El Cosmico here, enjoying RoadRunner connectivity problems after a storm, with an anime series that I figured could use a review in these parts, since I frequently get email asking me to recommend anime titles, well, here you go.
Whenever someone asks me to recommend anime to them, a few titles pop straight into mind...and one of them, a title that I consider essential to any serious anime collection, is last year's Serial Experiments: Lain. Here's why.
The first thing I noted about Lain was the extreme clarity of the video and audio transfer. The quality of this series is very impressive. At once, one is struck by the beauty of the visuals, and the care with which the sound mix was done, for example, there's a scene near the beginning with a guy writing on a chalkboard, and if you've got a good surround system, it's just FREAKY as all get out. Super-cool.
The colors are VIVID. Well-saturated, but not overdone. Watching Lain repeatedly made me appreciate my investments in quality video and audio equipment; it really brings out the best in a good system. This is a great series to show off your equipment with. Particularly impressive is the attention to compression detail, with a strikingly low incidence of video artifacts. The word for this series is beautiful.
The menus are likewise impressive, stylistically well done, and including access to conceptual drawings and information about the music included on the disc, which is quite enjoyable as well. In fact, the Lain series has a good deal of solid music, including the excellent and memorable opening theme from BOA, which will stick in your head and make you want to watch more, and a closing credits theme by none other than Nakaido Reichi, aka "Chabo", who is just one of the finest Japanese rock musicians ever to grace this earth. His themes for Prefectural Earth Defense Force (Kore wa science fiction!) are some of the coolest music I've ever heard. The guy has character. By the way, if anyone knows where I can get a PEDF Laserdisc/import DVD, let me know, and likewise, if you know of a good source for Chabo CDs, send that info along too. Thanks. Oh, and there are also also secret menu extras: on disc one, click the "E" in the logo, on disc two, highlight Lain's eyes, on disc three, highlight the logo on her jacket, on disc four, click on the eyes again.
Okay, so what is the series ABOUT? First, read through the descriptions on the jackets, spoilers are minimal, but skip ahead if you want to retain a clean slate:
Volume I - "Navi" - Four episodes:
There is a world around us, a world of people, tactile sensation, and culture. There is the wired world, inside the computer, of images, personalities, virtual experiences, and a culture all of its own. The day after a classmate commits suicide, Lain, a thirteen year-old girl, discovers how closely the two worlds are linked when she receives an e-mail from the dead girl: "I just abandoned my body. I still live here..." Has the line between the real world and the wired world begun to blur?
Volume II - "Knights" - Three episodes:
"KNIGHTS" - a super hacker group that has large effects in the wired. No one knows who the members are, but they control information and sometimes develop and distribute illegal information equipment. The KNIGHTS are trying to make Lain do something... When Lain metaphorizes her physical self into the wired to search for an answer of incidents that kids commit suicide. She finds that the KNIGHTS are behind this incident. One day, a group of men in black suits make a contact Lain. They ask "Are those people who you live with really your parents?" "Are you Lain of the wired?" and "Who are you really?"
Volume III - "Deus" - Three episodes:
There are rumors that Lain is stealing people's secrets and spreading them in the wired. Her friends, aincluding Arisu, abandon Lain, and even her parents leave, telling Lain that they are not her real parents. Then Lain discovers the one in the wired causing the trouble - her other self. "Which is the real me!?" Lonely and confuse, Lain then encounters a man who calls himself "God" in the wired.
Volume IV - "Reset" - Three episodes: Who am I? The question is asked over and over again throughout the noise. Lain destroys her own creator and loses her best friend, now Lain must decide what to do. Should she delete herself from everyone's memory?! If she does, the real world should remain exactly the same, but if no one remembers her, did Lain ever really exist?
Uhh...yeah. Kind of strange, huh? One of the things that makes SE:Lain so impressive and memorable is that it's probably like no anime, or anything else, that you've ever seen. The story is way out there, and, well, you have to pay attention. Fans of anime will also be familiar with the use of confusion and vagueness, aka "mental contamination" as a method of ending the series...people who aren't familiar, trust me on this one, this is a cultural difference, not a question of writing quality. Japanese audiences seem to enjoy a certain amount of uncertainty in their endings, perhaps for purposes of discussion, who knows, but they do, and Lain is no exception.
No matter which camp you're in on the ending side of things, you'll appreciate the journey there. This is a very atmospheric series, that quickly draws you into its world. There are little details here and there, like the super-cool computer "Navi" interfaces (which give a nod to a defunct OS project from Apple), and, well, I really wish I had an outfit like Lain's teddy bear pajamas. This series is by no means good simply because of the transfer and encoding quality...the story is engaging and interesting, quite unpredictable, and is most definitely not formulaic.
There are, of course, frequent occurences of solid audiovisual experience, and the series makes you want to keep watching it, which is obviously essential. Like I said, I consider this a key part of any serious anime collection. Lain is distinctly different from other anime, it's cerebral, often very trippy, probably not good for children since it may do weird things to their minds, but most of all, Lain is just truly outstanding and memorable anime. That's reason enough why you need to see it.
On a side note to serious collectors, there's a possibility of a limited special edition Lain Lunchbox box-set coming out later this fall, so be on the lookout for that too!
-El Cosmico
email: elcosmico@aintitcool.com
