Is there a maximum amount of people one can truly be in love with? The latest arc in Chainsaw Man, the Reze arc, explores the themes of what it means to conflict with yourself when moving forward and finding new connections. While this movie at a runtime of 1 hour and 40 minutes feels relatively long, the experience feels very short and sweet for how there is a strong focus on a small subset of the cast compared to the first season. In this movie, the main focal characters are Denji, Reze, Aki, and Angel. Within the movie, each one of these four deal with an internal struggle of the position they find themselves in versus what they want to do. This movie explores how one struggles with lying to themselves about their real feelings.

(Note* this review is based off what I remember from the movie, as of this review it is not on any streaming service, so it’s possible I have forgotten something.)

With Denji, the first arc shows a clear growth of his character, while still barking and panting to the air of makima’s presence and following her every command with no hesitation, we see Denji start to question the stuff he experiences and who he is as a person compared to normal society. He has several moments where he goes to the people he cares about for advice, such as makima and pochita, and express his confusion on whether he fits within society. The first act of the movie does a very good job showcasing how while Denji still yearns for affection and love, he’s grown to a point where he can start questioning every form of affection towards him and whether it is genuine or not. These internal conflicts within Denji also smoothly transitions into the second act with his time with Reze. We see the shift of internal questioning within Denji turn from his worry-ness of not being normal to turn into his struggle between the two women he fell in love with.

The second act is a great out of world romance between Denji and Reze. The animation is done beautifully while accompanying the intense closeness Denji and Reze buildup. Reze and Denji’s nighttime interactions also becomes a great focal point for Denji’s internal struggles. This second act hammers in on how Denji never lived a normal life, calling back to the first episode to how denji wishes to live like a normal teenage boy. The nighttime portion really gives a sense of escaping the cruel world and letting Denji live a semblance of a normal teenager he wished for when he was younger. There is a strong intensity between Denji and Reze that is well deserve, and that is why the pain of it crashing down hits so much harder in act three.

Without going to any spoilers, the main fight of the movie is done beautifully. Every moment is filled with so much action and chaos. It is such a beautiful mix of insanity with cold calculation with mix of mind-blowing unexpectedness. This third act also solidified my favorite character of this move, Beam. I was genuinely surprised after watching this movie on how Beam became the best character in the movie. His charm and chaotic-ness blend so well with Denji’s insanity.

But to shift back into the main focal point of Denji’s struggles, we see at the end of how Denji is still true to himself and his loyalty to his current life at Public Safety, but we see how Denji’s grown from his time with Reze and how even though he doesn’t leave his current life, he still cares for Reze. Denji’s internal struggle is how he navigates the complexity between love and loyalty, akin to with how he thinks about Reze and Makima.

With Reze, we see her internal struggles of doing her job versus her feelings for Denji throughout the movie. Like with Denji, her feelings and attraction for him is real, coupled with the same internal struggles. Reze gives Denji’s the ability to wonder to himself on whether he could’ve lived a normal life. There is a small moment in the movie that is all about confronting the fact that Denji is a 16-year-old boy working in Public Safety, he never went to school. The second act explores the question on if it’s cruel that Denji and people like him, Reze, never got the chance to live a normal life. That is why in the third act, the main fight, there is a sense of sad acknowledgement between Denji and Reze for the lives they live, in the way they fight each other. The best part of the fights between Denji and Reze in when they showcase the best traits of each of their fighting skills, while incorporating the internal struggles they feel for each other. Mainly in how the fight also references moments in the second act. That unspoken feeling hits harder for when the ending comes. This movie has a sad ending; it is the sad result of not being able to stop lying to yourself until its too late. For some people it may take till the dust past to realize their real feelings, but for other, it could be at the most frightening event where they no longer hold back inside.

That other truly belongs to Aki and his internal struggle throughout the movie. With the Reze Arc taking place immediately after the end of the first season, we still get to see Aki’s personality post losing Himeno, and the internal struggles within Aki after losing her are very much prominent. We see in the first and third arc of this film, aki recluses back into his much older personality where he is much more pessimistic when dealing with fiends/devils. We see that he is partnered with the angel devil. From right at the beginning with Aki’s initial portion, we can easily see what aki’s struggles will be throughout the movie, moving forward after himeno’s death and his relationship with Angel. Theres a lot of heavy symbolism in how aki tries to deal with moving forward now that himeno is gone with the shift of him getting to partner with Angel. With his relationship with Angel, we as the audience can clearly see aki’s reclusiveness back into the early personality to how he use to act with denji and power, very argumentative and dismissive of Angel. There are several early moments where Aki cannot seem to get Angel to do what he wants. Angel at several times complains about his no desire to work and just would rather die instead of working. The conflict between how Angel’s not willingness to work and wanting to die rather than work comes into direct contrast of Aki’s position, where he is very close to dying and pushing himself the hardest to try and reach the gun devil. These moments of arguments between these helps build up Aki’s internal struggle, which come out in the most frightening moment of the movie. In this most frightening moment of the movie, there is another huge argument/conflict between Aki and Angel where both are in danger. In that moment of danger, we get to see Aki reveal his real feelings, he fears of trying to connect with people.

Looking at Aki’s moments, the constant symbolism of reminding the audience of Himeno and his arguments with Angel devil help showcase his internal struggle, or his lie, that he doesn’t care about his coworkers. There are a buildup of the wall Aki puts up in front of people, but we see that in the most climatic moment, him tearing down that wall himself. Aki’s was lying to himself that he doesn’t care about his coworkers, but he does care, he feared facing that pain like with Himeno, and the movie showcases that beautifully by not saying that, but by the body language and the rash decisions Aki makes in the third act. We see a strong indication from Aki’s body language near the end of the third act on how he doesn’t want to see any of coworker die again. He’s struggles with dealing with the Angel devil became of point of reflection for the both where we see that they do care for each other, even if they don’t say it.

With the last major focal character, Angel, his arc really helps tie the struggles between each of the main characters, his and Reze’s analogy of the city or country mouse really highlight the theme of choosing to live in dull safety or risk danger to live a grander life. We see constantly throughout the first and third act Angel’s unwillingness to work, to point where he’d rather just die than work. But as the audience, we see that the complaint is not just a complaint, but rather a plea as the movie progress. We see an irony of how angel treats people and work throughout the movie, at the beginning, Angel is very uncooperative, he has no desire to help at all. There are several moments where Angel witnesses death, but feels nothing, or rather a hint of jealousy of how people will die and be free from the mundane, yet these dying people ask Angel for help. For an angel devi, there is an irony that he is confused by people wanting to live and still don’t want to die. Yet with the third act, we see Angel has a moment of wanting to be left behind so Aki can prioritize himself, yet we can see that his body language tells a different story, the third act helps shine of the truth on Angel’s internal struggle, his struggle on the fear of death. Angel is shown as a conflicting force on how people look at death, often making the comparison that death is better than work. But in real danger, we see that Angel shows his real feelings from his tone and body language that he himself, like many others, that dying can be both terrifying and sad. The fear of death from Angel and Aki’s fear of losing more people he cares about culminates into a beautiful sadness at the climax of the third act. We see Angel growth in the final moments of the movie where he decides to follow work in commands that others would conflict with. Yet he chooses to do it because he doesn’t want his close ones to deal with that conflict.

Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc, tells are story about lies and consequences. What does it mean to lie to yourself about your real feelings and what are the consequences of lying to yourself for so long? For some, it can be damaging to yourself worth and who you choose to find support in. For others, it can be damaging to how you treat other people and who you can rely on. Maybe for some, it can be damaging to how you treat conflict and how to keep moving forward. Lying to yourself will only be a temporary fix, if you cannot face your reality with honesty and real courage, you will be bound to fall into disappointment and what could’ve been. The Reze Arc is beautiful for how it shows that the consequences of what could’ve been. The fireworks and heart throbbing romance with Reze is done beautifully and is as hot as the sun, yet the subtlety and sadness from the rain and air from the silence and lying is chilling. The result is a fog you wish it could’ve been better. The fog will pass on one day, so never stop trying to want a happy place in life.