mostly berserk meta. i'm into berserk mainly for griffguts and i'm a huge fan of griffith.
so the fact that griffith volunteered to take doldrey with 5000 men and his plan hinged on gennon being an idiot, clearing the castle and coming out personally means that yeah griffith absolutely knew gennon’s been throwing his resources away trying to idk get to him for the last few years.
yk there’s a very, with these he offended me vibe to how certain notorious creeps get dispatched in Berserk.
Donovan gets stabbed in the mouth because he told Guts Gambino sold him:
Torturer loses his tongue both for taking Griffith’s and for telling Guts what he did to him:
Adon gets sliced through the mouth after spending several chapters taunting Casca:
Griffith stabs Gennon through the eye for his predatory gaze:
and yk what despite wishing casca’s adversary was more epic than fucking adon, i love this moment of triumph for her sfm it makes me a little teary. she’s the one who achieved their objective and won the war by capturing doldrey.
griffith’s face when guts’ sword breaks
goddamn guts and griffith spend this entire battle worrying about each other
good sequence of panels:
griffith eyeing gennon’s position across the battlefield
followed by gennon whining that they can’t reach him
followed by
tbh I love the way this fight is structured so that Casca’s appearance on the scene gives me chills
Like you’re with Boscogne as the audience, wondering what the fuck Griffith’s plan is and how he hopes to win a fight against 30,000 men or whatever. Throughout the first half of the fight you’re going, okay what the fuck is going on, how is Griffith gonna capture this fortress???
The main force regroups with their backs to the river to put their lives on the line in a straightforward fight against a hopeless number of enemies, and Griffith’s like, ok but if we don’t die we’ll win, and you’re like, ….? doesn’t seem like a gr8 plan man.
And then bam suddenly it’s revealed that Casca’s the hinge on which Griffith’s plan turns, as she leads her troops in a surprise infiltration, and idk basically the way it cuts from the hopeless battle to Casca making it work is just rly delightful to me.
The potentially mammoth, post- torture mental state speculation for Griffith is finally (partly )here
Also since most of these panels were never animated in any form, they might be kinda insightful to a lot of people who either haven’t got around reading the manga or skimmed through it.
For me, as someone who was introduced to Berserk by the movie trilogy ( yeah yeah i know) there was this gap between Griffith putting his hand on Guts’ in the dungeon and Griffith asking (screaming at) him to stay away in the river-Right before the start of the Eclipse- which i was never quite able to bridge until I finally (after finishing the ‘97 anime) read the manga.
I went in with the belief that they were trying to go with a “so he was tortured and traumatised and is now emotionally unstable, erratic, and kind of unhinged” kinda explanation there but really-
It actually seems to have almost nothing to have to do with that.
The interesting thing here is that Griffith came out of the torture with a mostly sane mind.
It’s what came after that slowly, systematically and fundamentally broke every feature of his identity and emotional core.
This is one of my favorite pages of the manga. And honestly I don’t think one needs any explanation for what is going on, the art itself does a pretty amazing job of explaining and expressing everything.
But this is the start of my reason for naming this article “Change”
Because This is the stripping away of the First layer defense mechanism Griffith had built- The displaced Anger.
Ruminating about every unpleasant thing that had happened, was happening to Griffith during the year spent under the tower, Griffith’s reaction to having to acknowledge his pain was to displace his misery onto Guts and hold him responsible. It was a cognitive exercise, maybe one designed to keep him holding onto his sanity using the emotions he could still feel- pain and anger. Because as he himself says “ and now all those great many things I felt affection for, i feel…I am no more capable, it seems like a feeling which existed in a dream. I don’t feel it anymore.”
But of course actually meeting Guts strips that away. His tears blow Griffith’s cognitive exercise to smithereens.
He changes from “I hate you for doing this to me.” to
“How can I hate you?”
But there’s hidden hope there. There’s an implicit- how can I hate you when you cared enough to come back, when you look like you genuinely care.
There’s more of that continuing sentiment here. Guts is in Berserk mode over Griffith and Griffith can see that. Even though he does seem a little bit surprised and thoughtful about it.
“He does care. He did.”
“He cares. He cares. He care— Oh.”
I’m not saying anything, the expression in that single eye conveys everything. The vulnerability and confusion.
Griffith realises that in the time he was shut away things have happened that he is no more a part of, no more privy too. That there may be more to Guts motivations here too.
It’s the first glaring difference between who he used to be and who he is now.
(And no he isn’t happy about it, of course. But I don’t think this is the beginning of his ‘grudge’ against Casca or Guts. Because of later panels I will talk about)
I think this is the point he starts trying to shut off the emotional vulnerability window he’d kept open for a little while here.
Because now more than ever he wants desperately to feel like himself again. And the him he wants to be again was not vulnerable, was not left out, and most of all was….
…Useful.
Ok ill be honest, I cried a little at this smile. Griffith gets his opportunity to save the day again. Guts is looking at him again with awe and admiration. The way it was before. This is good. It’s not all different. He’s free now. He’s back!
Those other things don’t matter now.
He’s home.
The interesting thing here is that you never again see that expression of open confusion and hurt on his face again. Even in the successive instances of him witnessing Guts and Casca’s new intimacy, he looks on either dispassionately or with a hint of pensiveness. There’s no big reactions anymore.
He’s decided to not let it matter.
It’s like slowly slipping back into himself. A peasant girl giving her regards, an almost familiar feeling. He’s starting to feel like himself again. Its different of course. But not in all bad ways. There’s still hope. There’s love and he’s finally starting to learn how wonderful that is.
There’s that little content smile on his face. He’s happy.
He can’t walk or speak or move. But he’s truly happy to be here. To be able to trust . To at least finally be free to admit to himself that his dream had changed. And that he was with the very person the dream had changed to in whatever capacity.
Also he turns slightly towards Casca before smiling off into the distance. There’s no ill will there at all. He seems pretty content with her presence too actually.
It’s distant.
The pressure is off. It’s liberating.
And the peaceful moment doesn’t last. Once again people have started dying for him. Its’ the same cycle all over again. He looks as disgusted as everyone else when he sees wyalds macabre procession. But this time he can’t get up and fight it off.
Once again he notices Casca’s concern, but there’s no reaction there. Just pensiveness. I think the empty speech bubble means he wants to ask though.
He was wrong.
This doesn’t feel like home.
Lying on his side away from the battle instead of the vanguard. Useless. Damaged. Those are his men fighting. The familiar sound of battle, of horses. He wants to be out their in it’s midst. Bring them victory again.
Id also love to hear your interpretation of these panels. I kinda had to cut this much shorter than intended because I thought it was getting too long.
Totally agreed! I think it’s up in the air whether Griffith could’ve been okay if Wyald hadn’t put his helplessness into stark relief so quickly, or whether it was inevitable that the happiness from being rescued and out of the dungeon would wear off and he’d get miserable anyway, but I do think that Wyald showing up and fucking everyone’s morale up so soon after being rescued is a huge part of the reason he fell into behelit-summoning despair.
And personally I do think that his attitude that we can see before everything gets fucked up, his smiles, the way he basically says goodbye to his dream seemingly content to a degree, does mean that if it weren’t for fate and the behelit etc he could’ve eventually come to terms with being disabled and physically dependent, at least if Guts stuck around.
I think his misery would have caught up with him eventually because, while the Hawks were pretty supportive at first, when they realised how useless he was now they all started thinking about themselves and their ambitions and goals in life. And while it was Wyald dangling Griffith naked, emaciated, damaged, and completely vulnerable in front of them that made them realise that way more quickly then they otherwise would have, they still would have realised it eventually on their own. And there’s no reason to believe they would have felt more compelled to stay in that scenario, what with their relationship with Griffith having still been an imbalanced one, where they had worshipped him and followed him as someone more capable than themselves and destined to succeed. He was no longer than person. Most of them had no particular relationship with him beyond the one I just described. They were going to have to find ambition and success somewhere else.
With most of the Hawks leaving and/or subtly showing their discontent, Guts’ unrelenting love and support would have meant a lot, but Griffith doesn’t do well with pity and exaggerated affection in order to comfort, and Guts is infamously bad at hiding his real intentions. He would have treated Griffith with a new gentleness, his loving gestures genuine but a constant reminder that things were drastically different now*. And on top of no longer being able to fight and being only somewhat able to help them plan fights, I think Griffith would miss all the things he used to do with Guts that he was no longer able to. Their late night talks, mischievous adventures, friendly (and sexually charged) duels … those are the things that I feel would kill him at night, when he’s alone with his thoughts, despite Guts’ warm and firm embrace. While possible, but it would take a lot for him to get over the fact that he was the one who robbed all of them of the very future he had promised them, the future he had killed so many of them for … and at the same time robbed himself of the chance to experience the simple life fully with the man he loves. You know what I mean, like ……. if he couldn’t have his dream, why couldn’t he at least have that.
*Not that Guts would treat him THAT differently, but I think Griffith is sensitive to those sorts of subtle changes in behaviour, and the intentions behind them. And it’s kind of ironic that Guts’ new, more open affection would have actually (imo) helped them grow closer together while at the same time being a painful reminder of how things have changed.
Of course, I agree that over time they would get better. I imagine Guts talking to Griffith at night before they go to sleep, trying to fill the silence but also accidentally working through his emotions verbally lol. Griffith listening intently. Focusing on Guts’ feelings in all this would help, I think. Occupy his mind so he doesn’t get drowned in his own guilt and sorrow… and yeah.
griffith and guts are obviously supposed to be foils-but the “reversal” of the nature of their ambitions and quest is funny to me lol. ive seen people point out how selfish guts quest for revenge is in nature (and how it uh actually looks from a humanitarian perspective) and i know that a lot of this is dependent upon the lost chapter but bear with me.
guts is introduced as the struggler and the subordinate- he submits his will and puts the will of others over his own, at least for the most part, and at least in his dynamic with griffith. its sort of what makes him so appealing as contradictory to the hyper masculine power fantasy a lot of fans see him as, bc he is truly, truly powerless. as the protagonist, were inclined to associate him and his ideals with “right”, especially in a moral sense, but a lot of guts actions especially post eclipse are just flat out selfish and expose such a basic disregard for human life and suffering from his whole “humans are like ants” bullshit to his prioritization is his own wants and desires over like, say the “greater good”. i mean, this guy is point blank told that if he goes to the tower thousands will dies and a demon king will be reincarnated and yet he goes after casca (and actually griffith, imho) anyway. guts had always prioritized who he cares about and their opinions over giving a shit about what anyone else thinks, and it really exposes itself for the worst here and in so many other post eclipse scenes.
and griffith. who is consistently characterized as selfish and putting his ambition above the well being of others, but griffiths whole. thing really depends on the impressions and image he keeps up with others. its been discussed to hell and back that the griffith that presents himself to the world is a carefully produced facade, an image of “perfection” tailored to fit the needs and wants of whom hes trying to impress; its very elegant of him, to “take” things without brute force but by quite literally molding himself to the whims of others. the emotional toll of hiding your weakness and vulnerability, of constantly keeping up an image cannot not be dismissed, and it wears on him. neogriffith is a being free from that emotional turmoil, and the perfect incarnation of the image human griffith wanted so desperately to project and believe in, but (because uh humans have weakness and feelings and vulnerabilities) he couldnt be. neogriffith is the answer to Everything, he fulfills the needs and wants of Everyone; if we take this into account alongside the lost chapter, neogriffith is, in the same roundabout way guts is the individualistic incarnation of one mans desires, the ultimate martyr. griffiths supposed dream was to become a king, and neogriffith is perfectly fulfilling that wish, and to a greater extend, the unconscious whims and desires of humanity perfectly. its partially why i truly believe that griffiths “dream” “died” with him (human griffith, not a demon or demigod perfect martyr savior) with him during the eclipse. by choosing to pursue his dream to the highest extent, he ultimately forfeited his humanity: emotions, wants, needs, desires, and a true sense of human individualism that comes with the package. i guess this is partially why the whole semantics of “he became ‘more human’ not a ‘demon’” bother me bc idk its not an interesting take really lol
anyway yea i found this half done in my drafts and i probably lost my point along the way but take it
One particularly warm evening Casca shows up at Farnese’s house, spirits her away when her parents aren’t looking and takes her for a drive in her beat up old truck. Farnese was honestly pretty confused about the whole thing but it was Casca so she was down, even though that rowdy girl didn’t give her time to change out of her pjs. Anyway, they drive for a while and Casca’s oddly silent, like she usually isn’t all that talkative but rn she’s just staring out at the road and the trees around them and just not saying anything. She’s got a real determined look but there’s still a light blush coloring her face, which Farnese notices. She doesn’t say anything immediately being caught up in the moment, but after a while she shakes off her trepidation and speaks up.
“So…what’s your angle?” She asks lightly, accompanied by a fidget in her seat to mask the wavering of her voice.
Casca just shakes her head, resting her elbow on the door and pressing a hand to her face. “No angle,” She says firmly, accompanied by a slight smirk and a squint. “I just figured you’d probably want out of that stuffy house. It smells like old people and you know it.”
Holding back a laugh, Farnese just raises an eyebrow, pressing her lips into a thin line. “Your truck smells like cows and dirt.”
“Yeah yeah, princess.” Waving a hand to ward off Farnese (who was poorly trying to hide how much she unironically liked being called princess), Casca falls silent again for a while before heaving a sigh and looking out the window, peering through the trees to their left. Outside it was reaching dusk, the sky turning shades of deep pink and orange, the sun low enough to look at without hurting your eyes. She didn’t have much daylight left. Working up some courage, Casca turns back to Farnese and speaks in a burst. “You wanna do something crazy?”
Letting out the laugh at that, Farnese pulls at her seat belt and leans forward to get a better look at Casca’s face. “Casca, I’ve already done two crazy things tonight, come outside at 8 o’clock at night and get in your raggedy-ass truck. What more do you want from me?“
“You’re insulting my girl now, you’re on thin ice, bitch!” Breaking out into her own fit of laughter, Casca pulls off temporarily onto a side road and lets the excitement play itself out. After a couple minutes of fun, she lets out a breath of finality and rests her arm on the steering wheel, about to give another snarky comment before pausing to admire the angelic form in the seat next to her. At that very angle, the low-hanging sun cut through Farnese’s hair like butter, giving her a golden glow that caught Casca entirely off-guard. “So, do y-” Her voice cracking, Casca quickly clears her throat and looks out the windshield, her lips pursed. “So. I’m being serious – do you wanna do something crazy, Farnese?” Punctuating her question by tapping on the dashboard, she twitches as Farnese snorts and starts laughing yet again.
“I-I, I’m s-orry, I just- I just can’t,” Grinning, Farnese kicks her legs as much as the confined space will allow and narrows her eyes at a very confused Casca. “I just can’t take you seriously when you look at me like that.” Sitting up straight and biting the middle of her lip, she flicks her eyes down and back up and nods, her eyebrows and shoulders bouncing in tandem. “Sure, let’s go do something fucking crazy.”
—
Driving down the dirt roads she knows by heart, Casca feels a sickening warmth building in her body as they get closer and closer to her destination. As she pulls onto the glorified path that’ll lead them there, the warmth takes over her everything, her stomach clenching like a vice grip and her mind careening through space and time. Throwing the truck into park and turning off the lights, she closes her eyes for a brief moment and then turns to Farnese, leaning towards her briefly before kicking open her stuck door. “We’re here,” She whispers in a low, ominous tone, slamming the door back shut and shoving her hands into her pockets.
“Well we’re out in the boonies, aren’t we.” Farnese thinks out loud, slipping out of the truck and looking around with her hands on her hips.
Taking off at a steady pace down a walking trail, Casca shrugs. “We live in the midwest, it’s all the boonies, Farnese.” Pausing to let the girl catch up, she leans against a tree and looks down, a genuine smile on her face. “Yes…”
A little further down the trail is a natural picture frame focusing on a modest pond. Flicking her tongue out to wet her lips, Casca trots a bit further down to get a better look. There were several similar bodies of water in the area, all of which she’s very familiar with, but this was definitely the cleanest, and in her opinion, the prettiest. The sun is just peeking through the canopies of the trees across the pond and casting soft rusty images on the water. Tossing a nearby pebble into the pond, Casa smirks as the sun catches each ripple and tosses back the light.
“Swimming?” Resting a hand on Casca’s shoulder, Farnese uses her as a counterbalance and places her other hand on her knee, leaning down to get a better look at the water. “Swimming is the ‘crazy thing’? I can swim any time I want to, y’know.”
Taking a deep breath and closing her eyes for a moment, Casca viciously fights her urge to falter or hesitate, trying to push every single negative scenario she’s considered out of her head. Everything rests on this one moment, and by God she’s determined to be stronger than her anxiety just this once. “Yeah, you can,” She murmurs, stepping back from Farnese and walking towards the water. “But,” She continues, her fingers sliding under the edge of her shirt. “You can’t just swim with me any time you want,” Pulling her shirt up and off, she tosses it to the side and tousels her hair, raising and eyebrow and tilting her head as she lets Farnese behold her in all her braless glory. “Now can you?”
FUCK. GAY. FUCK. GAY.
Her face immediately building a shade of dark crimson, Farnese stumbles over her words, stammering and helplessly waving her arms as her knees lock up and she sways like a reed in the wind. “I-eh-uh-I-I-ugmh?” Blinking, she knits up her eyebrows and gulps down her emotion (it’s a very big gulp), and Weakly smiles, the edges of her mouth moving like they’re attached to strings and a crazy puppeteer is controlling her every movement. “W-w…well, I, I uhm…I suppo…se…” Starting to trail off, she smacks her own cheeks and shapes up, mimicking Casca’s now very strained caricature of an expression. “No, I suppose I…can’t.”
Suffering, Casca unbuttons her pants and steps out of them at world record speed and leaps into the pond from the tiny cliff overlooking it, poking the top of her head out of the water and staring at a frozen Farnese with a face so heated it could boil the water around her. “Well, uh, are you gonna come in or what?”
Freaking out for a second and letting out an eep of surprise, Farnese looks down into the water and processes that Casca must’ve moved while she was momentarily incapacitated and running on autopilot. “Y-yeAh I, am.” Stumbling around on the shore, she pulls at the fabric of her night dress and mutters expletives at it, turning around in a full circle before her trembling limbs are able to move out of it. Balling it up and throwing it to the side, she nods and moves to step in the pond, instead letting out a screech as she falls off the cliff and plummets three feet before splashing into the water.
Wading over to her, Casca reaches under and pulls Farnese up, shaking her head and smiling wide. “Jesus fucking Christ, you’re a mess Farnese.”
As Casca holds her limp form up by the arm, Farnese coughs out water and looks up at her through stuck together bangs, her mouth hanging open as pond water drips out. “Uh. Huh.” She mumbles weakly, getting her legs underneath herself and gripping onto Casca’s shoulders for support.
Tilting her head, Casca does what she can to fix Farnese’s soaked hair, preening it and getting it back out of her eyes. Her heartbeat from before coming back full-force, she takes a lock of golden hair in her fingers and smooths it back behind Farnese’s ear, using the motion to get away with cupping her cheek in her hand. “So, you…” Not able to get out any more than that, Casca trails off and narrows her eyes, slowly travelling them downward and admiring the pictures the waning daylight paints on Farnese’s damp body. Bringing her eyes gradually back up, she’s startled by the saucers staring back at her.
Her eyes wide open and her lips parted, Farnese is fixed on Casca’s face, the thudding in her chest sharing a rhythm with the other girl’s. Leaning in, Farnese closes her eyes tight and brings her mouth within a hair’s breadth of Casca’s. “Just fucking kiss me you idiot.” She quickly murmurs with a tone of desperation against Casca’s lips, her arms pinned between them as Casca heeds the request and bundles her up in the world’s tightest hug, their lips coming together to form the world’s most passionate kiss.
Breaking apart for a moment, Farnese opens her eyes wide again, breathing in Casca’s air like it’s a drug. With the body tremors appropriate of an addiction she didn’t know (or at least wouldn’t admit to) having, she shakily unclasps her fancy lace bra and leaves it to float. Continuing to stare, trance-like, at Casca’s face she leaps out of the water, wrapping her legs around Casca’s body and pressing her hands firmly on the other girl’s face as she goes back in to break the world record for the world’s most passionate kiss.
Holding Farnese up by reflex, Casca takes everything she gives her and multiplies it back. Taking a moment to step back into her head while she lets her body do its thing, she mentally looks up and thanks whatever deities might be out there, desperately thanking them for letting something go terribly right for once in a very long time.
tbh this probably didn’t help guts’ feelings of inadequacy when he overheard griffith’s speech an hour later
irony: two dudes think of themselves as monstrous and unworthy of the other; become monsters because of it
While I’m looking for moments that demonstrate Guts’ attraction to Griffith I might as well post a few outtakes.
Like, what the fuck is this about?
I’m not including it bc Guts is wtfing at the behelit here, not (presumably) swooning over Griffith, but look at his collagen-injected lip, the forced contrast of his hair to shadowed skin, the shining eyes.
Like Griffith is supposed to be pretty, but Miura’s Golden Age art often makes certain images of him stand out as Extra compared to the rest in a scene, and when that image is from Guts’ point of view it’s a little eyebrow raising regardless of the context.
And it’s not just cause it’s a closeup either:
same scene, same distance from the ‘camera,’ same level of detail, v different vibe.
Guts has been thinking about how Griffith rode back to save his life
that first time and considering his answer inadequate for three years.
The potentially mammoth, post- torture mental state speculation for Griffith is finally (partly )here
Also since most of these panels were never animated in any form, they might be kinda insightful to a lot of people who either haven’t got around reading the manga or skimmed through it.
For me, as someone who was introduced to Berserk by the movie trilogy ( yeah yeah i know) there was this gap between Griffith putting his hand on Guts’ in the dungeon and Griffith asking (screaming at) him to stay away in the river-Right before the start of the Eclipse- which i was never quite able to bridge until I finally (after finishing the ‘97 anime) read the manga.
I went in with the belief that they were trying to go with a “so he was tortured and traumatised and is now emotionally unstable, erratic, and kind of unhinged” kinda explanation there but really-
It actually seems to have almost nothing to have to do with that.
The interesting thing here is that Griffith came out of the torture with a mostly sane mind.
It’s what came after that slowly, systematically and fundamentally broke every feature of his identity and emotional core.
This is one of my favorite pages of the manga. And honestly I don’t think one needs any explanation for what is going on, the art itself does a pretty amazing job of explaining and expressing everything.
But this is the start of my reason for naming this article “Change”
Because This is the stripping away of the First layer defense mechanism Griffith had built- The displaced Anger.
Ruminating about every unpleasant thing that had happened, was happening to Griffith during the year spent under the tower, Griffith’s reaction to having to acknowledge his pain was to displace his misery onto Guts and hold him responsible. It was a cognitive exercise, maybe one designed to keep him holding onto his sanity using the emotions he could still feel- pain and anger. Because as he himself says “ and now all those great many things I felt affection for, i feel…I am no more capable, it seems like a feeling which existed in a dream. I don’t feel it anymore.”
But of course actually meeting Guts strips that away. His tears blow Griffith’s cognitive exercise to smithereens.
He changes from “I hate you for doing this to me.” to
“How can I hate you?”
But there’s hidden hope there. There’s an implicit- how can I hate you when you cared enough to come back, when you look like you genuinely care.
There’s more of that continuing sentiment here. Guts is in Berserk mode over Griffith and Griffith can see that. Even though he does seem a little bit surprised and thoughtful about it.
“He does care. He did.”
“He cares. He cares. He care— Oh.”
I’m not saying anything, the expression in that single eye conveys everything. The vulnerability and confusion.
Griffith realises that in the time he was shut away things have happened that he is no more a part of, no more privy too. That there may be more to Guts motivations here too.
It’s the first glaring difference between who he used to be and who he is now.
(And no he isn’t happy about it, of course. But I don’t think this is the beginning of his ‘grudge’ against Casca or Guts. Because of later panels I will talk about)
I think this is the point he starts trying to shut off the emotional vulnerability window he’d kept open for a little while here.
Because now more than ever he wants desperately to feel like himself again. And the him he wants to be again was not vulnerable, was not left out, and most of all was….
…Useful.
Ok ill be honest, I cried a little at this smile. Griffith gets his opportunity to save the day again. Guts is looking at him again with awe and admiration. The way it was before. This is good. It’s not all different. He’s free now. He’s back!
Those other things don’t matter now.
He’s home.
The interesting thing here is that you never again see that expression of open confusion and hurt on his face again. Even in the successive instances of him witnessing Guts and Casca’s new intimacy, he looks on either dispassionately or with a hint of pensiveness. There’s no big reactions anymore.
He’s decided to not let it matter.
It’s like slowly slipping back into himself. A peasant girl giving her regards, an almost familiar feeling. He’s starting to feel like himself again. Its different of course. But not in all bad ways. There’s still hope. There’s love and he’s finally starting to learn how wonderful that is.
There’s that little content smile on his face. He’s happy.
He can’t walk or speak or move. But he’s truly happy to be here. To be able to trust . To at least finally be free to admit to himself that his dream had changed. And that he was with the very person the dream had changed to in whatever capacity.
Also he turns slightly towards Casca before smiling off into the distance. There’s no ill will there at all. He seems pretty content with her presence too actually.
It’s distant.
The pressure is off. It’s liberating.
And the peaceful moment doesn’t last. Once again people have started dying for him. Its’ the same cycle all over again. He looks as disgusted as everyone else when he sees wyalds macabre procession. But this time he can’t get up and fight it off.
Once again he notices Casca’s concern, but there’s no reaction there. Just pensiveness. I think the empty speech bubble means he wants to ask though.
He was wrong.
This doesn’t feel like home.
Lying on his side away from the battle instead of the vanguard. Useless. Damaged. Those are his men fighting. The familiar sound of battle, of horses. He wants to be out their in it’s midst. Bring them victory again.
Id also love to hear your interpretation of these panels. I kinda had to cut this much shorter than intended because I thought it was getting too long.
Totally agreed! I think it’s up in the air whether Griffith could’ve been okay if Wyald hadn’t put his helplessness into stark relief so quickly, or whether it was inevitable that the happiness from being rescued and out of the dungeon would wear off and he’d get miserable anyway, but I do think that Wyald showing up and fucking everyone’s morale up so soon after being rescued is a huge part of the reason he fell into behelit-summoning despair.
And personally I do think that his attitude that we can see before everything gets fucked up, his smiles, the way he basically says goodbye to his dream seemingly content to a degree, does mean that if it weren’t for fate and the behelit etc he could’ve eventually come to terms with being disabled and physically dependent, at least if Guts stuck around.
Another thing which gets skipped over in all the animations.
Usually Griffith is shown just passively listening to the God hand as if he’s thinking about their offer and then Guts obliviously gets angry and screams at them.
Look at this panel though.
Look how fucking distressed Griffith looks. That isn’t a “wow, tell me more” face. He’s shaking. He’s terrified. He looks like He’s trying to protest their assertion that he’ll sacrifice everyone.
And THAT’S what pisses Guts of. It’s because Griffith can’t put his distress into words and has no way to verbally protest and Guts can see that.
He’s yelling on Griffith’s behalf .
Also which makes me think. Often I’ve read or maybe even said myself that if Griffith hadn’t been in the exact state he was at the start of the eclipse he may not have agreed to the terms. But EVEN in that state without manipulation he wasn’t up for it.
After that of course lol. What was fated happened and all. And everything got fucked. But I still go back to teeny details to hurt my heart.
I love this so much.
One of my favourite things about the Golden Age is that there’s such a sense that the tragedy is a house of cards that could’ve come tumbling down if anything happened differently. Of course, thanks to fate, everything worked out perfectly to lead to the sacrifice, but there’s so many missed opportunities, half-finished sentences, crossroads, coincidences, and little significant details that it always makes me think, what if X happened differently? Even up to the Eclipse.
What if Casca finished a sentence, what if the King hadn’t interrupted Guts and Griffith on the staircase, what if the maid hadn’t seen Griffith with Charlotte, what if Guts hadn’t let go of Griffith’s hand on the mountain of heads, what if Guts never told Griffith to do whatever he had to do for the sake of his dream so the Godhand couldn’t whip up that handy memory to convince him, etc etc.
Everything had to happen exactly right (or wrong) for Griffith to sacrifice Guts and the Band. That’s a big reason the moment is so narratively satisfying to me imo.
I’m re-reading some of the golden age for finding instances of Guts’ attraction to Griffith reasons but man the way the story is structured it still floors me how strong the focus is on Guts and Griffith’s feelings for each other.
Chapter 1, the very first event we get to contextualize the previous three years which we skipped, where the characters are now and how they’re getting along, is Guts charging into battle against orders and Casca being pissy about it so Miura can show us the dynamic: Guts is Griffith’s fave and everyone knows it, Casca is resentful.
That’s the important info we need to establish going into the story. I love it.
(plus the first sight of Guts and Griffith unhelmeted after 3 years is the two of them staring at each other but the way it’s shown it’s more a part of the aforementioned ‘instances of guts’ attraction,’ coming soon)
I was just talking about this scene with a friend the other day, and I mentioned how I enjoy the translation in the version of the 1997 anime that I watched, which is:
Not that different, but I like the addition of the word ‘pet’ lol. So I got curious about the original Japanese line and went back and checked, and the word used is お気に入り (okiniiri), which indeed can either mean ‘favourite,’ or ‘pet’ as in like, the teacher’s pet, for example.
I’m re-reading some of the golden age for finding instances of Guts’ attraction to Griffith reasons but man the way the story is structured it still floors me how strong the focus is on Guts and Griffith’s feelings for each other.
Chapter 1, the very first event we get to contextualize the previous three years which we skipped, where the characters are now and how they’re getting along, is Guts charging into battle against orders and Casca being pissy about it so Miura can show us the dynamic: Guts is Griffith’s fave and everyone knows it, Casca is resentful.
That’s the important info we need to establish going into the story. I love it.
(plus the first sight of Guts and Griffith unhelmeted after 3 years is the two of them staring at each other but the way it’s shown it’s more a part of the aforementioned ‘instances of guts’ attraction,’ coming soon)
The background reactions are so pointless to me except as like, an additional reminder that Casca has a crush on Griffith.
I actually kind of wonder if like, idk, Miura was trying to tease the possibility here bc of Guts’ whole trying-to-be-a-good-bro-and-set-them-up thing? But that doesn’t really make sense to me bc that assumes the reader is an idiot who doesn’t know Griffith’s dedicated to his marry Charlotte plan and also in love with Guts, and one thing I’ll grant Miura as a writer is that he doesn’t treat his audience like idiots.
Like when Judeau spells Griffith’s practical need to marry the princess out to Guts a little later it shouldn’t come as a shock to the audience.
So idk maybe their slightly scandalized expressions are just a little joke at Casca’s expense.
But w/e aside from that one thing I do rly like about this scene is that Griffith’s compliment comes straight from Guts lol.
It’s kind of touching when you remove the possibility of het undertones and look at it as Guts’ influence helping Griffith come down to earth a little. It’s a nice full-circle moment starting from Guts thinking Griffith keeping the Hawks in the dark regarding his faking-his-death plan is “a little cruel” (something that doesn’t seem to occur to Griffith as an issue) and concluding with Guts and Griffith’s casual friendly interactions helping Griffith make up for it a little.
Femto has become more slender and sleek now.
I feel little everyone has lost a lot of weight in the recent chapters. Even neo Griffith seems to be thinner than Griffith was originally.
Same with Guts, Charlotte.
I think Casca’s lost a little bit of her muscle too
lol this is why i can’t figure out if we’re supposed to think guts has lost weight or if miura’s changing style is just making everyone thinner
like it would make sense for casca to lose her muscle definition and for guts to lose weight too due to the armour fucking him up but everyone’s so sleek now including like every rando npc soldier or sailor so idk
you're the only one 