Welcome back everyone to a special double feature of Kimetsu no Yaiba! Apologies for missing last week, I caught the Covid and surprise surprise, it fucks you up pretty bad. I’m back now though, feeling fine and ready to talk about some demons! So without further ado lets dive in.
Starting off like we usually do, lets talk visuals. This should come as no surprise but, by and large, Kimetsu no Yaiba still looks good! The entertainment district still makes great use of Yaiba’s lighting and bright colors. Sure the CGI can still be off in a few places, mostly the wide shots with full-body models. But for every shitty one of those we get a first person sequence through a house, so its cool. The only real complaint I have is with last weeks episode which felt like it cut a tad to much. We were switching scenes all over the place, constantly cutting between characters and shifting the tension. Yaiba had to tell 3 different character experiences, I get that. But maybe just… let them linger a bit longer rather than constantly jumping, yeah? Otherwise though, looked good!
Getting into the episodes proper lets start with last week, episode 10 “What Are You?”. This episode was largely setup for our demon, Warabihime, and I think it succeeded. Yaiba did a good job of balancing our crew finding the demon while showing us how she got here in the first place. For instance I like that Yaiba addressed the whole “Immortal Oiran” thing. Multiple Oiran’s that look, act, and are named similarly across decades don’t just… happen. It makes sense that people would notice these things and that, in turn, Warabihime would deal with them. Not just that, it makes sense some would just… follow along either to save their own lives or just make some money. Involving normal people like this, it adds another dimension to the usual Slayer vs Demon conflict.
As for the rest of our team, well, their experiences varied. Tanjiro had a pretty chill time! Dude ran around, cleaned shit and haunts the nightmares of his house matron with his oppressive “Let me help” energy. For the most part it feels like his section of the episode is just… setting up some loveable human fodder to die in the upcoming big demon battle. Hopefully that’s not the case! But I think it is. Meanwhile Inosuke is running through the house like a madman trying to track down Warabihime. I found this to be a generally good time. Inosuke usually leads to some fun physical comedy, such as his stretching or punching a customer, and his complete lack of social grace is on full display in the entertainment district. He also gave us a small taste of what Warabihime is capable leading into the second half.
Zenitsu meanwhile has, easily, the worst time of the three. Not in a “Zenitsu is a bad character” way, I mean he literally gets his ass kicked in a direct confrontation with Warabihime. And you know what? I like it. I like that Zenitsu’s attitude came back to bite him and that to fulfill that characteristic he had to act outside of his own best interests. This was a situation where the only way to avoid conflict was to not be Zenitsu. And I think that’s typically the best way to give a character conflict. To give them challenges where they have to either betray or reinforce core aspects of their character.
This brings me to Warabihime herself. I’ve said before that the most interesting part of a demon is their relationship to Muzan and that holds true here as well. We see how Muzan is, once again, playing the predator. Appealing to Warabihime’s beauty, vanity and seeming feelings for him. Now obviously this isn’t a healthy relationship. Once again we have a demon doing everything they can for just a shred of Muzan’s approval. And though there isn’t much beyond that just yet my hope is that Yaiba will, as the fight kicks off, shed more like on her past and how she got to be the demon she is today.
Next up we have this weeks episode “Tonight”. This one finally kicks off the fight proper, with Tanjiro confronting Warabihime, AKA Daki, as she kidnaps an Oiran. On the kidnapping front there isn’t much to say. I was right about what was going to happen with the normal humans that have been built up, this isn’t to surprising. Meanwhile on the Tanjiro side it’s cool to see how he handles a fight he clearly isn’t prepared for. Yaiba did a decent job of showing just how out matched he is while still letting Tanjiro get a win in there via cutting off the cloth. I’m looking forward to where this fight goes and how long he manages to hold out before Inosuke and Uzui inevitably show up to save his ass.
Speaking of Uzui, this week was good for him. It was only one scene but seeing the introspection on his part, the admittance of fault, did a lot for his character. He knows dragging people here was a bad idea. He knows how big of a risk it was and how much danger these people are in. But he did it anyways because he’s concerned for his wives. In a single scene Uzui goes from being a womanizing, arrogant, comic relief Hashira to someone who might actually deserve to stand next to Rengoku. Hopefully, just like Daki, as the season goes on we will get more and more glimpses of this side of his personality.
And with that we have basically covered the whole episode, not a lot happened outside of gags and Uzui. But thats only because a good chunk of the episode was taken up with what I think is just… a horrifically out of place conversation: The rankings. Lets be honest. Who here actually cares about the rankings? And for those that do, do you honestly think this was the best time to bring it up? To explain about a magic hand tattoo while on top of a building wondering what happened to their friend? It just… it feels so wildly out of place. Like a justification for them being stronger and able to hold their own this time when we really don’t need it because we’ve watched them get stronger. I think this is just one of the trappings of the Shounen genre sadly, and one Yaiba failed to avoid.
Anyways that aside I think that these two episodes were pretty good. Turns out when Yaiba isn’t rehashing a movie as a 6 episode TV arc, it’s actually a good time! My hope moving forward is that Daki and Uzui continue to get fleshed out and that we get a bomb-ass fight scene. One of those is all but guaranteed to happen, we all know how Yaiba works. The other one is what will decide if this season will just be a “Good time” or become “Legitimately good”. For now though we will have to wait until 2022 for the answer. So I hope you all had a merry Christmas and I’ll see you in the new year!
I think you misunderstand the ranking scene. Like it was a joke, the joke is that no one actually care about the ranking and Tanjirou’s bewilderment regarding Inosuke sudden burst of knowledge. The joke here is who is delivering these exposition to who. Also i pretty sure the ranking is just their position in the Corp and not actual power level.
If it was a joke, it was a joke that went on way to long.
As for it being a position, eh? I don’t really agree. Rankings like this are typically used to communicate a rough power ranking. Its why the Hashira are at the top and are also the strongest.
Clearly our MCs are outside of that, they are MCs. Its like Naruto still being a Genin in Shippuden despite being WAAAAAAAY above that. But just like in Naruto, thats when the ranking system starts to be irrelevant and not something really worth wasting time on if you catch my drift.