* AlternateCharacterInterpretation: Spider Jerusalem has this in spades. Is he an AntiHero, doing what has to be done? Is he a KnightTemplar who crosses the line just as much as those he's against, with his constant physical assaults, and violations of people's privacy? Perhaps the most disturbing possibility: he's a massive hypocrite, who thinks that as long as he calls out the powers that be, he's perfectly justified living in luxury, never giving a single cent to anyone in need.
* {{Anvilicious}}: Religion makes you evil, period. If you are religious you can't even die with dignity.
* CompleteMonster: The Smiler. In a world nearly without ethics, he goes above and beyond the call of evil. If you want a rundown, he [[spoiler: has his campaign coordinator publicly assassinated to win sympathy for himself after his campaign went into the gutter; he has his ''family'' killed in an "accident" to again win sympathy; he has a member of his StateSec pull a sniper spree on civilians so that no one would notice the freak storm brewing nearby, a storm that causes massive damage and loss of life, all so he could wipe the evidence against him from existence (and that was a fool's errand as Spider kept his own private records, meaning that the Smiler did what he did for nothing); he has a peaceful protest of college students riddled with bullets at the first opportunity of "I thought he was pulling a gun"; he allows the brutal murderers of an innocent kid to go free and orders the cops to butcher all of the protesters as soon as violence was initiated (and it was done so by the murderers) and then (briefly) used his power to prevent the media from even acknowledging the riot and the slaughter of innocent civilians from happening!]]. This man would make Satan cringe, and this is just the incidents that immediately come to mind. And just to add insult to injury, he also [[{{Squick}} masturbates]] [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking into the American flag whenever he's stressed]].
* CrazyAwesome - The whole thing, but ''especially'' Spider.
* CrossesTheLineTwice - And then hops back and forth over the line some more before firing a bowel disruptor into the air indiscriminately.
* EnsembleDarkhorse - The Chair Leg of Truth.
--> '''''IT. DOES. NOT. LIE!'''''
* FamilyUnfriendlyAesop - Like so many things in the series it CrossesTheLineTwice:
-->'''Spider:''' Hi. I'm Spider Jerusalem. I smoke. I take drugs. I drink. I wash every six weeks. I masturbate constantly and fling my steaming poison semen down from my window into your hair and food. I'm a rich and respected columnist for a major metropolitan newspaper. I live with two beautiful women in the city's most expensive and select community. Being a bastard '''works.'''\\
'''[[PublicServiceAnnouncement The City Careers Service.]]''' [[PublicServiceAnnouncement Call us now. No matter how much of a fuck you are.]]
* FunnyAneurysmMoment - Near the beginning, Spider gets a faceful of Information Pollen in a futurist "reservation". He complains that it causes an Alzheimer's-like effect and asks, "Did you just ruin my brain, you weird-looking fucker?" Near the end, [[spoiler:the I-pollen really ''does''.]]
** "Every law that curbs my basic human freedom; every lie about the things I care for; every crime committed against me by their politics; that's what's makes me get up and hound these fuckers, and I'll do that until the day I die... [[spoiler:or until my brain dries up or something]]."
* HarsherInHindsight: On the penultimate pages of the series, Spider [[spoiler:puts a cigarette in his mouth for OneLastSmoke, draws a handgun, puts it under his chin, and it turns out to be a lighter.]] Sad part? Three years later, Spider's inspiration, HunterSThompson, did the exact same thing... [[spoiler:[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter_S._Thompson#Death except the gun was real.]]]]
* HilariousInHindsight: Remember Fred Christ? Wannabee alien-love-god and all around waste of space? Turns out he shares a name with [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Trump Donald Trump's father]].
* JerkassWoobie: Spider. His reaction to [[spoiler:Vita Severn's murder]] is heartbreaking, and whenever he's not being completely insane, you can't help but feel bad for him.
-->''"Sometimes I want to be someone else so badly it hurts."''
* MisaimedFandom - Ellis has repeatedly said that Spider is not a role model to be emulated. And yet...
* MoralEventHorizon: [[spoiler:Vita Severn's murder.]]
** [[spoiler: It's eventually stated that Vita's death wasn't it after all, happening years previously with the family kitten thrown under a bus. It's revealed to be the Smiler's favorite political trick.]]
* ProtectionFromEditors - Used as a plot point. Royce, the editor at the newspaper Spider writes for, doesn't actually edit Spider's writing, nor does anyone want him to. He does occasionally suggest topics, but mostly he runs interference and protects Spider, finally getting a CrowningMomentOfAwesome for it in the runup to the finale.
* SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped - You can't do a tribute to HunterSThompson and not be anvilicious. 'Business', about child prostitution, is arguably the most famous.
* {{Squick}} - Yelena drinking the bottle of tequila on election night. Rather than a worm it has a ''cockroach'' in it and we're treated to an extreme close-up of her slowly ''[[NauseaFuel biting it in half!]]''
* TearJerker - A story Spider tells in an interview about a young woman and her brother. It's agonizing.
-->'''Spider:''' [[spoiler:He systematically sexually abused her over a two-year period and she missed him because he was her brother and she loved him.]]
*** [[spoiler: The picture for the above shot? A close-up of the girl's slashed wrists.]]
** [[spoiler:Vita's death.]] Spider's reaction shot is ''crushing''. We've seen him angry, excited, confused... it's the first time we've seen him ''horrified''.
** "Business". The whole damn thing. But especially the line "Can we go to Long Pig? They have toys."
* UnfortunateImplications: 'There is a Reason'. The story's central message, a critique of Margaret Thatcher's Care in the Community policy for treating the mentally-ill, was good and solid, but clashed jarringly with Ellis's habit of using FunnySchizophrenia as a punchline.
** Early on in the series, we see an absolutely ''hideous'' young man shouting, "Business?!?" In the chapter of that name, we learn that's what child prostitutes say to solicit customers. That means the earlier character was whoring himself out... and yet given how he was drawn, we weren't supposed to sympathize with him. Apparently child prostitution is only a horrid evil [[BeautyEqualsGoodness when they're cute]].
** ''All'' of the on-panel sex is heterosexual. The only nonheterosexual affection of ''any'' sort is the pair of (unnamed) escapees from the Communist China reservation.