What do you think of the way miura handles schierke’s crush on guts? Cause tbh it really creeps me out how the manga seems to take it seriously. Also that scene when schierkes taking a bath/naked and falls on sleeping guts is so…ewww . No wonder there are actual pedos in this fandom 😷

I pretty much hate it all around lol. I don’t think her crush is taken that seriously – Schierke takes it seriously but the narrative mostly plays it for laughs or mild sympathy – but it really irritates me how every female character in Berserk has a crush on Guts, it’s unnecessary and it just plain sucks.

Plus yeah I totally agree that it gets creepy af a few times. Like, I avoid this topic because I don’t want to get into a conversation about the epidemic of normalized pedo pandering in manga and anime and how Berserk plays into it bc I’m just not equipped for it. But I’ll just say that I can think of a few creepy pages in the manga, like the one you mentioned, that are up there at the top of the giant pile of things I hate about Berserk.

honestly im the same i dont have a specific dream finale because i just cant see where the story is going. all i really want is griffith and guts relationship to have an emotional resolution and maybe for them to die together bc im a sucker for my otps doing that and being codependent as hell (imagine them stabbing each other in the chest with their lips only a few breaths apart or guts stabbing griffith while griffith cradles guts head like he did during their first duel tho…fuck)

YES I’m a sucker for this kind of soulmatey hero/villain tragedy that leads to them dying together, I’d love that.

Also I want to see both their swords added to the Hill of Swords. I would cry and it would be beautiful and cathartic.

everytime i try to imagine an ending for berserk i cant come up with anything solid because miura completely subverted the good/evil trope. like you got an antag whos actually the messiah and acting out god and humanitys will/desires while the protag isnt fighting for any greater good but merely for revenge. if guts ends up killing griffith then what the hell happens? does god die too and the wheel of fate get broken? what would exactly constituite a satisfactory ending for this story to you?

Same, this is a real problem for me because I like trying to predict things, but I just can’t with Berserk lol.

I feel like he could swing an ending where somehow the Idea of Evil/Fate in general is like… defeated by humanity, who, thanks to whatever, would now rather struggle in an uncaring universe than blame all their problems on God. But I feel like that’s kind of unlikely because, idk, it just feels a little too big of a metaphysical change and too positive of a take on humanity for Berserk.

Honestly for me if Griffith does something irrational because he (not the damn fetus that’s a red herring as far as I’m concerned) still feels those pesky life-ruining emotions for Guts, and in turn Guts demonstrates his mixed-feelings towards Griffith in a powerful way, I’ll consider myself satisfied. Basically I’m thinking a 3rd duel (assuming Guts’ brand of sacrifice, which removes him a little from fate according to Skull Knight, means he can potentially hurt Griffith) where emotions are at their peak.

I’ve also vaguely considered an ending where Guts lets Griffith stab him, because he has a bad habit of doing that when he’s feeling conflicted about killing someone, or when he’s confronted with something that makes him feel guilty (in this case, the memories of human Griffith and their first two duels). In this scenario Griffith would be shocked because he expected Guts to block or w/e a la that time Casca stabbed him, and maybe have a breakdown beside his corpse.

I have a whole long speculative post here too but I can’t commit myself to one perfect ending lol, there’s so many possibilities. At the end of the day I just want that heavy emotional GutsGriff drama.

do you ever think about how griffith and guts haven’t interacted or even seen each other in like 19 volumes except in the last case for that moment before guts and co sailed to elfhelm and get super sad but also marvel at how the ship is still going strong canon-wise

God I know right? Like they’ve been separated for 20 real world years, aside from one brief meeting and that one meeting-each-other’s-eyes-from-across-a-distance moment and Guts has spent a large chunk of that time trying to forget him, but GriffGuts still feels hugely relevant.

I guess because the readers know they have to meet again (I mean could you imagine the story fizzling out with Guts deciding to retire in Elfhelm while Griffith rules the world lmao? No GriffGuts reunion, no epic climax) and we keep getting these occasional hints from the story that they’re nowhere near finished with each other emotionally, even as their current narratives have nothing to do with each other.

Guts has his temporarily chained inner beast still haunting him and threatening to take over and hunt Griffith down, and every few volumes the subject of Griffith comes back up to make him feel things and periodically remind the reader that it’s not over (the RPG group gossiping about the old Band of the Hawk, Laban asking
after him, meeting apostles and knowing Griff is nearby, witches in
Elfhelm asking after him, etc)

And on Griffith’s end we have that beating heart, and imo every volume of Griffith narrative we get where that’s conspicuously not brought up again and yet implied by the pointed ambiguity of Griffith’s emotional state (gorgeous portrait at the end of Sonia’s chapter on loneliness, serenity contrasting with transformed Ganeshka’s panicked loneliness, letting Rickert slap him, the question of who sent Raksas after him, etc), is just more tension added that will make the moment we do get to learn about Griffith’s emotions extra satisfying.

tbh structurally the way Miura showed Griffith’s pov as his heart was unfreezing, and then for every subsequent part of Griffith’s narrative gave us absolutely no information on his internal emotional state, and human Griffith’s downfall (and the thing that kept being brought up over and over and over and over again during the Golden Age) was his irrationality caused by his feelings for Guts – it just makes me intrinsically feel that we’re heading for something big. It’s a tease for a reason.

i like to think guts rolled his eyes and just fucking disliked the nobles lol guts:”y’all dumb. truly dumb” especially at the ball he was like “pls i don’t want to be here i hate these people lol”

that’s pretty much canon imo. he only went to one noble function and he avoided everyone while he was there. plus he ignored propriety all the time, like trying to walk in on Griffith while noblemen were visiting him in the hospital, only kneeling for the king when Griffith told him to, and angrily “hey pal”ing the king’s brother when he slapped Griffith lol.

oh also one of my favourite moments at Farnese’s family’s ball:

cue farnese saying, “wait a minute please, all my family are here in this place.”

lmao

idk why but i like when guts kinda doesn’t speak proper like instead of you all he says y’all or ain’t or he just shrugs his shoulders as a response i love it i love him

Yeah tbh I really like his speech patterns/voice in the official translation. idk if he’s ever said y’all specifically in the official version (definitely ain’t tho), but the translator did a gr8 job with character voices.

I saw a white hawk guts theory going around i just started laughing. cus Guts in white is pretty baffling to me but i think he’ll look nice and if he turned out to be the true hawk of light, he would legit refuse cus he don’t want people bowing down to him and all that mumbo jumbo he would tell the people to live your life as much as you can and expecting people to solve your problems.

yeah i’ve seen variations on that theory before and i def don’t buy it. i’ve always figured neogriffith is simultaneously the hawk of darkness and the hawk of light. revealing that guts is the real hawk of light and turning it into a darkness vs light thing sounds way too simplistic for berserk lol.

i think the only thing i like about the sea god arc is guts himself cus he looks a lot handsomer in this arc plus we get to see his astral body in the berserker armor a lot more which is dope cus it’s looks like werewolf motif. but other than that the sea god arc drags on and honestly i got kinda bored reading it but i read time to time but not much

but i see you are almost to gut’s flashback chapters which i love- this
showed that despite all the shit guts went through, he still has a kind
heart, especially towards kids(as we see with isdoro,rickert,erica,jill
and schierke). The art is very good and very nice to look at. all in all
this arc is short but i think adds a little bit more to guts as a
character. idk i just love it

re: the sea god stuff, yeah that’s fair, i’m not into guts myself but i can see the appeal, esp with that streak of white in his hair lol. and I do love the astral plane werewolf look.

and yesss honestly i’ve never wanted to hug a character more than teenage guts when he was determined to save that damn flower, omg.

my bro gave me a weird but somewhat intriguing concept: the godhand gives Griffith a choice to sacrifice…but he gets to choose two persons closes to him to be his “apostle companions” he of course chose guts and casca and they get a transformation(painful mind you) and they become apostles but they are more powerful than regular apostles?? idk he just gave that concept and honestly it sounds awesome guts with a dog/wolf form and casca prolly a lioness/or cheetah with incredible speed

AU where everyone joins the dark side and takes over the world, lol. this reminds me of rosine trying to turn jill into an extra powerful “elf” a little.

well that’s the point farnese is terrible at advice so in turn roderick keeps messing up. it takes serpico to actually tell him some genuine advice and he actually success one time and then the relationship blossoms from there :)

lmao @ farnese and serpico matchmaking, with serpico basically running after farnese with a fire extinguisher. metaphorically.

omg a cute au where roderick is crushing hard on guts and he goes to farnese for advice. he tries to follow it but he messes up cus guts is so pretty and handsome. guts knows about it but he acts like he don’t

one last thing since i keep blowing up your messages: farnese goes to
take a bath and sees casca washing herself and sees her “assets”.
farnese is like red since she is blushing so hard and is internally
screaming. casca notices her and asks her can she scrub her back for
her. farnese is like “oh god yes” but she corrects her self and agrees
to do it. she spends the rest of the bath looking at casca’s beautiful
figure

1. lol I think Farnese would be terrible at relationship advice, but yk that could make for some gr8 comedy.

2. well considering how much bath related fanservice there is already between them in canon it would be criminal not to include some in the Black Swordswoman AU or whatever we’re calling it, so good.

Here’s a happy though: Casca acting like a legit big sister to Farnese, teaching Farnese how to use a dagger and a sword, not even waiting to go get her back after Farnese gets them a boat, putting Roderick through the wringer because no random sailor is gonna get her girl so easily.

Omg I want this so much you have no idea. Give or take the sisterly part, lol, but man regardless of the potential romance or not, the idea of Casca being a mentor to budding warrior Farnese is so so good. Imagine them sparring together, Farnese absolutely determined to disarm Casca eventually, like, yes. And lmao at her giving Roderick hell and low-key tormenting him for being Farnese’s fiancee. She would, and i love it.

ohhh noooo i got another sad thought: isdoro talking about why he wanted to become a swordsman and he said cus of the band of the hawks raiders captain was wicked strong and he wondered if he’s still out there somewhere. casca looks in Guts direction whiles he’s with serpico and they are looking at bugs and giggling to himself. she says “yeah..i wonder too..” idk it makes sense in my head but i hope i worded it correctly

Yeah it makes sense. 😦 Though now that you mentioned Isidro I think Casca would definitely be a better influence than Guts for him. She’d teach him to not be a little shit asap.

yeah casca would be fucking ripped as fuck son like farnese would be wiping her forehead like “oh she’s giving me the vapors” damn i’m getting the vapors just thinking about it

and in that moment we were all farnese

omg Serpico taking care of infantile!Guts sounds interesting: he helps with his clothes, washes him, and helps him go to bed (Guts has nightmares and hates being alone when he sleeps) Guts has a decent relationship with the rest of Casca’s party but he really clings to serpico the most

oh god i’m thinking of when casca was forced to travel with guts when
she lost his trust: him screaming and crying no like some scared child,
casca having to bind his hands in rope to get him to move, guts trying
to escape and failing each time. when casca’s party is formed, he mostly
stayed by serpico side. anytime casca got near him, he would hide
behind serpico and say no or just flat out growl at her

i really really love the thought of Guts and Serpico being this version’s Casca and Farnese. but everything else u said gets a sad
awww 😦

(tho there’s a silver lining: if Casca can drag Guts along imagine how buff she got fighting monsters for 2 years.)

but if i was to do black swordsman casca, i would take out “that scene”(the one where she got bit on the tat) and just replace it with casca choking the living hell out of guts to the point where his eyes rolls to the back of head(damn i’m cruel) but she breaks out of it and sees the consequences of her actions. Guts runs away and casca has to detain him but it’s a bit difficult cus of his size. he tries biting kicking the works sometimes she has to knock him out sigh

Plus Blackswordsman! Casca can develop with the female cast (farnese and
schierke) since she really didn’t have any female friends (hell she
talked to princess Charlotte once during the golden age arc) and i would
like to see her interact with females tbh. Farnese seeing casca as a
guide of sorts and scheirke as a mother figure.

i kinda have several hc about infantile!Guts but i’ll keep it simple: he
can say a few words but they are pretty simple but he mostly just nods
or shakes his head. he’s very shy around people but if you are kind to
him, he’ll be near you. he likes to stare at things alot and can get
distracted pretty easily(god forbid you go to a field full of
butterflies or he sees a dog) but old guts is still in there somewhere
but it’s really rare

God, yes, esp to the second part (tho anything that gets rid of the attempted rape is good in my book, and ngl it is really easy to see Casca lashing out violently while in a dark place. Which is one of the reasons I love her. More fucked up female characters for all). And god anything with Casca interacting with more women is Good Shit. She might be less inclined than Guts was to let Schierke take the reins during the troll fiasco, but I think she’d respect and appreciate her abilities, and when the Berserker armour started taking over she’d probably have a similar relationship to her as Guts did (though let’s say without the unnecessary crush)

Farnese on the other hand would totally still have a hero-worshippy crush on her.

(also ok pardon my gayness but now i’m thinking of that scene where farnese was possessed and getting intimate with guts’ sword, but with casca instead, and whoa. And also that whole thing with Slan. Oh man so many opportunities for fucked up f/f scenes.)

And yeah, solid, kinda depressing (but that’s the point) Guts headcanons, especially since now I’m just imagining good old fashioned fantasy mental torture as the source. Also consider: Griffith saving him from falling rocks, and repressing some subtle disturbed feelings at what he’s reduced him to.

What do you think of the fact guts and casca originally weren’t supposed to be together (and as such casca wasn’t supposed to be important to the story) and miura only did it to make the eclipse more dramatic for guts? Imo it really speaks of the sexist nature of miura’s writing (i know he got better recently but still) and g*tsca.

Strong agree. Like I’ve said a few times that if Casca wakes up and does something really important plot-wise in reaction to her trauma that has to happen at this point in the story it would at least help a little to justify Casca’s 20 year long non-existence, but Miura’s comments make it so clear to me that he had no real long game for her in mind, and it wouldn’t change that fact. Like, like Guts, he shoved her into a cave for two years to keep her out of the way until he needed a damsel in distress and then a handy reason for Guts to try conquering his rage.

She really is like a walking plot device and it seems so obvious that it’s entirely because he didn’t know how to include her as a character in the plot so he just got rid of her character for a while in a really shitty way.

When it comes to G*tsca like… I mean technically I guess I prefer the tentative, two people giving something a shot vibe to say, a planned out epic romance, but the fact that it was just to give Guts more manpain is so, so gross. On the one hand at least there’s a silver lining there in the fact that Miura did not plan G*tsca as a true love happy ending thing from the start, which hopefully makes it less likely to happen, but on the other hand if it does turn into a romance again, then extra ew.

Especially since like, if he’s making it up as he goes along, the idea of Miura writing their “relationship” the way he did throughout the last 3 arcs and then deciding romance is the way to go from there is… horrifying lmao.

But whatever I’m clinging to “your wishes may not be her wishes” like a life raft rn.

whenever i think of berserk au of casca being the blackswordsman, it goes into really deep sad territory :( Guts being like how casca is now is really a sad thought buuut also casca in berserker armor tho sooo it’s sad but it has so many possibilities

yk I’ve never really thought about this but goddamn I love the concept of Black Swordsman Casca. All that worship and love and admiration turned into rage and bitterness. Plus Casca with an eyepatch and canon arm would be fucking amazing. Though unlike Guts whose dog motif worked well with the Berserker armour idk if Casca’s sword thing would translate as well. Though you could go the route of the armour turning her into a walking weapon… plz share your ideas here if you have more, I have no creativity lol.

(I’m less into the concept of infantile Guts but hey like… maybe Femto killed him. Or he reacts in a less godawfully stupid way to trauma. I’ll gladly take the opportunity to undo some of Miura’s bad decisions here. Although the thought of Casca abandoning him in a cave for two years while she rampages around is kind of great.)

so i’ve seen a lot of people theorize that void sacrificed skull knight to become god hand which may explain why skull knight seem to have it with him in particular/why void appeared as a god hand right after gaiseric’s reign fell. well then since you can only sacrifice someone that you love so much they’re like half of your soul + considering there seem to be some parallels with guts and griffith here does this mean that void/skull knight is #real

if the theory is true then absolutely

look u can cut the ust with a knife. or reality-shattering sword, if u have one.

(which also means void’s giant external brain is a blatant diss and way of saying “i’m over u” since gaiseric’s thing was a skull js)