History Main / IdentifyingTheBody

* Two Literature/MissMarple novels - ''Literature/TheBodyInTheLibrary'' and ''FourFiftyFromPaddington'' have this as an early part of the case: the police can't make intelligent inquiries as to who might want someone dead and why when the deceased is an out-of-towner with no identification, so first they have to figure out who the dead person is. [[spoiler:In both cases, a key part of the solution lies in the fact that the original identification of the body was wrong.]]

* Subverted in ''Series/{{Briarpatch}}'', where Felicity Dill's remains are so burned that her sister Allegra is just shown photographs of the parts that are still identifiable.
* ''Series/Daredevil2015'': When Elena Cardenas is killed on Wilson Fisk's orders, Brett Mahoney has Matt, Karen, and Foggy come down to the morgue to identify her. Karen and Foggy are reduced to tears, and their reaction leaves Matt deadset on killing Fisk, unknowingly walking into a trap Fisk has set for him.

* ''Seriesb{{Forever|2014}}'': Henry works as a Medical Examiner, so this happens several times. As in real life, it's normally done by photographs rather than seeing the actual body.

* ''Film/LAConfidential'': When one of the Nite Owl victims is identified as Susan Lefferts, the police bring in her mother to verify her identity. While she's changed a lot appearance-wise because of cosmetics, the mother confirms it's her daughter because of a birthmark on her hip. Bud White also identifies the body separately as he'd seen her with bandages on her face a few weeks prior at Christmas, a detail he keeps to himself as he pursues his own line of investigation.

While this sort of scene is usually used for dramatic purposes, showing the relative [[InelegantBlubbering bawling their eyes out]] over the corpse of their loved one or on [[CryIntoChest someone else's chest]], it can also serve to set up clues that may serve a role later in the plot, such as the relative sharing heretofore unknown information about the dead person's life or something unusual about the corpse itself.

* In the opening of the ''Series/{{Trust}}'' episode "John, Chapter 11" Gail has to identify the remains of Little Paul, who was supposedly burned to death beyond recognition. While the shoes are his, she realizes that the body is not, because the shoes are tied; Little Paul DoesNotLikeShoes and thus never ties the laces properly.

* In one episode of ''Series/DarkAngel'' Max sees a body on TV with the barcode tattoo of one of her brothers on it, so she asks to identify the body [[spoiler: it's not him, he's become a serial killer who tattoos his barcode on his victims.]]

One of the deepest {{Adult Fear}}s is that of losing a loved one. In this case, that fear comes true via characters being summoned by police to a morgue to identify a body they believe to be a family member of theirs. For the family of the victim, this can be partly expected if, say the victim had been missing for some time, but at others, it can come completely out of left field. Now they can do nothing save arrange a funeral.

* After one of Phil's suicides in ''Film/GroundhogDay'' Rita is shown identifying his body at the morgue, showing that the time loop isn't entirely dependent on him. Also played for laughs a bit, as his former cameraman notes it's a tragic loss while his body language screams [[AndThereWasMuchRejoicing "Ding dong, the witch is dead!"]].
* ''Film/LAConfidential'': When one of the Nite Owl victims is identified as Susan Lefferts, the police bring in her mother to verify her identity. While she's changed a lot appearance-wise because of cosmetics, the mother confirms it's her daughter because of a birthmark. Bud White also identifies the body separately as he'd seen her with bandages on her face a few weeks prior at Christmas, a detail he keeps to himself as he pursues his own line of investigation.

* Subverted on ''Series/TheDetail''. A man comes in to see if a body found burned in a dumpster might be his missing brother but the body is too badly burned for the standard visual identification. The man ends up describing an old injury that his brother had and the police get a tentative identification based on the victim having the same injury in the past. They end up having to do a blood test for a conclusive identification. Throughout this, the victim's brother is in tears as his hope that it is not his brother slowly evaporates.

Compare DeathNotification. If a body is damaged beyond identification, usually the IdentificationByDentalRecords occurs instead.

* ''Theatre/TheOddCouple'': In "[[Recap/TheOddCouple1970S1E11FelixIsMissing Felix is Missing]]", Felix goes missing and Murray eventually manages to ask Oscar to come down to the morgue to identify a body he thinks is Felix. Oscar is subdued with grief until he sees the body, whereupon he's shocked that they could actually think the guy was Felix. (The police had "identified" the body by the wallet.)

* In the ''Father's Day'' short of ''Film/{{Creepshow}},'' Bedelia identifies her boyfriend Harold at the morgue, whom her father had shot to keep Bedelia to heel. This is one of the reasons she bludgeons her father to death with an ashtray (the other being that goddamn banging he made with his cane when he was upset, especially when he wanted his [[TitleDrop Father's Day]] cake).

* ''Theatre/TheOddCouple'': Felix goes missing and Murray eventually manages to ask Oscar to come down to the morgue to identify a body he thinks is Felix. Oscar is subdued with grief until he sees the body, whereupon he's shocked that they could actually think the guy was Felix. (The police had "identified" the body by the wallet.)

One of the deepest {{Adult Fear}}s is that of losing a loved one. In this case that fear comes true via characters being summoned by police to a morgue to identify a body they believe to be a family member of theirs. For the family of the victim this can be partly expected if, say the victim had been missing for some time, but at others it can come completely out of left field. Now they can do nothing save arrange a funeral.

* In the ''Father's Day'' short of ''Film/{{Creepshow}},'' Bedelia identifies her boyfriend Harold at the morgue, whom her father had had shot to keep Bedelia to heel. This is one of the reasons she bludgeons her father to death with an ashtray (the other being that goddamn banging he made with his cane when he was upset, especially when he wanted his [[TitleDrop Father's Day]] cake).

* After one of Phil's suicides in ''Film/GroundhogDay'' Rita is shown identifying his body at the morgue, showing that the time loop isn't entirely dependent on him. Also played for laughs a bit, as his former cameraman notes it's a tragic loss while his body language screams [[AndThereWasMuchRejoicing "Ding ding the witch is dead!"]].

* Subverted on ''Series/TheDetail''. A man comes in to see if a body found burned in a dumpster might be his missing brother but the body is too badly burned for the standard visual identification. The man ends up describing an old injury that his brother had and the police get a tentative identification based on the victim having the same injury in the past. They end up having to do a blood test for a conclusive identification. Throughout this the victim's brother is in tears as his hope that it is not his brother slowly evaporates.

* ''Series/{{Leverage}}'': "The Big Bang Job" has the team trying to thwart an international arm dealer's sale of a giant EMP bomb, who at one point has one of his suppliers bumped off. Fortunately, the team was able to fake his death and they cap it off with Sophie, posing as the man's wife, coming in and "identifying" his body with great heaving sobs.

* ''Series/Daredevil2015'': When Elena Cardenas is killed on Wilson Fisk's orders, Brett Mahoney has Matt, Karen and Foggy come down to the morgue to identify her. Karen and Foggy are reduced to tears, and their reaction leaves Matt deadset on killing Fisk, unknowingly walking into a trap Fisk has set for him.

* Spoofed in WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons where Marge is called to a mortuary. The corps ([[ButtMonkey Moleman]]) is not only not her uncle, but he's still alive

* ''Film/LAConfidential'': When a Jane Doe is found dead, they bring in her mother to verify the girl's identity. While she's changed a lot appearance-wise because of cosmetics, the mother confirms it's her daughter because of a birthmark. This also causes Detective Bud White to realize that he'd seen the girl in the company of a pimp called Pierce Patchett a few days before, which he keeps to himself as he pursues his own line of investigation.

* In ''Series/StrangerThings'' episode "[[Recap/StrangerThingsS1E4ChapterFourTheBody The Body]]", Joyce and Jonathan go down to the morgue to identify Will's body that has been found in the previous episode. When the body is uncovered, Jonathan can't take it and leaves to avoid a StressVomit. Joyce is still unwilling to believe that her son is dead and demands to be shown the birthmark on Will's arm. Then the scene cuts away. Watch it [[https://youtu.be/8Oz3ENhkwns here]].

* ''Film/TheAccidentalTourist'': Grieving, emotionally shocked Macon has to identify his son Ethan's body. Almost unemotionally, Macon says, "Yes. That is my son." In the original book, Sarah asks him what it was like, and Macon says that the body was Ethan, but the thing that made Ethan ''Ethan'' was gone.

* In opening of the ''Series/{{Trust}}'' episode "John, Chapter 11" Gail has to identify the remains of Little Paul, who was supposedly burned to death beyond recognition. While the shoes are his, she realizes that the body is not, because the shoes are tied; Little Paul DoesNotLikeShoes and thus never ties the laces properly.

* ''Series/{{Leverage}}'': "the Big Bang Job" has the team trying to thwart an international arm dealer's sale of a giant EMP bomb, who at one point has one of his suppliers bumped off. Fortunately, the team was able to fake his death and they cap it off with Sophie, posing as the man's wife, coming in and "identifying" his body with great heaving sobs.

* ''Series/TheOddCouple'': Felix goes missing and Murray eventually manages to ask Oscar to come down to the morgue to identify a body he thinks is Felix. Oscar is subdued with grief until he sees the body, whereupon he's shocked that they could actually think the guy was Felix. (The police had "identified" the body by the wallet.)

* ''Whose Body?'', the first Literature/LordPeterWimsey novel, has a harrowing scene in which a woman is called upon to help identify the corpse of her husband, which was cut up into pieces after the death. Making it worse is that the head has not been recovered, so the identification relies on her knowledge of the rest of his body.

* ''Film/WesCravensNewNightmare'': Heather Langenkamp has to identify her husband's corpse after he dies in a mysterious car crash caused by Freddy Krueger. The coroner tries to shield her from the worst of it by only showing her his face, but when Heather pulls down the rest of the cover, the giant slash marks on her husband's chest are shocking enough to cause her to [[VomitIndiscretionShot throw up right on the spot]].

Adopted by Morgenthaler
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