Portal:Anime and Manga/Selected series/10
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Elfen Lied (エルフェンリート Erufen Rīto?) is a Japanese manga series created by author Lynn Okamoto. A thirteen-episode anime television series adaptation based on the manga was produced by the studio ARMS, and broadcast on TV Tokyo from July to October 2004; the anime was later licensed in North America on DVD by ADV Films. The anime started before the manga was complete; as a result, the plot differed between the two, especially towards the ending of the story. In 2005, a special original video animation, written to occur between the tenth and eleventh episodes of the series, was released. The title is literally German for "Elfin Song", and takes its name from the poem Elfenlied and the German lied, a classical-romantic poem or musical work.
Elfen Lied revolves around the race of diclonius, a mutant human species identified by two cat-ear like horns and transparent "vectors", and the ways in which the humans abuse and reject them as part of society, instead seizing them for storage and experimentation in an offshore laboratory. The series is centered around the teenage diclonius girl "Lucy", said to be the first diclonius, becoming sadistic as a result of her vengeance and delivering it on the humans who rejected her.
Elfen Lied involves themes of social alienation, identity, revenge and the value of humanity. [1]The series employs graphic violence and nudity, especially the graphic opening sequence of the first episode. So far, only the thirteen-episode anime series has been licensed in the United States, by ADV Films. ADV Films said the series was one of their bestselling and "most notorious" releases of 2005.[2][3]
