The fourth volume of D. N. Angel starts picking up the pace, but only a little.  After a couple of volumes where not a lot happens, there are some actual plot advances this time around.  Too bad they involve subplots rather than the main story, but at this point I'll take what I can get.

Diasuke Niwa is a young boy who leads a fairly ordinary life.  Until he turns 14 that is.  On that day, a gene that all the males in his family possess becomes active and turns his life inside out.  This gene causes him to transform into a notorious thief, Phantom Dark, whenever he thinks about the girl he loves.   These transformations will continue until Diasuke's love is returned.  The only problem is that the object of his affections, Risa, doesn't like him, she love his alter ego, Phantom Dark.  It's Risa's twin sister, Riku who is infatuated with Diasuke, but he doesn't seem to notice her at all.

A new character enters in the first episode as Diasuke and Dark have set their eyes on a the Eternal Guide.  No one thinks this dirty old statue is valuable, so the police don't even bother to guard it.  Krad knows that Dark wants it though, and sets a trap for the Phantom Thief.   He traps him in a magic crystal, and it's up to Diasuke to save Dark.  He calls on the Eternal Guide for help, and the statue turns into a cute young girl called Mio Hio.  She agrees to help Diasuke if he will take her away.  After saving his alter ego, Mio Hio moves in with Diasuke's family.

Another new person arrives to mess up Diasuke's life in the next episode too.  Towa is a new student at school, and she's fallen for Diasuke in a big way.  She's not afraid to let everyone know it either, much to Diasuke's dismay.

One of the funniest shows in the series is up next as summer break starts.  Risa and her twin sister are going off to their beach house, but their car breaks down in front of Diasuke's house.  Towa is keeping an eye on Diasuke of course, and when the twins are invited in, she comes too.  It's a battle for Diasuke's attention, but he has forgotten that the house is trapped for his training.  Comic mayhem ensues.

This series is starting to pick up a little bit now that it's in its second half.  The two new characters, especially Towa, are good for comic relief, and add some good humorous moments.  The plot is moving at a faster clip also.  After the fairly stagnant first half, Risa and Dark's relation actually develops.  I would have liked some the relationship between Dark and Krad to have been at least discussed a little bit more, instead of only a brief encounter in the first episode.  The main story isn't really going anywhere, but I have hopes that it will soon.  (Of course there are only two volumes left.)

This volume contains the four episodes of the show, and comes in a clear keepcase with a reversible cover.  There is also an insert listing the episodes and extras.

Audio:

As is becoming the standard for anime, this disc offers the choice of a 5.1 dub in English, or the original Japanese audio in stereo.  I alternated languages while watching this and found them to be about equal in quality.  I like the Japanese voices a little bit more, they just seemed to fit the characters better.  I have to admit that I loved Jessica Boone's version of the bubbly Mio Hio.  Her 'valley girl' style was wonderfully comic.  A great job!  The English dub made good use of the soundstage though, with voices and sound effects panning both from left to right and front to back.  There were no audio defects worth noting.

Video:

The full frame image was pretty good over all.  There was a slightly larger than average problem with aliasing, causing fine lines to sometime shimmer and diagonals to have a stair-step effect.  Other than that, it was a fine looking disc, with the colors being reproduced faithfully and the image sharp and clear.

Extras:

This disc has some good extras included on it.  There is a commentary on the an episode with Monica Rial (Towa) and Jessica Boone (Mio Hio).  I'm not a big fan of anime commentary tracks, and this one didn't do a lot for me.  Monica talks about shopping at Ross, and they discuss which pets people at ADV have.  Ooookayyyy.

In addition to the standard clean opening and closing there is D. N. Angel Talk 2 with actor Miyu Irino (Diasuke) and vocalist Shunichi Miyamoto.  This 8½- minute segment has the two young boys talking about their acting history and what shows they've been involved with as well as what their career goals are.  This wasn't anything that I was interested in, but it was nice that they included it.

There is also the D. N. Angel Video Collection, nearly half an hour of the background music set to scenes from the show.

Final Thoughts:

Some of the previous volumes dragged a little, but this the show is starting to pick up with this set of shows.  They managed to add two new characters and show some significant developments between Dark and Risa.  I was disappointed that all of the plot developments concerned more minor subplots though.  The main story, what there is of it, hasn't evolved much since the first volume.  This volume would make a good rental.