Eighteen-year-old cynical college dropout George Lass dies in a bizarre, freak accident when a toilet seat falls from the Mir space station and strikes her dead. Instead of passing on, George is thrust into the afterlife as a grim reaper, part of an unseen team tasked with harvesting human souls just moments before their deaths to ease their transition. Led by the enigmatic Rube Sofer, George joins a dysfunctional
surrogate family of reapers, including cynical Mason, bitter former 1920s silent film star Daisy Adair, and pragmatic Roxy Harvey. George is assigned to work as a lowly temp at Happy Time, a soul-crushing staffing agency, allowing her to observe human mortality up close.Initially, George struggles immensely with her new reality, mourning her lost youth and resenting her undead duties. However, her grief is magnified by watching her living family—her grieving mother Joy,
emotionally distant father Reggie, and younger sister—fall apart in the wake of her passing. Unable to reveal her true identity, George takes on a new mortal identity as Millie, a quirky office worker, just to remain close to her shattered family.Throughout the series, the reapers guide a diverse array of souls—some peaceful, others terrified or angry—into the great unknown. They operate under strict rules, the most important being that mortals must never see their true faces, and reapers must not interfere with fate. George learns harsh lessons about empathy, consequence, and the value of human connection. Her relationship with her mother remains a central emotional anchor; as Joy slowly learns to cope with her grief, George begins to find a strange sort of peace with her own death.Along the way, the reapers face various crises, including the loss and replacement of Rube, internal power struggles, and the constant psychological toll of collecting souls. George frequently grapples with her unresolved teenage angst, learning that life is precious precisely because it is finite. As she matures in death, she stops viewing her reaper status as a curse and begins to see it as a second chance to understand humanity. Ultimately, George accepts her bizarre destiny, forging deep bonds with her fellow reapers and finally finding the maturity and emotional closure she entirely lacked when she was alive.