I often feel like Berserk (2016) might be a tricky show for anyone watching without having seen any of the earlier material beforehand. I try not to spoil things for people, but I’m aware that I’m naming some characters because honestly they’re not really formally introduced otherwise. If they’re named in-show, then I’ll use their name once it’s known, but there are others who are not named and so I’m going ahead and introducing them for anyone reading this review.
Take the opening scene of this episode, for example. The deformed spirit who appears and saves Casca from the approaching zombies is Guts and Casca’s baby., and we’ve seen it a couple of times already. In the first season of Berserk and the movies, right before the Band of the Hawk went to rescue Griffith, Guts and Casca finally confessed their feelings for each other and had sex. Unknowingly at the time Casca conceived, but that embryo was later tainted by Griffith’s seed when he raped her during the Eclipse. The baby was later born extremely prematurely, and disappeared before Guts could kill it.
The other unnamed character we meet this episode is the aptly named Skull Knight. He approaches Guts and warns him of events to come. Namely that at St. Albion there will be an event similar to the Eclipse, and someone who signifies the hawk will appear in the mortal world. Once every thousand years, when the levels of power reach high enough levels, something normally residing in the place of the gods is incarnated. This event cannot be changed, so Guts needs to hurry so he can at least be with Casca and protect her when shit goes down.
At St. Albion, Farnese is starting to question her faith. She’s seen too many of Mozgus’ ways and is beginning to doubt God. Additionally the other commanders are openly questioning her ability to lead, and wonder why she’s sucking up to Mozgus. Farnese decides to go see Mozgus herself, and of course Serpico goes with her. En route they run into one of the torturers, the one with the bird mask. He reveals that while he looks normal, he has a skin condition that makes him unable to be in direct sunlight, otherwise his skin starts to blister and boil. This had lead to him being deformed and ostracized in his past.
When the trio gets to the chapel they see Mozgus is prostrating himself, similar to Farnese whipping herself with her flail earlier in the season. This is the biggest sign that Mozgus is not quite who he seems to be; I mean who else would survive slamming their head into the floor three thousand times a day? Well, what was that about the Skull Knight mentioning an Apostle earlier…? *whistles*
We get more of the same religious bullshit about how Mozgus’ mission is to enforce God’s strict law, which in his mind allows for the torturing and murder of “sinners.” Mozgus can tell that Farnese is having trouble wrapping her head around this because she doesn’t see how it “saves” people, plus she knows that both the refugees and some of her fellow knights hate her. Mozgus merely smiles and tells her not to doubt God, because faith is living for God’s glory while living through hardships.
And throughout it all, two amber eyes are watching everyone…
Back at the refugee camp, Nina and Elaine bump into Joachim, one of Nina’s customers and someone who claims to love her. Nina angrily tells him that if he 
really loves her, he’ll meet her at midnight on the riverbank.
Sure enough, when the midnight bell tolls Joachim shows up, and Nina is there with an empty look in her eyes. She asks him if he’d be willing to damn himself to hell for her, and when he says yes she takes him to a secret location. There he sees dozens if not hundreds of people, naked and dancing around a bonfire. It’s one large orgy of sex and drugs, and Joachim is clearly shocked, even as they’re both enveloped by the larger group and pleasured.
Afterwards Nina takes Joachim to meet the Great Goat, a man wearing a giant goat head. Nina offers Joachim a bowl of broth to drink which would seal his initiation, but there are body parts in it and Joachim drops the bowl before fleeing. Nina screams for the others to kill Joachim, so they chase him to a cliff and push him off. Then Luca, who has followed Nina and watched the entire scene, reveals herself to Nina. When Nina freaks out, Luca puts Nina over her knee and spanks her like a naughty child until Nina breaks down and apologizes.
Nearby a group of cultists has surrounded Casca, who has sneaked out of the camp and followed Luca. Once an ugly old man takes the bandages off Casca’s face and sees how beautiful she is, he pushes her to the ground and prepares to defile her. Casca’s memories of being raped come back to her and she starts screaming, which is interrupted when the cultists are possessed by demonic spirits and start eating each other. As they converge on Casca her deformed child materializes and causes the demonic spirits to disappear. The surviving cultists bow down to Casca and start praising her as a witch.
At the bottom of the canyon, Joachim has somehow survived. The being with the amber eyes pulls his naked body from the water and then disappears.
After the credits, it’s the next day, and the Holy See Knights are burning some heretics alive. As the bodies burn, Farnese’s men whisper behind her back how it was rumored that Farnese loved to light fires as a child, and that the reason she was allowed to hunt down Guts was because she had burned a bunch of heretics at the stake three years prior. Nearby Serpico watches the bodies burn, and a cold, almost psychotic look comes over his face.
After the burning is over, Luca’s lover Jerome finds Serpico sitting alone and they talk briefly. Serpico reveals that his mother had been burned at the stake as a heretic, also three years ago. Later we see Farnese is “enjoying” her typical sadistic thoughts about hurting people; this show is definitely portraying her as a pyrophiliac, along with being a sadist. We see that as a child, Farnese was encouraged to start helping burn people alive, even though she was so young.
My thoughts: Finally a bit of a tamer episode that gives a break from all the blood and torture. I’m glad that Guts has almost arrived at St. Albion because that’s when this arc will really get going.
Who is the creature with the amber eyes, and what does it want? What will happen to Guts and Casca’s child? Will Griffith really be reincarnated? Stay tuned for the next episode.
Also, I wish the soundtrack (or at least “Hai Yo”) would be released already!! >___<
* Susumu Hirasawa song of the week: I forgot to include one in last week’s review, so you get two this week. The first is “Niwashi King“, from his August 1998 solo album, and “Parade” from the Paprika OST.
Author’s Note: I apologize for this review being late, as I was not able to get my laptop working properly while I was away. Therefore all of this past week’s reviews are going to be slightly delayed. Thank you for your patience!