Chainsaw Man: Why Do People Call Denji – Dennis?
Denji, whose last name is unknown, is the Chainsaw Man manga and anime protagonist. This quirky young man returned from the dead to become one of the most dreaded Hybrids in the series. Denji’s story is the focus of the manga, and that makes Denji a great character to write about, which is what we are going to do here. But Dennis is als… wait, Dennis? You mean Denji, right? Well, yes, although we have written Dennis, we actually mean Denji, and the reasons behind this will be the topic of this article. In it, we will explain why some people in the West call Denji the protagonist of Chainsaw Man, Dennis.
People keep calling Denji Dennis because of the autocorrect function on people’s phones, and stems mostly from the Pochitaposting Facebook group. When people in the West wanted to write Denji using their phones, autocorrect would change it to Dennis, a fairly common Western name, and since not everyone would notice it, the name lingered on in the form of a meme.
The rest of the article will give you more information on Denji’s history in the Chainsaw Man series, as well as a more detailed explanation of why he is called Dennis by some people online, as we will trace the roots of this issue for you. The article is, of course, going to contain spoilers, so we just wanted to warn you.
Why is Denji called Dennis by some people?
Denji is the protagonist of the Chainsaw Man series who, thanks to Pochita’s sacrifice, becomes a Hybrid and is invited to join Public Safety as a Devil Hunter. He is a Hybrid who hunts down Devils as Chainsaw Man, the embodiment of the Chainsaw Devil. Due to his great poverty, lack of education, and improper upbringing as a youngster, Denji is cheeky and ignorant. As a result, he comes off as unpleasant and harsh in a childlike way. Nevertheless, despite his shortcomings, he has a strong empathy for other people and is eager to help those in trouble whenever possible.
Despite not necessarily having the finest intelligence, the Chainsaw Devil can devise cunning plans to destroy other devils, as when he once set himself on fire and used light to make Santa Claus vulnerable enough to be killed. Denji is confused about what he wants out in life after achieving his fundamental necessities and becoming a Public Safety Devil Hunter. He regrets the transitory nature of his dream’s realization and worries that he may lose his capacity for empathy, attachment, and even emotion.
Denji’s need to love and be loved and his emotional damage become more and more apparent as the story progresses. As a coping technique, Denji becomes emotionally dependent on Makima, even expressing his wish to be her dog without sense. Due to this psychological instability, Denji decides not to kill Makima but to unite with her instead and allow himself to be victorious, so he consumes her at the end of Part 1.
Now, this was a brief intro to Denji’s story, and while it does not reveal the reasons behind him being called Dennis, it reveals a bit about him and his quirky nature. It also reveals that he is, in fact, called Denji, and we can confirm that the English localization of the Chainsaw Man anime has not changed that fact, i.e., that Denji remained Denji even in the West. We emphasized this because there were numerous instances when the localized version changed the characters’ names from the original series. But, as we’ve said, Denji is not an example of this, so that we can proceed with our explanation.
So, if you were browsing around the Internet, you might have noticed that the protagonist of Chainsaw Man is called Dennis instead of Denji. This does sound like a typo, and, well, at its core, it is, but there is a story behind it, and it is a fact that the Dennis typo became a meme actually when the Chainsawman Series is concerned.
If you want to know the source of the meme, we can confirm that it can be traced back to the Pochitaposting Facebook group, a specialized fan group focusing on the Chainsaw Man manga and anime. And although this is definitely not the first and only place where Denji was renamed Dennis, the name change became a meme thanks to the aforementioned Facebook group, where it was commonly used and spread throughout the Internet. And that group is the place where we can also find the reason behind this phenomenon. And it’s much simpler than you think.
And no, it’s not a reference to the Dennis the Menace comic strip and its titular character, who was also a good-natured yet mischievous young boy with short blonde hair, which is why someone might have thought that it was a more twister reference to that popular series, but – as we have said – the reason is much simpler and much more benign than you’d think.
Namely, if you use your phone to write messages – and you do – you’ll certainly know about a quaint little thing called the autocorrect function. It can be helpful, and it probably is most of the time, but sometimes it can be the source of the most comical of situations (as the AI behind it is not necessarily the most intelligent one out there). Be that as it may, if you don’t have a history of writing Denji on the phone, and most Western people did not have it when all of this began, you’ll autocorrect will probably try to change that for you, and one of the versions you’ll get is – Dennis. You’ve guessed it.
Denji thus became Dennis because of the autocorrect function, which changed the name into a close enough and fairly common Western variant. Of course, some people did not notice that, and the name simply stuck and started spreading like a virus, thus becoming a fan name for Denji. In the same manner, Kobeni is often called Kenobi by fans. And that is the whole story behind the name Dennis.
