Board Thread:Off Topic/@comment-23790511-20150129221847/@comment-3146930-20150130214445

Obviously the only right answer is the end of Pokémon: The First Movie. Ash in order to stop the fighting between the two groups of Pokémon puts himself between them and pays the price for it, being turned to stone. Then Pikachu runs up and tries to shock him back to life, but doesn't work and all he can do is cry! :'(

On a more serious note, Wall-E is another good example. This is pretty much the one Pixar film most people don't cry over (not counting the Cars movies, the bottom of the Pixar pile), but I do. Wall-E tries so hard for most of the movie to get Eve to like him, but she is too busy with her mission. Later Wall-E is basically stabbed and slowly dying, but he still keeps going and puts Eve's mission and humanity ahead of himself and gives Eve the plant instead of holding her hand. Then he gets crushed when trying to prevent the Holo-Detector from going down. When they do get back to Earth, the Captain takes his hat off to Wall-E as a sign of respect because no one on the ship knows if Wall-E is even going to survive. Eve then rebuilds him and he has no memory at all of anything and is in default mode. Eve "kisses" him and he sees they are holding hands and everyone is happy.

As far as TV goes, Clannad and Clannad After Story are horribly depressing, but very happy too. *Spoiler* When Ushio and Tomoya go on a vacation, Tomoya finally breaks out of his slump and talks to his daughter for probably the first time for real. Then on the train back, he tells her all about her mother and what she was like *Spoiler End*

Another series like that is Ef-A Tale of Melodies (second season). Unlike the other two example where there is some joy, this is just sad. Without going into too much detail, this girl who is basically a Stepford Smiler has had nothing good happen to her in her entire life pretty much. Then when she finally becomes happy, she is hit by a car and dies. To make things worse, it was a hit and run so she was just left there on the side of the road slowly bleeding to death with no one around at all to help her.

Honorable Mentions

 * When Mufasa dies in The Lion King
 * When Kermit the Frog/Bob Cratchit returns home after Tiny Tim dies in A Muppet Christmas Carol.
 * The end of The Lego Movie when Emmet and Lord Business talk about what it means to be special; plus the father seeing that to his son, he is the bad guy. It is almost painful for him to realize how his son sees him.
 * ParaNorman, when Norman sees the town judges sentence the "witch" to death. This isn't sad, but it brings up a lot of strong emotions and those that have seen the movie know why. Ending counts too.
 * Serenity, when Captain Malcolm Reynolds finds what is on Miranda and gives a speech to inspire his crew. Just epic all around.
 * Truman Show, pretty much from the time he starts escaping until the end of the movie.
 * Wreck-it Ralph-When Ralph is falling out of the sky to break the top of the Mentos/Soda volcano.
 * All of AnoHana.
 * Last episode of Elfen Lied.
 * Many moments in Fruits Basket.
 * Last episode of Sound of the Sky; you have no idea.
 * Last 1/3 of ToraDora.
 * Basically all of Usagi Drop.