Look, I know what you're probably thinking; Why did you watch this? Are you some kinda serial gooner? A High School DxD log, during the month of November no less? Your creditbility is rapidly evaporating, ACritic! Real talk, I did it for a friend. For years now, practically since we met, they have not quit tryna recommend this to me. Naturally, I took one look at it and raised an incredulous eyebrow at them. To which they always replied: "If you look past the boobs, the story is peak!" That always seemed like a poor excuse to try and rope me into what looked like hentai with a thin plot with magic shit. But with some time free and the feeling to redeem a favour, I thought I'd finally give this a whirl, just to see how "peak" the story is if you gaze beyond the breasteses. This one was for you, Riley. And after four seasons, including the specials, unaired episodes and shorts inbetween (to get the full experience of course), what's the verdict? Is it as peak as my friend claims? No. At least not in the traditional sense. What it definitely is though, is some sublime silly entertainment. It ain't deep, but it's not completely smut. It's ridiculous, yet also heartfelt at times. It balances a lot of things on a thin tightrope. To illustrate this point further, allow me to regale to you a typical moment in an action scene featuring one of the main girl characters. One of the girls will rush towards the camera, until her honkers enter the full frame, before we speed pan down to her skirt, under her legs, doing a panty shot, and then out the other side until we face her back. The action across the show is pretty well done, pretty hype. But they never fail to throw one of these sequences in at least once during every fight. It was around this time that I concluded that the show is absolutely taking the piss. It is knowingly self-aware with how it handles its fanservice. It's so ridiculously extra. Oh Issei needs to vent this harmful energy out of his body. How do we do that? Oh, Akeno has to suck his finger every day! Oh, Issei needs to charge up his powers and heal every night? Oh yea, ALL the girls have to sleep with him naked, because skin to skin contact is the most efficent way to heal him! Or Koneko just sits in his lap, because why the fuck not? Nearly every establishing or introductory shot is on one of the girl's chests. They craft these big, worldending threats that are usually solved by our protagonist groping or poking dobonhonkeros ("Nipples aren't the bell of a front door!"), achieving his full power and then yelling at the antagonist about how he'll defeat him in the name of boobies the world over. And then proceed to beat the antagonist. In S2, he literally agrees to a peace treaty to end fighting just so he has time to try and hang hog with Rias. One of Issei's most powerful attacks is just blowing the clothes off of an opponent which knocks them out of the fight because they're embarrased and don't wanna fight anymore. You can't make this shiz up. There's not even any sex in the show, it's a running joke that Issei always gets walked in on by somebody, usually caught in the worst situation imaginable (8 times out of 10, it being with Xenovia or Akeno). Though I do like that they subvert this gag in the final season and tie it into the main relationship conflict. And for how much Issei yearns to be the Harem King, he fucking freaks out every single time one of the girls makes advances towards him. Put simply, this show is horny, but always manages to warp it into something hysterical. It's like it's having its cake and eating it. And trust me, I giggled something fierce throughout this show. It was a hoot and a holler for most of it. Matsuda and Motohama are a standout whenever they're in a scene, Issei typically has an amusing Inner Monologue, and as talked about above, there's just a lot of humourous situations. As well as slick gems in the writing like BDS (Boobs Deficiency Syndrome) or Booblingual (Instead of mindreading, you read your opponent's heart's desire through their chesticles) which I will remember for quite a long time. So the show has humour to spare, but there is an actual story, despite popular belief. It's not just all about the dohoonkabhankoloos. Though the fanservice does play a key role in pivotal moments in the show. As mentioned earlier, whenever Issei needs to charge up his power level, there will need to be some cleavage present. Often resulting in an awkwardly hilarious situation everyone bears witness to. There's actual continuity, events that are important to later goings on. They do commit to character growth and genuine emotinal moments. Everyone is a completely different person at the end of the show than where they began. Albeit it's very simplistic, but you do see the people behind this cared about there being a story to get invested in. And I can't lie, I was invested in the characters. You get your sweet, hearfelt bonding, the growing beyond weaknesses and resolving trauma. And I do find it neat how large the cast is by S4, when we started out with only six characters. We've got a whole entourage of goofy goobers we've accumulated through our silly shenanigans. Nice li'l community. Favourites were probably Akeno and Koneko. They had the more interesting stories going on, and of the main cast, they provided the biggest laughs. Though the worldbuilding takes a more smorgasbord, everything-in-the-kitchen-sink approach. Ya start off basic enough at the beginning; demons, angels, and fallen angels, in a three way war. With random monsters on the fringes. But after that, shit goes off the rails. We get all sorts disaparaging additions. Femboy vampires that can freeze time, Norse AND Greek mythology, with all the gods and monsters associated, horny plants that grow boob fruit, rogue holy men morphing into women's underwear, catgirls, dragons, nine-tailed foxgirls, anything goes in this show. And it kinda works despite being a collection of random things. Maybe it's anime thing I don't fully understand. Animation is some pretty good stuff. Action scenes are especially great, they're fluid, they're exciting, they're silly at times (Every Dressbreak usage), but maintain a general awesome feel. The artstyle does change in S4, the linework is thinner, but the lighting and shading got incredibly refined, so it all balances itself out and still looks noice. And I'll give them this, they sure do know female anatomy, them DxD animators! Music is pretty stellar, especially S1+3's outro themes by StylipS, hot damn did they cook there! I won't lie, there were times where I was sat back in befuddlement at the mad antics onscreen thinking: "What are we doing here, why am I watching this." And believe me, I've taken quite the bollocking over watching this these last few months by certain folk (y'all know who you are). But y'know at the end of the day, when the dust settles (or clears); it's just a silly show with a risque sense of humour. I'll chalk this one up to an acquired taste. If you like silly horny humour with hype action and sporadic sweet emotional moments, then go ahead. If not, hey, maybe skip it. But don't be slagging it off like it's fucking abyss fiction or something ridiculous like that. Reliable ACritic proofed it, he's here to say: it's fine! I'm wavering on a 3.5 rating overall, though I think purely for how much I laughed throughout the whole show, I think it just abouts skirts by with an extra .5 to the score. Wonder if they'll ever make more of this....