Holy mother of God, what a chapter. 10/10!
First of all, this manga has some of the best world building ever. The build up and reveal of the existence of Primal Devils was masterfully handled and the Darkness Devil did not disappoint - that is easily the most horrific display of power displayed in Chainsaw so far. Like, Makima surviving the assassination was great, Reze's explosive getaway was awesome... but the Darkness Devil? It literally disarmed them with 0 effort and made all the Devils shit themselves just from the feeling that it was near. Primal Devils are clearly on another level and I love it.
One question this does raise is what other Primal Devils there are. Given the name it must be things that humans don't get an acquired fear of - so nothing like insects or weapons. Rather they are innate fears that humans naturally have and have had for thousands of years. IMO likely candidates for more Primal Devils are:
- Fire
- Pain/Mutilation (pain is an intrinsic fear but mutilation even more so, you can survive pain but losing chunks of flesh/limbs is far more severe)
- Drowning
- Extinction/Death (death is obviously feared, but extinction is referring to total extinction of humanity here since practically no one wants total extinction)
- Control (more the lack of it)
- Separation/Humiliation (grouping these together because separation can cause or be caused by humiliation)
- Existentialism (fear of reality not having meaning or it having a meaning you're terrified of)
Also, I have a theory as to how the Chainsaw Devil fits into Hell and why so many people want Denji dead/Chainsaw's heart - Chainsaw was a balancing force in Hell. There's two routes this can go down:
1) Chainsaw is a Devil that seeks to purge any Demon it comes across and is second only to the Primal Devils when its full potential is being used. We know that Chainsaw had quite the kill streak in Hell because of what Angel said a while back, so the Devils wanting to send Chainsaw back to Hell would make sense since it would let more Devils cross into Earth.
2) Chainsaw is a Devil that is essentially an executioner that the Primal Devils employ. This is my favourite of the two but could easily be wrong, what I think is evidence for this is:
- We know that most (if not all IIRC) of the Devils that Angels talked to said all they remember before arriving in Earth is the sound of a chainsaw
- We know that the Primal Devils have never been killed by (or maybe have not even fought) Chainsaw
- We know from what one of Quanxi's allies said that if a Devil angers or catches the hostility of a Primal Devil, they are dead
My line of thinking is that Chainsaw (at full potential) is the strongest of the none-Primal Devils and that the Primals use the Chainsaw to keep Hell as they like it. This would explain why so many people want Chainsaw dead - because the Primals want it back in Hell doing their bidding. Why the Primals can't just do it themselves is something I'm unsure of, but something tells me they aren't the types to get involved with other Devils often given the reaction they have to just sensing a Primal that's approaching them.
How the team are going to escape the shit they are in is beyond me lmfao, but they should be fine, they have Kobeni with them after all!
The plot developing with Master/Makima is looking fantastic as well. Master, who already seems OP as hell, wanting/needing a power up from a Primal Devil is some serious hype for Makima. Its not exactly surprising given the antics we've seen her do, such as the time she casually survived a shot to the head and massacred her attackers, but Makima/Kishibi were already worried about Master before she had this power up, so their fight (if they have one) should be insane. Makes me wonder what Kishibe is going to do, he clearly knows that there's some serious business going on, but Quanxi seemed to think he was in over his head. I really hope he isn't, but its not looking great.
Also imagine being poor Yoshida in this clusterfuck. The dude is a badass private Devil Hunter, managed to give Quanxi a good fight, got thrown out of a god damn window... and it ended up saving him. Makima had better be paying him well.
Like I said at the start of this, 10/10 chapter. In general Chainsaw has been far better than the other weekly mangas I read, I swear it only gets better every week.
The fact that they had to make a deal with one of those ancient devils to kill Makima makes me question this whole thing with her hunting the gun devil tbh. And from this I think we can start to assume she isn't fully human. This manga gets better and better every week.
@Ebony Maw what do you think?
Makima being human was iffy from the start IMO, her eyes are way too unique. The most likely case for Makima is that she's actually a corpse possessed by a Devil. So far every Devil Man has had a distinct feature - Power has her horns, Denji/Reze have their cords, Angel has his halo, Prinz has her multiple legs, etc. etc. If we follow this pattern. Makima being a corpse possessed by a Devil would make sense.
In fact I'm convinced that's the case, since it explains why Kishibe wants her dead - he knows his former student is already dead and that a Devil is using her corpse as a skin puppet.
As for her motives... very hard to speculate on right now. Killing the Gun Devil is beneficial for her regardless of her motive unless she is outright working with it in secret - killing it means she either gets rid of a competitor as a Devil (assuming she is one), advances her agenda of keeping people (assuming she is as well meaning as we currently think) or reinforces her cover (assuming she is hiding something and isn't as benevolent as she seems).
Master wanting her dead + the note we got in this chapter is VERY ominous though, so her being benevolent or working with the Gun Devil is unlikely IMO. At the very least she must be crazy powerful considering someone as already massively powerful as Master felt she needed the power of a Primal Devil in her hands to take her down. Whether or not this means Makima is bad and that Master is good is still up in the air, but its definitely looking to be possible.