Why no one Ever Agrees on what is the Best Arc in Made in Abyss

Piromysl said:
Have you ever wondered why you are hardstuck on 300 subscribers?

Piromysl said:
Have you ever wondered why you are hardstuck on 300 subscribers?

Apolygon2 said:
1. I don't upload much
2. sometimes I make random shit that actually 0 human beings care about
3. I don't have schedule or one specific type of content that I do 
4. I rarely ask for subscribers, and when I do it's at the end of the video or in comments
5. I still have yet to develop a "internet personality", idk what to call it, you know what it is
6. I'm not stuck, I am slowly gaining. the reason it seems like I'm stuck is because most of my subs were from one of the videos blowing up, so now that, that has slowed down, it seems like I'm stuck. even though I am going faster than what was my normal rate.


I can name a lot of things. unlike what you think I am more than aware of my short comings. and I also know this wall of text is something that not many people would care about. but I still made it for my own satisfaction, sue me for liking to talk about the writing of shows I like.

Piromysl said:

That's not what I meant.
You just got the entire premise wrong. While overall analysis is nice, the question revolves around something completely irrelevant, which is MAL score and that is not that interesting and will turn off some people.
It basically comes down to score fluctuation. Much less people added manga to their list and rated it, having much more rating power, while anime has much more members and some of them are softies who gave it a low score because children characters are being hurt (Yes, we should gatekeep anime) and that's it.

Apolygon2 said:
you bring up a good point.

I changed it, is it better now?

SandyAxe78 said:
Maybe cause it’s mid 🥱

Apolygon2 said:
you know, I never understand the pleasure of seeing a fan talk passionately about a show they love, and having this urge to just go, and say it's mid.

as ma boy thorfinn says "you are my enemy"

what do you get out of doing this?

I think demon slayer is mid, I don't go write "it's mid" on every topic or post about it. that's just toxic. 

SandyAxe78 said:

Didn’t even read what y’all said. I was just extremely bored. No hate lol

Apolygon2 said:
fair enough I've been awake for 31 hours, this is my version of shower thoughts.

Apolygon2 said:
Made in abyss's story is an anomaly. it has done something that no other piece of media that I know of has ever done.

yesterday I was thinking about how made in abyss is the only show where none of the fans can agree on the quality of the arcs. like there is no fan favorite part. you can ask 100 different made in abyss fans and get 100 completely different takes on the quality of these arks in comparison to each other.


this doesn't happen with other shows. there isn't always a clear winner, but there are always more liked and less liked parts of the story. but that is absolutely not the case for made in abyss, and I think I know why. 

ladies and gentle men, may I present to you:

The Element focus theory:

As you can probably guessed, the name is something that I made the fuck up, but I promise I'm going somewhere with this.

made in abyss is a complex show, and has many different layers in more ways than 1. and complexity is achieved by fusing different elements for the sake of creating a better final product.

and made in abyss, has a lot of elements. 

so, let me ask, what is made in abyss to you?

is it an adventure deep into the unknown, filled with new, terrifying and exciting discoveries?

is it a heart breaking tragedy that can bring the manliest of man to tears with it's unrivalled emotional climaxes?

or is it a survival show, focusing on 2 lonely kids, fighting elements much stronger than them, getting hurt, and always barely scraping by?

or is love craft horror. with disturbing imagery that become a part of your nightmares for years to come?





well the show is obviously all of these, and every arc does include them to some degree.

but ask yourself, this, which one of these elements is your favorite thing about the show?


and chances are, I can tell you exactly what your favorite arc is based on that answer.

what abyss does, that no other show has done, is that every arc focuses on one of these elements. I don't mean it removes other stuff, but every arc pushes 1 of these elements to it's maximum potential. 

think about it.

season 1, is the adventure season. yes every other season has adventure, and yes season 1 still has horror, survival, and tragedy, but when you think made in abyss season 1, you think adventure first.

the movie is survival. most of it is about escaping, fighting, surviving just to get past this seemingly all powerful threat. it's the entry where our characters come the closest they have ever gotten to dying. it's also the entry that by far has the most action scene. it's a battle of survival. when you think dawn of deep soul, you think about "getting past bondrewd". once again, the sense of adventure is still there, so is the horror, and tragedy. but survival is the main plot point.

the city of scorching sun or made in abyss season 2, is tragedy. There is not a single non-extremely tragic plot point in this whole arc. from the very start, it's the tragedy of outcasts and helpless adventurers going down a path they can never come back from. the history of the village, is tragedy, faputa's creation is tragedy, reg forgetting his promise is tragedy, the fate of the village at the end is tragedy. 



going on scale of 1-5 on each aspect:

s1 is 5/5 adventure,  3/5 tragedy, 2/5 horror, 3/5 survival

dawn of deep soul is 1/5 adventure 3/5 tragedy 3/5 horror 5/5 survival

and city of scorching  sun is 2/5 adventure 5/5 tragedy 4/5 horror 2/5 survival


you see what happened?

every arc is pushing a different strength of the show to it's maximum potential. and since all of them are done extremely well, a huge part of "what arc is the best" will depend on "which aspect of made in abyss is your favorite"


I am near certain one of the arcs in this show is going to put it's biggest focus on horror.


thanks for reading, I want some different takes on this. I want to make it into a video, but I also want to discuss it a little before doing so.

CHT13 said:
I’ve really enjoyed each arc for all the different reasons you pointed out. I would put adventure and survival as my favorite aspects followed by horror and tragedy in that order. Tragedy last because it’s so gut wrenching but adds such emotional weight to each part and it wouldn’t be made in abyss without it. I wonder as it keeps going if I’ll become immune to the tragic parts? Probably not. There’s also the mystery aspect that I love so much. Maybe in your video you can discuss that as well. So which arc do you think I like the best?

Apolygon2 said:
Made in abyss's story is an anomaly. it has done something that no other piece of media that I know of has ever done.

yesterday I was thinking about how made in abyss is the only show where none of the fans can agree on the quality of the arcs. like there is no fan favorite part. you can ask 100 different made in abyss fans and get 100 completely different takes on the quality of these arks in comparison to each other.


this doesn't happen with other shows. there isn't always a clear winner, but there are always more liked and less liked parts of the story. but that is absolutely not the case for made in abyss, and I think I know why. 

ladies and gentle men, may I present to you:

The Element focus theory:

As you can probably guessed, the name is something that I made the fuck up, but I promise I'm going somewhere with this.

made in abyss is a complex show, and has many different layers in more ways than 1. and complexity is achieved by fusing different elements for the sake of creating a better final product.

and made in abyss, has a lot of elements. 

so, let me ask, what is made in abyss to you?

is it an adventure deep into the unknown, filled with new, terrifying and exciting discoveries?

is it a heart breaking tragedy that can bring the manliest of man to tears with it's unrivalled emotional climaxes?

or is it a survival show, focusing on 2 lonely kids, fighting elements much stronger than them, getting hurt, and always barely scraping by?

or is love craft horror. with disturbing imagery that become a part of your nightmares for years to come?





well the show is obviously all of these, and every arc does include them to some degree.

but ask yourself, this, which one of these elements is your favorite thing about the show?


and chances are, I can tell you exactly what your favorite arc is based on that answer.

what abyss does, that no other show has done, is that every arc focuses on one of these elements. I don't mean it removes other stuff, but every arc pushes 1 of these elements to it's maximum potential. 

think about it.

season 1, is the adventure season. yes every other season has adventure, and yes season 1 still has horror, survival, and tragedy, but when you think made in abyss season 1, you think adventure first.

the movie is survival. most of it is about escaping, fighting, surviving just to get past this seemingly all powerful threat. it's the entry where our characters come the closest they have ever gotten to dying. it's also the entry that by far has the most action scene. it's a battle of survival. when you think dawn of deep soul, you think about "getting past bondrewd". once again, the sense of adventure is still there, so is the horror, and tragedy. but survival is the main plot point.

the city of scorching sun or made in abyss season 2, is tragedy. There is not a single non-extremely tragic plot point in this whole arc. from the very start, it's the tragedy of outcasts and helpless adventurers going down a path they can never come back from. the history of the village, is tragedy, faputa's creation is tragedy, reg forgetting his promise is tragedy, the fate of the village at the end is tragedy. 



going on scale of 1-5 on each aspect:

s1 is 5/5 adventure,  3/5 tragedy, 2/5 horror, 3/5 survival

dawn of deep soul is 1/5 adventure 3/5 tragedy 3/5 horror 5/5 survival

and city of scorching  sun is 2/5 adventure 5/5 tragedy 4/5 horror 2/5 survival


you see what happened?

every arc is pushing a different strength of the show to it's maximum potential. and since all of them are done extremely well, a huge part of "what arc is the best" will depend on "which aspect of made in abyss is your favorite"


I am near certain one of the arcs in this show is going to put it's biggest focus on horror.


thanks for reading, I want some different takes on this. I want to make it into a video, but I also want to discuss it a little before doing so.

Grub_ said:
I think I enjoyed the movie better because of the build up made by season 1, introducing the White Whistles as important figures, Ozen putting Bondrewd as a threat, Nanachi hating him because of the things he did to her and when we go to the movie everything just colapses and it's amazing. I was expecting the same thing for season 2, but i ended a bit disappointed.

Eva_Unit_00 said:
I don’t know, I think I gave Golden City of the Scorching Sun a 10/10. But Vuekos death really pissed me off.

Usual_Vermicelli said:
what make me like Made in Abyss is the Adventure part, and of course when they slowly reveal the mystery of the Abyss.

and those also the reason this anime fell off little bit for me, because there's not much adventure anymore past season 1.

although I kinda like the evolution? upgrade? from the Season 2, Prushka get crafted, Silver Reg, Riko... haircut?? and Nanachi new gear (although she doesn't really need it, nor it serve any purpose, yet)

APolygons2 said:


bruh lmao

how is nanachi's gear and a hair cut more important that freaking faputa joining the crew?

did you jist forget or is there another reason you didn't mention her?

Usual_Vermicelli said:

which part of "evolution" did you not understand? if I prefer liking character upgrade/development over added roaster, that's my preference.

getting additional characters has been a constant in the series. Nanachi in season 1, Phruska in Movie and Faputa in season 2. It's no longer a surprise.....

APolygons2 said:


i mean, heres the thing the introduction of bondrewd and nanachi in s1 was indeed build up for the movie.

but if you look at it from a slightly different angel, s2 had the same build up.

s2 was obviously longer than the movie, so it spend 8 episodesd building up the city and its backstory before hitting you with the climax.

the only difference is that the movie's build up was in s1, while s2s build up was within itself.

and s1 didn't really need that much build up since the appeal was adventure. And learning and exploring on its own is thr appeal of that genre.

Grub_ said:

Honestly, i feel like the appeal of MIA is the mystery, i can put everything past me just to keep seeing where it will end and i think that's why most people have a problem with the movie or season 2.

Both of them are a detour made in the main story, we are prepared for the movie because of the build up and everything, but season 2 introduces us to a new society (and yes, we know about the past between Reg and Faputa, but we could live without it too) and our main story is completely put aside for something some people don't care about.

And this new arc of the manga seems to be going back for the main story and build up for some big event, i hope.

APolygons2 said:
hmmm... I mean fair. this latest arc had it's own mysteries, but the only overall mystery was reg's past.

I feel like the fact that there are still party members joining shows that we are probably half or less of the way through the story. and I personally don't think spending an entire arc fleshing out the said party member is a bad thing at all.

I see what you are saying though.

I guess my only question to people who think like you is, what is it exactly that makes the main plot more interesting?

is it just because it's the main plot?

cause to me these ""side stories"" are just as, if not even more interesting than the main plot, so I wanna understand why some people aren't as invested in them?

SakataGintoki246 said:
Wow I really enjoyed reading this thread

brandondb0 said:
I’ll settle it for you. Dawn of the deep soul was the best. Bondrewd is GOATed as a villain, and season 2 was mid for the reasons Grub gave.

Jailed said:
I agree completely. Not to mention, all the genres that it combines go so well together. The concept of the village and its trading system for me felt way too complicated for made in abyss, at least it felt that way in the manga. But I understand how people would appreciate this arc more than others

Hopefully a future arc does focus on the cosmic horror aspect of this show, one of the best and most interesting horror types but super under represented in anime

APolygons2 said:
I can see that. 

s2 being my favourite may actually be partly due to a guy that made weekly videos reviewing the episodes as they came out, with super high quality. and he did clear up a lot of small things that I was confused about, and also pointed out a lot of cool details.

s2 is definitely the one that can easily make you lost, so that guy really helped me fully appreciate it and not miss anything.

Jailed said:


What is that channel? I’m interested now

Jailed said:


What is that channel? I’m interested now

APolygons2 said:
this guy: https://www.youtube.com/@TheMickellPickell/videos

his channel is mainly about animating the manga of made in abyss, but I've only seen the videos he made on the anime.