#//fumiko

[poop-benedict]

CSM #174 Spoilers

Turns out that the Aging Devil might be a mistranslation and the Japanese government isn't making the insanely stupid decision to end the concept of aging.

Credit to Reddit user u/DutifulCleric over on the CSM subreddit for pointing out that it could be the Old Age Devil instead which is a very different thing.

Getting it eaten won't stop people from aging, just from getting old. And now it makes sense why it wants 10,000 children to die in front of it, it wants to see youth die.

This might also not be a solely selfish decision by the old wrinkly ass higher ups, or more likely, Public Safety is using the higher ups selfishness to achieve their goal. The fear of getting old is a big part of the fear of dying. If life lost that inevitability, the Death Devil would lose a lot of its strength.

[theallknowingmimir]

"Nice one, human."

[jaylee-is-here]

all eyes.

( god the books are so rough im sorry 😨 )

[iridescentscarecrow]

funniest sequence of panels ever, my sides.

[bunkerjking]

[jaruis]

Her headslam lunch special.

Burning bridges with Barem's balls.

[morgenstern16]

part two girls

[goreygirl03]

Csm chapter 156

[strawberryblondie-locks]

#CSMTOBER DAY FIVE: KARAOKE

[thespacehatter]

Weird flex but okay 🙄

[angeldeviloshi]

Edit: Aight, didn't expect this post to blow up this much (300 notes, that's a new record on this blog) this analysis is based on context established in my previous analysis, it's not the most in-depth. Mostly just collecting my thoughts bc this chapter kinda unified what I had in mind lol.

You can check out my prev. analysis leading up to this here, here, here and here. (It's a rabbithole)

Ok so first off, I'm thinking about the way this chapter opens with the Prime Minister and then to the rest of the cabinet before leading up to Fumiko filling them in on the Chainsaw Man's powers as the potential for human evolution, such as the erasure of harmful substances and even nations presented as a greater good. Fumiko's mirroring of Makima here not just as the Chainsaw Man fan but someone who answers to the cabinet just as Makima did, the parallel with Makima's exposition of the Chainsaw Man to Kishibe, himself a senior agent. Also

"Keeping Chainsaw Man's chaos controlled" yeah. Makima's goal of "controlling" the Chainsaw Man in p1 through the lens of Pochita as this unparalleled chaotic unruly being. The foil to her as the Control Devil.

The state's eagerness to contain Chainsaw Man and use his powers to rewrite reality to their benefit despite the cost. The deaths of 10000 children under the nation, just as the state was willing to sacrifice its citizens for Makima's contract while she's leashed by them. The "necessary evil".

Now, given that we have information that the devils Pochita eats only erases the specific concept they embody and not the function of the thing, if Pochita were to eat the Aging devil it may not necessarily mean that people will become immortal but simply that the idea of aging (specifically old age. Aging devil's name is 老いの悪魔) will be gone. (e.g maybe living things reach the end of their lifespan without looking or growing old, maybe getting grey hair and wrinkles will be attributed to something else etc.) But of note here is the interest in the ministers to have old age erased for the unknown "good" it could bring.

The idea of aging presented here is associated with physical and mental decline. Aspects of how we view our mortality through old age. But aging is also how humans grow, contrast that with the hybrids who can't age, only able to exist in stasis, as an object, a hollow tool to be purposed by humanity, their humanity robbed and faded through their status. The ministers trying to play god here through the Chainsaw Man by erasing a primal aspect of human experience, the way Makima's "godhood" in p1 both preventing her from connecting with humanity (Product of the state) while also her pursuit in developing a human-like connection. (Control of Pochita)

Also the state's sacrifice of children here eerily echoes the Church's exploitation of students in the name of the Chainsaw Man. Fumiko herself embodying the Church and State in her identity as a fan and an agent in her complicity in Denji's pain leading to his transformation into the Chainsaw Man and her objectification, idolisation of the symbol, Chainsaw Man. The Church and State both echoing Makima's godhood and necessary evil, in the control for the Chainsaw Man.

It's also somewhat meaningful how the deaths of young children is specified here, Fumiko's framing of Denji as a child behind the Chainsaw Man, the Chainsaw Man a representation of Denji's "manhood" (Power's birthday cake, the loss of Denji's "normal" as a highschooler in p2, the sexual assault he experiences due to his identity as the Chainsaw MAN) the death of youth before a mirror by the devil of aging, the mirror showing you the horror of aging. But also in a way, the death of Denji's youth in the horrific process of growing into the Chainsaw Man.

Blegh scattered thoughts. Originally I was gonna mention some stuff about the Barem Makima godhood post here wrt to the ommission of God despite there being places of worship/idea of heaven etc. In csm wrt the explanation of how the Chainsaw Man's erasure ability works but I left it out bc I had no idea how to link it cohesively lol.

This is probably a boring post if you've read my other csm analysis because they're pretty much about the same core ideas conveyed and presented in a roundabout way through what's happening lol.

[sugar-grigri]

What does the devil of aging want ?

Let's be synthetic for once (I'm sure I won't be able to). But this is surely the most philosophical chapter in the whole of CSM.

The whole chapter is an insult to what Pochita is. The greatest contempt that can be shown.

I'm going to ask you 3 questions, each of which calls for a philosophical answer.

Does the demon of aging really care about living?

Why does they want to be eaten by CSM?

Is Chainsaw Man really... messy?

The answer is actually in this line. Chaos.

What is chaos? I'm not going to play the expert on Greek antiquity. But I can say with certainty that the Greek chaos is in no way disorderly. Even if this may seem contradictory.

Greek chaos is not disorder, it is what exists even before the beginning. That which exists before the light itself.

Now I'm going to ask you, how can these old fogies teach Pochita a lesson ? Control chaos ? Hold the power of Pochita?

Fumiko always thought she had Denji. In itself, she got it. But the mistake she made was not only in thinking she understood Denji, but even more fundamentally in thinking she understood Chainsaw Man.

Pochita is basically chaos. Because he has the power to make disappear. He can either decide to start again, or to reappear and end. Its power allows it to precede existence.

When you were reading this chapter, did you ever wonder how many times things had disappeared and reappeared without you noticing? I'm not talking about disappearing into the collective unconscious. But to see something reappear without you even realising that you've lost it. What this chapter tells you is that Pochita's power is above all an opportunity. Everything that disappears and appears is part of his choice.

Holding a newborn baby. Having an idea. To create. They are nothing more than things whose existence we discover through our senses. The birth of a thing lies in the moment when something is brought to your attention.

What we have here is a power of creation rather than inhibition (to the Anon who asked me this question, I haven't forgotten you) . I had previously analysed the fact that Pochita explained his power by the disappearance of the hearing.

He continues to do so with the disappearance of the mouth. The second lesson Pochita gives you is that he is the beginning itself. Birth itself. Or the demon of birth.

Why would the demon of old age want to be eaten by the demon of birth? Because old age is obsessed with youth. The discussion in this chapter is your answer. Aging does not want to die. And the demon of old age is not looking for disappearance. On the contrary, what he's looking for is a rebirth.

But the demon of old age is a primal fear!!!!!! He's super strong, he's not scared of death.

Yes! But he’s terrified of being closer to an end than a beginning. That's what old age is all about.

In French, the chapter is called 'coup de vieux', which means feeling old, often because of the gap with the younger generation. This gap with the beginning of life is precisely what explains the objective of this demon.

I also don't want people talking about Denji or Pochita symbolically wanting to protect young people. This is not the case. Enough has been said to emphasise the fact that the very church that spoke of CSM as the hero of the younger generation did not resonate at all with Denji.

On the contrary, Pochita is the most.... Paternalistic of all in this chapter. You want to be young? So lose what allows you to scorn. Don't talk like an infant. Worse: keep quiet.

It’s fair to interpret all these elements as traumatic elements of Denji. I'm not here to explain each of them, I think that everyone can see through them a part of Denji's tragedy. And it's also very interesting to see analyses explaining that these are things that the reader is aware of, not Denji. (Denji fought Aki, the snowball fight was Aki's hallucination, so Denji wasn't aware of all that, for example).

But you have to take it all the way. What brought these elements to you? What are you holding in your hands? That manga called Chainsaw Man, right?

We said it here. What is born is nothing more than what is brought to our attention.

Continue to interpret everything in relation to Pochita. Denji is simply the key to understanding its mystery.

A devil carrying the weight of what precedes existence.

The trauma of birth.

[numbmontezuma]

Also i tought makima or himeno were the biggest opps to minors in this manga but in comes Fumiko "literally talking about genociding children with a smile" Mine:

[iridescentscarecrow]

what frustrates me about fandom interpretations of makima as a one note Source of evil, apart from the fact that the manga itself refutes this, is that her character haunts and ties together so much of part two that it's impossible to fully understand without understanding her.

makima isn't ever a unilateral antagonistic force. she's an agent of the institutional evil that looms over all of CSM. she's in as much a commentary on gender and performance of gender as denji is.

and fjmt in part two enacts the "haunting the narrative" trope in such an interesting manner because you see flashes of makima in every female character. you see elements of her diluted into, most visibly, the characters of asa, nayuta and fumiko.

in asa, i see makima in that yearning for connection. i see her in the way that asa herself is fundamentally unable to approach the relationship of equals that she so desperately desires, partly due to her own social awkwardness but also because of yoru's threat: everyone she gets close to turns into a weapon. the fundamental inequality to human relationships that makima is unable to overcome.

during the aquarium date, you see asa echo makima again and again in lines that evoke makima's purposing of denji. that weaponising. "i'll grant you any request / save me chainsaw man! / you don't have to think about a thing."

and her connection with denji also founds itself upon this. yoshida talks to asa about parasocial relationships -- rerendering makima's idealisation of the CSM in how asa sees denji as a love interest. asa and denji parallel each other so organically in their gendered suppression and portrusion of desire. it's a punctuation of denji's search for intimacy that's mirrored by makima's in part one. exploring how asa is different from makima is perhaps the most intriguing part of this reflection though: an example being the way asa overthinks her outfit for her date with denji while makima seamlessly models herself into an Effortless woman.

[it's not like asa borrows just from makima. for example, there are things to be said about the way she views her Body (as compared with reze and quanxi) but examining how mkm's character bleeds into asaden is quite compelling.]

nayuta being the most visible remnant of what makima was is also interesting because makima herself appears so little in nayuta beyond the surface. nayuta's role as the control devil is hinted at frequently as is her appearance resembling makima's

but her and denji's dynamic more often echoes the hayakawa family and pochita than anything else. consider: aki giving up his goal (his 'easy revenge' that he finally sees for what it is) for the sake of his family, that warmth of blood and platonic bodily intimacy that power embodies--

it's all referenced to again with nayuta and denji, in direct panel callbacks and the plot itself! nayuta is The Family that makima constructs for denji in part one to pull him along the plot she prepares. i'm thinking about how makima is an allegory for capitalism. and what the family unit means in a capitalistic structure. the propagation of an ideal that hinges on birth and descendancy, about narrative and reproduction of narrative, about how nayuta births herself from makima and denji's relationship.

and this is also why nayuta herself exerts so much control over denji in the plot, as well as why she's used as a piece to control him. in part one, family was used to create the Chainsaw Man from denji. in part two, it's used to make denji abandon the Chainsaw Man, this icon that the church and the public now take possession of. [something something alienation of the worker from the product. from the collective. from the self.]

fumiko is perhaps the hardest to pin down here because her role evolves as the fandomisation of the Chainsaw Man evolves too. in fact, as a denji fan, she represents not just makima but multiple people who see something in and want something from denji! (think of how she references reze in her highlighting how denji is just a child; how reze uses her commentary on denji to engage with her Self. it's fandomisation,,, and what is makima but Chainsaw Man's fan?)

fumiko most obviously calls back to these wants and their conceptualisation of denji in the raw sexual violence that the events in the theater scene moving into the karaoke scene embody. the undercurrent of sa that runs through p1 and p2 is brought to the forefront in this scene -- denji falling back into these cycles of abuse, him slipping into habitating the wants of others (his initial horrified expression and then his grin during the fight. his initial inner monologue and then the cut to him licking the tentacle.)

so much of CSM rests on this fandom of denji, this theme of what production and idealisation means, one you can trace through fjmt's body of work. and this fandom reaches its crescendo in p2. what's even more interesting about fumiko is her pathos under this layer. her seeing denji as denji at some level but in the end, her handling of him is so selfish. her echoing makima's uninhibited laughter at the horror of denji's situation, her predatory cruelty. denji simultaneously humanised and dehumanised through her fandom.

fjmt's characters exist as foils, as parallels and ideas. makima's character has such a stranglehold over part one and these ideas run over into part two naturally -- as a consequence of denji being a reciever of these themes, but also deliberately in fjmt evoking the Thing that is makima repetitively -- to underscore the forever re emerging structure that denji and now asa are trapped in. the same structure that makima produced and was simultaneously caged by.

[ashenpumpkin]

they're both so cute

[jaruis]

A requiem from thou to thee

To herd two birds with one Chainsaw Man.