ELFEN LIED

DESCRIPTION

CAST

CHAPTERS

ANIME ActionElfen Lied

REVIEWS

• 

  biogundam

  40/100
  over-hyped trash and the writer should be burned at the stake

  Warning: this review contains spoilers.

  First impressions:
  So, we got a mutant race of humans coming into existence, and humans are trying to kill them. Sounds interesting enough, what could go wrong?

  Story: 4/10
  Elfen Lied is about a race of mutated humans called the diclonius, that instinctively kill humans and who are captured by the government and placed in a top secret base, to be experimented on. The main focus is an escapee diclonius named Lucy who gets shot in the head, causing her to have amnesia and a split personality called Nyu, who washes up on a shore, where she’s found and taken in by our primary protagonist, Kouta, together with his cousin.

  Elfen Lied is trying to be this socio-political drama about the diclonius, who are discriminated against by humans, and are usually killed on sight. It does this by asking questions like “Can humans and diclonius co-exist?” and “Are diclonius born to kill humans or is it because of human’s treatment of them, that they are the way they are?”. On paper, this sounds like a really interesting (if a bit tired) idea, but the problem is that the presentation and execution of this concept are very poor and lackluster, to say the least. This holds especially true because the ending doesn't even begin to answer the questions that are set up, and any hint of an answer is told very vaguely.

  The story itself suffers from the biggest case of tonal-whiplash that I’ve seen in quite a while. This is because even though this series is trying to be dark and serious, with its socio-political themes of society’s moral hypocrisy and alienation of out groups, it just doesn't really work, when it relies so much on cheap, emotionally-manipulative shock factor, instead of something of actual substance. An example of this is in a scene where a group of psychotic little kids beat a puppy to death, while grinning from ear to ear. Besides that, you’ve got at least one fanservice scene in almost every chapter, some examples of which being the time Lucy/Nyu needs help getting dressed, the time(s) the main character’s cousin wants to bang him and the time Lucy/Nyu gropes and makes out with people, just ‘cause. To top it all off, the plot becomes silly, in how dark and serious it's trying to be with the execution of its themes, all of which basically boil down to “humanity does fucked up things”. Now just to be clear, I don’t mind when manga take a more naturalistic approach with their storytelling. The problem with Elfen Lied, though, is that not only can it not pick an appropriate tone, both overall and in the individual scenes, but also that it goes so unnecessarily over the top, so that it just ends up coming across as cartoony and falling flat on its face.

  The storyline itself is a whole other beast, which I’ll talk about now. I don't mind the slice-of-life moments, as they allow for some levity, but also give you the time to get to care about the characters, and actually feel bad for them when the shit hits the fan. I find it jarring, though, that it turns into a harem, because as the story continues, Kouta picks up a new loli or a new diclonius to live with him because [insert tragic reason here]. Also, there are some narrative choices that are so ridiculous, that I almost cry tears of laughter when reading them, because of how over-the-top they are. For example, when Lucy kills Kouta’s father and sister, that was basically kick-started by a misunderstanding, because his cousin was getting a little too close to him, she decides she likes Kouta too, and goes yandere on his ass. I find that entire series of events funny as hell, and to add more to my comedy, it turns around and frames it as tragic, but to my mind, it’s just forced melodrama. This series’ tendency to force drama is only escalated when it turns out that Kouta and Lucy conveniently meet again years later, around the same time period when Lucy escapes and Kouta comes to live in the town where he and Lucy met and played together as children. It's there that Kouta conveniently doesn't remember what happened in his past, and Lucy conveniently exhibits the cognitive ability of a four year old. Did the planets just align for this one monument or is Kouta just a loli magnet? I can probably name a few more examples of in-series, off-screen godly intervention, for the sake of drama, but I digress. In all honestly though, if this were to happen in real life, it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest. The inhuman experiments, the double moral standards and the comically evil psychopaths in power; all of these are visible a mile away, yet this story showcases them like this is some sort of new concept that hasn't been explored before, even though it has been, but much better elsewhere.

  Characters: 4/10
  Our lead protagonist, Kouta, is pretty much bland-as-toast, due to how passive he is. Even if personality-wise, he’s a good, if not conflicted guy, he just isn't used to his full effect. This is rather bothersome, as he has major roles to play in the story. I like the fact that they tried to add more depth to him, by giving him some history with Lucy before the start of the main story, adding a good amount of conflicts stemming from that, later on in the story. At the end of the day though, it doesn't really amount to much in the grand scheme of things. It flip-flops between “I hate you” and “I love you” way too much, making it feel cheap, and I stopped caring after the first so many times. Fortunately, to balance out Kouta’s blandness, we have our secondary protagonist, Lucy/Nyu, who’s a little better written and offering a far greater level of intrigue than Kouta, besides the whole split personality thing. The thing that I find to be the most interesting about her is her inner conflict, as on the one hand, she hates humanity and has a natural instinct to kill all humans, but on the other hand, there’s also the part of her that just wants to live a peaceful life with Kouta and extras, despite her guilt towards him. This duality that’s presented in her character is much more interesting than a one dimensional, sadistic attitude of “kill all humans, cause humans are bad, m’kay”.

  The side characters are just as bland and lacking in both depth and character development as the leads. The only characters that actually stood out for having something more to them were Nana and doctor Kurama. Nana, because she’s one of a few diclonius that are actually kept alive for experiments and has been stuck in a lab for most of her life, yet doesn't have any hostility towards humans, besides for self-defense. Even in those cases though, humans are generally still alive after the encounter, as she actively chooses to spare them, despite the fact that diclonius are supposed to instinctively want to kill humans. Relative to Nana though, doctor Kurama is an entirely different breed of interesting. On the outside, he seems like a very cold and cruel man, to humans and diclonius alike. Despite this though, he seems to have this very odd father-daughter relationship with Nana, even though his real biological daughter is another diclonius, that’s kept at the base. The main appeal of his character is his dual nature, where on the one hand, he’ll kill both humans and diclonius without a second thought, but on the other hand, will express clear feelings of affection (paternal, not romantic) towards Nana. This is exemplified when Nana was badly injured and was going to be put down for failing her mission, but he went out his way to help fix her up and even gave her massive amounts of money, to help her start a new life. His backstory was also pretty well done, as in it, he was presented with this very interesting moral dilemma, where he happened to find out his baby daughter was a diclonius. The result of this revelation was, of course, that he received an order from his superiors to kill his daughter, which made him heavily conflicted. On the one hand, his child would most likely be a threat to humanity, one day, but on the other hand, it was his baby daughter, who hadn’t harmed anyone. So to make a long story short, he tried to go through with it, but in the process his wife saw him and killed herself, but then his daughter ended up in the lab on the base where he works, and he is forced to live with guilt for his actions. On another note, the villains in this story are very cartoonishly evil, as they just do their thing, because they can. They're just evil for the sake of being evil and are used as a poor excuse to hammer in the message, which is that humans do fucked up things.

  Art: 5/10
  Where do I begin with this? The artwork is really ugly and the backgrounds look really shitty. As for the artstyle, it has this moe/cartoony aesthetic that really doesn't fit with the dark tone of the series. The character designs are probably some of the ugliest things I’ve ever had to look at, especially when it comes to the characters’ eyes. They’re drawn huge, even by manga standards and look like they came from the anime for clannad, except without Kyoani’s standard high level of detail.

  Enjoyment: 6/10
  Now I know I’ve been somewhat negative about Elfen Lied throughout this review, but there are a few parts I liked. I liked the gory fights, where people get ripped apart and even some of the fan service, jarring as it was.

  Overall: 4/10

  Conclusion:
  Elfen Lied is a cluster fuck of ideas that by themselves are good, but which are badly implemented by an incompetent writer, who doesn't know how to use them to their full effect, and instead substitutes proper writing for cheap drama and shallow thematic development to get a rise out of people. That is Elfen Lied’s biggest trap, and it’s main tactic, that it uses to get you to care and invest emotions in its narrative, that even I myself fell into it. Once you get off its emotional roller coaster though, and regain the use of your brain, you see it for what it is. If you’re looking for a gore fest, then Elfen Lied is the manga for you. However, if you're not looking for a gore fest, then you’ll be unimpressed by its poorly written characters and generally lazy writing. On the bright side, if you like this concept and wish it were executed better, then I recommend you read Parasyte or Ajin (or even Tokyo Ghoul, if you’ve really exhausted all other options, and feel you can’t live without more).

  Special credit to my unpaid and slightly pissed editor, Lonecrit.

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• 

  lamialuv

  84/100
  Humans are the Real Enemy: A Manga about Psychological Horror and True Suffering

  _How far will you go for ambition? Is the pain never enough? Is living truly worth it? Are humans the real enemy...?_

  Foreword:

  For the past three days I have been reading Elfen Lied. Firstly, I am kind of a fan of the anime. I've watched it about 3 times...in 3 different dubbed languages. Although, after rewatching it again recently, I just discovered that I only like it out of nostalgia since it was one of my first anime, and one of my first exposures to horror.

  From recent knowledge I know that 12 episode anime are most of the time not that great if their source has more than 50 chapters. I figured that perhaps the manga to Elfen Lied is way better than whatever the anime was.

  and damn...I was right. The anime simply does not compare.

  Firstly, most of the plot is organized completely different. The first 20 chapters are, almost the same as the anime, but they are organized much SO much better. Most of the big plot points are revealed towards the beginning rather than the end. E.g Lucy killing Kouta's family is revealed WAY earlier, around chapter 12 while the anime didn't even introduce this until the last few episodes.

  SO basically what I am saying, is if you didn;'t enjoy the anime, but still liked the idea of Elfen Lied...I highly recommend you give the manga a try. If gore, rape, snuff, torture, and human experimentation are too much for you I implore you to just not read this manga or digest any of Elfen Lied's content.

  For this review, I will be structuring this completely different. I want to analyze how unique this piece truly is.

  

  Quick individual ratings:
  Plot 9/10: I think there is a lot of thought put into this plot, and everything finally makes sense at the end. It's a wild ride, and I highly suggest.
  Characters 6/10: The only good character is Lucy I am not gonna lie. The characters are really either rapists, girls with psychological trauma or Kouta. Im not sure how i feel about him, still.
  Art 10/10: The horror and gruesome bits are done quite well, other wise it looks great for a 2002-2005 manga.

  Overall, I think this is a great introductory horror manga really. Below this I will be analyzing the plot, characters and art more in depth. Spoilers all ahead.
  

  Problems with Elfen Lied

  Now, you might think I want to talk about problems with the themes, and I am not. I actually love this fucked up shit, but less so in a "oh im edgy I love blood and guts" way, but from an investigative and curious way. This manga shows you how far people are willing to go for ambition, for science, and how humans truly have no care for the pain they cause, as long as they get something in return.

  My biggest problem is the power scale in this manga. I will use chapters 84 and 85 for this example. (why does chapter 85 have 100 pages...?)

  

  This scene was so fucking great, because Lucy had an insane powerup, but what is so dumb is that the reason she got captured is because someone came and shot one of her horns off?? I don't understand how she becomes so powerful and she doesn't realize someone is coming to shoot her, and doesn't even block it as well. Remember when she could fly as well during her first fight with Nana? She never flies ever again in this manga, and it's really strange. I am not sure if I missed something, but for real the power scale in this manga makes absolutely no sense. The only explanation of this is that the author wanted her to be captured so she could meet Anna. Even then, it just doesn't make much sense.

  This problem is all across this manga, especially with how humans suddenly become so powerful they can harm even Lucy. In most of her fights she just slowly walks towards the opponents, most of the Diclonius do. Why do they just not run if their opponent is just beyond their reach? She just kinda stood around and took all the damage when she knows she isn't immune to being hurt.

  

  The romance is definitely the next biggest problem. It fuckin sucks. I've seen romance in horror manga done way better than this and they have less than 30 chapters.

  

  First off, I genuinely hate Yuka. She's the only character in this that is COMPLETELY useless. The ONLY thing she contributed to the plot, was giving Nyuu clothes and teaching her how to use the bathroom. In the ENTIRE plot she has NO contribution to anything, I just don't understand. At least with the other girls they have important roles. Mayu and Nozomi have backstories, and have some type of character development. The only reason why the author has Yuka still in this plot, is so that Lucy would have someone to enact jealousy within her. Essentially, this jealously is what made Lucy into a serial killer, and made this happen:

  

  As for the main plot, the reason why she is there still with Kouta, is firstly because she really likes him. YES, they are cousins I think we should point this out. And the second reason, is for this scene below. Literally no other reason why she is present in the plot.

  

  And then towards the end, the MC still rejects Lucy's love. So what she killed your family? She has protect Kouta all this time, and has shown that she can change. Also in the ending bit, Nana's "Papa" shoots Lucy and she reflects it back into him. Kouta comes down and thinks she just shot the professor, and that she broke their promise. Kouta, this girl is literally a serial killer, AND there are people trying to kill her. Is she not able to defend herself? Kouta's self righteousness is really toxic as well, but it's an aspect that is not as important.

  

  famzoned

  Overall, I genuinely think the powerscaling and the romance are just fucking shitty, and I think these are really the biggest criticisms for this work.

  The Good

  Thankfully, there is a lot of good in this manga as well. I would go so far to call this manga a textbook on psychological horror. It even goes to institution based psychological horror, which is really just something wild and crazy.

  First off, I want to applaud some of the heart touching moments of this manga. I also want to applaud the use of psychological disorders.

  

  The writer is definitely concerned about domestic abuse, and is quite literally all over this manga. Starting from Lucy's backstory, to Nozomi's backstory, and especially to Mayu's backstory. Nozomi has physical issues because she is so scared of everything due to her father's harassment, so she has to wear diapers (lol). Mayu has extremely bad PTSD from her stepfather, who would sexually and physically abuse her as a child. Anytime she becomes naked in this manga, she gets PTSD flashbacks and it's pretty rough. Kouta himself has amenesia, he thinks his sister is in a hospital. But It is revealed towards the end of the manga Lucy killed his sister and father, which gave him trauma and eventually amnesia to protect his sanity.

  

  Lucy herself is obsessed with killing people because she believes the human race is truly terrible, although this is a diclonius's natural mental state. Nana was given conditioning to make herself able to endure torture. Many side characters have issues with narcissism and (Lucy) bites them back eventually. Anna believed her father to be great, so she endured physical modification to make herself into some weird eldritch monster.

  

  god i love shit like this, Lucy's personality disorder is something else.

  The way this manga is concerned about domestic abuse, mistreatment of experimental patients, redemption, the meaning of humanity, and terrible parenting is just so fucking interesting. This manga has so much to offer in all aspects of horror.

  Here are a few funny little panels that get thrown in the manga:

  

  Happiness isn't forever, we are never safe, humans are the real monsters are the main points of this manga. I think this is the message that Okamoto sensei is trying to tell us with this manga, and showing us to the extents how humans are worse than we could ever think. The "enemy" may just be nicer than we may think.

  

  At the end it shows those twins, and here's my theory. I think those twins are the reincarnation of Lucy. They are most likely her two personalities, Myuu and Lucy and have been born into the world as two different diclonius. You can see the horns on their head in the very last panel, and the note on Lucy's dog's burial spot. I don't think kouta married yuka, I have a hard time imagining it but it's definitely possible.

  I genuinely feel so terrible for Lucy, she's such a great character, but is constantly undermined in the plot.

  Thanks for reading my little analysis, this is just my interpretation of this manga. I hope more people will like it, I think it's definite a "like" or "hate" type of manga.

  
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• 

  Tobi404

  97/100
  Elfen Lied and why you should read the manga version as well as experience the anime.

  I want to start this review by saying two things; one this will not be an especially long review and two, that I have been a fan of the anime for Elfen lied since I was at least in middle school. I had not gotten around to reading the manga until this year and I'm very glad I did. I personally consider both the anime and the manga to be equally valid pieces of media that both should be experienced. The anime only covers about half of the story from Elfen Lied and similar to the anime for the Claymore series it had its own anime original ending. I never thought anything could top the wonderful, bittersweet and touching ending of the anime, that is until I finished the manga. The manga expands on that same sort of feeling the anime version was going for with its ending.

  I personally think that it's ideal to maybe start with the anime for newer fans and to then go and read the manga. One of the things I loved about the manga was the inclusion of the character of Nozomi, who had been left out of the anime for what I think were some censorship reasons due to her unique problem of always urinating herself. Yes Elfen Lied has comical and ecchi things like that but it's more than anything a tale of suffering, anger, sadness but also a tale of fellowship, humanities positive qualities eventually outweighing the negative and certainly a tale of redemption. Some people consider Lynn Okamoto's art to be " amateur" but I personally love that sort of style. His characters are all very unique looking in their designs that stand out from more standard manga and anime that some people new to the medium of entertainment might not be used to. His female characters are especially cute and erotic, and this also adds to their appeal. Above all though it also serves as an interesting contrast between the very cute artistical style and the often-hellish things that transpire in this work.

  Elfen lied is full of tonal shifts between very slice of life and wholesome moments to very dark and painful ones. I feel this is something that adds an immense realism to the work. Many people might find such a thing unrealistic but imo it's quite the opposite and serves as an accurate portrayal of the dichotomy between human beings and our ability to immerse ourselves in both our happiest moments and our most miserable. Lucy at her worst is a lonely broken hearted killing machine who lashes out in her seething at times unquenchable anger at humanity who made her suffer so much. At her best Lucy is a genuinely sweet girl who more than anything wants to be loved, to be held, to be accepted, to feel safe, to feel closeness with others and to protect those she loves. At times in this story, particularly the manga; it felt as if Lucy was the main villain and there were times where I rooted against her from the bottom of my heart. By the same token there were times when I cried for her and felt the deepest of compassion towards her from the bottom of my heart. Lucy is a character with a number of personalities inside her but ultimately in either version of this story she is a creature that deserves warmth. While both the anime and manga portray this brilliantly, I feel the manga does a slightly better job because it takes the idea further and to a greater scale.

  All of the supporting cast is well written and uniquely interesting. I'm particularly fond of Nana and Mariko, part of that is that's just the part of me that yearns for a daughter. Nana and Mariko went through so much but they're good girls who love their papa more than anything. This story has so much pain and suffering and the faint of heart types will probably have a very tough time and not enjoy. But personally, I'm not concerned with such people at all. My reason for writing this review is to get people who are into this sort of genre and who may have seen the anime to also explore the brilliant manga version of the tale. If you like the psychosocial and horror genre with slice of life elements present than I recommend this story. If you like the dichotomy between Okamoto's cute art style and his often-bittersweet writing style than I highly recommend it and lastly if you enjoyed the anime version than I implore you to read this manga. Everything you loved in the anime is present here and it is fleshed out even further. I honestly have hopes that perhaps someday the manga will receive a full adaptation but with anime often being toned down from their manga counterparts more than ever these days I know that is a pipe dream for now.

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