@mastermistressofdesire said:
oh I was going to say
something about how the convincing and cajoling about piling bodies was
seemed mostly intended towards convincing him to sacrifice the non-guts
parts of the band of the hawk. The seeds for wanting Guts gone had
already been planted during the year of torture. It’s just that actually
being surrounded by the real Guts after that kinda made it apparent
that his emotions hadn’t quite caught up to that line of thinking, he
can’t help that being
with Guts again is currently blocking all that out because of simply how amazing and comforting and warm and fluffy it feels
Also I was going to write about some
panels from the post-torture arc which I realised I should actually
complement with pictures so that post is kind of in the works.
lol so i totally missed this response from however long ago. i wonder if it was when the tumblr activity page was buggy and refusing to load all the way.
but now that i’ve coincidentally happened to see it i just wanted to say yeah! i was actually thinking of adding another paragraph about how it would make sense symbolically that griffith has 2 separate motivations for the sacrifice, one for the band and one for guts, bc it underlines that guts (as several characters kept harping on about) wasn’t even part of the band at that point, and that he’d never actually been a volunteer to die for Griffith’s dream in the first place – his loyalty was won in a duel.
also if you’re still planning on making that post torture post i’d love to read it!
tbh I don’t really have any solid detailed ideas here. I can say that if I was reading it I’d want this au to still have a misunderstanding and stupid “breakup” and I think my preference would be for Griffith to downward spiral somehow (not like a torture chamber, but idk risky behaviour, stupid decisions, dropping out of uni, that kinda thing) after Guts leaves to find himself, and for them to get together after Guts comes back and finds him miserable and self destructive. Like, re-do the Golden Age but fate isn’t a thing and gods aren’t a thing and Griffith still has a tongue so Guts has his revelation that he shouldn’t’ve left and instead of summoning gods they figure their shit out and then make out.
Also I’m gonna tag @yesgabsstuff and @mastermistressofdesire and also if anyone else wants to get in on this plz do bc frankly I am not creative enough to contribute much to entertaining au ideas lol. My style is like, ok well here’s what happened in canon so let’s do the exact same thing but slightly different bc of circumstances.
@yesgabsstuff said:
I actually was
thinking about something you said in passing a while ago. We were
talking about how he learned how to behave around nobles and you called
it the “miss manners stuff.” I realized that we don’t really have an
equivalent expression for men and that got me thinking about about how
being polite and showing the “correct” deference to your betters is kind
of inherently feminized labor in a way? I also was thinking about how
that instinct for self protection, which is really what
I think it is at this point for him
extended his polite behavior to his own rape. I don’t really know where
I’m going with this but I had thoughts.
That doesn’t really undo the effects of toxic masculinity but rather adds a different dimension of his character for me?
Ooh yeah I see what you mean. lol it really is – I remember reading some studies about that in like a sociology class years ago or something, how a lot of behaviour coded as feminine is the same deferential behaviour eg men show to their bosses.
tbh idk I’d mostly separate the way Griffith behaves among nobility (deferential, always polite, always uses proper address/titles/etc, keenly aware of his place as an outsider and mitigating it with the shows of submission – smiling and apologizing when Julius slaps him is a gr8 example – etc) vs the way he behaves among the Hawks as their grand soaring leader.
BUT that said ia it is all tied to self-protection, and tbh you’re right – there isn’t a whole lot of difference between Griffith smiling when Julius slaps him, lip bleeding, and Griffith smiling when Casca hugs him, arms bleeding. I think he might tell himself that he’s trying to reverse the dynamic and comfort Casca instead of allowing her to comfort him because he has to be a strong leader and can’t show weakness, but I could definitely see a huge part of it being fear of his own vulnerability.
Idk I just really dig your point and tbh I think it would be really interesting to compare/contrast Griffith among the Hawks and Griffith among the nobles. Both masks stemming from the same place of vulnerability, yk?
@yesgabsstuff said:
Ditto for a conversation with Casca except that it ends with her taking the implement of self harm out of his hands and saying;
“You’re totally full of shit but I guess it’s time to put you to bed.”
awww. this is all
so perfect tbh. i’d seriously read 200k words of berserk as just a low key, realistic group of
traumatized and mentally ill people trying to support each other and get by and often failing and fucking up but
sometimes succeeding.
(i mean that’s basically what it is already but yk, take away the monsters and you’re still left with so much good character stuff and making it quietly realistic + modern adds a certain tone that agrees with me more than i would’ve expected. though i wouldn’t necessarily want to follow the plot of berserk to a tee lol. keep the themes, maybe explore different directions)
It’s weird. I think my age at this point has turned almost into optimism. What I mean is that Casca kind of barreling in and trying to get him to feel better and not knowing how because she can’t handle him being sad and Griffith kind of pulling it together in response to that is more realistic I think than what I just made up. It’s like I imagined what they would be with another five years under their belts and some solid self awareness. To her credit, Casca is the closest to being that person out of the three of them, but still. She’s always the Mom Friend regardless.
TO BE FAIR we are talking about an AU where they have some psychological knowledge and therapy experience, so it makes sense that they’d make better decisions occasionally haha.
in fact this really is the perfect setting to do like, a Berserk re-do where they’re all dealing with the exact same shit except actually learning coping methods and therefore not ruining everything all the time.
They can still ruin some things. just like, not irreversibly maybe.
That’s true. This is the setting where things could be made right for them even if the world still sucks.
Casca performs the bulk of the emotional labor but I also just thought about Griffith’s allergy to making other people uncomfortable. It’s interesting how his emotional labor is actually pretty similar to what Casca does? I don’t really know where to go from here.
That’s actually a rly good point that I didn’t think of. I guess Casca is more like, figuring out everyone’s shit for them and being stuck with the fallout of Griffith and Guts’ issues, but Griffith is really about hiding his own emotions so he can be the ideal leader everyone has perfect faith in.
Griffith’s is more typically masculine I’d say but it stands out since it’s acknowledged as a thing he does that’s also bad for his psyche in-text. Hey it’s a solid point for your “Berserk is about toxic masculinity” thesis statement you mentioned the other day 😀
okay this is post #1000 on this blog so i think it should be something good and thoughtful and really exemplify what i think berserk is truly about, when you carefully examine the themes and get right down to the core of the story
@yesgabsstuff said:
Ditto for a conversation with Casca except that it ends with her taking the implement of self harm out of his hands and saying;
“You’re totally full of shit but I guess it’s time to put you to bed.”
awww. this is all
so perfect tbh. i’d seriously read 200k words of berserk as just a low key, realistic group of
traumatized and mentally ill people trying to support each other and get by and often failing and fucking up but
sometimes succeeding.
(i mean that’s basically what it is already but yk, take away the monsters and you’re still left with so much good character stuff and making it quietly realistic + modern adds a certain tone that agrees with me more than i would’ve expected. though i wouldn’t necessarily want to follow the plot of berserk to a tee lol. keep the themes, maybe explore different directions)
It’s weird. I think my age at this point has turned almost into optimism. What I mean is that Casca kind of barreling in and trying to get him to feel better and not knowing how because she can’t handle him being sad and Griffith kind of pulling it together in response to that is more realistic I think than what I just made up. It’s like I imagined what they would be with another five years under their belts and some solid self awareness. To her credit, Casca is the closest to being that person out of the three of them, but still. She’s always the Mom Friend regardless.
TO BE FAIR we are talking about an AU where they have some psychological knowledge and therapy experience, so it makes sense that they’d make better decisions occasionally haha.
in fact this really is the perfect setting to do like, a Berserk re-do where they’re all dealing with the exact same shit except actually learning coping methods and therefore not ruining everything all the time.
They can still ruin some things. just like, not irreversibly maybe.
@yesgabsstuff said:
Ditto for a conversation with Casca except that it ends with her taking the implement of self harm out of his hands and saying;
“You’re totally full of shit but I guess it’s time to put you to bed.”
awww. this is all
so perfect tbh. i’d seriously read 200k words of berserk as just a low key, realistic group of
traumatized and mentally ill people trying to support each other and get by and often failing and fucking up but
sometimes succeeding.
(i mean that’s basically what it is already but yk, take away the monsters and you’re still left with so much good character stuff and making it quietly realistic + modern adds a certain tone that agrees with me more than i would’ve expected. though i wouldn’t necessarily want to follow the plot of berserk to a tee lol. keep the themes, maybe explore different directions)
Well tbh I have my issues with how Charlotte is written since I think she’s too passive and two dimensional at the moment (though I have hope for her in the future bc there’s plenty of room for her to grow and she has shown some depth before, eg spearheading the plot to rescue Griffith) but I think these points in particular are a little unfair.
When the first thing your boyfriend does when he shows up again after 2 years is fly you out of a tower with the help of a cool monster idk if I’d think to question his recovery either. It’s even possible she asked off-screen, but not important for the reader to see because imo it’s pretty easy to assume that “magic” is a reasonable explanation when this is a dude who performs miracles.
And as for Charlotte ruling her kingdom, I mean, this is fantasy middle ages in Berserk, aka a world hardly known for granting women a lot of power. I don’t think Charlotte was ever expected to actually take control of a kingdom – she was supposed to get married to someone who would do that. And from her point of view she’s marrying the literal saviour of the world, declared divine by the highest religious authority, regular performer of miracles, who magically created the best damn kingdom the world’s ever seen. I don’t think she’d feel the need to vy for control when by all accounts Griffith is doing a bang up job.
Like idk she’s boring to me too, but her choices and reactions all make sense to me since she’s a sheltered princess without a lot of life experience, so I can’t really direct any ire at her. I just wish she was written to be a little more dynamic I guess, and I can totally see why her passivity would grate on you. Here’s hoping she does something interesting in the future.
Oh and lastly I don’t think there’s any reason to believe Griffith wouldn’t continue being blandly nice after marrying her. Why do you think that would change?
You know expanding on the psych, group therapy angle, I’d really
like for it to be like this unofficial support group Griffith put together
while still in school because a lot of kids in the neighbourhood could not
afford therapy, but is now working towards getting a degree and making it like
a professional deal, maybe even join a bigger set up or really expand upon the
project. And it’s sort of become a safe space for all these kids and over the years,
some of the older ones like Judeau, Pippin, Corkus have all stayed together and
become like this group of people who at this point just support each other as
friends and actually even help to guide the newer ones who join. (Corkus has
his own brand of tough love which surprisingly works on some of the most
withdrawn kids so they sort of let him be).
And everyone of course, completely loves Griffith because this
guy literally gave a lot of them life.
Griffith however has in recent times started to develop a very
non-disclosure, sterile clinical style of counselling, where he’ll hear
everyone out, non-judgmentally, of course but not really give any personal
inputs. And he’s pretty good at this.( Psych students would be rolling their
eyes here- but there’s like these two schools of thought regarding counselling
among psychologists, one that the psychologist should not bring any personality
to the table, as the therapy isn’t about them, they should merely be a mirror
in which their clients can find themselves, an emotionless but rational and
non-maleficent screen and the other is that the psychologist should interact
with the client as their authentic selves, to be better able to build trust, a
sense of reality and connection and extend human support to the client.)
However, this wasn’t always the case and when he was younger,
and didn’t really know much about psychology or therapy. Griffith would reach
out pretty much how any concerned person would, he was just a lot better at it
intrinsically
Unfortunately, as with any group of people dealing with
participants from such sad and messed up personal situations, among the many
happy recoveries there are also some things which couldn’t be fixed. Over the
years there have been those who relapsed, ran away or most commonly committed
suicide, mostly during the early years of the Group when Griffith was still
doing the stuff pretty much solo and he has a huge case of unresolved guilt
associated with these cases. Because in retrospect sometimes he keeps wondering
if it was something he had unthinkingly or unknowingly said and simply the fact
that he had taken responsibility for these people and that maybe what was his
amateurish incompetence and over involvement had ultimately failed them.
Casca however turns out to be one of his early
successful ‘cases’ and he helps her recover from and infact directly stops
her from being sexually assaulted. And he really helps her kind of regain her
sense of control over herself .Casca completely hero-worships him. This goes
on till final year of high school by when Casca has become somewhat of a support
counsellor herself but then things suddenly turn ugly when this kid who’d
recently joined them commits suicide, and this is the one of the youngest kids ever that Griffith had
taken in and he’s completely shaken by this incident.
This also starts his goal toward working his ass off and getting that actual degree and scholarship. So he applies to a lot of Universities, and gets accepted into a great one except Gennon is the Dean. Go figure.
So Casca witnesses an incident and she’s pretty shaken about it but later when she asks Griffith why he wont just leave, he tells her it’s not important in the grand scheme of things and right now the degree is the most important thing for him because he refuses to take risks with the lives of people who trust him with their lives. Plus it’s kind of his dream to have his own sort of therepeutic set up .
and so it goes, and also like when Griffith first meets Guts, he asks him to join in on their meetings and Guts takes offense and says he doesn’t need it.
In the beginning Guts resents Griffith slightly because he looks like he’s so untouched by the things which everyone else is suffering from. He seems normal and happy and well-adjusted and Guts can’t relate to that and sometimes just wants to drag him down to his level.
But as the years go by it becomes what he loves the most about Griffith, that he can just waltz in and make Guts smile despite himself. And Guts becomes exceedingly protective of him because he feels like he wants to protect a little bit of that ‘ innocence’.
Later he hears about Casca’s story and —
haha this is getting real long but yeah canon typical things. but they will talk because it’s what they do for a living in this au. and things will be better.
Ooh I love this idea too, long but worth reading. tbh I’ve heard a lot about those two schools of thought you mentioned from a friend who’s a therapist and that’s a really clever and in-character way of applying it imo.
also i’ll add this here bc it’s all related to the same au:
@yesgabsstuff said: I feel like you could even keep the
whole Gennon situation in if you wanted? Like you have a student that
was on the waiting list for the group and he didn’t get the treatment he
needed in time due to a lack of funding and he ends up killing himself?
Grad student Griffith would totally blame himself and give into the
advances of a spooky doner
Patron of the department for a grant to be sent their way.
If you wanted. I would because it was important character development.
Yeah I think it’s pretty necessary. both this and @mastermistressofdesire‘s idea up there totally work for me.
The only thing I want to suggest is an original motivation for Griffith to decide to start this whole helping other people cope with trauma thing. Bc I mean canon Griffith didn’t necessarily have much of an original pre-gennon motivation for the castle dream but that was a rly simple + childish dream whereas this is more complex and I think should be rooted in something. Building off of the whole apparently orphan kid in a back-alley thing maybe he grew up in orphanages/foster homes and witnessed and/or experienced abuse and couldn’t do anything about it, and this is his way of taking back that sense of control and “making up for it” as he might think to himself?
Which kind of maybe is moving the dead kid motivation ahead a little, but idk.
@godclaw said:
Totally believe in dirt poor griffith
who got a scholarship and worked his ass off to be a grad student
yeah this seems pretty much perfect for a modern au
@yesgabsstuff said: I feel like they would know each other
from before. Maybe from undergrad? Like Casca was a theatre major or
something and was a huge techie and decided to stay on that side of it
after school. A previous group therapy thing where they were both
patients makes sense to me.
Guts I could see going to therapy to deal with anger issues and being
reluctantly directed towards the group after his therapist suspects some
trauma.
ooh i dig these ideas! also if it’s anger related maybe it’s court-ordered. i could see him engaging in some destruction of public property if he’s really pissed off.
also lmao i have no idea how to squeeze corkus into the plot but the idea of him as a bitter grad student is perfect
@yesgabsstuff said:
Casca is a contractor with a specialty in carpentry. Guts feels like a mechanic for boats or some shit.
Now how do we force Guts to go the fuck to therapy?
1. I could feel this. guts as a mechanic works gr8 for me and obviously so does carpenter casca.
2. hm yk he might realize it’s a good idea on his own if he has flashbacks during sex. maybe he’d go, check it out for one meeting, think ‘nah this isn’t my thing’ except when he tries to duck out griffith convinces him to stay. possibly thru a bet a la the manga but less dramatic than swords.
also! would griffith and casca be childhood(ish) friends in this version too (maybe meeting at earlier group therapy or smthn) or would they all meet at the same time?
@yesgabsstuff said:
Clinical psychologist
grad student running a sliding scale survivors group under supervision?
You could have some crazy intra-department drama in place of a kingdom.
Casca also coaches girls soccer in her spare time.
shit they could all meet thru a support group instead of a merc band. omg suddenly i really want to read this? i feel like this is actually like the most true to berserk way of doing a modern au – still about dealing with trauma, just with better mental health resources and less world-destroying now.
@madchen said:
im so angry bc i was
gonna say something poignant abt griffith and sexuality but then i
forgot wait i just remembered it-i hc griffith as gay and its so… i dont
know, him repressing his feelings and desires and attraction to other
men before guts comes along fits in pretty well with his character i
think. its hard to think abt w griffith just bc of the persona and
facade he puts out there but i like gay characters and thinking about
their gayness /shrugs
so like i actually have an essay sitting in my drafts that i started writing as a tongue in cheek joke on the premise “compulsory heterosexuality is the true villain of berserk” bc it seemed like a subject i could have fun bullshitting with. then i never posted it bc like halfway thru it got 2real and the tone was all weird
anyway the point is griffith’s narrative is waaaay too easy to read as repressing his sexuality considering his dream is represented by a heterosexual marriage and being in love with his best friend is the obstacle he overcomes to turn into an emotionless shell of himself.
sooo yeah i could definitely see it. plus from a characterization standpoint his whole thing is emotional repression. Also turns out Berserk gets even more depressing when you look at it from that angle, even if it is totally unintentional.
madchen said:
oh also i definitely
think that if griffith ever did feel comfortable enough to relinquish
some control guts would probably be exceedingly tender and gentle with
it and griff reaction to that is probably up in the air? i wonder how he
would ever feel about guts calling him beautiful/praising how he looks
bc i agree w your objectification trauma hypothesis and its been made
exceedingly clear that guts loves griffith well beyond his physical
appearance?
I totally agree. Idk I guess I’d err on the side of thinking that Griffith would probably never be entirely comfortable with being praised for his appearance but he wouldn’t necessarily have flashbacks either? So I’d say his reaction would be somewhere in between total acceptance and imminent breakdown. But if it was like a fic or smthn i could easily be convinced either way.
That essay sounds like a gem.
the first half is rly basic and obvious, like, here are all the times Charlotte’s existence fucked up their relationship/lives and resulted in Griffith and Guts overemphasizing Griffith’s heteronormative marriage/king/castle dream and delegitimizing their relationship, haha see what I did there?
then this happened:
I’m also going to point out that it’s not Guts and Casca getting
together that fucks Griffith up after he’s rescued – he’s not happy
about it obviously, but he can see what’s up and he’s not finding his
behelit and summoning the Godhand yet – but rather it’s Casca telling
Guts to leave while she stays, followed by Griffith’s vision of himself
seemingly as Casca’s romantic partner, kid in tow, no Guts to be seen.
Like
– just look at this fucking horrific vision here. Griffith is
essentially helpless and trapped, unable to move or speak. He’s part of a
family unit, wife and child, with the man he loves far away somewhere
and the kid named after him. It’s picturesque – Casca transformed into a
perfect housewife, reminiscing fondly about the old days but preferring
the quiet (gender role conforming) family life. Griffith looks good and is dressed up. Casca
leans in to kiss him and then spoon feeds him while he thinks that “this
peace and quiet… isn’t so bad.”
Then he wakes up, tries to kill himself, summons the Godhand, and becomes an evil demon.
And the thing is, that evil demon isn’t freedom, it’s just leveling up
in repression, emotionlessly playing the part of the ideal
boyfriend to a tee and entering into a loveless marriage while betraying
nothing of his inner feelings, maybe not even to himself. Seeing
the man he loves again and telling him he’s insignificant. And achieving his dream as easily as if it was handed to him on a silver
platter, because his dream is literally the externalized desires of society.
and i was like, oops that’s actually not very funny. (well the last sentence kind of is in a reachy way but yk)
tbh the more epic and fucked up a canon is the more charming i find chill modern aus, so i think my faves are aus where they’re basically normal. a little fucked up and weird and dramatic maybe, but like, when guts and griffith have a dramatic break up no one turns into a demon, they just downward spiral like ordinary people do and spend a while hating each other and making things awkward for their mutual friends.
also i think in a modern au guts should still have some kind of thing he does. if not swinging a sword then maybe a trade his shitty adopted father taught him, or a hobby he spends most of his downtime on (working out, sports, idk).
Also tradesman Casca – maybe she’s a welder or carpenter or mechanic or something. Sry I love her buff arms too much not to give her a physical job, and the class issues are important to the story so they’re all blue collar.
except Griffith who’s a grad student.
then casca could meet farnese by chance and have a whirlwind cliche class-differences romance that ends with them running off together (serpico tags along, eventually finds a dude of his own (Farnese’s surprisingly understanding fiancee Roderick?), and they’re all gay bffs who room together in an improbably nice new york apartment. who wouldn’t watch this sitcom? guts and griffith are recurring characters in a dramatic on again off again relationship.)
lol idk this devolved quickly. creativity is not my strong suit. i have another related ask tho so gimme a sec and i’ll cosign that idea too
ok but fair warning i don’t rly ship them myself so apologies if this is boring lmao
Sex headcanon
twotruckshavingsex.mp3
Relationship with/thoughts on _____ headcanon
They got that mutual respect going on. They’re both easy going and happy to lead or follow. Roderick is suave and could put the moves on Guts and Guts would be receptive to The Moves. Also the adrenaline-fueled post-battle sex would probably be good, assuming Guts isn’t in pieces.
Ok going modern AU for this because what even are holidays in Berserk: Guts either buys surprisingly thoughtful Christmas presents for people, or he buys generic gift baskets. No in-between.
Cooking headcanon
Guts learned to cook to feed Gambino, and he’s pretty good at it for a mercenary.
Sleeping headcanon
Bc Guts tended to sleep wrapped around his sword as a kid, when he sleeps with someone else he holds them particularly gently
Driving headcanon
Answered
Bathing/showering headcanon
Answered
Hugging headcanon
Griffith, post-torture, is the only person he’s ever hugged without thinking about it first. (I’m p sure there’s nothing in canon that proves this wrong)
Kissing headcanon
Kisses like he means it, ie, really tenderly.
Sex headcanon
Either wants to be told what to do and how best to please his partner, with lots of praise, or wants to lie back and basically be made love to. Basically needs verbal or physical adoration.
General physical contact headcanon
“Don’t touch me,” is one part rape trauma and one part from Gambino telling him he’s cursed, which is why it comes back with a vengeance after the Eclipse.
Physical appearance headcanon
Has no idea that he’s hot and half the people he knows swoon over him. I doubt he’s ever thought about how attractive he is but if he had he’d consider himself average and maybe slightly below average after losing his eye and his arm.
Wardrobe headcanon
He genuinely thought his giant feathered assassination hat was cool. It was only that unwavering belief that allowed him to pull it off.
Jewelry headcanon
He never stopped being slightly creeped out by Griffith’s behelit, even after it saved his life multiple times.
Nickname headcanon
He kinda likes it when Skull Knight calls him “Struggler.”
Dancing headcanon
Answered
Singing headcanon
Like the dancing question, he does not sing. He’d be a baritone if he did, and he’d be able to carry a tune with practice, but he’s not going to practice.
Anger headcanon
Idk what I can say that hasn’t been thoroughly explored in the story. Hmmm okay he gets angry because he’s a ‘doer’ and it’s an emotion that leads directly to action. Sorrow, fear, trauma, regret, loneliness, emotional need, etc, all ends up being expressed as anger so he can use it as fuel for monster slaying and feel like he’s accomplishing something. That’s practically canon but w/e.
Soft spot headcanon
Kids. It might not seem like it when he tells a 12 yr old to kill herself but man, few things make him feel worse about himself than hurting children. Why he let zombie girl stab him in the 2nd chapter, why he kept fucking up while fighting Rosine, etc.
Favorite possession headcanon
Sword. That’s an easy one ofc.
Favorite photograph headcanon
Like Casca’s it’s something simple and warm with the Band, but more Griffith-focused. One of many times they locked eyes and smiled at each other during a battle, for instance. Or getting tipsy together around a fire and just chilling next to each other. Also it would be in that brief time post-Zodd and pre-Promrose Hall.
Relationship with/thoughts on _____ headcanon
Well I’m gonna fill in the blank with Relationship with NeoGriffith. And a headcanon for that is that Guts is not going to be able to kill him. Like emotionally, even if he somehow found a way to physically. Dude can’t even think the words to himself lol. Though what I can see is Guts pseudo-accidentally killing him if they were on a physically level playing field. A la Gambino – subconsciously thinking he’ll avoid the strike easily and then feeling horrified when his sword goes through him. Though of course what kind of emotional shit must be wreaking havok on NeoGriff for him to fail to avoid a strike like that is another story.
Hmm that was more half-assed speculation than headcanon but w/e, close enough.
@madchen said:
im so angry bc i was
gonna say something poignant abt griffith and sexuality but then i
forgot wait i just remembered it-i hc griffith as gay and its so… i dont
know, him repressing his feelings and desires and attraction to other
men before guts comes along fits in pretty well with his character i
think. its hard to think abt w griffith just bc of the persona and
facade he puts out there but i like gay characters and thinking about
their gayness /shrugs
so like i actually have an essay sitting in my drafts that i started writing as a tongue in cheek joke on the premise “compulsory heterosexuality is the true villain of berserk” bc it seemed like a subject i could have fun bullshitting with. then i never posted it bc like halfway thru it got 2real and the tone was all weird
anyway the point is griffith’s narrative is waaaay too easy to read as repressing his sexuality considering his dream is represented by a heterosexual marriage and being in love with his best friend is the obstacle he overcomes to turn into an emotionless shell of himself.
sooo yeah i could definitely see it. plus from a characterization standpoint his whole thing is emotional repression. Also turns out Berserk gets even more depressing when you look at it from that angle, even if it is totally unintentional.
madchen said:
oh also i definitely
think that if griffith ever did feel comfortable enough to relinquish
some control guts would probably be exceedingly tender and gentle with
it and griff reaction to that is probably up in the air? i wonder how he
would ever feel about guts calling him beautiful/praising how he looks
bc i agree w your objectification trauma hypothesis and its been made
exceedingly clear that guts loves griffith well beyond his physical
appearance?
I totally agree. Idk I guess I’d err on the side of thinking that Griffith would probably never be entirely comfortable with being praised for his appearance but he wouldn’t necessarily have flashbacks either? So I’d say his reaction would be somewhere in between total acceptance and imminent breakdown. But if it was like a fic or smthn i could easily be convinced either way.
Guts cannot dance and has zero desire to try. If he did try he might actually be pretty good at it, I mean fighting is like dancing in some ways right? But it doesn’t matter bc he’s never gonna try.
Bathing/showering headcanon
– Guts
Guts doesn’t give a fuck, he’ll dunk himself in water when it’s handy but he’s not going to go out of his way to seek out a bath. It’s fantasy medieval times, everyone’s used to BO.
Kissing headcanon
– Roderick
Dude just goes for it. He’s confident in himself and suave and experienced so he relies on his charms to sweep ppl off their feet and seal the deal with a kiss at the right moment.
Sex headcanon
– Roderick
Probably good in the sack, he seems to know what he’s about. tbh he’s got to be one of the v few Berserk characters who’s had good sex multiple times. Also he brags a lot about women but I’m gonna say he might go for women on land but at sea he’s happy with dudes.
Relationship with/thoughts on _____ headcanon– Roderick
You didn’t specify so anything so I’m going with thoughts on getting swept up in the whole thing with Guts and co.
Bc tbh I like his attitude – genuinely enjoying the adventure, impressed by everybody but knowing he’s got his own skills to match, heroic and cool and mostly unfazed by all the monsters.
@mastermistressofdesire said: If I am not wrong these were coloured pencil sketches done buy Kentaro Miura himself
Yeah that’s what I thought but I wasn’t entirely sure, ty!
@yesgabsstuff said:
Lol I always thought
of Griffith as a serious Tumblr/Instagram person. His LinkedIn is also
meticulous. Casca also has a perfect LinkedIn and looks up DIY shit on
Pinterest.
And I could absolutely see Guts driving away from his panic attacks in the dead of night.
I also imagined that Guts maybe tried
Reddit workout boards but rage quit. He told everyone that he left
because it was petty and stupid, and the dudes were amatures but really
it was all of the weird homophobic language that got to him on his bad
days in a weird lizard brain way.
ia with all of the above. especially casca as a DIYer, for some reason that seems weirdly perfect to me lol. and aw Guts I could def see that happening.
maybe he’d start his own series of workout videos. he’d be awkward and suck at looking into the camera and talk with a lot of ‘uhs’ and ‘so yeahs’ but he’d get plenty of views because a) he knows his shit and b) he’s hot and griffith is the one holding the camera and adjusting the lighting (and c) griffith links them to his however many thousand followers)
I have a head cannon about how they met?
So like I imagine Guts has the channel, and though it’s really good it’s also kind of a small scale one, doesn’t get a lot of subscribers because it seems to have a very niche audience. But Guts doesn’t particularly care and he continues posting videos every week religiously. Until he gets a comment on one of his videos from Griffith asking about a collab- who everyone knows is sort of the main guy behind a highly successful channel called the hawks- which is this huge health and lifestyle channel with a lot of contributors.
And he ignores it because he’s mostly come across Griffith’s beauty, DIY and some like philosophical-ish videos. And though the last one intrigued him he doesn’t think this brand has anything to do with him. And he kind of scorns what he considers pretty people doing mundane things and hotgluing ribbons or generally the beauty guru thing. Because he thinks it’s all fake pretentious bullshit.
But this Griffith guy is oddly persistent. So Guts agrees to meet up with the intention of telling him off or just letting his gruffness chase him away.
When they meet ,Griffith asks him about doing a martial-art collab with him before Guts can even get a word in and honestly guts is a little in awe for the first few moments and doesn’t have his defenses up yet.
And Guts is like- with who?
And Griffith’s like- me.
And Guts is like- Hah as if. I don’t do scripted shit fyi and I’m sure you don’t want to get your pretty face punched in.
Griffith’s like-Just humor me, K?
So Guts takes him to his set up and Griffith keeps complimenting the details he’s taken so much care with and it makes Guts warm and Fuzzy which makes him upset and grumpier. And he’s being a cocky ass and they end up making a bet that if Guts wins Griffith needs to cut his hair or something and if Griffith wins, Guts joins their channel.
And they turn the video on and take positions. And Griffith predictably for us but very shockingly for Guts proceeds to completely own Guts’ ass in the bout.
And Later that night Guts keeps replaying and checking out the the footage, lying in bed and realises that this dude had some serious technique and he’s grudgingly impressed af.
But anyway Guts joins the channel. And his and Griffith’s first collab becomes viral as hell. And their videos become the most popular out of everyone else’s. And Casca is a little miffed because earlier she was the only one who would do joint videos with Griffith. and yeah.
Jill, being inspired by Guts but deciding to stay in her shitty town for whatever reason, channels her anger at all the awful people she’s surrounded by into teaching herself the sword. Maybe finds someone less terrible to teach her the stuff she can’t learn herself. When Griffith breaks the world half her town gets eaten and she takes off to become an adventurer.
Soft spot headcanon– Zodd
He has a soft spot for anyone who manages to survive more than 5 minutes against him. Especially Guts who he practically has a crush on and won’t let anyone else kill unless he absolutely has to.
Dancing headcanon– Theresia
hmmm okay – Theresia is out now, seeing the world for the first time, fueled by rage and revenge, but not so consumed by it that she can’t feel the wonder of experiencing the world properly finally after only seeing it from her window. She’s wandering from place to place learning to fight from anyone who will teach her something. One day she finds herself in a small town during some spring festival. There’s dancing in the streets, and she gets pulled into it. She doesn’t know how to dance but she has a great time moving from partner to partner and just going with it and letting loose for an afternoon. Afterwards it’s one of her fondest memories.
Anger headcanon – Slan
Omg okay I just thought of this bc of you putting the words Slan and Anger together, but hey what if the thing that turned her into a member of the Godhand wasn’t sex-related like we all assume from the fact that her tits are out in Berserk?
I’m not gonna build a whole narrative here but hell maybe she was an epic, prideful queen or something who lost a war, and decided to sacrifice all her loyal beloved subjects and become a god rather than accept her loss. Also for added camp drama the kingdom she lost to’s queen is her ex girlfriend. She was the main sacrifice. Now there’s a headcanon you can hang your hat on.
Relationship with NeoGriffith headcanon– Locus
Locus takes the noble knight thing waaaay too seriously. Also while the rest of the apostles are all in love with Griffith by default, Locus would be in love with him anyway. He’s got this whole loyal devoted knight/sexy king thing built up in his head.
Physical appearance headcanon
– Void
Dude looks like… that… because of a) how he was tortured (the hooks and stuff) and b) bc he’s a sage (nerd) and really wants to emphasize his brain over his looks. Superlong scarecrow skeleton arms are so he can pull his cloak out to the sides and flap it like wings and fly away.
Kissing headcanon– Anna
NICE. Okay her first kiss with Charlotte is initiated by Charlotte after she sobs in Anna’s arms about how she’s pretty sure her husband is a soul-less void and also gay af. Charlotte reaches out tentatively, says, “you’ll always love me, right?” and kisses her.
Anna spends about 2 seconds going ‘holy shit holy shit holy shit’ and then loses all decorum, takes control of the kiss, carries her to the bed, and immediately undertakes the job of making Charlotte forget all about her demon husband, with rousing success.
Driving headcanon
– Corkus
lmao THE WORST. Never get into a car with his man. He will scream at everyone, he will honk obnoxiously during traffic jams, he will tailgate, he will pass on a solid yellow line, he considers going the speed limit a form of losing.
Singing headcanon– Pippin
He has the best bass voice. He doesn’t sing often but get a few drinks into him and everyone shuts up to listen to him.
Hugging headcanon
– Casca
This is how she wants to comfort and be comforted. Casca is a huggy person, she will hug you without thinking if it looks like you need it. To get Farnesca for a sec Farnese loves nothing more than being wrapped in Casca’s strong comforting arms in a vulnerable moment.
Wardrobe headcanon
– Casca
Vastly prefers men’s clothes. Even if she got over her awkwardness with feeling out of place in a dress, men’s clothes are just more practical, easier to move in, and a whole lot better for combat. (Farnese agrees and they make a rly striking pair – Casca more casual while Farnese gets dandy-ish)
Favorite photograph headcanon
– Casca
I’d have to say her favourite memory is something really simple. Just, one of many very similar nights, hanging out around the fire, the rest of the hawk commanders are there. Actually yk that official (i think? if it’s fanart someone tell me who to credit) artwork?
lmaooo nice. And I’m doing all the apostles. We’re going straight into freaky god/army of devoted monsters action, and i’m taking it semi seriously. It’s like 1 am here it’s the perfect time for this.
putting this under a cut tho for the thin veneer of decency
Kissing headcanon
The apostles are divided between the ones who get lovey dovey, keep mostly to their humanish forms, and are rly body worshippy, and the ones who whip out the tentacles and weird prehensile monster dicks. The former are the ones who like to kiss. Anyway Locus is like the prime example of an apostle into making out all night and lots of foreplay and looking human and trying to please, mostly bc he’s totally in love with Griffith even without the magic apostle/god connection.
Sex headcanon
I’m not sure whether to go for monster orgies/gangbangs or just like an
everyone gets their night to look forward to thing. Actually let’s go with the
latter bc it’s easier logistically. Like there are a lot of apostles.
It’d be like a nightly ritual thing, the god attending to his servants and rewarding their loyalty. Thru freaky ritualistic sex. Yk something something empty vessel for humanity’s desires exemplified by the apostles who gave themselves over to base desire. Totally legit.
Anyway in addition to the ones who want to ~make love~ that I already mentioned you get types like Raksas who want to inflict pain bc it’s how they show their love, and it only kind of works bc Griffith is basically invulnerable – like he can still feel physical sensation, it just wouldn’t register as harmful or bad to his weird god brain. But the apostles are still into it.
Then you have the Miura-typical apostles who just want to take bc aggression and darkness or w/e and fucking their god is like the ultimate experience for them.
Tbh I wonder if Zodd would consider it one of those stupid apostle things like the Eclipse was to him and refrain, and look down on everyone who got into the whole god sex thing. otoh Zodd would be a great service top for rough sex so that would be a shame if so.
Griffith is indifferent to everything and contentedly passive, and it’s another v graphic way to showcase his alien-ness and the disturbing discrepancy between our Griffith and NeoGriffith. (Though with his heart beating that could slowly change buuut that’s veering into fucked up Berserk-appropriate territory rather than fun wacky sex headcanon territory so I’ll leave it at that.)
Soft spot headcanon
This is related only by a thread but I have to say it: Zodd peaces out of the sex thing after Griffith calls him Guts by mistake and then pretends it never happened. Zodd just claims it’s because he’s above all the base desires of the other apostles while being secretly bitter. Next time he sees Guts his residual soft spot for him as a worthy opponent is totally gone and Guts wonders where their fun rival-y rapport went. Now there’s an award winning love triangle for you.
He’s always the one hugging someone to comfort them, never the one needing comfort. So he’ll hug Casca after she thinks he’s dead to reassure her, but he’ll twist out of her arms when she’s trying to comfort him in the river.
But deep down, somewhere he won’t admit to himself, he really, really wants to be wrapped in Guts’ big arms. Like letting Guts hold him and letting himself feel comforted would be one of the highest relationship achievements to unlock.
Post-torture, when Guts did get to hug him and hold him a few times, Griffith would’ve pushed him away if he could and a tiny part of him was glad he couldn’t.
Sex headcanon
Because I think it fits him on a meta-level, I think if Griff has sex-related trauma it’s more about feeling objectified and used rather than say sexual position. So he’d switch but wants to be the one in control regardless. With Guts he’d definitely lean towards power bottoming, and he’d lavish praise on Guts, talk about how gorgeous he is, etc. Guts wants to be looked-at and Griffith wants to do the looking so I think they’d be rly compatible from the start. But I also think it’s kind of a burden to him to always feel the need to be in control so there’s another related high-level relationship achievement to unlock in some happily ever after au.
Also doing this one for NeoGriff because I feel like there’s a significant change:
NeoGriff otoh would have sex solely to please his partner. What with the whole “the desired” thing, he would just become whatever his partner wanted him to be, because the only reason he’d be having sex anyway is to further his goal. So Charlotte gets this ready-made fantasy object who doesn’t give a fuck but is really good at pretending to, and so does anyone else he might ever end up getting laid by, for whatever goal-related reason. He’s still in control no matter what he’s doing what with being a god and all, but it’s all dictated by the other’s desires.
Other than Guts who is still the eternal exception.
General physical contact headcanon
Guts’ rare casual touches make his heart skip several beats and get warm and fuzzy. like look at this look right after:
that hand on his shoulder is like a heating pad in a -40 blizzard.
I’m sorrry but I stopped midway and teared up a little in the hugging head cannon section. And yes. yes. I agree with everything here.
And I’ve actually thought about Griffith wanting to push Guts away in the post-torture arc before and to have it brought up again…
Because I distinctly remember that panel in which Guts is helping him put on his armor and Griffith looks like he’s actually quite distant and not enjoying this situation at all. i think there’s this implicit message that this level of proximity makes him uncomfortable because it’s not by his own choice, nor could he possibly stop it even if he really wanted to.
Guts has pretty much attached himself to Griffith at this point and there isn’t really anything he can do to change it and what use would that be anyway? He’s tense and distant the whole time. He knows Guts is trying to humor him and I think the assumed pity only makes it worse for him, makes him almost consistently avoid eye-contact except for that one moment when he asks for his armour.
(I actually have a lot of feels regarding this, but if I get into that now, I’ll never get to my point)
But so basically Griffith’s been sort of tensed right from the moment of rescue and it seems like he’d really rather be left alone but there’s this one panel when Guts lies down next to him and immediately falls asleep and Griffith just looks at him and relaxes, and there’s this slight smile on his face and you know he’s glad the Guts didn’t actually leave and it fucks me up. It really really does.
Oh maaaan ty for expanding on like my one sentence up there this is so good. I swear there’s so much to sob about during the post-torture pre-eclipse stuff but nothing hurts me more than Griffith’s actual smiles.
this is the most heartwrenching shit i’ve ever seen
Farnese would give Serpico a birthday gift on the anniversary of her finding him in the snow. She never asked when his actual birthday was.
Cooking headcanon
Serpico didn’t learn to cook until Farnese was sent to the monastery and he went with her. As punishment for some infraction (maybe something Farnese did and he took the blame for) he got assigned cooking duty, and found out he was good at it and enjoyed it.
Sleeping headcanon
Has a recurring nightmare about being burned alive, often by Farnese, sometimes by himself or his mother.
Driving headcanon
The best driver. He’s the guy you want to get in a car with – totally cool, chill, zen about traffic, lets people in, accelerates gently, always signals, doesn’t break the speed limit unless everyone else on the highway is, etc. Unless Farnese is in the passenger seat, because when she tells him to pass a slow driver on the shoulder of a four-lane highway or they’re totally going to be late for her appointment, he’ll do it.
Bathing/showering headcanon
The thing he likes least about traveling with Guts and co, other than the imminent danger aspect, is the lack of opportunities to bathe. I feel like personal hygiene is v important to him.
Hugging headcanon
Pretty much only hugs Farnese. Like if there was a crying child in front of him he’d only try to comfort him or her if no one else was available to do it instead. He’s a caretaker but not the most emotionally nuturing.
Kissing headcanon
answered
Sex headcanon
Okay I think he’s had plenty of unemotional hook ups with men in the past. Sure he was around a bunch of terrifying religious people, but we know the whole burning people alive thing was to keep the lower classes terrorized, so nobles weren’t really in danger. So he wasn’t too worried about being called a heretic for getting laid.
Also I think he’d want to be more submissive in bed than he’d actually allow himself. He’d feel like submitting to someone else was a kind of betrayal of Farnese, in a weird way. He’d still let the other dude have the upper hand during sex though.
General physical contact headcanon
Standoffish. Even with Farnese, she’s the one who generally has to initiate contact.
Physical appearance headcanon
A little vain. Knows he’s good looking and can be charming and uses it when necessary.
Wardrobe headcanon
Usually likes the finer things so he was surprised by how attached he got to his cloak, even if it is magic. He feels kind of like a fairytale hero when he wears it.
Jewelry headcanon
Not much of a jewelry wearer. I admit got nothin on this one.
Nickname headcanon
I’ll say he’s slightly embarrassed whenever Ivalera calls him a maid, if that counts as a nickname.
Dancing headcanon
Answered.
Singing headcanon
I’ve never heard his voice in the new anime, but I feel like he’d be a tenor. He’d also have a pretty good singing voice – I bet they had to learn hymns at the monastery. Maybe he was part of a choir for a couple years there.
Anger headcanon
Too repressed to get outwardly angry. Even when shit gets real and he brings the sword out and tries to kill Guts, he’s chill about it and only shows some intensity in his eyes. I can pretty much only see him losing it if Farnese ever got killed.
Soft spot headcanon
Other than Farnese? I think he actually has a soft spot for Guts, despite trying to kill him and considering him a danger. He respects him quite a bit, decides to put faith in his will power instead of trying to kill him again, and there’s that one moment during Ganeshka’s lightning storm where he leaps over to try to save Guts and Guts is like, ‘tf are you doing? you know there’s nothing you can do to help me so go do something useful.’ Little bit of irrational protectiveness coming out there. Then getting between him and Zodd. He probably has a bit of a crush.
Favorite possession headcanon
Probably the cloak and feather duster. I keep thinking of and then dismissing ways to say this. Like, it’s not that he wants to be special, or that they allow him to be useful, or that he wants to be part of something bigger than himself… it’s more like they symbolize he subtle ways he’s changing himself and becoming a better person – or at least a person he likes more?
Favorite photograph headcanon
Calling this favourite memory and tbh this is a tough one. Probably wouldn’t be anything pre-Guts. But anything post-Guts is also tinged with sadness because he’s on the outside looking in at Farnese, especially her more heartwarming and happy moments, a lot now. Man Serpico actually has a really sad life overall. Mmmmaybe I’ll go with waking up in bed being tended to by Farnese the very first time when she found him in the snow.
Relationship with/thoughts on _____ headcanon
I’m leaving this one blank because I have the worst time thinking of stuff to talk about if it’s not specified lol. But feel free to send another ask and fill in the blank! I was actually about to put relationship with Guts, but i figure I went over that pretty well in the soft spot question so… I’ll just leave it for now.
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