Now for the bad-- everything else. Serial Experiments Lain tries to tackle the problem of existence and identity but it completely fails. The parts that are supposed to be creepy are unconvincing and incoherent, and the attempt to create tension instead collapses into unbearably slow pacing in the storyline. Dialogue is much too short and yet drawn out. Entire scenes go by that neither attempt to interest the viewer nor advance the plot. Each episode except maybe the first one could have easily been cut in half without losing any content. The series could've been much better as a result.
The typical theme of weakening of identity as technology advances was handled very clumsily in the series, as if the writers thought that bringing up the issue alone was sufficient to be profound. It's not. The theme is nothing new in modern media.
Some reviews (not here) by mainstream critics claim that the series asks "deep" questions about contemporary life and the nature of reality, but this really is not true. The questions are old and the answers given are nonsensical and shallow. We are presented with several common plot devices in cyberpunk-- the near omnipotent digital entity that wants Lain (the protagonist) to abandon the flesh and become one with the cyber world, the use of dissociative identity disorder to symbolize Lain's mental fracture due to virtualization, the embodiment of humanity's collective unconscious made possible due to the new internet, etc. This stuff isn't new, which would be fine if at least SEL executed these things to perfection, but it doesn't. Instead the directors plod slowly onwards and resolve the philosophical dilemmas with absurd, silly conclusions about what Lain really is. It's just like they reduced everything down to magic.
Don't get me wrong, I really wanted to like this series. I enjoy cyberpunk and philosophy and wanted to look for a well done series that incorporated the two. I had heard many good things about this anime, but it just did not meet almost any of the most basic expectations I have for either anime or cyberpunk.
If you are interested in cyberpunk, Ghost in the Shell is very much the superior choice in all aspects, except possibly the art, though it's no sloucher there either. If you are interested in a coming of age story for children in a virtual world, Dennou Coil is better. For those just interested in really crazy, genuinely weird stuff-- that still makes actual sense-- try Paranoia Agent or Paprika.
That isn't to say you, the reader, might not like Serial Experiments Lain. If you have no prior exposure to cyberpunk or the philosophical issues raised within, or if you have very high tolerance to long scenes in which absolutely nothing advances the plot, or if enjoyment of the artistic merits of a series is sufficient for you, this just might do it. But it's not really enough for me.
