ITT: One arc wonders
>>287529356It has 2 great +1 good
Bleach, Soul Society arc made people think it was on the same level of Naruto and OP then it fell off
>>287529356what was the good arc? because I literally don't see it
>>287529356JJK
>>287529356Kaiju No. 8
Boku no Hero Academia. The Overhaul Arc.
>>287532782That one is really good, I still think about it to this day and I don't like MHA all that much
>>287532833From what I've seen, most people who really like the series consider it one of the weakest arcs. Absolutely insane to me. It's a legitimately fantastic standalone arc compared to the rest of the series ranging between meh, serviceable, and decent.
>>287532782the tournament arc actually
>>287532905That arc is good. But BNHA needs achieves anything beyond good with the exception of the Overhaul Arc. It's the only legitimately great part of the entire manga.
>>287529356more like half arc wondersit goes to shit when Guts leaves the band
>>287530991 Golden Age + Conviction (Lost Children specifically) are the 2 great, then Millennium Falcon is the “+1 good.” Everything after that is diminishing returns and boatposting, and before GA it’s basically edgy prototype Miura. Calling it a one arc wonder is bait though, Berserk is a two and a half arc wonder at minimum. The real one arc wonders are the ones carried entirely by a single tournament or rescue arc and then coast for 200 chapters.
>>287529356The poster child for this
>>287529356Terra Formars, the whole Mars arc, after they go back to earth I lost all interest>>287534645This too, after the escape from the orphanage the series was never as good
>>287532509Bleach is the best of Big 3. Cope and seethe below:
>>287534715>This one shit tastes better than the other 2
>>287529356reading berserk rn and kind of surprised how bad it falls off after golden age, the action is relentless and tiring, and everything from the themes to the character insights are delivered as directly as exposition, feels like there's little for the reader to intuit themselves. golden age probably had some of the same issues but they hadn't run its course by then
>>287532782That arc made me drop the whole series. Boring shit.
>>287534146Black Swordsman beats Millenium Falcon easily
>>287529356
HxH
Black swordsman is a pleb filter>waahhh, why is Guts acting like such an assholeThis is Guts right after the eclipse. This is him at his lowest. Also people seem to forget he’s a mercenary on revenge. He’s not some hero. Black swordsman is a great read after the golden age. Guts and Pucks’ interactions peak here, Puck is an actual character here. The slug lord is a great villain and near sympathetic. Plus, Guts’ whole persona is just a front to mask his pain. After he leaves Theresa heartbroken in a state of anguish, we see his real emotions come out and it’s one of the hardest hitting pages in the series
>>287534146I like the arcs you mentioned, but it honestly is a one arc wonder. Everything most people remember and revere Berserk for happened in Golden Age.
>>287535844Yeah, it’s impossible to deny that its entire rep is carried by the golden age and more specifically a handful of chapters that cover the eclipse. It’s the most important and best part of the story but you can’t help but think the series as a whole is overrated or people are forcing themselves to rate it so highly when out of 364 chapters, they only like about 70-80 of them.
>>287535585If you can't respect it being a product of its era your opinion is very much invalid.
>>287529356Out of Berserk, I’d say only the sea god and pirate chapters are downright bad. Everything else has been above average. Only talking about to Miura’s death, don’t care for the fanfic after
I was rereading Millennium Falcon and the amount of resistance Guts' party faces trying to get to Roderick's ship is absurd.>Have to fight through hordes of Daka, Guts has to fight a Makara, which previously took the Berserker Armor to beat, without activating it this time>The port is overrun with hundreds of Daka, Guts can't fend them all off without succumbing to his bloodlust>So Schierke summons a spirit of war flame to burn the Daka troops away>Which causes Daiba to deploy like four Makara to replace them>Guts gives in to his bloodlust because this enemy is too great and they're out of options>Guts kills them all and Daiba engages with Guts personally>Schierke's ethereal body manages to bring Guts back to sanity and Serpico joins the fight>Daiba fully deploys the Kundilini, his strongest familiar, who has mastery of Undine elementals>Schierke has to invoke the war flame again with the Dragon Slayer as the conduit to expose the Kundilini's real body, which Serpico beheads>This scorches Guts, who has to withstand it>Daiba retreats to his Garuda familiar>Emperor fucking Ganishka himself joins the battle, fries Guts before Guts is able to use the Dragon Slayer as a lightning rod to protect himself>Zodd's aerial battalion of Apostles joins the battle>Guts and Zodd team up to strike Ganishka's ethereal body, clearing the port, but frying Guts again>After Serpico stops Guts from arguing with Zodd, the Apostles leave, and Guts passes out from exhaustionAll that just to get on a fucking boat! And Guts' party isn't even allied with Griffith, meaning Ganishka and Daiba wasted most of the Pishaca trying to fight a force that wasn't looking for a fight.
>WTH IS AN ALUMINUM FALCON?!
>>287535899I’d say the entirety of Golden Age deserves its accolades. It has everything people say they love Betserk for: excellent panelling, political intrigue, class commentary, emotional tension and resonance, moral dilemmas, laserlike focus on characters who drive the story etc. After the end of GA, these things never appear together again. In the better arcs you might get like three of these at the same time, but that’s about it.
>>287536178It’s like a shitty gacha game, where the plot effectively vanishes and the devs try to keep you distracted by the endless procession of random power level events and mandatory sidequests.
>>287537270But half the point of this is to build up characters as memorable so when the Eclipse rips them away it hurts the reader just as much as it does Guts. You sympathize with him and feel his pain as his entire world is lost and he has to pick up the pieces and now go at it alone. If the Band of the Hawk were all bit characters except for Griffith, Guts, and Casca it wouldn't be anywhere near as effective.People just don't want to read about Guts' slow climb out of the dark pit he fell into after the Eclipse, they just like to read about the fall. Or rather watch, since most people are normalfags and the Golden Age is the only one with a good anime.
Farnese joining the band was the jump the shark moment but people won't admit it. Nothing against Farnese, she's cute but she was a sign of what was to come.
>>287537368Not really, the plot is still there, just internalized. Guts is again challenged to wield the Berserker Armor and yield to his bloodlust, even though that's a bad thing now because he could turn his fangs on his allies. He doesn't yield against the first Makara, but it takes some Black Swordsman-tier thinking to actually kill it without the boost the Armor gives him. He doesn't yield against the hundreds of Daka, but he very nearly does before Schierke pulls through. And even though he DOES yield against the Makara quartet, he's able to pull back with Schierke's help. And then his ideals are tested once again with Zodd appearing once more. He COULD kill his old rival, but that would make dealing with Ganishka difficult. And Zodd COULD kill Guts after, but they both chose to part ways instead. Guts' bloodlust and history are still there, but now he's able to still be a one-man army against foes he previously would've given his all to fell alone because he adapted so well, with allies that are able to work with him.The Struggler struggles.
>>287537449farnese is just a microcosm of gutsshe follows the same path
>>287537449it was the start of guts' jrpg party circlejerk
>>287537569People have a problem with potato Casca, and with Guts in part because of the fact that her being handed off to Farnese was both a way to contrive a longterm fray between Guts and Casca and justify Casca being shafted and more retarded than she already was. Farnese represents a stall in the story that never picks up until Casca is restored again, because Guts and Casca barely interacted from Conviction to Fantasia.
>>287537449Farnese and the gang are good characters but they hardly fit the context. Farnese in particular has so much backstory compared to Guts, Griffith and Casca she feels like she's from another manga entirely
>>287537862Having Casca remain a potato for 90% of the manga was truly the worst writing decision Miura made. Her being a retard just gets ridiculous for how long it goes on and she’s still just rapebait. Considering she’s meant to be the main reason for Guts’ quest of revenge, seeing her remain this way for so long just has the opposite effect on me and diminishes the importance of his journey. She doesn’t even have an active role or relationship with Guts
>>287537862It should be a way to teach Guts to once again rely on others but it's diluted with so much extra fluff and flashbacks and secondary meandering plotlines that Guts and Casca themselves are overwhelmed in their own story. The issue is that the story stretches to infinity, constant lengthy fight scenes and lore drops and shitty gags but the plot moves hardly an inch
Isidro and Schierke are the weaklinks. They’re annoying and Miura refused to put them in danger. Schierke is just there because of his loli fetish and Isidro is failed comic relief
>>287538009They'd be good characters in a different manga, they just have little to nothing in common with one expects from Berserk up until that point
>>287537979>Guts and Casca themselves are overwhelmed in their own story. Exactly. Like remember the sense of payoff and relief that came from Guts finally getting to comfort Casca at the tail end of Conviction? That never happens again, not even at the end of the manga. I actually like the "unresolved" aspect of their relationship, but that doesn't mean they should have been artificially kept away from each other to such a weird extent. It's to the point where their meeting again felt like dangling a carrot on a stick and a contrivance.
>>287537947Potato Casca is a revisit to Invalid Griffith, in that she's a tenuous shadow of her former self, on the verge of death. But while Guts couldn't save Griffith and he wound up sacrificing his humanity, he swore he wouldn't make the same mistake with Casca. Yeah she's rapebait, that's the point. A toddler marked with the Brand of Sacrifice is one not long for this world, and Guts had to somehow keep her alive through it all. If he didn't get help then Casca would've met her permanent end at Guts' own hands, and he'd be no better than Griffith by then.
>>287538069It's not that Guts didn't need to accept help, it's just that the help entirely replacing Guts's role as Casca's primary caregiver was a mistake, as well as the help traveling with him to be an onsite babysitter 24/7 which contrasts with the edgy parts of the manga in such a tonally dissonant way
>>287532782>>287532833>>287532884>Boku no Hero AcademiaNobody can basically agree with what arc was good or where it reached a peak. Easy with JJK, Bleach and Naruto
>>287532940>But BNHA needs achieves anything beyond good with the exception of the Overhaul ArcSchool Festival was better.>>287538128The only arc people agree is complete shit is Joint Training
>>287538117I don't think Casca having a babysitter is the issue, the problem is that said babysitter has enough backstory, themes and intricate character development to be a secondary protagonist for no fucking narrative reason.
>>287532782You misspelled My Villain Academia
>>287538176Kek yeah, she basically became a completely different character after chopping her hair off and people said it was character development. What Miura did was ask himself what he could come up with to separate Guts and Casca again after he literally just got her back
>>287538215Also I kinda wanna stress this point: The whole point of Erica being Casca's babysitter at first is that everyone thinks it's kind of sad that Guts can't take care of Casca because she's scared of him. That's why he wants to get her back and prove that he'll do better this time. I'm not saying the conflict in their relationship is bad - I actually like the sexual assault scene - but for him to just hand her off to another person again is basically undoing the entire point of Conviction's plot.
>>287538253Well how do you go on from there? Potato Casca is too afraid of Guts to let him handle her at that point
>>287538117Farnese and Casca traveling with him was absolutely necessary, did you miss Guts' introspection about how difficult it is to concile his bloodlust and the world he lives in that demands it with actually protecting someone? In Lost Children Jill asked to come with him and he said no, he's not the safety she wanted. Now once Millennium Falcon started Guts was forced into that very position. And for Farnese caring for Casca was her Black Swordsman phase, she didn't know who she was or what to do, so she did the only things she could as she adapted to the new world, finding her place within it. It's why Casca coming back is the conclusion of both Guts' and her arcs.
>>287538294I don't think him accepting help is bad, but I think Farnese was added only for that purpose, changing and denigrating her character and forcing a wedge between Guts and Casca with little hope for reconciliation and every incentive to keep the boring Farnese-babysit-Casca dynamic going. She also brought the dead weight Serpico along. And not defending the Continuation, because anything involving Griffith and his nefariousness is eyerolling, but I would literally have less of a problem with Casca being constantly stolen/a damsel in distress Guts has to save like she was in Conviction than what we got. It would have been more exciting than just fighting random monsters with Farnese being the one to save her. Farnese saving Casca means nothing to me and nothing to the story. She didn't know who Casca was prior or who exactly she is defending, just that she is defending Guts's companion. Guts defends Casca because he knew her and still loves her despite the fact that she's changed. That has emotional impact.
>>287538009i hate schierke so much. she's pretty much perfect and has no flaws, she immediately becomes the second most useful member always being able to use magic solve a problem and of course has a crush on guts. it does just feel like shameless fap fuel for otakus
>>287537551Dude, look at your wall of text and ask yourself how much of this nonsense served any real purpose and wasn’t just regurgitating the same tired tripe over and over again. >enemies show up, Guts kills them>oh no muh bloodlust>must control muh bloodlust>oh no, this guy is so strong, will Guts manage to defeat him????>of course he does, Guts is so strong and amazing>Gattsu, your shitty forgettable friends are totally important, btw retarded Casca is still retarded>enemies show up, rinse and repeatThis is basically Guts’ entire character arc after Conviction. It’s a bad shounen manga where the protagonist is essentially a void of nothing surrounded by other voids of nothing, and pages and pages of meaningless fighting try to hide that there’s nothing going on behind the ultra-detailed pictures. We don’t learn anything new about the characters, the character dynamics are barely there, the emotional tension is nonexistent, and the goals, if there are any, are drowned out by the endless white noise of Miura’s filler “content”, where three volumes are used to say what could be said—and used to be said—in three pages.
>>287538417As I said before, the new gang has too much screentime/explicit characterization. They should be the equivalent of Judeau, Corkus etc. not full-blown secondary characters with their dedicated flashbacks. Not that they're bad but they dilute the soup way too much
>>287529356i liked the whole thing. it was fun watching the art style evolve from one end to the other like AOT.
>>287537900Long backstory doesn’t necessarily make a good or entertaining character.
>>287538332>you miss Guts' introspection about how difficult it is to concile his bloodlust and the world he lives in that demands it with actually protecting someone?No I didn't, I just wish that Guts would have actually reconciled it instead of just offloading most of the work onto someone else. What was "protect Casca" became "protect my friends because they protect Casca." That careful line between caring for your loved ones and defending against threats is a very common one in war fiction, it didn't have to be as dull as Miura made it. Like, you can just tell he wanted to draw random fights and write pages-long tea parties between Farnese and Schierke
>>287538529>instead of just offloading most of the work onto someone elseThat's the lesson he has to learn after spending years alone trusting no one but his steel dildo, trusting others because he can't do everything himself
>>287529356Yeah, Lost Children is the only good arc. Wait, its actually Conviction. No, its really the Kushan Invasion. Huh.
>>287538417Again, Farnese is a reflection of Guts. They both went from human, mundane roles to losing their sense of identity after an Eclipse event, rebuilding them after as they matured into people unrecognizable from before, but far more capable of surviving. Like, the only way Miura could've made it more obvious is if Farnese received the Brand of Sacrifice during the Pseudo-Eclipse. The difference is that Guts survived through relying on his bloodlust, which was tempered into steel, while Farnese survived through her empathy, which blossomed into understanding and magical protection. She was able to reconcile the clerical dogma that previously sustained her with her newfound worldview, which only worked because her mind was opened by then.
>>287535844>>287535899>>287537270Golden Age is loved like that because the Berserk anime only went that far and every later adaptation has sucked or ended early. The Golden Age being the only 'real Berserk' is entirely a product of animeonlies defending their ignorance of the rest of the series by pretending that where they stopped following is where the story stopped mattering.
>>287538678It's the most adapted because it's the best part. While Black Swordsman and Conviction are good, why would they even adapt those if what follows is the mindnumbing shitheap that is Millennium Falcon
>>287538678I read the manga first and never checked out the anime for years and still feel the same way about Golden Age
Fire Force but the Last Arc was the Wonder Arc.
>>287538486If you're going to be that destructive, you could apply that to Golden Age and replace bloodlust with ennui.
>>287538678That may be true but it's also the only arc in which Guts Casca and Griffith are allowed to consistently interact with each other which forms the emotional and thematic core of the whole manga
>>287538576I understand that, but they didn't have to travel with him 24/7. Like I s2g this hero's journey shit isn't even that hard to write. It's called the friends we made along the way, not the friends we made who then follow us around every day
>>287538738Also Devilman Lady. The entire Manga is awful but the last arc is so wild over the top nonsense it saves the whole thing.
>>287538718It is the most adapted because it came early and is very long in its own right. It was skipped for 3Dzerk, but that had its own massive list of problems that made it unwatchable. This is like saying that the first couple chapters of Nausicaa are the best because that is what the film adapted and what everyone knows, and not all that came afterwards.
My favorite /a/ bit is the eternal contrarian
>>287537449Farnese's issue is that Miura is very good at writing Guts, but he's also extremely long winded about doing it and will draw entire chapters that are just visualizing Gut's rage and emotions. Which leaves little time for the side cast who are fighting for screen time with one another. Schrieke is basically the only exception because she has the direct ability to interface with Guts and share his screentime.
>>287538791Golden Age has been adapted 3 times. I'm not saying it's always the case that the best arc is what's adapted, but I'm saying it was in this case. Plus it's the only arc with a clear beginning and end
>>287538834Umm sorry its popular so you aren't allowed to like that arc, only anime secondary peasants enjoy it
>>287538816I'm not even sure who you're referencing here, the people who only like Golden Age or the people who don't?
>>287538202I do not remember a single good moment from this arc besides the Doofenshmirtz look alike
>>287537419>If the Band of the Hawk were all bit characters except for Griffith, Guts, and Casca it wouldn't be anywhere near as effective.They are all bit characters. None of them get more than a few speaking panels before the Eclipse.
>>287538009Isidro is fine. He's basically young Guts if he didn't have a scumbag for a father.
this is by far the worst thing in berserk bar none
>>287539401no its the new york jewish voiced female counter part
>>287538834You had the first 90s anime, then the mid 2010s film trilogy that covered the Golden Age to set up a new adaptation, and then you had the 2016 abomination that killed any potential the Berserk anime had. The later stuff didn't get adapted because the last anime essentially would have to be entirely remade before you could do anything else.
>>287539508nah Ivalera at least doesn't make Star Wars references every 2 pages
>>287529356Black Swordsman> Lost Children > rest of Conviction > Golden Age > rest of Berserk.
Guts’ chapter in prison with the fairy is the best single chapter in the series for me
>>287537270Golden Age is a tutorial level. That's why Miura started with the Black Swordsman's arc to hook you in. It's similar to how certain video games let you play for 20 mins at the start with all the upgrades unlocked before taking them all away from you.
>>287539528its not pucks fault that he is used a the mouthpiece for miuras cringe pop culture references have pity
>>287539401Casual hands typed this post
>>287537449Farnese would have made sense if she had managed to connect with Guts. As it stands, it does feel like she belongs to a different story.
Farnese lost all intrigue when she just became a Guts simp
Midland Saga only had one good arc
>>287539753I really can't imagine him pulling off those hijinks in his actual skinny form
>>287539632Based
>>287539401i think you're mistaken
>>287539882Farnese can't connect with Guts because there's nothing connecting them narratively after Conviction. She's not Casca, not Schierke, and has nearly nothing to offer him. Her arc could have been ended if she had just caught up to Guts and apologized for trying to fuck him.
>>287538823Considering he kept adding pointless characters and “visualising” the same thing for thirty years, maybe he wasn’t very good at writing Guts.
>>287540682What? They can easily connect through the shared experience of having their naive worldview shattered by the grim darkness of the demonic world. Guts even realizes Farnese's viewpoint is slowly shattering when she tracked him down, which is why he didn't strike back or react when she tried to torture him, and then chased after him. He saw that she was going through similar things that he did.
>>287538816that's all of 4chan
>>287534715
>>287541397NTA, but Guts had seen dozens of people whose “naive worldview is shattered by the grim darkness of the demon world”, starting with Theresa in the very first arc of the manga. So had the readers. There’s nothing special or interesting about Farnese after Conviction, she just exists so Guts can dump Casca’s retarded ass on her and successfully avoid the grim fate of being a baby sitter.
>>287542111None of those people were really in the same position he was. Guts was the raid captain of the Band of the Hawk, Farnese was the commander of the Holy Iron Chain Knights. Both important figures in the world of men, but all that experience pales when demons start walking around. Farnese looks to Guts for guidance on what to do, and he gives her that guidance through caring for Casca. Guts plays the role of the Skull Knight, giving purpose to the directionless struggler. It's no coincidence Gaiseric was the Berserker Armor's previous wielder.
>>287540795Nah, because it was top tier every time.
>>287538816It's the only thing keeping us away from those unwashed apes who are banging at our gatesSome of whom are already inside the castle walls
>>287542255Farnese-Guts is a parallel to Casca-Griffith
>>287540682She's lamenting exactly because she can't find a connection like Casca or Shierke have. But yeah maybe a lot of bullshit could have been cut if she never appeared after Conviction, especially if there was never a long term plan for her.
>>287543107>especially if there was never a long term plan for her.Do you people read the manga? Like all of Millennium Falcon and half of Falconia is about Farnese's development and maturation. There WAS a long-term plan for her.
>>287529356True. The one arc in question is Conviction tho
>>287529356He had no right to be this sexy
>>287539401I did get annoying that he was in caricature form practically the whole time in later chapters instead of just looking like that for gags. He pretty much stopped being an actual character around the time Isidro showed up.
>>287540860Pretty much this.
>>287543222All of that irrelevant to the main plot. Might as well made a spin-off.
>best girl gets spirited away while the two bugs remainFor what purpose?
>>287544502>All of that irrelevant to the main plot.Horse-fucking-shit. The main plot is how Guts adapts to the ever-changing world. Him taking on new companions to cover what he cannot is adapting. Him helping his companions and being more involved in their lives than he was with the Band of the Hawk is him adapting. He even asked Farnese if Vritannis was the end to her journey and she said no, she was just nostalgic for it. Just like how he was nostalgic for his mercenary days when explaining how the merc world works to the others when they first got to Vritannis.
>>287544502The second half of Berserk was about building a second Band of the Hawk, so exploring those characters to an end was as much the point as anything else. The only issue is that Miura didn't realize he was on a timer, and he got too indulgent about things like new boss battles or Griffith's empire building.
>>287529356It has 3 good arcs though. it becomes shit only after Berserker Armor and boat.
>>287538718>why would they even adapt those if what follows is the mindnumbing shitheap that is Millennium FalconWhat follows Black Swordsman is Golden Age, retard.
>>287529356But it has more than one arc that is good.
>Last panel before Miura kicks the bucketTalk about a massive fucking gut punch
>>287545854Golden Age is a prequel and Black Swordsman happens chronologically after
Why did he do it?
>>287538718Wouldn't Black Swordsman be the first thing they adapt? I've only read the manga, but I'm pretty sure that's the opening arc.
>>287546986He explains whyAnd then this explains why Guts is so afraid of being blamed for Griffith's downfall by Casca. But thankfully, unlike Gambino she came to her senses and listened to reason.
>>287547013Adaptations of series that go into long term flashbacks early, often will avoid the framing device and just start the story from the beginning of the flashback and rearrange the other stuff to be set in the 'right place' temporally. The Black Swordsman leads into the Golden Age flashback, but it is also a lot shorter than the Golden Age, so it is 'easier' to start with the Golden Age wholesale and move the Black Swordsman to after it, if they continued the adaptation.
>>287546986Unironically toxic masculinity. Gambino, like the name suggests, was meant to be a boss. The biggest dick around among the mercenaries. He's strong, he's willing to fight dirty, he's a man that people respect. But then he got crippled and emasculated and Guts went from a cute pet or even a son he loved, to being another example of himself getting soft and weak and no longer able to stand beside the other men as a strong warrior. So his relationship with Guts had to be destroyed for his own mental image. He couldn't have the weakness of love in addition to all the other weaknesses he now had.
>>287547063>Lonely puppy>Mad dog;_;
>>287547167WOOF WOOF
>>287546986He was being childish.
>>287532884I think it's because people were growing tired of the same arc structure the author was using. But it was the last time, though>Some new villain appears >he does something bad to some student >Deku and his friends face the villain>About to lose then the pro heroes shows up
>>287548472kek
