Don't worry, you didn't miss out on anything of value: the vaguely interesting and aesthetically neat setting is half baked as all hell and gets glossed over with even its core conceit ("you can't go up lmao") only ever mattering as much as the author feels like caring about it. I went and did a whole writeup (CW: it's about Made in Abyss, but all the worst stuff is under a spoiler with clearer CWs) a couple of weeks ago about how awful the show is and spent the next day melting down from the psychic damage. I think this line from that sums it up the best:
The whole experience is that of a sort of cargo cult imitation of a dark fantasy adventure story by someone who is fundamentally vapid and brain poisoned. It’s basically just mimicking genre tropes and trying to bring out emotion through showcasing horrific things, but it fails horribly because to put it bluntly the author is too twisted in his perspective and too aroused by what he wrote to do anything but revel in and whitewash the horror.
I'm probably failing to understand something, but I thought the ascending sickness was handled consistently. It only impacts passing the barrier between layers (and does not affect the robot, Reg). I do think it's bullshit that you can go up the "death" layer and avoid death by going back down again within a few seconds, but that's kind of a different problem.
There are several times where it hits a point that's like "wait, being unable to go up more than a few steps would be narratively inconvenient here, so, uh, the curse is just off right here, doesn't happen, we can forget about it for now." Also, even though it's described as being "between layers" in the start it quickly becomes "actually it's all the time, except when it's not," and then becomes even more incoherent where sometimes going up is fine because it's just a little and other times a few steps on a staircase are a deadly threat.
I'm starting to remember that there was that weird exception of the layers not having any effect inside of the city, though I think that one was fair enough given the cause, but I'm also quickly realizing that I should stop unearthing memories because I completely forgot about the birthing thing until I read your review. I will just trust that you've got it right.
I'm also quickly realizing that I should stop unearthing memories
Yeah, that's how I feel every time it gets brought up and all the concentrated awful of it comes welling up. "Cognitohazard" is a meme word but goddamn if it doesn't describe knowing about Made in Abyss perfectly.
Don't worry, you didn't miss out on anything of value: the vaguely interesting and aesthetically neat setting is half baked as all hell and gets glossed over with even its core conceit ("you can't go up lmao") only ever mattering as much as the author feels like caring about it. I went and did a whole writeup (CW: it's about Made in Abyss, but all the worst stuff is under a spoiler with clearer CWs) a couple of weeks ago about how awful the show is and spent the next day melting down from the psychic damage. I think this line from that sums it up the best:
I'm probably failing to understand something, but I thought the ascending sickness was handled consistently. It only impacts passing the barrier between layers (and does not affect the robot, Reg). I do think it's bullshit that you can go up the "death" layer and avoid death by going back down again within a few seconds, but that's kind of a different problem.
There are several times where it hits a point that's like "wait, being unable to go up more than a few steps would be narratively inconvenient here, so, uh, the curse is just off right here, doesn't happen, we can forget about it for now." Also, even though it's described as being "between layers" in the start it quickly becomes "actually it's all the time, except when it's not," and then becomes even more incoherent where sometimes going up is fine because it's just a little and other times a few steps on a staircase are a deadly threat.
I'm starting to remember that there was that weird exception of the layers not having any effect inside of the city, though I think that one was fair enough given the cause, but I'm also quickly realizing that I should stop unearthing memories because I completely forgot about the birthing thing until I read your review. I will just trust that you've got it right.
Yeah, that's how I feel every time it gets brought up and all the concentrated awful of it comes welling up. "Cognitohazard" is a meme word but goddamn if it doesn't describe knowing about Made in Abyss perfectly.