Rob Mullarkey reviews the "House of Flying Arrows" documentary, which available on Digital Download now and on DVD from Monday November 14.
"Anybody who spends enough time in this world playing around with numbers can achieve great things."
These are the words of Marcus du Sautoy, the Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science. And he's probably got a point; consider the example of Bill Gates and the decision he made one day to start dabbling in zeroes and ones.
Professor du Sautoy isn't the sort of man you'd expect to encounter in "House of Flying Arrows", a feature documentary following Michael van Gerwen and Gary Anderson in their respective bids to win the 2016 William Hill World Darts Championship. Yet there he was, on the same credits roll as Bobby George and Keith Deller.
Produced by Fulwell 73 - the studio responsible for The Class of 92 - and directed by Daniel Harris and Daniel Mendelle, House of Flying Arrows doesn't rest solely on the shoulders of van Gerwen and Anderson and their quest for glory. We all know how that ends, although from the word go, it's clear Harris and Mendelle expected both men to reach the final.
Instead, its mission is to examine, and to some extent explain, the popularity of a sport that is played against a backdrop of sell-out arenas even though it's not visible to the naked eye of the vast majority inside, and despite the oddity of the main protagonists performing their art with their backs to the crowd.
The creative opening credits are a nod to the fact that people have been throwing darts for centuries; Anne Boleyn presented King Henry VIII with a set, before he developed his association with more dangerous metal objects, and the Pilgrim fathers are said to have had darts on the Mayflower when they set sail for the New World in 1620. Almost 400 years on, darts itself is conquering the globe.
But how, and why?
"Most people have thrown a dart at a dartboard," says Barry Hearn, the chairman of the Professional Darts Corporation. It's even true of The Queen Mother and it's certainly true of van Gerwen, who is happy enough to reveal one or two of his tricks of the trade from the sanctuary of his local practice venue in Holland.
"I don't aim," admits the world number one when talking us through the motions of his throwing arm. In a similar vein Anderson, who confesses to vomiting before games, explains why he chooses not to wear his glasses on the oche, effectively rendering him blind.
Cue Dr Stephan Waldert from the Institute of Neuroscience at UCL to illustrate the physiological qualities that are evident in the make-up of the world's best players. The psychological aspect is left to Phil Taylor and, to a greater extent, a very engaging James Wade, who talks openly about his bipolar disorder, ADHD and the suggestion he is on the autism spectrum.
Inevitably, in pursuit of an explanation for darts being, according to the commentator Dave Lanning, "one of the most spectacular, unlikely success stories of the past 50 years", a segment is devoted to the sport's infamous schism involving the world's top players and the British Darts Organisation's former oligarch Olly Croft.
What seems astonishing now is that this rejection of darts by the BBC - who started to turn its back on darts in the late 1980s (although the demise of ITV's World of Sport in 1985 also didn't help) - began less than a decade after the watershed World Championship final of 1980 between Eric Bristow and Bobby George, with Sid Waddell providing the equally-influential backing track.
Harris and Mendelle give it just about the right treatment without ever threatening to venture into the territory of BBC2's Blood on the Carpet treatment of the split by the World Darts Council (the PDC's forerunner) from the BDO in 1992/93.
But the film does emphasise the point that it still required something extra to transform darts into what it is today - a behemoth of a sport played by multi-millionaires in front of sell-out crowds in vast arenas normally reserved for pop stars, and the second most-watched sport on Sky in the UK behind only football.
And that 'something' duly arrived when Hearn - the mastermind of snooker's transformation into a major TV attraction in the 1980s - made a visit to the Circus Tavern in Purfleet for the World Championship in 1997.
"I can just smell the money," Hearn told the Tournament Director.
Less than five years later, Hearn was in position as the chairman of the PDC and in position to, as Wade puts it, "deliver everything he says he's going to deliver, every time."
One factor that isn’t stressed enough is the direct correlation between prize money and three-dart averages. Hearn says: "They (the players) must have enough money in their pocket to justify giving us what we want, which is world-class sport."
Running parallel to all this is the sizeable acknowledgement of how darts has turned into an 'event' where "the crowd are almost as much of the show as the players themselves", far removed from the cardigan and comb-over brigade eloquently referred to by Waddell's son Dan.
Yet it is Harris and Mendelle's choice of ending that best encapsulates why darts is evolving the way it is. Ten days after Anderson's win over Adrian Lewis in the World Championship final at Alexandra Palace, 400 players from all over the world descended on a leisure centre in Wigan for four days of brutally intense competition called Q School.
With livelihoods on the line, it's darts' equivalent of the Oxford Entry Exam and only 30 will secure what Hearn calls "Willy Wonka's Golden Ticket" - the Tour Card that gives darts players a rite of passage into the PDC's ProTour events and the chance to take on the very best on a regular basis.
And it's that attainability that is one of darts' biggest strengths.
Success is not dependent on talent scouts or being in the right place at the right time. You don't need hundreds of thousands of pounds in sponsorship and backing. Darts is accessible to all and there's a system in place to ensure hard work and talent will not go unrewarded.
House of Flying Arrows will alter many people's perception of darts whereas those who already love the sport will say such a dedication was long overdue.
Follow Rob Mullarkey on Twitter @MullarkeyRob
House of Flying Arrows is now available on digital download and available on Blu-Ray and DVD from 14th November 2016. You can pre order now here.