Title:  Serial Experiments Lain

Creators:  Chiaki Konaka, yoshitoshi ABe

Year:  1998

Manga Incarnations:
Lain: The Nightmare of Fabrication - Short Story (Unlicensed)

Anime Incarnations:
Serial Experiments Lain - 13 Episode Series (MVM)

Game Incarnations:
Serial Experiments Lain - Sony PlayStation (Pioneer LDC)
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Overview: 
When a lonely 12 year old named Lain receives an e mail from a dead classmate she is drawn into the bewildering world of the Wired, a virtual reality network similar to the internet.  As she delves further into this virtual world her life begins to fall apart as she is caught up in a maelstrom of conspiracy, deceit and confusion that leads to her questioning the very meaning of existence.
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Random Trivia:

1.  Yoshitoshi ABe was hired to do the design for Serial Experiments Lain after the producer came across his portfolio on a website.

2.  A Serial Experiments Lain console game was released on the Sony Playstation in Japan.

3.  Writer Chiaki Konaka is most famous for writing more action based sci-fi tales, including the The Big O, Bubblegum Crisis 2040 and Gasaraki.

4.  There are several stylistic similarities between Lain and yoshitoshi ABe's second anime project, NeiA_7.  Most notable is probably the similarity between the DJ in Lain and Genzo in NeiA.

5.  An 18 page full colour Serial Experiments Lain manga can be found within the pages of the 'An Omnipresence in Wired' art book.  This manga is drawn by yoshitoshi ABe and is the only manga based on Lain to be produced.

6.  There are 'easter eggs' hidden on the menu screen of each DVD.

7.  Serial Experiments Lain was the first title released in the UK as part of MVM's sublicensing deal with US distributor Geneon.
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If you like this try:

.Hack://Sign (Anime - Beez)
Haibane Renmei (Anime - MVM)
Paranoia Agent (Anime - MVM)
Perfect Blue (Anime - Manga Entertainment)
Texhnolyze (Anime - MVM)
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