Berserk Official Guidebook Paperback – 2 Oct. 2018

Great

Son loves it

This is a must have for any Berserk fan.Full of good information and indepth of the characters.One of the best Manga series ever made. Just hope it finishes in our life time.

This book really helps to clarify things I did or didnt know about the manga.

To be blunt: there is nothing, save perhaps one or two sentences, in the Berserk Official Guidebook which is not already present in the text of the manga itself. Fans will not learn anything new about the world or the characters. What the guidebook is - and likely not by design - is a work of summary and retrospective.The bulk of it is taken up by short biographies of characters, broken up by glances at the broader world of Berserk, a timeline of events depicted within the manga, and information on how magic works. Reading it, you can't help but be impressed by Miura's dedication to Berserk as a text driven by characters. It is, in part, a mission statement: the age of the Black Swordsman is over. Guts travels in a party now, and if you have been in denial this long, this is your time to acknowledge it.There are a few scant insights into Miura's thought process through glimpses at the characters and a closing interview with him. It's nice to see him reminisce on the origins of older characters, and a two-page spread of various comedic Pucks, giving formal confirmation that he has been depicted as both Yoda from Star Wars and in the style of Go Nagai's Devilman. It becomes slowly, increasingly apparent that what unique text is there is not so much about Berserk, but about Kentaro Miura and his influences.For all my complaints about the guidebook, it exists now as one of the last 'public appearances' of Kentaro Miura before his death in 2021. The guidebook was originally published in 2016 in Japan, before the Elfheim arc started, and its English translation in 2018, a few months before the English publication of volume 39. Nobody could have known that only two more volumes would be published before Miura passed, volume 41 published posthumously. For it to come out so close to the end of Berserk (under Miura's direct authorship) leaves it as a near-complete look back at the characters that comprised it.I cannot wholeheartedly recommend it, but as a way to remember Miura, a good purchase for fans.

Does not contain much if any new information, but is a nice summary of what has been included in the series so far. A nice resource for those wanting to look at characters or lore without rereading.