My dream would be a scenario where if Guts does have a flashback that could be Serious Bonding Moment of Healing for them. Obviously they both know that they have to work together to make everything as okay as it’s going to be, but yeah. I hope both of them have it together enough know that what they have together is a different dynamic entirely from their previous experiences.
Guts I think is used
to thinking of himself as an outsider on some level so I think he may be
more emotionally equipped to handle the Gay Experience. Griffith
though, has a lot of aspirations to respectability so that part may be
harder for him even though I don’t think his men would give a flying
fuck. (I honestly think that Judeau would just owe Corkus money.)
i feel like it’s not necessarily a given that guts would have flashbacks his first time having sex with griffith too, since in canon he’s triggered by penetration in specific positions, i mean, there’s a good chance they’d start with handjobs and blowjobs etc anyway. one of the handy things about gay sex is that it doesn’t necessarily revolve around penetration by default assumption unlike het sex. plus since guts would maybe be more likely to anticipate like, strong negative feelings resurging during sex with a man as opposed to sex with a woman he might also have the presence of mind to start with non penetrative stuff.
so that way they’d have a chance to yk like, get used to sex with each other and get more intimate physically and emotionally, and both able to internalize the fact that their desire is reciprocated, before hitting a scenario that leads to guts flashbacking.
also yeah good point that guts could be more okay with his attraction to men than griffith. i tend to see griffith as understanding that he’s attracted to men and completely ignoring that fact bc his aspirations include marrying a specific woman and also he has hangups, but ofc i could also see him basically unaware and in denial.
and maybe if he does come to terms w/ it he can switch strategies to matchmaking charlotte and anna while making himself charlotte’s bff and then proposing a lavender marriage. happily ever after berserk au.
the only thing i disagree with is that i think corkus would owe judeau money if they were betting on griffith lol. but then corkus would immediately get it back thanks to guts anyway.
Guts has zero social skills but I could see Griffith permitting a hug. Guts, understanding on some level where this is all coming from would be really sad and might say the right thing about not needing to do it this way? I don’t know. It may backfire spectacularly because Guts may go down the “Are my desires inherently predatory????!!!!” road and that helps no one. Poor things.
yeah mb if guts already knows he’s attracted to griffith and is coming to terms w/ that then he could salvage the situation and not get too freaked out and escalate it badly. though man it would be really really easy for him to fuck that up lol.
but i mean there are worst case scenarios but there are also best case scenarios. like eg i could see guts smoothly bypassing a sexuality crisis by going from ‘this is fine because griffith is so special he’s basically a category all on his own‘ to ‘ok yeah ik griffith is a dude but by now i’m p comfortable having sex w/ that dude so w/e’ and/or ‘ok now i’m having a flashback but we’re emotionally close and comfortable enough by now to turn it into a comforting bonding experience’
and i could see griffith having all these issues we’ve been discussing but not making it obvious for a while, so when he does slip up and reveal that he’s got some fucked up attitudes towards sex as transactional and/or something that makes him feel dirty/self loathing, their relationship is more solid and they’re more equipped to deal w/ it together.
the implications of this make me sad but like its good in the content way
theres the assumption
that griffith knows that guts finds him physically/sexually attractive
(which gets worse when you tie in his feminine features and the
internalized homophobia) but the jump from him wanting guts to stay
around and offering his body just ends in static…
griffith drops 2 his knees and offers to suck guts off if he promises he wont leave just yet
it’s like, the combination of most plausible and most depressing way for them to turn/try to turn their relationship sexual
and i feel like guts would have to be the one who recognizes that griffith has fucked up attitudes towards sex bc i rly don’t think griffith is self aware enough to recognize that this is terrible lol, at least not without a serious wake-up call. but idk if guts has enough like… social awareness. it’s like griffith has the social awareness and guts has the self awareness and while in some circumstances that could work out really well, in this circumstance it’s the opposite of what they need.
agh this is such a disaster scenario. and like if griffith did offer then and there during a fraught moment as he’s freaked out about guts leaving, guts would absolutely be like ‘no what the fuck’ and griffith would then ofc take it as a rejection/condemnation.
but at least it might be enough to convince guts that griffith needs him a lot more than he believes? it’s a starting point at least.
also yeah the point about griffith knowing guts finds him attractive is so 😦 like we were talking a bit before about guts’ internalized homophobia + griffith’s femininity vs masculinity, but yeah it would be sad and interesting to explore how griffith feels about that too.
The incubus thing has really weird
implications I don’t want to think about and it’s weird as shit.
Just to be clear, sucubus and incubus are the same demons. As in they spend different times in their life cycle as both and must collect idk material from men to impregnate women. Assuming we’re talking about non-literal semen it gets weird when Guts is considered in all this. He spends time as the passive Neo-Griffith or human Griffith who struggles with being objectified and time as Femto. We will Not be literal about this, kids.
huh, i’ve never heard of this particular variation of incubi/succubi folklore, wild.
guess you could apply that to ngriff vs femto if you ignore the weird gender shit or just turn it into the fantasy monster version of being a switch lol. still gonna ignore anything eclipse related tho, and idk about ngriff being passive, sexually or otherwise, tho if u mean more like seductive then ia, but idk that’s prob beside the point when we’re talking about a semen go-between fantasy creature lmao.
lmaoo im the same i like ships that are on “the friends to enemies to its complicated and cant be explained in a trope” sid so fluff is a relief. griffiths issues with sex and intimacy have me fucked beyond his rape i think crossing that line with guts would lead to a contradiction with his sex=transaction viewpoint
like i can see him
trying to seduce guts when they have a disagreement because some part of
him thinks that trading his body/objectifying himself (?) is a viable
option to get what he wants or come to a compromise. as opposed to an
thing he does with a person he loves because he loves him and he wants
to do it. guts of course freaks out which only makes griffith more
hysterical etc
aaaaaaaaa yeah this is so real and now i’m depressed. i tried to add something but i just ended up re-stating what you said lol.
but also this has me immediately thinking of an au w/ griffith learning that guts intends to leave in a situation less immediate than the canon one but still incredibly emotionally intense for him, and leaping to offering sex. especially if he learns, unlike canon, that guts wants to leave to be his friend/equal, and therefore doesn’t necessarily see it as a rejection, but as a problem that could be fixed by offering himself.
and of course griffith does want sex for its own sake, as an expression of love and intimacy and pleasure etc, but it just isn’t how he thinks of it or frames it to himself. when it comes to sex w/ guts the transaction concept is more like an excuse to experience something he wants but can’t really admit he wants due to a) trauma and/or b) the way it runs counter to his dream.
well appearing in people’s dreams in a tempting manner does kinda fit what with ngriff’s whole ‘desired’ thing and everyone’s hawk dreams. tho incubi mythology also fits some of the least fun aspects of the story a little too well for me lol, so it wouldn’t be my first choice.
That would make Guts a werewolf- beast of darkness is a dog lol And aside from the obvious messiah parallels, what fantasy creature would Griffith be?
yeah guts is definitely a werewolf. for griffith i want to say siren. the bird type, not the mermaid type. his thing is being pretty, having ridiculous amounts of charisma and enchanting everyone basically, i feel like it fits.
I can’t believe I missed the fact that Griffith has sharp canines in that last panel. Suddenly I stan him even more, if that’s at all possible lol Also I agree with everything 😀
damn i never noticed that either lol
alongside the oddly pointy ears they both have little fangs
a matching set of intimidating, larger than life dark vs light figures
welcome to controversy country
Griffith’s decision to sacrifice the Hawks was perfectly reasonable not just taking into account Griffith’s own values and priorities, ie ensuring the thousands of dead posthumously achieve the thing they died for, but taking into account the Hawks’ own attitudes towards their lives, including Guts’.
It’s all there in Requiem of the Wind.
“More than half of us’ve been killed…”
These are the core group of Hawks. These are the ones who believe in Griffith so strongly that they’re willing to spend a year living as outlaws, dying in raids, so they can rescue him – so Griffith can lead them again.
There were lots of deserters over that year. People who didn’t think it was worth risking their lives for a chance at achieving Griffith’s dream. They’re presumably out there living happily ever after.
These Hawks are the ones who are willing to risk their lives, not out of friendship or loyalty to a man, but out of loyalty to what the man symbolizes for them, what he can bring them, the success that comes to them when they follow him. Out of loyalty to the dream.
Corkus is the only one throwing a tantrum, but he’s voicing all their thoughts, as we can see when his words are placed over their depressed faces.
Wyald spells it all out.
This is who Griffith is to them. He’s the facilitator of their dreams, dreams that each and every one of them is willing to risk their lives for.
And when he can’t be that to them anymore, what happens? He becomes a burden to them.
Judeau offers to take care of him because it’s the least he can do, because he owes it to him, but mostly because if he doesn’t he thinks Casca will, and he thinks it will be a life ruining burden for her. His offer is a personal sacrifice.
Casca offers to take care of him because it’s the least she can do, he’s so small now, he needs someone, and because if she doesn’t Guts will, and she thinks it will be a life ruining burden for him. Her offer is a personal sacrifice.
Guts’ offer is probably the only one based on a genuine desire to stay with Griffith.
Now, Guts doesn’t see Griffith as the guy who can grant him his dreams. Guts is the exception to that. He sees Griffith as a guy he wants to be friends with.
But here’s Guts’ take on the situation:
Finish the battles you start.
Well, that’s exactly what Griffith chose to do. The Eclipse is, in part, a narrative rebuke of Guts’ stubbornness lol, it happens because he seized on the concept of finding his own dream and couldn’t let it go until it was a moment too late.
When Guts finally drops his own “battle” in favour of staying with Griffith, ie makes the right choice contrary to his dogged nature, it comes too late because he’d successfully convinced Casca that he was dedicated to his dream at the expense of his friendships with the Hawks. “I want to draw a line, keep things separate.” He told her he didn’t want to stay with the Hawks, and she believed him, and that attitude is what ruins everything.
And ironically that’s the exact path Griffith chose when he agreed to the sacrifice. Drop his friends and relationships in favour of renewing his committment to a dream, and finishing his own battle.
For the rest of the Hawks, the Eclipse is a rebuke of their choice to live and risk their lives for tomorrow’s success rather than today’s existence.
Now, this absolutely isn’t me arguing that the Hawks deserved to die or anything lol, this is just me saying that Requiem of the Wind is largely set-up for the sacrifice, and I think it’s a clever way of like… depicting the sacrifice not just as a random tragedy that befell a group of people, but as a darkly fitting end to the way they live their lives.
It shows that the sacrifice is consistent with everything the Hawks profess to believe in.
They are all willing to lay down their lives for a victory they may never see.
The Eclipse is the fucked up yet logical conclusion to the Hawks’ very existence as a mercenary band that fights for an ideal, a dream, rather than just day to day living. They agree to potentially sacrifice their lives in every battle. The Eclipse is just one more battle, by this logic, and it’s one they win by losing their lives in it. By dying, they achieve their ultimate victory.
And I think by taking this whole philosophy of dedicating one’s life to a dream to its logical and horrific conclusion, Berserk is basically critiquing the concept of living for an ideal. In making the sacrifice, Griffith gave the Hawks what they wanted at a cost they’ve already agreed to by choosing to risk their lives for Griffith’s victories and the success he can bring them.
Of course, in the moment, knowing that death was inevitable, they would have preferred to live. None of them would knowingly trade their life for a future they won’t live to see. But that’s essentially what they’re doing by fighting battles for future hopes and dreams.
At the end of the day, the moral of Berserk’s story is really simple and basic: live for the sake of being alive. Guts had it right during his three years with the Hawks, before overhearing the Promrose Hall speech: no grand dream, no living for a potential future, nothing but doing the job of a mercenary with a group of people he considered family, enjoying life day to day, fighting just to live a life he considered worthwhile.
Personally I have mixed feelings about this message, but I’m pretty sure that’s basically the point of Berserk.
Black Swordsman: living for revenge (and, for extra irony, Guts’ own dream of fighting stronger and stronger enemies) is bad, living day to day with those “irreplacable things” – friends – is good. Golden Age: “I was too stupid and stubborn to notice it, but what I really wished for back then was here.” Guts left for a dream and by leaving threw away what he truly wanted – companionship. Conviction arc: the people who survived the shadow Eclipse were the people who acted to save their own lives, rather than out of a conviction, their faith in a higher power. Millennium Falcon: “Dreams can make for courageous challenges or opportune escapes” – emphasis on escapes. Troll village dude wanted to escape the darkness of life through a dream as a child, but eventually found greater fulfillment just living an ordinary life in his village. etc etc. Stop dreaming, focus on living.
And essentially the despair we see from the Hawks upon their realization that the fight is over and Griffith is no longer able to lead them to a greater dream leads directly to the Eclipse and gives it a layer of dark irony.
oh hard agree to all of this i dont have much to add atm… do you think their first real sexual encounter would significantly change things or subtly affect any of this? i think i remember you saying that them fucking would either bring them closer or push them apart aaannndddd i think about that a lot
i think they would both get incredibly clingy after they first have sex tbh, i could just see them the morning after having to go about their day doing mercenary or noble stuff or w/e just like, trailing after each other, practically staying within reach at all times even if they can’t like, actually hold hands. sneaking off to make out for a while every hour or two.
lol it’s funny, i’m all about dark angsty fucked up ships but when it comes to griffguts there’s something so appealing about a fluffy au where everything just works out and they get to be happy together.
but also yeah i think you could go a more dramatic angsty route where after frantic passionate sex griffith is flooded by the realization that guts is the number one most important thing in his life and it’s going to ruin everything, and he ends up like, thousand yard staring it fifteen minutes after sex, and pushes him away or says ‘don’t touch me’ when guts like, grabs his shoulder and asks ‘what’s wrong’
which would then really freak guts out and i could see that spiraling into a temporary disaster
also like wrt trauma idk why it never occurred to me before considering i think trauma 100% figures into both guts and griffith’s inability to deal w/ their feelings, but yeah now that u mention it i could totally see griffith feeling dirty and getting all self-loathing after enjoying sex with another man.
like the likeliest angsty scenarios are def guts having a flashback and freaking out, and/or griffith hating himself, and/or one or both feeling like they’re taking on the role of their own aggressor and victimizing the other because shit went badly – like w/ griffith’s only experience w/ same-sex desire being gennon, and sort-of canonically feeling like his own desire for guts is inherently predatory, and guts canonically comparing himself to donovan after killing adonis and during his sex flashback, i mean
that is a fraught emotional situation to introduce sex into
romcom angst senario (either canon or modern) where griffguts have an established relationship and sexual relationship but havent done anything involving penetration and then one night griffith insists guts fucks him sort of out of the blue and its quick and kind of sloppy and not great and griffith sort of takes control of the situation and gets on all fours while guts is a little put out he cant see griffiths face. and afterwards griffith immediately starts to clean up instead of staying to cuddle for a while like usual and guts is stressed and put out bc griffith sort of dismissively and quickly goes to work on paperwork or something
and for the next day griffith is way more withdrawn and cold and distant, even moreso thann before he and guts started this thing they have now and its driving guts crazy with all sorts of fears and anxieties and insecurities so he corners griffith up against a wall and sort of gently but gruffly demands he tells him what the fuck is going on and griffith is kind of :0 bc this is the first tims gits has taken the lead in their relationship and he really, really likes it.
and then its like. a more substantial actual conversation about griffiths confusion wrt his sa and sex in general and guilt, and how he badly he wanted to guts to fuck him and how illogically dirty /that/ made him feel and how he was afraid now that guts would pull away from him because guts had seen him laying himself out vulnerable and had asked to be taken and guts would find him repulsive and dirty and not at all like the griffith he must love
and yeah guts would bust a cog in his brain trying to explain to him that he doesnt find him dirty or disgusting, he loves him and having sex with him no matter how clumsy it is at first, and he loves that griffith wants him in such an intimate way and thinks its supr hot js. and maybe in the end he has to show him and lays griffith back and clumisly but earnestly makes love to him and then they cuddle the end
um guts u sure you’re not projecting a little
like casca’s not the only one who got all self destructive while thinking about griffith my dude
anyway i don’t think we’re meant to take guts’ statement up there without a hefty grain of salt considering guts immediately proceeds to have a flashback and talking about his dead father figure makes him feel better, and also considering that in a few days guts embraces the exact opposite point of view when he decides to stay and take care of griffith despite judeau basically repeating this sentiment to him
and also it’s callous as shit and pretty much tells us that guts is in full denial mode here while fucking casca
in fact it’s kind of similar to
oh holy shit and look at this, which i hadn’t even noticed til rn:
like we all accept and understand that Griffith is projecting when he tells Charlotte to ignore the sad shit, but SO IS GUTS!
and ACTUALLY yeah i’ll do this whole thing right now: Griffith fucking Charlotte and Guts fucking Casca are both attempts to deny their feelings for each other after being made painfully aware of those feelings
Griffith being left in the snow by Guts, and Guts learning about Griffith’s consequent crashing and burning – and specifically being stabbed by Casca while she screams that he broke Griffith
Both deny their feelings in like, a self harming manner. Sex with Charlotte is itself an act of self-destruction, while Guts just lets himself be stabbed first while denying any guilt in a disturbingly detached way
And additionally both these sexual encounters revolve around their respective dreams. Charlotte is a clear representation of Griffith’s dream and fucking her is his way of attaining it, just very badly timed due to being completely emotionally fucked up.
And Guts’ brief relationship with Casca represents his dream to an extent as we see when he compares her to his sword in his inner monologue after sex, when she’s the one he directs his whole promrose hall-y dream monologue to, when he invites her along with the caveat that she doesn’t get in the way of his dream, and when she tells him to leave to pursue his dream at the worst possible moment.
Griffith couldn’t manage to deny his feelings for very long, breaking down after Charlotte falls asleep, while Guts manages to hold out for a few days, and I’d say finally fully stops denying his feelings when he conclusively realizes he shouldn’t’ve left. “Why do I always see these things after they’re done and gone?”
basically i think guts and
griffith have parallel arcs wrt coming to terms with their particular
relationship and realizing they both value that relationship more than
their respective dreams, and both those arcs involve trying to use het
sex as a distraction before facing the music.
lol i posted the whole scene bc the context makes it better, but Griffith’s expression in this panel in particular is underappreciated.
right after guts calls him out on lying 3 years ago and before he turns away, smiles, and throws out the appropriately vague ‘no reason in particular’ denial.
like he’s uncomfortable at being called out on his distancing bullshit lol. this combined with “for your sake” *smoulder* seems like a good example of griffith being unaware of his own feelings. like i always feel like that moment, the bedroom eyes, the “for your sake,” nearly contradicts my reading of griffith as totally in denial and unaware that he’s in love, because it’s so pointed lol. it’s hard for me to read that moment and come away thinking griffith is unaware that he’s in love.
but i mean if that’s the case then griffith’s discomfort right before that is less of a “shit he’s got a point, why the hell did i save him?” and more of an “i know why i saved him and i resent my inconvenient feelings.”
Which doesn’t work because he does get genuine and personal enough immediately after for Guts to take it as a sign that he’s found the place where he belongs. It would be weird for Griffith to be thinking “because I love you(/feel very strong feelings towards you) and that could ruin everything” right before saying “for your sake” and giving him that sultry look.
so “for your sake” *smoulder* could just be a genuine expression of feelings regardless of whether he fully understands them. like it doesn’t have to be deliberate, it could just be an accidentally revealing choice of phrasing. i mean like, that’s how i default to reading it anyway, i just think that panel of griffith’s contemplative frowny face backs me up.
idk i’m just kinda bored rn and thinking outloud rly.
Yeah like, in canon they are surprisingly physical with each other. Or at least it surprises me on re-read how many of their significant relationship moments not just include but revolve around and specifically highlight physical touch.
Like from Griffith grabbing Guts’ face like he’s going to pull him into a kiss after defeating him in a physical fight to Griffith’s “if you touch me now…” moment of reality-breaking despair, touch is portrayed as a really significant component of their relationship.
Actually to get on my meta shit real quick, check out their first interactions. First Griffith shoving Casca at Guts, explicitly because she’s the only woman around and only a woman can cuddle naked with a dude (and damn if her first appearance doesn’t define her role in the story to a tee). Next, they duel with swords. Extensions of themselves, but not their actual physical bodies. Then they lose their swords and end up physically grappling with each other, and correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m wracking my brain and I’m pretty sure this is the only time we’ve ever seen either of them fight without weapons.
Which leads to this:
Their first meeting has the sense of an inevitable, physical pull between them imo, and that is a constant of their relationship.
And their mutual desire for physical contact can only be satisfied when they have the pretense of guys being dudes to fall back on lol. A fight, in this case. In other cases it’s saving each others’ lives, and supporting each other while injured mainly, and sometimes casual friendly touches, like Guts’ hand on Griffith’s shoulder which gains significance during Griffith’s torture chamber monologue.
When they don’t have that pretense available, when sex inevitably comes into the equation, that’s when Casca or Charlotte comes between them as outlets for those decidedly non platonic feelings, as The Designated Socially (and psychologically thanks to trauma) Acceptable Woman.
(I’d elaborate on that but like, I talk about Casca as an emotional and physical bridge between them a lot and have at least one giant thorough post about it. And Charlotte is just obvious. I figure we’re all on the same page here.)
Idk it’s not like they touch in every scene they’re in or anything, more that most of their intensely emotional and narratively significant scenes either involve touch in significant ways, or the very pointed absence of it (eg Guts reaching out towards Griffith as he transforms before pulling his hand away and turning to fight apostles. Or, yk, Griffith straight up thinking about Guts at the exact moment of penetration during the Charlotte sex scene, which I still can’t believe happened. Stuff like that lol).
So while I think them being physically drawn to each other and wanting to touch is v in character, and I can easily imagine them brushing shoulders, casually grabbing arms or w/e to get the others’ attention, back and shoulder pats, arm wrestling, play fighting, etc etc, and I think there’s plenty of indication that they probably find excuses to touch a lot, more importantly I think the narrative is telling us that physical touch is a significant aspect of their expression of feelings for each other regardless of how often they might actually get touchy feely.
ANYWAY i’m realizing that i have like fifty million things to say on this topic so I’m going to write more posts later. For now I’ll get into the headcanony stuff.
So basically I think that they absolutely would get v awkward and kind of shy about touch after acknowledging that their feelings are sexual. Suddenly they realize why they want to touch each other so much, they both have hangups about it even assuming they navigate the whole sexuality issue smoothly, and it would probably take a little while to adjust even if everything goes perfectly.
But I don’t think it would take very long, because the facts are that they really like being in physical contact with each other, and even if they got awkward for a while and second guessed things like shoulder pats or w/e a lot lol, they are ultimately used to touching and it’s pretty natural to them. It’s how they express their emotional closeness, and it would become even moreso once they accepted the sexual aspect of their feelings.
If this is in the canon universe I could see trying to keep their hands off each other being more of a problem lol. I feel like if they did get together, just about everyone would figure it out pretty quickly. They are absolutely the couple who sits in each others’ laps, leans against each other, casually wraps their arms around each other, etc, and it would be hard for them to refrain in general day to day interactions i m h o.
Also they’d be adorable as fuck.
Tho also for the sake of angst I could see things going much less than smoothly wrt the sexuality angle, particularly with Guts, and if one of them realized their feelings aren’t platonic first I could definitely see him physically withdrawing and specifically avoiding contact, whether it’s Guts or Griffith, though maybe especially if it’s Guts, and subtly making the other feel kind of neglected/rejected. But they’d get through that eventually.
You’re totally right about touch being integral to their pull towards each other. I noticed but I’m not sure that I had ever laid out each piece of their story together out like this. It’s like it happens before they can remember who they’re supposed to be and that’s very sweet, especially Guts.
I feel like it would be very difficult for both of them to get back there once they explicitly acknowledge the sexual element of their interest in each other. Griffith, because he’s doing that classic closeted thing of on some level knowing he likes Guts but telling himself these small moments are enough. And Guts, because he has on a visceral level not processed his trauma.
Griffith hasn’t either and once he a Guts theoretically cross that line, the way he had described his own rape to himself may fall apart for him. Like even though it was clear to us and to Casca that he had experienced an act of violence, he may very well have compartemtalized it away. Once he knows what sex is supposed to be, he has to see it for what it is and to see his own vulnerability at the time more clearly. The time between the ages of 13/14 and twenty is a long time and it would be hard to see himself as a child I think. So it’s possible he may withdraw abruptly too, even if Guts was more open.
Yeah like, in canon they are surprisingly physical with each other. Or at least it surprises me on re-read how many of their significant relationship moments not just include but revolve around and specifically highlight physical touch.
Like from Griffith grabbing Guts’ face like he’s going to pull him into a kiss after defeating him in a physical fight to Griffith’s “if you touch me now…” moment of reality-breaking despair, touch is portrayed as a really significant component of their relationship.
Actually to get on my meta shit real quick, check out their first interactions. First Griffith shoving Casca at Guts, explicitly because she’s the only woman around and only a woman can cuddle naked with a dude (and damn if her first appearance doesn’t define her role in the story to a tee). Next, they duel with swords. Extensions of themselves, but not their actual physical bodies. Then they lose their swords and end up physically grappling with each other, and correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m wracking my brain and I’m pretty sure this is the only time we’ve ever seen either of them fight without weapons.
Which leads to this:
Their first meeting has the sense of an inevitable, physical pull between them imo, and that is a constant of their relationship.
And their mutual desire for physical contact can only be satisfied when they have the pretense of guys being dudes to fall back on lol. A fight, in this case. In other cases it’s saving each others’ lives, and supporting each other while injured mainly, and sometimes casual friendly touches, like Guts’ hand on Griffith’s shoulder which gains significance during Griffith’s torture chamber monologue.
When they don’t have that pretense available, when sex inevitably comes into the equation, that’s when Casca or Charlotte comes between them as outlets for those decidedly non platonic feelings, as The Designated Socially (and psychologically thanks to trauma) Acceptable Woman.
(I’d elaborate on that but like, I talk about Casca as an emotional and physical bridge between them a lot and have at least one giant thorough post about it. And Charlotte is just obvious. I figure we’re all on the same page here.)
Idk it’s not like they touch in every scene they’re in or anything, more that most of their intensely emotional and narratively significant scenes either involve touch in significant ways, or the very pointed absence of it (eg Guts reaching out towards Griffith as he transforms before pulling his hand away and turning to fight apostles. Or, yk, Griffith straight up thinking about Guts at the exact moment of penetration during the Charlotte sex scene, which I still can’t believe happened. Stuff like that lol).
So while I think them being physically drawn to each other and wanting to touch is v in character, and I can easily imagine them brushing shoulders, casually grabbing arms or w/e to get the others’ attention, back and shoulder pats, arm wrestling, play fighting, etc etc, and I think there’s plenty of indication that they probably find excuses to touch a lot, more importantly I think the narrative is telling us that physical touch is a significant aspect of their expression of feelings for each other regardless of how often they might actually get touchy feely.
ANYWAY i’m realizing that i have like fifty million things to say on this topic so I’m going to write more posts later. For now I’ll get into the headcanony stuff.
So basically I think that they absolutely would get v awkward and kind of shy about touch after acknowledging that their feelings are sexual. Suddenly they realize why they want to touch each other so much, they both have hangups about it even assuming they navigate the whole sexuality issue smoothly, and it would probably take a little while to adjust even if everything goes perfectly.
But I don’t think it would take very long, because the facts are that they really like being in physical contact with each other, and even if they got awkward for a while and second guessed things like shoulder pats or w/e a lot lol, they are ultimately used to touching and it’s pretty natural to them. It’s how they express their emotional closeness, and it would become even moreso once they accepted the sexual aspect of their feelings.
If this is in the canon universe I could see trying to keep their hands off each other being more of a problem lol. I feel like if they did get together, just about everyone would figure it out pretty quickly. They are absolutely the couple who sits in each others’ laps, leans against each other, casually wraps their arms around each other, etc, and it would be hard for them to refrain in general day to day interactions i m h o.
Also they’d be adorable as fuck.
Tho also for the sake of angst I could see things going much less than smoothly wrt the sexuality angle, particularly with Guts, and if one of them realized their feelings aren’t platonic first I could definitely see him physically withdrawing and specifically avoiding contact, whether it’s Guts or Griffith, though maybe especially if it’s Guts, and subtly making the other feel kind of neglected/rejected. But they’d get through that eventually.
the warmth on my back from her wont allow me to do it. entrusted to me, one who can do nothing. a weaker being than i. those eyes that don’t understand a thing wont forgive me for being powerless. this is punishment or maybe.. is this salvation? the weak ones that i oppressed are they now going to save me? farnese + looking after casca
you're the only one 