The Seven Deadly Sins is a grouping of vices repeatedly referenced within Christian teachings, although they are not mentioned in the Bible. Behaviors or habits are classified under this category if they directly give rise to other immoralities. According to the standard list, they are wrath, gluttony, envy, sloth, greed, lust, and pride, which are contrary to the seven heavenly virtues. These sins are often thought to be abuses or excesses of natural faculties or passions (for example, gluttony abuses the natural hunger for nourishment).
See The Seven Deadly Sins for a more in-depth explanation.
The cardinal sins are used in Season One of Slasher as the Executioner's modus operandi. He determines their suitability based on which sin he feels they've committed, then after identifying one (or in sloth's case, two) potential targets, the Executioner kills them via their described punishment. Whether that be dismembered alive for the sin of wrath, to be force fed rats, toads, and serpents for the sin of gluttony, to be drowned in freezing water for the sin of envy, to be thrown in a pit of snakes for the sin of sloth, to be boiled in a vat of expensive oil for the sin of greed, to be smothered by fire and brimstone for the sin of lust, or to be "broken by the wheel" for the sin of pride.
Wrath[]
Verna dismembered in her own home
Wrath, also known as anger or rage, is an intense emotional state wherein someone becomes incredibly hostile or violent towards someone else.
The Executioner had targeted seven people for this first sin, but ended up killing Verna McBride for her involvement in her husband's (Peter McBride) death. It's revealed in Digging Your Grave with Your Teeth, that when Verna was younger she had shot and killed Peter after finding out about his infidelity with Rachel Ingram. It's for this sin of wrath and anger that she was targeted and killed.
The punishment for the sin of wrath is to be dismembered alive— to which the Executioner broke into Verna's house, bound her to her own bed, and cut off her hands and feet while she was still alive and conscious. Although Verna's death is offscreen, it's presumed that she died of blood loss due to her injuries. During this kill, the Executioner was interrupted after Sarah had heard Verna screaming and entered her home.
Gluttony[]
Justin being poisoned
Gluttony is the act of over-prioritizing the act of hedonism (eg. over-indulgence of food, drink, wealth, status, power, etc.) In Christianity, it is considered a sin if the excessive desire for consumption causes it to be withheld from the needy.
Like Verna McBride, the Executioner had targeted a list of eight people before finally deciding on Justin Faysal both for his drug addiction, and involvement in the Vicars family accident. It's revealed in Like as Fire Eateth Up and Burneth Wood, that Justin had used underhanded tactics to buy a plot of land from a poor family. He had used one of his connections in the city council to rezone their land, with the Vicars unable to afford the tax hike, forcing them to sell their land. After leaving, the family ended up staying in an old home with no heating or electricity during the winter, using a propane gas heater to keep them warm. But after the family went to sleep, they all silently suffocated and died from the fumes and lack of oxygen.
The punishment for the sin of gluttony is to be force fed rats, toads, and serpents— to which the Executioner mixed brodifacoum, bromethalin, and strychnine (rat poison) into his cocaine stash. After consuming it in secret, Justin began to bleed from the eyes and froth at the mouth. He died a few seconds after presumably due to heart failure or internal bleeding.
Envy[]
Brenda drowned in the lake
Envy is an emotion which comes up when someone lack's a quality, achievement, or possession and either wants it for themselves, or wishes that the other person didn't have it.
Like the previous victims, Brenda Merrit was chosen out of nine named targets to be punished for her sin of envy, due to accidently putting her friend, Ada Pavlovik into a coma. It's revealed in Like as Fire Eateth Up and Burneth Wood that unknown to everyone, a teenaged Brenda had dropped a cement block off a bridge while Sonja, Ronald Edwards and a few of her friends were driving underneath. Intent on hitting Sonja, Brenda actually hit Ada, another girl in the car who Brenda didn't know was there. This accident left Ada in a vegetate state of which she never recovered.
The punishment for the sin of envy is to be drowned in freezing water— to which the Executioner led both her and Sarah into the surrounding forest after driving them off the road. Upon doing so, he stalked the two of them for several minutes before separating them by knocking Brenda out. When Brenda woke back up, she was alone, chained to a cement block in a lakeside boathouse. Once the Executioner reentered the boathouse, Brenda had a chance to plead with him to no avail before pushing the block into the water. The chain dragged Brenda into the lake, with barely enough lenience to keep her eyes above the water. She drowned a few seconds later.
Sloth[]
Trent in the pit of snakes
Sloth is the most difficult sin to define and credit as sin, since it can refer to mental, spiritual, pathological, or physical laziness. Unlike the other sins which are commitments of immorality, sloth is an exclusion or disinclination towards desire.
From the nine people the Executioner initially targeted, this time Trent McBride and June Henry were both chosen to be punished due to their involvement in Ariel Peterson's disappearance. It's revealed in As Water Is Corrupted Unless It Moves that Trent and June were in an ambulance that night five years prior, finding Ariel drunk on the side of the road. With June wanting to pick her up and drop her at home, Trent manages to convince her to leave Ariel behind in order to avoid doing extra paperwork. As a result, Ariel was later kidnapped, raped, and confined for the years afterwards.
June eaten by animals and insects
The punishment for the sin of sloth is to be thrown into a pit of snakes. For Trent's punishment, the Executioner stalked him while he was hunting and shot at him several times. Eventually leading him to a trap in the middle of the forest— a large hole covered by a thin cover and leaves. After falling in and breaking his leg, the Executioner approaches with a sack full of poisonous snakes and drops them onto him. A bite from the Eastern Brown snake (the second most venomous snake in the world) was the one that ultimately killed him.
Meanwhile several hours later, June was kidnapped from a church and knocked unconscious without much resistance. Upon waking up she finds herself the next day with an IV feeding her curare (a paralytic), and out in an open field with honey all over her body— presumably to attract animals. However it wasn't the animal bites and insect stings that killed her, rather she died of respiratory failure due to the concentration of curare in her body.
Greed[]
Alison’s head in a fast food grease trap
Greed, also known as avarice, is an uncontrolled yearning for material gain (be it food, money, land, or animate/inanimate possessions); or social value, such as status, or power.
This is the first and only instance where the target list is unavailable. It's unknown why no names are listed for greed in the Executioner's book, however it's implied that it's eventual target, Alison Sutherland was chosen after her interview with the Executioner since he had no hesitance in leaving her alone during their first interaction. It's revealed in Ill-Gotten Gains that Alison was strongly responsible for the manhunt against Ariel Peterson's father during her disappearance. After hacking into Benny Peterson's email account, she sent an incriminating email to Ariel hoping that the evidence would get more readers, and allow her to keep her newspaper afloat through sales. But after everyone began to believe that, Benny was a kidnapper and murderer, he hanged himself. Through a conversation with Lisa-Ann Follows, we're told that Alison expresses no guilt in doing what she did.
The punishment for the sin of greed is to be boiled in a vat of expensive oil— in which the Executioner abducted Alison on her way out of Waterbury and kept her tied in a chair back at their original interview location. After Alison woke up and began pleading for her life by admitting to her sin, the Executioner cut her throat and decapitated her. Her head was then stuck into a restaurant's vat of frying oil.
Lust[]
Iain burned alive inside a coffin
Lust is the intense desire, often sexual in nature for a particular object of affection.
Unlike the other sins, lust is the first instance where the Executioner has only put one name, Iain Vaughn. This is likely due to Iain's sin of lust being the only prevalent attribution to it in Waterbury, as him being directly responsible for Ariel Peterson's disappearance. It's revealed in The One Who Sows His Own Flesh that Iain was the one that kidnapped her. In the years that followed, Iain repeatedly raped her, and imprisoned Ariel in a room-sized safe in his basement as a concubine. Further confining their four-year-old son Jake, concieved after their first interaction.
The punishment for the sin of lust is to be smothered in fire and brimstone— to which the Executioner followed Iain to an old shack, after he had escaped from the police. Upon reaching the cabin, Iain was knocked over the head and brought back to Waterbury. When he regained consciousness, he was confined in a wooden coffin to unknowingly be immolated in a crematorium furnace.
Pride[]
Tom being "broken by the wheel"
Pride is considered to be the cardinal sin— worse than all the others. To be prideful or hubristic is to think oneself superior to others, or allow themselves to think they are better than God himself.
When the Executioner's book is first discovered, only two names are written on it before the actual target has been chosen. These being Tom Winston, for killing Rachel and Bryan Ingram, and Sarah Bennett for attempting to kill herself. Both acts attempt to play God by taking a life into their own hands, a sin of pride.
Initially Tom claims that his killing spree came about due to bringing justice and enacting God's work. But he reveals to both Sarah and the Executioner that he was simply acting out of an injured pride due to being used and blackmailed by the two. Meanwhile, before coming back to Waterbury Sarah attempted to end her own life by swallowing a bunch of pills.
The punishment for the sin of pride is to be broken on the wheel. Since Iain knew this when he kidnapped Sarah, he attempted to make her death look like the Executioner's work by throwing her onto a tire pile and breaking her bones with a tire iron. However, she managed to get away before he could kill her.
When the Executioner himself attempted to kill Sarah, he was going to throw her onto a sawblade used for logging. But Tom spoke up for Sarah and managed to convince him that he deserved to be punished, not her. The Executioner listened to his plea and untied them both, with Tom willingly falling on the spinning sawblade.