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Director: Tetsuya Yanagisawa
Screenplay: Takao Yoshioka
Based on light novels by Ichiei
Ishibumi
Voice Actors: Yōko Hikasa (as Rias
Gremory); Yuuki Kaji (as Issei Hyōdō); Ayana Taketatsu (as Koneko Tōjō); Azumi
Asakura (as Asia Argento); Shizuka Itou (as Akeno Himejima); Kenji Nojima (as Yūto Kiba)
Viewed in Japanese with English
subtitles
Update 26th March 2016: Originally this was a link to the review
for Videotape Swapshop but unfortunately as of the start of 2016 the site no
longer exists. This only effects this blog in that the following now, when you
click this modified post, is the full review left as it was originally. Additional
footnotes have been added with new reflections.
High School DxD if it was a live action exploitation film from the
seventies would be one about demonic schoolgirls that would be promoted as
being too illicit for the faint of heart. The only difference is that they
would've been played by actors in their thirties than drawn characters. That
the series was banned in New Zealand does add an infamy, but it was also passed
uncut and suitable for fifteen year olds to buy at a counter on DVD in the
United Kingdom too1. For all the nudity, the lurid commercial break
stills of female characters contorting in various states of undress and sleaze
its managed only a fifteen certificate, which shows a surprising moment of
progressiveness from the British censors. No lynch mobs have appeared, though I
dread the mother or father who stumbles in on their fifteen year old watching
this, as it makes some of the sleazier Italian movies of the seventies, with
higher age ratings, look tame in comparison. High School DxD rightly is available to buy as it was intended to
be, whether it's good for you or offensive, though when one of the bonus
mini-episodes has undo noodles come to life and molest the female cast like
tentacles, I have to wonder what the hell was in the water cooler at the BBFC
when it was decided "nah, an eighteen certificate would be too
harsh."
As in many an anime, the lead is
a hapless male school student called Issei Hyodo. Somehow anime can make it
sound logical, even just to itself, that he can be affable and ultimately a
wonderfully kind hearted person but also a pervert who hides with his friends
in the women's changing room all the time. His luck seemingly changes when a
shy girl asks him to be her boyfriend...then reveals she's an evil fallen angel
after him because he is blessed, like many an anime protagonist, with a special
ability called a Sacred Gear and kills him. What could be the shorted show
possible is lengthened drastically when a female demoness and fellow school
student of his, the red haired and young head of the demon family called Rias
Gremory, resurrects him as a demon to be taken under her leathery wings as a
beloved underling. With him as he learns the ropes are her vice president Akeno
Himejima, a sadistic thunder maiden who share's Rias' ridiculous Russ Meyer inspired character
proportions2; Koneko Toujou, a diminutive female tank who will
gladly knock his head off for being a pervert; and Yuto Kiba, the only other
male of Riass group who together gain pacts with humans and convene together.
Later on in the first main story of the series a female European named Asia
Argento is introduced who can heal people and is a very shy, affable girl. Yes,
she's named after Dario Argento's youngest
daughter and star of Land of the Dead
(2005), though I can't say if it's a reference or a freak coincidence.
The series is split into two
halves - the first with Argento and the evil fallen angels who plan to
manipulate her, the second half with the head of another demon family who wants
to take Rias as his wife forcibly. The real point of the series is for its
titillation, more of a sex comedy which lunges into drama and fantasy action
very abruptly at points. Sacrificing a great story potential doesn't help. It's
not original but you can make something from it as with any plot. However the
incongruous mix of the comedy and fantasy doesn't work when it should've stayed
only as a fantasy comedy. Neither does it help that it splashes in mythological
ideas it has no real interest in taking further unless it's a joke, like the
fact demons can't read Bibles without getting a horrible headache, the rest
underserved of its potential in favour of arousing the viewers. You have
demons, fallen angels, wars between them and the normal angels, familiars,
pacts with human and a various stew of ideas that never get any lip service.
There are two more series from this, but here little is used in twelve
episodes. It really becomes a pain when the series especially pulls out a
really esoteric reference once in a while that raises eyebrows - it's a slight
spoiler for the ending, but Issei's Sacred Gear, which is the conventional
anime trope of something which gives someone unlimited power and turns his hand
into a red dragon claw, turns out to be Y Ddraig Goch, the red dragon of Welsh
mythology on their nation's flag, a reference that just abruptly appears in the
final episode and comes out of nowhere in context of everything else. It does
get pushed later into something else as the franchise by Ichiei Ishibumi grew out from his light novels, but the anime
series never runs with this or many of the ideas it comes up with.
As for the titillation, there is
a lot of it and a LOT of animated nudity, going further than other shows which
merely tease the viewer to the point of desensitisation. Shredded clothes. Lots
of low camera angles. Cotton eating slime in a scene that references Pokemon. Cat girls welding chainsaws.
Shrine maidens and various fetishised costumes. Suggestive groans. Jiggle
physics a videogame would be proud of. Lots of shower scenes to the point there
is one in Rias' office she or anyone else can step into whenever they like. The
only fan service in terms of men is Yuto Kiba being a handsome guy and a butch
comedy character who dresses as a magical girl. If this was a year or so ago
I'd be ashamed for liking some of the stuff in High School DxD. Now I feel kink is a good thing for anyone and my
problems with this series in this area is a lot more complicated. To sound
crass, a few of the surface issues, especially why it was banned in New
Zealand, would've been resolved if this series was set at a university,
especially as this is an exaggerated version of a school setting where, barring
the uniforms, many of the characters are drawn like they are in their early
twenties. In the best of worlds, this would just encourage fifteen year old
Brits, if they saw it, to develop a thing for red heads and Goths.3
The real problems in terms of the
portrayal of this content - barring the few tinges of lolicon, unintentional or
not, that are just creepy regardless of context for me - is with the tone and
oversaturation of it. Immediately it has to be pointed out, like many of these
anime shows, there's no actual sex between characters. Barring in mind cultural
differences with Japan, Issei for all his thoughts about sex turns into a deer
in the headlights when someone actually propositions to him, and there is a
convoluted if very dubious concept as with other modern sex comedy anime that
virginity is prided upon yet still allows the viewer to perv up the young women,
a concept as problematic in the West but sticks to some of this animation the
worst. Even when you accept the cultural differences, there's something already
wrong with a show so willing to throw carefully drawn naked breasts at your
face and be tawdry about it, yet finds the idea that one of its ridiculously
dressed and proportioned female characters might be serious in her sexual
desires or might want to kiss Issei tasteless, the later only happen in the
last episode.
Also there's an uncomfortable
amount of humiliation and aggressiveness. It doesn't feel like something from
BDSM or roleplay where everyone is playing out a fantasy, or transgression for
the point of shocking the viewer with intention, but bad tonal shifts,
inappropriate moments of titillation and, speaking of transgression, a lopsided
version of it based on a gender bias. When the first episode has Argento
molested in a sexualised way at the same time as a serious scene is taking place
around the moment, it's scuzzy as one sees in many exploitation films and is so
badly put together it's more of a bad taste in the mouth. Even as someone who
admits having the Hanzo the Razor trilogy (1972-4) and the UK cut of Legend of the Overfiend (1989) in his
DVD collection, I've never been comfortable with this type of material even as
I defend the idea of transgression in art,
especially with the bugbear of poor plotting and mishandling of female
characters. 4
Ironically it's the female
characters who are the interesting thing about the series in terms of redeeming
value. It's what sells the DVDs in the first place. It's what someone, if they
aren't put off by the series, might want to cosplay as. It's them behind most
of the stuff that I found funny and entertaining in the show. But you are stuck
with characters that feel like they were written by twelve year olds afraid of
girls in their class for male otaku who are afraid of women. This ultimately is
what drags the series down when most of the sex humour eventually revolves
around this secretly and the drama isn't to par to save everything. The
titillation immediately from the first episode, while some joy in the
perversity is to be found, falters when you realise this, the need for a grown
up or a woman to be involved writing a lewd sex comedy desperately needed.
Thankfully it could've been
worse. It could've been about a naive childlike girl who'd decapitate herself
trying to use a toothbrush in her uselessness that promotes a
incestuous-paedophilic ideal that the concept of "moe" dangerously
veers to5. It's probably more
progressive and more watchable if your female lead is a confident head of a
family who welds great power in her hands and is so relaxed with her body that
she will sleep next to the male protagonist naked in his bed without any shame.
But when the writing even for a comedic character writes her merely as a fetish
object rather than an erotised archetype who has their dimensions and
personality detailed, any hope for that progression or better entertainment
than you get dies flat on its face. Eventually the story leads to Rias, a
collected and powerful demon, being saved like a damsel in distress by the same
guy who learns the secret technique of causing women's clothes to explode and
for them to presumably die in shame. Thus the series enforces how stone dead
its potential might've been that wasn't stained by some of the dubious ideals
it holds, still able to have offended the Kiwis but might've actually been
something one would've found sexy, funny, imaginative and actually good. High
School DxD could've been much worse but there's so much still wrong with it
as well.
--------
1 The curious leniency
the British film classifiers have on anime like this, only giving 18
certificates to very extreme depictions of violence, sex or sexual violence, is
surprising even for a liberal guy like myself. The fact that this has lead to
some questionable decisions, like rating a single episode of Mawaru Penguindrum (2011) 18 rated,
while the rest is acceptable for twelve year olds, because of restrained
references to child abuse and bondage, especially in contrast to High School DxD's lurid depictions,
makes it even stranger.
2 There are many
anime and manga that the late Russ Meyer
would've approved of, making one wonder if anyone slipped him any examples
before his passing in 2004...
3 Most of the problem,
barring the portrayals of women in some anime, is entirely to do with anime's
obsession with schoolgirls. This isn't just a problem with Japanese pop
culture, as the famous Britney Spears' video
Hit Me Baby One More Time can attest
to, but anime isn't the same as casting late twenty year olds to play people
attending high school. Frankly with some of these character designs, the
proportions are so over the top it's impossible to imagine them as teenagers,
but it's an area of art that's brought about controversy because of how murky
it is as a subject.
4 The screenwriter was
Takao Yoshioka, whose also done work
for the Ikki Tousen franchise which
is also known for depicting sex with some dubious aspects and, ironically, had
one of its series banned in New Zealand thus pulling the plug on the franchise continuing
there. He also wrote (entry #21) Elfen Lied
(2004), a series I'll defend even for some of the same strange titillation,
but with that case there was such a serious and dark narrative at play that it
negated most of it, the narrative reigning it in. With comedy and work that's
more for the sake of said fan service rather than a rich story - he also wrote
for the infamous Queen's Blade series
- he has very bad tendencies in depicting sexuality despite his good virtues
that will put people off.
5 To salvage this mess
of a sentence, it's better that at least the female characters in this are
meant to be independent and strong willed rather than the innocent waif that
"moe", a popular term in anime, usually promotes that couldn't
survive without a big brother figure to protect her and sub-textually romance
her, especially as one learns of the many pornography H-games on the subject
from Japan. Unfortunately High School
DxD doesn't go beyond merely the taste of this preferable attitude to
female characters in actually giving them strong wills to match the eye popping
proportions, leading to one of the biggest regrets with quite a bit of anime as
a fan - the lack of erotic or sensual anime that one wouldn't be embarrassed
about because of gender politics regardless of how kinky it was.
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