Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou

Dreaming of changing the world for good, Akuto Sai transfers to Constant Magic Academy where he befriends a virtuous ninja clan member, Junko Hattori. On the way to the academy, they vow to make the world a better place together; however, the situation suddenly takes a turn for the worse upon his arrival—it is prophesied that he will become the Demon King!

As word of his destiny spreads, the school begins to fear him, and Junko's trust in him falters. While Akuto is determined to not let his predicted future control his fate, it seems as though everything he says and does only serve to reinforce the fact that he is destined to be the Demon King. Moreover, he is surrounded by a harem of beautiful girls who each have their own plans for him, ranging from bringing him to justice to simply showering him with love. With his newly awakened powers, Akuto must cope with his constantly growing list of misfortunes and fight to prove that his fate is not set in stone.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Sai, Akuto Main

Kondo, Takashi Japanese

Korone Main

Yuuki, Aoi Japanese

Soga, Keena Main

Toyosaki, Aki Japanese

Hattori, Junko Main

Hikasa, Youko Japanese

Etou, Fujiko Main

Itou, Shizuka Japanese

Miwa, Hiroshi Main

Yonaga, Tsubasa Japanese

Peterhausen Supporting

Nakata, Jouji Japanese

Shiraishi, Lily Supporting

Hirohashi, Ryou Japanese

Teruya, Eiko Supporting

Tomatsu, Haruka Japanese

Kamiyama, Kanna Supporting

Mizuhara, Kaoru Japanese

Maruyama, Hajime Producer

Katou, Masazumi Producer

Iwasaki, Atsushi Producer

Watanabe, Hidenobu Producer

Reviews

Dec 19, 2011

jannexe

Recommended

This is why I liked Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou. It had the most "badass" protagonist I have ever seen (Sai Akuto). I loved how the characters, effects and environment were drawn. There was many turning points where I was amazed how the things turned out absolutely other way, what I first thought. :) Tiny little minus in the anime was that there could have been less ecchi scenes, but most of them were saved by they turning to funny or awkward moments. Which were a good things/parts because I got to laugh in those moments. :P If there is second season coming, Im certainly ... gonna watch it. If the anime intrests you even little, I recommend you to watch it!

Reviewer’s Rating: 9

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Jun 18, 2010

Detective

Mixed Feelings

"That's why I decided not to think about anything anymore!"

That's a good one-line summary of this anime taken straight from the last episode. It's safe to say that the enjoyment of this anime is inversely proportional to the amount of plot stuffed into one episode. Simply, the more plot, the less fun. Ichiban is a harem anime. That means it doesn't exist to cater to the brain, and it doesn't. You should be aware that if you're going to watch this anime, then you're watching it for a good laugh, a small smirk, and moments where you can go "Oh Japan!" and laugh at what ... makes it onto millions of TV sets across seas. You will like the fight scenes, and you will never learn the characters names - you will refer to them by hair color.

Story: 5/10
The demon lord, 100 years ago, tried to destroy humanity. The demon lord was killed and peace resumed, and up until our story begins, nothing as terrible has happened since then. Here our protagonist is introduced, Sai Akuto. His goal is be someone of great authority who will lead people to lead righteous lives (the anime alludes to the Pope). He then meets Hattori Junko, or "the Blue one", and she and Sai hit it off and look like they're going to be great friends. Then a tweest. Sai Akuto is designated by the sorting hat, I mean, the Yata-Garasu, as the future demon lord! Oh no! Blue gets mad, challenges Sai to a duel, then tsundere love kicks into effect and then a robot (Green) comes out of nowhere and an invisible girl gets fingered (Red) all in one episode! Actually, the exposition was pretty awesome and I really enjoyed it... But... It is safe to say, that the plot of the anime was almost nil after the first episode. Eventually we have incestuous sibling love, the power rangers, ninja idols, time travel, pseudo-space and all other kinds of crazy stuff coming into the anime. I understand it's anime about magic where 'anything could happen because we are led into a mysterious world whose limits are not ever revealed' but I would like at least some boundaries. When the mysterious man who is awkwardly introduced tried to rape numerous protagonists with giant sea cucumbers, I could safely say that I no longer took the plot seriously. But that's okay. It's a harem.

Art: 8/10
Think Gurren Lagann fight scenes. Then turn it down a little bit and make sure that there is a lot more OVER 9000 and laser beams and is sped up about fourteen times. You now have a good idea about what fight scenes in Ichiban are like. Animation is superb, art is a little different. The art for me was a little too generic. It felt kind of like fluidity and motion were really nice but left more to desire when someone wasn't kicking ass. If you were to compare this to numerous other harem anime, it just doesn't seem to be much different visually. But that's okay. It has cool fight scenes.

Sound: 7/10
Aki Toysaki does a really awesome job as Soga Keena (Red), but if you don't like her then I recommend turning the volume off, she gets a LOT of screen time, and talks a crap load. Aoi Yuuki (who voiced Mina Tepes from Vampire Bund and Noel from Sora no Woto) had a great voice too. She voiced a monotone character, but did a really job making it sound "not as monotone." I really had no affection toward the OP or the ED. But that's okay. They suited a harem anime very well, and maybe you'll like them because music is a developed taste.

Character: 6/10
I don't know whether to give this a 1 for about a million bland characters, or a 10 for Peterhausen the dragon who shoots fiery drills. The main cast is a pallet of fun (rimshot). Everyone is a different hair color and a different "dere" so they're easy to tell apart! That's where the harem anime has the most trouble in my opinion. A harem has set archetypal characters and refuses to create an original endearing woman. I'm not saying that any woman in this anime is poorly written. Each one is written with her character in mind, but never strays from what the textbook says. Red is an airhead, Etou (Purple) is masochist, Blue is tsundere, and Green is emotionless. All of them can be summed up in one word.

Sai Akuto is on the other hand, a very interesting character. The setting continually sets him up to be a bad guy, but somehow he always manages to do the right thing, whether people know he's doing it or not. The typical male protagonist in a harem always tries to avoid temptation, but without a clear motive as to why. For example, for some craaaazy reason one of the beautiful ladies has appeared in front of our protagonist naked.Our protagonist, who very often envisions this event happening, suddenly has an over-powering urge to avoid any sexually conduct with this woman. BUT WHY? She's beautiful, naked, and right freaking in front of you! This creates character inconsistencies, but where our protagonist differs, is that when he refuses the woman (which alas he does), he is still in character. In summary, Sai Akuto is a good guy, and no one can tell him otherwise. I like that. As for the rest of the other characters, they're nothing special. But that's okay. Sai is a really cool character you'll love to see on screen, and to boot he isn't a sissy wimp like a lot of other harem protagonists!

Enjoyment: 7/10
Even with so many things working against this anime, there are so many moments where you'll seriously just laugh. I enjoyed a great portion of this anime. The only problem I really had was with the plot. But that's definitely okay! I remembered that it was a harem anime and anyone who forgets this key factor should try to understand that a little bit of mindless humor is good once in a while.

Overall: 6/10
Ichiban is not a memorable anime. It really has nothing worth remembering (except Peterhausen). It just follows a long line of other harem anime into oblivion. But hey, it's only 12 episodes, and it's a fun little anime. I'd say it's worth recommending, but not worth ask feedback on. The response you'll get will be "Well... It was a harem anime... I liked 'X female'" so on and etc.

But that's okay. Because it IS a harem anime and expecting anything more than that is just plain craziness.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Aug 1, 2013

Utagai-

Not Recommended

Usually, when I start up a harem/ecchi anime, I prepare myself for the onslaught of nonsensical breasts, sporadic panty shots, illogical physics and random facesitting. These are the basics, and anyone who has watched more than one ecchi knows that this is a common theme in all of them.

And of course, naturally, these people don't go too hard on the show because "it comes with the genre," and "you have to look at it as a harem/ecchi."

I disagree.

There is a fundamental problem with ecchi anime that goes overboard. For an anime to be considered a good work, it needs to accomplish things such ... as thematic development and effective symbolism, amongst other things, although there are a few exceptions. There are, for sure, aspects such as art and sound that come into play when judging an anime, but when we consider the big picture, that is, the overall score, art and sound comprise 40% of it, while another 40% goes to story and characters, and 20% to enjoyment. Ecchi comes short when trying to develop the story and characters because of its various sexual moments. When an anime uses up screen-time to show these scenes, it loses time to develop the story and characters. In moderate amounts, you could argue for character development, for example, by demonstrating a certain character to be attractive, which may be an integral part to his/her character, but in most cases, you do not need her to jiggle her breasts ten times within the first five minutes to get that point across. When you constantly do this, you lose out in certain areas, which inevitably makes the anime lose points overall.

That being said, Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou is a stellar example of this phenomenon. The show is, and although I have no hard data to really prove this, half ecchi (and you might as well call some of that "ecchi," hentai). I mean, quite literally, if the show is twelve episodes, and we do the math, that's 4.6 hours. I would go as far as saying that a good 2.3 hours of that time is devoted to some sort of ecchi. When half of your show is ecchi, you will inevitably lose out on the story and character sections. Thus, my ratings for those sections are considerably low. The art and sound are not impacted by this, and that would explain my rather high score for the show's art (I'll explain my sound rating later). Enjoyment is entirely dependent on the individual, and I care quite a bit about story and characters so my score for that is quite low too.

Now for the specifics.
(I MAY HAVE SLIGHT SPOILERS)

STORY
Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou's story is nothing to praise. To provide a light synopsis for use in this review, the protagonist is supposedly a demon king and the show attempts to produce some sort of message about free thought and goodness through some morally gray situations. However, it is clear that the writers did not understand what the color gray looks like, because what I saw was pure black and pure white. The story is plagued by a lot of typical shounen moments and decisions that have had clear "right," answers. I was not for a second challenged with a question that I found to be considerably controversial. Not to mention, the way the story ends so idyllically ends up toppling whatever the writers accomplished, so even giving points for their attempt is difficult.

The story also suffers from a lightweight feeling. For example, a lot of things in the story do not have much of a backstory to provide support. Why is the protagonist a demon lord again? Was there any meaning in his status as one? Or what about his rival? What about him? Where did his powers come from? And what is with the convenient arrival thereof? A lot of unexplained questions lead to a lack of weight and the story loses a lot of points in this regard. What about the mystical magic all-powerful sword? It is given, (along with a little trope-tag of "it'll work when you need it to) yet the weight of this particular weapon weighs more than the entire story.

The inclusion of random characters is also everpresent in Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou, although it is to be expected from a typical harem that tries to squeeze in the entire world's population's C cup and above girls into a one mile radius within one day. However, compared to a show like Clannad, where the girls are actually people and not toys for the main character, Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou prefers to toss all sorts of spices in hoping one of them tastes well to the viewer. The fanservice involving these randomly tossed in characters inundates the viewer. It seemed to me that if there was an explosion, it was ingeniously rigged to blow up in just the perfect manner so as to rip the girls' clothes to shreds but leave their perfect skin and breasts untouched. Can't have bad complexion, now can we?

There are also some aspects of the story that just seem absolutely childish and idiotic. And for a show like this, where it goes as far as showing off some of the characters nipples (and this is why some may consider this almost a hentai), it clearly is not aimed at children. An ancient slumbering dragon is actually a robotic machination that shoots missiles and hacks computers that the God(s) use to interact with reality is a blasphemous concept. A girl who likes to masturbate in front of her brother's still-alive, preserved head and fantasizing about an evil demon lord? Did they originally attempt for a hentai plot but then forget about it? This sort of consistent foolishness would be acceptable if the show was some sort parody but it is not, and it is simply unnecessary and takes away too much attention from the story's attempts at thematic development (of which there is so little I will not even expand).

The story is also plagued with a lot of outrageous ecchi elements and tools that become almost intrusive, and at best, laughable. Our little Meena can go invisible, but somehow she hasn't studied magic enough to apply it to her clothing, so she has to go naked. Junko has a habit of only ripping her torso clean off. And Korone has a cute little tail that you need to pull to turn her off. Make sure to get a firm grip boys!

Overall, combined with generic and overused characters, the story is one of the more unoriginal things I've seen. Especially speaking of the backstory elements.

There is a few merits though that I must give to the story. The attempt is something I consider to be worthy of some points, since I think it is something that isn't found very often in the show's genre. The story is also pretty decent at building up some sort of tension, which is also nice to have. But the merits here are few, and are overwhelmed by the many blemishes.

I give the story a 3.

ART
The art, which also includes animation for me, was actually pretty rock solid. The fighting scenes were well drawn and had great and flashy physics. The scenes also seemed to be running at a great frame rate or had some apt motion blur, or both. A lot of times I could really get into the fight scenes since they looked captivating. They were smooth, cool and sometimes just simply awesome. The characters were for the most part also well drawn (with the exclusion of Hiroshi, who I thought just looked ridiculous). And I'll even go far as saying that those breasts looked great. Really though, the few men there were in this show (as it is a harem) were pretty well drawn and the artists put apt attention to important details and aspects of them, like the protagonist's unique eyes and toned body, or the cocky hair of Bouichirou, the man who challenged the Gods. I would have given it something closer to a 9 if it weren't for some bad inconsistency and coarseness with casual scenes, and the usage of pretty generic and crazy anime hair (although this part is mostly a preference).

I give the art an 8.

SOUND
There's not much to say here since the sound didn't really catch me whatsoever. I was never really captured by moving music in highly emotional parts of the show, or drawn to the screen during a bass filled drum-crazy fight theme, nor was I ever relaxed as I watched characters being casual with a smooth walking theme playing in the background. I do not, for the life of me, actually remember anything slightly noteworthy about the sound. If anything, I remember the OP having awkward and nonsensical lyrics. Overall, nothing amazing here, and since the soundtrack of a show is designed to heighten moments and keep it alive, Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou fails terribly.

I give the sound a 4.

CHARACTER
I have probably already developed on my critique of the characters in my story section, but regardless, there's much to say here.

Now, granted, since Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou is a harem, the character quality would decline, and just because it is a harem does not mean all of a sudden you should give it a 6 (Fair). Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou suffers from what I already described as the harem-character problem, where an interminable stream of characters (usually very attractive and sexualized girls) are shot into the show with little to no justification whatsoever, and this already destroys the score for the show. The characters become lifeless eye candy. You don't remember these characters by their names or by their achievements or by their struggles or their personality, but you remember them by their cup size, hip-waist ratio, and hair color. Oh, and I guess the sexually relevant traits are included too (I like the one who's all shy and doesn't want to have sex but clearly does!!!, etc.).

Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou also has some of the most heavy trope-elements in it, regarding characters, that I've ever seen. Every character in the show is some clear manifestation of some trope. Here are some examples (mind the spoilers, or skip):

Korone: Silent and smart hot girl that doesn't understand the meaning of sexual tact. Also has a conveniently placed off switch in the form of a fuzzy bunny-ball tail.
Junko: Active, tough and independent woman with a soft side for protagonist.
Keena: Onii-chan!!!
Mitsuko: Hot teacher with a deep compassion for her students. You can interpret compassion in whatever way you want. Wink.
Hiroshi: Dependent young brother that fights for his big bro and becomes powerful. For the yaoi fans out there.
(By the way, I read somewhere that when they were auditioning for the characters, they demanded a cup size of C or above from the ladies.)

I don't particularly hate tropes, they will always be present and you could argue that without tropes there would be no such thing as genres. But tropes can become intrusive when used to such great extent and absolutely demolishes the originality factor. Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou's cast is a chaotic blend of all sorts of harem/ecchi-suited tropes that provide no sort of unique or refreshing feel whatsoever.

The characters also are very two dimensional. Fujiko's little back-story for example is an overused vengeance plot and she overcomes this predicament with such ease and expediency that you really wonder if there was even a point of using that episode for that "development," when they could have just thrown more bare chested Junko at us. At least then, I could have used my imagination, and thus my brain, a bit more. Their back-stories are also, just like their character models, tropes.

Well, at least they look hot. Kind of.

I give the characters a 2.

ENJOYMENT
The enjoyment value for this show, for me was pretty low, but is subject to change depending on who is watching it, since I know some people who love ecchi, and others who despise it.

I personally am quite impartial with ecchi, and I am confident that my score for this area is unbiased, or at least, as unbiased as a score for a category named "enjoyment," can be. The enjoyment was low because of the low scores the show receives in all other areas. Simply speaking, I personally do not enjoy bad shows very much.

A lot of the enjoyment points were torn off due to ridiculous and outrageous scenes and unexplained and unanswered questions, all resulting in a slight bit of frustration and definitely a lack of joy. Such as the awkward and unjustified ecchi/almost hentai scenes that usually just made me uncomfortable and not enticed whatsoever. The characters were also too shallow for me to develop real connections and love for any of them, and the sound never heightened my feelings or emotions when watching so as to imprint a positive impression.

Also, the show is given the genre of "comedy," but it wasn't often that I laughed. There was one or two times where I did smile at a well written dialogue, but it wasn't nearly as often as I should have for my enjoyment factor to rise at all. The show also is classified under a handful of other genres that it all smashed into twelve episodes, leaving me unsatisfied and overstuffed.

However, the art did help the enjoyment factor a bit (and as expected, I gave it a very high score). The fight scenes, like I have said before, were well detailed and smooth, and I highly enjoyed watching a good punch in the antagonist's face or a vibrant ball of mana/energy being flung across the battlefield, or a dragon flying through the stratosphere.

OVERALL
4.4 --> 4.

LAST WORDS
Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou is, well, a harem ecchi and you really shouldn't expect any more than just that, and this mentality should be used for essentially every harem/ecchi you run into. You shouldn't run into this show expecting glory, but you shouldn't raise its score just because it chose to give up 40% of the overall score's value.

Seeing my score, I wouldn't recommend this show to anyone unless someone was specifically asking for ecchi, in which case, this cool show shows you a girl masturbating, some fine breasts in their full glory at high resolution and many other unsavory/pleasurable (you decide) things.

As I like to say:

"Only in anime."

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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