Check out our Q&A transcript with Masayuki Kojima, Shimpei Yamashita, Kevin Penkin, and Hiromitsu Iijima at the Made in Abyss premiere.

Q: How did you all first got involved with the project?

Yamashita: pretty simple I was in the bookstore when I saw the manga I fell in love, and from there I looked how to get involved I went to a production company and there was Mr. Ogasawara introduced me to Mr. Kojima.

Kojima: “I was introduced to the manga by the manga jacket it was that simple. As I started to read the manga I grew more involved in the world of the abyss so then I knew I had to get involved in making this film.

Yamashita: Also while working on another project I got introduce to Kevin Penkin and Hiromitsu Iijima and I asked them to be in charge of the music”

Kevin: “I was working at the time on 'Norn9' and also we did 'Under the Dog' a Kickstarter project after we completed these two shows 'Under the Dog' and 'Norn9' [Muneki] Ogasawara and Hiromitsu Iijima came to me and said we have this new project and all of a sudden it was “Made in Abyss” and  then we just went and started writing music and now we are here in this big movie theater. Not sure what happened in between. [laugh]

Iijima: “I remember it was six years ago or seven years ago.

Kevin: I was 22 when we met.

Iijima: So young when we meet.

Kevin: Yea what happened [laugh]

Iijima: So we met making 'Under the Dog' and 'Norn9' so Kevin, you are a genius making the music, especially emotional and action music. So it's well balanced and perfect for a composer. So 'Made in the Abyss' was a new challenge.

Kevin: So with 'Made in the Abyss' we didn't really have much of a blueprint we weren't sure what music was going to work with it so it was a bit of a guess but it worked out.

Q: Kevin what were some of your inspirations for the different music and themes in the film?

Kevin: So when I started writing as you can see behind us in this image there is a lot of foreground with the characters being very up-close and a lot of backgrounds. so it is a very dynamic picture with a very dynamic color palette and artistic approach to the picture. if you derive musical parameters from that you can see how it would make sense to have some instruments quite up front and sort of quite clear in the mix but also have a lot of background atmosphere creating the depth that the picture shows. so creating the depth between foreground and background was an interesting point to start with musically speaking and within that, you can distort styles and genre at your leisure. But as long as you have that sort of approach of lots of foreground and lots of backgrounds it should all work it, well that's the plan.

Q: Kojima do you think we will ever know all the mysteries of the abyss?

Kojima: I believe we will know all the secrets at one point but Mr. Yamashita I leave that to you.

Yamashita: how many years will it take? Well, of course, the only person who knows the secret of the abyss is the one who writes it and creates it. we all look forward to Tsukushi-sensei manga every month, but we have heard some things that are coming out in the future. so if you would like to know all the secrets of the abyss if you continue to support this film we are very interested in giving you all the secrets that are going to be coming out. so it would be wonderful if you can continue to support it by telling friends and spreading the word.

Q: Who is you're personal favorite character from 'Made in the Abyss'?

Kojima: Actually my favorite character isn't in this film but hopefully it will come out soon, really, really cute animal that I really love.

Kevin: this might sound a little cynical considering who I am holding (holds up a Nanachi plus) I really like Bondrewd. Now I have to write music for that guy at some point this year so I am looking to dive into that mind of his and seeing what comes out it won't be fun but impactful. so yea Bondrewd and Nanachi is kind of cool

Iijima: Mine is Regu as my favorite. I love Regu the fact that he is kind and has an iron body.

Yamashita: Mine is Marulk-chan.

Fan Question: The anime consists of 13 episodes how many of those episodes are in this film?

Yamashita: The episodes are 9, 10, 11, 12, and 14 which is a double length episode.

Fan Question: What were the challenges in adapting the art style from the manga into an anime style and then a movie-length film?

Kojima: First of all it is a very unique style very creative, very beautiful. One of the most difficult things about doing it, you have Tsukushi-san doing the manga by himself and then the anime is done by a whole team and then the film another team, so finding the balance between that is hard. even though it was a challenge doing this it made me work even harder to find the balance.