Why You Should Watch Made in Abyss

do you ever find a show and it's like yes yes this this right here is why I watch anime something that comes from completely out of left field that minutes into the first episode makes you remember why the medium is worth pursuing in the first place a series that brings purpose back to wading through the ocean of mediocrity that each new season brings and makes anime as a whole feel fresh and exciting all over again I only really come across a show like this maybe once or twice a year in 2016 it was mob psycho 100 and this year it's made in abyss the best way I could describe the appeal of maiden abyss is it's like the Wonder and beauty of the studio ghibli filum crossed with the nihilistic swayed o horror of Madoka Magica it's beautiful it's fun and it's incredibly dark the series follows the story of Rico and rag2 children and their journey down into the abyss a massive monolithic like chasm gouged deep in the earth a fantastical nearly alien feeling place filled with priceless treasure vicious monsters and frightening disturbing secrets the series started out life as a webcomic serialized in the monthly online manga publication webcomic gamma-gamma specializes in strange offbeat swayed O'Hara's or series with unconventional story elements or protagonists titles like kitschy kijima pumpkin Knight and even the manga adaptation of the UMaine McKee indie horror game and made an abyss fits into their catalogue perfectly it's totally far too dark for a series like shounen jump while also not really being Senen enough to fit into the more popular adult magazines and I think this is why smaller publications like this are important they're often more willing to take chances on less conventional stories which is exactly what main abyss is even from first glance of the manga it's obvious there's something a little bit special about this year the artwork is strikingly unique using an unusual combination of pencil line work and loose ink rendering giving the pages a soft nearly painterly quality that feels nearly more reminiscent of a storybook than it is a traditional pen and ink manga it's beautiful to look at but what really stands out are the incredibly detailed and highly rendered background spreads not only are these pages breathtaking they're also somewhat of an oddity in manga it's rare to see so much work poured into the construction of the world a story takes place in but world building is an aspect of storytelling that abysus author Akihito Sookie she seems to feel very passionately about something you can tell from both the wealth of supplemental information he provides in between chapters fleshing out the lore wildlife and technology of maiden abysus worlds as well as his personal work where he illustrates massive expansive environments with just as much care and detail as he does the characters that inhabit them the anime was produced by Studio Kinema citrus and the first episode was actually dramatically restructured from the opening of the manga and I think this was the right call the manga gets off to a pretty slow start but the changes series director masayuki kojima makes to the early portion of the story results in one of these strongest and most intriguing first episodes I've seen in a very long time we're giving zero setup no tech scroll no explanation or even any context were just dropped into made in abysus worlds who Amy Rico a young cave Raider in search of relics who after a little brush with a nightmarish monstrosity discovers a small unconscious robot boy with no memory of his past whom she later names reg and from here gradually over the course of the episode we watch as piece by piece made in abysus world slowly starts to come into focus with each shot piece of background art and line of dialogue slowly building our understanding of who these characters are as well as what kind of world Livan revealing that rico is an orphan who lives in the mining town or the episode culminates in this beautifully done scene where the camera pulls way back and we reveal that the entire city of orth is built around this gigantic chasm the abyss and I think what's so effective about this moment is how it beautifully binds together all the little disparate details the episode has fed us up until this points and galvanizes a business world with a sense of place and purpose spelling out exactly how gargantuan and mysterious the abyss is as well as the culture of war that's built up around it it also lets the audience know in no uncertain terms that these are our main characters and at some points these two little guys are headed straight down into the abyss I think what's so effective about starting the story like this is how evocative it is of other more traditional adventure narratives young character is traveling out into the world for the first time and all the potential mystery and Wonder that comes with that but I think we're made an abyss starts to distinguish itself is how it frames Rico and regs adventure as opposed to how other series do generally most adventure stories featuring a young protagonists work as a loose metaphor for journeying into adulthood and all these self-discovery that comes with that stories about realizing your inner strength and becoming who you really are but even from the earlier more upbeat episodes of the series there's a distinctly ominous feeling surrounding the abyss as well as Rico and rags potential journey into it the abyss is described as an intensely perilous place divided up into seven layers each of which grows more dangerous than the one that came before it with only the most elite of the elite cave Raiders the white whistles able to survive anything below its fourth layer information from cave Raiders down in the abyss is communicated through balloons which travel up through the chasm and retrieved by the town of or ahthe which is how one fateful day Rico receives a letter from her long mother a legendary white whistle known as Liza the Annihilator which claims that she's waiting for reco at the very bottom of the abyss which is the catalyst that sets the plot in motion but also serves to drive home just how dangerous the abyss might actually be with the letter containing a group of sketches depicting what appear to be massive gnarled monstrosity z' and unusual ancient relics one of whom looks suspiciously like reg it's this steady stream of ominous information that slowly begins to change how we view reco and regs journey as we gradually start to realize that this isn't a quest that either character is ever going to be returning from something driven home by the curse of the abyss a set of afflictions that grows more severe the further down the abyss you travel starting off in relatively light ways like light nausea and vomiting and ending in madness a total loss of humanity and even death the kicker with the curse of the abyss is that it doesn't affect people who are traveling down into the abyss but those who are attempting to rise up out of it meaning the further down into the abyss you go the more difficult it will be to ever return with anyone who descends below the fifth layer considered lost forever which is why when the various goodbyes take place between reco and friends there's a real feeling of sadness and finality to it generally in traditional adventure narratives the idea is that one day the hero will return home with their newfound power in tow and use that power to benefit all around them in fact it's this plot structure that's the entire final quarter of Joseph Anderson's the hero's journey but but making it clear that these characters are never likely to return it shrouds the journey of reco and reg in not only a sad finality but also an ominous sense of peril like whatever might be waiting for the two down in the depths of the abyss is very real and very very dangerous the earliest way the series communicates this is through the in universe map the charts the abyss I think a good fictional map can do a lot to sell the geography of a series while also foreshadowing story elements that are yet to come and the abysus map is successful in both these regards right up at the top here we have this city of Earth which is by no means a small place but just look at how completely dwarfed it is by the sheer size of the abyss a gargantuan vertical landscape divided into seven unique layers the rocky mountain side of the edge of the abyss the jungle like forest of temptation the sheer vertical drop of the great faults the humid springs of the goblet of giants and the frigid ice scape of the sea of corpses as well as the mysterious sixth and seventh layer the capital of the unreturned and the final maelstrom of which only rumors exists by establishing the existence of these locations early on the show creates a real sense of mystery and intrigue around the abysus layers and what might be lying in waste for egg and Rico in fact one aspect of the map that has me especially curious is what exactly are these strange eyeshape formations at the bottom of the abyss and why is the chasm starting to resemble a large gaping mouth it's questions like these that create such an intense layer of intrigue around the abyss and also makes it very easy to empathize with Rico and regs desire to delve down further into it which means that one of the main reasons the audience is watching the show to find out more about the abyss directly overlaps with the primary motivator of the stories two central characters which makes it very easy to get invested in both Rico and reg as well as the relationship that forms between them Rico is an optimistic upbeat driven person with a burning desire to explore the abyss to the point that she spent her entire life reading open it researching its mysteries and studying plants and wildlife this has given her an encyclopedic knowledge of the abysus upper layers and how best to navigate them her weaknesses however come down to her physical ability despite being raised as a cave Raider she's still just a regular human child which means not only is she in danger from the abyss is more aggressive creatures but also susceptible to the aforementioned curse of the abyss reg meanwhile is in many ways the total opposite of Rico he is far quieter and more withdrawn often doubting his decisions and becoming easily frightened despite the fact that his robotic body means that he's nearly completely invulnerable able to withstand massive amounts of physical punishment and quickly recover as well as wielding mechanical arms that can shoot out and extend like grapple hooks which also house regs trump card his incinerator cannon a devastating blast that annihilates anything in regs path at the cost of causing him to fall unconscious for a couple of errors after its use during which time Rico is alone and vulnerable what I think really works about the setup for these two characters is that very early on the strengths and weaknesses of each one is clearly established there's nearly an RPG like sense of what each individual character is good at and where their talents lie and a lot of the fun of the series comes from watching Rico and reg navigate their way through the abysus upper layers and apply their talents in interesting and creative ways like here Rico knows how to use these narrative flying discs squirrels like hell Rico knows how to use these flying discs squirrels to distract from the far more dangerous matter Jax in particular I really like all the creative uses the pair find for regs grapple arms they start off just by using them like glorified grappling hooks and even this I think is pretty cool giving characters interesting movement mechanics and shows can make the simple act of traveling from point A to point B a far more fun and engaging experience for the audience but what's really interesting is that as the show goes on the pair learn to use regs grapple arms in a variety of interesting utilizing them as a pulley to trap animals and even as an alarm system this also gives the sense that these two characters are constantly learning that they're actually progressing in their own skill sets and making progress on their adventure so when things happen like they acquire a new piece of equipment it actually feels significant not unlike how it does when you find a powerful piece of gear in a video game what really works in the writing behind Rico and ragas team is that it's so easy to see how their individual strengths complement the other's weakness and their mutual need to rely on one another without reg Rico is basically just a child alone in a viciously unforgiving environments by herself she'd have no real way of traversing the abyss or defending herself from it's more dangerous inhabitants and likewise without Rico reg would be left completely in the dark with no knowledge of his surroundings and no clear path forward and it's in the instances where the two becomes separated that you can really feel each individual one struggle without the other writing the pair like this shows not only Heather to rely on each other on a practical level but also on a deeply personal one for Rico reg is confirmation of something she's wanted her entire life proof that life exists in the depths of the abyss and therefore a connection to the idea that somewhere far below her mother may still be alive with reg being her only practical means of discovering if this is true or not while for reg Rico is his only real purpose to live not only does she give him the confidence he needs to overcome his self-doubt considering his total loss of memory she is his one connection to the living world and if anything were to happen her he'd be left completely alone and so it's very easy to believe that the two would form such a close bond as the driving motivator of each is dependent directly on the survival of the other and because of this it's easy to get invested in them and their adventure you want these little guys to be okay you want to see them succeed and where the show really starts to show its hand is taking the warmth of the friendship of Rico and reg and juxtaposing it against the coldness of the abyss what's frightening about the abyss isn't that it's directly malevolent to Rico and reg but that it's completely indifferent to them for as invested as the audience is in these characters it never feels like the world of the abyss rotates specifically around them rather in the abyss they are just another rung on the food chain a tiny part of a much larger ecosystem filled with potential predators and dangers what really establishes this is the investment made an abyss makes in its world building a lot of the world building of the show is very subtle often telling us things about characters and their experiences in ways that are extremely easy to miss like the interior of Nana Chi's hood one wall of which has a collection of Raiders whistles and if you've been paying attention to the show up until this points this will tell you a lot about the kind of life Nana Chi has lived and what she's had to endure it's this same sense of world building that applies directly to the layers of the abyss each one of which has a real sense that it's its own contained ecosystem as the various life forms that exist in each one interact with one another in a multitude of unusual ways like healthy bizarre plant like omec a guy emits a scent of fruit to trap our aforementioned disc whirls in its stomach and slowly digest them alive or the symbiotic relationship between these shroom bears and the parasitic water shrooms which inject their nutrients back into the shroom bear whenever it's about to die thus sustaining their host and keeping it alive for a lot longer than they would naturally last these are tiny little touches but it's details like this that stir a viewers imagination and and still be feeling of a far larger world and that to me is a lot more effective than just having characters exposit it's lore and history as rather than being told about in environments we get to actually experience it adding immeasurably to this sense of place is just how beautifully and imaginatively the business environments are brought to life subtle animation on background elements like the mist the abyss is filled with and be bare see inverted trees of the second layer really adds to the feeling that these are actual physical locations our characters are in and not just a painting they've been placed upon the biggest reason these environments feel so distinctive and alive however is the lead background artist on the project Osamu Massey Yama Massey Amma is a veteran of the animation industry having created backgrounds for some of the biggest projects in the entire medium titles like spirited away and your name he's also an artist who seems to feel very passionately about one subject in particular plant life and the natural world you only need to look at a clip of him painting to see the joy and ease he takes in illustrating nature and that's a joy he seems very keen to share with other people he dedicates a lot of his time into teaching others how to paint regularly running live classes and workshops and also releasing books on the subject like the unfortunately translated law of landscape sketch that does not tell you at school - draw using gouache gouache if you want to see a full video on Massey Yama and his work the cannibal effect has a great one link in the description down below another artists instrumental in establishing the feel of the abyss is Co ocean re the animator responsible for the chaotic wild movements of the abyss creatures yoshinari is famed for his unconventional line work and his ability to convey chaos and destruction something plain to see in the wild savage animations of the abyss is more dangerous creatures which combined with their eerie nearly alien feeling designs give a legitimately frightening threatening air to the beasts of the abyss a brutality bolstered by just how cruel and intelligent some of the business inhabitants actually are like the corpse sweeper a bird-like monster which reanimates dead human bodies in order to make them call out for help so it can draw in other humans to then prey upon its this duality that I think makes Rico and regs journey so compelling on one hand you have two extremely likeable characters who are incredibly fun to be around to people who really seem to deeply care for one another and on the other you have environments that constantly threatens to rip them apart and it's not just the individual threat of death that's frightening but the idea that if one were to die the other would be left alone something that frightens Rag in particular as while he is involved we combed f initely is not this is what underscore is reco and regs journey with a cruel sense of reality but also makes each step into the abyss feel significant and earned it's also when the show begins to make good on this threat that maiden abyss becomes nearly unbearably tense to watch I can already talk about this aspect of the show without getting into some pretty heavy spoilers but suffice to say if you like me enjoy getting invested in characters and then having your heart ripped out of your chest this is the show for you as much as I'm willing to praise this show however there are issues that I feel hold it back for one the pacing becomes a real problem about halfway through while problematic pacing can be an issue for a 26-episode series it is poison for a 13-episode series the problem kicks in around Episode six where Rico and reg enter a training arc with ozan but the issue is that it's hard to define what Rico and reg actually take away from the experience we just get a throwaway line of dialogue about how they've both improved their survival skills and it really grinds the momentum of the journey to a halt without advancing the characters in any meaningful way oh there's also the issue with Maiden abysus manga which tends to sexualizes characters in a way that I'm not comfortable showing here and my issue with this is simple these characters just feel way too young to be sexualized to this degree and it just feels gross I know there's various defenses people make for this kind of [ __ ] and I don't buy into any of them and it puzzles me as to why people feel a need to defend this side of the industry thankfully this aspect of the story is drastically scaled back in the anime mostly just Briggs awkwardness over his attraction to Rico but seeing as it's part of these series as a whole it still bothered me enough that I felt a need to point it out finally there's the way that made an abyss ends and without giving too much away I can say that just as the story really feels like it's kicking into gear the show concludes and it ends up feeling much more like half of a 26-episode series than a full complete 13 episode series and what really stings about this is that the arc that comes directly after the animes conclusion is not only the strongest of the series centering around one of the most frightening antagonists of experience in a long time it also explores and delivers on some of the show's themes of friendship and sacrifice and some really interesting and heartbreaking ways in way the anime only begins to I think if this section of the mango were adapted and adapted well it has the potential to cement maiden abyss as one of the all-time great anime series but as of now that potential is left irritatingly untapped what I think does save the series in its final hour however is episode 13 which is a 42 minutes special and if we're going to talk about this episode and what makes it special we're unfortunately going to have to drop a spoiler warning right here for the entirety of maiden abyss it feels like the series is building on two major themes the indifferent cruelty of the world at large and how only companionship can see people through that cruelty and what I love about episode 13 is how definitely it explores and delivers on both these themes focusing on the backstory of Nana Chi a character who's introduced later on in the series as well as her friend Mitty both characters were at one point human girls but after being the subject of a horrific experiments at the hands of a white whistle and the abysus v lair were robbed of their humanity with Nana Chi being transformed into a beast like Hollow and Mitty suffering far worse trapping her soul in a gelatinous cage of a body leaving her perfectly capable of feeling pain but also robbing her of her ability to die what I really loved about this dynamic is how it reframes the one between reg and Rico where reg is frightened that Rico will be killed leaving him alone in the abyss Nana Chi is equally scared that she herself will die leaving Mitty alone immortal and isolated lost in the abyss for all eternity and the conclusion these three characters reach is a heartbreakingly pointed scene about what it is to love someone and the brutal responsibility that love can sometimes bring ultimately it's moments like this that cements me what made an abyss is a wondrously joyous tale of adventure and discovery while also being a bitingly cruel story of friendships struggling in the harshest possible environment it's this dual nature of MAPE nabisco so special to me and also what reminded me of the potential anime has to tell stories of such wildly divergent tones and themes that can be all at once innocent joyous and cruel it's what made me remember why I started liking anime in the first place and it's also a pretty damn good reason why you should watch made in abyss [Music] friends thank you once again for joining me today and I really hope you had a good time with today's video if you did would like to help me create more like it as well as seeing your name listed among my beautiful backers right here then you can do so over at patreon.com slash super eyepatch wolf this week in particular I'd like to thank Vasily herb inca space Lian Yu Goro Bruno Zamboni no Carter case the Zayed show or PG grenade and Lauren B catch me on the let's fight a boss video game podcast or on Twitter at I pitch wolf friends take care of yourselves and I'll see you next time

Channel: Super Eyepatch Wolf

Views: 1,109,281

Keywords: Made in Abyss, Rico, Reg, Nanachi, Ep 10, Ozen, Fourth Layer, Orbed Piercer

Id: yjzbiKnyAv4

Length: 26min 33sec (1593 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 18 2017