History Main / TheGrimReaper

* ''Manga/HellTeacherNube'': Death shows up to claim Nube halfway through the manga. She's a cute, cheerful girl dressed in a black robe with skull motifs, [[{{Meganekko}} huge glasses]], with a taste for parfaits and confectioneries...and a huge scythe.

* In ''Manga/YuYuHakusho'', Botan is the equivalent of a Grim Reaper...although she doesn't look the part. Or act it. At all. This is because the afterlife in this series is based on ''eastern'' mythology, and Botan adheres to this motif: wearing a formal kimono and riding an oar which symbolizes the boats that carry departed souls to the afterlife.
* In ''Manga/ZombieLoan'', the Grim Reaper shows up and is quite menacing. Later, his soul/core is stolen...so he turns into a chibi and no one feels threatened by him anymore. An [[RidiculouslyCuteCritter incredibly adorable]] (and irritable) chibi, who pokes anyone who [[CutenessOverload succumbs to]] [[CutenessProximity the urge to cuddle him]] with his (now tiny) scythe.

* ''VideoGame/MagicalDrop'': Death is a playable character in ''Magical Drop 3'', as a {{Stripperiffic}} [[EvilIsSexy and very sexy]] FemmeFatale with a huge scythe, CuteLittleFangs and UnusualEars.

* The Grim Reaper is commonly depicted on the Death card of [[TarotMotifs Tarot decks]] (although it represents change rather than death as the end of all things, provided it's face-up. If it's face-down however it really means GameOver).[[note]]It has to be said that the ''really'' unlucky cards, the ones which ''really do'' have a strong association with extreme misfortune and even physical death, are in the Minor Arcana, the suit cards. The Ten of Swords is the one to avoid. Its depiction in several suits is of a corpse floating face-down in a river with nine daggers sticking out of its back, which conveys the general underlying theme. Looked at positively, in the full Tarot you only have a one-in-seventy-six chance of drawing this card as opposed to the one-in-twenty-two of getting Death from the Major Arcana only. Of course you could draw Death crossed by the Ten of Swords, which might be interpreted as meaning "do not make any long-term plans or commitments, as right now there really isn't much point". [[/note]]

* The [=PSA=] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sg6IVUvVsAs "dark and lonely water"]] features Creator/DonaldPleasance dressed up as Death ("the spirit of dark and lonely water"), who then proceeds to monologue about the children who he's here to reap.

*** The titular character of ''ComicBook/MortTheDeadTeenager'' spends much of the miniseries interacting with Teen Death, who is Death's adolescent son and specifically serves as a psychopomp for deceased teenagers.

%%* ''TabletopGame/{{Anathema}}'': You effectively play as the Grim Reaper. Players can also choose to have their shrouds resemble it.%%ZCE, explain.

* ''[[https://www.fimfiction.net/story/433318/reaping-rainbow Reaping Rainbow]]'': The Death of Ponies is essentially the same as Death from Literature/{{Discworld}}, until [[DeathTakesAHoliday Rainbow takes over his job for a while.]] She's actually quite descent at the job.

** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS1E16TheHitchHiker The Hitch-Hiker]]", Nan Adams is frightened by the fact that she sees the same strange hitchhiker at every stop no matter how fast and how far she drives. [[spoiler:She eventually learns that she has been DeadAllAlong, having been killed in a car accident six days earlier, and the hitchhiker is Death.]]
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E81NothingInTheDark Nothing in the Dark]]", Wanda Dunn is so terrified of being taken by Mr. Death that has not left her apartment in years. After a young police officer named Harold Beldon is shot, she very reluctantly brings him inside so that she can care for him. [[spoiler:It turns out that Beldon is Death and that he tricked her into letting him into her apartment to prove to her that she had nothing to fear from him.]]

* ''WebAnimation/OverlySarcasticProductions'' discusses the trope in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zx4ByQpIMBE&list=WL&index=1 this video,]] specifically bringing up examples like [[WesternAnimation/PussInBootsTheLastWish The Wolf]] and [[Literature/{{Discworld}} Death of Men.]]

* ''WebVideo/OverlySarcasticProductions'' discusses the trope in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zx4ByQpIMBE&list=WL&index=1 this video,]] specifically bringing up examples like [[WesternAnimation/PussInBootsTheLastWish The Wolf]] and [[Literature/{{Discworld}} Death of Men.]]

->’’Shut up! Don’t criticise me in front of them!’’

* ''Literature/ReignOfTheSevenSpellblades'': Floating beings garbed in the classic black cloak and SinisterScythe are introduced in volume 8 as the enforcers of the dead god's laws [[AllDeathsFinal against resurrection]] and living longer than 200 years. If you reach your 200th birthday, a reaper comes to kill you, and if by some miracle you actually defeat it,[[note]]sixth-year Tim Linton and several third-years including Oliver used every trick in the book and were barely able to HoldTheLine[[/note]] they return in increasing numbers every fifty years afterwards. It turns out though, [[spoiler:they don't feel any need to deliver the killing blow themselves: when Cyrus fatally stabs the resurrected Fau, the reaper that came for her immediately vanishes into thin air without even waiting for her to finish dying]].

* In Literature/TheSupervillainySaga by Creator/CTPhipps, the Grim Reaper is a PerkyGoth similar to Sandman but a good deal more serious as it is her job to cover for the failures of her fellow Primals that rule the multiverse. Amusingly, Gary is a psychopomp as part of his duties and thus is a wisecracking goofus who some ghosts are off-put by. [[spoiler:He is later made ruler of his universe's afterlife.]]

** Discussed in ''Sandman'' spinoff ''ComicBook/DeathTheHighCostOfLiving''. Sexton doesn't believe Didi is the personification of Death, because to him Death is a bone-faced cloaked guy with a scythe who plays chess with Scandinavians.

* ''Fanfic/TheManyWorldsInterpretation'': When the ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' meets ''Series/TheBigBangTheory'', the Grim Reaper of the Roundworld gets lectured by Sheldon Cooper about his appearance as a personification of Death being all wrong, and reflecting a long-outmoded Ingmar Bergman ''Film/TheSeventhSeal'' look. Sheldon expects the personification of ''his'' Death to be fully tailored to his specific requirements, to wit, [[ComicBook/TheSandman an upbeat, pretty, perky, Goth teenaged girl]] -- and until he sees that, ''he just isn't going''.

* ''Webcomic/AndShineHeavenNow'' uses Death of the Endless from ''ComicBook/TheSandman''. When she has some spare time, she doubles as the Ghost of Iscariot Yet to Come for Enrico Maxwell. Interestingly, she is shown to also be the Death for the [[Literature/GoodOmens Four Horsepersons of the Apocalypse]].

* ''Creator/CirqueDuSoleil'': In a horror pastiche episode of the WidgetSeries ''Solstrom'', once a hotel has been magically transformed into a HauntedCastle[=/=]HellHotel hybrid, Death arrives as a guest (i.e., he's taking a holiday). Even though he fits the traditional appearance pictured above, magically signs the register with a skull and crossbones symbol, and has a menacing laugh, he observes the strange hijinks going on rather than interfere with them. By the episode's end, an unlucky guest has perished via choking, and when Death checks out it's with the person's soul following him in a daze. Further playing this for dark humor, the Hotel Owner doesn't seem to recognize Death and treats him like any other guest (well, with everything else that's changed, what's one more bizarre stranger on the premises?).

* ''WesternAnimation/PussInBootsTheLastWish'': [[spoiler:The red-eyed Wolf chasing after Puss is in fact Death himself, making it crystal clear to the cat that it's no exaggeration. He was offended by the way Puss [[YetAnotherStupidDeath frivolously wasted eight of his lives]] and [[EnragedByIdiocy enraged]] [[DoNotTauntCthulhu by the cat's arrogant boasts of "laughing in the face of death"]], so he decided to hunt Puss down and claim his last life personally. When Puss demonstrates that he's able to truly value life, as well as face him down without fear, the Wolf allows him to live out the rest of his days until his time to die naturally comes.]]

* ''VideoGame/{{Persona}}'':

* The American [[FolkMusic folk song]] "O'Death" has been used in, among other places, ''Film/OBrotherWhereArtThou'', ''VideoGame/UntilDawn'', and an episode of ''Series/{{Supernatural}}''. The second verse has various versions, though the ''Until Dawn'' version goes:

* ''VideoGame/BlazBlue'': Ragna was at some point before the start of Calamity Trigger nicknamed "the Grim Reaper". He also uses a sword called the Bloodscythe, which turns into a scythe during his "Astral Finish" move.

* ''WesternAnimation/PussInBootsTheLastWish'': [[spoiler:The red-eyed Wolf chasing after Puss is in fact Death himself, making it crystal clear to the cat that it's no exaggeration. He was offended by the way Puss [[YetAnotherStupidDeath frivolously wasted eight of his lives]] and [[DoNotTauntCthulhu enraged by the cat's arrogant boasts of "laughing in the face of death"]], so he decided to hunt Puss down and claim his last life personally. When Puss demonstrates that he's able to truly value life, as well as face him down without fear, the Wolf allows him to live out the rest of his days until his time to die naturally comes.]]