Holy Shit That Was Bleak, I Love It

[Hazy]

End of Evangelion's Third Impact.


Delicious, tang-flavored Armageddon.

 

[Belaam]

Joining the chorus of The Road.

Adding in that I was a new father when I read it, I have intentionally avoided the movie because either A) it wouldn't do it justice, or if it does B) I have no desire to subject myself to something that bleak in film form.

Don't get me wrong; it was a great book, just not a fun one.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

Spec ops the line.

Spec ops the !@#$ING LINE.

By the end, I was sitting there, emotionally drained, shaking my head going "wow. Just...Wow. I can't believe they had the balls to do all that to me.". It was AWESOME. I have a bit of a "hero complex", especially in games, where I just want to help others. I just want to keep pushing forward to do the right thing, and stop anyone who wants to bring harm to others. And the game threw all that in my face and said "Good intentions aren't worth shit.".

A close second is Puella Magia Madoka Magica. DAMN that was a dark and awesome anime.

 

[Trunkage]

Spec ops the line.

Spec ops the !@#$ING LINE.

+1

A book called the Chain of Dogs by Steven Eriksen. Of all the depressing things he adds into the series, the end of this one was miserable. And awesome.

Arlington Road. The ending was great

Braid surprised me with metaphoric destruction

The recent finale of Hannibal was incredible

 

[Eddie the head]

Sabaton just released a new album and the single form it is called "To Hell And Back." It's about Audie Murphy and his PTSD. The whole album is kind of like that "Hearts Of Iron was about the "Battle of Halbe" in witch German troops where trying to brake through Soviet lines so they could surrender to the Americans.

 

[Sarcasm.]

School Days got pretty fucked up. I think the part I liked most about it is the contrast between the first 5 episodes and the remaining 7.

 

[Relish in Chaos]

Berserk. Pretty much everyone, from hapless villager to the main protagonist, gets tortured, raped, and/or killed throughout the course of the series, and

Spoiler

the equivalent of God in this series is basically the idea of evil itself.

And yet, the Golden Age arc is probably one of the best things in entertainment media I?ve ever read.

Watchmen. Along with The Dark Knight Returns, it?s known for kicking off the ?Dark Age of Comic Books? that dominated the ?90s, but it?s still a psychologically and philosophically deep and engaging story that stands the test of time.

 

[Black Reaper]

Anything by Gen Urobuchi, dude's called Gen the butcher for a reason

Spoiler: just look him up in google image search

Stuff he's done that i've seen/read and can confirm as good and bleak:
Saya no Uta, Madoka, Fate/Zero

Fullmetal Daemon Muramasa
It's about a guy called Kageaki who has a sweet red mecha, but it comes with a curse.
Whenever he kills anyone he hates, he has to kill someone he loves.
I´m sure you can see where this is going.
If you've ever read any of my posts in this site, you may have noticed i really like Muramasa

I think the Drakengard series by Yoko Taro counts

Spoiler: here is a very entertaining interview with Yoko Taro that probably explains this better than i can

Basically, Yoko explores different characterizations of murderers in his games, he finds it weird that games like Dynasty Warriors say thing like "100 enemies defeated!" so normally, you'd be a psycho if you killed 100 people.
That's the characterization he used for Drakengard 1's protagonist, he is a murder-loving mute, and the whole game is really fucked up, there is a mission where you go around killind child soldiers, and one of your party members is a pedophile and so on.

After 9/11, he realized people could also kill by thinking they were right, that's the theme he boarded in Nier, the sequel to one of the asshole troll endings of Drakengard 1
Nier is very bleak, both for the heroes and for the villains, if you complete the game once, you can see what the monsters were saying all along, and the game suddenly gets a lot darker

Note that Drakengard 2 wasn't done by him, and so it's not as fucked-up as the rest of the series

 

[FriendlyFyre]

I like to say that Veronica Mars has both the best and most harrowing premise that I've ever seen on TV. What's more is that she's able to rebound against such debilitating circumstances and constantly stay upbeat. Pretty inspiring, really.

 

[RipRoaringWaterfowl]

I see lots of good choices here. This thread might as well be an answer.

So like some others here, I immediately thought music rather than a film or anime...


Hell of an instrumental album. Not just bleak and beautiful but also somewhat surreal...

 

[Muspelheim]

Let the Right One In; the Novel of which the (proper) film was based.

It is... Terribly bleak and claustrophobic. Boredom and despair sets in as the black winter claws at the window, and the bleak sun between the crackling million program tower blocks serves only to light the way for the bullies that will find you. Maybe now, maybe later.

Then, of course, enters the dead that bleed the living dry. In every way they can. Brrrr...

Thing is, though, even without the supernatural element, it'd be a very bleak portrait. Breaking people, broken people and people breaking others. And it is a marvellous read.

The Misery modpack for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Call of Pripyat.

The Zone will not promise any man that he may live within five minutes. You come to the fate stone. To the right, there are bloodsuckers. To the left, there are well equipped mercenaries. Forward, utterly unknown. You will die, and die, and die. Until you finally break through despite impossible odds and gain at least a microscopically better chance. Provided there was anything worth the fight waiting.

I've never dreaded every single encounter as much as in there. Zonedogs are not dogs, they are the instrument of my torment. And me and my century-old rifle keep coming back for more.

 

[FrozenCones]

Requiem for a Dream and Trainspotting come to mind. The juxtaposition of seeing the hilarity and the tragedy of the drug culture always sends a shiver down my spine.

LIMBO was probably the last game I played that gave me a sense of bleak and hopelessness. As much as I enjoyed the game it always made me feel hollow inside and overcoming obstacles never felt truly rewarding.

 

[Dragonlayer]

All of Telltale's Walking Dead.

This.

Also Special Ops: The Line - "Man, I feel as though that's the closest I could ever come to getting actual shell-shock. That was AWESOME!"

 

[Dragonlayer]

I suppose the Warhammer 40,000 universe as a whole would qualify, but it's so over-the-top that it frequently crosses over into absurdity and self-parody. The novel Space Marine by Ian Watson plays it terrifyingly straight however and demonstrates just how inhumane and dystopian the Imperium really is. Instead of Space Marines being noble and heroic Space Knights, the book portrays them as barely constrained psychopaths with potentially crippling emotional baggage. They are kept in line only through threat of extreme punishment and a twisted portrayal of familial bonds with their "battle-brothers."

It's definitely a "your mileage may vary" read. It's written in a very flowery and poetic manner at times, and the author seems to have a strange preoccupation with scatological references. It's also not considered part of the "official" WH40k fluff anymore. It was written back around the 2nd Edition of the tabletop game and contains many elements that have been retconned out over the years. In spite of that, I'd say it's still worth checking out for those that want a truly "mature" (as in challenging and thought-provoking instead of "PEW PEW FOR TEH EMPRAH") take on the WH40k universe.

If you're in the market for truly "grimdark" 40K novels, I would recommend Fire Caste by Peter "Dragonlayer can't spell this name without cheating" Fehervari: the book is ostensibly about an Imperial Guard Commissar fighting the Tau on some backwater Deathworld, but is so much more and plays out almost like a 40K version of The Heart of Darkness. Anything involving the Iron Warriors in Graham Mcneil's works is also pretty brutal, and his take on the Ultramarines - while far less gritty then what you say about Watson - is firmly grounded in humanity, so no "Generic perfection at everything, because Macragge".

 

[Dragonlayer]

Everything involving Eugene Sledge in The Pacific. Peleliu and Okinawa were some of the most unrelentingly grim ordeals I've had to watch. Day after day of clearing ridge lines on a volcanic coral island, or mass slaughter of civilians in human wave attacks on Okinawa.

It's no wonder the guys who fought there had trouble sleeping at night.

"Ordeal" is dead on. Sure, Band of Brothers has its uncomfortable moments, but nothing like The Pacific - the human shields scene on Okinawa in particular is just.... argh.

 

[PinkiePyro]

book/creepypasta wise basically everything by H.P. Lovecraft or in the lovecraft style....

as for films the movies suckerpunch and the lovely bones both are fucking depressing in the end


ot: this thread is so depressing its making the captcha depressed I got speeding bullet as mine

 

[Irridium]

Song of Saya. Though I wouldn't say I loved it. Fucking christ is that thing dark... good lord.

 

[Arnoxthe1]

I was thinking Breaking bad as well. It has amazed me how my mind has changed about that show. I went from not really getting it, to it being one of my favourite shows. It has definitely grown on me.

It's mostly because the writers are so good at getting and keeping you invested in the characters and, by extension, the story. AMAZING drama.

 

[Little Woodsman]

Couple of different anime-- the movie Who's Left Behind? and the direct-to-video release Voices of a Distant Star.

 

[Bocaj2000]

Most of my tastes in movies and games revolve around the bleak. Where heroes are insignificant and their actions don't change anything.

My although I don't have a favorite, the best example might be the first episode of Cowboy Bebop. They start poor, fuck up the bounty, and end poor. I love this episode for more and better reasons, of course, but the futility of their profession connects with me.

Another interesting one is the manga Basilisk which has chapters titled appropriately from "10 vs. 10" to "1 vs. 1".

The Long Walk was one of my first Stephen King books. It has already been discussed in the thread, so I won't discuss it further.