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Okay, this is totally overkill, I know, but your ask has motivated me to just lay it all out, so ty!
Yeah, I can see why people look at this image and see it as one huge raised scar. It’s fairly ambiguous looking, and it’s the visual interpretation the anime went with, which reinforces this common perception:
But look at this:
You can see when he traces it that the “outline” of that “wound” fits his two fingers exactly. It’s not one scar, it’s two self-inflicted parallel scratch marks.
They’re not in the same place as the river scratches, there are only two instead of four, and they’re also older and therefore either mostly healed scabs or scars which he’s tracing instead of tearing open in that moment, which is why they’re not the same as the bleeding open wounds we see in chapter 17, but they are definitely two separate marks, not the edges of one giant scar.
Tbh I think Miura put them on his shoulder instead of his arms this time mainly for dramatic effect so Griffith is more curled in on himself when he traces them.
imo the movie is closer to the spirit of the manga in making them scratch marks and showing Griffith seemingly tempted to add to them. It’s still a little weird considering their placement further back, and idk what they expected new audiences to think since they cut out every relevant aspect of those marks being there, ie his backstory and the night Guts and Griffith assassinate the Queen and co. But whatever, it’s close enough for me.
And to just briefly explain those scratch marks a bit further, basically, as much as it looks a bit like a big scar in the manga, like you said, it really makes no sense for it to be.
If Guts’ sword had hit him in the second duel he’d either have a gaping wound or a discoloured bruise later that day, not a scar, and if he got it somewhere else that we never get to see then he has absolutely no narrative reason to trace it and cry while thinking about Guts. It would be nonsensical and meaningless for him to trace some random mysterious scar that has no relevance in this highly emotionally charged moment.
On the other hand we know he has a history of self-harming by scratching himself, and we’ve seen him viciously scratch himself under circumstances very similar to Tombstone of Flame Part 2 – the moment Griffith flashed back to just as we see his bare shoulder with those marks on it for the first time in that first image up there: “You believe that, don’t you?”
Griffith has done something he considers “dirty” for the sake of his dream, asks someone else what they think of him (”Am I dirty?” // “Do you think that I’m cruel?”), both Casca and Guts inadvertantly reinforce his belief that he’s dirty/cruel with their responses (”N- why… why were you alone with him before?” and “Ain’t that part of the path to your dream?”), and in the river in front of Casca he self harms while talking himself through the necessity of dirtying himself for his dream, so it feels safe to assume that sometime shortly following his conversation with Guts in Tombstone of Flame he also self harmed while telling himself it’s necessary to be cruel for his dream.
Now that Guts has left in what Griffith believes is a rejection of the “cruelty” and “dirtiness” that he let Guts in to see, he traces those old scratch marks and tries to convince himself again that it’s worth it for his dream. And the point of this moment is that he can’t convince himself this time. Instead he just curls up and sobs, because in the face of Guts’ apparent rejection, it’s not worth it.
Like I said lol, this is overkill as a response to your ask, but like I saw an excuse to explain my take on this moment in its own post, instead of buried in a much longer post, so I took it.
I think Griffith is gay, even though I feel like he doesn’t know it(maybe after a while he came to realize it, especially after Guts left him) as for Guts his sexuality is a mystery to me. I know he definitely likes men(even though he probably definitely doesnt understand that or acknowledge it) attraction to women is debatable.
The way I see it we
cant really pinpoint what Guts’ sexuality is or his thoughts on women.
Griffith was the first to give Guts something that he never had and I
feel like his affection for Griffith is dominantly based on this. No one
else in the manga, both men and women, have yet to give Guts what
Griffith gave him thus why no one has yet to win over his affections.
ia tbh
for me I think Griffith is variable, like i could see him being either super repressed about being gay thanks to a) his dream revolving around marrying a woman and b) gennon being the only textually gay dude in berserk (thx miura) and griffith being taken advantage of at probably the age where he’d be just starting to realize he had feelings of attraction to men, like, that seems extremely likely to fuck him up.
But I could also see him accepting that he’s attracted to men – I mean he reads a lot, he seems fairly worldly, maybe gennon isn’t his only exposure to same-sex attraction, etc – but also not thinking it’s important because it’s incompatible with his dream.
Either way though I definitely can’t see him as anything but gay.
Wrt Guts I see him as gay too. He could be bi easily enough, but it’s just so easy for me to see his short-lived relationship with Casca as repression at work lol. Like saying she was the only person who could touch him back in the day, which was textually because she’s a woman (and also wrong bc Griffith also could) feels really suggestive of this to me. And of course the way their relationship screams rebound from their feelings for Griffith for both of them. And post eclipse, the only times he thinks of Casca sexually are when Griffith is also somehow involved, a la
And of course the entire Beast of Darkness debacle.
But yeah sexualities aside, since I mean it still could go either way from gay to bi, so w/e, that’s a really good point about Griffith being the only person in the manga who’s given Guts what he’s so desperately wanted – ie affection and attention and respect from someone Guts respects. It’s Griffith who he wants to look at him. Not Casca, not any of his rpg group or any of the other Hawks, just Griffith. It’s Griffith whose respect he feels like he needs to earn, no one else’s. It’s Griffith who he needs to feel equal to, no one else. It’s Griffith who he’s been obsessed with, no one else.
It’s why their relationship is still so extra lol, it’s shown as singular in the story, whether Miura meant that to be sexual or not.
So yeah idk, good comment basically, I just wanted to ramble on the subject lol.
thank you v much for the link! I encourage ppl to buy the thing if they have the means, etc, but w/e this is handy.
Here’s the page:
@madchen you wanted a clear image and it doesn’t get clearer than this
I’m gonna block you, which is why I capped this message instead of responding directly, but I do actually want to take a sec and answer your questions first lol, because hey it’s an excuse to talk about this shit, responding to these basic attempts at takedowns can occasionally be useful as validation for other shippers lol, and the first one is actually kinda worth discussing.
first question
Guts and Griffith both ended up opening up to Casca about their respective traumas because she happened to be there at a point when they were both particularly vulnerable.
Guts didn’t sit down with Casca and consciously decide to tell her his life story, Guts had a violent flashback during sex, strangled Casca, and then rambled about his childhood in a daze while hardly even noticing she was in front of him until she touched him and he jumped and realized what he’d just said and done.
If he’d been hitting Griffith from behind instead of Casca the exact same thing probably would’ve happened.
And if Guts had been around back then and happened upon Griffith in the river after seeing him with Gennon the previous night, the exact same thing probably would’ve happened then too, give or take Guts’ response to the “am I dirty” question.
And neither of these dudes would’ve brought these subjects up without a catalyst to anyone, including each other. Griffith because he’s repressed about it, and Guts because it wouldn’t even occur to him as something worth sharing until he’s mid-flashback.
And Griffith did have an equivalent conversation with Guts, when he asked, “do you think that I’m cruel?” That also had a catalyst, ie, they just carried out some assassinations together, but it was just as vulnerable and intimate a question as Griffith’s “am I dirty?” to Casca.
So basically the answer is: just because Guts has never had a flashback in front of Griffith doesn’t mean he’s not comfortable with him.
second question
well for a start, here are a few:
Also the entirety of the Count’s backstory in chapter 7. And a bunch of panels I skipped because I’m lazy and I’ve already posted a million collections of Gay Berserk Moments.
third question
he hasn’t chosen to sleep with a man bc a) trauma, b) he doesn’t even consciously recognize his own feelings for griffith, his subconscious beast of darkness is the one telling him he’s longing for him etc, c) even if he did figure it out during the golden age he doesn’t think he’s worthy of griffith lol there’s a whole arc about that, d) he’s only had sex twice in his life give him a chance, e) most relevantly, he’s the protagonist of a story in a seinen mag written by and for presumably hetero men.
When guts invites casca to go with him he doesnt have a dream yet at that point, he was just chillin at godo’s the whole year training, when he invites casca to go with him, he invites her to the journey of searching a purpose to live. They could search for that dream… together.. at least that’s what i think
yk that does sound pretty nice and a lot more inspiring and romantic, but guts invites casca after a long monologue explaining that he found his dream – fighting stronger and stronger enemies and becoming the best.
and moreover, this is how he invites her (after, i want to add, grabbing her tit while she’s yelling at him, but I don’t want to post an image of that bc it’s awful):
you should come with me as long as you don’t get in the way of what i want to do, because i want to have more sex.
@madchen said:
i literally just went
to see if i could finally see griffiths dick and confirm my Dick
Headcanons but i can barely see anything… this is misogyny and
homophobia against me specifically somehow
i think they drew it at 2 different sizes anyway lol it looks like a shower in the first cap (as far as u can tell w/ the shitty quality lol) and a grower in the 2nd
this is what happens when your character ref sheets aren’t anatomically correct
tbh I think it might be a visual nod to how Casca was the leader of the Hawks. There was a strong emphasis on her role as the leader during the Eclipse, when Judeau was determined to save her, and to Guts she largely represents his three years of happiness with the Hawks now. She’s kind of set up as the representative of the Band 1.0, and the dress fits that.
This is a thread I like so maybe I’m overemphasizing it, but imo it would be nice if it was picked up again, and now’s the time to do it.
(or yk maybe it’s bc Danann genuinely wants to set her and Guts up and she knows Guts has a thing for ethereal figures dressed in white with wing motifs lmao.)
speaking of slan, yk for me most of her eclipse entrance is too ott to be sexy but ngl these are the hottest 2 panels in berserk:
even her tits look great and i hate how miura draws tits 90% of the time
There are two important parallels during the waterfall scene, when Guts and Casca fight, then fuck.
The first is this parallel to Guts and Griffith’s second duel.
Casca is the new leader of the Hawks, replacing Griffith’s role. She
challenges and fights Guts when he returns, in a mirror of Griffith
challenging and fighting him before he leaves. Then she falls to her
knees and has a self-destructive
breakdown. The last time the leader of the Hawks had a breakdown after
fighting him, Guts walked away. The scenario has presented itself again,
and this time Guts makes a different choice, one that might have
changed everything a year ago: he comforts her.
Sex with Casca is Guts subconsciously (from a character perspective) or symbolically (from a narrative perspective) trying to fix past mistakes, imo.
Throughout the fight by the waterfall, Casca is screaming at him that he broke Griffith by leaving, that it’s his fault. This scene is all about Griffith and their feelings towards him. For Guts, it’s the beginning of his eventual revelation that leaving was a mistake because Griffith didn’t look down on him after all – because Griffith’s “no good without” him.
The fact that Guts lets Casca stab him as she screams this tells us that her words hit home and he feels guilty, even as he denies it. It’s a pattern of behaviour for Guts that we’ve seen before and will see again, eg, when he let the zombie child stab him in the second chapter because he blamed himself for her death, and then denied feeling responsible to Puck afterwards (”If you’re always worried about crushing the ants beneath you… you won’t be able to walk.”)
He represses that guilt and doesn’t manage to acknowledge his mistake until about five minutes before the Eclipse, unfortunately, but this is how we know he feels it regardless, and this is how we know it’s informing his choices now – specifically, his choice to comfort, kiss, and have sex with Casca.
Guts’ denial of guilt while clearly feeling it is reminiscent of another character too:
This is the second parallel, to Casca finding Griffith in the river.
Casca eventually yanks her sword out of Guts, admits to him that she’s romantically in love with Griffith, proceeds to list all the ways Griffith is wholly unavailable (he needs to marry Charlotte, Guts took the place she wanted at Griffith’s side, and now he may not even be alive), bequeaths Griffith to Guts, and tries to kill herself. Griffith Griffith Griffith – the lead-in to sex revolves around him. Guts thinking about how he abandoned him in the snow, Casca thinking about how Griffith doesn’t need her, and Guts beginning to realize that Griffith needed him.
So Guts saves her from her suicide attempt, then comforts her through sex.
And Casca does the same in return:
She couldn’t comfort Griffith, she couldn’t be Griffith’s “woman,” she couldn’t be be something indispensable to Griffith’s dream, but she can comfort Guts, she can have sex with Guts, she can help Guts achieve his dream.
The situations requiring her comfort are even v similar – Guts has just had a flashback to his rape, and Griffith was calling himself “unclean” after selling himself to a pedophilic rapist. Griffith buries his feelings and refuses to be comforted, but Guts pours his heart out to Casca and lets her hold him.
My point is that Guts and Casca having sex is not about the other for either of them – it’s about their respective relationships to Griffith. Guts is presented with a similar scenario to the morning he left the Hawks, and after being told by Casca that he fucked up then and broke Griffith, he chooses a different course of action this time, and comforts and has sex with Casca. Casca is presented with a similar scenario to finding Griffith in the river after Gennon, but instead of being shut out she’s able to comfort the man in emotional turmoil this time.
tl;dr they’re both on the rebound from Griffith here, giving to each other what they didn’t or couldn’t give to him, and there are deliberate visual and situational parallels to illustrate this.
This is what I have thought for years. Casca and Guts whole “relationship” came about because they are in love with the same man. Griffith. Every time they are together conversation turns towards Griffith and lets face it they were both most likely thinking of Griffith during the sex.
Btw I want to say thank you for this post.
In a fandom as vitriol as most of Berserk’s western “fans” are they don’t allow for any kind of insight or discussion like this. But when I read things like this post it reminds me that I wasn’t just fucking seeing things because I swear certain types of people had me believing I was crazy.(I guess that is what those people wanted me to think).
It is posts like yours that make me want to get right back into everything that I love about Berserk.
Edit: Oh yeah I just remembered the all these talk about scars
and how the beast say that Guts basically only holding on to Casca because she is the scar Griffith give him.
Kind of like all the scars Guts indirectly gave Griffith due to his time in torture.
A nice reminder of how Guts subconscious won’t let him forget and how he really doesn’t want to let go of Griffith.
Also Guts looks fucking board after he and Casca had sex
Not to mention he out right lies here
Because
and with Griffith
There is no shoving away or telling him to not to touch him (like with Casca).
So Guts is really forgetful about whose touch it is he didn’t mind or unless you know he is projecting on to Casca that he is talking/being with someone else, a particular someone else.
Oh man I know what you mean. I’ve written so much about my interpretation of Berserk by now and sometimes the rest of the fandom still makes me wonder if I’m just seeing things or making things up. That’s one reason it’s important to find like-minded people imo, especially in a fandom that can be as hostile as this one.
Luckily I’ve managed to find a good place on tumblr where I don’t really have to deal with the majority of the fandom that hates griffith and griffguts lol.
And ty for the addition! That point about the scars and the Beast of Darkness referring to Casca as the wound Griffith left him, like damn I never thought of that but holy shit it’s perfect and fits into that scar discussion between Guts and Casca like a puzzle piece.
And lol yeah, I’m not sure whether that’s Guts fudging the details or Miura conveniently forgetting that moment with Griffith, but either way Guts’ statement that Casca was the only one who could touch him is demonstratably false.
ALSO can I just say “I don’t know what’s ahead. Whether bein with you will get in the way of what I want to do… or the opposite… I can’t tell now.”
Well what Guts wants to do is fight stronger and stronger enemies, like Wyald. He’s been thinking about fighting monsters since he left and decided he was sore about losing to Zodd.
And then he does get to fight a monster, and this is what happens when Casca’s with him:
so like, you’re telling me they would’ve lived happily ever after pursuing Guts’ monster-fighting dream together if Griffith turned out to be fine and fit to lead the Hawks after all?
Bc this is directly telling me that Guts would see Casca as a liability to that dream and Casca would probably stop supporting it pretty quickly if Guts kept on going the way he’s going.
I think there’s a strong argument to be made that, rather than being
depicted as burgeoning true love ruined by the Eclipse for the
sake of extra tragedy, Guts and Casca getting together is depicted as a mistake from the start.
Let’s look at Guts’ conversation with Judeau, where he seems to consider the possibility of Casca as a romantic interest for the first time.
“The one who has her eye… is Griffith. That’s why… right now… I’m no good for her… like this.”
I see two possible ways of interpreting this statement. Either the narrative and Guts just reframed Guts entire raison d’etre, his whole motivation for leaving and the reason he wants to be Griffith’s equal, thanks to a few leading statements from Judeau, or Guts is framing a potential relationship with Casca as another step on the journey of becoming Griffith’s equal.
The former defies belief. We just spent 22 chapters knowing exactly why Guts wants to leave and become Griffith’s equal. There’s no mystery there, there’s no detail left to be uncovered. Suddenly doing a 180 and saying actually, he wants to leave so he can be worthy of Casca, even though he never considered Casca a romantic possibility until approximately 30 seconds earlier, would just be impossibly bad writing from an otherwise extremely solid story.
But the latter, well, that fits right in.
After they have sex, Casca symbolically becomes Guts’ sword instead of Griffith’s:
To Casca, Guts is a more open, emotionally available replacement for Griffith, as I’ve discussed in detail in this post. Guts is in fact coming closer to his goal of becoming Griffith’s equal by sleeping with Casca, because after this Casca begins to transfer her obsession with Griffith and his dream to him.
And Casca isn’t an endgame for Guts. She’s not the goal, she’s not the motivation – she’s an addition to his overarching desire to have Griffith see him as an equal. He still plans to leave to continue fighting stronger and stronger enemies after they hook up. He invites her along – just so long as she doesn’t get in the way of his more important dream:
Non-committally inviting her along mollifies her, but it doesn’t address her point lol – he’s still selfishly prioritizing his dream. She’s become support for that, just the way she supported Griffith’s dream as his “sword.” Eventually that is exactly what leads to everything crashing down around them – Casca telling Guts to leave, because his dream is all-important.
And while we then leave Guts and Casca on a sweet moment where they kiss, that very same page shifts to pure ominousness to end both the chapter and Guts and Casca’s newly changed relationship on:
Cue snake man walking around and the Behelit floating down a river on its way to a date with Griffith.
And then the next chapter returns us to Griffith, a year since the last time we saw him, and his monologue about how his feelings for Guts are so strong and bright they make even the dream fade into dullness.
Guts is trying to “unbind” himself from Griffith. In his dream speech to Casca he says he can’t stay with the Hawks because he refuses to ever swing his sword in service to another again. And Casca tells Guts that she can’t continue defending the almost broken dream of someone who may not even be alive. Both he and Casca are trying to move on from Griffith in their own ways, and they try to do this through a connection with each other.
But the thing is, if you’re writing the kind of relationship triangle where two people help each other get over a third, if you want it to really feel satisfying and right, wouldn’t you want to establish that they both should be getting over Griffith, and that a relationship with each other is a more positive step for them?
The problem is that Guts’ whole thing, his whole desire to leave to become Griffith’s equal, is motivated by wanting to be closer to Griffith lol. He wants to be someone Griffith can call a friend. And it’s based on a falsehood: he thinks Griffith looks down on him.
When this is how Griffith feels about him:
Guts trying to unbind himself from Griffith doesn’t feel satisfying when we’re immediately reminded through a passionate monologue that Griffith is just as bound to Guts as Guts is to him, and that Guts only wants to become independent of Griffith because he doesn’t know that.
As for Casca, her obsession with Griffith came at the expense of
herself. Spending a year fighting for Griffith’s dream
and leading the Hawks while he was in a dungeon drove her to the point
of suicide.
But her encounter here with Guts doesn’t solve any of
that, she just transfers her obsession and her dedication to someone
else’s dream to Guts, as we see clearly through that sword metaphor,
through the parallels I linked to earlier, and through Casca telling
Guts he has to leave because his dream is the most important thing.
Casca trying to get over Griffith and move on doesn’t feel satisfying when she immediately falls into the same self-destructive patterns with a new person at the centre of her obsession.
Guts and Casca’s romance has
its postive aspects – Guts opens up to her about his childhood trauma,
eg, and is comforted. But there’s
dissonance beneath the surface. They have sex right after Guts let Casca
stab him because a part of him realized she was right about Griffith needing him. Casca had just tried to kill herself after telling Guts that Griffith doesn’t need her, as though she can only live in relation to someone else. In
deciding to leave the Hawks together, Guts continues suppressing his
eventual revelation that leaving in the first place was a mistake.
And
Guts recalls
Gambino giving him medicine – the one act of kindness from him which
Guts latches onto to help him deny the rest of Gambino’s abuse – while Casca is compared to a sword, which to me seems like a strong, not all that positive statement on their relationship: it doesn’t fix their underlying issues, it doesn’t change anything, it just helps them live in denial of those issues – Casca’s lack of independence, Guts’ dream being a mistake*** – for a while longer.
Basically, rather than moving forward and truly healing with each other, they’re revisiting the past, repeating negative patterns, maintaining denial, and essentially, well, licking wounds.
And by trying to move on from
Griffith by taking solace in each other, they only add to Guts’ original
mistake, which is failing to realize that there was no reason for him to move on in the first
place. Guts couldn’t stand the thought of Griffith looking down on him,
but this is who he is to Griffith, as we are told immediately before and
after he has sex with Casca:
And this is when Guts finally acknowledges his mistake, about 10 seconds after Griffith overheard Casca telling him to leave:
We know that Miura didn’t
intend Guts and Casca to get together from the start, let alone for it
to be a grand true love style romance. He’s said that he hooked them up
for the sake of more Eclipse drama. And I think that the way he framed
their relationship, from its placement in the narrative to the details of the scene itself to the way it goes hand in hand with Guts’ dream, makes it feel like it’s contributing to the series of unfortunate fuck ups that lead to the Eclipse, rather than just being an incidental casualty of it.
It’s a mistake the
way Miura writes mistakes – not obviously so, with no ill intent or
obviously misguided motives behind it. Their relationship isn’t meant to
be unpleasant, it’s shown as sweet and maybe not epic, maybe not
lasting, but overall more positive than negative for them. But so was
Guts’ year long sabbatical, and we’ve seen how much he regrets that:
In Berserk characters can make the wrong decisions despite having the best of intentions, despite some good coming out of those decisions, despite doing the best they can based on what they know. And I think Guts and Casca’s relationship is shown to be one of them.
*** I think both Casca’s lack of independence and Guts’ focus on his own dream of fighting stronger and stronger enemies are at least in part poor coping mechanisms for their respective childhood traumas, which makes the sword and medicine metaphors even more apt. But to get fully into that would take its own post, and it’s not necessary to my point here, so this is just a minor aside lol.
The way Miura wrote the story I’d say Guts is by far the stronger and more relatable character. Unfortunately Casca really gets the “the token chick” treatment where her whole story and all her issues and half her personality is about being a woman surrounded by men, and written by a dude, so yk, I don’t blame anyone for being unable to relate to her lol, and personal preference is whatever, so it’s not like you should have to like her just because you’re a girl.
And I definitely agree that Casca should develop on her own, away from Guts. The way she jumped straight from being overinvested in Griffith and his dream to being overinvested in Guts and his dream was pretty fucked up imo, and a sign that she needs to get independent.
But I’d have to disagree with you about their respective feelings, because while I think they both felt genuine affection for the other, neither of them felt genuine love, and I’d say even moreso than Casca did, Guts consistently prioritized/s Griffith over her.
cut for length
Rather than staying and supporting her he still wants to go out to become Griffith’s equal, and this is how he invites her along when Casca is outraged by his priorities:
which is pretty far from romantic or commital lol.
While Casca is jealous of Charlotte during the rescue, Guts’ reaction is basically, well that kinda sucks but lbr I got it even worse than she does so it’s not like I can blame her:
When they find Griffith this is the next thing he says to Casca:
During the Eclipse this is what Guts does when he sees the Band, including Casca, about to be eaten by monsters:
And of course after the Eclipse he dumps her in a cave for two years to pursue Griffith/continue pursuing his dream of fighting stronger and stronger opponents and therefore being Griffith’s friend/equal, once again prioritizing Griffith:
When he finally does end up sticking with her to take her to Elfhelm, this is how he makes that decision:
This is what he’s thinking about when he starts off on his journey:
and of course i’d be remiss if i didn’t mention how Griffith grabbing Guts’ attention away from rescuing Casca is framed:
AND then there’s the whole Beast of Darkness fiasco.
And even when they’re on the boat, he’s still planning to run back to Griffith once his sidequest with Casca is over:
Idk basically I would argue that Guts is by far shittier to Casca than Casca is to Guts, and neither are genuinely all that invested in their potential relationship. It’s a rebound for both, an attempt to get over Griffith that doesn’t work for either, but in fairness to Casca she tried, and even when she decided to stay with Griffith she told Guts to leave because she was prioritizing his stupid dream lol, while Guts’ investment in becoming worthy of being Griffith’s friend had him refusing to stay and suggesting Casca come with him only insofar as she doesn’t fuck up his dream from the very start.
There are two important parallels during the waterfall scene, when Guts and Casca fight, then fuck.
The first is this parallel to Guts and Griffith’s second duel.
Casca is the new leader of the Hawks, replacing Griffith’s role. She
challenges and fights Guts when he returns, in a mirror of Griffith
challenging and fighting him before he leaves. Then she falls to her
knees and has a self-destructive
breakdown. The last time the leader of the Hawks had a breakdown after
fighting him, Guts walked away. The scenario has presented itself again,
and this time Guts makes a different choice, one that might have
changed everything a year ago: he comforts her.
Sex with Casca is Guts subconsciously (from a character perspective) or symbolically (from a narrative perspectie) trying to fix past mistakes, imo.
Throughout the fight by the waterfall, Casca is screaming at him that he broke Griffith by leaving, that it’s his fault. This scene is all about Griffith and their feelings towards him. For Guts, it’s the beginning of his eventual revelation that leaving was a mistake because Griffith didn’t look down on him after all – because Griffith’s “no good without” him.
The fact that Guts lets Casca stab him as she screams this tells us that her words hit home and he feels guilty, even as he denies it. It’s a pattern of behaviour for Guts that we’ve seen before and will see again, eg, when he let the zombie child stab him in the second chapter because he blamed himself for her death, and then denied feeling responsible to Puck afterwards (”If you’re always worried about crushing the ants beneath you… you won’t be able to walk.”)
He represses that guilt and doesn’t manage to acknowledge his mistake until about five minutes before the Eclipse, unfortunately, but this is how we know he feels it regardless, and this is how we know it’s informing his choices now – specifically, his choice to comfort, kiss, and have sex with Casca.
Guts’ denial of guilt while clearly feeling it is reminiscent of another character too:
This is the second parallel, to Casca finding Griffith in the river.
Casca eventually yanks her sword out of Guts, admits to him that she’s romantically in love with Griffith, proceeds to list all the ways Griffith is wholly unavailable (he needs to marry Charlotte, Guts took the place she wanted at Griffith’s side, and now he may not even be alive), bequeaths Griffith to Guts, and tries to kill herself. Griffith Griffith Griffith – the lead-in to sex revolves around him. Guts thinking about how he abandoned him in the snow, Casca thinking about how Griffith doesn’t need her, and Guts beginning to realize that Griffith needed him.
So Guts saves her from her suicide attempt, then comforts her through sex.
And Casca does the same in return:
She couldn’t comfort Griffith, she couldn’t be Griffith’s “woman,” she couldn’t be be something indispensible to Griffith’s dream, but she can comfort Guts, she can have sex with Guts, she can help Guts achieve his dream.
The situations requiring her comfort are even v similar – Guts has just had a flashback to his rape, and Griffith was calling himself “unclean” after selling himself to a pedophilic rapist. Griffith buries his feelings and refuses to be comforted, but Guts pours his heart out to Casca and lets her hold him.
My point is that Guts and Casca having sex is not about the other for either of them – it’s about their respective relationships to Griffith. Guts is presented with a similar scenario to the morning he left the Hawks, and after being told by Casca that he fucked up then and broke Griffith, he chooses a different course of action this time, and comforts and has sex with Casca. Casca is presented with a similar scenario to finding Griffith in the river after Gennon, but instead of being shut out she’s able to comfort the man in emotional turmoil this time.
tl;dr they’re both on the rebound from Griffith here, giving to each other what they didn’t or couldn’t give to him, and there are deliberate visual and situational parallels to illustrate this.
There are two important parallels during the waterfall scene, when Guts and Casca fight, then fuck.
The first is this parallel to Guts and Griffith’s second duel.
Casca is the new leader of the Hawks, taking over Griffith’s role. She
challenges and fights Guts when he returns, in a mirror of Griffith
challenging and fighting him before he leaves. Then she falls to her
knees and has a self-destructive
breakdown. The last time the leader of the Hawks had a breakdown after
fighting him, Guts walked away. The scenario has presented itself again,
and this time Guts makes a different choice, one that might have
changed everything a year ago: he comforts her.
Sex with Casca is Guts subconsciously (from a character perspective) or symbolically (from a narrative perspective) trying to fix past mistakes, imo.
Throughout the fight by the waterfall, Casca is screaming at him that he broke Griffith by leaving, that it’s his fault. This scene is all about Griffith and their feelings towards him. For Guts, it’s the beginning of his eventual revelation that leaving was a mistake because Griffith didn’t look down on him after all – because Griffith’s “no good without” him.
The fact that Guts lets Casca stab him as she screams this tells us that her words hit home and he feels guilty, even as he denies it. It’s a pattern of behaviour for Guts that we’ve seen before and will see again, eg, when he let the zombie child stab him in the second chapter because he blamed himself for her death, and then denied feeling responsible to Puck afterwards (”If you’re always worried about crushing the ants beneath you… you won’t be able to walk.”)
He represses that guilt and doesn’t manage to acknowledge his mistake until about five minutes before the Eclipse, unfortunately, but this is how we know he feels it regardless, and this is how we know it’s informing his choices now – specifically, his choice to comfort, kiss, and have sex with Casca.
Guts’ denial of guilt while clearly feeling it is reminiscent of another character too:
This is the second parallel, to Casca finding Griffith in the river.
Casca eventually yanks her sword out of Guts, admits to him that she’s romantically in love with Griffith, proceeds to list all the ways Griffith is wholly unavailable (he needs to marry Charlotte, Guts took the place she wanted at Griffith’s side, and now he may not even be alive), bequeaths Griffith to Guts, and tries to kill herself. Griffith Griffith Griffith – the lead-in to sex revolves around him. Guts thinking about how he abandoned him in the snow, Casca thinking about how Griffith doesn’t need her, and Guts beginning to realize that Griffith needed him.
So Guts saves her from her suicide attempt, then comforts her through sex.
And Casca does the same in return:
She couldn’t comfort Griffith, she couldn’t be Griffith’s “woman,” she couldn’t be be something indispensable to Griffith’s dream, but she can comfort Guts, she can have sex with Guts, she can help Guts achieve his dream.
The situations requiring her comfort are even v similar – Guts has just had a flashback to his rape, and Griffith was calling himself “unclean” after selling himself to a pedophilic rapist. Griffith buries his feelings and refuses to be comforted, but Guts pours his heart out to Casca and lets her hold him.
My point is that Guts and Casca having sex is not about the other for either of them – it’s about their respective relationships to Griffith. Guts is presented with a similar scenario to the morning he left the Hawks, and after being told by Casca that he fucked up then and broke Griffith, he chooses a different course of action this time, and comforts and has sex with Casca. Casca is presented with a similar scenario to finding Griffith in the river after Gennon, but instead of being shut out she’s able to comfort the man in emotional turmoil this time.
tl;dr they’re both on the rebound from Griffith here, giving to each other what they didn’t or couldn’t give to him, and there are deliberate visual and situational parallels to illustrate this.
@phydia63 I agree that Casca would be sex repulsed. I don’t want her to have sex again either, that wouldn’t be right. I’m just saying that she wouldn’t be terrified of men, and that she would be happy to see Guts again. If she ever tries to have sex again, Miura should do what he’s been doing for her and what he did for Guts: Have her freak out at the bad memories and stop the act from happening.
Edit: If Casca was going to be afraid of men, she wouldn’t have had sex with Guts in the first place after the multiple times people try to rape her in the Golden Age.
The Beast of Darkness is a part of Guts, but you have to keep in mind that Guts was already unstable. And by that I mean up until he met Griffith, Casca, and the others, he was a violent person and couldn’t trust others for a lot of good reasons. So being betrayed by someone he thought he could trust, AGAIN (referencing Gambino here), losing the girl he loved, then fighting and losing to Griffith on the Hill of Swords gives a very good reason for the Beast of Darkness to exist.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not to trying to apologize for Guts biting Casca, but my point is that he was already fucked up and getting possessed after failing to kill Griffith creates more forgivable circumstances than if Guts had just seen Casca naked and attempted to rape her.
That’s the main issue I have when people cite Guts “assaulting” Casca as a reason they shouldn’t be together/try to argue that Guts is a terrible person. They twist it into something its not and fail to grasp the deeper meaning of the situation.
“Griffguts shippers are nasty and trivialize rape but heres a bunch of paragraphs why guts and casca NEED TO FUCK even tho he assaulted her twice. He wasnt in his right mind so its forgivable, much unlike when griffith was physically and mentally tortured for a solid year and then psychically manipulated by the devil”
Literally the second line is me saying they should haven’t sex
right right, sorry i used vague wording. in my friendgroup “fuck” is a word that refers to any kind of romantic or sexual attachment between people. what you really said is that casca should be happy to see a man who pinned her down and forced himself on her twice when she was at the weakest shed ever been. if casca doesnt enjoy the company of a man who abandoned her in a cave for two years and then tied her up and dragged her around like a dog when he did return it just wont make senze
I just got done arguing with someone that he doesn’t pin her down and attempt (emphasis on attempt) to rape her because Guts is a rapist.
Guts was under the influence of the Beast, which was brought about by him getting possessed by Demons. Read the whole argument here.
And as far as the cave goes, what was he supposed to do? Casca was insane and branded, and the Skull Knight told him that as long as the sun was down, Demons would be coming for them. The only logical thing to do was put her in a safe place where she wouldn’t get attacked by demons while she couldn’t defend herself.
I don’t know why I’m arguing with you. You’re yet another one of those people who thinks that Guts almost (emphasis on almost) raping Casca while he’s inner beast goads him for failing to kill Griffith and immediately feeling guilt for almost (emphasis on almost) forcing himself on her is the same thing as him sadistically raping her for the sheer pleasure of it.
Getting real tired of waking up to see people trying to start shit on my dash.
Guts sexually assaulted Casca. Say it’s not as bad as Femto sexually assaulting her all you want, create a big scale of totally-excusable to horrific incidences of fictional rape if you want, the fact remains that Guts sexually assaulted her and now she’s afraid of him, and that’s the case regardless of what Femto did, so I don’t know why you insist on comparing them to try to justify Guts’ actions.
Also what Guts was “supposed to do,” which was pointed out to him by Godo and Erica and Rickert, was stay with Casca in the cave and turn it into a home, and deal with his feelings instead of going on a pointless rampage of revenge.
I’m glad you linked that post you wrote because I don’t want to reblog it to refute it, since I don’t put images of sexual assault on my blog without a readmore. So, refution for the linked post:
You are wrong. Between Guts’ brief possession when he strangles Casca and the sexual assault, time has passed. There’s a montage and everything while he drags Casca around from fight to fight.
When Guts does assault Casca, it’s broad daylight, not a ghost in sight, and he is not possessed by a damn thing.
The
brief possession is not a prelude to another possession, the purpose it serves is to show us how weak Guts
is growing in willpower and resolve (Puck is pretty much narrating this
fact for us), which leads to him giving in to his own worst instincts
later on. Additionally, Guts himself questions whether he was really compelled to do something he didn’t want to do.
The visuals indicate that he was possessed, but his own doubt indicates
that he doubts himself, that he thinks he himself is capable of harming
Casca regardless – which fits nicely with the flash of the Beast we see in the
possession scene. It’s a perfect, straight forward set-up for Guts’ own internal weakness and
inability to keep his own darkness at bay during the assault scene in the following chapter.
I see you’ve acknowledged that the Beast of Darkness is part of Guts in other posts, so I’m not sure why you keep insisting that being under its influence absolves Guts lol – it literally means he’s giving in to his own worst instincts. You posted the picture of Guts-as-the-Beast assaulting her like it means it wasn’t Guts, while acknowledging elsewhere that the Beast IS part of Guts, so what do you think that image proves exactly? It’s symbolic of what’s going on in Guts’ mind as he pins Casca down, forcibly kisses her (right after a gangrape attempt), and bites her tit.
Also
lmao at phrasing it as “Guts is trying to rescue her from insanity.”
The narrative ominously foreshadows that it’s less a rescue and more
Guts forcing her to confront trauma before she’s ready, knowing
full-well that he’s doing what he himself wants, not necessarily what
she wants:
So consider that before asserting that Guts is a clear cut white knight only doing what’s best for Casca.
(incidentally
pointing out that Guts isn’t constantly trying to rape her and even
averted his eyes from her tits and therefore he never could assault her
is the most bizarre logic I’ve ever seen, and if you take that to its
logical conclusion then Griffith/Femto couldn’t possibly rape Casca bc he saved her
from rape once. So maybe check your own ridiculous arguments before
throwing out insults next time.)
@phydia63 bc you tagged me in the first post that got drama attached to it and this is in part a response to some of it lol. and there wasn’t really much i could add to your first response anyway 🙂
The whole point of this post and the one I linked was refuting people who say “Guts raped Casca”. That didn’t happen. The only reason the Beast of Darkness was able to influence his thoughts more than usual is because of the Incubis in this scene:
Giving him nightmares of killing Casca. Then he immediately refuses the thought:
Yes, you are correct that when he assaults her there aren’t any demons in sight and it’s midday, but an external demon isn’t always the source of turmoil. The Beast of Darkness, from as early on as the Lost Children arc, before Farnese captures Guts, is trying to convince Guts to go rabbid and kill everyone and everything in an an attempt to get to Griffith.
Maybe you thought I mean a demon was possessing him during the day, but that’s not what I meant. Guts has had trouble with the Beast influencing him for a very long time, and after the fight with Griffith and the hill of swords encounter, it’s more understandable to see why Guts acts the way he does.
That’s not the same as defending him. Obviously he needs to come clean with Casca if she can’t remember what happened. But it’s hard to see the Beast as a part of Guts when Guts is adamantly horrified by what he almost (emphasis on almost because most people think that he did rape her) did. I’m pretty sure I brought this up before, but the Beast is a direct result of the events of the eclipse. It’s a symptom of Guts’ trauma, the violent, angry part of him that has always existed given form by demons and encouraging him to become demon himself.
Yes, you are also right when citing Godo telling Guts to have saved Casca by staying with her and making it a home instead of leaving her behind. I will admit that what I said was wrong, at least in part.
But Guts has also been very emotional and hasn’t ever thought things through. He left the original Band of the Hawk because he didn’t want to be trapped in Griffith’s dream, even though he was content and happy there. He calls himself stupid for doing so, in fact.
He’s not a genius, and he’s never had a real family or anyone to show him how to help others. He did what he did best, which was leave and kill things. It’s kind of stupid to assume that Guts would do the smart thing when he’s consistently done dumb things over the course of the manga. After all, in battle he’s not some master tactician, he just goes in with brute strength and a large sword, trading blows with the demons.
THE WHOLE POINT OF THESE POSTS IS THIS:
People are taking what happened, massively oversimplifying it and turning it into a situation that just simply didn’t happen, and then trying to insist that they are right when they are getting the events of the story wrong. I didn’t say anywhere that Guts was a white knight (more than once in this thread I’ve been bringing up Guts’ flaws).
I’m sick of people, especially shippers, try and take the events that happened, ignore what happens in canon, then pretend that Guts is some evil serial rapist when that’s just not the case, at all.
I’m glad to finally meet someone who’s actually read the manga and had an intelligent argument.
The others you responded to have also read the manga, are very intelligent, and are probably just fatigued as fuck by this repetitive argument we see all the time in fandom and have no more energy to grace you with a decent argument when you’re the one picking fights.
I’m not fatigued because I usually manage to avoid these arguments lol, so here’s the thing: I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and rather than going back to evidence of this vs evidence of that in the manga, I’m just going to explain my perspective, in the hopes that you’ll understand where I (and possibly, though I can’t speak for them, others you’ve responded to) am coming from. But I have to go to work soon so this is probably going to be the end of my part in this conversation, just a heads up.
Guts has committed sexual assault twice. That’s just a fact. Note that sexual assault is not just penetrative rape, but also includes rape attempts and non-consensual non-penetrative sexual contact. To many of us it’s still extremely abhorrent, unsympathetic, and unforgiveable, and splitting hairs between penetrative rape and “pinned her down and forcibly kissed her right after she was sexually assaulted and bit her breast” is unnecessary, because in either case we don’t care to excuse the perpetrator’s actions.
Were Guts’ actions as bad as Femto’s, or any number of other characters who have committed sexual assault? I honestly don’t really give a fuck, I still hold Guts responsible for his actions (as the Beast of Darkness is part of him and essentially a metaphor for Guts lashing out due to trauma), and consider him a non-viable romantic partner for Casca because of them, and that is a perfectly reasonable opinion as far as I’m concerned. No one is obligated to forgive anyone, let alone a fictional character lol, and he doesn’t need anyone to go to bat for him when people express disgust with some of the events in Berserk, because he’s not real.
My point here is to say who cares if people are simplifying it. Guts committed sexual assault, and no one is obligated to split hairs and try to justify it, excuse it, or sympathize with his regret.
The main reason I myself can still enjoy Berserk despite Miura’s unfortunate tendency to depict the darkness of humanity through sexual assault 9 times out of 10 is because I compartmentalize. I write it off as Miura’s big flaw, and therefore I’m fully capable of still enjoying Guts, and Griffith, as characters. I love Guts, flaws, idiocy, heroism, darkness and light and all, and I love the same in Griffith. But any potential romance between Guts and Casca now is something I would find immensely uncomfortable and would certainly detract from my enjoyment of Berserk, and that is also a perfectly reasonable opinion based on what we’re shown in the manga.
Incidentally this would also be the case if I thought a romance between NeoGriffith and Casca was at all a possibility. I feel like that should go without saying, but as you condemn people for liking Griffith yet not excusing Guts, I feel like it’s worth mentioning. I don’t excuse either of Casca’s assailants, I don’t ship her with either of them, but I still like them both as characters, because they are still both interesting and mostly well-written characters, and there’s no contradiction there. I don’t have to excuse or justify Guts’ actions or Griffith’s actions to continue to enjoy them as characters, because they are fictional.
It seems clear to me that we’re coming at this from very different perspectives and ways of relating to media, reasons for liking characters, and particularly the way rape/assault is depicted in media, and we’re probably not going to come to an agreement here.
But I’d like to ask you to consider that everyone has their own perspectives on fiction, how they read and relate to it, and there’s nothing contradictory about not shipping G/C because of sexual assault yet still enjoying Guts as a character, or Guts and Griffith as characters or even as a ship. It’s fiction, we take what we can enjoy from it and leave the rest. If fictional sexual assault was an automatic deal-breaker for enjoying characters most of us wouldn’t be Berserk fans at all – we don’t need to forgive Guts’ actions, we can just enjoy the elements of the story we like despite them.
Finally, I just want to point out that ime most non Guts/Casca fans wouldn’t ship G/C anyway due to a number of factors, but tend to point out the sexual assault when others call them immoral, or rape apologists, etc for liking Griffith or shipping Guts/Griffith. G/C shippers don’t have a higher horse here, is the point, and splitting hairs to argue that Guts’ actions should be forgiven while saying that anyone who likes Griffith is a rape apologist is somewhat hypocritical.
(ps I do want to make clear that wrt Guts’ possession, the fact that you brought it up as a partial reason for his later assault on Casca made me assume you meant he was at least somewhat possessed in both instances (the second time by the Beast), and I have seen lots of other people argue that, so my bad there. Though I do think the possession was a symptom of his lack of resolve and inability to control his own inner darkness, not a cause of it.)
you're the only one 