This may be just a showing of my own ignorance, but I've always been confused by this one point of the Grim Fandango story.  Manny is in the 8th Underworld, and he and everyone he is with (more or less) is trying to get to the 9th Underworld. 

My first thought would be that prior to arriving at the 8th Underworld, people would have had to pass through the first seven.  But no!  Left and right, people are dying and showing up immediately in the 8th!  No one ever mentions the previous levels.

So do the 1st through 7th Underworlds exist?  If so, what are they for?  If not, why'd they skip straight to eight?

Speculation is welcome, but if someone actually knows the history behind this mythology, I'd love to hear how it works.

As far as i can read from Wikipedia, everyone who died (except for warriors, lightning-victims and women killed while giving birth) had to take the four-year journey to "Mictlan", the ninth underworld. It doesn't say specifically, but the way I understand it, the souls had to go through all the other underworlds first.

Two ideas:

1. The Land of the Dead in Grim Fandango is rather modernized, perhaps the highway that Manny takes to fetch the newly departed is built to bypass the first 7?
2. Perhaps the journey through the land of the dead IS a journey through all the first 8 underworlds. El Marrow is the first, Rubacava the second, a.s.o. Is it official that the game takes place in the 8th underworld, or is that just something people has figured out?

a.s.o.

However, there are three identical periods, make it a lot faster to type. Also, the period is a key I use a lot,  so it is easily found. All-in-all, a great abbreviation :)

Be sure to spend that extra half-second of your life well.

Sorry, I'm coming across as a mean-spirited prick. I just found it amusingly bizarre. Abbreviate away, my good man!

No offense taken, and i sure will!

Now, where were we...