History Main / EveryScarHasAStory

** In "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS22E10MomsIdLikeToForget Moms I'd Like to Forget]]", Bart goes to great lengths to learn the story behind a mysterious scar on his hand.
* ''WesternAnimation/StarTrekLowerDecks'': In "Temporal Edict", Ensign Mariner explains the history of her scars to Commander Ransom.

* In ''WesternAnimation/StarWarsCloneWars'', Anakin Skywalker receives a scar across his right eye from a lightsaber battle with Asajj Ventress. This carries over into ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith'', where Hayden Christensen sports the scar over his right eye.
* In ''WesternAnimation/ThunderCats2011'', Panthro comments that there's "a lot of history" in the scars on his arms, [[spoiler:which is the part he misses the most after sacrificing them to trap Grune inside the collapsing Astral Plane.]]
* Ratchet from ''WesternAnimation/TransformersAnimated'' has a broken crest on his head and a patch of exposed circuitry on his arm due to an old run-in with [[PsychoForHire Lockdown]]. The incident involved [[MyGreatestFailure his greatest failure]].

* ''ComicBook/RobinSeries'':
** Danny's very prominent scar on his side and the tattoo on his foot are the things that tip Tim off that there's more to Danny than he's telling.
** By the end of ''ComicBook/RedRobin'' Tim's amassed quite a collection of scars himself, like the one across his throat from Jason slitting it, the one in his chest from Jason stabbing him, the burns on the back of his neck from the General and the scars on his torso from being impaled by the Widower. These all add up to mean Tim wears his hair sort of long and always wears long sleeves in Gotham to avoid questions.

* Captain Ahab in ''Literature/MobyDick'', who lost his leg while grappling with the Great White Whale.

* In the ''VideoGame/StarTrekOnline'' fanfic ''Fanfic/BaitAndSwitchSTO'', this is the source of Captain Kanril Eleya's facial scars, along with one on her abdomen, is shown in a FlashbackNightmare in the first chapter. While repelling a boarding action she was slashed across the face then stabbed in the right kidney by a KnifeNut Orion matron.

-->-- '''ComicBook/TheJoker''', ''Film/TheDarkKnight''

* ComicBook/JonahHex is horribly scarred. Typically, people tend to avoid asking how it happened but sometimes, there is the occasional person who is just too curious for his or her own good.
--> '''Bystander:''' Don't mean to pry, fella but how'd you get that scar?\\
'''Jonah Hex:''' [[DeadpanSnarker Bit my cheek, eat'n.]]
* ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' has several scars and during the ''[[ComicBook/BatmanHush Hush]]'' storyline ComicBook/{{Catwoman}} sees them. We see that Two-face and ComicBook/TheJoker are tied to particular scars, as is [[DatingCatwoman Catwoman]], which they both treat as a fond memory.

* ComicBook/UltimateMarvel

** ''ComicBook/TheUltimates'': Captain America left a huge scar on Herr Kleiser's face with his shield. At one pointed he boasted that it had almost healed. Almost.

* Spoofed in the second ''Film/AngelTerminators'' movie, when Uncle Wan, a retired ex-triad boss, starts boasting about his past prowess as a triad enforcer while removing his shirt during dinnertime, showing off his back which is criss-crossed with various scars. Wan then proceed to tell the main characters how "each and every scar has a meaningful backstory behind"... only to cut to a scene where ''everyone'' had fallen asleep after listening to Wan's lengthy droning.
* The page quote comes from ''Film/TheDarkKnight'', where SelfDemonstrating/TheJoker tells the story of how he got his GlasgowGrin twice, to two different characters, and tries to tell it a third time to Batman mid-fight but doesn't get a chance. Of course, since this is the Joker we're talking about, [[MultipleChoicePast the story completely changes every time he tells it]].
* In the 1996 live-action ''[[Film/OneHundredAndOneDalmatians1996 101 Dalmatians]]'', Jasper tells Horace that Skinner has a horrible scar on his neck from where a dog nearly tore his throat out, rendering him mute, and [[TemptingFate warns Horace not to ask him about it.]] [[IgnoreTheDisability Horace immediately forgets this warning upon seeing the scar,]] and Jasper decks him.
* ''Film/{{Jaws}}''. Quint and Hooper show off their scars and explain how they received them. This leads to Quint telling the story of the USS ''Indianapolis''.

** There's also Spotted Horse, who does this [[BadassBoast to show he is]] ImmuneToBullets. [[spoiler: He's not, but doesn't go down easily.]]
* Invoked in ''Film/DragonTigerGate'' by Turbo Shek who has a scar on his face that he gave to himself in order to seem tougher and make others respect him. He gives several explanations for how he got it over the course of the movie.
* PlayedForLaughs (like everything else) in ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy'' when Peter Quill boasts of his manly scars, each of them amounting to "one of his flings injured him in a fit of anger."
* Invoked by Captain Jack Sparrow in a deleted scene from ''Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanTheCurseOfTheBlackPearl'' where Elizabeth asks him -- having learnt that his grand island escape was more of a three-day rum holiday - if any of the stories about him are even true. He pulls back his shirt to reveal a pirate brand on one arm, a huge scar down the other and two bullet scars on his chest, and replies, "No truth at all."

* ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'': Natasha shows Steve a bullet wound in her torso from a previous encounter with the Winter Soldier.
-->''"I was covering my engineer, so he shot him straight ''through'' me. Soviet slug. No rifling. Bye bye bikinis."''
** Earlier, Nick Fury told Steve, "The last time I trusted somebody I lost an eye." Years later, in ''Film/CaptainMarvel2019'', it's revealed that his eye was scratched out by a flerkin.
* In ''Film/BlackPanther2018'', Eric "Killmonger" Stevens has a scar somewhere on his body signifying each person he has killed.

* In ''[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musashi_no_Ken Musashi no Ken]]'', Musashi's puppy named Toichi somehow got into a fight with three larger feral dogs which ended up in Musashi being bitten in the arm and Toichi got permanently blind in the right eye with a permanent scar.

* The first quasi-romantic moment between Hanala'Jarva and Joachim Hoch in the ''Franchise/MassEffect'' fanfic ''[[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8213106/8/Uplifted Uplifted]]''.

* In the ''Series/{{Arrow}}'' fanfic ''[[http://archiveofourown.org/works/1768006/chapters/3782848 The Princess and Her Canary]]'', Felicity sees some of Nyssa's scars and asks the origins of them. Several of them came from the same incidents that gave Sara her scars. One came ''from'' Sara, in a sparring match...with real swords.
* Inverted in the ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' fanfic [[http://archiveofourown.org/works/907942 "In the Blood"]]. Sam Vimes [[CoveredInScars has too many scars to keep track of]], which ends up setting up the whole plot because he doesn't realise he's acquired another one during the events of ''Literature/TheFifthElephant''... [[spoiler: Until he wakes up with twice his usual quota of legs, and eventually figures out he got it from getting scratched by a werewolf's tooth.]]
* The ''WesternAnimation/MiloMurphysLaw'' fanfic "[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/8555944 What Doesn't Kill Him]]" is a more lighthearted example: [[OnlySaneMan Zack]] is shocked to see that [[BornUnlucky Milo]] is CoveredInScars under his shirt, but Milo just thinks of them as reminders of his many "adventures."

** In [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4bh3OU0YNA Adel Aka's rewrite of Weiss' arc]], Weiss received her scar in the same incident that [[MissingMom killed her mother]]. A White Fang spy worked for her family and attempted to assassinate all the Schnee's, but he only injured Weiss and killed her mother. This incident is the main factor in [[FantasticRacism Weiss' bias against faunus]].

[[caption-width-right:300:[[https://www.forcedentertainment.com/projects/scar-stories/ Image]] by [[https://hugoglendinning.com/ Hugo Glendinning]].]]

* Creator/ChuckNorris in a UsefulNotes/HongKong action movie. He's been arrested by the police who are listing his distinguishing marks for their report. In a clipped tone Chuck lists the cause of each scar as it's written down: gunshot, knife, pitchfork...

* The page quote, taken from ''Film/TheDarkKnight'', is one of several examples from the film. The Joker being the Joker, however, [[MultipleChoicePast the story changes every time he tells it]].

* ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'': Weiss has a small scar across her left eye. When Weiss's VA was asked about it, she dodged the question, replying that "[the fans] will find out." [[TheLawOfConservationOfDetail This alone implies that it's significant]]. It was later confirmed that she received her scar as depicted in the ''White'' trailer: A knight slashed her across the eye during a duel. Weiss was fighting the knight to prove to her father that she could go to Beacon.

* Hibiki Tachibana from ''Anime/SenkiZesshouSymphogear'' has a scar right about her breasts in the shape of a forte symbol. This scar is a reminder that Hibiki is the sole survivor of the Noise attack that killed Kanade and made Tsubasa a BrokenBird. It's also where Hibiki was impaled by the Gungnir shards that broke off from Kanade's armor.

* In ''WesternAnimation/IceAge3DawnOfTheDinosaurs'', Buck tells the story of [[EyeScream how he lost his eye]] during his first encounter with Rudy.

* In the ''Series/PersonOfInterest'' episode "[[Recap/PersonOfInterestS04E09 The Devil You Know]]", it turns out that Mafia boss Carl Elias' NumberTwo, Anthony "Scarface" Marconi, acquired the scar under his right eye in the process of killing his [[AbusiveParents abusive father]] to protect his mother.

** When he appears as an old man in ''Literature/TatooineGhost'', Teemto is happy to reminisce about all of the pod races he received various injuries in.

* ''Literature/JediApprentice:'' Bini has several scars on her hands, showing "how hard the work conditions were at the quarries better than words could."

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheGoodDinosaur'', Ramsey and Nash, the ''Tyrannosaurus'' siblings tell Arlo some of their scar stories, which prompts Arlo to ask their father Butch about the scar on his face. He explains that while drinking at a watering hole, he was attacked by three crocodiles, one of them biting on his face. He fought off all three of them and won, and drowned the croc that bit him in his own blood.

* ''Series/{{Arrow}}'':
** Ollie has horrible scars across his chest when he returns from the island, eventually explained as being the result of Deathstroke torturing him. A lot of the advertising of the series specifically invokes this trope. The writers even go out of their way to show how he got the majority of them throughout the first five seasons through flashbacks (he receives a few more in the present).
** In "[[Recap/ArrowS2E14TimeOfDeath Time of Death]]", Ollie, Diggle, and [[spoiler:Sara]] share the origins of their various scars (IED, grenade, knives, bullets, etc.) Felicity proudly states that she has a scar...from getting her wisdom teeth removed (3 stitches!). Later she gets a real one when she [[TakingTheBullet takes a bullet]] for [[spoiler:Sara]] and seems rather happy about it.
** Oliie gets them all removed between Season 3-4, but they continue to appear in flashbacks until Season 6.

* ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia'''s Tritagonist Shoto Todoroki has a defining, large scar on the left side of his face, which he got when he was a child from his mother, who, due to her husband's DomesticAbuse, [[SanitySlippage snapped]] and poured ''boiling water'' across Todoroki's face in a MomentOfWeakness.
--> '''Todoroki:''' In my memories, my mother is always crying. "Your left sight is unsightly," my mother said after she poured boiling water on me.

''Manga/MyHeroAcademia'''s Tritagonist Shoto Todoroki has a defining, large scar on the left side of his face, which he got when he was a child from his mother, who, due to her husband's DomesticAbuse, [[SanitySlippage snapped]] and poured ''boiling water'' across Todoroki's face in a MomentOfWeakness.

** Ken Kaneki from has a large surgical scar on his abdomen, from the surgery that turned him into a HalfHumanHybrid. It stands out since his extreme HealingFactor means he doesn't have any other scars, even from the other injuries he received the night Rize attacked him.

* In ''Film/RockNRolla'', [[ThoseTwoBadGuys Those Two]] [[TheMafiya Russian]] [[ThoseTwoBadGuys Bad Guys]] are introduced talking about their various scars, which come from things like bullet wounds, [[StuffBlowingUp grenades]], barb wire, and even [[SerialEscalation getting caught in tank tracks]]. One quickly gets the idea that they will be more than the misfit criminal protagonists have bargained for.