Like others have said, this episode felt completely superfluous. It didn't bring anything to the table. In related news,
Kurosaki confirmed on Twitter that six episodes were indeed planned originally and they just overran. Putting aside any questions about why they would announce a decisive number if it wasn't locked in, it's kind of incredible that this ends up being a less satisfying conclusion to the Elf island chapter than episode 370 was. But to me, it mainly cemented the fact they don't seem to know what they're doing, which really bums me out.
Misconstruing Schierke's body of light
The most egregious problem with episode 371 is something I don't expect many people will pick up on. It's the fact whoever wrote this doesn't understand what Schierke does when she intervenes to help Guts control the Berserk's armor. You see,
Schierke has never gone inside Guts' mind. What she does, as a witch, is go inside
the armor, which is a magical device. That's how she can "wake him up", by basically shielding him from or pulling him out of the flow of Od that distorts his perception.
But she doesn't have the ability to just go into people's minds and see what's in there. If she did, the group would have had no need to travel all the way to Skellig. She could have ventured inside Casca's mind all by herself. Note that we don't even see her even go inside him here anyway, she just hovers around in her body of light and somehow sees what's in his head. That actually makes even less sense, especially since she's eventually "repelled" back to her body because of what she sees or feels.
The way I see it, they just wanted to have striking visuals to show and tried to imitate what Miura did in volume 27, when Schierke first goes inside the armor to bring Guts back. But they didn't pause to think on whether or not it made sense narratively. The result is this pointless scene that reaffirms that "Guts is very distraught" because he couldn't hit Griffith, which is frankly unbelievably stupid.
"I could hit trolls... and crocodiles... and Daka... but why not the fifth member of the God Hand.
"
Taking the meaning out of the past
The scenes they chose as memories are meaningless here, and feel like they were only added because someone realized after 370 was done that it's a bit ridiculous to show Guts waxing poetic about his old swords that broke instead of the Dragon Slayer. They're simply used as "nondescript sword fights", which actually makes it worse, because they do all have meaning in the proper context. Case in point: the possessed horse isn't just notable because it had a grotesque face. When it assaulted Farnese in volume 17, Guts was reminded of Casca's rape by Femto and got so enraged he barely stopped short of cutting Farnese's head off.
So if any thought had been put in the scene, it
could have been meaningful. But that was not the point, and clearly Casca was meant to be erased from the picture here, same as in the previous episodes. It had to just be the sword. So we get this insipid and vacuous depiction. Honestly, I don't get this decision. I already talked about it at length
in the previous episode thread so I won't reiterate, but this isn't an accurate representation of Guts' relationship with his sword
at all.
I have to point out that there were other ways to feature this sort of imagery. Puck is right there with Schierke, and elves have been shown to be able to feel people's emotions and get glimpses of what's in their mind. It actually happens in that aforementioned scene in volume 17! They could have used it here as well. Or, like I said in the previous episode thread, they could have had Farnese go see Guts instead and use her "healing magic", since what she wanted to learn from Danan was
mind healing.
Missing the point of the Beast of Darkness
Schierke's little excursion ends with her seeing an image of the Beast of Darkness breaking the chains that keep it in check. Walter's
earlier comment on this was on point: it doesn't make any sense. The Beast of Darkness symbolizes Guts' aggressivity and hatred, his desire for revenge, his self-destructive impulse to go to any length to kill Griffith. This is documented at length throughout the series. The chains represent Guts' feelings towards his friends, and are used as a metaphor for his ability to resist the armor's pull. This is introduced in episode 290 (volume 33), and we see what happens when they break in episode 316 (volume 36).
It is related to one specific thing: Guts being able to use the armor without attacking his companions. Nothing else. Which is why it's utterly nonsensical here. We saw Guts fight Griffith and yet the armor didn't activate. The Beast of Darkness was completely silent, even as Guts watched Griffith fly off with Casca in his arms. More importantly, he is completely broken right now, with no fire left in him. No fighting spirit. Which means that the Beast should be shown defanged and cowering in a hole, or as a puppy licking a broken paw, basically in a greatly weakened state as a representation of Guts' own state of mind. It's a huge missed opportunity, but more worryingly it also shows that whoever wrote this doesn't understand what the Beast of Darkness is at all.
If anything, that's my takeaway from this episode: this team displays a shocking lack of understanding about relatively fundamental aspects of Berserk, which is just appalling. Like with episode 370, it's clear Miura didn't write any of this stuff, and now I'm genuinely wondering to what extent Mori is even participating. It seems pretty obvious to me that they don't have much to go on, and sadly it's coming to a point where it's hard for me to trust anything they're putting out. Now more than ever, I wish they would publish the raw material and information they got from Miura.
Stretching and rehashing
There's a visual of Guts screaming as the armor disintegrates and then he sinks down into the sea. Same as above: what's the point of this sequence? They make sure we see that he's actually just prostrated afterwards, because it's so meaningless and confusing on its own that it requires to be invalidated. I guess it's supposed to be what's going on in his mind, but... Again, that's just unrelated to his relationship with the Beast of Darkness, and the imagery doesn't fit what's been going on. It's like they just mixed in the scene from episode 287 (volume 33) because it looks cool, but without caring about the deeper meaning.
Just at that moment, Roderick also stops caring. He'd been frantically trying to open an unlocked and unobstructed door on his own ship so far as if there had been an extreme emergency, but it turns out it wasn't that important, I guess? It's hard to explain that sudden and unexplained change of behavior. As it is, it just doesn't make sense. If it had really mattered, they could have broken the door. But most likely, it was meant to artificially add tension to episode 370, and now it's over. Instead we get to see the rest of the island suddenly sink (Why now? Aren't the Gnawers gone?) and form a giant whirlpool, which also doesn't matter. Next time we see the Sea Horse, it won't be dealing with that.
Nothing else we see matters either, it's just rehashing the previous episode. Farnese is lighting up some guy's face. I guess that's why she was so urgently needed. Isidro is sulking. Molda is ordering people around. All in all, this is a weaker closure for our characters than episode 370.
Retconning Falconia (and Midland, really)
The episode then cuts to Falconia and boy, where to begin. First off, why is there now a harbor in Falconia? Wyndham was landlocked, and so is Falconia. Or I guess
was, because now it's near the sea. This is a pretty crazy change that I imagine they feel they can get away with because we never saw a clear aerial shot of the entire city, showing there's no sea shore at its back. The problem is... we do see and get told enough about the city for it to be very clear it's not by the sea side. This is really
far beyond plausible handwaving.
It's also completely unnecessary for this scene. Why would Griffith land there specifically? He could just come straight to the palace. Are they just all going to walk back several kilometers after that? While he's naked and holding Casca? Is that the plan? To me, there's only one logical explanation: they plan to have the Sea Horse reach Falconia directly, and so this was the most convenient way to do it that they could think of. It's basically a story shortcut. That's the most generous interpretation I can think of, but even if that's it, it's frankly a shocking liberty to take. Then again, it's only one more on top of the many others that directly concerned key characters.
Dumbing things down
Besides the egregious location, the welcoming committee also makes little sense. Lest we forget, Danan explained in episode 364 that
"a full moon night in the outside world lasts for at least a few days here". This means that while the boy may have stayed on the island a day or two (from what we see), only one night elapsed in the outside world. Meaning that Griffith should have only left for eight hours at most. And when he left, he did so discreetly, jumping out of Charlotte's window. It seemed like a rather private matter, which makes sense given the situation (him transforming into a kid that elopes to see his parents). So why is he welcomed by his lieutenants as if he was coming back from a long mission they're all aware of, with them kneeling and all? Beats me. I guess it's supposed to be cool and look triumphant. He got what he was after: the branded woman he once raped! Wait, really?
This is, in its own way, as big of a departure for the character of Griffith than the previous episodes have been for Guts. Perhaps more so, in fact. Even that smirk they gave him feels out of character. As a reminder, Guts and Casca have been meaningless to him until now, mere sacrifices that had already served their function. Remnants that were beneath his notice. It makes sense for him to try to neutralize the inconvenience that the boy represents, but outside of that motivation, it's not like this is a big victory for him. In every way that matters, this feels like a useless spectacle, once more simply trying to emulate a better scene from Berserk, in this case the apostles pledging themselves to Griffith at Shet.
We already knew where Griffith and Casca were going, and nothing of import happens other than them just landing there, so besides saying "hey there's a harbor in Falconia", showing this serves no useful purpose as far as I'm concerned. And this takes me back to what I said at the beginning: with each passing episode, it has felt more and more like this team was flailing around, simultaneously unsure of how to proceed and making bold moves, but in the wrong direction. Sadly, it doesn't reassure me at all for the future of the series.
So I guess to answer your question: no, Miura didn't do panels like these. His "rough" panel borders looked better.
