In a sentence that ends with a verb, when could "が" modify a 3rd person pronoun?

Question

3rd person pronouns (both English and Japanese) and the particle "は" have a commonality. For pronouns (jp & eng) antecedent must exist in the conversation. An "antecedent" is what the pronoun stands in the place of. This has no antecedent:

He went to Japan.

Structurally, the grammar is ok. But, who is he? No one knows. There is no antecedent. This doesn't really mean anything.

Jim is my co-worker.
He went to Japan.

So, "Jim" is the antecedent of "he". We put "Jim" in the universe of discussion, then we can use "he" as his proxy. In Japanese:

田中は私の同僚です。
彼は日本へ行った。

The antecedent of "彼" is "田中".

So, 3rd person pronouns can only be used if there is antecedent.

Similarly, in the "は" vs. "が" decision, "が" is used to mark new information into the universe of the discussion. See, but 3rd person pronouns must already be in the universe of discussion.

In a sentence that ends in a verb, could "が" ever modify "彼" / "彼女" and have a sentence that is a complete thought?

虎に彼が食べられた is not a complete thought. Who is 彼？

田中は私の仲間でした。昨日、虎に彼が食べられた。<--- this ok?
田中は私の仲間でした。昨日、虎に彼は食べられた。<--- or, this ok?

Answer 1

If you haven't read this question, please check it first: What's the difference between wa (は) and ga (が)?

Whether a noun is already in the universe of discourse is very important, but that's not the only thing that determines when to use が or は. There are at least three types of situation where が must be used with 彼 (or more generally, nouns which are already in the universe of discourse).

1. When 彼 is in a sub-clause, が must be used instead of は, because は usually marks the topic of the main clause.

   • 田中さんは私の仲間でした。彼が虎に食べられたのは昨日のことです。
   • 田中さんは私の仲間でした。彼が虎に食べられる瞬間、彼は何かを叫んでいました。

2. が is used if it is used as exhaustive-listing が.

   • その3人の中で、最初に彼が虎に食べられました。

3. が can be used with certain types of verbs as neutral-description が. "Sentences of neutral description present an objectively observable action, existence, or temporary state as a new event." (quote from the question above)

   • 先生はまだかな… (knock) あ、先生が来た！
   • どうしよう、お父さんが怒っている。
   • 大変です、彼が虎に襲われています！

Answer 2

I THINK SO! Maybe depends on what you mean by complete thought.

Probably sounds better without the pronoun though...

田中は私の仲間だった。昨日、虎に食べられた。

But to answer your question "In a sentence that ends in a verb, could "が" ever modify "彼" / "彼女" and have a sentence that is a complete thought?"...

I suppose you might hear something like this:

田中は仲間だった。立派な男だった。今日、我々は友人を失ってしまったのです。彼がトラに喰われてしまったのを初めて聞いたとき、正直、泣きました。彼の為ではなく、トラの為でした。あいつはがりがりで、きっとまずかっただろう。

• Tanaka was a colleague. He was a good man. Today, we have lost a friend. When I first heard that he had been eaten by a tiger, honestly, I wept. But not for Tanaka, for the tiger. That guy was really skinny. He must have tasted awful.