I haven’t been watching all the summer shows I’d intended to, but I am watching the second cour of Durarara’s second season.
When Durarara’s first season aired some five years ago, you either loved it or hated it. The stories of the denizens of Tokyo’s Ikebukuro ward told in a disjointed narrative captured the imagination of some anime fans, and left others cold.
The Durarara universe is made up of many characters. Three high schoolers – Mikado, Anri and Kida – were the focus of season one.
By the end of that season it was revealed that each was the head of their own gang in Ikebukuro. Of the three gangs, Mikado’s formless “Dollars” gang was the most intriguing.
Meeting only online and without a named leader (Mikado kept his leader role secret), the Dollars finally became an actual, as opposed to virtual, street gang in the last episodes of the first season.
The second season began with some new characters.
Varona was introduced in the first cour of the second season. She’s a Russian assassin with impressive fighting skills... until, of course, she meets Shizuo Heiwajima.
In the first cour's final episode Varona picks a fight with Shizuo. She’s helmeted, so he can’t see her face.
Shizuo chases down the truck that Varona is in, kicking a car down the road to shield himself from her bullets. He sees the child Akane kidnapped and tied up inside the truck and runs across the roof of a nearby building to reach the truck.
Varona challenges him, but Shizuo picks up Akane (after protecting her and receiving three knives in his back), passes by a seething Varona and casually jumps off the truck. :-D
The second cour finds Varona joining Shizuo in his debt collection business, while secretly vowing to best him one day in a fight. Shizuo doesn't recognize Varona, though she seems vaguely familiar. ;-)
Shizuo Heiwajima’s younger brother Kasuka Heiwajima, stage name Yuuhei Hanejima, a successful actor despite his completely expressionless face, has a new girlfriend – the wildly popular idol - and also serial killer - Ruri Hijiribe.
Ruri was introduced in the first cour, and she and Yuuhei are featured in the second cour. Only Durarara would have a character who is both an idol and a serial killer. Did I mention she also has vampire blood inherited from her grandfather?
The second scariest character currently in Durarara is a slight high-school boy named Aoba.
Aoba is the leader of the Blue Square gang. His slightly creepy eyes and fake smile let you know from the outset he’s bad news.
Aoba manipulates Mikado into becoming the head of Blue Square, but it doesn’t turn out well. . . for Aoba.
And that brings us to the scariest character in Durarara.
Surprise, it’s. . .
By the end of the second season’s first cour, Mikado had become increasingly disturbed by Blue Square’s infiltration and corruption of the Dollars gang and agreed to become Blue Square’s leader. We think he’s weak and just playing into Aoba’s hands, but in the first cour's final episode Mikado blows your mind.
Mikado states that “to get what you want in a world with no rules... you need power.” He asks Aoba to sign a contract with him, to seal the deal for Mikado to lead Blue Square.
Then Mikado stabs Aoba’s hand clean through with the ballpoint pen.
Mikado tells Aoba the stabbing is for Aoba’s dragging of Anri into the struggle. Then as soon as Aoba accepts this, Mikado suddenly turns into wimp!Mikado again, like a split personality, offering antiseptic and bandages with a nervous smile for Aoba’s wound.
It was totally unnerving—and if you’re like me and don’t read the light novels, a huge shock.
Mikado continues to lose it in the second cour, looking increasingly wild-eyed in his private moments over what has become of the Dollars and determined to change things for Anri and Kida’s sakes. I’ve read spoilers of what Mikado does later on and he only gets worse.
Durarara, in its second season, is more mature than in its first season. The characters are being explored more deeply, while the series retains its trademark eccentricities—the oddball characters, wild gangs, supernatural elements, black humor, and sudden moments of raw violence.
In the comments at Crunchyroll someone started a discussion over who is Durarara’s main character. Some said it was Celty, others Mikado or Izaya or Shizuo.
The comment I most agreed with though said that the main character of Durarara is really Ikebukuro, the ward of Tokyo where the entirety of Durarara’s action takes place. Its tales don’t entertain everyone, but if you’re a fan of headless riders and insanely strong bartenders, it does very nicely. ;-)
