Durarara!! / First Impressions

OP2 Sequence

OP2: 「コンプリケイション」 (Complication) by ROOKiEZ is PUNK’D
Watch the 2nd OP!: Download, Streaming ▼

「急転直下」 (Kyuuten Chokka)
“A Sudden Turn”

I wasn’t planning to pick up this series since I wasn’t caught up with it, but after an anime day marathon, here’s the latest episode of Durarara with new opening and ending themes and all. I like the original two songs a lot, but these new ones aren’t half bad either the more I listen to them. Also, the new “Butterfly” ending theme is sung by ON/OFF, whose songs in Vampire Knight I liked a fair bit.

Now as for the series itself, the reason I was putting it off was because I was hoping to finish Narita Ryougo‘s Baccano first. However, after watching a few more episodes of Durarara, it caught my interest much faster than Baccano and I thought the hell with it and decided to watch this first. I attribute that to the much more interesting characters from the get-go, in particular Celty and Masaomi, whom I absolutely love thanks to awesome performances by Sawashiro Miyuki and Miyano Mamoru respectively. The story is also a lot more captivating with the various character subplots, so I’m fully on board now.

With regards to this episode, it was interesting to see how things are in Ikebukuro six month’s after Mikado pulled off the crazy Dollars gathering to deal with Namie. Not a whole lot has changed since then quite frankly, but I enjoyed the change of focus to Anri here as she narrated in third-person. While things primarily revolved around her and how she’s reliant on others all the time, it still centered on Celty a fair bit with the introduction of the new motorcycle cop in town, Kuzuhara Kinnosuke (Fujiwara Keiji), who’s intent on bringing her in. That resulted in Celty shivering in fear over how zealous the police can be, which I rather enjoyed because I love seeing the weaker girlish side of her character. I’ve always found that part of Celty very endearing, but I’m still not quite at the level of Shinra who would consider sleeping with a headless inhuman existence. =P

In addition to Kinnosuke, we also have the reintroduction of Shinra’s father, Shingen (Ootsuka Akio), who was hilarious to watch when he talked smack to some punks and expected Celty to jump in to save him. Seeing as Celty doesn’t like Shinra’s father much but had to reluctantly to do, it made that scene even funnier. As for his gas mask, I have to agree that the air in Ikebukuro (and most of Japan for that matter) is a pretty smog-filled affair. Sad to say, but the crappy air quality is the one thing preventing me from wanting to stay in the country of anime for any extended period of time.

Story-wise, it looks like things are shifting to the Slashers sub-arc, or I should say, the one about the deranged-looking character responsible for all the attacks. The ganguros were the latest victims, but that was of course a welcomed turn of events seeing as they are complete bitches. =) Other than that, there was also the resurfacing of the Yellow Scarves, which Masaomi seems to be a member of in the past. Thanks to this foreshadowing and the cliffhanger with Anri, I’m quite interested in learning more on both fronts in the coming episodes.

Finally, I should note that the seiyuus have started to voice their own handles in the chat room now that we clearly know who each of them are, which brings a lot more personality to everything as you can probably imagine — Celty (Setton) in particular. Also, there was a So-Ra-No-Wo-To billboard cameo here. Anyone know what series in the billboard next to it is?

 

ED2 Sequence

ED2: 「Butterfly」 by ON/OFF
Watch the 2nd ED!: Download, Streaming ▼

Preview

94 Comments

  2. Very nice episode I must say. The week wait was damn long but worth it.

    As for the billboard with Sora-No-Woto I too was wondering what the one next to it was. The first thing that came to mind was Samurai Champloo but it could be completely different. There was a new Samurai type anime coming out right? Possibility of it being an anime that’s not out yet?

    Oh big side-note:
    Higashi no Eden Movie I: The King of Eden is out on torrents (been out for about 2 weeks). Have you checked it out? About to watch it today but just wondered if you had seen it.

    ROFLWAFFLELAWL
    Reply

    2. The very last one after the samurai one is Baccano again, featurin Jacuzzi Splot and Nice Holystone. But yes I too am wondering that samurai one. The samurai aime i know thats out nowIs Hakuouki, but I doubt its that.

      unknown2
      Reply

  3. I was kinda wondering for a while if you were gonna blog this series haha. I listened to the new OP and ED about an hour ago, and I already like them a lot :O. Also, it looks like theres gonna be an even bigger addition to the already large amount characters of the show (which in this case, is kinda of a good thing).

    Oh, and about a week ago I managed to finish Baccano. Its pretty good and you should if watch if you have the free time =P (Its a hell of a lot more confusing though because while they have a huge amount of main characters, they skip time periods around 3 times per episode)

    Click
    Reply

  4. Eh I can only recognize the Sora no Woto billboard too. As for the episode, it’s interesting to see the rest of the arcs getting animated. It looks like Anri’s going to play a bigger role.

    FlameStrike
    Reply

    1. I’m pretty sure it’s a split billboard, I haven’t seen “Blood+” or “Jigoku Shoujo”, but I’m pretty sure on the right side billboard is Jaccuzi and Nice from “Baccano!”

      Oh, and btw, this series is loaded with “Baccano!” cameos, and cameos in general.

      Click
      Reply

  7. While the first OP/ED were awesome, the new ones are good too 🙂
    one important piece in this episode is the three pieces on that chess board…
    Don’t know if people know what they represent?
    but nonetheless, it is nice to see Divine pick up this one now 🙂
    great story so far…
    thanks for doing this

    jrj
    Reply

    1. If the 3 pieces indeed represent people, then my guess is: Celty, Mikado, Namie.

      Because those are the people whom he shows interest in (Celty, Mikado) or constantly in touch with (Namie).

      tanukichan
      Reply

  8. Actually forgot about this series, nice to see it back. Really loving the new Op, much prefer it to the old one. As for the ending, found it a bit too generic and uninspiring for my tastes (in my view, each to their own and all that). Saying that, I was expecting it to be difficult to top the last ED, which has become one of my all-time favourite “feel-good” anime songs.

    My only disappointment with this series is that unless it does amazingly well, the series will end prematurely in comparison to the light novels and perhaps the manga. The novels are unlikely to ever release in the West as those that do tend to never sell well and so the localisation is halted. The manga has a better chance though I wouldn’t keep my hopes up.

    FX102
    Reply

      1. Thanks, will probably check it out once the series has ended. Bit guttered that the manga is not illustrated by Suzuhito Yasuda who does the novels’ illustrations, I do like his current work Yozakura Quartet.

        FX102
        Reply

  10. The OP is nice, but it doesn’t have the same kick as the 1st OP. Same goes for the ED.

    Otherwise, it’s great to have Durarara back, especially knowing that it will go on for another 13 episodes. Hopefully, they’ll tie up some of the loose ends in the story and focus on more of the other characters like Shizuo’s little brother.

    And more hopefully, we’ll get to see Show Spoiler ▼

    by the end of this.

    Phocus
    Reply

    1. We might see 1st spoiler, but I highly doubt the second one will show up since that is first mentioned (by what I know) in the 6th or 7th volume, and the first 12 eps were basically the first volume.

      Sissy
      Reply

  11. Whoa, you’re picking this up too! Thanks!

    I actually think Baccano is better than Durarara when it gets going (and its the only anime I can recommend the english dubs to, since they captured the accents perfectly) However, Durarara!! is one still a very good series.

    I like the first OP and ED better, it captured more of the feel of city life for me.

    I felt that this episode was a bit weak though. However, it’s just the beginning of the arc, so I’m not too worried.

    akani
    Reply

  12. The billboard next to So-Ra-No-Wo-To is indeed Jigoku Shoujo (at least part of it is…). Did a bit of research regarding the poster and it appeared in a couple other sites. Also the animation studio working on Durarara!! also worked on Jigoku Shoujo (as well as Spice and Wolf). Besides the character in the middle wearing the red kimono, I however cannot determine if the person holding what appears to be a sword is also from the same series… But I can say for a fact the character in the back middle of the billboard is from Jigoku Shoujo for sure.

    Akizuki
    Reply

    1. I like both a lot. But with Baccano, I liked how the story seems more tighter and less disjointed, with tons of action. Like the whole series was essentially one really long movie. With Durarara, I enjoy its character development much more. I rewatched Baccano recently, and while I love the characters, I felt the story was more important over the character development.

      shirokiryuu
      Reply

    1. Hmm, we’ve always posted streaming OP/ED videos here. The only difference now is that I host them myself using mp4s I specifically encode for streaming purposes so that the quality’s a lot better.

      divine
      Reply

  18. “but I’m still not quite at the level of Shinra who would consider sleeping with a headless inhuman existence. =P”

    turn the lights off and it wouldn’t matter.

    Xellos-_^
    Reply

  19. Divine, I respect you a lot for continuing this blog the way you have been doing so far. Don’t push yourself too hard, though. I get that this is the beginning of the spring season and all, so it IS a lot to check out… remember to take some breaks, though. 😉

    Glad to see you picked up Durarara. I really like this series. 🙂

    Acylia
    Reply

  20. thanks divine for picking this up.
    my guess is that the 3 pieces on the chess board are chat trio(just a guess, dont really know).
    now I can get great pictures of durarara too.

    amado
    Reply

  21. once again real glad you are keeping it up, stellar job so far.

    lost touch with durarara but after seeing this new opening ill have to catch up with it. any ideas when it’s released?

    robbiebizzle
    Reply

  28. Also I want to know if anyone else thinks this but:

    The password for Dollars that Mikado inputs in ep 10, did anyone else think the password was, or something close to, Baccano?

    ROFLWAFFLELAWL
    Reply

  31. Yeah I went to watch Baccano too after seeing how it was mentioned in Durarara. Things got really confusing here and there, and I had to go read it on wiki and stuff to get a better understanding after I finished watching the series haha. But yeah its a good anime too!

    Tenkou
    Reply

  34. Just found out on the net that the character designer Suzuhito Yasuda for SMT devil survivor on DS is the same one for Durarara!! that’s why Izaya reminds me so much of Naoya from the game.And now that he started talking about heaven and all this stuff even the background is similar.
    I loved this episode, the new OP/ED and the police officer with Ladd Russo’s voice.
    It was funny how Celty used her shadow to scare off the thugs from Shinra’s father she wanted to check if she was still scary lol.

    Rockmanshii
    Reply

  36. Hmm, 6 months passed but the relationship between Mikado and Anri is still the same? And I thought he confessed to her last episode! Boo >:

    About the new OP/ED, while I prefer the old OP song, I like the sequence in the new OP better. The new ED is on par with the old one.

    tanukichan
    Reply

  40. It’s good to see that you’ve picked this one up :] I always enjoy reading your impressions on shows.

    Hopefully, you’ll find the time to finish Baccano! soon. It’s a really good show (in my opinion), but it does take a few episodes to get interesting.

    Dee
    Reply

  42. Divine, i think you should definitely finish Baccano first. Well for no real reason, just that its pretty much finished while Durarara will go on for a while still. I already rewatched Baccano like 3 times, it is that awesome.

    More on topic, did anyone else kinda feel Nakajima-kun from “You are Under Arrest” from the police bikers? lol, its just the uniform i guess.

    xcswmboy
    Reply

    1. Huh? I thought it should be clear enough at this point, but since you asked…

      Tanaka Taro ~ Mikado
      Setton ~ Celty
      Kanra ~ Izaya
      Saika ~ currently unknown. Best guess: one of the Slashers (possibly that Haruna girl)

      tanukichan
      Reply

  44. Shinra and Selty are so cute together. I love them together and I have to say the more Selty is devolped the more I like her. Shinra’s dad is odd. I didnt exspect him to be like that. The ending was intresting. Im happy those 3 chicks are dead. Starting to get annoying picking on Anri.

    Tokki
    Reply

  47. ive got a new theory in the pieces on izaya’s board.
    I think it is about the 3 active gangs on durarara right now: dollars, yellow turbans and the slashers.
    but if you have been spoiled on who their leaders are, you probably know what I mean.

    amado
    Reply

  49. Did Namie become Izaya’s secretary? So that means she quit from her pharmaceuticals company? Didn’t think she would actually work for someone like Izaya since she seemed to had a bad impression of him initially, or so I thought. Then again the two are quite compatible, due to their twisted or warped logic and thinking. Quite a couple I’d say, just like Shinra and Celty, but in the case of these two, despite their weird or abnormal relationship, their feelings for each other are mutual and also the two are quite innocent like.

    Man it would be cool if the two best friends finally find out that they both are the leaders or founders of the two biggest groups in the city. Though I get the story of most of the people introduced, I still am confused about Anri, I get the fact that she’s the foil or basically the type to always depend on others, but besides from that, what did those 3 freaky looking girls meant by them accusing her of stealing their boyfriends???

    X
    Reply

    1. yeah, izaya X namie is my fave twisted couple in durarara(even the writer likes that couple).
      if you wanna know why just click on those links on my comments above.
      but if you wanna know real proof:Show Spoiler ▼

      I got that at the same web links above.

      amado
      Reply

  50. I thought that Anri was the slasher.. the slasher’s silhouette when she slashed celty looked like anri.. thanks for the blog.. now i understand the episode a lot better..

    Malloween
    Reply

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