The channel arose from a desire for analysis of currently-airing anime that went beyond impressions and reactions and surface-level opinions.  YouTube was awash in such content, but it also had a wealth of critical analysis and structured studies of past series. Trying to find a way to marry the two schools of videos was the unfocused notion upon which the channel was founded.  While there are a host of other types of content that were always intended by the channel creator (a guy named Th8a, with an 8), this was the original mission Nearly On Red was created to pursue.

And it failed almost immediately.

In order to pick a series well-suited to analysis, it was insufficient to rely on popularity or audience anticipation or even other anime journalists.  To choose the best option for critique, the critic should be the one who does the choosing, and this meant watching every single premiere episode in a season.  There are usually 40+ such premieres every 3 months (as anime seasons are actual seasons, 4 per year). While the viewing of so many first episodes is not an overwhelming burden, there was an accompanying hope to create a video each season which gave a roughly-sixty-second rundown of each premiere.  This was also a type of content that didn’t exist — a look at the complete lineup in a single video from a single source. It turns out there is a reason for this.

The first season for which Nearly On Red produced content was the Summer 2017 season, which begins on or around July 1st.  A look at the first line in this section will reveal the problem: that first video was August 8th, almost 6 weeks after the season began, very nearly the halfway point.  Even for an experienced content-creator, the viewing, critiquing, scripting, recording, and editing necessary to cover 40ish episodes in a single video is…well, it’s a tall order.  For a complete neophyte, it was far too much to bite off. Thus when actual analysis began on the first series (Made in Abyss), it was so far behind the broadcast that the basic purpose of analyzing something current was unmet out of the gate.  It would probably have been wiser to abandon the overview video when it was clear it interfered with the main goal, or at the least not begin a series halfway into its broadcast. Th8a did not possess such wisdom at the time.

Actually, we need to back up.  The August 8th compilation video was the first one published, but it was not the first one attempted.  In fact, Th8a had tried to do the very same thing for the season before, the Spring 2017 anime lineup. 100 or so hours into that video he abandoned it, as it was still incomplete and it was nearly 2 months into the season.  In light of this failure, Th8a found it untenable to similarly give up on the Summer 2017 version despite its own set of delays. There was a desire to prove to himself that he could actually complete something and set it loose into the world.  He did not wish to add another entry to the list of failed videos. Failed videos — plural that is — because actually…

Actually, we need to back up even further.  The first content intended for the channel was a look at the complete canon of the Ghost in the Shell anime: all the series and movies, one episode or movie per video.  The idea was to walk through the entire filmography in publication order, leading up to the March 31st premiere of the live-action Ghost in the Shell movie. Had the movie been well-received, the various anime properties would likely see a commensurate bump in audience interest and accompanying bumps in YouTube searches for Ghost in the Shell content.  

Trying to do so many videos in so little time was doomed from the start, but we don’t know what we don’t know.  Th8a was even less wise in those days. The plan then changed to at least taking a thorough look at the original 1995 movie and then at the live-action version.  However, production for that first analysis ran longer than anticipated, and before Th8a had covered even half of the movie he already had a 2-hour video on his hands.  He didn’t believe anyone would be willing to sit through a 4-hour YouTube video analyzing a single work. A 4-hour video seemed too crazy to try. Instead, he turned to at least looking at the new live-action film.  He went to both Thursday night pre-screenings, and then stayed up all night attempting to give something approximating “valuable insight.” It is best for us all that this never saw the light of day. Once the backlash against the adaptation was apparent, it seemed a poor use of time to try to rescue the analysis, especially as the new Spring 2017 season had begun.  Th8a thus abandoned the last attempt to do something Ghost in the Shell-related, and turned his attention to the much more important Spring 2017 compilation video.

Which — as we know now — was also eventually abandoned.

That brings us back to the Summer season, where Th8a finally put out a first analysis of an ongoing series, a look at Episode 1 of Made in Abyss.  Seven weeks too late, but at least it was finally begun. There was no hope of finishing the series before the Fall 2017 season commenced, but he would do what he could in the meantime, and figure out his best course of action when October came around.  Certainly he was more experienced now, and was unlikely to make similar mistakes.

When the Fall 2017 season began, Th8a decided to make similar mistakes.

He once again tried to make a sixty-second compilation video of every new series, again choosing one to analyze in an ongoing manner.  Shocking no one except him, this also took many weeks to create, stretching well into the Fall season. This of course meant that the new choice (Land of the Lustrous) would start behind schedule just as surely as Made in Abyss did…but with the added bonus that he hadn’t finished those videos, either. Now the two series each interfered with the other, and not only would he be unable to complete the Fall choice of Land of the Lustrous before the Winter season, he also wouldn’t be able to finish Made in Abyss.

Th8a thus began 2017 believing he would be putting out content all year, completing a look at the Ghost in the Shell canon, analyzing the premiere episodes of the Spring, Summer, and Fall seasons, and further analyzing 3 new series to completion.  He ended the year having completed not even a single series.

In light of this gulf between expectation and reality, Th8a changed things up for Winter 2018 season.  It was time to see whether he even could do what he originally intended: thorough analysis of current content.  He abandoned all notion of doing another compilation video, and further put Made in Abyss and Land of the Lustrous on hold.  Instead he chose a new series for Winter 2018, in hopes that with no other distractions he could manage the week-to-week videos initially envisioned.  The series chosen was Darling in the Franxx, a two-cours show that would run for the next 6 months. With no other distractions (and very little sleep), Th8a managed to stay on top of analyses for each new episode with only a couple slip-ups.  When that series wrapped up in July, Th8a finally accomplished the original goal: a complete episode-by-episode analysis of an ongoing series. This, then, was the only acceptable proof that he could do what he hoped. The channel concept was safe, and so was his dedication to it.

Emboldened by finally succeeding, Th8a returned to work on Made in Abyss, while also introducing new variations on analysis formats over the next two seasons.  Despite taking on multiple shows in both of those seasons, he managed to stay current week-to-week while also whittling down the remaining Made in Abyss backlog.  He ended 2018 having stayed on-schedule for the entire year, a complete reversal of 2017.

And then in January 2019, he finished Made in Abyss.  The finale video ended up being 4 hours long. This, even though a 4-hour video seemed too crazy to try.

It’s one of his most-viewed videos.