fangy

it's actually over.

we've been talking about how Chainsaw Man (the work) is meta-narratively made endless (in wanting to endlessly tell the story) by way of how Chainsaw Man (the figure) cannot die, and so, what about a work that doesn't have an ending at all?

i don't yet think the final chapter of csm will be a loop because it could very well just "AU where denji doesn't meet pochita" [either he lives or he dies in this AU] but i think turning part 2 into a loop that ends at the start of part 1 is a specific choice that deliberately prevents "an ending"

I agree with this. I don’t think Pochita is an objective speaker of the work’s thesis. he too is an embodiment of an aspect of it.

anyway, for now,

my feelings may change with more thought and/or the final chapter but I really disagree with the notion that this ending is nihilistic, speaking to a hopeless view of reality or affirming that nothing can or will change about human society.

“but what about power/kishibe returning/kobeni” what you should be thinking about is what do those characters look like in a world absent of chainsaw man’s influence?

to those saying that a csm part 3 is needed because there’s still so many unresolved plot threads to be addressed: friends. those plot threads do not exist anymore. there will be no addressing of them because they never happened.

there won’t be a part 3 because there isn’t a part 1 or 2 now

my biggest criticism of part 2 was the execution of asa's role, characterization, and storyline even in light of her being directly into "chainsaw man's woman" (quote the manga itself) but there's something where she's left abandoned by the writing but also by the intent of the narrative itself

asa was always doomed in a manga titled "chainsaw man" to never be the protagonist, how could she be? "chainsaw man" is The Hero, chainsaw man is The Manga About Chainsaw Man not Asa, etc. etc. maybe in this final chapter asa will be free even where denji is not.

reflecting on chainsaw man part 2 it really is astounding that "a manga that meticulously annihilates the concept of 'boys' dreams' by showing the nihilism, destruction, and instrumentalization by adults at the core of all of them" got put in jump plus

"Chainsaw man doesn't really exist! It's american propaganda!"

CHAINSAW MAN PART 2 THEMES

SEX = EVIL
ABORTION = GOOD
GAY = DOOMED
TIME = LOOPED

he spent the entire final arc literally "Trapped Within Chainsaw Man, Unable To Die", holy shit

asa basically could get a nothing ending other than the fact that heterosexuality is a prison and leads to the apocalypse.

the "man horse meme" except there's no horse and it's denji sitting dejectedly on the beach

now it's just

The throughline of Chainsaw Man pt 2 being Denji's growing realization that the demarcators of normative manhood/masculinity won't bring you happiness and ending it suddenly like that would be an all-timer move.

even if the series doesn't end here (hell, even if part 2 doesn't end here) I'll be pleased that more people understand part 2's ethos, the denial of the catharsis that comes from a story where problems are fundamentally fixable. chainsaw man cannot solve his own problems, nor external ones

there are points being missed where it feels like it is an intentional sprint away from them

man i don’t have my thoughts or conclusions from the chapter/direction of the ending sorted out at all and feel very lost but even i in my instability can see that so many people are entirely missing all of the points

A parent who wants their child to always be hopeful and have dreams, to give themselves a future and be filled with potential for good and meaningful things. And to vicariously experience that joyful innocence through them. Where everything is and will be ok.

Usagi: Chainsaw Man is crazy good this week.

I’m speechless and not ready for it to end.

Yes this is different than how other erasures have worked but like— it’s spelled out for us. Erasing the concept of erasure will bend reality in a way that hasn’t been done before.

my only “predictions” for the next chapter is that time has in fact turned back to the very beginning (in that our introduction to this new universe is at a time when denji was still living in the shack) and that we won’t see denji or his fate until the very end of the chapter.

In the end they did get to make their own world

Chainsaw man was a 42 month sociological study conducted by Harvard university

mhm. ch 136-137 was the tldr of pt II.

would it not be the most fitting end to the story that the next chapter also has a “to be continued” with no other chapters ever coming again

like. undoing the concept of an ending.

Quote to Minovsky post: "Don't even try to get into publicly predicting where Chainsaw Man is headed. You will lose." Well meaning quote reads: "when I saw this I thought it was some new nickname for Trump I hadn't heard."

Panel from Chainsaw Man of a guy saying "CHAINSAW MAN DOESN'T REALLY EXIST! IT'S AMERICAN PROPAGANDA!"