Makima is one of the most popular characters in the world of Chainsaw Man, and one that caught the attention of both artists and cosplayers, which only added to its popularity. Considering how attractive she is and how popular the series has become, this was just a matter of time!
But the thing about Makima is that she’s a lot more than just a pretty face. She’s one of the main foundations of the whole series and one of the strongest characters you can find in the world of manga and anime!
Still, what makes Makima so special? Let’s discuss this in detail, and showcase why we believe Makima in Chainsaw Man is such an interesting character.
Spoiler Alert: If you didn’t know, this article is filled with spoilers. If you are the kind of person who doesn’t like being spoiled, then stop reading right now. But if you are like me, who loves spoilers and wants to know what’s coming next, keep reading!
Who is Makima in Chainsaw Man?
There are many things we can say about Makima, but I believe we should start with the most obvious thing – her appearance, and possibly the main reason she is as popular, of course, besides her mesmerizing and unique personality.
Makima’s two main features we’d like to discuss are both her hair and her eyes. Firstly, the thing that draws the most attention is her red hair, which is often braided, with bangs reaching her eyebrows, and two cute side bangs covering her ears. Her eyes, yellow, almost golden-like, are embellished by red circles, giving her a very intimidating presence.
Not only that, she’s got a fantastic figure, which suits her personality quite a lot, just like an attractive, dominating beauty. Ever since the beginning of the series, Makima gave the feeling of being one of those mastermind types of characters, and this, whether we want to admit it or not, only made her even more attractive.
If you keep reading Chainsaw Man manga or watch the anime, you’ll quickly notice that the “mastermind” tag I mentioned earlier is pretty accurate. She’s pretty manipulative when it comes to others, but mainly towards the main character, Denji, promising him stuff to make sure she has a solid grasp of his existence and will, even going as far as promising a “special” relationship with him, or threatening him with death if he doesn’t obey.
Of course, this attitude also applies to many other characters, including Power, Aki, the Angel Devil, and many more, and things only get worse as you keep reading.
Makima herself is also a very complex character once you get to know her more, especially at the end of the series, since, although she does not act like one at times, she indeed hides the desire to experience very human-like events, things that people would normally experience throughout their lives that are almost impossible for her to enjoy.
But who is Makima? Or, instead, what is she?
At the beginning of the series, Makima is a high-ranking member of the Public Safety Devil Hunter committee. Because of her influence in the world of Devil Hunters, she moves strings to take Denji under her wings. She makes him join Aki and Power in the hunt for Gun Devil pieces, but in all truth, she mainly does it for the sake of having Denji as a pet.
However, her existence is much more complex than that, as it is later revealed!
SPOILER ALERT: She’s actually the reincarnation of the Control Devil, one of the strongest devils of hell and the embodiment of the fear of control or domination, something necessary to be mentioned if we were to talk about her powers.
Now, having known this, understanding her manipulative tendencies and the reasoning behind them makes a lot of sense, as manipulating people and making them feel inferior is one of the sources of her strength.
How Strong is Makima? – Powers & Abilities Explained
Having a solid grasp of the true extent of Makima’s powers can be difficult, mainly because of how powerful she is and how many aces she’s got under her sleeve. However, I will try my best to showcase as many of her traits as possible to make it easier to understand why she’s considered one of the strongest characters in the whole series.
First of all, Makima isn’t a Devil Hybrid or a Fiend; she is the reincarnation of the Control Devil. Denji, throughout the whole series, is shown to be capable of regenerating many fatal wounds as long as certain conditions are met, including drinking blood, as he spends it while fighting. In the case of Makima, this is pretty much unnecessary, as she can instantly heal any wound, regardless of how fatal it seems. She gets her head destroyed in one of the chapters just to be immediately restored!
But, to understand the true potential of her powers, we must understand the concept of fear and how it influences the strength of many characters in the series.
You see, a devil’s power is ultimately decided by its concept and the amount of fear it causes within society. Its nature heavily influences the devil’s abilities, but its raw power and strength are decided by the fear it causes. As the Control Devil, Makima is feared by devils, fiends, and humans alike; she’s absurdly strong.
Without mentioning her skills, her physical prowess alone is strong enough to threaten almost all characters in the series, including the Chainsaw Devil itself, as she can fight it one-on-one with her hands alone. But her supernatural abilities are what make her the scariest.
As the Control Devil, Makima has access to powers involving the nature of domination. To make things short, she can control others’ wills, including animals, humans, and devils. But the extent of her mind control powers is what’s to fear the most, as she can pretty much change their personalities if she so desires, making her enemies feel infatuated by her, and control them so they can make contracts with devils, or have devils form contracts with humans to have access to their powers.
Yeah, as you might have guessed, she can also control their powers by controlling others. Throughout the end of the series, she controlled a considerable amount of characters, some of which we were aware of and some of which we knew nothing about.
Another thing to add is that anyone can be a target of her domination abilities, as she’s shown to control even those who had already died in specific moments of the series. She even used a bunch of rats once to teleport somewhere almost instantaneously!
When Makima is revealed to be the Control Devil, the President of the United States of America, owner of a fraction of the Gun Devil’s body, sacrifices one year of life from all of its citizens to summon him to defeat Makima, as he redeems her to be a potential threat to his nation. During this confrontation, Makima not only manages to control Aki and the Angel Devil to fight the Gun Devil. She summons many devil hunters and devils, including the Punishment Devil.
Although not shown, it is implied that Makima won and managed to use Aki and the Gun Devil, turning Aki into the Gun Fiend and using him to attack Denji.
It is later revealed that this is one of the ways she intended to cause Denji despair to draw the true nature of the Chainsaw Devil eventually and then control it, as she was an obsessed fan of his, claiming to be happy with any result regardless of it involving her being devoured by it or being able to control it.
One would believe that that’s enough to make her the most dangerous creature in the world, but there’s more! She also has a unique ability, which was only used by the Darkness Devil, an entity that is dangerous enough to make her feel hesitant to face it. This ability is the power to control a type of force, a power that is very close to Telekinesis, which she can use to obliterate people physically. She used it against Power, one of the closest characters to Denji, just after his fight with Aki, and after saying a charismatic “Bang,” Power was pretty much deleted instantly.
However, even with that said, Makima’s dream might be considered relatively pure. Since she’s the embodiment of the fear of manipulation/control, she only knows how to interact with others by using fear, a tool she uses to make others feel inferior, a necessary trigger to control other people’s wills, regardless of their nature.
Although she claimed to want to use and control Denji and the Chainsaw Devil to her advantage in her path towards building a better world by using its devil-consuming powers, she actually just wanted to experience leading a happy life where she would stand beside someone as an equal, and not as a superior existence. Even though she did commit many atrocities throughout the whole series, her dream is without a doubt a very pure one, which, sadly, was pretty much impossible due to her circumstances.
Conclusion
Now that you know the real complexity behind Makima’s character, perhaps you might be able to appreciate her even more, even if it means understanding how powerful she is and how daunting it must have been for her enemies to face her.
And although she ended up being one of the series’ villains, and a ruthless villain at that, many of us cannot avoid her even more! No doubt, one of the main faces of the Chainsaw Man series and one of the reasons many people ended up loving it as much!
Also Read: Who is Reze in Chainsaw Man?
