Berserk/WMG

Gaiseric found immortality and his reign lasted for over 200 years
Then when he finally reached the end of his mortality, about to die, he sacrificed the capital city of his kingdom and became Void. The reason for this WMG is a simple math equation: were Void really to have become a God Hand 1080 years ago, there should be six of them around right now, instead of five. The only alternative is that at least one of them has died over the millennium, but it makes for a more exciting WMG this way.

== The four God Hands (excluding Femto) will be killed by Guts within the space of a few panels  == It's been stated that the Dragonslayer grows in power with each entity it kills. Hence, if it kills something as horrifying as a God Hand, Guts would take a massive level in badass. But what's going to happen is that Guts will make a Dynamic Entry into the Amazing Technicolor Battlefield, kill Ubik, Kill Conrad, and then kill Slan. Void will attempt to project a shield, but to no avail. Then Guts will be ready for the Final Battle against Femto and the ....
 * I obect to this one on the grounds that it has to be the Skull Knight who takes down Void.
 * No one said Skull Knight can't use Guts' sword if he is unable to. It'd be pretty much - Guts gets downed, Skull Knight takes sword and kills Void, tosses sword back to Guts and then evaporates.

Miura has developed a serious case of Vicarious Traumatic Stress Disorder from drawing this manga for years and years, which is a huge factor in the Schedule Slip
Back when he started, Miura didn't figure that working on a manga with such explicit horrifying material could have serious consequences on himself. Working on Berserk for so long took a serious toll on Muira's psychological and emotional health, which is why he's taking so many long breaks; his employers are letting him recuperate so the guy doesn't fucking kill himself. I mean, if I spent so much time living in the heads of fictional people who've lived through the deepest darkest bowels of human depravity and cruelty, I'd snap and turn into a moe-addict too.
 * So this is why humor is appearing more often as the story goes on...
 * The scary thing is that it's recently been confirmed by Mr. Miura himself that he takes breaks from writing and drawing Berserk due to psychological reasons. So, I guess you told us so! Hang in there, Miura!

Griffith will realize that in the grand scheme of things, he's not that important
Yeah, yeah, I know. Falcon of Light. Chosen by the Idea of Evil and all of humanity. But is that REALLY so important when you look at the big picture? The Idea of Evil is a human invention, and humans haven't been around for that long. In the long run, humans are going to die out along with the Idea of Evil, and even the Earth itself and all life on it is going to disappear. Someday, Griffith is going to be completely forgotten because the will of mankind is so puny compared to the will of nature and the will of the whole universe. Somehow, this is all going to occur to Griffith, and that's when shit really starts to go wrong.

Griffith has invalded Elfheim, Puck will become and apostle
Most of the foreshadowing coming from Flora not long after her introduction. After she elaborates about the Behelits and how they will always return to the person they're meant to corrupt, as Guts tries to throw it away, Puck stops him and carries it off claiming it's his.

The most logical thing to drive Puck over the Despair Event Horizon would be arriving at Elfheim only to find it razed.

Guts will gain a power-up from the land of the elves
He's kinda lagging behind Griffith.

Caska is half-Kushan
Hence, her distinct appearance. She describes herself as having been raised in a border area plagued by raids, which is probably the Midland-Kushan border. The events led to this could have either been voluntary or involuntary. Donovan and some of the extras, I'm not so sure about.
 * Hey, she could be all Kushanese: a Kushanese-Midlandian (like a Japanese-American).
 * Just compare her to Silat. As for Donovan, Pippin and most dark-skinned extras that aren't explicitly Kushans, they mostly are of clealy African descent or mixed race in the case of Pippin who was probably a mulatto.
 * Well, Miura has a knack at not making everybody a paper-doll cut out of each other, even if they're from the same ethnic group. Silat has a lot of sharp features to his face, as well as a lot of the Bakiraka, which could reflect how they were perceived as not really good guys - and maybe even a bit stereotyped - while Casca's features are a lot more soft and "normal" which is probably how a lot more Kushan people look like, judging from the way the children look. Personally, I always thought that a half-Kushan person would look like Guska, since he looks like both of his  parents and thus has features of both a Kushan and a Midlandian (or is it "Midlander"?).
 * Also with the Casca's true ethnic origin thing, I always imagined that Casca's home village was comprised of Kushan refugees: it's in a place that's technically a safe haven, but it's close to their home turf. Plus, it's possible that Casca's family was given the crappy land by the Kingdom of Midland because the government wanted to "assimilate" the Kushan immigrants into their society (or they were just cautious of their allegiance) - but from a confined distance which was basically an ethnic ghetto.

Seems like a lot of Bakiraka worked for Midland...
What with Silat working with mercenaries to attack the Hawk's encampment, and those five assassins who fought the Hawks in Wyndham when they were saving Griffith...Well, guess what? they were sent into Midland by Ganishka, to work with the kingdom and see what they can learn from the inside...
 * Jossed with the clan's establishment as disgraced Kushan exiles and Silat's willingness to disobey the Emperor.

Caska will regain her mind, but she's gonna Come Back Wrong...
...as a Haruko Expy who lives For the Evulz. Living without any inhibitions for so long is going to make a huge change in her personality, only now it's coupled with her intelligence and willpower. Now the world is truly @#!*%.

God Hand has a "good" equivalent
Each time it gains a new member, some badass who was supposed to die in the process ends up surviving, becoming a member of an opposing force. As such, in addition to Guts and Skull Knight, there are three other such people.
 * Maybe they're the godhand, and Griffith and the other memeber's are the devilhand, maybe?
 * Flora was probably one. But who would she oppose, Slan or Conrad?
 * What about Ubik?
 * I always figured they were in a power trio with Void, not unlike Guts, Caska and Griffith.
 * Would this require an ?
 * Yes, yes it would. It would obviously be much weaker than, but gaining in strength.
 * Maybe, it is what have saved guts all this years, just think about it. If it wasn´t for the people that have helped guts this far, and the people guts have helped, its probably he would have died very much ago. I mean, i don´t think of the idea of evil being so dumb to let one of the few person with enough power and good heart alive. The Idea of Evil want Guts dead, thats why Guts finds danger after danger, because the idea of evil is trying to kill him. But, the idea of good do everything he can, besides that the idea of evil is more powerful than him, to make Guts alive.
 * Maybe, they have lived a life in peace. And his descendents are Gut's companions. I mean, in this manga there is EVERYTHING except coincidences, first of all, Serpico's spirit really like him, which seems to be something unusual, as pointed by schierke. Besides that Schierke says that, when someone becomes mature, is hard to learn Magic, Farnese seems to do it very good. Isidr...well, he has show TOO much lucky for a human surviving a lot of dangerous situations and there is hints that he has some natural instinct to battle. Maybe, they are descendant's of survivors of the ceremony.

Zodd is Guts' biological father
They practically have the same face. Not to mention Zodd's apparent interest in Guts.
 * Sure they do...if Guts got hit with an Ugly Stick 40000.
 * It's not unheard of since they both have pointy ears. And a lot of apostles are creepy-ugly. Wyald couldn't possibly be born that way.
 * The bit with Wyald is true; his real form is a frail old man.
 * And his mother could have been hung for carrying a demon's (or, as far as the executioners knew, a well-known killer's) child. People have died horribly for less in this series.
 * This would also be an interesting twist since we know that most male apostles are horny and often force themselves on human women, and that people who have become apostles still have children from their human life. However, we have yet to see a case where an apostle procreated with a human and gave birth to a Half-Human Hybrid (or even apostles having little apostles with other apostles).
 * For the record, I call Law of Inverse Paternity.
 * That... would be awesome.

The series takes place on a forgotten Feudal World in the Imperium of Man from Warhammer 40000.
The setting of Midland is certainly grim, gritty, and vicious enought to fit in the 40K universe. The Godhand are just a local group of greater Slaaneshi or Tzeentchi demons; Griffith's was just his way of embracing Chaos. And Guts? If he ever got rid of that brand on his neck Chaos-taint, he'd probably be prime Space Marine material.
 * Additionally, Guts is one of the missing Primarchs. This would explain his prodigious strength and fighting skill, as well as why he doesn't have a mother. The woman he was found underneath just happened to be there when Chaos brought him to Midland, and isn't his real mother. And the Berserker's Armour isn't really a dwarven artifact, it's been cursed with the power of Chaos (probably has the Mark of Khorne on it somewhere).
 * Given that there were two missing Primarchs, this troper would surmise that would therefore be the other missing Primarch. Not only would this explain his and Guts unusually strong bond and their incredible combat strength but tie neatly into the fact that exactly half of the Primarchs fell to the influence of Chaos and  is nothing more than his appearance as a Daemon Prince.
 * And of course... the ? The Warp. They even have similar origin stories.
 * This would accomplish the impressive feat of making Berserk more depressing. Even if Guts and his True Companions somehow triumph against all odds against the Godhand and their Apostles and the Inherent in The System misery of Midland in general, the entire galaxy is still going to @#!*%.
 * The members of the Godhand represent different Chaos gods. Conrad is likely a Greater Daemon of Nurgle (he manifested himself with a pile of rats once), Slan is obviously a Slaaneshi Daemon, and Void and Ubik  follow Tzeentch. As for Khorne? He clearly decided to be subtle for once and settled for tainting the missing Primarch Guts, meaning that   isn't just a Super-Powered Evil Side, it's the manifestation of Khorne's will. Zodd the Immortal is clearly a follower of Khorne.
 * Nope, Zodd is just Zodd, maybe he is just like that, or if you really need an explanation for the demon-side; maybe he just beat a major demon down and stole it's power through the laws of Rule of Cool
 * He looks like a Bloodthirster though. Of course he's a demon of Khorne.
 * Or if not, certainly a Champion of Khorne.
 * Compare, if you will, Gut's brand to the mark of Khorne. They're just a few lines short of each other.
 * The Skull Knight is really a manifestation of the God-Emperor,
 * This Troper can totally imagine Farneze as a Sister of Battle, now. I mean, she was once a Knight Templar until recently, and she loooooooves fire.
 * Casca would also be something of a Sister of Battle. A dignified, loyal and fiercely brave Hot Chick With a Sword who can actually pull her weight and keep her cool even when surrounded by Hell itself? Who else could be the rightful consort of a Primarch like Guts?
 * Consider the following: Daemonculaba, a method used by certain Chaos Marines to create new members. Compare it to the Emperor's demon-soldier factory.
 * If we postulate than this WMG is true then, well, there's only one way this series can end...
 * Of course Guts would then have to fly into space, sneak aboard the imperial flagship, and start mowing down space marines by the thousands...
 * Even a Space Marine Primarch would be hard pressed to take on full chapters of marines on his own while basically unarmed and unarmored (and really, pretty much anything that Guts could plausibly get his hands on short of a daemon sword is going to be useless against Imperial weaponry). Then again, in the "Guts is one of the missing Primarchs" WMG, Bezerk would be taking place during or just prior to the Great Crusade, and the Emprah was markedly more reasonable than the rulers of the later Imperium. Of course, that would mean Guts probably is going to die during or shortly after the Horus Heresy, just in time to see the start of the Grimdark.

You aren't thinking far enough.
What if, rather than it just being another world, Berserk is the distant past of Terra. Guts? He's the origin of Khorne. Khorne was born during the Middle Ages on Earth. Who else would have enough raw anger to birth Khorne-Guts. The Beast is likely the embryonic form of the Chaos God. may be a primitive Chaos God. Each of the demons and the Godhand is an example of a Chaos Daemon. Tzeentch is likely in control of the to fill one of his countless gambits, because that's how he roles.

Berserk is an Alternate Universe of both Warhammer and Warhammer 40K.
In the 40K timeline, Slaanesh was the last of the Chaos gods to be formed from the unending depravity of the Eldar. The other three gods represent rage, disease and scheming, with Chaos Undivided generally bringing madness. Now consider the Godhand: Slan is Slaanesh, Conrad is Nurgle, Void is Tzeentch, and Ubik and Femto are Undivided. The only god missing is Khorne, the god of blood, who will be brought into being when so much blood is spilled, when the emotion of rage so dominates the planet that a god is birthed from it. Thus Zodd will become the new Godhand, and Guts will be his greatest servant, just as Khorne elevated Genghis Khan to Daemon Prince.
 * Seeing as the Godhand were all once mortals (?), it seems more likely that they're a group of daemon princes rather than the Chaos Gods themselves.

Guts is a distant relative of Conan the Barbarian
This is justified on accounts that both are sword-wielding, muscular badasses that kind of rampage across their respective Low Fantasy worlds, doing mighty deeds.

Guts is an alternate universe version of Auron
Let's go through the checklist, shall we? Now we know why they're kept in separate universes, the sheer amount of awesome they radiate would cause said universe to explode otherwise.
 * BFS? Check.
 * Badass? Check.
 * Only one functional eye? Check.
 * One arm held funny? Check.
 * Skunk Stripe? Check.
 * Had a bright future ahead of them before being screwed over by higher-ups? Check.
 * Know of the true evil that goes on behind the facade? Check. (Griffith/Yunalesca)
 * End up accompanying/being accompanied by a whiny kid who can barely fight? Check.

Georg Prime is an alternate universe version of Guts.
Now, Georg may use a katana and fights like a Samurai, while Guts is a mercenary who uses the mother of all BFSs, but most everything else fits. Both are Lightning Bruiser badasses capable of kicking all kinds of @#!*%. Both live in worlds controlled by some transcendental entities that manipulate the flow of causality (the  and the 27 True Runes). And @#!*%, both bear a striking resemblance to each other. And while we're at it, Georg tends to wear an eyepatch over his right eye, despite it still being fully functional. Perhaps this could be telling: either Guts has been fooling everyone all this time and his own right eye is still good, or Georg seems to share some kind of connection (or possibly memories) to his Midland counterpart and acts accordingly. Perhaps Suikoden does not take place in an alternate universe, but in the exact same universe as Berserk, in the distant future, with Georg being a reincarnation of Guts!

Guts is Batman.
[[media:gutsbatman.jpg|Seriously]].
 * Actually, it was Femto who was designed with Batman as inspiration.
 * Femto is the camp 60s Batman and Guts is one of those alternate Batmans who think killing is cool, like Azrael.
 * Didn't quite get it at first, but when you think about it: both had incredibly traumatic childhoods (though Batman's was mostly just one crucial event, whereas Guts' was pretty awful in general), despite the incredibly awful experiences they both go through that would have broken an ordinary man, they never give up and continue to fight to the bitter end, both start off working alone but gradually gain a group of True Companions who they love, but keep their distance from due to their traumatic pasts (in Guts' case this happens twice), and at an earlier point in Berserk's story, Guts was essentially a Byronic Hero, which Batman also is quite often. Batman also wore a cursed suit of armor at one point.
 * What did Batman's curse armor look like

The anime is the result of a tabletop RPG gone wrong.
It all began when a player Min-Maxed their way to your ultimate killing machine, and since it was technically allowed the DM declared they had to roleplay through the part where Guts got so @#!*% powerful. Griffith is the DM's character, hence why he gets so much screentime; the players became increasingly problematic for the DM and refused to follow the plot he had about this 'war of Midland' thing. So just when they had rescured Griffith and were looking forward to RP'ing in the present, the DM created the 'Eclipse' scenario to deter them from continuing. Totally @#!*% off at the GM, the players leave the game, hence why the anime stops just after the Eclipse. The manga, of course, is the Fanfic the DM wrote after the game broke up, continuing his idea of how the game should have gone.
 * Gone wrong? Unfinished due to a really complicated setting and a lack of patience to continue and overwhelm Guts' presence is something, but wrong is when you have so many problems that you give up the whole game facepalming and crying, almost screaming to your lungs, like you have just seen the worst filler episode of Naruto, ever. They probably just didn't understand what was going on at the time, not following Kentaro Miura's flow because they just weren't patient and inspired enough.
 * The first half of this theory is correct. Regarding the post-Eclipse portion of the story, though, rather than a fanfic it's the GM's new gaming group, plus the players of Guts and Casca (and Puck, unless he's supposed to be a GMNPC :P ), who stuck it out through the rougher portion of the storyline. New players' characters - Serpico, Farnese, Schierke, and Isidro - were introduced as they joined the gaming group, eventually forming a new party. If any portion of this a fanfic, it's the alternate perspective look at the new Band of the Hawk, written by the GM on his off time while the party heads for Elfheim, as background information for later when the story gets back to Midland.
 * By this theory, Isidro is a The Loonie player who took a ton of Flaws (Young, Short, etc.) without exchanging them for very good Feats, thus resulting in a goofy "kid warrior" character who survives on luck (which was probably one of the only useful Feats he took) and Hilarity Ensues / Rule of Funny for the GM and the rest of the players.
 * Well, partially, the group got tired of low fantasy so they had the GM kill off most of the players so they can roll new ones. Gutz was the only experienced player so all the other original PCs sucked. Now they're min-maxing more, but they still aren't perfect with it so Gutz still tends to take center stage.
 * I would have thought Sylphie casting telepathic bond every battle would have given it away, honestly.

Skull Knight is Emperor Gaiseric.
........Slan calls him "Your Majesty", after all. Ok, so this one is not all that wild.
 * I wouldn't be completely surprised if Gaiseric was actually Void, given the guy's status as a leader of men in life (a lot like Griffith) and that skull motif which Void also shares. Which means Skull Knight would probably be one of the Emperor's most loyal knights, who was betrayed much like Guts was and now has Void (and the Godhand in general) as an enemy.
 * If this is any indication, the Skull Knight is indeed Gaiseric and Void is the "wise man" imprisoned in the tower with a Crimson Behelit, and you all know what calling down the angels means.

King Gaiseric. is a Red Herring
Unless this is a mistranslation, The Skull Knight has been around for several thousands of years, while King Gaisaric rose to power approximately 1,000 years ago, meaning the two can't be one in the same. As such, The Skull Knight might have had a relationship with King Gaisaric similar to the one he has with Guts, or King Gaisaric went on to become Void.
 * It is a mistranslation. Zodd really says that the Skull Knight has been "our foe for a millenium."

The Dragonslayer will get to live up to its name.
With recent developments such as the return of supernatural creatures to the world, such as unicorns, Guts may very well have a chance to kill a dragon.
 * Sooo.... Chekhov's Gun? (See discussion page)

Guts will get a Harem End as the universe pays him back for being a badass.
Caska will regain her memory but also understand from Farnese taking care of her and talking to her that she is in love with Guts and offers to share with her. The three adopt Jill and then meet up with Luca, depending on Schierke's relationship with Isidro she may end up being Guts' lover when she becomes an adult.

Then they all go to Elf Land, set up a community while letting a defeated Griffith who has been depowered and knocked off his pedestal to rule the crap sack world.
 * While we're at it, Slan makes a Heel Face Turn, and joins in. Erica grows up and gets the hots for Guts as well. And since Guts is so badass that Even the Guys Want Him, so does Isidro. And Roderic. And Serpico. And Griffith ultimately becomes his @#!*% (and becomes happier that way). Everyone lives happily ever after...especially Guts!
 * And now by the looks of things, he's about to have caught the interest of a few thousand Merrows!
 * I always figured he would use the behelit, under the Berserker Armour's influence, sacrifice Caska, kill Griffith, and live happily ever after with Schierke.
 * Reread Volume 3. Can't sacrifice a sacrifice.
 * Plus, sacrificing a woman he's practically married to and then running off another person who was a little girl when they first met? Really, that's DEFINITELY not so many kinds of outrageously wrong and out of character. Plus, it's obvious Ishidro is the Guts to Schierke's Caska; trust me, she's far more likely to end up with him provided neither get killed.

Guts is a Norse God
Guts is secretly an Aesir. His immense battle prowess has left me to believe that he is, in fact, godlike. He should have died of blood loss a decade ago but he's still fighting. He's also Ashley Williams.
 * He's missing his eye, like Odin.
 * He's missing his arm, like Tyr.
 * His inner beast is a wolf, like Fenrir
 * Guts is a berserker
 * Okay, the last two aren't gods but you get my point.

Scheirke and Isildro will come to have a Toy Ship
This is definately what's been hinted at lately: they've been ship teased to the ground ever since they met, and they're probably the most healthy and wholesome relationship in the manga. (But I'm fully prepared for it all to get subverted somehow, considering how things go in this story.(

Isma will join the Guts clan
Not really a WILD guess, seems likely though.

Isma is Granmammare
She's quite an energetic, excitable, and hyperactive lass, so eager to learn about this whole new world she is immersed in, and is quite taken in with the very first person she comes across, while being a powerful entity closely associated with the sea and sealife. Quite like her daughter Ponyo will be a couple of millenium down the line. But furthermore, this means that the world of Ponyo is actually the future of the world of Berserk. That would certainly explain a few things, such as the lack of shock and surprise among the general populace at seeing a a fish with a humanoid head, and the universal nonchalance of a devastating tsunami. Because after the merging of the worlds in Berserk, things like that are now regarded as perfectly normal!

Isma is an avatar of the sea god
Come one guys, this is Berserk we're talking about. Theres no way this will end well.
 * Jossed. She is, but she's still shown fleeing the tentacles after that transformation.
 * And it might actually end well this time! Dun dun duuun!

There is no Idea of Good in the world...but there will be before the story is over
Deep breath, folks, this is going to be a long one: as those who have read chapter 83 (or have highlighted the spoilers on enough "Berserk" pages) know,

(And since none of the rest of this is going to make sense unless you know all that, you might as well highlight the spoilers.)

Continuing...Guts rejects all that. Destiny? Fate? Accepting that somehow everything that happened to you is for a high reason? To @#!*% with that! He's going to fight against whatever comes his way and never give in, no matter how impossible it might seem.

And it seems to be working. Guts keeps surviving cosmic disasters and battles with @#!*% that kill everyone else around him, all without any superpowers. And he's gaining followers who admire his attitude and want to emulate him.

Here's where the theory comes in. If the universe truly conforms itself to match the human subconscious, well, Guts has introduced a new idea into the mix. He's established the idea of rejecting fatalism, of not needing a God to explain away everything, of hope and determination in the face of absolute despair. Now that, the power of human minds on reality is probably going to increase. Guts will gain more and more followers as the series continues as people grow wise to Griffith's true nature starts to become apparent. As he continues to defeat the forces of evil when it is shouldn't even be remotely possible, more and more people will realize his is the better way. Finally, enough people will come to believe what Guts does that they will create a new force in the universe, an Idea of Good that will triumph over the Idea of Evil, since it will no longer have enough followers to maintain its existence.

Hence Berserk won't just end with Guts defeating Griffith and the God Hand, it will end with Guts, by the sheer force of his own awesome will creating a new god and ending the cycle of suffering that has plagued the world, and bringing it back to an acceptable, real-life level of suffering, sans demons and sacrifices and the religion of evil that has kept everything so awful.

At least, that's how this troper would write it.

Zodd will perform a Heel Face Turn at some point
Think about it. He's a Blood Knight whose favorite enemies are the Skull Knight and Guts. Enemy Mine much? Also, he already fought together with Guts once, though that was more a forced alliance. And finally, he's currently The Dragon to Griffith. Now think about who was Griffith's last dragon and what happened to him. Yeah, that's Guts. It may very well happen that Griffith will ditch Zodd or his entire demon servants at some point.
 * By saying they clash with the whole Falcon of Light image, they must be made to disappear, popular imagery will likely have written them out anyways. This could work.

Griffith will perform a Heel Face Turn.
Basically, a two part Heel Face Revolving Door. The Idea of Evil and having an unbreakable destiny is all but appealing. Knowing that what Guts is doing is crazy but right, combined with a wanting of friendship, he will betray the Godhand.
 * No. Griffith is so beyond his Moral Event Horizon that his redemption would require him to kill himself so many times over, the universe would most likely end before he atones for all his sins.

The process of founding the Idea of Good.
First, someone will found the Church of Pure Badass, with Guts being considered the Patron Saint of that church. This is because he's one of the only people to survive the ascention of a new Godhand member. You can't tell me that isn't Badass. From there, because he's fighting the Godhand, being a Badass would be associated with Good. From there, the Idea of Good takes hold.

Guts will be killed, at the very end, by Theresia.
Because wouldn't that be a twist/ChekhovsGun?

Silat will join Guts
Silat will undergo similar character development as Farneze and will sooner or later join Guts' team. C'mon, not all Kushans have to be evil.
 * It is bound to happen. Silat has openly questioned Griffith's legitimacy as a Messiah and despises the blind following of a deity for the sale of an uncertain greater good. He has a bone to pick with Guts for both the defeats he suffered at his hands but if he has been kept around and not Put On a Bus like Rickert or Luca, it means he will have a role to play sooner or later. And since he doesn't seem to happy with Griffith, the logical choice is joining Guts and his True Companions.

Guts is actually slowly destroying the idea of Evil
Guts is functionally constantly kicking the idea of fate in the teeth. Each time he would seem to be about to die he manages to get away from it, he also doesn't have any kind of reverence for the supernatural, instead seeing the world as kind of a 'it is what it is' kind of thing. Griffith became what he was by embracing a destiny and breaking when it didn't perfectly match what he saw. Guts just keeps struggling, that tears at fate, at the rules and principles the Idea of Evil maintains and lives off of. Given enough time he might be able to destroy the idea of evil, making people see that prophecy is just assumed goals and that sometimes things go wrong for no reason. The human subconscious changes and the idea of evil grows weaker, it NEEDS those of the Godhand and the various demons to maintain the suffering and torment, and they need it to maintain their power.

Berserk is a Medieval version of the Deadlands Universe
Encompassing idea of evil empowering servants of darkness, fear and suffering feeding them and making them stronger. And Griffith might be the equivalent to Stone in this version. Unfortunately the forces of evil have made a lot of headway, however normal mortals can still get pissed off and fight back.

The Whole Thing Started With Void Entering The God Hand
Void was the first God Hand, but before him there were no Behelits nor Apostles. The Idea of Evil still existed in the Abyss but it didn't have as great an effect on causality as it does now. As human, Void was an important figure in the Gaiseric Empire. He was a magic user who was attempting to control fate. He was going to try to safely enter the Abyss, something no other magic user could do, believing that the power to control reality resided there. And he did this during an eclipse because the immense power the collective unconscious gave such an event. Instead he found the Idea of Evil which also desired to control reality because that's what all humans want on some level. He became the first God Hand and created the Behelits to control the flow of causality using the near omniscience possessed by the Idea.
 * During the rescue of Griffith from the tower at the end of the Golden Age, it's mentioned that there's a legend about Gaiseric's fall being due to an old man praying to four angels. If this is taken as literal, it means that there were already four God Hands at the time of that eclipse ceremony. If that's true, it suggests that the God Hand members come and go and perhaps can be killed, but it also means that it has existed for longer than a thousand years with no end in sight. If that's NOT true, then it means, yes, Void was the first God Hand... and Femto will be the last. Not really less ominous.

Charlotte's going to find out about what Griffith did to the Hawks.
If she doesn't reject him, it would probably qualify as a Moral Event Horizon. If she does, it could be the first major dent in Griffith's plans that will eventually lead to his downfall.

Berserk takes place in Creation.
All the Exalted besides the Infernals have been corrupted, imprisoned or killed off. The Ebon Dragon Exalted Griffith and had him usurp the Light motif because that's how the Ebon Dragon rolls and then arranged for Isidoros to Exalt Guts because he needs someone to screw Griffith over later.

Guts will Screw Destiny disabling Godhand in some way
We all know there is a Behelit around Guts. Assuming it is really meant for Guts, he will refuse to use it when destiny said he would. In other words, Guts will perform a Screw Destiny maneuver that no one would see coming, shattering the Godhand's ability to predict/influence world in a major way. Combines nicely - WMG: There is no Idea of Good in the world...but there will be before the story is over.

Guts and Casca will die to make the Idea of Good
In the end I think Guts will be given a choice: fight Griffith or go join Casca in her demise. If a man so barraged and filled with hate and rage can forfeit it for his love, it would be powerful enough to give birth to an Idea of Good or Love.

Void was the first (and only) Godhand to undergo the Incarnation Ceremony before Femto
The Eclipse goes down once every 216 years in the Berserk universe, and each Eclipse marks the birth of a Godhand. There are five members of the Godhand at the time of this writing, meaning it's been 1080 years between the birth of Void and the birth of Femto. Since Femto went through the Incarnation Ceremony, which happens only once every 1,000 years, to become Griffith again two years after the Eclipse, then it's only logical for Void to have done the same thing roughly 82 years after the first Eclipse went down. Which raises some rather interesting questions concerning Void's identity before the first Eclipse, and also about how the Skull Knight became what he is today. Did the Berserker Armor convey a kind of immortality to the Skull Knight, or is there something more sinister behind it all?

The child that Casca found on the beach is not Casca and Gut's child.
For all we know, their child is now the newly reincarnated Griffith, who doesn't even know (consciously) that the bodily vessel he has taken is what it is. That leaves the creepy child to be....the Hanafubuku King/Lord of the elves. Notice how in chapter 316 that the child glows in the same way as Puck and Evarella, expect larger and more organized. It would also explain how he is so magically powerful.
 * Why would the Lord of elves need to protect Caska so badly?! And why wouldn't Puck or Evarella recognize him? Also he (the child) has no wings.

And in relation to Griffith's body being made of Casca and Gut's child...

Griffith's new body will prevent him from directly hurting Guts or Casca at a critical moment.
Karma bites back, and Griffith will find that he while he has removed the effect that Guts has on swaying him away from his goal, he now can't prevent him from dislodging his plans by killing him directly (thus committing patricide in the process)...
 * Or at least he will be swayed by Caska instead of Guts. Note, we already seen that he reflexively shielded Caska from a debris once.
 * On the flip side, this could pose a problem if Guts ever got the chance to take a stab at Griffith, since Griffith is using the body of Guts and Casca's child... Killing Griffith would mean killing his own son. I'd like to think that Guts isn't so implacable that he'd become a Gambino.

The mysterious child is the soul of the Caska and Guts' child.
As an alternative to the theory above, when their child's body was used as Griffith's vehicle for rebirth, its soul was not, and is now wandering the earth trying to protect its parents the same way it did when it was still in the flesh. It can manifest physically only on specific occasions, probably related to cycles of the moon or other natural phenomenon.

Berserk was partially inspired by Power Rangers.
Come on guys, the animal motifs? It's obvious Miura drew some of his inspiration from at least an episode or two of The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. The Red (Angry) Ranger gets pissed that The White (Chosen One) Ranger stole his lady (The Pink Ranger). But back to the animal motifs. It's an interesting and refreshing spin on the idea. The various armors of the Berserk universe would be so much more bland if not for the prominent animalistic features they sport. As for the apostles, they would fit perfectly in with the monsters Zedd and Rita are always creating for The Rangers to fight. Though sinister and horrifying, their design formula is actually quite simple: add face where face should not be, mix with animal parts, then make it all turn out wrong. Though, in the case of the New Band of the Hawk, make it all go pretty alright. Also, The White Ranger was reincarnated very much like how Griffith was. However, instead of being initially evil and becoming good, Griffith was the opposite.
 * I always thought of Locus' Apostle form as looking like a Power Ranger helmet...

Guts, Griffith, and The Skull Knight form The Holy Trinity of The Father, The Son and The Holy Ghost, respectively.
From the get go, Berserk established its style by drawing elements from high renaissance and protestant reformation art as well as The Bible. Griffith is obviously a deconstruction of the messiah archetype and follows nicely with Jesus's story of being the savior during a time of war and need. The only difference is that Berserk puts a spin things by making Jesus betray Judas in an actualized Abraham Issac Scenario.

Kentaro Miura Plays World of Warcraft.
Guts, Zodd, and The Skull Knight represent the three talent specializations available to the warrior class in Blizzard's vastly popular mmorpg. To explain for those unfamiliar with the game: Guts would be an arms warrior. He is incredibly strong and can move at lightning speeds. Warriors have a spell called charge that grants the same effect. Zodd is clearly a fury warrior. They are referred to as barbarians in WoW lore and Zodd fits the M.O. needless to say. He frequently dual wields and dresses in a loin cloth. Protection warriors are tanks and very survivable. The Skull Knight fights with sword and board, nothing flashy, but devastating by implementation. This Troper would also surmise that Griffith is/was a paladin turned wrong. The only difference is that in the Berserk universe, you can sacrifice your party for a wicked ass buff, as Griffith did.
 * Rrrright.. yup, he stolen everything from World of Warcraft, he did, over a decade ago before anyone even THOUGHT of WoW! Kentaro Miura is really a time traveller!
 * Not saying he stole anything. Just speculating that he might play. World of Warcraft got most of its class designs from Dungeons and Dragons, a table top rpg which existed long before Berserk and shares many similar qualities.
 * 1). Berserk began before the War Craft franchise even came into being. 2). World of Warcraft did not invent any of these combat styles. 3). Neither did Dungeons and Dragons.

Guts and Casca's child was reincarnated
In recent chapters a black haired kid has appeared on a full moon. This troper believes it is Guts and Casca's err.. son? The reason is that Griffith may not have been reincarnated because he still has the Femto form and it was Gutts' and Casca's child that was brought back instead.


 * We know that being in between the spiritual plane and the physical one means that your spirit can influence your physical self and improve your abilities (see Shierke's speculation about the source of Gut's strength when they're fighting the Trolls near the church), this will be massively amplified by

The Skull knight is screwed.
Now that  what do you think the odds are that they'll immediately eliminate the guy who has been a thorn in their side for thousands of years?

The Child is the true hawk of light.
It fits perfectly with Miura's contrasting origins and destiny approach toward the characters. Griffith was in a good position to become king with his Arthurian myth behind him and everything, however, he ultimately fell. The child's birth was literally tainted by evil, however, his actions thus far have been in service of good. Sometime after Griffith brings about an Age of Darkness, Guts will exact his revenge (most likely dying in the process) and the Child will appear as the true savior of Midland.

The Skull Knight ate his elf companion.
All the foreshadowing Miura has done points to the behelit being Puck's. If Gut's elf companion is destined to betray him, then it would mean the Skull Knight's betrayed him as well (What with the cycle of karma and all). Puck mentions that the Skull knight smells like an elf sometime around volume 17-18. If elf dust can miraculously heal wounds, then perhaps consuming one was how the Skull Knight gained his immortality.

Guts will have to cure Casca in the end, not the king of Elfheim.
It has been speculated that the reason why Schierke can't just go into Casca's mind and use magic to cure her mental state is because she's that way due to a psychological reason, not a magical one. Skull Knight also said at one point that being cured might not be what Casca wants. It could be that the real Casca has entombed herself in her psyche so she won't have to face Guts or the world after her rape, and she just doesn't want to come out. Since the whole world of Elfheim is based around magic, I doubt that their king could do anything more than to make a passage into Casca's mind so that Guts can get through to her, since he and Casca have the strongest bond with each other (even if Casca in her current state detests Guts) and that bond could have something to do with coaxing the real Casca out of her child-like shell.

Casca will be the one to kill Griffith.
Though highly improbable, there is a sense of personal rape revenge in the world of Berserk, especially among the main characters, such as when Guts killed Donovan after he sodomized him, Griffith killed that noble on the battlefield years after he whored himself out to him, and when Casca had to stab that noble who wanted to make her his sex slave. (Of course this would be a giant slap in the face to Guts and his whole pursuit of revenge on Griffith if Casca ends up being the one who offs him....)

The Child is the antithesis of the Beast.
Yet another alternative theory of the appearance of the mysterious black-haired child is that it's purpose is to be the direct opposite of the Beast: while the hound-like creature is an entity that dwells in Guts' mind and represents the dark side of his heart, the child is the embodiment of everything good in Guts' heart. The force is so strong that it takes on a physical form in the image of the child that was meant to be Guts and Casca's son, which in itself represented the love that the two shared and how Casca is the only person who keeps Guts from succumbing to the Beast's influence.

Guts' biological mother was executed with her unborn child on purpose.
Since the world of Berserk is filled with unnecessary evil and torment, I wouldn't be surprised that the innocent unborn child of a convicted woman would not be spared from execution of the mother. However, what if there was some prophecy going around that would involve the future Guts and some people didn't like it very much (whether they considered themselves "good" and wanted to prevent said evil (Guts) from rising, or they considered themselves evil and wanted to prevent said (semi) good from rising), so they decided to go all Sarah Connor on Guts' mama and killed her while Guts was still in the womb. Unbeknown to them, the child lived....
 * And to add, this can go along with the "Guts isn't entirely human" theory.

The elve's are the opposite to the behelits
If the behelits made Apostles, the elves made.........prophets?...angels?...demons? whatever, the point is that they made a...good version of the apostles, The Skull Knight is from this group, as proof of it, Puck say that he smell like and elf...okay, the smell of something can't be in something for centuries. Less if that something travels around the world slaughtering apostles. Also, even if it is confirmed not being human, it was also hinted that he isn't an apostle neither. when he and guts encounters in volume 17-18, when Guts feels him, he, confidently, say that it wasn't and enemy...just an old friend, that means that whenever he feels the Skull Knight, he feels something completely different from the apostles.

Flora was the Schierke to the Skull Knight's Guts
As in, she was a True Companion and helped him suppress his inner beast.

The Skull Knight said they were both friends at one point, Flora always looked at his ghastly armor in a tender manner, we don't know how old Flora really is so she could have even been a child at the time the Skull Knight wore it (since he's been around for a long, long time), and the Skull Knight said Guts was going down the same path he's walked for a while. It's possible he isn't the only one.

Farnese will be the Berserk equivalent of a Red Mage
You know how in Final Fantasy, a red mage is practically a jack-of-all-trades but never really excels in magic or melee fighting? Well, being the mere figure head of a group of "knights" that have little to no real skill in combat, Farnese could become an archetype later. She's currently learning magic under Schierke, but even Schierke said that the best time to learn magic is when you're young, so Farnese will probably never become a grandmaster witch. Now, suppose that Casca gets better and continues to be the badass action girl that she once was, giving the True Companions one more fighter, but leaving Farnese kinda, there. Guts didn't recruit Farnese because she was some great fighter, but so that she could take care of Casca in her mental state. One of Farnese's purposes to learning magic was so she could better protect Casca, but when the time comes that Casca doesn't need to be protected that much, then Farnese will be feeling all the more useless - until Casca repays Farnese for taking caring of her by teaching her the way of the sword. She most likely will not be as good as Casca, but she'll have enough combined knowledge in magic and melee fighting to not be a faux action girl.

Femto did what he did to Casca to "reclaim her"
While we are yet to hear Griffith's official reason for doing so, it is best assumed that he, in Femto form, raped Casca in order spite Guts. This little troper, after coming across a useful essay here, thought about the possibility that Griffith may have raped Casca in order to "reclaim her", which can also go under the "Spite Guts" category but on a different level. Just thinking about how Griffith acted toward Guts with the whole, "you belong to me now" deal and how he very clearly did not like it when his "property" defied him, he might have thought this way about Casca as well, even though Griffith had no romantic implications toward her and had no physical relationship with her. After seeing that she couldn't be his sword or his lover, Casca finally turns her attentions toward Guts... And it was noted that seeing Guts and Casca in love was what finally triggered Griffith to activate his Behelit. Griffith isn't dumb: he knows what loving couples do in their spare time. So not only has Guts surpassed him in skill and has practically taken his place among the Band of the Hawk, but he also took Casca away emotionally, and what's worse - he defiled his property. It didn't really matter if he actually had any romantic feelings toward Casca or not. Griffith cannot have this. So when the Eclipse goes down, Griffith, now Femto, decides to show Guts that Casca, her body and being, belonged to him and only him, showing it in the cruelest, most hideous sort of way.

This troper thought of this because she can just picture what Griffith would say if Guts ever came around to asking, "why Casca? Why to her?": Griffith simply replying, "I was simply taking back what was mine" like the Manipulative Bastard he is.

Gaiseric's bloodline has supernatural properties protecting the world from the God Hand
And Griffith's union with Charlotte would break it.

Something about Guts
It has been a matter of some discussion by fans of the series whether or not Guts is entirely human. In addition to his feats of superhuman speed, strength, and resolve, he is the only human character in the series shown to have pronounced canine teeth (fangs) and slightly pointed ears. As Guts is an orphan, born of a hanged corpse on a battle field, his true paternal lineage is currently unrevealed.
 * This could be plausible, though the only exception would be that there have been other (seemingly) human characters that have pointed ears (Griffith, Gambino, Sys). But Guts has teeth, so there's still that part. Miura himself seems to have stopped designing characters with pointed ears altogether.
 * That, or I thought that Guts' pointy ears might have been a trait among a certain group of people in a particular region in Midland (I noticed that a lot of the people in Gambino's mercenary band had pointy ears). So, perhaps there is an entire ethnicity in which their apical ancestor was an apostle or some supernatural being and Guts belong to this group.

If Guts represents The Berserker, then Casca represents the Valkyrie.
Just tracing back to the good ol' Scandinavian mythology motif throughout Berserk, could it be possible that Casca's character and imagery was loosely based off of the Valkyries? I'm just speaking in the context that Valkyries led the way to worthy warriors, but in this case, not necessarily to the afterlife after they chose which warriors would die. Casca, who was the series' only genuine Action Girl, led her squad of warriors into battle, some of which would have obviously died honorable deaths. In her present state, she doesn't do any fighting.... but she continues to lead Guts's way as his Morality Chain. Who knows? In the future, Casca's role might very well be to lead Guts into some battle that will lead to his death - which would lead to the ultimate battle in the next plane (which goes accordingly to Norse Mythology). Heck - if she ever gets better and starts fighting again, the Valkyrie could become Casca's entire motif. Just sayin'.

Eventually there will be a short story-arc ending on Everybody Lives.
I think such a story-arc will involve Guts protecting some group of innocents from an Apostle, possibly because Casca showed a liking for them. Not only will he succeed, but he will succeed completely. Not a single one of them will come to any harm (although, how long-lasting their safety would be would be questionable). I base this on two things: 1) There is no series for which such a thing would be more emotionally impactful. Think about it. Even with all the evil in the universe, even with Guts being who he is, even if Destiny Says So, SOMETIMES the good guys just win, SOMETIMES the bad guys just lose, SOMETIMES there isn't a price to pay, SOMETIMES even someone as ruthless as Guts can be the White Knight riding in on his noble steed to save the, day, if only for a little while. and 2) I think such a Hope Spot might aid in Casca's recovery, if she could see that maybe there is some good left in this world.
 * We already kinda' had something like that with the Enoch chapter. Guts and company not only managed to defend the village from the Trolls (without any innocent loss of life), but they were able to rescue women and children who had been dragged off the Qliphoth. And the place's subsequent collapse ensured it would no longer be a problem (until a certain big event transpired in the manga, anyway). And they reintroduced pagan concepts and customs to the Holy See worshippers there. AND the whole adventure cemented the group as True Companions in Guts' mind. Hasn't done anything directly for Casca, but the new dynamics the group built up certainly made the journey for the cure much easier.

At the very end of the series, a grown-up Theresia will show up and kill Guts.
You have to admit, it would be fitting.
 * Definitely. Guts dismissed her threats as meaningless, so that's exactly why she will succeed in killing Guts. Bonus points if Theresia looks exactly like her dead mother and is now a countess. And for extra tragedy just when Guts finally won too. He will no longer be anything like the bastard who gave Theresia her reason to seek revenge.

Guts will kill Femto, lose his brand of sacrifice, and then be re-sacrificed by Theresia.
A variation on the above, hear me out. Now, I know your initial reaction is "You can't sacrifice someone you hate!" However, Theresia doesn't really have anyone she loves left who she could sacrifice to become an Apostle. So instead, she doesn't really sacrifice a person, she sacrifices her right to vengeance. She wants to PERSONALLY kill Guts, but in exchange for the power of an Apostle, she agrees to let the Godhand have him. Here We Go Again.

Casca will become an Apostle Spawn.
Well, think about (even if you don't want to). Casca's baby was completely deformed because it came in contact with Femto's... essence. They made bodily contact. And Casca of course had forceful bodily contact when he raped her (which is how her baby got tainted in the first place). Because the baby was developing as a normal human, but got affected by a supernatural entity, it was in between two planes of reality. We could say that the Child was practically an Apostle Spawn. But fully developed humans can also became Apostle Spawns, as we know from experience. Even though sperm can only survive in the female reproductive system for a limited amount of time, it probably doesn't apply to super evil demon sperm, so for all we know, Femto's cellular material can be having some latent effect on Casca as a whole - but it's only being held back because Casca's insane at the moment. So curing Casca could mean awakening her very own Super-Powered Evil Side (if said side will be, in fact, truly evil).

A less drastic theory would be that as a result of being in direct bodily contact with Casca, it's the direct cause of Casca's insanity.

But getting back with the Came Back Wrong theory, this outcome will screw Guts up royally - nay - imperially. If Casca is cured but she awakens as an Apostle Spawn, this leaves Guts with two choices: to kill the woman he loves just to uphold his revenge against all Apostles, or to spare her, even if she may turn out evil and may go about her own thing. Neither choice will make the situation better.

On a more optimistic level, since not all Apostles are evil (or at least, not down right evil), Casca could be the True Companions' trump card in defeating enemies and can thus get upgraded to Badass Abnormal, since I've heard other fans talk about how Casca will be pretty much defenseless against the hordes of monsters roaming the earth, even with her swordsmanship.


 * Nice and well thought out. But not possible. Casca is just like Guts: out of the stream of Causality because she's a sacrifice. By your reasoning, Guts would also be some sort of an Apostle Spawn, simply due to his own Super-Powered Evil Side. I agree that there are high chances for Casca to Come Back Wrong, but I don't think she will this way. If we're going to fear for anything, Puck has much more potential to turn evil than Casca. Why? The Beherit he so dearly holds onto.

Charlotte finding out of just being a Meal Ticket to Griffith
What do you think will happend if Charlotte finds out that she is just a meal ticket to Griffith
 * Since Griffith never really had any affection for her and only needed her for that reason, I'm guessing, "You Have Outlived Your Usefulness."
 * Not unlikely, even pre-eclipse Griffith didn't seem to actualy like her. After having crazy compulsive sex with her, he's not only crying but reacting the same way he did after uh, doing things with that old baron in exchange for war funds, he's even scratching the same place he did after that happened!
 * Or alternatively, you know how apostles can sacrifice loved ones to regenerate themselves as implied by The Count? It's possible that Griffith is saving Charlotte for that purpose, and it's possible he can screw with the rules a little since he's one of the Godhand.
 * That - is actually kinda scary.

Casca is totally going to have another Badass Damsel moment in these next few chapter.
The last few panels of the most recent chapter (as of 6/23/11) shows the pirates boarding the Seahorse and engaging the True Companions, with Farnese having to defend not only Casca and the Child, but Schierke's physical body. Roderick's being engaged, Isidro's being in engaged, Magnifico is cowering in some corner, and Serpico is fighting too. Farnese is probably going to get over-powered, none of the other members will be able to help her, and then we get back to the usual Berserk routine: the pirates want to have their way with Casca, and begin to close in on she and the Child (and as a bonus, they want Farnese and Schierke's body too). Enter Casca truly going Mama Bear on their asses in order to protect the Child, leaving everyone else awestruck and pretty freaked out over what had just transpired.

The First God Hand Member?
Who do you think is the first member of The God Hand?
 * I'd say Femto was the first and last (if you add up the years, 1000 years ago would have been the 5th before Griffith, and I think that Femto incarnated into Emperor Gaiseric)
 * Pretty sure it's Void, considering he's the oldest member of the Godhand

Puck is going to activate the Behelit...
... But he's NOT going to make the deal or the turn, thus earning the true Power of Friendship!

Griffith raped Casca to spite Guts.
Ok, I took this for granted for a long time, but someone above mentioned the possibility that he saw himself as "reclaiming" her, so I figured I'd throw in my personal theory. I don't recall Griffith ever showing a strong emotion towards Casca. Yeah, he had that vision of her, but that was just because he knew she'd be the one to take care of him, not because he gave a shit about her. However, its painfully clear that he was deeply in love with Guts, and as the manga continues this becomes even more evident. So, he raped Casca just to get back at the man he loved for leaving him, and choosing her over him.
 * I think he personally did it to spite them both. He was pretty Yandere for them both at that point in time, and his Despair Event Horizon came from his learning that both of them were in a relationship together. He had grown to hate Guts during his year of torture, but he still believed that Casca had his back until that revelation, and he even had thoughts about settling down with her as shown in that little fantasy sequence before the Behelit returned to him. Plus there's the theory that Griffith, with his newfound powers as Femto, gleaned the event of Guts' rape at the hands of Donovan so long ago from either him or Casca, the only one he told about the incident, and decided to exploit this little weak point in the cruelest and most horrible way possible.

The legacy of the Band of the Hawk will turn into a Vicious Cycle.
Well, it already happened once: Griffith threw his first band away and made an entirely new one, each with an exact counterpart to the original lead members. Since Griffith is pretty much immortal, and stronger than his other Apostles so that he may dispatch them when he sees it necessary, while other members are going to age and die, we could see a new Band of the Hawk being created a hundred years from now, considering that Guts fails to kill Griffith. Alas, this could mean that a hundred years from now Guts's descendent(s) will have to lay witness to every new band's formation, and will continue this eternal struggle.

Guts is intended to be the sixth member of the Godhand.
Ok, this is based primarily on an image from "The Depths of Hellfire." We see the Godhand standing on a hand, with four on various fingers, and Femto on the palm...so, if the palm counts, then that means there must be a sixth member for the pointer finger. Now, based on what we know this sixth member should come about in a quarter-millenia, but that would make it superflous to the story. Furthermore, at least twice its been suggested that Guts could make a sacrifice himself (once by the beast, and once by Slan). It sounds like he's being pushed in that direction. Whether or not he'll succeed, we have yet to find out.

There's going to be an uprising in hell.
Tracing back to the discussion in the Fridge section, it seems that two-thirds of the Berserkerverse are going to hell, since it has been speculated that just being in contact with Apostles or demons will give you a first class ticket. And since there is going to be some obvious over-crowding issues down there from the diaspora that's going to happen what with the natural and supernatural worlds being merged... I don't think the tenants are going to be putting up with that b.s. anymore. No, there's going to be an uprising. They'll literally become The United Legion of Hell And who's going to be head of the union when it forms?

GUTS.

The Berserk storyline is going to play out as an epic Norse saga.
Guts already has many attributes of a Norse god, right? Well, he isn't a god, but that's okay, because he doesn't need to be one. Anyway, all of the events surrounding Griffith's merging of the supernatural world and the natural world and claiming his own kingdom is starting the Age Of Darkness - in other words, it will be Berserk's equivalent of Ragnarok. This mean that the world will go through some more detrimental deterioration, and during the final battle, the Godhand will meet its end, but at the cost of most of the world's population. In the aftermath, everything will be reborn: the Idea of Evil will become the Idea of Good (or at least, the Idea of Neutrality), and Guts and Casca will survive it all and repopulate the earth. Okay, so Miura could probably play out the Ragnarok canon to his taste, but it would be cool to see that in the future of the Berserkerverse, Guts' story will become legendary.

Sorry. I just like the whole Norse aspect of the series.

When influenced by the Beast, Guts is a counterpart of Femto.
After reading this post, I don't think the parallels between Guts' and Griffith's alter egos are meant to be a coincidence (although I don't entirely agree with everything that some posters have mentioned - particularly the viewpoints that talk about Guts' relationship with post-Eclipse Casca as just another power struggle between he and Griffith - the similarities are kinda creepy).

My own theory on this is that Guts truly doesn't see Casca as just some object of possession between he and Griffith and that he does want to see her well again... but the Beast does want Guts to believe that, as we've seen in volume 23. I think that while Griffith/Femto has similarities with Guts' Enemy Within - that's just it. Femto and the Beast have similarities, but that doesn't equate to Griffith/Femto and Guts himself having similarities. So, perhaps the Beast has an even more malevolent role to play in Guts' life. Maybe it doesn't just want Guts to kill Griffith: maybe the Beast wants Guts to actually become Griffith, or rather, a being very similar to Griffith. Hence all of the parallels between Griffith/Femto and Guts when he's being manipulated by the Beast. Maybe the hellhound has some future role to play with the Godhand??? It's pretty much a supernatural creature after all, so who knows?

The only way to beat the God Hand is trough the collective conciousness of humanity.
Berserk scholars know about the missing chapter with  The God Hand draws all it's power directly from that source too and they only have gotten more invincible when the world sunk away into hell. Humanity is helpless against it, because it is completely oblivious to the true nature of the universe. So if Guts wants to win against such a foe, he only has one possible way to do it: Inspiring the people to be more badass and rejecting fatalism. He already did that to several characters before, but it didn't have any effect yet because it was only on a small scale. If Guts where to do something that caused Griffith's pretty facade to fall off in a sufficiently epic way wile the intire world is watching, the God Hand might suddenly start to weaken. Not enough to render them powerless, but enough for Guts to finally fight on a more equal footing likely allowing him to finally strike a blow against Griffith/Femto. And when more people see that God-on-Earth Griffith is not only a loathsome devil in disguise but that he can bleed after all, the massive flood of hot blood will become unstoppable and gradually drain the powers of  away. And then you will see some payback like you never saw before...

The Skull Knight was originaly King Gaiseric who escaped an eclipse and Void was an old friend of his who bretrayed/rebelled against him.
When talking to Farnese and one of his torturer-servants in the tower of conviction, Mozgus mentions that the room he was using for praying is the very same room were King Gaiseric tortured a man for unknown reasons, and that man managed to bring Gaiseric's downfall by praying to god. Since Void and the Skull Knight are old rivals, this could mean that Void was that man and imply he had a red behelit at the time of the torture. The man used the behelit to call forth the God Hand and used Gaiseric and his kingdom as a sacrifice to become a God Hand himself, but Gaiseric managed to escape the eclipse like Guts and Casca. Later he would become immortal through unknown means and hunt the God Hand and the apostles for a millenia to the present day. In fact, escaping the eclipse could be the direct cause of his immortality, which would lead us to..

Whoever is branded as a sacrifice but escapes the eclipse becomes a type II immortal after some time
If the WMG above is true, this could mean that the ones branded by sacrifice are not only removed from the stream of causality but also become a type II immortal IE undying but killable. The reason Guts and Casca are rounded by apostles and evil spirits wherever they go is because a branded person exists in the border between life and death or "hazama" as described by Schierke, and she also questions herself if being in the hazama for a long time could have affected Guts and Casca in some deeper way, namely Guts going from very strong to absurdly mighty after the events of the eclipse. They would keep aging but remain killable through conventional means. Assuming the Skull Knight is has been branded as a sacrifice before, of course. This doesn't explain his horse, though.

Or the reason for his immortality could also be:

Prolonged use of the Berserker armor leads to the user's flesh being absorbed by the armor but renders the user into a type II immortal.
Its heavily implied that the Skull Knight was the previous user of the armor, and its mentioned that its last user wore it for such a long time that the armor absorbed his flesh and blood leaving only his bones. Seeing what the armor did to him, he asked flora to keep it sealed in her magic vault. Again, this doens't explain his horse.

At some point during the final battle, Guts will give up, only to be inspired back into action by...Magnifico.
Ok, this probably sounds crazy, but think about it: First off, Guts has had a great affect on everyone around him, he just really hasn't had time to influence Magnifico yet. Beyond that, Magnifico is now in a position to start learning how little everything he values really matters and, like his sister, to realize how weak he is. Furthermore, the screwing destiny is easy when you're somewhat like Guts...however, imagine how incredible it would be if someone like Magnifico pulled it off. Even knowing he couldn't win, even having some kind of potential escape hatch, when Guts goes down he runs forward to fight because, having seen what he has, he'd rather die than live in a world where his life is not his own. This would be the ultimate Screw Destiny: even the most pathetic among us can rebel against our destinies. Such a display of will might actually be a major blow to the Idea of Evil itself, who was now losing his grip not only on the destinies of heroes, but on the destinies of common people. Seeing this, Guts gets his second wind.

How Casca is going to get her scar.
During their love scene, when Casca is emotionally healing Guts of his childhood trauma, she says that she wants a scar from Guts, which more than likely signifies that she either wants to get a scar from protecting Guts, or that she wants a symbolic scar given to her personally by Guts. Even though this was back in volume 9, I always took this as a sign of Foreshadowing. So how is Casca going to get her scar on account of Guts? The best theory I've come up with is as followed:

So, Casca gets cured, and let us assume that everything turns out fine. Guts is as happy as can be - except the Beast still wants Guts to kill Casca, and perhaps it's the Beast's presence that will partially get in the way of Guts and Casca reaffirming their relationship (other than Casca having to come to terms with all that has happened to her), since he is still worried that he will succumb to its influence and turn on her. So Guts is still cautious when he is around Casca, which puts a road block in their relationship not only because Guts is going to such lengths to protect Casca, but because Casca herself might feel even more useless (and I don't mean that in the Chickification sort of way - HELL. NO.). Now cue in a dramatic turn of events. Everyone seems to like the "Elfheim is going to get destroyed" theory, so we'll go with that. Apostles are everywhere, the team is fighting amok, and Casca wants to participate in the action as well, but Guts adamantly tells Casca to stay out of it and that he'll protect her and blah blah Knight in Shining Armor-speech blah. Way to put a defunct Action Girl down. Amidst all of the carnage, Guts succumbs to the beast, and slaughters all of the enemies present. That's good and all, except now he's going to turn on his friends. Maybe he even strikes out against one of the team (probably Serpico), and Schierke can't get through to Guts in his subconscious. It's not a full moon, so the Child is not present. Crap. what's left for them to do?

Invoke the Power of Love.

Casca steps in. She sees Guts in this malevolent armor, clearly not himself; she is perhaps a bit frightened by him. But Casca steadily begins to approach Guts, perhaps with more courageous steps at confronting the entity that has been taking physical and emotional advantage of Guts for so long (insert the rest of the group yelling, "No Casca! Don't!"), and starts talking to him. It's basically going to be the standard "I know you're in there!" speech, with Casca recanting how good of a person Guts really is, and how much she loves him. She then takes the boldest step by embracing Guts in the berserker armor - leaving her totally open for him to bite her on the shoulder with that big-ass monstrous helmet. But she doesn't let go, despite the pain and the blood. The Beast, now closer to his goal than ever, tells Guts to finish her off, only all of the good emotions start to flood back to Guts' subconscious from hearing snippets of Casca's words and feeling her embrace (insert love montage here). Then, Guts is finally able to rid himself of the Beast once and for all, and comes back to his senses... Only to see Casca bloody and unconscious on the ground.

Don't worry. She'll get better. AND she'll have a lasting reminder in the form of a bite mark, something that Guts will not be too proud of, but something that will give Casca a new found meaning in her life as well as giving her a more heroic She's Back reintroduction as she and Guts take another step in their healing relationship.

And that's my theory, which hopefully encompasses the fact that Casca protected Guts (from himself) and that Guts gave the scar to her himself.

At the end of the series Godhand still won't be defeated
Guts wil only stop Griffith's plans and save the world, but Godhand will still be around. Guts and his team will start picking up orphans and train them to become Apostle hunters. Because if Guts is capable of beating so many Apostles, imagine what damage to Godhand's cause could do an army of badasses trained by him, Serpico, Schierke, Roderick and Farnese (and additionally maybe Skull Knight, Azan or Casca), with equipment created by Ricket.

Those with Pointy Ears are of demonic lineage.
Reiterating some factoids above, it's possible that people with pointy ears might not be entirely human, and might actually be part of an ethnicity/nation of people who had an apostle as an apical ancestor. They're kind of like the "elves" of the Zelda-verse: they have pointy ears because of some meaningful lineage, but other than that, they're pretty much normal humans. Because of their demonic lineage, they've become pariahs and have no national boundary of their own, so they must live off the borders of other states as mercenaries (so, they're basically a combination of the proud warrior race and proud merchant race). If they stay in one place for too long, they're subjected to ethnic cleansing, which might have been the unfortunate fate of our hero's mother. So, maybe reason why we've been seeing less characters with pointy ears is because the story simply is not taking place in their territory.

Let's look at Guts in particular for a moment. We've discussed both here and in the headscratcher section that it's arguable that Guts isn't really a normal human anymore because of the influence that being a part of the nexus has on him. In essence, we can all argue that Guts has now attained another level of badassery: Badass Abnormal. But it's not just because he's in between the natural and the supernatural realms, but by being exposed to this is re-exposing him to his apostle ancestors, giving him a power boost. So Guts is technically a self-hater if this is the case, but at the same time, what better person to hunt apostles than one who is part apostle himself?

Here's the kicker. The only other main person besides Guts who has pointy ears is Griffith (yeah he's not technically a human anymore). So that would mean that he and Guts are practically kin. Perhaps this partially explains their bond to one another... And a reason why Griffith was chosen by the crimson behelit. How creepy is that?

The Skull Knight IS the Petal Storm King.
Remember back when he came to "visit" Guts at the beginning of the Conviction Arc?

It was very brief, but Puck did mention that an Elf aura emanated from the Skull Knight. You know how Miura works, nothing in the manga is thrown just for the kicks of it. If Puck said something like this, it's Foreshadowing.

The Skull Knight has something to do with the elves.

Many believe he was the Emperor Gaiseric. Slan calls him "Majesty". He wears a crown of "bones" around his skull. Clearly, he used to be royalty before becoming an undead. Plus, he talks about the Petal Storm King, but not even Puck nor Evarella seemed to know about that king... There's something just not right here.

My belief is indeed that the Skull Knight IS the Petal Storm King and he's just acting as Guts' Cynical Mentor in order to test his mettle and to help him unleash his full potential, in order for him not to do the same mistakes he did back in the days. He might be an Obi-Wan to Guts in the end and will help him bringing Casca back.

However, the Skull Knight knows what Casca really wants and knows that this will cause Guts huge pain. I'm pretty sure he will tell him something around the lines of Be Careful What You Wish For, because maybe it's better for everyone if Casca remains in her state. The Skull Knight definitely knows more than what he lets on, so I'm pretty sure he has something to do with Elfhelm in one way or another.

The white entity that helps Gutts control the berserker armour is the child they met on the beach.
In the Falconia arc Gutts ends up fighting a sea God and almost gets taken over by his demon. However the child they found on the beach watches the sea god and we get multiple close ups of the child when Gutts is found safe. Considering Miura this is probably going to be realised when the child starts talking.

Gutts and Zodd are decedants of Emporer Gaiseric.
It would make sense in context. All three are Badass, Have considerable fighting skills and all have something to do with god hand (if Gaiseric is the Skull Knight).

Griffith discarded some of The Child's essence, which turns into The More Grown Up Child
Shortly after he was reborn with The Child's flesh, he visited Rickert and Guts to see if there's any reaction to them. While he initially felt nothing, he felt a reaction when Guts fought Zodd, and later protected Caska from a bunch of falling rocks. Seeing how he wishes to be 'free', he could have found a way to seperate those parts of the Child which still has feelings for his parents, keeping only those he needs.

Miura put a veiled Pro life aesop in Berserk
He makes some very valid points too. Just look at the corrupted child:


 * It's treated as a character, even tough it was only conceived a few days earlier and should only have been a pile of cells.
 * Guts wants to get rid of it as soon as it appears, but Casca stops him from doing it.
 * The Skull Knight also urges Guts to kill it. He is a very cynical guy.
 * Even tough it's evil, the child ultimately proves to be on the side of it's parents, not the Godhands.
 * If Guts had killed the child, Casca would have been burned at the stake without Guts knowing of it.
 * Now that it appears to have been purged of corruption, the child turned out to be very cute and infused with some superpowers that could prove helpfull against Griffith in the long run.
 * So Miura tells us that aborting an unwanted foetus denies it it's right to choose for itself what it wants to do with it's existence. And the boy does rather well, considering his origins.

Gambino wanted to kill Guts out of jealousy.
Not that Gambino didn't also hate Guts because he "supposedly" was the cause of Sys' death, but Gambino might have also have been jealous of young Guts due to the attention that Sys gave to Guts. Finding baby Guts spared her from insanity, so she must of put a lot more attention into him, aside from just taking care of him as a mother should. Even her last words were of Guts, not Gambino.

Griffith will try to make Gut's companions join him
He could attempt it with his new powers that basically makes everybody except Guts want to give him oral sex. But Guts will prevent it by finally telling everyone about his past and what he did.
 * Alternatively it will be Casca, who may regain her sense at that time, that will tell them everything.

Guts will be blinded in his other eye...
...and it will only make him EVEN MORE badass.

Akira Inugami is Guts if Berserk had taken place in a high school setting.
They do have a butt load in common:
 * Tall, Dark and Handsome AND snarky
 * Pointy Ears
 * Wolf motif
 * Doom Magnets
 * Stupid people mess with them all the time
 * Ripped
 * Arch nemeses have a hawk motifs (though, I hear that Haguro is also compared to a lion)
 * Said arch nemeses have an unhealthy relationship to them to the point where
 * Unfortunate enough to have to helplessly witness the
 * Both vow to protect them afterward.

Charlotte will be the ultimate Big Bad of Berserk.

 * Someone mentioned above that Griffith my sacrifice her, using his status as a member of the Godhand to bend the rules to allow the sacrifice (since she's not really a "loved one")...however, strictly speaking no rule bending would be required for HER TO SACRIFICE HIM!!!!! The trigger for this would likely be the realization that he never loved her. This realization would likely also turn her into a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds, trying to euthanize the entire universe so that no one else would ever have to feel a broken heart like hers.
 * Or euthanize it because, well, wouldn't you?

How Theresia is going to make her evil comeback.
Now that Theresia is considered another Ensemble Darkhorse, now we can discuss how exactly she is going to come back into the picture after all of this time. I think that she will come back... but not anytime soon, since there is honestly no telling at what point in time Berserk is going to come to an end (staying true the Icelandic saga tradition, Berserk can end when Guts is in his 70s or even with a possible descendant after his death... Who knows what Miura is planning?). I think it would be reasonable for Theresia to come back when she is in her late teens or early twenties. I hear a lot of fans saying that she's simply going to become an apostle herself, but that seems too easy and kind of overused now. Rather, I think things will go down like this:

Wandering the world without a home or parents, it's unfortunate to think that little Theresia might have fallen on desperate times: after losing her home and possibly being forced out of the castle town that her father reigned, she might have possibly became a prostitute, but I think there's an even stronger chance that she might have followed in her mother's footsteps and became involved with pagan worshipers (orgies and all). Only Theresia takes it up a notch by becoming an actual sorceress.

A dark one, of course. We haven't seen any legit wicked witches in Berserk yet.

Theresia becomes a dark witch, using her powers to sway men to her will, disposing of them along the way, and eventually climbs back up the social ladder through lust and deceit. Then, to gain even MORE power, she willingly becomes involved with an apostle, remembering how powerful her father was, perhaps even marrying one, and they produce offspring (that is to say if she re-enters the story at an even later age, like in her 30s or 40s).

And her magic, political power, husband, and children will all be her instruments of revenge against Guts.

Basically, I picture Theresia becoming this Morgan le Fey/Echidna/Elizabeth Bathory kind of woman, surely a deadly foe for Guts (I mention [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echidna_

On a lighter note, this would make Theresia the "bread-winner" in her family, as she is calling all of the shots, making her apostle husband the Henpecked Husband.

She'll still be scary as shit.

Griffith will sacrifice his new Band of the Hawk.
Given that he's acting as The Messiah, it certainly wouldn't do for people to go around claiming he used hideous evil monsters to do his work for him, as he similarly demonstrated on Gannon. Zodd will survive, and join Guts until the day of reckoning occurs in a singularity of Badassery.

Casca's life will get worse.
In the fridge section, somebody mentioned how the sheer magnitude of what has happened to Casca is pure unadulterated horror itself, and I don't think any of us are denying that. I at first disagreed that Miura could possibly think of anything worse that he could do to this women above making her be raped by the epitome of evil... but I think he can now. How so?

By forcing her to marry the epitome of all evil!

So along the storyline, Griffith does indeed dispose of Charlotte, since he had empty feelings for her to begin with. But he still needs "something." I know that half of the fanbase says that Griffith has no empathy for anything while the other half says that he and the rest of the Godhand have the most embodiment of human emotions... at this point, I just don't know what to think of Griffith's complex characterization. All in all, say that he still does have some feelings (be they of affection or of malice or both) toward both Guts and Casca. Guts just keeps getting stronger and stronger and has his own army of allies and can possibly out match Griffith, earning Guts more resentment from Griffith. That, and Casca is cured at this point and is at Guts' side again, which miffs Griffith even more (since you can interpret Griffith's deeds toward Guts and Casca during the eclipse as his own way of separating them as what he saw as punishment for their actions). So if violating Casca wasn't completely successful at driving Guts into a pit of despair, what else can he do?

How about using said unholy tryst as a form of marital rite and drag her off to hell to be with you for eternity?

I always found the Griffith-getting-Casca-killed-so-he-can-officially-take-her-to-hell-and-force-her-to-become-his-bride scenario plausible, since Griffith fantasized about Casca becoming his wife before he ever did with Charlotte (if he's ever done so with Charlotte). Of course, Guts probably isn't going to take this sitting down and he'll probably make the greatest sacrifice of getting killed (or even killing himself) in order to go down to hell and defeat Griffith once and for all, which could be one possibility for a final showdown.

"And then what?" since both are technically dead at this point?

Uh, I guess the "Formation of the Idea of Good" theory mentioned above could play a role...

Guts' Five-Man Band is going to become the good Godhand.
I know that Guts has more than five companions, but let's just say the pick of the litter - Farnese, Serpico, Isidro, Schierke, and Puck - will Ascend to A Higher Plane of Existence and form a good equivalent of the Godhand in the ethereal plane. Could be a possible answer to the "good Godhand equivalent" theory if the "creation of a non-existent good Godhand" theory is correct.

Griffith wants Guts to be a Godhand.
Given how possesive he is, it wouldn't be surprising that he wants Guts under control instead of simply killing him. Plus there's the fact that, due to what happened in the Eclipse, Guts escaped the flow of causality and continues to shove a middle finger in its face. The last thing a system that runs on Because Destiny Says So is someone outside it, and converting them to their cause makes them a very useful puppet. Griffith is making it so that either Guts gets killed, or broken to the point of Heel Face Turn. Screwing with the physical plane is just part of this.
 * In the Black Swordsman arc, I remember the rest of the Godhand discussing how they wanted Guts to come over to The Dark Side... I'm not sure if that included Femto though, but it's a possibility. That or I thought the complete opposite would happen and Femto wouldn't want the competition if Guts became a Godhand/apostle.

The Skull Knight is the Grim Reaper.
As this world's Anthropomorphic Personification of death, his first priority is to rid it of the immortal creatures messing up the natural order, starting with the Godhand.

The Godhand (sans Slan) are the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
Striking similarity?


 * Femto - War
 * Void - Death
 * Conrad - Pestilence
 * Ubik - Famine

Slan is more of a personification of the Seven Deadly Sins (seven guesses as to which one), but I will add that the lines of which Godhand best represents which horseman is blurred, since there are several interpretations on what each of the four horsemen represent in themselves. For example, the White Horseman (pestilence) would actually be more befitting for Femto instead of Conrad, since scriptures say that the White Horseman is suppose to represent The Antichrist, and so far, Griffith deceives the people as a messiah, conquers all that oppose him, and he returned on a white steed; however, according to the cool wiki, there are some allusions that Ubik can represent the Antichrist, since he also has powers of deceivement, as he used them on none other than Griffith when he first appeared. Of course, Conrad could himself take on the role of the both the White Horseman and the Black Horseman (famine), since his image was present when Wyndam was wrought with plague. Pretty obvious why Void would be the Pale Horseman (death). Of course, if you wanted to throw the theory mentioned above into the mix... They are rivals after all.