Episode 362

Aazealh

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As others mentioned earlier in this topic regarding Zodd's age, I was thinking why they call him "Immortal" might be more than just about his abilities in battle. Cant wait to find out more.

Well yes, that's how it's explained when he is first introduced. Mercenaries have called him that because he's been seen on battlegrounds for "almost a hundred years" and every time he's believed to have been killed, he shows up again. The idea that Zodd has been alive for longer than 300 years, a number he specifically mentions twice in the series (volume 5, volume 17) has very little going for it. It hinges on a single thing: the fact Zodd is familiar with the Berserk's armor. But there are other ways to explain that knowledge than him having been alive during the time of Gaiseric's empire.
 

Mammon

Mangoku army
Another breath-taking episode, seeing the "previous GodHand" really got me pumped. Always a pleasure to know that after I'm down reading, I'll be able to go on SkullKnight.net where Griffith, Aazealh, Walter and all the others with help me digest these new infos :ubik:

Those previous God Hand designs and the tentical-scape are super freaky, I love it. Immediately saw Artemis of Ephesus in the one GH to the right. I was looking too hard at those low res spoilers this morning trying to figure out if that one next to her had a big Sauron eyeball or a vagina face... it’s a mouth.:ganishka:
Funny you should mention that, the first thing that came to my mind when I saw this particular guy was the alternate design that the "Mouth of Sauron" almost got, that we can see in the bonuses of the extended edition of "The Return of the King".
This is the normal Mouth of Sauron, with the enlarged mouth, which was kept in the end (but sadly not used in the theatrical release):
Mouth_of_Sauron.png


The alternate version that Peter Jackson thought about using before getting the idea of simply enlarging the mouth of the actor =>
(click to watch the side mouth in motion)

The other 3 "new ones" remind me of some of the designs from Gigantomakhia , especially of the Olympus Empire, it's "Titan" and the oracles controlling it. Not one creature in particular, but the general feel of it...

Once again, I'm reminded why Mr Miura is my favorite mangaka...
 
He bled to death because of the armor; note the streams of blood increasingly filling his vision as he sees, presumably, his woman and his city die. It would also be weird if they said "here's when he died," the armor simulated a state of death, or deactivation in its case, but it was only a coincidence the armor went into sleep mode then.:shrug:

Just a theory here, but is it possible that it's not Skully bleeding out, but instead him about to be reborn into his current form? Perhaps he was desperate to save his kingdom and the sacrifice was the woman in his arms as she is branded, and the person who is the sacrifice needs to be of importance to the person who called on the Behelit?

Also, what are the chances of this woman being a fairy of some kind, or a witch, we know that Gaiseric must have known Hanarr for him to have obtained the Berserker Armour whilst alive, and Hanarr calling him his King, so knowing other magical beings is quite likely?
 

Aazealh

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Just a theory here, but is it possible that it's not Skully bleeding out, but instead him about to be reborn into his current form? Perhaps he was desperate to save his kingdom and the sacrifice was the woman in his arms as she is branded

No, I don't think so. His current self is sustained through a special armor Hanarr crafted for him. That was made clear last episode, and was reinforced in this one by the Skull Knight's last line: "What you saw was the end of the foolish king. The beginning of a dead man’s endless wandering of the night." Furthermore, it's been clear since very early on in the series that the Skull Knight is the enemy of the God Hand. It never made too much sense to assume he had himself been one of them.
 
Not sure why this comes up so much, but Gaeseric isn't a correct way to spell that name. It's Gaiseric.
Shit, I even tried to double check before posting, but I had a shorter window of time to proofread than intended, so I missed your post clarifying it on this very page. Thanks!

If there was any intent behind it, I think this was the extent of it. I mean, my mind also immediately went to Griffith when I saw the hair and cape, like was this God Hand memory morphing into a berserker vision of Guts grabbing hold of him (he was lashing out, after all), but then you see the Berserk's Armor is as it was when Skully wore it and of course the next page dispels any such notion the person is Griffith. Of course, it could also just be pure coincidence, plenty of curly blonde-haired women's hair has resembled Griffith's, but the fact it's just "white" hair and cape when Miura could have made a different pose or any number of accessories visible to clear it up may suggest an intentional fake out, but again, no way to know and probably not an important connotation in any case.

Unless you think it's foreshadowing this moment...


Grifdeath.jpg confirmed!? :troll:
Yeah, I'm mainly thinking either an intentional fake out, or foreshadowing Griffdeath. Or both at once? Maybe not "foreshadowing" Griffith's demise, but moreso showing Guts, by comparison, what successfully getting your revenge might look and feel like: everything else burning around you as you die alone. A Pyrrhic victory at absolute best. At least, that's visually what it brings to mind. Contextually it's all quite opposite of how Guts' revenge would play out, but I feel it makes for an apt warning against pursuing vengeance in addition to the more explicit warning against pushing himself too far in the armor (which are overlapping concerns anyway).

I'm wondering now if the visual similarity was also meant to convey Guts' heightened psychological fixation on Griffith in this state, to the point that anyone with a lightly colored cape and hair might be briefly/immediately mistaken as Griffith by him. We saw Griffith at first, because Guts saw Griffith at first.
 
Well we know the worlds were merged in ancient times. I've speculated in the past that back then, because magic users were much more common, humans might have able to live more normally alongside astral critters like trolls or ogres.
I wonder (unless I'm getting my lore wrong lol) why would there be a need for an incarnation ceremony if the two worlds were merged. From my understanding of it at least, since the worlds were merged, couldn't the God Hand move about the physical world freely? What would be the point of a physical body? It could be that the God Hand needed a Griffith/human like figure to do some work on the ground, but that might not necessarily the case. The incarnation (at least as far as we know) happened before Void became a god hand member (this is assuming that the "sage/wiseman" told by Mozgus was in fact Void). If the God Hand were going to summon one of their own into the physical world with a physical body, a person who was famous in recent memory would be the perfect one for the job. However, the last God Hand member would have been alive 200+ years prior to this event, and if this person was indeed famous, we would have at least heard something about them by now. But that also does not make sense, because if Void was not a God Hand member at that point, how did the women get the brand (if what we we're being shown was in fact the incarnation ceremony, and that happened before Void was a God Hand member)? All that being said, if someone was incarnated, that person could have been an important who led some sort of fifth column against Gaiseric's empire. And if Gaiseric died at the incarnation ceremony, that could have been a way to utilize the instability in order to sacrifice his empire. Since the mark is on the foreheads of those people at the bottom of the tower of rebirth, perhaps the mark of the sacrifice was given out to everyone in some sort of crowd at a speech or something, where they were all looking in one direction? Given by an incarnated God Hand member? (if one of them were incarnated before what we see during this episode, they could have very easily switched back to their normal form like we see with Femto, so seeing them in their God Hand forms this episode does not discount this theory) But then again, this person should have been discussed by now since they are so instrumental to the fall of Gaiseric's empire, so why haven't we heard of something specifically by now? Instead of just being referred to by the cryptic title "angel" or "angels". But this point is also assuming that the God Hand would have had a reason to be incarnated in a world where they could already operate freely in with no restrictions anyways. They could have possibly accomplished all of this using their normal forms (4/5 angels destroying Gaiseric's empire). Could this "angel" be not a god hand member, but something more nefarious? I might be reading into it a bit too much, but the ceremony's purpose is to give a physical body to something that should only exist in the divine domain/heavenly spheres, SK does not explicitly mention God Hand members being the only beings to manifest by this process. Perhaps it was used to manifest a body for something else entirely, perhaps like the vortex/IOE we see in this episode? Perhaps the IOE merely just existed in the world of Idea, or maybe was in a very weakened state, and this ceremony was the last push in order to manifest it into what we know it is now? All this is assuming that the IOE is somewhat canon. Idk, just wanted to put what I've been thinking over the past 12 hours into writing lol, sorry if this was a bit too long.
 
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Aazealh

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I wonder (unless I'm getting my lore wrong lol) why would there be a need for an incarnation ceremony if the two worlds were merged. From my understanding of it at least, since the worlds were merged, couldn't the God Hand move about the physical world freely? What would be the point of a physical body?

That is indeed one of the key problems with the idea that a member of the God Hand was incarnated a thousand years ago. What would the purpose have been?

The incarnation (at least as far as we know) happened before Void became a god hand member (this is assuming that the "sage/wiseman" told by Mozgus was in fact Void).

From what we see in this episode, Void was there when Gaiseric's capital fell, and is likely to have been the cause of its downfall. It seems therefore that he was present during the big event that occurred a thousand years ago, the rarity and magnitude of which was equivalent to Femto's incarnation.

And if Gaiseric died at the incarnation ceremony, that could have been a way to utilize the instability in order to sacrifice his empire.

I think it's more likely Gaiseric bore witness to the destruction of his empire. He died holding his woman, with the Brand burning on the landscape in the background.

Since the mark is on the foreheads of those people at the bottom of the tower of rebirth, perhaps the mark of the sacrifice was given out to everyone in some sort of crowd at a speech or something, where they were all looking in one direction? Given by an incarnated God Hand member?

That's not how it works as far as we know. The Brand isn't handed out randomly, and when people are offered as sacrifices, it serves a specific purpose (usually in exchange for obtaining power).

Perhaps it was used to manifest a body for something else entirely, perhaps like the vortex/IOE we see in this episode?

From what we understand of the Berserk world's cosmology, it wouldn't make much sense for the Idea of Evil to be manifested in the corporeal world. It already exists as a part of every human being.
 
A point I want to make that I don't think I've seen brought up yet is what Skull Knight said in Episode 221 when he first used the Beherit Sword in Qliphoth when he used it to escape from the cave with Guts. He mentions that "Though this was only meant to be wielded to entomb them in that vortex.". It's interesting that he doesn't say kill in the traditional sense but rather "entomb". With the revelation that there was a previous God Hand group, maybe the previous members weren't killed in the normal sense but rater trapped or entombed in the Vortex of Souls forever. Whether this means death or not is unknown for a God Hand member. Maybe Gaiseric couldn't kill them at all and had to find another way to "destroy" them? Any thoughts?
 

Walter

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A point I want to make that I don't think I've seen brought up yet is what Skull Knight said in Episode 221 when he first used the Beherit Sword in Qliphoth when he used it to escape from the cave with Guts. He mentions that "Though this was only meant to be wielded to entomb them in that vortex.". It's interesting that he doesn't say kill in the traditional sense but rather "entomb". With the revelation that there was a previous God Hand group, maybe the previous members weren't killed in the normal sense but rater trapped or entombed in the Vortex of Souls forever. Whether this means death or not is unknown for a God Hand member. Maybe Gaiseric couldn't kill them at all and had to find another way to "destroy" them? Any thoughts?
I think that’s kind of semantics. If they’re trapped in the vortex forever, what’s the difference if he couldn’t “kill” them?

I do think you’re right though that the vortex could be used, perhaps. Though the relationship between it and the God Hand remains somewhat nebulous. We see the Idea of Evil manipulating it in 83, and it comes basically on command in vol 3.
 

Aazealh

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With the revelation that there was a previous God Hand group, maybe the previous members weren't killed in the normal sense but rater trapped or entombed in the Vortex of Souls forever. Whether this means death or not is unknown for a God Hand member. Maybe Gaiseric couldn't kill them at all and had to find another way to "destroy" them? Any thoughts?

The Vortex of Souls is where souls with bad karma end up after dying. So it's kind of expected that incredibly maleficent beings like members of the God Hand would end up there if they were destroyed.
 
I absolutely love the design of the previous God Hand members , i love how they look more raw, more unrefined, more chaotic, it definitely makes Void and the next God Hand members look more like the next "GEN", somewhat of a, more perfected version of the God Hand, (of a perfect vision of an ideal) a work in progress by the Idea of Evil. Like a factory constantly trying to out put the most optimized, perfect, ideal, of its own concept possible.
 
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I don't know if anyone has brought this up yet, but based on the designs of the "proto-apostles", I'm wondering if Zodd is one of them. The proto-apostles are very hairy and so is Zodd. I don't think this is the case for most apostles (I guess Wyald was hairy too, but not dark hair like that).

I also wonder whether the proto-godhand are really godhand members, or just the head apostles. I guess the imagery parallels heavily imply that they are Godhand. But maybe they were something a bit different.
 
I don't know if anyone has brought this up yet, but based on the designs of the "proto-apostles", I'm wondering if Zodd is one of them. The pro-apostles are very hairy and so is Zodd. I don't think this is the case for most apostles (I guess Wyald was hairy too).
If anything Zodd, is the perfect apostle! Zodd exist to fuck you up and thats what hes apostle form was made for! Hes a meat made PANZER tank, created to fuck everything in his path up!
 
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I think that’s kind of semantics. If they’re trapped in the vortex forever, what’s the difference if he couldn’t “kill” them?
I think it was the phrasing that threw me off to be honest. The way he said it made it sound to me he couldn't kill them through conventional means and had to send them to the Vortex by more obscure methods i.e. the Beherit sword. It made me think if he didn't have the sword but he was the cause of the old God Hand's demise, how did he accomplish such a feat. But yeah I think I looked a bit too much into it.

I do think you’re right though that the vortex could be used, perhaps. Though the relationship between it and the God Hand remains somewhat nebulous. We see the Idea of Evil manipulating it in 83, and it comes basically on command in vol 3.
Interesting, I always considered the Vortex and the God Hand just mere instruments of the IoE with the God Hand having at least some measure of control over the Vortex considering like you said what happens in vol 3.

The Vortex of Souls is where souls with bad karma end up after dying. So it's kind of expected that incredibly maleficent beings like members of the God Hand would end up there if they were destroyed.

Yeah I think the phrasing just threw me off a bit, my bad,
 

Aazealh

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Maybe apostles back then were actually stronger because the worlds were merged, as some have been speculating. So they were created closer to the "source" of their power? Could be why Zodd is so much stronger than the average apostle

That seems unlikely. The creatures we see get diced up by Gaiseric and don't appear much stronger than the apostles we know. Zodd also refers to himself twice as having lived for 300 years. Lastly and more importantly, Zodd isn't merely strong but also very skilled. He's fearsome because he's a formidable warrior in addition to being a monster, as opposed to most apostles.
 
That seems unlikely. The creatures we see get diced up by Gaiseric and don't appear much stronger than the apostles we know. Zodd also refers to himself twice as having lived for 300 years. Lastly and more importantly, Zodd isn't merely strong but also very skilled. He's fearsome because he's a formidable warrior in addition to being a monster, as opposed to most apostles.

That's a good point. My theory is probably wrong.

I'm a bit confused about Zodd's age because he also seems to have known the skull knight while he was wearing the berserk armor, which would have been 1000 years ago. Maybe he just heard about it?

When was the second time he referred to his age? I know one time was when he first fought Guts.
 

Aazealh

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I'm a bit confused about Zodd's age because he also seems to have known the skull knight while he was wearing the berserk armor, which would have been 1000 years ago. Maybe he just heard about it?

Yeah, a lot of people are stumped by his line in volume 26. It came up a few times in this thread already. I don't have a definitive answer obviously, but I do think his experience with it must have been different from, say, fighting a human Gaiseric. An old speculation of mine is that the Skull Knight may have seen a potential ally in Zodd while he was still human three hundred years ago. Just like he saw an ally in Guts. He may have tried to mentor Zodd at the time, and even offered him the choice of using the Berserk's armor. But Zodd refused, and eventually was mortally wounded... and became an apostle. A spectacular backfire which would also partly explain why Zodd is so unique among apostles. There are of course plenty of other possibilities, this is just food for thought.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
I'm a bit confused about Zodd's age because he also seems to have known the skull knight while he was wearing the berserk armor, which would have been 1000 years ago. Maybe he just heard about it?

Presumably after the fact, yeah. Slan also knowingly mocked Skull Knight's identity but clearly wasn't around to see it for herself. Of course, she's a God Hand, but it would also make sense for someone like Zodd to find out the origins of their greatest enemy, plus his own first-hand experience with him since.

BTW, that bitter exchange they had about Skully not being the type to go chasing a woman in battle has a little extra nuance for us now! Zodd may have unwittingly hit a sore spot. :zodd:

Yeah, a lot of people are stumped by his line in volume 26. It came up a few times in this thread already. I don't have a definitive answer obviously, but I do think his experience with it must have been different from, say, fighting a human Gaiseric.

Yeah, I've had to fix a couple of my posts already because I'm not as well versed in the scriptures as I used to be. :stop:

An old speculation of mine is that the Skull Knight may have seen a potential ally in Zodd while he was still human three hundred years ago. Just like he saw an ally in Guts. He may have tried to mentor Zodd at the time, and even offered him the choice of using the Berserk's armor. But Zodd refused, and eventually was mortally wounded... and became an apostle. A spectacular backfire which would also partly explain why Zodd is so unique among apostles. There are of course plenty of other possibilities, this is just food for thought.

Super cool theory though, I wouldn't mind it coming true and hope what we get is at least as interesting. The only thing I might prefer is an even more expansive individual backstory for him separate from Skully, though those things aren't mutually exclusive. I just hope we get a pretty decent Zodd flashback in an episode and it's not left to the novelizations. =)
 

Aazealh

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Super cool theory though, I wouldn't mind it coming true and hope what we get is at least as interesting. The only thing I might prefer is an even more expansive individual backstory for him separate from Skully, though those things aren't mutually exclusive. I just hope we get a pretty decent Zodd flashback in an episode and it's not left to the novelizations. :mozgus:

No kidding, I was daydreaming earlier today about a one-volume Zodd backstory that Miura would be releasing after the series ended (and after another more general one-volume epilogue, obviously :schnoz:). One can dream...
 
Everything indicates that he dies at that point. Including the title of the episode.

Yes I agree with this point (same point I was making in my post).

This isn't just directed at you but I don't even know what you guys mean by "reincarnated" here. When a human becomes a member of the God Hand, the wording used is that they're reborn, or a new being is born. Then when a member of the God Hand acquires a physical body (a very rare event), it's an incarnation (a spirit receiving a fleshly body). A reincarnation is a slightly different thing, it's when a soul leaves a corporeal body for another one. Can seem like a minute difference but it's better to be precise to avoid confusion. Anyway, it's not hard to think of ways the woman could have been branded while escaping from the ceremony, especially since she died in Gaiseric's arms.

Ah, thanks for clearing that up. Hard to keep all the terms straight all the time. My reference to “reincarnation” was meant to mean “incarnation” by the definition you provided.

I also don’t think it’s as straight forward as you say as to why/how the branded woman made it out of the ceremony. Yes she died in Gaiseric’s arms so he likely had a hand in helping her, but how did HE make it out? Guts had the help of SK, Gaiseric had....possibly the Berserker armor? And we don’t even know if the concept of behelits/ being branded existed at this time.

I’ve also been meaning to ask you why you refer to it as the Berserks armor instead of Berserker? I’m sure you’ve found that it’s a more accurate translation but I’m just going by the official dark horse translation.

Yeah I'm well aware. But the situation seems different. At the time, Guts piggy-backed on an apostle who through extraordinary circumstances was given the chance to be rejunevated by making another sacrifice. However, in this scene Gaiseric is facing Void and the others, who stand on an altar, and a multitude of creatures are coming at him. It just doesn't feel like the same scenario.

It's possible and I've thought of it, but it's not a perfect match, like I said above. In any case it's clear that ceremony is unique compared to those we've known so far.

Ah yes, I wasn’t saying it’s the same scenario, but just trying to draw similarities between the two. Seems to have more similarities with that scenario than that of an Eclipse.

But I agree this is unique from any other temporal junction point we’ve seen in the past.



Since magic was more commonplace and the physical and astral worlds were more closely aligned during Gaiseric's time, it was probably much easier to transform a person (or several persons) into a member of God Hand (or whatever the equivalent could be called). That's my speculation for why we see no dying sun here, anyway. :shrug:

Interesting point for sure, I personally keep going back on forth on if they all became God Hand at once or indiviudally

My sentiments are with Aaz on this, but it's definitely worth entertaining some weird possibilities since everything doesn't quite add up yet. The circumstances of these events could be even more unique and extraordinary than we can imagine precisely because we're trying to make them fit in ways that already make sense to us, when the circumstances could be different from anything we've seen thus far. Basically, we can only go so far guessing based on extrapolation, we need a creative, Aaz-like leap of inspiration, which I'm sure he'll provide in his BIG post on the subject. No pressure. :griffnotevil:

Yeah I definitely don’t think it’s the same scenario as what we saw with the count, I just think there seems to be more similarities with that event than an eclipse. Either way, yes I’m very much looking forward to Aaz’s BIG post on this episode :)
 

Aazealh

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Gaiseric had....possibly the Berserker armor?

Gaiseric definitely was wearing the Berserk's armor, since Guts is reliving those memories through the blood spilled inside the armor (and "deeply ingrained" in it).

And we don’t even know if the concept of behelits/ being branded existed at this time.

Given that the woman bears the brand on her shoulder (as does the landscape in the background), I would say that the brand existed back then.

I’ve also been meaning to ask you why you refer to it as the Berserks armor instead of Berserker? I’m sure you’ve found that it’s a more accurate translation but I’m just going by the official dark horse translation.

Glad you asked! That's just its proper name. The kanji for "berserk" in Berserk is associated with the furigana "berserk". :iva: To phrase it another way, it's just like the title of the manga. "Berserk" in this case is meant as a noun, not a verb. Miura likely made that choice because he based himself on the original Nordic term and not the English one. But regardless, "berserk" can be used as a noun in English, "berserker" is merely a variant of it. Here's what the dictionary says about it, if you care.

As for Dark Horse, they probably just figured "berserker" would sound more natural to their American audience. Which is probably true, but given that the manga's title is literally Berserk, and that it's the same word, I find that a bit problematic. But there's a long list of problems with Dark Horse's translation anyway, that's just one among many others.

Ah yes, I wasn’t saying it’s the same scenario, but just trying to draw similarities between the two. Seems to have more similarities with that scenario than that of an Eclipse.

I disagree! You'll see why in my future post on the matter, which I will hopefully finish tomorrow.
 
Hold on a second... if the current godhand were incrementally born every 216 years, that would mean that Void should have been born about 864 years ago (4 eclipses before Griffith). But what we saw in this episode was supposed to be 1,000 years ago.
 
Hold on a second... if the current godhand were incrementally born every 216 years, that would mean that Void should have been born about 864 years ago (4 eclipses before Griffith). But what we saw in this episode was supposed to be 1,000 years ago.
It could be a case of using 1,000 years in a general not-literal sense, and just rounding 864 years up to nearly 1,000 years ago for sake of expression.
 
A bit late to the party but here I go. What an amazing episode! Those consecutive two page spreads were a blast to read, not only what they showed but also the art was top notch.

I haven't decided if I like the idea of all 5 "old" god hand members being born at once or if Void was the fifth one. The lack of the eclipse/black sun and the missing hand imagery makes it pretty different from Griffith's ones and hence leans me more to the idea that all 5 were born at once.
Which would almost certainly make them the very first god hand and a different ceremony. Who would've told them about the ceremony, what lead them to the conclusion they had to sacrifice what was most dear to them? Were behelits even invented by that time or was that a thing that came later on?
Was it easier for the IoE to create such entities because the worlds were still merged at that point which made it possible for all 5 of them to be born at once?
The split of the worlds could've made it more difficult to create god hand like entities, hence it's now only possible once every 216 years when all circumstances are "perfect".

Regarding those those apostle like creatures, so far I think they are probably just some astral creatures but later on served as a basis or idea for what later came to be apostles.

Lots of questions and speculation all over the place but that's the fun in it :ganishka:
 
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