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A pair of youngsters experience a intimate, tender instant at the neighborhood secondary school’s outdoor swimming pool late at night. While they drift together, hanging beneath the night sky in the quietness of the night, the sequence captures the ephemeral, exhilarating excitement of adolescent romance, completely caught up in the present, consequences overlooked.

About half an hour into Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc, it became clear these scenes are the heart of the movie. Denji and Reze’s love story became the focus, and every bit of background details and character histories I had gleaned from the series’ first season proved to be mostly unnecessary. Despite being a canonical installment within the franchise, Reze Arc provides a more accessible entry point for first-time viewers — regardless of they missed its prior content. This method has its benefits, but it also hinders some of the urgency of the movie’s narrative.

Developed by the original creator, Chainsaw Man follows the protagonist, a indebted fiend fighter in a universe where demons embody specific evils (including ideas like getting older and obscurity to terrifying entities like cockroaches or World War II). When he’s betrayed and killed by the criminal syndicate, he makes a pact with his faithful companion, Pochita, and returns from the dead as a part-human chainsaw wielder with the ability to permanently erase Devils and the terrors they represent from reality.

Thrust into a brutal conflict between demons and hunters, the hero encounters a new character — a charming barista hiding a deadly secret — igniting a heartbreaking clash between the pair where love and survival intersect. The movie picks up right after the first season, delving into Denji’s connection with his love interest as he wrestles with his feelings for her and his devotion to his controlling superior, Makima, forcing him to decide among passion, loyalty, and survival.

An Independent Love Story Amidst a Broader Universe

Reze Arc is inherently a romance-to-rivalry story, with our imperfect main character the hero becoming enamored with his counterpart right away upon introduction. He is a isolated young man seeking love, which renders him unreliable and easily swayed on a first-come, first-served. Consequently, in spite of all of Chainsaw Man’s complex lore and its extensive cast of characters, Reze Arc is very independent. Filmmaker the director understands this and ensures the love story is at the center, instead of weighing it down with filler recaps for the uninitiated, particularly since none of that really matters to the overall storyline.

Regardless of the protagonist’s flaws, it’s difficult not to feel for him. He’s after all a teenager, stumbling his way through a world that’s warped his understanding of right and wrong. His intense longing for love makes him come off like a infatuated puppy, although he’s prone to growling, snapping, and causing chaos along the way. Reze is a perfect match for him, an effective femme fatale who targets her prey in our protagonist. Viewers hope to see the main character win the ire of his love interest, even if Reze is obviously concealing something from him. So when her real identity is revealed, you still cannot avoid wish they’ll in some way succeed, although internally, you know a positive outcome is not truly in the cards. As such, the tension don’t feel as intense as they should be since their relationship is doomed. This is compounded by that the movie acts as a direct sequel to the first season, leaving little room for a love story like this amid the darker developments that fans are aware are coming soon.

Stunning Visuals and Technical Craftsmanship

This movie’s graphics seamlessly blend traditional animation with computer-generated settings, delivering stunning visual appeal even before the excitement begins. Including vehicles to tiny office appliances, digital assets enhance realism and texture to each scene, allowing the 2D characters pop strikingly. Unlike Demon Slayer, which frequently showcases its digital elements and changing settings, Reze Arc uses them more sparingly, most noticeably during its explosive finale, where such elements, though not unappealing, become easier to spot. These smooth, ever-shifting environments make the film’s fights both spectacular to watch and surprisingly easy to understand. Still, the technique shines brightest when it’s invisible, improving the dynamic range and movement of the hand-drawn art.

Final Thoughts and Broader Implications

Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc serves as a good starting place, likely leaving first-time audiences pleased, but it also has a downside. Presenting a standalone story limits the tension of what should feel like a expansive anime epic. It’s an example of why continuing a popular anime season with a movie is not the optimal approach if it weakens the franchise’s overall narrative possibilities.

Whereas Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle found success by tying up multiple seasons of animated series with an grand film, and JuJutsu Kaisen 0 avoided the problem entirely by acting as a backstory to its popular show, Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc advances boldly, maybe a slightly foolishly. But that doesn’t stop the movie from being a great experience, a excellent point of entry, and a unforgettable love story.