{"id":156871,"date":"2025-11-28T04:45:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-28T04:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/156871\/"},"modified":"2025-11-28T04:45:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-28T04:45:09","slug":"the-greatest-anime-ending-of-the-90s-has-aged-masterfully","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/156871\/","title":{"rendered":"The Greatest Anime Ending of the \u201990s Has Aged Masterfully"},"content":{"rendered":"

The ’90s proved to be one of the best decades in anime<\/a> history, with series like Cowboy Bebop and Evangelion changing the medium forever. It’s when Luffy and the Straw Hat Pirates first set sail, and when Sailor Moon and the Sailor Scouts set sail for the first time. <\/p>\n

Plenty of classic ’90s anime series are rightfully recognized, but one of the best series ever made has been mostly forgotten, even though it’s incredible from start to finish. Serial Experiments Lain is an incredible cyberpunk anime from the Y2K era, and 27 years later, its ending hits harder than ever. <\/p>\n

Serial Experiments Lain Is a Cyberpunk Anime About the Online World<\/p>\n

\"Lain
\n Image via Triangle Project<\/p>\n

Even though Serial Experiments Lain takes place in the late ’90s, the same time the series was released, it’s one of the best cyberpunk anime of all time<\/a>. It follows Lain Iwakura, a painfully shy and isolated middle schooler, as she becomes wrapped up in the Wired, the show’s version of the internet. <\/p>\n

At the start of the show, Lain receives an email from Chisa, a classmate who recently took her own life. In the message, Chisa insists that she isn’t actually dead and that she’s abandoned her physical form to live entirely online. <\/p>\n

The Wired is a vast virtual world that feels more like modern-day VR chat than the 90s-era internet. It’s an incredibly immersive place where users can project alternate versions of their real selves, making it naturally appealing to the alienated Lain. <\/p>\n

Even though Lain is new to the Wired, she has a natural affinity for it, and as she spends more time in this virtual world, she becomes bolder and more powerful, both online and in reality. As Lain plunges deeper into the Wired, she begins to question everything she knows about the real world. <\/p>\n

Serial Experiments Lain’s Ending Questions What It Means to Be Human<\/p>\n

\"Eiri
\n Image via Triangle Project<\/p>\n

Serial Experiments Lain eventually reveals that Lain isn’t a human at all and is actually an incredibly advanced computer program that was built to break the boundaries between the internet and reality. As she spends more time on the Wired, the two worlds begin to blur until they’re one and the same. <\/p>\n

Lain is confronted by a man named Eiri who has abandoned his physical body to live in the Wired. Eiri claims to have created Lain and claims to be the god of the Wired. He attacks Lain and attempts to steal her power for himself, but Lain crushes him and declares herself the true goddess of the Wired. <\/p>\n

In the final episode of Serial Experiments Lain, Lain decides to reset the world, erasing herself from everyone’s memories. Lain chooses to exist as an omnipotent, virtual being who observes the world from the outside. Humanity carries on, and people are brought back to life, but Lain is no longer part of the real world. <\/p>\n

Lain Is One of the Most Tragic Anime Characters Ever<\/p>\n

\"Lain
\n Image via Triangle Project<\/p>\n

Throughout Serial Experiments Lain, Lain has one true friend: Alice, a classmate who accepts Lain for who she is and tries to bring her out of her shell. Alice is with Lain when Eiri attacks, and even though she makes it out unscathed, she’s traumatized by what she’s seen. <\/p>\n

Lain is deeply pained by how much she’s hurt Alice, and it’s because of her friend that she decides to reset the world. Even though Lain is all-powerful, she’s one of the most tragic anime characters ever<\/a>, and she truly believes that the people she loves are better off without her. <\/p>\n

“It’s easy to be a goddess. I think it’s easier than being a human,” says Lain in Wired. However, it doesn’t seem like Lain truly believes these words. She’s seen crying as the world is rewritten, and it’s clear she misses the human life she’s leaving behind. <\/p>\n

The show’s final scene shows an adult version of Alice happily walking through the city. She sees Lain and is immediately drawn to her, but doesn’t know why she seems so familiar. Alice approaches Lain and asks if they’ve met before, but Lain assures her that they don’t know each other. <\/p>\n

As Alice walks away, Lain says that she can see her anytime. Lain is endlessly powerful, but she’ll always be an observer without a real connection to humanity. It’s a gut-punch of an ending, and decades later, it still hits just as hard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The ’90s proved to be one of the best decades in anime history, with series like Cowboy Bebop…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":156872,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[146,85,46,411],"class_list":["post-156871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156871\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/156872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}