History Main / DeadManWalking

Does not have anything to do with TheUndead but is often used that way JustForPun. Compare YourDaysAreNumbered, WhodunnitToMe, IncurableCoughOfDeath, DoomyDoomsOfDoom.

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

* On ''Series/{{Mythbusters}}'', the Narrator often intones the phrase jokingly when referring to the (inanimate) victim of the day's experiment - usually Buster the crash test dummy but there's been [[TheAllegedCar "Dead Car Driving!"]] and others.

-->'''Marine Sgt. Hegarty''': [[BerserkButton You never mess with a Marine's coffee]], if you want to live, Agent [=DiNozzo=].\\

--> '''[=DiNozzo=]:''' Where is LJ, Dead Agent Walking?

--> '''Malcolm Tucker''': ''[Ben enters a party]'' Oh, here he is. Dead man walking.

* An episode of ''Series/{{Torchwood}}'' is titled "Dead Man Walking". In which Jack tries to resurrect someone with a magic resurrection gauntlet against the warning of his companions.
* In the Episode "Bridesmaids Revisited" from ''Series/GilmoreGirls'' Rory and Logan are at the wedding of Logan's sister. They encounter the groom in the hallway, and Logan has to help him get ready for the ceremony. He grabs his shoulder and calls out that phrase as they walk to his room.

* In ''VideoGame/MaxPayne'' part two there is a minigame called DeadManWalking in which you fight infinitely respawning enemies, trying to take as many as you can with you.
* ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins''. All Grey Wardens, due to the Taint. Also, [[spoiler: Wynne]] and, more figuratively speaking, the Legion Of The Dead. Their initiation is a dwarven funeral rite. Since they are already dead, they have nothing to fear.
* In ''VideoGame/{{Crysis}}'', [[spoiler:everyone who puts on a Nanosuit.]] And more literally, Alcatraz, the PlayerCharacter in the second game.
-->'''Hargreave''': [[spoiler:[[WellIntentionedExtremist This isn't a war ordinary men can win!]]]] This is the future, death's an inconvenience now, nothing more. We are ''all'' dead men walking.

* ''Film/DeadManWalking'', [[TropeNamer obviously.]]

* In the first ''[[Film/IronMan1 Iron Man]]''-movie, Yinsen describes a type of bomb victim he and the people in his village refer to as "The Walking Dead"[[note]] No, not [[Series/TheWalkingDead that one]].[[/note]]. These people walk around with bomb shrapnel in their bloodstream, and live for about a week before their organs are torn to shreds. This happens to main character Tony Stark as well, who only survives by having an electromagnet implanted into his chest to keep the shrapnel from tearing his heart to ribbons.

-->--'''Ho Yinsen''', ''Film/IronMan1''

* In ''Film/SpiderManNoWayHome'', Otto Octavius, upon meeting Norman Osborn, whom he believed to be [[Film/SpiderMan1 deceased]], describes him as a 'walking corpse'. This is soon confirmed by Flint Marko, who, much to Otto's disbelief, mentions ''[[Film/SpiderMan2 he died as well]]''.

[[folder:Film]]
* ''Film/DeadManWalking'', [[TropeNamer obviously.]]
* As a dog is being led away to be put down at the [[PoundsAreAnimalPrisons pound]] that Lucky's taken to in the Creator/EddieMurphy film version of ''Film/DrDolittle'', one of the dogs comments "dead dog walking."

* In ''Film/LooneyTunesBackInAction'', Daffy gets fired from Warner Bros. Studios and is led out of the office by Kate and Bugs calls out "Dead duck walking!"
* In ''Film/NightOfTheComet'', the {{Technically Living Zombie}}s [[spoiler: are doomed to dissolve into dust if they go too long without drinking human blood, and by the end of the film, they've all crumbled into nothingness from starvation]].
* In the first ''[[Film/IronMan1 Iron Man]]''-movie, Yinsen describes a type of bomb victim he and the people in his village refer to as "The Walking Dead"[[note]] No, not [[Series/TheWalkingDead that one]].[[/note]]. These people walk around with bomb shrapnel in their bloodstream, and live for about a week before their organs are torn to shreds. This happens to main character Tony Stark as well, who only survives by having an electromagnet implanted into his chest to keep the shrapnel from tearing his heart to ribbons.
* In ''Film/SpiderManNoWayHome'', Otto Octavius, upon meeting Norman Osborn, whom he believed to be [[Film/SpiderMan1 deceased]], describes him as a 'walking corpse'. This is soon confirmed by Flint Marko, who, much to Otto's disbelief, mentions ''[[Film/SpiderMan2 he died as well]]''.

* In ''Film/SpiderManNoWayHome'', Otto Octavius, upon meeting Norman Osborn, whom he believed to be deceased, describes him as a 'walking corpse'. This is soon confirmed by Flint Marko, who, much to Otto's disbelief, mentions he died ''as well.''

* Literally the title of a TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}} novel, showcasing the [[CrapsackWorld incredibly dour]] [[PuttingOnTheReich Death Korps of Krieg]] as they battle the [[ImplacableMan implacable Necrons]]. The title comes from the fact that the [[WeHaveReserves Kriegers have no moral compunction against sacrificing their own men to kill the enemy]], and are all drilled to have no dreams, aspirations, or visions of the future beyond service in the [[RedShirtArmy Imperial Guard]]--and their inevitable death. [[UncannyValley They are so cold and emotionless]] as to creep out their fellow Guardsmen.

* [[HitmanWithAHeart Thane Krios]] from ''VideoGame/MassEffect2''. He has an incurable disease that slowly destroys his ability to breathe, and all the doctors say he'll be dead in less than a year. If he survives ''Mass Effect 2'''s SuicideMission, then when you meet him again in ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'', he tells you that the doctors say he'll be dead in around three months...and [[{{Determinator}} he last talked to them nine months ago.]] Later on, [[spoiler:he manages to drive off Kai Leng from the salarian Councilor despite his disease, leaving him barely able to breathe]].

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** [[CloningBlues It helps that all Kriegers are cloned.]] Actually no, just borned artificially.

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* In ''Film/SpiderManNoWayHome'', Otto Octavius, upon meeting Norman Osborn, whom he believed to be deceased, describes him as a 'walking corpse'. This is soon confirmed Flint Marko, who, much to Otto's disbelief, mentions he died ''as well.''

** [[CloningBlues It helps that all Kriegers are cloned.]]Actually no, just borned artificially.

** [[CloningBlues It helps that all Kriegers are cloned.Actually no, just borned artificially.]]

** [[CloningBlues It helps that all Kriegers are cloned.]]

* In ''VideoGame/YakuzaDeadSouls'', Goro Majima gets bit by a zombie. By the next chapter of the game, he is falling ill and his eye is turning red. He goes to a sauna in a last-ditch effort to cure himself. [[spoiler:Ultimately subverted: the zombie that bit him wore dentures and never actually infected him. The sickness and the redness in his eye? Just allergies.]]

* ''Literature/Discworld'':

* Variation from ''Literature/TheFifthElephant'', when [[spoiler:Vimes is accosted by a hostile SuperSupremacist werewolf]]:

* ''Dead Man Walking'', [[TropeNamer obviously.]]

* There's a chilling scene in ''Disney/LadyAndTheTramp'' at the pound in which some of the dogs obliquely reference this trope when a dog is taken by a human into a back room, hinting that the dog will be put to sleep.

* Variation from ''Discworld/TheFifthElephant'', when [[spoiler:Vimes is accosted by a hostile SuperSupremacist werewolf]]:

* In the first ''[[Film/IronMan1 Iron Man]]''-movie, Yinsen describes a type of bomb victim he and the people in his village refer to as "The Walking Dead"[[note]] No, not [[Series/TheWalkingDead that one.[[/note]]. These people walk around with bomb shrapnel in their bloodstream, and live for about a week before their organs are torn to shreds. This happens to main character Tony Stark as well, who only survives by having an electromagnet implanted into his chest to keep the shrapnel from tearing his heart to ribbons.