the kids -- essentially, "Mom's been dead for 6 years, go bang Aunt Robin, Dad!" -- this is meant to be the ultimate happy ending of two long-lost lovers. You wonder if the writers realize that the blue french horn, which Ted holds up for Robin at the end, has become an object of derision and tragedy in the fanbase. There's also no real reason to believe Ted and Robin are actually going to work out this time since the show had previously spent quite a bit of time deconstructing their relationship and ultimately showing them as incompatible. Most of the issues that caused them to break up in the past haven't been resolved, nor have they ever managed to overcome them in their numerous attempts to get together in the past. It's worth noting that the ending was planned and in part filmed (the parts with the kids) years earlier. As a consequence, many of the reasons for the ending not working (establishing Barney and Robin as a FanPreferredCouple who'd have to be broken up and the various issues the writers had to raise in the Ted/Robin relationship to explain these two single supposedly "perfect for each other" people not being together all these years) hadn't been developed yet. Additionally, the ending relied on the romantic trope of making a big "romantic gesture" and living happily ever after. Unfortunately, the long-running nature of the show meant it ultimately subverted this trope by having characters making these gestures repeatedly only to definitively not end up with the person they made the gesture to, thereby showing how it's definitely not guaranteed.
* The TV movie ''Film/IceAngel'' is about a male hockey player (Matt) who dies and is brought back to life in the body of a female figure skater (Sarah) so he can win an Olympic gold medal on the ice. He is surprised and unhappy at his unasked for GenderBender but adjusts to his new life and learns to let go of his old girlfriend and friends who have moved on. As he (now she) is in the middle of winning the gold medal, the two angels who have been watching over Matt mention that as soon as the performance is over 'Sarah' will forget all about being Matt. This is presented as a happy ending but comes across more like Matt -- who already has his Aesop and seems content to continue life as Sarah -- gets his identity erased for no good reason. This holds true to the source of the story ''Here Comes Mr. Jordan'' (which the film ''Film/HeavenCanWait'' is also based off of) where the soul and habits of the deceased do live on in the new body but they will forget everything else about their adventures and time in Heaven and the Afterlife Bureaucracy. It is meant to help the soul and person go back to living a normal life.
* ''Series/KamenRiderDecade'' does this in a couple of arcs due to forgetting WhatHappenedToTheMouse. Yaaay, the Grongi are defeated, and all the millions of people who have been turned into Grongi have ceased to exist when the main villain was destroyed! Aweso- wait, ''what?'' Using the secret weapon that's the last hope of the few surviving humans on the world where monsters and dark Riders rule, the Riders defeat a few enforcers before leaving forever, taking said device with them! toy, yay-- wait, ''what?''anyone
* ''Series/KamenRiderGaim'' has the protagonist win the war for the Golden Fruit, and rather than keep his new godlike powers on Earth he moves to a lifeless planet far away, saving Earth from destruction at the hands of the Helheim Forest. Helheim's avatar ultimately approves of this outcome [[InferredHolocaust and moves on to the next world to overrun while tempting its occupants to war with one another]]. The ending appears to be predicated on the audience believing that Helheim is in fact just a mindless plant and doesn't bear any blame for the worlds it invades and ruins, but its avatar being one of the most intelligent and philosophically-driven characters in the show means it instead comes across as a KarmaHoudini.
* ''Series/KamenRiderZeroOne'' ends with the GreaterScopeVillain who caused the entire plot [[KarmaHoudini getting off scot free]] after a hazy redemption, the topic of [[AndroidsArePeopleToo Humagear rights]] going unaddressed even though it's clearly shown some Humagears resent being used as tools, TheHero's cute RobotBuddy effectively [[DeathOfPersonality gone forever]], her killer allowed to go free after being EasilyForgiven, and [[DarkChick As]] also [[KarmaHoudini getting away]], able to create more [[BigBad Ark]]s as she sees fit.
* The Creator/StephenKing miniseries ''Literature/TheLangoliers'' ends with the main characters running towards the camera and leaping into the foreground laughing and smiling -- just in case you were in any doubt that this is meant to be a happy ending. Don't think too hard however about the innocent blind girl who was stabbed to death, [[BlackDudeDiesFirst the black guy]] who was also stabbed to death, Mr. Toomy who was eaten alive (who is implied to have been a good person destroyed by his abusive father), and the guy who just heroically vaporized himself to save all of your lives. In addition, none of you will be able to explain what happened to the hundreds of other people on this flight who disappeared into thin air when the police start to investigate. At best, the authorities will think they are mad, and at worst, they will be tried for hijacking and kidnapping.
* The finale of ''Series/{{Lost}}'' could certainly be seen this way. Everybody from the Island remains friends in the afterlife, except for the ones you don't see for some reason. Okay, fine. But why does Sayid have to be with Shannon and lose Nadia? Why can't Locke stay with Helen? Christian Shepherd seems to have dictatorial powers over the lives of people he didn't even really know. Plus, it's implied that several of the characters who outlived Jack led long lives, yet apparently none of them formed any meaningful relationships during the intervening years--so Kate, Sawyer, and Claire all potentially spent decades mourning their respective love interests and never loving else, while Aaron and Ji-Yeon apparently had such empty lives that they entered the afterlife as babies whose only bonds are with their parents. And Miles just gets abandoned and forgotten in limbo, despite his apparent devotion to Sawyer.the
* ''Series/TheManInTheHighCastle'' ends with Japanese having withdrawn from the Pacific States, the Nazi leadership in Berlin replaced with fresh blood, John Smith dead at the hands of the resistance and his subordinate ripping off his Nazi insignia when he's apprised of this, and the ''Nebenswelt'' portal being permanently opened and masses of people from other worlds arriving in the Axis world. While Smith's soul was so far gone by this point that the world would be better off without him, it's already pointed out that even if he died [[EvilPowerVacuum he would just be replaced with someone else]]. The US has been ruled by the Nazi regime for twenty years, with all the indoctrination and fanaticism of rank and file soldiers and citizens that implies. His replacement would have to contend with hardliners and rogue units in the American Reich attempting to depose him, not to mention the Reichsfuhrer in Berlin might just decide that his deal with Smith is null and void with the latter's death. It's a recipe for a civil war. Japan is also still lording over a massive empire in the Pacific and East Asia, with the withdrawal from North America giving them renewed resources to keep those territories under their thumb. And with the Nebenswelt smack-dab in the middle between two formerly oppressed sub-countries, a massive cache of unforeseen and unprecedented wealth and technological potential in the hands of subversive rebels who made it their mission to tick both sides off, it's implied that a second American Civil War is inevitable.the people
* ''Series/RebeldeWay'': The series tries to present the season two finale as some wonderful, happy ending where true love triumphed, the students beat the bad guy and reformed the school...But it's not all sunshine and roses as the show implies. Aside from the fact that the series completely romanticized TeenPregnancy (never even alluding to all the emotional and economical problems a sixteen-year-old having a child will have), the finale also failed to address the huge problems both of the main couples had over the course of the series (Manuel dismissing Mia and cheating on her, Marizza misjudging Pablo) and tries to paint a picture of all being forgiven and true love saving the day. For a series that was recommended for trying to tackle real subjects in a realistic manner, this poorly thought-out ending seemed to have come out of some fairy tale kitsch desire.
* ''{{Series/Roswell}}'' ends with the teens marked for death by the FBI Special Unit and forced to leave their families and loved ones and go on the run. Also, Max decides they need to give up on trying to return to their home planet and just worry about themselves, [[ProtagonistCenteredMorality dooming their people to remain slaves]]. Yet somehow, the show tries to spin this as a positive ending, [[MoodWhiplash abruptly]] cutting from Liz's father crying over her farewell note to the teens [[AngstWhatAngst smiling like loons]] as Max and Liz get married in a country chapel and the show ends on Liz grinning into camera as a voiceover announces, "I'm Liz Parker and I'm happy." Er, ''why''?
* ''Series/{{Seinfeld}}'' is an example for an esoteric nonplussing ending. Creator/LarryDavid likely only intended to write an episode that is absurdist UpToEleven, and a setting to have a large number of characters BackForTheFinale, and when talking about the finale, had never hinted at any [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotDidactic intentions]] or stipulated that the show was intended to be about [[{{Fanon}} jerkasses]]. So the four main characters being sent to prison resulted in fans being unhappy.
* ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'': "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS03E12PastTensePartII Past Tense Part II]]" ends on a real high note, with the promise that the human-rights violating Sanctuary Districts will close and that real effort would be made to help inside find the jobs, homes and medical care that they need. According to Sisko this is one of the most momentous days in human history and helped pave the way for the Federation (as we see when their actions accidentally wipe it out). Unfortunately, as anyone who is up on their Trek history knows; this episode is set two years before the Third World War. Everyone you see in this episode grinning about how bright their futures now are? Were either killed in the atomic hellfire and radiation of nuclear war, gunned down (or worse) by the enemy or (ironically) found themselves in refugee camps that were just as bad if not worse than the Sanctuary Districts were.with
* ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'': In "[[Recap/StarTrekEnterpriseS01E13DearDoctor Dear Doctor]]", Archer and Phlox decide not to give the Valakians and Menk a cure to their illness, likely dooming both races to extinction, and this decision helps Phlox gain new respect for Archer? The excuse was that the Valakians were [[ArtisticLicenseBiology fated to die according to evolution]], and so it would somehow be immoral to cure them. It was supposed to be character affirming as Archer does the 'right' thing no matter how hard it is, but even if we accept this warped HollywoodEvolution, most people don't think that some 'evolutionary plan' is more valuable than billions of lives. This can be blamed on ExecutiveMeddling since the story was supposed to end Archer and Phlox at odds with each other (Archer wanting the cure, Phlox opposing it), but executives didn't want any disagreements between them. This itself is a meta-example Esoteric Happy Ending, as the executives were happy that they were able to avoid having a proper ethical dilemma and argument in the episode, which is the kind of thing that typical Star Trek viewers generally WANT in the show.(if not
* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'' episode "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS4E107Mute Mute]]" is about Ilsa, a little girl whose parents never speak verbally to her, because they are training her to become psychic. She and her parents ''are'' psychic and can communicate very well, but after they're killed in a fire, she is sent to live with foster parents who are unaware of her psychic abilities and try to get her to speak normally. At school, her teacher basically torments her and makes her life a living hell until she finally begins speaking. Another psychic couple shows up wanting to adopt her and continue developing her psychic powers, but the girl turns them away, saying she'd rather stay with her foster parents. As the couple leaves, they comment that it was just as well that she stayed behind, as her psychic abilities had been destroyed by the horrific treatment she'd received at the school. It is stated by pretty much every adult character that this is a happy ending for Ilsa, in spite of the fact that she was tormented at school and lost a paranormal ability in the process. (The author has claimed that her original parents treated her more as a science experiment than a daughter, but there's nothing in the final version of the story to suggest that.)
* ''Series/WarOfTheWorlds1988'' ends with the Morthren leader (Malzor) dead and the threat vanquished, and the heroes triumphantly [[RidingIntoTheSunset walking at sunrise]] as a heroic theme plays... except a cursory thought into the circ*mstances of the ending reveal that nothing is solved. The remaining Morthren (36 in total) will attempt to integrate into the world -- a place where the air is so toxic to them that getting cut in any way will eventually severely weaken outright kill) them, unless they're put in a recovery machine, not to mention food they can't eat, dwindling resources and no way of getting back home. Even then, there's an unresolved SequelHook of a secondary Morthrai invasion force (the villains from the first season) that were set to arrive in five years. Whatever the case, Blackwood and friends make it clear to themselves that [[IWillFightNoMoreForever "they're done with all of it."]] "Nice morning", indeed.
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[[folder:Music]]
* The last movement of Dmitri Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 ends in [[HappinessIsMandatory a forced triumphant cry of the high strings and the brass]], suggesting one such trope. Not only that but as conductor Michael Tilson Thomas notes, he slips in a few [[TakeThat zingers]] into the final "rejoicing" flourishes. When the music reaches major chords played by the brass, Shostakovich signals a conventional ending -- but, we find out a moment later that, instead of keeping put in that resting chord, Shostakovich ''keeps pushing'' the brass section higher and higher into minor registers, before lurching heavily into a tacked-on ending.
* "Judy's Turn to Cry" -- the sequel to "It's My Party And I'll Cry if I Want To" by Lesley Gore has the singer pull off OperationJealousy to get Johnny's attention back (after he came to her party with another girl). It works: Johnny decks the poor sap and ditches Judy to come back to our heroine, who now... gets the guy who abandoned her for nothing and hits people for little provocation. Great?
* ''Music/TheChristmasShoes'' is about a man who learns the meaning of Christmas through an act of charity. However, the act of charity is a result of God making the man bump into a child whose mom is dying, and helping him out. The implication being that God felt it was more important to teach a grumpy guy a lesson than to miraculously heal this kid's dying mother. Creator/PattonOswalt does not neglect to note this in his take on the song:
-->Creator/PattonOswalt: ''Let's review: There's a guy in line. He's a little cranky on Christmas. God looks down and sees this. "Somebody in a bad mood on my son's birthday? BULLsh*t! Give that kid's mom cancer, make sure he's front of them in line, make him seven cents short for the shoes, this guy will buy them and then he'll be in a good mood." I almost feel like Jesus is behind God going, "I don't think we need to give a kid's mom-""Kid, you shut the f*ck up! This is gonna be the best birthday you ever had!"
* Music/CarrieUnderwood's [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaSy8yy-mr8 "Before He Cheats"]] ends with a moment of triumph for the jilted (she assumes) girlfriend who assumes her boyfriend will "think before he cheats". A far more likely ending would involve him turning her in for vandalism, especially since she so conveniently carved her name into the seats. (Underwood herself has stated she does ''not'' recommend such retribution.)
* Rupert Holmes' "Escape (The Pina Colada Song)" ends with the man responding to a personals ad and discovering the woman who had placed the ad was none other than his own wife/girlfriend. Pretty romantic, except for the part where, along with all the other nice stuff they realized they have in common, they also both learned their respective partner was not only willing to cheat on them but even actively seeking to.
to:
[[folder:Music]]* The last movement of Dmitri Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 ends in [[HappinessIsMandatory a forced triumphant cry of the high strings and the brass]], suggesting one such trope. Not only that but as conductor Michael Tilson Thomas notes, he slips in a few [[TakeThat zingers]] into the final "rejoicing" flourishes. When the music reaches major chords played by the brass, Shostakovich signals a conventional ending -- but, we find out a moment later that, instead of keeping put in that resting chord, Shostakovich ''keeps pushing'' the brass section higher and higher into minor registers, before lurching heavily into a tacked-on ending.for nothing and
* "Judy's Turn to Cry" -- the sequel to "It's My Party And I'll Cry if I Want To" by Lesley Gore has the singer pull off OperationJealousy to get Johnny's attention back (after he came to her party with another girl). It works: Johnny decks the poor sap and ditches Judy to come back to our heroine, who now... gets the guy who abandoned her hits people for little provocation. Great?to
* ''Music/TheChristmasShoes'' is about a man who learns the meaning of Christmas through an act of charity. However, the act of charity is a result of God making the man bump into a child whose mom is dying, and helping him out. The implication being that God felt it was more important teach a grumpy guy a lesson than to miraculously heal this kid's dying mother. Creator/PattonOswalt does not neglect to note this in his take on the song:and
-->Creator/PattonOswalt: ''Let's review: There's a guy in line. He's a little cranky on Christmas. God looks down sees this. "Somebody in a bad mood on my son's birthday? BULLsh*t! Give that kid's mom cancer, make sure he's front of them in line, make him seven cents short for the shoes, this guy will buy them and then he'll be in a good mood." I almost feel like Jesus is behind God going, "I don't think we need to give a kid's mom-""Kid, you shut the f*ck up! This is gonna be the best birthday you ever had!"only
* Music/CarrieUnderwood's [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaSy8yy-mr8 "Before He Cheats"]] ends with a moment of triumph for the jilted (she assumes) girlfriend who assumes her boyfriend will "think before he cheats". A far more likely ending would involve him turning her in for vandalism, especially since she so conveniently carved her name into the seats. (Underwood herself has stated she does ''not'' recommend such retribution.)
* Rupert Holmes' "Escape (The Pina Colada Song)" ends with the man responding to a personals ad and discovering the woman who had placed the ad was none other than his own wife/girlfriend. Pretty romantic, except for the part where, along with all the other nice stuff they realized they have in common, they also both learned their respective partner was not willing to cheat on them but even actively seeking to.
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[[folder:Mythology and Religion]]
* Myth/EgyptianMythology: During the Old Kingdom, only kings got the privilege of an afterlife. But by the time of the New Kingdom, anyone could enter the afterlife as follows: If an Egyptian peasant dies, he has to take a very long walk across the desert (and hope the people who buried him gave him ''The Book of the Dead'', a book of spells designed to defeat the monsters). At the end of this arduous journey, his heart gets weighed. If it outweighs a magical feather representing Truth, it gets thrown to the Devourer (a beast with a crocodile's head, a lion's mane, and a hippo's hindquarters), who eats it and condemns the unfortunate soul to CessationOfExistence. However, if the man's heart weighs the same as the feather (if not lighter), he gets to go to Egyptian heaven, which means... he must work in Osiris' fields for all eternity. Congratulations, man. You get to do what you did for your ''entire mortal life''. (Then again, [[ValuesDissonance to a farmer, that might be a pleasurable afterlife]].)
to:
[[folder:Mythology and Religion]]the
* Myth/EgyptianMythology: During Old Kingdom, only kings got the privilege of an afterlife. But by the time of the New Kingdom, anyone could enter the afterlife as follows: If an Egyptian peasant dies, he has to take a very long walk across the desert (and hope the people who buried him gave him ''The Book of the Dead'', a book of spells designed to defeat the monsters). At the end of this arduous journey, his heart gets weighed. If it outweighs a magical feather representing Truth, it gets thrown to the Devourer (a beast with a crocodile's head, a lion's mane, and a hippo's hindquarters), who eats it and condemns the unfortunate soul to CessationOfExistence. However, if the man's heart weighs the same as the feather (if not lighter), he gets to go to Egyptian heaven, which means... he must work in Osiris' fields for all eternity. Congratulations, man. You get to do what you did for your ''entire mortal life''. (Then again, [[ValuesDissonance to a farmer, that might be a pleasurable afterlife]].)
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[[folder:Radio Play]]
* ''[[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho064TheNextLife Doctor Who: The Next Life]]'' ends seemingly happily: The Doctor, Charley and C'rizz are back in the main universe (or in it for the first time in C'rizz's case), acting like friends again and ready to go on adventures. Rassilon and Kro'ka got their comeuppance, and it seems everything worked out for the best. Except for the fact that the Divergent Universe is doomed to reset over and over again. All of the stories set within the Divergent Universe will repeat again and again, but without the Doctor, many of them will have a much less happy ending for those involved, to say nothing of what will happen to the Eutermesans without C'rizz around. And even beyond that, Zagreus and Keep have decided to team up to terrorise this universe, so who knows what havoc and misery they will sow. The TARDIS team may have achieved their happy ending, but for the residents of the Divergent Universe, the horror is only just beginning...
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
* ''TabletopGame/WerewolfTheApocalypse'': In the Time of Judgment scenario in which the Wyrm is released from confinement in the Weaver's web, the Weaver and Wyrm become sane again, and the cosmos is restored to balance. However, virtually all the changing breeds have been killed and the human race has been hurled back into the stone age.
* ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasquerade'' features an in-universe case in the Followers of Set clanbook: during the history chapter, the narrator briefly focuses on the disastrous events of the Children's Crusade, and true to history, it ended with the majority of the children either dead or sold at the slave markets of Alexandria. Of course, the Followers of Set admit to buying several consignments of enslaved crusaders, many of whom ended up as temple servants - or blood sacrifices. However, [[DeliberateValuesDissonance the narrator assures the reader that this is actually a happy ending]] - because out the thousands of children enslaved and murdered by the cult, ''eleven'' of them were Embraced into the clan... and ''four'' live on as respected elders of a vampire clan dedicated to furthering corruption and decay throughout the world.
[[/folder]]
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[[folder:Video Games]]
* ''VideoGame/AceCombat6FiresOfLiberation'' has a handful of initially-unrelated plotlines, chief among them a fighter pilot upset over having to retreat and abandon his family, and a refugee (who believes her fighter pilot husband was killed in the failed defense of the city) searching for her missing daughter. When allied forces finally liberate the city, are we treated to a heartwarming scene of the fighter pilot husband reunited with his refugee wife and newly-found missing daughter? [[TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot Nope]]. The refugee's husband is actually dead, ''and so is the fighter pilot's family'' (they were killed during the initial invasion, so have been dead [[ShootTheShaggyDog the entire time he was fighting to liberate them]]). The pilot briefly becomes a DeathSeeker, but ends up a WheelchairWoobie instead after his probably-unnecessary HeroicSacrifice [[BungledSuicide doesn't work out how he wanted]]. But wait, it's okay! The pilot meets the refugees after the war and they become each other's ReplacementGoldfish.
* In ''VideoGame/AmnesiaTheDarkDescent'', you have the choice between two of these or a straight-forward DownerEnding when you finally face Alexander. If you disrupt the ritual and allow The Darkness to devour Alexander, Daniel is allowed to go free and presumably pursue a normal life... despite the countless people he helped to torture and murder as part of Alexander's plans. More closely fitting to this trope is the alternative, where you send Agrippa's head through the portal. Alexander and Daniel are both devoured by The Darkness, but Agrippa is apparently able to somehow rescue Daniel and draw him through to another dimension... which brings with it the FridgeLogic of how this is supposed to save Daniel from being tracked down by The Darkness again, which is explicitly mentioned in an InUniverse document as being why Alexander was going to simply abandon Daniel when the ritual was complete.
* In ''VideoGame/AmnesiaAMachineForPigs'', FridgeLogic turns the BittersweetEnding of Oswald Mandus making a HeroicSacrifice to destroy the titular machine into this; yes, London was saved, but how much damage did the Machine and its [[PigMan Manpigs]] do to London before Oswald defeated it, and what effect will it have on the coming future?
* ''VideoGame/{{Bastion}}'s'' Restoration ending, which hits the ResetButton on the entire plot and goes back to before [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt the Calamity]] happened. However, it's heavily implied (especially in the NewGamePlus, where Rucks starts having moments of deja vu during his narration) that history will simply repeat itself and the Calamity will just be triggered again, trapping everyone in a GroundhogDayLoop until the Kid chooses not to reset everything.
* ''[[https://kotaku.com/mario-golf-s-fun-but-battle-golfer-yui-blows-sh*t-up-1847223617 Battle Golfer Yui]]'' has two different endings depending on what you choose to do with the BigBad's MindControlDevice. Using it, obviously results in a bad ending where the heroine becomes the new Big Bad. Choosing to destroy it, however, frees the heroine's friend from its effects. Just as they take each other's hands, however, a bomb goes off that destroys the golf course the game takes place on, killing 20,000 people...but hey, at least the bad guy was defeated, right?
* This applies to one half of the ending for ''VideoGame/Bioshock2''. The part determined by how the player treats the Little Sisters akin to the previous game remains as straight as an arrow, this time with Eleanor Lamb's moral fibre being determined by this. The contentious factor comes in the form of how the player addresses three other characters with their own motivations and reasons for antagonising the player ([[AntiVillain Grace Holloway]], [[DirtyCoward Stanley Poole]], and [[BrainwashedAndCrazy Gilbert Alexander]]), and how this plays a role in the other half of the ending. The alleged "purely good" ending requires the player to spare these three characters in addition to rescuing the Little Sisters (this nets an achievement too). However, the fate of these three characters only determines what happens to the BigBad Sofia Lamb, Eleanor Lamb's EvilMatriarch. A lot of players would accuse Sofia Lamb of becoming a KarmaHoudini should Eleanor Lamb save her, and would much prefer the ending where Eleanor Lamb kills her own mother (the factor with the Little Sisters is thankfully independent of Sofia Lamb's fate, making it possible to still have an overall good outcome while punishing Sofia Lamb). The only catch to this is that the player ''must'' [[ShootTheDog kill Grace Holloway]] to make this possible, in addition to slaying Poole and Alexander.
* While there are several variables in ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'' that ultimately work out for the best (ie: Robo existing in the future, Crono being brought back even if you don't do so yourself, etc.), the fate of Schala is left both mysterious and yet soul-crushingly unoptimistic. Worse yet, despite her good nature, she is surrounded by and associated with many of the game's cruelest villains, to where an uninitiated person might just assume she is one of them. Even in the main ending, Marle only mentions her in passing, asking if she factors into another party member's plans - Everyone is just supposed to accept that their victory came with only one lasting sacrifice (''VideoGame/ChronoCross'' does address this, but not in a way that holds much significance in relation to the plot of ''Trigger'').
* ''VideoGame/CrusaderOfCenty'': In a game which not only [[BrokenAesop breaks its Aesop, but jumps on the pieces]], a lot of time has been spent setting up that monsters aren't evil, and just want peace, except when you have to fight them, which you spend the entire game doing (again, really BrokenAesop), with scenes with them begging you to find way for humans and monsters to live in peace... You go back to before humans existed and send all the monsters off to their own world, because HumansAreBastards, and will never, ever accept them. This is meant as a happy ending, evidently. Though one could argue that the alternatives are worse...
* In the original ''VideoGame/DevilSurvivor'', some consider the Silent Revolution ending this, as it gives exclusive control of the Demon Summoning Program to the Japanese government. In a game that pulled no punches in showing how the police quickly got DrunkWithPower and took PoliceBrutality to horrifying extremes once they got their hands on the summoning app, and also showed the government was planning on wiping out everyone in Tokyo in a FinalSolution if the crisis got out of control. The ending narration also mentions the government weaponizes the app to turn Japan into not only an economic superpower, but a military one as well.
** Its sequel ''VideoGame/DevilSurvivor2'' has MultipleEndings, but this specific one is the Liberator ending. In this ending, Polaris has been killed and the world is no longer being swallowed up into a void, and the people still around are doing their best in managing the situation now. But the rest of the world hasn't returned, so all that is left is what little of the surface remains and the rest is simply a huge ocean full of undrinkable water. And by killing Polaris, the world has lost all supernatural aspects that were, yes, trying to kill them, but also removed all possible benevolent help they could have gotten. Humanity is now likely doomed to die of starvation and this situation could cause people to go back and become violent again. The only HopeSpot is that the next person in line for the Heavenly Throne will arrive and fix things, but how soon that will happen... ''[[UpdatedRerelease Record Breaker]]'' pushes the InferredHolocaust angle even further by revealing that Canopus, the ultimate head of the Administrator System, deems humanity as a threat to universal order after the party kills Polaris. As mentioned above, if the next set of invaders, the Triangulum, appear in the Liberator world, humanity will have absolutely no way to fight them back.
* ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry2DiddysKongQuest'''s GoldenEnding - in terms of both canon and meta. Crocodile Isle's destruction is treated as the ultimate SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome for the Kongs; however, along with the InferredHolocaust, this also means that many beloved levels are gone as well.
* ''Franchise/DragonAge'' has become infamous for this among mage and/or elf fans. Every game, the PlayerCharacter protects the local Andrastian human kingdom or religious organization from crumbling due to their own incompetence and/or corruption. [[note]]The Warden saves Ferelden from Civil War and the Blight, Hawke saves Kirkwall from the Qunari and the rebel mages and Templars from tearing the city apart, and the Inquisitor saves Orlais from Civil War, the Chantry from crumbling, and Andrastian Southern Thedas from falling to a Tevinter madman[[/note]] However, these same Andrastian human kingdoms and religious institutions have deeply ingrained FantasticRacism against mages and/or elves. Even if the PlayerCharacter is an elf/mage, saves the world, and is exalted as as a hero at the end, within a few years the society you saved goes back to mistreating your people.
** In ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins'', a City Elf Warden can {{lampshade|Hanging}} this trope at the very end, after using their new status as hero to grant the alienage a bann to represent them at court. Your father is thrilled that humans are praising an elf as their hero, while the City Elf [=PC=] can cynically reply that it's only a matter of time before they start treating elves like crap again. A Mage Warden also can say as much to their mentor regarding mages. Both turn out to be right.
** In ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition,'' a player who chooses to aid elven rights activist Briala co-rule Orlais with Gaspard or Celene is presented as a happy end to the civil war for elves. Reuniting Briala with Celene is especially presented as the "ideal" happy ending for all parties. However, a lot of players note that both outcomes look shaky and short-lived at best, since Briala's power lasts only as long as Gaspard is alive ''and'' under her thumb, or her relationship with Celene continues to go well, since Celene still has ''all'' the power and hasn't hesitated to use it to screw over Briala and the elves before. Basically, despite the game framing Briala co-ruling with Gaspard or Celene as a happy ending for elves, many players are waiting for the other shoe to drop.
** Even when you take helping elves out of the equation, those who've read ''Literature/TheMaskedEmpire'' feel that the game resenting the reconciliation between Celene and Briala as the most ideal happy ending to the whole Orlesian Civil War as this. While the game treats the reunion as a heartwarming example of love triumphing over hard feelings, those who've read the book know how toxic, imbalanced, and even abusive their relationship was, and how this "reunion" doesn't address the power imbalance that allowed Celene to hurt Briala as badly as she did. Many players don't see it as a heartwarming reunion so much as convincing an angry, emotionally vulnerable abuse victim to go back to her abuser.
* The ending of ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIIMorrowind'' with its add-on ''Tribunal''. Okay, "the false gods" are gone, which is represented as a good thing. However, those "false" gods were the beings which essentially created and shaped Dunmer society as it is, and cared about the Dunmer people. And the "true" gods are Daedra, who are notorious for their BlueAndOrangeMorality, petty vengefulness and the fact that their idea of good and righteous Dunmer society is tribalism. Not to mention the entire big floating rock debacle which led Morrowind to a slight local apocalypse. ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'' confirms that the aftermath of ''Morrowind'' did indeed result in the near complete destruction of Dunmer civilization.
* Discussed InUniverse in ''Videogame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'':
** The ending to the main questline seems at first glance to be a positive one. After all, [[DestroyerDeity Alduin]] is defeated, the dragons are now somewhat pacified and following the Way of the Voice, and the Skyrim civil war is either finished or at least at a ceasefire. However, as Paarthurnax says, the Dragonborn's attempt to defeat Alduin might have prevented him from destroying the world... or [[BecauseDestinySaysSo it might have sped up the ending of the world]], since it is Alduin's role to be the one who eats the world so it may be reborn, and all that Alduin desired in this timeline was to ''rule'' the world. In defeating him, the player may have simply put him back in his place as the World-Eater.
** Also, depending on how the CivilWar itself was ended, this could be the case. If the Stormcloaks win, then the Empire is shattered apart, leaving the continent at risk of being once more invaded by [[ANaziByAnyOtherName the Thalmor]]. If the Empire wins, however, Skyrim is still devastated by the war and the worship of Talos will be further suppressed, which will further weaken the metaphysical forces holding the world together, [[OmnicidalManiac which is what the Thalmor want]].
* The good ending of ''VideoGame/{{Eversion}}'' plays this for laughs--the princess still turns into a monster, but the hero becomes a monster as well, and the two live happily ever after.
* There's a strange variation in ''VideoGame/Fallout3''. The regular ending has two choices: You sacrifice yourself to save the wasteland by activating Project Purity (which will flood the activation room with radiation), or you get Lyons to sacrifice herself for you. The ultimate effect is the same, but the game [[WhatTheHellHero chews you out]] if you choose to sacrifice Lyons. Thing is, you don't even have the ''option'' of say, sending Fawkes, the '''explicitly radiation-immune''' Super Mutant to do it, or Charon, the ghoul who's '''healed by radiation''', using a robot, surviving by use of the copious amounts of Rad-Away you've most likely accumulated over your journey, or even poking the activation buttons with a pole from far away. Severe fan backlash got Bethesda to release the ''Broken Steel'' DLC, which allows you to [[TakeAThirdOption take the obvious third option]] and send Fawkes to do it. The wasteland has pure water, EverybodyLives, AndTheAdventureContinues. You still get called out for it, though, due to the ending dialogue not changing.
* ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'':
** The ''Compilation of VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'' suggests that humanity switched from Planet-destroying Mako energy to... fossil fuels, which are destroying our own planet in real life. Fans tend to assume that people are reverting to fossil fuels as a stopgap to keep society going while looking for more ecologically sound alternatives, but there's no evidence for this in the text, and - as we know from real life - switching over is unlikely to be easy.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVIII'' ends on an upbeat note, with Squall having made substantial progress in overcoming his emotional issues, Ultimecia defeated, and [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt Time Compression]] thus prevented. Unfortunately, the StableTimeLoop means that Ultimecia's rise in the future, and her subsequent reign of terror up until her death at the hands of the protagonists, are inevitable.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXV: Episode Ignis'''s GoldenEnding gives a happy ending to the bros (and Ravus) and screws over Ardyn's plan, but Ardyn's still a pile of demons biding his time, Lunafreya is still dead, and Lucis is still an absolute monarchy with all its sins of unchecked privilege, imperialism and apathy. Your [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation opinion on Ardyn]] and your own political views will probably influence whether a good guy being in charge of that institution is a happy ending or not. On top of that, Ardyn's only been given another couple of millennia to think about his plan before another candidate for the prophecy is born... And as ''Dawn of the Future'' revealed, [[TheManBehindTheMan Bahamut]] was manipulating both Noctis and Ardyn into killing each other, and the two being alive only delays his plans of [[OmnicidalManiac wiping Eos clean of life]] as he needs the two ''dead'' to enact it without any opposition.
** Like a lot of works that feature both [[RealityWarper reality warping]] and a "face reality" Aesop, ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyTacticsAdvance'' ends with the characters returning to the real world and facing all the problems they'd previously tried to escape from. This makes a certain degree of sense in the Japanese version, but the English translation puts less emphasis on how many people are suffering in Mewt's world (which is implied by the fact that three zombies/vampires share the same names as Mewt's bullies), and more emphasis on the idea that perhaps said world is just as real as their own, making the whole thing somewhat pointless. What's more, Doned is still crippled.
* ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'' has two endings: depending on who you choose to deal the final blow to the final boss. Chrom's version is generally considered to be one of these by most players, as it merely [[SealedEvilInACan seals Grima away for another thousand years]], meaning that while the main characters get to live their lives happily, Grima will one day return to terrorise the world again and to the protagonists that's just [[BystanderSyndrome Somebody Else's Problem]]. The Avatar's ending kills Grima permanently, seemingly at the cost of the Avatar's life, which would make it a BittersweetEnding... were it not for the fact that the Avatar is revealed to have survived. As such, since the latter is a GoldenEnding with no drawbacks, most players consider the first ending choice pointless.
* The story mode of ''VideoGame/FireEmblemWarriors'' ends with the OriginalGeneration twins being crowned co-Regents in the ruins of Aytolis castle, having defeated Velezark and sending the many heroes back to their own realms. Except the twins committed a character-flaw-driven mistake, the sort most ''Fire Emblem'' Lords learn to overcome, in the last three chapters of the game, and many people would argue that it's indicative of poor priorities for a ruler. Further, the neighboring kingdom of Gristonne is now completely lacking a royal family and any sort of armed forces. Finally, with what can be learned about Aytolisian succession, both twins are going to have firstborns with an equal claim, making a SuccessionCrisis and civil war all but certain. Small wonder the final cutscene doesn't actually address the plot's aftermath at all.
* TheHero has beaten the BigBad in ''VideoGame/FragileDreamsFarewellRuinsOfTheMoon'' and is set to journey with the heroine to find other survivors in the empty world. What makes this an example is the ending dialogue features a voiceover of the aged hero, with many implications he's at the end of his life, his female companion has died and he's back to square one of being alone again. The game ends following his monologue.
* Applied to the first two ''VideoGame/GodEater'' games. It was made very clear that everything the titular God Eaters did was a stopgap, humanity was running out of resources in this arms race, and eventually an Aragami would form that was simply too powerful to stop and this GreyGoo variant would reach its logical conclusion. The third game finally tackled this with an ending that conclusively ruled out an apocalypse, though humanity still had a lot of rebuilding to do. Because of this, it also applies to [[StealthSequel stealth prequel]] ''VideoGame/CodeVein''.
* ''VideoGame/GodOfWarIII'': After killing anyone and everyone who has ever even vaguely pissed him off until there is nothing left of the world but a charred, storm-swept wasteland, Kratos discovers that he has accidentally become the physical repository of the concept of hope, released from Pandora's Box. Instead of giving it to the ghost of Athena to rebuild mankind on her terms, he commits suicide to release it to all of mankind... The currently busy with drowning, being riddled with plagues and locust swarms, tormented by the dead returning from the graves and having no afterlife, having to escape fire falling from the sky, ravaged by constant lightning strikes and uncontrollable storms and living in a world without sunlight, order or gods of mankind. Literally, the only thing they have left is hope. The only bright side is that without the tyranny of the Olympians, the world can finally heal and start over.
** According to IGN, the whole thing is supposed to play out as a Twisted "Comedic" Tragedy, where the main character makes all the wrong decisions; fighting the gods, killing the gods, feeding innocent people (more than one in this game) to death traps, and leaving the power vacuum without a successor. It's heavily implied that this is not any kind of happy or downer ending; Kratos WON... and that's a bad thing.
* ''VideoGame/HomeworldDesertsOfKharak'': Hurrah! Your faction has defeated the evil religious fundamentalists who were standing in the way of your civilisation redeveloping hyperdrive and seeking out new life and new civilisations... Except that [[DoomedByCanon this is a prequel]], and in a few decades everyone is going to find out that [[TheExtremistWasRight those fundamentalists were right]] about the terrible doom and catastrophe that will befall Kharak as a result.
* Parodied with ''VideoGame/ImOK'', a response to Jack Thompson's "Modest Video Game Proposal" featuring a vengeful father out to slaughter video gamers and devs over the death of his son. After gorily massacring a multitude of bystanders (including children. Many, many children,) industry employees, and eventually destroying the building E3 is hosted in, the game gives a generic "Congratulations! You killed every game designer in the world! America is saved!" ending.
* The main story ending of Rayark’s ''VideoGame/{{Implosion}}'' is supposed to be bittersweet, but the FridgeHorror implications seem to much more bitter than sweet. Jake ends up with total amnesia in hospital after his brain gets operated and put an AI-related device to wake him from unconsciousness after he performed a TakingYouWithMe attack on the Queen when Jake controls [[RemoteBody Warmech-III "Avalon"]] by using his subconscious. It's heavily implied that Jake can't remember ''anything'', including his identity, his family, his world-saving mission, and others. [[WasOnceAMan [=XADA=]s Warmech-III "Avalon" killed were once humans and animals before they were infected and corrupted into]] zombies and Queen-obeying {{Eldritch Abomination}}s by XADA pathogens, and it's heavily implied that they're much greater in numbers than [=XADA=]s from their home planet. The XADA infections/corruptions have no cure at all, so killing them is the only solution. Even worse, the story [[NoEnding suddenly ends]] and then is followed by a credits roll right after the scene of the wheelchair girl who wants to name him since he is amnesiac. We also don't know whether the rest of XADA aliens are still on Earth, although it's implied that they're completely obliterated, while it's not clear that XADA pathogens are airborne and still on Earth.
* The first ending to the original ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsI'' mildly fits this trope, as the ending was intended to be bittersweet either way. The final cut-scene shows Sora and Mickey sealing the door to (then referred to as) Kingdom Hearts with Riku's help, and Sora has a sort of spiritual talk with love-interest Kairi, desperately getting out that he will indeed find his way back to her somehow, before they are symbolically and spiritually separated as the fragments of worlds realign to their original places, and [[TheChosenOne Sora]] has saved the universe! FridgeHorror sets in when one realizes that a defenseless best friend Riku and King Mickey have been trapped permanently in a dimension populated entirely by an army of Heartless monsters, and that Sora and the party are either in some zero-space between worlds (since they were not restored to their "proper homes" as the end montage shows for everyone else, even making a point of showing Kairi alone on the island), or at worst, since their final showdown was on a patchwork planet made up of what was left of the worlds devoured by Heartless, they may have been left in cold, dark space to die without a planetary body to sit on, and their spaceship, made up of the old barriers between worlds? Yeah, that barrier has been restored, presumably with their spaceship. This ending disturbed the American representatives at Disney so much that they made Square add on an epilogue (made with game footage due to lack of time), signaling that Sora and co. may not be home, but they're at least alive and "looking for Riku and the King" implying they too survived. Square rolled with it and made that coda lead directly into the intro of ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsChainOfMemories''.
* ''Franchise/TheLegendOfZelda'':
** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'' has a beautiful, uplifting ending... unless you play ''[[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaMajorasMask Majora's Mask]]'' and prefer to take a darker interpretation of the WordOfGod stating that [=OoT=]-Link eventually becomes ''[[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTwilightPrincess Twilight Princess]]'''s Hero Shade. Things might not have gone so hot for Link after the ending. There's also the knowledge that even though Link went back in time and created a new timeline where Hyrule ''wasn't'' burned and conquered by Ganondorf, the original timeline is still going on, one where the people are finally free, but a lot of them are dead, the castle is completely destroyed in a lake of lava, and the Hero of Time has vanished and thus can't help them anymore, [[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheWindWaker leading to the flooding of Hyrule when Ganondorf resurfaces]].
** The worst might be from ''[[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaLinksAwakening Link's Awakening]]'', where our hero causes a DreamApocalypse and wakes up stranded in the middle of the ocean... with a big smile on his face and triumphant music playing. ''Literature/HyruleHistoria'' noticed this disconnect, and gave its retelling of the story a more explicitly downbeat ending stating that Link's fate was unknown, only for ''Zelda Encyclopedia'' to go the opposite route and confirm his survival by moving the ''Oracle'' games from before to after this game.
* ''Videogame/LifeIsStrange:'' While both endings are [[BittersweetEnding bittersweet]] to varying degrees, the ending in which Max chooses to allow Chloe to die to stop the storm from destroying the town seems to be intended as the [[StoryBranchFavoritism "better" of the two]] and is definitely the one the developers put more effort into. Players on the other hand often have a great deal of criticisms of it, pointing out what while more characters explicitly survive in this ending and [[MadArtist Jefferson]] and [[TeensAreMonsters Nathan]] are busted, as far as anyone can tell, Arcadia Bay is still a DyingTown run like a fiefdom by Nathan's [[CorruptCorporateExecutive amoral real estate mogul]] father, Chloe dies alone and unloved at her absolute lowest point (with the last words she ever hears being "Nobody would miss your punk ass!"), and Max has lost the love of her life and/or best friend, may be traumatized for years, and has essentially learned the heartwarming message that [[ShootTheShaggyDog going on her adventure in the first place made everything worse]].
* ''VideoGame/LittleNightmares'' ends with Six killing the Guests who caused her so much torment, and escaping the Maw where she was being held prisoner. However, in her escape she stooped low enough to KickTheDog by ''eating a sentient creature alive''. Plus, promotional materials for the first game imply (and [[VideoGame/LittleNightmaresII the second game]] outright confirms) that the outside world is arguably ''worse'' than the Maw.
* ''Videogame/MassEffect3'''s original ending caused more than a little backlash among fans for various reasons, but sticking to just this trope:
** The Mass Relay network is destroyed. This method of faster-than-light travel is absolutely essential to galactic civilization. There's no indication that the technology or knowledge exists to repair or replace relays, and it's treated as something of a surprise earlier in the trilogy that a since-extinct race was able to build their own relay. Without them, galactic civilization as the player has experienced it for three games is essentially destroyed.
** A DLC for the second game shows that when a Mass Relay is destroyed (by crashing a giant asteroid into one), it releases energy comparable to a supernova, and also destroys the star system it occupies. The method used to destroy the entire network in ''Mass Effect 3'' gives no indication that it avoids this side effect, so on top of civilization being destroyed, it also looks like the trillions of people living in systems with relays die immediately.
** The player's companions seemingly survive the initial event, but wind up stranded on an apparently uninhabited planet. In addition, only three (seemingly randomly chosen) characters are definitively shown to survive. [[note]]And given how biochemistry works in ''Mass Effect'', even if everyone survived, either two of your companions are now doomed to starve to death, or everyone but those two are going to starve.[[/note]]
** One of the three endings, Destroy, kills every robotic character in the galaxy, on top of destroying the Relay network and maybe destroying star systems with relays.
** The so-called "best" ending Synthesis, does a poor job of explaining why it should be considered the best. [[note]]The clearest indication to this effect is the rather meta fact that it is simply the most difficult to unlock.[[/note]] Supposedly somehow fusing organic and inorganic life into one greater whole -- involuntarily, at that -- the only actual effect it is shown to have is to cover organisms in a glowing green circuitry pattern and make their eyes (if they have them) glow green.
** To [=BioWare=]'s credit, the free Extended Cut DLC, which extends the ending cinemas, addresses at least these issues, by [[RetCon retconning]] it so the Relay system is only damaged, not destroyed, definitively showing it can be repaired, and including scenes showing civilization rebuilding after the war. However "Destroy" is confirmed to wipe out the Geth and kill Edi (who is added to the montage of fallen comrades). Futhermore synthesis is apparently shown granting husks sentience. The horrific implications of Cannibals, Banshees and ''worse'' abominations being made self-aware didn't escape fans.
** Two of the endings are also esoteric in that the message is that synthetic and organic life are (somehow, in some vaguely-defined way) utterly incompatible and will inevitably try to destroy each other for poorly-defined reasons, and that this can only be resolved by implementing a galaxy-wide Final Solution of some variety that inevitably involves either obliterating ''all'' synthetic life without exception or forcibly apply UnwillingRoboticisation to ''all'' organic and synthetic life against their will. Both of these completely break the Aesop of every single interaction you have with synthetic allies. (The Control ending avoids this problem, since it only affects the hostile Reapers.)
** In Synthesis and Destroy, the Citadel is also shown exploding, with the Presidium, the structural core of the station, collapsing. Through inference of its holding station instead of orbiting when the Reapers brought it to Earth, the billion-ton ward arms would be falling Earthward and possibly causing five extinction event impacts. The Extended Cut changes this into having the Citadel instead look like it should be condemned and dismantled, with holes in the Wards' bases, and a huge chunk out of the Presidium (which again is the structural core of the station). Control averts this.
* ''VideoGame/MaxPayne'':
** In ''Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne'', Max lays in the destroyed Inner Circle manor and mentions a dream about his dead wife, who is dead but "that was alright". But the closest thing he had to a ''living'' spouse/girlfriend/what have you is dead, and anyone who can explain anything is dead including the extremely powerful Alfred Woden, who had connections to senators. His death, and the death of Detective Winterson are going to be in all likelihood put squarely on Max's shoulders. So not only is he going to be a scapegoat for the death of these powerful people, but also justly prosecuted for the death of a detective with a ''blind son'', who is now an ''orphan''. An Ex-Cop is going to be sent to jail, and we all know how well they go over there. This was probably intentional given the narrative, but it's something of a miracle that a sequel was produced at all that did not involve Max getting shanked to death in the first thirty minutes. If you finish the game on the hardest difficulty, the final Noir cutscene ends with Mona waking up, implying that this could be an EarnYourHappyEnding, but the third game runs with the "Mona is dead" ending as canon and goes out of its way to point out how unhappy Max was, with or without her.
** As for the events of ''Max Payne 3'', apparently Max managed to talk his way out of any murder charges, but that's about the only way his life didn't completely self-destruct: His career's in ruins, he's slowly killing himself with [[TheAlcoholic alcohol abuse]] in an attempt to self-medicate for [[ShellShockedVeteran post-traumatic stress disorder]], and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking just to add insult to injury]] he's been forced to move out of New York and into a crummy apartment in New Jersey. Surprisingly, by the end of the game he's actually a little better off: [[EarnYourHappyEnding He has to go through yet more awful sh*t to get there]], but the bad guys are ''definitely'' getting theirs this time and he's at least started the process of getting his life back together.
* ''VideoGame/Mother3'' ends with the corrupted world being destroyed by a benevolent EldritchAbomination, and then cuts to total blackness. However, you can still walk around in it, and you soon discover that everyone made it out alive. You can talk to the other characters, who are apparently right there with you, and most of them seem relieved that they no longer have to live in that [[CrapsackWorld Crapsack of a world]]. However, given the fact that you're all in a black void, and the ''world was just destroyed'', you all may very well be ''floating through space''. Plus, nothing can change the fact that Lucas's Mother and Brother are dead.
* [[IronWoobie Aribeth's]] story in ''VideoGame/NeverwinterNights'' ends with her spirit earning its way into heaven by helping the wounded in the aftermath of Mephistopheles' attack in the second expansion pack, but it's pretty ambiguously 'happy' given the degree of crap she had to go through and the magnitude of the fight she put up to remain a good person that apparently didn't matter to whatever authority consigned her to hell based on actions taken under mental influence in the first place. Not to mention that [[KarmaHoudini the leadership of Neverwinter]] doesn't answer for unjustly executing two staunch champions of the city as scapegoats, which means none of the wrongs anyone ever did Aribeth were addressed.
** In ''VideoGame/NeverwinterNights2'', there are hints that the Hero of Neverwinter had a severe falling out with Lord Nasher and walked away from the city. If you accept that the Hero of Neverwinter is also the same person as the protagonist of last expansion pack, then it's likely he walked away due to the fact that the city was demonizing his two good friends, Fentwick and Aribeth, who he ''knows'' are generally innocent of the crimes laid against them.
* This is a DeconstructedTrope in ''VideoGame/{{Nier}}''. The first playthrough of the game shows the protagonist working to save his daughter/sister (depending on the version) and then getting a standard happy-looking ending by finally vanquishing the evil Shadowlord, the master of the monsters known as Shades, that lets his daughter/sister come back to live with him. The second playthrough onwards makes it ''abundantly'' clear that this was, in fact, ''not'' a happy ending ''at all'' because what you ''actually'' did was render humanity totally extinct, while also senselessly killing completely innocent sentient beings along the way, and as a direct result the protagonist's sister is going to die anyway along with everyone else.
* Made a DiscussedTrope in ''VideoGame/NierAutomata''. As they're reconstructing the protagonists' bodies to give them a final chance at a free life, the Pods speculate that since they're going to be using a complete image of each android's personality at the time of their death, it's entirely possible they'll just repeat the same mistakes that lead to their end in the first place. However, they conclude that they feel the androids deserve that chance, and the fact they themselves have [[GrewBeyondTheirProgramming grown beyond their programming]] enough to contemplate and make said decision is proof the androids can avoid past mistakes.
* All the cheeriness from the ending of ''[[VideoGame/{{Pikmin}} Pikmin 3]]'' fizzles away when you realize that even though Olimar makes it off the planet alive, he still failed his mission, left his partners to die, and ultimately screwed over his employer. In short, it's a happy ending for Koppai, but not for Hocotate.
* ''VideoGame/Portal2'':
** At the end, Chell is finally set free by an emotionally exhausted [=GLaDOS=] and dropped off in the middle of a wheat field, the CompanionCube from the first game by her side. Good for her!... Except the ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'' games take place in the same universe as ''VideoGame/HalfLife'', meaning that Chell is likely now living in a post-apocalyptic world ruled by tyrannical aliens from another dimension, overrun by monsters and zombies, with no weapons or knowledge of how to handle herself in a Combine-run society. Given, there is some timeline confusion between ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'' and ''VideoGame/HalfLife'', but the fact that the ''Borealis'' is missing from its loading dock in ''VideoGame/Portal2'' confirms the Combine Invasion has already happened in ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'s'' timeline.
** Invoked in the co-op campaign. It ends with [=GLaDOS=] telling the bots "you saved science!" and the robots starting dancing with joy as the very upbeat electro song "Robots FTW" starts playing. How did the robots save science? By rescuing thousands of humans preserved in cryogenic storage, who are now going to be put through dangerous tests like Chell was, until they die painfully. Just to twist the knife further, the robots get blown up by [=GLaDOS=] due to being made obsolete, the happy music ''still'' plays [[BlueAndOrangeMorality because the robots only cared about science]], so it was a success to them, and the ''Peer Review'' DLC reveals all those humans died off in less than a week.
* While ''VideoGame/ProfessorLaytonVsPhoenixWrightAceAttorney'' story's ends happily, the whole thing being a successful attempt by the British government to alter memories and brainwash people on a large scale goes unremarked on, despite the potentially horrific ramifications for the world's future. The sheer ''amount'' of trauma many characters go through can also prevent the ending from feeling as happy as it's presented, especially concerning Espella, Darklaw, and Jean.
* The [[EarnYourHappyEnding best ending]] in ''VideoGame/PuellaMagiMadokaMagicaPortable'' has Madoka successfully avoid a contract while the other four girls defeat Walpurgisnacht. The story then ends with the girls having a ShipTease-laden tea party, happily smiling and joking at each other. However, since Madoka didn't make a contract, millions of girls are still dying of despair, humankind is still plagued by witches, and the main characters are probably going to all die in a few years after their Soul Gems start to run dry.
* ''[[VideoGame/{{Rampage}} Rampage: Total Destruction]]'''s ending is a likely deliberate example meant to be funny. The monsters destroy several cities and kill and eat countless people, but the company that accidentally created the monsters makes a ton of money selling their mutagenic soda [[NoSuchThingAsBadPublicity due to the free publicity that the monsters give them]], so [[TheBadGuyWins everything is alright]].
* ''[[VideoGame/{{Resistance}} Resistance 3]]'' seems to end on a pretty triumphant note, with the Chimeran war finally over after almost 20 years with their wormhole to their homeworld closed and humanity rising up to finally eliminate the last of them. The problem is humanity, after all that fighting, has been reduced by 90%, either killed or converted by the Chimera. A population decline like that would be borderline impossible to recover from, especially with the loss of so many people who would be necessary for things like labor, industrial work, science, medicine, etc. Human society has essentially regressed by several hundred years. And that's not even getting into the HostileTerraforming that the Chimera have done to Earth, trying to plunge it into a new ice age. An act that, even if it has been undone by the loss of their terraforming machines, has likely lead to the extinction of countless species and permanently damaged the Earth's ecology.
* The ''VideoGame/RuneScape'' quest ''The Brink of Extinction'' has you saving the [=TzHaar=] race from going extinct. You eventually defeat the villain responsible and solve the cause of the problem. However, if you go back to the villain after the quest to confront him about the reasons for his actions, he reveals that the [=TzHaar=] are slowly growing weaker with every generation due to losing their [[GeneticMemory racial memories]] because they were never intended to reproduce. By taking away their ability to reproduce, he was trying to force them to return to the Elder Kiln so they could be properly reborn as intended. So although you have saved the [=TzHaar=] in the short term, you have doomed them in the long run, although the situation is not quite as bad as it was before because now the [=TzHaar=] are aware that their bodies need to be returned to the sacred lava after death so their souls can be freed from AndIMustScream, and the Ga'Al ([=TzHaar=] born [[BlankSlate without any memories]]) are no longer being killed on birth.
* ''VideoGame/SaintsRowGatOutOfHell'' plays this for laughs: Its MultipleEndings run the whole gamut of "happy": from Johnny (re)gaining personal happiness, gaining immense power, securing his friends' happiness, to hitting the ResetButton on the entire franchise. The last ending, however, is decisively esoteric: Johnny gains the answers to all questions in the universe and just stands there for a bit, going "Ooooh!" with an incredibly satisfied smile, before the credits roll.
* The ending of ''VideoGame/SandsOfDestruction'' is unambiguously meant to be happy: Kyrie has control of his PowerIncontinence, the [[SandIsWater Sand Sea]] is now filled with water (and therefore much more livable) and it's no longer trying to swallow all the continents to help end the world, humans are no longer [[FantasticRacism oppressed by Ferals]], and [[AlwaysSaveTheGirl best of all]], he and Morte (who no longer wishes to end the world) are a happy OfficialCouple. Well, great, except the epilogue doesn't show ''any'' Ferals except [[OnlyTheLeadsGetAHappyEnding Taupy, Rhi'a, and Naja]]. What happened to the rest? Rhi'a is seen chasing after a house cat who resembles Felis Rex, so perhaps they've been turned into ordinary animals - a fitting end to those who were oppressive, sure, but the game points out that Ferals are as diverse as humans in personality; some are cruel and some are kind. On top of that, the only reason Kyrie has control of his powers is ThePowerOfLove, and he and Morte are teenagers: what happens if they break up, like so many other teenagers tend to do? Worse yet, the Crimson Sun gave Morte the Destruct Code that controls Kyrie's powers, and the only reason she's [[LoveRedeems no longer interested in ending the world]] is because Kyrie is WorthLivingFor; she's still shown to be temperamental and prone to acting before she thinks. So if Kyrie ever falls out of love and breaks her heart, she's [[SuicidalCosmicTemperTantrum likely to end the world in a fit of anger]] because she now knows ''exactly'' how to do it, and he'd be powerless to stop her. Oops.
* All four main endings in ''VideoGame/SilentHill2'' leave open this possibility:
** 'Leave' tends to be viewed, by most, to be the game's happiest ending, as Mary forgives James, and James leaves town along with Laura, seemingly escaping the nightmare. But, it's also possible that James is really still in denial, and has 'conjured' Mary in order to forgive himself, leaving town with a clear conscience that he only has because he has convinced himself he deserves it.
** 'In Water' is often viewed as a DownerEnding, in which he commits suicide by driving his car into Lake Toluca, though it can also be seen as a final end to his torment and an escape from a life which has been broken beyond repair, to spend eternity with his wife in a place where death maybe isn't the last word.
** 'Maria' is an ending most people consider to be bad, in which James decides to choose the Silent Hill construct Maria over his wife, and ending on a potentially sinister note with Maria displaying symptoms of Mary's fatal illness. However, instead of this being an example of a careless James rejecting his wife in favor of her doppelganger, it is an ending you get by being a good person, defending and taking care of a person who claims to be helpless and actively seeks your protection. Rather than rejecting Mary, the final battle may simply be a reflection of the guilt he feels for doing the right thing for Maria when he failed to do the right thing for Mary.
** 'Rebirth' has James attempting an occult ritual hoping to physically revive Mary. The ending implies that the ritual is a success (and ''VideoGame/SilentHill4'' demonstrates this same ritual definitely succeeding). We do not see this take place and we are given no hint of the outcome. It could be that James gets exactly what he wanted, or that he got way more than he bargained for, or that he's so out of sanity at this point that nothing happens at all and he just believes otherwise.
* The "Bogeyman" ending in ''VideoGame/SilentHillHomecoming'', which involves Alex being transformed into one of the [[VideoGame/SilentHill2 Pyramidhead-like]] Bogeymen, initially seems like a straightforward bad ending... [[FridgeBrilliance but when you think about it, becomes this instead]]. The actions that trigger this ending involving ''acting'' in the role of Silent Hill's executioner and tormentor (by deliberately causing pain and suffering to those who broke Silent Hill's laws), which means that the transformation could just as easily be [[BlueAndOrangeMorality Silent Hill's idea of "rewarding" Alex]]. Furthermore, given that Alex by the end of the game has been left mentally scarred and permanently crippled, with all of his paperwork lost in the now-haunted Shepherd's Glen, he doesn't really have a life left worth living amongst humanity. Becoming a monstrous avenger of evil and tormenting the wicked for all eternity is an honest step ''up'' from where he'd otherwise be left as. Furthermore, it fits with the recurring motif of SinsOfOurFathers present in the game; the machinations of the Shepherd's Glen cult made monsters out of all of Alex's peers... and end up making a monster of Alex, too.
* Unabashedly used in ''VideoGame/{{SOMA}}''; due to the nature of how BrainUploading works in that universe, after all the effort of trudging through the monster-riddled ruins of [=PATHOS II=] and launching the [=ARK=] into space, protagonist Simon is left stranded in his cobbled-together ArtificialZombie body at the bottom of the oceanic abyss, as he was only able to make a copy of his mind aboard the satellite's artificial reality, rather than directly transferring himself. As he argues with his only companion, a previously uploaded engineer who created the [=ARK=], about this fate, the imperfect computer she's been forced to use to host her consciousness finally overloads and kills her, leaving him completely alone, the last vestige of human sentience, under miles of water on a planet where the surface has been scorched clean. Up above, the duplicates of Simon and Catherine enjoy a happy reunion in the [=ARK=]... although how long it'll actually ''survive'' is anyone's guess.
* ''VideoGame/SpiderManShatteredDimensions'' has this feeling occur in-universe after 2099 Spider-Man defeats his version of Scorpion; Scorpion took the tablet at the bidding of another villain, who promised to turn him back into a human (his backstory is that he was turned into a scorpion-like mutant) if he found it for her. Consequently, Spider-Man feels sorry for him and wishes there was something he could do. When Madame Webb congratulates him and assures him that the day is his, he glumly asks, "Yeah? Then why do I feel so ''bad'' about it?"
* In-universe in ''VideoGame/StrongBadsCoolGameForAttractivePeople'', everyone complains about Strong Bad's ending for ''Dangeresque 3''.
-->'''Coach Z:''' What happened to the part where Dangeresque swoops in, rescuing me from danger and carrying me off into the sunset?\\
'''Strong Bad:''' Oh, yeah... [[DroppedABridgeOnHim Renaldo dies now.]]\\
'''Coach Z:''' ''(dismayed)'' [[BigWhat WHAT?!]] Oh, but I only had two weeks 'til retirement!\\
'''Marzipan:''' ''(upset)'' Yeah, and you fast forwarded through the eight minutes of educational content I provided!\\
'''Bubs:''' ''(upset)'' And what happened to my nude scene?!\\
'''Strong Sad:''' Where is the artistic noir cinematic stylings you promised?\\
''[[ZergRush (Everyone crowds in close to Strong Bad, who climbs up on the couch to elude them)]]''\\
'''Strong Bad:''' Now calm down, people! Every great film has to make some creative editing decisions in order to make me look better.
* Depends a little bit on your interpretation of the epilogue in ''VideoGame/TalesOfTheAbyss''. If you think/support Luke coming home, and Tears' tears being from joy, then you win. If you support Asch coming home, and Tears' tears being from the realization that she'll never again see the man she loved, then this fits it pretty well. Either way, though, Natalia has lost someone close to her. You ''can'' TakeAThirdOption and choose to believe the person who came back was a SplitPersonalityMerge of Luke and Asch, [[LoveTriangle either]] of [[OneTrueThreesome which]] leaves the ending happy but complicated. And while Van's plan of wanting to destroy the world and every single person alive (to replace them with Replica to take their place and hence prevent [[BecauseDestinySaysSo the Score's predetermined end of the world]]) has been thwarted, the Planet Storm has been stopped, meaning that any fonic arts are growing weaker and will likely [[TheMagicGoesAway cease to exist soon]], leaving the inhabitants, who are somewhat reliant on fonic arts for various machinery and similar to be completely useless... until they perhaps find a substitute, which could take years, if not decades or centuries.
* ''VideoGame/TalesOfXillia2'':
** The game has MultipleEndings and the 'semi-good' ending is this. Elle became the millionth divergence crystal, humanity has successfully completed Origin's trial and he has removed all fractured dimensions, as was the party's plan. Everyone's doing fine and Ludger is shown to meet Lara, with implications that they will fall in love, get married and have [[KidFromTheFuture Elle]]. However, this ending implies that Ludger could go down the same path of his alternate self in the fractured dimensions, turning into 'Victor', who murdered majority of the Xillia past when they tried to use Elle. Considering how this ending is called 'Fate Repeater' ''and'' it's the only ending that gives you the Victor Costume, the implications are definitely there.
** Even the best, true ending is this. The entire plot of the game involves destroying alternate universes, and the game doesn't hide that everyone in those universes dies. While there are some scenes of party members feeling bad about it, they quickly get over it and the party just accepts this as a necessary evil. By the time of the ending, everyone is long done feeling bad about about destroying alternate realities, which means that not only does the ending involve killing trillions of people when all the remaining realities are destroyed, but nobody even cares.
* ''VideoGame/ToTheMoon'' ends with Johnny fulfilling his wish of going to the Moon with the love of his life, River. But... it's all a DyingDream, Johnny's twin brother, Joey, remained dead in the real world for most of Johnny's life, the real Johnny dies without knowing what his wife, River, was trying to tell him, while the real River died knowing Johnny [[ForgottenFirstMeeting never remembered his first meeting with her]], something she was desperately trying him to do so for most of her life. The whole uplifting ending never happened in reality.
* ''VideoGame/{{Transistor}}'' ends with Red finally stopping the Process, but not before all of Cloudbank and its citizens have been processed. At this point, she has the power to remake the city however she wants, but instead chooses to return to the man in the Transistor's body and kill herself with it. But then the credits sequence starts getting surprisingly upbeat until it's revealed that Red killing herself with the Transistor resulted in her getting processed as well, and she can spend the rest of her life with the man in the Transistor in the Country. However, like Bastion, it's implied the game's events will repeat themselves inside the Transistor world.
* ''VideoGame/{{Undertale}}'':
** The GoldenEnding in general is quite positive, but the Amalgamates returning to their families to live happily seems out of place, considering the horror attached to their reveal and the BodyHorror they experience. In addition, some dislike that, while Alphys shows guilt and regret in the lesser endings (in the worst ending she's implied to [[DrivenToSuicide kill herself]]), in the GoldenEnding, she doesn't face even the ''least'' amount of punishment for having ''created'' the Amalgamates.
** Flowey/Asriel's fate (losing his physical body and reverting to an emotionless flower creature) rubs a lot of people the wrong way, and somewhat diminishes what would otherwise be a literally perfect ending for everyone. Many a FixFic involves finding a way to get Asriel his soul back.
** A similar, but far more subtle and subjective case could be made about Sans. He explicitly states at the end of a No Mercy route that it doesn't matter to him if he makes it to the surface or not - he's been so conditioned by Flowey/the player's continuous resets that making it would just feel like a false hope being dangled in front of his face. The question here is a matter of AlternativeCharacterInterpretation; was he only saying that because he was at his DarkestHour, and has enough faith in the protagonist/player by the end of a pacifist route to enjoy life on the surface like everyone else, or will he spend the rest of his days just as depressed and nihilistic as before?
* ''VideoGame/ValkyriaChronicles'' ends with the war being won, the bad guys being defeated, and the good guys going back to their rescued hometown to live their peaceful lives. That's all well and good for ''them'', but it doesn't acknowledge the fallout: one, it's possible to replicate Valkyria powers artificially. Max's attempt was blown up, but it ''worked'', and it's not-so-subtly implied that it failed primarily because Valkyria are exclusively female and Maximillian is a man. Sure, ''Max'' is gone, but everyone who ''produced'' that technology is still in the Empire. Two, Alicia proves that any random orphaned little girl may be descended from the Valkyrur, and practically ''any'' non-Darcsen woman in Europa could easily claim the same thing: the entire game is about how AmbitionIsEvil and some people will do anything to control the power of the Valkyria, and the most viable potential Valkyria are an extremely vulnerable demographic that have to be ''nearly dead'' to awaken their powers. And three, the Princess of Gallia just openly declared that the entire history of Gallia is a big fat lie and she is a Darcsen, a minority race that is widely reviled. The sequel [[AscendedFridgeHorror examines the consequences of most of these]]. ''VideoGame/ValkyriaChronicles4'' picks up the slack on what it doesn't cover, too. Specifically, the empire has known for a while anyone can have Valkyrur blood and has been going a massive amount of genealogy research to narrow down possible candidates. The Federation's guilty of exactly the same thing, too.
* ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'' has several of these already underneath its' belt because of the PlayerCharacters' actions in each expansion. With the most prominent of them being in ''Warlords of Draenor'' where we wound up going to an AlternateTimeline version of the planet Draenor to chase down Garrosh Hellscream; the BigBad from the previous expansion who united the Orcish Clans there to militarize them into fighting the Alliance and Horde on Azeroth as the Iron Horde. Only to later have the plot be [[HijackedByGanon hijacked by a returned Gul'Dan]] whom we end up defeating, only for Gul'Dan to be sent through a collapsing demonic portal towards a Legion-controlled world; where he would end up becoming TheDragon of the next expansion ''Legion''. Despite it seeming like a happy ending for the Orcs and Draenei who decided to make peace, there are underlying details missed out on.
*** During the Iron Hordes conquest of Draenor, many powerful groups on Draenor such as The Breakers, The Evergrowth, the Ogre Empires, and the Adherents of Rukhmar were mostly toppled, and later collapsed completely because of the Alliance and Horde players chasing after the Iron Horde; resulting in a massive power vacuum to form on the planet.
*** The Draenei had lost their spiritual leader Velen, and that Yrel was left in full control over their people. Yrel has already shown instances of her being emotionally unstable due to the deaths of her sister Samaara, her mentor Velen, and of her friend Maraad by the actions of the Iron Horde.
*** [[SparedByTheAdaptation Because the Draenei civilization in this timeline didn't fall]]; they would never get a spiritual awakening and learn the path of Shamanism and how to commune with the Elements, thereby leaving many of the Draenei closed off to other means of thought or acceptance of other practices and beliefs.
** All of this combined together resulted in [[ProtagonistJourneyToVillain the Draenei of the alternate Draenor to fall towards extremism]] and try to start forcibly converting every other sapient race on the planet to the Holy Light as The Lightbound; sometimes even against their own will. This results in [[LaResistance The remaining Mag'har Orcs]] to band together to try and stop the threat of the Draenei and of their High Exarch Yrel. In many ways, it just shows exactly how similar the Draenei are to their Eredar cousins: where one managed to poison their people into an obedient slave army with the Fel and Demonic Magics, the other is doing the same with the Holy Light.
* By the time ''VideoGame/{{Xenogears}}'' is over most of the world's population is dead or worse. The ending focuses on the fact that you've saved Elly and taken care of the forces that'd been working against you, but does it really matter at that point?
* ''VideoGame/YesYourGrace'': The player can engineer different endings for various characters. The good ending for Asalia, the PlayerCharacter's middle daughter, is obtained via allowing her to run off with her girlfriend when given the option to do so. Did we mention that both Asalia and her girlfriend are around twelve years old, and that Asalia picks up a sword for the very fist time during the year covered by the game? Her girlfriend is heavily implied to be a decent fighter and able to live on her own despite her young age, but that's about all they have going for them in terms of cumulated survival skills as far as the player knows. On top of this, one of Asalia's bad endings consists of running off with her girlfriend ''without'' permission and never contacting her family ever again. The only thing that's different in the good ending is that the PlayerCharacter gets letters from her and knows she's still alive. The part where he never gets to see her again remains.
* Not in regards to the actual ending, but in ''VideoGame/YokaiWatch'' for completing a SideQuest the player gets a "Bonus Scene", a little animation that plays out one of three ways, "Boo" which is the worst ending with no prize, "Bingo!" which is the good ending and a small prize, and "Jackpot!" which of the best ending with the best prize. However one scene shows the demon cat Jibanyan trying to help the kappa Walkappa up the mountain, with the "Boo" ending being they both fall off and the "Bingo!" ending being Jibanyan helps Walkappa up the peak. For some reason, the "Jackpot!" ending has Walkappa missing Jibanyan's hand and falling down the mountain, with Jibanyan just standing there and shrugging in confusion.
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