Revealing something about somebody through their personal effects, often posthumously, in Live-Action TV series.
- Averted in Angel. After Doyle's death, Cordelia tries to do this but finds that Doyle didn't have any personal effects kept in the office, so she couldn't learn any more about him.
- But then, it turns out he did leave something behind (albeit not something tangible): his visions. At the end of the episode, Cordelia even frames a drawing she made of her first vision as a reminder that something of Doyle's is still there.
- Battlestar Galactica does this trope once or twice when pilots are killed.
- One of the last episodes of Babylon 5 has Zack find a vital clue to catching an assassin in the effects of a security guard killed by the assassin for his comlink: the fake replacement comlink.
- This is actually done when Franklin goes through Captain Sheridan's effects after he died at Z'Ha'Dum and finds a datacrystal in which Sheridan professes his love for Delenn. It's an extremely moving message, and Delenn quotes from it as she enjoins the Rangers and the White Star fleet to launch a desperate final assault on the Shadow's homeworld: "A friend told me, if you're falling off a cliff, you might as well try to fly. Here, and now, I give you one final chance to fly."
- Happened on Bones after Zach has been revealed as evil, crippled, and institutionalized. Remarkable in that it didn't involve an actual death, but still a major tearjerker.
- Happens in Brothers & Sisters. One of the central mysteries to the first season is the identity of a baby found in one of William Walker's photographs. And since they can't ask him (being dead and all), the first answer they get to the question is the wrong one.
- CSI does this with Warrick, mostly to get something to bury him in, and it's then that Catherine and Greg find the documents and video relating to Warrick's custody fight for his infant son, Eli.
- In Dharma & Greg, an elderly neighbor dies and the title characters read her diary, which seems to indicate that she died a virgin. This sets up the episode's central plot, which is the neighbor's spirit possibly possessing Dharma's body and having sex with Greg.
- Occurs in the Doctor Who story Terminus, where it is revealed that new companion Turlough has inherited Adric's quarters on board the TARDIS, Adric having been killed off towards the end of the previous season. This leads to a scene in which artifacts relating to Adric's time with the Doctor make cameo appearances.
- Parodied in Firefly; when River and Simon are kidnapped in the episode "Safe," Jayne rifles through Simon's belongings, stealing his cash and mocking him in his journal."Dear Diary, today I was pompous and my sister was crazy. Today we were kidnapped by hillfolk never to be seen again. It was the best day ever."
- When they return to the ship at the end of the episode, Jayne tries to return their stuff before they notice, running into Simon on his way out.
- Forever: Played with in "The Night In Question." When Henry and Abe finally learn where Abigail went after she left them, her landlady had kept a box of stuff "Sylvia" left behind when she disappeared. They take the box home, but there's nothing but everyday junk inside. Then, Henry finds a letter tucked into a ratty old poetry book, which Abigail never got the chance to send, asking Henry to come join her so they can spend the rest of Abigail's life together.
- Parodied in the penultimate episode of Friends, where the gang find a set of furry hand-cuffs in the closet in Monica's spare room. After going through all of the old inhabitants of the room (Monica, Rachel, and Phoebe), they come to the conclusion that they belonged to Monica and Ross' grandmother.Wow, Nana liked it rough!
- In "The one where Mr.Heckles dies" Monica and Rachel are left all of the belongings of their annoying downstairs neighbor, and they discover he has many similarities to Chandler.
- In Gilmore Girls, Richard's mother, "Trix," dies, and he's so distraught that Emily takes charge over the arrangements. While going through her things, she and Lorelei discover a letter that Trix sent to Richard right before his and Emily's wedding, begging him not to go through with it. Emily is so furious that she leaves Lorelei to take care of everything, which rapidly proves to be too much for her to handle.
- Horatio Hornblower: The TV movie/episode The Fire Ships, the men are auctioning off the possessions of a deceased crewmate, to send the proceeds home to his widow. The deceased sailor's best friend, stricken with guilt, hands over all of his money for the entire collection and throws it overboard.
- Interesting use in an early episode of Lost: the survivors hold a memorial for those who died in the crash, whom they didn't know. They go through their effects to glean what they can for the service.
- M*A*S*H:
- In the episode "Death Takes a Holiday," during a Christmas party for local orphans, Hawkeye, BJ, and Margaret try to help a wounded G.I. After seeing there was no chance to save him, Margaret finds a photo of his wife and kids. BJ decides to try to keep him alive for a few hours more, so his kids "won't think of Christmas as the day their daddy died."
- In the episode "Who Knew?" has Hawkeye preparing to eulogize a nurse who died after stepping on a landmine. While going through her personal effects, Father Mulcahy comes across her diary, where she revealed her strong feelings for Hawkeye, with whom she'd spent what he'd assumed to be a casual one-night-stand.
- In an episode of NCIS Gibbs takes one last look through a box of personal effects gathered from the desk of a deceased agent. He explains to Ziva it's a tradition of making sure nothing upsetting in that box makes it back to the family.
- After Rimmer leaves in Red Dwarf, Lister has to throw out his old things to reduce the weight on the ship and gets teary-eyed at the memories. Kryten then decides to 'cheer him up' by collecting Rimmer's old journals and making 'The Rimmer Experience' ride on the holodeck. Lister suddenly remembers why he hated Rimmer so much.
- In an early episode of Stargate SG-1, when it's believed Daniel's been killed (this is before it became a character trait, believe it or not), the rest of SG-1 go through this. Carter ends up finding Daniel's journal from the original movie, among other things.
- Star Trek: The Next Generation: Geordi and Wesley do this for Data after he's believed to have been killed in "The Most Toys", including working out which possessions go to which crew member. They end up discovering a photo/holograph of Tasha Yar, a book on William Shakespeare (a gift from the captain), and a set of playing cards. Wesley is also surprised to discover Data's medals—including several of Starfleet's highest honours. The audience knew about these from the earlier episode, "The Measure Of A Man", but the characters apparently didn't.Geordi: Not bad for a walking pile of circuitry and memory cells.
- Parodied in the episode of Strangers with Candy where Jerri's father dies. She goes through his closet looking through his stuff—we see some intriguing things like a huge wad of money, a gun, and a KKK outfit... but Jerri just laments that she's still learned nothing about him.
- Supernatural:
- It's some time after the death, but the boys eventually find their father's storage locker. Although they were actually looking for something plot relevant, they also find some of Sam's old report cards and the first shotgun that Dean sawed off by himself.
- After Bobby's death, Dean keeps his flask. After Dean and Sam burn his body, his ghost is able to manifest itself, because the flask was a huge part of him.
- Subverted in an episode of Van der Valk: After a teenage petty thief falls to his death while fleeing from the police, the titular detective finds himself going through the personal effects of the tourist whose suitcase the boy had stolen. Much to his dismay, it turned out that there was nothing of significant value in the case; he died over a couple of changes of clothes, some toiletries, and a paperback Agatha Christie novel.
- Warehouse 13 does this at the end of an episode where they investigated the death of a former Warehouse agent. In his personal effects (untouched since he died), they find an engagement ring, meant for Rebecca - who had previously said that her dead boyfriend/former partner "always chose the Warehouse before me."Agent Bering: (showing her the ring) Looks like he chose you after all.
- In the Australian series Water Rats the police search the flat of a lonely man who committed suicide and find a sex doll there. When his father comes to pick up his personal items, the doll has mysteriously disappeared.
- After prominent drug kingpin Stringer Bell is killed on The Wire, the cops find and go to his apartment... and are shocked to see that it's a tastefully decorated apartment that looks like it should belong to a corporate executive. McNulty in particular is surprised to realise that they knew nothing about the guy they'd been investigating for years.McNulty: [After pulling an edition of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations off a bookshelf] Who the fuck was I chasing?
- Happens (sort of) on The X-Files in the hunt for Mulder after he goes missing. While looking through his things, Scully finds that Mulder was keeping a terrible secret: he was dying from a brain disorder and had never told her. He had a headstone made and was getting his affairs in order.
