History Main / DeathSeeker

* Suzaku Kururugi's exceptional piloting skills and willingness to put himself in mortal danger in ''Anime/CodeGeass'' are revealed to be because he is a Death Seeker of the RedemptionEqualsDeath variety: [[spoiler: after he murdered his father, ex-Prime Minister Genbu Kururugi, and doomed Japan to Britannian tyranny because of that, he seeks to be punished for the crime he was never blamed for]]. This gets a whole lot trickier when Lelouch places a [[MindControl Geass]] on him instructing him to "Live!" with no duration or parameters. Thus, whenever he tries to do something suicidal, or even just accepts that death will be the result of his current situation, the Geass command forces him to take any action he possibly can to avoid dying. [[spoiler:Given the [[CrapsackWorld nature of ''Code Geass'']], this has predictably tragic results.]] It doesn't stop him from trying, though, which leads to [[spoiler: Suzaku destroying pretty much the entire Tokyo settlement when he tried to let Kallen kill him while carrying a nuke]]. NiceJobBreakingItHero on both sides. However, he does use the Geass to his advantage at one point. [[spoiler:When he fights an enemy with a Geass that allows them to see into the future, Suzaku uses the "Live!" effect to enhance his performance and move too fast for his opponent to keep up.]] Lampshaded by Lelouch, who comments on how powerful his mental discipline is. The Geass even provides him with knowledge he shouldn't even be able to have; [[spoiler: his reflexes tell him when to throw a spear that will disable a FLEJA nuke]].

* ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'''s Dean is this in a nutshell. Notice how whenever he gets the choice to die or keep living, the choice is always ambiguous. After his Dad dies for him, he's too tired of this life and as the Crossroad Demon says in "Crossroad Blues", his first thought in the morning is "I can't do this anymore." It finally comes to a head in the Season Two finale when Sam dies and Dean sells his soul to get him back, for a whole bunch of messed up reasons. For the first half of Season Three, he doesn't seem to mind if he goes downstairs ahead of schedule but finally, ''finally'' in "Dream a Little Dream of Me" he realizes the obvious fact that he doesn't ''deserve'' eternity in hell. Except his martyrdom comes back in full-force in ''No Rest For The Wicked'' [[spoiler: and he still thinks he doesn't deserve to live in ''Lazurus Rising'']] so you can't help but still think his sole goal for himself is death.
** Dean's earliest brush with this is way back in the season one episode "Faith" when he learns that by seeking the help of a faith healer he has inadvertently caused the death of a young man. Later in the episode when a Reaper appears to kill him, he does not try to escape. Dean has managed to hit a new low as of mid-season seven, what with [[spoiler: losing everybody, even having to give up his car, with his brother nearly dyinig of madness]]. Basically, Sam is the only thing keeping Dean from being DrivenToSuicide, and that doesn't work so well when Dean can't trust his brother.
** While Dean is the most extreme version of this, nearly every character in the show has desperately wanted death at some point; Bobby wanted it in ''Dream a Little Dream Of Me'' [[spoiler: and while crippled]], John probably wanted it most of Sam's life.

* As recently pointed out by her therapist, Meredith of ''GreysAnatomy'' may be a subconscious Death Seeker.

[[quoteright:361:[[Videogame/{{Gungrave}} http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Bunji_3945.png]]]]

!!Examples

[[folder:Anime]]

[[folder:Film]]

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

* In a rather dark twist for a Pixar film, it's implied in ''WesternAnimation/{{Up}}'' that this trope was what motivated [[spoiler:Carl]] to finally go to Paradise Falls. ''At first,'' anyway. [[spoiler:With Ellie dead and no family left to speak of, what better way to go out than to do the one thing that he could still pull off? Despite knowing that it'd be a one-way trip with a good chance of going horribly wrong.]]

* Lady Shiva of TheDCU is a Death Seeker like Cassandra Cain [[spoiler: her own daughter]] mentioned earlier. Shiva has always regretted that her sister was killed for the sake of her own potential as a martial artist and confessed to Cassandra that she misses her every day. As a result, Shiva is a mix of a BloodKnight and a Death Seeker. She continues to challenge and train gifted martial artists out of a need to validate her sister's death by proving that she is the strongest, but at the same time she secretly hopes to die at the hands of someone better due to her guilt.

* The Joker from ''Film/TheDarkKnight''. There has been several occasions where he puts his life on the line for his cause.

[[quoteright:361:[[Videogame/{{Gungrave}} http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Bunji_3945.png]]]]

->'''[[PlayerCharacter The Courier]]''': ''"How do you know your punishment isn't over?"''
->'''[[HeartbrokenBadass Craig Boone]]''': ''"Because I'm still alive."''

* In ''Manga/YuYuHakusho'', this is arguably Younger Toguro's entire reason for getting Yusuke involved in the Dark Tournament.

** [[spoiler: Don't forget Raizen, Bui, Hiei, and possibly Mukuro. Not sure if Gama counts, but he was willing to give "all for the team" and used his last few minutes to incapacitate Kurama rather than heal himself. Also the mind controlled humans at the beginning of the Tournament, forced to kill for Ichigaki and sick of it.]]

* Suzaku Kururugi's exceptional piloting skills and willingness to put himself in mortal danger in ''Anime/CodeGeass'' are revealed to be because he is a Death Seeker of the RedemptionEqualsDeath variety: [[spoiler: after he murdered his father, ex-Prime Minister Genbu Kururugi, and doomed Japan to Britannian tyranny because of that, he seeks to be punished for the crime he was never blamed for]]. This gets a whole lot trickier when Lelouch places a [[MindControl Geass]] on him instructing him to "Live!" with no duration or parameters. Thus, whenever he tries to do something suicidal, or even just accepts that death will be the result of his current situation, the Geass command forces him to take any action he possibly can to avoid dying. [[spoiler:Given the [[CrapsackWorld nature of ''Code Geass'']], this has predictably tragic results.]]
** It doesn't stop him from trying, though, which leads to [[spoiler: Suzaku destroying pretty much the entire Tokyo settlement when he tried to let Kallen kill him while carrying a nuke]]. NiceJobBreakingItHero on both sides.
** However, he does use the Geass to his advantage at one point. [[spoiler:When he fights an enemy with a Geass that allows them to see into the future, Suzaku uses the "Live!" effect to enhance his performance and move too fast for his opponent to keep up.]]
*** LampShaded by Lelouch, who comments on how powerful his mental discipline is. The Geass even provides him with knowledge he shouldn't even be able to have; [[spoiler: his reflexes tell him when to throw a spear that will disable a FLEJA nuke]].
*** [[spoiler: Keep in mind that the time window for desabling the nuke was 0.04 ''seconds''.]]
** [[spoiler:C.C.]] is eventually revealed to be suicidal, [[spoiler:but she's been trapped in an immortal body since the middle ages. She can survive getting shot in the head, being burned at the stake, and even being crushed by the intense water pressure at the bottom of the ocean. The entire reason she's gone around granting Geass powers to people like Mao and Lelouch is because she needs someone to become powerful enough to kill her.]]
*** [[spoiler:Somewhat subverted in this case, Lelouch mentions her "true wish" afterwards and she stays with him, even though he couldn't bring himself to kill her and she ditched Mao for that very reason]]

** [[spoiler:Subverted when he is finally dying in the last chapter. After everything, he decides at the last moment he wants to live on but it's too late.]]
*** He still qualifies. After fixing the country and ruined relationship with his sons, he does change his mind about dying; however when he does anyway he is content with it and dies smiling.

** The Major is another possible example, as Schrodinger infers that the Major's desire to create as much warfare as possible is an elaborate suicide plan (with the rest of Millennium being drawn along with him by his charisma). Given that [[spoiler: he dies with a smile on his face when Integra kills him, it seems likely]].
*** When Seras and Integra are storming the Major's airship, they notice that the Nazis they're killing actually seem pleased by their deaths, and the Major confirms that they want to die. Seras angrily asks why they don't just commit suicide, causing the Major to reply that it isn't enough to die; they have to die doing something ''meaningful'' to them.

* Shinji Ikari (and, to a lesser extent, [[spoiler:Asuka Langley Soryu]] from ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' could fit this trope to a T, except by the little part that Shinji was fighting to seek his father's attention, and [[spoiler:Asuka was too much of a StepfordSmiler to give up]]. At the end, [[spoiler: only these two failed to die, presumably. Irony at its best.]]
** [[spoiler:Until episode 18, anyway. After killing and/or maiming his best friend, depending on whether we're going by the anime or the manga, we see him in episode 19, no longer greatly concerned with what his father or anyone else thinks of him. The CrazyAwesome of the moment--and it is, if you haven't seen it--is muted at the end of the series when we reflect and realize that when he went out to fight, "fangs out and hair on fire," he was almost certainly trying to die.]]
** [[spoiler: Rei. Explicitly says she "Is a thing that wishes to die"? Check. Deliberately takes suicide missions? Check. Gets herself killed ''twice?'' Check. Fails hard at ''staying'' dead? Hoo boy.]] In fact, [[spoiler:Rei]] explicitly stated in ep24 that [[spoiler:she]] hates Gendo for not letting [[spoiler:her]] die until [[spoiler:she]] had fulfilled the purpose he had set. [[SarcasmMode Ladies and gentlemen, meet the protectors of mankind!]] We are so boned.

* [[spoiler:Deneve]] from ''{{Claymore}}'' was one of these [[spoiler:until Helen knocked some sense into her.]]
** Later on there's [[spoiler:Cynthia, who is feeling horribly guilty about not being able to save her commander Flora in the Northern Campaign, and begs Yuma to kill her. Yuma isn't having any of it.]]

* Partially played straight with Guts from ''{{Berserk}}''. While he isn't actively wishing for death, he throws himself into suicidal battles against creatures that greatly exceed the power of man with reckless abandon. It can be argued that he doesn't expect to actually beat the Apostles and Godhand, but is merely killing them off due to his unquenchable hatred until one of them finally manages to best him.

* Mr. Immortal of the GreatLakesAvengers. He discovered his powers after his girlfriend Terri killed herself and he tried to follow suit. After dozens of suicide attempts he finally realizes that he has superpowers (little slow on the uptake) and decides to fight crime. However, he is still prone to depression (especially after his new LoveInterest Dinah Soar was killed), and occasionally goes on multiple suicide sprees. Since he now knows about his powers, it's unclear if he is actually looking for a loophole, or if it's just his way of blowing off steam.
** Specifically, Mr. Immortal's power is that shortly after death, he is resurrected.

* Arguably, [[spoiler:Morpheus]] from ''ComicBook/TheSandman''. If he indeed was (his methodology makes it somewhat uncertain how much was planned and how much was not), he certainly went about doing it [[GambitRoulette in an]] ''[[GambitRoulette extremely]]'' [[GambitRoulette roundabout way]].
** WordOfGod essentially confirms this. Gaiman once summarized ''Sandman'' in the sentence "[[spoiler:The King of Dreams learns that all things must change or die and makes his choice]]."

** [[spoiler: He finally got his wish after being separated from his latest body and defeated on the astral plane.]]
*** [[spoiler:Except maybe not. It appears that he's expected to play a role in the "Reign Of Doomsday" arc that's coming up due to Doomsday's apparent interest in the original replacement Superman from TheDeathOfSuperman. Sucks to be Henshaw... again]]...

* [[IronMan Tony Stark]], to a [[TheWoobie horribly painful degree]]. And, no, it didn't start during/after Comicbook/CivilWar, either, though that certainly [[UpToEleven made it worse]]. It started when he was struck with [[SurvivorGuilt survivor's guilt]] over the [[MyGreatestFailure death of Yin Sen]] -- that's right, it started with his ''origin story'' -- and [[HurtingHero just kind of]] [[FromBadToWorse went downhill]] [[DrowningMySorrows at breakneck speed]] [[TraumaCongaLine from there]]. Unfortunately, Marvel [[DarkerAndEdgier isn't kind enough]] to just [[MercyKill let him die]] at this point, whether by way of [[DrivenToSuicide suicide]] or [[SuicideByCop death by supervillain]] -- though this may be [[BlatantLies justified]] by the fact that apparently, [[RunningTheAsylum no one at Marvel]] has bothered to crack open a psychology textbook to figure out that [[TheMentallyIll someone like Tony Stark]] should probably not still be alive of his own free will. Considering Tony's history of barely caring if he lives or dies, [[BeAllMySinsRemembered as well as his absolute self-loathing]], it's hard to believe that he's still breathing. Hell, if nothing else, it's a goddamned miracle that he hasn't [[DrivenToVillainy become an outright supervillain]], gone [[MurderIsTheBestSolution batshit crazy]], or [[WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds worse]]. Usually, when a character [[DespairEventHorizon hits rock bottom]], the general procedure is to [[RedemptionEqualsDeath have them]] [[HeroicSacrifice go out]] [[DyingMomentOfAwesome in a blaze of glory]]. Instead, Marvel [[WellIntentionedExtremist handed him]] [[KickThemWhileTheyAreDown a shovel]].
** He ''did'' become a supervillain and died briefly. It was called "The Crossing" and he was replaced by a teenaged version of himself. [[DorkAge No one liked it]]. [[DeathIsCheap Adult Tony came back]] and it's been {{Retcon}}ned that [[NotHimself he wasn't himself]] -- he was being mind-controlled by Kang -- Teen Tony got written out, and it's more or less [[FanonDisContinuity ignored]] now.

** Don't worry, if you read ''The End'' [[spoiler: Thanos winds up saving ALL REALITY which he originally tried to kill off HALF OF. By the end Thanos himself makes the statement, [[RedemptionEqualsDeath "I have been many things...]] [[HeelFaceTurn and now, healer."]] Death, in return for his sacrifice, finally gives him her love.]]
*** [[TearJerker WordOfGod (Jim Starlin, both writer and penciler) claims that he couldn't finish the final issue for a full day after penciling the final three pages.]] You WILL mist up.

* {{Deadpool}} wants to die. Death is in love with him and vice versa, so jealous {{Thanos}} cursed him with [[WhoWantsToLiveForever eternal life]]. In the Age of Stryfe, an alternate future timeline Deadpool is still alive because of the curse and not his healing factor. The voices in Deadpool confirm his deathwish among other things :the only reason he desperately wants to be accepted is so his friends will care and put him out of his misery. If that doesn't work out he antagonizes them so they can extract their revenge on him.
** The recent "Dead" storyline finally gives this to him via SpiderMan villain Tombstone. However, it doesn't stick - he comes back, but [[spoiler:he loses his healing factor, but his body is totally healed and he's regained his true face.]] More importantly, [[spoiler:he doesn't want to die anymore.]]

* ''ComicBook/RedHoodAndTheOutlaws'': [[spoiler: Arsenal fights Killer Croc for the sole purpose of dying looking like a hero, after hitting rock bottom.]]
** [[spoiler: The Talon implies that Red Hood may be one, at some degree (especially considering how the fight was handled as a NotSoDifferent situation).]]

** Being the author of this story, I'm flattered that I'm listed on this site. But to contribute, this story was a {{Shoutout}} and {{Homage}} to X-Files season 6 episode 10 [[http://in-the-x-i-believe.blogspot.com/2007/08/season-6-tithonus-6x09.html "Tithonus"]].

** Much like [[TheDarkKnightReturns one of its main inspirations]], ''Film/TheDarkKnightRises'' puts Batman firmly in this territory. His world, his future and his entire life has been shattered, so despite being [[DentedIron in bad physical shape]], he puts the cowl back on and throws himself into a fight with a much tougher opponent rather than find a way to live as Bruce Wayne. [[spoiler:He finds his "fear of death" again and by the end of the film, he's able to give up being Batman and find a life for himself.]]

* Éowyn in ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'', whose courageous ride to the Battle of the Pelennor Fields has also been described as a lovesick suicide attempt.
** According to Aragorn, the very object of her unrequited love, her disappointment was just the final straw - personal frustrations and grief having already robbed her of much hope. And then of course there's the apparent hopelessness of the global situation - the entire army rides into battle shouting "DEATH!" after all.
** To paraphrase Gandalf and Aragorn, she had to look after Théoden as he succumbed to Grí­ma's lies and part-truths, all the while listening to them herself, and it seemed like she would never do anything else but watch as the House of Éorl sunk deeper into dishonor. Even after Aragorn heals her, she wants to go out and die.

** Rand al'Thor could be seen as this. He intends to stay alive juuuust long enough to get to the FinalBattle, then die while winning it.
*** Also, any male among the [[ProudWarriorRace Aiel]] that discovers they can channel, since men who channel eventually go insane, they go into [[GardenOfEvil the Blight]] and die fighting the minions of [[{{Satan}} the Dark One]]

* [[spoiler: Albus Dumbledore]] of the ''Literature/HarryPotter'' series shows this trope at some point in between ''[[Literature/HarryPotterAndTheOrderOfThePhoenix Order of the Phoenix]]'' and ''[[Literature/HarryPotterAndTheHalfBloodPrince The Half Blood Prince]]'', when he becomes [[spoiler: cursed to die by the ring containing the resurrection stone. To end the misery of dying slowly and to spare Draco Malfoy, Who he learned had been tasked by Voldemort to kill him, Dumbledore asks Snape to kill him in a [[GambitRoulette Overly Elaborate plot]] to also get Snape closer to Voldemort and to continue protecting Harry.]]
** Snape himself became this after [[spoiler: Lily Evans's death]] until Dumbledore [[QuitYourWhining snapped him out of it.]]

* Prince Elfangor, from ''Literature/{{Animorphs}}'' seems to be a good example of this after he gets [[spoiler:pulled off Earth by the Ellimist.]] His first action was [[spoiler:ramming the Blade Ship with his little fighter in what should have been a suicide run only to survive, turn the tide of battle, and become a war hero whose example was held up as a golden standard.]] And at the end of his life, he really wasn't out of options - he could have morphed, or even used his ship's shredder to cut through the concrete surrounding the Time Matrix. And yet...
** Another example from ''Animorphs'' is [[SixthRangerTraitor David]] by the end of his last book. Abandoned by Crayak, betrayed by his henchmen and still condemned to [[FateWorseThanDeath live out the rest of his days as a rat]], he tearfully begs Rachel to end his misery.

** It's strongly hinted, as the series progressed, that Buffy herself had tendencies in this direction, particularly by Spike, who is [[LivingLieDetector never wrong]] about these sorts of things. Season 6 made this characteristic much more explicit.
*** ''All'' Slayers had suicidal tendencies, as they isolated themselves from family and friends until they had nothing to live for, and then they die in battle. That's how Spike killed two Slayers (he stepped in at just the right moment and is much tougher than the standard vampire), and why Buffy lived so longer than the average Slayer: she still had friends and family.

** Don't forget Worf's brother Kurn. After Worf [[spoiler: loses his family honor for the second time, Kurn loses his high council seat and finds his way to [=DS9=]. He joins Odo's security forces, but Worf quickly realizes he's just looking to die. In the end, Worf is forced to wipe Kurn's memory in order to keep his brother from dying.]] Just a tremendously sad story all around,

*** The ''GotrekAndFelix'' novels, in particular, tell the story of Felix Jaeger, a young poet who finds himself honor bound to accompany a Slayer and record his heroic doom. Unfortunately for Felix, Gotrek Grunnisson just happens to be the worst Slayer in history, on account of him being the most BadAss Dwarf, if not being, on the planet. He has killed everything from incarnations of rage and blood to dragons the length of football fields. Even if anything ''could'' kill Gotrek, Felix has no illusions about the fact that it would kill him soon after.
*** Troll Slayers are a player career path in ''WarhammerFantasyRoleplay'', though after advancing through the Giant and Daemon Slayer stages their only exit career is "Glorious Death," so a note advises players to "think it over carefully" before picking the class. The class evades GameBreaker status because anyone playing a slayer is expected to act like one; you are supposed to pick fights even when the odds aren't good, sleep deprivation, mental instability and rampant alcoholism is the best way to spend your downtime, and armour is for people without a death wish (i.e. people who are not you). Your impressive combat prowess is there to make the party want to hang out with you anyway. Their only non-combat abilities are limited to "resistance to getting drunk" and "scaring people," so the only thing a Slayer is good for outside of a fight is ''starting'' one.

*** ''DawnOfWar II: Chaos Rising'' does a particularly good job of representing this. Chaos Dreadnoughts repeatedly beg the player to let them die (when their dialogue is even intelligible). When a Chaos Dreadnought dies, the announcer informs the player, "One of your Dreadnoughts has escaped in death."

* One of the example villains in the old edition of ''{{GURPS}}'' Supers was a disgraced sumo wrestler who couldn't commit seppuku due to his NighInvulnerability. Thus, he sought out other supers to goad them into killing him. His sympathetic backstory, and his history of tracking down and defeating violent supers, make him more of an AntiVillain.
** There's also a [[PointBuildSystem disadvantage]] called 'On The Edge', that basically allows you to play your character as a Death Seeker. It makes you passively suicidal. You won't off ''yourself'', but if you're, say, [[CurbStompBattle facing down an entire biker gang while armed with a toothbrush]]...

** Don't forget Vamp. Made evident when he asks Raiden, "Could you be the one to finally finish me?"

* Meyvn Nooj from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyX-2'', until he changed his mind. Which makes him really bad at it, as he lives in a world with staggering numbers of vicious fiends who exist purely to kill people - not to mention [[EldritchAbomination Sin]], up until two years prior to FFX-2. His base can't even be reached without battling numerous fiends, leaving one with the impression that he's just not trying hard enough.
** Though despite all that, he gets extra points for being known in-game as "Nooj The Deathseeker". [[InformedAbility Informed Characteristic, perhaps?]]
** At one point, during a recording the player can view, it looks like he is about to actually pull it off, but is saved by the person who's recording him in combat to see if he's good enough to join an elite military unit.
* [[spoiler: Vanille]] from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII'' has a genuine death wish, believing that her actions served as the catalyst for the horrible events that dragged the rest of the party into the game.
** Evidently she's not the only one in the ''FFXIII'' world with this mindset, seeing as [[spoiler:Orphan, Barthandelus, and ''every other fal'Cie in existence'' also want to die.]] Even if it means destroying the world and '''''everyone else in it.'''''
*** It turns out that [[spoiler: the Fal'Cie]] want to [[spoiler: destroy Cocoon]], because that many people dying at once would [[spoiler: bring back the world's god: The Maker, who is also the Fal'Cie's 'parent' who orphaned them when she left the world]]. That many people dying at once would [[spoiler: open the door to the Maker]], and [[spoiler: Orphan is vital to the upkeep of Cocoon, so it's death would mean the death of Cocoon]], and all the humans living there.

* [[spoiler: Kratos]] from ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphonia'' is eventually revealed to be a Death Seeker and has singled out [[TheMessiah Lloyd]] as the one who'll finally kill him -- [[spoiler: which he'll have to do because Kratos' lifeforce keeps a seal on the CosmicKeystone]]. Fails miserably, after Lloyd [[TakeAThirdOption merely beats]] ''[[TakeAThirdOption six]]'' [[TakeAThirdOption shades of hell out of him]] during their final encounter, [[spoiler:undoing the seal]], and then proceeds to chew out his NotQuiteDead opponent over being so incredibly ''stupid'' in trying to throw his life away.
** Similarly, [[spoiler: Zelos]] spends a good part of the game with a death wish, [[spoiler: his HandsomeLech personality for the most part [[StepfordSmiler an act]]]]. Whether he succeeds or not is up to the player.
*** The sequel then gives us [[spoiler:Emil]]. Once he realizes that he is [[spoiler:The Summon Spirit Ratatosk, and responsible for the death of Aster]] he plans to atone by [[spoiler:faking possession by his SuperpoweredEvilSide]] and having the rest of the party kill him [[spoiler:so that he can become a core to seal the door to Niflheim]].

* Originally, [[spoiler: Atton]] in ''KnightsOfTheOldRepublic II'' had a chance at RedemptionEqualsDeath by the end of the game, but that sequence got axed.
** He's not the first pilot of the Ebon Hawk to have this streak. "I always figured I'd be dead once Saul was," anyone?
** [[spoiler:Hanharr]] from the same game also qualifies. He has lived such a horrific life that he just wants it to end. [[spoiler:Unfortunately, his life debt to Mira prevents him from killing himself unless he kills her.]]

* Urick from ''{{Drakengard}} 2'' got his butt royally kicked by Caim, but was so terrified of dying that he made a pact with a Reaper, rendering him all but unkillable. But he felt so bad about failing in his duties and letting his General get killed that finding a way to break his pact, and therefore die, is pretty much his sole reason for living. And despite the incredible {{Wangst}} potential of all this, he's actually a pretty NiceGuy.
** [[spoiler:He eventually gets his wish when he runs into Caim again. Caim ''beats the pact out of him''.]]

* In ''VideoGame/NeverwinterNights2'', it is heavily implied that Casavir is this. (He gets over it. Mostly.)
** The same can be said of Bishop as well; he states that he felt "all these chains come off me" when he was dying, and was extremely unhappy when Duncan saved him before he could actually could.

* The Men of Valhalla, and to a lesser extent the Men of Wotan, from the ''VideoGame/MedievalIITotalWar'' conversion mod ''{{Thera}}'' believe that only a man who dies a worthy death in battle may go to their heaven and join the gods. [[HornyVikings Sounds familiar]]?

* According to contemporary records, Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria-Hungary was strongly implied to have become this towards the later years of his life, going so far as to practically mention this trope by name. Then again, after having to deal with the deaths of all those around him, including his brother (Maximilian; killed by firing squad in Mexico), wife (Elisabeth/Sissi; killed by an Italian anarchist), eldest daughter (Sophie; illness), son/heir (Rudolf; the Meyerling Incident) and nephew/successor (Franz Ferdinand; assassinated in Sarajevo with his wife Sophie, sparking WorldWarI) and watching his Empire slowly fall apart from war, [[IronWoobie one has to wonder]].

[[folder:Film]

[[folder:Film]]

** {{Batman}} himself subconsciously slid into Death Seeker territory after [[DeadSidekick the death of Jason Todd/Robin II]], to the great worry of [[TeamMom Alfred]] and Dick, and prompting Tim into becoming Robin, under the belief that 'Batman needs a Robin.'
** Similarly in ''TheDarkKnightReturns'', while it's not explicitly stated Batman is constantly reflecting on the life-and-death situations he finds himself in and musing that "this would be a good way to die," the clear implication being that he's actively looking to go out in a suitable blaze of glory. [[spoiler: Ultimately subverted; although Batman appears to go out in a blaze of glory fighting Superman, it's revealed that he faked his own death, having discovered a new purpose to live over the course of the story.]]

* Light in ''FanFic/TheArtOfDrowning'' upon learning that L is [[spoiler: his [[ForgottenFriendNewFoe long lost childhood friend]] and [[FreudianExcuse the reason]] [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge he became Kira in the first place]]]] to L's utter disbelief Light suddenly confesses to being Kira and begs L to execute him.

* In ''{{Starcraft 2}}'', when you fight the Zerg-infested colonists, the very first one you meet asks you to kill him just before suicide rushing your base.

** To paraphrase Gandalf and Aragorn, she had to look after Théoden as he succumbed to Grima's lies and part-truths, all the while listening to them herself, and it seemed like she would never do anything else but watch as the House of Éorl sunk deeper into dishonor. Even after Aragorn heals her, she wants to go out and die.