History ComicBook / RachelRising

** Malus claims to a woman who is "pushing 50" that Zoe is old enough to be the woman's mother. As noted above, Lilith puts Zoe at 57 years old. While there are [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_youngest_birth_mothers a handful of recorded cases of girls 8 years old or less giving birth]], it certainly isn't the norm, nor is it what's generally meant when people say that somebody could be their mother or their father.

* PostCreditStinger: Perhaps the first comic book to pull a MarvelCinematicUniverse after-credits sequel bait scene in the final issue.

* AbortedArc /FauxShadowing: [[spoiler: The writer with the yard full of corpses was being set up as Rachel's killer, up to and including him reacting with shock at a picture of her alive and coming home to the little girl who saw Rachel's spirit walking around staring at him...only to disappear from the story and never be addressed again, with a last issue twist of a completely different character being her killer instead]].

* AbortedArc/FauxShadowing: [[spoiler: The writer with the yard full of corpses was being set up as Rachel's killer, up to and including him reacting with shock at a picture of her alive and coming home to the little girl who saw Rachel's spirit walking around staring at him...only to disappear from the story and never be addressed again, with a last issue twist of a completely different character being her killer instead]].

* TheAntichrist: The demon Malus wants to produce one, even quipping about how he will needs far fewer generation to produce his "avatar" than God needed to produce the "avatar" we know today as Jesus.

* ReincarnationRomance: Thoroughly averted. [[spoiler:Rachel's past life had a PrecociousCrush on and older boy named James. James, it turns out, is reincarnated in the present generation as Jet, but even after this revelation Rachel definitely has no romantic feelings for Jet, and nor does she when James' spirit temporarily possesses Jet's body.]]

In January 2016 Moore announced that the series would be concluding with issue #42, which would bring the story up to 7 trade paperbacks. At one point there was talk of adapting the series for television, but that fell through in 2013 and Moore hasn't found any other takers for the script.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: An InUniverse case regarding [[spoiler:Carol apparently freaking out and trying to poison the entire main cast.]] Johnny claims that the note left behind doesn't fit either [[spoiler:Carol's]] handwriting or way of thinking, and Rachel offers the possibility that Malus have possessed her and forced her to take those actions. (Which he has certainly done before.) However, [[TheGrimReaper Angel of Death]] Ma Malai reacted to [[spoiler:Carol]] the same way she does to bad people. So either the gang is wrong, or Ma Malai treats people who've been controlled by Malus as though they're responsible for any evil committed while possessed, which is a pretty horrifying prospect.

* AssholeVictim: They tend to show up regularly. Being mean or sexually abusive to women or children will usually mark you for a quick death. [[spoiler:Malus gets Zoe to kill someone he claims is this, but given how manipulative, evil, and untrustworthy Malus is, odds are he simply had Zoe kill an innocent and lied to her.]]
* TheBeastmaster: One of the two witches following Lilith commands a pair of wolves

* BuryYourGays: Zigzagged. [[spoiler:Aunt Johnny, who is apparently a trans woman in a relationship with another woman, gets saved from imminent death where an attempt was made to poison all the protagonists at once. Her partner Carol wasn't so fortunate, however.]]

** Later Malus claims that mortuary assistant Robert Mann was the true Jack the Ripper, although who knows if he's telling the truth or simply messing with the head of the person he's talking to.
* DarkIsNotEvil Rachel tends to dress entirely in black following rising from the grave, complete with UhOhEyes (which Johnny theorizes is a result of blood vessels in her eyes bursting as she was strangled) and a nasty scar around her neck, but she's the main protagonist.

* FlatEarthAtheist: Aunt Johnny spends the first three volumes insisting that everything has a rational, scientific explanation, despite seeing things like her niece ([[spoiler:and her niece's best friend]]) come back from the dead several times. Jet even makes a comment that Johnny's attitude toward science can be similar to that of a TheFundamentalist towards their chosen religion.

* OnlyMostlyDead: After first rising from her grave, any fatal injury that Rachel suffers sends her into this state. Given enough time, she'll get back up again as though nothing had happened. [[spoiler:This later applies to Jet, (who gets hit with this regularly, as listed under TheyKilledKennyAgain) and also Aunt Johnny when Rachel tries to save Johnny from the edge of death by stuffing Johnny's soul into a dog and keeping Johnny's body just barely alive. Strangely enough, it ''doesn't'' seem as though other reincarnated witches who were helping Lillith get this benefit for reasons that are never explained.]]

* RevenantZombie: More or less what Rachel is, except she's so fresh that apparently extreme pallor and the damage suffered by her body while she was being killed are the only surface signs that she's undead.
* RevengeBeforeReason: Lilith, who apparently thinks that taking revenge on the descendants of people from 300 years ago is perfectly logical and justified.

** When Aunt Johnny first sees Rachel, she assumes that she is having a case of this. She details how her mind has a habit of trying to distract her during the course of her work by conjuring up visitors. She first assumes Rachel to be another one of these. Doctor Siemen, as we come to learn, has suffered a much more serious case of it.

** Lilith appears to be undergoing a much larger and more destructive case of it.
* {{Seers}}: Rachel starts tapping into a talent for telling the future after her death.

** At one point point Rachel makes a snarky comment about Jet tweeting all through class during high school. Rachel earlier said that she's 28, and from everything we see Jet is about the same age. The story started publishing in 2012 and is set in the same time, (Lilith talks about how Zoe is 57 and was born in 1955) and Twitter only was founded in 2006. So even if they were using Twitter the moment it became available, Jet and Rachel would have needed to still be in high school at 22 in order to tweet during a high school class.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: An InUniverse case regarding [[spoiler:Carol apparently freaking out and trying to poison the entire main cast.]] Johnny claims that the note left behind doesn't fit either [[spoiler:Carol's]] handwriting or way of thinking, and Rachel offers the possibility that Malus have possessed her and forced her to take those actions. (Which he has certainly done before.) However, AngelOfDeath Ma Malai reacted to [[spoiler:Carol]] the same way she does to bad people. So either the gang is wrong, or Ma Malai treats people who've been controlled by Malus as though they're responsible for any evil committed while possessed, which is a pretty horrifying prospect.

-->Tonight you feel five stories onto a car, Rachel. They had to pry you out of the roof you crushed. The [=EMTs=] at the scene found no signs of life and declared you legally dead. But here you are two hours later standing and talking to us, so either Jet and I are sharing a grief-induced illusion or you're not dead. At least, not medically. But the state you're in is not conducive to life either. You didn't feel the pin [that was sticking out of Rachel's finger] for the same reason you didn't feel the fall - your nervous system is in a kind of stasis - your whole body is. Your pulse is down somewhere around six beats a minute, your skin is cool to the touch, your breathing is almost undetectable...you're deathly pale but still pink, indicating some, if minimal, circulation. The acute petechial hemorrhaging in your eyes is caused by the blood vessels bursting during the trauma of asphyxiation. The marks on your neck are from strangulation. Rachel, you should not be alive. By all known medical reason, your next breath should be your last.

* {{Intangibility}}: Malus is a spirit who possesses human hosts and then moves on the moment they die, even if it's just flatlining before being resuscitated in the hospital. With the permission of the hose and the proper spell, however, Lilith is able to talk to him while he's still [[spoiler:inside Zoe]].

''Rachel Rising'' is a comic series with a focus on horror and the supernatural by Creator/TerryMoore, perhaps best known for ''ComicBook/StrangersInParadise'' and ''ComicBook/{{Echo}}''.

** During a tense conversation with Lilith, Malus claims they are only 5 generations from the day of Firehill. Malus must be using a different definition of generation than most people if 300 years = 5 generations, especially considering that historically speaking people in the US were generally having their first children at somewhere around 20 years old. The word he wants is ''lifetimes''.

* AssholeVictim: They tend to show up with a decent regularity. Being mean or sexually abusive to women or children will usually mark you for a quick death. [[spoiler:Malus gets Zoe to kill someone he claims is this, but given how manipulative, evil, and untrustworthy Malus is, odds are he simply had Zoe kill an innocent and lied to her.]]

Meanwhile, the same woman that watched Rachel rise from the grave is making her way around town, causing mayhem in her wake, with a specialty for causing people to murder their loved ones. In particular, she targets and follows a young girl named Zoe, who takes to murder with unnerving skill. When Rachel and Zoe meet and Rachel tries to confront the woman in white, what had been a bad couple of days for Rachel and Zoe becomes some very bad days for ''everyone'' around,

** At one point point Rachel makes a snarky comment about Jet tweeting all through class during high school. Rachel earlier said that she's 28, and from everything we see Jet is about the same age. The story started publishing in 2012 and is set in the same time, (Lilith talks about how Zoe is 57 and was born in 1955) and Twitter only was founded in 2006. So even if they were using Twitter the moment it became available, Jet and Rachel would have needed to still be in high school at 22.
** Malus claims to a woman who is "pushing 50" that Zoe is old enough to be the woman's mother. As noted above, Lilith puts Zoe at 57 years old. While there are a handful of recorded cases of girls 8 years old or less giving birth, it certainly isn't the norm.

* CreepyMortician: Aunt Johnny is a mortician, and while she's not creepy she does certainly have the wry sense of humor thing going, along with an admitted lack of skill in dealing with the living.

** [[spoiler:Zoe turns out to be the host of a demon called Malus, and as a result has appeared 10 years old for almost 50 years.]]

* FlatEarthAtheist: Aunt Johnny spends the first three volumes insisting that everything has a rational, scientific explanation, despite seeing things like her niece ([[spoiler:and her niece's best friend]]) come back from the dead several times. Jet even makes a comment that Jet's attitude toward science can be similar to that of a TheFundamentalist towards their chosen religion.
* HistoricalInJoke: Malus strongly hints that Zoe is the great granddaughter of Jack the Ripper, as he claims the man was Robert Mann, (one of many possible suspects for Jack) and gives her a very special knife that he calls Jack that belonged to her great grandfather. Malus is also hitned to have been either possessed or been collaborating with the Ripper.

* MadeOfIron: One fo the benefits of undeath seems to be that Rachel suffers little or no physical harm from things that should turn her into a pretzel.

-->'''Woman in Bathroom:''' WHOA! Honey, I want whatever you're drinkin'.\\

** The mysterious woman who instigates so many of the events of the comics claims to be [[spoiler:Lilith, the first woman, who Eve eventually replaced.]]

* WritersCannotDoMath: During a tense conversation with Lilith, Malus claims they are only 5 generations from the day of Firehill. Malus must be using a different definition of generation than most people if 300 years = 5 generations.

* Flat EarthAtheist: Aunt Johnny spends the first three volumes insisting that everything has a rational, scientific explanation, despite seeing things like her niece ([[spoiler:and her niece's best friend]]) come back from the dead several times. Jet even makes a comment that Jet's attitude toward science can be similar to that of a TheFundamentalist towards their chosen religion.

* DontFearTheReaper: Zigzagged. Ma Malai, the local Angel of Death, appears neutral until you take her hand. For bad people she's horrifying, but she smiles gently and encourages the good. Lilith is actually desperate for Ma Malai to take her, but due to Lilith eating the fruit from the Tree of Life, Ma Malai is forbidden to speak with or take her.

* MadeOfIron: One fo the benefits of undeath seems to be that Rachel suffers little or no physical harm from things that shoudl turn her into a pretzel.

** Lilith appears to be undergoing a much larger, and more destructive case.

The story begins with a young woman named Rachel clawing her way out of a shallow grave in the woods around the small town of Manson, where she lives. All the while a mysterious woman dressed in white that bears a close resemblance to Rachel watches as Rachel staggers out of the woods. A disorientated Rachel makes her way home, rests, then sets out to find the people she trusts most, (her Aunt Johnny and Jet, her best friend since childhood) to try to make sense of things, including why it's several days later than she thought, why she can't remember what happened to her that caused her to wake up in the grave, and why some people she encounters who know her refuse to believe that she's really Rachel.

Meanwhile, the same woman that watched Rachel rise from the grave is making her way around town, causing mayhem in her wake, with a specialty for causing people to murder their loved ones. In particular, she targets and follows a young girl named Zoe, who takes to murder with unnerving skill. When Rachel and Zoe meet and Rachel tries to confront the figure, what had been a bad couple of days for Rachel and Zoe becomes some very bad days for ''everyone'' around.

* CompellingVoice: The figure in white has some version of this, that lets it easily talk people into murdering loved ones.

* DarkIsNotEvil Rachel tends to dress entirely in black following rising from the grave, complete with UhOhEyes, (a result of blood vessels in her eyes bursting as she was strangled) and nasty scar around her neck, but she's the main protagonist.

* DemonicPossession: Natalie, a victim of the figure who is buried almost exactly where Rachel was, appears to be a victim of it, as a snake crawls inside her mouth and seems to have at least some control over her.

* LightIsNotGood: The woman causing the mayhem has a tendency to dress in white, but that doesn't make it any less evil.

* SanitySlippage: When Aunt Johnny first sees Rachel, she assumes that she is having a case of this. She details how her mind has a habit of trying to distract her during the course of her work by conjuring up visitors. She first assumes Rachel to be another one of these. Doctor Siemen, as we come to learn, has suffered a much more serious case of it.
-->'''Johnny:''' Oh, you'd be amazed at the people I've talked to in this building after midnight. Buddy Holly, Jack the Ripper, that beautiful ensign from New Zealand (God, I miss the Navy) ... one night Christ rode in here on a donkey, palm leaves all all over the place. That was a mess. I saw Elvis in the bathroom, go talk to him.

* TownWithADarkSecret: Manson. Aunt Johnny talks about the mass execution of witches and grisly unsolved murders that have taken place in the town when first accompanying Rachel to the site of the grave.

* TroublingUnchildlikeBehavior: We see Zoe engaged in a fair amount of this while being controlled. Jet and Rachel made a childhood pinky swear to be best friends to the grave and the afterlife. When Rachel points out how weird it is for young kids to do something like that and asks what sort of kids get it into their minds to make such an oath, Jet replies "Kids that live in [[TownWithADarkSecret Manson]]."
* WhamShot: The first TPB ends with one. [[spoiler:Jet, dead due to the car accident she, Rachel, and Johnny were in, is lying in the morgue. For three panels she simply lays there, eyes closed. In the fourth, her eyes open, and they look just like Rachel's.]]

* RevanentZombie: More or less what Rachel is, except she's so fresh that apparently extreme pallor and the damage suffered by her body while she was being killed are the only surface signs that she's undead.

The story begins with a young woman named Rachel clawing her way out of a shallow grave in the woods around the small town of Manson, where she lives. All the while a mysterious figure dressed in white that bears a close resemblance to Rachel watches as Rachel staggers out of the woods. A disorientated Rachel makes her way home, rests, then sets out to find the people she trusts most, (her Aunt Johnny and best friend since childhood, Jet) to try to make sense of things, including why it's several days later than she thought, why she can't remember what happened to her that caused her to wake up in the grave, and why some people she encounters who know her refuse to believe that she's really Rachel.

Meanwhile, the same figure that watched Rachel rise from the grave is making its way around town, causing mayhem in its wake, with a specialty for causing people to murder their loved ones. In particular, she targets and follows a young girl named Zoe, who takes to killing with unnerving skill. When Rachel and Zoe meet and Rachel tries to confront the figure, what had been a bad couple of days for Rachel and Zoe becomes some very bad days for ''everyone'' around.

* {{Seers}}: Rachel starts tapping into a talent for telling the truth after her death.

* TownWithADarkSecret: Manson. Aunt Johnny talks about the mass execution of witches and grisly unsolved murders when first accompanying Rachel to the site of the grave.

''Rachel Rising'' is a comic series with a focus on horror and the supernatural by Creator/TerryMoore, perhaps best known for ''ComicBook/StrangersInParadise'' and ComicBook/Echo.

''Rachel Rising'' is a comic series with a focus on horror and the supernatural by Creator/TerryMoore, perhaps best known for ''ComicBook/StrangersInParadise''.

* MindControlledEyes: People under the control of the woman in white sometimes show this, specifically with EmptyEyes.

* TroublingUnchildlikeBehavior: We see Zoe engaged in a fair amount of this while being controlled.