CHAINSAW MAN Episode 1 Dog And A Chainsaw REACTION (HOLY SH*T! WHAAAAT) 😲

Every year it seems like anime gets weirder, wilder, and more creative. There’s a natural tendency to keep moving forward that continues to push the medium to extreme places. This excess can function at the series’ surface level, but it’s also led to a trend where stylized expressions of magic, energy, or even violence can become powerful metaphors for the internal problems that consume us all. A lot of anime have pushed this idea to the extreme, but few are more ridiculous than Chainsaw Man, an anime where a mild-mannered teen named Denji transforms into a chainsaw-limbed God of destruction. In Chainsaw Man, this weapon’s engine revs loudly and body parts and viscera fly with reckless abandon, but the noise of this spectacle doesn’t drown out the heart and soul of the characters underneath.

The biggest fault against Chainsaw Man’s first episode is that it’s exactly that: a first episode. Chainsaw Man exposes audiences to a radical new universe of Devils, but “Dog & Chainsaw” is endemic of many extravagant anime premieres that hold back on answers and instead feast on spectacles. That being said, “Dog & Chainsaw” still accomplishes its goal and it contains flashes of brilliance, brutality, and creativity.

This premiere doesn’t attempt to bite off more than it can chew and it’s largely focused on Denji and his sordid lot in life. It’s not until the episode’s final seconds that Maki and the rest of Public Safety show up to complicate the story and introduce Denji to a whole new world of professional Devil Hunters. In fact, there’s a lot in common with the first episode of Chainsaw Man and the premieres of Devilman Crybaby or Tokyo Ghoul, two other dark anime where a beleaguered protagonist gets tempted over to a transformative world of evil. This is hardly a fresh anime trope, but hopefully Chainsaw Man manages to avoid the same pitfalls that held back these at-one-point similar seinen series.