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A pair of youngsters experience a private, gentle moment at the local secondary school’s open-air swimming pool after hours. As they float together, hanging under the stars in the quietness of the evening, the sequence captures the fleeting, heady thrill of adolescent romance, completely engrossed in the present, consequences overlooked.

About 30 minutes into Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc, I realized these scenes are the core of the film. Denji and Reze’s love story became the focus, and all the background details and backstories previously known from the series’ first season turned out to be mostly unnecessary. Despite being a official entry within the franchise, Reze Arc provides a easier starting place for newcomers — regardless of they haven’t seen its single episode. The approach has its benefits, but it simultaneously limits a portion of the urgency of the film’s story.

Developed by the original creator, Chainsaw Man chronicles Denji, a indebted fiend fighter in a universe where demons embody specific evils (ranging from ideas like Aging and Darkness to terrifying entities like cockroaches or historical conflicts). After being betrayed and murdered by the criminal syndicate, he forms a contract with his faithful devil-dog, his pet, and returns from the deceased as a chainsaw-human hybrid with the power to completely destroy Devils and the terrors they represent from existence.

Plunged into a violent struggle between devils and hunters, Denji meets Reze — a alluring coffee server hiding a deadly secret — igniting a heartbreaking confrontation between the two where affection and existence intersect. This film continues right after season 1, exploring the main character’s connection with his love interest as he wrestles with his emotions for her and his devotion to his manipulative boss, Makima, compelling him to choose between passion, loyalty, and self-preservation.

A Self-Contained Love Story Within a Larger World

Reze Arc is inherently a lovers-to-enemies plot, with our imperfect main character the hero falling for his counterpart almost immediately upon meeting. He’s a lonely young man looking for love, which renders him unreliable 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. Filmmaker the director recognizes this and ensures the love story is at the center, instead of weighing it down with unnecessary summaries for the uninitiated, particularly since such details really matters to the overall storyline.

Regardless of Denji’s imperfections, it’s hard not to sympathize with him. He is after all a teenager, fumbling his way through a reality that’s distorted his sense of right and wrong. His intense longing for affection makes him come off like a infatuated puppy, although he’s prone to growling, biting, and making a mess along the way. His love interest is a perfect match for Denji, an compelling seductive antagonist who finds her prey in our protagonist. Viewers hope to see Denji earn the affection of his love interest, even if she is clearly concealing something from him. Thus when her true nature is revealed, audiences cannot avoid wish they’ll in some way make it work, even though internally, it is known a positive outcome is not truly in the cards. As such, the tension don’t feel as high as they ought to be since their romance is doomed. This is compounded by that the movie serves as a direct sequel to the first season, leaving minimal space for a romance like this among the darker developments that followers are aware are coming soon.

Breathtaking Animation and Technical Execution

The film’s graphics effortlessly combine traditional animation with computer-generated settings, delivering impressive visual appeal prior to the excitement kicks in. Including vehicles to tiny office appliances, digital assets add depth and detail to every scene, making the animated figures pop strikingly. In contrast to Demon Slayer, which frequently highlights its digital elements and changing backgrounds, Reze Arc uses them more sparingly, particularly evident during its action-packed climax, where such elements, though not unappealing, become easier to identify. Such smooth, ever-shifting environments render the movie’s battles both visually bombastic and surprisingly easy to follow. Nonetheless, the technique shines brightest when it’s invisible, enhancing the vibrancy and movement of the hand-drawn art.

Concluding Thoughts and Wider Implications

Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc serves as a good point of entry, likely leaving first-time audiences satisfied, but it also has a drawback. Telling a standalone narrative limits the stakes of what should feel like a expansive anime epic. This is an illustration of why continuing a successful anime season with a movie isn’t the best strategy if it weakens the series’ general storytelling potential.

While Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle succeeded by concluding several installments of animated series with an epic movie, and JuJutsu Kaisen 0 avoided the problem entirely by acting as a backstory to its well-known show, Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc charges forward, perhaps a bit foolishly. But that doesn’t stop the movie from proving to be a great time, a excellent introduction, and a unforgettable love story.