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| Overall | Art | Animation | Character Design | Music | Series Story | Episode Story | Reviewer | |
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| Watch | 8 | 8 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 6 |
 Ggultra2764
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[series:3669#1552] |
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Kimetsu no Yaiba is one of the more recent popular shounen action anime titles to come out in its focus on series lead, Tanjiro Kamado, and his younger sister turned demon, Nezuko, attempting to locate the whereabouts of the demon that slain their family while hunting down other demons in their new profession as Demon Slayers. I'll be the first to admit that outside of Hunter x Hunter, I've found it increasingly difficult to care for many shounen action titles in recent years given I know of many of the cliches and storytelling formulas that typically come up in the more popular titles aimed for the crowd and I find myself feeling either indifferent or frustrated with how elements of the storytelling, character personalities, and comedic timing can come off within these titles. My reception to Kimetsu no Yaiba is no different in this regard as regardless of the fanfare many have been giving it, many of the storytelling and character tropes for it are familiar territory to me. But suppose before I get into my criticisms, I'll at least get into what I liked with the series. Ufotable being at the helm with animating Kimetsu no Yaiba makes it a nice visual spectacle with gorgeous scenery, good-looking character designs among human and demon characters, and great fight choreography utilized in a number of the action scenes and abilities demonstrated of the demons and human Demon Slayers involved. In its more serious moments, the series carries a nice grim mood and dark aesthetic to fit the hardships and struggles faced by Tanjiro and other characters during their encounters with enemy demons. There are some effective moments of drama and horror conveyed such as Tanjiro witnessing the aftermath of his family's murder and scenes where series antagonist, Muzan Kibutsuji, makes his presence felt to bring violent misery upon anyone in vicinity of him. Plus for a young male lead, Tanjiro is depicted to be competent, if a bit naive and inexperienced, in trying to get his bearings on dealing with demon threats and having to plan around the abilities of demon threats to land any killing blow on them, showing some battles to have strategy applied to them. As the demonic threats become more difficult, Tanjiro does find himself having to learn to improve his abilities as a Demon Slayer if he hopes to be up to Muzan's caliber to avenge his family. Setting aside my praises, Kimetsu no Yaiba still carries a number of the same issues that befall shounen action titles of its ilk. Ill-timed comedy is a frequent thing throughout the series, even usually clashing with more serious moments. Said comedy often involves characters getting into emotional extremes and being rather obnoxious with it, Zenitsu and Inosuke being the worst offenders of this for their larger screen presence throughout the series with the former's cowardice and the latter's impulsive and brash personality. While I do praise Tanjiro for being fairly competent in combat, his character motives are still largely pretty typical being the idealist seeing the good in everyone and not allowing his personal beliefs to falter in his quest to restore Nezuko's humanity and trying to sympathize with the personal tragedies of the demons he slays, pretty much making him pretty shallow as far as character developments go. Nezuko isn't much better off as she largely exists to pander to the audience with her cute appearance and mannerisms outside of combat situations, not having much to show as a character beyond helping out her brother in heated situations. The series also has the bad habit of exploring the tragic back story of demons just as they are about to be slain in a superficial attempt to have the audience sympathize with them, despite the fact said demons were depicted to be irredeemable villains and lacked enough fleshing out and screen time to earn said sympathy. The series also ends inconclusively just as it is about to start another story arc, though the story continues through with the Mugen Train film sequel for the TV anime and a second TV series is currently in development to further continue the series. Between its manga source material being complete and its current popularity, a full adaptation of Kimetsu no Yaiba should be quite likely to happen. In short, I'm rather indifferent on Kimetsu no Yaiba to a large degree because of having a good number of the typical flaws and frustrating elements found within a good number of action-adventure titles aimed for the shounen demographic. I'll admit I did enjoy a fair number of the aesthetic elements, action scenes, and serious moments offered with the series. But the more troublesome elements of storytelling, characterization, and comedy from shounen titles still rear their head quite often within Kimetsu no Yaiba and I'm not invested enough into the series where I'd want to dabble into later installments of the franchise. Last updated Saturday, July 10 2021. Created Saturday, July 10 2021. | ||||||||
| Unevaluated |
 Stretch
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[series:3669#628] | ||||||
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(11 episodes watched): Based on episode one and in particular the ED sequence, Tanjiro will no doubt become a fabled Demon Slayer himself. It looks like he will be part of a small team of colorful fighters, and so will the semi-rehabilitated Nezuko. The 'can Tanjiro save his sister?' question is what is unusual and intriguing here, though the ED sequence sort of gives away how successful he will be. These Demons seem to behave much like zombies, in that they must devour humans to survive and don't seem to employ any sort of magic to do so (other than a strange ability to grow larger, which is not explained here). Character designs seem fairly detailed and realistic, and the degree of realism is often directly proportional to how serious the plot of an anime will be. Nevertheless it looks like there will be a degree of comedy, just not in episode one. The story seems to be taking place in the early 20th century, based on a telegraph/electrical pole that appeared in one scene. This show did not strike me as brilliant, but it seems good enough to justify watching some more. If the team of slayers that Tanjiro joins are interesting and believable people, and the opponents they face are plausible, this might turn out to be a fun show. In episodes two and three Tanjiro undergoes the usual merciless training that transforms him from a mediocre at best swordsman to an incredibly good one who can even do physically impossible things. But this is so typical (and so difficult to suspend disbelief about) that I found myself a little bored by it. The Demon Slayers he meets don't excite me a whole lot; they seem distant and stuck-up. Nezuko is in a disturbing state of sleep that lasts for months, so there's not much character development between her and Tanjiro. He may be becoming less of a loving brother and more of a heartless professional warrior, and probably not because that was intended as a plot device. I wish we would get back to the business of hunting demons. Episode four, in which Tanjiro takes the test to become a Demon Slayer, was more fun. He takes on a hideous demon (and learns something which makes the fight personal). We learn that the impossible stuff he did in training wasn't what it seemed like, so it wasn't impossible after all. This show takes some trouble to tell a more sophisticated story than most, and while it doesn't work without a hitch the result is pleasing. Not surprisingly, Tanjiro passes the test with flying colors and is accepted as a (low ranked) Demon Slayer. We also meet some of the people who he will no doubt be teaming up with, and Nezuko finally awakens. An interesting touch was that Tanjiro (unsuccessfully) attempted to force some of the talking demons he encountered to tell him how to re-convert a demon back into an ordinary human. He tries it again while on his first assignment as a demon hunter, during which he finds that Nezuko isn't just baggage that he must carry along with him, no, she's a useful ally. I trust the series will expand on this interesting point. Tanjiro learns that a demon boss, known as Muzan, might have some connection to the slaughter of his family and/or know how to reconvert a demon into a human. It doesn't take long before Tanjiro runs into Muzan (and we learn that, yes, this show is taking place roughly around the year 1920). Not all demons are bad to the bone, and Tanjiro meets a beautiful one who is working on just the sort of remedy he needs. The problem is that she will need him to collect tissue samples by killing big time demons. I wish the fight against two of Muzan's minions had taken one episode rather than two. Their tricks--some sort of deadly dodgeballs and eyes imbedded in hands--were semi interesting but didn't justify the long, drawn out battle that followed. Exactly how Tanjiro managed to beat the latter one was unclear--some sort of colorfully named swordsmanship tactic--and therefore hard to believe. And then we are told that these were relatively minor fighters from among Muzan's small army. Didn't Tanjiro say at the end that he had broken a rib? He seemed to be back to normal in a matter of minutes. And then Zenitsu comes along. This guy is a snivelling coward who has a fingernails-on-blackboard effect as he whines and complains. Yet somehow he is a full-fledged Demon Slayer, apparently because he was just incredibly lucky during the deadly final exam. How in the world he even made it that far is beyond me--perhaps his instructors hated him so much that they wanted him to get killed, so they OK'd him for the test. Apparently this is supposed to be funny, but it definitely isn't. It was a bit odd that the series was halfway through a season before the team of Demon Slayers that we had been seeing in the OP sequence since episode one finally began to come together. What with this extremely annoying character and my feeling that Kimetsu was becoming more and more a fight-of-the-week type show, I decided not to watch the second half. Last updated Wednesday, January 01 2020. Created Wednesday, April 10 2019. | ||||||||
