Devil May Care is an animated series airing on Syfy, starring Alan Tudyk, Pamela Adlon and Stephanie Beatriz.
Seeking to revamp Hell and improve its image, the Devil hires recently-deceased social-media manager Zachary Bean as part of an effort to rebrand the realm as a hot new place to live.
Has nothing to do with the Devil May Cry video game series.
Devil May Care contains examples of:
- Aerith and Bob: Subverted. Even the demons tend to have regular names like "Gloria" and "Regina".
- Alcohol-Induced Idiocy: In "The Sisters", Regina and her sister Jezebeth get wasted on Leviathan's spinal fluid and go off to make havoc on Earth, culminating in Regina trying to seduce Vladimir Putin in order to convince him to launch a nuclear missile.
- Amazonian Beauty: Gloria is very large, muscular and broad shouldered, and is surprisingly beautiful for a demoness. "The Influncer" showcases her in a bikini that especially flatters her body and abs.
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: When McKinley becomes a meme, his misfortunes include getting kicked by a horse, being pied in the face, getting carried away by a hellbeast, and not turning in quarterly reports on time.
- Artifact of Doom: "The Atheist" introduces The Contract, an old artifact from the early days of mankind that allows whoever owns it to summon the Devil and request a favor in exchange for their immortal soul. The Devil created it and distributed it to humans as an insurance policy in case God didn't send enough people to Hell (the Devil badly overestimated God's tolerance for humans' foibles.) In the five millennia since, The Contract has become a nuisance for the Devil, as the only people who use it tend to have unreasonable requests, like the man who wanted the Devil to turn the whole world yellow or the atheist who demanded that the Devil prove that God doesn't exist. Worse, the Devil can't return to Hell until the summoner releases him, and prolonged absence from Hell causes the realm to fall apart.
- Ass Shove: In the opening of "The Freeze", Devil is briefly distracted from his duties by a pegging session with Regina. Unfortunately, this distraction happens to come just before Hell almost literally freezes over.
- Barred from the Afterlife: Gwyneth Paltrow was rejected from both Heaven and Hell, much to God's amusement. It's not known what, if anything, will happen to her.
- Downplayed for laughs in "The Atheist". The episode title character's friends show up to the gates of Hell, only to be told Hell was closed for repairs and to wait until they're done.
- Benevolent Boss: Surprisingly, Devil himself has his moments. For example, when Beans accidentally lets evil cats attempt a coup, Devil recognizes that the blame lies not with the ignorant Beans (a brand new soul in Hell), but with McKinley (who knows the rules and should have told Beans), and punishes accordingly.
- Beware the Nice Ones/Beware the Silly Ones: Despite Devil's nice and quirky personality, anyone who betrays him (or significantly annoy and inconvenience him) will suffer for it, at least long enough to regret it.
- Big Red Devil: Devil's original/true form. Tall and muscular, horns, wings, and red all over. Interestingly enough, this is also what God's other angels look like, only in different colors.
- Born as an Adult: Zigzagged. The first demons were created ex-nihlo by God when they made Hell for the sole purpose of running it. The demons after that for the most part were made the old fashion way.
- Boss's Unfavorite Employee: Downplayed. God was never overtly mean to Devil, but He (rather understandably) didn't value his contributions to Creation the same way He did his other angels. Devil doesn't seem to realize this and was told running Hell was a promotion.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Devil is quirky and has a bit of a short attention span, but he's able to keep Hell running as smoothly as a former plane of torment can be expected to run.
- Cats Are Mean: The series claims that cats are the one truly evil creature in Hell. In the first episode alone, under the leadership of Adolf Kitler, they attempt to overthrow the Devil himself.
- Cephalothorax: The door guards of Devil Tower, as well as the horse that kicks McKinley.
- City of the Damned: Hell was originally the stereotypical lava-pit of eternal suffering before the Devil had it "gentrified".
- Couch Gag: The road sign and movie theater marquee in the theme song change each episode.
- Cute Monster Girl:
- Coma mostly looks looks like an Endearingly Dorky humanoid girl, except for the fact that she has horns and her hair covers her whole face. "The Freeze" reveals that her hair is actually the entirety of her being; her "body" is just an artifice she adopted in order to fit in better with the humanoid demons.
- Ziva, from "The Date", looks pretty much what you'd expect from a dentist's daughter, except that she has horns.
- Dating What Daddy Hates: In "The Date", Beans' date with Ziva seems to be going well until they go back to Ziva's place, where Beans learns that Ziva's dad hates humans, and thus he suspects that Ziva's only dating him in order to piss the old man off.
- Devilish Hair Horns: Devil has an interesting variation—rather that his hair standing up in points, his hairline
◊ makes the shape of horns coming off of his forehead. His demon form subverts this, with actual horns in the same place. - Do Not Call Me "Paul": Regina hates being called "Reggie".
- Everyone Has Standards: After hearing that social media influencers often are more trusted than the average President of the United States, Devils' response was to sit down on the floor in despair and quietly mutter, "Oh my god...".
- Extreme Omnisexual: Gloria boasts that she has had sex with every type of creature in Hell. The end of "The Date" shows her going home with the Cthulhu-like monstrosity that Beans rejected earlier.
- Fire and Brimstone Hell: Hell used to be this, but the Devil found it a pain in the ass having to organize the torture and imprisonment of millions of people, so instead Hell has become gentrified.
- Fashion-Shop Fashion Show: Parodied and subverted to Hell and back in "The Date", when Devil helps Beans get ready for his dates. They go to Cliché's, an upscale boutique where the whole point is to have a fun montage of various silly outfits. Beans, however, ruins it by trying on the single good outfit first. Devil is displeased and the shopkeep is heartbroken.
- Fisher King: According to Coma, if the Devil is away from Hell for too long, the realm falls apart.
- YMMV on this one, as she later admits the main reason she wants Devil back is because he has a meeting soon.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: Often used for a subtle background Take That!, since Hell is explicitly only full of terrible things. Devil's office is usually good for one of these, having an ET Atari game on display and a portrait of Barney the Dinosaur on the wall.
- Good Thing You Can Heal: One of the upsides to life in Hell is that it's nearly impossible to destroy a soul, so while it's possible to feel pain and get injured in Hell, the injured person will eventually heal. Consequently, standard worker's compensation for on-the-job injuries is a free frozen yogurt and a blowjob.
- Groin Attack: In the first episode, the Devil is temporarily incapacitated after his wife takes a stiletto to his crotch during a BSDM session.
- Happens to Beans in "The Freeze" when Devil needs some virgin blood in a ritual..
- A Hell of a Time: Devil's ultimate goal. It's... a work in progress, but modern-day Hell is still much more pleasant than the old days.
- Horned Humanoid: Most natural-born demons and all the succubi. Devil sports a pair in his true demon form.
- Insane Troll Logic: An atheist summons Devil... in order to have Devil prove God doesn't exist! The Devil rightfully points out that his very existence by default proves God exists and gets increasingly frustrated the atheist wasn't accepting any of Devil's answers because it contradicted what the atheist wanted to hear.
- Jerkass Genie: Devil apparently likes to fill this role when summoned to Earth, stating that any request he grants comes with "monkey's paw" rules.
- Jerkass God: God is depicted as a vain, immature jerk who created Hell as a dumping ground for anything that might slightly inconvenience Him. He banished the Devil there not because of some rebellion, but because the Devil annoyed Him. And he didn't even have the decency to explain to the Devil why he got banished; the Devil still believes that he was promoted as a reward because God loved his contributions to Australia.
- Let's Get Dangerous!: Devil, when a group of conspiracy theorists push him too far in "The Atheist".Devil: Okay, time in! Time WAY in!
- Meet Cute: "The Date" features a classic example, with Beans first meeting Ziva after he collides with her while trying to flee his date.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Beans' real name, Zachary Bean, is given once in the pilot and never mentioned again.
- Our Angels Are Different: God's angels look more like Devil's true form, each one in a different color.
- Our Demons Are Different: Besides the whole "gentrifying Hell" thing, Devil seems immune to at least a couple classic demon weaknesses. He exits a summoning pentacle without even thinking about it, and can touch and hold a holy Bible without it burning his flesh.
- Outside-Context Problem: "The Freeze" sees Hell suddenly hit with a snowstorm for the first time ever. Gloria and her team have absolutely no preparation for it; some of her dumber underlings initially thinks all the white stuff is cocaine.Gloria: (watching an underling attempt to snort yellow snow) This is gonna be my favorite day ever. I can tell.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Donned by Devil and Beans as part of a plan to topple McKinley as Hell's number one Chit-Chat star.
- Reassigned to Antarctica: "The Shipment" reveals the secret origins of Hell - God created Hell as a dumping ground for everything and everyone who annoyed Him, and then tricked the Devil into running the place because He got tired of the Devil's creative suggestions.
- Satan Is Good: Shockingly, yes. Devil is genuinely a nice and affable person. In fact, the only reason why Hell was a Fire and Brimstone Hell for so long was he didn't realize that humans didn't enjoy burning in lava until he started to pay more attention to them and their wants and needs. Now he wants Hell to be at least somewhat enjoyable. That said, Good Is Not Soft also applies, so anyone who intentionally messes with him will be reminded why he's in charge.
- Servile Snarker: Gloria, the Devil's right-hand woman, regularly snarks about her boss.
- Ship Tease: "The Date" and "The Freeze" both suggest that Beans and Coma might have feelings for each other.
- Small Name, Big Ego: President McKinley still fervently believes that one day, people will remember all the things he accomplished as the 25th President of the United States of America.
- The Starscream: President McKinley wants to take over Hell and return it to the bad old days of fire and brimstone.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: In "The Freeze", all of the Devil's efforts to gentrify Hell turn out to have had an unexpected side-effect - the city has been preventing Hell's heat from circulating properly, and it's finally reached the point where Hell's temperature has dropped below the freezing point.
- Sweet Tooth: Devil takes his coffee with one milk and eleven sugars.
- Take That!: "The Shipment" features Hell getting a shipment of all the latest things to get rejected from Heaven, and thus takes potshots at Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, shake-weights, fidget spinners, and Gwyneth Paltrow.
- Since Hell is explicitly stated to be only full of terrible things, the writers and animators can have a lot of fun with this. The tobacco of choice is an e-cigarette, all of the phones are flip phones, and sole amusement park in Hell is filled with only Tilt-A-Whirl rides.
- Too Kinky to Torture: In "The Sisters", Regina tries to take out her frustrations on a willing submissive, but is annoyed that he gets off on the pain.
- Unholy Matrimony: The Devil has a wife, a succubus named Regina. Their marriage has some friction in it, as Regina is an old-school demoness who refuses to give up on tormenting mortals.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: The third mortal to die. God created Hell as soon as he realized he needed to a place to send him away, otherwise spend eternity with
someone who wipes his ass with his hands.- Inverted with whoever it was that The Devil spoke to and informed him humans don't like being in a lake of fire. It's what set into motion the devil turning Hell into what it is now.
- Vague Age: Beans' age is never given, but he lumps himself in with "Gen Z" (born 1997-2015) and is probably in his early-to-mid-twenties.
- Vocal Dissonance: Devil's pet snake Eden—referred to as female by Devil, but her voice is deep and raspy.
- Vocal Evolution: Gloria has a much stronger New York accent in the pilot. Likewise, when Devil's daughter appears in episode 2 she has an accent much like Regina's. By her next speaking role, the accent is gone.
- You Need to Get Laid: In "The Date", The Devil orders Beans to find a girlfriend, as he is concerned that Beans isn't putting down roots in Hell. Beans' lack of a love life also raises practical concerns - he is still a virgin, and virgins are sought-after in Hell by demons.
