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A pair of teenagers share a intimate, gentle moment at the neighborhood secondary school’s outdoor swimming pool after hours. While they drift as one, hanging under the stars in the quietness of the evening, the sequence portrays the ephemeral, exhilarating excitement of teenage love, completely engrossed in the moment, consequences overlooked.

About half an hour into Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc, I realized such moments are the core of the movie. Denji and Reze’s love story became the focus, and all the contextual information and character histories I had gleaned from the series’ first season proved to be largely unnecessary. Despite being a official installment within the series, Reze Arc offers a easier entry point for newcomers — regardless of they haven’t seen its single episode. The approach brings advantages, but it also hinders a portion of the urgency of the movie’s story.

Created by the original creator, Chainsaw Man follows Denji, a indebted fiend fighter in a world where demons embody specific dangers (including concepts like getting older and Darkness to specific horrors like cockroaches or World War II). When he’s betrayed and killed by the yakuza, he makes a pact with his faithful devil-dog, Pochita, and returns from the deceased as a part-human chainsaw wielder with the power to permanently erase fiends and the horrors they represent from reality.

Plunged into a violent struggle between demons and hunters, Denji meets Reze — a charming coffee server hiding a deadly mystery — sparking a heartbreaking clash between the pair where love and existence intersect. This film picks up immediately following the first season, delving into Denji’s relationship with Reze as he grapples with his emotions for her and his loyalty to his manipulative boss, Makima, compelling him to decide among passion, loyalty, and self-preservation.

A Self-Contained Romantic Tale Within a Larger World

Reze Arc is inherently a lovers-to-enemies plot, with our fallible main character Denji falling for Reze almost immediately upon introduction. He’s a isolated young man seeking affection, which renders him vulnerable and easily swayed on a first-come basis. Consequently, in spite of all of Chainsaw Man’s intricate lore and its extensive ensemble, Reze Arc is very self-contained. Director the director recognizes this and ensures the romantic arc is at the forefront, rather than bogging it down with unnecessary summaries for the uninitiated, particularly since none of that really matters to the overall plot.

Despite the protagonist’s imperfections, it’s hard not to feel for him. He’s still a teenager, stumbling his way through a reality that’s distorted his understanding of morality. His intense craving for affection portrays him like a lovesick puppy, even if he’s likely to barking, snapping, and making a mess along the way. Reze is a ideal pairing for him, an effective seductive antagonist who finds her prey in our protagonist. You want to see the main character win the ire of his affection, even if she is clearly concealing something from him. So when her real identity is revealed, audiences can’t help but hope they’ll in some way succeed, even though internally, it is known a happy ending is never really in the plan. Therefore, the stakes don’t feel as high as they should be since their relationship is doomed. This is compounded by that the movie serves as a immediate follow-up to the first season, leaving minimal space for a love story like this among the more grim events that followers are aware are coming soon.

Stunning Visuals and Technical Execution

This movie’s visuals seamlessly blend 2D animation with computer-generated settings, providing stunning visual appeal even before the action begins. Including cars to tiny office appliances, 3D models enhance realism and texture to every shot, allowing the animated figures stand out strikingly. In contrast to Demon Slayer, which often showcases its 3D assets and changing settings, Reze Arc employs them less frequently, particularly evident during its action-packed finale, where those models, while not unattractive, are more apparent to spot. These smooth, dynamic environments render the film’s fights both visually bombastic and remarkably simple to understand. Still, the technique shines brightest when it’s unnoticeable, improving the vibrancy and motion of the hand-drawn art.

Concluding Impressions and Broader Considerations

Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc functions as a solid point of entry, likely leaving first-time audiences satisfied, but it additionally carries a drawback. Presenting a standalone story limits the stakes of what should feel like a sprawling animated saga. This is an illustration of why following up a successful anime season with a film is not the best strategy if it weakens the franchise’s general narrative possibilities.

While Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle found success by concluding several seasons of animated series with an grand film, and JuJutsu Kaisen 0 sidestepped the issue completely by acting as a prequel to its popular series, Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc advances boldly, perhaps a bit recklessly. However that doesn’t stop the film from proving to be a great experience, a excellent point of entry, and a unforgettable romantic tale.