Chainsaw Man is Deeper than you think

in writing a door can represent many different things a door could be the unknown physically obscuring whatever's behind it infinite possibility because anything could be on the other side the past somewhere a character has already passed through possibly closed and locked to be forgotten the future the next step in a character's journey a door could represent ignorance limiting a character's worldview to the contents of the room that it's attached to but it could also be opportunity after all we've all heard the saying i can open the door for you but you have to pass through and the door can represent choice because ultimately it is up to that character whether or not they choose to go through in chainsaw man the door represents all of these things [Music] a devil sits in a graveyard awaiting a group of people approaching him he addresses the woman in front and asks her a simple question in the perfect world she's trying to create will bad movies still exist she replies that she believes the world would be better without them and he decides that if that's the case he's going to have to kill her listen but i like the room too but don't you think that's an overreaction i fed up with his world [Music] the group attack him and he's able to hold his own relatively well that is until the woman joins in after which she's quickly overwhelmed she reaches into his chest and rips out his heart he's lost and been defeated but how did we get here [Music] chainsaw man is a manga written by tatsuki fujimoto that first began serialization in weekly shonen jump on december 3rd 2018. now i read just about everything that shonen jump releases and that means i read a lot of garbage there's about 30 percent of jumps catalog that is heavy hitter series that draw in the readers the other 70 is mediocre or just straight up bad now since i do read so much bad manga i feel a great sense of pride in being able to say that i have read a good series since its first chapter released i'm able to say this of dr stone kaiju number eight and chainsaw man and let me tell you when i read that first chapter i knew i had something special on my hands from story to characters to art direction there is very little the chainsaw man doesn't do right but where it really truly excels is in the usage of subtle writing fujimoto has a very show don't tell approach to manga creation which really takes advantage of the strengths of his chosen medium and more than anything he loves to read things up to the reader's interpretation while also providing them enough context to not get confused it leads to a manga that is on the surface just another shonen manga but underneath the hood there's so much more going on our protagonist is a kid named denji who starts off in shall we say not the best place i mean we're just skipping the whole apparent dying in the first chapter thing his parents are already dead denji's father took his own life before paying off a massive debt to the yakuza and the yakuza who were not known for being nice straight up american healthcare system that [ __ ] and passed it off to his next of kin you don't have free healthcare do you so now denji does anything and everything he can to pay off the yakuza including selling his own organs although his primary means of making money is by hunting devils with his dog or should i call him a raw chicken pochita all things considered though denji has a pretty good attitude about it all he's not the kind of guy who constantly mopes about how [ __ ] his life is he just kind of accepts that this is how it is right now and does what he can to get by that being said he does wish for more dengi dreams of things that for you or me are the bare minimum or the very least easily attainable he wants to eat decent food like sliced bread with jam on it and hug a girl well okay maybe the last one is so easily attainable for all of us listen i know exactly what demographic watches my videos don't worry guys we'll get there eventually maybe now since this is manga things can't stay well i was going to say good but things can't stay horrible for long the yakuza come picked ng up for a devil hunting gig but it's a trap they actually allied themselves with a devil that just kind of turned them all into zombies then it lured dengian so it could kill him and that's it he's dead no really they [ __ ] chopped him up and tossed him in a dumpster very classic yakuza what do you want me to say he's dead end of video really strong manga a bit short but i like it as a concept would have liked to see it fleshed out so i should probably explain the whole devil thing huh devils are monsters that threaten humans in the world of chainsaw man each of these devils is based on human objects and concepts so for example if there's a tomato there's a tomato devil if there's a chainsaw there's a chainsaw devil if there are zombies well there aren't zombies but the fictional idea of zombies is one that is well understood by most people thanks to the wealth the media created surrounding the subject so since the idea of zombies exists there is a zombie devil with the power to create zombies basically in the world of chainsaw man fiction writers are complete [ __ ] [ __ ] because they are actively creating more monsters for people to deal with jim starlin what you doing back there buddy no don't you do it no don't oh you son you bastard you did you bastard that was a thanos devil running around somewhere what were you thinking devil hunters are people who get paid to kill devils although the average strength of a devil is much higher than that of a humans so in order to fight back many of these devil hunters form contracts with devils in order to utilize a part of their power at a cost so for example being able to use the ghost devil's arm by giving it one of your eyes so i'm sure you have two questions right off the bat number one why if devils threaten humans would they ally themselves with one and number two why would they ever have to honor the terms of said contract well to answer that first question the world of chainsaw man is not as black and white as devil's bad humans good there are good or at least not evil devils who will ally themselves with humans just as there are bad humans who will abuse their power and second the word contract carries a lot of weight with devils if a devil enters into a contract with a human the terms of that contract must be met absolutely by both parties if one of them fails to hold her under the deal they'll die you're gonna want a good double contract lawyer hi i'm saul goodman did you know that you have rights you're not a real lawyer when denji first met pochita he was injured in bleeding denji recognizing that devils can regenerate if they drink blood offered to form a contract to pochita in exchange for his blood pochita had to save him and that's how their unlikely partnership that developed into a proper friendship began now that denji has died pochita appears before him in a dream he tells zenji he always loved hearing him talk about his dreams and yes he can talk now but cheetah form is another contract with genji pochita will give denji his heart and in exchange denji has to show pochita his dreams have you ever had a dream that that you um you had you you could you do what's going on with you what are you talking about you could do so you sound insane this contract gives dengi a very unique power so unique in fact that at this point in the story it doesn't even have a name we're gonna call it a hybrid like i said before most devil hunters can only use a part of a devil's power at a cost however because of their union denji gains all of the powers of the chainsaw devil at no actual cost he even gains the ability to regenerate by drinking blood which effectively makes him immortal with this newfound power denji immediately enacts his revenge by killing the zombie devil and all the yakuza in the aftermath public safety devil hunters arrive on the scene the woman in front ascertains that denji is not a devil because he smells neither human nor devil and we'll further elaborate in the next chapter that he has two cents one human and one devil clearly she's contracted with the shnoz devil this is makima and she's a public safety devil hunter public safety is a government-sanctioned organization of devil hunters even though he's not exactly a devil makima can't leave him be so she offers him a choice he can either be killed or become her pet and work at public safety he chooses the latter do you want to die today yeah i'm all right i'm in work here you don't want to die today i don't know are you sure yeah makima is a very interesting character she gives off a very kind almost motherly persona on their surface literally feeding clothing and providing shelter for denji and he quickly becomes infatuated with this side of her but she can also be incredibly cruel it may have seemed like awkward wording when makima offered to make denji her pet but she doubles down by literally referring to him as a dog and threatening to euthanize him if he fails to follow orders what a nice lady makima can be an open book but she's not always truthful and you always get the feeling that she knows exactly what's about to happen and just isn't letting anyone else in on that information even when it might save somebody denji definitely picks up on these more negative aspects of her personality but he's able to look past them because at the end of the day makima has something that he wants a real setup with donkeys packing some nova and hankeros massive the hookah bankaloos you want to know why denji is the most relatable protagonist in all of shonen manga it's because 80 of his motivation comes from his adolescent sexual desire tell me you can't relate to that i [ __ ] dare you i am being a little facetious here but legitimately speaking denji's progression of what he desires throughout the story is one of its strongest aspects in chapter one denji wanted to hug a girl well great he got that but now that he has that it's time for something more now he wants to touch a girl's boobs every time denji attains something he desires he realizes there's something more that he could want and starts chasing after that instead sometimes then he gets what he wants only to find out that it isn't exactly what he expected and it makes him question whether or not he should have wanted it in the first place anybody can relate to that kind of dilemma the story of chainsaw man is the story of denji figuring out what it is he truly wants and going for it but we're not there yet right now denji wants boobah and that means he'll do whatever makima wants but before we can get to some good old workplace harassment denji has to deal with some workplace harassment remarks such as you can't teach an old dog new tricks can be considered harassment excuse me this is akihakawa and he's benji's new supervisor these two don't get along so badly in fact that before they can even have a proper conversation aki beats denji up aki tells denji that anybody who gets into public safety for shallow reasons ends up dead so he should just quit now this seems cruel at first but let's not jump to conclusions remember subtlety is the word of the day aki is a foil for denji you can tell right away in their first panel together aki has really good posture suggesting that he's a very serious person compared to denji's slouched over form the immaculate state that his uniform is in also suggests that he's a very by-the-books kind of guy compared to denji whose shirt is barely tucked in and his sleeves are rolled up on a more abstract note aki is depicted in mostly dark colors representative of his experience whereas denji is depicted in mostly light colors representative of his innocence and naivete aki is the opposite of denji in nearly every regard his entire family was killed by a devil before his eyes so he views them as an absolute evil that needs to be stomped out this contrasts heavily with denji who harbors no hatred for devils and has even expressed a willingness to befriend them aki's desire to get revenge for his family is what fuels his conviction so he views denji's goal of attaining basic survival needs and being close to makima as laughable at best no life nerd who's never gotten [ __ ] before in his entire life that being said if aki didn't care about denji wouldn't he just leave him to get killed by a devil instead he's taking the time and energy to try to scare denji off before he can get hurt it's a rough approach but aki means what he says when he tells then he's trying to help him aki has no respect for denji but that doesn't mean he wants him to die this is the kind of character that aki is rough around the edges but good at heart but aki made one mistake he mistook shallow goals for shallow conviction [Applause] let's talk about relativity it's gonna be a recurring theme if a complete stranger walked up to you on the street and gave you 100 that would be a big deal you could put it into your savings maybe pay off some of your debt maybe buy something nice that you've been wanting however if that same person gave 100 to jeff bezos it would be an understatement to say that that 100 would make absolutely no difference it would be like tossing a single gold coin into scrooge mcduck's vault but why is that that 100 is worth the exact same amount whether or not it's in your hands or jeff's isn't it technically yes however the amount of wealth each of you had before that 100 was added effectively changes what it's worth and that's relativity basically i'm calling you poor aki thinks that denji's goals are shallow because for him a good meal and a warm bed are easily attainable almost a given however denji has been living in extreme poverty until just before this moment so for him a good meal and a warm bed are luxuries that he's willing to fight to protect their goals may be vastly different on a surface level but because of how each of them values those goals their conviction to attain them is the same also aki likes mahima too and he doesn't like denji for that boys will be boys am i right and just because life isn't fair denji lives with aki now just look how upset he is haragi now like i said earlier aki is denji's new supervisor so they're not going to be working together directly all the time and just like every cop needs a partner every devil hunter needs a buddy what's going on this is power and if you can believe it she's even more of a loose cannon than denji you can tell right away by her boisterous intro and the frankly pathetic state that her uniform is in i mean denzi's shirt was never tucked in well but she's not even trying and she rolls up her pant legs that has to be against dress code power is a fiend which means she's a devil that took over a human corpse fiends differ from hybrids in that the original human's personality is essentially overwritten by the devil they retain all of their devil power but they are weaker than when they were a full-fledged devil their regeneration is also weaker if dengi lost an arm he could regenerate it by drinking blood but if a fiend lost an arm they would just lose that arm really the only benefit to a double taking over a dead body is that it can save their life in a pinch but enough about what she is who is power well power's energetic violent greedy selfish manipulative a liar and i love her pairing denji up with a character like power is nothing short of genius because she is so unhinged that she forces denji to be the voice of reason denji the guy who's only willing to work with her because you guessed it she's got boobs just look at aki look at this poor man i imagine right now he's reconsidering every mistake he's ever made that led him here so let's see aki introduced himself by beating denji up so how can power top that that's it kill him power had a cat named nyako and no i'm not calling them meowing translators out there please don't translate names i get what you're trying to do you're trying to preserve the pun in the name but it rarely translates well plus it just creates confusion and conversations people have read different translations and all of a sudden you've got one side of the eye talking about neko mamushi and the other side talking about [ __ ] cat viper just don't do it sonyako was kidnapped by a devil power offers to let denji touch her chest if he rescues nyako and that is all denji needs to hear i i love how denji goes from completely disinterested in helping her to a white knight cat lover the moment boobs are on the table i don't know if i mentioned it yet but chainsaw man is hilarious unfortunately for denji it was a trap power didn't need denji's help she needed a human to offer to the bat devil so he'd give back nyakko unfortunately the bat devil is an [ __ ] and just bores nyako anyway quickly followed by power as denji lays there bleeding out he recalls a time when he lost pochita and how scared and afraid he was he then questions how power must have felt when nyako is kidnapped and more than anything he still wants to touch your tits this scene really shows how dengy can be a very empathetic person yes on the surface he's just doing this because of their agreement but he also realized while bleeding out that power didn't necessarily have malicious intent she just wanted her pet back he would have done the same thing in her shoes so then she kills the bat devil and rescues power and nyako good thing old bats doesn't chew his food huh in the aftermath denji doesn't push any blame onto power and again on the surface it may seem like he's just trying to protect his chance at booba but in reality denji just doesn't harbor any resentment for power because he was able to sympathize with her and power lives with them now too because aki just cannot catch a break when denji came to live with aki aki was annoyed by all his living habits now that powers come to live with them they're both annoyed by her habits how did you do that fujimoto how did you write a character like denji and then write another character who's somehow even worse she doesn't bathe regularly for god's sake tell me she isn't best girl i [ __ ] dare you but then she's willing to forgive this behavior too because the time has come they had an agreement and power's ready to honor it [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] it wasn't what denji was expecting he viewed this simple act as something so unattainable yet so desirable that he eventually worked it up into something that it could never be his expectations soared to such heights that he viewed the act of touching boobs as something forever life altering and no matter what it could never live up to that expectation i'm sure we've all felt this kind of disappointment before and it's very disheartening it really throws him for a loop though because this is the first time he's ever been so wholeheartedly let down it makes him question whether or not he's going to be let down again in the future who knows such a horny guy could finally touch boobs and then fall into a deep depression see there's character depth here guys i told you makima notices that denji is feeling a little off and after explaining himself she decides to do something about it as a more experienced individual she explains to denji that she believes such intimate acts feel better the more you know your partner that he should learn what her hands feel like how her ears are shaped what her bite feels like and then [Applause] [Music] [Applause] this is what energy was looking for this is tense big booba moment lads but just like my dealer tells me every day ecstasy doesn't come for free now that makima has his attention she has a request for him i'll remind you that devils are based on words in the human vernacular what i haven't mentioned yet is that a devil's strength is based on how feared that word is so again if there are tomatoes there's a tomato devil but a tomato devil would not be particularly powerful because tomatoes aren't something that's traditionally feared however blood on the other hand does make a lot of people uncomfortable blood can also bring to mind these situations in which blood might be present such as violent scenes or tragedies so as the blood devils fiend power is very powerful no pun intended it's worth pointing out that this concept only affects a devil's base strength it doesn't account for something like their actual skill with their own abilities it's not some cheap power level concept so fujimoto can avoid writing powerful enemies we're not gonna have a situation where denji meets an enemy and they're like aha chainsaw man you are very powerful indeed though you are the chainsaw devil i suppose however you stand no chance against me for i am the five nights at freddy's devil [Laughter] makima wants denzi to kill the gun devil i don't think i have to stop and explain that yeah the gun devil is pretty [ __ ] powerful but just in case he needs able to help you sleep tonight when the gun devil first appeared it hit eight different locations across the world in the span of five minutes in that time it killed 1.2 million people the gun devil is the one that killed aki's family and the one that he seeks to get revenge on most of the world is hunting for the gun devil makima wants denji to kill it and if he can she'll grant any wish he desires and yeah that motivates him plenty it's pretty obvious that makima is manipulating denji here she's abusing his overactive sexual desire to fulfill one of her goals but even if denji wasn't too stupid to notice i don't really think he'd care this is a golden opportunity in his mind he's not giving that up if i haven't made it abundantly clear already chainsaw man has incredible character writing so much so that it actually made it harder to write this video there are so many little character interactions so many little moments that hold so much importance that if i were to stop and talk about every single one we'd be here for 12 hours and i don't think anybody wants that or maybe you do you guys are weird i read a book once called manga in theory and in practice by hirohiko oraki the mangaka behind jojo's bizarre adventure in it he spoke about his process for creating characters which for him involves writing a character history that character history covers basic information about a character such as their name their age their likes their dislikes but it also covers information that may not ever actually be relevant in the story such as what kind of music they listen to who they look up to when they were born there's two reasons that he does this the first is so that he can kind of come up with a mental image of what that character looks like before designing them and the second is so that he can ensure that when that character is placed into any given situation there won't be inconsistencies with how they would react to it i believe that fujimoto has to write characters with a very similar process because all of his characters are just so authentic we've spoken before about how it's important to write characters that can exist outside of their given role in a story otherwise they risk failing to be a character at all and this is something that fujimoto excels at he writes characters that have believable ambitions that react in believable ways and most important of all they don't exist to simply service a role within the main plot it's shocking how few writers can manage that last part to show you what i'm talking about let's take a look at our next character this is he meno she's eccentric but kind she's flirty she cares a lot about the people she works with but she can be a bit of a bad influence she openly touts how awesome it is to have an addiction and she's the one who got aki to start smoking she's aki's buddy and has been since he started with public safety she also has a massive crush on aki she cares about him more than anyone else and is constantly trying to get him to quit public safety and give up on killing the gun devil when denji first meets himeno they get trapped by a devil with no escape that is until the devil offers them a contract if they kill denji they can all go free it's not clear why the devil wants denji in particular but it has something to do with him being the chainsaw hybrid the rest of the team who's going a bit stir crazy is all for this idea including power but he-man are against it that is until aki's safety gets called into question after which point ximeno immediately joins team kill denji the idea of losing aki makes ximena completely fall apart it all works out in the end though because denji goes full psycho mode and kills the devil after the battle ximena arranges for everybody to get drinks so they can apologize to denji during which she gets super drunk and gives him a big ol sloppy kiss and by sloppy i of course mean she throws up in his mouth oh denji is over two on first experiences but why would he menno kiss denji if she likes aki well as anyone who's ever had an anime girl profile picture will someday learn being horny and being in love are very different things then she takes him back to her place and tries to [ __ ] him but denji rejects her advances huh what that's right character development denji has had two disappointing firsts already he's realized that taking the most available option is not always the best choice and knowing that he's decided to save himself for makima what a romantic in the morning ximena apologizes and offers to help denji out she'll help benji get together with makima if denji will help her get together with aki and this is the start of a beautiful friendship ximena becomes a bit of a mentor for denji helping him navigate through life she also helps denji recognize that aki isn't such a bad guy and helps him to find some common ground [Music] i made that last part up ximena gets shot and killed in the very next chapter all of that character writing all that relationship development fujimoto wrote a character that complete just to kill them 12 chapters later this is an important lesson many characters in chainsaw man are important but they won't all survive so who killed ximenel this guy he's part of a much larger concentrated effort to take out all of the public safety special division devil hunters in one fell swoop including makima she's okay he also specifically mentions that the gun devil wants chainsaw's heart ah that's cute gun devil has a crush aki attacks the man with his fox devil but it's not enough oh yeah we got another hybrid on our hands this guy is the katana devil and he beats the absolute [ __ ] out of aki and denji power's okay she ran away it's pretty clear that this guy is way more skilled with his hybrid abilities than denji because denji is completely overwhelmed lucky for him he's got a guardian angel so here's the deal after getting shot in the head makima stood back up and killed her attackers then she collected a bunch of inmates at a temple and one by one had each of them say the name of one of the people attacking denji which allows her to [ __ ] squish them like a grape then the inmate also dies if you can tell me what devil she could possibly be contracted with that allows her to do that you win a screenshot of an nft worth one million dollars katana man is forced to retreat without taking denji you know how i mentioned how makima always seems to know what's about to happen well following this mass assassination all the special divisions are condensed into one under mahima's control and she seems eerily pleased by that news when confronted directly and asked if she knew this was going to happen she completely deflects the question [Music] [Music] aki and denji react very differently to himeno's death aki is distraught jimeno was his friend in many ways his mentor aki cares about protecting everybody but jimena was especially important to him i'm sure it's painful for him to realize that ximena probably wouldn't have died if he'd agreed to quit public safety with her it's even more heart-wrenching to see him realize that she only ever wanted to quit public safety for his sake ximeno represented a door for aki another option in life another path an opportunity for him to give up on his revenge and live a more peaceful safe life but now that she's dead there's absolutely no reason for him to go down that path so that door has closed denji on the other hand kinda doesn't care in fact the strongest emotion that ximena's death evokes in him is a fear that he's lost his human heart because he doesn't care we've seen denji be empathetic before so why isn't he bothered by this this battle made two things clear the enemy is targeting denji and denji is a weak little soy boy so makima arranges to have power and deji trained this is kishibe he's the strongest public safety devil hunter he's a grizzled old drunk who would be played perfectly by mads mikkelsen in a live-action chainsaw man please don't make a live-action chainsaw man kishime trained jimeno and he holds a belief about devil hunters that he touts like a catchphrase the devil hunters that the devils fear most are the ones with a few screws loose he believes that any sane person would be afraid of hunting devils and since devils grow stronger through fear the strongest hunters are the ones who are too insane to fear them so if you can't tell already since he's the strongest public safety devil hunter kishime ain't all there himself so how is he gonna train power and denji that's it kill them over and over again once again i have to point out how brilliant it is to pair up denji and power they realize that kishime is too strong to beat in a head-on fight so get this these two absolute morons these two [ __ ] idiots who have a collective iq of 43 decide that if they want to beat him they have to outsmart him just just look at these two they actually think that putting on glasses makes them smarter i love these two dunces with all of my heart anyway it doesn't work but kishime does praise them because it's more effective than just charging in blindly which is their usual fighting style it's proof that they have gotten stronger to some extent aki's means of getting stronger is to form a contract with a stronger devil he manages to strike a deal with the future devil and a pretty good one at that he gains the ability to see slightly into the future by having the future devil live in his eye the future devil tells him that he's going to die in the worst possible way and it wants to see that for itself now that everybody's had a little power up it's rematch time and special division 4 has some new members on its ranks to even the odds we've got beam the shark fiend who is just just wonderful we like beam in this house galgaly the violence fiend the spider devil who is creepy and the angel devil who is aki's new buddy kobeni is also there she was already there but i haven't had a chance to talk about her she's really strong but she's all unbelievably timid that she doesn't end up doing anything most of the time she's really good at peeing her pants but come on we all know what we're here for chainsaw versus katana round two and is it finally time for me to talk about the art direction oh i have been dying to talk about this tataki fujimoto has a very unique art style that utilizes a lot of rough sketchy lines this works really well with the very messy designs that he comes up with for devils he has an incredible ability to convey action scenes with the katana fight being one of my personal favorites there's such a clear flow from one panel to the next so you never get lost in what's happening and there's an incredible sense of impact when characters clash together he loves to utilize really over-the-top automotive characters in action scenes with the sound of denji's chainsaws being displayed loud and proud throughout a lot of his fights fujimoto is also a master of composition and it makes his panel so utterly striking take a look at this panel from chapter one listen i'm not an artist nor am i an art appraiser so i find it difficult to explain in words why i like some of this stuff but just look at it the way the zombie devil split corpse frames dengy combined with the harsh lighting makes him look absolutely terrifying how about this page of denji defeating the eternity devil the way the blood curves around his back and on to his chainsaw blade directs your eye to carefully examine each part of the panel and really take it all in oh i love it the last one i'll talk about is just this introductory page for katana it's so imposing and intimidating it's incredible how much detail fujimoto is able to get across in his clothes and face despite only using black grey and white chalk it up to effective cross hatching i guess if i could stop and talk about every panel in this manga that i love we'd be here all day but i have one more thing i want to talk about fujimoto is a genius when it comes to using color his color work is an absolute joy to see every time his color spreads usually fall into one of two camps spreads that utilize flat dull colors in order to convey a sense of calm or peace and spreads utilizing striking bright colors in order to emphasize the distorted nature within them take for example the cover of volume one you've got this striking orange background contrasted with the bright green blood splatters it's so visually interesting if i saw this in a bookstore i would absolutely be picking it up then we can take a look at this color spread from chapter 15 which utilizes much more muted colors really only emphasizing the green of the plant life it's cute they look happy then we can jump back over to this volume seven cover which has density depicted entirely in bright pink against a dull blue background all the other character spaces are also depicted in muted colors so that denji really pops out against it i really hope to see mapa lean into this usage of color in the chainsaw man anime this is a really long tangent but fujimoto is an incredible artist and i just wouldn't feel right not talking about it so denji is fighting katana he holds his own much better than before but he's definitely still struggling he loses both of his arms protecting a civilian but it's okay because he still has the chainsaw on his head but wait it was a trap he tricked katana into aiming for his head so that he could cut katana in half with a chainsaw he sprouted from his leg kishime's training paid off denji won because he was fighting with his brain for once this next scene is just it's it's just incredible denji knows he can't kill katana because public safety wants to question him about the gun but he doesn't think it's fair that after all he's done he he gets to get away with only going to prison but he has an idea for some payback aki arrives on the scene and denji proposes a little contest you ready for this they're going to take turns kicking katana in the nuts and whoever gets the strongest scream out of him wins what else can i say it's a very dengy kind of idea isn't it aki knows they're not supposed to torture him but he does have some personal stakes in this situation this scene is so important because it shows how aki and denji have affected one another by not outright killing katana denji is showing his ability to follow the rules and do what he's supposed to do a lot like aki and aki is showing his ability to lighten up on the things that don't matter so much like denji it's also just a really cute body moment look how much fun they're having i see i wasn't completely lying when i said ximena would leave the groundwork for their relationship [Music] denji dreams of a door in an alleyway you can hear pochita's voice on the other side and begs him to come out but pochetta refuses he warns denji not to open the door no matter what then denji is jolted awake as if he's had a nightmare but having no recollection of what he actually dreamt about it's not clear what could be behind the door maybe it's some secret that pochetta is hiding from denji with all the enemies who've come to get dungy's heart it seems obvious that there's more going on with the chainsaw devil than we know about but the chainsaw devil we know is just a weird little raw chicken dog and actually why was he like that chainsaws are objects that have a lot of fear attached to them they're meant to be used as tools but in the wrong hands they can be very dangerous as we've seen in media like the texas chainsaw massacre yet at the same time chainsaws are hardly the scariest objects out there so it doesn't make sense that there's so many enemies who are after the chainsaw devil yet at the same time it doesn't make sense that pochito is just some weak little devil clearly there's more to this story that we don't know maybe something that pochita doesn't want denji to know makima notices that something is bothering denji and offers to take him out on a date to cheer him up and oh boy does it wow makima you really know how to lift up this little horny boy's heart among other things really any time denji's losing motivation makima says or does something to rekindle his interest in her although ultimately it's an empty gesture because she never shows a desire to actually advance some kind of relationship again either dungy doesn't notice his motivation or simply doesn't care the parents spend the day hopping from one theater to the next watching movies but dandy doesn't really like any of them neither does makima who can say it a pretty clear reason to dislike each of them ninja laments his inability to connect with any of the movies but makima reassures him that only one out of every 10 movies is actually worth watching she proves her point because the last movie they watch puts them both in tears after they leave the theater denji asks makima if she thinks he has a heart he's clearly still bothered by the fact that he had no reaction jimenez death and his inability to connect with the movies today must have rekindled his fear that he lost his human heart in response makima just listens for a heartbeat which immediately erupts like a drum beat in denji's horny little body that's all he needs to know that he does indeed still have a heart i really really want to talk about this chapter but i can't not yet just keep it in mind because it's one of the most important chapters in the entire series so denji is reinvigorated by the knowledge that he does indeed still have a heart and his feelings for making are bolstered believing he could never love anyone else but there's a problem a darkness coming for denji that will shake his beliefs to their very core woman this is raising and she represents a real internal struggle for denji she's cute friendly she thinks denji is funny where makima is an older more mature woman who actively engages in denji's feelings for her but never reciprocates rezay is much closer to denji's age and gives off strong hints that she likes him that's a problem because denji's starting to like her back i've criticized other manga in the past for how they handle romance specifically we often see characters falling in love with one another just because they're nice to each other there's no semblance of an actual connection between two characters beyond a surface level we're just expected to believe that two characters are meant to be together for life based on superficial characteristics i love what we're seeing here with denji because yes he is quote unquote falling in love with raise a basically just because she shows affection for him but this works for two reasons first of all reza displays more complex reasons to like denji she likes that he's sweet and funny and for base level affection that's more than enough and second i've said it before and this just reiterates it denji doesn't know what he wants then she has very little experience with this kind of thing he doesn't know what he's looking for or what to value plus let's not forget that genji is only 16. let me tell you i can relate to falling in love with every girl who was nice to me at that age more than that though there's another really big reason that this works denji has had proper feelings for two girls now makima and raising what's the big difference between these two makima treats spending time with her and having a relationship with her as some hot commodity something that she has to work for something he only gets if he does something for her first reize is offering a relationship unconditionally razi represents an opportunity for denji to recognize that maybe just maybe makima is taking advantage of him a little bit heck reza really calls a lot in the question for denji she expresses concern for how he's living his life denji doesn't recognize that he's being taken advantage of because for him three square meals a day in a warm bed are luxuries for him the cost of getting cut in half by katana is paid by that simple reward but razi points out that that's not special it's the bare minimum again relativity denji's skewed way of valuing things means that he can't recognize his own worth and that he deserves basic human rights but there's another problem entirely something else denji doesn't recognize is how valuable his chainsaw heart is to the enemy anything they can use to get that from him is fair game even an innocent bystander like raisay look at the top of his head an assassin appears and chases rezay he tells her he's going to cut off her skin and gouge out her eye so he can make denji give up without a fight he attacks her and from what i understand the russian in these panels is a lullaby but it's not a real lullaby it's just something that fujimoto made up but the message is clear rezay isn't who she says she is and just like everybody else she's using denji the following day the pair go on another date where reza again expresses concern for denji's situation but this time she offers a solution she asks denji to run away with her of course we know that this is just a trap to lure him away from public safety but to denji this is very much a real offer he hesitates but ultimately decides that no he can't run away with her he cites how well things have been going for him recently as a reason specifically pointing out how he's managing to get along with aki and power like ximena did for aki rezay is offering denji an open door if denji runs away with raise he gains a whole world of possibilities he could go to school live life like a normal kid form a proper relationship with reza but in doing so he would close the door to what he already has he'd lose aki and power he'd lose makima and all the progress he's made in public safety he wants to be with raise he really does but losing what he's already gained is too steep a price to pay so he's prepared to close that door rezay reads between the lines and infers that what denji is really saying is that he likes someone else that he doesn't want to lose before he can answer she goes in for a kiss and man denji has some bad luck the first girl he kissed threw up in his mouth and the second while she bit his tongue off poor genji man hasn't the lad earned one normal kiss just one come on fujimoto cut him a break rezay enacts her plan to get denji's heart the other way this time even preventing him from going chainsaw mode basically denji's super screwed or is he [Music] [Applause] [Music] we like being in this house don't we beam managed to get engie away from rey's a but he's got to run fast if he wants to save ng because razi isn't just a particularly effective assassin she's the bomb hybrid and she is not letting denji get away beam barely manages to get denzi to aki who goes into full escape mode believing that rezay is too powerful to fight but then he's not having it as soon as he's revived he turns around to face crazy he expresses frustration that everybody's after his chainsaw heart but nobody wants his heart i'm 14 and this is deep razia responds by saying that she really does like denji and he almost falls for it but aki snaps him back into reality now the fight can truly begin except raise a is really really strong and beats the absolute [ __ ] out of denji and listen i try not to give a play-by-play of every fight in this series because uh believe it or not i am trying to limit how long this video is but we we have to stop it's you have to see this it's just it's so absurd raising turns dengy into a charred torso blowing up everything but his head and chest he would be completely screwed here except aki hit amongst some corpses left by razi's attack until he got a chance to cut off her arm and rescue denji beam and angel revived ng and he stops to think about what he's doing wrong beam who seems to know a lot about the chainsaw devil pre-dengy tells him that he used to be able to move a lot faster by throwing out his chains from his chainsaws and hooking onto buildings to swing around this prompts denji to then think about his fights with other hybrids and how they all use their powers with a lot more ingenuity than him and if he wants to win he's gonna have to start doing that as well so i know what you're thinking genji's gonna start you know swinging from building to building using his chainsaws like a really violent peter parker but has benji ever done what we expect him to do in fact has he ever done the most logical thing in any given situation do you think being told directly how he can use his powers a little more effectively would prompt them to do exactly that no no no no then he's not going to do that at all i want you to stop and think about what you think dungeon's going to do in this situation go ahead i'll wait okay got it all right whatever you thought he was gonna do you were wrong he unhooks his chain and uses it like a [ __ ] horse reign to ride beam into battle you did not expect him to do that surprisingly it works and he's able to hold his own much better than before oh this is the typhoon devil by the way it's dead now then she didn't learn nothing from being in reza though after beam gets defeated by a raise then she uses his chains to tie razei up and jump into the water where she can't explode and the two settle at the bottom of the sea rezay wakes up on the beach and denji tells her that he's not going to arrest her and let her go instead call it lingering feelings but it goes against his morals before she leaves denji asks raise if she wants to run away with him she responds this question by breaking his neck and walking away but then she is persistent he shouts after her that if she wants to run away he'll be waiting for her at the cafe she worked at this request seems super out of the blue but it also shows denji's empathetic side let's think back to before reza revealed herself to when she was expressing concern for denji's situation reza questioned whether or not it was right for someone as young as him to be used as a weapon to fight devils and she's right it's not okay then he's way too young to be throwing himself into that kind of danger so frequently not to mention too stupid the only reason he survived is because he's essentially immortal if he weren't he would have died to the bat devil but if this is true for him it's also true for reza she may not be as young as she says we have no way of knowing but we can still assume she's being used the same way that denji is and probably has been for a very long time every concern that she expressed for denji can be reflected back onto herself and knowing that genji wants to help her denji wasn't willing to take that risk and go through that door when it would only benefit him but he's ready now knowing that it would benefit her as well now it's easy to write off everything reza did as her trying to get closer to denji but allow me to explain why she was being more honest than she portrayed for starters why did she offer to run away with denji sure we can look at this and say that she was trying to lure him away from public safety but let's read between the lines a little right after making that offer she told denji that she would protect him and make him happy how would she protect him denji didn't know that razia was the bomb hybrid how would a normal schoolgirl be able to protect him why would she need to protect him in the first place razi wouldn't know that public safety would kill denji if he tries to leave rezay wouldn't know that there are assassins after denji's heart how and why would she need or be able to protect him at all okay so maybe she was trying to portray herself as just a naive schoolgirl who didn't know about the extent of his situation but when denji rejects her offer she looks legitimately upset keep in mind right after this moment she attacks denji there's no reason to put on an act anymore she's not pretending to be upset she just is need more proof that razia was being honest all right right before their fight razie finds out that denji's with makima and laments that even if they had run away it would have been pointless come on she's not acting anymore it was an offer for denji to get away from public safety but it was also an offer for her to escape from her situation so yeah it might seem absurd to suggest that she was ever being honest but if you think i'm crazy then tell me why reza goes to the cafe she's willing to go through that door too despite all of the risks that it presents this is what i'm talking about we didn't need a thought bubble from reza explaining that she was being honest the entire time and that she really does like denji fujimoto's subtle writing told us all we needed to know to draw our own conclusion but ultimately reza's assessment was correct they can't escape from makima razi represents a lot for denji someone who could love him unconditionally a chance for him to forge his own path free public safety and more than anything she represents a choice for him to make unfortunately that choice doesn't fit in the scenario that makima is trying to create so reza has to go if your brain is the size of a p allow me to clear things up for you makima isn't quite who she says she is either the following night deji dreams of the door again and pochita warns him again not to open it this is a reminder that pochita has something to hide from denji but symbolically it also represents how dengy could never truly run away with raise and that's manifesting in his dream with pochita warning him not to take such risks denji's had a rough time with all the enemies coming after him so far but he has no idea what's still in store thanks to the widespread destruction from his fight with raize denji begins appearing in the news media and this means that the world at large is now aware of his existence this means that enemies besides the gun devil will start coming after him makima predicts that governments from around the world will begin deploying to capture him we've questioned this before but why is there so much fuss over the chainsaw devil the chance that evil is strong sure but not the strongest and dendi's not even particularly good with his powers they're certainly not after his skill devils exist in a perpetual cycle of life and death when a devil dies in the human world they are reborn in hell and when they die in hell they're reborn in the human world in a technical sense they never truly die because they'll always be reborn but they never remember their time in hell or any of their previous human lives that is of course except for one exception many devils remember the last sound they heard before they died and strangely enough many of them remember the same sound sound of a chainsaw's engine revving that's certainly an interesting coincidence this knowledge certainly doesn't tell us why everyone's after dengy but it suggests there's a lot more to the chainsaw level than we're aware of public safety isn't interested in losing such an asset so they bring together all their forces to protect him from the incoming onslaught including the most valuable asset under their control ko benny's car [Music] [Applause] never in my life have i been as wrecked as i am now oh that was exhausting oh my god fun fact in the very first chainsaw man popularity poll kobeni's car came in seventh kobeni came in eighth you cannot make that [ __ ] up [Music] okay let's get a little rerun of what just happened so power forced kobeni to let her in the driver's street then she claimed kobani's car as her own to which kobani is too timid to fight back then power ran over denji and another agent and what does she do next she tries to gaslight kobeni by saying it's her fault for letting her drive in the first place god i love her best of all the agent she ran over and killed was actually an imposter after denji which she is all too ready to take credit for poor co benny man someone give her a hug mahima's prediction was right and assassins have started to come after denji hitmen from america the soviet union santa claus and their army of puppets quan chief from china how do i describe quan she okay how about this shonen jump has an app where you can read most of their catalog of manga however not everything is available on there things like golden kamui or dandadam that deal with more adult themes are unavailable and have to be read through a web browser chainsawman despite denji's non-stop raging erection is available on the shonen jump app except for one chapter and one chapter only chapter 59 is not available through the shonan jump app and has to be read through a browser that's because chapter 59 opens with a full page color spread of quantity in the middle of a lesbian orgy then in the next chapter she goes on an absolute rampage decapitating dozens of santa claus puppets in seconds before beating the [ __ ] out of dungey's group basically quan chi is super strong and super gay i love her quan chi's only real weakness is her girlfriends a weakness that kishibe quickly takes advantage of by taking them hostage and forcing kwanshi to sit down for a little negotiation their conversation is a cover-up though the real message is being conveyed by kishime's notepad he tells quan chi that he's planning to kill makima and wants her help with it it's not yet clear what he's planning or why but come on it's hardly a secret at this point that makima is planning something herself quan chi refuses and throws kishibe out a window right onto kobeni's car oh that is unfortunate surprisingly though quan chi is not the major threat in this situation no no no no no the worst is yet to come while all this is going down santa claus forms a contract with the hell devil to drag all of them directly into hell which is depicted as a flower field with a sky full of doors boy that's sure weird a lot of doors in this manga wonder what's up with that once there all of the devils start freaking out because they know what's in hell devil's so powerful that they've never once died devil's representing all of humanity's greatest fears devils such as [Music] [Music] hey yo i know this [ __ ] has joined thought of everybody's arms but real talk if the dogs never wore pants would you wear them like this or like this santa claus forms another contract with the darkness devil in exchange for bringing chainsaws heart she wants the power to kill makima wait a minute wasn't she here to capture denji for the soviet union was it all a deception was she after makima the entire time man the suspense just keeps building we've seen what people are willing to do to capture denji how much are they willing to do to kill makima i mean they're giving up chainsaw to do that santa claus's wish is granted and the darkness devil just kind of gets to work killing everybody cool dude chill dude good old darkness love to get a drink with that dude in a well-lit bar preferably since everybody's weak little soy boys makima is forced to come out and save them she even manages to damage the darkness devil but it comes at a great cost don't worry she'll be fine makima drags everybody back to the human world where they have very freaky looking darkness power it's santa claus to deal with now the problem is that any damage she takes is immediately regenerated while she's in the dark and she only grows more powerful as night falls so imagine you're a denji for a second maybe down a bottle of moonshine to slow your brain down to his level you have an enemy who heals constantly while in the dark how are you gonna deal with that aha light yourself on fire i don't know what if they're lying we should still protect the villagers oh don't worry i took care of that [Music] you can't get touched if you're on fire you know actually i'm torn on this is it unbelievably stupid or is it one of denji's best ideas because i mean it's not like he's gonna die while being on fire i think it's so stupid that it's accidentally smart because yeah it does work then she defeats her and all well it ends well right this battle had a devastating effect on public safety gogoli and bean were killed kobeni quit angel lost both of his arms they were only able to reattach one of aki's and power is left terrified of the dark she really got the short end of the stack here aki and denji are forced to sleep in shifts because she keeps screaming throughout the night and they have to constantly remind her that the darkness devil isn't coming for them it's shocking to see the proud and confident power reduced to this pathetic state it's hitting denji hard too makima offers to take danjian a vacation just the two of them alone but he refuses he feels like power needs him and he can't leave her be he's got a golden opportunity to spend some time with makima and he's throwing it away why power is so afraid of the darkness devil that she can't even bathe by herself and there denji is to help her naked with her bathing with her sleeping with her and none of this excites him power isn't just some girl tim anymore she's his friend his partner somebody he cares deeply for denji isn't the only one who's changed though power is terrified that denzi will hate her for making him miss out on his trip power who tried to kill him not that long ago she's so afraid of being hated that she forces denji to drink her blood as an a wait what what the [ __ ] in what way is that an apology that's some cake [ __ ] right there i don't know guys aha subtle character writing i like that power is the blood fiend she loves blood and frequently expresses a desire to drink it and considering her narcissistic personality you have to assume that she views her own blood as something pretty valuable power is offering denji an apology that she herself would want showing how important their friendship is to her but can you even call it a friendship at this point seeing all the intimate acts that they're engaging in then do you reflect on what makima told him so long ago how intimate acts feel better the more you know your partner but despite knowing power really well these intimate acts that should excite him simply don't then comes the realization that some things just aren't meant to be known and with that in mind he finally responds to pochita whatever's behind the door he doesn't need to know tenji started off as an extraordinarily ignorant character over time he's experienced things that have shown in the harsh realities of the world and some of it's been painful and disappointing he's come to the realization that sometimes ignorance is bliss aki decides this time to make his yearly trip to his family's grave site and denji and power decide to come with of course they're pests the whole way bickering and causing trouble and bugging aki he finally catches some peace once nightfalls and i just love this panel of denji and aki sitting watching the snow when denji first met aki and power they were both people that he thought he could never get along with their personalities just didn't mesh with him yet here he is sitting with those same two people people he cares about enough to give up a golden opportunity with makima the two people he trusts and cares about the most in the original version of this script i went off on a tangent here about how aki has grown as a character but in reviewing it i realized that this video isn't about aki i want to make it perfectly clear that aki's character development is both believable and well executed but here's what you need to know for now aki's desire to kill the gun devil has been replaced by a desire to protect denji and power to the point that aki's willing to give up on the gun entirely but that's not an option days before the operation to kill the gun devil the future devil shows aki a terrible future one wherein he and power will be killed by denji and then the devil the devil's fear most will appear not knowing what to do aki goes to makima to find some way to avoid this dreadful future you know makima she always knows what to do and is 100 trustworthy all of the time aki's willing to make any sacrifice form any contract with any devil in order to keep denji and power safe and with that in mind makima orders aki to form a contract with her in america the president is on the phone talking about how makima has to be stopped he's forming a contract and offers one year off the lifespan of every american citizen chainsaw man takes place in the year 1997 and at that time there were 273 million people in the united states still though one year off of everybody's life is a small price to pay right well how many people die in a year in that same year more than two million people died in the u.s so imagine how many people died the second the president formed this contract this is a massive sacrifice whatever he's planning is no joke in chapter 55 a devil hunter named subaru mentioned that devils have keener noses than humans in chapter 7 the bat devil decided what humans he would eat based on their smell from miles away and in chapter one makima mentioned that denji smelled neither human nor devil the president of the united states offers the gun devil 273 million years worth of life in exchange he wants the gun devil to kill makima the control devil we've posed the question before of what devil's makima could possibly be contracted with every time we see her she's using a different power every time she takes damage it immediately regenerates and everyone around her is either afraid of her or infatuated with her after all the easiest ways to control people are through fear or affection you want to know why aki likes makima because he sure doesn't remember it's because aki's being controlled by makima you want to know why makima has access to so much power at so little cost because makima isn't contracted with the devils who wield those powers she's controlling them too and you want to know why mockumen never seems to retain any damage because makima is a weapon being used by the japanese government and per her contract with the prime minister any damage she would take is instead redirected onto an innocent civilian fujimoto has been warning us the entire time makima is and always has been the greatest threat [Applause] denji awakes to someone incessantly ringing his doorbell he goes to answer the door but pochita warns him not to his telephone rings and he decides to answer that first it's makima she tells him they failed to defeat the gun devil and that it took over a dead body and escaped she tells him that the gun fiend is now at his front door denji thinks she's joking and believes that it's aki coming home but he won't know until he opens the door denji was half right we've established already that when a devil takes over a human's corpse the human's personality is overwritten but this is only partly true the humans personality can remain to some degree but it varies from fiend to fiend power seems to display no relation to our original human but goggly the violence fiend even still had memories from when he was still human whether it's because he's still partially alive or if he's just fading out into the gun devil's subconscious aki's in there but he's not entirely aware of what's happening in his mind he's a kid again he spots denji and wants to have a snowball fight okay i know this is all pretty heavy but did you know that people refer to aki's gun feeding form as aki 47 it's kind of like it's called like ak-47 that's that's funny i like that in his confusion aki keeps attacking denji and power and even innocent civilians passing by aki thinks this is all a game but in reality it's causing massive and widespread destruction denji does what he can to protect people while trying desperately to get through to aki but aki's so powerful that there isn't much he can do the civilians recognize that denji is fighting back and beg him to keep them safe this turn of events is so utterly tragic all aki wanted was to protect others from the gun devil and to keep denji and power safe and happy above all else yet now he's become the very threat he opposed and he's attacking the people that he cares about most denji knows that this is the last thing aki would have wanted denji knows what he has to do when aki first met the future devil it offered to tell him how he'd die it told him that he would die in the worst way possible aki brushed him off saying that he didn't care how he died as long as he got to accomplish his goals the future devil is only telling part of the truth aki is going to die in the worst possible way for denji that is [Music] aki's death is nothing like ximena's denji was close to aki he trusted him aki saved his ass so many times and before he died all aki wanted was to keep denji safe and happy no matter the cost ximena may have called denji friend but aki truly embodied what that meant denji can't just move past that he's racked with grief and guilt over aki's death he's stuck in an endless loop of regretting what happened and wondering if things could have ended differently and as she always is when denji loses his way makima is there she takes denji back to her place where she has a lot of dogs that makes sense she reminds denji that she owes him a favor for defeating the gun devil and that she'll grant any wish he wants now we know what denji wanted when this offer was made but things have changed denji's values are different now he's not horny anymore he's sad after giving it some thought then he decides that he wants to be machima's dog okay maybe he is still a horny denji i don't know if you're ready for that level of fetish [ __ ] denji expresses frustration over how things end with aki he wonders if aki could have survived if denji had known how to help him he blames himself for aki's death and feels terrible about it he decides that since makima is smarter than him he'll leave all the decision making up to her that way he won't have to regret his actions ever again but then the doorbell rings mahima tells denji that she invited power over then she tells denji to let power in so makima can kill her denji is shocked and confused by what he's hearing but dogs don't think for themselves dogs don't make their own decisions dogs listen what their owners say and do as they're told so despite pochita's warning denji reaches for the door handle rationalizing that this is all some bad joke when he opens the door power will be there with a birthday cake to celebrate his upcoming birthday and that's exactly what happens power comes inside and they eat cake then they play video games and drink mountain dew all night long then she lived happily ever after never had to feel bad again yay [Laughter] no denji can't process what just happened he begs makima to tell him this is all just a bad dream but she doesn't instead she laughs she just killed power and she's laughing the mask is off she has no need to manipulate denji any longer she got what she wanted makima reminds denji that when he gained his power he formed a contract with pochita denji dreamed of living a normal life and pochita gave dengi his heart in exchange for being shown that dream however thanks to denji's skewed perception of what a normal life looks like anything above the poverty he was living in before would in his mind achieve that dream so how could makima get dengue to break that contract the answer relativity yeah that son of a [ __ ] again first makima built denji up she gave him a job money food she gave him an older brother to guide him a younger sister to protect she made this his new normal she gave him a life so much better than he could have ever imagined then she tore it all down mahima showed denji a life so good that if he lost it he could never feel happy again denji can't go back to living in poverty anymore now that he knows how much better life can be denji asks makima why she would do such a horrible thing and she answers oh boy does she answer denji had a chance to stop makima from killing power a chance to challenge her and protect his friend but he was so afraid of the consequences of his choices that he selfishly left that choice up to someone else what denji didn't realize that a lack of a choice is still in and of itself a choice after all denji opened the door not makima and power died as a result we have no way of knowing if aki could have been saved or brought back but then he didn't even try he didn't try to restrain him he didn't try to capture him he didn't know what to do so he killed him whether it was the right choice or not aki's dead because of that choice denji's not the victim of circumstance that he makes himself out to be whether intentional or not he brought all this misfortune on to himself even way back when he was selling his own organs to pay off the yakuza that was his father's fault right wrong denji's father didn't kill himself denji killed him pochita tried to hide that truth from denji because he knew he would push that blame onto himself now denji's lost the will to dream of a normal life because he no longer feels like he deserves it makima broke him broke his conviction his heart and his boner and that one was really hard if you know what i'm saying and why because now denji is a perfect husk of a man right for being controlled a puppet for her to execute her ambition with makima put in all of this work all of this time and effort she gave up the gun devil so she could lock down denji the chainsaw hybrid what could possibly be the motivation the following day mahima takes dengi to public safety where kishibe ambushes them this is the plan he tried to get quan chi in on groups of soldiers attack and fire on makima while six agents give their lives to form a contract they ask the hell devil to kill makima and drag her into hell they're going full fighting game combo on her ass and they cannot be stopped this is a plan that has been thought out to perfect execution except for one variable that they didn't consider makima calls out to chainsaw man to save her before he died aki was shown a future wherein he and power would be killed by denji then the devil the devil's fear most would appear aki's dead power is dead and now the hell devil is here to clap some cheeks i've posed the question a number of times now as to why chainsaw is so special when chainsaws are hardly the scariest things out there we know that a devil's strength is based on how feared their name is correct well what if human fear is not the only contributing factor wouldn't that make the devil the devil's fear most one of the most powerful devils in existence the answer is yes mahima explains to kishibe that chainsaw man is a sort of superhero in hell if you ask for his help he'll chop down any devil in his way yet at the same time any devil that asks for his help will themselves be killed but the real reason chainsaw man is so feared any devil that chainsaw man eats will have their name erased from existence their names are erased from history and human consciousness makima asks kishime if he remembers the nazis and he has no idea what she's talking about that's right chainsaw man is a world where everybody looked at world war ii and kind of just said i for gore i realized this might have made it look like i was that was not my intention god i even got rid of the son of hitler book and this is still happening what the [ __ ] it's the only true death that a devil can face makima is the only one who can remember the names of those who are erased from existence and their names eventually fade from her memory too the only reason that she's able to remember them is that her ability to completely control anything allows her to have complete control over her own memory makima wants to use chainsaw man's power to create a better world yeah wouldn't you know it makima has good intentions although i personally can't imagine a good world where power is dead so she kind of [ __ ] that one up death war nfts makima wants to use chainsaw man's power to get rid of such terrible awful things so that humanity can be happier the problem is that makima looks up to chainsaw man too much she's self-admittedly a fan of his and puts him up on a pedestal makima's power only allows her to control those that she looks down on so if she wants to control chainsaw man she has to defeat him and prove that she's above him makima did after all ask for chainsaw man's help and that means he'll come to kill her too but she's pretty damn powerful so this ought to be one hell of a [ __ ] as a side note i want to mention why i've been referring to my chainsaw man and not denji denji's not in control here it's not made expressly clear but i believe the original chainsaw devil pochina has taken over completely or at least partially it's possible it's a sort of mix of their psyches chainsaw man is much more powerful and much more resourceful with his abilities than denji was he also acts just the way that makima described him helping anybody who asked for his help after he kills makima he hears another call for help and runs off this next scene is is so brilliant that that i'm not going to talk about it listen i'm bringing it up so no one thinks i skipped it but i'm not gonna go into detail chainsaw man goes to get a burger and it's just the best scene in the entire manga i'll happily spoil the entire story progression of this manga for you but i will not spoil this it's just it's too good plus this video is long enough as is the only thing i'll say is that chainsaw man is acting upon the dreams that denji conveyed to pochita going to get a nice burger and taking a girl out on a date it's cute kobeti has a lot of fun makima the joy sucker reappears when she hears chant on man having fun and she brings with her a bunch of hybrids including katana rezay and quan chi oh cuanchi is a hybrid by the way i didn't get a chance to talk about that they're all being controlled by makima and they attack chainsaw man but these soyboy hybrids are no match for the alpha chad energy that is chain saw man the hybrids barely managed to drag chainsaw man up into the air where makima fingers him out into space she figures even he can't survive without oxygen but makima oh machima you don't understand the raw big dick energy you're dealing with here chainsaw man rips his own heart out and throws it back down to earth where it grows a new body yeah then he lassos the remaining enemies just look how turned on makima is and takes them all down in one beautiful attack oh if i could talk about how much i love the choreography in this [ __ ] manga i'd be here all day of course making was still not dead and she appears before chainsaw man again this time she's ready to play her trump card though all around the world the news media begins reporting that denzi defeated the gun devil the whole world was afraid of the gun devil and now they know who defeated it the people take to the streets and begin praising chainsaw man's name and in doing so they weaken him mahima has carefully revealed denji to the world and in doing so has made their fear of the chainsaw devil go down they now view him as a superhero worthy of praise devils fear him and give him strength but humans love him and take it away mahima then fires an attack off on kobeni and chainsaw man is forced to take the hit to save her he's finally been defeated and makima seems almost disappointed with her own victory but hey things are never really that simple are they [Music] that's right baby my girl power is back whoa in oliver gross blood devil glory best carl is back let's [ __ ] go you kind of got the devil booty though okay what the [ __ ] is happening pochetta reached out to power through the blood that denji drank pochito offers to let power eat some of his flesh so that she can revive as a devil and in exchange he wants her to save denji she happily agrees even though it means facing makima again but despite the power up she got from eating the chainsaw devil's flesh she's still facing makima and power is quickly overwhelmed makima commands power to hand over chainsaw man but she runs instead makima's control no longer works on power which she herself is confused by but i think the answer is clear makima told power to hand over chainsaw man but power's not trying to save chainsaw man she's saving denji it may seem like simple semantics but that kind of thing matters in this world makima wants chainsaw man but power's not trying to save the hero of hell she's not trying to save the chainsaw devil she's saving her friend denji and makima never told her to hand over denji denji regains consciousness inside a dumpster with power where they share a very cute but probably very stinky hug power tells denji that she's here to save him but then she's lost the will to go on he's so broken up about losing her and aki that he feels like it's just his time to die he got what he wanted out of life and he doesn't need anything more power won't hear it though instead she forms a contact with denji power wants density to find the blood devil when it reincarnates back in the human world then turn them back into power by befriending them that way they can be together again in exchange denji gets power's blood so he can survive then denji wakes back up in the real world that's right power really is dead there's no get out of hell free cards here i really really want to talk about this scene but i can't yet we're going to circle back just keep it in mind thanks to power's help denji was able to escape mahima and now kishibe offers to set him free from her grasp of course kishibe's plan to kill makima utterly failed so what this really means is going on the run and avoiding her along with kobeni who's now a target for the rest of their lives they'll have to hide in the shadows and that means that denji can never be chainsaw man again because it would draw too much attention to himself kobani starts freaking out because she doesn't want to die and expresses jealousy over how denji is immortal in response denji tells her how things aren't exactly perfect for him either how denji now knows that he was being used the entire time and he never really had any freedom to begin with he was just being naive kobani then imparts the kind of basic knowledge that most people already have the kind of things that denji has yet to realize she asks him the most important question that he's ever been asked isn't that just normal she tells him that a life free of bad things doesn't exist except in your dreams and it hits denji like a truck [Music] genji realizes that like everything else he brought this on himself denji wanted to live a normal life and that's exactly what he got looking at his situation on the surface is it really any different from anybody else he works for a corporation that takes advantage of him he works too hard for very little return and despite all of this he still has to see sadness and death that describes my life i bet it describes yours too then kelbani asks denji if he really wanted to be normal as if that's a bad thing to want because for many of us we dream of living extraordinary lives we work towards breaking free of mediocrity and normality in order to make our lives mean something kobani was taken advantage of by her family made to work too hard and still she saw sadness and death and she wants nothing more than to break free of that that's why she's envious of denji [Music] then denji hears it the news is talking about him talking about how much everybody loves him he didn't know they'd been singing his praises this entire time and he's shocked by how much they love him and it's like a switch gets flipped genji's not normal he's chainsaw man and you know what he's sick and tired of eating bread with jam on it every day it's not enough anymore because makima made that normal and normal's not enough anymore he wants steak and he wants girls and he wants to [ __ ] constantly horny dendy is back baby he's found his motivation and he knows what he wants he doesn't want to be normal he wants to be special he wants to be chainsaw man and that means he needs to kill makima and here we find ourselves once again denji sits in a graveyard awaiting makima and her people he addresses mahima and asks her a simple question in the perfect world she's trying to create will bad movies still exist she responds that the world will be better without them and he decides that if that's the case he has to kill her i cannot overstate the importance of this simple exchange this simple question is a master class in subtle writing and my favorite exchange in the entire series on the surface it's just a question about movies but it's so much more than that it's a clashing of their fundamental ideals as well as a sign of major character development if we asked denji in the dumpster this same question i'm sure he would agree with makima dumpster denji was blinded by grief and unable to see past that pain he lost sight of anything beyond what he already experienced and decided that the pain he felt did not outweigh the positives he gained the food he ate the video games he played the family he found none of it was worth the pain of losing them he believed that he would have been happier if he never knew any of that and continued living in poverty ignorant of anything better by becoming chainsaw man denji opened a door that led into this life denji had a choice way back then to continue being chainsaw man or to be killed by makima by choosing to join public safety denji stepped through that door and opened himself up to all of the pain associated with those experiences dumpster denji would have rather left that door closed but then she has had time to process everything that's happened he's had time to think about what he's gained what he stands to lose and what he still has to experience life itself is a series of doors and denji stands before one now that door represents the unknown hidden behind it the infinite possibilities available after opening it the past he has to confront the future still ahead of him the ignorance he stands to lose the opportunity he stands to gain and the choice he has to make denji knows that if he goes through that door he risks being hurt even worse than he is now but there's also a chance he'll come out on the other side happier than he ever knew was possible makima wants to knock that door off its hinges she wants to remove the possibility of pain by getting rid of everything bad in the world but denji knows better experiencing pain and happiness go hand in hand you can't understand the good without experiencing the bad you have to watch nine bad movies before you can truly appreciate one good one that's why denji has to defeat makima and walk through that door before he can do that he has to actually defeat makima so how is he gonna pull that off uh he doesn't he gets his heart ripped out kind of underwhelming after all that builds up i wrote all those big words and he just kind of miffed it at the end nah you knew it wasn't going to go down like that denji pulls the ultimate uno reverse card and strikes down makima this is played out brilliantly too because if you look in the crowd of makima's followers denji's in there so i'm sure you have a few questions how did makima not notice denji standing right next to her why are there two denjis why does this attack work on makima when none of the others did well allow me to elaborate denji knew he couldn't defeat makima in a straight battle so he racked all two of his brain cells well one now to find a way to defeat her he remembered that as chainsaw man he was able to rip out his heart and grow a new body so he used power's blood to keep his original body running while the doppelganger got the [ __ ] kicked out of it as for why the attack works denji explains that the chainsaw he used was made using power's blood and as such is able to manipulate makima's blood in order to slow the healing process don't ask me how i made the chainsaw though i have no idea blood has iron in it so maybe he like extracted the iron and like i don't know now for the ultimate question how the hell did denzi get the drop on makima way back in chapter 2 makima mentioned that denji's body has two cents one human and one devil then she made an assumption about makima based on all his interactions with her that she doesn't identify people by their faces because she views people as so far beneath her instead she memorizes the smells of people who interest her extrapolating from that denji made a bet that makima never memorized his scent at all she was always looking at chainsaw man not denji therefore even if he was standing right next to her she wouldn't recognize him without pochita's scent that's right makima's sense of smell was used to not only subtly foreshadow that she was a devil but also how she would ultimately be defeated that [ __ ] is brilliant there is no other word for it before we move on i want to point out a couple things about this page first of all the chainsaw that deji made has horns that resemble powers plus dungey's pose resembles how aki looked when he struck down raising not to mention how denji is dressed like aki when aki was first introduced this is representative of the impact that aki and power have had on nenji and how he wouldn't have been able to defeat makima without their indirect help it's actually really ironic how makima used and manipulated all of them in order to draw a chainsaw man out but in doing so she provided denji with the tools he would use to defeat her hell even having kishibe trained denji came back to bite her kishibe taught denji to fight using his brain and that's the only reason he was able to use makima's sense of smell against her makima thought of denji as so far beneath her that she never really thought of him as a threat at all the fact that makimo was never looking at denji became his greatest weapon to defeat her of course she isn't really defeated just yet power's blood is slowing makima's regeneration but she will heal eventually but then she's already thought about that kishibi comes and picks the pair up he then leaves denji to finish the job but not without some parting words don't you die denji out of all the devil hunters i've met up to now you are the one most suited for the job of course we know that this is just a nice way of kishibe calling denji batshit crazy and as if to prove his point denji puts his plan into motion how do you kill someone that's unkillable any damage that mahima takes is redirected onto an innocent civilian even now the longer dungey takes to finish the job the more people get hurt he can't burn her he can't chop her up he can't toss her off a building but at the end of the day denji doesn't want to do any of that despite everything that's happened denji still has feelings from akima maybe it's that she introduced him to this whole world and taught him so many lessons maybe he's just chasing some idealized version of her maybe he just cannot get past that absolute dump truck she's packing whatever the case may be denji doesn't want to kill makima he wants to accept her for who she is and bear her sins with her by becoming one with her but how do you essentially absorb someone well how do you absorb nutrients and make that a part of you yeah that's right he's gonna eat her you really gotta appreciate how fuji want to make sure to draw out some really delicious looking food here even though we all know damn well what kind of meat it is we already know that devils that chainsaw man eats have their names erased from existence so maybe this works because denji shares a part of that power or maybe it's like a semantics loophole where denji isn't attacking makima per se because he's trying to become one with her but it does work even kishibe can't fully understand it but i think ultimately that's why it works denji has so many screws loose that nobody else would have ever thought about doing this nobody thinking logically would have thought of a plan like this much less actually executed it was that the bite of 87 yeah it didn't work makima's alive humanity is screwed we're all gonna die okay it worked but it didn't okay makima is dead but the control devil has already incarnated back into the human world i assume once makima got into hell the darkness devil hiked up his jorts and took her out again this is the new control devil and her name is nyuta kishibe explains that he grabbed her before the government could fearing that they would just turn her into another makima and he's absolutely right the soviets had santa claus china had quan chi reza was also from the soviet union we've seen how each of the major world powers wants to abuse double power rather than stop it it's painfully clear that the world views devil power not as a threat to be stopped but as weapons to be controlled had any of these world governments found naiuta we would absolutely have makima 2.0 on our hands so kishime's got a plan to avoid that leave the powerful devil child with the uneducated teenage cannibal yeah that's gonna work out great okay okay hold your objections it's not as crazy as it seems are you ready for a very very cute scene pochetta appears before denji in a dream and tells him how he always dreamed of being hugged but it never came true because he was so strong please leave a like on this video if you would give pochita a hug denji made pochita's dream come true and now pochita wants denji to do the same for the control devil the control devil always wanted to form equal relationships with others but she never could because everybody was afraid of her that's why makima did what she did in order to create a world where that would be possible pochetta wants denji to create that world for the controlled devil is that not just the cutest pages could have ended on all of that death destruction and sadness led to this uplifting ending denji harbors doubts about his own ability to pull this off but i actually think he's the perfect person for the job denji was able to form just such a relationship with pochita a devil half of chainsaw man is about deji forming a makeshift family with aki and power two people who on the surface have dislikable personalities and more than anything denji was never afraid of makima he had an intense admiration for her he longed to be closer to her and even though that feeling was born out of manipulation it wasn't worn out of being controlled by her the way that aki's feelings were denji is perhaps the most suitable person to provide an equal relationship for nyuta this too is a doorway into a new chapter in his life and we can tell that it's one that he chooses to step through and that's it that's the end well the end of part one at least this was played off super well by the way for weeks leading up to this chapter's release wsj's social media kept referring to chapter 97 as the final chapter they heavily implied that they would be announcing an anime along with the last chapter which they did but i don't think any of us were expecting at part two because of the way that i avoid spoilers like the plague i still had no idea when i went to read this chapter i felt a really bittersweet feeling of excitement when i opened it up but oh boy when i read that last page i completely lost my [ __ ] it's been more than a year since that last chapter came out and part 2 hasn't started yet but my excitement for it has not waned i so look forward to seeing dendi's dumbass struggle to balance out a school load while also concealing the fact that he's chainsaw man then coming home to take care of his adoptive little sister naiuta and their army of huskies since part one ended i've read fire punch the manga that fujimoto published before chainsaw man and look back the one shot that he published after part one ended and let me just say i feel pretty confident saying that chanson man is not a one hit wonder i have full faith that chan saw man part 2 will be incredible because at the end of the day it's clear that tatsuki fujimoto did not accidentally stumble upon gold with a brilliant concept everything about how chainsaw man is written just works beautifully the way everything came together at the end the way relationships formed and characters grew the exceptional action scenes that are so much fun to watch and it's all grounded by the way fujimoto very carefully and subtly nudges you towards the message he's trying to tell that's really what i love most about chan saw man imagine how obvious it would have been that makima was a devil if denji had some inner monologue about how it's so strange that she has such a strong sense of smell instead fujimoto approached it with little lines of dialogue that you're unlikely to see any real significance in when i first read that chapter i was shocked to find out that makimo was a devil but in subsequent read-throughs i'm shocked i didn't realize it sooner and there's so much more i didn't get to cover in this video it's insane how much is packed into this 97 chapter story and i hope i was able to show you why chainsaw man is a truly brilliant manga [Music] all right i'll keep this short so you guys can get back to watching hentai or whatever you do first of all thank you for 5 000 subscribers that's an insane number that for a long time i had lost hope of ever reaching so that's insane thank you so much second i'm sorry this video took so goddamn long it was a bit of a surprise to me too i mean for reference i told my thumbnail artist that i wanted to have this video out at the end of march and filling that the beginning of april it's now the beginning of may so that didn't pan out i already know what i want my next big project to be but i'm going to take a little break away from that and focus on some smaller shorter length projects first so expect something along those lines in the near future also while i was working on this video fujimoto released another one shot called goodbye airy and it's it's really good that guy is just a madman he just he keeps banging out bangers i mean i follow a lot of manga artists for like a single thing that they make that i really like but fujimoto is the first one i've like read multiple pieces from and loved all of so just just go read goodbye airy read fire punchly look back read chants on man just read all of it the guy is really good what he does okay lastly if you want to see more from me or just talk to me head on over to my twitch twitch.tv captain mac underscore i stream pretty frequently and we have a lot of fun over there we have a lot of manga readers in the chat and in our discord right now so if you're looking for people to talk about that kind of stuff with we're building a small community and it's kind of awesome so check out my twitch and lastly if you can name every anime or video game that i stole music from for the sake of this video you're a [ __ ] loser but you have my respect the only hit i'll give you is that there's 14 names that i'm looking for okay i'll see you guys later [Music] you

Channel: Captain Mack

Views: 308,292

Keywords: captain, mack, funny, comedy, chainsaw man, tatsuki fujimoto, anime, manga, denji, aki, power, makima, pochita, video essay, analysis, narrative, writing

Id: 5bifn15-BnI

Length: 106min 28sec (6388 seconds)

Published: Thu May 05 2022