Tag: b

prettykitten123
replied to your post “(½)Was thinking in a canon au if Griff and Guts actually did confess…”

This was the best lol. You’ve just made an outline to a high quality fanfiction my friend. I do like the idea of Griffith overcompensating and ends up causing a setback for the Hawks and himself. I feel like even when they do become a couple things would still be a bit awkward but in a cute way, this is their first relationship.

lol ty, feel free to steal it (this goes for anyone haha).

well i mean tbf it’s anon’s idea anyway so maybe i shouldn’t say that. Anon, you should write it!

and yeah ia. cute awkwardness would fit them really well. they’re both disasters but yk that doesn’t necessarily have to mean life-ruining, it could be cute too in an au.

(1/2)Was thinking in a canon au if Griff and Guts actually did confess to each other or accidentally find out about each other’s feelings(which is more likely) they would end up becoming sooo awkward around each other, they wouldn’t really know what to do or act around each other for A while. And everyone in the band of hawks are gonna wonder why they’re acting weird around each other or not hanging out with each other as often as usual. Casca would be the only one to know what’s going on.

(2/2) I actually see Casca being the one giving them the helpful push
they need since those two idiots won’t do it themselves. Like she would
be hurt and upset at first but being that she loves Griffith and always
puts his happiness and desires before her own and plus she cares about
his mental health, she would do what she’s to do to help him get what he
wants. In this case getting Guts to break the ice with Griffith. 

Ooh I could really easily see this tbh.

I mean like, think of say an AU where Guts never heard the Promrose Hall speech, but still ended up falling off a cliff with Casca and asking her what her deal is. Casca tells him the same story, complete with talking about how jealous she is of him and it’s almost as if… as if…

except without the memory of the speech getting in the way Guts actually gets it.

And then awkwardness ensues for a while and Griffith is maybe hurt by Guts’ sudden shift in attitude (maybe Guts is avoiding him bc he’s trying to sort his own feelings out) and now that Casca and Guts have bonded a little she gets pissed off at him for accidentally acting like a dick and they talk and Guts has a revelation during their conversation. Or something. Yk, a mild version of what she tells him in canon, without the stabbing.

Or maybe for a somewhat angstier, more drawn out version, Guts and Griffith end up making out at some point for whatever reason (impulsive thank god you’re alive kiss, drunk, intimate late night talk and it just happens, whatever) but afterwards Griffith freaks out because he has a life plan and his life plan doesn’t include falling in love with Guts but if he acknowledges his attraction to him he can’t deny the rest of his feelings anymore and the sudden realization of how intense his feelings are throws him for a loop and he tells Guts it was a mistake, he has a princess to seduce and a kingdom to attain, yadda yadda yadda.

And then Griffith overcompensates. Takes a stupid irrational risk(s) to win the war/achieve the dream. Maybe it works out, maybe it’s a setback, maybe plot things ensue. Things are weird and awkward between him and Guts and everyone can see it, some of them connect the dots between that and how Griffith’s been acting lately, and finally Casca’s like, okay what the fuck, if someone doesn’t fix this we’re all screwed, and rolls up her sleeves.

lol idk why I’m throwing plot outlines out in response to this ask lol, but idk it’s a good concept that feels like something that would happen in canon, feels good feels organic.

I mean in canon Casca’s role veers from griffguts commentator/attempted facilitator to emotional/physical bridge between them, and l b r here the former role is by far kinder and less horrible to her. Let her do her perceptive thing and help them get together, and then she maintain good platonic friendships with them, grow on her own, then get a girlfriend.

win/win.

also ngl I love the trope where everyone in the immediate circle can see something’s going on between the awkward not-couple. which is another thing berserk has in canon to an extent and another reason I love it and this scenario works so well lol.

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i know i’ve talked about this before lol but i s2g every time i remember this moment i’m even more taken aback by how fucking… jaw-droppingly suggestive it is

judeau, the dude whose sole goal in the latter half of the golden age is getting guts and casca together, telling rickert to shut up about how much griffith loves guts right before he overtly shoves guts at casca, starting on the very next page when judeau changes the subject to her leadership

like there is absolutely no reason for that panel to be there; rickert could’ve stopped talking of his own volition, guts could’ve had his moment, and the subject could’ve naturally changed to casca. you could remove it and change nothing else and everyone still makes sense in this scene, the dialogue still works, etc etc.

what it tells us is that judeau is being manipulative here, that he has an agenda in hooking guts and casca up (not that that’s subtle), and, the actual hugely interesting part, it means judeau has to avoid conversation about griffith’s feelings so guts and casca will get together – ie
guts and casca can only connect in the absence of griffith.

this is followed through of course when they both brood over him afterwards, and in how their sex scene is framed as a rebound for both of them through parallels to significant moments they each had with griffith, and in how their relationship such as it it starts to fall apart when they rescue griffith and eventually come to accept that he needs to be taken care of, and in how post-eclipse guts abandons her to pursue femto/griffith for 2-3 years, and in how he’s able to stick with casca after ngriff “deserts” him, and how he’s “come this far by letting go of his obsession with him,” etc etc

and mb even more interestingly, it also means that they can only connect when guts falsely believes griffith doesn’t feel strong irrational life-destroying feelings for him. hence judeau telling rickert to shut up while rickert is telling guts a game-changing truth. guts knowing how griffith feels about him is incompatible with his relationship with casca.

hence guts denying any feelings of guilt and regret when casca stabs him and putting it out of his mind when they fuck, until those feelings start creeping back during the rescue mission

AND hence guts moping and walking away with casca in tow when neogriffith flies off on zodd after telling guts he’s “free” from his feelings for him – only finally choosing to stay with her instead of pursuing revenge after ngriff deserts him.

so once again it comes back to this question:

what happens if guts finds out neogriffith’s heart isn’t frozen after all?

mastermistressofdesire
replied to your post “please extrapolate on griffith being a sub and why lmao?”

@marley-manson Yeah I mean the whole reversal of expected personality dynamics in bed is kind of a thing I feel for. And also though Griffith wields a lot of power over people his attitude towards it is very functional like he’s chill with it because it gets the job done. It’s very much a part of his professional commitment. So I wouldn’t think he’d carry over with that in private times?

I’m too lazy to c/p everything you said rn but yeah I get what you’re saying and totally agree. Like, I don’t think it’s always the case that people who are assertive and/or wield power in day to day life want to submit in relationships lol, but for some people it is and Griffith just reads like one of them to me. And yeah love that role reversal.

and like ngl I’m kind of the exact opposite which is probably partly why I’m into the role reversal thing in fiction, like I’m generally super easy going and chill and have zero desire for responsibility in day to day life, but I like to be in control in bed, so. it’s def a thing sometimes lol.

the plot of berserk was based on sonnet 26

Lord of my love, to whom in vassalage
Thy merit hath my duty strongly knit,
To thee I send this written ambassage,
To witness duty, not to show my wit.
Duty so great, which wit so poor as mine
May make seem bare, in wanting words to show it,
But that I hope some good conceit of thine
In thy soul’s thought, all naked, will bestow it:
Till whatsoever star that guides my moving,
Points on me graciously with fair aspect,
And puts apparel on my tattered loving,
To show me worthy of thy sweet respect:
  Then may I dare to boast how I do love thee,
  Till then not show my head where thou may’st prove me.

prettykitten123
replied to your post “Is Berserk still doing the ‘the power of friendship’ theme? I stopped…”

@bthump I feel like the Berserk from the 90s and the Berserk now are two different stories. Idk maybe Miura is doing this because the ‘power of friendship’ theme is so popular in anime but that’s usually a trope found in shounen not really seinen comics. But Idk maybe he is just doing this just so he could rip our hearts open again like before or maybe he doesn’t berserk to be as dark as it used to.

Yeah who knows, like it’s definitely way lighter now. It’s still violent ofc, but the violence is so much less personal, the characters are much healthier, etc.

I guess I think we’re probably not going to stay this light forever, there’s been plenty of ominous foreshadowing and I’ve been saying for ages that Guts needs to go full Beast of Darkness for a while or everything w/ the armour and his evil alter ego is pointless, plus I think Elfhelm is going to end up being sinister and not Guts’ allies, but I don’t think we’re ever going to go back to Lost Children or Black Swordsman arcs style dark. After 200 chapters of Guts internalizing some life lessons and chilling out I’m sure that’s not going to be just wiped away.

Also while I’m responding to replies I might as well hit a couple more of your replies on other topics

I really hope the
final battle between them would be a mixture of both, an epic battle
filled to the brim with intense emotions and tension. In all honesty I
dont want either of them to die but Idk I feel like one of them would
die. Im inclined to say Griffith would probably but a part of me feels
like Miura might throw a curve ball and kill Guts.

Yeah I could see either Guts or Griffith dying, or both. tbh what I hope is that if there is an epic guts v griff battle the actual volume long fight scene or w/e lol goes to Guts vs Zodd, and maybe whatever allies Guts has vs apostles and stuff, and after the dust settles we get the intimate and emotional griffguts confrontation.

Idk I feel like Guts vs Griffith being an epic physical battle would be distracting and kind of out of place. Gimme a 3rd duel with like, one strike a la the 2nd duel, that is entirely predicated on their emotions.

I have a thought, if eclipse never
happened and Griffith became king and entered a secret relationship with
Guts. I wonder how long it would take for Charlotte to start to notice.
I feel like everyone else would have a feeling but Charolette since she
lives in her own dream world when it comes to Griffith.

lol yeah I could definitely see Charlotte being the last to know. Esp bc I don’t think Guts and Griffith would be all that great at hiding it lol. Oh well she can eventually find out, be miserable for a while, and then start her own affair with Anna.

Is Berserk still doing the ‘the power of friendship’ theme? I stopped reading around the Falconia Arc. Its like, I like that Guts has friends again and everything isnt so hopeless anymore but this is Berserk. As much as I love the characters, and a part of me doesnt want anything bad to happen to them, I’m still waiting for something fucked up to happen.

chaoticgaygriffith:

bthump:

Some mild spoilers below fyi, but short answer, yes imo, and ngl I hope something fucked up happens lol. I also like the characters but Guts’ story has been too happy recently with super low stakes and it’s been so boring to me.

But yeah it’s been leaning pretty heavy on ppl saying that the rpg group’s journey together has been gr8 and worthwhile etc pretty recently and yeah I’d call it like the central ~thing~ going on rn lol. Schierke and Farnese putting Casca back together and using symbols of all their friends/relationships/histories etc as weapons in Casca’s mind, Farnese saying she thinks she can help Casca get over her trauma bc they bonded over the course of their journey, and Guts talking to Serpico and Roderick about how grateful he is that they’re with him, that kinda thing.

The real question is whether it’s talking the friendships up so the audience will be extra sad when tragedy ruins everything, or whether it’s set up for narrowly averted tragedy through the power of friendship. Or, what I think is probably most likely, some tragedy but also friendship saving everything from being completely horrible.

I like the friendship thing as long as it’s gay … Like, Farnese and Casca being each other’s support? I love it, please, more. Guts and Serpico bonding a little bit? Delicious. But all of them being like this big polyamorous yet platonic family who can get through anything with the power of friendship is just so … yawn ………….. I’m sorry I just really hate those kinds of themes and find them mind-numbingly boring

Oh yeah same, sometimes it’s the main highlight of the guts narrative lol, like serpico going from trying to kill guts again to jumping in front of a monster for him in one night, and everything farneseca ofc.

But like, what it kind of signifies for Guts’ arc is letting go of his ~obsession with griffith~ lol and if Miura’s pitting one thing against the other, friendship vs that obsession, man I’ll happily throw those friendships under the bus lol.

Also if g*tsca goes hand in hand with the rest of the rpg group bonding, which is not definite (could even be the opposite, ie his friendships are the only thing that prevents him from going super dark again if everything w/ casca goes south) but it’s something I worry about lol. It’s like you have revenge obsessed fucked up black swordsman guts on one side and chilled out family man protector-of-the-branded-girl guts on the other, and lbr I know what I’m about.

Now if there was some way to preserve those relationships to an extent, but darken them, and bury g*tsca while keeping some kind of farnesca, and have guts backslide back to obsession at least for a while… like give me everything miura, i’m greedy!

Is Berserk still doing the ‘the power of friendship’ theme? I stopped reading around the Falconia Arc. Its like, I like that Guts has friends again and everything isnt so hopeless anymore but this is Berserk. As much as I love the characters, and a part of me doesnt want anything bad to happen to them, I’m still waiting for something fucked up to happen.

Some mild spoilers below fyi, but short answer, yes imo, and ngl I hope something fucked up happens lol. I also like the characters but Guts’ story has been too happy recently with super low stakes and it’s been so boring to me.

But yeah it’s been leaning pretty heavy on ppl saying that the rpg group’s journey together has been gr8 and worthwhile etc pretty recently and yeah I’d call it like the central ~thing~ going on rn lol. Schierke and Farnese putting Casca back together and using symbols of all their friends/relationships/histories etc as weapons in Casca’s mind, Farnese saying she thinks she can help Casca get over her trauma bc they bonded over the course of their journey, and Guts talking to Serpico and Roderick about how grateful he is that they’re with him, that kinda thing.

The real question is whether it’s talking the friendships up so the audience will be extra sad when tragedy ruins everything, or whether it’s set up for narrowly averted tragedy through the power of friendship. Or, what I think is probably most likely, some tragedy but also friendship saving everything from being completely horrible.

When I first killed a man, I was still a kid who didn’t know right from left. I haven’t learned anything off the battlefield since then – and I haven’t tried to learn. Killing to survive… there was nothing else I could do. That was everything.

But… it was all right. If one person… anyone… had looked my way…

But wandering the battlefields made me realize… that wouldn’t do me any good in tryin’ to survive. It was just somethin’ of a childish complaint.

Even so… incidentally… I found someone I really wanted… to have look at me.

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freewilllife:

bthump:

ninjabelle:

bthump:

strangemonochromes:

Berserk (ベルセルク) // Kentaro Miura

ok anime aside, anyone know if there’s any proof that these are guts’ thoughts, like in the original japanese wording or smthn? because they read so griffith to me in phrasing, and also if these are guts’ lines then it kills a lot of my sympathy for him lol.

like kinda turns it from guts leaving without a word bc he didn’t think griffith would care, to guts leaving without a word despite knowing he was causing some amount of emotional damage, bc he’s thinking w/e griffith will get over it. like, surprise dude, he did not get over it. or, to be more cutting, he did in fact eventually stand up and start walking, and that was a bad time for everyone.

(on the other hand if i was adapting this and if it is genuinely ambiguous, i’d rly want to have both vas say these lines lol. i mean maybe it’s not completely a bad thing for guts to not be super sympathetic in his choice to leave. understandable, yes, but a mistake is a mistake and if guts gets these lines that’s just kind of underscoring it.)

honestly I never even doubted that these were 100% guts’ words, I mean now that you’re bringing it up I guess maybe they could be griffith’s (the like stumbling on a rock, a small thing part aka him lying to himself about how much it impacts him) but that makes zero sense to me considering in this very moment he’s just sitting there utterly defeated (like… even more so mentally than physically) so him internally monologuing this deeply feels really out of place. (i always considered him so completely shocked there everything else was just static to him. like he hears no sounds. doesn’t even feel the cold. can’t think. it’s just guts walking further and further away booooo) but you’re right about it killing a bit of the guts sympathy tho because yeah, why leave at all if you’re aware you’re already important enough to cause griff at least SOME form of pain. I mean isn’t that what he wanted all along like why willingly walk away if you’re semi-aware you already mean enough to someone to cause them a minor breakdown. (lol understatement of the century but then again guts at this point knew nothing of the true depth of griff’s feelings)

and this brings up another issue, if these are guts thoughts, and we then assume he was aware he was at least ‘a rock on griff’s road’ yet still left, can we then also safely assume that whatever he was aware of that griff felt for him, was not enough for him, like this whole scene always read to me as guts leaving because he wanted MORE (like yeah i know that’s the whole plot but hear me out) and steeling his resolve to go by winning back his freedom because his eventual return as griffith’s equal would magically undo the hurt and anger griff might’ve felt over guts breaking from his hold. like he had to at the very least know damn well that griffith valued him greatly as a captain and treated him different than the rest of the band, casca deadass tells him that and the only thing that stands in the way of him accepting it personally is his inferiority complex or whatever you wanna call it.

I know guts is a self-unaware idiot esp. in the golden age but cmon dude, he saw the way griff was sitting there stunned before him after that strike, he saw how he was completely shocked he’d lost the duel and thus his hold on guts. take into consideration guts’ own represses feelings for griff and you can imagine his heart must’ve ached at seeing griff so completely shook up.

BUT HE STILL WALKS OFF, monologues the above complete bs of an excuse to himself to justify why it is somehow okay for him to leave and become worthy of being griffith’s equal (that in any case, he already more than was but hnngg berserk is not a happy love story unfortunately)

Its actually good if that kills some of the sympathy because yes this is what inevitably kicked off all events that led to the eclipse and yes it was partly guts fault and YES he should feel very fuckin sorry.

and since the whole plot of berserk is in essence based on the weight of choice and how much of it is really your own or set in stone by fate this is a really good example of a really realllly reallllllly bad one with unimaginable consequences.

tldr; those have to be guts’ lines and yes its cool if you resent him alil for them lmao because this page is the arguably the worst moment in the entire manga cause it kicks off the end of all good things era.

It’s funny bc I just assumed they were Griffith’s words when I read it, since I didn’t remember the scene in the anime at all at the time, and imo it feels like something Griffith would think. Tho I do get your point about Griffith being beyond internally monologuing to himself, and idk I’m kind of torn… like I don’t rly disagree, he is absolutely emotionally fucked here lol, but the way I see Griffith, if there’s anything that would be running through his head at this moment it would be, “it’s fine it’s nbd idc at all it’s nothing” all the while kneeling frozen in the snow while the rest of the hawks there shuffle their feet and glance at each other awkwardly.

But I’m like, all about Griffith denying his feelings to himself so it’s an aspect of his character I mmmmay exaggerate a bit lmao.

But yeah wrt it being from Guts’ pov, I agree with everything you said, and like… yeah it rly does work. tbh I don’t think you’re wrong about anything there, there’s a lot of evidence that Guts at least knows Griffith has strong feelings for him and was devastated when he walked away. But omg I just… can’t handle that lmao.

Like, I need to see Guts as completely blinded by his inadequacy issues because otherwise I feel actual anger towards him and honestly I almost never get angry at fictional characters, I’m generally way more detached than that, so this is a very weird feeling lmao.

Like, it really does shift my attitude towards Guts leaving from seeing it as a
very innocent mistake since he never in a million years believed leaving would genuinely hurt griffith, to really actually
assigning him some serious blame bc he knew it would hurt griffith and
the only mistake there was miscalculating how much.

And like, that’s not just low self esteem, that’s callousness, and it’s callousness that resulted in my fave being tortured for a year and then deciding to become a monster so like, i guess that’s probably why it pisses me off lol. fuck you guts.

So tbh I still want to cling to things like Guts’ complete lack of understanding and denial when he comes back, during Casca’s tirade and his chat with Rickert, and in the tunnels on the way to rescue Griffith, etc, as evidence that Guts’ mistake was being genuinely blind to Griffith’s feelings towards him no matter how obvious they are bc of his low self esteem and inadequacy issues, rather than like, knowing Griffith cared to an extent but miscalculating how easily he’d get over it. And like, “this says to me I’m still worth spillin blood over in your eyes,” also kind of makes me hope that he thought Griffith only gaf about him as a soldier.

idk it’s a lot more palatable to me as another mistake in a big pile of golden age mistakes that no one can really be blamed for because they all have serious issues fucking them and their relationships up, alongside things like griffith failing to recognize his feelings and making his speech to charlotte, and casca running to grab griffith to stop guts from leaving, and both of them choosing to fight rather than talk, etc. And idk maybe if I was unbiased it would still feel like another one of those mistakes bc it’s not like Guts’ issues aren’t contributing lol, but idk it feels like Guts walking away goes above and beyond.

And agggh yeah like that moment is given an above and beyond treatment in Guts’ memories and related guilt issues, so that’s still perfectly reasonable… lmao it feels weird to be the one wanting to defend Guts when I was just saying that narratively everything is his fault and tbh I always feel like most of the fandom lets him off the hook way too much lol.

tl;dr I think you’re most likely right but that makes me feel negative feelings :((( and yeah ok those negative feelings fit the story but still :(((

What if Guts just meant that Griffith would survive the humiliation that he has lost or to be more precisisely lost a very strong soldier?

@chaoticgaygriffith said:
I’m on the “definitely assumed they were Guts’ words” train, and that’s
why I was so frustrated with him lol and wanted to see way more guilt
from him. But I think he thought the damage would be more like, you
know, Griffith losing a good soldier, instead of losing the man he loves
& the only person he can be vulnerable with. Let me check the
original Japanese though, just in case! 

(I’m combining these responses to avoid reblogging the same long post twice in a row lol.)

but yeah lol this… really makes a lot of sense and idk I think I’m blinded by feelings here bc I can’t believe I didn’t think of looking at it like this lmao.

tho now that you’ve suggested it i’m suddenly missing all the angst and guilt involved in @ninjabelle‘s interpretation l q l

tbh
i think i could go either way depending if i’m in the mood for angst or
if i want to feel sympathy for everyone lol, guts either walking away
thinking griffith will get over losing a fight and a soldier vs guts
walking away knowing griffith cares somewhat on a personal level but
thinking of that as just more evidence that he needs to leave because
those feelings mean he’s the guy who can eventually become his
friend/equal.

do you know by any chance miura‘s opinion on griffguts?

I have heard on the grapevine that he’s been asked about it once or twice in interviews and does the typical ~men can have passionate relationships without it being sexual~ thing but I’ve never seen it first hand. (Well I guess I never will since it will always go through a translator first, but yk what I mean. Never seen more than a paraphrase.)

But also like, that doesn’t affect my reading at all lol. He clearly added intentional subtext, which is like, demonstrated when the characters themselves comment on it lol, and if he genuinely intended me to read them as two dudes who don’t want to fuck each other then he missed his target by so much that the dart somehow hit the wall behind him.

guts biting Griffith’s sword was a gay metaphor and then him breaking Griffith’s sword was another gay metaphor for guts “rejection” – or the perceived rejection from Griffith’s side

yeah i’ll def cosign this lol

i mean the sword blowjob was the farthest thing from subtle and while i think the second duel’s sword-breaking is largely about like… powerlessness moreso than clear sexual connotations like the first duel, it’s powerlessness in the face of griffith’s emotions for guts and his rejection by him, “how long ago did someone I was supposed to have in hand instead gain such a strong hold on me,” etc, so yeah. Totally a gay metaphor for griffith’s perceived rejection by guts.

(also i think you could argue that there are still some sexual connotations in the 2nd duel, it just feels like a little more of a stretch than w/ the hugely blatant first duel lol. but i mean, berserk equating wounds to sex not long after, guts breaking griffith’s sword before it hits him and then not even touching griffith with his own sword, right over top the scratch markes he gave himself which he traces after fucking charlotte later… lmfao fuck freudian imagery is such a fun rabbit hole, someone stop me.)

madchen
replied to your post “guts and griffith’s hetero relationships during the golden age are…”

i need to write or say something more about how casca is always the symbol/connection between guts and griffith (bc she is a woman etc) bc i feel like its generally ignored and dismissed for bad men do bad things or whatever.

lmao one time i wrote 5k words on this topic and i still feel like it only scratched the surface, like it seriously feels like every single moment of casca’s screen time that involves romantic feelings is suggestive of this. and you should def write something about it if u feel inspired because I want to know other ppl’s opinions, it really is one of those things that isn’t really talked about much. maybe because it gets so fucked up and it’s so unfair to casca and lbr it’s a fairly depressing and dark subject.

plus yk it kinda kills the central het ship

madchen
replied to your post “though actually while i’m on this subject, I do kind of have a big…”

i think berserk is walking that “revenge will destroy you” route and im not against a kind of emotional catharsis here but that would ideally be between guts and griffith and like that kind of reconciliation (given thats the angle were taking here) would leave an awful taste in my mouth bc of the eclipse rape lol.

tbh this is why i hope berserk isn’t so much going for a ‘revenge is bad and futile’ thing as it’s going for a ‘guts getting revenge in this particular case is bad and futile because it’s not his right to get revenge for the eclipse and also he wants revenge for the wrong reasons, ie bc it’s an easy outlet for his very complex feelings, but casca’s the hawk representative who never abandoned the band and also the person who suffered most so she’s the one who should get revenge.’

kind of suggested in part here at least:

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and yea youre right about the
railroading thing ughhgh that really gets me (im a broken record but it
reminds me of vriska and like that shit gets me). it feels pretty hallow
when you have to acknowledge this in the context of the whole story
especially bc griffiths helplessness to the waters of fate and destiny
isnt emphasized as overtly tragic as it really is. which is a valid
storytelling choice ic it just, again, gets me.
also femto is the consequence of guts actions and its clearly framed that way idk what people get out of insisting otherwise.

yeah i feel you, griffith’s narrative is so sad to me, but a lot of what’s tragic about it isn’t in your face.

and yeah it’s like, you can say guts didn’t deserve to experience the eclipse, which is obviously true bc v few people deserve that shit, and def not for making a mistake based on low self esteem lol, but narratively it’s the consequence of his actions bc berserk is a very dark story. guts is the main character who actively made a choice which set all the tragedy dominos falling. it’s even ironically fitting – his choice to “abandon” the hawks and griffith resulted in losing everyone permanently.

like i think ppl equate saying the eclipse/femto/griffith’s breakdown/etc is a consequence of guts’ actions to saying either a) guts deserved to suffer and/or b) if this happened in real life it would be right to blame guts for everything lol, neither of which are statements that necessarily follow the first one, and are clearly untrue. but fiction operates by different rules than reality.

strangemonochromes:

Berserk (ベルセルク) // Kentaro Miura

ok anime aside, anyone know if there’s any proof that these are guts’ thoughts, like in the original japanese wording or smthn? because they read so griffith to me in phrasing, and also if these are guts’ lines then it kills a lot of my sympathy for him lol.

like kinda turns it from guts leaving without a word bc he didn’t think griffith would care, to guts leaving without a word despite knowing he was causing some amount of emotional damage, bc he’s thinking w/e griffith will get over it. like, surprise dude, he did not get over it. or, to be more cutting, he did in fact eventually stand up and start walking, and that was a bad time for everyone.

(on the other hand if i was adapting this and if it is genuinely ambiguous, i’d rly want to have both vas say these lines lol. i mean maybe it’s not completely a bad thing for guts to not be super sympathetic in his choice to leave. understandable, yes, but a mistake is a mistake and if guts gets these lines that’s just kind of underscoring it.)

madchen
replied to your post “aight… hopefully ill stop bugging you after this but like in any…”

omg i love all this ive been busy tonight w work and i have to get up early so ill respond better tomorrow but the war lord/captive role play is so true and good and the added touch of it contradicting his dream is yea… it isnt dubcon rp as much as guts flaunts his power over griffith and both griffith and his warlordsona are eyelash batting hoes tbqh and i love him

lol yeah p much exactly the vibe i was thinking, like part of the appeal of the fantasy to griffith would be that fantasy!griffith is Into It.

and awesome i’m looking forward 2 more of your thoughts and hope you have a good evening and morning w/ work and whatever else 🙂

How come Charlotte be “Griffith Dream” I mean, what’s up with him trying to be a legitimate “King”?? They’re in a fairy tail world that his existence made fairy monsters creatures and humans mercy together he could’ve easily be a king. I don’t know why Miura thinks Charlotte is important others than being Griffith masterbation thing which is bad he doesn’t like her I refuse as a feminist supports muira letting Griffith use Charlotte that way. Women in Berserk get treated badly poor Charlotte.

I’m not sure I’m really understanding you right, but like, yeah ia that Berserk is super misogynist, though ngl NGriff still needing to marry Charlotte to seal the deal on his kingdom etc despite being basically a messiah now only makes me want to double down on my old “dream = sexual repression/heteronormative fantasy” reading lol.

also tbf compared to the shit most women in berserk suffer, charlotte co-ruling an awesome city with indoor plumbing and having a super charismatic husband who only pretends to care about her doesn’t seem that bad. but then i find it hard to empathize with fictional women whose whole lives revolve around their feelings for a dude, and the fact that griffith clearly does not return those feelings is the only thing that makes it palatable to me lol.

Like I’d say Charlotte is treated badly in Berserk not because she’s in a loveless relationship but because Miura has written her with absolutely nothing else in her life, yk? She is 100% defined by that relationship, so I can’t really bring myself to care about her beyond being exasperated by how badly Miura often writes women.

tl;dr actually i think i’m just twisting themes around to justify my intrinsic dread of a narrative where griffith was destroyed by his relationship with guts and guts’ mistake wrt that relationship, while guts getting over it by refocusing on a hetero love interest is narratively rewarded

though actually while i’m on this subject, I do kind of have a big issue with how this frames griffith.

cut bc this probably doesn’t really make sense lol, i’m rambling and i’m not entirely sure how to explain my thought process lol

like, if pre-eclipse griffith was a symbol of guts’ potential to have fulfilling relationships and find a place where he belongs, that guts then totally fucked up by “abandoning,” and post-eclipse neogriffith is a symbol of guts throwing away his potential to have fulfilling relationships by pursuing a stupid self-destructive dream, then there’s a bit of an awkward contradiction:

during the golden age, guts distancing himself from griffith was a bad thing that caused all his problems. after the eclipse, guts distancing himself from griffith is the narratively correct choice. this makes technical plot sense because in between griffith transformed into a demon lol, but thematically i think it’s unsatisfying.

griffith has essentially been replaced with guts’ protective relationship with casca. he fucked up and abandoned her, just like he fucked up and abandoned griffith, but now he’s making up for it by sticking around and protecting her – something he never got a chance to do w/ griffith. like, there was no magical cure to heal griffith, no long journey of personal growth, nada.

ignoring who could be
blamed for what if berserk happened in real life, bc this has nothing to do with morals or literal interpersonal responsibilities, from a fictional
storytelling perspective guts destroyed griffith when he made the wrong
choice by leaving. griffith’s year of torture and then eclipse causing
despair is the direct consequence of guts’ narrative mistake, and femto/ngriff
is an antagonist of guts’ own making.

so to then say that the right
thing for guts to do is to try to forget about him rubs me the wrong
way. it’d be one thing if griffith was dead and there was nothing guts
could do except try to avoid repeating his mistakes, but he’s alive and
currently acting on the world in a capacity that is, at least by some
standards, negative lol. the way stories work, that’s guts’ problem to
fix.

so if the thematic takeaway is that guts should just ignore
neogriffith and move on, and if he goes back to obsessing over him
that’s bad, then… i’m not satisfied with that lol.

also like, if the manga
decided to draw a very clear and explicit dividing line between human
griffith and neogriffith, essentially declaring everything human
griffith represented to guts as dead, that would also be one thing, but miura deliberately muddies the waters both by teasing the audience about
his beating heart and by guts’ emotional conflict a la “the instant I saw him I’d forgotten my
urge to kill,” and “longing,” and by continuing to utilize the light/dark imagery for their relationship, and having guts reminisce about original griffith after seeing him, etc.

so there’s this sense to me that neogriffith is simultaneously a symbol of guts’ self destructive dream (revenge, fighting stronger and stronger enemies, becoming griffith’s equal) and a symbol of guts’ mistake in pursuing that dream the first time – a symbol of what he threw away by leaving – and to me it feels unsatisfyingly contradictory.

and then on a purely emotional level lol it frustrates me that if the moral of the story really is that guts needs to move on and forget about the past and griffith and focus on the relationships he does have, then that means griffith was essentially a casualty of guts’ one step forward two steps back style character development. a character, from the perspective of his relationship to guts, who existed to be a consequence of guts’ mistake and teach guts a lesson through his destruction. and that just strikes me as unfair lol. idt guts should get to move on when griffith never had the opportunity – OR when griffith did take his opportunity ie the sacrifice, if we’re counting that, because then griffith moving on is evil but guts moving on is good.

and yeah maybe it’s a statement about moving on by suppressing your emotions vs moving on by forming new relationships, but griffith was railroaded by the narrative lol, he never got the chance to move on by forming new relationships, he was irreparably fucked the day after guts left. so if that’s the case then it’s weak.

but idk maybe i’m looking at this from entirely the wrong perspective. idk i’m just thinking outloud again rly. and until we find out what happens when casca has her mind back, it’s too early to draw any real conclusions anyway.

guts and griffith’s hetero relationships during the golden age are both symbols of their dreams, and exist in opposition to their relationship with each other

charlotte as a symbol of griffith’s dream is painfully obvious, but lemme outline casca as a symbol of guts’ quick:

  • guts’ dream is to become griffith’s equal and winning casca’s affection is framed as a step on that path, since casca loved and admired griffith
  • casca metaphorically becomes guts’ sword after they sleep together, now supporting his dream instead of griffith’s
  • guts tells casca all about his dream, repeating a lot of what griffith said to charlotte at promrose hall
  • guts invites casca along on his dream journey as long as she doesn’t get in the way of what he wants to do
  • casca is the one who tells guts to leave to pursue his dream instead of staying with griffith
  • and overhearing that completely fucks griffith up much the same way overhearing griffith talking to charlotte about his dream fucked guts up

the question is does this change after the eclipse? and i think it does – casca without her character represents a responsibility distracting guts from his dream (plus she’s the last “feeble flame” of that campfire he abandoned when he left to pursue a dream, so she represents the Hawks) whereas now neogriffith represents his dream.

however – consistently sex with casca has still been connected to his dream. when the beast of darkness taunts him, and when he assaults her, it’s “to get closer and closer to Griffith.”

i don’t have a conclusion to this or a point rly, i’m just thinking outloud

well i guess my point is “the golden age can be interpreted as a cautionary tale about heterosexuality and that’s why it’s the best arc” lol

aight… hopefully ill stop bugging you after this but like in any established relationship like canon or modern HOW do you think griffguts actually initiates sissy bdsm au like do they talk about it is it the culmination of spontaneous decisions or?

lol i appreciate u bugging me bc i need excuses to talk about this kinda thing

ummmmm good question tho lmao

I’m going to throw out some ideas for a canon au concept, bc I feel like I’m on more solid ground there, like the way my brain works I can’t rly conceptualize modern au griffguts unless I intricately map out like the whole world they’re inhabiting, backstories, how everyone fits in, etc lol.

So like, canon au where Guts assassinated Julius without a hitch, never heard the Promrose Hall speech, and inevitably hooked up with Griffith bc lbr here if he never heard that speech there’s no way in hell they’re not getting together at some point. You can like take it as read as far as I’m concerned ngl. And
I think it’s better or at least easier if it starts in an established relationship, just bc I
think griffguts trying to start out kinky would be disastrous lol. they
need to have sorted thru some shit together first.

1. tried and true sparring turns into more cliche. they get really into it one day, end up losing their swords and rolling around in the grass until guts pins griffith down, and griffith or both of them are like, ok this is a thing. next time they fuck griffith starts working on trying to get guts to do it again. and thinking about it as an extention of sparring might actually make it easier and more fun for guts tbh.

2. once griffith gets comfortable with being in a relationship with guts, starts letting himself fantasize about him, etc, he’d start to focus on how big and strong guts is, how good in battle he is, and things would just escalate from there. Then he’d start suggesting stuff in bed like guts holding him down and trying to get guts into it.

(also: griffith falling into a guts-as-an-opposing-warlord-who-defeats-him-in-battle-and-takes-him-prisoner fantasy. js js.)

(actually that would probably disturb griffith afterwards since he’d be getting off to a fantasy of his dream being taken away. but yk, that only makes it better and more interesting so)

3. he could read about bondage or w/e in one of his many educational books lmao and go ‘ohhhh yeah i want that.’

4. curveball: guts starts it by being kind of a cocky brat in bed, jerking griffith off slowly to make him squirm, ignoring griffith when he tells him to get on with it already, pushing his hands away when he tries to do it himself, etc. griffith realizes he’s actually really into guts flaunting power over him.

Tho in every scenario I think it’s probably more likely that Griffith just tries to encourage Guts to exert some physical power over him in bed, at least at first, rather than having an actual mature talk about what they both want lol. Less, “hey Guts I have this idea, how would you feel about it?” and more “hey so I happen to have this rope under my pillow”

and then Guts would actually initiate the mature conversation about it lol, because Guts is just way better at talking about feelings.