In Berserk 4, Guts continues to make his way as a mercenary in Gambino’s band. His upbringing his harsh as hell, with abuse at the worst and inconsistent love at the best. This drives Guts to spend most of his time swinging his sword, implying that this pain is what drove him to become so strong. I frankly hate this. Berserk is at its worst during the torture and rape scenes, but it’s at its second-worst in the implication that pain equals strength. This is edgelord bullshit that has real-world consequences, if you ever feel compelled to look up videos of people irl training with Guts greatswords, which spoiler alert is going to pay absolute havoc with their bones. Berserk has had a terrible cultural influence in the 4-chan corners of the world, and that is worse than watching twenty-somethings swing their swords around. It’s this Ayn Rand adjacent idea that the will is all that matters, romanticizing suffering and driving a subculture of men who desperately need therapy farther away from the help they need. I have this same problem with early season Rick & Morty among other fiction.
The story picks up when Guts is taken in by the Band of the Hawk, Griffith’s mercenary group. The band is wonderful, all of them working as believable friends and intense fighting compatriots. Griffith is believably portrayed as an excellent leader, and it makes what’s to come that much harder…