Everything about Power of Chainsaw Man

All about Power: Power is wide-eyed, carnal, detestable, and lovable. She’s sadistic but childish, a pathological liar and a fraidy cat, but more importantly, Power is probably one of the characters who evolve and change the most through the series, in terms of moral character, world understanding, and of course, personal loyalties. This rapid change takes place constantly, all the while not compromising her eccentric and carnal nature that comes to define her aesthetics and actions in the world the most.

Though, so what does make Power tick, and how does she interact with the world even when she takes so little time seemingly to try and understand it? Well, the Power we know, while self-serving, manipulative, and seemingly having no care for others at the beginning of the story, is actually a vast change from the version of her we see in her backstory. Hungry, filthy, with no regards for conventions of society, she seeks just to satiate her literal bloodlust of eating animals as she goes along.

She might be more described as animal than human even in her general actions and behavior, but her initial attachment to her cat tells us actually a lot about her and how she interacts with relationships, how she’s going to change and move through the series in a very important way. But first, I know what Power fans are really here for, and we’ll get into that, but to hold you off, here’s a little 20 seconds that might peak a Chainsaw Man fan’s interest: go to adamandeve.com for any adult product needs that you or your partner may have.

They’re celebrating their 50th year in business, plus you can now also use my code HIDING for 50% off one item plus free shipping in the US and Canada, with some exclusions applying. 20% of their profits also go toward fighting the spread of HIV. So, Power’s cat, initially underfed and pathetic, still shows care and relies on Power. Power initially rationalizes her feelings to protect this cat by stating that she just wants to fatten them up before consuming them.

“What good are they all skinny, after all?” It’s clear though, even if not initially to herself, that this is just a prideful justification of showing kindness toward this creature that she doesn’t understand, and the longer they spend together, the more attached she feels until eventually, this bond becomes more important to her than anything. While previously she held no regard for others and would kill or act as she wanted, now she is willing to act with a purpose towards something other than sustenance.

This is a fun setup because it really sort of serves as a window into how Power and Denji’s relationship will develop over the course of the series. Of course, Denji is more useful and smart than a cat, he’s more of a dog, sorry Power.

Continuously, pridefully lies and throws Dingy under the bus through their relationship, but it’s a sort of innocent, childlike behavior that, even though it’s malicious, it’s almost too incompetent to hold as a developed malicious intent.

(03:08) This is the place that Power and Dingy’s relationship sits in the early parts of the series. In the first mission, she’s willing to offer Dingy up to the monster, and at many points, she asks for some of his blood or seemingly doesn’t care if he dies, pushing him as a shield from her personal danger. Still, she cares and does something that one might see as small but shows improvement from how she was learning about societal customs and slowly becoming more accommodating to basic hygiene standards that her new roommates want.

Once again, that’s something that she doesn’t really care about or hold personal value to but starts to adjust in for the sake of the people around her. At chapter 30, we hit the most obvious change in her character. We see a transformation with how Power becomes attached when working toward a more personal goal with Dingy, and their normal bickering nature starts to take up a more comedic banter role.

It starts to become less harsh and malicious, so that by the time we hit the mid-50s, they’re acting almost like siblings, with Power asking Dingy earnestly if he’ll eat the tomatoes off of her burger and them looking out for each other, just generally speaking. She, of course, has moments of weakness and fear where she reverts to her hyper-self-preservationist self, but she is a demon after all. If this feels like a recap, don’t worry.

We’re getting to the central point soon. I just wanted to zip by some of these moments that really helped define Power’s outline and who she is as a character so we can, of course, analyze how it changed before we hit the climax and the why. By the way, I’ve been riddled with copyright these last few months, and a like and a comment would extremely help in terms of getting my channel back on track.

So, the selfishness of Power is probably her central trait and character flaw, her lack of loyalty, but it grows to feel more like a defense mechanism than anything, as we repeatedly see her fearful of all the things around her, like a scared wild puppy or cat. Soon, more than preservation, a beautiful dynamic forms from three people who couldn’t initially stand each other to an almost family-like dynamic. And so, the way that her cat Nyako grounded her into reality and gave her actions greater intent, she also is gaining that intent in tenfolds with these new people who care for and protect her.

Something that really helps additionally drive home her innocent, wide-eyed nature, despite her past, is her notable trauma. After the demon of darkness attacks, she spends many nights screaming, unable to rest properly, and more so to be alone.

This loneliness may not have been something that she realized she felt, the wonderlessness of moving from one place to another by herself, killing and eating whatever she finds. Nyako gave her a reason to act, then Denji and Aki gave her a place to belong, and now the fear that it could be swallowed up, that she could lose the value and the love that she has found here, has struck her for the first time. She’s scared for it to disappear.

After they help her somewhat with her trauma, we start to see the full loyalty from Power, even toward things that could lead to certain death. If Denji is doing it, so is she, because Denji is her buddy after all, and that’s the only reason she needs to go into danger.

In chapter 80, following Aki’s death, little is shown of the characters speaking. They are both described in very flat and matter-of-fact square boxes, as if they are trying to avoid thinking about what happened or acknowledging the emotionality of the situation. The starting reaction to grief, just as Denji goes out on his own and begins to ruminate about what happened, Mahima pulls him away and we don’t see Power until one of the biggest moments in the series.

Makima feeds on Denji’s moment of weakness and his guilt, and even drives it home, as in his weakness, he gives his freedom to her. Power, who is unaware of this, grows even more than just the thick and thin buddies that they had been up to this point. How hurt he must be feeling and how she is, so in her own simple childlike way, she wants to cheer him up by reminding him and bringing him a birthday cake.

Now that might seem very simple, but from somebody who had considered all life to be meaningless and nobody to have a real purpose, for her to celebrate a birthday, even if she won’t take note of this until later, she’s recognizing the value of the day he was born, the value of him existing in this world to her. A tragic moment for sure happens next, her life, or at least her will, is uncertain for the next few chapters until Pochetta appears to Power from within Denji.

He drank her blood when they secured their bond with one another, and her being the blood devil, lives inside of Denji still, if just barely. Her self-preservation, the central flaw shown thus far, seems to have come as she presents Chainsaw Man to Makima in the tensest moment thus far, and things for a moment are uncertain if she has grown at her core or not. This is the moment of truth, her hesitation leads to confusion, just like when she couldn’t bring herself to kill the cat all that time ago.

She distracts Makima and runs, exclaiming her confusion as to why she’s doing it. In this case, she can’t rationalize her selflessness into selfishness like she always has in the past. She can’t do something horrible to save face. She can’t explain how it’s actually to her benefit in some way. For all she knows and all she can think of, this is a death warrant to deny Makima’s orders and to run with Denji.

So she berates herself as to why Power is a character that lived for herself and for nothing, just to survive and pursue hedonism in the most shallow way. Not taking a moment to think or move, not being torn or heartbroken, not having to make hard choices, but also not having things to give her direction and value. When Power comes to her reason that saving Denji is because he was her first friend, what it really says about her is that she’s finally found the worth in her own life.

She’s finally acknowledged and come to understand the things she loves, and that because they matter to her, they matter, period. That her life isn’t valueless in some regard because she has purpose enough to decide when another person is worth protecting. So she even revives Denji’s spirit to fight and move forward, inspiring Denji to eventually fulfill his role and save the world. For now, all she asks is that if someday he ever finds her again, reincarnated or in another body, that he remembers this thing that has come to mean so much to her, the bond that they’ve formed.

And at least for part one, that’s the actions that Power takes. He uses a chainsaw made of Power’s blood ability later on, but I think this shows her arc in full. And from all of the characters in Chainsaw Man, she perhaps has the most extreme growth as a person through the series, learning to confront and deny her fear, learning that if she so decides, things can have value. Because whether she fully realizes it or not, that is her right as a living being, and so is it to everyone who lives.

What a person finds value in, what a person finds important is up to that person alone, and all the power vested in ourselves can be used to act out on that belief that we hold. From innocent, wide-eyed, scared, and cruel, through all her trauma and growth into purposeful and direction forward, acting as who she is still, never losing the charm and some of her negative qualities that still make her her. That’s Power to me, a genuinely moving and extremely interesting character from Chainsaw Man.

So until next week, I’ll see you then. Don’t forget to give me a comment below. Thank you guys