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Even before his ending of Gunnm (AKA Battle Angel Alita), the elements of AV were in place. Kishiro-sensei had given us the world of the Scrapyard; but he had only showed us angels, geniuses, and those with hope and a reason to be. He had professed his love for his own creation: Motorball, the ultraviolent sport of heavy crashes and cheap life. Lastly, there was the subtle though persistent mention of his love for American illustrator Frank Miller, among whose creations is the noir comic Sin City.
It is in AV that we see the convergence of these forces. The story revolves around Snev, a second-tier Motorball player with the talent--though, perhaps, not the stamina--to become a champion. But forces much greater, much more powerful than himself, are steering his fate on a course towards oblivion. With each frame, we wonder who conspires against Snev--his team, his "friends", faceless automata around him, or the demons feasting upon his psyche.
Along with this shadow-dark storyline comes Kishiro's adoption of an almost-monochromatic style. Snev's eyes stare out of the page, black pupils inside white sockets. The street signs that adorned Gally's world have been replaced by disjointed words and fragments. It is only the objects of beauty and trust in Snev's world--the prostitutes, though ironically, Snev seems to have no lust--whom Kishiro has given more than blotches of black and white.
Snev's world is, indeed, a Rorschach inkblot: how do we react to these people, and their conflicts? Do we draw away from the violence and unsheathed lusts? Do we cry at the senseless death and violence? Or do we reach forward and grasp at the shards of humanity that peek up from the concrete and sewage? God is dead, Satan nonexistent, in Snev's dystopic reality. Into this void rise people, merely people. How like the world we see around us....
