This series makes 'Perfect Blue' seem about as challenging as an episode of 'Cheers'. Take the 'who am I?' theme of 'Perfect Blue ("Am I really me?", is about the most straightforward question anyone asks of themselves in this show), mix in a healthy dose of Videodrome, David Lynch, X-Files, The Knights Templar, H.P. Lovecraft, The Ring, The Matrix, Philip K. Dick, and anything else paranoid or warped that springs to mind, then give the thing to a director and an art designer who work on the film ingesting acid in seperate sensory isolation tanks, and lastly, carefully remove any remnants that seem straightforward, and you've got 'Lain'.

Set supposedly in the 'present day, present time', the world of Lain is recognisably our own, but the internet is somewhat more advanced, and is called 'The Wired'. At the start, Lain is a normal, though rather withdrawn schoolgirl who recieves an email from a classmate who killed herself several days before. That's impossible, of course - unless this girl is somehow still alive within The Wired. Lain gets internet-savvy at a frightening pace and quickly begins to immerse herself in the world of The Wired, with consequences that eventually have both she and the viewer questioning the reality of everything and everyone in the series. One thing, though. This is not, I suspect, the sort of show that is impossible to figure out because there is information missing. It's just very cerebral, and I expect it invites repeated viewings.

The art design is truly gobsmacking, which keeps things exciting when the plot slows down. Someone got an individual credit for creating the look of the 'Wired' segments, and considering this animation is already 7 years old, it really is stunning, in a trippy, psychadelic sort of way. But it doesn't stop there. As reality blurs between The Wired and the real, scenes in the real world are constantly manipulated visually, giving them a shifting, or sometimes sharply transfiguring effect. Characters or objects will suddenly become grainy, go out of focus, re-appear in different locations, or any number of other things. You get a hint of this in the opening titles, where Lain's cap blows off, and everything in the scene freezes except her. Her cap, and a crow which was flying overhead hang motionless in mid air as she walks out of the shot. Whoever directed or worked on the art design probably has a few rock videos up their sleeve, but 'Lain' never gets annoying or ridiculous in the way that a rock video is apt to.

The story itself isn't easy to follow, because concepts are being thrown at you at a frightening pace, and almost as rapidly, they're being questioned or undermined. It's not so much blink and you miss it. It's more like keep your eyes propped open with matchsticks and you'll probably get lost anyway. Which is why the series invites you to go back to episode 1 almost as soon as the last episode finishes (and I never feel like re-watching things straight away).

So what is 'Lain' about? Well, obviously any answer would be speculative on my part, and constitute a spoiler anyway. You could say though, that it gets down to some pretty Zen ideas about the nature of the self, reality and humanity. Whether these ideas are deep, half-baked, or whether it doesn't even matter so long as it gets your brain working, you'll have to decide for yourself.

There are certainly those who find 'Lain' intolerably slow, and I can understand that. There are probably even more who would find it rather cold and detached, and I can understand that, too. In fact it's a criticism I often make of movies. If I don't connect with the characters emotionally, it loses me. This one kept me interested somehow.

I also think that 'Lain' deserves recognition for being such an exceptional anime, in that it isn't obviously aimed at girls wanting a romantic comedy or boys wanting an everthing blows up or gets hacked to pieces by Ninjas series. It's neither of these things, and it seriously doesn't seem pitched at either gender.

Also, I can't close without noting that 'Lain' has one of the best soundtracks of any anime series I can think of. It's just about up there with Yoko Kanno's work, which is the highest praise I could give.

There is one possible problem in that the show does assume the viewer is fairly computer savvy. Whereas something like 'Chobits' or 'Perfect Blue' guides you through basic internet and computer concepts as if you were a complete novice, 'Lain' assumes that you're at least as conversant with web-PC terminology as you probably are. This isn't a huge obstacle, but it's worth noting.

There is some violence, language and I think perhaps a ittle nudity in 'Lain' (I don't actually remember seeing any nudity, but according to one rating I read, it's there), but I think if anything makes this unsuitable for children it's the general, ominous, weirdness of it. Besides, it's improbable that anyone young enough to be affected by the mild language or violence is going to be able to wrap their thinking parts around this series anyway.

I'm giving 'Serial Experiments: Lain' three and a half stars, with the suspicion that it might shift half a star in either direction on a repeat viewing.

Seek out Lain if you liked 'Videodrome', 'Twin Peaks', 'Pi', 'Altered States', 'Brainstorm', 'Mulholland Drive', 'Existenz' or anything along those lines. Anyone who is going to flat-out hate the thing has probably realised that by now.

Get this one if you want your head seriously messed with.