!!!A proposal has been made to rename this trope: [[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=nsbnwryzejtyyuti766v44fb Discuss it here]]

A character who is dead or having a NearDeathExperience steps out of his body and observes what is happening with other characters in the story at that time. The events so observed are shown one way or another to be real and not the fantasy of a dying brain. Alternately, the character gets to review key events in his life, providing the justification for a ClipShow. Either variant can turn into yet another version of ChristmasCarol or WonderfulLife.

The sequence usually ends with dead characters moving on to the Afterlife, and [[ConvenientComa comatose ones]] waking up (occasionally as a MistimedRevival). Reawakened and revived characters rarely remember the experience as more than a [[DreamSequence blurry dream,]] although specific recollections are sometimes allowed for punchlines or AnAesop.
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!!Examples

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[[folder: Anime and Manga ]]

* ''GiantRobo'' uses the narration version of this trope to pull off AnyoneCanDie. [[spoiler: Ginrei narrates the beginning of the first episode as if she's flashing back after the end of the story. After she dies in the last episode, her disembodied spirit says a few lines in a post-credits epilogue.]]
* Ash and Pikachu go through this in the ''[[{{Pokemon}} Pokémon]]'' episode in which the team goes to Lavender Town in order to catch a Ghost Pokemon(which he does...kind of). HilarityEnsues with Misty and Brock.
* The protagonist of ''YuYuHakusho'' spends the first four episodes of the show as a ghost while trying desperately to get back into his body. (The arc is extended in the manga, but generally goes the same way.)
* In the manga version of ''ChronoCrusade'', [[spoiler:Rosette]] dies and has a vision (or perhaps goes to the story's version of the afterlife) of being on a train. While there, [[spoiler:she looks into the glass of [[IconicItem her watch]]]] to see [[spoiler:Chrono]] saying that he still has hope for her to return. [[spoiler:She does, and uses the surprise of her revival to shoot Aion's sword and destroy it.]]
* In ''[[RanmaOneHalf Ranma 1/2]]'', an old man named Harumaki has a foot in the grave already, and he can leave his agonizing body temporarily to go and annoy female-Ranma. He takes advantage of his ghostly form (and wispy, snake-like lower "body") by floating everywhere and trailing spirals around her.
* Another RumikoTakahashi story, the one-shot ''1 Or W'', shows the protagonist's girlfriend watching him mourn over her body after a nasty accident caused by his kendo team captain. Just as she's about to reenter her body and come back to life, ''the spirit of the kendo team captain'' outraces her and [[GrandTheftMe possesses her body]], leaving her to [[WallGlower fume angrily as a ghost for the rest of the story]] --unless the protagonist can defeat the captain in a match.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Film ]]

* ''TheSixthSense'' has a child who can see all sorts of Dead Men Walking. [[spoiler: Including the protagonist, who is totally unaware he's dead.]] It's so old now as to have become a [[ItWasHisSled catch-phrase]], but hey, a spoiler is a spoiler.
* The film ''{{Ghost}}'', of course.
* According to director commentary on TheAbyss, the sequence where Ed Harris's character tries to revive his love interest was shot with camera angles meant to evoke the "hovering over your body" idea.
* Lester (not a spoiler, he states that he's dead in the opening scene) in ''AmericanBeauty''.
* In ''What Dreams May Come'', the plot pretty much revolves around what happens in the afterlife. After [[spoiler:Robin William's character dies,]] he's shown what happens in the real world after his death.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Literature ]]

* Literary example: ''AnansiBoys'', by Neil Gaiman, which contains a subplot of the ghost of Maeve Livingstone watching the investigations of her own murder.
* Setup of ''The Lovely Bones''.
* The Christopher Pike novel ''Remember Me'' is about a girl who wakes up as a ghost after she is killed by one of her friends. She sees her family finding out about her death, her funeral, and then spends the rest of the book trying to figure out who killed her. After her murder is solved, she proceedes to the afterlife.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Live Action TV ]]

* An entire episode of ''[[{{MASH}} M*A*S*H]]'' is told from the point of view of a soldier's ghost, seen by Klinger while the latter [[FeverDreamEpisode recovers from a high fever]].
* ''DesperateHousewives'' manages to kill off its {{Narrator}} at the start of the first episode. She continues narrating, giving us glimpses into the personal lives of her still-living friends that they don't get to see in each other. She actually appears to Lynnette in one episode.
* {{MacGyver}} spends an episode in spiritual limbo after the bad guys first put him into a coma, and then try to poison his bed-ridden body. He escapes through the aid of a recently-deceased relative.
* The last episode of season five of ''CurbYourEnthusiasm'' has Larry David (playing himself) dying and going to Heaven. He eventually proves so annoying that his guardian angels send him back into his body, much to the disappointment of his friends and family.
* ''MrBelvedere'' had the titular character experiencing this; at first, it seems that everything's going comedically wrong without him, but it turns out that life goes on.
* The [[DarkerAndEdgier bleak]] ''DoctorWho'' spinoff ''{{Torchwood}}'' tried SomethingCompletelyDifferent with the more lighthearted, sentimental episode "Random Shoes", in which a recently deceased character observes (and subconsciously influences) the protagonist Gwen as she investigates his death.
* Subverted in an episode of ''{{Scrubs}}'': as various doctors are around a man's body (masking it from view) and finally saying that they lost him, a man walks up and begins to talk about how seeing himself die like that was strange. He even starts giving a speech about death itself...until J.D. comes up and angrily reminds him that he's not dead, just insane.
** However, there is also an episode that plays it straight: J.D. gets sick and has to undergo surgery where he has an out-of-body experience looking over Turk's shoulder as he's operating. Turk asks him (though "the ghost" isn't seen) to go away because he can't concentrate.
* The season two episode "Epiphanies" gave ''BattlestarGalactica'''s on-the-brink-of-death Laura Roslin the chance to remember TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt. It was the day she got told she had terminal breast cancer, got dumped ''and'' fired by the former President, stopped a union crisis, listened as the Cylons nuked her homeworld, got sworn in as the new President, and left a whole bunch of people in the hands of the Cylons. Oh, and she figured out Gaius Baltar betrayed everyone because he was making out with a known Cylon. 'Cept she can't prove it. Luckily, she said ScrewDestiny and woke the heck up [[spoiler:: due to some hybrid blood from the extra-special baby Sharon was carrying.]].
* Dean of ''{{Supernatural}}'' did this while in a coma in the season 2 premiere, and his brother used a Ouija board to communicate with him.
* In ''{{Stargate SG-1}}'', episode "Meridian", Dr. Jackson lies dying of radiation poisoning. While the other characters take turns sitting at his bedside, he is in deep conversation with [[EnergyBeings Oma Desala]] about whether he is satisfied with the life he led or not. Eventually, he makes himself visible to Jack to tell him to let him die. Then he walks through the active Stargate and [[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence ascends.]]
* An episode of ''{{House}}'' (''Three Stories'') involves him almost dying and having flashes of the other two patients he was talking about, as well as their eventual fates in regards to the legs they were worried about losing. Interestingly, he then claims that it certainly didn't make him believe in anything like God or the afterlife or even life flashing before his eye, just that his mind was creating a hallucination as he died to make him feel better.

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[[folder: Webcomics ]]

* A routine event for the titular character in {{Nodwick}}.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Western Animation ]]

* In ''{{Family Guy}}'', Peter is struck by lightning and has a NearDeathExperience. He proceeds to steal money from his own wallet and later tries to reenter his body through the mouth.
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