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During one ominous night, a part of Tokyo became what is known as “Hell’s Gate”, a field that seems to be closely tied to the emergence of Dolls, emotionless spiritual mediums, and Contractors, assassins with superpowers who only rely on their logic. Our main guy, Hei, is one of these Contractors, currently working for a mysterious crime organization only known as the “Syndicate”. Another thing you should know about Contractors is that after they use their powers they have to fulfill their contract by performing some specific activity, that is harmful and unpleasant to them. This element is one of my favourite things about the ... series, since it really helps to distinguish it from other series where people have superpowers, and it gives the show sort of it’s own personality.

STORY 9/10
The first 22 episodes of Darker Than Black are broken into 2 episode arcs, which is the reason I initially started to watch this series. I am a big fan of episodic shows like Mushishi or Jigoku Shoujo but Darker Than Black is a little different. All of the arcs are somehow related to the main plotline or at least reveal something interesting about one of the main characters. The last three episodes conclude the story in a truly spectacular manner that leaves you wanting more. I’ve seen some shows with mysterious premise that have a terrible ending but Darker Than Black is definitely not one of these. Another thing about the series is that it never spells out for you what is currently going on. You have to figure out a lot of it by yourself by reading in between the lines but no matter how much you try some parts of the plot will remain unknown for the whole 25 episodes, which is why I took of the one point in the story ranking. There is a sequel though so there is still hope that it will shed some light onto the mysteries of Darker Than Black.

CHARACTERS 6/10
In my opinion, characters were the weak point of this series mainly because of one thing, the main character Hei/Li/BK201/Black Reaper... I’ve seen some people who really like this guy, and I can kind of see why, but personally I think that he is the worst thing about this series. He really has two different personalities; one as an innocent transfer student who’s annoying as hell and another one as a cold-blooded killer who changes his face expression once per arc, at best. He goes through a fair bit of development but you can’t really tell that about him. Same monotone voice, same facial expression, same fighting style and even when he steps forward and does something big and unexpected it’s still more of the same. He’s not a broken character by any means; it’s just that I can’t stand him. Although the supporting cast was a little stereotypical they were well developed and most of the side characters weren’t underused.

ART 9/10
Art is definitely another strong point of this series. It is not quite up to the likes of “5 centimeters per Second” but the animation creates a great, gloomy atmosphere that’s really at the core of the series. The abilities and the fights are animated skillfully, because even in wild and intense fights you always know what is going on and even when some of the fights aren’t that great, the animation usually makes up for it. The characters each have their unique look so you’ll never mistake them for others and even the CGIs manage to blend in quite well.

SOUND 8/10
The first opening is kind of neat because it features lines that directly relate to the series but it also has a sequence where the opening titles appear in a way that kind of hurt my eyes, so I usually ended up skipping it. The second opening is solid but nothing captivating. Both endings are on the mellow side, but the second one is kind of odd and seems to be made for some romance/slice of life anime. The backing sound through ought the series is good and, again, helps to reinforce the atmosphere, although I am not a big fan of some of the strings-heavy classical pieces. I think some dramatic piano music would fit much better with a series like that.

ENJOYMENT 7/10
Darker Than Black is a good series that has a good storyline with great ending. The technical aspects are also really well done, and the pacing is good too but the thing that bothered me a lot was the lead character who annoyed the hell out of me. However, I’ve seen a lot of reviews that praised the main guy so it might be just me and personal preference shouldn’t keep you away from seeing a solid series like Darker Than Black.

OVERALL 7/10
Story 9/10
Characters 6/10
Art 9/10
Sound 8/10
Enjoyment 7/10
TOTAL 39/50 = 7.8/10

The review ratings round out to 8/10, but personally I rated it a 7 just because I don't think that it is quite as good as other animes I rated 8.

The ratings round out to an 8 but, personally, I rated it a 7 just because I don’t think it’s quite as good as other animes I rated 8.