lain

Serial Experiments Lain: Lain in Urban Outfit Limited Edition Collector's 8-inch Doll
$24.88
Lain is a 13 year old student, unassuming and unnoticed. After a classmate takes her own life, Lain begins to receive e-mail from the dead girl... As Lain becomes drawn in to the mystery, the line between the real world we know and the wired world of the computer begins to blur....The Urban Outfit Lain doll comes dressed in a highly detailed hooded sweatshirt and skirt. The fully articulated collector's doll is 7" tall and packaged in a window box.

Yoshitoshi Abe Lain Illustrations
$24.95
If you like Serial Experiments Lain at all, buy this book. Just trust me. This is by far one of the best art books I've come across. Absolutely worth the price.

Serial Experiments - Lain: Knights (Layers 5-7)
$29.98
Very good and very deep.

I watched it dub and have no complaints, but there's the option to watch it sub and a few extras, mostly conceptual drawings and a comercial for the playstation game Lain. There are no commentaries and no offical trailer. Scenes are spaced nicely with 8 scenes per episode. Each episode contains a device (short clip of a body part) and they are all included.

Serial Experiments Lain - Boxed Set
$119.98
Not since the computer HAL has there been such an unnerving computer voice, anime or otherwise.

"Serial Experiments Lain" is a product of its time. Released on Japanese airwaves in 1998, and on American VHS and DVD by 1999, I can't imagine a series like this being made now, given how mundane many anime series have become as well as the current economic crisis. An intelligent property like this wouldn't be viable, so let's count our blessings this was ever made at all.

Much like the films of David Lynch and Stanley Kubrick, "Lain" delves into the often disturbing and perplexing realm of human thought, memories, and anything in between. Fans of action anime or anything else may want to steer clear; the sheer perplexity and open-ended nature of the show is enough to frustrate most and garner academic articles from others. It really is that kind of show.

The show starts with a rather startling suicide, which leads to a number of girls, Lain included, receiving an e-mail from the dead girl explaining that she hasn't really died, and has found God within the Wired - a more advanced version of the internet.

Perhaps by fate or curiosity, Lain persuades her father to buy her the latest Navi computer. Not soon after, she's become enamored and rather obsessed with perfecting and expanding on her already powerful computer. Becoming more a part of the vast world of the Wired, Lain begins to slowly unravel its secrets and finds some disturbing links to its creation in the real world. To explain any further would do the series a disservice, as many of the more eye-opening moments are too difficult and fascinating to give away.

Its apparent script writer Chiaki J. Konaka (The Big O, Bubblegum Crisis Tokyo 2040) and director Ryutaro Nakamura (Legend of Crystania) are either well versed or have an abundant staff who are as interested in cyber punk culture and technological information as they are. Many sequences flow in a slow, often haunting fashion, sometimes interrupted by disturbing imagery or a wealth of on-screen information. The complex story is often tangled in conspiracy theories and scientific jargon, which only serves to either alienate or intrigue you. Before this show, I certainly had no clue about Schuman Resonance, or who Vanaver Bush was. Fascinating stuff.

Though this show will most certainly never have a complete explanation from its creators or maybe even an agreement by fans on the nature of the series, it would take all the fun out of it if anything was given away. Part of the charm of this series is how much ISN'T explained or divulged; like Utena and Evangelion before it, it's far more interesting to try and piece the puzzle together yourself than have everything laid out. This was a show meant to be explored and taken apart bit by bit.

The haunting imagery, subdued and menacing music, and deliberately slow pacing all give the show a very dream-like, ethereal quality that is inherently absent in most animation, Japanese or not. When the build up reaches its crescendo near the end of the series, you'll be hard-pressed not to marathon the rest of the way through just to try and discern everything the show's creators are throwing at you. Without giving too much away, one of the most fascinating scenes in the series takes place without any vicious battles or hardcore trauma. Instead, it's the subtle and delicate interactions between two very realized and human characters. Perhaps that is what Konaka and Nakamura are trying to tell us: that any real understanding between people can only be accomplished outside the boundaries of media, and with simple words and gestures.

This is a series that should not be missed. With an open mind and some patience, it's a disturbing, incredible, and downright bizarre experience.