Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba

Ah ufotable, the studio that keeps on giving. Before Kimetsu no Yaiba aired, news broke out that we’d get them animating the show. And to my delight, it’s a studio that earned its praise for its high caliber animation and consistently delivering quality content. Being their first 2-cour show (without a split cour break), Kimetsu no Yaiba is a special gift not just for the manga fans but anyone ready to experience a world of demons and dark fantasy. With over 170 chapters and counting, manga artist Koyoharu Gotouge made this series as a dark fantasy-adventure about demons. With 26 episodes, there are some concerns abouthow much content we’d actually get adapted. For statistical references, each episode adapts about 3 chapters. Most of the episodes follows these chapters by the letter and to manga fans, I think this is a special treat. Not too manga series follows this trend and some unfortunately decides to jump off the rail and follow its own path. With that being said, Kimetsu no Yaiba is a series that I recommend and there’s plenty reasons to see why. The experience of watching this show goes beyond the realm of its visual quality. Ufotabe applied their cinematic style to bring the characters and story to life but it’s important to realize what the author wanted to bring from his work. From the start, the show had a vision. It sets up a state of tragedy that deals with life and death. The demons in this show are devices created with the purpose to generate fear, the type of feeling that viewers needs to experience when watching a dark fantasy. Often these days, I find myself feeling bored when watching dark fantasies when it relies too much on relationship developments. Instead, Kimetsu no Yaiba elegantly tells a story that’s straightforward yet meaningful to deliver its premise. We meet main protagonist Tanjiro Kamado, a determined demon slayer who stops at nothing to help find a cure for his sister, Nezuko. The first few episodes establishes their important character relationship as even with Nezuko being a demon, he refuse to kill her. In return, Nezuko uses her own skills to help Tanjiro when he is in trouble fighting demons on his own. Early episodes also shows Tanjiro learning the ropes as a demon slayer. The anime makes it clear about the reality of their world where death is common and can happen in the brink of an eye. If you don’t believe me, just take a look at what happens to Tanjiro’s family. With such a tragic setup, the anime seeks to bring hope for Tanjiro and his journey to make things better for his only remaining family. In remembering the past, Kimetsu no Yaiba is known for showing the importance of family. Known for showing rather than telling, it should be easy to see the close relationship Tanjiro has with his sister, mother, and father. Throughout the show, Tanjiro is also known for his duty to eliminate demons although he doesn’t truly hate all of them. Rather than having a black and white philosophy, he also feels sympathy for some of the demons he faces. However, there is one demon he both fears and despises – the mysterious and powerful Kibutsuji Muzan. As the primary antagonist of the show, he is also the catalyst of tragic events in Tanjiro’s life. Let’s face the reality here: he killed Tanjiro’s family and is responsible in making Nezuko into a demon. How can Tanjiro not hate this demon? As a cold-hearted and manipulative personality, Kibutsuji is one of Tanjiro’s main obstacles to overcome during this dark fantasy adventure. Unfortunately, we don’t get too much inside scoop on Kibutsuji’s character besides what he shows on the surface. The anime limited itself with adapting his story but it’s still shown that he is one, if not the most dangerous antagonist in this show. With the premise of demon slaying, there’s plenty of room for other characters to get their own spotlights. Some of the more prominent names include Zenitsu Agatsuma, Inosuke Hashibira, and Genya Shinazugawa. The author made these characters with conflicting personalities to bring more value to their roles. For instance, Zenitsu is initially portrayed as a coward but over time, he conquers his fears and learns to accept his role as a demon slayer. Inosuke is known for his fierce personality and competitive persona. While the show doesn’t develop his character as much as the others, he brings a unique form of fighting and charisma. And we shouldn’t forget about Genya since he first appeared in the show. Known for its foul mouth and killing desire, one should wonder how much he can really fit the role as a demon slayer. It helps that Kimetsu no Yaiba features a diverse cast of characters who are all unique on their own. On the other hand, the same principle may not apply entirely for the demons. Truth to be told, most of the demons in the show has a rather one sided personality. Most of them are known for their bloodlust and urge to kill. It’s a primary factor that can make the demons more forgettable compared to the human characters. Outside of Kibutsuji, it’s really hard to say any of these demons are actually worth remembering for this adaptation. If in the future when this gets more animated episodes, they could be worth mentioning. Yet, ufotable is well worth mentioning again for their stellar animation and character work. It seems throughout the show, there isn’t one instance where an episode suffered quality. It manages to consistently adapt battle scenes with stylistic and cinematic choreography. Character movements aren’t wasted but instead used to showcase the different fighting styles of the cast. The show also uses a realistic environment of snow and mountains to show the harsh conditions of surviving in the wilderness. The demon designs are made with menacing elements from their aggressive nature to their killing expressions. At the same time, the anime also has room for humor with over the top character emotive performances especially from Zenitsu. Even Tanjiro himself has moments where you can’t easily forget. If there’s something to take away from this show, it’s ufotable and the director’s impressive work. They earned this praise. If you don't believe me, watch episode 19 and see for yourself. And it’s not only that either. Music and the soundtrack used in this show creates a thrilling atmosphere. In early episodes, I could feel the show being able to tell its story by its melancholic soundtrack alone. When you take the fact of the cast being able to make the characters into life, it really sends a strong impression. The OP song “Gurenge” by LISA carries a sensational aura with its visual storytelling while the ED theme “from the edge” contains a feeling of serenity and loneliness. Kimetsu no Yaiba is like a love letter to dark fantasy adventure fans. Based on financial reports, the first week had sold over 11k copies while the manga also enjoys a decent success. It’s not too often to see this type of series succeed but I’m so glad it’s on this road. With ufotable behind the wheels as its studio, this is no pushover when it comes to technical quality. The characters and storytelling are meaningful to its premise while maintain an aura of mystique. We really need more adaptations like Kimetsu no Yaiba.

Welp...I'm late to this party! Time to review the most overrated shonen garbage of the last 5 years! Demon Slayer is an anime that absolutely EVERYONE watched last year. Except for me of course, because I was watching bad hentai to make comedy reviews on the internet! I went in with pretty damn high expectations. As of January 2020, DS is rated one of the best anime of all time on MAL and the #1 anime of all time on Kitsu. I'm dead serious! The kids on Kitsu truly think that this is the GOAT. Galactic Heroes? Ping Pong? Lain? Ashita no Joe? No! Fuckthat shit! Demon Slayer baby! I went in expecting an action series SO epic that it blows your balls off and shoves them up your ass! I expected the love child of Hellsing Ultimate, Fist of the North Star, and Berserk with maybe some Shigurui and Violence Jack thrown in for good measure! The anime with SO much testosterone that Woody Allen could watch it and go into a Norse Berserker rampage, repeatedly bashing his head against a wall just to calm down! What did I get? A very average shonen that looks pretty but is horribly written. At least RebelPanda tried to warn me about this. I just didn't listen. He's now made me a sad panda too! So, what is Demon Slayer about? They certainly don't slay any demons. That's just a shitty translation into English. In Japanese the enemies are called Oni, but they're actually vampires. They're undead, fanged humans with vampire powers that can transform other humans by biting them and are immortal unless exposed to sunlight or decapitated with a holy weapon. They're fucking vampires! I'm going to call them that for the rest of this review. The story starts off as shonen as possible. The main character is named Tanjiro and he's a young coal miner/charcoal merchant from a small, mountain village. At least he's a country bumkin, so he's not in middle school! One day, an old man randomly warns him that vampires exist! Later that night, his family are slaughtered by vampires. The old man wasn't a vampire BTW, that was pure coincidence because this show is horribly written. However, Tanjiro's adorable little sister Nezuko has survived and turned into a vampire! A vampire hunter immediately shows up to kill Nezuko, but Tanjiro fights against him and desperately tries to save her. While all other vampires immediately turn evil, Nezuko is able to avoid killing her brother and retains her goodness because the power of love. The vampire hunter is very impressed by the strong bond between these siblings, so he spares Nezuko and sends Tanjiro off to train under an incredibly generic kung fu master and become a vampire hunter. As you would expect, Pai Mei is a hard bastard and puts Tanjiro through the wringer. He trains for a year and gains superhuman strength, speed, and techniques because this is a shonen. Now it's time for the vampire hunter test! The final exam involves surviving for days against hordes of high-level vampires. The test is so EXTREME and BADASS, that only 2 people have survived it in the last 50 years! The vampire hunter test has killed over 100 potential vampire hunters and thus has actually produced more vampires than hunters. Now that's what I call efficiency! Tanjiro survives of course because he's the main character and that gives him the power of plot armor! Let's stop the plot summary and talk about world building. Something that Demon Slayer forgot to do. I mentioned this in my review of Shiki, but vampires are fucking bullshit! In most vampire fiction, they're immortal and it takes 50 villagers with luck on their side to take down a vampire. The vampires can turn other people into vampires and increase their population exponentially, but somehow there aren't that many vampires and normal people don't believe in them. There's an amazing scene in the Witcher novels in which the comic relief bard talks to a vampire about how they reproduce. The vampire replies, "Of course we can't bite other people and turn them into vampires! Do you comprehend basic math? Let's assume a founding population of just 1,000 vampires that came into existence 500 years ago. Each vampire attacks remote villages and kills only 1 peasant per month. Just 20 percent of those bitten turn into vampires. At the end of the first year, there are just under 2400 vampires assuming a couple fucked up and got killed. At the end of year 5 there are 79,000 vampires. After 500 years, do you really think that vampires would be so rare that you've never seen one?!" The only way for humans to stand a prayer against vampires would be to design a highly effective weapon that's mass produced to the point that everyone has one and can use it. How about a crossbow that shoots blessed silver bolts? In Demon Slayer, the only thing stopping vampires is the guild of vampire hunters, who designed a test so EXTREME that there are 10-15 vampire hunters at any one time and that's being very generous. In order for the vampires to not overrun Japan, Tanjiro must be putting up INSANE kill numbers. We're talking Soviet state executioner Vasily Blokhin numbers. 7,000 vampires a week! His life is eating, shitting, and killing vampires on an assembly line! In season 2, we're going to be introduced to 3 vampire hunters that by themselves have somehow been running Vampire Treblinka in the middle of Tokyo! Jesus, that rant got dark. I apologize for that highly offensive joke, but I just hate this show so much! Next, we're introduced to some annoying side characters that add nothing and piss me off. We do get some cool fight scenes though and Tanjiro carries Nezuko around in a basket as an homage to the 1982 B-movie Basket Case. I just wish it had referenced the Toxic Avenger instead. I'm more of Toxie guy! The art and animation is the only reason this show got a 5 and not a 3 or 4. Demon Slayer followed the My Hero Academia formula to make shonen great again. Rule #1 No filler #2 Fuck character development. Just have non-stop action! #3 SAKUGA!!! MOAR SAKUGA!!!! The music was a huge letdown for me. An action scene for me lives or dies by its music. If you want to have non-stop ass kicking, you better have a pulse pounding, AMAZING OST. Demon Slayer got the composer of Idol Master and 1/10th of the Tekken 5 OST. What's wrong with you Ufotable?! You're based out of Japan! You could have hired Michiru Yamane, the goddess who wrote all the awesome Castlevania music over her 30 year career at Konami! She made a whole career out of orgasmic, badass music about beating the fuck out of vampires! Even I would probably give this series a 7 if Yamane had been given the OST. Instead, I'm left having to deliver the sad report that the climactic battle scene from Season 2 of Netflix Castlevania was better than any single scene in Demon Slayer. Yes, the Netflix Americanime with that obnoxious Indian director who said he comes from the future. That show is better than Demon Slayer! Because Bloody Tears! So in conclusion, if you enjoyed Vampire Slayer...that's cool with me! It just wasn't my cup of tea, but I'm glad other people had fun with it. Those guys on Kitsu sure are overly generous though! If they loved Demon Slayer so much, I can't wait to read the praise they wrote about my favorite anime! (Browses Kitsu) Let's see here...series rank 1,983rd. The top rated review by a longshot simply reads: "u might enjoy this if u re a stupid, horny 12 y/o. LOL!" (channels George Costanza rage) " You know we're living IN A SOCIETY! WE'RE SUPPOSED TO ACT IN A CIVILIZED WAY!" I think this is the last time I ever browse Kitsu.

Only cynical criticism can save us from the gooey sentimentality and naivete, but sometimes rarely a series too precious to deserve this treatment appears, offering nothing but genuine entertainment to a point where its own shortcomings start to seem very insignificant compared to its strongest merits. I may have a soft spot in my heart for this series, but all the things I found to be problematic within the work are still covered here in this review and explained why I think they can be forgiven, because even with all of its problems, this is -in its own way- one of the greatest series seenin the era of modern anime. The story itself is nothing to write home about. Boy experiences a dramatic event which entirely rewrites his life, after which he starts walking this path that is the combination of ongoing rescue arc and revenge tale. I wrote this sentence in about 6 seconds, and I assume the writer did his version in the same time. If you remove the script, what is left is quite an awful idea on paper. Had the show been done by any other studio, it'd have great potential to be unwatchable. But it's made by ufotable. And they remind us of one of the basic philosophies of anime that goes as follows: Anime is exactly as good as its execution. Which, in this case, is something that very accurate matches the definition of "epic". This is one of the rare series where the obscure statement "doing it right" can have universal meaning, because from artistic point of view, there is not much room for different interpretations. A lot can be said about the animation and art, but perhaps the most essential part is how immersive they are. The visual style can be absorbed to such extent that there is no room for multitasking or side-tracking. Every frame is like a painting, and every sequence and scene delivers because they have been polished beyond belief. Due to this, the series deserves 100% of its viewer's attention. This is the type of content that makes it hard to look away from the tv screen, because if you do, you're likely to miss something amazing. Overall, the quality combines things from 3 highest peaks of anime art. From it's color scheme and art design, Yaiba, at its best, can be compared to Katanagatari (which, I personally consider to be the highest peak of raw art in anime, and I don't compare anything to it lightly). From its fluid animation during action scenes, it's not far from the best of the best AKA One Punch Man. And from the small/even subtle details, its level of polish comes close to Mahou Tsukai no Yome. Seeing all of these combined and come to life inside a series that follows the classic shonen formula and maintains its quality for two continuous cours is something I never expected from this industry: it's simply not realistic to await something this outstanding/this beautiful to come, and because of this, the series is not less than a masterpiece from its artistic side - and becomes one of the rare must watch titles from 2019 for this reason alone. Yaiba's music and the use of the music in action scenes is simply stunning. I wouldn't change really anything from this department. OST choices are uncommon, yet efficient and highly fitting. Among the better things from this department is not really even how good the songs sound as standalone pieces, but how well and to what extent they are used in the series. Sound mixing stands out because the job is done in such respectable manner; beats play loudly, adding to the tension and atmosphere, and further serving the immersive effect and making the series captivating. OP and ED are praise-worthy as well. As a person who owns LiSA's entire discography, I cannot be but pleased to hear her twice in almost every episode. They have been setting me in the right mood/mindset and fixing it before/in-between each episode (I marathoned this series in 2 sections instead of watching it weekly). I don't think voice acting really deserves an analysis here because the seiyuu industry is very tight and talent is consistent there, so I will just say that seiyuu choices have been smart. Most of the time the voice goes well together with the character in question, maintaining a certain harmony where the person behind the character does not stand out but, rather, fits in. To sum up the production: Yaiba is among the highest peaks of audiovisual achievements in anime, but it doesn't only have godly production values: it also never falls into doing compromises. Moreover, anime, as a medium, has widely entered the zone of advertisement platform where original works are becoming scarce and ultimately adaptations based on manga are just a side product of the original. But Yaiba itself is an improvement over its sauce, and for this reason it has all the rights to exist and is deserving most of the praise it gets. This is very clearly a work driven by passion and love for the animated medium, and that makes all the difference in the world. Our cast itself doesn't do anything too great at any point. Their charm really lies within what they don't do instead. In every way, the cast is non typical for a series that follows classic shonen format. Tanjirou, our main lead, is a kind soul whose lawful "good guy traits" are not pushed to the realism of annoying moral soldier but limited so that it only happens to a respectable, genuine extent. This dude has some chill in him, but also totally different, down-to-earth type of serious side of him exists and it can best be seen in forms of the strong bonds he has for his own sister and the friends he makes along the run. What makes following his adventure and role as the main lead so pleasant and different from the usual is his inner balance which makes scenes that resolve around him appear rather neutral, keeping the focus in the events and visual art instead of being affected by Tanjirou's personal ideals. In many ways, he seems like a nameless video game main character thru to whom the viewer (player) experiences the series (game). I found this type of character approach to offer incredible entertainment value in Yaiba's case, because the series can be its raw self instead of being a reflection of the so called "heart" that many shonen series are famous for. For readable length, I will not go in depth with the other cast members, but I have found none of them annoying. Zenitsu is kind of a fujoshi bait, a real cowards and a whine even, but the way he acts out/how his personality is delivered made him my 2nd favorite character in the series. Inosuke (the boar head dude) is what Kacchan from Hero Academia should have been. Nezuko (the sister person) is just criminally cute. What I really appreciate about her is how her entire character -with its traits, behavior and personality- is told visually. Let me repeat what I already said: It's all about the execution, and it even makes the characters come alive. To briefly also cover the villains: after the beginning, lots of planning has been put into them. Not all are super memorable, but some still will be bound to be used as an example of good design by me in the future. Outside very few expectations, all of them were still enjoyable to follow in the given moment. Since Yaiba's writing itself is not super stellar, to put it lightly, the next two paragraphs will be covering some of its major problems as promised, and commenting on to what extent they are a problem and how&why they can be forgiven. The first impression is incredibly bad and off putting; The first 5 episodes are hideous, the build up phase literally sucks, the prologue should've been a backstory narration at later point in time, how the story starts rolling onward rises more questions than answers, episodes 6-7 are still subpar. The start is slow and very far from impressive, the story kinda just has to exist for the events to play out, otherwise it's highly meaningless. The main character has a superpower that works as a deus ex machina thru the first cour. The comedic reliefs and strong personalities of the assisting main cast can appear impossible to tolerate for some viewers. There is a long list of reasons to not find this show as enjoyable as I did, but even when acknowledging these issues, I don't think any of them are severe enough to actually make this anime any less than great. The beginning is hard to forgive, but most of the other stuff not. After the start, the author clearly does not even attempt writing a solid main plot for the series, but instead utterly focuses on polishing these fight scenes and his characters, which essentially are the entire point of the series, writing-wise. When the series so heavily centers around them while the main story itself is a secondary factor, it doesn't become hard to actually appreciate the things that are mastered here instead of complaining about things which are besides the point when taking in consideration the bigger picture and the approach of the show. The assisting lead characters are more preference based question, but even comedic reliefs centering around these personas are more of the sort that come from within the characters, being part of their genuine personality instead of purely existing as an attempt to make the audience chance their mood/laugh, which so many similar series fail to do in genuine/believable manner. In this case, I didn't have any problems with the approach of the comedic scenes due to this reason. I could complain that some of them are unnecessary, but they still were not badly made. The directing itself is a mixed back and inconsistent at times. It's like there is a respectable concept, but no solid means or ideas on how to deliver it, so they just kinda throw it in there without any type of build up and hope that the visuals will do the rest/carry it. For example, almost every single character introduction is just a teleportation. Dude/girl/monster appears from nowhere and be like sup. Then they fight or have a chat. That's it. There is very little vision and continuity to be seen, in fact, there is almost no content prior the main event (fight) at all. Another poor thing the series uses specially in the beginning are cheap devices that exist in purpose of adjusting the story or lead it to preferred direction. Literally NPC's appear and lead the way. They try to give an explanation, but it don't even matter, because the explanation could as well be "literally NPC's" and it wouldn't make a difference. These may seem like small things, but this is how the entirety of the story is constructed, developed and moved onward. It's simply not very solid way to lead the story and needs to be taken into consideration. Action-wise, the flow is splendid thanks to this very same attribute covered above, but story-wise, these events are based on coincidences, and that level of writing surely doesn't get my appreciation. As was already said: It's clear that the series doesn't even try to offer a substantial story where these events would be standing on more solid ground, and I do have to say that when there is no attempt, it cannot really be seen as a fail either. For example [[coincidence-based story events]], our mc literally just runs into a forest and meets people and monster because, for some reason, all of them are dwelling in the same place. Jojo's Bizarre Adventure gives a magnificent explanation why this happens in its story; stand users attach each others, and at the same time, there is always a possession of something physical or even mental (knowledge) that is of interest and therefore gives legit explanation why randoms meet each others in this manner. You can call it bs and not buy the explanation, but it still makes perfect sense and follows the series' own inner logic. Here it's like a bar gag. "Soo, you come here often?" These complains are something that I hanged onto during the worst parts (in the beginning, specifically), but after that, the series became pure art and entered the zone of genuine entertainment, having little to no annoying problems at all in the later episodes. In short: Kimetsu no Yaiba is not a flawless anime that's based on flawless writing, but it is pretty damn close to flawless art and flawless execution of its own flawed story. While appreciating imperfections may be a hard task, it's not hard at all to enjoy Yaiba for the few things which it does so incredibly well, especially when those are its main event. Now I hope that 122 episodes later, this can have its place as the 2nd best shonen anime. As a final verdict: No matter what you think of shonen anime in generally, I highly recommend giving this series a go, because Yaiba is not just a shonen done right, it's an anime done right: Art done right.

Maybe it’s just because I’ve gone old and crotchety, but I’ve been really disappointed with ufotable lately. Maybe even that is too harsh. I’ve just felt so out of touch with them for the past three and a half to four years since they seem to have completely abandoned their old selves. Whether it be the astronomical success of the Fate/Grand Order mobile game, or the fair success of their own Tales of Symphonia OVA BD sales, ufotable has apparently honed in on game adaptations. All they’ve made for TV following their 2014 re-adaptation of Studio Deen’s Fate/Stay Night, Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works, hasbeen game adaptations. God Eater, Tales of Zestiria the Cross, and Katsugeki/Touken Ranbu, with their only projects outside of TV animation being limited to even more Fate. The ONA series, Today's Menu for the Emiya Family, and the film trilogy, Fate/Stay Night: Heaven’s Feel. It just feels like it’s been so long since I’ve seen them put their phenomenal production values towards something other than a glorified advertisement for some game I have no interest in whatsoever. When I heard they were adapting Demon Slayer last year, I was excited for two reasons. For one, the manga itself had been selling big-time on its own rights and was extremely hyped up, and more importantly, because it was finally something I could latch onto as a real, self-contained, genuine story. However, I naively forgot a story itself has to be good enough to latch onto in the first place, no matter whose adapting it into animation. If I had to describe Demon Slayer in one word, it would be “expected.” Best seller in Shounen Jump? Okay, well it probably has a really bland main character for all the young boys to project themselves onto. Chapters are released weekly? Okay, well the narrative is probably really slow to give the author time to draw it consistently, with overwhelmingly drawn-out action scenes to keep the kids and teens engaged. Author is new to the industry? Okay, well then I’m sure it sells on stellar art design alone, much like its contemporaries who’s visuals obfuscate their aimless writing and vapid theming. I could keep rattling off my judgmental criticism all day, but the point is, no matter how crude I’m being, I’m not wrong. The main character Tanjiro is, indeed, an uninspired and unopinionated self-insert; the narrative is painfully slow, plodding, and directionless, but not in a way which comes across as intriguing or mysterious at all, just boring; the screenwriting can be frankly incompetent at times, like the time it followed up a scene of the main villain graphically murdering a young girl with a scene of Tanjiro boisterously bickering with a street chef about the unreasonable price of his udon bowls; and while the artwork is extremely unique, well-drawn, beautifully colored, and honestly just pretty to look at, the character writing is brain-numbingly insipid and archetypical. Any assumption you could’ve made about its source material translates identically to the adaptation, and while I mean that for both positive and negative points, the negative is quite pronounced. However, if the show’s blowout success didn’t make it obvious, the positives are very easy to boast, since the issues with this show—much like the issues with any pop-media bestseller which relies on the patronage of the disproportionally large casual masses—are all hidden under the surface, and while it doesn’t take much thought to peel back the layers and see the emptiness inside, it takes even less thought to just sit back, relax, grab yourself some popcorn, and indulge in the mindless spectacle before your eyes. The action sakuga is outstanding, with the likes of Go Kimura, Masayuki Kunihiro, Mitsuru Obunai, and any other ufotable veteran you can name going all out with their ever-impressive animation extravaganza, and the studio even outsourced some even greater talent in a few godly freelancers like Nozomu Abe to deliver on easily the best cuts of the entire season. And I don’t just mean the best cuts of Demon Slayer’s first season, I mean the best cuts of all concurrently airing anime running alongside it. The artwork is utterly gorgeous and fit with the same sharp, crisply digital, deep color design which ufotable has come to define their aesthetic with, only now with the most unique and attractive character designs and downright badass costume design they may’ve ever had the privilege to work with. Set in a magical take on feudal Japan, everyone wears these beautiful kimonos and yukatas with their own characteristic patchwork designs which take complete advantage of the phenomenal coloration aforementioned, and it all looks wonderful. Outside of action, the characters are unapologetically switched with CG models in tracking shots, and inside the action, the backgrounds are all 3DCG and frankly fail to copy the camerawork of WIT Studio—which they were obviously attempting to do—but the animation overtop was always bombastic enough to distract its desired casual audience from the cost-cutting, so taking issue with it is pointless. The voice acting was competent, with the exception of Hiro Shimono’s ear piercing performance as Zenitsu which sounds nothing like his best of work, and the sound design was at least existent, which is a hell of a lot more than you can say about most of its genre contemporaries who’ve realized how lazy they can be with their young audiences who couldn’t care less about quality sound design. But speaking of the soundscape, it’s time to stop bitching and start gushing, because I must complement the one person behind the production who outshone everyone else on staff despite said staff already bringing their all, the composer who I’m sure many of you love with all your heart even if you don’t know her name, Yuki Kajiura. If the name doesn’t ring a bell, you still probably know her from her iconic gothic soundtracks for some of the most famous anime of the last decade, from Fate/Zero to Magical Girl Madoka★Magica, and while her work on Demon Slayer was a collaboration with Go Shīna, the combination of his brass with her strings was a match made in heaven. Kajiura was a prodigy to begin with and has only continued as a full fledged musical genius for the past decade, and she and Shīna made this show so much more than it could’ve been, even with its already full staff of talent. Since Demon Slayer supplants its intellectual emptiness with tireless action sequences, she had more than enough room to work as many high-tempo tracks as she wanted, and they all fit their scenes like a glove. For BGM, she went a direction she hasn’t gone since .hack//Sign (if a little less experimental) and integrated traditional Japanese melodies and chants which complemented the feudal setting magnificently. Shīna has made some solid music before working with Ghost Oracle Drive and their insert songs in God Eater, but the insert songs he pulled off in collaboration with Kajiura are seriously something to behold, because everything I’ve discussed up until this point is all factored back in to the visual spectacle to breathtaking effect. The beautiful artwork is made utterly bewitching by the action wherein the characters’ designs and color aesthetics are artistically incorporated into their fighting styles in the most visually memorable ways imaginable, like Tanjiro’s bright blue scarf flowing off his neck like waves only to be enveloped in the tangible waves flowing out of his blade or his best friend’s striking yellow yukata lighting the entire screen up like fireworks in combat when he himself becomes a raving bolt of lightning. The 3DCG environments are shaky, and the action is what carries this otherwise innocuous show, but I personally found the meandering to sometimes be just as engaging as the show’s biggest and best flair thanks to the god tier hand-drawn background art from the art director who’s work with ufotable was so renowned, Production IG themselves reached out to have him do the backgrounds for Psycho-Pass, the highest budget and most ambitious TV animation production of the 2010s. But I need to make clear the fact this review sounds overwhelmingly positive only because applying critique to something so vacuous is a brief process. It’s boring, even if someone as seasoned and jaded as myself did manage to find some semblance of entertainment in the experience. I mean, its TV rating was R15, so it gets to be super edgy. There’s this one episode where he fights these two guys underwater and shreds them to pieces like they’re in a blender, so I guess that’s pretty fun. The show got a couple of good laughs out of me, if only for the sheer ridiculousness of the silly gore like that time this guy’s head popped like a ballon when he got hit with this weird CG volleyball. But that’s all the personality I have for you. Tanjiro, the main character, is just another Kaneki Ken, Igarashi Ganta, Midoriya Izuku, Kirito stock standard shounen self-insert. Zenitsu, the token secondary, is just another Uchiha Sasuke, Gray Fullbuster, Kuwabara Kazuma, Yukine stock standard shounen best friend and rival. Inosuke, the guy with the boar mask who literally does the Naruto Run everywhere he goes, is just another Excalibur, Albedo, Darkness, Osamu Dazai stock standard shounen one-note-meme character. Nezuko, the cute imouto waifu with a bamboo gag, is just another Kuroyukihime, Moriyama Shiemi, Elizabeth Liones, Lucy (Nyu) stock standard shounen pet girl. And worst of all, Tomioka, the Dutch uncle whose about as much fun as he looks, is just another All Might, Reigen Arataka, Ichinose Guren, Isshiki Satoshi stock standard shounen superficial senpai. If you liked any of the shows I just referenced, I highly recommend Demon Slayer since it’s the same thing, just much prettier. Not bad, not bad by any stretch of the word, but nothing beneath its eye candy. Thank you for reading.