Crapsack World/Anime and Manga: Difference between revisions

* The [[Cosmic Horror Story]] that is ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]''. After half of us have died and the Earth was left a wasted place, what was left of Humanity is left in a post-apocalyptic death race against the [[Eldritch Abomination|Angels]]. The only means of defense is to send what few children were born at the right time out in gigantic Angel-derived Evangelions. But it's actually worse than that. The children who are supposed to pilot the Evangelions [[Dysfunction Junction|are traumatized, broken, neurotic and mentally unstable]] to begin with, and the rest of the cast is growing to be increasingly generally bitter, psychologically incompetent, and pessimistic. Also, the entirety of existence basically revolves around the Hedgehog's Dilemma, which is the philosophical notion that if you go near other people, you become Hell to them and they become Hell to you, but when you go far from them, you cannot survive. As time passes, the dysfunction and insanity [[It Got Worse|only gets much more worse]] in scenes that [[Mind Rape|are more and more]] [[Go Mad From the Revelation|madness-inducing]] and utterly horrifying, while everyone is forced to watch them in all their gory details, the most memorable of them being played with [[Soundtrack Dissonance|unfitting music]], finally culminating in what the [[Omniscient Council of Vagueness|masterminds]] who masqueraded themselves to be humanity's protectors had in mind in the first place: {{spoiler|[[The End of the World as We Know It|ending the world in a manner that suits them]] through a controlled mass [[Mind Rape]] and [[Suicidal Cosmic Temper Tantrum|suicide of all humanity]] caused by the fusion of two dead-yet-almighty [[Eldritch Abomination|Eldritch Abominations]]. The only positive thing is that humans can be reborn, but the world would have been left as a totally alien and deserted Hell by then}}.

* ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's]]'' has Satellite, where Yusei has lived a hard life. This changes later on in the series.{{spoiler|The post-apocalyptic world Z-one, Antimony, Paradox and Aporia come from is also this.}}

* Newport City in [[Dominion Tank Police]] is a pretty horrid place to live. The main [[Sociopathic Hero|heroes are violently crazy for tanks and blowing up lots of stuff]], the few good people are all targeted by criminals, the whole city has been blanketed with a poison gas cloud for years, ANY attempt to fix this is sabotaged or destroyed, corporations are so corrupt that it would scare William Gibson, and life is generally pretty cheap.

* [[The City]] In ''[[Blame]]!'' is immeasurably vast and completely unmonitored, with countless civilisations existing within it; most of which are run by cruel and corrupt cyborg overlords. A common goal for anyone in the '[[Verse]] who hasn't already modified (or ''had'' modified) their bodies to the point of looking only vaguely human, is obtaining access to the [[Cyberspace|Net Sphere]] - which would serve the duel purpose of stopping the chaotic expansion of [[The City]] (which, by the end of the [[Manga]], had consumed {{spoiler|a majority of the Solar System}}) and providing an on-line paradise for anyone and everyone. That's right; in this world, ''absolute escapism'' [[Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism|is the only hope humanity has left]].

*** But wait, there's more! It turns out all iterations of the Devilman 'verse are interrelated because {{spoiler|the entity [[God Is Evil|known as God]] has put the whole setting in a perpetual time loop to torture [[Satan]] with the death of the one he loves over and over and over again}}.

* For the most part life in the ''[[Gunnm]] / [[Battle Angel Alita]]'' universe sucks hard. The few somewhat decent places happen to use things like [[Mind Control]] in order to maintain said decency. We don't know very much about Jupiter and Venus other than the facts that the people of Venus [[Eats Babies]] (genetically engineered to be non-sapient) and on both planets the people have biological immortality, which as a result of this they do not allow the birth of any more children. The places that don't have this limit are in a civil war (Mars), or just happen to be hellholes that don't legally exist which results in assorted miscreants doing whatever the hell they want in said places including and definitely not limited to wiping them out, which occurred on Earth and some asteroid colonies (like the nursery colony the Guntroll team was from).

** The [[Toku]] style Hero of Justice is a vigilante psychopath.

* Between the warmongering kingdoms and their [[Aristocrats Are Evil|corrupt nobility]], the [[Corrupt Church|heresy-crushing Holy See]], and [[Demon Lords and Archdevils|the evil Godhand]] [[The Legions of Hell|and their ravenous demonic Apostles]], life in the world of ''[[Berserk]]'' really, really, really, really, really, [[Overly Long Gag|really]] sucks hardcore. [[Cosmic Horror Story|The world seems to exist only to make people as miserable as possible and to give the demons somewhere to play]]; humanity exists so that the demons have something to play with. The biggest idealist in the entire setting (who is ''anything'' but altruistic and is quite willing to use ruthless methods to accomplish his dream) snapped under the pressure and is now the [[Big Bad]].

** The demons get screwed, too. The price that people pay to become demons, in addition to sacrificing the people closest to them, is a guaranteed trip to Hell after they die. Hell is a nightmarish vortex of damned souls that drags your spirit into it, where you suffer indescribable pain and torment until all traces of your being has been utterly consumed in a sea of eternal suffering. And thanks to {{spoiler|Griffith/Femto taking advantage of the Skull Knight's dimension warping attack, [[It Got Worse|that Hell has literally broken loose]]}}.

* Post-apocalyptic Tokyo in ''[[Akira]]''.

* The Future that Trunks came from in ''[[Dragon Ball|Dragon Ball Z]]'', a ravaged post-apocalyptic wreck where two powerful Androids go around killing anyone who opposes them, and have already killed the most powerful heroes of Earth. What makes it worse is that the [[Reset Button|Dragon Balls]] are gone because Kami, who shares a soul with Piccolo, one of the aforementioned heroes, is dead.

* Most of the stories in [[Osamu Tezuka]]'s ''[[Phoenix]]'' series. The historical chapters feature a decidedly unromantic depiction of feudal Japan full of war, famine, disease, filth, corruption, death & copious amounts of mutilation with sharp objects. But at least the characters in those stories had [[Scenery Porn|the breathtaking beauty of nature]] to raise their spirits. Those who have the misfortune of being born in this world's bleak, [[Zeerust|Zeerusted]] future get no such luck. In addition to having all the above mentioned problems, the world is ecologically screwed, full of [[Fantastic Racism|bigots]] who mistreat [[Cloning Blues|clones]] and robots, and occasionally ruled by an [[Corrupt Church|oppressive theocracy]]. After people start piling into rocket ships to escape this awful mess, the Earth eventually faces an immigration crisis when the space colonists & their children start coming back in droves because most of the other planets in the universe are even ''worse'' than the world that they left! When humanity finally goes extinct in the (chronologically) final chapter, it comes as something of a relief.

* The war-torn desert planet that ''[[Now and Then Here and There]]'' takes place on, mostly because it's a (slightly) exaggerated version of modern Africa.

* ''[[Hell Girl]]'' is ostensibly set in the real world. But with each grudge Enma Ai satisfies, it's more obvious that hers is a world of miserable bastards. On the one hand, we have her targets, almost always selfish people who deceive, abuse, and hurt those around them. On the other hand, we have her contractors -- who, while usually sympathetic, nonetheless resort to ''damning their enemies and themselves to hell'' to solve their problems. (The most generous thing you can call it is assassination.) And then there are the cases where the contractors are just as bad, and even where the targets are completely innocent. Ai will take pretty much anyone's contract, and she never lacks for work. The ultimate proof of this [[World Half Empty]] is the final storyline of ''Futakomori'', in which {{spoiler|hundreds of people in one town go vengeance-crazy, damning even their friends and family}}. It's a great show, but watching too many episodes in a row is hard on the soul.

** Futakomori (the 2nd season) is sick and sad enough...but wait until you see Mitsuganae (the 3rd season); it will shatter you soul into a little pieces.

* Pick a [[Hideshi Hino]] manga. Any Hideshi Hino manga.

* Any work of [[Mohiro Kitoh]] qualifies, most especially ''[[Bokurano]]'' (the manga at least), which takes place in a Multiverse Half Empty with, without giving anything away, [[Cosmic Horror Story|about as hopeless a scenario as anyone can imagine]]. As well as his effectiveness in savaging modern day life, his work focuses on the individual effort of people to stay noble in the face of such circumstances.

* The Universal Century of the ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam]]'' franchise. The One Year War which causes the deaths of half the population of the Solar System is between the Earth Federation, a corrupt, incompetent, and racist government unable to properly defend the solar system vs the Principality of Zeon, who started the war by gassing a colony full of millions of people and dropping it on the Earth. Even after the One Year War was over, war constantly sprung up due to the weakness (and/or the [[Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam|malice]]) of the Earth Federation, and [[Complete Monster|Complete Monsters]] are incredibly common. You can seriously argue that the solar system would have been better off if both sides had wiped each other out.

** [[Fridge Logic|Better for whom???]]

*** ... but yet the same tragedy repeats in ''G Saviour''. People never learn...

** Well, there is [[After War Gundam X|one Gundam AU based on the premise of the Federation and Zeon wiping each other out]]...while certainly less dark, it's hard to say people are better off.

** The setting of ''[[Mobile Suit Gundam 00|Gundam 00]]'' is a crapsack world as well, with the people living in poverty suffering endless warfare while the rich people relying on the giant solar panel system not giving a fuck about them. In the first season, political games among the three greedy, corrupt global superpowers still exist, and the second season is basically all the corrupt politicians banded together to continue torturing people who suffer in extreme hardship under their tyrannical grips. In both cases, we have the [[Byronic Hero]] Celestial Being who are among the very few people truly willing to change the world for the better even though their methods are questionable at best.

{{quote|'''Setsuna F. Seiei''': Exia R2, Setsuna F. Seiei, clearing the way for the future!!}}

* In pre-timeskip [[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]] humans have been driven from the surface into underground villages. If anyone dares to climb to the world above, they're mercilessly hunted down and killed by the Spiral King Lordgenome's Beastmen. Of course, all it takes is a band of insanely badass fighters led by an exceedingly charismatic and determined idiot, and then his young friend/stepbrother of sorts to turn everything around. [[It Got Worse|Then the aliens show up...]]

** Neither the Pre-timeskip world nor the Post-timeskip world looked too good. First people were forced to live underground, so there would never be 1 million humans on the planet. After timeskip, they are forced out of their underground homes, where they were safer, only to reach 1 million and get attacked by aliens, though those are easily repelled... until they toss the Moon at Earth, just to make sure humanity is exterminated. It gets better, though, when Simon and Co. turns the Moon into the Cathedral Terra, a giant battleship later named Chouginga Dai-Gurren.

* [[Mind Screw|Whatever's going on]] in ''Angel's Egg'', it's world isn't an inviting place to live.

* The world in ''[[Urotsukidouji]]'' is apparently such a wretched place {{spoiler|the Overfiend decides it's worthless and destroys the whole frikking thing!}}

** inhabited by oblivious, arrogant people,

** stricken by severe poverty or