#rezeposting

she assumes every Woman in Film trope ever in order to convey the genre of the bomb girl arc to the audience & herself to denji; which is why the arc itself is horromance since both romance & horror films are the epitome of on-screen Feminine: the woman//the monster. The Woman//Monster collaboration in films invoke e/o but simultaneously set itself against e/o. until the rooftop, damsel in distress has to be protected from Monster. //-ely, the Monstrous-Feminine is a concept of abject horror, a social distress, that reze occupies as the arc progresses.

the Monster in the arc transforms from the external threat of serial killer to the Monster that takes over the figure of the Damsel, reze. interesting that the scene which immediately precedes the rooftop is that of the pool; sweet cafe dates -> sexuality framed as temptation. the former is the domain of the damsel, & in fact the serial killer's initial promise-threat closes on a panel of denji-reze at the cafe. the latter is something more suited to the trope archetype of femme fatale, so it makes sense that it happens before the inversion. re: the move from Romantic -> Erotic: the fireworks scene with its eroticised violence is a location of transgression, from reze herself, from one genre to the other. the Woman, as blushing girl, kisses the protagonist (romantic element) & turns into the Monster in horror film, & that's how she's presented from that point forth. the girl asking for help outside public safety, her swimming out of the darkness with heads in her hands & the word "monster" at aki's mouth. she's gleeful: the monstrous feminine strips itself of damsel, cannibalising itself.

& it's so compelling that the end of the bomb devil arc, that no one in-story is privy to- not even makima as the story writer or angel, the witness - is entirely internal monologue; she is silent in that scene outside it. we've never heard her thoughts prior; in fact, within the classroom, her hair covering her eyes, she masks them both from audience & the story, even as she clearly feels certain ways about denji's circumstances that mirror her own. it's as if she daren't utter Herself outside the genres she plays with.

you held onto me like a crucifix

- chainsaw man, part 1

- timeloop, character study, 23k

- cast: reze (pov) x denji; makima

iris out art by kenshi yonezu... im sick with glee. the finger in her mouth is so unbearably delightful. rotting girl who has to bite up her own finger & remember herself?? add another lovely makima reze comparison to the mix, but of course makima/nayuta has someone's mouth to imprint onto... & reze has to stuff all that love-wanting into her own mouth alongside denji's tongue. sweet. it's sweet.

her teaching him dirty words in the classroom, & her reading in the café, the scene in the pool — "things you don't know... i'll teach you...": there's an overlap between intellectual & sexual maturity that she asserts over him in the arc. & i find that interesting because it's also wrapped in the role she's playing — a role that's part coerced (a child forced to act as a [honeypot] assassin) & part exertion of her agency (the way her facade mechanisms actually function). even her bargain for freedom, the plea before the fireworks scene, something that should be outside the boundaries of her [role as an assassin] happens at the same maturity location: "i'll protect you". she doesn't really ever let slip that dynamic she has with denji, whether it's the promise of protection before the kiss, the hurt of the kiss where her "i know" implies a kind of aged understanding of its violence, implies she's been through it before. or the continuation of the teaching role into the fight scene where she expresses her status as a hybrid as one she knows how to wield, "i'll teach *you* how we do battle". denji, despite his past & his present, is projected by her as uninitiated, as young — & she inhabits a location of control within the space of their interaction. even on the beach, she puts it as if he's the fool who was easily taken in by her experience...