The Real Reason 'Berserk' is So Horrifying.

What creates Berserk’s terrifying atmosphere?

What makes a good horror story? There are a lot of answers. It could be the ambiance of it, the settings and landscapes bathed in barely there light. It could be monsters, things that go bump in the night, and have designs that make your skin crawl. It could be cunning and malicious villains or events that mirror the terrible things that happen in real life. It could simply be the protagonist themselves, and their struggle to stay afloat in a dangerous world. Berserk is a series that has all of this. That isn’t a surprise; it’s a dark fantasy, known for its gore and brutality throughout. But, these things, while important to helping it develop the series’ horror undertones, are not what makes it scary. No, there is just one piece that solidifies the dread you feel as a member of the audience. And it can be summed up in one word.

Philosophy loves to argue whether we are creatures of free will. Are we really making our own choices, and do those choices even matter? Are we on a set path, where regardless of what road we take, we will always end at the one point we were always meant to? Plenty of media has asked these questions over the years. It’s something humans love to ask. We want to believe we’re in control of our lives.

Berserk does not present this choice.

Instead, it tells you that fate exists. There is no argument about it. We know from the very beginning that Guts is destined to suffer. He’s locked in a fruitless battle to change his own fate, and we watch him suffer from the moment he is born of his mother’s corpse. At that moment, you as the viewer must make a choice. Will you believe that there’s hope that Guts will prevail, or will you resign yourself to the truth that no matter what happens, Guts will meet his fate at every turn? No matter what you choose, you are left with trepidation. If you have hope, you’ll find it dying at every turn. It will be crushed when Guts is sold by Gambino to a soldier for the night. It will be shattered with each betrayal, with each scar. But if you don’t have hope? You will be stuck waiting for the shoe to drop with every moment of light.

Ultimately, the reason horror works is because it makes you feel nervous. It sets you on edge. What will be around the corner, inside the closet, running through the woods…it makes your heart race and your hands shake. Berserk achieves this not with monsters, but with the looming threat of destiny. As an audience, we know that something bad will always be coming. When Guts smiles, when he builds friendships with the mercenaries and with Griffith, it makes your stomach churn as you wait for the inevitable.

It’s an excellent form of storytelling. Instead of inspiring hope, Berserk begins with a straightforward message of what’s to come. It doesn’t sugarcoat; it tells you right away that this is a tale of woe, one of sorrow, gore, and betrayal from not only other people but from the universe itself. Sometimes, such a blatant message could ruin that feeling of fear. But because Berserk sets that expectation early, and asks the questions it needs to about fate, it manages to tell you what’s coming, but in a vague way that makes it hard to figure out where the ball will drop.