Texhnolyze (Season 1)

Texhnolyze (2003) is a Japanese anime series you can watch online on iFILM, produced by Madhouse with a script by Chiaki J. Konaka and character designs by Yoshitoshi ABe. Lux is an underground city the surface world stopped thinking about long ago. Three factions — the Organo, the Union, and the Racan — carve it up between them. The technology the series takes its name from replaces severed limbs with cybernetic prosthetics, and it has become the city's primary instrument of control.

Four people will decide what becomes of Lux: Ohnishi, who runs the Organo with a cold detachment; Ran, a young woman who sees forward in time; Yoshii, a visitor down from the surface with motives that stay opaque; and Ichise, a prizefighter who loses an arm and a leg within the opening episodes. Director Hiroshi Hamasaki keeps dialogue sparse early on — the first few episodes build almost entirely through image and atmosphere.

Among the most uncompromising anime series of the 2000s, and largely overlooked outside dedicated viewers. Stream Texhnolyze (2003) online on iFILM.