Disney Death- A Question

This question to mind because of a spoiler I heard about the newest novel in The Culture, Surface Detail. From what I understand, a character who seemed potentially dying at the end of a previous book turns out to be alive and well.

So, I was kind of wondering if Disney Death would apply to situations like this in which within a work a character seems fairly clearly dead, but turns out alive in a sequel. I sort of have this Schrodinger's Cat idea in mind- between the original work and the sequel, the character is in a state of flux.

There are a number of tropes about this subject, with subtle distinctions.

• Disney Death is about someone dying and getting better within the same work, largely to prevent kids from being traumatized. Generally used in media aimed at the younger crowd.
• Staying Alive is when a character explicitly dies, but then simply appears again in The Stinger or the next episode with no explanation.
• Not Quite Dead is when a character looks like they were killed, but wasn't, quite.
• Back from the Dead is when a character explicitly died and was explicitly brought back to life, rather than it being handwaved or ignored.
• Only Mostly Dead is when a character dies, but Death Is Cheap and they can be brought back with a modicum of effort. It's where there's a stated distinction between this type of death and Killed Off for Real.

edited 21st Oct '10 8:45:48 PM by Fighteer

Thanks, that's kind of helpful. I was also thinking of the best trope for an example I added (which I counted as a Disney Death, but might be Staying Alive). In Darker Than Black, one character, Amigiri is last seen in the first season being set on fire by a pyrokenetic character. Since she killed every single other person she did this to and this is an Anyone Can Die series, there's no reason to think that he survived. However, he shows up alive but scarred in an interquel OVA.

That sounds like a Not Quite Dead. He isn't explicitly killed (no one declares him dead or is weeping over the body) but there's no reason for the audience to think that he isn't — except that he shows up alive later.