Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated: Difference between revisions

When a character who is alive is mistakenly believed to be dead. Quite often includes the character being shown his own death certificate. Often includes being declared [[Legally Dead]], but isn't necessarily restricted to that.

 

 

{{deathtrope}}

== [[Anime]] & [[Manga]] ==

* Madara Uchiha/Tobi, in ''[[Naruto]]'', since everyone in the story thought that he died a long time ago. Some fans theorize that he actually IS dead; the story proper hasn't yet revealed exactly what's going on with him.

 

== [[Film]] ==

{{quote|''"Is the Warden supposed to be dead?"

"Well, it's supposed so: but, mind you, I don't believe it! The evidence is very weak—mere hear-say. A wandering Jester, with a Dancing-Bear (they found their way into the Palace, one day) has been telling people he comes from Fairyland, and that the Warden died there. I wanted the Vice-Warden to question him, but, most unluckily, he and my Lady were always out walking when the Jester came round. Yes, the Warden's supposed to be dead!" And more tears trickled down the old man's cheeks.'' }}

* Possibly as a [[Shout-Out]] to [[Mark Twain]], one book in ''[[Animorphs]]'' sees a new alien race that according to Ax was killed off millennia ago. "Reports of their extinction may have been exaggerated" indeed, they're trying to kill us right now.

* ''[[The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time]]'': Christopher's father told him his mother died. Then Christopher finds all the letters she's been writing to him since she left his father.

* In ''[[Temeraire|Victory of Eagles]]'', Laurence is presumed dead after the ship he was supposed to be on is sunk by the French.

* There's an episode of ''[[The Golden Girls]]'' in which Blanche's spurned boyfriend, an obituary editor, runs her obituary to get back at her. Blanche is more upset that he claimed she was 68 than being listed as dead.

* One ''[[My Two Dads]]'' episode has a typo in an obituary causing everyone to think Joey was dead. He goes along with it for a while to sell art, because [[Dead Artists Are Better]].

* In ''[[Coronation Street]]'' Jerry's father put his own obituary in the newspaper.

* Archie Bunker was misreported as dead by the Veterans Administration for one episode of ''[[All in The Family]].''

* In ''[[Babylon 5]]'', John Sheridan was thought to be dead. "I was. I got better." He spends a long time cleaning up the consequences of this.

* ''[[Game of Thrones]]'': "I see that the rumors of your demise were unfounded."

* Happens on more than one occasion in ''[[Doctor Who]]'':

* Jonathan Doors is shot by a sniper in the pilot of ''[[Earth The Final Conflict]]'', protecting the Taelon ambassador Da'an. Turns out, it was all a setup. The sniper was working for Doors and was shooting blanks, as was the doctor who confirmed his death. The goal was to set up [[La Résistance]] to figure out the real reason the Taelons came to Earth. A few episodes later, Doors publicly outs himself, using a similar line to this trope.

 

* In ''[[Mass Effect]] 2'', Shepard was dead for two years, which leads to trouble when (s)he returns to the Citadel and is picked up by the security scanners as being dead. Fortunately, a [[Reasonable Authority Figure|friendly C-Sec officer]] changes the records without making him/her jump through all the hoops (s)he would normally have to go through.

** You can also have them keep you out of the system, so to security you don't exist. This may have benefits in the third game, as Cerberus is listed as a terrorist organization, which doesn't normally help people stay out of the eyes of the law, Spectre or not.

* Doctor Halsey quotes this trope in ''[[Halo: Reach]]''. The casualty reports had listed her as K.I.A., or so Noble Team thought.

** Near the beginning of the level "Uprising" in ''[[Halo 2]]'', the Arbiter runs into some friendly forces. He's greeted with "The Arbiter! I thought he was dead!"

* The ''[[Fallout: New Vegas]]'' add-on, ''Lonesome Road'' adds a perk, "Thought You Died", which is basically this.

* [[Resident Evil|Albert Wesker and later, Jill Valentine]] both fall under this trope; Wesker in Code: Veronica and Jill in Resident Evil 5.

* In the Original Trilogy, [[Ninja Gaiden|Irene Lew]] is thought to have been killed in the opening of the third game. She shows up later on and she is not very happy with her former boss trying to kill her.

{{quote|'''Irene:''' Did you think that I would die that easily?}}

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

* On August 27, 2008, Bloomberg accidentally published a 17 page obituary regarding Steve Jobs' death. In a subsequent public appearance Jobs joked about the accident by displaying on screen, "The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."

* A newspaper mistakenly published an obituary for Alfred Nobel, instead of his deceased brother. Nobel was shocked to see himself called "merchant of death" for his invention of dynamite, and was inspired to start the Nobel Prize so that he would be remembered for something else. It worked.

* In India, it's popular to bribe an official to declare a relative dead so that you can inherit his property. It has all the advantages of murder without the unpleasant messiness.

* In the aftermath of the [[Velvet Revolution|17th November 1989 demonstration]], a rumor has spread that a student named Martin Šmíd was killed during the event. This turned to be a misinformation; a student of that name was at the demonstration, but left before the police intervention began. He was interviewed in the television, presumably to dispel the rumor...and the transmission started at just the wrong moment when he was saying, referring to the events of the day: "Death touched me." (In case this figure of speech doesn't translate well to English, he meant: "I was horrified.")

* Some accidental premature publishings on cnn.com revealed that CNN at least has outlines and some graphics prepared for obituaries of famous people, like Dick Cheney and Queen Elizabeth, who have yet to die in anticipation of eventually having to get one up on short notice.

* At the Battle of Hastings in 1066, a rumour suddenly swept through [[William The Conqueror]]'s army that Duke William had been killed. The Duke heard of this and took his helmet off so that his army could recognise his red hair. He proceeded to win the battle and complete the [[Norman Conquest]].

* When [[Queen Victoria]] was in her final years, it was frequently reported that she had died and implied that they were just pretending she was still alive to keep her son off the throne.

* Steve from [[Blue's Clues]] was surprised to hear he had died and been replaced with a lookalike. No matter how many times he said he was still alive, some people still believed he was dead.

* In describing the assessments of his medical condition once given to him by various doctors, composer Frederic Chopin commented "I have been sick as a dog during these past two weeks. Three doctors have visited me. The first said I was going to die; the second said I was breathing my last; and the third said I was already dead."

[[Category:Older Than Radio]]

[[Category:Infauxmation Desk]]