Elfen Lied Collection reviews

This anime is extremely violent and bloody and contains expilict nudity. If you can handle this then Elfen Lied is the anime for you. It has an awesome story with great characters. My only problem with it is some of the voices are kinda annoying like Yuka's but you get over it. My other problem with it is that the anime only does half the manga so you have to read it to find out what else happens. All in all though an excellent anime to add to your collection.

At first i thought i was just watching a blood bath, but after watching through each episode the story developed quite well, i was disappointed that the OVA was not dubbed but the 13 episodes are great (maybe a little too short)

If you want to try something new have a go at elfen lied :)

I watched this show years ago, and simply had to nab it when it appeared on mightyape's daily deals! While the show may contain too much senseless nudity (and probably a bit too much blood), if you can overlook it and follow the story, it's quite a thought provoking piece, showing both the good and bad that the human race is capable of. If you can overlook the aforementioned senselessness (that a lot of other buyers have also commented on) you can certainly enjoy watching the show. For the sqeamish or prudent however, I would suggest finding another anime to occupy your time.

At first all I was in for was just blood, gore and death, but I continued watching to find a rather excellent yet twisted story which had me at the edge of my seat. My only qualm is that the ending came up rather sudden, and that there isn't a second season :(

I highly recommend this anime!

Elfen Lied has got to be one of the most overrated animes ever. I decided to watch this among the scores of reviews online about how amazing this anime is, how some moments are so sad and tear jerking, that the story is so dark and psychological and how there is so much emotional depth within the characters. Well I gave Elfen Lied a go…and came out fully disappointed.

I think what I need to address first is the blood, gore and nudity in this anime. It's too overdone! Now I have no qualms with horror, if anything I'm actually quite a fan, but there is a point where it isn't necessary. Clearly, the director/mangaka did not know where the point was. It felt like every scene there was someone being beheaded or dismembered for no good reason, it just seemed like the director thought “Oh yeah, just go on and cut more people up.” Sure, they had to show the pure violence of these Diclonius and beheading and dismembering is perfect for that, my problem is that the pure horror that usually comes with seeing someone beheaded is empty. The blood and gore in Elfen Lied seems as normal as breathing air after the first episode and just gets boring and senseless too soon. And the nudity- It's obvious from the VERY beginning of the anime in the opening song. Extreme fan service anyone- Now to tie in with the nudity is the animation work, the quality of the art isn't actually bad but the main characters look like they're 12 years old. Which usually wouldn't be a problem just an annoyance, but when you've got a a main character who seems like she's only 12 years old walking around in the nude for a good amount of the series, you know there's a problem. Speaking of fan service, why not chuck in a some girls in a bath scene- Sure, that's fine. It's not bad to have some ecchi stuff here and there in anime. It's not, however, fine when they're a 12 year old (literally this time) and a looks-like-12-year-old. I mean, c'mon! Was all this nudity necessary- Of course not. They just felt like overdosing it in fan service is all.

The one thing I would agree on with the array of reviews out there is that Elfen Lied does indeed have a dark storyline. It's a girl who kills humans recklessly, a girl the military wants their hands on, a girl with a seemingly horrible past – plot elements that actually could have worked wonders. But this killing humans recklessly thing never seemed justified to me, the military wanting her story fell flat, her dark past was too predictable and relied on an overused concept found in many animes.

What made Elfen Lied lose a lot of stars on this review was the characters. I don't have much of a problem with the male protagonist, although he does get under your skin a few times. The annoying ones were the female characters, mainly the protagonist and the Cousin. Are we supposed to feel sorry for “Nyuu”- Because she comes off as the type of character who needs to pitied, the type of character that's asking for the label of ‘victim’, which is not exactly a label you can give her easily. There is a kind of ‘tug-of-war’ feeling towards why we should be feeling sorry for her, which makes liking the main character hard. Often, Nyuu comes off as rather annoying. And the Cousin – THERE IS NO END TO THE ANNOYANCE I FEEL TOWARDS HER. I can't even begin to describe the irritation I feel towards her, she's just…AF­HJGEK!! Without spoiling anything, lets just say; no one likes jealousy on irritating, looks-like-12 female characters. Seriously, I felt like my favourite character throughout this story was the dog. A plain, non-talking, can't use jutsu, can't transform into a giant God-like (or Hell-like) monster dog. Now that, my friends, is saying something.

I feel as though everyone hears about the good reviews to Elfen Lied and decide to watch, only to be disappointed so they dwell into the story too much and depict every detail coming up with the conclusion that it's so deep and moving. I say that Elfen Lied didn't meet their expectations so they had to cognitively tune this anime into something that did meet their expectations. Well try taking a step back and seeing the picture that way.

But they one thing that made me give this anime even one star is the opening song. “Lilium (Music Box)” is a beautiful song that deserves a better opening short than that of a naked woman.

To sum up, Elfen Lied is an overrated anime with an excessive amount of senseless gore, too much try-hard fan service, a lacking storyline and teeth grinding annoying characters. At first I felt mean for giving Elfen Lied only 1 star, but after all the praise it has gotten, 1 star is perfectly fine by me.

One of the classic projects that I feel is essential for any anime collector. A brilliant watch expressing the dark side of humanity as well as the few people who are better than the mould, in spite of tragedy. And also the unfairness life can throw at people as well. A very well written classic, but not for those who like a happily ever after story. Not to mention a very high body count.

If blood, gore, nudity and stuff of the sort doesn't throw you off, there's no real reason to not like it. There's drama, comedy, tears and laughter, it's just another impressive anime to be taken for what its worth. A story about outsiders and the to what extent is non-human with the point driven home by cruelty and drama, blood and cathartic exhaustion.

I brought this for my goddaughters birthday but thought I would check it out first and I couldn't stop watching. Interesting story, great animation. I can see why she loves it so much

I powered through this last night/today and it was just great like my god it was just amazing

Mindblowing plot and fascinating characters with a side order of decapitating, blood-spurting, limb-chopping, mutant girl fights, teen nudity and yeah… not for the close-minded or faint at heart. Recommend for fans of Gantz and Higurashi.

I didn't even know they had dubbed this in english when I bought it but the dub is flawless. I dvd extras are a little light but they show itself is incredible. Everyone needs to watch this.

Elfen lied is a deep, dark anime, at the beginning it doesn't seem to have much of a storyline, just strange characters and events but then everything starts falling into place, making you want more! Definatly a must watch! This language Is automatically set to English speaking, but I prefer to change the language it to how it was when I first stumbled upon this series ‘Japanese speaking, English subtitle’ :)