History FakingTheDead / AnimeAndManga

* Done hilariously in ''Manga/OnePiece''. Nami faked killing Usopp to get him away from Arlong. When he returned to Zoro and Sanji, they were having their first fight, and accidentally Double-KO'ed the arriving Usopp.
-->'''Sanji:''' He ''is'' alive.\\

* In ''LightNovel/TheFamiliarOfZero'', [[spoiler:Colbert dies onscreen in season 2. There is no hint that he might be alive until he shows up in season 3, saving the day at the last minute. It turns out his death was faked with magic.]]

* In ''LightNovel/FullMetalPanic'', [[spoiler:the powerful psychic and temporal energies coming off of Yamsk 11 cause Sophia ([[GrandTheftMe possessing Kaname's body]]), Sousuke, and Tessa to see a vision of a possible future in which Sophia shoots the latter two dead. The real Kaname, a prisoner in her own mind, [[FightingFromTheInside exerts enough mental influence]] to make Sophia believe that she really did kill Sousuke and Tessa so that she and her allies would turn their attention elsewhere, giving the heroes the breathing room they need to turn the tables. By the time she finds out, Sousuke is already ''en route'' to destroy her plans and it's too late to stop him.]]

* ''LightNovel/HeavyObject'':

*** Almost {{defied}}: Dio decides to cut his head off just in case, but Polnareff gets the jump on him, allowing Star Platinum to revive Jotaro and get him back in the fight.

* In ''LightNovel/NyarukoCrawlingWithLove'', Nyarko apparently gets killed TakingTheBullet for Mahiro. He sobs over her body, bemoaning how he should have been nicer to her...at which point she grabs his head and pulls him into a '''very''' deep kiss, with plenty of tongue. It turns out the good luck charm she gave him [[ChekhovsBoomerang in episode 2]] acted as a PocketProtector, and she played dead for [[LovableSexManiac this precise reason]]. Worth pointing out, during this episode the pair is in the middle of a FreakyFridayFlip, so from Mahiro's perspective ''his own body'' just gave him a giant French kiss; he's understandably not happy.

* In ''LightNovel/TheRisingOfTheShieldHero'', [[spoiler:Malty]] is sentenced to a CruelAndUnusualDeath which is confirmed when her body is shipped back. This is later revealed to be a homunculus created by [[spoiler:Tact's harem]] to hide her survival.

* In the two-part ''Anime/WeissKreuz'' OVA ''Verbrechen ~ Strafe,'' [[spoiler:Aya and Yoji receive orders to kill Ken and Omi for refusing to complete a mission. Tipped off that the orders are fraudulent, the four stage a vicious battle which apparently ends with the deaths of Omi, Yoji, and Aya, and use it as an opportunity to get the jump on the source of the fake orders.]]

** Also, both Toguro brothers fake the dead in the arc before the Dark Tournament, to let Yusuke and Kuwabara think that they are anywhere near close to them in power, at least for a little while.

* ''Manga/DeathNote'':
** [[spoiler:Matsuda]] throws himself off a balcony and onto a mattress hidden below, to reduce his risk from Kira.

** Senku lets Tsukasa think he's dead (to be fair, Tsukasa actually ''did'' kill him, he [[BackFromTheDead just got better]].

* In ''Manga/{{Gintama}}'', [[spoiler: Katsura slashed at the beginning of the Benizakura arc and disappears for the rest of the arc until the final battler when Katsura reveals to have been hiding in an Elizabeth costume.]] [[spoiler:Points to the person who ''killed'' him; Okada Nizuo was so confident in Katsura's defeat that Nizuo decided to cut off Katsura's hair as prize before he even checked Katsura's alive or dead status - allowing Katsura's to survive.]]

** In chapter 487, it's revealed that [[spoiler:Kisame faked his death with a Zetsu clone and is ''hiding inside Samehada'' so that he could infiltrate the Cloud Village and capture Killerbee more easily]]. He does note that the plan didn't go entirely without a hitch [[spoiler: since Samehada liked the Hachibi (Eight Tails) enough to actually give Killerbee chakra]]. Meaning that, when push comes to shove, [[spoiler: Samehada might have ConflictingLoyalty]].
** The most important use of this trope is the zigzagging with regards to [[spoiler:Uchiha Madara]]. Believed dead after his battle with [[spoiler:the First Hokage]], he used the following decades to perfect his EvilPlan until he died of old age well before the main story began. At that point his identity was assumed by [[spoiler:Obito]], his chosen successor who utilized [[spoiler:Madara]]'s reputation and apparent miraculous survival to his advantage.
** [[spoiler:Obito]] is also a mild zigzag, having apparently died while on a mission only to survive with no means to contact anyone. The faking was unwilling at first as he wanted to return home but after [[spoiler:witnessing Rin's death]] he decided ThatManIsDead and went with this trope.

* In ''LightNovel/TheRisingOfTheShieldHero'' [[spoiler:Malty]] is sentenced to a CruelAndUnusualDeath which is confirmed when her body is shipped back. This is later revealed to be a homunculus created by [[spoiler:Tact's harem]] to hide her survival.

* ''Manga/DetectiveConan'':
** In a case from volume 30, {{Captain Ersatz}}es of famous detectives were invited to an abandoned mansion and, being observed by surveillance cameras, fake killing each other off and/or dying via various ignoble means to deduce who the real killer was in order to PullTheThread on her.
** In a filler case, [[spoiler: a desperate woman stuck with an abusive fiancè asked her friends and neighbors for help to fake her death and get away, and they agreed. But in a horrible subversion, they didn't count on said abusive fiancè finding out about the plan, [[IfICantHaveYou killing the girl]] and then trying to use Kogoro as an UnwittingPawn to put the blame on the friends.]]

* In ''Manga/TheKindaichiCaseFiles'' volume 4 (or the first arc of the second season of the anime), [[spoiler: Hajime fakes his death in order to get all the suspects in one place, while at the same time demonstrating an optical illusion that the culprit was using to throw everyone off.]]

** In chapter 487, it's revealed that [[spoiler: Kisame faked his death with a Zetsu clone and is ''hiding inside Samehada'' so that he could infiltrate the Cloud Village and capture Killerbee more easily]]. He does note that the plan didn't go entirely without a hitch [[spoiler: since Samehada liked the Hachibi (Eight Tails) enough to actually give Killerbee chakra]]. Meaning that, when push comes to shove, [[spoiler: Samehada might have ConflictingLoyalty]].

** In a case from volume 30, {{Captain Ersatz}}es of famous detectives were invited to an abandoned mansion and, being observed by surveillance cameras, fake killing each other off and/or dying via various ignoble means to deduced who the real killer was in order to PullTheThread on her.
** In a filler case, [[spoiler: a desperate woman stuck with an abusive fiancè asked her friends and neighbors for help to fake her death and get away, and they agreed. But in an horrible subversion, they didn't count on said abusive fiancè finding out about the plan, [[IfICantHaveYou killing the girl]] and then trying to use Kogoro as an UnwittingPawn to put the blame on the friends.]]

** In the case concerning a [[spoiler:MadBomber who refuses to spill out where he hid his last and deadliest bomb]], [[spoiler:Class A and Class Q manage to trick the man into believing said last bomb had already detonated, which leads him to gloat about the destuction it caused and slip out where he had put it. The whole plan included Kintarou faking his death in the explosion, and Kazuma faking an HeroicBSOD over it. (The ''omake'' has Kintarou tragicomically wondering if this would happen when he died for real.)]]

** At the very last case, it turns out that [[spoiler:Ryu's father's death was faked by King Hades to give Ryu plausible motive to kill four of his former house servants[[note]]Ryu found his father hanged which looked like a suicide. And then, four of the servants took over four of mansions Amakusa Family owned for themselves. This gives off impression for outsiders that the four servants killed their master and Ryu knows about it.[[/note]] in a case ''nine years after the event''. Yes, it's much more complicated than it seems.]]

* In ''Manga/{{Gintama}}'', [[spoiler: Katsura slashed in the beginning of the Benizakura arc and disappears for the rest of the arc, until the final battler when Katsura reveals to have been hiding in an Elizabeth costume.]] [[spoiler:Points to the person who ''killed'' him; Okada Nizuo was so confident in Katsura's defeat that Nizuo decided to cut off Katsura's hair as prize before he even checked Katsura's alive or dead status - allowing Katsura's to survive.]]

** Earlier than that, Avdol is seemingly killed by Hol Horse and J. Geil, but eventually shows up later in the story, explaining that he just barely managed to deflect the otherwise-fatal blow so that it only knocked him out instead. His party (sans Polnareff, who was LockedOutOfTheLoop along with the audience for fear that he'd accidentally blab about what they were going to do next) then decided to fake his death so that he could recover in secret and eventually catch up with them.

* Prior to the events of ''Manga/MissKobayashisDragonMaid'', Tohru was saved from certain death by Kobayashi after a battle with the gods. Since everyone in other world assumed she was dead, she took the chance to drop off the radar and [[IJustWantToBeFree be freed of her responsibilities]], only informing Lucoa and Fafnir of her survival. [[spoiler:This ends up causing [[AngerBornOfWorry quite a bit of friction]] with her rival[=/=]former best friend Elma.]]

* Quite the [[TearJerker/SailorMoon Tear Jerker]] in TheNineties ''Manga/SailorMoon'' anime-- [[spoiler:One episode revealed Minako's BackStory as Sailor V. She lived in London with a [[OneeSama woman she saw as her older sister]] named Katarina and an older man named Alan who she clearly had a crush on for awhile, until one day when she went into a building to investigate a crime as Sailor V. The theif threw a grenade at her, which wrecked the building. Katarina barely escaped with her life, and Minako was alive, still hidden in the rubble, when she saw Katarina embrace Alan and realized those two were more than friends. [[IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy She left and pretended she had died in the accident so those two would be happy together without her getting in the way.]] [[note]]annoyingly this episode was left out of the North American Creator/DiC dub -- also odd, since thr Latin-American dub (based on the DIC dub until the R season) actually included it.[[/note]]]]

* In ''Manga/DetectiveSchoolQ'', this happenens ''several'' times:

* Done in ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'' with Maria Ross. Ross is charged guilty for killing Maes Hughes (who was actually killed by a shapeshifter assuming Ross's appearance). Roy Mustang, knowing that Ross wouldn't do this, forges a corpse and shows its wholly incinerated remains as evidence that Ross was properly punished, while Ross in actuality escapes and returns for the climax of the plot. The government does order the coroner to confirm the corpse's identity through dental records... but, as it turns out, the coroner was in on it too.

* In ''Manga/{{Yuureitou}}'', Reiko killed [[SelfMadeOrphan her adopted mother]] and apparently [[MurderSuicide killed herself]] afterwards. As it turns out, [[spoiler:Reiko was Tetsuo [[{{Transgender}} prior to his transition]].]]

* In ''LightNovel/HaiyoreNyarkoSan'', Nyarko apparently gets killed TakingTheBullet for Mahiro. He sobs over her body, bemoaning how he should have been nicer to her...at which point she grabs his head and pulls him into a '''very''' deep kiss, with plenty of tongue. It turns out the good luck charm she gave him [[ChekhovsBoomerang in episode 2]] acted as a PocketProtector, and she played dead for [[LovableSexManiac this precise reason]]. Worth pointing out, during this episode the pair is in the middle of a FreakyFridayFlip, so from Mahiro's perspective ''his own body'' just gave him a giant French kiss; he's understandably not happy.

** His grandfather Joesph pulls this on Wamuu, taking it to video game levels of RefugeInAudacity, as in he is moving around whenever Wamuu isn't looking. Wamuu does notice, but it's all a part of the plan.
* ''Manga/KatekyoHitmanReborn'':
** Rokudo Mukuro pretended to have suicided by shooting himself in the head. Turns out he shot himself with a special bullet that allows him to possess others and tries to surprise attack Tsuna using other people's bodies.
** [[spoiler:Future Tsuna]] also does the same thing in the future arc.

* When [[ActionGirl Balsa]] in ''Anime/MoribitoGuardianOfTheSpirit'' is hired to protect [[ShelteredAristocrat Prince Chagum]], her first step is to set fire to the Second Empress' palace, hoping the assassins will assume he died in the flames. They aren't fooled for a second.

* Part of the backstory of ''Anime/CodeGeass'': Lelouch and Nunnally Lamperouge are in fact disgraced royalty who faked their own deaths in order to hide in exile in Area 11 (formerly Japan). It gets used a few more times in the series, with [[spoiler:Zero declared dead at the start of R2, Nunnally, Sayoko and Guilford presumed dead after FLEIJA detonated, [[BrokenPedestal Marianne]] revealed to have hidden in another character's body, and Suzaku "dying" in the final battle to take up the mantle of Zero]]. Despite all of that, WordOfGod says [[spoiler: Lelouch is genuinely dead in the end]].

** His grandfather Joesph pulls this on Wham, taking it to video game levels of RefugeInAudacity, as in he is moving around whenever Wham isn't looking. Wham does notice, but it's all a part of the plan.

*** Almost {{defied}}: Dio decides to cut his head off just in case, but Jean Pierre gets the jump on him, allowing Star Platinum to revive Jotaro and get him back in the fight.