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Two teenagers experience a private, tender moment at the neighborhood high school’s outdoor swimming pool after hours. While they drift as one, suspended under the stars in the stillness of the evening, the scene portrays the ephemeral, heady thrill of teenage romance, utterly engrossed in the present, consequences overlooked.

Approximately half an hour into Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc, I realized these scenes are the core of the film. The romantic tale became the focus, and every bit of contextual information and character histories previously known from the series’ first season turned out to be mostly unnecessary. Despite being a canonical entry within the series, Reze Arc provides a more accessible entry point for newcomers — even if they missed its prior content. The approach brings advantages, but it simultaneously limits a portion of the tension of the film’s story.

Developed by Tatsuki Fujimoto, Chainsaw Man follows the protagonist, a debt-ridden fiend fighter in a world where Devils represent particular evils (including ideas like getting older and Darkness to specific horrors like insects or historical conflicts). When he’s deceived and murdered by the yakuza, Denji 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.

Thrust into a violent struggle between demons and hunters, Denji meets Reze — a alluring coffee server concealing a lethal mystery — sparking a heartbreaking clash between the two where love and existence intersect. The movie continues right after the first season, delving into the main character’s connection with his love interest as he wrestles with his feelings for her and his devotion to his controlling boss, his employer, forcing him to choose between desire, loyalty, and survival.

An Independent Romantic Tale Within a Broader Universe

Reze Arc is inherently a lovers-to-enemies story, with our imperfect main character the hero falling for Reze almost immediately upon meeting. He’s a isolated boy seeking affection, which renders him vulnerable and easily swayed on a first-come basis. As a result, despite all of Chainsaw Man’s intricate lore and its extensive cast of characters, Reze Arc is highly self-contained. Director Tatsuya Yoshihara recognizes this and ensures the romantic arc is at the center, rather than bogging it down with filler recaps for the new viewers, particularly since none of that is crucial to the overall storyline.

Regardless of the protagonist’s flaws, it’s hard not to feel for him. He is still a teenager, stumbling his way through a world that’s distorted his understanding of morality. His intense longing for love makes him come off like a lovesick puppy, although he’s likely to barking, snapping, and making a mess along the way. Reze is a perfect pairing for him, an effective femme fatale who finds her mark in our protagonist. You want to see the main character earn the affection of his affection, despite Reze is clearly concealing something from him. Thus when her true nature is revealed, audiences can’t help but hope they’ll in some way succeed, although internally, it is known a happy ending is never really in the cards. As such, the stakes don’t feel as intense as they should be since their romance is fated. This is compounded by that the film serves as a immediate follow-up to Season 1, leaving little room for a love story like this amid the more grim developments that fans know are coming soon.

Stunning Visuals and Artistic Craftsmanship

The film’s graphics effortlessly combine traditional animation with 3D environments, delivering stunning visual appeal even before the excitement begins. Including vehicles to tiny desk fans, 3D models add depth and detail to every shot, allowing the 2D characters stand out strikingly. Unlike Demon Slayer, which often showcases its 3D assets and changing settings, Reze Arc uses them less frequently, most noticeably during its action-packed finale, where such elements, while not unattractive, are more apparent to identify. Such fluid, ever-shifting backgrounds make the movie’s fights both visually bombastic and surprisingly easy to understand. Still, the technique shines brightest when it’s invisible, enhancing the vibrancy and motion of the hand-drawn art.

Final Thoughts and Wider Considerations

Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc functions as a solid starting place, likely leaving first-time audiences satisfied, but it also has a drawback. Presenting a self-contained story limits the tension of what ought to seem like a sprawling anime epic. It’s an example of why continuing a popular television series with a movie isn’t the best approach if it undermines the series’ general narrative possibilities.

Whereas Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle found success by concluding multiple installments of anime television with an grand movie, and JuJutsu Kaisen 0 avoided the problem entirely by serving as a backstory to its well-known series, Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc advances boldly, maybe a slightly foolishly. But that doesn’t stop the movie from being a enjoyable time, a terrific introduction, and a unforgettable romantic tale.