Black Lagoon

Black Lagoon
Manga Review

After easily making our list of top-ten coolest animes we'd love to be stranded on a desert island with, the manga for this awesome series makes life worth living after all. It goes much more in-depth, as only a manga can (by not being limited to a 22-minute episode), with all the internal politics only hinted at within the series.

The manga also delves much deeper into the moral and philosophical quandaries that are expressed in the anime series. The manga exudes existentialism, essentially asking the reading to accept that values and morality are things we create in our own minds, and furthermore, objects that we assign value to are essentially meaningless, if viewed outside the context of "normal" society.

All this and more as well as a ton of exciting action as Revy blasts anything that moves (while wearing as little as possible), combined with the political struggle between the Russian, Italian, Columbian and Chinese Mafias, all of whom either want to hire the Black Lagoon team, or see them dead and buried.

And poor Rock is in the middle of it all, trying to sort out the insanity of the situation, while also trying to come to terms with many of the philosophical points made during the course of the manga, as he sorts out his own personal demons and learns more about Revy's dark past.
Black Lagoon
Anime video Review

Rokuro Okajima is a meek, mild-mannered, middle-manager nobody working a dead-end, life-draining, white-collar, meaningless job for a giant, faceless corporation. However; his business trip in South-East Asia turns from pleasure cruise to terror when modern-day pirates board the ship to take the corporate data he is transporting. Grabbed initially as a hostage, he finds that he is expendable (according to his boss), and so, he joins with Dutch, Revy and Benny, who make up the crew of the Black Lagoon, a 'privateer' operation run from a PT Boat that takes on any job offered to them.

This series pleasantly surprised me. It is much, much better than you would expect. None of the characters are exactly what they would seem from the start, and each evolves into something else along the way. Furthermore, the team ends up playing politics with the Russian, Italian, Columbian and Chinese Mafias, all the while trying to stay one step ahead of the authorities and various others that may want them dead.

The director is clearly having fun — each episode starts serenely, like a peaceful sunrise, and then quickly evolves into complete anarchy. The action sequences are astounding; MADHOUSE is doing a top-notch job on this anime series. Even the end titles are a shocker.

And while "Rock" is the central protagonist, it's obvious to any fanboy with a libido that psycho-bitch, gun-crazy Revy is going to be the favorite and the subject of many blogs. Her dark past is meant to be in stark contrast to Rock's mundane existence.

Black Lagoon combines the dark and cynical nature of Fight Club with the non-stop action of a John Woo film. It also manages to be insightful and thought-provoking without being preachy. All the intrigue and philosophy behind the series is communicated by the action and the staccato dialog. It also presses buttons on the viewer, because South Seas Piracy is a very real threat and it is interesting to see these killers to be human as well.

This anime series is rife with cigarette smoking, foul language and significant bloodshed. It is however, startlingly accurate in the portrayal of the life of a soldier of fortune immersed in the criminal underworld of the china seas. Amen. Hallelujah. Peanut Butter.

Reviewed by Brian Cirulnick, July 2007

Below: Scenes from the Black Lagoon anime video.