Meet me at Hell’s Gate: the epic Darker Than Black rewatch
Just when we thought we’d seen the last of him (I knew better than that, truth be told) Owen rallies the troops and reminds us that Darker than Black aired almost two years ago this week, and drags us along for the ride. I actually put it on hold around ep #8 way back when (‘way back’ meaning the old days of my old blog when I could still be arsed to blog episodically) because it got licenced but hey, if it’s an excuse to see the thing through to the end before my retail DVD copy arrives in August, why argue?
The plan is to watch two episodes (==one story arc) each day through to completion; I’ll add the relevant links to everyone else’s impressions as time goes on but in all honesty I don’t have the time or energy to make a full post of every arc on my own so I’ll set out a short piece for each on my MAL blog and link back from here. It’s pretty well-timed actually, because I stumbled on an excellent AMV (a rare occurence in itself) that married the footage from the show with the song Remembrance Day by God is an Astronaut (Youtube vid after the Moar jump).
If you like the tune, pick up their All is Violent, All is Bright album…it’s fantastic. If you like the series, stick around and enjoy the link-fest.
Comrades in arms
- Owen and Hige’s introductory post: 1 & 2 (Still Alive)
- Owen and Hige 3 & 4: Family Matters
- Owen and Hige 5 & 6: Redrum
- Owen and Hige 7 & 8: Scentimental
- Owen and Hige 9 & 10: In Dependence
- Owen and Hige 11 & 12: Equivalent Exchange
- Owen and Hige 13 & 14: Atonement
- Owen and Hige 15 & 16: The Carver
- Owen and Hige 17 & 18: Dying to Escape
- Owen and Hige 19 & 20: Memory
- Mike’s introductory post
- 21stCenturyDigitalBoy (Fuzakenna!)
My arc-by-arc impressions (updated daily)
- Episodes 1 and 2 (The Stars of the Covenant Fall)
- Episodes 3 and 4 (The New Star Glimmers in the Twilight)
- Episodes 5 and 6 (The Red Dream of Catastrophe Vanishes into Eastern Europe)
- Episodes 7 and 8 (The Scent of Gardenias in the Summer Rain)
- Episodes 9 and 10 (The Pure White Dress Stains Her Dreams with Blood)
- Episodes 11 and 12 (When All Things Lost Within the Wall are Reclaimed)
- Episodes 13 and 14 (On that Silver Night, the Water of Her Soul was Calm)
- Episodes 15 and 16 (The Memory of Betrayal Is an Amber Smile)
- Episodes 17 and 18 (A Love Song Sung From a Rubbish Heap)
- Episodes 19 and 20 (Softly Dreaming, Never Drunk)
- Episodes 21 and 22 (The Worn Road is Wet with Tears)
The first volumes are available for pre-order here? Thanks for the reminder — I obviously need to keep a closer eye on the UK’s anime DVD schedules. I’m quite impressed by that AMV’s timing and sense of mood, though I’m rather less impressed by the presence of subtitles and by the aged film effects. DTB seems to fit well with music without words, but then I often find that lyrics in AMVs are quite intrusive.
I really appreciate the company, if only because it feels like the type of series that you should watch in tandem with a few people in order to properly savour it from all angles. Thanks for the linkage, at any rate.
That was a pretty neat AMV that matched the mood of that song very well (it’s a familiar one, for sure), but I still maintain that nothing would beat an AMV of Darker than Black synced to this song, if you ask me. The lyrics should explain itself.
[...] by my spoilerific thoughts at the end. Please enjoy. Just as a note, I had no idea there was this epic cross-blog rewatch of this show going on. It’s pretty cool, and just the introductory posts helped me a lot with [...]
I thought it was a pretty sucky AMV. Flashback usage was nice, and I like God is an Astronaut, but most of the vid was ‘oh hey fight scenes’. Anywho, posted on the show, linked above.
I only watched DtB for the first time a few months ago, so I don’t want to rewatch it just yet (time is also an issue), but it will be interesting to see how impressions might have changed in two year’s time. :o
Good review. As I noted in MAL, we’re in total agreement about it being a deliberate noir work. I think the cat is just a fantasy element.
When I saw ‘Darker Than Black’ in my feed I just couldn’t help but click. I would love to go along for the ride and re-watch the entire series, but its way too sentimental to bear. Just watching that AMV almost drove me to tears. XD The song is great, it feels so epic coupled with the footage. Ahh, man, lol, I’m just gonna buy the whole series on DVD. Man, oh man.
@IKnight: yep, the first volume is out later in the summer. Not bad value for money either…
@Ah, Incubus. That sure takes me back…I still listen to Make Yourself occasionally, especially at this time of year to get myself into a summer-y mood. I haven’t really kept up with them recently though.
@digitalboy: leading off from IKnight’s comment, I wish they’d had access to raws. I find GiaA’s songs to be quite intense so the tune fits the visuals for me. I believe the video that accompanies the live performances features bombs dropping and other old wartime footage…powerful stuff.
@Kiri: it’s really rewarding to pick it back up after so long – I recommend you rewatch it for yourself in a year or two!
@moritheil: I love the noir aesthetic in this; Mao I think is an important character as far as explaining the Contractors goes, if episodes 7 and 8 are anything to go by.
@Xerox: I can’t not get the DVD after this – the rewatchability is great. But yeah, it pulls on the heartstrings at points too…