![]() We learn mostly that from top to bottom they are: skittish, angry, and tranquil. We don’t get too much of their personalities over their short appearance here. We here meet the remainder of the surviving apprentices. He makes it to the summit of the mountain comparatively-uneventfully. This over, Tanjiro survives the remaining week. Tanjiro expresses sympathy–not contempt–for the creature, even knowing all it’s done. ![]() As the demon dies, garbled memories of its past life flash before its eyes. Barely five episodes into the series, and our protagonist is already a far cry from who he was at the start of episode 1. ![]() As a warrior first and foremost, but also as a person. This confrontation, which bleeds over from the end of the fourth episode into the beginning of the fifth, is evidence of his growth. Tanjiro’s character arc–well-trod as it may be–is important too. While the visual style definitely helps the show stand out, it’s not all that’s going on here. Stylistics aside, the juxtaposition underscores something important. Then, as we cut back to present, a gloryless, realistic version of the decapitation transpires. We see how his encounter with Urodaki fueled his hatred for the man. A flashback to the demon’s pre-imprisonment history on the mountain follows. It’s enough of a moment in fact, that the first section of the fifth episode is spent expanding on it. Is it shonen to a fault? Absolutely, but it’s so well executed that in the moment you don’t care. This episode’s easy highlight though is when Tanjiro beheads a monstrous demon which spent most of their fight bragging about how it ate Urodaki’s other students. It’s quite an amazing effect, and it’s enough to make one hope that it’s just a taste of what the show has in store. RELATED: The Title’s Only Half The Story In Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba A style is used when Tanjiro uses the techniques that his master taught him, his sword literally flows like a wave. The series really steps up its visual presentation here. While there are other children, the inclination of them to help each other seems slight during the fourth episode. It consists of being stranded on a dangerous, demon-infested mountain, where our boy is left to survive for a week, and make it to the summit. A process that is we might add, pretty nasty. The fourth episode thus chiefly revolves about Tanjiro surviving the selection process. In multiple ways, this is the most vulnerable Tanjiro has ever been as a character. He no longer has his mentor to rely on martially, or his co-protagonist to rely on narratively. ![]() It’s a great setup for the show’s first serious arc that has Tanjro standing on his feet as both a competent combatant and a protagonist unto himself. The last screening process for aspiring demon slayers. The term used in-universe is “Final Selection”. The fourth episode is where things begin to really pick up. Training episodes of this sort are rarely particularly interesting, so it’s good Demon Slayer really only spent time on one. Tanjiro training to become a titular demon slayer and eventually succeeding at cutting the boulder in twain. She fell into a coma at the start of the third episode, only waking up at the end of the arc. This also had the unfortunate side effect of sidelining the female lead in a very immediate way. Indeed, between them and his late family, Tanjiro is quite the haunted lad. Said characters have since become spirit advisers of a sort. Breathing exercises, an ostensibly impossible task (cutting a large boulder in two), some spiel about the scent of his opponents creating a “spirit thread”, and even Tanjiro meeting and fighting what we shortly thereafter found out were ghost children. This involved all the usual techniques associated with this sort of thing in anime. He’s helped by the mysterious, Tengu-masked Urodaki, who became his mentor. ![]() The third episode of the show focused largely on Tanjiro becoming a competent swordsman. Demon Slayer wisely decided to not spend too much time on training montages, mostly relegating them to a single episode. Demons & Ghostsīefore we get to that though, we should recap where the show’s been since then. Something that’s managed to help it stick out, and carry the weight for visually-innovative anime in a somewhat dry season. The series has gone through an important change since its premiere. To say that Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba is “developing nicely” would be an understatement. NOTE: This article contains mention and screencaps of potentially disturbing content due to the nature of the series in question. ![]()
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