Darker Than Black – Meteor Shower
23 September 2007
It’s like being hit by a large wrecking ball, all the way out of the park like a baseball, that’s what episode 24 was like. They basically catapult large chunks of information at you, one after one after one, giant masses colliding against weak, feeble fortifications once called my sanity, just chipping it away. I want to watch it again but at the same time, I just don’t have the heart to.
Huang’s gone. I don’t know how else to say it, the opening scenes with Huang in the car, telling them his fishing stories, on the side of the highway, when he lights up a cigarette and Hei stubs it out and tells him to quit and Yin gives him a hug and he ends up blowing himself up in a naval yard. Mao’s gone, too. I don’t really know what happened to him, but seeing the animal that used to be him run off, his last words lingering in the air, makes me wonder. All these people, their lives crisscrossing and intertwining, will they ever see each other again? I just want to throw my head back and weep and just cry and cry and cry, but that worst part is, I can’t.
All that talk about the Gate and the Saturn Ring and all that PANDORA scientific babble aside, there were only a handful of scenes I really like this episode. Huang’s farewell in the beginning is definitely one of them, probably one of my favorite moments this entire series. And the very last scene, Hei and Yin walking across water and the sun comes up, a giant, fiery blaze through the fog, with the stars falling left and right out of the sky. They see Amber, thanks to her remuneration, reduced to almost a toddler, and then she smiles.
And, finally, pretty much everything, everything has been revealed. The only one possible card left unturned is exactly what Amber is going to do. The Syndicate was really a collective of governments and intelligence bureaus across the world. PANDORA is trying to destroy the Gate and every contractor with it. Amagiri destroys the ring, gets killed by Mai, whose very brief appearance all but confused me, only to reveal that the Saturn Ring has a backup and the attack was just a decoy, Amber’s real plan was to guide a mass of dolls inside the gate. The key to positively everything, and by God I mean everything, is BK-201’s powers. It was once Bai’s power and it triggered Heaven’s Gate in South America. Now, it’s Hei’s power and it’s going to do something at Hell’s Gate in Tokyo.
So, exactly, how is this all going to end?! There’s Bai and Hei as kids in the preview, next episode’s the episode with the ominous title, is the dream of a shinigami darker than black? Darker Than Black brings symbolism to a different level, everything in the series has some sort of a meaning and alludes to some or another. The thing that gets me is the whole dreams thing. Yin said it again the in preview, contractors don’t dream. Contractors don’t dream. Maybe the whole thing was just a dream…
I share your feelings regarding Mao and Huang. They just… they just died… I had to stop for a moment to absorb those facts.
I think Mao’s intelligence and coherency is based on him being connected to some kind of “internet”-ish network, which provides him with mental fortification and the ability to prevent his mind from turning into a cat’s brain. Somehow, that connectivity is gone, and so Mao’s intelligence is gone.
Still, one of the brightest moments in that episode is the faces he made. No more comic effect for the rest of the series…
I wonder if Hei will really die. Consider Amber, who I think is still heavily in love with him. Would she be so calm if Hei dies? After all, she could see the future.
Poor Amber. A mind of the oldest and most experienced and probably most intelligent woman, and a body of a toddler… and growing smaller. I wonder how Hei feels, to see the woman he (used to) love(s) in the body of an eight years old (or younger).
You know what’s really funny? The fact that Huang and Mao really, really, really DIED hit me while I was eating lunch today. I watched the episode last night and it took a good half a day for it to really sink in. I mean, I acknowledged that they’re gone, but didn’t really admit it until around three today.
Maybe they fried Mao’s brain through the wireless network he’s always attached to. What a way to go…His last line, that tone of voice, if you ever come across a cat that looks like me…T_T!!
It’s not necessary for Hei to die. Really, after all that’s happened, does he really, really have to die. One of these days, I’m going to write a post about how he’s NOT going to die.
As for Amber, seeing her as a toddler was a bit of a shock. It was like, O_o..oiy…
It just makes me so nervous, so nervous even thinking about the next and final episode. >.<
Hey, I finally caught up to you in my “Darker than Black” viewing.
I’m not really sure what’s going to happen next. Huang’s death was particularly well done, but Mao’s really wasn’t. It was more of an afterthought than anything else. I certainly look forward to watching the finale.