It hits the high points successfully, but the aesthetic still suffers from that sterile digital look. Only a few caveats hold it back on occasion, one of which is Madhouse’s animation. It’s a very melancholy way to close out what is typically frenetic and over the top, and it speaks loudly of the type of care put into the show’s overall presentation.īlack Lagoon isn’t perfect by any means, but it’s incredibly consistent and fast-paced, something that can be attributed both to Sunao Katabuchi’s overall direction and his scripts culled from Hiroe’s source material.
The way each episode ends, sometimes abruptly, fading to the somber end theme that plays over Revy’s zombie-like destructive shamble across the sand. I also appreciate the format of Black Lagoon in general.
Gun-toting maids may not be wholly original, but it’s a single example of the amount of variety that takes place in such a short number of episodes. One of the standouts involves a young boy’s maid who, unbeknownst to him, is a ratta-tatta robot with a bar-bombing shotgun umbrella. The gunplay here is neither, and each new scenario offers something different than those preceding. Either it ends up being inconsequential padding or it’s just visually ineffective.
So many action shows build and build to their set pieces, only to fall flat when it’s finally time for the payoff. Thankfully that’s not the case with Black Lagoon.
#HOW MANY EPISODES BLACK LAGOON SEASON 1 SERIES#
From beginning to end, his are the ideal eyes for the audience to view the series through.Ī show can have all the interesting characters in the world and still find itself floundering in every other department. He reacts pretty realistically to the extreme circumstances, and the chain reaction of events that follows ultimately finds him joining up as a crucial part of the Black Lagoon team. Despite all of this, he still remains far separated from the kind of sheepish protagonist one might expect when he first appears. He depends on them and, with nowhere else to go, is at a loss when they want to part ways. Rock then goes through a quick case of Stockholm Syndrome, settling on his fate and inevitably starting to see these mercenaries as his only lifeline in their current situation. When Revy and Dutch kidnap him in the first episode, he’s understandably meek, going through all the motions of a hostage held at hot-barreled gunpoint. Rock is the standout by a wide margin, no matter how many DVD covers and advertisements have Revy plastered in the center in the classic combination of “sexy and menacing.” His character goes through the greatest transformation throughout the 12 episodes that comprise season one, starting off as a somewhat sheepish white collar worker to something much more. There’s the hot-headed, dual-wielding maniac, Revy the reluctant white-collar worker, Rock the brawny captain of the Black Lagoon, Dutch and Benny, the pony-tailed brainpower that tends to avoid the brunt of the team’s countless firefights. What makes Black Lagoon more interesting than your typical anime action fare is the group of mercenaries at the forefront, executing various deadly missions from the cramped confines of the titular PT boat.
I can’t argue with that, as Madhouse’s abrupt first season left me wanting more as soon as the final episode’s credits rolled. Whether via Rei Hiroe‘s original manga-the graphic novels of which are being published in North America by Viz (the series is still ongoing in Japan)-or the animated adaptation that’s under the lens here, many action fans have found it to be a breath of fresh air, gasped from an atmosphere of mostly wimpy protagonists and forgettable firefights. At this point, you may have experienced Black Lagoon in one form or another.
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