Thoughts on the berserk prototype chapter? Personally I find it meh, and I can’t take guts seriously in it lol, but ngl the whole thing about vuana and guts’ mom being killed by apostles rlly fascinate me. Like the fact griffith and casca probably don’t even exist in that universe changes everything, and I often wonder what’s the full backstory behind it (also lol @ fact miura apparently recycled frikka’s design for griffith)

I like it, but not really as a story so much as well, a prototype of Berserk. Like, it’s kind of cool to see basically the first scene of chapter one again but with Frikka instead of Puck (I wonder if the anime took its cue from it actually in how it changed its opening scene). And Guts is absolutely ridiculous lol, but in a way I find entertaining. I would not get invested in this version of him, but yk it’s still cool to see an early version of him before Miura refined his character and like, made him less shallowly obnoxious. Makes me appreciate the version of Guts we got more lol.

And there’s a lot of elements that find a new place in Berserk, which is cool to see. Like Frikka kind of has some of Casca’s backstory – taken by an evil nobleman, wagon attacked by bandits, saved by someone. Her interactions with Guts also remind me of Jill a bit. And I wonder if this Guts would’ve had a backstory closer to Theresia’s, if Miura had continued. Yk, maybe sacrificed by his father, since his mother was eaten by an apostle and he has a brand.

Also I think Frikka looking kind of like Griffith is probably accidental myself, like Miura just drew feminine faces p much the exact same way for the first few years of Berserk, they just both happen to be blond. Frikka looks most like a blond Theresia to me. But speaking of reused story elements, Frikka choosing not to run away because then another girl would be taken to the sinister implied pedophilic nobleman instead does remind me a bit of Griffith’s sex with Gennon to prevent more of his soldiers from dying in battle backstory.

Plus it’s neat to see what was a part of Berserk from the start – like Guts being more monstrous than apostles when he fights was part of the point from the very beginning. Or Guts having a soft spot but denying it. And I love that Puck was part of Miura’s conception of the story from the word go too. It is kind of weird to think that Griffith and Casca and really the whole concept of the Golden Age probably weren’t there from the start, but again like it just makes me appreciate what we got in actual Berserk more.