The key to the Funeral Cut is that the funeral is the first indication of what happened to the character. If we already know for sure the character had died, then it's just a cut that happens to be to a funeral. For this reason, the Funeral Cut only applies when the death occurs offscreen (or, at the very least, in the background). Though a funeral cut could occur after a fatal injury but before the audience knows if the character died. Also, it's not a funeral cut if the scene cuts back to the dead bodies where they died; that's just Killed Offscreen.
A funeral cut does need not be a cut to the funeral proper but could cut directly to something related to the funeral, such as a gravestone, an obituary, bells tolling, or people dressed in black.
The funeral cut is a common way to show the deaths of people who are Too Dumb to Live, and people who tempt fate, especially in Dark Comedy, where is it Played for Laughs.
Oftentimes deaths that are Foregone Conclusions (like when a character is sick) or heavily Foreshadowed are shown this way, where the Funeral Cut serves more as a Discretion Shot.
Because the Funeral Cut is a common trope, it's frequently subverted to make you think for a moment that the character is dead, but then it's revealed that character is still alive (usually because it's someone else's funeral).
A funeral cut may cut to any part of the mourning process. Common examples include a Shrine to the Fallen, a Memorial Photo, appropriate weather, mourners dressed in black, or a coffin, closed or open casket depending on how gruesome the death was. May be accompanied by the sound of church bells tolling. If it's a military funeral, look for Taps and the cut to a War Memorial or a Memorial Statue.
If the funeral cut shows up at the very beginning of the work, it's Starts with Their Funeral. If it's at the end, it's an Ending Memorial Service.
Sub-Trope of Discretion Shot. Very often a form of Gory Discretion Shot. Sister trope to Ambulance Cut, but with far worse results.
As this is a Death Trope, unmarked spoilers abound. Beware.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Fullmetal Alchemist (2003) has Hughes getting shot and injured by Envy before it cuts to his funeral.
Comic Books
- The Punisher: The Punisher: War Zone mini-series has a scenario where Lieutenant Molly von Richthofen charges into a room full of Mafia goons with the intent to arrest them. Then it cuts to her funeral, with the priest bemoaning how there was little left to bury after the resulting hail of gunfire. Then it cuts back to reality, where Molly wisely decides to hide instead.
Films — Animated
- Frozen: During the song "Do You Want To Build A Snowman?", we see Anna and Elsa's parents on a ship in bad weather, and the next shot is their funeral.
Films — Live-Action
- Chronicle: The film cuts to a funeral to establish Steve's death after being struck in the thunderstorm by Andrew.
- Final Destination 3 uses this in combination with a Match Cut with Ashley and Ashlyn's deaths. The overhead shot of the duo's tanning beds, where they are trapped inside by debris and burning alive, cuts to their funeral, with their caskets in the same position as their tanning beds in the previous shot.
- Hot Shots!: The film cuts to Dead Meat's funeral after his dismissive and reassuring question of what could possibly go wrong now that he's in a hospital.
- The first half of Ikiru ends with Watanabe declaring that he's going to put all of his effort into getting a children's park built, and rushing out of city hall; the next shot is of a mourning portrait of Watanabe at his funeral several months later.
- At the beginning of Joyful Noise, the previous director came down with a heart attack, and the film immediately cuts to his funeral.
- In The Natural, after Bump Bailey crashes through the outfield wall while chasing a deep fly ball and doesn't get up, it cuts directly to his funeral.
- Ocean Heaven: Old Wang, Struggling Single Father of the autistic protagonist Wang Da-fu, spends most of the movie battling a terminal disease until discovering he's not likely going to make it. Eventually Wang managed to reassure his son that he'll be with Da-fu, always, and realizing that Da-fu can be independent on his own; cut to the final scene where Da-fu is at Wang's grave and paying last respects to his father.
- In The Other Guys the NYPD's two top cops Highsmith and Danson (Samuel L. Jackson and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson) decide to jump off the roof of a 20-storey building in pursuit of a set of perps to the tune of "There Goes My Hero" by the Foo Fighters, they smash into the floor and whilst there's a brief moment when it looks like they could have survived with just terrible injuries the next scene is their funeral — one of the theories that is suggested is they had so many brushes with death they actually thought they were invincible.
- In Private Benjamin, Yael and Judy are making love on their wedding night when he suddenly goes silent. Judy calls out to him with increasing alarm in her voice. "Yael. Yael? YAEL??" Cut to the rabbi officiating Yael's funeral. He'd had a heart attack.
- Subverted in Short Time. Burt is shown losing his grip while hanging from a cleaning platform very high up on a skyscraper. Cut to funeral, but it turns out to be the funeral of the bus driver who had the disease Burt thought he had.
Literature
- Warrior Cats: In Onestar's Confession, Brushpaw is badly injured after a battle, and Onewhisker tries to reassure his friend that he'll be fine. There's a small break in the chapter, and it picks up days later as the Clan gathers to hold a vigil for Brushpaw's death.
Live-Action TV
- Subverted in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode "Lovers Walk" where during an action scene, Cordelia gets impaled on a rebar. Cut to a funeral in the distance, then Buffy & Willow enter the scene from screen left, Walk And Talking about how Cordelia is in the hospital but going to be OK.
- The fourth season of Chuck ends with Sarah getting poisoned just after getting engaged to Chuck. The finale has Chuck negotiate the antidote and administer it to Sarah, but it apparently has no effect. Cut to commercial and cut back to a church with a sign reading "Funeral and viewing". Pan down to reveal the sign also says "Walker-Bartowski wedding".
- Community, "Advanced Gay": When Jeff confronts Pierce's father, Cornelius, about how bad of a father he was, Cornelius falls over and appears to have a heart attack. Jeff, who knew that Cornelius had taught Pierce to fake a heart attack whenever he was in trouble, attempts to call him out on running away. Cut to the old man's funeral: it turned out he wasn't faking it that time.
- In the pilot of Everything's Gonna Be Okay, after Darren reveals to his daughters that he's dying of cancer, the next scene is the three of them cuddled up together in bed. And then the scene after that is Matilda, Genevieve, and Nicholas preparing for his funeral.
- A variation occurred on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Hilary's boyfriend Trevor appears on television to propose while bungee jumping. Unfortunately, the bungee cord is too long and Trevor impacts the ground. Uncle Phil goes to the phone to call the station and ask about his condition. Cut to the family returning from Trevor's funeral.
- The Golden Girls: In "Yes, We Have No Havanas," Blanche and Sophia end up dating the same man, Fidel Santiago, negotiating an uneasy truce over their schedules with him. One night, they both have plans with Fidel at the same time and start arguing over who he'll go out with—only for Dorothy, who's just gotten a phone call, to tell them that he won't be going anywhere. Cut to Sophia in Widow's Weeds sighing "We killed him" at his funeral, which is attended by every other woman (at least twenty) that Fidel was seeing simultaneously.
- A variant in How I Met Your Mother during a sequence showing how Marshall makes musical slideshows for every situation. One of the slideshows has Marshall sing about cat-sitting for Lily's mom, with the last photo showing the cat standing by an open window. Cut to the next slideshow, which takes place at the cat's funeral.
- Leverage: In The Two Live Crew Job, after the bomb goes off, we cut to Sophie's funeral. Subverted in that she's Faking the Dead and shows up in mourning costume.
- The Grand Finale of Parks and Recreation jumps to and from different points in the future. When the time comes for showing Jean-Ralphio's future, we are instead shown his funeral...and then subverted when it turns out he faked his death to collect the insurance money and start a casino abroad.
- In Parallels, Vanessa confronts her husband Hervé, a compulsive gambler who dug into the household's money in 2026. She then suffers a heart attack and, soon after being carried by paramedics, the camera goes to her funeral.
- In a Season 45 sketch of Saturday Night Live, a wife makes a disgusting "salad" overnight, which her husband and kids predictably hate. After they leave her, she attempts to eat the entire salad by herself, resulting in the scene cutting to her grave.
Music
- Tracy Lawrence's song "If I Don't Make It Back" is a "When I'm Gone" Song where a man tells his friends what he wants them to do to remember him if he doesn't survive his tour of duty in the military. The song never says that he dies, but the last chorus is about his friends doing everything he asked.
- "Travelin' Soldier" by Bruce Robison (Covered Up by The Chicks) starts with a young soldier on the way to war asking a girl if he can write her letters since he has no one else to write to. The last we hear from him is a letter saying, "Don't worry but I won't be able to write for a while." The third verse cuts to a football game where there's a brief memorial for local soldiers who died, and the girl is the only one to recognize his name and mourn his death.
- The "Coffin Dance
" meme involves videos that often start with a person (or people) performing an action about to lead to an injurious Epic Fail. Right as the ensuing disaster occurs, it Smash Cuts to a clip of dancing Ghanaian pallbearers set to a remix of the song "Astronomia" by Tony Igy and Vicetone.
- The larger part of the music video for "November Rain" by Guns N' Roses shows the main characters' wedding. Then suddenly it is cut short by a storm, and the scene cuts to the bride's funeral. What actually happened is left to the viewers' imagination.
Video Games
- Full Throttle: If Ben suceeds into jumping on his bike and escape from the truck explosion, it cuts to a funeral. It first seems that it's Ben's but actually it's Corley's, who was killed at the beginning of the game.
- After the final boss fight of Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, Nathan returns to Chloe and Elena, the latter of whom is severely injured and apparently dying. Nathan begs for her to get up, but she doesn't respond. We cut to a week later and a funeral. Then subverted when it turns out the funeral is for Schafer and Elena survived.
Web Animation
- A funeral cut is used in one of the shorts of ASDF Movie 2:
Guy 1: Kitten fight!Guy 2: No, wait! I'm allergic to adorableness![a kitten lands on the face of Guy 2; he picks it up]Guy 2: Aww.[the scene cuts to a gravestone]
- The Cyanide & Happiness Show: In one short called "The Man Who Could Sit Anywhere" Cliff Miller, the guy with the "comfortable ass," visits the doctor only to find out that he has "Ass Cancer." Just as he's about to ask how much longer he has to live, the scene cuts to his gravestone.
Webcomics
- One Nedroid strip subverts this. Harrison tempts fate by asking what could possibly go wrong with a particular plan. The next panel cuts to Harrison's tombstone. Then in the last panel, we see Harrison thanking his friends for buying a full-sized novelty tombstone.
- Checkerboard Nightmare's final comic was a parody of both xkcd and The Perry Bible Fellowship. A romantic nerd sits around, waiting for a Manic Pixie Dream Girl to come and shake his life up... then we cut to his tombstone. There's no explanation for how he died.
- Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal has Wonder Woman try to warn an ordinary guy that she's too powerful to sleep with him without accidentally killing him. The next panel shows a gravestone; presumably he went for it anyway.
Web Videos
- In Smosh, scenes of Ian and Anthony performing dangerous stunts only to suddenly cut to a badly-photoshopped gravestone immediately afterwards are usually played as a gag.
- Subverted in a 5 Second Films video. A dumbass teenager (the kind you'd expect to run with scissors) boasts that he'll "live forever", which immediately cuts to a gravestone. It turns out he and his friends are just running around the graveyard.
- Played with in some of the Vines made by the Eh Bee Family. In these, the father says or does something foolish in the vicinity of his wife; the shot immediately cuts to him laid out as if he is dead and ready to be buried with appropriate background music.
Western Animation
- The Amazing World of Gumball: In "The Choices," Nicole imagines how various decisions on the day she met her husband could have changed her life. A Running Gag is that, whenever she considers a dangerous decision (such as rejecting modern medicine, choking on a butterfly, or riding a moped without a helmet), the scene cuts to an image of her tombstone, scored by Toccata and Fugue in D minor.
- DuckTales (2017): After seemingly going crazy from an illness Scrooge is about to take one last dive in his money bin. The scene then cuts to his funeral. It's quickly revealed that Glomgold was messing with him and that the funeral was a sting to make him confess.
- The Patrick Star Show: Subverted in "Chum Bucket List". SpongeBob and Patrick are skydiving, when Patrick assures SpongeBob that they'll be safe. Smash Cut to square and star-shaped graves laying side by side. SpongeBob and Patrick safely parachute down in front of them.
- Robot Chicken:
- One sketch has a boy announcing he's going to shave "just like Daddy". As he pulls the straight razor toward his face, the scene cuts to his casket being lowered.
- In a sketch based on Inside Out, Riley attends a slumber party, where her friends have her get her ears pierced as a Rite of Passage. After Riley says "This is my decision!", the next scene takes place at her funeral, where the eulogist advises her family to remember Riley as a good girl and not someone who decided to ask her friend to stab her ear and then bled to death.
- The Simpsons:
- In "Homer's Enemy", Frank Grimes loses it and starts acting as dumb as he thinks Homer is, including handling electrical wires without safety gloves. The camera cuts to the others' reaction to Grimes being shocked off-screen, then cuts again to his funeral.
- In "Simpsons Bible Stories", King David (Bart) is thrown out of town by Goliath (Nelson) and meets Ralph Wiggum (portraying a shepherd), who idolises him. David tells him he is no longer his hero, so Ralph walks into the sunset, intending to face Goliath himself. Cut to the gravestone. Later on, however, Goliath gets killed by a gravestone to the neck... Ralph's gravestone. It turns out Ralph isn't dead after all.
- Subverted in "D'oh-in' In The Wind", where Homer tries to become a hippie. Homer had accidentally ruined an entire shipment of his hippie friends' juice business and secretly tried to save it by harvesting vegetables from their secret garden. He learns too late that the vegetables in question were drugged, and this attracted the police to the farm, willing to kill them. Homer makes a Rousing Speech and places flowers in the policemen's rifles, but the last rifle goes off as he is placing the flower into it. Scene cuts to a graveyard which is right next to a hospital, but it turns out Homer is in the hospital.
- In "I, (Annoyed Grunt)-Bot", Lisa's three cats' deaths are shown this way.
- First, Snowball II dies in a classic That Poor Cat when Dr. Hibbert runs her over off-screen. The next scene shows a gravestone marked Snowball II and a yet-to-be-buried shoe box.
- Her replacement Snowball III is found floating in an aquarium. Then it cuts to Snowball III's headstone.
- Snowball III's replacement Coltrane (aka Snowball IV) jumps out the window when Lisa plays her saxophone. Then it cuts to the headstone marked Coltrane.
- In "Mona Leaves-a", Homer's mother Mona peacefully Dies Wide Open in the Simpsons' living room, and the last line before commercial is Homer worriedly asking if she's OK, cluing the audience in that she's not. The first scene of the next act is Mona's funeral.
- South Park:
- In the episode "The Ring", after Kenny's girlfriend Tammy finally agrees to go to T.G.I. Friday's to give him a blowjob. Cut to Kenny's funeral where Father Maxi tells everyone that syphilis is still a deadly disease.
- In the episode "South Par Q Vaccination Special" the teacher starts coughing just as she is about to get the COVID-19 vaccine. Cut to her funeral.
- In the Spongebob Squarepants episode "Sing a Song of Patrick," one of the members of the band recording Patrick's song says they're going to finish it even if it kills them. Cut to a row of graves, and a man handing Patrick the record of his song.
