Note: As a Death Trope, all Spoilers will be unmarked ahead. Beware.
Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated in Anime and Manga.
- Kakine Teitoku, a.k.a. "Dark Matter", from A Certain Magical Index is brutally beaten up by a berserk Accelerator, after he stabs one of the few people Accelerator actually cares about right as she's trying to reason with him to spare Teitoku's life. After being buried waist-deep in the pavement and having his face quite literally sheared off, the #2 Level 5 is presumed deceased... until he resurfaces in the New Testaments, as bat shit as ever and completely white now as a result of his Dark Matter fueled regeneration. Unfortunately for him, Takitsubo's AIM Stalker causes one of his Beetle Army members to go rogue, kill him and take over his identity, memories, and power, but with a kind and well-meaning personality.
- Dragon Ball: Goku seems to be written off as dead by his friends for most of the King Piccolo saga, even though there's no indication of him actually dying. He just went after the mutant that killed Krillin and Bulma already declares him killed in action, not even considering the possibility that he might still be alive (something that Bulma would admit to later on after realizing her mistake). King Piccolo thought the same thing after their first battle where he seemingly killed him; he was quite surprised when Goku arrived to save Tien.
- In the finale of Durarara!!, after finally attempting to kill Shizuo, Izaya fails and is hit into another building by his nemesis where he suffers from internal bleeding, leading to a Trail of Blood. He then is forced to run from several airborne vending machines as he attempts to get away. Izaya finally then engages Shizuo in a fight in a last-ditch attempt at a Xanatos Gambit. He gets both his arms broken and is shot by Vorona with a ballistic knife. Izaya is able to escape in the end, but his odds of survival are only fifty-fifty, and he is last seen saying he does not want to die anywhere near Shizuo. It's confirmed that he did survive, though none of the characters know of his whereabouts as he never returned to Ikebukuro and thus never told anyone he was alive. At least, until he decided to troll Namie by E-mailing her.
- Fairy Tail:
- Lyon throws himself off a cliff with Racer of the Oracion Seis to protect Gray and Sherry from being killed by Racer's attempted explosive suicide attack, leaving them both to think he's dead after the bomb goes off and causing Sherry (thanks to the dark magic activating to switch people's moral alignments) to briefly go crazy-evil. Turns out, Lyon managed to cut the bomb off Racer and then shielded them both with a hastily-crafted ice wall, though the effort briefly knocked him out, and he returns with Racer as Gray is preventing Sherry from trying to murder Natsu and Lucy. He nearly invokes this word for word.
- Up until the Sirius Island arc, most of the world believed the Black Wizard Zeref had been dead for centuries with various dark guilds and cults using his left-behind dark magics to cause havoc or resurrect him. As it turns out, Zeref is very much alive into the present...though he certainly wishes otherwise.
- JoJo's Bizarre Adventure:
- In part 2, Stroheim is believed dead by Joseph, only to show up later as a cyborg.
- At the end of part 2, it's Joseph's turn to be believed dead. He shows up at his own funeral with his newlywed wife, Suzi Q. They were actually going to inform the rest of the cast that he was alive, but the latter forgot to telegram them.
- In part 3, Avdol is presumed dead after a fight with other Stand users. He is later revealed to have been simply recovering from his wounds, which was known by all the main characters excluding Polnareff, whom they assumed would not be able to keep the secret and would thus endanger their recovering friend.
- Lupin III:
- Lupin is apparently shot by a sniper and falls from the getaway chopper in Lupin III: Missed by a Dollar, only to reappear alive and well later on and play a Big Damn Hero to the rest of his cornered gang.
- Lupin III: Voyage to Danger has both Jigen and Goemon apparently killed. The former appeared to die in a massive explosion; he escaped via a hidden tunnel. The latter was stabbed by a thrown knife and fell from a cliff into the sea; his Absurdly Sharp Blade deflected the knife just enough to miss his heart, and he was later rescued by a local fisherman.
- Naruto: Everyone in the story thought that Madara Uchiha/Tobi died a long time ago. Turns out to be averted in the case of Madara, who was brought Back from the Dead, but Tobi is Obito, who was crushed "to death" in Kakashi's Gaiden. He was saved (half of him, anyway) by Madara. Who was still alive for a long period of time after he was believed to be dead anyway.
- One Piece:
- This happens to Luffy a few times where after receiving a vicious Curb-Stomp Battle, his enemy thinks he's dead... until he returns to challenge them again. This happened twice in his fights with Crocodile.
- During the Time Skip, where everyone thought the entire Straw Hat crew was dead because they had been gone for two years, not know they were actually training in secret. This gave a bunch of impostors the opportunity to take advantage of their MIA status and impersonate them, though not very well. After Sentomaru exposed the frauds, the pirates they had recruited truly thought Luffy was dead...until Sentomaru revealed that the guy the fake Luffy was threatening was the real deal, indicating that the Straw Hats were alive after all.
- The pirate Jack was reported dead after he picked a fight with Issho, Sengoku, and Tsuru. However, the Mink Tribe, which was recently attacked by Jack, giving a sample of just how freakishly strong he is, worry that he might be alive because they Never Found the Body; And he is, injured, but alive and more than furious that the newspapers wrote him off.
- The Big Mom Pirates make this assumption of the Sanji Retrieval Team during a meeting, due to a combination of unaware facts and Opera lying about Jimbei freeing Luffy and Nami to avoid punishment. Because of this, the Straw Hats were able to be successful Wedding Smashers.
- The mysterious Loser King from Tailenders is believed to be long dead ever since his mysterious disappearance during a race to reach the Terraformer on the Indian continent over a century ago. When the main characters undertake the same perilous race he did, they discover as they approach the Terraformer that the Loser King never died or disappeared, instead he is still racing to reach the end. As it turns out, there is some severe Time Dilation going on near the Terraformer and only minutes had passed from the Loser King's perspective. Additionally, Tomoe is revealed to have known the truth of the situation as she raced alongside him over a century ago and was desperate to reach him again after he sent her away when he realized what was going on. In the end, this trope occurs to Tomoe as well as The Rival racer Goodspeed when they are forced to return due to having been in the Terraformers presence with another century having passed in the short time they spent there and were similarly presumed dead.
- Heihachi Mishima from Tekken: Blood Vengeance is not as dead as most people think. He shows up for the three-way brawl between himself, his son, and grandson.Heihachi: It feels good to be back. Hiding in the shadows after faking your own death is a bore. In fact, it's downright tedious.
Kazuya: I thought I've thrown you into the depths of Hell.
Heihachi: Ha! If you thought that was enough to kill me, you are gravely mistaken.
