Skyhigh
Skyhigh is a fairly obscure Seinen manga by Takahashi Tsutomu, collected in two volumes in 2001-2002. It went on to inspire a live-action Japanese series and a film.
Izuko is the gatekeeper between Heaven and Earth. She gives the deceased three choices-- they can await reincarnation in heaven, defy death and remain Walking the Earth as a ghost forever, or to get revenge on a human and kill them, and burn in agony eternally in hell. They have 12 days to choose their fate, and can learn things about their lives and the people they once loved's current lives.
The manga tells the story of each victim and what path they take.
Tropes used in Skyhigh include:
- Complete Monster / Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Katou Iwaru.
- Crowning Moment of Heartwarming: Mai sacrifices her life to save her mother. At the gate, she asks to bring Katou along to heaven with her, despite the fact that he killed her.
- Driven to Suicide: Kino-shita, assisted suicide. Normally suicide gets you sent to hell immediately - Izuko says it's murdering yourself - so she researched this technicality and convinced her friend to do it.
- Emotionless Girl: Izuko
- Fluffy Cloud Heaven
- Ghostly Goals
- Gold Digger: A hideous man kills his girlfriend because he thinks she was after only his money.
- Goodbye, Cruel World: Kino-shita sends a note to each one of the Alpha Bitch snobs who bully her telling them that one of them is next, because she will come back to kill.
- Go Out with a Smile
- Hell Gate
- Heroic Spirit: Mai.
- Infant Immortality: The pregnant's woman son does not go down to hell with her. The cheating man's son is replaced by him.
- Invisible to Normals: Ghosts.
- It Can't Be Helped: After the schoolgirl Kino-shita kills herself because she knows she'll be able to kill the Libby at her school, she realizes that her friend she left behind is overjoyed in her death and then wishes she hadn't decided to drown herself. Izuko simply tells her that's it's too late and it can't be helped, so she might as well just go to heaven without going through with the killing.
- Loser Protagonist: The man that saves a woman from an assault.
- Meganekko: Kino-shita
- See You in Hell: The murdered gold digger's body is left under the hotel room's bed, and when a couple have sex on top of the bed she kills them and is damned for killing someone other than her murderer. Izuko tells her that she'll be eternally lonely there, like Izuko is, and the woman grins and tells her, "See you there."
- Self-Inflicted Hell: The third option.
- Spirit World
- Tall, Dark and Bishoujo: Izuko
- Tear Jerker: Ayame singing at the end...
- The two little girls killed in a car crash deliver a last goodbye to their parents and schoolmates - on Christmas, no less.
- Unfinished Business: Revenge fuels a lot of the decisions.
- Walking the Earth
- Who Dunnit to Me?: The pregnant woman was murdered.
- Woman Scorned: The pregnant woman.
- Your Cheating Heart: The pregnant woman was cheated on by her husband.