Mutated homo sapiens that have a dangerous telekinetic power is being captured and isolated in laboratories by the government. One of the sixth-sense-possessing humanoids escapes loses her memories and winds up living with a boy from her past.
Elfen Lied is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Lynn Okamoto. Elfen Lied revolves around the interactions, views, emotions, and differences between human beings and the Diclonii, a mutant species similar to humans in build but distinguishable by two horns on their heads and vectors, transparent telekinetically controlled arms that have the power to manipulate and cut objects within their reach. The series is centered on the teenage Diclonius girl Lucy who was rejected by human beings and subsequently wants revenge.
The series title German as well as Dutch for Elves song or more formally song of the elves and takes its name from the song Elfenlied, which is featured in the story. Elfen Lied involves themes of social alienation, identity, prejudice, revenge, abuse, jealousy, regret and the value of humanity. It is also noted for the graphic violence, emotional themes of how the characters change through, and the overall transgressive subject matter of the whole story. A 13-episode anime television series adaptation was produced by the studio Arms and broadcast on AT-X from July to October 2004. The anime series has been licensed in North America by ADV Films and in Australia by Madman Entertainment. ADV Films said the series was one of their bestselling and most notorious releases of 2005. The Anime Network is streaming the series in English, German, and French.
Episode 1: A Chance Encounter
After she breaks Kohta’s seashell, his keepsake from his younger sister Kanae who died of an illness eight years earlier, she runs away because Kohta gets angry with her. Later, she is found by Kohta and Yuka, two cousins who are reunited after eight years to study at university, and is taken back home with them. A diclonius named Lucy escapes from an experimental laboratory off the coast of Kamakura which is being used as a facility to hold diclonius and use them for experiments. After killing many guards, she is shot in the head and falls into the sea, her brain damage causes her to form an innocent, somewhat infantile split personality.
Episode 2: Annihilation
The offshore facility, headed by the scientist Kurama, sends a special task force, headed by the ruthless, cold-hearted assassin Bando, to hunt down Lucy at a beach in Kamakura. After being injured by Bando, Kohta is put in the hospital, but it is not severely injured and is released hours later while Yuka goes looking for Lucy. Bando then tells his partner to finish Nyu off, but the hit reverts Nyu back to Lucy, who kills Bando’s partner and goes after Bando.
Episode 3: Deep Feelings
Yuka, who has been in love with Kohta since childhood, caught him in several awkward situations with Nyu such as changing her clothes for her after the last episode because her other clothes are wet. Causing her to become increasingly jealous of Kohta’s concern for Nyu. Mayu, a 13-year-old girl and her dog Wanta, who witnessed the incidents in episode 2, return an umbrella left by Kohta on the beach to him, where she is interrogated about the events.
Episode 4: Attack
Nana, using the telepathic powers of diclonii to find Lucy, fights her in a local cemetery, and Mayu encounters them in the middle of the battle. Before long, Nana has all her limbs ripped off, nearly dead.
Episode 5: Receipt
Mayu’s past and why she ran away from home are revealed. As Kohta and Yuka enter university and take Nyu with them, professor Kakuzawa, the son of Kurama’s boss and by coincidence, the university lecturer discovers Nyu and she is taken from Kohta and Yuka. Kohta finds out it is also Mayu’s 14th birthday and invites her to stay permanently with them, where she finally feels that she has a family who cares for her.
Episode 6: Innermost Feelings
Bando escapes from the hospital, still trying to find Lucy to satisfy his grudge against her, professor Kakuzawa Yu’s decapitated body is found by his assistant and Kohta. While searching for Lucy, Kohta and Yuka develop a fondness for each other as displayed through a kiss. Finally, Lucy is found by Kohta and Yuka and taken back home.
Episode 7: Confrontations
Nana is released with brand new artificial limbs and enough money to last her for a while on her own. Kurama, his second in command Shirakawa, and his assistant are all reprimanded by Kakuzawa for letting her escape and letting Kohta enter the facility to find Lucy. Meanwhile, Nana, not knowing of anything outside the facility, does not know what to do with the money and begins to burn some. Discovering that Lucy actually Nyu is in the home. Nana attacks her.
Episode 8: The Beginning
When her peers discover that she has made friends with a stray dog, (discovered when a girl pretended to be Lucy’s friend) they forced her to watch as they beat it to death with a vase, and in her despair, Lucy activates her vectors and commits her first suicide murders against her schoolmates. As Lucy is recovering from being hit in the face by Nana, she goes through a flashback of her childhood, where she was raised in an orphanage all her life where her peers constantly bullied her.
Episode 9: Reminiscence
However, when she discovers Kohta’s cousin Yuka, who he claimed to be a boy, is actually a girl, she loses hope and begins her future murderous path. Lucy’s past links with Kohta briefly befriended her. Kohta plays the series opening theme Lilium in a music box which he bought in Kamakura.
Episode 10: Infant
He reluctantly agrees, however, as he is performing research, he is infected with the diclonius virus via transmission through their vectors, and as a result, his daughter Mariko is born a diclonius. He decides to kill her, however as his wife dies from complications after giving birth, begging him to spare her, Kurama chooses to let her live under Kazukawa’s conditions that bombs must be planted inside her to kill her in the case turns aggressive.
Episode 11: Complication
Mariko is revealed to be the true identity of No. Nana senses Mariko’s presence and her desire to kill her through their ability to locate each other.
Episode 12: Quagmire
The past which Kohta had tried to forget eight years ago comes back to him as he remembers that Lucy took revenge on Kohta’s lie about the gender of his cousin by killing Kohta’s father and his sister Kanae. Mariko is about to kill Nana as well as Kohta and Lucy until Nana uses her vectors to deactivate Mariko’s and falls off the bridge, as Mariko’s vectors fail and hse is taken away.
Episode 13:
Mariko regains the ability to use her vectors and stages one final meeting with Lucy. Here, Mariko realizes that Kurama is her father and meets him for the first time, beginning to cry after finally encountering her father, who appears to have abandoned her for Nana. The director of the facility that had been holding Lucy, Nana and Mariko reveal that he is a diclonius. Lucy, who makes it out of the fight alive, reveals her remorse and emotion for Kohta and they kiss before she leaves to encounter the security team. However, Lucy’s ultimate fate is unknown except that her other horn is broken, although it is possible that she is still alive or possibly dead as the shots of the guns continue, even after her horn is broken.