Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Entertainment District Arc

*out-of-context spoilers* People always say Demon Slayer is only popular thanks to its dazzling animation, but I completely disagree. When you actually sit down and watch it, you just see some generic, uninteresting shounen, and yet everyone acts like it’s this incredible masterpiece, so why the massive difference in opinion? It must be the flashy animation, right? Personally, I doubt it, because shows with good animation are ignored just as often as shows with bad animation are propped up. The most well-animated show of last season was Ousama Ranking, and it wasn’t even in the top five most popular shows of the season here on MAL.The most well-animated show from last Summer was Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid S, and conversely, it was in the top five. Spring was Vivy, and it wasn’t. And Winter was Mushoku Tensei, but it was. My point is there’s no consistency in behavior. Shows like Attack on Titan: The Final Season can have laughable CG and be defended ferociously, while shows like Overlord III can have equally laughable CG and be unanimously mocked. Obviously, the visuals have a lot to do with Demon Slayer’s ability to go viral online, but if you ask me, the real key to becoming this much of a monolithic mega-hit is its accessibility. This is not a show where the writers feel the need to diversify their exposition dumps. Even mid-battle, every character is perfectly willing to spontaneously inner-monologue any information even slightly necessary for the audience, and everyone’s motivation is so simple and straightforward, that to forget it, you would have to forget the entire existence of the character. If you’re a cynical bitch like me, it’s very easy to think, “Wow. This show must be written for retards, five-year-olds, or retarded five-year-olds.” However, I finally realized it’s not that it’s written for retards or five-year-olds. It’s written for people who literally haven’t watched the show before. Allow me to explain. This is going to come across as extremely condescending and insincere, but one thing I genuinely really appreciate about Demon Slayer, and the deciding factor which I think makes the show so easily accessible to such a vast audience, is that it’s so shallow and superficial, it requires no commitment and no real attention to enjoy. That’s an insult packaged within a very thin compliment, I understand that, but I’m being very genuine when I say this, because season one of Demon Slayer for me was a twenty six week long nap. I mean, seriously, I slept through so much of that first season, I truly do not remember even an hour’s worth of its content. I remember pretty much all of episode one, because I go into every show with somewhat of an open mind, and this is especially true with Demon Slayer, because ufotable has earned their reputation. I know their shows will never just be total effortless dogshit, and thanks to the massive marketing initiative Aniplex launched to advertise it, I had already seen the promotional material as well. I really loved the colors and the whole Taisho-era aesthetic of the show, so I really wanted to like it. When it turned out to be totally milquetoast and boring, that attention faded very quickly, but for at least episode one, I had my brain turned on, and I therefore remember how everything starts. This is important, because with shounen manga adaptations, the inciting incident is all that really matters. By the end of chapter one, you always have your one and only goal, and this one and only goal is the backbone of the Weekly Shounen Jump formula. Find One Piece and become Pirate King, become the Fifth Hokage, find all seven Dragon Balls, find a way to turn Nezuko back into a human, etc. But that’s where my memory kinda stops, and yet the fact my memory stops in no way impedes upon my enjoyment of the show. THAT’S the key to Demon Slayer’s success. Having watched season one in this drowsy stupor, barely sober and barely awake, I only really remember a few distinct, well-executed moments beyond episode one. I remember Tanjiro cutting the boulder in episode four; I remember Zenitsu unveiling his sleep attack in episode twelve; I remember the Blessed Rain After the Drought from episode sixteen; I remember Zenitsu going crazy in episode seventeen; I remember most of episode nineteen, as well as how they invalidated the victory in the following episode and CG water man had to come and finish off the spider guy; and I remember that one Hashira trying bait Nezuko into attacking him in one of the later episodes. But that’s not how the series actually plays out, because Demon Slayer was twenty six episodes worth of content, not just those few moments I was able to recall and describe. It had a plot, it had multiple story arcs, it had tons of dialogue I’m sure, but it was so tortuously boring, it always put me to sleep. I must also stress that I did not binge this. Every single week for twenty six weeks, I would turn on the new episode and just pass out. My soul would just exit my fucking body. When I went to go see Infinity Train, I asked these three boys who were sat near me in the theatre if we’d met Rengoku in the show before, and when they said, “no, not really,” I burst out laughing. His character development in the movie was easily among the most unoriginal, uninspired, generic shounen flashback backstories I’d ever seen, and since his whole personality was just haha lol so funny haha he said UMAI! haha xd funny meme bro haha ayy lmao haha, that by the time the end of the movie came around and he was fighting some OTHER fucking guy who we also just met and who had EVEN LESS screen time or memorable characterization, I was just cracking myself up in the theatre cackling like a psychopath screaming, “Who the fuck ARE you?!” All of ufotable’s most talented staff came together to produce one of the most spectacular fight sequences I’d ever seen, but there was no tension, no excitement, no emotion, no engagement, no anything, because the combatants were these two shallow non-characters who I only just met and who I didn’t give half a shit about at all. The result is an unbelievable spectacle that’s only impressive for the sake of being impressive, and that’s it. THAT’S the key to Demon Slayer’s success. Despite remembering only a handful of moments from season one and sleeping through the rest, I was able to watch Infinity Train (and now The Red Light District Arc as well) without feeling confused or missing the appeal at all. THAT’S the key to Demon Slayer’s success. It’s not successful simply because it has flashy animation—those people are just haters spouting random shit to diminish the show’s achievements because they don’t like it. It’s successful because anyone in Japan, whether they’re young or old, boy or girl, man or woman, student or professional, unemployed or retired, ANYONE can turn on the TV, see a sociopolitically whitewashed, inoffensive portrayal of Taisho, the most beloved and romanticized era of Japanese history, with pretty colors and a simple story, and say, “He wants to save his sister? That’s nice.” That’s called accessibility, and it’s why Demon Slayer is so popular. It’s boring and generic? Why the hell am I talking like these are bad things? Being boring and generic is exactly what people like about it! Like I said at the beginning of this review, it’s not written for dummies. It’s written for people who literally haven’t watched the show before. It’s written so that if you’re flipping though channels and land on Fuji TV, it’ll be more effort to find something else than it would be to think, “Eh. This looks fine.” If anything, the more dumbed-down the script is, the easier it is for people to get on board. In episode one of season two, Mini Rengoku says to Tanjiro, “But you came all this way for it, only to end up learning nothing about Hinokami Kagura or what my father called ‘Sun Breathing’,” and I seriously laughed for something like two minutes straight. The dialogue in this show is fucking negative IQ level shit. It feels like watching Alex Kurtzman’s Mummy, where the blonde lady has to keep explaining to Tom Cruise who his character is supposed to be so the Chinese theater audience has multiple opportunities to read the subtitles. This tiresome, dull-witted approach to scripting is reflected in the notoriously bad comedy as well, because there are no jokes in Demon Slayer. There is no written humor. It’s just a bunch of dopey physical comedy. Never does it setup or payoff a real, constructed joke. It’s just: “HAHA He screamed! XD” “HAHA He fell over! XD” “HAHA He made a silly face! XD” It’s such basic, bargain-bin humor that even a monkey could laugh at. It can get me to smile when it stops trying to play itself straight—like at the beginning of episode two when Tanjiro and Uzui are doing this unfunny comedy routine, and it just keeps cutting to Zenitsu going, “What the fuck are these people talking about?”—but most of the time, the childish humor is just as annoying as it’s ever been. And don’t even get me started on the inept tone. When I reach the point as an audience member where I’m watching the red-haired demon guy from Infinity Train shuttering in terror, groveling in fear, getting fiercely accosted by the main villain who looks like shota Michael Jackson, I have to take a step back and ask whether or not this is supposed to be funny. I mean, when they cast Maya Sakamoto, utilize her perfectly, but then make her embarrassingly bawl, “Tasukete, Onii-chan!” I’m not thinking, “Wow! What a dramatic character arc!” I’m thinking, “How the fuck am I even supposed to feel about this character?” I saw someone attempting to defend the shitty writing by arguing that generic shounenshit we’ve seen a million times like villains who waste time soapboxing instead of killing the protagonists shouldn’t be criticized because, indeed, we’ve seen this trash a million times and should be accustomed to it. This is a classic example of thinking with low standards. Yes, this trope is used as a crutch for hack authors who write themselves into corners all the time, but does that make it okay? Does banality elevate something above criticism? No, of course not. It isn’t not bad because it happens all the time; it’s bad, and it’s bad every time it happens. This, of course, is only addressing the general archetypes. I haven’t even touched the seriously goofy shit yet… >Shifting the positions of my internal organs and having immunity to poison is child’s play because…I grew up in the mountains? >Before, I was lightning speed, but when the narrative requires it, I AM GODSPEED. (please ignore Killua rip-off) >Nezuko burns away the demonic poison, and Tanjiro literally says “idk lol” when asked how she can do that. >”’Score?!’ Did he say ‘score?!’ Did he turn my Blood Demon Art into a song and deflect it?!” Yeah. Not exactly the most brilliantly written show in the universe. With a script THIS dumb, it’s no wonder ufotable relies on spectacle. To give credit where it’s due, Demon Slayer never derails and stays true to its core themes, hackneyed as they may be. If recent best-sellers are anything to go on, you can clearly see the “Big Three” era of 700+ chapter manga is over. A fantastic adaptation which greatly elevates the source material, amazing character designs, no extensive filler, good music, cool fights—just turn your brain off, and what's not to like, right? I’ve also seen people underrate Tanjiro as a character, labeling him a generic goodboy MC and moving on, but I think he's actually quite distinct from typical shounen protagonists. What makes him interesting is how his conscience is handled. He accepts the fact demons were once people, and he is able to sympathize with them despite the atrocities they commit, typically in the form of high bodycounts. However, he is also resolute in his efforts to slay them, and he does not hesitate to deliver killing blows. This apparent contradiction is justified by Tanjiro's innate respect for life: the driving, defining force behind his moral compass. This makes him relatively unique compared to most shounen protagonists, as he not only delivers killing blows frequently, but also with the knowledge he is deliberately ending an intelligent being's life—killing "people" that have been unsalvageably corrupted. I can't think of too many shounen protagonists who actually kill their enemies, much less one who is portrayed as a traditional hero as opposed to some edgy anti-hero. Deep character, right? Maybe, but what this boils down to in execution is: “Those lost lives will never return! They can never come back! Those made of flesh and blood can’t do what demons do. Why would you rob them? Why would you trample their lives?” There’s a solid character conceit hidden somewhere behind all that bland, platitudinous drivel, but it’s completely smothered by this Anakin Skywalker, Attack of the Clones-level writing. The only character who overcomes the shitty writing is Uzui. Uzui is not only the first character with enough actual characterization for me to consider a character at all, but he’s also the first member of the cast to actually make me like them as a person even a little bit. I just love it when anime prominently features men written by women, because unlike the majority-male industry of manga authors who write uncharismatic, unimposing, self-insert characters, female authors are actually comfortable with having men who stand out and leave an impression. When this guy was introduced slapping some girl’s ass, taking children into Red Light Districts, selling said children into prostitution, and boasting about his harem of three beautiful wives, I could not wipe the grin off my face. Much like the pandering waifus we always see in anime written by men, it is crystal clear to me that Uzui’s painted nails and flamboyant, fujoshi-bait K-pop aesthetic is the embodiment of everything the author fetishizes in a man. To me, he just screams old, hair metal, 80s rock bands like Guns N' Roses or Mötley Crüe who had long hair, wore make-up, and got beauty treatments at glamor salons. They all looked very feminine, and yet they had literal oceans of topless women throwing themselves at them. For all the basement-dwelling otaku who wouldn’t have the slightest idea what rock stars used to look like before the year 2000, let me just say I don’t think it’s a coincidence this guy is called the “Sound Hashira” and defeats his enemies with the power of music. Again, Uzui slapped some chick’s ass, and all the shameless girls on social media were immediately smitten, slobbering over their screens wishing they were her. No male author could manufacture that shit, and unlike the cast up until this point which has consisted entirely of cookie-cutter shounen re-skins, Uzui gives this series a much needed spark of personality. No offense to Director Sotozaki—and, yes, I’m fully aware fans of this series probably have little to no conception of what it means for something to be “well-directed”—I have no idea why this series hasn’t been handed over to Toshiyuki Shirai yet. His episodes are always more visually interesting, and I’d be curious to see if he could improve the tortuously boring episodes filled with nothing but braindead comedy and snail-paced narrative progression, or if he only seems wildly more talented as a director because he was lucky enough to be tasked with handling the more memorable episodes. Either way, the visuals are exactly what you’d expect from Fate-fotable: Unlimited Tax Evasion Works. Whether they’re drawing a still pose, adding speed lines, shaking the frame, and spamming digital effects, or actually treating us to well-rounded, legitimately impressive animation, the audience will eat it up regardless and denounce anyone who suggests the series has less than perfect visuals as a dishonest contrarian…but people call me that anyway, so fuck it. Let’s nitpick. First of all, no matter how relentless they are with their post-processing, ufotable still can’t hide their CG. The CG ribbons aren’t as bad as the CG tentacles from Infinity Train, but still. The main digital effects worth complaining about are the Michael Bay fireworks Uzui throws around, and of course, the fire. The digital smoke effects they love using in this aren’t terrible, but no matter how good ufotable’s compositing is, no one can make that Shutterstock™ fireplace.gif look natural. I could go on, but you get the point. Demon Slayer is an impressive, beautiful show, but anyone who says it’s flawless knows nothing about animation production. This show aired an episode with fight sequences nearly outclassing its own movie on the same day Attack on Titan ended on a jpeg of a manga panel, so even I’d feel petty for nitpicking too much. I have high standards, so even though I never had any real animosity toward Demon Slayer, I gave season one the negative score it deserved. Remember, it’s only real problem was being trite and consequentially boring to any thinking viewer, but by allowing myself to fall asleep, I didn’t torture myself with it. The result of this uncaring attitude is that all I really remembered about the show by the time Infinity Train came out was the handful of awesome highlights which actually kept me awake, so even though I’m consciously aware of its shortcomings and failures, all the memories I had of it were great. Feeling generous and not wanting to sour these good memories, I had a truly brilliant idea. To take advantage of the—how should I say this?—subcultural predilections of my fellow Americans, I bought a ticket downtown and reserved a seat at a theatre with a bar to guarantee the audience would be a lively, rowdy, urban bunch. This way, I could get shitfaced, overreact and talk shit, and still ultimately be quieter and more courteous than 99% of the hollering moviegoers sharing the cinema with my good self. A genius move, needless to say, because I had a fucking blast watching Infinity Train—easily the most fun I’ve ever had watching anime in a movie theater—and I didn’t even kill myself driving all the way home. (Don’t drink and drive, kids. I’m not a role model.) The point of the story? Demon Slayer is perfect for casuals who just want to turn their brains off and gawk at pretty colors and loud noises, or losers like me who just want an excuse to indulge in some nice, diversionary substance abuse to escape the tedium of their lives and be ever so briefly stupefied by visual excess. Decorate it as much as you want; a garden-variety shounen manga adaptation filled with nothing but one-note characters, lowbrow humor, and multi-episode, asspull-ridden fights simply is what it is, ufotable animation or not. Thank you for reading.

Finally. We have reached cinema. Acme. Apex. Kino. Peak. Pinnacle.Zenith. THE GOAT. Demon Slayer is the undisputed impeccable face of shounen. Everything about Demon Slayer is of ultimate quality. Despite the common horde of "criticism" the anime gets, Demon Slayer is the anime that has left a name for itself. It will be on countless top 10s, it will be the classic of the future, it will live as eternal memory in the anime timeline. Anime so good I can assure you Japan is never going back into recession with this goat's existence. But anyway, before I get into the actual review, I'd like to do some talk on the community as a whole with fiction such as Demon Slayer. It is clear to just about anyone who uses forums, reads reviews, or just chat with friends, will find that people will be on one of two sides. The first group will see any piece of animation ("art" works too) and call it the best thing in the world, the second will see said art and slander it by calling these works "overrated" and "overhyped" and literally any other words of criticism frowned upon via hidden reviewer rules as being lazy to use. I've explained this before in another review of mine, however, I am going to be on a different side this time, and if you couldn't already tell from my score, the anime captivated me enough such that I do believe Demon Slayer is a work of art worthy of all the praise in the world. But. I'd like to stress something, which I will do very soon. Sure, Demon Slayer is lucky and all. It managed to get in the hands of a nice studio. Though something about Demon Slayer is still very striking and very honest that regardless of what you may think of the writing side, you have to admit that it has some masterpiece or at the very minimum, *good* qualities. The story of Demon Slayer is nothing grand, but it is honest. Really, that is all that matters. Not just that it is honest, but it also goes to no lengths to stretch anything out into absurdity. It plays its cards nicely, doesn't overstay its welcome with any lopsided tactics in a desperate attempt to engage the audience, because it is already amazing in itself. I feel as if simplicity is often overlooked in media these days, something simple cannot somehow be appreciated equally as other more sophisticated titles out there. I'd argue against it for sure. It's even more concerning to know that many people will be very quick to call Demon Slayer "generic", and honestly, that is "true", but what the hell does that word even mean in an honest sense? Generic relative to what standard? Why is X considered generic and not just a plot device made to make the story go forward, because you know, plots need plot devices? When you say "generic", isn't that just a broad term taking in everything rather than looking at Demon Slayer as a shounen anime? Which it so happens to be one. People will throw around terms like the aforementioned but it is bizarre to me that it can be used so carefree in an anime that is also not trying to present itself in a genre with different motifs and themes running behind them irrelevant to the common ones seen in the genre it actually is inside of. It's unfortunate really that the story of this show will get overshadowed by standards it does not need to meet. But let's go over why the story isn't even bad in the first place rather than saying that it doesn't need to do X and Y. For this particular season, Demon Slayer focuses on the chapter on Uzui Tengen and the three musketeers infiltrating the Entertainment District in search of Uzui's wives. Nothing in this particular season stands out for what currently exists, and I would imagine that the quality would stay this way for future seasons to come for the anime (as well as from what I read, I can kinda confirm). But, as mentioned beforehand, this is all a very honest story. What we are met within this arc is none other than typical shounen tropes with exemplary performances attached to their name. There are multiple moments in this arc where characters would be pulled under situations where seemingly all hope is lost and countless lives are placed in peril. Doesn't sound like a lot, but for a story of its kind, with the amazing execution in art and writing, you can truly grasp the situation. It is like a "feels" effect but for shounen anime. The stakes are real here and the characters' emotions follow through with zero losses in the system. I wouldn't go around dismissing stuff like this as low-quality effortless works that exist simply to hold the story together. It seems to me that people are forgetting the target audience needs, or if you don't want to be cynical, they are not respecting the high-quality aspects usually found when evaluating anime as its kind. All unfortunate stuff, but it is understandable why one may think like that, but it also kinda strikes me as a little dishonest to say that the quality of these shows are some level of objectively (lol) bad because they are using tropes seen everywhere. As explained, it isn't as if Demon Slayer is being half-hearted with these tropes. Hell, our characters are not even in their endgame yet, they are also recalling vital memories of the past as a means to grow themselves into the ideal state they wish to become. The writing here doesn't suck, I'd vehemently disagree, and it would be nice if people could understand my perspective on the story as to why the writing isn't as bad as people make it out to be. Honestly, though, I will say one thing, and that is speed. I don't mean pacing is bad—issues exist there, however. What I mean is that you have moments of intense action followed up with talking that can last a little while long enough to take up more time than necessary. In an anime that is heavily focused on action and the likes, I see this as a distorted fit, something that doesn't work as well as people may hope it should. It's something I went over in another review (might as well check out all my reviews at this point), but being too critical of the matter isn't something I'd say is necessary. Sure, it is slow at times, but it should also come to clear notice as to how this is a TV anime, which has different fundamentals than compared to, let's say, a movie. You should expect to find that there are moments here that might kill the tension, but in this fault, there are consequences that follow up with something impressive, to say the least. Moments in this TV anime that have low retention to action isn't something that is consistent in the viewing experience. Only a few times does that even happen? Something that might as well be insufficient depending on who you are talking to, but it is something that I wanted to note. Even in this review basically praising Demon Slayer for just about every matter that has been drawn, the fault is still around these corners. Nothing too devastating though. Would imagine most would enjoy such. Most of the aforementioned is a stereotype enforced onto shounen anime anyway. A little bit about the pacing too. For the most part, it was liveable, most of the moments were correctly allocated to the correct episodes. One thing I didn't like however is how each episode would get cut short but some cliffhanger relative to each individual episode. It wasn't due to me disliking the tension being carried forward, rather, the abrupt endings to everything that was happening. I suppose that too is common in shounen anime, but it was something that I didn't find to be the most appealing in my viewing experience. Some decent closure in each episode would have been nice. Aside from all I have rambled on about. The writing aspect of Demon Slayer is generally underrated for the most part. Again, I will hands down admit that it isn't Evangelion or Tatami Galaxy or whatever kind of obscure pre-2010 avant-garde title you can throw at me. But I will be there fighting for this anime's side in its writing quality. No development? Literal training scenes. Nothing to draw attention to? Recollection of the past and everything that has happened thus far AND how that impacts the characters in the anime currently. It's boring? Subjectivity issue. I'd hope more people would recognise the story as something a little more than it is "generic". I could go on but I'd like to write some more down on other aspects. Demon Slayer often gets the cynical side of criticism very easily and I just wanted to relay something to support what it had going for itself. The characters of the story here are one of the best points here too. Following on from the Mugen Train arc, everyone here is still amidst the long journey they brought for themselves and it comes across as something that still will be something of a grand trek. Again, these characters are training, these characters are reflecting, these characters still have a lot on their shoulders. This isn't some rubbish out of nowhere. It was something of a well-crafted or at minima, something that had thought behind it. These guys are very easy to attach to with their goals set in stone, doing everything in their power to make sure that such becomes a reality. Tanjiro. The wholehearted wholesome guy. You can actually tell he cares about his job as a Demon Slayer, keeping up the morale and having the motivation required for him to truly fit the role of the main character of the story. The aspiration everyone would like to take the path of in bettering themselves. He is the embodiment of a world-class shounen character. Zenitsu and Inosuke. Here, they may seem the same as it was when this first aired, however, I do believe that they have changed for the better even if in minuscule segments. With all that training and lessons along the way, they take up their swords to strike down the enemy ahead of them in a way that was not like the past. I mean shoutout to Zenitsu for that exemplary commanding skill even in sleep. Nezuko. Doesn't really have the best development, which I would agree with. Although she isn't some dead weight (never really was), managed to improve herself and come to some terms that may be of future reference in the future arcs. Uzui. The flashing legend. Although he is no Rengoatku, the dude is still a loveable Hashira that has managed to sway the hearts of many as he did his three wives. He's not all fun and games though. Along with his flashy style, he has still had a past that is deep enough to make you understand that the guy has been through a lot already, it only stacks atop one another with stakes with episodes of this season. A solid cast of characters all around for this season really. Everyone had a role here and all were executed to masterful status. It is amazing how far they made the anime so enjoyable. Nothing here has led me to believe this is low quality or anything. Played their roles well and I would imagine most of the audience would agree. Now. The animation. No words can describe how amazing it was. Ufotable is truly pulling out mad ones and was not messing around this season. Literally, everything here was to some quality that doesn't come around every so often in such a very very very good way. Fluid animation, literally every sequence of frames was something of a magical experience. You could feel the literal action, the fights, the sword swings, whatever, they were all performed to such a high standard it is genuinely incredible. So much stuff got the detail it deserved, so many more stuff got the vibrant nature is dreaded for. Ufotable delivered, and that is all that was needed to make everything work. The thing is with art is that it is powerful enough to make people obscure thoughts that don't correlate to 100% of everything they are talking about. Happens with anything that has good art. Violet Evergarden, Your Name, Silent Voice, Solo Leveling, Ousama Ranking, the list goes on ad infinitum. But Demon Slayer's art and story worked well so much together that I don't believe it is something of a misinterpretation to say that the art here obscures the value of the anime. Sure, as pointed out, the faults are there. But there are glory points people seem to be forgetting as well. Demon Slayer is a lucky fiction to get the attention it has, but I will also stand by it and defend it where it should because people think the criticism it gets is something that is quite unfortunate, which it certainly is. I love this art and it helped out everything, yeah, but I also love the works beneath it. I am not so cynical to hate this for it being flashy. I mean, Uzui would love for it to be too. I used to be very myopic with Demon Slayer. I have to admit, I at one point in life, would not hesitate to say "oh, this anime bad!! it just got good animation, it's not actually **good**" but then I came to terms with myself and understood that not everything needs to have criticism in a way that may make an individual seem unique. It is really okay to love anime like Demon Slayer, it seems we have forgotten mutual respect out of the stuff like so that come out, but where the nail hits seem to be for big shounen. It's quite sad, people can have the opinions they want, but it is also disappointing that a distaste for real good shows that are indeed simple pieces of elaborate work exist out there. Nothing wrong with that, and that's all I need for a 10. ufotable has achieved cinema, and it is only going to be wild from thereon. I'll see you all in the next chapter.

*spoilers for Kimetsu no Yaiba: Mugen Ressha-hen and Yuukaku-hen Kimetsu no Yaiba's ultimate downfall can be quickly surmised as an attitude problem. The series's lack of respect for its audience or characters, its incessantly speedy pacing between arcs, and its inane humor can all be boiled down to this singular, core problem. Its sheer lack of restraint can be felt from that attitude problem as well. What made Mugen Train function was its limitations which forced the series to straighten up and dial back in all the bullshit which made the first season largely intolerable. However, this second season, Yuukaku-hen slips back into some of these oldhabits while bringing brand new issues into the fray. Let's start with its attitude regarding the death of Rengoku: the Fire Hashira from Mugen Train. It's awful, absolutely appalling in its presentation. They desperately oversell the reverence everyone has for the man. First off, the first 3 minutes are an awkwardly presented recap of the Mugen Train finale to remind the audience of what they just watched: the dude dying and everyone crying. More importantly, they have the gall to shove his smiling visage amidst a heavenly backdrop onto damn near every scene people talk about him in. It happens so often that nothing gets to speak for itself; Kimetsu no Yaiba can basically be boiled down to those last 6 words. Then again, considering a quarter of the double-length first episode is about Tanjirou assuring Rengoku's teary-eyed kid brother and confronting a painfully obnoxious deadbeat "I lash out and shittalk but actually care for and cry over the dead" drunkard dad, this is not unexpected. Perhaps it's rude to point at Naruto as a shining example on how to tactfully handle the fallout of the death of someone close to its heroes, as it’s one of the Big 3 and it often gets used as a measuring stick for how bogus 2010s shounen are. However, it's hard not to look at a shounen that genuinely respects those who have fallen, how the characters take the time to explore their surroundings, shut down, and require the help of others to move along, without noticing why KnY failed. In Naruto, we get to process the grief of those most affected in an artful way, not once, but twice. In KnY, we get caricatures and obnoxious slow-mo Zack Snyder trailer shots. Well, we also get a 4 month time-skip amidst a training montage and more obnoxious in-your-face yelly humor because clearly SAO shouldn't be alone in horribly mangled time skips. Hell, we even get told how Zenitsu and Inosuke develop rather than having that unfold in front of us, just like with Kirito in Aincrad. Actually, to be fair to SAO, even it has more respect for Kirito and his supporting cast than KnY does for most of its characters. Hell, not once in the grieving process where Tanjirou struggles with a stomach wound, does Nezuko attempt to console him. Perhaps it's because she's barely a character --lower than most pokemon-- and more of an object to only be deployed when necessary for asspulls. Zenitsu might still be an insufferable, screaming simpcel who should have embraced his role as a straight-man to his wacky teammates by now, but at least that prick's a character. It would be funny how the series still treats its sole female companion to the heroes worse than most shounen like Naruto, Fairy Tail, or every Yugioh title if it didn't mean that the core sibling dynamic at the heart of the series wasn't shafted to such a puzzling degree. Hell, despite it being a major focus in the latter half, the most Nezuko plays into it after she's decommissioned in ep 7 is by appearing in Tanjirou's dreams. Can't let our trophy plot device sister have any actual agency, now can we? As for the new characters, to address some of them, let's look at the show's lack of restraint regarding character gimmicks. Much like its Drifters-tier screamy tone-killer humor, KnY goes overboard with giving characters gimmicks. Sure, sometimes a gimmick or quirk is needed for a character to stand out. However, the way they constantly shift up gimmicks for Inosuke is head-tilting, and Zenitsu speaks (or shouts) for himself. More importantly, Tengen Uzui aka the Sound Hashira would be way better if he were just the vain ladies man and beleagured chaperone leader to our trio rather than having this irritating and incessant "muh flashiness" gimmick that he never shuts the fuck up about. Hell, that’s how most of the Hashiras in S1 were introduced, so it’s no surprise the issue continues. Admittedly, he does get better the more we learn of him and how world-weary he is and why he values “flashiness” so much. Still, a nasty first impression and gimmick crammed down our throats makes him the hardest to stomach of all the Hashiras that have gotten substantial screen time so far despite him being the best new character of the season. The antagonists themselves are pretty whatever as well, not that Kimetsu has ever been good at handling its villains barring maybe Akaza. They’re hardly worth discussing beyond just being mean vain pretty bitch Daki, and shaggy ugly avenger brother Gyytarou. Their powers are interesting, they’re petty, vengeful pricks, moving on. In spite of everything, however, the season was proving to be tolerable once we transitioned from the heinous premiere to the start of the arc proper. The aforementioned issues were all there, but even returning problems weren’t as bad as they were in S1. Less of Zenitsu being insufferable, more time for Inosuke to be a badass despite his growth being skipped, and largely serviceable build-up. It was standard KnY fair, which while not good, is more akin to the more tolerable parts of S1 than the entire middle portion of that season. Then the middle of the season happened, and from there, the show went back down to the abyss. Perhaps the most agonizing aspect of KnY’s attitude and approach to storytelling remains its usage of flashbacks as a primary tool. Mugen Train did well to limit this approach, not extending it to either of its antagonists, and using it for Rengoku long before his death so the audience can get attached to him without his exploration being an obvious pace-breaker or red flag. This season, on the other hand, has regressed back to the spider arc from S1, where fights are constantly being interrupted to provide brand new information about our characters that could and should have been naturally presented to us before the first moment they’re immediately relevant to a fight or emotional beat. It’s fake and hollow in its execution and overuse, making the show come off as wholly ingenuine when, say, we learn more about Tengen’s wives in the scene where they tearfully reunite with him than we did in all of the previous episodes, combined. Hell, they get more screen time in this one scene than they had cumulatively in previous episodes as well, though given how insufferable and one-note they are when they’re on-screen from ep 5-onwards, that might be for the best. The show’s rapid-fire flashback spam only even remotely works occasionally like with Tengen in ep 8, and that’s because they do it so often that, like with blindly or haphazardly throwing darts at a dartboard, there’s gonna be a hit somewhere in the distance amidst the meter-away misses. Still, when they’re bad, they’re abysmal, and the fact that the series has the gall to give its antagonists another ridiculously over the top sad backstory AFTER ONE OF THEM HAS DIED AND THE OTHER IS SOON TO FOLLOW, is scalding to the senses. Another issue that rears its ugly head in the 2nd half is the asspulls. KnY is no stranger to them. S1 ep 19 had several back to back in the climax of the arc’s big fight scene before the start of ep 20 undoes all of that with yet another one that contradicts the very events of that iconic moment. Mugen Train pulled a final boss out of nowhere because we needed a final act and the previous antagonist of the arc had been slain. Kimetsu no Yaiba’s 2nd season combines the two, while reintegrating the idea of crafting asspulls via flashbacks. Let's not even discuss all of the death fake-outs with bullshit justifications that take place towards the last 3 episodes like this was a latter day Fairy Tail arc. Tanjirou constantly pushes past his limits like broken clavicles without any supernatural aide whatsoever for extended periods of time, Nezuko gets cool new powers out of nowhere without us ever showing her train or anything, and recovery breathing on top of stuff like Zenitsu being fully autonomous and capable when asleep are introduced this season, too! GEE, I BET THIS WOULD HAVE ALL BEEN REALLY COOL AND NOT AT ALL A BUNCH OF OUTTA NOWHERE ASSPULL BULLSHIT IF WE HADN’T SKIPPED 4 MONTHS OF TRAINING AND INSTEAD GOTTEN TO SEE THESE IDIOTS WORK FOR THEIR NEW POWERS, HUH?! The second half, where the bulk of the fights take place, is filled to the brim with such utter nonsense that at some point, especially if you’re binging, you sorta become numb to them until an episode ends. Sure, the fights are all lavishly animated barring some gross ass CG blood splatter, but goddamn are they littered with idiocy. Between all that and the extraneous monologuing characters do in split-second slow-mo intervals, it all just becomes white noise. It’s hard to be consistently livid here compared to the insulting nonsense of episodes 1 and 5. Only when they keep spamming images of Rengoku because “HE WAS COOL, RIGHT GUYS”, is the numb trance broken. There are a ton of other issues and nitpicks that are barely worth addressing. Tanjirou learning more lore about his dad’s techniques is cool but they’re not expanded upon organically. Despite the breakneck pacing of the first half and how we time skip past all the training that could’ve justified much of what went on this season, the latter half is a dragged out bunch of flight scenes with painfully stretched-out episode closers. Characters sometimes just decide not to finish each other off for no reason or randomly become stronger in earlier parts of a fight when they were supposedly less threatening. Some of this is all standard shounen issues taken to their logical extreme because Kimetsu no Yaiba has always been like this. Some of it is new issues for this season. At some point, we can’t drag this review out like the show drags its fights, because watching this show has become nothing short of exhausting! No battle shounen has ever been this exhausting, Jesus Fucking Christ! On the topic of those flashy brawls, the visuals this season are overall better than they were in S1. Haruo Sotozaki has largely proved himself as a very good director, with several outstanding shots and weighty fight sequences that despite the immense chaos and speed towards the final few episodes, can still be kept up with when things go wild. However, before we get into the merits of the visuals, there are some nits worth picking since there are frame rate issues and some of the CG (fire in ep 10) still can’t hold up so well. More importantly, there are several questionable shots like the janky camera motions when cutting up from someone’s screaming death, or the disquieting amount of scenes unnecessarily infected by speed lines. The premiere is easily the worst, however, as it seems like whoever the episode director was, really wanted to emulate Zack Snyder with all the stupid slow-mo trailer shots. Between that and some unintentionally silly shots of angry Muzan and Tanjirou, the presentation comes.off as very overblown at times. Plus, there’s an amusing number of moments where characters run in place when they’re clearly supposed to be moving. However, these faults can in no way outweigh the technical prowess on display. Sure, they often try to oversell sequences to dumb degrees (and the music doesn’t help matters), but the visuals are still better than they were in the first season. There are no extremely ugly CG backgrounds, and they play more with experimental visualizations like watercolor brush stroke style visuals for visualizing certain sounds in a location, or how the show tries to visually represent certain explanations like Tengen’s shinobi upbringing. It's clear that Haruo Sotozaki and his team want to give the show the reverence its popularity affords, with more dynamic swooping shots and interesting styles than ever before. Moreover, the fight scenes get more and more impressive as they go along, showcasing some insane sakuga that can compete with the Heaven’s Feel Movie trilogy at times. Episodes 5-10 are an almost nonstop cavalcade of fight scenes, and each one looks better than the last. Ufotable’s trademark in-house digital effects certainly add that extra bit of flair to the spectacular action sequences. After all, it helped paper over some of the maddeningly dire state of the writing in the latter half. If one didn’t mind all the utter nonsense on display (or if they just watched sakugabooru clips) then they’d find these sequences nothing short of pulse-pounding rather than mildly cool. Without exaggeration, the latter half of S2 might be their strongest TV production to date in spite of some hiccups, not that the first half is bad by any means. “Not bad by any means” can also largely be used to describe the soundtrack which was once again helmed by Yuki Kajiura and Go Shiina. Unfortunately, this is certainly one of their weaker anime projects. Gone is any of the eeriness of some of S1’s tracks, and while the Marvel type orchestral tracks are fine, none of it is even remotely memorable. The OST serves the series well enough (barring that shitty dubstep piece in ep 5) and adding some light electronic elements to the mix isn’t a bad thing, but this is a bit of a step down from S1. There isn’t even an electrifying insert song like in S1 ep 19. If anything, Aimer’s OP “Zankyou Zanka” and ED “Asa ga Kuru” are picking up the pace a little, with some fun, energetic jazz pop for the former and a slower, more dramatic Kajiura type piece for the latter. The LiSA songs from S1, Mugen Train Movie, and even TV Mugen are overall preferable, but still, Kimetsu has never had a bad OP or ED and that continues even here. Kimetsu no Yaiba’s 2nd Season was nothing short of an overblown, ingenuine exercise in exhaustion. Everything bad about the first season has been kept and some of them have been amplified alongside new problems. Plus, season one at least had Shinobu and a fair number of ok episodes so that the experience wasn’t just misery like the middle portion of that 2-cour juggernaut was. The first half of this season was a mix of rushed, agonizing nonsense and some tolerable set-up, while the latter half is a nonstop barrage of asspulls, flashbacks, and fights that turn into noise as the eyes glaze over and the brain begs to shut down. The visuals are largely better than S1 and perhaps more interesting than ever. However, that alone cannot save this from being perhaps the worst full installment thus far, and the worst arc barring maybe the spider arc from S1….maybe. Sometimes you hear the take of ufotable carrying the series while the material itself is garbage, and there’s some merit to that claim. One might even wonder: had this gone to a lesser studio with a more modest batting average in terms of animation quality, would this be seen more akin to Fairy Tail or Boruto in terms of being the bottom of the battle shounen barrel. Such thinking is a tad malicious, as if whoever thinks so wishes the show got what it “deserved” rather than the royal treatment it has today. However, any good faith Mugen Train had built up after S1’s failings has been completely and utterly dashed. Worthwhile audiovisuals can only do so much to aid atrocious writing, but it's hard to deny that this show would not be as fondly remembered if not for the team it resonated with doing everything to make the most out of the material they more than likely love. Perhaps this abysmal battle shounen would be left to rot like a beheaded demon, and it would still see a sizable audience. Fairy Tail managed that before it became the shounen community’s punching bag, as did Hero Academia before the later seasons slipped up in production quality and started getting dogged on for it among other reasons. Alas, this is all speculation. What we have is what we have. Haruo Sotozaki and his team at ufotable should be proud, and if the legions of fans dazzled by the visuals and some of the show’s pathos cherish it as one of their favorites, good for them. Nothing can or should take that away from them. We are nearing the halfway point of Kimetsu no Yaiba's story, so before it chugs along to its 3rd season, let’s depart from this demon train peacefully.

Have you ever heard of demon slayer? Yes, that anime which everyone loves and calls a masterpiece, one that will be written down in the history as one of the best shonen's to have ever existed. Its for sure that its gonna happen but is demon slayer really worth it? Simple Answer, fuck no. This has been a complete down hill after it's first season which unfortunately also wasn't very pleasing to me. But. This is worse. All of the problems from last season continue, we get even more asspulls but the best episode now being one from this season, demon slayer is nothing but rottenfood that just sickens you. For one, it has the same generic, overused and absolutely garbage formula that not only makes a predictable story but one that has very little to enjoy about, no, no. I take that back! It has nothing to enjoy about! Its very frustrating watching a show that has no surprises for you and even the comedy makes you feel like drinking vomit! The comedy is basically: Character one: Chasing! Character 2: Screaming! Character 3: Screaming! Wow, the author somehow thought that's comedy, Yes! Screaming and running characters chased by more character doing the same thing is funny! Absolutely! That's hilarious! Who won't laugh? I mean, that's the funniest thing ever! The garbage, random and cringe dialogue make it worse. The repetitive cycle of this type of similar comedy (yes, they call that comedy) and it absolutely not improving is why this has to be the most unfunny thing I have ever seen in a (not dark, imagine thinking demon slayer is dark hahaha) shonen ever do. It's not hard to make good comedy, you have chainsaw man and jujutsu kaisen as an example. Despite both of them being shonen, they nail the comedy aspect! One might do it by bringing in perverted jokes or characters with funny goals instead of the "very" original and serious goal that Tanjiro has of saving her demon sister. Jokes are absolutely not perverted, none of them crack a funny or sex related joke. (this is something an interesting shonen does hehe) Not even once! The plot is set up to be either be fighting or unfunny and uninteresting characters who are doing random bullshit or on quests on hunting some fucking goddamn demon! One reason why the comedy also fails is that how the author made the characters. The characters and demons are supposed to be the same boring thing you have probably seen in every fucking old shonen. There is no good character development or there's none! Every fucking character, be it the main character, Inosuke, Zenitsu, Nezuko or even the Hashira's are super annoying. The character writing is also fucking hilariously bad. For Tanjiro, its because he is too kind (it makes him feel like every shonen protagonist) and keeps spitting random and unfunny stuff. Zenitsu is such a weakling and boring character, every time he is on screen he makes you vomit. He is a simp with nothing but this one trait of being a simp, his time on screen is either him fighting or him being a simp. Fucking whaaat?? Inosuke keeps shouting for no good reason. His character is very aggressive, making him an annoying retard. Nezuko does nothing aside from some fighting and she is not cute. Every hashira's is also very unfunny and keep speaking random bullshit. The art and animation may be the best part about demon slayer, for one the animation is done by ufotable a studio so top tier that every other shonen looks garbage in comparison, but I am not a fan of the animation style, its very flashy and the scenes aside from fighting aren't very pleasing to me. The character designs are also awful and I don't like them. The sound is like every shonen at least decent, the second seasons opening and ending theme wasn't bad but didn't feel as good as last seasons. The voice acting is amazing but its being put into a terrible show with ass dialogue where the voice actors need to shout or talk weirdly because that's how demon slayer's dialogues supposedly are. The fights apparently the best part about it are terrible, for episodes its like as: Demon Too strong. Heroes Can't win. Random Power Up. Monster Kill. This cycle is repeated to the point where its the formula of demon slayer. And this is one of the many reasons why demon slayer is one of the most boring anime to ever exist. I wish ufotable gave this kind of treatment to some good seinen manga such as Gantz hehe. (Joking, Joking, Gantz can never be adapted lol) To sum up the issues with Demon Slayer- -Them not to use much flashy colors -The comedy felt very forced to me, they could have cracked perverted jokes similar to csm -could have tried having more original plot twists unlike the same ones we have seen in other shonen -character writing needed more originality -dialogues felt cringe and out of place -very formulaic I understand that this might be a good anime for beginners but this is absolutely NOT a good show if you are looking for something more than bad jokes, great animated fights or a predictable story. Demon Slayer is unfortunately a terrible show which gets much undeserved love. If you are a beginner and want some actually good shows to watch, then try -Made In Abyss (s tier adventure) -Violet Evergarden (great drama) -Barakamon (God Tier sol) -Monster (peak mystery) -Odd Taxi (well written, solid mystery) -Samurai Champloo (fun, memorable) -Cowboy Bebop (fun, memorable) -Vinland Saga (good character, few issues related to character writing but most is fixed next season) -Mushishi (the god of sol) -Jujutsu Kaisen (a much better shonen than demon slayer) -Death Note (good mystery) -Kaguya sama (very funny) -Fate Series (great) -The Promised Neverland (obviously not season 2) -Bakuman (fun, inspiring) -Berserk (old version baka) -Hunter x Hunter (good shonen) -Houseki no Kuni (good characters, many issues in s1 but good) -Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood (nicely tied plot) -re:zero (mind fuck)