Serial Experiment Lain - Episode 5

[GloryQuestor]

After blitzing through Serial Experiment Lain, I noticed that this show really is unique, even though it reminds me of other "technological future" stories like .hack and The Matrix.

However, in this episode, "Distortion", in which

Lain's sister starts seeing Lain on the big screen, then starts to have her own wierd experiences (note that up to now, only Lain had been having these experiences):

- How does she get deleted like she does right at the end? (Has Lain's power at this point opened The Wired to the world?)

- Why does Lain's sister suddenly become a confused person after this if she has been effectively restarted? (The "new" sister did say "It's nothing" before Lain sees the ghost of the former sister, and seems normal. After this point for the rest of the series, she just mumbles and goes into a repressed state.)

[generalhs]

It's never fully explained but many believe believe Lain's 'sister' was also another experiment like Lain herself, but a failed one.

She was originally supposed to be what Lain becomes, but something went wrong along the way.

[GloryQuestor]

So, then:

Is the "real world" what I think everything lead up to, then -- just a virtual world like, say, The World or The Matrix?

[Poetic_Kaos]

So, then:

Is the "real world" what I think everything lead up to, then -- just a virtual world like, say, The World or The Matrix?

The Knights may have deleted Lain’s sister, or at least had something to do with it. Remember at about 13:30 where Lain’s sister is seating in shadow of the symbol of the Knights. It is also possible she deleted herself the whole, “Fulfill the prophecy thing”.

Lain’s power begins to open the wired from episode one. A good parallel between the amount the two worlds are merging is how advanced Lain’s Navi becomes, at the beginning it is on a child’s level.

The “real world” is the real world. Just that the line between the wired and the real is becoming progressively blurred as Lain becomes more intuitive.