The truth behind Jessica Harrow’s mysterious death and her connection to the Grim Reaper is finally revealed! But how does this connect to her unique abilities and the ancient force known only as The End? Grim #5 is written by Stephanie Phillips, drawn by Flaviano, colored by Rico Renzi and lettered by Tom Napolitano for BOOM Studios.
The opening pages of Grim #5 are a delight. Adira’s rage radiates from the conflicting teal of her skin and the brilliant red outlines of her army, all inked with sketchy lines. A battle seems to stretch across time and space and culture as the army of demons rages against Death — Adira’s brother — and his reapers from Egypt, Rome and Scandinavia. Above them all, Death’s electrified scythe swings against Adira’s double-edged ax.
Overlaid with all of this is a little backstory where we find out something we kind of already knew: Adira is power hungry and wants control. Death straight up gave her the afterlife while he bums around in a messy hotel room in Las Vegas. He’s had the chance now to experience life, not just death.
Not only that, but Death is a DAD! Which explains why Jessica can slip between the worlds of the living and the dead so easily, why she’s got a nasty skull face when she gets angry and why she can wield Death’s scythe.
I’m let down by this revelation. It seems like the oldest trick in the book. Or at least since Star Wars did it. Death gave up the afterlife to his demon sister in exchange for protection of Jessica, the daughter of Death and a human named Lilah. But Dad and Daughter get too into catching up, The End arrives to ruin the reunion. Death defends his daughter again and battles it out with The End across the casino floor. In the end (pun intended), Death makes the ultimate sacrifice and dies for Jessica while sending The End back down into what we assume is the netherworld.
Suddenly Adira is there, pinning this all on poor Jessica, stealing Death’s scythe and condemning Jessica and her fellow reapers Eddie and Marcel to life.
Meanwhile, Lilah Harrow gets a rare letter in prison, surprising her as apparently she doesn’t exist?
We got a lot of questions answered in this first arc, and while I’m disappointed by the easy “Death is Jessica’s dad” explanation, I’m interested to see what this means for her, Eddie and Marcel now that they’re trapped in the living world, and for us to get to learn more about Lilah.
Cat’s Death Corner
While we wait for the next arc, let’s dive into some death practices and beliefs!
In this issue of Grim, we learn a little about the sibling rivalry between Adira and Death. Turns out there are a lot of deity sibling rivalries across cultures! Most referenced is Osiris and Seth from Egypt.
Both Osiris and Seth wanted recognition from the sun god Ra. Seth ends up killing his brother over it, cuts his body up into 14 pieces and scatters those pieces around the world. Traditionally, ancient Egyptian royalty married within the family to keep bloodlines pure. As such, Osiris had a sister and wife in Isis, who swore to put all his pieces back together. She DOES and somehow gets impregnated by him, but he doesn’t stay alive. Instead, Osiris becomes king of the underworld and is associated with fertility, death and resurrection.
Being Seth was a god of chaos, war and disorder, and was known as a trickster god, it’s hard not to see parallels between this story and the one in the first arc of Grim. (Lewis, 1994) Osiris and Death are both rulers of their respective realms with a relative envious of their status. Adira resembles Seth in that she wants power and thrives in shady chaos making. Horus, Osiris’ son, ends up avenging his father’s death at the hand of his rival.
What does that tell us about Jessica? If she’s a parallel to Horus, that puts her in line to avenge her father’s death against Adira. Horus was also a falcon, and went on to represent the pharaohs of Egypt. That could make Lilah’s story similar to that of Isis, the goddess of healing and magic.
But we’ve seen this creative team borrow from other cultures’ religions and death rites before, so I imagine they will again!
Sources referenced: Lewis, J. R. (1994). Encyclopedia of afterlife beliefs and phenomena. Gale Research.
Cat Purcell is a Career Services Librarian, cosplayer, artist, and massive coffee consumer.
