Anime : What does the escapist think about Elfen Lied?

[l3o2828]

There seems to be a clear love/dislike split with the show.

I'm clearly in the dislike camp. OK, I did watch it and what I saw was thought provoking and fairly interesting to see, but ultimately a good number of things just ruined it for me. No, not the gore, the gore was fine, but the nudity. Why? I love to see a good pair of breasts as much as the next guy but this was just... ugh. Far too much of it at fairly inappropriate times, and I think I died a little when Nana's clothes got ripped off by what's-'er-face toward the end, for no apparent reason. It went beyond "fanservice" and into "turn-off" category often. Though, I have to admit, the first ten minutes were perhaps the best handled of any part of the show. It painted Lucy as both evil and powerful in a very primal way, and the nudity and her covered face only added to the monstrosity that she was.

Which leads to my second real argument. I could never quite figure out what this tale wanted to be. Obviously it was trying to be serious and dark, but at times it seemed like it was trying to be silly. For instance, I can handly Lucy losing all of here memories when shot in the head, and it's easy to swallow a personality change, but Nyu is annoying. It would have been far more interesting to see Lucy emerge from the water with no malicious intent, but still with a voice and words to speak. It would have been interesting to see her memories slowly come back, but the care and decency she would have seen from Kohta had caused her to second guess her actions. What would she do? Go back to her old ways? Feel remorse? Would she kill Kohta and company in a cold-blooded manner, then everyone else? Or would her remorse get the best of her and the pain of living with all that death cause her to commit suicide? I just think there's an incredibly intriguing character arc buried there that only rears its head every now and then. I believe there are some other characters that could have had interesting arcs as well.

Another mark against it is that it often tries too hard to be dark. It has little depth, but unlike some stuff that tries to be too dark, the depth could obviously be there but it just isn't. It takes on far too much and never gets down to solving it all, and it comes across as bad by the time Kohta is forgiving Lucy for popping his father's head off years ago. Actually, it came across as harmful to the show when it reveals that Mayu's father was a pedophile. That entire character was nearly unnecessary.

A final complaint, and this one was given on both sides so don't pull the "shoulda watched subbed" shit on me. The dub is not good at all. I liked Lucy's voice, it was pretty interesting. It was definitely female, but it was also deep and strong and introverted, just like her character should be. Kohta sounded like a dumbass, which he was so I guess that fit too. Everyone else sucked, especially Mayu and Nana. What's worse, I didn't hate their characters, just their voices. They were so fake and annoying and high-pitched that it got on my last nerves.

I do have other complaints about the show, but there are my main ones. The idea had the potential to be an amazing anime, one to prove that anime could really be a form of art instead of just a stupid cartoon. It could have stood up there with Cowboy Bebop and Neon Genesis Evangelion, but ultimately it sits on a pile of decidedly average stuff with too much hype.

I like this. I like this a lot.
It's basically a much more kind-hearted version of my review (although mine is decidedly longer since i take on every small aspect then review it generally)

 

[somonels]

Yup, mostly recognized as great by teenage boys because of flat boobs, pointless violence and extremely generous gore.
I did like it when she liquidized the daycare kids, but a waste of time and memory otherwise.

 

[BreakfastMan]

Overly pretentious, shallow, emo porn. It had a nice idea, but was badly written, unappealing, and was incredibly, pitifully depressing to an absurd degree. I often found myself gagging, not because of the gore, but because of how ridiculously sad it was trying to make itself. Simply put, not a fan. At all.

EDIT: FYI, this is coming from someone who enjoys himself some anime and manga.

 

[Ciartan]

Only watched like, half of the first episode, and i hated it. Seriously, the cat girl that peed herself or w.e just completely destroyed all interest i had in the series.

 

[Zen Toombs]

Interesting. Very disturbing but interesting.

Also the puppy scene. :'(

 

[Nazulu]

Well, not complete rubbish, but pretty close. It's been awhile since I've watched it but I can remember the main characters were as bland as characters get with no interesting traits what-so-ever, and everyone else is just poorly characterized, being serious one second to flipping mental the next.

 

[Smertnik]

The anime is pretty juvenile, with all the gore and ecchi bits; story and characters don't hold up, either. So yeah, it's quite mediocre. The best thing about it is the intro song.


Unrelated:
http://www.google.com/recaptcha/api/image?c=03AHJ_Vuuqb1B-YeP6UIj9LoZPJaoEKPfi_71FskyonAvWbROMYZCn8dU_vMNtm4bcC3nietIlkJFqsxPM8jSlqDXxoC-TF61K7aZ2d5pFffTTFdzMxJIN0JS2S2XZEWm5O1cTbNez0FSjQLAEdTNCTIylTc9Z3xfXfw

 

[NathLines]

Loved it, actually. Glad that they ended it where they did, the manga just goes bananas.

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

I enjoyed it, was kind of disappointed that it ended almost halfway through the Manga but it's an OK ending regardless.
The story was OK, a bit melodramatic at times but atleast not as bad as NGE was. The nudity was used a bit too much although I'm glad they decided to go all out with it instead of frequent use of "Convienient Scenery/Hair" as you see with other shows (think of that what you will). As for the gore? No problems here! Brutal decapitations are fine in my book and atleast a quarter of them did have it coming.

 

[JesterRaiin]

Elfen Lied ?
Boring, recycled concepts, cliched, "trying too hard".

 

[ReinWeisserRitter]

Got tired of its almost exclusive reliance on shock factor somewhere around episode 4.

 

[NickCaligo42]

Hated it. Manipulative, exploitationist crap with crummy voice acting.

 

[V8 Ninja]

Before The Wikipedia Search: Isn't Elfen Lied just little girls butchering people?

After The Wikipedia Search: I'm sorry, it appears that Elfen Lied is the story of ONE little girl butchering people. My mistake!

 

[Roofstone]

I enjoyed it. But it can be a bit... "Too much" at times I think. Restraint is a good thing, something the elfen lied creators didn't grasp.

 

[Trivun]

I wasn't a fan of the Bolivian Army Ending, but in general I thought it was great. It was my first proper anime, and I have seen better since then (Higurashi, Umineko, Death Note, etc.), but that doesn't diminish Elfen Lied at all. Good characters, an interesting story, and I really enjoyed the whole love story angle, even if it was a love story with a ton of blood and gore. And fanservice. All in all, not the best anime I've seen, but certainly ranking up there in the top few :.

 

[gruggins]

Tits, gore and angst (and Pretentiousness): the animie
...
that pretty much sums it up for me

 

[Sonicron]

Just... sad. An embarassingly badly written piece of gore porn and ecchi fanservice. I watched all of it, and I regret it to this day.

 

[Gemore]

Elfen lied it's the same kind of adult as The Witcher or some other dark fantasy etc.

gah i really hope you have read the books. but im assuming you haven't. They are really good, but i would call it dark fantasy done right..

No sorry i've only played the games.

And yeah i agree it's not done well, that's why i compared it to Elfen lied, because i think Elfen lied is a gritty dark mature anime done terribly bad.

fair enough, each to their own . personalyl i liked the witcher game and elfen lied, but everyone different hey. Either way the books were way better then the game

 

[TheIronRuler]

You see, i was requested to write a review about it, it's finished.
But, i wont post it yet, i just wanted to look at peoples opinions before posting it, i might find some new perspectives about it.
My opinion still stands but i would like to aknowledge several perspectives just to make my overall understanding of this thing richer.

.
It tried to show the frailness of the human psych..
It took small, weak little girls and gave them extraordinary powers by birth. Now, it shows how society treats a different person and how people can be cruel by shunning the abnormal...
It laughs at your face. The most weak looking people are actually able to stop entire armies by their thoughts. And yet, on the inside, they are either very lonely and seek true companionship or are over that stage and hate everyone else so much that they prefer to murder them.
My point?
It's bad. You could have tried to transmit all of it without the excessive gore, mutants, clones, spheres of influence and nudity. Yes, a young woman walking through a compound naked with men pointing guns at her does sound frightening - she is so vulnerable, but a moment later she snaps a man in half.
You could say that it has some philosophical merit.
In my eyes? It's Gore, Tits and an unintentional Harem sequence later on.