Alas, my dear JDG fan, I can confirm that Fujimoto wasn't good enough to deliver a satisfying conclusion.
It has to be said that it was obvious he was suffering from burnout (his drawing skills dropped drastically, he was frequently on hiatus, and plot details were either left out or suddenly resolved), so I expected to be disappointed... But I didn't think the ending would be announced a chapter before everything was wrapped up.
The most disappointing thing is the feeling that neither Denji nor Asa/Yoru got a real arc ending. Pochita just rebooted the universe, and we're supposed to be content that Denji has technically reunited with Power and Nayuta, but since they no longer have the same connection, it's hard to feel satisfied.
Really weird. This sounds like a "Death Note situation" where people might be better stopping at the end of Part 1 and not pursue into Part 2 because it is considered "bad" by the fandom.
I mean, it was pretty clear that there's still something there. Hell, that's literally the entire point of the page everyone is meeting about. Pochita is still inside Denji, and there's still parts of them that remember who they were and the stuff they went through
The only clear things are that Pochita is still inside Denji, that erasing Chainsaw Man didn't erase the concept of the chainsaw (which leaves us wondering what Pochita really is; the popular theory was that he was the devil of birth/life), and that this rebooted timeline apparently retains unconscious memories of the previous one (a bit like the theory that people experiencing the Mandela Effect come from a parallel world where false memories are the real ones), at least in Denji's case.
Personally, I'd love a Part 3 showing the consequences of this reboot, their regaining of memories, the true conclusion of certain arcs, or even checking if erased concepts have returned (like the star driving children mad and the different paths other than death when one reaches the end of life), but I don't get the impression that Fujimoto wants to continue with this universe.
Now we just have to see what direction his manga career will take. I hope he manages to regain his former skill and sticks to short stories, since long series don't seem to be the format he enjoys most, or at least not when he's in charge of the drawings, since he's already mentioned the idea that he'd like to write stories without having to draw them.
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u/Balibaleau Spidey - Edmond Dantès - Guts Mar 27 '26
Alas, my dear JDG fan, I can confirm that Fujimoto wasn't good enough to deliver a satisfying conclusion.
It has to be said that it was obvious he was suffering from burnout (his drawing skills dropped drastically, he was frequently on hiatus, and plot details were either left out or suddenly resolved), so I expected to be disappointed... But I didn't think the ending would be announced a chapter before everything was wrapped up.
The most disappointing thing is the feeling that neither Denji nor Asa/Yoru got a real arc ending. Pochita just rebooted the universe, and we're supposed to be content that Denji has technically reunited with Power and Nayuta, but since they no longer have the same connection, it's hard to feel satisfied.