Review (5/5): Hair feels like silk afterwards.  Very pleased.  But, I'll need a second treatment.
I wish I'd taken pictures. As soon as I put this on my hair, I could see the difference between this and other products. I have colored my brown VERY fine, VERY thick split-personality hair (curly under, straight on top) for years ranging from a bright burgundy red to black, to various browns. This last time, I had used a bleaching prep product to add a few vibrant blue streaks. But all I got was black that won't go away.
SMELL
I've tried bleach and non-bleach products. Those smelled terrible. This didn't have much smell in comparison. It definitely didn't smell like the other reviews.
COMPARISON TO OTHER PRODUCTS
The other products I tried destroyed my hair leaving it crunchy and damaged. They also only managed to lighten the color from the crown and left the near black almost exactly as I started. (Beware of the competitor non-bleach product that says it only takes 20 minutes. The box doesn't say you have to rinse it a MINIMUM of 20 minutes. That one also required a recolor, which stabilized the hair. I think my hair would have snapped off had I not recolored it.)
COST EFFECTIVE
My hair is so thick, I had to use 2 boxes of other products just to get coverage. This product went on so easy, my hair sucked it in and softened as it went on. I only used 2/3 of the solutions in this product. I'm impressed that I didn't need it all. (Hairdressers always charged more to color my hair because it's so thick.)
PROCEDURE/OUTCOME
I left it on for probably 40 minutes, used a cap, but didn't heat. The top lightened to my natural light brown color (I forgot what that looked like!) and the black is now a rich brown, not even really a two-tone, which I've had since my experiment. But, it still needs another treatment to get it the rest of the way. My hair has blond overtones now, not brassy at all.
BONUS!
My hair is really, really soft. I would do this as a conditioning treatment! I am ordering a second batch to retreat since what I have left isn't enough. Next time, I will heat my hair slightly to see if it will take it the rest of the way. Anything left over will be used for a future treatment to condition my hair. (I live next to the ocean and the salt and wind has been really hard on my hair so I'm very happy to find something to help.)