Durarara!! / First Impressions

「一寸先は闇」 (Issun Saki wa Yami)
“No One Knows What the Future Holds”

This week I learnt: even if Shizuo’s not angry, he’s still plenty capable of wrecking people.

The one who learnt this lesson firsthand, one Rokujou Chikage (Ono Yuuji), is the main face introduced in this start of a new story arc. He joins the growing list of names with a grudge against the Dollars, and will probably serve as a major antagonist in the near future. Actually having the Dollars, as an organisation, because as an organisation the Dollars isn’t really a thing (even if Aoba is trying to give it more form with his mailing list and all). Rocchi may not know that, but he doesn’t really know what the Dollars is at all. He simply has a vendetta that he needs to exact on something that resembles an enemy entity. It’s demonstrative of the way humans have always viewed each other in the context of social groups rather than individuals. And probably something about vicarious liability.

Characters in Durarara!! love all sorts of weird things in all sorts of weird way, but  Rokujou Chikage appears to love all women unconditionally. Whether this attitude is chivalrous and chauvinistic (or both) is up to interpretation. What’s interesting is that the narrator for this episode was Namie, who loves only her brother. Her singular obsession and general hatred for everything that lives serves as a nice contrast to the womanising Chikage. She finds his unfocused affections vapid and his standard of general female exceptionalism—consider his willingness to use disproportionate violence save on women—insulting, but everyone has strange moral standards. Even the yakuza, who are very comfortable with violence but not with poor manners. I guess that’s what it means to be a professional gangster.

Namie is right, though, in that women, at least in Durarara!!, don’t need special treatment. Two dangerous females were introduced this episode, each seeming to be going after some of the most prominent citizens of Ikebukuro. I do wonder what they’re trying to achieve though; if someone is trying to assassinate Shizuo, then a cute kid (I was hoping she’d go, ‘Daddy!’ but ‘Die!’ is good too) is probably the way through his defences, but a stun gun (frankly, anything less than artillery) is definitely not. If someone is trying to take Celty’s head, then… well, that ship sailed a long time ago. You can tell these folk are from out of town if they didn’t know that Celty has nothing under the helmet and that Shizuo is simply unkillable.

If there are outside elements at work here, then it would mean that Ikebukuro is being, in a way, invaded. As Masaomi warns, there is definitely something brewing again. With most of the disputes in Ikebukuro having been settled, it’s only natural that we’d need to import some. The bikers from Saitama are a good start (though I was disappointed that they didn’t spontaneously break out into song), and the attempted murders just means we’re now in the territory of serious business. I sympathise with Shizuo’s wish for a peaceful life, but that simply does not make for good television. Yeah, Izaya’s still a prick, but hopefully he’d at least give us something to watch. So, new story arc! I’m looking forward to this one.

Full-length images: 34.

 

Preview

39 Comments

  3. … I know the animation is overall the same as Season 1, but to the trained eye…. I can see that it’s WORSE. Not worse by a noticeable margin, but man do some of these movements and line work feel a bit more messy. Izaya does not look right at all. This may be attributed to a new studio being behind this even though most or all of the same crew worked from the first season worked on this. Maybe it’s just my eye, or how I’m watching this on a computer screen instead of a TV screen this time.

    I’ll buy Namie a T-shirt that says Rubbish.

    Oooh Shizuo got a cute admirer–AAAAHHH HOLY CRAP LADY!!

    starss
    Reply

    1. Izaya does look different. All character designs were redone to look more like the novel, but it’s more noticeable with him than with everyone else.

      About the animation, yes, a bit worse, but not to the point of being annoying or distracting, at least for me.

      Kazuki
      Reply

      1. I agree, I’m also willing to give them the benefit of the doubt as this is Studio Shukas first major work. They’re quite a new studio. They will likely improve as they go on with the series.

        Lyfe
        Reply

    2. I kinda disagree; the animation is subpar; (that’s been the durarara way) but the art this season has improved 1. thanks to being displayed in true 720p, but 2. the colors are sharper and the character models, while a bit lanky have a bit more sharpness to them as well like the extra detail in shizuo’s hair and what not. Now if we are talking about animation consistency, that’s different. The animation consistency has not been the best and the trained eye can pick up on that very easily. Still, the standard of the art set by the opening and the first ep is slightly above the art of the first season.

      sonicsenryaku
      Reply

  8. It seemed as if animation and design of characters changed a bit? They became a bit thinner and more “angular”, I guess. Closer to how illustrations in LN look I would say. May be it’s just my imagination (comparing this ep screens with previous ones).

    Crake
    Reply

    1. No you’re right the animation and designed did undergo a slight change from the first season. Its definable closer to the illustrations from the light novels. Personally, despite a few hiccups here and there, I find this change to be a improvement from last season. The new animations and designs shows how, Studio Shuka has done an exceptional job so far in adaptation and showing how their not a carbon copy of the previous studio who did DRRR!! season 1, Brain Base.

      Grimm911
      Reply

  10. Let me see if I understand this: Rokujo Chikae picked a fight a against Shizuo, SHIZUO! and he manages to get punch FOUR times before he´s finally out cold, I don´t if this guy is an idiot or the bravest man alive!. XD

    haseo0408
    Reply

  12. I almost feel bad for Chikage if not for how unbearable his character in general can be at times. He’s going to have quite a surprising and entertaining fight later in the series that I’m really looking forward to.

    Did they not include the Baccano reference that was suppose to be in this episode? Sad. Will note I haven’t watched it quite yet so if I’m mistaken I’ll come back and mention it. It really adds something to the conversation though so it feels pretty odd if it’s left out.

    And thus the story of Shizou and his Loli commences. Que exciting Shizou involved episodes for most of the rest of the season (probably).

    c14
    Reply

    1. No mention of the Baccano reference after all. Somewhat spoiler I suppose though probably never going to be mentioned.

      Show Spoiler ▼

      c14
      Reply

  13. “anything less than artillery”

    Passerbay-san I have this feeling that if you hit Shizuo at point blank range with a nuke he´ll just walk out of the flames a little wounded and insanely angry as hell!.

    haseo0408
    Reply

    1. I was going to give you advice based on the Japanese characters but that probably won’t help if you haven’t studied Japanese lol. So basically just know that blue is Mikado, Green is Kida, Red is Anri, Black is Celty, the new blue/indigoish ones are the twins, can’t tell which is which yet lol. Don’t follow it by voices because i think sometimes other characters read out what others write.

      Inugirlz
      Reply

      1. Really? After watching the latest episode (6) i got the impression that the indigo one that talks a little less (but no less enthusiastic) is Kururi (gym uniform) and the light blue like Mikado’s is Mairu (glasses).

        Inugirlz
        Reply

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