Pandora Hearts brings the darkness

I'd never heard of Pandora Hearts, but Yen Press was sure excited about this license, and I've been digging it in Yen+.  It starts out interestingly dark and only gets darker from there. 

However, I was a bit hesitant.  I've been burned so many time by series that start out well and then crash and burn by tapering off, often because they're by new authors.  In a spirit of magnanimity, I picked up an earlier one-shot title by this author.  This was actually another strike against the author because I don't like most one volume series.  It's hard to establish characters, create a world, and follow a whole story arc to a satisfying conclusion in one book.

Crimson Spell wasn't earth-shattering, but it was intriguing.  After reading it, I find myself looking forward to a nice, well-crafted, earned unhappy ending to Pandora Hearts, one that will honor its great set-up, world-building, and tragic characters.  That probably sounds a bit morbid, but I've also been burned by works that start out with tragedy and style and darkness and end in whimpery, simpery happy-endings, maybe because the creators can't keep up the darkness realistically.

It's not that I like doom and gloom and sadness, per se.  I just like consistency.  I will suspend my disbelief way further than most people, but if you jar me out of your world of your own volition, sometimes, I get annoyed.  I feel disappointed because the expectations you've built up go unfulfilled.

So, anyway, here's hoping Pandora Hearts stays exquisitely tragic right until the bitterly sweet end.  :)


Any darker anime/manga you liked that didn't fizzle at the end?  Any that drove you crazy by crashing and burning into sentimentality?