Oh yeah true, and tbf I don’t know exactly what he said in interviews either, since I’ve never even seen any direct translations, just paraphrases. But yeah lol regardless that last bit p much sums it up
Based on like, plot set up stuff in the last few chapters, my guess is that there’s going to be a time skip when everyone leaves Elfhelm. Rickert will have spent the last 10 or however many years in the Bakiraka village, he’ll be a cool warrior/inventor, he’ll give everyone weapon upgrades lol, and yk, village full of super intense assassins who do nothing but train + a wizard = handy canon fodder allies.
Now ofc I’m hoping really really hard that doesn’t mean we’re just going a rote route of Guts and co leaving Elfhelm to attack Falconia/Griffith and hitting up the Bakiraka and Rickert along the way for allies and power ups lol. I mean god could you imagine anything more boring?
Guts is due to go Beast of Darkness, so another possibility is that whichever of his friends survive whatever goes down trail him on his way to kill Griffith, stop at the village along the way, swap Guts stories with Rickert, get power ups and allies, and then go kick Guts’ ass and try to bring him to his senses.
Then there’s my Void (probably but hell maybe Elfhelm, I got some vague hopes there) is the actual big bad theory and Rickert and co could end up being part of an enemies teaming up to fight the worse dude plot.
Anyway I guess regardless of the circumstances my answer boils down to Rickert probably being the archetypal helpful ally who
provides weapons, maybe helps fight, and knows more about Guts and Griffith than just
about everyone else (pending Casca’s narrative future) and so can potentially provide ~wise insight~ wrt how the past could inform the future.
And also since he visited Falconia and met NeoGriffith there he could also tell Guts what happened, though I didn’t get the impression that he discovered anything particularly insightful. Unless the fact that he was able to slap Griffith goes somewhere interesting.
I have heard second hand info that he’s been asked about the homoeroticism in interviews b4 and does the “two dudes can have an intense connection without it being sexual” song and dance.
Which doesn’t really make an ounce of difference to me lol. He added the gay subtext on purpose so whether he has to downplay it bc of industry/publisher concerns,
whether it’s something he regrets,
whether he just added it to make sure G+G have chemistry without anticipating that obviously many fans were going to take that and run with it, whether he added the subtext to highlight the fact that G+G never act on it and portray their relationship as “pure” in comparison to their histories of sexual assault (which imo would be the worst, most offensive option, and it doesn’t explain everything, but it’s a possibility I’ve been wondering about), etc, it doesn’t change the story he wrote, which is very very gay.
One of the last Sketchtember works, Guts from Berserk. The Universe he’s belonging to is filled with so much cruelty that I wanted to draw a moment of peaceful silence.
As promised, here is the colored version of my newest drawing of Casca. In case you missed the black and white version from yesterday, here’s what I had to say about it then:
“Breaking from the current comic, here we have a return to Berserk fanart with another piece of Casca art. So, couple of reasons for why I wanted to do this, 1: she’s coming back guys! (IT’S HAPPENING!! JUST A COUPLE MORE CHAPTERS!!!), 2: I recently purchased one of the artbooks that came with the collector’s editions of the Berserk movies from a few years ago and to my pleasant surprise, they contained several pieces of redone art straight from the manga in the movies’ art style (which I quite like). One of those was the chapter cover of chapter 50 (or episode 50 if you’re that kind of particular asshat) which I’ve always kinda held a certain affection for. What I’ve done here to add my own spin to this image (other than just take Charlotte out) is firstly I’ve made Casca be wearing her cape rather than just having it draped over her arm, I’ve completely added in Casca’s other arm as a side effect of that and I’ve also made a conscious effort to draw this in my own style rather than just ape directly from Miura or Naoyuki Onda (the character designer of the movies, who I would assume drew the version from the artbook), though my style is very much similar/derived from those styles so similarities will occur. Also, third note, there will be a fully colored version of this image coming out tomorrow (assuming I’m reasonably productive).”
So now it’s tomorrow and here’s what I have to add now that it’s colored: FUCK this turned out good. But in all seriousness, I can actually say something legitimate about the colors chosen here. So for the most part the colors here are based upon this outfit’s coloration in the movies, with some minor changes that make it a little closer to the coloration seen from Miura himself (the ‘manga’ colors, if that makes sense) in the one colored drawing he did of this outfit on Casca. That change is on the little curly bits on her chest and shoulder armor. In the movies, both of those sets of bits are colored brown to imply leather. In the 97 anime, they’re all gray (along with the rest of her armor because the colorers may have been a little lazy) to imply metal. In the one Miura drawing out there (and from what I can infer from how they’re shaded in the actual manga), the shoulder bits are brown, while the chest bits are gray. I know this is all riveting information that you all can’t get enough of, but hey, it’s what I have to say.
Well there’s no proof, in the sense of like a definitive statement, because I think the point of NeoGriffith’s narrative right now is that it’s ambiguous. We’re being teased with the possibility, but Griffith is using the fetus as a scapegoat and excuse to ignore his feelings, and it’s technically left up in the air as to whether that’s true or whether Griffith is in denial. The reader is meant to be uncertain right now.
That said, I’m gonna give two reasons I’m 110% certain NGriff’s feelings are legit:
the first is straight up the entirety of Berserk lmao. Guts and Griffith’s feelings for each other are the core of the story, the driving thrust of every aspect of the narrative, from the Black Swordsman arc’s climactic reveal of those feelings, to the Golden Age’s exploration of them, to the Millenium Falcon arc’s tension as Guts tries to let go of those feelings and NeoGriffith’s feelings are left very pointedly ambiguous.
Like, even when Guts chooses Casca in the MF arc, his choice to stick with Casca is framed as the alternative to his feelings for Griffith. Those feelings drive Guts, whether it’s in feeling like he’s found the place where he belongs, striving to feel like he’s earned Griffith’s friendship, striving to hunt him down and kill him, or striving to escape his feelings.
You cannot write a story about those feelings, make Griffith’s choice to escape those feelings the epic climax of his narrative, then tease that those feelings may still exist only to go ‘psyche it’s actually just the unrelated feelings of a fetus.’ You can use the fetus to keep things ambiguous until the big reveal, but you can’t have the fetus be the reveal. it would be comedically absurd.
But the second reason is the visual details of two scenes:
Femto, completely pre-fetus, letting Guts go. These are Griffith’s feelings, maybe not entirely wiped away because Guts managed to survive the sacrifice, but for whatever reason, they’re there, and they’re still making him do irrational stupid shit for Guts.
We know Femto didn’t let Guts escape because he needed two people w/ brands of sacrifice and a fetus as part of a grand plan to resurrect himself three years later because we see that he has intent to kill. He tried to kill Skull Knight who narrowly dodged the telekinetic attack, and he’s raised his hand to attack again here, only to lower it after a close up specifically of Guts, the dude Griffith does stupid irrational shit for.
Then we close this moment with a distant shot of Femto from a high angle (used to make the subject appear weak/small/vulnerable) as a smear on the background, surrounded by monsters, perfectly evoking a feeling of isolation. This is what Griffith is left with after purposefully destroying his relationship with Guts – nothing but his own monstrousness.
This moment is followed through subtlely but consistently throughout NGriff’s narrative, in the way he’s portrayed as unknowable, distant, singular. He’s the absolute, without equal, and, in the context of Berserk’s themes, that’s just a grandiose way of saying he’s alone after sacrificing Guts.
The other of the two scenes is:
NeoGriffith has come to see Guts specifically to test whether anything can shake his heart. “It seems I am free,” he declares smugly. Then he watches Guts fight (and it’s v worth noting that his very first entranced glimpse of Guts back in chapter 12 was while observing another fight against a bigger stronger opponent, Guts throwing himself into danger then struggling his way out), and feels his heart start to stir after all.
“uhhhh that’s gotta be that fetus” thinks Griffith. Next page:
Like, everything about this says Griffith is lying to himself, at least where Guts is concerned. This is the page that inspired my url for a reason lol.
The positioning – Griffith left, fetus vs Guts right. Fetus is Griffith’s thoughts/hope, Guts is what’s right in front of him in reality.
The fact that this is the final page of the chapter, so it has a feeling of conclusiveness to it. Griffith is a champ at denial, but reality is still reality.
the “……..” “bthump,” that practically reads like a taunt.
The fact that Griffith deliberately came to face Guts to test himself, then his heart went off! Like I said at the start, there’s no way you make these dudes’ feelings the core of Berserk, have Griffith fail his own test of whether he successfully got rid of his, then say “lol it’s not really his feelings though.”
Liiiiike from a pure storytelling perspective, this scene is emotionally pointless if it ends up being the fetus after all.It may be significant to the plot eventually – I wouldn’t be surprised if it is to blame for Griffith saving Casca, even if I think that’s dumb as fuck lol – but the emotional purpose of this scene is to tease the audience.
Guts is unaware of Griffith’s heart doing anything so it’s meaningless to his emotional state and decisions.
It’s only meaningful to the audience, and only because we are invested in Griffith’s feelings after the Golden Age – we want Griffith to fail his test. “I am free” is disappointing, “my blood should have been frozen” is intriguing.
Griffith has dismissed his feelings by blaming them on the fetus, and if he’s right, then this scene is meaningless to him.
And if it turns out to be the fetus after all, it’s meaningless to us too.
Also I feel ridic doing this lol but I have such a huge backlog of posts by now that it almost seems like a waste not to link some when relevant, so for ~further reading~ lmao:
did a shitty drawing of guts on my phone i cant fking draw him fhskljghlks. all i want from the berserk manga this year is guts without his armor on more. (*whispers in your face* his armor is also like…a metaphor)
Yeah it’s really unfortunate that a large majority of the fandom is totally steeped in homophobia bc honestly the most compelling aspect of Berserk (imo but also lbr objectively) is Griffith and Guts’ extremely charged relationship, and I think the fact that so much of fandom tries hard to downplay it is kind of itself proof of how super gay it is lol. Like they can insist it’s just platonic but the fact that they feel compelled to ignore huge important plot points like eg the fact that Guts’ sole motivation for leaving the Hawks was to become Griffith’s friend, or the fact that Griffith textually valued Guts over his dream, etc, is pretty telling. Would they need to ignore so much if they really believed they were only platonic bros?
(lol sorry think I just had to get that out of my system and you gave me an opening.)
But anyway wrt your question, I think it would depend why Guts chose to stay (did Griffith win their second duel? did some action of Griffith’s convince him that despite the speech Griffith does value him ridiculously highly? or did Guts never hear the Promrose Hall speech in the first place?), but regardless of the exact reason Guts stays, I imagine that Berserk would end up being pretty much a really compelling story about medieval politics and relationship drama lol.
Like, take the tone of Tombstone of Flame Part 2, and that would be Berserk. Cool political scheming and complicated yet intense character relationships. Actually I say “relationships” but really it’s just Guts and Griffith’s that gets the real intensity and complexity lol.
Tho speaking of, I don’t really know where Miura could’ve taken their relationship in this alternate version of Berserk. Like, I can only see them eventually getting together if the Eclipse doesn’t happen ngl. But idk I guess this version of Berserk would be shorter, and maybe Guts and Griffith would have some conflict (eg if Guts lost the duel, maybe Guts’ feelings of inadequacy vs Griffith’s feelings of rejection) that eventually gets resolved. Ooh yk the logical happy ending for them in this kind of AU would be Griffith forced to choose between his dream and Guts and choosing Guts.
So yeah how about that? Political scheming, Griffith’s rise to the throne, both Guts and Griffith filled with self-loathing and their relationship totally tanked because Griffith thinks Guts wanted to leave and he forced him to stay, and Guts thinks he’ll never be someone worthy of respect in Griffith’s eyes, neither of them acknowledging this and Guts maybe continuing to help him but beneath the surface their closeness is gone, but then plot happens, Griffith demonstrates how he really feels once again but rly decisively this time by prioritizing Guts over his dream again, and they both start to figure their shit out.
As for a no Eclipse AU, I think it’s actually the perfect scenario to force Guts, Griffith, and Casca to actually deal with their issues. Like, in canon the Eclipse is basically a giant distraction. For Griffith it’s an escape, for Guts it’s an excuse to bury all of his emotions except rage and swing his sword at monsters for 3 years (and that’s his own escape and outlet: “when I’m swinging this sword… I don’t have to think about anything”), for Casca it drives her insane and puts her entire character on hold.
Without it what you have is Griffith with no dream, his emotional dependency on Guts mirrored by his physical dependency, and no escape from either his feelings for Guts or his feelings of failure and self-loathing. You have Guts who has just realized how hard he fucked up, who blames himself for ruining everyone’s lives but especially Griffith’s, and who has just figured out how much he actually means to Griffith. And you have Casca who… idk I think maybe her biggest issue now is with Guts and Griffith both losing/giving up their “dreams” and gravitating towards each other, she’s lost her motivation. She switched from supporting Griffith’s dream to supporting Guts’ dream and she has to let both go and support herself instead of dudes imho. And okay, maybe Miura wouldn’t go that direction with her character, but idc.
But I’m going to stay vague on how these issues could be resolved and lead to a low key happy ending because I’ve had this as a fic idea on the backburner for ages and someday I might actually finish it lol.
he almost breaks here
lips don’t do that if you aren’t about to cry
i wonder if had it been guts that hugged him here, (even though this was before they met) would he have cried? i almost think he would’ve … he feels safe being vulnerable around guts, he trusts him. griffith could’ve used a nice healthy emotional release with his friend instead of shutting it off and trying to look strong. guts is the only one allowed to see him weak, ever.
hill of swords sets up the ideal climactic griffguts drama so perfectly that it’s ridic
Guts: conflicted because he desperately misses Griffith, the way he was back when all Guts wanted was for Griffith to look at him (value him, love him). He maintains his rage by separating Griffith now from Griffith then, and NeoGriffith’s existence makes it that much harder.
That same beating heart?
Griffith: has failed to completely eradicate his past self.
Like, that’s the two important emotional points this scene sets up: Guts conflicted about killing NeoGriffith because he’s reminded of human Griffith, and NeoGriffith evidencing human Griffith’s emotions.
You can’t write this without intending to pay it off by forcing Guts to square with the fact that there’s still some of his Griffith remaining in NeoGriffith. This absolutely requires a future moment where Guts and NeoGriffith confront each other and Guts realizes that NGriff is still in love with him.
Ofc this could lead to like, a final test of Guts’ obsession with Griffith which he then passes by killing him anyway or something like that. But if the narrative turns back to Guts and Griffith focused on each other rather than Guts and Griffith steadfastly focused on their goals in their mutual attempt to get over each other it could lead to some excellently hightened, resonant emotions during their final confrontation.
Plus it’s worth noting that Guts’ obsession with Griffith which he’s trying to drop is an obsession with killing him – that’s what leads him to darkness – while this conflict between Griffith now and Griffith then makes Guts forget his urge to kill. So yk, if Miura’s theoretical not super bleak ending involves Guts not succumbing to his inner darkness and urge to kill, this conflict might actually facilitate that happyish ending.
Or maybe this is irrelevant and it’s all the fetus anyway and NGriff is fully removed from human Griffith’s emotions so Guts can kill him completely sans internal conflict and then ride off into the sunset lol. Or maybe the perfectly on point emotional content is an accidental side-effect of just establishing NGriff’s plot-point weakness.
This is inaccurate
lol care to elaborate on which aspect of this post is contradicted by canon or is this the entirety of your valuable contribution
hill of swords sets up the ideal climactic griffguts drama so perfectly that it’s ridic
Guts: conflicted because he desperately misses Griffith, the way he was back when all Guts wanted was for Griffith to look at him (value him, love him). He maintains his rage by separating Griffith now from Griffith then, and NeoGriffith’s existence makes it that much harder.
That same beating heart?
Griffith: has failed to completely eradicate his past self.
Like, that’s the two important emotional points this scene sets up: Guts conflicted about killing NeoGriffith because he’s reminded of human Griffith, and NeoGriffith evidencing human Griffith’s emotions.
You can’t write this without intending to pay it off by forcing Guts to square with the fact that there’s still some of his Griffith remaining in NeoGriffith. This absolutely requires a future moment where Guts and NeoGriffith confront each other and Guts realizes that NGriff is still in love with him.
Ofc this could lead to like, a final test of Guts’ obsession with Griffith which he then passes by killing him anyway or something like that. But if the narrative turns back to Guts and Griffith focused on each other rather than Guts and Griffith steadfastly focused on their goals in their mutual attempt to get over each other it could lead to some excellently hightened, resonant emotions during their final confrontation.
Plus it’s worth noting that Guts’ obsession with Griffith which he’s trying to drop is an obsession with killing him – that’s what leads him to darkness – while this conflict between Griffith now and Griffith then makes Guts forget his urge to kill. So yk, if Miura’s theoretical not super bleak ending involves Guts not succumbing to his inner darkness and urge to kill, this conflict might actually facilitate that happyish ending.
Or maybe this is irrelevant and it’s all the fetus anyway and NGriff is fully removed from human Griffith’s emotions so Guts can kill him completely sans internal conflict and then ride off into the sunset lol. Or maybe the perfectly on point emotional content is an accidental side-effect of just establishing NGriff’s plot-point weakness.
you're the only one 