hello! i would really, really love to hear your take on that scene of post torture griffith in the wagon throwing himself over casca and then a short moment later imagining domestic life with her? i keep thinking about these scenes and whether it shows how he reciprocates his feelings with casca? it gets used alot in the argument that griffith genuinely wanted to NTR guts or something, though i personally would argue otherwise, i still cant make out what these scenes mean lol it would be great to hear your take!
Hi, thanks for the ask! I have a pretty extensive post about that sequence here, and I get into that whole pre-eclipse section in-depth somewhere in here, in the fourth part of a very long Griffith essay as well lol.
But the quicker rundown on my own take is that the wagon scene is Griffith making Casca an offer in exchange for being taken care of, and subsequently imagining/hallucinating that life in the pond, sans Guts, and trying to kill himself.
The wagon scene happens right after Wyald's devastating summation of how fucked Griffith is now that he can't even survive on his own, and it fits into Griffith's pattern of viewing sex as transactional, and viewing his own worth in terms of what he can do for others. It also happens while Casca is thinking about how weak Griffith is, and how it's her turn to be strong for him, and it's visually laid out as a parallel to the river scene, with Griffith and Casca's roles reversed - now Casca's the one who places a comforting hand on Griffith. And outside you've got Judeau describing taking care of Griffith as an obligation.
This says to me that the important information in this sequence is that Griffith is helpless, desperate, and pitiable. He offers sex to Casca in this scene out of desperation, because he has nothing else to offer, and he perceives himself as a burden.
Then he hears Casca tell Guts to leave, imagines the future he essentially asked her for, that at least from his pov she seems to have agreed to given that she's sending Guts away without her (and it's worth noting that Guts' absence is highlighted more than any other aspect of that nightmare), and this vision of the future drives him to suicide. So I don't consider it a sign that he's attracted to Casca, or reciprocates her feelings at all. It's the complete opposite, if anything. That vision was his version of hell.
And as foreshadowing for the eclipse, I consider it a strong contrast rather than a preview. If Femto's rape of Casca has any relation to this moment at all, it's as a role reversal and show of power after this humiliating weakness, imo.
