Denji

Pochita and Power are the pairing critics single out, and Wikipedia notes that both were well received alongside his backstory. Makima is the relationship that hurts in hindsight. Makima exploits Denji's longing for an ordinary, fulfilling life, using his attachment to her to advance her own objective of separating him from Pochita. He later killed her and resigned from Public Safety. The story then hands him Nayuta, who is Makima's reincarnation, and he becomes her caretaker and adoptive brother. In Part 2, Asa Mitaka enters the picture. Yoshida brings Asa and Denji together, but their first interactions are awkward: she finds his repeated insistence that he is Chainsaw Man hard to take seriously, and initially assumes he is desperate for attention. They came to like each other after that. Asa is bonded to Yoru the War Devil and is pushed into hunting Chainsaw Man, so she grows close to Denji without knowing who he is.

Denji's ambitions become more elaborate as his circumstances change. Early on, even basic comforts and the possibility of romantic attention feel like extraordinary rewards; later, he imagines a life filled with better food and multiple girlfriends. The Chainsaw Man Wiki suggests that Denji has become attached to the transformation itself, making a quiet, routine existence harder for him to accept. Part 2 then shifts the dream itself. ScreenRant interprets Denji's financial ambitions in Part 2 as being increasingly tied to his responsibilities toward Nayuta, including preparing for her future education. The article connects his experiences with Aki and Power to this shift in priorities, interpreting his increasingly desperate attempts to earn money as part of his effort to provide for Nayuta. Many fans first read that behaviour as leftover poverty instincts. In TV Tropes' interpretation, Denji's losses and past relationships make him more guarded, changing how readily he places confidence in people he has only just met. His later circumstances draw him into Public Safety's orbit again, while his responsibilities toward Nayuta complicate his attempts to live on his own terms. Denji's past remains a complicated part of his life, and the story leaves uncertainty around how much of those earlier bonds he can recover. Asa's recognition of him as Chainsaw Man appears to trigger a response, although its significance is not entirely clear. His involvement with the Chainsaw Man Church reaches a breaking point when its demands concerning Asa become unacceptable to him, prompting him to leave.

The first argument is about how central he still is. Denji's place in Part 2 has prompted different readings: Wikipedia describes him as sharing the lead role, while an early ComicBook.com article argued that the manga benefited from temporarily shifting its attention to Asa and leaving Denji's whereabouts uncertain. The shift in narrative focus is another point of discussion: Part 1 centres primarily on Denji, while Part 2 gives Asa a substantial perspective of her own alongside his continuing storyline. The second argument is the Asa romance. One interpretation on TV Tropes is that Denji's interest in Asa reflects his struggle with loneliness after the losses he experiences in the first part of the manga. It also says Chapter 183 shows him still loving Reze, and reads his interest in Asa and Yoru as a wish not to be lonely. That is a fan-wiki interpretation, not settled fact. The third argument is about craft. Aftermath describes fans complaining that his character growth is non-linear across Part 2's weekly releases.