Dead Hand Shot: Difference between revisions

This is a stock type of camera shot that is also popular for [[Film Posters|posters and cover art]]. The story typically has death or murder as a central element, but featuring a corpse front and center, especially a very maimed one, prominently on the box art is usually not considered a good way to sell. So a compromise is used, an artfully limp and bloody hand is shown, perhaps holding (or dropping) an important object. Of course, the hand may be [[An Arm and A Leg|separate from the body]], or itself badly damaged.

* Happens in ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime)|Fullmetal Alchemist]]: The Conquer of Shamballa'', mixed with an [[Empathy Doll Shot]]. We hear a scream, see a gust of wind, then cue a hand underneath a pile of debris right next to a teddy bear.

* In ''[[Dragonball]] Z'', as Vegeta draws his final breath on Namek, his tear-blurred vision fades from his point of view, and we next see a close-up of his gloved hand falling onto the ground, followed by a shot of his body shivering with his eyes closed before becoming still and lifeless, followed by a gust of wind blowing on his body.

* In the ''[[School Days (Visual Novel)|School Days]]'' HQ-exclusive bad ending ([http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unoeytu3SIA seen here]), Kotonoha is pushed by Sekai onto train tracks and is killed by the arriving train. Right after the train hits, the scene cuts to Makoto holding her [[An Arm and A Leg|torn-off]] [[Dead Hand Shot|hand]]

* Happens to Nono Motoe in [[Blood-C]]. Or better said, we see her legs after she and her twin sister Nene are ''horribly'' eaten alive in front of their friend Saya Kisaragi. And then it's subverted: it was all an act. They ''do'' get killed off again... [[Gorn|and it's much worse]].

* ''[[Citizen Kane (Film)|Citizen Kane]]'' starts off with a shot of Kane's hand holding a snowglobe, then dropping it when he dies.

* The George Romero ''[[Dawn of the Dead (Film)|Dawn of the Dead]]'' movie has a zombie hand too, and those are the living dead. The hand doesn't have the courtesy to lie there prettily though. It grasps.

* The ending of the 1930 film version of ''[[All Quiet On the Western Front (Literature)|All Quiet On the Western Front]]''.

* ''[[Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs (Disney)|Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs]]'', complete with dropped apple. Of course, it's only "sleeping death".

* When the Doctor [[Deader Than Dead|dies permanently]] in the ''[[Doctor Who (TV)|Doctor Who]]'' episode "Turn Left", his body is covered with a sheet, but his limp hand falls into view and drops the sonic screwdriver.

* ''[[The Plague Dogs (Literature)|The Plague Dogs]]'': The scene where the dog shoots the hunter in the head.

* [http://www.giantbomb.com/dead-space/61-20800/all-images/52-179977/dead_space_cover/51-851818/ The box art] for ''[[Dead Space (Video Game)|Dead Space]]''.

* One of the very few images of Courier 6 from [[Fallout New Vegas]] is of a very sad-looking hand, [http://images.wikia.com/fallout/images/6/61/Courier_buried.jpg poking up out of a shallow grave.]

* During a flashback in ''[[Professor Layton and The Unwound Future]]'', Claire's hand is the only part of her body that's exposed amidst the rubble following the catastrophic explosion that killed her and several other people.

* ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2003 (Animation)|Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2003]]'' cartoon ''loved'' this trope. Standouts include Splinter (who in reality wasn't seriously hurt, although that didn't stop producers from using the shot to suggest it in the episode's promo), Tang Shen (who did).

* Near the end of the ''[[Jonny Quest the Real Adventures (Animation)|Jonny Quest the Real Adventures]]'' episode "Undersea Urgency", Jonny and other survivors of a doomed [[Underwater Base]] (overrun by [[CHUD]]-like creatures awakened by a a seaquake), one of surviving scientists tries to go back for one of the dead creatures ([[For Science!]]!). Turns out the creature (and it's inhuman maw full of razor-sharp teeth) is [[Not Quite Dead]]. Cue [[Dead Hand Shot]].