Science-fiction has always been displaced just enough from reality to be fiction but just close enough to teach us lessons about the real dangers of the misuse of science. Be it motivated by good intentions or driven by mad desires for power, characters in anime often push their science too far or too fast, and oftentimes the result is disastrous.
Regardless of whether those results are limited in scope to just a few people or shake the foundations of the universe and reality, they all can serve as lessons to viewers. They caution the real world against taking ambition to dangerous places and teach us to beware of power falling into the wrong hands.
10 Serial Experiments Lain: Blurring The Lines Between Fiction And Reality
Fear of technology is often unjustified, but never completely unwarranted. After all, one of humanity's greatest fears is of the unknown. Serial Experiments Lain was created at a time when the internet was still on the rise, when people sometimes feared the new ethereal technology. Serial Experiments Lain not only shows what the fear of the unknown can drive people to do, it also shows how the virual can take over reality if one isn't too careful as Lain gets slowly absorbed into the Wired, the show's version of the internet.
9 Elfen Lied: The Experiment Decides To Teach Us A Lesson
Forced scientific experimentation on a living being is never justifiable. Scientists in Elfen Lied are experimenting on living creatures called Diclonius, a species human in consciousness and form save for the invisible appendages on their backs that are stronger, longer, and faster than any human arms. Lucy, one of these creatures, manages to escape from her confinement and proceeds to wreak vengeance on these scientists.
As bloody as her rampage is, the viewer cannot help but sympathize with her. Science is no excuse to experiment on sentient living creatures against their will. Lucy makes sure they, and all people, realize that.
8 Made in Abyss: Here There Be Monsters
Contact with the unusual or unknown through study or exploration can be highly rewarding but can also be extremely dangerous. It can put lives in instant danger or transform people into horrific beings, outwardly or inwardly. In Made in Abyss, Riko and Reg set out on an adventure to find Riko's mom, who has traveled deep into the fabled Abyss. While they meet dangers along the way, they always manage to escape unscathed, until, suddenly, they don't.
From there, not only is the danger of their adventure now made abundantly clear, but they see the true horror of the Abyss. Whether morphed beyond recognition like Mitty or twisted in their hearts like Bondrewd, the Abyss creates monsters the likes of which no one could have imagined.
7 Neon Genesis Evangelion: Playing God Has Never Gone Well For Mankind
Within the intricate story of Neon Genesis Evangelion, the minds behind NERV and SEELE have become aware of the prophecies regarding the Angels that visit the Earth and have set a plan in motion to further their own purposes within that predicted framework. They attempt to take humanity to a new plane of existence, a new evolution. They want to bring about the "Human Instrumentality Project," hoping to end the strife between individual humans by making them into a single consciousness. They trample on human autonomy and more or less kill all of humanity through their efforts to play God.
6 Psycho-Pass: Blurring The Boundary Between Science and Law
While science and law enforcement inevitably overlap, the line between the two must be drawn. In Psycho-Pass, the ruling powers have implemented a system that allows them to detect potential crimes before they happen, whereupon they send their Enforcers to stop the crimes or exact justice on the criminals involved.
The Sybil System consists of an interconnected consciousness formed through living human brains, a monstrous creation by itself, that monitors each citizen and assigns a criminal potential to each. The government in Psycho-Pass has used technology to invade the very thoughts of its citizens, branding them criminals based on criminal potential before they ever take any criminal action.
5 Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song Showcases Humanity's Ongoing Concerns With AI
The dangers of AI haunt the world still. People fear that one day, AIs will be intelligent and powerful enough to compete with humanity. In Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song, AIs do just that. One day, they simply start attacking humans, and much of the human race is slaughtered as they go about their daily lives before any kind of defense can be mounted against the machines.
Thankfully for the characters in this story, just like in The Terminator, technology has advanced to a point where time travel is possible, and they can go back in time to try to undo the events that led to this tragedy. But in the real world, things might not be so convenient. Thus the human race continues to view AI with caution.
4 Steins;Gate: Jumping Through Time Is Riskier Than We Can Understand
The human race may never be able to travel through time. But if such a feat is ever accomplished, people should ensure all the risks of such actions are known before taking the first leap. Like in most time travel stories, Rintaro and his compatriots in Steins;Gate alter the past and affect the present, with disastrous effects and at great personal cost.
Rintaro will attempt to alter the past to save one person which in turn causes the death of another, whereupon he must repeat the process for that person, as he seeks the optimal outcome where everyone survives. Ultimately he's able to find that possibility. The rest of us in the real world might not be so lucky if it ever came to that.
3 Trigun: Mega Weapons Come With Mega Responsibility
Trigun is about a mysterious gunslinger named Vash who doesn't ever want to kill anybody. He has found himself living on a desert planet with the remnants of humanity that has managed to survive a sabotaged space mission from 150 years in the past. His brother, Knives, planned the sabotage in an attempt to kill all the humans on the spaceships, as he looks down on them as inferior to Vash and himself.
Once that attempt is partially thwarted, Knives looks for a new way to exterminate humanity, ultimately creating two revolver-style guns that can transform into mega weapons, one for himself and one for Vash. Mega weapons in the hands of those with dreams of superiority are ever a danger to humanity anywhere.
2 Guilty Crown: The Cure Is Sometimes Worse Than The Disease
When the Apocalypse Virus is unleashed upon Japan in Guilty Crown, the government takes drastic actions to prevent the spread, even resorting to calling in a foreign power in the GHQ to help in their efforts. While the virus is suppressed for a time, GHQ ends up becoming the ruling power in Japan, opposed only by the rebel group Funeral Parlor.
Through a series of battles, betrayals, heroics, and sacrifices, the virus is ultimately destroyed and those behind its propagation are defeated. This anime is a particularly apt reminder that no matter how dire the circumstances, those in power should measure their response to threats, lest they bring about a worse situation by jumping to drastic lengths out of fear before understanding the reality of the situation.
1 Cowboy Bebop: The Dangers Of Rushing New Technology
Rushing to use new technology or any new creation without being certain of its effects or risks is dangerous. In Cowboy Bebop, the solar system finds itself in crisis, as much of the surface of the Earth has been devastated by meteors, causing its inhabitants to seek other places to live and other livelihoods once they get there. The damage was caused by the effects of an accident with a hyperspace portal device, a new invention designed to greatly speed up space travel and exploration. But the experiment goes very wrong and causes damage to the nearby Moon, which subsequently sets off a chain of events that scars the Earth.