A Swan Song is the last work a creator created before they died, especially when undertaken with the foresight or expectation that it will be the last thing they will ever make. It can also be the last performance of an actor. Either way this is when a creator or thespian decides that if they're gonna stop, then they might as well go out with a bang.

Note that this ''must'' be on purpose. [[Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs People die after making works all the time]], but few of them have the foresight to know what their last act would be.

This can overlap with MagnumOpus, where the artist puts their all onto it and creates something that exceeds the quality of the previous works, or it can be something that is SoOkayItsAverage. Depending on the amount of time between the finishing touches and death, finishing the work can also be a DyingMomentOfAwesome.

Not to be confused with ShapeshifterSwanSong, which is just a shapeshifter's pre-mortem cycling of their previous forms. Sometimes overlaps with DiedDuringProduction. Compare GrandFinale, and compare and contrast PosthumousCredit and FatalMethodActing. For characters in-story who engage in final acts of daring or accomplishment, see TheLastDance.
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!Examples:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
* ''Anime/TheTaleOfThePrincessKaguya'' was Creator/IsaoTakahata's final film as a director for Creator/StudioGhibli. Even though the film was a box-office failure, it received critical acclaim. Not long after completing this film, Takahata retired and eventually died of lung cancer on April 26, 2018.
* The ''Anime/{{Oresuki}}'' OVA was the last work by Connect before its parent company Creator/SilverLink dissolved it and absorbed it.
* ''Franchise/FullmetalAlchemist: Brotherhood'' was the last anime title (and perhaps the last production ever) to be dubbed in Portuguese by the Brazilian dubbing studio Álamo, which used to be a long-time client for the [[NetworkDecay primarily]] anime-focused channel Animax and dubbed ''[[ArchivePanic a bunch]]'' of anime shows for such channel. Animax was shut down in the country in 2011, and the dubbing studio in question also shut down in the same year after almost 40 years of activity, while ''FMAB'' went into broadcast in its successor (Sony Spin) [[EndOfAnAge and was the last anime ever to be broadcast there]].
* ''Manga/ReincarnatedAsASword'''s anime adaptation's first ending theme, "more＜STRONGLY", was singer Music/MaonKurosaki's final song before her February 2023 death.
* ''Anime/DragonBallSuperBroly'' was the last time Creator/ChrisAyres portrayed Frieza. While the role had been passed on to Creator/DamanMills in the games and later episodes of ''Anime/DragonBallSuper'' due to his struggles with COPD, he returned in ''Broly'' to voice Frieza once final time, albeit prepared to stop recording ''mid-session'' and leave for a lung transplant if need be, [[https://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-feature/2018/09/12/chris-sabat-on-vegetas-fear-gokus-selfishness-and-talking-to-himself per]] Creator/ChristopherSabat. Ayres would peacefully pass away on October 18, 2021.
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[[folder:Comic Books]]
* ''[[Recap/TintinTintinAndThePicaros Tintin and the Picaros]]'' from 1976 would become Creator/{{Herge}}'s last finished Franchise/{{Tintin}} album, but he still worked on the ultimately unfinished ''[[Recap/TintinTintinAndAlphArt Tintin and Alph-Art]]'' until his death in 1983. Hergé was in poor health though, so he always knew that even if he managed to finish that album, it would be the last one.
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[[folder:Film]]
* ''Film/FromRussiaWithLove'': Creator/PedroArmendariz (Ali Kerim Bey) was dying of cancer during filming. He knew this, but kept going in order to assure his family financial resources. In various scenes, he simply couldn't walk and had to have a [[FakeShemp body double]]. Shortly after finishing all of his scenes, he committed suicide because of the pain, four months before the release of the film.
* {{Invoked}} by director Creator/GarryMarshall in order to persuade Creator/JackieGleason to co-star in ''Film/NothingInCommon''. Marshall approached Gleason and basically said "do you really want your final film to have been ''Film/SmokeyAndTheBandit Part 3''?"
* Also invoked on ''Film/StreetFighter'': Creator/RaulJulia knew he was dying of cancer and decided to be part of the production because it would provide a paycheck large enough to help his family when he was gone, [[SoMyKidsCanWatch and because his children liked the game a lot.]]
* Creator/ChristopherLee's last role was a voice acting one in the independent film ''Angels in Notting Hill'', which he completed a few weeks before passing away in 2015. His last scene has him voicing Mr. President, a magical living plush dog with some eerie dialogue. It was intentionally so according to director Michael Pakleppa.
-->'''Mr. President:''' I will dream of you. Have a good life, Geoffrey.\\
'''Geoffrey:''' I'll miss you, a lot.\\
'''Mr. President:''' Don't dare, or I'll haunt your dreams. ''(vanishes)''
* ''WesternAnimation/AtlantisTheLostEmpire'': This was the final role for Creator/JimVarney, the voice of Cookie, who died more than a year before it came out. He was dying of lung cancer at the time, and he performed the role knowing full-well he wouldn't live to see the finished film.
* Creator/ErnestBorgnine's last film role was voicing Slink the Mouse for the 2011 animated film ''The Lion of Judah''. The film came out a year before his passing on July 8, 2012.
* ''Film/TheShootist'' was the final film for Creator/JohnWayne before he died of cancer three years later.
* Creator/EdwardGRobinson was dying from cancer as he made ''Film/SoylentGreen''. His character has an extended death scene in the film, and it was the last scene that Robinson shot; he passed on just a few days later.
* ''Film/Expend4bles'' was the final time Creator/AlainDorval dubbed Creator/SylvesterStallone in European French. He had cancer and passed in February 2024.
* ''Film/MyFuhrer'' was the last film Creator/UlrichMuhe did before he passed from stomach cancer. He was already ill when it was filmed.
* Creator/OrsonWelles' final role was the voice of Unicron in ''WesternAnimation/TheTransformersTheMovie'', his lines being recorded a mere five days before his death.
* Creator/TickyHolgado had lung cancer (he was a chain smoker) when working on ''Film/AVeryLongEngagement''. His condition worsened just after filming wrapped up in late 2003. He passed away in January 2004.
* ''WesternAnimation/{{Up}}'': The Latin American Spanish dub was Tito Reséndiz's final film before he died of lung cancer on May 20, 2009.
* ''WesternAnimation/JetsonsTheMovie'' was the swan song for both lead voice actor George O'Hanlon, who had suffered a debilitating stroke prior to production and died of a second stroke in the recording studio, and Creator/MelBlanc, who recorded his lines for Mr. Spacely in the hospital before passing away from complications of emphysema and coronary artery disease. It was also the final theatrical film directed by [[Creator/HannaBarbera William Hanna and Joseph Barbera]].
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[[folder:Literature]]
* Former US President UsefulNotes/UlyssesSGrant knew he was dying of throat cancer so he put all his energy into writing his memoirs, in order to provide for his family after he was gone. He died two days after completion.
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[[folder:Music]]
* Nobody died (yet), but ''Music/AbbeyRoad'' was intended to be this for Music/TheBeatles. After the [[TroubledProduction disastrous]] ''Get Back'' sessions, they decided to pull it together for one more album before their breakup. However, Apple Records brought in Music/PhilSpector to salvage the ''Get Back'' tapes, and the result was ''Music/LetItBe'', the band's chronological final album.
* Although the last piece Music/LudwigVanBeethoven completed before his death was the shorter finale that replaced the ''Grosse Fuge'' in his ''String Quartet No.13 in B-flat'' (the ''Grosse Fuge'' is now more usually performed as a standalone work), the last full-length work he completed was his ''String Quartet No.16 in F''. The finale is subtitled "Der schwer gefaßte Entschluß" ("The difficult decision") and features a slow motif marked "Muß es sein?" ("Must it be?") and a contrasting faster motif marked "Es muß sein!" ("It must be!"); while the meaning of these questions is the subject of much debate, the theory that Beethoven was reflecting on his mortality is one of the more popular.
* Music/DavidBowie's final album, ''Music/BlackstarAlbum'', was written and recorded while he was suffering from liver cancer, and released on his 69th birthday, two days before his death. The whole thing eerily alludes to the fact that it was the end of the road for him.
** The last music video that he appeared in, "Lazarus", even had him on a death bed, just to drive the point home.
* Music/JDilla's last two albums he recorded, ''Music/{{Donuts}}'' and ''The Shining'', were recorded as he was dying from both lupus and an incurable blood disease, and were consciously crafted as his goodbyes to his family and colleagues. ''Donuts'' was all-but completed while he was in the hospital (he produced 29 out of the album's 31 tracks while completely bedridden), but Dilla eventually got too sick to complete ''The Shining'', which was 75 percent complete. So he entrusted friend and producer Karriem Riggins to finish it. Dilla's ''true'' swan song, however, was something he never officially released: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eG6qQCjKCiY The very last beat he created mere hours before dying]]. According to Questlove, who played the beat during a Red Bull Music seminar, Dilla had gotten so sick, he couldn't speak, and instead expressed himself through music. Sampling "[[Music/GeorgeClinton America Eats Its Young]]", the instrumental's claustrophobic and heavy atmosphere reflected Dilla's thoughts during his last moments on the mortal coil.
* Music/{{Motorhead}} released the album ''Bad Magic'' in August 2015, five months before the death of lead singer Lemmy Kilmister (and the subsequent end of Motorhead). ''Bad Magic'' featured the uncharacteristically solemn "'Til The End", where Lemmy tearfully sings about the approaching end of his life and how he's lived life to the fullest with no regrets. Coupled with this long-known health issues (revealed to be terminal brain and neck cancer after his death), this makes the intent of the album as a SwanSong pretty evident.
* Music/{{Queen|Band}}:
** Their last song within Music/FreddieMercury's lifetime, [[Music/{{Innuendo}} "The Show Must Go On"]], is about Mercury [[FaceDeathWithDignity facing death with dignity]]. When Music/BrianMay presented the demo to Freddie, he had doubts that the latter would be able to sing due to his illness at the time. When the time came to record the vocals, Mercury drank a measure of vodka and said [[{{Determinator}} "I'll fucking do it, darling!"]], then recorded it in one take.
--->The show must go on\\
The show must go on, yeah\\
Oooh inside my heart is breaking\\
My make-up may be flaking\\
But my smile still stays on
** The last song Freddie wrote by himself, [[Music/MadeInHeaven "A Winter's Tale"]], was coincidentally inspired by watching the swans at Lake Geneva, therefore being his swan song in more than one way. It was recorded after "The Show Must Go On" and "These Are the Days of Our Lives" but before "Mother Love", which he and Brian wrote together.
* Similar to ''Abbey Road'', when Music/{{Sentenced}} recorded their GrandFinale ''The Funeral Album'' no one was actually dying, but the band itself was very much falling apart due to personal conflicts as well as the lead singer Ville Laihiala's growing disinterest, but the group ultimately decided to make one last album with a limited tour and go out in a blaze of glory rather than simply fade out.
* Music/WarrenZevon's last album, ''The Wind'', was written and recorded against his impending death from mesothelioma. It opens with a reflection on his "Dirty Life and Times," includes a cover of "[[Music/BobDylan Knocking on Heaven's Door]]," and closes with the melancholy "Keep Me In Your Heart." He passed away two weeks after its release.
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[[folder:Mythology and Religion]]
* The {{Trope Namer|s}}, the ancient Greek myth that a swan—a bird normally not known for its musical abilities—will sing a most beautiful melody just before it dies.
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[[folder:Video Games]]
* Creator/SatoruIwata, the president of Creator/{{Nintendo}} from 2002 to 2015, has the UsefulNotes/NintendoSwitch. The Switch was greenlit under his watch and he was incredibly hands-on with the system's development, serving as project lead while he was alive and giving heavy technology input for the device's form factor and features. He also prepped the software divisions at Nintendo for future Switch projects by restructuring the company's previously disparate console and handheld development teams. Iwata would die in July 2015, over a year before the Switch would hit market.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyI'' was intended to be one of these -- nobody was dying (contrary to urban legend, [[Creator/SquareEnix the company]] wasn't even having financial troubles), but director Hironobu Sakaguchi's last few games had flopped, so he planned to quit the company after completing one last game[[note]]though it's not where the name came from--Sakaguchi just wanted a name with initials FF[[/note]]. [[Franchise/FinalFantasy It turned out not to be so final, in the end.]]
* "Episode Ardyn" has become this for ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXV'' following director Hajime Tabata's departure from Creator/SquareEnix and the subsequent cancellation of the rest of the game's planned DLC campaigns.
* The old Creator/IrrationalGames releases the massively popular and acclaimed ''VideoGame/BioShockInfinite'' before changing business models and downsizing drastically. Among other things, they wanted to make ''BSI'' their best product yet to make sure all of their employees who found themselves out of job had an amazing game on their portfolios.
* ''VideoGame/{{Wizardry}} 8'' was the swan song for its developer, Creator/SirTech Canada, who closed its doors soon after its release, ending the twenty years-old series with a bang--unlike [[VideoGame/{{Ultima}} many other]] [[VideoGame/MightAndMagic classic series]] of the GoldenAge of {{Western RPG}}s. ''W8'' can also be considered a swan song of the Golden Age itself, as it was the last great game to exemplify the design paradigms and virtues typical for this period of the genre's history.
* From early 2014 until her death in late 2018, Creator/ToshikoFujita was in failing health that left her largely unable to continue her work as a voice actress. Before she lost her battle with breast cancer late 2018, she [[RoleReprise reprised]] one of her roles, Dai from ''Manga/DragonQuestTheAdventureOfDai'', in ''VideoGame/JumpForce''.
* Around the 2010s, ''Franchise/FireEmblem'' had been in a steady decline and was about to be cancelled, so Creator/IntelligentSystems decided to go all out with ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'', basically indulging in ContinuityPorn to the older series and ending on [[HappyEnding a high note]] instead of a [[BittersweetEnding bittersweet one]]. However, like the ''Final Fantasy'' example above, it instead [[NewbieBoom revitalized]] the series and brought it back into one of Nintendo's main franchises.
* Creator/BillyKametz's role as Tearer in ''VideoGame/AITheSomniumFilesNirvanaInitiative'' as well as his role as Ferdinand von Aegir in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemWarriorsThreeHopes'' would be his final roles before passing away on June 9, 2022.
* ''VideoGame/PuyoPuyoFever'' was Sega's swan song as a first-party developer. It was the last game they have ever released for the Platform/{{Dreamcast}}, and by extension, their own consoles.[[note]]It wasn't, however, the final non-homebrew game on the Dreamcast, period. The ''actual'' final game to officially come out for the Dreamcast would be the vertical scrolling ShootEmUp ''Karous'', developed and published by [=MileStone=] Inc. in 2007.[[/note]]
* ''VideoGame/{{Segagaga}}'' also qualifies as a swan song for the Platform/Dreamcast. In essence, it represented the point where Sega accepted they were bowing out of the console industry, and thus, stopped giving a shit and decided to go [[QuirkyWork balls-to-the-wall]] with this light-hearted SelfParody.
* The original English release of ''VideoGame/KingdomHearts358DaysOver2'' has the very last performance Creator/WayneAllwine recorded, both as WesternAnimation/MickeyMouse and in general, before he died. He was narrowly the longest lasting official voice actor for the character by that point.
* ''VideoGame/{{Batsugun}}'' was Creator/{{Toaplan}}'s final shmup before they declared bankruptcy. While not Toaplan's last game overall -- that honor goes to ''VideoGame/SnowBros 2'' which was released the following year -- ''Batsugun'' in particular was the final game that they would pour all their heart and soul into, with absolutely dazzling weapons and [[BulletHell thick and structures enemy bullet patterns]] that would serve as the standard for many shmups going forward.
* The life-sim and adventure game ''VideoGame/DisneyDreamlightValley'', will mark Creator/PatCarroll's final performance as [[WesternAnimation/TheLittleMermaid1989 Ursula]] before her passing on July 31, 2022. She managed to record new bits of dialogue and laughs for the character.
* ''VideoGame/SuicideSquadKillTheJusticeLeague'' marks Creator/KevinConroy's final performance as Batman before his passing from colon cancer on November 10, 2022 and will be released posthumously. The reveal of his role in the game at the 2022 Game Awards was also an InMemoriam.
* ''VideoGame/PowerRangersBattleForTheGrid'' marks Creator/JasonDavidFrank's final performance as Tommy Oliver before his death in 2022.
* ''VideoGame/EiyudenChronicleHundredHeroes'' would be the final game worked on by Yoshitaka Murayama, the game's scenario writer and former creator of the ''VideoGame/{{Suikoden}}'' series. He sadly passed away two months before the game's release due to an long time illness.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Western Animation]]
* The 1948 Christmas cartoon ''[[WesternAnimation/RudolphTheRedNosedReindeer1948 Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer]]'' ([[Literature/RudolphTheRedNosedReindeer a direct adaptation of the original 1939 story/poem]]) is not only the final cartoon directed by [[Creator/MaxAndDaveFleischer Max Fleischer]], but is also the very last time Max Fleischer ever got involved with animation.
* Marvel Studios' ''WesternAnimation/WhatIf2021'' is the last media that Creator/ChadwickBoseman portrays the character [[ComicBook/BlackPanther T'Challa / Black Panther]] and his last project altogether before his passing on August 28, 2020 due to Stage IV colon cancer, a diagnosis he kept secret from everyone but his closest friends and family.
* ''WesternAnimation/MickeyMouse2013'''s third season saw Creator/AlanYoung reprise his role as [[Franchise/DuckTales Scrooge McDuck]] for the last time, which was also his final acting role overall, before his death on May 19, 2016.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'':
** Season 9's "Realty Bites" was the last episode to feature Creator/PhilHartman as Lionel Hutz before his death on May 28, 1998. Season 10's "Bart The Mother" was the last episode to feature Hartman as Troy [=McClure=], airing 4 months after his death.
** Season 25's "The Man Who Grew Too Much" was the last episode to feature Creator/MarciaWallace as Edna Krabappel after her death on October 25, 2013.
** Season 31's "Thanksgiving Of Horror" was the last episode to feature Creator/RussiTaylor as Martin Prince after she passed away on July 26, 2019.
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