Two more short stories released to steam now have piratable versions ready to play for free. I'm not sure how much these short stories are worth, since they were made long after the original games as just a cash grab (and thus were never part of the original vision/continuity of the story), but it wouldn't hurt to try them and find out. The same for the upcoming Grisaia spinoff sequel.
Meanwhile, I've finished Durara Ketsu, and thus all of Durara. My rewatch of this vast series can now be checked off the to do list. I can't say much in praise of Durara. The plot points feel forced and confusing, rather than flowing naturally from one to the next. Orihara Izaya should have been killed by Shizuo like he promised when he said 'abeyo,' and then turned off the phone. Any ending short of Izaya or Shizuo's death in that circumstance is totally unnatural and contrived. Ryuugamine Mikado started changing his mind about what he wanted so quickly it was like he had gone totally insane, no rational person changes his ways that quickly that often. Celty deciding to leave town and then changing her mind just because Shinra flew into the air makes no sense either.
Everyone in this show is either crazy or acts crazy despite supposedly being sane. Seiji is crazy. The girl who loves him, Mika, is crazy. The Slasher is crazy. Takashi, the guy she loves, has no discernible reason behind any of his actions so he may as well be crazy too. Aoba acts crazy, and his brother Izumii seems straight-out crazy. Izaya's two younger sisters are clearly crazy. Hollywood is crazy. So is the stalker hunting her. At a certain point, when every single character and every single plot point can be described as 'well the guy/girl was crazy so that's why x happened.' You just shut down. As a viewer, it's just a bunch of nonsense piled on top of each other like a garbage pile. It's no longer a structure representing anything. The only reason Durara is ranked is because it's paired with Baccano, a much better story. It's possible to watch all of Durara twice, I did it after all, but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone else.
I finished God Emperor of Dune, which was a good book, though confusing, and started up on Heretics of Dune, which is just bad. It has no relation to any of the previous books. In fact, so much has changed between Heretics and God-Emperor that it may as well have been set in a completely different franchise. There are no characters from the first four books in book five. It's just like, 'hey, meet some new guys in this new world 10,000 years after everything else that's happened.' Why should I care about them? They have nothing to do with Paul or Alia, Ghanima or Leto II. Why are they bothering me with their pointless random lives? I never fell in love with them, so why would I care whatever the hell they're doing or up to?
Oh well, I still have to finish the series, just for completion's sake. Just Heretics and Chapter House left to go.
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