Our paper focuses on how Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (TRCs) deal with dissonant memories in transitional justice processes. Truth and Reconciliation Commissions aim to shed light on a traumatic near past marked by murders, disappearances, torture, suffering, and structural discrimination, by bringing together perpetrators and victims simultaneously. The prominent place given to the words and memories of the victims, combined with the rhetoric of forgiveness used by most of the perpetrators, is supposed to contribute to the construction of pacified memories that will allow society to be rebuilt despite this dissonant heritage. However, while speaking out can certainly be a relief for victims at first, the reopening of the wound it causes can lead to more unrest in the long run. Moreover, one of the flaws of these commissions seems to be the gap between the expectations they raised and the concrete measures taken by governments afterwards. From a methodological point of view, our article is situated at the intersection of law, anthropology, and history. We examine four different TRCs, followed by a comparative analysis of selected cases and an evaluation of outcomes. Our idea is to explore several geographic areas, so we have chosen the Togolese, the Chilean, the South African, and the German Commissions. These Commissions dealt with different dissonant memories and political regimes, yet they developed crosscutting concepts, processes, and practices. We consider the specificities and differences between the Commissions in order to see how they address these dissonant pasts.