When theanimeElfen Lied first emerged into the world, kicking and screaming and sticky with vernix caseosa, it was a spectacle from which few could avert their eyes. In a review written for Anime News Network, Theron Martin described the experience of watching Elfen Lied as“distinctive and intriguing”, while Travis Pierce, writing forGamerz-Edge, referred to the show as “weird and deranged at times, and I’m sad to say that I kind of enjoy it that way”. Inspiring shock, emotion, and ultimately awe from viewers in equal measure, the general consensus upon the release of Elfen Lied was that it was a show withimpact.
In recent years, however, Elfen Lied has developed something of a bad reputation. Once hailed as a masterpiece of anime, today it is not uncommon to hear the same title’s name being dismissed as an exercise in schlock. Dubbed cheap, leery, and on some occasions, outright offensive, the enduring reputation of Elfen Lied is that of a completely disposable gorefest with little to no redeeming qualities at all. Is that reputation justified?
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Let’s start by addressing the elephant in the room (or should I say theElfenin the — well, you get the point). Elfen Lied is indeed an anime that includes gore. In Elfen Lied, heads are cleaved from bodies; limbs from torsos; fingers sliced up into little bits of skin and bone. The anime’s first seven minutes are committed to depicting gore at its most visceral. In a sequence once considered iconic, now deemed infamous, protagonist Lucy floats naked through the bowels of a government facility, silently tearing soldiers to shreds of blood and offal.
None of Elfen Lied’s other scenes of gore are quite as palpable as its opening, however. In fact, successive scenes of brutality actually end up decreasing not only in frequency, but also in severity as the show goes on. By the penultimate episode, on-screen gore has been completely substituted with acts of violence that are only carried out off-screen. In a harrowing flashback revealed toward the climax of the series, a younger Lucy kills her classmates in retaliation for beating her pet dog to death, and we see none of this violent act ourselves — only the collateral blood as it suddenly sprays on to a potted lily on the classroom desk.
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There is absolutely an argument to be made that the show’s opening sequence is, in fact, just a gorefest (I would even argue that the entire point of the opening sequence is that itisjust a gorefest). But the entirety of Elfen Lied can’t be written off as one, not when the rest of the show dials down the violence in favor of focusing on the story and characters.
Speaking of which: In addition to being generally (though, as I’ve demonstrated,unfairly) deemed a celebration of mutilation, Elfen Lied also has a reputation for being a cheap harem with even cheaper fanservice. Setting the topic of fanservice aside (for now), it is impossible to gauge what value Elfen Lied has as a harem anime, because the truth of the matter is that to sweepingly deem it as such is to completely miss the point of its character dynamics.
Elfen Lied may feature a 4:1 ratio of female to male characters, but this does not necessarily a harem anime make. What defines a standard harem anime isn’t the percentage of characters of one gender or another, but rather how female characters act in relation to the leading man. If, for example, each of the girls are all vying for the token guy’s affection or have an overly invested interest in his love life — a la Love Hina or Rent-A-Girlfriend — then voila, you have you a yourself harem anime.
The vast majority of Elfen Lied’s female characters, however, are not concerned at all with romancing the male character Kouta — or with romance,period. Though they and Kouta all end up living in the same home together, the group dynamic here is far lessharemand far morefound family. Kouta is not the center of everyone’s attention nor the metaphorical sun around which they all rotate. Rather, everyone living within the Maple House is concerned with everyone — looking after each other and taking care of each other equally in what is essentially the round table of communal life.
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So, Elfen Lied isn’t a harem — but is it just as heavy on the fanservice as its reputation would have us believe? Many point out that the show contains ample amounts of nudity, from Lucy’s naked state during the opening massacre at the government facility, to several scenes of outdoor bathing, which occur during the show’s more domestic moments.
But depictions of nudity do not automatically make for fanservice; rather, it is how the nudity is framed that makes all the difference. For example, in an anime such as To Love-Ru, we get detailed close-ups of all the jiggly bits and genitals because the intention thereisto titillate the audience. In Elfen Lied, the nudity is completely utilitarian. While nipples, breasts, and thighs are all shown on screen, not once does the camera zoom in to give us all the intimate details. The nudity is not sexually charged. It is sterile. It is raw.
And it is especially not fanservice — just as Elfen Lied itself is especially not a harem, nor is it a gorefest, as it is so often deemed to be. Of course, none of these elements make for a bad anime by default, and there is definitely a discussion to be had on the sneering implication that any show with heavy helpings of gore and fanservice is automatically garbage. But in the case of Elfen Lied, the general reputation that it has been laden with — based on its supposed lashings of gore, harem themes, and fanservice — is certainly not a positive one, nor is it deserved at all.
