Leviathan mY: The Frame-by-Frame Analyst Who Made Chinese Animation Worth Watching Twice

Leviathan mY is a Chinese animation and gaming analyst and one of the most distinctive figures in Bilibili's animation section. His account, which he has operated under the handle Leviathan mY since beginning uploads in the late 2010s, has accumulated approximately 1.94 million followers as of early 2026, and he has been named to Bilibili's annual Top 100 UP Creator list twice, for 2024 and 2025. His account registration date is August 1, though he has never publicly disclosed his real name or educational background. What distinguishes him from the vast majority of animation commentators on Chinese video platforms is his method: he approaches animated series and video games not as entertainment products to be consumed and reviewed but as dense visual texts to be read frame by frame, with every camera movement, color choice, and background detail treated as potential evidence for interpretive claims about the work's deeper meaning. His videos routinely run thirty minutes to an hour, and the production cycle for a single episode can extend beyond three weeks, a pace that places him among the most labor-intensive creators in Bilibili's animation ecosystem.

Leviathan mY began his Bilibili career in the late 2010s as a commentator on domestic animation, or guochuang, a category that Bilibili was actively promoting as part of its broader strategy to support Chinese-origin creative content. His early videos focused on series such as *The Legend of Qin* and *Mortals' Journey to Immortality*, and he quickly established a reputation for noticing details that other commentators overlooked. His analysis of *Mortals' Journey to Immortality*, for example, examined the internal logic of magical combat systems by tracing the consistency of rules across episodes, demonstrating that the series' apparent complexity was grounded in a coherent set of principles that the animation team had carefully maintained. This approach, which treats animation as a system of meaning rather than a sequence of spectacles, attracted an audience of viewers who wanted more from animation commentary than plot summary or emotional reaction. By 2021, he had accumulated approximately 500,000 followers and was selected for Bilibili's Top 100 UP Creator list for the first time. His growth continued steadily over the following years, and by January 2025 his follower count had reached approximately 1.526 million, rising to 1.937 million by early 2026.

What makes Leviathan mY's content structurally distinctive is the extreme granularity of his analysis and the sheer volume of research that supports it. His most celebrated project is a four-hundred-thousand-character analysis of *The Wandering Earth II*, the 2023 science fiction film directed by Frant Gwo. The video, which runs well over an hour, reconstructs the film's hidden narrative lines by cross-referencing visual details across the entire runtime, from the design of control panels to the positioning of background characters. It was not merely a review but a reconstruction of the film's implied world, and it became one of the most widely cited analyses of the film in Chinese-language media. His sixteen-part deep analysis of *Black Myth: Wukong*, the 2024 action role-playing game developed by Game Science, represents an even more ambitious undertaking. Across sixteen episodes released over several months, he examined the game's narrative structure, mythological references, environmental storytelling, and combat design, culminating in an interpretation of the game's ending that differed substantially from the readings offered by most other commentators. The series was widely praised for identifying details that even dedicated players had missed, and it established Leviathan mY as one of the most authoritative voices on the game's narrative complexity.

His other major works include comprehensive analyses of *The Legend of Qin*, one of China's longest-running animated series, and *Link Click*, a time-travel thriller that became one of the most critically acclaimed Chinese animations of the early 2020s. His analysis of *Link Click* focused on the series' use of visual clues to foreshadow plot developments, and he demonstrated that seemingly incidental details in early episodes functioned as deliberate setups for revelations in later seasons. This method of analysis, which he has described as treating the animation team as collaborators in a puzzle that the audience is invited to solve, has influenced a generation of younger animation commentators on Bilibili. His video on the animated series *The Ravages of Time*, adapted from the historical manga by Chan Mou, examined the series' treatment of political strategy and its fidelity to the source material, and it was cited by fans as an example of how adaptation analysis can illuminate both the original work and its animated interpretation.

The platform achievements of Leviathan mY reflect the growing institutional recognition of deep analysis as a legitimate and valuable form of animation content. His two consecutive Top 100 UP Creator selections, in 2024 and 2025, placed him alongside creators with audiences several times larger than his own, a recognition that reflects Bilibili's stated commitment to rewarding depth over mere popularity. His average video performance is substantial: his most successful analyses have accumulated millions of views, and his sixteen-part *Black Myth* series generated sustained engagement across its entire release period. In 2025, he was featured in media coverage of the Top 100 list as a representative of the animation analysis category, with journalists noting that his inclusion signaled the platform's recognition of "frame-by-frame interpretation" as a distinct and valued genre. He has also collaborated with animation studios and game developers, including a 2025 collaboration with the studio behind *Mortals' Journey to Immortality* for an exclusive interview with the series' director, demonstrating that his analytical work has earned the respect of the creators whose work he examines.

The broader social value of Leviathan mY's work lies in his demonstration that animation and video games are worthy of the same kind of close reading that literary scholars apply to novels and poems. In a media environment where animation is often dismissed as children's entertainment or treated as a niche passion with limited intellectual depth, his videos argue implicitly for the artistic seriousness of the medium. He does not approach animation with the assumption that it needs to be defended; he approaches it with the assumption that it contains layers of meaning that reward sustained attention. For viewers who have grown up with animation and who sense that there is more to their favorite series than they have consciously noticed, his videos offer a second experience of the work, one in which passive enjoyment is transformed into active interpretation. His emphasis on evidence and reasoning, rather than emotional declaration, models a way of engaging with popular culture that is both rigorous and passionate.

In summary, Leviathan mY represents a model of the creator as a visual close reader, someone who has built a significant audience by doing one thing exceptionally well rather than by chasing the latest trends. His nearly two million followers, his two Top 100 UP Creator selections, and his sixteen-part *Black Myth* analysis are all evidence that his method has resonated with viewers who want more from animation commentary than a recap of plot points. For Bilibili, he is a cornerstone of the animation section and a demonstration that the platform's community culture can sustain creators who prioritize depth over speed. For viewers, he offers a reminder that the most rewarding way to experience a great animated work is to watch it twice: once to enjoy it, and once to understand how it was made. His long-term significance lies in his demonstration that the most valuable cultural criticism is not the loudest but the most careful, and that an audience exists for content that respects their intelligence and invites them to see what they have been looking at all along.