User blog comment:B214/Volume 23 discussion blog/@comment-201.215.165.7-20170530154301/@comment-31137559-20170530205110

To be honest, Ex was a mess. While not a mess, but close to it. I'm pretty sure that it's really not worth it to be thought of so hard. It was just an excuse and apology by Ishibumi to the LN readers in a way watching the anime. So he basically retconned Born by using Ex and time travel as an excuse and gave us a chance to see Issei's kids and that he got his harem and provide some insight on some of the characters like Issei, Rias, and Vali in the future. Now some will call Ishibumi clever, but the only thing I like about Ex is Issei's children and Gasper being a badass in the future. The rest I was impartial about or didn't make any sense to me. The light novels are still ongoing and I would rather act as Ex never happened since it has no bearing on that story besides Ishibumi using Ex to foreshadow some events that were revealed in Volume 21 like ExE and the Seven Maou system. It was basically a mess written by Ishibumi to try to make Born(another mess) canon in a way. Maybe he would like to use that to make a Season 4 following Born and he had to explain why Born diverged so he could continue on with the story and stick to the LNs. But that would only work for the LN readers that watch the anime and it wouldn't excuse the half-ass job that did with Born(at least to me, it won't). How about the anime-only watchers? We already have people confused that think Ex is going to be Season 4(I need to find a time machine and kill the guy who started that rumor). By writing Ex, Ishibumi kind of put himself in a corner. If they stick to the source material and continue on with the anime like Born didn't happen, then how will that be explained to the anime-only watchers who don't bother reading the LNs? If they decided to make a movie out of Ex or something like that(not saying that they will), how will that be explained to the anime-only watchers because there are things in Ex that haven't been revealed in the anime?

Sorry for ranting. Just had to get that off my chest. I really don't view Born and Ex as terrible. Well, that's me being generous. But they weren't well-done. If you read through this, thanks for your time. But still, the events in Ex aren't meant to be taken seriously in my opinion since the main story can continue on without it.