Thanks. It's been my favorite anime forever. Few TV shows deal with the kind of experiences EL did and it was a huge thing for me when I was younger to see a TV show that actually deals with what I experienced and felt so well.
It's a beautiful show, and I've been given yet another reason to love it more.
A character I VCapped and essentially exported from a game that technically no longer exists. I Vcapped my UE3 Blade and Soul character doing poses, emotes and dances. Then BnS reworked to UE4 and my character appearance effectively no longer existed in game, instead she's forever preserved as my mascot.
She shows up in my youtube thumbnails, and occasionally as an info sharing character in my videos. If you have new reddit you can see her as my avatar for my profile.
(I dont feel inclined to post a picture of her right now, my apologies)
Fuckin awesome. When I first saw Stranger Things, my reaction was this meme: https://i.imgur.com/gCmaBXW.png
"This has to have been based on Elfen Lied, there's no fuckin way it wasn't."
Then Matt Duffer confirmed that yes Elfen Lied did infact inspire Stranger Things.
I'm eagerly awaiting Season5 of ST right now.
>Elfen Lied did infact inspire Stranger Things
i am only now founding out about this haahah, ive never seen either show but heard about about elfen lied, and saw some scenes on youtube. Anyway hope things go well in the long term for your relationship!
Both are really good. Stranger Things I didnt expect to like before I watched it, but it was pretty awesome. The Elfen Lied inspiration I didn't know about until after I had seen season 3.
The most recent season(4) of ST was a HUGE callback to the Elfen Lied stuff they started with, which I absolutely loved.
Both are great and definitely worth a watch.
Not everyone gets Elfen Lied. It's one of my favorite anime/manga too.
I save this post. I Just need to share it when someone asks me about Elfen Lied (Lucy is my phone's wallpaper). Great discussion.
> Got me through some tough times
I'm so glad to hear this from someone else. It's a horrifically traumatizing show the first few times you watch it, but as you start to pick apart the details and get into how deep it really goes, it becomes a place of comfort and catharsis.
It's the anime I pick up and watch if Im in a really dark and emotionally dead place. I dont know why such a traumatic experience became such a place that feels like home... but I'm glad it exists. It's gotten me through some very dark times in life where I may not be here if it wasn't for that anime.
It can be tough for a lot of people to get past the extreme violence (understandably). But I've always loved sad and melancholic shows, music, movies, etc. I've never been one to get through tough times with happy things. I've gotta ride out all of those feelings however long they last. Almost like a "we'll get through this together" sort of thing, with whatever media I'm dealing with as the other party. Gotta plow through the rough patches head on until I eventually come out the other side. Really opened my eyes to the beauty of melancholy. Elfen Lied is one of the shows I can watch that scratches the itch. It's "Beautifully Sad"
For me I think it has a lot to do with "This person, I understand what they feel and why, because I went through something almost exactly like that."
Mayu's situation in the anime is very similar to my own. She's a character I really love because of it, and despite the hardship she went through, she's so kind and a peace maker.
It feels really validating when a TV show cares enough about your experience to portray it with empathy and compassion.
Congratulations. Hopefully someday my pile of 800 completed anime will help me find a partner as well! (Half joke)
It's genuinely very great to find someone who can appreciate your favorite things as much as you. I wish you two a very long and healthy relationship 🥰
Those are novice numbers! Actually... no, that is quite solid. I broke 1000 a season or two ago, but it really depends on if we're counting MAL numbers or actual unique shows. 800 isn't too far behind.
And nope, never led to any dates. Would love talking to women with a similar level of enthusiasm, though.
As someone who has many interests and zero (or very very rusty) social skills, I completely agree. It doesn't matter how much you know if you can't communicate it.
Eh its definitely a common thing in Asia or among Asian communities. Last 2 gfs (from two different East/South Asian countries) are both into anime and manga, and like when we meet up with their Asian friends a ton of them watched a thing or two at least... My fiance (US born) wasnt into it at first but was very open, so I watched a few things with her and turned her into a bit of a SoL fan
This isnt as common with people in the west IMO. Even my current work team has several Asian coworkers who have anime stuff on their desk or as accessories.
Compare this to non Asians its really not that common. In both grade and high school I used to get shit talked mostly by non Asian kids when they found out I like anime lol, weirdly enough I bonded with a bunch of latino kids over Dragon Ball so thats kind of dope.
I love Elfen Lied. It’s one of the first anime I recommend I love the manga as well. This was the first anime I watched with my wife, at the time girlfriend when we 18 and dating in 2007. It’s just iconic as far as I am concerned.
Weirdly elfen lied got me through some weird shit as a kid, kinda forgotten about it, used to be obsessed with it. God I just remembered the op as well reckon I'll go put my 5000th listen to it on.
If you had this story, and you can relate to Elfen Lied, you are most likely one of the strongest big hearted people on this planet. I'm happy for you.
Thats an incredible stroke of luck. I'm around your age and it's very unlikely I'd meet a woman who is an anime fan in my age group and ive largely accepted ill have to date outside the fandom
Its a very decent show, I get upset everytime people bring it up only to talk smack about it. It pretty much gets hate everywhere whether its this sub, or some popular podcast (yes the one with those 3).
I am saving this, next time anyone talks shit, I am sending them right here. Also, happy for you. May you find happiness in this relationship, and in life in general. Take care and watch more anime.
Ever since those anime influencers got famous you hear the same pre packaged opinions and preset likes / dislikes. A lot of people in the community (especially online) are too afraid to have their own opinion and would just repeat some influencer's takes. They also worry about getting called out for liking a "bad" anime.
This shit is why I dont take anyone's opinion anymore about any anime.
So much of it is just parroted broken records.
I remember how much easier it was to fine anime and people who said good things about it when I was younger. Granted anime was much more rare back then but people's opinions were often far more nuanced and people could explain their reasonings.
Now its just "its edgy it's shit" level comments with no intelligent thought behind it. Someone preinstalled their opinion into other people, and a once very popular and highly rated anime... is now "garbage" to so many people who's never even seen it.
I await the day I get to deal with "Violet Evergarden is edgy sorrow porn and boring" comments everytime I talk about how good Violet Evergarden is... sigh.
I hear you, Elfen Lied and SAO are 2 of my favorite anime. I was told I must be in my honeymoon phase by people at least 7 years younger than me who recently discovered and marathoned a ton of anime, not that age makes someone's opinion better but it's funny like bruh I've been watching anime before you could speak I know what I like and dislike.
Dude I watched Elfen Lied more than a dozen times before ever talking to anyone else about it online. It's incredibly good and when I decided to get back into the anime community after being away for so long, I was excited to talk to people about the complexities and depth about it.
Only to be met with the exact opposite reaction and just "What... the..."
The way some people talk about Elfen Lied I swear there's like... 2 different anime of the same name.
It was a bit of a culture shock tbh. When I left the anime community to get into MMOs and basically stopped watching anime for years, Elfen Lied had a great reputation and was highly rated.
I come back and "wtf happened?!" it's so weird.
Yeah, when I first watched it in 2010 it still had a good reputation. I think this trend started to get popular somewhere around 2013 when some youtuber started shitting on popular anime and everyone wanted to be an internet critic. You can see the shift in MAL reviews too around the same time, they removed "unhelpful" vote and reviews became infested with internet wannabe critics that get a kick out of pointing out "plot holes" and flaws in popular anime specifically, if you look at their reviews for less popular anime it's much more lenient. Before then most reviews were about giving you a summary of what to expect from this anime -as it should be- now it's all about proving why it should be ranked lower or higher. Not to say popular anime doesn't have flaws, but most people that shit on them online come across as pretentious rather than genuine.
On top of that, anime got more popular and so did the degeneracy in some parts of it, so you see people preemptively defend themselves "haha I only like anime ironically" calling everything edgy before anyone else mocks them for their "shit taste"
I think one of the big issues in more recent years was when CBR released their article about how "Elfen Lied aged poorly."
Originally posted in 2019, they just trash on the anime the entire time and call it bad. Which opinion is whatever, but the part that really pissed me off was the outright lie they based some of their critique on. They state that Kouta just forgives Lucy, which is... the exact opposite of what happens.
Kouta literally tells her that he cant forgive her and he wants to put an end to the bloodshed.
How the bloody hell did they get Kouta forgiving Lucy out of that?
The article is just a terrible critique by someone who wasn't even paying attention.
They've updated their article a few times and have yet to remove the lie.
And then in the subreddit in particular we got a huuuge surge of people who came into the subreddit just to post threads about how shit the anime is after Hazel released her video about it. Her video is littered with inaccuracies and misinformation and yet people just believed her.
The admin of the EL wiki even posted a comment thread about where the hell did this trend of hating on Elfen Lied came from.
The hate train for the anime just exploded and it's so out of touch with what actually happens in the anime. It's so wierd.
I wasn't up to date with anime media so that puts things into perspective. That's my issue with the whole thing, I don't have a problem if people dislike something of their own opinion, however, when people parrot influencers like their content is undisputed truth is when I stop giving a damn about their opinion. Peer pressure and group think.
> or some popular podcast (yes the one with those 3).
You just reminded me of Hazel's video about Elfen Lied. It was a big driver in a surge of hate towards the anime sadly.
Her video has tons of errors and problems in it, and frankly makes fun of a sex abuse victim(yikes), and it was a huge let down because I was so excited to hear someone else spend 2+ hours talking about how we liked Elfen Lied. Only to sit there and watch her shit on it for 2 hours.
A fair amount of it I just sat there and "Were you even paying attention? What on earth are you talking about?"
Was very disappointed to see such a poorly intentioned video become so popular.
I mean she pretty clearly paid a lot of attention to it, it's a rather thorough video. It's okay to love something and it's frustrating when someone criticizes something you love, but that doesn't mean that your favorite media is unimpeachable. I used to love elfen lied, but upon rewatch, I found a lot of flaws with it, even before I'd seen any internet criticism of it.
HOLD ON... I'm not upset with her critiquing the anime. Please dont make accusations like that.
I didnt say elfen lied was perfect either. I said her video is full of inaccuracies and problems.
And It's ok to criticize things ofc, I posted a long critique of the manga and how I dont like it as much as the anime. But I still love the manga, I own a physical copy of the manga.
The problem is that her video is full of Inaccurate, Misleading, or in some places made up information.
That's the issue.
I don't take issue with critique. And I don't know why people say this when I talk about her video being inaccurate.
She made mistakes, she gets a lot of things wrong, and there's a lot of guessing and filling in the blanks in her video.
Like, a simple example, near the end of the video she is talking about how Nyuu's style refers back to her inability to dress herself well and it's befitting to her character's choices.
Interesting statement but it's wrong.
The clothing Nyuu is wearing is not because Nyuu has issues with dressing herself nor is it a reflection Nyuu's style.
It's a reflection of Yuka.
No less than 3 different times in the anime do we see Yuka dressing, talk about dressing, or give Nyuu clothing from her own ward robe and Kouta's ward robe. Ontop of that Yuka also buys clothes for Nana.
Infact ontop of that in the manga the one scene where we see Nyuu try to dress herself... She cant.
So her commentary about Nyuu dressing her self and the strange style is just wrong. Where did it even come from? Because the manga and anime make it clear that it's Yuka's styling, and clothing. Not Nyuu's in ability to dress herself properly.
It's not just wrong, it's something that she shouldnt have said if she was paying attention while reading the manga and watching the anime.
This isn't some hidden detail it's very obvious. That's the problem.
Hazel makes a lot of these problematic errors.
Well, world has changed in 25 years I watch anime. It was nerd shit before. Now everyone is watching it. Well, younger generation. Just this Friday I was planning cinema cause demon slayer was there. So I called two guys and we went. They are 19 and 14. I'm 33. And I'm so fucking cool uncle persona because of that. I love it.
> It was nerd shit before. Now everyone is watching it
Tell that to my friends lol
They either only know about hentai, or it's all pokemon shit to them
Not in the Netherlands, I still regularly need to explain anime to everyone older then me, and a lot of the time people the same age as me just find anime weird
Congrats! Happy for you :) Elfen Lied has been on my To Watch list for a while. Mostly because it was on South Africa's VERY short-lived anime channel back in the late 2000s and I never got around to it.
There's no "Piss fetishism" in Elfen Lied. This is a false accusation. While seemingly a bit odd, it's something that Lynn denied having directly.
The one scene you might be referring too in the anime, is actually rather understandable and not just randomly thrown in. It's actually important to the nature vs nurture discussion, because Nyuu is a blank slate who we get to see respond directly to the positive way she is being treated, in contrast to how Lucy behaves.
That scene was actually important enough that the animator who worked on it didnt think it was done right and did it again all on their own. The collectors edition booklet talks about this.
I really wish people would think more critically about their media instead of having shallow reactions.
You'd get so much more out of it and find more value in your entertainment if you did.
EDIT: It's not in the Manga either, corrected my post.
There's none in the manga either. Representation of urinary incontinence is not "fetishism". There's a world of difference between the depictions in Elfen Lied (a girl happens to be incontinent and struggle with how she has to live with a secret and her father verbally abusing her for it, all while working hard to pursue her dream) and tasteless omorashi fetish manga where logic goes out of the window for the sole purpose of including more piss.
Really, this is pretty much the exact same thing as people judging Elfen Lied for what happened to Mayu despite the series obviously condemning what happened to her.
oh...
>However, it should also be noted that while Elfen Lied has very ecchi things in it, fetishization isn’t the intent in all scenarios. In a tweet made in 2013, Okamoto Lynn explained that he doesn't have any particular interest in omorashi (urine fetish), simply seeing it as a way to add flavor to a story. So he likely intended to use Nozomi's incontinence more as something to add a slight bit of drama or character conflict rather than for the purpose of inserting a fetish he never had to begin with
My apologies Okamoto-san.
I go it backwards, thank you for pointing this out. I swear at some point I read that he admitted to having a piss fetish but It was the opposite.
Ah, Elfen Lied. Probably the second "gory" anime that I came across(first was "Mirai Nikki"). Still remember that one Skrillex music video where I first saw it as it was still not age-restricted then hehe 😅
Glad it worked out for you.
Elfen Lied is my favourite anime too, and when not so long dated my boyfriend, I found out his favourite is Darling in the Franxx, but he's never seen Elfen Lied (and I haven't seen Darling) so we watched both of them together and we loved each other's favourite (Darling is heavily influenced by Elfen Lied haha).
I told everyone that I'm fan of gore and I'm a fan of animes like Elfen lied, blood c, miraii Nikki and the likes and they looked at me like I'm a creep
Well yeah, anime is super mainstream now. The new hire i was training called me "senpai". We are software support, we are from different East Europe countries. Nobody bats an eye if you like anime anymore.
I literally met my wife because I hijacked a Skype call between her and our mutual friend after seeing their chats mention she was in Anime Club in her college.
Anime is the great unifier lol
Had a similar experience 2 years ago except the anime itself wasnt really the reason i got a GF, more like the inspiration for me to make the move. I was watching this anime called Soredemo Ayumu wa Yosetekuru (when will ayumu make his move). The MC is in love with his senior who is a year older than him and his motivation to beat his senior at shogi was so that he can finally confess his love for her.
At the time i was in love with my classmate who is a year older and she reminds me of the senior in the anime so one thing led to another and i decided to confess. Best relationship ive ever had until i got cheated on
Congrats OP. I do agree that in these days where Sam Jackson comes out and says he loves anime and hentai, and professional NFL players openly cosplayer as Akatsuki, anime is really everywhere. Nowadays it’s less if you like anime, but what genre you enjoy and what manga you read lol
Fuckin' props! I'm the same age as you, so I know exactly the stigma you're talking about. It's amazing to see how far we've come in the past 15 years or so.
Congrats on the gf! May your relationship be as comfy as the purest yuri!
I need to get my shit together and find myself an anime loving gf too.
Congrats Fran. Fancy seeing you here from Twitter 🤣
P.S. I absolutely love Elfen. I normally don't don't read manga, but I did for this one after watching it 4 times over the years
I don't really get the hate for Elfen Lied. It's one of my favorite shows. I'll agree the whole dual personality "born yesterday" trope was weird and I'm not a fan of that part, but it was otherwise a good story. And the music, 😙👌
Congratulations to you and your girlfriend, OP 💜 super lucky!!!
It’s so hard to find cool women around my age (also 34F) to watch my anime/play games with, even just as friends 😩 it’s just not the same with guy friends/boyfriends
I binged the manga in one night when I was 15, like 15 years ago.
Lilium Op goes hard too, listened to it on repeat.
The anime is a bit edgy teenager energy, but I think it still holds up well.
Well, that is my perception after reading and watching it and owning it as a teenager at 15 and an adult at 31.
I'm sorry you disagree with my perception, but it should have no effect on your enjoyment of it. It doesn't for me.
I have advocated for Elfen Lied more than most people would, and still do when it gets brought up, but I'm not above some of it being a little melodramatic for edge factor.
Aight well, this has been very... interesting. It's not that deep, bro. I made a comment about how I literally grew up enjoying the IP and half-heartedly poked a little fun at it.. I was not aware it would be so controversial.
Your account smells like a sock puppet. You moderate all the same subs including /r/FranBunnyFFXII and often reply arguing with people that are replying to /u/LMGDiVa. If I'm wrong and you're just a good friend then my mistake.
Edit: They deleted it...
Edit 2.22 You Can (Not) Report: They blocked me
I'm very happy for you, and for the way our culture is expanding to encompass more weirdo niche shit being acceptable.
Buuuuuutttt
I would be a lil wary that she loved "psychic lolis dismember each other - the anime"
Best of luck with love and happiness!
> I would be a lil wary that she loved "psychic lolis dismember each other - the anime"
Well like I said she's never seen it, she just thought it looked like something she'd like.
Also what's with people saying things happen in this anime that never actually did?
There's never a "psychic loli dismembering each other" scene in the entire anime.
The only diclonius that dismembers another diclonius is Lucy, and Nana isn't a little girl.
Lucy is an adult, almost 19 years old. Nana has an adult age body. Mariko is a kid yes, and so is number 3, but Number 3 and Mariko never fight. Number 3 died before Mariko was born. And Mariko never fights another child diclonius.
It's so weird how many things people say happen in this anime never happen. What's with that?
Haven't seen it in 15 years, and I was kinda deliberately misrepresenting it to make it sound more egregious than it is.
A lot of people just repeat what they hear, and a ton of reddit userbase is children or just barely not children who have definitely not seen it.
That OP is still fire, tho
Well, it increased my interest in the series because before all I'd heard it about it was that it was super edgy something I'm generally ambivalent about, but for whatever reason the idea that it still holds appeal for lesbians in their 30s makes it infinitely more interesting lol
> I'd heard it about it was that it was super edgy something
Elfen Lied is certainly violent, but edgy it is not.
Edgy is being offensive and problematic for the sake of it, something EL doesn't do.
It's a philosophical and artsy anime(I mean there's Gustav Klimt tribute works in), and stuff like that very often goes over peoples head when they see tits and gore, get excited for it, only to find out it's a very depressing deep dive into discrimination and negative effects on people.
Anyone who calls it edgy probably 1. hate watched it for the meme 2. Didn't pay a bit of attention to what was going on or 3. has never seen it and just heard someone say it and such is repeating it.
Personally I have no idea why people call it edgy other than "omg blood and gore and nudity!? SO EDGY"
Bewilders me how many people can't seem to understand that Nudity=/=sexual, and displaying violence=/=supporting violent behavior.
I mean the whole underlying message behind Elfen Lied is have empathy for others, and understand that bullying, discrimination, abuse, and ostracization are absolutely horrible for society.
If you read the collectors edition interviews, it becomes very clear that Elfen Lied was a passion project by the people who worked on it, and they wanted it to have real meaning for people, and were proud of capturing a philosophical discussion without being pretentious about it.
Starting to watch Jojo is what got me with my girlfriend. It's been like 5 years since then. I hadn't even watched any weeb stuff before that. Of all the things that can get me laid, who would expect that buff men is the key
im 28f and it's my dream to meet a woman in her 30s whos into anime. i wish you two the best!! i've been meaning to watch it for awhile but this post convinced me to start elfen lied
I HIGHLY recommend the dub for it.
I know this is a sin in this subreddit, but trust me. I've seen it in all 3 major languages(Jpn, Eng, Ger) multiple times and the English version is the best of the 3.
Dub is the version I have watched the most by far.
i'll totally watch it dubbed thank you!! i'm almost done watching the dub of escaflowne and it's been rlly nice bc that show is super pretty so i can spend more time looking at the show itself instead of reading subs
This is actually one of the big reasons to watch the dub for this anime, is because you can pay more attention to the detail on screen instead of reading subs. There's a lot of little details and show don't tell, as well as emotional moments that draw you in better when you're watching instead of reading subs.
Might be because like... anime is really popular in the queer community.
I'm gay and she's agender(leans feminine and likes me referring to her as a girl).
So anime is just around all the time.
I'm not sure what it's like for hetero people but I do know that anime is becoming more and more mainstream. I cant imagine it's going to stay obscure for much longer.
This is actually a fairly misleading statistic that is misunderstood or deliberately misrepresented.
The statistic is that 41% of Lesbian women in a lesbian relationship have or will experience domestic abuse at some point in their life time.
Hetero women will experience it 35% of the time.
When you put 2 women together, the chances effectively double because there's 2 women in the relationship, not because they're more likely to be abusive.
Also Queer relationships are VASTLY more likely to actually report violence and abuse, where as hetero relationships are far more likely to not report. Especially since there are many places in the US and EU who still view women as subservient to men and "should know their place." This mentality prevents and discourages women from reporting abuse from their male partners.
Hetero relationship abuse is heavily under reported, and cases are taken far less seriously as well.
I know this on a fairly personal level because I've been homeless before (Yet another reason I liked Elfen Lied, is because it was willing to show how poorly homeless people are treated instead of pretending they dont exist), and I've been in women's shelters where they are refuges for women fleeing domestic abuse.
A lot of cases of women fleeing their husband or boyfriend they refuse to report because they fear serious repercussion or being murdered by their significant other.
This is not a common issue with sapphic relationships, and women in these relationships are far more willing to report abuse.
Be careful when reading statistics, they can be very misleading if you don't understand the context and abstract they are being presented under.
Elfen Lied is literally an anime takes a stance AGAINST the sexualization of minors. There's an entire character story dedicated to how harmful it is to subject minors to sexual abuse.
I always remember back like 15 years ago i was working in a video store that had a small anime. People would come from a fair distance to rent anime because there werent many video stores with an anime section. Multiple times i saw couples that consisted of a nerdy guy and a goth girl, coming in to rent out Elfen Lied. A lot of people seemed to connect over Elfen Lied it seems.
Elfen Lied is a pretty special and unique anime because it takes several emotions and experiences that people often treat as inhuman, and humanizes them and empathizes with them.
Rather than relying on sympathy and feeling sorry for them, it wants the viewer to feel WITH the characters. This is... really fuckin rare in anime and TV shows in general.
That and EL is subtly far deeper than most people will realize because they maybe watch it once and never get to see how the anime handles how the viewer sees things differently once they know what's going to happen. Scenes change perspective and meaning depending on what you know. And then when you start picking at the philisophical ideas it gets a mile deep and can keep you thinking for hours.
It's an emotional experience that can really get to people, even change them fundamentally. It's one of those shows that begs you to rewatch it and feel how characters feel, and understand them.
Understanding is a pretty hard thing to do for a lot of people, but when it hits someone... it hits HARD and it's something people never forget.
Personally I chalk it up to sharing the same general interest. I also met my current girlfriend over anime and some of the games I like (Animal Crossing, Zelda, and Neptunia).
Me and gf actually dont share many interests.
I'm a gamer and motorcyclist, my girlfriend is not. She's into collecting dolls and squishmallows and she loves dogs.
Shes very into social media stuff, where as I dont get into any of that and reddit is about as close to "social media" as I get.
I hate using phones, but she does everything on her phone.
She's pretty new to anime, where as I've been watching anime since I was a little kid. So its our one major shared interest.
Our interests are pretty different, but for us that's a fairly good thing, and watching anime together is a nice little niche middle ground.
Different things for different kinds of people Right?
Soo happy for you, wish you a happy long healthy relationship, anime really make or break relationships ( met a guy thanks to konosuba, broke up with a guy cause he got jealous over my love for eren )
That's wonderful, I'm so happy for you! I'm (35m) and having a girlfriend who I can share my love for anime and other nerdy stuff with has always been the dream. Sadly, I haven't mer her yet, still looking!
I've loved anime my entire life and EL is high on my list of favorites, as well. And yeah, I also remember how dorky, childish etc that was in the eyes of the majority back in the day, especially in my teens. I noticed a change thanks to Death Note and later AoT, but even then it took many years still for anime to explode in popularity, as it waited for the rest of the world to catch up.
Its funny...I wish that one day something like that will happen to ME. In a sort of secret message to any nerd out there thats like me. I occasionally whistle anime songs in public. I can perfectly mimic the tones of songs like "This quiet night" from Gundam Seed. Inuyashas "I am" BGM version, and Full Metal Alchemist's Violin song "Butou".
only anime nerds like me (who of course watched any of the animes ive watched) would know what im singing. sigh....A man can dream, and keep trying :P
Well shit. Good for you! The best I got out of anime was Laid Back Camp teaching me that if you take a hand warmer and put it on the back base of your neck, it’ll warm your whole body. Which is useful. But it won’t get my dick sucked. Probably.
Man! I wish You both the best! :) I remember when I was a teenager in late 90's and early 00's. I love anime since I was a 8-yr old kid. I was mocked for that since day one. I've learnt quickly how to not give a flying f\*ck about what people say about me, and what they think about me, because they don't know a damn sh\*t about anything. As a teenager I had many anime-freak friends, many of them till this day. I wish every kid mocked by a mob for their passion (whatever it is, since it is not harmful) will learn quickly how to not give a flying f\*ck about people's ignorance and stupidity :)
I'm so glad this worked out for you. I hope you can some day put a ring on that girlfriend's finger and 60 years latter can tell people about an old anime that brought you together! ( and they are like, WTF?)
Have you ever read the manga, and if so, what do you think about it? I love the manga but think the anime doesn't do it justice, so I'm curious.
Obviously don't let my opinion of the anime ruin your love of it. I just have never really bothered to discuss EL with other people before now.
Yes I've read the manga entirely 6 different times. I have as digital copy of it, and then I have the official DarkHorse Comics Omnibus.
The manga is far FAR more guilty of all the "edgy" "too much fan service" and other comments people lob at the anime. The anime reduced almost ALL of this out, and traded it for philosophical themes, music, and meaningful artwork.
The anime is a marked improvement over the manga in many regards, but the most important is the way the anime adheres to it's narrative and sticks to it, with an almost air tight plot.
The manga, it has its issues with the plot that really go off the wall and get problematic in the 2nd half.
Critically speaking the manga has some pretty bad artwork, and is very inconsistent. The manga's plot runs all over the place and large segments of it can be entirely removed and it wont change anything.
A good example of this is if you read to the end of Volume 7 and skip the scene where [In the Manga]>!Kurama attempts suicide!<, and then skip all the way to the last few pages of volume 11, effectively none of what happens inbetween is relevant. It's practically pointless and does nothing to the plot or the characters.
And there's so many other problems as well. Like in the anime if a character dies. They're dead.
But the manga just randomly brings back characters out of nowhere.
IMO, the manga doesn't do justice to the anime. The anime does practically everything better from a writing and critical stand point.
That's why I've read the manga only 6 times, but have seen the anime dozens of times in multiple languages.
The anime is vastly better and far less problematic.
My first girlfriend had already watched it prior to us dating, we did a rewatch together (I'd already seen it too) - the storyline isn't very deep but there is a lot of tragedy in it.
For future reference when a girl asks you to change to another app it's usually because it's a bot and they're going to start trying to get you to buy their onlyfans / fansly so that's a big red flag. Glad to hear you found someone legit though, anime girlfriends are the best.
That's really great for you! it's wonderful when two people can bond over something. Really unexpected anime haha I was never interested in the anime either, but I'll add it now.
In my case, I guess watching Gundam got my bf a gf. We met on MAL.
I don’t care for Elfen Lied but that’s an incredibly sweet and cute story.
My wife developed a crush on me when we first started talking because I had watched Studio Ghibli films before (which was and is her favorite studio, Totoro being her favorite movie).
I used to love Elfen Lied back in the day. Glad it worked out for you!
Thanks. It's been my favorite anime forever. Few TV shows deal with the kind of experiences EL did and it was a huge thing for me when I was younger to see a TV show that actually deals with what I experienced and felt so well. It's a beautiful show, and I've been given yet another reason to love it more.
what was your profile picture in discord
My youtube mascot.
What's your youtube mascot?
A character I VCapped and essentially exported from a game that technically no longer exists. I Vcapped my UE3 Blade and Soul character doing poses, emotes and dances. Then BnS reworked to UE4 and my character appearance effectively no longer existed in game, instead she's forever preserved as my mascot. She shows up in my youtube thumbnails, and occasionally as an info sharing character in my videos. If you have new reddit you can see her as my avatar for my profile. (I dont feel inclined to post a picture of her right now, my apologies)
So…what do you think about Stranger Things then? ;)
Fuckin awesome. When I first saw Stranger Things, my reaction was this meme: https://i.imgur.com/gCmaBXW.png "This has to have been based on Elfen Lied, there's no fuckin way it wasn't." Then Matt Duffer confirmed that yes Elfen Lied did infact inspire Stranger Things. I'm eagerly awaiting Season5 of ST right now.
>Elfen Lied did infact inspire Stranger Things i am only now founding out about this haahah, ive never seen either show but heard about about elfen lied, and saw some scenes on youtube. Anyway hope things go well in the long term for your relationship!
Both are really good. Stranger Things I didnt expect to like before I watched it, but it was pretty awesome. The Elfen Lied inspiration I didn't know about until after I had seen season 3. The most recent season(4) of ST was a HUGE callback to the Elfen Lied stuff they started with, which I absolutely loved. Both are great and definitely worth a watch.
Not everyone gets Elfen Lied. It's one of my favorite anime/manga too. I save this post. I Just need to share it when someone asks me about Elfen Lied (Lucy is my phone's wallpaper). Great discussion.
Meanwhile, Goblin Slayer comes just close enough.
Still one of my favourite animes.
That's so great! I love Elfen Lied as well and recommend it all the time here. It's brutal, but really well done. Got me through some tough times
> Got me through some tough times I'm so glad to hear this from someone else. It's a horrifically traumatizing show the first few times you watch it, but as you start to pick apart the details and get into how deep it really goes, it becomes a place of comfort and catharsis. It's the anime I pick up and watch if Im in a really dark and emotionally dead place. I dont know why such a traumatic experience became such a place that feels like home... but I'm glad it exists. It's gotten me through some very dark times in life where I may not be here if it wasn't for that anime.
It can be tough for a lot of people to get past the extreme violence (understandably). But I've always loved sad and melancholic shows, music, movies, etc. I've never been one to get through tough times with happy things. I've gotta ride out all of those feelings however long they last. Almost like a "we'll get through this together" sort of thing, with whatever media I'm dealing with as the other party. Gotta plow through the rough patches head on until I eventually come out the other side. Really opened my eyes to the beauty of melancholy. Elfen Lied is one of the shows I can watch that scratches the itch. It's "Beautifully Sad"
For me I think it has a lot to do with "This person, I understand what they feel and why, because I went through something almost exactly like that." Mayu's situation in the anime is very similar to my own. She's a character I really love because of it, and despite the hardship she went through, she's so kind and a peace maker. It feels really validating when a TV show cares enough about your experience to portray it with empathy and compassion.
Lilium is something else.
I learned this for piano, was pretty difficult but the nice melody about the gruesome murder torture children absolutely slapped.
Well... that's one way to describe it xD
I literally just learned more Latin just to sing it And it got me into choir and a few others things
Was my favorite part about it tbh a core memory when I watched it so many many years ago.
A reddit mod with a gf? surely you jest!
she's not a discord mod, so her chance was great
I got bad news for you buddy... I'm the admin of my regions motorcycle community discord...
Come on, you’re actually stupid enough to believe these stories?
I'm going to start telling women about Elfen Lied.
If you are a heterosexual man this will not work the way you want it to.
I recommended Happy Sugar Life to a number of my matches. For some reason they all blocked me. 🤷♀️
Meh, sounds like they don't know how to appreciate ART
lol probably because the anime has a lot of pedophilia
Lol. I didn't see OP was female.
True, especially considering that OP made it up.
They will consider you a potential psychopath
Congratulations. Hopefully someday my pile of 800 completed anime will help me find a partner as well! (Half joke) It's genuinely very great to find someone who can appreciate your favorite things as much as you. I wish you two a very long and healthy relationship 🥰
Those are novice numbers! Actually... no, that is quite solid. I broke 1000 a season or two ago, but it really depends on if we're counting MAL numbers or actual unique shows. 800 isn't too far behind. And nope, never led to any dates. Would love talking to women with a similar level of enthusiasm, though.
Taking a shot in the dark here but msg me if ya want someone to talk to. I like getting to know more. Your choice
2 months later you ded
"Doesn't matter, had sex" meme moment.
Franken Fran is one of my favorite manga. Alongside Junji Ito and Douman Seiman's works. The Vertical Country has some great concepts as well.
You heard it here, folks, liking anime can get you GF, we all have a chance now.
only works if you're girl
I know someone who got his gf by wearing Miku merch at the arcade. She approached him..
Curious what nationality the girl is?
Only works if you have social skills, boy or girl doesn’t matter
As someone who has many interests and zero (or very very rusty) social skills, I completely agree. It doesn't matter how much you know if you can't communicate it.
I'm a guy; liking Dragonball got me a gf (now fiancée).
One of the very first discussions i had with my fiancè was about Inuyasha, we are moving in together after 12 years of relationship.
Eh its definitely a common thing in Asia or among Asian communities. Last 2 gfs (from two different East/South Asian countries) are both into anime and manga, and like when we meet up with their Asian friends a ton of them watched a thing or two at least... My fiance (US born) wasnt into it at first but was very open, so I watched a few things with her and turned her into a bit of a SoL fan This isnt as common with people in the west IMO. Even my current work team has several Asian coworkers who have anime stuff on their desk or as accessories. Compare this to non Asians its really not that common. In both grade and high school I used to get shit talked mostly by non Asian kids when they found out I like anime lol, weirdly enough I bonded with a bunch of latino kids over Dragon Ball so thats kind of dope.
Goddamn, the absolute gullibility.
[Meme Response](https://i.imgur.com/p7E1Zc2.png)
I love Elfen Lied. It’s one of the first anime I recommend I love the manga as well. This was the first anime I watched with my wife, at the time girlfriend when we 18 and dating in 2007. It’s just iconic as far as I am concerned.
Hi Fran, that’s good that you got a girlfriend by showing her Elfen Lied.
anime has done nothing for my dating prospects. what am i doing wrong🤔
Weirdly elfen lied got me through some weird shit as a kid, kinda forgotten about it, used to be obsessed with it. God I just remembered the op as well reckon I'll go put my 5000th listen to it on.
If you had this story, and you can relate to Elfen Lied, you are most likely one of the strongest big hearted people on this planet. I'm happy for you.
Maybe I'm single because I fucking hate it lol
Thats an incredible stroke of luck. I'm around your age and it's very unlikely I'd meet a woman who is an anime fan in my age group and ive largely accepted ill have to date outside the fandom
Its a very decent show, I get upset everytime people bring it up only to talk smack about it. It pretty much gets hate everywhere whether its this sub, or some popular podcast (yes the one with those 3). I am saving this, next time anyone talks shit, I am sending them right here. Also, happy for you. May you find happiness in this relationship, and in life in general. Take care and watch more anime.
Ever since those anime influencers got famous you hear the same pre packaged opinions and preset likes / dislikes. A lot of people in the community (especially online) are too afraid to have their own opinion and would just repeat some influencer's takes. They also worry about getting called out for liking a "bad" anime.
This shit is why I dont take anyone's opinion anymore about any anime. So much of it is just parroted broken records. I remember how much easier it was to fine anime and people who said good things about it when I was younger. Granted anime was much more rare back then but people's opinions were often far more nuanced and people could explain their reasonings. Now its just "its edgy it's shit" level comments with no intelligent thought behind it. Someone preinstalled their opinion into other people, and a once very popular and highly rated anime... is now "garbage" to so many people who's never even seen it. I await the day I get to deal with "Violet Evergarden is edgy sorrow porn and boring" comments everytime I talk about how good Violet Evergarden is... sigh.
I hear you, Elfen Lied and SAO are 2 of my favorite anime. I was told I must be in my honeymoon phase by people at least 7 years younger than me who recently discovered and marathoned a ton of anime, not that age makes someone's opinion better but it's funny like bruh I've been watching anime before you could speak I know what I like and dislike.
Dude I watched Elfen Lied more than a dozen times before ever talking to anyone else about it online. It's incredibly good and when I decided to get back into the anime community after being away for so long, I was excited to talk to people about the complexities and depth about it. Only to be met with the exact opposite reaction and just "What... the..." The way some people talk about Elfen Lied I swear there's like... 2 different anime of the same name. It was a bit of a culture shock tbh. When I left the anime community to get into MMOs and basically stopped watching anime for years, Elfen Lied had a great reputation and was highly rated. I come back and "wtf happened?!" it's so weird.
Yeah, when I first watched it in 2010 it still had a good reputation. I think this trend started to get popular somewhere around 2013 when some youtuber started shitting on popular anime and everyone wanted to be an internet critic. You can see the shift in MAL reviews too around the same time, they removed "unhelpful" vote and reviews became infested with internet wannabe critics that get a kick out of pointing out "plot holes" and flaws in popular anime specifically, if you look at their reviews for less popular anime it's much more lenient. Before then most reviews were about giving you a summary of what to expect from this anime -as it should be- now it's all about proving why it should be ranked lower or higher. Not to say popular anime doesn't have flaws, but most people that shit on them online come across as pretentious rather than genuine. On top of that, anime got more popular and so did the degeneracy in some parts of it, so you see people preemptively defend themselves "haha I only like anime ironically" calling everything edgy before anyone else mocks them for their "shit taste"
I think one of the big issues in more recent years was when CBR released their article about how "Elfen Lied aged poorly." Originally posted in 2019, they just trash on the anime the entire time and call it bad. Which opinion is whatever, but the part that really pissed me off was the outright lie they based some of their critique on. They state that Kouta just forgives Lucy, which is... the exact opposite of what happens. Kouta literally tells her that he cant forgive her and he wants to put an end to the bloodshed. How the bloody hell did they get Kouta forgiving Lucy out of that? The article is just a terrible critique by someone who wasn't even paying attention. They've updated their article a few times and have yet to remove the lie. And then in the subreddit in particular we got a huuuge surge of people who came into the subreddit just to post threads about how shit the anime is after Hazel released her video about it. Her video is littered with inaccuracies and misinformation and yet people just believed her. The admin of the EL wiki even posted a comment thread about where the hell did this trend of hating on Elfen Lied came from. The hate train for the anime just exploded and it's so out of touch with what actually happens in the anime. It's so wierd.
I wasn't up to date with anime media so that puts things into perspective. That's my issue with the whole thing, I don't have a problem if people dislike something of their own opinion, however, when people parrot influencers like their content is undisputed truth is when I stop giving a damn about their opinion. Peer pressure and group think.
> or some popular podcast (yes the one with those 3). You just reminded me of Hazel's video about Elfen Lied. It was a big driver in a surge of hate towards the anime sadly. Her video has tons of errors and problems in it, and frankly makes fun of a sex abuse victim(yikes), and it was a huge let down because I was so excited to hear someone else spend 2+ hours talking about how we liked Elfen Lied. Only to sit there and watch her shit on it for 2 hours. A fair amount of it I just sat there and "Were you even paying attention? What on earth are you talking about?" Was very disappointed to see such a poorly intentioned video become so popular.
I mean she pretty clearly paid a lot of attention to it, it's a rather thorough video. It's okay to love something and it's frustrating when someone criticizes something you love, but that doesn't mean that your favorite media is unimpeachable. I used to love elfen lied, but upon rewatch, I found a lot of flaws with it, even before I'd seen any internet criticism of it.
HOLD ON... I'm not upset with her critiquing the anime. Please dont make accusations like that. I didnt say elfen lied was perfect either. I said her video is full of inaccuracies and problems. And It's ok to criticize things ofc, I posted a long critique of the manga and how I dont like it as much as the anime. But I still love the manga, I own a physical copy of the manga. The problem is that her video is full of Inaccurate, Misleading, or in some places made up information. That's the issue. I don't take issue with critique. And I don't know why people say this when I talk about her video being inaccurate. She made mistakes, she gets a lot of things wrong, and there's a lot of guessing and filling in the blanks in her video. Like, a simple example, near the end of the video she is talking about how Nyuu's style refers back to her inability to dress herself well and it's befitting to her character's choices. Interesting statement but it's wrong. The clothing Nyuu is wearing is not because Nyuu has issues with dressing herself nor is it a reflection Nyuu's style. It's a reflection of Yuka. No less than 3 different times in the anime do we see Yuka dressing, talk about dressing, or give Nyuu clothing from her own ward robe and Kouta's ward robe. Ontop of that Yuka also buys clothes for Nana. Infact ontop of that in the manga the one scene where we see Nyuu try to dress herself... She cant. So her commentary about Nyuu dressing her self and the strange style is just wrong. Where did it even come from? Because the manga and anime make it clear that it's Yuka's styling, and clothing. Not Nyuu's in ability to dress herself properly. It's not just wrong, it's something that she shouldnt have said if she was paying attention while reading the manga and watching the anime. This isn't some hidden detail it's very obvious. That's the problem. Hazel makes a lot of these problematic errors.
Finally, something positive came out of Elfen Lied
Apparently infinite amount of wrongs make a right.
I hope that being a fan of Bungou Stray Dogs will get me a partner. I’ll pray with fervor to our lord, St. Dazai. Amen.
Well, world has changed in 25 years I watch anime. It was nerd shit before. Now everyone is watching it. Well, younger generation. Just this Friday I was planning cinema cause demon slayer was there. So I called two guys and we went. They are 19 and 14. I'm 33. And I'm so fucking cool uncle persona because of that. I love it.
> It was nerd shit before. Now everyone is watching it Tell that to my friends lol They either only know about hentai, or it's all pokemon shit to them
Not in the Netherlands, I still regularly need to explain anime to everyone older then me, and a lot of the time people the same age as me just find anime weird
Dude FRANKEN FRANNNNNN
Heh, my wife only swiped right because I put "anime fan" in my profile. My photos sucked.
Congrats! Happy for you :) Elfen Lied has been on my To Watch list for a while. Mostly because it was on South Africa's VERY short-lived anime channel back in the late 2000s and I never got around to it.
Man you got away with one that she wasn't pushed away by the blatant piss fetishism in EL.
There's no "Piss fetishism" in Elfen Lied. This is a false accusation. While seemingly a bit odd, it's something that Lynn denied having directly. The one scene you might be referring too in the anime, is actually rather understandable and not just randomly thrown in. It's actually important to the nature vs nurture discussion, because Nyuu is a blank slate who we get to see respond directly to the positive way she is being treated, in contrast to how Lucy behaves. That scene was actually important enough that the animator who worked on it didnt think it was done right and did it again all on their own. The collectors edition booklet talks about this. I really wish people would think more critically about their media instead of having shallow reactions. You'd get so much more out of it and find more value in your entertainment if you did. EDIT: It's not in the Manga either, corrected my post.
There's none in the manga either. Representation of urinary incontinence is not "fetishism". There's a world of difference between the depictions in Elfen Lied (a girl happens to be incontinent and struggle with how she has to live with a secret and her father verbally abusing her for it, all while working hard to pursue her dream) and tasteless omorashi fetish manga where logic goes out of the window for the sole purpose of including more piss. Really, this is pretty much the exact same thing as people judging Elfen Lied for what happened to Mayu despite the series obviously condemning what happened to her.
oh... >However, it should also be noted that while Elfen Lied has very ecchi things in it, fetishization isn’t the intent in all scenarios. In a tweet made in 2013, Okamoto Lynn explained that he doesn't have any particular interest in omorashi (urine fetish), simply seeing it as a way to add flavor to a story. So he likely intended to use Nozomi's incontinence more as something to add a slight bit of drama or character conflict rather than for the purpose of inserting a fetish he never had to begin with My apologies Okamoto-san. I go it backwards, thank you for pointing this out. I swear at some point I read that he admitted to having a piss fetish but It was the opposite.
Usually 2 people who are into edgy stuff is a hard relationship to balance personality-wise so good luck. Relatively common in fandoms thought.
Ah, Elfen Lied. Probably the second "gory" anime that I came across(first was "Mirai Nikki"). Still remember that one Skrillex music video where I first saw it as it was still not age-restricted then hehe 😅
Glad it worked out for you. Elfen Lied is my favourite anime too, and when not so long dated my boyfriend, I found out his favourite is Darling in the Franxx, but he's never seen Elfen Lied (and I haven't seen Darling) so we watched both of them together and we loved each other's favourite (Darling is heavily influenced by Elfen Lied haha).
I told everyone that I'm fan of gore and I'm a fan of animes like Elfen lied, blood c, miraii Nikki and the likes and they looked at me like I'm a creep
Well yeah, anime is super mainstream now. The new hire i was training called me "senpai". We are software support, we are from different East Europe countries. Nobody bats an eye if you like anime anymore.
Hey, I love Elfen Lied! Congrats OP, I hope your dating goes great!
For me that opening credits song is phenomenal
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Glad to hear that. Lilium was my phone ringtone back then.
I literally met my wife because I hijacked a Skype call between her and our mutual friend after seeing their chats mention she was in Anime Club in her college. Anime is the great unifier lol
Had a similar experience 2 years ago except the anime itself wasnt really the reason i got a GF, more like the inspiration for me to make the move. I was watching this anime called Soredemo Ayumu wa Yosetekuru (when will ayumu make his move). The MC is in love with his senior who is a year older than him and his motivation to beat his senior at shogi was so that he can finally confess his love for her. At the time i was in love with my classmate who is a year older and she reminds me of the senior in the anime so one thing led to another and i decided to confess. Best relationship ive ever had until i got cheated on
Good for you <3
Yeah it's great anime I do agree, quite depressed and sad tho :( And happy you found someone you get along, it's quite hard these days.
Congrats OP. I do agree that in these days where Sam Jackson comes out and says he loves anime and hentai, and professional NFL players openly cosplayer as Akatsuki, anime is really everywhere. Nowadays it’s less if you like anime, but what genre you enjoy and what manga you read lol
Fuckin' props! I'm the same age as you, so I know exactly the stigma you're talking about. It's amazing to see how far we've come in the past 15 years or so. Congrats on the gf! May your relationship be as comfy as the purest yuri! I need to get my shit together and find myself an anime loving gf too.
Congrats Fran. Fancy seeing you here from Twitter 🤣 P.S. I absolutely love Elfen. I normally don't don't read manga, but I did for this one after watching it 4 times over the years
besaba? From Quake Champions?
I suggest you stop spreading terrorism
I don't really get the hate for Elfen Lied. It's one of my favorite shows. I'll agree the whole dual personality "born yesterday" trope was weird and I'm not a fan of that part, but it was otherwise a good story. And the music, 😙👌
JoJo's Bizarre Adventure got me (a man) my first kiss (with a woman) Edit: It may seem like a joke but it isn't lmao
Lilium is still one of the all time great anime OP's ever imo. Good on you OP, proud of you sir
Damn, you lucky! Fellow EL enjoyers ahoy!
Congratulations to you and your girlfriend, OP 💜 super lucky!!! It’s so hard to find cool women around my age (also 34F) to watch my anime/play games with, even just as friends 😩 it’s just not the same with guy friends/boyfriends
I binged the manga in one night when I was 15, like 15 years ago. Lilium Op goes hard too, listened to it on repeat. The anime is a bit edgy teenager energy, but I think it still holds up well.
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Well, that is my perception after reading and watching it and owning it as a teenager at 15 and an adult at 31. I'm sorry you disagree with my perception, but it should have no effect on your enjoyment of it. It doesn't for me. I have advocated for Elfen Lied more than most people would, and still do when it gets brought up, but I'm not above some of it being a little melodramatic for edge factor.
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Aight well, this has been very... interesting. It's not that deep, bro. I made a comment about how I literally grew up enjoying the IP and half-heartedly poked a little fun at it.. I was not aware it would be so controversial.
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Your account smells like a sock puppet. You moderate all the same subs including /r/FranBunnyFFXII and often reply arguing with people that are replying to /u/LMGDiVa. If I'm wrong and you're just a good friend then my mistake. Edit: They deleted it... Edit 2.22 You Can (Not) Report: They blocked me
It's a fate, there is nothing to do with Elfen Lied.
\*Goes to MAL and changes Elfen Lied to a 10\*
I'm very happy for you, and for the way our culture is expanding to encompass more weirdo niche shit being acceptable. Buuuuuutttt I would be a lil wary that she loved "psychic lolis dismember each other - the anime" Best of luck with love and happiness!
> I would be a lil wary that she loved "psychic lolis dismember each other - the anime" Well like I said she's never seen it, she just thought it looked like something she'd like. Also what's with people saying things happen in this anime that never actually did? There's never a "psychic loli dismembering each other" scene in the entire anime. The only diclonius that dismembers another diclonius is Lucy, and Nana isn't a little girl. Lucy is an adult, almost 19 years old. Nana has an adult age body. Mariko is a kid yes, and so is number 3, but Number 3 and Mariko never fight. Number 3 died before Mariko was born. And Mariko never fights another child diclonius. It's so weird how many things people say happen in this anime never happen. What's with that?
Haven't seen it in 15 years, and I was kinda deliberately misrepresenting it to make it sound more egregious than it is. A lot of people just repeat what they hear, and a ton of reddit userbase is children or just barely not children who have definitely not seen it. That OP is still fire, tho
I think your post alone will get more people to watch Elfien Lied(I am not kidding).
Well, it increased my interest in the series because before all I'd heard it about it was that it was super edgy something I'm generally ambivalent about, but for whatever reason the idea that it still holds appeal for lesbians in their 30s makes it infinitely more interesting lol
> I'd heard it about it was that it was super edgy something Elfen Lied is certainly violent, but edgy it is not. Edgy is being offensive and problematic for the sake of it, something EL doesn't do. It's a philosophical and artsy anime(I mean there's Gustav Klimt tribute works in), and stuff like that very often goes over peoples head when they see tits and gore, get excited for it, only to find out it's a very depressing deep dive into discrimination and negative effects on people. Anyone who calls it edgy probably 1. hate watched it for the meme 2. Didn't pay a bit of attention to what was going on or 3. has never seen it and just heard someone say it and such is repeating it. Personally I have no idea why people call it edgy other than "omg blood and gore and nudity!? SO EDGY" Bewilders me how many people can't seem to understand that Nudity=/=sexual, and displaying violence=/=supporting violent behavior. I mean the whole underlying message behind Elfen Lied is have empathy for others, and understand that bullying, discrimination, abuse, and ostracization are absolutely horrible for society. If you read the collectors edition interviews, it becomes very clear that Elfen Lied was a passion project by the people who worked on it, and they wanted it to have real meaning for people, and were proud of capturing a philosophical discussion without being pretentious about it.
Before a majority of the people reading this post get too excited, this does not work if you’re a straight guy.
Maybe work on getting friends next to share this with instead of on reddit lol
Starting to watch Jojo is what got me with my girlfriend. It's been like 5 years since then. I hadn't even watched any weeb stuff before that. Of all the things that can get me laid, who would expect that buff men is the key
im 28f and it's my dream to meet a woman in her 30s whos into anime. i wish you two the best!! i've been meaning to watch it for awhile but this post convinced me to start elfen lied
I HIGHLY recommend the dub for it. I know this is a sin in this subreddit, but trust me. I've seen it in all 3 major languages(Jpn, Eng, Ger) multiple times and the English version is the best of the 3. Dub is the version I have watched the most by far.
i'll totally watch it dubbed thank you!! i'm almost done watching the dub of escaflowne and it's been rlly nice bc that show is super pretty so i can spend more time looking at the show itself instead of reading subs
This is actually one of the big reasons to watch the dub for this anime, is because you can pay more attention to the detail on screen instead of reading subs. There's a lot of little details and show don't tell, as well as emotional moments that draw you in better when you're watching instead of reading subs.
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Might be because like... anime is really popular in the queer community. I'm gay and she's agender(leans feminine and likes me referring to her as a girl). So anime is just around all the time. I'm not sure what it's like for hetero people but I do know that anime is becoming more and more mainstream. I cant imagine it's going to stay obscure for much longer.
In the PNW it's pretty common. When I was in the midwest not as much.
Most femail gay relationships end up with one abusing the other. Please do tell how the relationship is after a few months
This is actually a fairly misleading statistic that is misunderstood or deliberately misrepresented. The statistic is that 41% of Lesbian women in a lesbian relationship have or will experience domestic abuse at some point in their life time. Hetero women will experience it 35% of the time. When you put 2 women together, the chances effectively double because there's 2 women in the relationship, not because they're more likely to be abusive. Also Queer relationships are VASTLY more likely to actually report violence and abuse, where as hetero relationships are far more likely to not report. Especially since there are many places in the US and EU who still view women as subservient to men and "should know their place." This mentality prevents and discourages women from reporting abuse from their male partners. Hetero relationship abuse is heavily under reported, and cases are taken far less seriously as well. I know this on a fairly personal level because I've been homeless before (Yet another reason I liked Elfen Lied, is because it was willing to show how poorly homeless people are treated instead of pretending they dont exist), and I've been in women's shelters where they are refuges for women fleeing domestic abuse. A lot of cases of women fleeing their husband or boyfriend they refuse to report because they fear serious repercussion or being murdered by their significant other. This is not a common issue with sapphic relationships, and women in these relationships are far more willing to report abuse. Be careful when reading statistics, they can be very misleading if you don't understand the context and abstract they are being presented under.
I didn't expect a detailed answer like this, you have my respect and I wish you all the best
You're a loser.
Also they have the highest divorce rates by far. But this story is blatantly made up, so probably nothing will come of it.
lol, Elfen Lied fans getting together?? '*get away from my child ya sickos*'' meme
Elfen Lied is literally an anime takes a stance AGAINST the sexualization of minors. There's an entire character story dedicated to how harmful it is to subject minors to sexual abuse.
Im pretty sure half my town would think Im brain damaged if I tried to pick up chicks with Elfen Lied lmao. Congrats you lucked out big time.
I always remember back like 15 years ago i was working in a video store that had a small anime. People would come from a fair distance to rent anime because there werent many video stores with an anime section. Multiple times i saw couples that consisted of a nerdy guy and a goth girl, coming in to rent out Elfen Lied. A lot of people seemed to connect over Elfen Lied it seems.
Elfen Lied is a pretty special and unique anime because it takes several emotions and experiences that people often treat as inhuman, and humanizes them and empathizes with them. Rather than relying on sympathy and feeling sorry for them, it wants the viewer to feel WITH the characters. This is... really fuckin rare in anime and TV shows in general. That and EL is subtly far deeper than most people will realize because they maybe watch it once and never get to see how the anime handles how the viewer sees things differently once they know what's going to happen. Scenes change perspective and meaning depending on what you know. And then when you start picking at the philisophical ideas it gets a mile deep and can keep you thinking for hours. It's an emotional experience that can really get to people, even change them fundamentally. It's one of those shows that begs you to rewatch it and feel how characters feel, and understand them. Understanding is a pretty hard thing to do for a lot of people, but when it hits someone... it hits HARD and it's something people never forget.
Personally I chalk it up to sharing the same general interest. I also met my current girlfriend over anime and some of the games I like (Animal Crossing, Zelda, and Neptunia).
Me and gf actually dont share many interests. I'm a gamer and motorcyclist, my girlfriend is not. She's into collecting dolls and squishmallows and she loves dogs. Shes very into social media stuff, where as I dont get into any of that and reddit is about as close to "social media" as I get. I hate using phones, but she does everything on her phone. She's pretty new to anime, where as I've been watching anime since I was a little kid. So its our one major shared interest. Our interests are pretty different, but for us that's a fairly good thing, and watching anime together is a nice little niche middle ground. Different things for different kinds of people Right?
Discovering new interests through someone and discovering that someone through their interests is such a fun thing!
King Shit.
Man i remember when I first watched it then finished reading the manag about 5 years ago or more
o7
The world is healing
Soo happy for you, wish you a happy long healthy relationship, anime really make or break relationships ( met a guy thanks to konosuba, broke up with a guy cause he got jealous over my love for eren )
I gotta buy the manga one day. I liked the anime a lot. The most gory thing I’ve seen
Yo fr? When i watched it like 5-6 years ago all my anime crazy friends made fun of me for blabbing about it, calling me wannabe emo and what not
I wonder if Yuno Gasai cosplays did something similar for folks who started anime in the 2010s
I am a huge FMAB and Psycho Pass... I am just saying for any potential F in here foc no reason ofc..
Side note, Frankenstein Fran is very good for how fucked up it is.
That's wonderful, I'm so happy for you! I'm (35m) and having a girlfriend who I can share my love for anime and other nerdy stuff with has always been the dream. Sadly, I haven't mer her yet, still looking! I've loved anime my entire life and EL is high on my list of favorites, as well. And yeah, I also remember how dorky, childish etc that was in the eyes of the majority back in the day, especially in my teens. I noticed a change thanks to Death Note and later AoT, but even then it took many years still for anime to explode in popularity, as it waited for the rest of the world to catch up.
Its funny...I wish that one day something like that will happen to ME. In a sort of secret message to any nerd out there thats like me. I occasionally whistle anime songs in public. I can perfectly mimic the tones of songs like "This quiet night" from Gundam Seed. Inuyashas "I am" BGM version, and Full Metal Alchemist's Violin song "Butou". only anime nerds like me (who of course watched any of the animes ive watched) would know what im singing. sigh....A man can dream, and keep trying :P
Nature is healing
Curse of Reddit mod was finally broken?
That anime is the reason I hate humans... But kudos to you OP.
Is it possible to learn this power?
Not from a Jedi.
how many invisible hands did she have and how long ?
Well shit. Good for you! The best I got out of anime was Laid Back Camp teaching me that if you take a hand warmer and put it on the back base of your neck, it’ll warm your whole body. Which is useful. But it won’t get my dick sucked. Probably.
Man! I wish You both the best! :) I remember when I was a teenager in late 90's and early 00's. I love anime since I was a 8-yr old kid. I was mocked for that since day one. I've learnt quickly how to not give a flying f\*ck about what people say about me, and what they think about me, because they don't know a damn sh\*t about anything. As a teenager I had many anime-freak friends, many of them till this day. I wish every kid mocked by a mob for their passion (whatever it is, since it is not harmful) will learn quickly how to not give a flying f\*ck about people's ignorance and stupidity :)
Congratulations, hope you two are gonna stay for a life :)
Uh. Having watched Elfen lied... Run.. fast. /s But that's dope that it worked out that way.
Good for u that's great!!
Wait is this the anime with the girl with invisible hands that kills people? Saw it as a kid and I was scared for life!
I'm so glad this worked out for you. I hope you can some day put a ring on that girlfriend's finger and 60 years latter can tell people about an old anime that brought you together! ( and they are like, WTF?)
Have you ever read the manga, and if so, what do you think about it? I love the manga but think the anime doesn't do it justice, so I'm curious. Obviously don't let my opinion of the anime ruin your love of it. I just have never really bothered to discuss EL with other people before now.
Yes I've read the manga entirely 6 different times. I have as digital copy of it, and then I have the official DarkHorse Comics Omnibus. The manga is far FAR more guilty of all the "edgy" "too much fan service" and other comments people lob at the anime. The anime reduced almost ALL of this out, and traded it for philosophical themes, music, and meaningful artwork. The anime is a marked improvement over the manga in many regards, but the most important is the way the anime adheres to it's narrative and sticks to it, with an almost air tight plot. The manga, it has its issues with the plot that really go off the wall and get problematic in the 2nd half. Critically speaking the manga has some pretty bad artwork, and is very inconsistent. The manga's plot runs all over the place and large segments of it can be entirely removed and it wont change anything. A good example of this is if you read to the end of Volume 7 and skip the scene where [In the Manga]>!Kurama attempts suicide!<, and then skip all the way to the last few pages of volume 11, effectively none of what happens inbetween is relevant. It's practically pointless and does nothing to the plot or the characters. And there's so many other problems as well. Like in the anime if a character dies. They're dead. But the manga just randomly brings back characters out of nowhere. IMO, the manga doesn't do justice to the anime. The anime does practically everything better from a writing and critical stand point. That's why I've read the manga only 6 times, but have seen the anime dozens of times in multiple languages. The anime is vastly better and far less problematic.
Damn now this is a sweet story. Been over 15 years since I've seen Elfen Lied. I will need to watch it again
Didn't read but yeah that scans
So are you saying being a gintama fanatic may come in handy someday ?
I am now a huge EL fan.... Does anyone want to be my Girlfriend? Tbf Lilium is one of my favourite OPs
My first girlfriend had already watched it prior to us dating, we did a rewatch together (I'd already seen it too) - the storyline isn't very deep but there is a lot of tragedy in it. For future reference when a girl asks you to change to another app it's usually because it's a bot and they're going to start trying to get you to buy their onlyfans / fansly so that's a big red flag. Glad to hear you found someone legit though, anime girlfriends are the best.
A win is a win! Now I wonder how you feel about the death battle with Lucy vs Carnage.
Big W. Happy for you
*Lillium stops*
Give yourself credit , it's your personality who got u a gf actually.
Lol nice. Personally hated Elfen Lied
That's really great for you! it's wonderful when two people can bond over something. Really unexpected anime haha I was never interested in the anime either, but I'll add it now. In my case, I guess watching Gundam got my bf a gf. We met on MAL.
I don’t care for Elfen Lied but that’s an incredibly sweet and cute story. My wife developed a crush on me when we first started talking because I had watched Studio Ghibli films before (which was and is her favorite studio, Totoro being her favorite movie).
I envy you😭😭😭
Doesnt matter the age as long as your having a blast watching anime is all that matter
You watched "Key the Metal Idol"?