Overly Specific Afterlife

Nala: So, if Simba and I get into trouble while he's gone, he'll be watching over us still?
Zazu: That's where he'll be.
Nala: Who told you this, Zazu?
Zazu: Mufasa, of course. From generations to generations, each king has passed it down to their son.
Nala: How about the queens? Are there any of them up there?
Zazu: That I do not know.

— Zazu and Nala discussing the afterlife, Missing You

In some depictions, "good" people go to heaven while "bad" people go to hell (or similar equivalents), while other depictions, everyone goes to the same afterlife no matter their beliefs, cultures, or even species. Other times, you need to worship in a specific way to get into the afterlife. This trope is the latter belief but even more specific.

Only certain people are allowed into a certain afterlife. Maybe you have to be born into the right culture, family, or hierarchy, but unless you're in it, you're not allowed in. What happens to everyone else can vary. They can go to a different afterlife, they can go to no afterlife, or it could just be unclarified.

Super-Trope to Species-Specific Afterlife, Personalized Afterlife, Ironic Hell, and Warrior Heaven.

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Examples:

Fan Works

• Warriors Redux: The four Clans believe that good Clan cats enter a Hive Mind afterlife upon death, while bad Clan cats stop existing. When the kittypet-born Firepaw asks the seer Spottedleaf if non-Clan cats can enter StarClan, she treats it as a stupid question—of course they don't. StarClan is Clan heaven, not cat heaven, so only Clan cats are allowed.

Films — Animation

• The Lion King: The series only mentions that the Great Kings live in the stars upon dying. Nothing is stated about other lions or non-lions. Zira asking Scar to look after Nuka upon his death in The Lion King II: Simba's Pride implies that regular lions aren't barred from an afterlife, but it's otherwise undiscussed in the films. The semi-canon Spin-Offspring show The Lion Guard shows that animals turn into spirits.

Films — Live-Action

• 1934's Wonder Bar features a black character (played by a white man in blackface) going to a black-segregated heaven. It's full of stereotypes such as black Americans loving watermelon and pork chops.
• In Pirates of the Great Salt Lake one of the main characters' mom is worried about his lifestyle because she firmly believes pirates (or even pirate larpers) can't get into heaven. The film's final punchline is that she's right... which is why there's a separate Pirate Heaven.

Literature

• Warrior Cats: Three different afterlives have been shown but they're all specific to either tribe cats or Clan cats. What happens to rogues, kittypets, and other cats isn't known. Firestar's kittypet father Jake is shown to exist after dying, which means there's some sort of afterlife for pets (and whether their owners can be with them is also unspecified). Clan cats are themselves barred from the kittypet afterlife as it's been shown that even Clan cats that later become kittypets end up in StarClan.
• In Hunter's Moon (1989) and Frost Dancers, predators and prey have different afterlives. Hare mythology is that hares are tempted by deceased predators before entering the afterlife. If the hare gives in, they enter the predator's afterlife and are forced to act as prey for all eternity.
• Corum has an afterlife just for people that he kills. He can summon them to fight for him and if they kill someone to take their place there, they can move on to what's implied to be Cessation of Existence.

Live-Action TV

• Awkward.: Played for laughs, when gay couple Theo and Cole tell the religious-but-questioning Lyssa that gay people don't go to hell- they go to gay heaven. She freaks out over "how many heavens there are", and wonders whether or not bisexuals "go back and forth" between gay and straight heaven.

Podcasts

• The Thrilling Adventure Hour: In the Beyond Belief episode "The Haunting of Howard Schroeder", Frank explains that Heaven and Hell are based on the ideas of Heaven and Hell. Heavens exist anywhere ghosts think they have been good and deserve a reward, and Hells exist anyplace ghosts feel they deserve punishment. There are, as a result, several winning Heavens in the Hamptons, and there are more Hells than one can count; all of New Jersey for example.

Tabletop Games

• Dungeons & Dragons: The dead journey to one of seventeen Outer Planes, determined by their Character Alignment or patron god. In addition, some gods' divine realms act as Pocket Dimensions that might or might not allow travel to and from their home Plane.
• Warhammer: Age of Sigmar: Shyish, the Realm of Death, is home to every afterlife anyone in any of the eight Mortal Realms has ever believed in, from ones relating to cultures and civilizations, to warrior paradises, to ones of peace; basically, if anyone anywhere in the Mortal Realms has had an idea of what they think the afterlife is like, that afterlife exists somewhere in Shyish. Originally these were all ruled by individual death gods, spirits, or otherwise, but in the Age of Myth Nagash went about subjugating them until he was the one singular god of death in the Mortal Realms. He even made them into pretty nice ones too, before his Face–Heel Turn.

Video Games

• Afterlife is, as the title suggests, all about this. You have to provide suitable afterlives for your clients according to their very convoluted belief systems (covering Rewards, Punishments, and Reincarnation as needed). Most Punishments and Rewards are also tied to specific Sins and Virtues, so the Slothful spend their time suffering an itch they can never scratch while the Greedy are afflicted with a Midas-like curse where everything they touch turns into disgusting spam.
• In Final Fantasy XIV, Eorzeans who worship the Twelve believe there are six heavens and six hells in the afterlife. When you are judged by Nald'thal, you are sent to one of these heavens or hells based on your profession or sins. This is only mythology, as it's been proven that when you die your soul returns to the Aetherial Sea and will eventually reincarnate into a new life.
• The afterlife in World of Warcraft is made up of hundreds if not thousands of separate realms known collectively as the Shadowlands. Unless someone's soul is claimed in life by certain powers or beings(examples include the Holy Light or the loa Bwonsamdi), you are instead judged by the Arbiter upon death. Based on what kind of person you were in life and how much of an impact you had in the world you lived in, measured in a source of energy called anima, your soul is then sent to one of the afterlives you best fit the description for.

Webcomics

• In Champions of Far'aus, being a follower of certain deities causes the spirits of dead mortals to go to whatever realms of Elsewhere their deities have set up for them. Ones that don’t go to a specific Deity’s realm of Elsewhere for their afterlife, and end up hanging around in the mortal realm, get hunted down by the Grim Council’s Reapers, & sent to the Otherworld, which was created by the Grim Council. If a mishap causes a spirit meant for a certain deities Realm to get sent to the Otherworld by mistake, their deities can contact the Grim Pantheon’s “Lost & Found” division.
• The Order of the Stick's cosmology is derived from Dungeons & Dragons, so souls travel to an Outer Plane that suits their Character Alignment or patron god. When Roy is temporarily killed, Elan laments that they won't meet in the afterlife "because you're Lawful, and Chaotic Good am I". Furthermore, due to a bargain between the death goddess Hel and the other gods, dwarves only go to their alignment-respective afterlife if they died an honorable death. Dwarves who died dishonorably will end up in the domain of Hel and will be her slaves for eternity. To avoid eternal damnation, dwarf culture is extremely honor-centric.
• Comedian Heaven is a webcomic about historical comedians interacting in a heaven specifically for them, with mention being made of Serious Actor Heaven, Politician Heaven, and Trucker Heaven.
• Played with in Schlock Mercenary: Durning a flare-up in the Andromeda-Milky Way war trillions of sentient beings are brain-uploaded into a virtual world, with plans to revive them after the battles are over. The "waiting room" for each group/world/species is presented as a particular afterlife, though at least a few on-screen cases has the tour guide say that it's just the best they could come up with to help everyone get an idea of what was happening.

Web Original

• The Internet Historian episode "Going Camping at the End of the World" features a paid sponsorship for NordVPN cyber security where-in Jesus shows up at a gamer's door and tells him that after seeing his internet search history, he's no longer eligible to get into Heaven, or the more exclusive Super Heaven, which features a delicious seafood buffet.
• The first installment of The Grim Reaper Show depicts people being sorted into their various afterlives. One man, who apparently made up his own religion, is told that his afterlife is to go to "the floating island of Mandingo," where everyone enjoys an eternity of steaming-hot sex, and there is no jealousy or boredom. The Reaper compliments the man on his choice of religion, and allows a nearby agnostic to go too.

Western Animation

• In The Boondocks, after Uncle Ruckus gets struck by lightning, he is greeted by Ronald Reagan, who explains that Heaven is segregated. Black Heaven is nice for what it is, but White Heaven will always be better.
• The Simpsons:
  • There's a Couch Gag where there is a heaven for fit dogs and a hell for unfit dogs. Santa's Little Helper dies from overeating. At the Pearly Gates, he is shown that he isn't fit enough for heaven. He is wary about going to hell, but the enticement of free pizza changes his mind and he heads there.
  • In "Days of Wine and D'oh'ses", a drunk Barney tells Lisa that when we die there will be separate planets for the French and the Chinese and we'll all be a lot happier.
  • Marge in "The Father, the Son and the Holy Guest Star" had a daydream where Heaven is divided between the Protestants and the Catholics after Bart and Homer converted to the latter. The former is like a country club attended by stereotpyical WASP New Englishmen, the latter is a giant party mostly full of Irish and Italian people.
• In Avatar: The Last Airbender, some humans pass onto the Spirit World after death, usually because they were very connected to other spirits. The Avatar will reincarnate on Earth, though it doesn't really fit the traditional idea of reincarnation—each life has a separate spirit that goes to the Spirit World after death, they're just all connected to each other. The afterlife for everyone is unspecified.

Real Life

• Segregationist senator James Eastland (D-MS) was once heard saying heaven was racially segregated.
  I remembered when Betty and I had heard him give a speech in which he proclaimed there were two heavens—one for blacks and another for whites. We were aghast by his comment, but also surprised that he even thought blacks had the chance to go to heaven. That was generous for Eastland.

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