History Main / InMediasRes

-->'''Ershon:''' I think the best way to tell this story is by starting at the end, briefly, then going back to the beginning; then periodically returning to the end, maybe giving different characters' perspectives throughout. Just to, you know, give it a bit of dynamism . Otherwise it's just sort of a linear story. ''(makes yawning gesture)''

* Episode 0 of ''LightNovel/HowToRaiseABoringGirlfriend'' does this. It briefly shows off the various characters in the show and what their relationship is like with the protagonist Tomoya. Episode 1 then starts the story at the beginning. Chronologically, Episode 0 takes place just before the ending of Episode 12, as they took a trip to the woods and a hot springs hotel to help inspire them with ideas for the game Tomoya wants to make.

* LightNovel/TheMasterOfRagnarokAndBlesserOfEinherjar starts the entire series after the protagonist, Yuuto Suou has been the patriarch of the wolf-clan for several years, and slowly reveals how he got that way over an extended series of flashbacks as the story unfolds.

* ''[[http://danbooru.donmai.us/pools/3715 Mami x Touma + Charlotte]]'' begins with [[Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica Mami Tomoe]] and [[LightNovel/ACertainMagicalIndex Touma Kamijou]] fighting. The fic never actually explains why they were fighting in the first place.

* Rarer in music but can be found in some concept-based albums (although this isn't a general rule).

* ''LightNovel/AllYouNeedIsKill'' by Hiroshi Sakurazaka has an interesting example of it. The book starts off [[WarIsHell in the middle of a battlefield]] where some of the would-be supporting cast are killed off. At the end of the first chapter, the main character dies. He then wakes up in his bed, believing it to all be a dream, but many of the events throughout the dream happening before the battle start happening in real life (such as his platoon receiving punishment for taking alcohol from storage) while other events are slightly different (a woman soldier who he met in the dream on the battlefield before he died takes part in the punishment in real life, while she simply watched in the dream). In reality, [[spoiler:the main character is stuck in a time loop due to accidental exposure to alien technology]].

* ''Series/WandaVision'' opens with the title characters, HappilyMarried and driving into Westview, with absolutely zero explanation of when they got married, how Vision is suddenly BackFromTheDead after the events of ''Film/AvengersInfinityWar'', or why everything is presented as a sitcom from the 50s. And the show just rolls with the sitcom hijinks (with the occasional SurpriseCreepy moment) up until the ending of the third episode, and the following episode starts giving some explanation to what’s really going on.

** ''VideoGame/Uncharted4AThiefsEnd'' begins with Nate and Sam in a boat at night during a storm running away from bad guys on the way to an island. A notable instance as it was only inserted at the beginning because the sequence it was in was too long with it included; when you catch up to that part of the story, the game skips it over entirely.

* ''WesternAnimation/OverTheGardenWall'' begins with [[ClassicalAntiHero Wirt]] [[[[FoolishSiblingResponsibleSibling and]] [[CloudCuckoolander Greg]] wandering around [[TheWonderland the Unknown]], with Wirt suddenly questioning how they got there and where their home is. Despite their odd outfits, it's hinted that they [[TrappedInAnotherWorld come from a more modern, normal world]], and Wirt alludes to a few events that happened before their arrival, but it's only in the ninth and penultimate episode that we get a WholeEpisodeFlashback. (Which notably reveals that, just before finding themselves in the forest, they were [[spoiler:drowning, implying that the Unknown is the afterlife and/or some kind of dream world]]).

** When considered as a narrative whole, the MCU itself begins in media res: The first film, ''Film/IronMan1'' takes place chronologically after ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger'' and ''Film/CaptainMarvel2019''.

* Creator/QuentinTarantino likes playing with the chronology of his plots, though only occasionally does he use an outright in media res plotline to its conclusion:

* ''Literature/TheAeneid'' continues the Creator/{{Homer}}ic tradition of ''in media res'' and begins in much the same way, with Aeneas' fleet threatened by a divine storm while en route to Italy. Aeneas fills in the beginning of the story later on using a FramingDevice.

** "Colony" starts in media res as well, and Mulder [[FlatLine flat-lines]]. Scully appears and knows how he must be treated to be saved.

* The first ''VideoGame/GodOfWarI'' begins with Kratos standing on a cliff, stating "The Gods of Olympus have abandoned me... now, there is no hope..." before he simply falls off. [[spoiler:Gaia]] spouts some babble while the camera shows him falling down the mountain, and when he finally hits the ocean... the screen blacks out and the game flashes back a couple weeks to when Kratos was sailing the Aegean Sea. Also, as the adventure moves forward, Kratos' backstory is revealed in media res. So the first God of War starts at the end, goes to the middle, and visits the beginning multiple times through the story.

* ''{{Webcomic/Girly}}'' [[http://girlyyy.com/go/504 Part 4 starts]] in Media Res, with the protagonists trapped in an alien-looking landscape.

* In the ''Manga/AsteroidInLove'' manga, the way Mira and Ao met as children is narrated in the middle of the first chapter, as Mira explains in PresentDay [[ThePromise why]] she wants to [[GoalInLife discovery an asteroid]]. The anime, on the other hand, moves it to the front, making it a case of AMinorKidroduction.

* ''[[Fanfic/{{Eleutherophobia}} The Day the Earth Stood Still]]'' begins during chapter 1 of ''Literature/{{Animorphs}} #54: The Beginning'', hours before the end of the war, at the [[ForWantOfANail exact moment]] it diverges from canon.

* The second series of [[{{Series/PrincessReturningPearl}} Princess Returning Pearl]] essentially starts off like this, with the two main girls arrested and being taken to the execution block, surrounded by a crowd of disbelieving commoners, complete with references to events that are only shown later in the series. This sequence stops when the commoners stop the procession and [[PleaseSpareHimMyLiege ask the official in charge to spare the princess' lives,]] only to receive a message from the emperor ordering them to kill without pardon. We later find out how things actually got up to this point.

* The second series of {{Series/PrincessReturningPearl}} essentially starts off like this, with the two main girls arrested and being taken to the execution block, surrounded by a crowd of disbelieving commoners, complete with references to events that are only shown later in the series. This sequence stops when the commoners stop the procession and [[PleaseSpareThemMyLiege ask the official in charge to spare the princess' lives,]] only to receive a message from the emperor ordering them to kill without pardon. We later find out how things actually got up to this point.

-->-- '''Creator/HarlanEllison''', ''"Repent, Harlequin!" said the Ticktockman''

* ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'':

* ''WesternAnimation/OverTheGardenWall'' begins with [[FoolishSiblingResponsibleSibling Wirt and Greg]] wandering around in a forest, with Wirt suddenly questioning what they're doing there and how they're supposed to get home. It becomes clear that they're [[TrappedInAnotherWorld from a more modern, normal world]] despite their odd outfits, and Wirt alludes to events that happened just before they came to Unknown, but it's only in the ninth and penultimate episode that we get a WholeEpisodeFlashback about what happened. (Which reveals, most notably, that [[spoiler:they were drowning in a river]] just before finding themselves in the forest.)

** The [[Anime/FullmetalAlchemist 2003 anime version]] also begins in the middle of their journey, with the actual introduction happening in the third episode and several more episodes of flashback until it catches up to where they were at the end of the first two episodes.

* The anime for ''LightNovel/AscendanceOfABookworm'' technically begins some point during the second major arc of the story before flashing back to the beginning. While Myne is shown in the clothes of a priestess during the introductory scene, we see her begin life as a peasant and eventually works her way up to a merchant before moving into the temple for health reasons.

This is a very common trope for [[{{Biography}} biographies]] — specifically the author will start with a taste of some part of the subject's life that everyone's familiar with, then jump back to the mundanities of his/her heritage and upbringing.

* In ''VideoGame/DarkCloud 2'', immediately after starting a new game you're thrown into the middle of an invasion of King Raybrandt's castle by Emperor Griffon's forces, the latest coup in a long-running war between the future world and the timeline-erasing BigBad. You only have a very brief explanation of how the controls work before you, as Princess Monica Raybrandt, have to fend off the attackers with sword and magic. It's only after [[YouKilledMyFather the final fate of the combatants is decided]] that the narrative calms down and introduces you to the main protagonist, Max, in the present time.

* ''VideoGame/ChronoCross'': After naming the main character, you're thrust into a sequence where he, Kid, and a random potential party member are going after Lynx. Eventually some strange events occur, and.. Serge wakes up in his bed at home. Naturally he was DreamingOfThingsToCome.

* ''VideoGame/ChaosRingsII'' begins with [[PlayerCharacter Darwin]] facing off against the FinalBoss,[[spoiler:the Destroyer/Neron]]. He proceeds to get one hit killed in a CurbStompBattle. Cue the flashback, beginning with time first being frozen by Bachs.

* ''VideoGame/BrothersInArms'': Hill 30 begins with the player and his squad about to get overrun. The player character is knocked off his feet by a scripted shell and loses consciousness. The screen then goes black and it takes you back eight days to D-Day where the narrative begins.
* ''VideoGame/BrothersInArms'' Hell's Highway starts with the protagonist, Baker and his friend, Hartsock, navigating through an abandoned hospital in the midst of a German attack. Baker gets knocked on the ground by a falling bomb, and Hartsock watches as Baker is seemingly executed in front of him. Cut to the beginning, when they first landed. [[spoiler:Turns out that the gunshots of Baker's "execution" were actually him shooting at hallucinations.]]