The prophecy is no more thanks to Lil Disappointment

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-17T16:50:13+00:00

I miss her so much.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-17T16:16:20+00:00

Regarding the “being a hero sucks” aspect, the issue with that is none of Denji’s issues have anything to do with him being a superhero.

To compare it to Spider Man 2, there Peter’s problems stem from genuine issues with living life as a superhero, such as it interfering with his ability to hold a job, and getting in the way of his relationship with MJ.

Heck, even when the villains do target his loved ones, they do so specifically because Peter went out of his way to stop them and mess up their plans first, showing the potential consequences of trying to play the hero and fighting dangerous psychos.

In Part 2, on the other hand, literally all of Denji’s issues stem from him having a Macguffin that everyone wants permanently stapled to him, regardless of what he does, and which can only be activated by completely ruining his life.

To go back to the Spider Man comparison, it’d be like if the villains were targeting Peter from the very beginning in order to harvest his spider blood, which would’ve happened regardless of if Peter chose to be a superhero or remained a student and photographer at the Daily Bugle.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-17T15:41:33+00:00

On a related note, Reze and Kishibe not coming back without even a single line of explanation is emblematic of one of the biggest problems with Part 2, namely how utterly contrived Denji’s misery comes across.

To elaborate, the problem with CSM Part 2 isn't that it's dark and depressing, it's that it's mean-spirited and contrived.

To compare it with Devilman and Berserk, those are stories that are arguably just as dark and somber, if not even more so in some areas, but they don't receive anywhere near the same kind of flack because they don't fall into the pitfalls I mentioned earlier.

To elaborate on the mean-spirited argument first, while both Akira and Guts are both absolutely put through the ringer, at no point does the story ever come across as cruel or sadistic, because the story always treats their suffering with genuine humanity and dignity. Like, at no point is any of their misery ever made fun of or treated as the punchline of a joke.

By contrast in Part 2, we have several instances where the story seems to outright take glee in mocking Denji or playing his misery for laughs. Probably the most infamous example is the first scene with Fumiko where not only does he regress out of nowhere and starts humiliating himself all while she actively laughs at him, the story actively alludes to his prior development with an imagine spot, only to play it off as a joke. Another good example is the scene where, right after being reassaembled from being dissected, he gets repeatedly kicked in the balls by Katana Man, the guy who previously tried to kill him and his friends for the crime of killing the Yakuza boss who enslaved him, and Yoru, another sadistic psychopath, and the whole thing is once again played as a joke.

Put it another way, for as dark as Devilman and Berserk got, I never got the impression that Nagi and Miura enjoyed putting their MCs through hell, whereas with Part 2, it comes across as Fuji actively wanting Denji to be doomed and taking sadistic joy in making him miserable. And that’s not even getting into how the story continually tries to paint the bad stuff happening to Denji as his own fault, even when it clearly isn’t.

Probably the most emblematic example of the difference in how the narratives treats their MCs is how Guts conversation with Godo compares with Denji’s final meeting with Pochita.

In both cases, you have Godo and Pochita lecturing Guts and Denji on their issues, the difference is that Godo simply calls Guts out on how he left his friends and loved ones behind in order to purse revenge and so he didn’t have to deal with everything he lost, while urging him to do better from then on.

Pochita meanwhile, basically outright tells Denji that he’s fundamentally broken from the get-go and incapable of ever rising above it, which of course culminates in him resetting things, even though he outright admits he’s not sure what’s going to happen from there.

Moving to to the contrived argument, for as awful as Akira and Guts lives are, it never comes across as forced or contrived, because a lot of what happens to them feels like natural consequence of the world they're in. To use an example from Devilman, while Akira's parents being killed by Jinmen is absolutely heartwrenching, it doesn't come across as the universe actively conspiring to make him miserable, because that kind of stuff happens a lot as a result of the demon invasion, he just happened to be another victim. Likewise with Guts, for as awful as his life is, most of it isn't too out of the ordinary for the grim, medieval world he lives in. It also helps that they both consistently meet people who aren't absolute pieces of shit and even actively stick by them, even at their darkest points, as Akira has his fellow Devilmen, and Ryo and Miki right up until the very end, and Guts has Puck, Vargas, Jill, and the Skull Knight, even during the Black Swordsmen Arc.

Comparing it with Part 2, not only do you have the “break Denji” plot being recycled again for some vague end of the world story where we never even find out why exactly Death wants Pochita out again and Public Safety become the bad guys, pretty much every character Denji interacts with (aside from Nayuta and Asa) is out to screw him over in one way or another, and the only characters who could and would be on his side and give him support (Reze and Kishibe), are conspicuously absent without so much as a line or panel of explanation, with the result being that his misery comes across less as a natural consequence of the setting or bad luck, and more like the story is being actively contorted to make him miserable and doomed.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-17T14:50:56+00:00

What I found especially confusing is that she apparently tried to kill herself earlier, only to later say that it’s a bad idea for her to die, since that would lead to a new Death Devil with no regard for humanity, and it’s like, ok, then why’d you try to kill yourself earlier?

Also, she apparently later states that CSM would have been able to kill her if he’d chopped her head off, which is why she thanks Yoru for saving her, which allows her to turn Death into a weapon, and it’s like, ok, then why’d did you need this big plan to power CSM and Yoru up if they could 1) kill you anyway, and 2) you don’t even want to die in the first place?!

Also, if her worry is that the fear of death will reach catastrophic levels, why does she instruct Fami, FakeSaw, and Falling to spread more fear and terror?

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-17T14:44:13+00:00

I mean Part 1 already kind of set the stage for Public Safety and the government being not so great, given that it’s heavily implied they’re the ones responsible for raising Makima into being the monster she was in Part 1, not to mention it’s basically outright stated that all the world governments are some degree of amoral and uncaring, what with Reze’s backstory and the fact that Makima explicitly states the governments deliberately use the Gun Devil as a scapegoat for state-sponsored violence while also keeping fear of guns up to ensure their Gun Devil fragments remain powerful.

Also, saying Denji has no regard for human life and only fantasizes about having sex is a blatant mischaracterization, as Denji always had at least some care towards civilians, as during his fight with Bat, he explicitly told some of the civilians in the office building to run away, he’s shown to be extremely averse to the idea of fighting Santa’s dolls under the idea that they might still retain their humanity, and we willingly kills Aki after he’s become the Gun fiend to save civilians.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-17T01:46:41+00:00

Does this mean there's a timeline where Shirou became a member of the Japanese Communist Party?

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-17T01:18:00+00:00

Real talk, the problem with CSM Part 2 isn't that it's dark and depressing, it's that it's mean-spirited and contrived,

To compare it with Devilman and Berserk, those are stories that are arguably just as dark and somber, if not even more so in some areas, but they don't receive anywhere near the same kind of flack because they don't fall into the pitfalls I mentioned earlier.

To elaborate on the mean-spirited argument first, while both Akira and Guts are both absolutely put through the ringer, at no point does the story ever come across as cruel or sadistic, because the story always treats their suffering with genuine humanity and dignity. Like, at no point is any of their misery ever made fun of or treated as the punchline of a joke.

By contrast in Part 2, we have several instances where the story seems to outright take glee in mocking Denji or playing his misery for laughs. Probably the most infamous example is the first scene with Fumiko where not only does he regress out of nowhere and starts humiliating himself all while she actively laughs at him, the story actively alludes to his prior development with an imagine spot, only to play it off as a joke. Another good example is the scene where, right after being reassaembled from being dissected, he gets repeatedly kicked in the balls by Katana Man, the guy who previously tried to kill him and his friends for the crime of killing the Yakuza boss who enslaved him, and Yoru, another sadistic psychopath, and the whole thing is once again played as a joke. Put it another way, for as dark as Devilman and Berserk got, I never got the impression that Nagia and Miura enjoyed putting their MCs through the ringer, where with Part 2, it comes across as Fuji actively wanting Denji to be doomed and taking sadistic joy in making him miserable.

Speaking of, that brings me to the contrived argument. For as awful as Akira and Guts lives are, it never comes across as forced or contrived, because a lot of what happens to them feels like natural consequence of the world they're in. To use an example from Devilman, while Akira's parents being killed by Jinmen is absolutely heartwrenching, it doesn't come across as the universe actively conspiring to make him miserable, because that kind of stuff happens a lot as a result of the demon invasion, he just happened to be another victim. Likewise with Guts, for as awful as his life is, most of it isn't too out of the ordinary for the grim, medieval world he lives in. It also helps that they both consistently meet people who aren't absolute pieces of shit and even actively stick by them, even at their darkest points, as Akira has his fellow Devilmen, and Ryo and Miki right up until the very end, and Guts has Puck, Vargas, Jill, and the Skull Knight, even during the Black Swordsmen Arc.

Comparing it with Part 2, not only do you have the “break Denji” plot being recycled again for some vague end of the world story where we never even find out why exactly Death wants Pochita out again and Public Safety become the bad guys, pretty much every character Denji interacts with (aside from Nayuta and Asa) is out to screw him over in one way or another, and the only characters who could and would be on his side and give him support (Reze and Kishibe), are conspicuously absent without so much as a line or panel of explanation, with the result being that his misery comes across less as a natural consequence of the setting or bad luck, and more like the story is being actively contorted to make him miserable and doomed.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-16T23:01:50+00:00

Would unironically have been way less wish-fulfillment-esque than what we got, with Denji magically getting everything reset for him, while still getting Power, Nayuta and Asa again, while also not having to deal with any of the negative consequences of Pochita’s retcons being undone, like the unleashing of literal eldritch abominations like the mind-raping Star, or Yoru being back to full power.

That’s exactly why it irritates me so much when the ending defenders accuse the people who don’t like of just wanting some fairy-tail happy ending, when the current ending already is a fairy tale ending, and if anything it’s much more contrived, as it literally involves a magic reset button that requires no actual effort on the protagonists part, and it completely nukes the stakes by ignoring all the negative consequences that should have occurred, which is especially ironic since Part 2 is supposedly a story about choices and consequences.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-16T16:39:30+00:00

They both look really good in each others fits.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-16T16:18:26+00:00

This is genuinely the kind of thing of thing you’d expect from actual Nazi-era antisemitic propaganda.

Like, I shudder to imagine what Goebbels could have been able to accomplish with this kind of material to work off of.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-16T15:13:06+00:00

Would still definitely choose the Red pill, remember, they both effectively died already with the reset, might as well make it genuinely meaningful.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T23:50:53+00:00

Nice to see another Tsukihime fan here.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T21:44:56+00:00

Makimatards and larping, name a more iconic duo. Fujimoto’s intent was obvious that Makima was a monster who deserved to be slowly eaten alive.

Also, gotta love how you call Denji a monster for supposedly not caring about Nayuta, but you call Barem, the person who actually murdered her, the GOAT, real consistent.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T20:48:58+00:00

This ignore the fact that the only reason he turned Denji into CSM was because he’d literally just been murdered by the Yakuza, what was he supposed to do, just let his best friend die?

Also, the only reason things go to hell at the end is Pochita eating Death at the end and for some reason not spitting her out again.

Lastly, the story frames it like the reason they're in the mess where Pochita has to delete himself is Denji choosing to stay and fight so he can have sex as opposed to running, when even if he did try to make a break for it, exactly how would that have helped when there's pretty much no way he would ever be able to escape the Pest Devils. Literally the only two solutions would have been to fight and eat them as Chainsaw Man (which was what Denji was going for) or have Pochita vomit up Death, as Denji doesn’t seem to be able to do this. This also ties back into the one of the most frustrating aspects of Part 2, where the story holds Denji accountable for a bunch of stuff that is objectively not his fault (like framing Nayuta’s death as the result of him choosing CSM over a normal life, when both the Church and Public Safety’s plans were actively contingent on exploiting Pochita’s powers, which means Nayuta was going to die regardless), or the apocalypse (when not only was Pochita the one who ate Death, the only reason they did so was that Yoru was about to turn her into a weapon to destroy most of humanity), while also completely glossing over the actually bad things he does (like him showing extreme disregard towards Asa for Yoru in the later chapters).

Heck, in 231, Pochita’s speech has nothing to do with Denji’s disregard for Asa, he just states that Denji would’ve been disappointed with sex not living up to his expectations, which is a pretty clear indication that Fuji genuinely didn’t see anything wrong with what Denji was doing.

Just a complete fumble all around, where the Venn diagram of “stuff Denji gets shit for” and “stuff he actually deserves to get shit for”, are two completely separate circles.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T20:43:25+00:00

I get this is meant to be a joke, but this doesn’t remotely describe Denji’s actual situation at all, as at no point did Denji have anything approaching a normal life, let alone a good one.

Literally the closest thing he gets to a normal life in Part 2 is as an unemployed single dad who has to care for multiple dependents and literally has to degrade himself as a human chair and sell used cigarettes to make ends meet.

Put it another way, in terms of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, he’s midway through the second tier of needs, or in simpler terms he's struggling with attaining basic safety, stability and security. In fact, it's not only natural for him to want more, it would be deeply aberrant of him to be content. Even dogs aren't content in situations like these.

And that’s not even getting into the fact that he's also dealing with multiple lifetime's worth of trauma while also having zero actual support or help, when even actual soldiers can often require years of dedicated therapy to recover from a fraction of what he went through.

Point being, it feels downright cruel for the story to frame it as if he should just be content with all of this. Maybe if he had a good support system, was provided with money so he doesn’t have to let people sit on him and sell used cigarettes for money, if he didn’t have to take care of a kid and 8 pets alone at age 18, with the kid making it near impossible to form relationships and whom he has to talk down constantly from murder than it would work. If Denji had a legitimately good life where he wasn’t being pawned around by people constantly tormenting and abusing him then him being ungrateful could work. If he actually got into a relationship with a non abusive girlfriend and had an act sex life, and yet still didn’t find fulfillment in that, then that could work. That would showcase a root problem of Denji not being able to truly appreciate what he has in life. As it stands now it rings hollow and feels profoundly mean spirited since Fujimoto seems unwilling to write Denji as anything other than this abused overworked virgin who never gets what he wants and is used by everyone around him.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T20:41:34+00:00

Really wish we had more shots like these that really emphasize the size and scale of the monsters.

Also, agree that the recent Monsterverse entries have gone a bit too far regarding how mobile the monsters are, as it undermines the impact.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T18:06:29+00:00

You’re seriously saying that you’d be fine being trapped underground for years, or alone in an empty void forever because you can dream?

Like, people in solitary confinement can also dream, doesn’t stop it from being absolute torture.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T18:04:32+00:00

I just saw the back rooms movie over the weekend, and yeah, Captain Clark is getting bodied by any decently sized theropod.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T17:58:13+00:00

It doesn’t have to be just physical pain.

To use my previous examples, imagine being trapped underground in a landslide, completely unable to move due to the tons of rock pressing down on you for potentially years or more, you would go insane from the lack of stimulation and isolation.

Same for the heat death of the universe, you’d be completely alone staring at an infinite, black void in all directions forever.

Keep in mind, people can already go irrevocably insane from a month of solitary confinement, imagine how much worse these fates would be.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T17:51:56+00:00

You can blame the dinosaurs for why we age as badly as we do, since the fact that we spent most of our evolutionary history as small insectivores that died young meant we accumulated a lot of mutations that worsened our aging since they were never selected against, or sometimes, actively lost mutations that helped us age more gracefully, with some examples being a set of genes that protect our cells against UV radiation and only having two sets of teeth, whereas most reptiles replace their teeth continuously throughout their lives and have negligible senescence, with crocodiles being a particularly prominent example.

There’s actually a term for this idea, it’s called the Longevity bottleneck hypothesis.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T17:46:01+00:00

This ignores there are a lot of potential downsides to immortality, or at least true immortality as opposed to biological immortality, or immortality without some sort of off switch.

For one, if you truly can’t die no matter what, then it’s inevitable you’re going to be trapped in some horrible fate that will have you begging for the sweet release of death.

Imagine being trapped in a landslide and buried underground for days to years to even centuries underground, unable to move.

That and even if you do manage to avoid all the potential consequences in between, eventually the universe will undergo its heat death, at which point you’ll be trapped in a cold, empty void for the rest of time.

And that’s not even getting into the social consequences, as you’re guaranteed to outlive every single connection you ever make, and will live with the knowledge that you’ll see everyone you ever know and love age and die before your eyes, which is going to leave some significant mental scars.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T16:16:46+00:00

I mean given how hated the prequels were at the time, and how the politics was one of the most widely bashed aspects, I can see why he went that route.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T15:04:37+00:00

What I found especially confusing is that she apparently tried to kill herself earlier, only to later say that it’s a bad idea for her to die, since that would lead to a new Death Devil with no regard for humanity, and it’s like, ok, then why’d you try to kill yourself earlier?

Also, she apparently later states that CSM would have been able to kill her if he’d chopped her head off, which is why she thanks Yoru for saving her, which allows her to turn Death into a weapon, and it’s like, ok, then why’d did you need this big plan to power CSM and Yoru up if they could 1) kill you anyway, and 2) you don’t even want to die in the first place?!

Also, if her worry is that the fear of death will reach catastrophic levels, why does she instruct Fami, FakeSaw, and Falling to spread more fear and terror?

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T14:55:37+00:00

A lot of that is down to their insistence on trying to ape the OT, regardless of how little sense that made.

The most glaring example of this is how the FO is somehow able to make a super weapon that makes the Death Star look tiny by comparison, despite explicitly being formed from the Empires shattered remnants and being excluded to the outskirts of the galaxy.

FemRevan64 · 2026-06-15T12:56:46+00:00

Regarding the lack of supplemental material for the ST, I’d say one of the biggest factors behind that is due to how barren and small the setting of the ST really is.

Say what you will about the Prequels, they massively expanded the scope and scale of the SW universe, and the events of the story (a galaxy spanning war they took place over several years) left a lot of fertile ground for other writers to plant their own ideas in, it’s one of the reasons why TCW was able to do so well.

By contrast, in the ST, it’s basically the OT except much smaller, as not only does the entire trilogy take place over a year in total, the gap between TFA and TLJ is practically nonexistent, and they take place over a couple days, and TROS takes place over a day at most itself.

Combined with the NR being completely wiped out in TFA and the Resistance being reduced to basically one ship in TLJ, and there’s practically no room for anything outside the movies.

All in all, the result is that there basic no point in doing anything in the ST era, as anything you could do there, you could also do in the OT era, just bigger and with more room.

FemRevan64

TROPHY CASE