SPOTLIGHT ON HORROR: BERSERK’S DEMON WOMB

CONTENT WARNING: FORCED PREGNANCY, FORCED BIRTH, GORE, BODY HORROR

Spotlight on Horror is a new segment where I take a look at moments in media that have truly stuck with me because of their over the top, disgusting or terrifying nature.

Kentaro Miura has a knack for creating some of the most bizarre, grotesque and unique monsters in all of manga. Every creature in the infamous Eclipse scene of Berserk is an ungodly abomination, warped versions of animals and people, piles of flesh and gnashing teeth, all with an insatiable bloodlust and proclivity to violence and intense suffering. Page after page of individuals inked with such detail and care. I have no idea how he is able to, after all these years, STILL come up with new devils to add to the roster. One that has always stuck with me, however, is a device from the Kushan Empire and the final trump card in King Ganishka’s plans.

Before we get to that, though, there are a few Berserk concepts I would like to explain. An Apostle is a former human who, in their most desperate hour, is given the choice of obtaining a higher power – to become a demon in exchange for their very humanity. A Beherit is the object that grants this transformation, an egg adorned with a face contorted in agony and bleeding eyes. Ganishka is an apostle, having become one by sacrificing the life of his son. He has an enormous army of ghouls and plans on conquering the kingdom of Midland. Griffith, a recurring character and antagonist to the Demon Slayer Guts, is also an apostle, although one of a MUCH higher power.

Once he faces Griffith, the main antagonist of Berserk, who is a deceptively angelic young man cloaked in feathers and blindly ethereal armor, Ganishka panics. He is visibly shaking, sweat running down his face and terrified to have Griffith touch him because he believes it will completely subdue him and make him a slave to the whims of the young man. Hysterical, he flees and unleashes his final plan out of desperation: the Man-Made Beherit, also known as the Demon Womb.

Contained within a building to shield it from prying eyes, it is a dome shaped structure made entirely from the still-living bodies of apostles, patched and chained together and filled with amniotic fluid. Pregnant women are lowered into an opening at the top where their fetuses are infused with overwhelming evil energies until a demon child literally bursts forth from their body, killing the mother. The younglings are then rounded up to be raised as soldiers for Ganishka’s attack force. The sheer scale of this operation is what is most upsetting… the army is AT LEAST 200,000 units strong. Every one of those, presumably, a forced pregnancy and violent birth via the Demon Womb. The women shown appear to be captured from Midland. A monstrous and effective war tactic.  I don’t think I have heard of anything quite as horrific.

Ganishka arrives and demands to be lowered into the device, while his most trusted adviser pleads with him to stop. To go beyond Apostlehood…it is unheard of. Every living thing surrounding the Womb is sucked in, their energy fueling the transformation that is happening. Men turned to skeletons as they patrol, war elephants collapsing and turning to dust. And yet still more as what was once the Demon King expands. What emerges is so cosmic in scale Miura himself seems to struggle to contain it within single pages, it’s form mainly shown in elaborate 2 page spreads.

Once a man, Ganishka is now a colossal, tree like entity that is so vast it touches the skies with ease. The last gambit of the King of Kushan. Covered in overlapping faces that seem to have no beginning or end and tentacle-like appendages that crush humans as if they were insects. I love the way he is drawn, moving so slowly and with such power and weight. You never quite get a full picture of how he looks, adding to the terror and mystery of this creature. Ganishka’s reign of destruction is brought to a swift end by Griffith and the unsurmountable amount of suffering he caused to the world and it’s people is finally over.  

Berserk continues to impress me with it’s hyper detailed, imaginative nightmare inducing creatures and engaging storyline with Guts and Griffith. Kentaro Miura is truly a master of his craft and one of my favourite manga authors. ※