Kill Revive Kill

[tinkerdan]

Very cute;

The second time... well, everybody dies (a final time [that sounds odd!]) eventually.

Everyone dies a final time, I've suffered to avoid that. The problem is that one can never tell which one that is, so I've tended toward trying to avoid them all. Not that I'm a coward. Its just that I've gotten to where I've slunk along the sides of buildings, like a rat, among the shadows with an alert eye cast every which way to keep watch and to duck into stank alleyways one moment and swiftly out again in case the dark eminence waited somewhere in its deepest recess. Ever vigilant. Even in the worst inclement weather I've gazed up constantly, listened carefully, and came to a place where I could smell death when it drew near. Trouble with habits, even the good ones, is that they're habits and are observable. So, when two imminent possibilities from opposite directions approached, the odor was distinct, the absence of sound was an eerie disquiet, I slipped down an alley I knew was shortest and broke out into a bustling street; only to come face to face with the enemy. Who'd have thought she'd be so disarming.

I starred into the face of death and didn't have to ask which one it was.

 

[Plucky Novice]

What are your thoughts on the situation where a character is killed, then brought back to life, only to be killed off permanently later on (either in the next book, or later in the story)? And any examples where this is done? I don't need any where they're killed and brought back as that's a pretty common thing.

Ta.

Obvious example for me is voldemort but to be fair he starts the book dead, comes back to life and pretty much makes it to the end of the series.

More concerning to me is not wanting to write the character. If you don't enjoy writing your characters, you can't expect people to enjoy reading them.

Have you thought of why you don't like writing the character and what you could change so that you do?

Are they better off dead?

 

[Culhwch]

First character that jumped to my mind was Ser Beric Dondarrion in A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones. I can't recall if he's still kicking in the books, but he's definitively dead in the show, after many a resurrection.

 

[CTRandall]

There's a ghost story from Cumbria in which a woman dies and her coffin is being carried by horse to the nearest church yard. On the way, the horse bumps against a rowan tree, the coffin falls off its back and the woman pops out, hale and hearty. She goes on to live for several more years but, as with all things, once more passes to the great beyond. Again, her body is being carried to the church yard but, as the horse nears the rowan, the woman's husband calls out, "Mind the tree!"

The End

Works for me!

 

[Jondo_]

First character that jumped to my mind was Ser Beric Dondarrion in A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones. I can't recall if he's still kicking in the books, but he's definitively dead in the show, after many a resurrection.

He's gone in the books as well, having passed his life on to Lady Stoneheart.

Since nobody's mentioned it yet, Neil Gaiman does something along these lines in American Gods. I won't go into too much detail, but I think he does an alright job with it (since the resurrection and second death comes along with some pretty extensive character shifts and relationship changes).

The key, I think, is to have the death-resurrection-death mean something as a sequence. A death can pack a punch, do stuff for the story etc etc, as can a surprise resurrection. A second death, however, if it's not informed by / presented in relation to the first one, will probably fail to hit the mark.

 

[Mouse]

Oh derp, I forgot Laura from American Gods!

I'm not bored with writing the character, it's more that their story is kinda done, plus I found them quite difficult to write.

 

[The Big Peat]

A little late to the party but in addition to American Gods and Song of Ice and Fire, I'd point out that a few of the Forsaken in Wheel of Time are killed, brought back from the dead, and then killed again in different ways. I think that Windle Poots dies, comes back from the dead, then dies again in Pratchett's Reaper Man. Also in Feist's books over the long haul. Kinda one of the characters in the Dresden Files too.

Also kinda alluded to in a few of Pratchett's other books (both through vampirism and serial reincarnation) and the web comic The Order of the Stick (where the difference between death you can come back from and permanent final death definitely exists).

In short, it seems a reasonably common thing in Fantasy, and it wouldn't bother me.

 

[mistri]

Any book or show where someone dies and then comes back to life more than once, makes it pretty certain that I will never trust any future death on that show. That I will always be thinking/hoping/assuming there's a chance they will come back.

Arguably, if you're planning to do it, it may be useful to show it once to prove it can happen to your character too, but even so, it's a tricky path to walk...

 

[tegeus-Cromis]

They did this on Gotham all the time. Galavan, Butch/Solomon Grundy, etc etc.

 

[Mouse]

Ok so it seems like most people would be fine with it provided it was done well, which is always the answer isn't it! So now I just have to decide whether it's worth writing the sequel, which might be another thread.

 

[CupofJoe]

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned Buffy. She died.. a lot.
And there was cost to her [and others] when other people brought her back.
As others have said there has to a good reason why death is not permanent in the first case. And for why revival/return has happened and is exceptional.

 

[tinkerdan]

Good thought--though it ignores what the op asks for: Which is coming back only to die permanently:

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned Buffy. She died.. a lot.
And there was cost to her [and others] when other people brought her back.
As others have said there has to a good reason why death is not permanent in the first case. And for why revival/return has happened and is exceptional.

I think what might be a close analogy to the OP would be Ghost Whiperer.

Where the person is not resurrected; however their ghost lingers as a character until something is resolved.
The resolution allows them to go forward and they are effectively finished with the dying process.
Their function is motivation for the main character to locate what is keeping them here. Then they are gone.

This is much the same in Dean Koontz's Odd Thomas series where he has to help ghosts resolve issues so they can move on.

So, if there is a reason for them to come back and that gets resolved in some way and they die permanently and it all makes sense to the story, then there shouldn't be a problem.

 

[Mouse]

Yeah, Buffy doesn't die permanently.

I pondered the ghost thing, but I've done that before in Whitecott Manor.