Black Lagoon - The Second Barrage: Volume 1

Introduction

Trust the US anime industry to get into gear at the last moment. All through the releases of the first season of Black Lagoon, I've been gloating at the possibility that we in the UK would get DVDs of The Second Barrage before the US, following the withdrawal of Geneon from the distribution business last November. Then last month, Funimation announced that they had finalised an agreement with Geneon that would see the resumption of their releases, and coincidentally the long awaited continuation of Black Lagoon. It boils down to the US getting this volume three weeks before us in the UK, and subsequent volumes on even shorter order than our bi-monthly schedule. My regular opportunity to crow cruelly snatched from me, I'll have to console myself with the fact that at least I get to see this review disc first, getting an early dose of Revytastic action. Also the fact that a third season of Black Lagoon has been announced in Japan is enough to give me a warm glow.

The life of a salaryman, or white-collar worker isn't an easy one. Years of hard competitive education just to get your foot on the first rung of the corporate ladder in a big firm. As the lowest of the low, you get the toughest work, and all the abuse from the higher ups. You spend years of your life, make sacrifices of your family and free time, pledging eternal loyalty to the company, all in the hope that one day, you'll be the one doing the abusing instead of being abused. Then, while acting as a courier, you're kidnapped by mercenaries for the sensitive data disc that you're carrying, disowned by your superiors as an unfortunate loss, get caught up in battles and gunfights with the mercs your company send to retrieve the disc, and start a new job as a pirate. Okay, so that doesn't happen to your average Reginald Perrin, but it does happen to Rokuro Okajima, in the acclaimed anime Black Lagoon. The first four episodes of The Second Barrage are presented here on this MVM disc, chronicling the further adventures of Dutch, Revy, Benny and Rock. While this is the second season of Black Lagoon, it continues directly from where the first left off, evident in the episode numbers.


13. The Vampire Twins Comen
It's a rainy day in Roanapur, and there are a couple of new serial killers in town, preying on the populace. Given the usual cutthroat nature of the residents, these killers are making quite an impression, especially as they are preying on the rival gangs in the city. It's mostly Balalaika's Hotel Moscow group that is being targeted, but it's enough to get all four rival syndicate leaders into a meeting to discuss the problem. Someone is messing with the balance of power, and Balalaika, Chang, Verrocchio of the Italian mafia, and Abrego have more reason to suspect each other than anyone from outside. It's the description of a bartender who barely survived the last attack, and Rock's facility with European languages that narrows down the suspects. It's depraved even for Roanapur's denizens. Romanian twin children, victims of the fall of the communist state, who learnt their bloodthirsty trade being forced to perform in snuff videos, and who have come to relish the slaughter. Regardless of the background of the brother and sister, Balalaika needs to avenge her fallen men, and she puts a hefty reward up. The dollar signs flash in Revy's eyes, and when psycho nun Eda comes knocking, she doesn't need to be asked twice.

14. Bloodsport Fairytale
Someone had to be sponsoring the killers in Roanapur, and when Chang and Balalaika find out, they're determined that there be one less gang in the city. They haven't counted on Hansel and Gretel. Children don't like being shouted at, and when their current employer gives them a scolding for getting messy, they throw a tantrum, with hatchets and automatic weapons. Balalaika has unleashed a free for all with her posted reward, and the whole city is up in arms targeting any likely looking child. But for the Russian, vengeance is personal, and she has another plan up her sleeve that will see the children come to her. She has also given orders that if anyone else gets in the way, to just get rid of them, she'll be the one to kill the twins. Which is when Eda and Revy corner the kids in a back alley.


15. Swan Song At Dawn
It's an inconclusive confrontation, and the twins escape and split up. Revy and Eda have to deal with losing their payday, even though they managed to avoid being perforated by vengeful Russians, and give up the whole thing as a lost cause and go their separate ways. Which is when Eda is bushwhacked by one of the twins who are looking for an escape route from Roanapur. The other twin is intent on completing the contract on Balalaika and is going hunting. As it so often is in this topsy turvy town, Black Lagoon end up with their previous targets as clients, and the whole of Hotel Moscow on their tail.

16. Greenback Jane
It's a hot sweaty day in Roanapur, made worse for Revy as she got drunk and shot the air conditioner. She tries looking for comfort at the church, and while their air conditioner is just as kaput, at least Eda has some booze to take the edge off. They're not expecting anyone to use the church as, well as a church. But when a master counterfeiter bursts in looking for sanctuary, the bullets aren't long in flying. She is an artist, who takes pride in her work, but her most recent contract has been with the new criminals in town, who have no patience, but itchy trigger fingers. When her partner is shot as an incentive to faster work, she looks for the exit and sanctuary. Elvis and his gang don't know much about Roanapur or Revy, or they never would have pulled their guns at the church. Now they have to find some hired guns quick to get the counterfeiter back, while Eda and Revy see a chance to make some serious money from the action.

Picture

Black Lagoon gets a 1.78:1 anamorphic transfer, which is as good as it gets without it being a native PAL source. The image is clear and sharp, detail is excellent, colours are consistent, and I didn't notice a single compression artefact. It's a good thing too, as Black Lagoon has some of the best animation I have seen in a television anime. It's fluidly and dynamically animated, the attention to detail is astounding, especially with the military equipment. This may be the anime of choice when it comes to gun porn, with Revy's Cutlasses getting special attention. It's an action packed show, with plenty of gunfights, explosions and chases to be getting on with. The character designs have had a lot of thought put into them, and are particularly effective with a cast of grizzled and battle worn mercenaries. CGI texture mapping comes into its own here, as I doubt the plethora of scars and tattoos adorning some skins could have been possible were they animated traditionally.

Sound

An action packed show needs a suitably expressive soundtrack, and my preference of the DD 2.0 Japanese doesn't disappoint, with plenty of directionality to the sound design, especially when pro-logicked up, while keeping the dialogue clear and audible. Translated subtitles are provided of course, along with a signs only track. Unfortunately, and apparently a legacy of the Australian release from Madman, the 5.1 English audio has been dropped for the first disc of the second series, replaced with a vanilla stereo track. Given the action nature of the show, this is a bit of a blow, and to add insult to injury the 5.1 audio track is mentioned in the end credits. I'll never be a fan of English dubs, but Black Lagoon's is near passable, with some impressive performances. I think the English language actor chosen for Dutch is perfectly cast, and if some other performances are a little too typical of dubs, they don't detract from the show.

It's a shame there isn't a Japanese surround track though, and now it's twice as shameful that the English audio has been downgraded.

Extras

Jacket picture, animated menu and trailers for FLCL and Starship Operators, the latter at the wrong aspect ratio (squished), along with the second textless closing sequence.

Conclusion

If you have been reading my reviews of Black Lagoon so far, you've probably had to wipe yourselves off due to my unreserved gushing for this brilliant action anime show. I was expecting big things from this first volume of The Second Barrage, especially given the Geneon hiatus in the US and the associated hype. Yet it looked as if this disc would turn out to be a comparative dud, given a first episode that was more devoted to building up tension and setting the scene. By the second episode it became apparent that the Black Lagoon crew were only playing a peripheral part in the story, and I was beginning to think that Black Lagoon was losing its way.


Of course I was totally wrong, as the Twins Arc is probably the strongest yet of the series, and it doesn't matter if for the most part the story focuses on Balalaika and the Russians, as well as the two siblings who come into Roanapur to wreak havoc on the various gangs. Rock, Revy, Dutch and Benny do have an important part in the story in the final quarter, but their absence in the earlier part isn't felt at all. The story is also unremittingly bleak, probably the darkest anime I have yet seen, and a reminder that animation as a medium can cross boundaries and explore ideas that live action just cannot touch. The idea of child assassins is touchy enough, but has been explored in films like Leon and anime like Gunslinger Girl. But that's the 'lighter' side of the concept; children that still have a degree of innocence, are likeable, and are the protagonists. But the idea of a child assassin that is the villain, totally irredeemable, depraved and drowning in bloodlust is something that the rational, commercial filmmaker will probably shy away from. It's totally impossible to do in live action, and even in animation you're crossing so many lines of good taste that tabloid hacks would be salivating at the prospect of another moral crusade.


For a moment there, it looked as if Black Lagoon was heading straight down that path, introducing a couple of murderous pre-pubescent siblings, one wielding a hatchet, one with a massive machine gun, who enjoy bathing in the blood of their victims, appear to get a sexual thrill from the kill, and also have a slight incestuous air to their relationship. For a brief moment I was brought back to the bad old days of anime, with 18 ratings and rampant tentacles. But then Black Lagoon redeemed itself, paradoxically by making it worse. The story actually gives the twins a background, explains where they come from and why they are the way they are. I remember seeing the lost children of Romania festering away in orphanages on the news a few years after the fall of Communist State. That's the starting point of the twins' story, although Black Lagoon pushes it a little further along the path of exploitation to come up with an explanation of why they are such playful killers. The thing is that it's all the more horrifying for its plausibility, and because of that, the twins stop being stereotypes and start being real characters, children whom despite their actions it is possible to sympathise with.

They are the ultimate lost souls, little more than ravenous beasts, made all the more tragic for the loss of their innocence and the idea of what could have been. Typically Rock tries to be the shepherd to redeem them, but gets the rudest awakening yet to the world in which he now lives. It's something that the likes of Revy and Balalaika are all too aware of, having seen the darker side of humanity, and they know that not everyone can be redeemed, if only because they too are irredeemable in their own way.


We're back to normal service for the final episode, as we get back to a light-hearted story where bullets fly, random bystanders get shot, computer geeks are brutally murdered, and ridiculous outlandish characters join in the free-for-all gunslinging mayhem. It's definitely the more fun side of the series as an unsuspecting counterfeiter/geek falls on the not so delicate mercy of Revy and the nuns at the local church (we met the smuggling nuns in volume 2). Of course the episode ends on one of those infuriating cliff-hangers, making sure that you'll have the next volume on pre-order before the credits have finished rolling on this one. It quickly becomes clear that this second season of Black Lagoon is building on what has come before, with Balalaika and the Roanapur gangs taking centre stage in the first story, while this disc also sees the return of the psycho nun Eda. We briefly encountered Eda during a brief negotiation in Volume 2, where Rock managed to smooth things over with the Mother Superior, while Eda and Revy managed not to blow each others' heads off in the background. When we meet Eda again in this volume, she's lost the habit, and now has a halter-top miniskirt combo to match Revy's dress sense, and she's a man hunter with Rock in her sights. She impressed in that brief appearance as a character that was more Revy than Revy, another psychotic gunslinger who fights with no holds barred. We see a lot more of her here, both literally and figuratively, and this time fighting side by side with Revy, it sets up an interesting character dynamic between the two.

This second season of Black Lagoon gets off to a flying start, and rather than just giving us the same old eighties action comedy mayhem, it actually adds a little social comment to the mix. It may be unnerving to think of children as being capable of vicious crimes, of being victims of horrific inhumanities, and even I'd be first to admit that I wouldn't go out of my way to watch it. But the truth is that these stories need to be told, because far worse happens in the real world, and perhaps through fiction we can begin to understand what factors shape such children. The idea of doing so in live action would be repellent, but animation provides such an avenue, and even in Black Lagoon's constrained eighties action genre milieu, it manages to provoke thought.


I'm beginning to feel like Jonathan Ross. Each week on his show, the latest guest will be greeted with "I love your work, I'm your biggest fan, I think you're the best at what you do", just to be repeated for the next guest ad nauseum. Well it feels like every other time I put an anime disc into my player this year, I'm compelled to say that this is my favourite anime ever. I'm on something like my seventh favourite anime ever this year, and its only August. But there you have it; Black Lagoon is my favourite anime ever... as well.