Finding the Human Heart in a Cyberpunk World: An Interview with YOUR FORMA Director Takaharu Ozaki

Currently-airing anime Takaharu Ozaki to talk about how he got involved with the project, the major themes of the work, and his approach to adapting the story into animation.

Ozaki first learned of YOUR FORMA through an industry . What stood out to Ozaki about the novel was how it often felt like a metaphor for our current age. “I read YOUR FORMA without knowing anything about it at first, but what I found interesting was that the sci-fi elements could be swapped out for things extremely close to what we have in the present,” he told me. “For example, the book calls [the titular ‘Your Forma’ device] a 'cyberbrain,' but to me, it's more like a smartphone than a true cybernetic brain. All they did was put a smartphone in their heads—and while the robots are in the shape of humans, I think they are basically what we would call AI today. […] When you add this into the drama between two people, I thought this work could be condensed to explore modern themes and social issues. That was the trigger for me to say that I really wanted to do this, so I accepted the offer.”

Another part of what made Ozaki so excited to adapt YOUR FORMA into an anime was his own history with similar sci-fi tales. “When I first started reading Your Forma, I thought of typical cyberpunk stories like Ghost in the Shell, Blade Runner, and The Matrix—I was thinking of cyberpunk movies from the '80s and '90s,” Ozaki said, reflecting on his past. “As I read on in the novel, other works came to mind. There is a TV series called Westworld, which is all about what it means to be human—and there is also a film called Strange Days directed by Kathryn Bigelow that's kind of lost to time now, but it is a film where the characters can look into the brain and use what they find as evidence of a crime—and through that film, things like social labor and other kinds of turmoil are explored.”

"There is also a French animated film called Renaissance with Daniel Craig voicing the main character. It's a very interesting work set in an animated version of near-future Europe. I think it may have influenced me.” He smiled, “I think I may be responding more to stoic social issues or issues dealing with interpersonal relationships [than to the cyberpunk aspect of the stories]. Of course, I like classic cyberpunk, too!”

From pretty much day one, Ozaki and his staff had a large hurdle to overcome: how to adapt the story. Four volumes of YOUR FORMA were released during pre-production. Just as the series composition was being developed, the fifth volume was released, and the story is still ongoing.

“We had to take a huge amount of source material and put it into animation. We had to reduce the size of the story and streamline it, so it was very difficult to decide which parts of the scenario to cut or omit. Since several staff worked on it, we were all over the place—like 'this part is necessary, that part is not necessary'—and it was difficult to reach a consensus,” Ozaki explained. “In the end, when we were trying to slim it down, we said to ourselves, 'What is the most important thing? Let's keep that vital part!' and, well, that turned out to be the story's drama—the connection between Echika and Harold as people.”

This revelation brought focus to the project. “In reality, I think that by making the theme about the relationship between two people, the anime became much easier to trim down—and in the end, I think it came together well,” Ozaki continued. “I feel that we put the anime together using the bare minimum of sci-fi elements. So, looking at the final result, we focused on depicting the relationship between two people rather than explaining sci-fi terminology at length. We've reached a point where I think this will be enough to convey the content of the work.”

Of course, these cuts and changes weren't made unilaterally. Ozaki and the rest of the production staff were in regular with YOUR FORMA author, Mareho Kikuishi. “Kikuishi-san was in the scenario meetings, supervised the setting, and checked it over. Kikuishi-san also showed up at the voice recording sessions, so we confirmed various things there as well,” Ozaki explained. “I think we worked together in a style that was not so different from how it generally works for anime. [...] It went very smoothly."

Like many similar sci-fi stories, a large aspect of YOUR FORMA is the relationship between humans and androids—though not in the way you might expect: “Actually, we tried not to make too much of a distinction between [humans and androids]. The reason is that the theme in this work was not 'What is a human and what is a robot?'” Ozaki began, detailing his philosophy on the topic. “This may be a selfish human assumption, but if ‘minds’ exist in things other than humans […], then I think there is a possibility to connect with them and find value in them.”

“If minds exist in everything, for example, if this plastic bottle and this book have minds,” he said, motioning to the objects on the table, “and we can become attached to them, then there can be some kind of relationship between them and humans. [...] I think that's important.”

This theme is further bolstered by the fact that humans can't differentiate between the living and the robotic by appearance alone. “As for the Amicus, to feel familiar to human beings, it is necessary to radiate a sense of trustworthiness. If they are scary or eerie, they will not fit within the human world,” Ozaki explained, alluding to the uncanny valley phenomenon. “The only way to tell them apart [from humans] is to look at the ‘Your Forma’ interface screen. In the anime, we added an Amicus recognition application setting—so ‘Your Forma’ s can see who is an Amicus. From the general public's point of view, they're almost the same as humans, so it's hard to tell.”

Of course, as this is a story about the relationships between Amicus androids and humans, it's important for us, the viewers, to be able to tell them apart. So, how does Ozaki tackle this seemingly inherent contradiction between the contents of the fictional world and what the audience needs to see? “You won't be able to tell the difference just by looking in this anime. You will only know which characters are androids when you need to know [for the sake of the story],” Ozaki told me. “We always drop it into the dialogue or put [the information] in the line of sight on someone's ‘Your Forma’ interface—to make sure to indicate that a given character is an Amicus.”

“If you don't really know [who's an Amicus], there's no drama,” Ozaki continued. “So while you don't know if every single character walking down the street is an Amicus or not, we scattered hints so that you can recognize the fact when it's important—for the characters that you should recognize as being Amicus.”

To wrap things up, Ozaki elucidated the story's appeal for audiences worldwide: “I think that the connection between people, between things, and between anything and everything is something that applies not only in Japan but is something shared in common all over the world. I think watching this anime will be an opportunity for everyone, whether Japanese or foreign, to reexamine and face the relationships between people.” Ozaki concluded, “I don't think it's possible to move forward by denying such human relationships, so I am sure that, in this respect, this feeling—or rather the thoughts of the staff—will definitely connect with people all over the world.”

YOUR FORMA is currently streaming on Samsung TV+ in the U.S. and on YouTube and other services worldwide.