it’s not just the panel you uploaded, then griffith says he’ll get his kindom and proceeds to leave and he keeps touching his heart and there are bthumps everywhere and guts is left. it’s damn bittersweet. as for the demon child personally i think that miura won’t go there i think what he’s tryna do is show that casca won’t want revenge like guts because griffith is using the baby’s vessel. or some weird shit like that. personally im glad who she wanted to see wasn’t a man evenif i hate babies

yeah the whole scene is fantastic, i love it.

tbh that’s a good point, given the choice between the fetus being who she wants to see vs guts or griffith, yeah i’ll take the fetus too. actually not gonna lie I completely forgot about “i want to see that person” or w/e the line was.

i was also kinda thinking that it’s going to mean casca isn’t going to want revenge and will cockblock guts’ revenge quest because ngriff absorbed the fetus. “your wishes may not be her wishes,” if guts’ wish is revenge. i’d find that immensely disappointing though because i want casca to go out and get herself some revenge really bad

plus as a conflict it’s like… bad. guts is already conflicted about revenge, adding another reason for him not to go out and get it is completely unnecessary

but hey who knows, nothing’s set in stone and i could still be pleasantly surprised.

prettykitten123:

Just sharing a message I sent to a friend. Since she enjoyed the theory I wanted to see what the rest of the fandom thought. 

I believe there was a time that Griffith appreciated and valued Casca. She was the only one from the looks of it that knew Griffith’s secrets and the saccrifices he would make for the good of the band of hawks. She also was the first to accept Griffith for the person he truly was. 

But of course the years past and he began to distance himself from everyone, even her but Casca was okay with that. She understood why he was doing that. I feel that was all the more reason for her to get pissed off over Guts. 

Griffith opened up to a complete stranger, a person who didn’t even know him the way Casca knew him. 

 But changing the subject a little from Casca/Griffith to Casca/Guts, I feel like maybe (if I’m not reading too deeply into this which I probably am) they saw pieces of Griffith in each other. Casca’s a strong leader, she’s determined, and strategic just like Griffith. 

As for Guts, Casca probably admired Guts’ desire to find his own purpose in the world and to better himself, which are things that she liked about Griffith. When you think about it they both had qualities that Griffith lost after the year of being tortured. Casca became the beloved leader and Guts became the admired swordsman with a developing purpose in life, he even gained the admiration of Casca. And after Eclispe Griffith took all of that power and qualities back from them. 

these two pages are the most strongly visually conveyed theory -> rebuttal i’ve ever seen

like i’m sorry i can worry all i want over ominous fetus-y portents and casca’s narrative, and i am, but i just can’t believe the same guy who wrote this scene is going to skimp on the emotional resolution to guts and griffith’s relationship

he went to see guts to test if anything would shake his heart! and then failed that test! while watching a fight extremely reminiscent of his very first sight of guts! this is just so good

griff-guts:

both guts and griffith have problems sleeping – guts is extremely restless and will thrash around under the covers if he hasn’t physically exhausted himself before trying to fall asleep, and griffith lays awake overthinking for hours. it gets a bit better when they start sharing a bed tho because just each other’s company is reassuring

seisans
replied to your post “seisans
replied to your post “phydia63
replied to your post “never…”

yeah though he’s clearly way more emotional than neo griff? neo griff is very poker face while femto is over there handing out glares and saying petty hurtful shit as often as possible

you’re right. tbh it could make sense with the fact that femto is just plain made out of negative emotion and so lets his asshole flag fly, while neogriffith being corporeal probably doubled down on his emotional repression

but the fact that neogriffith figured he had to test his capacity for emotion just seems weird with that explanation since yeah he obviously had the capacity for it as femto. i guess ‘griffith lives in denial and this is true of every incarnation’ could kinda work as an explanation for that inconsistency tho.

seisans
replied to your post “phydia63
replied to your post “never forget”
…”

to be fair femto vs neo griff is still unclear

true

but you’d think femto would be even less capable of emotion than neogriff since he got the whole frozen blood crystalization of your last tear shed thing, while neogriff had to test himself now that he’s in a flesh and blood body, and then failed the test

but yeah it is still like ambiguous and up in the air so i guess we can’t do more than throw educated guesses at the wall lol

@phydia63 said:
People conveniently forget about that moment too. It’s propaganda I say xD 

yeah it gets ignored way too often when it’s like the high point of the post-sacrifice eclipse stuff.

I mean, no pressure to answer this but what would be your predicted possible Worst Case ending(/griffguts emotional conclusion) and your Best Case one that you could actually see happening in canon either way?

kissing-monsters:

bthump:

WORST CASE ENDING

all plot, no substance. any heart bthumpy emotions NeoGriff is feeling are actually the fetus’ feelings. it’s his weakness™ and if Guts and Casca defeat NeoGriff they’ll be able to magically separate it out and fuse it with its soul, the Moonlight Boy, achieving a Happily Ever After™ as a Picturesque Family™

Or possibly if they defeat NeoGriffith they free their child’s soul to go to swirly soul heaven, and the ending is bittersweet™

Miura retcons Femto letting Guts go, and all the hints that NeoGriffith feels things that are entirely unrelated to whatever tf the fetus might care about are red herrings/misdirection.

In a flash forward we find out that Rickert and Erika are happily married in a terrible Guts/Casca parallel.

ummm what else… NeoGriff is defeated through a power-up/Elfland magic after a volume long physical battle.

Guts bones Casca and thus conquers his obsession with Griffith and is finally able to move on™ but NeoGriff attacks Elfhelm, forcing the final battle.

possibly the other godhand are there too, what with fusing the physical and spiritual worlds and miura hinting that void’s gonna be important yadda yadda yadda. it turns into Good Spirit Elemental Guardians against Evil Godhand in the most boring fight ever while Guts and NeoGriff fight.

Oooh Casca experiences some strong negative emotions upon regaining her sanity, but the Moonlight Boy appears to her and her maternal feelings™ soothe her.

Guts kills NGriff, rides off into the sunset with casca.

oh also there’s undertones of falconia being a naive fantasy while guts’ ‘just struggle your way through everything instead of finding/creating a safe happy paradise’ philosophy is touted as more mature and better

ok that’s enough dwelling on the negative

BEST CASE ENDING

the fetus is affecting Griffith only insomuch as being fused with its physical flesh makes his heart start beating because he’s corporeal and thus subject to those worldy emotions he’d thought he’d left behind.

The shot of it at the end of this chapter shows that Casca is kind of obsessed with it, and therefore when she wakes up with all her sanity and memories she demonstrates that her wishes were not Guts’ wishes and falls into despair and sacrifices that little fucker. I mean, half the apostle sacrifices we’ve seen have been parent/child, it’s possible right?

this destroys Moonlight Boy, aka the essence of the fetus, and whatever hope the audience had for a happily ever after family with Guts Casca and child. it’s meant to be seen as a tragic low point. I cackle gleefully.

I wouldn’t actually enjoy this but i think it would make sense: along with that low point Miura hints that NeoGriff’s feelings are gone thanks to Casca’s sacrifice – oh no, his one weakness! now he’s unstoppable! etc – but psych later on it turns out the feelings were his own all along.

casca, now an apostle, leaves to get revenge on neogriff. guts goes after her to either help or stop her, he’s not sure which. also if casca steals guts’ armour, i will die of happiness, but that + being an apostle might be overkill.

we get casca’s point of view, and it’s quite similar to black swordsman guts and full of parallels. guts has now achieved some character development which is why he’s torn between helping casca get revenge vs trying to just save her because she’s no match for neogriff (vs deep down wanting to save neogriff and/or stick his own sword in him because his feelings are still all fucked up. undertones of guts and casca’s old griffith-related romantic rivalry but dark)

thematically, Elfhelm is soured – the whole magical therapy for Casca thing turned out to be a terrible idea, the people there are unwilling to help clean up their mess because they’re isolationist dicks, AND maybe there are hints that the four spirit guardians schierke calls on for protection are other forms of the godhand?

however it happens, ultimately the thematic takeaway is that rather than there being a good vs evil thing going on in the spirit world, good and evil are two sides of the same coin and what you perceive really depends on what you’re calling on the spirit world for, and most things are both at once. yk, aren’t gods and devils the same thing?

i’m skipping over plot stuff and more theme stuff because i’m willing to accept a lot of possibilities and i really don’t care much.

the important thing is that guts and griffith have a final emotional confrontation after the dust of the big action climax settles, and it comes in the form of a 3rd duel.

also at some point in the lead-up to it, they figure their shit out. possibly this involves schierke’s or sonia’s or both’s magical mind exploration magic. we see griffith’s unemotional facade starting to crack. we see guts’ ambivalence towards griffith – does he want to kill him or plead with him or fuck him or reject him entirely?

and guts realizes that griffith’s heart is beating again for him, and everything he wanted – griffith’s respect admiration and love is still there, residing in his worst enemy. and griffith realizes that guts admired and loved him and never once saw human him as the monster he saw himself and allowed himself to become.

tragically idk how you could depict both without looking really silly, but either guts’ residual guilt for his part in the lead up to the eclipse gets the better of him and he lets a still-repressed griffith kill him, the way he always lets himself get stabbed when he feels bad about something, OR neogriffith’s irrational love gets the better of him and he lets guts kill him – guts ends up sticking him in the throat in a mirror of how he killed gambino.

either way there’s a lot of crying and cradling a corpse.

tbh i’m leaning towards griffith killing guts for that devilman ending, and this way casca gets to play the role of angry god by swooping in and killing him. if that’s the case griffith lets her because his irrational emotions have finally truly burst free and taken hold over him after he kills guts. his crying is a call-back to his ‘last tear shed.’

(maybe casca becomes zodd 2.0, living for battle and becoming a sword just for herself. kind of a darkly fucked-up “happy” ending for her lol.)

BEST CASE ENDING WITH NO FUCKS GIVEN FOR PLAUSIBILITY

all of the above but after finally understanding each other they make out instead of dueling and then casca kills neogriff and an adult theresia kills guts, and they both ride off into the sunset with their respective girlfriends, farnese and jill.

A) I’m with you pretty strongly on the Do Not Want for the Happy Family parent/child relationships are the Be All End All thing, and I really hope that Miura doesn’t fall into that one (he’s pretty good with not idolising family relationships at least??? Augh).

and B)

Oooh Casca experiences some strong negative emotions upon regaining her sanity, but the Moonlight Boy appears to her and her maternal feelings™ soothe her.

I am screaming this is the darkest timeline oh my GOD do not WANT and yet THIS I can see potentially happening? That is SO grim. Like the idea of Casca’s story being even further reduced to a set of cliches about female characters kills me.

however it happens, ultimately the thematic takeaway is that rather than there being a good vs evil thing going on in the spirit world, good and evil are two sides of the same coin and what you perceive really depends on what you’re calling on the spirit world for, and most things are both at once. yk, aren’t gods and devils the same thing?

This is one of the things I love about Berserk and I hope it plays a part in the ending in some context. If it doesn’t somewhat play out in a way that emphasises this then Miura’s played himself.

neogriffith’s irrational love gets the better of him and he lets guts kill him – guts ends up sticking him in the throat in a mirror of how he killed gambino.

!!! You have killed me. This would actually make me cry if it happened.

(I mean the make-out ending is good too).

Ahhh I fully expect one or both of them to die– I’d honestly be shocked if either of them lived tbh.

It’s true every single family in Berserk, from blood relations to adopted, has been awful. The only exception I can think of is Godo and Erika. I kinda like that about Berserk, I’m not big on stories about happy families. So I do have hope that Miura might tease the concept of a Guts and Casca and baby happy family before fucking it all up and ending that prospect in weird tragedy.

Honestly though Casca being obsessed with the fetus – possibly even mentally regressed and insane not because of the rape or not just because of it but also because the fetus was corrupted and miscarried, now that I consider how Miura portrayed Shizu – just makes me lose hope that Casca’s going to get to be anything ever other than a projection screen for Miura’s fucked up thoughts on women. Like are we really going from her narrative being all about rape and her relationships to men to her narrative being all about motherhood? It’s so depressing to think about.

And lol yeah, tbh I kind of want them both to die? Idk I like a good death scene and these have the potential to be epic and extremely satisfying. Give or take the whole afterlife thing, I tend to think that actually seeing Guts and/or Griffith’s souls being carted off to whichever whirlpools they end up in would ruin it, but yk, Miura could leave that in implication.

whatever happens, we always have that second of hesitation that allowed guts and co to escape i guess. i cant guess what else having the fetus there could mean will happen :(

yeah v true. and considering our most recent foray into neogriffith’s storyline involved him teasingly having potential feelings related to rickert/his old life/his identity, none of which the fetus should gaf about, i still feel fairly safe assuming that we’re not going to venture down the darkest timeline where neogriffith actually is totally emotionless after all and it’s just that a magical fetus sometimes takes the wheel.

on the other hand seeing the fetus there does not exactly fill me with hope for casca’s storyline. god knows i fucking hate precious fictional children, i hate maternal/paternal feelings, so personally i’m probably going to be highly annoyed unless miura does something spectacularly unexpected like the theory i just posted of having casca sacrifice it lol.

(and i am also filled with fear that certain horrifying theories will prove to be true, ie casca leaves and joins neogriffith because of the fetus connection or something. i’d like to believe miura won’t go there, but is there anything he won’t do to ruin casca’s story? puts ‘your wishes may not be her wishes’ in a very chilling light.)

I mean, no pressure to answer this but what would be your predicted possible Worst Case ending(/griffguts emotional conclusion) and your Best Case one that you could actually see happening in canon either way?

WORST CASE ENDING

all plot, no substance. any heart bthumpy emotions NeoGriff is feeling are actually the fetus’ feelings. it’s his weakness™ and if Guts and Casca defeat NeoGriff they’ll be able to magically separate it out and fuse it with its soul, the Moonlight Boy, achieving a Happily Ever After™ as a Picturesque Family™

Or possibly if they defeat NeoGriffith they free their child’s soul to go to swirly soul heaven, and the ending is bittersweet™

Miura retcons Femto letting Guts go, and all the hints that NeoGriffith feels things that are entirely unrelated to whatever tf the fetus might care about are red herrings/misdirection.

In a flash forward we find out that Rickert and Erika are happily married in a terrible Guts/Casca parallel.

ummm what else… NeoGriff is defeated through a power-up/Elfland magic after a volume long physical battle.

Guts bones Casca and thus conquers his obsession with Griffith and is finally able to move on™ but NeoGriff attacks Elfhelm, forcing the final battle.

possibly the other godhand are there too, what with fusing the physical and spiritual worlds and miura hinting that void’s gonna be important yadda yadda yadda. it turns into Good Spirit Elemental Guardians against Evil Godhand in the most boring fight ever while Guts and NeoGriff fight.

Oooh Casca experiences some strong negative emotions upon regaining her sanity, but the Moonlight Boy appears to her and her maternal feelings™ soothe her.

Guts kills NGriff, rides off into the sunset with casca.

oh also there’s undertones of falconia being a naive fantasy while guts’ ‘just struggle your way through everything instead of finding/creating a safe happy paradise’ philosophy is touted as more mature and better

ok that’s enough dwelling on the negative

BEST CASE ENDING

the fetus is affecting Griffith only insomuch as being fused with its physical flesh makes his heart start beating because he’s corporeal and thus subject to those worldy emotions he’d thought he’d left behind.

The shot of it at the end of this chapter shows that Casca is kind of obsessed with it, and therefore when she wakes up with all her sanity and memories she demonstrates that her wishes were not Guts’ wishes and falls into despair and sacrifices that little fucker. I mean, half the apostle sacrifices we’ve seen have been parent/child, it’s possible right?

this destroys Moonlight Boy, aka the essence of the fetus, and whatever hope the audience had for a happily ever after family with Guts Casca and child. it’s meant to be seen as a tragic low point. I cackle gleefully.

I wouldn’t actually enjoy this but i think it would make sense: along with that low point Miura hints that NeoGriff’s feelings are gone thanks to Casca’s sacrifice – oh no, his one weakness! now he’s unstoppable! etc – but psych later on it turns out the feelings were his own all along.

casca, now an apostle, leaves to get revenge on neogriff. guts goes after her to either help or stop her, he’s not sure which. also if casca steals guts’ armour, i will die of happiness, but that + being an apostle might be overkill.

we get casca’s point of view, and it’s quite similar to black swordsman guts and full of parallels. guts has now achieved some character development which is why he’s torn between helping casca get revenge vs trying to just save her because she’s no match for neogriff (vs deep down wanting to save neogriff and/or stick his own sword in him because his feelings are still all fucked up. undertones of guts and casca’s old griffith-related romantic rivalry but dark)

thematically, Elfhelm is soured – the whole magical therapy for Casca thing turned out to be a terrible idea, the people there are unwilling to help clean up their mess because they’re isolationist dicks, AND maybe there are hints that the four spirit guardians schierke calls on for protection are other forms of the godhand?

however it happens, ultimately the thematic takeaway is that rather than there being a good vs evil thing going on in the spirit world, good and evil are two sides of the same coin and what you perceive really depends on what you’re calling on the spirit world for, and most things are both at once. yk, aren’t gods and devils the same thing?

i’m skipping over plot stuff and more theme stuff because i’m willing to accept a lot of possibilities and i really don’t care much.

the important thing is that guts and griffith have a final emotional confrontation after the dust of the big action climax settles, and it comes in the form of a 3rd duel.

also at some point in the lead-up to it, they figure their shit out. possibly this involves schierke’s or sonia’s or both’s magical mind exploration magic. we see griffith’s unemotional facade starting to crack. we see guts’ ambivalence towards griffith – does he want to kill him or plead with him or fuck him or reject him entirely?

and guts realizes that griffith’s heart is beating again for him, and everything he wanted – griffith’s respect admiration and love is still there, residing in his worst enemy. and griffith realizes that guts admired and loved him and never once saw human him as the monster he saw himself and allowed himself to become.

tragically idk how you could depict both without looking really silly, but either guts’ residual guilt for his part in the lead up to the eclipse gets the better of him and he lets a still-repressed griffith kill him, the way he always lets himself get stabbed when he feels bad about something, OR neogriffith’s irrational love gets the better of him and he lets guts kill him – guts ends up sticking him in the throat in a mirror of how he killed gambino.

either way there’s a lot of crying and cradling a corpse.

tbh i’m leaning towards griffith killing guts for that devilman ending, and this way casca gets to play the role of angry god by swooping in and killing him. if that’s the case griffith lets her because his irrational emotions have finally truly burst free and taken hold over him after he kills guts. his crying is a call-back to his ‘last tear shed.’

(maybe casca becomes zodd 2.0, living for battle and becoming a sword just for herself. kind of a darkly fucked-up “happy” ending for her lol.)

BEST CASE ENDING WITH NO FUCKS GIVEN FOR PLAUSIBILITY

all of the above but after finally understanding each other they make out instead of dueling and then casca kills neogriff and an adult theresia kills guts, and they both ride off into the sunset with their respective girlfriends, farnese and jill.

kissing-monsters
replied to your post “@phydia63​ if you want spoilers kissing-monsters
replied to your…”

I have a bit of context for this through reading spoilers with abandon and that sounds… ominous. if something as long running as berserk that you need a lot of investment to get into completely falls down now that would suck a fuck tbh. I’d be so disappointed (keeping up with spoilers may actually save me £££ for more of the manga though at least. HM).

not to encourage illegal activity but hmu if you want a link to the official english translation online. i figure if you’ve already bought the golden age you’ve paid a fair price for the entirety of the series 😛

ALSO yeah. like the saving grace is that no matter what shit miura pulls, the golden age is closed canon and he can’t retroactively ruin it. *knocks on wood* but i s2g if he fucks with the emotional catharsis i want from a griffguts confrontation by inserting that fucking fetus where my actual emotional investment in whatever neogriffith is feeling could be, i will be happy to call berserk an overall failure of storytelling.

@phydia63​ if you want spoilers

kissing-monsters
replied to your post “reddit fan: that was amazing, i gasped when i got to that last page…”

oh jesus what now

the return of my most hated fictional entity of all time: the fucking fetus

i haven’t seen an english translation yet but fetus(/moonlight boy) is like representitve to me of all the ways berserk could end up being absolutely terrible and disappointing so i’m 😡 about seeing it in casca’s mind right after imaginary guts fights imaginary femto

regardless of what the context might end up being i doubt it’s gonna make me happy. at the very least it seems like a strong indication that the fetus is influencing NeoGriff and Casca sensed it which, while not a final nail in the coffin yet, feels like a hammer poised to hit one