It's been three years since Chainsaw Man took the world by storm with an incredible first season. From its nuanced storytelling and character development to the series' unparalleled cinematic flair, Chainsaw Man immediately defined itself as one of the best modern anime around.
Sporting an especially high quality English dub certainly helped the anime stand out, too. Ahead of Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc's North American release, CBR had the pleasure to sit down and chat with Ryan Colt Levy – none other than Denji, himself – in a fantastic conversation touching on what the series & character means to him, his favorite upcoming story arcs, and Tatsuki Fujimoto's masterpiece of a franchise.
To quote Austin Powers, Denji is a very “randy” character. What's your take on Denji’s obsession with women?
Ryan Colt Levy: As someone who read the manga before the show was even announced, I have a very strong feeling and take on this whole thing. I think a lot of people actually mischaracterized Denji because, even watching the first season, people have misremembered how scenes play out, or just misconstrued a lot of stuff. Maybe it's just the actor in me who's mining the deep stuff about Denji in order to give him what he needs to be played, but the way that I've always read this and seen it is: he's never had a family. He's been shown zero affection in his life. He has been constantly used and abused and just put in survival mode, so he's never had a chance to even have a childhood.
And yet he's in this arrested development, while also being [an] age where your hormones are naturally all over the place. He's never had an education. He's never been to school a day in his life. So forget about life knowledge — behavioral stuff is just so alien to him [and] outside of what he's seeing other people do. I think given all of that, he's still an extraordinarily deep, layered and sensitive — and complicated — human. Really, all he wants is to be loved and to be seen and to be valued as a person. Because he's never had any of that, and he doesn't even know what any of it could feel like or look like, or what form it comes in, or how it's supposed to work.
His own conflation of love and sexuality and human connection is all so alien to him that he's like, "If this happens, then does that mean this?" It's like that meme of the dude with the butterfly — everything to Denji is like, "Is this love? Is this a relationship? Is this communication? Is this how you're supposed to act? Is this friendship?" Even when he says something like, "I want to touch some boobs," – one, he says it to himself, in a moment of real personal reflection. But also, what he says and what he means are very different things, because he doesn't know how to express the depth of his actual thoughts. If he was a more eloquent person, he would say it a lot differently, but people fixate on these words and create a different idea for them than [how] the idea is really presented.
So I think Denji's whole thing — his weakness — is that women see that he is putty in their hands. They are all the ones manipulating and pushing and prodding and putting his hands in places. Denji never once does an act on his own. He is instructed or forced or coerced or manipulated into any of the scenarios people may remember. Time and time and time again, he is broken down by it and questioning it — and introspective without realizing he's being introspective. He's a really deep character, and I think intimacy for him has, unfortunately, never been introduced in a way that is genuine and heartfelt and sensitive, and with his consent.
He's the one who never gets consent. I think that's the sad irony of the whole thing.
I love what you were saying about the actors' perspective. In that respect, what ways do you feel like you relate and identify with Denji? Where does Ryan come into the equation when performing as him and creating this character?
I relate in so many ways to him. I think he's so deeply human and relatable. Man, woman — doesn't matter. I don't think Denji is a particularly male-coded character, even though he's clearly a dude and he's...got those kinds of thoughts and everything. But [with] the way that he's written, I've spoken to more women that understand Denji than some dudes. I think what I resonate with so much, initially out the gate, is his resilience and his optimism in the face of literally being dealt the worst cards. He's not waking up every day going, "I wish I was dead." He's not being an edgy teenager about it. He's not like, "I want to die. Everything's miserable." Instead, he wakes up in a place that most people would just let themselves rot and decay in, and he's like, "Maybe tomorrow I can figure out how to get out of this. Or maybe I can meet somebody who's gonna treat me nicer, or, well, at least I got my buddy Potchita." I think there's so much going on with Denji, man.
What would you say differentiates Denji's voice from other characters you performed throughout your career?
So much of it is the attitude and the intention. There's a street rat kind of element to it in a really lovely way that I like. I adore him as a character, and I think he needs to feel rough and kind of stupid, but in a way that doesn't laugh at the character. He needs to feel like someone who's trying to grow and learn, but also isn't necessarily given all the tools to do it right. He's really primal. So much of it for me is about making it really loose and [following my] first instinct into the performance as [closely as] possible, and not letting it be this neat little bow of a thing.
Sometimes you want characters to feel really pristine and clean, and you want your diction to be a certain way. But with Denji, you want it to be dirty and messy and sloppy and to throw away some words – kind of like, "What did you say? I should hear that again," because he doesn't know how to really put himself out there. The thing with Denji, too is, as the story progresses, he also changes his energy, changes the things that happen to him, affecting how much he puts out or keeps in. All of that stuff registers.
Chainsaw Man's English dub has been nothing short of phenomenal so far, and I'd say your performance is definitely a large reason why. What's the direction been like for the English dub, especially dubbing a movie versus an episodic series, now that you've done both back to back?
So much of the process isn't really that different, technically, but there are two huge differences. One, when we were doing the show, we were doing it [one] week [per] episode kind of thing. We had a week where we'd work on a full episode, and then it would come out the next Tuesday. Then that week we'd be working on the next episode, and then that would come out the next Tuesday — [that] kind of thing. But with the movie, I did the equivalent of four or five episodes in four days, so it was a lot more condensed.
The other weird thing is [that] before [the movie], even though I had the story in my bones — now I've had Denji, my version of Denji, for the last three years. I've been soaking in it, steeping in it, preparing, thinking about it, talking to people about it and waiting for this — and it's in my heart. We just locked into it, and I was actually surprised that, for the most part, I thought I was going to overthink it a lot and have way more [feelings of], "Can I do that take one more time?" on a bunch of stuff, and it was one or two takes for basically everything we did. We just kind of blasted through stuff because it just felt so in the moment, and just felt right.
The biggest difference, though, was that for the first season, the extraordinary Mike McFarland — who cast and directed us throughout that whole thing and really brought us into this world — he wasn't able to direct the film. He's all over it as far as I'm concerned, but we really built this together; [we] built that story, that energy, the way these performances work and the way the characters interacted. We found all of that with Mike, and he treated it with so much love and care — and he still cares so deeply about it — but we really got lucky with the movie.
Caitlin Glass and Sean Gann were both able to take over and help with it. Sean worked with me on a bunch of the action stuff and Caitlin [did] all of the rest. They both really, really cared. We had the manga in the sessions every day just in case, double-checking things and going over ideas. They both were so present and loving of the material, and also were really trusting of me. They both were like, "You've been this guy," so they gave me a lot of freedom and leeway to set the [tone] like, "Yes, we would say that. No, we wouldn't say that." Or if I wanted to do something, they always let me do more.
It was a process of trust and love, but I lost my voice by the end of it. It was crazy.
Maybe a redundant question, but building off that, were there any other major differences for you, either in terms of the work process or simply the energy surrounding the project, when it comes to recording a TV series versus a feature film?
The energy for sure. The anticipation was so great in so many ways, and I really have had such emotional resonance with this whole story and experience since then. This arc means a lot to me. There are moments and lines of dialogue that, while recording it, I was very emotional. I remember previewing one scene in particular, I was just crying because it's so beautiful, and I was like, "I feel so connected to so much of it in such a weird way."
So I think when we went into it, they threw me right into the action stuff first because they knew that I was buzzing; I needed to get [it out], let [it] out. So they let me, and we went absolutely bananas. I gave everything to this thing in the happiest of ways because I knew — the other thing that I knew is I really tried my best.
I would say it in real time every day: stay present, really soak this up, and enjoy it. because it's gonna go by so fast. I waited for three years, and then we were done. Now we get to share it. Today is finally the day, and I'm so excited. I cannot wait. I'm gonna see it tonight in a big, big [theater]. I double-checked — it looks like it's a packed theater. I can't wait to just hear people experiencing it.
By the same token, you've also done a lot of live-action dubbing work over the years. Are there any particular quirks that anime voice acting in particular has that may not be present in other forms of VA work?
Everything is stylistic based on the tone and what the thing needs. So there are some anime [where] something like Chainsaw Man is closer to what you do with a live-action Dub, because you're really trying to play it more like the closest thing to real people, while also staying in a heightened kind of state. In general with anime, a lot of people like to joke about the sounds and certain things. There are certain elements that a lot of projects will have those tropes or those audio ticks that people are used to from the cultural way that [anime has been] delegated.
As I have done it now for a couple of years, [anime voice acting] really has shown itself to be more [than that]. A lot of people think of anime specifically as a genre, but it's a medium. It's full of so many different tones and flavors and shapes. Some things want more of a Saturday morning cartoon — a big, crazy, over-the-top performance. Sometimes you need that, and it calls for it, and sometimes things need to be more grounded and real — and sometimes things can balance all kinds of weird tones together.
There are certain things when you do enough anime that you start to shorthand or understand, like how to manipulate the tempo within the flaps that you have to work with. A lot of it is more just how your brain lines up with how to make the performances fit the bodies of the characters better. That's so much of how I think about it when I'm performing.
If you notice, I'm wearing headphones. I have a different pair that I wear that only has one side, because I like to hear myself in the room when I record, so I can get a sense of the actual dynamic. When I'm recording, I'm trying to think about it coming from within [the character's] body.
So you have to think about the physicality, about their shape, about their posture, about where they're sitting — all of those elements. It really comes down to like the image; if you are working with it, it can give you so much to play with the nuance. But the more you do it, the more you learn to refine that stuff.
So coming into this new Reze movie from the perspective of someone who's read the Chainsaw Man manga, the Reze Arc is a very foundational, informative part of the whole series. With it also being three years since CSM Season 1, how do you feel that Denji's character and your performance have changed and evolved?
As far as Denji's character goes, he sort of evolves and regresses and evolves again. What's so exciting about it — because I don't want to say too much — is that in this particular arc, in 140 or so minutes, people are going to get a whole other dimension and understanding of Denji. People are going to start to really get the depth of his heart and, in a weird way, his innocence.
He's not necessarily innocent, but there's an innocence [within him], an innocence that he never had the chance to hold on to. Some moments in [Chainsaw Man: Reze Arc] are about a sweet little boy who is not ready for what he's about to get into.
For me, there's a confidence that I bring to this that I learned throughout the first season. So much of recording the first season was just trusting my heart to guide me, keep me within the lanes and not go off the rails, and trusting my cast mates to just balance the tone and keep everything alive. By the time we got to this movie, I really felt comfortable. I met so many people too, because, like I said, nobody knew who the hell I was [before Chainsaw Man].
After these three years, I know people are resonating and connecting with this story and how much it's meant to people, and that means so much to me. I don't have words for that, but I know that a comfort and confidence now that I can bring to [voicing Denji]. When I walked into the booth and my directors on the film were like, "We trust you with this guy," and I went in being like," I am so ready for this. I've been breathing this for years." It didn't mean I was like, "Nobody tell me what to do," I just felt ready.
It's become more common for anime arcs to be made into a film as opposed to a full season. How do you feel the Reze arc is different?
I feel like it's meant to be a film. The thing that has been said to me by multiple people who have seen it now, who have not spoken to each other, because none of them know each other, is the word Miyazaki. And it's what I thought about when I was recording. I was like, "This feels like if a Ghibli movie was a psychedelic nightmare."
It is so deeply beautiful. This arc was inherently cinematic; it is literally baked into the language of the arc. Going to the movies and talking about cinema is a whole element of it. [Chainsaw Man author Tatsuki Fujimoto] is a cinematic storyteller who loves film, and it's part of how he's telling this story.
[The Reze Arc] is such a condensed arc compared to how the rest of the story moves forward, and if we were at a different point in [Chainsaw Man], I don't think a movie would actually make sense. But this particular arc is so romantic and sad and beautiful, and it plays to so many different kinds of things that people love to see in a movie. It is just enough set pieces to keep contained, but also expand on a massive scale.
It also takes the characters so much deeper. To have that on a big screen, where you have to focus in on it is really crucial. This has worked out because it was always meant to be a movie.
Discussing Fujimoto-san's love of cinema one of the biggest differences between the Reza arc movie and chainsaw man season one is their art styled and kind of approach to the medium. I know it might be like picking a favorite child, but do you have a preference in terms of their two styles?
I really do love them both. The director of the film worked on [Chainsaw Man] Season 1, and the team is shuffled around to some degree. The head director left, and I thought he did a beautiful job. But what I love about the new art style is that it is definitely closer to the Fujimoto kind of like feel, and it feels so alive in that way. It also doesn't feel like it's disconnected from Season 1.
I think this show can kind of grow and shift and change as it goes. There's something that the art styles kind of contribute to the different parts of them. Season 1 was perfectly cinematic as this introductory setting up of the chess board, and this movie shifts more into the psychedelic madness of it. I think from here on out, who knows how weird it could get.
Speaking about things from here on out, I know you said you were a fan of the manga for a long time. Without getting into spoilers, what's your favorite arc in the manga – and how do you feel about part two compared to part one?
As far as Part One, this arc is top, top, top tier. And the end of Part One is, to use a hip word that the kids are all doing, might just be peak. Part One condensed is truly one of the greatest modern stories ever told.
I personally love Part Two even though I know that a lot of people have a lot of feelings about it. I've gone back and read Part Two from the start now, and it's insane how much it has packed into it that you almost don't even remember.
I also love that it's such a deconstruction of so much of Part One. While it is incredibly rough to read at some points, it is very true to the characters. There's some really human stuff in it that is a hard pill to swallow. A lot of the things that people are frustrated with are things that I'm like, "That's how it would actually happen."
I think [Part Two] is what Fujimoto has been working towards. He's being really true to himself and not playing this game of "Oh, you guys really liked how that went? I'm just gonna do that again." He's like, "No, I have a story to tell," and he's never failed me. So I can't wait.
Most fans are currently assuming that Chainsaw Man Season 2 will likely adapt the rest of Part One of the manga. Without getting into any spoilers, which scene from that section of the story are you most looking forward to voicing?
Oh, my God. If they do that, I hope it's a longer season too! I don't think people realize what that means when they say it.
What's so weird about a question like this is just being a fan of it. Sometimes I'm not necessarily excited about a scene that I'm voicing. Sometimes, I'm just excited about a certain line I like. I don't always think about it from the perspective of, "Oh, I can't wait for my line." Like in this movie, the line was very important. But when I think of Chainsaw Man, a lot of the time I think of the next arc, or "Oh, I can't wait for this moment."
So I will just say "Darkness."
Well said. Building off that, besides Denji, obviously, who's your favorite character in Chainsaw Man?
Another really difficult question! I think it changes a lot, because they're all so beautifully written. They're so layered and dense. The idea that Power is so beloved by all of us, and yet, if you wrote that character in any other story, in any other medium, you'd be like, "Burnt them. Burn them. Throw this character away. We all hate them, right?" Her traits are inherently awful, but the execution makes you be like, "I love her, I would kill for her."
I think Aki is so beautifully special. God, they're so much fun. Beam is such a f***ing ride. Apologies. Man, it's so hard. Are we sticking to season one?
I mean, we can look into the future.
You know what? In the long run, I'm going to say Pochita.
Great pick. I know you probably love every anime and game you've ever dubbed, but do you have any special favorites? Maybe due to the staff you got the opportunity to work with, or a character you really identified with?
For very obvious reasons, I feel like it's [Chainsaw Man]. There are so many things I love working on. I loved working on My Hero Academia. I loved working on Moriarty the Patriot, which is a not seen enough, Sherlock Holmes anime. I got to play John Watson. That was never going to happen otherwise. I've got to do a Ghostbusters video game. I've got to do so many cool things.
I hadn't read a manga since I was in middle school, and I found [Chainsaw Man's] cover, and I was like, "What is that?"
This story changed my life. I fell in love with it, like I fell in love with a David Lynch movie or a great record. This was a piece of art that I needed to experience, and it found me, and I didn't know how much I needed it.
It's hard to pick something else. It really is, and especially with this movie. I really can say it proudly with a full chest, this is the most beautiful thing I've ever had the privilege of working on. I think it's astounding.
Love hearing that. And my final question, but perhaps the most important, Makima or Reze?
Dude. (Laughs)
I mean, are we coming at the... Alright, now I'm just gonna – yeah – I'm saying Reze, okay?
CHAINSAW MAN – THE MOVIE: REZE ARC is officially playing in theaters now.