History Main / DeathTakesAHoliday

** Also played straight later on, though it isn't really Death that takes a holiday; it's [[spoiler:Lucifer Morningstar, who literally closes Hell]]. Because of this, the universe is thrown out of whack, and everyone who's ever died (or at least died and gone to Hell) returns to walk the Earth and interact with the living. There are numerous examples of various horrors, among which are the ghost of an undeveloped stillborn being cradled by its mother and a boy who's recently died watching his dead body. On the other hand, it also led to ''The Dead Boy Detectives'', so that's all right.

** In ''Literature/{{Mort}}'', Death takes on an apprentice (Mort) and then leaves him in charge whilst Death himself goes wandering around the Disc trying human pleasures such as fishing, partying, and getting drunk. Naturally, HilarityEnsues...
** ''Literature/ReaperMan'' features Death being "laid off" by the Auditors, with quite a bit of chaos resulting, including a wizard coming back as a zombie, a rash of poltergeist activity, and, strangest of all, the city of Ankh-Morpork being threatened by a living, parasitic shopping mall. Again, HilarityEnsues.
** In ''Literature/SoulMusic'', Death has run off to forget his troubles and his granddaughter Susan must fill in, much to her annoyance. Yet again, HilarityEnsues.

* ''Series/Charmed1998'' episode "Styx Feet Under". When a demon, Sirk, tries to destroy his human half by killing off his remaining blood relatives, Paige casts a spell that inadvertently blocks all death from occurring. Annoyed that he now has a backlog of work, the Angel of Death insists that the Charmed Ones help him clean up the mess and "kills" Piper so she can help him restore the Grand Design.

* In the ''Series/TheKidsInTheHall'' mini-series ''Series/DeathComesToTown'', [[spoiler:Ricky]] was an [[BlackComedy aborted baby]] who miraculously survived because Death slept in.
* Variation on ''Series/HerculesTheLegendaryJourneys'' in ''Love Takes a Holiday'' where it's Aphrodite, the goddess of love, so love is suspended instead of death. It only applies to women and Aphrodite explains that "if men felt the same way, where would the fun be?", which may be a LampshadeHanging since she doesn't otherwise seem to be in control of the effect.
* ''Series/InLivingColor'' had this happen in a ''literal'' sense, with Creator/JimCarrey playing TheGrimReaper [[http://youtu.be/xczQ5c26pWs at a beach resort]]. He meets with a couple who goad him into showcasing his powers, and HilarityEnsues.
* Inverted in the episode "Death Takes A Holiday" of ''Series/{{MASH}}''. While the rest of the camp celebrates Christmas, BJ, Hawkeye and Margaret are doing everything they can to keep a dying soldier alive till the next day, so his family does not to remember Christmas as the day he died. Ramming home the message that "war sucks", the doctors fail with 10 minutes to go. Hawkeye advances the clock past midnight so they can put December 26 on the death certificate.
* One episode of ''Series/NightCourt'' had this when a middle-aged man was held for examination when he claimed to be Death. After the usual {{Aesop}}, he was released and people resumed dying.
* "The Soldier and Death", an episode of ''Series/TheStoryteller'', features a man that keeps Death imprisoned. It was adapted from an the same story as the above mentioned "Jack Tales", though with a different ending.

** This is the premise of "Death Takes A Holiday" where the boys stumble upon a village where no one is dying. In this case [[spoiler:the village's [[TheGrimReaper Reapers]] were captured by a demon so one can be sacrificed in order to open one of the seals imprisoning Lucifer.]]
** Played with in "Appointment in Samarra". Death agrees to do a favor for Dean, in exchange for Dean taking on his job for 24 hours. When Dean thinks this means he can pick and choose who gets to die, things don't turn out well. The whole point was to teach Dean AnAesop because Death was annoyed over how the Winchester brothers [[DeathIsCheap kept coming back from the dead]].

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone2002'' reboot had the episode "One Night of Mercy". Death (played by Jason Alexander) decided to quit, and the doctor he confided this with was thrilled. This was looking optimistic and hopeful right up until the point where [[AndIMustScream a bunch of people who were immolated was brought into the emergency room, still alive because Death had quit]]. Naturally, the good doctor found Death and convinced him to return to work, after seeing this, and [[spoiler: gets taken as Death's first victim, as a result (he had been suffering "headaches" up until then, in reality the symptoms of an oncoming aneurysm)]].
* ''Series/XenaWarriorPrincess'': In episode "Death in Chains", Sisyphus captures the AnthropomorphicPersonification of Death, and we find out that it's not such a great deal: Sisyphus gets to cheat nature, but those suffering agonizing mortal injuries are subjected to AndIMustScream. If Death is not released soon, the effect becomes permanent, and the whole ''world'' will suffer this thanks to AgeWithoutYouth.) and "Mortal Beloved".

* ''Literature/TheDresdenFiles'': Although TheGrimReaper's existence hasn't been confirmed InUniverse ([[AllMythsAreTrue yet]]), this is basically the goal of Kumori in ''Dead Beat''. Harry himself is intelligent enough to realize this is a horrible idea.

* Creator/AlexanderAfanasyev's "Literature/TheSoldierAndDeath": Death stops being active for several yers due to being trapped in a sack and hung from a tree by the titular soldier, who releases the Grim Reaper when he realizes that people has not stopped aging.

* ''VideoGame/DiscworldII'' has death take a holiday to get away from his troubles, leaving Rincewind to take his place.

* ''Literature/{{Confessions}}'': The culmination of Augustine's recounting of his friends' death is the realization that Death itself has been slain, thanks to the sheer quantity of life in UsefulNotes/{{Jesus}} overwhelming death at the Crucifixion.

* "Death gets stuck in a magic tree" is the idea behind the folktale ''Tia Miseria'': an old woman traps Death in her pear tree and only agrees to release him when her oldest friend begs to be allowed to die of old age. However, Tia Miseria makes Death promise never to come for her; as long as Death keeps his promise, [[JustForPun there will always be misery in the world]].

* In an issue of ''Comicbook/{{Fables}}'', Jack of the Tales traps Death in a sack to secure a roll in the sheets with a wealthy but terminally ill southern belle. Lets just say it makes breakfast awkward when it refuses to stay still after slaughter. When released, Death is actually grateful for his first day off, ever, and will forgive Jack on the condition that he gets a day trapped in the sack every year or so.

* ''ComicBook/{{Superman}}'' story arc: "ComicBook/TheBlackRing": Invertedwhen Lex Luthor [[FusionDance becomes one with the child of the Phantom Zone]], and he stops entropy itself. The concept of death itself is stopped and so Death has her very first vacation since the beginning of time.

* In the Series/TheKidsInTheHall mini-series ''Series/DeathComesToTown'', [[spoiler:Ricky]] was an [[BlackComedy aborted baby]] who miraculously survived because Death slept in.

* ''Videogame/FallenLondon'' features this as a major aspect of the setting. Permanent death is extraordinarily rare in Fallen London. It only happens as the result of old age, disease, or an ''exceptionally'' messy death such as being cut into bits -- although this is a mixed blessing. Much like in ''Film/DeathBecomesHer'', a person's body ''can'' become worn out through injury, and those in a sufficient state of disrepair are sent off to the Tomb-Colonies, which are just as pleasant as they sound.

* In the ''Videogame/RuneScape'' quest "Missing, Presumed Death", the player must investigate why a group of souls would not cross over after Death and Icthlarin (the Menaphite god of the dead) are kidnapped.
* How the 9th ''VideoGame/{{Touhou}}'' game ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'' happens, basically. Every 60 years, a surge of death happens for whatever reason, which presumably requires the [[TheGrimReaper shinigami]] to work overtime. [[TheFerryman Komachi]] just happened to be slacking off this time around, leading to all the souls she wasn't escorting to the afterlife to start manifesting as flowers.

* This becomes a worldwide problem in the Creator/MarvelComics series ''[[ComicBook/EarthX Paradise X]]'', an unforeseen side effect of [[spoiler:the destruction of Death at the end of Universe X]]. This also happens in the ''ComicBook/SecretWarsII'' CrisisCrossover, when the naive Beyonder kills Death because "nobody wants to die".
* In an issue of ''Comicbook/{{Fables}}'', Jack of the Tales traps Death in a sack to secure a roll in the sheets with a wealthy but terminally ill southern belle. Lets just say it makes breakfast awkward when it refuses to stay still after slaughter. When released, Death is actually grateful for his first day off, ever, and will forgive Jack on the condition that he gets a day trapped in the sack every year or so.

* ''Franchise/BillAndTed'';
** In issue #2 of ''ComicBook/BillAndTedsExcellentComicBook'', Death gets annoyed and quits, causing the dead to rise as zombies until Bill and Ted persuade him to come back.
** A later issue has him getting fired and replaced by a ReplacementScrappy called Morty who'd apparently been waiting for the job for centuries despite not being mentioned the last time Death quit.
** In ''[[ComicBook/BillAndTedsMostTriumphantReturn Bill & Ted's Most Triumphant Return]]'' Chuck De Nomolos wins ChessWithDeath several times. One of the things he demands is Death relinquish his job and powers to Chuck's younger brother. Due to him being too lazy to do his job, this leads to a BadFuture where everybody's still alive thousands of years from now.
* In ''ComicBook/IbisTheInvincible'' #2, ''Ibis sends Death on a Holiday'', Ibis uses his Ibistick to banish Death from the city. This leads to chaos after a criminal sentenced to execution survives, breaks out, and causes a crime wave. Finally Ibis allows Death to return.
* ''ComicBook/TheGrievousJourneyOfIchabodAzrael'': [[spoiler:[[TheFerryman Charon]] is tired of ferrying souls from limbo to their final destination for all eternity and orchestrates a scheme that will allow him to escape to the land of the living. However, without Charon being there to keep the flow of life and death stable, all reality will ultimately cease to exist.]]
* Done in ''ComicBook/{{Ghostbusters IDW}}''; a friend of Egon's is hit by a car and, when Death (oh, sorry, "an entity that siphons excess psychic energy from our dimensional plane") comes for him, he manages to imprison it in a sack. People still die, because their bodies stop working, but the extra PKE in the air builds up, causing a steroid effect in all the ghosts of the story arc.

* "Literature/DeathInANut", in which a boy traps death to save his mother, but then can't get bacon, cabbages, etc. His mother explains that death is natural, and he releases the Reaper.

* In one of the Appalachian "Jack Tales" (derived from English folktales), Jack, through magic, is able to see Death perched above the bed of a dying person and traps Death in a sack. Many, many years later, he meets a very old woman who complains of being so old and not able to die because some fool has Death trapped in a sack. Jack thinks about this, goes home and unties the sack and Death resumes his duties, "and Jack was just about the first one Death got, I reckon."
** A variation on this story has Death so afraid of Jack that he runs from Jack once released and refuses to take him.
** This is related to a folktale in which Jack traps the Devil, rather than death. Sometimes he traps him up a tree by planting crosses or carving a cross. Sometimes he tricks him into turning into a coin, which is then placed in a wallet next to a cross. Either way, Jack ends up wandering the world, carrying one of the embers of hell with him to light his way: Jack of the Lantern. Similarly, you can end up with WillOTheWisp. Jack o'Lantern was originally, fable notwithstanding, just a term for a night watchman, a guy with a lantern.

* ''Fanfic/DeathIsForcedToTakeAVacation'': Fall Harvest, the Reaper of Alicorns (and one of many adjuncts to the Role of Death) is forced to take a vacation from his duties, literally getting back into his old skin to do so. Considering how few alicorns there are, and how long it'll be until he's due to collect any more, he can easily stay away for a time without complications.

* And then there's the fanfic ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/6983158/1/FiM-Binky-Pie Binky Pie]]'', a ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' crossover in which it's Death's horse who's out of action and [[ItMakesSenseInContext for reasons that make sense in context]], he recruits a replacement from [[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic the magical land of Equestria]]. Death is TheComicallySerious and Pinkie is... well, ''Pinkie'', so their working relationship can be... strained.

[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]

* This is part of the main premise of the Franchise/FinalDestination series; while the main cast of each film manage to evade or one-up Death in some way by avoiding dying through having premonitions of a major catastrophe that would have resulted in their deaths, Death (as a character) will not let them get away with escaping their fate.

* In Creator/GeorgeARomero's ''Film/LivingDeadSeries'' anyone who dies comes back as a zombie unless [[RemovingTheHeadOrDestroyingTheBrain you remove their head or destroy their brain]]. One of the various theories as to why comes from ''[[Film/DawnOfTheDead1978 Dawn Of The Dead]]'' is that Hell is full so the dead have to walk the Earth.

* Creator/RayBradbury's short story ''The Scythe'' features a man who becomes the Grim Reaper. When he learns what he's been doing he refuses to work, only to find that if he doesn't take the souls of people who are supposed to die they end up in an unconscious limbo state between life and death.
* ''Literature/{{Confessions}}'': The culmination of Augustine's recounting of his friends' death is the realization that Death itself has been slain, thanks to the sheer quantity of life in UsefulNotes/{{Jesus}} overwhelming death at the Crucifixion.

* ''Literature/TheBookThief'': Death mentions that his job is very wearying, but he can't exactly go on a package holiday, since he's aware of what would happen if he tried.
* ''Horatio in the Wind'' is a children's book about a boy who traps Death to give his kingdom eternal life.

* In the first part of Creator/JoseSaramago's ''Literature/DeathWithInterruptions (As intermitências da morte)'', people abruptly stop dying within a particular country. Chaos ensues as expected, including a "maphia" that begins ferrying the terminally ill across the border so they can die. At a certain point Death announces that she is ending her experiment and switching to a new system in which those who are going to die will receive a polite letter a week in advance to allow them to prepare.

%%* ''Series/Charmed1998'' episode "Styx Feet Under".

* ''Series/XenaWarriorPrincess'': In episode "Death in Chains", Sisyphus captures the AnthropomorphicPersonification of Death, and we find out that it's not such a great deal: Sisyphus gets to cheat nature, but those suffering agonizing mortal injuries are subjected to AndIMustScream. If Death is not released soon, the effect becomes permanent, and the whole ''world'' will suffer this thanks to AgeWithoutYouth.) and "Mortal Beloved".

* ''Series/InLivingColor'' had this happen in a ''literal'' sense, with Creator/JimCarrey playing TheGrimReaper [[http://youtu.be/xczQ5c26pWs at a beach resort]]. He meets with a couple who goad him into showcasing his powers, and HilarityEnsues.

* In the Broadway play ''On Borrowed Time'', the protagonist traps death so he won't die with no one left to take care of his orphaned grandson.

* How the 9th ''VideoGame/{{Touhou}}'' game ''Phantasmagoria of Flower View'' happens, basically. Every 60 years, a surge of death happens for whatever reason, which presumably requires the [[TheGrimReaper shinigami]] to work overtime. [[TheFerryman Komachi]] just happened to be slacking off this time around, leading to all the souls she wasn't escorting to the afterlife to start manifesting as flowers.
* Played with in ''VideoGame/JadeEmpire''. The Water Dragon does not die, but she is incapacitated. As a result, people still die, but their souls don't go to the underworld to be reincarnated. This causes ghosts to crop up everywhere and eventually go crazy from their lost state. As the last [[PlayerCharacter Spirit Monk]], it is your job to set things right by [[GhostlyGoals helping the ghosts resolve matters from back when they were alive]] and/or beating them up with kung fu magic.
* Played with in the online game ''VideoGame/AdventureQuest'', Death has taken on a policy of sending adventurers back in exchange for being owed a favor. The characters are all very aware of this effect, comment when Death fails to send back a soul he desires, and have noted the immense number of favors Death has been accumulating but never called in. It has also been blamed for the lack of dragons as powerful as existed only 5 years earlier in the prequel game ''Dragonfable'': once adventurers stopped dying, many more of them were able to get powerful enough to slay the rather rare most powerful dragons, leaving only the more common weaker ones.

* This is a major part of the plot of ''VideoGame/LightningReturnsFinalFantasyXIII'', as [[VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII2 the previous game]] ended with the death of Etro, the goddess of death. Even though 500 years passed between the two games, no one could die of old age. However, this is also a downplayed example as people could still die from other means like disease or murder. Another issue that arose from Etro's death is that, since she was also responsible for reincarnating souls, no new life can be born, meaning the population of the world has been slowly declining.
* In ''VideoGame/AFKArena'', the god of death, Annih, was sick of being [[EverybodyHatesHades hated by mortals]], and in turn [[ThenLetMeBeEvil gave them a good reason to hate him]] by creating the demons known as Hypogeans and waging war on humankind. In the process, he [[TakeThisJobAndShoveIt intentionally abandoned his duties as the god of death]]. The result is that souls tend to wander aimlessly in [[PurgatoryAndLimbo limbo dimensions]], becoming increasingly consumed by the unfinished business they had in life. Characters with supernatural connections such as the necromancer Niru, the twin deities Elijah & Lailah, and very likely others are able to to [[RelievingTheReaper guide lost souls themselves]] when they have the chance, but they can only do so much.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Gargoyles}}'' episode "[[Recap/GargoylesS2Grief Grief]]", a man traps the god of death (Anubis) by summoning him and nothing is able to die until he leaves. Anubis points out the dangers of his actions: there is still birth, but now no death to balance it out. Interestingly, he gets his happy ending: he traps Anubis to force him to return his dead son, but in the end, he is happily reunited with his son in the afterlife -- a pretty sensible solution for a setting with an explicitly true afterlife. [[WordOfGod Greg Weisman]] regretted not actually ''doing'' anything with the idea that people became unable to die, especially since the heroes ended up captured, and in a position where the villain would try to kill them.

* In the fourth season of ''WesternAnimation/LesShadoks'', the Shadoks have discovered that their world is going to get destroyed in the near future, and they can't do much to stop it. So, to avoid being killed in the catastrophe, they decide to arrest the Grim Reaper [[MindScrew and sentence him to death]]. However, the Shadoks are [[VillainProtagonist so mean]] that their main distraction is to kill and torture each other. The Grim Reaper reminds them of that, and gets away. [[spoiler:In the end, the apocalypse does happen but the Shadoks eventually find another world to live in, though not as convenient as the one they had.]]

* Played with in ''Webcomic/{{Jack|DavidHopkins}}''. The eponymous personification of Wrath and Death goes on vacation for [[http://www.pholph.com/whole_arc_viewer.php?id=106 two]] [[http://www.pholph.com/whole_arc_viewer.php?id=107 strips.]] Played for laughs, ironically, considering that this is one of the few comics that would blatantly show the horrors of no Death.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Gargoyles}}'' episode "Grief" when a man traps the god of death (Anubis) by summoning him and nothing is able to die until he leaves. Anubis points out the dangers of his actions: there is still birth, but now no death to balance it out. Interestingly he got his happy ending: he trapped Anubis to try and force him to return his dead son, but in the end he was happily reunited with his son, in the afterlife. A pretty sensible solution for a verse with an explicitly true afterlife.\\
[[WordOfGod Greg Weisman]] regretted not actually ''doing'' anything with the idea that people became unable to die, especially since the heroes ended up captured, and in a position where the villain would try to kill them.

* In ''VideoGame/{{AFK Arena}}'', the god of death, Annih, was sick of being [[EverybodyHatesHades hated by mortals]], and in turn [[ThenLetMeBeEvil gave them a good reason to hate him]] by creating the demons known as Hypogeans and waging war on humankind. In the process, he [[TakeThisJobAndShoveIt intentionally abandoned his duties as the god of death]]. The result is that souls tend to wander aimlessly in [[PurgatoryAndLimbo limbo dimensions]], becoming increasingly consumed by the unfinished business they had in life. Characters with supernatural connections such as the necromancer Niru, the twin deities Elijah & Lailah, and very likely others are able to to [[RelievingTheReaper guide lost souls themselves]] when they have the chance, but they can only do so much.

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* An early episode of ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' had Death twist his ankle while trying to claim Peter, forcing the Griffins to take care of him until he gets better. Peter lets the cat out of the bag, revealing to the world that nobody can die, and Death forces him to kill the cast of ''Series/DawsonsCreek'' in order to prove that he still has power. In the end, Peter [[TakeAThirdOption accidentally finds a solution]] that spares the actors and shows that Death is still around.

* In a [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Simpsons']] Treehouse of Horror special, Homer kills Death after trying to save Bart from him. Lisa mentions that there is now a world without death, and then cue scenes around Springfield of people not dying when they should. Homer then puts on Death's cloak for fun and accidentally becomes the new Grim Reaper (Possibly an AffectionateParody slash Hallow'een version of ''Film/TheSantaClause''). HilarityEnsues.

* Played with in the online game ''VideoGame/AdventureQuest'', Death has taken on a policy of sending adventurers back in exchange for being owed a favor. The characters are all very aware of this effect, comment when Death fails to send back a soul he desires, and have, if I recall correctly, noted the immense number of favors Death has been accumulating but never called in. It has also been blamed for the lack of dragons as powerful as existed only 5 years earlier in the prequel game ''Dragonfable'': once adventurers stopped dying, many more of them were able to get powerful enough to slay the rather rare most powerful dragons, leaving only the more common weaker ones.

[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
* This is the premise of ''LightNovel/SundayWithoutGod''. One day, people stopped dying and giving birth. Some characters believe it's because God abandoned the world, while others believe that [[RealityWarper humanity collectively wished to live forever]], but that [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor wish didn't turn out quite how they expected]]; basically, when a person "dies," they become like a zombie, and while they're still themselves and can still think and act like a normal human, without the right kind of support eventually both their mind and body will rot, driving them mad. However, the walking dead weren't without hope for rest, as soon mystical beings called "gravekeepers" began to appear, and they can grant true rest to the living deceased, and eventually both the living and deceased adjusted to this new world, and not being able to truly die just became a normal part of life. Protagonist Ai is one such gravekeeper, and she sets out on a journey to save the world.
[[/folder]]

%%* ''Series/{{Charmed|1998}}'' episode "Styx Feet Under".