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Immediate Sequel

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Marty McFly: Oh, this is heavy, Doc. I mean, it's like I was just here yesterday.
Doc Brown: You were here yesterday, Marty, you were!
— Back to the Future Part II

A sequel where the plot picks up immediately after the previous part. Either literally immediately, to such a degree that it's possible to edit the two parts together without it looking noticeably strange, or at most within a couple of hours or so. Sometimes they'll open with the final moments of the previous installment as a kind of recap which then leads into the plot of the sequel. Prequels may also occasionally end with a scene that immediately precedes or even flows into the opening of a previous installment, making it an Immediate Prequel.

Not to be confused with a sequel which is produced or released shortly after the previous part, while actually taking place later.

This may be used to start from a previous entry's instance of And the Adventure Continues or Cliffhanger.

The last third of a Two-Part Trilogy often fits. Related to Extremely Short Timespan. For this trope's polar opposite, see Distant Sequel.

Due to this trope's nature, beware of unmarked spoilers for the endings of certain installments.

Examples

    open/close all folders 

    Anime & Manga 
  • The second season of Attack on Titan starts immediately after the first season ended. The last episode of the first season shows Pastor Nick yelling at the Survey Corps members to keep the two fighting titans away from the walls, and the stinger for that episode showed the face of a titan inside the wall as a piece of it crumbled away due to damage. The first episode of the second season opens on the Survey Corps members staring up at the face in the wall, just as Nick finally catches up to them. We then get a flashback to twelve hours ago, meaning that part of the episode was actually running concurrently with the first season's last episode.
  • Cardcaptor Sakura ends with Syaoran and Sakura meeting again in Tomoeda and hugging note . Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card picks up from exactly that point, with them still hugging when the manga starts.
  • Futari wa Pretty Cure's sequel MaX Heart picks up where the original ends.
  • Gundam ZZ picks up exactly where Zeta Gundam left off.
  • Love Live!: The movies for both the original series and Love Live! Sunshine!!, following an opening childhood flashback, start right after the final episode of their respective series.
  • Being a two-part movie, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Reflection and Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Detonation actually have several seconds of overlap (Nanoha's final line in the first one is the first line in the second).
  • Psycho-Pass 3: First Inspector begins the literal second right after the Psycho-Pass 3's final episode. This is very notable because every other sequel in the Psycho-Pass franchise takes place after a lengthy Time Skip.
  • Evangelion:3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time begins directly after the events of the third film, Evangelion:3.0 You can (not) redo.

    Audio Plays 
  • Big Finish Doctor Who:
    • "Unregenerate!" takes place immediately after "Time and the Rani" and involves the Seventh Doctor dealing with the aftermath of his regeneration.
    • Similar to the above, "Psychodrome" takes place immediately after the Fifth Doctor's debut television story "Castrovalva" and involves his companions Adric, Nyssa and Tegan getting to know the newly regenerated Doctor.
    • In "Destination: Nerva", the Fourth Doctor and Leela travel to Space Dock Nerva immediately after defeating Magnus Greel and bidding farewell to Professor George Litefoot and Henry Gordon Jago in "The Talons of Weng-Chiang".
    • "The Waters of Amsterdam" takes place immediately after the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa were reunited with Tegan in Amsterdam in January 1983 and the three of them defeated Omega in "Arc of Infinity".

    Comic Books 

    Fan Works 

    Films — Animation 

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Alien
    • Aliens pretends to do this, with the team rescuing Ripley in her escape pod from the first film. It's only later that she is told that she has been missing for over half a century.
    • Alien³ starts off very shortly after the events of Aliens with Ripley, Newt, Hicks and Bishop still in stasis aboard the Sulaco bound for Earth.
    • AVP: Alien vs. Predator ends in a Predalien chestburster appearing out of the corpse of the final Predator, as his comrades are leaving Earth. The sequel Requiem starts with the chestburster morphing into the drone form and causing the ship to crash back on Earth.
  • Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me begins where International Man of Mystery left off with Austin (Mike Myers) and Vanessa (Elizabeth Hurley) on their honeymoon.
  • Both Back to the Future sequels. Part 1 ends with Doc Brown coming to take Marty and Jennifer back to the future with him to avert problems with their future family, and Part 2 begins with that scene (albeit reshot given Jennifer was recast, plus some added set-up for later plotlines) and then them arriving in the future. Part 2 ends with Marty trapped in 1955 and visiting the Doc Brown of said time period, and Part 3 begins with that scene followed by Marty driving Doc home after the initial meeting.
  • Beneath the Planet of the Apes continues with Taylor and Nova riding along the beach after the infamous, Earth All Along Twist Ending from the first film.
  • The Bourne Series:
    • The Bourne Ultimatum begins (not counting the final scene in The Bourne Supremacy, which is seen in this film in its proper chronological order) immediately after the wounded Bourne said his condolences to Irena Neski, and is trying to flee the immediate area after the chase with the assassin.
    • The Bourne Legacy starts during the events of Ultimatum.
  • Bride of Frankenstein starts with the villagers concluding that the Monster has died in the burning windmill. The Monster then climbs back up and kills the parents of the little girl that he accidentally murdered in the previous film.
  • Children of the Corn II: The Final Sacrifice starts with authorities alerted by the previous film's protagonists going through Gatlin's tragedy, and relocating the remaining children to the neighboring town of Hemingford.
  • Dead Snow ends with remaining character realizing that he has the remaining piece of the treasure that the Nazi zombies are looking for, and being attacked by them. The sequel Red vs. Dead starts with him escaping this predicament.
  • Dracula's Daughter starts with two constables finding the aftermath of Dracula (1931), and arresting Prof. Van Helsing for murder, not knowing that his "victim" was a vampire.
  • Dune: Part Two picks the story more or less where the first film ended, with Stilgar's troop going back to Sietch Tabr while carrying Jamis' corpse and bringing Paul and Jessica with them. They ambush Harkonnen soldiers on the way.
  • El Camino picks up just after the finale of Breaking Bad with Jesse on the run from the cops having escaped his captivity from the Aryans.
  • All three original Evil Dead movies lead directly into one another. Bruce Campbell has noted that, with a little judicious editing to remove the recaps and some minor contradictory stuff between the second and third films, one can make a near-seamless 4 1/2-hour movie out of the trilogy (which fans, not surprisingly, have indeed done).
  • Fast & Furious ends with Dominic's gang ready to spring him from a prison bus. Fast Five begins with them rescuing Dom.
  • Final Destination 5 (2011) reveals itself to be an Immediate Prequel as it ends with Sam and Molly getting killed in the Flight 180 disaster, overlapping with the opening of Final Destination (2000).
  • Force 10 from Navarone begins with the destruction of The Guns of Navarone, and the two survivors of the operation getting picked up by a rescue boat.
  • Friday the 13th
  • Halloween
  • Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay opens approximately an hour or two after the ending of the first film: just enough time for the two to eat a couple dozen burgers each, drive home, and for Harold to start running a shower, and the burgers to work their way through Kumar's digestive system all before they head off to Amsterdam.
  • The Hatchet trilogy
    • Hatchet abruptly cuts to black on one of the characters, mid-scream. The sequel opens with a smash cuts into the second half of the scream.
    • Similar thing happens between the sequel and the third movie as well, showing what happened after the villain was supposedly killed for good (spoiler: he wasn't).
  • Played with in The Human Centipede series. The second film does begin with the last scene of the first one... being watched by somebody in Real Life who decides to make their own Human Centipede.
  • James Bond:
    • From Russia with Love starts not long after Dr. No, as Bond is first seen on a romantic picnic with Sylvia Trench (which he promised to her in the previous film). The recent death of Dr. Julius No is also brought up by Kronsteen when he discusses the operation to kill Bond with the other SPECTRE heads.
    • The Action Prologue of Diamonds Are Forever might be set not long after the end of On Her Majesty's Secret Service, which saw Bond's newlywed wife Tracy being killed in a drive-by by Irma Bunt with Blofeld at the wheel. The opening of Diamonds are Forever has Bond frantically punch his way through informants to find Blofeld, which can be interpreted as a Roaring Rampage of Revenge.
    • Uniquely among the Bond films, Quantum of Solace follows immediately on from Casino Royale, with Bond transporting Mr. White to M in Siena after capturing him at the end of the previous film.
    • Outside the Distant Prologue that opens the film, the present-day Action Prologue of No Time to Die picks up right where Spectre ended (Bond Riding into the Sunset with Madeleine Swann), with Bond and Madeleine enjoying life together in Italy before being ambushed by Spectre and separating. The rest of the film happens five years after this.
  • John Wick: Chapter 2 directly picks up from the events of John Wick, with at most a week between the two. John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum is an even more extreme example - it picks up 20 minutes after Chapter 2!
  • In a strange case, the first 30 minutes or so of Ju-On: The Curse 2 are the last 30 minutes or so of Ju-on: The Curse with some added footage in places and the plot continuing from the point The Curse ended after that. Since all the Ju-On movies are told in Anachronic Order it's debatable to what extent this is an example since the portion of the first film repeated is in parts set significantly earlier (detailing the origin of the curse).
  • The Karate Kid Part II begins with the aftermath of the tournament (a sequence originally written for but then cut out of the first movie), before doing a Time Skip to six months later.
  • Look Who's Talking has Julie's conception and birth happening over the end credits. Look Who's Talking Too starts with those events, as well as Mikey's potty training.
  • The second and third movies in The Lord of the Rings series start exactly where the previous film left off (give or take a day), due to basically being one big, three part movie.
    • Ditto for The Hobbit movies, since each movie is one part of the same book.
  • Marvel Cinematic Universe
  • The Matrix Revolutions picks up where The Matrix Reloaded ended off. This contributes to the Two-Part Trilogy feel of the series.
  • The first Mortal Kombat film ends with the protagonists celebrating the end of the tournament, and preparing themselves to fight the suddenly appearing Shao Khan. Mortal Kombat: Annihilation picks up from this setup, but changes a bit that Shao Khan's appearance is now accompanied by an extra-dimensional invasion.
  • The first thing seen in Muppets Most Wanted is the "The End" title from the previous movie. It also instantly establishes that the previous movie was a movie in-universe and only loosely canon.
  • Each of the Phantasm sequels pick up immediately where the preceding film ended.
  • Porky's is followed by Porky's 2: The Next Day.
  • [REC] 2 starts five minutes after the end of [REC], and [REC] 4: Apocalypse picks up exactly where [REC] 2 left off. [REC] 3: Genesis begins hours before the first film and ends the next day, happening concurrently with the other films.
  • Red Dragon is an immediate prequel to The Silence of the Lambs, overlapping with the first 9 or so minutes, as the epilogue shows Dr. Chilton informing Hannibal Lecter that "a pretty young woman from the FBI" would like to meet with him.
  • Rocky:
    • Rocky II starts with the aftermath of the first film's climactic fight.
    • Rocky IV begins with Rocky coming home after the "fun" spar with Apollo, which was the conclusion of Rocky III.
    • Rocky V begins minutes after Rocky IV, with Rocky suffering the effects of Drago's blows.
  • Saw: While an amount of time ranging from months to years passes between the events of most films (with Saw IV being a P.O.V. Sequel to III), Saw III, Saw V, Saw VI and Saw 3D start off within seconds, minutes or hours after their respective preceding films.
  • See No Evil 2 begins with the villain Jacob Goodnight being pronounced dead on his way to the hospital after his defeat in the previous film. He doesn't stay that way for long.
  • Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, being the only entry to date in the Star Trek film series to immediately follow its predecessor, opens with the last set of events of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and picks up shortly thereafter with the damaged Enterprise making its way back to Earth spacedock following the Battle of the Mutara Nebula and Spock's funeral above the Genesis Planet.
  • Star Wars
    • As a cross-media example, Revenge of the Sith begins a few hours after the end of the original Clone Wars series (after Palpatine had been scooped up by Grievous and the Separatist forces on Coruscant and the Jedi launch a rescue operation). The Nelvaan storyline with Anakin was rendered as Canon Discontinuity due to the CGI series, which instead opted for Lower Deck Synchronous Episodes spanning the film's time frame in its final arc, however the Coruscant siege from the 2D show is uniquely supported by the 3D show (Obi-Wan mentions losing contact with Shaak Ti in 3D, which happens as she first flees from Grievous in 2D).
    • The ending scene to Rogue One directly leads to the opening of A New Hope with the rebels making a run for it aboard the Tantive IV having acquired the Death Star plans after the climactic Battle of Scarif with a CG Princess Leia cameo onboard. The difference between the two is a couple of hours spent in Hyperspace.
    • The Force Awakens ends with protagonist Rey face-to-face with Luke Skywalker, who has been missing for many years. The Last Jedi picks up just a few seconds after that, with Luke taking the lightsaber and the Rebels escaping their base from the previous film.
  • The first four Subspecies films take place immediately after the last. The fifth is an origins film, with Radu narrating from some unknown time period after the films.
  • Although the original cut of Superman II takes place some time after the ending of the first movie, the Richard Donner version released in 2006 begins during the events of the first film, where the nuclear missile Superman launches into space winds up releasing Zod, Ursa, and Non from the Phantom Zone.
  • The Thing (2011) ends with Lars seeing the creature, disguised as an Alaskan Malamute, escaping from Thule Station. He then has his pilot friend who just arrived to restart the helicopter where he tries to shoot the "dog" down leading into the opening scene of The Thing (1982).
  • After the Thin Man takes place several hours after The Thin Man, when the train Nick and Nora were on with Dorothy and her new husband Tommy arrives in San Francisco.
  • Underworld: Evolution starts with Selene and Michael on the run, the morning after the first film's climax. In fact, discounting the prequel, and the Time Skip (during which time Selene is in suspended animation), from her perspective the movies all take place over the course of about a week.
  • Waxwork II: Lost in Time starts immediately after the first film's Sequel Hook, with the crawling zombie hand causing trouble. Although the effect is a little odd, because one of the surviving characters from the original is now The Other Darrin.

    Literature 
  • The Acts of the Apostles in The Bible begins with Jesus's ascension to Heaven a few weeks after his resurrection, which is more or less where each of the four Gospels leaves off. Most directly, it's a sequel to the book of Luke, both being penned by the same guy.
  • Aftershock by Colin Thiele begins right where the penultimate chapter of Shatterbelt left off, showing us the earthquake that the first book only referenced in a news report.
  • Animorphs Several of the books pick up immediately after or even slightly before the previous one ended.
    • Each book of The Andalite Chronicles begins where the previous left off.
    • Each book of The David Trilogy. Book 20 ends with most of the team in cockroach morph being blown out of the Blade Ship, and Book 21 begins with them falling through the air. Book 21 in turn ends Jake sending Ax to wake Rachel while he hunts for David and loses the fight, and Book 22 beginning with Rachel being woken by Ax and joining the hunt.
    • Book 35 ends with Marco receiving a phone call from Visser One in his mother's body. Visser depicts Visser One on trial, eventually getting to the point where she calls him. The rest of the book is then effectively a sequel to 35.
    • Book 45 ends with the team sending a transmission to the Andalites, and book 46 begins with them actually talking to the Andalites.
    • The second to last book of the series ends with Jake ordering Rachel to launch her attack. The last book begins with Rachel going on her suicide/assassination mission, she gets the order at the end of chapter 2.
  • Catriona, the sequel to Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson. Kidnapped ends with the protagonist visiting a bank where he can cash a letter of credit. Catriona begins as he leaves the bank with his money.
  • Several books in A Certain Magical Index begin just as the previous one finishes. A notable example is New Testament Volume 18, which begins exactly 5 seconds after 17 ends.
  • Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator picks up immediately after the ending of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, with Willy Wonka and the Bucket family headed back to the factory in the elevator — but the process of doing so is screwed up by the frightened, still-bedridden grandparents, and the elevator ends up in orbit.
  • The second half of COLD, an original James Bond novel by John Gardner, picks up right after his previous original Bond novel SeaFire, with Bond leaving Puerto Rico with his battered girlfiend Fredericka von Grüsse on a helicopter.note 
  • Deryni series: Camber's body is found at the end of Camber the Heretic; The Harrowing of Gwynedd opens with his son and daughter discussing the fact that his body shows no signs of decay.
  • The first two Discworld novels: The Colour of Magic ends on a Cliffhanger of Rincewind falling off the Rim, which The Light Fantastic resolves.
  • The Divergent series' second book, Insurgent, takes place immediately after the first, specifically, just as Tris and co. arrive at the Amity sector.
  • The Dresden Files: Ghost Story continues from the moment Changes ended, at least, from Harry's POV. Turns out, half a year has passed while he hung out in the Afterlife Antechamber.
  • Earth's Children: The Mammoth Hunters and The Shelters of Stone both begin immediately where the previous books (The Valley of Horses and The Plains of Passage, respectively) ended.
    • The Valley of Horses ends with Ayla and Jondalar encountering a band of Mamutoi hunters while exploring the nearby area; The Mammoth Hunters begins by detailing their meeting and fleshing out the Mamutoi characters, who invite Ayla and Jondalar to stay at their camp.
    • The Plains of Passage ends with Ayla, Jondalar and their animals finally reaching the Ninth Cave of the Zelandonii and someone calling out that "Jondalar is home"; The Shelters of Stone opens with Jondalar being reunited with and introducing Ayla to his friends and family. This one particularly stands out given The Plains of Passage was published twelve years prior, but in-universe no time had passed.
  • Firefox Down: Author Craig Thomas notes in the foreword that it "...takes up the story of Mitchell Gant and the MiG-31 at precisely the point where its predecessor left them."
  • Green-Sky Trilogy by Zilpha Keatley Snyder: And All Between starts out with Teera and her life underground, but the Kindar part of the tale picks up just minutes after the events that close off Below the Root. Until the Celebration starts on the evening after the events that close And All Between. Raamo climbs into the farheights of the tree city to think things over, as he does at the beginning of ''Below The Root''.
  • The last three books of The Heroes of Olympus series break the series tradition of a one-year-gap between each novel by having it immediately pick up from where the previous one left off. The Mark of Athena begins immediately after The Son of Neptune ends, albeit from a different perspective. The House of Hades begins maybe a day at most after TMA ends. Finally, The Blood of Olympus picks up the next afternoon after THH ends. It's justified, since there's a prophecy to fulfill and only a few weeks to spare since the end of TSN.
  • Hive Mind (2016): Each of the first three novels ends with Amber's team being sent off on an emergency run; the next novel starts with that run. The fourth ends with Amber and Lucas sharing a New Year kiss; the fifth starts mid-kiss.
  • The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy:
  • A couple of Honor Harrington novels:
    • Book 3, A Short Victorious War, ends with Honor and her crew returning to Manticore; Book 4, Field of Dishonor, begins with their arrival back home.
    • Book 8, Echoes of Honor, ends with Admiral White Haven getting Honor's message that she survived and is back in the system; Book 9, Ashes of Victory, begins a couple hours later when Honor actually arrives.
  • KonoSuba: The Explosions! spin-off follows Megumin's life before she joins up with Kazuma's party. The last volume takes place concurently with the two week period after Kazuma and Aqua arrived (which was mostly glossed over in the main story) and ends right when Megumin introduces herself to them.
  • Lethal White, the fourth book of the Cormoran Strike Novels, picks up immediately after the dramatic cliffhanger at the end of Career of Evil in which Strike stumbles into Robin's wedding as she's giving her "I do," and crashes on the floor, causing her to look into his eyes and not those of her new husband. This is the prologue, and the first chapter then begins a year later.
  • The Millennium Trilogy: the second ends with Lisbeth being airlifted to a hospital, the third with her arriving.
  • The Missus begins right where The Mister ended, with Maxim and Alessia preparing for their hastily-arranged wedding in Albania at the insistence of Alessia's father.
  • Kyell Gold does this between Out of Position and Isolation Play with only about a five minute passing between the two books.
  • The V. C. Andrews novel Petals on the Wind picks up right where Flowers in the Attic left off, with the three surviving Dollanganger siblings on a bus heading out of town, having escaped their attic prison.
  • Retired Witches Mysteries: Book 3 literally starts with the same line that book 2 ended with.
  • Scarlett, the authorized sequel to Gone with the Wind; despite being published 55 years later, it picks up only a few days after the end of the original novel. Gone With the Wind ends with Melanie's death, and Scarlett begins at her funeral.
  • Seekers of the Sky duology by Sergey Lukyanenko: The start of the second novel makes it appear as if this trope is averted, but it's then revealed that less than a day passed after the end of the first novel. This makes it seem like the duology is Divided for Publication.
  • Septimus Heap: Syren starts immediately where Queste ends.
  • A Series of Unfortunate Events: From The Vile Village onward, each book directly leads into the next one and the Time Skip in the earlier books were a few days at most. It's pointed out a few times that the Baudelaires' previous adventures happened one or two day prior.
  • Shatter the Sky: The second book starts exactly where the first left off.
  • Slan Hunter starts within hours of the end of Slan, preventing our heroes from being able to put what they learned in the first book to use before multiple disasters strike.
  • Very little time passes between books in A Song of Ice and Fire; the time passed between the end of one book and the start of the next is no different to the time passed between some chapters. Special mention must go to the gap between book 3, which ends with the night of the death of Lord Tywin Lannister, and book 4, which opens with the other Lannisters finding his body before dawn has broken.
  • The Stars Are Cold Toys duology by Sergey Lukyanenko: Star Shadow starts mere hours after the end of The Stars Are Cold Toys. This makes it seem like the duology is Divided for Publication.
  • Star Wars Legends:
    • The Truce at Bakura begins shortly after the destruction of the Death Star in Return of the Jedi. The Rebel Alliance is still camped on Endor's Sanctuary Moon, its ships and pilots in need of rest and repair. Leia and Han share some Ewok wine, and Luke has to spend several hours in bed in order to recover from the Force Lightning he'd been zapped with on the Death Star.
    • Labyrinth of Evil is an immediate prequel to Revenge of the Sith, ending with General Grevious capturing Palpatine and Obi-Wan and Anakin being recalled to rescue him.
    • Dark Lord—The Rise of Darth Vader starts at the end of Revenge of the Sith, opening with one of the final battles of the Clone Wars and the activation of Order 66, with the story proper is set in the very early days of the Empire. Vader meanwhile is almost completely unknown to everyone, and he spends most of the book struggling to adapt to his new body.
    • Star Wars: Kenobi is also an immediate sequel to Revenge of the Sith, the prologue has Obi-Wan on Tatooine before he's even dropped Luke off with the Lars. The rest of the story is the beginning of his time on Tatooine.
  • The Stormlight Archive: Words of Radiance starts the day after the end of The Way of Kings and the same happens between Words of Radiance and Oathbringer. Rhythm of War bucks this trend, with a one year Time Skip.
  • Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind: The breaks between books rarely take place more than a few instants after the end of the previous one. On several occasions, the new book starts while the characters are still busy celebrating their victory in the previous book. One exception is Faith of the Fallen, but even then, the bulk of the time passing is a timeskip after the book starts. Even the break between the end of the main Sword of Truth series (Confessor) and the start of the new Richard and Kahlan series (The Omen Machine), several years in real time, is maybe half an hour in-universe.
  • Andrei Belyanin's Sword with No Name ends with a short Time Skip after the protagonist returns home, following a phone call from the Medieval European Fantasy world he visited with a request to come back. Guess how the sequel starts. It should be noted that time flows differently in the fantasy world, so this trope is averted for the people there.
  • The Return of Tarzan, the first sequel to Tarzan of the Apes, picks up during the same conversation on which the first novel ended.
  • Thursday Next: The Well of Lost Plots also takes up where Lost in a Good Book leaves off.
  • Time Out of Time: The second book, "The Telling Stone", starts where the first book, "Beyond The Door", ends.
  • In Mikhail Akhmanov's Trevelyan's Mission series, the end of the second novel has the titular protagonist convinced to travel to planet Inferno to deal with the crisis there. The third novel starts with him traveling to Inferno on an AI-controlled ship as the only passenger. After dealing with the book's crisis, he continues on his way to Inferno. Naturally, the fourth novel starts with him arriving to the planet.
  • Two Graves opens by following the last chapter of Cold Vengeance from a different character's POV, then immediately follows up on its cliffhanger mere minutes after the book ended.
  • In the Warrior Cats series, the most notable examples are:
    • The end of Rising Storm and beginning of A Dangerous Path - Rising Storm ends with a cliffhanger, and A Dangerous Path picks up at the same moment. In fact, you could stick the first line of chapter 1 of A Dangerous Path after the last line of Rising Storm, and not know that there was meant to be a break.
    • Starlight begins minutes (at the longest) after Dawn ends - the Clans arrive at the lake just at the beginning of dawn, and Starlight's first page describes how they're staring down at the water, and it still describes it as very early dawn.
    • Twilight and Sunset have a bit of a cliffhanger as well - Twilight ends at the end of a battle, with Brambleclaw seeing two characters he never thought he'd see again, and Sunset begins with him walking over to them.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Annika (2021): Season 2 starts up within hours of Season 1, with the cops off on another murder case. Everyone is worried about Annika, who is still working right after she was held captive in the trunk of her car—though Annika is fine about that: what looks like PTSD to people who aren't privy to Annika's Internal Monologue is actually Annika angsting about whether she should tell Michael he's Morgan's father.
  • Breaking Bad: Flash Forward Cold Open aside, "Seven Thirty-Seven" (and Season 2) starts at and continues on from the end of "A No-Rough-Stuff-Type Deal". Fitting, given how the gap between the episodes' air dates was exactly one year.
  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer:
    • "What's My Line?" (both parts) ended then began with the reveal that Kendra, who is thought to be a villain, is also a Slayer.
    • "Hush" ends with Buffy and Riley awkwardly staring at each other after finding out each other's secret lives. "Doomed" begins when they break the awkwardness.
    • "I Was Made To Love You" ends with Buffy finding Joyce dead. "The Body" begins with Buffy trying to wake Joyce up.
  • Burn Notice
    • Season 1 ends with Michael driving his car into a trailer truck in the middle of the overseas highway. The next season begins when he gets out of the truck and finds himself in the middle of an airstrip that has been attacked.
    • The Season 2 mid-season finale ends with Michael evading a bomb blast. The next episode begins with him walking away while injured. The season itself ends with Michael jumping out of a helicopter in the middle of the ocean. The next season begins with him swimming back to shore.
  • Cobra Kai:
    • Season 2 begins right where season 1 left off; with Johnny being reunited with his former sensei Kreese.
    • Season 3 ended with Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang joining forces. Johnny tells the students "Let's begin!". The next season, Demitri asks "Begin what?".
  • The first season of Dawson's Creek ends with a zoom-out on two characters kissing. The next season begins by zooming back in on them engaging in the same kiss. (Notably, it's the only season break in the series that does not involve an In-Universe summer vacation.)
  • Dexter: While most seasons feature time skips of varying lengths between them, Seasons 5 and 7 begin right after the Wham Episodes which ended the previous seasons; in Season 5's case dealing with the aftermath of Rita's murder by the Trinity Killer, and in Season 7 Deb discovering that Dexter is a serial killer.
  • Doctor Who: As a general rule of thumb, if two stories do not provide any narrative wiggle room for the Doctor in the time frame between them for authors to squeeze in Doctor Who Expanded Universe stories in the gap, they qualify.
  • Friends:
    • Season 2 starts with the now smitten Rachel waiting for Ross at the airport, but he brings his new girlfriend Julie. The only clue that months had passed between seasons is that Matthew Perry and Matt LeBlanc have cut their hair. This becomes part of the B-plot.
    • Seasons 5 and 8 picks up from the previous seasons during a wedding ceremony.
    • Season 6 starts the morning after Ross and Rachel got married in Las Vegas last season.
    • Season 7 has to be the worst example as it begins mere hours after Chandler proposed to Monica. Matthew Perry lost a lot of weight between seasons but this is never acknowledged.
    • Season 9 has Joey accidentally proposing to Rachel, then Ross walks in on them.
    • Season 10 begins when Ross walks in on Joey and Rachel kissing.
  • Game of Thrones:
    • Season 1 episode 9 ends with Ned Stark getting executed. The next episode begins as his carcass is dragged away.
    • Season 2 ends with the Night's Watch being surrounded by an army of the dead. Season 3 begins with the survivors hobbling away from the battle which ended just moments ago.
  • Once Upon a Time:
    • Season 1 ends with David and Mary Margaret embracing each other as a cloud of magic engulfs the town. Season 2 begins with them as the cloud disappears.
    • Season 2 ends with everybody going to Neverland. Season 3 begins the same way.
    • Season 3 ends with Queen Elsa being let out of a magic bottle where she was imprisoned. Season 4 begins with her heading to town.
  • The Outer Limits (1995): "The Origin of Species" begins several minutes after the final scene of "Double Helix" in which Dr. Martin Nodel, his son Paul, Hope and six students board the alien ship which will take them to the homeworld of the race that seeded Earth with their DNA 60 million years ago.
  • Person of Interest:
    • "Number Crunch" ends with Finch narrowly escaping with a seriously wounded Reese. "Super" begins with Finch taking Reese to a morgue so his wound can be stitched up.
    • "2-Pi-R" ends with Reese getting arrested. "Prisoner's Dilemma" begins with him getting interrogated.
    • Season 2 begins where the previous season ended; with Reese answering a phone call from The Machine.
    • Season 4 ends with Team machine fighting their way out of a building. The next season begins with them fanning out all over the city.
  • "Old Friends," the premiere of Season 2 of Resident Alien, picks up right where Season 1 left off with Harry and Max in Harry's spaceship and Max demanding that Harry take him back to Earth.
  • Rome season 1 ends with the deaths of Julius Caesar and Niobe. The next season begins with Caesar's murderers still standing over his body and Vorenus' children walking in on him cradling his wife's body.

    Music 
  • The Notorious B.I.G.'s first album "Ready To Die" ends with "Suicidal Thoughts", where his death is indicated by the stopping of his heart. His second album "Life After Death" begins with his heart beating again.
  • Tupac Shakur's "California Love" music video ends with him waking up from a nightmare. The "California Love Remix" video begins with him telling Dr. Dre about his nightmare.
  • Usher's "U Got It Bad" video ends with him depressed in bed. The "U Don't Have to Call" video begins when he gets a call from P. Diddy to get out of bed because he's coming with them to a party.

    Theatre 
  • Annie Warbucks, the rarely-performed sequel to Annie, literally begins where Annie ends, with the cast singing the last few bars of "A New Deal for Christmas" and Sandy being brought onstage to reunite with Annie.

    Theme Parks 

    Video Games 
  • Aero the Acro-Bat 2 takes place seconds after the first game's ambiguous ending, with Zero saving Edgar Ektor from his apparent downfall. In turn, Zero the Kamikaze Squirrel picks up on the events described in 2's epilogue, as Zero wants to investigate the deforestation of his homeland against his master's wishes.
  • The Framing Device of Assassin's Creed II picks up from the exact moment the first game ended. In Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, the framing story opens with Desmond in the van as the assassins flee their hideout, at most a few hours after II, and Ezio's story starts with him escaping the Vatican, exactly where we left him. The 'present' plot also continues in this fashion in Assassin's Creed: Revelations and Assassin's Creed III.
  • Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear is a later interquel that ends with what was depicted as a premise in the intro of Baldur's Gate II (namely the protagonist and his/her companions leaving the titular city in a hurry and being suddenly captured by figures hidden in shadow under the order of the Big Bad of the sequel). The latter still starts the actual game some times after that premise.
  • Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 ends with Nikolai and Price evacuating the grievously wounded Soap from Afghanistan. Modern Warfare 3 picks up as they land in India.
  • Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker: After the credits, it's revealed the Wii U version takes place right before Super Mario 3D World showing the opening and then Captain Toad falling down the clear pipe, revealing how he is in 3D World and also making the game a Stealth Prequel.
  • In Command And Conquer Generals: Zero Hour, the GLA campaign ends with them destroying the last major US base in Europe. The Chinese campaign begins with the GLA getting hit with a nuclear missile while celebrating their victory.
  • Crash Bandicoot
  • In Digital Devil Saga, the intro of the second game picks up almost literally after the end of the first one.
  • Distorted Travesty 3 starts off several in-universe seconds after Distorted Travesty 2's cliffhanger ending.
  • Duke Nukem 3D starts as Duke is coming home from his abduction in Duke Nukem II.
    • Duke Nukem Forever parodies this by starting with Duke playing the previous game and beating the final boss.
  • Ecco: The Tides of Time picks up with Ecco frolicking among his podmates just after rescuing them... and with the final boss of the first game following the escaping dolphins back to Earth.
  • The end of God of War II has the Titans scaling Mount Olympus to wage war against the gods. God of War III picks up as they're still climbing. The last line Kratos says in II is also the first line he says in III, and it comes after Zeus gives a Rousing Speech to the gods in both games.
  • Golden Sun: The Lost Age opens up where the previous game left off, minus the epilogue (which saw the Player Party sail off) since the main character is now the antagonist of the previous game. It begins at the point where Felix and his True Companions (minus Saturos and Menardi, since they were the previous game's Final Boss) were last seen; leaving the Venus tower.
  • Half-Life 2 doesn't fully qualify as about two decades have passed after Half-Life, but since Gordon Freeman was frozen in time, from his frame of reference they follow on immediately. Episodes One and Two play it straight, each starting more or less immediately where the previous game left off; it's still possible Gordon was knocked out for some time, but for all intents and purposes it doesn't matter.
  • Halo 3 starts with Master Chief performing a Rocketless Reentry after jumping off the Forerunner Dreadnought that he ended Halo 2 on as it lands on Earth.
  • Hero of Sparta ends with you sailing back home to Sparta after escaping the underworld. The sequel begins it's first stage with your arrival in Sparta and realizing the city is being attacked by various monsters, with you kicking ass before even leaving your ship.
  • Hitman 2 is set immediately after the first game ends, with the gap not being any longer than a week. Hitman 3 is set no more than two weeks after Hitman 2.
  • The Incredibles: Rise of the Underminer picks up directly where the movie ended, with the heroes facing the eponymous villain. This was rendered Canon Discontinuity by Incredibles 2, which also picks up at the exact same spot as mentioned above.
  • Jumper Two opens with Ogmo jumping off a plane that made up the final sector of the first Jumper.
  • King's Quest III ends with Graham tossing his adventurer's cap to his children. King's Quest IV opens with the same scene.
  • Kingdom Hearts:
  • Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver:
    • Part 1 ends has Raziel having a boss fight with Kain then he chases Kain into a portal where he meets Moebius. Part 2 retcons the boss fight into a FMV cutscene.
    • Part 2 ends with Raziel storming the Sarafan stronghold and killing the Sarafan knights including his past human self to avenge Janos. Kain realizes that they have both been manipulated by the Elder God and that Janos must stay dead. Raziel then vanishes back into the underworld. When Defiance begins, Kain must fight his way out of the stronghold.
  • The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky's First Chapter ends with Estelle being sedated by Joshua and left to sleep on her bed. The Second Chapter begins the next day as she's waking up. If not for a few subtle changes to the game's interface and font, you'd not know they weren't part of the same game. Seeing as it's a Two-Part Trilogy, it makes sense.
  • The Legend of Zelda:
  • The Mary Skelter series features an unusual example. Mary Skelter: Nightmares ends with the group preparing to escape from underground. Mary Skelter 2 is Butterfly of Doom caused by time travel shenanigans, with a potential Stable Time Loop being severed in the Embedded Precursor version of the first game that results in an ending that is roughly the same as the original's. Mary Skelter Finale happens immediately after the heroes escape from underground.
  • Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor ended with the protagonist Talion promising to forge a new Ring of Power. Middle-earth: Shadow of War opens with him and Celebrimbor setting out to do just that. On an extended note, the Blade of Galadriel DLC for Shadow of War starts where the sequel left off with A corrupted Talion gazing at the Palantir and setting off to perpetuate a Forever War against the Lord of Mordor
  • Mortal Kombat has done this a few times.
  • The good ending to Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee ends with Abe attending a ceremony celebrating his rescue of the Mudokon slaves. Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus's opening cutscene is Abe falling off the stage at that ceremony and getting knocked unconscious, where he has a Prophetic Dream that kicks off the game's plot. Gameplay itself starts a couple days later when Abe travels to the location mentioned in the dream.
  • The Other series: The Other: Airi's Adventure, and The Other: Rosie's Road of Love: The second happens not long after the first's heroes return home.
  • The Paper Dolls sequel takes place immediately after the first. The original game ends with you getting sucked into a vortex leading to the spirit world, and the second game begins with you exploring said world.
  • Psychonauts in the Rhombus of Ruin takes place immediately after the ending of Psychonauts, and Psychonauts 2 takes places mere minutes later.
  • Putrefaction ends with you entering a portal. The sequel opens with you emerging from said portal, discovering another universe.
  • Most games in the Quest for Glory franchise take place immediately following one another; Quest for Glory I ends with the Hero departing Spielberg with Khameen, Shema, and Abdulla on their flying carpet, with Quest for Glory II picking up in its credits with their flight and arrival in Shapeir. Quest for Glory III ends with the Hero trapped in a spell, while Quest for Glory IV begins with him arriving in Mordavia (somewhat played with in that the malfunctioning spell requires a couple weeks to get him to Mordavia thanks to the Dark One's influence). IV in turn ends with the Hero spirited off to Silmaria, and Quest for Glory V begins with his arrival in Erasmus's house. The only break the Hero gets in the entire series is the time he spent lounging around Shapeir between II and III.
  • The Return of Ishtar begins with Ki and Gil right where they were at the end of The Tower of Druaga; i.e., at the top of the tower. They have to go down.
  • Shenmue III begins with the Cliffhanger that ended the previous game, which is Ryo and Shenhua discovering massive replicas of the Dragon and Phoenix Mirrors carved into the walls of a stone quarry, and Shenhua reciting a poem.
  • The Sonic the Hedgehog series:
    • Sonic 3 takes place immediately after the 16-bit version of Sonic 2. Sonic rides Tails's biplane back down to sea level to escape the Death Egg that ended Sonic 2. The first land sighted happens to be the Floating Island, where guardian Knuckles the Echidna ambushes Sonic and steals his Chaos Emeralds, kicking off the plot of Sonic 3. The Death Egg crash-landed here too, and Dr. Eggman wants those Emeralds to relaunch it. Sonic 3 ends and Sonic & Knuckles begins when Eggman finds the Hidden Palace and its Super Emeralds. However, this is a subversion since Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles are actually One Game for the Price of Two, so they were never meant to be separate installments in the first place.
      • This has been retroactively applied to the four main Classic Sonic games with Story Mode in Sonic Origins, which suggests the events of each game happened immediately after the previous one, with newly animated Pre-Rendered Cutscenes bridging the stories together into one massive epic.
    • Sonic Mania ends with the Phantom Ruby opening a dimensional portal and traveling through it, pulling Sonic into it in the process. The both of them wind up in the dimension of Modern Sonic, where Dr. Eggman uses the Phantom Ruby to Take Over the World before Sonic Mania's Sonic could arrive there, kicking off the story for Sonic Forces.
    • Sonic Forces ends with Classic Sonic returning to his own dimension due to the defeat of Eggman and the Phantom Ruby. This sets the stage for the Updated Re-release of Sonic Mania, Sonic Mania Plus, whose Encore Mode opens with Sonic and the Phantom Ruby returning to Angel Island.
      • Strangely, the first episode of Sonic Mania Adventures (the animated YouTube series based on Sonic Mania) also seems to suggest it too is an Immediate Sequel to Forces with Sonic returning to his own dimension in the middle of waving good bye, meaning he went somewhere between the final battle in Egg Reverie and coming back to his world. The subsequent events between Adventures and Encore Mode are irreconcilable yet both suggest that they are canon to Forces.
  • Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon takes place with Roger still in cold sleep which he entered at the end of the second one, although this trope could be averted for everyone but Roger, since we're not told how much time has passed. Space Quest IV opens with Roger stopping off at a bar on his way home from Space Quest III's ending. Space Quest 6 starts with Roger being court-martialed for his actions in Space Quest V, implying that not much time passes between the games.
  • Spider-Man 2 – Enter: Electro takes place shortly after Spider-Man (2000), as part of the start sees Peter reading a copy of the Daily Bugle talking about the capture of Dr. Octopus and the end sees Electro, Shocker, and Hammerhead in the cell across from Dr. Octopus, Mysterio, Scorpion, Rhino, and a Jade Syndicate goon.
  • Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People: The fourth episode, Dangeresque 3, ends with Strong Bad jumping off his couch to escape being surrounded by the other characters, who were not happy with the changes he made to the movie compared to what he promised them. The fifth and final episode, 8-Bit is Enough, opens with Strong Bad landing from that very jump, crashing into and damaging the Trogdor arcade machine in the process.
  • Sunrider: Liberation Day picks up right after the end of Sunrider: Mask Of Arcadius, with Veniczar Fontana having just unmasked the titular Arcadius as one of the Prototypes, a cabal of hive-minded clones bent on ruling the galaxy from the shadows, and Chigara freaking out at the realization that said Prototypes look exactly like her.
  • Super Metroid recounts the story of Samus finding a baby metroid at the end of the previous game, then explains that she took it to a laboratory, before said laboratory was attacked. The minute she arrives back at the lab is when the game actually begins.
  • Syphon Filter 3 begins at Teresa's funeral, which was the end of part 2.
  • Tekken 5 begins after Jin leaves Hon-Maru in his ending of Tekken 4. Kazuya and Heihachi wake up from their beatings with just enough time to be greeted by an invasion of Jack robots. The actual tournament begins a month later.
  • Viewtiful Joe ends with Silvia getting a V-watch and UFOs invading Movie Land. Viewtiful Joe 2 picks up right then, in the final scene of the first game, with Joe and Silvia making their way toward the new enemy.
  • Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap starts with beating the previous game's final boss.
  • The second part of Xenosaga begins right where the first part left off.
  • The Fan Sequel Yo! Noid 2: Enter the Void happens after the Noid claims his pizzas for saving New York in the original game.
  • Yoshi's New Island takes place immediately after the original albeit with a Retcon: the parents who were brought the Mario Bros. are actually not their parents.
  • Ys: Ancient Ys Vanished ~ Omen ends with series protagonist Adol Christin defeating Dark Fact at the top of Darm Tower and acquiring his Book of Ys before being consumed in light. Ys II: Ancient Ys Vanished – The Final Chapter opens with Adol waking up on the titular Floating Continent after being teleported there. In fact, both games are so closely related that all subsequent re-releases of them bundle them together as Ys I & II.
  • The original Zork trilogy directly picks up where you finished the last adventure. The second game has you getting up after you've fallen into a barrow. The third installment has you tumbling down the enchanted staircase where the second ends.

    Webcomics 
  • Early Dominic Deegan storylines tended to start a week or even the day after the previous one has concluded, resulting in everything from Luna's introduction to the War in Hell taking place in a timespan of about a month. The trope ends up being deconstructed as by the time of the War in Hell, Dominic is utterly exhausted from having to continually save the day without any real downtime to recuperate. After that, new plots would usually start a few months after the prior one.

    Western Animation 

 
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Force Awakens to Last Jedi

The Last Jedi picks right up with Luke taking his light sabre from Rey. And then immediately discarding it.

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Immediate Prequel

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Assassin's Cree...

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Force Awakens to Last Jedi

The Last Jedi picks right up with Luke taking his light sabre from Rey. And then immediately discarding it.

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5 (11 votes)

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Force Awakens t...

Spider-Man: Far...

Immediate Prequel

Assassin's Cree...

Assassin's Cree...