History YMMV / ElfenLied

** For Western audiences, Yuka's infatuation with Kouta could certainly be this at times, as the two are established from the beginning to be [[KissingCousins cousins]]. It's an awkward case of TruthInTelevision and ValuesDissonance as such relationships are not uncommon in Japan and elsewhere in Asia, but are typically frowned upon in the West. The anime hilariously [[LampshadeHanging lampshades this]] during their kiss scene by cutting away to the statues around them, which look disgusted.

* DracoInLeatherPants: Now, this was completely deliberate on the writers' part, since EvilIsSexy and Lucy is one of the [[WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds most sympathetic mass murderers in anime history]], with a genuinely powerful and surprisingly well-executed FreudianExcuse. However, to hear her fanboys ([[EvenTheGirlsWantHer and more than one fangirl]]) talk, you'd think that she had never done anything wrong and just needed a hug to be turned into an angel of sweetness and light. Never mind the fact that she started off the series freely killing any human except for Kouta who ever crossed her path. Her romantic rival, Yuka's ClingyJealousGirl tendencies are {{Flanderiz|ation}}ed to the point that the Lucy fandom often gleefully wish for Lucy to dismember Yuka. While Yuka has her issues, Lucy is the real {{Yandere}}, who slaughtered a carnival full of innocent people when Kouta snubbed her, as well as wanting to [[KillAllHumans eradicate mankind]]. It's worth noting that while she's an unrepentant mass murderer, the ''real'' OmnicidalManiac BigBad is actually the [[EnemyWithin DNA Voice]].

* EvilIsSexy: Lucy drops Nyu's particular type of {{Moe}}, but turns into a [[EvilSoundsDeep deep-voiced]] badass {{Yandere}} with major {{Woobie}} credentials.

* NarmCharm: The series' infamously over-the-top evilness of human characters is in fact a [[RealityIsUnrealistic fairly realistic]] portrayal of what victims of marginalization face (albeit the manga does a somewhat better job by giving many characters HiddenDepths and CharacterDevelopment). In fact, many fans who are survivors of abuse find this portrayal [[FridgeHorror subdued]]

* OvershadowedByControversy: While violence is to be expected in a work that tells a story about the persecution an evolutionary species from humanity endure and their murderous vendetta against their persecutors, the ''sheer amount'' of gore (and nudity) on display is what this work is best known for.

* NarmCharm: The series infamously over the top evilness of human characters is in fact a [[RealityIsUnrealistic fairly realistic]] portrayal of what victims of marginalization face (albeit the manga does somewhat better job by giving many characters HiddenDepths and CharacterDevelopment), In fact many fans who are survivors of abuse find this portrayal [[FridgeHorror subdued]]

** The Orphanage Girl who has less screen time than Tomoo also counts. But whetever she was part of it or not people still discussed about it until today

* EsotericHappyEnding: The final chapter of the manga clearly states that [[spoiler:the World Health Organization "forbade" the birth of Diclonii worldwide until they discovered a vaccine capable of preventing their conception. Red tape and technobabble aside, the term for this is '''genocide''']].

* HypeBacklash: While this series had a ''huge'' cult following at first in America, the general tone of anime fandom has changed pretty heavily over the years, and the [[{{Gorn}} type of series]] has largely [[CondemnedByHistory fallen out of favor.]] As a result, while older anime fans tend to be at least okay with the series, younger fans and those who have discovered anime more recently tend to hate this show with every fiber of their being and treat it as emblematic of everything wrong with anime (similarly to series such as ''LightNovel/GoblinSlayer'' and ''Literature/TheRisingOfTheShieldHero'', but considered somewhat less inflammatory than those shows due to its relative age).

* WoobieSpecies: The Diclonii. Bonus points for the bulk of them going down the Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds road.

* ValuesDissonance: A major reason why the manga wasn't released in English [[LateExportForYou for well over a decade after it was first published]] was because the series is ''too hardcore'' even for American audiences. The anime may be extreme, but the manga may be even ''worse'', and no U.S. licensing company wanted anything to do with a series that involves brutal murder, torture, rape, and with ''children'' being victimized, lest they face controversy from all angles. It took 17 years for Creator/DarkHorseComics to finally step up and license the series, which most likely owes itself to the sheer internet following ''Elfen Lied'' has attained after all this time.

* AudienceAlienatingPremise: The series actually poses thought-provoking questions about nature vs nurture and unethical science. To anyone walking in, however, it's just a gory series about little girls being tortured. You're lucky if they don't think of you as a sadistic paedophile. And although tempting, using this series to demonstrate that animation is not [[AnimationAgeGhetto always for children]] is just as likely to backfire as anything else, since people who see it are likely to simply jump to the [[AllAnimeIsNaughtyTentacles other extreme]].

* CondemnedByHistory: The series absolutely exploded in popularity in America when the anime was released, thanks to the [[{{Gorn}} massive amount of gore and carnage]], as well as having [[TrueArtIsAngsty very dark and mature themes]], in complete contrast to other anime circulating the country at the time. Although it was [[OvershadowedByControversy ''extremely'' controversial at the time of release]], its fans tended to outweigh its haters. However, come the 2010s and especially the 2020s, most people have begun to fall into the latter category. Reasons cited for this include how unnecessary and gratuitous the violence really is, the extremely dark tone either being [[{{Narm}} unintentionally hilarious]] or [[TooBleakStoppedCaring too bleak to continue watching]], and newer anime using mature themes in a more effective way. With this, the anime was slowly forgotten about and most of the series' fans nowadays are ones who enjoy it in a SoBadItsGood way.

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%%''Elfen Lied'' has no other examples of CompleteMonster, per the Special Efforts forum. Do not add any more.

* AdaptationDisplacement: Justified for American viewers, as the manga was not licensed in the U.S. until ''2019''.

* AudienceAlienatingPremise: The series actually poses thought-provoking questions about nature vs nurture and unethical science. To anyone walking in, however, it's just a gory series about little girls being tortured. You're lucky if they don't think of you as a sadistic paedophile.
** Although tempting, using this series to demonstrate that animation is not [[AnimationAgeGhetto always for children]] is just as likely to backfire as anything else, since people who see it are likely to simply jump to the [[AllAnimeIsNaughtyTentacles other extreme]].

* TooBleakStoppedCaring: Between the series' tendency to take HumansAreBastards to almost [[CardCarryingVillain cartoonish extremes]] and the Diclonii themselves not exactly being much better (what with the implication that [[AlwaysChaoticEvil they're genetically predisposed to wiping out the human race anyway]]), it's hard to really find any characters worth sympathizing with. And that's not even getting to the fact that [[BreakTheCutie most of them keep getting put through the emotional wringer]] over and over. That said, things ''do'' get a bit more optimistic by the end of the series, especially in the manga, where, in an aversion of [[TooGoodForThisSinfulEarth the most moral characters dying in the end]], [[spoiler:Kouta, Mayu, Nana and Anna all survive until the end, despite being all "good" characters in a crapsack world]]. Whether or not this is enough to compensate the near pornographic amount of gorn and suffering that comes before this, is up to the viewer though.

** Although tempting, using this series to demonstrate that anime is not always for children is just as likely to backfire as anything else, since people will simply jump to the other extreme.