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Elfen Lied
Posted By EthaNox On June 29, 2010
Anime Review: Elfen Lied
Here is the first part of our new cycle of dark anime reviews, a title which many would call a “Master Piece” without getting weird looks. Elfen Lied is built on a great set of characters and has enough action to keep things interesting, especially for those fans who love the bloody bits and pieces of anime.
Not for The Faint of Heart
Elfen Lied doesn’t beat around the bush when it says it’s loaded with adult themes. There is some nudity in the opening sequence and the first episode starts off with a violent gore-fest carried out by a naked woman, so many people with gentler sensitivities will be turned off by the first few minutes of the show even if the nudity is amazingly tasteful by many an anime’s standards. However, those who were looking for pure gore by the end of this first episode will also be let down. The thing with Elfen Lied is that it doesn’t try to be edgy or controversial; the general feel of the use of gore and nudity comes through as almost a way for its creator to make an artistic statement while keeping things interesting.
At the end of the day, Elfen Lied deals with something as basic as human nature and how much of a horrible thing it can be. The themes in the anime do not dawdle too deeply into philosophy and evolution as they did in the original manga and yet they manage to convey a series of ideas about humanity as a species. In a way, you could say that Elfen Lied appeals to the primal nature of its viewers; using violence, death and in a lesser form sex to guide them through the story. The anime is classified as mature not just because of the strong visual content, but the way it is engineered to draw on emotion and thoughts from the viewer’s mind.
Twisted Beauty
The show is based off of a manga by the same name created by Lynn Okamotto in 2002 and was later adapted into the 13 episode show in 2004. Even though they are related, by the end of the anime you’ll find that the two greatly differ. The anime came around half-way through the manga’s plot, so it was left to an ambiguous end that, to this day, leaves fans demanding for closure.
On the bright side, though, the manga’s artwork is vastly improved in the anime which gives the characters and visuals a more polished look that flows nicely. The animation work is provided by AMRS, a somewhat obscure studio that has produced shows on the pervier side of the scale, which some fans would take as indication that they paid close attention to the female character’s form. Hiyoo!!
The first episode of Elfen Lied serves as great way to sum up the general tone of the show. The anime starts off with an amazingly gory and somewhat cruel sequence that once it is put into perspective will lead to a better understanding of one of the main characters’ personal traits. The sequence itself leads on to a calmer half where the innocent aspect of the show takes form.
In a nutshell, the first episode serves as contrast between the female lead’s character. She is a “Diclonious”, a mutant human born from an unnatural step in evolution whose sole role seems to be the extermination of the human race as the dominant species, that loses her memory due to the events that took place during her bloody escape from a facility where she was being held. As a product of this memory loss, a second half is created. What many would go on to call her “human” half features a child like personality that resembles a new born baby that the main human characters decide to take in and name after a sound she constantly makes: “Nyu”.
The first episode of Elfen Lied is what hooks many fans to the show as it begins to unravel the plot piece by piece by presenting a series of foreboding events and the introduction of the main cast, including both sides of the show’s “cover girl” Lucy, the seemingly evil and sadistic girl with a mysterious past.
All in all, Elfen Lied is an absolutely terrific show that doesn’t hold back until the end which is sadly a huge let down. Not because of what happens after the credits roll but because a certain scene involving a wig that will leave those who didn’t read the manga scratching their heads. The anime and manga differ greatly around this point, but both are strong enough in their own regards to be taken as examples of how adult themes can be used to convey a wonderful story without being senselessly violent or overly sexual.
