Serial Experiments Lain/Kids

Kids
Season 1, Episode 6
Airdate	August 10, 1998
Production Number	06
Written by	Chiaki J. Konaka
Directed by	Ryutaro Nakamura
ADR Writer(s)	Gavin Glennon
ADR Director(s)	Lia Sargent
← 1x05 Distortion	1x07 → Society
Serial Experiments Lain — Season One

Kids is the sixth episode of the first season of Serial Experiments Lain.

Cast: Kaori Shimizu (Lain Iwakura), Ryunosuke Obayashi (Yasuo Iwakura), Rei Igarashi (Miho Iwakura), Ayako Kawasumi (Mika Iwakura), Yoko Asada (Arisu Mizuki), Chiharu Tezuka (Reika Yamamoto), Manabi Mizuno (Juri Kato), Takumi Yamazaki (Men in Black), Joji Nakata (Men in Black), Kuniko Yoshioka (S), Hikaru Miyata (Dr. Hodgeson), Tomokazu Yamazaki (Man)

Plot Overview

Lain's computer set up has grown even large since the previous episode, allowing her increased movement in the Wired. Her father enters her room to speak with her, but she is absorbed into the Wired, speaking with Serial Experiments Lain/Knights.

At school the next day, Arisu confronts Lain about how she's withdrawn into the Wired, like she was before they met. Reika claims that Lain's net-friends aren't real friends, so she is forced into the real world with her friends. While they're out, they see a boy with his arms stretched to the sky. Moments later, the clouds part and the image of Lain appears.

Back at home, Mika has apparently been lobotomized into the shell of a person that her mother and father appear to be. Lain logs into the Wired and attempts to uncover more about PHANTOMa by speaking with a Cheshire Cat avatar and Professor Hodgeson. She confronts Hodgeson about "KIDS" and the Kensington Experiment.

Professor explains that his experiment was to harness their low levels of "psi" and convert it into electromagnetic energy. He combined the psi of several dozen kids, which generated so much energy that it couldn't be controlled. The game is a resurrected version of his experiment that is stealing the souls of the people using it. She asks the professor who is using the game, but he dies before she can get an answer. However, she figures that the Knights are the ones using the program.

In reality, Lain verbally assaults the Knights, who remain quiet. When she demands an answer, she sees the two lasers from the men in black again. Instead of running from them, she chases after them and accuses them of being Knights. As she questions them, the cooling system in her room explodes. She demands to know who sabotaged her system, and is told that it was the Knights.

Notes

Introduction

• "If people can connect to one another, even the smallest of voices will grow loud. If people can connect to one another, even their lives will become longer. So?"

Arc Advancement

Happenings

• Knights: The Knights have taken up arms against Lain, despite acting pleasant towards her earlier in the episode.
• PHANTOMa: The true nature of the netgame that has killed people in a string of suicides is fully explained as a game created from a retrofitted experiment to harness and contain psi energy from children.

Characters

• Mika: Mika is no longer the energetic girl that she once was. She's now as deadpan and soulless as her mother and father are. This is likely connected to the events from the previous episode.

Trivia

Allusions and References

• Cheshire Cat: The Cheshire Cat is a character in Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland which is most recognized for disappearing, only leaving a big grin. Like in the episode, the Cat provides Alice with conversation that is amusing, but gradually becomes more any more vexing to the point of annoyance. The cat has been hypothesized as being the God of the Wonderland world, as he is both apparently omniscient and omnipresent. However, in this instance, he seems to only exist to reinforce the Alice parallel.

Lain: Stupid Cheshire Cat poseur.

Memorable Moments

• Lain enters the Wired to discover what the secret of the game actually is. There, she is confronted with a giant grin, which she compares to the Cheshire Cat.

Quotes

• Dr. Hodgeson: I don't know what you plan to do here in the Wired or what your intention are or even what will ever become of you, but you're powerful, that's for sure. Incredibly powerful. If there is a god in the Wired, even I'm not sure of that, you're a child that has been blessed.