History Main / WakingUpAtTheMorgue

* In ''FanFic/HitList'', the SequelHook of the epilogue has this happen to [[spoiler:Ganondorf, since Link hadn't killed him with the Master Sword.]]

[[folder:Film]]

* ''Film/BehindTheMaskTheRiseOfLeslieVernon.'' [[spoiler: During the end credits, Leslie Vernon is shown being wheeled around in a morgue. While the lab technician's back is turned, Vernon sits up on the table.]]
* Sean William Scott's character does this in a post-credits in the movie ''Film/CopOut'' with no explanation as to how he survived

* In ''Die Nacht der lebenden Loser'' (''Film/NightOfTheLivingDorks''), a German horror comedy, three boys are killed in a car accident while driving home after a voodoo ceremony. They wake up at the morgue as zombies.
* In ''Film/{{Nightbreed}}'', Aaron Boone is shot to death by the police after his PsychoPsychologist frames him for his crimes. He awakens at the morgue as a new member of the supernatural Nightbreed and escapes to go live with them.
* SlasherMovie sequels ''Film/FridayThe13thTheFinalChapter'', ''Film/ColdPrey2'' and ''Film/SeeNoEvil2'' start with their respective villains being taken to a morgue, and springing back to life there. Cue murder with local tools.
* In ''Film/TheProphecy3TheAscent'' after being shot by a blind man Danyael wakes up locked in a body storage locker in the Morgue.
* ''Film/ScannersIIITheTakeover'': Alex temporarily shuts down his heart to fake death in the hospital to avoid a SickbedSlaying. He later wakes up at the morgue. There's an initial BaitAndSwitch where it seems like the coroner is about to saw open his chest, but it turns out he was working on another body.
* [[PlayingWithATrope Played with]] in ''Film/TheAmazingSpiderMan2''. Max Dillon falls into a vat full of genetically engineered electric eels at his job at Oscorp that jolt him to high heaven, is pronounced dead and shipped off to the morgue. It quickly turns out that he didn't quite die though. His body was undergoing a radical transformation and he wakes up in his body bag having become an [[ShockAndAwe electricity based]] EnergyBeing.
* While not quite a morgue, this becomes Mr. Black's RunningGag in ''Film/ComedyOfTerrors''. Black (played by Creator/BasilRathbone) has a form of catalepsy that makes him appear dead to the outside world. Of course crooked undertakers Waldo Trumble and his assistant, Felix Gilly (played respectively by Creator/VincentPrice and Creator/PeterLorre) have a plot to murder him and then make money off of his funeral. Every time they think he's safely dead, ThatDarnCat comes by and triggers Black's allergy, waking him up. It ends up in a RoaringRampageOfRevenge with a gleefully hammy Black chasing Trumbull and Gilly with an axe while shouting out quotes from ''Macbeth''.
* ''Film/CradleOfFear'': According to Inspector Neilson, this happened to the last of Kemper's victims. Blood loss from her wounds, combined with shock, dropped her into a catatonic coma where her vital signs were too faint to be detected. She woke up in a freezer drawer at the morgue and subsequently suffocated. When she was eventually found, she had broken every bone in her hands pounding on the inside of the drawer to attract attention, but no one had heard. Neilson blames himself for this because he did not check to see if she was dead before they removed her, and it is why he now insists on touching very body at a crime scene.

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

* In the first few pages of the manga series ''Manga/{{Variante}}'', this happens.

* The Puma Sisters wake up in the morgue in Creator/ShirowMasamune's ''[[Anime/DominionTankPolice Dominion Conflict 1: No More Noise]]''. But they're not very surprised--after all, they went to sleep there, thinking it was awfully nice of Newport City Police to provide such nice beds for them.
* In ''Manga/BlackButler'', Shinigami Grell falls asleep on the side of the road and forgets to breathe. He's mistaken for dead and taken to the local undertaker, where he wakes up after being called a fourth rate body by the undertaker.

* ''ComicBook/AllNewUltimates'': The doctor that was checking Terry calls: the corpse has simply woke up and left when nobody was watching.

* Rocky, a member of the ComicBook/ChallengersOfTheUnknown, was seemingly killed during a wrestling match where he was crushed to death by his opponent with a very strong bear hug, only to wake up when the doctors were ready to do an autopsy on his body.
* In the first issue of ''ComicBook/TheImmortalHulk'' after [[spoiler: getting shot in the head by a robber, Bruce's body is sent to the morgue although he doesn't stay dead for long as Devil Hulk forcefully makes their corpse transform and come back to life.]]

* [[http://www.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUSN149975820070917 Venezuelan dude]] was being examined in the morgue when the doctors noticed he was bleeding, and decided to stitch the wound without thinking there was anything odd (even if bleeding is a luxury of living beings). Then he sits on the table, screaming.

If you have a character that has regeneration or ResurrectiveImmortality, a great way for them to discover the power is for them to wake up at the morgue. Can also be done if the character is drugged or FakingTheDead. Either way it can be shocking, as the last place a person wants to be is at the morgue.

** In the episode "Iceman", the medical examiner Ducky is in autopsy, doing his usual [[TalkingToTheDead "talking to the corpse"]] thing as he's fixing his morning tea. When the tea kettle starts whistling, the "corpse" opens his eyes and sits up. Apparently the man was found nearly frozen, and "a body isn't dead until it's ''warm'' and dead." [[spoiler: The man however, has severe brain damage because of a lack of oxygen when he was frozen, and [[RealityEnsues dies at the end anyway]].]]

[[/folder]]

* A ''Series/TwilightZone'' has a young hillbilly wake up at his own funeral. He insists he was just in a coma; the local coroner insists he was dead. His character changes; he becomes a go-getter, where before he was a layabout. The locals believe that he's occupied by a demon. He gives an angry speech denying it, but says if he is possessed, everybody better beware. He disperses the crowd, and his girl believes him- until the end, when she sees him light a cigar without matches or a lighter.

* In 1786, Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, then a sergeant of Louis XVI's army, suffered from a severe lung disease, was mistaken for dead and only narrowly escaped a premature burial, thanks to the meticulousness of a young surgeon.

* ''Series/{{Highlander}}'' has a few of these just like the films. In one, the female immortal kills the coroner before walking off. Another has a similar scene with a different immortal woman.

* Piper does this in the ''Series/Charmed1998'' episode "Styx Feet Under". Since the FBI agent who's been following them for the last few episodes is in the room when it happens, it's the event that finally allows him to penetrate TheMasquerade.

* A funeral service is being held in a church for a woman who has just passed away. At the end of the service, the pallbearers carrying the casket accidentally bump into a wall jarring the casket. They hear a faint moan. They open the casket and find that the woman is actually alive. She lives for 10 more years and then dies. A ceremony is again held at the same church and at the end the pallbearers are again carrying the casket out. As they are walking, the husband calls out, "Watch out for the wall!"

* After dying from injuries sustained in a battle with Neron, Franchise/WonderWoman is transformed into a goddess and wakes up after being autopsied and stuffed into a bodybag.

** Averted in ''Discworld/MenAtArms'', but only because the Watch didn't actually have a morgue, so Carrot left Angua's body in a bedroom to await her moonrise revival.

* Happens in the 2007 movie ''Film/RiseBloodHunter'': The reporter Sadie Blake after being attacked and left for dead by a vampire wakes up in a cold box and has to kick it open to get out. [[spoiler: After hunting down and killing her attacker, she ends up dead again and the last shot is of her body being shelved into a cold box in the morgue. The ''very'' last shot is of her kicking open the box. ]]

* In the live-action ''Film/StreetFighter'' movie, an example that involves FakingTheDead as Guile wakes up in a morgue (scaring Chun-Li in the process) after apparently getting shot by Ryu and Ken during their prison break. Of course, it was all part of the plan [[spoiler:to get Ryu and Ken on Bison and Sagat's good side so that they could take them down later]].
* ''Film/InnocentBlood'', a recently-vampirized mob boss wakes up at the morgue. He is quite disgruntled to find a thermometer sticking out of his stomach and a man standing over him with a bonesaw.
* In ''Film/DeathBecomesHer'' Madeline fainted after finding out that she died. She ended up waking up in the morgue in a body bag.
* Parodied in ''Film/FletchLives''. Fletch fakes being dead to sneak into a morgue. He hides in a locker to avoid getting caught and ends up scaring a janitor.

* In ''Film/DangerDiabolik'', the title character escapes a police dragnet by taking a pill that puts him in a death-like state. His DarkMistress gives him the antidote just in time for him to stop his own autopsy.
* In ''Die Nacht der lebenden Loser'' (''Night of the Living Dorks''), a German horror comedy, three boys are killed in a car accident while driving home after a voodoo ceremony. They wake up at the morgue as zombies.

Naturally, there will be much confusion the first time it happens to someone, with or without amnesia and will usually [[UndressingTheUnconscious they have been completely undressed]], and may have to make do without any clothing or equipment. Compare RiseFromYourGrave and WakingUpElsewhere. Can be a form of FirstEpisodeResurrection.

Naturally, there will be much confusion the first time it happens to someone, with or without amnesia. Compare RiseFromYourGrave. Can be a form of FirstEpisodeResurrection.

** In the first season one [[MonsterOfTheWeek Kryptonite Freak Of The Week's]] powers manifested when he woke up in the morgue. He'd been thrown out a window and woke up just in time to grab the coroner's arm and stop him from cutting him open with the bonesaw.
** Also happened to [[spoiler:Chloe]] in the season seven premiere, [[spoiler:as part of her healing powers]].

* Ads for the series ''Series/Forever'' employ this trope, but it never happens on the series proper because Henry always resurrects in a nearby body of water.

* In James Blaylock's ''Homunculus'', Willis Pule is knocked unconscious during a scuffle with zombies, then hauled away with the bodies left behind when they de-animate. Pule's skin had been stained pale green in an earlier incident, so whoever collected the bodies can't be wholly blamed for mistaking him for yet another corpse.

* Obviously happens all the time in the ''Series/{{Highlander}}'' franchise.

* ''Series/{{Smallville}}'': In the first season one [[MonsterOfTheWeek Kryptonite Freak Of The Week's]] powers manifested when he woke up in the morgue. He'd been thrown out a window and woke up just in time to grab the coroner's arm and stop him from cutting him open with the bonesaw.

* This happens to a college professor who had been experimenting with a mind-enhancing drug in the ''Series/TheOuterLimits1963'' episode "Expanding Human".