The trope seems to be about a character, racked with guilt over something (usually murder) vigorously cleaning their hands/themselves, evidence, or the crime scene, even (and especially) when there's no longer any blood on it. It's making the "wash the blood off your hands" metaphor literal but showing that the guilt for whatever they've done can never go away, so the person can never truly be clean enough. Hence the vigorous and often continuous washing (really good page image on this one, imo).

But the trope is being widely misused, per the wick check. Out of 50 wicks checked, only 9 were correct/in the right ballpark (I was being pretty lenient). 27 or 54% were some form of misuse, with the greatest amount (24%) falling under "a character just felt remorse or guilty," which may or may not be My God, What Have I Done?. Outside of that, the wicks didn't really adhere to one single pattern, which is unusual. I suspect a combination of the name (some examples seemed to take it as referring to cleaning in general) and the laconic (which reads "Obsessive ways to cleanse oneself of guilt" rather vaguely) is the culprit here.

There was another section I labeled ambiguous that makes up 16% of the wick check. This was for examples that might be correct but it's not clear that the character was feeling guilty as they washed their hands. Truthfully, I checked out this trope after I had an idea about a character vigorously scrubbing/ washing themselves out of disgust after experiencing or dealing with something traumatic in some way, but I wasn't sure if Out, Damned Spot! was supposed to cover that already, despite the description specifying guilt. The majority of the examples in this section are similar: can't tell whether it's out of guilt or disgust (or any other emotion since it's not specified). Though, I'm not sure the line between guilt and disgust is always clear enough to do a hard split between, anyways. That said, even if we assumed all of these examples were correct, that would only bump up the correct folder to 17 wicks or 34%. Misuse would still be more than 50% of the wicks checked.

Suggestions: While I think the idea itself is tropeworthy, it's clear the page needs to be changed given the amount of misuse. If we keep it as defined, I think at minimum there needs to be a rename to something more indicative, along with a rewrite of the laconic to better specify the trope and some editing of the description.

But the ambiguous folder (third largest) still has me concerned. I think there might be a Missing Supertrope or Sister Trope for when a character vigorously washes/scrubs their hands, face, body, etc. (any part doesn't matter) as a trauma response. Could be guilt-based, could be disgust-based (most common for sexual abuse victims), could be anxiety-based, etc. Point is that the character is trying to physically wash the feeling away.

We could rewrite this trope to be that broader one or we could TLP/yard it.

• Moriarty the Patriot: William mentions that his hands have seemed cover with blood since his first murder and that he never intended for them to get this stained, but he cannot seem to wash it out. He tries anyway in The Final Problem.
• Through the Eyes of Madness: Wyrd Sisters has several scenes from the perspective of Duke Felmet, and his conviction that the witches are making the king's blood reappear on his hands, however hard he scrubs them with wire-wool and sandpaper...
• Junji Ito Kyoufu Manga Collection: The obsessive-compulsive mother in "The Groaning Drain" deals with this when she accidentally kills her husband and his blood won't wash off the floorboards. Then she tries cleaning her skin...
• The Night the Magic Died: Implied as it happens behind closed doors, but according to Word of God, Celestia frantically tries in vain to wash the blood stain from her hoof after cracking Nahmat's skull.
  Princess Celestia: It won't wash off... WHY WON'T IT WASH OFF!?
• Fate/Grand Order - Lancers G to M - Gareth: It's stated in Camelot/Zero that after killing the Knights of the Round Table who went against the Lion King, Gareth kept washing her hands obsessively after every battle, leading to her fingers becoming disfigured due to the constant washing.
• The Power of the Equinox: After Pinkie Pie's idea to use Dimmed Star's Ink in a non-destructive way leads to the latter becoming possessed and nearly killing her, Pinkie secludes herself in the bathroom to wash herself of the Ink she was covered in. The trauma causes her to vigorously wash herself over again, and she later does it again by using rainwater.
• The Velvet Vampire - Not His Blood: Diane doesn't do a thorough enough job of washing off the blood from the would-be rapist that she stabbed to death. When Lee spots blood on her hand she says that it isn't hers, and makes up a ridiculous story involving a Mercy Kill of terribly injured stray cat. Lee the moron buys it.
• Man in the Attic: Slade compulsively washes his hands in the Thames after each of the Ripper murders.
• The Faerie Queene:
  • Canto II begins with Guyon attempting to guiltily clean his hands of the blood of the couple he failed to save from poisoning and death, only for none of the blood to come off.
  • Canto VII: The ghost of Pontius Pilate is trapped in the river Cocytus forever failing to wash his hands clean of Christ's blood.

• Jōjū Senjin!! Mushibugyō - Shungikou: Says his hands feel like lead concerning his killings

• Gran Hotel: Sofía has guilt dreams of dripping blood following her second kill.

• Viridian Dreams - Forensic Drama: You never know what's going to happen in a Quest. One moment, your protagonist could be just sitting around minding their own business. The next they could be nearly raped, stab the would-be-rapist in the kidney, and then need to (Out, Damned Spot!) dissolve their body in a chemical tub in order to get rid of it, to avoid getting both herself and her mage convicted.

• Soul Nomad & the World Eaters: Cuthbert. Despite his cold and aloof demeanor, as well as his affiliation with Lobo, he clearly regrets much of his actions with Yesterwind. It's also the reason why he kills himself.
• Winterset: Judge Ellis has gone partly insane from this ordeal. He walks around like a madman, muttering to himself, warning others from the peril of judging rashly.
• RRR (2022) - Bheem, My God, What Have I Done?: When Sita reveals that Ram was actually working undercover for the rebellion the entire time, Bheem cries out in remorse for leaving Ram at the mercy of the British army after he was seriously injured rescuing him from the army's prison transport. He even (Out, Damned Spot!) stares at his hands when he hears the truth.
• Digimon Adventure 02 New Chosen Children - Ken Ichijouji: After his Heel–Face Turn he continues to feel guilt for his actions.
• Brutal Series Horrible: Gouges out her own eyes in the first What If so she won't be tormented by visions of Spain.
• A Place of Greater Safety - Robbespierre: A variant. Robespierre spits up blood into a handkerchief in the scene where he finally signs Danton’s death warrant. Possibly also an allusion to his real-life suicide attempt.
• The Americans The Jennings Family - Philip: As the series goes on, Philip becomes more and more consumed by guilt over killing innocent people who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. At the end of Season 5, he and Elizabeth decide that it has become too much and so he retires from active KGB Duty.
• Roulette Rampage Reloaded - After he ripped up his brother's Hope's Peak letter, he scrubbed his hands until they were raw and bleeding.
• The Lion King: Simba: In the second film, he is shown to still be consumed with guilt over Mufasa's death, and it forms a major role in his actions in said sequel.
• V For Vendetta Comic - Delia: The only one of the Larkhill Three whose conscience is bothered by what she did, she's clearly haunted by her deeds at Larkhill until the story's present.
• Ambience A Fleet Symphony Six - Hiyou: In her Fleet Log in chapter 134, she feels that her military career will have tarnished her desired civilian career aboard a luxury liner to the point where that civilian career path just won't be viable anymore.
• Shadow Of The Valley - Older Than They Look: Light ages quite gracefully and still looks much like he did when he was twenty but he feels worn out and used up from the subconscious burden of guilt of having ended so many lives.

• Doomsday Clock - Hates Being Touched: Rorschach II gets really annoyed with people touching him. It reaches Out, Damned Spot! levels when he showers, freaking out about having touched Veidt and scratching his head enough to draw blood.
• Robert A. Heinlein: In Hoag, the title character comes home every day with red gunk under his fingernails, which he then compulsively scrubs clean.
• Tropes H to P: Parodied in an early episode where Edd is shown desperately trying to scrub off a grass stain as it were a blood stain. When this fails, he falls on his knees and gives a Skyward Scream.
  Edd: STUBBORN GRASS STAIN!!!! AAAAAAHHHHH!!!!

• Mortal Kombat 11 - Shell-Shocked Veteran: Jax Briggs is revealed in the first chapter to have been honorably discharged from the Special Forces due to his physical and mental trauma, unable to cope with the stress caused by losing his arms, dying, (Out, Damned Spot!) becoming a revenant, and losing his wife to sickness a year before the story begins.
• Little Eyolf: Rita feels the eyes of her son follows her everywhere, and she can´t get rid of them.
• Julius Caesar: Inverted, interestingly, when Brutus suggests:
  ... Stoop, Romans, stoop,
  And let us bathe our hands in Caesar's blood
  Up to the elbows, and besmear our swords:
  Then walk we forth, even to the market-place,
  And waving our red weapons o'er our heads,
  Let's all cry Peace, Freedom, and Liberty.
• Graceland - Heroic BSoD: Mike has a pretty intense one after Eddy kills himself. Of course, it doesn't help matters that right after watching Eddy blow his brains out, he has to go home and (Out, Damned Spot!) clean up a sink full of blood-red spaghetti sauce from dinner.
• MCU: White Collar Criminals - Ward demonstrates this repeatedly. He first gets blood on his sleeve after Danny takes him to see the decapitated head of a Hand soldier who failed to stop Danny, which Ward tries to rub off. He later gets it again when he kills Harold by stabbing him to death, first seeing blood on his sleeve and hand before he starts seeing it everywhere, dripping from doors and walls. It doesn't go away until Harold comes back to life. — seeing blood everywhere is not the same as trying to scrub it clean
• Watashitachi Wa Roger Kaizoku Desu We Still Stand Proud: Even over twenty years later, Shanks and Buggy still sometimes hallucinate dirt under their nails from all the graves they dug in Baterilla.
• 7 Days (2021): Callum at one point hallucinates that he's got blood on his hands.
• Casino Royale (2006): Bond finds Vesper sitting fully-clothed under a running shower after she was attacked. Apparently the script originally called for her to have stripped to her underwear, but Daniel Craig pointed out if she were truly upset she would have either stayed fully clothed or stripped to (Out, Damned Spot!) nothing at all, so they went with the more conservative option.

• Home Sick Pilots: Played with regarding Meg, the only survivor of the Nuclear Bastards. When she emerges from the house she is completely covered in blood. And it doesn't matter what Meg does, because the blood never washes off. Even if she wipes some off her hands or her face, the blood just grows back.
• Scotland, PA: Fry grease splashes onto Pat's hand during Duncan's murder, and for the rest of the movie she keeps applying ointments to remove what she perceives to be a disfiguring burn.
• Throne of Blood: Isuzu Yamada does a terrific mad scene where she sits in a trance, trying to wash imaginary blood off her hands. — doesn't say why so can't determine if it was out of guilt
• Film/Bullitt: The ending. Bullitt stands in his bathroom washing his hands and pondering just how badly he's screwed things up. Or just how much his girlfriend Cathy is right about how callous he is about the violence he faces on the job. Note that the last shot is a closeup of his holstered gun and spare rounds. — unclear if the washing the hands was vigorous to scrub off guilt or if this is more of a These Hands Have Killed moment
• Inuyasha Band Of Seven - Suikotsu: His good personality doesn't like blood. Even Kikyo was weirded out when he kept washing his hands after they already looked clean. — doesn't say it's caused by guilt. could just be hemophobic
• Babylon Bee: One article parodies public ambivalence toward both candidates in the 2020 presidential election by describing polling places offering basins of water to allow voters to wash their hands of their vote in the manner of Pontius Pilate. — guilt for voting for bad candidates or disgust at voting for bad candidates?
• The FanFiction Critic: A rare humorous version. She feels dirtied by quoting a racist fanfic and begins scrubbing her mouth with a toothbrush. Overlaps with Shower of Angst below. — guilt for having read it or disgust at the bigotry?
  • The Shower of Angst example for more context: Fan Fiction Critic had to keep on taking showers because she was reading a fic involving Bella Swan getting raped by Edward Cullen and Bella was okay with it. Later parodied, as she leaps up for showers repeatedly over the course of a single review. Eventually, she has a toothbrushing of angst after quoting a racist fanfiction, claiming it made her mouth "feel dirty."
• Top of the Lake: One of the last shots of the series is Robin wading in the lake attempting to get Al's blood out of her shirt. — is it for guilt or to hide the evidence?

• Older Than Steam
• Sammy Keyes: Happens in Dead Giveaway. Luckily, it ends better than a lot of examples.
• Dangerverse: Danger struggles with this for a while after killing Quirrell.
• Tomb Raider - Second Lara: Has this reaction after realising she's killed Larson.
• The Mystic Knights of Tir Na Nóg: When Rohan discovers that the Mark of Destiny is a birthmark shared by his half-brother Lugad and his mother Queen Maeve, he furiously tries to scrub the Mark of Destiny off of his arm. — partial
• Buffyverse: Sunnydale Residents
• Darths & Droids - Palpatine: By the time of Episode 5.