Made famous by its anime adaptation, Elfen Lied is well known for being THE cruelest, goriest, and a highly perverted, piece of work ever. The level of bloody mess you will encounter throughout the story can haunt the unprepared for many moons to come. In short, one is expected to have a strong stomach to survive these 107 chapters. Consider ...yourself warned!
Elfen Lied is perhaps the most controversial story of all time. Opinions on it varies greatly with some calling it "garbage of the century" while others claiming it an outstanding "masterpiece of all masterpieces". I prefer to stay away from these extremes but without a doubt naming Elfen Lied as the former is far from justified.
While it is rare to see "kawaii" horned girls brutally tearing bodies apart (or get their bodies tear apart), quite frankly Elfen Lied is infamous for that. However, that is not to say things just happen out of the blue and limps go flying for no apparent reason. In fact, it is evident that the mangaka put a great deal of effort into both explaining the background to this horrid power, and at the same time develop the story and character relationships. Many questions will likely come to mind as one read deeper into this manga. Questions like "why is this nude girl mercilessly killing innocents?" and "why do they possess these terrifying power?" will be among the first. Rest assure, that answers will be given in great elaborate details and the results will likely make heads go spinning, yet they will also cast an irresistible curse on you to keep reading.
The overall plot of Elfen Lied is truly amazing. It covers a wide variety of themes in great details, ranging from simple triangle love relationship, to the ever more common child abuse, to the horrid reality of non-ethical scientific research, to the threat of global terrorism, and lastly on human origin and our mutation/evolution. One can truly say Elfen Lied has it all.
However, nothing is perfect. What Elfen Lied lacked was some great artistic drawing. Although the reader can depict one action from the next, the amount of detail (ie. the quality of the artwork) is seemingly below what one would expect from such high quality story. But I guess we can also call it fortunate since if the artwork is better drawn, people might really start to faint from reading the manga due to excessive gore or result in severe nosebleed when the story gets to the more perverted scenes.
Strong character developments plus complex interrelations is another successful selling point of this manga. Although there are certain characters where we can easily identify as black or white (as in those we should love vs those we should hate), many actually belong somewhere in the gray region. Throughout the story you will find yourself rooting for a character in one chapter and surprisingly find yourself wanting to have that same character killed in the next chapter. It is precisely these types of character building techniques that make Elfen Lied loved and hated by many.
Finally I would like to once again remind my fellow MAL readers that this manga is not meant for young children and hopefully it will give you enjoyment rather than weeks of nightmare. I know I certainly enjoyed it to its fullest.
Reviewer BS:
*This is my first manga review. If you think there are places to improve on (and I know there are tons), please send me a friendly PM or just leave a comment. Thank You.*
