This chapter end with the words 'Till next time'
I don't like that at all
This chapter end with the words 'Till next time'
I don't like that at all
!
Oh my fucking god, that's one of the most precious smiles in the world.
I need insulin.
Do people cosplay Berserk characters regularly at cons? Cause if not then nobody is gonna make that Casca cosplay sadly.
From what I know they don't cosplay them often, but a dress like that is almost a challenge to the cosplayers out there. It's the kind of beautiful fairy princess (literally) dress that girls love to wear at least once in their life.
I would prefer her to hold a wand anyday than holding that behelit Guts has been carrying all along.
P.S:By the way last time we saw Caska in a maidan's dress was at the victory celebration of Doldrey win, which should be way back in 1990 or about that time.:happy:
Good lord! I wasn't even an itch in my dad's pants in 1990, and Miura's still chugging along with this, all this time.
Well folks, you wanted Eclipse imagery, here you go. That spread with Guts and the faces of the eclipse behind him more than made up for the airy-faery approach taken in the dream sequence.
Looking forward to seeing Casca go through a total mental breakdown as she comes to terms with what happened :ninja:
Well folks, you wanted Eclipse imagery, here you go. That spread with Guts and the faces of the eclipse behind him more than made up for the airy-faery approach taken in the dream sequence.
Looking forward to seeing Casca go through a total mental breakdown as she comes to terms with what happened :ninja:
Caska will have to cope with the pain.Perhaps she will resent Guts for curing her for a time.But eventually Miura will let her to come in terms with the reality.But what her final resolution will be is open for speculations.I still believe Guts is carrying that Behelit for Caska.I am pretty sure Miura won't demonise her, but i can't imagine what the purpose that Behelit will serve.
Ugh, why did I have to get into Berserk seriously when this happens and we got on haitus.
I don't know if it was posted before in this thread and it was a very old interview, still for those who never read it-a very insightful(albeit a bit superficial with surprising honesty) peek to Miura's world.
https://mangabrog.wordpress.com/2015/12/14/berserk-artist-kentaro-miura-interview-i-actually-dont-think-i-could-let-such-a-long-grim-story-end-with-a-grim-ending/
That was so completely fascinating.
Ugh, why did I have to get into Berserk seriously when this happens and we got on haitus.
Lol That would have been the case whenever you got into it. Its always on break.
Just imagine starting on it 20 years ago shortly after the anime came out.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
I don't know if it was posted before in this thread and it was a very old interview, still for those who never read it-a very insightful(albeit a bit superficial with surprising honesty) peek to Miura's world.
https://mangabrog.wordpress.com/2015/12/14/berserk-artist-kentaro-miura-interview-i-actually-dont-think-i-could-let-such-a-long-grim-story-end-with-a-grim-ending/
Gah. Tthat light thin font against a white background is hurting my eyes. Zooming in helps.
Yeah, fascinating stuff. Especially that Muira is drawn in as Pippin.
If true,it made my long burdensome day….
Is April 11 not just double April fool's day
You tellin me people interpreted an editors note at the end of a chapter wrong?:ninja:
You tellin me people interpreted an editors note at the end of a chapter wrong?:ninja:
It was no hiatus announcement just 'till next time'
It was no hiatus announcement just 'till next time'
I know, and yet a lot of folks said omg that means another hiatus. xD
It was a fair assumption.Since when in running,Berserk chapters generally end with specific date(of the magazine issue).
Early chapter: https://imgur.com/gallery/lGA2A01
Not what we expected
I mean it was really pretty, but my God do I not care about Griffith's army.
Yeah i don't care about his army right now.
I dont know why I even care to look at the raws anymore.
Not what we were expecting, but to be honest until a few days ago we weren't expecting anything so I won't complain.
… who am I kidding, I would gladly interrupt anything for more of Griffith :ninja:
Damn you Miura!
Welp, see you in a few years, Guts-ka.
I saw some joking around saying that Miura was going on another idol hiatus for a year and left us with that chapter, that woulda been some top tier trolling. Though I'm starting to feel convinced he doesn't actually have a goal for this story and just uses it as an outlet to draw cool things sometimes.
I Though I'm starting to feel convinced he doesn't actually have a goal for this story and just uses it as an outlet to draw cool things sometimes.
It has been like that since the last ten years. He has nothing to tell anymore.
I saw some joking around saying that Miura was going on another idol hiatus for a year and left us with that chapter, that woulda been some top tier trolling. Though I'm starting to feel convinced he doesn't actually have a goal for this story and just uses it as an outlet to draw cool things sometimes.
It has been like that since the last ten years. He has nothing to tell anymore.
I agree putting a mini-arc at this point of time is very hard on long time readers, but it's absolutely wrong that he has nothing to tell or he has no fixed objective.
Berserk,when read as a whole, always appear to be a very coherent story with minor interruption to the flows occasionally(like Wyald's or those troll's rapes,Miura had excessive rape fetishes at some points).But i never find any arc when completed being pointless or served no purposes to further the story.
Really, Miura.
Really.
I have seen plenty people making a joke that it would just cut to Griffith and it did, lol.
This cut away here is maybe the right choice for the actual finished story, for when it's finished in 20 years.
It's an awful audience trolling choice as a standalone chapter on this release schedule however.
Yeah definitely feels trollish now. I mean was it really needed to cut away instead of giving us just one chapter with Guts and Caska talking? And then he could cut away. Would it really change the story up so much? Only time will tell.
This cut away here is maybe the right choice for the actual finished story, for when it's finished in 20 years.
It's an awful audience trolling choice as a standalone chapter on this release schedule however.
Yeah. The transition from Caska's image of Griffith going to Griffith itself will probably look good in the volume.
Yeyyyyyyyyyyyyyy! We're back to focusing on the character, who hasn't had any real interesting character stuff since Golden age arc, instead of resolving one of the emotional core of the series and why Berserk was even worth a damn.
Since it ended with 'till next time'( just like previous chapter), i assume we will get another chapter in a month. If that happens, it will be first time since 2012 that 6 or more chapters of Berserk came out in a year.
I did a coloring from the newest chapter, thought I'd post it here.
Full size here: https://imgur.com/JOyFYTq
^
Very good job.
I'm curious to know when you all feel this story loses its stride. I've spent the last couple days reading it and I have mixed feelings. I'm on chapter 100, and he's lost me. I assume this was around the point when people started to lose interest (I've read online that the introduction of the monsters was really when it started to fumble).
I think so far the peak of the writing was in Guts and Casca's love making scene. It's definitely a depiction of sex I rarely see explored, and it was really poignant to have two characters with a history of sexual abuse redefine sex for themselves. These characters always had really great chemistry in my opinion and those couple of chapters were just beautiful. There's some really stand out imagery and shot composition too in those early chapters, but it seems to be shelved for now in favor of showing cool demons and action panels. I'm not at all interested in the action scenes, and I was really surprised by this. For such a renown action manga, I really do think the action is just totally boring to read. I felt that when the monsters were being introduced, they would frequently show up simply to stall character moments. I'm not the kind of guy who is blown away by intricate details in drawing. There seems to be a lot of thought put into the designs of these demonic characters but 99% of them are totally derivative and I can't care about them. The enormous panels showing sweeping vistas of "gross demon shit" is really lost on me. Maybe if it were a bit more subtle?
The most frustrated I'd been with the story was Guts fighting Rapeguy Horseface in the woods. Those were tremendously boring chapters, I hated the gratuitous Casca fan service, I hated that Casca in general just seemed to turn from "badass sword wizard leader" to "damsel in distress" on a dime, and the fight itself was just super lackluster. It was getting increasingly hard for me to care about the characters the more absurd the action got, because I didn't get the impression that it was tongue in cheek and it wasn't particularly fun to read. All the talk of dreams and ambition really get undercut by these JoJo levels of insanity sequences and the manga just hits this discordant note. Post Eclipse, I have no idea what the characters are fighting for anymore. I don't know why I should care at all.
I'm really bitter about the whole thing. What happened in the Eclipse was interesting but I really can't make out a coherent narrative. It's not a total mess, but it's messy. Should I even bother with the manga anymore or is it only going to get worse from here on out?
The Golden Age arc is definitely the peak of the series for self contained story, but yes, it's absolutely still good afterwards, though the author did flounder a bit with Black Knight guts as he was trying to balance and reconcile the character he created at the start of the series with the character he became during the flashback.
It gets better once the new cast starts coming in.
I'm really bitter about the whole thing.
You're supposed to be bitter after the eclipse. You're supposed to hate the new status quo and how much everything sucks and be angry that everyone is dead and that they're constantly hunted by demons and Caska is messed up and Guts is screwed up. It's supposed to be a bad time.
But it gets better.
I always felt there was a massive tone shift after the Golden Age arc, where the manga becomes more..well more like a traditional manga.
Still great, but more boilerplate after the big moment.
I'm curious to know when you all feel this story loses its stride. I've spent the last couple days reading it and I have mixed feelings. I'm on chapter 100, and he's lost me. I assume this was around the point when people started to lose interest (I've read online that the introduction of the monsters was really when it started to fumble).
I think so far the peak of the writing was in Guts and Casca's love making scene. It's definitely a depiction of sex I rarely see explored, and it was really poignant to have two characters with a history of sexual abuse redefine sex for themselves. These characters always had really great chemistry in my opinion and those couple of chapters were just beautiful. There's some really stand out imagery and shot composition too in those early chapters, but it seems to be shelved for now in favor of showing cool demons and action panels. I'm not at all interested in the action scenes, and I was really surprised by this. For such a renown action manga, I really do think the action is just totally boring to read. I felt that when the monsters were being introduced, they would frequently show up simply to stall character moments. I'm not the kind of guy who is blown away by intricate details in drawing. There seems to be a lot of thought put into the designs of these demonic characters but 99% of them are totally derivative and I can't care about them. The enormous panels showing sweeping vistas of "gross demon shit" is really lost on me. Maybe if it were a bit more subtle?
The most frustrated I'd been with the story was Guts fighting Rapeguy Horseface in the woods. Those were tremendously boring chapters, I hated the gratuitous Casca fan service, I hated that Casca in general just seemed to turn from "badass sword wizard leader" to "damsel in distress" on a dime, and the fight itself was just super lackluster. It was getting increasingly hard for me to care about the characters the more absurd the action got, because I didn't get the impression that it was tongue in cheek and it wasn't particularly fun to read. All the talk of dreams and ambition really get undercut by these JoJo levels of insanity sequences and the manga just hits this discordant note. Post Eclipse, I have no idea what the characters are fighting for anymore. I don't know why I should care at all.
I'm really bitter about the whole thing. What happened in the Eclipse was interesting but I really can't make out a coherent narrative. It's not a total mess, but it's messy. Should I even bother with the manga anymore or is it only going to get worse from here on out?
Catch up to the story. Some of your doubts( if not all) will be clear. For me people focus on Golden Age arc too much, particularly the ones who are not long time or that serious readers of Berserk. It is so great a arc that as a first time reader you may feel disappointed to the story once it cools down. But just as Robby said, when it goes down the line where new comrades start to join, you will get the enthusiasm back. There are some unnecessary things that kept cropping up, but they are very small. Overall the story remained as great as it was since the Golden Age arc.
Only downbeat being once you catch up, you have to wait forever to see the glimmer of ending.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
I always felt there was a massive tone shift after the Golden Age arc, where the manga becomes more..well more like a traditional manga.
Still great, but more boilerplate after the big moment.
Miura can't help it, since the main direction of the story was pretty much set at the end of the Eclipse. For the story to start at some point after the event and we get the Golden Age arc as a whole flashback seals it.
I feel after the Conviction Arc the series quickly loses steam. Ganishka was interesting but he was written out of the story far too quickly and not made to be a personal foe for Guts to have to deal with than just another annoying obstacle. Griffith has lost all character motivations since his transformation into Femto, having no real time to reconnect with his humanity. He may as well be a plank of wood with a wig on.
I'm curious to know when you all feel this story loses its stride. I've spent the last couple days reading it and I have mixed feelings. I'm on chapter 100, and he's lost me. I assume this was around the point when people started to lose interest (I've read online that the introduction of the monsters was really when it started to fumble).
I think so far the peak of the writing was in Guts and Casca's love making scene. It's definitely a depiction of sex I rarely see explored, and it was really poignant to have two characters with a history of sexual abuse redefine sex for themselves. These characters always had really great chemistry in my opinion and those couple of chapters were just beautiful. There's some really stand out imagery and shot composition too in those early chapters, but it seems to be shelved for now in favor of showing cool demons and action panels. I'm not at all interested in the action scenes, and I was really surprised by this. For such a renown action manga, I really do think the action is just totally boring to read. I felt that when the monsters were being introduced, they would frequently show up simply to stall character moments. I'm not the kind of guy who is blown away by intricate details in drawing. There seems to be a lot of thought put into the designs of these demonic characters but 99% of them are totally derivative and I can't care about them. The enormous panels showing sweeping vistas of "gross demon shit" is really lost on me. Maybe if it were a bit more subtle?
The most frustrated I'd been with the story was Guts fighting Rapeguy Horseface in the woods. Those were tremendously boring chapters, I hated the gratuitous Casca fan service, I hated that Casca in general just seemed to turn from "badass sword wizard leader" to "damsel in distress" on a dime, and the fight itself was just super lackluster. It was getting increasingly hard for me to care about the characters the more absurd the action got, because I didn't get the impression that it was tongue in cheek and it wasn't particularly fun to read. All the talk of dreams and ambition really get undercut by these JoJo levels of insanity sequences and the manga just hits this discordant note. Post Eclipse, I have no idea what the characters are fighting for anymore. I don't know why I should care at all.
I'm really bitter about the whole thing. What happened in the Eclipse was interesting but I really can't make out a coherent narrative. It's not a total mess, but it's messy. Should I even bother with the manga anymore or is it only going to get worse from here on out?
Think of the Golden Age as one super longass dark and gritty One Piece flashback focused on Guts' origins, and that only now is the story truly starting in the present day status-quo where Guts is trying to become the Pirate King find a way to kill Griffith. It hones in on his vengeance not just for superficial cool action, but to demonstrate how his lone wolf demon hunter obsession arguably makes him look more like a selfish beast than the actual demons he kills. It provides a premise for meaningful progress from this unhealthy lifestyle fueled by the Eclipse's trauma afterwards, where he's trying to erase/escape from that pain rather than cope with it while supporting the people he cares about like Casca.
Do you remember when Guts was at the lowest point of his life where he only lived for survival and killing after killing Gambino but before meeting the Band of the Hawk? How he only lived off of accepting random bounties to kill people for cash? He's basically bacl at that low point. And like back then, he needs to see the consequences of his selfishness and meet new allies to help pull him out of that hole again. Remind him that there's more to living life than just fighting and sleeping.
Give the series more time to reestablish itself than only a measly five-six chapters after the less than 100 chapter long Golden Age arc. The short arc you're reading right now is meant to be similar to the very first arc right before the Golden Age to reestablish Guts' state of mind post-Eclipse, which you most likely totally forgot about (hence why Miura wanted to remind us) after all of the Elf demon stuff is done, then the series' themes and gradually growing cast/worldbuilding start to get rolling dynamically again.
I'm curious to know when you all feel this story loses its stride. I've spent the last couple days reading it and I have mixed feelings.
Hmm well, I dunno, I mean it may not have the sharpness it used to, but on the other hand it still
I'm on chapter 100
ahahahaha what the fuck, not only is that ridiculous, but how do you expect people to have this conversation with you when the people itt are up to date. You're talking like you're anywhere near caught up.
Christ the Elf arc is short and you quickly get oriented more right after it. Just be patient fer crying out loud.
Post Eclipse, I have no idea what the characters are fighting for anymore. I don't know why I should care at all.
1. You don't have a "they". You have Gutts, it's the simplest point in the whole series. Unless you count Puck, you're just following Gutts.
2. He's fighting because of the Eclipse lol. He's seeking revenge against the Apostles and Griffith. The only way you can't care about this is if you don't care about the Eclipse.
Also your disregard for creepy demon stuff is strange, this is a dark fantasy series with a heavy flavor of medieval horror. This is like complaining about a Castlevania game having lots of candles. If that doesn't interest you it really isn't the manga's fault.
I'm really bitter about the whole thing. What happened in the Eclipse was interesting but I really can't make out a coherent narrative. It's not a total mess, but it's messy.
-So ok there's this dude, and he was part of a club for cool soldiers dudes. And they were his friends, and one was his lover.
-But then the leader of the club fed all of those guys to demons to become a devil god. Our main dude survived, and his lover too but she went insane.
-So now he's angry and a little insane himself and seeking revenge. And he roams the land killing those same demons and trying to find a way to also kill his former club leader.
How is this messy.
@Count:
Think of the Golden Age as one super longass dark and gritty One Piece flashback focused on Guts' origins, and that only now is the story truly starting in the present day status-quo where Guts is trying to
become the Pirate Kingfind a way to kill Griffith. It hones in on his vengeance not just for superficial cool action, but to demonstrate how his lone wolf demon hunter obsession arguably makes him look more like a selfish beast than the actual demons he kills. It provides a premise for meaningful progress from this unhealthy lifestyle fueled by the Eclipse's trauma afterwards, where he's trying to erase/escape from that pain rather than cope with it while supporting the people he cares about like Casca.Do you remember when Guts was at the lowest point of his life where he only lived for survival and killing after killing Gambino but before meeting the Band of the Hawk? How he only lived off of accepting random bounties to kill people for cash? He's basically bacl at that low point. And like back then, he needs to see the consequences of his selfishness and meet new allies to help pull him out of that hole again. Remind him that there's more to living life than just fighting and sleeping.
Give the series more time to reestablish itself than only a measly five-six chapters after the less than 100 chapter long Golden Age arc. The short arc you're reading right now is meant to be similar to the very first arc right before the Golden Age to reestablish Guts' state of mind post-Eclipse, which you most likely totally forgot about (hence why Miura wanted to remind us) after all of the Elf demon stuff is done, then the series' themes and gradually growing cast/worldbuilding start to get rolling dynamically again.
Yeah I actually appreciated the feeling that everything up to this point was a super long flashback. Alright, that's cool then. I don't think I was actually going to drop the series or anything, but I wanted to vent the current frustration that I was having with it. The earlier chapters focused a lot on ambition, personal motivation, self-preservation, self-worth, and how different dreams could detract or even snuff out other's. Casca's character (and Griffith's too, I'm guessing) arc are stuck in limbo… I think it's important for the manga to portray where Guts is right now as not the right road, but it has been leaning heavily on some manga tropes that seem to celebrate his new "badass" direction as a character (gun hand, new sword/outfit, new thirst for blood) when it's a severe backpedal from where he was prior. I appreciate the response.
@Monkey:
how do you expect people to have this conversation with you when the people itt are up to date. You're talking like you're anywhere near caught up.
lol I don't mean to sound like I'm caught up. I'm obviously not even 1/3rd through the story - but this is a Berserk discussion thread and I just got finished with the first major arc so I'm here to discuss it. I could rush to the very end and discuss it but that would frankly be a big disservice to me as the reader.
We're happy to discuss, we were just a little shocked at your response to only 100 chapters in.
I hated the gratuitous Casca fan service, I hated that Casca in general just seemed to turn from "badass sword wizard leader" to "damsel in distress" on a dime, and the fight itself was just super lackluster. It was getting increasingly hard for me to care about the characters the more absurd the action got, because I didn't get the impression that it was tongue in cheek and it wasn't particularly fun to read. All the talk of dreams and ambition really get undercut by these JoJo levels of insanity sequences and the manga just hits this discordant note. Post Eclipse, I have no idea what the characters are fighting for anymore. I don't know why I should care at all.
That's the tragedy of it. All that stuff early post-Eclipse is all about tragedy. Big. Fucking. Tragedy. Shakespearean levels.
And all long series have their ups and downs in terms of narrative. Anybody who reads One Piece can agree with this.
Yeah I actually appreciated the feeling that everything up to this point was a super long flashback. Alright, that's cool then. I don't think I was actually going to drop the series or anything, but I wanted to vent the current frustration that I was having with it. The earlier chapters focused a lot on ambition, personal motivation, self-preservation, self-worth, and how different dreams could detract or even snuff out other's. Casca's character (and Griffith's too, I'm guessing) arc are stuck in limbo… I think it's important for the manga to portray where Guts is right now as not the right road, but it has been leaning heavily on some manga tropes that seem to celebrate his new "badass" direction as a character (gun hand, new sword/outfit, new thirst for blood) when it's a severe backpedal from where he was prior. I appreciate the response.
Gutts is going to have a talking to soon enough, with a character you've already met, that lays any idea of dark revenge Gutts as megasupercool right flat on its ass.
You will appreciate it very much by the sound of things.
It's funny because Muira started with that Guts in the first couple volumes and he was totally generic supercool badass Conan style guy…. and then he gave him an actual personality in the flashback and grew as a writer, and by the time he got back to that point six years later, clearly his values as a writer had changed a lot.
Are we so sure Gutts wasn't always intended to be more complex?
Reread the Count storyline and there's lots of little details suggesting the coming depth, namely the subtext that big bad cool manly man far from being above the ugly little toady cripple man, is actually seeing a complete and total reflection of himself in Vargas.
And then of course the whole thing ends with him secretly crying a bit about the Theresa affair.
I also don't think the Black Swordsman isn't cool. He is. But that's in a very specific way, and one that is ultimately dangerous. There's a crazy appeal to the madman after revenge, but of course everything said by NAME REDACTED in that bedside scene is 100% true as hell.
Gutts whole character ever since has been him resisting the temptation to give in to that addictive attractive madness.
Maybe Muira always had an inkling of what was there, sure, but it's hard to judge because the Golden Age flashback is just SO long and in depth. and such a chance in tone and even sort of genre from the first three volumes. It's difficult to see any writer, especially a new one, in serialized format, starting with a year long version of a thing and then intentionally leaving that behind and completely changing tone for the next six years before getting back to it.
That just doesn't ring quite true as a pacing decision anyone would make ahead of time. Maybe in a novel format, but not in an ongoing serial. That's the sort of thing that happens organically as you go rather than by plan.
I can totally see having a master plan, and knowing that the revenge arc is going to be the real focus of the whole thing, that you have to start with some inkling of that and frontload that Guts is eventually going to get messed up, and so you can't just start from when Guts is born…. but the time spent on both sections makes that ring untrue. I really think he just started developing as a writer when he got into the meat of the flashback and by the time he got back to modern Guts, he'd grown as a character, and so the old version no longer quite fit.
Similarly, given that the series has gone for nearly 30 years, Muira has matured a bit more and the series has changed dramatically for some time now. Very little shock value graphic mutilation, horror or nudity rape anymore. Natural organic growth and change.
I disagree with that framing though. Modern Gutts is neither the Black Swordsman or Golden Age Gutts. He's basically the sum of both of them
You make it sound like Miura had to quickly clean up and dust away the archaic early Gutts stuff with the Retribution material, but that really isn't what he did or has done.
That side of Gutts still exists, and has continually existed since he mellowed out a bit. It even gained a literal symbolic form first in the Beast, and then in the Berserker Armor.
To put it more simply, modern Gutts doesn't exist without either old Gutts. Golden Age Gutts had to become the Black Swordsman before becoming modern Gutts. It makes story sense.
Do you think Golden Age Gutts is similar to modern? Go back and you'll see how much more a swaggering smiling bro he was with the Hawks.
Modern Gutts is at his most mellow right now, and even then he's clearly in a head cloud of melancholy almost constantly.
Also I'm not saying he had it super planned out, but that the idea of a deeper Gutts was always there. And that Miura never intended to just make a shallow barbarian man manga.
The exact nature of that depth and character? Yeah, probably not figured out ahead of time.
But at most you could convince me that the first two chapters had Miura just writing a nasty barbarian dude character. Sure. But by the Count storyline that's plainly not the case.