Elfen Lied – Series Review

Elfen Lied is an action packed mystery anime with some elements of gore. While the gore isn’t the focus of the anime, there is enough littering the various episodes for the squeamish to stay away. Coming in at 13 episodes long, it’s a short enough narrative to sit down and watch over the weekend if you have enough pocky and mountain dew. Special features include an interview with the creator and previews of other releases by ADV. The story is hard enough to describe without giving any important details away. But it’s the story that is the real driving force. Endings of each episode aren’t exactly cliffhangers, but after a single tantalizing detail is revealed, you just want to keep watching right up until the very end. The basic premise is twofold: a lab experiment goes awry and a monster escapes, with the lab personnel trying to recover their creation; and a boy with amnesia returns to his hometown to live with his childhood friend, and comes into contact with the creature. While this sounds quite cliché, it’s handled with utmost care. Revealing much more may actually hinder your enjoyment, so I say just give the first couple episodes a try. This is recommended for mature audiences only, as it deals with some very adult themes and has some gore. Some scenes may disturb sensitive viewers, but the most disturbing stuff happens off-screen, so it’s really a matter of how good (or bad) your imagination is.

Review: by Shini

Edited by: Ryuu