Webcomic / I'm the Grim Reaper

" On earth there are bad people, and then there are REALLY BAD people. If you’re one of the latter, you don’t just get sent to Hell, you get sent to Hell and get assigned a job collecting the souls of some of the worst people on Earth. Such is the career path of a young woman named Scarlet, who dies and is delivered down to the fiery underworld only to find herself in an entry level position as…The Grim Reaper!

— Description on Webtoon

I'm the Grim Reaper is an Animesque Webcomic created by Graveweaver in 2018, and was featured in August 2019.

Upon a young woman's death, she loses her memories and is taken directly to Hell, where she not only meets the devil, but is informed that she was one of the worst sinners there were, and is given a choice: either become one of his grim reapers, or be sentenced to the ninth circle of Hell, a complete void lacking in any of the five senses.

To avoid this fate, she agrees. Going by the name of Scarlet, she now has to kill one sinner per day, lest she be taken to the ninth circle. However, she meets a detective who seems to know something about who she was while alive. Hungry for answers, she teams up with him to try to discover who she was while alive. However, she's keeping her identity as a reaper a secret, and she still must find and kill one sinner every day, which complicates things.

In 2024, the comic was picked up for adaptation as a TV series.

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I'm the Grim Reaper provides examples of:

• A Lighter Shade of Black: Ultimately, Scarlet and Chase and later Brook. While they are murderers, they are ultimately better than Satan and Judah.
• Absurdly Long Wait: Played for drama. When Liam discovers Ana's body and calls emergency services, he discovers that not only is there a waitlist, but it'll take twenty-five whole days for anyone to come investigate. It plays a major role in his Sanity Slippage.
• Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: This may not be a movie, but for a webcomic with so many action scenes, there are definitely more contemplative moments, since life and death are very prevalent themes.
• Action Girl: Scarlet is very good at using her scythe... however, as badass as she is, she’s still a new reaper and lacks experience.
• After-Action Healing Drama: Episode 43 has Scarlet struggling to find a way to save Chase after she, in her demon form, stabbed him. Fortunately for her, she has a vision of herself from her past life, revealing that stitching and suturing wounds is basically second nature to her.
• After the End:
  • A nuclear war rendered most of the Earth uninhabitable. All that is left is the poles. The North Pole decided to exterminate the rulers that caused this tragedy in the first place, and has effectively become ruled by a Nebulous Criminal Conspiracy instead. The South Pole took the opposite approach, where the rulers have become all-powerful and quelled all dissent. Both countries are living hell holes. And then Ashe destroys the South.
  • In season four, when the barrier separating the dimensions of Earth and the afterlife is shattered, things go from Bad To Worse. Civilization ends completely, along with most of humanity, even at the North Pole. Only scattered bands remain, and even they are dying out rapidly whether due to the lack of resources or descending into madness.
• Alas, Poor Villain:
  • Scarlet can't help but feel bad for Ana, who despite killing her own child, had a terrible life and thus made bad choices which led to her fate. Chase disregards this, saying she never should’ve gotten to that point and feels no sympathy for her.
  • Despite Satan proving himself the Avatar of Evil, we discover that his origin story is genuinely sympathetic. The crime that Satan committed to become the first-ever sinner in Hell? None whatsoever. He was sentenced to Hell moments after he was born, personally tortured with the first Sinner's Mark in existence, and left wondering for ages why he continues to exist no matter how much evil he perpetuates. All because God wanted some kind of answer about the meaning of existence! No wonder he's a total psychopath!
• Alone with the Psycho:
  • Played with. Scarlet, unknowingly, with Jordan, who she doesn't know is a serial killer. The two quickly switch places when Scarlet literally cuts him in half in a dark alley. A second example is the flashback where Chase interrogates a man who murdered his wife and is using his children as hostages unless all charges against him are dropped. They switch roles when, after Chase gets all the information he needs, Chase shoots the man in the head three times, all on camera, knowing the consequences.
  • In season 3, Brook gets stuck in a trap set by Judah that slices him into pieces.
• All According to Plan: Apparently part of Chase's plan when he and Scarlet go back to the Red Spades to find her file was to meet Brook somehow and talk to him and maybe sway him to their side, which he does after being captured by him after he "fell" for an obvious trap.
• All Crimes Are Equal:
  • What Scarlet finds out with her second sinner. The red X appears on sinners, be it a murderer or a thief, a sinner is a sinner. After discovering this she tries to find out more about her targets to make sure she is actually killing a vile person rather than someone that just stole something quick to eat.
  • Averted when the sinner is actually in Hell though, as the Devil places sinners in the Levels of Hell fitting for their crime. When Scarlet sees a Serial Killer only going to Level 6, she is horrified to wonder what she did to justify being sent to the 9th.
  • While lesser sins have lighter punishments, it's an eternal sentence, regardless of whether the sin is mass murder or petty theft. Satan outright says that there is no such thing as atonement or redemption. Heaven and Hell were created for God, not mortals. Neither Satan nor God give a damn about whether it's fair.
• Always Someone Better: Scarlet is an Action Girl who can take care of sinners easily. But she’s also a new reaper, and so Brook (who is more experienced than she is) beats her in a fight with ease.
• And I Must Scream: The fate of anyone sentenced to the last circle of Hell, since it's a void empty of any sensation or other people and you can't even sleep, being left with just your thoughts for the rest of eternity. It's little wonder Scarlet is so desperate to avoid it.
• Animal Motifs: Both Scarlet and Chase are associated with cats, with Chase even having an Imagine Spot of her as a Cat Girl once. Brook's ribbons and mask immediately bring bunnies to mind, down to being called the rabbit reaper. In Season 3, Scarlet ends up being associated more with wolves than cats.
• Animesque: The comic is drawn and plotted like a supernatural Shōnen anime. This is parodied in Chase's flashback to his college days, which is instead depicted as being like a Shoujo anime — which is due to Scarlet deliberately imagining it as being like "some kind of cartoon for girls".
• An Offer You Can't Refuse: How Scarlet sees her job as a Grim Reaper. She was forced to either kill a Sinner a day or live out the rest of existence in the 9th Level of Hell, a completely empty void that robs her of all of her senses.
• Apologetic Attacker: Scarlet apologizes to her first victim before killing him. After finding out what kind of person he was, she probably regrets doing so.
• Archangel Azrael: Azrael is one of the three angels of God. He is depicted as a Casanova Wannabe flirting with his fellow angels. Azrael can see the future and hence basically lives his life with no care in the world since he views the future as set in stone.
• Art Shift:
  • Chase's backstories have different ones. The one where he details his abusive ex starts off with a bright, pastel color palette before slowly turning back into the series' usual tones. His backstory regarding how he got his X starts off with muted colors, but as it goes on his mother’s colors become brighter...while his stay muted.
  • When we finally get his backstory about what happened to his mom and siblings, it alternates between black and white and full color.
• Asshole Victim: Played straight with the first sinner, who was a serial killer. Played with in regards to the second sinner, as Scarlet finds her sin to not be too bad, and very played with the third sinner, whose sin was horrible, but also had an awful past, and also accepted her punishment with grace.
• Assimilation Plot: When the world ends, God plans to rejoin with all of their creations in order to gain an understanding of themself.
• Author Appeal: Graveweaver has stated multiple times that the comic is made up of things she loves, and has even gone so far as to call the comic "completely self-serving".
• Awesomeness by Analysis: While Chase may or may not be Obfuscating Stupidity, he is definitely analytical and manipulative, able to trick and manipulate others into making grave mistakes.
• Backstory Horror:
  • On his 18th birthday, Brook was strangled to death by his sister in order to prevent him from inheriting the family fur business.
  • As a child, after his dad's death, Chase's mom killed both of his siblings and tried to kill him in a murder-suicide. However, she fell down the stairs and stabbed herself before she could kill him.
• Batter Up!: Liam kills a random old man with a baseball bat and nearly tries to kill Chase so he can become a sinner, be killed by Scarlet, and be sent to hell with Ana.
• Beneath Suspicion: Most sinners look like normal people, with the extent of their actions only becoming visible after extensive investigation.
• Berserker Tears: Scarlet sheds these as she kills Jordan, the first sinner.
• Black-and-Grey Morality: While the sinners are certainly awful, the main characters include a developing Blood Knight with a demonic side who works for the devil, and a former detective with a mysterious past and manipulative streak who shouldn't be trusted with a gun. They aren't exactly the pinnacles of virtue.
• Bland-Name Product: FateCraft is a portmanteau of Fate/Grand Order and Warcraft, the game itself being shown to resemble the latter.
• Blank White Eyes: Used for comedic moments when characters are surprised or flustered.
• Blatant Lies: When Jordan asks Scarlet what her name is, she doesn't remember it nor has she come up with one. She stumbles over her words until she says "Scarlet". He seems to buy it.
• Blood Knight:
  • Scarlet displays some of these tendencies, becoming more willing and almost happy to take out sinners.
  • This is much more notable in the case of Ashe, the oldest reaper: while the other reapers are required to kill one sinner per day, Ashe has a limit of ten per day instead — a limit intended as a restraint; he'd kill a lot more if he were allowed.
• Breather Episode: Some turn up on occasion.
  • Episode 34 happens after Scarlet and Chase team up to take out sinners and Satan has Brook tell him everything he knows about them and has Scarlet and Chase talking and being friends.
  • Episode 50 happens after the major revelation of Scarlet's real name, Ante Nora, being revealed. It involves Scarlet and Chase playing FateCraft together.
• Brought Down to Normal: Just as Scarlet is about to lose control of her demon, she manages to forcibly recover it, only for her to stop feeling her demon at all and become little different from a normal human. She manages to get it back after killing a sinner.
• Cain and Abel: Brook's sister's dislike of him eventually turned murderous in order to prevent him from taking control of the family fur business.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You: This is how Scarlet and Chase view each other in the beginning. For her, he's a way to uncover her past and find a steady stream of sinners, but if he finds out too much she's more than willing to kill him. For him, she's a way back onto the police force by being his lead in Case X, but hes' also willing to kill her if need be. They eventually do become genuine friends, especially once they team up to kill sinners.
• Capitalism Is Bad: The root of the mortal world's problems. The government privatized the hospital system. The world's population is collapsing rapidly due to the for profit hospital system's very strong Kill the Poor mentality. They are only willing to treat the rich in return for obscene costs. Furthermore, they are also more than willing to enact a Poison and Cure Gambit, meaning that survival without a hospital's help is no longer an option. The private hospital system is literally ending the human race just to squeeze out more money in it's final moments. Further emphasized by the fact that it's a free market. If anyone doesn't like what they are doing, they are welcome to compete and nobody will stop them, and yet it seems that nobody actually does.
• Cat Girl: When Scarlet reveals her horns and tail, Chase's imagination turns these into cat ears and a feline tail.
• Caught Up in the Rapture: A very dark take on this is more or less what happens when Bernadette decides to perform a mass ascension, erasing the virtuous out of existence shortly before the end of the world to prevent a Cosmic Flaw from making the end of the world from being even worse than it already is.
• Cessation of Existence: The fate of any soul sent to the Ninth Circle of Heaven. Apparently, non-existence is considered the greatest reward for the virtuous, in parallel to the other Ninth Circle, where "all you can do is exist". With God no longer judging souls, all those who are ascended by Archangels are sent to the Ninth Circle indiscriminately.
• Color-Coded Characters: Scarlet is associated with red, Chase with blue, Satan with yellow, and Brook with pink.
• Contemplate Our Navels: The characters often talk about their views on morality and the nature of sin.
• Cosmic Flaw: When the number of souls awaiting Judgment becomes greater than what Heaven is built to sustain, the entire plane starts to collapse.
• Crapsack World: The world the characters live in is not kind, with Scarlet seeing sinners everywhere. We get to see two murderers up close, and only over a matter of a few days. Also, the series takes place After the End of World War III, which irradiated Earth to the point that only Antarctica and the North Pole are habitable.
• Crapsaccharine World: To a regular human, the world continues as normal, people walk the streets, and the sky is still blue. To anyone who sees the systems behind the world, it's a vicious, sadistic monstrosity that has long abandoned any principles, honor, or even self-preservation. Scarlet can see sinners everywhere. Chase knows the police have institutionalized corruption and his stepmother is the only honest captain on the force. Even the 'good' sections of the afterlife are messed up, with Brooke claiming that Purgatory, while truly peaceful and pleasant, is as meaningless and empty as Hell. And of course, every sinner goes to a neverending Hell when they die. In Chapter 48 Bernadette reveals that the human population has plummeted to less than a billion at least, Judgement has halted so that no one gets into Heaven, and God hasn't communicated with his Archangels in thousands of years. Not only that, but the other angels (represented by the other two Archangels) are either just ambivalent to it all or in Blind Obedience to God, opposing her desire to try to make a positive change.
• Creator Cameo: After Scarlet tosses herself out a window to escape Brook, the sinner she kills in order to go to hell is Graveweaver herself.
• Cute Little Fangs: Scarlet gets these after becoming a grim reaper. She doesn't find them cute, but Chase does in his own way.
• Cynicism Catalyst: Scarlet's comes very early in the story. At first, she's more apprehensive about killing sinners, but when the dorky young man she meets who’s marked as one turns out to be a cold-blooded serial killer, she quickly becomes more jaded and willing to do the job.
• Deadly Nosebleed: Bleeding from the nose is one of the primary signs of the Scarlet Rot, a deadly disease. This is most notably visible when Chase doesn't take his pills for an extended period of time.
• Deal with the Devil: By definition, becoming a Reaper means making a deal with Satan where the mortal agrees to serve as the devil's hitman in order to postpone their own damnation.
  • Scarlet makes one to avoid being sent to the last circle of hell.
  • Later, Brook does the same in order to free Scarlet from the Ninth Circle. She can go free, without agreeing to reap Chase, but Brook (who had been a soul from Purgatory, acting as a Reaper to keep his sister out of Hell) will be judged for his sins as a Reaper and sent to the void himself, should he fail to meet his quota.
• Death of a Child:
  • The first case that Chase and Scarlet investigate is of a missing boy. His mother strangled him, cut him into pieces, and flushed him down the toilet to hide the evidence.
  • It's revealed that a part of Chase's Dark and Troubled Past was his mother killing his two younger siblings after their father's death.
• Deliberately Monochrome: The Discover version is in mostly black and white, with splashes of color (particularly red, but sometimes pink or other colors) here and there for effect. The featured version is mostly colored, but there are scenes that are like this on occasion.
• Demonic Possession: Aside from the demons empowering the reapers themselves, Hell also has weaker demons. When the dimensional barrier created by God shatters, lesser demons start leaking into the waking realm and bond themselves to sinners.
• Devilish Hair Horns: Scarlet has two licks of hair on the side of her head that stand up, giving the image of devil horns, which areater revealed they actually are horns. Perfectly fitting considering she's a reaper for Satan.
• Dirty Business: Zig-zagged. Scarlet’s first kill is a serial killer whom she feels the world is better off without, and begins to have the view of sinners deserving death. But after Ana she begins to reconsider this, acknowledging that sins are all very complicated.
• Dirty Cop: When the police show up to arrest Scarlet and kill Chase, roughly half of them are sinners. Not to mention the fact that the police were sent after them not for any of their actual crimes, but because Judah ordered them to for his own benefit.
• Distinguishing Mark: Scarlet has a scar on her mouth.
• Dogged Nice Guy: Implied to be the case with Liam and Ana. While they were childhood friends, Liam's extreme belief in her still being alive and that they're "fated" to be together... is concerning.
• Don't Fear the Reaper: If you're not a sinner, Scarlet probably won't bother you. Averted for sinners though.
• Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male: Averted. Chase’s past relationship with a tsundere is played very seriously, and the abuse and the effects on him are not played for laughs at all. Even Scarlet is disturbed by it, and she immediately apologizes for her rather rude statements saying only idiots can't think about love rationally.
• Downer Beginning: The comic opens with Scarlet arriving in Hell.
• Emo Teen:
  • Although she's an adult, Scarlet's grim reaper outfit definitely looks like this, and is even Lampshaded several times.
  • In high school, Chase had an emo teen phase that he's very embarrassed of now.
• Emotions vs. Stoicism: Something Chase has to deal with. He considers himself very pragmatic and logical, and prioritizes that over emotions and feelings. But after becoming genuine friends with Scarlet, he realizes he needs to open himself up to emotions more again.
• Even Evil Can Be Loved:
  • Liam never stops loving Ana, not even after he finds out she'd killed her own son.
  • Scarlet and Chase as well; despite being objectively terrible people, they're the most important people to each other.
• Everyone Can See It:
  • It says something when Brook, who has had minimal interactions with Chase, feels bold enough to tease Chase about his relationship with Scarlet, almost even telling him he’s in love to his face... before Chase cuts him off.
  • A darker example is during the season two finale, when Satan tells Scarlet that he can tell she fancies someone, and orders her to kill Chase by midnight that night or be sent back to the 9th level forever.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Calling Scarlet good is a stretch, but the Red Spades leader seriously got ahead of herself offering Scarlet a job with the Red Spades in exchange for being told what her life was, albeit with sending Chase to the other side of the world so he can’t get involved anymore. Scarlet turned it down, despite the Red Spades leader being convinced she would take it since it was the "only logical option". Scarlet simply tells her that feelings aren't logical.
• The Exile: Criminals are banished to a Ghost Town outside the city wall, where people resort to cannibalism to survive.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: At the beginning of Season 3, after spending twenty-five years in the 9th layer, Scarlet's bob becomes a floor-length hairdo.
• Eye Color Change: Before becoming a reaper, Scarlet's eyes are a very human shade of dark brown/black. After becoming a reaper, they permanently turn bright red.
• Face Death with Dignity:
  • Played with. The woman who killed her son is killed too quickly for her to even react, but she accepts her punishment in Hell with grace.
  • Played very straight later with Scarlet, when she chooses to die permanently and be damned rather than reap Chase. After struggling with her (literal) inner demon, she decides that she would rather be thrown eternally into Hell than live as Satan's pet, lying down next to Chase and waiting for the clock to strike midnight.
• Face–Heel Turn: Although it's implied he wasn't all there to begin with, Liam was one of the few non-sinners in the series. And then he finds Ana's corpse, and kills someone solely because he guesses that, if he does, he can be reaped by Scarlet.
• Family Portrait of Characterization: Scarlet/Yue's mom's characterization is built off of the photos she took of her daughter including one of the two of them which she captioned "Love You Forever".
• Fan Disservice: Chase's first shirtless scene was played for laughs. The second one is while Scarlet is stitching him up after she stabbed him in her demon form.
• Fate Worse than Death: The reapers physically cannot die, but they can definitely still be injured. This is used to its fullest extent when Judah kindly demonstrates to Brook what it feels like to be liquified. It takes a lot to traumatize a century-old reaper to the point where he can't even look at soup, you know.
• Female Angel, Male Demon: Downplayed. The archangels are two women and one man, while the reapers are the other way around.
• Female Fighter, Male Handler: Played with. Scarlet takes out sinners, while Chase narrows down which sinners deserve to die, although he says the choice is ultimately hers.
• Flower Motifs: Scarlet/Yue's mother is associated with sunflowers, showing off her warm disposition and kind personality.
• The Fog of Ages: Whilst talking to Scarlet, Brook mentions that he tends to update his blog frequently, as he tends to forget things easily.
• Freudian Excuse:
  • The woman who killed her son is given one: she had parents that squashed her unconventional dreams of becoming a writer, and who pressured her into getting an ordinary life by marrying an ordinary man, who abandoned her shortly after she had their son. When her son became terminally ill and she didn’t have the funds to get medicine, she killed him. However, it is presented as less of an excuse, and more of an explanation.
  • Satan's "tragic backstory" is that he was sentenced to Hell a few seconds after he was born.
• Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse:
  • Chase's response to Scarlet after she confirmed the woman killed her son, claiming that those were her choices and there were still a vast amount of other options she could have taken to take care of him.
  • Satan himself admits his tragic backstory isn't a free pass for all the monstrous trolling he commits on the entire world for his own amusement. He's going to do it anyway. But since God gave him a free pass Himself...
• Freudian Slip: The woman Chase and Scarlet are questioning about her missing son. She uses the word "was" relating to him, indicating she knows he's already dead.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: None of the Reapers like spending any amount of time with Satan, except for Ashe, who is incredibly worshipful of him.
• Ghost Amnesia: Scarlet has no recollection of her life, and much of her goals center on finding out who she was.
• Ghost Town: Much of the area outside the city walls is composed of abandoned city blocks, inhabited only by exiled criminals.
• God and Satan Are Both Jerks: Whilst God isn't shown to be actively malicious, he certainly isn't scoring any extra points by refusing to judge souls, letting the human world rot away, and refusing contact with his archangels
• Go Mad from the Isolation: The ninth level of Hell is a void devoid of all senses. It’s the fear of being sent here for eternity that drives Scarlet to become a reaper. Played with in the beginning of Season 3, when Scarlet actually spends a quarter century (of subjective time) in the Ninth Circle. She has incredibly vivid hallucinations, but is aware of what they are. After being freed by Brook, Scarlet initially believes him to be another hallucination, but this is reasonable given the circumstances, and breaks apart as soon as he gives her information that she couldn't have gained otherwise. For the most part, she seems to be pretty stable, albeit traumatized. This may be part of the torture of the Ninth Circle, since Scarlet notes that being unable to drift into unconsciousness was the worst part of her torment. Being unable to go mad from isolation, and having to endure it consciously for all eternity, seems to be an even worse fate.
• Green-Eyed Monster: Satan hates it when he isn't the center of attention. He even point blank says that he's jealous that Scarlet's (whom he views as a plaything) attention has been divided, and that's part of why he gives her her Sadistic Choice.
• The Grim Reaper: Reapers are damned souls who struck a deal with Satan, who permits them to remain in the mortal world as long as they kill a certain quote of sinners per day. Visually, only Scarlet fits the classic image, as she wears a long, hooded black coat and uses a scythe in combat.
• God Is Evil: Of course, this comes from Satan's mouth, but God sentenced Satan to eternal suffering in Hell for absolutely nothing. Satan is unable to die or redeem himself because God demands it. Everything Satan does to humanity is endorsed by God. All because God wanted an answer to a question about existence.
• Godzilla Threshold:
  • When it becomes clear that the world is about to end, Bernadette breaks the laws of Heaven and forces her way into God's sanctum to demand answers. What she discovers is God's blood spattered corpse.
  • The archangels are not supposed to ascend people unless it's an emergency. Making matters worse, if God isn't managing judgement, those souls will automatically go to the Ninth Circle of Heaven to be erased. To prevent aforementioned end of the world, Bernadette prepares to ascend all living mortals, saving those in heaven, but dooming all living mortals to Cessation of Existence.
• Government Conspiracy: God's absence aside, the physical reason the mortal world is falling into ruin is due to the actions of a conspiracy involving the government, the police, the hospitals, and the organized crime group known as the Red Spades. The exact nature of the conspiracy is so complicated that, even after becoming the new leader of the Red Spades, Veronica still cannot begin to understand it, only knowing that the Red Spades were created to serve as The Scapegoat for them.
• Gross-Up Close-Up Whilst in the ninth layer a gory mass of organs, which then shift into Ante Nora, can be seen descending from the ceiling
• Half the Man He Used to Be: Scarlet has a habit of cutting her victims in two with her scythe. The most notable examples are Jordan, the first sinner, and eventually Liam, after he has already murdered someone and attempts to kill Chase so she has to kill him.
• Happily Failed Suicide: Whilst trying to attempt suicide by jumping off a cliff to reunite with Scarlet, Scarlet catches him, and they reunite.
• Hate Sink:
  • The Red Spades leader. Unlike other antagonists like Brook and Bernadette or outright villains like Satan, she has no style, funny moments, sympathetic motives, or class to make her even a little likable.
  • Later on, Judah becomes one too, due to Scarlet still being traumatized enough by him during her life as Ante Nora to remember him after twenty-five years in hell, and later on melting Brook down into nothing except for his hand.
• Hell: Hell is a dimension of infinite size, where the souls of sinners are imprisoned to be tortured forever. It's divided into nine Circles, each holding increasingly terrible punishments for increasingly grave sins.
• Hellish Pupils: All reapers have slit pupils.
• Hell of a Heaven: The higher levels of heaven are ironically less humane than the lower ones. The seventh circle, while allowing artisans to do whatever they excelled at in life, effectively makes them slaves to said purpose and unable to feel bored or tired of doing the same thing for eternity. The Eighth Circle is a divine drug den, where people are kept in such a tranquil state of euphoria that they can barely think about their loved ones or their identities. And nobody lives in the Ninth Circle of Heaven, because their souls are destroyed. God specifically says that souls which are abnormally, inhumanely good and pure beyond all reason are useless to Them.
• High-Dive Escape: To escape from Brook, Scarlet tosses herself out of a window during their first fight.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Satan is underneath two restrictions, he cannot leave Hell, and he cannot kill himself. Satan sets up a plan to break the universe, in the hopes it will set him free, preferably by releasing him from Hell, but he implies that his own death would be an acceptable alternative. The Cosmic Flaw does end up breaking the universe, but things don't turn out as he expects. The waking world ends up intersecting every piece of Hell except the Ninth Circle, and Satan's restrictions actually prevent him from accessing those pieces of his own kingdom instead of acting as a loophole. As a result, he is left with even less than he started with.
• Horrifying the Horror:
  • Scarlet's demon form is powerful enough to scare Brook badly, far more than he would like to admit. It’s implied he would much rather ignore her than risk her going out of control again.
  • Judah, despite being a mere human, horrifies Scarlet with what few memories she has of him as Ante. Later, after being sliced into pieces and melted down into liquid except for his hand by him, Brook is even terrified of him.
• Humans Are the Real Monsters: Played with. Sinners are everywhere in this series, with their sins varying from almost silly sounding to murder. It is worth noting that Scarlet can only see sinners; she cannot see the virtuous, only archangels can do that. When we finally do see through the eyes of an Archangel, it's revealed that many people actually fall into both categories.
• I Have to Go Iron My Dog: While Chase is still recovering from being stabbed, at one point he starts talking about a soup he had as a kid and how much he would like it again. Scarlet immediately starts putting her shoes on and when asked what she’s doing she says she has to go check what color the sky is.
• The "I Love You" Stigma: Once Brook joins Scarlet and Chase, he starts teasing Chase in particular about his and Scarlet's relationship, even beginning to say "I can tell from a mile away that you’re in lo-" before Chase cuts him off, red-faced.
• Identical Stranger: The excuse Scarlet gives for not being whoever Chase wants to arrest, even though she probably is. It's easier for her to get away with this since the "stranger" is a corpse in the morgue.
• Identity Amnesia: The Myth Arc for the series so far is Scarlet tying to find out who she was when she was alive and what she did to make the Devil himself claim she was one of the worst sinners ever to live.
• If I Wanted You Dead...: Nyra doesn't know what Azrael is up to, but he admitted to letting God die when he could have stopped it and tells her it is his duty to destroy the universe in the event of God's death. When they meet again, he persuades her to back down by pointing out that if he really wanted her dead, he could have killed her any time just by thinking about it.
• I Never Said It Was Poison: Chase is able to trick a woman into inadvertently using the word "was" in regards to her missing son, basically confirming she killed him.
• I Never Told You My Name: Scarlet gets startled when Liam calls out to her by calling her Grim Reaper, it turns out it's because her gamer name on FateCraft is GrimReaper666 and he never learned her real name.
• Inherent in the System: A common theme among sinners is that they blame society for being rotten to the core. It's left ambiguous as to whether or not they're right to blame society, but they're effectively right otherwise.^note  Corruption is at its highest, hospitals have been privatized and refuse to treat the poor, and death rates exceed birth rates since pollution and crime have been left unresolved by the government. It says something when a mass-murdering gang are sympathetic since they're the only ones willing to sell life-saving medicine to the poor. And then there's the supernatural crap; Satan is a spiteful, almost childish bully, the public subconsciously decides who goes to Hell regardless of intent or context, reapers who go insane will turn into Eldritch Abominations and rampage across the streets, and Heaven is apparently doing nothing to stop the apocalypse.
• Internal Reveal: At the start of Season 2, Scarlet reveals she is the Grim Reaper to Chase.
• In the Hood: Scarlet wears one to hide her horns.
• It Amused Me: Pretty much everything the Devil does is because he finds it funny or entertaining in some way.
• It Gets Easier: When Scarlet kills her first Sinner she cries and says she's sorry, then later kills an unnamed mook without hesitation.
• Just Before the End: The Earth was already irradiated by worldwide nuclear war, with civilization only surviving at the poles. In season 4, a Cosmic Flaw caused by God's death destroys the barrier between Limbo and Earth, triggers world shattering earthquakes and ends civilization completely. There are only pockets of survivors, and no renewable resources left, meaning that barring supernatural interference, humanity is finished. The only calm spot is a Small, Secluded World Chase created with God's authority just before he died.
• Killer Rabbit: Brook wears a cutesy ":3" mask and a ribbon tied on his head that resembles bunny ears, but is absolutely terrifying in a fight. The first time he meets Scarlet, he tears off two of her limbs. She only manages to survive by quick thinking and throwing herself out of a window to escape. Twice.
• Kill the Host Body: If a demon possessed dies to supernatural causes, the demon will die with them.
  • This is why it is in Barghest's best interest to not let Scarlet die when fighting an angel.
  • In Season 4, demons start leaking from Hell and bonding themselves to sinners. The easiest way to get rid of them is to kill the host. Scarlet and Brook eventually invent a skit to scare the demon into leaving its host instead.
• Kill the Poor: Basically how this world's medical system look at things. Even though they could easily sell affordable medicine to everyone, they are only interested in serving the rich, choosing to massively overprice them to the point that only the rich can afford any kind of treatment at all. As a result, most of humanity is dying off of disease.
• Light/Darkness Juxtaposition: Chase and Scarlet's first "official" meeting has him in the light and her in shadows.
• Line-of-Sight Alias: Done when the protagonist is asked for her name by another character, Jordan. After mumbling through several names, she sees a red X on Jordan's chest, and blurts out, "Uh... Scarlet!" He takes it at face value.
• Loophole Abuse:
  • Archangels and reapers are only supposed to kill sinners and the virtuous during emergencies. Satan considers his personal boredom to be an "emergency". Heaven is largely willing to let it go, with Bernadette being the only one to care enough to want to do something about it.
  • Satan is only allowed to have as many active reapers as there are archangels: three. But Satan has given out four demons to empower the three. There's no rule against a reaper having more than one demon's worth of authority after all.
• Love Makes You Dumb: What Scarlet believes; she doesn’t want to be distracted from her work.
• Love Is a Weakness: Subconsciously, this is what Chase believes and even fears; while dreaming after being stabbed by Scarlet in her demon form, a crow that suspiciously begins to start looking like her demon tells him he has always been weak, especially since he'd developed an attachment to Scarlet, rather than keep thinking of her as a tool. The crow even nearly says this trope word for word to him. But he makes it clear he won't listen to those fears anymore.
• Luminescent Blush: Chase sports a major one after using the trolley problem as a metaphor for how important Scarlet is to him; basically, in any scenario, he'd allow that one person to die while the others live, unless it was her in danger. Then he'd let the others die instead.
• Master Actor: Chase is able to convince a woman he's also a parent who lost a child in order to get her to trust him. It works.
• Meaningful Name: Scarlet's name brings to mind her color scheme and the scar on her face, while Chase relentlessly chases down answers to Case X.
• Mercy Kill: What Ana justifies her murder of her son as — he was terminally ill, and she could not afford medicine, so she chose to shorten his suffering. The author doesn't make it clear whether it's the true reason or not, and leaves it ambiguous as to whether it was justifiable.
• Mr. Exposition: Satan explains a lot about the grim reapers and Hell, since he is her boss. Doesn't mean he tells her everything though...
• Mugging the Monster:
  • Scarlet's first sinner was planning to kill her for fun. He ends up being the one killed.
  • A bunch of Dirty Cops are ordered to arrest Scarlet, unaware that reapers even exist up until several of them are killed.
• Murder Is the Best Solution: Ultimately what Chase believes. He thinks by taking out all the worst people and sinners, the world will become a better place.
• Neck Lift: During their first fight, Brook has to lift Scarlet by the neck in order to rip off her arm.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: After Scarlet takes a bullet for Chase and he thinks she's died, he snaps at the would-be killer, tells him that since he killed her, he'll kill him, and nearly succeeds in beating him to death with his bare hands.
• The Nose Knows: Chase states Scarlet often reeks of blood.
• The Nothing After Death: While Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory all exist in this series' universe, this trope still awaits the most evil sinners. The Ninth Circle of Hell is an endless void where the worst of the worst are left alone with themselves for all eternity.
• Nothing Is Scarier:
  • Scarlet is absolutely horrified to see that her sins were deemed worse than a serial killer and yet she cannot remember what she did to justify that.
  • Essentially what the 9th Circle of Hell is, Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Scarlet is horrified at the idea of ever being sent back.
• Obliviously Evil: According to God's Akashic records, God was born without emotion, only developing it after millennia of creation, and spent eons trying to understand what it was through logical trial and error (beginning with moving each atom in His body and recording the results). This might explain why He created a clone of himself and experimented on it until it became pure evil.
• Obstructive Code of Conduct: The laws of Heaven limit the ways an angel can intervene in the mortal world. The human race is mysteriously starting to die out, but only one archangel, Bernadette, is willing to help, and will be punished by a higher ranking archangel if she breaks the rules.
• Offing the Offspring: This is revealed to be a major part of Chase's backstory. After his father's death, his mom went off the deep end and killed his two younger siblings and tried to kill Chase in an attempted murder-suicide. She fell down the stairs and stabbed herself before she could kill him, however.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Scarlet is not her real name. She doesn't have any memories, so she just calls herself that.
• Our Angels Are Different: There are three archangels on top, and a mention of lower angels beneath them. All of the archangels are former mortals. They are implied to receive Powers via Possession from a "real" angel, which is more like an Eldritch Abomination. Angels prefer to use the shape of Winged Humanoids, but if pushed by an emergency, can release the true angel possessing them to become Angelic Abominations, communicating in Starfish Language and losing access to their humanity, becoming something entirely alien.
• Our Demons Are Different:
  • The most powerful demons are the beings Satan uses to indirectly power his reapers with Powers via Possession. They are normally just animals driven by instinct, but if they connect well enough with the reaper they have been bonded to, they can gain access to their host's sapience.
  • Weaker demons also reside in Hell. When The Afterlife merges with the human world, they leak out and bond with sinners. Reaper bodies are built to let the human soul control the demon. Human bodies are not, so it is easier for the demon to take over.
• Pimped-Out Dress: Satan, being as petty as he is, changes Scarlet's usual reaper outfit into a decadent and somewhat revealing dress before they fight at the end of season two.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: Scarlet is only 5'3", but is a force to be reckoned with. Brook is even shorter and is an even more formidable opponent.
• Poison and Cure Gambit: Implied to be part of the sin that damned Scarlet to hell and the reason the human population is collapsing. The medical system did research on extremely deadly viruses, and someone released them to make the world depend on their cures.
• Poor Communication Kills: Amazingly averted in season two after Scarlet and Chase team up to take out sinners. They actually talk to each other, letting the other know of their thoughts, opinions, etc. This notably happens after Scarlet stabs him in her demon state and she explains what the demon is, and that he's her link to her humanity. This doesn't mean that Chase isn’t still hiding some things though...
• Power Incontinence: Scarlet has a very powerful demon inside her that when activated, is nearly invincible. The problem is that the demon is a single-minded killing machine, slaughtering anything in its way, and Scarlet can't control it when it starts creeping out and lets it take her over easily.
• Powers as Programs: Archangels and the demons empowering reapers are distributed some of God's and Satan's authorities over reality.
• Powers via Possession: Where a reaper's power is drawn from. A reaper is basically a human soul and a demon soul inside of a puppet body. The demon is just an animal driven by emotion. The human soul is in charge most of the time, but if they start losing control of their emotions, the demon starts taking over.
• Pyrrhic Victory:
  • Scarlet finally has the Red Spades leader in a position where she can reveal her past when Chase's mother arrives to arrest her. Rather than be arrested, the leader commits suicide, taking the secrets of Scarlet's past with her. On the other hand, Brook has quit the Red Spades and seems to be on their side.
  • In episode 123, Scarlet seemingly kills Judah, the man who had caused Ante/Yue's downfall, but not before he succeeds in burning down her childhood home and her mother's photographs.
• Over-the-Shoulder Carry: After rescuing Chase from the Red Spades and running into Brook again, Scarlet swings him over her shoulder so she can wield her scythe.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Veronica Carter, Chase’s adoptive mom. She’s the chief of police, and somehow has managed to keep herself from becoming a sinner in her quest to improve the world.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Scarlet's demon, Barghest, tells her that it was previously skeptical of her Ninth Circle sentence, and even after learning her true history, it wondered if her actions were fully her own. But now having witnessed her so easily sacrifice the rest of humanity to an eternity of suffering just to prolong the life of one person, who's destined to die either way, it now knows that she truly is a Ninth Circle sinner.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Scarlet's irises are bright red ordinarily, and one of them tends to glow when she summons her weapon.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Played with in regards to Scarlet and Chase. Scarlet at times resembles the red, not only due to her colors but because she’s growing into a Blood Knight who kills sinners, and can be reckless at times. Chase sometimes resembles the blue for tending to be more cautious, and being a detective and therefore mostly on the right side of the law. However, during their questioning of the woman with a missing son, they briefly switch: Chase asks Scarlet to hold onto his gun for him, and it’s a good thing he did; he got angry enough at the woman to reach out to his gun holster, likely meaning to shoot her. Scarlet is the one to get him to leave and distract him.
• Red Sky, Take Warning: The sky is always a vivid shade of red, and considering the world the characters live in...
• The Rich Want to Be Richer: The world's rulers are mostly motivated by profit, and they are literally willing to wipe out most of humanity to squeeze out more money.
• Rule of Cool: Satan’s justification for Scarlet’s physical changes that include horns, fangs, black and red hair, and even a tail. She, on the other hand, is less than thrilled.
• Sadistic Choice: Satan gives Scarlet one at the end of season two. Seeing how much she cares about Chase and wanting to torment her, he tells her that she must either kill Chase by midnight that night, or be sent back to the ninth circle forever.
• The Scapegoat: The government uses the Red Spades as one for all the corruption in the city. The Red Spades are seemingly an organized crime gang responsible for murder, drugs, and messing up the medical system. In truth, the Red Spades answer to the government in the first place and were created to give the public someone to blame.
• Scars Are Forever: Scarlet is relatively unmarked on her death, except for a small scar on her mouth. Later, she finds out she has scars all over her chest and stomach.
• Sexual Euphemism: Brook thinks that Chase and Scarlet want to be alone to "dance the Devil's Tango".
• She Is Not My Girlfriend: After Brook calls Scarlet Chase's girlfriend and insinuates that they're sleeping together, Chase turns bright red before saying that they don't have that kind of relationship and shuts Brook up when he tries to point-blank say he can tell he's in love with her.
• Shirtless Scene: Played for laughs when Scarlet walks in on Chase changing his shirt. He gets flustered while she couldn't care less.
• Shout-Out: Many.
  • Chase's tie and Scarlet's boots and prowess with a scythe are shoutouts to Soul Eater.
  • Graveweaver stated that Scarlet's design was inspired by Maka Albarn from Soul Eater, Zack from Angels of Death, and Rukia from Bleach, while her demon's appearance is an homage to Hellsing.
  • FateCraft, a popular MMO game in-universe, is a shout-out to both Fate/Grand Order and Warcraft.
  • One panel has a blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot showing that Chase has Frostmourne from Warcraft hanging in his apartment.
  • The scene in episode 123 where Scarlet stabs Judah repeatedly with scissors looks an awful lot like the scene in Perfect Blue where Mima stabs the photographer to death.
• Sibling Murder: Brook's sister ended up murdering him in order to prevent him from becoming head of his family's fur business.
• Sinister Scythe: Scarlet's weapon of choice, fitting her role as a reaper of souls, is a spectral scythe that she can manifest out of thin air.
• Slasher Smile: Scarlet lets loose some of these during her Blood Knight moments, especially notable during her killing of the second sinner.
• Small, Secluded World: Chase performs a Heroic Sacrifice to create one, borrowing God's authority to create a Pocket Dimension using his own mind as a base, one with unlimited space, food, and the fundamentals humans need to survive. It soon becomes the last inhabitable place left in the waking world.
• Strong Girl, Smart Guy: Scarlet is an Action Girl, while Chase is a detective with a manipulative streak.
• Stupid Evil: Humanity has decayed so badly, that its wicked desires often override concepts as basic as self-preservation.
• Suicide by Cop: Liam murders someone to become a sinner so Scarlet will reap him. At first she refuses, but, once he goes after Chase, she wastes no time killing him.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: In college, Chase fell for a tsundere and they started dating. The relationship turned emotionally and physically abusive and didn't work out.
• Sweet Tooth:
  • Scarlet has a strong reaction to her first time eating cotton candy.
  • Whilst trying to convince Scarlet that he's not Satan, Brook talks about his love of sweets.
    Brook: "The cakes with that thick chocolate mousse inside are my favorite"
• Symbol Swearing: While most of the time the swears are completely uncensored, the one time they are is when Brook asks Chase why his dog (Lightstalker, his cat) looks like a ***.
• Tears of Remorse: Scarlet sheds these when she kills her first sinner. She grows out of it quickly.
• Terminally Dependent Society: The main reason the setting has become a Crapsack World is because the universe is reliant on God for maintenance. God has been focusing on another priority for some time, leaving it to fall apart.
• There Is Another: The Devil tells Scarlet that there are two other Reapers besides her, but not until after she's nearly killed by one.
• Title Drop: Scarlet just before she kills her first victim.
  Scarlet: "There's something I need to tell you. I'm the grim reaper."
• Troll: The Devil will constantly leave out important details to Scarlet and will usually justify not telling her because she didn't ask.
• Tsundere: Chase dated one in his past. Deconstructed, as the relationship was an incredibly toxic and abusive one.
• Unfeeling Heavens: God is too different from humans to relate to them, resulting in an afterlife that seems messed up and unfair to many. Hell is a place of eternal damnation even for 1st Circle sinners, with no hope of redemption or atonement. The lower levels of Heaven are pleasant enough for the most part if you can get in, but good luck with that since God has stopped judging virtuous souls, leaving the virtuous trapped in an eternal wait. And the higher levels of Heaven show a degree of Getting Smilies Painted on Your Soul. In the 9th Circle of Heaven, you apparently cease to exist entirely. If the archangels chose to ascend a virtuous soul while God is not available for judgement, they would automatically go to the 9th Circle.
• Unsound Effect: The comic often uses words such as "reach", "touch", "dissipate", or "surprise" as stand-ins for sound effects.
• We ARE Struggling Together: Scarlet and Brooke are both Reapers that know full well Satan is using them for his amusement, however every time they meet they try to kill the other. At least, until Brook decides to side with Chase over the Red Spades, and then develops a much more fraternal relationship with Scarlet.
• Wide Eyes and Shrunken Irises: Pops up sometimes when characters undergo strong emotions. Notable early moments include Scarlet experiencing the 9th circle firsthand and later seeing Jordan’s body after she comes back from hell and fully realizing she just killed someone.
• Withholding the Cure: The basis of the conspiracy that rules the world. The modern medicine of this world has actually developed cures for just about everything, even up to the level of biological immortality, but the world's rulers keep it to themselves as a form of control. If you aren't useful to them, then they will gladly let you die. Most of the world isn't deemed useful to them, and the population has dropped by billions to only a fraction of what it was before. Even if you have some use, they prefer to release only overpriced treatments rather than actual cures to keep you dependent on them. Judah claims that it's a free market and that anyone else is free to develop their own if they think that's unfair, but it doesn't seem that anybody else has.
• Wham Line: Episode 68, Bernadette gives two in a row.
  Bernadette: "Perfect"? How mindless are you?! Judgement is halted ! Not a soul has arrived in Heaven in years! Not only that, but mortals have been dying in inconceivable numbers! There were once billions of mortal humans , but now there is but a paltry sum of what there was before.
• White Hair, Black Heart: Jordan, the first sinner Scarlet meets, seems like a sweetheart, but he's also a serial killer who has murdered several women.
• Worf Had the Flu: Scarlet is easily able to deal Bernadette multiple mortal wounds, due to Bernadette exhausting herself against Celeste and using too much of her power to ascend all virtuous souls.
• Year Inside, Hour Outside:
  • Time travels several times faster in Hell than it does in the mortal world. In the 9th Circle Scarlet was in it for 25 years, but on earth it appeared as if only a few months had passed.
  • The same is true in Heaven, where Azrael spends a century doing a favor for Celeste, while far less time has passed in the mortal world.
• You Are Worth Hell: Cruelly subverted with Liam. After learning that Ana has been killed and is now damned, Liam opts to murder an old man who he doesn't know in an attempt to be damned beside of her. Unfortunately, Ana's sin (killing her own son) is considered more serious than Liam's, which ends with Liam being punished in a different Circle and eternally separated from the woman he believed to be his fated soulmate.
• You Monster!: Scarlet has called Satan "the worst" several times. He basically asks her what she was expecting, since he is the devil after all.

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