The best description for this intelligent, erudite, confusing and chilling anime from the late 1990s is "creepy cool seinen cyberpunk." Serial Experiments Lain takes an information-rich dive deep into the nature of reality and truth, and in the process leads viewers to come up with their own conclusions about the meaning of the show, the meaning of reality, and even what actually happens in both. Much of the plot development is orthogonal to the viewer, sometimes seen but often simply implied, requiring viewers to think about and draw their own conclusions about what is happening. A fair amount of information is obscured or distorted, challenging viewers to impose their own interpretation on even the most self-evident aspects of the show.
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