History Main / StartToCorpse

* In VideoGame/{{Persona 4}}, Saki Konishi's corpse is found on a TV antenna 2-3 hours into the start of the game, which is still before gameplay starts properly. Saki herself discovered the reporter Yamano's body in the same manner before that, but it is not shown.

* The first episode of ''UminekoNoNakuKoroNi'' has a start-to-corpse time of roughly four hours, taking its time to introduce [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters the 18 people on the island]] and a few pieces of the JigsawPuzzlePlot before getting down to the main murder mystery. Of course, once the corpses start coming, they start coming ''fast''.

* The video game ''TheLastExpress'' has you encountering the corpse of your dead friend almost immediately after boarding the train. Even better, you are already wanted by the police and you are the first person to find your friend's body.

* ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' averages out to a significantly longer [=StC=] time, however, as many victims are sexually assaulted or kidnapped - not murdered (yet). Not only that, but in some episodes no one is killed at all.
** ''SVU'''s Start-To-''Victim'' time, however, is very similar to other ''Law And Order'' shows, if the requirement that the victim be dead rather than unconscious is waived.

* ''Series/{{Psych}}'' often has the corpse show up near-exactly midway through a story about a crime that is not murder (to the point that it often feels tacked-on: corpses thrown Just Because into a story that doesn't really call for one at all and was more interesting ''before'' the standard murder investigation stuff took over.)

* In VideoGame/{{Persona4}}, Saki Konishi's corpse is found on a TV antenna 2-3 hours into the start of the game, which is still before gameplay starts properly. Saki herself discovered the reporter Yamano's body in the same manner before that, but it is not shown.

* The eponymous murder in ''[[RiftwarCycle Murder in Lamut]]'' takes place around three-quarters of the way through the book. Just about everything in the earlier chapters is the three main characters enduring the politicking of various nobles competing for an honor that anyone familiar with the series already knows will be given to somebody who doesn't appear in this book.

* The ''second page'' of ''TheKurosagiCorpseDeliveryService''. The first page is an establishing shot.

* ''PoliceSquad'' may be the only show with a ''negative'' time, as the special guest star is killed off during the ''opening'' credits.

* ''{{Bearmageddon}}'''s STC is fairly high. It initially seems like another 'slacker' comic until we spot the mangled police cruiser.

A measurement of time which appears to have originated at TelevisionWithoutPity of how long it takes from the start of the episode to the first body turning up. A show such as ''Series/{{CSI}}'' will have a very short Start to Corpse time, with something like ''Series/{{Poirot}}'' occasionally exceeding half an hour of a two-hour program. A similar concept is the Start-To-Cure time, made most famous by ''Series/{{House}}''; although the name is a little misleading, it's a measure of the time it takes from the start of an episode to the first specific treatment that would act as a cure if the unlucky patient indeed had the disease it was a cure to. In mystery novels, this is a page count.

* The video game ''TheLastExpress'' has you encountering the corpse of your dead friend almost immediately after boarding the train. Even better, you are already wanted by the police and you are the first person to find your friends body.

* StuartAshen spoofed this with ''[[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-RCHyWcfIU Quickest Game Overs ever?]]'', in which he showcases some of the games with the quickest Start-To-''Your''-Corpse time.

-->--'''WebVideo/TheCinemaSnob''', ''Film/SleepawayCamp''

** Amusingly, his novel, ''{{Mogworld}}'' has the protagonist die in the prologue.

* ''Series/LawAndOrder'' and spinoffs average about 30 seconds, as the ColdOpening shows either someone finding a body or the actual murder.

* In most of the cases in the ''VideoGame/AceAttorney'' series, the corpse shows up within the first few minutes of the case. Of course, as attorneys, the main characters of the games usually aren't pulled in until a body shows up and someone gets arrested for the murder.

* Varies on ''MidsomerMurders'', from 30 seconds to around 15 minutes.

The name is based on the computer gaming equivalent, the [[CrateExpectations Start-To-Crate]] time.

* Yahtzee Croshaw's adventure series ''The ChzoMythos'' developed a modest running gag out of this. While the first episode, 5 Days a Stranger, passed several days before the first body was discovered, subsequent installments reduced the delay ominously until [[spoiler: Trilby's Notes, which began with an exceedingly gruesome murder in the first scene.]]

* ''Series/{{Columbo}}'' averaged fifteen to twenty minutes from StartToCorpse because it took that long for the murderer to commit the murder. This applies to both one-and-a-half-hour and two-hour editions.

* The 1970s film version of ''MurderOnTheOrientExpress'' had a StartToCorpse time of less than five minutes because it started with some of the Armstrong tragedy. The TV-movies run closer to a half-hour.