Is Diabolik Lovers the Worst Anime Ever?

Let me start off giving you a very quick answer to the question posed above:

Yes.

At least from my experience thus far.

Light Spoilers. If you care, anyway.

Also: trigger warning to those sensitive to the topic/depiction of sexual assault.

For those of you who don't know what this anime is: good for you. If you still have as bad a sense of morbid curiosity like me, then here's the basic run-down: This chick named Yui is sent by the church (with no apparent explanation being given to her as to why) to live in a mansion with six vampire brothers, and her blood just smells and tastes so good that they all want a taste of it. They try to add more plot to it later, but, really, it's just stupid, and that's about all you need to know.

I ran across this flaming garbage heap a couple of times in the form of some of the "Top 10 Reverse Harem Anime" lists that litter YouTube, though all I really got outside  of those was that this somehow ranked above Ouran High School Host Club in most, so while I had put it on my watch-list for a while, I never got around to it until this video was released by Anime America. A drinking game. After listening to the rules, I became kind of horrified and mystified at the same time, so my curiosity won out very quickly. Now, as I was under 21 (the legal drinking age in my country) at the time, I played with goldfish, but it still had the affect of me not wanting to look at those delightful little snacks for at least another week, and I had wanted to kill myself after just the first four of those fifteen-minute episodes. It was pretty bad.

And what made it so bad? Well, here's a list of things that happened in that short span of time:

• Lead boy, Ayato, assaults lead girl, Yui, within the first five minutes of the anime.
• Nobody seems to think this is wrong or mentions this again.
• This disgusting scene is what established Ayato as lead boy.
• Literally all the boys constantly go on about how much they want to drink Yui's blood, and how abnormally good it tastes.
• None of the boys can stop talking about the smell/look of fear in her eyes, and how much they love it.
• Yui doesn't know how to stand up for herself except by shouting "no," "help," "please stop," and "God" when being assaulted.
• I feel so awful for this girl that I literally can't listen to this with both earbuds in.
• Lead boy Ayato constantly claims Yui like she's an object.
• Yui never even thinks to tell him otherwise.

• At one point early in the anime, Ayato dumps Yui- who can not swim- into a pool for no reason and- while she is still under the water and in the process of drowning- decides to kiss her and drink her blood.
• This is portrayed as being romantic.
• The writers still try to make Ayato, like all the other awful characters, redeemable with a tragic backstory later.
• It doesn't work

• Yui is sexually assaulted twice in one episode by one character, Laito. The first time, he only presses his leg between hers and bites her neck once before she escapes. The second time is in a church, where he unbuttons the top buttons of her shirt, and bites both her neck and the inside of her thigh. The anime cuts to the end credits, and I'm pretty sure a lot more disgusting stuff happens afterwards.
• The only thing Yui upset about in the next episode is that Laito told her the obvious fact that the church sent her as a sacrifice. Like that hadn't already been obvious by that point.
• The writers still try to make Laito, like all the other awful characters, redeemable with a tragic backstory later.
• It doesn't work

And, you know, I probably wouldn't mind the fact that Yui is being insulted, slut-shamed, body-shamed, put down, man-handled and physically assaulted if not for the fact that the anime is obviously trying to portray the boys as being broken and in need of being fixed, like that solves all of their character issues and makes any of this romantic. Because it doesn't. I always like to say that a person's past only makes up a part of who they are; the fact that someone had a bad past or childhood does not excuse them from being an awful person in the present. And the fact that Yui actually shows any semblance of affection for these boys when they've done nothing but be terrible people to her makes me absolutely pissed. In fact, Yui in general makes me pissed, so let's talk about her real quick.

Yui is a completely weak and spine-less lead role, and is completely void of any personality whatsoever. I suppose it's so other girls watching this can put themselves in her shoes, but, and consider this for a moment: WHO THE HELL WOULD WANT TO BE IN HER SHOES??? It makes no sense at all because Yui makes a show of being miserable and not liking it when she's being touched by the guys, so I'm really not sure why she's a character you're supposed to want to insert yourself into.

Also, while she obviously doesn't like being abused the way she is in the show- as shown by her constant shouting of "stop" and her minuscule amount of struggling- she never really tries to get out of her situation. She never tries to fight by flailing her limbs, biting, or kicking the boys between the legs when she has the clear opportunity to do so. She just takes everything that's thrown at her and kind of accepts it without much complaint, which just annoys me because she obviously isn't happy with the situation AND SHE JUST MAKES NO DAMN SENSE.

And, really this has no no place as being an actual complaint, but I legitimately cringe any time one of the guys bites her because it sounds like they're biting into an apple, and she sucking noises that follow are just so gross and I- I just- I just can't even. Just everything about this show grosses me out and makes me feel so incredibly unclean.

Plus, they dragged poor Monica Rial into this train wreak. I really liked her, too. :(

The worst part, though: it somehow worked. Women actually like this crap. I'm not even kidding you. I can't count the number of times I would scroll down into the comments section while re-watching this abomination looking for some comfort, only to find girls saying things along the lines of "Kanato is so cute," or "we need more anime like this." Because, no, Kanato is as freaking psychopathic as all the other brothers, and no, we certainly do not need more anime like this. I'm distrubed by the sheer amount of people that think this, and I mean, yes, I do find even more people on my side of things, but that doesn't change the fact that there are some girls out there that find this anime romantic, and that... that's a little scary, actually.

I can't say that I don't see whypeople like it, though, to some degree, anyway. It's a shame, really, because Diabolik Lovers has quite a few things that even helped it: the art is beautiful (I absolutely adore the colors), the soundtrack is great, and the character designs are pretty decent (well, some of them, anyway- I hate it when the animators make so that you can see a character's eye through their hair like with Subaru, and pretty much all the designs in the second season are total garbage, honestly).

Ah, yes, there it is- I watched season two. I can already hear the comments: "Why the hell did you watch the entire thing if you hate it that much?" You're probably asking right now. And, yes, you have a very valid point. I do normally stop watching a show if I realize I'm not going to like it early in, and in this case, I would have stopped in the first five minutes at the earliest or the end of the second episode at the latest. But, here's the thing: Diabolik Lovers is like Amnesia in that while I can tell this thing is a train wreck, I am also mesmerized by the absolute absurdity of it and feel the overwhelming desire to see just how much worse it can possibly get.

Also, because the characters were already awful, and the later addition of plot only served to make things even more pointlessly stupid and confusing, it just made me so mad. And, as I said in my Harry Potter post, I'm not a confrontational person by nature irl, so there are only two ways that I am really able to release my anger: 1) road-raging, and 2) yelling at fictional characters and stupid shows that personally insult me on a philosophical level. That's what Diabolik Lovers did to me, and so while I get extremely angry and frustrated while watching this thing, I feel like I can't stop. I want to see how much worse it can get, and I do want to release some of that pent-up anger by shaking my fists and muttering obscenities at the computer screen. It just makes me feel so much better when I finish a season and move on to something else. It's almost kind of therapeutic, actually.

It's still extremely awful, though, and probably one of the worst things I've ever seen. I just love hating it too much, I guess.

Td;dr: Diabolik Lovers is complete and total garbage, but it's the kind of garbage that you can't stop watching because it's on fire and you just want to see what else it'll catch.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go swan dive off a cliff. Y'all have a good day.