kissing-monsters:

bthump:

 replied to your post “madchen
replied to your post “the berserk episode synopses on…”

“the only woman guts ever loved” as if guts has ever come within breathing room of any other woman since the only one he knows personally is on account of her being his coworker and thus forced to share space with his smelly b*tch ass….

lmao true

also luv that w/ het ships ppl can declare shit like this with utter conviction despite guts never speaking or thinking of casca in terms of love, and despite the writer saying that casca and guts hooked up for extra eclipse drama and casca’s only around now so guts can keep being bitter.

but anything gay? clearly fake and just reaching

so it’s been stated that casca didn’t die literally to fuel guts angst (which, let’s leave aside how disgusting THAT is for a second) and bitterness, which leads me to believe that basically

without casca there as a very heavy reminder

guts would have 100% just forgiven griffith pretty much asap after seeing him again? ha

lmao right?

I mean yeah if Casca died with the rest of the Band during the Eclipse then sure Guts absolutely 100% would forgive Griffith/Femto immediately because it’s pretty clear that he never blamed him for sacrificing everyone in the first place lol. He was sad, sure, but he wasn’t angry about Griffith choosing to make the sacrifice. If anything he’d’ve blamed himself. But if say Casca died during the Conviction Arc, should we assume Guts would’ve gone ‘ok w/e fuck it idc anymore’ and moved on?

Actually yk what considering his “forgot my urge to kill” moment and how sad he was about NeoGriff ditching him it’s actually not that hard of a sell.

But damn either way I wish Miura would do something with Casca’s character other than continue making her an accessory to Guts’ desire for revenge.

anime dub adventures continued

“Stay away from me… if you touch me now… if you so much as touch my shoulder… I’ll never be able to… you and I will never be…”

you know how much i love that the moment of despair that opens the behelit is the moment guts touches him but man, preceeding it with “you and I will never be…” is one hell of a choice

like the manga translation of “I’ll never… I’ll never…!” is functionally meaningless as far as I can tell. Maybe I’ll never forgive you? But it’s not the point, the point is Guts’ touch sending Griffith into despair. Griffith’s words just draw attention to it. Despair + touch.

“You and I will never be…” on the other hand, like, that’s nothing but a statement on Griffith’s abject horror of being touched in that moment by a man he can’t have, right? How else can I interpret that? Add “I’ll never be able to” and all I’m getting is something along the lines of, “I’ll never be able to let you go but I’ll never have you either.”

anyway how do ppl interpret Griffith’s horror at being touched by Guts and subsequent despair, regardless of specifics of translation? I’ve always kind of wondered but I don’t think I’ve seen any meta or interpretations or anything about it at all.

replied to your post “ replied to your post “madchen
replied to your post “the berserk…”

YUP 100% LOVE IT like if the (het) characters are weirdly forced together/put together obviously to add drama its fucking nuts that ppl can read it as True Love and like. bc griffith and guts dont outright say ‘we are gay and and love’ all the “’subtext”“ is ”’noncanonical’“ and therefore means nothing and is irrelevant i guess

ikr, and when it comes to canonicity like… it’s canonically ambiguous i guess bc yeah it’s only subtext but who cares when lbr we know it’s gay and they know it’s gay and everyone knows it

like come on if there was legit no overwhelming subtext and their relationship could be most easily interpreted as purely platonic, uncomfortable dudebro berserk fans wouldn’t feel compelled to disregard half the plot to the point of hamstringing the story for themselves

since i’m still watching scenes from the anime one more thing:

ten seconds of guts killing dudes with one arm and cradling griffith in his other arm is high quality content and beats 90% of the wyald chapters it replaced by a mile

 replied to your post “madchen
replied to your post “the berserk episode synopses on…”

“the only woman guts ever loved” as if guts has ever come within breathing room of any other woman since the only one he knows personally is on account of her being his coworker and thus forced to share space with his smelly b*tch ass….

lmao true

also luv that w/ het ships ppl can declare shit like this with utter conviction despite guts never speaking or thinking of casca in terms of love, and despite the writer saying that casca and guts hooked up for extra eclipse drama and casca’s only around now so guts can keep being bitter.

but anything gay? clearly fake and just reaching

psa to any of my followers potentially interested in making amvs or w/e other video editing may interest you:

sony vegas edit is on humble bundle rn for 20$

i haven’t used it myself but yk, it’s highly recommended by a lot of ppl and the original price is like 400$ or smthn so i’d recommend snapping it up if there’s even a possibility that you might one day want to try it out

ALSO speaking of ppl trying to kill Guts

fandom needs to give Casca more credit for her earnest, premeditated murder attempt here. Like Griffith’s was a split-second decision to make a move that had a risk of potentially killing Guts, while still aiming only to wound, and it’s taken as proof that he’s been evil all along. Casca’s straight up aiming to kill here, but no one takes her seriously.

Which is partly Miura’s fault for not taking Casca seriously as a threat to Guts, but the intent is here I’m js and I like it because it’s dark and fucked up and shows Casca’s very own interesting inner darkness. I don’t want to just condemn her for it bc I’m into Casca’s violent rage, but I hate how she gets infantalized both by Guts not even bothering to draw his sword and by fandom treating this less like a murder attempt and more like a cute hissy fit.

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i happened to watch this scene in the anime dub last night and man

“if he will not be mine his life is forefeit” just doesn’t have the same oomph as “if I can’t have him…!”

plus the dub dialogue just doesn’t encapsulate Griffith’s frantic back and forth with himself. It goes “I might really kill him… NO – if he will not be mine” etc. Comes across more cold and resolute than the manga where it’s more of a split-second decision to just go for it because fuck it.

kissing-monsters
replied to your post “the berserk episode synopses on wikipedia are killing me cut for petty…”

It’s… so confusing though, a close friend of mine watched the series based partially on my rec and him wanting to see it for ages and he misunderstood… basically… everything??? HOW DOES BERSERK FANDOM OUTSIDE TUMBLR FUNCTION???

honestly same, I really don’t get it. Like I can see general homophobia making ppl desperately want to downplay the gay vibes leading to as little emphasis on Guts and Griffith’s relationship, and especially Guts’ (extremely and wholly positive) feelings for Griffith as possible. Like describing Guts’ decision to leave the Hawks as “he does not want to be caught up in Griffith’s dream anymore” is technically accurate, and yet completely downplays the fact that the reason he doesn’t want to be caught up in Griffith’s dream is because Griffith is “dazzling” and he wants Griffith to “look at [him]” and he wants to feel like his equal and be regarded as a True Friend. In the terrible episode description it’s instead framed like Guts is pissed off about having to assassinate people lol.

And idk I think it might also be partially this weird desperate need to have a Hero and a Villain and have Guts prevail over the villain and ride off into the sunset with the Rescued Love Interest, because a lot of people are frankly boring and like boring stories and can’t conceive of good stories outside those basic parameters. So they twist the narrative in their head until it fits that shape, despite Guts and Casca not having anything like a traditional true love romance and Miura saying he only had Casca survive the Eclipse to keep Guts focused on revenge, despite Griffith not being a pure evil villain even after the Eclipse and certainly not before (like Miura’s directly talked about NGriff’s moral ambiguity and the way he’s not a traditional evil antagonist), despite the clearly complicated emotions that still exist between Guts and Griffith/Femto/NGriff, etc.

At my most generous I think part of the reason people choose to believe Griffith was evil all along is because Femto’s defining act is rape and people are uncomfortable seeing any good in a character who eventually becomes a rapist, tho personally the fact that he magically transforms into a demon first kind of mitigates that for me lol. (And, and I’ve ranted about this before but still, it’s also a double standard when so many of the same people go out of their way to excuse Guts when he sexually assaults Casca.)

But still idk it’s weird. Like, eg there’s so much you have to ignore to believe that Guts leaving the Hawks was fine and dandy and a good choice and Griffith was just a dick who overreacted. Pages and pages of Guts fretting about it, Casca yelling it at him, Guts regretting leaving, Guts realizing he was wrong in thinking Griffith looked down on him, Guts comparing abandoning Casca to abandoning Griffith multiple times, Guts determined not to make the same mistake again, etc etc. You can support Guts’ choice and blame Griffith all you want, but the narrative clearly does not, and it’s honestly baffling how ppl can ignore that when it’s not only discussed many times in direct words, but the whole story revolves around the fact that Guts made a mistake when he left.

Like what do you think the Golden Age is about if it’s not about a stupid misunderstanding between 2 dudes who both rly like each other and fail to realize their feelings are reciprocated and overreact and make dumb decisions because of that misunderstanding? I don’t understand what most Berserk fans see, it genuinely feels like we’re reading 2 different stories lol.

yesgabsstuff
replied to your post

“the berserk episode synopses on wikipedia are killing me cut for petty…”

“Everything Griffith does is Evil Plotting because his hair is too shinny uwu.”

assassinating people who tried to assassinate him first? evil

saving lives at great personal risk or sacrifice? evil

catching a girl who almost fell down some stairs? evil

killing a pedophile who’d just spent 90% of his screen time cackling about his nefarious plan to capture him as a sex slave? you better believe that’s evil

the berserk episode synopses on wikipedia are killing me

cut for petty complaining and v basic preaching to the choir


Though he and Guts are still injured from their encounter with Nosferatu
Zodd, Griffith uses it to get closer to the King and his daughter
Charlotte.

like dude griffith is manipulative and good at climbing the ladder but even he didn’t somehow connivingly arrange for charlotte to trip on the stairs or for the king to come by and say kudos. you don’t have to make shit up. also no mention of griffith and guts’ pivotal conversation ofc


Guts uses the sword to kill Boscogn while Griffith kills a wounded Gennon to assure the Hawks’ victory.

written like griffith killing gennon (who wasn’t in fact injured) is a morally ambiguous moment somehow?


Griffith has again used Guts to remove his competition. Guts decides to
leave and tells a pleading Casca that he does not want to be caught up
in Griffith’s dream anymore.

lol i’m honestly amazed at this misrepresentation of guts’ decision. idk i guess i don’t remember the second half of the anime that well, maybe it changed guts’ entire character motivation and i just forgot.


Casca blames Guts for Griffith’s problems, but realizes it is not his fault.

sometimes i forget that the understanding that guts shouldn’t’ve left the hawks in the first place isn’t taken as read by most berserk fans. but lbr ‘a dude made a mistake based on a misunderstanding and ruined everything and casca isn’t entirely right but she ain’t entirely wrong either’ isn’t black and white enough for berserk fans.

like ik ik this is just how berserk fandom is outside this one chunk of tumblr but man, i forget and lull myself into a sense of security and then i stumble across stuff like this and it completely throws me for a loop and i need to whine about it.

kissing-monsters:

bthump:

bthump:

Browsing through the rebirth chapters and it just leaps out at me how utterly sexualized Griffith is, especially in comparison to Casca, who is (at least by Miura’s standards) totally desexualized.

Guts’ internal conflict is essentially desire vs responsibility, ie revenge vs escorting Casca to Elfhelm, ie Griffith vs Casca, and the visual depiction of that conflict is straight up, extremely loud and clear, naked sexy Griffith vs Casca all childlike in a shapeless cloak

Keep reading

yk what I was partly wrong here and over simplifying things

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it’s not that Guts’ desire for revenge is sexualized through Griffith, it’s that Griffith’s sexualization is actually at odds with Guts’ desire to kill him. You can’t rly ignore “the instant I saw him… I’d forgotten my urge to kill.”

Revenge and sexual desire aren’t rly equated yet. Guts wants to kill faceless masked bird boy with great prejudice

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he does not want to kill sexy naked Griffith.

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Now that he’s actually reachable I’m having second thoughts oh no what the fuck.

So when the hound says he’s longing for Griffith and tells him to give him a heap of raw iron, what’s actually going on is less sexualization of revenge, and more… revengalization of sex, yk?

Sexual desire and violent stabby revenge are being equated by the hound to encourage Guts to pursue Griffith. Guts wants to stick something in him all right, and he should still want revenge, so it’s best if that something is a literal sword. As opposed to his desire for revenge becoming sexualized, the inherent sexualization of Guts’ desire for Griffith is what the hound seizes on and twists to lead Guts back to revenge.

Anyway basically Griffith’s desirability is still hardcore contrasted to Casca’s lack thereof, but honestly I think it’s less a metaphor for wanting revenge vs being stuck babysitting and more plain old straightforward gay subtext which is then utilized to give an added layer of complexity to Guts’ desire for revenge (and desire to desire revenge.)

ik this comes across as fake jokey analysis and/or giving the subtext too much weight so I can reach super hard, but tbh idk how to read this part without it. i mean you could just say that Guts fantasizing about Griffith’s pretty hair and ass and forgetting his urge to kill and whining about being stuck with Casca and Griffith abandoning him and the hound’s many innuendos are all unrelated or accidental but

l
b
r

I’d actually love to see a dead serious analysis of this like you’ve done but deliberately disregarding any gay subtext just to see if it could make anywhere near as much compelling sense? I don’t think there’s a way this makes sense without at least some gay subtext– nor does basically the majority of berserk in general, which makes me curious but also scared to branch outside of tumblr for people’s meta on it.

tbh i’m kind of curious too lol. i’ve seen bits and pieces of non gay meta/opinions/etc on brief forays onto reddit and skull knight etc but nothing involving Guts and Griffith’s characters/relationship that I didn’t immediately think of counterpoints to.

and like for a thought experiment i tried wracking my brain to come up with a heterosexual explanation for one of the most homoerotic moments

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and the best I got is that Guts is picturing NeoGriffith like that to serve as a strong contrast to Femto, yk all naked with flowing hair as opposed to the exoskeleton + helmet look.

and it still doesn’t explain why an image meant to convey a sense of humanity is the most sensual image of a person we’ve seen in 176 chapters of Berserk give or take actual sex scenes, and that’s including Griffith’s resurrection (in which he’s described as “the desired”) a few chapters earlier.

like idk at the end of the day I think Berserk does mostly make sense if you assume Guts and Griffith’s feelings for each other are 110% platonic, at least the plot does, but i def think the homoeroticsm adds more depth and richness, plus it’s a simple cohesive explanation for a lot of stuff that is otherwise pointless or weird, from Casca’s jealousy to a bunch of images of Griffith to their intensity-at-first-sight vibe to why Griffith didn’t answer when Guts asked if he was gay, etc etc, and it’s disingenuous to ignore it imo.