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What starts off as an interesting but dark story devolves into a convoluted mess of contradictory preaching.

The author tries to make some sort of nuanced statement about the relationships between men and women and the natural power struggle they're locked in, but ends up implying some absolutely horrifying hot takes such as:

Women may say they hate rape, but in reality they love it!
Trying to abort another woman's baby isn't a bad thing, because a MAN made you do it.
Women have no agency
The only way to overcome rape is to find another man. Good dick cancels out bad dick; it's math!
Emotions dictate everything, and that's a ... good thing!
Men are always hurting women
A woman's lot in life is to be hurt, used and dirtied by men. Lay back and think of England.
The most horrible punishment that can be inflicted on a man is not death, but fatherhood.
Love means letting your husband beat you and sleep around
Society is 100% totally OK with every single behaviour stated above

If the story had just focused on the Teacher character and her struggle with rape/blackmail it would have been a better story, but the author shoves in a shitty romance between her and a student and focuses on some of the worst characters ever put to paper. Every single person in this manga is either a hollow slave to emotion or an irredeemable piece of trash. Since this author decided to take a massive dump all over humanity she made all the women sorry sacks of crying and estrogen and all the men vile tyrants with a constant erection.

On a technical level, the story is awful. It's slow, characters trudge along from one bad scenario to another with no real pacing or motivation, character's actions are not dictated by their previous actions and everything is always rape. All the time. Rape. Everywhere.

Near the end the story devolves into characters giving speeches outlining the author's warped worldview. The bad characters get away like nothing happened (because feelings), and everyone's life is ruined but no one learned anything (other than sensei who learns to stop worrying and love the dick)

The art is competent, at least. Shame it couldn't service a better story.

In conclusion: Over all this was a trainwreck of shallow characters raping/getting raped because nature says men shall rape all women with some nice art and some of the worst writing since Bobo the chimp got his hands on a typewriter. It also manages to set women back 5,000 years. That's an accomplishment, right?

What do you get when you cross the X-men with anime? You get Darker than Black, an interesting little story about super powered humans and their never ending war against humans. Is it any good? Let's find out.

Story: Super powered humans known as 'contractors' are wreaking havoc and have been for quite some time in Tokyo. Each of these "contractors" have a unique super power that they use for their own personal gain. These contractors are presented in an interesting manner and the story behind them is the Anime's main story. Talking about it without spoiling anything is near impossible, but I will say ... it is an intriguing tale that unfolds rather nicely and at a brisk pace. 10/10

Art: Stiff and limited animation combined with some "been there, done that" art give the series a bland look. The characters themselves are well drawn/designed but not much can be said about their bland city scapes. The fight scenes look nice, though. 6/10

Sound: Some electric guitar riffs and the ocassional classical score set the mood here. The voice acting is very good, but the actors don't have much to work with, since the lines are delivered in a deliberately stoic way. The english dub is by far one of the best dubs I've heard along with one of the catchiest theme songs (Howling by Abignon Boys School). The one used after the season's half way mark (A song by Ane Cafe) is pretty catchy, but the first one personified the series better. 9/10

Character: Some well designed albeit stoic characters drive the story forward. The characters here are very interesting, well developed and entertaining. Each of the contractor's special powers helps to personify them very well as well as the "payment" they have to make after using their powers. 10/10

Overall: 8.8/10

PERSONAL REVIEW:
Here's where I write my shamelessly biased opinion:
This anime is great. I mean GREAT. It is one of the best animes I have seen. A friend of mine recommended it to me and my expectations going into it were lower than low. I watched it with a scowl on my face but I was quickly won over by this show. The characters were what really got me. They are deep, interesting and very entertaining. The main character (Hei) is a very intriguing person which is developed quite nicely throughout the series.
The story is also great. It's mysterious and well paced. Most Animes pace their stories very very slowly, but Darker than Black manages to keep things moving without much filler. It's not a funny show in the least, but midway through we're introduced to a detective and his obnoxious little wench assistant. The detective serves as good comic relief since his story is interesting and he's a good character, but the little pink haired she-troll is cringe inducing.

My verdict: Watch this. Seriously WATCH THIS SHOW. But DON'T watch its second season. It's horrible.
Personal score: 10/10