Darwin Carmichael Is Going to Hell
It's tough living in Brooklyn when you've got a crap job, you haven't been on a date in a long time, and you've got so much bad karma that nothing goes right for you. Your pet manticore is always annoying you, and those good-for-nothing angels on your couch do nothing but smoke pot all day. And, oh yeah, you're going to hell.
Darwin Carmichael is Going to Hell is set in a version of Brooklyn where All Myths Are True. Darwin himself has to deal with a buildup of negative karma due to making the Dalai Lama "retarded", which is partially responsible for giving him a terrible life and will send him to Hell unless he does something about it. His friends include Ella, an almost-literal Karma Houdini, his landlord Patrick, a Minotaur, his artist friend Matt, Matt's Muse girlfriend Melete, and his pet manticore Skittles, with a literal age of 2000 or so and a mental age of twelve.
- All Myths Are True: Apparently, the Christian God sent down some angels to prevent Darwin from accidentally letting the Dalai Lama hurt himself as a baby. Most of the minor characters also seem to be from Greek mythology. Every cute girl also owns a unicorn.
- Bi the Way: Ella.
- Cloudcuckoolander: Skittles
- Country Matters: Referenced by Darwin here.
- Easy Road to Hell: No matter how hard he tries to make up for his actions, Darwin Carmichael Is Going to Hell. Inverted, however, with a character who has so much good karma that she can get away with almost anything.
- Flat Earth Atheist: A group of scientists were able to convince the pot-head angels that God doesn't exist.
- Karma Houdini: Ella's parents (who seem to be expies of John Lennon and, um, someone else) were able to acquire some much positive karma that she is unable to do anything wrong. On the other hand, Darwin's negative karma resulting from accidentally allowing the infant Dalai Lama to fall and damage his brain has screwed Darwin over so badly he's having trouble getting back to zero karma again. Observe.
- Mermaid Problem: Patrick sees a hot mermaid at a party, but accidentally sleeps with her sister, a reverse-mermaid.
- Shout-Out: One of the unicorns is essentially Fat Pony with a horn on its head.
- They have literal Karma Police. Darwin has been arrested by them seventeen times by accident.
- The Stoner: A group of three angels, oddly enough. Whose dealer is a demon.
- Too Spicy for Yog-Sothoth: Matt's dreams are too weird for the nightmare-inducing rock god.
- True Art Is Incomprehensible: In-Universe example. Matt's work, such as "Untitled Series #12" a.k.a. "I Stuck My Head Up My Ass and This Is What I Found".
- After Ella and Skittles go on a raid randomly stealing street musicians' instruments, Matt decides to "take credit" for the jumbled mess they leave.
- Virgin Power: not quite, but unicorns really love virgins, much to Darwin's chagrin.
Unicorn: *nuzzle*
Darwin:"Hey, it's just been a while!"
- Also, they apparently follow the rule of the Technical Virgin, as cute redheaded Ginny is much-desired by the unicorns because in her words "what I do doesn't count"