by Tatsuki Fujimoto
English Translation by Amanda Haley
Touch-up art/Lettering by Sabrina Heep and James Gaubatz
Design by Julian JR Robinson
Edited by Alexis Kirsch
Published in 11 paperback volumes October 2020-June 2022 by Viz Media.
Also available digitally.
Original Japanese language serialization began in 2018.
. . .
"Wouldn't you like to have a prairie dog living in the middle of your chest, sharing your blood supply?"
-American philosopher George Carlin from his book Brain Droppings (1997)
"That . . . was a family slap, okay?"
-dialogue from the manga Chainsaw Man
. . .
Review by William D. Tucker.
You follow the news, and things seem to only get worse.
People are working longer and harder than ever for wages that only know how to stagnate even as the cost of living increases.
Anthropogenic climate change creates drought, famine, plague, water wars, permanently displaced people, and extreme weather disasters, the harsh aftermaths of which seem to offer a preview of the posthuman Earth.
Democracy seems to be on life support all over the planet, as dictators rise to power.
Random acts of terrorism and violence are perpetrated by extremists as they enact lethal persecution fantasias to assert their identities.
Politicians serve the interests of capital.
Capital serves itself.
Strange devils appear to slaughter humans to consume their blood.
Only the work grind offers any kind of hope in a world that has no place for intimacy or kindness; or failing that, a distraction from troubling feelings of despair or discontent.
Some, in the depths of their powerlessness, make deals with the blood drinking devils for fantastic combat capabilities in order to survive this brutal reality.
Chainsaw Man follows the bloody misadventures of a Japanese teenager named Denji who strikes a deal with a cute devil named Pochita in order to level up his grind so that he can pay off a crushing debt inherited from his dead father. Pochita is a 'Chainsaw Devil,' which means that he is both an adorable Pokemon-esque quadruped and a chainsaw. He's got handles on his butt and his head, the blade protrudes from his face, and you pull on his tail to spark the engine. Pochita is either a horrific abomination or the coolest pet of all times depending on how you reckon such things. Pochita seems friendly, though, and not especially aggressive all on his own. In fact, Pochita seems to want nothing more than to be of service to a kind master.
You see, Denji has already sold off parts of his body to service his debt. But the people he's indebted to are scummy gangsters-yakuza-who just keep inventing bullshit reasons for Denji to pay them more and more money. Denji, who is naive in these matters, decides to take up devil hunting as a job to make an honest living so he can pay off his debt. Denji's an illiterate high school dropout, so devil hunting-an extremely dirty and dangerous job-is about the only gig he can score that pays above minimum wage. Denji uses Pochita as a living chainsaw to slice grotesque devils for cash. The kid is trying, he really is; and all the while he dreams of having enough money to ask a girl out on a date. Sixteen year old Denji's highest aspiration, in fact, is to touch female human breasts.
But this is truly a tale of woe, as Denji is murdered by the same gangsters who were ripping him off, but, in a twist, our hero returns from the dead after Pochita sacrifices his own adorable life to combine his Chainsaw Devil heart with Denji's human heart thus giving birth to the titular Chainsaw Man . . . which should really be Chainsaw Teen, but it's fine. Boys become soldiers that die in wars in order to become men, right? Ah, hell, let's give it to the kid. He's been through it. Denji dies, and we'll go ahead and call that a growth experience since he did indeed come back from the land of the dead. Most teens would just eat all of your food, play video games while farting up your couch, and stay dead. Denji's earned it.
Now, as Chainsaw Man, Denji's dressed in a nice shirt and a necktie-like he's a server at a nice sitdown restaurant or he's an office temp or something-but with the pull-cord tail of Pochita sticking out of his chest. That's right: when Denji's ready for action he yanks himself just so . . . and chainsaw blades pop out of his arms and head. He also sports a gaping mouth full of wicked fangs. Chainsaw Man's fuel is not gasoline, but blood. The longer Chainsaw Man goes, the more blood he uses. It's like Ultraman's color timer or the limited battery life of an EVA Unit, except Chainsaw Man can refuel by consuming blood. Chainsaw Man's main gig is killing devils whose blood also happens to be quite drinkable due to Denji being merged with a devil-sweet Pochita-which makes our boy a half-devil. I think that's how it works. So, as long as Chainsaw Man stays bloodthirsty and eats as he kills there's no limit to what this kid can achieve!
Denji eventually gets conscripted into a government-funded devil killing organization who exploit his half-devil status to deny him human rights and force him to work for food and shelter. Denji's been so down that he can't see a way out of this unfair deal even as he instinctually resents it. The head of this organization is a woman named Makima, who brazenly manipulates Denji with sexual titilation. At first, we are seemingly in the tropey realm of action manga pandering to the power fantasies of teenage boys. It's common for the adolescent heterosexual male protagonists of these comics to magically become the center of the universe, to fight all the battles, and to miraculously be irresistable to attractive, older women. Often these stories are balanced with farcical humor in which the hero guy's Big Dick Energy is undercut by various humiliating episodes-usually in a high school setting-which bring him back down to Earth. The recently reprinted Spriggan offers some amusing examples of this, in which a teen super-agent gets his ass kicked by unimpressed female classmates between bouts of world-saving combat with cyborgs and ancient aliens. One of the more extreme examples occurs in Eden: It's An Endless World in which the teenage hero survives various brutal battles involving cyborg militias and bloodthirsty gangsters only to become an undercover cop while romancing a cynical sex worker-scenes of puerile humor play counterpoint to vistas of slaughter in jaw-dropping fashion-
At first, Chainsaw Man seems to be falling into line with this brand of power fantasy, but the devil's in the details. Remember, Denji's an illiterate high school dropout who has suffered one devastation after another: death of his father; homelessness; economic exploitation by the yakuza; violent death-he's lucky to be alive. When a government agency offers to take care of him, it's the first time he has a chance at having a place to sleep, good food, a sense of belonging, and a purpose to his existence beyond survival. Yes, Denji's being manipulated and exploited yet again . . . but it is also, sadly, brutally, an improved form of bondage. Later on, one of Denji's devil killing colleagues-a teenage girl-speaks bluntly about how she would've taken up sex work if not for the government gig. Chainsaw Man's action power fantasy characters pay a steep price for the glory of killing devils.
But this makes it sound totally depressing. Which it really isn't. Chainsaw Man is quite hilarious and exciting. People make deals with devils for various superpowers which allow devil killers to unleash heavy destruction upon their enemies. The various monstrous creatures assume forms that are both terrifying and amusing, leaving one with the distinct impression that devils embody our tackiness as well as our evil. Combat rages across countless pages in the wild, unconstrained style of action manga. Comic interludes involve the government devil killers getting blackout drunk and engaging in all kinds of regret-inducing behaviors.
But the fun and excitement are counterbalanced by paranoia and sudden death. Terrorists also cut deals with devils to commit mass slaughter. Assassins target the government agents. Epic battles level entire city blocks and massacre scores of civilians. One gruesome image involves what might be an entire telephone book's worth of names of people killed during an especially appalling event. Chainsaw Man offers both naked power and chilling consequences in equal measure.
I was absorbed by the thousand or so pages I read of Chainsaw Man. I liked the fantastic displays of devil-enhanced powers. I was intrigued by the themes of exploitation and power that complicated the 'super-team' action sequences. I was kept on edge by the sudden death which could seemingly befall any character. There's even a bizarre and fascinating element to do with historical amnesia which provocatively suggests why so many action manga have highly abstracted settings divorced from real world concerns. Chainsaw Man is an ongoing serial, so it could still let me down. But so far so good.
Y'know, for all the trouble and pain it would cause me . . . I think I wouldn't mind having a super-kawaii Chainsaw Devil inside my chest, too! It would hurt, sure. But I could also really fuck shit up. Sometimes the pain is worth it.
