I wanted to enjoy "Black Bullet," but my gosh it is a mesh. The core of the issue is that it tries to be too many things, some of which conflict with each other, and so it rushes through without satisfying anyone. I haven't seen an anime with such poor pacing and direction since "Guilty Crown," and at least that had better visuals and production values in general, not to mention the story went far enough off the rails that I could marvel at its effort. With "Black Bullet," it is only barely enjoyable as an action show, and more mediocre than not. I don't know if it should be blamed on the director or the writing, although looking at Masayuki Kojima's past directorial efforts, I have to assume it isn't his fault (despite not having seen them at the time of this writing, some of his past work had been critically acclaimed upon their release).Taking place in an alternate dystopian future, mysterious alien beings (described as the Gastrea virus) have infected humans and wiped out most of the race. Humans were able to protect themselves by surrounding a central city core with huge mineral pillars that magically keep the creatures away, but this also means that any humans infected with the virus within the walls are trapped there and continue to terrorize them. Enter the special task force (or rather, several, as each are run as separate mercenaries for hrie as separate businesses competing with each other) to find and eliminate the internal threat: Rentaro and Enju are such a pair, Rentaro being a Promoter (with his own fighting abilities and special gun) and Enju being a Initiator (a cursed child with special abilities well-suited to fight Gastrea). What are "cursed children?" Only appearing as ten-year-old girls, they are born with red eyes and part of the mutated virus inside of them, able to keep it at bay (and even use its powers), but to grow more infected until eventually, they too turn into monsters and must be destroyed. That's a lot of sci-fi plot already, and that's all just in the first episode. The story arc in the first four episodes is what might normally be covered in twelve episodes in another show. I don't mind removing unnecessary filler, but this pacing is ridiculous. And it still feels like filler is present.So what themes are present? We have cool guns by (teenage) agents in suits. We have a mad scientist who turned the main character into a cyborg to save his life and to give him a secret fighting advantage several episodes into the show. We have transforming infected-human-creatures. We have cute ten-year-old girls fighting. The girls have tragic fates waiting for them. The girls have to deal with prejudice from citizens who believe them to be monsters despite their fighting for their safety, and watch verbal and physical abuse from both work partners and people on the street. And the girls all want to be Rentaro's wife, because he seems to be the only nice guy in the city. Did I mention they're ten!? "Black Bullet" clearly takes inspiration from several other, better action shows, and the mixture of tropes does not work at all. Even during the most tragic scenes, it is difficult to care when so little characterization was given prior (we often see characters die in the same episode we meet them). Character logic defies itself, plot holes are everywhere, plot threads are left unfullfilled. The final episode shows a confrontation with the supposed cause of a huge battle (despite our not having seen or hearing about him before in the show), and how the show deals with him completely changes the future of one of the supporting good guys. But of all of this, its the fanservice with the little girls that bothers me the most. Enju should have the relationship of a little-sister to Rentaro, but instead keeps making sexual advances and asking to bear his child. When a second cursed child joins their team, she too asks to become his wife. When Rentaro takes to tutoring a group of cursed children living in sewers outside of town, they too all ask to be his girlfriends. I understand that after constant hate received throughout their lives, to see one man less than twice their age care for them can be difficult to understand how to handle properly. BUT THEY ARE TEN! It just felt too dirty to enjoy the humor that came of it.
If, after all of this ranting, you still have some interest to watch this show, then I'll let you feel a bit better about it: the pacing and characterization gets a little better in the second half. The action, while not particularly well-choreographed, is plentiful. The character designs, while generic and with inconsistent animation, still look good. The music was generally a treat to listen to, both the opening and ending songs were catchy and fit the mood the show was going for. Oh, I forgot to mention the best part of the show: the masked man, Kagetane Hiruko, the poster villan in the anime and with his own Initiator, his own daughter, who seems to have gone mad and wishes to kill everything in sight for fun. His design makes him the Batman's "Joker" of this world, and he simply seems to want to cause chaos and bloodshed. His mask, top hat and red coattails are a great design, and his dialogue is infectiously juicy. Thanks to the mask, there's no lip-sync to worry about, so even in the English dub, the actor (Jay Hickman) had the freedom to say whatever he wanted with any delivery, and does so with a camp and mysterious menace. Sentai Filmworks milked his dub clip in their social media for good reason. This pair steals evvery scene they appear in, and even seem to lift the rest of the cast: the characters are all on guard when he's in the room, and its satisfying to hear Rentaro outright tell this baddie "F-You" to his face (while there are a couple other moments where he unnecessarily swears, he otherwise doesn't use this language often in the dub, giving it more weight against Hiruko). Of cource, the show ruins it when they kill off Hiruko about four episodes in, and the show is weaker without him... until he randomly appears again in the final episodes to help the good guys in their final fight. Who he is never explained in the anime. Oh well, at least it was fun to have him.So there's certainly fun that can be had with "Black Bullet" as a popcorn-action show. All the serious problems I had with it came from the story, and not necessarily the content, but how it was presented and paced. Had the series been twice the length, and a second season exist to continue the story, then this could have been a much more satisfying ride. Shame.