The Nextlander Watchcast 055: Serial Experiments Lain: Episodes 01-03
Added 2023-08-07 21:25:01 +0000 UTCFor the first time the Watchcast moves into the wide and wild world of anime! We're christening our first anime watch with the 1998 series Serial Experiments Lain, both because it's great, and it gives us an excuse to talk about old computers.
CHAPTERS:
(00:00:00) - NOTE: Some timecodes may be inaccurate for versions other than the ad-free Patreon version due to dynamic ad insertions. Please use caution if skipping around to avoid spoilers. Thanks for listening.
(00:00:32) - Intro.
(00:02:09) - Our histories with Anime.
(00:12:35) - So what are we kicking off our great anime adventure with? Serial Experiments Lain!
(00:20:23) - The Apple Computers connection.
(00:22:36) - Soundtrack talk.
(00:27:00) - Launching into our first episodes.
(00:35:08) - Talking about our protagonist, her family, cool computers, and terrifying emails.
(00:40:56) - Lain checks her email, and decides to upgrade.
(00:50:01) - Break!
(00:50:19) - Lain's fashion sense, and our introduction to Club Cyberia.
(00:57:00) - Lain's "friends" invite her to the club.
(00:59:57) - The new Navi arrives.
(01:05:53) - Things are going down at Cyberia.
(01:09:44) - Lain's folks ain't around right now.
(01:12:39) - Weird stuff keeps happening to Lain.
(01:16:45) - Dad suddenly clams up, and Lain returns to the scene of the crime.
(01:23:26) - The Iwakuras get an unwelcome visit, and Lain's weird end-of-episode face.
(01:28:31) - Final thoughts on our first few episodes.
(01:36:40) - Outro.
Comments
I want to say thank you to exposing this to me. One of the best anime series I have seen. Rewatching to this day
Sam Kenward
2025-06-26 07:43:12 +0000 UTCSpeaking of knowing songs from childhood but having no idea why: the relatively obscure (even in their own catalog) "Another Holy War" by Blind Guardian always pulls up a not of insane nostalgia and a feeling I know this song from childhood somewhere, and the best I can muster is that the son of my babysitter as a kid may have been into Blind Guardian, as he used to let me play Duke Nukem 2 (the old sidescroller, pre-3D) with him sometimes and that kind of seems right for that memory. But I have no idea otherwise. It's just a song that I know firmly was familiar to me as child and I have no idea why.
Peter L Eldred
2023-09-09 07:24:59 +0000 UTCThis is kinda old, so I hope this is helpful. But you can just get a subscription on Funimation for a lot less than 27 bucks. Or even wait until they are further in and use the free trial to just watch through it for free when they are wrapping up
Hayden Berthelot
2023-08-22 16:23:24 +0000 UTCA reasonable way to see it. It's cool if it's not for everyone. I'm sure there are people who also took a break when David Lynch started getting air time, too. No shame in it.
Hayden Berthelot
2023-08-22 16:22:07 +0000 UTCNevermind... Read the description: "Genres: Anime, Horror, Cyberpunk, Science fiction, Psychological horror, Mystery, Thriller..." then watched the 1st episode. 100% hooked! SO excited, and SO glad they chose this, or else I would've never found it! Thanks Alex!
Ramblin Ray
2023-08-17 01:47:24 +0000 UTCOnly place I could find it was on AppleTV, and it was $27 US. I agree, kinda sucks a not more easily accessible show wasn't chosen 🫤 BUT, been following these dudes for a decade and a half and they haven't steered me wrong yet... Let's GOOooo!
Ramblin Ray
2023-08-17 01:18:53 +0000 UTCThis is one of those shows that, as a non-anime person, I tried really hard to give it a shot just so I could keep up with the watchcast and it just isn't my thing. Anime is like From Software for me, every time an opportunity comes along where I think "maybe this is the one," I'm reminded that actually, this might never click for me. And that's ok, not everything has to be for me.
Michael Polston
2023-08-08 12:41:17 +0000 UTCHearing the dub clips here reminds me of how the dialogue is delivered in this very slow dispassionate manner. Something akin to Silent Hill 2. Before that, I got the sense of this whole anime feels like one of those very slow heady episodes of Evangelion but stretched out and about the internet instead of mecha. I've only seen shows like Ghost in the Shell or Akira but I feel like this is so wholly different it's not even worth comparing.
Zeemod
2023-08-08 00:53:29 +0000 UTCI always encourage people to watch through legal means (hence why I listed where you can watch it legally in the original post), but rights issues in different regions sometimes make that impossible, and my personal stance (Alex speaking here) is that when rightsholders make it impossible for people to access material for one reason or another, I don't really care if people find workarounds for that. Especially if it's from a random YouTube rip that's been up for four years. If anything, that's in the spirit of watching bootlegged copies of anime on VHS tapes that people had to do back when stuff like this show was coming out.
nextlander
2023-08-07 23:53:24 +0000 UTCWell I certainly wasn't expecting this on present day, present time!
Manny Marmol
2023-08-07 23:28:34 +0000 UTCThanks. But I'm gonna sound so old now. I'm not sure how I feel about you encouraging me (or anyone) to watch what will be a pirated rip of an anime on YouTube. This is especially odd to me considering your stance on supporting the SAG and writers strikes. At the end of the day I want to support all creators as I support you guys (and those striking in the US), so I guess as I do not live in the US I shall have to skip this series of podcasts. EDIT: what I have discovered is that the Blu-Ray is available from Amazon in the UK. So at least that option exists.
B&L
2023-08-07 22:53:10 +0000 UTCI promise you if I've come across it it's not THAT obscure. But as tends to be the case with anime, rights stuff for home releases and streaming is generally weird. Incidentally, you can find the entire dubbed version of the series on YouTube for free if nothing else. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMxlDSO9bOM&list=PLivZTA_vMCVZ_i8PZLSQudE_stSGpX51w
nextlander
2023-08-07 22:20:21 +0000 UTCNow I'll admit I'm not a big Anime person, but damn that's obscure and not easy to find or watch. Yeh it seems cool but I can find no legitimate way to stream this in the UK at all. Considering how you will be doing Anime exclusively for the time being, making it a little more approachable might have been cool.
B&L
2023-08-07 21:33:28 +0000 UTCRad
Trevor and Adrienne R
2023-08-07 21:27:12 +0000 UTC
