Sorry if someone has posted something like this before but this idea has been rattling around in my brain for a little while now. I think Miura’s overarching story for Berserk is to show Guts going through the 5 stages of grief. Tell me what you guys think

1. Denial (The Sprint after Eclipse): The Golden Age arc sets up everything Guts has and who he is, then after the eclipse Guts goes on the sprint. This represents him in denial after losing the band of the hawk. He doesn’t want to believe it so he just runs.

2. Anger (The Black Swordsman Arc): This one is pretty self explanatory to me. He’s just venting all his anger about his loss by going around killing all the apostles. The interesting part to me is how it’s obvious that he suppresses his guilt about the innocent lives he’s affecting like when he throws up after the girl and the priest die because of him.

3. Bargaining (Traveling to Elfheim to get Casca back): After his conversation with Godot, Guts realizes that living by the will of his rage and trying to get revenge on Griffith isn’t going to make him feel whole. If he can’t get anything else back, the one thing he will try to get back is the only one he has left: Casca. If he can get her memories back then maybe he will feel whole again. We know how this story goes tho.

4. Depression (Casca is too traumatized and Griffith steals her away): This is where we see Guts right now. Casca can’t stand to even look at or talk to Guts at this point. Griffith comes and steals her away, and Guts is powerless to stop him. These newest chapters show that Guts can’t even pick up his sword anymore. He’s gone completely hopeless and nothing he’s tried has worked to fill the hole of loss inside him. We see the beast of darkness is trying to pull him back into the anger stage, which i predict he’s going to slip back into for a little while before his friends help him out and he reaches acceptance.

5. Acceptance (The Future/Predictions): I honestly have no idea what acceptance would look like in this situation. I think Guts killing Griffith might be his way of accepting that his best friend is actually gone. He says himself that when he first saw him again in his physical form he felt his rage fade away. He’ll have to accept that the past is the past now and Griffith is not who he was anymore. I also think acceptance might be him deciding that killing Griffith will do nothing for him, and he might only focus on saving Casca and try to help her heal so they can live a happy life together. What do you guys think tho? What would the acceptance stage look like for Guts?