A quick review of Serial Experiments LainMain theme
Serial Experiments Lain is... WEIRD. And the show accepts it as it starts with its Layer 1 (episode 1), "Weird". The main theme of this show is that the world of wired (internet) and the real world is connected, not just in technical terms but also physical and philosophical terms. This show keeps many of its themes totally unexplained or leaves them on your interpretation and that makes it really really tough to comprehend because different people have different perspectives, they can interpret anything as they want. This show feels like collection of random events, which literally make no sense (not even after the end). But as I said, if you add something from yourself, it starts making a little sense, at least for you, but it depends on how much you are putting in it.My interpretation
For me, SEL is divided into four parts. So Part 1 (Weird, Girls, Psyche, Religion) introduces you to the world of wired and how people get into it or how people are already in it. Part 2 (Distortion, Kids, Society, Rumors), this part focuses on how things work in the world of wired and how they affect the real world. Distortion in people's mentality, manipulation of kids, social interactions through wired and rumors that get spread through wired (it all sounds like Social Media of present day). Part 3 (Protocol, Love, Infornography), this part is related to human emotions, values, morals and ideologies. This part is where the random things happening kind of start making sense and then the last part (Landscape and Ego), this part is about realisation of everything that happened in the previous parts and rebelling against the one opposite force which was making the previous events happen.Analysis
Obviously, I didn't get everything that this show wants to offer as it was my first watch but still, the things I've deduced and learnt from this show are pretty interesting. If I have to explain the whole plot of SEL in one sentence. "SEL is a story of a god-like entity created by humanity itself, trying to understand what humanity is". There are so many confusing technical aspects to this show but its philosophical and psychological aspects are more important as they try to tell you how humanity is losing its originality. As humans are progressing towards the future, they're forcing themselves to evolve. If there is any way for humans to further evolve after technological advancements, it's only with the help of internet, the wired, as it connects everyone and it can help humanity progress and evolve collectively. But everything has its dark side and as the dark side of this evolution, humans are losing their individuality as they're becoming one. Humans are losing their emotions, their friends, their families. We all are connected yet we are so far from each other. Not only our physical individuality, we also are losing ourselves psychologically. There is a huge difference between our personality in real life and our personality on the internet, the social media, the wired.Conclusion
SEL goes deep but it still feels so random, it's definitely not for everyone. You cannot understand every little thing that this show tries to convey through it, even if you try to, because as I said, it depends on your perspective what understanding and comprehension means to you. For an example, in the show, Lain has different personalities in the wired. But in an episode, it is revealed that she also has split personality disorder in the real world. They call that personality "Lain of the wired". But what the show is trying to tell then? Is this other personality only bound to the world of wired. Well, no, depends on how you interpret it. Some can interpret it as, she has a split personality disorder and that's why she's different in the world of wired than she's in the real world. Some can interpret is as, she has a different personality in the world of wired which sometimes takes over her in the real world and some can also interpret it as, both interpretations are true. It's also mentioned that Lain has multiple personalities, not just two or three, which makes it clear that people interact with different people differently, not just in the real world but in the world of wired, the internet too. Later it's revealed that Lain is something beyond human, something that was created by humanity which actually connects everyone through the wired, the internet, that means everyone in the world is Lain, everyone has some part of Lain in them, and even if that part of all of us is sometimes cruel, sometimes kind, we have to accept it. We can't hate that part of ours, we have to love that part present in everyone, we have to love Lain in everyone. So, "Let's all love Lain".
