Review of Demon King Daimao

There's so much I want to say about this anime... I don't even know where to start. You know, in my personal blog back in the day, I had a post, from 2010, when this anime was just airing. In it, I said the following about it: "I think, that this is a new masterpiece for my collection. I can't see anything wrong with this anime. OP is fantastic, I'm listening to it for the 3rd day straight. Seiyu are perfect, beyond praise. Girl who voiced Korone is absolutely priceless. Art is, once again, great. The authors definitely had their own style. Maybe legs are a bit toothin, but whatever.
Music is not particularly original, but is always to the point.
The story is simple, but never boring. And the characters - oh my god - they are the absolute best! And, imagine this, are not over the top crazy. Especially the protagonist. He's not a mumbler, not a pushover, not a loud showoff or a superhero, he's just a normal, decent guy. It's so refreshing, that it alone is enough to call this a masterpiece!"

And so, now I have re-watched this anime, and want to take this "review" apart to see what changed in almost 10 years, now that I have more experience and, hopefully, better taste in anime. So bear with me.

First things first, "OP is fantastic, I'm listening to it for the 3rd day straight."
Absolute truth. Now I can say that I'm listening to it for the 10th year straight. It's one of the best anime openings I've heard in my life.
When I was a kid, I always watched "Darkwing Duck" before school, and to my neighbors' and parents' dismay, always pushed the volume of that opening to a 100%. I'm not doing this often now that I'm an adult, but when Daimaou's opening started, I just couldn't help it and caught myself doing exaclty that. It's just that good.
The rest of the soundtrack is not particularly memorable, but always creates the atmosphere needed. I also liked that it included the variations of the opening song for action scenes.

Next one. "Seiyu are perfect, beyond praise. Girl who voiced Korone is absolutely priceless."
You can't even imagine, how hard I laughed when I've seen this in a 10 years old post. The thing is, I never really cared about seiyu. I knew the most popular names at the time, like Miyano Mamoru, Romi Park, Rie Kugimiya... you know, the big names. But I rarely, if ever, checked the other ones. It was enough for me that it sounds good, I didn't need to know who voiced who. So, noting a seiyu was a big deal for me back then.
So, with that said, now I know that Korone was voiced by, hands down, my absolute favorite seiyu these days, Aoi Yuuki. This is just destiny. I need to make a statue of this girl and pray at it every morning. So, there's really nothing more to add, seiyu in this anime are indeed perfect.

I thought that I may have oversold it when I said that art is great. And maybe I did, it definitely has it's flaws and it's not, say, Violet Evergarden by any means. But if you give it some leeway for it being a harem anime, then compared to its "colleagues" at the time, like Rosario+Vampire or Princess Resurrection, it looks like a masterpiece. Especially the animation. It doesn't look too static (for example, much as I like it, I could only re-watch Princess Resurrection at x1.5 speed, because of how badly it was animated), not too twitchy, it's just good. The backgrounds are sometimes a little meh, but that was never a big deal for me.
Other than that, the picture is bright, the lines are pleasingly thick, it is pretty detailed. Easily passes the test of time and looks better than many modern anime.
There's also almost no censorship. Yay, nipples!

As for the story and characters. Usually, harem anime follows a simple path of one waifu per episode until they show them all. Daimaou was different in that it showed every single character in the very first episode, and then started to develop them only when the story needed them, and not just because a new waifu must happen.
The episodes are full of content, there's barely any downtime at all. There is no time wasted, the episodes are literally just opening, ending and new content. No flashbacks, no "previously, on Daimaou...", nothing unnecessary. However, because of how packed the episodes are, everything moves a little faster than I would've liked and some moments feel rushed and undeserved. Including the character relationships (especially between Acto and Junko) and the series finale.

Acto, the protagonist, is amazing. He doesn't constantly whine, his nose doesn't bleed every time he sees a woman. He's charismatic, looks badass, acts rationally. One of the best harem protagonists to date.
Korone is the best girl. If anything, just because of her "turn off" button. Dream come true. Plus her hairstyle, voice, striped panties... everything that I love, she's still my favorite character in this anime.
And while we're on the topic of panties. This anime has some of the best variety that I've ever seen. Eto has lace, Junko has fundoshi, Soga has a bear print and they are signed so that she doesn't lose them etc.
And speaking of Soga... she's just precious. Every dialogue with her is worth quoting. It's interesting how she manages to be adorable, but in a non anime cliche way. I really miss characters like her in modern series.
Junko is an unfortunate victim of that content overload. If their conflict with Acto was more developed, it would be just perfect. Their arc had a lot of potential. But instead it felt rushed and therefore phony. Still, love her.
Lily is even worse in this regard. Compared to manga, they may have as well just cut her out altogether. Which is unfortunate, because she is easily one of my favorite characters visually. And not just in this anime, but literally one of the favorite ever. I still use her face on avatars in some places. Just gorgeous.

And finally, to touch the last point of my original "review".
"I think, that this is a new masterpiece for my collection. I can't see anything wrong with this anime."
And you know what? 10 years later, I pretty much stand by it.

The biggest problem this anime has is that it only has 12 episodes. But it's 12 episodes with 24 episodes worth of content. On one hand it's great, because there's never a dull moment, the story keeps moving, the relationships fluctuate... but at the same time, it doesn't let you stop enjoy said relationships, develop characters, world etc. They do it, but very hastily. Which only makes me think "what if they had at least 24 episodes..."
Still, I got immense enjoyment out of this anime now, just as I did the first time.
Yes, it's a harem anime. A harem anime, in which the hero respects the girls around him, doesn't spray fountains of blood of his nose, doesn't constantly try to look under the girls' skirts, doesn't focus on one single "main" girl shoved in your face by the story. And they, in turn, have reasonable motivation to be with him, other than "he's the protagonist".
This is a good story, covered in beautiful art with colorful panties flying around from time to time. "Harem" is not the purpose here. It's just some fanservice that a good author can add tastefully. Which is exactly what happened in Daimaou.

Is it the best anime ever? No, of course not. But one of the best in the genre? Very likely. And if I were to make some sort of a top-50 anime list, there's a good chance Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou would end up in it.

P.S. I also recommend the specials. While nothing outstanding, they are still a fun addition if you enjoyed the main series. The animation took a bit of a hit in quality, but not to the point where it's ugly or anything. Very much worth it if you want some extra fanservice and comedy in your life.