Two-twenty
06-21-2006, 10:41 PM
I've had this written for days but work and the flu prevented me from getting anywhere near a computer until now, so I couldn't enter it in the Student Review contest (dammit! http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v486/Twotwenty/argh.gif). Rather than let it go to waste, I'll post a good ol' fashion review thread.
___________________________
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v486/Twotwenty/elfen2.jpg
Why are the pretty ones always serial killers
Summary:
Lucy is a Diclonius: a species of mutated human, with horns, a dangerous telekinetic sixth sense and the potential to destroy the world. After escaping from the laboratory that held her, ruthlessly massacring many guards in the process, she is shot in the head as a last ditch attempt to stop her. While she survived, she lost her memory and speech ability bar the word ‘Nyuu’. Two teenagers, Kouta and Yuka, find her at the beach and decide to take her under their wing, not knowing what horrific dangers it will bring on them.
Title: Elfen Lied
Genre: Horror
Company: Genco/Vap
Format: 13 episodes
Dates: 25/07/04 – 17/10/04
Grade: 59%
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v486/Twotwenty/elfen3.jpg
Highs: Opening theme and sequence; starts off well; there are a couple of genuinely dramatic moments.
Lows: Annoying characterisation; fanservice and comedy doesn’t mix well with romance or gore and horror; the story turns lacklustre pretty quickly.
__________________________________
There are very few anime that have set my expectations so high yet let me down so very, very much. Elfen Lied is one of them.
Starting off, the opening theme and sequence is one of the best I’ve ever seen. It melds images of the main characters with paintings and the art style of Gustav Klimt (Google it). Pair this with a hypnotic and foreboding theme and it gave me overall the impression that what would follow would be a mind**** of truly biblical proportions and for the first few episodes, it almost looked that way.
Although it certainly isn’t for the faint-hearted, I have no problem with the pool-fulls of blood and gore this anime has, because for the most part it’s necessary for shock value. This was most effective in the first few episodes. Lucy’s indiscriminate, emotionless acts of violence pulled off with such ease made many of the early scenes incredibly horrifying. Violence was one of the ways Elfen Lied explored the extremes of power given to those who aren’t equipped to handle it. It’s an interesting theme, but it became apparent that it would only become obscured and cheapened as the series wore on.
I blame this firstly on the characterisation. Most of the main characters just aren’t interesting enough. Kouta and Yuka have your typical shounen protagonist/tsundere girl (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v486/Twotwenty/v.gif) relationship and their actions are as predictable as the sunrise. Kurama is the same tall-dark-mysterious-stranger-but-with-a-heart-of-gold that you’ve seen in every other anime, so when the story’s focus shifted to him towards the end it was even harder to sustain any interest. But perhaps the most awkward and irritating element is its notion of sincere romance between pre-pubescent children. Kids do not know how to handle a relationship with the same maturity of an adult. When I was young if a member of the opposite gender touched me I’d rub the ‘germs’ off on the boy next to me, shout ‘girls germs, no returns!’ then run away. To the best of my knowledge, not much has changed. Considering a good deal of the story relies on flashbacks to character’s childhoods, it made it incredibly hard not to cringe at the way it developed.
Secondly, I blame its salad bowl of genres. Elfen Lied dabbles in horror, drama, romance and comedy and they clash with each other badly. Trying to put so many comedic elements in horror doesn’t work. Fear and humour are at the opposite ends of the emotion spectrum and Elfen Lied leaves us in the clumsy grey area in between the two. Also, many good romantic moments were outright wrecked by poorly placed humour. The comedy wasn’t even really that funny. Most of the humour seemed like it was copied straight out of Love Hina, and in this case that’s not a good thing. Apart from violence, the other obvious point of contention is the amount of nudity. When it was used in conjunction with horror, it was effective, showing that even when at their most vulnerable, people unsuited to wield power are still just as deadly. When used for comedy and fanservice, it was mind-numbingly lame. When you’ve got heads rolling in one scene and a panty shot in the next, it really makes you wonder just what the hell the creator’s intentions are.
It wasn’t all terrible though, although few and far between, there were some decent non-horror parts. Mayu’s backstory was particularly unsettling and a scene developing the relationship between Kouta and Yuka was remarkably tense, although ruined, once again, by poorly placed humour.
Elfen Lied showed promise and I really wanted to like it, but I just couldn’t. I attribute it’s downfall to clichéd and unrealistic characterisation and the failure to devote enough time to each of the genres it covers or even meld them together adequately. The fanservice cheapened the horror and the comedy cheapened the romance, so by the end of the series the dramatic tension had all but disappeared and I couldn’t take any of it seriously enough. Oh well.
___________________________
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v486/Twotwenty/elfen2.jpg
Why are the pretty ones always serial killers
Summary:
Lucy is a Diclonius: a species of mutated human, with horns, a dangerous telekinetic sixth sense and the potential to destroy the world. After escaping from the laboratory that held her, ruthlessly massacring many guards in the process, she is shot in the head as a last ditch attempt to stop her. While she survived, she lost her memory and speech ability bar the word ‘Nyuu’. Two teenagers, Kouta and Yuka, find her at the beach and decide to take her under their wing, not knowing what horrific dangers it will bring on them.
Title: Elfen Lied
Genre: Horror
Company: Genco/Vap
Format: 13 episodes
Dates: 25/07/04 – 17/10/04
Grade: 59%
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v486/Twotwenty/elfen3.jpg
Highs: Opening theme and sequence; starts off well; there are a couple of genuinely dramatic moments.
Lows: Annoying characterisation; fanservice and comedy doesn’t mix well with romance or gore and horror; the story turns lacklustre pretty quickly.
__________________________________
There are very few anime that have set my expectations so high yet let me down so very, very much. Elfen Lied is one of them.
Starting off, the opening theme and sequence is one of the best I’ve ever seen. It melds images of the main characters with paintings and the art style of Gustav Klimt (Google it). Pair this with a hypnotic and foreboding theme and it gave me overall the impression that what would follow would be a mind**** of truly biblical proportions and for the first few episodes, it almost looked that way.
Although it certainly isn’t for the faint-hearted, I have no problem with the pool-fulls of blood and gore this anime has, because for the most part it’s necessary for shock value. This was most effective in the first few episodes. Lucy’s indiscriminate, emotionless acts of violence pulled off with such ease made many of the early scenes incredibly horrifying. Violence was one of the ways Elfen Lied explored the extremes of power given to those who aren’t equipped to handle it. It’s an interesting theme, but it became apparent that it would only become obscured and cheapened as the series wore on.
I blame this firstly on the characterisation. Most of the main characters just aren’t interesting enough. Kouta and Yuka have your typical shounen protagonist/tsundere girl (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v486/Twotwenty/v.gif) relationship and their actions are as predictable as the sunrise. Kurama is the same tall-dark-mysterious-stranger-but-with-a-heart-of-gold that you’ve seen in every other anime, so when the story’s focus shifted to him towards the end it was even harder to sustain any interest. But perhaps the most awkward and irritating element is its notion of sincere romance between pre-pubescent children. Kids do not know how to handle a relationship with the same maturity of an adult. When I was young if a member of the opposite gender touched me I’d rub the ‘germs’ off on the boy next to me, shout ‘girls germs, no returns!’ then run away. To the best of my knowledge, not much has changed. Considering a good deal of the story relies on flashbacks to character’s childhoods, it made it incredibly hard not to cringe at the way it developed.
Secondly, I blame its salad bowl of genres. Elfen Lied dabbles in horror, drama, romance and comedy and they clash with each other badly. Trying to put so many comedic elements in horror doesn’t work. Fear and humour are at the opposite ends of the emotion spectrum and Elfen Lied leaves us in the clumsy grey area in between the two. Also, many good romantic moments were outright wrecked by poorly placed humour. The comedy wasn’t even really that funny. Most of the humour seemed like it was copied straight out of Love Hina, and in this case that’s not a good thing. Apart from violence, the other obvious point of contention is the amount of nudity. When it was used in conjunction with horror, it was effective, showing that even when at their most vulnerable, people unsuited to wield power are still just as deadly. When used for comedy and fanservice, it was mind-numbingly lame. When you’ve got heads rolling in one scene and a panty shot in the next, it really makes you wonder just what the hell the creator’s intentions are.
It wasn’t all terrible though, although few and far between, there were some decent non-horror parts. Mayu’s backstory was particularly unsettling and a scene developing the relationship between Kouta and Yuka was remarkably tense, although ruined, once again, by poorly placed humour.
Elfen Lied showed promise and I really wanted to like it, but I just couldn’t. I attribute it’s downfall to clichéd and unrealistic characterisation and the failure to devote enough time to each of the genres it covers or even meld them together adequately. The fanservice cheapened the horror and the comedy cheapened the romance, so by the end of the series the dramatic tension had all but disappeared and I couldn’t take any of it seriously enough. Oh well.