Durarara!! 01
The winter anime season finally kicked off for me with the first episode of Durarara!! I wasn’t really sure what to expect as details about the series seemed to be relatively scant before the premiere. After watching the first episode on CR, I still don’t have a good idea of what the show will be about, but I have a feeling that this will be a show that is worth watching.
Whether or not Durarara!! will be good enough to convince me to keep my CR subscription is another matter. In my opinion, CR’s winter lineup is rather weak.
I really cannot comment too much on the story, as I really am not sure exactly what this series will be about. The first episode centered around a high school kid named (I’m not making this up) Ryuugamine Mikado (henceforth Ryuu for short) moving to Ikebukuro at the behest of his friend Kida. It would seem that Ikebukuro has seen better days- recently gangs have been active, and crime has increased.
All that crime could very well be the least of Ikebukuro’s problems as urban legends and rumors of a mysterious headless motorcycle rider fly around the city. No one is sure of the motives of this mysterious rider. Although most people agree that the biker should be avoided, Kida and Ryuu cannot help but be attracted to him/her, and manage to see the mysterious rider rocket past on the street.
If the actions of the mystery rider in the first episode are anything to go by, the headless biker is a supernatural crime fighter/vigilante. He/she stops the abduction of a high school girl by a gang bent on, most likely, sexual slavery. That intervention produced the action shot you see above. The biker fights using real-world objects when possible, but can use supernatural powers (in this episode, a scythe) if the situation demands it.
Overall it was entertaining. Given that this series is produced by the same people who did Baccano!, I’m willing to bet that Durarara!!’s plot will be relatively convoluted and will require multiple viewings to get the full story. Hopefully Durarara!! will turn out to be as entertaining and engaging as Baccano! was.