http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/grave-snow-death1.jpg
->''"Blondes make the best victims. They're like virgin snow that shows up the bloody footprints."''
->-- ''Alfred Hitchcock''

There are many ideas associated with snow: Tranquility, purity, cleanliness, beauty...

So naturally, many people are shown dramatically dying in the snow. It may have something to do with how red blood contrasts so sharply with white snow, especially when gentle snowflakes are falling around a scene of carnage. It may have something to do with the way the snow seems to try and wash away the unclean corpses and ruins. It may have something to do with how it looks like a beautiful and peaceful way to die, just letting the cold embrace you as you fall to sleep.

[[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotSymbolic And then there's the symbolism]].

As beautiful as snow is, it also signifies winter, associated with the death of the year (in the northern hemisphere at least), the death of crops, and the death of the sun. [[SnowedIn Snow also covers the world with a blanket of white]], and in Eastern cultures, white is the color of death.

Whatever the reason, using snow is a great way to portray a character on the verge of dying or a place torn by war in a very artful manner.

A sub-trope of EmpathicEnvironment. For a different interpretation of snow, see SnowMeansLove. See WhiteShirtOfDeath and BloodSplatteredWeddingDress for a similar trope, only applied to clothing instead.

As this is one of the DeathTropes, expect spoilers.
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!!Examples

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder: Anime and Manga ]]

* The 2006 version of ''{{Kanon}}'' has Yuuichi searching for Ayu in a raging blizzard, then giving up and waiting for death. There's also the LookBothWays incident, which was made more dramatic with the scene of red mixed in the snow. And when [[spoiler:Makoto]] dies, a previously completely green area was instantly covered in snow. Interesting because ''Kanon'' is the ultimate SnowMeansLove series and one of the few works of KeyVisualArts with a happy ending.
** Speaking of KeyVisualArts, ''{{Clannad}}'' features this as well, with [[spoiler:Nagisa's]] near death experience happening on a snowy night when she was young, a foreshadowing of events that will happen ''years'' later on a similar snowy night in ''After Story'', eventually culminating with [[spoiler:the deaths of Ushio ''and'' Tomoya]] moments after it starts snowing in the penultimate regular episode of ''After Story''.
* The incident in ''MagicalGirlLyricalNanoha'' where Nanoha was unprepared for a sudden ambush. There was so much blood on her white Barrier Jacket and the snow-covered terrain, while Vita tried to keep her awake in the gently falling snow.
** And then there's Reinforce's last moments. Also snow.
* The first ''GundamWing'' intro. A city in ruins and an EmpathyDollShot, all covered in a sheet of falling snow. TheMovie ''Endless Waltz'' actually shows how it happened ([[spoiler:Heero accidentally blew up an apartment building]]); as the realization sinks in, snow starts to fall.
* The ''DeathNote'' anime has this one. It starts snowing [[spoiler:just as Naomi lets down her guard enough to reveal her real name to Light, who sentences her to suicide. The snow continues as she walks to her fate]].
* In ''{{Naruto}}'', the deaths of Zabuza and Haku are marked with the falling of snow.
* The first Suzaku Seishi to die in ''FushigiYuugi''--and by extension the Seiryuu Seishi he did the death-battle with--does so after a bloody battle in a field of snow.
* Snow falling in summer is taken as an omen of Happosai's impending death in ''[[RanmaOneHalf Ranma 1/2]]''. (He recovers, though.)
* The happy flashback to Sara meeting her brother in the snow in ''SoukouNoStrain'' appears just before they prepare to fight to the death in the present.
* In the fourth ''RurouniKenshin'' OVA, [[spoiler:Tomoe]] dies in the snow.
* In ''FullMoonOSagashite'', it's snowing once Mitsuki has learned of [[spoiler:Eichi]]'s death.
* Episode 13 of ''CowboyBebop'', as Gren's ship crashes in a snowy field. He doesn't die there, but he starts coughing up blood and is clearly a goner.
* At the end of the Galaxian Wars arc of ''SaintSeiya'', it starts to snow in the mountains where Phoenix Ikki has just been defeated by the other Bronze Saints. While Seiya and the others hold off Docrates' forces, preventing them from stealing the Sagittarius Gold Cloth, a dying Ikki regards the snow as a symbol of his purification... and then gets up and [[RedemptionEqualsDeath brings down the mountain on himself and Docrates]] to save the Saints' lives, burying everything and everyone in rock and snow. Then again, he IS the ''[[BackFromTheDead Phoenix]]'' Saint.
* The winter scenes in ''MilenniumActress'' portend doom: when she first meets and falls in love with the artist he's bleeding; later during WWII she's imprisoned for helping him [[spoiler: and he gets captured and executed]]; during the 50s she tries to find him in the snow fields of Hokkaido and nearly dies. [[spoiler: During her ''actual'' death it's raining - close enough.]]
* In ''MahouSenseiNegima'', [[DoomedHometown the destruction of Negi's hometown]] occurred over the course of one snowy night.
* The last episode of ''WelcomeToTheNHK'' combines this with SnowMeansLove; for various reasons, Sato and Misaki both attempt to commit suicide at a snow-covered jetty and realise they love each other.
* At the end of ''CicadaInWinter'', the doomed lovers commit seppuku in the snow.
* In ''WolfsRain'' there's a scene where Quent, thinking Blue is dead, lays down in the snow to die. It's a subversion because Toboe saves him by sharing his body warmth. [[spoiler:In the final two episodes they and others end up dead anyway, and snow covers their bodies before the titular rain finally shows up.]]
* GambleFish: [[spoiler: The death of Tsukiyono's brother.]]
* The [[TearJerker tear-jerking]] scene which scarred many 5-8 year old Latin American children (including this tropper back then) of Remi (''{{Ie Naki Ko}}''), when the performing monkey dies of pneumonia after forcing itself to perform one last time on the snowy streets.
* [[spoiler: Stella's burial]] in GundamSEEDDestiny.

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[[folder: Film ]]

* In the movie ''ThreeDaysOfTheCondor'', the protagonist, Joseph Turner (a.k.a. Condor), notices that Kathy Hale photographs and displays only scenes of winter (bare trees, lifeless snow). He comments to her that she is focusing on death, which she confirms.
* Not a straight example, but the snow globe in ''CitizenKane'' should get an honorable mention.
* The Chinese movie ''RaiseTheRedLantern'' has the servant Yan'er kneel outdoors in winter until she dies from the cold, while snow flakes fall around her.
* O-Ren in ''KillBill'' also enjoys picturesque death on the snow.
** Although few consider [[spoiler:getting the top of one's head lopped off]] anywhere near picturesque...
* The end of ''HouseOfFlyingDaggers'' went from brightly sunlit to a blizzard, just in time for the dramatic death scene.
* ''MoulinRouge!'' ends with the defeated Duke walking through a snowfall, leaving the theater in which the heroine Satine has just died
* ''{{Fargo}}'', where several people die before a snowy background.
* Subverted in ''TheShining''. Jack does freeze to death, but his expression is anything but peaceful!
* Played straight and subverted in ''TheDayAfterTomorrow''. The first time, some survivors have fallen asleep and froze to death while sleeping. They look peaceful. The second time is the naysaying policeman, whose frozen expression is rather pained. But that's what you get for ignoring TheJorEl.
* One segment of Akira Kurosawa's ''{{Dreams}}'' features the story of a mountain climber who, trapped in a blizzard and suffering from frostbite, either hallucinates or experiences a visit from a yuki-onna - a snow demon who takes the form of a beautiful woman.
** A yuki-onna figures in one of the stories in ''{{Kwaidan}}'', an anthology film adapting several Japanese folk tales.
* In the 1989 film of ''DangerousLiaisons'', Valmont gets stabbed to death in a midwinter duel. This is pretty much entirely so the director can have a cool shot of his blood splattered across the snow.
* ''TheIceStorm'' is the cinematic tribute to this trope.
* ''TheSweetHereafter'' depicts children in a horrific bus accident, caused and contrasted by the peacefulness of the snow around them. Snow and cold are used throughout the movie to symbolize the original serenity in the town.
* [[SinCity Bruce Willis]]' John shoots himself in a snowy field.
* In DeadPoetsSociety, the boys are seen in a snowy feild after learning of Neil's death. The sense of hopelessness that scene brings the rest of the film really is incredible.
** A less obvious but more literal SnowMeansDeath moment in DPS is that you see through the window that it's snowing just before Neil shoots himself.
* Used somewhat more literally in ''Mulan''. [[spoilers: She uses a cannon to start an avalanche and wipe out the Hun army. Mostly.]]

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[[folder: Literature ]]

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_build_a_fire To Build A Fire]] by Jack London
* ''The Little Match Girl'', which makes [[TooGoodForThisSinfulEarth dying from cold and starvation lovely, glorious]], and filled with so much {{Glurge}}.
** Deconstructed in Terry Pratchett's ''[[{{Discworld}} Hogfather]]'', where Death (who's filling in for the local equivalent of Santa Claus) saves the archetypal Little Match Girl, dismissing her death as needlessly cruel, in the midst of his [[{{Deconstruction}} deconstructing]] a number of Christmastime tropes.
* James Joyce's ''TheDead'' may end with the definitive example of this trope. As the protagonist slowly drifts to sleep, thinking of the dead man his wife once loved, snow covers his window and his thoughts. The closing line: "His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead."
* In {{Discworld}}, the dark pagan origins of the Hogfather (the local expy of SantaClaus) explain the choice of colours in his clothing: red and white from blood on the snow, ultimately coming from druidic human sacrifices in midwinter to make the sun come back.
* RaptorRed and her pack encounter a whip-tailed sauropod on a snowy mountain near the end of the book. It doesn't end well.
* The death of Snowden obviously had quite the impact on the narrator of ''Catch-22'', so much so that the first page of the book asks the random question: "Where are the Snowdens of yesteryear?" Snowden's last words are, "It's cold." Considering everyone ''else's'' name is symbolic, it's fair to see this as an example of this trope.
* {{Harry Potter}} visits his parents' graves for the first time in ''Deathly Hallows'', accompanied by Hermione. It so happens that they do this in December, and the graveyard is covered in snow. Harry, of course, [[TearJerker cannot help but cry]] (and neither can many readers).

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Live Action TV ]]

* Jonathan Kent's funeral in ''{{Smallville}}''.
* [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] by ''Buffy the Vampire Slayer'', in which Angel's First Evil-inspired attempt to kill himself is foiled by an inexplicable snowstorm in southern California.
* Joss later played it straight in {{Firefly}}, with [[spoiler: Tracey]]'s funeral.
** The above is a meta-example, since it was also the very last scene shot [[ScrewedByTheNetwork for the entire series]].
* [[spoiler:Brian's Dad]]'s funeral in ''QueerAsFolk''.
* The [[spoiler:Cybermen]] gatecrash a funeral in the snow in ''DoctorWho The Next Doctor''. [[{{Understatement}} There is a little bit of death involved]].
* In [[SuperSentai Mahou Sentai Magiranger]], after Miyuki Ozu's death, snow fell.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Myth And Legend ]]

* Japanese legend speaks of the Yuki-onna, a female snow spirit that appears during the snow storm and leads travellers astray to die of exposure.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Video Games ]]

* In ''TalesOfSymphonia'', [[spoiler:Zelos gives a detailed account of his childhood, culminating in him witnessing his mother's murder in the snow.]] You get a really clear mental picture from it.
* Elise Deauxnim, [[spoiler: best known as Misty Fey, Mia and Maya's mother,]] in the fifth case of ''PhoenixWrightAceAttorney: Trials and Tribulations''.
** The series has a few cases set in the snowbound winter, and since Phoenix's cases are AlwaysMurder...
* [[spoiler:Sniper Wolf]] in ''MetalGearSolid''.
* The snowy fog used in the ''SilentHill'' games might be a use of this trope.
*TheUndead Scourge of ''{{Warcraft}}'' make their base in the frozen north. Heck,[[http://www.wow-europe.com/wrath/intro.xml just watch the new cinematic for the expansion that focuses on it]]
* In ''[[KanaLittleSister Kana: Little Sister]]'', [[spoiler:In one of the many endings that feature her death, Kana tells her brother that she will make it snow when she dies. And of course, [[TearJerker the moment it starts to snow she's dead.]]]]
* White Len, the "evil" counterpart to Len in ''MeltyBlood'' specifically makes her zone snow with her dream powers.
* The prologue of ''KatawaShoujo'' initially appears to be SnowMeansLove. The main character meets his [[HighSchoolSweethearts High School Sweetheart]] on a snowy day for a confession of love. Unknown to anyone, he has cardiac arrythmia and the excitement brings on a heart attack. He survives, but his old life is over.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Webcomics ]]

*''SlightlyDamned'': [[spoiler:Sakido]]'s death occurs during wintertime on the surface.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Comic Books ]]


*The most famous example of this trope in Argentina is Hector German Osterheld's magnum opus, ''El Eternauta''. There, the first sign of the alien invasion of the Manos and the Ellos is glowing snow that kills within contact with the skin, forcing the protagonist, his friends and family to don radiation suits in order to survive.
*[[spoiler: The Question]] in ''[[FiftyTwo 52]]''. Renee Montoya drags him through the snow, [[spoiler: leaving a question-mark-shaped trail.]]
*The final chapters of ''{{Watchmen}}'', for the big reveal on Laurie's past, and the final fate of one of the mains.
* SinCity. That Yellow Bastard.
* ''ElfQuest'' had a bloody elf-troll battle in the frozen north.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Real Life ]]

* Captain Scott's ill-fated Antarctic expedition.
* The day following the Halifax Explosion brought a huge blizzard that only helped to add to the the death toll.
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