Heavenly Delusion was almost perfect
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.ย. 2024
- Heavenly Delusion was a great show. Overwhelmingly so. As I was watching I knew I wanted to make a video about it. But by the time I finished I felt like the entire show was overshadowed by one decision.
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ive watched like 3 of your videos in a row now and i was so suprisied to see that you only have 1.84k subs, your content is so good and polished, i hope you grow and dont stop making amazing and well thought out content
Thank you 😁
Me too...
It is very rare that I seek out a certain author to watch back to back
This is the second time I have done this
This video... this one really shows your humanity
There are places too hard for me
Thanks for putting out this comment
Same
I'd love to watch some video essays on Link Click from you
thank you for the suggestion, I hadn't heard of it before this but it looks really interesting!
Oh man, made in abyss suffers from a very similar problem, where like certain parts of it are amazing, and others are completely unnecessarily sexual. Great video, it’s a problem that comes up more than I’d like in anime ;(
holy moly I hated what they did in made in abyss. I genuinely cant stand some of the decisions they made, like when they are descending into the last layer, or in the movie when reg is connected to those cables. It was really terrible ughhhh.
@@PeyTalksAnime it’s soooo unfortunate because the world and setting and music is INCREDIBLE imo. S1 is still one of my favorites despite everything. But it just keeps getting worse 😭
@@PeyTalksAnime Okay THANK YOU. I commented on Reddit one time about how I enjoyed season 1 of Made in Abyss but that so much of season 2 felt like egregious suffer porn. Like, having the child who was abandoned by her tribe for being infertile give birth to ONE baby that died immediately would've been plenty tragic and heartbreaking. But then, to have said child continually give birth to new doomed babies day after day? And this somehow 'saves' the crew? It just got so ridiculous that I was laughing by the end tbh
I mean this is a whole different type of sexual, usually it's sexual for the sake of fanservice, this was sexual for the sake of unsettling the viewer
Thank you for pointing out you had made a video about this. I wholeheartedly agree with your take. I also went on to read the manga almost out of morbid curiosity after that scene. I think it's safe to say it was unnecessary, even as some kind of tool to change Maru. Neither character is affected enough to warrant what happened. In fact, I'd say that the lack of change is a critical part of why the scene is so bad to the point of being rightfully called offensive, or at least justifying a major asterisk to what is otherwise great writing.
I know I'm commenting this late. I just wanted to say while I understand what you are talking about, this is NOT a scene for maru in the slightest. If you haven't read the manga then this scene will feel very hollow, like it feels like they just move on all hunky dory and to an extent it does. Kiruko does not move on. The way they process the trauma of what happened to them is very prevalent in the preceding events but I don't want to spoil anything for you or anyone who reads this so I won't talk about it more than that.
Was it necessary? That is up to you of course I'm not really the judge of what you connect to or not, but for me as someone who has been through that exact thing and having read the manga up to it's current chapter. Kirukos thoughts through out the process of all of it are incredibly realistic to what I went through as I as well as them did not seek help for a long time and just trying to PMA through it. It gave me a feeling of not being alone, like I'm not the only one who has been through this and maybe I can make it too.
While I understand why it has made people uncomfortable, especially when so many anime have tried this and failed on many many levels. It gave me something to confide in when I had no one to turn to and helped me get the help I need. and I think that more than worth something.
Anyway sorry if that was poorly formatted or if it was too longwinded I haven't written something this long in awhile. Thank you for your time and have a good day. :)
Thank you for sharing your perspective. It's insightful and compelling
@@PeyTalksAnime No problem and I forgot to say good video btw
I probably missed a few of the latest chapters, but I honestly don't plan on reading further. After reading pretty much every chapter until a few months ago, I still very much feel like it was brushed off. Did it affect Kiruko? Yes. Does it do justice to the awfulness that took place? It's a very flat "no" from me. At this point, I very strongly doubt that it will ever come back around feeling like it was necessary. Is it likely we'll see Robin again and that this will affect a second reunion? Of course, but I still doubt it will feel satisfying or necessary.
@@OhmIsFutile I think you have a very black and white view on how trauma affects individuals. Especially given the state of the world they live in. You'd be surprised what the human brain can do to deal with traumatic events when you have no choice but to keep moving.
@@mathiaschristensen1194 Nobody can claim to know exactly how every victim would react, but this is a narrative. Narratives usually exaggerate things. At the very least, as pointed out in the video, major events are meant to serve a purpose, whether it is to drive change in certain characters or move the story forward or something. For having read the manga up until recently-ish, I will gladly repeat: it doesn't really serve the narrative.
This level of grossness was absolutely unjustified and, nevermind exaggeration, we hardly see much of a trauma response. We could say Kiruko dissociated or is repressing it to the point of basically forgetting about it, but I still find that answer disrespectful to real victims because the severity of what happened does not match the attention it's receiving. We don't even get much worrying from Maru. We don't get any substantial reflection from Kiruko either and the state of the relationship with Robin could have been changed to a similar degree without going this hard.
So to start off, I absolutely love Heavenly Delusion, I genuinely mean it when I say it has been one of the most impactful forms of media I’ve ever observed. In so many ways I have seen myself in these flawed characters and even been unfortunate enough to experience some of what they have.
Beyond this will be spoilers for the series from the manga. Primarily, it was revenge. We learned recently in the manga that Robin was the one behind the disappearances that we saw in the beginning of Kiruko’s flashback. He was secretly abducting women (and possibly men) to both experiment on them and to SA them. Kiriko found out what he was doing right before the flashback starts and plans with their orphanage leader to leave town with all the kids. Of course everything in the flashback occurs and Haruki’s brain is put into Kiriko’s body. so Haruki knows nothing about it. Many scenes in the series hint at this, but we only realize this 6 years after the manga started.
I genuinely find it so hard to talk about this scene, because with more of the context we have now, it is in character for him to do that. He’s had a powertrip his entire life, literally since childhood. Considering this, part of me wants to say that it is “valid” in the show, but at the same time I have to wonder if there is something else they could have done to still get across how horrible he is.
I have watched the anime 5 times and read the manga 2 times, I genuinely love his writing, world building and art, and maybe in the end the story that is told will justify that scene existing in the series. We have to keep in mind this series has literally brought back ideas or concepts introduced in the first chapters of the series, so he without a doubt has put an incredible amount of thought into the work. I hope that im not just wishfully thinking that that scene happened for a reason.
I agree with this honestly, the rest of the show was amazing and that moment just felt unnecessarily dark.
i want to say i really enjoy your videos, especially the last couple. I had saw you had a video on this and i rushed to finish the show since i was half way through the first season. Though in this instance i cant say i agree, even though i can 100% see how you got here
The bit i dont agree with to a less extent is that this was for trope. I dont know if they were trying to give Maru a hero scene, because i dont know how they're going to tackle it since it was a season ender. I do think this was really poor planning and this show should have been green lit for at least 18 instead of 13 episodes just fix this problem. I dont like judging things in parts and instead look at it as a whole. I can understand your distaste but until i see the whole story and see how this effects Kiruko i cant share in it just yet
I also dont feel like the attack at the end of the season was any darker then what we had seen before. Our main characters met a man whos back story was literally "i was a sex slave and the only women who kinda cared about me was killed helping me." that story line alone let me know the writer was not afraid to go really dark, this moment just feels worse cause we were shown it and it happened to one of our two main characters
2:00 i completely agree with that statement about black mirror, there was one particular episode i watched that pissed me off to no end and made me never want to watch the series, its an episode called crocodile, long story short its just a short film where a woman murders an entire family including a blind child then gets caught. all it did was make me angry that i just essentially watched a murder film where no one won.
MAN THIS IS SPOT ON
*Spoiler warning*
Straight up summarized my thoughts in video form. The way I rate this anime is "it should have been a 9, but the SA scene made it an 8". So unnecessary, the way the characters react to it is so dumb, brushing it off like nothing happened, and the fucker doesn't even die which would have softened the blow a little bit. The story is SO GOOD, the mystery aspect is incredibly intriguing and engaging but the author is unfortunately a creep and a little obsessed with sexualizing the main character. It's so common to see anime fans willingly ignore overly sexualized characters because it's the norm but I have never been able to stomach it. Such a shame too, since it's genuinely a masterpiece of a show otherwise.
Whats worse is when I went to the manga to see if this ever got a shred of resolution, I had to stop cus every other damn chapter had naked kids in it. Author needs his hard drives checked bad
@@o0ugi860I was wondering the same thing because my theory was that they brushed it off immediately after so that it could be explored deeper in the next season, but am I hearing that it just ends at that?????
Completely agree, it was a great show, no doubt, but that scene and how they handled the aftermath especially just left a sour taste in my mouth for the finale. I do have some interesting theories about it, but as an anime only we'll just have to wait and find out I guess.
This almost perfectly expresses my feelings about that scene. I actually thought the scene itself was really good. What bothers me is what they did with it. SPOILER WARNING
Based on what was shown and implied, Haruki spent several days imprisoned and being r*ped. I think the horror of that, as well as his identity crisis were portrayed very well, and yet it somehow feels inconsequential to the plot. Like you said, it happened right at the end of the season, so maybe there’s more, but as it is now it’s like the author wrote that scene, then completely forgot that it was actually a significant plot point. I forget their names, but bad guy gets beat up, Haruki is saved, and has somehow completely recovered? He’s just experienced unfathomable psychological trauma, but he seems…fine? How does this event not affect his character WAY more? It’s like they wanted this moment, but then didn’t know what to really do with it.
i haven't watched the video yet but i'm guessing it's about the very uh oh not good thing the author did with (REDACTED)
(SPOILERS IN THE READ MORE)
edit: y e p
on top of the topic of "necessity", I feel like a lot of the "perverted" stuff that they did with Kiroku.... wasn't necessary. Did Haruki NEED to ACTUALLY FALL IN LOVE with his own sister? Did Kiroku's boobs NEED to be groped by that one homeless/storyteller guy?
i could be wrong, but honestly I just feel like none of these things really added to the story in any way other then being... gross. You could replace Haruki and Kiroku's relationship with literally just a normal loving sibling relationship, and nothing much would change.
but again, I could be wrong, maybe there IS something I'm not seeing? who knows
yo any chance you could add a spoiler warning to the edit if possible.
I definitely agree. I think a lot of anime viewers (me included) have developed a tolerance for scenes that are very weird, especially when it comes to topics like unnecessary sexualization of a female character. They also could have kept all of those scenes without making them so fan service-y by changing the shot. I think those shots are largely a byproduct of anime targeting the audience of teenage/preteen boys and often offer little to nothing to the story while being yucky
@@PeyTalksAnime the incest is what really threw me over the line
i will never be the same
You’re right. For me, I can understand how Haruki having a thing for his sis Kiroku is a normal phase for some young boys, but I thought it added to the tragedy of him being in her body before he had a chance to work out those feelings. But then, I guess it wouldn’t change anything if it were left out. What was totally unnecessary was the guy groping Kiroku’s breasts for so long. It was played up as a comedic scene, but it really undercuts the horrific SA themes.
Wait I understood them as "orphan siblings", like they happened to be come across each other at some point and started to help each other out, thus creating this "brother/sister relationship", at least for the older girl, but the little boy just didn't see it like that.... or something....? No? Like how Maru just starts calling "Haruki/Kiruko" as "neechan" from the get go, even though he didn't even grow up with him/her?
That moment was a deal breaker for me too. And I like Made in Abyss, even if it has a lot of cringy sexualization.
This whole scene was a really complicated jumble of issues, even in the Manga. I have to agree that it was top dark for darkness sake. But what it did do, at least in my oppinion was capture how complicated and nuanced the situation was.
Major Spoilers for those it concerns.
Kiruko, at least seemingly, (the flashback has yet to be explained in the manga) was in love with him. And her brother loved him deeply, though in a less mature way. As such when Maru, arguably rightly snapped, Kiruko stopped him.
And it isn't as if the scene came without consequences. Moving forward into the manga Kiruko's self-worth and self-esteem are lower than ever. And her budding feelings for Maru are actively being buried by her over the trauma she has gone through.
It becomes a rightly complex situation for Kiruko's already very messed up psychology and was treated with at least some level of decorum. Though I did have to skip large sections of the manga because the author most certainly over sexualizes characters he shouldn't. I was surprised to see both care and nuance being brought to a sa narrative considering how under valued and under focused the topic is in Japan.
Specifically, in Japan it is shockingly common and rarely punished with anything more than a minor fine. Which isn't me trying to defend the Mangaka per say. More just shedding light on what a complicated issue this all is.
If you guys thought that was dark, wait til you watch berserk
ok so, take this with a grain of salt. also, spoilers below.
-------------------
as someone who's had some personal experiences with SA (i'm not gonna use the other word in case youtube gets fussy), and also an anime fan that happens to be a woman (tragic) i've always had a bit of a love/hate relationship with the mediums portrayal of this topic- and women in general, but that's another story. in a genre already rife with fanservice and misogyny, there's a real tightrope to walk between portraying SA with levity, or even comedy!? (see panty-shots, randomly groping people, sexualized framing of women and girls, casual sexual harassment, etc) vs. being so graphic it felt like fanservice AND shock value rolled up in one exploitative package. [ there *are* shows that do it right. everyone go watch revolutionary girl utena] so suffice to say i'm pretty critical when it comes to passing judgement on portrayals of this topic. that's just my experience as a viewer, etc.
so, when i first watched heavenly delusion, there were definitely a few scenes that made me pause and say. "huh. was this *really* necessary?" maru and haruki/kiriko's weird "big sis" thing, and the scenes where maru kind of ignores consent (he's a kid, he fucks up, i get it. im not cancelling maru). haruki/kiruko's exploration of her naked body- the one that once belonged to her sister. and then, there was That Scene. i definitely needed to sit with it for a while. upon rewatch, i came to a few conclusions: heavenly delusion is a show about the messiness of Bodies: the onset of puberty, budding sexuality, the discomfort and alienation you can feel in your own body, struggling with gender and gender roles, etc. (haruki's story esp. felt like an allegory for body dysmorphia and/or gender dysphoria). to me, That Scene is there to portray the ultimate violation of the body; someone taking something that should be yours and making it their own. and the fact that it was robin, someone that haruki trusted and loved, that did that to her, made her watch, made her feel like a stranger in her own skin-- that felt like a gut-punch, but it was realistic. more often than not, an abuser is someone the victim is familar with, trusts or loves. you might struggle to reconcile your former relationship to that person with the horror of what was just done to you. what i will say is that i wish the series had focused more on haruki's pain in that moment- it *did* feel a bit like an outlet for maru's anger and guilt and helplessness- all of which are valid for him to feel, but centering him in that moment does fall closer towards "woman in fridge" territory. i am also just an anime-only, so i have no idea how That Scene will impact the rest of the story. i'm hoping it gets used as an opportunity to portray haruki's disassociation/ discomfort in her body and explore the effects of trauma post SA. i'm hoping it *doesn't* just become fodder for maru's hero complex (i love him, i do, but this isn't and shouldn't be about him.) we'll see, i guess.
*in conclusion: i really liked heavenly delusion. i think it's inclusion of SA was just as graphic as it needed to be- no more and no less. it served it's purpose, and upon rewatch there's a certain catharsis in watching robin get beaten to a pulp. i hope the story delivers on that front. i would also probably add a trigger warning if i were to recommend it to a friend. excited for what's to come.*
[ wow that was a lot longer than i'd intended. just found your channel through your frieren analysis and am enjoying the nuance with which you approach your analysis! figured i'd add my two cents, unnecessary as they may be, in case any of it resonates with your interpretations. looking forward to more videos!]
Spoilers, the author doesn't deliver. Kiruko just walks away entirely unaffected like it never happened and Robin barely gets comeuppance.
But you don't got a problem with the episodes before? We saw man shoot himself in the head?? And you know it's not a seinen
It's post apocalyptic setting it's not an excuse but it has been part of the gerne to be realisticly dark. You don't see bezerk going around giving you a warning on how fucked this world is
I agree with this. This is not the first time i‘ve heard this criticism and i always wonder: what about the rest of the show? We see people get their heads cut off, blow own their brains out, etc. This was not even necessarily the darkest moment in the show, but it was the most shocking for the audience since it was our main character being affected this time.
And imo, there’s not really anything you could do that’s as effective in showing how much of a bad person robin is and makes sense in the context of the story.
The real world can be a lot more fucked up than media and as soon as we get a glimpse of that inside our comfort zone, people freak out.
And berserk also has a problem with using rape to create shocking moments and then just acting like it never happened. At least in berserk it's done really well at some points like with casca, but Farnese and the horse? That added literally nothing. Same with the rape in heavenly delusion (also the author definitely likes kids, the manga has naked kids ever few chapters it's horrid I dropped that shit immediately)
I get your point, maybe the scene was too graphic and it made uncomfortable to a lot of people but I must disagree almost entirely with your statements from a scriptwriter point of view and here is why (I am a graduate of film school).
First of all, Heavenly Delusion is a Seinen manga, that's the category for "adult" type of topics were there is a heavy emphasis in murders, dystopia, philosophical statements, etc... and was produced by Production I.G, were animes are influenced by japanese culture, so this type of storylines fall into the "normal" category. Examples of another very graphic Seinen manga turned into anime is Attack on Titan. So when this scene you mentioned did impacted a lot of viewers, that is just because cultural differences, anime like this is usually directed towards japanese audiences. Your critic is trying to portray Heavenly Delusion as a Shonen like Naruto, but it is not.
Another example of this is Berserk, a well known Seinen manga where in one of the arcs, there is a very graphic rape scene, that broke mentally the character and left it as a shell of its former self. I am not saying it is good or bad, I am just laying out the foundation that whether this made western audiences uncomfortable or not, anime are not cartoons and will not try to appeal for western culture.
I think the authors tried to make it as realest as possible, you can not cut short the trauma a person must endure during a rape and the aftermath of it. In a post apocalyptical setting, is much more likely that this things can happen due to the lack of laws and extreme violence to survive. When the scene as a whole was hard to watch, I think your point of view is inclined towards a subjective opinion were it harmed you in a psychological level, rather an objective one were it shows the true reality of female brutality in the world and an ongoing problem in today's society.
Didn't cross your mind that sugar coating this scene would harm a true rape survivor? To just label the scene as something that "happened" and the female character just get on with her life?
Where I do agree with you is about the hollow necessity to make a female character go through this in order for the development of other characters, but again, if you want to portray a true world trough your story, there are certain topics that cannot be left at the side. This rape scene was labeled and foreshadowed from the very beginning where they mention in episode 3 that Robin was obsessed with Kiruko, so it was just a matter of time for this to happened.
Regarding all the other sexualization of Kiruko and other female characters during the series, yes I agree is unnecessary and gross, but again, Japanese culture is very weird and I assume that they think of it as normal. They are known for consuming "pervert" type of media and anime does not fall short in this either.
Big brain take IMO, and to add to this the scene was not just a rape scene, it created new questions from plot previously given, answered others, and altered the physiological battle between his own mind and the viewers. It leaves us in the same position as kiruko with a graphical demonstration of the trauma not just because of rape, but the feelings that were caused and questions left on the table from the identity torture. It wasn't just development for other characters, it inserted a larger magnitude of self identity that is on seesaw with one another. I'm not saying rape was the only way to portray that, but I wouldn't say that this was a trope either. I thought it was well-thought out for the world, and was a catastrophic amount of character building for multitude of people.
Robin was not the person we thought he was going to be, but has been transformed from a safe haven to a villain in minutes. His backstory is unknown for the most part, and his goals were wildly inconclusive. Yes rape is horrendous, yet other than the physical action, he was "scientific" in that scene, he was more interested in whos mind it actually was, what other way to do that in a world like this without other forms of torture. Albeit, horribly indecent he had a goal in mind in actions that we as people don't accept in our lives.
@@MinorinX Exactly yeah, you have added very good and profound points regarding this topic.
I think the main reason there is some backlash in this type of content, is because like you said, the weight falls on the philosophical and psychological spectrum of the characters, which you can't see literally.
In Shonen anime the characters get their resolve by throwing punches and that is what audiences are accustomed to. We actually see the intent of the writer by not letting Maru killed Robin.
I agree with the part where you mentioned "sugar coating it would harm a true rape survivor"
Are you aware how in Western media, movies and shows get sugar coated because they don't want to make the fans uncomfortable? I think showing these can help people understand and notice these types of situations.
As an art student, you'll see an eclectic range of artworks that makes the audience feel things or give their own interpretation of the work.
@@sagemaster1357 Exactly, that is why for us as artists is much more difficult nowadays to express freely certain topics in western market because of media guidelines that constrain art in general due to consumption of "normal" and mundane content that can produce money more easily.
We are bound to it and there are not a lot of escapes from this, another reason why people is moving away from Hollywood and trying to release there own art through self publishing.
Unfortunately this rape scene is literally pointless. All it does is generate shock. And you can't use berserk as an example when berserk has both the casca, which was handles incredibly well and the farnese horse scene, which was utterly pointless just like this one.
I read forward in the manga because I had watched up until the episode before the one with the r*** scene and wanted to know what happened. Needless to say I was completely blindsided, and left wondering if maybe the manga tone was darker than the anime's. The tone wasn't that much different, though iirc the manga r*** was a little more graphic. Anyway, I read forward up until the end of what was currently out at that time (probably a couple volumes past _that_ scene) and I can tell you I haven't seen much rationale for it in the manga thus far either.
"That" didn't bother me. I don't think it it because I've been desensitized. I didn't enjoy "that" and it wasn't meant to be enjoyed but I also won't pretend that it's part of the "art" or "the world they live in".
Maybe the author could have include that in a different way like you said, maybe it was careless of the author to even just bring up that subject. I dunno but all I can say is that I don't feel like the author was treating his characters like it's been done with Made in Abyss and that's why it doesn't bother me.
The way things were presented did imply more of it than what could have possibly been done and I think it was good enough while it could have gone even worse. We are supposed to hate the aggressor and we are supposed to understand that something is really broken in him and sometimes the best way to convey that is by having the aggressor be what he is and make sure that it's disgusting.
I'm also not saying you are wrong for feeling this way, we all experience things differently and I really like your take on that situation because it's a point of view that's worth looking at and discussing.
i think that wasnt a faulty thing in the story.
The funny thing is I agree with the “almost perfect” sentiment but my asterisk would point to a different thing in the story. The two things that rubbed me the wrong way were 1) the bear episode, especially with how it sexualized that one character, and 2) when the main character had their breasts groped by that one guy in a way that was played for laughs. Both of those moments felt largely unnecessary and in bad taste, something I didn’t feel towards the moment you were talking about (though I can definitely understand where you’re coming from).
Great points. Very fair!
i would disagree it made the ending better than if it would be less dark in my opinion.
would be nice if the author doesn't shove a bunch of Kiruko fan service knowing how bad the context is story-wise. The ending was also unnecessarily morbid provided what happened in both the anime and manga. The fact that it's a core part of the story that changes them as people and the fact that it was practically forced to happen is baffling. Hope season two makes up for it
That's the one place I find devastating
I know a victim I know how it stays with her
I know if people get good therapy RIGHT AWAY... it has a better impact
I know she didn't
Yeah, honestly the more and more I study Japanese culture and history, and its impact on anime, it becomes apparent that this stuff is put into the anime not to appeal to people’s wants or the intended audience, but because it appeals to the authors kinks and feelings. It really becomes bothersome and disturbing, especially the more you notice it even in your favorite shows that you never caught it in before.
Yes, some authors have kinks and fetishes but that doesn't mean they have a kink for grape nor do they condone that behaviour.
@@sagemaster1357 i think you should scan more with an open mind and see that at times that isn’t the case. Its easy to kneejerk and say that that isn’t something that others feel because you don’t want them to. But some are capable of disgusting things and its usually only the surface that they project outside.
tbh scenes like that are so off putting to me that i tend to skip ahead even tho i may miss out on some things.
I don't like dark for the sake of dark, but when is adding value i have no problem, you are too sensitive.
It didn't add value tho?
Ngl for me I think the school section is the weakest of the show it didn't match to the creative and interseting plot with kiruko and maru adventure.