Demon Slayer is an anime based on the manga series and is comprised of 26 episodes. It is set in the Taisho era of Japan. It is an unique setting since it shows a time in Japan’s past where swordsmen are still a common sight. However, you’ll get a surprise later on. It follows Kamada Tanjiro who is living a happy normal life with his family consisting of his mother and several siblings. They live atop of a mountain with Tanjiro regularly heading down to the village to buy and sell items. On one fateful day, he returns to find his family massacred.
His sister, Nezuko, who seemed mortally wounded, was still clinging onto life and so Tanjiro races down to the village in an effort to get her to a doctor. Along the way, his sister seemingly transforms into a demon and that is when he realizes that was what had slaughtered his family. Tanjiro later encounters a demon slayer who informs him of the Demon Slayer Corps. It is an organization comprised of people who works in the shadows to protect the people by slaying the demons. The demon slayer, seeing potential, recommends Tanjiro to a master to help train him up, which will also help Tanjiro find a cure for his sister.
The demons have a few traits that make them stand out (which also has a few parallels to western vampires). First, they cannot stand sunlight, withering to ashes as soon as the rays hit them. Second, they consume human, more so for their blood rather than flesh. For each human they consume, they get stronger. The more powerful demons gain additional abilities and change forms, looking more like monsters and losing any trace that they were once humans. Finally, the only way to kill a demon is to decapitate them using a special sword.
Demon Slayer starts off with a strong first episode and then dials it down as it shows Tanjiro’s training. While Tanjiro shows potential, he had to work hard into realizing it and so he is constantly being thrashed in the beginning. The fourth episode is where the pacing starts to pick up again, leading to a climactic battle that served as an excellent ending to the episode. The scenarios only get better from there as Tanjiro learns of the cause of the demons and the one who is ultimately behind it. that person is the only one who would be ablet o tell Tanjiro how to turn Nezuko back to a human. Tanjiro’s quest to find this person takes some interesting turns. You would expect Tanjiro’s quest to be a slow burn yet the developments are quicker than you’d expect as he finds some promising leads.
So not only is Tanjiro is a demon slayer travelling with a demon but Nezuko doesn’t act like a typical demon either. While she isn’t shown to have any extraordinary powers and her healing factor is slow, her behavior is different. She doesn’t speak but is able to understand just fine. This isn’t to mention the bamboo she keeps biting on all the time. Most of the variety of the anime comes in the different types of powers that demons have. A few of them are definitely unique and it shows its creativity in how they apply those powers in battles. Tanjiro relies on a set number of “forms” and the way he triumphs over the demons lacks the same creativity. However, the battles nail the atmosphere. Coupled with the unique aesthetics of the anime, and it is visually striking when the water effects of Tanjiro’s sword skills come into play during his attacks.
The anime has a good mix of humor and emotional moments, managing to balance those two. There are a few annoying characters, especially the one who is afraid of everything. You wonder how he managed to survive thus far (naturally, he has a hidden ability). The other character that’s extremely impatient is also frustrating to watch. However, both of them eventually become more endearing.
Tanjiro is shown to be too kind hearted and naïve at times. He easily forgives even though the enemy may have been cruel and killed countless humans before (sometimes right before his eyes). A significant amount of time is spent on each demon’s backstories, their past lives as humans before they turned, in an attempt to justify their actions. On the flipside, while you do expect the demons to do horrifying things, they still manage to do things even worse than you’d expect. There is a really nice battle towards the end of the anime against one of the strongest demons that Tanjiro has faced thus far. While Tanjiro pulls some moves we haven’t seen before out of nowhere, the fight emphasizes the contrast in colors and the fluidity of Tanjiro’s movement as well as the strong connection between him and Nezuko. All this leads to one of the most visually and emotionally spectacular fights within the anime.
After the climactic battle it spends the rest of the episodes with massive amounts of world building. It expands on the Demon Slayer corps, its inner workings and Tanjiro undergoing further training to power up. We learn about the motivations of several characters and it manages to keep hitting the high emotional notes.
Overall, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba manages to exceed your expectations of a typical action anime. The concept isn’t terribly special but its execution is pretty solid. The iconic battle towards the end of the anime is one of the best in terms of its emotional atmosphere. The ending, while lacking in action, is still engrossing especially since it leads to an arc that you’ll be eagerly anticipating.
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