In October, I was invited to attend the highly anticipated LightBox Expo, an annual gathering of established and aspiring creators invested in the entertainment industry. Click here to read more about my first LBX experience and see if attending LightBox in 2026 could be for you!
Overall, I greatly enjoyed my first time touring LBX, exploring its diverse Artist Alley, attending insightful panels, and meeting incredibly talented creators. And one of my favorite highlights of attending LBX was reconnecting with the WEBTOON team and interviewing three of their Original creators. At LightBox, I interviewed artist, author, and full-time comic creator GRAVEWEAVER, who is responsible for the supernatural sensation and WEBTOON Original series, I’m the Grim Reaper.
With over 200 episodes available to read for FREE, anime-inspired action scenes and characters with questionable morals, I’m The Grim Reaper has become a fan favorite among WEBTOON readers since its launch in August 2019. In this supernatural smash hit, a young woman named Scarlet dies and makes a deal with the King of Hell, Satan, to escape an eternity in the ninth circle of Hell. To escape Judgement, Scarlet agrees to become one of his grim reapers and kill a sinner, for Satan to condemn, each day. If she disobeys his orders or fails to kill a sinner per day, Scarlet will be returned to the ninth circle to suffer an oblivion alone for all eternity. As a grim reaper, she returns to Earth, where she encounters her fair choice of sinners. Initially conflicted but desperate to save herself, Scarlet kills her first sinner and delivers his soul to Satan for Judgement.
Afterwards, Scarlet is returned to Earth with a new role and more questions than answers. Upon their first meeting, Satan claimed that Scarlet caught his attention and became his favorite sinner by being “the worst of the worst,” but with no memories from her mortal life, she has no way of knowing what sins condemned her to the ninth circle. To learn more about what killed her and condemned her to Hell, she partners with sinner and disgraced former detective Chase Carter, and as they become closer, Scarlet discovers that not all sin weighs the same.
In this LBX exclusive interview, ITGR creator GRAVEWEAVER discusses how she was first introduced to the WEBTOON platform, the role morality plays in her original webcomic, and what inspired the elements of its main protagonist. GRAVEWEAVER also shares how she maintains healthy boundaries as a creator with a large fan base and offers advice on comic creation. Keep reading if YOU want to learn more about GRAVEWEAVER and how her original webcomic has been running strong, with a loyal fanbase, for over five years!
For readers who are unfamiliar with your work, can you tell us about yourself, your original webcomic on WEBTOON, and what drew you to comics as a medium?
I’ve told stories since I was in fifth grade. I was drawing comics in between notes at school to show to my friends and get their fun reactions. It was a way to utilize my art and add a story to it. Since then, webcomics have evolved. Originally, you would create a website, upload your comic, and people online would visit your site to read your comic. For example, I would post on DeviantArt, but since DA wasn’t meant for comics, it was hard to read them. Eventually, I took a break from comics and worked conventions full-time. One year, I didn’t get into many conventions and had a lot of free time. It was on my bucket list to finish a webcomic. I had made so many, but I never finished them.
At that point, it had been a couple of years since I made my last comic, so I asked a couple of friends, and two of them mentioned WEBTOON. One of them, who’s Korean, said WEBTOON was huge in Korea, and recently they had opened a branch in the United States. I thought up a story, drew it in one or two days, and then uploaded it. I didn’t care if anybody read it because this was for me. This was for my bucket list, so I uploaded it, didn’t tell any of my friends, and posted under a different username.
Then, my comic got really popular, and after a month, it had jumped to number two on the supernatural subgenres on the platform. That’s when I told my social media followers that I had been working on this comic in secret and where to find it. By then, the comic already had more readers than I had followers on all my social media accounts combined. Then, within two months, WEBTOON asked me if I would be willing to make it an Original. The rest is history.
How would you pitch I’m The Grim Reaper to new readers?
At conventions, I’m constantly pitching my comic to potential readers, and oftentimes, I start with this. Scarlet wakes up in Hell with no memories of who she was in life. Satan condemns her as one of the worst sinners he’s ever seen, so she’s going straight to the ninth circle of Hell to suffer for all eternity. But since she’s so interesting, Satan offers her a deal. Become one of his grim reapers and kill one sinner per day to postpone your sentence. Scarlet takes the deal and, thus, the comic begins.
ITGR presents numerous moral questions, often forcing readers to self-reflect, confront their own demons, and assess what’s right versus wrong. How would you argue that things like morality, religion, and philosophy play a role in your worldbuilding?
No religion per se. Instead, I applied the nine circles of Hell from Dante Alighieri’s Inferno, which is basically Bible fanfiction that takes an interesting spin on how eternal punishment is doled out. And I then put my personal spin on it.
With ITGR, I propose that things aren’t simple. I don’t like simple stories, where the bad guy wants to blow up the world and the good guy wants to save it. It’s too cut and dry. I prefer characters who are selfish sometimes. They may do a good thing here and there, but does doing that negate all the bad things they’ve done? I like proposing those types of questions, and I like it when people engage in discussion and debate. People aren’t one-dimensional, so I find those kinds of characters more realistic.
How would you say you engage with your fans and their theories and debates regarding your comic?
I don’t. The only feedback I take is from my editors because there are just too many voices online. If you listen to all the voices, you find out fast that everyone has their own opinions and interpretations. At the end of the day, it’s my story and I’m going to tell the story in the way I want. I like it when my readers debate, but I do not want to get involved. I just like to let the fans do their own thing, and I do my own thing.
I have been doing this comic for five years, and I do talk to my fans, but about other things. I have a Discord, but it’s mainly for Minecraft. It’s against the rules to ask me about ITGR. Recently, I ran a Hunger Games Minecraft server where all my fans are invited to kill each other Minecraft style. I like interacting with my fans, but not about the comic.
I’m The Grim Reaper showcases classic elements from manga and anime. Do you have any desire to see your comic eventually adapted into an anime or animated series? If yes, would you consider introducing new characters or expanding themes commonly explored in your current series?
I think if it were ever to be made into an anime, I would want it to just be one-to-one. Yes, there are a lot of things I could have done better, but lots of my readers like the comic as it is. If you start making too many changes, it’s like changing the thing they grew up with. Since it’s been five years, some of my fans grew up reading my comic between middle school and college.
How would you describe Scarlet as a protagonist, and what elements inspired her character?
ITGR is a pretty serious comic. I have added humor to it, but I don’t want to downplay the severity of the characters’ actions. I don’t want the world to seem less dangerous, so there’s a certain tone I wanted to lean into. Scarlet is driven, even selfish sometimes. Actually, she’s selfish a lot of the time, and that’s part of her character development, learning not to be selfish. She’s still working on that. She’s also dry, sarcastic, and dense, and that’s just the kind of protagonist who worked best with the story I wanted to tell.
But I do have some bubbly and quirky characters. At one point in the story, a girl goes to the first circle of Hell for stealing escargot. It’s goofy, so she gets to be a goofy character. But Scarlet was a very bad person in life, and throughout the story, she continues to do bad things, but simultaneously tries to repent for her sins.
How did it feel to be among the panelists for WEBTOON’s first appearance at LightBox?
It was awesome! I’ve never been to LightBox Expo, and it had such a great vibe, very professional. It was awesome to be surrounded by other creatives. And the audience was very engaged and clearly fans of the platform and its stories!
With many current and aspiring comic creators attending LBX, what advice would you give them regarding comic creation, building their brands, and engaging with their readers?
I say it all the time, and people don’t like this answer, but I tell them to just do it. Just pick up the pencil and do it. Just get started. Building a brand and an online reputation is a marathon, not a sprint, and you want to have as much time as possible to collect and engage with your valuable readers. Even if you think you’re not good enough now, you will be able to practice to become better by just doing your comic, so get started! Worried your first comic will suck? My first ten comics sucked, but there’s no way around it. You’ve gotta keep going to get to the good stuff. Remember that the good artists are just bad artists who never gave up.
With up to 228 episodes to read for FREE on WEBTOON, I’m The Grim Reaper updates every Saturday at 6 PM PST! You can follow GRAVEWEAVER and her creative journey on X, Instagram, and Facebook, can support her via Patreon, and can read my original 2023 interview with GRAVEWEAVER if you click here!
