Review: Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou (いちばんうしろの大魔王)

The main title male protagonist, aptly called The Demon King.

Today’s review will be a short one for a 2010 anime titled Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou. It has a main protagonist (pictured above) that could have become the best character in the series, but haven’t managed to. Because of that, this anime failed to reach its utmost potential, therefore keeping the current ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ incumbent Katanagatari unchallenged for now. Read on to see why this is happening.

Just one of the deeds that the Demon King has done.

Story:-
In a modern world where technology co-exists with magic (and ninjas), our main title male protagonist transferred into a prestigious magical school to start a new life as a high-school student. His dreams to become a High Priest was shattered in the first day at school when he was told that he is destined to become a Demon King instead, who will destroy the world in the future. Because of that, he has to spend his days at school building up his evil organization and develop his powers so that he can do exactly what he is destined to do.

The single main weakness of this anime is; at 12 episodes, it is too short. That’s it, this anime is too short for its own good. The whole anime runs like this:-

Main protagonist arrived at school and was told that he is the Demon King.
Starting to build up the harem with a blue-haired girl, a red-haired girl and a green-haired girl.
Find a ‘treasure’, and powered up a little while simultaneously building up the harem a little bit more with a loli blonde and a dark-haired girl. Probably with another green-haired girl too.
Beach episode (which is not even a quarter as good as the flag-bearer HighSchool of the Dead OVA is) with almost all of the harem members.
ENDING ARC!

The main problem in this anime is that the story is very thin, not unlike Infinite Stratos. Well, this anime isn’t as bad as the latter though. The ending arc comes out too soon for my liking, mainly because his character developments is too shallow in time for the start of the ending arc. There should be more plots being put into the space between the beach episode and the final arc, not only to give more meats onto the main storyline but also advance the character development for the main protagonist in a more subtle and believable way.

For God’s sake, in this anime, he become a fully-fledged Demon King and started to destroy the world less than 6 months after he entered the high school. Even the crappiest of shounen titles doesn’t do this kind of thing for the last 20 years or so. At least maybe the main protagonist should become Demon King after a year or two, after having some semblance of control upon his massive latent powers. The fact that the dragon has to unlock that power in the final 5 minutes of the final episodes shows how much badly handled the main protagonist’s character development is.

Speaking about the ending, it is actually quite decent and actually is the best part of this anime. While predictable, it is not laden with clichés. The fact that the ending arc is quite long (4 episodes or so) also helps it greatly. Now if only the preceding episodes has more substance in them, things would have been much better. I don’t see a second season coming out for this series the way it was written though. Considering that I watched the uncensored version, there will be plenty of frontal nudity here, some sexual innuendos and humor too.

The pacing of this anime is quite fast for the reasons mentioned above. The lack of substance in the plot doesn’t help the flow of the storyline either, with the transition to the ending arc from the preceding episodes being a good example of this deficiency. As for character developments, the way this series is written means that character developments in this series is not really good. The main male protagonist doesn’t manage to realize his devilish potential, but certain characters like the blue and red-haired girls has done surprisingly well.

The Demon King with his rape face on, laughing hysterically before commencing more raping sessions.

Character Design:-
This anime employed your standard shounen design templates (big eyes, hair colors that isn’t black, impossible body proportions et. al.) although the bulky build that the main title male protagonist has makes me somewhat nervous (did he always have it?). Considering all the nudity, this probably isn’t a bad thing. A positive aspect for this anime.

Voice Acting:-
Voice acting in this anime is excellent, with the main title male protagonist, the blue-haired girl and the green-haired girls (not a typo) being the best characters in this regard. Make no mistake, most of the other characters has done well too in this regard. Basically, there are no ‘just average’ jobs being done here in this regard. I have not seen (or heard) such an overall great gigs like this one for quite some time. A positive aspect for this anime.

Music:-
Unfortunately,the only good thing this anime has in the music department is the OP theme. The OST and the ED theme are pretty much forgettable.

Animation/Direction:-
The overall animation quality in this anime is good, even in fast-paced scenes. Integration between CGI and tradition 2D animation is seamless. Choreography for action scenes is just average though. The director should have done something about the very thin substance in the plot that affects the pacing and story developments, but apart from that, the director has done well.

Conclusion:-
7 out of 10. A series with an unrealized potential. The next anime I will review here is the long-awaited racing movie Redline, therefore the next review should come sooner than later.

The Demon King also has a time-travel device that he uses a lot to avoid taking responsibility for the women that he has deflowered.