Durarara! is my Anti-Baccano! (And That Ain’t a Good Thing)
It pains me to say this, since there’s so much about Durarara! that I enjoyed to some extent:
In the end, Durarara! just isn’t all that great of a series.
Much has been said about the similarities and differences between Baccano! and Durarara! It makes sense, what with both being written by the same author. The only way in which the two series come close to being similar is the characters. Both series utilize over-the-top, larger-than-life characters to draw in readers/viewers. Baccano! is all about immortal mafistos and serial killers and goofball criminal “masterminds” while Durarara! has trickster gods, Herculean bartenders, and headless grim reapers. At the same time you have “normals” thrown into the mix, and a good deal of whatever conflict arises comes from the clashing of the normal with the surreal and supernatural.
The similarities between the series ends there, though. In fact, the two series are all but polar opposites of one another in every other feasible facet. And this includes the over quality of the series in question.
Baccano! was a fast-paced, action-packed pulp adventure. While there were multiple storylines running parallel to one another, for the most part we were focused upon two central conflicts: The Flying Pussyfoot massacre and gang warfare on the streets of New York. Despite the chronological discord, chaotic events, and ridiculously sized cast, Baccano! was pretty damn focused and deliberate in its actions. There was an end point towards which it was working, and all of the events worked their way towards resolving this ending. Stuff went down on the Pussyfoot and was resolved. Gangs fought in New York and a clear outcome came about.
Essentially, stuff happened, stuff was resolved, and any dangling plotlines were of the “TO BE CONTINUED but you don’t really NEED to see their outcome” variety. We didn’t need to see the three OAV episodes that resolved Chane and Claire’s relationship, since nothing vital was hinging on that resolution. It was just a little extra tidbit of development that made things all the more interesting.
None of that can be said of Durarara! Where Baccano! was fast-paced and worked its way towards a definite ending, Durarara! moves at a more leisurely pace and meanders around the plot. This in and of itself isn’t a bad thing, it’s just different. The catch is that in the end Durarara! didn’t pull this off very well.
The problem is that there’s absolutely no conflict in Durarara! Yeah, you heard me right. There was absolutely no tension and no sense of struggle at any point in the series. The series worked its way towards various “climaxes,” going at its own pace, but once it reached these moments absolutely nothing happened. Mikado is forced to call upon the Dollars when he’s about to be kidnapped by evil pharmaceutical henchmen. People’s phones ring… and he’s safe. That’s it. A few phone ringing resolves what little danger Mikado was in at that moment. And this was supposed to be the big midway point climax.
I could buy into that if the rest of the series made up for that anti-climatic moment. I figured that the first half was meant to be build-up. Things were going on to establish characters, establish the stakes, and lead us into a second half that would get down and dirty with Izaya’s grand scheme.
Nope. Instead we got another 12 or so episodes of establishing boundaries. We got more characters, we got into the heads of the high school kids, and we found out that no one is really “normal” in this town.
And then the series ended.
I didn’t expect Izaya’s scheme to blossom completely by the end of the series, but I expected something to happen. Maybe he comes close but the characters band together to halt his progress. Something like that. Instead we got a few gang members beating up some people, we get Kida getting hit in the face with a crowbar, and then we get some more gang member beating each other up.