History Main / BodySurf

* In ''VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles3'', this is M's power as a Moebius, and, when she battles against the Ouroboros, she [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjX4FqAuEL8&t=11m18s she transfers her consciousness into each of them in turn and has them fight one another.]] [[TheStrategist Taion]] figures out a way to use his Mondo to track who M is controlling in order to help the team hold their own in the fight against her. [[spoiler:This power turns out to even be capable of a full FreakyFridayFlip, as she secretly swaps bodies with Mio as part of her ThanatosGambit to show N the error of his ways.]]

* The BonusBoss of ''VideoGame/BaldursGateTalesOfTheSwordCoast'' Aec'letec will immediately take over the body of one of his cultists every time he is killed. Depending on how quickly you kill him each time this trope can easily come into play. Especially if you exploit his crippling weakness to Cloudkill.

Compare VainSorceress. May happen when people play hackey sack with a HeartDrive capable of DemonicPossession.

* ''Anime/DoraemonNobitaAndTheGalaxySuperExpress'' have Doraemon and gang, aboard the titular express, being attacked by the Yadori aliens, nasty little {{Puppeteer Parasite}}s which can infect humans or humanoid aliens. However it seems like they can affect only a single victim - the one that possessed Suneo jumps over to infect Nobita once Suneo gets knocked out, and later Nobita gets hit by soap spray, which ends up removing the Yadori alien infecting him. Later on Suneo regains consciousness and he's back to his normal self.

* In the {{Hentai}} ''Bible Black,'' this is the motivation behind the actions of [[BigBad Reika Kitami.]] Years before the first series takes place, she was used a VirginSacrifice to summon the Devil. It didn't work, because she had been gang raped by the goons of her captor, the leader of a coven, hours before. After the leader of the coven killed her followers, Kitmai managed to kill her, [[DealWithTheDevil the Devil told her she could live for several more years on the condition he gave him a soul.]] As time ran out, he chose the LoveInterest of her former protégé, and after the ceremony is stopped, Kitami is seemingly killed, but is revealed that at the last second she manged to pu her soul into the other body. In the sequel, the coven is restarted and led by a new arrival, and in the final episode, the new leader's soul is taken to hell, while Kitami's soul takes over her body.

* In ''Film/HeavenCanWait1978'', Warren Beatty's character Joe Pendleton is a quarterback who is taken from his body "before his time" by an over-anxious guardian angel. His body is turned into ashes by the time this is discovered, however, and he thus must find a new one to inhabit. While waiting for a more fitting corpse, Joe settles for that of an elderly millionaire. HilarityEnsues.

* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'', Timmy gets a buzzer-like device that he can use to switch bodies with anyone he shakes hands with. After he inadvertently switches with Crocker, he has to rush back home to keep Crocker in his body from finding his Godparents. Because Timmy's dad won't let Crocker's body in the house (thinking that Timmy's mom has feelings for Crocker), Timmy has to switch with his dad. HilarityEnsues as Timmy accidentally bumps into and switches with everyone else in the house: Timmy in his dad's body switches with his mom, Timmy in his mom's body switches with Vicky, Timmy in Vicky's body switches with Vicky's dog, and Timmy in the dog's body finally switches with Crocker in Timmy's body.

* In Elizabeth Moon's Legacy of Paksennarion books, Dorrin returns to her birth family's home to put most of the family under attainder for crimes against the crown and attempts to salvage the rest. In the process of cleaning up her family's mess, she discovers that multiple members of her birth family do this [[spoiler:and are now inhabiting the bodies of children in the nursery and people not related to her but who had done business with the family]].
** One such soul tries to take over Stammel [[spoiler: who manages to fight it off, but ends up blind as a result]].

* ''Series/QuantumLeap'' and its [[Series/QuantumLeap2022 sequel series]] is built around this premise, but the body surfer is the protagonist, and is required to "set things right" in the person's life by the end of each episode. It does involve MentalTimeTravel, and a full mind swap in the earlier series. The sequel series even explains that from a leapee's perspective, they black out for a little while until the leaper departs.

* ''Series/QuantumLeap'' is built around this premise but the body surfer is the protagonist, and is required to "set things right" in the person's life by the end of each episode. Does involve MentalTimeTravel and mind swap (which [[FridgeLogic raises the question]] what happens to the timeline that has been "set right" after the befuddled host is returned to his or her body).

* ''Film/TheHidden1987'' (1987). A PuppeteerParasite-like alien takes over various people in Los Angeles and [[ForTheEvulz uses them to commit thrill crimes]]. He is chased by a member of a different PuppeteerParasite species who is inhabiting the body of an FBI agent.

* ''Film/TheHidden'' (1987). A PuppeteerParasite-like alien takes over various people in Los Angeles and [[ForTheEvulz uses them to commit thrill crimes]]. He is chased by a member of a different PuppeteerParasite species who is inhabiting the body of an FBI agent.

** Ditto for [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1510 SCP-1510]], an ancient Roman soldier's helmet containing the cursed spirit of its former owner. Any man between 28 and 35 years old who wears it will [[HatMakesTheMan become possessed by the soldier's spirit]], although unlike Bright's hosts they go back to normal when they take it off.

* Dr Bright of the Wiki/SCPFoundation. His spirit is tied to [[http://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-963 SCP-963]], so anytime his body dies, the SCP can be transferred to a new body. Bright is also a darker example of the trope than usual, since possessing someone even briefly [[DeathOfPersonality wipes their original brain pattern.]]
** Ditto for [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1510 SCP-1510]], an ancient Roman soldier's helmet containing the cursed spirit of its former owner. Any man between 28 and 35 years old who wears it will become possessed by the soldier's spirit.

* The A.I. O'Malley from ''Machinima/RedVsBlue''. O'Malley's degree of control over its host seems to vary from individual to individual: Caboose's mind is completely subsumed while possessed (which may account for his [[TheDitz sudden drop in IQ]] once it's removed), Doc develops O'Malley as a campy would-be universal tyrant split personality, and most of the other soldiers simply have some bizarre aspect of their character amplified to dangerous levels. Church somehow escapes its effects, ostensibly due to being ''that'' much of an asshole.

* In [[Anime/FullmetalAlchemist the 2003 anime adaptation of]] ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'', the Philosopher's Stone can be used to Body Surf by transferring someone's soul and mind into a new body. The series BigBad has this technique repeatedly and is over 400 years old. Unfortunately the amount of time she can spend in each body lessens each time she does it, meaning she requires more and more Philosopher's Stones to keep going.

* ''FanFic/PonyPOVSeries'':

* In the world of Corona, the setting of the DemonWarsSaga, any sufficiently skilled user of magic gemstones can do this to an unborn child with a good magical hematite. In ''Mortalis'', Abbot Je'howith is tempted to pull this on the child of the king when he suffers a heart attack after using magic to verify the pregnancy, but eventually resists and accepts his fate. In ''Transcendence'', it is revealed that the long line of miraculous prodigies leading the theocracy of Behren have secretly all been one despicable old man's soul doing this over and over again.

** ''Film/HereComesMrJordan'' and the Chris Rock comedy ''Film/DownToEarth'' does a similar thing with a prizefighter and a black comedian, respectively.

* In the J-Horror film ''Another Heaven'', the Body Surfing killer is actually [[spoiler: a murderess from the future whose (inadvertent?) time travel turned her into a ''sapient puddle of water''.]] The bodies possessed are found to be missing their brains [[spoiler:which are found to be merely shrivelled up and covered in tumours]]. The film gets kind of weird towards the end, with the implication that [[spoiler:the killer evaporated from a housefire, and is now in the rain]].

** ''The Fearmonger'' has the titular Fearmonger jumping into people... first the leader of the biggest political party, and then, [[spoiler:apparently,]] the Doctor. [[spoiler: At the end, it's revealed the monster was in another guy up until the point where Ace had been in hospital-- whereupon it jumped over to her, getting her to try to kill the Doctor.]]

* ''The Great Game'' by Creator/DaveDuncan: Tion, soi-disant "god" of youth (actually a enchanter from an AlternateUniverse -- but that's much of a muchness, since in this story being from elsewhere in TheMultiverse is the defining attribute of enchanters) holds a contest every year for the most beautiful and skilled youth in all the land. This youth 'represents' Tion and hands out the prizes -- and then disappears for several years. Unbeknownst to everyone else, Tion has been committing GrandTheftMe for the sheer fun of it. The "god" is later shown changing bodies several times, and comments that male bodies 'wear better'. It is implied that the theft is reversed (with them Brainwashed not to remember) after several years of, um, wear; one of the characters has a chunk of his mind missing.

* In ''Literature/LockIn'', a sizable percentage of the population of the world is suffering from Hayden's Syndrome, one of the symptoms of a flu-like disease. The titular condition is of the AndIMustScream variety - the Haydens are unable to interact with the world in any way. After trillions of dollars in research, several methods of allowing the Haydens to live semi-normal lives are developed. One involves the use of Integrators, a rare form of Hayden who did not suffer a lock in, but whose brain chemistry was still altered. An Integrator can be used as a temporary vessel for a locked-in Hayden. The more common alternative is the use of Threeps, robotic avatars, although they don't provide for a full experience.

** "Better Luck Next Time" featured two nearly immortal aliens who could inhabit any living host and can survive for however long they can bind to the central nervous system. After the host dies, they have only moments to transfer into another body until they die, since they can't live too long in the Earth's atmosphere. If they transfer, they will still live for however long they can repeat the sequence. If they fail, they disintegrate. This was a sequel to another episode: one of the duo was in fact ''Jack the Ripper!''

** The [[http://www.lomion.de/cmm/lichsuel.php Suel Lichs]] from the ''TabletopGame/GreyHawk'' setting escape certain death this way. The hosts a suel lich takes over age very quickly and thus, they need to do this regulary. If they lose their body by either violence or rapid aging, they will need to find a new host even faster. Otherwise their true form, which manifests as a negative energy spirit, will eventually dissipate and die for good.

* The "Phantom Thief G" in ''Manga/DGrayMan'' ([[spoiler:actually an orphan with a parasite-type Innocence]]) can possess people [[spoiler:and Akuma]] just by looking at them; he's gotten roughly ''three dozen'' people arrested in his place.