Durarara!! ×2 The Third Arc

Episodes 29-30

After weeks upon weeks of sinister setup, the final climax of Durarara!! is off like a shot in two of its most pulse-pounding, fist-pumping episodes yet. This is especially weird because, strictly speaking, episodes 5 and 6 were yet more setup for the final showdown, but everything just feels different now. Where past episodes revolved around characters hemming and hawing about their strategies for the final showdown, these episodes shift the focus forward as the cast starts rushing toward all their places on the Ikebukuro game board. One by one, they're making their final decisions, and one by one, the plot bombs have started going off.

Episode 5 begins with one of the most shocking explosive events of the entire series. Kasane Kujiragi has not stopped by Celty's apartment to negotiate for her head, but to ensnare her body in a bid to take the whole dullahan down. Ever the wicked judge of character, she strides into the room and plants her lips squarely on Shinra's mouth while infecting him with Saika right in front of Celty. The shock immediately gives way to heartbreak, as Celty can feel her supernatural affections for Shinra being forced out of his heart by this violent, foreign force of Saika's love. Overwhelmed with rage, Celty explodes into a hellish, goopy, black shadow of death and starts chasing Kujiragi as she retreats with Shinra over her shoulder. I guess that makes him the damsel in distress, but Shinra's dark knight forgot her noble steed; by the time poor Shooter comes rocketing up the stairs to help his mistress, he's already lost track of her. (Walker isn't much help, because all this chaos has just convinced him that he's finally become the protagonist of his own light novel. Sorry, bro. You are in a light novel, but you're a tertiary character at best.)

Of course, Kujiragi didn't lock lips with Shinra because she has any interest in him. He's just the bait meant to force Celty into her trap, so as soon as Kujiragi's got her pursuer worn out and confused enough, she dumps his body into a getaway car and wraps Celty's rage-shadow up in a web of thin yet unbreakable blades. (For his part, Shinra seems fascinated in a typical mad-scientist way by the war of affection taking place in his heart as he begins to go catatonic from the shock. I trust his love for Celty to triumph over Saika's zombification, but it is distressing to see that he isn't currently able to parse which feelings are his own and which feelings are part of the dastardly infection.) And who should be driving this getaway car but our favorite lonely Russian assassin: Varona.

For what it's worth, Varona isn't being manipulated by Saika. After losing Sloan, she found herself adrift in the city with no place to call her own. She took the job from Kujiragi because she was trying to reconnect with the kind of work that used to make her "happy" in the days before she met Shizuo. As she drives off with Shinra's convulsing body, Varona begins to realize that the joy she once took in performing jobs like these, the bitter sadism and opportunity to "learn" by killing challenging opponents, has all completely evaporated. Now all she can think about is the look of betrayal and disappointment on Shizuo's face when he saw her driving away with Celty's head. She hasn't decided what to do about it yet, but Varona finally understands that she was truly happy for the first time in her life when she was living peacefully in Shizuo's company. Maybe the only way to stop her from falling back into a destructive pattern is to bring her face-to-face with the man she loves just one more time?

On that note, Shizuo is also adrift in the city after getting out of prison, but that changes pretty quick when he sees a panicked Shooter gallop up to him desperate for help. Of all the little innocuous character details that make up Durarara!!, this was one of my all-time favorites. Of course Shooter would pick Shizuo of all Celty's friends to seek help from when things were at their worst. Shizuo's one of the few people who never saw his master as a monster even for a second, and he's ridden tandem on Shooter several times without fear too. Since Shizuo can't speak headless horse, he asks Shooter to take him to Celty on his back, but he's not comfortable riding a giant horse, and he doesn't have a motorcycle license, so Shooter turns into a bicycle instead. Shizuo's super-strong spirit helps power the Shooter-bike down the street like a rocket, and it's things like this that remind me why I love this show so much. I'm worried about what will happen when he encounters Varona again, though. Right now, he thinks she's working for Izaya, his sworn enemy, in an effort to destroy one of his closest friends. I hope they can work things out without too much unnecessary violence, but this is Shizuo and Varona we're talking about here.

Speaking of unnecessary violence, Masaomi and Rokujo's fight was promptly interrupted by Izumii last week, causing the Yellow Scarves' leader to fly into a rage. Righteous anger or not, if Masaomi wasn't a match for Rokujo, he definitely isn't a match for Izumii, who just responds to a face-punch powerful enough to drawn blood by breaking into a horrible smile. Masaomi pulls his hand away crumpled and possibly broken, and Rokujo immediately realizes that this has become a life-or-death situation. Things only gets nastier when Izumii lies and says he's here on orders from Mikado to wipe out the Yellow Scarves. So at first he was working for Izaya, then he went rogue to take revenge on Dotachin, and now he's working for the Awakusu while lying about being part of Mikado's Blue Blood Cells. He may seem like a blockhead, but Izumii has successfully played everybody else in the series while we weren't paying attention, so maybe we should give him a little more credit. But before he can splatter Masaomi's brains across the roof with his giant hammer, Rokujo rings the building's emergency police alarm, hoists Masaomi like a squirming sack of potatoes, and dive-rolls onto a passing truck.

The conversation that follows between these two gang leaders in episode 6 speaks volumes about Rokujo's character in ways I had never considered before. In many ways, Rokujo represents the ideal version of who Masaomi wants to be, and the biggest difference between them lies in the Kida kid's abysmal communication skills. They both have the charisma to rally other ruffians around them, but Rokujo is a better leader because he's a fantastic communicator! He's always honest about how he feels and what he wants, and most importantly, he listens to both his allies and enemies before acting rashly. In fact, Rokujo's decision to listen to Shizuo, Dotachin, and Mikado during the almost-war between the Dollars and his Saitama bikers was one of the biggest factors that prevented things from escalating. So after getting Masaomi's full backstory, Rokujo does what the audience has always wanted to do and clocks him across his empty blond head. Then he decides to call Mikado and set up a meeting between him and Masaomi so they can get their shit together. Masaomi will still have to learn how to communicate with others in a healthy way on his own, but at least Rokujo has given him a big boot in the right direction. Mind you, the Saitama dandy isn't just doing this out of the goodness of his heart. He's already recognized that Izumii has found his way into the hands of real gangsters on their way to consume them all (the Awakusu), so if these boys don't resolve their differences and stand together to fight the real enemy, The Dollars will become the plaything of a powerful criminal syndicate, and the Yellow Scarves will probably all wind up dead.

Just when you think the tension can't get any higher, Izumii makes his next pit stop at the Blue Blood Cells' HQ to meet with Mikado, who's spent enough time spinning around his own head (breaking out only to talk with Aoba or Izaya, two very bad influences) that he's officially become the worst possible version of himself. Sadly, he's started completely ignoring his messages, so he won't be getting that call from Rokujo anytime soon. (He also ignores a few freaked-out messages from Namie threatening to expose Mikado's identity to the entire world if he doesn't stop what he's doing.) Masaomi really will have to fight that battle alone, which is fine by me. It would feel a little bit cheap if their friendship woes were mostly resolved because Rokujo had to put Masaomi's big boy pants on for him. All of Mikado's scenes are automatically creepy at this point, but adding Izumii to the mix ups the creep factor thousandfold as he greets the hammer-wielding psycho as "the leader of the Blue Square." (Mikado, no! This isn't you! Turn back!) When Izumii asks Mikado why he isn't scared of him, the whole scene only becomes sadder. Mikado responds by openly admitting that he's scared all the time, so he just acts like he doesn't feel anything anymore. He's purifying The Dollars of people like Izumii because he's terrified of his own creation, and when he decides he can be proud of it again, then and only then will he allow himself to let go and "become normal" again. (That's the last thing he's still truly delusional about.)

It's a stunning level of self-awareness for Mikado, but he's been stunningly self-aware ever since he finally acknowledged his thirst for power, which is what makes his current resolve so terrifying. Mikado knows exactly what he's doing, why he's doing it, and even that it's morally wrong and emotionally unhealthy for him. The problem is that he feels like he has no other choice. This also explains why he and Anri are drawn together so strongly; Anri also feels that she has no choice but to be a parasite to survive. In both cases, their only escape must come from mutual honesty and unconditional love from one another, but at this point, it's going to take an incredible effort to get them both there. Satisfied with Mikado's answer, Izumii warns him that he's in for a real fight, so he leaves him something real to fight with. We don't see it directly, but I'm assuming Mikado's been given a gun, and given Izumii's chitchat with the Awakusu brass later, the intent is probably to get him convicted of murder so they can swoop in and clean up afterwards. Fortunately, Akabayashi has been watching the whole thing go down. Sure, the Blue Demon isn't exactly a force for good most of the time, but I do believe his loyalty to Anri's mother will override his loyalty to the syndicate when push comes to shove, and Anri's love for Mikado has yet to be fully unleashed. If he cares about Anri, Akabayashi will do right by Mikado.

Anri's role in these episodes is fairly minimal, which further convinces me that she'll be one of the biggest catalytic wildcards of the final battle. As things are, she accepts an invitation to meet with Masaomi's girlfriend Saki, who wants to confront her about her feelings for the boys (especially her boyfriend with the wandering eyes). Once she finds out that Anri has romantic feelings for Mikado and not Masaomi, Saki softens her approach and opens up more about her own experiences with love. She used to be just like Anri, believing that she had no right to love or be loved, no thanks to Izaya's cruel influence. She chose to date Masaomi on Izaya's orders, and was only able to break away from him when she experienced true love in Masaomi's company for the first time and started dating him for real. Anri has to believe that she is not only worthy of love, but has the power to give love and strength to others divorced from Saika's influence. Her conversations with Haruna and Kujiragi showed Anri who she didn't want to be, and now this conversation with Saki has shown her a more hopeful possibility for who she could become instead.

Last but certainly not least, Izaya contemplates all of these twists and turns around him, reveling in the victory he's already sure he's got coming to him. (He's also added tarot cards to his hodgepodge Ikebukuro board-game.) Mikage and Kine are the only two remaining friends in his arsenal, now that everyone else has been claimed by different factions in the fight, and even they seem to be reaching the end of their patience with his condescending lack of empathy. Izaya has decided to pour all his efforts to plunge Ikebukuro into chaos on Mikado, since "Mikado has self-destructed in a far more spectacular fashion than I'd have ever imagined." (What a douche.) Now that he's finally sure which pieces he needs and which ones he doesn't, Izaya decides to try and remove all the non-humans from the picture: Anri Sonohara, Kasane Kujiragi, Celty Sturlson, and most of all, Shizuo Heiwajima. Izaya fears that Shizuo has the most potential power to defuse the situation as a superpowered and highly respected former Dollar, so now all he has to do is let Mikado destroy himself and focus his own efforts on destroying Shizuo...

I cannot even begin to express how excited I am for this final season's final half. I came into this third arc with a sense of resignation from too many anticlimaxes, but I've always loved these characters and this world, and I feel like I'm seeing their full potential realized at long last. The show's production work has also markedly improved, with better animation, better pacing, and a greater clarity and depth to every new scene. The ultimate arc of Durarara!! is finally rewarding us for following and caring about all these different stories, and I couldn't be happier about it.

Rating: A

Durarara!! ×2 The Third Arc is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Jake has been an anime fan since childhood, and likes to chat about cartoons, pop culture, and visual novel dev on Twitter.